Professional Documents
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ISBN 978-1-4303-2422-5
First Published 2007 by lulu.com
THE HIDDEN LAYER 3
Prologue
6 THE HIDDEN LAYER
THE HIDDEN LAYER 7
Summer, 1980
the blue van had been, the entire wall between two windows caved in
under the enormous pressure pushing it from outside.
The chairs and tables nearest the windows, complete with their
few doomed occupants, lifted off the floor and joined the hurtling
barrage of debris and fire that was sweeping the interior of the bar. As
the blast pervaded the room, the brightly painted pillars of wood and
plaster crumbled and fell away and the lethal mass of glass, wood,
masonry, metal, flesh and bones and the scorching shockwaves of air
proceeded to exterminate everything in its path.
In that instant the man and the woman were swept away and time
restarted.
The ceiling, having been heaved upwards with the force of the
enormous explosion, and with its supporting pillars blown away,
buckled precariously, held for a few seconds, then with a crash
collapsed through to the ground floor. Timber and furniture and
plaster rained down into the scorched drinking area and fuelled the
flames that had already taken hold.
Later that evening, after the raging fires had been damped and the
rubble had started to be cleared, the unidentifiable body of a young
woman was dragged from the debris and identified by one of the
shocked, surviving local women by her necklace and bracelet. She
was Emma Taylor, an 18 year old from Bishop’s Stortford, England.
Much later into the night, after the emergency services had cleared
away more of the wreckage, a worker pulled a charred rucksack from
the rubble. Inside the rucksack, amongst his other belongings, was the
passport of one Robert Asher, also 18 and from England. Soon after
they found his poor, lifeless body too.
‘Oh. Can I help you?’ said the man to the two police officers
standing on his front doorstep. The little boy peeked out from the
kitchen doorway and down the hall to see if he could see who it was.
Nothing. His father was in the way.
‘Good morning sir. I’m Detective Inspector Barnes from the
Bishop’s Stortford Constabulary. This is PC Stanley. Are you Mr
Richard Taylor?’
10 THE HIDDEN LAYER
1982 - 1984
It was early evening and Rachel had waited impatiently all day for
this moment. In fact she’d waited patiently for the best part of the
year but today the suspense was especially unbearable. Ever since the
school had bought a desktop computer she’d known there and then
that that was what she’d wanted. She had to have one. Eagerly she
tore the wrapping paper from the large package and underneath was
the glossy surface of a cardboard box upon which was emblazoned a
dramatic photograph of a computer. But it wasn’t what she was
expecting. She frowned, afraid that her father had messed up, then she
realised that it was in fact a superior model. It was different to the one
in her classroom but the highly distorted perspective of the picture
made the machine look many times larger than it actually was. It had
the desired effect on Rachel and her eyes opened wide with
excitement.
‘Oh wow! This is better than the one we’ve got at school! Thank
you!’
Her father smiled at his eight year-old daughter and nodded
knowingly. The seal on the box had already been broken so she was
able to delve right in and pull out a grey and black computer that was
no bigger than a writing pad. She set it carefully down on the floor
and ran her fingers over the upward facing surface. It was raised and
angled towards her and was covered with thin, white keys. Rachel
thought it looked like someone had arranged a boxful of Tic-Tacs into
rows. She reached in again and pulled out a bag of wires, followed by
a heavy black power pack, a spiral-bound book with the same image
on it as the box had, a tape recorder and finally a pack of ten cassette
tapes, all with different pictures on. The rest was foam packaging,
almost to Rachel’s disappointment.
Desperate to try the computer out, Rachel was made to wait until
her mother had finished watching Paul Daniels’ Magical Christmas.
Within minutes of the credits rolling the living room television had
been commandeered as a screen and the little computer was
screeching and flashing as it loaded it’s first game from the tape
player. She couldn’t wait to show her friend Marcus. He would be so
jealous! His father might have been rich but he was strict and never
bought Marcus things like this. Rachel’s parents knew it and seemed
to delight in having Marcus over to play.
THE HIDDEN LAYER 13
So by Boxing Day she and Marcus had tried all ten of the games.
By New Year’s Day they had all been completed and Rachel was so
absorbed by the computer that her father realised he was going to
have to buy her her own portable TV to use with it. The games were
entertaining but they weren’t quite enough for Rachel – she was more
interested in getting underneath the hood of the computer. In the
weeks that followed Christmas she developed a rapacious appetite for
learning about the little machine’s capabilities and within a couple of
months, with a few pointers from her teacher at school, she had
figured out how to make the computer save snippets of information
onto blank 15-minute cassette tapes. Her friends’ names and
addresses suddenly found themselves in digital form on what she
called her “stored people tape” but she was frustrated by how slow the
whole thing was. Reluctantly she accepted the limitations because she
knew it was one of the better machines on the market.
But Rachel had big ambitions and learned all she could about
computers from her teacher and by reading magazines. Most of what
she found was to do with industrial or scientific machines, or games
and other people’s software but what she was really interested in was
how computers interacted with their human owners. She was puzzled
as to why the language of computers was so regimented and longed
for it to be more “organic”. To this end, within a year she had tried to
fool her technologically ignorant parents into believing the little
computer was intelligent. Her goal was to make the computer
somehow cognisant – her rudimentary program recognised key
English phrases and responded to them in a life-like manner. But
being so young she had no idea of the chasm between her dreams and
the realms of possibility.
‘Mum, try it now!’ she would demand time and time again after
she had carried out improvements.
‘That’s very good dear,’ her mother would say after slowly typing
phrases into the computer to illicit the required responses. ‘Much
better than last time. I’m so proud of you!’
By this time Rachel was just nine and her parents spotted the
child-like language patterns easily and soon exhausted the program’s
tiny vocabulary. Undeterred and not lacking ability she persisted and
the following Christmas brought Rachel a new computer with more
memory and a stronger processor. This time, as Rachel already had
14 THE HIDDEN LAYER
her own screen, her mother was free to enjoy Revenge of the Pink
Panther in peace.
Obsessed with improving her artificial friend she read all she
could about Alan Turing and his test for machine intelligence. She
dreamed of the day computers would become powerful enough to
make someone think that they were conversing on-screen with a
fellow human being. She re-wrote her software on her new machine
and was delighted to discover that it ran many times faster. She
expanded its vocabulary and depth of syntax analysis and it worked
better with every month that passed. But it was simplistic and always
in the back of her mind she was aware that her design was
fundamentally limited. There were a finite number of words the
program knew and grammatical constructs it could decipher. And no
matter how much Rachel improved and added to the program she was
beginning to realise that she could never hope to replicate the entire
English language or keep up with its evolution. The more Rachel
thought about it the more she knew she was right. The problem was
that her program had no capability to expand itself. To learn, like
people. By the age of ten, she knew that that was where the answer
lay.
‘Dad, how do I make the computer learn?’ she asked one day.
‘I don’t know poppet,’ replied her father, absently scanning his
newspaper. ‘Why?’
‘I want to be the first to make a program that passes the Turing
Test.’
‘Really?’ Her father raised an eyebrow, impressed, and folded his
paper. He was a literary man and had read about Alan Turing, the
leading AI theorist in the 1950s. He made an educated guess.
‘Well then let’s have a think. OK, let’s start here : when you learn
something where does the new stuff go?’
‘Into my brain?’
‘OK good. Now, you know what your brain is made of?’
‘No.’
‘Well, there are lots of little switches in your brain. Lots and lots
of them. They’re called neurons.’
‘Noorons.’
‘Yes and it’s your neurons that store all the information you learn.
They’re responsible for all sorts of things like remembering,
recognising and reasoning.’
THE HIDDEN LAYER 15
1
Do You Forget?
18 THE HIDDEN LAYER
THE HIDDEN LAYER 19
watched the receding patchwork of tiny fields give way to the rugged
coastline and the blue expanse of the English Channel and, craning
his neck down and backwards, thought he recognised a few
landmarks. Yes, wasn’t that was Osea Island, the distinctive old
World War I base just out in the estuary? That meant they were
heading…north. He twisted his neck even further and looked
backwards until he could see the Thames emptying into the English
Channel. North? But surely Beijing was south? Suddenly panic
gripped him again. What was going on? Think. Think think. The
stewardess had announced Beijing hadn’t she? Was he on the wrong
aeroplane? Oh my god I’m on the wrong flight! I misheard all the
announcements and they let me on! She said some other destination
and I heard “Beijing”! What sounds like Beijing? Linköping?
Helsinki? Minsk? Asher was half rising from his seat, trapped by his
seat-belt, scanning for a stewardess but there were none to be seen.
‘Good evening everyone,’ said a reassuring voice on the PA. ‘I’m
your Captain, Dan Tucker, and I’d like to welcome you aboard this
Air China flight to Beijing today.’
Asher breathed a long sigh of relief and sank back down into his
seat. This was too much for him! Ironically it wasn’t flying that was
causing him the problem. It was flying to China. He had been there
before, or so his parents had assured him, when he’d been small. The
only memory he had was the pungent smell of incense and a smoky
image of a small man with a short beard. Now he felt sick at the very
thought of having to go there again. His insides turned to jelly just at
the mention of the word “Beijing”. He knew it was irrational but he
had also known for a very long time that one day he would have to
bite the bullet, as it were, and go. It was the only way – his searching
had hit obstacle after obstacle and then come to a grinding halt. So
now that day had come, and here he was.
‘We’ll be cruising at 39 thousand feet and the observant among
you will have noticed that we’re currently flying in a north-easterly
direction. Reason being that although Beijing is on a more southerly
latitude than London, the shortest route is actually to fly what we in
the business call a great circle around the Earth, over the top as it
were. This’ll take us north-eastwards over Denmark, Sweden and
Finland, staying a little bit south of the Arctic Circle to ride the jet
stream, and then across Russia and Mongolia and we’ll finally dip
down into northern China to approach Beijing from the north-west.
THE HIDDEN LAYER 21
The local time in Beijing is twelve minutes past midnight and the
temperature over there is currently a balmy 27 degrees and a lot
warmer in the daytime. So just sit back, let the cabin crew help you
enjoy the flight and have the Best Day.’
Asher grimaced – even the captain (and he usually held pilots in
high regard) was infected. He was stuck on board a plane, being
flown to a country he hated by a happy-go-lucky captain and being
served by a stewardess wearing what looked like a drug-induced
perma-grin. He laughed at himself, at the inescapable absurdity of his
situation, sank deeper into his seat and let the journey proceed as
advertised.
For the most part he found it dull. He ate the food they offered
him, exhausted the films he was interested in, listened to the radio
until he was sure it had looped around, wasn’t keen on the mediocre
video games and stayed well away from the extortionately expensive
air-to-surface telephone. He spent a lot of time walking to the bar and
back, at first just for the exercise but then somewhere over Russia an
idea struck him. He decided to get drunk. During the few flights he
had taken he had developed a theory, which was that the best way to
reset one’s body clock was to drink just enough alcohol then sleep
through the time zones. In getting drunk his clock would be
scrambled and would be forced to synchronise itself to the local time
of whichever zone it happened to find itself sobering up in. He had
yet to find out how much was “just enough”, as he always seemed to
overdo it and the hangovers usually kicked in even before he’d
reached his destination but he vowed to keep trying. So he drank his
way through Mongolia and somewhere over north-western China he
decided he was nicely drunk enough and settled down to sleep. It was
a working theory but Asher was always willing to attempt to disprove
it.
Behind them to the west, unbeknown to Asher as he slept, the sun
set more quickly than usual and the plane rushed eastwards to meet it
again, condensing the night and making the dawn break three hours
sooner than it should have, and when they touched down at Beijing
International Airport it was nine the following morning. Asher always
found it a little harder travelling eastwards, even though he was fast-
forwarding into someone else’s day. He usually found that his internal
clock had trouble winding down and going to bed at the end of a too-
short day when it wasn’t ready, so he’d always had an easier time of
22 THE HIDDEN LAYER
westward journeys. But this time he seemed to have finally proven his
theory! His body really thought it had had a good night’s sleep and
was ready for a new day, even though back in England it was still
only two in the morning. He was alert now and with so much that lay
ahead to think about, the dread of touching-down on Chinese soil had
completely evaporated. It had been like sitting an exam where the
build-up, the anticipation, was crippling. But once he was sat at that
desk, pen in hand and the invigilator’s clock had started its
countdown, there was a job to do and the fear was gone.
Special Operations have seized all CCTV footage from the M25
Control Centre at South Mimms and those tapes plus footage from the
surrounding road network will be analysed as a key part of their
ongoing investigations. For now though the emergency services are
doing all they can to clear the debris and retrieve the remaining
bodies. Needless to say this is one of the most horrific atrocities this
reporter has ever witnessed and the backlash in the international
community will be unprecedented. At this point we don’t know much
more but I’ll be remaining on the scene and the police are due to
make a press-statement any time soon. For now, back to you in the
studio.’
think he had let his optimism get the better of him. He’d found
nothing of value at all and by four o’clock he’d exhausted himself
mentally. He left the library, despondent and hungry, and took another
taxi to his accommodation near the centre of town. The Harmony
Hotel was a modern, Western-with-a-hint-of-China, three-star
establishment on a backstreet near the railway station and main tourist
attractions that, being so central, suited Asher’s requirements
perfectly. After checking-in at the glitzy-looking reception and then
having to force himself to go down to the restaurant to put some food
into his empty, groaning stomach, Asher was so tired and his bed so
soft and familiar, that he was fast asleep by six thirty that evening.
It turned out that the trick he had played on his body clock hadn’t
worked that well after all and having been forced seven hours out of
its normal routine his biorhythm was syncopated and his sleep that
night was fitful. He tossed and turned all night, never being fully,
deeply asleep and on his second day he awoke feeling tired and
drained at four in the morning. Not having anything else to do he
watched Chinese TV mindlessly until seven, then had a shower and a
shave. He didn’t know what to expect from breakfast and he went
down to the blue-and-beige, bamboo-festooned restaurant with an
open-mind.
The morning goods consisted of some alien food that Asher had
never seen before lunchtime – water-melon, banana, star fruit, mango
and tea. Delicious as it was it left him wanting and he went back for
the sausage, egg and coffee too. Then, replete, he decided his body
had all the calories it needed to reset itself and get on with the day.
And today was going to take a bit of courage. Disappointed with the
library he’d had the idea that he might get further by going to talk to
someone in person at the police station. It occurred to him that he
should probably ring ahead and arrange an appointment but thinking
about it further he decided he would just go. They probably wouldn’t
even understand him on the telephone anyway and as this could be his
only life-line he didn’t want to take the risk of being turned down
26 THE HIDDEN LAYER
point blank and so spoil his chances. And besides, he thought, they
might warm to a charming Englishman on an impromptu, friendly
visit and that might give him a slim chance of getting to talk to
somebody. He would be suave and compelling. Persuasive and
convincing.
So, full of optimism once again he made his way out into Beijing
on foot for the first time. The woman at reception had drawn him a
little diagram of how to get to the police station – at the southern end
of Tiananmen Square it would have been an ideal opportunity to visit
the great Chairman Mao’s resting place but, thought Asher, there’s no
time for sight-seeing on this trip. After half an hour’s walk he arrived
at an intimidating, dark office building that was the Beijing Municipal
Police Headquarters and, standing outside, took a few deep breaths,
composed himself and went in, putting on an air of friendly
confidence.
He couldn’t even get past the front desk at reception. He was a
gibbering idiot. If anything, Asher could see the officers becoming
more and more alarmed that a totally foreign stranger had appeared
apparently from nowhere, ranting in pigeon-Mandarin about
bombings that had happened decades ago sometime between the
Vietnam War and the uprising of ‘89. When Asher glimpsed the
confusion in their eyes and their twitching fingers fiddling with
holster catches he muddled through some sincere apologies and exited
quickly, shamefully embarrassed about how naïve his grand idea had
been. The police had been no more cooperative or courteous to him
than the local constabulary back in England would have been to a
drunken, loud-mouthed, foreign lager lout. In hindsight he thought he
had probably got away lightly. He was annoyed, firstly by the fact
that he hadn’t gleaned anything at all – nothing. And secondly, how
stupid was he anyway? Stupid, stupid idiot! Had he not learnt
anything about Chinese authority from his years of study? The more
he thought about it, the more he cringed and the more he wanted to
jump on the next aeroplane and fly back home into the safe,
welcoming arms of England. But he didn’t. What he wanted, he
wanted far too desperately.
THE HIDDEN LAYER 27
Asher was at a loss. His very loose plan for the rest of the day was
to visit an internet café down on Wangfujing Street a short walk away
to see if he could dig anything up on the local internet. He left the
square and wandered along some of the crooked, cobbled hutongs and
eventually made it out to a café in the main shopping district. His
usual ‘net surfing would be conducted from his comfortable swivel-
chair and armed with a large mug of milky coffee but today he had to
make do with a grubby keyboard and a small pot of one of the lightly
scented varieties of tea they offered. Despite the caffeine set-back and
equipped with his drink, Asher set to work on the internet, which he
found completely disorienting and to his dismay revealed even less
than his pre-visit searches he had carried out in his own living room in
Kingston upon Thames. Although the keyboard was covered in bits of
Chinese characters he had no idea how to use it and his vocabulary
was so small that he couldn’t have typed anything useful even if he
had known. So he resorted once again to Pinyin, the English-looking,
Chinese-sounding words one could type on a normal Roman-lettered
keyboard. But on top of this encumbrance, heavy internet censorship
rendered his every search futile, returning only articles that had been
pre-filtered for him by the thousands of members of the
government-run internet police.
Asher realised that he was looking at the ‘authorised’ version of
the world, so he gave up before lunch and ventured out into the
shopping district to find something to eat. A noodle bar that served
something that looked quite a lot like chicken chow-mein caught his
attention, so he ate there and mulled over his next move. The
morning’s efforts had yielded nothing and he could feel the time
slipping away like sand through his fingers. Downhearted and with no
other leads he decided to go sight seeing to clear his mind, so he
finished his food leisurely and walked, aimlessly at first, ending up at
the huge walls of the ancient Forbidden City. Then he headed back
down to the enormous, majestic Tiananmen Square – the scene of the
famous protests. He remembered the uprising well – he had been 16
back then – and he marvelled at how such recent history had been
utterly obliterated by those in control. The lone civilian, armed only
with his briefcase, standing in front of the line of tanks. One man
halting the might of the Chinese military. It put him in mind of an
illustration in a science fiction story he’d read once before where a
preacher had held his crucifix up to a line of advancing, unstoppable
28 THE HIDDEN LAYER
but despite the lack of progress (and perhaps because of the energy he
had expended through the day) he slept soundly that night.
It wasn’t until his third day in Beijing, after the library, the
internet and the police had all failed him, after combing the streets,
the avenues and the hutongs fruitlessly and just as he was beginning
to believe the whole trip had been a huge waste of time and money,
that Asher got anywhere near to obtaining the information he had
come for.
He sauntered along the busy road with his rucksack on his back
and the old photo in his hand. Thirty years had passed since the
picture had been taken and the faded colour was yellowing around the
edges. He had studied the image that many times that he didn’t really
need it with him. Memorised every detail. But better safe than sorry.
He looked down at the picture once more, for comfort more than
anything. Scrawled in the lower right corner was the note: “This is the
girl I met!” The young woman being referred to in the photo smiled
back at him without a care in the world. “Look, a bar!” she seemed to
be saying, pointing to the door of the blue-fronted establishment
behind her. Asher looked up at the office block directly across the
junction. No, that wasn’t it. Right colour, wrong style. But the
building next door looked familiar. He glanced at the photo again and
held it up so he could match the two views. He studied the picture
harder. The lampposts seemed to be in a similar position. Asher
waited for the lights to change and made his way across the junction
to the market vendors that lined the road the other side.
From behind the stall canvases he stood looking first at the
building, then to the one next-door, then to the photograph. Yes, this
was the place alright. Although the building he was interested in was
30 THE HIDDEN LAYER
Asher the suspicion that he was still being ripped off. ‘I’m sorry, I just
think it’s too much for a fake label. Two twenty.’
‘Can’t sell so cheap! I have family to feed! Four hundred. Best
price!’
‘No, sorry. My best price is two twenty.’
‘No, no, no. You have bargain, three fifty. Best price for you.’
‘No, it’s too much. I have to go now. Thanks anyway.’ Asher
turned and started walking away, counting to himself. Three, two,
one.
‘OK! OK! You have bargain! Two twenty!’
He smiled and turned back to find the sweat-shirt already wrapped
in a plastic bag.’
‘Great!’
‘I cut arm off for you! No food for family now.’ This little old
lady wasn’t as frail as she seemed, although Asher could see it was all
an act. She watched eagerly as Asher opened his wallet. He was
pleased with the outcome – he’d never had a gift for bartering and so,
feeling generous, he separated out two hundred and fifty yuan inside
his wallet.
‘OK. Here you go.’
As he pulled the notes out with a flourish, the photograph came
too and tumbled groundwards. Instinctively the little old lady flicked
out her hand and caught it mid-flight. Asher watched in amazement as
she slowly turned it over to look at the picture side. Then her smile
faded and she looked up at him, her gaunt sockets housing tiny, black,
pin-prick eyes.
Asher held the money out for her but she just looked back at the
picture and smiled. She was still for what Asher thought must have
been a very long time, then she put the photo on top of Asher’s money
in his hand and gently pushed the whole thing back to him. She
looked up and there were tears in her eyes.
‘No. Sweat-shirt free for you. Old happy memory worth two
twenty.’
‘Wait, do you recognise this?’ Asher bent down to the old lady’s
level.
‘I know this. Long time ago. I sell clothes here too.’
‘But do you remember the bar?’
32 THE HIDDEN LAYER
‘Yes. Bar is very good bar long time ago. Xian Yin. Crazy man
make bad fire with bar. But I not here.’ She shook her head and
waved a finger at Asher. ‘I have lucky day off.’
‘I’ll say. Did you know the owner?’
‘I know owner.’ The old lady nodded slowly.
‘Sorry, you know him, or you knew him? Is he still alive?’
‘Yes, I know owner. Long time ago. He alive.’
‘Can you tell me where he is?’
‘OK. I give street. I give number. I know him.’
She ferreted around behind her table and produced a pencil then
taking the photo, proceeded to scribble something on the reverse side.
The back surface of the picture was papery as opposed to shiny and
her hand was steady as the pencil’s lead left its precise marks. Having
written a row of perfectly drawn little Chinese characters she handed
it back to Asher. His heart sank when he realised there was no
translation – his written Mandarin wasn’t nearly as good as his
spoken, and that was rudimentary at best.
Back in the library on his first day he had hoped to have been able
to find at least one article about the bombing written from the Chinese
point of view, which might just have pointed the finger at someone
and guided him in the right direction. A single lead, that was all he
needed to start digging into a crime that the British and Chinese
governments had swept under the carpet. But even with it being the
largest and oldest library in China he had gleaned nothing from it. The
books had been abundant but to his dismay he had understood only a
miniscule amount of the text and after a whole day of hard
concentration the little Chinese characters had danced around on the
pages in front of him, taunting him, defying his already limited
translation powers. The internet had been the same and he had given
up on that too, disappointed at his own lack of linguistic ability and
understanding.
‘I’m sorry, what does this say?’
‘Bah, you foreigner! It say “Five two five Xinghua Road. Number
eight”.’
‘And this is where the he lives?’
‘Yes, he live. Bar owner live here. Hong-Li.’ She jabbed at the
characters. ‘Long time ago. Now, don’t know. I not see him for one
year, maybe two.’
THE HIDDEN LAYER 33
‘Thank you. Thank you!’ Asher pressed the money back into the
old lady’s hands and took the bag. He rummaged in his wallet and
much to the old lady’s delight pulled out another two hundred and
fifty yuan and added that to the amount she was already holding.
‘Here. Take this. Very important information is worth a big tip!’ He
turned, leaving her looking at the money uncertainly.
‘OK but you not good negotiator!’ called the old lady as Asher
left with his sweat-shirt in search of a taxi.
It wasn’t long before he managed to hail a cab on the main road.
The red saloon pulled up and Asher got in and handed the photo to the
driver.
‘OK?’ he asked.
‘Shi! OK, OK!’ said the driver after studying the address supplied.
The journey was quick and the meter didn’t move from its standing
charge of ten yuan. Asher took the receipt, paid the fare and walked
up to the foot of some steps that led through what looked like an
entrance to a small, white temple. Uncertain, he pointed inside and
called back to the driver.
‘Here?’
‘OK, yes, yes!’ said the driver, nodding vigorously from the open
car window. Then he swung the taxi out into the road and pulled
away, leaving Asher facing the temple-like building. He entered.
The place had no door, only a wide, open-air corridor that led
through the building and opened out into a large, peaceful quadrangle.
The grass was well tended and in the centre stood an ancient, crooked
plum tree. Asher looked around the courtyard. Arranged around the
square were ten or twelve single-storey apartments raised on thick
stilts. Each home was joined to the next and each had an low balcony
facing into the yard. The whole structure had a large, overhanging
roof of dark red ceramic tiles and steps to the entrance of each
residence led up from the gravel path that circumnavigated the central
lawn. Dangling from the eves of the roofs were large incense spirals,
gently smoking, one outside each front door.
Asher started walking around the path, looking for numbers on the
doors but there were none. Puzzled, he continued. The gentle notes of
a zither drifted from one of the open windows and as he meandered
around the path and took in the calming atmosphere he noticed a man
dressed in a blue, mandarin-collar shirt and loose, white trousers. He
was holding a thin pole up to an incense spiral. Asher approached the
34 THE HIDDEN LAYER
man, who placed his pole carefully against the wall, turned to him and
bowed lightly. Asher judged him to be in his late sixties, early
seventies. The man frowned at him, then his eyes widened.
‘Ni hao,’ greeted Asher and bowed back. He produced the photo
and handed it to the man, reverse-side up. ‘Zai nar…?’ he asked,
pointing to the characters the woman had written.
The man studied the address for a moment, then flipped the photo
over, looked briefly at the picture, then turned it back again.
‘Good afternoon, Mr Asher,’ said the man. His English was very
good indeed.
Asher was stunned.
‘I beg your pardon?’
‘I assume you Mr Asher?’
‘How on earth do you know my name?’
‘Hm. I give this picture to you, last time we meet. Do you forget?’
‘I’ve been here before?’
‘Yes. Long time ago. I see you are no longer a child. I see your
brother in you now.’
‘You’re the owner of the bar?’
‘The Xian Yin, yes. I was owner at time it was destroyed. I must
say family usually visit only once. I did not expect to see kin again
after you and your parents visited. But do not worry. Robert is still
here. Please, come inside.’
The man started up the steps and Asher followed, confused.
‘What do you mean? Robert is here?’
‘Yes. I show you. Patience.’
The interior of the house was cool and airy, wood and cloth. There
was a single central room from which several doors lead to other
rooms. To one side was a low table, set with tea making
accoutrements.
‘Come, please.’
The man ushered him to a sunny window in the far corner of the
main room where a cork board stood atop a small table. Some tea-
lights scattered across the table flickered weakly against the flood of
light pouring through the window and the smoke from more incense
sticks rose through the rays of sun. Mounted on the board were ten
photographs of ten people, arranged in two lines of five. Some were
actual photographs, others were clipped from old newspapers. They
all had a yellowy-brown hue to them but Asher recognised them all
THE HIDDEN LAYER 35
‘Many people have asked same question before. But I say no to all
of them. I have spent long time trying to heal old wounds, not re-open
them. If you are looking for revenge Mr Asher, you should tread
carefully. It will not be worth it. Why you want this information?’
Asher flinched and shifted in his seated position.
‘You tell people no but I get the impression you do know though,
don’t you?’
‘Many people ask, so finally I hire private detective. He find one
who knows, one who can help you. He find professor of sociology
and politics at university. Professor knows what police know.’
His own efforts with the police had been embarrassing to say the
least and to Asher it sounded like he was now being given a back door
to the same information.
‘Really, how?’
‘He is policeman too, long time ago. Not now. He is professor
now.’
‘Wow. Is he here, in Beijing?’
‘Yes, he is here. He lives at university. Please, give me picture.’
Asher handed over the picture and Hong-Li took a pen from the
table and scribbled some more characters beneath his own address.
‘I’m really sorry – I can’t translate that.’
‘It’s OK. Just give to taxi driver.’
‘This will take me to him?’
He nodded. ‘It will take you to him. It say Shao Yuan, Building
Five. His name is Kuai-Heng Sun.’ He pointed the to Roman letters
spelling out the professor’s name in Pinyin.
‘Thank you. And thank you for keeping Robert’s memory alive.’
‘You welcome.’ Hong-Li peered into Asher’s bag. ‘Ah…nice
sweat-shirt.’
It was eight in the morning on his fifth day in central Beijing and
Asher jumped into the back seat of one of the ubiquitous red taxies
that had pulled up outside his hotel.
‘Wo xiang qu…uh,’ He broke off. Damn! What’s the word for
university? Then he remembered Hong-Li’s written directions. He
pulled out the photo and passed it forward, making sure his finger was
pointing to the second address; he didn’t want to go back to Hong-
THE HIDDEN LAYER 37
Li’s place. The driver nodded curtly and threw his cigarette out of the
window, the tyres screeched for grip and the car in which Asher was
sitting sped off into the rush-hour traffic, catapulting him into the
back seat. He held on for dear life and a frantic ten minutes later they
arrived at their destination and he got out and paid as quickly as he
could.
‘Thank you!’ he shouted as he hurried towards the university’s
entrance, truly thankful to be out of the car.
The reception at Shao Yuan was open and Asher was relieved that
the woman on the desk spoke good English. He quickly ascertained
the location of the professor’s room and with a rudimentary map
drawn by the receptionist made his way through the grey, winding
corridors of the university accommodation. Then he was there. It was
still before eight thirty in the morning and he hoped the professor
hadn’t started out for lectures already. He raised his hand to knock but
the door opened before his fist made contact.
‘Hello,’ said Asher.
‘Australian?’
‘English.’
‘Sorry. Follow me.’
The man was short and chubby and his wiry, grey hair was tied
back in a short pony tail. He wore an untucked, short-sleeved shirt
over faded jeans. He pulled his door to, locked it and started marching
down the corridor. Asher skipped after him. He looked to be of
similar age to Hong-Li but he moved much more quickly.
‘Excuse me, Kuai-Heng Sun?’
‘That’s me. And you are?’
‘Jason Asher.’
‘I’m afraid I’m late Mr Asher, can you talk as we walk?’
‘Yes, of course.’
‘Good. What can I do for you?’
‘Well I was given your name by a Mr Wang. Hong-Li Wang. He
said you might have some information regarding something that
happened when you were in the police force.’
‘That’s going back a few years. Go on.’ Kuai-Heng pushed out
through the rear exit doors and on to the path that led towards the
campus buildings. Asher walked briskly to keep up.
‘Mr Wang used to own a bar downtown called The Xian Yin.’
38 THE HIDDEN LAYER
‘Ang Mo is in England.’
‘You’re joking.’ Asher put his hands to his face and pulled them
down his cheeks, stretching his jowls.
‘Not at all. My contact in England thinks he emigrated there a few
years ago to escape sentencing for some serious crimes.’
‘And he’s going to call me?’
‘Yes, my contact will call you. He knows Ang’s whereabouts in
England. I’m sorry I can’t be more specific than that.’
‘That’s OK. You’ve been very helpful.’
‘Now, go home Mr Asher and good luck. Excuse me, I have
lectures now.’
‘Of course.’
Asher sat in his economy window seat and washed the last of his
peanuts down with beer. Air China flight 0937 was making good
progress back to Heathrow and even though it had taken-off late the
pilot had promised to make up the time en-route. His six days in
Beijing had been an interesting experience and Asher’s mind was now
distilling his time there into some interesting memories. Tomorrow it
would probably seem like a weird dream, he thought.
There were four reasons why he was drinking beer. The first and
second were that he liked beer and it was free. The third was the body
clock thing, although with the buzz of his success he wasn’t that
concerned by the long return haul. But the fourth was that he was
nervous of what was to come, when he got back to England. He still
had a get-out clause if he didn’t want to go ahead with his search for
Ang Mo – he could simply not answer the phone. That comforted him
a little. But on the other hand, what if he decided to go ahead and
there was no call? What if Kuai-Heng forgot, or couldn’t get in touch
with his contact in England? What if he’d made a mistake writing his
number down?
Asher frowned to himself and shifted in his seat. How long should
he wait until he could decide that there wasn’t going to be a call?
What if they called but he missed it? He suddenly realised that all his
40 THE HIDDEN LAYER
‘Yes.’
‘Hello? I uh… Someone gave me this number. I understand you
have a…service to offer?’
‘That depends on what kind of service you’re looking for.’
‘I have some urgent business I need attended to.’
‘OK maybe I can help. Who gave you this number?’
‘I was told to tell you “Victor”.’
‘OK, good. Let’s go through some ground rules.’
‘Sure.’
‘Right. Rule number 1: Names. My name is “Mike”. Your name is
“Oscar”. Your urgent business is called “Charlie”.’
‘OK, got that.’
‘Right. Rule number 2: There are no other names. Those are the
only references we use.’
‘Right.’
‘Rule number 3: We will never meet. Understand?’
‘Yes.’
‘Good. Victor gave you two contact numbers for me, yes?’
‘That’s correct.’
‘Good. Rule number 4: Alternate between the two numbers every
time you call.’
‘OK.’
‘Rule number 5: Use a different phone every time you call. OK?’
‘Yes, OK.’
‘Good. Now use rules 4 and 5 to continue this conversation. Stick
to the rules and we’ll be fine.’
42 THE HIDDEN LAYER
There was a lot of history, too much even for a lone native to fully
comprehend. As such it had taken the considerable talent and
dedication of countless scholars decades, even centuries to distil the
events and opinions of thousands of years of history down to a
definitive, comprehensible and factual account. It was of course just
one of the many differing, definitive, factual accounts written about
the political state of the region. The view of the Uyghurs differed
considerably from the view of the rest of the Turkic people (those
ancient but still younger populations to the West) and the view held
by the ruling government, amongst others.
Ang Mo however, himself an Uyghur, was the kind of individual
for whom the written word meant little. He was of the unshakeable
opinion that only the foolish took anything on face value, and he was
also the type of person not to take hostile actions against him or his
people lying down. All through his life, ever since he had learned the
hard way (after being tricked into believing he had paid hard-earned
cash for a real Kalashnikov, rather than the cheap fake it turned out to
be and which had subsequently malfunctioned, exploded and killed
one of his best friends) his motto had been “never take anybody’s
word for it”. Ever. If you simply believed what someone else said, the
best outcome one could hope for would be the same as if you’d done
the thinking for yourself in the first place. The worst possible
outcome, well…if you’re deceived, then you’ve left yourself wide
open to attack from all-comers and it would be entirely your own
fault. So, unlike the leaders of his country, or rather the leaders of his
territory, the Xinjiang Uyghur Autonomous Region in the northwest
corner of China, he wasn’t going to let himself be pushed around by
those who thought they knew better.
Eastern Turkestan, as the Uyghur separatists liked Xinjiang to be
known, was a vast swathe of land covering the entire north-western
territory of China and the crux of the current problem was that it had
oil. Billions upon billions of barrels of the shiny, black stuff. Liquid
gold. The fact that the land harboured such a huge natural resource
wasn’t in itself a problem. The sticking point was that the Uyghurs,
on top of rejecting Chinese leadership and authority, also maintained
THE HIDDEN LAYER 43
that the right to the oil was theirs and theirs alone. After all it was on
their land. Why should a government sitting in Beijing, a city over a
thousand miles away, get rich from their natural resources, when just
a few decades ago they weren’t even a part of China? Historically,
Turkestan had been a country in its own right, spanning vast parts of
the rugged steppes of middle Asia but having been conquered many
times by warlords from its neighbouring countries it now lay split in
two halves: the West and the East. The Western part encompassed
most of the countries from the shores of the Caspian Sea to the
majestic peaks of the Tien Shan mountain range where China
bordered Kazakhstan, but the Eastern part lay entirely in the People’s
Republic itself. Ang’s blood boiled every time he recounted the
political and military turmoil of his birthplace and, like many Uyghurs
before him (and doubtless many to come) he was of the unswerving
opinion that China must one day stop its relentless exploitation of the
territory at the expense of its native inhabitants. More-over the
territory should be given its independence back and made into a stable
country once again. Set the people free, give them their rightful
wealth and an economy – everything a country needed to become
great in the 21st Century. Everything worth fighting for!
But the oil, although being tapped, refined and sold to the western
world, remained mostly in the ground and while it did, China kept its
stranglehold. It was not about to relinquish such a vast well of money
(let alone control of such a large percentage of the world’s oil) and it
certainly wasn’t going to grant independence to more than a sixth of
its own nation, especially when the natives would get the oil out of
the ground for almost nothing. And therein lay the dilemma of the
Uyghur people of Eastern Turkestan – they had no bargaining power,
no military might and therefore no choice and short of an uprising on
a grand scale they would be locked into the master-slave relationship
for eternity.
Ang Mo had fumed as year after year he watched the government
invite one international drilling company after another to prospect for
oil, promising handsome incentives and tax breaks to those who
succeeded and drilled on behalf of the government. The oil remained
the property of the government and the sale of it to the west boosted
China’s economy considerably but alas the local people never got to
see the generated wealth. The incoming prospecting companies even
managed to undercut the government’s own massive China National
44 THE HIDDEN LAYER
‘Yes.’
‘This is um… Oscar.’
‘Good. Do you have Charlie’s details?’
‘Charlie? Oh, yes, I have a name but I don’t have any pic – ’
‘I need pictures. Is the name unique?
‘I – I imagine it is.’
‘Good. Makes it easier but get pictures first. When do you want to
move?’
‘Move? Oh, right. As soon as possible please.’
‘OK. You know the fee.’
‘Ah… Victor told me twenty thousand.’
‘Correct. You pay half up front and half on completion.’
‘OK. And how do I –’
‘Cash. Half in twenties, half in fifties. Leave it in a box at
Berkeley Safe Deposit on Cromwell Road. With it you need to leave
his name, written clearly on a single piece of paper, and some photos.
Then call me back. Rule number 6: the contract starts when I take
delivery of the first payment. Clear?’
‘Clear. Berkeley Safe Deposit, Cromwell Road. Got it.’
‘Good.’
q
46 THE HIDDEN LAYER
THE HIDDEN LAYER 47
2
Play It By Ear
48 THE HIDDEN LAYER
THE HIDDEN LAYER 49
Rachel spent the rest of the day thinking about her long-lost
childhood friend. She and Marcus Forton had been raised across the
52 THE HIDDEN LAYER
road from each other in the affluent little town of Bishop’s Stortford,
nestling in the green commuter belt just north of London. Marcus’
parents had owned the house opposite and they had been best of
friends through early school. He was an only child too and when
Rachel had started at Queenswood girls’ school at the young age of
11, Marcus had been sent away to board at the Bedford School for
boys. Despite this they had stayed in touch through their education
and had eagerly returned each holiday to see each other.
But as time went on they met different people and experimented
with relationships. Their friendship had gradually become patchier
until, just when Rachel was starting her degree, Marcus had
disappeared. His family had moved out of the street and Rachel had
thought he had gone to Oxford for the university but when she had
made inquiries she had been told he had attended only for a few
weeks and then had quit suddenly. He was no longer registered with
any of the colleges or halls there. And so with no forwarding details
the trail had gone cold and their dwindling friendship had come to an
abrupt end.
Rachel had a lot of questions for Marcus. When they had started
university she had expected them to remain friends, not to the
exclusion of other relationships but she had thought they were going
to stay close. Or at the very least stay in touch.
Up until now everything Rachel had thought about Marcus’
disappearance had been speculation. She didn’t know if he had gone
to university, joined the armed forces or even moved to a different
country. In Rachel’s view moving abroad was entirely possible, as
Marcus had inherited dual nationality from his Polish mother. She had
even considered the possibility that he could have been sent to prison
for something or even been killed, although the latter could never
have been true because she believed that somehow she would have
found out. If he had turned out bad or dead the gossip would have
swept the neighbourhood. She would have heard something. But there
had been no word at all and Rachel had always clung to the belief that
no news was good news.
As the afternoon wore on, she found herself feeling more and
more ambivalent towards meeting Marcus again. On the one hand she
was finally going to find out what had happened all those years back,
why he had disappeared. And she was going to see him again, the boy
she had once liked so much. But the flip side was that this was a
THE HIDDEN LAYER 53
Jason Asher was about to the click the READ button when his
cordless phone started bleeping and flashing on it’s stand. Could this
be the call he was waiting for? He leaned over the desk, picked up the
receiver and pressed the green button. He had taken a couple of days
off in anticipation because he didn’t want to have this kind of
conversation at work.
Every one of his living room windows was open in a vain attempt
to allow a breeze through to combat the heat. The July mid-day sun
was bearing down through his bay window, glaring off his desk and
computer equipment. Asher didn’t need to see it to know that it had
just started raining outside. He could hear it dinging off the
corrugated tin roof outside his first floor window and he could smell
the dry mustiness of drizzle on tarmac after a long, hot spell. The city
had seen blue skies and temperatures well into the thirties for more
than five weeks and the hose-pipe and bath ban had just come into
force. Showers only from now on. That was OK by Asher, he didn’t
like baths anyway but he had always wondered how they thought they
could enforce such a thing. Could they just burst in on you, naked and
54 THE HIDDEN LAYER
Ten minutes after he had hung up the receiver Asher was roasting
on the top deck of the Number 65 north out of Kingston. The rain had
turned out to be a flurry, quickly chased off by the heat, and the sun
was baking the tarmac again. At Richmond he took the District line
six stops east over to Hammersmith. Then the Piccadilly line took him
another five stops northbound up to Knightsbridge. From there it was
a ten minute walk west down Kensington Road and into Hyde Park
through the Alexandra Gate. It had taken him just under an hour on
THE HIDDEN LAYER 55
‘Mr Asher, you are looking for your brother’s killer. I can tell you
that you will not find this person. They are not living in the same
world as you are.’
Asher frowned. What the hell does that mean?
‘I’m sorry?’ he said, widening his eyes and trying not to glance
sideways.
‘Mr Asher, do you think that a man capable of such things is
concerned with the trivialities of a technologically modern life? He
does not have a bank account and he does not use credit or debit
cards, at least not his own. He does not have a mobile phone, at least
for not more than a day. Those he uses are stolen and then discarded.
If he has a car, it will be what you call a “ringer” in this country, or it
will have no chassis number and no documentation. He has no ID and
no passport, he is probably not even a registered citizen. The
authorities certainly do not know he is here. CCTV will not reveal
anything, Mr Asher. He will walk with his face shielded from the
camera by a hat or a hood. He is living in an underworld, detached
from all of…this.’
In his peripheral vision Asher saw the man gesturing to the park
with a flick of his hand.
‘If somebody in that world wants to remain unfound Mr Asher,
then they will remain unfound. Nothing and nobody can trace them. I
am here to tell you that your search is futile.’
‘How do I find him then?’
‘You do not find him. He knows you are looking for him. If he
wants to he will find you.’
‘OK, but how? Is he in the country?’
‘Yes. He emigrated here. Maybe ten years ago.’
‘Really? Why?’
‘To escape punishment in Eastern Turkestan. The Chinese
authorities there have been trying to track him down for a long, long
time. He is a dangerous man and has committed many crimes.’
Asher was confused now. That was it? That was the information
the man on the phone had spoken of? He turned to look directly at the
man.
‘So you’ve come here to tell me to stop looking because he’s
dangerous?’ he asked with more affront than he had intended.
The man slowly turned his head to look straight at him.
‘No, Mr Asher. I am here to ensure you stop looking.’
THE HIDDEN LAYER 57
‘What?’
‘If you want to take that path, take deep breaths as you go because
they will be your last.’
Asher felt a pang of fear shoot through his bowels and up his
neck. To Asher it was a shockingly thinly veiled threat. This had
certainly never happened to him before! He saw his horrified face in
the mirrors and pulled himself together. Had to press on.
‘D-do you know him? Personally?’ He nearly soiled himself as he
said it.
The man turned back to the lake and smiled.
‘Yes.’
‘I have money if you can lead me to him.’
‘Mr Asher, let me put it to you less…subtly. Abandon your search
for this person, or you will die.’
Asher was dumbfounded. A death threat! He sat there, reeling
from what he had just heard. His bowels had definitely loosened now
and he could feel his breath coming slightly faster and shorter.
Then the man got up and started walking towards the Serpentine
bridge, the way Asher had come. Asher watched him go until he was
over the bridge and out of sight. He realised he was trembling slightly
and his heart was racing. He put his face in his hands for a few
seconds, then massaged his eye sockets with the tips of his fingers,
put his hands on his knees and stood up carefully. He took a deep
breath and straightened up, defiant. He needed a drink and a toilet.
Mr Jones my arse! thought Asher as he started walking back to
the café to buy himself a beer.
Asher had spent ten minutes in the men’s room and three pounds
in the café by the time he’d started thinking properly. Something Mr
Jones had said was nagging at him. He emptied half of his Grolsch
bottle in one long pull and as he sat at an outside table already
contemplating another beer, he spooled backwards through the
conversation. The man getting up and leaving, before that the death
threat (dear God a death threat!), before that his offer of money,
before that…what? Mr Jones denied he knew anything, told him to
stop looking.
58 THE HIDDEN LAYER
‘Shit!’ barked Asher, as the train hissed it’s brakes off, jerked and
then pulled slowly along the platform. He thumped the side of the last
carriage as it slid past.
‘Shit! Shit! SHIT!’ He stood there with his head bowed, staring at
the empty tracks and electrical rails.
The guard walked past him smiling and shaking his head.
‘Next train to Letchworth is in twenty minutes sir,’ he said with a
smug smile. ‘Platform five.’
‘SOD OFF!’ shouted Asher.
But then it gave him an idea. Letchworth. He ran past the guard
and back on to the plaza where the information board for platform
four still had the route listed. Nine stops to Letchworth. Too many to
take a guess. But he was hoping he didn’t need to guess. Asher caught
his breath and starting thinking. Mr Jones had rung at three and had
been at the park by four. It had taken him less than an hour to get to
Hyde Park. So assuming he had called from his home town and
assuming he had gone back the same way he had come, it would have
taken him around twenty minutes to get from King’s Cross to the park
because that’s how long it had taken him to get back. Say ten minutes
hanging around on platforms waiting for trains. Maybe ten minutes
the other end to get from wherever he lived to the station. So that left
roughly twenty minutes for the train journey.
Asher trotted slowly back to the guard who was still wandering
back along the platform. The running had caught up with him now.
‘Really sorry about before,’ wheezed Asher apologetically. ‘I
really needed to get on that train.’
‘Don’t worry sir. Get it all the time,’ said the guard. He was a
portly man of retirement age and he was dressed in a dark blue suit
with a DayGlo orange tabard over it. He had a whistle around his
neck and a dispatch-bat in his hand.
‘Listen, er Ron,’ said Asher, scanning the man’s name badge.
‘That train. Which of the stops would be maybe fifteen or twenty
minutes out?’
‘Fifteen or twenty minutes? Let me see…’ The guard puffed
himself up, relishing the fact that his expertise was being called upon,
and cradled his chin between his thumb and index finger, frowning
dramatically.
Come on, stop dicking around! thought Asher.
THE HIDDEN LAYER 61
‘Well, the first stop is Finsbury Park but that’s too close, only
about five minutes up the line. The next stop is Potters Bar, about
fifteen minutes. Then there’s Hatfield at about twenty minutes and
Welwyn Garden City, which is probably getting on for twenty five.
So if you ask me, Potters Bar or Hatfield.’
‘Potters Bar or Hatfield,’ repeated Asher quickly. ‘Thanks very
much!’ he said and started back across the plaza and down into the
underground system.
Another idea was forming in his head as he boarded a southbound
Victoria Line train to make his way home. He just hoped to God that
no one else had called his apartment in the meantime.
Rachel looked over the railing of the circular balcony down to the
lower floor and immediately saw she was at the right place. The
underground shopping mall, beneath the fifty storey skyscraper. Tens
of thousands of people, a built-in railway station and hundreds of
shops. She had never gotten used to the scale of the Canada Square
complex. It was like a small town in its own right.
She rode the escalator down, did a full U-turn to the right and
there it was. The escalator had set her down in the middle of a large
circular space constructed of marbled tiles, pillars and glass. Four
corridors led away from the centre in the shape of a cross, quartering
the circle. At each of the four points formed by the junctions was a
curved, glass-fronted shop of some kind. The shop she was looking at
now had an orange sign and was indeed called Blenders and it was
bustling with kind of after-work socialites who preferred an expensive
cup of coffee to an expensive pint of beer.
And there was Marcus sitting at a stool in the window, waving to
her. Her eyes widened in anticipation and she gave a little smile and
returned the wave by waggling her fingers at him. Here we go. She
walked the radius of the circle, into Blenders and made her way over
to the window where Marcus was sitting.
‘Rach!’ He opened his arms wide and smiled at her.
Hugs it is then, thought Rachel. He looked pretty much as she’d
remembered him – the same wavy locks, same cheeky grin, although
his face was little chubbier. She opened her arms.
62 THE HIDDEN LAYER
the rat-race and live on a farm in Norfolk, where the money from the
sale of their house had bought them a ranch of a property on several
tens of acres of land somewhere near Norwich. On moving day his
mother and father had set off together but the journey north had ended
in catastrophe. The police had told Marcus that, despite the
conspicuous warnings and restrictions on the road, his father had
overtaken a lorry at an accident black spot where many drivers had
met their maker.
The road to Norwich was built on an old Roman road and this
particular stretch was straight as a die for five or six miles but it
concealed a treacherous hidden dip where the road went down then up
then levelled out again. Deceptively, and especially for drivers poking
their heads out to assess the overtaking situation, the road ahead could
look empty for miles, when in fact there could be cars coming the
other way that were very close and entirely invisible. Apparently,
according to the accident investigator, as his father had accelerated
and pulled out and alongside the lorry, one such car had appeared
from the concealed depression, coming headlong at full speed.
Between the lorry and the hedgerow there had been nowhere for his
father to go and, still carrying his overtaking velocity, the closing
speed had been 140 mph. In a second Marcus had been orphaned.
He had gone on to explain that his life from that moment had
never been the same. With nothing left to tie him down, he had quit
Oxford almost straight away, left England and spent the next five
years working his way eastwards around the world. Working in bars
and clubs when he couldn’t make himself well understood and high-
tech companies when he could, he made it as far as Australia but the
most improbable part of his story was what came next.
Whilst working in Sydney he had found out he had been eligible
to enter the US green card lottery on account of his mother’s
nationality. Incredibly he had won and had upped anchor and moved
to America. He had worked and travelled there for a further ten years.
Married and divorced twice, imprisoned once and hospitalised for a
number of months. He had kept moving on until finally he realised he
was over his parents’ death and was ready to come back to England.
After fifteen long years it was time to face up to what had happened
and Rachel was his only link to the past.
He had talked for the best part of half an hour and for most of it
Rachel had stared at Marcus open mouthed. Everything was so
64 THE HIDDEN LAYER
Asher took the tube from Monument to Waterloo and for the
whole journey back to Kingston on the train he hoped, prayed that he
hadn’t had any more phone calls. The next part of his new plan
depended on it. He had worked out he needed to call three numbers as
soon as he got in. He wasn’t sure why he knew which three, it was
just one of those things you did or didn’t know.
By the time Asher reached home it was five thirty. He wiped the
sweat from his forehead. His back and underarms were totally
drenched and he was hot, tired and thirsty. He badly needed a cold
drink and a shower. He shut his front door and despite his discomfort
half walked, half ran to the phone. The first number was British
Telecom’s last caller ID service.
‘Telephone number. 0-1-7-0-7-5-’ Yes! Come on…three o’clock,
please!
‘-0. Called. Today.’ continued the mechanised lady. ‘At. Fifteen.
Oh one. Hours. To return the call –’
THE HIDDEN LAYER 65
She realised she’d definitely had some affection for him back then
but looking back from this standpoint she couldn’t remember if it had
been juvenile love or not. Either way Marcus had never known and
never would. She had gotten over him a long time ago and she wasn’t
about to let anything like that happen to her again, by him or anyone
else. Marcus’ life had taken a dramatic turn and his story was an
endless series of incredible events. The most incredible in Rachel’s
mind was that he had come back to look for her. She had the same
slightly detached feeling now that she remembered having after
seeing her first big West End musical. Full of wonder and optimism,
elements of the plot swimming in her head. But what was Marcus’
plot? Was she just another incredible event in his burgeoning
collection?
She smiled to herself and snapped out of it, shaking her head, then
turned on the spot and made her way through the throng to the lifts
and rode down to the underground parking. She was one of the
privileged few commuters who didn’t have to suffer London’s
cramped and stuffy public transport system every day. Instead she
walked most days from her riverside apartment and could drive
whenever it suited her, such as on a Friday when she took the car
south for the weekend and although it was extortionately expensive to
leave a car parked all day in Canada Place, Rachel didn’t care because
the company picked up the tab. Today however was a Tuesday but
she’d driven to work nonetheless. She’d been working hard lately,
preparing for the go-live on Thursday and as everything was now in
place just waiting, she’d booked the Wednesday in-between off with
the express intention of relaxing in the calm before the storm and
spending the day by the sea doing nothing.
She found her car in it’s normal space, three along from the
stairwell. It was pretty much Rachel’s only vice – a gleaming black,
vintage Nissan 300ZX grand tourer. It was her pride and joy and a
hobby on which she had spent thousands restoring and performance
tuning. It was also the only way she regularly broke the law. As she
slid into the cream Connelly leather seat she noticed a shadowy,
balding man watching her from behind the dark windscreen of a new
looking BMW opposite, a few spaces along. She summarily dismissed
it as there were always plenty of people down here.
She turned the engine over and it fired. The dashboard beeped and
blinked into life. The six cylinders settled into a smooth growl and
THE HIDDEN LAYER 69
Rachel drove out of the car park into the light evening. She made her
way around the twisting roads and roundabouts of Canary Wharf and
out on to the A102.
The road led southwards through the Blackwall tunnel under the
river, then she dropped down on to the A20 and out of central
London. The traffic thinned out and she was able to drive quickly,
making good progress. A good seven or eight miles later she picked
up the M20 motorway, which sped drivers out towards the coast. That
was where Rachel was headed: Ocean View. She was going to her
weekend retreat down on the southeast coast.
Weekdays and weekends could not have been more different for
Rachel. During the week she hung out in a one bed flat in
Docklands – the happening place for young London financialites to be
seen and very much heard. She didn’t do the social thing though, the
location was more for it’s convenience for work than anything. But at
the weekends she usually managed to escape to a place that was a
world away from the noise and stress of all those greased-up
corporate career ladders and the exhausting pursuit of all things
material. In total contrast Ocean View was a little upside-down
cottage that had a top floor living room and a balcony that looked out
over the dunes to the English Channel beyond. It was on a sleepy
stretch of shoreline that had a beautiful, long beach backed by
secluded sand-dunes, a bucket-and-spade shop and a couple of café-
diners, one of which sold stomach-stretching portions of fish and
chips. She spent the majority of most Fridays relishing the drive down
and today was going to be even better because it was a Tuesday and
that meant no weekend traffic. Joyous at the thought, she pulled out
into the fast lane and floored the accelerator. The turbos whined
quietly and the car gathered another 40 miles per hour in a couple of
seconds; she never tired of letting the car do what it was designed to
do.
She glanced in the rear-view mirror and that was when it
registered. Two cars behind her was a dark BMW that looked quite
like the one in the car park. Had it followed her all the way from
Canary Wharf? She’d noticed it at first but it wasn’t unusual for
people to be going the same way at the same time in a city, especially
on the main routes out of London. She had forgotten about it
completely for the half hour it had taken her to carve her way through
the evening exodus but now it was there again. Definitely. The same
70 THE HIDDEN LAYER
the dashboard. It was a small button with the letters ‘ECU’ that was
obviously an after market attachment. Rachel knew exactly what it
would do if she pressed it. She had programmed the matrices herself.
There was another crunching lurch and this time the rear of the car
twitched side to side, then gained traction again. It was too much for
her.
She pressed the button and the acceleration was instant. In the
heart of the engine’s control unit a large matrix of numbers was
replaced by a new set, giving the car instant access to another hundred
horses and the Nissan pulled easily away from the BMW. The turbos
whined and the engine whistled and when she next looked at the
speedo she was doing 170mph. She desperately hoped no one pulled
out into the fast lane and she prayed there were no police on this
stretch.
As she suspected the BMW was evidently still factory limited to
155. Unable to keep up, it fell back into the mêlée of cars behind her
but for Rachel the outside world had become a blurred streak of
scenery. The only objects that had any focus were the cars in the
middle lane flashing past backwards at 100mph relative to her. The
cars on the other carriageway were just streaks of gleaming metal
under the yellow sodium lamps. Luck was on her side though as the
traffic was thinning the further she got from London. She kept up the
pace for a few minutes until she was sure she had left the BMW far
behind then clicked the button off and slowed right down to eighty,
which felt very pedestrian to her.
She came off at the next junction, drove a little way along the road
and pulled over into the first lay-by. She turned the engine off and sat
there breathing slowly and deeply, waiting for the adrenaline to
subside. The chassis and engine block creaked and pinged as it
cooled. She was buzzing but shaken and thoughts ricocheted around
in her mind. That was no boy racer. Or a cop! Whoever it was, they
were following me. Someone wants me dead or very scared. Oh crap.
But why? What do they want? The project? Could have ended badly
for both of us. Would somebody want me dead? Why? I know too
much. The project... Shit. What happens if I’m killed? It’s a world-
beater. If it ends up in the wrong hands…well. Wait a minute! Who
gives a damn about the project? What about me? I’ll be dead! I do. I
care. I’ve got no contingency plan. If I die, that’s it. End of me. End of
project.
72 THE HIDDEN LAYER
‘Bloody hell!’ Rachel shouted, cross with the stranger in the other
car and annoyed at her situation. She switched the radio on and
searched for a pop channel. She radio found Kiss and just sat there
listening to pop songs for a while. After five minutes the BMW still
hadn’t shown up and she decided that she was safe. She started the
engine, switched the radio over to Classic and rest of the journey to
the coast was a leisurely drive on B roads.
‘No, don’t be silly. It’s not that. I’ve got a small room. It’ll be
good to have somebody to stay.’
‘Should I come tonight or tomorrow?’
‘I’ll be OK tonight. Do you want to come first thing tomorrow?’
‘Sure. Where’s your place?’
When Rachel had recited her address and finished off the call she
felt much happier. It had all been too much – she was feeling like she
was battling this thing alone, she had to tell someone about what the
hell was going on in her life. She couldn’t keep it all to herself any
longer and it was then that she decided: she was going to tell Marcus
everything. He would understand, always had. Slightly shocked at her
own indiscretion she smiled to herself. She would be breaking her
promise to her boss, sure, but only a little bit and he’d never find out.
She drained her glass, lay back on the comfy bench with her feet up,
flopped her head back and gazed up at the glittering stars scattered
across the cloudless night sky.
‘How is it,’ she said sleepily to the Orion constellation in
particular, ‘that some of you don’t even exist any more but I can still
see you and talk to you?’
There was no reply.
‘I’ll tell you why. Because of the distance between us. Such an
enormous distance. After such a long journey you turn up on my
terrace, twinkling as if nothing had happened between when you
started your journey and now. I suppose if you’re prepared to wait
long enough, you can go anywhere you want in the whole universe.’
Still no reply.
‘You can go anywhere. Huh. I can go anywhere…’
She closed her eyes for a moment and this time a reply came.
‘Rach? Rachel? Hello?’
THE HIDDEN LAYER 75
3
Ferroequinology
76 THE HIDDEN LAYER
THE HIDDEN LAYER 77
A sher and his wife stood to the side of the front door of the
wooden house, their backs to the wall. They were safe inside
for now; he had his pump-action shotgun. He twisted, cracked the
door open a little and looked out. Coming down the escarpment were
thousands of troops, marching towards the little house. His wife
crouched and looked out of the crack below him. The troops were
advancing quickly. Ten thousand Civil War Yankees, marching
relentlessly - blue tunics and trousers with long black boots. Peaked
caps and rifled muskets on shoulders. He closed the door.
‘We can go if you like,’ he said, waving the car keys at her. ‘The
car’s just out the back. We can be in Wales in ten minutes.’
She looked at him blankly. He knew then they had to stay and
fight.
As the first of the troops reached the house, Asher pumped the gun
once. He opened the door to find an infantry-man there on the porch,
advancing.
‘Hello,’ smiled the soldier, coming at him.
Asher aimed the gun at his face and pulled the trigger. There was
no blood but the man fell to the ground, out of his direct view. The
next man came up on to the porch smiling and Asher pumped the gun
again. Blew him away too. And the next. And the next. Over and over.
They kept dropping away out of view, like a computer game. In the
back of his mind Asher had the notion that he should be feeling guilty
and scared but he was enjoying it. Like shooting the bad guys on an
arcade machine.
Then Asher’s work colleagues started coming through the door.
He carried on firing at them, one after another. But they were just
walking through the door past him, each one shot in the face but only
mildly annoyed.
‘What’s he doing?’ said one colleague to another.
‘Sorry,’ said Asher, still pumping the shotgun and firing at them.
78 THE HIDDEN LAYER
down on the brown leather sofa. Marcus put his tray down on the
table and pulled the matching comfy chair around to face her.
Her recent scare aside, Rachel had been experiencing some
anxiety lately. She supposed it was from all of the secrecy
enshrouding her project. The mask she had to wear constantly to not
give anything away. Being cautious about people’s questions and
cagey with her answers. Worrying about whether the project would
fly making millions or flop taking millions. She had realised the stress
had started getting to her physically as well as mentally. She had a
constant pain down the left side of her neck, which never used to be
there. She had noticed that she clenched her teeth so that her jaw
ached, which she never used to do. She had started forgetting things –
little things but forgetting nonetheless, whereas before she never
forgot anything. This was the moment she’d been waiting for. She
was like a champagne bottle that had just had its cork-retaining wire
loosened.
‘I need to tell you about something I’ve been working on,’ she
said, smoothing the arm of the sofa.
Marcus stopped in mid-air, squatting over his chair. ‘Sounds
ominous. What is it?’ he said, sitting down.
‘It’s top secret OK? I can’t keep it to myself any longer – I need to
tell someone and I know I can trust you. But I want you to promise
first that if anything happens to me, you know with this…business,
you’ll let my family know all about the project I was working on.’
He hunched forward, elbows on knees, hands clasped. ‘OK,
mum’s the word. So what is it?’
‘My system that I’m working on. It predicts stock market prices,
highs and lows.’
‘Wait. You’ve built a system that predicts stock highs and lows?’
Marcus raised his eyebrows and smirked at her. ‘That’s the holy grail
of trading! I thought you couldn’t predict the markets because they’re
inherently random?’
‘Well, as it turns out that’s not quite true,’ she said. ‘See, in the
long-term stocks are a safe bet because the markets always rise. But
my theory was that you can learn the movements of the short-term
stock market.’ She leaned back on the sofa and clasped her hands
behind her head. She was enjoying this. ‘You just treat the whole
thing as a big system. You learn all the inputs, all the outputs and
make the correlation in the middle.’
Marcus was already grinning and wagging a finger.
‘But that only works for non-random systems. The short-term
movements can be totally random. No-one has ever been able to
reliably predict them and anyone who claims they have is playing the
odds, they’ve been lucky a few times but it’s not repeatable.’
Rachel shook hear head.
‘That’s a backwards argument. The reason no-one’s been able to
predict what’ll happen in the next second or minute or half-hour is
because they haven’t had the right tools, and so they’ve argued it’s
too random. It’s not, it’s just a system. What I’ve discovered is that,
like any system if you hit it, it rings with it’s own unique signature.’
Marcus proceeded to smear strawberry jam thickly onto a slice of
toast.
‘Rings? What d’ya mean, like a bell?’
‘Yes, exactly like a bell,’ said Rachel nodding. ‘You’ve just got to
figure out the dimensions – with a bell it’s the shape, circumference,
density of the metal, whatever. Once you know all that it’s easy to
predict what the bell’s going to sound like when you hit it. You just
build a virtual model of the bell, whack it with a virtual hammer and
let the computer work out what sound it’s going to make.’
Marcus thought about this for a few seconds. He frowned and
looked out of the tea shop window.
‘So you’re saying,’ he said slowly ‘that your system can figure out
the dimensions of the markets…and predict the response for a given
input?’
‘Precisely, as long as we know what the inputs are.’
82 THE HIDDEN LAYER
The human traffic had died drastically after ten and had stayed
light throughout his sandwiches and into the afternoon. Then Asher
got lucky. Three carriages away, alighting from the 1535 to Welwyn
Garden City was Mr Jones, exactly as he had been the day before,
sunglasses and all. Yes! Immediately Asher’s pulse started to race,
heart beating faster. How could he have missed him this morning?
Maybe he had been on that very first train after all. Or maybe he’d
been out all night.
Shit! Sunglasses! Too late to worry about that now. From the end
of the platform he switched his camera on and pretended to take a
picture along the length of the train. But instead of a wide angle of the
locomotive he held the zoom + button down. His lens motor whirred,
narrowing his field of view and the digital image in his viewfinder
enlarged itself until Mr Jones’ head and shoulders entirely filled the
frame. Asher was trembling terribly with excitement but the camera’s
anti-shake managed to hold the view stable enough to let him take the
shot at that range. On automatic he took two fast frames face-on and
managed to get one side-on shot as Mr Jones turned to go down the
steps to the exit tunnel.
Then the camera was back in the bag and he set off jogging along
the platform to the access tunnel. He caught up just before Mr Jones
reached the exit barriers and realised this was where he had to be
careful. Only a handful of other people had got off the train (they had
disappeared already) and Mr Jones was through the exit tunnel and
out of the station already. Asher followed, trying to stay well back but
not so far back that he was in danger of losing his mark. Potters Bar
only covered an area of one and a half square miles, so if Mr Jones
was going home Asher figured he was going to find out where he
lived pretty quickly.
From the station exit Mr Jones went north on Darkes Lane, one of
the two main roads making out a giant X shape through the centre of
THE HIDDEN LAYER 85
narrow alley and the street receded from view. They struggled
backwards together and when they were deeper in the alley amongst
the garages Asher was wrenched around to face a white painted brick
wall, his assailant still unknown, still behind him.
He was pushed forward violently and hit his forehead hard on the
bricks, leaving a red smear of blood across the white paint and a stab
of pain shot through his eyes and across his forehead. His vision
blurred momentarily and he felt his legs weaken. For a second and he
could feel the hot breath of someone with their mouth very close to
his head and their full weight was pushing Asher against the warm
wall.
‘So Mr Asher,’ said a slow, deliberate East Asian, possibly
Oriental voice that Asher recognised straight away. ‘We meet again.’
They were a hundred feet high before the silence was broken.
Usually the Director would book a capsule for himself and the
investor would call his mobile once they were off the ground. The
meeting would be conducted via a mid-air teleconference but this
time the Investor was there in person, which slightly worried the
Director.
‘We’ve been funding you for quite a while now, haven’t we?’ said
the Investor, studying the shrinking buildings below. The Director
nodded slowly, looking at the back of the man’s head. He didn’t
really understand who ‘we’ was but as long as the money kept coming
he didn’t much care. The last few years had been good to him with the
Investor’s money coming in. How many year’s had it been? Four?
No, five, surely?
‘Yes,’ he said. ‘Five years. Could – could I just ask why we’re
having this meeting?’
‘Well,’ said the investor as he turned around. He walked around
the bench on which The Director was sitting to look out in a different
direction. He was a tall, youngish man, well-built who, despite the
present heat, always dressed in a dark blue pin-stripe suit over a
THE HIDDEN LAYER 87
cream shirt with a Boston Red Sox baseball cap. ‘Since you ask,
there’s a small problem.’
‘Oh?’
‘And I would hate to see this little deal of ours go under because
of it. Because if it did, we’d want our investment back, you see?’
‘Yes, I understand that. But I –’
‘And I understand the project is about to start live trials.’ The
Investor turned away from the view again and faced the Director,
hands clasped behind his back and a look of inquisition in his eyes.
The Director stared at him, almost through him, confused.
‘That’s right,’ he said. ‘How do you know that?’
‘Come on, use your head!’ said the Investor like a school teacher
who had just heard the wrong answer. His physical position gave him
easy control of the conversation. The Director was sitting on an
isolated bench in the middle of the glass capsule and now the man
was slowly walking around it again taking in all the views of the city
in the afternoon sun. The glass of the pod was no more than a few feet
away from the bench so the Director had to look up at him when he
spoke. He suspected it was finely calculated, like everything this man
did.
‘Your board turns you down because they think you’ve got some
crackpot invention that’ll never work. We step in and pay your
development budget for the last five years, regular as clockwork and
suddenly, out of the blue you ask for a million pounds more? There’s
got to be a reason. Do you think we’re just going to pay it? Sterling
doesn’t grow on trees, you know? Do you think we’re stupid? No! So
what do we do? We send someone in to investigate where the money
is going. And who do we send in?’
‘I don’t know,’ said The Director trying to shrug. He realised he
was holding the edge of the bench too tightly and released his grip a
little.
‘Me!’ exclaimed the Investor. ‘We send in little old me!’
‘Look, it was stupid,’ said The Director. He half stood up.
‘SIT DOWN!’ barked the man and The Director instantly did as
he was told.
‘I –’ He took a deep breath. ‘I thought you wouldn’t authorise it if
I just asked. I wanted to surprise you, prove to you that this thing was
working by doubling your investment in a few days. If I had just
88 THE HIDDEN LAYER
asked I would’ve had to have admitted there was a risk of losing it. So
I tried to spread it across the budget. I’m sorry, it was stupid.’
‘Actually I’m not bothered by the extra million. Although you of
all people should know by now my agency will not tolerate deception.
I’m prepared to let it go this time but never try anything like this
again. Clear?’
‘Yes, very clear. Thank you,’ said The Director with his head
bowed.
‘Now, to why I’m really here. We do have another hitch. My
agency will not see this project lost to a competitor.’
The Director jerked his head up.
‘Of course not! Is there a problem?’
‘A problem? The problem is that your chief engineer has
been…incautious. Indiscreet even. Talking.’
‘What? You must be mistaken!’
‘I assure you she has.’
The Director was having trouble believing what he was hearing.
Rachel had always been totally reliable and trustworthy. She couldn’t
possibly have sold out to a competitor. Not now.
‘How do you know, have you got proof?’
‘Do you think we’d be having this meeting if I didn’t? She
disclosed everything.’ The investor stopped in front of the Director.
‘I’ve been following her. Apparently she got herself into a spot of
bother and got scared. Taken some comfort talking to an old friend
she hasn’t seen for a long time.’
‘Oh my god.’ The Director scanned the floor of the pod as if it
held the explanation he was looking for. Some signal from Rachel he
had missed.
‘Oh my god indeed. So what are you going to do about it?’
‘What?’ He looked up again. ‘What do you mean? What exactly
did she disclose?’
‘Just like I said - everything. The plans, the design principles, the
budgets, timescales. Everything. She revealed it all to someone she
hasn’t seen for fifteen years like it was yesterday’s gossip. As is turns
out this person is benign and the likelihood of him taking further
action on what he’s heard is minimal but we can’t take any chances.
How do we know she hasn’t already sold us out to some backstreet
start-up for a little financial incentive? You’d be surprised what
people will do for money, especially with what’s inside her head.’
THE HIDDEN LAYER 89
‘She wouldn’t! She gave me her word! She doesn’t give a damn
about the money. I pay her well enough.’
‘Word or no word, money or no money she has to go.’ They were
at the highest point now, high enough now to see down into the
courtyard of the Houses of Parliament.
‘We can’t lose her now! She’s the only one who knows how to
operate Ceptron. I can’t fire her.’
The man turned and looked out of the window again into a
neighbouring pod.
‘Oh dear, this is so tedious. I’m not talking about firing her.’
There was a pause as it sank in, then the Director looked up in
horror.
‘What?’
‘It’s my job to safeguard my agency’s interests and Rachel Taylor
is jeopardising our oh-so-very-large investment right now. We cannot
afford to let anyone else get their hands on this technology. She must
be dealt with. Get your house in order Director, or I will be forced to
do it myself.’
The Director started to panic, gripping the bench tighter again. He
looked down at the floor between his legs.
‘OK, I’ll talk to her! I’ll make her realise what’s at stake. I’ll
make her understand. She won’t talk again, I promise! Just let me deal
with her. Please!’
‘I don’t like untidiness. And this is so very, very untidy. I need
more than a promise.’
‘What do you need?’
‘I need assurance. Security. Ha! So apt for your line of work,
don’t you think?’
‘OK but what?’ said the Director. He didn’t like where this was
leading and was beginning to panic a little.
‘Don’t you worry about that. I’ve already got it covered.’
The investor tossed a small photograph on to the wooden bench. It
flipped a few times in flight and landed face-down next to the
Director. He turned it over and frowned at the picture.
‘I’ll keep this until the handover,’ said the Investor matter-of-
factly. The Director’s frown deepened.
‘Sorry, you want to keep this?’ he asked, flipping the photograph
over a few times. ‘Where did you get it?’
‘Tut, tut. Always the wrong end of the stick.’
90 THE HIDDEN LAYER
The Director thought for a moment, then his face filled with total
horror.
‘What? Oh my god. No, please!’
The voice was loud in his ear. It was Mr Jones. He had seen him
when he’d walked past his house! He struggled and tried to shout out
but his nose and mouth were being clamped shut by the hand and no
consonants made it past. Instead he made a muffled, high-pitched
whining noise.
‘Shhhh. No one will hear you here. Calm down and be quiet and I
won’t break your neck. Deal?’
Asher relaxed slightly and nodded his consent but the man didn’t
remove his hand or let up the pressure against the wall or the clamp
around his neck.
‘What do you think you have got on me, I wonder?’ said the
voice. ‘Do you think I am guilty of some crime? The business with
your brother, maybe? Hmm?’ He jerked Asher’s neck hard.
Asher shook his head quickly and blood from his forehead started
to trickle down into his wide eyes, blurring his vision red.
‘It is no longer relevant anyway. I told you to stop looking. You
didn’t listen. And now look what you’ve done. You followed me.
Very clever Mr Asher but I warned you and now you are going pay.’
Asher felt the man’s breathing slowing, getting deeper as if
preparing himself psychologically for something. The stranglehold
around Asher’s neck was gradually tightening and Asher could feel
his windpipe being crushed. He was gasping for breath. He could feel
the blood pressure building up in his face, like his eyes were going to
pop out. Asher struggled but it was in vain. The man was too strong.
He was starting to feel light-headed and reality wheeled about him.
He tried to focus but his vision blurred again. Now he couldn’t
breathe at all, the grip was so tight. His vision started washing out like
an over-exposed film and he could see dark sparkles in the white
blankness.
Then in the distance there was the sound of children shouting to
each other and a football being kicked and bounced on concrete,
coming closer. Asher felt Mr Jones turn his head sideways towards
THE HIDDEN LAYER 91
the sound and then back again to look the other way. He seized the
only opportunity he was going to get and as Mr Jones swung his head
back again, he pushed up with his knees with all his remaining
strength and flung his head backwards as hard as he could.
Bulls-eye! The back of his head smashed into something and there
was a sickening crunch as the bridge of Mr Jones’ nose caved in.
There was a guttural roar and Asher felt the weight of the man drop
away instantly and the pressure on his throat release. He took a huge
gasp of air. There was a thud as a body hit the floor. Unconscious or
not, Asher didn’t care. He propped himself against the wall for the
few seconds it took for his eyesight to return and when it did he could
see more blood splatters on the white paint in front of him. He span
around and didn’t wait to find out anything more. Jumping over the
crumpled form of Mr Jones he ran as fast as his exhausted legs would
allow all the way back to the station, gasping heavily for breath as he
went but pretty sure Mr Jones hadn’t followed him.
that the extra money is justified for the go live, so it’ll be paid into
your account directly.’
‘Oh my god, I feel sick,’ said the Director, shaking his head and
retching slightly. ‘How can I undo this?’ He had started salivating
profusely under his tongue and there were beads of sweat across his
forehead.
‘You can’t. This is how things are going to be for a little while.
Don’t worry old chap. Stay calm, do your job and everything will be
hunky-dory. Capiche?’
The man smiled and slapped the Director on the back. The
Director heaved and threw up his mostly digested lunch. The man
grimaced and walked away to the end of the pod to admire the last of
the views over London, as the surrounding buildings rose about them.
After a few more minutes of silent descent broken only by the low
moaning sound made by the Director the doors finally opened and the
Investor strode confidently out of the still-moving pod. The Director
followed, hunched and dragging his feet and they were ushered off
the gantry together and across the boardwalk towards the exit
turnstiles. The man stopped and turned.
‘Hell of a ride, huh?’ he said cheerily. The Director leaned against
a kiosk on the wooden decking. His face was white and he was
feeling very sick indeed.
‘Doesn’t like heights,’ quipped the Investor to one of the
concerned operators who was looking on. He tugged the peak of his
cap down, smiled, pushed through the turnstile and strode off along
the quayside leaving The Director to recover from the ordeal.
‘No way,’ breathed the Director at the Investor’s back. ‘No
goddamn way on Earth you’re getting away with this.’
Asher reached the station quickly and spent a further few anxious
minutes amongst rush-hour crowds waiting for the next train. The
people nearest to him were giving odd looks and granting him a wide
berth. He was sweaty and bloody, standing in a daze, and when he
finally boarded he was let on first. Typically for this time of day the
train was already full but a frail-looking woman sitting near the doors
gave him a concerned look and offered him her seat. He took it.
THE HIDDEN LAYER 93
‘Yes.’
‘Um, this is Oscar. I’ve left everything you need in a deposit box
at the agreed location.’
‘Well done. You have the key?’
‘I do.’
‘Wait for a call from me.’
‘OK.’
96 THE HIDDEN LAYER
‘Hello?’
‘Oscar?’
‘Yes.’
‘Listen carefully. The Executive Suite at Threadneedles Hotel has
been booked for tonight in the name of Oscar Gunhill. Got that?’
‘Threadneedles, Oscar Gunhill. Got it.’
‘Good. Leave the safe deposit key taped to the underside of the
desk drawer. Call me tomorrow morning when you’ve checked out.
Got that?’
‘Deposit key, desk drawer. OK.’
THE HIDDEN LAYER 97
4
We’ll Cause A Meltdown
98 THE HIDDEN LAYER
THE HIDDEN LAYER 99
‘No, thanks. Look, don’t worry about it for the moment. Forget I
said anything. If it happens again, maybe I’ll reconsider the offer.’
‘Right-o. Just say the word, OK? So. How’s our little project
coming along?’
‘OK. First, the good news. Ceptron’s portfolio value has grown by
about 10 percent since we went live this morning. The one million we
started with is currently worth around 1.1 million and I’ve no reason
to believe it’s a one-off. If you trend it, that’s four million profit in
around eight days. It’s way more than we anticipated sir.’
‘Good grief, that’s fantastic!’ said the Director and smiled. ‘How
much is that in a year?’
‘It’s going too fast sir,’ she replied, avoiding the question. ‘I’ve
done the sums and we have to take Ceptron offline again while I add
some moderating algorithms. And we’ve got to do it soon.’
‘Why?’
‘Because if it keeps investing at this rate, and there’s no reason to
believe it won’t, there’s going to be an economic crash. We, you and
I, are going to bring Britain’s financial world to its knees. If we allow
Ceptron to keep investing at this rate unchecked it’ll acquire too much
wealth for the economy to support.’
‘Sorry Rachel, you’ve lost me. How much money are we talking
about exactly?’
‘OK…according to the latest estimates of Gross World Product,
about eight trillion times more wealth than there is on the entire
planet.’
There was a lengthy silence in the office. The Director shifted in
his seat. It was an incomprehensible number. Even Rachel with her
head for figures couldn’t really understand the meaning of a number
that big. She hoped the Director would see it for the serious matter it
was.
‘Ah-ha!’ he said at last. ‘Very funny. Eight trillion, good one!
You nearly had me,’ he said, wagging a finger. He was nodding at
Rachel, grinning and frowning at the same time. Confused, she
thought.
‘No sir, I don’t think you understand. Twenty percent on a million
pounds, compounded daily over a year gives you a really big number.
Huge. It’s all theoretical of course because there’s a finite pot of
wealth out there but given time Ceptron would probably flat-line the
entire securities market and not just in Britain. Globally.’
102 THE HIDDEN LAYER
‘Yes.’
‘This is Oscar. I’ve checked out and the key is in place.’
‘Good. I’ll call you when I am in a position to move. OK?’
‘OK.’
104 THE HIDDEN LAYER
He hadn’t had much sleep that night so now he was trying to bring
himself round with a strong coffee. He yawned as he shook the mouse
of his ageing computer to bring it to life. With all the excitement over
the past few days he had completely forgotten to check his e-mails.
From: mpbd@dhhdgsiuag.net
To: jasher@j&rresearch.com
Sent: Thu 19th July 2012 8:20pm
Subject: Requested data
Dear jasher@j&rresearch.com,
Here are the results of the data you requested:
Instrument: [DT]
Next price: 234 Date: 20/JUL/2012 Time: --:--
Next high: --- Date: --/---/---- Time: --:--
Next low: --- Date: --/---/---- Time: --:--
This e-mail may contain confidential and/or privileged information. If you are not
the intended recipient please notify mpbdsec@dhhdgsiuag.net immediately and
destroy this e-mail. Any unauthorized disclosure or distribution of the material in
this e-mail is strictly forbidden.
He squinted tiredly at the week old text – it had been written and
sent on the day he’d flown out to China.
For god’s sake, who are these idiots? With a sigh he clicked
DELETE and the offending box disappeared, restoring his desktop. He
had received hundreds like it over the past year. Many times he had
tried replying to let the sender know they’d got the wrong address but
his attempts had disappeared into a black-hole without an
acknowledgement or even a delivery error. So now he usually just
deleted them whenever they appeared.
THE HIDDEN LAYER 105
Back in her office Rachel picked the key up again and turned it
over a few times in her hand. She had absolutely no recollection of
what it was for, which annoyed her greatly because it was one of
those little, insignificant things that she wouldn’t have forgotten a
year ago. She let it break her concentration for a few seconds then,
perturbed, placed it back next to her keyboard and continued typing.
It was ten in the morning and, barring the minor set-back, it had
already been a good day for Rachel. She finished typing in commands
and looked around her glass-fronted office. This was her control
room. There was no need to go down to the secure computer hall to
interrogate the leviathan – she could access it all remotely from up
here on her office computer. Besides, it was always too cold and too
noisy for her to think straight down there. She used to love the idea of
being amongst the wires and the fans, the disks and blinking lights but
that was way back when she was young and fresh, influenced by
Hollywood films. Back when she had had the idea, way before LSI
Co. Her design hadn’t had a name back then but now it did. Ceptron.
It was her design and reality – her baby. She had brought Ceptron into
the world, coaxed it into life and now it was working perfectly, way
beyond all her expectations. Totally secret, even from the rest of the
company, there were only three people who knew of it’s existence
and she and Marcus were two of them.
The third person was the Director. To get the project off the
ground the Director had convinced the board to invest in an unknown
entity that would bring the company massive returns at a modest
106 THE HIDDEN LAYER
From: jasher@j&rresearch.com
To: mpbdsec@dhhdgsiuag.net
Sent: Thu 26th July 2012 9:35am
Subject: FW: Requested data
Hi, I have received this mail in error. Please remove me from your mailing list!
Thanks
J Asher
Original message:
From: mpbd@dhhdgsiuag.net
To: jasher@j&rresearch.com
Sent: Thu 19th July 2012 8:20pm
Subject: Requested data
Dear jasher@j&rresearch.com,
Here are the results of the data you requested:
Instrument: [DT]
Next price: 234 Date: 20/JUL/2012 Time: --:--
Next high: --- Date: --/---/---- Time: --:--
Next low: --- Date: --/---/---- Time: --:--
Rachel was suddenly uneasy. She flushed with the same feeling
she’d had on rare occasions when she’d let slip some secret about a
friend that was supposed to have been kept in confidence. She tilted
her head like she was trying to work out an optical illusion.
But this was no illusion. Rachel knew exactly what it was she was
looking at. She recognised it immediately. Frowning deeply she
scanned the text for a few moments, thinking back to a possible
security breach…J. Asher? Who on earth was that? No. She had given
her word to the Director that this project would be totally secret and
as far as he knew she had kept her promise. She’d just had the one
moment of weakness, yet here was someone from outside asking very
politely not to be bothered by e-mails from her supposedly top-secret
machine. What the hell was going on? She re-read the sender’s
address and her heart nearly stopped. No. Surely not! The pang in her
stomach grew and her palms and fingertips moistened, it was similar
to the deep-down panic she’d felt when she was being chased the
night before last. She had to get to the bottom of this.
108 THE HIDDEN LAYER
5
I Thought You’d Never Ask
110 THE HIDDEN LAYER
THE HIDDEN LAYER 111
were safeguards to stop that happening, it had been tested. What else
then? She closed her eyes to think. What came to her was surprising
but she knew straight away that it was probably right and that maybe
this wasn’t quite as intractable as it at first appeared.
OK, priorities. She had a possible security breach to deal with
here, she would worry about the cause of the glitch later. She
commanded Ceptron to provide a list of e-mails it had sent to the
‘jasher’ address. Nothing. She had known it would say that but right
now she had to close off all avenues. Rachel knew what she had to do.
She just hoped she could contain this before the Director found out.
She clicked the BACK button on her browser and selected
CONTACT US. She opened her mobile and with a finger pointing to the
screen and her head bobbing up and down she single-handedly dialled
the digits into the keypad of her phone.
and, switching the phone to his other ear, swivelled 180 degrees to
look out of his window. The view was a magnificent panorama over
the trees, lakes and green spaces of St James’ Park.
‘What kind of trouble?’ he asked.
‘Oh it’s a mess,’ sighed the Director on the other end. ‘A
monstrous pile of stinking elephant-shit mess is what it is. Look, it’s
my daughter Cassandra. She’s been kidnapped. Being held to
ransom.’
‘My god. Are you serious?’ Daintree leaned forward.
‘Very, I’m afraid.’
‘Jesus. Do you know why? Who’s responsible?’
‘My investor. Don’t think I’ve mentioned him before.’
‘Your investor? What the hell kind of work are you involved in?’
‘I’d better explain,’ conceded the Director.
‘I think you had.’
‘It’s like this. I’m running a secret project at LSI.Co. The Board
know nothing about it. About five years ago a private investor
approached me with the idea, said he could fund the project if I could
provide the facilities and expertise. He’s been financing us ever
since.’
As the Director talked Daintree leaned back again and tracked a
passenger jet in the far distance with his finger as it dragged it’s thin
sharp contrails through the wispy clouds. It glinted now and again in
the sunshine as it banked and turned.
‘There’s a lot of money at stake,’ continued the Director. ‘Trouble
is this project has the potential to earn billions for whoever has
control of it and he thinks my chief engineer has sold us out to the
competition and I’m sure she hasn’t. It’s a terrible mess. The bottom
line is that he wants me to get rid of her. Permanently, if you know
what I mean and to make sure I comply he’s holding Cassy. As far as
I know Cassy’s still OK but this guy is a real menace and I don’t
know what else to do.’
‘Jesus Christ man, this is absurd! I’m going to look into it – get
someone on it straight away. Have you spoken to any other
authorities?’
‘No!’ The Director suddenly sounded alarmed.
‘Well why not for heaven’s sake?’
‘Because he’s got me over a barrel! I don’t have proof but I’m
certain his money is dirty and he’s planning to use Ceptron as a
114 THE HIDDEN LAYER
Between the ages of twenty six and thirty Jason Asher had
suspected he had been the victim of dumming-down. He had been
steadily losing steam, year by year, convinced that he was living proof
of the results of a generation of the media pandering to the lowest
common denominator, to the stupid people. He had lost his edge,
could never think fast enough, especially in meetings. He would sit
there, running his fingers through his mousey hair occasionally and
nodding with the current consensus, longing to be sharp witted
enough to take the meeting by storm and tell everyone what was what.
The truth was he didn’t really care any more. He used to like number
crunching and analysis, problem solving, making strategic decisions
but he came to find it dull and uninspiring. Luckily for him he’d
found a way out. He grew his hobby until it became his bread and
butter and he’d been able to quit his day job in time to save his sanity.
Now, aged thirty nine, he was doing quite well for himself, although
his brother’s death had always hung over him like a dark cloud
threatening to rain.
Despite his success in recent years, that cloud had grown and
grown until one day, about two years ago, there had been the seed of
an idea to get rid of it and let the sun shine through. It had taken root
and been given room to develop, slowly but surely. Even now, it was
still just an idea and occasionally he tried to pretend to himself that it
wasn’t going to happen, like when you have two choices and you
pretend that you don’t know which one you’re going to pick. But your
subconscious knows. It’s inevitable, already decided. You can’t
suppress it, there is only one direction. And although he denied it to
THE HIDDEN LAYER 115
himself, for Asher there was only one way forward. Only one way to
fix it all. The phone rang and woke Asher from his daydream.
‘Hello?’
‘Hello, can I speak to J. Asher please?’ said a female voice.
Without his authorisation Asher’s brain plucked a ready-made
stereotype from it’s collection. Thirty-five, blonde, attractive, five-
ten, slim. He perked up a bit.
‘Speaking.’
‘Hi. My name is Rachel Taylor, I believe you’ve been receiving
some unsolicited e-mails from us.’
‘Oh. Yes, I have been actually. You finally got my e-mail then?’
‘Yes. Firstly I’d like to apologise – you shouldn’t have been
getting the e-mails.’
‘No harm done, just a bit annoying. Sorry, you are…?’
‘Sorry, I work for the London Stock Investment Company. I’m
the administrator responsible for the computer system that’s been
sending the e-mails, although they’re generated automatically. I found
your number on your website, I hope you don’t mind me calling you
directly.’
‘No, not at all,’ said Asher. ‘But couldn’t you have just removed
me from your distribution list?’
‘Actually it’s not that simple. You see there is no distribution list.’
‘Oh.’
‘It’s a long story. Can I ask how many of these mails you’ve
received?’
‘In total? Couple of hundred maybe.’
Silence.
‘Hello?’ he asked.
‘Have you still got them all?’ She was very direct, Asher thought.
‘Some of them. I can just look for you. I don’t empty my Deleted
folder very often. Hold on…Yes…I’ve probably got a month’s
worth.’
‘OK, Mr Asher. This may sound a bit odd but it’s quite important
that I come round and speak to you in person.’
‘OK…’ Asher was suddenly unsure of where this was going. The
attractive blonde at the other end of the phone was obviously aware of
his hesitation.
‘Let me explain a bit more. We’re running a project that
encompasses many data sources. I believe your website has been
116 THE HIDDEN LAYER
‘Hello?’
‘This is Mike. I have located Charlie.’
‘What? Already?’
‘You gave me some good information. You know Charlie’s quite
a high profile figure in the wrong circles? You sure you want to do
this?’
‘Yes.’
‘OK.’
‘Ah, when will it take place?’
‘Tonight at eleven o’clock exactly, unless I hear from you by ten.
From precisely ten onwards you cannot reach me. Consider the
contract complete. If you abort before ten I keep the first half of the
payment. Understand?’
‘OK. How do you want the second half?’
‘Same as before but I will call with details on successful
completion. If you don’t hear from me by eleven thirty then
something has gone wrong. Charlie will not have been touched and
the deal is off. It’s unlikely but if it happens, we both walk away.’
‘OK. Thank – hello?’
118 THE HIDDEN LAYER
Asher had spent the hour tidying his flat followed by ten minutes
scanning his computer for pictures that other people might find
offensive. Being single and living alone he had strayed a number of
times into the more adult locations the internet had to offer. Nothing
wrong with that he had always told himself. But now he had just had a
phone call from a very technically able woman and she was going to
come and analyse his computer. He wasn’t really sure what that
meant but in any case, why on earth had he agreed? Letting a perfect
stranger on his computer, prying into his private life, looking through
his personal files and correspondence. He should have just said, look,
you take me off your distribution list and I’ll delete the e-mails I’ve
already received. Then everything is sorted and we can go on living
happily ever after.
But he knew exactly why. The image he had in his head was the
same as it was when she had called. Thirty-five, blonde, attractive,
five-ten, slim. That was not a meeting to be turned down in any young
bachelor’s book. That was why. And now he had the young lady
coming to his house, almost like a blind date! Then he had told
himself to calm down, don’t be stupid, it wasn’t a date. All she was
interested in was the e-mails but there was something deep in his
psyche that was making him nervous as hell. Being single he had by
default not succeeded with a stable relationship and he felt himself
under pressure to come across as a well balanced, mature, interesting
individual. With no untoward intentions, purely professional, he
thought. He’d be OK. But what if he was attracted to her? He was
dreading how he would handle it. He always botched it, even when
the poor woman was married and not interested in the slightest. They
all thought he was some kind of geek. Come on Asher, be a man!
What about how she must be feeling? She was blindly going in to a
stranger’s house, particularly that of a guy she had only spoken to on
the phone for a few minutes. Whatever this was about, it must be
important to her. My god, she’s got more balls than me!
The harsh drill of the doorbell awoke Asher from his daydream.
Too late now. He jumped up from the desk and almost ran out to the
hall and the front door but, realising it would look like he’d been too
eager if he had opened it right then, he paused. He quickly counted
down from ten, then opened the door.
THE HIDDEN LAYER 119
in particular. The page listing all the attacks? I was surprised to see
that.’
Asher returned with two glasses of water and took his seat. He felt
a little pressure to justify his website, to show he wasn’t a nutcase.
‘Ah, yes. That page. It’s more for my own use than anything, but
since I had all the data I thought it might be useful to a wider
community, you know? I have a particular interest in that sort of
thing. A member of my family was killed by a bomber a long time
ago. My brother, actually.’
‘My god, I’m sorry.’
Asher had told this story a hundred times, so he was comfortable
talking about it.
‘Yes, well, the police got nowhere with their investigations, which
I suppose is normal nowadays. You know, they used to crack terror
cells almost straight away? But now there are so many it’s all so
difficult. I was only little when it happened but over the years as I
learned more about it I became angry. I felt I had to try to find some
meaning in my brother’s death, so I collated as much information as I
could about terrorist attacks and tried to find patterns. Tried to
understand them, the psychology. Obviously that was pointless, so
now I just put the data on a website and update it when something
happens. Hopefully other people find it useful.’
‘Well, I don’t know about other people but my computer system
sure did.’
‘So what is this computer system of yours?’
Rachel hesitated, obviously unsure about how much she should
reveal.
‘OK. Put simply it takes a load of data and tries to look for
patterns that people can’t see and even if they could, wouldn’t know
how to make use of it.’
‘But you’re from an investment bank. What’s this got to do with
me and my website?’
Rachel took a deep breath and continued reluctantly.
‘My computer system has taken your list of death-toll figures,
formulated the rules governing them and predicted the next number.’
There was a second of silence.
‘How can it do that? There are no rules, they’re just numbers that
have happened by chance. By random acts of terrorism.’
THE HIDDEN LAYER 121
‘There are rules. They’re varied and extremely subtle but the huge
range of information the system has at it’s disposal means that it’s
been able to work them out.’
‘I’m sorry, I don’t buy that.’
Rachel hesitated again, seemed to be weighing up options in her
head. She came visibly to a conclusion, nodded once and took a deep
breath.
‘Right. It’s difficult to explain and to be perfectly honest it’s a
company secret. I really shouldn’t be telling you this…’
‘But…?’
‘But…you seem like a decent guy. What do you do for a living?’
‘Politics and history. Mainly I do research. Sometimes I lecture,
sometimes advise government bodies. Write papers, speak at
symposia, that sort of thing.’
‘Wow, you really know this stuff then. How technically minded
are you?’
‘Uh, OK at maths. Not to shabby with the old mouse. Why?’
‘I’m just trying to think of a good analogy. OK. Imagine a
sequence of numbers. Two, four, six, eight. What’s the next number?’
‘Ten,’ said Asher without hesitation.
‘Right. How did you know?’
‘It’s obvious,’ he sniggered. ‘It’s the two times table.’
‘OK. Good. Now, what if I told you the next number was twelve,
not ten?’
‘I’d be surprised. There isn’t a rule that gives a sequence like
that.’
‘Exactly. But actually there are an infinite number of them, you
just don’t know them. Now, what if I told you the next numbers after
twelve were fourteen, sixteen, eighteen and twenty?’
‘That’s not a proper sequence. You’ve just skipped ten in the two
times table, that’s all.’
‘Wrong,’ said Rachel smiling. ‘There’s a formula that gives that
exact sequence. It’s just more complicated than you can do in your
head. You need a calculator to do it.’
‘What is it then?’ he asked.
‘I can write it down if you’ve got some paper and a pen.’
Asher was definitely curious.
‘Sure, hold on.’ He pulled a sheet from the printer’s feeder tray
and grabbed the pen he had used before. ‘There you go.’
122 THE HIDDEN LAYER
‘That makes the two times table without the number ten?’ said
Asher, suspiciously.
‘Well, at first glance it looks like the two times table. My point is
that A you’re not dealing with the two times table and B there can be
much more complicated rules for predicting something than you
might expect. Rules that only a computer or very brainy person can
work out. Have I convinced you?’
Asher was sceptical about the formula, so the next few minutes
were spent in silence as he put it to the test with his calculator. As he
was writing each result down on the paper, he became aware that
Rachel was watching his every move, making sure he made no
mistakes. It was like being back at school being watched over by the
teacher. But this time it also felt good to have the full attention of an
attractive, intelligent woman. Asher smiled and shook his head as the
numbers came out one by one. Two times table, no number ten!
‘OK, I’m convinced,’ he said at last.
‘Good. How often do you update your list?’
‘Whenever there’s another incident. I updated it last week with
another attack in the Middle East…’ he tailed off and frowned. ‘Hold
on a second.’
‘Pull up that last e-mail you sent me,’ said Rachel with the
beginnings of a smirk on her lips.
‘I was just going to look for it…here is it.’ He scanned the e-mail,
looking for the same things Rachel had looked for. Then he went to
his own website to check the last entry in his list, just as Rachel had
done. Her smirk broke into a smile as he went through exactly the
same actions as she had.
‘Hold on, the numbers I put on my site were from the news, not
the e-mail. But they’re the same. And the e-mail was sent a day before
it happened. This is weird. It must be a coincidence.’
‘That’s what I’m here to check out. I need you to retrieve the
other e-mails. You said on the phone that you’ve still got them?’
‘Yeah, they’re all here.’
THE HIDDEN LAYER 123
One by one Asher pulled the e-mails up from his deleted items
folder and they cross-checked the numbers with his website. Sure
enough, one by one, they tallied. An e-mail one day. A terrorist attack
the next. The numbers were identical, spot on. For every single one.
They both sat there staring at the screen, open mouthed, not
knowing how to react. Asher had the feeling he had just seen an up-
close card trick and annoyingly he had missed the crucial secret
move. He wanted to shout do it again! like a child but he knew it was
no card trick. This was very strange indeed. This was the stuff of
science fiction. Yet here they were, sitting in his living room, being
presented with the foretellings of the Nostradamus of computers in
front of them. They looked at each other and continued to stare open
mouthed. Asher let out a single ‘ha’, involuntarily.
‘Jesus Christ! It never clicked. I’ve been receiving these e-mails
for well over a year and I’ve been updating my website with all those
incidents and I never put two and two together! Is this thing really
predicting terrorist attacks? It is, isn’t it? How is this possible?’
Rachel sat there nodding quietly, staring at the screen again.
‘Do you realise how big this is?’ said Asher, jabbing at the e-mail.
His liquid crystal screen rippled. ‘Governments don’t have the ability
to do this. This is huge. This computer of yours going to make you
rich!’
‘Look, I really shouldn’t be telling you all this but I absolutely
have to get to the bottom of why your website has become involved.
You have to promise not to tell anyone about what you’ve seen.’
‘OK, I promise. But…this is huge! Never mind me, I’d be
surprised if military intelligence didn’t want to get their grubby mitts
on it.’ Asher noticed that Rachel hadn’t really heard his astute
observation.
‘It doesn’t predict location,’ she said distantly, almost detached,
still staring at the screen.
‘No, but surely it must still be worth something? Even without
locations,’ said Asher, not believing how analytical Rachel was being.
She seemed to be wrestling with herself in her head. Something was
taking a while to sink in. Asher suddenly had the feeling that there
was more to this than Rachel was letting on. Shouldn’t she be
jumping up and down? She was going to be rich, wasn’t she? Then
she turned to him, back in the room.
124 THE HIDDEN LAYER
‘The only ones who are going to make money from this are
LSI.Co because it’s their project. It was my idea and design but they
paid to make it happen. They own it all.’
‘But you’ll be credited, surely? You’ll be acclaimed!’
Rachel looked at Asher and thought for a second and then seemed
to chirp up.
‘Care to join me for some lunch?’
Asher glanced at his watch. It read 11:30am.
‘OK,’ he said, without hesitation.
Exactly one hour after he had hung up the Director strode into the
bar and went straight upstairs. He saw his friend sitting at a small
round metal table overlooking Waterloo Station’s main concourse. He
made his way on to the balcony and took the seat opposite.
‘Thanks for meeting me, it means a lot you know?’
‘Don’t mention it. Here, drink this. It’s your favourite.’ He handed
him a glass tumbler and eyed him cautiously. ‘What’s this about an
offer then?’
The Director downed the whisky in one and breathed the fumes
out.
‘This guy is the bane of my life,’ he said. ‘I need him taken care
of.’
‘Yes, like I said I’ll get someone on it right away,’ replied
Daintree. ‘Most of the guys are preparing for tomorrow but I’m sure I
can rustle up a team.’
‘I don’t just want him taken in. I need more. I need rid of him for
good.’ He squinted at Daintree to catch his reaction but Daintree was
conversational, almost playful.
‘What do you want me to do? He’s a kidnapper, that’s all. I can’t
rightly do anything more than hunt him down and apprehend him.
What you’re asking for would be illegal my friend.’
‘Indeed.’ The Director looked out over the plaza at the commuters
hurrying to their trains below. ‘Now, don’t be shocked at what I’m
about to say. This man is very rich. He’s pumped lot of money into
the project and the returns are huge. He’s also a tough character,
mentally agile. Won’t be cornered. Would fight tooth and nail not to
THE HIDDEN LAYER 125
be. Given that, I think it would be easy to force him to give your men
a reason to take him out. There’s a reward in it. Those investment
returns I mentioned? It’s all his at the moment. I suppose you could
get your hands on a slice of it, in his…absence?’
‘How much are we talking?’
‘A million.’
‘Hmm. What’s involved?’
‘Nothing you don’t already do day-to-day.’
‘What’s the plan?’
‘I thought you’d never ask,’ smiled the Director. ‘The plan is this.
We meet regularly on the London Eye. Usually just me, I think he
hangs out nearby and we talk by phone. I don’t know why, he
probably wants to watch me or something. Control freak. Last time he
was there in person. He won’t think anything of another meeting,
especially with what he wants from me. He’ll almost certainly have a
gun concealed on him somewhere. One that a cursory inspection by
the operators won’t pick up. I can’t prove it but I believe he never
goes anywhere without one. Wears a suit and a baseball cap. When
we’re near the top of the ride I’ll radio the operator and tell him
there’s a madman waving a gun around and that I’ve already called
you guys at the Met. He’ll have to stop the wheel, so he’s caged until
you get there. Ten minutes max, yes? Then under your command the
operator will lower the capsules to the ground and I guarantee that
when he sees you guys there he’ll open fire to try and make good his
escape. He’ll be a sitting duck and your boys will take care of him.
Easy. Can’t go wrong.’
‘But you’ll be in the capsule with him? He’ll take you hostage.’
‘No, I’ll book two capsules, one each and we’ll hold the meeting
by phone again. He won’t think anything of it – he loves eccentricities
like that. He’ll probably even compliment me on my style, the twisted
bastard.’
‘I have a couple of questions. This guy, he’s definitely a bad egg
right?’
‘Rotten through.’ The Director grimaced with spite as he said it.
‘Who is he? Do you know his name?’
‘No idea. If he had a name it would be false anyway. Haven’t got
a clue who he is at all. All I know is that he’s scum.’
‘Your engineer, you sure she’s good? She’s not implicated at all?’
126 THE HIDDEN LAYER
‘She’s innocent, I’m sure. Nothing’s happened to her yet but who
can say? Maybe he’s got something planned for her regardless of
what I do.’
‘Can’t rule it out. Can she stay with someone until this is over?’
‘By that do I take it you’re in?’
‘Not so fast, Tonto. I need to ensure there’s no fallout. I can’t
have any complications. If I do this it has to be clean OK?’
‘No question.’
‘So what about the engineer? Can she stay with family or
something?’
‘Rachel? She’s single and her parents live abroad so no direct
family. But she does have a cottage out on the coast. I could tell her to
hang out there for a couple of days. Take some well earned time off,
do some sunbathing and so forth. She’d probably buy that.’
‘Good. When do you want to do this?’
‘As soon as possible. I’m in a desperate position Ron. What about
it? A cool million. Easy money.’
‘How do we manage the payment?’
‘No problem. It’ll come to you in instalments over a couple of
years. The payments will be disguised as returns on a lucrative
investment. I can even arrange for it to be paid into a Swiss numbered
account if it makes you feel better.’
‘You’ve got this all worked out!’
‘Like I said I’m desperate. You’re my only hope. If not for me, do
it for Cassy and Liz.’
‘Liz must know all about this?’
‘Yes, she’s frantic. She doesn’t care how we get Cassy back. We
just want it to end.’
‘Well, that brings me to my last question. Where’s Cassandra?’
‘He’s taken her somewhere safe but he wouldn’t tell me. That
much I believe but for this plan to work he has to tell me where
during our meeting. He won’t return her himself – he’d see that as
being submissive. After I’ve convinced him that Rachel has been
dealt with, he’s promised to tell me where she is. I’ve no reason to
doubt him. Then the plan goes into action.’
‘Are you stupid man? What if he doesn’t tell you?’
‘He will. His single virtue is that he’s a man of his word. The only
reason he wouldn’t tell me is if he doesn’t believe me about Rachel.’
‘Then what?’
THE HIDDEN LAYER 127
‘Plan B. This all comes out in the open. You arrest him, take him
back to the Yard and charge him with possessing a firearm or
whatever. Coerce the answer out of him.’
‘OK. Then it becomes a standard case. Possible terrorist has taken
a little girl hostage. There’s one glitch – if he doesn’t tell you where
she is and we have to go in heavy, there’s a danger that we’ll need to
take him out. What’s the plan then?’
‘That’s the worst case scenario and I don’t really want to think
about it. If it comes down like that then it’ll be up to you guys to do
you forensic shit and track her down. You’re good at all that stuff.’
‘Don’t be so confident. It’s still a risk.’
‘I know! I know. But right now there’s no other option. It’s a risk
I’m willing to take.’
128 THE HIDDEN LAYER
THE HIDDEN LAYER 129
6
I Know What It Means
130 THE HIDDEN LAYER
THE HIDDEN LAYER 131
‘Well, they had a nice drink together in the sunshine and then I
don’t really know, it hasn’t ended yet…’
They both chuckled. Rachel caught herself starting to act like a
schoolgirl and sat up, serious. What was she doing? She was on
business, not a date! She was getting ahead of herself.
‘I’m really sorry about your brother. Do you have other family?’
‘I’ve got a sister who lives in Epsom and my parents who are
retired now. You?’
‘No brothers, no sisters. My parents live in France most of the
time so I only get to see them occasionally. What about your parents?
It must have hit them hard too.’
‘Harder than me I think,’ said Asher nodding sombrely. ‘My dad
always said he’d pay good money for the bastard to be hunted down
and shot. The police tried their damndest to track him down but you
know the police. If they don’t get them within a few days, they never
will. The trail goes cold and we’ve all got to put it behind us and
move on. Which is easier said than done.’
Asher tailed off, looking absently into his beer. There was a few
seconds of silence, then he perked up again.
‘Anyway, what about this bloody magic computer of yours? It’s
incredible! What are we going to do if we get another e-mail?’
Rachel shrugged.
‘Nothing.’
‘Nothing? How come?’
‘We can’t do anything at all. It doesn’t give us the location of the
next prediction. Even if it predicts a thousand deaths, there’s no way
of us telling where it’s going to happen. Those numbers on your
website are from all over the world, right?’
‘Yes…’ said Asher defiantly.
‘Then that’s what the computer is predicting: attacks all over the
world. We could tell someone but what are we going to say?’
‘But we have a moral responsibility here. Don’t you think
someone should know?’
‘Well yes but all we can say is, “Excuse me Mr Whoever, a
thousand people are going to die on Tuesday and it could be
anywhere in the world.” Then what happens when a thousand people
actually do die?’
134 THE HIDDEN LAYER
Rachel bent her head over her spritzer and located the straw with
her tongue then pouted her lips to drink. Feeling like a twenty five
year-old again, she looked coyly up at Asher as she sucked. Asher
smiled a bewildered smile back at her and took a gulp of his own
drink. This was turning out to be an interesting day.
security checks because most people are lazy? People just use their
date of birth or their cat’s name or the make of their car.’
‘But mine is such an obscure phrase it doesn’t actually make
sense.’
In frustration Asher glanced forwards and caught the eye of the
cab driver in the rear view mirror through the glass divide. His
dissatisfaction obviously showed on his face because the driver took
one look and interjected.
‘C’mon Miss,’ said the cabbie. ‘Tell ‘im the password!’
‘I beg your pardon?’ asked Rachel, taken aback that the driver had
been listening to their conversation.
‘Sorry for butting-in an all but it occurs to me that you ain’t gonna
solve this little puzzle of yours unless you trust matey ‘ere and tell ‘im
the password.’
Rachel glared at the driver for a second then rolled her eyes
dramatically.
‘Alright, for what it’s worth. But keep it quiet.’
‘Of course!’ exclaimed Asher indignantly.
Still holding his knee, Rachel leaned right over, cupped her hand
and whispered into Asher’s ear.
‘It’s The Xian Yin.’ She leaned back again.
Asher smiled.
‘I know what it means,’ he said.
like a satellite photo. They were approaching two thirds the way up
the Shell building, over 200 feet in the air. He glanced backwards
towards the hub and saw the spoke cables holding the rim of the great
white wheel edging towards the horizontal. Half way up. Quarter of a
turn. He dialled. It rang twice.
‘Yes,’ came a sharp voice.
‘It’s me.’
‘And?’ said the voice impatiently. ‘I hope you have some good
news for me,’ he added with an air of aloofness.
The Director took a deep breath.
‘Yes, I’ve done what you wanted. Rachel’s gone.’
‘Good. How?’ came the reply instantly.
One falter in the conversation would give the game away but the
Director answered seamlessly.
‘Someone I know was able to help,’ he reeled off.
‘Who?’ This was quick-fire, sharp.
‘An old friend,’ he ricocheted back, trying to keep pace.
‘When did it happen?’
The Director realised what was going on. He was being rushed on
purpose – a blatant attempt at lie detection. Hoping he’d say the
wrong thing or contradict himself under the pressure. Well, that ain’t
going to happen!
‘Last night,’ he said confidently. ‘She was found dead in her
apartment by a colleague this morning when she didn’t turn up for
work.’ The Director screwed his face up and hoped the Investor didn’t
know that Rachel worked mostly alone. No-one would even miss her
let alone visit her apartment to see if she was OK. There was silence
on the other end of the phone so he pressed on.
‘The local coroner is involved because it was unexpected but it’s
nothing to worry about. He should report death by non-dependant
drug taking. Misadventure.’
‘Why? How did she die?’ asked the Investor . His tone suggested
he was trying to suppress his curiosity. He was hooked! Now for the
clincher.
‘All the stress at work, looks like she’d taken cocaine for the first
time. Fatal overdose, unfortunately for her. Couldn’t bring herself to
snort it so injected it. Stopped breathing in her sleep.’
‘Huh. Has a certain…élan I suppose. You know how to keep
Ceptron running?’
140 THE HIDDEN LAYER
This had blindsided Rachel and she didn’t know what to think. A
rebuff was all she could come up with.
‘You’re not serious are you?’
‘Yes, completely,’ continued Asher, unabated. ‘The more I look
the more I see it! Rach, how old were you in 1980?’
‘1980? That’s when my parents got married...I was six at the time.
I was their bridesmaid.’
‘Wait, you recall not having a father until you were six?’
‘Yes of course.’
‘Did they ever mention someone called Ademia Taylor?’
‘No. Who is she?’ said Rachel. As she said it a flash of memory
from her childhood shone for a brief moment, like torchlight
sweeping across some old photographs in a dark attic.
‘I don’t know,’ said Asher frowning.
‘Oh my god, I’ve just remembered where I know that phrase
from!’ This time Rachel screwed her eyes up, recalling her early
years. ‘I remember eavesdropping on a conversation my parents were
having the day they married. They were talking about…’ she shook
her head, ‘…something had happened and I didn’t know what it was.
And they made a pact. Yes that was it! They made a pact… to never
talk about the whole thing ever again. I didn’t know what a pact was –
I thought it was like a voodoo doll or something. I was desperate to
find out so later that night I snuck back down to the kitchen and
searched through the dustbin. I never found the doll. But I did find a
newspaper article about some tragedy I didn’t really understand. I
could read some of the story but the words…they were so alien.
That’s what burned into my mind, you know? Stuck there ever since.
The Xian Yin.’
‘They kept it quiet,’ Asher said, almost to himself.
‘I don’t believe it,’ said Rachel in a trance and the rest of the cab
ride was spent in silence, which not even the driver broke.
7
Alker-Saltzered
148 THE HIDDEN LAYER
THE HIDDEN LAYER 149
‘Well?’
‘Uh, I’m still following up on a few things, so the jury’s still
out.’
‘Hm.’ Rachel frowned, a little disappointed with his answer,
then brightened up. ‘I’d love to go there some day.’
‘Why don’t you?’
‘I could I suppose. I don’t know any Chinese though. I wouldn’t
know where to start.’
‘You’d get by. I can help you. If all this stuff is true then you’ve
got unfinished business there. You should go.’
Rachel considered it for a while and nodded.
‘You know I think I will. Got to talk to my father first, get his
take on things. But I can’t see how we could be wrong on this. It all
fits too well.’
‘I don’t know how you’re staying so calm about it all. Someone
killed your half-sister Rach! Don’t you feel anything? Not angry or
sad?’
‘No, not really. I’m more stunned by the fact that I even had a
half-sister. Never mind that she was killed. Someone else did that
grieving a long time ago. That’s way in the past.’
Asher was getting agitated that Rachel didn’t seem to share his
outrage.
‘But what about the bomber? Don’t you want justice?’
‘How?’
‘Track him down and, and…’
‘What? Exact your revenge?’
‘I don’t know. Maybe?’
‘No, of course not! That would make me worse than him! And
Robert and Emma would still be dead.’ Rachel looked at him sternly.
‘Asher, you didn’t go to Beijing for that did you?’
‘Ha ha! Good grief, no! Like I said, just trying to trace Robert’s
last few days.’
Rachel looked sideways at him and their beer and dim-sum
arrived.
‘Ah! Here we go.’ But Asher’s sudden enthusiasm was cut
short.
‘I’m sorry sir, we’re out of Yanjing,’ announced the waiter.
Asher was crestfallen but perked back up when the waiter said: ‘Is
Tsingtao OK?’
THE HIDDEN LAYER 151
‘Yeah, great!’ The waiter served, poured and left. Happy again,
though Rachel suspected not as happy as he’d have been with
Yanjing, Asher continued probing.
‘What about your father? He kept it a secret from you for years.
How can you go along with that?’
‘We don’t know if any of this is for real yet. Anyway, what else
can I do? Hold a grudge and never speak to him again? That won’t do
any good. I love him and he was only doing what he thought was
right. People have good reasons for doing what they do Asher, even if
you don’t understand them at first.’
‘That’s the most compassionate thing I’ve heard for a long
time.’
‘You need to take a closer look at yourself. You have more
compassion than you realise.’
‘I do?’
‘Sure you do. It’s been hard for you all these years but you’ve
managed to stay straight and lead a decent life. You haven’t gone off
the rails. Yet. Want some advice?’
‘Go on.’
‘Whatever you’re thinking of doing, don’t.’
Asher didn’t reply and they dropped into an uncomfortable
silence as they studied the main course menus. Then, after a short
while, he announced: ‘I’m going to have the Peking duck with egg
noodles and black bean sauce.’
‘Kung Po chicken and jasmine rice for me.’
And that was the end of it. Nothing more was said about China
for the entire meal, with which they drank white wine instead of beer
and had three bottles between them. Through the evening Asher got
funnier and more charming and Rachel got smarter and even more
beautiful and by the end of dessert they were flirting full-on with each
other, much to the quiet amusement of the other diners.
‘You know what? I’dmire what you’re doing,’ slurred Rachel.
‘What’s that then?’
‘About your website and all. Amazing stuff. I wonder if anyone
uses it, seriously I mean, not like me or that bloody computer of mine.
Like the police or Her Majesty’s Secret Service.’
‘All I know is that it gets millions of hits a day. Thousands,
even. But you can’t tell who’s looking. No no no.’
152 THE HIDDEN LAYER
‘Ye –’
‘This is Oscar.’
‘– oo – nt.’
‘Hello? Hello? This is Oscar, can you hear me?’
‘– nt he –’
‘Hello? I want to abort. Listen, if you can hear me, please abort. I
don’t want to go through with it! Walk away!’
‘’
‘Hello? Can you hear me? Shit! SHIT!’
THE HIDDEN LAYER 155
There was no coffee. Instead the smooth piano and rich bass of
Robert Miles’ Children emanated from the speakers as Asher lay on
the bed fully clothed and Rachel hitched her skirt up and ran and
pounced on top of him laughing. They rolled once together across the
king-sized mattress, stopping just short of one edge with Rachel
underneath and Asher on top. With their legs entwined he pushed
himself up on his hands and looked down into her bright blue eyes.
Their stares faltered from eyes to lips a few times, the urge for
physical contact growing by the second, and then they thrust their
mouths together and kissed a long, hard, passionate, drunken kiss.
Hands ran through hair and arms hugged and squeezed torsos. Their
legs were wrapped around each other and Rachel’s skirt rode up as
they moved together.
They parted and grinned at each other like school children, then
kissed again. But this time Asher’s hand, instead of running through
her hair, was gently gripping her outer thigh. As they kissed more he
moved his hand slowly upwards, under the hem of her ridden-up skirt,
and carried on up until he could feel the cotton of her knickers against
her hips. Rachel made no moves to stop him, and in response started
her own exploration down Asher’s back and into his trousers. She slid
her hand down, through the hair in the small of his back and under the
elastic of his boxers until her hand was firmly on his buttocks. She
gripped and squeezed and as she did so Asher slid one finger under
the cotton of her knickers, then his whole hand, then slowly moved it
round onto Rachel’s warm, soft bottom. He squeezed the flesh and
with their lips still interlocked, she breathed in with a gasp.
Asher explored her mouth with his tongue and she did the same,
her tongue going slightly deeper than he’d dared. They broke off and
looked into each other’s eyes with a new understanding: no holds
barred.
‘Jason!’ she giggled.
‘Rachel!’
And then they dove once again into the kiss. Asher moved to one
side of Rachel and his hand quickly slid from her bottom, around her
thigh and to the front where he found what he was looking for, soft
and hairless. Rachel opened her legs for him, pushing her skirt up
around her waist as she scrambled at Asher’s fly buttons, pinging
them open one by one. He wasn’t wearing a belt; his trousers opened
easily and she felt no resistance as she slid her hand over his hairy
156 THE HIDDEN LAYER
belly and down inside his boxers again. She in turn found what she
was looking for and Asher groaned a sigh of satisfaction as she took a
firm but gentle hold.
Rachel started unbuttoning Asher’s shirt with her free hand and
Asher fumbled to undo her blouse to gain access to her bra. After a
scramble they were at last fully naked, pleasuring each other under
the harsh glare of the overhead bedroom light as the track played on,
nearing its end. At the crescendo of the song they climaxed together
and were finally satisfied. Exhausted, Rachel quickly fell asleep and
Asher lay looking at her naked form for a few minutes, then felt the
waves of tiredness wash over him a few times. He dragged the duvet
up over them both, pulled the light cord and in the darkness drifted
into a deep sleep, induced partly by alcohol but mostly by his
dwindled supplies of energy and his absolute happiness.
The dark BMW’s main beam lit the tarmac ahead as it sped along
the A-road out of London towards the coast. The bald driver smiled to
himself. He was good at this game. It was all about pre-emptive
moves. Block your opponent. Set yourself up for the attack at the
same time. How far ahead could he think? He had predicted that
under the circumstances she wouldn’t feel safe in the Big Smoke any
more and would retreat as fast as she could to the place she loved the
most and felt safest. And he was going to be there to welcome her.
Yes, welcome her. That bitch! How dare she? She was living her life
in blissful ignorance while he was made to suffer the endless torture
of knowing the true sequence of events. For not a single day in the
last three decades had he been free of that resentment. She had stolen
the only thing he’d ever held dear. Stolen, taken as her own, and then
smashed what was left to pieces! Why should she have everything and
he have nothing? Well now the tables were turned. He was going to
take the one thing she cherished as his own. Something that she had
put her life into. Conceiving, designing, nuturing, cherishing. That
damn computer was going to make him unstoppable and now, with
the only obstacle out of the way, it would be like taking sweets from a
child.
THE HIDDEN LAYER 157
his guard down. He was proud of his cool composure and he had
momentarily lost it. How dare she put him through this!
No. Calm down. Focus. Think of the game. Yes. Like a game of
chess. Think ahead, move for move. But this was just going to be
check for now. He was going to make her pay for everything. Be
patient. The end game would come soon enough.
Asher could hear a far away beat and jovial, raised voices. The
buoyant sounds faded in and out. Music, laughter, clinking glasses.
He stepped through the doorway. Before him laid out like a General’s
view of the battlefield was an enormous nightclub dance-floor. Dark
and smoky, pulsating and fluorescent. He floated down the steps and
could feel every one of a thousand pairs of eyes fixed on him. The
sounds of the club were still muted, distant, though he was there, in its
midst. The eyes bobbed up and down in time with the beat and the
massed army of dancers parted for him as he walked forwards onto
the dance floor. The girl stood at the far side, smiling coquettishly at
him. He didn’t know her but strangely he thought he did. She looked
like an angel but naughty, dressed in short black. Revealing. She
turned and walked away, suddenly naked. The rounds of her buttocks
rising and falling as she walked in slow motion. Asher could feel his
erection, strong and hard. He looked down. He too was naked now,
standing proud. No shame. He was relishing this moment. He had
never been exposed in front of so many people.
Somehow she was now reclining on a sofa with one foot on the
floor. Her back was arched and as she moved her arms up behind her
head her breasts stretched and flattened. Her skin glistened. Asher
looked through a window at her, then like magic he was there on the
sofa beneath her and they were joined and moving rhythmically to the
ever-present beat. It felt good. Oblivious to the watchers. He wrapped
his arms around her and her body heat made his chest sweat against
her back. With his left hand he cupped her right breast and squeezed
the nipple, and with his right he rubbed her in a strong circular
motion. She breathed in sharply and her body convulsed. She held her
THE HIDDEN LAYER 159
breath for a few seconds, then exhaled. Still thrusting slowly to the
rhythm he nuzzled and kissed the side of her neck, her black hair
falling over his face and he smiled. And came.
Asher turned over in his bed. It was a few seconds until he
realised what had happened. He opened his eyes immediately and
knew that the throbbing beat wasn’t music, it was in his temples.
Rachel had her back to him, sleeping peacefully on her front beneath
the white duvet with one knee up in the classic recovery position. He
hoped he hadn’t uttered anything during his lucid dream that would
have freaked her out. Or at least that she was asleep enough to have
not heard. Fuzzy through his headache, Asher studied her lines for a
moment. She was beautiful, serene. Her dark hair splayed partly over
the pillow, partly over her face. Her shoulders were smooth and
uncovered and Asher knew she had nothing on under the duvet either.
Last night’s drunken groping had seen to that. If the bed clothes were
removed, he guessed that in that position he would have been able to
see more than she would have wanted him to. Normally he would
have been excited by such a thought but he was already spent.
He got out of bed and tip-toed quietly, so as not to wake her, to
the small en-suite to wash himself. After cleaning up he sat down on
the fluffy toilet seat lid for a few minutes with his eyes closed,
spinning the dream-sequence through in his head, re-living the
euphoric moment. The music, the people, the lust. The headache.
Finally he opened his eyes, yawned, stretched and woke up properly.
What a nice morning.
Naked and mentally absent, he got up walked back into the
bedroom. Rachel was already up and standing next to the bed, also
undressed and about to retrieve her underwear from the floor. She
looked up, startled, and they both instinctively moved their hands to
cover as much of their intimate parts as possible. Easy for him, harder
for her but she managed. They looked sheepishly at each other. Asher
could feel another erection coming on.
‘Morning!’ he said wide-eyed and smiled as if he was greeting a
colleague at the office.
‘Hi. Ah…I was just um…’ said Rachel. With her eyes she
motioned to her underwear lying on the floor and Asher realised he
should do the gentlemanly thing.
‘Sorry!’ he blurted. He closed his eyes and spun around.
Oh God, I bet my arse is spotty.
160 THE HIDDEN LAYER
With his eyes still shut Asher covered his bottom with his hands.
Certain that he could now look straight ahead, he opened his eyes to
see Rachel in the full-length mirror next to the bathroom door
straightening up from retrieving her underwear. Their eyes locked and
like rabbits in the glare of each other’s headlights they froze again and
stared at each other’s neatly framed full-frontal reflections. But this
time there were no cover-ups.
At first they looked into each others eyes speechlessly. After a
few seconds the stares began to falter and make short trips down the
torso to other parts of their bodies and then back up to the eyes. Then
they took longer sweeps, openly studying each other’s forms in the
long mirror. After a whole minute of silent, mutual interrogation
Rachel spoke.
‘Thank you,’ she said quietly, clutching her underwear but making
no attempt to hide her modesty. ‘That was very gallant of you to turn
away to save my honour. You may turn back now.’
Asher glanced backwards over his shoulder and slowly turned to
face her, his hands still covering his bottom. Another few seconds
passed, face to face, eyes wandering. Rachel dropped her knickers on
the floor once more and Asher felt a sudden rush of adrenaline. He
was there again. Tensed and excited, standing proud. His heart raced.
They almost ran at each other and collapsed on to the bed, their
limbs entangled and writhing. Asher surprised himself and during the
next ten minutes he had one of the best, if not the best sexual
encounter he’d ever had in his life.
Then, after dozing for another half hour, happy and exhausted and
with their blood laced with the drug of lust, Rachel got up and dressed
silently in front of Asher. He watched her perfect curves moving in
smooth coordination as she clothed herself.
‘I have to go to work,’ she stated matter-of-factly when she was
done. Asher smiled and said nothing.
‘I don’t usually do this,’ she continued. ‘I mean sleeping with a
guy on the first date.’
Asher smiled again.
‘Don’t worry about it,’ he said playfully. ‘Neither do I. I ah, I
don’t know if it’s obvious to you but I sense we’ve got some kind of
a…’ He waved his hand back and forth between Rachel and himself.
‘…thing going on here?’
Rachel let out a snort of laughter and smiled at the floor.
THE HIDDEN LAYER 161
Soon after Rachel had left, Asher had breakfasted and Alker-
Saltzered and was washed, clean shaven, dressed and smelling of CK
One. What a morning! Sitting at his computer once again, he quickly
navigated through three or four of his favourite news sites as he
always did to make sure he got the details right.
‘Mustn’t make any mistakes now!’ he said to himself. ‘Not now
that Sssseptron is watching…oooeee Big Brother, hello, can you hear
me…?’ He jokingly spoke into the monitor screen as if it could hear
him. There was no response and he suddenly felt foolish. Perhaps he
was still drunk, he thought to himself.
He pulled up his publishing package and opened the website for
editing remotely. Scrolling straight to the end of the main data table,
he added a new entry at the bottom and typed in the details of the
M25 bombing, smiling to himself. Luckily for him on this occasion
all the news agencies seemed to agree on the final statistics. Time of
detonation: 8:45am. Number of casualties: 234. Thinking nothing
about the shocking number he chuckled to himself. How on earth did
he miss it? It was all so obvious with 20/20 hindsight.
The first coffee had disappeared quickly so Asher published the
page and went to make another one. He sat on his breakfast stool in
the kitchen and as he was stirring in the milk a message popped up on
his computer screen in the living room. It said “You have 1 unread e-
mail” but he was oblivious to it. In fact he couldn’t even see it from
where he was sitting so instead he carried on stirring his coffee and
thinking about Rachel. He hadn’t felt as optimistic about the future in
years and he let his thoughts drift.
An upturned fly buzzed frantically in the corner of the kitchen
window until it was the right way up and started climbing the glass
162 THE HIDDEN LAYER
again. Asher idly opened the window to let it out into the sunshine.
He watched almost under a spell as it weaved off into the morning
outside, bringing back memories of when he was a little boy at his
parents’ old place in a more leafy suburb further out of town. In the
summer he would try to catch insects and put them in matchboxes,
usually without success. But every now and again he would get one
and proudly carry the poor insect around in his pocket until his
mother made him release it. He could almost feel the noisy little
matchbox in his pocket now. Every now and then there would be a
gentle buzz against his thigh and he would smile and right at that
moment the trapped bluebottle was all he cared about. He would be in
control, king of his world. In the distance he could hear his mother’s
voice: Jason, let that insect go! Reluctantly he pulled the matchbox
from his pocket and opened it up. It stopped buzzing and put it to his
ear. He blinked and shook his head as he snapped forward thirty years
back to the present. His flip-phone stopped vibrating.
‘Hello?’
‘Hello Mister,’ said Rachel on the other end. Asher lifted
completely from his daydream.
‘Hi Sexy. You OK?’
‘Nearly at work. Meet up later?’
‘Sure, I’ll come in to town.’
‘Great. I uh…enjoyed this morning.’
‘Me too.’
Silence.
‘See you later then,’ she said.
‘Yeah, see you later.’
Asher smiled and closed his phone. Talk about moving fast.
was standing but from up on the surface there was no sign of it. She
looked down the perfectly aligned main axis of the Wharf complex to
the glittering tower at the other end and smiled. Everything felt so
nice this morning. The sun was shining and warm once again, she
loved her job and finally something might be happening in her
personal life. In the little park the morning keep-fitters were all lined
up on the lawn, stretching into their various yoga positions. She
passed the ghetto-blaster lying to one side playing relaxing pan-pipe
music and said good morning to the instructor.
She continued a brisk pace up West India Avenue, lined with its
many lime trees and into Cabot Square, a more open, concreted plaza.
Suits and laptops now instead of shorts and t-shirts. She exited the
square and continued on up The North Colonnade, where a newspaper
stand stood back from the road-side. Today’s headline read : “Wharf
Man Murdered On Wheel”. Tutting at the madness of the world in
general, Rachel stopped briefly to buy a paper and, folding it twice,
tucked it into her handbag. She continued on to Canada Tower,
smiling cheerily to the receptionists on the ground floor of the
building and she just caught an elevator as its doors were closing.
Everything was so right!
Five minutes later Rachel was reeling at the news. Her eyes were
wide and her mouth was open. It couldn’t be! Sitting in the small
room euphemistically called the “O.H. Department”, she had just one
thought in her head. This must be a joke. Wasn’t it? The woman from
Occupational Health was looking at her, concerned.
‘Are you OK?’
Rachel blinked.
‘You’re not serious are you?’
‘I’m sorry. It’s terrible news, I know. You were obviously close to
him, working with him every day. Probably the closest person in the
company. He saw you as his protégé you know? He always told the
board that you were working on ground-breaking technology. He
loved boasting about you.’
‘What happened?’
164 THE HIDDEN LAYER
‘We don’t know the exact sequence of events yet but we do know
his daughter’s gone missing. The police think it’s linked. His wife is
distraught. Do you know his wife?’
Rachel had been invited to their house a number of times for
dinner, drinks or whatever sucking-up activities one was supposed to
engage in to impress one’s boss but had always had, or maintained to
have had clashing appointments. The truth was that she had never felt
comfortable about mixing socially with her superiors, especially as a
young, single woman who worked for a slightly older, slightly
handsome, albeit family, man. On the one occasion that she had met
her boss’ wife at a company barbeque, she had also got the impression
that she saw her as a little bit of a threat. After-all, they did work
along-side each other day-in, day-out.
‘No,’ said Rachel.
‘Oh. Well, never mind. How do you feel?’
‘How the hell do you think I feel? I’m shocked. I need answers.’
‘Well that’s partly why we’re here, to try to find answers to your
questions. That way you can begin to deal with your emotions.’
‘Not emotional answers, factual ones! How did he die?’
‘The police think he was murdered.’
‘Murdered?’ repeated Rachel, alarmed.
‘Yes. They think he got himself caught up in some sort of terrorist
activity.’
Rachel groaned and went pale.
‘Unbelievable isn’t it?’
‘Who killed him?’
‘Well they think it might have been a business partner. Not
someone from the company you understand.’ She laughed nervously.
‘Someone outside who he might have been dealing with. Do you
know of any, uh, slightly dodgy characters he might have known?’
‘No. Look I’ve got to get out of here. I’m going away for a couple
of days to get my head straight.’ She stood up to leave.
‘No problem. I’ll let the relevant people know.’
‘Thanks. One question. What will happen to me now? My work?’
‘I suppose you’ll have to explain what you were working on to his
superiors and they’ll make the decision to carry on or not.’
‘Or not?’ Rachel was alarmed.
‘As you’ve explained, you were working on his projects. When
you’re back you can tell them all about it and maybe they’ll just let
THE HIDDEN LAYER 165
He had a day to kill but that would easily be used up. He thought
about what he could do in the meantime. First thing, check e-mails.
Back in the living room Asher sat down in front of the computer, took
a gulp of coffee and opened his single unread message.
From: mpbd@dhhdgsiuag.net
To: jasher@r&jresearch.com
Sent: Fri 27th July 2012 8:31am
Subject: Requested data
Dear jasher@r&jresearch.com,
Here are the results of the data you requested:
Instrument: [DT]
Next price: 80000 Date: 27/JUL/2012 Time: --:--
Next high: --- Date: --/---/---- Time: --:--
Next low: --- Date: --/---/---- Time: --:--
‘You know she should have her mobile with her? You could try
that.’
‘I will, thank you. Do you know why she had to leave?’
‘Well she had some bad news today. We all did. I can’t really say
any more than that I’m afraid.’ The end of her sentence rose as if she
was about to cry but was stifling it.
‘Really? Is she OK?’
‘As far as I know yes.’ Asher could hear the woman’s voice falter
and she let out a little sob. ‘But that’s all I know.’
‘Excuse me but are you OK?’
‘Sorry. I’ll be fine.’
‘OK. Thanks for your help then.’
‘You’re welcome.’
‘Bye.’
Asher tried Rachel’s mobile but got just her answer phone, so he
hung up. Come on Rach, where are you? She couldn’t have
disappeared that quickly. He tried again with the same result. He sat
looking out of the window, cradling the remainder of his coffee in the
mug. If he couldn’t reach Rachel to confirm what was going on, the
only thing left was for him to assume the worst. Which meant he had
to tell someone. He grabbed the phone book and leafed through the
pages until he came to the entry for ‘Police’. Below the main entry
was an long list of local offices. No, this was no good. He needed
something bigger. Almost immediately it came to him - he needed the
Metropolitan Police. He was always seeing them on TV. That was
where they had the different departments like the Flying Squad and
Anti-Terrorism. He’d ring them. They’d know what to do. Asher
reached for his old mouse again and opened up an internet search
page to look for their number. Then he stopped and thought for a
second. No…he had a better idea.
168 THE HIDDEN LAYER
THE HIDDEN LAYER 169
8
Everybloodything
170 THE HIDDEN LAYER
THE HIDDEN LAYER 171
Nothing and no-one would interrupt her and she was going to think
about all the things that had been going on recently. After all an awful
lot of things had happened and she figured she needed at least that
long to get her head straight. She started going through the events one
by one. Her boss had been killed. That was shocking enough in itself,
let alone the fact that someone had tried to kill her on this very same
journey a few days ago. Plus she’d screwed a guy she hardly knew,
which was very unlike her indeed. And on top of everything there was
Emma who existed at the very least in theory, but at the most had
been Rachel’s very real half-sister.
After two hours of careful driving she turned off from the main
road onto the smaller one that lead along the shore to Ocean View and
got to thinking back to her previous journey again. Suddenly panic set
in. What if the guy who’d killed her boss was still following her?
What if he was waiting for her at home right now? Or worse still what
if he was somewhere behind her in a car, trailing her, unseen.
Followed her all this way again. She glanced in her rear-view mirror
and, seeing no other vehicles, turned physically in her seat to look
backwards, just to reassure herself that the mirror wasn’t lying. There
was definitely nobody there but that didn’t stop Rachel changing her
plans.
A little out of his depth, Asher eyed the man up and down. He
knew that he was in the presence of the head of SO13, Deputy
Assistant Commissioner Ronald Daintree. He knew this not from the
symbols on the epaulettes of his impeccable uniform, as they meant
nothing to Asher, but from the polished brass plaque on his office
door. Of his own doing Asher had been frisked, scanned and checked
and now found himself sitting in Daintree’s plush office at New
Scotland Yard in the heart of Westminster. Asher, having never met a
police officer of this standing, was a little nervous about the situation,
particularly considering the extent of what he was trying to tell them.
They were surely going to lock him up!
‘Sergeant Dunmore tells me you have some information that you
think is pertinent to a crime that is about to happen?’ opened Daintree
with his dry, low voice. He looked quizzically at Asher.
THE HIDDEN LAYER 173
‘Yes,’ he said ‘But that’s beside the point! Her machine is sending
me predictions of atrocities about to occur and now that I know what
they are I feel duty-bound to report them to some kind of authority!’
Asher reached for the wad of paper in his back pocket. ‘Look. I’ve
printed out the last few e-mails and…and here are corresponding
newspaper headings reporting them. You can see the e-mails all
precede the reports by a day.’
Daintree took the papers and sifted through them with an
uncomfortable look on his face, as if he had the sun in his eyes. He
put them down.
‘These are just pieces of paper Mr Asher. Anyone with a word
processor could have written these e-mails and printed them off.’
‘But I didn’t! These are real e-mails!’
‘That may be the case but you must understand that from my point
of view they don’t constitute solid evidence of anything at all. That
said, I’m going to keep them for reference.’
‘Can’t you trace them or something? Can’t MI5 do something?
What about GCHQ? Can’t they verify them? They listen to
everybloodything don’t they? I’m sure they must have intercepted the
data on it’s way from Rachel’s computer to mine!’
Daintree gave Asher a long, hard stare and Asher felt his bravado
shrivel under the glare.
‘Did Sergeant Dunmore take your contact details?’ he asked
Asher finally.
‘Yes, she did.’
‘Good. Mr Asher, I’m sure you realise that this department has
many leads and many organisations to investigate. I’m afraid at this
point we don’t have the time or the resources to do anything without
any physical evidence.’
Asher was getting wound up now.
‘Well what would constitute physical evidence then?’ he blurted,
then regretted the outburst. Daintree looked coolly at him and stuck
his thumb up.
‘Recordings of phone calls.’ He hit his thumb with the index
finger of his other hand, then continued counting on his fingers.
‘Traces of explosives. Photos of meetings. Videos from known terror
cell leaders. Code words.’ Then he jabbed his finger down on Asher’s
documents. ‘Not old newspaper clippings and a computer printout.’
176 THE HIDDEN LAYER
‘Fine! Eighty thousand people are going to die and you’re not
going to do anything. I don’t know why I even bothered coming!’
‘Listen to yourself Mr Asher. There is nothing to do. Where is this
act going to take place?’
Asher opened his mouth to say he didn’t know but Daintree knew
that already and interrupted again before he could speak.
‘Where is this machine? Where is the inventor? How on Earth can
a computer predict the future? I’ll tell you - it can’t! And on top of all
that, no single organisation ever managed to orchestrate an attack on
anything close to the scale you’re talking about. These are war
casualty figures, not the results of a terrorist act. I’m sorry Mr Asher
but nothing adds up, therefore I can do nothing.’
‘I’ll find Rachel,’ announced Asher defiantly. ‘She’ll have all the
details. It says this thing is going to happen today so I’ve got to try
and do something. I can’t just stand by and, and…’
‘Very well,’ replied Daintree. ‘Do as you wish, follow it up. Come
back when you’ve found her and have some concrete evidence. I’m
sorry you’ve wasted your afternoon.’
He stood and waited for Asher to do the same.
‘I’m sorry too,’ said Asher curtly. ‘Thanks for your time.’
‘Not at all. The sergeant will show you out.’
‘Thanks.’
Daintree walked over to his office door and found Sergeant
Dunmore still waiting in the corridor. He said a few words to her
quietly and when she replied it was just loudly enough for Asher to
overhear.
‘Yes sir, I’ll get on it right away,’ he heard her say quietly.
Daintree nodded and went back inside leaving Asher in the care of
Sergeant Dunmore. She smiled and showed him along the corridor.
‘You must be special,’ she said to Asher.
‘What do you mean?’
‘No-one is ever interviewed personally by the Deputy Assistant
Commissioner. He must have a special interest in you.’
‘Really? I didn’t think he was interested at all,’ said Asher,
puzzled.
‘Oh, yes. I reported your statement to the Inspector and before I
knew it I’d been summoned by the head honcho. You know you
skipped five ranks?’ The young sergeant seemed to be impressed by
this feat.
THE HIDDEN LAYER 177
He knew what his next move had to be. Rachel held the key to
unlocking this mess. He pulled his mobile from his pocket and
pressed last-number redial.
‘Hi. This is Rachel. I can’t take your call now but leave a
message!’
‘Hi Rach. Where are you?’ started Asher in frustration. He
stopped and started again, more calmly. He explained about the new
e-mail and his trip to the Met then hung up. He had to find her and big
as central London was, at least he had a vague idea of where she lived
and worked. He needed the Jubilee Line. After obtaining directions
from the constable who had been assigned to look official in front of
the iconic revolving sign and a brisk walk up to Parliament Square he
found Westminster Underground. He rode the tube across to Canary
Wharf and got the escalator up into Reuters Plaza where people were
starting to gather in the bars after work. To his right, the towering
hulk of One Canada Square gleamed in the sunlight. Asher craned his
neck and looked up at fifty stories of steel and glass. That was where
Rachel worked, on one of those floors. But she wasn’t there. The lady
on the phone had confirmed that. Where then? Where?
Rachel had almost reached the front door when she stopped in her
tracks. She looked up at the living room windows on the upper storey
and tightened her grip on the crook-lock. That was odd. There was a
light on, spilling yellow out through a chink in the curtains. It’s broad
daylight. There shouldn’t be any lights on. And why were the curtains
closed? Her heart skipped a beat, then thumped faster and she felt her
hands go clammy as the fight-or-flight response took over her body.
She had thought she was going to be safe here. Bloody hell, if this
wasn’t a safe-house then she had nowhere else to go! This had to end
right now.
With her free hand starting to tremble with adrenaline Rachel
turned the key in the lock, opened the door and stepped inside. She
closed the door quietly behind her, turning the latch herself so the
spring didn’t force it to click back loudly. The downstairs lights were
off but she knew the layout well enough. To her right the gloomy
hallway veered off to the downstairs bedrooms and directly in front of
THE HIDDEN LAYER 179
her a shaft of warm light poured down the stairs from the living area.
Breathing deliberately and slowly to control her fear she crept quietly
up the stairs clinging tightly to the banister rail and preparing to use
her weapon.
The top of the stairs opened out into the terracotta-tiled open plan
living area. Her heart was racing and she could feel her pulse beating
in her ears. The veins in her temples were throbbing as she neared the
top of the staircase. Despite all the things that had happened to Rachel
lately nothing had prepared her for what happened next. She reached
the top and suddenly there was a loud, two-toned greeting from two
people she knew very well and loved very much.
‘Surprise!’ her parents shouted in unison from the kitchenette
area. Rachel’s heart jumped out of her chest and she dropped the
crook-lock with a clang. The shock quickly gave way to relief as she
was overcome with joy at seeing her family so unexpectedly. She
burst into tears and ran over to her bewildered parents who were
waving half emptied glasses of red wine at her.
‘Mum! Dad!’ she cried and hugged them both hard. ‘What are you
doing here?’
‘Well it is our house darling,’ said her mother, sarcastically
indignant.
‘I wasn’t expecting you for another week!’ Rachel wiped some of
the tears from her eyes and sniffed.
‘Well we decided to come over early. The weather down there is
atrocious! Much nicer here. Darling what’s wrong?’
‘Oh! Nothing,’ said Rachel, checking herself and realising that
weeping and bear hugging would seem to them like a gross over-
reaction to seeing them again. A kiss on the cheek usually sufficed
whenever they saw each other.
‘Why are you crying then?’ asked her mother, taking her usual
blundering matter-of-fact approach.
‘Oh, this? Just some weird stuff has been going on lately,’ said
Rachel pointing to her father’s glass. ‘Give me one of those and I’ll
tell you about it. And dad?’
‘Hello sweetie!’ her father perked up, pleased to be included in
the conversation.
‘You might want to pour yourself another one before I start.’ She
looked at him though glistening eyes. Her mental image of him had
changed over the last few days and now she was trying to fit this new
180 THE HIDDEN LAYER
image to the man she saw in front of her. She still didn’t know what
to feel about the way they had kept the secret from her for so many
years. It was completely out of character for her mother and Rachel
suspected she would have an enormous guilt complex about it. She
had probably gone along with it because she was in love with him.
Her father – he was the driving force behind this. He was the one who
broke his marriage vows and had engaged in adultery. He who
sacrificed a whole family for his own self-centred egotism. She had to
find out if it was all true. Right now. From her father, in his own
words.
Her mother poured Rachel a glass of wine and after refreshing her
husband’s and her own they all sat down together in the seating area.
Rachel decided to just go for it.
‘The Xian Yin,’ she said.
‘Oh my god!’ Her mother looked quickly at her father with wide
eyes then covered her mouth as if she had just given something away.
Her father ignored her and held Rachel’s gaze, calm and collected.
He was prepared for this, thought Rachel. There was a long
silence. An eternity, during which Rachel very much wanted
somebody to speak but no words came to her, nor apparently to her
father either. That was it, she’d done it. The cat was out. The ball was
in his court but the silence continued. Eventually her father came to a
conclusion.
‘Tell me how much you know,’ he said quietly, ‘and I’ll tell you
the rest.’
Her mother gasped and her father turned to say something. She
understood immediately – this was between him and his daughter.
‘Who wants bacon sandwiches?’ she said quickly and got up. She
hesitated and when no reply was forthcoming she nodded and headed
off to the kitchen. Rachel held her glass by its stem and span it back
and forth in her fingers. She felt awkward about the situation she had
just created.
‘Thanks mum. Sorry.’
‘Don’t mention it dear!’ called her mother as she disappeared
below the counter top to peer into the grill. Rachel took a large gulp
of wine, not noticing it was a robust Rioja, which she didn’t usually
like. She took a long slow breath in and out as the wine settled inside.
‘I’ll start from the beginning,’ she said. ‘You remember the
project I’m working on don’t you? Well a couple of days ago I was
THE HIDDEN LAYER 181
contacted by a guy who said he’d been getting spam e-mails from my
system with meaningless data in them. The guy runs a research
agency for the government but his side-hobby is collecting terrorist
activity data. He has a website that has thousands of acts of terrorism
listed. Why he does it I don’t know but I guess that’s his business. His
brother was killed in a bombing in Beijing so I suppose it probably
has something to do with that. The attack was on a bar called The
Xian Yin, which was apparently almost completely destroyed. It
doesn’t exist any more. Anyway, I’ve known that phrase – The Xian
Yin – all my life but I’ve never known what it meant. I think I
overheard you once when I was little. This guy I met, Asher,
explained it to me. He said he had studied the incident closely over
the years and had copies of photos of all the victims. He said I looked
just like another Brit who had died there. She was called Emma
Taylor. She had a father called Richard and a mother called Ademia.
It all fitted except for one thing. I tried not to jump to conclusions dad
but Asher made a convincing argument that was too close for
comfort. Is he right dad? Were you married to this woman? Did I
have a half-sister?’
Rachel’s father grunted and gazed out over the dunes towards the
sea. He bowed his head.
‘How can you ever forgive me Rach? I loved Emma more than
anything, more than I loved her mother. When she died we were both
devastated but by that time our marriage was already falling apart. It
was a defining day in all our lives. I was already seeing your mother
at the time. In fact, as I recall, you were already six. I was given an
easy way out – a brand new life. A ready-made family. From loveless
to loving in one easy step. I’m ashamed to think of the way I treated
Ademia back then. The poor woman lost her daughter and her
husband in quick succession. But at least she –’
He stopped abruptly and sighed.
‘At least she what?’
‘Oh, nothing. Nothing. Look Rach, please understand it had
nothing to do with your mother OK? Margaret and I were so in love. I
made her promise. It was my way of trying to tidy up the god-awful
mess that was my previous life.’
‘But why didn’t you ever tell me?’
‘It’s been the hardest thing I’ve ever had to do. I’ve always hated
keeping it a secret. I was afraid of what you’d think of me. We were
182 THE HIDDEN LAYER
just starting out as a little family and for once in my life everything
was so…perfect. I didn’t want to ruin that.’
‘We all have secrets, I suppose,’ said Rachel.
‘Just some are bigger than others,’ replied her father, nodding.
Rachel spent the evening learning who her father was again. The
life he had had before with this stranger. Rachel cried at the part
where they received news that Emma had been killed. How the police
had arrived and how, within an hour of them leaving, their marriage
had gone beyond any hope of repair.
He had waited long enough. It was clear to him now that this was
neither the time nor the place. Reluctantly the bald man stood and
walked to the refrigerator, secreting his gun in the back of his trousers
once again. The fridge was sparsely populated and what was there
didn’t appeal to him much. He opened a cheese triangle and ate it,
then washed it down with a swig of orange juice. Then he slammed
the fridge door shut and crossed back through the living room,
stomped down the stairs and out to the front where his car was parked
a little way along.
window down to the road. A pang of fear shot through her as a dark
blue car cruised past outside. Rachel caught a few glimpses of it
through the trees that lined the pavement as it carried on its way and
out of sight. That was definitely a BMW 5 series. Same colour too. My
god, am I being paranoid or what? Calm down. There must be
thousands of similar cars on the road. It’s just some neighbour going
out for a drive.
‘Hurry up Rachel, it’s everywhere!’
‘Coming!’ She squeezed the cloth and hurried back over to clean
up what looked for all the world like a murder scene.
The bald man’s journey back to London was fast and silent. He
was angry that he’d been wrong-footed by Rachel but was totally
focused on his next move. He would go back to where he saw her last.
Wait for her there. If she didn’t turn up by chance then he’d just have
to call her again, just like he had done the first time.
When he finally got back to Canary Wharf a further idea struck
him: home. He realized that Rachel had two homes, one on-wharf and
one back on the coast. Of course! He hit the steering wheel and swore.
Why hadn’t he thought of that before? He knew exactly where she
lived; that should have been the first place he tried. He sped down the
crisp streets to Rachel’s swish apartment near the jetty. He tried her
buzzer. Waited. No answer. He tried again. Waited. Still nothing and,
since it was a gated development and he didn’t have any other
options, he decided to switch back to Plan A. Disgruntled but not
entirely annoyed, he got back in his car and drove back out to Cabot
Square near the tower, where he dumped the car underground and
started on his journey back up to where he’d first seen Rachel. He
would find her soon, he was sure of it.
Asher had visited the Wharf a couple of times in the past but
couldn’t claim to know the area at all. The only landmark he knew
was the main tower and now he stood on the Colonnade looking up at
the huge steel and glass building disappearing into the blue sky.
184 THE HIDDEN LAYER
9
Antigravity? Megabucks!
186 THE HIDDEN LAYER
THE HIDDEN LAYER 187
‘H i Rach. Where are you? I called your work and they said
you had to leave for personal reasons. They gave me your
mobile number. Are you OK? Uh, listen…I received another e-mail.
A big one if you know what I mean. Really big. And it’s going to
happen today. I need to talk to you straight away. In person. So get in
touch when you get this, OK? … I had to go to the police this time.
I’ve just come out. I thought they’d think I was crazy and lock me up
but all they said was there was nothing they could do. It’s weird but
the head guy there kind of acted like he knew you. Look Rach, either
your machine has gone really wrong or something big is going to
happen, and I mean big with a capital B. Shit. Ring me back on this
number. It’s my mobile. Bye.’
Rachel clicked her phone off. She wasn’t about to return Asher’s
call - she had to get back to London straight away. What a wasted
journey! There was obviously a problem with the system and boss or
no boss she couldn’t afford to have it destabilised by a silly little
computing error. She had to find and disconnect whatever rogue feed
was causing the problem. Rachel had put too much in to getting
Ceptron on its feet – it was a sensitive thing and although she was
terribly shaken by her boss’ death she couldn’t leave it now.
She had thought hard on the journey to her parents’ house. She
was going to have to come clean and tell the Board about what they’d
been funding for the last five years and she had no idea how they
were going to react. Had barely even spoken to any of them. In fact
looking back now, the only one with whom she had ever had contact
was the Director of Technology. They’d probably be shocked that
their capital had been frittered away on research and theory. On the
other hand the fact that Ceptron seemed to be a runaway success
might soften the blow for them. Maybe that would be enough to
convince them that she, and now she alone, hadn’t squandered their
many millions of pounds on essentially thin air and computers. She
188 THE HIDDEN LAYER
would just have to bite the bullet and hope for the best. In her mind
she gave the sequence of events a more positive spin to build her
confidence. She would request an emergency meeting with the Board,
lay it all on the table and they would say how sorry and sad they were
to see such a fine man cut down in his leadership prime but, hey, look
at the great legacy he has left behind in Ceptron and Rachel. Easy.
Then they would appoint a new Director of Technology and she
would continue her work as before. She would worry about the
circumstances of her boss’ death later.
She hurried back to the guest bedroom and threw her few
possessions back into the valise that was open and waiting on the bed.
She locked it and dumped it in the hallway then as she made her way
back upstairs she retrieved Asher’s number from her call list and
dialled.
‘Hello?’ came the reply almost immediately.
‘Hi Asher it’s Rachel.’ She walked out on to the terrace and
slumped into a deck chair in the warm sunshine.
‘Where are you?’ said the tinny voice in the earpiece.
‘I just had to get away for a bit.’
‘OK, whatever.’ Asher was hurrying his words out. ‘As long as
you’re OK. Did you get my message?’
‘Yeah I did. I’m sure it’s nothing. I’m going to make my way
back to London tonight to check out Ceptron. Your e-mail – exactly
how big was it?’
‘Eighty thousand. Today.’ Followed by silence…this could be
serious. Rachel thought quickly.
‘Wow. Number like that, it’s probably just a glitch in the system.
I’ll check it out tonight,’ she said.
‘I don’t think so Rach. Not sure if it’s significant and it might just
be a coincidence but there was only a ten or twenty second interval
between when I updated my website and when I received the new e-
mail. I’m no expert but it looks to me like Ceptron’s got a spotlight on
my page.’
Asher’s voice suddenly became quieter as he continued his theory.
‘It analysed the data right away and e-mailed a new prediction straight
out. I double-checked my entry and I didn’t make any mistakes either.
Rach, we’ve got to do something.’
This altered the scenario and again Rachel was required to think
on her feet.
THE HIDDEN LAYER 189
It was four in the afternoon and the bald man sat with a coffee and
pastry in front of him at the same window seat in Blenders that Rachel
had occupied two days before. He had hoped to find her there again
but having thought about it rationally he had realised that she was too
private a person to spend time on her own in a public place, especially
as her apartment was so close. He had tried there too, with no luck, so
now he watched the people milling around in the shopping centre
through the thick glass, unable to hear them. The only noise inside the
shop was the light jazz music and the occasional clink of crockery and
orders being passed around behind the serving area. Given the recent
chain of events he had to find Rachel and quickly. Much to his
chagrin she had given him the slip. He hadn’t been able to locate her
anywhere, even at her work where they’d just told him that she’d
“gone away”. As he was mulling over how unhelpful they had been, a
young man sat down next to him with a large coffee and some cake.
He looked slightly dishevelled, as if he had been running and not had
time or didn’t care to sharpen himself up.
The unkempt man’s phone rang, muffled inside his pocket and he
pulled it out and answered in a hushed voice.
‘Hello?… Where are you?… OK, whatever, as long as you’re OK.
Did you get my message?… Eighty thousand… I don’t think so
Rach.’
Rach? The man with the pastry’s ears pricked up at the mention of
a familiar name. Must be a thousand Rachels in Canary Wharf; how
many Raches, he wondered? He couldn’t stop himself from listening
further and started eating his maple and pecan slice to give the
impression he was minding his own business. The scruffy man
continued.
‘Not sure if it’s significant, and it might just be a coincidence, but
there was only a ten or twenty second period between when I updated
my website and when I received the new e-mail. I’m no expert Rach
but it looks to me like Ceptron had a spotlight on my page.’
He nearly choked on his pastry and the man on the phone glanced
in his direction and lowered his voice some more. Now he knew
exactly who the caller was, and who was on the other end. He kept
eating slowly, straining to hear the one-side of the conversation.
‘It analysed the data right away and e-mailed a new prediction
straight out,’ he continued. ‘I double-checked my entry and I didn’t
THE HIDDEN LAYER 191
make any mistakes either. Frankly it’s worrying… Sure, what?... OK,
but why?… Oh shit… Rach, I went to the police…’
At that point the caller turned away from the him and whispered
the rest of the conversation, rendering it inaudible. But he’d heard
enough already and by the time the unkempt man ended his call and
and turned back around, he was gone.
‘Well, as far as I can gather there’s been some kind of a mix up.
She has a machine that stumbled across some anomalies on my
website. Seems her computer couldn’t handle it. So I’m here to help
her out.’
‘Wow. You must be good. Rachel’s the best and if she can’t fix it,
we’re all in trouble! You some kind of consultant?’
‘Uh, not exactly. I’m kind of a data analyst myself, though my
data is more in the past than in the–’ Asher stopped himself short.
Had he said too much?
‘In the what? Future?’
‘Well…yes. Ha, sounds silly doesn’t it?’
‘Not at all. Down on twenty second we’d all heard rumours that
those guys upstairs were working on something that predicts stock
prices. Didn’t believe a word of it. Until today that is.’
‘Stock prices?’ He said it louder than he had intended and it was
almost a shout in the small confines of the elevator. Asher’s brain
slowly put two and two together to make the link between what
Rachel had told him about Ceptron and what she really did at LSI.Co.
The four he would have got, had he been bothered to think about it.
So that’s what the project is about – money!
‘That’s right, stock prices. It’s all very hush-hush but from what
you’ve said, it confirms what I’ve heard. It takes data from all over,
smushes it all up and pops out buys and sells. To be honest we all
thought it was a bit kooky. You know, one of those projects that
companies take a big risk on. Like the guy at NASA who gets paid a
hundred grand to sit in a corner of a hangar working on anti-gravity
experiments. The company knows it’ll never work but hey! Just think
– what if he actually does discover anti-gravity?’
Asher was bemused. ‘Sorry, what does happen if he finds it?’
‘Antigravity? Megabucks! Plus it’ll change the way we live as we
know it.’
‘Oh, I see,’ he said, not really seeing.
‘Yeah! Patents, licensing technology. But in LSI’s case it’s a
matter of keep schtum and bank the profits. That’s what Rachel’s
project is all about man! Megabucks and more megabucks.’
‘Really? She doesn’t seem like a money-oriented person.’
Asher was a little deflated to learn that Ceptron’s sole purpose
was to earn enormous quantities of money on the stock exchanges. In
his naïvety he had somehow allowed himself to believe her machine
THE HIDDEN LAYER 195
‘The computers don’t like the heat. That noise you can hear?
That’s five-thousand fans getting rid of the heat generated by the
processors and power supplies. The air-con is way over-spec’d to
keep the air ice cold. Keeps the core temperature down and the
efficiency up.’
They walked down the main corridor and Asher began to feel
slightly under-specified himself. He wasn’t usually intimidated by
technology but this was serious kit. This is what he imagined
organisations like the government’s listening post at Cheltenham
would be like. Acres of high powered machines. Peering down an
alley he could see that they stretched off a good way into the distance
too, each monolithic slab towering over him. There was something
almost primitive about it, like Stone Henge.
‘A thousand, in case you’re wondering.’
‘A thousand computers?’
‘Yeah.’
‘Why no windows?’
‘There are. They’re blocked out with solar film then boarded up.
Keeps out any heat from the sun.’
‘And no wires?’
‘All under floor. Cool huh?’
They came out into a square clearing with a semi-circular desk in
the middle. The desk was covered in the kind of computers that Asher
recognised.
‘This is the control desk. That’s odd, Rachel said she’d be here
waiting. Hold on, I’ll just call her.’
Asher was in awe, these people were pros. He broke away from
the American guy and went up to one of the computer racks on the
edge of the clearing. Cupping his hands against the smoky glass he
put his face up to the portal he’d made and peered into one of the
machines. Suddenly there was a searing pain in his head and he fell to
the floor. The last thing he remembered thinking was did I just get an
electric shock? Then the world went fuzzy and he blacked out.
hedgerows. Apart from the gentle breeze rustling the leaves of the oak
trees that marked the perimeters of the fields and the sound of
birdsong in the sunshine, a languid stillness permeated the landscape.
On the edge of imagination, very, very far away, came the faintest
sound of a machine, roaring in the distance and then it was gone. The
sun beat down on the black tarmac, softening its surface with the
relentless glare. The sound returned, piercing into reality with the
definitive snarl of an engine and, lasting only for a few seconds and
with a whoosh, it disappeared once again. A moment later it returned
at a slightly higher pitch and as it did so, at the bottom of the hill at
the point where the road bent out of sight, a lorry emerged spewing
black soot into the pristine blue sky. It was a large, white tractor unit
followed by an enormous, white trailer. But there was something odd
about the way it looked, something not quite normal.
It rounded the corner and straightened to tackle the long climb up
the hill, dropping another couple of gears and revving its huge diesel
engine even harder. It started the ascent, with the revs gradually
falling until at last it couldn’t sustain the power. Once again there was
a puff of black smoke from the gleaming chrome exhaust pipe
followed a second later by the engine cutting and re-engaging at yet
higher revs. That was the right ratio now. Sustainable. The roar got
louder as the lorry laboured upwards towards the summit, gradually
re-gaining its momentum. Completely unmarked, even the badge of
the lorry’s maker had been removed. What was distinctive about it
was the menacing metal structure that had been built on to the front of
the cab, which was a strange fusion of scaffolding, battering ram and
snow plough.
A fox sauntered from the hedgerow into the middle of the road
and stopped, looking down the hill at the strange white beast. It angle
its large ears towards the spectacle and listened. The lorry blared its
air-horn twice and the fox turned, unimpressed, and trotted
nonchalantly across the road and into the hedge on the other side.
The snow-plough lorry had gathered some pace now and at last it
reached the top of the long climb, whipping the hedgerows with its
slipstream as it thundered past, leaves and debris swirling and dancing
in the vortices it had created. Almost immediately there was silence as
it plunged over the brow of the hill and disappeared once again. The
residual sound died away then gradually the birds started singing
again against the gentle backdrop of the sound of leaves rustling in
198 THE HIDDEN LAYER
the gentle breeze. From the top of the hill, looking in the direction the
lorry was headed, was a distant, panoramic view of London, gleaming
like a prize in the early evening sun.
THE HIDDEN LAYER 199
10
Are You Not Listening?
200 THE HIDDEN LAYER
THE HIDDEN LAYER 201
The going was flat now and the road was almost empty as the
snow-plough lorry hurtled along, closing in on its destination by the
second, the city building up as it went. Up in the cab the driver
blinked away a bead of sweat that had dripped from his forehead and
looked down at the navigation screen to confirm the distance to go
was less than two miles. He smiled nervously to himself, gripping the
huge wheel with grim determination and as he drove on his breathing
slowed and deepened, as if he was preparing himself for something
big. After seeing the aerial photographs and picturing this part of the
journey many times he was now able to place the landmarks around
him. The village where the thousands of athletes were accommodated
in squat, square blocks, was in front of him, slightly to his left, and
the scrubby grassland of Hackney Marsh, which hadn’t been as
revitalised as some people had said it would be, was to his right.
He sniggered to himself at the irrelevance of the Marsh - it was
nearly time and none of that would matter soon. He put it out of his
mind and concentrated on the road ahead, which curved sharply to the
left before entering an underground stretch that signalled the start of
his approach towards his glittering goal. In the evening sunshine, far
away to his left but already looming due to its sheer size, shone the
metal bulges of the Olympic Stadium. In the rank and file of the
stadium seats he knew eighty thousand spectators and athletes awaited
the start of the opening ceremony and with the help of those souls he
would secure his place in history. But that was a secondary thing.
More importantly, justice would be served at last. The people waited
alright but not for the opening ceremony. No. They were waiting for
the earth to open up and swallow them into the burning depths of hell,
because that was what it was going to do.
The driver knew for a fact that there were seventy-five thousand
ticket holders and four thousand athletes from every part of the globe
and over five thousand organisational staff. He started thinking back
to what they had done to his homeland, to his family and his friends.
All of them, these people, all waiting for him now in their little plastic
204 THE HIDDEN LAYER
seats. Gathered together to face his wrath. Rounded up. Trapped. This
was retribution on a grand scale. Payback for every criminal deal a
multinational had forced upon his small government. Every
concession given to a global company. They had crippled his country
and now it was dying, slowly but surely, unable to sustain itself
economically, begging and eating out of the hands of the giant
corporations. It spurred him on again and he almost put his foot to the
floor in anger but resisted the temptation. Not now. Do it properly.
You have time. The lorry rumbled on, speed unchanging, its
momentum carrying it underground and around the left hand bend.
The tunnel was only 300 yards long and when he surfaced heading
south he thrilled to see the great Olympic Stadium straight ahead,
looking like a giant alien’s nest. The distance readout on the
navigation screen started blinking as the lorry came within a mile of
the pre-programmed location. His exit would be coming up soon so
he eased off the throttle to start the slow deceleration.
Thinking that it shouldn’t be this easy he couldn’t suppress a
laugh, which he barked out loud. Sweat dotted his brow as his
nervousness finally bubbled to the surface and he concentrated hard
so as to not put a foot wrong at this crucial late stage. A drip of
perspiration ran down his forehead and he took a slippery hand off the
wheel to wipe it away from his eye. As he did so the lorry’s wheels
ran into the well-worn ruts in the slow lane, causing the whole rig to
swerve dangerously to the left, then to the right as he quickly put his
hand back on the wheel to correct it. He breathed deeply as the lorry
settled itself in the center of the lane again and continued its
inexorable approach. He’d gotten away with it this time. No more
mistakes!
went beneath the River Thames. In the orange glow of the tunnel they
ploughed on and the cacophony of blue flashing lights and sirens
made the enclosing walls spin and shriek as they went. At the other
end of the tunnel they surfaced, north of the river, and suddenly the
road here was empty. At each entry ramp they passed police
motorcycles were parked across the road, blocking the way and
holding the traffic back. People stood next to their cars and vans,
engines off, waiting to see what the commotion was about and
pointing and taking pictures on their phones as the two-dozen
emergency vehicles roared by. After a couple of miles the cavalcade
came upon another junction and as they slowed five of the squad cars
pulled to the side of the road allowing the rest of the convoy to pass.
A riot van joined them, followed by three fire engines, two of the
ambulances and a bomb disposal truck. Detective Inspector Royce
stepped out of the front car onto the baking heat of the tarmac and
radioed to his controller as the rest of the traffic rolled on by, through
the junction’s underpass.
‘Bravo to Control. We are in place at the northbound exit ramp to
Stadium Way.’
‘Ah, roger that Bravo,’ came the reply. ‘In place at northbound
exit.’
He looked on as three of the squad cars arranged themselves into a
“V” configuration across what had expanded into the three lanes of
the carriageway. The officers driving all got out, leaving the blue
lights flashing but silent. Two marksmen got out from the back of
each car and quickly hid themselves behind barriers and pillars along
the road, rifles ready, and a couple of the officers got something bulky
from the car’s boot and ran back along the road a few hundred yards
with it. The remaining two squad cars formed a road-block on the exit
ramp; again the occupants got out and the marksmen ran up on to the
flyover to get a good view directly over the northbound carriageway.
The rest of the vehicles were manoeuvring further up the road,
parking there to wait until they were needed. When he was happy that
everything was in place, he radioed again.
‘Bravo to Control. We have secured the northbound exit. Repeat,
northbound exit is secure.’
‘Roger that Bravo, northbound exit now secure. Good job.’
Royce, in full riot gear (which for senior officers consisted of a
flak-jacket and rifle), looked up the road a quarter of a mile to where
206 THE HIDDEN LAYER
the Alpha team had just started setting up their road-block and hoped
to hell intelligence had got the right location. They shimmered in the
distance and Royce wiped the sweat from his brow with the back of
his white shirt sleeve. He dreaded to think how he’d smell at the end
of this – he was drenched underneath the heavy flak-jacket. A few
tense minutes passed, then he heard a crackled voice over the radio.
‘Control, this is Alpha. Repeat, Alpha to Control. We are in now
in place and the southbound exit is secure.’
‘Ah, roger that Alpha. Southbound exit now secure. Good job
Alpha. All units stand by.’
‘Roger.’
‘Roger,’ replied Royce. He looked up into the sky and saw two
dark blue helicopters with yellow engine cowlings, which he knew for
a fact were Echo and Foxtrot units. Echo hovered over the road to the
north and Foxtrot over the stadium. They were the eyes of the
operation – nothing would happen now until one of them gave the
signal. The ground teams had got there in time and if the operation
planners had got their information right, they wouldn’t have to wait
long now until they found out who was going to be the lucky, or
maybe unlucky, crew.
The minutes ticked by and they sat tight. There was no local
traffic due to the police diversions and blocks that had been put in
place and even up in the sky, Royce noticed, there was an eerie
absence of aircraft, where one could usually find a handful of
passenger jets and a criss-crossing of trails. The silence was broken
by a crackling hiss followed by another radioed exchange.
‘Control, this is Echo. We have a visual. I repeat, we have a
visual.’
‘Go ahead Echo.’
‘Target is a white lorry heading southbound on the A1. Current
position is 1 mile north of Stadium Way. Repeat 1 mile north of
rendezvous. Lorry looks to be articulated, white, travelling at
approximately fifty miles per hour. Target looks to have a battering
ram attached to the front.’
‘Sorry Echo, did you say battering ram?’
‘That is correct Control. A battering ram.’
‘Um. OK, roger that Echo. Alpha team you are good to go.’
‘Alpha to Control, please confirm your last command.’
‘Certainly Alpha, you are good to go.’
THE HIDDEN LAYER 207
The driver of the lorry couldn’t believe his eyes. Up ahead police
on motorcycles were diverting the traffic off the road. A line of three
or four bikes was parked across the road and the police were stopping
the traffic and waving them to turn almost completely around and
back up an entry ramp. No. This could not be allowed to happen. No,
no, no, no, NO! A build up of vehicles was forming in the fast lane,
getting ready to leave the road but to his left the slow lane was free of
traffic and the driver of the snowplough lorry saw his opportunity and
seized it. He put his foot down to regain the speed he’d momentarily
lost and drove towards the bikes. The police waved frantically to him
to stop but he ignored them – he was far beyond worrying about
traffic cops now. He accelerated along the inside lane and when he
struck the bikes the lorry was doing about seventy miles an hour. This
was the first real test of his Mad Max style accessory.
He lurched forward in his seat as the ram clipped the end of one
bike, sending it spinning off to the left side of the road, destroyed in a
instant. Straight away he hit a second but this time it was full on. The
ram smashed into it and tore it in half, and its back end flew up and to
the right, towards the traffic and the police. The front portion
containing the fuel tank exploded in a flash as the whole thing went
underneath the lorry, sucking the flames with it. The lorry’s cab
jumped wildly as the bike went under and dragged the trailer with it,
so the trailer and cab were seesawing dangerously. The driver winced
– he knew he’d probably punctured at least a couple of the eighteen
tyres. He felt the trailer roll over the mangled messed and shudder a
few times as he finally cleared the wreckage and got out onto open
208 THE HIDDEN LAYER
road, where there was no traffic at all. Listening carefully for road and
tyre noise, he gradually smiled again, his lips thin and determined.
Nothing could stop him now!
‘Sorry, would you all excuse me for one second?’ said Rachel to
the virtual gathering as politely as she could and pressed the mute
button on the conference unit.
‘Asher!’ she said in a loud stage whisper, despite the muted
microphones. ‘Where are you?’
‘Rachel!’ said a voice with a strong English accent cloaking a
faint American lilt. ‘How the hell are you? I’ve been trying to track
you down.’
‘Marcus? Is that you?’
‘Yes indeedy, it certainly is!’
‘How come you’re on Asher’s phone? And where’s Asher?’
‘He’s here, with me. We’re down in the computer hall, just taking
in the grand tour. Very impressive, I must say!’
‘What the hell are you doing down there? Who gave you access?
Never mind. Stay there, I’m coming down!’
‘Will do, sis! We’re waitin’ for you.’
Rachel looked at her phone in puzzlement and dialled off. That
wasn’t the Marcus she knew. And how on earth did he know Asher?
She un-muted the conference.
‘I’m really sorry everyone. Something urgent has just come up
and I really need to deal with it.’ She didn’t know what else to say to
the Board so she just said ‘Er, goodbye,’ and without waiting for any
responses ended the conference call.
Royce was a patient man; during operations like this you had to be
– sometimes little would happen for hours, then all at once it was
over. There would be nothing, then a commotion, some fast thinking,
and then nothing again. The event would have happened and you had
THE HIDDEN LAYER 209
to make the best of it. But this time he didn’t have to wait long for
more news. He radio crackled into life again.
‘This is Echo to Control. Target has breached the diversion.
Repeat initial diversion is breached. He went straight through the
line. We now have two totalled bikes and target is approaching
roadblock Alpha.’
‘Roger that Echo. Team Alpha, standby for action.’
‘This is Alpha. Roger that Control. Standing by.’
Feeling useless Royce wandered down the slip-road and on to the
main carriageway to see if he could see anything but much to his
annoyance all he could see was team Alpha shimmering in the
distance through the heat-haze that was emanating from the tarmac.
He watched and waited. Then he saw it - a tiny glint in the distance, a
spot of sunlight reflecting off of something metal and moving. That
was it. He knew it – he had a gut instinct for things like this. That was
the target, the renegade lorry with a battering ram built across its
engine grille. As he watched it became apparent that the shining was
indeed coming from something that was attached to a much larger
object, the bulk of which through the haze had merged into the
scenery and become invisible. He squinted to get a better view and
saw the square front of a lorry cab starting to emerge uncertainly out
of the surroundings, gradually forming a more solid shape until at last
it was nearly as visible as team Alpha.
‘This is Alpha to Control. We have a visual. Repeat, we have a
visual. A large white lorry with some…structure attached to it? We
are attempting to deploy Stinger.’
‘Echo to all units. The lorry’s speed is 65 miles per hour and
increasing steadily. Estimated speed at impact is 70 miles per hour.’
‘Roger that Echo.’
He’s not stopping! thought Royce, as he studied the scene far in
the distance. He could just make out the police officers by the side of
the road, waiting for the lorry to get close enough before they
deployed the device. He knew the procedure well – he had trained
many pursuit squads to use it. If you throw the concertinaed strip too
early, the target can potentially avoid it. Too late and you’ll only
puncture the trailing tyres, or none at all. On a successful hit the
hollow spikes would embed themselves in the tyres’ rubber and let
them down in a controlled way.
210 THE HIDDEN LAYER
Royce watched as the lorry bore right onto the southbound slip-
road and there was a sudden flurry of activity from the Alpha team.
He saw the Stinger fly across the road and underneath the lorry but it
continued on its warpath.
‘Alpha to Control. Code Red. The target changed direction.
Stinger was deployed too late, only got some rear trailer tyres. Target
is not disabled. Repeat, target is still active.’
The juggernaut continued up the long exit ramp and a second later
the two police cars guarding it flew into the air, one toppling end-
over-end down the embankment and crashed on to the main road on
it’s roof. Royce watched, wide-eyed, waiting for the explosion. It
came with a blinding flash followed a second later by a deafening
boom as the petrol ignited directly beneath the over-pass.
‘Alpha to Control, we are breached. Repeat, Alpha roadblock is
breached.’
‘Roger that Alpha. All units, lethal force is authorised. Let’s stop
this bastard please.’
‘Roger Control.’
‘Roger Control,’ shouted Royce into his radio. He scrambled up
the embankment and onto the slip road to see the lorry entering the
giant roundabout that formed the overpass at the opposing entrance.
Alpha’s marksmen on the bridge had been taken out by the explosion
and were lying on the ground motionless. His own marksmen from
Beta team were already taking aim and suddenly there was gunfire.
The lorry missed its turning and carried on in a straight line for a few
tens of yards before the driver leaped from the high cab and hit the
ground, rolling over a few times. He got up, stumbled along and then
ran but when the next round of gunfire was over, he too was on the
ground, still.
‘Beta to Control,’ shouted Royce into his radio as he ran towards
the lorry. ‘I’m at the scene. Target has been disabled. The suspect is
down and motionless, believed to be hit. Am approaching with
caution now.’
‘Roger Beta. Be careful Royce.’
‘Will do.’
Royce ran as fast as he could the wrong way around the
roundabout and slowed to approach the stricken driver, raising his
pistol and pointing it carefully at the suspect’s head. Blood was
streaked across the road and a pool of the stuff was forming around
THE HIDDEN LAYER 211
the man’s torso. Possibly not dead. Other police officers were running
up the slip-road from the Alpha team side but everyone slowed and
stopped to watch from a distance as Royce neared his target. As he
got close he saw a device half clutched in his half open left hand. A
small grey box with a single black button on it. Covering the button
was what looked like a transparent, hinged protective lid. The man’s
thumb was holding the cover down as if he’d tried to press the button
but had forgotten to lift the flap first. Royce knew what the button
underneath the cover did and he now he knew exactly what was in the
back of the lorry. He very carefully bent down and with his gun still
pointed at the unconscious man’s skull, took the box and pulled it
easily out of his hand. There was no resistance at all and he didn’t
move.
Royce stood up and looked around to find a hive of activity going
on around him. The paramedics from the ambulance crews were
already there, ready with a stretcher. The bomb squad were all over
the trailer and the fire crews were attending to the destroyed cars and
casualties who had been caught in the explosion. He stepped back to
let the paramedics do their job and stood there with the device, taking
special care not to go anywhere near the button. He handed it
carefully to a member of the bomb squad – that was their headache
now.
‘This is Beta to Control. Suspect is disarmed. Going to clear the
area now.’
‘Ah, Roger that Beta. Good job man!’
‘Thanks.’
With a sigh of relief, Detective Inspector Royce set off to assist in
the mammoth task of evacuating the area.
11
A Million Pounds A Second
214 THE HIDDEN LAYER
THE HIDDEN LAYER 215
messages that would never be read. All except for one message that
caught Rachel’s eye in the few seconds for which it was on screen:
Rachel couldn’t believe it. She had slept with the bastard. She felt
used and dirty. A flash of panic took her back to yesterday morning.
Had they used protection or not? She thought hard, piercing through
the wash of emotion and action that had gone on in Asher’s bedroom.
She closed on a picture of the silver packet on the bedside table. Yes!
Thank god, they had. What a nightmare that could have turned out to
be and on top of everything she was shocked that this was the first
time she had thought about it as a potential problem. Her relief
quickly gave way to anger. She had been used like a sweet wrapper
that had been discarded after the sticky contents had been devoured.
What kind of twisted person was he? There was no need for anything
like that to have happened. She shuddered to think what plans Asher
had had for her after he’d got his hands on Ceptron’s design. She
guessed the only option open to him would have been to kill her. Her
anger intensified. She had been made to believe in something she
thought was real. He’d had real explanations. A real story. One that
was borne out by her father. If it was all a façade, it was an extremely
elaborate one. He must have done an awful lot of research just to get
her on side. And to what end? Why hadn’t he just taken his gun and
pointed it at her? Much as she felt protective of her project, she would
have given up Ceptron before her own life in a second. She had half a
mind to shoot him herself, there and then. She remembered the
intimacy. It had seemed so real. So good, so right. Who does that?
Who would go to all that trouble just to get a computer design?
Asher jerked and moaned out loud.
‘Marcus! The gun.’
‘It’s OK. I found a cable tie over there so I tied his other hand to
the desk.’
Nevertheless Marcus pointed the gun at Asher and waited for him
to come around.
‘Stay where you are!’ he yelled. ‘She knows everything!’
‘What? Who knows?’ Asher rubbed the back of his head with his
free hand and tried to sit up. Then he looked at his bound hand and
gave it a few tugs, rattling the monitors on the desk.
‘Hey! What’s going on?’
‘Rachel knows everything you told me!’ said Marcus. ‘She knows
what you’re really trying to do.’
‘Does she?’ said Asher rubbing and squinting. ‘Could she explain
it to me? Why am I tied to this table? And who hit me?’
218 THE HIDDEN LAYER
though. You know, something big must be going on. All the defence
stocks are dropping like lead balloons.’
‘Something has happened,’ called Asher from his place on the
floor. He had a sense of dread and foreboding in his voice. ‘The
prediction. It’s all backwards. Something’s happened outside. Is there
a TV in here?’
‘Actually there is.’ Rachel leaned to the back of the desk and
moved aside a stack of papers. Behind was a small LCD television,
propped up on its stand. She extended the aerials, made a V and
switched the screen on. There was no picture and no sound. She
fiddled with the tiny controls until she got a station, then cycled
through a few channels until she arrived at some 24-hour news.
ahead to use deadly force. Eyewitnesses report that the driver, who is
believed to be a wanted international terrorist known as Ang Mo, was
hit in the chest and was disarmed during the gunfire. His condition
and indeed whether he still alive is not known as during the incident
he was taken under-covers to an ambulance waiting on the scene. In
their statement the police also defended the shooting as being ‘totally
necessary’ following tip-offs from two separate but anonymous
sources. Both sources used known code-words and it is not yet known
if this is an isolated attack or whether it is part of a larger plot. The
head of the Anti-Terrorism squad, Deputy Assistant Commissioner
Ronald Daintree, had this to say about the incident:
‘In this day and age we cannot afford to take any chances
whatever when it come to terrorism. We’ve been wrong on a number
of occasions in the past but today we have apprehended a dangerous
criminal and averted a major terrorist attack. I hope those who are
critical of past police operations now understand why we take the
action that we sometimes do, unpleasant as it might seem. If we had
not disabled this individual or indeed taken any action on the
intelligence we received the results would have been catastrophic.
The Olympic Stadium holds eighty thousand people and as our
intelligence now suggests that this was indeed the intended target,
with the sheer quantity of explosives on board the vehicle it’s likely
that a large proportion of those people would now be dead or fighting
for their lives. We believe the man we apprehended is Ang Mo, a
known terrorist with a long history of violent attacks and wanted in
several countries, including the United States, China and the United
Kingdom. He is in a critical condition in hospital and will be helping
us with our inquiries if and when he is able. The success of this
operation means that the lives of thousands, if not tens of thousands of
people have been saved today. If he had been allowed to carry out this
despicable, cowardly act then, needless to say, Britain and indeed the
world would be a very different place right now. Thank you.’
“Police are now trying to piece together whether the attack is
linked with any other terrorist organisations but initial research
shows that Ang Mo normally works alone and often his cause is
unknown. The government and the Civil Aviation Authority have
declared a no-fly zone over all UK cities and have closed all London
airports as a precaution. A no-go zone has been set up around the
lorry and all residents and businesses within a half mile radius have
228 THE HIDDEN LAYER
been evacuated as bomb squads from the Metropolitan Police and the
Army work together to make safe the trailer using remote controlled
robots. Initial reports suggest the main tractor unit, which has now
been removed to a forensic facility, had a battering-ram or snow-
plough like structure fitted to the front and it is thought that Ang Mo
was planning to drive right into the stadium by smashing through the
security gates and the main access doors and detonating the bomb
once he was in the centre. Had he succeeded the results, given the
sheer size of the device, would have been catastrophic for all nations,
not just Britain but for the world, as the opening ceremony features
all of the international athletes and of course the attending crowds
are from every continent.
As the news arrived during final trading of the US markets, the
market experienced a significant downturn but then recovered before
the close, wiping billions of dollars off the value of top American
companies and then regaining it almost immediately. We can now go
live to New York where our financial correspondent John Brenner has
been keeping an eye on the last of the afternoon’s trading. John, how
have the markets reacted?”
‘Thanks. In contrast to 9/11 the US markets stayed buoyant today,
holding out against a widely held belief that another terrorist attack on
this scale would cause a global slump. What’s different about today is
that it was a non-event and we’re seeing an exact mirror image of
eleven years ago, when only defence companies held their value in a
free-falling market. That this terrorist attack seems to have come from
within the UK itself seems to have hammered home recent global
feeling that a military defence is not necessarily the answer to every
attack scenario and as a result, the defence sector is significantly
down this afternoon. As you know the UK markets were lucky to
have ceased trading by the time this story broke and it’s expected that
Monday’s open won’t be affected.’
might have become a deranged control freak but he wasn’t stupid. She
surreptitiously turned to the end of the table to pick up the gun and
was shocked to find it was gone.
‘Way ahead of you, bitch.’ Marcus pointed the weapon at her.
‘You knew didn’t you? All along. This contraption of yours just cost
me thirty million pounds. You knew the market would cave in
because Ceptron predicted that attack and when it didn’t happen,
boom! The algorithm screwed up. And then you let it carry on
throwing my money down a hole as if there was no tomorrow! My
family’s money! My inheritance!’
‘I didn’t know! How could I have?’
‘Eighty thousand? How much of a coincidence is that? What do
you take me for?’
He continued before Rachel could venture an answer.
‘Shut up! Get over there.’ With the barrel of the gun he motioned
away from the control desk towards one of the cabinets and she
obliged, backing away facing him all the time. ‘I’m going to need to
you transfer what’s left back to my account. Tell me how to do it.
Now!’
Rachel could still see the screen with the budget management
program running.
‘OK. OK. First go to the management screen. From there you
should see some transfer options. Select the one that says Budget
Transfer. In the From box select Ceptron’s trading account and in the
To box select the R&D account. In the Amount box enter the amount
you want to transfer.’
‘Wait!’ shouted Marcus. Rachel watched as he squinted at the
screen trying to decipher the account codes. Eventually he selected
the correct two.
‘OK. What’s next?’
‘In the Amount box enter how much you want to transfer and
submit it.’
Marcus glanced at the wiggly line on the Trading Fund graph. It
was just over the 20M mark. Carefully he typed a 2 followed by six
zeros into the terminal. He counted the zeros back to make sure he
had the right number and hit the Transfer button.
Asher was on his own with a crazy man. Rachel had just run up
into the computer aisles in the opposite direction to the main entrance,
so he wasn’t really clear what her plan was. She obviously had
something up her sleeve but Marcus was getting more enraged by the
second so Asher decided there was only one thing for it. Stay quiet
and stay put. Rachel always seemed to know what to do, she would
THE HIDDEN LAYER 231
Rachel hid behind Cabinet 23 at the far end of one of the side
alleys. She had no plan and didn’t have a clue what she was doing.
The only thing she was sure of was that the spare power supply she
was straining to hold above her head would knock a man clean out
and possibly kill him with its sharp metal corners and hefty weight.
She waited. Nothing happened. One minute. Two minutes. Three.
Four. And then something did happen that she wasn’t expecting at all.
The lights went out. She had never been there in the dark before and
232 THE HIDDEN LAYER
the computer hall she was so familiar with and normally felt at home
in suddenly became a menacing, cold space. The green and red
flashing diodes lit up her face and she could see her own ghostly
image in the glass-fronted door of the cabinet opposite. A bizarre,
green and red spectre holding a metal box above her head. Had her
situation been less serious she would have laughed. She heard
something behind, over the noise of the machines. She waited,
motionless and silent. It sounded like a footstep but she couldn’t be
sure. The suspended floor tiles were carpeted and masked footfalls
easily. But that wasn’t what she’d heard. It had been more like the
sound of a badly fitting tile tilting under someone’s weight. She heard
it again. This time she was sure. It was a tile. It was either Asher
come to help, in which case he’d dealt with Marcus somehow and the
lights were off for some strange reason, or it was Marcus and he was
playing games.
‘Rachel?’ came a voice through the cabinet behind her. It was
Marcus.
‘I can see you…’ he sang.
She ran again. Back along the aisle, up the corridor another few
rows and into another aisle. She didn’t know if he’d been able to
follow but she knew this aisle wasn’t a dead end. Having no final
cabinet created a walkway around the end into the next aisle, giving
her an escape route. She ran down to hide again and came to a halt,
exhaling sharply. She’d got the wrong aisle! It must have been further
up. Or was it on the other side? In her panic she’d become
disoriented, she couldn’t think straight. She turned to run back and
stopped again as if she had run into an invisible, solid barrier. At the
end of the aisle was the black silhouette of Marcus, his gun pointing
at the floor. His dark shape was outlined by a halo of blinking lights
from the cabinets across the corridor and his eyes twinkled in the light
from the computers between them. Pin-pricks of blinking red and
green reflected from his now bald and sweating head.
‘You’re not leaving already? I’ve got so much to tell you.’
‘Marcus, what the hell’s wrong with you? What do you want from
me?’
‘What do I want? What do I want? Payback, Rachel! Payback!’
‘What do you mean?’
Marcus shook his head in disbelief.
THE HIDDEN LAYER 233
‘You never had a clue did you? You’re not as smart as I took you
for.’ He raised the gun in the darkness and Rachel assumed it was
pointed at her. All she could see was that his silhouette now only had
one arm. For a second she considered throwing the power supply at
him but reconsidered. If she missed, he would surely shoot.
‘Your machine,’ he croaked, ‘was going to make me the richest
ever to have lived, you know? That’s how much you owe me Rachel.
That’s how much he’s worth.’
‘Who? Who is worth?’
‘Father!’
‘Marcus, your father? He was killed in the car crash. You told me
yourself!’
He started walking forwards slowly.
‘No! No, no, no. I killed him you see?’ He had a spiteful look in
his eyes now. ‘I killed them both. He hated me. And my mother never
stood up to him. They were as bad as each other. They both had to go.
No, I’m not talking about that impostor. I’m talking about our father.’
‘What do you mean our father?’
‘Have you never felt it Rachel? That special bond between us?’
‘You – you’re bluffing.’ Rachel was stunned. She felt her stomach
churn and shivered as a wave of goose bumps crept across her skin.
She gripped the power supply harder as Marcus continued his
tirade.
‘You stole my father from me! After your mother screwed him
and went through with the pregnancy. You’re illegitimate Rachel. I’m
the first-born child. You shouldn’t be here!’
She was having trouble keeping the influx of new information in
her head. It made sense, all of those feelings she’d had when they
were younger. The confused, unfocussed emotions – that had been
sibling love. Now, that sibling was getting close and she could make
out the features on his face. His tight-lipped smile showed pleasure
but his eyes showed rage.
‘When Emma was killed, my family became an empty shell – she
had been the only thing holding it together. Our father, you see, he
didn’t love my mother, he loved yours. He preferred you and your
precious mother to me and left us to rot with that arrogant, child-
hating bastard of a step-father! You ruined my childhood! You
wrecked it! I ought to take care of dad and your mother too.’
234 THE HIDDEN LAYER
‘Look, let’s talk about this normally, rationally, like adults,’ said
Rachel, starting to lower the metal box. ‘Put the gun down and I’ll go
and turn the lights on.’
‘Normal? Normal! You have no idea how he treated me! He
denied me everything. Everything our father bought for you should
have been mine!’
‘I’m so sorry. I never knew.’
Marcus stopped six feet away.
‘Never knew. Ha! Here’s something else you never knew. With
my step-father’s money, I inherited his contacts. Pulled a few strings
here and there. Watched your career with interest. I always knew
you’d come through for me. My clever sister.’
‘Come through for you? What does that mean?’
‘C’mon sis. Who do you think’s been funding your project for the
last five years? I saw your potential, even when we were kids. I saw
what you were capable of. The one with the brains. You were always
going to make money. Lots of it. That’s why I decided to get you the
job here at LSI.’
‘What?’
‘Yeah that’s right, I got you your job. It’s not the first one either.
Remember your first job after university? Yes, me! Your previous job
before this one? Me also! Hold on…three jobs? That’s your entire
career isn’t it? My gosh, and you thought you’d been doing so well
for yourself!’
‘Why are you saying this? It’s not true, it can’t be.’ Rachel’s head
was spinning.
‘Oh it’s true alright.’
‘Shut up! Shut up!’ Rachel couldn’t take it any more. She was just
coming to terms with the fact that she and Marcus were related and
now her working life had been an utter sham. She raised the power
supply above her head again. ‘I don’t believe you!’
Marcus refocused his aim.
‘Believe what you want. Tell me the password to transfer the
money back.’
‘You’re the last person on Earth I’d give that to!’
‘I’ll kill you anyway. Family doesn’t matter now, it’s
meaningless. You taught me that.’
THE HIDDEN LAYER 235
pulse, lighting the hall. She managed to lead Asher back to the main
corridor, and stumbled. Something was hurting her foot.
‘It’s the fire system! It’s on automatic,’ she yelled. ‘We’ve got
about thirty seconds to clear the hall. Come on!’ She winced as she
tried to run again and stopped.
‘What does it do?’ shouted Asher.
‘CO2 flooding! It seals the room and pressurises it with carbon
dioxide. Enough to extinguish fires but at that level it’s lethal. You’ll
bleed from your ears and suffocate at the same time! Let’s go! Can
you see anything?’
‘Only in stills!’
‘Me too. And my ankle hurts like hell!’ She looked down and saw
blood around her foot. ‘He must have got me!’ She could still move it
around, so she bit the bullet and tried to run. Every step shot pain up
her leg and yelled to her brain to stop and she after five paces she
almost collapsed.
‘I can’t move!’ she looked up at Asher in horror.
‘Don’t worry, girl, we’ll get you out of here. Put your arm around
my shoulder.’
Rachel felt faint and the strobing lights were making her nauseous
and sweaty in the cold room. She put her arm around Asher for
support and together they stumbled along the corridor back towards
the control desk, lurching from side to side in a strange stop-motion
animation. They finally reached the control desk and Rachel
desperately wanted to sit down but Asher pulled her on.
or certain death. Yet another gunshot filled the hall and the glass front
in a cabinet next to them shattered as another bullet missed its target.
Then another shot and Rachel suddenly went limp in Asher’s arms.
He took her weight fully and stumbled, re-gained his balance and half
carried, half dragged her for what felt like an eternity before reaching
the main entrance. He slammed a clenched fist against the exit button
and the electromagnet released. The door swung open as they crashed
through into the lobby and swung shut behind them. Asher got up and
looked through wired-glass window. It was dark inside. He waited for
a single flash of the strobe lights and when it came he glimpsed
Marcus at the control desk, limping towards them with his gun aimed
at the door. But there were no shots. He waited for another snapshot.
Marcus was closer. He had blood pouring down his left leg and from
his head, his right arm looked useless and he was limping badly.
Perhaps the gun was damaged, or perhaps he only had one round left.
Perhaps he wanted to get closer for a better left-handed shot.
Then, abruptly, the klaxon stopped and the strobes left the hall in
quiet darkness, save for the blinking lights of the computers. Asher
moved back from the door and dragged Rachel to one side, laying her
on the floor. She was bleeding badly from the shoulder and there were
red streaks across the wall where she had slumped sideways but she
was alive.
‘Help!’ he yelled, hoping someone from reception would hear
him, but there was no response. He fumbled in his pocket for his
phone, opened it up and dialled 999.
‘Ambulance, police and fire! Er…21st floor, Canada Tower.
Someone’s been shot and there’s a fire! Yes, it’s Jason Asher. She’s
called Rachel Taylor, I’m a friend. Some psycho shot her in the chest
– she’s breathing but bleeding badly. He’s stuck in the computer
room.’
The doors rattled as Marcus tried to open them but a red sign had
come on above the door.
‘He’s locked in!’ He grabbed a red box on the wall next to the
door and used it to pull himself up. As he levelled with the window a
bloody, glistening face appeared and smeared itself on the glass.
Asher jumped and dropped the phone.
238 THE HIDDEN LAYER
‘Shit!’
Marcus shouldered the door heavily with a loud thump twice, then
then his enraged face appeared again and he started banging on the
window with his fist.
‘LET ME OUT!’
Asher held his ground and shook his head slowly. Then he noticed
the red box on the wall he had used as a grab-handle – it had a lift-up
front panel and was labelled “Abort” and behind the little Perspex
window was a key-operated switch. He lifted the panel. No key. He
looked back up through window and froze as he saw Marcus stepping
back and raising the gun again. Asher ducked but there were no
gunshots. Instead a loud buzzer sounded in the lobby area and another
sign flashed above the door, an amber one.
There was an abrupt roaring noise inside the room and Asher
scrambled backwards away from the door. Marcus started screaming
and banged on the other side of the door but all Asher could see
through the security glass was a white mist, which started seeping
under and around the door. The roaring and screaming continued and
he put his hands over his ears and slumped down, sitting on the floor
with his back against the door. As the mist from the door touched
Asher’s arm with an icy stroke, the screaming ceased and he could
feel the banging in his shoulder blades getting slower and weaker. He
shivered. The banging lasted an excruciating ten or fifteen seconds
more and then, as abruptly as the commotion had started, it all
stopped. Asher gradually removed his hands from his ears and
cautiously listened to the white noise of silence in the lobby for a
moment. Then he remembered Rachel and scrambled over to where
she lay. He looked back up at the sign, which had changed to flashing
green and was now displaying a new message.
DISCHARGED
‘It’s OK. I’ll be OK. It’s not as bad as it must look.’ She rolled her
eyes down to look at Asher without moving. ‘Thanks.’
‘For what?’
‘Everything.’
‘They’re coming to help, Rach, don’t move.’
‘I know. What happened to Marcus?’
‘I think he’s…dead. The doors locked themselves and the
gas…gassed him. Do you think he suffocated?’
‘Definitely. Did you check?’
‘No. I’m leaving that to the authorities. He was some piece of
work, you know?’
‘He was indeed.’
‘Who was he anyway?’
‘Just an old acquaintance.’ Rachel winced. ‘Bad luck turned him
into someone else.’
‘Any more of your friends like that?’
‘I hope not.’
Asher grunted and stared at the floor. Then he looked sideways
towards her.
‘The override…there wasn’t a key.’
Through her pain Rachel either grimaced or smiled faintly, Asher
couldn’t be sure.
240 THE HIDDEN LAYER
THE HIDDEN LAYER 241
Epilogue
242 THE HIDDEN LAYER
THE HIDDEN LAYER 243
He smiled back and then, after warming his hands in the hot air
flow for a few seconds more, got out and walked around to the
driver’s door. He waited for the driver to lower his window, then from
his inside coat pocket pulled out the old photograph, on the back of
which were written two rows of Chinese characters that he knew were
addresses. He handed the picture to the driver and pointed to the first
line. The driver nodded and Asher said to Rachel: ‘I’ll wait here for
you.’ He motioned to the café-bar they were parked outside of and
slapped the cold roof of the car twice.
‘OK, we’ll be back soon,’ she called from the back seat.
The car pulled out into the traffic, the exhaust fumes making large
clouds that dissipated quickly as they cooled. Asher watched them go,
then turned and headed into the warmth of the café-bar.
The taxi pulled up at their destination and Rachel took the photo
back from the driver.
‘Could you show us where this is please?’
‘Yes, yes. No problem.’ Asher had gone through nine or ten taxis
trying to find one whose driver could speak reasonable English,
especially for Rachel.
She made a mental note of the fare and they all got out of the car
and into the bitter evening. The cab driver led them through the
archway, into the courtyard where a lonely plum tree stood, lifeless,
crooked and stripped bare. They reached a set of steps at the top of
which was a white, painted door fronted by a gauze mesh. There were
no identifying marks on the house, yet the driver seemed quite certain
that that was the location in question. Rachel looked around. The
solitary tree stood dormant in the middle of a dead-grass yard and
gently smoking incense spirals that hung outside every door gave the
cold air a refreshing, pungent aroma. It was a peaceful place, even in
the cold bite of late autumn.
‘Could you wait for us please? We won’t be long.’
‘Of course.’ The driver retreated just as the front door opened. A
small man wearing a dark green sweat-shirt stood behind the insect
screen. Rachel supposed he might be in his sixties and he exactly fit
the description Asher had given her of Hong-Li.
‘Mr Wang?’
THE HIDDEN LAYER 245
board. Neither Hong-Li nor her father asked what it was for and they
all lowered their heads in remembrance.
Once again Asher had a beer in front of him and he was getting
anxious. Rachel and her father had been gone for a while now and he
was beginning to wonder if the taxi driver had been as reliable as he’d
thought after all. But at least it had given him time to contemplate
things. He wasn’t sure how much Rachel’s father knew but Asher and
she had never really talked much about what had happened during the
weeks that had followed Marcus’ death. Although Rachel knew about
Ang Mo, he’d decided soon after the event not to say anything to
Rachel about his alias, Mr Jones, or about his own alias, Oscar. That
secret would go with him to the grave.
‘Another one Mr Asher?’
‘No thanks Bert. I’m going to wait for my friends.’
‘Good idea. Drinking alone not good way.’
No sooner had the words left this mouth, Rachel and her father
appeared in the doorway and rubbed their hands in the warmth.
Removing their coats, they walked over and sat next to him at the bar,
Rachel closest.
‘Beginning to think you’d gone home without me,’ he said.
‘No chance,’ said Rachel. ‘Mine’s a white wine. Dad?’
‘Beer please sweetie,’ said her father.
Asher turned to the barman to order but didn’t get the chance.
‘Actually,’ butted in Rachel before he’d said anything. ‘Make
mine a beer too.’
‘Bert, three beers please!’
‘Coming right up, Mr Asher.’
‘How did it go then?’
‘Good.’ Rachel nodded. ‘Hong-Li’s a nice guy. We did everything
we came to do.’
‘Uh, nearly everything,’ corrected Asher.
‘Hm?’
‘I just wanted to talk about Marcus.’
Rachel’s eyes flashed a look of dread.
‘Really, why?’
THE HIDDEN LAYER 247
‘Still some things I’m not clear on you know. Like who he
actually was. Where did he get all his money? We never talked about
all that stuff.’
Rachel glanced at her father, who shrugged.
‘True. Well, he was just a childhood friend, you know? Seems he
went off the rails and did his own parents in for their fortune. His
father was very rich, some big-hitting lawyer or something, quite
strict and Marcus was always jealous of what I had but would never
admit it. We played at each other’s houses as kids but mostly he came
round to ours because of the toys Dad bought me. His father, actually
his step father I believe, rarely bought him anything so as a child
Marcus hated him. Never liked him myself actually.’
‘Wow, that could screw a kid up. OK, so how did you know he
was lying? You know when he said I was crazy but you believed me?
You didn’t trust him at all. You must have known something.’
‘Couple of things I suppose. I did the sums in my head. He’d
disappeared fifteen years ago when he was eighteen. That made him
33 this year, and you don’t bequeath money to someone when they
turn 33, do you? He said he’d just got his hands on it but if any money
was left to him it’s more likely he got it a few years ago when he was
30, don’t you think? Then, when he claimed you had him at gun point
and he didn’t want the police involved, that made me suspicious.’
‘They’re not real reasons though. Please tell me you had more to
go on than that!’
‘The clincher was that he knew Ade had been killed. There’s
absolutely no way he could have known that unless he’d known my
affairs. So logically he was the one who’d been following me and it
all fell into place. If he was the one who’d been following me, then he
was the one who’d tried to kill me. It was an easy decision after that.’
‘Wow. Still a guess though?’
‘But an educated one,’ grinned Rachel.
‘OK, OK. But why did Daintree believe me about the stadium
bombing? If it was me, I’d have called me a nutter and locked me
away.’
‘Do you know what? I have no idea. I can only imagine he got
wind of something before you saw him.’
‘Yeah…he was involved in the investigation of your boss’ death. I
saw it in the papers. He knew something alright.’
‘And what about that terrorist?’
248 THE HIDDEN LAYER