James Katt's Arc

Chapter 1 of 7

James Katt had lost the most important file in the world. The encrypted dossier held the name of every deep-cover UNCLE spy alive. If enemies cracked it, those agents would die. James knew where it had been three days ago. He did not know where it had gone since. Every hour narrowed the gap between his search and their code-breakers. He stood in the elevator, jaw tight, one hand flat against the cold wall. His Beretta pressed under his jacket. The doors opened onto the top floor of UNCLE headquarters. Telari waited by the office door. She was his partner, and the one person he trusted with his life. She had run three field checks while he chased dead ends. Her red hair was pulled back, her mouth a hard line. "I ran every transfer log," she said. "Nothing. The trail just stops." "Then we're already too late," James said. "Not yet." She pushed the door open. Inside, their director sat behind a wide desk. Alexander Waverly was sixty, gray-suited, calm in a way that unsettled younger agents. He gave the missions. He decided who lived and died on paper. He did not look up when they entered. He was turning a small reel of tape between two fingers. "Sit," Waverly said. "You've both been looking in the wrong place." James stayed standing. "The dossier moved. We can't find where." "Because it didn't move the way you think." Waverly set the tape on the desk. "This came in an hour ago. A courier we lost last week. She recorded her last transfer before they took her." He pressed a switch. A woman's voice filled the room, fast and afraid. She named a shipping crate. She named a private airfield. Then the tape cut to static. James leaned over the desk. "An airfield. When did the crate leave?" "Six hours ago," Waverly said. "Bound out of the country. The dossier is on that plane." Telari looked at James. "That's a real lead. First one in three days." Relief hit James, then drained just as fast. Six hours out meant the dossier was crossing into enemy ground. Recovery on foreign soil meant no backup and no rules. Waverly stood. He slid a folder across the desk. "The plane belongs to THRUSH. Their leader arranged the pickup himself." James opened the folder. A photograph showed a man in a black hooded robe, a red-tipped cane in his hand. Thuldark. His oldest enemy. "He has the list," James said quietly. "He has it," Waverly agreed. "And he's flying it home to be decrypted. You have until it lands." James closed the folder. The lost trail was found. But finding it had put the dossier in Thuldark's hands, on a plane James did not control, heading somewhere he was not cleared to go. "We move now," Telari said. James nodded. "We chase the plane."