The Acquaintance Read online

  She would come clean to him. “I have cancer”, she said simply. The words were met with silence. Ram was staring at her. His eyes were so intense that Nargis drew her arms around her. She felt like she was being X-rayed. “It’s true”, she said with a laugh that caught in her throat. “Invasive ductal carcinoma 2. I have been to two chemo appointments and they are already kicking my ass”, she said popping another pill for dramatic effect.

  “The past thirty hours haven’t been exactly recuperative for me.” She didn’t know what happened next, Ram was beside her. She felt his embrace as his arms enveloped her in a cocoon of security from which she never wanted to escape. “I’m so sorry”, he said softly. She could feel his breath on her air, it made her skin tingle. This was the most intimate she had ever been with anyone for a long time. She felt her walls melting as she felt his hands rove her back, soothing and comforting. “Whatever it is you need, I will be there for you.” She looked up at him, the sincerity on his face was heartbreaking. For a moment Nargis faltered. Maybe she could tell him the whole truth. He couldn’t possibly stay mad at a woman with cancer now could he? She opened her mouth, but the words that came out were, “So does that mean you’ll follow my orders without question or complain?” Ram shrugged, “Maybe 70% less complaining.”

  Nargis laughed. Ram stepped back and for a moment Nargis felt an unexplainable sense of loss, she wanted him close to her. She didn’t know why?

  CHAPTER 28

  The man was dressed in a white Gant shirt, the sleeves rolled up to his elbows, his collar unbuttoned. He wore stiff slacks that did not seem to crease. He was tall and lithe with a face that looked like a blank slate made of wet clay. He had unremarkable features that seemed like they could change on a whim. He had tan lines around his eyes where his frames would touch his skin. He wore spectacles, but right now they were resting on his head. He looked like an old accountant, but his gait and persona told a different story entirely. He was a man who came from wealth. The limited edition Ulysse Nardin on his wrist gave that away. His shoes were custom made alligator skin marc Jacobs. A man of taste. Nargis guessed he came from wealth. He was the epitome of the adage, “Money Shouts but Wealth whispers.”

  “We are not your run of the mill intelligence organisation Ms. Hussein. We only operate when a situation becomes untenable.”

  “What does that mean?”

  “Are you familiar with the story of Prahlad and Narasimha?”

  Nargis stared at him, what was with this guy and mythology. Of course she knew the story of Prahlad. A young boy, a devout worshipper of Lord Vishnu who is tormented by his demon of a step-father, Hiranyakashipu, a king who had been granted a boon that he could not be killed of anything born from a living womb, neither be killed by a man nor an animal, neither during the day nor at night, neither indoors nor outdoors, neither on land, nor in the air nor in water and of no man made weapon. However, after repeated attempts of filicide by Hiranyakashipu unto Prahlāda, Prahlāda was finally saved by Lord Narasimha, a prominent avatar of Vishnu who descended to demonstrate the quality of Divine rage and redemption by killing the demon king. Thus Narsimha to a being who is half man and half lion. The Narasimha fulfilled all the proper requirements by which the otherwise nearly-invincible Hiranyakashipu could be killed.

  After the death of his father, Prahlāda took his father’s kingdom and ruled peacefully and virtuously. He was known for his generosity and kindness.

  “Well in this scenario, Rizwan Zaid is Prahlad and Mahmoud Shahzad is Hiranyakashipu.”

  The words hit Nargis like a punch to her gut, but she still couldn’t process the information. Rizwan hadn’t shared much about his childhood with her. He had told her he had been raised by his uncle and aunt just like Nargis had. In one particularly vulnerable moment he had confessed to her that his mother had been lynched by a mob of village elders. She had been killed because she had lain with a man outside of marriage. His father had been driven out and just like that he had been orphaned.”

  “Rizwan is the son of a terrorist?”

  The acquaintance shook his head, “Absolutely not, but he’s been made to believe so.”

  “Why?”

  “That is a good question.” He stopped and faced her, his eyes probing into her very soul. She looked away after a few seconds of looking into the depths of his unnerving eyes. “What I’m about to tell you is classified information and of a very sensitive nature, I trust you will treat it as such.” Nargis shrugged in frustration. Enough with the cloak and dagger, just get on with it. “Very well, Ms. Hussein, Rizwan works for us, he is a spy, or rather a spy in training.”

  Nargis laughed out loud. This was ridiculous. Rizwan a spy? “Whoever you are, you have a perverse sense of humour. I just lost my husband and you bring me here to your little theatrical stage play to play a practical joke on me? I must applaud your commitment.” The man picked up the remote and clicked on the screen. Nargis watched as the screen filled with grainy footage shot from above. It showed a desert mountainous region. Hiking up a trail was a caravan of camels, Nargis watched mesmerised as the caravan stopped and a singular person broke off to continue his journey on foot. “What is this? What am I watching?”

  “You are watching a live drone feed over Afghanistan’s Wardak province. And that lone figure struggling his way up the mountain is your estranged husband.” The words felt like being kissed by a freight train. She looked at the man to see if he was joking. He looked stoic and patient, like a parent trying to explain something to their particularly dense child. “You’re lying, that can’t be Rizwan. It’s just not possible.” Nargis felt the air leave her lungs, she was suffocating, she heaved trying to catch her breath and doubled over. “Rizwan was a terrorist? Rizwan was a spy? Rizwan was a spy pretending to be a terrorist? This was all too much to take in, she needed air, she needed to get out of this sarcophagus of a place. She was shaking. The man placed a hand on her shoulder to steady her. “Don’t touch me”, she screamed and her voice echoed in the darkness. The man quietly handed her a paper bag to breathe into. He was still playing the part of the patient parent.

  “Ms. Hussein, I know this is a lot to take in, but believe me everything will make sense to you in time, and that is all I ask, to give me some of your time.” Nargis exhaled into the bag and felt the tightness in her chest ease. She didn’t trust this man one bit, but he seemed sincere.

  Her rationality didn’t budge, sincerity could be faked. But her gut told her that the man was telling her the truth. But she couldn’t trust her gut either, after how it had led her astray with Rizwan. “Good, you don’t trust me. You have good instincts. All I’m asking from you is to look at that screen and wait for a few minutes. We’re trying to get a better angle.”

  “A better angle for what?”, said Nargis, turning to the screen. “For that….”, said the man, and in an instant the lone figure looked up to the sky and the drone camera zoomed in. Nargis had only experienced the horrific experience of drowning once, when she was five and maama jaan had taken her to the community pool, she had strayed into the deep end and slipped out of her floatie. She could still feel the water hit her lungs and suffocate her in its embrace. She could feel the water clawing up her throat as she looked at the face on the screen. Bright as day, squinting up at the sun was her husband, Rizwan.

  “Right now, he is on a classified mission. I shouldn’t even be showing you this but…”

  “Then why are you showing it to me.” “Well you see Ms. Hussein, I believe that Rizwan is losing sight of himself, becoming too ambitious as it were. We fear he might be going rogue. We believe that all this talk of him being the heir to Shahzad has gone to his head. And if that is in fact the case, we might need someone to stop him. Someone who knows him intimately. Nargis stared at him. Was this guy serious?

  “What are you trying to do here? What is this birdwatcher bullshit?”, said Nargis. Birdwatcher was the british term for a spy. She had learned it while watching a documentary on the BBC
. The man laughed, “I’m impressed Ms. Husseinn you’re already familiar with the parlance. Birdwatcher is a nice word but we prefer the term Spooks, much more suitable to describe us.”

  “I am a Psychology major. I don’t know what you want or expect from me? What is it that you want from me?”, said Nargis walking in a daze as she took in her surroundings. They had reached an open space, cluttered with filing cabinets, cables and banks of computers. The man walked towards a filing cabinet and pulled open a drawer. This one was different from the others. The other cabinets were hulking behemoths spotted with oxidised metal and ancient dust. The one the man had pulled open was the smallest one in the entire room and also the shiniest. It bore no marks of age. It was new. It didn’t seem to follow any filing system at all. It certainly didn’t match the code of reference the other cabinets used. Nargis had observed the labels on the cabinets, they used a system of encrypted alphabetisation, confusing to the untrained eye but quite simple when you knew what you were looking at. She stared at the file in the man’s hands. “Nargis Hussein, district level swim champ, state level gymnastics champ. Athletic scholarship to JNU. Interned at the New York Philharmonic, proficient at the violin and piano. Proficient in six languages, seven if you count the least spoken language in the world. Nargis understood the reference. She was proficient in English, Hindi, Mandarin, French, German and Pashto, she had received certification for all of them from their respective embassies. But the seventh language the man spoke of, Nargis had learned in her bedroom using old text-books and with the help of her friend Andre. No one in the world knew that she could communicate using the unspoken language. The least spoken language in the world, Sign language. The thought that the man knew this intimate secret of hers simultaneously unnerved her but also gave him credibility when it came to her husband. The man smiled. He knew that he had her attention.

  “The question you should be asking me isn’t what you can do for me, but what I can do for you.”

  “And what is it that you can do for me?” The man clapped his hands together and made his way to her like a showman about to reveal his greatest attraction. He led her to a massive wall made of grey granite. It was imposing and intimidating, it went upwards for ages and disappeared into the darkness. “What do you see Ms. Hussein?” “A wall, a massive impenetrable wall, a dead end.”

  “That is where you’re wrong Ms. Hussein, for this isn’t a wall, but a door. We don’t sneak in through windows Ms. Hussein, we charge in through the front door. Here at HOME, the first thing you will learn is that every obstacle, every wall in your way hides a door to an opportunity. All you need to do is find the knob.” The man tapped a keypad on his palm and the wall before her parted. Nargis’ jaw hit the floor. The massive wall which didn’t even have a hairline seam in it but looked like one massive block of granite parted ways like the Red Sea to reveal the belly of the beast. HOMA in all its glory.

  “My real name is classified, but from this day forward I will simply be known as your acquaintance.”

  Two years later, on the acquaintance’s orders she had joined the CTU as a rookie agent.

  CHAPTER 29

  “Nargis wake up”, came a voice out of nowhere. She felt herself being jostled gently by the shoulders and she bolted awake. She had dozed off in her chair. When there was a ticking time bomb on the loose. She looked up to see Ram leaning over her. She recoiled and he backed away looking concerned. “Are you okay?” he asked, his eyes taking in her appearance. He was looking at her like she would be blown away by a strong gust of wind. All because she fell asleep after thirty-eight hours of wide-eye. Of course he would look at her like that. Then she remembered their conversation a short hour ago. She groaned. He knew about her illness now. She straightened up, sitting straight backed and attentive. She couldn’t show any signs of weakness now that he knew. Knowing Ram, he would be watching her even more closely, if that were even possible. Sharing her diagnosis had been a moment of weakness. She had no intention of sharing anything else with him. “Is there a reason you’re in my office Ram?”, she said with authority. Her tone reminded him who was boss. “We have a problem.”

  Nargis was wide awake now. Meaning Azhar. “She made contact?”

  “Well, not exactly.”

  Nargis was confused. “You better come with me”, said Ram leading the way towards the tech room where Jogi was hunched behind a massive bank of monitors.

  “What’s happening?”

  “We just flagged a 100 call in the south region reporting a kidnapping. The woman named the missing as her daughter Amina. She is at the police station right now”, said Jogi. Nargis was out the door towards the South Region police station with Ram in tow. “If we have any trouble with jurisdictional issues I want you to finesse the situation. There is no way we’re letting that woman screw with us. “I know why I’m here Nargis, and once again contrary to what you might think, I’m damn good at my job.”

  Nargis bit back the retort that was forming on her tongue. She opened the driver’s side door to the car and saw Ram eye her warily. What now? “Maybe you should stay back while I go get this perp.”

  “Excuse me?”, said Nargis acidly. Ram sighed, “Listen, you honestly don’t look so good, you really need to rest. Besides, there is no one in there to guard our assets besides tweedle dee and tweedle dum. I think they’ll need someone of your calibre to hold down the fort.”

  Don’t patronise me Ram. But you know what, you’re right, jurisdiction be damned, I’ll handle Azhar while you see to our guests.”

  As they stared each other down. Out of the corner of her eye, Nargis noticed a black SUV thundering towards them. Nargis reacted on instinct, she drew her side-arm and fired at the approaching vehicle. The windshield shattered and the car veered dangerously close to her before stopping. “Put your hands where I can see them”, yelled Nargis, her weapon levelled at the driver who had his hands raised. Ram was on her other side covering the passenger. “Get out of the car”, she instructed threateningly, her aim not wavering from the driver. She stepped back and swept her gaze over the rest of the car. It appeared to be empty. “Get on your knees”, she said and the driver obliged. He dropped to his knees and interlocked his fingers over his head. His passenger did the same. Nargis covered them both while Ram inspected the car. “It’s clean”, he said. “Who are you?”, said Nargis. “We are the assigned security detail for Dead drop alpha”, said the driver, nodding his chin towards the house.” Nargis didn’t believe him. She pressed her gun to the driver’s temple. “I will ask you again. Who are you? Who sent you here?”

  “Director Abraham”, said the driver.

  “Do you have your bonafides?”, asked Nargis. The men looked at each other. They were dressed in identical all-black ensembles of tee shirt, jeans, and service boots. They were both military through and through, clean shaven, buzz-cuts and facial hair on the driver that was measured with a side ruler. Ram stepped forward. Bona fides were credentials of agents proving their identity. “I have credentials in my right breast pocket if you’ll allow me.”

  “Go on.” Said Nargis. “Slowly.”

  The driver reached into his inner pocket and produced a leather billfold, gingerly he handed it to Nargis. She flipped it open and studied its contents. “Shit”, she whispered again, these were John’s men, they had been sent here to keep an eye on her. Pay back for insulting him earlier no question. Only he could be so petty as to jeopardize an intelligence operation over his ego. “What is your assignment?”, she asked.

  “We were asked to provide security details for Dead drop alpha. That is all we know Ma’am. We report to the Case Officer of Alpha House.” Sure you do, thought Nargis as she lowered her weapon. Their bona fides were clean. They were military intelligence alright. But she seriously suspected that they reported to her directly. More likely was the fact that they were cut-outs, agents who would be Abraham’s eyes and ears in what was going on at the dead drop. She couldn’t let them inside. She had two of her tr
usted babysitters, watching over Amina and Rizwan, she wouldn’t need more. Contrary to what Ram or anyone else might think.

  “I did not request any additional bodies”, said Nargis to the two men before her who looked like professional wrestlers. “Director Abraham’s orders ma’am.”

  “Well, I can’t let you in there. There is extremely sensitive intelligence we are dealing with inside that building and I can’t have unvetted agents waltzing in and out of my facility.”

  “You’ll have to take that up with the director ma’am”, shrugged the driver. He seemed like he was in charge. “Think again soldier. You said you report to the CO of Alpha House, well you got her”, the driver turned to her with a look of disbelief on his face. Nargis was so used to the reaction that it barely registered. A woman leading an operation was always a noteworthy event, but never for the right reasons. Nargis continued as if nothing had happened. “As CO of Alpha House, I’m ordering you to man the gates, no one comes in, no one goes out, are we clear?” The men didn’t respond. “Are we clear?”, she said in a louder voice. Both men nodded. “Well on your feet.” The men obliged.