Blackout - By Tom Barber Page 0,16

the entrance to the Embassy.

He’d lived in London for over a decade and after a rocky start, he found that he liked it more and more with each passing year. He'd arrived here in 1999, fresh out of his training at Camp Peary just outside Williamsburg, Virginia, aka ‘The Farm’, where every CIA trainee goes to learn his craft and hopefully then graduate into a position with the Agency. He’d excelled at the paramilitary and tradecraft operations set up by the agency instructors, and being just twenty five at the time and a non-smoker, had been in excellent physical condition, cruising through all the fitness tests. He had learned everything he could ever need in the field, from defensive driving and handling Zodiac boats to hand-to-hand combat and parachuting. He’d learnt interrogation techniques, manipulation and evasion tactics, how to deceive and turn the tables from having an enemy watching you to you watching him, and had finished the training fully expecting to become an NOC, a non-official cover, an operative who would work overseas with no official ties to the United States Government. Basically, a spy.

But then, at his final interview and to his dismay, the instructors had decided that they wanted him behind a desk. He had scored very highly on the leadership and aptitude tests and they said his talents would be wasted undercover in some foreign country. Instead, they had offered him a well-paid job in London in charge of a small team, and he’d had to adjust his thinking, determined to make the most of the opportunity given to him.

He'd been born and bred in Staunton, Virginia and found after he’d arrived in London in late-February 1999, that the weather in the UK was comparable and not such a shock to his system as it might otherwise have been. During his time here, he'd seen agents arrive on postings from Florida or California, and the frequently grey and gloomy weather had been a nasty surprise for them. He’d been one of the few students in his class in high school who'd enjoyed learning about British history, about their Kings and Queens, how their parliamentary system had evolved and the great battles they'd fought, such as Agincourt, Trafalgar and Waterloo. When the opportunity had arisen, he was excited to both begin his career in the CIA and come to live London and experience their culture firsthand. America was such a comparatively modern place that he had grown to love living here, absorbing the history around him. He'd spent many a weekend going to the old churches and cathedrals scattered across the city, buildings older than any in his home country. Just last weekend he'd been eating lunch in a pub that was built in the 15th Century. A pub that was older than the formation of his nation. Even now, that sort of thing still blew his mind.

And aside from the history of the place, he'd found the lifestyle agreed with him too. Over the years several promotions had given him a substantial increase in salary over his peers and an apartment paid for by the Agency, both of which allowed him to live well in an expensive city. Physically most guys his age and position on the ladder had started to soften around the midsection, but he was thirty-nine years old and still looked fifteen years younger, having avoided cigarettes and excess caffeine his entire life, diligently maintaining the prodigious fitness he’d had back at The Farm all those years before.

In all, life was pretty good. He’d spent the last fifteen years trying to help others and his country, and felt as if he had done a pretty decent job. He’d never harmed or killed anyone, and in his position as an Operations Officer he was one of the best guys around doing what he did. He had a six man team under his command in this building and a further six agents scattered across Europe whom only a select few knew worked for both him and therefore the CIA. The information his team had gathered over the past few years had proved invaluable to the United States Government, and they were a crucial part of the Agency’s European intelligence gathering.

In a large and extremely powerful organisation, the man approaching the entrance to the Embassy had built a solid reputation for himself as a good leader and valuable employee. He'd worked his ass off to get where he was, with a silent determination that a lot