by James Rosone
“You’re Omar Bishara, right?” inquired the gentleman as he walked up to the table.
“I am, but how do you know me?” he asked, confused.
The man pulled out the chair opposite him and sat down. “I’m a part of an organization that knows quite a bit about any number of people,” the man said, pulling out a badge. On it was his name, Denton Holt, his picture, and below the government seal was the title, “MI6.”
Now Omar’s curiosity was piqued. “So, what’s your interest in me?” he asked.
“It’s very simple, really. We need smart, educated people from the Middle East who can help us to interpret not just the language, but the nuances of the culture, politics, and religion in the region. With your studies at Oxford and your family’s background, you are our ideal candidate,” replied Denton in a very matter-of-fact tone.
“I won’t lie and tell you that I’m not interested,” admitted Omar, feeling his heart race at the thought of being an actual spy. “However, I am supposed to be returning to Riyadh. My father helped me to secure a position in the Saudi diplomatic corps, and it is really a prestigious opportunity. If I were to turn that down, I would have to present him with a glowing alternative.”
Denton did not seem concerned at all by the initial dismissal.
“I’m quite certain that we could arrange for a cover story that would be acceptable to your family, Mr. Bishara,” he explained.
It wasn’t long before Omar’s protests were completely dismantled, and he agreed to delay his journey back to Saudi Arabia.
True to his word, Mr. Holt did help to organize a very impressive opportunity for Omar to present to his parents. MI6 placed Omar into a promising position with the Royal Bank of Scotland, which came with a large signing bonus. The cover story was that he was being groomed to become a banking executive at RBS, which was planning on establishing a presence in Saudi Arabia and other locations in the Middle East. This provided him with a plausible reason for turning down the diplomatic corps and an explanation for his extended training in the UK before he would return to Saudi Arabia.
When Omar told his father, the conversation couldn’t have gone any better. The opportunity to rise in the financial ranks of a global bank was just as significant to him as working in the diplomatic corps of their home nation. It would open up all sorts of new opportunities for Omar, and he couldn’t have been prouder.
Once Omar had completed his two years of training with MI6, he received another six months of intense training in investment banking and analysis. Two and a half years after graduating Oxford, Omar was transferred to RBS’s new Middle East office in Riyadh, where he began his first overseas assignment as a spy. Omar’s career was moving along quickly, both at RBS and with MI6. He had successfully recruited fifteen sources, several of whom were senior officers in the Saudi military and two of whom were in the diplomatic corps.
Then, in 1996, a terrorist organization called “The Base,” or Al Qaeda, carried out a terrorist attack against the US forces who had been staying at the Khobar Towers near the King Abdulaziz Air Base. It was one of the largest terrorist attacks in the kingdom’s history. MI6 tasked him with trying to find out what he could about this organization and its leader, a man by the name of Osama bin Laden. The bin Laden family was very wealthy and influential in the kingdom, so they needed to tread lightly.
Omar wasn’t exactly a devout Muslim, but tracing information about Al Qaeda would require a fervent adherence to Islam. Not having the necessary skills to personally infiltrate the organization, Bishara set out to identify those who could. Over the next several years, he recruited several individuals who were successful in joining the organization. They provided him with valuable information on the formation of some terrorist training camps in the Sudan and Afghanistan.
Then, during one of Omar’s meets with a high-level source in the diplomatic corps, he was arrested. He fell into a counterintelligence trap set by the Maslahat Al-Istikhbarat Al-Aammah, or General Intelligence Department of Saudi Arabia. The Saudis had been conducting their own infiltration of Al Qaeda, and one of the individuals they had arrested, tortured, and turned had been one of Omar’s sources.
As a dual Saudi-UK citizen and spy for another nation, Omar knew that he wasn’t in a particularly good situation. After a few weeks of beatings to soften him up, a man named Prince Nawaf bin Abdullah came to visit him in prison.
“I think you know what kind of trouble you are in,” he began. “They wanted to kill you, of course. However, I saw that you might still have some value in this world. Do you want to live, Omar?” he asked, putting a briefcase on the table.
Omar gulped, then gasped, “Yes. Yes, I want to live.”
Nodding his head, Nawaf said, “Excellent choice, Omar. I have another decision for you to make. You can either work for me in the GID as a double agent, or you can face execution.”
He paused for a moment, either for dramatic effect or to let the information sink in. “So, what do you choose?” inquired Prince Nawaf.
“I want to live,” Bishara answered without hesitation.
*******
Thus began his life as a double agent. While the decision was easy to make, the actual reality of life as a spy within MI6 was very challenging to pull off. After four years of living as a double agent, a few people at MI6 started to suspect that perhaps Omar’s loyalties were no longer pure.
They ran a parallel collection operation, giving Omar the same information to collect as two other trusted sources. He failed the test on multiple occasions, which ultimately sealed his fate.
Fortunately for Bishara, the GID had a mole within the UK’s Ministry of Justice, who intercepted a discussion about an arrest warrant for “an MI6 agent who had been identified as a double agent.” With his cover blown, Omar was whisked away and given a new identity before the British were able to make their arrest.
Right from the get-go, Omar began to work directly for Prince Nawaf within the GID. Most of his work seemed to benefit a specific firm, Gulf State International. He was given projects ranging from corporate espionage, sabotage, and occasionally, assassinations.
Then, in 2003, with the advent of the US-led invasion of Iraq, Omar’s role as a spy morphed once again. He received orders to gather intelligence and infiltrate the Al Qaeda in Iraq organization. His identity was changed more permanently this time, as he underwent more advanced facial reconstruction surgery and fingerprint alteration. He began to successfully cultivate sources within Al Qaeda in Iraq and the various terrorist and insurgent organizations fighting the Iraqi government and the Americans. Over the next four years, Omar had developed the persona known within the circles of Islamic extremists as “the Ghost.” He developed networks to acquire weapons, explosives, smuggle people, narcotics and nearly every other skill that made him indispensable to a terrorist organization. By the end of the Iraq war, Omar had become a rather influential leader while still being a secret informant to the GID.
The intelligence he gathered had led to the capture or death of numerous Al Qaeda leaders across the Middle East and around the globe that posed a threat to the kingdom. Their deaths had also facilitated his continued rise within the organization as he was effectively killing off his competition.
This undercover position came with incredibly peril to his own safety. He was nearly killed by numerous US drone strikes and several US-led capture missions, but Prince Nawaf had also helped him stay one step ahead of the Americans. From what Omar could tell, the Americans knew Prince Nawaf had a source high in the organization, but they had not identified him as the source. This anonymity had worked to his benefit and only further added to his mystique as “the Ghost.”
In addition to the facial reconstruction surgery, Bishara implemented numerous additional safeguards to keep himself from being detected and captured. When traveling through airports, he used special contact lenses that not only changed the color of his eyes but gave him a different iris image. He also used fake finger
prints to help him evade the biometric sensors being used for those entering the UK and US from foreign countries. Omar had an American identity he would use when he needed to travel to the US, UK or EU, which enabled him to bypass the need for travel visas and additional vetting. For trips to other regions, he could pull out his Canadian or Saudi passports.
The Ghost was living the spy’s life, and frankly, he was exceptionally good at his job. If he were entirely honest with himself, he even enjoyed it. In the occasional quiet moments though, he did long for the freedom to do whatever he chose to do. Which was why he took great pride in controlling whatever he could about his life, no matter how small it was.
Prince Nawaf recognized his natural talents and slowly began to groom him for something new after the Iraq war ended. Each mission he completed as the Ghost now came with a healthy bonus. He began to become very wealthy in his own right. Then one day, he was given an offer he couldn’t refuse. If he worked with the Knights of Islam and completed their missions, he would be a free man, allowed to retire and use his money as he saw fit, or grow his position within the organization if he chose to stay and be inducted in.
Now, hiding out in Lucerne, the Ghost was truly afraid--not frightened of being caught or killed, but of losing his one chance at freedom. The only thing he wanted in the world was to break free of his many masters, and he saw it slipping away from him.
Chapter 36
Joint Mission
Lucerne, Switzerland
After Marwan’s meeting with Nihad, he stayed in Lucerne one more day and visited the Grand Casino Luzern on Haldenstrasse, which had a spectacular view of Lake Lucerne. He spent most of the day playing poker and other card games with a variety of people.
At first, Diana didn’t think anything of it. It made sense that a spy would enjoy a sport that was all about reading and manipulating people. She slowly nursed a martini at the bar and tried to keep observing without being too obvious.
Suddenly, Micah’s expression changed, and she knew he’d spotted something. He walked around the bar to her, held her hand, and then whispered in her ear, “Diana, Marwan is meeting some of his sources while he’s here.”
Her left eyebrow rose, and then she whispered back, “How do you want to proceed?”
Micah wasn’t much of a poker player, but he bought into the table that Marwan was playing at and made sure his lapel pin was transmitting the images of the people his target was interacting with. Diana then left the bar and moved over to the café in the casino, which had a better angle on the poker tables. She deftly set up her pen camera and directional mic at the table and began monitoring what Micah was seeing and parsing out the audio of the various people at the table.
Pulling out her smartphone, she logged in to the casino’s Wi-Fi and established the secure VPN link to their team’s makeshift office at the suite where they were staying. She also made sure the data was streaming back to CTU.
She almost chuckled at the sight of Micah as he continued his best effort to fake it at the poker table, but all the while, the images his lapel pin collected were being cross-checked against all the government intelligence databases to see if they could find a match.
Marwan moved on to a different table and seemed to be talking with someone else there. Diana grunted. Micah would have to continue to play poker for a while so as not to draw suspicion.
A few minutes later, Diana’s laptop notified her that she had a new email from CTU. She had barely finished reading the subject line when her phone buzzed. In her twenty-second conversation with someone from Washington, she learned that they had been given the green light to apprehend Marwan immediately.
Diana spoke in hushed tones into the mike on her sleeve. “We have a live capture order for our subject,” she announced. “Micah and I will keep an eye on the Ghost. George, it’s time to rent a van. Bring it to the casino parking lot. Ashley…it’s time to do your thing.”
The team acknowledged her directions and set into motion.
A few minutes later, Ashley entered the casino in a tight-fitting slinky skirt and a low-cut top. Many of the males in the room seemed to suffer whiplash as they watched her move gracefully around the card tables toward the bar. Clearly, she had their attention.
A waiter at the bar was finalizing the drinks to be brought to the card table that Marwan was sitting at when he looked up and noticed the stunningly beautiful woman who had suddenly appeared before him. Smiling as he finished loading the drinks on the tray, he paused to see if she wanted him to fix her one before he left. She motioned for him to come closer, then reached out and took his hand, whispering something flirtatious to him in Swiss German. The guy’s cheeks flushed, and they exchanged a few hushed words.
While the waiter, bartender, and other patrons at the bar were distracted by her interplay with this now bewildered young man, Diana walked near the waiter’s drink platter and placed something in the drink that was meant for Marwan. It helped that he always ordered the same thing.
The waiter stammered for a minute, then Ashley, apparently put off by his blubbering mannerisms, pushed him away and told him that she just wanted a gin and tonic. She sat at the bar, turning a bit so that the men at the card tables could see her. As she crossed her legs, the slit in her skirt showed off more of her athletic legs.
Diana smiled as she walked back to her laptop in the café. She noticed that Ashley was having way too much fun playing the honey pot as she worked the room to make sure all eyes stayed on her. When she noticed Micah gazing at her just a little too long, she got a bit miffed, but then she reminded herself that he was a man, and all straight men seemed to be trapped when a woman showed a little too much skin.
The waiter brought over the drinks to Marwan’s table and handed them out to their respective owners. Marwan had also been watching Ashley, so when he received his drink, he unknowingly took several gulps before returning to the business at hand. After ten minutes, during which the men of the casino continued to ogle Ashley, Marwan suddenly got up to head to the restroom.
As he headed toward a sign that read “Toilette,” Diana closed her laptop and placed it in her bookbag. She got up and walked toward the powder rooms as well. Out of the corner of her eye, she spotted Micah collecting his chips and cashing out. He too began to amble toward the restroom. As the rest of the patrons of the casino continued to watch either Ashley or their cards, Diana and Micah both converged on the restroom Marwan had gone into. Micah took up a position near the pay phones just opposite the entrance and waited.
Then, Marwan exited the bathroom looking a little pale. Diana bumped into him. “Oh, dear me. I’m so sorry. I didn’t see you. Please excuse me,” she said in a British accent, trying to distract him briefly while Micah went in for the kill. Before Marwan could respond, Micah stabbed a needle through his target’s shirt into his deltoid muscle. He quickly pushed the plunger down, slamming the drug rapidly into his body.
In seconds, Marwan’s world went black and he collapsed into Micah’s arms. Diana reached over and picked up Marwan’s left arm and placed it over her shoulder and around her neck to help Micah as they carried him toward the exit at the end of the hall.
From an outsider’s perspective, it would look like Marwan had had too many drinks and his friends were helping him home. However, as they exited the building, George pulled up with the white van and opened the side door. In seconds, Marwan was inside the van, along with Diana and Micah.
Diana spoke into her sleeve. “Ashley, we have our mark. It’s time to head for the airport.”
“Roger that,” came the reply.
Diana pictured her colleague chatting away with wealthy men. She must have caused just as much fanfare on her way out as she had coming into the casino. Diana tried not to feel jealous about just how good a job she’d done as the distraction.
Focusing her attention back on the task before her, she and Micah checked over Marwan’s body for any possible weapons or bugs and then hoisted him into a large
ski carrying case. They had purchased this bag in advance, knowing that it should be big enough to hide Marwan inside, but breathable enough to keep him from suffocating.
As they approached the municipal airport, they pulled up to the Lear jet that would whisk them away once they had everyone on board. As they got out of the van, two men grabbed the now-quite-heavy ski bag and loaded it into the cabin of the aircraft, along with their other suitcases and equipment. Twenty minutes later, Ashley arrived and walked over to the aircraft as well.
She flashed a devilish smile. “That was fun. Now stop staring at me, you guys—where are my clothes?”
Micah and Diana chuckled uncomfortably. Diana had never really noticed her colleague’s figure before—she tended to wear clothes that kept it well hidden while on the job. She handed her a small duffle bag and they all boarded the plane.
As their aircraft took to the air, the pilot announced, “We’re flying to the London City Airport, folks. Your charge will be handed off to a joint interrogation group with MI6 and CTU agents.”
The flight wasn’t a long one, just a few hours, which gave the team time to decompress and begin to write up the mountain of paperwork from their operation. As the aircraft descended, they caught a great bird’s-eye view of London as they came in on their final approach. When their plane landed, it was escorted to a nondescript-looking hangar near the end of the airport, where several blacked-out vehicles waited inside. The pilot began the process of shutting down the engines while a couple of attendants moved to chock the wheels.
George, their wheelman, reached over and unlocked the aircraft exit, pushing it forward and then down as it turned into their stairs to leave the plane. As he exited the aircraft, Micah followed suit, each of them carrying half of the ski case. Ashley and Diana exited next as several people approached their group.
