Hey, guys! I know that I decided to give up on this story but I've changed my mind now, so I'm starting it of again from the Royal & General chapter!

Royal & General

Sabina read and Fox's eyes widened but nobody noticed.

The bank rang the following day.

"Why won't you leave him alone?" John complained

"In a way I'm glad they didn't leave him alone" Fox muttered so that nobody could hear him.

"This is John Crawley. Do you remember me? Personnel Manager at Royal & General. We were wondering if you could come in."

"Come in?" Alex was half-dressed, already late for school.

"Alex!" Helen shrieked whilst the K-Unit chuckled.

"This afternoon. We found some papers of your uncle's. We need to talk to you… about your own position."

Was there something faintly threatening in the man's voice?

"There better not be" Both Fox, John and Wolf growled. Fox and John looked at Wolf in confusion. Why did this man care?

"What? Cub's a member of the of the K-Unit and if anybody insults a member of the K-Unit then there in for hell." Wolf shrugged.

"What time this afternoon?" Alex asked

"He can't really be serious?" Ian sneered.

"Could you manage half-past four? We're on Liverpool Street; we can send a cab-"

"I'll be there" Alex said. "And I'll take the tube."

"Woo! Go Alex and your mouth! Although it's probably gonna be the death of you…" Sabina cheered then frowned.

"Uh, I agree" Fox shook his head.

"Who was that?" Jack called out of the kitchen. She was cooking breakfast for the two of them although how long she could remain with Alex was a growing worry. Her wages hadn't been paid. She had only her own money to buy food and pay for the running of the house. Worse still, her visa was about to expire. Soon she wouldn't even be allowed to stay in the country.

"If she goes back to America then what will happen to Alex?" Helen asked but everyone left to the book to answer.

"We could have looked after him?" Eagle looked at the rest of his gang.

"Eagle, we didn't know him then" Wolf answered without looking at him.

"Oh yeah" Eagle's fore head scrunched up and looked down thinking about…whatever Eagle thinks about.

"That was the bank." Alex came into the room wearing his spare uniform. He hadn't told her what had happened at the breaker's yard. He hadn't even told her about the empty office.

"You should tell her, Alex. And anyways, how did he get past her in the mess that he was in?" Helen shrieked.

Jack had enough on her mind. "I'm going there this afternoon," he said.

"Do you want me to come?"

"No I'll be fine."

"No, take her with you! They might not try to do anything to you or with you!" John

"See, this is where he starts to talk to the book" Ian whispered to the SAS men and John wacked him in the back of the head.

He found the bank easily enough. The Royal & General occupied a tall, antique-looking building with a Union Jack fluttering from a pole about fifteen floors up.

"God bless England." Ian held a hand over his heart.

"Um, Tiger…its god bless America not England" John put a hand on his brothers shoulder.

"Oh" Ian looked down and everyone stifled a laugh.

There was a brass plaque with the name next to the main door and a security camera swiveling slowly over the pavement.

Alex stopped in front of it. For a moment he wondered if he was making a mistake going in.

"Yes! Yes, it is a big mistake going in there!" Ian shrieked.

"And in the first chapter he said that I just reached puberty" John whispered Helen who laughed silently.

"What?" Ian looked brother.

"Nothing!" John smiled cheerily at Ian.

If the bank had been responsible in some way for Ian Rider's death, it was always possible they had asked him here to arrange his own.

But why would anyone from the bank want to kill him? He didn't even have an account there.

"Ha ha, Alex! Very funny…Not" Sabina said and Ian began to lean over and say you know what but she shoved him back and said "Oh shut up!"

He went inside and in an office on the seventeenth floor the image on the television monitor flickered and changes as Street Camera #1 smoothly cut across to Reception Cameras #2 and #3 and Ale passed the brightness outside to the cool shadows of the interior. A man sitting behind a desk reached out and pressed a button and the camera zoomed in until Alex's face filled the screen.

"So he came," the chairman of the bank muttered.

"Isn't the chairman of the bank Mr. Blunt?" Helen said out of curiosity.

"Yep" Ian muttered dryly back to her then he realized what he had just said and sat bolt right up, "Shit!"

"My sentiments exactly" John leant forwards slightly.

"That's the boy?" The speaker was a middle-aged woman. She had a strange, potato-shaped head and her black hair looked as if it had been cut using a pair of blunt scissors and an upturned bowl.

"Is it me or is that women familiar?" Ian asked John. John's only answer was,

"Mmm" whilst Smithers just shook his head, smiling.

Her eyes were almost as black as her hair. She was dressed in a severe gray suit and was sucking a peppermint. "Are you sure about this, Alan?" she asked.

"Yes, thank you! Somebody who might be seeing sense and Ian don't even think about it!" Helen exclaimed without looking at Ian.

"I like peppermints" Eagle mused, looking up at the ceiling and everyone looked at him. Eagle looked down when he felt eyes on him, "Sorry, did I say that out loud?" K-Unit just shook his head and everyone else resumed to reading again.

Alan Blunt nodded. "Oh yes. Quite sure. You know what to do." This last question was addressed to his driver, who was also in the room.

The driver was standing uncomfortably, slightly hunched over. His face was a chalky white. He had been like that ever since he had tried to stop Alex in the auto junkyard.

Everybody began to laugh at this.

"Yes, sir." he said.

"Then do it." Blunt said. His eyes never left the screen.

"Do what?" Eagle asked his leader

"You know what, idiot!" Wolf snapped at him.

In the lobby, Alex had asked for John Crawley and was sitting on a leather sofa, vaguely wondering why so few people were going in or out.

"Probably because once you go in you never come out alive again" Ian said in a spooky voice and John sighed, answering dryly and heavily,

"Shut up"

The reception area was quiet and claustrophobic, with a brown marble floor, three elevators to one side, and above the desk a row of clocks showing the time in every major world city. But it could have been the entrance to anywhere. A hospital. A concert hall. Even a cruise liner. The place had no identity of its own.

"Neither does any of the people working there" Ian muttered.

One of the elevators slid open and Crawley appeared in the same suit he had worn at the funeral but with a different tie. "I'm sorry to have kept you waiting, Alex." he said. "Have you come straight from school?"

Alex stood up but said nothing, allowing his uniform to answer the man's question.

"He's cocky!" Ian whistled

"Let's go up to my office." Crawley said. He gestured. "We'll take the elevator."

Alex didn't notice the fourth camera inside the elevator, but then it was concealed on the other side of the one-way mirror that covered the back wall. Nor did he see the thermal intensifier next to the camera. But this second machine both looked at him and through him as he stood there, turning him into a pulsating mass of different colors, none of which translated into the cold steel of a hidden gun or knife.

"They better not hurt him!" Helen growled, leaving the K-Unit confused on why she cared so much.

In less than the time it took Alex to blink, the machine had passed its information down to a computer that had instantly evaluated and then sent its own signal back to the circuits that controlled the elevator. It's OK. He's unarmed. Continue to the fifteenth floor.

In less than the time it took Alex to blink, the machine had passed its information down to a computer that had instantly evaluated and then sent its own signal back to the circuits that controlled the elevator. It's OK. He's unarmed. Continue to the fifteenth floor.

"I should hope he's unarmed" Snake's eyes widened.

"Here we are." Crawley smiled and ushered Alex out into a long corridor with an uncarpeted wooden floor and modern lighting. A series of doors were punctuated by brightly colored abstract paintings. "My office is just along here." Crawley pointed the way. They had passed three doors when Alex stopped. Each door had a nameplate and this one he knew 1504: Ian Rider.

"Oh no. Don't even think about it, son." John said and Wolf snapped his head to him,

"What?"

"Nothing!" John hurried.

White letters on black plastic.

Crawley nodded sadly. "Yes. This was where your uncle worked. He'll be much missed."

"I heard about his uncle" Eagle said.

"Yeah, I heard about his parents too" Snake agreed.

John, Helen and Ian looked at each other.

"Can I go inside?" Alex asked.

Crawley seemed surprised. "Why do you want to do that?"

"I'd be interested to see where he worked."

"Hell, yeah, it would be interesting" Ian said and lent back into the sofa.

"I'm sorry." Crawley sighed. "The door will have been locked and I don't have the key. Another time perhaps."

"Ugh, yeah right" Ian said.

"Will you ever shut up? Jeez, we don't get through two sentences before you start again!" John complained.

He gestured again. He used his hands like a magician as if he were about to produce a fan of cards.

"I have the office next door. Just here."

They went into 1505. It was a large square room, with three windows looking out over the station.

There was a flutter of red and blue outside and Alex remembered the flag he had seen. The flagpole was right next to the office.

"Again, what's with describing it so much?" Helen asked and Smithers just shook his head; Mr. Blunt had showed him the video after Alex went to train with the SAS

Inside there was a desk and chair, a couple of sofas in the corner, a fridge on the wall, a couple of prints. A boring executive's office. Perfect for a boring executive.

"Burn" Ian and K-Unit muttered so John couldn't hear them.

"Please, Alex. Sit down." Crawley said. He went over to the fridge. "Can I get you a drink?"

"Say no; there could be poison in it!" Sabina said and Smithers chuckle silently.

"No, thanks." Alex took a sip. It wasn't Coke. It wasn't even Pepsi. He recognized the oversweet, slightly cloying taste of supermarket cola and wished he'd asked for water. "So what do you want to talk to me about?"

"Your uncle's will…"

The telephone rang and with another hand sign, this one for 'excuse me', Crawley answered it. He spoke for a few moments, then hung up again. "I'm very sorry, Alex. I have to go back down to the lobby. Do you mind?"

"What a coincidence" Fox looked at his fellow members.

"Go ahead." Alex settled himself on the sofa.

"I'll be about five minutes." With a final nod of apology, Crawley left.

Alex waited a few seconds. Then he poured the cola into a potted plant and stood up.

Everybody began to laugh.

He went over to the door and back into the corridor. At the far end a woman carrying a bunch of papers appeared and disappeared through a door. There was no sign of Crawley.

"What is doing?" Helen asked.

Quickly, Alex moved back to the door of 1504 and tried the handle… But Crawley had been telling the truth. It was locked.

"Oh, thank god!" John side and settled back into the sofa.

Alex went back into Crawley's office. He would have given anything to spend a few minutes alone in Ian Rider's office. Somebody thought the dead man's work was important enough to keep hidden from him.

"Well, he can't do anything because the doors locked" Ian reassured everyone but Fox snorted,

"A locked door won't stop Alex. Trust me"

They had broken into his house and cleaned out everything they'd found in the office there. Perhaps the office next door might tell him why. What exactly was Ian Rider involved in? And was it the reason why he had been killed?

"Why won't he just give up" John pleaded,

"John," Ian put a worried hand on his shoulder, "I think you're going to the bad place"

John just looked at him dryly.

The flag fluttered again and, seeing it, Alex went over to the window. The pole jutted out of the building, exactly halfway between rooms 1504 and 1505.

"Why is he so interested in that flag?" Sabina shook his head.

If he could somehow reach it, he should be able to jump onto the ledge that ran along the side of the building outside room 1504.

"Oh! That's why he's so interested in the flag!" Sabina said smiling and nodding but then she realized what was happening in the book.

Of course he was fifteen floors up. If he jumped and missed there would be a couple of hundred feet to fall. It was a stupid idea. It wasn't even worth thinking about.

"Exactly! So don't do it!" Helen whimpered and John hugged her.

Alex opened the window and climbed out.

"Wha-! He just said-!" Helen cried.

It was better not to think about it at all.

"Oh! So that's supposed to make it better!" Helen cried again.

He would just do it. After all, if this was the ground floor or a jungle gym in the school yard it would be child's play.

"This isn't a play ground!" Helen shrieked.

"Helen, you're scaring me…" Ian shuffled to the edge of sofa.

"Sorry, Ian" Helen blushed.

It was only the sheer brick wall stretching down to the pavement, the cars and buses moving like toys, so far below and the blast of the wind against his face that made it terrifying. Don't think about it. Do it.

Alex lowered himself on the ledge outside Crawley's office.

"He's gonna die" Wolf shook his head.

His hands were behind him, clutching on to the window-sill. He took a deep breath. And jumped.

Sabina's eyes widened as she realized he actually did it! But then again, she always thought that he was a little bit of a moron.

A camera located in an office across the road caught Alex as he launched himself into space. Two floors above, Alan Blunt was still sitting in front of the screen. He chuckled

"What? Just letting him do this? He's horrible" the corner of Helen's mouth twisted up in an expression of disgust.

It was a humorless sound. "I told you," he said. "The boy's extraordinary."

"Well, thanks for complementing him but couldn't you say that about and about something, like, a school report." John huffed.

"The boy's quite mad," the woman retorted.

"Well, maybe that's what we need."

"You're just going to sit there here and watch him kill himself?"

"Says you" Sabina snorted.

"I'm going to sit here and hope he survives."

Alex had miscalculated the jump.

"What does that mean?" Helen raised an eyebrow.

"Miscalculated means-" Ian began, pretending to shove a pair of glasses up his nose.

"I know what miscalculated means!" Helen yelled then apologized…again.

He had missed the flagpole by a centimeter and would have plunged down to the pavement if his hands hadn't caught hold of the Union Jack itself.

"You tell he love his country! He's hanging on to it!" Eagle cackled.

"So not funny" Fox replied. Snake lent over to his friend,

"Mate, just keep quite"

He was hanging now with his feet in mid-air. Slowly, with huge effort, he pulled himself up, his fingers hooking into the material.

"What if it rips?" Ian asked

"I don't want to think about it" John shook his head.

Somehow he managed to climb back on to the pole. He still didn't look down. He just hoped that no passer-by would look up.

It was easier after that. He squatted on the pole, then threw himself across to the ledge out-side Ian Rider's office.

"I knew he was a moron but a suicidal moron, really?" Sabina raised an eyebrow.

He had to be careful.

"Oh, you're being careful now?" Sabina snorted and everyone chuckled a little.

Too far to the left and he would crash into the side of the building, but too far the other way and he would fall.

"At least it thought about it this time" Smithers shrugged

"This time?" John raised an eyebrow and Smithers gulped.

In fact he landed perfectly, grabbing hold of the ledge with both hands and then pulling himself up until he was level with the window. It was only now that he wondered if the window would be locked. If so he'd just have to go back.

"Oh, good one, genius!" Sabina shrieked,

It wasn't. Alex slid the window open and hoisted himself into the second office, which was, in many ways, a carbon copy of the first. It had the same furniture, the same carpet, even a similar painting on the wall.

"MI6's interior is so boring" Ian moaned.

"Why do you care, you're never there" John's eyebrow's rose.

"Huh! That rhymed! You're a poet and you don't know it!" Eagle grinned and everyone just ignored him.

He went over to the desk and sat down.

Ian snorted, "Help yourself why don't you!"

"Ian, shut up!" John's eyebrow scrunched together.

The first thing he saw was a photograph of himself taken the summer before on the Caribbean island of Guadeloupe where he had gone diving. There was a second picture tucked into the corner of the frame, Alex aged five or six.

"Aw, is Ian really a big softy?" John teased and patted his brother's head like a he was his pet dog. Ian shoved John's hand away and huffed.

He was surprised and a little saddened by the photographs. Ian Rider had been more sentimental than he had pretended.

"See, even Alex agrees with us!" John laughed.

Alex glanced at his watch. About three minutes had passed since Crawley had left the office and he had said he would be back in five. If he was going to find anything here, he had to find it quickly. He pulled open a drawer in the desk. It contained four or five thick files. Alex took them and opened them. He saw at once that they had nothing to do with banking.

"Great! Now's he's gonna find out about us!" John complained and threw his hands in the air.

The first was marked NERVE POISONS: NEW METHODS OF CONCEALMENT AND DISSEMINATION.

"Ah! A trip down memory lane!" Ian smiled, "Let's see. Got slapped by a woman"

Alex put it aside and looked at the second, ASSASSINATIONS: FOUR CASE STUDIES.

"Got punched by a woman"

Growing ever more puzzled, he quickly flicked through the rest of the files which covered counterterrorism, the movement of uranium across Europe, and interrogation techniques. The last file was simply labeled: STORMBREAKER.

"And got kicked by a woman before 'dying'" At this point everyone was laughing.

"Wow! Rejection much!" John gripped his side in pain.

Alex was about to read it when the door suddenly opened and two men walked in.

John snorted, "What a coincidence!"

One of them was Crawley. The other was the driver from the junkyard. Alex knew that there was no point trying to explain what he was doing. He was sitting behind the desk with the Stormbreaker file open in his hands.

"I can just imagine it! 'Sorry, sirs, I was just looking for the toilet'" Eagle laughed and so did Ian. 'Like Eagle, like Ian' John smirked.

But at the same time he realized that the two men weren't surprised to see him there. From the way they had come into the room, they had expected to find him.

"Obviously" John snorted.

"This isn't a bank." Alex said. "Who are you? Was my uncle working for you? Did you kill him?"

"So many questions." Crawley muttered. "But I'm afraid we're not authorized to give you the answers."

The second man lifted his hand and Alex saw that he was holding a gun. He stood up behind the desk, holding the file as if to protect himself. "No…" he began.

The man fired.

"They did not just shot my son!" John's face turned red wit fury and everyone edged away from him.

"Honey, calm down" Helen rested her hand on her husband's shoulder and tried to reassure him that Alex wasn't gonna die because there was still 8 books left. Although she was panicking to, she was just holding it in.

There was no explosion.

"If there was no explosion then it can't be a real gun" Ian raised an eyebrow.

"Dart" Wolf murmured and all the men nodded in understanding.

The gun spat at Alex and he felt something slam into his heart. His hand opened, and the file tumbled to the ground. Then, his legs buckled, the room twisted, and he fell back into nothing.

Helen winced and tried to keep her anger from boiling out of control. John squeezed her and whispered soothing words in her ear.

"I'll read next." Ben said gruffly and picked up the book.

There, I've tweaked so that Alex doesn't come in as soon as I originally planned.