Kabul, Parwan Province, Afghanistan
8th April 2010, 20:21 hours AFT
Hamid Shirzad stepped off the Bagram Air Base bus onto the service road which ran parallel to Kabul Airport. Overhead, a 747 thundered into the night sky, its huge Pratt & Whitney JT9D turbofan engines roaring with relief as they lifted the enormous aircraft above the city. He always felt nervous, stepping from the relative comfort of the air-conditioned interior into the chaotic familiarity of Kabul. Even though the bus was unmarked, someone could easily follow the fifteen-seater from the American Air Base, forty odd miles north of the city, and pick off the men as they disappeared home to their families. The job at Bagram offered riches they couldn’t have imagined just five years ago, and that was the problem. Each one was a target, of envious friends and family who hadn’t benefited from the Americans’ largesse, but also of the Taliban. Attacks were common in Kabul. People vanished all the time. He was right to feel nervous.
Hamid popped an M&M into his mouth and hurried down the airport road [JH1] towards Aria City, a huge development of mid-rises that had recently sprung up, fuelled by American cash and Afghani corruption. He didn’t care though. His family had been fortunate enough to secure one of the apartments, courtesy of his job at the air base. They were tiny but felt like palaces compared to the poverty of Khost, his hometown on the Afghan-Pakistan border. He couldn’t wait to tell Asal of his promotion. He was now head of service at the main mess hall. In charge of five servers no less. An extra fifty dollars a month. He felt rich. Like a king. At this rate, he would have enough to bring his mother to Kabul. Maybe even get her an apartment next to theirs.
To access the complex, he needed to take the underpass, a pedestrian tunnel which avoided the chaos of the airport road. It was normally well lit, but tonight, the steps disappeared into a gloomy blackness. He reached for the packet of American candy, debating whether to risk the road, but at this time of night it would be impossible to navigate the traffic on foot. He crunched down on the coloured candy, took a deep breath, and hurried down the steps. It was cooler down here, but not enough to explain his involuntary shudder. Up ahead the warm glow of the exit propelled him forward, but fifty feet in, a low rumble from behind dissolved his sugar-fuelled courage and he broke into a run. Was this the night? The night when he failed to come home, leaving Asal with four children under five at the mercy of the Taliban, his family and friends. By the time his boot hit the first step of the exit, Hamid was panting heavily and, as he emerged into the warm night, he stopped to catch his breath. He risked a glance back, down into the dark underpass, but there was nothing. For the love of Allah, he chided himself. His neurosis was getting the better of him and he popped another sweet into his mouth as he hurried through the security barriers into Aria City.
As he crossed the road, a van pulled out of a side street up ahead, turning towards him. It was American. A battered Ford transit van, every window blacked out, its red paint scoured pink by the harsh Afghani terrain. Hamid barely gave it a glance. These vans were everywhere, driven mainly by the private security contractors that swarmed Kabul. It rumbled past him, heading back towards the concrete blast blocks of the checkpoint. Hamid half heard its worn tyres protesting as it U-turned. He waited for it to pass, but the engine idled noisily behind him at a walking pace and his heart quickened. He popped one, two, three sweets into his dry mouth and eventually risked a glance back. As he did, the van roared forward, its side door screeching open. Two men appeared, one holding a heavy sack, whilst the other pinned his arms back, causing the brightly coloured packet to spill from his right hand. He felt a tiny pinprick on his arm. Hamid looked down in confusion, his head already woozing over, but all he could see were the brightly coloured sweets scattered on the weed-scrubbed concrete on the street.
When he came to, Hamid was bound and gagged. Face down on a carpet. It smelled of smoke. And something else. A rancid festering odour that burned his nostrils and paralysed his mind with images of death and torture. He groaned in despair at his first thought—that he would never see Asal again. Or any of his children: dear sweet innocent Paak, her soft brown eyes, always so thoughtful; Aalem, tall for his age and fearless like a black bear; little Fateh, forever reading books, waiting patiently for him to return home so she could curl up in his lap with her favourite story; and, finally, young Mukhtar, already speaking English, head bursting with big thoughts that Hamid could only dream of. He suppressed a sob, trying to control his breathing. Why had he accepted the job? He should have remained in Khost. They would be dirt poor, but at least they would be alive and together. Actually, that wasn’t true. Under the Taliban, they all faced daily dangers: he could be forced to fight; his wife married off to another fighter, effectively sold into a lifetime of sexual slavery; his girls would suffer the same fate. He realised with a start that he shouldn’t be alive, and the thought made him feel better. His abduction didn’t make sense: kidnappings were rare. Whilst he had a good job by Afghani standards, he wasn’t wealthy. Certainly not worth all this trouble. Most people at his level were simply executed, their bodies left in the street as a warning to others that they should not work with the Americans. So why was he still breathing?
He had barely asked himself the question when he heard low voices talking in Dari. It was too low for him to catch anything, but he thought he heard an accent. What was an American doing here? With the Taliban? He assumed that’s what they were. Who else would kidnap him? The voices approached. He shifted, trying to sit up. Strong arms hauled him to his feet. The hood came off, a bright light burning his eyes as Hamid stood, swaying and blinking. Slowly, shadows solidified, and he found himself standing in an apartment. It felt familiar. With a start, he realised it was exactly the same layout as his. He glanced towards the windows which weren’t covered, the bright lights of Kabul twinkling below. They were high up, probably top floor. It must be within the Aria City complex. The thought gave him strength. To think that his family was close by. One of his captors gave him a shove, and he stumbled forward, only now taking in the men. Two were clearly Taliban: heavy beards, rifles strung across their backs, their unassuming white-leather Cheetah high-top sneakers, the clincher. Beloved by Taliban fighters, they were seen as a status symbol. Everyone avoided wearing them. How had they even got here without attracting attention? The third man was the most mysterious: clearly American; tiny, like a small mouse, his bald head gleaming in the single light of the apartment. He was sitting at a table, tapping away at a keyboard.
‘I’m ready,’ he muttered to no one in particular. ‘Please, prepare the prisoner.’
They led Hamid to the doorway around which a metal frame had been constructed. His captor stopped, but continued to hold him tightly.
‘OK, now. Put him through the gate.’
The guard roughly pushed Hamid forward and, without a sound, he disappeared.
‘OK, you next.’ The American nodded at one of Hamid's captors, who also stepped through and disappeared.
The man turned back to the keyboard. Seconds later, two men came back through the gate.
Hamid stumbled forward into the room, dimly aware of the American still sitting at the table, still tapping away. He sensed another figure behind him, but didn’t get the chance to turn, instead, sinking to his knees as candy-coloured bile soaked the cheap carpet. His mind was whirling with unanswered questions. What had just happened? Why did he feel so sick? He groaned, trying to calm his stomach. Had he eaten too many of those sweets? He’d found them at the base. They were free in the kitchens and he now consumed three packs per day. With a groan, he eased himself into a standing position, and as he did, the man behind him stepped forward. Into Hamid’s line of sight. He’d assumed it was one of the fighters, but something about him looked familiar. The realisation nearly made him sink to his knees again. It was him—Hamid—standing there, staring back. For a ridiculous moment, he thought he was staring into a mirror, but as his hand reached forward and touched the man’s face, no hand came to meet his. How was this possible? Had he died? Had he entered Barzakh, a state of waiting, until the Day of Judgement? And was this an angel sent to question him? If so, why did it look like him? Was he an angel?
‘Come on, we haven’t got all day,’ the American grumbled.
Hamid’s double gently removed his hand and went over to the table, where a gun lay. It had an overlong barrel and looked menacing. How had Hamid not noticed it before? Had he been gone a long time? The man picked it up, flicked a switch on the side and returned to Hamid, who stood there, staring dumbly at his double. As the nozzle pressed gently to his skull, Hamid stared questioningly at himself. The barrel puffed quietly and the back of Hamid’s head exploded. As he crumpled to the floor, Hamid’s double stood there, staring at the corpse, his face expressionless.
‘Clear up this mess,’ the American said, standing up and gathering his laptop. ‘You know where to leave the body, and once I’ve gone, dismantle the gate.’
Without waiting for an answer, he stepped through the doorway and disappeared.
Townhouse, Camden Town, London
8th April 2010, 17:11 hours GMT
Ed Fox studied the pickets gathered in small groups around him, shifting from side to side as they struggled to keep warm against the biting wind, the cold air having long since silenced their protest. A woman in a ragged sheepskin coat slalomed through the crowd with a large tray, on which cups of hot soup steamed. Ed rested his placard against a lamppost and accepted a serving as she passed by – he wasn’t cold, but he was hungry. As he sipped the scalding liquid, he asked himself the same question that he’d posed on his first night, ten days ago: what was he doing here? The answer was simple, but also complex. He shouldn’t be here. He should be in California with Jo’s parents, getting his head straight, preparing for a return to work. His command had given him an extended leave of absence. It finished in three days. Ample time for him to complete his new mission, but then what? He had no desire to return. There was nothing there for him anymore.
A man approached. He was wearing a heavy parka, the hood pulled low, face in deep shadow. He nodded at Ed, a friendly nod, one borne of camaraderie on the picket line. Ed recognised him from his first night.
‘It’s Ed, right?’ the man held out a hand.
‘I’m sorry, I don’t remember your name.’ Ed did. He just didn’t want to talk.
‘James Forsyth,’ the man said. ‘With PCA. Or at least I was until yesterday.’
Ed frowned.
‘It’s a private plane charter company. Based out of Stansted. They laid off half the workforce yesterday. Because of—’ The man glanced up at the building. Ed followed his gaze. ‘—Uma Jakobsdóttir and Ethan Rae.’ He spat on the pavement. ‘And you?’
‘Ostend Ferries. Out of Dover. Same problem.’ Part of his story was true, at least. The bit about boats. He always found it easier to lie if there was an element of truth.
James scowled.
‘Why bother with a ninety-minute journey, eh,’ he said sarcastically, ‘when you can be transported from your home instantaneously.’
Up ahead, some of the group stirred. One of the organisers blew into his megaphone and started to chant. Others around him put their cups down and grabbed their own placards. James and Ed did the same, electrified by the collective energy that rippled around the crowd. The chant started slowly. It always did. Just one voice, then others joined and suddenly hundreds were chanting as one.
‘Keep your LEAP,’ they screamed.
***
The room was growing dark, its tall ceilings swallowed up by the advancing gloom, as the wintry sun surrendered meekly beneath the London rooftops. Uma pulled the sheet tightly around her shoulders as she watched the pickets below. She couldn’t hear what they were chanting. She didn't need to. They’d been there all day and would be there all night. It was the same in DC, outside her apartment, and in every other major city: a ragtag bunch of religious nutters and others opposed to the LEAP rollout[JH2] . They’d appeared the day after the Copenhagen Treaty, where she’d stood with President Jamal Williams to announce that LEAP would be available globally. For free. At first it had been a few lonely protesters, but over the weeks, as the ramifications of the rollout had become clearer, they had grown in number. So much so, that Ethan had persuaded the Met Police to station two squad cars outside the house to prevent anyone breaking through the wooden cordon the council had thrown up.
Uma shrugged in frustration and stepped away from the window. What was she doing, wasting time, watching people who weren’t prepared to change? The realisation returned her to the huge bed that dominated the room. She stared down at the sleeping figure. Ethan stirred slightly, but didn’t wake, his lips curled into a half smile, as if amused by Uma’s annoyance. His forearm covered the rest of his face, the ragged scar from his ordeal, an angry red. It was Uma’s turn to smile. Had it only been three months since she was first in this room? Waking up in this very bed, Ethan sitting beside her, cradling his shattered arm, nervously contemplating what he had to tell her: that she had died, in an earthquake at Reynolds Castle; that Ethan had restored her using LEAP. But he didn’t need to explain himself. She had done the same thing years earlier, restoring his comatose body because she couldn’t bear the thought of losing him. But the best thing about that night had been their reconciliation. Before then they had been at war, Ethan unable to forgive her, not for entangling him with Anderson, but for keeping it from him and deciding to cut him from the LEAP launch. After she had restored him from his coma, it had been the first thing he remembered and the perceived betrayal had infected his soul like a cancer, reducing him to a malevolent recluse, holed up in Reynolds’ bleak castle at the end of the world. He had refused to help in her hour of greatest need, and it had taken Uma’s death in the Hall of Steel to drag him out of his malaise. They had made love that night for the first time and the memory made her feel warm inside, for the first time in a long time. And here they now were: LEAP finally launched as Uma had intended when she had first approached Ethan all those long years ago. He was now based in London. All the better for coordinating the rollout of the LEAP technology, given the multiple time zones he was dealing with. She was in DC, busy dealing with the Americans, but it didn’t matter. With LEAP, they saw each other every day, usually late afternoon in London, lunchtime on the east coast. Today was a short visit. She was heading out to Iceland. It would have been her father’s birthday today. It didn’t seem like a good reason to go, but she felt drawn to the island, like a moth to the flame of a flickering candle.
Ethan stirred, stretching luxuriously, sleepy eyes flickering open, his mouth breaking into a boyish grin as Uma let the sheet slip to the floor. She knelt on the bed and kissed him deeply. God, his lips were so soft. Ethan responded, butterflying her tongue with his own. Pangs of pleasure bolted down her spine and she groaned. Encouraged, he slipped a hand between her thighs.
‘I’ve got to go,’ she giggled, pulling away.
‘Please stay,’ he said, pushing his lower lip out. ‘We never see each other.’
‘I’d love to,’ she said, trying to find her clothes under the mess of sheets, ‘but I’ve got to go to Iceland and be back in DC for—’ she glanced at her watch, trying to work out the time in Washington, five hours from now, ‘—one o’clock.’
‘Please,’ he repeated.
‘I can’t. The rollout is going way too slowly. The Americans are so damn cautious, mired up to their eyeballs in vested interests: airlines, car companies, trains, shipping—’
‘It’ll change,’ he cut in, watching her bend over and then disappear beneath the bed. ‘It always does.’
‘You keep saying that.’ Uma’s head appeared above the mattress. ‘But it's not just the politicians. I’m meeting a delegation of lawyers this evening from some of the biggest law firms in DC. They’re worried about the privacy consequences for their billionaire clients handing over their atomic code to us. They’re suggesting it be held on an escrow server into which we’re granted limited access. Otherwise, their clients will stop LEAPing.’ Uma stood up, holding her jeans and shirt. ‘Meanwhile, the earth continues to pump CO2 into the atmosphere at an unprecedented rate because the vast majority of people are still not benefiting from LEAP.’ A faint pink tinge had appeared on her neck.
‘Well, it will. Remember, I’ve done this a few times.’
Ethan stroked Uma’s thigh, pulling her towards the bed, but she wriggled away and turned on him, the blush now a deep red that blossomed out across her chest.
‘Well, it’s not fast enough,’ she exploded. ‘Every hour we delay, millions more tonnes of CO2 spews into the atmosphere where they’ll sit for generations. We need to move faster.’
Ethan nodded solemnly, even as his eyes hungrily drank in Uma’s nakedness.
She turned away in frustration, suddenly desperate to leave.
‘Looking for these?’
Ethan was sitting up, twirling her panties suggestively in one hand. She lunged for them, but he pulled his hand under the sheets, curling up into a foetal position.
‘This is important,’ she yelled at him, struggling into her jeans and shirt. She spied her boots and grabbed them before flinging the door open. It smashed into a tray containing their half-eaten lunch from earlier, spilling plates, cutlery and half-eaten pot pie across the floorboards. She screamed in frustration and stormed off down the landing towards the LEAP gate.
Ethan’s head appeared above the bed sheets as he listened to her stomping up the steps to the attic. Curses drifted through the open door and then suddenly it went quiet. He got out of bed and recovered the tray, carefully picking up its contents. Mrs Carr, his housekeeper, could clean this up later. He wondered whether to call Uma, but abandoned the idea. She would be mad for hours now. He’d seen it happen three times in the last week. She seemed to be carrying the weight of the world on her shoulders regarding the rollout, and despite his protestations to the contrary, he was also worried about the pace. Every government seemed gripped by paralysis and indecision, but it was too late to turn back now. Not after the Saudis had acquired a copy of the LEAP technology and declared a new alliance of other Arab nations that would have exclusive access to the stolen code. They’d been forced to counter the move quickly –[JH3] it had been Uma’s idea. To accelerate the rollout by announcing that they could in fact teleport humans and that it would be available free to every country on the planet: 182 countries out of a possible 192 had taken up the offer. Which was all well and good, but President Williams’ plan for a controlled rollout had been obliterated in an instant. As the President had feared, it was now chaos, as countries, corporations and individuals fought for a foothold in the new world order, or tried to slow it down. Ethan was caught in the middle, battling to accelerate Uma’s timeline, whilst managing a thousand vested interests. Getting dressed quickly, Ethan made his way downstairs. It was strange living in the Camden townhouse after spending so many years in Reynolds’ Castle, the latter being a cold, dark and soulless – what had Uma called it? – mausoleum. It was a fitting description, whereas his London home was bright and airy and he was surrounded by people all intent on helping them with the biggest rollout in human history. He was now in the basement, his former deal room, where he had bought and sold companies at a rapid rate. At one point it had made him the richest man in the UK and was now the nerve centre for the global rollout. On the main screen, their mission boldly claimed a LEAP gate in every household on Earth by the end of 2012. That was 2.3 billion houses. Across 6.9 billion people. They weren’t even close, and the team knew it. Many were slumped at their desks, staring at their screens, eyes dull with fatigue, faces creased with frustration.
Ethan entered his office and sat down, his thoughts returning to Uma. He regretted laughing now, knowing the levels of stress she was under, and grabbed his mobile, wondering what to do. In front of him his parents’ photo smiled back. It was his favourite, taken when he was four. The young couple were standing outside, in their garden in Aberdeen, Ethan squeezed between their legs, looking up at his mother. There was a time when the sight would have triggered a tsunami of pain: first from his leg and then across his back. The metal pins that were inserted into his thigh after the car accident that killed them would begin to ache at the memory. Ethan had been driving that day in Saudi, where his father had worked as an engineer. He had blamed himself for their deaths. As had the Saudi court that summarily sentenced him to fifty lashes and ten years in prison. His back, now a ragtag of scar tissue, would have blossomed like a fireball whenever he thought of them. He’d spent, what felt like a lifetime, trying to atone for that one mistake. That is, until he’d met Uma, who had filled the void left by his parents and ultimately enabled him to move on. He owed her everything, and the reminder guided his fingers across the mobile screen. Ethan waited expectantly, but after four rings, the tone cut to Uma’s voicemail. He ended the connection, suddenly at a loss what to do, which was laughable given everything he had to do.
His phone rang. For a joyful moment, he thought Uma had called him back, but it was his PA: The Swedish Prime Minister wanted to speak to him. Apparently, Volvo was demanding a share of the Swedish licence agreement. Ethan sighed. It was going to be a long evening.
