Author's Note :

I'm so sorry for the so long delay to the ending of this story. Unfortunately life has thrown me quite the amount of roadblocks those last years, commencing with my health that slowly degradated to end with myself barely able to as little as sit for an hour, and I'm not even talking about walking (I ended unable to walk more than twenty meters without being forced to sit if I did not want to end on the ground as the pain was unbearable).

Fortunately physiotherapy had relieved that a bit (even if I'm not still able to walk more than fifty meters before having to seat) but at least I can now be back seating at my computer or my workbench for at least a few hours at a time... And I don't even get into the losses I experienced, first my godfather, then my mother, and also having to adapt to my new job as scale models kit designer for a local producer and the fact I ended up officially recognized as disabled by the Belgian NHS and having to stop working in the book store where I was working (at least I could still keep my model designer job), all of that made that writing had becoming difficult for me, as inspiration deserted me.

Luckily, with help from some friends, I now feel more confident in myself after passing trough some dark times, and now found my inspiration back and can finally finish this story and hopefully write the Prequel I had planned for it, telling the story of the Alexanders and of how Alex became a RAF pilot and how Blunt betrayed Alex's trust and later fled to Scorpia when his misdeeds were exposed by Sabina's father wth the help of his daughter who had helped Alex find Jack who Blunt had faked the death of to get guardianship of Alex... But I won't say more, you'll discover all that in the next month hopefully,

And now without further adoo, let's get back to the ending of Codename Excalibur.

I don't own Alex Rider, he's the sole property of Anthony Horrowitz and I only own this story and the OC's I created for it.

Chapter 18 : Endgame !

The few days that followed the sinking of the Sao Paulo were quite evetfull. Both squadrons continued their missions in suport of the landing forces while they took back both Mount Pleasaint Airbase and Darwin. But you easily could tell that the argie's morale was at its lowest as, during the assault on Goose Green Settlement, a whole unit of hteir infantry surrendered without even firing a single shot. Unfortunately it was not to be the same in Mount Pleasant, as there was posted one of the elite unit of the Argentinian army which fought to the last man, the tiffies of squadron 15 even having to bring a bunker where they retreated down to the ground as all other attempts to capture them had ended in utter defeat for our troops, the last one causing even a SAS unit to loose nearly 80 percent of its men...

Alex, as head of the new 1st Naval Air Squadron of the Fleet Air Arm(1), was often flying high above the melee, covering them against any air attack that would have been attempted either by the fighters posted in Stanley (before a strike from 617 squadron made mincemeat of the jets based there) or coming from their remaining bases on the mainland.

Five days after operation Razgriz, a message finally came from London ordering a cease-fire as the Argies apparently had thrown a coup to evict their corrupted government, jailing their members as well as the Scorpia operative that were counseling them. As peace talks took place between some envoys that flew from London to Ascension on an Airbus ant then from there to the Independance on a COD, some argentinian diplomats were sent to Mount Pleasant where Tom picked them with his Sea-King to bring them on the carrier, Alex and the pilots from 1st NAS enjoyed a three days leave to Ascension. Alex quickly boarded the COD with Rich and Tom, who were also granted leave, and soon enough they were airborne, heading back to ascension for a well deserved break with their families and friends.

Ascension, three days later...

As Alex rested in his sofa, Sabina cuddled against him, he remembered the welcome he was given when they landed in Ascension three days earlier after a four hours flight on the carrier-based cargo plane or COD. The press had somewhat learned that he and some other pilots were arriving on a leave and were waiting for him at the airbase. If they thought they would be able to ask him any question, they were utterly disappointed as, no sooner Alex has got his feet on solid ground, he found himself properly bowled over by an overenthusiastic Sabina, whose relief to be seeing him back safe and sound was made clearly apparent by the monster of a hug she gave him, both of them ending on the ground as she launched herself in his arms in total abandon... Meanwhile, on the side, Jack and Sandy were welcoming Richard and Tom who were standing a bit behind their friend, quite amused by the reception given to him by his spitfire of a wife... Soon Alex was ushered by both his spouse and Jack to a SUV allocated to them for the duration of their stay on the island by the RAF and, as soon as they were all inside the car, Jack drove them back to Alex's quarters on the military side of the airbase where Sabina's parents had prepared them a welcoming brunch.

Since sabina had fallen asleep, he lowered the volume of the TV ad sighed in contentent, but soon a frown came to his face as a message came during the credit titles of the movie they were watching announcing a special edition of the news... Once the title "Victory in the Falklands" appeared, he put on the subtitles as not to wake his wife who was quite tired by the pregnancy, and had to clamp a hand on his mouth not to let out a whoop of utter joy and relief as the host announced the unconditionnal surrender of all argentinian troops located in the Islands while the provisory government that had taken over in Buenos Aires had sued for peace, asking for the return of all argentinian prisonners to the mainland in exchange for the estradition of any non-argentinian Scorpia operative apprehended in Argentina during their coup to the UK while the argentinian members of Scorpia would face a military tribunal in the argentinian capitol under accusation of treason, also proposing an alliance with the UK to eradicate the plague that was the criminal organisation in their two countries, and providing the UK invaluable Intelligence with all information they had and would gather about Scorpia. It was beyond doubt that the MP, meeting in emergency at the Parliament on order by the Prime Minister, were enthusiastic about this and immediately accepted the argentinian proposition, even going as far as to propose them the UK's help in restoring democracy in their country, which of course they readily accepted.

When the communique ended and the host and its guests started discussing the political situation regarding the treaty, Sabina woke up to a grinning Alex...

"Honey ? You seem in awfully high spirits for one who's got to leave back to war tomorrow... "

"Well, I'm not so sure I'll have to leave after all... and at least, I would not go to war anymore... They surrendered and both Argentina and London signed a peace treaty !"

"wha... "

"Well, it seems there was a coup in Buenos Aires and they have caught Scorpia with its pants down... They're leaving soon and we'll be able to finally get back home ! Even better, they arrested all Scorpia agents in Argentina and the Falklands and are ready to hand us over all non argentinian ones ! "

"Blimey ! I bet Jack and Sally will be quite happy if it means no more separation. I can already tell I'm extatic about it !"

"Me too, love ! But I really hope that the 15th will be posted to Mount Pleasant with tom and me, cause if not she'll have to choose between leaving with him back to the UK or ending their relationship... "

"My god ! That's awfull !"

"No worry though, Sabina. I'll have a word with James about it... I'd be glad to have both of them with us in our squad as I know that our former CO will remain as CAG (2) on board the Independance until the Queen Elisabeth is seaworthy... Then we'll see what happens, as I fear I'll be then either posted on it, or I'll be assigned to the second carrier, the Prince of Wales, as I know that James is on the line to be its CAG ! "

"God... And what about us then ?"

"Don't worry too much Sab, it won't happen before at least four to five years, and who knows where I'll be then ? I have four years max to serve before I have to choose between re-enlisting or retiring back to civilian life... and I'll be damned if I let my family play second fiddle to my military career, and I could care less about what anybody could say about it ! "

"Well... We'll see I guess... Let's just hope you'll at least stay here for a few years this time, as I'm not sure I'd be happy to see you leave for extended deployments while our baby is not at least in his early teens... "

"Me too, love. I don't want him to experience what I had to live, never knowning my parents and loosing my uncle as a teenager... I want him to have the happy childhood with his parents and family I was deprived of. And to hell with my job if it ever interferes with it !"

At that moment, Alex's cellphone started to ring...

"Flight Lieutenant McKittrick ?", he answered the call...

"Hey AL, it's James here... You heard the news ?"

"Sure I have Jim, I should be there tomorrow afternoon as scheduled, by the way !"

"Negative, the schedule has been changed, You'll leave in three days with our personnel and our families back to Mount Pleasant on our Herkies and two Airbuses that are being sent from the mainland. And there's even more... You're the new Station Air Group commander, Squadron Leader McKittrick !"

"Wha... How... " stuttered Alex in shock

Well, the 15th is officially split into the 1st NAS, that I'll command, and the new 2 NAS that Richard will command and that will be affected to Mount Pleasant for at least a year and a half while the Independance will be conducting trainings in the south Atlantic for the forseable future, and once completion of the Queen Elisabeth, it'll be officially affected to our new naval base we'll build in Stanley as I will then take over as her CAG while Merrill will be posted as the Queen Elisabeth's first CAG... "

Gosh, I bet Richard will be glad about that... I'm certain Jack will also be extatic about it... I already can hear the wedding bells in the distance", Alex answered, a huge grin on his face...

"Well, that was for the good news... The bad ones is that Blunt was found dead in his cell this morning... Apparently, he hung himself up with some towels when he heard of the argentinian surrender and the terms of the peace treaty,..."

"Oh Sh** ! I knew we should have put him under strict surveilance... I guess London won't be too happy about that situation !"

"Your guess is spot on as usual, Alex... They pinned it on Tolland... The poor bloke is beyond himself about that as he ordered him to be checked every 30 minutes, yet this happened !"

"Well, short of having him uder cuffs all the time, I don't see what he could have done more. I'll call Jones about it to try to save his hide... My only regret is that that bastard Blunt took a wealth of information in his grave !"

"That's not so sure... He left a note and a disk for you... The disk is encrypted and he says in his note that only you should be able to know the password to decrypt it... "

"Let's hope then that he has taken the right decision in the end... It can be anything from intel on me to intel on his contact with scorpia, and I don't know why but I'd be better if it was the latter... "

"Me too, no offense to you... So, why don't you get your wife ready, pack your stuff and get ready to head back there in two days ? I'll take care of things here for you in the meanwhile, and by the way, seems your house was used by some big hat of the Argentinian Air Force... Fortunately he's changed very few things... He has been killed in the last skirmishes unfortunately, cause I'm sure you'd have wanted to wring his neck as he's nearly emptied you wine cave !"

"Damn it ! I had rare bottles there... gifts for friends and even some I inherited from uncle Ian's own reserve... He's indeed lucky he's six feet under or I would sure have ran him round the bise with my boot to his ass !"

"Well, I'll leave you then. Give my best to Sabina and Jack, and I'll see you soon, mate !"

"Sure will do, mate ! Till friday then !"

Once he had hung up, he turned to see his wife approaching with a large smile on her face...

"Good news, love ? ", she asked him

"Aye... We better call both Jack, Tom and your parents, and all start packing... We're heading back to Mound Pleasant in 48 hours with the two herkies and the KC-135s... And the other good news is that I'm promoted to CO of the 1st NAS and that Richard will stay with us as my XO while the 617th will remain in the area for at least six month before returning to Lossiemouth..."

"Yes ! We can have them with us when the baby comes, then Jack and Richard's wedding once I'm well enough after childbirth to attend it... "

"Of course, Love... Told you I'd chase them out for our kid to be born at home in Mt Pleasant, didn't I ?"

"You did, love... You did indeed !"

Alex then called Jack and Tom while Sabina called her parents to give them the good news and soon they were heading back to the falklands, hopefully to stay this time !

Notes :

(1) : Fleet Air Arm : Naval branch of Britain's Air Forces.

(2) : Carrier Air Group : Leader of all aircrafts based on a carrier.