Here's your next chapter, readers! I hope you enjoy it, peeps! Read on!

Alex walked into the lab, not expecting the loud music that blared out of the speakers. He covered his ears quickly, trying to protect them as much as he could from becoming deaf. "What the hell?"

Andy covered his ears as well. "Ahhh! Too loud, too loud!" He looked over at Gibbs. "Make it stop! Make it stop!"

"ABBY!" Gibbs yelled. "TURN IT OFF!"

Abby turned around from her computer and quickly reached over to turn off the loud music that was blaring out of her speakers. "Sorry guys…"

The trio slowly unplugged their ears and gave her small smiles.

Abby smiled back. "What can I do for you guys, then? Need sweets? Chocolate? High energy drinks?" she asked, holding up her Caf-Pow.

"Uh, Ms Sciuto…" Alex started, causing Abby to blush slightly.

"Abby," Andy corrected automatically, not used to formalities at all around the team.

Alex nodded. "Right, Abby. Do you have the memory stick?" he asked.

Abby frowned before pointing at where it was plugged into her computer. "Yeah, I do, but it's impossible to hack into," she explained as she took a sip of her caffeinated drink. She frowned slightly at Alex. "Why?"

"Alex believes it has some important information on it that would help us with this case," Gibbs explained as the trio walked further into the lab.

Abby frowned before she turned to Alex. "Well, unless you can hack into this annoying little flash drive, I'm afraid it won't be of any use at all to the case." She gave him a sad smile.

Alex sighed, his brain going deep into thought, before his dark eyes lit up slightly. Only slightly. "I think I can…"

Abby frowned. "You can?"

Andy raised an eyebrow questioningly. "You think?"

"Well, I'm not sure, but… I could try."

Andy grinned and pushed Alex towards the computer just as Abby grabbed his arm and pulled him over. She quickly opened up the password page for the drive.

"Here you go, Alex."

Alex frowned slightly. "Do you have any password programmes…?" he asked.

Abby opened one up. "Yup."

Alex smiled at her. "Thanks." He cracked his knuckles before taking a deep breath and setting his fingers on the computer keyboard. "Right-y ho… here we go…"

Andy chuckled. "You British morons are weird."

Gibbs frowned at his son. "Andy…"

"So are you American gits," Alex bit back with a grin as he began to type. "Now shut up and let me concentrate, idiot."

It was about five hours later – making it around six in the evening – before Alex finally managed to get a hit on the password and hack into the system.

The lab was quiet, apart from the continuous tapping on the keyboard and occasional growl or curse when Alex got the password wrong – the tiredness was starting to get to him.

"Can't you try any harder?" Andy groaned as he sat on the stool beside Alex, his head on the desk – or what was available of the desk to put his head on, as Abby always kept that desk cluttered with computer stuff – watching his every move as he attempted to break the password to the flash drive.

Alex gritted his teeth as he continued to tap his fingers on the keyboard keys, trying every password he could possibly think of at this point. "If I try any harder, I swear my brain is going to explode."

"That would be an interesting sight."

Alex stopped and turned to glare at Andy. "You do not know how incredibly tempting it is to smash your nose in right now."

Andy smirked at Alex. "Really?"

Alex turned back to the computer and continued to type. "Yes really. In fact, maybe I should do it right now just to sho—" His eyes widened when the computer suddenly dinged, and a wide grin spread on his face. "I did it."

Andy's eyes widened in shock and slight confusion as he turned to his blonde friend. "What?" he asked.

"I did it, Andy." Alex turned to grin at the other boy. "I got in!" he exclaimed excitedly.

Andy's face broke into a huge grin. "Yeah!" His fist pumped the air. "I bet you're glad you didn't punch me now, aren't you?"

"Shut up."

"Now all we have to do is go through this information…" Alex muttered as he opened up one of the files on the flash drive.

Andy groaned. "More searching? Oh, come on, Alex…"

"Yeah, Gibbs."

"We've done it."

Gibbs paused for a few seconds before he stood from his desk, alerting his three agents. "You've done it?"

"Yup. We're in. Well, I'm in. Andy did nothing."

Gibbs heard an indignant cry of, "I did something!" In the background, and he chuckled. "Alright, I'll be right down."

"No, we're on our way up. Stay. Besides, we need to know what the rest of the team found."

Gibbs nodded, even though he knew Alex couldn't see it. "Alright." He ended the call abruptly and sat back down at his desk. His three agents were still staring at him. "What?" he asked.

"Alex managed to hack into the flash drive?" McGee asked, shocked. "But… how…?"

"Ask him yourself," Tony muttered. "It's not as if we want to know, McNerd."

"McNerd? How caring and original…" Alex muttered as he and Andy walked into the bullpen with Abby in tow, the flash drive in their hands. Alex walked straight over to McGee's desk and inserted the flash drive into his computer.

Tony frowned. "I'd like to see you call someone an original name," he muttered, only loud enough for Andy to hear.

He didn't think that Alex had such good hearing.

"I'd rather not," Alex replied. "Calling them the more common insults keeps it fun. Creating your own names in my opinion makes it childish and stupid."

Tony's eyes widened and he blushed lightly. Now that was just insulting…

Ziva and McGee had to hide their laughter at Tony's reaction. Neither of them had seen Tony get insulted by a teenager… apart from Andy, of course. And Alice. Alice was always resourceful with her words.

Andy snorted. "Dude, you just got owned."

Tony glared at Andy. "Shut up."

Alex quickly hacked into the flash drive again before bringing up the files he had found on the big screen. "Okay, so here's what I got on the memory stick." He opened one of the documents. "It contains all the details about the Petty Officer's past… including the CIA." He was glad to see that the team wasn't surprised. "So you managed to hack into the CIA, I assume?"

McGee nodded. "The Petty Officer was a previous member of the CIA, and was able to work several missions as a field agent. However, he retired to become a marine…" McGee frowned. "We just don't know why…"

Alex opened one of the files. "I do." He watched as the document came up on the screen large enough for everyone to read. "Peter Marks was a member of the CIA until last year, when there was a problem with his circumstances." Alex took a deep breath. "His partner was a double agent for an enemy organization that prepared assassins."

Gibbs frowned. "What's this organization, then?" he asked.

Alex bit his lip. "Scorpia."

Ziva paled. "You… you cannot be serious…"

Alex nodded.

Tony frowned. "What's going on? Who's this Scorpia, and what did they do to our Petty Officer?"

Alex frowned at them. "You… you don't know?"

"Ziva seems to be the only one that knows," McGee pointed out, causing all of the guys to send her a look.

She shrugged. "I was a member of Mossad. It was required that we knew such things."

Gibbs frowned before he turned to Alex. Then how did he…?

Alex turned back to the flat screen. "The Petty Officer found out that his partner was, in fact, a Scorpia operative that was working within the CIA in order to bring the company down. An agent from another organization was sent in to confirm this suspicion after he reported it anonymously to his bosses, and the agent managed to confirm it. The double agent was arrested, and the Peter Marks became a marine."

McGee frowned at Alex. "How did you know all that?"

"I read through the information," Alex stated. It wasn't a complete lie… but he didn't want to tell the complete truth. "It told me everything in there."

Tony sighed. "So, what does all of this very valuable information have to do with our case, Alex?" he asked.

Alex looked to Ziva to explain. He didn't want to seem like he knew everything… it would give everything away.

Ziva stepped forward. "As Scorpia are an enemy organization, they would have had something against the CIA. Scorpia stands for Sabotage, Corruption, Intelligence and Assassination." She walked towards the screen. "It seems as if what Petty Officer Marks did may have clicked off—"

"Ticked off," Tony automatically corrected, causing Ziva to send him a glare.

"Alright, he must have ticked off Scorpia," she corrected. "Scorpia does not take to these types of things lightly, so they would have dealt with them in a way they thought appropriate…"

Andy's eyes widened. "Assassination…"

The team was silent, absorbing all of the information that they were being given. The Petty Officer was assassinated? How were they supposed to solve the case now?

"We still have to get the guy that ordered him to be killed, don't we?" Tony asked, noticing the determined look that appeared on Gibbs' face.

"Yep."

The team groaned.

Alex sighed as he walked away from the park, hands in his pockets. They're all idiots. The lot of them. Every single freaking American is an idiot.

It had been about two days since he'd managed to hack into the memory stick – or flash drive, as the Americans called it – and now he was left to hang out with Andy until they managed to get a lead on whoever had ordered the assassination of the Petty Officer and declared Alex safe enough to go back to his parents.

So Alex had decided to tag along with Andy when he said he was going to the park with his friends.

Only to have the most disturbing truth questions delivered to him.

He sulked as he sat on a nearby bench. Andy was his only ride home…

"Alex!"

Alex sighed and turned his head to see Andy jogging up to him. He groaned. "What?" he snapped.

Andy froze. "Look, I'm sorry that Jon and Terry are absolute morons, and I'm sorry that they had the nerve to pry into your private life, alright?"

Alex just continued to scowl. "It's not that… it's just…"

Andy raised an eyebrow. "It's just what?"

"Why didn't you stop them?"

Andy just stared at him. "Alex, I was curious too, you know."

"But why?"

"Because you've told me nothing about your private life."

"Because it's private!"

Andy sighed and joined Alex on the bench. "Alex, how do you expect me to stand for you when I basically know nothing about you myself? I know you have extensive knowledge of hacking, you can fight, you're prone to nightmares… and you've had amnesia recently! Not only that, but you know how the military and the government work better than I do! And I've grown up being accustomed to both!" He looked sharply at Alex. "I barely know anything about you! Not about your life, who your family are, what they're like, your friends…"

Alex understood what he meant. "You mean, because I know everything about you, you think you deserve to know more about me?"

Andy nodded guiltily. "Sorry if I offended you."

"Nah, it's alright." There was a small smile on Alex's face. "I guess I should…" He stood up. "But can we talk on the way home? If there's anyone listening, I only want them to hear snippets. Not the whole story."

Andy frowned. This is confusing… "What if they're following us?"

"I'll know if they are," Alex answered.

Andy sighed and stood up, and the boys began to walk towards the Gibbs residence.

"Andy… there's something really important I need to tell you…" Alex said suddenly as they walked down the street.

Andy raised an eyebrow. "Okay… talk."

"You know the other day when I said I read all of that information off the sheet?" Alex asked.

Andy frowned as he tried to remember, but nodded when he did. "Yeah, I do… what about it?"

"I lied."

"You what?!"

Alex was about to answer when his wrist was suddenly grabbed by a gloved hand. His eyes widened and he spun to face a masked man standing beside him, wearing a plain black outfit. He tensed. Oh crap…

Andy's eyes widened when he felt an arm wrap around his waist and another around his mouth. "Shit…" he managed to mutter under the gloves.

Alex struggled to pull himself out of the man's grip, but he was only pulled so that the man had his arms wrapped around him.

He suddenly felt breath against his ear. "Come quietly, boy."

Alex's eyes narrowed. "Or else what?"

He was turned to that he was facing Andy. "Or else your friend won't be treated so kindly."

Andy froze in his struggling when he spotted Alex, and they shared a look.

This whole escape depends on me, Alex's eyes seemed to say.

No, it depends on us, moron, Andy's replied before the teen found himself stamping on his captor's foot. Hard. When the captor cried out in pain he loosened his grip on Andy's arms, and Andy took this as his chance to elbow the guy in the ribs.

Alex smirked before breaking out of his captor's grip and punching him hard in the gut, knocking the wind out of him. He smiled when he stayed down. They were pretty much free…

Until he felt something hit the back of his head, and then he was out cold.

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