Whether Or Not You Believe All Those Lies
Kaleidoscope of Spies #3
[May 2001]
"Rider?"
"….is that Rider?"
"Looks like it."
"Did you hear, it was him who blew up the science block?"
"No—really?"
"Yeah. He's in some kind of gang or something, I heard."
"But he always seemed so…oh, I don't know…nice, I s'pose. Don't you remember when he took down those bullies a few years ago? They were picking on some younger kids, and Rider stepped in."
"Where do you think he learned all those fighting skills, then? Sort of thing you'd learn in a gang, innit?"
"No, he knows karate, you numbskull. My older cousin works at the place he used to go to. Black belt, Rider is."
"Well, maybe Rider's been taking drugs or something. Look at the circles under his eyes! He could be addicted, and trying to go clean. That might be why he's been so whacko recently, blowing up half the school and such."
"Maybe that's where he's been when he's gone so much! Could be rehab…."
Alex Rider finished collecting his books from his locker and swung his backpack on, heading towards his first class of the day and away from the gossiping group of kids in the hall. It was his first day back at school after the fight with his clone, when the science block had basically been destroyed. And the other students were already talking.
Only about the wrong things, though.
All the wrong things—anything and everything except the actual truth. MI6 had promised to make sure of that.
"They'll never find out that you're a spy, Alex," they had said.
And somehow, ever since his uncle's death and the Stormbreaker incident that had started everything, they had managed it.
Alex didn't know how. The official excuse was always that he had been ill.
Ill.
As if anyone was ill that much.
But all of the information checked out. He had doctor's notes for every 'affliction' that had come his way since March, and there was a number for the headmaster to call if he wanted details. The line was directed straight to an office at the Royal and General Bank, where someone would convince whoever called that Alex was telling the truth.
The headmaster, Mr. Bray, hadn't called yet, as far as Alex knew, but it was very possible that he might sooner or later. All the rumors flying around the school that he was in a gang, or a druggie, or a thief, or anything else, really…well, the headmaster was bound to hear about them at some point if he hadn't already.
Everyone was so taken in, Alex marveled. How did MI6 do it? Whatever they were doing to get the rumors going, it was working. Or, Alex considered, there was always a chance that it was just his peers' own conclusions and active imaginations at work, using whatever they saw as evidence, and then putting it to work in their gossip of the day.
Everyone believed something, though. Even Alex's closest friends, Tom Harris and James Hale, knew that something wasn't right. They were suspicious—but Alex didn't know what of.
And to tell the truth, he thought, he didn't want to.
He didn't want to hear how his best friends thought him a drug addict, or involved in gang warfare in his spare time.
The real truth of his life as a spy might sting, but at least he knew that no matter what Brookland believed, they were wrong, and they knew nothing at all.