a hook. He put them on and the voices in the cockpit came to life.
The operations room commander sat in his high chair staring at the giant screen showing the North Sea covered in its various information markers, with Morpheus in the centre. On the east coast of England, close to the Scottish border, was a moving object circled in red, the window next to it giving its details. The circle turned to blue and began to flash.
‘Whisky four-zero is back on line, sir,’ one of the console operators called out, informing his boss of something that he had seen for himself.
The ops officer pushed a button on his panel. ‘Whisky four-zero, this is zero Charlie.’
‘Zero Charlie, Whisky four-zero.’ The pilot’s voice came over speakers that were mounted around the room.
The operations officer beckoned to one of the aides. ‘Tell Nevins we’ve got comms with the SBS team,’ he said.
‘Haven’t a clue about the cause of the blackout,’ the pilot continued. ‘Strangest bloody communications breakdown I’ve ever experienced. Everything went offline. Even our mobile phones. Diagnostics picked up absolutely nothing.’
The ops officer frowned. ‘What’s the likelihood of it happening again?’
‘Since I don’t know what caused it, I have no idea.’
The ops officer looked over at his communications specialist who could only reply with an apologetic shrug. The door opened and Nevins walked in, his stare switching immediately to the screen.
Jason joined Stratton at the cockpit door, unhooked another pair of headphones off the bulkhead and put them over his ears. ‘You’re fifty minutes behind schedule,’ he heard the ops officer say to the pilot. ‘How’s your fuel?’
‘Plenty to get to the RV. I was idle while at India one-six waiting for the team change which took more than half an hour.’
Jason and Stratton braced themselves for the reply.
The operations officer frowned on hearing the words, as though he had missed something. ‘What do you mean, “team change”?’
‘The new team, sir. After Chaz’s bunch got stuck in the airlock. They took a while to get geared up.’
The ops officer looked around at Nevins whose confused expression reflected his own.
‘I received a report of a shutdown at Sixteen but no mention of any personnel involved,’ Nevins told the officer.
The ops officer was now completely confused. ‘I don’t know what the hell you’re talking about,’ he said into the microphone.
The pilots looked at each other and the crewman turned to look at Stratton.
‘Tell me precisely who you have on board your helicopter,’ the ops officer asked.
‘John Stratton, SBS, and five members of MI16, one of them a woman.’
Jason moved the headphones’ microphone to his mouth and found the transmit switch on the cable hanging from one of the earpieces. ‘Hello. This is Jason Mansfield, head of MI16.’
The ops officer was stunned to hear the strange voice boom over the speakers, as was Nevins.
‘I am accompanied by Phillip Binning, Avis Jackson, Harold Smith and Rowena Deboventurer,’ Jason continued.
‘By whose authority are you on board my helicopter?’ the operations officer asked.
‘The original team violated a security protocol and got themselves automatically locked in a security vault as a result. The task is within our capability and so I decided to take it on. Naturally, I would have contacted you immediately but the communications failure prevented that.’ At this blatant lie he gave Stratton a child-like look but he was still working on sticking to the task, desperate as that was.
The ops officer removed the microphone from his lips. ‘Can someone pinch me?’ he said. ‘I don’t believe I’m having this conversation.’
Neither did anyone else in the room by the look of their expressions.
The officer returned the mike to his mouth. ‘I sometimes feel I could do a better job as England’s scrum-half but I have so far resisted the temptation to rush down onto the pitch and take over. I’ll ask you once again,’ he said, raising his voice. ‘What the hell are you doing on my helicopter?’
Jason put his hand over the mike. ‘I think he’s upset.’
Stratton was ahead of the scientist. He knew what would happen next and he wasn’t looking forward to it. Yet his concern for Jordan, his failure to come to the man’s aid, overshadowed the fear of punishment. He’d failed his old friend.
Nevins piped up. ‘You tell that pilot he’s to put that bloody kite down and then I want those fools locked up until we can get to the bottom of this.’
The operations officer was about to relay the order when Nevins stopped him. ‘Wait. Give me that.