Thank you to everyone who has read and reviewed this story, it means a lot.

Just to clarify, the Animal Liberation Front/Militia is real and the 1984 poisoning hoax really did happen. Everything else is invented by me, including 'Black Flag' (except the name, which I've 'borrowed' off an American Punk band).

Chapter Three: Blind Alleys

Ros' eyes narrowed as she focused on her computer screen, the monitor reflected in her widening pupils as she leaned forward to see it better. Immediately, the background bustle of the Grid receded to an inconsequential buzz as she began reading in earnest. Dated as July, 1984, the article was first published well over twenty years previously in the Guardian newspaper. The Mars Company had been performing tooth decay experiments on animals, provoking an outcry that included a hoax chemical poisoning identical to the one she and Lucas had spent that morning investigating. But in that case, the reason and objective was clear from the off. Whereas their case seemed random and purposeless. No animals were being harmed by the company affected and no trade laws were being violated. Nothing to raise the ire of the Animal Liberation Front.

Sighing in frustration, Ros slumped back in her seat and glared at the monitor. Only briefly, she raised her gaze to see where Lucas had got to, only to find him answering a call that had been put through to Jo's desk phone. Looking back at her computer, she started going through the options in her head. Either the coincidences were too much and Black Flag was a front for the Animal Rights brigades, or she was about to waste time, effort and money into barking up the wrong tree altogether. She didn't know what she expected to find on the Animal Liberation Front's website, but she decided to try it anyway.

What she found, a few seconds later, almost made her laugh. Albeit the awkward laugh of one caught in a no-man's-land between the deadly serious and the ridiculously absurd. Their website was illustrated with photographs of men dressed in black balaclavas and urban camouflage army surplus. Their paramilitary posturing strangely juxtaposed by the fact that they were cradling puppies and fluffy white rabbits in their arms, instead of AK-47s and homemade rocket launchers. Reminding herself that these people were still dangerous, she had to pull herself together as she continued to browse their website. There were more articles about hoax poisonings, some in England but more in America and Canada. But there was no mention of any other groups, and less still of Black Flag.

One thing that did catch her eye was the 'rogue's gallery', featuring photographs and biographical details of every person they had caught infiltrating their organisation. Her heartbeat quickened as she scanned all of them. One was an undercover reporter from the BBC; another from Sky News. Others were members of law enforcement and, even more sinisterly, others were people who had simply become disillusioned with the group and left in high dudgeon. Although she breathed a silent sigh of relief that none of the victims were MI-5, she still started jotting down the names so they could be contacted and warned. Jo could do it as soon as she returned from Suffolk.

In the meantime, Lucas had ended his call and come over to join her with fresh brewed tea for them both. She thanked him as she accepted her cup, blowing on the steam before taking a scalding sip.

"Look at this," she said, nodding towards the screen. "No idea whether they have anything to do with Black Flag, or the poisoning, but they still need watching."

She couldn't believe Animal Liberation Front had been allowed to slip under the radar. They could have been watching them; they should have been watching them all this time. But the time for self-recrimination had passed. Wheeling her chair aside to make room for Lucas, she started making a note of the names while Lucas explored the site for himself.

"That was Ben on the phone," he said, volunteering the information. "He and the Minister have arrived in the North East okay."

Ros breathed a small sigh of relief. All she needed now was Jo to get back from Suffolk, where she was helping Lucile settle into the bunker for the security op, and she could get started on warning the ALF targets. So far, the whole Op was running smoothly and, just for once, she wanted the whole thing to pass off without incident. Meanwhile, Lucas had stopped navigating his way through the website and was sat back in his chair, glowering at the monitor. He seemed on the brink of saying something as his brow tightened and he drew a sharp breath. But he stopped and sighed heavily instead.

"What is the matter?" asked Ros, half-smiling at his obvious conundrum.

"I'm trying to think of a way in with these people that won't end with my mug shot being plastered all over their website," he explained.

Ros put down her pen for a second. "If it does, I'm pretty sure Malcolm has what it takes to pull the whole site immediately. But look, I don't think that's going to be the real problem here."

"No?"

She took a moment to marshal her thoughts. "We'll speak with Ruth when she gets back, she'll know more about how these people operate, but it's not as simple as that. Anyway, like you say, we could be barking up the wrong tree entirely."

It was like a fairground hall of mirrors. Each group, disparate and fractured, was a distorted reflection of the other. The real ones lost among the warped shapes of the others, bleeding into each other and conjoining to form a mutated mass. Stay too long, and you could lose your way and be running blind down dead ends and false corridors forever, while the genuine group at the heart of the op wreaked havoc on the outside. Already, before they had even begun, Ros felt herself already to be groping her way clumsily through the opaque distortions of groups, sub-groups and criminal networks. Ros closed her eyes and sipped her tea, savouring the last few minutes of normality before Ruth returned to bring them the day's good news.

Jo and Lucile climbed out of the car to be met with a lungful of clean, country air. It was almost serene with the nearby woodlands surrounding a small, squat village nearby. A sandstone church up a hill was the tallest of the buildings, this far out of London. A narrow river wound through the outskirts of the housing area, leading into the woods. Lucile's cover story was that she was working for Cambridge University and carrying out a survey of insects and butterflies whose natural habitat was deep inside the aforementioned wooded area. Perfect for the location she and Jo found themselves in.

Whereas the sun lit up the quaint, chocolate box style village nearby, the woods by contrast were strangely dark and almost ominous. Like something from a seventies Hammer Horror film: thin, far set birches and pines in a cluster, with no real footpath to lead the way inside. Shaded by a thick canopy of trees in full summer bloom, it was chilly and silent as the sound of the already sparse traffic was smothered. Even Lucile shivered as this new environment closed in and around them. If there was any sound to be heard, it was unseen birds high overhead, taking startled flight if one of them accidentally trod on a twig. The crack amplified and carried all round, even alarmed them. More than once, Jo lost her footing and cursed under her breath.

"You're a city girl too then?" asked Lucile as she reached her hand out to Jo, helping her back up.

Jo rolled her eyes. "It's that obvious is it?"

Lucile laughed, dispelling some of the foreboding atmosphere that had accumulated. "When I first got married, I thought I'd love a place in the countryside. Now I'm thinking it'd do my head in."

They paused a few minutes later, when they drew closer to what they knew to be the Ministry of Defence installation, so Jo could consult an MoD map. Just over a mile into the woods, it was outwardly fenced off with warnings about trespassing. The sign clearly stated that the land belonged to the MoD, but beyond that, there was no information. Besides, it was set well back from the footpath favoured by local dog walkers and the fifty feet high fences topped with razor wire were too much even for the most intrepid of bored kids. The bunker itself, they found, was underground and accessible only by a manhole that had been obscured naturally by falling leaves and branches. To the naked eye, the entire compound looked simply like it was private and awaiting development, rather than something already being there.

"Here goes," said Jo, clearing the entrance cover and levering it open.

Inside, an iron ladder, rungs fixed to the stone walls, led downwards six feet. She went in first, with Lucile close behind. When, a few minutes later, they found themselves in an impenetrably dark and freezing cold space, Jo had to rummage blindly for a torch until they could get their bearings and switch the electricity back on. It probably had not been used in years and Lucile would need to spend the next day or so just getting it stocked up. But when they found when they did get the lights back on was passable enough.

Out of necessity, everything was basic. The kitchen was the size of a postage stamp, the women's dormitory was enough to house several people, and the bathroom was all stainless steel and basic wall fitted showers. Lucile could only be relieved that she would be alone for this Op, with the exception of the guards who would be stationed in the local village and checking on her every day. There was only one way in and out, making it easy to defend but difficult in the event of a fire. The broadcasting suite was towards the rear of the bunker, next to a utility room and recreation area. It was small, but had everything she needed to function properly. A red light shone above the door, signalling off-air status. Everything seemed in working order.

It was an hour later, when Jo left to return to Thames House, that Lucile felt a thrill of excitement course through her. If she proved herself capable on this field Op, she knew she would be called into action again. To do this – real spy work.

"The trouble is, they're not a cohesive group." Ruth toyed with a silver bracelet round her wrist as she spoke. Everyone else in the meeting room: Harry, Ros and Lucas, were silent. All of them were watching her, looking her in the eye and making her nervous. "With groups like the Animal Liberation Front and Animal Liberation Militia, they don't operate like the IRA or Al-Qaeda. There are no cells or any central body to infiltrate. They're more like a collective of activists who have merely adopted the names of the groups."

There she paused, trying to find a way to explain more succinctly how these people operated. For her colleagues, it would be like clutching at smoke. There were no meetings, no organised events, no recruiting or even any advertisements beyond the group's websites. They were not affiliated to anyone else. There was no leader or central organising committee. None of the usual terrorist structures. They had a core set of values and any individual who shared them had a right to call themselves a member. It was as simple as that, which made it hazy for them. The look of dismay in the eyes of Ros and Lucas was almost palpably real. In a poor response, Ruth raised a pained smile.

"There almost is no way in," she admitted with a shrug of her shoulders. "Unless, one particular individual comes up on the radar, and you can try and get in with them."

"Except they act alone," said Ros.

"But wait," Lucas cut in. "On their website, they're breaking into labs. Whole groups of them. Surely that's a cell we can infiltrate?"

"I'm afraid not," Harry answered, sparing Ruth the effort. "In my limited experience of dealing with these people, they all just arrange a date and bring nothing more than wire cutters."

"So what can we do?" Ros asked, sounding more irritable. "We can't just sit back and let them cause chaos, regardless of the name they're using."

Once more, they all turn to Ruth like she's the oracle of terrorist networks. She can feel the heat rising in her face as she wilts under the collective glare, which was one more aspect of life in MI-5 she had managed to airbrush out while in Cyprus.

"The thing is," she began. "I think we need to wait until we learn more about Black Flag themselves. The similarities in tactics are undeniable, but it's still a mistake to automatically lump all these different groups together. We know Black Flag existed before-"

"But you said they didn't do anything!"

Ruth stalled as Ros cut in, but let her speak.

"No, I said they did nothing dangerous," she clarified. "They were still a monumental and expensive pain the arse. For all we know, however, the shared name is pure coincidence. We need to hang back and see if they make another move."

Harry flinched. Almost imperceptibly, but Ruth saw it and she knew what he was thinking.

"We have no evidence to suggest they're armed or particularly dangerous to human life," she pointed out. "It will be another industrial target. But we need to observe and learn. Like I said, these groups are never like ordinary terrorists, with clear goals, objectives and methods."

There was a long moment of drawn out silence in the meeting room. A clock on the far wall ticked down the seconds, while the others all looked from one to the other, mutinous and restive. Lucas shifted in his seat, fixing Ruth with a hard look.

"So, you're saying we should do nothing and wait for them to make the next move?"

Ruth suppressed a sigh. "No, that's not what I said," she explained, forcing herself to be patient. "But surely you can see that while we know so very little about them, what they want or what they're trying to do, we're limited here. We're completely blind."

I don't have all the answers, she wanted to scream at them. Two years out of the service, two years of threats, groups, disgruntled wannabe paramilitaries to catch up and these people had caught her wrong footed. Ruth could feel herself slowly deflating under the disappointed looks of her colleagues. But she couldn't just magic a way in for them, she didn't absorb intelligence like the process of osmosis. Like them, she needed something to go on.

Dejectedly, she drew back her chair to leave. The whole situation troubled her, but she stood by the minimal intelligence she had gathered thus far. Black Flag were mimicking the tactics of others, while posing no immediate threat. They simply didn't have the physical capabilities and if they did, MI-5 would know about it through criminal back channels. Emerging on to the Grid, Ruth looked up to see Jo returning from Suffolk and raised a hand in a gesture of greeting. But she didn't stop to say hello. She returned to her desk, tapping the space bar of her computer to wake it up again with the intention of carrying on with her search for Black Flag. But before she could begin again, she noticed that Harry had followed her out of the meeting room. He nodded towards one of the vacant interrogation rooms, a silent gesture for her to follow him in.

She did, and closed the door behind her. The room they were in was basic and grim, with just one window set high in the wall and barred with iron. It cast a long, narrow shaft of light through the gloom onto the bare, lino covered floor. Harry pulled out a chair for her at the interview table, while he moved to the other side. Nervous about what had prompted this private audience, she could feel her heartbeat quicken and self-justification bubbling inside her.

"Harry, before you say anything, I really am trying here. You know I'm not Mystic Meg and I can't just make stuff up to fill in the intelligence gaps-"

"Ruth!" he held up a hand to silence her, which she did, in stuttering stages.

"Okay, okay," she said between deep, steadying breaths.

She looked at earnestly, across the small space that divided them. He looked back at her, his eyes coal black in the poor light.

"Stop panicking," he implored her, softly. "The only person who expects you to have all the answers is you."

However much Ruth wanted to believe that, she couldn't escape the look in the other's faces as she all but admitted her powerlessness. "But Ros and Lucas-"

"No," he cut her off again, reaching across the table so that his hands found hers. He tugged her forwards, making sure he had her undivided attention. "It's not you, you know that. It's just the job. The blind alleys. Surely you remember what it's like?" he paused there, watching her reaction carefully.

Despite her continued dismay, Ruth managed to raise the ghost of a smile on her face. "I remember," she replied. Maybe she did. Maybe she had whitewashed her job with MI-5 while in Cyprus, screening out the bad bits and glorifying the good to make up for the extra space in her memory. There was always bound to be a comedown.

"You can't give up," he told her, leaning over the table. "I won't let you."

She leaned forwards, too, meeting him halfway where they closed their eyes and kissed each other. This at least explained the use of an abandoned interrogation room instead of Harry's very un-private office. But he had faith in her, and that gave her a little more faith in herself. She hadn't forgotten that about MI-5: the way they shored each other up, even in the darkest of hours. Well, perhaps they weren't all quite so touchy-feely, but Ruth could live with that.

Emma was poring over a map in the living room of the squat they had taken up residence in. Leon watched her carefully from the back of the room. Suffolk had been marked out in red ink, and the name of the village jotted down in a notebook at her side on an old, unsteady table. All the flirtatiousness had gone out of her, now. It was as though someone else had started inhabiting her skin. She had been scowling at that map and running random Google searches for hours. She only stopped to field calls and send messages. Occasionally, when it seemed as though she had forgotten he was there at all, she would look up and fire questions at him. Questions about where MI-5 had stationed their agents, both in Suffolk and in the North East. The latter he could scarcely answer since the Agents would be tailing the Minister at a very discreet distance.

"Is your father going with her?" asked Emma, looking up from the map.

Leon had his eye trained on a gap in the window boards, trying to see outside into the sunny gardens. He jerked round to look back into the room. "Of course not," he replied. "Dad's busy in London. He can't just go swanning off on public tours. What are you planning, anyway?"

Emma grinned, the first trace of personality she had shown since he passed on the information he had about the Minister's tour of the north. "You'll just have to wait and see," she teased him. "But I want you in on it."

A flicker of triumphant excitement curled in his belly, but Leon was careful to school his reaction. The last thing he wanted was to look like a kid at Christmas, but it was still just beginning to touch the sides of how he felt. There was only one problem that snagged at him as he pushed away from the back wall and joined Emma at the table.

"If you want me in on it," he said, sliding into a seat. "Then isn't it rather essential I know what 'it' is?"

Emma was not so easily won, however. The impish grin was back on her face as she rolled her eyes. "You just follow our lead," she said, cupping his chin with her right hand, pinching his cheek with her left. "Come along for the ride, see how we operate, and you'll be fine for the next operation, I promise."

He tried to tell himself he didn't mind. But he could feel himself being drawn in with one hand, and pushed away with the other. It was all so typical of Emma and he couldn't help but give in and go along with it, she always knew better than he did.

"Thank you," he murmured, half-heartedly.

Emma kissed him then, pulled him in close for reassurance. "You've done brilliantly, Lee," she said, running her hand through his hair. "You've given us the chance to do something huge, and you will be rewarded for it, I promise. But if I'm going to pull this off, I'll need the help of the others. Other's who're way more experienced than you. Do you understand?"

She led him over to an old, flea-bitten sofa close to where he was waiting earlier. They were alone in the house, the others had gone out and some had headed to the North East, to Durham where the Minister would be starting her tour. Leon couldn't imagine what they would be doing there, but he would soon hear about it – he hoped. But there was something that had jarred with him since that morning's initial planning. Something he hadn't yet voiced and wasn't sure whether he would. It seemed as though Black Flag already had people based there, suggesting that the network was much larger than he had been led to believe. It all enticed him further in, built up the expectation and the thrill of what they were doing. Emma was like an ideological strip tease, showing just enough to keep him interested while the real deal, the bits he really wanted, were still out of sight and out of touching range.

"Are you attacking MI-5, or the Minister?" he asked, suddenly nervous. "What exactly are you planning?"

"Wait and see," she insisted, cutting off any further protest with a kiss. "You'll have everything you want in due course, I promise. I need you for the next two days solid. Can you work that out with your dad?"

"Sure, he won't even notice I'm gone. But what if the police and the spies are already on us?" he asked, voicing another latent fear.

"Don't worry, they won't be," she replied, almost dismissively.

She cut off further protest the best way she knew how, and Leon didn't complain. It was better than worrying about things that hadn't yet happened. But even as she unlooped his belt and fumbled for his zip, all he could think of was what was around the corner.

Thanks again for reading, reviews would be welcome if you have a minute. Thank you.