Surprise Surprise. Nothing due tomorrow so guess who had the time to write. 3. I wanted to write more of unforeseen circumstances but yep, this was calling out to me more.

It may have been a sense of justice that spurred Mike on, maybe a desire to know the truth. Maybe a combination of both.

What for sure played a part was that painful pit in his stomach when he thought of Alex back in the hospital. Alex was a hero. He didn't have do what he did but he did it. He paid the price but couldn't even enjoy the returns of his investment. Mike felt indebted to Alex. That feeling had manifested itself as a knot that would only tighten with every new piece of information he got about the young blond.

If I could hear good information for a change… He thought to himself as he mentally traced the knot in his stomach to its source.

James was updating him on the young blond over coffee in the hospital cafeteria. Every piece felt like it was only tightening that knot inside him while at the same time digging into the pit of his stomach like a glass shrapnel.

'Alex couldn't even eat. They had to stick a tube up his nose to make sure he doesn't starve." James' worry and disbelief at Alex's state was apparent in his tone and face.

"It doesn't look like he'll be getting out of the hospital soon." Mike commented, silently hoping for a negation from his cousin. James rarely agreed with him always trying his best to counter Mike's points even in topics he wasn't familiar with. He was almost hoping James would counter his pessimism with some optimism about Alex's situation.

To his dismay though, James had nodded in agreement "Tom said he'll be in the hospital for two months at the least then months of therapy after."

"Does he have to stay here that long. What can the hospital do that he can't do alone? " Mike asked as he played with the stirrer of his coffee.

Everything…

His mind answered as he thought back once again to the glimpse of Alex he managed through the slit on the hospital door. Hypothetically, how many of those tubes could he remove without killing Alex?

"Jack says he needs the painkillers they've been pumping him with. He'll be going back to surgery a few more times too. I didn't even know stomach ulcers could get this bad."

At the word ulcer, Mike needed a downtime of 2 seconds to register. James didn't know that Alex had been shot multiple times all over his chest and stomach cavity. To him, Alex just had a severe case of ulcers and meningitis. He had to remind himself of that.

"The thing is he was playing really well in our football match. No one expected he'd get rushed to the hospital for ulcers that same night"

Because it wasn't ulcers.

It made him sick. The last time James saw Alex up and healthy was the game last Friday. Alex had scored one goal for the team and looked capable of scoring another according to James.

Halfway through the timeout, he had suddenly disappeared. Tom was the one who told the team that he left for some family emergency

That family emergency was meddling in a hostage situation in a bank. A few hours after his football match, he was left struggling to breathe and eat, a far cry from the boy who scored a goal in a high school football match. That Alex confined to the hospital bed wouldn't be as capable of scoring a goal as the Alex James played with only a week ago. Heck, with physical therapy, it would probably be months before he can even dribble a soccer ball again. Funny how that accident was all that was needed to turn his life around.

The fact is, Alex had no business with the bank. He could have easily just turned a blind eye at whoever had made him suspicious enough to want to go to the bank. If he did, he probably would have spent that day in school or in football practice instead of in the hospital being stuffed with bananas, jelly and ensure while being hooked up to machines.

But then, Rosalie Persse probably would have died. Mike and the other hostages would have died as well. In a way, Alex was the sacrificial lamb, everyone else had escaped unhurt.

None of the hostages were hurt.

One of the articles he had looked through had said. With that kind of article, of course James wouldn't know that Alex was the only casualty in the incident. No one would, unless they were there, unless they had seen the hero Alex had been first hand.

None of the hostages were hurt. He repeated in his head

They weren't wrong. Alex wasn't a hostage. Or at the least, he wasn't supposed to be a hostage, He could have just looked away as he saw the two men in the duffel bag head to the bank yet there he was, the one casualty of the whole ordeal, the one casualty was the one that saved all of them.

None of the original hostages were hurt. He silently assessed the verifiability of that statement.

He didn't want their money but he knew he'd have trouble letting a misreport like this slide. Alex was a hero. He had done what he needed to do. He had paid the price and got nothing in return. He could even say it was a net loss in the end. He had eventually come up with the conclusion that the whole banking ordeal was a net loss for everyone involved anyway. It was traumatic for everyone even if they all came out of it unscathed. There was no doubt Alex came out of it with his own set of traumas as well. Unlike the others though, he did not come out of it unscathed.

The assessment was utilitarian. Mike had done the same ethical assessment many times before as he learned of the many ethical dilemmas over the years in class and on the news. He was not a completely cold blooded utilitarian though. What he had thought of was merely an assessment of the whole situation. In the end, it was his gut feel, that emotion that he could have articulated as anger, confusion and frustration all mixed into one unintelligible knot that had him balling his fists and hitting the table in front him, only to find out that all it did was scare his cousin. It did nothing to relax him.

Transparency

It was 12am when he messaged Howard Tanner. He had tried to get a good night's sleep. As soon as he got sleepy enough, his brain flew back to Alex. It didn't help that he had his phone by his bedside. His journalist streak was kicking in and he found himself scrolling through Alex's Facebook Timeline or at least what was accessible to him in the dark.

Alex Rider is with James Hale.

Alex Rider is with Tom Harris and James Hale.

Alex Rider is with James Hale.

What else could he find there?

He saw a post tagged with Alex's name. He recognized the name of the one who posted as Jack. It was a movie poster from a few months back.

Alex rider. Game for friday night?

His finger hovered over the mouse as he considered adding her as a friend on facebook. Was it inappropriate? She had opened up to him somehow and Mike took it as enough justification to shamelessly drop a friend request in her inbox. How could he even get better at investigating and reporting if he was second thinking adding someone on facebook because he was shy?

Mike looked at his messenger notifications to see a red bubble. Howard replied.

Dinner at five I have updates. He quickly after glancing at Howard's short greeting.

A part of him wanted to break the news to him over facebook that Alex was alive, What kind of conversation could flow at midnight, over chat?

Alex was injured, bedridden and miserable.

The published articles about the incident were a mess.

Mike for some reason was heralded as the hero in all that.

The unsung true hero deserved more than being loaded with painkillers until his next surgery.

Mike didn't need any flowery words to illicit a reaction from Howard over a dinner of pork chops in a small diner next to a tube station. He had started with typical greetings.

"How was work?"

"Okay."

Alex wasn't okay.

"How's your daughter?"

"Managed to get back to her daily routine."

Routine

Mike's thoughts naturally flew to Alex.

Every morning a nurse comes in to change Alex's bandages and adjust his medication so he's generally freer in the afternoon so we visit then. It's pretty much routine now.

"How's your granddaughter?"

"Good news, she managed to get back to school this week."

Alex will probably sit for his GCSEs over summer break. They'll figure it out when Alex is strong enough to actually sit up and open a text book. He definitely won't be back before the autumn term though.

"Alex is alive." As James' stories echoed in his head and as the knot only got tighter and tighter, Mike found himself just blurting it out. He needed to find a sense of justice in all of it. At that moment, he was desperately looking at it in the man in front of him. As impossible as it was, he wanted Howard to tell him there was a magical solution that could Alex walking by tomorrow morning.

Howard dropped his fork and stared at Mike, looking dumbfounded.

"He's real. He wasn't a figment of our imagination." Mike continued.

Howard buried his face in his hands and Mike could see that he was quick to wipe his tears. "My god, I thought I was crazy. Everyone has been going on and on about the news articles and the interviews. They all said you were the hero. I couldn't take it. I wanted that young boy to be real. But at the same time, if he was real and he was killed… I wouldn't be able to live with the guilt... How did you find out?"

"Coincidence really… A few quick facebook searches… turns out he's a family friend."

"Social media really is a blessing at times. How is he? If you could give me address, I'd love to send over a small token of appreciation or a compensation of some sorts. Or if he's not comfortable with it, I'll course it through-"

"A hospital room in St. Dominic's."

Howard's head drop. "Ah yeah, I should have expected that… When he gets discharged we could-"

"We'll have to wait months then because my cousin says he won't be out til the autumn term." Mike gestured out the window. It wasn't completely dark yet so Mike made his point well. The flowers were still blooming, the weather still wasn't too hot. Spring was just starting to end.

Alex was going to miss his whole summer break.

"I'll ask his family if they're willing to give you his contact details. Worse comes to worst, I'll take whatever token you have to him."

"Thank you. I'll make sure to tell my family about it tonight. It would be nice to meet him again."

"Yes it will."

Mike wondered if he would ever get the chance to talk to that young boy one on one. How did he end up in the bank? How did he save Rosalie? How did he know how to deactivate the bomb? How did he muster up the courage to fight the terrorists? More importantly, why?

Alex was on watch 24/7 though, either by Tom, Jack or a night nurse. It would be months before he's back to school. Would Tom or Jack leave him alone long enough for Mike to swoop in and just delve into Alex's thinking process? Would Alex even be open to answering these questions?

Mike had just said his goodbyes to Howard when he received a call from his aunt.

"I don't think James will be having dinner with us tonight. Make sure he eats okay? Take him out or something… even just around St. Dominic's"

"St. Dominic's?"

"You're with him right? He said he'd contact you about it. He left the house in a hurry just an hour ago. He said he might be there all night…"

"Wait. Why?"

James didn't like staying out too late if he had a lot of coursework to finish. This was a rare instance and Mike instantly new it was foreboding.

"Friend's not doing too well… James said it might be the last time he'd get to talk to him."

Thank you for reading!

Tell me what you think and maybe that could gave me a glimpse of inspiration.