The Winx and the Specialists all crowded around Techna's computer as the video played in slow motion. Words appeared on the screen.
My. Name. Is. Alex. Cow.
"So Alex's last name is Cow?" Stella snorted.
"This app is faulty," Techna explained, pausing the video. "It could be the wrong word. What rhymes with cow?"
"Pow?" Riven offered, imagining the sound of a punch to the jaw.
"Chow?" Musa added, stomach grumbling.
"Now?" Flora whispered, thinking of the simplest option. Everyone turned to her.
"'My name is Alex now'," Techna tested the sentence. "It makes the most sense out of all the options so far."
"So maybe Alex had a different name before then," Bloom asked, sending a shudder down all spines.
"Pardon the interruption."
Everyone jumped and squealed at the sound of a voice, spinning to the door. At the door, was none other than Alex, with that adorable, innocent grin plastered on his face. "I hope I'm not walking in on something important?" he asked, eyes wide with naivety.
"No, come on in," Techna pressed a single key, exiting out of the video. Alex's smile brightened, and the boy entered the room.
"I saw the Specialists headed this way and I thought I would follow. We do have class, after all, and I thought maybe they were ditching."
"N-No, we got an excused absence," Timmy said, thinking back to their conversation with the Headmaster, who was aware of their suspicions.
Alex smiled, walking towards them, hands behinds his back, chest out. Suddenly, he seemed a lot older than he was, which frightened the others. Yet they stayed composed as Alex confidently strode over to look at the computer.
"Watching something interesting?" he asked, voice dripping with sweet innocence.
"Oh, no, just working on our business back in the human world," Techna's voice never trembled once, the most comfortable Winx with lying.
"Oh, on Earth?" Alex's giant brown eyes flashed with curiosity. "You have a business on Earth?"
"Yes. A pet business," Techna never missed a beat, her eyes staying locked confidently with Alex's deep brown ones. Alex's expression never changed, not even a flicker.
"That's cute," he grinned. "Well, I guess if that's all, I'll just go back to school now. You guys have fun." With that, Alex turned on his heel and exited with a skip in his step.
The instant the pink door closed behind him, his smile fell into a scowl. "They think I'm evil," he growled, back to the door. His hand in his pocket clenched the piece of paper with tight fists. "And they have a video!" Alex cleared his throat, a smile spreading across his features. But it wasn't the same smile he used in the room. It was a sly, sneaky smile.
"But I'm very careful with my conversations," he spoke to the door, as if to the Winx and the Specialists. "Even with knowing what we spoke about, you have no proof." But then, he winced, recalling mentioning his three childhood friends. "I'm not evil," he whispered, in an entirely new emotion, rarely seen on the boy, taking over. "I'm not," he whispered again. His eyes were wide and sad. "I'm not." It was as if he was trying to convince himself.
Holding back tears, the boy spun around and stormed out of Alfea before there could be any more problems. The Winx hated the witches. There was no way they'll trust him after seeing that. He needed to get out, and fast. It was time to speed up the mission.
"DARCY!" Stormy hissed, sending a bolt of lightning to Darcy's rear. Darcy squeaked in pain, spinning around and preparing to send Stormy flying into oblivion.
"GIRLS!" Icy hissed, landing with her hands on her hips between the two fighting witches. "We're going."
"Going? Going where?" Stormy asked her leader. A cold, icy smile twitched on Icy's lips.
"Dévildania."
Ice. Darcy. Store me.
"Icy, Darcy, and Stormy?!" Bloom gasped, recognizing the witch's names even through the errors of the app.
"Alex knows those witches?" Brandon seemed equally surprised. Stella's eyes flickered to the ground, sadly. She honestly thought that little Alex was good.
"Well, they could be Alex's enemies?" Flora tried.
"I dunno about that, Flora," Musa scratched the back of her head in thought.
"So he IS evil?" Riven had a small sense of pride that he was right about the kid, but mostly feeling sad.
Everyone was silent for a moment. They remembered Alex, the instant he joined Red Fountain. His uniform that was just the slightest bit too big, his huge, adorable smile, his choppy hair and big brown eyes. The youthful energy, causing trouble whether on purpose or on accident, the innocence.
"It was all an act," Roxy interrupted their thoughts, a slight growl forming in her voice. She was furious, of course, but she tried to contain it. "None of it was real."
"Alex isn't even his real name," Riven's fingers were gripped tightly on the back of Techna's chair, white-knuckled.
"The app makes mistakes, guys!" Stella spun around to the group, blonde hair flying dramatically. "Maybe this is all just a mistake!"
"It makes some mistakes, Stell, but we got the basic gist," Techna said sadly, hating to see her friend so upset.
"There's no way he can be evil! Flora?" she looked to the sweet girl for some backup. Flora just stared at the ground in sadness.
"Stella..." Brandon reached out for his girlfriend. Stella stepped back, smacking his hand out of the way.
"NO! He's good, I'm going to prove it!" With that, Stella stormed out of the room, slamming the big door shut.
In a flash of brilliant light, Stella transformed. With a flick of her beautiful golden wings, she shot into the sky. As soon as she looked down on the forest, she could see Alex, on his red bike, headed back to Red Fountain. She lowered herself so she just touched the tops of the trees, following closely behind the boy without making herself known.
Stella skid to a stop as Alex parked his bike and head inside Red Fountain. Re-transforming, Stella's wings disappeared, and she quickly followed suit on foot.
Luckily for Stella, the school was crowded with students, so she could easily hide in the large groups. It wasn't so lucky for Alex, however, it made it difficult to sneak around.
Stella rounded over to Alex's side, just ten feet away, hidden behind rushing Red Fountain students. She gasped, noticing a scowl taking over Alex's usually happy features. He seemed to be growing more and more irritated with the crowd, but soon disappeared down a flight of stairs, where there were no students. Careful to make no sound, Stella slowly followed him.
She realized that she was being hypocritical. This had become a spy mission after she specifically told the girls that they shouldn't spy on him. Whatever. She shook it off, hiding behind an empty, open wooden chest in Red Fountain's basement, watching as Alex stood in the center of the basement, looking around.
"HELLO?" he called out. "ANYONE HERE?!" Prepared for being caught, he was going to use the excuse that he had gotten lost on his way to the bathroom. When there was no response, he started to walk around.
"This place is huge," he thought out loud. "I should have come down here sooner. Now where is that- oh, here it is," he cut himself off, dragging a projector machine into the middle of the room. He blew sharply on it, a cloud of dust flying off. Then, he slipped out a cell phone and plugged it in, typing in some numbers.
Stella realized that he was calling someone. But why didn't he use holograms instead of a projector? She leaned forward to get a closer look at the phone and realized it was old. Really old. Why would he be carrying around such a phone?
A small boy picked up the phone, no older than six. He had hair just like Alex's, but he was combed out and gelled back neatly, with only one small brown strand falling limply across his forehead. He and Alex shared the same giant brown eyes.
The six year old clapped his hands happily. "You called! You called!"
"Yes, yes I did, now shhhhhh," Alex put his finger to his mouth, wincing at the loudness of the projector screen. "You can see where I am, right?"
"The basement of Red Fountain," a voice came from the other end of the projector, but it wasn't the boy's. On screen, three girls slinked on, smiles splitting across their wicked features.
"Icy! Darcy! Stormy!" Alex laughed with relief. Stella bit back a gasp. So Alex DOES know the witches! "How's it going? Did you find a way to wake up my magic?"
Woah woah woah. HOLD THE PHONE! Stella took a moment to process this. Alex had magic? Sure, it was asleep, but it was still magic! Was he some kind of wizard?
"No, sorry, kid. Looks like you'll be spending some more time in that testosterone-drenched muscle boy school," Darcy answered, seeming almost...sorry. Sympathetic, maybe. Stella shoved that thought away, there was no way the witches could have any nonevil feelings.
Alex groaned. "But I hate it here!" For a moment, Alex sounded like a kid. A real kid, not the way he's been acting. A real kid who misses home. "Not to mention those Winx may have caught on to me."
"The WINX?!" Icy nearly blew a fuse at the name of their old enemy.
"I warned you that I might run into them," Alex shrugged. "Anyway, they know I know you, but they don't know the whole story."
"No doubt they think you're evil," Stormy added understandingly.
Stella blinked. Think he's evil? They all think Alex is evil. But from the way the witches were saying it, it sounded like Alex maybe wasn't?
"Yep," Alex shrugged, bowing his head sadly. Stella's eyes widened, hating seeing the cute boy so sad. He was just a little kid, after all. The Specialists and the Winx seemed to have forgotten that. Alex was just a kid, and they're shoving all this blame onto him!
"You should probably get out of there as soon as possible," Icy said. Alex snapped to attention.
"That's actually why I called. I decided to finish the mission now. I haven't finished training yet, or my research, but I'm sure I can find it now and try to figure it out back home."
Home. Alex rarely mentioned his home. Does he live where Icy, Darcy, and Stormy live?
"You're coming home?" the little boy bounced back onto the screen, a bright grin that was identical to Alex's beaming on his face. Solemn Alex couldn't help but laugh, really laugh, at the boy's happiness.
"That's right, buddy, I'm coming home," Alex reached up as if to touch the kid. Then he pulled his hand away, head snapping up to the stairs with paranoia. "Right now I need to find it. It should be easier to find it with you guys back."
It? What is it?
Darcy on the screen nodded, holding out her hands. Her magic shot out from the projected image, a wave of darkness shooting over the room. Stella watched in awe at the black waves, which had a slight purple tint that she never noticed. A bolt of gold shot up from a corner of the room, and the blackness dissolved. Alex sprinted over to the corner, knocking down a pile of chests. He opened one by one, groaning at the emptiness, until he realized that all the chests were actually piled on top of a small door in the ground, only four inches wide and four inches tall. Alex opened the small compartment on the floor and grinned, pulling out a diamond.
"Is that it?" Icy whispered from the projection.
"This is it," Alex pulled the diamond farther out from the compartment, revealing it attached to a wire. "I'm going to take it out, and I'll need to get out of here right away."
What is that diamond? Stella wondered.
"One." Alex let out a slow, shaky breath, fingers tightening around the jewel. "Two."
He pulled slightly on the diamond, the wire tightening, ready to snap right off.
"Alex is coming home!" the little boy squealed.
Alex grinned at the sound of the boy's voice. "Three."
He pulled.