Traitor

he dress like one. He looked scruffy compared with his colleagues in MI6. And he had a voice to match, coming as he did from the East End or south-of-the-river London - or so rumour had it. But Jervis was head of the intelligence organisation’s operations wing for a reason. Some referred to him as the brilliant mongrel - not to his face, of course, although maybe Jervis wouldn’t have minded the nickname as much as he might have made out on hearing it.

‘You know, I just realised something,’ the CO said. ‘Is Stratton in date . . . for diving? Didn’t you get shot in the chest a couple of years ago?’

‘And the rest of it,’ Mike muttered. ‘He’s in date, sir. He’d better be. He’s still getting paid for it.’

‘I should think so too,’ Jervis said, looking at Stratton and wearing one of his rare smiles. He was referring to a task he had run earlier in the year at a certain undersea prison. The other men in the room obviously knew of Stratton’s frequent loans to MI6 for specialist operations, in particular the CO who was required officially to ‘sign him off’ from time to time. None were privy to the missions themselves although there were always rumours. All had heard something about a deep-sea operation involving Stratton and the Yanks but that was about it.

‘Oh yes,’ acknowledged the CO, who knew a little more than most. It was sometimes an odd position to be in, both for Stratton and the CO, when the subordinate knew more about what was going on than those further up the hierarchy.

The CO glanced at Stratton. Something in the look gave Stratton pause for thought. It was the way the man looked away as Stratton caught his gaze. That was most unusual for the CO.

‘Right,’ the CO said. ‘To business, then . . . David.’

The well-groomed young ops officer stood, smoothed his jacket on his slender frame and stepped lightly over to two large widescreen monitors. He touched the base of one. A satellite image zoomed in on the Black Sea, veering to the north of the mass of water and pushing in further to hold a position a few hundred thousand feet above a large harbour, its entrance at the centre of the screen.

‘Sevastopol,’ the officer announced. ‘Principal base for Russia’s Black Sea fleet. This is a ship-hull recording job. For the past few decades Six have carried out this kind of thing using robot cameras,’ he said, nodding to Jervis. ‘That’s not going to be possible this time.’

The screen image zoomed in closer, following the main channel into the harbour and heading south along a finger of water. After a few moments it paused and focused its bird’s-eye view on a naval ship moored stern-on to a jetty, several other vessels parked tightly either side of it. The ops officer touched the adjacent monitor and it displayed several close-up shots of the same vessel taken from the jetty itself. It was battleship grey and had the feel of a military craft yet it was void of armaments: no rocket platforms, no deck ordnance. Instead the design was stealth, the angular superstructure bristling with dishes, antennae and other complex-looking communications- technology features.

‘The Inessa,’ the ops officer said. ‘For the aficionados among us that was the name of Lenin’s mistress . . . It’s Russian navy. We’re not entirely sure what its precise purpose is. It may have more than one. There’s evidence to suggest it’s a mother ship for submersibles, manned and unmanned. Other evidence indicates it’s a surveillance ship. Mr Jervis believes it is far worse. The Inessa may aid in the delivery of chemical and biological weaponry . . . Our task? To photograph the underside of it.’

The CO gave Stratton another glance, which the operative did not return though he could sense the man’s eyes upon him. The CO was far from being a dramatic type and Stratton wondered what his concerns were.

‘And why can’t the technical people do this?’ Mike asked.

‘Technology may be advancing every day,’ Jervis said. ‘But it will never replace human input.’

A moment’s silence followed for them to digest that small pearl of wisdom. They waited to see if Jervis, the most senior person present, had anything to add to his own comment. He sat there impassively.

‘The Inessa has so far defeated all attempts to visually record her hull bottom,’ David continued. ‘She has a device on her underside that MI16 has euphemistically termed a disrupter, a powerful combination of sonar, electronic jamming, microwave and sound waves. Two recording devices used against it already in operations have yielded nothing. In fact, the disrupter wrecked their electronics.’

‘For the purpose of this briefing,’ the CO interrupted, ‘which, as you know is recorded, I should mention something we talked about before Stratton’s arrival. I understand we don’t know what this disrupter will do to a man?’

‘That’s right,’ the ops officer said, glancing at Jervis.

‘Much the same thing, I expect,’ Jervis said in an off-hand manner. ‘This will be our first attempt, so no one really knows.’

The soldiers in the room all had the same thought - Jervis was a cold bastard. The others glanced at Stratton for any reaction since it was pretty obvious who the man was intended to be.

Stratton’s gaze flicked to Jervis who was studying the screen images. The operative switched to Mike who could offer nothing more than a sympathetic raise of the eyebrows. The CO looked at him and again Stratton chose to ignore it. There always seemed to be something in each operational task briefing that caused angst. Experience had taught him to keep quiet until the end when he would have the full picture.

Jervis finally spoke. ‘In our attempts to understand this unique system we’ve discovered occasions when the device is switched off,’ he said. ‘Our boffins at Sixteen believe that operating it in shallow water causes a bounce effect that would be detrimental to the equipment on board the ship itself.’ Jervis nodded for the ops officer to continue.

‘The ship never sails anywhere except in deep water in order to keep the disrupter operational. The Inessa is also obliged to turn off the disrupter in Sevastopol harbour because of the density of sonar surveillance and security systems in operation. Those same systems prohibit us from mounting an effective surveillance task while she’s in port. The Inessa’s disrupter is therefore kept in the standby mode until the ship has left the harbour. The captain can turn it on as soon as he has passed the mole. He appears to make a habit of taking the vessel as close to the northern mole as he can. The seabed there is less than a metre below propeller depth. The logic seems to be that if he can’t use the disrupter until the ship’s clear of the mole he’ll opt for the shallowest point. The turbulence created by the vessel is too great to position a robot. A team of Spetsnaz shadow the ship and they have been seen inspecting the shallows after she has passed this point. They appear to take every precaution. We believe the only solution is to send a diver in, someone who can react quickly to a changing situation, record the data and get out of there before the Spetsnaz arrive.

‘We have carried out a survey of the seabed, where the Inessa likes to pass,’ the ops officer went on, touching the screen, which zoomed in to an area just beyond the end of the mole. ‘It’s uneven, made up of large rocks. MI16 has come up with a harness that can be bolted to rock. Theoretically, a diver should be able to attach himself to the harness and operate a recording device while the vessel passes overhead. When it’s gone he disconnects and gets out of there.’ The ops officer looked around at them. ‘That’s the task in general detail.’

‘What tests have been carried out with this harness and recorder?’ the CO asked. ‘Has anyone actually tried this before?’

‘I had a moment with the chap from MI16 who’s here,’ the ops officer said. ‘I understand they’ve carried out several satisfactory trials.’

The CO looked at Stratton. ‘What do you think?’

Stratton tried to visualise the operation. ‘It’ll depend on the kit, sir. There’ll be a lot of turbulence. But if it’s been done . . .’

The CO turned back to David. ‘Did he describe the precise conditions in which they tested the equipment?’

‘Apparently one of them wore the harness in its intended role while a Royal Navy frigate passed overhead,’ the ops officer replied. ‘With the same clearances as may be expected in Sevastopol.’

‘They actually trialled it using one of their own?’ the CO asked, impressed.

‘So he said, sir.’

‘Why don’t we just get them to do it?’ Mike quipped, with a smirk. No one laughed, though Jervis smiled thinly.

‘The Spetsnaz are as much of a concern to me as the turbulence, ’ the CO said. ‘This is a job for a soldier, not a scientist.’

‘We have some useful underwater toys,’ Mike offered.