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DURING SNAKEHEAD

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"He almost didn't make it this time," Mrs Jones warned her superior. "He's getting tired and sloppy. He's also getting emotionally detached. We should have warned him about Anthony."

Alan Blunt's expression was non committal. "Rider did a good job."

"Is that all you can say?" Mrs Jones complained. "What about his school work? He's falling behind in all of his lessons and not connecting with the other kids. He's been badly hurt, Alan, physically and emotionally. I'm worried he might crack."

Blunt's expression, however, did not change. "He's a strong lad. He'll be fine."

Mrs Jones sighed. Alan Blunt seemed to think Alex Rider was invincible, but Mrs Jones knew this was far from true. On the contrary, Alex seemed to be getting more and more withdrawn.

Emotionally, he was drained – Mrs Jones knew they'd been wrong not to tell him about his godfather. Alex was a teenager, and an orphan too; he was not yet equipped to cope singlehandedly with the psychological burdens thrust upon him during each mission.

Physically, Alex hadn't even recovered from his bullet wound, let alone from his latest injuries. Exhaustion was showing in his every move – he looked stiff and uncoordinated. He carried bruises that were taking much too long to heal. After Alex was shot, his surgeon had warned of anaemia, and unfortunately it now looked though the surgeon was right.

Overall, Mrs Jones was very worried about Alex Rider.

"What will happen to Alex if he loses it?" Mrs Jones wanted to know.

Alan Blunt said nothing. He looked down at his hands as though they would yield some fascinating response. Then he shrugged. "Let's worry about that when it happens. In the meantime, we have other things to worry about. That bloody Gregorovich still hasn't been caught. He's slipping away from us. We cannot let him get back to Scorpia."

"We can assign more men to the hunt."

Blunt frowned. "I think we need to assign more committed men, if you see what I mean."

"You mean you want to kill him?"

"Only if he doesn't come quietly …"

Mrs Jones nodded her understanding. Sometimes there just wasn't a choice. Which was exactly what made her so nervous about the Alex Rider situation. She couldn't ignore the anxiety gnawing at her belly and asked: "Do you think Gregorovich will try to find Alex?"

Blunt shook his head. "He thinks the boy is dead."

It still worried Mrs Jones. Yassen Gregorovich was the one person who could ruin everything for MI6. If the Russian killer managed to get his hands on Alex, there was no accounting for what would happen.

"Don't you think we should at least foresee the possibility that he will try to find Alex?"

Blunt frowned. "Why would Gregorovich want to find Alex?"

Mrs Jones knew she was dismissed by the tone of Alan's voice. There was no point in arguing. It wasn't her call. But deep down, she knew Alan Blunt was wrong, and she thought they were making a huge mistake.

o o o

Yassen was blissfully unaware of Mrs Jones and Alan Blunt's discussion about him. He was not, however, unaware that MI6 agents were scouring the nation for him.

Upon his escape, Yassen had immediately disappeared into the busy mill of London's public transport system. Using a stolen Oyster card, he had taken the Circle Line to Victoria Station, and from there a train down to Brighton. In Brighton, it was easy for Yassen to make a reverse charged call to a trusted notary to organise perfectly legal credit card with which he then booked himself into a busy hotel, becoming just another of many unfamiliar foreign faces. He knew he needed to lay low for a while.

London CCTV had lost him after he got on the tube – hundreds of agents were working on the logged tapes, checking every single station along the Circle Line to find Yassen's exit from the tube, but it was a hopeless task. Thousands, maybe millions, of blurry faces walked past the cameras every day …

And so Yassen was able to settle into his hotel room and put up his feet while waiting for the notary to make the necessary phone calls that would connect up the assassin with the people who could make him disappear.

Finally, four luxurious days after his escape, there came a knock on Yassen's hotel room door.

"Mr Semple, I have a special delivery for you."

Yassen jumped to his feet, senses alert. "Do you know what's inside?" he asked through the door, remembering the code easily.

"Scorpions …"

Yassen opened the door and let the Scorpia man inside. They did not exchange a word as the man opened his briefcase and removed a manila envelope for Yassen. It contained a passport, a driving licence – both in the name of Michael Semple – and three thousand pounds in cash.

Yassen pocketed the items, and then finally addressed the Scorpia man. "You must tell me what happened after I was captured. I sent Alex Rider to Scorpia."

The man scowled. "There were some problems with the boy. He was not willing to kill; he was not willing to learn properly. We wanted to keep him at Malagosto for a few months, maybe years, to work on him. But Julia lost her mind – she blamed the boy for his father's transgressions and made him part of the Invisible Sword project. He escaped and she died, so our superiors decided to eliminate the boy. He knew too much. He was too volatile."

Yassen held his breath as the man spoke. Then he exhaled slowly. "So he is dead."

"What? No, the boy has the luck of the Devil. He survived a bullet in the chest – should have pierced his heart. Frankly, there's no reason for us to go after him again. He's only a kid. I think he'll have learnt his lesson about messing with Scorpia."

Alive … Alex was alive.

Yassen could hardly believe his ears. Outwardly, however, he showed no emotion. He would find Alex and finish what he had started on Air Force One.

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To be continued …