by JT Brannan
Frantic, he had used the secure radio to contact his Control; he would know what to do. His Control, surprisingly, had not been shocked, and Shin-Yang found this somewhat impressive, yet at the same time disconcerting.
He had been told to wait in the hotel room, and had been assured that there were no leaks; he would be safe until someone came to get him.
That had been twenty minutes ago, which was twenty minutes too long in Shin-Yang’s opinion. Should he radio his Control again? No. The man had been quite firm on that; with the massive security crackdown that had commenced after the attack, even a secure radio link could not be trusted entirely.
Should he try to escape on his own? In his nervous state, this was highly tempting, but he knew it would be fruitless – any person who appeared to be of even slight Oriental appearance would be rounded up and interrogated, and the Human Rights Act be damned.
Nobody at the hotel had seen him; the room was registered to a Jake Dolman of Canada, and he’d picked up the key from a safety deposit box at the train station the day before. No, his Control was right. He was better off where he was, riding out the storm until –
A knock on the door pierced his reverie, as short and sharp as the crack of a bullet. His heart rate increased in an instant, adrenaline flooding his body. He’d served as a Captain in the People’s Republic Army, which was why he’d been chosen to act as the coordinator for this particular mission; all the other members of the team had been enlisted men. But that had been different. He’d trained for open warfare, not the clandestine, nerve-wracking uncertainty of small-unit covert operations. He and his team had undergone a good deal of specific preparation and training for this mission, but this was the first time he had been truly tested in the field. His team had so far failed; how would he measure up? he wondered anxiously.
Moving to the door, his sweaty hand gripped around his pistol, cocked and ready to fire, he bent forwards to look through the eye-piece in the door’s centre. Looking through with one eye, Shin-Yang stifled a gasp of surprise.
The man on the other side of the door was his Control, in person, here in Stockholm. He had obviously wanted to monitor the operation more closely than Shin-Yang had been led to believe. Doesn’t he trust me? he thought uneasily. Does he blame me for the failure?
‘Who is it?’ asked Shin-Yang reluctantly, starting the code.
‘Fred Sizemore,’ answered the man on the other side of the door. Shin-Yang had tried to place the man’s accent before, but couldn’t. Still, all Westerners sounded the same to him.
‘Our meeting’s not ’til three,’ he continued.
‘Sorry, I thought it was one. Can I come in anyway?’
‘Of course.’ The code complete, Shin-Yang unbolted the door. He decocked his pistol, but didn’t holster it.
As the man calling himself Fred Sizemore entered the room, closing the door behind him, Shin-Yang started to instinctively defend himself and distance himself from the mission, a skill honed whilst serving in the highly politicized atmosphere of the PRA. The best method of defence was attack, and Shin-Yang reasoned that if his Control was going to try and lay the blame for the mission’s failure on him, then he was going to go down fighting.
‘Sir, there must be a leak somewhere, I can’t explain it, perhaps one of our own men – ’
Shin-Yang’s Control cut him off with a raise of the hand. ‘Don’t worry, Lao,’ he said in perfect Mandarin. ‘Don’t worry. These things happen. Missions don’t always go to plan. Now we need to get out of here, but we need to take this gear with us.’ He gestured at the electronic communications equipment sprawled over the room’s small living area.
Shin-Yang nodded vigorously, happy that he wasn’t being blamed as he’d feared, and newly confident in their chances of escape. He even started to dare think that, despite the mission’s failure, his Control might yet keep the promises he had made about the future of Shin-Yang and his family.
Finally relaxing, he turned round to start getting his kit together, the pistol going back into his belt. As ‘Sizemore’ was presented with Shin-Yang’s back, he withdrew a Chinese-made Tokarev semi-automatic pistol from his own belt, a large and sinister Hakker silencer already in place.
Shin-Yang was still thinking about his family when his brains were blown out across the hotel room’s cheap beige carpet.
5
Cole was stymied by what he saw on the television. He had changed channels from the bemused CNN presenter to a live feed from Fox News.
The scene was one of devastation; a huge crater scarred the roadside, emergency crews tended to the dozens of injured people, and there was a trail of dead bodies scattered around the area, unattended due to the chaotic melee that had ensued.
The Fox reporter, wide-eyed with shock, breathlessly tried to explain what had happened, before an armed security guard marched up to him and ordered him to move away. Only minutes had passed since the blast impact, but the area was already filled with more police and military personnel than Cole could count.
The scene changed back to the newsroom, where the studio commentators played back the video of the incident, which the Fox cameraman had miraculously captured in all its morbid glory.
A Chinese attack on the Russian President? Cole wondered, dumbfounded. He knew Tsang Feng was against the defence pact, but this was just insane. As he considered matters further, his initial hatred and anger subsided, replaced by a cool detachment that had served him well throughout an operational career that seemed barely believable, especially to those who knew its full extent.
Anger wouldn’t help, he knew. And he could receive a call at any minute; his unique skill set ensured that his services were still regularly called upon, even after so many years.
He took the remote control to start taping the news channel for future reference, but found that it was already recording. He had started it, without conscious thought, from the moment he’d seen the look of shock on the CNN commentator’s face.
Angry or not, the cool detachment was there with him, always.
6
Vice Admiral Charles Hansard relaxed back in his plush leather captain’s chair, the telephone receiver cradled to his ear as he lit his hand-crafted pipe. Despite the softness of the seat, he sat with his back ramrod straight. The man had a decidedly military bearing, an understandable characteristic having joined the US Navy after graduating first in his class at Annapolis back in 1971. He had graduated summa cum laude from Harvard Law just the year before, but had decided to serve the American military machine in one way or another ever since.
He was at the present time the Director of National Intelligence, tasked with implementing the integration of the wider intelligence community into a coherent whole. His role gave him jurisdiction over the entire US intelligence world, and he was the President’s principle advisor on such matters.
Although he was often at the White House or the Pentagon, the Office of the Director of National Intelligence was based in a non-descript office block in Chevy Chase, between Bethesda and Silver Spring, and it was here that Hansard took the phone call from Clyde Rutherford.
‘So how is she feeling?’ Hansard asked the Secretary for Defence.
‘Not bad considering,’ Rutherford replied. He was calling from an encrypted cell phone, aboard Air Force One on his way home with President Abrams. It had been decided that it might be unsafe to stay in Stockholm considering what had occurred earlier that day.
‘Early thoughts on a reaction?’ Hansard asked next, pouring himself a measure of cognac into a cut crystal balloon.
‘Pretty much exactly like you thought,’ Rutherford confirmed. ‘You’ll know soon enough anyway, she’s gonna want to see you as soon as she gets back.’
‘Yes, she’s already sent word for me to meet her at the White House this evening,’ Hansard said casually, sipping from the amber liquid, savouring its flavour.
‘What about Bill?’ Rutherford asked tentatively.
‘We’ll see
. It doesn’t look good though, so I’m prepared to go with the plan.’
There was a pause on the other end of the line. ‘A shame,’ Rutherford said finally.
‘A damn shame,’ Hansard agreed. ‘But you know as well as I that you can’t make an omelette without breaking some eggs.’
7
Ensconced in the Presidential aircraft a thousand miles away, Rutherford’s blood ran cold.
He knew all too well that Charles Hansard had no problem whatsoever with breaking eggs. His absolute ruthlessness, disguised by the genteel manners of an older gentleman, was what made him so terribly effective in what he did. That, Rutherford thought, and his incredible intellect. Hansard’s intelligence combined with a relentlessness that bordered on the sociopathic, and it was a combination to be both admired and feared.
For his part, Rutherford felt both ways about the old man. But despite his personal feelings, he was in no doubt whatsoever that Hansard was the right man for the path the country was being led toward, a path that Rutherford fervently believed in and which Hansard himself was instrumental in planning.
‘You’re right, Charles,’ he agreed finally. ‘You’re right.’
Hansard always was.
8
Even after six years on the islands, Cole still found it strange to be celebrating Christmas Day in 24 degrees Celsius heat. Not that Christmases before his move had been exclusively in the depths of winter back in his hometown of Hamtramck, Michigan; many had been spent in even hotter climates, whether on exercise with the Australian SAS in the bone-dry deserts of the Northern Territories, or on operations in the sweltering jungles of Bolivia. It was just strange to be enjoying a family Christmas, at home, in such balmy weather.
As for the children, they’d never known any other way, and Cole watched with affection as Sarah kicked a ball to them on the hundred metres of white sand beach that had come with the property, the deep azure of the Caribbean stretching out from it as far as the eye could see. Cole was playing goalkeeper, and his over-the-top play-acting of trips and dives as Ben and Amy took their shots had both children in constant fits of giggles.
As Cole dived again onto the warm sand, the sight of his family warmed him immensely. He’d managed to avoid watching the news all morning, not wanting to spoil the fun his kids were having opening their presents. The simple joys of his own childhood Christmas mornings had been brought back to him, and he let himself think for a time about the family of Mark Kowalski – for he now thought of Kowalski as a separate person, entirely unrelated to himself. Since his official death in Pakistan, he accepted that he would never again see his parents, his brothers or sisters, or any other member of his old family, ever again. He knew they were all still alive and well back in the same old, small city near Detroit though, and that would have to be enough. At least he had fond memories of them.
Sarah’s memories of her own childhood were not so positive, Cole knew. Her mother had died when she was very young, and she had been raised by her father. He was uninterested in the extreme, however – as well as being inordinately busy – and she had really been raised by the housekeeper, Mrs Dyson, until she had reached her teens and decided she was old enough to raise herself.
The telephone rang then, from inside the house. ‘I’ll get it,’ said Cole, and he jogged back along the sand, going in through a large set of open French doors.
He picked up the landline handset, and an automatic message clicked on. It lasted just five seconds, and he hung up.
What could have happened since yesterday?
9
‘What evidence have we managed to get so far?’ asked President Danko at a virtual conference held via the US secure satellite system.
Jan Hanneskog, the Swedish Prime Minister, picked up the bat for that one. ‘Our intelligence services have identified the origin of the attackers as Han Chinese, from the various remains. We’ve also found remnants of Chinese-manufactured assault rifles and radio equipment, and the guided missile launcher is of a type used by both China and North Korea. Although it appears that the guidance systems on both launchers were mercifully faulty.’
‘We know all that,’ interjected Danko impatiently. ‘Do we know anything else? Ellen?’ He directed his enquiry to President Abrams, as the US was rightly regarded as having both the best electronic and the best human resources in the global intelligence community.
Abrams cleared her throat before speaking. ‘The Office of the Director of National Intelligence here in Washington has disseminated a full report this morning, detailing all that is presently known. All of you have a copy.’ She took a sip of water from the glass on the table in front of her, seeming to consider matters for a few short moments. ‘In essence, what we have is a group of people who happen to be from a specific Chinese ethnic group, utilising weapons and equipment known to be used by China and her allies. It certainly points a finger in the direction of the People’s Republic, but the evidence is circumstantial at best. Han Chinese are the largest ethnic group in China, and are also found all over the globe. And the weapons are available anywhere, from Afghanistan to America, to Europe itself. Thus far, we have no direct link between the PRC and the attackers. We’re working hard to identify the suspects and trace their movements prior to the attack, as well as tracing the origin of their equipment. But this sort of work takes time, as we all know.’
‘We do not have time!’ Danko bellowed. ‘We need to act, and act now!’ Once more, the giant fist slammed into the table.
Behind Abrams in the electronic communications room in the basement of White House West Wing, unseen by the projected images of the other participants of the conference call, Hansard smiled.
His report was getting exactly the reaction he had planned.
10
Just half an hour later, Cole was in his study, facing a wall of books that lined the solid mahogany shelves stretched from one side of the room to the other.
After receiving his telephone call, a recorded had voice simply announced ‘Please call your answer phone to retrieve your messages.’ The call forced Cole to immediately switch mindset. Although it was Christmas Day, dinner would just have to wait. He was being given a mission.
The recorded message had told him that he had an encrypted cipher to pick up, and the only time that ever happened was when his services were being called upon by his controller.
And so, instead of sitting down to Christmas dinner with his family, Cole found himself reaching for Volume IV of Churchill’s ‘The Second World War’ on the shelf directly in front of him. As he tilted the book off the shelf, a soft mechanical whirr emanated across the room as a section of the huge, solid bookcase retreated back into the wall before sliding away smoothly behind the rest. As the narrow stairway which wound its way down to the hidden basement was revealed, Cole found it hard to suppress a grin. It was terribly clichéd, he knew, but he loved it anyway. A lifetime of military training and secret intelligence work had still not jaded the excitement; inside, he was still the little boy reading his comic books and James Bond novels, dreaming of one day living that same peculiar lifestyle. It was an enthusiasm that had seen him through mission after mission, and that had allowed him to survive situations that would certainly have broken other men. He loved spending time with his family, of course; but only when the secret calls came did he once again realize that he needed the mission.
As he quickly descended the stairs, the bookcase slid shut behind him. At the bottom of the stairwell was a rather more stringent security measure than the cantilevered book – a ten-inch thick reinforced steel door. ‘Cole,’ he said as he approached it, the voice recognition software responding to his unique vocal pattern and sending an electronic message to the control panel to the side of the door, which popped open immediately. He entered an eight-digit code into the keypad, using each finger of both hands, one for each digit. The computer system accepted the code, whilst simultaneously checking Cole’s fingerprints against its files. Were Cole
to be compromised, for anybody to gain access to the hidden room they would need both of Cole’s hands and to know in which order each finger pressed each key; all elements were needed for validation. A retina scan onto Cole’s moving eyeball completed the checks. Overcautious perhaps, but Cole knew better than most the inherent dangers of his profession.
The team from the technical branch of the NSA that had installed Cole’s basement had been subjected to drug-based memory erasure after they had completed the work. Upon their return to the workrooms at Fort Meade, Maryland, they couldn’t even remember where they had been for the previous month.
For the hidden room was a room of secrets.
11
Cole seated himself at the cipher station in the small, armoured, underground room and started the process of retrieving his message. There were quicker methods, of course, but the old-fashioned cipher was still the most secure. They had proved themselves throughout history time and again, from the famous Enigma machine used by the Germans in World War II, to the incredible complexity of the NH67 ‘Swordfish’, used by both the American NSA and the British GCHQ. This was a modified example of just that system, which was now in its eighteenth generation. The original was nigh-on unbreakable, and the new NH67 was perhaps the most secure form of communication in the world; not totally secure, as anything made by man can be broken by man; but it was near as damn it.
After the normal, tortuous wait, the message finally came through, in plain text after the painstaking decoding:
START PREPARATIONS FOR MISSION TYPE 1 STOP FULL DETAILS TO BE PROVIDED BY C STOP C IS ENROUTE TO YOUR LOCATION NOW STOP MAKE NECESSARY ARRANGEMENTS TO RECEIVE HIM IN PRIVATE STOP SEND DETAILS BACK VIA THIS CHANNEL ONLY STOP END OF TRANSMISSION
