The Mysterious Messenger

It was just a quarter past nine in the morning according to the Dent clock at St Pancras train station. Dev King was late. He was supposed to be here at nine on the dot. Sebastian did not know exactly who Dev was. All he knew was that this mystery man had called him out of the blue and said that he had something of great importance to give to Seb. He said it was something that would cause shockwaves the world over if it ever got out.

From the tone of Dev's voice, this was not your normal everyday scammer or troll. There was just something about his well-bred mid-European accent and calm intonation that piqued Seb's curiosity. Whatever it was Dev had to hand over, he was late and if he didn't turn up by nine-thirty Seb would simply leave the station and go directly to his office.

Thinking that the mystery man might already be around the station somewhere, Seb began to cast his eyes around the various platform exit gates. All he could see were the usual brolley-carrying, bowler-hatted city gents, mixed with pretty secretaries running late, an unruly, ragtag group of students from somewhere in Asia, and a long line of what appeared to be British day trippers from the provinces. Seb could not see anybody who stood out as a likely candidate for the secretive Dev.

All Dev had said was for Seb to wait under the clock at nine o'clock sharp. The seven feet long minute hand of the clock had moved down the clock face to twenty past the hour in what seemed like an hour. Time was dragging so slowly, and yet...Suddenly Seb became aware of a young guy on a skateboard heading towards him. Hardly the mode of transport Seb might have expected from some sort of secret agent. Surely this couldn't be him, Seb thought to himself.

In a matter of seconds, the guy brushed past Seb, deftly and discretely thrusting a black plastic file inside the front of Seb's jacket, and whispered "The clock is ticking Seb" before skating off at great speed toward the station exit. Within less than five seconds the guy was out of sight, lost in the crowd of tourists pushing to get through the melee to leave the station at the main entrance.

Seb turned his eyes to the direction the guy had come from, to see two suspicious-looking, East European heavy types, who for all the world looked like a couple of Russian agents. They seemed to be earnestly following the guy on the skateboard, who Seb had presumed to be Dev. The two heavies gave the impression that they were the sort not to be messed about with. Seb lowered his gaze as he turned to head toward a station-side exit.

In his years in the British SAS, Seb had learned all about playing the grey man. The best way to pass through anywhere was to not look at anybody. If you don't look at people, they generally do not look at you. In this way, it was perfectly possible to pass any group un-noticed. It is all about not drawing attention to yourself. Obviously, it helps if you dress conservatively. No brash colors or outlandish fashion designs. The idea is to blend in with your surroundings. Grey was the most popular color of choice, followed by a soft beige.

As he made his way across the station concourse Seb got the uncanny feeling that he was being followed. Just before Dev had turned up on his skateboard, Seb had noticed some guy at a nearby newsagents leafing through a magazine. Seb got the impression that the guy was observing him out of the corner of his eye. After so many years on special missions in the field, Seb was not only well-versed in playing the invisible man, he became equally good at spotting other grey men trying to elude him.

Seb suddenly changed direction to head toward a station men's clothes shop, with a full-height, highly reflective shop window. In the window, he could see that indeed he was being followed by the other grey man. Seb remained unfazed, he knew exactly what to do next.

Seb had pre-bought a soft-coloured sweater and a windcheater jacket of a similar color. All he had to do was go into the shop, grab his purchase and head for the secret exit he knew they had at the back of the changing rooms. The exit came out onto a little used side street where it was not uncommon to find the odd London black taxi cab. In no time at all Seb was outside and quickly jumped into a waiting black cab. He quickly slammed the door shut and said "Okay driver, just go, I'll tell you where in a minute." As he said this he thrust a fifty-pound note into the driver's hands.

The cab driver, sensing Seb's urgency sped off down the street. Seb looked behind through the rear windscreen, just in time to see the other grey man run out of the main entrance into the middle of the street. Fortunately, Seb's black cab had been the only one in the street. He was clear. Also clear was that whatever Dev had passed him in the black folder, had to be some sort of hot potato. Russian agents and Secret Service grey men did not make a habit of running around the Capital chasing wild geese.

***

"Right, where to Gov?" asked the cab driver.

"Take me to the busiest tourist spot," replied Seb.

The first thing Seb did was change his clothes, neatly folding and placing his used clothes in the carry bag the new clothes had come out of. He then gently opened the folder to see what all the fuss was about. He took out a sheaf of papers that looked as if they contained Top Secret scientific information. He took out his cell phone and quickly photographed every page. Then, Seb gave the empty black folder to the driver and told him to throw it into the nearest bin after he had dropped Seb off. The sheaf of papers would go into a series of other bins at various other locations. Seb had seen enough information on the papers to know that any one page was totally meaningless without the others.

"Right Gov, here ya go, Oxford Street, that enough of a crowd for ya?" said the cab driver, proudly grinning to himself. The street was teeming with thousands of people, a melting pot of just about every nationality and ethnic minority you could care to mention.

"Great, perfect, in fact," said Seb as he got out of the cab. Even as he exited, a family of Nepalese women in brightly colored Saris all jumped in and the cab sped off once more. Seb just mingled with the main thrust of the crowd of tourists and shoppers, slowly making his way to his office on the other side of town, making sure to be observant every step of the way.

***

As Seb made his way along the random route he had decided to take to his office in the East End of London, he thought about his idea of ditching the papers in various waste paper bins, one page at a time. The more he thought about it, the more he felt uncomfortable about it. Theoretically, somebody could be following him and simply retrieve the pages as easily as picking low-hanging fruit.

Suddenly, as he crossed a narrow side road, Seb saw what looked like an office worker throwing old office papers of some sort into a fire inside a steel bin. Seb ambled casually down the street, being savvy enough to keep an eye on the street behind him, just in case. When he got to the bin he simply asked the office clerk "Do you mind?" as he clutched the papers to his chest.

"Sure, go ahead." the clerk smiled. "It's all going up in smoke anyway. No skin off my nose, mate."

With that Seb dropped the papers into the fire and stayed a minute or two to watch them burn. He then said "Thank you." and retraced his steps back to the main road.

Eventually, Seb arrived back at his office and went in, locking the strong front door behind him, dropping the corrugated steel window shutters, and closing the blinds.

Seb took out his cell phone and downloaded the papers into a secure Cloud Safe app on his computer. He turned on the small TV on a shelf opposite his makeshift desk, then sat to read through the pages on his cell phone display screen.

What Seb saw did not make for good reading. The papers claimed that a new type of drug had been developed for the elimination of millions of people around the world. However, Dev had realized that the big idea was the result of some rogue scientific brain wave, developed by a big corporate pharma company, to create a drug, along with a quick-acting antidote, to simply hold the world to ransom. If the target countries were willing to make a substantial payment into a series of secret, untraceable bank accounts, then the world could be saved.

The problem was that other parties got wind of the idea, maybe Russia, China, or both, and were determined to get their hands on the secret biological ingredients and scientific processes to pursue their own agenda, which was an attempt to rule the entire planet. It was also suspected that some big-time mafia organization was also keen to get hold of those papers to enrich their own almighty dollar coffers.

The only problem for everybody was that there was one page missing, containing the secret biological messenger details. It might be some form of mRNA messenger or a modified version of such. The big question was, who had the missing page?

Seb closed his eyes to concentrate on where he might start to locate the missing page. Dev King was the only lead he had to go on. As that name passed through his mind, Seb overheard the BBC news presenter announce that there had been a serious accident in central London. Some guy on a skateboard was being chased by two suspicious-looking East Europeans when he ran into the middle of the road and got hit by a motorbike. The boy was dead on arrival at the Saint Thomas Hospital.

At the end of the announcement, Seb's fixed telephone rang. He grabbed hold of the handset and said "Hello, Esco investigations, how can I help you?"

A strange voice said softly "It would be more to the point, Mister Seb, if I were to ask you, how can I help you?"

"Go on, how can you help me?" replied Seb.

"I believe you are missing a very important page, Mister Seb. And I am looking for half a dozen missing pages. I like to think that we can help each other, if you get my drift, as they say."

"Who are you?" Seb demanded.

"It matters not who I am Mister Seb. However, you can call me Marcus, Marcus Blight. That is not my real name of course, but then neither is your real name Sebastian. I think we should meet somewhere safe and private, don't you agree?"

"Of course, where do you suggest?" Seb replied.

"I can highly recommend the Carlton Gentlemen's Club if you know where that is."

"Yes, I know where that is, excellent choice. When would you like to meet?"

"Well, there is no point wasting each other's time, how about this evening at eleven pm on the dot?"

"That suits me fine. Listen, what happened to the boy Dev King? That was no accident."

"Dev King was out of his depth Mister Sebastian. He got careless due to his youthful over-exuberant desire to play with the big boys. I do hope you do not make the same mistakes as Dev. He was such a nice boy, it is a pity he wasn't more experienced in high-caliber industrial espionage. Until this evening then Mister Sebastian. Please, do not be late, like your late friend Dev."

The phone went dead, and if Sebastian was not careful with Marcus Blight, that was how he would end up later on tonight.