Skeleton Key (Alex Rider)

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Alex met Sabina at the Wimbledon Tennis Championships in Britain. The two became friends and Alex started liking her but she was interested in older men. When she grows suspicious about Alex's disappearnces and Alex tells her the truth about his being a spy, sorta like James Bond, she thinks that it is a joke. In the epilogue of Skeleton Key, Sabina introduces Alex to her parents and takes him to dinner. According to Alex, the day was cloudy and grey before he met Sabina but, after he met her it turned out to be a sunny day. [19] In Eagle Strike, Sabina invited Alex to spend his summer vacation with her in Cornwall. She expresses her feelings for Alex, kissing him a couple of times and telling him more than once that she thinks he is attractive. After her father is targeted, Alex tries to tell her that he really is a spy but, she refuses to believe him and gets angry when he insists it’s the truth. After they are kidnapped by Damian Cray, however, she apologizes to him. She leaves with her family to live in America soon after. Though she insists that they can still be friends or more, Alex does not believe her and thinks that this is the end of their relationship. [21] In the TV series, however, their relationship is highly underrated. As Skeleton Key was not included in the TV series, a large part of their relationship was cut. Sabina was very rude to Alex when he told her that he was in fact a spy and did not even give an appropriate apology later. In the aftermath, she simply told him that she liked him and Alex hugged her. [20] Tom Harris The following is a list of the protagonists recurring, appearing in, or referred to in the Alex Rider series, listed alphabetically. Major Winston Yu (deceased, broke every single bone in his body spontaneously after his yacht was hit by a tidal wave)

Alex does not like horse riding. This is a notable irony about Alex, as his name is Rider - and riding is the only sport he hates. [18] Despite the crew's best intentions, Alex uses one of his exploding Baht coins to damage the Liberian Star's cargo refrigeration unit, and escape. It is later revealed, when Alex is captured and forced to attend dinner with Major Yu, that Yu himself killed de Wynter, thFor all his skills, Yassen is obviously best known for his assassinations; throughout the series, his reputation seems to be one of a man who makes no mistakes, and he is considered an active threat by MI6. He has been employed by Iraq, Serbia, Libya, and China. It is suggested that his training included, as is demonstrated on a single occasion when he convinces Alex not to shoot him by describing what will happen when he pulls the trigger, basic psychological warfare. He was also an expert with conventional weaponry and terrorist techniques, though both are demonstrated only once throughout the series before his death. Yassen made another appearance (in a scene set in the past) in the seventh book of the series, Snakehead. He was fluent in nine languages and was learning Japanese at the time of his death, while working with Damian Cray.

Captain Hermann de Wynter is a minor antagonist in Snakehead. He is the Dutch captain of the snakehead's container ship, the MV Liberian Star, which is used to smuggle illegal immigrants into Australia from elsewhere. Alan Blunt was the head of MI6 Special Operations until Scorpia Rising. He is an aloof, impassive, and ruthless man. Throughout the series he is known for wearing a grey suit and grey glasses and being driven around in a Rolls-Royce. From the book Point Blanc, it is said that he had graduated with a First-Class Honours degree in mathematics from Cambridge University. Blunt is dedicated to his job and has a very analytical mind. After the events of the book Scorpia Rising and Scorpia's demise, Alan Blunt retires from his role at MI6, supposedly forced to by pressure from higher-ups. His assistant Lâle "Tulip" Jones, known better as Mrs. Jones, takes over from the end of Scorpia Rising onwards. It is stated in the same book that he receives knighthood following his retirement. Sofia Jones (Number Six): The long-lost daughter of Mrs. Jones, who was partnered with Freddy Grey on the assassination that eventually led to Nightshade's exposure. She and Freddy appear to be romantically interested in each other. Vosper is first seen at the Grimaldi twins' villa in Saint-Tropez, where he discusses part of Operation Steel Claw with the twins. From his information, Alex and MI6 at first believe the twins are trying to steal Mesoamerican gold artefacts from the museum, but bugging his office and the museum disproves this theory. Alex works out that it is, in fact, Vosper's wife, Jane, who the twins are going after, after seeing a poster for a Shakespeare play that Vosper mentioned at the villa. Sayle's dislike of the UK, and especially the British schoolchildren and Prime Minister, is a strong contrast to Winston Yu, the antagonist of Snakehead, who is obsessed with Britain and liked being brought up in a British public school (in his case, Harrow). He was only ever bullied on one occasion (the bully was then assassinated by his mother).ALEX RIDER SERIES SKELETON KEY would send in his field workers—the macheteros—to recover the banknotes. Not that the money was important. He was the owner of one kilogram of weapons grade uranium. As Carlo had said, he now had the power to destroy a small city. But Sarov had no intention of destroying a city. His target was the entire world. The American Secretary of State is an unnamed minor character in the novel Scorpia Rising. She is described by Joe Byrne as a "hardliner," and is central to Scorpia agent Abdul Aziz al-Rahim's plan to have the Elgin Marbles returned to Greece (and is apparently of Greek extract herself). A potential rival to the US president, the Secretary of State is in Egypt to make a speech denouncing Britain as a world power – a speech guaranteed to give her international attention. Ark Angel - Tamara Knight uses an explosive issued by MI6 to blast open a ship door to stop him from drowning

Sabina Pleasure is a protagonist who made her first appearance in the novel Skeleton Key and has gone on to appear in Eagle Strike, Snakehead, Crocodile Tears, Scorpia Rising and Never Say Die. She is romantically interested in Alex and has been supportive of his work as a teenage spy. Her parents are Edward Pleasure and Elizabeth “Liz” Pleasure. Ian Rider is played by Ewan McGregor in the film adaptation of Stormbreaker and Andrew Buchan in the Alex Rider TV series. In his first physical appearance, during the novel Snakehead, Kurst devises an operation dubbed Reef Encounter to destroy a small Australian island in which an anti-poverty conference is being held, by planting a powerful non-nuclear, British-made bomb called Royal Blue along a tectonic fault line to create a tsunami that will obliterate the island, as well as a considerable part of the west coast of northern Australia. After Kurst has his agents acquire Royal Blue, he puts the operation under the control of Winston Yu, who will have his snakehead, the most powerful criminal organisation in South East Asia, smuggle the bomb to the fault line. Kurst supervises Yu's progress throughout the novel, and when Alex Rider is found to be investigating Yu's snakehead, he advises the Major not to repeat Julia Rothman's mistake of underestimating Rider's abilities, referencing the boy's success in thwarting operation Invisible Sword during the novel Scorpia.

Dominic Royce is the main antagonist of Nightshade, and the instigator of their operation "Leap of Faith". He is the Permanent Under-Secretary of State for Foreign Affairs to the British government, and a very disagreeable and intimidating man, unlike his friendly predecessor. Kaspar is the second major antagonist to still be alive after the main antagonist of the story (Nikolei Drevin) is killed. The first was Yassen Gregorovitch, who first killed Herod Sayle himself in Stormbreaker, and later died in Eagle Strike shortly after the main antagonist, Damian Cray, was killed. Nurse Wilcox is a minor antagonist in Snakehead. She is one of the nurses at the Kakadu organ harvesting clinic, and is meant to be Alex's anaesthetist. She is later arrested by ASIS. Kyra is a character that only appears in the TV series. She was one of Alex's fellow students at Point Blanc. Initially, Alex befriends James Sprintz and Laura. Kyra is initially a shy and sarcastic person. But when Alex tells James about the "dream" he had on his first night, Kyra says that she had the same dream. Kyra senses that Alex is hiding something from her and so she doesn't trust him. But when she rescues Alex from Dr Greif, Alex tells her about him being a spy.

SCORPIA (acronym for Sabotage, Corru ption, Intelligence and Assassination) is a criminal organisation, and the series' main antagonist. Despite not appearing until the fifth novel Scorpia, their influence was felt in the very first novel, Stormbreaker, as it was revealed when they appeared in Snakehead that they were responsible for supplying the virus Sayle uses, and Yassen Gregorovich's employer. Scorpia has had a great deal of influence on the Alex Rider series, and are mentioned at least three times. They were formed in Paris in the early 1980s by spies and assassins from several governments who, fearing they would lose their jobs when the Cold War ended, decided to go into business for themselves. They split profits equally and are assigned tasks alphabetically, with chairmen chosen as new projects arise. After many years of work, they are now responsible for a tenth of the world's terrorism. Scorpia caused the assassinations of Alex's mother, father, and uncle. In addition, they attempted to kill Alex by using a sniper, however the sniper missed his heart by an inch as Alex was going down a step at the moment the sniper took the shot (Alex lived because his artery shut itself down after he was shot). He first appears in the novel after placing a bomb in The Salesman's ship, where he is seen by Alex Rider, although Alex doesn't know who he is at the time. Later, after Tom Turner (named Glen Carver in the US version of Skeleton Key) and Belinda Troy are killed in an underwater cave, Conrad kidnaps Alex and puts him in a crusher, only for Alex to be saved by General Sarov, who plans on adopting Alex. It is possible that The Gentleman has either heard of or encountered or used to be 'The Priest', a contract killer MI6 has encountered in the past. In Crocodile Tears, he was hospitalized after having fractured his ankle and receiving burns from an exploding fuel drum. [13] [24] [15] [18] [19] Major Winston Yu is one of the members of the executive board of Scorpia, and the main antagonist of the novel Snakehead. He was asked by Zeljan Kurst, another board member of Scorpia, to command operation "Reef Encounter". This involved generating an artificial tsunami to destroy Reef Island and the west coast of Australia by detonating a stolen bomb named "Royal Blue" between two underwater tectonic plates when they are most vulnerable. He was the superior of Anan Sukit, but apparently inherits control of the Bangkok Snakehead when Ben "Fox" Daniels kills Sukit. Yu suffers from brittle bone disease, which makes his skeleton highly unstable. His mother named him after Winston Churchill.General Alexei Igorevich Sarov is the main antagonist of Skeleton Key. He is a former Russian general who still longs for the old days of communist Russia, of the Soviet Union, and of Stalin. Graham Adair • Smithers • Mark Kellner • George Adair • Tom Harris • Jerry Harris • Harold Liebermann Alex’s best friend at Brookland, Tom Harris, knows about Alex’s involvement with MI6 but unlike Alex’s other friend Sabina, is very supportive of him and covers for him whenever he needs it. [21] [24]Tom Harris is Alex's best friend but he isn't even mentioned in the first four books in the series. This may indicate that Alex is not very close to him. He makes his first appearance in Scorpia. Initially, Alex doesn't tell him anything about his involvement with MI6 and his mission of finding SCORPIA. Yet, Tom helps Alex in his mission in any way possible. Later, when Alex meets Tom on the train after escaping from SCORPIA, Alex tells Tom everything about his involvement with MI6, his past missions and whatever he knows about SCORPIA. Unlike with Sabina, Tom and his elder brother Jerry believe Alex immediately. Jerry teaches Alex BASE jumping and Alex BASE jumps into Consanto Enterprises. [15]