A/N: Chappie 5! Jess is trained and seriously ticked at Alan Blunt and co. Anything exciting gonna happen? Any sparks/fists/explosive devices gonna fly?

Disclaimer: I'm not Anthony Horowitz, so do I own Alex Rider? Nuh-uh.

Chapter Five: A Partner

At a small house in Chelsea, the phone rang. A young woman answered it, listened a moment.

"Alex, it's for you!" she yelled, holding the mouthpiece against her shoulder.

Alex Rider looked up from his science book and scowled. The quaver in Jack's voice told him that it wasn't good news. Although, honestly, nearly anything would be better than the paper he was struggling to write.

He got up and made his way to the nearest phone. He picked it up and said, "Hello?" It was only after the click of Jack hanging up her end was heard that he got a response.

"Alex Rider," came the familiar – and very unwelcome – voice on the other end.

"What do you want, Blunt?" Alex's scowl deepened.

"I need you to come to the Royal and General, Alex. Can you be here in half an hour?"
Alex sighed. "Do I have choice?"

There was silence for a second. "It would appear you do not." Click.

oOo

Thirty minutes later, Alex found himself walking through the doors of the Liverpool Street entrance of the Royal and General bank, doors he had been hoping to never set foot through again. He really didn't know why he was here – he hated Alan Blunt and almost everything he stood for.

Almost.

Alex nodded to the receptionists behind the desk, who smiled and instructed him to go to the fifteenth floor. Alex did so, heading directly to Alan Blunt's office once he got there. He knocked, was called inside, and entered. He complied, shutting the door behind him.

What he saw in Blunt's office literally stopped him in his tracks.

It still looked much the same as it always did. It was boring, plain, and completely devoid of personality. Blunt sat behind his desk, Mrs. Jones by his side. In front of that desk were two chairs, and one was occupied. But not by a man, as Alex would have thought. No, the chair was occupied by a girl who couldn't possibly be any older than himself.

Alex took a good look at her as he obeyed Blunt's invitation to "sit down, please, Alex." She seemed to be tall, but it was hard to tell since she was sitting. She wore black jeans, combat boots, and a bright green tank top – bright enough that Alex was sure that his retinas had been seared clean away – underneath a black jean jacket. She was slim and graceful-looking, with ash-blonde hair pulled up into a high ponytail, fair skin, and bright blue eyes. Those eyes were currently turned on him – sizing him up in his turn, he was certain. She seemed vaguely familiar, though he couldn't think why – he had never met her, of that he was certain. Perhaps she reminded him of someone?

"Alex," Blunt said, startling Alex out of his reverie, "this is Jessica Fox."

Alex nodded to her, and she nodded back, unsmiling. Alex supposed that he would do the same, if their roles were reversed. He tuned back into the conversation in time to hear Blunt say, "Jessica, this is Alex Rider. He will be your partner on your mission."

Alex's eyes widened at those calm words. As if it wasn't enough for Blunt to drag him into the spy world at fourteen, now he had to "recruit" another kid? And a girl to boot? Not that he had any doubts as to girls' abilities – it just didn't seem right to shanghai a teenage girl into service.

Alex opened his mouth to say as much – and a bit else besides – when Blunt held up a hand and said, "Please, Alex, spare us your wrath." Alex thought he detected sarcasm in the man's words, but it was impossible to be certain. "Jessica is here purely of her own volition," Blunt continued. "Please, listen."

Alex didn't notice that Jessica narrowed her eyes at the penultimate statement, nor that her fingers tightened their grip on the arms of her chair. She said nothing, though, letting Alex lean back in his seat – he had unconsciously leaned forward in his anger – and say, "I'll listen. But don't expect me to like what I hear."

"You don't have to like it, Alex, merely listen to it." Blunt went on to explain about Dorian Roberts and M16's suspicions. Alex even saw the photograph. When Blunt finished speaking, he leaned back and waited for Alex to give an answer.

Alex thought for a few moments. He couldn't put into words how much he did not want to accept the mission. He especially didn't want to be an accomplice in the girl's doom, if it came to that. Still, it definitely wouldn't be a bad idea to keep an eye on her. "You've gone to so much trouble, I'd hate to turn you down," he accepted sarcastically.

If Blunt was a different person, Alex was sure he would have smiled. As it was, he merely said, "Excellent. You'll leave tomorrow for Barcelona, where one of our operatives will pick you up and brief you further. For now, go on down to see Smithers; I'm sure he has a thing or two for you."

Mrs. Jones gave them directions, Blunt dismissed the pair, and they left the office. Alex led the way to Smithers' domain. He remained silent the entire way, and Jessica did nothing to convince him to do otherwise. Eventually, mercifully, they arrived at the proper door, and Alex, being closest, knocked.

"Come in," came Smithers' hearty welcome from the other side of the door.

They acquiesced, and Smithers looked up from his desk, where he had been tinkering with some unidentifiable thing. "Alex, m'boy!" he exclaimed jovially as they entered. "And you must be the new girl," he continued, turning to Jessica. "Pleasure to meet you, m'dear." He held out a meaty hand for her to shake.

She took it, smiling, her slim fingers nearly disappearing into Smithers' hand. Still, she said nothing.

"Well," Smithers said after a slightly awkward silence, "you two need gadgets, am I right?" Not even allowing them time to answer, he continued, "Course I'm right. Why else would you be down here? Now, if you'll hold on a moment-" he started opening and closing drawers in his desk- "I'll – maybe – find your stuff...Ah-hah!" he cried triumphantly, having apparently found the correct drawer. He pulled it completely open, exposing its contents. He pulled them out one by one and placed them in a small row on the desk.

"Now, I must admit, I've never made anything for a teenage girl before," he began, speaking to Jessica, "so you'll just have to kind of roll with me. Okay?" She nodded, still silent. "Okay. Then let's begin."

He held up a tube of what appeared to be lip gloss. "Ladies first. This stuff will eat through almost anything. I'm not entirely sure of the extent of its effects on human skin, so be careful with it."

Jessica nodded and took the tube. Smithers picked up a plain black hair tie and explained, "This here is much, much stronger and more elastic than it looks. I'm talking superhero-grade here. You could practically use it to stop a plane from taking off." At that, Alex and Jessica raised their eyebrows in disbelief. "Okay, so it's not that strong. But it's pretty close." Smiling, he handed the tie over to Jessica.

He turned now to Alex. "As for you, I have a couple things I think you'll like." He lifted what looked like an eraser. "As I understand it, you'll be doing your preliminary reconnaissance as part of a school group, so this won't be conspicuous. This will mold itself to any conventional lock, and harden. Stick one of the narrow ends up against a lock, wait about ten seconds, and hey presto, you've got yourself a key." He gave Alex the eraser and grasped a key ring, complete with key chains.

"This is the little one I'm most proud of. This key chain-" he pointed out a small, circular piece of black metal- "is actually an explosive device. Notice the dots? Press them in a certain sequence, and the chain turns into a mini-bomb. The rest are just for show, honestly." He demonstrated the bomb's activation sequence to Alex, then showed both of them the last two items – mobile phones.

"Um, Smithers?" Alex began, but the gadget maker quickly shushed him.

"Trust me, Alex. These are actually quite genius, if I do say so myself. They're much like normal mobiles – they don't call anyone, though, I'm warning you now – but they're so much better. Teenagers text, right? They text a lot. So it won't be unusual for the two of you to be texting during the tour, which I'm certain will be utterly boring." His lips twitched in a smile as he continued. "In fact, these puppies provide a direct line to M16, so you can report anything unusual you might find. You can also text each other in situations where it would be a bad idea for you to speak."

"But wouldn't they be able to figure out we were talking to each other?" Alex interrupted.

Smithers grinned. "Ah, that's where the real genius comes in. I built a special feature in here that will delay the receiving of texts from the other phone for random intervals. You'll also get the occasional blank text, just to throw them off. That make sense?"

Alex nodded slowly. "I don't know how you do it, Smithers."

His grin widened. "What can I say, I'm a genius." He handed the two phones to Alex and Jessica, leaving the desk free of all gadgets except the one he had been working on.

"Good luck, you two," Smithers said.

"Thanks," Alex replied. "For the gadgets and the luck. I have a feeling we'll need both."

oOo

Alex walked out the doors of the bank with a feeling of intense relief, Jessica by his side. He turned to face her and said, "Jessica-"

"Jess." It was the first word she had spoken since he met her. She had an accent, but he couldn't quite place it from the single word. Scottish, perhaps?

"Huh?" Oh, yeah, real smooth, he thought.

"Call me Jess," she clarified, flicking the end of her ponytail of her shoulder.

"Okay, then...Jess." Not Scottish – Irish. "I hope you know what you're getting into-"

"I do," she interrupted coolly.

"Okay...good." Alex rubbed the back of his neck, her suddenness having disrupted his train of thought. His next question finally came back to him, and he blurted, "What do you think of Blunt?"

Her face darkened. "I think he can go fall off a cliff." She hesitated over the f in "fall," making Alex think that she was about to say something else. He didn't comment on it, though, choosing instead to smile.

"I think we're going to get along just fine," he said.

A/N: Yes, Jess was going to say that Blunt could go f*** himself. Naughty, naughty Jess! What would your mother say, young lady? Oh, wait, you don't know (but I do xD). What would your aunt say, young lady? :)

I have to say, I had a lot of fun writing Smithers. He didn't get a lot of page time *sniff* but still, he's a really interesting character to write.

Thanks to Articwolfstudios for clearing up my British language issues, and to Khushbu Salazar for betaing!

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