The Religion War (9 page)

"To protect them from enemies, so they can fight for our people," said Ali. "Leaders are no good to us if they are dead."

"Don't you believe that God alone decides when your leaders will die?"

"Of course."

"So if only God decides when they die, that means that all human enemies are harmless until God determines otherwise?"

"Yes."

"Do you think your leaders know that?"

"Of course."

"Then the only explanation for the bodyguards is that they have been hired to protect the leaders from God himself, since God is their only known threat."

Alijust drove.

"What sort of person would hire bodyguards to protect him from God?" asked the Avatar.

Ali ignored the question.

"You don't need to answer," said the Avatar. "You know that either your leaders don't believe what they say they believe or they are irrational. Neither possibility is comforting on the eve of war."

Ali didn't speak for the rest of the trip. Several counterarguments came to mind, only to be rejected before they reached his mouth. The cab pulled up to the airport's loading zone. The Avatar thanked Ali for the ride. Ali just stared straight ahead, both hands on the steering wheel.

Inside the terminal, the Avatar studied the destination information for all the flights, looking for patterns. As he read the name of each city, all the memories of that city activated in his mind, forming patterns, with special attention to any news reports in the past five years.

The Avatar's mind cycled through unrelated facts about each city, feeling for patterns:
distances...number of terrorist attacks...counterterrorism arrests...friendlygovernments...arms dealers...ter
rain...news accounts...economies...religious extremism...

The Avatar considered all of those patterns and more, scanning each city, pausing to meditate on what bubbled to the top: Cairo...Tehran...Riyadh...Qadum.There it was: Qadum, a city that didn't show up on any map five years ago. Now it had an international airport. It was a center of commerce for the Arab world. It was a city where huge amounts of construction would go unnoticed amid the other huge amounts of construction. It was a place where a world leader could start from scratch and build his underground fortress, escape tunnels, and defenses without being noticed. The Avatar bought a ticket for Qadum and waited at the gate.

The Avatar settled into his business-class seat, collecting suspicious glances from the other travelers who noticed his ragged clothing. A forty-year-old banker arranged himself in the next seat, attending to his little pillow and his carry-on luggage, and handing his jacket to the flight attendant while ordering a Jack Daniel's on the rocks. He was a big man, Boston grown, Ivy League education. A glance at the Avatar and his ragged clothes convinced the banker that it might be a long flight.

A French auto executive, early fifties, dropped his briefcase and newspaper in the seat next to the banker, hunted for some overhead storage, and handed his jacket to a flight attendant. As the plane taxied down the runway, the Avatar meditated while the banker and the auto executive sipped their drinks.The Frenchman harrumphed at the front page of the paper, hoping to engage the banker and ultimately enrich the world with the magic and beauty of his opinions, but the banker wasn't having it.

"Stupid war," said the Frenchman, trying harder to engage the banker.

"No one wins," said the banker, trying to end the conversation with a comment that offered no traction.

"You know why we're heading to war, don't you?" the Frenchman asked.

The banker turned and looked at him, saying nothing, unsure about getting into this sort of discussion on such a long flight "The Jews control the media. That's why," said the Frenchman. "Ever since Israel got overrun, the Jews have been hammering at war, war, war. They control the news in America, and the news controls the politicians."

The banker took a deep breath.That was too much fresh meat for a good northeastern liberal to ignore. "That's ridiculous," he said, with an undertone of disdain. "No one controls the media."

"Really? When was the last time you saw al-Zee's viewpoint in your media?" asked the Frenchman.

"Those guys don't have a viewpoint. They just want to kill people .That's just crazy .The media don't put crazy people on TV. It wouldjust make things worse."

"It's very convenient that all two billion of your enemies are crazy. That makes their opinions easy to ignore."

"Look," the banker continued, "you can't put people on TV that are saying, 'If you kill all the Americans and all the Jews you can go to paradise.' That's just common sense. Terrorism isn't a valid opinion."

"How do you know unless you listen to their reasons?"

"Are you
in favor
of terrorism?"

"You are avoiding the question. If the only viewpoints you allowed on television were the ones that you and I agreed with, would that be good?"

"So big deal if the wacko viewpoints don't get on television. You have to do some filtering."

"How many people have to have the same so-called wacko opinions before they are, in your opinion, worthy of media attention?" asked the Frenchman.

"The Muslims aren't
right
just because there are a lot of them."

"We are not discussing the rightness of their ideas, only the ne w sworthiness."

"Okay, so why do
you
think their views aren't in the media? You're blaming Jews? That's ridiculous. Jews manage maybe five percent ofthe media, tops.What about the other ninety-five percent? How do you explain why
they
don't run al-Zee's views?"

"Obviously it is more than five percent," said the Frenchman. "There is no other way to explain it. The Jews control the entire media behind the scenes, but they hide it."

"There is a simpler explanation," offered the Avatar as the two businessmen's faces registered an ugly combination of surprise and disdain.

"I'm all ears," said the banker, eager to get the Frenchman off his back.

"Every group controls its own story," explained the Avatar. "Black people control the media's coverage of black issues, Christians control the media's coverage of Christianity, gay people control the media's coverage of gay issues, women control the media's coverage of women's issues, disabled people control the media coverage of disabled people. No reporter would risk his career by crossing any of those groups, or any one of a dozen other organized groups. So when you say that Jews control the media, you don't mean that Jews control the coverage of gay rights, or women's rights, or any other group's story. You simply mean that reporters are human and they know to steer clear of stories that would offend people who could later influence their careers."

The Frenchman and the banker both paused, each hoping the other wouldjump into the argument. The Avatar seemed surprisingly coherent. After a pause for digestion, the banker looked at the Avatar and asked another question.

"Do you think we should put terrorists' opinions in the media?"

"Yes," replied the Avatar. "The most basic need of any human being is the need to communicate. If you shut down the nonviolent channels of communication, people will find alternate channels.Terrorism is communication disguised as warfare. If you treat it as war, you cannot stop it. When you treat it as communication, you have a chance to replace it with something less lethal."

"So you would let some crazy sheikh go on Crossfire and explain why all infidels should be killed?"

"I would not only
let
him. I would
require
it. And I would broadcast it often, along with alternative viewpoints. Bad ideas do not survive when they are exposed to the air."

"Let me get this straight," said the banker. "Let's say you have one Muslim and one Jew on television arguing over who should own Jerusalem. The Muslim claims that God gave that land to the Muslims.The Jew says God gave it to the Jews. How the hell does that sort of debate help anything?"

"There is a third view that must be added to the mix whenever the two views are expressed. You must include a scientist who can explain that the notion oflocation' is absurd. Educated people know that in a universe where all the planets are moving and spinning, there is no such thing as a holy 'place' because location is only meaningful as a relationship to fixed objects. In our universe, nothing is fixed. Everything is continually moving. Certainly an omnipotent God would know there could be no such thing as a holy 'place.' Perhaps the dirt and rocks could be holy, some would argue, but if so, then we can find a way to share the dirt. Put it in trucks and drive it to anyone who wants some holy dirt. After all, we are talking about a desert; I am confident there is enough dirt for everyone."

"You're funny, old man," said the banker.

"Everyone is entitled to an opinion," said the Frenchman, not meaning it.

The Frenchman and the banker didn't talk for the rest of the flight.

Qadum looked like any other Middle Eastern city, an undisciplined symphony of traffic, buildings, markets, and people, with a mix of modern steel and local construction materials. But a mile beneath the surface lived a second city, the home of al-Zee. Lower Qadum was built in anticipation of a final battle with the infidels, hardened to withstand a nuclear detonation, self-sustaining, to endure a siege for decades. It was impenetrable by "anyone but God" according to the proud builders.

The Avatar didn't get much of a tour, his head being covered with a hood for the long elevator descent. He could hear the guards talking, and felt their hands gripping his arms from either side.The elevator slowed, and his skin felt heavy as the lift rattled to a stop.

He walked half a mile, maybe more, past the sounds of street activity, down cement hallways where the sound of his footsteps echoed off walls.They passed hydroponic gardens that smelled of vegetables and fertilizer, passed honey merchants and spice vendors. Then he waited, hood removed, in a marble foyer, no one speaking to him directly. Serious-looking people entered and exited through a huge doorway guarded by two of the biggest men he'd ever seen.

A low-level assistant in charge of scheduling approached the marble bench where the Avatar sat, flanked by his handlers. The assistant whispered that al-Zee was available. Guards on either side of the huge door pulled it open in halves. The Avatar and his handlers entered a cavernous room, decorated in a thousand shades of white marble, gold, and shadow. The space dwarfed its most important resident, who sat on an oversize purple cushion, surrounded by five smaller-pillowed advisers competing to see who could look the most menacing.

No one spoke as the handlers guided the Avatar to a pillow in the middle of the group, facing al-Zee. The Avatar sat and studied the face of the world's most dangerous terrorist according to the Christians, and the right hand of God according to two billion Muslims.The Avatar felt his chemistry changing and marveled at the power of al-Zee's charisma. There was something about his eyes, his face, his posture, and his confidence, such that without uttering a word he could alter your body chemistry, make you want to believe him, want to please him. The Avatar was not unaffected, but he recognized it for the illusion that it was.

Al-Zee always let his visitors wait for an uncomfortable period before he started a conversation. He understood the power of his own personality, and he found it useful to let its full impact sink in. But this Avatar fellow seemed odd to al-Zee. He wasn't frightened. It had been years since al-Zee had entertained anyone who didn't fear for his life, and with good reason. He fed his people a continuous stream of rumors about arbitrary executions and torture, partly because doing so made the real thing unnecessary, mostly because it cut down on unnecessary meetings. Al-Zee was a practical man who used violence when he felt God would approve, to better the lives of his people. Toughness was often necessary to preserve order in the Great Caliphate, but when the
appearance
of toughness worked just as well, al-Zee preferred it.

Most people would break under the pressure of al-Zee's silent stare and start babbling. The Avatar just looked and waited for an invitation. Al-Zee was puzzled at first, then competitive, not wanting to be the first to talk. But he also had a full schedule that day. Better to get this over with, he figured, since it was more of a curiosity meeting than a useful one.

"I hear that you know my war plans," he said, in perfect English through a tight-lipped smile. "Is that true?"

"Yes."

"How can you be so sure that you have it right?"

"I wasn't sure until you invited me here," said the Avatar.

Al-Zee laughed. His five advisers were quick to pick up on the cue and laugh too, each one conscious that there could be consequences for laughing overly long or not enough. The laughter was disturbing.

"You know you won't be leaving here alive, don't you?" asked al-Zee, anxious to intimidate his guest.

"I can see why you would feel that way," said the Avatar.

That wasn't the reaction al-Zee wanted. He was looking for some fear, maybe pleading and bargaining. His face turned stern and cold. "Tell me how you found out our war plans."

"I will be happy to tell you. In return, may I ask you one question?"

The advisers shifted and mumbled to each other. No one ever negotiated with al-Zee. It wasn't clear if the Avatar was brave or crazy. Al-Zee stared at the Avatar with a strictness that would feel like punishment to anyone else. Seeing it had no effect, al-Zee smiled.The old man amused him. It had been so long since anyone had spoken to him like a peer that it struck him as funny. "Yes, you may ask me one question later," he said.

"Very good. Thank you," said the Avatar. "Now, about your war plans, you're wondering if someone leaked them to me. The answer is no. I deduced them."

"And how does one deduce so accurately?"

"I assumed that you came to your current position by intelligence and not luck.Then I asked myself what I would do in your position."