Sayed stares at me intensely. The professor lays his pencil aside, braces himself against the desk, lifts his chin, and looks me straight in the eyes. “It’s not just any mission,” he informs me.
I don’t turn away.
“We’re talking about an operation of a unique kind,” the professor goes on, slightly unsettled by my stiffness and my silence. “The West has left us no choice. Sayed’s just back from Baghdad. The situation there is alarming. Iraq’s imploding, and its people are on the verge of civil war. If we don’t act quickly, the region will go up in flames and never recover.”
“The Shi’a and the Sunnis are tearing one another to pieces,” Sayed adds. “The spirit of revenge is growing stronger every day.”
“I think it’s you two who are wasting time,” I say. “Tell me what you expect of me and I’ll do it.”
The professor freezes, his hand on his pencil. The two men exchange furtive glances. The professor’s the first to react, holding the pencil suspended in the air. “It’s not an ordinary mission,” he says. “The weapon we’re entrusting to you is both effective and undetectable. No scanner will reveal it; no search will find it. It makes no difference how you carry it. You can do so naked, if that appeals to you. The enemy won’t detect anything.”
“I’m listening.”
The pencil touches the blotter, rises slowly, comes down on a pile of paper, and doesn’t move again. Sayed thrusts his hands between his thighs. A heavy silence weighs like a leaden cape on the three of us. One or two unbearable minutes pass. Far off, we can hear the hum of an air conditioner, or perhaps a printer. The professor picks up his pencil again, turning it round and round in his fingers. He knows that this is the decisive moment, and he fears it. After having cleared his throat and clenched his fists, he gathers himself and says abruptly, “The weapon in question is a virus.”
I don’t flinch, nor do I completely understand what he’s said. I don’t see the connection with the mission. The word virus passes through my consciousness. A strange term, I think, but it leaves me with a feeling of déjà vu. What’s a virus? Where have I heard that word? It comes back to me, yet I still can’t manage to situate it properly. Then the examinations, the X rays, and the medications fall into place in the puzzle, and the word virus slowly, bit by bit, gives up its secret. Microbe, microorganism, flu, illness, epidemic, treatment, hospitalization — all sorts of stereotyped images parade through my head, mingle, and blur…. However, I still don’t see the connection.
Sayed sits beside me, unmoving, as tense as a bowstring. The professor continues his explanation. “A revolutionary virus. I’ve spent years perfecting it. Untold amounts of money have been sunk into this project. Men have given their lives to make it possible.”
What’s he telling me?
“A virus,” the professor repeats.
“I understand. So what’s the problem?”
“The only problem is you. Are you game for the mission or not?”
“I never back down.”
“You’ll be the person carrying the virus.”
I’m having trouble following him. Something in his words escapes me. I’m not digesting them. It’s as though I’ve become autistic. The professor continues: “All those tests and medications were designed to determine whether your body would be fit to receive it. Your physical reactions have been impeccable.”
Only now do I see the light; all at once, everything becomes clear in my mind. The weapon in question is a virus. My mission consists in carrying a virus. That’s it; I’ve been physically prepared to receive a virus. A virus. My weapon, my bomb, my kamikaze airplane…
Sayed tries to grab my wrist; I avoid his touch.
“You look surprised,” the professor tells me.
“I am. But that’s all.”
“Is there a problem?” Sayed inquires.
“There’s no problem,” I say curtly.
The virologist tries to follow up. “We have—”
“Professor, I’m telling you there’s no problem. Virus or bomb, what’s the difference? You don’t need to explain the why; just tell me the when and the where. I’m neither more nor less brave than the Iraqis who are dying every day in my country. When I agreed to follow Sayed, I divorced myself from life. I’m a dead man waiting for a decent burial.”
“I never doubted your determination for a second,” Sayed tells me, his voice shaking a little.
“In that case, why not move directly to concrete matters? When will I have the…the honor of serving my Cause?”
“In five days,” the professor replies.
“Why not today?”
“We’re adhering to a strict schedule.”
“Very well. I won’t leave my hotel. You can come and fetch me whenever you want — the sooner the better. I can’t wait to recover my soul.”
Sayed dismisses Shakir and invites me to get into his car. We drive across half the city without saying a word. I sense that he’s searching for words but not finding any. Once, unable to stand the silence, he reaches for the radio and then draws his hand back. It’s raining very hard again. The buildings seem to submit to the deluge with resignation. Their gloominess puts me in mind of the tramp I watched not long ago from the window of my hotel room.
We pass through a neighborhood with ravaged buildings. The marks of war take a long time to erase. Work sites devour large sections of the city, bristling with cranes, their bulldozers attacking the ruins like pit bulls. At an intersection, two drivers are screaming at each other; their cars have just collided. Shards of glass lie scattered on the asphalt. Sayed runs a red light and nearly crashes into a car that suddenly appears out of a side street. Drivers on all sides angrily blow their horns at us. Sayed doesn’t hear them. He’s lost in whatever’s on his mind.
We take the coastal road. The sea is stormy, as though tormented by an immense anger. Some vessels lie in the roadstead; in the general grayness, they look like phantom ships.
We drive about forty kilometers before Sayed emerges from his fog. He discovers that he’s missed his turn, twists his head around to get his bearings, abruptly veers onto the shoulder of the road, brings the car to a stop, and waits until he can put his thoughts into some order. Then he says, “It’s a very important mission. Very, very important. I didn’t tell you anything about the virus because no one must know. And I really believed, after all those visits to the clinic, that you would start figuring it out yourself…. Do you understand what I’m saying? It may look to you as though I kept quiet because I wanted to confront you with a fait accompli, but that’s not the case. As of right now, nothing’s set in stone. Please don’t think there’s any pressure on you; please don’t imagine there’s been any breach of trust. If you don’t consider yourself ready, or if this mission doesn’t suit you, you can back out and no one will hold it against you. I just want to assure you that the next candidate won’t be treated any differently. He won’t know anything until the last moment, either. For our security and for the success of the mission, we have to operate this way.”
“Are you afraid I’m not up to it?”
“No!” he cried out before he could stop himself. His finger joints whitened as he clutched the steering wheel. “I’m sorry, I didn’t mean to raise my voice. I’m just confused, that’s all. If you felt cheated or trapped, I wouldn’t forgive myself. I warned you in Baghdad that this would be a mission unlike any other. I couldn’t tell you anything more than that. Do you understand?”