Temple of Spies

by Ian Kharitonov

“Is our arrangement still in place, Mr. David?”

  Kinkladze shot the Thai official a stern glance.

  “You need not worry, General. Trust my word.”

  Sokolov made a mental note of the exchange as he followed Kinkladze to the embassy car. It was a black metallic Toyota Crown Royal with tinted windows and diplomatic license plates. Kinkladze climbed into the driver’s seat on the right.

  With Sokolov sitting in the back, Kinkladze chauffeured him to Bangkok. It wasn’t the first time Sokolov had visited a country with left-hand traffic, but the odd feeling of driving in the wrong lane took a while to shake off.

  “First up,” the attaché said, “we have to check out that dead guy. A funny story, if you ask me.”

  “What’s so funny about someone dying?”

  “Oh, he’s got your name. He even looks like you. Same name, age, hair color, height, weight, build, all very similar. The catch is, here in Thailand, last names are unique to each family. Thais don’t share a surname unless they are related. So it’s amusing. Kind of. That dead guy is definitely not you, but are you sure he’s not your brother or something?” Kinkladze chuckled.

  “My brother is alive and well, thanks for your concern.”

  “Yeah, huh, good. That’s what I want you to say at the coroner’s office. Instead of transporting the body back to Russia, we’ll leave it unclaimed and unidentified. I’ll do most of the talking, you just nod, okay? Afterwards, we can forget about the whole thing. Then we go and pick up the passenger.”

  “So, is the passport fake or genuine?”

  “That’s a tough question.”

  “What is that supposed to mean?”

  “Don’t tell anyone, Major, but it’s damned easy to get a real Russian passport in a false name. You can get one in Moscow for about three or four thousand bucks, American. The prices are competitive. That money buys you a forged Russian ID, which you then use to apply for a genuine Russian passport. Just make sure you opt for the plain old variety which doesn’t have the machine-readable biometrics chip with your fingerprints, eye retina scan or whatever. Nonetheless, it’s an honest-to-goodness Russian passport, valid for ten years. Choose any name to your heart’s content, even Donald Duck, nobody will bat an eyelid. That’s just one way to obtain it. Throw in hundreds of lost passports which are reported each year by tourists. These can be doctored by crooks easily. Even blank passports get stolen from embassies.”

  Or get sold by crooked diplomats, Sokolov thought.

  “Are you saying there’s an entire market for this sort of thing?” he asked, feigning ignorance.

  “You bet. Especially here in Thailand. Lots of people want to protect their privacy, you know. Anonymity is in high demand these days.”

  11

  Tom Frey drove to the All Saints Church. He’d contacted Langley and reported his findings but the reply was taking too long and he had no time to waste. Similarly, the embassy station chief had no field men at his disposal to assist Frey.

  “I advise extreme caution in the current highly volatile political climate,” the diplomat had told him.

  Damned politicians, the lot of ‘em.

  Frey was determined to take the matter into his own hands and locate Ri Kwang-Hyok, also known as Father Dionysius. He’d deal with whatever happened next on his own terms. There wasn’t a problem that his Beretta and a few spare clips couldn’t solve. Even if he was making a mistake—which was impossible, he told himself—he had to act on the lead he’d unearthed. He was not going to let that one slip from his grasp. Hell no.

  He found the Russian church closed. It was located in a deserted blind alley, concealed amid tropical trees and shrubs away from the nearest street. The secluded position reminded Frey of a black site.

  He hid behind the foliage on the other side of the street. He waited in ambush for almost an hour, but nobody showed up. The church—a three-storied building which resembled a colonial-style villa with domed cupolas attached on top—stood locked and seemingly abandoned.

  The Kim-Jong-Un-lovin’ bastard hightailed it out of Pattaya, Frey thought. He knew I’d be coming for him.

  Frey took out his phone. He debated on calling Chatchai but decided against it. He’d do it alone. He was hot on the North Korean’s heels. He had to keep up the chase. Frey was by no means a trigger-happy gunslinger but the thrill of the hunt made his heart pound. Dionysius thought he had fooled him, but now Frey was coming after him.

  Bangkok. Frey had to get there, the sooner the better. The St. Nicholas Chapel. The enemy’s lair.

  All the answers lay there. And this time he would be the confessor.

  12

  Sokolov had witnessed death numerous times. The morgue in Bangkok hardly differed from any other around the world. But he had never encountered something so unexpected as he was shown the corpse of the drowned Russian.

  The dead face was waxen, mannequin-like, yet still recognizable.

  He hoped his eyes were playing tricks on him. He had to be wrong.

  “Do you know this man?” asked a bespectacled Thai official.

  “No,” Sokolov lied. His voice did not betray his surprise.

  Kinkladze took over the conversation.

  “Thank you for informing us about the death of a Russian citizen. As you can see, we have attempted to find the next-of-kin without success. We’ll continue our search, but frankly, I don’t believe that anyone else will claim the body. Mr. Sokolov here is in no way related to the man in question. However slim the odds, I’m glad we got it out of the way. Mr. Sokolov also happens to represent the Russian government. The main reason he’s here is to verify the cause of death and coordinate the financial requirements arising from the body’s disposition.”

  “The forensic examination determined the cause of death as drowning. The full autopsy report will be available within three months. I’ll make sure that your embassy receives it. As for the disposition of the remains, I understand that you see no reason for repatriation?”

  “Unless we find the next-of-kin,” Kinkladze said. “And I assure you that it’s highly unlikely at this point. We’ve already done our best.”

  “In that case, no additional mortuary expenses will accrue. The remains will be cremated and buried at a private graveyard. The PBK Foundation—the volunteers who found the body—will do it free of charge.”

  “Excellent. Our business is done, then. Thanks again for your help. Khob khun krap.” Kinkladze bowed and turned to leave.

  “Khob khun krap! Sawasdee krap.” The Thai bowed back.

  “What about the personal effects?” Sokolov asked.

  “Chai krap. But of course! I must pass them over to you. Please wait.”

  A minute later, the Thai official returned carrying a small plastic bag. He handed it to Sokolov.

  It contained just two items.

  The ill-fated Russian passport.

  And a blue casino token.

  13

  He had met Alexei—or ‘Alex’—Grib at a mixed martial arts tournament in Poland, seven years before. Alex, a Belorussian sambo fighter, had always favored dirty tricks, hitting his opponents in the neck and groin areas. When Sokolov knocked him down twice in the first round, Alex had gone mental, trying to gouge Sokolov’s eyes. Sokolov had knocked him out. Disqualified by the referee and subsequently banned from competitive fighting, Alex had instigated a nightclub brawl and faced charges of rape on the next day. He’d fled from prosecution back to Belarus and nobody had heard from him ever since.

  Not until he’d stolen Sokolov’s identity, perhaps to avoid arrest.

  Sokolov didn’t bother telling the story to Kinkladze. For starters, Sokolov couldn’t be one hundred percent certain it was him, no matter how striking the resemblance of the ghostly face. He’d seen Alex in the flesh only once before. Seven years had passed. Secondly, assuming the dead man was indeed Alex Grib, nobody would mourn his demise. And finally, the death of anyone other than a Russian national wouldn’t interest K
inkladze in the slightest. Nothing mattered to Kinkladze apart from reaching the St. Nicholas Chapel to pick up his spy.

  Through heavy traffic, Kinkladze navigated the streets of Bangkok, careful to bypass the districts paralyzed by the riots. At one junction, Sokolov glimpsed a police cordon holding off a seething throng of protesters. All of them wore red bandannas and yelled out slogans, incited by their leaders. The unruly crowd threatened to clash with the armed policemen, the two sides separated by coils of barbed wire laid across the road. Red flags waved, drums thumped, bullhorns blared with angry, hysterical shrieks. Cursing, Kinkladze turned from the bottleneck to a small alley.

  The St. Nicholas Chapel was unlike anything Sokolov had expected to set his eyes on. He could hardly call it a chapel at all. Instead, it was a single-story shed with an image of the Virgin painted above the door and a couple of crudely-constructed crosses stuck on the roof like TV aerials. A clumsy wooden sign did proclaim it as a Russian Orthodox church, nonetheless. The tiny yard between the front gate and the church entrance was cluttered with assorted flower pots, a water hose, an empty bucket, and a broken motorcycle covered by tarpaulin. Rundown Thai homes neighbored it, surrounded by rust-eaten fencing.

  Kinkladze stopped the car in the middle of the littered alley. He waited behind the wheel, reluctant to venture out in the stinking heat. He stole glances at the dashboard clock.

  “Where the hell is he?” Kinkladze said. “We arranged to meet here without delay.”

  Kinkladze left the car and approached the low sliding gate before the shack-like chapel. He pressed the buzzer. No response. He held the button again, insistently.

  Finally, a man emerged from the back of the house. An Oriental with matted hair, dressed in a checkered shirt, baggy pants and flip-flops, was lugging a gym bag with great strain. Kinkladze motioned for him to hurry up. The Korean scurried past Kinkladze, who stayed behind to lock the gate with his own key.

  Stuck in traffic at an intersection, Tom Frey paid the cab fare and proceeded on foot. The polluted air and the humidity made him sweat from exertion as he walked the distance to the designated street.

  He failed to spot the church. The tell-tale onion dome was nowhere to be found. He peered at the English-dubbed street sign, which gave him the correct name.

  Abruptly, he detected something else, and realized that he shouldn’t have been looking for a Russian church where there wasn’t one.

  Hurrying from a house which had a slapdash cross jutting atop its roof, was the man he’d come for.

  Dionysius. Or rather, Ri Kwang-Hyok. Gone were the dignified black cassock, the golden crucifix, the ceremonial demeanor. The Korean now bore more resemblance to a vagrant than a holy father as he walked over to a waiting Toyota.

  Frey gained pace, reaching for his holstered Beretta. The car’s tinted windows made it impossible to discern if another passenger occupied the rear seat. Frey fancied his chances, regardless.

  “Hey, you!” he shouted. “Hold it right there, you son of a bitch!”

  Blocking his path to the car, Frey grabbed Dionysius by the lapel and jabbed the gun into his ribs. With a shocked expression, he dropped his gym bag and gaped at Frey.

  Behind the Korean, another man—an Eastern European—rushed forward to intervene. Frey recalled his face from a file listing Russian SVR personnel in Thailand. Frey shoved him back. The Russian staggered and fell.

  Dionysius kicked out at Frey, trying to break free desperately, so he smacked him across the face with the butt of the Beretta.

  Just then, a looming figure came into view.

  A red bandanna masked his face. He held a gun, leveling it at Frey.

  Frey swung his Beretta.

  Alerted by the commotion in the narrow street, Sokolov turned to see what was going on. To his amazement, a gun-wielding heavyset Caucasian was attacking Kinkladze and the Korean. The situation was getting out of hand. Sokolov had to sort it out before it turned ugly. He reached for the car door.

  Suddenly, two gunshots thundered in quick succession.

  Through the tinted glass, Sokolov watched the Korean and his assailant topple, spewing blood. Their masked killer switched his aim to Kinkladze. The SVR man cowered. Another shot blasted. Blood erupted from Kinkladze’s forehead and he crashed down.

  The killer discarded the gun and took flight, moving swiftly as he jumped over a fence and ran between houses to an adjacent street. His red bandanna would help him blend into the crowd of protesters. Sokolov had no chance to distinguish his hidden face. But he would never forget the killer’s eyes, different in color. Dark brown and light hazel.

  14

  One minute. The fine margin between success and failure—life and death—couldn’t have been more pronounced. Song marveled at the workings of fate as he waded through a roaring mass of protesters, indiscernible in the crowd.

  Sixty seconds later, Kinkladze would have taken Dionysius away, never to be found by the CIA. Frey would have finished his search empty-handed. Song wouldn’t have had to kill all three of them.

  No matter. The outcome satisfied him. He had solved the problem for good. Dispatching Alex Grib and then Lee had proved insufficient. Now he had eliminated all danger completely: Dionysius, his Russian handler, and the meddlesome American.

  For a few days, the tabloids would spin their deaths into a juicy backpage story, playing into Song’s hands. A rendezvous between a CIA spy and his Russian counterpart gone awry, killing an innocent bystander, some unknown priest.

  No links could be traced, the true meaning of the murder scene impossible to deduce.

  Nothing—and nobody—could jeopardize his operation.

  15

  Sokolov held his emotions in check. He had to act professionally. He stepped out of the car and examined the gruesome picture. Three lifeless bodies lay sprawled on the ground. Three clean head shots indicated the work of a trained hitman.

  Sokolov scanned the alley. The booming gunfire had attracted a few frightened neighbors.

  The Toyota’s engine idled. He weighed the alternatives. No point in giving chase, he reasoned. The killer had vanished out of sight. The police would sooner start chasing him. Refuge at the Russian embassy didn’t present a viable option. Trying to explain Kinkladze’s death would complicate matters further. The last thing on his mind was giving himself in to an angry SVR spy section who would likely blame him for the death of their comrade.

  Leave the country first, deal with the authorities later. His first priority lay in getting his two team-mates out of Don Muang safely.

  As he got in the right-sided driver’s seat, he pulled out his rugged Sonim phone and dialed Zubov.

  “Sergei? It’s me. Tell Mischenko to prepare for take-off. Right now. I’m coming back, alone.”

  “Is anything wrong, Gene?”

  “Everything is wrong.”

  Wary of the traffic flow, he drove out of the alley and dashed around a maze of streets. If only he could find the way back to Don Muang. The diplomatic plates granted him immunity from the police, for the time being. Irate motorists honked as the Toyota cut in front of them, darting between lanes sharply. He had to reach the motorway as fast as he could. He remembered the general route but the chaotic traffic, aggravated by the protests, made him feel trapped.

  He had walked into a trap right from the start. In some mystical way, Alex Grib’s death had led him into it. But for a moment’s hesitation, he would now be lying dead on the ground, detected and shot by the killer. He felt determined to play no part in whatever spy game the SVR was running.

  As the traffic slowed to a crawl, Sokolov snatched Kinkladze’s handbag. The Toyota lacked a navigation system, and Sokolov’s old-school phone had no GPS chip.

  Delving into the handbag, he was taken aback by the contents. Two bundles of cash, ten thousand U.S. dollars each, made for an unusual discovery. He put the money aside and dug deeper. He had to unzip a hidden compartment to find what he was looking for.

  He fish
ed out a portable device. Lightweight, the mid-sized tablet fitted comfortably in his hand. The gadget had a clean, sleek design, dominated by the screen. The thin bezel around it contained no elements apart from the power button. Oddly, the manufacturer logo was absent. He spotted neither a fingerprint scanner nor a facial-recognition camera, so he tried his luck. Chances were that the device had no security protection.

  Struggling to keep his eyes on the road, Sokolov powered on the no-name slate. The operating system booted quickly, requiring no PIN-code entry. He expected to find some mapping software among the stock applications, but his hopes evaporated once he saw the main screen.

  The tablet ran on custom firmware, the likes of which he had never encountered. The minimalist user interface featured no icons, widgets or buttons. The display remained blank for a few seconds.

  Against a black background, white text popped up.

  Welcome to the Dark Web

  Two multi-colored options appeared below.

  Exit, in blue.

  Enter, in red.

  16

  Sokolov tapped on Exit.

  The tablet powered off.

  He booted it up again, and was shown the same start screen.

  Welcome to the Dark Web

  This time, he pressed Enter.

  A text field appeared, prompting input on a virtual keyboard.

  Once more, two choices presented themselves beneath. Blue and red. Exit and Enter.

  Sokolov had no idea what any of it meant. Was he supposed to enter a password?

  The Dark Web? What the hell?

  The tablet equally baffled and intrigued him. There must have been a reason Kinkladze had kept it. Could it possibly be a spy gadget? Sokolov wondered. Too unorthodox for an SVR communications device. Strangely sophisticated and mysterious.

  Sokolov could think of only one person who might give him the answer.

  He dialed Pavel Netto, the EMERCOM tech whiz back in Moscow.