S2 E3 – Cipher

The first part of this season we will see a lot of scenes where Sydney is running thru the park on her way to the covert entry of the CIA command center.  I’m not sure that it is said every time that she is coming in that way, but I love how when they recognize that she is requesting entry, an agent says that he will contact Agent Vaughn.   I don’t know how far in the tunnel system he goes to meet with her, but it is nice to know that he does go to meet her when she enters the building.

On that note, Sydney has come to the command center to tell Kendall that even though they got the camera last week, it was only a prototype.  They continue to discuss what SD-6 has planned and what they will do, however Kendall wants Sydney to go to her mother and get more info on it.  Sydney is very quick to tell Kendall to stop referring to Irina as her mother. As well as telling him that she spoke to her mother last time because it was necessary, she does not intend to make it a habit.  Kendall then tells Vaughn that he assumes that he has an opinion on the matter.  Vaughn plays this very diplomatically I think.  He tells Kendall that he doesn’t have an easy answer, but Kendall will take the complicated one.  For to paraphrase what is said is a little hard, so I’ll place in the quote, because I think Vaughn is very careful about his words now.  He knows that Kendall is manipulative enough to use his words against him, and also he wants to make sure that Sydney knows that he is on her side, always. “I can’t pretend to hide my bias here; Irina Derevko betrayed this country and killed my father in the process. On the other hand she is a certifiable Rambaldi expert and probably knows more about the inner workings of global organized crime than any other person in US custody. Having said that, I believe Agent Bristow and I were effectively countering SD-6 before Derevko turned herself in, and I stand behind whatever she decides.”  Upon hearing Vaughn speech to Kendall Sydney is very appreciative, you could see that she was going to get upset, when he was towing the company line, but she was definitely happy with how he defended her and their work together.  Kendall than made his final play, telling her that the sooner they know what she knows, the soon Sydney won’t have to see her ever again; which definitely gets Sydney thinking.

After discussing Sydney’s counter mission, Vaughn changes the subject and lets Sydney know that they want to talk to Will again.  Sydney is curious as to why they would need him. Apparently when Will was on his way to Taipei he was in and out of consciousness, and the CIA believes that with some regression therapy, he may be able to remember seeing Sark working on his computer.  Vaughn tells Sydney that if there was a way to do this without Will to access some of the information that they need, they would avoid bringing Will on, but they need him.

Sydney goes home and tells Will that the CIA wants to meet with him again, she gives him his SOP, standard operating procedure, so he will know how to get in contact with them, and then she tells him that he will be meeting with her handler, he asks if it’s Vaughn.  She tells Will that Vaughn is smart, professional, and that he won’t waste his time.  Sydney also tells him that he deserves to move on, but before she can finish Francie walks in and they end their conversation.

So I have to admit that even though Sydney is not in this scene, I get a huge grin whenever I even think of the first time Will meets Vaughn.  I love Will, and in the beginning I thought that Will would be a good match for Sydney, but then I met Vaughn and immediately changed my mind.  But Will is so in love with Sydney and the jealousy upon seeing that Vaughn is not an older agent kinda gets him down.  The moment when Will walks into the elevator and realizes that this other good looking man is Vaughn and eyes him up and down and then says, “So you’re Vaughn.”   You can tell immediately that he now knows why Sydney was so intent on going back to find him in Taipei.   Vaughn is quite happy though, he knows that this is Sydney’s best friend who she is now at liberty to talk to about her life and the fact that Will knows his name makes him smile. Then later when Will tells him that he has to help a friend get ready for her restaurant opening and Vaughn knows that it is Francie, it throws Will off a little.  Will is not thrilled that Vaughn knows so much about Sydney and her friends; he probably wonders what Vaughn knows about him.  Vaughn tells Will how they will contact him tomorrow, and Will suddenly realized that every time that Sydney would get a call that was a wrong number that she was on her way to see Vaughn and something clicked in his head.  Was there some times when she was overly excited to leave or something else that we didn’t see?  Vaughn tells him yes, that she was going to meet with him and why they do it that way.  Then Will asks about the picture frame, remembering when she opened the present. Will assumed that it must have been just another way to contact her, but Vaughn tells him that it was just a gift form him to her.  They say their goodbyes and part ways, but as they leave, I think that Will has realized that even though he’s closer with Sydney than ever now that he knows about her secret life, he has some big competition.  Vaughn isn’t completely confident, but seeing how jealous Will was, definitely lifted his spirits.

Will is back at the CIA in the medical area hooked up to all kinds of machines so that they can perform the memory regression on him to see if they can find out if Will did see anything while with Sark.  While Will is under he admits to being afraid that they are going kill him and get to Sydney.  The hypnotist reminds him that everything he sees has already happened, and that he doesn’t need to be afraid.  Sydney and Vaughn watch him from the room with the hypnotist.  From what I can see, Vaughn is concerned about Will, but he is more concerned about the way that Sydney is looking at Will.  Vaughn tells the hypnotist about Will debrief mentioning being carried out of the plane and wonders if he saw anything when he exited the plane. The Hypnotist takes this path and directs him to remember leaving the plane, but Will gets scared and Sydney sees something that in his demeanor in the present that causes her to be alarmed and tells the hypnotist to wake him. Sydney is assured that he is alright.  They are able to get him to read Sark’s computer as he is leaving the plane in his memory.  Once he reads off what is on the computer they wake him up.  When he wakes up, he is very happy to see Sydney watching him from the other room.  Vaughn and Sydney discuss why Sark was typing out the names of Russian authors, and decide that it must be a Cipher text.  Vaughn tells Sydney that he doesn’t like mentioning it, but with the time frame that they have, her mother may be the only way they could decipher the text before she leaves.   Sydney agrees, and then Vaughn tells her what the counter mission will be.  Right then Sydney is called into the room with Will, so she leaves Vaughn to be with Will and comfort him after what he just went through.  We see a little of Sydney holding on to Will’s arm and them just being close.  But then the camera turns to Vaughn, and I love the way the way that they shot this scene.  Because as we watch Vaughn watching Sydney and Will, and you can tell that he is jealous and he knows that he shouldn’t be.  But we can see the reflection of Sydney and Will in the window.  Personally it shows me the relationship that Vaughn wants to have with Sydney, he wants to be that person that she is concerned for, and rushes to his side.  Then I think that Vaughn even has a moment of guilt for being jealous and has possibly decided that he can’t just wait around for her since they can’t even be seen together in public, he may need to move on. – Trust me this is not a response that I like, but it makes sense that this could be the moment that leads to some future moments.

Sydney is on her mission in Siberia, and it is cold.  Dixon reminds her to stay sharp and watch her step, because if the ice breaks, it only takes four seconds for the ice to reform.  Sydney makes her way into an ice cave and sees the music box that they are after.  She tells Dixon that the ground is a little shaky, so she is going to go radio silent, but really she will need to transmit the music from the box to the CIA.  She contacts base ops/Vaughn to let him know that she has the music box and that she is getting ready to transmit.  While this is happening Dixon is getting a reading of other people making their way towards them, he tries calling to Sydney, but she is radio silent.  The other two agents that Sydney and Dixon brought along were killed from underneath.   Sydney asks for verification that they got the recording before she destroys the music box.  Vaughn tells her that they got it, and she sprays something on the box to disintegrate it.  Once she goes off radio silent, she hears Dixon yelling, and she asks him what is happening.  She finds out that Sark is here, she turns around and he is behind her.  Sark forces her to hand over the box and they chat a little, bitterly for Sydney.  Once she can, she throws an ice pick at Sark and it goes into his leg, and he starts shooting all over, including the ice below him.  Sydney tries to escape and go for the music box, but ends up falling thru the ice, she swims back to the surface, but the ice has already formed.