Heat and cold are a matter of discipline, Klaus reminded himself, as the clammy chill seeped into his bones and the fog rolled in off the harbour. He glanced at his watch. Twenty-five minutes past midnight.

Cramped up inside a battered delivery van, Klaus and two of his agents were watching, waiting. The courier they'd been tailing for the last week was expected to come to this isolated spot on the edge of the docklands tonight to meet his contact. Intercepting the hand-over would give them the first solid piece of evidence they needed to explain why the Purification Brigade had suddenly activated its communication networks across Europe.

‘Anti-imperialist urban guerrillas', they called themselves. ‘Fucking terrorists,' that's what Klaus thought of them: a pack of rabid communist fanatics who wanted to bring down democracy and see communism triumphant across Europe. NATO Intelligence had been keeping them under low level surveillance for years. The Purification Brigade had always been a small organisation, long on rhetoric and short on action, and largely uncoordinated. Until now. Something was afoot, and NATO Intelligence needed to know what it was.

Outside the van, the fog began to thicken.

Fucking Istanbul.

He hadn't been in Istanbul since 1984. Nearly three years ago. He'd almost died on that mission, trying to recover stolen goods from the Russians - a top secret computer-enhancement device. He hadn't succeeded. The KGB had got away with their ‘Black Box', and Klaus had nearly been killed trying to stop them.

Later, while he was still in hospital, he'd learned he hadn't been intended to succeed. The bloody thing was designed to malfunction, so the KGB's victory had been a hollow one.

The memory still disgusted him. Istanbul disgusted him.

"Sir!" Agent Z sat up, fully alert, his eyes pressed close to the narrow slit in the side of the van that let him see the deserted roadway.

Klaus joined him, peering out.

A man walked along the empty road to a bench at the bus stop, and sat down, placing an attaché case under the seat.

"That's him. That's the courier. Z, B - get ready to move."

There was no traffic. All was quiet. About five minutes passed, and a second man came into view.

"Here's the contact. Stand by."

B and Z checked their firearms. Klaus watched the target, ready to give the signal.

As the contact neared the bench, the courier looked up. The contact reached inside his overcoat, drew a gun, and fired two bullets into the courier's forehead.

The doors of the van burst open; the agents leaped out and opened fire. Their target, taken by surprise, gaped in confusion, and before he could return fire, a bullet struck him in the leg. He fell heavily, dropping his gun, and the agents were on him in an instant. The wounded gunman, his victim, and the attaché case were all bundled into the van, and they drove to a Turkish Army base where secure rooms had been set aside for their use.

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Rasim Topal shifted uncomfortably on the hard chair, his elbows on the tabletop and his head cradled in his hands. His leg wound throbbed dully. The first aid given in the van had been rough and ready, and the jolting of the vehicle as they drove to this place had hurt like nothing else he'd ever experienced. He'd been nearly out of his mind with pain and nausea by the time they arrived. Then, two medics had shot him full of painkillers, mumbling to each other about blood loss and antibiotics and shock, talking across him as if he was an insensible piece of meat with no interest in what was happening. Nobody had talked to him at all. As soon as he'd been bandaged up, they'd brought him to this bare, cold room and left him here.

He shifted in his seat again, and longed for coffee and a cigarette. His leg felt as if it belonged to someone else - for which he was grateful, because he knew that when those painkillers started to wear off it was going to hurt like a bitch.

How long had he been here now? At least two hours. He imagined someone would come in soon to question him. That's what he'd been told to expect if ever he was captured. Questioning. Detention. Trial. Imprisonment.

The Brigade wouldn't try to get him out of here. He knew he was expendable - they all were. The Brigade taught its recruits: "We are all expendable - only The Cause endures". That's what he'd been doing when he was shot and captured - ensuring that The Cause was served, by eliminating the courier who'd been deemed expendable.

Behind him, the door opened. Topal twisted in his seat to see. A guard in military uniform stepped into the room and stood just inside the door. Next, a tall man with a forbidding expression on his face strode in and sat in the chair at the opposite side of the table. Topal watched him warily.

Cold-eyed, the man smiled.

Topal quailed. He couldn't help it. That smile was like the smile of Death.

So what now? Questioning. Detention. Trial. Imprisonment. He knew that sometimes ‘Torture' featured on that list too. He had no doubt the man facing him across the table was capable of inflicting torture. He knew he'd never be able to withstand it. His stomach turned over. Capture, and all that might follow, had existed only as a kind of theoretical possibility when first he joined the Brigade. Young, idealistic and fresh from involvement in student politics at university, he was sure then that he'd be willing to face anything to free the deluded masses from imperialist expansion and capitalist exploitation. Now, looking Death's twin in the face, he wasn't so sure he was up to the task.

"So." The man broke the silence. "You're a Purification Brigade operative, and you've just killed one of your own men. Why?"

Topal felt sweat breaking out on his forehead. In the four years since he'd joined the Purification Brigade, he'd carried messages and shifted packages, he'd engaged in meetings where idealistic believers made speeches that stirred the blood. None of that had prepared him for the reality of killing and death, the weight of a gun in his own hand - nor for the fear of what might happen to him now, in the hands of these nameless men who might torture him or kill him without anyone knowing he'd even been captured.

His interrogator stood up and leaned across the table, fixing him with a chilly green glare. "Did you hear me, you worthless piece of shit? I asked you a question!"

"I have nothing to say," he mumbled.

"What? I didn't hear you. Why did you kill one of your own men?"

Topal felt sick. His stomach heaved, threatening to empty its contents onto the floor. There'd been training sessions about how to hold out under interrogation; the instructions had all made sense at the time, but with this terrifying brute towering over him, he felt his courage fading. To his shame, he realised he must look as frightened as he felt.

A few minutes of enduring his interrogator's hectoring, a few minutes of fearful resistance, and he let go of any pretensions he'd had to stoicism or loyalty. Topal threw up his hands, defeated. "All right, all right. I admit it. I was working for the Purification Brigade. The dead man was a Brigade courier. I killed him on their orders."

As soon as he'd made the admission, he slumped hopelessly in his chair. "There, I've signed my own death warrant. They'll kill me for admitting that. They'll know; they always know. It'll make no difference whether I'm in prison or not: they'll find me and kill me."

His interrogator smiled icily. "Then you have nothing more to lose, do you? So tell me what the man had done to make the Brigade order his death."

"He'd done nothing. The Brigade's liquidating its old courier network. They're moving into attack configuration, and the old couriers are no longer necessary." Topal swallowed down the sour taste that rose in his throat, ashamed of every word but too terrified to put up any resistance. "The couriers know too much about the Brigade's work. Now they're of no further use, it's easier to kill them than keep them quiet."

We are all expendable - only The Cause endures.

"Attack configuration - what does that mean? What's the Brigade planning?"

"I don't know."

"Come on, you don't expect me to believe that. Their communication networks have come to life all over Europe. What are they up to?"

"I tell you, I don't know." Topal's mouth was dry; his throat felt constricted and his heart was racing. It was true: he didn't know. What would this brute do to him if he couldn't answer? Would this be when the torture started? He tried to placate the man: "Nobody in the Brigade knows all the information. We're only told what we need to know."

His interrogator fixed him with an ominous gaze. "The blueprints."

"What blueprints?"

"God damn it! The blueprints you picked up from the courier. We went through the attaché case, and found blueprints for a building."

Topal's eyes darted nervously from side to side. He knew so little - but what lengths would his captors go to before they believed that? Before they gave up?

"Come on!" the man barked. "You've got nothing to lose. If you cooperate, we might make your last days comfortable for you while you wait for your comrades to send your executioner to visit. The blueprints! What are they for?"

Topal slumped back into his hopeless posture. "They're the plans for a building that will be used in the next stage. I don't know what the building is, or where it is. I was to pass them on to my next contact."

"This air ticket." The interrogator pulled a slip of paper from his pocket and dangled it in front of Topal's face. "This was in the case with the blueprints. Is this where you have to meet your contact? Düsseldorf? Somewhere else in Germany?"

"I don't know. They were only going to send the instructions just before I had to leave."

"So, tell me about this next stage. What will the building be used for?"

"I don't know."

"Oh, for god's sake!" The tall man pounded the table top angrily, got up and walked away across the room, rubbing his temples furiously. "You can't be as ignorant as that! You know what's going on-"

"I tell you, I don't know! The Brigade only discloses details to the people who are to act on them!"

"Fuck the details! You know what the operation is about! You talk about shifting into attack configuration, moving to the next stage. Next stage of what? What's the Brigade planning?"

The half-forgotten directions he'd heard in those long-ago training sessions echoed faintly in Topal's mind. "Remain impassive. Do not let yourself show fear or anger. Do not be misled by promises of kindness or reward. Give no information that may harm The Cause. Speak only of our ideals."

He surged upright in his chair, suddenly energetic. "You know what the Brigade stands for! We want to purify Europe, clear out the scourge of imperialist corruption that's dragging our people towards perdition! We want to bring the pure ideals of Communism to heal our decadent society! So the Brigade's making ready, recruiting the soldiers we need for the task ahead!"

"Save the speeches!" the interrogator snarled. "I don't want to hear your party rhetoric. You talk about healing - but you're recruiting fighters. Doesn't that sound contradictory to you?"

Topal glowered belligerently. Give no information that may harm The Cause. Speak only of our ideals.

"We want to purify Europe. Once Europe has been delivered from corruption, the people will be free."

"And what kind of freedom would that be?"

"Freedom from imperialist power. Freedom from the oppression of the many in pursuit of wealth for the few. That's freedom worth fighting for! That's the freedom we choose! And we'll break the grip of imperialist power by removing the power brokers who wield it!"

"Assassination. That's what you're talking about."

The truth was, Topal didn't know exactly what the Brigade was gearing up for, but as soon as the word was spoken he knew his interrogator had hit on the right answer.

He glared sullenly, and ground out, "I tell you, I don't know." His burst of energy was ebbing away fast. He mumbled, "All I know is, the Brigade has been recruiting men."

"Names?" the man prompted.

Give no information that may harm The Cause. We are all expendable - only The Cause endures.

Topal screwed his mouth up into an unwilling knot, but fear of what his captors might do to him was outweighing his ideals. He slumped back in his chair, beaten.

"All right; I'm dead anyway. Names, then. Dmitri Vasnetsov and Kadir Solak."

No reaction showed on the tall man's face. The wintry green eyes bored into Topal's, as if they could see right into his mind, sorting truth from fiction.

We are all expendable - only The Cause endures. Silently, he repeated it over and over as a kind of mantra, trying to keep up what little courage he had left.

Abruptly, the interrogator turned away and strode across to where the guard stood just inside the door. Topal heard him say, "Give the prisoner some water, and make sure the medics check him in an hour's time." Then the door opened and closed, and Topal was alone again.

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Klaus joined his men in the next room, where they'd been watching the interrogation through a one-way observation panel. Agent B handed the Major a mug of Nescafe. Gratefully, Klaus took a sip, and sat with his men at the observation bench.

"Didn't take you long to get him talking, sir," B remarked.

Klaus snorted contemptuously. "Amateurs! These idiots join political factions and then find themselves out of their depth when things get serious. He was ready to piss himself before I got started."

He swallowed down the rest of his coffee and set the mug on the table in front of him.

"So. What do we have? We're still unsure of what the Brigade is planning to do; possibly an assassination, but not necessarily. We've got blueprints for a building that will play a part, but we don't know what it is or where. We have a one way plane ticket to Düsseldorf, two days from now, suggesting whatever is to happen might take place in Germany - but again, it's not certain. The prisoner could have been lying - but I doubt it. The way he was quaking in his boots, I'd say he didn't know much. The most solid piece of information is the names of the men who are to carry out the task, whatever it may be."

"Who are Vasnetsov and Solak, sir?" B asked. "I'm not familiar with the names."

"Dmitri Vasnetsov and Kadir Solak are both explosives experts. Solak was in prison for his part in a series of bombings in Eastern Turkey in 1985. Just two months ago, he escaped. Vasnetsov is a mercenary, a murderous bastard who'd blow up his own grandmother's house for a fee. As far as I'm aware, Vasnetsov and Solak have never worked together before, but if they've joined forces, they'll be a formidable team."

"Explosives experts? I don't get it." Z's face wore a puzzled frown. "I mean, it's a clumsy method for an assassination. Unless- unless they mean to kill more than one person."

Klaus looked grim. "Exactly. Multiple targets, and a highly visible method of taking them out. These political fanatics can never resist the grand gesture. Agent B - get in touch with Bonn. Get L to do some research - find out if there are any events coming up in the next two or three weeks that might be targets for a bomb attack. Politicians, business leaders - whoever the Purification Brigade might see as ‘power brokers'. Tell him to have something for me by the time we get back tomorrow evening." He glanced at his watch. "Make that ‘this evening'. And get the others onto tracking down Vasnetsov and Solak. We need to know where they are."

The three finished their business at the army base, and went back to the hotel to grab a couple of hours sleep before their late-afternoon flight back to Bonn. They'd be going in to headquarters when they landed, Klaus reminded the others, and they needed to function.

Back in his room, Klaus closed the drapes, collapsed onto the bed, and made himself to go to sleep. When he woke up, two hours had passed, and he didn't feel refreshed. His sleep had been full of half-remembered fragments of dreams. Fishing boats on the Bosporus. Struggling with an opponent on a high tower, his feet slipping on a narrow foothold. Running through subterranean tunnels that were falling in on him. A red shirt, framing shapely arms. Shapely male arms.

Groaning, Klaus rolled off the bed and opened the drapes. The afternoon sun slanted into the room.

Fucking Istanbul. He looked at his watch. Time to go.

He went to call the others.