This is the first part of a long and convoluted series that inserts Alec Trevelyan into the Craig!Bond canon. While this Alec has his roots in Goldeneye, the two characters are not the same, and my Alec is drawn as much from other fanfics and my own imagination. I hope you become as fond of him as I have.

Nebraska, USA, December 2005

The wind buffeted the as it wound its way through the city buildings, causing the tall man crouched on top of a small office block to put out a hand to brace himself. The binoculars he was holding firmly to his face hid sharp grey eyes and straight eyebrows, over a twice-broken nose and a mouth that was capable of a wide smile. Not today, though. From his perch he watched Ruben Buguima, an arms dealer, walk slowly down the sparsely populated street.

The man's earpiece crackled to life. 'Get down from that ledge, Trevelyan. You're clear to engage.'

'Affirmative, I'm moving now.'

Alec slipped down the fire escape and onto the pavement. Buguima's pace hadn't changed, and if he noticed Alec shadowing him from across the street, he showed no sign of it.

Five minutes later, as they were approaching the arms dealer's hotel, a tall thin man came out of a bank and fell into step beside him.

'A, do you see him?'

'Yes, we're running a facial match now, but the angle –'

'There's not –' The stranger's head turned for a fraction of a second, and Alec got a glimpse of a face he'd know anywhere, he'd seen it so many times at HQ.

Willem Swart.

MI6's most wanted man was walking down the street right in front of him.

'Come in A, do you see –'

'Yes, Christ, hang on –'

'In a minute they'll be inside the hotel and I'll lose my window. Unless I get orders otherwise –'

'He's on the list, Trevelyan,' a new voice cut through the Station A tech's babble, 'act as you see fit.'

There was only one option, then, wasn't there?

As a clothes rack hid him from the other side of the road, Alec drew his pistol and disengaged the safety. There was no one else around to see him take careful aim and fire two shots.

Buguima yelled as his companion collapsed, and Alec holstered his gun and kept walking.

'You made the right call, Trevelyan.'

'Thank you, Ma'am.'

She gave him a Look. Apparently taking out MI6's most wanted man didn't mean he could be too pleased with himself. 'I expect your full report submitted by tomorrow morning. Now,' M leant forward slightly. 'You are aware, I take it, of the requirements for the Double O section?'

Ah. No wonder she had wanted to see him post-haste. 'Of course.' Only the best field agents became Double Os, and then only after you'd made two kills. MI6 didn't count self-defense killings, because apparently anyone could kill in self defense. Alec begged to differ, but he didn't write the regulations, did he?

M glanced down at a file. 'Tanner says you've shown an interest.'

'Yes, Ma'am.' Alec watched her carefully. MI6 might have a fondness for military types, but it wouldn't do to sound too eager to kill people in cold blood.

'You are aware of the immense responsibility that comes with the licence to kill?'

'Yes.'

She continued to look skeptical, but then, she always did. 'Very well, your file will be marked.' She gave him a piercing look. 'Don't get cocky, Trevelyan. I know your type. You're dismissed.'

James's cubical was empty when Alec got down to the large room that housed the offices for most of the field agents. A few quick questions confirmed that he was still on his mission, somewhere or other in Germany.

Halfway through the writing of his report a cup of coffee appeared next to Alec's elbow, and he looked up to see a scruffy man with a permanent three days growth. Mark Ronson leant against the partition between their desks and grinned, as Alec raised the mug in salute.

'Thanks.'

'No problem. Report writing? You look like you'd rather be pulling out your own toenails.'

'Oh, definitely.' Alec smirked as he lent back in his chair, and Mark, with a roll of his eyes, asked dutifully, 'why, when was the last time you had to do that?'

'Can't remember.'

Mark snorted. 'You talk far too much shit, Trevelyan.'

Ronson had been with MI6 for longer than Alec and James, but he'd started there without spending any time in the military, and so he was wary of James and Alec's tales of grand adventure. If only he realised how little of it was made up. However, Alec had never pulled out his own toenails. That had been James, and it had been for a bet. Teenagers will do a lot of stupid things when they're bored.

Mark feigned reading the computer screen over Alec's shoulder and Alec minimised the page with a huff. 'You can't blame me,' said Mark, setting down his own cup. 'Everyone in here's dying of curiosity. What did M want that was so urgent it came before handing in your equipment and writing your report?' M didn't debrief all the agents herself, or she'd never get anything done. And of course everyone knew he'd been to see her. Fucking spies.

'That's classified, Ronson, you ought to know better than to ask.' On the other hand, he'd know in a matter of hours, considering the nature of the news. The rumour mill was extremely efficient. 'I made my first kill.'

Mark blinked. 'Well then.' He was well aware of Alec and James's desires to become Double O agents. In the five years they'd been in the Secret Service, they'd already more than proved their potential.

'Still not interested in joining us?'

'I'll leave the assassinations to you two, I think. James is going to be pissed.'

Alec shrugged. 'Not my fault he decided it had to be a bloody race, is it?'

Swart's death weighed on Alec's mind for the rest of the week. It wasn't as if he hadn't killed before. One envisioned life in the Navy as one on or under the sea, but the SBS is part of the special forces for a reason. Infiltration, covert operations, that sort of thing. Death, and killing in cold blood, was something you had came to terms with.

He wasn't exactly going to lose sleep over the death of a man who deserved far worse. But that didn't mean he didn't feel something.

In the end, he dismissed it. He had more important things to think about.

He was going to be a Double O.

MI6 HQ, London, UK, March 2006

Alec had just had a thorough training session on how to effectively murder someone with a high-heeled shoe when he encountered a half-dressed James in the gym's changing room. James had been out of the country for a month, so Alec was surprised to see him.

It was the condition he was in more than his sudden appearance that made Alec exclaim 'Where the hell've you been?' however. James, half a foot shorter than Alec and built like a boxer, looked like he'd been in a few drunken brawls while he'd been away (that was, of course, a possibility). Most of the bruises Alec could see had faded to a sickly green, but they still looked painful.

'What, no hello? Lovely to see you?' Out came the signature Bond smirk. 'Why, did I miss something important?'

'Oh, nothing much, someone only assassinated the Prague section chief. Baker's wild about it and M won't tell him anything.' Alec started getting dressed. The MI6 change rooms were always bloody freezing. 'This section chief, Dryden, he was in Rome in '04, d'you remember him? The one who made an official complaint about MI6's falling standards when he found out I was born in Russia?'

James shrugged on his shirt. 'Yeah, I remember.' He paused, and Alec felt a sudden prickling on the back of his neck. Suspicious, he looked up: James was staring blankly at the opposite wall. He noticed Alec's narrowed eyes. 'What?'

'Tell me I shouldn't be thinking you had something to do with it.'

There was a significant pause. 'You want me to lie?'

'You're fucking kidding me, right?'

James continued putting on his cufflinks, as if this were a conversation they had every day. 'Would I joke about something like this?' He shrugged on his jacket and checked to see they were alone. Discussing this here probably was breaking half a dozen security regulations, but rules were made to be broken.

With clear disgust, James said, 'he was selling our intel. He was the leak half the agents in Europe have been chasing for the last six months.'

Shit. 'I thought you were going to Pakistan.'

'I did. Had to find his contact first.'

'And what, exactly, happened to the contact?'

'The same thing that happened to Dryden. He lasted a bit longer than his boss, though.'

'So. Two kills. You all right, then?' It was the closest he would get to asking James how he was coping. It wasn't something they did.

'He deserved it.'

'Not what I meant.'

That earned him another pause. 'If I wasn't okay with it, trust me, you'd know.'

They had had a bet, James and Alec, over who'd reach two kills first. Neither of them had really taken it seriously, but James had won, and Alec always paid his debts.

'It's for my wife,' he told the dealer. He was playing the rich businessman this time. People were so easy to fool. 'She only wants one because all her American friends drive them.'

The dealer visibly deflated, stopping his spiel on the benefits of that particular model. He showed Alec where to sign, and left it at that.

'You'd better appreciate it, I went into a car dealership for you.'

'And hell just froze over. Please tell me you didn't just buy the most expensive thing you could find.' Alec laughed, and James continued hopefully, 'it's not the new Aston, is it?'

'You want a fucking Aston Martin, you buy it yourself.' Alec had never understood James's fascination with cars. 'Here.' The lift doors opened and the car was revealed.

'Oh, you sodding bastard –' Alec started laughing and didn't stop when James thumped him on the shoulder, hard. By the time James joined in, Alec was leaning against the wall, gasping. 'You've wasted your money, you know, I'm never driving a fucking Prius, Jesus.'

'I got it parked under your name and I'm not bloody well driving it. Are you going to let them tow my present?'

'Fuck off.'

Alexandria, Egypt, May 2006

The shuffling of at least twenty pairs of of young feet echoed through the empty dock. Alec glanced first at his watch, and then at Mark. Right on time.

They were in Alexandria after following this particular people smuggling ring from London, through Europe, to the start of the line, here. Local sources had tipped them off that the monthly "cargo," twenty or so children, was due for departure, and here it was.

The coordinator of this end of the line apparently saw all the boats off (and wasn't that disturbing), was waiting at the docks, unaware of his two shadows. Alec peered around a shipping container at the group. there. Five men, all armed, and roughly twenty kids. A good three quarters of them were girls.

He signaled to Mark, at the end of the next container. Now. Guns up, they converged on the group, one in front, one behind, barrel-mounted torches shining in the eyes of the smugglers.

'Stop.' They all whirled to look at Mark, who gestured with his pistol. 'Weapons down, step away from the children.' There was a moment when Alec thought they were going to resist, or they didn't understand English, but then all but one of them obeyed. But the last one wasn't co-operating.

He turned slowly, squinting at Alec and Mark in turn before reaching for the children. Alec took two steps forward ('Don't move!') but the thug grabbed a girl of about ten, yanking her by her hair and – oh shit – holding a knife to her throat.

'I'll kill her,' the thug snarled, and Alec could see blood starting to bead on the girl's neck. For a moment he saw snow, a different girl – but that was twenty years ago, and this was now, and Alec's gun hand was perfectly steady.

The bullet hit right between the eyes, a perfect shot, and the knife-wielder fell. And as he did, his weight pulled the knife through the girl's throat.

So much blood.

Alec's hands started shaking.

James had apparently been living in Alec's flat for at least some of the time Alec had been away, although he did have a habit of using breaking and entering as a way of showing concern. He looked up when Alec dropped his bags as loudly as he could, trying to relieve the urge to punch something. His hands were still fucking shaking.

'How was Egypt?'

'You're not supposed to know I was there.'

'Never stopped us before.'

The kicked the bag into the bedroom. 'Fucking shithouse, if you must know.'

James frowned, folding up his newspaper. 'Mark said–'

'I don't want to talk about it.' Alec started putting his things away, slamming everything that closed because he wanted to scream.

'Alec–'

'There were kids, James. There's a little girl dead on a slab, do you really want to know the fucking details?'

There was a godawful moment where Alec was sure James was going to keep talking, but he just dropped the paper and walked past Alec to rifle through the drinks cabinet. 'Vodka?'

'Please.' He hadn't had anything on the plane and had been dragged through his debrief as soon as they touched down. What he really needed was to be shitfaced drunk. It would at least stop the nightmares.

James gave him a long look before handing over the bottle without any glasses. Alec must look even worse than he thought he did. Alek snatched it from him and took a long pull, barely even noticing the burn. Fuck. Fuck.

James settled back down in his seat and picked the newspaper back up. He wouldn't ask any more questions. Just like they never talked about Skyfall, they never talked about Veronika.

'I don't need you to play designated driver, you know.'

'I know. Drink your bloody vodka, I'll make sure you don't choke on your own vomit later.'

Officially, nobody knew what had happened in China. Four Double Os had simply disappeared, and four new names had appeared on the memorial wall. Unofficially, everyone knew. Four Double O agents killed by the Ministry of State Security. Four. Half the Double O section.

A memorial service was held because there were no bodies for proper funerals. Officially Alec didn't know that either, but Villiers was a fountain of information when properly persuaded.

On the roof of Alec's building, he and James tried not to feel so excited that people had died.

Alec blew smoke rings. 'M won't wait to appoint more. She's fond of the Double Os.'

James, who had stopped smoking in the past month or so, made a face but didn't cave in and steal one. He'd quit because apparently he "valued his lungs," though why that mattered, Alec had no idea. If they did make Double O, they'd be dead before they'd get any sort of cancer. James shrugged. 'Yes, but you heard Tanner, the ISC isn't. They want to cut down numbers.'

'She won't let them, they're too scared of her.'

There was a pause. James gave in and took a cigarette. 'Who else is up? Scarlett Papava?'

'She's the only other one.'

'And four positions to fill.'

He got promoted a week later.

James was in Bern on bodyguard duty, and pissed off about it. They're a bit above that sort of thing these days, and on one hand Alec felt sorry for him – but on the other hand, Tanner, newly minted Chief of Staff, had practically told him that James was next on the list, and Alec got a perverse pleasure out of knowing he'd gotten there first.

006 reporting for duty.

Sicily, Italy, June 2006

Of course his first mission had to be a simple one, to ease him into it (or make sure he died quickly if he was the wrong man for the job). Alec knew it made sense, but that didn't stop him from wishing for something with a bit more substance than follow target home from airport, take target out. He'd been an SBS sniper, for God's sake.

He watched Rosario Esposito, a Cosa Nostra bigwig, playing in the garden with his grandchildren. He wouldn't shoot while the children were there. That was his only rule: don't involve kids, no matter who their parents were.

Esposito sent the children inside so he could have a smoke.

Three lights on a match with draw a sniper...

The crack of his sniper rifle would have been heard from the house below, but by the time the rest of the family worked out what had happened, Alec would be miles away. He paused to swap his scope for binoculars. A clean headshot. Perfect.

Alec arrived back in London fifteen hours later to find that most of the Double Os were also back, bored out of their brains. Most.

'No Bond?'

'He's somewhere in Africa, I heard. M sent him out with a bloody new recruit, it'll be a miracle if Carter survives.'

'James was pissed?'

'You wouldn't be? We're Double Os, not babysitters.'