3.57 pm, Saturday, 2nd April

Royal and General Bank, Liverpool Street

"What the bloody hell" Alex said, tightly, "do you mean he got away?!"

It was late afternoon the following day, and he was sitting in Blunt's office at the Royal and General building on Liverpool Street - the building he'd initially woken up in after MI6 had kidnapped him over three weeks ago.

After they'd managed to cut him down from the roof, he'd been ushered by nameless agents into a black car outside - very much against his will. He hadn't managed to say anymore to Wolf after he'd shot out the Stormbreaker computer on the podium, but he'd seen the man try and run after him before his way had been blocked by MI6 goons.

Alex had been left in a windowless room, not much bigger than the wooden huts back at Brecon Beacons, and empty asides from a single bed with rough grey sheets, a metal locker, a toilet, and a tiny mirror above an equally small stainless steel sink.

No one had come to talk to him for hours - no matter how much he yelled - and the door of the room had no handle; it was locked from the outside. When someone did finally show up, it had been the same blank-faced doctor who had injected him with the tracking and listening device.

At first, Alex had been elated - the man was going to take it out again! - but his relief was quickly overcome by fury and bitterness as the doctor told him that no, he wasn't there to remove anything; instead, he'd been sent in with a worryingly large first aid kit to tend to his other wounds.

It had been a long, cold, lonely night, and now-

Now Alan fucking Blunt was sitting behind his boring fucking desk and telling him straight to his own fucking face that Herod fucking Sayle had fucking escaped!

"We believe you managed to shoot him twice, based on the security footage and the blood splatter" he continued, voice as dull as ever, "But with all of the confusion, he managed to slip out amongst the crowd".

"So where the hell is he?!"

"We don't know. But we'll find him. There's nowhere on earth he can hide from us". Blunt gave him a rather disapproving look. "You slightly spoiled things by shooting the prime minister".

"I'm not much of a conservative".

His face darkened at the sarcastic response, but before Blunt could say anything, Mrs Jones spoke up.

"You might like to know about the clearing-up operation" she stated, sucking on a peppermint, but Alex shook his head.

"Are the Stormbreakers offline?"

"Well… yes".

"Then that's all the clearing-up operation I want to know". He turned back to Blunt. "Why didn't you stop him?"

"We had it all under control-"

"Bullshit!" he snapped, slamming his hand down on the man's desk, "You heard every single word he said when he told me his plans! And I know you did too since you injected this- this fucking thing-"

"We had everything under control" Blunt repeated, cutting him off with a sharp look, "And if I were you, Alex, I would watch my tone".

"Oh yeah? And what will you do if I don't? Kill me? Oh, wait! You already tried that, didn't you?"

Jones sighed. "Alex-"

"Do you know who supplied the virus?"

Blunt coughed. "... No"

"How about the submarine that I saw?"

"Forget about the submarine". It was obvious that Blunt didn't want to talk about it. "You can just be sure that we'll make all the necessary inquiries-"

"What about Yassen Gregorovich?" Alex asked.

"We've closed down the plant at Port Tallon" Mrs Jones said, "We already have most of the personnel under arrest. It's unfortunate though that we weren't able to talk to either Nadia Vole or the man you knew as Mr Grin".

"He never talked much, anyway" Alex muttered.

"It was lucky that his plane crashed into a building site" Jones went on, "Nobody else was killed. As for Yassen, I imagine he'll disappear. From what you've told us, it's clear that he wasn't actually working for Sayle. He was working for the people who were sponsoring Sayle… and I doubt they'll be very pleased with him. Yassen is probably on the other side of the world already. But one day, perhaps, we'll find him. We'll never stop looking".

There was a long silence. It seemed that the two spymasters had said all they wanted. But there was one question that nobody had tackled.

"What happens to me?" Alex asked.

"Well… a deal's a deal" Blunt replied, "You get to go back home".

"Thanks". His voice dripped with venom. "I'll see myself out".

4.25 pm, Saturday, 2nd April

Liverpool Street, London

Alex stood up and left before Blunt or Jones could reply, but neither of them tried to stop him. He should have been feeling better. As he took the elevator down to the ground floor, he reflected that he'd saved thousands of schoolchildren, he'd beaten Herod Sayle, and he hadn't been killed or even badly hurt - and even more importantly, he was about to see Ian again! He could go home!

So what was there to be unhappy about? The answer was simple. Blunt had forced him into this. In the end, the big difference between him and James Bond wasn't a question of age. It was a question of loyalty.

In the old days, spies had done what they'd done because they loved their country, because they believed in what they were doing. But he'd never been given a choice. Nowadays, spies weren't employed. They were used.

He came out of the building, meaning to walk up to the tube station, but just then a cab drove along and he flagged it down. He was too tired for public transport but he didn't have a phone on him to call anyone, either. He glanced at the driver, huddled over the wheel in a horribly knitted, homemade cardigan, and slumped onto the backseat.

"Cheyne Walk, Chelsea" Alex said.

The driver turned around. He was holding a gun. His face was paler than it had been the last time Alex saw it, and the pain of two bullet wounds was drawn all over it, but - impossibly - it was Herod Sayle.

"If you move, you bliddy child, I will shoot you" Sayle said, "If you try anything, I will shoot you. Sit still. You're coming with me".

The doors clicked shut, locking automatically. Herod Sayle turned around and drove off, down Liverpool Street, heading for the City.

Alex didn't know what to do. He was certain that Sayle planned to shoot him, anyway. Why else would he have taken the huge chance of driving up to the very door of MI6 headquarters in London? He thought about trying the window, perhaps trying to get the attention of another car at a traffic light. But it wouldn't work. Sayle would turn around and kill him.

The man had nothing left to lose.

They drove for ten minutes. It was a Saturday and the City was closed. The traffic was light. Then Sayle pulled up in front of a modern, glass-fronted skyscraper with an abstract statue - two oversized bronze walnuts on a slab of concrete - outside the front door.

"You will get out of the car with me" Sayle commanded, "You and I will walk into the building. If you even think about running, remember that this gun is pointing at your spine".

Sayle got out of the car first. His eyes never left Alex. Alex guessed that the two bullets must have hit him in the left arm and shoulder. His left hand was hanging limp. But the gun was in his right hand. It was perfectly steady, aimed at Alex's lower back.

"In".

The building had swing doors and they were open. Alex found himself in a marble-clad hall with leather sofas and a curving reception desk. There was nobody here either. Sayle gestured with the gun and he walked over to a bank of elevators. One of them was waiting. He got in.

"The twenty-ninth floor" Sayle said.

Alex pressed the button. "Are we going up for the view?"

"You make all the bliddy jokes you want" he said, "But I'm going to have the last laugh."

They stood in silence. Alex could feel the pressure in his ears as the elevator rose higher and higher. Sayle was staring at him, his damaged arm tucked into his side, supporting himself against one wall. Alex thought about attacking him. If he could just get the element of surprise. But, no… they were too close - and Sayle was coiled up like a spring.

The elevator slowed down and the doors opened. Sayle waved with the gun, and Alex obediently followed his every command to the letter.

How the bloody hell did Sayle even find him? The Headquarters of MI6 was publicly listed as Vauxhall Cross - and that was where most of the paperwork was done too, from what Alex could guess. So how had Sayle known that a seemingly normal bank in the middle of Liverpool Street was secretly the main office of MI6?!

They stepped out onto the roof.

Looking around, Alex could see right across the city to Canary Wharf and beyond. It had seemed a quiet spring day when he left the Royal and General offices. But up here the wind streaked past and the clouds boiled.

"You ruined everything!" Sayle howled, "How did you do it? How did you trick me? I'd have beaten you if you'd been a man! But they had to send a boy! A bliddy schoolboy! Well, it isn't over yet! I'm leaving England. That's why I brought you here. I wanted you to see!"

Sayle nodded and Alex turned around to see that there was a helicopter hovering in the air behind him. It swung around over him, its blades beating in the air.

"That's my ticket out of here!" Sayle continued, "They'll never find me! And one day I'll be back. Next time, nothing will go wrong. And you won't be here to stop me. This is the end for you! This is where you die!"

There was nothing Alex could do.

Sayle raised the gun and took aim, his eyes wide, the pupils blacker than they had ever been, mere pinpricks in the bulging white.

There were two small explosive cracks.

Alex looked down, expecting to see blood.

There was nothing.

He couldn't feel anything.

Then Sayle staggered and fell onto his back.

There were two gaping holes in his chest.

The helicopter landed in the centre of the cross.

And the pilot got out.

5.01 pm, Saturday, 2nd April

New Square Street, London

"You're Yassen Gregorovich".

The Russian nodded. It was impossible to tell what was going on in his head. His clear blue eyes gave nothing away. Alex found his gaze drifting back down to the body across from him.

"... Why did you kill him?" he asked.

"Those were my instructions". There was no trace of an accent in his voice. He spoke softly, reasonably. "He had become an embarrassment. It was better this way".

"Not better for him".

Yassen shrugged.

"What about me?" he asked.

The Russian ran his eyes over Alex as if weighing him up.

"I have no instructions concerning you".

"You're not going to shoot me too?"

"Do I have any need to?"

There was a pause. The two of them gazed at each other over the corpse of Herod Sayle. For one, small, tiny, hysterical moment, Alex felt like laughing at the absolute absurdity of it all. As if sensing his thoughts, Yassen smiled.

"Believe me" he said, "It would be better if we didn't meet again. Go back to school. Go back to your life. And the next time they ask you, say no. Killing is for grown-ups and you're still a child".

"You say that as if they gave me a choice".

The words were out before he could stop them - and Alex suddenly became acutely aware of the red glowing beacon that was still in his wrist. The assassin, too, had paused, and a peculiar, almost curious expression came over his face.

"... Why are you-"

There was a loud bang from behind them as one of the doors on the top floor was flung open, and they both heard the rushing footsteps and radio static approaching the roof.

When Alex turned back, Yassen was already halfway back to his helicopter.

He wondered, distantly, if he should try and stop him - the man was a contract killer, after all, and wanted in over a dozen countries. He had his back turned to him too, as he climbed into the cabin. And Sayle's body, lying next to him, still had a gun. But-

No.

The blades started up, and a few seconds later, the helicopter rose back into the air. For a moment it hovered at the side of the building - just as a team of black-clad agents stormed the roof.

Behind the glass, Yassen raised his hand, uncaring of a dozen semi-automatics now pointed at him. A gesture of friendship? A salute? Alex raised his hand in return, feeling a strange sort of… kinship, almost, with the assassin, although he couldn't quite explain why.

The agents surrounding him started yelling and giving hand commands. The helicopter spun away. Alex stood where he was, watching it until it had disappeared in the dying light.

5.48 pm, Saturday, 2nd April

Royal and General Bank, Liverpool Street

On the way back to MI6, Alex had been given time to think, and three things had slowly but surely become abundantly clear.

One: the GPS tracker and listening device had been left in his arm for a reason.

Two: Herod bloody Sayle running into him outside of the bank had been no fucking coincidence.

And three: A soulless viper like Alan Blunt would never simply let his newest weapon slip through his fingers without a fight.

The Head of MI6 was exactly where Alex had left him just over an hour ago - sitting at his desk like a particularly horrible granite statue. Mrs Jones stood behind him, her eyes blank but her jaw clenched tightly. Alex wondered if she'd been told what Blunt was planning - but then he remembered the flash of fury that had come over her face when she'd seen the tracker for the first time, and realised, no, she hadn't.

"Alex" Blunt greeted, "Please, take a seat".

He marched over to the solitary chair placed in front of the cold metal desk, picked it up, and flung it against the wall. It smashed with a satisfying crack, and even tore a rather large hole in the plasterwork too - but it didn't make him feel any better.

"Don't make me call security, Alex" Blunt threatened lightly. The prick hadn't even flinched.

"It was a set-up" he spat, "This entire fucking thing was a set-up! You knew he'd come after me! You used me as bait!"

The man remained tellingly silent.

"So that's it, huh? That was the plan all along? Let him hold me at gunpoint until your agents rushed in to save the day? He tried to kill me!"

"He tried to kill every school child in Britain, Alex. In the grand scheme of things, your death would have been rather insignificant".

Jones took a sudden step forward, shock clearly written across her face, but Alex simply scoffed and shook his head.

"Whatever. The mission is over - I did what you wanted me to and Sayle's dead. So I'm going home. Now".

Blunt had a strange look on his face and something very horribly resembling a smile on his lips.

"I don't think you're in any position to be making demands, boy".

"I'm not- You- We had a deal!"

"Yes. We do have a deal, and the deal is, you get to go home as soon as you've proven yourself useful".

"Useful? Useful?! And just what the bloody hell was I for the last three weeks?! What the hell was Sayle and- and Stormbreaker all about if not me proving my- my usefulness?! What, was that supposed to be just some kind of- of- of test?!"

Alan Blunt stared back at him with blank eyes and the full extent of just what he'd been blackmailed into suddenly hit Alex with full force.

"Oh my god" he whispered.

He took a step back.

"Oh my god" he repeated, louder this time, but the man in front of him remained unfazed. "It was a test, wasn't it? I just- just risked my life for a test? I almost died for a stupid fucking test?!"

"Do not curse at me, boy!" Blunt said sharply but Alex shook his head, feeling vaguely hysterical. "No. No, I will curse at you all I fucking like! I almost died! It was pure fucking chance that survived and now you're going to just fucking sit there and- and tell me that you're keeping me here?! You can't do that! I have a- a life and a family and friends and school and- and- and we had a deal!"

Mrs Jones took another step forwards.

"Alan, he's right. You cannot possibly think that-"

"That's enough".

"This is a terrible idea and you know it-"

"I said that's enough!" he snapped, losing his composure, "Remember your place, Tulip".

There was an incredibly long moment of dead silence before Mrs Jone ever so slowly took a step back. Blunt nodded once, satisfied, and turned back to Alex with a scowl.

"The deal was, you prove yourself useful without telling anyone about our little agreement, and in return, you get to see your precious uncle again - someday, anyway. The problem is, Alex, you reneged on our deal".

"What?!" he exploded, "No I didn't! I did exactly as you asked! I trained at Brecon Beacons, I went to Port Tallon, I investigated the Stormbreaker computers, I stopped Sayle, I-"

Blunt reached across his desk and tapped a button on his computer - and suddenly, Alex heard his own voice being parroted back to him.

"-going to shoot me too?"

"Do I have any need to? Believe me. It would be better if we didn't meet again. Go back to school. Go back to your life. And the next time they ask you, say no. Killing is for grown-ups and you're still a child".

"You say that as if they gave me a choice".

He pressed the keyboard again and the recording cut off.

"I can't help but wonder, Alex". His voice was quiet and silky smooth. "What would you have told him, had my agents not arrived on that roof?"

"Nothing! I would have- have told him nothing! He's an assassin! A contract killer! I'm lucky that he didn't kill me!"

Blunt's grey eyes stared into the depths of his soul.

"Hmm, yes… You are lucky, aren't you? But nevertheless - you tried to tell Yassen Gregorovich about our agreement. And I believe I already informed you what would happen if you did that".

Alex's eyes widened.

He couldn't mean-

"I wonder what Gregorovich's rates are these days" he mused out loud, "And if they're higher, perhaps, for ex-agents".

Jones jerked forwards. "Alan-"

He held up a hand and cut her off.

"So what will it be, Alex?" he asked, his voice already smug, "Are you going to help us? Or do I need to make a phone call?

Alex wanted to scream.

He wanted to scream, he wanted to cry, he wanted to smash another chair, he wanted to ask the bastard if he seriously had Yassen Gregorovich on speed dial just so he could murder his uncle, he wanted-

Most of all, he wanted to go home again.

Alex nodded and tried to ignore the feeling that he'd just signed his own death warrant.

7.04 pm, Sunday, 3rd April

Chelsea, London

"Rider" he said, hissing as a spatter of grease lept from the pan and burned his hand.

"It's Wolf".

The tone of the man's voice made him pause, and he quickly turned down the heat on the stove so he could give the phone his full attention.

"What's happened?"

"... You watch the news lately?"

"Every day" Ian replied cautiously, "Why?"

"Did you see the coverage of the Sayle convention?"

Frowning, Ian made the decision to turn off the stove completely, and he took a seat at the kitchen table, opening up his laptop and googling the BBC report of the event. A video loaded above the article, and he hit mute before pressing play.

"The sergeant mentioned you guys were on babysitting duty for that" he said, watching as the prime minister gave a silent speech, "I remember watching the live stream of it, but it was cut off before the Stormbreakers were turned on. Some unknown terrorist organisation parachuted through the glass roof and attacked Sayle, right?"

"Right" Wolf replied, "Except… it wasn't actually an unknown terrorist organisation… It was Cub".

Ian stilled.

"... It was what?"

"I was one of the first on the floor" he explained, "It was Cub. I recognized him, he recognized me… and then I may or may not have possibly handed him my gun".

"You did what?!"

"He asked me for it!"

"He is also only fourteen years old, Wolf! Do you give your gun to every child that asks for it?!"

"I think you and I both know that Cub isn't exactly a normal child".

And- There!

Ian quickly paused the video, and then very slowly and very carefully reversed it second by second, frame by frame, until-

It must have been filmed right before the transmission was cut. The camera had been swung around in the chaos of someone smashing through the ceiling, and although the panicked faces of the BBC journalists took up much of the screen - right there, in the corner, was someone dangling from a parachute.

A short, slim, blond someone.

Alex.

"Are you telling me" he started, "that my nephew just shot the bloody prime minister?!"

"If Cub is your nephew" the soldier replied, and Ian couldn't help but snort. "A tiny blond kid just smashed through a glass ceiling and shot the bloody prime minister on national television, Wolf - it was Alex".

"... Is this the part where I'm supposed to say you've raised him well?"

"Did you vote for the conservatives last year?"

"... No".

"Then yeah. This is the part where you tell me I raised him well".

"... Well. I can see who he got his snarkiness from".

Ian sat back in his chair, feeling equal parts amused, bewildered, and horrified. If it had been Alex who had parachuted through the roof of the Science Museum - and that sentence alone was enough to convince him that it was - then that meant it was Alex who had stopped Herod Sayle from releasing the Stormbreakers.

The current story was that there was a dangerous product fault in the computers and that anyone turning them on could get electrocuted - and already, the Stormbreaker devices had all been recalled - but if Alex was involved in this, if MI6 were involved in this…

Then there had been something far more deadly about those machines.

"You said he asked you for your gun. Did you talk to him?"

There was an irritated huff at the other end of the line.

"No. I didn't - I tried to, of course, but before we could so much as blink there were so many spooks running about that it might as well have been a convention for them! The bloody bastards cut Cub down and then hauled him out of there. When I tried to follow - they stopped me".

Fuck.

"Did you see Alex talking to anyone?" Ian tried again, "Or anyone talking to him?"

"Negative. It was just a sea of black suits and ties with shades and earpieces" Wolf replied, the disgust audible in his voice, "We spent yesterday getting debriefed, and then we travelled back to Beacons today. I'm using the sergeant's phone right now, up at the main office - he was pretty interested to hear what happened too".

"... Right. Well. Thanks for telling me".

"'Course. Any brat that can hit four for six at two-hundred yards is a brat worth knowing, in my books".

Ian felt a rising warmth of pride in his chest as he hung up, but it was quickly followed by guilt. Yes, he had taught Alex how to shoot, and yes, him hitting his target four out of six times at that distance while being suspended in midair by a torn parachute was… you know; more than a little bit impressive - but his nephew had also just shot someone.

Two someones, in fact, but given that the prime minister had only been clipped on the hand, he wasn't sure if that counted. Sayle had taken two shots to the chest, however, which was far more life-threatening - although, according to the media, he was completely fine and recuperating while in hiding.

But Ian knew his nephew, and he knew that there was no chance in hell that Alex would ever have shot Sayle had he been given any other choice.

Alan Blunt had kidnapped him, forced him through brutal SAS training, and then made his kid shoot another living, breathing human being - and Ian was going to make him pay for it.

Perhaps it was about time that he paid the man a visit…