Deadfall: Agent 21
Contents
9. All Creatures Great and Small
Deep in the African jungle, an army of child soldiers strengthens its troops. Scars on the boys’ faces mark their allegiance, for life.
Meanwhile shadowy agent Zak Darke is tracking their movements, hunting the source of a huge international criminal operation. But he may have underestimated their commander. By the time Zak realizes the danger he’s in, will it be too late?
He’s going to need every ounce of his training to survive Deadfall.
Real name:
Zak Darke
Known pseudonyms:
Harry Gold, Jason Cole
Age:
15
Date of birth:
March 27
Parents:
Al and Janet Darke [DECEASED]
Operational skills:
Weapons handling, navigation, excellent facility with languages, excellent computer and technical skills. Trained in codebreaking.
Previous operations:
(1) Inserted under cover into the compound of Mexican drug magnate Cesar Martinez Toledo. Befriended target’s son Cruz. Successfully supplied evidence of target’s illegal activities. Successfully guided commando team in to compound. Target eliminated.
(2) Inserted into Angola to place explosive device on suspected terrorist ship, the
MV Mercantile
. Vessel destroyed, Agent 21 extracted.
(3) To extract skilled person from secure hospital site and work alongside
same; also inserted undercover alongside suspect. Mission to eliminate bomb threats to both civilians and major targets in the UK. Successful outcome.
Real name:
classified
Known pseudonyms:
‘Gabriella’, ‘Gabs’
Age:
27
Operational skills:
Advanced combat and self-defence, surveillance, tracking.
Currently charged with ongoing training of Agent 21 on remote Scottish island of St Peter’s Crag.
Real name:
classified
Known pseudonyms:
‘Raphael’, ‘Raf’
Age:
30
Operational skills:
Advanced combat and self-defence, sub-aqua, land-vehicle control.
Currently charged with ongoing training
of Agent 21 on remote Scottish island of St Peter’s Crag.
Real name:
classified
Known pseudonyms:
‘Mr Bartholomew’
Age:
classified
Recruited Agent 21 after death of his parents. Currently his handler. Has links with MI5, but represents a classified government agency.
(Presumed Dead)
Age:
17
Significant information:
Succeeded Cesar Martinez as head of largest Mexican drug cartel. Thought to blame Agent 21 for death of father. Highly intelligent. Profile remained low since coming to power. Thought to have drowned during sinking of
MV Mercantile
.
Age:
14
Significant information:
Borderline autistic computer hacker. Known to have cracked the security of a number of intelligence agencies. Has provided help to Agent 21 in the past. Currently living off the grid in Johannesburg, South Africa.
1
FUN WORLD
J
OHANNESBURG
, S
OUTH
A
FRICA
. S
ATURDAY
. 11.00
HRS
There had been a thin layer of frost on the ice-cold bottle of Coke. Beads of condensation ran down the glass.
Just like the bead of sweat that ran down the side of Zak’s face.
This should be an easy op. Why, then, did he feel so on edge?
He hadn’t touched his drink. He was too busy looking through the window of the café.
Zak could only half see his reflection, but it still surprised him. In another time and place, he might have thought he looked stupid. Not now. This new appearance had a purpose. His hair had been dyed blond and cut scruffily short. He had put in a set of
blue contact lenses. Fake tan had darkened his skin. With his bright red baseball cap on the table in front of him, he looked like a surfer dude. Not a teenage boy who spent all his time living on a windswept island off the coast of Scotland.
Amazing how easy it was to change the way you look.
He glanced across the table at Gabs. His Guardian Angel always managed to appear a little bit glamorous, even when she was in disguise. Today you could only see strands of her blonde hair tumbling down below the edge of a peaked beret. She wore a T-shirt with a sparkling Rolling Stones logo. In front of her was a half-drunk cappuccino.
‘You should take a sip of your Coke, sweetie,’ she murmured. ‘If anyone’s watching . . .’
‘Nobody’s watching.’
‘
Zak!
’
Gabs’s voice was suddenly severe. Zak flushed. He knew better than that. If Zak – or Raf, or Gabs, or anyone he’d met in the time his ordinary life had become extraordinary, and he’d gone from being Zak Darke to Agent 21 – was conducting surveillance on someone in this café, would
they
notice
him
?
Not a chance.
And it worked both ways.
A single sweep of the café told him that any one
of a number of people could have eyes-on. The waiter wiping down the coffee machine behind the bar. The tired mum with two kids eating ice cream at the next table. The waitress who had served them . . .
He gave Gabs an apologetic nod and took a pull on his Coke.
Then he stared out of the window again.
They were staking out a toy shop called Fun World. Four storeys high, and wide enough for six separate window displays. Each window was painted with a large picture of a clown’s face. They were supposed to look happy, but they just freaked Zak out – he almost felt as if they were staring straight at him, and he had to suppress a shudder.
Once, when he was much younger, Zak’s mum and dad had taken him to the huge London toy shop, Hamleys, to see Father Christmas. Fun World was similar in size, but nowhere near as busy.
Bottom line: this place gave him the creeps. It didn’t look much fun at all.
Which kind of figured.
Because it wasn’t like Agent 21 and his Guardian Angels had been sent to South Africa to go shopping for toys.
‘You think he’s in there?’ Zak asked.
‘Cruz?’
Zak nodded. Of
course
Cruz. Cruz Martinez, his former friend turned Mexican drug lord. Cruz Martinez, whose father had ordered the deaths of Zak’s own parents, and had taken a round from Gabs’s gun for his trouble. Cruz Martinez, who he’d last seen falling from a sinking ship into a stormy sea. Who everyone had insisted was dead, even though Zak knew in his heart he was still alive. Whose very name caused Zak’s flesh to grow cold.
Whom intelligence operators had spotted three times in the past month visiting this very toy shop.
And nobody thought he was there to buy teddy bears.
‘Yeah,’ said Zak. ‘Cruz.’
‘I doubt it,’ Gabs said. ‘Saturday morning and everything. I don’t think he’d rock up when it’s busy.’
‘It’s not
that
busy,’ Zak observed.
Gabs shrugged. ‘Not a lot of money in this part of the world for buying toys.’ She looked through the window of the café. ‘There’s Raf,’ she breathed.
She was right. Raf had suddenly appeared. He was standing outside the main door of Fun World, and had removed his lightweight linen jacket and slung it over his shoulder. That was the signal. It meant he’d staked out the surrounding area and hadn’t seen anything suspicious.
The op was a go.
Gabs drained her coffee cup and motioned at Zak to do the same. ‘Remember,’ she said to him. ‘This is surveillance, nothing more. Understood?’
‘This is surveillance, nothing more.’
Zak’s handler Michael had used those exact words during their briefing session just two days ago on the bleak island of St Peter’s Crag that was now his home.
‘You’re the only one who’s been inside the Martinez inner circle. All you have to do is determine if anybody you saw during your time in Mexico is working at Fun World.’
‘Surely they have security cameras in the store,’ Zak had said. ‘Can’t you just hack in to those? I can look at the pictures, tell you if there’s anyone I recognize. That would be safer, wouldn’t it?’
‘Much safer. Unfortunately, all the CCTV images are encrypted and uploaded to a server elsewhere. We’ve had our best people on it. They can’t even locate the Fun World server, let alone decrypt the images. The only way we’re going to do this is by putting you on the ground. Now listen, Zak: if you recognize anyone, do not – repeat
do not
– try to apprehend them. Leave that to the experts. You just need to look like a kid in a toy shop. It’s the only reason you’re there.’