#wow this is so much
Jack is such a missed opportunity. Ian Rider is a spy, gone more often than not and he needs a nanny - does he pick someone reliable with an established background and portfolio to handle such things who he can trust to look after his kid and cook real meals for him or does he pick a Uni student with no formal training and just hope she works out? Alex would have been young enough when Jack first came that he would have latched onto anyone. Not quite to the age where “you’re not my Mom” is anything more than something said in anger to hurt instead of a declaration of war like it would be for 14 year old Alex
Young enough for Alex to trustand maybe those accents she would make them play weren’t so innocent. Maybe her obliviousness isn’t so sincere - “did you notice?” is such a fun game it makes Alex feel smart for seeing stuff that Jack missed. Maybe “What’s his deal?” Isn’t just a silly story time game they play in public trying to guess all kinds of fun facts about people by what they’re wearing and doing (Ian started this game with him but Jack makes it funwhen she adds in silly little stories about their lives). Maybe her cooking skills were a joke for a reason - make Alex do it. Make him more independent, more adaptable, more easily able to slip into any role because “It’s just play pretend, Alex. Let’s see if we can convince them we’re brother and sister?”
This totally plays into my head cannon that Ian Rider does not exist.
So I head cannon that the man who raised Alex was not “Ian Rider” Ian was a cover for a bank agent. That’s why Alex knew literally nothing about his parents other than what could be pulled from a Bio in a report.
Ok so there are two ways that could happen and what I mean by what I said.
So 1) Ian Rider, the MI6 agent (or he doesn’t work for the bank, maybe in some other inelegance organization) exists and is the brother of John, but either died before he could raise Alex OR was not told that Alex survived and either died in the mean time or is still alive out there somewhere and can be another adult in Alex’s life at some point.
Or 2) Ian Rider is a complete fiction (not just a agent taking the name of the actual Ian Rider) made for the purpose of acquiring an asset and training the asset to adequate usefulness.
Also if that’s not bad enough, the guy who raised Alex may or may not be dead. It was a closed casket funeral. So we don’t know.
Honestly, I don’t know what would mess Alex up more. Finding out your dead uncle is not your uncle (but is still dead) OR finding out your dead uncle is not dead and not your uncle OR finding out your dead uncle is alive and the guy you thought was your uncle wasn’t and is alive too.
Bless. Ian Rider was born the moment John Rider died is my favorite theory. It explains the lack of photographs or stories about their childhood, smooths away the fact that Ash wasn’t familiar with him. Explains why SCORPIA didn’t automatically doubt John Rider for having a brother working for MI6. Ian never talked about John because he didn’t know him.
And then there’s the story of Alex running into him again (The man called uncle indeed). A chance encounter that only his luck could manage and he sees Ian there with his “family” - a daughter likely 7, around the time Jack came and Ian was gone more often. And it clicks that his “missions” were visits to his real family, the games were more training than anything else, it all adds up even if it does take longer for the anger and betray to fade into the cold horror of just how many strings had been pulled to get him to where he is now.
