AN: I've been cruel to this story in terms of updates. I really do love it, but sometimes it's just hard to write, you know? I want it to be perfect. For those of you who are curious, I have two short stories that are prequels to this: No Signs of Weakness and Over the Edge. If you want to know why Alex is so cold, I would suggest you read those. (Of course, a little more will be revealed later…) Please enjoy!
Disclaimer: I do not own Alex Rider.
They settled into their regular seats, Aaron reluctantly separating himself from Maggie. Maggie wasn't sure how she felt about his sudden attachment to her. She wasn't sure how she felt about his sudden kiss. If he started clinging to her, then there would be problems.
She pulled the earrings—sparkling under the glare of the fluorescents—out of her ears. She saw the others doing the same with an odd assortment of things. Olivia seemed to be pulling, of all things, a lace bra from her pocket, and Chloe a small bottle of perfume. Lee pulled a small square something from deep in his pocket. From her angle, Maggie couldn't see what it was. Charlie and Ben laughed, and Lee blushed. Wood and Luke were conspiring over a pair of expensive-looking sunglasses.
Maggie frowned. The competition would be closer than she had expected.
Rider watched them all from his desk, his expression faraway and almost sentimental. Maggie filed that information away for later. Something about shoplifting brought back good memories. She couldn't even bring herself to be shocked. The more time she spent around their "teacher," the less his bizarre responses surprised her. Expect the unexpected was a trite idiom, but it fit nonetheless.
Aaron smiled over at her as Rider cleared his throat. For some reason, Maggie found herself blushing. She noticed absently that Aaron had a very nice smile.
"It looks like every group got something, at least. Good. I want to see price tags and products." He stood, walking down the aisle of desks with a grace that almost made him look like he was floating. He approached Charlie, Ben and Lee. "Well," he said, and compared to the three of them—none of them older than 14—he looked imposing, "what did you get?"
Lee pulled out the square. Maggie could see now that it was a picture frame of some sort, of a shiny and metallic silver. "Lifted this from an art gallery. With the print inside, its worth 125 pounds." Ben and Charlie puffed out their chests.
Next to her, Aaron whistled his appreciation. "You were caught, though." Rider said, his voice flat. His face was blank, but Lee flinched from the accusation.
"Yeah," he said. "I was caught. It was the diversion." Maggie caught the desperate lie in his voice. It hadn't been a diversion at all—Lee had just been caught. She knew immediately that Rider saw this too, but their instructor kept his voice devoid of emotion.
"I said if you were arrested you would be kicked out. It's only thanks to luck that you weren't." He paused. "Creative excuse, but next time, try harder. For that little episode, I'm only counting half of your price. Your good is now worth 63 pounds." He glanced around the room, at the expensive and unnecessary items that littered the desks. "It won't get you kicked out, but you probably won't win."
Charlie and Ben deflated, casting angry looks at Lee. The boy looked crushed. Maggie wondered if they would have won. Her earrings were only worth 99 pounds, with white gold and tiny, sparkling gems.
Rider moved on. Olivia and Grace were the proud owners of a piece of lingerie. "How much?" Rider asked, his eyebrow raised. The two girls looked at one another and immediately burst out into giggles.
"T-twenty five pounds," Grace managed to get out. She dissolved into laugher once more, and Rider shook his head before leaving them. The two girls had lost, but they didn't seem to mind. Maggie envied them their fun.
Jack and Luke were next. Jack wore a classic pair of aviator sunglasses. "Ray Bans," Aaron whispered next to her. "Ridiculously expensive. I wonder how they got at them…they're usually locked up."
As Rider approached, Jack removed the glasses with a heavy smirk. "One hundred and fifteen pounds," he declared, as if confident that no one would beat that price.
Rider nodded. "Good." He said nothing else, but moved to Maggie and Aaron. Maggie held out the earrings while Aaron announced the price—just under 100 pounds. They wouldn't win, but it was nice to be in second, at least. Maggie's sore muscles protested the loss. A break from training—even if it was just for a day—sounded like heaven.
Chloe was the last to go, her perfume bottle delicately perched on the desk. Maggie thought the bottle looked somehow familiar: it was cut crystal (or at least something that looked like crystal) filled with an amber fragrance and topped off with an ornate diamond stopper.
For once, Chloe didn't wait for Rider's prompting to speak. "Chanel N 5," she said, quiet pride obvious in her voice. "One hundred and," here she paused—if Maggie hadn't known the girl to be so quiet, she would have said the pause was meant for dramatic effect—"thirty five pounds."
The effect was immediate. Maggie watched in glee as the smug look on Jack's face slipped right off. Aaron laughed out loud, leaning back in his desk. He shot Maggie a winning smile.
Rider nodded. "Good. Look's like you're free tomorrow. Stay in bed…or not. I'm sure there are books lying around here somewhere."
Chloe nodded, the ghost of a smile on her face. Maggie noticed for the first time how pretty the girl was—she appeared plain at first glance, with her stringy brown hair and mostly unremarkable face, perfect for blending into a crowd—but the smile almost made her glow.
Rider walked back to his desk, standing behind it and leaning over. "Well," Rider said, and they all quieted down, "You did much better than I expected."
She leaned over to Aaron. "That's the closest we're ever going to get to a compliment, I think."
Aaron again smiled, flashing his perfect white teeth. "Don't get used to it."
The rest of the day was spent reviewing what they had learned—essentially, how to survive any sort of situation where you were on the wrong end of the weapon. They paired up and took turns as assailant and victim, using whatever skills they could muster to try and win. Aaron had a hard time being the attacker. He was fine with the knife, but when it came time to put a gun in his hand, his performance was suddenly lacklustre.
"Hand it over," he said weakly, forcing the cool, metal (and empty) barrel against Maggie's temple. "C'mon, turn out your pockets."
Maggie's eyes were filled with crocodile tears, a technique that Rider encouraged. "Take advantage of whatever you have. Girls, you need to be able to cry on command. Faced with tears, men pause. Use that pause to gain the upper hand—it might save your life someday." She let out a fake sob.
"T-that's all, that's all I h-have!" she cried. "I s-swear!"
Aaron looked miserable. Maggie almost felt bad when she dodged left, grabbing the hammer of the gun. She twisted the gun counter clockwise, and it almost fell right out of Aaron's hand. She kicked it away. Maggie moved closer to him and pivoted to the right, twisting his wrist. Applying some specific pressure to his wrist and continuing to twist, Maggie was able to knock him over quickly. In just a few seconds, Aaron was on the ground, with Maggie's knee poised threateningly on his ribcage.
He groaned when she stood, wiping her hands on her pants. "I'm never going to get the hang of that," he said, shaking his head and twisting his wrist around.
"I think the better question is: are you ever going to get used to holding a gun?" Rider seemed to come out of nowhere, but he was suddenly standing in between the two of them. They both jumped. Maggie glanced curiously at Aaron. He looked almost ill. Suddenly, he collapsed backwards, onto a nearby desk. Maggie twitched, as if to move closer, but stayed where she stood.
Rider shot Aaron an unreadable look. When he spoke, his voice was almost understanding: "Everyone here has issues, Lowe. Find a way to get over yours. In the field, you'll probably have to handle guns every once and a while. Get used to that fact."
With that, he walked away. Maggie wanted to walk over to Aaron, to somehow comfort him. He lifted her mood just by smiling at her—shouldn't she be able to do the same for him? But at the same time, she found herself frozen. She wasn't the comforting type. On the streets, she focused more on keeping her brothers and sisters alive. Elizabeth, her younger sister, was their mother. She held Lucy when she cried; she comforted Oliver when things looked bleaker than usual; she helped Will fall asleep when all they could find to sleep in for the night was a back alley. She and Maggie were a team, and without Lizzy, Maggie wasn't sure what to do.
Aaron had his head in his hands. Something in Maggie broke, and she moved closer to him. "You all right, Aaron?"
He sighed, and when he looked back up at her his eyes were solemn. "My dad died about a year ago. My—he died from a gunshot wound."
Maggie sat down next to him, tentatively taking his hand. He latched onto her, gripping her fingers tightly. "I'm sorry," she said, her voice barely more than a whisper.
He let out a laugh, shaking his head. "Not your fault." It came out bitter. His hold on her hand seemed to tighten. She stole a glance around the room. Everyone was busy practicing. As she watched, Lee knocked Charlie's gun out of his hands.
"Still," she said. "I'm sorry. My parents died a long time ago, but I remember how it feels."
Aaron rubbed his thumb along Maggie's hand, making sparks run up her arm. "Thanks," he said. He let go of her hand, and Maggie was surprised to find that she missed the feeling. "We should probably get started again, Rider's glaring in our direction."
Maggie let out a laugh. "It's my turn now. You'll never get this gun away from me!"
Alex Rider watched his class with a mixed sense of pride and overwhelming dread. They were getting better. He could see how they would be useful in the field. No one would ever suspect tiny Grace of passing along sensitive intel, or pale and scrawny Olivia of being capable of hacking into the most sophisticated computer systems in the world. Maggie and Jack Wood looked tough, but they were still young. They could easily infiltrate drug rings or spend time undercover.
It made him sick.
I found all of the prices of things by looking at actual Oxford Street shops online. If you're interested in the conversions, here's what I have: 125 British pounds is a little more than 200 American dollars (63 pounds, then, is about 103 dollars); 99 pounds is a little more than 160 dollars; 25 pounds is a little less than 40 dollars; 115 pounds is a little less than 188 dollars; and 135 pounds is about 220 dollars.
The move Maggie makes to disarm Aaron can be seen here: http (:) //alonline (dot) org/2006/09/26/how-to-disarm-a-gunman-at-close-range/. It's a pretty cool-looking move, if you want to check it out.