Chapter 1: Breaking and Entering

Alex sighed. He was sitting in the office of a certain head of MI6 and yet again they wanted to use him. Well Alex was sick of it. There was nothing they could use against him now that Jack was dead. She'd been the only thing that had mattered to him for a long time. Then again, maybe a mission would be good for him. He had no one to come home to now, no reason to live. Either way he'd be forced to listen to Mrs. Jones speech on why he should do it and listen to her blackmail him in to eventually doing it. She did learn from the best after all. Blunt was even better than she was and Alex had felt relief at the announcement of his retirement.

"Alex?" A female voice said pulling him out of his thoughts. Alex shook his head, focusing again on the conversation at hand.

"Yeah. Sorry Mrs. Jones. Could you repeat that? I zoned out for a minute." She nodded.

"Very well. What I said was that we have another mission for you. We wanted to know if you'd be interested." Alex smiled grimly, the expression never quite reaching his eyes.

"Do I have a choice?" He asked sarcastically.

"You always have a choice," Mrs. Jones said very seriously. Alex nodded.

"What's the mission?" He asked. He watched Mrs. Jones eyes widen in surprise at how easily he gave in.

"We want you to take down Scorpia once and for all. There's a meeting in the United States soon. We believe that if we thwart their plan one more time, it could be their downfall for good. They'll disband and we can pick off whatever's left. However, you're going to need more than Smithers' gadgets to help you this time. We want you to have a partner. To get her, you'll need to infiltrate Gallagher Academy in Virginia and convince her to go. She's about your age. Her name is Cameroon Morgan. She has a team too. If they want to go that's fine but we need her for sure."

"Why can't you guys just phone over and have Joe send her to meet me?" Alex asked. "I assume she's CIA and therefore at his discretion." Mrs. Jones shook her head.

"It's not that easy. We aren't supposed to know she exists. We found out about the academy on accident at one of our meetings and I fear if they knew that we know, they'd assume we'd been spying on them, which wouldn't be good for our nations' friendship. Not to mention, she has a very overprotective mother with very good connections in the CIA. Her father died on a mission for them which could account for the overprotectiveness."

"So how am I going to convince her then?" Alex asked. Mrs. Jones shrugged.

"That's your problem. Your flight leaves in five hours. Go down to Smithers to get your materials and then head home and pack. You'll be landing in Virginia to recruit Ms. Morgan. You'll have 48 hours to do so and then you two need to get to California where the Scorpia meeting will take place. From there it's your job to find out what they're up to and stop it. We'll be on standby and will provide all the funds and alias'." Alex nodded and left for Smithers' office.

"Alex! Just the person I wanted to see!" Smithers exclaimed as Alex walked in.

"Hey Smithers," Alex said, genuinely smiling. Mr. Smithers had long since been one of Alex's only friends, certainly the only one at MI6.

"I've got some really great gadgets for you! For one, here's a watch!" Alex raised his eyebrows.

"What does it do?" He asked.

"Well it tells time of course!" Smithers said. He waited a minute to see how Alex would react and when he didn't Smithers sighed. "That was a joke Alex, lighten up a bit old chap. No need to be so serious all the time!" Alex shook his head smiling. "It will automatically change time for you depending on what timezone you're in. This little silver button on the side is also a one was radio. Press it and we'll be able to hear you or anyone within a couple yards from you. The down side is that we won't be able to communicate back, though it sends an alert to us every time you try to communicate so we make sure we'll have someone listening. Another thing it does is if you press the silver button on the other side, it disrupts any signal and cancels any listening devices near you until you turn it off. Downside to that is it also cancels our side so you can't use both buttons at once. Onto the next thing. Sunglasses! They, of course, function as regular sunglasses but when you tap this little button on the side, it will allow you to see any hidden weapons that someone might be concealing. Very helpful. Now these are fun!" Smithers exclaimed holding up two small packets.

"What are they?" Alex asked, taking them from him.

"These are a couple packets of expanding bubble gum. What you do is chew it for ten seconds and then stick it in any lock. It will expand until the lock breaks. Careful you don't swallow it though or it'll expand until it breaks your stomach." Alex nodded his understanding. He turned to leave but Smithers held him back.

"I have one last thing for you Alex. Your aliases. You'll be Alex Green and Cameroon will be your sister Cameroon Green. Should the rest of her team choose to come, a Rebecca Baxter will be Rebecca Hotchner, a Macey McHenry will be Macey Reed, and Elizabeth Sutton will be Elizabeth Heart. We figured since they're new to this, it might be easiest for them to keep their first names in their aliases. Besides Cameroon, all the others are your cousins. Finally, this credit card is unlimited. It's hooked up to an account that we'll make sure always has plenty of money in it. You'll need it for air fair in the United States. Since we didn't know how many people would be going, we didn't purchase your tickets for California so it's up to you to buy them and get there," Smithers informed him, handing him a packet of passports and IDs and a credit card. Alex nodded.

"Thanks for everything Smithers!" He exclaimed. Smithers smiled back.

"No problem. Just try not to get yourself killed alright! I know how dangerous those missions are no matter how much they say they aren't!" Alex grinned as he walked out. He reckoned Smithers was the only person alive that could make him smile anymore. He shrugged it off and headed for home he only had a few hours to pack and get to the airport.

Alex hurried down the terminal towards his flight. It would stop boarding any second but Alex always liked to board at the last minute instead of waiting around. There was less of a chance that someone would see you and follow you. He made it just in time. Giving the lady his ticket, he slipped on board as she closed the door. The plane took off and Alex relaxed into his seat. It landed in Virginia after about eight hours. It felt good to stretch his legs a bit. Alex would have loved to see the little town he had landed in but he had to get to Gallagher Academy. As he left the airport, he pressed the button on his watch.

"I'm in Virginia, on my way to the academy," he discretely said into it. Then he pressed the button again, turning off the comm unit. Mrs. Jones said he would have 48 hours to find Cameroon and convince her to help once he got to Virginia. Alex hailed a taxi and got in.

"Can you take me to a hotel just off the Gallagher Academy. I can't remember the name of it but I have a room there," Alex told the driver using a perfect American accent, just right for this part of the country.

"Yeah. No problem," the driver said. "I think I know which one you're talking about." Alex suffered the driver's constant questions about him for a twenty minute car ride. He answered as best he could using what his alias would say. Finally, he was dropped off at a hotel called the Red Stag. The Gallagher Academy was on a hill overlooking the small town. Alex smiled. Perfect. He thanked the driver and gave him a generous tip. Then he went inside and booked a room. He knew he wasn't going to be spending even one night but he did it anyway for appearances. Anyone following him would never know his true target was the school. Alex waited until midnight before jogging up the hill. When he got there, he was faced with a wall. He didn't know if he could climb it, especially in the dark so he walked around the perimeter slowly. He stopped as he saw what looked like a small tunnel, just big enough for him to walk through. Alex smiled and walked in. This was proving to be easier than he thought.

Up in her room, Liz woke to a soft beeping. She looked at her computer to see it flashing an alert. One of her alarms in the southeast secret entrance had been tripped. The alarm was specially designed so a rat or bug or something couldn't trip it. It had to be bigger, much bigger. She turned off the alarm and ran into Cammie and Bex's room, shaking them awake urgently.

"Cammie! Bex! Someone tripped the alarm at one of our secret entrances. Southeast one by the weeping willow by the looks of it!" She exclaimed. Cammie bolted upright, pulling on her clothes and motioning for Bex to do the same.

"It's probably just a rat!" Bex moaned sleepily. Cammie threw a pillow at her to wake her up.

"Bex you know only a person could set those things off!" She exclaimed, clearly exasperated. "We have to go check it out! Liz, go get Macey!"

"Already here!" Macey said bursting into the room. Liz explained the situation and Macey paled. "You don't think it could be the Circle do you?" She asked. Cammie shrugged.

"Either way, we've got to go see. Now hurry up!" Now that they were all fully clothed they raced down the halls, slowing as they reached the entrance to the respective tunnel. The statue that hid it slid open to reveal a boy. He paused and looked around before coming fully out. The girls glanced at each other. Who was this boy?

Alex emerged into the hallway of the Academy. He looked around. Nobody seemed to be around but he couldn't shake the feeling he was being watched. Alex slipped into the shadows and headed for the nearest staircase. Mrs. Jones had given him the layout of the building. He knew relatively where he had to go to find Cameroon Morgan. There was a sneeze and Alex whipped around, knowing for sure he wasn't alone now.

"Who's there?" He whispered to the shadows. When he didn't get a reply he shrugged, pretending to think he imagined it or something. Then, at the last possible second he whirled around and caught the fist of a girl. She was pretty with dirty blonde hair and blue eyes. However, she was attacking him. He maneuvered her arm quickly, slipping behind her and sweeping her legs out from under her. Then he dodged another blow from a pretty bleach blonde girl who was clearly not as good as the first and she landed on top of the other girl. He blinked, staggering backward slightly as a punch from a red head connected with his jaw.

"Nice punch!" He complemented taking her in. She was very stylish and seemed to dress in all designer wear. "You must be Macey. That means the bleach blonde is Elizabeth and the dirty blonde is Cameroon Morgan. Just the person I needed to talk to. Wait a minute," he paused. "Where's Rebecca?" There was a soft thud as a heavy club from one of the displays hit his head. Alex's eyes rolled back into his head and he sank to the floor unconscious.

The girls stared, as Bex was revealed, standing behind the boy with the offending weapon. She put it back.

"Bex!" Cameroon exclaimed. The girl shrugged.

"What? He was creeping me out!" She said. "How do you think he knew all our names?" Macey shrugged.

"I have no idea but I think now is an ideal time to tell your mom about all of this!" She said. Cameroon nodded and ran off to get her mom while the other three babysat to make sure he wouldn't wake up and disappear on them.

A/N: Hey everyone! I promise I'm still writing Never Play Dead but I've had this idea going for a while and I wanted to post it and see what you guys think. I only rated this M because there is occasional swearing and also so I wouldn't have to worry about what happens in later chapters since I'm not a hundred percent sure where this is going. Please read and review. I love hearing feedback, especially if it's constructive criticism. If you are a guest and don't have an account, you can still leave reviews. If you leave a name I will acknowledge you after the Author's Note at the end of the chapter after you reviewed. Thanks for reading guys! Hope you liked it!