Chapter five

Published: Jun 16, 2026 by

Lily stepped out of the dusty storage room and into the main office. Jake stood facing her with his hands behind his back and a gloved hand was covering his mouth, preventing him from screaming out any warning to his colleague. Standing behind him was a group of four people, all wearing black combat fatigues, helmets, face masks, flash glasses and their matching black gloves.

Her eyes glanced sideways from the four strangers to the exit door on her right. She weighed up her options in her mind. By the time she had reached the door, swiped her access card and scanned her retina, the group would easily be upon her. Her eyes moved slightly further to the right and took in the red fire alarm upon the wall. She might be able to reach that and trigger the alarm to inform others in the building of her plight. Before she could make a move, one of the strangers spoke.

“Miss Kortuga. You need to come with us.” One of the strangers lowered the face mask and revealed his face as he spoke. He reached into a pocket at the front of his jacket and removed a black leather wallet, flipping it open revealing an ID card with a photo that matched the now unmasked face before her. The words “Secret Intelligence Service” were emblazoned above the name James Bland.

“What the hell is MI6 doing here? And more importantly, James Bland? Could you not think of a better cover name than that?” Lily chuckled, trying to hide her fear with bravado. She wasn’t sure anyone was buying it, but it was worth a try.

“I get that a lot, Miss Kortuga. It’s actually my real name. Now like I said, you need to come with us.” James replied, his face calm and emotionless, but Lily could see his eyes sparking, ready to move at any sign of a threat.

“I have a question, no, two questions, well, maybe more depending on the answers to the first two questions.” Lily was speaking faster than her brain could process her thoughts.

“You have 60 seconds then we need to go.” James replied calmly.

Lily took a deep breath, getting her thoughts in order before she spoke. 5 seconds of the 60 had now gone. “Where are we going and why have you restrained Jake?”

“To an undisclosed location and because we have no record of this gentleman on our records, we assumed he is hostile and restrained him.” James replied, looking at his watch, checking how long before they had to move.

“Ok, well, you can let him go. Jake works here with me.” Lily spoke firmly. The agent restraining Jake waited for James Bland to nod before letting Jake go.

“Yeah, you’d better let me go. How dare you come in here and grab me like that.” Jake went to poke the tall agent with his index finger in the chest to make his point, but instantly regretted it as the agent grabbed his wrist and restrained him once more, before his index finger could even connect with the black fatigues.

“Sorry!” Jake apologised, wincing at the pain coming from his right wrist twisted behind his back. James nodded to the agent once more and Jake was released. This time Jake walked quickly over to where Lily was standing and raised his hands up in surrender, but out of reach of the agent.

Lily looked over at Jake, making sure he was ok, before turning back to face the agents. It had been 40 seconds since they had started talking. “Last question. Why do you need us?”

“There has been an incident and protocol dictates NOSEE must be summoned for an incident of this… nature.” James replied, “As we cannot locate Professor Rang, we need you, not ‘us’. If you can vouch for this gentleman, then he can stay here and continue monitoring the situation at his work station.”

“Professor Rang retired years ago? No wonder you can’t find him.” Lily replied, her face a picture of confusion. “Yes, I can vouch for Jake. He has top level security clearance.”

James glanced quickly at his watch once more. “Time is up. We are leaving.”

Two of the agents took a step towards Lily. “Listen, there is no need to drag me out of here. I’m coming. Just let me get my laptop bag and I’ll be right with you.”

Lily walked forward towards the two agents dressed in black and gently pushed them apart to walk between them. They both took a step back and allowed her to proceed. Walking over to her desk, she locked her desktop computer, the array of screens on the desk instantly turning off. She pulled out a hardware authentication token out of the desktop computer and put it into one of the pockets of her trouser suit. Grabbing her laptop bag from under the desk, she stood up straight, turning back to face the two agents.

Before she could react, one agent grabbed her wrists and tied them behind her back with a thick plastic cable tie, whilst the other placed a hood over her head. Everything went black.

“Please stay calm Miss Kortuga. This is standard security protocol.” James’ voice sounded muffled through the fabric of the hood, but she understood the words clearly.

She thought back to her induction to the job in her first week, where it was briefly mentioned that on the rare occasion that something major occurred then this may happen. “Oh yes, when aliens attack the earth you may be dragged out of your office with a hood over your head,” the instructor had laughed out loud to himself after delivering that point in the presentation slide, obviously thinking it would never happen.

She shook her head in disbelief at the current situation she found herself in. “Jake, do what they say and remind me to chase up your induction with MI6. They never got back to me, even after sending five chase up emails. Probably why you aren’t in their systems.”

“Yes boss, will do!” Jake shouted back at her from the other side of the room.

Lily relaxed and allowed herself to be escorted out of the building by the agents. Although she couldn’t see anything through the dark hood, she was able to retrace her journey in her head through the winding corridors of the University campus, each part of the building being added one after the other as it had expanded over the years, leading to corridors that wrapped their way between various large lecture theatres and research labs. She would have normally turned left at this point to enter the main reception, but instead they turned right and through what she could only imagine was a fire escape.

A few steps later, and they had stopped. She heard a heavy van door sliding open along its hinges. Although she couldn’t see the van, she imagined it was also black, with dark privacy glass. These government agencies were all alike, choosing vehicles that were trying to remain hidden, but the result was the opposite, standing out like a sore thumb.

She was helped into the back of the van by one of the agents. Lily noticed the voice of a female agent instructing her where to step and when to sit, unsure if they were already in the van or one of the agents with their face covered that had been in their office. The noise of the door sliding slamming shut echoed inside the van and someone banged twice on the outside of the door to indicate it was secure.

The van started moving, with Lily swaying gently side to side, buffered by two strong agents sitting either side of her, preventing her from falling any further. They sat in silence as the van made its way to wherever they were headed. There was very little traffic noise coming from outside. Lily assumed this was due to the van being well insulated, or maybe due to bulletproofing. Hopefully she wouldn’t have to find out, she thought to herself.