A/N: One of my reviewers pointed out that I shouldn't threaten you for more reviews . . . I would like to say I'm sorry and as an apology I'm putting this up today instead of next week. I do it as more of a joke but I can see where you are coming from. Personally when I read it on someone else's story I'm amused, but I can see that not everyone feels that way.

For those of you who liked Ian's POV he'll be in this chapter as well.

Warning: this chapter has blood (briefly mentioned) and wounds and traumatized kids, if that makes you queasy you can skip it.

Oh, and it also has spoilers for the books.

Enjoy!

Chapter 4

Secrets

Tears poured down Alex's cheeks as his side hit the stone floor again. His side hurt terribly, and he had cracked his head against the wall at some point. A gash on his thigh bled sluggishly and Alex knew that he wouldn't be able to put any weight on it if he didn't want to make it worse.

"I'll ask you again, boy, who does you uncle work for?!" The man yelled, bloody knife gripped tightly in his hand.

"I-I d-don't know!" Alex cried desperately as he scrambled away from the tall adult.

"I know you know something! Tell me!" another quick slice and the knife cut across Alex's arm as he held it up in a desperate attempt to block the blow from his face.

Whimpering Alex scooted back until his spine hit the stone wall.

"If you don't say something useful soon boy you'll–"

"Sr.," someone was standing at the door and through his tears Alex noticed that he had the same symbol sewn onto his clothing as his tormentor, "Something is happening at the docks. It's chaos down there."

Baldy growled, "Then why haven't you fixed it yet?"

Alex tried to make himself as small as possible, hoping that they would both just go away.

"No one is listening, Sr." the building suddenly shook and Baldy stumbled.

"What. Was. That?" Baldy gritted out through his clenched teeth. Alex's refusal to answer any of the questions had already angered him and now he looked to be at the point of exploding.

"That would probably be the barrels of gunpowder we had in storage," the man at the door replied shakily, turning white at his boss's anger.

Baldy's eyes fixed on the man, "You better have your grave already dug, Smith, because after I'm done sorting this out your going to have a new residence . . . in a coffin," Baldy strode to the door, bypassing the other man who now looked like he was going to pass out due to fear.

Before the door closed completely behind him Baldy turned around and examined the small boy huddled in the corner, "Take some time to think, boy. When I come back, I'll need answers, and next time it won't just be a knife I bring," the door slammed shut and Alex flinched, staring blankly at it.

Another explosion rocked the building and Alex felt his shoulders shake with silent sobs as more tears spilled down his face.

It didn't matter if his uncle was involved in something dangerous he just wanted to be comported. Ian was the closest thing he had to a dad, and right now he really wanted his uncle to be there to help him through this.

Several minutes passed in the dark room as the explosions continued. Slowly, Alex's heart rate began to clam down and his mind sharpened. He knew that it would be near impossible for his uncle to find him and rescue him, though there was no doubt that he would try.

No, if Alex wanted to escape then he would need to do it himself.

Swiping at his moist eyes Alex pushed himself up, steeling himself against the pain. His thigh wound split open again and, knowing that if the lost to much blood he could die, he tore of a strip of his tee-shirt and tied it around his leg to hold the two sides of the cut together. The yellow strip of cloth quickly stained, turning a dark brown in the dim lighting.

Alex knew that there had to be some way out. As his uncle had once said, "The only inescapable situation is death . . . and government jobs, of course."

He had never really gotten the second part, but that didn't matter. Another saying of his uncle came to mind when he was teaching him how to pick locks with a wire, "The only truly locked door is a door without hinges and keyholes, and by that point it's not a door at all."

This door didn't have a keyhole that he could pick, but it did have hinges. Whoever and designed these rooms never planed for someone who had been taught by Ian Rider, and therefore thought outside the box regularly.

A small nail was quickly pulled from his pocket as he leaned on the wall by the door, don't ask why it was in was there in the first place, which he used to pry the pin (which looked like a large nail with a flat end, the name was misleading) out. The pin was used to hold the two pieces of the hinge together and to let it turn. Without it there was nothing stopping the door from opening from the other side.

He repeated this process for the other two (they usually have three per door), surprised at how easily they came out. Must have been the oil they used to keep the door from squeaking. After that was done he wedged the nail and the pins in the crack between the wall and the door and pushed on them until there was enough room for his to pull the door inward the rest of the way.

Sunlight filtered into the room and Alex used the gap he had made to slip out. Outside of the room was a long empty hallway, most of the people having been distracted by the explosions.

Now he just had to find the exit.

0~o~0

Ian smiled unmercifully as another bomb went off. The storage of gunpowder had been an interesting find . . . and had an interesting effect. In the complete chaos of what was happening no one bothered to stop the middle aged man slipping though their midst.

Agent Neil had been a big help. He was the one who had brought the bombs and helped plant them, giving Ian enough time to get in without been spotted.

People rushed pass him yelling at everyone to grab some bucket and where was the water? It was clear that they had no idea what they were supposed to do and had not planned for this situation.

The halls cleared the farther into the building he got and he began looking for the prisoner rooms, where he believed they were keeping Alex. This had been one branch of the criminal ring he had been uninformed of, and as such he felt responsible for the fact that Alex was here in the first place. If he had known then they would have never been able to get hold of his nephew in the first place.

There was also the fact that every time he took his nephew with him there was the chance that they could figure out who he was and try to hurt Alex. Sadly, he had been unable to find a solution to the problem and it wasn't like he could leave the boy home for weeks without supervision.

A sudden, pain filled scream echoed through the hall and made Ian freeze in his tracks. That had been a child's scream. Turning on his heel and pulling his gun from its side holster he aimed it at the man behind him. Bald and with a scar stretching across his face the man had a slightly deranged look, not helped by the fact that he had Ian's nephew kneeling with a knife at his throat.

"I suggest you put your gun down, Rider. You wouldn't want your nephew hurt, would you?" the man sneered. If Ian remembered right this was Walter Johnson, one of the lesser known associates of the criminal ring he had taken down. Ian had only met him once before but that was all it took to realize that the man was insane. There was no doubt that he wouldn't hesitate to kill the child.

Never letting his eyes leave them he carefully set his handgun on the ground and then stood back up, his face completely blank.

"Good," the man sneered and Alex winced at the knife pressed harder against the soft skin of his throat, "Kick the gun over here."

Ian's hand twitched as he saw Alex wince and cursed himself for getting into this situation. Personal attachment was never a good thing for an Agent, especially on a mission. That's why most spy's never got married, not that the life expectancy was long enough for them to enjoy growing old with a spouse.

This was his nephew, though, and he wouldn't let Alex get hurt. Face carefully black he kicked the gun over and Walter picked it up, a glint appearing in his eye.

"You know, I never expected to meet the great Ian Rider. There are a lot of rumors about you, did you know? One of the most popular is about you brother. What was it again?" The man grinned and Ian felt a flash of panic go though him as his eyes flicked to Alex, who was looking at them both with confusion, "Oh, yes, it must be such a shame, what happened to him. Just one bad egg–"

"John Rider has nothing to do with this," Ian twitched as he spoke, interrupting before Walter could spill one of MI6's biggest secrets.

John Rider, Alex's father, was one of the most amazing people Ian had ever known. He was skilled in almost anything that he did, something that his son shared. Just out of school they were both recruited by MI6 and John had taken to spying like a fish to water, outstripping all of the other recruits with Ian not far behind him.

He had been one of MI6's best agents.

Then he had gone undercover for almost a year and Ian had not heard anything from him for several months only to find out that he had been sent to infiltrate one of the worst terrorist organizations in the world and had been caught. MI6 had done an exchange to get their best agent back, faking his death during the trade so that the terrorist organization wouldn't come after him.

He still died though. John hand his wife had boarded a plan which had exploded, leaving his one year old son an orphan.

What the rest of the world believed, however, was that John had been a SCORPIA agent the entire time, a fact that was supported by him spending several months as an assassin before being recruited by the organization.

His brother's past was bloodstained and gruesome. He wished that he had been able to protect his younger brother better, that they had never joined MI6. Sometimes, he wondered what their lives would have turned out as if they hadn't.

But that wasn't here or now. A spy's past is never a happy one, but that doesn't mean that they give up.

"Touched a nerve, have I?" Walter sneered and examined the gun, "I've never liked your kind, Rider, and I know I'll never be able too kill all of you off," his eyes glinted again, "but you and your nephew will be a start."

What happened next was just as much a surprise to Ian as it was to Walter.

Walter brought the gun up and pulled the trigger. Seconds before that Ian dropped to the ground, hearing the bullet whistle past his head as he fell. While the criminal's attention was off of Alex the boy grabbed the hand that was holding the knife and pushed it away from his throat at the same time he sent his elbow flying backward to hit his captor. If Alex had been standing the pointy part of his elbow would have hit the man's stomach. As it was he hit just a little bit lower and Walter's face clouded over with pain as he stumbled.

Not wasting the opportunity Ian lunged forward and snatched the gun from Walter's hand. Before the other man could react he used the gun as a club and batted him over the head. The already pained pain stared at him dazedly for a second before his eyes rolled into the back of his head and he collapsed, unconscious.

Ian stared at the man who had held his nephew at knifepoint and then to his nephew. Alex started to shake when he caught his uncle's eyes and Ian holstered his gun and held his arms out. Without hesitating Alex accepted the embrace and sobbed into Ian's shirt.

"Shhh, Alex, you're safe now," Ian murmured softly into his nephew's hair as he held the boy, kneeling so that he could be at the same height.

"I want to go home," Alex hiccupped softly, "Please can we just go home?"

"Of course, Alex," Ian glanced up at Agent Neil who had frozen as soon as he had seen his partner hugging his nephew, unsure of what to do. Ian smiled and gestured that everything was fine and turned his attention back to his nephew, helping him dry his eyes and pulling him to his feet, "Let's go home."

0~o~0

It had been a month since the . . . incident. Alex never spoke of it but a lot of things had changed. Ian had bought a permanent house in (wherever Alex lives currently) and hired a housekeeper to take care of him while his uncle was away. Ian still said he would take Alex on trips, but he knew that they would be fewer than before.

Alex entered the school nervously. No matter how many times he moved it never ceased to make him jumpy his first day at a new school. Being the new kid meant that all of their attention would be on him and who he was. It made him nervous, especially after what had happened not to long ago.

The first bell rang and Alex took a deep breath as he secured his backpack over his shoulder. His first class was maths and he was worried if he knew enough. Moving around a lot didn't help him gain a very steady education.

The moment he entered the classroom it seemed as if sound had been sucked out as people hushed at seeing someone new, and then exploded into whispers. One of the girls close to him squealed excitedly and Alex blushed and he heard what they said.

"He's so cute!"

"I wonder where he moved from."

"Do you think he has an accent?"

"Did you see those scars?"

"Quiet!" Mr. Lanark shouted and the students quieted, glancing between Alex and the new student, "Thank you, class," he turned to Alex with a bright smile, "You must be Alex. Come and introduce yourself."

Shuffling to the front of the classroom he blushed again as he realized that all of the stares were directed at him.

"Um, well, I'm Alex Rider. I just moved here. Hi?" Thankfully his voice didn't shake, although his legs felt like jelly.

Mr. Lanark smiled, seeming to see the problem, "Any questions class?"

A girl in the front row raised her hand and the teacher called on her, "What's your favorite sport?"

Alex answered that he liked football (soccer in American terms) as well as swimming.

Question after question was asked and Alex grew more confidant as time went on, though he carefully avoided anything to do with his scars. They were too fresh and he still didn't quite understand what had happened. Ian never explained to him why he had been kidnapped, probably something to do with his work.

He was grateful, however, when Mr. Lanark called a stop to the questions and showed Alex his new seat so that he could start class.

With the teacher's back turned a black haired kid next to him leaned over with a grin, "Hey, cool scars."

Alex tensed, waiting for the inevitable question.

"Want to play football after school with some friends of mine?" the black haired kid asked, still in a whisper so the teacher didn't hear.

"Look I don't want to talk–" Alex paused at the boy's question registered in his mind and he blinked, "Oh, um, yah. Sure."

The boy seemed to give and even bigger smile at that, "Expecting me to say something else?"

Alex nodded and shrugged, "I don't usually talk to very many people."

The boy shrugged as well, "That's ok, you're talking now. My name is Tom, by the way. Tom Harris," he held out his hand.

Alex smiled slightly and shook the offered hand, "Alex Rider, but you already know that."

Tom chuckled, "Of course. Doesn't mean you can't reintroduce yourself. I know some people who can never remember names. Thankfully, I'm not one of them!"

Alex laughed along with Tom. Maybe things wouldn't be so bad after all.

0~o~0

"You sure this was the room the boy was held in?" Alan Blunt leaned back in his black leather chair as he looked over the photographs he had been handed.

Agent Neil nodded, "Yes, that room was the only one that had an occupant the day we rescued the boy."

Alan hummed, thoughtful, though his face showed no emotion. The pictures were . . . intriguing.

"We can assume the boy escaped before you and Agent Rider found him?"

"There is no doubt. Walter Johnson must have found him trying to get out of the building and used him to confront Agent Rider."

Alan nodded and set the report down. "Good job Agent. You are dismissed."

Agent Neil nodded and briskly left the room. Alan glanced back down at the pictures again. One door, no gadgets, and a lock on the outside, yet the boy still managed to make an escape attempt. A successful escape attempt.

Alex Rider would make a fine spy one day, just like his father.

A small, almost unnoticeable smile tilted Alan's face. If any of his employees ever saw him like this they would be terrified for their lives.

Alan Blunt never, ever smiled.

Give the kid a few years, Alan thought, closing the report, and he'll be even better.

0~o~0

Feelings . . . ick. They are hard to write. If anyone has any questions feel free to ask and I'll try to answer. The next chapter should be the last (probably . . . maybe . . . and here comes an idea) but if anyone wants a sequel I don't mind writing one.

Thanks to those who have read and like this story so far. I hope you can tolerate my terrible grammar and spelling mistakes.