Disclaimers: I do not own or lay claim to Walker, Texas Ranger or the characters Walker, Gage, Sydney, Trivette or Alex. This was written for entertainment purposes only.

It's Not Her

Chapter 1: Gage's Apartment

A faint light was emitted from the television in his bedroom as Gage lay in his bed just about to fall asleep. It had been a long week for him and the other rangers of Company B. They had spent the entire week trying to catch a car thief. He was stealing luxury cars and selling them to wealthy people in Mexico. Finally, Walker had received some help from some friends in Mexico and they were able to set up a bust. Gage, Sydney, Walker and Trivette had spent the last three days waiting in the woods for the deal to go down and quickly apprehended the thief and his men when it did. Gage felt good to finally be able to sleep in his own bed again, even if he did have to go back to work the next day. Just as he was about to drift into lullaby land he heard the phone ring.

"You've got to be kidding me." He said to himself not wanting to answer the phone. "It's 3 AM, who is calling me?" He let it ring five more times hoping the person would hang up and when it continued to ring he sat up and picked up the receiver. "Yeah," he said hoping the persistent caller had the wrong number.

"Gage? Did I wake you? I'm sorry. I was hoping you'd be awake." Hearing it was his partner Sydney calling, Gage stood up and trying to awaken his muscles that were partially still asleep.

Plopping himself back down on bed he blinked a few times. "I'm awake. Kind of. What did you need?"

"I woke you. Okay then, forget it. I'm sorry." Then, without waiting for Gage to speak again, she hung up.

"What the hell?" Gage said to himself in response to the weird conversation he had just had. Sydney usually didn't call Gage this late at night. Actually, the more he thought about it, Gage realized that Sydney didn't call him at all unless there was something really important to talk about. "She sounded strange. I think I'll call her back," he said to himself as he got up and walked out of his bedroom towards the kitchen. He got into his kitchen and turned the light and coffee pot on.

Picking up the phone hanging on his kitchen wall he dialed Sydney's apartment. After letting it ring about ten times, Gage hung up the phone and decided to call her cell phone. He dialed the number and heard ringing from both his phone receiver and from what seemed to be right outside his front door. Still holding the phone to his ear, he stretched the cord to its fullest extent so that he could reach his door. He undid the lock and opened the door to find his partner sitting in the hallway of his apartment, her cell phone ringing beside her.

He dropped his phone which, because of the cord contracting, went flying across his kitchen floor hitting the wall and smashing into many pieces thus disconnecting the call stopping Sydney's cell phone from ringing as well.

Gage didn't care about the phone, though. He was more concerned with the sight he saw before him. Sydney was sitting against the hallway wall with knees bent and arms around them. Her head was resting on her knees and Gage could hear a faint sniffle every few seconds. She was dressed in a gray sweatshirt that was far too big for her, bright blue spandex shorts and sneakers.

"Syd! What's wrong?" Gage said kneeling down in front of her. "Are you okay? What are you doing here? Syd, look at me!"

Looking up, Gage saw that Sydney had a huge bruise on the left side of her face. She also had black streaks down her cheeks created from the mixture of her eye make up and her tears. With tears resting in the corner of her eyes she softly said, "I'm sorry Gage."

Gage realized that it was around 3 AM and they couldn't sit and have a conversation in the hallway. Without saying a word, he slipped one arm beneath Sydney's still bent knees and the other one behind her back, picking her up as he stood. She put her head on his shoulder and her arms around his neck letting him carry her into his apartment.

He sat her down on the couch and kneeled in front of her. Breaking the silence he said the only thing that popped into his head, "Hey, Syd."

Smiling she responded, "Hi Gage."

Looking at her and taking her hands in his he said, "Sydney, what happened to you?"

In a choked up voice she said, "Well I had just gotten back to my apartment at around 9:30 after I picked a couple of things up from the store because I knew that I had no milk in my fridge. When I got into my apartment, and tried to rest, I realized that for some reason I was way too tired to sleep."

"Okay," Gage said listening to her story trying very hard to make eye contact with her even though she was looking down at their hands while she spoke. "Go on."

"Well, I decided that I would go for a run to try to see if I could release some of this pent up energy I had. I usually run along this path through a park near my apartment."

"Syd, by 9:30 it was dark, why didn't you call me then? I would have run with you. If you had fallen or something."

"If I had fallen I had my phone with me." She said sternly trying to regain the professional and strong attitude the world usually saw.

"Syd, where in this story am I going to find out what happened to your face and how you showed up at my apartment which is across town from yours?"

"I'm getting there," she said as she took a deep breath. "Well, I never got to the park. Right as I was about to run down the outside door of my apartment, someone who was waiting outside the door grabbed me from the left side and threw me down the front steps. Luckily I landed on the grass, but I got up and begin to fight this attacker. He was in all black and I threw some punches and kicks, but before I knew it, there were many men dressed in all black around me. Four of them grabbed me, and I was unable to fight back."

"Did you get a good look at any of them?"

"They all had black ski masks on and were wearing all black."

"So if four of them were holding you, how did you get away?"

"Well, the man who I had originally tried to fight had gotten up and looked at me. Then he said, 'It's not her.' I could tell the voice was of an Asian accent. That's when the guy smacked me across the face and I blacked out until about twenty minutes ago when I found myself lying in an alley which happens to have been near your apartment."

"Oh, Syd. When you called I was."

"Sleeping? I was going to go home but your place was closer and, I don't know. I figured."

"Syd, you can come here anytime. Why didn't you knock instead of calling?"

"I don't know. I had my cell phone in my hand as I was walking up the street and someone was leaving your apartment while I was calling you, so I came in and was in the hall. I don't know."

"Okay, coffee?" Gage said noticing that Sydney had began to calm down from the tramatic event of the evening.

"Coffee sounds great," She said as the both stood up. Gage dropped Sydney's hands from his and headed to the kitchen. He knew that she hated it when she couldn't take her attackers. Sydney walked over the mirror that Gage had hanging in his living room and looked at the black and blue that took over her left cheek. Touching it gently, she flinched softly saying, "Ow."

Coming up behind her, Gage handed her a mug and looked into the mirror. She saw his reflection in the mirror and said, "Oh, Gage, it looks awful."

"I think it gives character, Syd."

"Yeah, right." She said sarcastically.

Gage put his mug down on the coffee table and stood behind Sydney as she continued to stare into the mirror. After taking a sip of her coffee, she placed her mug on top of his television which was to the immediate right of the mirror. She placed her palm on her wound, moving her hand slowly to soothe the slight pain. Gage put one of his hands over her hand gently rubbing the back of it. He delicately placed his other hand on her waist.

Gage and Sydney had never been too involved romantically. They were partners and every once in a while they would share a kiss, like after Alex and Walker's plane had safely landed after it had been hijacked, but other than that, nothing. There was a significant amount of sexual tension between the two partners but neither of them acted on their feelings. However, here in his apartment, Gage couldn't hold back his feelings.

Sydney took the hand from her face and held Gage's hand. She turned around to face him. "Gage, what are." was all she could get out before Gage's lips covered hers. In her mind she knew that she should pull away, but in her heart she knew that this was right. The kiss deepened as the two slowly turned in circles around each other. Sydney finally broke the kiss and taking Gage's hand, she led him to his bedroom.

"Syd, are you sure you want to do this?" Gage asked.

Sydney lay down on the bed and motioned from him to join her, which he did. They stayed there together caught up in the heat of passion for hours.

Chapter 2: Gage's Apartment, the next morning

Gage woke at around 10 AM the next day with a smile on his face. He opened his eyes and searched his bed for Sydney, but she wasn't there. "Syd? Are you here?" he said aloud figuring she got up early and was in another room. When he did not receive an answer, he slipped some clothes on and looked around his apartment. He was alone.

Seconds later, his phone rang. He went to answer his kitchen phone but then realized it was broken in pieces on the floor. He ran to his room and picked up that phone, "Syd?"

"No, it's Trivette."

"Oh, hi Trivette. What's up?"

"Not too much, doing a little work."

"Oh my god, its ten, I was supposed to be at work an hour ago, I'm sorry. I'll be there soon."

"Okay, buddy. We have a new case to work on, so get here soon. I'll see you when you get here."

"Yeah. By the way, is Syd there yet?" Gage asked wondering where she was.

"She was here on time as usual. Why?"

"No reason, just curious."

"Okay, I got to go."

"See you soon." Gage said as he hung up the phone.

Gage hopped into the shower. He couldn't understand why Sydney wouldn't have said goodbye to him. "Maybe she didn't want to wake me or maybe she didn't want Walker and Trivette to know what had happened between us." Either way, he would have to talk to her and find out.

Chapter 3: Ranger Headquarters

Gage got to headquarters around 11 AM. He walked in to find Trivette and Sydney standing in front of Walker's desk.

"Hello Gage," Walker said, "we have a new case to work on. Sydney fill him in. Trivette and I are supposed to be witnesses in court at 11:30. After you fill Gage in get a list of tenants who live in your building and see if you can come up with any possibilities. We should be back at around 2."

"Okay. See you guys later." Sydney said to Walker and Trivette as they walked out of the room.

"So," Gage said, "what's the case?"

"Well, you know how I told you about those guys who I had a problem with last night?"

"Yeah."

"Well do you remember I told you they said, 'It's not her.'?"

"Yeah."

"When I came in to work this morning and Walker saw my face, I told him the story and he suggests that we find out who those men were looking for. If there were a bunch of guys waiting for one girl, she must be pretty important."

"Your face looks better than it did last night." Gage said as he lifted his hand to try to touch her face, but his hand was swatted by Sydney's as she backed away from him.

"What's wrong, Syd?" he said as he took a step closer to her and she continued to step back.

"Nothing Gage. You know the case, so let's get a list together of the tenants in my building and start investigating. We need to see if we can come up with a list of women that those men might have wanted."

"Okay, Syd." Gage said taking a deep breath knowing this was going to be a long day.

To be continued..