Cowards die many times before their deaths;
The valiant never taste of death but once.
Of all the wonders that I yet have heard,
It seems to me most strange that men should fear;
Seeing that death, a necessary end,
Will come when it will come.

- Julius caesar

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AUTHOR'S NOTE

Thanks for the reviews. I posted the first three chapters so quickly because that's what I had done. So I'm sorry if it may take me some time to post future chapters. I have these mood swings where my writing is crap and I'd hate to post crap. So sometimes I'm not quick at posting. I was recently asked for a description of my characters because I really haven't given one. Now, Oz -- I had an actor in mind when i created him. This actor is how I see him in my mind when I write him, and I imagine he fights just like this actor can fight. The actor is named Johnny Yong Bosch. So, I have this youtube video of his movie the extreme heist. Now the movie is strictly nonexistent budget wise so it looks really cheap. And it's basically a showcase of Alpha stunts -- the same stunts as Power rangers. But if you want an idea of how I envision how he fights -- watch it for the fighting -- This is a picture of him (this is from the ninties so this isn't how the actor presently looks, but if you want more of the actor -- he has many videoes on youtube. Don't be shy, you know you love him...) -- http://s206. sort of just imgined Alex as Alex pettyfer so I assume you guys know what he looks like. My other two characters I didn't base off of celebrities. But to sum up the essence of Peyton Dewey I think I did imagine her like the character Peyton Sawyer, I guss that's where I got the name from. Now, it will be much harder for me to place a face to Bart, because I don't think there's a celebrity in which he may resemble. No, he's strictly mine. Now when I devised up Bart I wanted a character that could resemble all three of the previous characters and yet resemble none of them. So -- if you must have a picture, think of Robin. Yes the comic book character. Tim Drake to be specific...there is three universal robins after all... No, I don't have a picture. But I did name him after Tim Drake's team mate, Bartholomew Allen. My hero. But don't worry -- I tend to be more descriptive when writing -- I'll try to always instill an image in your head and I realize that I have failed to do so previously. So if you want -- you can ignore the previous information I have just given to you, and envision these characters how I describe them within the story. Whatever floats your boat is perfectly fine with me. Thanks for the reviews.

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A week later and the team hadn't progressed with their mission. Alex found himself unusually frustrated. He didn't know how to progress in this case. He didn't know how to not fail. Blunt hadn't really given them much to go on. Academy bad. Got it. Next? But there was no next. There were no gadgets. There was hardly a mission in the first place. And it frustrated the hell out of Alex.

Peyton and Bart hadn't ever been 'spies' before in their lives. They'd never had to wait and wait and wait until something inside of them found something more to go on. Bart didn't seem to be waiting as much as the rest of them were. He always seemed busy with some plan or another, but he never offered up his plans. He didn't seem to view the others as a team, he didn't seem to realize they were all in the same boat. The boat that lacked a motor. One life vest hidden in secret wasn't going to help any of them.

Peyton, on the other hand, didn't seem too disturbed by this lack of success. She did her homework and participated in class as if she were at home. Normal. Oz differed from them all and Alex soon found that he couldn't quite read this one. Oz continued annoying the students and soon he learned the error of his ways. The teachers were not friendly, passive manikins like those he once went to school with. They were physical, and somewhat violent.

Yes, Oz did have a somewhat negative juvenile record, but never had he been manhandled quite so before and it unnerved him. Until his cover was blown he couldn't bodily defend himself. And if his cover were eventually blown? Well then he would be dead and therefore couldn't defend himself either way. But the team still wasn't sharing things. He hadn't told anybody how many times he'd been slammed against lockers or hit with rulers and nobody had told him how many times they'd each been physically assaulted. They were not quite a team and they may never become one. Not until tragedy shoved them together.

"What happened to your face?" Peyton asked. Her question was blunt as was her statement. That was her right there. Blunt, short, to the point. She didn't get offended and she didn't mind offending. She had blonde hair, the sort that was unquestionably real; thin, the curls crisp. The hair barely reached her shoulders and Oz found himself wondering what it would look like if it were longer, straighter. There was a dark shadow across her face and suddenly she wasn't quite the same person. She was different, darker, not quite a teenager anymore.

Peyton was sitting promptly on Oz's bed, the bed furthest from the door and yet she still faced the door, indian style, her arms draped over her knees, her expression seemingly light. "There's a chain of command in this school," Oz told her quietly. He was still standing in front of the dorm's door, leaning back against it. He looked physically exhausted, his head tipped back against the door, his mouth parted slightly, his eyes slightly open. His cheek was red and there was a nasty cut above his right eye. The skin around the cut looked tender, red. A thick line of blood had found itself across his eyebrow and nearly reached his eye. Until he wiped it away, smeering the blood. "It's an irrelivent fact -- seeing as there's a chain of command at every school. But how the teachers used to act...I guess I thought they gave themselves commands with one superior -- the principle. Or headmaster. Whatever. But something changed today and I don't know what."

"What do you mean?" Peyton asked, rising from the bed. There was a uniform at the school and Peyton seemed highly uncomfortable in the attire. Her skirt wasn't quite as short as her fellow classmates were, but she hadn't bothered to hem it up at all. It was a mossy green color with dark stripes that stopped just above her knees. She currently wore a dress shirt that was supposed to be tucked into her skirt. But she had immediately untucked it after classes. Her sleeves were also unbuttoned and loosely rolled up. She looked ruffled. That was the word. But Oz couldn't help looking at her. Her legs, barely visible between her socks and skirt. He looked away quickly. No. That wasn't happening and he was going to proceed to ignore her. Just another girl.

"So see," Oz began. "If you're doing something bad, cuss or just annoy the hell out of your teacher. Professor. My teachers would take me to their office and hit me. With a stick or their fist. Whatever. But they'd do it of their own accord. Fuck punishment -- that's how they disciplined. But suddenly it changed today and I'm not sure why."

"Changed?" Peyton asked, slowly approaching Oz. "Then who hit you?"

"It was a bat," Oz stated calmly. "There's this guy named Luiz. And he likes bats. He told me that. In between swings." Peyton's facial expressions suggested pity and Oz didn't like it. He shook his head quickly. "That's not the problem. He said he was in charge now. He was the go to guy when it comes to discipline. So I might as well get used to it or shape up. The teachers aren't permitted to discipline the students on a higher scale like they used to be. I wonder why."

Oz seemed paler in this light. Younger. His face was pale, his cut vibrantly red against his faint skin. He almost looked sick. He wasn't wearing the uniform, dressed in blue jeans and a dark t-shirt. His hair, which apparently stopped somewhere above his chin, was tied back in a tight poney tail. If his hair hadn't been curly it would have been longer. Peyton found herself staring at him. Dropping her eyes down his body, until she saw his hands. They were bloody along the knuckles, and inside one palm from where he had attempted to wipe away his bloody brow. His wrists were bloody too and the only thing that came to Peyton's mind was shackles. "You should sit down," she told him quietly. She used a voice he hadn't ever heard her use before. "I'll go get some...stuff. Anti-bacterial and what not, alright?"

Oz nodded slowly. In honesty, he would have been fine on his own. He hadn't expected anyone to be in his room but he should have. Alex never returned to the dorm after classes, but Peyton seemed to always be there. Sometimes it annoyed him, but right now he felt like comfort wouldn't be too bad. Not this time, at least.

Peyton had disappeared into the bathroom and when she returned Oz was sitting on the edge of his bed. She hadn't seen how gingerly he had sat down. Maybe she wouldn't have to know. She had toliet paper, a glass of water, a few band aids, gauze and a tube of anti-bacteria creme. She wet a piece of toliet paper and turned to Oz. "Give me your hand," she said quietly, glancing up at his eyes. He lifted his hand and held it in front of her, staring at her unashamed.

Peyton made quick work of his hands and wrists, trying to ignore the nearly silent grunts and hisses. And then she gently moved onto the cut above his eye, slowly sponging away the blood. Her hands were soft, ghosting over his skin. She was completely in control, calm and confident. "You done this before?" Oz heard himself say.

A flicker of a smile touched Peyton's lips before disappearing once more. "My mother was a doctor," she admitted, but the tone of her voice told a story all on it's own. "She was pretty adament about her children following in her footsteps. She taught me a lot. And then my brother was this cagefighter, so he would always show up kind've beaten, he didn't suck; he just wasn't invincible. He taught me how to fight." Peyton fell silent as she finished with his cut. "You okay?" She asked him quietly, leaning back slightly, giving the kid room.

"Yeah, I'm fine," Oz commented dismissively, glancing away.

"We're not friends, are we?" Peyton asked, leaning back slightly. Oz didn't answer, his empty gaze returning to Peyton's face. The shadow hadn't moved, it hadn't flickered, it remained attached to Peyton's face. It was the sort of shadow that could make beautiful girls unattractive, the shadow that remains there as the person behind it hardens. "Blunt thinks he's so clever. He thinks he can just throw people together and get things done. I don't think he quite understands humanity. He definitely can't imagine the inhuman stress he places upon a bunch of teenagers. If we fail, what is he gonna do? If we can't become friends, magically, suddenly, we'll die in here. Just because we're stubborn, stupid, teenagers. Just because we are who we were supposed to be. Children." Peyton rose from the bed. "You've probably experienced pretty bad 'discipline' here, but you haven't told anybody, have you?"

"Being friends wouldn't change that," Oz stated quietly, honestly. "It's kind've just me. Sorry. I suck."

"Yeah," Peyton agreed sorrowfully. "You kind of do." She had slowly made her way across the room and slowly stopped before the door. She glanced back at Oz before retreating from his room, softly closing the door behind her.

The library was so expansive that it was located in a different neighboring building. The building was half the size of the school, seven floors high. It was an old building containing an old elevator that didn't work half the time. This is the location of Bartholomew Malloy and this has been his location for the previous week. Silent observations and curious inquiries that normal students ignored; just new students asking around, innocent strangers, random bystanders would say. But those students did not realize that it was Alex Rider who sat opposite Bart.

"That's Dante," Bart said nodding to the right of their table. Alex follwed Bart's gaze. Dante sat more than half way across the room. He did not appear to be the particular student who spent his free time in the library. "He is the go-to guy of the student population. If anybody can get anything done it is that man. If anybody knows anything, it is him."

Alex squinted at Dante, trying to assess him. To be quite honest, he appeared as any normal teenager appeared. Maybe just a little darker. Alex supposed that he was of Italian descent. But his clothes were dark, and the book he was reading easily hid his facial features. His hair was black and scruffy, shielding his eyes. "Why?" was Alex's first question.

"I'm not sure," Bart answered honestly. "He's almost mythological. The stories surrounding this kid is not only lore but hard to differentiate. It's impossible to tell which ones are actual fact, maybe none of them are. The standard time spent here by any student is four years. Most kids come here, learn and then leave, without a problem. But this kid has left and come again several times. Almost as if it were -"

"A punishment," Alex finished for him. "That's an interesting way to view school."

"Accurate, I'd figure," Bart agreed. "But according to anybody who is willing to speak to me, this kid has been here longer than any of them. He leaves for a few months but he always returns."

Alex nodded curtly. "So anything that happens at this school you figure this kid knows," he confirmed. Bart nodded slowly still gazing evenly in Dante's general direction. "What do you think he knows?" Alex asked after a moment of silence.

Bart lifted his gaze sharply. It wasn't a question he had been prepared to answer. He didn't think anybody would inquiry such a thought. "There's a bad feeling in this school. I know you feel it too. It just feels so empty. Emptier than school normally feels. I know Blunt is stabbing blindly here because he wants to be able to pin someting on this school. I don't know why, maybe an old rivlery or something; it doesn't matter. But I believe that there is something wrong with this school. And I believe that that kid agrees with me."

Bart almost looked human. He was so completely removed from everybody else that it was almost surreal to see him show emotion for anything. But now Alex saw it in him. Humanity. His generally emotionless face appeared as somebody else's face; because it looked nothing like Bart's. His black hair obscurred his eyes. And his hands were knotted in his lap. Bart needed this mission to be a success just as much as anybody else. If not for Blunt then for himself.

"Alright," Alex replied calmly. His voice was almost reassuring. "I'll talk to him, see what he knows."

"If he doesn't know anything," Bart began, leaning forward in his seat slightly.

"Then we're left with nothing, again," Alex concluded. "Yeah, I know." Alex rose to his feet and proceeded to cross the expansive room without glancing back at Bart. Bart watched Alex leave him, slumbing back into his chair.