Romanov?

The Briefing Room was silent as the assorted officers sat down. Even the ever enthusiastic Will looked shocked. Ruth sighed, noticing Tariq still looked tired and a little haunted by his ordeal. She looked away as Alec joined the team.

"Any news?" Malcolm asked as Alec sat next to him.

"Juliet is not dead. Those photos were taken elsewhere and the dead woman in them, if it isn't a dummy is not her." He frowned.

"Did you see her?" Zoe asked as Alec nodded.

"Briefly, long enough for her to tell me to rot in Hell."

"She's fine." Ros glared; unable to shift the hatred she felt for the woman. Harry smirked before starting the meeting. He knew Juliet had burned too many bridges this time. That too many people who loved her had been betrayed, but he couldn't help but be happy to know she was still alive.

"We need to verify who the dead woman in that photo is." Harry paused as Ruth nodded.

"Are we sure it's an actual body?" Will asked. "Not a stage prop or a dummy?"

"It's real." Ruth sighed sadly. She had been a spook for too long to take anything at face value. The anger still burned over the fact someone had wanted her to believe her husband had died. "I sent the image to forensic photography. They say there is no reason not to believe it's not a human in that photograph."

"Who'd have thought the Witch Of Whitehall would have a doppelgänger?" Zaf shook his head. Adam smirked as he glanced at Will. The new boy held up his hands.

"No more jokes about winter please."

"Oh it's snow joke." Dimitri whispered as Beth rolled her eyes.

"Children." Ros chastised them. Zaf and Will fell quite as Dimitri his his smirk. Sometimes it really did seem that the only way to cope with a situation was to joke about it - however dark the humour.

"The cloning programme was started back in the early 1980s. Initially it was an idea stolen from the Nazi's after the Second World War." Harry explained. Erin felt her stomach churn at the mention of the Nazi's. Her Jewish heritage made the subject more sensitive. She knew her grandfather had been murdered by the regime.

"Eugenics." Alec spat the word, he had heard his parents stories of life under Nazi rule. A German mother and British father had made him aware of how precious life and the freedom he grew up in was. He narrowed his eyes. "How does that equate to now? It's 2018 not 1942."

"It can't? Can it?" Zoe dropped her pen on the table. Ros folded her arms as she leaned against the wall.

"Yes." Harry nodded once. "As you all know I was stationed with 6 in Berlin. We were assigned to investigate the Russians — it was believed the KGB had acquired some intelligence that would endanger lives of US and UK citizens."

"KGB scientists were well ahead in those days. Remember in the War Russia switched sides and became our allies. They also stole a lot of things from the defeated Germany and adapted it. One of these was surgically cloning humans. Making one person into an identical replica of another. Removing the original and placing their doppelgänger in their place." Ruth explained.

"Bit far fetched." Adam pulled a face. Harry nodded.

"I agree." He looked at his friend. "I'm the late 1940s and 1950s it was mere science fiction."

"But come the rise in surgical products and techniques in the 1980s and 1990s and it moves from impossible to improbable." Malcolm sighed. "You think the dead man in the mortuary and the woman in the photo were supposed to replace you and Juliet?"

Ros felt sick, knowing that the rest of the team had no idea how squeamish the thought of cosmetic surgery made her. Needles and Ros Myers did not get along. The nausea built as she tried to focus on what was said.

"Yes." Harry answered honestly. "I'm assuming Romanov, who lead the project is dead and his superiors are removing evidence of the problem."

"By killing the clones?" Adam glanced at Lucas who was watching Ros. He hated anything that could drag either of them back to the former Soviet Union. He knew she did too.

"So it would seem. Adam these clones - this creating a perfect replacement for people that the KGB wanted rid of sounds like something from a trashy spy novel but I was there. The plan seemed to be remove the original and replace them with a copy so identical not even their own mother would be aware of the switch."

"And what happened to the person they abducted?" Will asked as Lucas covered his eyes briefly.

"I'd imagine tortured for information and then killed. I'm guessing that was standard practice while their person infiltrates the life of the victim and feeds information back." Ros stated firmly. "This was the 80s and 90s. Think how much technology and science have moved on, they could be 'cleaning up ' before launching a 21st century version of this."

Harry nodded. "My asset believed so."

"Believed?" Adam frowned.

"Martina Vilanchi was dragged out the Thames two hours ago." Harry narrowed his eyes. "If they are playing silly buggers and it seems so we have to stop them." He pushed his chair away from the desk as the meeting drew to a close. Watching Ros assign tasks he had a feeling that once again his past would come back to haunt him.

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