I hope you all like this! :D Its my first fanfic and I wrote it in 8th grade (4 years ago) so don't hate on me too much!
California Mishap
Most kids want to be a spy or a secret agent when they grow up. Not me. I'm an average fourteen year old British boy except my parents died, my guardian uncle died, my godfather tried to kill me then died, oh and I'm a spy. My name is Alex Rider.
I'm trying to get away from my life by moving to California for a bit. I mean seriously, what can go wrong in Cali? Exactly. It's not like I'm running away from my life, fears, or family, oh wait, I don't have any living family. I'm just going on a vacation.
It was weird actually. I got to go through security at the airport and use my real identity! Every other time I'm under a Spanish name or a French name like Pablo or Pierre. After the fifteen hour flight, my plane reached Los Angeles, California. I looked around the foreign airport to learn a comforting fact. Everywhere you looked, security cameras, watching your every move. Just like my home in Chelsea.
When I got to the luggage claim, I glanced at the other people collecting their bags. I saw a very pregnant lady desperately trying to bend over to grab her fallen bag without breaking her water. There also was a grimy looking middle-aged man who looked as if he were ready to snatch an unsuspecting woman's purse. I finally found my navy blue suitcase with my initials in brass on top. AR, Always Ready as some people called me. Right now, Age Recession fit better because I felt like a little child standing in a foreign country's airport knowing and trusting no one.
After I got my suitcase, I left the airport and waited for a cab to take me the twenty blocks to my hotel. I paid the driver in American money which, to a British kid, is not even close to being familiar. I think the driver was only nice because I paid him too much. "So where you headed?" the driver asked.
"The Baja please," I replied to the cab driver's thick American accent.
"Will do,"
"Thanks." As I rode along, I kept thinking about the strange looking man I saw lurking in the dimly lit corner of the airport by the exit. He was wearing baggy blue jeans with an American Eagle sweatshirt and a backwards Red Sox hat. He looked like he wasn't much older than thirty. He was about 5 feet and 6 inches tall and well built, in a muscular way. He seemed to be waiting for someone by the way he was watching people walk past.
"Here you are," the driver said after the ten minute ride.
"Thanks again, bye," I said. As I walked up the short flight of stairs to the lobby of the Baja, I was having disturbing thoughts like, 'what if they don't let me get a room because of my age?' and 'what if I don't have enough money to pay for a room?' and the one that scared me the most 'what if MI6 finds me and wants me to work with them on some secret mission again?'
Okay I just have to remember that I'm on vacation and I shouldn't think about things like that. So what if MI6 wants me to work for them? I can always say no. Can't I?
I got to the check in desk in the main lobby of the Baja and asked the receptionist if I could have a room for a week.
"Aren't you a little young to be getting a room by yourself?" the receptionist asked rudely. She was in her fifties with short gray hair that frames her cat-eye glasses and round face. She was a short woman with a rough, scratchy voice that made me jump when I first heard it.
"No and aren't you a little old not to have manners?" the woman didn't have much to say after that.
"Okay would you like a room with a view of the pacific?"
"How much more does it cost than a regular room?"
"Twenty-five dollars more than a room with a view of a brick wall." I thought about it for a moment and decided that I'm on vacation so why not have a view of something I can't see in Chelsea?
"Okay I'll take the view of the Pacific please," I answered politely to the very impolite woman.
"Your total comes to eight-hundred, seventy-eight dollars." I handed over the money and I think I actually got the amount right this time. "Here's your room key. Don't lose it and leave it in the room on the table when you leave."
"Thank you, oh and if anyone comes looking for me, please tell them I'm not here. It's a long story so please don't ask," I told the woman, slipping a hundred dollar bill over the counter.
"Right, you're not here, got it."
I went over to the elevator and pressed the round yellow button with the number five on it. My room was four-hundred, eighty-seven. I heard the ding of the elevator arriving and stepped inside with another man. I studied him carefully and remembered him as the guy from the airport who stood alone in the corner.
"What floor you going to?" the man asked me.
"Five please," I reached out to press the button with the five on it again but the man slapped my hand away.
"You know, it's dangerous for a little kid like you to be wandering around by yourself."
"I'm not a little kid thank you and I'm not alone, my parents are upstairs," I said wishing this were true. The longing for my parents had gotten stronger the longer I was away from Chelsea.
"Why you got all your bags? Running away?"
"I'm not running away, we just got here and I forgot my suitcase down stairs," the elevator was moving surprisingly slow and was only at the third floor. If only it would go faster I could rid of this creep. Just as I was thinking this I felt a strong pain race through my head. I tried to scream but I couldn't make my voice go through the gag in my mouth. I fell to the floor just as I heard the ding of the elevator doors.
I awoke to the gentle pitter patter of rain on a metal roof. It was quiet in the room and pitch black. I had no idea how I hadn't gotten there or even where there was. I tried to sit up but found that my body was strapped to the table I had been sleeping on. I saw a quick shimmer of light and movement in the far corner of the room. "Hello? Where am I?"
"Ah, I see you have awakened finally. My name is Fredrick Rodriquez Junior but you can call me Freddy," the still invisible man said to me.
"What do you want with me? Why am I here? Let me go!"
"Ha! Silly boy, we are not going to just let you go just because you said so. No, no we need you Alex, you see, I will explain my plan to you since you won't be able to tell anyone about it considering your circumstances. I am going to put you in a submarine and launch you to the bottom of the Pacific Ocean where there is a humongous pit that has never been explored. You and a monkey will travel to the bottom of the pit and video tape everything you see and then travel back to the surface where I will be anxiously waiting for you. Does that make sense?"
"Not really. Why do you need me? Why do you need a monkey if you need me? Why do you want me to video tape the darkest pit under the ocean?" all these questions were coming out at once and I couldn't help it.
"I need you, Alex Rider, because you are an amazing agent for MI6 and I believe that you would be able to get past any obstacles you would encounter while you are on the trip and other reasons that I will get to shortly. I will need the monkey, um, to um, I don't really know why it just sounded like a good idea because monkeys go in space ships so they should probably go in submarines too. I want you to record the pit because marine biologists are giving a reward to anyone who dares to go down to the bottom of the pit. A reward of ten million dollars, Alex. That is a lot of money just to go down a dark hole. The only thing is that today is the last day to enter. Midnight is when it closes."
"So you still aren't explaining why you need me. Why don't you get someone else to do it like an adult?"
"Well Alex, if I had an adult, I wouldn't be able to pass them off as my son. Since you are under eighteen years old, you wouldn't be allowed to claim the reward so your parents or guardian would need to. Since you have none, it would be perfect for me to step up as your guardian. Don't you see? It's a perfect plan!"
"Um, I hate to burst your bubble but I have a guardian."
"Oh really? Do you see her here?"
"No she's back in England."
"I wouldn't be so sure of that. Guards, bring Miss Starbright in here."
"You kidnapped her too! No, let her go, I'll do it just let her go."
"Oh but wait Alex, there's more. Guards, bring in the girl." I couldn't take it. I knew who was going to come around the corner and I didn't want to have to reside to helplessness. I struggled not to look up but I did anyway. Sabina. The only other person who could have gotten me out of this when all else fails.
"Okay I'll do it just don't hurt them and you have to untie me first," I said with an idea coming to mind with the doubt of it working getting larger every passing second.
"Oh, I think we've hit a soft spot with Mr. Rider here. He'll do anything for his girls," Freddy was laughing so hard now that he was choking. "Oh and I should mention that if you don't go with my totally awesome plan, then I will make you watch me slowly and oh so very painfully kill your friends here then kill you the same way."
I looked at Jack and Sabina, who were both free of shackles but were surrounded by guards. I glanced around the room looking for anyway out. This man was stupid enough that if I was lucky, I might be able to find some way out. The room was small but large enough to fit two identical tables like the one I was on and several chairs. I studied the locks holding me to the table. They were rusty but when I shook my hand, it unlocked itself. Better keep that to myself for now.
"When do you plan on doing this Freddy?"
"As soon as we find a submarine. We are working on it now but eBay doesn't have many subs."
"Ok so when you do find a sub, where are you going to get a monkey?" I asked slightly mockingly.
"Well you remember when you set off a huge fire in the middle of the jungle in Australia? Well it took away many homes of innocent animals so a shelter came and collected most of the animals that weren't burned to death and put them in a huge hotel like place where you can visit them almost like zoo. I asked them if I could buy a monkey but unfortunately, they said no."
"So how did that help you get a monkey?"
"Oh right, I stole one!"
"You stole a monkey?"
"Yeah, guards bring in the monkey." The guards brought in a little brownish grayish monkey that had a name tag around its neck saying 'Hello, my name is Ed'. The tiny room was getting smaller and smaller with every new guard and victim that came in.
"You named the monkey Ed?"
"Yeah I think it fits him pretty well, don't you?"
"Sure,"
"Just let Alex and us go already! There are plenty of other people out there that you could use instead of him. You could go to an orphanage and get your own child. You don't need him!" Jack cried.
"Jack its okay I'll do it. So what if I make someone ten million dollars richer? I'll get it over with and then come back home. Its no big deal," I said trying to reassure her.
"Oh here you go again with your silliness. I'm not going to let you just return to your normal life after. If I did then when you turn eighteen you would be old enough to claim your reward so I would have to hand over the ten million dollars but, if I kill you and make it look like someone else did it, then I will be able to keep the money! Isn't it wonderful? I know it is spectacular so all I have to do is get a submarine, put you and Ed in it, retrieve the recording, then kill you without getting caught, and get rich. It won't be too hard." Okay so I started realizing this guy wasn't so stupid in his reasoning but he was stupid enough not to notice I had both my hands free and working on getting my feet out.
"Well I'm hungry so I'm going to go fetch myself some lunch. I shall see you later," the invisible man said to me. As he was walking out of the room, I caught a glimpse of baggy blue jeans and a red sox symbol on a hat.
When everyone had left the room I looked more carefully around to see if there was anything that could help me break out. The room was completely empty with only one window that was small and rectangular. There were no bars on it but it did have an old piece of glass covered in what looked like hundred year old cob webs. Freddy had taken my pocket knife but left me with my shoelaces and the zipper on my jacket. We might have been in California but it was cold.
If I could just get my feet unlocked then I could get out. The locks were very rusty but came apart with ease. There!
I got them out. Now I just need to take my laces out and tie one end around my zipper. The zipper can probably cut the glass and I can tie the other end of my laces to the hook next to the window. Yeah this Freddy guy, not exactly the sharpest tool in the shed. Then I can slide out the window and down the wall. Unless I'm below ground level. But then there wouldn't be a window so my plan should still be good.
About ten minutes later I was all ready to climb out. I had gotten the window out easily and my shoelaces were surprisingly long enough so I wouldn't have to jump far from the second story window. I was just getting ready to climb out when I heard the door knob wiggle. I quickly jumped back onto the table and lay down with my arms and legs in the locks but not locked.
"Alex, it's me, Sabina, I'm just supposed to be bringing you lunch but I wouldn't eat it if I were you," Sabina said to me. I had known Sabina for a while and we were good friends. She was wearing white jeans with a blue tee shirt and her hair was pulled back into a pony tail.
"Thankfully it's only you. I almost just jumped out the window. Where is that Freddy guy? How did he get you and Jack?"
"There's no time for that now. Freddy is waiting in the other room for me to come back. I'll talk to you soon though. Bye Alex and be careful." Then she was gone.
Back to the window. I climbed onto the window sill and looked down. "Well, here goes nothing," I thought as I jumped out the window. With my makeshift rope, I got down one story then had to jump the last. It was concrete under the window so falling would hurt. I looked to the left and right and saw the building's garden with a keep out sign. I had no other choice so I guess I had to take the risk of ticking off Freddy.
When I hit the ground, I twisted my ankle. I heard someone shouting above me. Looks as though they found an empty room.
"Alex Rider! Where are you? When I find you, you will rue the day when you unsuccessfully tried escaping me, the evil Fredrick Rodriquez Junior!" Freddy screamed from the second floor. Thank god for his stupidness not to look out the broken window. Now that they know I'm gone, I have better get going before they send search parties.
I looked up to see a clock tower in the distance and I could just barely make out the roman numerals on it. It said three thirty pm. That means I have eight and a half hours to stop Freddy of his evil plan and try not to get killed and save Sabina and Jack. Well so far, this is a very relaxing vacation.
I'll show him. He thinks he can just get away with running away. Ha! Well when I find him he is going to watch his friends die then he shall die," Freddy said to his head guard, Jason.
"Don't worry Mr. Rodriquez. We'll find him and torture him until his bones ache and burst and candy comes flowing out!" Jason exclaimed.
"You're going to torture him? I should torture you for thinking that! No, no, no, I will torture him until his bones ache and burst and candy comes flowing out!" Freddy corrected Jason, "Ha ha ha this is turning out to be a pretty fun day but we only have seven and three half hours to turn in our recording of the deepest, darkest pit in the world!"
I found a small gas station store on the corner of the street the building was on. I went inside and asked the cashier how to get to the Baja Hotel from here.
"If you continue north on this road then take a left, it is right there," the cashier named Geoffrey answered.
"Thanks," I said to Geoffrey. I walked north on this street which was called Izle Street. When I got to the end, I took a left onto Grand Road and saw the Baja. It was one of the fanciest hotels in the whole state of California. The joy was seeping through the pores in my face like sweat.
I went into the hotel and up the elevator that I had been knocked out in. I was relieved when no one else was in it. I went up to the seventh floor to try to get in my room. Hopefully I still have my key. I checked my pockets in my jeans and found my key and relief. The elevator was still slow and by the time I reached the fifth floor, five minutes had passed. "Next time I should take the stairs."
I went to room four eighty-seven and inserted my key. A little green light flicked on and the door swung open. I went inside the bright room to find my suitcase sitting on the large bed in the middle of the room. There were three windows and a long table that matched the brown comforter on the bed. There was a note on top of my suitcase that said:
Your suitcase has been searched and returned to you but a few items. You will notice these items include your pocket knife, your vitamins, and your cologne. If you want them back, you must return to my building by four o'clock tonight. Also be here if you ever want to see your friends again.
Your friend, Freddy
I couldn't understand why he would take my vitamins or my cologne but he was smart taking the pocket knife.
"Ha! Now if he ever wants to see his friends, vitamins, or cologne, he will have to return. My evil plan is working so well. Unless he… well lets not go there," Freddy had laughed to his evilly sleepy men. He had Jason go into my room to rummage through my things and leave the note from Freddy.
"Wait, I don't understand why we took his vitamins and deodorant?" Jason asked Freddy.
"Well, those are two things he needs. Vitamins to stay healthy and deodorant to stay smelling fresh. Without these, he loses part of himself in a way, kind of, I guess. I don't really know why we took them, we just did, okay?"
"You don't have to get angry; I was just asking a simple question, jeez."
"Yeah, you're right, I'm sorry."
"Wait a minute, bad guys aren't supposed to say they're sorry. Toughen up."
"Now that comment will get you killed if you say it again or anything like it."
As I tried to think of a plan to stall Freddy of his plan, I heard a knock on the door. I went and looked out the peephole to see Sabina. I slowly opened the door just in case it was a trap of Freddy's to get me back to go in the submarine.
"Alex I'm so glad I found you. I've been looking for what feels like hours. What…" Sabina was cut off by me grabbing her arm and pulling her into the room.
"How did you find me? How did you get away from Freddy? But most importantly, how did you find me?" I asked the questions that were bouncing around in my head but I couldn't speak them fast enough.
"First of all this is the only hotel around for miles and once I came in, I asked the receptionist where to find you and she said room four eighty-seven, fifth floor. I got away from them when they all fell asleep and Jack and I didn't have any hand cuffs or anything stopping us from leaving."
"So the receptionist seriously told you where I was?"
"Yeah and she seemed pretty excited to tell me too."
"I paid her one hundred dollars not to tell anyone I was here! I'm supposed to be on vacation!"
"Oh I'm sorry, do you want me to leave?"
"No, no, of course not it's just, never mind. Okay, help me figure out a way to stall Freddy for a few hours." I said, changing the subject.
We thought together for about an hour, dismissing ideas that we could not perform, so we only had seven hours left to waste. "I've got it! We could tie him to a chair and put him on the roof of the hotel." Sabina said.
"That could work; just it would look weird to carry a guy tied to a chair up into the hotel. We would need someway of getting him into the hotel first," I replied.
"We could tell him you are here then he would come on his own free will. Then once he is up here we could attack him then tie him up and put him up on the roof."
"I don't think I have any rope but I did bring duck tape. That should work. Okay, now just to tell him I'm here."
Ring ring ring. The phone in the lounge of the dark building where Freddy and his evil henchmen were napping was ringing and it startled them all.
"I'll get it," Jason told the rest of his group then to the phone, "Hello?... The Baja?... Okay then we'll be there."
"Who was that?" Freddy asked.
"Just some dude telling us that Alex Rider is at the Baja Hotel on Grand Road."
"What are we waiting for then? Let's go get him!" Freddy exclaimed.
"But, what if it's a trap?"
"Nonsense, we are going to get him now."
Back in the hotel, Sabina and I were anxiously waiting for Freddy and his gang to show up. The phone call was made by Sabina lowering her voice. It was a piece of cake to get the not-so-smart people to come to the hotel. "So you don't think a lot of them will come do you? If they do, we are in a lot of trouble. Two against possibly ten Alex, I don't think we could do that," Sabina cried.
"Yes but in brain size, we have a huge advantage over them," I said reassuringly.
"True. Oh! I hear footsteps and voices in the hall!"
"Shh!" I said just as the unlocked door started opening.
'Wait here' Freddy had told his men just minutes before. 'This won't take long.'
Now he was gone and his gang was left sitting in the air-conditioned lobby of the Baja.
"Alex? Where are you Alex? I know you're in here somewhere," Freddy had yelled in a child's voice.
"NOW!" I yelled to Sabina. We both knocked Freddy in the head with chairs from the table across the room.
"Good. Now he'll be out cold for a while so let's tie him up and get him on the roof," Sabina said to me. It took us about fifteen minutes to get Freddy's body into the chair and all tied up.
"I just hope we didn't kill him," Sabina said sounding very worried.
"He still has a pulse so that's a good thing. Okay on the count of three, pick him up. One…two…three!" As we picked him up, I realized he weighed much more than the 170 pounds I thought he was when I first saw him.
We got to the elevator and pressed the button with the picture of a roof on it and up we went.
"Where could he be? He's been gone for almost a half hour now. Should we go up?" Jason asked the rest of Freddy's men.
"No, he said under no circumstances were we allowed to leave this lobby. Alex is his to finish," another guard named James replied.
"Well then, I guess we wait," Jason sighed.
Sabina and I had gotten to the roof and with one last heave, managed to pick Freddy up to bring him the next ten feet to the middle of the roof. "I don't think he'll be able to go very far when he wakes up. We taped him pretty good." I noted.
"Yeah, maybe once he realizes what we are capable of, he will just give up on the whole submarine thing. Let's see, only six and a half hours left."
"Well if he sleeps long enough, he won't have enough time to get Ed and me to the ocean and have us go to the bottom."
"If he wakes up too early, we could always knock him out again," Sabina offered.
"That's true. We could. So now we have to wait up here for him to wake up."
"I have an idea about what we can do to him when he wakes up."
"What?"
"We could call the police and have them deal with him."
"That's a very good idea and I can't believe we didn't think of it before," I said.
"Should I go call them now?"
"Yeah, do you have your cell phone?"
"Yes," Sabina said to me then to the phone, "Hi I would like to report a kidnapping…" Sabina's voice faded when I heard the shouts from below.
"Look! There are kids on the roof!" one man had said.
"They're gonna jump!" said a woman. Just then Sabina had gotten off the phone and was now asking what all the yelling was about.
"The people down there think we are going to commit suicide."
"Oh wonderful, just what we need, a crowd," Sabina said sarcastically. "The police will be here shortly."
"Okay good." About five minutes later I heard sirens and saw red and blue flashing lights. After another minute, several police were on the roof asking Sabina and I questions about Freddy.
"So what exactly did he do?" the older looking police man, Joe said.
"He kidnapped us then was threatening to kill us," Sabina answered. After a few more minutes of questions, Freddy was being carried away. He was just starting to come around.
"I'm glad that's over but we still need to get Ed back to the shelter in Australia," I said.
"Um, my parents and I are going there on vacation next month so I could take him home with me and bring him when we go."
"That will work I guess. Does this mean you are leaving now?"
"Yes, my parents are probably worried sick about me although they more than likely know I'm with you."
"Yeah probably. Okay so I guess this is good bye then."
"Yeah, bye Alex and be careful, please, be careful."
"I will don't worry." I said as Sabina looked back once more as she headed for the elevator. Then she was gone. I didn't worry too much about not seeing her because I knew I would soon. I sat down on the warm concrete of the Baja's roof. Finally I got the vacation I had come for, but now, more than anything, I wanted to go home and see Jack. She was like the mother I never had (and the father). I checked my watch. Six hours left to enter the contest for ten million dollars. Well, I have to admit I am kind of disappointed that MI6 didn't show up and try to talk me into working for them. Just as I thought this, I heard the ding of the elevator doors opening, high heels clacking on the concrete, and the faint smell of peppermint.
"Alex?" the voice said. I turned around to see Mrs. Jones, the head of MI6, looking at me.
What did you all think? I personally really like the ending :D Did anyone find Freddy really annoying? That was my first intention! Mwahaha. Okay please review! Much appreciated! Thank you!