James Smythe - The Testimony

That afternoon we found a video on the internet, claiming to be made by a terror cell that our intelligence reports had previously linked to Iran, taking responsibility for the bombings. There was no face there, no Bin Laden or Hussein to get angry at, just a shot of one of the camps burning, flattened, almost, and a voice speaking, telling us that until we admitted that the voice heard around the world was an American hoax they would maintain attacks on American soil. Repent and you will be spared.

Dafni Haza, political speechwriter, Tel Aviv

Everybody knew about Iran, the threat it posed. For a while, when everything settled down in the so-called Middle East a decade or so before, it was all the international press seemed to talk about. America – in fact, no, the whole world – had been worrying for years about the potential that they had to attack, because it seemed that no amount of sanctions could stop them, or stop their people. When I was a little girl it had all been about Iraq. Now Iraq was a gentle ally, neutered in the eyes of the world, and their brother – who had been there for so long, biding his time, it seemed – became the real threat, only he did nothing. Rumours had surrounded them for over a decade that they were building weapons, but those same rumours surrounded us, even; there was something about Iran. Israel, of course, was estranged anyway, so as a people, as a government, we weren’t concerned when the Americans began their bombing. But it seemed rash, I think. When we saw the footage on the televisions, of the bomb-sites, then the terrorist cell video that appeared after it, it all became very real. Even those wars before, decades of conflict in this part of the world, they seemed like they would be brushed away, because this – the potential of this – was so much worse.

Piers Anderson, private military contractor, the Middle East

We were hundreds and hundreds of miles away, still in Turkey, so we didn’t see a thing, but it only took ten minutes before we knew about it on the TV, and only a few minutes after that word started trickling in that it was the Americans that had launched their attack. Are we at war? we asked the suit in charge of the mission, and he said that he didn’t have a clue whether we were, but the Americans almost certainly were. Are they ever not? he asked.

Phil Gossard, sales executive, London

I watched the footage of the Yank missiles – or, rather, of the aftermath of them, the satellite footage of smoking craters, then the video of the terrorist taken from the internet, or the supposed terrorist. It didn’t seem real enough; that a terrorist would just use YouTube? That seemed wrong, somehow. That was on every news station within a few minutes, but the presenters weren’t giving it a chance, not actually listening to what it was saying; like they were telling us, This isn’t a lie, that was the voice of our God. The biggest issue, and nobody was actually talking about it, it felt like, was who was actually right. We all were; none of us were. We didn’t know if it was God, aliens, technology, V’ger… Could have been anything. The Times said that, post- The Broadcast , 92 per cent of British citizens polled believed in the presence of a higher power. But that raised issues in itself, because there was no way that 92 per cent of the British population were Christians. There were Muslims and Hindus and Jews and Buddhists, so who the hell was actually right? The papers were going with the Christian God, and Christianity was the largest religion in the world, so most would be fine with that. But those people who weren’t Christian… Who was to say that they were wrong, that everything they believed was wrong?

My hand wasn’t getting better from where it had hit Bill as he fell. I wondered if there was a broken bone, maybe; the bruise ran right across the back of it. Karen wanted to get me in for X-rays but I told her to not worry about it. We had always agreed to keep her medical opinion out of the marriage; it made her a hypochondriac in some cases, made her shrug off real problems in others. I could still move my fingers so I knew it wasn’t totally ruinous, and it felt better, even as it looked worse. It’ll heal, I told her.

Mei Hsüeh, professional gamer, Shanghai

They started cutting off internet in some countries, trying to – this was the theory – constrain the flow of information. China was one of the first, and most of the people I knew went, but I got my internet from a private pipe, which cost me more, but was worth it – especially then, because everybody else lost all contact to anything that wasn’t government-controlled. So many people disappeared from the servers, but there were enough still going – most of the Americans, the Europeans. (I guess the local servers were emptier, particularly for places like China and Korea, but I didn’t touch those – the people who played on them were so snobby.) I still had mine, because my line came from a company who weren’t government-controlled, which was amazingly lucky, really. They filtered everything, and I picked them because they used proxy servers, hid it all from the government, so I got to stay online. Our guild was down to twelve all of a sudden, which meant we had just enough to do another dungeon, but only barely. It would be close.

Katy Kasher, high school student, Orlando

My Dad was a pilot, flew for Delta a few years back, then after that some smaller airlines, mostly doing shuttles between states, that kind of thing. He was grounded because the airports were all shut, and that made him angry. I think he was trying to forget that I hadn’t heard The Broadcast , whereas it was all Mom would talk about. She was full-on that it was the voice of God, and that because I didn’t hear it, He was testing me. She called up the local priest, and he came right over as soon as he heard why.

Mom told him that she was worried I had the devil in me or whatever, but he said that he was sure God had just decided that I wasn’t ready to hear from Him yet. She’ll hear as soon as she opens her heart to the Lord, he said, even though I was sitting right there with them. She just needs time; everybody will hear His call that wants to. (He didn’t ask if I wanted to, but I believed in God, so yeah, sure I wanted to, of course I did.) Mom then asked if there were others he had heard about, like me. (I think she wanted to lure us all into a Hot Topic and lock the doors or something.) He said that I was it, which made her look so sad. The priest kept smiling at me, which was a, pretty creepy, and b, made me keep thinking of that bit in the Exorcist remake from a couple of years back, where he talks to the girl and is all The Power Of Christ Compels You .

Dhruv Rawat, doctor, Bankipore

Later that afternoon, after I had watched the news about the missiles, I went to find Adele, because I wanted to apologize. I was not completely sure that it was my fault she was angry – what she had said came out of anger, that much was certain, and I assumed that it was because she was here and her family was there, and she was alone here (apart from her crew, who were as much strangers as anybody else, and me, who… We were still strangers. I didn’t even know her entire name). So it made sense that she was angry. In those situations, I always liked to apologize first; it showed strength of character. I went to the hotel and asked for her room number, because I didn’t know it, and they called her on the telephone, but she wasn’t there, or she didn’t answer. Can you tell me her room? I asked. I need to speak to her, and you’ll be closed maybe by the time she returns. I knew the girl on the reception desk – she was a cousin of one of my old friends, though he had left and moved to Malaysia, and I don’t think she remembered me from the time we had met – and I gave her my best smile. Sure, she said. She wrote the number down on a piece of paper. I went straight upstairs, tried knocking on the door, but there was no answer, so I went and sat with the newspaper – I wanted to read everything about the rest of the world, because it was so easy to forget when nobody was worried about it – and I watched on the news about America’s actions, which they were treating as the start of World War 3, accusing everybody of everything. I waited all night, and then I knocked on her door again, when she would have been going to bed, so surely would have been in, but there was no answer.