Chapter 22

Agent 1 was awakened by someone knocking on the door. He lifted his head and looked at the clock next to his bed. He grunted when he saw that it was only barely past five o'clock in the morning. He didn't care for getting out of bed yet. So, he pulled on the cord, that was hanging down on the wall behind the back board of his bed, to switch the lights on. He waited on his eyes to adjust to the light and then shouted in the direction of the open door of his bedroom, "YES!"

He could hear how someone opened the door in the front room and when that person walked in the direction of his bedroom, he knew that it had to be a woman. He knew this from the sound of her steps, she was probably wearing shoes with 2 or 4 inch heals, and they make a very recognizable sound when used on a wooden floor. And then he could also hear a familiar voice, it was saying, "It's me, Sir. Can I come further?"

Because he knew that it was his assistant, he said, "Sure, come on in."

He didn't show it in his voice, but he was surprised that she had come in person to his room. Normally, she would use the phone, when there was something she needed to talk about. Especially when it was in the middle of the night.

When his assistant walked in, he could see that she didn't look as her normal self. Her hair was a mess, and she had no make-up on. It was obvious to him that she was also pulled out of bed unexpectedly.

"Sir ... um ... sorry to disturb you, but we have a pressing matter at hand."

"What is it? Is Sylvia okay?" Agent 1 asked with concern in his voice.

"Yes, Sir! She is fine. But we just received the file about Sylvia's dad and the guy who brought it wants to see you in person right away, he has some other information about our investigation, and he said it was very urgent."

Agent 1 grunted again and said, "Do you know who he is?"

"No, Sir, he only said that he wants to talk with you in person. We have checked his papers, and it had his service number on it, but no name."

Agent 1 pulled his bed covers away and jumped out of bed. While he did this, his assistant gasped and quickly turned around while saying, "I ... um ... I'll wait in the front room, if that's okay for you?"

Before Agent 1 could answer, the woman had already rushed out of his bedroom. Her reaction made Agent 1 smile, and he thought, "Why is she acting like that? You would think she should be used to it by now."

The thing that Agent 1 didn't know about her, was that she had been having a crush on him for a while now and seeing him naked so suddenly had surprised her. And of course, she was also a little afraid that he would notice something if she would stay and look at him. She was sure that she would have stared at that nice specimen between his legs, even limp, it had looked impressive. And while she was thinking this, she started to blush. She was sure that she wouldn't get the image of him naked out of her mind for a few days to come. However, the thing that had surprised her the most, was that she had seen that he kept his pubic hair nicely trimmed, and it made her wonder how it would feel against her own bare skin.

She almost jumped out of her skin, the moment that she felt his hand on her shoulder. She had been so occupied in thoughts that she hadn't noticed how he had snuck up on her.

"Sorry, did I startle you?" Agent 1 asked.

"Um ... it's nothing Sir, I was ... um ... with my mind somewhere else."

"Can you bring me to that guy now?" Agent 1 asked and he smiled at her when he could see how she was blushing at him. He wondered why she looked so guilty at him.

"Sure," she answered him and then walked out of the room. Agent 1 followed her and it seemed she was bringing him to one of the meeting rooms they often used for guests.

When they reached the room, she turned around and said, "He wants to see you in private! Sir, do you want me to bring you two some coffee and something to eat?"

"That would be nice," he said. He then knocked on the door and walked in.

The room was well lit, and it had a round table in the middle of it. About a dozen chairs stood around the table and on one of the chairs, the visitor was sitting. When he saw Agent 1 walking in, he stood up and did a few steps in his direction.

Agent 1 looked at him, and he saw that this guy was well built and had to be around 1m85 tall. His hair was pitch black, and he had deep brown eyes that looked surprisingly gentle. Agent 1 noticed that he was also very tanned.

"Good morning," Agent 1 said and held out his hand.

The guy accepted his hand and shook it. Agent 1 noticed that he had a firm grip.

"Hello," the other guy said back to him. "Sorry, to wake you so early, but it was important I saw you immediately. There have been some developments and that's why I got here somewhat earlier than planned."

They let go of each other's hand and then Agent 1 said, "Well, sit down, and then you can explain it to me. By the way, who are you?"

They both went sitting at the table. The guy smiled at him and said, "You already know more about me then I do about you, I think."

"I do?"

"Yes, I'm Ravid Mesika! They have told me you have looked up my file already."

Agent 1's eyes narrowed and then he said, "So, you are the guy that has been with Sylvia's dad and who trained Sylvia to defend herself, and if my information is correct, you two were also something more than just trainer and pupil?!"

"So, she has told you about us! Well, she must have, because I'm sure that this last part you mentioned wasn't in my file!"

"Yes, she did. We tested the girls and also if they could fight, and that made me take a closer look in her past."

"I hope she didn't hurt anyone?" Ravid said jokingly.

"Only my pride," Agent 1 said with a smile. "I wasn't prepared for a girl that also knew Krav Maga and when I used one of the deadlier moves against her, she countered it, and if she would have had a real knife in her hands, I would probably have been death by now."

"Yes, she really is something else, isn't she?"

"She sure is, but we'd better get to the point now."

"Of course, you are right. Well, I'm here to tell you that she is innocent. However, before I will tell you all about her and her dad, I first need to inform you about something else. Our organization has been keeping an eye on Sylvia after her father died and..."

"You had her under surveillance?"

"Not exactly under surveillance, but we just wanted to make sure she was safe. By the time I'm done with my story, all will be perfectly clear to you."

"Umm, okay," Agent 1 said and decided to let Ravid end his story before he would ask him questions again.

"To go on with what I was saying, so we had our eyes on her and our agent even followed her to Brazil. Needles to say that we were very surprised when she met up with those two people in that club. By the way, he calls himself Carlos these days and his wife uses the name Inez.

You have to know that our agent, that was following Sylvia, has joined forces with two other agents of ours in Brazil, to start following those two instead of Sylvia and her friend. We knew that she would be picked up by you guys after we had informed your organization about those two meeting up with two girls in Brazil. I'm sure you also had some agents keeping an eye on Carlos and his wife."

"Yes we did, but we never found out the names they were using. How did you find that out?"

"We found it out just a few hours ago, you must know that..."

Then there was a knock on the door and Agent 1's assistant walked into the room with a tray in her hands. It had two coffee mugs on it and some sandwiches. She walked up to the table and placed it in between the two men.

"Do you need me for anything else?" she asked.

"No, but maybe you could make arrangements to wake up the other agents and their assistants already. Let them gather in our meeting room and wait for me there."

"Yes, Sir," she said and then walked out of the room, closing the door behind her.

"Pretty girl," Ravid told Agent 1.

"Who, my assistant? Yeah, maybe you are right." Agent 1 said, he hadn't really noticed it, but it seemed that she had found some time to brush her hair and put on some makeup. He is so used to seeing her like that, that he doesn't pay too much attention to her anymore.

Agent 1 took the coffee mugs off of the tray and gave Ravid one of them. Both of them decided to drink it black, probably because both weren't completely awake yet.

"So, to go on with my story. After our agents started to follow those two, we noticed that they got nervous when they heard that the plane, with the girls on, had gone down somewhere over the Atlantic Ocean. Probably, because they knew that their message wouldn't reach their associates in Europe in time now, they made contact with the cell themselves, and they used the Internet for it.

They made contact with a cell in Liege, and they used a p2p connection to transfer them a file. We managed to make a copy of that file and our IT department cracked the code to open it. Inside the file, we found two new files. One is heavily encrypted and we still haven't cracked it. However, the other file was just a text file and didn't say anything important, unless you use one of their encryption filters on it. That new message explained the situation to their men, and that they had to advance their plans by twenty-four hours.

By the time we had informed the Belgium Police about it, and they raided the house that those terrorists used, they had already abandoned the building. They only found some electronics and traces of Semtex there. So, we now are sure that they will bomb something in Belgium. Probably, something in Brussels, but we still don't know what.

We think that the other file will hold the information about the target and maybe the plans about the attack. I have already given the file to your IT department. I hope that your guys have something that can unlock it. However, I doubt it that they will manage it in time.

That's why we still need to find out what Petra or Sabina knows about it. I'm more than sure that Sylvia, and her friend Sofia, don't know anything about it.

So, it will be up to you guys to make those two girls talk, and I'm sure that I don't have to tell you that by this new development, you now only have time until midday today, because else it will be too late to intervene."

"Um ... we had already planned something for today, but I'm not sure if one of those two girls will talk. In my eyes, Sabina is the girl that could maybe be made to talk, but I'm not sure if she knows anything. I think that it is Petra, who knows what we need to know, but that is the problem, I don't think we can make her talk."

"I'm not sure how far you can go with interrogating those suspects, but if you want, I can always try to get the information out of them! Our organiza..."

"That won't be necessary," Agent 1 said to interrupt him. "We have total freedom about those things. We even have received kill orders if we can't make them talk. I'm sure I don't have to explain this to you."

"No, you don't! We have used the same technique as well in the past."

"However, I must confess that I don't want to go that far. I don't want to kill any of those girls, even when they won't talk."

Ravid looked quietly at Agent 1 for a while, but didn't say anything about his last statement.

"So," Agent 1 said to change the topic, "maybe you can give me the file about Sylvia's dad now."

Ravid then smiled again and said, "The file I have with me, only contains more information about the group we are after. However, I think this is more interesting than the file itself."

Ravid opened a map lying next to him and took a DVD-disc out of it.

"This video is meant for Sylvia, but I will show it to you first. It will explain you everything about her dad and also explain you why we kept an eye on Sylvia." He then looked around him and said, "Um ... They told me this room had a screen and DVD-player."