CHAPTER 5: SPOOKED

MI5.

The organization responsible for the domestic security of the United Kingdom and its citizens.

And two of its agents stood in the heart of the Glasgow CSI lab.

Hesitantly, Faulds shook Bently's hand. "Cameron Faulds. Excuse my confusion here, gentlemen, but I'm at a loss to understand why MI5 have dispatched two of their agents."

"A helicopter crashes as it leaves a British airport, of course that's going to be a matter for state security."

"We've only just begun our investigations, there's no need for MI5 to be anywhere near our investigation right now. You'll have our findings as soon as we have them."

Bently smiled thinly. "I appreciate that, but you have to understand that if this is any kind of a terrorist action, we cannot afford to waste any time." He gestured at the screens. "And since you seem to be investigating some explosives…"

"Explosives don't necessarily mean terrorists, Agent Bently," Charlotte interjected. "Anyway, if it does turn out to be terrorists, we'll just call John Smeaton," she added dryly.

The two agents stared blankly before Bently continued. "CSI Graham? With all due respect, I don't think you're enough of an expert in the field to talk in such certainties."

Charlotte and Faulds exchanged a small glance before she replied. "Maybe not, but I am certain enough to know that in an investigation like this, if you go charging off in the wrong direction, then all you're doing is wasting time. We don't like to jump to conclusions around here."

Bently looked at the floor for a second before returning his gaze to Faulds. "May we talk to you both alone?"

Four sets of eyes fell on Eddie Watt.

"You, er, want me to bugger off?" he eventually asked Faulds.

"Please, Ed."

The stocky figure walked past the two MI5 agents, eying them warily as he went.

"Don't let them move anything," he said as he reached the door.

"Ed…"

He held up one hand in a gesture of acceptance before leaving the room, the other emerging from his pocket with a mangled chocolate bar as he sauntered out of the lab.

"Now that we're free of interruptions," Bently said, "This is my colleague, Tom Lawson."

Lawson nodded, unsmiling.

"Gentlemen," Faulds began, "I understand your agency's concern, but my lab and my staff are more than able to adequately handle this situation. Let me reassure you that you'll be the first to be notified as soon as we find something. In fact, we already have strong leads that we're investigating." He paused, hoping to read something from Bently's reactions, but the MI5 agent remained impassive.

"I hope it's more than the presence of explosives," Bently said. "That doesn't narrow things much."

"On the contrary," said Faulds. "It tells me everything I could want to know about our bomber."

"Such as?"

Faulds smiled. "You're not asking me to give away all of my party tricks already, are you?"

Bently nodded. "Okay, I'll just settle for what he had for breakfast this morning," he said with a smile.

"It was hearty, possibly a fry-up," Faulds replied quickly. "Our bomber is experienced, knows what they're doing to an extent, knows to be prepared and to eat when it's safe in the case they have to run later. No caffeine though, they won't want the jitters when they're priming a detonator."

The two agents stared at Faulds.

"What can I say," Charlotte added. "He's good."

"Well," Bently said. "I knew your background was impressive, but I never thought you'd be telling me I need to start collecting sausages as evidence," he joked. "Now if you'll just surrender your evidence to us, we'll have a team pick up…"

Faulds and Charlotte exchanged a baffled look. "Surrender our evidence? On what grounds?"

"On the grounds that its my job now to find this bomber. Again, we appreciate the work you've done thus far, and we'll make it very clear that your lab gets full recognition for your work…"

"We're not looking for recognition, we're looking for a suspect," Faulds said sharply.

Bently held his hands up. "Listen, if it was up to me, I'd be happy to leave this case in your capable hands." He reached into his suit pocket and withdrew a nondescript envelope. "I have all the documentation here."

Faulds ignored the paperwork. "You don't have the jurisdiction here. This is a Strathclyde matter, Scottish law dictates that all sudden deaths are under the remit of the local Procurator Fiscal..."

"I'm sorry, but I'm afraid it's not up for discussion."

"Then get your Director-General on the phone, and we'll discuss it then."

"It's not as easy as that, Cameron," Bently said, an edge to his voice.

"Well until I hear otherwise from someone who has the authority, this case stays with my lab."

"This comes from the top. This isn't about petty points scoring between departments, this is a matter of national security. Hell, this is a matter of reassuring the public that they're safe. And before you say anything, I'm not doubting the ability of your staff, but you know how the public are, they're quick to disregard any official explanations and jump into full-blown panic.

"The press will be over this thing like a rash, and by tomorrow morning every paper in the Western world will be running this story. All that does is stir up more panic, and before you know it, we have journalists and politicians looming over us, over all of us. We're in the same team after all.

"The public and the media are increasingly cynical towards incidents like this. Do you know what they backlash is to incidents like this? No-one believes that things are simply black and white anymore, since 9/11 even the most mundane accident is turned into a terrorist conspiracy and a Government cover-up."

"So you're saying you're taking over our investigation for a public relations exercise?" Charlotte asked.

"The British Government merely wants to show it is dedicating its best resources to any potential terrorist action," Lawson said coldly, speaking for the first time.

"We are the best resource," Faulds said firmly.

Lawson snorted. "Given the chequered history of this lab and its personnel, I doubt that."

"And you guys will do what?" Faulds asked. "Bring in a number of techs that don't know each other's methods and trip each other up?"

"We have our teams already in place, they're well versed in working with each other."

"And they're used to criminal investigations, are they? They're qualified criminologists with knowledge of the fields and theories involved, experience in working within Scots Law, as well as connections within the local law enforcement, the judiciary and the media?"

Lawson glared hard at Faulds.

"Maybe not then," the CSI smiled.

"This is bigger than CSI, Mr Faulds. Now…"

"Doctor."

"Excuse me?"

"Dr Faulds, not mister. If you're coming into my lab and trying to take my cases then I at least expect some professional courtesy."

Bently smiled briefly. "I apologise, Dr Faulds. But the fact remains, we're taking over this investigation. You've done some great work up until now, but this isn't your case any more."

Looks like the subtle approach isn't working, thought Faulds. Plan B goes a little bit more direct.

"It's still my case, and the bodies upstairs in my morgue say otherwise, but I suppose you know more about them than we do."

"I don't know what you're talking about."

"Spare me. We've just run their prints through PNC and hit a brick wall. CSI doesn't have the access, which means government-level clearance, which means you, you who have just happened to turn up in my lab. Now they're what, members of the service? Witness protection? Maybe informants? And before you spin a line, just remember that if I have to look through intelligence briefings myself by hand, I will find out who they are. And no matter how long it takes, I will come knocking on your door and this investigation will start all over again.

"Now, you tell me who they are, you tell me why you're really here, and you let me and my team get on with this investigation."

Bently levelled Faulds with a dead-eye stare, his jovial mood gone.

"I was expecting this from you, Faulds."

"Then I'm glad I haven't disappointed you. So it goes like this, you can either work with me, or against me, and if you think I'm being awkward right now, you're in for one hell of a surprise if you try to undermine my lab."

"You can't blackmail your way into this investigation."

"I don't need to, this is already my investigation."

Lawson scowled. "Think you're pretty funny, don't you?"

"Just one of my many talents." Out of the corner of his eye, he saw Charlotte close her eyes in exasperation.

Lawson took a step forward. "You think this is some kind of joke? The joke his that you think your little outfit has any say in this matter."

Faulds met the MI5 agent's glare. "I tell you what, fellas, I've had enough of these fun and games." His expression darkened. "Now, get the hell out of my lab."

XXX

Faulds pulled his earphones out on Charlotte's entrance to the trace lab. After Bently and Lawson's departure, she had left to collect the results of the black box analysis, saying little as she had gone.

"Ed not back yet?" she asked.

"I think he's in the huff," he replied, attempting to read her mood.

"Well I've got the results from the flight recorder here, and there's no evidence of a systems failure beforehand, which at least means we're on the right track." Charlotte read the printout carefully. "However, there were two signals picked up by the black box before the explosion, one was a standard cellular signal, the other was a much higher frequency."

"The detonator?"

"Looks like it. There was a cellular call for twenty three seconds, but the black box only picked up the second signal for a split-second before the explosion."

Faulds drummed his fingers on the desk. "So the chopper received a remote signal before it blew, which means it's someone who really knows what they're doing."

"Is that a good or a bad thing?"

"Neither and both." He fixed Charlotte with a quizzical look. "You okay?"

"I'm fine," she said, her tone clipped.

"Somehow I don't think…"

"Do you ever hold back?" she said suddenly.

"Excuse me?"

"You just got into an argument with two MI5 agents. MI5...government agents, Cameron. I mean, I can see Rav doing that, in fact, I'm surprised he hasn't done that already, but…"

"Charlotte…"

"Nothing…Just that's the first time since I've known you that you've made someone call you doctor, doctor. If I didn't know better I'd say you were trying to start a fight."

Faulds smiled slightly. "He knew what he was saying, you don't think that they didn't look through our files before turning up? I'm not letting him score points against us, not in my lab."

"Don't take this personal, Cameron," she warned. "This isn't against you."

"I can't help it," he shrugged.

"Well you need to help it. This is one fight you can't win, and the repercussions are serious."

"Well they can threaten me with all the repercussions they like, all I'm concerned about is this bomber."

She shook her head. "Fine, I'll stop trying to save your career from an ass-kicking. Got any ideas then?"

"Well our killer clearly knows what they're doing, so they're either experienced somehow or they've had some tuition from someone who has. Your typical bomber is a coward, they'll avoid direct contact as much as possible, up until a point, so our killer isn't brave, isn't athletic, isn't a fighter. Our killer is deceitful, capable of lying, not just to police, but to their family, friends and colleagues."

"Colleagues?"

"Either criminal colleagues, or standard employment. Our killer is intelligent, at least as intelligent as you have to be to make a bomb without taking their own head off. It's nothing too high up though, our killer just obliterated a helicopter in the middle of the city, so they're too much of a sociopath to deal with many people under them.

"This means possibly trained construction or ex-military, if they're not, then they know someone who is, someone they trust, deeply. It's not just trust in not ratting them out to the police, it's the trust that this bomb isn't going to kill the maker. They're literally putting their life in the hands of another."

"And if they've already got a criminal background?"

Faulds drummed his fingers together. "Then it means connections."

"So we could be talking any number of groups or criminal gangs. Doesn't exactly narrow things down."

"I know. Anyone that's ever cracked a safe could be in the frame."

"In this city? Our list of suspects would be like a phonebook. We'll get nowhere unless we can get the information we need on the victims. Who they are tells us what they're involved with and who they know."

"I don't think MI5 want to give up their secrets, though. It's too much of a coincidence that we can't access the information and they're trying to take this case from us. It has to be them behind this block. But until we can get that information from them, we're fighting blind."

"So where does that leave us?"

"I need you to get back out to the airport."

She raised an eyebrow. "We miss something?"

"Maybe we did. I want you to try and track down the car that the victims arrived in, see if that gives us any new angles. If it's not there, see if you can track down some CCTV tapes, might give us a witness."

"What about you?"

"Just offender files. Miles and miles of files."

XXX

Faulds was midway through a list of known offenders that had similar a modus operandi of bomb-making, three-quarters into a can of Red Bull and just finishing Scouting for Girls' debut album when his phone rang. Grumbling, he snapped it open.

"Making some new friends, Faulds?"

He laughed on hearing the voice of Clive Andrews, the Area Procurator Fiscal for Glasgow. Although the Procurator Fiscal was responsible for public prosecutions in Scotland, and overseeing the direction of cases, in murder cases the police normally completed their investigations before involving the PF.

So why do I have the APF calling now? Faulds wondered. Can't be good, whatever the case.

"I hear you've had some visitors," Clive noted.

"Yeah, charming they were, too."

"Well charming or not, they're not exactly enamoured with you."

Faulds grinned. "They shouldn't try to take my cases."

"They're not trying, they've taken it."

The grin crashed off Faulds' face. "What?"

"I had them in my office earlier. They've got the paperwork, Cameron, dotted and crossed. The case is theirs."

"And we have no say in it?"

"None, this isn't like Lockerbie," Clive said, referring to the investigation into the bombing of Pan Am Flight 103 over the Scottish town of Lockerbie in 1988. Despite the case involving all levels of British governmental agencies, the AAIB, the American FBI, Department of Defence and even NASA, the investigation fell first and foremost under the direction of the Dumfries and Galloway Constabulary. "It's a different world now, Faulds, and we're bumped down the list accordingly. No-one thinks local cops are capable of adequately investigating another front in the war on terror," he said acerbically. "I don't even have the details of the case myself. Whatever this case is connected to, we're not privy to that knowledge."

Faulds slammed his hand onto the desk. "So where does that leave us?"

"It leaves you with no investigation, I'm afraid. Everything connected to the deaths of the chopper's occupants is off-limits, which means no further analysis of evidence. And Cameron, don't go thinking of going around me on this one, it's not just your arse on the line if you go against this one, they'll hammer any of your techs or morgue staff if they go anywhere near this. Career suicide for anyone with a hint of involvement."

"I take it they told you that themselves?"

"Expressly. Seems like they've been doing their homework on you."

"I really have to stop caring," Faulds deadpanned. "So there's nothing we can do?"

"I'm sorry, Cameron, it's over. This investigation isn't yours anymore."