The Shadow's Code

by Miles Goodson

  He hovered his foot above the throttle, waiting to see if they passed him, but they didn’t. He mashed the accelerator into the carpet and cornered hard, heading back down the road he had been on. The police did their best to follow. The blue lights pulsed against buildings and the empty roads. Tyres screeching as the two officers struggled to keep up with Kioshi in his more powerful car. After a few minutes the flashing lights were no longer visible in Kioshi’s rear view mirror. He would find a quiet spot and abandon the car. He questioned himself for several minutes. Why would the police want to stop him? Unless they knew who he was.

  Kioshi cursed the police car. It had been a bad night. Lindon had slipped through his fingers and now he was going to have to dispose of his car. Kioshi indicated to turn right on the roundabout ahead. As he did he noticed the flashing blue lights again, but this time it was in all directions. The police car that had followed him had alerted all available officers and alerted HQ. James and Bill had gone with MI5 the second they had heard the report in an unmarked Jaguar XF and were stopped across the road directly ahead of Kioshi, who was now slowly driving in a circle around the roundabout. The first exit had three police vehicles waiting and the third exit had two police pursuit cars stopped diagonally across both lanes.

  Kioshi immediately put his foot down and the back end of the Mercedes slid around. Kioshi aggressively turned to go back the way he had come. As he did two unmarked police Volvos that he hadn’t noticed came into vision and were blocking the road. Kioshi did another lap of the roundabout and decided to head towards the first exit. It had three police vehicles but they were all smaller slower cars. He turned down the street and raced toward the police hitting a car and scraping between it and the Armco. There was just enough space to push his way through. The police ran towards him with their truncheons at the ready but Kioshi had already slipped away and throttled the car away.

  The armed response officers in BMWs immediately gave chase when he turned off the roundabout. The two unmarked Volvos also screeched their tyres around the corner to try and catch Kioshi. Bill and James were sat in the back of the Jaguar watching events unfold. The MI5 agent driving turned to them and said “Hold on” as he then lit up the rear tyres and the Jaguar’s supercharger whined as the agent raced after the squadron of police vehicles. Several minutes of high speed twists and turns were tough for Kioshi. Dodging in and out of vehicles in a city he didn’t know trying to outrun police officers that knew the roads like backs of their hands. Kioshi headed for central London. Kioshi was hitting 80mph through the city streets.

  He reached Shoreditch and headed for a small building on Buckland Street. Kioshi was a few seconds ahead of the officers as he whipped the back end of the Mercedes out to turn sharply. He opened the driver’s door and screeched to a halt. As Kioshi jumped out of the driver’s door one of the police BMWs turned sharply into the street, narrowly missing the curb. Kioshi ran into a business and pulled out his gun from his belt holster. He shot a few rounds toward the police vehicle. The MI5 Jaguar skidded around the corner. James just caught sight of Kioshi popping off shots towards the armed officers in front of them.

  “Stay in here,” the MI5 driver ordered as he got out. The armed officers began approaching the car and the business. They were slow and careful with every movement. James and Bill got out of the Jaguar and took a few cautious steps down the street. The armed officers reached the shop and opened the front door. For three minutes they walked around the small building shouting “CLEAR” in short intervals. There was no sign of Kioshi.

  “DAMMIT, HE COULDN’T HAVE GONE FAR!” James shouted. No one answered. The MI5 agent was still in the building focused on the storage area. He found a hole under a long ice-cream fridge. “IN HERE!” he shouted. Everyone ran in the room and stared at the gap in the floor. It was very narrow, certainly too narrow for the two armed police officers and the MI5 agent. A few other officers appeared. One was slim enough to fit down the hole. The MI5 agent handed his gun to police officer.

  “Here, it’s loaded and the safety is off. If you need to use it, use it.” The officer nodded. There was a ladder leading down about fifteen feet. After five minutes of fruitless searching the officer walked as far as he could along a tunnel. It was an old underground train line that had several doors across it. Kioshi was nowhere to be seen. The search was called off and the attention turned to Kioshi’s car. Any information about where the car had been from the GPS system was of huge value. James and Bill were disappointed and annoyed. To be so close and lose Kioshi was a bitter pill to swallow, but neither of them expected finding him to be easy.

  Chapter 25

  The investigation into the small business premises went on into the early hours. It had been vacant for a decade; the building’s owner had been tracked down to a small farmhouse in Surrey but was of little help. The building was previously a butcher’s shop that his father had owned. After he passed away the man had inherited the building but was unable to sell or lease it due to critical repairs needed to the building’s structure. There was evidence of squatters in one room and some used needles in another. It was becoming clear the Kioshi had discovered the building was dormant and decided to use it as a base. The upstairs area was littered with fast food packets and empty bottles of water. An officer discovered a cupboard with a razor, toothbrush and comb. They all looked as though they had been used recently. The forensic team bagged everything they could to take for analysis. Officers found a business nearby that had CCTV cameras. They scanned through the footage of the last few days and saw Kioshi’s Mercedes come and go from the property. Roger, Bill and James now knew where Kioshi had been, but they still didn’t know where he was going.

  Kioshi was enraged. He shouted to himself and frothed spit from the corners of his mouth. After an hour of ranting to himself his blood pressure began to drop. He finally calmed from his incensed state and the vein on his forehead stopped throbbing. He had escaped down a series of maintenance tunnels and then reached an underground station. At 7.00am he received a call. It was his informant. Kioshi needed good news.

  “Idiot!” the man shouted. Kioshi’s rage began to boil again but before he had a response ready the informant gave him a golden nugget of information. The location, time and date of Lindon’s next job in London. Kioshi repeated the details in his mind time after time, committing everything the informant had said to memory.

  “If you screw up again then that’s it. He will disappear after this mission. The American authorities are working this guy as well. They have sent a task force. If you don’t get him this time then you’ve blown it for life,” the informant said dramatically, then hung up.

  Kioshi squatted down on to the concrete floor of the underground car park he was in. He began whispering to himself, and then raised his voice with every repetition until he was shouting. The concrete walls of the underground car park echoed his menacing screams.

  Lindon had been very busy since leaving the airport. His focus switched to the upcoming job and he was still uneasy about it. His preparation time was too short. Lindon was getting a stronger and stronger feeling to abandon the job; every time he reached for his phone to call it off he had one thought, the money. The recent text messages were haunting. He had no idea who they were from and why they had sent them. As he thought about the job again all the hairs on his neck stood on end. His hands twitched towards his phone pocket again. The money, he thought. His hand rested back to his side.

  During Lindon’s time in the Middle East, sandstorms would build during combat and the enemy would advance. To survive you had to sharpen every sense. Hearing a footstep in a blizzard would mean life or death. Lindon had been taught how to sharpen the senses to a point that you can tell when a pin drops in a different room. He learnt to listen for the slightest change in sound. He had come within seconds of death in the sandstorms. It was the training that had kept him alive. Now he knew that to stay alive he would have to rely on his training. Lindon tried to relax. He h
ad checked into an underground luxury hotel for the night. The surroundings were opulent but even the duck feathered pillows couldn’t help Lindon rest. He knew he should back out of the job but after this payday he would never have to work as a mercenary again. He would be free. Lindon thought about his wood cabin in Sweden. “Money is no use if you’re dead, Lindon,” he said to himself whilst lying on the bed and shutting his eyes.

  Lindon woke up at 4am and searched an internet auction site for a car. By 8am he was standing in a man’s driveway looking at a 1999 Range Rover. The owner, an elderly but charismatic Caribbean gentlemen who walked with a long wooden cane swore that it ran well. He had recently had it serviced by his son who ran a local garage, and had all the recalls and modifications to resolve the known faults. The old man had been a bus mechanic for many years and so knew how to look after a motor. Lindon shook hands with the frail man on a cash deal and drove it away.

  He arrived at a side street in central London and paid for the day’s parking and walked away. Lindon hoped he would not need the Range Rover. It was his getaway car if the job went badly. Lindon flicked his hood up over his head as he walked and raised his phone to his ear. He called the caretaker for his boat in Scotland. The dial tone repeated time after time. Lindon held on and after a minute a man answered gruffly. The caretaker spoke with a broad Scottish accent.

  “Yes, I started her up three days ago, she’s running fine.” Lindon insisted he should take the boat out for a short trip, just to make sure all was well. It had been such a long time since he had last seen the boat that he couldn’t even remember the name of it.

  “Nordak,” the caretaker told him. “You don’t remember the name of your own boat? he queried with a laugh.

  “I have several boats,” Lindon lied.

  “Aye well. I will take her out for you, no problem, d’ya want me to make sure she’s fueled?” he asked.

  Lindon struggled to understand every word the man said. “Yes, fill her up, and a reserve drum, one of the hundred liter ones,” Lindon said whilst scanning the street and the people around him.

  “OK, I will put it on your account.”

  That afternoon Lindon purchased food supplies and two large water containers and some hiking gear. He rushed back to the Range Rover and filled the boot with his emergency supplies. As he did so he noticed a man hanging around the end of the street smoking and chatting on the phone. He watched the man for a moment.

  “Ya na ulice kuryu… davai,“ the man said.

  Lindon listened. “Russian” he whispered to himself. Lindon walked off without looking at the man again.

  A plan was starting to come together in Lindon’s mind. He paid great attention to small details, as it was the small details that saved your life. As the sun dropped lower in the sky Lindon tried to relax. He spent the night scanning the mission brief. With one finger he combed over every word. By midnight his eyes struggled to stay open. He eventually slept on the sofa in his small hotel room. At 5am he woke up and took off his white t-shirt and walked to the shower. He stared at the tiles in the shower, thinking. The water rushed over Lindon whilst his mind raced. Why does the job have such high pay? Maybe all these government protection type jobs pay really well? Maybe he wasn’t experienced enough to be trusted before? Lindon stopped asking himself questions the moment he stepped out of the shower. Governments are spending taxpayers’ money, he thought. Why would they care how much they pay? ‘I’m too used to private jobs,’ Lindon said to himself.

  Lindon was now beginning his final preparations for the mission. There was no turning back now. In twelve hours he would be working his last job. In the back of his mind was Stephanie. She seemed like a ray of normality in his otherwise wild world and yet he hadn’t seen or spoken to her in over a year. He bowed his head low and exhaled. Life would be changed by tomorrow he thought. Just one more job.

  Chapter 26

  At 4pm everyone began to assemble in Room Foxtrot. Roger, James, Warren and Bill sipped coffee as they waited for the mission to begin. The lights were dimmed and the security monitors began pinging up on every screen. Street cameras, body cameras and a drone were all waiting to relay images to the monitors for the eagle-eyed viewers. Warren worked with an MI5 technician to activate each screen. The drone had to wait for special clearance from Simon before it could be deployed. Seth, Anthony and Liam met up on Forest Road. A transit van was parked waiting for them. The three men got into the back and closed the door. The driver, a hairy man in his forties shouted at them from the driver’s seat in a clear Welsh accent, “Right lads, off we go,” and the van pulled away. Lindon planned to meet his team on location at 6.55pm. Lindon was already wearing his tactical gear and bulletproof jacket as he waited patiently in his newly acquired car.

  Kioshi kneeled on the rooftop of a building facing the location the informant had given him. He stared out to an open space with a short square building in the middle. The square building had a lot of security including several police officers who were visibly armed. Kioshi decided it would be best to find a location inside the building as shooting from the roof would leave him too exposed. Kioshi broke in and found an office with the perfect view on the top floor of the building. The large window would make it easy for him to see everything in his target building.

  Lindon arrived at exactly 6.55pm on location. The cold air made his breath visible. It was an especially dark night in London with only a slither of a moon.

  “Hey guys,” he said as he walked into the small room with a large opening facing the small square building. Liam didn’t look up but Anthony turned around.

  “Hey Lindon. We got you a space to set up just over there. You well?” Anthony asked, sounding his usual self.

  “Yes thanks. Have you guys managed to access the mainframe to drop the net?” Lindon asked as he kneeled down. The net was the secure barrier that the team planned to use keep the venue secure from any cyber attack. The invisible barrier would alert them to any intrusion before it managed to get into the secure mainframe.

  “Not yet. We need you to work on some codes. Shouldn’t take long,” Anthony said as he fiddled with wires. Lindon wouldn’t normally mention money, but he had to know what everyone else thought of the huge payday.

  “So I’m guessing you guys are all getting a big payday for this easy job. Crazy isn’t it?”

  Anthony managed to keep his cool and answered calmly. “It’s government work. I know Dino won’t tell you who the employer is but I’ve worked for this client before. Government pay is always unreal.” Anthony began to walk to the other side of the room, hoping Liam or Seth would take over the conversation.

  “You’ve done these jobs before? How are you not retired, Anthony?” Lindon queried. Anthony looked over at Seth and realized he was going to have carry on the conversation.

  “Well you know how it is. You live to your means in this life. The more you have in the bank, the more your wife spends.” Anthony laughed. Liam and Seth joined in to try and calm their nerves.

  Anthony swept his hand through his hair and stared ahead at the building below.

  “OK guys, I’ve run some access codes, who’s got the master key?” Anthony asked.

  “Liam,” Seth blurted, forgetting that, of all them, Liam was the weakest at lying.

  “What’s the master key code?” Lindon asked Liam, looking at him across the room. Liam was wearing a baseball cap that he had pulled as low as possible and was trying his best to hide in. A few seconds passed without an answer.

  “Liam?” Lindon called.

  Seth then raised his voice “Liam!”

  Liam shook slightly; his voice was uncharacteristically quiet and fast. “Err, master code. It’s 4 Delta Lima Kilo 8 7 2 5 9 Bravo Sierra.”

  “Thanks, are you OK?” Lindon asked.

  “He’s fine. We had a bumpy flight and he’s been shaking ever since. Dropped 2,000 feet at one point,” Seth said with a steady smile. Lindon knew Liam was not a nervous flyer. Nervous looks
shot around the room.

  “Hey, is everything alright guys? You seem a little…on edge,” Lindon said, standing facing all three men.

  “Yeah, we got another mission straight after this one. Our minds have been drifting for days. Sorry,” Anthony said convincingly, trying to settle the situation.

  Lindon relaxed but decided not to mention the messages he had received. He felt he could trust these guys but something didn’t add up. Lindon clicked buttons on his computer for a second.

  “OK, well anyway I’m in the network. The net should be visible on all your screens,” Lindon said.

  The team looked at their laptop screens in silence as the first guests arrived at the square building in the open space below.

  Jim sat in his office in Toronto with his leg shaking. Outside the snow was falling on the dark streets below. The office was still full as people were planning to stay late until confirmation of a completed job came through. This was the Christmas bonus job and everyone wanted to be there when it was a success. Jim didn’t join them in their excited anticipation. Blinking had become a challenge for Jim’s sore eyes. His chin sagged and his body was limp in his leather office chair. Jim hoped that Lindon had received the text messages he had sent. He had taken a huge risk by buying a burner cell phone and sending text messages to tradesmen outside official channels but he just couldn’t unshackle his mind from the thought of turning on one of his own. Jim crunched headache pills and sipped whisky. In his office draw was a gun that he kept for security. He had thought more than once about ending it all, such was his depression. The next few hours would be the toughest of his life. He had been shot at as a young man in warzones but this was worse. The enemy was now him, and he was the one dangling the dagger over a comrade’s life.