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In between his assignments, stiff library chairs and two-minute noodles, Alex has finally started feeling like a real university kid. He has not missed a single deadline. He has attended awkward club meet-ups—some with drinks, some without (but always, always , do they have pizza). He has even made a couple of friends here and there—the kind you’d nod to as you cross paths with or sit beside without acknowledgement in lectures. Standing in a humid bar, leaning on sticky countertops, squashed in between sweaty bodies while loud music pulses in his ear, Alex starts to feel like a real university kid.
“I think I saw one of my supervisor’s PhD students here,” Tom shouts in his ear. “Isn’t this great?”
It kind of is, in a horribly humid and gross kind of way. Tom’s fringe is damp and sticking to his forehead, much like his own. He hasn’t stopped blurring for the last twenty minutes, a fact that isn’t helped by Tom’s own staggering. Alex grins and quite expertly flails his way into something akin to a dance move. Together, he and Tom lose themselves to the thrumming music, the red-blue-purple lights washing the worries of quizzes, tutorials and lab assignments away.
The haze doesn’t last, no matter how oddly pleasant it is. Awareness jars his senses into a slow wake as Alex realises that it’s not the feeling of bodies bumping into him which is jostling his pants pocket. It’s his phone ringing—his ‘work’ phone.
Alex fumbles with the lock-screen. “Hello,” he slurs.
“I'm sending a car to pick you up,” Jones says. “Be out front in ten minutes.”
And with two sentences—two measly sentences—Alex feels like he’s been punched in the gut with a fist sharpened by resentment and bitterness.
Tom glances at his face and does a double take. “Mate, what’s wrong?”
Alex scrunches his nose. “Just samurai stuff,” Alex says, a code which they’ve sussed out to mean MI6. He points to the door. “Won’t be long.”
Turning himself away from Tom’s doubtful glance, he heads outside, cupping the phone in his hand.
“What?” Alex says. “Can’t it wait?”
“We have cause to believe that Miyamoto is on the move. You will need to be outfitted for deployment as soon as possible.”
“For how long?”
“We don’t have an estimate yet but depending on how things goes we can have you out there and back here within a fortnight.”
“That won’t work. I have an exam next week.”
“This can’t wait,” Jones insists. “There are details that are much better shared over person. Ones which will certainly underline how urgent this is.”
“Then tell me tomorrow,” Alex says. “Or better yet, tell me next week. This exam’s important, you know. This is thirty percent of my grade. I’ve worked very hard to keep up with everything, you know. Despite falling behind every time you decide to the ship me off to wherever tickles your fancy—”
“Alex,” Jones says, almost reproachfully. “The Dean of the faculty will make an exception.”
“What if they don’t? What if they think it’s some corruption like the ‘College Admissions Scandal’ and I get reported before I even have the chance to explain myself?”
“They won’t,” Jones says firmly. “We will work something out. This, you can trust me on. This is just another exam. One like the others.”
“This is different this time. I’ve—” Alex’s shoulder drops as his anger deflates. “I’ve already prepared for this one.”
It’s stupid. Alex swipes the sweat from his eyes. He can face down a world-class terrorist without trembling but a couple of firm words from Jones, once again, and he feels out of his depth—like a stupid kid.
There’s silence over the line, and Alex can just imagine Jones pursing her lips, unwarping a mint. “And I’m sure you would have done very well in it,” Jones says, in that stupid gentle tone of voice that she uses when she wants to placate him. “You know I wouldn’t ask this of you if it wasn’t necessary.”
It’s always necessary, Alex thinks. It’s been necessary since he was sixteen, and it’s even more necessary now six years later. Either she thinks Alex is stupid enough to be manipulated by her fake sympathy or she actually believes the statement herself, which is funny, because Alex never took Jones as a fool.
“Fine,” Alex says. “Whatever. I’m already outside.”
He hangs up before she has the chance to say anything. A small victory to placate himself until the next mission. He slumps against the wall, kicking a stray rock unlucky enough to exist on the gravel road underneath his feet.
A figure catches the corner of his eyes. “Hey,” Tom says, slumping against the wall beside him. “They’re sending you out already? In the middle of the night?”
“Yeah.”
“Sucks, man.” Tom sounds like he’s chewing something. “Have some chips. It’ll sober you up.”
Indeed, when Alex finally looks over, Tom has somehow acquired a cup of hot chips, tomato sauce slathered on top and all. He’s aiming one at his mouth, yet he keeps missing, ending up with dollops of tomato sauce on his face. Alex is honestly even surprised that the idea of food doesn’t turn his stomach, considering the size of nachos they both smashed down during dinner. Still, he appreciates the tomato sauce, though. Tom doesn’t mind tomato sauce, but Alex knows he much prefers barbecue if he was eating it alone.
Alex reaches over and swipes the thin, crispy one Tom was aiming at his mouth.
“Oi,” Tom says, offended.
“What,” Alex says, chip already half chewed.
Rolling his eyes, Tom says, “Don’t talk with your mouth full, genius. It’s disgusting.”
“You’re disgusting.”
“Fuck, you’re smart.”
“Shut it,” Alex says, even though he is smiling. Tom’s stupidity is so bloody infectious. “You’re not supposed to wait with me, you know,” he says, feeling lighter with every bite of his chip. “You’re not supposed to be involved more than you already were.”
Tom snorts, and even while drunk he manages to say, through a mouth full of chips, “They can deal with it.”
Alex at twenty-two isn’t much different than Alex at twenty-one.
He’s still slowly but surely working his way through a Computer Science degree, one that Jack likes to boast about to anyone within a five meter radius. He’s staying at a student accommodation three hours away from home, with a set of flat mates that come and go with the semesters. Once and a while, MI6 plucks him out of his life and plunks him in some covert operation on the other end of the world. It usually ends up in an explosion and a scar, one to join the collection growing on his body.
He’s failed a lot of courses. Yeah, that’s been rough.
The worst part of a mission isn’t the physical or emotional exertion demanded from him. It isn’t the constant fear of being caught, or the thrill of escaping something dangerous and how addictive having that kind of adrenaline coursing through his body can be. It’s coming back home—it’s always coming back home—and finding that the world has moved on without him. It doesn’t count as imposter syndrome if he is an imposter. Some people don’t need to repeat their courses once, twice, or even thrice. Some people are finished with their degree, some people are graduating, and hell, some people are even starting a new one in the time that Alex has managed to repeat and complete a single academic year. If he were any other student, he would have flunked his way out of uni with the amount of classes he’s failed.
But of course, MI6 paid his way back into his degree. Anything else would be admitting that money isn’t adequate compensation for all the ‘services’ they’ve required.
Alex made the mistake of befriending people in his first year, and now they’re posting pictures of their new jobs, new partners, or new cars on their Instagram. All the while, Alex downloads third editions of coursebooks he’ll probably forget the next time someone’s aiming a gun at him.
At least he still has Tom with him. Hopefully, Tom will decide to continue on with his post-graduate study for—well—forever. Maybe, by that time, he’ll manage a single semester studying without leaving the country.
It wouldn’t be true to say that nothing has changed for Alex at twenty-two. His missions are cleaner, lying becomes easier, and he finally has the experience to back up his curiosity. There is one big, notably Russian difference, announcing his presence not with a bang, but with a quiet sip of his champagne—in a corporate office during mid-day.
“Alex,” Yassen greets, in a clean-cut three piece suit, lounging behind the desk like a cat napping in sunbeam. He stretches one lean leg, and Alex is very much reminded that it took him ten minutes to deactivate the room’s security protocols all the while Yassen luxuriates in said room.
He almost rolls his eyes in reaction. “Go away,” Alex says. “I’m working.”
“I see that,” Yassen says, eyes raking Alex up and down. If it were any other person, Alex would feel undignified, being sized up like a piece of meat. Knowing Yassen’s fastidious nature, however, he’s probably admiring how Alex has found the only piece of wardrobe that’s tailored to fit him. He shouldn’t be too happy, however. This is a rent out from MI6.
Humming in approval, Yassen says, “Well, don’t let me keep you standing.”
“Were you hired to keep me away or something?”
“Or something,” Yassen says, but he does swivel his chair away in a kind and generous manner that will put Alex right in front of him as Alex uses the computer. Yes, a very kind and generous man Yassen is.
“Uh-huh.” Alex folds his arms. “And I suppose it’s a complete coincidence that you’re here.”
“Yes,” Yassen says, which naturally translates to, ‘I’m retired now. I do what I want.’ “You have been busy studying.”
And it’s as if Yassen plucked all the prickles that’ve been burrowing under his skin. Alex considers himself very fluent in Yassen, and what Yassen’s saying right now—he can feel it more than hear it. The hard work, enthusiasm and dread Alex has put in for the exam is acknowledged. His disappointment at having the experience ripped out from him is heard. Being displaced is jarring, and it’s a mutual understanding. Yassen will not help MI6, but he will ease the way for Alex, and Alex realises that the time spent trying to break in could have easily been doubled if there had not been any intervention.
This also tells Alex another thing; that Yassen has been keeping away as a courtesy, so that Alex could focus on his studies. Which is very silly. Alex misses him terribly.
Not that Alex will admit it out loud. He clears his throat. “Won’t Miyamoto be pissed that you’ve let someone through?”
“He will only find out if you are sloppy,” Yassen says, making a ‘chop-chop’ motion at the computer.
Alex feels very much like his mission is being hijacked. He sucks in his bottom lip and tries very hard not to smile. “Alright, alright. Keep your knickers on.”
“Knickers,” Yassen repeats, amused.
“Yes, knickers,” Alex says, nudging his way through Yassen’s legs. “Now, budge please.”
Technology has come a long way since Blunt first recruited him. Many of his missions now only require him because of his break-in expertise or his—lord help him—his espionage expertise. Often, once he’s in the right location, it’s a matter of waiting as Smithers’ software is plugged in and extracts the needed information. Alex prefers missions that are more pro-active, the ones that require him to compile the data himself, although those are few and far in-between.
This mission is one of the former ones, where Alex has to wait and watch as Smithers’ software does its magic. Somehow, he’s found his way to being seated on Yassen’s lap, with a pair of hands attached to his hips.
Yassen gives his hips a squeeze. “You’re not carrying a handgun?” he asks.
Of course he would notice something like that within a few minutes of pawing him.
“I have one,” Alex says. “Although, it’s filled with tranquiliser darts. It’s small enough to slot into the sole of my shoes. Pretty neat, right?”
“Neat, but inconvenient,” Yassen says. “They should outfit you with a weapon and bullet proof vest, at least.”
“I’m fine.”
“For now. You're not so young anymore that people will pause before they shoot.”
Alex eyes him thoughtfully. “You know, you were the only one who ever did that.”
“Hmm,” Yassen says, and he sounds doubtful of his past self.
While Smithers’ software chugs away at the computer, a multitude of thoughts cross his head. Yassen looks very much like a cat who licked something he wasn’t supposed to and is very much denying it by the way he’s keeping his face blank. It brings out a little fold in Yassen’s forehead. Alex wants to smooth the crease out with his thumb, make him look a little less stern. Yassen shouldn’t be so surprised by himself. If there is one thing Alex has learnt from his missions, it’s that compassion can be found in the most foreign places. Compassion is a universal language—and no matter how much he resents Jones and her minions for disrupting his life, he can’t deny that she has been compassionate and kind to him, at times.
He settles for resettling himself, making sure that the sharpest part of his butt is stabbing Yassen’s lap.
“Watch it.” Yassen taps his hips. “I will call the guards on you.”
Alex snickers, a taunt on the tip of his tongue, when Smithers’ software suddenly stops, a grey box popping-up when the program should have been running for a further three minutes and twenty-four seconds. It details the numerous system files and executables blocking the software from fully extracting the necessary data. Which is—impossible. Smithers’ work is not something any commercial cybersecurity software can match.
Scanning the screen, two specific files catch his eye. Two names with some form of Greek alphabet attached at the end.
nuo_rho.exe
andriy_tau.exe
Nuo and Andriy. Alex has heard those names before.
Behind him, Yassen sits up, body tensing imperceptibly. “The guard’s alarm has been set. The discreet one. You will have to go.”
Alex ejects his USB and quickly jams it back into his pocket. When Yassen’s in business mode, that means they need to go. “You still haven’t told me what it is you’re doing here.”
“I am what I need to be,” Yassen says in his incredibly vague way. He nods toward the door, one hand on Alex’s shoulder, and escorts him out to the hallway.
There are things he can change about his life, and things he can’t; forces in motion where Alex isn’t even aware of a mass existing. Alex prefers focusing on the things he can change, the things he can control, because stewing on the things he can’t remind him of how powerless he is in the grand scheme of things.
For instance, the following are things he can control: his level of noise when coming and going, his cleanliness around the flat, smiling when appropriate and his friendliness towards his flatmates.
And the following are the things he can’t control: people’s perception of him, how they think he’s a slacker, that his trust fund paid his way through uni, of how he’s privileged and he’s squandering it, or worse, how he tries so hard and yet still fails because some people are just not meant for further study—
Alex’s last project partner sent an email so scathing, Alex only read a paragraph of it before deleting it with a sick stomach. That was roughly when the university (Jones) stepped in and placed him under ‘special circumstances.’ Which means that Alex hasn’t had to work with anyone in his classes or in his labs ever since.
At least there are people who are nice about it. Tom’s girlfriend is younger than them, but she’s two years above Alex academically and she tutors subjects in Alex’s year when she has time. She sends Alex the little study notes she makes for her tutoring kids, in case Alex ever wants to use them.
Somehow, that feels even worse than if she hadn’t cared about him at all.
It’s afternoon when Alex gets home, shoulders heavy with the burden of an unsuccessful mission. A stupid feeling to have, he knows. He shouldn’t be internalising any failure of the mission since he had no control over the preparation of it. It’s hard, though—Alex never likes seeing disappointment on people’s faces, even when it’s not directed at him.
His flatmates are all in the living room, watching a live stream of a cricket game. They exchange their nods and hellos at Alex as Alex dumps his bag in his room and goes to boil the kettle. It’s not long before Alex hears a set of footsteps following his own.
“Hey,” Lance says. “A couple of us are going to the pub crawl tonight and wondering if you’re keen to come with?”
Alex likes Lance. Lance is one of the braver ones, and one of the newer ones. He moved in the second week of the semester. He’s a bit of a stoner, but he’s outgoing, sociable, and he hasn’t stopped giving Alex a shot long after their other flatmates did. He doesn’t want to keep rejecting Lance’s friendly overtures when lord knows he could use more friends around. But god, is he exhausted.
“Appreciate the offer, Lance, I really do, but I’m dead tired.” Alex mindlessly swipes at his hair before chucking a tea bag into his mug. “Another time, maybe?”
Lance looks at him up and down. “Alright,” Lance says. “Figured you’d say that. I thought I’d give it a shot anyway before your sugar daddy whisks you away and we don’t see you for another week or so.”
Alex almost spills the boiling hot water over his hand. “My what?”
“You know,” Lance whispers, like their keeping it a secret. He waves at his face. “Scary blond guy. With the suit.”
Alex is torn between responses, starting with ‘not my sugar daddy’ and ‘he showed you his face and you’re still alive?’. He settles with a resounding, “Oh.” Immediately, the back of his neck feels hot. “You’ve—uh—you’ve met him?”
“Yeah.”
“And you’re… uhm…”
“He made us all pancakes when you were still asleep one morning—” Lance pauses. “Oh, well, one afternoon.”
“That’s nice of him,” Alex says, wondering if Yassen put any poison or behaviour-altering drug in the pancakes. “Did it taste alright?”
“It was brilliant. Why?”
“Nothing,” Alex says, taking a careful sip of his hot tea. “Just curious.”
Lance’s face takes on a more sincere turn as he leans on the kitchen counter. “Listen, you know that we’re okay if you want to just invite him over to watch movies on the couch or anything. Cam, Tim and I—it’s not a problem for us. You don’t always have to hide in your room. Well, maybe for Haagen, but he’s a bit of a homophobe. We’ve all kind of agreed that he’s a little bit of a dick anyway, so no one really talks to him. And if it’s not what it seems like then that’s okay too. Uni is expensive and we all have to do what we have to do to get by.”
He ends his little speech with a pat on Alex’s back and Alex—Alex doesn’t know whether to laugh or cry. Really, he’s touched. Just the image of Yassen in his dress shirt making pancakes is already enough to send his head spinning. But the idea that a subset of his flatmates were ducking their heads and discussing it—discussing ways to welcome Alex into their lives—
Alex has never had this before.
Indeed, when he looks over at the couch, Cam and Tim are watching them instead of the cricket.
They hold their thumbs up in reply.
Alex’s phone rings, then, saving him from deciding if he should give Lance a pat on the back or an awkward handshake.
Unknown number calling.
“Sorry, I really have to answer this,” Alex says, before gracefully fleeing to his room. As soon as Alex closes the door, Kyra’s voice chimes out from his phone.
“This line is secure,” she says. “Why did you want me to call you? Is it urgent?”
“When you designed Miyamoto’s security systems, did you know what he’d be using it for?”
There’s an abrupt pause from Kyra’s end, and it’s tinged with suspicion. It’s not from a lack of greeting. Their calls are always straight and to the point, even when they’re made in leisure. “Why are you asking?” she asks carefully.
“I’m just worried about you.”
“And you are saying that as my friend? Or as an agent?”
“Jesus, Kyra, I’m not—” Alex staggers onto his bed. “I’m not asking because MI6 sent me to. I’m asking because you were already on MI6’s radar before, but now they’ll be actively watching you for designing something that makes their resources look like a toddler designed them.”
“So you are worried about me because I’m too good at my job?”
“I’m worried because I don’t want them to see you as a potential threat. And government intelligence sectors, you know what they’re like!”
“I didn’t know what Miyamoto intended to do with the software he requested,” Kyra says. “I didn’t ask. He had a set of requirements and my team fulfilled them. It’s just business, Alex. If that is what it takes for your government agency to deem me as a threat, then let them come. I doubt they can find me anyway.”
“You don’t…” A lump grows in Alex’s throat. “You don’t mean that.”
“I do, Alex,” she says firmly. “I’m not in your country. I’m not a British citizen. If I’m not with them, I might as well be against them. That’s how people like them always see it. I have the potential for it, don’t I?”
“They can be reasonable,” Alex insists. “They saved you from Point Blanc and you weren’t a British citizen then.”
“We were children back then. There are international laws and obligations which prioritise the needs of children above anything else. And even then, they sent you into Point Blanc in the first place. What do you want me to do?”
“Maybe I can talk to Jones—”
“And say what?” she snaps. “You barely have any say on what goes on in your own life. They pull your strings like a puppet and yet you always go back the next time expecting them to treat you like a real person even though nothing changes.”
Alex almost drops his phone. Humiliation swells in him.
A beat of silence falls between them.
“Alex…” Kyra says, and it’s almost remorseful. “Look, Alex. I didn’t mean—”
“Yes, you did,” Alex says, in defeat. “And you’re right.”
“But that was cruel… I’m sorry. I didn’t mean to be cruel.”
Kyra and him, as much as they pull and push at each other, they’re always quick to put down their arms. The fear of losing each other in the conflict—it’s mutual.
“Was it your technology guy—what’s his name—Smithers that told you about my work?”
“No,” Alex says. “I recognised your parents in some of the file names.”
Kyra sighs over the line. “It’s… silly. My parents might have been distant, but they gave me freedom with my education. I don’t know who I would’ve been if my learning had been restricted. If I had been forced to focus on economics and accounting. Stuff you’d need to run a business like my father’s.”
Funny, in a way, Ian almost did the opposite without even realising it, Alex thinks, staring at the ceiling. “I still think you’d be brilliant. Forbes 30 under 30, I bet.”
Another beat of silence, but this time, Alex can imagine a smile on her face. The kind where she’d hide the fact that his comment made her smile in the first place.
“You’re studying Computer Science now, aren’t you?” Kyra asks. “You should come and work for me after. If you want to, that is. You’re smart, you pick up things easily. Most importantly, I can trust you.”
The offer hits him like a punch to the gut, but afterwards, there’s an aching inside, a sudden longing for the possibility presented in front of him. He lets himself indulge in it. A sweet second of reprieve before the drought of his reality sets in. “I don’t even know if I’m ever going to graduate. And sometimes, I even like being a spy. Sometimes.”
“But they are not good people, Alex. Not like you,” Kyra says. “A singular person can be good in that department, but what does it mean when they’ve supported someone questionable in the first place? Someone who should have the power to be making decision for the masses. ”
This causes him to sit up. “What do you mean by that?”
“Look up Operation Laconia. Look up every bill, every operation Alan Blunt has supported. He was not a good man, but he was patriotic and discreet. The people in charge now—your Mrs. Jones and Smithers and Crawley—they stood by and watched. ”
“I… I don’t know how I can look that up.”
“I can send the information to you.”
“No.” Alex shuffles himself until he reaches his laptop. He shuffles his phone until he can cradle it between his cheek and his shoulder. “Teach me. I want to know.”
“Okay.”
Rustling noises over the phone lets Alex know that Kyra’s probably doing the same thing. Setting up her computer, the equivalent of her armour and weapon.
“Ready?” she asks.
“Ready.”
“Power reveals, Alex,” Kyra says. “Remember that.”
Years ago, Kyra and Alex made an effort to counter the things they were taught by Greif in Point Blanc. One of the prominent figures taught in Greif’s class was Robert Moses, a famous American public official responsible for New York’s infrastructure in the early to mid-nineteen hundreds. His life was a study in power using the means of public works. He was a controversial figure, but not to Greif, and that drove Kyra and Alex to seek out works in opposition. Which led them to a biography critically detailing his life, a dissection of Moses’s rise to power written by American journalist Robert A. Caro.
In his book, Caro offers an illuminating view about Moses and power which Alex has had the misfortune to witness over first-hand, time and time again. A clarification on the aphorism of power corrupts and absolute power corrupts absolutely. Instead, Caro insists that power reveals. “When you have enough power to do what you always wanted to do,” says Caro, “then you see what the guy always wanted to do.”
Blunt has always been cognizant of the laws regarding child spies in the UK. The advantages, in his mind, greatly outweigh the dangers. A spy’s greatest enemy is suspicion, and their greatest killer intelligence. Children attract less suspicion. Thus, it can be necessary to use a child as a covert human intelligence source when the use is proportionate to what is sought to be achieved. It must be carefully worded, however, lest his justification reveal how inconsistent his actions and ideals are with his legal obligations.
His growing interest in using children in covert operations is sprinkled in redacted documents. Alex finds him through following his departments than through searching for his name. There are files documenting cases of using child spies from terrorism to gangs and drug dealers. It’s success, it’s struggles and its results. From his career as an agent to the head of his department.
The more Alex reads, the more he can’t stop. Blunt’s actions are laid crystal clear on-screen, from recruiting his father to hiring someone to shoot at Tom, thus spurring Alex into seeking out Scorpia. There’s anger, white-hot anger, blending in with disgust and betrayal in his chest until the wound leaves no edges to pick at. Then, there is exhaustion. Finally, there is disappointment, because Alex realises that the people who were supposed to protect him never will. He’s too useful to be placed in the side-lines while at the same thing being expendable. A nation’s safety more often than not ends up being a numbers game, and what is the price of one orphan compared to many. An ideal asset.
What surprises Alex, though, what really coalesces the bile into a rock at the bottom of his stomach—is that Alex wasn’t the first child sent on a mission deemed important enough to risk his life. He was just the most successful.
“I don’t understand why you’re here, sometimes.”
Yassen doesn’t peel his eyes away from Alex’s laptop, where an episode of The Black Adder plays. There are no overt gestures which signify his response. Nonetheless, Alex knows that he has Yassen’s full attention. “Hmm?” he asks.
They’re lying on Alex’s bed, a common occurrence despite Yassen’s supposed allergy to cotton sheets with a thread count of less than three-hundred. Yassen has an arm slung over Alex’s shoulder and it’s—cosy. Alex has forgotten how nice it could be just existing beside someone who understands both aspects of his life and expects nothing in return.
Well, almost nothing. Yassen has quite a long list of pop-culture media he wants to consume now that he finally has the time to indulge himself.
“Like, I don’t understand why you’re here watching shows with me when you can be skiing in the Alps, sleeping with models, and staying at five-star hotels for the rest of your life.”
“Is that what you think I do with my spare time?” Yassen asks, amused.
Alex shoves him, cheeks dusted red. “Answer my question, jerk.”
Yassen tilts his head, considering the question. “We can still do all that,” he agrees. “But you will need to finish your studies first. No naked models until after exam, Alex.”
Alex lightly slaps his chest in frustration. “I’m serious, Yassen.”
Yassen raises one eyebrow.
“People think you’re dead. You have more money than more people can ever dream of. You are basically free, and I can’t figure it out. I can’t give you anything you don’t have, or anything you can’t get for yourself.”
“This is bothering you,” Yassen surmises, after scanning his face. “It shouldn’t, however. Sometimes things are as simple as they seem. I am retired now. My life has moved beyond focusing on transactions.”
Which is just another variant of, ‘I’m retired now. I do what I want.’ Alex resists the urge to pout since, technically, he supposes that’s true.
Sensing his displeasure, Yassen straightens up against the headboard and pauses the episode, which he does only when there’s serious business to be discussed. He drinks in Alex’s face, tilting his chin until Alex meets his eyes.
“If it will truly make you happy, then I will tell you," Yassen says. "At first, I was curious for a multitude of reasons. I wondered what happened to the child spy dropped into a world that’s far too dangerous for him. I wondered what happened to John’s son, if he ever followed the footsteps of his renowned father. I wondered if he was still alive. So I went out looking for him and I found him. I found that he is resilient. That he is like steel. Put him under the heat or the cold and he will yield, but he will not break. He will grow stronger, reaching new strengths with every challenge thrown at him. What can I say? You were intriguing and you still are. I kept coming back. The longer I stayed, the more I realised; if it had been you instead of John during my days in Scorpia, I think my life would have ended up much differently.”
There’s that stupid lump in his throat again. Funny, when it comes to quips that can drive someone mad enough to make mistakes, Alex can dish out an endless amount of them under pressure. Yet a couple of careful words from Yassen, and Alex feels totally undone.
Alex clears his throat. “For the better, I hope?”
Yassen pushes Alex’s fringe away from his forehead, thumb lingering on his Alex’s hairline. Then, he reaches out and he presses his lips against the back of Alex’s hand.
“I want you to succeed,” Yassen says. “I want you to achieve what I never did until it was too late. You deserve peace, Alex. One day, I hope you find it.”
It’s not often he storms into Jones’ office without invitation. It’s even less often that he looks like he’s about to murder someone. Armed with a folder, he stomps inside the Royal and General Bank, all the way to the top floor.
“I want to speak with Mrs. Jones now,” Alex tells the secretary.
“Mrs. Jones is pre-occupied with a sensitive matter until further notice. If you’d like, I can call you back when to arrange an appropriate time—”
Alex slams his hand on the table. “I want to speak with Jones now and you will tell her that, or I will march in there myself.”
The secretary clenches his jaw, refusing to back down to Alex’s intimidation. Good on him, but Alex really doesn’t feel like dealing with his shit right now. He’s already itching for a fight and Jones’s secretary seems like a worthy opponent. Security is about to be called in if the secretary doesn’t throw Alex out himself.
“As I was saying,” the secretary says in a tight voice. “Mrs. Jones is busy right now.”
“I don’t care.”
“Look, Mr—”
“Dallas.”
They both look where Jones stands in the doorway, lips pursed into a thin line. She turns around, already expecting Alex at her heels, and Alex throws Dallas a smug look as he follows her into the office.
His duel with Dallas proves to be a small reprieve from his anger. But once the door closes, he spies the name plate of Jones’s table and the rage inside him simmers.
Jones takes seat and folds her hands on the table in front of him. The lines on her otherwise immaculate face outline her displeasure. “I don’t know what you were hoping to achieve with that little tantrum of yours, but here I am,” she says. “Now, what is it that you need to tell me?”
“The sniper Blunt sent to shoot at Tom. Did you know?”
“Excuse me?”
“When I was at school, and a sniper shot at Tom. I thought it was Scorpia, but it wasn’t.” Courage fills him with every word uttered. He lifts up his chin. “It was Blunt. Did you know?”
A tick in her jaw, but she doesn’t look away. There is steel in her eyes—her defensive position and her admission of guilt. Alex thought he knew what to expect, but still, the revelations leave him winded.
“You knew,” Alex says, blinking slowly. “Since when?”
“Alan Blunt retired shortly after you came back from Venice. This was a determining factor in his retirement.”
Yes, Alex thinks bitterly. Blunt’s peaceful retirement where he travels Europe with his wife undisturbed.
“And you didn’t think it was important to tell me?”
“The matter was already handled by then, and it was agreed that, considering your delicate state of mind—”
“And whose fault is that?”
“It was agreed that, considering your delicate state of mind at the time,” Jones repeats again, “that you would be shielded from the matter until further discussion.”
Shielded. As if she were protecting Alex by obscuring the truth of his own reality from him.
Alex feels a headache coming on. He pinches the bridge of his noise, and the smell of mint coils into his nose.
“What about Operation Laconia,” he says. “Did you know then too?”
Jones visibly bites on her mint until it breaks. Gotcha, Alex thinks.
“How did you hear about that?” she asks.
Alex doesn’t answer her. He settles for running his tongue against the front of his teeth until Jones sees that he’s unwilling to bend, and she sighs.
“Your friends are dangerous, and they will get you into trouble one day.”
“Don’t bring Kyra into this.”
“Fine,” she snaps. “Shall I bring Gregorovich into this then? The man responsible for the deaths of more than a hundred people, of which Ian, your uncle, is one.”
“ Don’t, ” Alex snarls. “Don’t bring Yassen into this. If that mission didn’t kill him, then the next one could’ve. Do you honestly believe that Yassen has killed more people than Blunt has? Just because he caused them indirectly? I know you’re not that stupid.”
“Alex!” she hisses. “Some respect, if you will.”
“Fine.” Alex throws the folder on the table. “Have this instead.”
Vindicated, Alex watches as Jones picks up the file with trepidation. He watches as she flicks through pages of the folder, and he watches as her face grows increasingly tight.
“All I see are the names of people who were dire threats to our national security.”
“Some of them,” Alex challenges. “The rest were collateral, then. I guess.”
Jones closes the folder and folds her hands on top it carefully. Alex is quickly realising that this must be another tic of hers. “Sacrifices have to be made to ensure the safety of the nation.”
“And I was his to make, was I? Do you even hear yourself?” Alex says, quietly. “You sound just like him.”
A sharp inhale from Jones. Alex didn’t mean to sound so dismayed. He started off so strong with his anger—and he held on to that for as long as he could. But the anger dissipates quickly, and Alex is left hollow from all the times he wished that his life would have gone differently.
When the silence becomes too thick, Jones finally clears her throat. “I… understand your frustrations,” she admits. “Admittedly, I had them myself on many occasions.”
“Then why didn’t you do anything about it?”
“Blunt came into power long before I did. There’s no denying that he was a man with questionable methods, but he did important work for the country. I was only a field agent throughout Operation Laconia’s whole life-cycle. I had no knowledge of the operation until I came into the position as Deputy. Even then, all the children have been relocated back into their homes and they seem to be adjusting.”
“Not well, I bet.”
“No,” Jones agrees with a grim set to her mouth. “But adjusting nonetheless.”
“Then why do you stay?” His voice is accusatory. “Blunt was protected all his life by MI6. Why stay in a place who protects people like him? A place that rewards him for ruining the lives of so many people all in the name of Queen and Country?”
“For each life that’s given to the service, many more are saved—”
“Stop!” Alex spits out. “Just stop and be honest with me for once! For once! ”
Jones flinches from the volume of his voice because Alex has never—Alex has never yelled at her like that.
That only makes Alex all the more exhausted.
Despite everything that MI6 has put him through, there has always been affection between Jones and Alex. Back when Blunt was still in power, Jones felt like his only ally. The fact is not one that is routinely acknowledged, but one that can be felt by Alex at times. It’s tiring then—knowing that despite Jones’ care for him, she’s not above emotionally manipulating him.
“Please,” he says. “I just want to know the truth. I was a child back then—you were supposed to protect me, and you didn’t. This job killed my uncle. It killed my mother and my father. One day it will kill me too. Don’t you think I’m owed a little bit of honesty after that?”
“Alex…” she says.
His eyes begin to sting. He swipes at his eyes and glares at the floor. He can’t see Jones’ face, but he can hear her composing herself, wiping away the fog that’s clouded her glasses.
“Would you believe it if I said I wanted to make a change within our operations?” Jones says. “I fought for you… I really did. I fought for you to the best that I can, but I guess didn’t fight for you hard enough. And now, I’m relying on you too much…. I sincerely apologise.”
Jones picks up the folder once more, and after visibly debating with herself, she hands the folder back to Alex. “What will you do with this knowledge? I don’t have to tell you that multiple identities overseas would be compromised if this information is leaked to the public.”
Alex stares at the folder. He accepts it as the peace offering it’s meant to be, but he leaves it on her table.
“I know,” Alex says. “I could have destroyed you with this information, I could have released everything Blunt has done to every platform I know, both in the mainstream web and the dark web. This whole department would have been taken down as collateral. But I don’t want to do that because he’s already ruined enough lives. I respect you and I know you’ll give me what I want.”
Jones raises one eyebrow. “That confident, huh?”
“I am.” Alex nods “I refuse to be like that man, and I know you don’t want to be either. That’s the only reason I came here in the first place.”
“And what is it that you want? That you’re willing to risk national security for?”
“No more,” Alex says. “No more missions. No more assignments. No more interventions. You leave my friends alone. You leave Jack alone. If I ever want to work for you again, then I will go through the appropriate and official channels into becoming an agent. Okay?”
Seconds pass by where it feels like the world has stopped turning on its axis. “Okay,” she says at last. “No more.”
Leaning back, Alex closes his eyes. As if a boulder blocking the entrance of a cave has been dislodged and Alex is finally free to feel the warmth of the sun on his face again.
“Thank you,” Alex says, and his voice shakes towards the end. “Thank you.”
“Don’t thank me, Alex,” Jones says, pressing her nails against her hands. “I should have done this a long time ago.”
Suddenly, she stands up and strides to the window that stretches across her office, the one that overlooks the busy streets of London from sky-high. Alex takes her sudden departure from her seat as cue to leave. He grabs his folder and quickly rubs his face until his eyes stop itching.
“Knowing what you do now, he would not have let you walk through that door,” Jones says wryly, still not looking at him. “For what it’s worth, Alex. You really are an exceptional person. No one, and I do mean no one, can ever compare.”
That’s the thing, isn’t it. Alex never wanted to be exceptional. He just wanted to be normal.
“You were always one of the kinder ones in my eyes,” Alex says, right before the door closes. “Isn’t that sad?”
The walk back home is—dizzying. London is its usual brand of cloudy grey, and yet Alex could spend hours absorbing its loud noises and subtle mists. When he arrives home, he’s greeted with the smell of green curry cooking on the stove. He looks at the couch, and his flatmates are watching the new Black Widow movie with a bag of prawn crackers shared between them. There’s no way they got that for themselves, though, and the thought leaves Alex giddy and eager to make his way to the kitchen.
He finds Yassen not wearing a suit, but he might as well be with the way his dress-shirt and slacks are perfectly fitted to him. On the stove, a pan filled with big, juicy chicken thighs browns while a pot of green curry bubbles.
Alex sneaks his arms around Yassen’s waist and parks his chin right on Yassen’s shoulder. This position lets Alex nose his way under Yassen’s chin, and it’s very much he likes doing. “Hi,” he says. “That smells yummy.”
As if reading his mind, Yassen taps his hand in warning with a wooden spoon. “Not until it’s ready, please.”
Alex pouts. “Fine,” he says, and he’s suddenly washed with the desire that he really wants to kiss Yassen. So that’s what he does, and Yassen doesn’t even fight him. He turns in Alex’s hold so that he can meet Alex’s kiss fully.
There is power in this too, Alex thinks. His arm slung over Yassen’s shoulder. His lips yielding under Alex’s own. The fresh smell of Yassen’s shampoo hits his nose. Alex suddenly feels too overwhelmed by Yassen feeling like home in every single way.
When they part, Yassen touches his cheek with the back of his fingers. “What brought this on?” he asks, and Alex can feel Yassen’s pleasure as if he’s humming it.
“Nothing,” Alex says. “Thank you for dinner.”
Yassen tilts his head. “Uh-huh.”
“I’ll tell you later,” he says, before pulling Yassen back in for another kiss.
If Alex asked him to, Yassen would kill for him. This must have been part of the power that Blunt wielded. A word from him, and someone’s life ends. It would be as easy as ordering food over the phone.
But Alex doesn’t want that. What Alex wants is this: Yassen’s face in his hands, his scent seeping into his skin, his dry humour greeting him every day, his sharp wit testing Alex’s own, and his affections softening their days together.
It’s within his grasp. Peace to live his life. Freedom to make his own mistakes, and a future filled with genuine human connection.
Finally, Alex can taste it.