The Religion War (13 page)

"He won't be coming back from that visit," Cruz observed before taking another hit of whiskey. "So tell me what you think of the war, Waters."

"Your battle planning is very thorough," said Waters.

"You know that's not what I mean," said Cruz, his voice trailing off, staring at his glass and rotating it with one hand.

Waters hesitated, letting his thoughts form, not quite sure what would come out of his mouth until he heard it himself. Cruz was the most powerful man in the history of civilization. He was tired, clearly uncertain, starting to get tipsy, and for the first time since Waters had known him, he was unpredictable.

"Are you asking me if the war is
right?"
asked Waters.

"Don't make me say it."

Waters took a deep breath and stood up, pacing, choosing his words carefully before releasing them.

"You believe God is on your side," said Waters.

"I do."

"Why?"

"Because I'm fighting evil."

"Doesn't al-Zee feel exactly the same way?"

"Waters, are you going to tell me God is on the side of the terrorists?"

Waters paced and looked at the wall art, the floor, everywhere but directly at Cruz, who was refilling his glass.

"What if you're
both
wrong?"

"We can't
both
be fighting evil if we're fighting each other."

"I don't think that's necessarily true, but it's not what I mean. I mean, what if God doesn't exist?"

Cruz laughed a little too loudly and took another drink. "Any idiot knows God exists, Waters. That part is obvious."

"Perhaps. But there's something that has always bothered me."

"Let's not get philosophical, Lieutenant. We don't need to know how many angels can dance on the head of a pin."

"You said any idiot knows that God exists, and I think you're right. But here's what bothers me..."

Waters spun the computer monitor around to face his side of the desk and pulled the keyboard closer .With a few keystrokes he called up the home page for the local branch of Mensa, the social organization of people with genius IQs.With a few clicks he sent Mensa's phone number to the desk phone and pushed the speaker button. Cruz had one of the few unrestricted phones in the world. Unlike the civilian population, he could call anyone. The call rang through to Mensa. Cruzjust watched.

"Hello, this is Mensa," said a female voice.

"This is Lieutenant Ben Waters. Would you mind if I asked you a question?"

"No problem.We get that a lot."

"Do you believe God exists?"

"Nope. Next question."

Cruz didn't like where this was going. "Are you in Mensa or just the operator?" he asked.

"We're all here for the weekly meeting. I was closest to the phone."

"What about the other people in your organization? Do
they
believe in God?"

"Hold on, I'll ask them."

Cruz and Waters waited, not looking at each other. Half a minute passed before the voice returned.

"Depends how you define God."

Cruz jumped in. "We're talking about the God of creation, intelligent, all-powerful, listens to prayers, heaven and hell."

"Okay, I'll try that. Hold on."

Cruz and Waters waited another minute.

"No takers," said the voice.

"What do you mean 'no takers'?" asked Cruz defensively.

"No one here believes in that kind of God," said the voice.

"How many people are there?" asked Waters.

"Twenty-three. Why are you asking?" asked the Mensan.

Waters responded, "I read in
Newsweek
that smart people are less likely to believe in God.There was some sort of study."

"Oh, yeah. That's true," said the Mensan. "But it's not
because
of intelligence. It's because smart people have more exposure to science. People who have exposure to scientific training usually become nonreligious, unless they have some vested interest. I mean, the Pope is a pretty blight guy, but no matter how much he studies science, he's not going to become an atheist."

"What about faith?" Cruz asked. "Don't any of you brainiacs have faith?"

"Have you ever looked up the definition of faith' in the dictionary?"

"I know what faith is," said Cruz.

"I don't think you do. The dictionary definition of faith involves believing in something
without evidence.
You and I have never met, but I'll bet every penny to my name that you believe in God
because
of evidence, not
without
it. For example, I'll bet you see the Bible as evidence that God exists. You've probably perceived some link between your prayers and your successes, and that seems to be more evidence of God. Maybe you think that because the world seems so well designed, that's evidence of an intelligent creator. If you're influenced by evidence, it's not faith."

"If it's not faith, what is it?" asked Waters.

"It's a really, really, really bad way to do science." The Mensan laughed. "You might not need the scientific method to decide what shirt to wear, but when you're talking about life and death and the hereafter, you ought to be putting a little more rigor into evaluating the evidence."

"Evidence exists, and I can't ignore it, but I would believe in God without any. I do have faith," said Cruz.

"We have a rule in the local group that we don't call anyone stupid. But if you look up the definition of stupid' in the dictionary, it will say 'unreasoned thinking'. That includes believing in something without evidence."

"I thought you weren't allowed to call me stupid," said Cruz.

"You're the one who said you have faith. The dictionary called you stupid. I'm just connecting the dots."

Waters thanked the Mensan and ended the call. He and Cruz both leaned back in their chairs. Cruz didn't know exactly what to say.

"And
that's
what bothers me," said Waters.

When al-Zee's guards looked for the camel in his washroom, they found no trace that one had ever been there. Al-Zee was so angry he thought his forehead would burst. He'd distinctly seen the camel's head in the darkness, but he couldn't deny that it was no longer there. This was no time to be losing his mind. He needed answers, and he needed them before the war started.

"Find the Avatar," he yelled at his chief of security. "Put the word out on the network."

Despite the best efforts of his enemies, al-Zee maintained full communications with his terror groups via the Internet. Cruz's intelligence forces electronically searched every message that crossed the Internet, but their sniffing programs were looking for text, keywords, key phrases, and encrypted files. Al-Zee's people thwarted the filters by simply handwriting their messages on photographs of landscapes, scanning in the entire pictures, and sending them as e-mail attachments. A human could easily read the handwritten message on the photo, but a computer wouldn't find enough regularity or structure to identify where a tree ended and a letter began.

Only one response to the Avatar query came back, from a hydrocab driver pseudo-named Hector Rodriguez. He didn't know where the Avatar was, but he knew he was doing business at GIC.

"Destroy it," ordered al-Zee. "And he'll find us."

Although GIC was the data collection center for identifying terrorists, the building was virtually unprotected save for a security guard in the lobby The data was safely housed in fortified underground bunkers in another state, with full backups in a third state. The thing that kept GIC safe from terror attacks was that the citizens of the Christian Alliance hated it more than the terrorists feared it. Citizens didn't like the fact that the government had access to all of their transactions and preferences. It was an ugly violation of privacy. That had been a good enough reason for al-Zee to avoid targeting it in the past. Anything that turned the citizens of the Christian Alliance against their own government was good for him. But now he had a higher priority. He wanted to find the Avatar.

The drone flew close to the ground, avoiding radar and the automated particle beam defense grid. Terror drones were always painted black and designed to make a frightening screech as they passed overhead. Terror was the objective, and if you could generate extra terror on the way to the target, all the better from al-Zee's perspective. Hydrocabs pulled into alleys and side streets for protection as the drone screamed overhead. Its guidance system was so accurate, and its internal radar so precise, that it zigzagged around buildings and deftly avoided street poles before turning abruptly and heading directly for the main lobby entrance of GIC headquarters. The small nose cone explosive detonated on impact with the door, creating a hole for its payload to enter before doing its work.

The science of GPS-guided bombing had become sophisti-cated.The amount of explosives was carefully adjusted to gut the target building and blow out the windows without much damage to adjacent buildings. Al-Zee always operated with precision because doing so sent a message of competence. He wanted people to know he could destroy anything he wanted, anytime he wanted, without damaging anything nearby.

At 2:30 P.M. Eric Mackey looked up from his club sandwich at Stacey's Cafejust in time to see his place of employment disintegrate. The shock wave blew out windows and sent the patrons to the floor. A thick cloud of construction debris filled the restaurant as the customers and employees staggered for the exit, holding napkins and aprons over their mouths, coughing, crying, and screaming.

Mackey picked up his laptop computer from the floor and followed the crowd to the exit. He knew that everyone in the GIC building was dead. He knew grief would hit him in a few minutes, but right now he was in survival mode. Hejogged half a block to get away from the worst of the dust.

"Now it's personal," he muttered to himself.

A pink-haired woman staggered out of the cloud of debris, coughing and knocking the crud off her shoulders and hair. Her phone was already at her ear, and she was cursing at her insurance agent.

"Well of course you haven't heard about it because it just happened. I want an adjuster down here in fifteen minutes. I've been paying you jokers for thirty years and now it's your turn. I want to reopen tomorrow...Okay, Wednesday at the latest...Call me when you have the check."

Mackey stood and stared at the remains of his building, clutching his laptop. Stacey clipped her phone to her wrist and stood next to him, still knocking debris off her sweater.

"About your lunch. It's on me today."

"Thanks," said Mackey reflexively, not really registering the absurdity.

"I thought you said they'd never bomb your building."

"I don't understand. Everyone knows the data isn't in the building. And the public hates us more than the terrorists do. It doesn't make sense. Al-Zee always picks his targets by PR."

"He's after someone," said Stacey. "Maybe it's you."

"I don't think so. If they wanted me they would have made sure I was in the building."

"Well, aren't we full of ourselves. I was just kidding. Why would al-Zee care about you?"

"I built the data-mining algorithms. I know more about the system than anyone on Earth. But they're not after me. They aren't that sloppy."

"Then why'd they do it? You're so smart with your algorithms. Sound it out."

Mackey shifted his weight from one foot to the other and thought about it. Al-Zee's attacks were always messages. They were never random. He was trying to tell someone something.

The rubble scanners were already in place, creating three-dimensional models of the debris and directing rescuers with laser pointers. Only two minutes had passed, and already most of the rescue equipment and crews were on the scene working. Bombings had become so common that cleanup was a profitable business. There was a cleanup company in every corner of the city, equipped to handle freshly demolished buildings. Men in HAZMAT suits dragged multipurpose devices that could quickly dig, lift, cut, or move concrete and steel. Each time the rubble scanner put another laser dot on the pile, a team closed in on it and started tunneling with macabre efficiency. The sirens had already stopped because everyone who needed to be there was, including the mobile hospital trucks.

"It's a message," mumbled Mackey.

"What?" asked Stacey while looking at her damaged restaurant.

"A message. Al-Zee is trying to tell someone something."

"And he doesn't have e-mail?" asked Stacey.

"It's a message to someone who can't be reached any other way. Someone who has a connection to this building but wouldn't be in it now."

"You're right," said the Avatar, now standing behind Mackey.

Mackey turned to the Avatar, surprised to see him, and not trusting the thoughts that were connecting in his brain.

"It's you?" Mackey asked.

"We'll know in a minute," said the Avatar, scanning the street behind him, fixing his gaze on a hydrocab that crept up to them, driven by Hector Rodriguez, the only remaining member of al-Zee's local cell that hadn't been captured or killed by Cruz's forces. Stacey, on her phone again, wandered off to tell the bread delivery man he could skip today. Hector pressed a button on his steering wheel, and the passenger door swung open.

"I'm being invited to a meeting. Come with me to the airport," the Avatar said to Mackey.

Hector heard the invitation and gestured emphatically that the Avatar was to travel alone.The Avatar acknowledged Hector's distress and turned to explain. "This is Eric Mackey. He knows you work for al-Zee. He can read your hydrocab ID plate. Do you want to leave him here?"

Hector cursed in Arabic and waved a thumb toward the backseat as if to say, Get in.

"Seriously?" Mackey asked the Avatar.

"Ride with me to the airport. We need to talk."

"If he's al-Zee's guy, won't he kill us?"

"Hisjob is to take me to al-Zee."

"Okay, let me rephrase that.Won't he kill me?"

"He intends to. Either now or later."

The Avatar gestured toward Hector, who was pointing a large handgun at Mackey.

"Remind me to thank you for getting me into this," Mackey said as he bundled into the hydrocab.