by Rose Fox
“What happened?” he asked while they were walking, “where’s your backpack?”
She neither answered nor heard him and had he not held her, she would have collapsed again. Karma hesitated to pick her up in his arms because they were still in the area of a holy site. He led her slowly, almost dragging her, to the bus awaiting the group, which was touring the Bazaar. The front door of the empty bus was open. The driver sat at the wheel and threw them a bored glance as he dug his teeth back in the huge sandwich he was eating.
“Water, water,” she muttered, and suddenly noticed Karma beside her. She whispered hoarsely:
“We have to get away from here, they’re looking for me.”
Right then, shouts were heard behind them and a terrifying Alsatian dog burst out of the Mosque, followed by another black dog, whose tongue hung out of its jaws. Both dogs ran back and forth outside the entrance sniffing the ground with loud breaths as the visitors dispersed and cleared the square. Two soldiers stood close to the large turquoise gates and tensely followed the two dogs, which were running around in circles.
Abigail pointed to them, then looked at the empty bus and climbed into it. She suddenly pulled the driver out of his seat and pushed him to a passenger seat as she took his place at the wheel. To the driver and Karma’s surprise she started the bus and within in seconds, began to drive it away. The driver opened his mouth and put out his arm but, not a word came out of his mouth. Abigail maneuvered between the parked vehicles, blew the horn and drove on with the bus door still open.
They traveled like that along the busy streets till they reached a narrow lane where the traffic was sparse and, she stopped there, got out of the driver’s seat and yelled to Karma:
“Quickly, let’s get out and hitch a ride!
Before they stepped down from the bus, she touched the shocked driver, mumbled apologetically and got off. Then, her world began to spin and she fell at the roadside. Karma ran to her and she stood up again.
A dark-colored cab drew up behind them and Abigail went to it, as she wiped her face. Karma watched as she talked to the taxi driver, turning her back towards him, pulled something out of her collar and handed it to the driver. Amazement flashed through Karma’s mind at how lucky they were that a taxi arrived so quickly and just in time.
The bus driver came to his senses, shut the door and making a sharp U-turn, returned to where he had been to await the group that was still shopping in the Bazaar.
Abigail whispered to Karma as they sat in the cab:
“I’m going to faint and I feel cold. Take me to a doctor and…” she stopped speaking.
Karma turned around to her, called out her name and spoke the driver in a frightened voice:
“I apologize, my wife is pregnant, she’s feeling awful. Help, please get us to a doctor!”
The driver nodded and accelerated, apparently understanding the emergency. Not for a moment did it occur to them that this taxi driver, Robin, had been on their heels like a shadow. He was following Abigail, and according to all the rules of the game, had been watching and reporting back, without revealing himself, of course.
During the minutes they traveled, Abigail regained consciousness at least twice as she teetered on the edge of awareness and reality, which scared Karma to death. He offered the driver another banknote and begged him to hurry but, the driver refused the cash and nodded. He said that in a few minutes, they would reach Gachin, where he knew an excellent doctor. He pointed to the right, to a row of houses in the distance, between the hilltops and added that his children lived there and, perhaps, his daughter, Jamilla…
“Thank you, thank you, you were sent to us by Allah,” mumbled Karma and looked at Abigail. Her eyes were wide open, but she didn’t seem to be aware of anything. Horrified, he wondered what transpired when she disappeared in the Mosque. He didn’t even hear the beep that sounded on the driver’s radio phone, nor did it occur to him that the driver had already notified the doctor that they were on their way.
Dr. Muna received them at her home, where she also had her clinic and Robin insisted on staying with them. He explained that their case touched his heart and suggested that when the lady recovered, perhaps he would take them to their desired destination.
The black blood-soaked scarf was removed from Abigail’s leg, revealing her torn calf. The doctor recoiled instinctively, at first and muttered: “Yah, good God!” and announced immediately: “You have to go to the hospital!”
Deathly pale, Abigail shook her head and muttered that it was impossible, that she would not go anywhere, even if it meant dying. The doctor understood and, knowing very well who she was dealing with, she considered how to handle the situation.
The doctor herself was a member of the underground ‘Mujahedin-e-Khalq’ that was associated with the Israeli ‘Mossad’ and was known as “The Dove.” Her medical care of the organization’s injured members was part of her activity against the regime in her country, but she hid it well. Her home was an important meeting place and the members of the organization called it “the Nest.”
Now she sighed and began attending to the injured woman. She drew a sample of blood from her, leaned across and listened to her heart, then pulled down Abigail’s lower eyelid and noticed her pallor.
“She needs a pint of blood, maybe even two,” she turned to Robin, the driver. They spoke in whispers and she handed him a test tube containing Abigail’s blood. When he left, she made a phone call, talking quietly and covering her mouth with her hand to hide her lips but, her voice was clearly audible.
“Doctor Adel, I need advice and assistance,” she said. She spoke in medical terminology and discussed the treatment she should give to the injured woman at her clinic. She made some notes and turned her face away but, Karma heard her ask:
“What seems most urgent to you?” When she hung up, she sat for a moment to think, then she addressed them quietly.
“A surgeon will come to suture the wound and will probably bring some blood for a transfusion.”
“What does it depend on?” Karma asked, but the doctor didn’t answer, only glanced at Abigail and, after a short pause, sat down beside her.
“How long ago did this happen?”
Abigail was silent and Karma answered for her:
“Today, before noon. Does it make a difference?”
“She has lost a lot of blood,” the doctor replied, “it’s important to know so that her body doesn’t go into shock.”
Until the arrival of the surgeon, Abigail received two injections and Dr. Muna calmly explained that one was anti-tetanus and the other – an antibiotic. She brought her a large glass of water and encouraged her to drink all of it.
“Stop looking at us like a worried mother hen,” she said to Karma, “go to the waiting room and make some coffee or tea, for yourself and for me.”
Karma prepared the drinks and thought how lucky they were that everything was going so smoothly.
A few minutes later, the surgeon arrived. Dr. Adel was a short man. From the bald patch on top of his head, which was surrounded by a crown of red hair and to the end of his nose, which was also red, he looked funny. The doctor leaned over to examine Abigail’s leg and shook his head with displeasure.
“No, no, it can’t be attended to here.”
He repeated the sentence several times, looked at Abigail and asked:
“How did this happen? It looks as though someone bit you and pulled off a chunk of your flesh. What happened to you?”
Abigail did not respond. Her eyes were closed and she wasn’t paying attention to what was going on around her. Once more, Dr. Adel repeated:
“This treatment needs to be carried out in a hospital, under different conditions, with skin grafts, and under general anesthetic.”
This surgeon was not a party to the secret and he related to the treatment purely as a matter of medical care. When Dr. Muna also did not respond, he realized he was talking to himself and that there was no chance his advice woul
d be followed.
He trusted his colleague, Dr. Muna and knew that she was an internist. She had called him in as a specialist and expert in his field, which explained why he was surprised that his advice to transfer the patient to the hospital was not accepted. After a few minutes he relented and gave up, took a surgical kit out of his bag as he stopped ranting under his reddened nose.
Abigail spent the following two days at Dr.Muna’s home and did not realize what astounding results the tunnel operation had achieved or its worldwide success.
Karma heard snippets of information about the virus attack on the state’s computers. The damage was extensive especially to the computer systems of the Ministry of Fuel and part of the information stored in them was just erased. The next day, it was reported in the Iranian newspaper, “Inshallah,” which quoted the Iranian Deputy Minister of Fuel, who said:
“It is still unclear whether the attack was mounted within Iran or from outside the country.”
Karma was proud when he heard and read the reports but could not decide whether Abigail was connected to the lethal blow to the state’s computer system. He sent Robin to fetch a newspaper and hungrily devoured the information. It was reported that, on Sunday evening, the employees of Iranian State Fuel Company had been instructed to close down all of their computers, at once.
The spyware that had been implanted into the system in the tunnel had penetrated the central computer and caused countrywide contamination. The virus changed network settings, copied recorded messages, photographed screens and messaging software, transmitting them to central computer hubs in other countries. The virus made its way to 135 computers. It reached mechanical and electrical equipment programs in Saudi Arabia, Lebanon, Syrian, the Sudan and Egypt and gathered information from them.
The Iranians did everything to track down and discover where the virus came from, but it was impossible to identify which of the computers had been hacked. All the information that was copied was sent to many servers and only one of them was in the tunnel – the location where the hacking had taken place.
Another week later, the official response from the Iranian Students’ News Agency, ‘ISNA’ was received. It reported that the “Viper” virus had attacked the computers of the Ministry of Fuel and its subordinate companies. The Agency assured that no damage had been caused to the production of the black gold from the Islamic Republic.
The truth was that the loss was greatest at the nuclear facility at Bushehr. It frightened the Russian scientists, who were operating it to such an extent that they warned that if it was made operational again too early, it was likely to cause another “Chernobyl disaster.”
Karma’s hands shook as he read a short report on another page, fearing that it may have some truth in it.
“After an intensive investigation, it was found that the “Viper” virus was implanted using a USB Flash-drive by a local agent operating on behalf of Israeli intelligence.”
As a result of the penetration of the virus in the tunnel of the “Imam Mosque,” the Iranian project upon which the entire Iranian nuclear program is based was removed. Almost a month later an imaging sketch was published of the military facility at Parchin, which, as suspected all over the world, served the Ayatollahs’ regime to promote this program.
A worldwide security warning was issued by the management of Microsoft. The company announced that it would work to repair the break into its “Windows” software that had allowed the virus to pose as the program and cause the damage.
An urgent knock was heard at the front door. Dr. Muna peered through the peephole and opened the door. Robin stormed in and cried out as he waved his arms and the doctor turned pale.
“Where are they now and how soon will they get here?”
“Two cars had parked down below and others are approaching from the side streets!”
“Oh God, help us!” Dr. Muna called out, wringing her hands. She paused and then yelled:
“Everybody, go to the opening!”
“Where’s the opening? Quickly!” Robin shouted and the doctor pointed to the cupboard under the marble top in the clinic. Robin ran, opened the doors wide, bent down and entered, leaving only his rear sticking out of it. He fiddled around with something there and called out in a muffled voice:
“It’s open, come in!”
The doctor pulled Abigail, pointed to the opening under the marble top and whispered to her:
“Do as I am doing.” She bent down, crawled on her hands and knees and Abigail heard her voice echoing from inside the cupboard, calling her name. Abigail crawled inside and heard her whisper:
“Hurry, close the doors behind you!”
From behind them they heard heavy blows coming from the apartment, followed by the sound of shattering glass, screaming and heavy footsteps.
“Come here, be quick,” Abigail heard and crawled after the doctor into the narrow tunnel. Abigail reached a low-ceilinged burrow that was impossible to stand up in and curled up beside them. The odor of the sand and the musty air took her back in time to the dark period, when she had lain bound and tied up, as a captive in an underground prison for years. She shuddered, found it hard to breath and sobs burst out of her lips. Robin pulled her to him and covered her mouth with his hand. In the silence that fell, they could hear the footsteps of people running around the apartment, doors opening and banging shut, shots and blows and her heart beat wildly.
Somehow Abigail had still not grasped that she was lying beside two underground fighters, members of the ‘Mujahedin-e-Khalq’ that Karma also belonged to.
The soldiers spent quite a long while on their rampage of the “Nest”. They moved and dragged things about, opened and slammed doors and fired into closets to ensure they would kill anyone hiding inside rather than be surprised by them if they entered the rooms. They searched in bins and banged their rifles on the walls, listening for sounds coming out of them, trying to discover whether they were empty or serving as a hiding place. They peered into dark niches, destroyed whatever they could get their hands on, letting out their anger on objects they found. The soldiers’ screams “Allahu Akbar!” (Allah is Great) were heard by the three of them, curled up in the dark tunnel.
Muna understood that they would never be able to return to that apartment. She pushed a handle in the corner of the low ceiling and whispered:
“Are you ready to move?”
Then, she pushed the wall. A breeze and bright sunlight entered the dugout and blinded their eyes that had grown accustomed to the gloom. They ran and hid among some bushes and from there, crouched as they moved ahead to the entrance to the yard and went out to the street.
When they were some hundred meters from the building, Dr. Muna turned and looked back and whispered to Abigail:
“Don’t be frightened by the explosion.”
“What explosion are you talking about?!” she asked as her eyes opened wide.
The explosion that was heard a few seconds later hurt Abigail’s ears and was immediately followed an additional explosion. Abigail was preparing to run away but, stared at the doctor who stood fixed to the spot and her eyes opened in amazement when she saw her smiling with happiness. Now, a chain of explosions was heard, clouds of gray smoke burst out of the windows and then everything was silent. Flames licked the trees and shrubs in the yard and Abigail pointed to them, staring in amazement at how calmly Muna and Robin stood by and watched, their faces beaming with satisfaction.
Robin murmured:
“No lab, no clinic, and no more soldiers.” He gazed at the doctor and she responded:
“Yes, thank God, they’re all gone.”
Only now, Abigail began to grasp that she was not here by chance. She understood that Robin, the good-hearted driver, did not just happen to be following the bus she and Karma had escaped on by some coincidence. He also didn’t just wait for her to recover by chance, either.
Abigail regarded the doctor beside her. She thought that she would never have guessed she w
as a freedom fighter, who risked her life with clandestine activities.
There was an uproar raging in the Mosque, above the tunnel.
When Abigail fled for her life into the secret royal passage, she saved some valuable seconds that allowed her to reach the outer bounds of the hall. The guards hurried to the dog she had kicked off the rope ladder after it bit and tore away some flesh from her leg. They patted it on the back to encourage the animal and urged it back up to chase after her. They understood that the animal smelled the scent of its prey, tasted its blood and would be able to track it down and lead them to it. Another black Alsatian joined the dog and they ran together to the place where the bus was waiting. Here, the two dogs went around sniffing the air with their sensitive noses trying to trace the scent that had disappeared from that exact spot.
Five minutes later the empty bus returned from its adventure and the distraught driver told the soldiers of the Republican Guards that a man and a woman had boarded the vehicle. He told them a story they found difficult to believe.
“The woman pulled me out of my seat and drove the bus to the main road, “Tachta Jamche”, and when she got off the bus, I saw her hailing a cab.”
The guards took the driver back to the place where he said the two had got off. There, they noticed the drops of blood at the side of the road and they saw the dogs yelping excitedly and running around in circles.
When they returned to the Mosque, they began gathering evidence from witnesses who were still wandering around the site.
“I saw someone supporting a woman, who was almost fainting, and taking her outside. She could hardly walk and blood was running down her legs,” a woman reported emotionally and pointed to traces of blood that looked like the sole of a shoe.
Mussa, a plainclothes policeman, who was in the area, approached them, panting. He told them that he had seen two people get on the bus that drove away with its door open. Someone else reported that he saw the taxi pick up the couple, there, on the main street and that the woman fell as she got out of the bus. This man was a cab driver and he added an important detail. He said:
