15: Search

Linda's daughter was sick so she missed the briefing, leaving Dawn to conduct it by herself. She seemed happy, however, since the quality of information coming from Katie was top-grade.

"ASIS have drafted about ten more staff in from other departments and regions for this," she explained, sipping at a mug of coffee while George demolished the chocolate cake she'd brought. "We've even had a couple of financial specialists fly down from Sydney. Biggest breakthrough we've had in a decade."

Katie blushed slightly. "Well, it's just a matter of remembering everything people say. No difficult undercover work at all."

"Well it's all good work, however you do it. We've already got sufficient evidence to lock up about fifteen of Melbourne's career criminals, but we want to wait until we've got Zach in our net."

"Do you think you can arrest him from the evidence Katie's getting?" George asked, wiping his mouth on his sleeve.

Dawn shook her head. "He's more careful than that. Some of the evidence could certainly be used against him, but a court wouldn't consider it enough for any convictions."

"Unless there's some sort of major event about to happen, I don't think I'm going to get anything more spectacular from the agency," Katie said, brushing her fingers through her hair. "It's good for rumours and gossip, but they won't stand up in court."

Waggling a finger, Dawn stopped her. "The rumours and gossip are exactly what we need at ASIS. The only way we're going to get Zach behind bars is to catch him red-handed in the middle of a deal, which means we need to know when and where it's happening. A rumour of a major drug deal or a large amount of cash being moved could be the crack in his armour."

Katie nodded. "Well, I'll keep up what I'm doing. Writing up the reports is the hardest part, though."

"That's what we thought, so we've taken the liberty of ordering you a state-of-the-art copier machine which should arrive tomorrow. We've got the expertise on this case now which can deal with the raw documents, so just scan them over to us. The only things you need to keep sending are the details of everything you hear."

Katie breathed a sigh of relief. "That makes a huge difference."

"I thought it might," Dawn replied, giving her a double thumbs-up. "Now, George, how're things going with you and Riley?"

"I put it in my latest report, didn't you get it?" George asked, brushing crumbs off his lap.

"I know, but I wanted to hear the latest from you."

"We're pretty tight. He totally trusts me and I think Zach also thinks I'm harmless, although he's never going to let his guard down completely. I can basically go to Riley's house whenever I want, but his mum doesn't like me and likes to keep an eye on us whenever we're not in his bedroom," George explained. "It's not a big problem, nothing I can't handle."

"That's good. Do you think you can get into Zach's office?"

George considered it for a moment. "Probably. It'd be hard to explain if I got caught, but so long as his mum's distracted by something, I could get five minutes in there."

"We don't have the resources to plant bugs or anything," Linda said, finishing the dregs of her coffee. "What we need right now is for you to get inside and see if you can find a couple of key documents, maybe have a poke around. I'll send you the details, but do you think it would be possible?"

Katie butted in. "George hasn't been on a computer hacking course, so he probably won't be able to break into Zach's PC unless it's left running or something."

"The documents should be on paper, but you never know," Dawn said, biting her lip. "If it's okay with you George, we'd like you to try. If you can't find anything, just get out safely and we'll survive without it."

"No problem," George said, feeling better now that he was an important part of the mission again.

"Do you think it's worth flying George back to England at some point to do a hacking course?" Katie asked.

Dawn shook her head. "We've got guys in ASIS who can probably give you a crash course, but if we need something advanced doing, we'd organise some kind of operation to get an expert into Zach's office."

It took a couple of days for ASIS to send through the details of exactly what they wanted George to hunt for, which gave him and Katie plenty of time to formulate a plan. He got himself invited round to Riley's house on a Friday afternoon on the pretext of a PlayStation marathon and memorised every detail of what ASIS wanted.

"Make yourself comfortable," Riley said, throwing George a beanbag. The weekend had put both boys in a good mood, and there was only a week left of school before the long summer holiday started so there was an added feeling of relief.

"Don't mind if I do," George said, settling down on the bag and draining half a bottle of sparkling water. "What're we playing?"

"Battlefield 3," Riley replied, slotting the disc in. "I'm gonna give you a good kicking again."

Since he visited Riley so often, George hadn't got round to installing any games consoles in his room and didn't get as much practice as Riley. This meant he usually got beaten, but it was relatively fun to run around trying not to get shot. He surprised himself and won the first two rounds, but once Riley got into a rhythm he was a machine and George lost three in a row, the last one by an embarrassing margin.

"You suck so much!" Riley yelled triumphantly as the results flashed up. "Riley is the master every time."

"Whatever," George shrugged, dropping his controller onto the beanbag. "Anyway, I need to take a shit, where's most comfortable?"

Riley cracked up and took a few moments to reply. "Just use the one up here. Third door on the left."

"Cheers," George grinned. "It's gonna be a lengthy one, so I'm gonna take my books and do some homework."

Riley laughed uncontrollably as George left, leaving his books but making sure he had the tiny handheld document scanner tucked into his shorts. The toilet was empty so he switched the light on and shut the door from the outside before taking three long strides to the door of Zach's office. It wouldn't open, but the lock was basic and it only took ten seconds with the lock gun for George to get inside.

Zach's office wasn't as George expected. Instead of smart chairs and a beautiful desk, he took in a desk so cheap that the chipboard was showing through in a number of places and a solitary office chair with no back on it. The computer on the desk was switched off but looked like it was well-used, and three fireproof filing cabinets stood behind the desk. ASIS thought the documents would probably be in one of the cabinets, so George did a cursory check of the drawers in the desk to find the keys. They were sitting next to a financial calculator, which meant he didn't have to waste time finding the right attachment on his lock gun.

The first one contained well-ordered documents that looked like family stuff, including Riley's passport and bills for Melbourne Academy. The next two were both the same; overflowing with documents kept in unmarked paper wallets, which made it almost impossible for George to look through them without disturbing the order. He doubted if Zach really knew how they were organised, but he couldn't take the risk. The few pieces of paper he could see without disturbing anything were long lists of figures and George had no idea what they meant. He scanned them for good measure, just in case he was looking at something crucial for ASIS to know. Locking the cabinets up again, he checked the rest of the room for a safe or similar, but there was nothing he could spot. He considered the computer, but they usually took a minute to boot and if it had a password he'd have no chance. Annoyed, he waited by the door for a few seconds to see if he could hear anyone outside before stepping out, locking it again and strolling back to the toilet. After a flush and wetting his hands, he headed back to Riley's room, wondering whether Zach kept all of his important documents somewhere safer than a few filing cabinets in a crappy office with the keys in the desk drawer.

His trip into Zach's office went unnoticed, even when Zach got home and went in there for half an hour. When he emerged he didn't seem to have noticedanything, and even offered to buy the boys a pizza since it was Friday.

George spent the rest of the evening eating a double pepperoni and playing a co-operative campaign with Riley, but he couldn't shake the feeling of having failed. There was no way he could have found anything in the office without getting lucky or spending dangerously long there, but he still felt like he needed to do better. The performance of the mission might depend on a crucial bit of evidence he was supposed to provide.

"See you at school on Monday," Riley said as he left to catch the last train. George just nodded, his mind elsewhere. He ideally wanted to talk to his friend Michael, back on campus, about it, but he knew the time difference would be a pain and he didn't know whether Michael was on campus or on a mission, so he settled for Katie.

"I'm just about to go on a run," Katie said, lacing up her trainers. "If you want a chat, you can always come with me."

"You're too fast," George complained.

"Don't worry, I'll take it slow. I've got a full day's training tomorrow down at the university so I need to go slowly tonight," Katie said, straightening up and giving him a friendly pat on the shoulder. "Meet me outside?"

They just jogged gently around the local neighbourhood, making a large loop. It felt hot and George's t-shirt was sticking to his back by the time they'd been running for five minutes, but Katie seemed to carry on effortlessly. Since it was getting dark and nobody was around, they could talk openly.

"So you're worried you missed something?" Katie asked once he'd explained what had happened.

"Something like an obvious clue. I mean, no criminal as slick as Zach keeps everything in such a mess," George said.

Katie shook her head. "Look, you did basic training the same as me, although I do think Mr. Large was way tougher on the trainees than Kazakov ever is. I don't know if you missed something, but you've got to trust your training."

"I know, but surely-"

Katie interrupted him. "You did the right thing in not prying too much and risking damage to the mission. In fact, it might help ASIS if we know that he keeps everything on his computer or in files somewhere away from his office. You may feel like you've revealed nothing but in reality, we know a lot more than we did this morning. Stop beating yourself up, or you'll put pressure on yourself and make a mistake later."

George nodded. "I suppose. I just don't want to be the kid who screws up the whole mission."

"If it's really worrying you, give Dawn or Linda a ring tomorrow and see if they can meet you in the city to talk it over. They ultimately write the mission reports that get read on campus, so they'll be able to put your mind at rest about whether you're marked down. I think you did well and I'll stand by that if they challenge it."

Having Katie's support made George feel a bit better. "Thanks Katie."

"Just keep your mind on what's important and you'll be fine. Mission nerves get to us all. Anyway, race you the last section?"

George felt pretty good and broke into a sprint, hoping the sudden head start would give him an edge, but Katie eased past after a few seconds, not even breaking out of a fast jog, and left him for dust.