For what? He shrugged to himself. To get ready, I guess.
But as they pulled up to the border crossing, with its high walls and thick metal gate, he saw very quickly that there was little he could have done, except remain quiet — Lennon’s sole warning to him.
His minder handed documents and cash to one of the Yemeni guards. They were all dressed in desert camos and bore assault rifles and pistols.
The guard pocketed the cash, offered a cursory glance at the passports, and sent them on their way.
Ruhi dozed, escaping the grating music. When Lennon roused him an hour later, the iPod had been shut off. But whatever relief that might have provided was instantly supplanted by Lennon pointing out where the jihadists had abducted Candace. He explained what took place in some detail, and then finished by saying, “Everything happened in minutes.”
Not everything, Ruhi thought. What are they doing to her now? How many fingernails does she have left? How many ways are they violating her?
Then he asked himself one last unavoidable question: How many people did she give up?
As Ruhi closed his eyes, Lennon spoke up:
“Do not worry, Ruhi. We have ample protection. Yemen is a lawless nation, so we make sure we bring the law with us. Do you know what the law is down here?”
“Guns?”
Lennon laughed. “Yes, many, many guns and the men we pay to carry them for us.”
Ruhi glanced out the windows and saw yellowish mountains that looked incapable of supporting life of any kind, save the microbes that he thought would outlive all humanity.
Their destination, Sana, was already on the verge of perishing. Not from internal strife, of which Yemen had plenty, but from a simple lack of water. The World Bank said it was likely to become the first global capital to run completely dry, a terrifying prognostication for the city’s two million inhabitants.
It was already drained of law and order. Al Qaeda members routinely benefited from not-so-mysterious prison breaks on a nearly regular basis, and jihadists almost took armed control of Aden, the capital, in 2012. Aden was also the site of a 2000 suicide bombing against the U.S.S. Cole that claimed the lives of seventeen sailors and injured thirty-one others, for which Al Qaeda was quick to claim credit. It was the most lethal attack against a U.S. Navy vessel in the previous twenty-five years.
Yemen was now number one in U.S. concerns about terrorism. So it came as no surprise when Lennon casually informed Ruhi that the failing state was bin Laden’s ancestral home.
More recently, it had become the principal target for U.S. drone attacks, which the complacent government, such as it was, had tried to cover up by claiming that its own military was targeting its citizens. The ruse — promulgated in exchange for considerable U.S. military hardware — had failed miserably, and the government that offered the hapless lie was reputed to be hanging on by its fingernails.
Hardly a shock, then, when Lennon told him that Iran was also getting involved in Yemen, sending weapons, especially for the Huthis in the north, the very region they were traversing. That ragged crew took their inspiration from Hezbollah. The Saudis had fought the Huthis in the late 1990s but failed to defeat them.
“How much longer?” was Ruhi’s response, feeling like a kid again in the back of his parents’ minivan.
“Go back to sleep, Ruhi. Let him have the back row,” Lennon ordered the Mabahith officers on either side of him.
Ruhi climbed past the men and curled into a fetal position, the only way to accommodate his long legs.
Lennon returned his gaze to the road, searching. Always searching.
Hamza “the lion” held his pistol to the bus driver’s head as they rolled off I-295. The fuel tank was almost empty. The hijacker looked jumpy to Emma, which worried her because he was the one in charge.
His walkie-talkie had squawked an hour ago with news that diesel would be delivered to the Paulsboro Travel Center, a truck stop. Hamza had demanded that the entire lot be cleared of vehicles before they arrived. But as they pulled in, Emma spotted a tow truck racing away with an old Buick.
At a glance, the truck stop looked like a ghost town. Then, as they drew closer, she saw that the station’s big plate-glass windows were shattered, and realized that the store had been looted. Even the pumps looked vandalized.
But Hamza’s remote contact had assured him that the fuel would be available. Still, there were no signs of anyone. There were, however, a trailer sitting unhitched at the back of the lot and a cattle truck closer to the fuel island.
“I said I wanted everything out of here,” Hamza shouted into his mouthpiece. He looked scared — and that frightened Emma, too. It was like everything was out of control and getting crazier by the moment.
He looked at the ceiling of the bus. His lips moved rapidly. His walkie-talkie came alive with a screech that made him jump. She did, too.
His contact person said the “authorities,” whoever they were, had told him that they had just now located a tanker to carry the diesel he wanted.
“That’s a lie,” Hamza yelled. “A lie! Tell them I’ll take a life for every lie, starting now. Do you hear? A life for a lie.”
“Hamza.” A distinctly new voice came on. “We have your fuel. We also have your friend in custody. Listen to me carefully. If we wanted to do something stupid, we could have sent a team to move that tanker and cattle truck. But we’re guessing you don’t want us anywhere near there. If we had cell phone service, we could send you satellite photos of the lot before the first cyberattack and after, so you could see that those two trucks have been there for almost a week. The cattle truck won’t start, and we don’t have a tractor to drive away with that trailer. That’s why they haven’t moved. So please listen carefully. We have a diesel delivery lined up. But it’s coming down from Long Island. It’s at least four hours away. If you’ve followed any news at all, you know pumps are dry everywhere. But we got fuel from a New York State armory, okay?”
“No, it is not okay. I said I wanted fuel when we stopped. I said if it wasn’t here, I would start killing. Now you listen to me because I’m going to let you hear that I mean what I say.”
He switched the mouthpiece to “transmit,” clipped it to his shirt, and stormed down the aisle.
Emma started crying. She knew Hamza was going to murder someone. She could see it in his eyes. They were strangely blank and unblinking, yet intensely dark, like pools deeper than death.
He grabbed Pastor William Sr., using his filleting knife to slice the gag from his mouth with no regard for the man’s swollen cheeks. Blood spilled onto his black suit, white shirt, and splattered his shiny blue tie. Then Hamza dragged the bound man to the front of the bus. Pastor William Sr. stumbled but stayed on his feet. Two of Hamza’s cohorts kept their weapons trained on everyone, including the driver. The bomber had his hand on the bomb trigger, as if ready to blow them all up at any second.
“Open the door!” Hamza screamed.
The driver obeyed immediately.
Hamza shoved the pastor down the stairs. William Sr. fell hard. He couldn’t break his fall with his hands cuffed behind his back. His face hit the pavement, bloodying his nose and lips.
Hamza pounced on him like a jackal, dragging him upright, keeping the pastor in front of him.
“Tell them what I am doing,” Hamza demanded as he jammed the muzzle of his pistol into the back of Pastor William Sr.’s head.
Everybody in the bus stared out the window. Most of the kids prayed. Emma was on her feet, along with all the other choir members on the far side of the aisle. She didn’t want to watch, but she did. She could hear Pastor William Sr. clearly: