Chapter 5, The Wrong Direction

'Cause I love to feel loved but I can't stand the rejection
I hide behind my jokes as a form of protection
I thought I was close but under further inspection
It seems I've been running in the wrong direction

- Passenger

In hindsight, Wolf realized that he should probably have known that Cub – Alex? – was more trouble than he was worth. Sure, they had gotten along fine that very first night and he had even felt that he might come to like that brat, imagine that! However, the very next night, he was certain that he would never be able to feel anything but annoyance about the teenager. He was infuriatingly irritating and seemingly completely unaware of this, which bugged the soldier off even more.

It had started the moment he woke up. Wolf had never been a morning person and to add to that he was a bit of a light sleeper and so when he woke up at six in the morning he was ready to kill whoever had woken him. It wasn't that he necessarily hadn't gotten enough sleep, but he firmly believed that any time before noon was too early to be doing anything important and so he promptly decided that he would ignore the sound and hope that it went away.

Unfortunately the tapping on his door increased until it finally ceased, leaving him relieved for a millisecond before the door was busted open to show his young ward.

"What?" he groaned and hid his face in the pillow, ignoring the voice in his head that told him to act his age.

"It's Monday?" the boy said, or asked, and Wolf had no clue what he was supposed to do with that information. "And, ehum, I thought that maybe I should get back to school?"

Okay, now Wolf sat up in his bed to stare at the boy. "Are you flippin' kidding me?"

The blonde awkwardly pulled a hand through his already messy hair. "No?"

"You just came back from the hospital! You've been locked in a cell and tortured and you want to get back to school?"

Perhaps that wasn't the smartest thing to say and Wolf cursed himself as something dark passed the teenager's eyes. Then, before he good wonder about it, it was gone and the boy smiled at him, if weakly.

"I like school?" he tried and though Wolf felt like there was more to it he couldn't really come up with a good reason for the kid to stay home from school. Yes, he might be a bit hurt but he could most likely manage to sit in school, as long as he didn't participate in PE.

"Fine," he agreed, if a bit reluctantly. "Go get ready, I'll be out in a sec."

Alex didn't need any prompting and immediately left the room. A few minutes later Wolf could hear him going about in the kitchen, most likely preparing breakfast for the two of them. The man put on a tee and his favourite pair of jeans and soon joined the fifteen-year-old in the kitchen. Breakfast was a quiet affair and Wolf found out that although Alex's cooking wasn't terrible it certainly left a lot of room for wishing. Honestly, who didn't put any salt in their scrambled eggs?

"Where's your school?" he asked the kid as he finished his – by now almost cold – cup of coffee.

"Brookland, in Chelsea."

Shit. "That's what, half an hour from here? How're you even planning on getting there?"

"The underground?"

In the end, Wolf ended up driving the kid to school and although he would've rather done something productive, like sleeping, he thought that it would at least give him a chance to get to know the strange kid. Naturally, he was proven wrong. Cub didn't say a word the whole way to his school, save from telling his guardian that he could take the underground home, so Wolf needn't worry about that.

"Bleeding kid," he grunted as he turned the car to get back home. He had been given the first two weeks with Alex off to get used to his new role as a guardian, but now he wished that he had refused. He had assumed that he would at least have the child for company but now he found that he was going to be left all on his own in the flat while the kid was in school. Even if he took time to cook properly – something that he never normally did – and went to the gym – to keep his fitness up, of course – and keep his home clean, there would still be plenty of time left for him to be bored.

Because of this, he saw no need to hurry up on his way home and as the breakfast hadn't exactly been overly good, he decided to stop at a café and have a cup of coffee and a sandwich. Figures, with his bad luck, that he would happen to be run into by somebody that he knew.

"Well, if it isn't Wolf!" a familiar voice cried out and Wolf momentarily wondered if he would have time to run the other direction. Of course, he couldn't and soon he found himself face to face with the fair haired Scot he had once spent three tormenting weeks with.

"Snake," he not as much greeted as acknowledged the other man. Unfortunately the soldier didn't seem to realize that his once team mate preferred to be left alone but took this as a cue to sit down in the chair next to Wolf.

"It's been a long time since I last saw you!"

"Perhaps," Wolf grumpily agreed.

"I see you havenae changed a wee bit, have ya"?

And then Wolf couldn't help but snort. He knew that he tended to be a bit blunt and yes, sometimes rude, but it was a characteristic that he didn't feel was particularly bothersome. If people were annoying, then they might as well get to know that, right? However, he knew that while Snake knew this part of him very well, he had also seen the soft person that Wolf could sometimes be, as well as knowing most of his weaknesses and strengths. They had, after all, spent three weeks doing their very best to make sure that they managed to get on to the next step and in order to do that they had to help each other as much as possible.

"I guess not," he half-grinned. "What've you been up to?"

"Well, I s'pose you heard the SAS binned me, aye? Well, me new team wasn't nearly as good as ole K, and so almost all of us were binned during the first few days of jungle training. I went back to the usual army, but soon realized that I'd rather continue with meds – it was me passion to begin with! I'm working at one of the local hospitals now, studying to become a surgeon and all. Thought I'd give it a shoot and maybe I could go back and be part of the med part of the army. I miss it, you know?"

Snake had always been more talkative than Wolf and overall a much friendlier and more likeable person. He almost always did his best to make others feel comfortable, even though he sometimes failed spectacularly, as had been the case with Cub. Up until this day, Wolf still wasn't sure if the other three had resented the boy for the same reason as he had or if they had simply stayed away from him as their leader didn't seem to like him. He guessed it probably didn't matter but thought that at least Fox had actually liked the boy. With Eagle, it was hard to tell, as the man had been very tired during their time together at training and so was very hard to get to know.

"What about you, what've you been up to?"

The questioned was directed to Wolf, whom shrugged. "Well, I got past training so I'm an official SAS now. Came back from my last operation a few days ago."

He didn't mention Cub, as he felt like it was much too personal and besides, it wasn't really his story to tell. He figured that the boy wouldn't want more people knowing about his unfortunate life than possible, as he seemed to be an even more private person than Wolf was.

"Congrats," Snake grinned and Wolf was happily surprised to see that the other man seemed genuinely pleased on his behalf. "I always thought you'd manage – you were the best in our group, no doubts! I heard Fox was binned 'bout the same time as I was?"

"Yeah."

"And Eagle, what about him?"

Wolf told him what he knew about the fourth member of their group, but didn't say anything about Fox's current occupation. Again, it really wasn't his story to tell, especially not as it probably required a way higher clearance than Snake would ever dream to have. He thought that he had heard somewhere that those working for MI6 were only allowed to tell one person in their surroundings and he was fairly certain that Fox wouldn't choose Snake as his.

They stayed at the cozy café for a while, both consuming more coffee than they cared to admit. Although he had grown up in the UK and had a British mother, Wolf had always much preferred coffee to tea. About lunchtime, Wolf grew aware that he probably should at least get something productive done before the kid came home from home so he started to excuse himself.

"Andrew, by the way," Snake added and shook Wolf's hand with a grin.

"James."

"Here's my number, in case you ever wanna get a drink or something, you know, for ole times' sake. Would be nice to catch up with the other blokes as well, but I haven't heard from any of them since training. You'll stay in touch?"

Wolf nodded – he didn't dare do anything else, the way that Snake glared at him. He supposed it would be nice to have a friend whom actually knew at least a little bit about his life but wasn't directly involved in it. He much preferred not to get too well acquainted with his fellow soldiers, as he knew that many of them wouldn't live through the next year and preferred to lose strangers, if comrades, to losing friends.

The way home was short and by five o'clock he had managed to clean the flat – something he hadn't done in weeks – prepare dinner, read the paper, finish the crossword, take a run, shower for a good half hour and watch the second half of some silly American movie about some High School students. By then, he realized that his ward probably should have been home and took up his phone to call and check on him, only the find out that he didn't have Alex's number. Bugger.

Of course, he wasn't really worried, why should he be? It wasn't like the kid had a history of messing things up, or being in danger, or attracting trouble… Bugger! He reasoned that he probably was just a tad bit concern because he knew that MI6 would skin him alive if their favourite secret teenage spy was harmed while staying at his place.

When he heard the key in the lock at half past six, he had almost picked up his phone to call the police and angrily met his ward in the entre. "What the heck do you think you're up to?" he prompted and regretted to taking the kid in at all. "Your school must've ended hours ago! Are you out of your mind? What if something had happened to you – you could've been kidnapped again, or robbed or anything! We're in London, not exactly the safest town around, right?"

Since he came in, the boy had been staring at his shoes, leaving Wolf to yell at his blonde hair, but now he reluctantly looked up and warily met his guardian's eyes. The man closed his mouth and stared at the boy. He looked precisely as bad as he had a few days ago, when he first woke up in the hospital bed, eyes dark and secretive. Wolf was furious to note that he spotted a black eye and a split lip as well. Had it not been for his dead look he would have assumed that the boy had been in a fight but something told him that could not have been the case now.

"What the heck's happened to you?" he hissed, but the kid ignored him, pushed him away and walked into the kitchen. Wait – was he limping? "Cub!" No reaction. "Alex, look at me when I'm talking to you!"

He finally turned around, a smile on his lips that looked more painful than genuine. "What do you think happened? I'm not exactly the most well-liked person in my school – go figure out!"

He then stomped of to his room and slammed the door angrily behind him, leaving Wolf behind to try and figure out exactly what he meant. An unpleasant suspicion was growing inside of him but he shook it away. Sure, he thought the kid was a bit odd but wasn't all teenagers? He probably had fought with someone, but didn't dare tell Wolf in case he would get told off or punished for it. That brat.

The main reason that Wolf was sure he could never get used to living with the annoying kid, however, didn't show up until hours later, when he had just gotten to bed and was trying to fall asleep. He had just managed to when a shrill shriek awakened him. He sat up abruptly, frantically looking around for the threat – only to find that there wasn't one. He was starting to think that it had only been a dream when he heard it again and this time he realized that it didn't come from his own room but from the next.

Cub! Wolf would never forgive himself if the kid was hurt under his watch! As soon as he entered his wards room, he confusedly looked around and saw that the only person in the room was Alex. Then where had the shout came from – there it was again! It was the bleeding kid!

Figures that out of all teenage spies, he would get stuck with the one with loud nightmares.

Finally, an update! Please send my a review to tell me what you think! Is Wolf realistic? Did I completely fail with Snake's accent (I know I did!)? Any mistakes you noticed? Let me know!