by J. J. Harkin
“You are scholarly as ever,” nodded Talman, “but no. I have recently learned that the oldest copies of the prophecy all say Damascus, as you may remember some were already hypothesizing while you were still at school. It seems the scribes always tended to fill in the current capital of the kingdom when rewriting the prophecy, most likely due to the wishes of their rulers. Yet ever since Ariadne confirmed the city as Damascus, I knew we’d be fools not to focus our efforts there.”
“Hmmm… very well, then,” agreed Muhammad, giving up at last. Talman had answered his every question perfectly, so that Muhammad was unable to pick up anything out of the ordinary in his replies. Talman was a highly experienced liar, and the younger man had little chance of knowing any of his true intentions. Thus the reluctant Mahdi rested his eyelids in relief for a while, having run out of both questions and energy alike.
The rest of the night passed quietly, and Muhammad awoke to see the Red Sea stretched before him. Noticing he was alone, he hurried up the ladder in search of Talman. He found the man standing on the shore of the sea, staring ponderously out into its depths.
“What’s up?” he asked as he approached.
“Good morning!” smiled Talman, seeming to stir from meditation abruptly. “Just waiting for our ride…”
“What ride?”
Before speaking, Talman responded by pointing out to sea. “That one,” he said, and Muhammad could see a small boat emerging from the shadow of a larger vessel. “We’ll board here and then head north through the Suez Canal. Then it’s just a short distance eastward to our final destination.”
When the dingy arrived they jumped in with their belongings. The friendly Egyptian sailor greeted them excitedly, for apparently he was somehow connected with one of Talman’s business ventures. Before they knew it he had whisked them away to the mother ship, where their boat was hoisted aboard by massive chains. They had a wonderful trip that day, for the sailors were good humored, and entertained them both with hilarious stories of their exploits. To Muhammad’s relief, not a one of them accosted him claiming to have seen visions of a halo above his head, though there were a few odd moments when he did notice one crew member or another staring blankly in his direction. Perhaps Talman had warned them all to give him some distance, and for this he was grateful. A hot meal and a real bed that evening were the icing on the cake, and by morning they found themselves just offshore at Beirut, the capital of Lebanon.
There Talman made an odd request, saying it would not do for them to pull into port. Rather he insisted they come ashore at a large beach in another dingy, which seemed rather strange to everyone. Regardless, they all did as they were told, and soon Talman and Muhammad found themselves being lowered into the water. Before long they drew near to dry land. That is when they saw the crowd of onlookers.
“Oh, no…” moaned Muhammad. “What now? Is this because of me?”
“I believe so,” said Talman gently, “but don’t worry. I have a car waiting for us just over there.” He was pointing to a parking lot behind the crowd.
Muhammad sighed to himself. Maybe things would be better when he got to Damascus. He hoped his government position would include security, for there was no doubt he needed it. To his surprise, however, most of the awaiting crowd turned out to be photographers, all of whom cleared out of the way expeditiously as he and Talman stepped from the boat. More odd than anything was their reaction to his arrival, for they all behaved as though he had just walked on water or something, which could not have been further from the truth.
“Come on,” whispered Talman, as they strode across the sand toward the limo, “keep it moving…”
The Lebanese reporters gave them a wide berth, but cries of “Al-Mahdi!” and “Allahu Akbar!” went up on every side as the two men finally jumped into the back of the car. They headed east out of the city along the Beirut Road toward Damascus, a journey that would only take a few hours. Their surroundings became increasingly mountainous as they proceeded, and the road began to wind back and forth, crossing high bridges from time to time. As Muhammad had spent all of his life studying ancient languages and cultures, yet never actually been abroad, he was beyond excited. Damascus was one of the oldest surviving cities in the world, having existed for five thousand years at least, and he longed to study every inch of it.
When they reached a certain point in the mountains, Muhammad knew they were close, having often admired photographs of all of these places. There, to his surprise and lasting delight, it happened that they did not continue out of the mountain pass into Damascus, as he might have expected. Rather the driver turned to take them up a mountain just north of the highway, and the road wound this way and that in ever more convoluted paths as they proceeded upward.
“But this is Mount Qassioun!” he exclaimed to Talman. “I’ve always wanted to see the city from its top! Just as Muhammad – peace be upon him – did when he came over the mountains…”
“Yes,” said Talman, enjoying seeing such youthful passion in the forty-year-old. “When the Prophet – peace be upon him – looked down upon the city at last, tradition states that he refused to descend, saying a man could enter paradise only once.” He smiled reminiscently as he spoke, adding: “Though of course we won’t be going quite so high as the top.”
“Isn’t it also tradition that Mount Qassioun is where Cain killed his brother Abel?”
“That is one of the many fanciful legends of Mount Qassioun. They say the earth split apart and swallowed the murderer into a massive crevasse, though honestly there has never been any archeological proof of such claims.” Talman’s disdain for the idea could not have been more apparent. “After all, the mountain is full of cracks and fissures of every shape and size, and barely resembles the mountain it was in antiquity.”
Muhammad was struck by an odd impulse at that moment. “You speak with conviction, Talman, as though you know this to be true.”
Yet Talman did not respond, for he was busy pulling down his window to speak to some sort of guard. They were about halfway up the mountain, and Muhammad could tell from all the fences and gates that they were entering a private military installation. A good distance higher up, a massive radio or television tower jutted from the mountain’s peak. The guard did not ask for identification, as evidently he knew Talman’s face at first glance. The guard’s reaction when he looked across at Muhammad was priceless. The trooper’s mouth fell right open in surprise, perhaps having glimpsed the much-gossiped-about halo atop his head. Immediately the man jumped backwards, shouting alarmed orders to anyone nearby whom would listen. The gate veritably flew open then, as men jumped out of their way, seeming almost terrified in their expedience.
Looking behind out the rear window, Muhammad for a moment could see the guards gathered together, jabbering wildly. The limo circled along the road southeastward, and then they were gone, hidden by the mountainside. At this point the sight of all sights greeted them on their right. Damascus, city of the ancients, lay far below in the shadow of the mountain, and at last Muhammad truly understood the misgivings of his namesake all those hundreds of years ago. There was something quaint about the interdependent fusion of mountain and modern mechanization. This was an electrical city like every other major capital, yet that did not detract from the spine-tingling awe one experienced when first taking in the net of streets and buildings which had for so many millennia remained arranged unchanged.
The limo came to a halt before a magnificent villa circled by lush gardens, and they got out. As the car pulled away, Talman approached Muhammad, who remained transfixed by the view of the valley at the foot of the mountain.
“Look!” said Talman, pointing. “That rectangular building at the center of the city. It is Ummayad Mosque, and at its corner…”
“…is the Minaret of Isa – the Tower of Jesus – where they say the Savior will descend…” Though Muhammad had begun to finish Talman’s sentence, he stopped abruptly, no longer having the confidence to finish his own.
; “Yes,” said Talman gently, perceiving the other’s thoughts clearly, “and they say he will descend to greet you, Muhammad Abdullah. For the Mahdi will be the imam leading prayers that day.”
Muhammad had nothing to say to any of this. It was all far too grandiose to be true. Yet there was no point arguing further either, as it had only been two days before that when he and Talman had stood among the ruins northwest of Mecca, gawking at the sword, standard, and robe providence had so clearly revealed. In lieu of speaking further, they turned back toward the house. There, grinning, stood the President of Syria himself, Dr. Bashar al-Assad, who Talman seemed to know well. The two laughed as they exchanged greetings, but the man turned solemn when his glance fell upon Muhammad.
“I do not know what customary measures might suffice, My Lord,” he said, bowing respectfully. “We have heard copious rumors concerning you of late, and naturally remember well every prophecy, as they concern our city most closely. Nothing, however, could have compared to – or even prepared us for – your glorious arrival on the shores of Beirut this morning.”
“What?”
“Have you not seen the news, then?” asked President al-Assad, genuinely surprised. “Oh, you must see this…”
Muhammad frowned quizzically in Talman’s direction as they followed their host into the house, but the man only shrugged his shoulders, giving the impression that he had no idea what this might be about. Everywhere servants, and even family members – all wide-eyed and terrified – darted this way and that out of their path, as the trio strode to the back of the villa. It seemed this was rather funny to Talman and the President, for they chuckled as they walked, yet Muhammad was certain it could be no improvement to his already crippled state of interpersonal affairs. He bit his lip with worry as they proceeded into a large communications den.
“See?” said the President, pointing to a large screen on the wall before them.
It was a news channel, already ablaze with tidings of their arrival. Before Muhammad even had time to sit down, he noticed so many discrepancies between his own experience and the images onscreen that he cried out in alarm. His body fell onto a couch like a ton of bricks. How could this be possible? They were playing the same footage on a loop, and he could see why. There he was on the beach at Beirut, yet there was no sign of Talman or the little dingy they had arrived in. The loop began to replay. There his image walked alone, between…
“What?!” said Muhammad, standing back up. “What is all this?!”
The man on TV had arrived onshore out of what seemed to be a dry path in the sea, abutted on either side by immense walls of blue-green water. As he reached the sand, the waves crashed back into position behind him like a scene cut directly from Exodus. The photographers yelled excitedly to the man as he crossed the beach, just as Muhammad remembered, but he got into the limo alone and it sped away – all without a single sign of Talman!
“It’s a t-t-t-t-trick!” stammered Muhammad, slapping his left thigh with his right hand habitually. “I d-d-d-didn’t… B-b-but you were…”
“It’s okay,” said Talman in a most fatherly fashion, as he pushed Muhammad gently back into a seated position on the couch. “It’s clearly some sort of digital retouching, probably put together by one of your more unbalanced supporters.”
Talman actually knew this to be true, as it had been he who so carefully arranged the illusion. In fact, he had spent the entire night before their arrival putting together convincing composites of Muhammad. Then he had layered them against the precisely prearranged backdrop of separated waves which he had commissioned days earlier, so as to make it seem as though Muhammad had arrived walking across the bottom of the sea. Finally, he had arranged for a “paint out” program to be in play upon their arrival, so that Talman, his footprints, and the dingy remained effectively invisible the whole time.
It had been one of Talman’s personal assistants’ job to make sure the photographers were all present and using digital cameras that morning, for this was the first test of a new technology connected with the satellites, one which would at last allow them to beam illusions directly into the circuitous nerve centers of electronic devices. It seemed the test had been quite successful, and Talman was well pleased, yet he knew it best to focus on Muhammad, and said all he could think of to allay any fears the man might have. President al-Assad, who seemed genuinely worried at the turn of events, had hurried to pour a glass of water for the poor, stuttering Muhammad, and now handed it across to him.
“B-but it’s not true!” he exclaimed, after taking a gulp of his drink. “It’s a lie! How are we going to convince the p-p-p-people of the truth now?”
“I don’t suppose we should bother, should we?” replied Talman matter-of-factly. “I mean, the footage will only serve to convince people that you really are the Mahdi, and since you and I already know that to be true anyway, it would be counterproductive to indicate otherwise.”
“W-w-what is going on, though?”
“Difficult to say,” said President al-Assad gravely, as in truth he had no idea of Talman’s holographic mechanizations of deceit, “but I agree with Talman. Now that this footage is out there you’ll never be able to convince people it’s a ruse. Don’t even bother.”
“We’ll be back,” concluded Talman gently. “Drink your water and try to calm yourself. The President and I must speak briefly, but we’ll return before you know it.”
Then Talman and his friend exited the room around a corner, leaving Muhammad Abdullah on the couch, still staring starkly through the television in disbelief. How was this possible? It was all far too similar to everything else that had happened to him his whole life. After all, he had never seen the halo so many claimed was atop his head. Might this be a similar phenomenon?
“It must be!” Muhammad muttered to himself. “They’re all mad!” This was the only thing his humble mind could accept, after all, for he still had no idea of Talman’s holographic exploits. Even had he somehow found out about Talman’s illusions, Muhammad would never have suspected that his own halo existed in truth. Though he did not know it, the halo was set aside to be seen only by those with special gifts, and had nothing whatever to do with any evil influence.
To Muhammad’s great relief, the news coverage soon shifted to images of a solar eclipse visible in some distant country. His sense of relief did not last long, unfortunately. Before he knew it Muhammad was biting his tongue yet again, for the halo-like images of the moon passing in front of the sun had given him immediate reason to pause. His moment had come, and he knew it.
Judaism Dies in Egypt
Eliyahu Hanavi had been the last proper synagogue in Alexandria, but now it was a bloody mess. As the Darkwater troopers prowled the halls in search of any worshippers whom had been missed, their leader wiped the gore from his phone to dial his superior.
“Yes?”
“Alexandria has been liberated, Grand Dragon.”
“All of them?”
“Yes. What should we do with the bodies?”
“Chop them up. Haul them to our men on the Red Sea. Tell the captain to dump them off the Israeli coast, as usual.”
“Shark bait?”
“That’s right. I don’t suppose so much blood in the water will do anything good for tourism there. Now go, but make sure to dice them up very thoroughly!” The call was abruptly over.
As the commander stowed his phone, he signaled to the nearest officer. “Tell the others to pile the bodies here, and get me the chainsaw.” He turned to another man. “Back the truck up to the rear exit, Ramses.”
“What about the mess?” asked one of the younger recruits, as he glanced about the blood-spattered temple. “Shall I…?”
“Leave it!” snapped the commander. “And don’t be an idiot. Go out into the street to tell the gossips what has come to pass. Judaism has died in Egypt!”
“Of course, of course,” said the foolish underling, doing his best not to tremble at the horrific sights which surr
ounded him. Cringing, he turned toward the door, as the sound of the commander’s saw split the air with a deafening whine. The soldier quickened his pace to escape the scene of carnage behind him, and the mingled echoes of flesh beneath a whirring blade chased him into the street.
Chapter XI
THE BENT KING
Maria dressed carefully when morning came, aiming to impress without looking the least bit traditional. The helicopter ride to the little offshore island of Abadan was a windy affair, but her love of high places kicked in immediately, and she enjoyed every minute of it. “It really is amazing just where you can get yourself in a hurry when you’re an international superstar,” she thought. Even Maria had to be impressed with herself once in a while.
Abadan was a small Iranian island which still saw little traffic, even this long after the Iran/Iraq War. There had been times not long ago when next to no one lived there at all, but Maria heard it had now become something of a hideaway for the wealthy. The waters of the Persian Gulf whizzed by beneath them as the pilot took them through the vehicle’s paces. Soon the chopper was descending upon the designated helipad at Abadan, and a number of attendants were scurrying this way and that, into neat rows, to receive her.
Maria was a starkly futuristic vision of loveliness as she stepped from the chopper, throwing her handbag at the nearest man imperiously. She had made the flashy decision to wear a silver dress, topped with the straightest, bluest, most metallic bob of a hair piece she could find. Maria might have just stepped off the bridge of a starship. Indeed, no man could mistake her for a slave of the Sharia in such a getup, and such was her exact intention.
The walk from the helicopter was treacherous in heels, for the wash of surf struck the stone walkway intermittently. It was a beautiful day, and a balmy noontime. The strange attendants who led the way were all wearing the same black jumpers and headbands – both an oddly militant look and a strange fashion decision, in Maria’s opinion. Finally they rounded a last corner, and there was Essien, his hands resting upon a chair back before a little, round table in a wind-screened area, surrounded by servants. A place opposite him had been left for her. Maria could hear the tinkling of wind chimes somewhere.