Gray Redemption (Tom Gray #3) (6 page)

“How soon is eventually?”

Uddin swallowed, knowing the answer was not going to be accepted with good
cheer.

“It could take months, perhaps a year,” he said, awaiting the backlash.

None came.  Instead, Al-Asiri seemed quite happy with the timeframe.

 “What about delivery methods,” the head of Al-Qaeda asked.

Uddin was happy for the subject to be changed and breathed a sigh. 
“The virus is a hybrid of Influenza A and so can be passed from person to
person through airborne transfer.  The lifespan outside of the host is an
impressive one hour in the air, with a reduced period of around thirty minutes
on door handles, work surfaces and other non-porous surfaces.  On contact
with skin and other porous surfaces, such as paper, the virus will die within a
few minutes, but if anyone comes into contact with an infected surface and then
touches their eyes, nose or mouth, they will be susceptible.”

“What about introducing it into the water supply?” Al-Asiri
suggested.  “Surely that would have the greatest reach?”

“From the very start of the project, the delivery method was a primary
consideration.  Your idea was one of the first we looked at, but
investigations showed that most modern water purification processes use
ultraviolet light to eliminate bacteria, viruses and mold from the
sewage.  Our virus would not be able to withstand such exposure to the UV
radiation.”

“Then what do you propose?”

Uddin explained that the virus
had an incubation period of four to five days, following which the subject
would experience mild flu-like symptoms which would last two, perhaps three days
at the most. 

“Introducing the virus into a
densely populated area would have the maximum effect.  Perhaps you could
send infected subjects onto the London underground to spend the rush hour
riding the tube, or have
them
attend an indoor
concert.”

Al-Asiri filed the suggestions
away for later consideration, but he had a more pressing concern.  “What
about the selectivity issue?”  He asked.  “Can you guarantee that
only westerners will be affected?”

“There are no guarantees, but
the
differential allelic gene
expression resulting from X-chromosome —”

“Enough!” Al-Asiri said, his patience worn thin.  “Just give me a
number.  Are you one hundred percent sure that it will affect only
westerners, or just ten percent?”

Uddin considered his answer carefully.  While there had been extensive
research in this area, it had yet to be proven conclusively that a particular
race could be identified – never mind targeted – at the genome level. 
Nevertheless, his work with a variety of cell samples was had managed to produce
the desired results in seventy-seven percent of trials, a figure he shared with
Al-Asiri.

The response was quiet contemplation for a few moments before Al-Asiri
declared the number high enough for the project to go ahead. 

“Prepare as much as you can over the next ten days,” he said, rising from
his seat.  “I will be in touch with you after I have made other
preparations.”

He made sure his disguise was in place before leaving the scientist in the
hotel room and making his way back to the car.  Once settled, he reflected
on how far things had come in the last few years, and how close their biggest
victory now appeared. 

It was a shame that they would never be able to claim responsibility for
it.

* * *

Veronica Ellis strode
purposefully into the Technical Operations office, her mood destroyed by yet
another phone conversation with James Farrar. 

“Any idea when it will be
ready?” she asked Gerald Small, her tone a little harsher than she normally
used on the staff.

The technician continued tapping
away on his keyboard. 

“Almost there.” 

Another few keystrokes and he
declared the job done.

“The next time he logs on to his
computer, his account profile will be pulled from the central server. 
When this happens, the key logging application will extract itself and begin
running.  I’ll place an icon on your desktop that gives you a breakdown of
every key he presses in real time.”

Ellis thanked him and apologised
for her abrupt manner.  The thrice-daily calls from Farrar were beginning
to grate on her nerves, especially as he now had three times the manpower
working on the search.

The accounts he’d requested had
been set up a few days earlier and she had been through their searches only to
find that they were simply duplicating much of the work her team had already
done.  None of their network activity had given any clues as to who they
were working for, which was why she had requested that the key logging software
be installed on their workstations.  Unfortunately, it wasn’t standard
software in the MI5 inventory and so she’d asked Small to code it up
himself.  Being more of an infrastructure specialist rather than a
developer, it had taken
Small
a couple of days to get
a working version ready to deploy.

“Please let me know once it is
activated,” she said as she left the office. 

Her next port of call was Andrew
Harvey’s station, where she found him involved in a heated phone call. 
She waited for him to finish and then asked for an update on the two men they
were concentrating on: The Sarge and Timmy.

“We’ve been through the records
of all eight men involved in the Tom Gray episode, and between them they served
under
five sergeants in the SAS.  So far we’ve
had no luck with four of them.”

“What about the other
one?”  Ellis asked.

“The other one was Tom Gray himself,”
Farsi said, from the opposite desk, “so we
kinda
ruled him out, with him being dead and all.” 

Ellis conceded that it was a
fair call.  “What about Timmy?  Did you manage to identify him?”

“We’ve had seven hits and we’re
working through them now,” Harvey told her.

“Diplomatically, I hope,”
recalling the conversation he was having when she arrived at his desk.

It took Harvey a moment to
realise what she was referring to.  “Oh, that. 
Just
some dickhead at the British Embassy in Manila.
  I’ve been waiting
for news about Knight Logistics Management, the company Smart and Baines were
supposed to be working for.  I sent the request in over a week ago and
he’s still dragging his feet.”

“Want me to have a word with
them?”  Ellis asked.

“No, it’s okay.  I’ve put a
flea in his ear and he promised to get back in touch later today.”

“So how long before we can
identify Timmy?”

“We’ve eliminated four so far,”
Farsi told her.  “Of the other three, one left the country a few years ago
and we think he might be the one we’re looking for.  His name is Timothy
Hughes and he served with Levine eight years ago.”

“Who was his sergeant at the
time?” Ellis asked, hoping the pieces would just drop into place.

Her momentary excitement
evaporated when Farsi told her that it had been Tom Gray.

“Any idea
where Hughes is now?”

“We already sent out a request
to the British High Commission in Singapore,” Harvey said.  “They came
back with an address and I’ve asked them for all information they have on him.”

“Let’s hope they don’t take as
long as Manila,” Ellis said.

Harvey was about to respond when
his phone rang.  He took the call and indicated for Ellis to hang
around.  After a minute he asked the caller for all phone records and
emails for the last month and hung up.

“That was the Commission in
Singapore,” he said.  “The good news is: they’ve found Timmy Hughes.”

“And the bad news…?”

“He’s in the morgue.  It
looks like a professional hit.”

*
* *

James Farrar rubbed his temples
as he digested the news he’d just received from the British Embassy in
Manila.  Why hadn’t he considered the fact that MI5 might make a
connection between Levine and Campbell and tie them to Baines and Smart?

Yet another sleepless night was
beginning to take its toll, and he’d been unable to come up with a quick and
satisfying answer, instead telling the attaché to just stall any further
requests for the time being. 

The last thing he needed was
Ellis and her team poking around in his operation, and he decided to nip that
activity in the bud.

“Veronica,” he said with his
most pleasant voice when she answered his call.  “I understand you are
doing some investigation into Simon Baines and Len Smart.”

“And just how would you know
that, James?” 
Ellis asked, her curiosity aroused.

“Well…obviously…I want to be
kept abreast of developments, and as you haven’t done a very good job of
finding my two fugitives I decided to look through the logs to see what your
team had been doing all this time.”

Farrar was relieved at having come
up with such a good excuse, yet angry for leaving himself wide open like
that.  In future he would think it through before calling Ellis: She was
nobody’s fool and one day he was going to dig himself a hole too deep to climb
out of.

“We’ve been doing what you
asked,” Ellis said, indignation in her voice.  “We know there is an
obvious link between all four men and we want to —”

“Forget about them,” he
interrupted. “Baines and Smart have nothing to do with this case, so stop
wasting valuable time on them and concentrate your efforts on finding Levine
and Campbell.”

“James, we have to investigate
all possibilities if —”

“Veronica, I want you to
drop
it
!”  He shouted.  
“
Now
!”
 

Farrar took a few moments to
calm
himself
, the phone shaking in his hand. 
“I’m sorry,” he eventually said.  “This whole case is being closely
watched by the Home Secretary and he wants results sooner rather than
later.  I can’t have you sending your people on wild goose chases when
resources are so limited.”

It was Ellis’s turn to pause,
and for a moment Farrar thought she’d already hung up.  Her voice came
back, the tone one he recognised from their time together: Compliance, but not
wilful.  “Okay, James, we’ll ignore Baines and Smart and concentrate on
your two suspects.”

Farrar started to thank her but
found
himself
talking to a dial tone.

Great, he thought.  Just
when the day couldn’t get any worse, a quick chat with Veronica and it turns to
complete shit.  He was wondering for the umpteenth time how they’d managed
to stay together for so long when his phone rang.  The caller simply gave
him a twelve-digit number before hanging up.

Farrar recognised Palmer’s voice
and logged into his computer, and then brought up the website he had used
earlier in the week.  After entering the code he was redirected to a page
with a short message that improved his mood a little:

Sorry about the delay in
replying, was waiting for the right moment.  Spoke to subject 1
yesterday.  Knows that they travelled by boat (Huang Zhen) to Durban but
no onward itinerary available.  Subject 2 confirmed same. 
Additional: there are now 4 (four) passengers heading your way. 
Names unknown.

Farrar wondered where the hell
this fourth person had come from, but the more pressing issue was how to track
them once they reached South Africa.  He opened a new browser and searched
for a website offering shipping itineraries. Once he found one he entered the
name
Huang Zhen
and found that it was due in to Durban on the seventh of
May, a week from today.  That was plenty of time for Palmer to get to
South Africa and head them off.

He wrote a quick note in reply
to the message and hit the Send button.

*
* *

Ellis was still fuming when
Small knocked and entered her office.  Before she could even begin to
complain about the intrusion he gave her some much-needed good news.

“Farrar logged on and the
software has been activated.” 

He hit a couple of keys on her
laptop to minimise the open files and clicked the icon he had placed on her
desktop.  A new window filled the screen and Ellis soon found some
human-readable data.

“What are these other
characters?”  She asked Small, pointing to what appeared to be random
keystrokes.  He told her that they were non-alphanumeric keys, such as
Backspace or Shift.

“I can filter them out if you
like, but it will take time and you’ll have to wait until he logs out and back
in again.”

“Never mind,” she said.  “I
can make it out.”

Near the top of the screen she
saw what looked like a website URL suffix, but the random characters before it
didn’t look like any internet address she’d ever seen, and she dismissed it as
a coincidence.  Small, however, had found it more curious.  He
grabbed the mouse and highlighted a series of characters.

“This is the first website he
visited after logging on,” Small explained.  “I’ve been there and found
just a textbox and Submit button.”  He moved down the screen and selected
a twelve-digit number.  “It looks like this was his login.  I tried
entering the same code but it simply redirected me to a porn site.”

“Do you think that was Farrar’s
intended destination?”  Ellis asked.

“I shouldn’t think so,” Small
said.   “After logging in he went to another website and did a search
for ‘
Huang Zhen
’.  I retraced his steps and saw the itinerary for a
cargo ship.”