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windshield looking like it’s been hit by a dozen white paintballs, doesn’t look particularly damaged at all and is able to drive away from the scene without difficulty. Almost as an afterthought, John rewinds the video to 7:16 and studies the images of the Mercedes entering Birchin Lane, only to be followed moments later by the BMW. He takes a couple more still images of this, and notices that the black Mercedes at this point in time clearly has a passenger in the rear, as if he’s being chauffeur driven, most probably to his place of work. Gibson prints a couple more images of what he’s seen and after thanking the control room supervisor for his help he terminates their session.
    Draining the last mouthfuls of cold coffee from his mug, John now logs onto the police computer system. Once on-line, it takes only seconds to discover that the Merc is registered to one Mr Eddie Slater. A few minutes later DS Gibson has checked a couple of other databases and discovers that Slater is a self-employed security advisor (ex-army), has a British Passport and has an address in Mayfair. A picture is forming in John Gibson’s mind, a bodyguard driving some rich businessman, getting shot at in the middle of London.
–It’s looking like a proper bit of action so perhaps the next couple of weeks aren’t going to be quite so boring after all?
    The licence plate from the white truck shows it to be registered to a budget rental company in South London. The owner of the BMW is one Mr Trevor Conroy. Names and addresses are scribbled down in the Detective Sergeant’s notebook. Digging a little deeper, John discovers that both vehicles were reported stolen at about the same time just yesterday (Sunday), from the same place, East Dulwich. This coincidence would appear to indicate that they were both stolen by the same criminal gang and that the incident in Birchin Lane had been pre-meditated and well-planned. The people in the truck and the people in the BMW appeared to be working together, so was this some armed bank raid gone wrong? Perhaps some turf-war between feuding gangs?
Maybe a failed assassination attempt?
    Trying the internet and searching against KRONOS, John gets a number of interesting hits. As well as being the name of some sort of mythical Greek God, it looks likely that it might relate to the name of a high profile business, ‘Kronos Capital Management’. And although it’s registered in the Cayman Islands, it also has a London address, and that address is…
60 Lombard Street on the corner with Birchin Lane!
    Now things are definitely starting to fall into place. John checks the images he’s saved of the Mercedes entering Birchin Lane and studies the passenger in the back seat. A chauffeur driven Mercedes with a banker in the back has just got shot at with assault rifles in the middle of the City.
What the hell has been going on?
Gibson gathers up his CCTV image print-outs and goes to report back on his findings to the guvnor.
    Many of the officers who attended the scene have by now returned to the station, and word gets round that the DCI wants everyone who’s been working the incident to gather in the main conference room on the 2nd floor. Once everyone’s assembled, one by one the guvnor gets everyone to pool-in their information. The first officer to report explains that the bullet casings have been confirmed by ballistics to be AK-47, and adds casually “A no-brainer really…”
    â€œAnd why would it be such a no-brainer?” the DCI asks, clearly puzzled by the nonchalant comment. The officer in question suddenly feels very self-conscious, unwilling to reveal his interest in firearms to the gathered assembly. There’s a brief pause before the same voice speaks up again, but a little quieter and more timidly than before. “Well, the casings found at the scene are tapered, not parallel. This feature is pretty unique to the Russian made