Savas shook his head. “You're using this argument on the wrong man, Husaam. I'm not sure what I believe. I very nearly became violent with the priest of the church where I was an altar boy, and this crazy man still hears my confessions. Confessions mostly about how much I don't know, and how I can't see God.”
Jordan nodded. “But my point is that if we are to judge a belief system by the actions of any group that claims to act in its name, every creed that exists or has existed will fall. Just as great beauty and selfless service to humanity has come from Christianity, so, too, from Islam.” He paused for a moment, considering his next words.
“John, Islam is very personal for me. I grew up in poverty, abandoned by my parents, rejected by society — both black and white. I joined a gang before I could shave. At least there I mattered, I had a family. There was a code of honor and loyalty. The gang gave me a sense of worth and purpose society had denied me. But it was a life of sin. In prison as an adolescent, an imam who had emigrated from Africa was making the rounds. I was ready to hear what he had to say. I was ready to open myself to something larger and to find my place with God.”
His eyes had a faraway look. He smiled softly.
“Do you know what the al-Hajar-ul-Aswad is?”
Savas shook his head.
“It is more commonly known as the Black Stone.”
“Yes,” Savas dredged his memory. “The meteorite in Mecca. Where the pilgrims go every year.”
“Yes. It is one of the Five Pillars of Islam to make at least one pilgrimage to Mecca in a Muslim's lifetime. There the pilgrims congregate at the al-Masjid al-Haram Mosque in Saudi Arabia, and in the center of this mosque is the holiest site in all of Islam — the Kaaba. The Kaaba is a cube carved out of granite from the hillsides, covered with a black silk curtain decorated with gold-embroidered calligraphy, its four corners pointing in the four directions of the compass. It is the site to which we Muslims pray five times a day.”
Jordan's eyes appeared to gaze far off, as if trying to glimpse the site itself. “At the eastern-most corner of the Kaaba is the Black Stone. According to our tradition, it fell from Heaven during the time of Adam and Eve. After the Fall, it was hidden by the Angels until Abraham rebuilt the Kaaba, and then the Arch-Angel Gabriel brought it to him from its keeping place.”
Jordan paused for emphasis and turned toward Savas. “Muslims believe, John, that when the Kaaba fell to the earth from the heavens, the stone was not black but a blinding white. It has since absorbed, year after year, the crimes, the lies, the pain, the torture, the murder, poverty, and starvation — in short, the sins of mankind. The white stone from above turned as solid black as the evening sky from our sins. So you see, Muslims do not turn away from this truth, that we are all both light and dark. Someday, I will make the pilgrimage, the Hajj, and I will walk around the Kaaba, find my way to the Black Stone, and kiss it as did the Prophet.”
He nearly recited. “I believe that there is no god but Allah, and that Mohammed is his Prophet. Not despite any evils of Islam, but because of its beauties, and its call to submission to God in the face of the evils every nation, every creed, and every person has committed.”
Savas held his gaze. “How do we know that the evil itself isn't somehow built into many of the beliefs that claim to save us from them? For all the talk of salvation, there seems to be scant evidence that anyone has been saved by any of these faiths. We keep repeating the same old evils, in old as well as new forms. If religion and faith are real, and change us, and heal us, and remake us, then I have to ask why this is the case. I've called to God, and listened, but so far I haven't heard anything.”
Jordan smiled. “But you are honest! How much closer to God you are than so many who deceive themselves. When Muslims, Christians, or Hindus, whoever, do evil in the name of God, they listen not to God but only to themselves, their fears, their inadequacies. At least you will not create a false god to serve your own needs. I will have hope for you yet!”
“That's fine. Hope is good,” said Savas with resignation. “Just let's keep the volume down on all this religious hoping, if you would.”
Before Jordan could speak, Manuel Hernandez came crashing down the hallway, his awkward gait nearly a full run. Too many long hours hunched over a computer screen had given him the dough-boy physique of a programmer, and he panted, struggling for air as he leaned over to catch his breath, his long brown hair hanging over his face and covering it, his brushy beard the only part sticking out from under the hair. He gasped out anxious words.
“John, we've got a situation.”
45
Savas rolled his eyes. He wasn't sure he even knew what that meant anymore. “What, another one? Get back to me after the other twenty-three clear, Manuel. I don't have time for another one.”
“No, I mean a situation,” he wheezed out the last word, trying hard to place emphasis.
Savas opened his palms toward him. “OK, shoot.”
“We've been hacked.”
Jordan glanced toward him, his eyebrows raised. Savas stood there stunned for a moment, trying to come to terms with the implications. “What? I thought you said your security setup was like Fort Knox.”
“No, not us directly. Someone hacked into Personnel, Accounting, perhaps a few other departments. I don't know the extent of it yet. Hell, they don't even know it happened yet.” Hernandez stood straight up now, hands off his knees, recovering from his sprint to John's office. He saw the confusion in the other two faces in front of him.
“See, they did try to hack us, and then when they failed, they tried to go through other internal servers — hack into those, use internal networks to find security holes, break into our stuff that way. Well, that didn't work either, as I've walled us off even from the FBI.”
“You're one paranoid geek, Manuel.”
“Yeah, thanks. So, we're not compromised. But just about everyone I've checked in the building is.”
“How long have you known this?”
“Ten minutes, John. I ran over here as soon as I was sure and had some idea about the extent of it.”
“Well, that's ten minutes too long. You get up to Larry's office. Tell that bulldog guarding outside I sent you priority. Get Larry to write you a get-out-of-Intel-Free pass, and get up to those departments and try to figure out what the hell is going on.”
“Timing's what's worrying me,” interrupted Hernandez. Jordan looked over at Savas and nodded.
“I mean, right when we start to get a lock on this guy, this Gunn-dude, we get hacked. And, let me tell you, they were aiming for us, John, following the tracks, I mean, of all the offices and groups. These were black hats on a mission. They wanted us.”
Savas nodded. “Get up to Larry and find out all you can. Track them through this if you can. Maybe we can find out who or where they are.”
“OK. I'm on it. But I'm done running for the day.” Hernandez turned around and walked briskly back down the hallway.
“You think it's Gunn?” asked Savas.
Jordan nodded. “This looks like a pro job, and if there's one thing we know about Mjolnir, it's that they are professionals. Only the connection with Gunn would lead a bunch of skilled hackers to focus on you and your people. In some ways, it's just more evidence that we are on the right track.”
“Not some random cyber attack?”