Darke Mission (36 page)

JJ was a fashion chameleon and one whose outer shell had a significant impact on his mental processes. If he donned suit, shirt, tie and dress leather shoes then he was in the mind-set of the office, financial markets, dealing with FCA hounds. T-shirt and shorts meant that he was on a beach, or wanted to be, or it was a hot and humid weekend in central London. A polo shirt and cargo pants meant he was relaxing, lolling about, going for lunch or a movie with Cyrus and Gil at the weekend. Accessories joined in with the chameleon attire. Suit meant steel bracelet or leather strap watch, T-shirt meant rubber strapped watch, polo shirt then rubber or Velcro band watch. Suit meant one of three Idol white gold rings, dominus, maximus or the chosen one; to the uninitiated that was bull, shark and star respectively, all encased in black, turquoise and clear mini diamonds, setting the creature or symbol of choice. A watch and a ring were JJ's only man jewellery. As a fashion statement the white gold rings were, maybe, excessive but they made JJ smile, triggered light hearted derision from Cyrus and Gil, and would be handy in a fight. The recipient of an Idol-ringed blow, however, would not have much trouble identifying his assailant. There were not that many Idol rings in global circulation and if you had the imprint of a great white on the side of your head that would considerably narrow down the manhunt.

JJ's eclectic and random fashion thoughts were not really what should have been rattling through his cropped hair head at this moment. He was in the back of the Mercedes Sprinter van, positioned under a few trees in the trailer park of Pyeonghwa Motors petrol station, just south of Taedong River in Pyongyang and a few minutes' drive from the DPRK's central bank. Jim Bradbury, Victor Pagari and the six ‘Toblerones' were in there with him, the former two also gearing up for the night's activities. The rest of the crew were ready and laying low in the cabs of the two disguised PetroChina tankers parked a few metres away.

“Still packing that old Glock 17 I see JJ,” said Jim Bradbury, attempting to lighten the atmosphere a little.

“Sure am Jim, held me in good stead in Bosnia, as you well know!” JJ and his Glock had saved Bradbury's life in Bosnia, he was extremely partial to both.

“How about you? What is your weapon of choice for tonight?” The Scot was changing into his multi-pocketed, Kevlar enhanced dark olive green cargo pants, lightweight bullet proof vest and Gore-Tex boots. As he asked Jim Bradbury this question JJ's mental process had already diverted path from bling rings to killer weapons.

“I've always liked the SIG Sauers, JJ,” Jim replied. “Tonight's a full sized semi-automatic, 19x9mm rounds in staggered magazines. If I can't hit some random asshole or security guard with this little beauty then I'll retire.”

JJ said nothing but was hoping that tonight's raid on the central bank would go as smooth as Yul Brynner's head and as silent as an abandoned hut in a snowdrift. A shootout in Pyongyang's central bank would not likely end well for anybody.

“Are you carrying anything else JJ, or is the Glock it?” persisted Jim.

“Well, I've got this blacked up commando knife,” said JJ, showing Jim a veteran British Commando, Fairbairn-Sykes, fighting knife. “My mum gave it to me for my birthday one year. I had it augmented with a rubber indented grip. It's in its original leather sheath. A real classic.”

“You and your classics,” mocked Jim. “I hope it still works and isn't going to rust away and disintegrate just when you need it old buddy.”

“It won't,” JJ assured him. He had looked after his knife. It was sharper than a razor, clean as a whistle, as well balanced as an Olympic beam gymnast. It would be deadly efficient if called upon.

“Haven't you got anything belonging to this century, JJ, or are all your weapons from Arthurian Legend or World War II?” asked Jim, chuckling away a little too heartily for a grown man.

JJ acknowledged Jim's question, reached into his kit bag and pulled something out. “Well, speaking of ancient legend, I've got this,” replied JJ holding aloft a small, but clearly distinguishable, crossbow.

“A crossbow!” exclaimed Jim. Even Victor, who had been ignoring all the banter about guns and knives, stopped checking his laptop, tablets and other electronic gear to take a look.

“No ordinary crossbow. This jet black beauty is a Winchester Stallion crossbow. It is compact, made of lightweight aluminium with carbon fibre rods and shoots arrows at 350ft per second. It is very light, seventeen inches wide and has a 3x illuminated reticle; that would be telescopic sight to you ignoramuses,” said JJ, admiring his contribution to twenty-first century weaponry.

“What's 350ft per second in miles per hour?” asked Victor, at last interested in the conversation.

“Just under 240mph, Victor. Faster than the speed of a McLaren F1. Though it is roughly one quarter of the speed of one of Jim's 9mm rounds fired from his SIG Sauer it is certainly fast enough, silent enough, and accurate enough to drop any human target within a range of fifty yards before he could utter ‘William Tell'!” announced JJ as he strapped his crossbow over his back.

Both the KLO and the ex-MI5 officer knew that stealth would be part of the cocktail of a successful operation tonight. Jim's SIG Sauer would perform admirably in a shootout, but the decibel level would be mega. If some poor unfortunate had to be laid out on this operation, a broken neck, a knife or, indeed, a crossbow would be the procedure of choice.

The three men in the Sprinter van proceeded to finalise their preparations. JJ and Jim both had lightweight backpacks with emergency medical supplies and other tools of the trade that may be necessary. JJ had four small smoke bombs, several tear gas grenades and two canisters of sticky foam in his backpack. Jim had a couple of flashbangs, he really seemed to like loud and bright stuff, thought JJ, and a couple of canisters of pepper spray. They both had torches, binoculars, Kevlar reinforced beanies and walkie-talkies. On his left wrist, JJ had a matte black MTM Cobra Special Ops watch on a black ballistic Velcro strap. This 47mm diameter timepiece was not there as a fashion accessory, even though its total blackness, bar the tritium luminous hands, would have matched his other gear. It was on his wrist because it was very light, had slide rule, compass and chronograph functions. Watch on, JJ was ready. Jim Bradbury was as well and Victor was just putting the finishing touches to his kit bag. Neither Jim nor JJ had any assault or sniper rifles or submachine guns. Lily and the Iceman had these as they were designated initially to stay in the Sprinter van once the current three occupants plus Ethel made their way into the central bank. The moaner Ji-hun and deep cover Kwon were also to be in the van at that point. Kwon was there partly to keep an eye on the former and partly to quiz him further about the central bank's security if required.

“Victor,” said JJ, just before exiting the back of the van to signal to the rest of the team that they were ready to rock. “Apart from Ji-hun, you're the only one not used to handling guns and the like. I'm not expecting a fire fight but do you have any means of protection on you, apart from your brains and quick wit?” Victor shook his head. “Can you shoot?” JJ continued, realising that there was not much point in giving the youngster a lethal weapon if he hadn't a blind clue as to how to use it.

“I'm no expert, JJ, not like you and Jim, but my grandfather took me to a firing range just outside of Toulouse a few times, so I know how to point and shoot, if the gun is straightforward enough,” replied Victor.

JJ reached into his near empty kit bag on the floor pan of the van. “Here, take this,” he said giving Victor a handgun. “Not that you're interested in it Victor, you're more brain than brawn, but this is a Glock 22. It's light, has an indented hand grip and a very strong polymer frame that dampens recoil. It's more modern than mine, not that that matters. It has a trigger safety, so keep that engaged for the moment. It's loaded with fifteen rounds and it's reliable. If you need to use it, remember to release the safety, then aim and shoot. You'll hit something, just make sure it's not any of the rest of us.”

Victor looked at the handgun and understood everything that JJ had said about it. He nodded to JJ, put the Glock in his kit bag, zipped it up and said “Ready.”

JJ nodded back, silently musing that clearly Victor wasn't expecting to need his newly acquired firearm. Sticking it in his zipped up holdall didn't make it the most accessible if the young fellow needed it in a hurry. JJ decided not to mention this as he did not want to freak out Victor any more than he had done already. The safe cracker was going to be in pole position soon and he would need the calmest of minds to crack the DPRK's central bank vaults.

On JJ's signal, Ethel, Lily, the Iceman, Kwon and Ji-hun, got out of the PetroChina tankers' cabs and headed to the van. It was a tight squeeze, all squashed up in between the ‘Toblerones'. Jim Bradbury and his two PAU Travel colleagues were in the front of the van, in the driver's cabin, with the remaining five in the back. It made sense that way. The team was not expecting to be stopped between the petrol station and the central bank. There were no official checkpoints. The van was dark blue, de-badged and anonymous. If anyone caught a peek at or spoke to the drivers then there were two Koreans and a Korean linguist up front. Jim had put on his baseball cap for the short journey from the petrol station to the central bank. He was not committing the same fashion faux pas as at Songnim docks but nobody would clock his Caucasian chopper at that time of night, in the dark, in disguise lite.

The fifteen minute drive to the rear of the central bank was uneventful. The Iceman had parked up, about a hundred yards from the central bank and on a slight incline, so that they could survey the car park.

“Can you see anything Iceman?” asked JJ from the back of the van. Kim Chun-So had his binoculars out and was scouring the car park.

“There are about seven vehicles still in the car park,” the Iceman reported. “Looks like around four saloon cars and three vans, two of which are about the same dimensions as this one. There are no guards either at the gates of the car park or what looks to be the rear entrance to the central bank. There are two CCTV cameras on long poles at the gates pointed inwards to the car park, and two aimed at the rear entrance of the central bank,” he added.

JJ absorbed the information. “Kwon, ask Ji-hun if there are normally guards at the rear of the central bank, either the building itself or the car park?”

Kwon asked and Ji-hun said no, only cameras. It made sense, thought JJ. In a country where you could be thrown into a stinking cesspit of a jail for farting a mile upwind of its supreme leader, the penalties for serious crime were so harsh and unrelenting that the non-political crime rate was one of the lowest on the planet. Nobody in their right mind would try to rob anywhere in Pyongyang let alone the central bank. A quartet of cameras seemed a reasonable security precaution under the circumstances.

“Victor,” said JJ. “What are we going to do about the cameras?”

“I'm on it,” replied Victor, tapping away on his laptop.

“What are you doing?” asked Ethel, mesmerised by the speed and dexterity of his keyboard work.

“There are several ways to disable a surveillance camera,” replied Victor. “Crude ways involve hitting it with a hammer, or disabling the camera lens with an infra-red laser. The trouble with the crudes is that the camera might spot you as you try to assault it so an image will show up on the security office's computer screens. Even if you manage to zap the eye in the sky with a laser, the monitoring guard will realise the camera is down and investigate. So the crude ways are off the menu tonight.

“So what are your dancing digits doing then?” persisted Ethel.

“In the vast majority of cases, when CCTV cameras are set up, their default settings can be accessed remotely via the internet. Most purchasers and users of the equipment don't know this. They're just hoping that it allows them to access the footage via a laptop, even mobile phone. So if the appropriate central bank's security guard is having a number 2 in the bank's loo, he can watch the CCTV footage on his mobile phone, if he wants to,” said Victor smiling. “For the bad guys, or the good guys, however you would like to describe this happy band of eight tonight, these default settings allow us, i.e. me, to access the surveillance systems. If I can hack into them, and their password security is normally pathetic, then I too can look at the footage. More importantly, I can move the camera remotely, change the line of sight, zoom in and zoom out, send it on a loop,” added Victor, his mesmeric fingers now at rest. “Viola!” he announced, turning his laptop screen towards Ethel and JJ. Victor was now in charge of the DPRK's external CCTV system.

“What was the password, genius?” asked Ethel.

“1,2,3,4,” replied Victor. “Around 80 – 85% of these types of cameras use one of four passwords, 1234, 1111, admin, or user. The new users of the cameras rarely change them to something more secure, and no matter which country they're in, the default settings security password is still usually one of these.”

“Good job, Victor,” said JJ, placing a hand on the young hacker's back.

“Won't the bank's security guard who is monitoring the camera's live footage, notice it's been tampered with?” asked Jim Bradbury.

“No,” said Victor. “Unless the guard is remotely accessing the camera's output at exactly the same time as me, he will notice nothing. I've now sent the cameras on a loop so in all probability we can remain undetected in the car park until the morning.”

“OK,” said JJ. “Let's drive closer to the gates. Lily you open them, Iceman you park up next to that dark coloured van you saw and which seemed to be only a few yards from the bank's rear entrance.”