A/N: Thank you to everyone who followed, favorited, and/or reviewed the story since the last chapter! It makes me so happy and motivated to know that there are people who actually want to read my story!
aniseed flower: Thank you for a second, long review! I'm glad that my logic about the dark spot makes sense. And it's okay if you act like you're 12! No matter what age, it's always nice to get some acknowledgment. :) About Jones manipulating Alex in the books, I agree that she would get more out of him by treating him as a person. We can already see the difference between Alex's relationship with Blunt (much more cold and antagonistic) vs. with Jones (more open to talking). I'd hope that Jones is smart enough to recognize that in the next book. And yes, Alex does get into enough difficult situations without any help! If you've ever read some of the AR short stories that Anthony Horowitz has written, I find it quite funny how Alex manages to just stumble across major crimes that make it to every news station while he's out trying to just live his life.
Oriande Moonshadow: Thank you for the review! When I was writing the legal emancipation part, I wasn't sure if it was a good idea so I'm glad someone likes it!
So far, it seems like I'm taking about two weeks to update most of my chapters. This chapter took longer than I anticipated to write but it's longer so I hope that makes up for the extra week it took to update. Anyways, I hope you all enjoy it!
Snake growled as he was pulled from his sleep at 0400 hours for the second time in as many days. Someone had just thrown their heavy boot at him. Blearily glaring at the offending object, he heard someone struggling in their sleep. Cub. Sighing, he realized that Wolf had thrown the boot to wake him up faster. It had been decided last night that he was the best person to deal with Cub's nightmares the next time it happened. Besides, there was a reason that he was the unit medic. Rubbing his eyes, Snake sat up to look at the source of his disturbed rest. Instantly, he was on his feet. Wolf really hadn't been exaggerating when he had described the results of Cub's nightmares. Hesitantly, Snake reached out a hand to shake the boy's shoulder. And froze. Not because Cub's reaction had startled him. Wolf had given him plenty of warning to prepare him for the boy's behavior. Rather, it was because he didn't want to make any movements to disorient the boy further.
"Snake?" Cub whispered hoarsely, panting as he slowly started to recognize his surroundings.
"Yeah," he whispered back.
"Sorry to wake you," Cub said quietly, eyes downcast.
"It's fine," Snake assured the boy. "Was it the same as last night?"
"No."
"Do you want to talk about it?" Cub shook his head. He studied the boy, trying to think of what might prevent Cub from wanting to talk about his problems. Didn't all teens complain about how horrible their life was? Then again, he had never once heard the boy complain. Not even when Wolf took his foulest temper out on the boy during the most miserable of training exercises. Finally, Snake advised on the only thing he could think of. "Everyone has nightmares, Cub. Even soldiers. There's no shame in having them. It helps to talk about it."
Cub gave him an amused look. "I'm not ashamed."
"Then, why don't you talk about it?" Snake asked confusedly.
"Because it's personal," Cub replied. "And complicated. Classified too."
Snake sighed. Everything came back to trust and clearance level. They had really messed up the first time. Now, he couldn't even help the boy by getting him to talk. Maybe he could still help some other way. Hopefully. "Creating a routine before going to bed might reduce the frequency of the nightmares."
"I'll keep that in mind," Cub said, getting up from the bed. "I'm going to go take a shower."
"Alright. Don't be out too long. Sarge will hand out punishment duty to the whole unit if he catches you."
Alex nodded and stiffly left the hut. Like the night before, he took his shower before heading into the forest for his combat breathing and meditations. An hour later, he was chilled to the bone but much calmer. He moved on to stretching, trying to relieve the soreness of his muscles from the tests. When he felt like he had done enough, Alex jogged back to the hut, joining K-Unit on their way to the mess hall.
"Cubby!" Eagle exclaimed, trying to ruffle Alex's hair. He dodged the soldier's attempt. "Where have you been?"
"Around."
"You don't go back to sleep after waking up from the nightmares, do you?" Snake asked, narrowing his eyes. Alex shook his head. "That's going to be a problem. The training is already exhausting enough and cuts back on sleep." He ignored Alex's sarcastically pointed look that told him it was obvious and to get on with it. "You need to let someone help you with this. If it doesn't get any better, I'm going to have to request a psychological assessment for you."
"I'm fine, Snake," Alex sighed as they entered the mess hall, flashing the kitchen staff a quick smile in greeting when they stood in line to get their food. "I can get it under control." At least he hoped so. He still wasn't sure why the nightmares had come back in full force, even with the meditations.
"You better," Snake said sternly.
"Or Snakey is gonna make your treatment really hard," Eagle sang as they joined the other two units at the table.
"Who's injured?" Otter asked, having only heard Eagle's comment and assumed it was something that needed physical medical attention.
"No one," Wolf growled.
"Just Cub having really bad nightmares," Badger chipped in.
B-Unit snorted derisively. "How bad can a spoiled, rich brat's nightmares be?" Lion spat scornfully. "Your fear of the dark keeping you awake, Double-o-nothing?" The soldier's unit laughed.
"Afraid of becoming a king predator," Alex shot back. It took a few moments for everyone to catch on to what he was implying. When they did, J-Unit and K-Unit widened their eyes, choking back their laughter, while B-Unit grew steadily redder in the face.
"You little - " Lion snarled, lunging at Alex.
"Enough," Tiger commanded, pulling Lion back down into his seat. "Give Cub a break, will you? We've got a tight enough schedule as it is."
Lion scowled but let it go for now and his unit did the same, leaving everyone to finish breakfast in silence as they were still too tired to do much more than eat. Alex knew he would pay for the comment later though, regardless of the fact that it was the truth. The soldiers didn't know that his most recent nightmare had been about the people he had killed on his missions, whether the deaths had been intended or not. Yes, Alex was afraid of becoming a predator. The assassin that SCORPIA had tried to make out of him. A monster.
"Alright, Cub," Wolf growled once everyone finished their last bite. "The first phase of selection is the hills. Basically, you do marches throughout the Brecon Beacons to develop your physical and navigational ability. At the end of this phase, you have test week, where you will do five timed marches, followed by the sketch map and then the endurance march. That requires you to march forty miles in twenty hours while carrying a seventy-pound bergen. In addition, there is a swimming test that you need to pass, where you should be able to swim two miles in ninety minutes or less. Normally, the training takes three weeks and the fourth week is test week. You have two weeks to complete both."
"You got your training schedule from the sergeant on your first day," Tiger took over. "We'll be sticking to that schedule for now but it will be adjusted depending on your progress. The units decided last night that we're going to combine your marches with theory lessons and anything else your tutor decides to lecture on. We'll be taking turns training you so each unit has time to plan the next lesson and do our own refresher courses. You're with K-Unit for the assault course first. Got it?"
"Yes, sir." Alex sat straighter, feeling the unit leaders' shift into their role as his training officers.
"Let's go then," Wolf grunted.
When they got to the assault course, K-Unit had him run through the course twice, yelling at him the whole time. "Pathetic," Wolf snapped after the first run. 16:45. His time had only improved marginally. The second time, Alex pushed himself even harder, ignoring the pain in his arm when he pulled himself up and over the wall. Splattered with mud, he jogged back to K-Unit, panting while wiping the sweat and rain off his face with the back of his hand. "Abysmal," Wolf snarled, showing him the stopwatch. 16:41. Only a few seconds off.
"Alright, group run is next," Badger said.
"Cub, do you remember how to run the course as a unit?" Snake asked.
"Mostly, sir. I'll need a refresher."
His unit nodded and gave him a brief rundown of how to do it as a unit. "Remember, Cub, comms and medics are always in the middle of the patrol," Eagle instructed as they got into position, waiting for Wolf to start the stopwatch. "You're going to be taking over my position today so you're the TEC."
"Go!" Wolf barked.
And the unit took off. Eagle lead them, followed by Snake and Badger. Alex did his best to keep up, succeeding for the most part, but he could tell that they had slowed down to let him get a feel for things. When they got to the ten-foot wall, the climbing nets from the individual run were gone, attached to the six foot wall instead. This left a higher wall for them to climb over as a team. Snake and Badger formed a foothold with their hands to lift Eagle up onto the top of the wall. Once Eagle was up, Badger motioned for him to help do the same for Snake. There was a twinge of pain in his arm as they lifted Snake but he ignored it. Then, they backed up, Badger doing a running leap with Alex following when Eagle and Snake had finished pulling the soldier up. After climbing over the wall, they ran through the rest of the assault course, trying not to slip in the mud. On the last stretch of their run, Alex suddenly felt a prickling feeling on the back of his neck. Instantly, he ducked down, calling for the others to do the same while scanning their surroundings. He didn't even think. The crack of a shot rang out a moment later.
"WHAT THE HELL WERE YOU DOING, CUB?!" Wolf bellowed, jogging over to them. "YOUR TIME IS 18:57 AND THAT WAS THE WORST TEC JOB I'VE EVER SEEN! YOUR ONLY REDEEMING FACTOR WAS KNOWING WHEN TO DUCK!" Alex loosened his tensed body a little, understanding that Wolf had fired a blank to test him. "NOW DROP AND GIVE ME 50!"
Wordlessly, Alex dropped down and did the 50 press-ups. When he was done, Wolf was still pacing angrily while the rest of his unit was frowning at him. "Cubby, do you know what you did wrong?" Eagle asked.
"I should have been paying attention to our surroundings, especially behind us."
"Damn right, you should have!" Wolf snarled. "If this were in the field, the whole unit could be dead!"
"Lay off him," Badger said warningly. "From what I've gathered, you never included him in the exercises last time which means he just tagged along and this is his first time training for these roles. I'm sure he'll do better next time."
"Besides, what I want to know is how you knew Wolf was going to shoot if you weren't paying attention," Snake added quietly with a calculative look. That piqued the whole unit's interest.
"I didn't know," Alex answered uncomfortably. "It was just a feeling."
There was silence for a long moment as the unit decided if he was telling the truth or not. Finally, Snake said, "We've run out of time. Go to the shooting range. J-Unit is waiting for you there."
"Yes, sir!" Alex saluted the soldiers and left, berating himself for letting down his guard. He was training for better survival skills, not fooling around with friends on a school trip! Alex reached the firing range, annoyed with himself, and tried to clear his mind for the next lesson. Walking towards J-Unit, he stood at attention.
"At ease," Tiger said. "From yesterday's testing, you seem to be quite familiar with handguns. But we don't know how much knowledge you have so we'll run through the handguns and their history quickly before moving on to rifles."
"If there is anything we're covering that you already know," Otter added, "tell us immediately so we can move the lessons along."
"Yes, sir."
At Tiger's gesture, Alex stepped forward to a table that had been set up for the lesson. There were several types of guns displayed. He knew most of them. Bat pointed at one and said, "This one is a P228. You should be familiar enough with it as it is a variant of the P226 that you were using yesterday. This one is only available in the 9mm rounds. Since it's more compact than the P226, we use it for close protection and undercover work. Any questions?"
"No, sir. I already know this."
J-Unit studied him for a moment. Then, "How about you point to all the guns that you already know and give us a summary of them?" Horse proposed slowly.
Alex nodded and then pointed to a gun. "Browning Hi Power. Military designates it as the L9A1. 9mm rounds, 13 magazine capacity. Single action, semi-automatic pistol so it has to be cocked before firing the first round. That is to say, the hammer has to be pulled back first. Because of this, it's better to carry it cocked with the safety catch on so you can draw and fire it more quickly. One of the flaws is that the standard trigger pull is heavy. It also has a tendency to "bite" the web of the shooter's hand. It was based on a design by an American firearms inventor and finished by a Belgian small arms designer. Originally developed in response to French military requirements for a new service pistol. This gun was replaced in the military by the Glock 17 and Sig Sauer P226."
And so he went on to summarize the rest of the guns that he knew in the same fashion. Alex did this with the various Sig Sauer, Glock, Smith & Wesson, Colt, and Beretta models they had, among many others. When he was finished with the handguns, he moved on to the rifles and machine guns, reciting the information from his memory of Gordon Ross' lectures during his SCORPIA training on the island, Malagosto. Sometimes, he went into more detail about the history and uses of each weapon than was necessary, forgetting that this wasn't a SCORPIA test. As he finally finished talking about the last gun, half an hour after he started, Alex looked up at J-Unit and winced inwardly. His training officers were staring at him with their mouths open.
Snapping out of it, Tiger cleared his throat and asked, "Are you a gun enthusiast or something?"
"A survivor," Alex stated, only just realizing how true that was. Even though he had lived through all of his missions, he had never consciously associated that word with himself before now.
"Jesus Christ, Cub! You know more than most recruits do!" Otter exclaimed in wonder.
"Some of the history was even news to me and I'm the weapons expert of the unit!" Bat added.
"Where did you learn all this?" Horse asked.
"Classified."
The soldiers didn't know what to think of that so, after a moment of silence, they filled him in on the guns that he didn't know and moved on to firing practice. "I think we can all agree from your assessment yesterday that your shots with a handgun are exceptional, Cub. Do you know how to shoot a rifle or machine gun though?" He hadn't trained with SCORPIA long enough to practice with rifles and machine guns so Alex shook his head, telling them that he didn't know how to shoot normally either. They raised their eyebrows at this new information. Learning to shoot instinctively without knowing the normal way was very unusual. J-Unit didn't comment on it though, just proceeded to teach him the normal way first to prepare him for learning how to shoot with a rifle and machine gun. Instinctive firing didn't work too well with those bigger weapons. As they shouted instructions and insults at him, the soldiers quickly found that Alex picked up normal shooting quite easily, even if his shots weren't as accurate as when he used instinctive firing. Within ten minutes, he had a 60% rate of accuracy. They wanted to see how much more accurate the shots could be if Alex had more time but they were on a tight schedule so J-Unit decided to use the remaining twenty minutes of the lesson for shooting with rifles and machine guns. Alex learned these quite quickly as well. If J-Unit were unnerved by the speed which Alex picked up these skills, they didn't show it.
"Alright," Tiger called out when it was time for the next lesson. "That's enough for today. You're with B-Unit for hand-to-hand combat in the training field now. Dismissed."
"Yes, sir!" Alex saluted them and jogged over to the training field, cursing the soldiers' planning in his head. He could already sense the trouble that would result from having B-Unit teach him hand-to-hand combat. Grimly shifting his mindset in preparation for the lesson, Alex walked into the training field towards the glaring soldiers and stood at attention.
"At ease," Lion snapped reluctantly. Then with a feral grin, he sneered, "You're going up against each of us in turns, Double-o-nothing. I bet you'll be crying and demanding to go home by the end of it."
Zebra stepped forward, signaling that he was up against the medic first. Circling each other, Alex used the time to study his opponent. Tall and well-built. Alex was already at a disadvantage by size. From experience, brute force wouldn't work well against the soldier. Actually, it wouldn't work well against most of the soldiers. He was shorter than most of them. If brute force was out, that left speed and redirecting the momentum of an attack.
Suddenly, Zebra struck faster than Alex had anticipated. He barely blocked the punch in time. For the next few minutes, the rest of the world faded away as Alex focused on the fight and ignored the jeering soldiers, reacting with his instincts and attacking whenever he saw an opportunity. A couple of times, he made the soldier stumble for a second as his redirection of the momentum made Zebra lose his balance but the man always regained the upper hand quickly. The fight ended with Zebra pushing him in the chest while hooking a foot around his leg to kick him behind the knee. Alex fell flat onto his back, both of them panting for breath.
"How… does… that… move… work?" Alex asked between breaths, getting up from where he had fallen.
"Figure it out," Zebra sneered, leaving their designated sparring area to let the next person fight.
The rest of the matches went similarly with Alex only beating Squirrel, their communications expert. Every time they beat him with a move he'd never seen before, Alex would ask how it worked or how to do it but they never gave him an answer, only mocking him for not knowing. Receiving the same answers to his questions after the last match, against Lion, Alex gritted his teeth and growled, "You're not going to teach me anything, are you? All you want is an excuse to beat me up without getting into trouble."
B-Unit exchanged smirks and in the next second, Alex was suddenly attacked by all four SAS soldiers. They weren't holding back either. Not that they had held back before but there was a distinctly vicious feel to their movements this time. Blow after blow rained down on him, Alex doing the best he could to block the ones to his head and other vital organs. There was a moment of blind panic when he thought that the soldiers just might beat him to death.
"You think you can just walk in to a camp for elite soldiers and train, Double-o-nothing?" Alex heard one of the soldiers snarl at him. "What right do you have? You're just a spoiled brat! Your rich daddy probably paid your way in!"
"K-Unit told us about your classified file," another soldier growled. "Who do you think you're fooling? It's probably so classified because the government doesn't want anyone to know they're wasting taxpayers' money on you!
"This isn't a game and your presence is a mockery to all soldiers!" Alex heard another soldier finish up. "You'll never know what it's like to actually fight a war! To lose a comrade, a brother!"
Suddenly, Alex was angry. He's faced several psychopaths and stopped multiple terrorist plots on his own, nearly being killed in the process! His uncle and sister had died by being involved in this! He was just as much a part of the war as these soldiers were, only operating in a different way! It was always the same. Every time, he would go from being patted on the back for saving the world to being treated like a child that knew nothing about the world. Even among people in similar lines of work, he was treated this way. It couldn't go on. From civilians, he could accept. From military and law enforcement, he couldn't. Those were the people he was supposed to be working with and if they treated him this way, they weren't going to work very effectively. He would show these soldiers that he wasn't the rich, spoiled brat they believed him to be. With a focus that only came from fighting for his life, Alex recalled Yassen's advice and started his combat breathing exercises while blocking the blows, clearing his mind like SCORPIA had taught him so many months ago. Mind blank, he scanned his surroundings, detachedly analyzing everything. Take out the weakest first. That will allow him to have one less person to worry about at least. A previously injured leg, judging from the way the other leg was favored. Good place to target. Rage and arrogance. His opponents will make more mistakes.
Within a few seconds, he was done his analysis and abruptly threw his whole body to the side, the momentum knocking Squirrel backwards. Using a quick strike to a pressure point an inch below the base of the ear that SCORPIA had taught him, Alex rendered the comms expert unconscious. Before the rest of the unit could recover from the surprise of his sudden offense tactics, Alex had rolled back into a fighting stance, grabbing a handful of mud along the way, and snapped a leg out, his foot slamming into Hawk's solar plexus. A strained groan told him he had succeeded in winding the man. That was all he could do before Lion and Zebra were onto him, snarling in rage. Alex dodged a punch from the unit leader to get closer to the medic, blocking Zebra's strike and lobbing the handful of mud in Lion's direction to blind the man at the same time. Then, he kicked the medic's previously injured leg with all his might. Howling in pain, the man's leg gave out from under him but Alex had no time to check the extent of the damage as Lion barreled into him. He lay on his back, Lion sitting on top of him with mud running down the man's face, and Alex shielded his face with his arms as the unit leader punched him again. Through a gap in his arms, Alex watched the trajectory of the next punch and shot out a hand, twisting Lion's wrist while bucking the man off. The unit leader could only cry out in surprise and pain before Alex struck his temple, knocking him out as well.
"Cub!" Snake yelled, running towards Alex with his unit, closely followed by J-Unit. As they reached him, Snake pulled him closer to check for injuries and asked urgently, "Are you okay? Do you feel any pain or dizziness?" Alex gave him a look, panting to catch his breath. "Okay, bad question. Where do you feel pain?"
"Bruised everywhere... but I'm fine," Alex answered tiredly in between his heavy breathing, letting the medic do his job but making sure that his scars wouldn't be exposed.
A few feet away, the rest of the units were chewing out the conscious members of B-Unit while Otter roughly treated their injuries. Even though all of them were burning with anger, some of them still prevented Wolf from attacking B-Unit a few times so that Otter could do his job. "WHAT THE FUCKING HELL DO YOU THINK YOU'RE DOING?!" Wolf roared at B-Unit. "I DON'T CARE IF YOU DON'T LIKE HIM! I DON'T CARE IF HE PROVOKED YOU! THOSE MOVES YOU USED WERE DESIGNED TO KILL! YOU'RE SUPPOSED TO BE TRAINING CUB, NOT MURDERING HIM! NO ONE MESSES WITH MY UNIT! I KNOW CUB CAN TAKE CARE OF HIMSELF BUT IF YOU EVER DO ANYTHING LIKE THIS AGAIN, I WILL PERSONALLY SKIN YOU ALIVE, RIP OUT YOUR INTESTESTINES, AND SHOVE THEM INTO YOUR MOUTHS! DO YOU UNDERSTAND?!"
"We'll be right there with him too," Tiger added in a deadly voice. The two units moved to stand behind the unit leaders, demonstrating their solidarity in the promise. Even Eagle, usually happy and laid back, had a stony expression on his face. Hawk and Zebra, the only conscious members of B-Unit, stared up at everyone with wide, fearful eyes and nodded meekly.
Satisfied with the response for now, Wolf stalked towards Alex. "YOU!" Wolf snarled. "You've been holding back! Beating four fully trained soldiers wasn't what you demonstrated yesterday! This isn't the boy scouts, Cub! If we're going to be training you, you better make it worth our while and give it everything you've got! Do you understand?!"
Alex clenched his jaw in silence, trying to decide how to respond. His reflections on the past during the car ride to the camp had made him realize how many people had died on his missions. If he continued to be untrained like he had been so far, the accidental deaths of his adversaries would only keep piling up. Trained, he would be more dangerous but better able to control the resulting deaths. Keeping everything from his unit was bound to backfire on him eventually. At the same time, he couldn't reveal too much.
Furious at the lack of response, Wolf screamed, "I SAID, DO YOU UNDERSTAND?!"
Snapping to attention, Alex barked out, "With all due respect, sir, I meant it when I said I was afraid of becoming a predator."
"What's that supposed to mean?" Wolf asked angrily.
"It means that fighting at his best is a bad idea," Otter answered for him quietly. Wolf turned his glare on J-Unit's medic. "Hawk might have a hairline fracture on his ribs, Zebra has a broken leg again, and the strikes to Lion and Squirrel could have killed them. Cub has enough skill to be lethal but not enough to control the damage. Judging from the fight we just saw and the amount of damage to B-Unit, we'll all be dead in couple of weeks if Cub gives the fights everything he has."
"Not to mention it seems that the kind of fighting Cub just displayed now is only activated when he feels like it is a life or death situation," Bat commented quietly.
This assessment was met with silence as each soldier tried to process how dangerous the teenager they were supposed to be training could be if pushed far enough. Wolf looked like he was at a loss for how to deal with him. Alex watched as his unit leader's expression flickered between anger and concern. In the end, the silence was broken by Tiger. "Alright, we teach him more hand-to-hand combat techniques but with a heavy focus on control and when to use the moves then."
The soldiers murmured their assent but Snake frowned and said, "Most people don't fight like this though. In order for our lessons to be effective, Cub, we need to know how this happened and what psychological state you're in."
Everyone's attention turned to Alex but he stayed silent, debating how much to tell them. Finally, he said emotionlessly, "Eleven days of SAS training was all I had before I was sent on missions. Almost everyone who has tried to kill me is dead. Most were accidents. Any other information is classified."
"… That doesn't tell us a whole lot," Badger stated slowly.
"It tells you enough." It should, anyways, if they read between the lines.
The soldiers weren't catching on to the underlying implications though so they didn't know what to think, just stood there awkwardly. Eventually Wolf just asked gruffly, "Do you think you can continue today's training, Cub?"
"Yes, sir!" The soldiers already saw him as weaker than them. He didn't need to give them a reason to justify their view. Besides, he needed the training.
"Alright, let's head to the lake then. You're swimming two miles with your training outfit on."
Alex nodded, mentally breathing a sigh of relief at the fact that he would be able to keep his scars hidden. As they headed over to the lake, the soldiers exchanged uneasy glances before J-Unit left to bring B-Unit to the infirmary, unsure of how much more Alex could take after the fight. Their worries were unfounded though. Although the soldiers continued to yell obscenities at him, Alex swam the length in fifty minutes, a decent time, and enjoyed the reprieve from interacting with the men. There was even enough time left in the exercise to practice treading water and diving into the lake from a ten-metre height. At the end of the lesson, Alex got out of the lake and wrung out the bottom of his shirt. Sensing someone's attention directed at him, he looked up to see Wolf staring at his exposed lower torso. Not sure what was wrong, Alex hastily straightened out his shirt again.
"Cub, you're with us for today's ten-mile fan dance march exercise!" Tiger called out. J-Unit had come back in a military truck some time ago with Miss Treat in tow, the soldiers staring at the woman. When Alex reached the truck, they handed him a thirty-five pound bergen, a rifle, a map, and a compass. He geared up in the truck while J-Unit drove to their starting point, Horse explaining that the fan dance was going up and down the hills with combat loads. Once they reached their destination, Tiger stopped the vehicle and told Alex to get out. "Here's how this is going to work," the unit leader explained. "While you're doing the march, we will be driving the truck alongside you so that your tutor can give you lectures for your regular schooling. If a topic comes up that can be related back to your military training, we'll add that in as well. Got it?"
"Yes, sir."
"Get going then."
So, Alex looked at his map and compared it to his surroundings. With big hills on either side of him and rain obscuring the view, everything looked the same. There were only small details that could help to narrow down where they might possibly be. Eventually finding his location, Alex set off in the direction he needed to go and listened as Miss Treat started her lecture.
"We'll start with biology for today," Miss Treat said from her seat in the truck driving along beside him. "I believe your lessons had just started on homeostasis when you left the country. Homeostasis is the ability to maintain a constant internal environment even when the external environment changes. The nervous and endocrine systems control your body's homeostasis through mechanisms in your organs that provide feedback..."
And that was how Alex spent the rest of the march. Listening to the lecture on homeostasis while doing his best to maintain a brisk, steady pace through the rough terrain. After a while, he was shivering from being soaked in rain and sweat with the wind blowing against the direction he was going in. The straps of the thirty-five pound rucksack on his back, digging into his shoulders, only made the journey more difficult. There were times when he looked at the soldiers and his tutor sitting under the covers of the military truck and thought that this must be a form of torture designed to test his mental strength. Checking his map from time to time, Alex hoped that he was going at a decent enough pace. Even his lunch, army rations, was eaten while he kept walking.
"… some examples of homeostasis," he heard Miss Treat finish up, "include temperature control, pH balance, and blood pressure."
"Your body temperature is controlled so that your enzymes are operating at its best. This is usually at 37°C," Otter added. "If you're outside in cold environments for an extended period of time, then there are some ways that you can try to keep warm. These include tucking the bottom of your trousers into your socks, keeping your body moving, and rubbing your wrists. There are pulse points in your wrist where blood vessels come close to the surface of the skin. Warming this area will help heat the blood and spread that to the rest of the body. Also, try to eat complex carbohydrates like whole grains..."
The rest of the march was taken up by the unit lecturing him about survival tips that related back to homeostasis. The medic talked about maintaining blood sugar levels and keeping water content in the body, among many other things. About five hours after he started the march, Alex finally reached his destination. The soldiers nodded their approval and he tiredly got back into the military truck, answering questions during the ride back to camp as he was tested on the lecture he had just received. He passed the test, even if he had forgotten a few things.
Once they arrived at the camp, it was already 1600 hours. Considering the amount of material that he still had to get through, there wasn't much time left in the day. Without taking a shower, Miss Treat had herded him into the mess hall to help him get caught up in his school studies. They went through Maths, Chemistry, and Physics. Before he knew it, four hours had passed and the soldiers trickled in for dinner. The units took one look at Alex and left him to eat in peace. He probably looked as exhausted as he felt. When he finished eating, he took a shower and collapsed onto his bed, falling asleep as soon as his head hit the pillow.
While Alex was asleep, the soldiers went to report to the sergeant. There was a lot that they had learned about Cub but each new piece of information only raised more questions, confusing them even more. Wolf knocked twice on the door and the two units filed into the office at the sergeant's command, standing at attention.
"At ease," the sergeant said. "Where is B-Unit?"
"In the infirmary, sir. Their hand-to-hand combat session with Cub didn't go too well," Wolf answered.
The sergeant raised an eyebrow in surprise. A teenager shouldn't have been able to beat a whole unit of highly trained soldiers. "I expect details later. Report."
"Cub is doing as we expected on the assault course but he needs to work on each of the individual roles in the unit," Wolf told the sergeant. "He was supposed to be the TEC today but didn't pay attention to his surroundings."
"Wolf shot a blank at us to test him," Snake added. "Even though he wasn't aware of what was going on around him, Cub somehow knew when we were about to be shot."
The sergeant frowned. "Did you get him to tell you how he knew?"
"He told us he didn't know. Just said it was a feeling," Badger answered quietly.
"He seems to be telling the truth," Eagle chipped in.
Everyone in the office only frowned more deeply at this. They all knew that those kinds of instincts were rare. Most of the time, the intuition was developed as a result of experience. It was a troubling thought that a teenager was experienced enough that they could feel when they were being targeted. Eventually, the sergeant instructed, "Keep going."
"Cub has an unusual level of knowledge and familiarity with guns," Tiger reported. "But the strange thing is that we had to teach him normal shooting today. He said that he'd only ever learned how to fire instinctively."
"It was unnerving how quickly he learned too, like he was born to do this," Bat added. "And there was information about the gun models that even the SAS don't teach. If I weren't the weapons expert in the unit, I'd say he knew more than I did."
The soldiers were stunned by this assessment but the sergeant gestured for them to keep talking. Sanders wanted a full picture of the day before they started trying to piece things together. So Otter carried on, detailing B-Unit's injuries and reiterating, for the sergeant, his previous assessment of Alex's level of skill and control. He finished up by saying, "Another unusual thing about the fight is that Cub used pressure point fighting. We all know that technique is extremely dangerous to use and only taught to the elite military. But he's barely trained with us. So where did he learn it? If the strikes to Lion and Squirrel had been any harder, they'd be dead right now. And I don't think Cub knew that."
"The change in his fighting style was curious too," Horse commented, the rest of the soldiers nodding along in agreement. "Even from afar, we could see him taking the hits in the beginning and only having enough time to block the strikes to his vital areas while B-Unit yelled at him. He was struggling to keep up. But something happened. It was like a completely different person took over. Suddenly, Cub became completely calm and his movements were… predatory. But, at the same time, there was a desperate quality to it."
"What did Cub have to say about the fight?" Sergeant Sanders asked, frowning.
"He said that he was afraid of becoming a predator," Snake answered.
"And his time with us last year was all the training he had before he was sent out on missions," Wolf growled. "Said almost everyone who has tried to kill him is dead but most were accidents. What does that even mean?!"
The sergeant sat back in his chair and thought over the words. Slowly, he explained, "It means that he has been forced to survive using whatever means necessary. And that he has deliberately killed in cold blood before. Even though Cub has done it in self-defence, he is struggling to come to terms with it. We are dealing with an experienced and traumatized operative, not a mere teenager. It also means that he won't trust anyone easily." The soldiers were silent as they processed the sergeant's explanation. Sanders allowed the message to sink in before gesturing for them to continue with their report.
"Cub's swimming ability is at a decent level," Eagle said happily. "I think he just needs the daily exercises to build up his endurance further. He'll pass the swimming test easily."
"What's bothering you, Wolf?" Sanders asked, noticing the soldier's frown deepening.
"I'm not sure," Wolf admitted reluctantly. "Cub was wringing out his shirt after swimming and his lower torso was exposed, the only skin he's shown us since he got here. He doesn't even shower at the same time as us. But something is off about the skin there."
"What do you mean?" Snake and Otter asked at the same time, frowning. "Was there a scar or something?"
"Scar…," Wolf muttered, lowering his head in thought. "No, there wasn't…" Then, his eyes widened in realization and his head snapped up. "But there should have been! When I was stationed in Baghdad several months ago, before our unit was put back together again, I got an update on Cub's status as he was still listed in our files as a part of our unit. Cub was supposed to be in the hospital at the time with appendicitis but there's no scar where the surgery would have been performed!"
The soldiers exchanged alarmed looks. Those updates were supposed to be reliable, coming straight from the top ranks, and meant to inform soldiers about important statuses that could affect a current or future mission. "Oh shit," the sergeant whispered in an uncharacteristic display of emotion, closing his eyes briefly. "I hate spies. This means MI6 lied about Cub's status. And when intelligence agencies lie about something, it means their covering up something worse," Sanders growled, almost to himself. Looking hard at his soldiers, the sergeant barked out, "Listen up, soldiers! Cub might not have had appendicitis but this means he must have been severely injured on a mission. MI6 aren't known for taking care of their agents. I want you to keep a close eye on him from now on and earn his trust! He may be in deeper trouble than we thought and if we don't have his trust, we can't help him. Do you understand?!"
"Yes, sir!"
"Good," the sergeant nodded. "Anything else to report?"
"Cub is keeping up better on the marches than most recruits do," Horse said. "And the usual recruits don't have the added responsibility of keeping up with new lecture material at the same time."
"His brain is like a sponge," Tiger commented thoughtfully. "But even a sponge has limits. I'm just afraid that Cub will reach his soon with the pace that we're going at. I don't even know if we could have kept up our training alongside regular schooling."
After they finished giving the report, the sergeant and the soldiers discussed all of their findings, trying to connect the dots to get a better idea of who Cub was. For all their efforts, they were still only sure of a few things, the only bits of information that Cub himself had confirmed so far. Cub was involved with MI6. He was here for training. And he was more capable than any of them had ever thought. If not by skill, then by sheer determination. Eventually, they gave up and left to go sleep for the night. As they went back to their huts, the sergeant ran a hand through his hair. There was something seriously wrong with Cub's situation. Sanders felt like the teen's clearance level while having no rank assigned was a clue. But to what? He was afraid of what he would find if they kept digging. But he couldn't ignore it. Whether he liked it or not, Cub was one of his men now. And he couldn't leave any of his men to fend for themselves, not if they might be in too much trouble to dig themselves out of it.
The rest of the week passed by the same way. Alex would get up earlier than everyone else to do meditations, have breakfast, and attend the lessons in his schedule. The only difference was that B-Unit was much more professional towards him. He couldn't tell if this was because they grudgingly respected him after their fight or because the other units insisted on supervising B-Unit's interactions with him. Either way, he was relieved that there hadn't been any more altercations at the camp. It might even be Snake that had made a difference. From the way B-Unit became more skittish around his unit medic, Alex guessed that Snake must have had a "talk" with them. By the end of the week with this routine, his nightmares had mostly gone away. His time on the assault course had been cut to 13:54 individually with a time of 16:37 as a unit. On the shooting range, he had a 96% accuracy rate for his normal shooting with handguns and 90% for shooting rifles and machine guns. His hand-to-hand combat had improved significantly as well. The units had taught him a lot of moves that the SAS used as well as specific instruction in various martial arts from those who had the training. Coupled with the rest of his lessons, the soldiers had taught him more control. Now, he was better able to understand the damage that each move does and how to limit or counteract it. He still had a long way to go though. That was in contrast to his swimming, which he could do with ease, even with the increasingly longer distances required. As for the marches, the last one he did before the weekend was eighteen miles with a fifty-pound bergen. He made it in just under nine hours. Over the week, he had done more fan dance and point to point marches, each one with increasingly heavy weights and longer distances. During these marches for the whole week, Miss Treat lectured him on History, Geography, Politics, Biology, and Japanese. Politics wasn't one of his school subjects so he assumed that it was one of the extra lessons that Jones wanted him to learn. Sometimes, Treat read the texts for his English class out loud to him so they could discuss it after the march. Other times, the soldiers tied in lectures on demolitions, first aid, map reading and navigation, communications protocols, SAS hand signals, and parachute protocols to go along with Miss Treat's lessons. After the marches, he and Miss Treat would work on English, Japanese, Maths, Chemistry, Physics, and Drama. The time available to work on school subjects in the mess hall became increasingly shorter though as the marches got longer. To catch up, he would go to bed later and later each night, waking up more exhausted in the morning than the previous day.
Alex could barely keep his eyes open on Saturday morning but the weekend didn't give him a break either. He still had to do the assault course, hand-to-hand combat, and swimming. These exercises woke him up quickly, even if he was still utterly exhausted. At this point, Alex was fairly sure that he was running on adrenaline and pure determination. After swimming in the lake though, each unit still took him for a lesson on their specialization instead of the usual shooting lessons or march exercises.
K-Unit gave him lectures on the air troop, making Alex practice parachute insertions. He went through exercises on high altitude low opening (HALO), high altitude high opening (HAHO), and static line. Just before Alex's first jump, Eagle had a good time joking about having him kick Wolf out of a plane again. The unit leader wasn't amused and Alex jumped before the man could yell at him for Eagle's joke too. It was only after these exercises that Alex realized he had only ever been instructed on HAHO the last time he was here. Even then, it had only been the theory. Alex hadn't been allowed to participate in the actual exercise.
J-Unit took him out for lessons on the mobility troop next. They were surprised that Alex already knew the basics of fixing a vehicle and how to drive and hotwire a car. Ian had taught him as soon as his feet could reach the gas pedal. His uncle's lessons had helped the soldiers save some time with the basics. Instead, they jumped right into the exercises, showing him how to drive each of the different military vehicles and how to use the weapons that were fixed to them. They gave him more advanced mechanical lessons as well. Because he was unlikely to be in an active war zone with the military, J-Unit also taught him tactical driving with regular cars, pushing the vehicles to their limits. By the end of the exercises, Alex was able to do basic ambushes and lose a tail with the vehicles. The only thing that he still had some trouble with was close quarter driving. He knew he would have to work on that in his own time after his two months of training were over.
The last ones to give him their lectures were B-Unit, on the boat troop. They taught him how to sail various boats, having Alex complete exercises on shallow diving for covert infiltrations and underwater demolitions. The soldiers also taught him some basics about camouflage, setting and avoiding ambushes, and movements to avoid being seen. By the end of B-Unit's lesson each day, it was already dinner time. There was a quick meal and then they geared up for an exercise in the Killing House, testing his hostage extraction skills in the mock-up of the embassy. There had been no time for his schoolwork on the weekend and he was too exhausted to care that his Test Week started the next day. With such a packed schedule, Alex slept like the dead on Sunday night and didn't even wake up for his meditations.
The next morning, Alex was woken up by Wolf yelling at him to get moving before he missed breakfast. Groaning, he checked the clock and bolted out of bed. It was already 0530 hours and he was going to be late! Within five minutes, he was ready and ran to the mess hall. But when he got there, everyone was standing outside, tense and alert. Even the kitchen staff and Miss Treat were there. Someone yelled an order to get the sergeant. The rest muttered amongst themselves. Curious as to what was happening, Alex slowly approached. K-Unit saw and tried to block his view, telling him to stay away, but Alex ignored them. When he got close enough, he stopped in his tracks and stared. There was a rain-soaked body placed in an awkward sitting position against the flag pole. The legs were splayed out at different angles. A laminated note was stapled to the man's chest. There was foam around the corners of his mouth, either from poisoning or a drug overdose. The person's head was twisted all the way to face the opposite side of where it was supposed to be. A single bullet was in the middle of the forehead. And he recognized the face of the victim, one that he had disfigured. Walking towards Skoda's body to examine the note, Alex could feel everyone else staring at him apprehensively, carefully gauging his reaction to the body in front of them.
"Well, someone snuffed him out," Alex commented, just as the sergeant reached them. The soldiers stared at him like he was insane but Miss Treat raised an eyebrow in amusement. He supposed that most people wouldn't react so calmly to seeing a dead body.
"Do you know the victim, Cub?" Sergeant Sanders asked.
"Yes, sir. He was a drug dealer."
"Why do you know a drug dealer?" Wolf growled, the whole unit glaring at Alex.
"You can interrogate Cub about his personal life later," the sergeant reprimanded, glancing at the unit leader. "Right now, we need to figure out why there is a dead body in the middle of the camp!"
Walking towards Alex and the body, Miss Treat read the note out loud. "'Another walks free and seeks revenge. If you want to play with the wolves, learn the rules to the game.' This was targeted at you, Cub. Do you know who did this?"
"No," Alex answered firmly, keeping his face blank. He could make a good guess though. The note already hinted at the identity of the killer. And the placement of the body was a message too. It had taken him a few seconds longer to figure it out but Alex was fairly sure that he wouldn't be getting any sleep after the day's march.
Miss Treat eyed him suspiciously but eventually decided to take him for his word and left to call MI6. While they waited for someone from the intelligence agency to get to the camp, the sergeant decided that they were to continue on with their day. Leaving the body where it was so that MI6 could examine the crime scene, they went into the mess hall to have breakfast. As they ate, the soldiers kept asking him questions while the sergeant listened in, bewildered by the fact that a teenager was being targeted. But the only question Alex answered was Wolf's, assuring his unit leader that he despised drugs and had never done them. For all the other questions, he only told the soldiers to wait for MI6 to arrive. This only frustrated them further, making the soldiers grumble and stab at their food.
Just as they finished eating, Mrs. Jones walked into the mess hall. Seeing the high-ranking woman, Miss Treat and the sergeant stood at attention, prompting all of the other confused soldiers to follow suit. Alex remained seated, not sure if Mrs. Jones expected him to show the same formalities. He didn't care either. Not even when Wolf tried to stomp on his foot in warning. The sergeant would have been angry at the teen but he was too baffled by Jones' acceptance of the disrespect shown and that someone so high up took enough of an interest in the boy to fly out as soon as there was a problem.
"At ease," Mrs. Jones said. "For those of you who do not know me, I am the current head of Special Operations. My agents will be collecting the evidence and going around to ask each of you some questions. Once that is done, you can go back to your duties."
"Yes, ma'am!"
Satisfied, Mrs. Jones gestured for her agents to start the questioning and turned her black, beady eyes towards Alex. "Answer me honestly. Do you know who did this?"
"No."
Mrs. Jones examined him for a long moment before nodding, turning on her heel to leave. Although her instincts were telling her not to believe the teen, she let it go for now. She knew that Alex would never knowingly put others in danger. Even if the teen was lying, she trusted that it wasn't something big enough to require the intelligence agency's attention. Not yet, anyways.
Once everyone had given their witness statements, the MI6 agents packed everything up and took the body back to London with them. With MI6 gone, the soldiers gave Alex his instructions for the first march of the week. He was flown out to Elan Valley for a fifteen-mile march, carrying a forty pound bergen, water, food, and a rifle. The terrain was no easier than the Brecon Beacons and he was completely alone for the marches this week. No military truck driving alongside him, no jokes or verbal abuse from the soldiers, and no lectures. Just the sounds of nature all around him. After the previous week, the silence was deafening to him. But Alex appreciated it for the break that his brain was getting. The amount of information he had to process last week during the marches had taken a toll on him and there were times when he got an intense headache. He had felt like his brain would explode from the information overload. So Alex enjoyed the quiet while he could, even if it meant that it was harder to ignore the burn in his muscles and the extra effort it took to get through the elements working against him. Really, the test wasn't much different from the exercises and he made it in good time. Alex finished the march in just under seven hours, the allotted time for the day, and the soldiers breathed a collective sigh of relief. He didn't blame them. They were all afraid to be put on probation if Alex didn't pass the tests.
Since it was mid-afternoon by the time he finished the march and there was nothing else scheduled for the day, Miss Treat pulled him aside to work on his school subjects again, testing him on last week's material before introducing new topics. Despite the amount of information being thrown at him every day, Alex actually enjoyed his lessons with the woman. She treated him more like an equal than a student and he was able to talk to her more freely because of it. Like usual, they kept up the studies until dinner time. After dinner though, the time was his to do as he wanted. It was the first break that Alex had since arriving at the camp. He spent it talking to the kitchen staff and wandering through the training grounds but otherwise, kept up the same routine. Alex still showered when everyone else wasn't in the common bathroom and went to bed at his usual time. He didn't sleep though. Instead, Alex waited until K-Unit had fallen asleep before silently getting out of bed, leaving the hut. He made sure that nothing he did would wake Wolf or Snake, the two lightest sleepers of the unit besides himself.
Cautiously entering the forest, Alex wandered in the general direction that Skoda's body had indicated. With the way that the man's head and legs had been positioned, he was fairly sure he was in the right place even though he was late. If he was right, then Skoda's head had been twisted so that his empty eyes were looking towards the forest where Alex usually did his meditations. This was the intended meeting place. The drug dealer's legs were the hands on a clock, positioned at 2330 hours. It was now midnight. Alex grimaced. If his reason wasn't because he was trying to keep suspicion off of himself, he would fully expect some sort of punishment for being late. Even now, there still might be consequences. As he walked among the trees, there was no sign of human presence anywhere. All he could hear were the sounds of the forest at night. Crickets chirping, the screech of an owl, the soft rustle of wings flapping. Even a wolf howling somewhere. An audible click as the safety catch of a gun was flicked off. Alex froze. In the next second, he dived to the ground as a bullet flew past him. There had been no sound of a gunshot. The shooter must be using a silencer. Scrambling behind a tree for cover, Alex listened for anything that might give away the position of his attacker. He should have known he would never stand a chance. A graceful figure suddenly emerged right in front of him and Alex threw his hands up to block the anticipated strike. But it never came.
"You're late, little Alex," the man stated. "And that was unacceptable. You should never let down your guard. I could have killed you at any time in the last ten minutes."
"Yassen," Alex greeted tiredly, slightly alarmed that he had been followed for so long without realizing it but too exhausted to truly care at the moment. "What are you doing here?"
"Training you," Yassen simply said.
"A simple note would have told me to come here. Or do assassins always leave dead bodies behind as a message?"
"We leave bodies behind to make a statement," Yassen corrected.
Alex considered the assassin's words. A statement. There was more to this than a command then. "Directed to who?"
"You. MI6. All the other intelligence agencies."
He stared at Yassen. It was a lot of people to target with one body. Was it a single statement or multiple? Alex worked through the puzzle in his mind. A message to himself might be a lesson. To MI6, it could be a warning or threat. The same could be said for the other intelligence agencies. Eventually, he slowly guessed, "The message to me is that I shouldn't entrust my security to the intelligence agencies. To MI6, you are telling them that someone is watching their every move. To the intelligence agencies in general, you're saying that you can infiltrate any place unseen and they could be next."
"Partially correct," Yassen confirmed impassively. "Your drug dealer was in MI6's custody and still escaped, becoming a threat to you."
"You think that MI6 has an agenda that involves me."
"Assume everyone has an agenda."
"Even you?" Yassen gave him a curt nod. He considered it for a moment. Alex doubted that the assassin's plans for him included death so he dismissed the matter from his mind for now. Instead, he revealed, "MI6 never gives me files but I got some from Jones. Either I'm paranoid or she's up to something."
"Have your instincts been wrong before?"
"… Not really."
"Always trust your instincts. They won't lead you astray. Your father had some of the best instincts in the world and relied on them to stay alive. Your instincts are just as good."
"He still died because of my godfather's betrayal," Alex said bitterly.
"Hunter's mistake was forming attachments. It clouded his judgement of Ash."
Alex stayed silent. Was he supposed to go through the rest of his life without a single meaningful relationship now? He knew better than to ask the assassin. The man's answer to the question was obvious. Instead, he asked, "Can you tell me more about my father?"
"Perhaps one day, I will. But not right now," Yassen replied quietly. The assassin understood the teen's need to know more about his parents but it could be destructive at the same time. The boy's willingness to follow his instructions into the heart of SCORPIA had proven that. "Your parents do not define you, little Alex. I can see Hunter in you but you are so much more. Carve out your own path, your own identity." The teen was silent for a long while but eventually nodded. Satisfied, Yassen reached into the inside of his jacket and handed Alex a stack of files. "Read and memorize them."
Alex took the files and complied with the command. Settling down on the wet ground and resting the files on his legs, he opened the first document. As soon as he saw the first page, his head snapped up to stare at Yassen in alarm, asking sharply, "SCORPIA files?"
"Yes."
"What are you planning?" Alex questioned warily. The assassin only gestured for him to read the files. Resigned, he turned back to the first page and began reading. The files contained a full profile of every important figure within the organization, dead or alive, along with Yassen's own notes and observations of each person. These figures included board members, staff at Malagosto, and top operatives of the organization. The original board had thirteen members. About half of them were dead now. Some were internal jobs. Two were because of Alex. With the reduced numbers, SCORPIA had sought out some new blood and four people were added to the board after his mission with the Australians. Razim had been one of them, dead after Alex's mission in Egypt. One more new board member had been killed sometime between now and Yassen's appearance at his house a couple of weeks ago. That couldn't be a coincidence. As Alex read on, the files revealed summaries of past and current operations, including who was involved in each one. At the moment, it seemed like SCORPIA didn't have any major jobs coming to them. The organization had been overlooked in favour of others after the few operations that Alex had destroyed. So instead of these large jobs, SCORPIA had been focusing on smaller ones, like vices, to build up their reputation again. It took a while for Alex to get through the details of these operations. Once Alex had finished reading the files, he looked up at the assassin again. "The last board member that died... That was you, wasn't it?"
"It was," the man confirmed, a hint of approval in his eyes.
"Why?"
"After Damian Cray, I had wanted to retire. As the current situation stands, that is now impossible."
"Retire?" Alex asked, surprised at the very notion. Even after he thought that the man had died, the assassin had always seemed timeless to him. "You look like you're in your mid-twenties."
"I am in my late-thirties," Yassen corrected amusedly. "Quite old in this line of work."
Alex fell silent. Logically, he knew that what the man told him was the truth. Still, it threw him for a moment. As long as the assassin was alive, Alex had still felt like the man was a constant. Never changing. Always in this line of work. His own choice to continue in the intelligence world made him wonder if he would live long enough to make it to retirement age. Considering his past missions, he would be lucky to reach his twenties. It did no good to dwell on that now though. What he needed to focus on was figuring out why the man was giving him a full profile on SCORPIA. If Yassen wanted to retire but the organization wasn't letting him go, then there were very few options to achieve what he wanted. Blackmail was one. But SCORPIA, even weakened, was too big and powerful for that to succeed. Making a deal could be an option. But that wouldn't explain why the man wanted him to read the files. Killing all of the board members was the most likely option, especially considering the recent assassination. But how does that make the organization let the man live his life peacefully? SCORPIA was all about business. And a business didn't die just because the current people who ran it did. Finally, Alex asked suspiciously, "You're planning to assassinate the whole board, aren't you?"
"Yes," the man nodded once in approval.
"But that's not all. You're not telling me everything."
"It is too soon."
"Why give me the files then?"
"It is good to know what you are dealing with. You are already on their radar. They will not leave you alone for long, especially when you are back in the field. Always know your enemy," Yassen advised. Having gotten his point across, the assassin pulled a folded piece of paper from the inside of his jacket and handed it to Alex in exchange for the files back. "This villa is just outside Saint-Tropez. It belongs to Giovanni and Eduardo Grimaldi, the twins and only remaining new members of the executive board. Find a way in."
"Can't you do it?" Alex asked, frowning. He didn't want any part in assassinating the board.
"By only observing the perimeters, how long did it take you to find a way into Cray's compound? Into Consanto Enterprises?"
Alex shrugged. "A day. Maybe less."
"Both of those places had some of the highest security that a civilian could have, similar to the Grimaldi twins' villa. I may be good at what I do but I have never seen anyone, with such limited information, figure out a way to infiltrate a target as quickly as you. Even Hunter would have taken longer. With the blueprints, you can find a way in much faster," Yassen stated matter-of-factly. "The Grimaldi twins are scheduled to arrive at the villa tomorrow morning to oversee SCORPIA's most recent venture into underage gambling in France. The job needs to look personal to direct suspicion towards other organizations."
Grimacing, Alex nodded in understanding and got to work. The assassin could snipe the twins right outside their villa from afar but it would not look personal. To achieve the effect Yassen wanted, the kills needed to happen inside the twins' domain. As much as Alex despised playing a part in someone's death, he knew the man would find some way to force him into it anyways if he refused. So over the next two hours, Alex pored over the villa's blueprints and the known security surrounding the place. Infrared beams at night but only guards patrolling through the day. CCTV cameras everywhere, mostly monitoring anyone coming onto the property and not those already in the villa. Surrounded by pine trees, cedars, and a high stone wall for privacy. An electronic gate that opened onto a long driveway with a guardhouse monitoring everything. Gardens and a lawn that spread over the hillside surrounded the pink and white house with several terraces. Outside, there was a dining table underneath a stone balcony. A bar, tennis court, and king-size swimming pool were dotted throughout the grounds. Even a helipad. Upstairs, it was all bedrooms. The twins shared one room. Their file said that they had never spent a single minute apart in their whole lives. They might be able to use that against them. The only sign of security inside the villa were the uniformed servants and guards. Getting in would be a problem. After that, the challenge would be remaining undetected by the numerous staff. Alex couldn't see any way to get in without being found. Every angle was covered on the ground. There was nothing to suggest there was an underground way in either. That left going in by air. Not sure what the assassin would think of his idea, Alex cautiously asked, "How do you feel about hang gliding during the night onto the roof of the house?"
Yassen raised an eyebrow. "Unconventional but it can be done."
Taking a deep breath, Alex continued. "You want it to look personal. What about climbing down from the roof to hide underneath the twins' bed?"
The man narrowed his eyes at him. "Done that before, have you?" Alex didn't answer but he knew the assassin understood anyways. He would have to do something later about the suicidal methods the boy tended to use, the assassin thought to himself. After studying him for a few more moments, Yassen abruptly asked him, "Have you been doing your meditations and combat breathing?"
"Yes."
"And your nightmares?"
"They got better and less frequent until I came to the camp. After that, the progress started all over again."
Yassen nodded and stated, "That could be from the change in environment. Unfamiliar places or those associated with unpleasant memories can increase mental agitation. The level of exhaustion also plays a role in how bad your nightmares are." Alex nodded, understanding that the man was telling him this as a lesson. Missions were almost always in unfamiliar places and being aware of how it affected his mental state would help with his survival. Satisfied that Alex had worked out the implications, Yassen instructed, "Come back tomorrow night."
Alex recognized the dismissal and handed the blueprints back to the man. Yassen watched emotionlessly as the boy left, thinking about how much potential Hunter's child had with the right training. Even without being taught properly, Alex was remarkable. The unconventional and suicidal tactics employed on his missions showed that the teen had different thought patterns than most people. Patterns that made him especially useful in this line of work. That was why the intelligence agencies all sought his service. The longer Alex spent in the intelligence world, the likelier it was that criminal organizations would seek his services too. Bluntly refusing those requests, like the boy was in the habit of doing when something didn't agree with him, would only result in many more attempts on Alex's life. If he was going to invest his time in keeping the teen alive, then he needed to teach the boy some self-preservation tactics. This was partially why he chose to display the drug dealer's body in the middle of the camp. Yassen would never tell but Alex had only guessed a part of his reasons for the choice of message delivery. He trusted the teen to figure out the rest himself. If not, there were other ways make him learn. The boy's assumptions of the message to the intelligence agencies had been completely correct. With regards to Alex himself, the boy's assumptions had fallen short. His first reason was to protect the boy from the drug dealer's assassination attempts, however pathetic they may be. The second was to teach Alex to always be on his guard and never assume that others can help protect him. This was the only one the boy had guessed. The third was a warning that every action the teen took had the potential to make himself more enemies. And lastly, it had been a test. Yassen needed to be sure that the teen would follow his instructions and not betray him. In a camp full of soldiers, it would have been easy to let slip the fact that he had been behind the drug dealer's murder. But the video footage from the camera he had installed in a tree had shown that Alex had never even hinted at any knowledge of the killer's identity. The boy had passed the test. That was why he had chosen to reveal some of his plans to the teen tonight. As Alex disappeared from view, Yassen turned to leave. The flight to Saint-Tropez would take two hours, leaving just enough time to put Alex's plan in action. If all went well, then two more SCORPIA board members would be dead before the next nightfall.
The rest of the week soon passed quickly, the days blurring together in Alex's mind. Every morning, he would wake up to Wolf yelling at the unit to get moving, have breakfast, and start on the day's march. He did one more in Elan Valley and three in the Brecon Beacons. By the fifth march during test week, he was carrying a fifty-nine pound bergen over eighteen miles in addition to water, food, and a rifle. Even with the weather steadily getting worse over the week, leaving him to battle the elements more than ever, Alex had still managed to finish this fifth march in the allotted nine hours. The soldiers continued to let out a sigh of relief after every march he passed.
After that fifth march, he did his swimming test which was broken up into four sections. The first was a high-water entry dive from a ten meter height. He passed that easily, having practiced it during training. The second was a water entry from a three-meter height and swimming twenty-five meters while wearing webbing and carrying a rifle. This was slightly more difficult, as he was unaccustomed to carrying a weapon while swimming, but he had no problem passing this assessment. For the third section, the soldiers had him kitted out in full combat gear and then sent him to tread water for five minutes, which was immediately followed by a two hundred metre swim. The added weight of the combat gear made this test much more difficult but he still passed it, gasping for breath. The final section was a ten-meter underwater swim with a retrieval of a small weight. This one, he passed with ease as well. After swimming to the surface of a freezing lake in the middle of winter with Edward Pleasure's unconscious body, this final assessment was child's play to him.
Other than this swimming test, his time after the marches were filled with more school studies. Miss Treat kept up a brutal pace with her lessons, making him completely exhausted by the end of the day. Because he was so tired that he no longer woke up before everyone else, he couldn't do his meditations and combat breathing exercises in the morning anymore. Instead, he chose to do it in the night, right before his meetings with Yassen. He never asked about the Grimaldi twins and the man never told him. As curious as Alex was, he decided it was probably for the best. Someone would inevitably let something slip. If he didn't know the full details beforehand, then he could act with genuine surprise when he finally heard the news and no one would suspect him of knowing anything about the matter. So during the whole week, the assassin just trained him, for an hour or two every night, in the art of invisibility and recognizing anyone who did so. He remembered some of those tricks from Yermalov's practical lessons at Malagosto but there were many more that were new to him. Alex picked up the skills quickly and could even detect Yassen's presence by the end of the week.
Because of these extra lessons, he only got an average of three hours of sleep each night. By the sixth march on Saturday, he was quite irritated and the soldiers steered clear of him. They quickly gave Alex his instructions for the sketch map march and handed him a hand-drawn map, instead of the usual printed one. It was to test map reading and navigation skills more thoroughly. As it was one of the two killer marches that even excellent candidates could fail, the soldiers breathed a collective sigh of relief and finished their own training for the day in a much better mood when they saw that he had completed the twenty-two mile march within the eleven hour time frame. They still avoided Alex though, knowing that he was still in a bad mood from all the exhaustion and tests. The men were very aware that they had been in a constant, foul mood during their own selection process, which had been easier than the teen's. When the next day arrived, Alex went through the same morning routine before he was sent on his final march for the hills phase. The endurance march, as Wolf had told him at the beginning, was forty miles with a seventy-pound bergen. Alex spent the whole day hiking through the Brecon Beacons to his destination without any food, popping glucose and caffeine tablets from time to time so that he could keep going. There were soldiers at a couple of checkpoints, acting as the DS, so that he could point out his next destination on the map to them. By the time he reached the last RV point, it was 0200 hours, the same time he normally finished his lessons with Yassen. The sergeant and all three units were there, waiting for him. Alex hurt everywhere. Even after a day of SAS training, it was impossible to not have a nasty bruise somewhere. Now though, his body and face were littered with cuts and bruises. His muscles were burning from exhaustion. And the old bullet wound on his chest, as well as the more recent on one his arm, ached ferociously.
"Sirs!" Alex gasped out, standing at attention.
"At ease," the sergeant said. "Congratulations, Cub. You passed the first phase of selection. Now, go get some rest. You're flying to Brunei tomorrow for the jungle phase."
A/N: TEC = Tail End Charlie (the last person in the patrol so responsible for covering their backs)
DS = Directing Staff
After Alex's SCORPIA training, the books have largely ignored the skills that he learned on Malagosto. Personally, I don't think that's very realistic as a life or death situation would probably make someone instinctively use the most harmful methods they know to get out alive unless they were extremely skilled and have developed a high level of control. Since Alex is not skilled or controlled to that point yet, his SCORPIA training will be playing a bigger role in this story than they do in the books.
Thanks for reading! I'm not sure if this chapter was too long or not... Maybe I should have split it into two chapters. Let me know what you think so far! Please follow, favorite, and/or leave a review on the story!