Greg Rucka - A gentleman_s game

So when Abdul Aziz came to the house for a second time, Shuneal knew it was his only chance. • A cassette player rested on the dining table this time, and once everyone was seated and still, Abdul Aziz moved to it and, without a word, set the tape to play.

The voice that filled the room was immediately familiar to Shuneal.

"You who have come to make Hajj, give thanks to Allah, all praise to Him," Dr. Faud bin Abdullah al-Shimmari told them. His voice crackled, distorted through the tiny speaker on the cassette player. "You who have come to secure your place in Paradise, know that you have spared yourself Hellfire. You have achieved the fifth pillar of our faith, but there is a sixth, and who of you dare to reach it?

"To be muwahhidun, to be the greatest advocates of oneness, should be your highest aspiration. Jihad is a great deed, indeed, and there is no deed whose blessing, whose reward, is that of it. For this reason, if none other, it is the greatest thing you, any of you, can volunteer for.

"The warrior who gives his life in a true jihad becomes shahid, guaranteed that rarest place in Paradise. You must rub the sleep from your eyes, my brothers, and rise to jihad! Find the ember in your soul, and let your breath give life to the flame! Let that flame feed your hatred of those who defile and damn us, of those Jews and Christians and infidels who would steal from you that which is yours, your future as the One True Religion! We know the Jews are the objects of Allah's avowed wrath, all praises sung unto Him, while the Christians have long since fallen from the path of righteousness. The Qu'ran tells us the Jews are a nation cursed by Allah, a nation he turned into apes and pigs, who worship idols.

"You live in great times, the days before the Days of Judgment, with civilizations in conflict, with the civilization of the corrupt West on the verge of collapse. While the West seeks to steal our youth from us, to diminish our heritage as the One True Religion, we see they are weak, immoral, and corrupt. The battle before you is not one simply of ideas, but one to be fought with bloodshed, with the rifle, the airplane, the word, the bomb. This is a new phase in our great Crusade, to accelerate that collapse, to return in kind a thousandfold what they have laid at our feet.

"Allah will take revenge against the tyrants with His sword in this world, and in the world to come. We beseech Allah to grant Mujihadin everywhere speedy victory, and forsake America, and those who help and are allies with her, and bring destruction upon her and her friends. It is Allah's will, and it will be done.

"Allah's prayers upon you, you who would be jihadi." • The silence after the tape ended was heavy, broken only by the sound of their breathing, the students seated on the floor. Abdul Aziz did not move, letting the cassette run out, and there was a shocking snap as the button on the player popped up once more. From the corner of his eye, Shuneal saw several of the students start at the noise, surprised.

Abdul Aziz took the cassette player from the table, tucked it beneath his arm, and, still without uttering a word, turned and walked out of the room. Shuneal could hear him moving away, the echo of his steps on the tile floor, and then the sound of the door opening and closing. Around him, other students exchanged looks of confusion and loss.

Shuneal moved first, taking a step forward, then stopping, looking back. Aamil, still seated, hesitated, then rose to follow. Shuneal heard the rustle of cloth as more of the students got to their feet, but he didn't wait, and he didn't look back, now moving faster, suddenly afraid that Abdul Aziz wouldn't wait for him. He reached the door, pushed it open, and rushed out into the cool Madinah night.

Abdul Aziz stood at the back of the battered military surplus truck that had pulled up outside. Canvas covered the sides and back of the bed, but as Shuneal approached, Abdul Aziz reached up and drew it back, then pulled the latch and dropped the gate. Shuneal started forward, reached out to hold on to the side of the vehicle to help pull himself inside, but Abdul Aziz put a hand on his breast, a forceful pressure just short of a push.

"Give me your name, boy."

"Shuneal. Shuneal bin Muhammad."

Abdul Aziz's face broke into an amused smile and the shining scar on his jaw seemed to climb to reach his eye. "You are British?"

"I am a Muslim."

"Do you still have your passport?"

Shuneal couldn't understand why it mattered. "Yes, with my belongings."

"In the house?"

"Yes." Shuneal dropped his hand from where he was still gripping the side of the truck, felt a swell of desperation so acute and so sudden, he was afraid it would bring him to tears. When he spoke, he tried to keep the whine from his voice. "Please, I understand. I understand what you told us, before we made the pilgrimage, I saw it, I saw the Jamrah, Abdul Aziz. I saw it."

"I know." He said it with such flat conviction that Shuneal realized all at once that Abdul Aziz had been watching him throughout the Hajj. "Shuneal bin Muhammad?"

"Yes, the name I took when I avowed my faith."

"No, no more."

Abdul Aziz reached out and took hold of Shuneal's still newly shaven head in a surprisingly strong grip, and turned him to face Aamil and the others who had come outside.

"See your brother," Abdul Aziz said. "He has the heart of a jihadi, and I give him the name of one now, the name Sinan bin al-Baari. The spearhead of God."

He released his grip.

"Get on the truck," Abdul Aziz ordered.

And Sinan bin al-Baari, who had been Shuneal bin Muhammad and who had been christened William Dennis Leacock, climbed aboard and began his long trip to his new home in the Wadi-as-Sirhan.

London-Wood Green, North London 10 August 0414 GMT Chace came around the back way on foot, as instructed, mounting the six steps to the apartment building, hands thrust deep in her windbreaker, head down, pretending to the walk of shame, just in case anyone who shouldn't see her coming did. She'd passed one of Box's surveillance vans almost two hundred meters back, done up to look as if it was on its last legs, and she knew they'd seen her, and that was to the good, because it meant no one would be surprised by her arrival, and that therefore no one would shoot her by mistake.

She was armed herself, an HK P2000 tucked at her waist, and that in and of itself was almost as odd as the errand she'd been sent on. It was a rule broken: Minders did not go armed in London.

But the errand itself broke another rule: SIS and Box do not work together.

It was a big, sad building, late fifties architecture that had forgone aesthetics in pursuit of efficiency, but even that had failed it, and in the cast of the electric lights over the door the masonry had the hue of a smoker's teeth. She pushed through the entrance, out of the night, and into a hallway that was even more poorly illuminated than the world outside. She stopped to let her eyes adjust before continuing down the hall, stepping carefully around the trash in the corridor, food wrappers, empty bottles. A television was playing in one of the apartments she passed and she heard the unmistakably empty passion of a porno.

She ignored the elevator and took the stairs, climbing three flights before stepping onto a landing and orienting herself. The light was marginally better, flickering from a spastic bulb in a fixture halfway along the wall. Chace slowed down, going as quietly as she could. She passed four-twelve, stopped in front of four-fourteen, and didn't knock.

The man who opened the door was dressed in black tactical BDUs, and he motioned her inside without a word. Chace stepped through, then aside, and he closed the door as silently as he'd opened it. He pointed to her, indicated toward the main room, and Chace nodded, following as he led the way.