Sword of God

delivery to Jeddah. I do not know what this means. It could be nothing. It could be everything.'

He paused again, searching for words.

'For all I know, this message might never be seen or heard. Either way, I am confident that it will survive longer than I will. After today, they have no reason to keep me alive.'

He took a deep breath, realization in his eyes.

'In my heart, I know what they are doing is wrong. My only hope is they will be stopped.'

53

Shari Shasmeen sat in the lounge for more than an hour, staying as close to the interview room as possible in case Payne or Jones had any more questions. To her, the furniture looked like it had been donated by Goodwill. Mismatched chairs, a badly scratched card table, a coffeepot that was older than Juan Valdez. She tried to get comfortable on the lumpy couch, but it felt like it had been stuffed with straw.

'I'm guessing you've never been in the military,' said Kia Choi as she entered the room. 'Otherwise you'd be used to our opulent accommodations.'

Shari smiled. 'I've spent the past few months in a tunnel, and it was nicer than this.'

She reached out her hand in introduction. 'I'm Kia, by the way.'

'I'm Shari.'

'Actually,' Kia admitted, 'I knew that already. I work with Jon, and he told me all about you when he returned from Mecca. How are you feeling?'

She touched the tape on her broken nose. 'About as good as I look.'

'Can I get you something? Some aspirin or-'

'Thanks, but no thanks. I'm tough. I can take it.'

Kia smiled. 'Do you mind if I sit down?'

'Of course not. I'd welcome the company. It's been a while since I've talked with a female. All of my coworkers are men, so our conversations were somewhat limited.'

'In that case, I'm kind of hesitant to ask you my next question.'

'Why's that?'

'I wanted to ask you about your job.'

Shari laughed. 'Don't worry. It's fine. I'm happy to talk about it. What did you want to know?'

'Well, as I mentioned, Jon told me about finding you in the tunnel. Unfortunately, he didn't have enough time to tell me about the site. So I was wondering-'

'What we were looking for.'

Kia nodded. 'Is that too personal?'

'A few days ago, I probably would've played stupid and said, What site? But as things stand, I guess there's no harm in talking about it now.'

'Just so you know,' Kia said, 'I work as a translator for the military, and Arabic is one of the languages I speak. So I'm not a total novice when it comes to Islam. I know some of the basics about its history and culture.'

'What do you know about Muhammad?'

'I know Muhammad is revered as the Prophet. Muslims believe he received the word of God, and his revelations form the pages of the Qur'an.'

'I'm impressed. That's more than most non-Muslims know.'

Kia smiled. 'Unfortunately, that's where my knowledge ends.'

'That's okay. I can pick up the story from there. Even though Muhammad died in 632 AD, the first copy of the Qur'an wasn't written until 650 AD. It was compiled by Uthman ibn Affan, the third caliph of Islam, based on all the transcripts and teachings he could find.'

'Eighteen years after Muhammad died?'

Shari nodded. 'Some scholars, myself included, have always wondered what might have been omitted in that span. Languages were evolving, politics were changing, and Muhammad's original followers were dying off. There's no telling what could have been lost during that time. Furthermore, many people believe the oldest surviving Qur'an was written in the eighth century, approximately one hundred years after the Uthman version. Suddenly we're talking about a wide chasm in history that could've altered Muhammad's initial message.'

'So what did you find?'

'As I mentioned, the Uthman version was compiled from transcripts of Muhammad's direct recitations, recorded by his companions on anything they could get ahold of. Bark, bones, whatever was available. Uthman formed a committee that sorted through all these messages, eventually agreeing on the text of the first Qur'an. For years I have been searching for one of these copies, thinking it was the purest version available. But I was wrong. I neglected to consider the transcripts themselves.'

'The transcripts?'

'The bark, the bones, the loose parchments of text. In actuality, they contained the original message from Muhammad, the literal word of God. All this time I was looking for the first Qur'an and neglected to search for its source.'

'And that's what you found?'

Shari nodded. 'I think I did. Unfortunately, before I had a chance to find out for sure, the site was violated and everything was stolen.'

The discussion stopped when Payne and Jones walked into me lounge and closed the door.

'Shari,' Payne said as he took a seat next to the couch, 'I have some photos that I'd like you to look at. Please tell me if you recognize anyone.'

He handed her a folder filled with pictures from Al-Jahani's webcam. Harrington's staff had decrypted the files and altered the brightness so the photographs were much clearer.

The instant she glanced at the first image, her face went pale. It was a reaction she couldn't fake, a combination of fear and hatred.

'Oh my God! That's the guard. The one who attacked me!'

She flipped to the next photo and nodded. And the one after that. She recognized them all.

'These are the guards. The ones from the tunnel.'

Payne smiled. 'We had a hunch they were.'

'Wait. Does this mean you caught them?'

'Not yet, but we're working on it. We're running down some leads.'

'Then where did you get these photos?'

'Actually, we got them from you. They were inside your package.'

'What do you mean?' she asked, confused. 'I had pictures of the guards?'

Payne told her the simplified version of the SD card, not wanting to overwhelm her with all the details. When he was done, he shifted her focus back to the photographs.

He said, 'I know you've been through a lot, and I know the last thing you want to do is stare at the guys who attacked you. But if you could, I'd like you to take a closer look at them. Maybe their faces will jog your memory. Something from the tunnel or something they said. At this point, any information would be helpful. Sometimes the smallest things mean the most.'

'Sure,' Shari said. 'Whatever you need.'

She took out the first picture and studied the face of the main guard. She stared at his eyes and mouth, trying to remember anything she could about the man who knocked her unconscious. 'He talked on his phone a lot. The first day he arrived he made, like, twenty calls.'

'Did you hear anything?' Jones asked.

'To be honest, the guy spooked me from the very beginning, so I stayed away from him as much as I could. I spent half the day avoiding him.'

'This was when? On Saturday?'

She nodded. 'Omar called them to remove the body.'

'What were they driving?' Kia wondered.

Payne looked at her and smiled. It was a good question.