Chapter 23

Gibbs watched in horror as the factory slowly collapsed. Beside him, Snake seemed to have stopped breathing.

It just...collapsed. How? What did they do wrong?

"Boss? Boss, what should I do?"

Strangely enough, it was McGee's panicked voice that broke Gibbs out of his shock-induced trance.

"Stay where you are. Apprehend any members of Menten's spy ring who come out. And give Ziva back her gun," Gibbs ordered, "Snake and I are going in."

"We are?" Snake asked, quickly disassembling his sniper.

"We are." Gibbs stood, not bothering to pack his own away; there would be time for that later. Instead, he just slung the sniper across his back, before drawing his gun. "Let's go."

By the time the two had arrived at the collapsed entrance, Eagle had just stumbled out. Coughing helplessly, he turned to help Wolf drag out a heavily bleeding and very pale looking Matthew. Gibbs immediately ordered for an ambulance to be called.

"Boss, ambulance is on its way," McGee reported back.

At the same time, Rose and Ben stumbled out, both coughing uncontrollably as their bodies fought to rid itself from the collection of years worth of dust and God-knows what else that had accumulated in the factory.

"Boss?" Ziva suddenly appeared, limping slightly. "Tony and Shark were blown backwards from the blast. Tony says he is okay, but Shark has some kind of head injury; I could not really make out what he was saying over the headset."

Gibbs frowned, before turning to face the survivors. "You two," he said, pointing to Wolf and Rose. They nodded, and before Gibbs had even given an instruction, had set off to locate Tony and Shark.

It was only after Rose and Wolf had helped Tony and the limping and very dazed looking Shark back, and after the ambulances had arrived, and after they'd caught thirteen out of the original seventeen spotted spies, did anyone realise that Alex and Desiree were still missing.

.

Slowly, the roof began to collapse.

"Get out!" Wolf roared, shoving Eagle ahead of him and pausing to grab the injured Matthew.

It was chaos, as friend and foe alike scattered, trying to dodge the pieces of the roof that seemed intent on taking them out. Years of dust swirled around, clogging their lungs and dimming their eyesight.

And in the middle of it all, there was a sudden scream that stopped Alex's heart.

"Desiree!" Alex shouted, rushing back towards the scream.

Several pieces of the roof began to rain down on him, forcing Alex to use his arms as a protective barrier. Thankfully, the adrenaline pumping through him was enough to keep him from feeling the pain of being smashed repeatedly with metal and heavy plaster.

"Desiree!" He shouted again, and this time there was an answering call.

"Alex!" Desiree screamed.

It was only now, as he neared her, that Alex could pick out the choked quality to her cries.

"Dessi? De – woah!" Alex broke off in mid-shout as he almost tripped over a fallen body. The man wasn't moving. He swallowed heavily, hoping that it wasn't someone from their side.

"Dessi? Are...are you alright?"

"No I'm not alright!"

And suddenly, Desiree was right there in front of him. In fact, it had been so unexpected that did trip this time, over the poor girl, causing her to let out a sharp yelp when his foot connected with her ribs.

Wait...ribs?

It was only then that Alex realised Desiree was in fact on the ground, trapped under a rather large section of the roof. And...was it the really bad light, or was her face a lot paler than natural?

"Dessi?" Alex approached uncertainly.

"Alex," Desiree said through gritted teeth, not entirely able to mask the pain, "Get it off me."

"I don't think so."

Alex spun around, while Desiree craned her neck as far as she could, to catch sight of two men belonging to the spy ring, probably the last two men still left standing inside the fallen factory. Unfortunately for Alex, what with Desiree trapped, it was two against one. What made it even worse was that the two spies both had guns...and his was nowhere to be found.

Shit, I must have dropped it somewhere, Alex cursed.

"Now be a good little boy," the blonde haired man – officially dubbed Blondie – continued, his gun aimed straight at Alex's heart, "And step away from the girl."

The other man – Freckles – merely stood beside Blondie with a supposedly sinister smirk on his face, though it really didn't terrify Alex at all, something the boy thought was prudent to point out.

"Shut your mouth," Freckles snarled, smirk wiped clean off his face.

And in that instant when Freckles' guard dropped, and Blondie's gun wavered just a fraction of an inch, Alex moved.

The main threat was the drawn gun (Freckles had, rather stupidly in Alex's opinion, left his own in its holster, hanging uselessly on his hip). So before anything else happened, Alex had to make sure that gun was gone.

It happened before Blondie could blink.

One moment, his gun was in his hand. Then next, there was a stinging pain that forced him to let go with a roar. The gun flew across the factory, almost in slow motion, and landed several metres away.

Too far to reach.

Alex fell back onto both feet, barely hiding his triumphant smirk. Behind him, he heard Desiree's soft sigh of relief.

Freckles blinked, blinked again, then roared in anger. He reached down to grab his own gun, with the full intention of killing the boy where he stood. Alex reacted faster.

It took a single well-placed kick to knock the gun halfway across the room. An elbow to the neck and a side-swipe to break the man's nose meant that for the moment, Freckles was out of business. Unfortunately, Blondie was more than capable of taking over.

Alerted by a shout from Dessi, Alex swung around and ducked under Blondie's would-be powerful punch. He barely had time to dodge the second blow, and it was only his fast reflexes that allowed him to block the third.

Damn, this guy's fast.

His mind was working overtime trying to stem the number of blows coming his way. And just when he was about ready to give up, the slightest opening appeared. And Alex took it.

One moment, Blondie was coming towards him, fist curled and ready, and the next his head had snapped back very roughly, an audible crack shooting through the factory as Alex's elbow came into contact with his nose.

The man dropped to the ground, unconscious, blood dripping from his mutilated nose. Alex turned away with a grim look, hoping that he hadn't killed the man. Only, he was sure he'd felt the bone snap inwards. Well, either way, it was one down.

And one to go...

He turned just in time to see Freckles trying to lunge for a gun lying uselessly on the ground.

Not on my watch, Alex thought grimly, quickly glancing around.

One of the better things to result from the collapsing of the roof, is the many pieces of concrete and metal that could be used as ammunition. Like that rather large slab over there, the one that was almost the exact same shape as a soccer ball...

Alex smirked, lining the concrete 'soccer ball' up with Freckles, before doing a short run up and booting it towards him.

Okay, so the ball was a lot heavier than what he was accustomed to. And, damn, that hurt. But nonetheless, the concrete ball soared towards its target. Freckles jerked back in time to avoid being knocked out by the heavy thing.

Unfortunately for him, Alex was already following up with plan B. And before Freckles could react, Alex was on top of the man. He lashed out, his foot connecting firmly with the man's knee. He was sure he felt something buckle, but didn't wait to find out. A knee to his stomach, and an elbow to his temple quickly followed.

And for good measure, he broke the man's nose. Again.

Freckles fell to the ground, limp, unconscious. Alex barely had time to celebrate before a soft whimper drew his attention.

He turned to see Dessi even paler than before, and almost slumped completely onto the ground. Biting his lip, he quickly rushed over.

"Dessi?"

"Alex," Dessi gasped, reaching out for his hand, "You've gotten better."

Alex flashed the girl a brief smile. "Thanks. Now, tell me what's wrong."

"My leg; it – it burns."

"Is it broken?"

"I sincerely hope not," Dessi said, whimpering slightly when she tried to move, "Alex, get it off me."

"Sure thing; I just need you to let go of my hand," Alex said, gently freeing his hand from the girl's bruising grip. Either she was in a lot of pain, or she really hated his hand.

"Damn it, Alex!" Dessi hissed, when Alex paused for a moment to see how best to tackle the situation. "Just shove it off!"

"And do more damage?" Alex retorted. "Just be patient."

"Patience is something I don't have right now!"

"Yeah, funnily enough I figured that out for myself," Alex muttered. In the end though, he decided to just push the thing until it was far away enough to Dessi to be able to pull herself out from under it while he held it up. It was definitely too heavy for him to lift all the way.

"Ready?" Alex asked.

"Yeah," Dessi breathed.

"Okay," Alex said, gritting his teeth.

At first, nothing happened. The thick, metal reinforced concrete didn't even budge. But then, it began to slide.

Dessi winced slightly, but bit her lip and kept quiet as Alex managed to shift the slab far enough for her to drag herself out. Slowly but surely, she emerged from under the slab, until finally she was no longer under.

At which point Alex let the thing fall with a relieved sigh.

"Damn that thing's heavy," he breathed. "Alright, let's get you out of here."

With her arm slung over his shoulder, and supporting most of her weight, Alex managed to get the limping Dessi out of the fallen factory in one relative piece, though no doubt they both looked much worse for wear.

"Alex!"

"Dessi!"

"Oh, thank God you're alright!"

Ben was the first to Alex's side, followed by Snake, and together they relieved Alex of his load and carried the complaining girl to the one of the ambulances. Then Rose had run up and had pulled Alex into a tight hug.

"Do you know how worried we all were?" She demanded when she let him go.

"Erm...very?" Alex offered meekly.

Rose just sighed, before pulling him into another hug, "Just don't do that again."

Alex gently disentangled himself from her grasp, before heading over to where Dessi was being given a check-up by one of the paramedics. Looking around, he frowned when he realised that there were several people missing. Quickly, he snagged the passing McGee for answers.

"Well," he began, "Matthew had a bullet wound to the leg, Shark was...kinda out-of-it, and Eagle wouldn't stop coughing, so all three were sent to the hospital. Tony, Gibbs and Wolf left as 'escorts' for the spy ring – well, the ones who made it out alive, at any rate. Um...oh, and Gibbs sent out a call for Ziva just a little while ago to interrogate the spies."

"Ah, I see," Alex said. Always send in a spy to extract information from those trained in the art of espionage. "So, who's in charge now?"

"Well...I'm not sure," McGee shrugged. "I'd assumed it would be Desiree, but she doesn't exactly look too well."

"Yeah..." Alex sighed, "Well, thanks for your help."

McGee smiled. "You're welcomed. Maybe you should think about getting a check up too," he added, clapping the boy on his shoulder before walking away.

There was a sudden retching sound; Alex turned in time to see the paramedic, Ben and Snake dart back away from Desiree. Biting his lip, Alex hurried over.

"What's wrong with her?" He asked.

"She's sitting right here," Dessi said, her voice very hoarse. "And honestly, you try being stuck under a massive slab of concrete, and see how your body takes it."

"I'm sorry sir, but I've yet to finish the check-up," the paramedic interjected, shooing Alex back a little, "So if you don't mind."

Alex rolled his eyes, before turning to Ben and Snake. "There're still two unconscious men in there, along with quite a few who are...well, not moving. So I was wondering..."

"We're on it," Snake nodded, striding away.

"I'll grab Rose too," Ben added, "I think she needs something to do."

"Thanks." Alex smiled, before turning back to the paramedic, who was having to deal with a very annoyed girl refusing point blank to go to hospital.

.