As always, many thanks to my wonderful readers and reviewers for sticking with the story for this long. There are only three more chapters to go after this one so we're almost there!

36. Saturday afternoon. November 2012.

12:30-12:45 hours

The plane was already out of the hanger when Ruth dropped Harry off at the aerodrome in Atherton. He had, to her great disquiet, removed the Beretta 92FS pistol and ammunition from the gun safe before they left home; when they arrived Ray had looked at the weapon when Harry discretely placed it in the pocket on the back of the pilot's seat and only said,

"Good idea. You'll see I've got my Ruger on the back seat."

So they were both armed… Ruth's gut suddenly contracted at the realisation and she swallowed hard. Up until now she hadn't been too worried: Ray was going to fly out to a remote airstrip east of Capricorn Downs with Harry in tow to pick up Lucas and Elliott and then bring them back to Cairns where they would hand the pair over to Ilian's people and then they could all go home. Now, seeing Ray's SR-22 semi-automatic rifle in combination with their Beretta, she realised that it might be anything but a straightforward mission but it was too late to stop it now. Seeing her stricken expression, Harry walked back over and pulled her into a hug, kissing the top of her head.

"It's okay, Fruit. The weapons are a contingency, nothing more. Lucas is so far ahead of his pursuers that we won't need them for anything."

She lifted her head and he could see the worry roiling in their luminous depths but she said, surprisingly firmly,

"I know. Just be careful." She wasn't going to ask him to not get himself shot again, that was just asking for trouble, for all that she knew he could probably see the comment in her eyes. "We don't have much time so I'm going to keep on. Send a message if you can, when you've got him."

"I will. You watch your back when you pick the woman up at the airport."

"Don't worry about me. I'll have several big, burly coppers with me!"

"Laurie, I need to give you a briefing and then we've got to get going." Ray's voice boomed over to them, forcing an end to their conversation. He regretted breaking into their farewell but time literally was of the essence so he had no choice. He could see from Iona's face that she was having the same sudden doubts that Marie had expressed when he had picked up the rifle and ammunition just before he left home…

"Raymond, I though you said this was just a quick pick-up, not a full extraction."

Her grey-green eyes were dark with worry, as was her face under the faded blonde hair so he had done much as Laurence just had – wrapped his wife in a bear-hug and prevaricated.

"I'm really in trouble if you're using my full name!"

"Don't joke. Why are you taking the rifle? You promised me years ago that there would be no more dangerous field missions."

"And I've kept that promise. This really is just a case of go and get the good guys and come back. I'm just being cautious by taking the gun."

"That had better be all it is. We're too old for any more of this sort of stress and I'm sure the grand-kids would appreciate knowing you for a bit longer."

"We'll be right, you'll see."

He had kissed her and left; in this case, Laurence kissed Iona and then she left, getting back into the Subaru and leaving the men behind on the edge of the long grass strip, only to continue to worry all the way for her hour-plus drive into Cairns.

Harry joined the big man by the small aeroplane and listened intently to the safety briefing as he examined the craft that was about to take them west on the rescue mission. Just over seven metres long and with a wing span a little under ten metres it was a single engine four seater low-wing with a sliding canopy, painted up in full camouflage colours. The tail seemed to be enormous, as were the other control surfaces, compared to the other small aircraft parked on the edge of the strip, and the wings had a prominent dihedral, giving the plane an overall look of being strangely bright-eyed, bushy-tailed and keen to get into the air. A surprise was when Ray, doing the pre-flight walk-around, grabbed the front of one wing and pulled, and what appeared to be the front of both wings suddenly popped out, leaving a prominent gap between the shell and the main wing.

"Something you don't normally see on a small plane, Laurence. Full leading-edge slats; combined with the over size control surfaces means that this little beastie is STOL." Seeing the other man's blank expression he expanded. "Short Take Off and Landing. We can put her down on a road or paddock if we have to, or land and take off again on the shortest strips around. And she's manoeuvrable. The design was originally a military trainer known as the Guerrier and they've actually been used as counter-insurgency and light war planes in various countries in the past, hence the paint-job: I take her to Warbird meets occasionally. Unfortunately for us I'm not allowed to fit her out with the bombs, rockets or machine-gun pods to make her the full bottle so we'll have to make do with what we've got! Come on, climb in, get yourself settled and remember that all the controls on your side are live so keep your hands and feet out of the way."

Harry did as he was told, somehow managing to get himself in without getting tangled in the headset or the joystick; after having a checklist thrust into his hands he ran through it for Ray and, within a few minutes, they were lumbering down the grassed runway, needing over half of its length due to the weight of their full tanks and the hot weather to get up speed before suddenly almost leaping into the air to track west once they had gained sufficient height. Their part would be all over bar the shouting inside a couple of hours.

They had driven in almost total silence for the first fifteen minutes, Elliott connecting Lucas' satellite phone into the sound system by Bluetooth along with Brendan's, as they negotiated the rough track over the river bed and on until they reached the Development Road. Once there, Lucas had been able to put his foot down and they had barrelled east along the corrugated red road as fast as he had dared until they had hit a washout buried in bulldust and spun out on the gravelled surface, ending up at a precarious angle half in a ditch on the side of the road. As they were sitting there, shaken, the phone rang. It was Brendan and the news wasn't good. They had been found out and Hartono was on their tail, with bin Osman along for the ride, both of whom were armed. After ascertaining that the lad was okay and keeping his head down Lucas terminated the call and started the vehicle up again, only to realise as they limped out onto the road that they had a flat tyre. Changing it chewed up another fifteen precious minutes as they battled the heat, flies and increasing humidity that was reflected in the clouds beginning to pile up on the western horizon, and the temptation to hit top speed again once they were under way was almost irresistible but they decided that they still had half an hour in hand so it would be safer to slow down. Once settled at a more reasonable speed Elliott looked over at his companion and said, flatly,

"You're still working for them, aren't you? Is it Five or Six?"

Lucas didn't take his eyes off the road as he replied with perfect truth,

"Neither."

The other man patently didn't believe it, slowly shaking his head as he responded harshly,

"Come on, after what happened at the station and with that phone call, you've got to be working for one of them." Silence was the only response, a silence that dragged on and was somehow only amplified by the rattles and squeaks of the vehicle and the endless road noise. Realisation belatedly dawned for Elliott and he added, with a different sort of disbelief, "Don't tell me: you're working with the locals instead. How long? All the time?"

Letting the silence continue on for a little longer Lucas briefly considered whether to even answer the question but decided it wouldn't matter if he did – the odds were that Burgess/Elliott would be arrested as soon as they arrived in Cairns anyway and would get nowhere now if he tried to do a runner.

"No. Only the last few weeks."

Victor Elliott was stunned. That the man – this Lucas North – was an escapee from the same security services as he himself was he had picked early on. North had to have been, otherwise Shinwari wouldn't have hired him in the first place, any more than he would have got this cushy little number without his experience. But he had been absolutely certain that the man had been so scarred by his previous life that he would never, ever return to it, any more than he would have, yet now the bastard was sitting here and admitting, as calm as you like, that he had been jumped ship to ASIO…

"Jesus Christ. How did they find you?"

He didn't think he could be any more surprised but North's response did just that.

"They didn't. I found them."

The silence that greeted his reply was total and Lucas could sense that the other man really had nothing to say to that, or nothing that would be good. Eventually he muttered, derision dripping from every word,

"So I was right all along. You do actually care about this shit, despite whatever it was they did to you that gives you insomnia and nightmares." His taciturn associate really was an idiot. To have escaped the twisted intrigues of the security services only to willingly return to them was well beyond his ken, as were the man's next words.

"They did nothing to me. I did it to them. I'm trying to make up for it."

He didn't expect Elliott to understand and wasn't about the explain any of it; in fact, he just wished the other man would let it go. He reached for the radio and had just tuned it to ABC AM, the only channel they would pick up out here, when Elliott said, dryly dismissive,

"You picked a fucking dangerous way to do it. Spying on a bunch of fanatical Muslims so now they're chasing us down in the middle of nowhere trying to kill us. You'd better cross your bloody fingers that we make it out of this alive so you can get your fucking repentance."

Lucas said nothing, just turned the radio up so that the static-laden discussion on plans for a mega-irrigation development ironically not far north of Capricorn Downs filled the vehicle's cabin, and let his thoughts wander. He wondered how Brendan was going; from there he moved to wondering why Ilian had said nothing about the presence of the young man but it didn't take long for him to realise that she had just been protecting him: he had said that he was working for his Aunt so presumably he wasn't an official employee of ASIO, more like an asset, but an asset that was family. It wasn't a position he would have cared to find himself in…

It was only a few minutes later that the phone rang. Elliott glanced at it, perched in its Bluetooth cradle, incuriously but made no move towards it so Lucas stabbed at it and gave a terse,

"Yes?"

A female voice, soft, rich and lilting, seemed to take the abruptness in its stride.

"Jonah?" He answered in the affirmative. "It's Ruby. Do you know where you are?"

Brendan's Aunt…and Ilian's second-in-command. He checked the odometer and said,

"We're about thirty kilometres from the junction of the Development Road with the track to Capricorn Downs. Heading east."

"Good." The disembodied voice even caught Elliott's attention with her next words. "Because you are being followed we've sent someone out to pick you up. You're about seventy kilometres away from the turn-off to Highbury Station. I'll send you the co-ordinates but when you get there turn left up the access road. The station airstrip is adjacent to the station buildings about two kilometres in – go to the strip and wait, an aircraft will arrive around the same time as you do. You know the two people on board, Jonah. I will text you their number in case you need to contact them directly. Helen will be there by the time you get back to the coast. Good luck."

That was the second time he had heard that name so Elliott ground out,

"Who the hell is this 'Helen'?"

The other man's blue eyes flicked what seemed to be a slightly amused glance at him.

"The woman who's saving your life, mate."

"Your new boss? Is she anyone I've ever heard of?"

The question was sharp but Lucas, remembering the responses he had received from both Harry and Ilian after not dis-similar questions, let a small smile remain on his lips as he answered.

"She's not my boss – I'm doing this for free – and I doubt it. You'll find out yourself soon enough."

From having been almost silent at the start of the trip Elliott seemed to have recovered his propensity for talking.

"Doing it for free? That makes you even stranger. No doubt Helen isn't her real name."

The smile faded and he sighed.

"About as much as Kim is yours or Jonah is mine."

Elliott sat back and fished in his shirt pocket for his cigarettes and lighter.

"Weren't you asking for trouble calling yourself Jonah?"

"I was already in trouble so it was more a case of finding a name to suit the reality." Lucas took the opportunity to ask his own question – if Elliott could be a smart-arse, so could he. "What's your excuse? Couldn't you find someone better to name yourself after than two of the most notorious traitors in recent British history?"

Unexpectedly, Elliott laughed.

"I'm glad someone appreciated the irony. I've been tarred as a traitor for the past eighteen months so I decided to live up to it and what better inspiration could there be than Kim Philby and Guy Burgess?"

"Well, that's one way of looking at it," Lucas muttered and then lowered the window on Elliott's side of the cab as the man lit up a cigarette. At the other man's startled exclamation he added, "If you're going to light up one of those bloody things you can keep the smoke outside."

The Stationair had settled at its cruising altitude of 21,000 feet but progress was slower than it should have been due to strong headwinds. The level they were at was the best of a not very impressive choice below their service ceiling so the pilot had informed Shinwari of their revised arrival time, assured her they would still be well within time to connect to her international flight out and told her to sit back and relax. She hadn't looked happy but had complied and had been sitting silently, staring out at the tiger country – a patchwork of red, orange and pallid white ground with scattered khaki vegetation, dry river channels and barely a track in sight – far below, ever since. He had finished his paperwork and, because he was bored, was flying the plane manually instead of using the autopilot, when a female voice broke the airwaves, which had been largely quiet since they took off.

"Brisbane Centre, aircraft overhead Wrotham Park at Flight Level Two-One, eastbound. Squawk IDENT."

Checking their position on the GPS he realised that air traffic control was talking to him. Reaching for the transponder he commented casually,

"That would be us," but before he could comply with their request his passenger had slapped his hand way.

"What do they want?"

He shrugged, disconcerted by her reaction.

"Probably who we are and where we're going."

"Why?"

The question was sharp. The woman had been unsettled enough to find out there was a strong headwind and it would take fifteen minutes longer than it should have to get to Cairns; now, this disembodied voice emerging from nowhere, asking where they were going, was unaccountably making her nervous. Although everything was in place now and no-one was going to be able to stop their plan, she needed to be able to slip out of this country unidentified and get back home in time to not only claim responsibility but to instigate the next attacks to reinforce the message. The pilot didn't seem worried, though, as he replied with a casual,

"Got no idea," and finally pressed the IDENT button on the transponder. Within moments the anonymous voice responded crisply.

"Brisbane Centre, Zulu Zulu Yankee, g'day."

"Zulu Zulu Yankee, g'day," he answered, still keeping a weather eye on his passenger. She was tugging at her jacket, trying to free it from the seatbelt – maybe she was a bit warm or something.

"Zulu Zulu Yankee, please state destination and intentions."

It had been a very unusual request that had lobbed, in person, onto the desk of the Head at Brisbane Centre, the manager for northern Australian airspace, half an hour ago from the highest of levels at ASIO. Try to find a particular aircraft, which had not lodged a flight plan, and determine its current position and intended destination. When the Manager had tried to find out more information he had been stone-walled and the order had been reinforced by the head of Airservices Australia so he had stopped arguing and assigned a senior controller to do the job, with the assistance of the controllers at Townsville, which as both a civilian and military airport was under the control of the air force. It had taken almost twenty minutes but the military had come up trumps, pinging an anonymous aircraft in about the right spot. And so the senior had called.

In the Cessna Shinwari interjected before her pilot could answer.

"Do not tell them."

He sighed heavily.

"I don't have an option, love—"

The woman had finally finished struggling with her jacket; she hadn't been trying to get the thing off, she had been trying to get the pistol out of its pocket. Aiming the compact semi-automatic at him she ordered flatly,

"Do not tell them. We pay you well for your silence."

Charles 'Chicka' Baird had started out in commercial aviation thirty five years ago with small regional airlines but had got bored and moved on, into crop-dusting and aerial mustering for over a decade before decamping to another small airline, this time in the Highlands of Papua New Guinea, where he had been until the opportunity to first buy into and then take over this small charter company had arisen. He was the first to admit that he believed rules were there to be broken and, in his time, had seen and done more than most but this was the first time anyone had ever pulled a gun on him in his own plane and he didn't appreciate it. Looking from the tiny DoubleTap 9mm to his passenger and back again he began to slowly ease off the throttle while gently pulling back on the yoke, almost imperceptibly lifting the nose of the aircraft. Then he grinned at her and explained.

"If I don't tell them it will only make them suspicious—"

"Do NOT tell them." She flicked off the safety catch and he decided he had nothing to lose. It would be dangerous but she was really pissing him off. Unexpectedly, he laughed.

"Go ahead and shoot, if you reckon you can fly this plane. If you can't, make sure you kill me outright because I don't fancy going down with the ship. You have control." With those words he simultaneously pulled the throttle right off, hauled the yoke back into his belly and turned it gently to the left. The nose of the plane went up while its momentum all but disappeared and, in response to the laws of physics, the craft immediately stalled so they went from staring up at nothing but blue sky to violently falling over sideways as the wing on Baird's side dropped to port, the nose pointed straight at the ground and the airframe began to shudder as it picked up speed. Shinwari screamed in terror and the gun flew out of her hand, clattering into the footwell. When she screamed again and started muttering something – prayers, by the sound of it – he trod on the starboard rudder, levelled the wings, pushed the throttle back in and slowly brought the nose up again until they had returned to straight and level flight. The whole thing had only taken a few seconds but to Shinwari it had felt like forever and she was frozen in her seat with terror, eyes wide and staring at the madman flying the plane. Chicka grinned back and said sagely,

"Didn't think you could fly. Now be a good girl and put the gun away, unless you want a repeat performance, or something worse." Very carefully and with one eye on the man, she picked the small weapon up from under her feet, thumbed the catch back on and returned it to her pocket.

"Brisbane Centre, Zulu Zulu Yankee, respond."

The air traffic controller had noticed the aircraft suddenly lose 500 feet in altitude and wondered what was going on, if ASIO were involved, so spoke sharply. Chicka glanced over again and added,

"We really don't need to draw any more attention to ourselves," before thumbing the push-to-talk button. "Tracking one-two-zero for Cairns and a full stop. ETA circuit time three-zero. Zulu Zulu Yankee."

The unknown woman in Brisbane breathed a sigh of relief – every controller's fear was losing an aircraft – and replied with the lie she had been told to say in order to explain the contact.

"Zulu Zulu Yankee, maintain Flight Level Two-One and be aware R967 is now active. Amend current heading to remain clear."

The words raised no suspicion in Baird – R967 was a commonly used zone of airspace designated for live firing exercises for the military – and even if they had it wouldn't have made any difference to him at this stage. He just wanted to get rid of this bloody woman sitting next to him.

"Maintain Flight Level Two-One, R967 active. Current heading amended, remaining clear. Zulu Zulu Yankee"

"Brisbane Centre Zulu Zulu Yankee, thank you."

The controller scrubbed her face and glanced up at the besuited, anonymous man standing behind her but he was already on the phone to Ruby. Giving her a casual salute in thanks he walked away, leaving her wondering if she would ever know what that was all about.

Hamzah Rashid had been pacing the building since the other pair had left, wondering if everything was about to go wrong. Finally making a cup of tea to calm his nerves he had repaired to the veranda and taken a seat, trying to keep the flies from his cup and his face as he watched the clouds building up and darkening the sky to the west with phenomenal speed. The wind was starting to gust and he caught a subliminal flash of lightning and glanced around to see if anyone else was around but he was on his own, only dry leaves and dust dancing around in mad circles on the grass. He was going to have to wait for one of the stockmen to return so he could get down to the boat and make sure it was safe – the way the weather was blowing up he didn't want to risk it breaking its moorings.

Standing up, he thought he caught another sound on the wind and turned to the west, eyes scanning the sky. There was nothing for half a minute and he was about to turn away when he heard it again and this time it didn't fade away. A low throb that turned into a regular beating but it wasn't the station helicopter, which was still sitting in the hangar at the airstrip; this one sounded larger and was approaching rapidly. Frowning and beginning to feel deeply unsettled, Rashid continued staring until, suddenly, it appeared low above the trees. An Army Blackhawk, fully armed and, even as he watched, disgorging equally heavily armed soldiers down ropes as it hovered at the far end of the lawn.

Suddenly panicking, he slipped back inside and ran to the office, pulling out his own satellite phone. Clearly something had gone very, very wrong and he would have to tell Shinwari and Macapodi immediately. Stabbing the speed-dial for Agustina, he waited impatiently for the call to connect; when it didn't he glanced at the screen and realised, for the first time ever, that he didn't have a signal. Cursing, he threw the thing on the desk and picked up the old land-line receiver. At least it should work – it was still an archaic copper line and so should be immune to the vagaries of electronic transmissions. It didn't. That line was dead as well. What was going on

Turning back to the door, he was stunned to see one of the aboriginal jackaroos standing there, rifle in one hand, the other up on the door frame, barring the access. It was the young, quiet one they had seen out in the shed earlier in the day. Normally he was smiling and happy but not now, his eyes were hard and his face grim.

"Don't bother. I cut the wires."

Rashid heard the words but didn't – couldn't – fully comprehend them.

"What do you mean, you cut them?"

"Exactly what I said. I cut the phone line. All electronic communications are being jammed. The Army has just landed on the lawn and soldiers will be in here any second. It's over, Mr Rashid. Your vicious little group has failed so you might as well come quietly."

The Malaysian couldn't believe what he was hearing but there was no doubt about the truth of at least part of it, as thumping footsteps and yells could be heard coming from the front of the house. Making a break for the French doors leading onto the back veranda he only made it a couple of steps before Brendan raised his gun.

"Don't waste your time, mate. If I don't get you the Army will." As he spoke a shadow passed by the window, followed by another – soldiers, spreading out around the perimeter. Rashid's resistance suddenly broke – there was no way out and he was now regretting the lack of weapons – and he slumped against the doors, staring at the young man, eyes blank. Brendan gestured towards the hallway with the rifle. "Out. Do yourself a favour and go quietly."

The voices outside were close now, yelling for everyone to come out. There was nothing more he could do here, so he pushed himself off the door and past the kid into the hallway, where Brendan took pleasure in digging the point of the gun into the other man's back.

"Walk." There was no further resistance and they were at the door within moments. "Open it slowly and move out with your hands up if you don't want to be shot on sight."

The door swung open and they went through it to be confronted by the sight of half a dozen soldiers aiming their guns at them.

"Don't worry, boys, this is the bloke you want," the youngster announced cheerfully. "Hamzah Rashid, the co-leader of the Brotherhood of the Sword of Islam, in person."

"Drop your weapon," the Captain in command of the group ordered and Brendan complied, equally cheerfully. "Now move forward." When they had stopped in front of him the man, a battle-hardened veteran of Iraq and Afghanistan, gestured for a couple of his troops to restrain the Malaysian while he gazed curiously at the slightly nondescript jackaroo in front of him. "Who the hell are you?"

The grin broadened.

"Brendan Little. ASIO Counter-intelligence." At the look of disbelief on the Captain's face he added, moving carefully, "My identification," and removed his ID from his pocket. The soldier read it and said, bluntly,

"Shit. You're serious. Bloody ASIO."

"You? You are a spy?" the interjection came from Rashid, who was staggered by the revelation and its implications. The boy hadn't been joking then – it was all over. They must have known everything, all along…

"Yes, me." He switched languages, to Indonesian. "Maybe that will teach you to not judge people by their appearance." Brendan enjoyed watching the blood drain out of the bastard's face as he absorbed this second blow: not only had there been a spy in among them from the start but he spoke their language as well… Turning back to the Captain, now looking slightly perplexed, he added, "Come on, I can show you where everything is but we need to move quickly – you know that Yorse Hartono and Ishak bin Osman have gone after the other pair? You may need to send the chopper out after them. I will tell you where they're going while we walk…"

The Captain, now totally bemused, just followed the boy and wondered why everything felt like it had just been turned on its head. The rest of his regiment would never believe this when they got back to Townsville. Bloody spooks…