The Mirage

by Matt Ruff

  “It wasn’t a request,” Abdullah said. “More like a prediction. He said he’d like to talk to Mustafa, but he didn’t think he’d get here in time.”

  “Where is Mustafa?”

  “Out somewhere. He’s not answering his cell phone.”

  Farouk turned back towards the glass. The man in the white tunic was still staring at him. Smiling. “All right,” Farouk said. “Keep trying Mustafa’s cell. And see if you can find the other prisoner some clothes.”

  The apartment was on an upper floor of a high-rise in Mansour. Its balcony faced northwest and offered an excellent view of the approaching sandstorm. The storm’s leading edge, a wall of sand and dust several hundred meters high, was advancing in seeming slow motion across Baghdad’s outlying suburbs. Behind this, the horizon was covered by a dark smudge that stretched up into the clouds and made it look as though the heavens and the earth were dissolving into a void. Even to a veteran of holy war who prided himself on his fearlessness, the sight was unnerving, and eventually Idris had to turn away in order to concentrate on his phone conversation.

  “Yes, Senator,” he said. “Yes, zero fatalities . . . No. It wasn’t a problem with the device . . . I am sure. I had men in the crowd, they confirm what the news is reporting . . . No, not the hand of God, but not a human hand, either . . . Yes, that’s what I’m saying . . . I have also received a report from Adhamiyah that that Tikriti thug has his people scouring the city for someone . . . Yes . . . Yes, I think so . . . Homeland Security has two individuals in custody. One of them— . . . I’ve already dispatched a team. They understand the seriousness . . . Yes, as soon as I hear anything . . . My men have been instructed to bring the creature to the northern safe house. I suggest you head there now, before the storm hits . . . God willing . . . What? . . . Yes, it is a pity. So many targets on one stage. But there will be other opportunities. In the chaos after the mirage collapses, we can hunt many of them down, the ones who aren’t dead already . . . Yes . . . Peace be unto you as well, Senator.”

  He hung up and went back inside. In the living room the TV was on, tuned to Al Jazeera with the sound muted. They were showing the video from the rally: shaky footage of Joe Simeon stabbing the security guard, stepping towards the stage, then several seconds of blackness, and then the ravens, spiraling upwards. The caption read: MIRACLE AT GROUND ZERO?

  Idris picked up the remote and switched off the TV. “Khalid!” he shouted. “Get your weapon! We are going out!”

  But the person who responded to his call was Mustafa al Baghdadi. Mustafa came out of the kitchen carrying a teapot and two cups and saucers on a silver tray. “You are almost out of sugar,” he said.

  “What are you doing here?” Idris said. “Khalid!”

  “Your servant won’t be disturbing us,” Mustafa told him, setting the tray on the table in the center of the room. “I asked him to step out so that you and I could have a conversation.”

  “About what?”

  “About Al Qaeda and the 11/9 hijackings,” Mustafa said. He began pouring the tea. “About your role in the murder of thousands of innocent people. My wife among them.”

  There was a leather case on top of a cabinet to Idris’s right. He reached for it, flipped open the lid . . . and found the case empty.

  Mustafa cleared his throat. Idris turned and saw the gun he’d been seeking lying on the table next to the tea tray.

  “You disappoint me,” Mustafa said. He settled within arm’s length of the gun and picked up one of the teacups. “The crusaders of America, if they kill even a single Muslim, are only too happy to brag about it. But you and Osama bin Laden slaughter multitudes, and you don’t want to claim credit? And after all your talk of righteousness. Shouldn’t a righteous man be proud of his deeds?”

  Idris was still looking at the gun. “I’m not afraid to die,” he said.

  “Yes, I get that,” said Mustafa. “But you aren’t in a hurry to die, either, are you? You’d rather let others do the dying for you, while you remain to savor the suffering of their victims. Very well, I get that, too: You were always a sadist. What I don’t see is the connection between this and anything worthy of the name Islam. I don’t see how even you fool yourself that such a connection exists.”

  “You are right, you don’t see,” Idris said, growing heated. “But I am no fool.”

  “I say you are. I say you are as deluded as the so-called Christians who spread terror in the name of Jesus.”

  “Do not compare me to those people!”

  “Why not?” Mustafa said. “You chase the same mirage, and worship at the same false altar.”

  “No!” Idris wagged a finger. “God is on our side.”

  “ ‘Our side.’ And whose side was Fadwa on?”

  “I cannot say. I did not know her. But I know that she was either righteous, or unrighteous. If she was righteous, then she died a martyr and will live on in paradise. If not—why should I care that she is dead?”

  “Because her life was not yours to take!” Mustafa shouted. “I hope there is a paradise. I hope Fadwa finds her way there, finds the joy I could not give her. But even if that is so, it was not for you, in your supreme arrogance, to send her on her way. And not just her. Thousands dead in the towers alone. Thousands! What were you thinking? What was Osama bin Laden thinking? Who do you people think you are?”

  “I am a warrior of God,” Idris Abd al Qahhar said proudly. “I, and Osama bin Laden, and all the men of Al Qaeda. You cannot make us regret what we have done. When this world passes away and God’s final truth is revealed, even to unbelievers who would deny it, everyone will see we were in the right. But it will be too late for you then, Mustafa al Baghdadi.” Nodding, he continued: “Go ahead. Take your revenge. It will change nothing.”

  “My revenge.” Mustafa set down his cup and placed a hand on the gun. Took a breath. “I told Gabriel Costello that if the men responsible for 11/9 were brought before me, I would show them no mercy . . .”

  “To hell with your mercy,” Idris said. “I care nothing for it.”

  “I know,” said Mustafa. “And it would be a great pleasure to kill you—like having a wish come true. But God still does care about mercy. I must believe that, if I’m to go on living in this or any other world . . . Yes, I must believe it.” With an effort he withdrew his hand from the gun. “Anyway,” he went on, “I’ve used up all my wishes already. Time to give someone else a turn.” Sitting back, he called out: “Samir!”

  Footsteps in the hall. Samir came in, and Amal, and behind them Abu Naji and Sayyid. Sayyid was holding a tape recorder with a wireless antenna.

  Idris shook his head, forcing a smile. “Now you disappoint me,” he said to Mustafa. “I tell you I am willing to die. You think you can punish me with prison?”

  “We’ll see how you feel after the first forty years,” Mustafa replied.

  Idris laughed. “No,” he said. “No, I don’t think so.”

  He lunged for the gun on the table, but Amal had been waiting for this and hit him with a taser before he’d taken two steps.

  “Samir,” Mustafa said. “Do the honors, please.”

  Idris had collapsed onto his back. He lay breathing shallowly, red-faced, too stunned to move but still able to summon a look of such hatred that Samir, standing over him, hesitated. Then Samir remembered his sons and his fear dissipated. He crouched down, pulling out handcuffs.

  “Idris Abd al Qahhar,” he said. “I arrest you for conspiracy to commit murder. By the grace of God the All-Merciful and Compassionate, you have the right to remain silent . . .”

  “Hello,” Farouk said, closing the interrogation room door behind him. “I understand you wish to speak with me.”

  “Oh, I try never to make wishes,” the man in the white tunic said. “They so rarely turn out the way you expect. I am happy to speak with you, however.”

  “Good, then. Let’s start with a name.”

  “Of course.” The man’s smile turned mischievous. “What woul
d you like to call me?”

  “How about your real name?”

  “It would mean nothing to you, I’m afraid. I’m not in any of your databases.”

  “What about a home address then?” Farouk pulled out a chair and sat opposite the man. “You don’t sound like a Baghdadi to me.”

  “My family home is in Arabia, in the Rub al Khali.”

  “I didn’t know there were homes in the Empty Quarter. Do you work in the oil industry?”

  “We mind our own business.” That mischievous smile again. “Most of us.”

  “And what brings you to Baghdad?”

  “I fly all over the country.”

  “On your family’s business?”

  “A personal research project of sorts. I’ve been going from place to place, studying how things have changed.”

  “Changed since when? Have you been away somewhere?”

  “That too,” the man in the white tunic said. “I was in prison for many years, and the world changed quite a bit during that time. Since my release, it’s changed again. It’s the second set of changes I’m most interested in. One should recognize one’s own handiwork, but I keep encountering things that surprise me, things that suggest the intervention of another, greater power. So I’ve been trying to work out what it all means. What the larger plan might be.”

  “Prison,” Farouk said. “I thought you said you weren’t in our databases.”

  “It wasn’t one of your prisons.”

  “You know we have access to Interpol files here too, right?”

  “My jailer was not a member of Interpol.”

  “Where were you locked up, North Korea?” Receiving no answer but that same smile, Farouk continued: “Let’s talk about this afternoon. What were you doing at the rally? More research?”

  “I was following that man, the one you are holding in the other room.”

  “Why? Do you know him?”

  “I know his type. A maker of burnt offerings. Such men were common in my youth, and time doesn’t seem to have lessened their numbers much. I’ve encountered quite a few in my travels.”

  “When you encounter them, what do you do?”

  “Usually nothing. Interfering in others’ affairs, even with the best of intentions, well it’s like making wishes—there are always unforeseen consequences. I really should have learned that lesson by now. But today, crossing paths with that man, sensing what he was about to do, I felt a powerful urge to intervene. An impulse not entirely my own.”

  “What does that mean, not entirely your own?”

  “You know how it is,” the man in the white tunic said. “God allows evil to exist in the world. Sometimes He permits it to operate unchecked. But sometimes, He puts a stone in the path of the wicked.”

  “And today you were the stone?”

  “I thought so.” The smile a bit sheepish now, as he looked down at the steel cuffs on his wrists. “Now I’m thinking I may have been mistaken about the source of the impulse . . .” He shrugged. “Ah well. Ultimately all things proceed from God’s will.”

  “Let’s leave God’s will aside for the moment,” said Farouk, “and get back to what happened at the rally. You say you decided to intervene. How?”

  The prisoner sighed. “Forgive me. I don’t wish to be uncooperative—”

  “Then don’t be. Tell me what you did.”

  “You wouldn’t believe it. I could convince you, but it would require yet another intervention. Anyway, we are almost out of time.”

  “No, we’re not,” Farouk said, allowing his annoyance to show. “You are a suspect in a terrorism case, and you’re not going anywhere until I get answers.”

  From over his shoulder came the muffled sound of shouting. Farouk turned in his chair and saw the mirror shudder as something slammed the other side of the glass.

  “They are here for me,” the man in the white tunic said, as Farouk stood up. “Do not resist them. They will only hurt you.”

  The interrogation room door burst open. A big man stepped through, holding a pistol.

  “What’s the meaning of this interruption?” Farouk said. “Get the hell out of here!”

  Siraj al Din didn’t bother to reply. Instead, stepping forward, he brought the butt of the gun crashing down on Farouk’s forehead.

  The sandstorm arrived as they were loading Idris into the arrest wagon.

  Abu Naji and Sayyid had parked on the east side of the block. Idris offered no further resistance as he was led out of the apartment building and manacled to a bench in the back of the wagon. Samir watched from the curb with a mixture of unease and disappointment, the satisfaction he’d felt reading Idris his Mirandas already ebbing away. He turned to Mustafa and said: “You know this isn’t the end of it.”

  “I know,” Mustafa said. He held up the tape recorder. “But it’s a good start. Now—”

  A shadow fell over the street, and at the north end of the block someone cried out in alarm. Mustafa and Samir turned towards the sound. There were people running from the corner, while others stood staring and pointing to the west.

  They knew what was coming, of course—they’d seen it from the apartment—but timing was always tricky with sandstorms, and no amount of advance warning could lessen the shock of fear at the appearance of the dust cloud, boiling through the streets of the city like debris from some mighty tower’s fall. It surged across the intersection, swallowing up everything—people, cars, streetlights—and came sweeping towards them.

  “Fu-u-u-uck!” Abu Naji said, a long exhalation. He jumped down from the back of the wagon and slammed the door. Mustafa looked up. A billow of dust and sand overtopped the apartment building and wrapped around its sides, making it seem for a moment as though the upper floors were pancaking.

  “Come on!” Samir shouted, tugging on Mustafa’s arm. Leaving Idris in the wagon, they ran back to the building, making it inside with just seconds to spare. As the lobby door swung shut, a woman darted past on the sidewalk, clutching the ends of her headscarf with both hands. Then the dust cloud swept down in a thick curtain, obscuring everything.

  The bulbs in the apartment building lobby seemed to flicker, but it was just their eyes adjusting to the sudden loss of daylight. Fine dust puffed through the cracks around the door, bringing a smell like fresh chalk. Abu Naji stifled a sneeze.

  As the leading edge of the sandstorm continued sweeping eastward, the air outside cleared enough that they could see again. The Homeland Security agents looked out into the haze at a city transformed, and compared this vision to their memories of another day nearly a decade in the past. They noticed the arrest wagon rocking back and forth, and though it was surely only the wind, none of them were above wishing that it might actually be Idris, driven mad by the storm and tasting just a fraction of the terror he had chosen to inflict on others.

  “All right,” Mustafa said finally, breaking the silence. “Now we go pick up Osama bin Laden.”

  “What?” said Sayyid. “You want to drive all the way down to Riyadh? In this?”

  “He’s not in Riyadh,” Amal said. “Bin Laden is here in Baghdad today, for the rally. That will be over now, but he’s supposed to be staying at the Rasheed Hotel. We should be able to catch him there.”

  “The rally?” Abu Naji said. “The Ground Zero rally?” He looked at them. “You mean you guys haven’t heard?”

  A figure in a black burqa, head bowed against the wind, was pulling a wheeled shopping basket along the sidewalk behind AHS headquarters. All the other pedestrians in the area had been driven indoors by the storm, but Siraj al Din, hands cupped to shield his eyes from blowing sand, made a careful scan of the doorways and rooftops across the street before stepping out into the open.

  He made his way to an SUV that was idling at the curb. Three other Qaeda men with drawn pistols were close behind him, and bringing up the rear were two more men with the prisoner between them. The prisoner’s handcuffs had been supplemented with a pair of leg irons, so he had t
o be carried down the steps from the building’s rear exit.

  The SUV’s front passenger door was locked. Siraj al Din yanked impatiently at the door handle and bent his face to the window. He had just enough time to identify the shotgun muzzle on the other side of the glass before the Baath killer in the driver’s seat pulled the trigger. Two more Republican Guardsmen in the rear of the SUV opened fire through the tinted side windows, killing the Qaeda men with the pistols. The duo holding the prisoner separated and tried to find cover, but the figure in the burqa had pulled a rifle from the shopping basket and was already taking aim; within seconds, these last two Qaeda agents were dead as well.

  The Republican Guardsmen jumped out of the SUV and rushed to secure the prisoner, who’d stood unflinching through the gunfire. Qusay Hussein stripped off the burqa and dropped it and the rifle back in the basket. Then he went over to take a closer look at their prize. He’d never seen a jinn before and wasn’t sure he believed in them. And indeed, the prisoner looked just like a man—defiant and unafraid, perhaps, but human.

  “Murder is a sin,” the prisoner informed him.

  Qusay glanced unconcerned at one of the nearby corpses. “These men were murderers too, you may be sure.”

  “What does that logic suggest about your own future?” the prisoner said.

  Qusay didn’t bother to answer. A trio of police cars had just rounded the corner, responding to the gunfire. Qusay stepped to the curb and gestured for them to hurry.

  By the time Mustafa and the others arrived, sand had begun to coat the corpses and collect in drifts on their windward sides. Siraj al Din, decapitated by the shotgun blast, resembled a beach sculpture eroded by the tide. The street had been closed off and a mixed group of AHS, ABI, and local police were wandering about the scene.

  After a quick look at the bodies, Mustafa, Samir, and Amal took shelter inside the building. While Amal got on her cell phone, Mustafa and Samir spoke to Abdullah, who was battered but conscious. Farouk had been taken to the hospital; Joe Simeon was bound for the morgue.

  “They said they were from Riyadh,” Abdullah explained. His face was streaked with blood, and he kept an ice pack pressed to his scalp as he spoke. “They said they had orders to collect both prisoners. And they had proper ID, but something about the way they just barged into the interview suite without any advance warning . . . I don’t know, it just didn’t feel right. So I told them they were going to have to wait outside while I made a call, and that’s when the big bastard bounced my head off the glass.”