A Fractured Identity

Jack sat and listened to Sarah cry uncontrollably, battling with himself on if he should go in there and get her or wait for her to come out. Everything he heard through the listening device was gut wrenching for him to hear, and he could only imagine how it was for Sarah. Sarah sat on the floor for what seemed like an eternity, bawling her eyes out. She couldn't believe her life had come to this. Who is she really? Is she really Sarah Jenkins, or was that just a name they gave her? Is her life even real? So many thoughts ran through her head as she sat on the floor and let her tears flow. Sarah began to slowly gather up all of the files on the floor, wetting them up with her tears, as she picked herself up off the cold concrete.

As she stood up her knees buckled and she fell right back down again, scattering the files and the paper inside of them everywhere. "Ja..Jack," she pauses through tears, "if you are still there, please come help me, I don't have the strength to move," she says sounding defeated. Jack quickly got out of the car, scanning his surroundings, before running towards the warehouse building. Jack hurriedly went inside, desperately trying to find Sarah. As he heard her harsh cries, he immediately ran towards the noise. When Jack finally rounded the corner, the sight he saw broke his heart into pieces. Sarah was sitting on the floor, knees to her chest, with papers and files scattered around her, crying so hard no sounds came out and hyperventilating.

Jack leaned down, scooping her up into his arms, and letting her cry on his chest. Jack sat there and let Sarah get everything out that she has been holding in. "Am I really going to die?" Sarah said shakily through tears. "No, not if I have anything to say about it," Jack says sternly, his blood boiling over with pure rage. He then gathered up all the files and gingerly held Sarah up in his arms and walked out to the car. Sarah laid in his arms, her cries muffled by his chest. Jack carried Sarah to the car gazing down at her with hurt and anger in his eyes. He felt sorry for her and wished she didn't have to go through this. By the time Jack reached the car, Sarah had cried herself to sleep in his arms.

Jack carefully unlocked the door and gently placed her in the passenger seat, and buckled her in. Jack looked at Sarah, his face so close he could feel her breath on his skin, and something in him just broke. He softly closed the door, "I'm going to save her, if it's the last thing I do," Jack determinedly said to himself. Jack hops in the car and speeds off, losing himself in thought, trying to figure out how he is going to save Sarah's life. Jack finally reached his home, parking in the back alley where no one could see him, and gently picked up Sarah and carefully carried her inside. Jack opened his door with his code, gingerly moving Sarah more to his left side to do so.

He slowly walked in his home, taking Sarah to his bedroom, carefully placing her on the bed, and under his covers. Jack quietly walked out the room turning off the lights and softly closed the door. As soon as the door closed, Jack immediately got to work. Jack went into his office, logged onto his computer, and started doing some research. He called his buddy Brian to get more details on the sleeper agent program. "Hey Brian I need you to get some information on a government program about sleeper agents that disbanded years ago," Jack said. "Uh okay, is this something I should be concerned about?" Brian asks. "I'll give you the rundown later on," Jack says firmly. "Ok, I got you, I'll get back to you as soon as I find anything," Brian replies. "Thanks bro," Jack says. "No problem bro, I got you," Brian replies before ending the call. Jack printed out all he could find on the internet about the sleeper agent program, the Russian government connection to it, Mr.Harrington's mafia gang and the rival mafia gang.

Jack worked so intensely that he fell asleep at his desk, with his computer open. Sarah woke up confused, "Where am I? Whose bed is this?" "What happened last night?" Sarah asked herself, as she looked around the room, wiping the crust from her eyes. "What time is it?" She says as she stretches, and sees that the clock on the nightstand next to the bed read 8:00am. Flashbacks hit her like a brick wall and she felt her heart break all over again. Tears began to fall onto the comforter. She quickly wiped her tears and got out of bed, walking towards the door. As Sarah explored Jack's house, she walked past, seeing him asleep at his desk.

She graciously placed a cover over him, when she did she caught a glimpse at all the research he did last night. Picking it up, she examined the papers that laid across his desk. "Wow, I see someone was busy," she quietly laughed to herself. She gathered up the pieces of paper and files, and headed outta the room, softly closing the door behind her. Sarah walks towards the kitchen, placing the papers down on the breakfast nook, and proceeds to make breakfast. Sarah made pancakes, bacon, eggs, some toast, and coffee. As she was looking for the plates, Jack woke up and proceeded to head to the kitchen, "mhmm something smells good," he said with a smile. Sarah jumped at the sound of his voice, placing her hand over her chest. "Omg! You scared me," she half laughed. "I thought you were still sleeping, I was just about to come in and wake you up," Sarah says sweetly.

"No need, the smell of this delicious food was my alarm clock," Jack said jokingly. Sarah chuckled to herself, "well can you please tell me where the plates are, so we can eat," Sarah says with a smile. "Oh," Jack laughs, "they're in the upper right hand corner," he said, as he pointed at the cabinet. Sarah smiles softly, "why thank you." As she turned around to try to grab the plates, she realized that they were a little outta her reach, and she proceeded to jump to try and grab them. Jack laughed deeply to himself as he walked up behind her and reached over her, gently grabbing two large plates and handing one to her.

"Here you go," he says with a smile. Sarah froze in place for a few seconds, her heart skipping a beat before turning and looking up at Jack, making eye contact and gingerly taking the plate outta his hand. "Thank you," she said softly. "You're welcome," Jack says as he turns around to start making his plate of food. "I will make you a plate," Sarah says. " Ah, that's alright," Jack replies. "No, I insist. It's the least I can do, after all you have done for me," Sarah says with a bright smile. "Well if you insist, who am I to say no," Jack says, laughing as he hands her the plate and walks away, sitting down at the table.

Sarah proceeds to make both their plates, and pour fresh hot coffee for the both of them. Sarah carefully brought over both their plates to the table, sitting them down slowly. She then went back to the kitchen to get the coffee, creamer, sugar, and utensils. "I don't know how you like your coffee, so I brought everything," she says, as she places his coffee cup down in front of him. "Thank you and it's okay. I like my coffee pretty strong, so I only put one packet of creamer and two packets of sugar in there," Jack replies.

"Really," Sarah asked excitedly? "Yes," Jack laughed. "That's so funny because I like to drink my coffee the same way," Sarah says with a slight chuckle. "Oh really, you do?" Jack happily asks. Sarah happily nodded yes, as she sat down at the table. "Well I guess great minds do think alike," Jack says with a grin. "I guess they do," Sarah says, returning the smile. Sarah and Jack quietly said a prayer and then proceeded to eat their food. "Wow, this is delicious," Jack exclaims. Sarah unknowingly blushes "It's not all that," she says trying to brush off the compliment. "No, it really is amazing," Jack says while happily enjoying his food.

"Why thank you, I really appreciate it," Sarah replies with a warm smile. Sarah and Jack proceed to eat and enjoy their food silently, while their minds begin to wander and think haphazardly. After finishing her food Sarah broke the silence first, "I saw the research you were doing last, did you happen to find anything?" "I found a few things,let me get my laptop and we can go over what I found," Jack says, getting up from the table, and walking towards his office to retrieve his computer. Jack returned with his computer and sat down, pulling up all the information he had found. Sarah proceeded to get the papers that she retrieved from his office earlier, and placed them down on the table.

"Here is what I found so far," Jack says as he turns the computer towards Sarah. "I really couldn't get much information offline about the sleeper agent program, but I did see somewhere that it was disbanded in 2015 and that was right around the time the Russian government was dispatched to the U.S to take the sleeper agents down. Sarah looked up from the computer screen, intensively listening to what Jack had to say. "Okay what does these papers mean," Sarah asked as she held them up in her hand. "Oh, that is a little bit of everything, information on Mr.Harrington and his mafia gang, called The Black Syndicate and the rival mafia gang called The Downtown Savages," Jack says. "It's also a deep dive into their history and how they got to this point. It has a little bit of what I could find on the sleeper agent program, which isn't much, but I'm waiting on a call from Brian to see if he was able to find out more."

As soon as Jack said his name, Brian's name ran across his phone screen. "Speaking of the devil," Jack says, raising his phone to show Sarah. "Talk to me, what did you find?" Jack asked. "Jack I think you need to sit down for this, because what I found is insane," Brian stated. Jack looked over at Sarah in shock. "Hold on, let me put you on speaker phone, so Sarah can hear too," Jack replied as he pressed the speaker button and placed the phone on the table. "Okay speak," Jack says to Brian. "Okay I had to do a lot of digging and phone calling to get this information, it is heavily guarded," Brian says. Sarah looked up at Jack in horror, "What is it Brian?" Jack asked firmly. "So the sleeper agent program started back in the 80s, it was just supposed to be trained CIA agents in the program, but somewhere between 83 and 85 things changed," Brian says. "What do you mean changed?" Jack asked, concerned.

"So between that time instead of it just being trained CIA agents, the government went out and started paying poor families large sums of money for their child to put them in the program disguise as giving them a "better education", but it really was a program to inject the kids with weird things to make them stronger,smarter, and more deadly," Brian pauses to catch his breath, while Jack and Sarah looked at each other in utter shock, disbelief, and horror. "I feel like I'm going to be sick," Sarah says as she holds her stomach and runs to the bathroom. "It's getting worse," Brian says. "Hold that thought, let's wait for Sarah to get back," Jack replies.

Sarah walks back to the room looking like life has been drained from her body. She slowly sits down, takes a sip of her coffee, and signals for Jack to tell Brian to proceed. "Okay Brian you can go ahead." "Ok so after they started paying poor families for their children, they also started to go around adoption agencies to adopt babies, because it was easier to manipulate and train them to be a deadly weapon." Sarah held her head down in defeat. It became eerily quiet over the phone. "Brian," Jack called out. "I'm here, I just don't know how to say this part," Brian says sadly. "Just spit it out," Jack demanded. "Sarah was one of those adoptees," Brian says. "WHAT!" Jack screamed in shock. As Jack looked up and saw Sarah frozen in place. "Sarah, are you okay?" Jack asked, concerned. Sarah blinked in astonishment. "Sarah was adopted back in the 90s, she was one of the last group of children that the government obtained," Brian says.

"She was also one of their top ranking sleeper agents, they trained her to be the deadliest of them all." Jack jaw dropped, looking over at Sarah in disbelief. Brian continued, " They were just rounding up the last sleeper agents, when the Russian government came over and started killing the sleeper agents one by one. At first the U.S government thought they were just dying on missions, until one sleeper agent by the name of John Jones made it back, but clinging to life and on the verge of death, was able to tell them that the Russians had infiltrated the program and were killing them off one by one. The U.S government found the Russians that infiltrated the program and killed them off, but due to not knowing what the Russians plans were they disbanded the program, suppressing the memories of all the remaining sleeper agents, changing their identities to protect them and allowing them to live normal lives, while also creating a code that they can use to awaken all the sleeper agents when needed."

"They also placed trackers in their body to alert them if someone awakens their abilities early and to know where they're at all times," Brian finishes. "But what about Sarah?" Jack asked. "She unlocked her memories earlier than expected. Sarah is obviously the exception to the rule," Brian states. "The U.S government is now looking for her, as she has awoken early, and her life might be in danger. Also they...," Brian trails off. "They might what?!" Jack yelled. "They might be coming to neutralize her," Brian says dishearteningly. Jack slowly looked up at Sarah, who was still frozen in place, her mind spinning, and not talking. Sarah slowly tries to get up but as she tries to take a step she immediately passes out and collapses in Jack's arms. "Brian let me call you back," Jack yells as he carefully picks up Sarah in his arms and takes her back to his room and places her in the bed and quietly closes the door.

Sarah awoke a few hours later with a raging headache. She slowly got outta bed to find Jack and some medicine. Sarah walked down the hallway finding Jack in his office looking over the information Brian sent over to him. "Oh you're awake," Jack asked, a little startled. "Yea, but my head is killing me, do you have anything I can take?" Sarah asked while holding her head. "Yea, one second I'll bring it to you," Jack says as he gently sits Sarah down on the couch. A few seconds later Jack returned with a packet of BC powder and some water. "Here you go," Jack says while handing it over to Sarah. Sarah took the medicine and the water, making a face in disgust, "This is gross," Sarah says after taking the medicine.

"I know," Jack laughs, "but it works." Jack then leaves the room to get Sarah something to eat, warming up leftovers that he cooked earlier. "Here, you need to eat something," Jack says, handing Sarah the food. "Thank you," Sarah replied. They sat in silence as Sarah ate her food and Jack continued to look over the documents he had. Sarah finished her food, placing the plate down next to her, and began to silently cry. Jack walked over to Sarah, sitting down next to her, wrapping his arms around her, and pulling her into him. "Who am I Jack?" Sarah asked through tears. "I don't even know who I truly am anymore." Jack gently held her tighter, "You're Sarah Jenkins, you're my friend," Jack stated matter of factly.

"No Jack, I'm not. That's the name they gave me, I don't even have real parents, the government is my parent," Sarah says shockingly. Jack slowly pushes her away from him looking into her eyes, "Sarah you are who you want to be and I'll be here to help you choose who that person is," Jack says lovingly. Sarah looked into his eyes, slightly smiled and fell back into his chest and cried. "Thank you," Sarah said through tears. "I'll be here no matter what, we will make it through this together and alive," Jack says, hugging her tightly. Sarah pulled away, wiping her tears, "Thank you Jack, I don't think I could've made it through this without you. Thank you for being a friend," Sarah said with a smile and wrapping her arms around him to hug him.

Jack softly patted her back, "Let's figure out how to take these people down and help you reclaim your life back," Jack says with passion. "You're right," Sarah replied. "Okay let's get down to business," Jack said, clapping his hands and getting up off the couch. "This is everything that Brian found and what I found as well." " Okay let's devise a plan that allows us to kill three birds with one stone," Sarah says as she pulls up a chair. Both Jack and Sarah worked diligently together until the sun arose.