James Barrington - Foxbat

Halfway across, a sudden gust of wind rattled the entire structure, and for a minute or so Richter paused, just in case a sentry heard the noise and looked up, but then the breeze died away and he continued his careful progress.

Less than four minutes after he’d stepped onto the gantry, he climbed off it thankfully at the other end, and began crawling up the gently sloping roof towards the central ridge. He wouldn’t need to get into this hangar: merely force a panel and look carefully inside, and record whatever he saw there with the camera.

More or less reaching the centre of the roof, he took out his jemmy, and began to lever up a panel. The sound of tearing metal was not loud enough to be heard by the guards below, and soon Richter was able to lift the entire panel free and peer down, along the narrow but powerful beam of his torch as it illuminated the interior of the hangar.

Directly below him was a small electric-powered towing truck, normally used to manoeuvre aircraft in and out of the hangar or around the hardstandings. To one side of that, closer to the wall of the building, was another cherry-picker, but what astonished Richter was what else occupied the hangar.

‘Shit a brick,’ he muttered as he fished the Nikon out of his pocket. ‘Six will never believe this.’

Monday

North Korea

Well before he left Seoul, Yi Min-Ho had spent several hours with his colleagues at Naegok-dong working out the optimum route to his objective, though there had actually been little choice. The coastal area was mainly flat, but cultivated and inhabited, and therefore potentially dangerous. The hills extending north of the coast provided very difficult terrain and, although taking that route would guarantee the least chance of being detected, it would take him an unacceptable length of time to reach his objective.

So Yi stayed near the coast, and followed the main – almost the only – road. He walked along the grass verge because the sound of footsteps – even those made by his rubber-soled boots – risked alerting someone to his presence. Every fifty paces or so he stopped and listened for a short while, in case his ears might detect something his eyes had missed.

Twice he froze into immobility on hearing the sound of movement nearby, his hand reaching for his pistol, but each time the noises faded away. Animals, he assumed, resuming his solitary march. Once a vehicle – an old truck lacking one of its headlamps – rattled past the ditch where he’d already taken cover. He stayed motionless for a few minutes after it had passed him, just in case anyone was following it on foot.

His GPS unit told him that he’d covered almost three kilometres in the first hour, and he calculated that he should reach the vicinity of Ugom in another two. Yi stopped between two stunted bushes for a brief rest, ate a small chocolate bar and washed it down with a mouthful of water, then resumed his steady progress eastward.

Aïn Oussera Air Base, Algeria

Richter held the Nikon firmly by the strap and aimed it at the far end of the hangar, pressed the button, then moved the digital camera slightly to cover the next section of the floor of the large building. Because of the filter, the electronic flash was invisible to his eyes – and more importantly, invisible to the sentries standing outside the building – but was ideally matched to the infrared-sensitive media inside the camera.

He took a dozen pictures, then another couple just in case, switched off the Nikon and replaced it in his pocket. There was no way he could refit the metal roof panel, so he just pushed it down until it was more or less level with those either side of it.

‘Spook. I’m on the way back,’ he murmured into his microphone, then started crawling across the roof back towards the lighting gantry.

‘Roger,’ Dekker replied. ‘Heads up, all callsigns. Watch the guards, but don’t fire unless you’ve no other option.’

Wallace settled the stock of the rifle comfortably into his shoulder and aimed it along the left-hand side of the nearest hangar, looking out for the sentry.

Before stepping out on to the lighting gantry, Richter checked below for the current positions of the guards, who still appeared totally unaware of his presence. The return trip seemed to take less time than before, and within five minutes he was crouching on the roof of the first hangar to make a final check all round him, before re-entering the building itself.

He slid his legs into the gap where he’d lifted the panel, his feet locating the steel beam. He crouched down on it and did his best to pull the panel back into place behind him. It wasn’t a good fit, and would be obvious to anyone doing an inspection of the roof, but from the ground it would probably pass muster.

Rather than crawl precariously back down the sloping roof girder, Richter decided it would be quicker to use his climbing rope, and go straight down to the floor of the hangar. He draped it over the main roof spar, both ends of it easily reaching the ground. He looped the safety strap around the beam, clipped it to his harness, and altered his position until he was lying flat across the steel spar.

Trapping the two lengths of the dangling rope between his boots, he also gripped it firmly with his right hand before totally letting go of the beam itself. The safety strap immediately tugged at his harness, and he reached down and released the clip, allowing the strap to slide around and off the steel beam and dangle loose below him. The descent was fast and easy, Richter letting the doubled-over climbing rope slide through his gloved hands, till in seconds he was standing on the hangar floor.

He tugged one end of the rope, pulling it clear of the beam, then coiled it and looped it back over his shoulder. He next walked over to the cherry-picker and lowered its cradle to ground level, then checked around with his torch that he wasn’t leaving anything behind him. Seeing nothing out of place, he crossed over to the side door he’d used to enter. At least he wouldn’t have to pick the lock this time, nor was he wasn’t going to bother relocking the five-lever mortise. He’d merely close the door behind him and walk away.

Richter pressed his ear to the door and just listened for a few seconds. ‘Spook. I’m coming out,’ he said into the microphone, and waited for Dekker’s acknowledgement. Then he turned the handle of the Yale lock and eased the door open.

Wallace moved the rifle across to cover the side door of the hangar, watching for Richter to re-emerge. He saw the doorway turn black as the door opened inwards, then a dark shape appeared and looked cautiously in both directions. The sentry wasn’t in sight, and within seconds the door was closed again behind him.

But as Richter started to sprint across the open ground towards the cover of the oil drums, the guard suddenly stepped around the corner, then froze as he saw a running man.

‘Boss,’ Wallace hissed urgently.

‘I see him. Alpha Two – take him out.’

Wallace shifted his aim fractionally, centring the cross-hairs on the sentry’s chest. Above the sight picture, he saw the Algerian open his mouth to shout as he began unslinging his AK47 assault rifle. Then Wallace squeezed the trigger. The sniper rifle bucked against his shoulder, but the suppressor reduced the noise to a muffled thud, and the guard tumbled backwards, the Kalashnikov falling from his lifeless hands.

Hearing the faint noise of the shot coming from outside the boundary fence, Richter glanced round even as he ran. He absorbed the scene in an instant. Time was now crucial, as sooner or later one of the other guards would be bound to notice that the sentry was missing, and head around the side of the hangar to check on him. The team had minutes at best to get away from here.