by Todd Turner
Kundi smiled. “I’m not half as stupid as you’d like me to be. I wiped all information about those cars after sending to dealers we wanted them to go to.”
Craig was angry but suppressed his rage. “You must know nothing is ever totally destroyed in digital; it just takes time to restore. Of course, we don’t have time, millions could die. You won’t further your cause, in fact you’ll cement this society’s hatred for Islam. You’ll only set your cause back decades.”
“You must realize by now I don’t have much concern for the lives you are worried about. They are casualties in a war you brought on yourselves. So if you are hoping I’ll collapse in a heap of crushing guilt by seeing things through your distorted view of humanity like in your perverted Hollywood interpretation of moral conscience, you’re going to be sadly disappointed, little man,” said Rezeya in her most belittling tone.
Craig barely even smiled at the insult. This woman’s view of the world and of America’s role in it, particularly in the Middle East, was subject to such extreme myopia there was clearly no point in arguing about that. Her view was a tenet of her faith.
“I understand you have strong beliefs about how the people of Islam have been treated by the international community, and by America in particular. But one thing I hope you will believe is that I do not have any opinion about how a person worships God, or which name they have for God, or even if they believe in a God at all,” Craig explained. “Yes, I know that to you that makes me an infidel, but I don’t judge anyone for what they believe in. It is not my place to make such a judgment.”
“That’s the problem with an infidel, you don’t believe in anything, or you believe in the wrong things. There is no honor, no duty to an obligation bigger than yourself, bigger than your country, or beyond your life here,” Rezeya spat.
“I’ll tell you what I believe and love: this life, here, now, you and me. And how precious life is—everyone’s. God doesn’t need my help with mass murder.”
She looked into his eyes with hate.
Craig knew he’d never change this woman’s belief. What he did hope to change was her ability to consider that different ideas could co-exist. His was not to argue but rather play to her sense of curiosity, with the hope that she would begin to ask questions—to maybe try to understand something else. He needed to plant that seed.
This was all a primer to the bigger goal of driving in a wedge between what she knew to be true and those things she might never have considered. His strategy: to prompt questions in her mind by presenting certain facts he hoped Scott Barton would be successful in digging up. These facts might just be big enough to create a crack of doubt. That’s all he needed, a crack in which to drive his wedge—and he could create a chasm.
June 28, 14:05 EDT
Detroit, Michigan
“Focus on the father. He is the same man he has always been. Follow his life day by day back in time and you’ll find the story of his daughter.” That was the advice Craig received from the director, who then shared it with Scott.
The NSA’s not-as-secret-as-they-would-like-to-believe supercomputer had been chewing on the small pieces of information he’d been able to feed it. The director was half right, but it was not the father’s past that produced the greatest revelations. They discovered Rezeya’s mother was alive and well, living in a quiet suburb of Paris. Rezeya had always been told her mother was dead.
In a twisted, cruel deception, her father had lied to the girl about her mother starting from when Rezeya was six. This lie had a purpose: to manipulate a little girl’s psyche and thereby shape her hatred of the West. The deception made it that much easier to press her into service when the time was right, harnessing that carefully cultivated hate to further the cause of Islamic extremism.
Rezeya grew up believing her mother was killed by the Americans, who, she was told, were operating covertly and illegally in Iran, chasing so-called terrorists who were supplying Iraqi subversives with arms, training, and explosives.
In this case, the omission of selected facts lent credence to the tale. It’s true that Rezeya’s mother was shot during a raid by the Americans, who had grown tired of border crossings into Iraq by Iranians who operated with their government’s approval. The shot, though, was not delivered by Americans.
No matter; any and all collateral deaths and injuries were always blamed on the Americans. The state-owned Iranian news made sure. Never mind that the Iranians had been using American-made weapons and artillery for some time in these border conflicts; evidence was rarely needed. Fars News Agency could be relied on to tell the story from the perspective of the Islamic militants.
This particular attack had been covered extensively for a reason. Rezeya’s mother was the daughter of a prominent industrialist who owned Iran’s most prestigious electrical engineering firm. He was loyal to the Shah and rejected the change to an Islamic Republic. He feared the power given to one man, the Ayatollah. To have an entire country led by one omnipotent Supreme Leader was a terrifying concept, one he feared would lead the nation to isolation from the rest of the world.
Rezeya’s grandfather led a small but fierce faction that supported the Shah and opposed those who wanted regime change. Naturally, his business became a target for takeover when the new regime took power—and just as naturally, his death warrant had been signed.
He did manage one thing, though, to keep his daughter safe: marrying her off to a man gaining prominence in the new regime, a man he hated to the core. This was a man whose beliefs of what was best for the country were the polar opposite of his own. At this point, all that mattered was his daughter’s life. That was December 14, 1977, two years before the storm.
His deal: he would turn over all his work on the plans he and his company had done on the design of a nuclear reactor in exchange for the safe passage and marriage of his daughter to a man “tight” with the reformist organization.
Rezeya was born less than a year after the marriage, and her grandfather was put to death the next day.
June 28, 16:49 EDT
Detroit, Michigan
Unblinkingly, Scott Barton had been watching the processing inquiry message on the terminal screen for the past forty-four minutes, an eternity. His dry eyes and twitching fingers noticed inquiry complete but took a second to respond.
Typing in his password yet again, the report began to stream onto the screen. He read quickly, unlike an analyst. There wasn’t time. He had to get the meat out of the dry text. There it was on the fourth page, a glimmer of hope, something they might be able to use.
The first good news of this whole damn drama.
Scott called Director Richards and explained what he found. He told him he urgently needed a team in Paris to get to an address on the outskirts of the city and set up a video uplink directly to the Detroit office.
Rushing to the elevator, he snatched the page being printed out. Impatient for the elevator, he began to pace, resisting the urge to take the stairs—which would do him no good, since he lacked access to the underground levels. Craig was going to be elated.
Running down the hall to the interrogation rooms, Scott had to force himself to settle. Getting an investigator out of a room never involved rushing in. Instead, a signal of blinking lights is used, visible to the interrogator. Once the signal is seen, the interrogator can then segue departure.
Scott made the signal, then paced. At last, the door opened, and Craig came out. Scott almost didn’t recognize him. He seemed to have aged ten years and looked as though he hadn’t slept in a week. It broke his heart, but he handed over the page and began to tell Craig the story.
Craig’s eyes lit up and he kissed Scott’s forehead, not caring what anyone might think. He would have kissed anyone bearing this news. He started back in and Scott stopped him.
“Wait. You look like shit. You’re haggard and beat. Let me talk to her.”
“Thanks a lot! Great seeing y—” stopping midsentence, he knew Scott was right. “Yeah
… yes, you’re right. Besides, she hates my guts; chances are good you’ll get further than I will. The stakes are high. This is the biggest crisis we’ll ever see—if there is a God,” said Craig. “I sure as hell don’t believe I am the only person can get her to cooperate.”
Scott gripped Craig’s shoulder. “Have a seat. Watch me. If you see me messing up, come in. There’s no way you can offend me. This isn’t my usual thing.”
“Yeah, I know you’re all about the behind-the-scenes shit, but I have a feeling you are definitely what we need now. A fresh voice and face, and a much more empathetic one at that. And you have a better read on people than anyone I know other than my CIA recruiter, Pecone—at least with me—and I like to think I’m pretty hard to read.”
Scott smiled, at the same time terrified with his hand on the door, waiting for the electronic lock to buzz. Once he was in, he saw her at the table, defiant and angry. Instantly, he thought, She hates me too.
Something within him told him to smile the biggest, warmest, friendliest smile he could offer. And there it was: a crack, a glimmer of humanity, a slight disarmament of the hostility, tempered still with a solid look of distrust.
She spoke. “And who are you supposed to be? The good cop, I suppose?”
“I’ll not pretend that I am any such thing to you, ma’am, but my name is Scott Barton, and there’s some information I hope you’ll let me share with you about your past. There are a few things you may have been told that are not true.”
She hadn’t heard anything past the name. She narrowed her eyes with questioning disbelief. “Barton as in President Barton?”
“I am his son, and also an analyst with the National Security Agency, which is why I’ve come to talk with you.”
“Ummmmph, like I’d believe anything to come from that den of liars!”
“I know you have to believe that. Your life experiences have given you no other information on which to base your opinions. But can you accept that we do have the most advanced computers in the world? They are capable of searching nearly anything that’s ever been accessible to anyone, anywhere, by remote access. Web pages, scanned documents emailed to someone, bank records, vital statistics on births, deaths, marriages, credit applications and reports, tax records, phone usage data, cellphone text messages . . . if anyone has been able to access a piece of information from any computer connected to a phone line or network that has any open communication outside, or has been transmitted by any form of broadcast, we’ve seen it, cataloged it, and stored it,” Scott explained.
“Knowing how you believe everything is yours, I’d not be surprised!” muttered Rezeya.
“Good, so at least you can believe it, while you may begrudge that we do it. This computer can also search a massive clearinghouse of data, based on a visual memory of pictures, names, dates, and many other criteria, with a relational ability that comes as close to ‘thinking’ as is currently possible with a computer,” said Scott.
“Like all Americans, you sound so proud of the things you have access to as a result of the money you have made off the backs of the poor people the world over.” The disdain in her voice was venomous.
“I’ve heard those sentiments before, and while I’d love to talk politics, that’s not why I’m here. The point is, we have found your mother. She is very much alive and living a secluded life in a small town south of Paris.”
“What do you take me for? I’ve been taught your tricks since childhood. My father made sure I was aware of your games. The supporters of the Shah killed my mother, with the assistance of your own CIA. I know what happened to her. Using the memory of a pure and good woman to attempt to turn me from the just cause of Allah is pure evil!”
Scott asked with sympathy, “Do you remember her? Her voice, what she looks like? I know you were young and it’s been almost forty years, but if you saw her now, would you recognize her?”
Perplexed, her facial expression softened. On the opposite wall, in what she knew to be a one-way window, a video screen came to life with the image of a single woman at a kitchen table in a small apartment with exposed stone walls. Not stone walls as in Iran or the Middle East, but more the type of construction in an older European home or farmhouse. These were small blocks of limestone with varying gaps of thick mortar holding them together, at the same time rustic and classical.
It was a simple and solid wooden table, probably a hundred years old. Seated at the end was a woman, mid-sixties, smiling but sad. The image was crystal clear, with occasional digital artifacts appearing as small blocks here and there. Suddenly the woman’s expression changed. She squinted and drew back, then leaned forward, eyes wide, as her hand came to her face, her fingers gently covering her mouth. Then a gasp, a sob.
At once Rezeya saw the woman recognized her. This old woman somewhere on the other end of a satellite feed seemed to know her. Still stubborn, Rezeya told herself an actor could appear to recognize a long-lost daughter and come to tears at will.
“Can she hear me?” Rezeya asked.
Scott faintly raised his eyebrows as the woman responded to the question herself. “Yes, daughter, I can hear you.”
Squinting one eye, Rezeya asked the woman why she thought she was her daughter.
“Simple. When I saw you, I thought I was looking in a mirror that could take thirty years off my face.”
It was an answer from a simple woman, not from a script. The beginnings of belief were invading her skepticism. Far from convinced, Rezeya crossed her arms in that way typical of blocking the advance of someone into her personal space. “Where have you been? You were killed.”
“No, my dear, I escaped. It’s a very long story, but I ran from your father. I tried to take you; he found us. He nearly killed me and left me for dead. My mother and brothers found me and nursed me for months. Your father left, with you, but we knew he’d be back. He sent word that you’d been sent away, I’d never find you, and that he was going to come and finish what he started with me. I fled and eventually settled in France, where I blended in with the Algerians. I tried to keep tabs on you, but you had literally disappeared off the face of the earth. Your father eventually did as well. I knew it was the work of the new leaders of Iran. I also knew going back would be a death sentence. All I could do was pray—and I did pray, four times a day—that one day, Allah would bring you back to me.”
The older woman reached across the table, pulling a picture in a frame into the field of vision of the camera. As it came into focus, it was now Rezeya’s turn to go through the difficult recognition, remembering the scene in the picture as though it were yesterday. It was her, her mother, and her father at the shore of the Caspian Sea during a time when Iran was much more liberal and people went to the shore to play in the water and sand and eat falafel and caviar from vendors. It was a good memory of a peaceful time, a time when they were a family. Even then, though, her father’s expression was cold, with a determined look in his eyes.
Though teary, Rezeya wasn’t yet convinced this woman was her mother—and even if she were, did it matter? Would it change anything? Would the passion her father held for the “cause” be lessened in meaning and importance to her just because she had been taken from her mother and her life molded into that of a soldier of Allah? Yet, there remained too many questions, shaking the foundation of her identity. She was always her father’s daughter; but what if she was also her mother’s? Could she be both? That didn’t seem possible.
“Why does my father appear angry in the picture, when it seemed like we were so happy?”
“Even though I never felt love for your father—ours was an arranged marriage—I was told my father set it up to protect me; even so, there were times I thought he was a good man. But he was always hard-hearted. He’d look at the way people were enjoying themselves, at the beach, for instance, with a judgmental scorn.
“I know that your father is wrong, the West is not godless. They allow me to live.” At once she looked incredibly sad.
Rezeya was not broken, her hardness was softening, but her devotion to the cause, to her father, was too entrenched. She had found her mother but realized a reunion was a possibility she herself had destroyed. Surely these people would kill her when this was over. She would never see her mother again.
“Mother, I don’t see a future where that is possible. I can’t undo the things I have done, and I am convinced these people will kill me, either secretly or by conviction through a trial.”
Rezeya’s mother reacted the way only a mother can when her offspring is threatened. “Who’s in charge there? I want to see your face!”
Scott Barton walked into view of the camera off to the side of Rezeya. “Do you know who I am, Mrs. Kundi?”
Her eyes expressed a smile. “Yes, of course, I know you are the president’s son. Though I may not like everything your father has done, he’s a better man than some others who’ve sat in his office.”
“Thank you, Mrs. Kundi. I’ll let him know, and I hope you understand that he’s not always able to do all things the way he’d like to.”
Mrs. Kundi looked down, slightly nodding. “Then I like him even more. Some men push their will through regardless of the thoughts or concerns of those around them.”
“Yes … but if I may, Mrs. Kundi, I must press on. Time is not on our side.”
“I understand, sir, but you can’t go yet. I want you to promise me that if my daughter helps you now, her life will be spared!” For emphasis, she pounded the table with her fist. “Promise me!”
