Vauxhall Cross, London
NO ONE WHO worked at Vauxhall Cross had ever seen Felix Schauer without his trademark bow-tie. No one had ever seen him late, flustered or in any way losing his cool. Today MI6’s Director Critical was all of those things.
‘Into the conference room now. All of you,’ he announced, rushing into the third-floor open-plan office used by the China team. ‘Please,’ he added, as an afterthought.
‘I have just been informed by Security Section,’ he began, barely waiting for the last person to take their seat, ‘that the data breach on Angela’s phone is even worse than we thought.’ He shook his head and closed his eyes for a moment. To those around the table it was almost as if he were in physical pain. ‘Yes, it’s bad, very bad,’ he continued, as if answering a question that no one had asked. ‘Someone, and we don’t yet know who, has been sending text messages from Angela’s phone to Luke Carlton in Taiwan. Unbelievable, I know, but her phone was taken over by a malign operator. Zombified, I think they’re calling it. We’re still trying to find out exactly when this happened.’
He looked around the row of shocked faces.
‘I want you all to stay calm,’ he continued. No one had moved a muscle so far. ‘But now we have to take some drastic action. You!’ He pointed at the fair-haired, freckled Scotsman in the room.
‘Director?’ Donald answered.
‘I need you to contact Luke and Jenny once I’ve finished here … No, go and do it now. Tell them to ignore any instructions they received from what they will have presumed was Angela’s device. Those orders will almost certainly lead them on a false trail …’ He paused briefly, shaking his head from side to side in disbelief. ‘Oh mein Gott. This is a disaster.’
Felix Schauer stayed talking for a few more minutes, going through some of the operational changes this would mean for the team. It was then that Donald returned, his face paler than ever. ‘I’ve tried both their phones,’ he said. ‘They’re switched off. So I contacted our station chief in Taipei instead.’
‘Yes, good. Graham Leach. And?’
‘They went to meet the opposition. It was at an unspecified location. He said the instruction came directly to them from Angela’s phone.’
‘Oh Christ,’ exclaimed Schauer.
‘One more thing,’ Donald said. ‘Leach arranged for them to be shadowed to the meeting but now the comms are down. It seems we’ve lost contact with Luke and Jenny.’