Disclaimer: I do not own Alex Rider/NCIS.

AN: Thanks for reviewing! It really does help with writing! :) If you wanted to know - Taipan appears again. And no, this is a bit more serious than XYXX. Enough said.

Enjoy!

Chapter 9: Captivating (~2,030 words)

"Okay, so what are we going to do against them?", McGee wondered.

Just when Alex was about to answer, her phone buzzed.

The third time in one day? That meant bad news.

And it were bad news indeed.

Alex mouth formed an O before she closed it, rage erasing any emotion from her face. She was absolutely lethal now, not like during the sparring, but worse.

Eagle who had looked over her shoulder, blanched.

Alex swallowed, before she trusted herself enough to speak.

"They have Sabina.", she said, face impassive.

"They have your sister?", Lemming repeated.

"They do."

Alex got her laptop out. She transferred the picture on the screen, so everyone could see it.

Sabina was still wearing the clothes she had worn yesterday when they had seen her last.

Alex reminded herself that she was a human not a killing machine. Pain was an emotion.

She desperately wanted to shut it off.

"You have a sister?"

"No, not by blood. I lived with them for a year."

The NCIS agents felt sorry for Alex. The SAS soldiers feared rather what the spy was going to do now.

"I need air.", Alex suddenly said. She got up and grabbed Eagle's jacket, heading out of the room.

"Alex...!" Ben's attempt to stop her from going alone failed.

Eagle went after her, keeping his distance to give her some privacy.

Agent Daniels ran a hand through his hair, exasperated and worried.

"It's just like last year all over again. She's going to kick in the door no matter the cost.", he prophesied, more to himself than anyone else.

Wolf growled. "If she does that again, I'm personally going to buy her those icky heels and glue them to her feet."

Ziva raised an eye brow at that.

"We can't really threaten her with getting grounded, can we?", Snake explained. "And she hates pink, glitz and fluffy stuff."

"So you threaten her with pink clothes and high heels?", Tony laughed.

McGee chuckled. The soldiers kept their serious expressions though.

"You mean it?", Tony asked, unsure if they were kidding or not.

Ziva thought about everything Alex had told them about her missions. "How long have you been her back up team?"

"We trained together when she was fourteen for about two weeks. Officially we are not her back up team. She prefers to work alone, anyway. Most of her partners don't survive very long."

"How come you guys know each other so well, then?", Tony asked.

"I adopted her. She is like a daughter to me."

"And a little sister to us. Ben used to be in our unit and we visit each other often. That's how we learned of Alex's true profession."

"Did she have a back up team before then?", Ziva interrupted, trying to get back on her original question.

"On some missions, yes. Like I said, she prefers solo jobs and the former head didn't think it was necessary on some.", Daniels answered.

"And they would think she pulled a solo now, after seeing her sister like that?", Ziva questioned, following her train of thought.

Ben nodded. "Yes."

"Then we need to work together to stop them. They would never expect her to team up with someone, right? She wouldn't want to put anyone else in danger.", Ziva suggested.

Daniels looked at her, appraising. "You would be right in assuming that. Maybe that's the loophole."

"Do you have any idea where they could hold this girl?", Gibbs wanted to know.

The spy shrugged. "It could be almost anywhere. They have the money and experience to modify a regular white picket-fence house into a torture chamber. They love secret passages, hidden doors and soundproof walls. There are security cameras pretty much everywhere, also hidden, so you don't know where exactly. Cells are bugged as well as most of the other rooms. There is usually only one surveillance room though which is their weak point."

"They get sloppy if they feel secure.", Wolf added, remembering the warehouse in Germany.

"Those guys were mostly amateurs. Newbies. Walker and my good friend the Stranger, however, were not. Walker knows Alex since she was fourteen. He has trained alongside her for weeks. He must have gotten a good look at what she could do then."

"Okay. Let's recap here for a moment. What do we know of Alex's training with Scorpia?", Snake threw in.

Gibbs nodded to McGee to take notes. Looking at things backwards sometimes made it easier to see a minor detail they had missed beforehand.

Ziva opened the thick file on the table and looked for the Scorpia training section.

"Alex must have learned instinctive shooting there. She is a natural. Her accuracy is astonishing. When she sets her mind to it, she can hit a shirt button from two hundred yards away without using a telescope or even looking.", Ben Daniels told the NCIS agents.

Lemming whistled. "She's that good?", he wondered sceptically.

Gibbs grabbed the other file.

Tony stared at Agent Daniels, before deciding to just assume Alex was outstanding at whatever she did.

Ziva didn't agree. "She could be. Alex doesn't shoot at people if she can help it. Her aim wavers when she is confronted with human-shaped targets.", she read from the file.

"That was when she was fourteen. Her aim still wavers but she doesn't hesitate much anymore if she gets into her 'mission mode.'", Ben countered.

He shuddered at the thought of what would happen if Alex lost her self in herself.

"She is a lethal weapon. You saw her face earlier. Did it seem very human to you?"

"No. She looked like an assassin. Like a machine."

"I know. For a short while she worked for your father, doing his dirty work for him. I'm not sure how much she damaged herself during that time."

Ziva nodded. "When?"

"I think when she was fifteen, shortly after returning to Britain. I'm guessing she was still grieving about Jack."

"She had a boyfriend?"

"No. Jack was her female housekeeper and guardian. She died on her ninth mission because she accompanied Alex and they were captured. Their captor wanted to test how much pain a human being can bear. Jack thought she was escaping to get help. Really, Alex's clone blew her jeep up. All of that was filmed and Alex had to watch it all on a screen as the clone pressed the button."

Ziva felt pity well up in her. This girl's life was even worse than her own.

And her childhood hadn't been all unicorns and rainbows either.

"Her sense of self-preservation is overruled by her love for others.", Ben continued. "Even more so since then."

Alex went up to the roof.

She avoided the picture in the message and scrolled down.

We will kidnap lover boy next. It's you or him. Decide.

She dialed a number. "I need information on those three other assassinations.", she heard herself say in a cold, detached voice.

After clearing a few formalities, the person on the other line answered her questions as satisfactorily as she could.

"Thank you.", Alex said politely.

She knew where they were and how to contact them now.

Before hiding the phone, she sent one last message.

Then she got into position.

Sorry, Chris.

"She didn't care how much it would cost her. She went ahead with her plan anyway when she heard you being tortured.", Wolf added thoughtfully.

He glared at the thick file in Ziva's hands as if he wanted to incinerate it with his look alone.

"Eagle is just like her underneath all of that childish behavior. I'm worried what will happen if either of them gets hurt. In Germany... When he heard her scream - her leg was broken by Ben's captor in a fight - he threw all caution out of the window."

"Childish behavior?", Tony repeated.

The SAS man glared at him. "He is actually very much like you, in a way."

"The Eagle you saw today was not his usual self. They had to break up - it's one of the more stupid rules of '6 - this morning."

"We need to keep an eye out for both of them then. And all the while try not to get hurt.", summarized McGee, pen in hand.

Ben nodded. "Yes. They love each other."

"Isn't she a bit young for him? I mean she's only eighteen.", McGee wondered.

"I would be happy if she acted her age every once in a while. He is more of a four-year-old most of the time, so they balance each other out.", Ben answered.

"Did you see any psych evals?", Ziva asked Gibbs.

He shook his head, teeth gritted together angrily. "No, none."

"On one hand that's good. That way the enemy won't know about her feelings and emotions other than what they witnessed or watched from the footage.", Ben argued. "On the other, however, that's not good. Alex won't talk to anyone about her feelings. That proclamation last night was highly out of character. If they heard whatever she said exactly, she is in deep sh**."

"What proclamation?", Lemming asked.

Snake rolled his eyes, annoyed. "The new proclamation of independence. What do you think she proclaimed to Eagle? That she likes black nail polish?"

Tony snickered. "So she did the naughty with your friend?"

"Well we didn't stay to listen if you were wondering. Before this transformation no girl was safe from the Rider-charm."

"Kind of like Tony. He has a lot of girlfriends in a short amount of time.", McGee observed, oblivious to Tony' glare.

The SAS men laughed.

"Maybe that's why she was immune to you at the pool.", Gibbs muttered.

"You tried to get her out of her shell by flirting?", Ben laughed.

The SAS men - save Lemming - grinned, thinking about the night before the masquerade when she used her potential for the first time on them.

"Honestly?", Snake grinned.

"Yes. Why is that funny?"

"You realize what Alex told you about manipulating men, right? She had to practice during a refresher. Find the weakest, lure him in and bite his head off.", Snake told them. "She could have seduced you, before you could think up a way to say no."

"I don't think we should discuss her love life.", Ziva told them.

"No. It's one of her strengths."

"We need to speak to Taipan. He trained her recently and can give us a detailed description of what exactly she is capable of and how much Scorpia knows. He must have given her better pointers than them.", Wolf argued.

"Well, we can always try. If we tell him that she is in danger and we need to profile her, he might be willing to help.", Ben said thoughtfully.

"He might?", Gibbs interrupted.

"Yes. He's not exactly fond of spies or soldiers.", Wolf growled.

"He is an assassin.", Ziva stated, even though it was a question.

"Yes. A high-profile one. And if we give you any information on his whereabouts or a name, either Alex or himself will kill us.", Snake answered, giving them something to think over.

"Is there a possibility to talk with him without him showing his face or location?", Gibbs wondered. Technology wasn't one of his strong points.

Ben nodded. "I think so. We need your MTAC room."

The door was more forcefully pushed open than absolutely necessary by Eagle.

His eyes had darkened and gave nothing away but pure hatred. His whole body was tense, hands clenched into fists so hard that the knuckles whitened.

In other words: he was furious.

He glared at them all, making even Ziva shudder, but not really seeing them.

Then he opened his mouth, for only three words.

Three words they never wanted to hear and that expressed sufficiently all his pent-up rage, desperation and hurt.

"They have her."