There’s something to be said for a story that starts like a James Bond movie, throwing you straight in the deep end, a perfect way of getting to know the main character, David, or is that Alistair?
A retired spy, well, not so much a spy as a retired errand boy, David’s rather wry description of his talents, and a woman that most men would give their left arm for, not exactly the ideal couple, but there is a spark in a meeting that may or may not have been a setup.
But as the story progressed, the question I kept asking myself was why he’d bother.
And, page after unrelenting page, you find out.
Susan is exactly the sort of woman to pique his interest. Then, inexplicably, she disappears. That might have been the end of it, but Prendergast, that shadowy enigma, David’s ex-boss who loves playing games with real people, gives him an ultimatum: find her or come back to work.
Nothing like an offer that’s a double-edged sword!
A dragon for a mother, a sister he didn’t know about, Susan’s BFF who is not what she seems or a friend indeed, and Susan’s father, who, up till David meets her, couldn’t be less interested, his nemesis proves to be the impossible dream, and he’s always just that one step behind.
When the rollercoaster finally came to a halt, and I could start breathing again, it was an ending that was completely unexpected.
This story is now on the list to be finished so over the new few weeks, expect a new episode every few days.
The reason why new episodes have been sporadic, there are also other stories to write, and I’m not very good at prioritizing.
But, here we are, a few minutes opened up and it didn’t take long to get back into the groove.
Things are about to get complicated…
Behind me, I could see Dobbin moving towards the door.
“You really don’t want to do this,” I said.
“He offered me a better deal.”
“I give you these, you will probably have about an hour, two at the most before he kills you.”
She shrugged. She was a deadly shot, so it was not an option to talk her out of it. I threw the plastic bag to her.
“This way, at least, you live. You’re good, but too trusting.”
Dobbin opened the door. “Enough chit-chat; let’s go before someone else turns up. Walk away Jackson, don’t do anything you’ll regret.”
I watched them leave, then turned to Anna. “This should please you immensely.”
“You mean you couldn’t see it coming? Hell, with all that analysis it wasn’t hard to work out Dobbin was the one orchestrating everything.”
I pulled out my phone and dialled Joanne’s number. When she answered I said, “They just left.”
“With the data?”
“With what they think is the data.”
“You have it?”
“No. O’Connell had it, and someone got to him. He’s dead next door, by the way, and we have two medical cases, one relatively serious, both requiring an ambulance sooner rather than later.”
“On it. And thanks.”
I went over to Anna and sat beside her.
Jan was glaring at us. “You said no one would get shot.”
We watched her slide over and join us against the wall.
“I said Jennifer was an unknown quantity. I didn’t think she’d take me so literally, but on the other hand, the signs were there. In training, she shot at three of the recruits.”
“Well, she didn’t recognise me, which, I guess, is something.”
“Who are you again?” Jan asked her.
“Yolanda. I was at the training camp with Sam. Severin made a pass at me, I kicked him in the you know what’s, and he kicked me out. I never gave back the comms unit, and I used to listen in to the exercises and discovered they’d finally been activated, so I went to have a look. Things got very scary when the target started taking out the surveillance team. They were out of their depth. Then I caught up with Sam, called him, and asked him what was going on. He said the target was going to the café and for me to go around the back, no time for hello’s. A minute or so later I see a guy toss something into the back of the café and take off. Then it goes up and all hell broke loose. Naturally, I got the hell out of there, and called him later, asked if he needed some off-book help, and here I am.”
“Could have been the death of you.”
“Nah. Sam and I were the best two of that bunch, and then maybe Jennifer. Damn that bitch to hell now. Hope they give us five minutes with her.”
“So,” I could see Jan was still wrestling with details. “Anna died in that explosion?”
“Yes.”
“Did you know who Anna was?”
“Not at first, but when I saw a photo of her, and the similarities I shared with her, Sam suggested I take her place, and we took it from there. Sam told me where I could find O’Connell and it wasn’t hard to reconnect, it was six months and he didn’t notice the changes in Anna, which, to me, is a sign of bad tradecraft. He still had the money, I pretended to still have the USB but not with me but back at the flat. He tested the USB and found the right level of encryption, then gave me the five million pounds, and we parted. Now he’s dead. When Sam arrived, I thought it was going to be me next.”
“How did you know what sort of encryption was on the USB?”
Good question. Jan was thinking outside the box, which is what any agent should be doing.
“We spend a few weeks off and on in training, studying encryption techniques, but concentrated on one, for reasons we were never told. I realized that it was related to the eventual mission. It wasn’t hard to emulate. I made up about a dozen USBs just in case.”
Tara Benson was not my idea of a typical nuclear physicist, but then I always had been a bad judge of matching occupations to personnel.
I had read her biography and service record, mainly the one-paragraph summary, and it said she was one of the best in the world.
Criteria indeed for anyone on this ship apparently, though I didn’t regard myself as fitting into the category, someone must have thought I had the potential.
On the way down I had a few moments to contemplate her ordeal, not only being taken prisoner, but being transported back in the manner we had used, when it was a means I would not willingly use on myself.
It was why the first thought I had when I saw her was to apologise.
She was sitting in one of the special chairs that could analyse everything about you, what ailed you, what diseases you had, the state of your body.
When I had my first medical examination, they put me in an earlier model of that chair and it picked up the missing anatomical parts, the fact I once had several broken bones, that I was slightly anaemic, and the reason why I sometimes had bouts of indigestion.
They fixed all that, and a slight imperfection in my eyesight which I didn’t know about.
The doctor was looking at the monitor when I arrived.
“How is she?”
“Better than we expected. Other than being exposed to radiation for longer than prescribed, and which we can fix, she is in perfect health.”
“Mentally?”
“You can ask her yourself. I’m about to sign off on her going back to work, after a good night’s sleep.”
He spoke to her for a minute or so, then helped her up out of the chair.
“I assume you are the new captain,” she said when she saw me.
“Not by choice, but for the time being, yes.”
“I have a few questions, if I may?”
“Now?”
“If it’s possible”
There was a consultation room free, so I escorted her inside and closed the door. It was odd, I thought, that she sat behind the desk.
I also felt like she was making a mental assessment of me, perhaps thinking that I was not what she might have considered Captain material. To a certain extent, I may have once agreed with her, because everyone expected a captain to be much older and therefore wiser.
It was an analogy I’d heard before.
“Whose idea was it to transport me across to this vessel?”
I had expected that the means might be questionable, but in the moment, and considered along with the course of action I’d taken, it was the right decision.
“Mine. After discussion, of course, with the relevant experts. The risk was acceptable, proven by the fact you’re here now, and relatively unharmed.”
“It was a surprise, I’ll grant you that, and a first. From what I managed to overhear, the plutonium was sent down to their bunker to provide power to the facility, under the surface of the moon, and only accessible by the transporter. Given the risks, it also surprised me they were so committed to using it.”
“Since most of that crew were escaped convicts from the Mars mining prison, any means would be acceptable.”
“Prisoners, not aliens?”
“Yes. The ships were old personnel transports, and the big ship, where you were being held, an old freighter.”
“The Orion.”
I knew it well and surprised that I’d not recognised it. They had managed to disguise it well.
“A ship, I’m sure, you might be familiar with,” she added.
Perhaps my captain’s bland expression was not so bland.
“Ancient history,” I said, “from a time that I would rather leave in the past.”
There was a story, and not a pretty one, of a voyage not so long after commissioning, where systems failed and crew members died, all part of the experience in those early years in space. The quest for profits had outweighed the necessity for proper testing, and we had borne the brunt of the ‘test as you go’ mentality that had reigned before Space Command had taken over.
“You must tell me, one day.”
Her expression was one of curiosity and not one to be mistaken for anything else.
“Is there anything else?”
“If you are considering retrieving the plutonium, let me know and I’ll be happy to help. I suspect the people on Venus would like to see it sooner rather than later.”
“You know where this base is?”
“Of course.”
“Good. I’ll let you know after I’ve spoken to the security people.”
Then he checked behind him in case he was being followed. He was not. He ducked under an awning as another gust of wind shook it, avoiding a gush of water that fell like a waterfall, then moved on.
Was it Clara Higgins, an informant and a club singer? He had interviewed her for a case, and they hit it off. She worked at the ‘Blue Note’. Her voice was pure velvet and smoke, a sultry husky drawl that had bought and sold a dozen cops and PI’s before him.
She was leaning against his car six weeks ago, smelling of gin and expensive perfume, whispering about a crime that desperate men were about to commit.
It could be her. She lived in the shadows, but she usually called him Jackie. The caller didn’t.
Was it Lydia Vance, now Rawlings, his sister, a woman variously in and out of trouble, with a no-good husband he had offered to sort out?
She had a voice that had grown raspy over time from a heavy bourbon habit she said was the only thing keeping her sane.
Their last conversation was a tense, midnight phone call eight months ago, her voice thick and gravelly as she begged for money to clear a gambling debt.
No, she didn’t have the stomach for whatever dangerous game this was.
He shook his head, and the water dripped from his hat brim. Another glance up and down the road before turning the next corner. Three suspects, but they were heading in a different direction.
He turned the corner, the lane narrowing, this time not stopping to look up at the rain. It was falling harder, and he could hear the sound of the drops hitting the ground.
It was the sort of rain that made a familiar sound.
It bounced off the walls of the lane, as did other sounds, though he could not say where they came from. An arguing voice came from above, distorted by the rain and the surrounding walls.
The theatre alleyway was looming ahead, a dark chasm where anyone or anything could be waiting. Jack slowed his pace as his heart rate increased, and he could feel the sweat from walking fast in anticipation.
Was it Sarah Kelly, the missing journalist? She was the nosy type who pushed buttons and limits, but good at her job. He had been quietly helping her. Her voice was naturally husky, especially when tired and working a lead.
She was sitting on his office desk just three weeks before, her voice dropping to an intense, quiet rasp as she showed him some evidence and city hall shenanigans. Two days later she vanished.
The cadence matched perfectly. Was she alive? Was she trying to get a message to him, or was it a trap?
Could be, but…
Was it May Lin, the ex-detective he had just taken on? She had a cold, raspy cough for the last week from a flu that she refused to take time off to get better.
Just yesterday, at their early morning meet-up at the diner, her voice was a rough, gravelly whisper, warning him that she heard on the grapevine that Internal Affairs was investigating his old cases when he was a cop.
If it was her, why the disguise?
He stopped just short of the turn into the alley. A sixth sense sent a shiver down his spine. The rain eased. His mind settled on two candidates: a desperate Sarah Kelly trying to surface from the dead, and a compromised May Lin playing a double game.
He turned into the narrow, dark alleyway, the neon lights from the main road reflecting in the pools of water that covered the cobblestones at the entrance.
He cursed, just remembering the cracks in the sole of the left shoe as the water seeped in, cold and uncompromising.
He pulled his hat down low, covering his face in case CCTV cameras had recently been installed. Then he looked up and saw a blinking red light mounted near the entrance.
He scurried past, close to the wall.
He travelled the full length of the alleyway, checking doorways and hiding spots for assailants, his hand on the gun in his pocket, just in case.
It was eerily silent, except for the occasional sound of running water. He saw the telephone booth, now disused and grimy, and walked past it, barely able to make out where any evidence might be, before continuing.
On one side, a single lamp cast a dim glow over the telephone itself, but it was not strong enough to reach the ground.
If he was being observed, it would not do to let them know the telephone booth was his destination. Not yet.
He slowly returned as the rain eased, as if on cue. Above him, several high windows were lit, casting a pale yellowish light into the night. They did not illuminate the alley.
He was here. Now. As there was no evidence, he would wait. Perhaps the husky-voiced woman would come, thrust an envelope into his hands and then disappear. Dressed in black, she could easily fade into the gloom.
The only sounds now were his breathing and raindrops hitting metal. Leaning against the telephone booth, he was right under a steady drip onto his hat, so regular, so mesmerising, he closed his eyes for a moment and tried to massage away the tiredness.
The steady drip onto his hat nearly caused him to miss the beam of light from above. It shone directly on a plain, stained and creased envelope sitting atop the pile of rubbish that had accumulated against the booth.
Just as he leaned down to pick it up, the light snapped off, plunging the area into darkness. The sudden change left him temporarily blind.
“Go to the diner and wait.”
The same husky voice. He swivelled around, but all he could see was darkness, punctuated by a rim of light from the bulb above, and a sloshing sound.
The woman escaping?
It took two minutes for his sight to return. He had the envelope, but no clue as to the identity of the woman.
He took his torch out of the other coat pocket and opened the envelope. It contained a photograph.
It was a photograph of him and Jackson Pike, taken a year ago when Vance was a cop investigating a break-in at City Hall. Pike was alleged to have staged the break-in to obtain evidence of a rigged election. The photograph showed Pike handing Vance an envelope.
Evidence of what? Was Vance part of a cover-up? There had been evidence, but it was not Vance who was the guilty party. It had been his partner, Elroy Baggins. Two weeks before, Elroy had been killed in a shootout.
Baggins had died and had taken the truth with him, leaving Vance to explain the unexplainable: that the dead officer was corrupt. That maybe he was guilty by association or tarred with the same brush. It was why he quit. He had been very close to finding the proof, and then the boss called him into the office and gave him a choice: resign or be destroyed.
In the end, he had no choice.
Now, Vance figured, if they couldn’t get Baggins, they would come after him.
May Lin had tried to warn him, but his money was now on Sarah. She had somehow got hold of the internal affairs evidence and had got the message to Jack via May.
Another look around the alley showed nothing. She had gone.
There was nothing for it, except to go to the diner and wait.
50 photographs, 50 stories, of which there is one of the 50 below.
They all start with –
A picture paints … well, as many words as you like. For instance:
And, the story:
Have you ever watched your hopes and dreams simply fly away?
Everything I thought I wanted and needed had just left in an aeroplane, and although I said I was not going to, I came to the airport to see the plane leave. Not the person on it, that would have been far too difficult and emotional, but perhaps it was symbolic, the end of one life and the start of another.
But no matter what I thought or felt, we had both come to the right decision. She needed the opportunity to spread her wings. It was probably not the best idea for her to apply for the job without telling me, but I understood her reasons.
She was in a rut. Though her job was a very good one, it was not as demanding as she had expected, particularly after the last promotion, but with it came resentment from others on her level that she, the youngest of the group, would get the position.
It was something that had been weighing her down for the last three months, and if she noticed it, the late nights, the moodiness, sometimes a flash of temper. I knew she had one; no one could have such red hair and not, but she had always kept it in check.
And then there was us, together, and after seven years, it felt like we were going nowhere. Perhaps that was down to my lack of ambition, and though she never said it, lack of sophistication. It hadn’t been an issue, well, not until her last promotion, and the fact that she had to entertain more, and frankly, I felt like an embarrassment to her.
So, there it was, three days ago, the beginning of the weekend, and we had planned to go away for a few days and take stock. We both acknowledged we needed to talk, but it never seemed the right time.
It was then that she said she had quit her job and found a new one. Starting the following Monday.
Ok, that took me by surprise, not so much that it was something I sort of guessed might happen, but that she would just blurt it out.
I think that right then, at that moment, I could feel her frustration with everything around her.
What surprised her was my reaction. None.
I simply asked who, where, and when.
A world-class newspaper in New York, and she had to be there in a week.
A week.
It was all the time I had left with her.
I remember just shrugging and asking if the planned weekend away was off.
She stood on the other side of the kitchen counter, hands around a cup of coffee she had just poured, and that one thing I remembered was the lone tear that ran down her cheek.
Is that all you want to know?
I did, yes, but we had lost the intimacy we used to have, where she would have told me what was happening, and we would have brainstormed solutions. I might be a cabinet maker, but I still had a brain, was what I overheard her tell a friend once.
There’s not much to ask, I said. You’ve been desperately unhappy and haven’t been able to hide it all that well, you have been under a lot of pressure trying to deal with a group of troglodytes, and you’ve been leaning on Bentley’s shoulder instead of mine, and I get it, he’s got more experience in that place, and the politics that go with it, and is still an ally.
Her immediate superior was instrumental in her getting the position, but unlike some men in his position, he had not taken advantage of the situation like some might. And even if she had made a move, which I doubted, that was not the sort of woman she was, he would have politely declined.
One of the very few happily married men in that organisation, so I heard.
So, she said, you’re not just a pretty face.
Par for the course for a cabinet maker whose university degree is in psychology. It doesn’t take rocket science to see what was happening to you. I just didn’t think it was my place to jump in unless you asked me, and when you didn’t, well, that told me everything I needed to know.
Yes, our relationship had a use-by date, and it was in the next few days.
I was thinking, she said, that you might come with me; you can make cabinets anywhere.
I could, but I think the real problem wasn’t just the job. It was everything around her and going with her that would just be a constant reminder of what had been holding her back. I didn’t want that for her and said so.
Then the only question left was, what do we do now?
Go shopping for suitcases. Bags to pack, and places to go.
Getting on the roller coaster is easy. At the beginning, it’s a slow, easy ride, followed by the slow climb to the top. It’s much like some relationships; they start out easy, they require a little work to get to the next level, followed by the adrenaline rush when it all comes together.
What most people forget is that what comes down must go back up, and life is pretty much a roller coaster with highs and lows.
Our roller coaster had just come out of the final turn, and we were braking so that it would stop at the station.
There was no question of going with her to New York. Yes, I promised I’d come over and visit her, but that was a promise with crossed fingers behind my back. After a few months in the new job, the last thing she’d want was a reminder of what she left behind. New friends, new life.
We packed her bags, threw out everything she didn’t want, a free trip to the op shop with stuff she knew others would like to have, and basically, by the time she was ready to go, there was nothing left of her in the apartment, or anywhere.
Her friends would be seeing her off at the airport, and that’s when I told her I was not coming; that moment, the taxi arrived to take her away forever. I remember standing there, watching the taxi go. It was going to be, and was, as hard as it was to watch the plane leave.
So, there I was, finally staring at the blank sky, around me a dozen other plane spotters, a rather motley crew of plane enthusiasts.
Already that morning, there had been 6 different types of planes departing, and I could hear another winding up its engines for take-off.
People coming, people going.
Maybe I would go to New York in a couple of months, not to see her, but just to see what the attraction was. Or maybe I would drop in, just to see how she was.
As one of my friends told me when I gave him the news, the future is never written in stone, and it’s about time you broadened your horizons.
It could be said that of all the women one could meet, whether contrived or by sheer luck, what are the odds it would turn out to be the woman who was being paid a very large sum to kill you?
John Pennington is a man who may be lucky in business, but not so lucky in love. He has just broken up with Phillipa Sternhaven, the woman he thought was the one, but relatives and circumstances, and perhaps because she was a ‘princess’, may also have contributed to the end result.
So, what do you do when you are heartbroken?
That is a story that slowly unfolds, from the first meeting with his nemesis on Lake Geneva, all the way to a hotel room in Sorrento, where he learns the shattering truth.
What should have been solace after disappointment turns out to be something else entirely, and from that point, everything goes to hell in a handbasket.
He suddenly realises his so-called friend Sebastian has not exactly told him the truth about a small job he asked him to do, the woman he is falling in love with is not quite who she says she is, and he is caught in the middle of a war between two men who consider people becoming collateral damage as part of their business.
The story paints the characters, cleverly displaying all their flaws and weaknesses. The locations add to the story at times, taking me back down memory lane, especially to Venice, where, in those back streets, I confess it’s not all that hard to get lost.
All in all, a thoroughly entertaining story with, for once, a satisfying end.
Then he checked behind him in case he was being followed. He was not. He ducked under an awning as another gust of wind shook it, avoiding a gush of water that fell like a waterfall, then moved on.
Was it Clara Higgins, an informant and a club singer? He had interviewed her for a case, and they hit it off. She worked at the ‘Blue Note’. Her voice was pure velvet and smoke, a sultry husky drawl that had bought and sold a dozen cops and PI’s before him.
She was leaning against his car six weeks ago, smelling of gin and expensive perfume, whispering about a crime that desperate men were about to commit.
It could be her. She lived in the shadows, but she usually called him Jackie. The caller didn’t.
Was it Lydia Vance, now Rawlings, his sister, a woman variously in and out of trouble, with a no-good husband he had offered to sort out?
She had a voice that had grown raspy over time from a heavy bourbon habit she said was the only thing keeping her sane.
Their last conversation was a tense, midnight phone call eight months ago, her voice thick and gravelly as she begged for money to clear a gambling debt.
No, she didn’t have the stomach for whatever dangerous game this was.
He shook his head, and the water dripped from his hat brim. Another glance up and down the road before turning the next corner. Three suspects, but they were heading in a different direction.
He turned the corner, the lane narrowing, this time not stopping to look up at the rain. It was falling harder, and he could hear the sound of the drops hitting the ground.
It was the sort of rain that made a familiar sound.
It bounced off the walls of the lane, as did other sounds, though he could not say where they came from. An arguing voice came from above, distorted by the rain and the surrounding walls.
The theatre alleyway was looming ahead, a dark chasm where anyone or anything could be waiting. Jack slowed his pace as his heart rate increased, and he could feel the sweat from walking fast in anticipation.
Was it Sarah Kelly, the missing journalist? She was the nosy type who pushed buttons and limits, but good at her job. He had been quietly helping her. Her voice was naturally husky, especially when tired and working a lead.
She was sitting on his office desk just three weeks before, her voice dropping to an intense, quiet rasp as she showed him some evidence and city hall shenanigans. Two days later she vanished.
The cadence matched perfectly. Was she alive? Was she trying to get a message to him, or was it a trap?
Could be, but…
Was it May Lin, the ex-detective he had just taken on? She had a cold, raspy cough for the last week from a flu that she refused to take time off to get better.
Just yesterday, at their early morning meet-up at the diner, her voice was a rough, gravelly whisper, warning him that she heard on the grapevine that Internal Affairs was investigating his old cases when he was a cop.
If it was her, why the disguise?
He stopped just short of the turn into the alley. A sixth sense sent a shiver down his spine. The rain eased. His mind settled on two candidates: a desperate Sarah Kelly trying to surface from the dead, and a compromised May Lin playing a double game.
He turned into the narrow, dark alleyway, the neon lights from the main road reflecting in the pools of water that covered the cobblestones at the entrance.
He cursed, just remembering the cracks in the sole of the left shoe as the water seeped in, cold and uncompromising.
He pulled his hat down low, covering his face in case CCTV cameras had recently been installed. Then he looked up and saw a blinking red light mounted near the entrance.
He scurried past, close to the wall.
He travelled the full length of the alleyway, checking doorways and hiding spots for assailants, his hand on the gun in his pocket, just in case.
It was eerily silent, except for the occasional sound of running water. He saw the telephone booth, now disused and grimy, and walked past it, barely able to make out where any evidence might be, before continuing.
On one side, a single lamp cast a dim glow over the telephone itself, but it was not strong enough to reach the ground.
If he was being observed, it would not do to let them know the telephone booth was his destination. Not yet.
He slowly returned as the rain eased, as if on cue. Above him, several high windows were lit, casting a pale yellowish light into the night. They did not illuminate the alley.
He was here. Now. As there was no evidence, he would wait. Perhaps the husky-voiced woman would come, thrust an envelope into his hands and then disappear. Dressed in black, she could easily fade into the gloom.
The only sounds now were his breathing and raindrops hitting metal. Leaning against the telephone booth, he was right under a steady drip onto his hat, so regular, so mesmerising, he closed his eyes for a moment and tried to massage away the tiredness.
The steady drip onto his hat nearly caused him to miss the beam of light from above. It shone directly on a plain, stained and creased envelope sitting atop the pile of rubbish that had accumulated against the booth.
Just as he leaned down to pick it up, the light snapped off, plunging the area into darkness. The sudden change left him temporarily blind.
“Go to the diner and wait.”
The same husky voice. He swivelled around, but all he could see was darkness, punctuated by a rim of light from the bulb above, and a sloshing sound.
The woman escaping?
It took two minutes for his sight to return. He had the envelope, but no clue as to the identity of the woman.
He took his torch out of the other coat pocket and opened the envelope. It contained a photograph.
It was a photograph of him and Jackson Pike, taken a year ago when Vance was a cop investigating a break-in at City Hall. Pike was alleged to have staged the break-in to obtain evidence of a rigged election. The photograph showed Pike handing Vance an envelope.
Evidence of what? Was Vance part of a cover-up? There had been evidence, but it was not Vance who was the guilty party. It had been his partner, Elroy Baggins. Two weeks before, Elroy had been killed in a shootout.
Baggins had died and had taken the truth with him, leaving Vance to explain the unexplainable: that the dead officer was corrupt. That maybe he was guilty by association or tarred with the same brush. It was why he quit. He had been very close to finding the proof, and then the boss called him into the office and gave him a choice: resign or be destroyed.
In the end, he had no choice.
Now, Vance figured, if they couldn’t get Baggins, they would come after him.
May Lin had tried to warn him, but his money was now on Sarah. She had somehow got hold of the internal affairs evidence and had got the message to Jack via May.
Another look around the alley showed nothing. She had gone.
There was nothing for it, except to go to the diner and wait.
This story is now on the list to be finished so over the new few weeks, expect a new episode every few days.
The reason why new episodes have been sporadic, there are also other stories to write, and I’m not very good at prioritizing.
But, here we are, a few minutes opened up and it didn’t take long to get back into the groove.
Things are about to get complicated…
I had no idea how long I had before Monica or someone else turned up to take charge, so it was time for questions.
To Anna, “Were you having an affair with Severin back at the lab, before you hatched this plan, or was it Severin’s idea?”
“Are we playing truth or dare now?” She was trying to be detached, but the pain must be excruciating by now.
“We’re playing how to save your life. You can live or you can die, it’s your choice, but my patience is very thing at the moment.”
“I liked Severin. At the time I thought he was just a security guard. And yes, after a few months, he did suggest, in a kidding sort of way, that money could be made by stealing the formulas. A lot of money.”
To Dobbin, “Either you or someone else had sent Severin and Maury to the lab after a mock discharge from the service and given them glowing resumes to get jobs there. It was an odd choice given Severin had a rather interesting career, particularly in his handling of women operatives. Was that you?”
“I don’t have to answer your questions.”
“I don’t have to shoot you in various painful places when you test my patience, but I will if I have to.”
“Do you know who you’re talking to?”
“Yes. An inveterate liar who had been leading me down the garden path for far too long. I will ask once more, was that you. Don’t make me count to three.”
He glared at me, the sort of glare that mean there was going to be hell to pay eventually.
“No. I did not. But I was interested in the fact they were sent to Arche Laboratories. It wasn’t until the data came up for sale on the dark web did I put two and two together.”
“That’s when you got O’Connell to handle the purchase and delivery of the data?”
“Yes.”
“Why the six-month delay between negotiation and delivery?”
“Anna’s husband in his infinite wisdom must have guessed he was going to be double-crossed and put a security protocol in place. We made arrangements to keep her safe until the exchange. At the appropriate time when the six months had lapsed, O’Connell was tasked to go to a specified meeting place, pay the money and collect the USB.”
“In the meantime, you arranged for Severin and Maury to put a surveillance team together. I assume Severin came clean about what had happened, and you gave him a chance to redeem himself.”
“Yes.”
“At what point did you realize the operation was compromised? My guess, is when O’Connell was running late, and the bomb went off on time, but before the exchange could take place. Surely you knew O’Connell couldn’t have the USB.”
“True, so we arranged for an extraction and led him to the alley where you cornered him. Total unexpected. As was the sniper, who I believe had tapped into our communications with O’Connell. I’m not sure why Severin and Maury were there, but once they saw O’Connell get shot they left. They, for some reason, believed O’Connell had the USB and passed it to you before they got there, hence the visit you had from Severin. Their usefulness ended at the alley.”
“Who was the sniper working for?”
“No idea. Another interested party perhaps, that Anna forgot to tell us about. It would be no surprise to know she had other buyers waiting.”
“I didn’t. O’Connell was the only one as per our agreement. You don’t think I was going to screw up a five-million-pound payday.” Anna sounded indignant.
To Anna, “When did you and O’Connell get together, after the explosion. Or did you think he set you up?”
“I waited a few days then called him and asked what we should do. He said he got the impression he’d been set up, that we were both in danger and to individually go into hiding until he could find out who was after us. He said he couldn’t trust his boss after what had happened, both at the café and then in the alley. He mentioned that I should find you and insinuate myself into your investigation because he knew you’d find out eventually. He was right, by the way,:” she said to no one in particular.
Back to Dobbin, “Why did O’Connell suddenly no longer trust you and for all intents and purposes disappear?”
“He didn’t say, but I suspect nearly getting killed may have pushed him in that direction. I did not sanction that bomb, by the way.”
“What was the purpose of the surveillance team?”
“To find out where the exchange point was because it was always agreed that they should be the only two to preserve their safety. He was not supposed to find out about the surveillance. It’s the reason why we were not responsible for the bomb in the café because we didn’t know where the exchange was taking place.”
“If he didn’t know, and then discovered people following him, I’m not surprised he killed most of them. That’s on you, Dobbin.”
“It was a calculated risk, but the stakes were very high, and the operation was justified. It also afforded us the opportunity to discover a new and very accomplished agent, namely you.”
“Flattery will not stop me from shooting you if I have to.”
His look of disdain went to utter disdain.
“I’ve answered your questions, now what?”
“Anna will now give me the USBs, the real USBs with the data on them. I will destroy them, and then we can all go about our business.”
“You…”
“If you say anything other than, Sam, here they are, you will die. They are in this room, and I will find them, whether you are dead or alive. Personally, if I were you I’d want to live, but then, you might have a death wish you want fulfilled. I’ll be happy to count to three if you like?”
She thought about it, but not for too long. She reached into a pocket and pulled out another plastic bag.
I went over and took it from her.
Two more USBs.
“I’ll take those, thank you.” Jennifer. “Don’t make me do something I don’t want to.”
This story has been ongoing since I was seventeen, and just to let you know, I’m 72 this year.
Yes, it’s taken a long time to get it done.
Why, you might ask.
Well, I never gave it much interest because I started writing it after a small incident when I was 17, and working as a book packer for a book distributor in Melbourne
At the end of my first year, at Christmas, the employer had a Christmas party, and that year, it was at a venue in St Kilda.
I wasn’t going to go because at that age, I was an ordinary boy who was very introverted and basically scared of his own shadow and terrified by girls.
Back then, I would cross the street to avoid them
Also, other members of the staff in the shipping department were rough and ready types who were not backwards in telling me what happened, and being naive, perhaps they knew I’d be either shocked or intrigued.
I was both adamant I wasn’t coming and then got roped in on a dare.
Damn!
So, back then, in the early 70s, people looked the other way when it came to drinking, and of course, Dutch courage always takes away the concerns, especially when normally you wouldn’t do half the stuff you wouldn’t in a million years
I made it to the end, not as drunk and stupid as I thought I might be, and St Kilda being a salacious place if you knew where to look, my new friends decided to give me a surprise.
It didn’t take long to realise these men were ‘men about town’ as they kept saying, and we went on an odyssey. Yes, those backstreet brothels where one could, I was told, have anything they could imagine.
Let me tell you, large quantities of alcohol and imagination were a very bad mix.
So, the odyssey in ‘The things we do’ was based on that, and then the encounter with Diana. Well, let’s just say I learned a great deal about girls that night.
Firstly, not all girls are nasty and spiteful, which seemed to be the case whenever I met one. There was a way to approach, greet, talk to, and behave.
It was also true that I could have had anything I wanted, but I decided what was in my imagination could stay there. She was amused that all I wanted was to talk, but it was my money, and I could spend it how I liked.
And like any 17-year-old naive fool, I fell in love with her and had all these foolish notions. Months later, I went back, but she had moved on, to where no one was saying or knew.
Needless to say, I was heartbroken and had to get over that first loss, which, like any 17-year-old, was like the end of the world.
But it was the best hour I’d ever spent in my life and would remain so until I met the woman I have been married to for the last 48 years.
As Henry, he was in part based on a rebel, the son of rich parents who despised them and their wealth, and he used to regale anyone who would listen about how they had messed up his life
If only I’d come from such a background!
And yes, I was only a run away from climbing up the stairs to get on board a ship, acting as a purser.
I worked for a shipping company and they gave their junior staff members an opportunity to spend a year at sea working as a purser on a cargo ship that sailed between Melbourne, Sydney and Hobart in Australia.
One of the other junior staff members’ turn came, and I would visit him on board when he would tell me stories about life on board, the officers, the crew, and other events. These stories, which sounded incredible to someone so impressionable, were a delight to hear.
Alas, by that time, I had tired of office work and moved on to be a tradesman at the place where my father worked.
It proved to be the right move, as that is where I met my wife. Diana had been right; love would find me when I least expected it.
“They’re hailing us,” the communications officer said, then turned expecting an order to open a channel.
“What’s the speakers tone?”
I got a blank look in return.
“Does he sound agitated, angry, arrogant…?
“Like a person of authority.”
Not much help in gauging their mood.
“OK, put him on the viewer.” I had one of the crew bring up the data we had on the vessel class.
It was once a personnel transport, one of a dozen that had been taken to the edge of space and dumped, if that was a word that could be used to describe what happened. They should have been destroyed, but another contractor took the cheap option, and abandoned them off Neptune.
The spokesman was dressed in the same suit as those I’d seen before, on the cargo ship, and in the Captains day room. Clearly he didn’t want to be identified.
“What can I do for you,” I asked, after waiting a minute or so after realising he was waiting for me to speak.
“Surrender your ship.”
Of course. They had three ships, we had one. A junior officer came over and gave me a sheet of paper. The names of the ship’s, how many life signs on each, and scans indicating possible weaponry.
Weapons needed power, and if they were anything like ours, they would need auxiliary power sources. No indication yet they intended to use any.
Life signs was interesting, six on each of the smaller ships, roughly half the crew when the ships were commercially used, and 34 for the larger vessel, including the nuclear scientist.
“Why would I do that?”
Number one’s expression was one of surprise, the Lt Colonel not so much.
“We have superior fire power, and will disable the ship if you don’t. That means taking out the life support. You can save your crew an ignominious death.”
No alien would use the word ‘ignominious’.
The two smaller ships were the closest, acting as guards for the bigger ship. I suspect they had the weapons, being smaller and more manoeuvrable.
I’d spoken to the Lt Colonel and the gunnery sergeant when he arrived on the bridge, and we agreed that the best action would be to target the bridges of the enemy vessels. After we retrieved the scientist.
“You do realise you’re targeting a research vessel, not a man of war.”
“Is that what they told you?”
“Define ‘they’.”
“Space command, that bunch on nincompoops who think the rest of the planets believes their lies.”
Well, that was the statement that proved they were not aliens, but working for one of the other countries no so happy with the deal that had been struck over space exploration. The Admiral could work out which one in his own time.
For the operation of removing our crew member, I had a direct line to the cargo bay where ? was setting up the parameters for the transport. All I had to do was keep the ship as steady as possible.
“Ready when you are,” his voice was in my ear.
“Now.”
Ten seconds later, “she’s aboard, safe.”
From the side, “There’s activity…”
“Gunnery sergeant, now,” I said.
The viewer cleared of my counterpart, and showed two explosions, where I would have said were the command centres of the two ships, and then the sudden movement of the larger ship, moving away, and at speed, to a point where it disappeared.
“Can we track that escaping ship?”
“We have sufficient information about it to send it back to HQ and let them deal with it. We achieved what we set out to do.”
The Lt Colonel was right, but it would be good to know where our enemy was.
A crew member said, “we can track it if you like, but it just jumped to high speed and out of scanner range.”
“Life signs?” I asked, looking at the two ships adrift, if that was possible. I didn’t like the idea of using force, and it was going to create a mountain of paperwork, and an investigation, but they were going to attack
“Eleven remaining on board, all deceased “
“Eleven?”
“One transported to the larger ship just before we attacked.”
Number one appeared beside me. “Do you think we should go over to the other ships and verify that the dead crew were the escaped prisoners.”
“For your report? Yes. Take a medical team, and the military.” The Lt Colonel looked over at the mention of the military. “You can arrange a squad,” I asked him.
“Yes sir.”
The third officer, Jacobs, like myself, crossing over from captaining cargo vessels, recently promoted to Second had been at his station for the duration, instead of resting, a man who wanted more experience. And spent as much time as he could on the bridge.
“Jacobs?”
“Sir.” He jumped up out of his seat, whether from fright or enthusiasm I wasn’t sure.
“You have the bridge. Try not to run into those ships out there.”
