Alex Rider finds himself in the hospital, having narrowly survived the assassination attempt against him at the end of Scorpia. He meets a boy named Paul Drevin the son of Russian billionaire Nikolei Dreven, who is building a revolutionary hotel in space. Alex and Paul exchange conversation. That night, four armed men enter the hospital in an attempt to kidnap Paul, but Alex switches the room numbers above his room and Paul's room, resulting in the men kidnapping him instead. He manages to fight off four of them, but passes out easily due to his weakened state when attempting to fight a fifth man who arrives at the hospital as backup.