AN: This is a "A Difference of Time" AU (fanfiction s/12401393/1/A-Difference-Of-Time (remove the space)). I would like to thank Zyzyax for allowing me to use their fic as a base for this OS. Also, a lot of thanks to Zyzyax for betaing (making it reader-friendly) and helping me to write and adding some parts to this!
Brendan Chase wasn't by any means naive or stupid. Which was the reason why he instantly got suspicious when he heard of Alejandro's death not too long after his second letter to that boy.
The timing was just too suspicious to be anything but someone trying to cover a burned identity. Alejandro supposedly died from his injuries caused by falling off a cliff, his body was burned due to a subsequent forest fire which had reached his body a day later. Further investigation revealed that he apparently had taken a vacation in America. Hiking. Alone. In an area without reception. One of the more stupid things one could do. Alejandro was supposedly a bright medical student trained in first aid and CPR. According to the conjecture of the firefighters who found the corpse, they guessed that he probably fell off a cliff and succumbed to his injuries shortly after. Judging by the burned scrub nearby no one would probably have seen him from the road or the air. Thus, his burned corpse was only found when firefighters combed the ground looking for pockets of embers. It was a very convenient scenario for faking the identification of a body. Fake dentist records to get the desired identification for a burned corpse were one of the oldest tricks in that particular trade. Chase was a bit disappointed at that. However, it did point to a brilliant but inexperienced mind with a lot of potential. The death was beautifully convenient and very much believable to the general public. After all, didn't boys in college do stupid things all the time? Chase remembered some of the stunts he and the boys had pulled in college. It had been a long time ago. Tracing the arrangements made for this death to work might prove interesting, though. To keep his potential recruit under wraps and the hell away from his nosy colleagues he told Nile to work on finding out who on earth was behind the very nicely faked death. Discreetly. That man wasn't his second in command for nothing. Despite some people thinking differently, they were SCORPIA, not SCORPA.
However, apparently whoever arranged this death had done a very thorough job and was skilled to the boot. There had been the most basic evidence to prove that the death and the body were indeed legitimate. There was a funeral which his parents apparently attended, a grave, a death certificate. Records of a car rented at the airport, plane tickets, a rented car. Everything was there. It was perfect for fake death purposes. Alejandro was not bad at what he did, he simply lacked formal instruction and experience. As for Nile, he asked his dearest second in command to do some leg work. The man could and would keep it a secret, unlike some of the other underlings who were considered "mutual property" by the board. A second in command was considered yours and yours alone. Besides, someone who manages to burn their identity by visiting London a bit too often had to have too much time on their hands, right? No, he wasn't displeased about it. Not one bit. He was curious, though, what on earth had caused Nile to visit London, where various secret services had their headquarters, that often. Nile, while young, wasn't someone who burned identities for kicks or because he was bored. No operative who was successful, for that matter. Going through the electronic evidence he'd gathered was startling. Whoever faked the death was worth recruiting, too, as he could not think of anyone that skilled. Alejandro either knew a genius with hacking or was an exceptionally gifted hacker himself. There was security camera footage showing a young Hispanic man going through the airport, boarding the airplane, renting a car and visiting some gas stations and convenience stores along his route. There were authentic human interactions, toilet breaks, drinking and eating included. Additionally, airport computers registered him at the exact same time the security footage showed. Shadows and reflections were normal, too.
There was one thing, though. He was always the first or last going through a counter. That was what tipped them off. The young man was like a ghost only security cameras could see, he let families take his place in boarding. They never acknowledged him. There were no thanks, no flight attendants silently grateful. Nada. Zilch. It was like he didn't exist. The hacker or Alejandro must have some sort of cinematographer or they did it themselves. If that was the real face of Alejandro and he really entered the airport and traveled to his death, Chase would eat his gun. It was mind-boggling how detailed and skilled the trip had been faked. Using routes that minimized the interaction between the person and their environment, thus cutting down the amount of material that had to be faked. Careful. Mathematically calculated. Precise. It was rather fascinating to follow the path of the corpse, which was indeed real and not just electronic fiction. It seemed that some poor soul would never be found, adding to the endless missing person cases.
Where on earth did Yassen find Pierre? He certainly discovered far more interesting young people to introduce into SCORPIA than their own human resources department. Rhea had shown that Yassen could work with a student if he put his mind to it. A precedent was set, a perfect excuse to try to shove other promising students onto Yassen. Chase suspected that Yassen liked them mouldable and young, younger than SCORPIA's usual recruitment age. Maybe they should follow that example and look for younger people, too? After all, they were easier to mould, had more potential, would serve them longer, it would be easier to gain their loyalty and less danger of them being spies (Hunter was a failure that was hard to forget) if you found the right ones, that is. Without or with less prior training they would be harder to train and it would be a far more delicate process to instill absolute loyalty into them, which would use a lot of human resources better invested in training intelligence or army deserters and others who would be weeded through and could bring good results as well. Not anywhere near Yassen and Nile, though, those two were rare gems, and it seemed one needed to start young to get there, but Rhea had the potential to become like them. Yassen and Nile were interesting, ever since their near-brawl in the cafeteria, they had been almost...friendly. It was unusual. Unless...they were planning on training the next one together. It could work. There could be more of them out there. Hopefully, they would join and live out their true potential.
A destiny as one of those rare children that came into their program and thrived.
Thank you for reading!