Chapter 2
Secret Operations
England – 10 Days Before
Major Tom Sheffield walked in a quick yet unhurried pace through the walls of the Special Air Service Directorate building outside London. No matter where he went, or how quickly he needed to move, the Major never appeared to hurry. Hurrying was, to him, a cardinal sin. It implied a lack of control; that circumstances had somehow slipped beyond your immediate grasp. Even if they had, they should never appear like it.
Appearances were more than just a vanity to Sheffield. People gathered intelligence by your appearance. They found out things about you from how you looked: things that could be used against you. So Sheffield, in every circumstance, projected an image of control. No matter what was happening around him, he was the 'Teflon Man.' What he didn't share, others couldn't use.
Most people inside or outside of London in this day and age would have found such thinking paranoid. Most would have been right. For Sheffield and his men, though, it was about survival. Sheffield had spent the better part of the last fifteen years in hostile country, operating covertly on missions of such dire secrecy and discretion he would not even admit them to himself deep in the dead of night. Sheffield lived life on a razor's edge where any loss of control could result in death or something even worse. But he'd found that you didn't always have to actually have control, as long as everyone else thought you did. As soon as the enemy suspected that you didn't, you were sunk.
He turned smartly on his heel at an intersection of the large marble floors and continued with the same measured pace down another corridor. The building was, to all observers, easily navigated. The corridors were straight, intersecting at regular intervals. Along them were regularly spaced office doors, each clearly marked. What the casual observer did not know about, would never know about, was the building within the building.
Sheffield took another smart turn at a minor corridor leading to the refresher facilities and few phone booths. These were the old style booths, made of dark wood, and allowed the caller to stand inside fully with the door closed. Sheffield walked directly to the one on the end of the row, stepped in, and shut the door. He picked up the receiver and dialed in his access code. A tone sounded on the other end, and he spoke, "Major Thomas Sheffield." He received an answering tone on the phone, and hung it up.
The back wall of the booth slid open, and Sheffield turned about and walked through it into a different, hidden corridor. On either side of that particular entryway stood two armed guards. The Major stopped and showed them his identification card, which they swiped into a portable reader and then held it up to his eye. He looked into the reader for a moment while his retina was scanned, and then the device beeped once and lit a green light.
The guard handed him back the identification and then saluted. "Good Morning, Major," the man said in his crisp British accent.
Sheffield returned the salute. "Good Morning, Brad," he said. "How'd the game go Saturday?"
"We lost three to two," he replied.
"Sounds like you need a new keeper," Sheffield replied. "East Section can't aim for crap!"
"Job's open, if you want it," Brad responded, smiling.
"Maybe someday, Brad, but not today," Sheffield said. He turned and walked off. He couldn't and wouldn't share with anyone what his schedule for coming and going was. He didn't know until it was time to leave most of the time. Someday, though, he'd be able to join a football team. Someday, but not today.
He navigated this interior corridor with the same confidence that he displayed on the exterior corridors. He'd been through them enough to know every crack in the floor, every name on every door. He climbed a set of stairs leading to the floor above, took a right, and strode down that corridor to a non-descript door at the end of the hall. He knocked once, and then let himself in.
An immaculately turned out Lieutenant sat at the desk typing. The young man's resemblance to a certain Vice-Admiral of the Royal Navy was unmistakable. Sheffield couldn't say that the boy would get less special treatment by being in the Royal Air Force, but he liked to think so. Still, his connection to the Vice-Admiral helped him attain the very highest of security clearances. The Lieutenant stood up and saluted. "He'll see you now," was all he said.
Sheffield turned and walked through the interior door to the spacious office of Sir Radcliffe Holm. Sir Radcliffe held no official military rank per se. However, for as long as Sheffield could remember, 'Director of Special Projects' Holm had kept an office in this building – this very office, come to think of it – and dispensed orders to the RAF with neither pause nor qualm.
No one really knew his background, but everyone knew to fear him. He was a singular power in the machine that drove both politics and the military in Great Britain. His orders were never questioned; his decisions were never reviewed. No one ever interfered with his work.
At the moment, Holm had his back turned to the door and was studying a file of some great interest to him. He didn't turn as Sheffield entered, or so much as lift his head. He simply said, "Have a seat Sheffield, we have much to discuss."
Sheffield sat on one of the antique wood and leather chairs that were opposite the man's desk. The desk itself was as immaculate as the shelves were cluttered. The room was well lit from several lamps placed about, but still held a dark, brooding sense of plots and counterplots, secrets and lies. Holm turned eventually, and looked at Sheffield with a smile.
"Tom," he said expansively, "it's been too long. How are you?" The old Sir Radcliffe was dressed in a simple black suit, slightly out of date in its style. His hair was white and thinning, but then again it had been that way the entire time Sheffield had known him.
"Sir Radcliffe," Sheffield replied with a nod. "No complaints. How about you?"
"No complaints indeed," the elder man said. "After that operation in the Balkans last month, I'd not believe that. The intelligence section has an awful lot to account for in that one."
"I really can't comment on that Operation, Sir Radcliffe. You know that," Sheffield replied calmly.
"I do indeed," Sir Radcliffe replied, nodding. "I have another operation for you, Tom. This one should be a real cakewalk; a vacation practically."
"What's wrong with it?" Sheffield said, knowing full well that he wouldn't have been called in on a 'cakewalk' assignment. Sheffield knew that he was reserved for the most difficult of tasks.
Sir Radcliffe folded his hands before him. "It's politically sensitive. Very hush, hush, you know. One of those 'you were never there' assignments." Radcliffe paused a moment and waggled his eyebrows. "You can pick your own team. I'll send Captain MacKenzie along with you; he has the psych background for what is required. Everyone else will be up to you."
Sheffield smiled. Captain "Mac" MacKenzie was known to specialize in missions involving 'nontraditional' elements. He convinced voodoo men in Africa to supply information on the drug trade and talked druids in MacKenzie's native Scotland to turn in suspected ecoterrorists. Magic and other such nonsense was Mac's stock in trade.
Sheffield considered for a moment. All his missions were top secret. He was never to reveal his presence anywhere he went. Foreign governments didn't appreciate SAS teams running about their country. So, why specifically label this one as such? "They're all hush, hush," Sheffield replied. "What's different about this one? Who are we dropping in on that will get so upset about our visit?"
Radcliffe smiled. He loved Sheffield's mind. "The Americans," he responded. "You're going to California. Sunnydale, to be precise."
* * *
Captain MacKenzie sat in the back room of a tiny pub near King's Cross station sipping whisky and holding a hand of cards. The smoke in the room was thick and smelled vaguely of spices. In one corner, a gang of Indian's talked quietly and sipped from a water pipe. They were waiting for their contact to the spirit world, a shaman named Radu. MacKenzie was waiting for Radu as well.
He turned back to his hand and the pot in the center of the table. He knew the game was rigged; but with patience, hard earned skill, and more than a little luck, he had drawn into an inside straight and was ready to bust the bank at the table. He wasn't even going to scratch what the place as a whole took in each day, but he would win his stake back three times over.
The last round of bets were going around when Radu entered. Mac cursed under his breath. He needed two more minutes in this game to win. But halfway across the room, Radu saw him. Recognition crossed the man's face and he turned to run. Mac set his cards face down, stood, and drew his .45 all in one motion.
"Game's up, Radu," he said. "You sold out the wrong side in Sri Lanka."
Radu turned to face him, looked wildly about for a moment, and then reached into his sleeve. He pulled out out a small, twisted twig and began chanting in Hindi. Out of the end of it erupted the ghostly form of a tiger, which headed directly for Mac.
Without turning, Mac reached behind him and grabbed a salt shaker from the tray of food behind him. He tossed it in the air and fired, all in the space of a heartbeat. The shaker disintegrated into dust as the bullet hit it, spreading salt everywhere. The ghostly tiger hit a spray of salt and shredded into whips of smoke.
The Indians in the booth next to him began to chatter. "I'm no magician, lads," he said to them. "That's just widows' magic. Everyone knows that kind of conjuring won't stand up to a bit of salt." He turned his attention back to the trembling figure of Radu. "Let's not make this hard, aye? Just kneel down right there and I willna need to kill you."
Radu obeyed, sinking slowly to his knees and dropping the twig. Mac put his pistol back into his coat. Then he looked down at the table and picked up three chips from his pile. He tossed them into the center of the table. "Call," he said, flipped his cards over, and smiled. "Aye," he said to no one in particular, "this is turnin' into a fine, fine day."
