' The Longest Night ' & ' Crossing the Rubicon ': The Original Map Illustrated and Uncut Final Volume (Armageddon's Song) (46 page)

Leaving his chair he stood before the screen, arms crossed and wearing a thoughtful expression.

“Who else did you speak with, after the Vietnamese of course?” he asked Randolph Carmine.

“I have spoken with no one in regard to bases for
Vespers
, sir.”

“But?”

General Carmine had met with the commander of the small Royal Brunei Navy the day before over access to fuel and victualling for the region. The admiral had confided his disquiet at the members of the government who were allowing the business community to influence their decisions over disputed territory. The general was not exactly a stranger to that kind of pressure and had sympathised.

“Now it becomes clear.” said the President, wearily. “I think that Vietnam and Brunei… and Malaysia too, bet your life on that one… are also about to enter the war, although not necessarily for the greater good, most certainly for their own.”

“The oil under the Spratly Islands, Mr President?” asked Terry Jones, who had just worked it out.

“Yes indeed, although Brunei doesn’t have a snowballs chance in hell with her tiny armed forces the Vietnamese intelligence services will have learned of General Carmine’s meeting and jumped to the wrong conclusion.” reasoned the president. “The Philippines and Taiwan are also claimants to the islands but they are under PRC occupation. The PLAN seized the Spratlys with elements of their 1
st
Marine Division the day after nuking the Taiwanese back to the stone age.”

Terry brought up the region on the screen

“Those marines are now in Australia?” queried the President, having exhausted his general knowledge of military events during that period. “So what do they have holding those islands now?”

“A parachute battalion, a quartet of fast attack boats, and a nuclear threat that the PRC no longer possesses.” Randolph replied.

“They haven’t reinforced?”

“No sir and those three countries you just mentioned will have all noticed though, you can bet on that.”

“There will never be another more opportune moment for Malaysia, Vietnam and Brunei to try an end run against China for possession of the islands.” Terry mused.

It would be welcome indeed to have someone else in the region provide a headache for the Chinese, but without doubt that headache would be passed on to the USA at the conclusion of this war, trying to restore peace in the region.

“Do you have any idea when the attempt to snatch the islands is likely to begin?”

“If I were the Vietnamese I would move the second we land troops on Mactan, Mr President.”

“At least we now know why they are being so helpful and cooperative in allowing us to stage out of their air bases. We will be running interference for them, even if we didn’t know it, and the time limit they attached after noting your meeting with Brunei means they slam the door on our presence in-country, and any possibility of our attempting to influence the issue in any of the other countries favour.” The President shook his head in exasperation at having been played.

“We could have used those vessels, troops and aircraft in the invasion of Cebu.” he grumbled.

Terry Jones made no comment but he was willing to bet that in attempting to capitalise on the fighting between the allies and the Chinese, that Vietnam, Malaysia and Brunei had outsmarted themselves and unwittingly their combined forces were about to quadruple in potential value to the allies.

“Okay, back to the problems at hand, and if we can’t send a few more battalions can we at least send something to give the
Vespers
airborne element an edge?”

It took an hour of discussion before contacting the countries concerned after concluding that a British unit which had just arrived by air in New Zealand, for onward transport to
Australia, did have something that could assist. It would mean moving the unit to Australia’s Northern Territory where the Royal Air Force C-17s of 99 Squadron would make a 3,600 miles round journey to deliver them to Mactan, supported by the elderly but trusty Boeing 707 tankers of 33 Squadron Royal Australian Air Force.

Eurostar terminal, St Pancras station, London.

It was hardly the most glamorous means of arrival but the specialist was satisfied that it was low profile, hoisting a battered backpack onto one shoulder and joining the queue for passport control and customs.

Old jeans and a cheap overcoat, a little stained and very threadbare, fitted perfectly with the hair that needed a wash and comb.

The process took an hour, and a tube ride to a seedy bedsit in Brixton followed. The room above the hair stylists shop had been kept securely locked and there was no sign that anyone had entered since the current lock had been fitted.

Several new changes of clothes in a suitcase placed above a cheap wardrobe were all in the specialist’s size.

After a few hours’ sleep the specialist began work.

The target had been injured and sent to a clinic in the Thames Valley for treatment. It was an exclusive establishment, treating injured police officers who remained there as residents as they recovered. The information had cost the specialist a thousand pounds but access was impossible under the circumstances. A visual surveillance from across the valley by way of a sniper scope had however confirmed the target being in residence. 

Goring-upon-Thames, the nearest town, had several pubs frequented by the patients from the clinic but in three days the target had not appeared in the town. On the fourth day the target disappeared, departing unexpectedly.

Dr Austin Bengot would have been both flattered and alarmed if he had learned that he was known to the specialist, but the specialist could not know that the doctor’s report had been the reason for the targets vanishing in the night.

More money, twice as much this time, got the specialist a name, a new lead to the new location. It was a very clever hiding place really, as instead of the target hiding on a lonely mountain on the other side of the planet they had been kept where a searcher would not necessarily look.

The targets language skills were being sought by the same people arranging the concealment, and the accommodation would turn out not to be a cave, far from it.

Sir Richard Tennant boarded a southbound underground train on the Northern Line, departing the carriage once it arrived at Stockwell. The service was much improved now that the war was far away and the fuel was again arriving in quantity.

Rather than leave the station he instead sat and read his newspaper, glancing up on occasion in a seemingly innocent way to check on who else was nearby. It was a sound counter surveillance tactic designed to catch out anyone tailing off the subject.

A small ladies purse sized vanity mirror and a piece of blu-tac allowed the specialist to observe the Metropolitan Police Commissioner, it was pressed against the tiled wall where it reflected a view of the length of the platform as the specialist stood safely out of sight inside the platforms furthest exit.

Three trains came and went before Sir Richard stood and tucked his copy of The Time under one arm. The platform had three exits and his back was to the central one. Light appeared along the tunnel and the passengers stood watching the train approach. Behind the Commissioner the exit led to the Victoria Line platform, just forty feet away, and commuters needed to traverse that platform to exit the station or reach the northbound platform of the Northern Line. As the train entered the station and slid to a halt before Sir Richard, a Victoria Line train also halted at the platform behind him. The specialist watched in the mirror as the commissioner took a pace towards the Northern Line train and then turned swiftly,
sprinting between the platforms and jumping aboard the Victoria Line train as the automatic doors slid shut behind him. Quite nimble and sprightly for a man of his age.

Having completed another anti-surveillance trick, apparently with success, the Commissioner was relaxed and safe in the assumption that he was tail free. The specialist was younger, faster, and did this sort of thing for a living so the move had been anticipated. Entering a carriage much further down the train it had however taken some effort to reach Sir Richards Tennant’s carriage before it pulled in at Vauxhall.

Sir Richard did not depart the train at Vauxhall; he stayed on for several stops, rising to depart as Green Park approached. That was when the specialist made the mistake, gasping aloud in shock, as much as pain, when struck in the face by another commuters elbow. The sound drew the commissioner’s gaze and his eyes widened slightly as he thought he saw someone he knew, but the specialist used the rising commuters as cover, moving out of view.

With the train stopped and doors open Sir Richard beheld the smiling face of Svetlana waiting for him on the platform. As he exited his head turned to look momentarily back towards the end of the carriage where the commotion had occurred, a slight frown furrowing his forehead but then a beautiful girl with come-hither green eyes and chestnut locks was grasping his arm affectionately and leaving lipstick on his cheek. He forgot all about what had just occurred except a reminder to himself to wipe away the lipstick before returning to the office.

The specialist watched from the safety of the crowd, allowing a safe distance to grow before following. The target had both her arms wrapped about the commissioner’s right arm, clearly fond of him and chatting animatedly, just as vivacious and attractive as she had been reported to be, the heels of her stiletto shoes clicking on the flag stones. Sir Richard was clearly enjoying the moment, and the envious looks he was receiving from strangers.

The pair had lunch in a café and the specialist visited a sandwich shop across the road, keeping them in sight through the window. They parted after lunch, going their separate
ways, and the target led the specialist north to the fringes of Hampstead Heath, to a grand Victorian era house with an indoor pool and glass ceiling.

Gaining access to a suitable surveillance pitch proved much easier than the specialist had feared it would be. The target was living rent free, house-sitting for the wealthy owners who had gone abroad for the duration of the war. The same held true for the adjoining property, but no house-sitters were in residence to ensure its safety, just an expensive burglar alarm that was not worth what the owners had paid for it. A trapdoor allowed access to the roof and from there the specialist settled down to observe, removing from the backpack a camera with video features and a paparazzi quality zoom lens.

The pool room was not unoccupied, the figure of another person reclined on a sun lounger, reading a novel. When the target appeared she did so shedding her clothing with the skill of an exotic dancer, dropping the items as she slowly approached the recliner at the far end until at last she was nude but for the heels.

Switching to ‘Record’ the specialist had first focussed on the dogs paw tattoo which was only just visible beneath the long mane of chestnut curls that bounced fetching off those delightfully wiggling buttocks. With the identifying feature established the view was zoomed out again.

Setting up a small pocket sized camera clamp stand the specialist carefully aimed the camera down through the glass ceiling before taking out the sandwiches and enjoying the view across the Heath as they were unhurriedly consumed.  The specialist washed down the sandwiches with bottled water before replaying the recording. After editing a five minute highlight a mobile phone was plugged into the camera and the video file sent as an attachment to a cell number written on a slip of paper.

It took a surprisingly short time before a reply was received and the specialist read it with a slight feeling of regret.  Perhaps the person on the other end had expected the target to be having sex with a man, not another woman? The two word
text messaged reply remained on the screen of the phone until the erase button was pressed and ‘DESTROY HER’ vanished.

Hampstead, twelve hours later.

Caroline peered out from a gap in the sheets and blankets that had gathered around her in a pile during the night. The light peeping through the cracks in the curtains did not bode well for the previous night’s weather girl’s promise that today would be one of fine sunny periods. It had sickly yellow hues rather than the intensity that comes from rays born of clear blue skies.

Her nose twitched as she tested the air, there was a scent in the air of toast but it was not recent, not fresh, and she contemplated remaining in the bed for another hour before accepting that to do so would be to put off the discomfort.

She bit her lip and groaned aloud as she rolled over on to the edge of the mattress and swung her feet to the floor, using her left hand to prop herself upright. The pain took her breath away and she sat there for a second before standing and tottering naked to the bathroom. Having accommodated the morning’s first call of nature she stood and in doing so caught sight of herself in the full-length mirror that was fixed to one wall.

Cradling the plaster cast encased right arm with her left USAFs most newly promoted lieutenant colonel wondered ruefully how much that men’s magazine would offer now, had they been present. The bruising down her left side was changing from black and blue to blue and yellow but the doctor had warned that the discoloration would be gone weeks before the bone of the ribs that lay below the bruising had finished knitting together.