S3 E21 - Legacy

Before going into details, this episode is a fairly big one for Sydney and Vaughn.  But unfortunately it’s not exactly the most positive for their relationship.  I will go into more details during each scene, but this episode is crucial to the deleted scene from the last episode, because there are some aspects that really don’t make much sense in this episode without that knowledge. https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=dXjRA_sJ0ek

Also you have to infer a few things about the aftermath of the scene as well, for instance I have to guess that Sydney did tell Vaughn what Lauren did to him and he may have gone into detail about what he may or may not have disclosed.  I don’t know, as that portion is never revealed.  But it is evident that they have discussed it, and it has affected both of them heavily.  I would have to say that Vaughn is probably more affected by the revelation though.  I know that a huge part of the episode is trying to rescue Nadia and what her experience is, but honestly, this portion somewhat bores me and I am going to try and stick to just Sydney and Vaughn tonight.

The first interaction that Sydney and Vaughn have starts out really nice actually.  Vaughn is walking through the Rotunda obviously looking for Sydney.  He sees her before she sees him, and it’s only there for a small moment, but that impish grin that he gets when he is happy to see Sydney reappears.   I have really missed that smile; it brought me back to the days before SD-6 went down when he would light up just with her appearance.  But he walks over to her and she finishes her phone call.  Her first reaction to seeing him is concern.  She wonders what he is doing there, since she had thought that he was supposed to stay in the hospital for a few more days.  But he tells her that he checked himself out early.  She wonders if they wanted to keep him for observation for a few days, but he tells her that he is fine.  You can tell that she really is concerned for his well-being, but I think that she sees something else there.  I think she wonders if he really is ready to be back and function at the level that he needs to with what has happened to him not only physically, but mentally.  He can see the worry in her eyes and tries to change the subject to what is really on his mind.  He tells her; “Look, whatever Lauren did to me, I want you to know that I take full responsibility for what’s happened.  I messed up. And if you can’t get past that, I understand. But will you try?”   She tells him that she doesn’t know and you can see that even though she loves him, and still considers him her soul mate, she has also become a little bitter against Vaughn.  After hearing her reply, Vaughn is a little crestfallen, as you would expect after an admission like that.  But he goes on to tell her; “Will you at least think about it? Because it’s all I can think about.” As he asks her to think about it, he eyes look up and see Dixon behind him, and she simply tells him that she will think about it.  Dixon talks to them for a moment then leaves.  Sydney and Vaughn share  a glance, Vaughn looks at Sydney hopefully, but she quickly adverts her eyes away from him and walks away leaving Vaughn to follow her, but looking heartbroken.

This is a scene that plays into the deleted scene.  I remember seeing it for the first few times and having no idea what they are talking about, and wondering why Sydney is so upset with him.  I just thought that their last interaction didn’t go badly; in fact it went pretty well.  They held hands, and Vaughn showed her how even though he had almost been tortured to death, his main concern in the hospital was about her and her involvement with the Passenger because of the Prophecy. There is one website that I often look to when I am preparing myself to start a new episode and their captions for scenes can give you a whole new perspective on the episode, but the website is TwoEvilMonks.org.  They have gone through and have screen shots for almost every scene with captions for every episode until season 5.  But when I read the comment under this scene, I had to laugh, and thought I would share. I have the screen shot from the website below.

So I think overall everyone may have been a bit confused over that scene initially.  But it is with this attitude that Sydney and Vaughn go into the episode with.  Vaughn desperately wants to regain Sydney’s approval as well as fix anything that Lauren may have done.  Sydney is broken with how she feels towards Vaughn.  She wants to be with him and knows that they finally have a chance now, but is clearly hesitant after how many times Vaughn has gone back to Lauren this season.  She wants to believe that it can work, but she has been hurt too much and is just overall confused about her own feelings.

In the conference room a briefing is being held with Sydney, Vaughn, Dixon, Jack and Weiss.  They discuss Sloane’s latest maneuvers and how they may be able to go to a facility and place a tracker on the Rambaldi fluid that Sloane needs more of so he can continue to get the Rambaldi end game from Nadia.  Dixon tells Sydney and Vaughn that they will go on that mission together and see what they can get.  After getting the instructions for the mission, Vaughn wants to know where they stand in finding Lauren.  Weiss tells Vaughn that FBI counterintelligence is going over all of her info and is handling the case.  Vaughn questions whether the CIA field office are also involved,  as well as seeing if they can re-task  some of the Echelon satellites.  Vaughn knows that his job is to help Sydney find and rescue Nadia with Sydney, but he has a high stake in finding out where Lauren is and wants to make sure that she is brought to justice.   Dixon reminds Vaughn that they are doing all that they can, but the priority in their office is Sloane.  This is not what Vaughn wants to hear, but doesn’t protest, at least for now.  He only shakes his head frustrated.  Jack looks at Vaughn, and knows what he is going through.  Jack doesn’t say anything, but you can see that Jack is thinking of how he can help Vaughn, because his look is full of concern.

When Sydney and Vaughn arrive at the facility where Sloane had sent someone in to retrieve the fluid, they arrive to find that the guards have already been taken out.  Sydney and Vaughn had been carrying tranquilizer guns, but upon realizing that Sloane had beat them there, Vaughn puts away his tranq gun and picks up the rifle that the guard was using.  They get into the facility and find that all of the fluid has been taken, so they can’t place a tracker on anything to track back to Sloane.  But they had a secondary protocol to get any data that they can from the facility, since it was originally used by the Russians as a Rambaldi research facility.  Once again Sydney and Vaughn prove that while they may have personal issues that need to be resolved, as a team in the field, they make perfect partners and are very effective together.  While Vaughn is working on uploading the files to Marshall, Sydney comes up behind him and gets closer to him than she would’ve been over the last year.  Even if she is trying to be a little cold toward Vaughn and not let her true feelings out, her subconscious is proving that hard to do.  In the video they see that Nadia was held there for a time and the Rambaldi was used on her there.  Sydney walks over to the room where Nadia was tortured with the fluid when Marshall warns them that they triggered a silent alarm.  And the Russian guards walk in followed by Katya Derevko, only Sydney and Vaughn don’t know that she was the one who saved them in North Korea.

As the scene reopens, Katya looks at Sydney and calls her by name which shocks Sydney to say the least.  Vaughn is also a little confused as she orders some of the guards to secure the perimter then takes his tranq gun and proceeds to shoot some of her own men with it.  She then tells Sydney and Vaughn to take their uniforms.  Before she does this however, you can see Vaughn looking back and forth between Katya, and Sydney.  From the looks he has, I can guess that he is trying to determine how to protect Sydney and whether he could take out Katya if needed.  Unfortunately this is only in the background so you can’t see it that well.  But once again I give props to Michael Vartan and his fantastic acting skills when he only gets to work with facial expressions.   Sydney finally asks the question of who she is.  Katya tells her that she is Sydney’s mother’s sister.  With hearing this Sydney realizes that it must be Katya, who Jack told her helped them out of North Korea, so Sydney and Vaughn become much more willing to trust her as she helps them get out of the facility.  While not much happens with the mission, concerning the relationship aspect, we do see them going back to their instincts, as well as seeing a few other things going for them.  One that they can work together better than any other partnership, two that Vaughn will always be looking for ways to protect Sydney, and third that even though Sydney thinks she wants nothing to do with him romantically, right now because of Lauren, she still craves being close to Vaughn and subconsciously moves closer to him when her that guard is let down.

The scene that immediately follows them getting out of the compound, is one of the few favorites of mine that doesn’t involve Sydney or Vaughn.  The scene is between Nadia and Sloane in Kyoto, and I won’t go into it too far, but I love how Nadia essentially tells Sloane that she thinks him to be a terrible father and she wishes that he wasn’t hers.   It is a great Nadia moment; especially after hearing that knowing he had a daughter is supposedly what reformed Sloane.

In general we know that both Sydney and Vaughn are frustrated when finding that a mission didn’t produce the results that they would have liked.  This mission to the facility that held the Rambaldi fluid is no different.  Yes they were able to get a sample of the fluid and gain access to the computer files that held video, but they didn’t achieve their ultimate goal of tracking the liquid so it could lead them to Sloane.   But they are both frustrated, but Sydney seems to take it with a grain of salt and can go about the next portion of the mission as planned.  But not being able to track Sloane upsets Vaughn more than usual.   

We’ve never really seen Vaughn get aggravated over a mission, he has always been such a rock emotionally overall.   We have seen him get mad and protective over Sydney and even Lauren at one point.  But we are now seeing Vaughn’s transformation.  He’s never been overly vengeful; he even found a way to work with Irina knowing that she killed his father, even if he never fully trusted her and always held his suspicions.  But the last three years have changed him, he first had to bury Sydney and deal with the grief of losing her, then working through the process of attempting to move on with Lauren.  He was finally at a relatively good point of functioning without Sydney when he gets the call that she is alive and is asked to go get her, while having Sydney back definitely made him happy, it also put him in a tough spot. He never stopped loving Sydney, but he did love Lauren as well, just in a different way, and we’ve watched him struggle with that dilemma throughout the season.  Now he has learned that this woman, who he trusted, who he found a reprieve from his grief with has betrayed him and was using him the whole time.  Vaughn has almost reached his breaking point.  He knows the politics of the office and he knows that his teams’ assignment is to find and capture Sloane as well as recover Nadia.  I think that in Vaughn’s mind he has the thought that once they find Sloane and Nadia, they will be able to go after Lauren, and while right now he hasn’t reached the point of truly wanting her dead, he does want her to pay for what she did to him, as well as what she has done to Sydney. 

After getting away from the facility where the Rambaldi fluid was kept; Sydney, Vaughn, and Katya go to a safe house in St. Petersburg.  The first thing we see is Vaughn on the phone with Weiss, telling him that Katya saw Lauren and Sark on the surveillance feed where they took a canister of the Rambaldi fluid.  This just frustrates Vaughn, knowing that they must have just missed them, and not just being able to track the liquid back to Sloane.  Vaughn tells Weiss that they need to re-task the satellites.  Weiss replies, but Vaughn doesn’t want to hear what he is being told, he quickly tells Weiss that he understands, but he wants them found.  Another moment passes where Weiss is talking, and Weiss is not helping Vaughns frustration, Vaughn walks out the room almost yelling; “That’s not good enough, Weiss!” 

A small side note, I always knew that Vaughn was voicing his frustrations her to Weiss, but until this episode I didn’t realize how much he knew about Lauren here.  I don’t know how I missed it, but this was the first time I heard him telling Weiss that Katya saw Lauren and Sark on the surveillance feed.   So this new knowledge of how close they were to finding Lauren only adds another level to the rage that is building up in Vaughn.    

While Vaughn is talking to Weiss Sydney is talking to Katya about Nadia and trying to decide how much to tell Katya about what she knows.  Sydney asks why Nadia is so important if she had already completed Rambaldi’s message that they saw in the video tapes.  Katya tells her that Nadia was taken before she finished the message.  Vaughn walks in at this point and tells Katya that it was his father that took her away to protect her.  Katya doesn’t like the implications that Vaughn is going towards, but Vaughns asks her why she is so interested in finding her long lost niece.   One thing that is important to note about Vaughn here is that he is staying professional and is actually very calm when he is in the room with Katya and Sydney.  He is still has control over his rage.  Katya tells them that she understands their hesitations, but reminds them what she has risked to help them as well as why she is now back on the track looking for Nadia.  After hearing this information, and knowing that the knowledge of finding out that Sloane is Nadia’s father was the driving force behind Katya’s search for Nadia, leads Sydney to tell Nadia that Sloane does in fact have Nadia at the moment.

Upon returning to LA, Marshall has examined the sample of the fluid that Sydney brought back and is telling the taskforce about the fluid and what it can do.  As Marshall is explaining it, the group is watching the video feed that they brought back with Nadia as a child being injected by an unknown doctor and beginning to write out the formula.  While concerned about the side effects that the fluid has, Sydney and Vaughn are also curious about the doctor.  They get the idea that if they can find the doctor maybe he can lead them to Sloane.  After Vaughn voicing how he wishes they could see the doctors face, Sydney sees a reflection in a glass case, and asks Marshall to zoom in on it and enhance it.  After enhance the picture, both Sydney and Marshall have looks of horror on their face, as they realize that it is Suit and Glasses man that tortured both of them as well as Will.

Now knowing who the doctor is, they reassemble in the conference room, they find out the doctors name, Suit and Glasses man is actually Dr. Zhang Lee.   He was the lead researcher for the experiments on Nadia, and he has recently met with Sloane in Zurich, they believe that it was to help Sloane procure the fluid.  After the initial information is given, Vaughn once again asks what is happening in tracking Lauren and Sark.  Dixon tells him that they don’t believe that they have any connection to Dr. Lee.  Which only upsets Vaughn again, he tries to stay calm, but is having a hard time doing it. He goes on about the satellites and how they should’ve been tasked to follow her.  I think he has seen exactly how evil she is and that she is may be the key to everything that they are looking for.  Because now that he has separated himself from her and is starting to look at the whole picture of their relationship, he can see where he was manipulated, and that she had an endgame the whole time.  After a small argument between Vaughn and Weiss about the satellites, Dixon interrupts them and tells them that this is not the time.  Vaughn stops his arguments, but isn’t happy that he is being dismissed again, and that they still won’t be going after Lauren.  From across the table Jack looks at Vaughn, he doesn’t say anything, but you can tell that Jack can sympathize very well with Vaughn in this moment.  Sydney breaks the tension in the room by asking where Dr. Lee is now.  Dixon tells her that he is in a research facility in Cuba, and that she and Vaughn will head there to question him about the Rambaldi experiments and where to find Sloane. 

After the briefing, Vaughn is quick to get out of there, Jack quickly follows.  In the hallway, Vaughn looks very determined to get out of the building and release some of his pent up anger, but Jack stops him and asks him if he has a minute.  Vaughn turns around and temporarily stores away his rage to talk to Jack.  Vaughn doesn’t see the concern on Jack’s face, but it is there, Jack tells Vaughn; “I know why you checked yourself out of medical services early. I know you’re under the impression you’re fine, that all you need to do is hold yourself together and bury yourself in work.”  This is not the conversation that Vaughn is in the mood to have right now though, and he tells Jack to get to the point rather impatiently.  So Jack goes on saying; “My point is, your rage is seething under the surface. I know because I’ve been there, and I promise you if you don’t resolve this as quickly and expediently as you can it will spill over into every aspect of your life, including your professional and personal relationship with my daughter, and I do not want you endangering her.”  Watching Vaughns face while Jack is talking I am reminded of the speech that jack gave him just a few episode ago, in Unveiled S3 E19, he is polite, but he wants to Jack a piece of his mind once he has to chance to speak.   Vaughn sees a break and tell Jack; “I am doing my job the best I can. Do you have a better suggestion?”  This last part almost seemed like an afterthought to Vaughn.  I think that Vaughn is finally realizing that he is more like Jack than he would like, but has reached the point where accepting advice from Jack on the issue may actually be helpful to him.  Jack tells him; “I suggest you focus your energy onto achieving closure on this matter.”  Before Jack can go on, Vaughn interrupts him saying; “No one wants Lauren in custody more than I do.”  Jack then tells him; “That’s not the kind of closure I’m referring to.”  Jack then reaches into his jacket pocket and hands Vaughn a key.  Vaughn asks him what it is, and Jack tells him; “It’s the key to my storage facility, you’ve been there before. In it you’ll find false identification, unmarked and untraceable weapons, contact sheets, as well as disposal facilities capable of dealing with her remains.”   This suggestion of Vaughn killing Lauren does not please Vaughn.  He tells Jack; “That might be your way of dealing with things. It’s not mine.”  Vaughn looks like he has to use every ounce of energy he has to hold in his anger at this point, and Jack can see it.  So when Vaughn tries to hand the key back to Jack, Jack tells him to keep it and walks away.  Vaughn watches Jack walk away and at first I think that the anger in his eyes is at Jack, but then it starts to look more contemplative and makes me think that Vaughn is starting to think that Jack may be right.

**** SPOILERS AND A LOT OF SPECUALTION*** Next paragraph only

On a completely different note it is at this point that I have to wonder if Jack has already used the equipment from his storage facility, to kill Irina.  We know that the last time that Jack was speaking to Irina was two episodes ago in Hourglass S3 E19, while Lauren was known to be a traitor, but not taken in yet.  I have to think that Jack found out about the hit on Sydney ordered by Irina happened sometime between saving Sloane from his execution and when he, Sloane and Sydney went on the journey to find Nadia.  That is the only explanation I can think of for how Lauren could’ve known where to tell Sydney to look.  From her contacts at the Covenant, she would’ve known that Jack didn’t really kill Irina, but a helix formed double of Irina.  Then still being active with the NSC she would’ve had access to find out where the classified documents were being held.  So there is my theory for the cliffhanger at the end of the season.

In Cuba, Sydney tricks the bodyguards into helping her and distracts them long enough for Vaughn to be able to shoot them with the tranq gun.  They both run out of the water and towards the house that is being used as a lab for Dr. Lee.  I assume that they change once they get in, because Sydney is more covered up next time we see her and Vaughn isn’t wearing a wetsuit.  We also see Dr. Lee experimenting with a substance that he drew out of a fish.  As he takes the fluid from the fish and puts it into a container filled with another substance you can hear it sizzle and steam rises out of it.  He hears the floor crack and he shouts back that he told them no disturbances and continues on with his work.  Sydney comes up behind him and tells him, “I’m sure you can make an exception for an old friend.”  Then she proceeds to knock him out by hitting him on the head with the butt of her gun.

Once Dr. Lee has been knocked out, Sydney and Vaughn tie him up in his wheelchair (courtesy of Will’s revenge telling him 1 in 5.)  Sydney then wakes him up and says; “Remember me from Taipei? Red Hair. You liked my teeth.”  She then starts talking about the experiments that he conducted on Nadia.  But we then see Vaughn and although he knows that this doctor tortured Sydney (and her friends) at some point, seeing her talking to him and hearing about the torture sparks something in him again.  Nothing is said so I can’t really confirm this, but by the look on his face, he becomes even madder than he has been.  So on top of his already mounting rage, he is face to face with someone who has tortured Sydney and you can see that he is done letting anyone hurt Sydney, and he is ready to hurt them as much as they have hurt her, if not more.  Just that one look tells me that the transformation from being the cool and collected CIA agent to the CIA agent that will do anything needed to get the results he wants.

As Sydney is questioning Dr. Lee about what will be found when they get to the site that the Rambaldi equation that Nadia is drawing out when under the influence of the Rambaldi fluid.  Vaughn has had enough since Dr. Lee isn’t sufficiently answering Sydney’s questions.  He asked Dr. Lee where Sloane is, and Dr. Lee tells him that he has no idea.   Vaughn then decides to prove to the doctor exactly how far he is willing to go to get the answers he wants.  He takes a dropper and extracts some of the liquid that Dr. Lee was experimenting with and drops some on to Dr. Lee’s paralyzed leg.  The liquid is some form of acid and it has burned through his pants and is burning the skin underneath.  Vaughn looks at him and tells him; “Now I know that you can’t feel that, but you can see it, and you can imagine what it’s going to feel like when I pour the rest of this on you.”  Sydney knows that this type of interrogation is not Vaughn’s style and now realizes how full of rage Vaughn really is.  She looks at him concerned and says his name to stop him.  But he doesn’t respond to her.  We then see the acid dripping down and burning through the metal of the wheelchair.  Vaughn continues to interrogate Dr. Lee in this way with Dr. Lee insisting that he only met with Sloane for charity.  Sydney continues to plead with Vaughn to stop telling him that he can’t do this.  At that remark Vaughn asks Sydney; “Why not? He would.” Then Vaughn continues to question him.  Vaughn asks him a few more questions, none of them receiving the answers he was looking for, and then finally tells the doctor, “Wrong answer.”  And then proceeds to pour the acid onto Dr. Lee, presumably killing him.  Sydney watches in horror and then looks at Vaughn wondering what has happened to him.

Watching this scene happen I am drawn back to the scene in season two right after Dixon’s wife was killed and Dixon interrogates a man, also trying to get information about Sloane has done.  Sydney sat back and had to watch that go down as well.  There she had to try and stop Dixon from completely killing the man as well.  It’s hard not to draw a parallel with these two scenes.  In both Sydney feels that both men should be allowed to keep working even if their mental state may be fractured, due to recent events concerning their wives and what Sloane has done.  Both men mean a great deal to her and it is hard to watch as they suffer, but when they see an opportunity to seek revenge on someone who isn’t completely responsible, she has to try and stop them from turning into someone that they aren’t.   Since much of Dixon’s recovery was done during the two years that Sydney was missing, and he has mostly recovered from losing his wife by the time we come back.  We will see the continued pressure of Vaughn losing his wife as we end this season and go into the next. 

In the plane on their way home from Cuba, Vaughn tells Sydney that he just spoke with Dixon and that Jack and Katya may have found a lead as to where to find Sloane from Toni Cummings and that they may have his location by the time they get back.  But Sydney has other things on her mind; you can see something been eating away at her.  She tells Vaughn; “What you did to Dr. Lee was unacceptable.”  You can tell that it’s hard for her to say this to Vaughn, but she has to say it.  After saying it she immediately looks away from him again.  I don’t think that she wants to argue, but she knows that it probably will, and with his current state, I think she is afraid of what may happen.  Vaughn is upset with her comment, but stays fairly calm and tells her; “You wouldn’t say that if I had gotten something out of him.”  But this comment doesn’t help his situation, she looks right at him now and tells him; “What he knew or didn’t know is beside the point.”  You can see that Vaughn doesn’t want to argue either, in his head he got revenge on someone that hurt the person he loves most in the world, and he would do anything to get her back and make her happy.  But even with that, he isn’t going to back down yet and responds by telling her; “Exactly. The point is, we’re trying to find your sister.”  Sydney is getting really upset and begins to almost shout, saying; “And if you had gotten the answer, it still wouldn’t have been okay.”  Vaughn responds with a matching tone, but is trying to get her to understand that he did it for her saying, “Sloane has her. Wouldn’t you do anything to get her back?”  Sydney still doesn’t understand exactly why he did what he did and tells him that he knew they had other options.  Hearing this frustrates Vaughn, so he tells her what I believe to be his main motivation behind such a brutal interrogation, in a tone similar to begging her tells her; “Sydney, the man tortured you, he tortured Marshall, and he tortured your sister.”  Personally I think he left out Will, because he doesn’t want her thinking about Will when he is finally able to start something with her again.  After hearing what Vaughn’s true reasoning was, or at least what I believe it to be, she tells him her true concern as well saying; “This isn’t about him. This is about you, and what I saw scared me.”  Vaughn then understands her pleading; he realizes that his rage may have gone too far, and that he may have exacted his revenge on the wrong person.  He looks up at Sydney and realizes that she is more concerned with him than anything else, and even though he is upset, a little bit of hope enters into him again. He then nods his head slightly, and finally responds; “ Yeah… Well… It scared me, too… “  He looks a Sydney for a moment longer, then looks away for a moment or two before going on, much calmer than before, confessing; “What I’m willing to do to find her. When I was with Dr. Lee, all I could think about was, If we get to Sloane, we’ll get to her.” Taking into consideration the other things he has said and done, I have to still believe that part of his thinking whether it was consciously or not, was getting revenge on the man who hurt Sydney, even if he has said otherwise in this moment.  But he does pause for a moment before going on to tell Sydney; “Now I want to find your sister, but I need to find my wife. Lauren cannot be allowed to get away with what she’s done.”   I think that Sydney is happy to learn the truth behind his motivations, but shows Vaughn some tough love, and tells him; “Well, Lauren might, and you have to be prepared to deal with that.”  This is not the response that Vaughn was looking for, but I think he knew it was coming.  They both look at each other for a few moments more, trying to understand each other, as well as trying to figure out how they are going to get back to a happy place for the two of them.

With the information that was gather from Toni Cummings, they go to Kyoto Japan to attempt a rescue of Nadia, bringing Cummings with them to be able to gain access past whatever security system she put in place. Right before arriving in Kyoto, Sydney leans in to Vaughn and tells him; “I need to know that you will stay on mission…To protect Nadia, no matter what else happens.”  While she says this Vaughn looks contemplative, but we never see him agree to it, after she is done speaking, Vaughn just stubbornly looks forward.

Once they reach Sloane location, Sydney, Vaughn, and Cummings all repel down from the helicopter, and surprise attack the guards. Weiss and a bigger team with members unknown are following in a truck ready to enter as soon as the security is down.  Cummings gains access to the compound and Sydney and Vaughn start to invade the house as Weiss and his team begins the invasion of the compound.  As this is happening, Lauren and Sark have forced Sloane to administer more fluid than Nadia’s brain can handle into Nadia, which upsets Sloane and he has his men turn on them, unfortunately Sark was faster and shot Sloane’s body guards before they could get him.  Sark has Sloane at gunpoint as Sydney and Vaughn burst in.  A firefight that puts Sydney and Vaughn against Lauren and Sark ensues.  Upon seeing Lauren, Vaughn is hell-bent on capturing Lauren and making sure that she more than anyone pays for what has happened.  Sark and Lauren escapes from the room where Nadia is being held, and Vaughn runs after them.  Sydney sees this and tries to stop him, yelling for him to stop and that they need to secure Nadia.  But without looking back, he yells back at her telling her that he’s going after Lauren.  She yells his name again, but he doesn’t return.  Sydney is not happy, but she continues on her mission.  She tells Sloane that he needs to back away; he simply tries to make her understand that he doesn’t want Nadia harmed either, but she still keeps her gun trained on him as she approaches Nadia, and frees her from the medical table she was on.  Sloane’s men enter and tell him that he needs to leave and another firefight begins, this one putting Sydney against Sloane’s bodyguards.  After sometime it comes down to Sydney doing hand to hand combat with both of his men. Sydney is able to take down one of the men, but the other man was able to find his gun and he traps Sydney.  Before he can do much more then tell Sydney to freeze, Nadia stands up with her own gun and shoots the man with the gun pointed at Sydney.

Outside Vaughn is chasing after Sark and Lauren and more gun shots are passed, but no one is hit. Cummings sees Sark and Lauren escaping and she begins shooting at them as well. But Lauren then gets out grenade launcher and points it at Vaughn and Cummings, they immediately move out of the way and one of their trucks is destroyed.  Vaughn gets up and watches in horror as she escapes from their clutches.

Vaughn returns to the room where Nadia is being held and helps Sydney carry Nadia back to the helicopter.  Once inside they all get situated and Sydney tells Nadia, thinking she will reassure her that she is safe and that she promises that Sloane will never be able to hurt her again.  Nadia leans back and tells them that he saved her.   With this comment Vaughn looks at her and Sydney for a quick second and then turns away.  He won’t say it, but he then knows that Sark and Lauren are the ones who really want to harm Nadia.  Sydney just looks out the window and tries to make sense of the whole thing.

Back at the Rotunda, Dixon is debriefing Sydney and Vaughn when he tells them; “The only blemish on a job well done is a debrief I received from the TAC team leader indicating that an initial failure to secure Nadia provided Sloane an opportunity to escape. Is there anything to that?”  While Dixon is talking, Vaughn looks properly abashed, and turns to Sydney to watch her tell Dixon of his failure to do his job, yet, hoping that she won’t.  Sydney just looks up at Dixon, shakes her head and says; “No there isn’t.”   Once again, Vaughn looks down abashed, yet grateful.

The next thing we see is the two of them walking out of the conference room, Sydney hot on Vaughn’s heels.   She quickly shuts the door behind her and begins talking to Vaughn, saying; “I won’t cover for you like that again. You violated mission protocol, and you left me behind. Nadia saved my life.”  Vaughn is not in the mood to be lectured though, and he turns on her and tells her; “It was a judgment call. If it was the wrong one, I’m sorry. I would never put your life in jeopardy.”  Sydney isn’t taking this answer, she tells him; “You saw a chance to get Lauren, and you took it no matter what. You didn’t have my back.” Vaughn is getting somewhat irritated with this conversation and interrupts her and tells her; “We got Nadia. That’s what counts.”  Sydney can see his irritation and steps back for a moment, to gather her thought and change her approach.  She doesn’t really want to fight with Vaughn, she knows that she can help him more than anyone, and finally looks at him sympathetically and says; “I understand what you're going through. What it feels like to be betrayed. You saw how my hatred of Sloane consumed me. Vaughn; you saved me from that. From letting my anger turn me into a different person. And now it is my turn to do that for you. But you have to let me; you have to listen to me. You have to believe me when I tell you that the person you are right now is not the person you want to be. I told you that I didn't know if we could figure things out between us, I still don't. But I do know that we can't even begin to try until you deal with this.” He looks at her and nods a small nod, knowing that she is right, but when he doesn’t respond she walks away.  He watches her walk away, and you can see him contemplating all of his options.

The next time we see Vaughn, he has open the garage door to the storage unit.  He enters and shuts the door.  He takes a good look around takes a sniper rifle from off of the wall.  Puts it up like he is getting ready to fire, and shoots the unloaded gun towards his imaginary target; looking like he is ready to kill.   

I just want to take a moment here and discuss the ending for a moment, I have been on a lot of different sites, and many people seem to have a problem with Sydney’s speech that she gives to Vaughn at the end.  They state that it is too contradictory in her statements.  Her saying that she isn’t sure if she can move on, but he has to deal with his stuff first, but at the same time saying that she wants to help him get through it.  I’ll admit that the first time hearing it, I thought some of the same things, but then I really listened to it, and thought about it.  She still wants to be friends, and she isn’t going anywhere.  She is going to be around, she is simply telling him, that I want to help you get through your revenge and hatred, just like you helped me at the beginning.  My first thought goes back to S1 E4 – A Broken Heart.  At that time she has an overwhelming amount of hatred and betrayal from Sloane which is the obvious one, but also her father and she feels like her world is crashing down around her.  Then Vaughn gives the perfect speech to her.  Telling her how strong she is and how he will be there for her.  http://romancingalias.blogspot.com/2013/07/s1-e4-broken-heart.html When he told her those things they weren’t romantically involved in any way, but he was telling her that as a friend he would help her.  Now when I listen to what she tells him when he is full of rage is that even if she isn’t sure if they will have a romantic relationship or not, she is still there for him as his friend, and she will help him through it.  But at the same time telling him that once he has worked through it, then she can consider that type of relationship again.  But she knows that he doesn’t want to be this person he is right now and that is no way to re-kindle their relationship.  So I personally think the speech that she gives him is fine.

**** SPOILERS AND A LOT OF SPECUALTION*** Next paragraph only

I do have to go off on a small tangent / theory here.  It really has nothing to do with the relationship, although it does affect it a little in season four.  I lined up a few things on a timeline concerning Vaughn’s father Bill, Irina’s fake death when she was pregnant with Nadia, and when Nadia was born as well as when she was taken from the facility in Russia.  So we know that the date listed for Bill Vaughn’s death is October 21^st, 1979, which lines up with other things that we know, Vaughn was 8 when his father died, Vaughn was born in November of 1970.  So it lines up there.  The problem that I have is that Bill Vaughn had anything to do with Nadia.  I know that we like to think of Brill, friend of Jack’s who helped free Sydney as a good guy who has retired from the CIA, who also knew Bill Vaughn.  But his knowledge of the passenger was too convenient for me when I started to really think about it.  Brill called him when Lauren knew that Vaughn knew about her situation.  Sark’s people knew exactly where to find Vaughn after talking with Brill.  Could Brill have been working for Elena the whole time, planting this seed of curiosity into Vaughn’s head about his father?  Because how on earth could Bill Vaughn have saved Nadia when she wasn’t even born until at least 1981, which is after Laura Bristow, AKA Irina Derevko, “dies” in a car accident.   I know that Elena headed up the Covenant, she could’ve sent in Brill to tell Vaughn about the whereabouts of the passenger for him to “save” her, since Elena had been keeping tabs on both Nadia and Sydney.  Then telling Sark where to find Vaughn who would have the information he needed. She used Sark, Brill, and Vaughn as players in her endgame, as well as throwing off any suspicion of her.  I don’t come to this realization lightly, I have examined the whole scenario over and over in my head, and this is the only explanation that I can come up with, besides just throwing my hands up and saying that the writers had no idea what they were doing with that storyline and didn’t research characters. Brill may have known Vaughn’s father, but Brill must’ve turned and is now working for the Covenant in some capacity, and fed Vaughn the story that Bill Vaughn had saved Nadia.  Someone else actually did that.

• Items I found Noteworthy 
• While Sydney and Vaughn are in Cuba questioning Dr. Lee, Jack is tasked to work with Katya on looking through Sloane’s financials. While looking through them they find a connection to Toni Cummings who builds the high end security systems, who Sydney and Weiss arrested back in episode After Six S3 E13. Katya is incredibly excited about the idea of being able to find Nadia and Sloane, but her happiness seems suspicious to me.  Like she really doesn’t care about finding them, but finding what they have found. (Or Maybe I just know too much and know what to look for…) 
•  Jack met with Toni Cummings and arranged a deal with her.  She helps them find Sloane and she gets out of prison.  While still in the prison Marshall works with Toni Cummings and she decides that she is very impressed with him and offers him a job working for her.  I love how Marshall reacts to this, eventually telling her that he really enjoys working for the good guys.

S3 E20 – Blood Ties

This episode contains very little contact between Sydney and Vaughn.   The time that they share on screen is less than 2 minutes in fact.  So I am hoping that I will be able to keep this semi short.  In past episodes we see Sydney with the A story line on her own most of the time, but usually Vaughn comes into the A story line at some point.  This episode seems almost as if there are two A story lines, and they don’t come together until the last few minutes of the episode.  And Sydney and Vaughn each have their own story.  As I said before this episode does change the course of the relationship though.  They still have feelings for each other and they still care for each other more than anything else.  But new information is gained as well as a new character that will affect them and their relationship.

So with the storylines being so different, I am going to try something a little different and write up the storylines separately rather than in the order that they appear in the episode.  So I will tell the Vaughn story then the Sydney storyline, ending with them finding each other.  Hopefully this will work out as I think it will.

Vaughn:

As the show opens we see Vaughn at the firing range, and Dixon approaches him.  Vaughn is complaining that his role of playing the loving husband was supposed to be over by now, and with how much he wants to be with Sydney and the anger he feels towards Lauren I believe that he has the right to be a little crabby about the situation.  But Dixon explains to him that with Sloane now dead, they have reached a dead end in searching for the passenger, and that they can still use Lauren as an asset.  Explaining that they can use her to feed incorrect information to the Covenant, and keep them off of Jack and Sydney’s investigation into the passenger, and they will take Lauren into custody.  Vaughn understands, but is not happy about it, so he takes out his frustrations with shooting a few more shots.  I wonder if he has placed a picture of Lauren on the target, if I were in his position, I think I would have.

After taking out his frustrations, Vaughn is surprised to find Lauren at the Rotunda since she had told him that she would be working from home.  He hates having to play the part, but does a good job of going along with the loving husband alias, knowing that he is ultimately doing it for Sydney.  While he is playing nice with Lauren, he receives a phone call from Brill. (Brill is the man that Vaughn and Jack went to for help in getting Sydney out of the NSC holding facility, who also knew Vaughn’s father.)  Brill tells Vaughn that he has some information that Vaughn needs to know about his father and tells Vaughn where to meet him.  During the conversation Vaughn works to not disclose who he really is talking with as Lauren watches.  When he hangs up and Lauren asks about the call, he tells her that it was just the dry cleaner.  They play the happy married couple for a moment longer and then Lauren goes to leave.   Once she is out of his immediate eye line, Vaughn’s fake smile disappears and he looks to Weiss to go and follow her.  Unfortunately while following her Weiss ends up losing her trail.  This part always makes me wonder, if they are able to track all these horrible terrorists with Marshall’s fun gadgets, why didn’t they stick something on Lauren, rather than depending on visual monitoring from one agent? 

Upon arriving at the location where Brill requested Vaughn to go, they get in an elevator and then stop the elevator to have their meeting.  Brill then goes on to tell Vaughn what he needs to know, saying; “I told you that I worked with your father. But what I didn’t tell you is I was with him on his final mission.”  Vaughn tells him that he knows how his father died, and by the look on Vaughn’s face it isn’t really a subject that he wants to talk about right now.  But Brill looks at him and tells him; “You don’t have a clue. Yeah, he was working on something. An operation that wasn’t sanctioned by the CIA.”  This does not make Vaughn happy in the least, and he tells Brill that his father wouldn’t ever go against the CIA.   Brill then tells Vaughn that Bill Vaughn was a follower of Rambaldi.  This just makes Vaughn even more upset, and tells Brill that it’s impossible.  Brill stays calm and tells him; “He died protecting the little girl. The followers knew she was the Passenger. He broke her out of KGB custody. But he didn’t trust the CIA, either, so he took her someplace where she would be safe with other followers.”  None of this makes any sense to Vaughn, (or to the overall viewers when we start comparing timelines, but I won’t go into that) and he tells Brill that the man he is describing is not his father.  By this point Brill is somewhat frustrated with Vaughn’s unwillingness to believe him, so he gets a little more adamant and tells him; “Your father was the best man I’ve ever known. And he gave his life to make sure that that little girl would be safe. Now if you don’t stop what’s happening, his sacrifice will be for nothing.”    Now we have to assume that they continue to talk because of the information that Vaughn has at the end of the episode, but we don’t know exactly what is said.

As I have mentioned before, when I am watching the episodes for this rather than for my own entertainment, I have found that I notice more little of the details and I think more about how the characters must be feeling as some of these revelations come out.  And this is no exception.  As I looked at Vaughn’s face when Brill was telling him that that he was with his father on his last mission, his face looked pained.  Vaughn is always pained by the topic of his father’s death, but I think that it is affecting him more today than is shown.  Thinking about his father’s death, makes him think about Irina Derevko and ultimately Sydney.  But in this moment I think his thoughts may have gone deeper.  Maybe he was thinking of the last time he saw Irina, and the last time he saw Irina was only hours before his last moments with Sydney before her alleged death.  Also noting that he was being debriefed about Irina while Sydney was being taken, so he feels some guilt there, thinking that he should have been with Sydney protecting her.  Also it was after that last encounter with Irina that led him to meeting Lauren.  So now more than ever possibly, he realizes how much damage the Covenant has not only done to Sydney, but also to him.  Also in the coming episodes where the mission is to find the Passenger, Nadia, I can see where he has mixed feelings.  His instinct has always been to help Sydney in any way that he can, but finding the Passenger can’t be easy on Vaughn as his father gave up his life with Vaughn for her safety.  So I could easily see him having a bit of resentment towards her and not having her on the top of his priorities.  But this is all just theory once again, as well as a testament to Michael Vartan’s acting skills.  The way that I can get this much of a theory built up based off of a look on his face.

As they are ending their conversation, Brill tells Vaughn that he knows what he needs to do and to just make sure that they don’t get to her.  Vaughn asks him why he came to him and Brill tells him, because it’s what your father would’ve wanted me to do and then Brill exits the elevator.  Vaughn is left to think more about what he needs to do and possibly weigh that against what he wants to do and the elevator closes, inside he gets out his phone to call someone, I have to assume that it is Sydney, so she can know where to go and what their plan should be.  But before he has a chance to say anything he exits the elevator and then is attacked and knocked out.

The next time we see Vaughn, he is hanging by his arms in a warehouse somewhere and we hear Sark speaking to him.  We also see that Vaughn has been stripped down so his chest is fully visible, which normally I get excited about seeing that nicely chiseled chest, but since he is hanging and also covered in blood I don’t take as much pleasure in seeing it. Besides the blood running down one side of his body, seeing water raining down on him doesn’t bode well with me either.  Vaughn is coming to after being knocked out and that Sark is now telling him that the Covenant has known for a while that Vaughn’s father was a follower of Rambaldi.  Also that Brill eluded them, but Vaughn was not as lucky.  Sark tells Vaughn that there are three things he needs to know. The first being about the device he holds which can deliver up to 500,000 volts, which Sark tells him isn’t enough to kill him, but just enough to make Vaughn wish that it would. The second item being that Sark believes that Brill disclosed the location of the Passenger to Vaughn, which means that Sark won’t stop the torture until Vaughn tells him where she is. The third item being that Sark is going to enjoy the torture far more than he should.  After telling Vaughn of the three things he should know, Sark begins the torture by jabbing the highly charged baton into Vaughn’s side.  Making Vaughn scream in pain, and shake vigorously. 

On a quick side note, Weiss does return to the Rotunda and a task force is put together to find not only Lauren but also Vaughn since they believe he may have been compromised.

Sometime has passed before we see Vaughn again, only now he is covered in more of his own blood and we can see where he has been burned.  Sark remarks how impressed he is at Vaughn’s ability to withstand the torture, but then turns up the machine to a higher setting.  Coming from Sark who we have seen quickly bow to the pressure of torture; it’s not surprising that Sark is impressed.  But Sark tells Vaughn that he is done showing restrain and asks him again where the Passenger is.  Vaughn is in an extreme amount of pain and it shows in how hard it is to speak.  But Vaughn has been trained to withstand torture and we know that he will do anything to save Sydney, including dying.  So it is no surprise that in this moment of excruciating pain, Vaughn actually provokes Sark and tells him; “Holding that thing, you almost look like you’ve reached puberty.”  Sark does not take the insult well and takes it out on Vaughn by holding the baton to Vaughn’s chest for longer than the last time.  While Vaughn is shaking and screaming, Lauren emerges and sees Sark torturing Vaughn.  I believe that it is in this moment that Vaughn sees Lauren with Sark for the first time.

When Sark is finished with Vaughn, at least for the time being, Lauren approaches Vaughn to clean him up a little.  She is the last person Vaughn wants to accept help from and he yells at her to not touch him.  She tells him that Sark is going to give him the Inferno protocol and that after all that he has been through, he wouldn’t survive.  He asks her why she cares, and she tells him that not everything was a lie.  As Sark’s men are taking Vaughn out of the restraints that are holding him up and take him to a cot, we see Lauren begging for Sark to wait, and not to do the Inferno Protocol, that he needs time to recover.  Sark asks her why she has this sudden concern for her husband now.  They go on talking and he eventually slaps her, and tells his men to take Lauren out of the room.  He then goes back to Vaughn and places and mask over his head to start the protocol.  We as watchers know (I hope) that this is all just show; they want to play on Vaughn’s sympathetic side and have him believe that she isn’t the callous bitch we know her to be. 

The mask is removed from Vaughn’s face and someone is there at his side assisting him to wake up. We find that it is Lauren, and Vaughn actually fell for Lauren and Sark’s manipulation and isn’t overly upset that Lauren is there with him.  He asked her what is going on, she tells him that the protocol worked and that he somehow survived.  He allows her to help him out of the bed, and he asks her if he told him.  Lauren tells Vaughn that he told Sark everything, but that he will be back any second and that Vaughn needs to get out of there.   He asks her why she is doing this, and she tells him that for her their marriage was real, and that it was the only real thing in her life.   She helps him dress and tells him to leave.  So Vaughn stumbles out of the warehouse and makes it to the street. 

Once out in the open Vaughn sees a car approach him and tries to flag them down, but has no success, but a truck quickly follows and does stop to help Vaughn.  Vaughn gets in and the driver is concerned with Vaughn’s appearance.  Vaughn just tells him that he needs to get to a phone, so the trucker quickly allows him to use his.   Vaughn, takes the phone hesitantly, thinking about making his call with a civilian near him, but decides that he will do it anyway.  He calls into the CIA dispatch and asks to speak to Dixon immediately.   When speaking with Dixon, Vaughn tells him that the Covenant knows the location of the Passenger and that Sark is moving on the lead.  Dixon asks him how they got the Intel, and Vaughn looks again to the driver, but dismisses his hesitations and tells Dixon that they got it from him.    Dixon then tells him that they will put together a tactical team and beat them to it, and asks where the Passenger is now.  Vaughn becomes suspicious now, I’m not sure if it is from the way Dixon worded his question or the truck drivers interest in Vaughn’s phone call, but Vaughn can see that something is not right.  He tells Dixon that he cut out and that there is bad reception.   We then see that Dixon isn’t Dixon, but Lauren typing the words that Dixon is saying into her laptop.  She has him ask Vaughn what is wrong, and in reply he asks if Sydney is back from Hong Kong.  With this statement, Lauren and Sark know that their rouse didn’t work, and Vaughn realizes that the truck driver is Covenant.  Vaughn goes to attack the driver at the same time that the driver goes in to attack Vaughn.  But even in Vaughn’s condition, Vaughn is still able to overpower the driver.  Eventually knocking him out and making the truck crash into some parked cars.  Vaughn quickly exits the truck as best he can after the crash, and as he is jogging away from the truck, the truck explodes.  Then a car pulls up to him and Sark and Lauren get out with their guns trained on him.   Vaughn finally realizes that Lauren played him once again.  She ends up knocking him out with a quick kick in the head after telling him that he is smarter than she thought. 

It is in this moment I believe that Vaughn truly begins his change.  He’s never been overly cynical or revenge driven.  But this latest betrayal at Lauren’s hand brings out a side of Vaughn that we have never seen before and his actions in the next episode are a result of this.  But I will go into that more later.

Back at the Rotunda, luckily Marshall has found a lead, he shows Dixon the footage that he found, Dixon instructs him to look at the surveillance from every camera within a five mile radius of where Sark and Lauren picked him up after the truck crashed.    With Marshall being this close, you know that Vaughn will be found, it’s just a question of the condition that he will be in.

Back at the warehouse, the game playing is over, they tried to trick Vaughn into thinking that they had run the Inferno protocol on him, when they really hadn’t.  But this time, Lauren is more than happy to help with the set up.   After the setup is complete and Vaughn is fully emerged in the Inferno protocol, Sark begins his questions.  What I find amazing is Vaughn’s strength even here.  The questions that Sark asks that would ultimately have no effect on Sydney or the Passenger, Vaughn answers, but any question that would affect Sydney, or the Passenger, Vaughn is able to still refrain from answering.  Showing that even under the worst conditions, even his subconscious is unwilling to hurt Sydney in anyway.  Proving that Vaughn will go to any extreme for her, including dying, which is good for Lauren to watch.  As  Sark instructs Lauren to increase the dosage, Sark receive a phone call, after hanging up he tells Lauren that they are done that they have the location of the Passenger.  Lauren asks Sark about Vaughn to which Sark tells her to kill him.  She hesitates for a small moment, before turning the wheel on the medication up allowing the medication to kill him for her and she walks away.

At the Rotunda, Marshall calls Dixon and Weiss into his office and shows them the footage that he found.  After Marshall’s usual over talking, Weiss finally gets the location of where Vaughn is now out of him and races off to save his best friend.  This is something that we rarely get to see, but is nice to see.  Weiss and Vaughn have been friends for a long time, and since the downfall of the Alliance, Weiss and Vaughn haven’t worked together as partners much.  But seeing Weiss show his own strengths as an agent to find Vaughn shows another side to their friendship. Then seeing the actual rescue of Vaughn and the fear on Weiss’s face as he finds Vaughn shows how much he really cares for his friend.  I know it’s not part of the Sydney and Vaughn relationship, per say, but in any relationship the closest friends of each side of the couple do affect the couple.  And seeing how good of a friend is to Vaughn here as well as how much Sydney has depended on him this year, shows that he would do anything for them.

Sydney:

We know that Sydney is not happy with Jack over him letting Sloane die, knowing that Jack had the information that would exonerate him.  If you have only watched the episode, you can see her anger at Jack.  But I love how she was able to expound upon her true feelings about Sloane’s death with Vaughn in the deleted scene that I posted in the last episode recap.  But before anything is said, you can tell that she is still not happy with Jack and hates being in his presence.   But the situation quickly changes as jack explains that yes he did have the information to exonerate Sloane, but as he was going to hand over the evidence to Bell, the guy from Justice who came to oversee Sloane’s execution, when he quickly realized that Bell was part of the Trust.   With Bell being part of the Trust jack knew that he couldn’t turn over the information that he had to him. Sydney then sees Sloane and they begin their search for the passenger.  I know that I could go into a lot more detail about the details of finding the Passenger, but I don’t find them overly relevant right now.  So this storyline will be kept short.  I will say that Sloane tells Sydney and Vaughn why the Passenger is so important, and why everyone is searching for her.  Rambaldi told of a Passenger that would serve as a conduit to Rambaldi himself and that when given an elixir she would be able to pass a message that would show Rambaldi’s ultimate end game.

While on the search for the Passenger, Sydney and Jack do share a nice moment.  While it isn’t relevant to the relationship, I am a sucker for a good Sydney and Jack moment. They are in the van ready for surveillance and Jack tells her; “Sydney, there’s something you should know. When I first learned of Sloane’s affair with your mother, I was forced to consider the possibility that I wasn’t in fact your biological father. It’s not the case. I had our medical files examined. Our relationship is clear. But I wanted you to know during that brief time before I was reassured, my feelings for you never changed.”  Sydney says a simple Dad in return and then they share a smile before going back to their work.  It’s one of those moments that are few and far between for Jack to open up to Sydney.

After a trip to Washington DC to see the Trust and retrieve a Rambaldi artifact, they use the substance that was in the Hourglass to power the new artifact and it prints out what appears to be brain waves.  The brain waves are from the Passenger, and with the help form some contacts, they are able to find her using her brain waves and the equipment that the DOD uses to search brainwaves from orbit.  She is in a women’s labor camp in Chechnya.  Jack reminds Sydney that Sydney needs to make sure that her expectations for her new sister are not the same as she had for her mother.  Sydney reassures him that after meeting Irina, she won’t be making the same mistake twice.

In Chechnya, Sydney has managed to break in to the women’s labor camp and is searching for her sister, when she finds her she is in the hospital infirmary in a catatonic state.  Upon seeing her new found sister like this Sydney’s empathetic side immediately comes out.  Sydney sits down next to her, and starts to release her from the restraints.  As she does this she introduces herself and tells her that she is her sister, and that she is there to help her and she will make her safe.  You can see that even though Sydney promised that she would not fall into the trap of believing that her sister was innocent and trustworthy, she has already come to love this sister of hers.

While escaping the prison with her sister, Sydney has to fight with some guards.  While she is fighting her way out, her sister suddenly begins helping Sydney fight off the guards. After the guards are taken down, Sydney escapes with her sister.  They stop for a moment to allow for resting, with some questioning, Sydney realizes why the Passenger had so many Aliases’.  It is the same reason that Sydney does herself, she is an agent from Argentina, and her name is Nadia.   Sydney shows that she has already fallen for the idea of having a sister.  Sydney also tells Nadia that it wasn’t just her there to rescue her, but her father helped and that he is waiting for her.

 Later after escaping Jack, Sydney, Sloane and Nadia are at a CIA safe house.  Nadia wakes up and sees Sloane holding her; she tells him that she knows who he is.  He tells her that the reason that he changed his criminal behavior was to become worthy of her love and respect.  After a nice moment between Sloane and Nadia we hear an explosion, Sydney and Jack jump into action while Sloane stays behind to cover Nadia.  We hear Sark instructing others that the Passenger is to remain unharmed.  Sydney and Jack take out some of Sark’s men, but then have to retreat back into the room where Sloane and Nadia are, only to find them gone.  Sydney and Jack hide in the rafters and watch Sark and Lauren search the room.  Lauren finds a wall that opens up to an escape tunnel, and tells Sark that Sloane set them up.  Jack tells Sydney that they are in a Chechen safe house that Sloane suggested that they take refuge in.  They deduct that Sloane knew about the escape route and was the only other person that knew where they were.  Sloane set them up again, he called the Covenant to come and act as a distraction giving Sloane time to escape with Nadia.  This was part of his ultimate end game, I wonder if Lindsay had seen this far into the plan, or if Lindsay only saw a part of the end game that we discover next season.  But Sloane never truly reformed.

Sydney and Vaughn:

As far as a timeline given for how long Vaughn was held by Sark and Lauren before Weiss was able to rescue him is fairly unknown, but we can speculate that it was a good amount of time since we can infer that he was taken around the same time that Sydney met with Jack and found that Sloane had not been executed.  So judging by what Sydney was able to do, spend a good amount of time in Washington DC, as well as rescuing Nadia from the labor camp in Chechnya, we have to guess that Vaughn was held for at least two days.  However that is never fully confirmed.  What we do know is that he is in pretty bad shape after all of his torture.  Sydney and Vaughn’s stories finally come together after Sydney has returned from Chechnya, so Vaughn has been in the hospital for at least a day since we have to give time for Sark and Lauren to make it to Chechnya and Sydney to make it back.  In the actual episode shown we see them for the first time as Sydney first enters Vaughn’s room.  However there is a deleted scene that took place immediately before her entering. I really wish that they had left this scene in place, because while they don’t directly refer to it, the knowledge gained in that scene makes other comments in the next episode make more sense in the long run. So before I continue with the actual episode, I think that I need to go over the deleted scene first.

The beginning of the scene, at least for me doesn’t add much to the plot and I can see why it was cut, it contains Dixon and Sydney discussing Sloane and why Jack did what he did.  Also that they are working with the DOD to try and find her brainwave pattern again, but they aren’t having much luck; Sydney suspects that Sloane has done something to her.  But Dixon reassures her that they will do all that they can to get her sister back to her. 

 This conversation takes place outside of Vaughn’s hospital room and as much as Sydney now cares about the status of her newfound sister, she didn’t come to the hospital to talk shop with Dixon.  When she first comes into the scene you could see the immediate concern in her face.  She talked shop as much as she could, but now she can’t wait any longer.  She needs to check on Vaughn.  She starts walking to his room to go greet him.  But before she can get too close, Dixon stops her.  He tells her; “Syd, before you go in there, there’s something you need to know about Vaughn. The doctors ran tests to see if there were any permanent affects from the Inferno protocol, there were none. But… they discovered something else; signs of Psychological conditioning. We believe that Lauren is responsible.”   Sydney has this mixed look of absolute concern for Vaughn mixed with a look of revenge for Lauren.  I can imagine that after hearing this, she wants nothing more than to kill Lauren herself, but she first needs to check on Vaughn.  She asks Dixon if Vaughn has been told, and he tells her that he thought that it would be better if he regained his strength before hearing the news.   Sydney nods in agreement and the deleted scene ends.  

So essentially Dixon just told Sydney that Vaughn has been going thru similar conditioning that Allison Doren put Will through at the end of Season two.  Although the one thing that we do know, or at least can infer from seeing Vaughn being tortured, he has been somewhat conditioned by the CIA to withstand some brainwashing techniques, but within his own subconscious he won’t disclose anything that would ultimately affect Sydney.  The only time that she could’ve gained information that would’ve affected Sydney would’ve taken place before she returned from the dead.  Once Vaughn knew she was alive his priorities, at least subconsciously at first if not outwardly shown, were to protect Sydney.  So I could also infer that Lauren may have gained the knowledge that ultimately put Jack in prison from Vaughn when they first started dating.  But I can’t believe that she would be able to get much info that would hurt Sydney.  But where Sydney was not involved, I can see him divulging some of that information.  But knowing that this conditioning took place lets us be able to understand some upcoming statements that Vaughn says that originally had me very confused.

 In the episode itself, the scene opens with Sydney walking into Vaughn’s hospital room immediately following this conversation with Dixon.  So it is at the forefront of her mind when she approaches Vaughn.  You can tell that she is thinking about something, but knowing what Dixon just told her gives us more insight.  She approaches Vaughn’s bed and softly speaks his name.  He wakes up and you can see that he is in very bad shape overall, so Sydney’s train of thought does change to his overall condition rather than what Lauren did to him.  Vaughn looks up at her and says her name, and you can tell that she is the only person on his mind.  He reaches out his hand to her; she looks down and then takes his hand in hers.  With all of Vaughn bruises and scars, he shows nothing but concern in his eyes and then asks her if she is alright.  Typical Vaughn, no matter what type of pain he is in, his first concern is for Sydney and her wellbeing.  This somewhat reminds me of when Vaughn was dying from being contaminated by the water from the red ball and he is lying in the hospital bed asking Sydney how dangerous getting his cure will be.  No matter what the situation has been, Vaughn always wants to protect Sydney, and it’s killing him in situations like this that he can’t be with her to protect her.   But with his question, Sydney looks a little surprised and looks him over before telling him that she is fine.   By the look that Sydney has, you can tell that Vaughn is starting to alarm her, because she has nothing but concern for him in her face.  He then asks her; “The Passenger… Did you find her?”   She has a look of wonder at this question, but she tells him that yes, she found her, but that she is already gone and missing.   You can see that Vaughn is actually scared for Sydney here, his breaths quicken and her tells her; “You can’t go after her.”  Sydney questions him, wondering what he is talking about.  He goes on to tell her; “Your sister. You have to let her go.”  Unsure of what is going on, Sydney tells Vaughn that he is tired and that she should let him sleep.  It looks like Sydney may have attempted to release his hand, but he held hers tight and pulled her closer.  Once again his concern for Sydney is showing and it is his main concern above any type of pain that he may be in, he tells her; “No. My father was killed because he took her from the KGB. He hid her from your mother. That’s why she murdered him. I met someone who told me the prophecy…”   While Vaughn is talking Sydney can’t quite wrap her head around what he is telling her and she is very confused, but he goes on and tells her the prophecy of The Passenger. “The Passenger and the Chosen One shall battle. Neither will survive.”  Vaughn and Sydney have never been big believers of the Rambaldi stuff, but they have seen too much to not have a little fear when it comes to the prophecies.  Vaughn looks up at Sydney and goes on; “Sydney… You can’t see her again.”   While Vaughn says this, Sydney looks down at him wondering what to do, but she can’t ignore the concern that Vaughn has for her. 

The last thing we see is Nadia being held somewhere by Sloane and she is chained to a chair.  Sloane injects her with the green elixir that he made from the Rambaldi manuscripts, so that she can become the conduit to Rambaldi’s end game.  She goes into convulsions and Sloane places a mask over her face to put her to sleep.

So overall, while Sydney and Vaughn have very little contact in the episode, what happened to them will definitely affect their overall relationship.  Sydney has gained a new sister, who is prophesied to end up killing her, but Sydney having met her has a hard time believing this, but she will always have it at the back of her mind knowing what prophecies have come true.  For Vaughn, he was originally angry at Lauren for her betrayal in marrying him as well as betraying the country, but after what she and Sark put him through and falling for her last manipulation over him.  He becomes very bitter and angry, plus he is told about the psychological conditioning.  So he has two things on his mind, bringing Lauren to justice and making her pay for what she has done not only to him but to Sydney as well.  Because in his mind, he sees Lauren being responsible for Sydney’s disappearance and all the agony that he and Sydney went through during those two years, as well as the pain that he has had to inflict on Sydney over the last year, trying to be a good husband.   But his second concern and his main overall concern although at times, it doesn’t show as his number one concern is gaining Sydney’s trust and love back.  He wants nothing more than to be back with Sydney and for them to be happy together once again.