Who remembers?
The car. A Mercedes, driving a fourteen-year-old to Cornwall. Driving a spy, a veteran and hero to be, towards his first step of the journey. The journey, ended on the tenth mission. The return to how it all began...
It was picturesque. Port Tallon. The sea spread to a wide horizon. The fishing boats set sail across it. And those that sat at home, waited for their return, strolled maybe, to the library, perhaps, where waited books on the history of the tin mines, shelf CL. Or maybe they sat in the beer garden of the Fisherman's Arms, visible as dots to the congregation on the hillside.
There had been a complex there, and a manufacturing line, and computers and deadly viruses. There had been a runway, a fish tank, a Man-o'-War. A man with a smile, a woman with a bun, a man with money and a grudge.
An assassin with a gun. Or several.
But now, all traces were gone, buried. All but the one car.
It was old now, it had been left in the wind too long. The sleek black paint had rusted and peeled in just two short years unattended. The seats had been stolen by some daring youngsters, but nobody minded. They weren't needed. All that was needed was the number plate's identification, and the knowledge that, yes, it was the car that started the journey.
Some said the journey started in a bank, or at a training camp, but it had reached the point of no return in this car, so this car was the one. No-one could be bothered to argue. Arguing was pointless now.
And the one for whom the journey had ended. The side doors of the car were open, and the coffin rested next to it, on a table. The coffin was closed; the face, that they all knew had seen far too much, and was at last disfigured by the bullet that ended him, needed no more tears shed over it.
There were many at the gathering, not all expected. Grey people in grey suits, overseeing the proceedings as might be expected. An out-of-place Unit, containing a solemn leader and a returned deserter, the latter of which seemed volatile with confusion and sorrow. A girl, black-haired, and her parents, she sobbing openly, they looking on in grief. A boy, short, short black hair, with a football under one arm, who wore a scowl with pride as he glared at those in grey.
A knight, a supermarket chain owner, with his daughter, who liked horses a lot less now. A group of boys, rich people's sons, saved by the one they grieve. A sad-faced American governmental agency boss. A "fat" man, wishing he'd invented that one, better gadget that could have saved the life. A man that had once fired a near-fatal shot, come now to beg forgiveness when free from his overseers. A dead rich man's son, bidding farewell to the boy he shared a hospital with. A female American agent who talked about monkeys and rockets and space, once. An Australian Governmental head. An American agent once involved in a raid on a desert stronghold. And a young man, in his twenties, assigned older brother before his charge's death.
There were no speeches, no talking. At the allotted time, the coffin was quietly slotted into the old car. Both past their time, past their prime. On the roof was carved a message:
Once, this car sneered at speed limits.
Once, the boy within did, too.
That's why we love him.
The car was pushed forwards, by the Unit, towards the prepared hole. There was a setup there, to lower the car in, the same setup that had once helped lower another car with the boy in into a compressor. STRYKER AND SONS, read the label on the side.
The Unit member, the agent, made a mistake with the apparatus, or maybe the apparatus broke free from its responsibility. The car slid into the hole, unbalanced. It landed on the diagonal at the bottom, six feet under. The boot had snapped open, sticking straight up. The coffin could be seen to be leaning to one side within the car, against the doors.
They buried it like that, foregoing the headstone and carving messages on the upright boot panel instead. They knew he wouldn't mind; he lived life trapped at strange angles and he made the most of it. Why not the same in death?
Out of the ground, the memorial said this:
Here lies Alex Rider,
In the metaphorical car crash his life has become,
In the very same car In which that process begun.
To any traveller,
You won't know his name,
But if he could see your face He'd be laughing again.
Do you remember,
How good he could have been?
Had he not lived in Everyone else's dream?
Not too young to die,
But too tough to go alone.
Not unsympathetic,
But that could be undone.
He was always gracious,
He tried to keep giving.
If only he'd said no He would still be living.
And the congregation placed flowers on the grave. Most had chosen white roses, or flowers of the same colour. The boy with the football had a slight sarcastic grin on his face as he placed the hot pink rose on the marker. The group of boys had bunched together for a massive wreath. The Unit member and agent, casting a glare at the most prominent woman in grey, placed a black tulip to the side of the bunch. The woman in grey herself, however, placed a poppy, inciting recognition from the Unit member.
But perhaps the most telling, the most fitting, was the girl. Her parents in the background, as the others had all silently moved away and were looking to her, she drew a single, wrapped flower from a bag. She placed the stiff stalk of the genetically modified, blood red daffodil, that seemed both beautiful and like something that never should have happened all at once, in the direct centre of the group. And then, as they wondered of the symbolism and significance, she scattered the seeds of the same plant around the general area, particularly the grave site.
Then, she wept.
The flowers would grow, in time, and spread over most of Cornwall, even reaching a discreet little bay where once a wave had been ridden and a jet ski dodged, and a fourteen-year-old saved by mouth-to-mouth. But they would always be at their most plentiful in those quiet hills above Port Tallon.