He held his tongue as he pushed the blue folder back; he would not comment. Not yet.

Clarke immediately exchanged the file for a green folder.

Jax spent almost half an hour poring over the documents inside, which amounted to a detailed analysis of all the world’s known terror groups. Jax was especially interested in ASIO’s assessment of which groups were most likely to be conducting the Church Bombings.

The green folder was followed by a yellow one containing information on twenty-seven former Goulburn inmates who were still at large. It took Jax about twenty minutes to go through it. By then he had some ideas on how he could narrow the list down.

Clarke finally slid Jax a black folder, a compendium of all the evidence collected on the Terror Twelve. Included in the file were transcripts from the calls made on the contraband mobile phones and conversations picked up by the bug in the Kent brothers’ cell. There were also detailed reports on operations called ‘Watch’, ‘Extract’ and ‘Apprehend’.

‘What you won’t find in any of the reports was what happened yesterday,’ Sami said after Jax had turned and read the last page in the final folder. ‘As you’ve heard, there was another attack. Another 351 killed when a bomb was detonated inside Salisbury Cathedral in the UK.’

The specifics were news to Jax. Though the prison grapevine was hardy, it wasn’t usually entirely accurate, nor rich with subtleties.

‘The Magna Carta?’ Jax asked.

‘Gone,’ Sami said. ‘Burnt to a crisp.’

‘So what do you need from me?’ Jax asked.

‘We need you to find out who’s behind this, son,’ Sami said. ‘I have read all your files and I reckon these guys from ASIO should be the ones—’

Sami bit his lip as Clarke’s fist slammed into the table. Sami gave Clarke a meaningful look before turning back to face Jax.

‘We need everyone we can on this, and from what I have read about you, you could be our best shot. I think you can do a lot more than deliver phones and install bugs. Am I right?’

Jax nodded.

‘So, whaddya need?’ Sami asked. ‘Say the word and it’s yours.’

Jax rattled off a list: a laptop, an internet connection, an iPhone, a bag of blank electronic keys and a file on every Goulburn inmate.

JAX found the laptop in his cell. It had been left in the cavity behind the false front in his shelves, along with everything else he’d requested.

Muster over, he had the whole day ahead of him. His twenty-nine-day countdown started now.