‘Sure, no problem.’ Ying stood. She hesitated for a moment. There was more she felt she should say. ‘Jenny, this is not like Ang. She doesn’t do this sort of thing…’
‘Don’t worry,’ said Tadzic as Rachael Ying began to walk slowly from her office. ‘I’m sure it’s all pretty innocent. I’ll catch up with you later and let you know what I’ve found out.’
Missing persons wasn’t exactly Jenny Tadzic’s forte, but getting an official inquiry underway smartly was the least she could do. Tadzic sifted through her files for a map of Thailand and pinned it to her wall. According to the postcards, the last place Angie visited was a town called Sop Huai Hai. Two young girls in colourful clothes smiled toothily at the camera. Tadzic arranged the other cards according to the dates Angie had thoughtfully written on each: Mae La, Noi Khun Yhun, Mae Hong Son and, lastly, Sop Huai Hai. Checking against the map, the pattern was obvious. It was a trail heading to Myanmar, and Sop Huai Hai was the last stop before the border. Tadzic knew that Angie had been gathering information on a drug lord on the Nam Sa River, thirty kilometres or so inside the border. A certain General Trip – a seriously bad motherfucker. ‘Angie, you’re a silly girl,’ Tadzic said quietly, the cold reality of messing with people like the general well known to her. She accessed the AFP’s information file on General Trip and skimmed it. A recent American DEA agent, she saw, had also gone missing two months ago in the same vicinity. Maybe it wasn’t all pretty innocent after all.
Well, thought Tadzic, that was the morning shot to shit. She’d have to make a report to Foreign Affairs, ASIS, and contact the United States DEA to see if their agent had turned up. Tadzic knew the likelihood of ever seeing her friend again, dead or alive, was remote if she’d trekked up to the Shan state and begun sniffing around. The jungle would swallow her and her boyfriend with nothing more than a handful of water-stained postcards to mark the point of disappearance. An image popped into the federal agent’s mind of an eddy swirling momentarily on the surface of shark-infested waters where, just moments before, a swimmer had been splashing. Tadzic shivered.
Jakarta, Indonesia
Dedy Abimanu lost his wife and his children in a motor scooter accident, and his job in the public service soon after. It was the time in his life when he had felt abandoned by God, unloved and unwanted. He’d lived on the streets for a time, begging, stealing, doing what was necessary to survive, and at the same time looking for answers. And then he’d met Duat, a man close to God and with the certainty that life, indeed the world, would change and that he, Duat, would help facilitate that change as God’s instrument.
And so Dedy Abimanu fell in with Babu Islam. He accompanied Duat on a bus high into the hills of central Java where the nights were cold on his skin and the air clean. He felt invigorated by Duat’s belief in God’s love for His servants, and their cause. The government was corrupt, they said, in the eyes of God; a slave of the World Bank and, through it, the hated Americans. It had to go.
These men were devout Muslims who obeyed the Qur’an and hated the unbelievers. Dedy stayed in the mountains, living with his newfound brothers. He trained with them, learning how to handle the weapons that would help to change the world: swords, guns, explosives.
This was not the God he had known as a boy or a teenager. It wasn’t the God of his wife, nor the God of anyone he had known before. This was an angry God, vengeful, dark and hateful, a God intolerant of differences and ignorant of compassion for all but the truly devout. It was the God he needed, giving him purpose, and permission to take revenge.
He met Kadar Al-Jahani after a month in the hills, introduced to the leader with half a dozen others who had joined recently, in a special ceremony of initiation. Dedy was impressed by the man’s service to God as a warrior, as a soldier of Islam. And by his obvious skill with explosives.
At night, around a low fire, Kadar recounted the mighty deeds and battles of Khalid bin Al-Waleed, the great general of Mohammed, may His name be praised. Yes, the Sword of Allah, great weapon of the faithful. Kadar also spoke of the fearless sacrifices made by soldiers back in his homeland, fighting against overwhelming odds. They were martyrs. Kadar didn’t need to exaggerate either their commitment to God, or their bravery, for the suicide bombers who had wreaked havoc in Israel and brought it to its knees – and the bargaining table – were both utterly brave and committed, and their deeds were already the stuff of legend. Kadar Al-Jahani explained that they were warriors fighting in the defence of Islam and, as such, would sit by the side of God in heaven. Like all the men around him, Dedy Abimanu was entranced by the stories, and he envied these warriors the opportunities afforded them in paradise.
Kadar Al-Jahani recognised the potential in Dedy early. He had known many suicide bombers and they were mostly clones of each other: people on the edge of the despair that came hand in hand with hopelessness, who believed a noble death in the service of Islam would bring them the rewards that they had missed on earth. And mostly they all had the same mother and father – poverty and powerlessness. Dedy didn’t quite fit the profile, but he had something just as reliable: hate.
Dedy became his top student, and Kadar Al-Jahani used him always as an example for others to follow. This acceptance and warmth were as manna for Dedy’s soul. So when Kadar and Duat said they needed a volunteer to send a message to the world that Indonesia was ready to fight the infidels, Dedy stepped forward. He knew he would not come back from this mission. Instead, he would journey to heaven and sit beside God with the other warriors who had proved their love for Him. Perhaps he would even meet the Sword of Allah himself, Khalid bin Al-Waleed. Death would become Dedy’s life’s mission.
On the appointed day, Kadar Al-Jahani prepared Dedy, warrior stepping forth into battle, in an apartment block in a crowded residential area of Jakarta. His battledress was a clean shave, neatly combed hair, Nikes, a black T-shirt and a photographer’s jacket, the type with many pockets for lenses, filters and rolls of film. He wore a Nikon around his neck, and the photographer’s bag contained several camera bodies, lenses and filters, the tools of his trade. The wallet in his back pocket had formerly belonged to a British citizen, and the accompanying passport verified the driver’s licence it contained. His name was now Alex Ablas, resident of Fulham Broadway, London, and he was a Reuters news photographer on assignment. The fact that Dedy spoke English well was vital. He’d picked it up working at the government tourist agency for many years before his office was closed, ironically due to the global downturn in tourism brought about by terrorist activity.
Dedy knew the plan backwards and he was committed to it heart and soul. He amazed himself that he was not in the least nervous as he walked towards the heavy gates, arriving mid morning when the queues were long and patience short. He thought only of the mission and of his service to God.
The three uniformed Indonesian police at the outer gate were vigilant, scrutinising the documents of every person wishing to gain entrance. They examined the British passport of Alex Ablas and asked him what his business was. Mr Ablas told them that he was a Reuters photographer – confirmed by the press ID in the window in his wallet – and that he needed to check on various newly imposed visa requirements for entry to the United States. He walked through the metal detector several times and was eventually passed after he removed his shoes, the eyelets tripping the device’s sensors. They put his camera case, the camera around his neck and the contents of all his pockets through the x-ray scanner. The police, being extra cautious, had him open the case so they could give its contents a closer inspection. They pulled the cameras out, examined them quickly, checked beneath the dense foam packing and, satisfied, waved him through to the next checkpoint, manned by the US Army. Mr Ablas walked along the covered path, aware of the tension. The gates were heavier than he thought. In front of and behind them were concrete anti-tank bollards designed to stop truck bombs.
Ablas approached the first three soldiers, two young men and one woman in her mid twenties. Anoth
er three soldiers stood behind them in full battle gear, body armour, helmets and M16s at the ready, guarding the final entrance. He joined the queue. Everyone was hot and impatient. He eventually reached the soldiers. They asked him the same questions that the Indonesian police guarding the gate had put to him.
‘Passport please, sir.’
He handed it to them with a smile, despite their serious faces.
‘What is your business here, sir?’
Mr Ablas began to reiterate what that business was when a middle-aged woman with her husband in tow pushed through. ‘Excuse me, excuse me,’ she said, bustling past Ablas.
‘Ma’am, you’ll have to wait your turn,’ said one of the young soldiers, a private first class.
‘My passport – it’s been stolen.’
‘Sorry to hear that, ma’am, but you’ll still have to wait your turn.’
‘Excuse me, but I think I was before you,’ said another man in the line, annoyed by the woman’s attempt to jump the queue.
‘Can’t you let us through?’ asked the woman whose passport had been stolen. ‘We have planes to catch, connections…’
‘Doing our best, ma’am, but as you’ve been told, you’ll have to wait your turn, I’m afraid,’ said the female soldier, a sergeant, who had come to her comrade’s rescue. She impatiently waved Alex Ablas towards a table and a second x-ray machine, and then followed him over.
Ablas was then asked a third time to show his passport. The sergeant checked it, saw that the photo matched the holder and returned it to him.
‘This is your case, sir?’ the sergeant asked.
Ablas nodded.
‘Open it please, sir,’ she said, checking over her shoulder. The woman with the passport problem was still loudly chewing the PFC’s ear off. ‘We pay our taxes. I’m writing down your number, young man. We know a congressman…’
Ablas did as he was asked. He opened the case and turned it around so that the sergeant could see inside.
‘Turn the cameras on please, sir.’ The sergeant was obviously distracted by the argument behind her. Dedy Abimanu, alias Alex Ablas, turned each camera on and was relieved when green lights flashed on all three.
The sergeant picked up the portable scanner and touched the ‘self test’ button as procedure required her to do. The scanner’s LED display informed her that it was functioning properly. She waved the scanner’s nose over the case and its contents, and then held the sensor in the device’s nose over the cameras for the required time. The scanner took around thirty seconds to register the presence of C-4, RDX and a number of other explosives by examining the vapour released by each. She watched the scanner’s LED display impatiently while its CPU processed the make-up of the air sample tested. A watched pot never boils… And then, ‘Negative’. She put the scanner down, gave the cameras a cursory examination and lifted the protective foam, her concentration broken by the impatient old duck further back in the queue. She took out one camera body to see if there was anything under it and then replaced it. Nice-looking camera – new. The sergeant was vaguely interested in photography – something she would like to take up one day. Indeed, ordinarily she would have happily conversed with a professional photographer, but not at that moment. Too much going on.
‘Your business here, sir?’ she asked, closing the case.
‘Can you hurry, please,’ said the woman with the passport problem, now arrived beside Ablas with her husband. The sergeant sighed and felt sorry for the man. The woman had successfully bullied the PFCs and now, obviously, it was her turn.
‘Entry visa,’ Ablas said, his face serene, relaxed.
‘Keep your case on you at all times, sir,’ she said to Ablas, waving him through.
‘Sergeant. Sergeant!’ said the woman. ‘We have a plane to catch, if you please!’
Mr Ablas thanked the sergeant and moved on past the final armed guards, who ignored him completely.
The female soldier checked the purse of the impatient woman: compact, nail polish, wallet, notebook – those camera bodies were on the heavy side, weren’t they? – mints, sunglasses case…
‘Anyone can see my husband and I aren’t terrorists. Honestly…’ she said, as she stuffed everything back in her purse, huffing and puffing. Her husband shrugged apologetically at the soldier.
‘Thank you, ma’am,’ said the sergeant as politely as she could manage. She wiped her fingers absently on her fatigues. They felt waxy. Where’d that come from?
Mr Ablas made his way to the visa department. He took a number from the dispenser and sat on the one remaining chair. His number was three hundred and ninety-seven. The indicator on the wall said three hundred and seventy-eight. All three windows were occupied with problems. It would have been a long wait…
He opened the case on his knee, took the flash from its place and popped off the clear plastic shield in front of the bulb. Next he removed the bulb itself, and pulled a small wire from the socket and fed it into the female socket on one of the camera bodies. He clicked the flash’s switch to the on position, closed the case and waited calmly.
Exactly thirty seconds later, the timer in the flash sent an electric charge down the wire and into the camera body.
Kadar Al-Jahani heard the almighty blast over the noise of the city from four blocks away. Duat had already departed and was on a scooter climbing into the hills. A mushroom cloud of grey dust blossomed over the skyline, following the sound of the explosion seconds earlier. The city was silent for several moments after that, as if taking a breath, and then the chorus began: tens, then hundreds then thousands of horns blared in an impromptu salute. The US Embassy had been struck. Kadar punched a number into the stolen cellphone and let it ring twice before disconnecting: the prearranged signal. The move to a remote site on the island of Flores would begin immediately. The authorities – American and Indonesian – would swarm over the bombsite. Kadar Al-Jahani wondered how long it would take before the Americans connected him with the explosion.
Townsville, Queensland, Australia
‘Good evening. This is Annabelle Gilbert with the news. The United States Embassy in Jakarta, Indonesia, was struck today by a bomb blast at just after one pm Eastern Australian time. The attack is believed to have been carried out by one or more suicide bombers.
‘Reports from the devastation are still sketchy, but indications are that around eighty people have been killed and a substantial number wounded. Around fifty people are still missing.
‘No Australians are reported to have been in the building at the time.
‘The US Embassy building suffered major structural damage in the attack and may have to be completely demolished.
‘The embassy had been in a general state of heightened alert over the past six months since the American Express and Citibank buildings in London were attacked in a coordinated assault.’
Annabelle Gilbert’s immaculately made-up features were replaced on TV screens by scenes of chaos at the bombed embassy. Indonesian soldiers joined police to remove injured people from the rubble. Wounded people wandered around dazed, their clothes torn and streaked with blood.
‘Authorities are mystified by how a person carrying explosives could have passed unnoticed through two checkpoints, both equipped with x-ray scanners. It’s believed the bomb or bombs were detonated somewhere deep inside the building, possibly the visa section.
‘Indonesian police who worked on the successful pursuit of the Bali bombers and the bombing of the Marriott Hotel in Jakarta have been called in to investigate this new attack, and American experts are rushing to the scene to join them.
‘So far, no group has claimed responsibility for the attack, although al Qa’ida, Abu Sayyaf and Jamaah Islamiah, the groups responsible for other attacks throughout South East Asia, are currently the prime suspects.
‘Australian embassies and consulates throughout South East Asia are now on full alert.
‘In Canberra, Prime Minister Mr William Blight…’
Jak
arta, Indonesia
Kadar Al-Jahani spent the night in a safe house before making his way to the airport. The sirens had wailed all night, as he knew they would. The sounds were as familiar to him as ordinary traffic noise. He glanced up at the departures board. The Singapore Airlines flight to Frankfurt via Singapore was boarding on schedule. There was time. He took a seat at the Internet kiosk and checked to ensure the connection was live. He called up the website for the Sydney Morning Herald and checked the front page. He was pleased by what he saw. At the bottom of the main article was an invitation to email it to a friend.
Amman, Jordan
The Saudi woke refreshed and early after getting in from the airport quite late. He travelled so much that it had long since ceased to be an adventure. Instead it was a chore, and it was good to be home. He stretched out in his bed, searching for the cold corners with his toes, and delighting in the scent of the young woman lying beside him. He turned to look at her, a flight attendant for Emirates, facing away from him. She had worked in first class and there had been a certain frisson between them from the start. Perhaps he reminded her of her father? He was always surprised when a woman almost half his age found him attractive. She had said that she was Iranian. He marvelled at the flawless skin of her back and the hint of muscle in her upper arm stretched out beyond her head. He had performed well for her last night and they had both slept the exhausted sleep of lovers.
He slipped out of bed and went to the home office off his bedroom. The cold flagstones and dark indigo Belouch rugs, a present from an old Soviet client, felt good under his bare feet. He checked the screen of his computer. He had mail. After twelve hours without checking his in-tray, as usual he had quite a bit of it. There was one email that intrigued him. Its subject read, ‘A sign from Allah’. The Saudi opened it. No message, just a URL. He doubleclicked on it and a connection was made to a newspaper he’d never heard of before called the Sydney Morning Herald. The headline roared, ‘ATTACK’.
Sword of Allah Page 14
