Andrew Kaplan - Scorpion Deception

He would get to Chalus under cover of the Red Wednesday celebrations that night, he decided, signed off the computer and cleaned any trace of having been there with his NSA software. He checked his watch, saw he’d been online four minutes fifteen seconds, and looked around uneasily. Just the usual crop of students online and teenagers playing video games; nothing out of the ordinary. But he couldn’t shake the feeling that he was pushing it. He left the cafe and was less than a block away when he spotted plainclothes VEVAK agents barging into the Internet cafe.

They had been faster than he thought. He hadn’t had much of a margin at all.

And now Scorpion knew he had to leave the restaurant. Despite his Haji Firuz disguise, a waiter near the kitchen kept looking at him, then away. When the waiter disappeared into the kitchen, no doubt to make a phone call, he left a stack of tomans on the table and walked out, not looking back for two blocks before heading down an alley and doubling back on the next street. He was waiting at a bus stop when he got the text message from Ghanbari to meet him on the bridge in Mellat Park.

Ghanbari had shaved his beard. Sporting sunglasses and a fake Tom Selleck-like mustache, he looked more like a sports car salesman than an academic.

“What about your colleagues?” Scorpion asked, eyes restlessly running over the families and young people, students mostly, playing or walking near the lake. Apart, it was dangerous enough. The two of them together was like a neon sign saying, Call the police .

“Under arrest or disappeared. My two closest friends, Koosha and Nader, are disappeared. I’m sure they’re dead. Beikzadeh and Kta’eb Hezbollah have taken over the al Quds Force, which means the Revolutionary Guards. The tail is wagging the dog. If they find me, I’m dead,” Ghanbani said, rubbing his hands over and over, as if they were cold.

“What about your wife and children?”

Ghanbari looked at him, his eyes stricken.

“We talked. She’s going to divorce me, denounce me. She’ll testify I’m a CIA spy, whatever they want. It’s the only way to protect her and the children. Later, when it’s safe, she’ll go back to her family in Isfahan. Inshallah- ” God willing “-someday we’ll see each other again. But my parents!” he exclaimed. “They will think I’m a traitor. They will live with shame,” shaking his head. “I can’t do this.”

“I’m leaving Iran tonight,” Scorpion said. “Are you coming?”

“What are you offering?”

“Me? I’m not offering anything. I’ll get you out. Someone else will take it from there.”

“The CIA?”

Scorpion didn’t say anything. Ghanbari’s face knotted up.

“They force me to be a traitor. My own people.” He grabbed at Scorpion’s arm. “What will they offer me?”

“The Americans?” He shrugged. “I don’t know. Depends on the value of the information you give them. Asylum, some money probably.”

“For a spy, you’ve been honest with me,” Ghanbari said, his face twisting. “Tell me the truth. They’ll use me up and throw me away, yes?”

Scorpion looked at him and at the sun sparkling on the lake. From the shore came the sounds of families and children’s voices. It’s like their last moments of peace and innocence, he thought. Not for the first time, he wished he were in another line of work.

“Yes,” he said.

“It’s hopeless. I should kill myself,” Ghanbari said, taking his ZOAF pistol out of his pocket and looking down at it.

“Then Beikzadeh and his kind win. Is that what you want?” Scorpion asked.

“What else is there for me?”

“Things change. I’ve seen things I never would have believed,” he said. “Besides, you can’t commit suicide on Red Wednesday.”

“Why not?” Ghanbari said.

“Bad luck,” Scorpion said, and smiled.

As the sun set at last, a smoggy orange glow like a fire burning over the skyline, Red Wednesday exploded. There were fireworks, bonfires, rockets, and firecrackers all over the city. Children dressed in costumes or black shrouds ran through the streets, banging spoons on pots and pans and going door-to-door. They banged their pans loudly and were greeted by beaming adults offering scoops of ajeel , mixed nuts and berries, and clear water to refresh them.

People wore new clothes and broke earthen jars shaped like animals that supposedly held last year’s bad luck, so only good luck would come in the New Year. Others went up to total strangers in the street asking them to untie a knot in their handkerchiefs as a way of taking away any bad luck. Young single women, practicing fal gosh , would eavesdrop on conversations of passersby in the street. It was said that one could tell one’s future, including the romantic future, from a scrap of conversation from the first passerby you overheard.

In every street, square, and park across the country there were bonfires where people of all ages, adults and children who were old enough, would jump over the fire, singing: “Zardi-ye man az to, Sorkhi-ye to az man.” My sickly yellow paleness is yours; your fiery red color is mine.

“You understand, this is early Zoroastrianism, thousands of years older than Islam,” Ghanbari said. “Rebirth of life after winter. That sort of thing. What are we waiting for?” he asked as Scorpion, still dressed as Haji Firuz, jumped and capered around him like a clown.

“That,” Scorpion said, watching a family with three children, parents, and grandparents parking their white Peugeot 4008 SUV in a lot on Sadaqat next to Mellat Park. He also kept an eye on two Basiji militia-men who were watching the parking lot and the street. There was a sudden crackling from a string of firecrackers as the family entered the park to join the festivities.

Scorpion draped an arm over Ghanbari, who wore a spooky Guy Fawkes type mask, as if they were drunken buddies, and making gestures like a fool, he pulled Ghanbari with him as they followed the family toward the park entrance. There were more Basiji militiamen at the entrance, but they ignored him and Ghanbari, focusing on a group of teenagers, one of whom tossed a firecracker into the park. Two of the Basiji grabbed the teenager. For tonight at least, being Haji Firuz was saving his life, he thought. But what about tomorrow?

They followed the family from the Peugeot down the path to an open area with illuminated water fountains and dozens of bonfires surrounded by crowds, singing and talking and taking turns making a running leap over the fire. People were clapping and laughing as if the crisis didn’t exist. There was a high whistling sound and a vertical stream of sparks as someone fired a rocket into the sky.

As the family from the Peugeot approached one of the bonfires, Scorpion accidentally bumped into the father, knocking a messenger-type bag off his shoulder.

“Bebakhshid, ghorban,” Scorpion apologized. “Khahesh mikonam,” please, picking the bag up off the ground and handing it to the father with a bow.

“Bashe, mersi , Haji Firuz, ” the father laughed with a shrug. It’s okay, thanks.

“Mersi, mersi,” Scorpion said, shook his tambourine and danced a little jig for the children who giggled. He gestured for them to jump over the fire.

The father took one of his sons, a boy of about seven, and stood him about six or seven feet from the fire, then gave him a nudge. The boy ran at the fire, his tongue sticking out and jumped over and everyone cheered.

“Barikallah! Barikallah!” Bravo! Bravo! Scorpion joined in cheering. As the others in the family started their jumps over the fire, Scorpion nudged Ghanbari and they began to edge away in the crowd. They made their way on the crowded walkways, shadows from the flames dancing on faces as they headed across an open area toward a hedge near the edge of the park.