The Last Refuge

by Ben Coes

  Nava slouched back in the seat and smiled, relaxing. He reached out and put his small arm around Qassou’s neck affectionately.

  “You’re sweating like a pig, Lonny,” said Nava.

  “It’s ninety-five degrees out.”

  “You know, it is very hard to trust people when you are the leader,” said Nava, looking out the window. “So many people want things. I realized yesterday that you have never wanted anything, Lon. Not once have you asked. That is why I am showing you.”

  Qassou nodded to the front seat, referring to the two soldiers.

  “Are they…?” asked Qassou, his voice trailing off.

  “Trustworthy?” answered Nava, whispering back. “Let me see. Tarik, Anwar: Can you two be trusted?” His voice was louder as he posed the question, then he started laughing.

  The two soldiers did not look back, instead they glanced at each other, their faces remaining stone-cold.

  “Yes, Lon, they can be trusted,” said Nava. “They’ll be driving it to the port.”

  * * *

  Paria was in a meeting when the call from Marwan came in. His assistant knocked on the office door, then peeked his head in.

  “Excuse me, General. Marwan is on the phone. He says it’s urgent.”

  Paria picked up the phone on his desk.

  “What?” he demanded.

  “He’s not here,” said Marwan.

  “What do you mean he’s not there? You had him under your surveillance an hour ago. Am I correct?”

  “Yes, you’re correct, General Paria. But he escaped. When Vesid came in through a window, Qassou stabbed him in the eye with a toothbrush. He’s on his way to the hospital.”

  “I don’t care about Vesid. Find Qassou!”

  “What do you want us to do?”

  Paria was silent. He held the phone against his ear, thinking.

  “Nothing. You two fucked this up. So go fuck yourselves back to Baghdad.”

  Paria hung up the phone. He looked at the two men seated in front of his desk.

  “What is it, Abu?” asked one of the men, his top lieutenant.

  “There’s something going on,” said Paria quietly, his eyes searching the room as he appeared lost in thought.

  “What happened?”

  “He escaped,” said Paria.

  Paria looked down at his desk. Other than his telephone console, the desk was bare—except for two photos of Qassou and Andreas, the American.

  “This is no longer a discreet project,” said Paria, opening his desk drawer and removing his shoulder holster. He wrapped it around his left shoulder, then tightened it. From the same drawer, he pulled out a handgun. “I want an All Points Warrant for the immediate arrest of Qassou put out. Get it out through VEVAK, then disseminate out to Tehran central police as well as the Guard. Lon Qassou is working against the Republic. I’d bet my life on it.”

  “Yes, sir.”

  “Dead or alive. He is to be considered armed and dangerous. An enemy of the state. I don’t care if he’s in a meeting with the president himself: shoot this son of a bitch before he does something to harm us all.”

  * * *

  The green Range Rover exited the A83 Highway near Mahdishahr. At the end of the exit ramp, they went left. They drove through the town of Mahdishahr, through the small city’s crowded main street, then into an industrial area of warehouses, scrap yards, a long line of large gasoline tanks, then more warehouses.

  Qassou registered the name: Golestan Street.

  At one of the warehouses, a light yellow unit with rust along the building’s roof eave, the Range Rover slowed and entered the parking lot. The driver pushed the vehicle quickly across the parking lot, aiming for the corner of the building without slowing down, punching into a thin alley that ran around back. They sped along the edge of the warehouse into another parking lot out behind the building. The driver stopped in the parking lot, the front of the SUV aimed at the middle of the warehouse. They waited for nearly a minute, then a large door at the back of the warehouse began to slide slowly open.

  They drove inside and the door quickly slid shut behind them.

  Inside, a dozen or so soldiers stood; their weapons trained on the Range Rover. Nava was the first to climb out, then Qassou. One of the soldiers inspected the inside of the vehicle, the trunk and engine, then the undercarriage; when he held his left hand up, signaling that it was clean, the others moved their weapons down to their sides.

  “Good morning, Mr. President,” said the soldier who had just conducted the inspection, a middle-aged man with graying hair and a mustache. “We weren’t expecting you until after lunch.”

  “A change of plans, Colonel,” said Nava.

  Qassou stepped around the SUV.

  “Follow me,” said Nava.

  There were several military vehicles parked inside the warehouse, including a pair of tanks, which Nava pointed at.

  “An old army storage facility,” said Nava. “Rather than build something new and raise suspicions.”

  They walked through the empty warehouse, past piles of parts, tools, a Dumpster. They came to a shining silver chain-link fence, which looked brand-new. The fence was built in a square box, twenty feet wide, ten feet high, twenty feet deep. Behind the fence, a silver semitrailer was parked.

  Qassou looked down and saw that his hands were shaking. He put them in his pockets. He felt, all at once, a sense of sickness and triumph, anger and jubilation. His plan had worked; he was within a stone’s throw. It was the nuclear device Iran had denied trying to make for the past decade, a bomb that, had its existence been known, would likely have led to an invasion of the country. He felt triumph at his having made it here, to the center of it all.

  But, in the same moment, he felt incredible regret and shame. The brilliance of the scientists who had created this object was now to be used to destroy countless innocent people whose only sin was to have been born Jewish. How could a country, a people with such skill be capable of such an atrocity? he asked himself as Colonel Hek unlocked the chain-link fence and stepped inside the protected enclosure.

  Qassou followed Nava. A set of stairs was set against the back steps of the truck. Nava stepped first into the open bay. Qassou followed him inside.

  A pair of halogen lights, set on temporary orange parapets, shone down on a shining steel table. On top of the table, tied down with steel wire rope, was the bomb. It was dark silver, with a patina of scratches and small dents. Qassou was surprised at the shape of it; like an elongated soup can. At one end, the bomb was tapered and pointed. At the other, a rectangular attachment, the size and shape of a shoe box, made of a different shade of steel, jutted out.

  “It’s larger than I imagined it would be,” said Qassou, stepping forward.

  He moved alongside the device, then ran his hand along the steel, from one end to the other.

  “Be careful,” said Nava, grinning. “Don’t set it off by accident, Lonny.”

  “What is this?” asked Qassou, nodding to a boxlike object that jutted from the tail.

  “A stabilizer, useful if we were to drop it from a plane. But we don’t need it.”

  Qassou looked at Nava. Nava’s smile looked manic as he waited for Qassou’s approval somehow. Qassou examined the Persian writing, scrolled along the side of the nuclear device in red paint.

  Goodbye, Tel Aviv.

  Qassou read the words, felt his heart beating, then looked at Nava. He kept his tongue silent. He knew he could show Nava no trace of doubt, no hint of betrayal. He knew the name of the city, the street, the location. In his pocket, he felt the slight lump of his cell phone, pressed against his chest. He was so close.

  For the first time in weeks, Qassou smiled. Nava thought it was because his aide shared his twisted vision, his excitement at the coming annihilation of Tel Aviv. Only Qassou knew that it was precisely the opposite.

  44

  TEHRAN

  Paria stormed into the presidential palace. The guards at the entranc
e stepped back, for while protocol dictated that all visitors be carded and their identification checked, all six Revolutionary Guard soldiers knew who Paria was. They saw the anger in his gait, the hatred in his eyes, and, perhaps most important, they all noted the handgun now grasped firmly in his right hand, cocked to fire.

  As the head of VEVAK pushed through the short line, knocking a man down as he did so, then leapt past the line of soldiers, and began a full sprint down the hall, the guards to a man thought the same thought: Paria might be going to kill Nava himself. They all knew Paria answered only to the Supreme Leader, Suleiman, and as long as that was so, the combustible, rabid wolverine of a man could do whatever the hell he wanted to, including put a bullet in the head of the president of Iran.

  Paria took the stairwell three steps at a time, running, sweat dripping down from his forehead, his khaki shirt half drenched. Two flights up, he went left and began a full-out sprint. He barreled into Nava’s office at full speed, moved past the president’s three assistants in the antechamber.

  One of the three assistants stood, saying, “He’s not in, General Paria.”

  But Paria continued on, grabbing the brass doorknob and lurching inside Nava’s office.

  “Where is he?” screamed Paria, turning from the empty office and looking at the assistant.

  The assistant was speechless, trembling in fear.

  Paria raised his handgun. His eyes widened as he aimed the muzzle of the weapon at the man’s head.

  “Where is he?” repeated Paria, slower this time, without yelling. Yet the words seemed to hold even more anger than when he’d yelled.

  “He left with Minister Qassou,” said one of the other assistants, an older man with thick glasses, seated near the doorway. “Exactly one and a half hours ago. He did not say where he was going, General.”

  Paria bolted through the door, then down the hallway.

  He approached the door to the Ministry of Information. Despite the fact that it was unlocked, he kicked the door just above the doorknob with every ounce of strength. The kick sent the door flying in, and tore the top hinge from the frame.

  Paria entered Qassou’s antechamber. Firouz stood up.

  Paria rushed past him, without even acknowledging Qassou’s assistant. He did the same thing to the door to Qassou’s office, kicking it just above the knob. This time, the entire door went flying off the hinges, landing with a crash inside Qassou’s large office, crushing a tall glass lamp on its way to the ground.

  Inside, Paria walked to Qassou’s desk and began opening drawers, pulling documents out from the drawers as he did so, looking through them.

  Firouz followed Paria into the office. He knew who Paria was, but his loyalty to Qassou got the better of him.

  “General Paria,” said Firouz. “Does Minister Qassou know that you’re in his office?”

  Paria looked up from his desk.

  “Where did he go?” Paria asked, raw rage in his voice.

  “I … I don’t know,” Firouz coughed out.

  Paria flipped open Qassou’s laptop. A security page appeared.

  “What’s Qassou’s password?”

  “I have no idea.”

  “Where is he?” screamed Paria, stepping around the desk, the muzzle of the weapon shaking slightly as he trained it on Firouz’s head.

  “He didn’t say…”

  He lifted the weapon and aimed it at Firouz.

  “The fucking password. What is it?”

  Firouz stood in silence, a look of resignation and fear causing his brow to furrow and then tears to begin streaming down his cheeks. He raised his hands.

  Paria fired the handgun. The crack of gunfire was followed, a moment later, by the thud of Firouz falling to the ground, a single slug between his eyes.

  * * *

  The Range Rover left the warehouse, with Qassou staring out the window as they passed the last of the soldiers, standing inside the building. All Qassou could think about, as the SUV passed through the doors and the soldiers inside slid them closed, was Taris. He had to call her.

  A low ringing noise came from a cell phone. It was Nava’s phone.

  “Yes,” he said.

  Qassou tried to listen. He looked away from Nava, out the window. They were moving at least thirty miles per hour back toward the city.

  “Really,” said Nava into his phone.

  Had they found the man in his apartment?

  But what if it hadn’t even been a VEVAK thug, Qassou considered. What if it was simply a thief? A common criminal, there to steal his television?

  But Qassou knew the truth.

  Qassou felt the adrenaline rush through his head. His nerves, which had made it hard to even walk across the floor of the warehouse, washed away in a wave of confidence.

  This is why you were put here.

  Qassou placed his right hand on the door latch, while in his left hand he clutched his cell phone. The Range Rover continued to move, faster now. The way Nava looked at him, his black eyes scanning his face suspiciously, sent a burst of fear through him. All he had to do was tell the soldiers in front, and the whole thing would be gone. Taris would never receive the call. Andreas would never be told the location. The bomb would leave the port at Bushehr on a small fishing boat, bound for Tel Aviv.

  Nava hung up the phone. He was silent for several moments. He stared forward. Then he turned to Qassou.

  “Meir is to be executed this afternoon,” said Nava. He was strangely quiet as he relayed the information.

  “How?” asked Qassou.

  “Firing squad. They haven’t determined where. I would like it to be in public. The fear is that Israel, once apprised of the location, will send their jets in. After all of the Iranians Mossad has murdered in the past week, I feel why not shoot him in public? Let the world see.”

  “We should allow the court to make the announcement,” said Qassou.

  “Why? Why not us?” asked Nava.

  “It will look like we’re gloating. Unpresidential. It will look like we’re killing him for political reasons, not for justice.”

  “So smart, as always,” said Nava. He looked into Qassou’s eyes. “It’s really going to happen, Lonny.”

  The SUV came into the crowded main street of Semnān. There was a small traffic jam.

  Qassou kept his fingers gripped on the door handle.

  As they approached a red light on a busy Semnān street, filled with shops and vendors, Nava’s cell rang again.

  “Yes,” he said.

  Qassou froze. He held on to the door latch. His heart started to beat wildly.

  “Yes, he’s right here.”

  As the light changed, the soldier stepped on the gas pedal, and the Range Rover began to move. Qassou waited a moment, then yanked the door latch.

  He leapt from the back of the accelerating SUV as he heard the words, barked loudly, from Nava.

  “Stop him!”

  Qassou’s right foot hit the ground first and before his left could touch the tar he went tumbling to the ground, landing on his right arm, which he felt snap at the elbow. He screamed as he rolled, his head striking the ground next. He heard brakes as the rusted grille of a Paykan sedan in the other traffic lane nearly slammed into him.

  The Range Rover’s brakes screeched. Qassou reached up with his other arm and touched his forehead; the palm of his hand ran red with blood.

  He looked up from the ground and saw Nava through the open door of the Range Rover, which was now stopped. Nava was pointing at him and trying to climb out, but the driver held him by the shirt. The passenger door opened next, and from the ground Qassou saw the shining black boot of the other soldier, leaping from the car to give chase.

  The pain in his elbow was acute. Sharp pain shot up from the elbow to his shoulder and down to his hand. He couldn’t move his fingers. His arm was twisted sideways, like a pretzel, unnaturally, enough to make him nauseated. But Qassou knew he had to run.

  “Get him!” came the words, scr
eamed this time, in the familiar voice of Mahmoud Nava. “Traitor!”

  Qassou grabbed the cell phone with his left hand, stood up, and through the torpor of dizziness that the fall had caused, began a furious dash for the sidewalk, his right arm now lame, dangling awkwardly at his side.

  He ran between two cars and jumped to the sidewalk.

  As he ran, he pulled the cell phone from his pocket. He looked behind him and saw one of the soldiers following; clutching a black submachine gun in his right hand, waving it like a baton as he sprinted between the cars. Qassou kept running, feeling his lungs burning. Then he heard the staccato bullets of the machine gun. A burka-clad woman in front of him, strolling along the sidewalk, was suddenly hit with a spray of bullets and pummeled to the ground. Qassou weaved to the right just as bullets from the SMG struck a parked car, piercing through steel.

  Then the gunfire abruptly stopped. The staccato was interrupted by the screech of car brakes, then a loud slam; Qassou jerked his head around to see a white taxicab slam into the soldier and send him tumbling to the tar.

  As screaming and chaos enveloped the street and sidewalk where the woman had just been gunned down, Qassou sprinted as fast as he could. A block away, he saw a men’s clothing store called Semnān Eka. He slowed as he approached the store, went inside, then looked back out the window.

  Coming down the sidewalk was the other soldier, SMG in hand. Nava was right behind him, and behind them was a swarm of soldiers. Nava was yelling and pointing at the store.

  The pain in Qassou’s broken arm was debilitating. Turning, he glimpsed his reflection in the mirror; the arm dangled down and bent sideways, unnaturally.

  The store was empty except for a man looking at shirts. The owner of the store came rushing from the back.

  “What do you want?” he asked. “Can I help you?”

  Qassou grabbed a pair of pants from a shelf.

  “A changing room,” Qassou said, panting and trying to catch his breath. “I’m in a rush.”

  “This way.”

  He led Qassou to the back of the shop. Qassou went inside, then shut the door. He slid a lock to the side.