AN: Hey everyone! I know I already updated once today but this was begging to get out so here it is! Enjoy!
Panther took his time starting to talk, the rest of his unit didn't mind too much, they were well used to this, whenever he needed to say something important he either spat it out quickly and sarcastically or took ages to form even one word. So they just walked along with him in companionable silence waiting for him to get his thoughts squared away.
"I didn't mean to tell you like this." He finally said, looking exhausted, "Who I am-"
Owl rolled his eyes, "We already knew who you were idiot, Panther, our teammate. Just because your real name isn't Ian doesn't mean you're not Panther."
Lemur nodded agreeably, "You're a moron sometimes you know that Pan?"
Panther shot him a half hearted glare, but he was obviously too pleased for it to have any real sting, "I mean who I was before I came here, how old I am-"
Falcon grinned, "I honestly don't care, all this means is that we have ten times more bragging rights over the other units." He saw the threatening glare on Panther's face and back tracked, "If you ever want to tell them that is."
Panther nodded looking satisfied, "What I'm trying to say is that I wanted to tell you in my own time, not because my old unit and mission partner showed up out of no where and I owed them answers."
Owl looked at him searchingly, "Why would when you tell us matter? You could have told us fifty years from now when we're all old and grey and everyone but Lemur's settled down-"
"Hey!" Lemur yelped indignantly, "What's that supposed to mean?"
Owl patted him on the shoulder consolingly, "Only that you are completely incapable of having longer than a one night stand relationship. Perhaps you whould see someone about that? I've heard there are some very good shrinks around-"
Lemur suddenly leapt forward with no warning, taking Owl down to the ground with them, both of them rolling about, fighting for the upper hand, "Take it back!" Lemur howled, "I'll have you know I've been seeing a girl seriously for the past-" He stopped himself mid sentence, mentally kicking himself.
The rest of his unit had frozen and were staring at him, jaws slightly open- Panther closed his mouth and opened it again, bearing an uncanny resembelence to a fish. "You...have a serious girlfriend?"
Lemur pouted, "Why is that so hard to believe?"
They all looked at him flatly and he grumbled a bit, "Just because I'm better at picking up girls than the rest of you doesn't mean that I'm incapable-"
"Lemur the longest you've ever held a relationship was five days and it ended with you running back into our flat dripping wet with a handprint on your face." Falcon half laughed, still trying to figure out if his team mate was joking or not.
"Hey, Maureen was crazy you know that!" He cried, "She shouldn't even count! And maybe I was traumatized after her, you ever think of that?"
They all continued staring for a moment, then it finally caught up to them and they fell to the ground, howling in laughter.
"Hey! Hey! This isn't funny! This isn't funny at all! You're all terrible, horrible team mates who are incapable of feeling mercy or compassion!" Lemur yowled, giving Owl a half hearted kick to the ribs which only made him laugh more.
"You know what, you guys suck!" He said with a pout, "Like a bunch of five year olds-"
Panther finally managed to get up, tears of mirth streaming from his eyes, "Honestly Lemur? This coming from the man who still enjoys finger painting!"
"I will have you know that it's very relaxing and creative!" He objected, glaring as they all dissolved into laughter again.
"Oh my god Lemur, I love you." Owl gasped, clutching his ribs and sitting up, leaning against Falcon in exhaustion, "Seriously though Pan, we don't care so stop all the freak attacks I'm sure you're planning in your head about how you're horrible for not telling us or that you're too dangerous to be around us or some other dramatic crap. You're Panther. That's enough for us."
Panther grinned happily, feeling lighter than he had all day, "Good. I honestly don't think I could handle any more dramatics today, I might explode."
Falcon nodded empathetically, "I hear you. Oh and Pan, Lemur?"
He looked up, suddenly feeling very aprehensive and out of the corner of his eye he saw Lemur react almost the same way.
"We'll talk about that...thing...when you're ready, don't feel rushed okay?"
They nodded in relief, then looked back towards the cabin where Ben was standing just outside the door watching them calmly.
"We should head back shouldn't we?" Owl asked, looking towards Falcon for a decision.
Falcon deliberated for a moment, "Nah. They've waited this long they can wait a little bit longer. Come on guys, let's go watch J-Unit go over the assault course, I hear that Rat can't get over the second the trip wire and keeps eating it face first into the mud."
The rest of them snorted in amusement and stood up, slowly making their way towards the assault course, stopping occasionally to throw a light hearted punch or kick in the direction of one of their other teammates, only barely aware that they were being watched by the unit they were leaving behind.
It was an unseasonably sunny day in London, but it didn't seem to penetrate the walls of the Royal and General Bank. The few offices that actually had windows belonged to either low level agents or those high enough on the food chain to throw a fit about the lack of windows and not get fired from it. Alan Blunt didn't really care too much when his higher level agents moved into their new offices with smug looks on their faces, anticipating not feeling clausterphobic all the time. After all, the no windows rule was meant to guard against snipers, if they showed such a blatent wish to be assasinated, who was he to stop them?
All in all Alan Blunt was having a very pleasant day; a covert operation in the Philipines had yielded good results and the threat to national security would be dispensed of as soon as he could find a suitable agent. Of course usually he would consider only two people for the job- Ben Daniels or Alex Rider- but due to unfortunate circumstances beyond his control, Daniels had sustained multiple wounds that left him unable to preform at peak levels for another month, and Rider had been killed almost a year before. To an extent anyway.
Alan almost laughed to himself as he thought about how the boy honestly believed they didn't know about his Machiavellian Manuevre, they were MI6 nothing slipped by them. At this very moment they had enough cameras on the fool that he couldn't sneeze without at least three agents or analysists knowing. It would have been easy to drag him back to headquarters as soon as he was stable, but Alan had seen an advantage and decided to take it.
Before his "death" Rider had been growing tired, almost catonic when not in the middle of a situation where action was needed. The boy had been quite good at hiding it from the SAS unit he had moved in with and Alan had felt something akin to pride as he watched the boy's deception grow; he truly had turned into a spectacular agent, perhaps the best they had ever had. But the problem was that when agents lose the will to live it's not something that can be fixed with a few quick visits to a shrink and a bit of vacation time to spend with their family. When an agent loses the will to live they simply stop living, as quickly and efficiently as possible.
Alan had searched for a solution to this for quite some time, Rider's former guardian had been killed, the Harris boy was distanced as soon as he realized the true risks that being a friend to a known MI6 operative presented, and although the boy seemed genuinely happy and safe with the SAS unit it didn't seem to be enough that he would only see them for periods of a week or two at a time with his missions and their deployments to consider.
He had been considering forcing the unit to take enough leave to fix the boy when Rider found his chance in the way only a Rider could. He succeeded in getting himself captured with a tracker and a recording device implanted into his arm and annoyed them long enough to get them to reveal pertinent information to him. The fact that Rider was being tortured was unfortunate and unsavory but with the steady flow of information Alan found his choice to be rather simple- Rider had made his own decision and while unfortunate his death had been unavoidable for quite some time.
It had been a bit of a chore keeping the whole affair from Daniels who was unreasonably protective of his partner in Alan's opinion. The man would have found a way to put a stop to it immediatly which Alan simply couldn't allow to happen, after all, what was the life of one when the lives of many are at stake?
Rider's survival had been a pleasant surprise, as was the news of Sergeant Wyss taking the boy in. The man had helped a number of his soldiers recover from Post Traumatic Stress Disorder, perhaps after a few weeks recuperating with Wyss Rider would be sufficiently prepared to resume active status. Then suddenly he had a new name, Ian Johnson (did they expect that to fool anyone? Ian Johnson? Just how stupid were they?) and a new unit that seemed almost obsessive about curing him of his depression. Alan let it happen for a while, he thought it would be amusing to see just what three young soldiers could come up with that legions of therapists and doctors hadn't. But to his amazement, Rider started to show signs of improvement until he was almost unrecognizable as the agent who had wandered around in an almost pathetic haze a few months before.
So Alan had watched his recovery with interest, found the smallest ways each member of the unit could be...convinced to see things his way and as Rider slowly allowed himself to become attached to the men. Alan definately approved, not only would it keep Rider alive and human, it never hurt to give his agents a bit more...incentive to do their jobs properly and promptly.
Alan looked down at the file in his hands one more time and called in his secretary and instructed her to ready a helicopter for him and a few agents to be ready in three hours time. She gave him a brisk nod and walked out the door, the picture of efficiency; Alan smirked, if his secretary's work was up to it's normal standards the helicopter would be ready at least half an hour early. Alex Rider could run and hide all he liked but Alan always knew exactly where to find him and which buttons to push until the boy conformed to his way of seeing things; it had been the same way with his uncle and his father, the Rider men had a sense of duty and family ingrained in them that no other could match.
Alex had been slightly out of his reach for a short while but now Alan wanted him back. And what Alan Blunt, head of MI6 wanted, he got.