by N Lee Wood
Khuruchabja still has a long, long way to go, the usual nepotism and business by baksheesh too ingrained to disappear instantly. The career of Islamic leaders has never been an enviable one; the balancing act between religion and secularism exhausting and often unrewarding. Those few whomanage it without resorting to despotism and bloodshed are admirable and underrated heroes.
Of course, Ibrahim’s rivals still have an unfortunate tendency to mysteriously disappear when they get too pesky; what was left of Larry’s family prudently decided to retire along with their Swiss bank accounts to the ski slopes of Europe; and ulemas of every sect, understandably, were incensed at this perversion of Islam with its corresponding usurpation of their political dominance.
Ahmat continued filing reports for GBN, slowly toning down the wild rhetoric as his English improved and he grew more sophisticated. GBN added decoders for several Arabic dialects to their list of choices as homemade satellite dishes began popping up like mushrooms all over the tiny desert country. Hamid’s network kept CDI and any vestiges of disgruntled out-of-power factions from killing the kid, or oppressing his news-hungry neighbors, until his television-fused tribe had grown so large, former enemies did the age-old, two-step shuffle and joined the side that was winning.
Little Khuruchabja began experiencing its first economic growth in centuries. It was hard to argue with the flourishing middle class as Khuruchabja’s burgeoning electronics industry brought a burst of economic spring to the parched desert. But in the face of this growing prosperity, the ulemas seemed somewhat surprised at the open reception the New Age Islam received. Ibrahim had meant what he’d said, no matter how cynically he felt about it privately. One by one, the clerics gradually gave up their futile struggle to turn back the clock and started looking for ways to fit that old-time religion into the new succession. Those who continued to preach violence and murder in the name of Allah found themselves cut off from support, in more ways than one, while those who preached the tenets of Islam based on a love of God were heavily endorsed by Ibrahim’s government, both politically and financially. Islam Studies Institutions rapidly expanded throughout the country. The government constantly emphasized that Islam had traditionally integrated politics and religion, this was an Islanmic flowering, an Islamic revival, that Ibrahim had declared his country was on a peaceful Islamic economic jihad.
It was ambitious as hell, and there are still a discouraging number of problems, but Khuruchabja is just beginning to slowly pull out of the medieval tarpit they’d been sunk in for centuries and come into their own blossoming Twenty-first-century Islamic renaissance. By all accounts, Ibrahim’s new government seems to have gotten off to a vocal, heated start, squalling as lustily as any healthy newborn baby. With luck, it’ll survive.
And so, it seems, will we.
After the feature and the GBN interview with Ibrahim, I had a sudden rush of fame which made me feel both relieved and massively uncomfortable. CDI got a badly needed shot of public goodwill, which helped tremendously when budget time came around. The Director in Chief of CDI sent me a strange, reserved note of congratulations, meticulously avoiding all mention of John. A shaky truce, but a truce nonetheless.
Arlando threw a celebratory party for Halton and me (and all our little bodyguards) at the security complex. I’d had enough of the contrived best wishes and congratulations in about ten minutes flat, and spent the rest of the evening OD’ing on vacuous conversation and egotism.
I stood grinning frozenly, empty champagne glass clenched in one hand, while listening to some exiled South American generalissimo do “My secret’s better than yours but I’m not telling you without a really good book contract” with some Mafioso informant under wraps until he’s called to testify flanked by his lawyer and his investigative reporter. When I couldn’t stand it anymore, I wandered around to find John.
John had become rather popular with the ladies at GBN Center when he’d started working as a new anchorman. His instant celebrity and glamour as an ex-CDI spy had just upped his desirability factor by ten. I found myself having to fight not to get ridiculously insecure and jealous whenever some buxomy blond brain-dead bimbo made a serious play for him. I didn’t always succeed, and that, combined with my smart-assed mouth and hot temper, made any real friendships problematical. John always managed to turn them down gently. He gets along with just about anyone; they all think he’s so mellow, so sweet and wonderful.
Couldn’t hurt a fly.
I spotted him trapped in the corner going through some intense socialization ritual, trying to puzzle out all the sexual innuendoes and invitations from the bored wives of absent, shady millionaires off finking on their even wealthier and shadier bosses. Not all of his most ardent admirers were female, I noticed, which amused me.
By the time I’d wormed my way through the crowd of too many sweaty bodies pressed together to rescue him, he’d vanished. Oh, well. I turned, and glanced out the French doors into the garden, where several guests had fled in search of some fresher air.
One of the guests Arlando had invited to the party, a little man with strange skin that looked as if he had had the wrinkles surgically stretched out of it one too many times, was working his way toward me, thin lips stretched in a predatory smile. He had been badgering me all night for the film rights to produce some kind of fictionalized TV holo series based on our exciting True Life Adventures in Khuruchabja. Lotsa money, he’d wheezed furtively while surreptitiously squeezing various unerogenous parts of my body. Lotsa money.
Suddenly the garden seemed like a good idea to me, too.
I discovered John standing by himself at one end of the garden, staring unblinkingly at a stack of trussed up rosebushes left by a gardener to be planted the next day. He’d fallen into one of his trances. I stood a few yards away and watched.
Although the attacks had gotten less frequent, he could be triggered into a dream state by just about anything, a spot on the wall, a button on his shirt, a bundle of rosebushes stacked against a fence. Maybe the stress of the party had provoked it, I don’t know. I’d learned to simply leave him alone when his mind checked out for lunch. He stared with absolute concentration at rosebushes in bondage while people strolled by, laughter and the heavy smell of lilac lingering on the night air.
He’d also caught the rapacious eye of one of the better-known holo stars who frequently visits her political friends here when she’s not out decorating films and overdosing on fame. I intercepted her before she reached him.
“Hi,” I said cheerfully, blocking the path between her and John with a big, friendly smile and my short little body. “Wow, it sure is hot in there, isn’t it?”
“God, is it ever,” she said with forced courtesy, resentful I’d prevented her from seizing a few private moments with John.
“Yeah. Really hot,” I agreed vacuously.
I could feel her eyeing me, wondering what a young, good-looking hunk like John could possibly see in an old bow-wow like me. She had about four extra inches on me, all of it leg, and ten less pounds nicely distributed on the rest of her body. She had on a rather skimpy dress to show off her perfect curves, the kind of slinky outfit I’d love to be able to wear but would look ludicrous in if I tried.
She smiled her dazzling white, perfect teeth at me, but kept batting her eyelashes seductively in John’s direction. How disappointed she looked, I was pleased to note. Her sly, and not too subtle attempts at catching John’s attention right under my nose sent my blood temperature higher, but John remained catatonic. Not even the lure of her tanned, smooth thighs rubbing together suggestively could break that spell.
“Is he like part Indian or something?” she said, admiring him over my shoulder, stuck with trying to be nice to the ugly little wifey. She had some chutzpah, no doubt about it. “I mean from India, not American Indian, y’know, into Buddhism and meditation and that kinda thing?”
“You could say that,” I agreed. You could say anything you wanted. John continued gazing at the r
osebushes, locked into his private reverie.
“I knew it. He’s like, y’know, so in tune with nature and all.”
I smiled politely and didn’t bother to enlighten her. John doesn’t actually see much nature. He wants to understand it, he wants to understand everything, but “in tune” with nature, he’s not. He’s got a hard enough time trying to get in tune with himself. Maybe he was looking for his own Mahdi in the nano-torn recesses of his mind.
She finally gave up, giving me a withering look that made her appraisal of me infinitely clear before wriggling back to a more appreciative audience. When John blinked his way back to the real world, scared and silent, we ditched the party and went home.
That was a few years ago, and up until the other day he hadn’t had another of his attacks.
I wear a ring on my left hand, and endorse my paycheck these days “Kay Munadi Halton,” as in “Mrs.” We’re not married, not legally, since John isn’t legally a person. It doesn’t matter.
We got our bank checks in the mail with both our “married” names emblazoned on the top. John sat down and held the checks in his lap, staring unblinkingly at them for over an hour. I made myself a cup of coffee and leaned against the doorjamb, waiting patiently for him to come out of it.
My coffee dregs had gone cold, and I’d just about decided to give up, when he looked at me, his eyes as round as a child’s.
“What is it?”
“There’s only one,” he said, wonder in his voice.
“Only one what?”
“Only one John Halton.”
That’s right. They’d killed all the others; he was the only one left in the whole world.
“I’m unique,” he said, awed.
I sat down next to him and took his hand. “You always were.”
Acknowledgments
* * *
Many thanks to the following people who aided and abetted in the writing of this book:
Susan Allison, Scott and Suzi Baker, Elaine Block, Chris Bunch, Anne Choller, Allan Cole, Craig Copetas, Roland Gilles, François Landon, Doris Lessing, Pat LoBrutto, Bob McCabe, Mike and Linda Moorcock, Hans-Peter Otto, Stephanie Laidman Tade, Erik Thoraval, Hassane Tlili, Jim Williams, and to l’Institut du Monde Arabe, Mme. Bibi, Mohmed Smaiel, Djaffai Mouliti, Azoua Yakhou and all the rest of the regulars at “Le Onze” in Paris.
copyright
* * *
This Ace Book contains the complete text of the original trade edition. It has been completely reset in a typeface designed for easy reading, and was printed from new film.
LOOKING FOR THE MAHDI
An Ace Book / published by arrangement with the author
PRINTING HISTORY
Ace edition / February 1996 Ace mass-market edition / August 1997
All rights reserved.
Copyright © 1996 by N. Lee Wood.
Cover art by Bruce Jensen.
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