Disclaimer: I don't own Alex Rider
A/N: Special thanks as always to OnlyABookworm for being amazing and editing this! Thanks to you guys for reading, favoriting, following, and reviewing!
Dedication: To TimeyWimeyBadWolf (love the penname, though I'm more of an Impossible Girl myself, lol)- don't think I haven't noticed all your reviews to all my stories! Thank you very much ;D
Operation Zeta 13
Wolf was at his wit's end. He had tried being as patient as he could with the children from Brookland Comprehensive, but he just couldn't contain his anger. They were brats. He wanted to strangle all of them with his bare hands. He wanted to watch as the light in their eyes faded away. He wanted to see their feeble attempts to break free of his grasp, ultimately failing-
"Wolf!"
Wolf jerked out of his fantasy when Snake hit him in the arm. He turned to the redhead, a scowl on his face, "What?"
Snake scowled back at him, nodding to the kids, "You've been glaring at them like you want to kill them for the past twenty minutes."
Wolf blinked rapidly. Had he been glaring that long? He probably had, seeing how much he wanted to crush their esophagus underneath his fingers and di-
He cleared his throat, "I do want to kill them. They're worse than Cub."
Snake frowned at the unit leader, "Cub is a good kid."
Wolf shrugged, "Yeah, he is."
"I hope he's okay… wherever he is," Snake sighed, looking at the children, who were running around like wild monkeys.
Wolf nodded in agreement. Cub had disappeared after the Sergeant and two MI6 agents had appeared. K-Unit had assumed it was a mission. Judging by the Sergeant's angry words after Cub had gone, it had been a dangerous one, ruffling even the gruffest man.
"It has something to do with Zeta and SCORPIA's alliance," Wolf muttered to himself, thinking hard.
Snake had heard him, "What?"
Wolf crossed his arms, still raking his brain for why Cub had suddenly disappeared, "Zeta and SCORPIA, remember? The guy we rescued: Agent Taylor. The attack on Brookland. Cheetah. Those were all Zeta-SCORPIA, and Cub was sent to stop them!"
Wolf had thought that the Zeta-SCORPIA issue was a one-time thing for K-Unit and Cub, but that evidently was not the case. Cub was deep in it. He was most likely in trouble.
Zeta-SCORPIA was brutal. He'd seen it with his own eyes when his unit had discovered M-Unit's Cheetah. Perhaps they were in it deeper than they'd thought too.
"What are you talking about?" Snake questioned, folding his arms in the same way that Wolf was, "Cub was sent to stop Zeta and SCORPIA? That's suicide!"
"Yeah," Wolf muttered under his breath, "So why would MI6 send him there with no backup while injured?"
"Excuse me, Wolf-man-sir-guy," the unit leader could barely contain his annoyance. He turned to the student, delivering his best death-glare. The student looked barely fazed.
He was short, a little shorter than Wolf, who found this pleasing (Wolf had always been shorter than most). He had sharp blue eyes and spike-y black hair that seemed familiar. Wolf vaguely recalled this boy to be one of the class clowns. Tim, maybe. Or was it Tom?
"Did you say that MI6 sent Cub on another mission?" The boy asked, biting his lip worriedly.
"None of your business, brat," Wolf snapped, dismissing the student.
"It is my business!" the kid snapped back, glaring at Wolf, "He's my friend, and I need to know if he's okay!"
Wolf was about to retort angrily with a 'give me fifty press-ups!' when Snake intervened.
"We don't know where he is, but it seems like he was sent on a mission," the redhead said softly, looking earnestly at the boy, "You won't tell your classmates this, right?"
The boy snorted, "Are you kidding? Half the class still hates him. Reckons that he set up the attack on the school, and he's just trying to play the hero. They still think he's some sort of gang leader."
"And you don't?" Wolf bit back.
The boy frowned, "Alex – Cub - told me everything he's been through. Everyone out there," he gestured to the students and teachers who had stopped running and were now getting drinks, "is an idiot. They don't understand."
"You understand?" Snake looked puzzled.
"No," the kid rolled his eyes, "but I helped him a couple times on a mission. I'd say I know more than them."
Snake nodded thoughtfully.
"Do you know who he's against this time?" the teenager turned to Snake, who was probably the better choice to ask, "Tell me it's something easy. Something safe."
Snake glanced at Wolf, who stared stoically at the student. The unit leader inclined his head a fraction of an inch.
"We can't tell you," Snake responded after a moment of dilemma, "we don't know who he's facing."
The boy looked disappointed, "But you have a feeling," he fished around for an answer, "otherwise you wouldn't look so worried! Both of you!"
Wolf was back to his angry, brooding self, "Just leave it, will you? You wouldn't know who they were anyway."
"Try me," the boy snarled back.
"No," Snake said firmly, cutting Wolf off, "You don't want to know, kid. Just get back with the rest of your class."
The kid opened his mouth furiously, about to snap a retort back, but Wolf beat him, "That was an order, brat."
The boy glared at Wolf for another seconds before turning away.
"Fucking shit-head," Wolf ground out angrily, "He doesn't get anything."
"Calm down, Wolf," Snake sighed, patting his unit leader's shoulder in a sort of motherly way, "I'm sure MI6 will call us in soon. They care about Cub too."
"Not likely," a voice from behind them called. Wolf didn't have to turn around to know that it was Rock who had spoken.
"What? Are we talking about Cub?" Eagle's boisterous voice was easily heard over the growing loudness of the class on the track.
"Hey!" Wolf shouted, "Get back to running!"
A few fearful looks in his direction and the kids were off.
"Wolf reckons he was sent to stop the Zeta-SCORPIA alliance," Snake told the two soldiers who had taken their places by Wolf's side.
"The Zeta-SCORPIA alliance?" Rock frowned, "That's one hell of an ambition. How can one agent overthrow those two organizations?"
"Maybe he's not alone," Eagle pipped up hopefully.
Wolf shrugged, "He doesn't seem like the kind of guy to have a partner."
Truthfully, Wolf was recalling the time he had been summoned to the French Alps. He hadn't gone with K-Unit for that particular mission because MI6 had specifically picked a team out based on their strengths. The rest of K-Unit didn't have the same level of clearance as Wolf, which was why they were so oblivious to Cub's independent nature.
If he remembered correctly, Cheetah had also been in that mission.
"Still," Eagle insisted, "they must have other undercover agents as a backup. If Cub really is a valuable asset to them, they won't let him go."
"Is he a valuable asset?" Rock asked, "to them at least?"
"No," Wolf realized with a sinking feeling, "Cub isn't special. They can always get another kid and train him up."
The unit stood in uncomfortable silence as each man thought.
"So, what are we going to do about it?" Snake broke the silence with the unasked question that had been lingering on all four men's minds.
Wolf gritted his teeth, turning to a soldier who was passing by, "Hey, can you watch these kids for a bit? My unit and I have to go talk to the Sergeant."
The man chuckled, "Good luck with that. He was throwing a fit last I heard. Arguing with the head of MI6 herself."
"Good to know we're on the same side," Wolf muttered mostly to himself, though the other four men heard. He nodded to the soldier and led K-Unit to the office.
The rest of his unit fell into silence, knowing that Wolf had control of the situation.
The short unit leader knocked sharply on the door, pretending not to hear the small thump from inside the room accompanied by a low string of curses.
"In," the Sergeant commanded cuttingly.
Wolf cast a look back at the three men before entering. The four snapped to attention in front of the Sergeant, who was holding a very broken phone.
"What do you want?" the Sergeant had a defeated look in his eyes as he sat down on his comfy chair behind his desk.
"K-Unit requests to know where Cub is, sir."
The Sergeant sighed, looking down at the broken cellphone in his hand. He looked back up at the soldiers, "I'm afraid that's classified by our superiors, soldier."
"What?" Eagle squawked indignantly, "Cub is part of K-"
He was silenced as the other three members of K-Unit threw him a warning look.
The Sergeant sighed again, putting the phone down on his desk, "I know, and I'm afraid I can't do anything. I only know that Cub's somewhere in Greece out of our reach."
Wolf opened his mouth, clearly about to retort, but the Sergeant glared pointedly at him.
"Shouldn't you be looking after some brats?"
"Yes, sir," Wolf replied stiffly.
The Sergeant nodded, "Then you are dismissed."
Wolf wanted to argue. He wanted to tell the man to fix his damn phone and call back MI6. He wanted to shout at him. He wanted Cub back, safe with K-Unit.
As much as Wolf didn't want to admit it, little Cub had crawled into his circle of friends, earning his respect and loyalty along the way.
And Wolf never abandoned his men.
OPERATION*ZETA
"Who is this man?" the woman's voice was soft. She was trying to keep quiet as the sun sunk down below the horizon.
The woman had been hiding out in the woods nearby the SAS camp in Wales, patiently waiting for orders.
"A picture will be sent to your phone," the other man replied.
The woman had never met her commanding officer, but she had talked to him over the phone plenty of times, always taking orders. Always obeying.
"You must kill him like you killed the first target," the man growled lowly.
The woman wrinkled her nose in disgust. The first man she had killed, Cheetah, if she remembered correctly, had been a messy kill. Messy kills were not her favorite. She preferred a simple gunshot to the head or even a silent slit of the throat.
"His name is Sparrow," the man said, "he was on the mission in the French Alps."
"Another one?" the woman questioned, tilting her head as she watched the silent camp below her.
"There were seven men in total," the man told her, "Get it done, and get it done fast."
The man hung up, leaving the woman by herself. She loosened her grip on the tree branch a little, waiting for the picture to be sent to her phone.
She opened the message, gazing curiously at the man on her screen.
A flicker of movement caught her eye. Black hair. Muscular, stout stature. It was her target. Lucky for the woman. The last man had taken four days to finally get alone.
She swung down from her tree, silent and graceful, not a foot out of step.
Hunting was the woman's specialty. Killing was her sport.
A/N: And the plot thickens... Kind of.
I'm not sure how many more chapters we have left, but I can very nearly see the end.
Alrighty! Don't forget to feed me (with reviews) on the way out! I appreciate even a tiny comment :)
-Alice x