Katakana growled fiercely as he was handcuffed, knowing it was proper procedure, but wishing he'd never gone on this damn mission. Hell, he was CIA, wasn't he? He hoped that the Brits actually gave a shit about his employers; he'd once been tortured overseas when someone didn't think that he was telling the truth about working for the CIA. He thanked God he'd had the foresight too have two or three handlers this time.

He sighed as someone came into the room. Katakana could tell that the man was American, and at a second glance, could tell that the man was FBI. Good! Maybe the man would believe him. If he had to get arrested, at least he'd been arrested on American soil.

Even if the man didn't believe, he'd have to bust out of here, anyway. The people didn't realize how important it was to find Alan Blunt – and not just because of how he could kill Alex.

Taking a deep breath, the FBI agent sat down. "Don Eppes, FBI," he said. "I have some questions to ask you about your recent… behaviors. I know you screamed that you were CIA when my men were bringing you down. How the hell am I supposed to verify that? You were undercover in the SAS?" Don's voice clearly dripped sarcasm. It wasn't that Katakana didn't understand. He just needed Don to understand him.

"Like no American member has ever run a job overseas," Katakana snapped. "Listen, you don't understand. I have two handlers. Their names are Jacob White and Wright Smith. You can have them come up here and crap if you want. This whole op was well-documented."

"Yeah, right, so well documented I don't even get to know your code name," Eppes snorted, obviously not believing it. "Or your real name. Do you even have one of those? Or do you just hide under fake names?"

"I have a real name, but you're not getting it until you talk to my handlers," Katakana snapped. "For now, you can call me Katakana. And I've also done nothing wrong, so you can drop the whole damn self-righteous act."

"You sliced up a kid and terrorized someone else," Don said, obviously not buying his story. He hadn't left to call, and Katakana found himself growing worried.

"Okay," Katakana said, letting out a sigh. "Let me start from the beginning. You know Alan Blunt? Well, if you're looking for Alex Rider, you obviously do. What you don't know, my friend, is that Alan Blunt can be detrimental to the health of everyone here. Why do you think that is? Sure, he's likely to kill Alex and whoever he has taking care of him…"

"Why do you say he has someone taking care of Alex Rider?" Don asked, not missing the man's play on words. He still didn't believe him, although he knew that Colby Granger, who was watching the man and his conversation, would already be trying to track Katakana - is that what the man had called himself? - track his handlers down.

"Because there's no way he's going to care for that kid himself. Why do you think he had Ian Rider care for him before? He hated Ian Rider's guts, I'm willing to bet, but didn't want to have to do anything to care for the Rider kid. While Rider is important, you need to stop him for different reasons."

"Why's that?" Alex said.

"Because Alan Blunt's goal," Katakana said, "is to poison all of New York's water supply."

"Oh, yeah, poison the water supply, good one. How am I supposed to verify that story?" Don snorted.

"Look, if you'd call my handlers, this could go much quicker," Katakana snapped, "and it'd be a verifiable story too, dammit. But basically, Blunt wants to poison certain water supplies with some drug. He wants people to become addicted too it. Then he wants them to buy his supply. It's sick, it's hard to explain, and if you'd talk to one of my handlers, they can explain it a hell of a lot better than I could... especially since you won't listen to me."

## break ##

Alex swallowed hard as he looked nervously at Alan Blunt. Although grateful that Fox didn't seem to be anywhere near the vicinity (which hopefully meant that he'd been rescued), he was terrified of being left alone with Alan Blunt. The very thought of his father's lack of self-control made him shiver. The man wouldn't know what self-control meant if it had hit him in the face.

Taking in a breath, Alex opened the door of the car when his father opened his own door, and then released his seatbelt. His father was still talking on his cell phone, barking orders at somebody else. Alex groaned, and stretched, trying to eye his current, single parent, and assess how pissed off he was. Realizing his father's attention was divided and that he wasn't in his direct eyesight right now, Alex chose that second to take off, ignoring the fact that his father had confiscated his shoes in case he would try to do something like this.

His bare feet pounded the pavement, and he winced at the hot heat. He didn't blink, though, he just kept going, ignoring his father's pissed-off, ticked, murderous angry cry at him. Alex picked up his pace as the shouts continued, not even slowing at his father's threat of, "I'm going to kill your skimpy, white ass!"

Alex leapt onto the pavement, ready to try his break for freedom. Deep down, he knew he was going to get caught. He knew that he was going to be beaten by his father. His father was always bitter when, as his so-called blood relation usually put it, "You antagonize me with this shit."

Looking behind him, Alex winced; he'd forgotten how fast his father could run. Although in his mid forties, Blunt wasn't experiencing a middle aged crisis (although maybe some people would say he would by being willing to beat the shit out of his son, Alex didn't know). Alex kept going, his feet hitting the green, mushy grass. But it wasn't long before Alex had tripped over a stick of some sort and fallen into the mud.

"I'm going to kick your ass, you arrogant piece of shit!" With that Alan Blunt was right behind Alex. The teenager tried to push himself up to try again, but his hand ached and he found himself fumbling. He winced as he felt his hands yanked roughly behind his back, and he felt his hands being cuffed.

Damn. Alex knew that when his father brought out the gun, he was more than ready and willing to fight. Although, then again, his father liked to threaten him with a gun, and if Alex didn't know that his father's favorite hobby was taking recreational crack (although Alex suspected his father used crack for a lot more than just recreational reasons), he'd say it was his father pointing a gun at his face.

"Move," his father growled. Alex felt him slip his gun back into his pocket. The walk felt torturous, the heat of the day making the pavement burn against Alex's bare feet. His father wasn't gentle on his care, that was for sure. Actually, self-control was one other thing that Alex didn't think that his father was good with..

"You're not going to get away with this," Alex said, suddenly fueled with anger."The sergeant will find you."

"The sergeant couldn't find his way out of his own asshole if his head was stuck in it," Blunt responded, tightly twisting his son's arm behind his back as he saw someone move their way out of the shadows. He shoved his son inside roughly and closed the door. "Crawley, you home?" he demanded, greeting the new man. Alex drew in a breath as he saw the stranger for the first time in twelve years.

"Oh, so is this our new home?" Crawley said with a roll of his eyes. "I see you found your son. I saw him take a little sprint through the front yard."

"You could've helped, like shot him in the kneecap, or something," Blunt said, looking at his son in disgust.

"The last time I shot him, you made me take him to the hospital! Do you really think I want to go to that effort? He is your son, by the way. Oh, and our other prisoner's upstairs. I don't think we kidnapped him for much use, though. He hasn't talked yet."

An evil smile formed around Blunt's face. "I have an idea," he said, making Alex's blood run cold. Who was their other prisoner? And he never, ever liked his father's other ideas.

He was forced up the stairs. Not bothering to resist, useless since he was in handcuffs, he made his way up the stairs. Oh, God, he hoped that Crawley wouldn't get his hands on him again. While Crawley didn't usually physically torture him, he was much, much worse than Ian to be with… actually, come to think of it, Alex would rather spend his spare time with Ian than with Crawley, which was saying something.

Blunt shoved his only son into the first room, saying only, "By morning, you and your stupid-ass friend will talk." He didn't bother to take off Alex's handcuffs, and slammed the basement door shut.

Alex pushed himself up of the floor, spying the two cots. He sighed forcefully. As always, his father was prepared. He guiltily rose his eyes to meet the other member on the bed, the person who was probably going to get tortured because of him.

His blood ran cold at the sight of the still, yet breathing, figure.

It was Wolf – who everyone else, including Alex, after what Ian had told him, had thought to be dead.

CHALLENGES:

THANKS TO SEKAI, FOR READING, AND FOR SamayouTamashi for her comments on the chapter, as well as the following challenges.

What has Katakana really been up too? Is he good, or bad?

What happened to Ben/Fox?

Where has Wolf been, and what will happen to Wolf and Alex?