Escape from Baghdad!

by Saad Hossain

  This discovery had fired them all up, but after hours of conjecture and feverish speculation, they had been forced to come back to reality. Very possibly, Dagr had glumly concluded, just a mechanical aberration. In fact, given the difficulty of making a watch behave deliberately in this way, it very likely was a natural aberration. Still, the alternative was so exciting that it was impossible to dismiss.

  Dagr had transposed a 72-hour clock against the vibrations and assigned a numerical value against each one. His grid was essentially a breakdown of 72 hours into seconds: 72(hours) × 60(mins) × 60(secs) = 259,200 seconds. Against each of these points, there was either a 0 (for no vibration) or a 1 (for a vibration). Thus,

  S1, S2, S3, S4, S5, S6, S7…

  1, 0, 0, 0, 0, 1, 0, …

  The first and obvious assumption, of course, was that this was a binary code, and Dagr had spent some moments of joy at having solved the puzzle so easily. The binary code, used in machine language, was essentially one of the oldest forms of transcribing letters to numbers by simply using a sequence of 0s and 1s. The permutation of a string of 0s and 1s could be used to represent each letter of the alphabet in question, and the string could be as short as or as long as necessary, depending on the size of the alphabet. In computer language, for example, the binary code for each letter was a sequence of seven 0s and 1s, i.e., the letter A might equal 01000001.

  The first few binary code analyses, however, had not been fruitful, possible messages being gibberish. Dagr also had to consider that binary code in itself was not so much useful for hiding information, as it was for transcribing letters into numbers so machines could deal with them.

  A second kind of relationship had occurred to him, namely, the correspondence of seconds (S) against vibrations (V) on a numeric scale, where say, S(1) = V(1), S(6) = V(2), S(136) = V(3), S(144) = V(4)…S(259,198) = V(XXX). From S(259,200), the entire thing started repeating. Dagr, following this path, was left with a bunch of numbers or fractions or number associations, which he had to sift through. He had put these results through various mathematical algorithms, trying, without much success to come to a scheme where the numbers coalesced into letters. It was difficult enough, but without knowing even which language the code might be in or a hint of what kind of math had been used or some inkling of what kind of words were in the message, it was almost impossible.

  Or, as Dagr concluded to Xervish, if he had the use of a US supercomputer, perhaps the one that played chess against Kasparov, he might run through all possible permutations and get some idea of what they had. This was the “brute force” approach to breaking systems, and it was accepted that any code could be broken given enough time and computational power, but where both of these were lacking, it was necessary to obtain extraneous information. For example, if Dagr could guess a set of words that was likely to appear in the message, he could devise tests for the frequency of those vowel combinations; he would have, in essence, moved from random to somewhat informed.

  Kinza, loath to give up, sent Xervish forth with this new mission. It was apparent to him that the Lion, injured, disoriented perhaps, must be in the city somewhere. Baghdad was now dissected by bunkers and checkpoints into zones with flows of traffic, and it was possible, given a starting area, to narrow down where exactly someone might flee to. Poring over Google earth maps, Dagr had drawn up a grid. The idea was for Xervish to make discreet enquiries to initiate contact, if possible. After all, they had something that belonged to the Lion, some kind of negotiation should be welcome to both sides. Since they couldn’t leave the house, it was necessary to bring the Lion to them, voluntarily. In the few days they had left, Kinza hoped to learn something.

  The very next day Xervish returned again, like a homing pigeon drawn to his keeper. His first report was not good. No one in the criminal fraternity had heard of the Lion. Hassan Salemi had upped the price on their heads. Hoffman was missing, probably court-martialled. Kinza grimaced but kept his cool.

  They had taken to spending the afternoon tea hour at the library, discussing the code with Mikhail. It was not an unpleasant way to kill time. Even the librarian, somewhat convinced by Kinza’s teatime manners, could face these sessions with a semblance of equanimity. Dagr could almost believe he was in his old room, surrounded by his texts, working on some obscure equation. Much of the time was spent with Kinza and Mikhail offering outlandish suggestions, which Dagr had to shoot down with tedious explanations in mathematics.

  In this time, surrounded by books, he even captured some of his previous donnish nature, the forgotten art of steepling his fingers just so, the constant struggle to enunciate, using mathematical notation on small scraps of looted paper to demonstrate quite obvious points that his audience nonetheless failed to appreciate. He had asked for a blackboard and chalk since he did his best thinking that way, but this turned out to be against the Code of Behavior compiled by Mikhail for proper library etiquette. Ever since Dagr had broken the spine of a 1917 atlas, tearing Greenland asunder forever, the librarian had put him down as one of those individuals who was Inadvertently Dangerous to Books and now kept him under close observation.

  It had taken considerable persuasion to allow freehand ink-work in the library, Dagr having had to vociferously express his resolve not to write his name in any books or draw in the margins or tear out pages or any of the other infractions that Mikhail imagined Dagr to be on the constant verge of committing.

  Mikhail, who had read up on the Druze, had a number of ideas. His powers of expression, however, were so underdeveloped that he could barely get two words out without stammering and becoming rapidly incoherent. His favored mode of communication was to blurt out a single word and then shy away in a fit of mumbling, the deciphering of which required a form of cryptanalysis in itself.

  “We’re in a tough spot,” Dagr was saying, “The Druze used an alphanumeric code.”

  “Which means?”

  “Numbers equal letters,” Dagr said. “For example, the simplest alphanumeric is A=1, B=2, C=3, etc… Computers, for example, commonly use ASCII alphanumerics, which is a seven-number sequence of 0s and 1s, essentially binary code. Another simple code, also used in programming, is Hex, which converts all the characters on a keyboard to a double digit number.”

  “And the Druze code isn’t one of these simple ones?” Kinza asked.

  “No, I tried all the obvious stuff already,” Dagr said. “In most cases, an alphanumeric code is not really a method of hiding information so much as converting letters into numbers so computers and their programmers can deal with them.”

  “This Druze thing is a computer code?”

  “Probably not,” Dagr hesitated. “I mean, why put it into a watch? If it was recent, you could use a disk or pen drive or any other kind of electronic media. This code is put into a mechanical object. And it’s actually set against time. I think it must be to hide something, something quite long perhaps.”

  “So how would you break this, professor?”

  “Well, this is really more of a job for a cryptanalyst.”

  “You’re just being modest.”

  “Computers. We need really big computers!” Mikhail blurted out. He spoke low and fast. Oftentimes, only Dagr understood him.

  “Right, or computers. Lots of them. Or one really big one.”

  “Yes, yes, like the one that played chess with Kasparov,” Kinza gave a shout of laughter that startled everyone. “You’ve got some kind of fetish for that thing.”

  “Well, it’s a lot of computing power to waste on something useless like chess,” Dagr said, exasperated. “I mean here we’ve got hundreds of itinerant mathematicians begging for processing space, and the imperialistic white devils are just mocking us by using mainframes to beat third-rate chess players.”

  “Third rate?”

  “Well, he didn’t beat the computer, did he?”

  “He’s the best player who ever lived,” Kinza said. “According to FIDE.”

  “Incorrect. He’s the b
est professional player who ever lived,” Dagr said. “Chess is just a bunch of permutations of a single scenario. It only looks like a game. In reality, it’s just a math puzzle. It’s even easier than a completely random puzzle because the same few situations keep repeating themselves. Logically, any first-rate mathematician would be unbeatable in chess. Of course, they’d never play it in the first place because they’d have better things to do.”

  “So Kasparov would be no good at deciphering the Druze code.”

  “Precisely.”

  “Whereas you would be excellent at chess.”

  “Precisely,” Dagr said. “If I bothered playing of course, which I wouldn’t because I have better uses of my time.”

  Except of course, Dagr had played chess once, and these days, he dreamed of it often. Sitting in the balcony with his grandfather an hour before kindergarten, the sun just beginning to warm things up, the old man back from his morning walk, natty in his ivory cane and hat. He smelled of soap and tobacco and faint aftershave. They had a ritual, both of them early risers while the rest of the family slept. First, they would open a little packet of pastry, freshly bought, smacking of honey and butter, and then the wooden chess board, with the beautiful grainy pieces, felt lined in the bottom, solid and heavy with its little knights and bishops. The morning game, a secret for no discernible reason; Dagr couldn’t imagine anyone objecting to it, but no one else played, and somehow the conspiracy was cherished.

  The grandson would always set the board, laboriously putting each piece dead center, and then the old man would take a pawn in each closed fist and offer the choice, and no matter which he picked, some legerdemain always gave him the black. The white pieces started and therefore had the advantage, and his grandfather took a fiendish delight in trouncing him. The black had to defend, and Dagr always lost until he learned to play to a standstill, and then finally to counterattack and win.

  Beautiful mornings for two years, until his grandfather had a stroke, and the board was lost, and…

  “Alkindus…etaionshrdlu.” Mikhail interjected, brandishing a tattered hardcover edition.

  It took Dagr a moment to focus; it was difficult to wrench his mind back, the world in the past was too strong, too richly colored compared to what was now left over. “Hmm, Al Kindi?” he finally said. “You’re on the right track, but I’ve tried that already.”

  “Polyalphabetic—like ENIGMA.”

  “Rotor like the World War Two stuff, you think? Could be. I’ve done the obvious frequency analyses for Arabic. Hmm, might be a different language altogether, you think? Sneaky Druze.”

  “Excuse me, what the hell are you guys talking about?” Kinza asked.

  “You know, cryptanalysis,” Dagr said.

  “Two…two or more languages,” Mikhail said.

  “Words from two languages? Hmm, that might throw off the frequency counts of course.”

  “No vowels…” he whispered.

  “No vowels? To throw us off? Sneaky Druze.”

  The unmistakable snicker of an East German Makarov cocking cut him off. “Really, I’m serious. What the hell are you guys talking about?”

  18: EMPTY NEST

  TOMMY DIDN’T KNOW WHAT WAS HAPPENING WITH HOFFMAN, BUT he had his orders to stay put, and he was pretty sure the Army would fall apart if people stopped following orders. The apartment they had appropriated was a bare shell with mattresses, table fans, and little else. The Humvee was parked outside. They had stripped out the electronics, TV, and Xbox so that the men at least had something to do in the sweltering heat. They were bored, uncomfortable, and getting fractious.

  Tommy was on a strict budget, and as this was black ops, he was pretty sure resupply was out of the question. Ancelloti, recently reborn as some kind of Rastafarian, was his second in command and quartermaster, occupying the storeroom and guarding it against night time pilferage. The men were afraid of his nocturnal episodes, were loath to disturb his rest. The gunner was saner now if somewhat dazed, and Tommy had promoted him because he needed someone to pow wow with. It was lonely at the top.

  “We’re clear out of stuff,” Ancelloti said during inventory. They were holed up in the supply room, which was an airless hole further polluted by Ancelloti’s “medication.” “Three days of booze on half rations and maybe a week of food if they can keep down the dry stuff. They’re getting antsy. Someone tried to jimmy the lock last night. I made a lot of rattling noises with my bullets and they ran off.”

  “Good job,” Tommy said. It was important to encourage initiative.

  “So we need resupply fast.”

  “I always ask myself, what would Hoffy do?” Tommy said. “And he’d say we have to forge the land.”

  “Forage, like?”

  “Right, right, like live off the land,” Tommy said. “And, you’re the quartermaster. It’s on you, man.”

  “You want me to forage for stuff?” Ancelloti asked. “You know we’re in a city, right? Everything here belongs to someone else?”

  “What are ya, some kinda lawyer?”

  “Ok, so I guess I’ll go and steal some stuff then.”

  Three days on and no sign of Ancelloti, and Tommy had to reflect on the wisdom of sending out a known drug addict PTSD victim to forage. Now he had no booze, no quartermaster, and most crucially, no gunner. It was tough because a squad without a gunner was hardly ever taken seriously, no matter how big their Humvee was. The men were openly talking mutiny, and he was getting such black looks that he had taken to locking himself inside the armored vehicle for large swathes of time.

  It was during one of these episodes that he noticed a knot of local police hanging out by the corner kibbeh stall, which had a shady spot of pavement. The kibbeh was a kind of delicious kebab that Tommy heartily approved of. The police seemed paunchy and content, rather similar to police back home, so much so that he instantly felt a shiver of guilty dread until he remembered that he was a marine and black ops specialist and in fact outranked all cops. Watching them closely, he realized that they were doing some kind of brisk business. Of course, it was his duty to investigate.

  “Hi guys.”

  “What?”

  “What?”

  “Who the fuck are you?”

  “Guys, I just wanna buy some stuff. My name’s Tommy.”

  The paunchiest cop spoke perfect English and had a superb waxed moustache that curled up at the edges. He looked Tommy up and down and gave him a patently false grin.

  “My friend,” he said, “how can I help you? We are just humble police enjoying a break. My name is ah… Abu-Abu.”

  “You got any of those Indonesian cigarettes?” Tommy asked.

  “You want an Indonesian cigarette? My friend, this is Baghdad. We have everything. But I’m not sure.”

  “You know, the ones with pot in them?” Tommy clarified.

  “Ah, yes, pot, hahaha,” Abu-Abu said. “We have hashish, my friend, but that is for old ladies and pimply boys. For the military, we have something so much better.” He pulled out a packet of pills, red ones, white ones, blue ones with squiggly lines. “Uppers, downers, Iranian ‘bloody’ Valium, Lebanani, and these Abu Hajib, enough to stone a donkey. You want to party, we’ll hook you up no problem.”

  “Ya, a party’d be great,” Tommy said. “See, my squad up there is getting real antsy. We’re out of booze and stuff, and they keep wanting to shoot shit up.”

  “You have a squad of Marines up there?” Abu-Abu squinted at the building.

  “Yup, plus our gunner Ancelloti is out here somewhere foraging.”

  “And that’s your Humvee?”

  “Yup. Black ops, Abu. I don’t mind telling you, but keep it hush hush,” Tommy said. “We’ve got orders from Col. Bradley himself. Airstrikes and everything.”

  “My friend, no need for colonels and airstrikes,” Abu-Abu said. “Why don’t we have a party? Free, on us. After all, you are guests in our country.”

  “Free? That’s cool, man, cus’ we’re out o
f money.”

  “Money? Bah what is money between good friends like us? I will give you money, my friend,” Abu-Abu pulled him into a conspiratorial huddle. “For a little favor. See my men are toiling on the streets, selling these pills in the heat.”

  “It is so hot here man.”

  “What if we kept the pills in your apartment?”

  “I do have a quartermaster,” Tommy said proudly.

  “Right, right, let’s say we keep them there, and then we can sell from your front step there, and maybe your guys can walk around a bit with us sometime, just to show that we’re all friends.”

  “Yeah man, we’re always ready to help the local police, you know?” Tommy said. “Got to serve the people, right?”

  “Of course, a joint mission, cross cultural cooperation,” Abu-Abu said. “And don’t worry about your problems, Commander Tommy, we’re gonna take care of all that. Booze, you said? We got arak, vodka, cough syrup, whatever you want.”

  “Yeah and the guys are getting tired of dry rations too. That shit makes you blocked up if you know what I mean.”

  “Dry rations? Pfft…” Abu-Abu snapped his finger at the kibbeh chef. “This stall happens to be mine. Or close enough. Kibbeh for everyone! All you can eat, whenever you like, for you and your mates, and a cut from the pill business, of course. Now let’s go upstairs and get out of the sun, eh?”

  Tommy linked arms with his new friend and beamed. This diplomacy stuff was easy. Hoffy would be so proud when he got back.

  19: AL KINDI

  “DO YOU KNOW THAT WE INVENTED CRYPTOGRAPHY?” DAGR ASKED.

  “No, nor do I particularly care.”

  “Al Kindi. One of the most brilliant minds ever lived. A mathematician of immense power.”

  “Do I have to pay for this lecture or is it gratis?”

  “Very funny,” Dagr pounded on the table. “The intellectual leaps made during our golden age are unparalleled in the history of mankind, comparable only to the Enlightenment period in Europe, when Newton, Hooke, Leibniz, etc. were at work.”