by Tom Marcus
‘Afternoon, ma’am, can I see some ID and your car pass, please.’
As Alex pulls out her civilian cover ID and laminated car pass, I can see, printed on the blue lanyard, the words ‘Fraud Prevention’. It’s obvious Alex has already been briefed on her cover and who knows what else while I’ve been drinking myself into oblivion. I feel a twitch of annoyance that I’ve been out of the loop, even though I was in no fit state to be briefed on anything. But now I want in. I don’t want anyone treating me like I’m not quite up to it. I’m anxious to get where we’re going and get started, and I’m starting to get pre-emptively pissed off with anyone treating me like a second-class member of the team, even though we haven’t actually met anyone else yet and less than twenty-four hours ago any sane person would have written me off as a drunken fuck-up.
Alex can see the dark look on my face. ‘Are you all right?’
‘Yeah, I’m good. Just want to get stuck in, you know?’
She nods. ‘That’s good. Me too.’
As we wind our way slowly through the camp, past what look like the barracks stores and two huge block buildings that I guess house the electrical substations needed to power the huge early warning radars, I realize I haven’t given any thought to how I am going to interact with my new team members, or – maybe more importantly – how they are going to interact with me. I might not know anything about them, but they’ll know all about me, and about what happened to Sarah and Joseph. They’ll be expecting a wreck, a broken man. Some of them might be full of sympathy. Others might not want to work alongside an emotional basket case. I have to make sure I put both groups straight, right from the off. At the funeral, I’d put my feelings about Sarah and Joseph in a box and sealed it up tight. From that moment, no one else was ever going to see that side of me. Ever. What they’ll see is the old Logan. The operator. Switched on to the environment, unflappable and now, because my heart went with my family, with absolutely no emotional weakness. Anyone who dares question my ability to operate on the ground will fucking regret it.
‘Yeah, just fucking try it,’ I mumble under my breath.
Alex puts a foot on the brake. ‘Sorry?’
‘Nothing. Nothing. Carry on. Where the hell is our new place, anyway? You sure you know where you’re going?’
She frowns, but there’s a hint of a smile in it. I guess Alex is pleased the Logan she’s known for years is starting to make a reappearance. As if on cue, we round a bend and the smooth tarmac we’ve been driving on gives way to rough concrete. There are weeds growing from between the slabs and it looks like we’re the first people to drive to this part of the camp for some time. Bending around the back of the substations, we bump along towards a pair of grimy roller-shutter doors.
‘Well, it’s not Thames House, that’s for sure.’
Our new home doesn’t look new at all. The roof is mostly covered in moss, which is starting to creep up the overly large chimney, the gutters are completely blocked and about to drop off the building any minute, and there isn’t a single window. It’s just a brick box, about fifty metres by about thirty wide, and looks as if it might cave in at any minute. The only clue that it might be a bit more robust than it looks is the discreet camera pointing down towards the roller doors and a new, very clean matt-black keypad stand.
‘I like it,’ I say.
Alex winds down the window and taps a six-digit code into the keypad. The shutters start to wind up with a smoothness that doesn’t fit with the building’s grimy exterior, and we enter what at first glance looks like a regular garage or workshop, with several cars parked along the far wall. Alex backs in alongside them. We always reverse park unless we’re on the ground operationally, where it’s better to blend in. There are a ton of reasons why we do it this way, but the main one is that the front of a vehicle is stronger than the back, so it’s much easier to drive your way out of an ambush facing forwards. Even though we are in relatively safe surroundings here, Alex’s decision shows how the manoeuvre becomes almost like muscle memory.
Killing the engine, we survey the ground floor of our new home. Most of the floor space is taken up by the parking area. Along one wall there’s a row of brand-new storage lockers, just like the ones at Thames House, and two doors marked ‘WC’. In the far corner is what looks like an incinerator – a big industrial-looking thing that I assume is there for burning sensitive material rather than heating the building. On the other side of the cars is a set of wrought-iron stairs leading to the upper level, where a gantry walkway runs around the building and gives access to numerous rooms around the outside. Alex and I glance at each other, clearly having the same thought: just like a prison. The only thing missing is the anti-suicide cargo net to catch you if you jumped – or were pushed – off the walkway. I feel light-headed for a moment, flashing back to the moment I almost decapitated myself.
Alex doesn’t notice and is already beckoning me out of the car with a brusque ‘Right, come on.’ We walk up the narrow stairs and onto the top floor. Following the sound of voices, we enter a low-ceilinged room which still smells of the plaster on the recently erected stud walls. A dozen white plastic garden chairs – four of them occupied – are ranged in a rough half-circle in front of a white formica table where a man in a dark suit, crisp white shirt and a military tie is sorting documents into neat piles. Jeremy Leyton-Hughes, the intelligence officer on the brothers’ case, with a direct line to the DG. Even if this unit was the DG’s baby, there was no way he could be directly tied to it; he needed to keep his hands clean, so it made sense that Leyton-Hughes would be heading it up. But that doesn’t necessarily mean I’m pleased to see him. I’ve always hated his arrogance towards us grunts on the ground. It feels like he sees operators as disposable objects, like a wet wipe he’s used to clean up a mess before discarding. Without looking up, he indicates two empty chairs. The talking abruptly stops, and as we make our way to sit down I give the other team members the once-over.
Three men. One woman. A couple of them look vaguely familiar, but I’ve definitely not met them properly before today. With me and Alex that makes six. Is this everybody or are the extra chairs waiting to be filled? My old team was way bigger than this. I wonder how we’ll be able to mount proper surveillance ops, let alone execute any of the more hands-on stuff. I give each person a nod out of courtesy, trying to pack as much meaning into the gesture as I can. They’re all used to evaluating body language, making instant risk assessments based on the way people carry themselves, so hopefully they’ll get the message loud and clear: expressions of sympathy not required. I wish we’d stopped off at a service station so I could have changed out of my funeral suit into my normal clothes. I might as well have a sign around my neck saying ‘Just Been to a Funeral’. As I sit down I unknot my tie and stuff it in my jacket pocket, just to hammer the message home.
Clearly no one is going to introduce themselves, but they look like an interesting bunch. Immediately on my left is a guy in his late thirties or early forties, wearing jeans and a black T-shirt and lounging so far back in his chair it’s in danger of tipping over. With his long black hair and a colourful tattoo of a Japanese koi carp that I can see disappearing under the sleeve of his T-shirt, he gives off a very different vibe to Leyton-Hughes’s military correctness. Next to him is the second woman in the group: early thirties, dressed like a mum running late on the school run. Despite her relaxed nature, her eyes suggest she is extremely aware of her surroundings. The type of look I’m increasingly used to seeing from worried mums on the streets. Then, at the opposite end of the row, there’s the two other men: an Asian guy dressed in grey shalwar kameez with black Nike Air Max trainers has a broad, open face that seems perpetually on the point of breaking into a grin; and a sharp-faced guy with short blond hair who meets my challenging look with an unreadable one of his own.
Leyton-Hughes finally stops shuffling his papers and straightens. A lean six-foot with a narrow face and close-cropped dark hair, he taps a pen sharply on t
he table to get our attention.
‘Right, everybody’s finally here.’
Did I imagine the slight emphasis on ‘finally’? I give him a hard stare, but he doesn’t blink and carries on.
‘Each of you was personally recruited into this unit by the director general, so I don’t need to tell you why we’re here or what our purpose is. And that’s the last time the DG will be mentioned within these walls. We have his full support, of course, but his position cannot be compromised. None of you will have any further direct communication with him, or with anyone else at Thames House. I will be the sole point of contact there. I will also be your operations officer.’
In my opinion, individuals who have risen through the ranks from being an operator within the surveillance teams make the best ops officers; they understand the challenges of being on the ground and what information you need and when. The intelligence officers who dual-role as operations officers normally lack the field experience that’s needed to make sure everything runs smoothly for us.
That is one problem with Jeremy Leyton-Hughes, but the other is that he is a complete twat.
He pauses to see if there are any dissenting voices. In practical terms, what he said made sense, but I don’t like the heavy-handed way he’s trying to establish his authority. Isn’t the whole point of the unit that it does away with all that hierarchical bollocks and just gets on with the job? Alex can sense I’m bristling and gives me a nudge. I get the message: calm down and give him a chance. I give her a little nod without turning. Fair enough. No point getting riled up before we’ve even started.
Leyton-Hughes continues. ‘Let me be absolutely clear. Officially we do not exist. As far as Thames House is concerned, we do not exist. What we, or you, will be doing, is not legal. Collectively and as individuals, we are totally deniable. If we need to refer to the unit among ourselves, we will call it Blindeye.’
Well, that made it crystal clear. I haven’t heard anyone use that phrase for a while, but some of the old boys talk about an operation being given a ‘blind eye’ during the Cold War days, when MI5 and MI6’s ops were still deniable. The term meant the operation was deemed illegal but necessary. No one would stop you, but if you got caught you were on your own. Sink or swim.
‘OK, good. Now, what are we supposed to be doing here? What’s our cover story? Obviously we’re on a military base, and you are all Fraud Prevention Officers with the DVLA, looking for untaxed vehicles all over the country. Hence the need for coming and going at all hours, in different vehicles. Hopefully no one will ask any questions, or poke their noses in here, but over the next few weeks and months it’d be just as well if a few of you occasionally use the RAF canteen and gym so you can start sowing the seeds of our cover story. Dropping “work-related” terms into conversation when they’re in earshot of you, mentioning DVLA, tax, fraud, that sort of thing. That way no one gets too interested in what we are doing.’ He grins. ‘Unless they’re driving an untaxed vehicle, of course.’
The Asian guy smiles dutifully.
On the face of it, it sounds a little far-fetched. Tax inspectors holed up in a secure military base? But I have to admit it’s actually totally plausible, as well as being nice and simple. Real estate is expensive and the British taxpayers are sick of their hard-earned money going into over-funded agencies, especially when those agencies are supposed to be collecting even more taxes. Plus, with the reduction in our military’s size over the past few years, there’s more space within camps like this. It won’t be a difficult cover to maintain.
‘Living your cover begins now. Which means your old identity goes in the bin – now. All your Security Service ID badges need to be handed in – to me. From this moment, you can NOT deploy with them or go back to Thames House.’ He taps a pile of manila folders. ‘And your new identities are all in here: cover IDs and addresses, fuel cards, credit cards, phones and keys to new team vehicles. Needless to say, the admin team who set all this up are off-site and have no knowledge of the use to which all this is going to be put.’
That must have been a tricky one to pull off, I think: new cars, bikes and vans; radios, new driving licenses with cover names to match our addresses; new passports. And even harder to hide all this activity within the Security Service. Just explaining why A4 surveillance teams had suddenly lost half a dozen or so experienced operators would require robust cover stories. Redundancies, medical retirements, private-sector job offers – whatever the reasons given for people leaving the teams, it would all have to look legit in order to pull this level of deniability off properly and allow us to operate long-term. We’re all nosey bastards by profession, and most MI5 employees, whether it be admin staff or operators on the ground, notice little things like staff being moved around.
‘Before you introduce yourselves to each other, I should mention one member of the team who isn’t here. Alan Woodburn is our tech. He’ll sort anything, from comms in here to your personal kit, and he’s currently working to make this place absolutely secure. This is one of two rooms in this building where your phones or radios won’t work, for instance.’
We all take our phones out to confirm that we don’t have a signal. I’d already noticed the metal mesh-work in between the plasterboard panels, making the room into a do-it-yourself Faraday cage, which would remove the threat of our phones being turned into mobile microphones for anyone trying to listen in to our briefings.
‘Communications and voice procedure will be as it was in your old A4 teams. You have a radio system that was bought by the service specifically for entry teams when they went out to install eavesdropping devices, but they ended up with the A4 surveillance radios and the kit was just lying around in a locker until Alan borrowed it. No one else on the planet has these radios or access to the encryption they use.’
I’d worked with Alan, and it’s good to know he has our backs tech-wise. There’s nothing he doesn’t know or can’t do with our operational kit. He designed some of the earliest versions of the technical kit we use today. I’ve always thought that if he’d gone into the private sector he’d be the billionaire CEO of some revolutionary tech company, but for whatever reason, he never has. The best thing about Alan is that he doesn’t just try and bodge something with bits of batteries and tape and see if it works, he’ll design it, think it through. He’s quick and always keeps in mind that the people using his stuff will be under pressure in challenging conditions, so he tries to keep it simple. It’s easy to fuck up a complicated piece of tech when surrounded by terrorists, unless it’s as simple as possible.
‘Alan’s tech bay is on the ground floor. As I said, his first priority is getting the building’s security up to scratch, but tomorrow he’ll be handing out some more bits of kit. Before your first briefing at 0900 hours.’ Leyton-Hughes sees the raised eyebrows among the team. ‘I don’t need to tell you, we don’t have time for the usual protocols. We have to hit the ground running. I’m going to hand out your new IDs etcetera, everything you’ll need, then I suggest you get to know each other. Tomorrow morning you’ll be back on the ground.’ With that he scoops up the folders, dumps them on the nearest empty chair, straightens his tie and walks out.
For a moment, no one says anything. If they have questions, Leyton-Hughes is no longer here to answer them. Better get used to it, I think. That’s his style.
Alex leans across and starts sorting through the folders. She takes one for herself and hands me mine. The others find their own.
I dump the contents on my lap. One completely genuine British passport in the name of Anthony Davies, a driving license to match, with cover address. Credit card in the same name, Audi car keys, presumably to the grey S3 parked downstairs, a phone and charger. My civilian ID card to get onto the base is in my bag, in Alex’s car. Good to go then. I just need whatever goodies Alan is going to hand out. I drop everything back in the folder, place it on the floor and sit back while everyone else finishes sorting through their stuff. There is an awkward silence as every
one waits for someone else to kick things off. I decide to seize the moment.
‘Right, I’m Logan. Before A4, I was Military Special Operations. Before that, regular army.’ I pause. What else is there to say? As far as I’m concerned, when I handed in my Thames House ID, my old identity would be incinerated along with it. There is no point in telling them personal details about someone who no longer exists. I might as well just make a clean break. I realize it’s different for them. They’ll be living two identities from now on, as they shuttle between home and the alternative world of Blindeye. For me it will be a lot simpler. I only have one identity now and one home: this soulless warehouse on a windswept RAF base in the middle of nowhere.
And this little group of strangers is my new family.
They collectively realize I’m not going to say any more, and some of the tension leaves the room. I can tell they’re relieved not to have to confront what happened to me.
The Asian guy takes up the baton. ‘OK. Good to meet you, Logan. My name’s Riaz. I’m currently – I should say I was until five minutes ago – A4, same as you. The Navy before that, but for some reason they thought I’d do better sitting in a van all day and pissing in a bottle than commanding a nuclear destroyer. Go figure.’
That gets a laugh and the atmosphere lightens even further. Alex is next to step up to the plate. ‘I’m Alex. Background, Royal Signals. Mostly ride bikes with A4. I hope they’ve given me a good one.’
The other woman grins. ‘Claire. I was an avionics technician before joining A4. Army. Nice to meet you.’
‘And I’m Craig,’ says the blond guy. ‘I went straight into the Service after . . . university. Found my niche in A4. Good to be here.’
