InsaneJournal

Alex wondered how long it would be before he got the call. He was impressed that Alan Blunt had waited three entire days after Jack had left. The car came around on Thursday to take him to MI6 headquarters so that he could be briefed on his next mission. Alex hadn’t even bothered to protest. It wouldn’t have done any good. He’d just accepted the file on the case and went home to read it.

He had until next week to study it thoroughly before he’d have to leave. At least they were waiting until he was on Christmas break before sending him off to wherever.

He couldn’t tell Jack that they’d come for him, not while she was so worried about her mother. He’d have to hope he’d survive this next mission without too many new scars. At least the cuts and bruises should be gone by the time she returned.

He sat in the dark room, staring into the flickering light of the fire he’d made earlier that evening. He’d barely had enough energy to make it, but staring at the fire in the fireplace was the one thing that had always brought him a sense of peace. He certainly needed that now to help keep his fears at bay.

Alex wasn’t sure which was more depressing – that Ian had only thought of him as an agent in training, or that in another mission or two, Alex was sure to be joining Ian in the grave. Alex’s youthfulness was what made him valuable to MI6, yet it was also a handicap. He was smaller and weaker than most of the adults he’d gone up against. It was only through his wits and sheer dumb luck that he was alive today.

By all rights, Alex should have been killed on his first mission. He still didn’t understand why Yassen hadn’t gone through with it when he’d had the chance. Actually, Yassen had had several chances over the past nine months to kill him, yet here he was, still alive. Alex shivered, remembering the photo Mrs. Jones had shown him of Yassen right before Alex had left for Sayle Enterprises, her words echoing in his ears even now: if Yassen finds out you’re working for us, he’ll kill you too.

But she’d been wrong. Yassen had said it was because he was only ordered to kill Sayle, but Alex thought that it went deeper than that. Yassen was a cold-hearted assassin, and when Alex had flat out told Yassen he’d kill him one day for murdering his uncle, Yassen still had let him go.

Maybe that incident could be explained away by the lack of orders, but nothing could account for Yassen's not killing him three months later. Alex had held a gun to the man's head, but as much as Alex had wanted revenge, as much as he hated Yassen for taking Ian from him, Alex simply could not pull the trigger. Yassen had removed the gun from Alex's trembling hand, but instead of Yassen shooting him as he'd expected, Yassen had only brushed the side of Alex's face with his fingertips. Looking at Alex with what seemed like pity in his eyes, Yassen had told him to leave the boat. Within an hour, the yacht, and Yassen, were gone.

Then the third time, on the plane with Cray, when Cray had ordered Yassen to shoot Alex, Yassen had shot Cray instead. Yassen had only said that a competitor had ended up paying him more to kill Cray than Cray was paying him for protection.

As Alex thought more on it, he knew that there was something going on that he wasn’t being told about. It made no sense for Yassen to continue to let him live. But to whom could he go to find out why?

Mrs. Jones had been the one who’d first warned him about Yassen. She had had the photos, and Yassen’s file.

Maybe Mrs. Jones had the answer. Maybe she knew why Yassen wouldn’t kill him.

When he returned from this upcoming mission, if he returned, he decided he was going to have a long talk with Mrs. Jones.