The following day we kept all the staff away and erected high fences around the perimeter with large signs proclaiming 'danger: building work in progress'. That meant that nobody in the surrounding houses could see anything and we were able to move around freely and plan for the attack.
We slept in shifts throughout the day so that we would all be fresh for the early evening briefing.
I discussed with White the possibility of planting further red herrings via Arthur but in the end we agreed it would be over-egging the pudding. It seemed overwhelmingly likely that they would soon be exactly where we wanted them. We also figured that if, as we suspected, these fifty agents were working outside usual CIA boundaries, they wouldn't be reporting back to Washington. Hopefully we could capture and interrogate them, or indeed kill them if necessary, and they would remain forever rogue agents who had mysteriously disappeared.
There was always the possibility that word would get back and we would be facing an international incident of unprecedented stickiness, but that was for the politicians to worry about.
Mid afternoon found me in the canteen filling up on coffee and carbohydrates.
"How are you not twenty stone?" said Hannah as I tucked into my second plate of sausages, chips and bread and butter.
"I've never thought about it, I just eat when I'm hungry. I suppose I burn it off somehow: chasing terrorists, going for walks, a good, hard fuck."
I immediately felt sorry for Adam as he choked violently and tea came out of his nose. I nudged him under the table with my foot and smiled apologetically.
"Anyway," I said, "who knows how long we'll have to wait before breakfast tomorrow?"
"Speaking of which," said John standing up and draining his tea, "I'm going for a puff around the perimeter."
"I'll join you," said Hannah, "I need to stretch my legs before we're cooped up in here all night like battery chickens."
"Sorry," I said when they'd gone, "that just slipped out."
"It's my fault, I shouldn't be so sensitive."
"It's one of your finest qualities," I said, causing him to blush again.
"When was it you sent that email to get me out of the house?"
"Two, nearly three months ago, why?"
"Fuck, it seems like years. It's all rather kicked off since then, hasn't it?"
"I suppose without Peterson killing Libby we'd never have known anything was awry. They may never even have gone after Arthur."
"Maybe," I said, gathering a few chips on my fork, "who knows?"
I munched away, thinking for the first time about how everything seemed to stem from that one confusing day.
"I suppose," I concluded as I finished my meal, "that it was only your concern for me that lead to all this. Otherwise we may never have caught Peterson, I'd have finished my assignment and Arthur would never have gone to Washington."
White came over to our table to save Adam the embarrassment of having to form a reply.
"All set?" he asked, pouring himself a tea.
"Can't wait," I said genuinely. "This will be the biggest feather in our collective caps."
"Unless it goes pear-shaped."
"Can you have a pear-shaped feather?" I mused. "Never mind, something worrying you?"
"Nothing specific," said White, "just the potential scale of this. I'll have to answer to the Prime Minister for whatever transpires tonight."
"He supports us, doesn't he?" asked Adam.
"More than we could hope for, yes, but the aftermath of this could be enormous."
"We're a non-political organisation," I said, "leave all the PR bullshit to Downing Street."
"Of course, but I still have to think about the public impact of our operations."
"Your welcome to it," I said, "I just want to get on with my job and catch the bad guys."
White smiled.
"Tonight you'll have all the bad guys you could ever want. Try to leave some of them in a state to answer questions."
"I only ever kill people who try to kill me or someone else first."
By six o'clock the T14 teams were all ensconced within the main building, save for John's team of six who were parked around the corner ready to capture any getaway drivers or agents who didn't enter the grounds of the complex. They were also to keep any members of the public from entering. John, of course, was the first to volunteer for this outdoor position.
We had to wait until past one o'clock in the morning for any action.
"Four highly suspicious looking black vans just turning into your road," said John, "trust the fucking Americans."
I grinned to myself before gathering my concentration.
White was in the portacabin with twenty Marines, the other ten covering the rear waste ground. I heard him over my earpiece telling them to be ready for anything.
As well as our usual Kalashnikovs we were all also armed with pistols and silencers. I dreaded to think how many other weapons Adam had about his person. Boys and their toys. I contented myself with a knife strapped to each leg and a couple of stun grenades.
In an office near the first of the lab doors I watched the monitor as John poked a pen-sized camera around the corner and filmed the vans parking up.
"A1," I said into my mic, "45 here. They're not exactly being subtle are they? Are they really just going to park four huge vans within view of a residential street?"
"I bloody hope not," he replied. "Fingers crossed they drive into the complex."
Fortunately they were professional enough to move part of the fence with minimum noise and replace it after themselves.
"A1, 22 here. Do you want us to stay outside or move in and disable their vehicles?"
"Await further instructions. Keep watch on the outer perimeter for now."
"Will do."
I watched on another monitor as the four vans parked up and switched off their engines.
Nothing happened for ten minutes, I suppose they were discussing tactics and checking they hadn't set off any alarms when they entered.
"Scanners indicate eleven personnel in rear of each van plus one driver," said White.
"Let's hope they don't have the same scanning equipment," I said quietly, "or they'll know what's waiting for them."
Being an unofficial operation, they would most likely be limited to what they could easily get their hands on upon arrival. Even the CIA would notice a pile of its own equipment going missing.
The rear door of one of the vans opened and eleven men moved out. They were all wearing ski masks, hardly standard CIA issue.
"No sign of comms units," said White. That was to our distinct advantage. Mind you, who were they going to communicate with?
I followed them on various cameras as they circled the building. Thankfully they showed no interest in the portacabin. Having disabled all the dummy cameras we'd mounted on the exterior, one of them beckoned towards the vans and the other thirty three men streamed out. They were either very brave, arrogant or stupid.
We deliberately hadn't yet reinforced the main door, so they easily broke the padlocks we'd placed and all forty four of them moved into the reception foyer.
"Nothing happening at the rear," I heard White whisper, "anything with you 22?"
"Negative, quiet as the proverbial," confirmed John.
"Okay," continued White, "it seems we won't be joined by anyone else tonight. 22, come in and capture the drivers as quietly as possible, I'll provide cover."
"On our way," said John, in a manner which I knew indicated that he was taking a last drag of his cigarette before moving off. I couldn't help smiling again. One day I fully expected to see him capture or kill a terrorist with a fag hanging from his mouth like Dot Cotton in a launderette.
Now that there were forty four armed CIA agents in the building, we were outnumbered. Not that I was bothered, I relished a challenge. But I knew that as soon as the drivers were eliminated we would be joined by at least twenty marines, and that could easily turn into a bloodbath.
I kept an eye on two monitors at once, one showing the vans outside, the other showing the people inside the building.
"All forty four infiltrators are moving away from reception towards the centre of the building," I whispered, "22 the drivers are all yours, no interference."
"Roger and wilko," said John perkily, doubtless anticipating being able to light up again in a couple of minutes.
I saw him and the other three creep through the fence.
To make things even easier for us, two of the drivers had got out and were having a seemingly casual chat next to the second van. Using the first van as cover, they moved around behind the two men.
John and 74 advanced and simultaneously placed both a hand over their mouths and a pistol to their heads. The other two moved around the back of the other vans but they must have heard something because both drivers jumped out brandishing machine guns. I heard White order the two marines to fire their single shot, silenced rifles and both men slumped against their vans.
I saw White running towards the vans and John handcuffing the other two so I switched my attention to the other monitor.
The forty four appeared not to know quite where they were going, and I could barely contain my amusement as they poked their weapons into various store cupboards and lavatories.
"All secure out here," said White, "61, are they with you yet?"
Hannah didn't answer, confirming what I could see on the monitors that they were almost within earshot.
"45 here, they're almost on top of team one. Shall we let them continue?"
"No evidence of explosives in the vans," cut in John, "in fact there's fuck all in here except food and drink. Whatever weaponry they have on them, that's it."
"No radios either," added 74.
"Okay, hold fire for now," said White, "I want to know what they're planning. I'm coming in with a dozen marines to secure the entrance."
Through my headset I heard Hannah let out the tiniest sigh as the infiltrators trooped past her team.
My mind was boggling at the thought of all forty four of them sticking together like a rugby team. I supposed they would have intercepted our references to the 'central area' of the building and, without any further knowledge, were simply working their way towards that.
I suddenly noticed that six of them had rather bulky backpacks.
I reported this to everyone, and posed the question of what may be in them.
"Everyone keep an eye on those six men," said White, "if anyone reaches for those backpacks we have to react immediately."
As my team were the closest to the centre that would almost certainly be us doing most of the reacting. And at their present rate they would be with us in about two minutes.
I was therefore delighted when they split into two groups. Half of them seemed to be setting up some sort of barricade while the rest continued moving towards us. I immediately appraised White, who couldn't see a monitor, of this development.
"A1, I think you have to start picking off some of these," I said, "my team can't take twenty two of them easily, not to mention whatever's in those packs and all six of them will be with us soon. Must be explosives or grenades or something. I think we have to risk storming them immediately - we could even be talking about a suicide bombing."
"Okay," whispered A1, "listen everyone, teams one and two advance immediately on that barricade - kill all of them with silencers. I'll then come through with the marines. Teams three and four prepare to storm the forward group on my command. Take some alive, then hit the lights and find out what's in those backpacks."
I switched off the monitors; we'd be relying in our eyes and ears from now on.
I heard nothing except the footsteps of the advancing twenty two men at the far end of the long corridor which lead to the first of the fourteen security doors. Nonetheless, as they were within twenty feet of our position, I heard Hannah say "Barricade destroyed."
I and my team from our position crouched on the floor of the office could only see the light of their torches. They were almost level with us and we had to act soon or one of their torches could betray us. I'd removed the plastic windows from the office a few days ago when I chose it as our last line of defence.
"Go team three," said White.
Shooting erupted from the rear.
"Go team four," I shouted in the confusion and all thirteen of us sprang up and aimed our weapons, the vivid red lights of the laser sites telling us all who was and wasn't covered.
As we had trained for so many times, it took a mere couple of seconds for each of us to have one man covered.
"Rear seven down," said Hannah. That left fifteen, and we had thirteen of them covered.
A volley of shots rang out and I could tell that someone in my team had been hit.
Three of the front thirteen took that as a signal to get clever and none of them had rucksacks so I shot them in the head.
"That ought to instil some order," I thought, moving out of the office to check things at the rear.
Team three had switched the lights on in their office base and Adam gave me the thumbs up.
"Drop your weapons," I shouted at the twelve who remained alive.
By the time White and the marines arrived we had established order.
One of my team had taken a bullet in the shoulder and he was carried away for medical attention.
I separated the ones with the backpacks and the rest were handcuffed and lead away.
"Hello, I'm Bill," said White in his admirably terrifying manner. "Now then, what have you got in there?"
They remained silent and all seemed to possess the steely superiority we'd often seen in CIA agents.
"You," he said, prodding one of them in the chest with his pistol, "slowly take off your backpack and place it on the ground. Open it very, very slowly and then stand up."
To emphasise the instruction I aimed my rifle at his head.
The pack was chock full of grenades.
"Is that what you all have?" I asked, looking at the others. Nothing.
Okay, that's how they wanted to play it, fine.
One by one we made them remove and open their packs. They all contained either Semtex or grenades. Maybe enough to get through three or four of our nice new doors. A week ago, it would have easily been enough to penetrate right through to the core of the lab.
Once all six had been thoroughly searched for weapons or detonators they were handcuffed and taken to the canteen to be stood over by marines who looked really pissed off that they hadn't got to kill anyone tonight.
White congratulated us on a successful mission and phoned the Prime Minister for his advice on what to do next.
As we were sorting through the bodies, a murmur arose.
I checked a few other corpses to make sure and as subtly as possible got rid of the few marines who were hanging around. I told them to start loading everything from the portacabin into the black vans - I had the feeling we may need to make a swift exit.
"Sorry to interrupt," I said tapping White on the shoulder when they had gone, "but most of these aren't CIA."
His phone almost exploded and I clearly heard the Prime Minister shout "Who the fuck are they?"
"Look," I said, "two thirds of them are clearly from the middle east. No way they'd ever get in the CIA."
"I know this one," said Adam, "he was in the IRA."
For the first time in eight years I saw that White was actually lost for words.
I took the phone from him.
"Hello, Prime Minister, agent 45 here, I was at your briefing. We seem to have around thirty middle eastern men and at least one ex-IRA."
"But..."
"I couldn't agree more.”