A/N: This chapter is set before Alex begins to play the game, but it catches up to chapter one and goes on from there. I had to make it so MI6, K-Unit, and Jack all found out about Alex in the game.
(K-Unit's POV)
We looked everywhere for the missing unit, but to no avail. When we went to wake the kids up this morning, they weren't there and after checking around we realized they were nowhere in the camp. Now, we were scouting the forest looking for the idiotic children.
Fox cursed under his breath, "Where else can they be? We have checked everywhere!"
"I don't know, but it's growing dark. We need to report to the sargeant and tell him we can't find them." Eagle stated. For once, everybody knew that Eagle was right. Walking back to camp, K-Unit reported to the sargeant. He didn't say anything, just hung his head and looked at the phone.
"Looks like we have no other choice." The sargeant picked up the phone and dialed a number. It rang a few times before somebody answered. "This is the sargeant of SAS, put me through to Mr. Blunt." While he was on hold, he dismissed the confused unit. Why would the sargeant be calling MI6? How did those kids disappear? What was going to happen now? They walked back to the barracks and waited for the sargeant's orders.
(Jack's POV)
I had the television on watching a crime show that was so far pretty good. A bowl of ice cream was in my hand as I watched the show with interest. The phone started ringing and I sat the bowl of ice cream down before answering the phone. "Hello?"
"Jack Starbright, we need you to come to the bank right away to sign some documents. We will expect you here in fifteen minutes." Blunt. Anger traveled through me and I was very close to cussing him out, but I regained my composure.
"I'll be there in ten." I hung up the phone, turned off the television, grabbed my jacket and started to run to the 'bank'. It took me a little over ten minutes to get there, but if I drove or hailed a taxi, it would have taken a lot longer. I entered the lobby and met Mrs. Jones, waiting for me. She motioned for me to follow her onto an elevator. We went up a few floors before the door opened, freeing us from that confined space. I didn't bother asking her questions, because I knew she wouldn't answer; Blunt will be the one to tell me what's going on. We walked through his door and he was talking to a few men dressed in military uniforms. On their uniforms there was a a tab on the pocket labeled SAS. "What's happened to Alex?"
Blunt looked at me along with the SAS men. "Jack Starbright. These people are-"
"SAS, I know. Now tell me what happened to Alex." I replied, scared and worried. I just knew he was dead, but what was the SAS doing here? I looked into every one of their eyes and none of them revealed anything.
Blunt turned on one of the televisions in the room. "We need you to watch this." A man appeared on the screen, adressing all of it's viewers. "This is a worldwide broadcast." Blunt informed me as I continued watching.
The man, whose alias was Serpant, started talking. "This world holds many secrets, secrets I am about to reveal to those of you watching. I am from a terrorist organization called Scorpia, a group many has tried to annihilate. However, one person managed to cripple us for a few months. He is a spy for Military Intelligence, a student still in high school, a fourteen year old boy. His name is Alex Rider." A small clip appeared of Alex and a few of his classmates. "These boys were sent to Brecon Beacons, an SAS camp, for some 'experiance'. However, some Scorpia infiltrators managed to abduct them from the SAS by catching them all off guard in a patch of woodland. I must say that tranquilizers works wonderfully!" The man laughed before continuing. "Alex Rider has been on many missions for MI6, however he became a rogue agent on one of them. Damian Cray was a millionaire and also created the game Feathered Serpant. The game had features like no other game had; you could see the avatar's pain. Damian Cray was able to achieve this by using real people. There was a larger version of the game underneath and inside his own home. Alex Rider started to investigate Cray without MI6's consent. Therefore, Alex was captured and forced to play Feathered Serpant in reality. He didn't complete the game, but he did escape by deceiving the guards inside the game. Alex Rider later managed to kill Damian Cray and he thought he would never have to live through another game again. However, that's not going to happen. Scorpia has created another game; a sequel to Feathered Serpant. Alex Rider, teenage spy, will play and complete this game or die along the way. We have taken over the satellites all over the world and this will be broadcasted on every channel around the world. I hope you enjoy seeing Alex Rider die. To those of you who know Alex, remember these words; Scorpia never forgives, Scorpia never forgets." The screen went black for a moment before it showed Alex facing a set of iron gates. His face showed fear for a moment before he started to calm down again. He looked behind him and saw no way out, so he moved forward cautiously.
"What are you doing just sitting there in that stupid chair of yours? Send somebody in there to get him out of that game!" I yelled at Blunt, making some the SAS men flinch.
Blunt didn't even blink, "Jack. We would go in there and get him, but we have no clue where he is. The only thing we can hope for now is that he survives."
"That's not enough! He is just a kid! If you never blackmailed him, he wouldn't be in the situation he's in now. You have got him shot and injured many times! How many more times will he come home with all of those injuries and his emotional state steadily fading into madness? How many more times are you going to use him for your suicidal missions?" I yelled at Blunt, "Don't tell me it runs through his family because every one of his family is dead because of you!"
Blunt didn't say anything, he just watched the television carefully watching Alex's every move. I continued to watch too as Alex looked around him for any signs of danger. We all saw the floor start to fall before Alex did. Fear made my heart beat faster as I watched the floor fall close to Alex's feet. He looked down and saw the cracks in the floor, then started running. Then the ceiling started to fall. A camera zoomed in on Alex's face, a look of determination was raging like a fire in his eyes as he continued to run. When he looked up and saw chunks of the ceiling falling he focused on the way forward. By watching the shadows on the floor of the onjects above him, he was able to tell which way to dodge.
We all watched as he dodged to the left, just as the floor gave way. Alex fell with it for a heartbeat before grabbing the edge of a piece of the floor that was about to give way. He gritted his teeth and started to pull himself up. He got one foot on the floor, the other one still dangling over the edge, before it fell. Alex jumped just before it broke, landing on his side away from the ledge. He was up a few seconds later, running again. He made it to the doorway a the end of the hallway and jumped through it. He realized too late that there was no floor and he fell into it. The hole was huge and filled with needles and knives. Alex rolled all the way to the bottom with his arms protecting his head. A minute later he stood up with needles sticking out of his skin and a knife in his side. A pained expression was on his face, but he pulled out the knife and as many needles as he could. He took off his military uniform painfully and wrapped it around his side to slow the bleeding. He looked up at the sheer sheetrock walls. He held the knife in his hand and grinned before digging through the needles.
"What is he doing?" A SAS member asked.
Another one replied, "I'm assuming he's looking for another knife..."
"I know that, Eagle, but what's he going to do with it?"
Eagle shrugged, "I can't see into the future, Wolf."
We started to watch the television again as Alex found another knife. He walked up to the walls and stabbed one of the knives into the wall high above him. Then he jumped and stabbed the other one into the wall. Using this same motion, he climbed up the wall. When he was about fifteen feet up, the wall started shaking and crumbled away, making Alex loose his grip on the knives. He fell on his back in the needles and knives again. We could hear him curse, "I should have remembered that from the first time." He got up and tried to regain the breath that was knocked out of him. He looked around him again, searching for a way out, then looked back up at the wall. He found two more knives and started climbing to a hole where he had ben before. Boards ran along the wall behind the sheetrock and Alex grabbed onto one of them and tested it's weight. He looked to the right of him, down where the needles and knives were and we could see a door without a handle where he was looking. Then, he grabbed onto the board in the wall and started to climb down. We couldn't see him anymore and I hoped he was okay. A few minutes passed by before the camera changed to a hallway where a knife was jutting out of another sheetrock wall. It disappeared for a moment before it appeared again. Then, a foot slammed through the wall, making a larger hole. Once the hole was large enough, Alex crawled through it, blody, bruised and exhausted he sat down on the floor. He looked around to see if there was any surprises, but there was none. He had only been playing this game for about thiry five minutes now and I could tell he was ready to give up. Then, he got up and walked further before sliding down a wall into a sitting postion again. He put his head in his hands, a signal of defeat.
He stayed like that for a while before raising his head and looking at the torture devices with their blood-coating glistening in the torchlight. He took in a breath before getting up and started walking down the hallway again. He entered into another hallway and walked about halfway before he stopped abruptly. He looked to the wall as eight feet spikes appeared jutting out of the walls. Alex started running and I realized the spikes weren't moving yet, then they started moving at an accelerated speed. Alex continued to run, but the spikes continued to close in on its prey. The spikes started to scrape against his skin and he jumped out of range of the spikes; they closed completely a few seconds later. Alex laid there for a moment before getting up again. He looked at the spikes for a moment before turning around down another hallway. He still had both knives in his hand as he walked.
Tears filled my eyes at the sight of Alex, "Blunt. Please, you have to find him before he gets killed." Right now, on the television screen, Alex was no longer a teenager; he was a weapon. He wasn't the boy I used to know when he was seven or when he scraped his knee after wrecking his bicycle. Right now, he was independant, scary, and confident. He regained the strength to continue Scorpia's game and found the courage to beat them. As he walked down the hallway, I could see a plan forming in his head. I smiled for a moment, because I was sure of two things; his classmates will be safe and Alex Rider will not die.