I've finally gotten around and sat up on my lazy butt, grabbed the laptop, and began to rewrite this story. I'm sorry you had to wait, I'm sorry you got crap chapters, and I'm sorry for being a bad writer while you are being supportive. Thank you. A few quick changes- I will be putting most things in American style, and you won't see a lot of things like pounds in this because I am American, and I will do my best. However, I did have help and will try to fix it. If you are reading and spot something that is not as... British/English, I'm sorry, so please tell me and I will correct that.

Disclaimer for the entire story: I, Achieving Elysium, solemnly swear that I am up to no good. Just kidding, I do not own Alex Rider nor the quote that reveals the Marauder's Map.


dedicated to my readers, who have supported me from the start

Classified


AS usual, Alex was having a not-so-good day. Shoving some more people out of his way, he rubbed his temples, trying to get used to the crowded place and loud noise. Of course, this bad day wasn't as bad as some of the others he had had, but the teenager in him griped and groaned about having to deal with hell on Earth. Apparently, to teens such as fifteen-year old boy, hell on Earthwas school, not Brecon Beacons. But then again, Alex Rider was no normal teen. In fact, Alex Rider was a spy-someone not used to environments such as a noisy, smelly school hallway.

And then it came up that Alex Rider was indeed back in school.

Which actually meant that there were some kids who'd known him staring, whispering, and pointing at him, and they were seriously pissing him off. He wanted so bloody badly to go around and see if they enjoyed a good chuck in the nose, but Alex was pretty sure he would get expelled for that. All he had wanted that day was to slip in, blend with the crowd, and find his footing between two completely whacked up worlds. He should've known better though. This was Brookland, filled with the most annoying kids on Earth, which was probably why teachers called it hell on Earth. Alex couldn't decide which was worse-the world of angry sergeants and the military, or the halls and classrooms of Brookland. He was slowly leaning towards the latter.

All in all, Alex's day continued to get worse. Ducking his head to avoid the stares, he swiftly walked towards Room 206, where he would have Biology with Mr. Donovan, someone he hadn't seen since... He didn't actually remember. Shoving through the mass of people, he spotted the back of his mate's head, Tom.

"Tom!" He yelled, his voice almost getting lost in the loud chattering. "Tom! Mate, wait up!" Only a few glances were thrown his way, for it was not unusual for there to be yelling in the halls. He walked faster, trying hard not to run, and poked Tom's back with a pencil he hadn't noticed clenched in his hand. His best mate whirled around, letting out a yell of anger, then letting out a yell of surprise when he saw Alex.

"Bloody hell!" Tom roared as the two headed for the classroom. "It's been such a long time, Alex! I thought I would never see you walking the halls of our wonderful school again."

Alex groaned. "And your thoughts might be correct if the rest of the day is like this. " He made a face. "Mate, I think Brecon Beacons might be better than this dump." Tom was suddenly interested.

"You mean that place you went at the start of your, er, career?" Alex laughed bitterly at the word career but nodded in agreement.

"Yeah," he muttered. "School's even worse, I believe."

Tom just sighed. "I think you've gotten that right, mate. Now come on, Mr. Donovan's not known for his acceptance of late students." He imitated Donovan's annoying, higher-pitched voice. "Alex, I thought better of you. Tom, I still expected you to be late. Oh my, it is Alex! Oh my!" Alex chuckled softly, something he hadn't known he'd been able to do, and grabbed his friend's arm.

The moment the two boys walked into class, chaos erupted. Chatter, stares, snickers... They were all here. Mr. Donovan, the short, stout man still as chubby as he remembered, snatched at his round glasses, his pudgy fingers feeling along the top of the desk. He fit the glasses onto his nose and simply stared, open mouthed, at Alex. He sighed, a bit self-conscious, and picked at a thread on his shirt. He quickly made an effort to collect himself.

"Ah, looks like you've finally showed up for class. For a second, I thought someone by the name of Alex Rider had shown up." Snickers were heard around the room as Alex and Tom headed to the two empty seats in the back. He slung off the backpack, grabbed a sheet of paper and a pencil, trying to drown in the droning of a teacher's voice.

Unfortunately for him, he had taken a five-month break before heading back to school, and in that time, he had studied, played video games, and stayed on alert. That also meant after long, sleepless nights of trying to catch up, he had gone a little overboard with the semester and studied what Donovan was teaching now.

"-ductless organs that secrete hormones directly into either the bloodstream or into extra cellular fluids-" Tom passed him a note.

Boring as hell. You ready for this day to end? :P

Alex rolled his eyes at the smiley face at the edge of the paper and wrote back:

Hell yeah. Who isn't?

Tom furiously began to scribble, Alex having no clue what he was doing, when Donovan called on him and asked a question on some cell.

The sleepless nights suddenly weren't so bad as Alex answered, "Steroid hormones." He calmly bowed his head and began to doodle a cartoon of Donovan on his blank paper. Wadded up paper was thrown at him when Donovan's back was turned. He instinctively caught it and unrolled the crumpled sheet. On it was a single word:

Druggy.

He looked up to see a face he didn't recognize smirking at him. He quickly wrote his answer and threw it back, careful not to alert Donovan. He'd replied with:

Arse.

The boy glared. He simply smirked, inwardly laughing at Alex beating him at his own game. Tom passed him the note with raised eyebrows.

Where have you been? :( What did Hatstand (boy who threw note) tell you? BTW, five more minutes and we're out of here. YES! :D

He grinned at the five more minutes part. Glancing at his MI6 watch, he noticed it was indeed five minutes until dismissal from Biology. He looked at Tom, who was looking at him, and mouthed Tell you later. Tom made a face and sighed. Alex stuck his tongue out, which felt good to do, and Tom laughed loudly. Donovan turned, about to scold him, when the bell rang. The boys cheered and jumped up, shoving all stuff into their packs and ran out the door. They met up and high-fived, Alex dropping his doodle at the top of the trash can, placed so when Donovan was ready to bring the garbage to the front, he would see a picture of himself, head enlarged, face tomato red. Alex grinned at the thought of his teacher's face when seeing the drawing.

"Alex, wait!" He heard the middle-aged teacher shout. Alex grabbed Tom's wrist and began to drag him through the crowd. Tom yelled some non-coherent things at him as Alex dragged him further and further through the crowd, desperately trying to avoid the bombard of questions.

"Alex!" he heard again, and he tried to 'go with the flow,' as people would say. This wasn't very hard-it was time for lunch, and there were people milling in the halls, talking, laughing, and just getting ready for some free time where they could sit down and talk to friends. He finally dragged Tom to an empty table in the corner, where a panting, red-faced Tom tried to glare at him, but it didn't work as Alex was too busy laughing at his mate's current state.

"Mate," Tom panted. "You're almost my brother, and I get that-" Pant. Pant. "-but was it really necessary-" He grabbed some water. "-to drag me to lunch? You know how tiring this can be?" He threw his hands up dramatically and mock-glared at Alex. Alex just laughed.

"I thought you were pretty fit, Tom," he said coolly. "Aren't you on the football team?"

"Yeah, so?" came the reply. "Exercise is not being dragged through the halls, Alex!" He then proceeded to grab a sandwich, and still mad, threw one at Alex. He caught it, unwrapping the plastic, and pretended to ignore the fact that Tom was probably pissed at his reflexes.

"I hate you," Tom mumbled between bites of sandwich. Alex just nudged his friend, and somehow lunch turned into a nudging fight between bites of ham and cheese. Maybe there was hope for an okay rest-of-the-day.

He proceeded to groan as the minutes dragged by; the teacher didn't notice him seeing as the rest of the class was groaning, too. Not even a day in and Alex already had to do a research project on one of the bloody American wars? America, he admitted, was nice, but the fact that he had to do a research paper on somewhere he wasn't about to go sucked. Hearing the rest of the class, he knew they would agree, too.

Then a scream cut through the noise as easily as butter.

The familiar sound of shattering glass jolted Alex out of a daze, where he had panicked and shut down for a moment. Gruff yelling, gunshots, and screams were heard all around. The new teacher, Miss Dearling or whatever, was yelling at them to move out through the exit door. In the chaos, Alex turned his back on the terrified class and began to run in the other direction.


1, 765 words. I hope you're pleased with me. To my old readers: Thank you for the support, information, and help. I'm sorry-There was no excuse for my sloppy writing. I hope you guys liked the new replacement chapters one, two, and three. When I started this fanfiction, I got reckless. I was sloppy, not caring very much, soaking up the attention like a cat in the sun. Sorry I put you through this; Sorry I had you wait. I was out of whack in the Alex Rider fandom. Speaking of things, did you guys hear? I am fangirling so hard right now- There is a tenth book coming out in the US, Russian Roulette, on Oct. 1, 2013. That's in a few months. In the UK, it will release on Sept. 12, 2013.

I am freaking out about that. I just found out.

Anyway, it involves something with Yassen Gregovitch, the assassin himself. Apparently Alex hates him for killing his uncle. And yes, Yassen will be in this fanfiction, and no, Alex and Yassen will not try to strangle each other. I want to cry because I always thought Yassen and Alex as these kind-of close people, not very, but they hold on to each other because of John Rider.

Oh yeah, I changed my pen name a long time ago-it was wuzzlerox.

Achieving Elysium