Soviets were filling themilitary’s armoury with hardware and its head with idealistic rubbish. The army divided into factions. Her father was asked to join both and he declined both, which made him the friend of neither.
One night when her father was sleeping at the barracks, they came for him. No one knew whether it was the Communists or the Nationalists but a lot of men died that night when the old government was removed with bullets and knives.
Her mother had scooped her up from her cot and ‘friendlies’ had smuggled them to Singapore. From there they went to Australia and applied for refugee status. The colonel had been highly regarded by senior Australian army officers. That helped them win their refugee status and A-6 spent the next sixteen years of her life growing into a proud Australian woman.
And then one day, a young man, a total stranger, approached her. He showed her ghastly photographs of her father snapped after they had finished with him. The man asked her whether she wanted to avenge her father’s death. Looking back on it, the whole episode had been unconvincing. Nevertheless, she’d fallen for it. Now, she couldn’t even be sure the photos had been genuine. They could easily have been faked. They could also have been real and the man being tortured could have been anyone. But she had been vulnerable. She’d heard many stories about her father, how much he’d loved her when she was a baby. A-6 even believed that she remembered him as a large and friendly shadow in the most distant reaches of her memory. She had said to the man that she wanted time to think but she already knew that the answer was yes.
She spent the next three months learning basic spycraft,self-defence, and how to pass herself off as a poor Indonesian. That was two years ago.
At first A-6 enjoyed the cloak and dagger stuff. It was easy being a spy in the new millennium. All she had to do was call in detailed reports of troop deployments in and around Hasanuddin AFB. For this she was given a satellite phone. The techies back home were a bit concerned about that at first. The handset was nothing special. It looked just like any old Nokia. The dish, however, was more obtrusive, even though it was small, about the size of a small dinner plate. A woman with an old mobile wasn’t in the least unusual, but a satellite phone? It turned out not to be an issue. Satellite TV was everywhere in Sulawesi, or throughout Maros at least. It was cheap, easy entertainment. It was almost unusual not to have it and a dish sat on even the poorest roof.
The phone could be used as a normal mobile but to use it as a satellite phone, she had to key in a ten-digit code. The handset then scrambled her voice into a random binary code and transmitted it on a scattered frequency to a military communications satellite. It was important that her calls could not be intercepted, unscrambled or traced without considerable effort. It was just prudent to be out of sight when she phoned in her reports. No big deal, she’d thought, although finding privacy in Maros was difficult.
Her run-in with Sergeant Melon demonstrated how serious and dangerous espionage was. And the current amicable relationship between Australia and Indonesia could turn ugly in a heartbeat, as it had often enough in the past. If she was caught when things were tense, there was the likelihood that she would be taken away and shot, unless there was political mileage to be gained by parading her through the courts. And then they’d shoot her.
A-6 wondered what it would be like to be a normal woman again, going to parties, the beach, nightclubs. It would be nice to dance, meet boys and have a normal life. The danger was all getting a bit too close now, especially given the continued contact with Sergeant Melon.
A-6 gave herself another six months. After that, she would review her situation. But in the meantime, something unusual was definitely going on in town. She heard the choppers before
One night when her father was sleeping at the barracks, they came for him. No one knew whether it was the Communists or the Nationalists but a lot of men died that night when the old government was removed with bullets and knives.
Her mother had scooped her up from her cot and ‘friendlies’ had smuggled them to Singapore. From there they went to Australia and applied for refugee status. The colonel had been highly regarded by senior Australian army officers. That helped them win their refugee status and A-6 spent the next sixteen years of her life growing into a proud Australian woman.
And then one day, a young man, a total stranger, approached her. He showed her ghastly photographs of her father snapped after they had finished with him. The man asked her whether she wanted to avenge her father’s death. Looking back on it, the whole episode had been unconvincing. Nevertheless, she’d fallen for it. Now, she couldn’t even be sure the photos had been genuine. They could easily have been faked. They could also have been real and the man being tortured could have been anyone. But she had been vulnerable. She’d heard many stories about her father, how much he’d loved her when she was a baby. A-6 even believed that she remembered him as a large and friendly shadow in the most distant reaches of her memory. She had said to the man that she wanted time to think but she already knew that the answer was yes.
She spent the next three months learning basic spycraft,self-defence, and how to pass herself off as a poor Indonesian. That was two years ago.
At first A-6 enjoyed the cloak and dagger stuff. It was easy being a spy in the new millennium. All she had to do was call in detailed reports of troop deployments in and around Hasanuddin AFB. For this she was given a satellite phone. The techies back home were a bit concerned about that at first. The handset was nothing special. It looked just like any old Nokia. The dish, however, was more obtrusive, even though it was small, about the size of a small dinner plate. A woman with an old mobile wasn’t in the least unusual, but a satellite phone? It turned out not to be an issue. Satellite TV was everywhere in Sulawesi, or throughout Maros at least. It was cheap, easy entertainment. It was almost unusual not to have it and a dish sat on even the poorest roof.
The phone could be used as a normal mobile but to use it as a satellite phone, she had to key in a ten-digit code. The handset then scrambled her voice into a random binary code and transmitted it on a scattered frequency to a military communications satellite. It was important that her calls could not be intercepted, unscrambled or traced without considerable effort. It was just prudent to be out of sight when she phoned in her reports. No big deal, she’d thought, although finding privacy in Maros was difficult.
Her run-in with Sergeant Melon demonstrated how serious and dangerous espionage was. And the current amicable relationship between Australia and Indonesia could turn ugly in a heartbeat, as it had often enough in the past. If she was caught when things were tense, there was the likelihood that she would be taken away and shot, unless there was political mileage to be gained by parading her through the courts. And then they’d shoot her.
A-6 wondered what it would be like to be a normal woman again, going to parties, the beach, nightclubs. It would be nice to dance, meet boys and have a normal life. The danger was all getting a bit too close now, especially given the continued contact with Sergeant Melon.
A-6 gave herself another six months. After that, she would review her situation. But in the meantime, something unusual was definitely going on in town. She heard the choppers before
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