Work Text:
The clock struck 9 PM on Christmas Eve, and Alex was almost ready to call it a day. He switched the channel – another cheesy Christmas movie. Alex buried further into the hand-made woollen blanket. Last winter, Ian had spilt coffee on it, and Alex imagined he could still faintly smell the bitter brew.
Even with the heat ramped up to max, the house felt cold.
These days the shivers felt ingrained in his bones. He never quite managed to calm them completely.
The weather had not been much warmer in Granada, but at least Alex had been able to focus on the mission. If Alex had known it would finish early, he would have booked a ticket to the states and joined Jack. She had invited him, of course, but at the time, Alex had been convinced he would spend Christmas stopping another crazy billionaire from committing genocide. So when the mission surprisingly turned out exactly as easy as MI6 had promised, Alex had gone home to Chelsea. He didn’t want to bother Jack and her family by showing up unexpectedly on their doorstep in the middle of the Christmas preparations.
Alex held out for another five minutes, then turned the TV off. Watching other people have fun only made his improvised pickle-on-toast-dinner taste sourer. His stomach flipped in protest when he cleaned the plate away, but he had enough. Shopping could wait for tomorrow when sunlight made him feel less like he was standing at the edge of a sinkhole, the ground below him threatening to crumble if he moved the wrong way.
He folded up the blanket and turned to the stairs, ready to finally collapse in bed and forget about Ian and Jack and stupid holidays, when the doorbell ringing made him freeze.
MI6 had already debriefed him and didn’t expect his written report before New Year, and Alex could think of no other reason for anyone to come over today of all days.
Maybe his neighbour had run out of flour again?
And maybe a werewolf wanted to seek asylum under his sink. Sounded about as likely, knowing his luck.
He grabbed the gun strapped to the underside of his coffee table - a weapon Alex had made sure MI6 didn’t know about - and snook into the entrance hall. The doorbell rang again, but he ignored it. Instead of heading straight for the door, he went for the window in the kitchen overlooking the porch and lifted the blinds an inch to peak out.
He should have gone to bed.
Alex stomped back to the entrance hall and yanked the door open with his left hand, careful to conceal the gun in his right.
“What the hell are you doing here?”
“Rider!” Walker gave him a wide grin. He looked gaunter than the last time Alex had seen him, back at Malagosto, but then again, being on the run couldn’t be easy.
Speaking of which.
“Thought you were arrested.”
Walker shrugged. “Didn’t stick.” Unfortunately.
Alex turned to the others. Klaus and Amanda looked more or less like themselves, though Klaus had gotten a new scar on his chin, and Amanda’s hair was now red instead of blond. The colour suited her. Sinead Craig waved at him from where she stood behind the others. Alex hadn’t spoken much with her. Of all of them, she was the last one he would have guessed to have survived SCORPIA’s collapse. Klaus and Amanda were experienced operatives when they got to Malagosto, and Walker was ferocious and skilled enough to escape most tight situations. Miss Craig seemed a little … distracted in comparison. However, Alex had learned not to take appearances at face value. The fact she was here, alive, was enough to make him wary.
“What do you want?” Alex asked when none of the former SCORPIA assassins made a move to explain. They hadn’t made a move to attack him yet, and killing him would have been easier if they hadn’t alerted him by ringing the doorbell. He hadn’t ruled kidnapping out yet, though.
“Do we have to have a reason other than wanting to wish our favourite classmate Merry Christmas?”
Alex raised a brow.
“We brought a gift?” Walker gestured, and Sinead and Klaus stepped aside, revealing a wide-eyed Tom. He gave Alex a half-shrug as if to say I don’t know why I’m here either, mate.
Alex tightened his grip on his gun. “That’s not a gift.”
Tom looked a little insulted. Walker barely blinked at Alex’s animosity.
“We thought you might be a little lonely.”
“So, you kidnap my friend, show up unannounced on Christmas Eve and what? Expect me to let you in, or you’ll hurt my friend?”
Surprisingly, Klaus answered. Alex had never heard the man speak more than one sentence at a time.
“Weihnachtsfrieden.” Klaus looked like he had just told a private joke. “A truce for the holidays. Like during World War I. We bring food and company, nothing else, I promise.”
Alex paused. They couldn’t stay like this for long, or the neighbours would get curious—even on Christmas Eve. And the last thing Alex wanted was for MI6 to come and sniff around.
“Come on, mate,” Tom said. “We’re freezing our limbs off here.” He wasn’t wearing a jacket and had started to shake.
Alex took a deep breath, then slipped the gun to the small of his back and hid it smoothly under his sweatshirt.
“Alright,” he said and knew he would regret it later. “But weapons stay in the hall, and if I see even a hint of poison at the table, I’ll personally throw you all headfirst in a ditch.”
☆★☆
Alex grabbed Tom on their way inside. The entrance now smelled of dank clothes, and the heavy air settled around Alex’s shoulders like a shawl.
“What about your parents?” Alex whispered while the assassins fumbled with their winter clothes in the narrow hall - a difficult task made harder by them trying not to stab each other with the weapons they were piling beside the shoes. Amanda was the only one missing, as she was gathering the last bags from the car. Apparently, they had brought actual food.
Tom grimaced.
“They probably won’t notice. They got into another argument over dinner, and I snook away to my room. Still hadn’t stopped shouting when that crazy guy—” he pointed at Walker,”—climbed through my window and said he was taking me to you.”
“And you just listened? Tom, they are contract killers. You can’t trust them.”
“You let them inside your house.” Tom made an unimpressed face. “Besides, he had a gun.”
Alex sighed. Nothing to do about it now. If the situation became dangerous, he would deal with it then. But, for now, he would do damage control.
“It’s good to see you,” Alex admitted. He had been too tired to contact Tom after getting home from the mission, so this was the first time he saw his friend in two weeks.
Tom brightened. “You too, mate.” He pointed at the kitchen. “Now, Sinead mentioned cookies, and I don’t care if they’re poisoned or something. I want some before they’re gone.”
Alex shook his head as Tom skipped away, but he was smiling.
At that moment, Amanda opened the door, and Alex helped her manoeuvre the bags inside.
“Walker has too many bags,” she grumbled and swept away a strand of hair that had gotten into her face. Alex accepted her jacket and hung it beside the others while she added her weapons to the pile. The pile probably barely contained half of the weapons the assassins actually carried, but Alex appreciated the gesture.
“Why did you really come?” Alex asked.
“I’m just here for the food. Walker’s paying.”
Alex raised a brow, not buying the excuse for a second. Amanda raised the corner of her mouth in what went for a smile.
“Where else would we go?”
Before Alex could answer, Walker’s voice reached them from the kitchen.
“I swear I had my card on me when we left!”
Klaus answered a moment later. “You would think a Malagosto graduate would have noticed a pickpocket.”
Alex hurried to intervene before anyone went for the knives. He refused to clean blood off the carpet on Christmas Eve.
☆★☆
Ten minutes later, the impending disaster had been stopped, and Alex helped Amanda sort through the bags of food.
“What even is this?” he asked and held up a suspicious red package with candy so brightly coloured you could probably get allergies just from looking at them.
“Sinead’s,” Amanda answered without looking up from where her head was stuck halfway inside the oven. “When was this last cleaned? It looks like someone died, and their viscera dried out in here.”
Alex made a face at the image. Jack did not use the oven for her ten-minute food, and Alex had not cooked a meal not intended for the microwave since before Ian … He stopped the thought before it could properly form.
“I don’t think anyone knows.”
Amanda sighed and tracked down the cleaning utensils while Sinead helped Alex stuff the turkey. Well, Alex stuffed the turkey, and Sinead gleefully played with a kitchen knife too close to his face while still managing to cut the carrots and onions into perfect slices.
Safe cooking was a work in progress.
Besides the turkey and a few ingredients for the stuffing, the former SCORPIA assassins had not brought any traditional British Christmas food. Instead, a giant pepperoni pizza with extra garlic now used up half of the kitchen counter. Alex found several boxes of vegetarian Chinese takeout in the bags, squeezed together between two Happy Meals with extra fries, nine plates of dark chocolate, three litres of organic strawberry ice cream, and a bunch of green seedless grapes.
Alex used rubber gloves to hold up the biological weapon that was one severely rotten avocado.
“You can’t convince me you bought this today.” It dripped juices on the table, and he hurried to throw it out and decided it was time to take the trash out. Even if it meant leaving four unemployed assassins and Tom alone in his house for a minute.
“I just brought whatever bags was in Walker’s car.”
“Lovely.”
Alex looked into what was, thankfully, the last bag.
“Why did someone buy dog food?”
☆★☆
Alex escaped the kitchen after the oven nearly exploded.
And for once, it wasn’t even his fault.
Sinead had been left to watch the turkey for a few minutes while Amanda set the dinner table and Alex washed up the used knives and carving board. A few minutes was enough. Luckily, Amanda saved the kitchen in time, though the turkey turned a little black at the edges.
Alex thought this was the right time to retreat to the living room.
When he arrived, Klaus was kneeling before the fireplace, fiddling with a pack of matches, while Walker was dragging the hat stand from the hallway into the room.
“What are you doing?” Alex asked the latter as Walker stepped back to admire the stand against its new place in the corner beside the fireplace.
“You had no tree.” Walker shrugged. “I improvised.”
“With a hat stand?”
“Of course.” Walker grinned and held up two pairs of scissors. “Now we’re only missing the decorations.”
And that was how Alex got roped into making paper chains out of old newspapers with Tom, while Walker cut an approximation of a star and taped it to the top. Amanda used some red thread to hang a few store-bought cookies between the chains, and it nearly felt Christmas-ly.
In the meantime, Klaus had found a box of forgotten candles and candlesticks. He proceeded to place them on every available surface. Alex amused himself by lighting them on fire. Was having candles literally everywhere, including the bathroom, a fire hazard? Maybe. But Alex was done being the responsible one.
Four adults were in the house, and at least two of them could act like it as well. Let them do the boring stuff for once.
He regretted the thought a moment later when one of the candles sat one of the curtains in the guest room on fire, and he had to smoother it with the bedcover.
Alright, so maybe Walker, Sinead, and Klaus barely counted as adults.
Alex moved the candles to the living room so they could at least keep an eye on them.
☆★☆
A pair of old socks hung beside the fireplace. Walker took one look at them and nearly freaked out.
“Who’s the creep who went through my trash?”
He tried to force everyone into admitting the act, then went to scowl in a corner when it didn’t work - well, he claimed to restock the fire, but no one believed him - and it wasn’t like anyone else wanted to touch the socks, so they stayed.
Who knew, maybe Santa would visit the house after all.
☆★☆
Dinner was … less chaotic than Alex had feared. After the disaster cooking, he expected everything from Tom starting a food fight to one of them planting a bomb in the ice cream.
Other than Sinead accidentally choking Walker with a cracker, nothing wild happened. However, they quickly realised they didn’t have enough food to feed four assassins and two growing teenagers.
“We haven’t got any presents either,” Tom added when Amanda suggested going to the corner store to buy a few sandwiches.
“Kid’s right,” Walker said. “Christmas means presents.”
“You’re like a child, Walker,” Amanda said.
“You say that like it’s an insult.”
Walker went over to the leftover newspapers and turned to Alex.
“You got a pen and a bowl?”
Five minutes later, they all reluctantly stood in a circle and drew slips of papers from the bowl to see whom they’d be getting a present for.
And then they redrew them because Walker managed to get his own name. Twice.
Alex ended up with Amanda, and while she, Sinead, and Tom all left for the store to get sandwiches and buy presents, Alex snook went on a hunt around the house.
☆★☆
Because Klaus declared waiting to open the presents stupid, they gathered around the hat stand as soon as everyone got back. The presents looked like kindergarten art-protects, wrapped half-heartedly in leftover newspapers or plastic bags from the store.
“I’ll start,” Amanda said. No one complained. She fetched her present and chucked it at Walker, who barely caught it. His expression turned a little wary, and Alex hoped this wasn’t the moment when the ‘party’ spiralled for real.
Walker unwrapped the package with the same care you would use with unstable explosives, then glared at Amanda.
“You shouldn’t have,” he said drily and held up a candy bar.
“I didn’t.”
Walker frowned, then froze when something else fell out of the package: a credit card. Alex barely heard Walker cursing above Klaus’ laughter.
Tom gave Sinead a package of cheap chocolate shaped like a Christmas tree. Surprisingly, she was delighted and gave him a kiss on the cheek in thanks, and to Alex’s delight, Tom’s cheeks burned brighter than the fire.
Klaus received a small angel ornament from Sinead. For a long moment, he didn’t react. Then he walked over to the substitute-tree and hung it up with a wistful expression before returning to his spot as if nothing had happened.
No one commented.
Alex gave Amanda his present: A Fairbairn-Sykes fighting knife Ales found in Ian’s study and which he would never want to carry himself. Amanda looked pleased, though, so he took it as a win.
Tom wasn’t as impressed. “You’ve been holding out on me!”
Alex rolled his eyes. “You don’t need a double-edged fighting knife, Tom.”
“How do you know I won’t? I’m always running around with you, aren’t I?”
“Kid’s got a point,” Walker said.
Alex shifted. Were they right? Tom had been in danger more than once just by being Alex’s friend. And now Alex had dragged Tom into whatever this was as well.
“Good thing I’m here,” Walker continued, and Alex’s mood fell even further. Especially when the assassin in question gave Tom a present that turned out to be a fukiya - a Japanese blowgun. And not one of those used in sports either.
“Cool,” Tom said with a grin. Alex added blowgun lessons to his ever-growing to-do list. Preferably before his friend took someone’s eye out with a poisoned dart.
Alex was the last to get his present. Klaus was the giver, and at this point, Alex was no longer sure he wanted to open it. He did, though, because it was the polite thing to do - and because it would be at least as dangerous to refuse it. He let out a breath when a small red address book tumbled out of the paper and not one of Klaus’ favourite hand grenades.
“Better not keep it for long,” Klaus muttered while the others watched as a new fight broke out between Walker and Amanda. They were as bad as Tom’s parents.
Alex flipped the book open. Pages of neatly written phone numbers greeted him. Instead of names, they had a few notes scribbled beside them. Alex read Passports: EU and US and Best customised scopes in UK before closing the book again.
He exchanged a short, meaningful glance with Klaus and nodded in thanks.
Alex would make sure to memorise the numbers as soon as possible. As Klaus said, it was best not to leave something like that lying around for long.
☆★☆
After opening the presents, Walker insisted they should be allowed to relax a little and disappeared from the room.
“Look what I found,” he said when he got back a few minutes later and wriggled an expensive bottle of champagne in their direction. Alex vaguely recognised it from Ian’s liquor cabinet.
Sinead was quick to find some proper glasses, and Klaus snatched the bottle out of Walker’s hand, ignored his swears, and opened it. Soon a row of nice glasses stood on the table, filled with bubbly liquid.
Tom was the first to grab one, only for Amanda to steal it from him.
“Not for you.” She took a long drink, looking pleased. Tom tried to stammer a half-hearted protest but clearly knew it was a lost cause.
Alex raised a brow.
“You draw the line at underage drinking?”
Amanda smiled. “Someone needs to be a good role model.”
“You say while earning your money by murder and mayhem.”
“Can’t be worse than Blunt.”
Alex had no good counter to that.
☆★☆
When everyone held a drink - Alex and Tom had to settle for a coke, which was unfair, as they were technically drinking Alex’s champagne - they gathered at the dinner table and played board games.
Alex bankrupted everyone in Monopoly so fast that even Amanda gave him a mildly impressed look. Playing Cluedo against assassins was exactly as terrifying as you would think, and their last round of Uno turned more intense than most high stakes poker games. Alex was extremely glad he had insisted they left the weapons in the entrance hall, or he was sure someone would have died.
For all the extra stress of having assassins running around his house, Alex was surprised to realise he was enjoying himself.
So, when Klaus suggested a 2 AM football game after a few glasses of whiskey to ‘live up to the spirit of the original Christmas truce,’ Alex was the first to agree.
☆★☆
Alex woke with a smile. He couldn’t remember the last time he had done this.
Morning light streamed through his open blinds. They had stumbled to bed at four - Amanda and Sinead taking the guest room while Walker and Klaus shared Ian’s old room - yet Alex felt surprisingly refreshed.
Tom gave a loud snore and shifted on the mattress beside the bed. Alex suspected he would be out cold for a few hours yet and made sure not to make a sound while sneaking out of the room and a fresh set of clothes under his arm. A short trip to the bathroom later, he looked at least semi-presentable.
As he expected, the doors to Ian’s old room and the guest room were both open. The beds were made, and if the assassins had ever slept in the room, they were long gone now and had left no trace. Alex closed the doors and went downstairs to make some breakfast.
A sandwich and two slices of dry toast later - he really needed to do some shopping today - and Alex settled in one of the armchairs in the living room, a proper cup of tea in one hand, to enjoy a bit of quiet before Tom woke.
Most of the decorations were still there, although Alex noted that Klaus’ angel ornament was missing from the tree. He smiled and took a sip of his tea, feeling more content than he had in ages, when his eyes landed on the fireplace. Alex burst out laughing.
Walker’s old socks still hung beside the burned-out fire, but someone - and Alex had his suspicions - had taken the time to fill them to the brim with coal.
