Chapter 2 - Made Great Olympus Tremble

The secret to success in any war of attrition is patience. Wear down one's enemy bit by bit. Subtle incursions, blockades, anything to undermine the will to carry on, all through the use tactics varied and unassuming. Harry had the time, the resources and the patience; with minimal effort, he would expose Ruth Evershed and rid her from his section.

Taken in isolation, no one would be able to assign any underlying meaning to the events surrounding her first day on the Grid. It had been an innocent oversight on his part that he had failed to mention the briefing time to her, but really, she was an analyst, if she couldn't find out the briefing time how well did that bode for her tenure in the section. Her ill timed entrance, juggling files, seemingly overwhelmed, accompanied by her obvious opening statement had afforded him no end of opportunity. How could he resist a joke at her expense, with the possible added bonus of undermining her credibility? He had thought his words rather clever but it had only earned an eye roll from Zoe, rather akin to his daughter as a teenager. In all honesty, there had been no time for introductions, they were in the middle of an important operation. Besides, why get to know her. And he may have overlooked informing Tom that she was starting. Didn't his Section Chief have more important matters to deal with? All in all, he was rather pleased with his first few minor assaults. Surely in time, these missteps would wear her down.

It would seem though that none of these events had dampened her ardour for sharing information, for moments ago, she had flown at the glass of the briefing room, tapping on the window like a bird. Papers in hand, positively brimming with information, she had entered the room smiling ear to ear. Tom had looked at him, and Harry had only shrugged his shoulders. He had not voiced his suspicions about her to his Section Chief. Hopefully, she would crash and burn without her duplicity ever having come to light.

Of course, unearthing an Algerian agent that had turned up at Scotland Yard was immensely valuable, but he would only admit that to himself. The team had quickly vacated the room eager to act on the information, leaving him to stand at the table, looking down at the printouts. Annoyingly, she had decided not to follow the team but remained standing next to his shoulder, exuding an air of expectation. Let her wait. He made a show of examining the papers in front of him. He still retained a healthy command of the language to study the French one, but the article from the Algerian paper was completely indecipherable. She, of course, was fluent in both languages. The aura of optimism that emanated from her was palatable. He closed his eyes but no matter how hard he tried he could not blot out one fact. This creature had hacked into the French Secret Service database. Damn. They had actually sent him a beyond decent analyst. He tapped his fingers on the table, schooling his expression back from his initial surprise, reordering his thoughts on how to handle this woman. It might be tactically prudent to make limited use of her skills, but at the moment he found her presence rather cloying. Perhaps if he extended the silence long enough, she might take it as a hint to leave. A second ticked by, then two. Apparently, not. He spoke as he shuffled the papers.

"Is there anything else?"

It was a leading question; he was, in fact, referring to any other information regarding Ibn Khaldun, but she gave him an expectant half smile indicating that she wanted something else. Ah, she was searching for the balm of the uninitiated. Validation. He would not give it to her. Withholding praise, one more weapon in his arsenal. He gathered up the documents and stepped away from the table. She stepped with him, positioning herself in his path.

"I just wanted to say I hope I wasn't out of line."

"With what?"

"My comment yesterday. About the Home Office. I didn't really mean it. First day nerves and all."

It was on the tip of his tongue to assure her that he too had on many occasions wanted the Home Office to bugger off, but he held back. It could all be a trap, a supposed private conversation where he defamed the Home Office, an admission that would come back to haunt him. He had tipped his hand enough when he had agreed with her yesterday. Never reveal more than was strictly necessary.

"A word of advice, Miss Evershed. In our line of work, it is always wise to keep one's thoughts close to one's chest."

He had no idea why he was giving her any pointers. Then again, it might serve to give her pause for thought and stem any information she might leak. If indeed she was a mole.

"Of course." She dipped her head and lowered her voice, a touch of a conspiratorial smile on her face as she leaned in close to him. "I am from GCHQ."

Pulling his head back, he ran an assessing eye over her, taking the time to inspect her outfit. A vest covered in spiralling circles and a necklace that looked like it had the tooth of some prehistoric fish. If he ever wanted to distract the enemy, he would send her out. Wardrobe choices aside, he had no time to humour her.

"Other than that, I hope everything is satisfactory."

The comment was meant to be a dismissal, and he took another step toward the door, only for her to once again impede his progress.

"I was wondering about the location of my desk."

He narrowed his eyes at her, annoyed not only by her request but by the fact she did not seem to be intimidated by him. He would have to fix that.

"What about it?"

"If it was closer to the technical suite and the printers, it would save me time running back and forth. More efficient."

Her work station had been placed at its specific location for one reason; it was in the direct line of sight from his office. Granted, he couldn't see what was on her terminal but it was important that he always knew her exact whereabouts, it would make easier to narrow down any potential channels of communication. The location also had the added benefit of being off to one side, thus forcing her to sit alone on a solitary island, while the other stations were grouped together. Fewer chances for socialising that way.

"I can't do anything about that until another desk becomes available."

A frown of disappointment crossed her face as she digested his words. He cleared his throat as a subtle signal that it was time for her to move on. Either she hadn't heard it or didn't catch the signal, for she remained solidly in his path. He closed his eyes and took a deep breath, almost afraid to continue.

"Anything else?"

"I need a new desk lamp."

"I beg your pardon." For a moment, he thought she might be speaking in some sort of code.

"The light on my desk is broken," she spoke slowly. "I need a new one."

His mouth parted slightly, annoyed that she would bring such a trivial request to his attention. Why would he even remotely care about her desk lamp? He ran the bloody section for God's sake. He wasn't part of the maintenance crew.

"I suggest you take that up with Miss Buxton. She can requisition one for you."

She nodded.

"If that's everything..." Again another dismissal.

With a small nod, she rocked forward on her toes and spun around, launching herself towards the door. As she left the room, the faint sound of her skirt swished behind her. Perhaps he could step up his assaults, make her tenure even shorter. Harry let out a long breath. A malfunctioning desk lamp; why hadn't he thought of that? No, that would have been too obvious. His eyes fell to the papers in his hand. She was clever. It was documented in her files but he had not bargained for the scope of it in actuality. And he couldn't remember the last time he had heard the rustle of a skirt. But surely he could find another analyst just as capable, and the rustle of one skirt was the same as another. It was not enough to swerve him from his plan. He only needed to bide his time and wait to make a move.

A week later, the opportunity presented itself. He would freeze her out. Literally.

Harry blew into the hollow of his hands as he perched on the edge of his desk, regretting that he had not thought to bring in his gloves. His eyes swept over his all but deserted domain. Colin had advised him to shut down all non-essential services in an effort to thwart the next attempted hack on their system - and heating was one of those services. One by one, his staff had succumbed to the chill, moving off to find warmth in other parts of the building. But not her. She had steadfastly remained at her desk. He supposed he should be grateful for her dedication, but it only left him irritated. She sat at her desk wrapped in a ridiculous white coat. Silly woman, didn't she know that spooks wore black. Perhaps it was better that she wasn't wearing black for then she would have resembled what Harry had come to think of her as; a spider, with a web of information. It was all very suspect, how she acquired her information, and he theorised that she was being supplied by an outside source. He had no idea where the strands of her web were tethered; Whitehall, Six, the JIC, he only knew that he did not want to be the insect ensnared in it. He had instructed the team not to share anything with her, but somehow she had formed an alliance with Sam. Well, Sam was new too, it made sense that they would gravitate towards each other. But that still left him to wonder what she could be up to. The longer he stared at the analyst, the more her presence irked him, as if she were mocking him.

He pushed himself off the desk and walked onto the Grid, his irritation carefully hidden beneath his overcoat. Keeping his tone light, he approached her workstation.

"You don't have to stay here and suffer." His voice was congenial, but his smile did not quite reach his eyes.

"It doesn't bother me." she remarked offhandedly, keeping her head down.

"You could always find another station."

"I'm perfectly fine here."

The frost of her words lowered the temperature of the Grid by another degree. She was intelligent, not insensitive, she knew that she was been left out. He would have to be careful not to over play his hand. There was a momentary twinge as he admitted he might be abusing her talents, that her intelligence would be better used in tracking down the hacker, but she was an outsider, an unknown quantity, still smelling of GCHQ. To her, it was all about the world of cyber communications with no sense of the stakes involved in being a real spy. He had lost communication with two agents in the field; lives were at stake. They were vulnerable enough without having her leak information to whomever she worked for. She was a desk spook, living in comfort. Besides, The breach of their system was a reflection on Five and by extension a reflection on him. He could not let it be known how dire the situation was. As well as protecting the service, he needed to protect his reputation. Each incursion drove closer to exposing their core. He needed to deflect her from any weakness.

"What are you working on?"

As she looked up at him, the massive white collar of her coat framed her face, her hair dark against the trim, making her eyes an even icier blue.

"The phrase that you told me to look into."

His mouth twitched. The phrase he had assigned her was merely a taunt by the hacker, misdirection, no doubt, the need for the offender to appear more intelligent than they were in reality. He had dismissed her from the briefing on a fool's errand, giving a child a task to occupy its time and keep it out of trouble, but apparently, she had not taken it as such. Curious as to what she could have possibly done with such little information, he reached down to the paper she was working on. She covered it with her hand.

"I haven't quite puzzled it out yet."

True to form she was stuck on the logistics of language, looking for meaning where there was none. She was bluffing, he could tell. The finger of blame pointed squarely at Blaney and his SMF crew, it was only a matter of time before he slipped up. Zoe was embedded at the school, Danny was undercover as a reporter. The noose was tightening. It was on the tip of his tongue to tell her such, but he held back and decided to play along.

"You said yourself, it was a threat."

"But why this particular passage."

"A person of a certain education?"

"Certainly knowledge of the Iliad," she agreed. "And Zeus." Leaning her elbow on the desk, she cradled her chin in her hand, a wistful look crossing her face. "It's a shame, really, that there are no modern day gods."

"A number of religions might disagree with you."

"No, I mean like the Greek gods. Full of faults and transgressions. Hubris, jealousy, lust. Feet of clay."

Harry nudged against her desk and hitched his leg up to partially sit on the edge, inexplicably drawn into the conversation.

"We don't need them anymore."

"They served a purpose, didn't they?"

"To explain the workings of the world."

"But they also enacted our baser tendencies. Perhaps we wouldn't be in the predicament we are now if we could live through them."

He tilted his head at her, trying to remember the last time he had held such a conversation of the Grid. The talk was usually of operations, politics, dilemmas. There was never time for the debating other subjects, such as the need for Greek divinities, let alone someone of intelligence to debate it with.

"I'm sure the ancients still possessed their share of greed and aggression," he asserted.

"Yes, I suppose we moderns have nothing on starting a war over a beautiful face."

She flashed him a quick smile, her face lighting up as a result, and he found himself, as he had done in her interview, assessing the merits of her countenance.

"Was it really a war over a woman? he postulated, "Or was she merely an excuse?"

Her nose crinkled for a moment as she thought about his theory. "You're probably right, it's always about land and resources, isn't it? Or power, or revenge." She paused, her eyes growing distant as she reflected on the last word.

"What?" he prodded.

"Nothing." She moved the papers around on her desk, avoiding his eyes.

"Each god has his day." Harry eased himself from off her desk.

"If it is convenient that there be gods, then let us believe there are," she quoted to him.

"What's that from?"

"Ovid. Or my corruption thereof."She looked directly at him. "I suppose gods disappear because no one believes in them anymore."

Her eyes seem to see straight through him. Or maybe he was reading too much into her gaze. The blueness of her eyes still had the capacity to unnerve him.

Whether she had intended to or not, her words had found a crack in his armour and he couldn't help but feel she was making an allusion to his power. Wasn't that the fear of every leader - to lose the faith of his troops. He struggled with that every day - the wrong decision, a miscalculated move, any of it could undermine his authority. He looked at her intently, trying to divine her meaning. Was she playing a game with him? No, he had already come to the conclusion that she did not possess the capacity for manipulation. That was for more seasoned players. But she knew something, and he dreaded to think to whom she might report his weakness. He shifted his posture, straightening to his full height while he flexed his shoulders under the bulk of his black overcoat. This was his territory, he had the advantage. He was being paranoid, but that was part of his job.

"Yes, well, we best turn our energies to solving the current crisis." Giving her a tight smile of dismissal, he turned and walked back to his office.

A bird, a spider, or a mole, whatever she was, he couldn't let himself be distracted by pleasant conversation. It would never do to let down the gate and invite her in; after all, it had lead to defeat for the Trojans.

.

The alarms abruptly stopped, silenced by the click of a mouse found across the city in the room of a teenage boy. Chaos had ceased and order was again returned to the Grid. Cleopatra's voice broke over the comms. The agents were safe.

Harry slowly turned his gaze to the palpable crackle of intellectual energy that stood across from him. Fighting a smile, slightly embarrassed, she looked at him from under lowered lashes, the blushing hint of triumph on her cheeks. Her tenacity in researching the phrase had paid off, he would give her that, but one battle did not a victory make. He still didn't trust her. He would make use of her talents but he would not cede any ground. He still had time on his side.