Janus was encompassed with a dark mist. His spirit was crying out desperately inside for even a single chance to find his way out of the thick, cold murk; a chance to see the sun of life in an azure, timeless sky, and to feel its warm, vibrant rays against his face once again. Yet deep down in his heart, he knew that any such hope was merely wishful thinking.
Black oblivion was easier to accept.
MERSHAD
Mershad Shahab sat quietly and morosely in his assigned room at the university dormitory.
For Mershad the small space was a veritable sanctuary. Just outside the door to that room was a world growing darker and more unsettling by the day.
The television monitor in his room remained dark, and Mershad was increasingly reticent to turn it on. To him, it was just a window to the core of the very things that he so badly wanted to escape from.
The government of the United States had gone through the appearance of a deliberation, but in truth it was little more than a formality. Without much delay, the two chambers of Congress had authorized the president to use force in an ongoing dispute with a much smaller, weaker country far to the east.
That country, Iraq, just happened to be the birthplace of Mershad’s parents, and was the current residence of nearly all of his blood relatives. Mershad, his two brothers, and his sister were the first in the entire family to be born in the USA.
Mershad’s ancestral lands were indeed ruled by a heavy-handed dictator, but the strongman was of little threat to anyone beyond the country’s borders. The country’s military and economic power had eroded under withering sanctions in place for well more than a decade. The country could not even sustain electric power in its largest cities anymore, and its most basic infrastructure was crumbling.
Mershad could not believe the public campaign that had been unleashed to build up support for an attack. To him, the image created by the media versus the reality that he was well aware of was staggering.
It was heavily publicized that Iraq possessed weapons of great destructive potential, and would use them if not soon overthrown. Also put forth was the idea that the strongman ruler was in league with shadowy militants bent on holy war.
That postulation, to Mershad’s amazement, ignored the seemingly obvious fact that those same militant organizations openly deemed the strongman to be one of their prime enemies. He was considered far too secular and worldly in their eyes, and was an opponent of their dreams of outright religious rule.
The media was filled with stories and images that painted a dark and foreboding picture of the dictator and the power that he wielded in Iraq. The tone of the stories had often taken on a hysterical and frenzied pitch. If one were to believe the reports, the strongman was a dire and immediate existential threat to the USA.
Underneath all of it, as Mershad well knew, were a couple of great prizes to be claimed. Iraq sat astride one of the world’s largest sources of oil. Even more valuable in a political world, its location offered control of a strategic geography for wielding authority over the entire Middle East.
Through massive diplomacy, in many instances using outright bribery or coercion, a great coalition of nations was brought together. A huge military force was gradually amassed on the borders of Iraq, and it soon became apparent to all but the most naive that war was imminent.
The actual war had begun with a massive bombing conducted by hordes of aircraft and missiles. News networks, beamed across satellites, were awash with images of the tremendous, devastating assault. The highly surgical bombing attack was aided by new space-based weapon systems, technological wonders that filled the general public with an eerie sense of awe.
Shortly after the assault had begun, Mershad had heard an eruption of elated, spirited cheers from other students in the dormitory, as if they were spectators gathered at some sort of sporting event. Whenever he recalled those whoops of exuberance afterwards, he felt a chill seep into him.
Up and down the halls, students had gathered around the televisions, eating and drinking as if they were observing a sporting event, watching the images of destruction raining down upon Baghdad.
Mershad’s extended family lived within that very same capital, and each vivid scene of the attack frightened and saddened him. Each massive explosion indicated within the reports, and shown in all their terrible might on the video coverage, could easily have been the last living moment of members of Mershad’s very own family.
They were simple people, caught up in events far beyond their control. Their jobs as electricians, construction workers, working in restaurants, running small shops and the like were pursuits no different than those of the people of the USA.
Mershad had never personally been to his ancestral nation before, but he knew that the people of Iraq, such as his relatives, posed no grave threat to the world. Deep pain wracked Mershad’s heart as he imagined the immense fear that must have been gripping his relatives and the millions of people who had been summarily condemned within that country.
Tallies of the destruction of infrastructure, casualty estimates, and sorties were little more than statistics for some sort of diabolical game. Interviewed military personnel seemed to barely be able to suppress the excitement that they felt towards the thunderous displays of martial prowess.
Mantras speaking of patriotism and troop support were repeated time and time again in the inundating media coverage. To the public, the whole episode was presented as another chapter in the stark conflict of good versus evil.
The only thing wrong with the scenario was that the defined enemy included Mershad’s poor, struggling, extended family, and so very many others like them. Mershad wanted to scream out that good, real people were dying or having their lives irrevocably eviscerated.
The vivid new images pouring across the screens each day became increasingly chilling to Mershad’s soul.
Resentment had quickly grown within Mershad towards the other students. It absolutely horrified him that most of the students did little to question or to even think about what was happening, and the underlying motivations. Only a few scattered bands of students bothered to voice any kind of opposition or protest. They were dismissed largely as malcontents, misguided or ignorant at best, unpatriotic to the edge of being treasonous at worst.
Then there was the way that his fellow citizens and students had begun to treat him. That was by far the most troubling for Mershad, a loyal USA citizen from the first second of his life onward.
The obvious stares, jostles, and insults had begun, and soon increased with frequency, a great many targeting his ethnicity. It was as if he were some covert sympathizer with the enemy, or a potential terrorist.
He had read the accounts of people physically assaulting others with his same ethnic background. He had to steel his mind to the relentless mental assault brought on by the harassment that he suffered. He also had to keep his awareness up, lest he find himself becoming a victim to an especially violent assault himself.
In a torturous silence, he feared and sorrowed for his family, and prayed that they might somehow escape the devastating onslaught. He also feared for the people of the country that he had pledged his allegiance to, many of whom had suddenly become so hostile to him.
As the days wore on, and the reports of destruction and civilian emergencies mounted ever higher, Mershad’s heart grew unbearably heavier. He could do nothing to immunize or numb himself to the terrible realities.
Then matters became even worse. Some violent attacks had occurred around the world on interests related to the great economic powers of the United Nations. The attacks on innocent lives served to spiral the paranoia directed towards those of Mershad’s ethnicity.