Lethal Sky

by Greg Barron

  Up ahead he can see the first dull lumps on the sea floor. Three bodies together. All have been mauled to some degree by sharks and other sea creatures, limbs and other body parts are missing.

  Jeff has seen bodies underwater before, but the sight of ropes tied to concrete building blocks feels like an icy hand on his throat. There are more ahead. He signals a change in formation, the line compressing inwards now, men equipped with the powerheads taking position to protect the formation.

  The sharks, however, seem totally intent on their prey. Some bodies have broken free from their ropes and levitate like ghosts in the water, the sharks rushing in and taking mouthfuls of rotting flesh.

  As they move on they see dozens, if not hundreds, of bodies, in clusters or alone. Body parts, worried at by sharks and small fish, leaving a mist of rotten particles behind them, float through the water.

  One of the other divers, a young Brooklyn Catholic called Martin, crosses himself.

  Jeff stops, and uses a hand signal to order the others to come in. He is fairly sure that they will need to bring a couple of cadavers up so the forensics guys can get to work on them. He issues orders for ropes and markers to go up so the grisly samples can be winched up from the surface. Distasteful work, but relatively quick; a few minutes later they begin the ascent under strict time control from the Seiko on Jeff’s wrist.

  The decompression process takes almost twenty minutes, but finally they climb up into the Seahawk. Jeff tears the mask from his face and uses the chopper’s radio comms to call Diego Garcia.

  ‘This is Deep Sea Team Sierra. There are bodies down there, hundreds of them. It’s a fucking charnel house.’

  THIRTY-SIX

  LONDON

  LOCAL TIME: 0630

  Using the misty early morning as cover, Captain Walid brings the Isra to a stop a couple of miles out from the sea channel of the River Roach, the waterway that divides the lush green farmland of Foulness Island from the mainland. Their position, he estimates, is about ten nautical miles from where they had been at anchor the previous night.

  Walid is tired but satisfied, and before he settles down to sleep in his cabin he sits at his desk and fills out a complete set of fresh paperwork, all in the name Lucky Swan. The mere sight of A4 paper sheets with their officiously worded questions is offensive to him. He grumbles under his breath as he writes, wanting only to climb into his cot and go to sleep.

  Finally, he faxes off the forms and, pleased that he’s done everything necessary to pull off the subterfuge, pours himself a small glass of absinthe for a nightcap.

  There is a knock on the cabin door.

  ‘Who is it?’

  Cassie appears, dressed in track pants and a thick woollen pullover. He has never seen her without make-up before. She looks younger.

  He grunts. ‘What are you doing here?’

  She places one hand on the jamb and swings inward. ‘Nothing much. Just wondered if you wanted to see something.’

  Walid drops his eyes to her boobs pushing against the fabric of her top.

  Cassie laughs. ‘Not that, naughty boy. Something even better.’

  He coughs to clear his throat. ‘Like what?’

  She raises her forefinger and crooks it in invitation. ‘I’ll show you.’

  Walid follows her into the owner’s cabin. Badi had ordered its construction during the refit in Oman. He’s not sure how much the refit cost, but it must have been millions. The carpets are pure wool, and the walls panelled in Lebanese cedar. Cassie leads him through into Badi’s bedroom.

  Walid has not entered that sacrosanct space since the refit was completed. ‘More like a football pitch than a bed,’ he mutters.

  ‘Doesn’t get much use, I can tell you,’ Cassie says. ‘He makes me sleep in a fucking cupboard.’ She walks to the wardrobe and opens the door, revealing a gleaming Chubb safe. ‘That’s Badi’s personal safe. Do you want to have a look?’

  Walid shakes his head slowly. ‘Are you mad? He’ll kill us both. And we don’t have the combination.’

  ‘Yes I do, I’ve watched him open it. Lots of times. I memorised the numbers.’

  Walid feels a spike of avarice so intense it’s like physical pain. ‘If you watched him, how come you didn’t see inside?’

  ‘I have, just a little — there’s money in there, lots of it. Other things too.’

  ‘Lots of money?’

  ‘Stacks.’

  ‘OK. You open and we look. That’s all.’

  Cassie grins and falls to her knees in front of the safe. Walid can see the outline of her body through her clothes, the smooth line of her hips swelling into her arse. Soon, when Badi pays him, he will be rich enough to afford such a girl every night of the week. He is crazy to risk that for nothing, just for a look inside the safe, but he can’t help himself.

  It takes the girl two attempts before the massive iron door swings open. He falls to his knees beside her and looks inside. The bottom section is wall-to-wall banknotes, joined with elastic bands at neat intervals.

  Cassie reaches in and removes one fat bundle, shaking her head in disbelief, laughing softly. ‘Would you look at this?’

  ‘Be careful,’ Walid snaps. ‘He will see if anything is changed.’ Even as he speaks, however, his eyes fall to the stack of notes. United States hundred dollar bills. ‘Mother of heaven, there is surely not so much money in the world.’

  Cassie thumbs through the stack, then turns to grin at him. ‘There’s about twenty grand in each stack. There’s millions here. And pound notes too, look.’ She points at sheaves of larger banknotes to one side.

  ‘Put it back now,’ Walid hisses. ‘And close the safe.’

  ‘Wait a minute …’ her voice is seductive, melodic. ‘I want to see what else is in here.’

  She puts the money back exactly as it was, then delves into the top shelf. Blister packs of pharmaceuticals with a brand name unfamiliar to Walid.

  ‘What is it?’

  Cassie starts to read the ingredient list aloud. She dissolves into laughter. Walid joins in with her. Beside the main package there are loose, smaller packages and a store of small hypodermic needles.

  ‘So that’s his little secret,’ she smiles.

  Walid stops laughing. ‘Close the safe now.’

  The redhead places one hand on Walid’s leg, above the knee. He can smell her fragrance. ‘You have a small boat onboard, don’t you?’

  ‘Yes, of course.’ Walid feels dizzy. ‘There is a ship’s tender on davits at the stern.’

  ‘If we wanted, you and I could take half the money each, split it into a couple of suitcases and head for shore.’

  Walid brushes her hand away. ‘Except we are not that stupid. Badi would find and kill us before we spend one tenth of this. You know what he’s like.’

  ‘Yes, I know. He likes to kill.’

  ‘Why you with him anyway?’

  Cassie raises herself on the floor, squares her shoulders. ‘I grew up in Jacksonville, Florida. You been there?’

  ‘Maybe, long ago when I was just a dumb seaman.’

  ‘Well it’s a hole. We lived in a slum on the Westside — a shitbox of a house with holes in the walls. My pa was a crewman on a freighter. When he was home, which wasn’t much, thankfully, he used to kick Ma round the kitchen every night, then he’d come and try to force himself on me, until I started taking a kitchen knife to bed and pricked his hairy belly one night.’

  ‘So how you meet Badi?’

  ‘I got a job in the kitchen on a cruise ship — bummed around the world. Jumped ship in Dubai. Made myself available if you know what I mean. After a while I started working as a hostess in Riyadh. A hooker by any other name, but I was making good money, staying in apartments and hotel rooms I could only ever have dreamed of. Some of those sons of bitches were almost as cruel as Badi. He chose me one night and took a shine to me. I saw a chance to land the real money …’

  ‘Close the safe, Cassie.’

  She nods, and the
iron door bangs closed. They both stand. Walid knows that this is a turning point. He has to be strong. She touches his arm, fingers curling around his forearm. ‘You can have me, if you like.’

  Walid points down at the safe. ‘No. You are as dangerous as the money. More maybe. Go get sleep, plenty will happen soon.’ Before he can weaken, on either count, he turns and strides from the cabin.

  The primary response to any terrorist threat in the United Kingdom is known as CONTEST, a loose acronym for ‘Counter Terrorism Strategy’. In essence it is a committee made up of the main players in UK security, in order to coordinate responses and prevent duplication or communication breakdown. The meeting convenes in a purpose-built room at Number 70 Whitehall.

  Despite the early hour, the Cabinet Office Briefing Room, usually shortened to COBRA, is crowded. Tom Mossel walks to his seat, sits down, and folds his arms across his chest. In his mind he is back at Eton, pinged by one of the seniors for smoking between the chapel and the ‘fives’ handball courts, waiting for the housemaster to carry out his sentence. In other words, the shit is about to hit the fan in a big way.

  He clears his throat. ‘I have just been informed by the Home Secretary that five high-tech unmanned aerial vehicles have been taken via a technique known as spoofing by persons unknown and may now be in the hands of a group known to be hostile to the people of Great Britain.

  ‘These units have a one-way deployment range of at least three hundred kilometres and are capable of being loaded with the biological weapons we know they possess and sent over London, Birmingham, Western France … the units are in a Pantech truck now heading towards central London.

  ‘Ground and air assets are in position, but a thick fog is causing difficulties. In addition, the vehicle has entered early morning commuter traffic. A plan is in effect to isolate and stop the vehicle at the Eastern Avenue Interchange using SAS and 2CG troops. We see this as our best chance at neutralising the threat without collateral damage at this stage.

  ‘Let me just assure everyone of the seriousness of this situation. Many of you don’t know enough to be afraid. An example it pains me to use is that of Gruinard Island, off the coast of Scotland. In 1942 our military scientists conducted tests using anthrax as a weapon there. They placed anthrax broadcasters on poles and killed live sheep at varying distances …’

  There is a mutter of unease from the floor, but Tom goes on.

  ‘That island remained contaminated, not just to humans but to all mammals, until it was finally cleaned up at a cost of many millions of pounds, half a century later. Worse. I once had the experience of travelling with an American clean-up team to Vozrozhdeniye Island in the Aral Sea, where the Russians tested their biological weapons before the break-up of the Union and the island reverted to Kazakhstan and Uzbekistan. On that desolate island we found a deserted town of one and a half thousand people, once called Kantubek. We found warehouses of chemical equipment. Empty. We found streets and schools, barracks and music halls. Halls of cages where they kept animals for testing, from mice, rabbits and monkeys to horses. I stopped at empty pedestrian crossings and, in my imagination, heard children laugh, saw them hold hands and cross the road. I saw empty tanks and cars where they had been abandoned.’

  The room is absolutely silent. Every eye on Tom Mossel as he takes a moment to find the next words.

  ‘The death of London at the hands of these madmen is something beyond your nightmares. Vozrozhdeniye Island gave me a glimpse of that future. Believe me when I tell you that we cannot let that future come to pass.’

  The Cabinet Office Briefing Room has a fireplace behind the PM, who sits in the centre of the long table, the green baize on the surface half hidden by tidy piles of documents.

  ‘If these drones are packed with anthrax and deployed, can we destroy them?’

  ‘We will, if we can see them. They are stealthy. They generate almost no heat. They use LPIR (Low Probability of Intercept) radars, laser designators and low observable features including a matt-neutral skin coating and smooth corners. Once they go above about five thousand feet no one can see them from the ground either, and you’d only see them from the air by accident.’

  ‘These people spoofed our drones in the first place. Why can’t we spoof them back?’

  ‘It’s possible, but difficult. Once they are in the air we’d have to find them, get reasonably physically close, from what I understand, then we need someone with the technical skills. From the company itself, two of the three main technicians, including the owner, are dead. The other one is in shock in Saint Bartholomew’s hospital, but apparently he was merely a trained operator, not up on the technical side. I can only think of one other person who might have any chance at this, and he’s rather inaccessible.’

  The PM leans forward, hands flat on the green baize table runner. ‘Out with it, man, who are you talking about?’

  ‘A year or two ago we were approached to attempt an electronic attack on several Defence-approved projects, to test for security. Apparently the Parliamentary Committee was worried — quite rightly it turns out — that semi-autonomous machines might be vulnerable to electronic attack. The Cluster Drone project was one of them. Our IT leader set up a system to take control of the machines in the air. He succeeded, and the company then developed defences against his technique, with his input. If anyone can do it again I’m sure it’s him.’

  ‘Who is this person?’

  ‘Julian Weiss.’

  ‘Good God, the traitor.’

  ‘Yes, the traitor.’

  ‘Get him here, Tom, it’s worth a try. I recall you telling me that he’s unbeatable with a computer in his hands. Besides, let him atone for his sins. There’s a certain justice in that.’

  Mossel looks down. ‘Very well. I agree that it’s worth a try … but he might not be easy to find.’

  Using one of the private rooms adjoining the CONTEST room, Mossel calls the Intelligence Liaison at the British High Commission in Myanmar. The line almost rings out before a distant voice comes on. ‘Tom. What’s happening?’

  ‘I’m calling about Julian Weiss. Do you know where he is?’

  ‘Oh yes … we’re monitoring him. He went up north into the boondocks a while ago — half expected him to end up ransomed by Kachin rebels or something. We lost track for a few weeks and then he popped back here into Yangon. Hardly seen him for months.’

  ‘You know where he is, though?’

  ‘Of course, dear boy.’

  ‘Do me a favour, get him on the first flight to London.’

  ‘What if he doesn’t want to play along? Arrest him?’

  ‘Tell him that Tom Mossel sent you. Tell him that he has a chance to redeem himself.’

  ‘Do you think that will work?’

  ‘If it doesn’t, tell him that we’ll reconsider this entire arrangement. Now hurry.’

  ‘I’ll get straight onto it after lunch — there’s this quite excellent restaurant downtown called Monsoon, next time you come we’ll have to …’

  ‘My dear Christopher, not to put too fine a point on this, but I don’t give a damn about your lunch. Get onto it right now.’

  THIRTY-SEVEN

  LONDON

  LOCAL TIME: 0630

  Eddie Wilder’s phone vibrates on the bedside table. He wakes and opens an app popular with teens. Snapchat. Images are sent, but are deleted from the servers within a few seconds of the recipient viewing it.

  Groups such as the one Eddie belongs to have found Snapchat an excellent mode of communication. Because images are sent, not text, there are no keywords for clandestine agencies to search for. OCR programs are easy to fool, by using non-standard letters. Even better, within seconds of a message being viewed, it dissolves into digital garbage, lost in the sheer volume of millions of images per hour of teens sending endless selfies.

  The image that has just arrived in his Snapchat account shows a section of a lined pad, on which a series of letters and numbers have been written.

/>   RP. 0700 TC

  Eddie has no trouble translating: Regent’s Park. 7 a.m. The message is from TC — Terry Caldwell, a highly placed cop and member of the Crusaders group.

  The pixels that made up the image disappear into nothing. Eddie’s body shivers with anticipation. This is big. It must be for Terry to take such a risk.

  Eddie sits on the train, alone, heading into the city, the carriage scattered with early commuters. He knows that Terry would not have contacted him unless his information was important. Something is brewing. Something big. He should know, being right at the top tier of leadership of the British right-wing group the Crusaders, the latest and biggest of the many manifestations of British racism over the years.

  Eddie’s own social and political development is as much a product of his upbringing and environment as his own deep-seated bigotry. He was born in Lambeth in 1984, not far from Brixton, a predominately black London suburb, and a minor centre of the Pakistani migration that began with efforts to satisfy a skilled-labour shortage.

  One winter Eddie’s father lost his job, along with many of his co-workers. He came home red-faced, fists clenched, unable to see the pattern of de-industrialisation that was sweeping the West.

  ‘You watch,’ he growled to his wife, ‘they sack us poor bastards and in two weeks they’ll hire Pakis at half the rate.’

  That Friday night, like so many others, Eddie sat outside the White Horse Inn listening to the men talk as they downed pints of ale and ate greasy salted chips. There was talk of revenge, not on the company that laid them off, but on the ‘brown-skinned bastards who stole our jobs’.

  Later, his father came home with bleeding knuckles and blood on his boots. There was a gleam of triumph in his eyes, and, as always, beer on his breath. To Eddie, beer was what men smelled like, and he loved his fist-throwing father; loved to hear his ringing laugh at his own jokes. Eddie grew up in a world of football violence, brown bottles and chronic unemployment. He was smart enough to rank in the top ten per cent at school, but left after his third year of secondary school.