A/N:
WELL. This has been the longest week of my life but. . . Thanksgiving break! Yay!
This is the third-to-last chapter!
Btw, the song Alex hears is Drown by Tyler Joseph. Highly recommend.
Reviews are always welcome :)
Danielle straightened her cramping her shoulders and wiped her eyes, leaving smears of dark mascara across her cheekbones. She didn't care if she looked like a raccoon.
She didn't particularly care about anything anymore, which wasn't a new development at all - she'd been teetering on the edge of that for weeks, and Alex was the only thing holding her back.
Him and his promises.
Now August was gone and she was free, with nowhere to go.
Scraps of rationality wound around the back of her mind and told her that Alex was hurting from wounds no one could see, maybe not even himself. Logically, she knew it wasn't just her.
But logic was dangerous.
Danielle realized that despite their newly shared surname and conversations when she was in the hospital, she didn't know Alex Rider very well at all, which was probably his whole point. Here she was, thinking he had let her in, but all he did was close himself farther away.
She should want to go find him, but something told her that if he didn't want to be found, he could easily disappear.
Instead, all she felt was empty.
Again.
She hated the hollow emptiness living inside her chest, like frigid coals of a fire that never got to burn.
Pushing herself away from the wall, she started to walk in jerky, uneven steps around the studio. A few moments ago, Ben went to get some water from one of the vending machines, saying something about how she looked dehydrated. He hadn't returned yet.
Maybe he would leave too.
Danielle ended up standing at the windowsill. The weathered muntins dividing the glass into panes were beginning to rot from the near-constant rain, but the sky outside was cloudy and dry. Wind rustled the top branches of one of the young trees planted in the courtyard. The skin on her face tingled; she wanted to feel the fresh air, too.
Sniffing, Danielle fumbled with the catches on the window to unlatch them and pushed the bottom pane up until it locked in place. The windows were old enough to lack screens, and this one was no different.
She climbed up onto the windowsill and swung her legs out the other side so they dangled out against the wall. The breeze was cold enough to make goosebumps crawl across her arms, but she made no move to climb back inside.
For a campus as populated as the Academy's, it was eerily empty. Not a single person crossed the courtyard below, and all the benches were empty.
No one to see her.
Danielle sighed. Her throat hurt.
Without a partner, she couldn't be a musician. She didn't have the experience to solo on her own, nor the credit to take out loans for a few more years of instruction. Her connections were nonexistent. She had come to the Academy banking on getting paired with someone.
She heard the door creak as the hinges gave.
"Danielle?"
She almost hit her head on the wall leaning back to see who it was.
Luke.
What was he doing here?
"Yeah?" she croaked, her voice dry, as she swung around on the sill and hopped back down to the floor, almost collapsing to the ground.
His brow wrinkled. "What were you doing?"
"Sitting."
"Oh."
She attempted to brush the wrinkles out of her clothes.
Luke shifted awkwardly in the doorway.
"Why are you here?" she asked finally. "Where's Ben?"
"He told me to come check on you. He's trying to find Alex."
"Oh. Well, I'm fine." *My career is ruined. I'm going to be thousands in debt. I don't have friends except for Clara, who's going to get a contract*.
His dark eyes scrutinized her face; she glanced away, crossing her arms over her stomach. She wouldn't cry again, she'd done plenty of that.
"Look, Alex can be a git -"
"I'm fine," she repeated, stronger this time. "Don't worry."
"I'm not worried."
"Then why are you here?"
He looked uncomfortable. "I . . . don't know."
She scoffed bitterly. "Of course."
"Look, next week you'll have to come to Child Services and they'll take care of your guardian situation and housing and. . ." Luke waved expansively. "The rest. Until your birthday."
"It's in three months."
"Well then, you won't be there for too long."
Oh. Right.
Everything in this world was temporary. She wasn't really Danielle Rider. Luke wasn't really her guardian - not that he was doing a bang-up job or anything; this was the first time he acknowledged the fact that he was responsible for her.
She didn't need him.
"I've been fine on my own for most of my life. Don't bother."
He shrugged. "I don't make the laws."
Danielle ran her hands through her hair. Her fingers caught in snarls, yanking painfully on her scalp, and she knew that she probably looked like something that crawled out of the sewer. She felt even worse.
I'll run away, she silently vowed. Over and over until I'm eighteen. I won't let anyone else take care of me. I'm done.
She was done chasing after people who wouldn't come back.
"Luke?"
"What?"
"Why -" her voice cracked, but not from crying. She swallowed thickly. This was the last question she would ask, the last thing she wanted to know - it would confirm what she already suspected. One last, desperate try. "Why can't I just stay with you? I mean. I could just stay back at my flat. You wouldn't have to know I exist - you could just, like, call every few days." She bit her lip again, feeling the sore spot there from her teeth digging in.
Luke's eyebrows might have hit the ceiling and she internally cringed, waiting for his inevitable rejection.
She snuck a glance at him - chiseled jaw, tan skin, cropped dark hair. His shoulders were broad and the sleeves of his polo clung in odd places around his biceps.
He looked like the poster child for the SAS.
"Uh." he cleared his throat. "I guess."
"I don't want to go anywhere else," Danielle said quickly. "Even though I barely know you. Or anyone else. I just. Don't want to move?"
"No - that's fine." He crossed his arms, then uncrossed them. "I figured that you wouldn't want to - you'd want something normal than having to answer to a stranger." He looked vaguely unsettled.
"Just check in now and then."
"As long as you're still breathing and don't get arrested, we should be fine."
She chuckled weakly.
Still breathing.
That might turn out to be hard.
The leaves did nothing to hide the gravestone.
Alex's suitcase felt heavy in his hand as he stood over Jack's grave marker. His shadow stretched and rippled over the granite like something alive, writhing and twisting as he knelt and brushed decaying leaves off the engraved script of her name. A lump lodged itself in his throat.
As usual, the church and cemetery were deserted.
He wasn't sure if his heart was still beating as his legs crumbled together and he fell forward onto his knees, the muscles in his shoulders tensing up into knots as he tried to not to cry.
Don't leave me.
Danielle.
He had to leave. They didn't understand.
It wasn't fair of him to stay for anyone if he hadn't been able to stay for Jack.
Fair.
Ha.
His flight was supposed to leave in an hour, but he found himself perfectly content to sit in the grass next to an empty grave.
After some time - ten minutes, half an hour, he didn't know - he heard light footsteps shuffling across the sidewalk, and the grating screech of the gate swinging open.
"Hey," someone said. A kid, by the sound of it. "You've been here before."
Alex had to muster the energy to turn his head towards the person. A kid stood there in scuffed cargo pants and a short stained with something that looked like grease. His hair was bright red like copper.
Alex recognized him. "You're the kid who was here last time."
"You're the guy who got stabbed." The kid hunched his shoulders forward, hands jammed into his pockets. "Who's -" he craned his neck to look. "Jack?"
Alex felt himself tense up. "A friend."
"Is that why you come here?"
"Why are you here?"
The kid jerked his head towards the derelict church. "I work here."
Alex had to lean on his suitcase to stand. His legs suddenly refused to cooperate, and he got a disturbing sense of deja vu for the time he had been stabbed. "I thought this place was abandoned."
"No one asked me to work there. I just do."
Alex shook his head. What he doing, talking to a kid when he should be going to the airport?
"You're Alex Rider. I told my sister I met you. She didn't believe me."
"Fascinating," Alex muttered, too tired to be nice.
The kid shrugged.
Alex tried to push past him, but he was blocked as the kid stepped in his path. "Wanna see the inside? I've been working there for months."
"Get out of my way."
"Come inside." The kid stepped back and flailed his arm towards the door - towards the same steps that Alex had laid bleeding on almost three months ago. "I'm Charles, by the way. Guess I shouldn't expect you to remember my name."
What's that supposed to mean? Alex thought, irritated. He had come to say goodbye to Jack and was now under the siege of an irritating brat when he had places to be. Anywhere else.
Charles bounded up the stairs and grabbed one of the old handles, wrenching the door open. The wood squeaked against the threshold as a gust of musty air rushed out and hit Alex full in the face. He paused inside the door to let his eyes adjust to the gloom.
"There's no one here," Charles said. "I'm not trying to convert you or anything. Just look."
There were wooden pews in two sections with an aisle between them, some stairs, a raised platform, an altar.
And stained glass images, molded into the walls. They shone, sparkling in the sliver of light that the door allowed in. That must have been what Charles was working on.
"It's nice," he muttered, turning to leave when Charles tugged on his sleeve
Alex almost snapped at him but restrained himself at the last minute.
"You're a musician - tons of classical music was inspired by windows like these, you know. Bach especially."
"Nice."
Suddenly, Alex's eyes landed on a part of the small interior that was less clean than the surroundings. It was a pile of ashes riddled with splintered wood, scuffed across the floor beneath the altar in garish black strokes. He jerked his chin towards the mess. "What happened there?"
Ashes. The burned-out remains of an SUV. Hot metal that didn't burn his hands.
The light went out of Charles' face, and he jammed his hands back into his pockets. "Burglary," he said shortly.
"Looks more like vandalism to me."
"They burned the cross." Charles' brow furrowed into a dark glower for a few seconds, but he quickly reverted to his insouciant manner with a nonchalant shrug that was almost convincing. "Nothing you can do about it now. There are other things to fix."
There are other things to fix.
His words echoed strangely in Alex's head. They sounded an awful lot like hope, which was probably why he shouldn't listen. It's not like Danielle or K Unit would want to see him again, not after he left like that. Bailed was probably a better word.
The night before their first concert.
And Tom - he was probably sick of Alex, anyways.
There wasn't anything left for him to fix.
Everything was broken.
And Alex realized that it had been a very long time before something mattered to him at all. Only three months ago had he started caring about his career, not just the music.
Only three months ago had he started caring about - about anyone else.
God, he was selfish.
The thoughts his mind screamed in the depths of the midnight hours were true.
His heart felt like it was crumbling inside his chest - true, true, everything was true, he was horrible, he shouldn't be allowed to live. Jack's gravestone was evidence enough of that.
He stumbled backwards out of the church back into the blinding sun.
Other things to fix. Other things to fix.
But there weren't any.
He'd broken everything too far.
Too many pieces.
Not enough glue.
He grabbed the handle of his suitcase and started down the stairs, towards the sidewalk.
"Hey!" Charles called. "Where are you going?"
"Airport."
"You look like you're running away."
"What the hell?" Alex scowled at him. "You don't know what you're talking about."
"Then you look like you've seen a ghost or something - man, why is it that both times I've met you, you look ready to die?" Charles cocked his head to the side. "Are you?"
"Shut up." Alex sighed wearily - he wasn't doing this, not with a child.
"You are. You can get help for that, you know."
"I'm not."
"But you're going somewhere."
"Yes. A flight. Because I have a Paying job."
Charles shook his head. "No, because you're supposed to be playing a concert tomorrow. My sister's a fan - she wanted to go, but can't 'cause responsibilities."
Damn.
Just keep walking, Alex told himself. He can't follow you forever.
He was fairly certain he wasn't this annoying when he was fourteen, or however old this brat was.
Alex had come to the cemetery to brood in peace. So much for that. If this wasn't a sign to leave England, he didn't know what was.
He hurried away before Charles could say anything else, down the street towards the corner with a tall, gilded lamppost.
Who was that kid?
What the hell?
Alex couldn't help but feel very disgruntled. It was almost as if Charles had known. . .
That was impossible.
Alex shook his head. Snap out of it.
Meeting Charles twice was a freak coincidence. He was just some kid cleaning a church because he had nothing else to do.
Alex readjusted his grip on the suitcase handle and kept walking.
That was when he realized:
He'd forgotten his violin.
Oh well.
Too late to go back.
Danielle unlocked the door to her old flat with trepidation and nudged it open, hanging back to see if anyone was inside.
The door swung open to reveal nothing else but broken shards of the TV, part of the mess left from when August's men sacked it.
She shook her head slightly and went in. Her shoes scuffed bits of broken plastic across the floor.
"What Happened?" Luke asked from the doorway.
Danielle cringed. He had to come - something about being sure her building was up to code for liability reasons. "Some people broke in a few months ago."
"This doesn't look like a burglary," Luke said as he stepped into the kitchen and peered through to her bedroom. She couldn't remember if she'd gotten the red-marked sheets off the bed or not before she left. Probably not, judging from the look on Luke's face.
She sighed. "It was by August and his men. They figured out I was in London."
Frowning, Luke strode farther back into the small flat.
Danielle plopped down on the sofa and cradled her head in her hands, praying to whoever was listening that Luke would let her stay. She could clean up, get new sheets - buy new clothes because, dang, she only had three sets - and live like she was before Alex.
Luke's footsteps clomped down the hall and he reappeared, leaning against the wall with his arms crossed. "Is the rest of your clothes and stuff back at the safe house?"
She bit down on her lower lip. "No."
"Is this All?"
She slowly nodded. "Except for some college books, but I have them online."
HIs eyebrows shot up. "Yeah, no - you're not staying here. It's about twenty-seven health code violations waiting to happen."
"But-"
"Nope. I could get canned for letting you stay in here." he ran his hand over his hair. "Ben said something about you staying with him-"
"No," she shook her head. "I can't impose. I'll be fine."
"Stop being stubborn. Come on."
"I'm not -"
"Yes you are. You're a lot like Alex."
Her chest contracted.
Alex, who left.
"We'll track him down," Luke said as if reading her mind.
Danielle forced herself to shrug. "Doesn't matter to me."
He knew she was lying, and said as much with the look he gave her.
Danielle ignored him as she stood and walked to the door again, her feet skittering pieces of the broken TV across the floor.
"Have you known him for very long?" Luke asked.
"No. We met the day before you and Ben came to his flat." Her keys jangled as she twisted them in the lock.
"Ah." He cleared his throat. "Alex is like this. From what I've heard. He can't deal with people very well."
She jabbed the button on the lift and the doors slid open almost immediately. She entered.
"He said he went to America," Danielle said abruptly. "Why did he come back?"
The lift arrived in the lobby with a chime and she slowly stepped out, looking at Luke.
"It wasn't working out." Luke shook his head with a heavy sigh that made him sound decades older. "Look, Danielle - I hate to break it to you, but Alex probably isn't coming back. Or if he does, he'll isolate himself. You can read his file if you want - Ben has a copy."
"Really?"
"Yeah. I'll drive you there now."
Canceled.
Alex swore under his breath. Of all the times his flight was canceled - and for what, a little rain? Gah.
He felt like the world was conspiring against him as he sat down on one of the uncomfortable airport seats and crumpled his ticket and boarding pass into his pocket. His suitcase sat against his leg like a block of concrete. He figured that if he could just keep his thoughts on the future he wouldn't have to worry about the present.
So, his working theory was that Troy had come after him.
Alex wracked his mind for places he could go after his flight landed in Australia, if it was ever rescheduled. He dreaded the impending thirteen-hour layover.
He rubbed his eyes and leaned back against the hard plastic seat. His shoulders slumped forward.
Leaving was the only way he could draw Troy away.
K Unit could fix the assassination.
Danielle could play the concert.
Their lives would go on without him, and they would be better off.
Maybe if he told himself that, he would start to believe it. Eventually.
Don't think, he thought.
His mind would turn no matter what he did. Idle thoughts of alcohol crossed his mind, but none was sold in airports and if he left he might not return.
He might lose his nerve.
With a shaky sigh, he reached up to comb his hair away from his face.
Alex bit his lip - then laughed because, God, he was becoming Danielle. He wondered what she was doing at that very moment, but all his mind called up was her expression, utterly wrecked, when he said he was leaving.
He could read all the thoughts in her eyes, even watching from the shield of his memories.
you weren't going to say goodbye?
Please don't leave me.
The truth?
Alex didn't know. He didn't know what was real and what the monsters inside his head whispered to his thoughts when he wasn't paying attention.
He was scared as hell - no one had to tell him that.
He didn't want anyone to -
To need him. Or want him.
Okay, time for other thoughts - any thoughts.
Maybe he would go back and get his violin. Yes, that sounded like an excellent plan. He could leave his things with the airline desk, take a cab to the Academy, and be back with ten hours to spare. Surely there were nooks and crannies all over the airport that he could practice in without disturbing too many people.
Ben held the door for Danielle as she entered, followed by Wolf. Her eyes darted nervously around the space even though she kept her face carefully blank. Ben had seen that same expression on Alex several times - Alex, who was currently missing.
He let out a quiet sigh and pushed the door shut until the knob clicked. His flat was located in central London in Regency Suites, a towering building made to look old with stonework around the upper perimeter. Personally, Ben found the gargoyles more than slightly repulsive, but this was the only open block when he needed somewhere to live, and thankfully his MI6 stipend covered it.
The front door opened to the living room, and Ben gestured to the couch for Danielle to sit as he grabbed Wolf's arm and yanked him into the kitchen.
"Where's Alex?"
"I dunno." Wolf shrugged. "He hasn't been back to the flat. Or the house."
"Do you think Troy-"
"Hasn't left his hotel."
Ben rubbed his forehead, feeling the muscles there twinge from constantly frowning. Gwen had remarked earlier that he looked irritated - he wasn't, just concerned.
"Someone else can play at the concert," he said at length. "If it's canceled now, that'll tip off the assassin."
"Yeah." Wolf uncrossed his arms and leaned against the counter. "Why haven't we found the guy yet?"
"He's hiding behind twelve different, ah, special interest groups. None of them are connected."
"We have the IRA, whoever did the mugging near the graveyard, the car wreck - Snake ran the plates, that SUV was stolen by, and I quote, 'two Asians' - and now the assassin." Wolf ticked the entities off his fingers. "If there even is one."
"Troy's been right before." Ben hated even saying the words.
"He also set Danielle up for some reason, so we can't really rely on him."
"Yeah."
"If this Minister dies, the next guy will probably reverse all his policies. The clash between Labours and Conservatives is starting to get ugly. You've seen the headlines?"
Ben nodded. "Probably borders on slander."
"So, political gain. That's motive. But who would employ an assassin?"
"Half the people in the United Kingdom, probably, who've felt isolated by this administration. Which doesn't make our job any easier."
"True." Wolf glanced back into the living room, then lowered his voice. "Can you get Gwen to stay with her tomorrow?"
Ben peered over his shoulder at Danielle, who sat on the edge of the couch with her eyes glued to the carpet. "To keep her here?"
"Yeah. I don't want her near the Palace Theater if things go to hell."
"Aw." Ben lightly punched him on the shoulder. "Feeling responsible?"
Wolf rolled his eyes. "No. I don't want to do massive amounts of paperwork, and I can't hire anyone to combat a wrongful death lawsuit from her family."
"Luke," Ben said. "She doesn't have family."
"She's gotta have someone."
"Her dad disappeared almost ten years ago."
He made a long, low whistle through his teeth. "Damn."
"I know."
"You have a copy of Alex's file?" Wolf asked.
"Somewhere. Why?"
"I told her she could read it."
Ben's headache started to pound with painful, stabbing pulses. "Why?"
"She needs to understand why Alex left."
"Luke, that file has everything. It has what happened in America-"
"Yeah. All of it."
Ben sighed, but it sounded more like a groan. "Fine. You get out of here and go find Snake and Eagle, get them to the Theater to set up sightlines and stuff."
"What about Alex?"
"I don't know."
Wolf nodded his agreement, and turned to leave with a short nod to Danielle. She lifted her hand in a wave, then swiftly glanced back to the carpet in the living room.
After the door shut, Ben took a deep breath, groped around on the counter for his bottle of pain medicine - his leg was aching again - and shook two of the tiny tablets into his hand.
When he swallowed them down, he went into the living room. "Danielle?"
She looked up, her hair swinging across her face like a curtain, and laced her fingers together. "Yes?" Her face was covered in red blotches that matched her eyes - she had obviously been crying - and he knew she would get dehydrated if she didn't drink something soon.
He smiled. "Would you like some water?"
"Um. . . sure. If it's no trouble."
"Of course not. Come on."
She hesitantly followed him into the kitchen; he deliberately made slow movements to open the cabinet door and get a glass, recalling the child safety training he received in the SAS. All soldiers had to take that course in case they were ever faced with a child hostage situation or refugee zones during deployment.
"Thanks," she said, taking the drink from him.
"No problem." He wondered if starting with Alex's file was a good idea. Probably not; she looked exhausted. "Gwen's in her office, she'll be out soon. Last minute fostering crisis with a pair of twins who were about to be separated."
Danielle's eyes widened. "That's awful."
"Yeah. Gwen and a few others work tooth-and-nail to keep that from happening with siblings. It's bad enough that these kids don't have fit parents; they don't need to lose each other."
"No. That happened to one of my friends when I was thirteen. She and her younger brothers got split up after their dad died - her parents were divorced, her mum couldn't take care of three kids." Danielle bit her lip. "She was really messed up."
Ben nodded. "I bet. It's even harder when you're young and don't really understand what's going on." Mentally, he filed away the bit of information about her having friends in secondary school. Usually children in her situation didn't have many friends.
"Probably would have happened to me," Danielle admitted. "I was. . . shy. And I had friends at school who believed everything was fine, which was what I wanted them to do. There wasn't any point in saying anything else."
Ben knew he had to tread carefully. "About?"
"The drugs. And August. I mean, I had a pretty normal life at school. Friends, decent grades, band. Then I realized I could go to the Academy with Clara and . . . not worry about being normal." her shoulders lifted in a vague shrug. "I don't know."
"That makes sense. Did any of your friends ever find out?"
She shook her head vehemently. "No. I was the last person anyone would suspect - they were oblivious. If any of them knew, they didn't say."
"Sometimes people see what they want to see."
"Yeah. Do you think Alex does?" her eyes flicked up to his, wide and brown, and Ben didn't know how to reply.
He thought for a few seconds. "What do you mean?"
"He seems scared. Do you think it's really as bad as he thinks, or -" her voice wavered for a second but she gripped the glass tighter. "Do you think he just wanted an excuse to leave?"
"Definitely not the second. Alex is. . . not sick, exactly, but he went through some things no one else should ever live through - least of all a kid. He was only fifteen." Ben ran his hand through his hair - he needed a haircut, he thought absently - and continued, "He doesn't really trust anyone."
"I don't blame him." she spoke almost forcefully, and Ben blinked.
"Really? Did he tell you about his missions?"
She bit her lip. "Yes. Probably not everything."
Hmm. Maybe Alex and Danielle were closer than Ben had thought.
"Probably not, but that's second nature to people like us."
"Mhm." she set the empty glass down on the counter and allowed her arms to hang awkwardly at her sides.
"Danielle!" Gwen's voice said.
Ben glanced over his shoulder; she had come in from the back part of the kitchen, with a stack of papers tucked under her arm and a warm smile.
Danielle smiled too. "Hi."
"I'll show you your room - Ben's been talking, hasn't he. Never stops. Do you have any stuff?"
Danielle looked slightly taken aback, but she shook her head. "No."
"That's fine. Alright, the stairs are through this hall . . ." Gwen's voice faded as she showed Danielle upstairs.
And, just like that, their conversation came to an abrupt halt.
Ben ran his hands through his hair again and decided to do some research in a last-ditch attempt to find out who the assassin was. There were only hours left until the concert.
Alex snuck back into his studio building. His shoes squeaked over the freshly waxed tiles as he hurried down the hall and unlocked his studio. Piano chords echoed through the wall from another room, and he had to remind himself that it wasn't Danielle.
He hastily grabbed his violin and shoved the lid shut, then turned to leave. He could almost feel her presence there, confused and hurt.
You weren't going to say goodbye?
He shook himself out of those thoughts and hurried out the door, his shin banging painfully against the edge. The key fell out of his hand, and he knelt to the floor to pick it up, giving him the chance to hear the piano music a little better.
It was a series of octave chords - G, A, F - with pulsing bass clef accompaniment. Whoever was playing started to sing in a quiet mumble that probably wasn't meant for anyone else to hear.
"Here I come, I, come to you, in the very clothes . . . that I killed, killed you in, and now I know I'm alone."
A shiver crawled down his spine. He could have written that himself. The music and the words laved the raw wounds inside his chest, at once soothing and tearing them.
"I walk towards you, rain falls from you, can you wash me? Can you drown me?"
Trailed off.
Piano chords. Single notes.
"I don't know if I'm dying or living."
Alex swallowed against the sudden lump in his throat and slumped down against the door to his studio. It creaked inward a little bit, the hinges squeaking. He cupped his face in his hands. He didn't want to become a recluse; he was only nineteen. Theoretically, he should have his whole life ahead of him, as long as some old enemy didn't come and slit his throat first, which, unfortunately, was looking more and more likely by the day. Look at Troy, for example. Alex didn't know what to do about him, or if he was right that Troy had ill intent, or if he was just being paranoid. Better safe than sorry, right?
But, Danielle wasn't exactly helpless. She could take care of herself just fine, and K Unit was with her.
He had left her, which had been a mistake. . .
Would anyone forgive him if he stayed, or was it too late?
As much as he wanted to protect the people he loved, getting rejected by them was too terrifying to contemplate. He wanted to hurt them before they hurt him. He wanted to leave them before they left him.
Hmmm. Maybe going to that psych-eval thing wouldn't be so bad after all.
Alex was trying - was daring, after all these years - to hope.
The kid, the church.
There are bigger things to fix.
The musician, the music.
I don't know if I'm dying or living.
Alex - Alex didn't want to die.
He wanted to live.
Overcome with this realization, he took his violin, left his studio unlocked, and made a hasty exit from the Academy. He hailed a cab and handed the driver a fifty pound note, telling him to keep the change, and went home.
When he arrived, Alex stumbled into his old flat - just as he left it, smelling like the clean paint of a construction company, and he noticed that the kitchen was entirely reconstructed after the microwave bomb.
Obviously, the first thing to do after having an existential realization was sleep.
Alex fell onto his bed, feeling all the worry and concern drain out of his bones.
He wanted to live.
So he would. No matter what anyone did.
Danielle sat cross-legged on the twin bed in the spare room that the Daniels' were lending her. She had been crying on and off all day, and just now managed to get control of herself, two boxes of tissues later.
Gwen said that crying was a completely normal response after such a massive amount of trauma, which was exactly the word Danielle would use to describe the past few months.
Trauma.
Not all bad, of course, but she didn't know what else to do with her life now that she wasn't hiding from anyone.
Old pop music played from her phone, muffled by the blanket. She found herself mouthing the words as she read through a sheaf of papers that Gwen had allowed her to print out. It was all excerpts from her molecular biology textbook that she needed for an essay that one of her online classes had assigned. She was behind on her work.
Slashing an orange highlighter across the definition of bound water, Danielle shifted position and brushed her hair out of her eyes. Maybe instead of being a musician, she could be a scientist. Nature, at least, was easy to understand. She could even be a vet, move to another country - the continent, even. Anywhere she didn't have to think about Alex, or Tom, or Clara.
Her heart squeezed. Clara. Her best friend. Her sister.
Clara had understood everything when no one else would have.
Just like that, Danielle felt her eyes welling up with tears again. She blinked hard and grabbed a clean tissue to wipe the tears away before they could fall.
Someone tapped lightly on the door.
"Come in!" she called softly, shuffling the papers around on her bed.
Ben stuck his head in, looking amused. "I wouldn't have pegged you as a One Direction fan."
Danielle felt her face flush. "How do you know?"
"My sister played that song all the time." He jerked his head towards her phone. She fumbled for it and paused the music.
"Anyways," he continued. "Gwen made dinner. Hungry?"
". . .yes." She hurriedly gathered up her studying materials and stacked them into a neat corner on the desk, then nudged her suitcase under the bed, trying to keep the room as clean as possible, before hurrying out after Ben.
Whatever Gwen made smelled delicious.
Danielle peered into the kitchen. Three plates of homemade pizza. Yum.
They all sat down in front of the TV, Ben and Gwen next to each other on the couch, and Danielle curled up in an armchair, balancing her plate on her knees.
She could get used to this.
Well, almost.
She already missed Alex, but if he wasn't coming back, what else could she do? She had asked him, practically begged, to stay. But he had walked out.
Had her Dad done the same thing? She couldn't remember that far back.
She hoped, somewhere deep down inside, that Alex would come back. Whatever he was punishing himself for, it wasn't his fault. She knew that.
If only he did.
Danielle had to be absolutely insane. She had agreed to play the concert with another violinist, which meant eight straight hours of rehearsing before the performance. The program wasn't even changed.
Ben, personally, didn't envy her. He'd heard her go down to the kitchen during the night- him and Gwen had their room on the first floor - and she was crying quietly. An emotional, knee-jerk response.
Years of emotion pouring out her eyes.
He pulled his car away from the curb of the Academy's campus after she vanished from sight and drove straight to the Palace Theater. Troy was supposed to be meeting the rest of the unit there to discuss security. Plainclothesmen would be implanted into the audience, and all the vantage points to the Prime Minister would be covered. The attempt would happen in seconds, and Ben's job was to anticipate it before anyone died.
The crossfire would be just as deadly as the aim. If someone moved, or the Prime Minister leaned over to whisper something to his aide, an innocent person would die.
Danielle would be there on that stage, something Luke wasn't happy about.
At a red light, Ben patted the breast pocket of his shirt for the folded print-out that Gwen had handed him that morning. Giddiness rolled through his stomach, despite everything else going on. He couldn't believe it.
He unfolded the paper and stared at it for a second, then, when the car behind him honked, refolded it and drove through the intersection.
He couldn't believe it.
Eight Hours Later
Alex woke up with a heart attack - so much for wanting to live.
It was - dear God, it was nearly nine p.m! Had he really slept for twenty-four hours? Man, he must have been exhausted.
The concert was starting . . . well, now. Maybe he could make it by intermission. Of course, he was gambling that Danielle would be there, but what other choice did he have? He yanked on his tuxedo, grabbed his violin, and ran out of his flat.
Traffic was absolute murder. By the time his cab arrived at the theater, Alex was a jittery mess. He was sure he'd missed it, and Daniele would be gone, and his only chance at apologizing would be blown. He ran in through the front doors, sprinted down the hall around the entrances to the audience seating, and practically fell through the backstage doors. He located his dressing room - it was still marked with his name, even though he hadn't shown up - and locked himself inside to run through all the pre-performance maintenance. If he ended up performing, that is.
If Danielle didn't kick him out.
If she did, there was always Australia.
Alex tucked his shirt into his dress pants and checked to be sure it was buttoned correctly, with no uneven gaps. Straightening his bowtie, he ran his fingers through his hair to comb it back away from his face, even though it would probably get in his eyes while he was playing.
He unzipped his case to carefully remove his violin and tune it. He slid the shoulder rest on, tightened and rosined his bow, then lifted it to his shoulder and played a few, quiet double stops.
It was almost intermission, according to the program left on his dressing table. One more piece - or not, because he heard applause ring out from the theater and hurried footsteps as stage hands rushed to lever the curtain down and shift equipment around. Alex set his violin and bow down on the table, took a deep breath, and opened the door.
No one had come off stage yet, but then there was a quiet rustling, and someone opened the door to the corridor and slipped inside.
Danielle.
She wore her hair pulled back in an intricate braid. Her eyes were a little smudged and very red; she sniffed as she leaned against the door, crossing her arms over her stomach. The dress she was wearing - dark, dark blue, covered in a layer of glittery fabric.
She sniffed again.
Alex cleared his throat hesitantly. Nerves curled through his stomach and, for the first time in years, he was nervous.
Her head jerked up.
"Um." he cleared his throat again. "Hey."
Danielle opened her mouth like she was going to say something, but it snapped shut and she shook her head, leaning back against the door. Her eyes rapidly blinked.
"I'm really sorry," Alex said. "I - I shouldn't have . . ." he was floundering speechless in the wake of too many things that he wanted to say.
Danielle straightened up, still hugging herself, and slowly approached him. "They told me you wouldn't come back."
He blinked. "Really?"
"They said if you didn't want to be found, you wouldn't."
Oh.
"I, uh." he paused. "I changed my mind."
She shook her head again, the corner of her mouth curving up in a small smile. "I can tell."
"I'm sorry, Danielle."
She bit her lip, and it was like a dam burst. "Sorry? You - you're one of my only friends, and you know *all* the dark scary circles of hell that my miserable life is, and I asked you to stay and I've never asked anyone to stay and - and you still left. . ."
His eyes started stinging. "I thought you would be better off-"
"You're not the one who knows that!" Her eyes were glistening, and her fingers wound a knot in her hair.
"I didn't -" Alex paused, taking a steadying breath. "I didn't want you to get hurt because of me. Someone else did. And she - she was like my sister too. I . . . I can't go through that again. And you're innocent. You don't deserve my . . . stuff."
"You have to let someone help you!" she cried, albeit quietly. "You need friends and family."
Alex shook his head, trying to find the words to explain why he couldn't have either of those things, but she gently touched his shoulder and the second he looked at her face he realized that he was crying.
She leaned against him, her shoulders shaking, and tightly gripped his hand. "Please stay this time."
"I'm sorry," he said again, and repeated it over and over until she gave him a light shove on the chest and said, her eyes shining,
"Alex. It was never your fault."
He was on stage.
He was on stage, and he was playing his violin, and Danielle was playing piano, and Alex felt a sense of rightness that settled deep inside his chest like a lost piece waiting to come home. He could do this. He could have friends and play music and, out of necessity, go to the mandated psych-evals.
He could live a normal life.
Alex knew that K Unit was in the audience or running surveillance. He would explain everything to them later when the concert was over.
In the meantime, he had an assassination to prevent. It would be the last thing he did as a spy.
Bright trills echoed off the Chopin nocturne as he furiously played a passage of sixteenth notes, meanwhile glancing around the audience and balcony for any unusual activity.
He counted the guards on the balcony level. Nine.
Wait.
Last time he checked - about twelve measures ago - there were ten.
The space where the tenth guard - SAS agent, actually - had been was right in the center of the mezzanine. It seemed like a year had passed since Alex had been up there looking at the carved rifle guide.
There was someone else there now.
Someone with black clothes and a military grade helmet, exactly like all the others but for the missing insignia on the front of his uniform.
Alex could just see the barrel of the rifle as it glinted in the overhead lighting.
He didn't need to look down to see it; he had a deep-seated gut instinct that told him exactly what he would see.
Still, holding his violin and playing, still playing despite all this, he glanced down.
And saw the single red laser dot hovering over his chest, the sightline straight from the eyepiece on the rifle.
This is the end.
Well! Two more chapters left! Any ideas on what's happening with Ben and the folded piece of paper?
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Guest: - Ahhh I know, I'm sorry. . . well, here it is!