Welcome to Dubai (The Traveler) (30 page)

But Saleem the immigrant traitor did not want to die at the hands of the soldiers without at least taking a shot at Heru, as Mohd would have inspired him to. Nevertheless, the thoughts of a sneak attack were growing slimmer. Heru checked the position of the men below them a final time. He then turned his man to face his toward the staircase window.

“I love my father and can forgive him for his treason against me, but I do not love you.”

In one ferocious move, Heru ran his man toward the window and shot out the glass before tossing the armed immigrant through it and down the side of the building, while the man screamed in shock, “NOOOO!”

As the man careened down the side of the building like a bungee jumper, the UAE soldiers were momentarily distracted by the screaming man falling, seemingly to his death. In that instant, Heru made his way down the stairs and began shooting down the soldiers like bowling pins.

By the time the remaining soldiers realized his successful ploy, Heru’s end of the rubber rope yanked him back up the steps, where he was able to fly back up in the air while firing his gun down on more of them.

With no training of how to defend themselves against such insane tactics, a dozen more of the soldiers were shot and killed as more of them retreated back into hallways of the building. Heru then cut himself from the rubber rope, sending the hanging immigrant gunman to his death below.

*****

Inside the surveillance room in the basement, Gary asked the Pakistani in confusion, “Why would he kill his own man? Is he sacrificing him?”

Saleem grinned sheepishly and said, “No.” He was utterly amazed at the American’s naivete. “There are men amongst him who have been planted by his father, Mohd, to stop him. Obviously, he knows.”

Gary had no idea how layered the situation was. There were subgroups within the immigrant revolutionaries sabotaging the terrorist attack. Immigrant fighters and the United Arab Emirates soldiers were being killed like pawns on a chessboard. Father was battling son, police were battling immigrants from the crowd outside, and innocent tourists were the ultimate victims in a class-warfare dispute that had nothing to do with them.

All Gary knew was that a group of terrorists had taken over the International Suites that was filled with unsuspecting, innocent people. So he chose to act.

Saleem took a deep breath and secured his assault weapon in his right arm. “Wish me luck,” he said to the American. “Heru is mine and will die at my hands.” As he turned to walk out of the room, Saleem came face-to-face with Akil, who was severely injured but still alive. Akil stood in the doorway and aimed his gun.

But before he could shoot, Gary grabbed Saleem’s gun and pushed them both to the floor while shooting the immigrant adversary multiple times in the chest and avoiding his return of bullets.

As Akil fell out of the doorway to his death, the Pakistani gave the American a serious eye from the floor where they both landed out of harm.

“Let that be your final warning,” Saleem told the American. “This is not an occupation of compassion.” He then climbed to his feet and brushed himself off. He took the gun back from the dazed American and added, “If your intention is to save lives in warfare, then you must overcome your avoidance of death.”

He then stepped out in the hallway, over Akil’s dead body, and pulled his knife from the neck of the man that he had killed earlier. He wiped off the blood of his blade on the man’s clothing. Then he headed for the staircase to find Heru.

Gary exhaled as he remained inside the surveillance room alone. He was only inches away from death, and the realization of his fatality had finally caught up to him. He gave the man that he had shot and killed a good, long look. Gary had to accept the fact that he had truly killed someone now. He felt numb and emotionless, like the dead bodies of the men that now flooded the hallways.

Chapter 31

In the middle of the madness outside the hotel, Tariq hustled Mohd into the Union Defence Force’s armored truck headquarters. Chief Ali and the UDF’s commanding officer awaited them while viewing a screen pulled up with information about Mohd’s first son, Talib Aquil Nasir, or better known as “Ra-Heru” and “Heru” for short. And there were few pleasantries exchanged when the Egyptian father entered their truck.

Ali eyed him sternly. “The last time we met, you were on the side of peace and justice. But this time you are on the side of war and treachery.”

They sat the Egyptian down in a chair with handcuffs before they released them so that he could talk freely with use of his hands.

Mohd ignored the chief officer’s slight and looked past him in the armored truck to view the computer screen that was pulled up on Heru.

“I see that you’ve now done your research on my son,” Mohd said.

The commander of the Union Defence Force nodded with deep respect. “Your son’s military record is impressive. Trained in the Egyptian Special Operations unit, he has served in
eleven
tours of anti-terrorism, including Afghanistan, Iraq, Jordan and Lebanon. So it is
blasphemous
that he has now reduced himself to his own acts of terrorism here in Dubai.”

Mohd continued to ignore their slights. He knew that he was there for them to listen. They had no choice. As the prime suspect and architect of the terrorist rebellion at the hotel, the police and the military were commissioned to report all information and findings to the Prime Minister and the President of the United Arab Emirates so that they might prevent another incident of an immigrant laborer revolt in the future.

Realizing his level of importance in their case, Mohd was able to take his time with them. He even asked them for something to drink.

To move the process along quickly, Tariq granted him his wish with a fast bottle of water, while the other men showed their obvious disdain with much slower movements.

“Thank you,” Mohd said to Tariq. “You have been very kind to me.”

Ali impatiently scowled at the Egyptian again. “This is not a
game.
You are only here to tell us what we need to know.” He stopped just short of reminding the Egyptian that he would surely be put to death when the dust settled, and that they would be ordered to torture him if needed. But Mohd already knew as much, and he did not plan to stall them any longer. He understood how valuable his story would be for the future of immigrant laborers in Dubai, for his nation of Egypt and as a lesson for the wealthy Arabs of the Middle East.

“Do any of you know the Egyptian legend of Osiris?” Mohd asked.

Including the UDFs second in command and the intelligence officials, Mohd had an audience of seven men. A few of them knew the story of Osiris vaguely, but they were not willing to admit to it to the extent that the wise, old Egyptian would know it. So they remained silent and let the man continue his revelations.

“In the ancient Egyptian legend, Osiris was a god and the king of Egypt, who was murdered by his jealous brother, Set, to capture his throne. Set chopped Osiris up into many pieces and spread his body all throughout Egypt. Then Isis, Osiris’s wife and queen, gathered all of the parts of her slain husband to resurrect him with a golden phallus to sire a son, Horus. And then it was
Horus
who was raised to avenge his father and take back the kingdom of Egypt.”

Ali cut him off and asked, “Are you making this reference in light of your own son to avenge you and the loss of your wife?” The chief continued to be impatient, particularly in the midst of hostages and warfare. Who wanted to hear some ancient legend in the middle of disarray? But the other men were interested in hearing how all the dots connected to the present.

Mohd answered, “Indeed. My son only recently changed his name to Ra-Heru, which is referenced as the Egyptian god of war and vengeance. But the name has its roots in
Horus,
who would avenge his own father.”

The commander of the UDF soldiers nodded, understanding his own ideas of the story to be correct. “But Egypt is a
Muslim
nation now. You are our
brothers.”

Mohd smiled and shook his head. “This is where our true conflict lies. Egypt was
never
a Muslim nation. Nor was it
Christian.
So although I now carry the name Mohd Ahmed Nasir from my
own
father, it was my Nubian Egyptian
wife
who understood
more
of the country’s history. And she reminded
me
and all of her five children that Egypt had been invaded by everyone, including Romans, Greeks, Persians, Turks and finally the Arabs. And each invading nation would force themselves and their cultures on Egypt in an attempt to change the beliefs, the language, the customs and the most elaborate
history
of mankind.

“So as I reveal
more
of the legend of Osiris,” Mohd continued, “we find that he was from the
true
lineage of Egyptian ancestors, where Set, his jealous brother, was linked with foreign invaders, who became his army. And when Isis was made to gather the slain parts of her husband’s body, she did so with the
allies
of Egypt, who would later help her son
Horus
to overthrow Set and his army of foreigners.”

“But we’re not
in
Egypt,” Ali argued. “That was all a long time ago. Your son is now holding hostage
hundreds
of innocent tourists and their families who have
nothing
to do with Egypt or Osiris.”

Mohd stroked his chin as he prepared a measured but stern response.

“That is where you are
wrong.
We are
all
in Egypt, my friend, and this has
everything
to do with Osiris. Just as the nomadic Arabs have now occupied lands that they build on and call their own, it is only through European investments in
oil
and more recently in construction, real estate and foreign trade that your so-called royal ‘Skeikhs’ mean
anything.
It is all stolen land and stolen wealth, where the arrogant Arabs now mistreat the Indians, the Africans, and the Asians, who are the true builders of these
new
Egypts around the world.

“So as I was first conflicted by my son’s mission to remind us all of our need for human
justice
, the present day
Osirises
are the true ancestral people of peace, who continue to be plotted against, slain, enslaved and shipped around the world to work and appease the greed of
nomads.
I have now realized that today was my son’s
fate.
And who else would be more qualified to remember this than the thousands of terrified tourists and their families, including thousands of more immigrant laborers who will all be affected by what happened here today at the International Suites?”

Even Ali fell silent. Suddenly Mohd’s story of Ancient Egypt made perfect sense. For what was the city of Dubai but a modern showcase of Arab wealth and amateur relics at the hands of cheap and foreign laborers? Even their building of man-made islands could easily be said to be inspired by the greatness of the Egyptian Pyramids. The whole
world
had been inspired by Egypt—Italy, Greece, Persia, Russia, France, Israel, Spain, Great Britain, India, China, Japan, Mexico, and the North and South Americas. It was not even an argument.

Mohd cut through the brief silence. “That is why the ancient Egyptians’ bloodline continue to have a chip on their shoulders, knowing that they are the
true
royal people of this earth, no matter how much the nomads from the North, the East or from the West continue to amass their stolen wealth. And even Egypt fell from greed.”

None of the men inside of the armored truck were from royal lineage, so they could all relate to the rich and wealthy of the world who had often used the ideas, the land, the labor, and the hope and dreams of everyone else to build their riches.

Tariq, an Oman immigrant with Ethiopian and Somalian blood in his own ancestry, finally ended the long-winded history lesson and brought everyone back to the tragedy at hand. “So how many immigrant men does he have?”

Mohd took a breath and knew that it was over. “Not enough to win. He only has enough men to make his point. And even some of those men are still loyal to me.”

“And do you feel this all will be worth it?” the UDF commander questioned. Even he realized that Mohd would be put to death by the Emirates.

Mohd exhaled and answered,
“Life
is always worth more than death. So my heart aches for him. But if it were not for the untimely death of my wife, none of us would be here today.”

*****

As Mohd finished his historical conversation inside the armored truck headquarters with the UAE authorities, more than a hundred reinforcement soldiers were flown into the downtown area with more on the way.

Ra-Heru watched from the window of the twenty-seventh floor of the building as a dozen more helicopters flew in. He understood that the end was near. Not only had his men lost the surveillance room, but they had now lost half of the bottom floors to the Union Defence Force as more hostages continued to flee.

Heru then called his lieutenant on the bottom floor of the lobby to check in without his surveillance team.

“It’s Heru. How are the men doing outside in the crowd?”

Down in the lobby with nearly a hundred hostages, the imposing lieutenant peeked outside to see what he could report without catching a sniper’s bullet in his forehead. But the dozen or so immigrant men from the ambush had already been chased down and killed.

“They are no longer in commission,” he reported back to Heru.

Heru nodded and paused. “Okay. It is time for phase three. Let’s stall the soldiers for as long as we can, and let the people all know our mission.”

“Yes, I agree,” his lieutenant commented. And he immediately began to shoot into the ceiling to gain everyone’s attention.

“AAAHHHH!” the tourists and their families screamed. None of the men had shot a gun in the lobby for the first thirty minutes that they had arrived there. They wanted the hostages to feel safe. But now the lieutenant needed them to listen while being well guarded by his men to prevent any attack.