Rogue Element

Niven ran his eye over the minister. He hadn’t yet decided whose team the man was on. Lurch was in his mid-fifties, very tall and stooped. His skin was pale and freckled. He had ginger hair and strong hands. A farm boy. Greenway had intense green eyes and his brow was fine, rather than overhanging like the character in the television show. But nicknames were rarely given to be flattering. Do I trust you? Greenway was a new appointment in a recent cabinet reshuffle. Niven just hadn’t had enough experience with the man to make up his mind either way.

Barely in the CDF’s office, the minister said, ‘I’ve just got off the phone to Byron Mills. I wanted to tell you both at the same time, rather than double up. There’s good news and bad news.’

Niven was an optimist. Even so, when offered the choice, he’d always go for the bad news first. It was like eating your greens before anything else, getting them over with and saving the best for last. ‘Give us the bad,’ he said.

‘The ambassador has been on at the Yanks about the satellite but they haven’t budged.’

‘Okay, we’ve already taken that on the chin. What else?’ said Niven, impatience creeping into his tone.

‘Mills had a talk with the people down at DIGO.’

Niven raised his eyebrows. The Defence Imagery and Geospatial Organisation was the department charged with, amongst other things, photo intelligence. They were the obvious experts to talk to when it came to spy satellites.

‘No specifics, Spike, don’t worry,’ said Greenway, reading the CDF’s frown. They’d all agreed that it would be best not to bring anyone else into the loop, at least until something concrete turned up. ‘They had a couple of ideas. He followed up on them and found us a private spy satellite. A company called SpaceEye.’

‘Yeah, I’ve heard of them,’ said Niven, his interest surging.

‘Launched their first satellite in ’99, then ran into problems with the US Congress. Issues about privacy, mainly. There was some attempt to have their technology limited.’

‘Did Congress succeed?’ Griffin asked.

‘Publicly yes, privately no. The sats were built by Rockwell and Kodak, with pretty much the same technology available to the US military — keyhole imaging, infrared, x-ray…’

‘How’d they manage that?’ asked Griffin.

‘Money, basically. Defence Intelligence prepared a circular on it last year. The satellite program was being funded by Mitsubishi, Hyundai and a few others, and they didn’t want their investment compromised.’

‘Look, guys, with respect, the investment strategy’s secondary. Can the satellite do the job for us?’ Niven said impatiently. The game of twenty questions was starting to annoy him. No one had rung to announce that the plane had been found. That meant the nightmare was continuing.

‘It’s being positioned as we speak,’ said Greenway virtually without moving his lips, in a broad, flat Australian accent that reminded Niven of vast, dusty cattle stations. ‘A mining company surveying the jungles of New Guinea has just finished using it. So the sat’s pretty close, which is fortunate. It’ll be in place over Sulawesi within three hours. Should be getting pictures by…’ he checked his Seiko, ‘… by lunch.’ Greenway stood.

‘Hugh, thanks. That is good news,’ said Niven, meaning it, his foul mood turned around.

Griffin also stood to go as the minister smiled and left.

‘Actually, Graeme, if you wouldn’t mind, could you stay for a bit? There are a few thoughts I want to run by you.’

‘Sure.’ Griffin sat back down and poured himself some water from the glass pitcher on the low table in front of him.

‘What’s up?’ Griffin knew the CDF well. When he’d left him last night, the man had had that look in his eye, a certain intensity that gripped Niven whenever there was danger in the air.

After some hesitation Niven said, ‘What do you know about Flight 007?’

Here it is, thought Griffin. He resisted the temptation to say something trite about James Bond. Niven was obviously not in any mood for banter. ‘Absolutely nothing,’ he said instead.

‘Then how about if I add Sakhalin Island?’ Niven was leaning forward on his desk, fingers forming a triangle in front of his face, forehead creased.

‘Okay, yes, as a matter of fact. The Korean Airlines 747 shot down by a Soviet rocket in…’85, I think, over Sakhalin Island. Soviet territory.’

‘September 1, 1983. And it was an SU-15 tactical fighter that fired the missile, an Anab air-to-air.’

‘Been doing some research have we?’ The question was rhetorical.

‘You remember before you left last night I mentioned that there were —’

‘— three hundred and forty-seven sites dedicated to aeroplane crashes? Yes, I remember.’

‘I was bullshitting you. There are far more than that. I was looking into the survivability of the Boeing 747.’

‘And…?’

‘And I found out that they are one very difficult mother to bring down. Unless you plough into something, or have a mid-air, or knock a wing off, they’ll keep flying until the pilots, or the on-board computers, are good and ready to land it.’