Boy of fire and earth, p.27
Boy of Fire and Earth, page 27
In Clifton, outside the mazaar, an addict wakes from a terrible dream. He rolls over, his arm numb from being pressed between his head and the hard concrete sidewalk. The feet of another addict twitch close to his face and he is offended by the blistered soles he is forced to stare at when he wakes. His answer is to climb on top of the unconscious man and push his thumb into the man’s eye. None of the other addicts sprawled around him stir and so he sits alone, staring at the final twitches of the dead body and smiles at how the single eye that stares blankly up at the sky looks so much like the single eye he saw staring at him in his dream.
In an apartment in Gulshan, a woman returns from a twelve-hour shift at a call centre, walks into the house without greeting her parents, takes a knife out of the kitchen drawer and plunges it into her own left eye, carving a hole under her brow. Then, before she loses consciousness, she smears a word onto the wall with a finger coated in blood.
Screams course through the city, a river of sound with a tragic undertow. Tributaries contribute to the flow, pain streaming through them like shoals of black fish.
At a traffic light on Tipu Sultan Road, a man hands his wallet and cellphone through the car window to the teenager on a motorbike. The teenager takes it, and as he is about to put the gun back into the waistband of his jeans, he thinks he hears the man say a single word. The sound startles him and he flinches, his finger still curled around the trigger flexing. A bullet punches through the man’s eye, tunnelling through his skull. The boy on the motorbike speeds away, repeating the word to himself, over and over.
In Korangi, outside a biscuit factory, three boys are run over by a truck. The driver stops and reverses over them, then drives forward again. Reverse. Forward. Repeat. And again. Finally, he is pulled from the truck by a crowd of horrified bystanders. As he drowns under a hail of fists, the word he is screaming over and over is transferred to them like a virus, until they are all screaming it.
Everywhere in Karachi, death screams its name triumphantly. The same name over and over. By murderers and killers, by old people feeling life slip away, and by the sick who cannot struggle against their illnesses any longer.
‘Dajjal!’ they say.
‘Dajjal!’
So close that he can smell the blood – but still too far to taste it – Dajjal smiles.
‘Soon,’ he says.
There was no clock in the room and so Wahid had no way of knowing how long he paced. Eventually, more exhausted by a sense of despair than exertion, he slumped down in the corner and buried his head in his hands. He tried to cry, hoping tears might relieve the frustration, but none came. Twice he called out to Iblis, first whispering the name and then trying it louder. No one appeared. The room stayed as brightly lit and empty as before.
After some time, when he was nodding off from boredom, a soldier brought him food. He devoured the mountain of steaming biryani, shovelling large bites into his mouth with barely a breath between them. Eating reminded him of his mother, and he realised she would have found out about his disappearance by now. Eventually, with a full stomach and a mind stretched thin with worry, he fell asleep.
A distant booming pulled him awake. Muffled thunder crashed in the distance, the first blast followed by another. Wahid lifted his head off the table and stretched his arms, stiffened joints popping loudly. The sound continued when he stopped moving, a rattle of firecracker replies to the deeper rumbling thunder. Just as his mind cleared enough to recognise them as gunfire, the entire room shook violently. Wahid’s chair jolted, the walls thrummed and the table clattered noisily as it danced across the floor. He got up and ran to the door, thumping on it hard.
‘Hello,’ he screamed, ‘what’s going on? Hello?’
From the other side came an aggressive, commanding man’s voice. ‘Oy! You aren’t supposed to be here!’
‘But you put me here,’ Wahid yelled into the flat steel door. He was about to thump his fist against it again when the cacophonous crash of gunfire punched through, loud enough to startle him away from the door. It was followed by screaming that started in the lower registers of rage, and then peaked as it switched into a yelp of pain. There was a wet crunching sound and then silence.
Wahid cautiously approached the door again.
‘Hello? What’s—’
There was another boom, closer than those previous. The door shuddered on its hinges, a bulge popping in its centre. Wahid stepped back, taking several steps until he was against the far wall, his fists raised to chest height.
The door swung open so hard, it smashed against the wall and almost bounced back shut again. A hand pushed against it and it swung in again, staying open this time. Framed in the entrance, wearing only a pair of blood-darkened jeans, his skinny torso riddled with punctures and deep gashes, was Hamza.
‘’Sup,’ he grinned.
‘Hamza!’ Wahid shrieked and ran across the room, throwing his arms around his friend. The two of them stood there, hugging each other tight for several seconds.
‘God,’ said Hamza, ‘you smell terrible. Get off!’
‘I thought you were dead?’ said Wahid, wiping tears away as he held Hamza at arm’s length.
‘I was,’ replied Hamza.
That was when Wahid realised how cold Hamza’s skin was under his grip. The flesh lacked any warmth and felt raw, like frozen meat. Wahid took in the damage done to Hamza’s body; the clean puncture wounds in his chest and stomach that went so deep he could see nothing but darkness inside each, and the jagged slice across his neck that still looked fresh enough to be bleeding. There was blood smeared across his face and his hands glistened red, but Wahid could tell that none of it came from Hamza.
‘I don’t understand,’ Wahid said.
‘Look, I can explain later. In detail. For now, yeah,
I died. I was killed by some sick fuck looking for you.’
‘I know,’ said Wahid, ‘he tried to kill me, too.’
‘Yeah, sorry,’ said Hamza, looking embarrassed. ‘I think I might have told him where you were. When he was torturing me. I tried not to but . . .’
‘It doesn’t matter. You’re alive. That’s all that matters.
I thought you were dead.’
‘I was. I died and I went to . . . a place. Arif was there. And your father. They sent me back to save you.’
Wahid took a step away from Hamza, still holding his hand. ‘My father? You saw Abbu? What do you mean?’
‘Like I said man, later. We gotta get the fuck outta here first.’
Wahid followed Hamza out into the corridor. The soldier who had brought him a plate of biryani lay face down on the ground. His gun was shattered next to him.
‘Did you do that?’
‘Yeah,’ grinned Hamza, ‘I’m like a super ninja zombie now. It’s quite cool actually.’
There was another distant rumbling, then two loud blasts somewhere overhead. The entire hallway quaked in response, Hamza and Wahid barely keeping their balance.
‘Did you do that too? What is that?’
‘No. That’s not me,’ replied Hamza. ‘I don’t know what it is. It was happening when I got here. Come on, let’s get out this way. I think there’s an exit ahead.’
Hamza led Wahid to the end of the corridor, blocked by another steel door. He tried the handle, found it unyielding and then pushed down on it. There was the wail of metal complaining and then the door sprang open. The two stepped through and found themselves at the foot of a wide stairway leading up. They raced up it, taking two steps at a time as the thunderous blasts continued somewhere in the distance, growing louder the higher they got. Hamza reached the landing first and almost slipped back down the stairs as his foot slid out from underneath him. Wahid, coming up behind, grabbed him in time.
‘Fuuuuuuck,’ said Hamza, staring at the puddle of blood he had stepped in.
A pair of soldiers lay on the ground in front of them. The side of one’s head had been excavated in a messy scoop. The other lay face down, even though he was on his back, his neck twisted around so neatly that the skin was barely creased. Hamza and Wahid looked up from the bodies in front of them to the man standing ahead. Their first impression was of a Star Wars stormtrooper, except dressed entirely in black. Black tinted goggles over a black gas mask, black jacket under a black bulletproof vest, even black pants under black thigh and shin pads. The figure stood utterly still, regarding them with a massive assault rifle clasped in both hands.
‘You,’ said the man, his voice muffled by the gas mask.
Then, from inside the man’s head, emerged a Marid. A skull full of night, with burning crescent eyes, streaming out like a soul evacuating a body.
‘You,’ the Marid hissed.
Before it could say any more, flames exploded around it. The fire had arced from Wahid faster than even he could see. As the man housing the Marid fell to the ground, flames curling around his writhing body, Wahid leaped over the dead soldiers in front of him. Skidding in blood, he regained his balance and raced over to the burning man, just in time to grab a hold of the Marid as it climbed out of the body and tried to throw itself away from the reach of the flames. Black skin sizzled under Wahid’s grip and the Marid screamed in agony.
‘What the fuck is going on here?’ roared Wahid, raising a fist against its face. The Marid gasped as he released the arm, smoke rising thickly between them, obscuring all but Wahid’s vision. The man whose body the Marid had been inhabiting let out a single subdued sigh and then stilled, fire still dancing across him. The ski mask over his face had caught, and his head was a twisting mass of orange streamers.
‘What the fuck was that?’ screamed Hamza, still standing on the topmost step.
‘Please,’ wailed the Marid, ‘I didn’t want to.’
‘What. Is. Going. On,’ growled Wahid, fire crackling hungrily in one eye.
‘I was forced to. We all were. He has the ring. We have no choice,’ the Marid whimpered.
Wahid, so full of anger that speaking was an effort, repeated his question. Somewhere in the distance, explosions and gunfire continued.
‘The man. He has Sulayman’s ring. With it he forced us to come here. We found bodies to fill and he made us attack this place. There is something he wants from here.’
‘Does he want me?’ yelled Wahid. ‘Who is he? Where is he?’
‘How did you do that?’ Hamza shouted, pointing at the burning body and then at Wahid.
‘Bombs,’ the Marid cried out, ‘he wants the nuclear bombs.’
A door ahead of them swung open and three soldiers ran into the hall, guns levelled at Wahid.
Then everything happened at once.
‘Stop,’ one of the soldiers screamed. Wahid looked up, just in time to see the flash of gunfire. By the time he registered the deafening clatter, the first bullet sliced across his cheek. The rest would have made several entries into his face had they not thudded into Hamza. He crouched in front of Wahid, a wide grin on his face as the bullets punched in his back. Then he blurred. A smudge of movement, too fast to track, that leaped backwards and slammed into the closest of the soldiers. Wahid clutched the side of his face, feeling blood trickle from a thin gash just below his burning eye. The Marid stole the opportunity and shoved at Wahid, pushing him back with immense force even as its palms seared on contact. As Wahid landed on his back, sliding towards the dead bodies behind him, the Marid bounded at the wall next to them, passing through it as effortlessly as if it were fog. Wahid shouted in anger as it disappeared into the concrete, just as the last of the three soldiers collapsed to the ground.
An abrupt silence filled the hallway, both friends staring at each other with wide eyes.
‘How did you do that?’ said Wahid, still on the ground.
‘I told you, I’m a ninja zombie. More importantly, how the fuck did you do that? Your eye was on fire and you set that guy on fire and what the hell was that black thing?’
Hamza walked over and helped Wahid to his feet.
‘You’re not the only one with powers.’
‘No shit. What was that?’
‘I don’t know. I think I can make it happen, but the two times it’s happened before it kinda happened by itself.’
‘Dude, that was like . . . like Cyclops from the X-Men. You blasted that guy with your eye. And what was that black thing?’
‘It was a djinn. It turns out I’m half djinn. My mother . . . you saw Abbu, did he say anything? About my mother being a djinn?’
‘Auntie is a djinn?’
‘No. Not my mother. I mean—’
Another blast, much louder than any of those before. The force of it splintered the ground and threw both against the wall. The lights overhead flickered, then died.
‘What the hell is going on out there?’ said Hamza, reaching out for Wahid in the dark.
‘I don’t know but we really need to get out of here fast. I can’t see anything.’
Hamza found Wahid’s hand, cold fingers wrapping around Wahid’s wrist.
‘I can see a bit, come on.’
They stumbled through a series of corridors, feeling their way up two more flights of stairs. No one else appeared in their path. The only evidence that they were headed towards the exit was the steadily increasing sounds of gunfire and explosions. Finally, they pushed through yet another door and stepped into night.
Wahid’s first thought was that the sky was burning. A low ceiling of flame roiled over their heads, painting the world violent ochre. Heated winds buffeted them, burning the air in Wahid’s lungs so that it felt like he was breathing in charcoal fumes. Hamza said something but Wahid couldn’t make it out over the immense roaring that sounded like every motorcycle in Karachi gunning its engine simultaneously. Flat tarmac stretched out ahead of them, its surface reflecting the overhead blaze. Hamza grabbed Wahid by the shoulder and pointed ahead. In front of them lay the skeletal remains of what must have been a cargo plane. A cumulus of black smoke fumed from the wreckage, metal ribs glowing neon bright, jutted from the undulent mass.
Another plane some yards ahead of it was still whole, its green camouflage skin charred by proximity. On the ground beneath it were several bodies. Even from a distance Wahid could see that they were not whole. More fires rose from craters around the planes, massive holes gouged out and filled with pools of lava.
Despite the continuous static roar, the staccato pop of gunfire from one side pulled their attention. They had emerged out of one of a series of buildings shaped like hangar bays, with flat, high walls and angled roofs. Wahid and Hamza turned and saw more black-clad stormtroopers, all raining hell down on a building several hundred feet away. They were crouched behind barriers, rows of low cement blocks jutting out like teeth in front of the buildings. Wahid could make out almost a dozen men, all of them simultaneously unleashing a relentless volley of gunfire. A hail of bullets spattered in a line in front of him and he pressed himself against the wall, crouching down. One bullet sliced through Hamza’s thigh, erupting from the other side. He staggered, caught his balance and then crouched next to Wahid.
‘The Marid!’ Wahid yelled to Hamza, pointing out a black ribbon of smoke that emerged from the ground ahead of them. It snaked through the air, reached the first of the stormtroopers and hardened into a human shape, turning and pointing back towards Wahid. All at once the siege came to an abrupt halt and each man turned in Wahid’s direction. He saw a dozen black faces appear out of the bodies, eyes shimmering like candles. Then they all ran. As one, the stormtroopers fled across the tarmac, crossing diagonally past the planes and towards a high boundary wall in the distance. Wahid saw puffs of bloodied vapour erupt from the heads of two of them then their bodies slumped to the ground, the djinns inside leaping out and continuing their pace without slowing at all.
‘I’ll nab one before they get away,’ Hamza cried into Wahid’s ear. Then, before Wahid could grab at him, he dissolved. The churning orange sky was throwing abstract shadows in patches across the tarmac and Hamza appeared to hop through them, leaping from one to the other as though they were rocks in a pond. The largest shadow was cast by the intact cargo plane. Just as the last Marid-possessed stormtrooper stepped onto this patch of darkness, Hamza surged up and out from inside it and blocked the terrorist’s path. The lone trooper skidded to a halt, then exploded. The plane blew apart. Despite the distance, a supernova of sound slammed into Wahid.
Wahid struggled to his feet, swaying clumsily as he did. He knew he was screaming, could feel his mouth making the shapes of Hamza’s name, but all he could hear was a continuous siren keening in his ears. He stumbled forward, turning towards the escaping men. The world was doubled in his vision, a blurred onionskin of repeated images overlaying everything. It was like looking at multiple realities simultaneously, all of them burning.
Some of the terrorists had been flattened by the explosion, their bodies discarded by the djinns who kept running towards the wall. The men who survived scaled the wall with ropes while the djinns simply passed through it.
Wahid shook his head, smacking his palms against his ears until the ringing faded a bit. He turned in time to see soldiers – recognisably human soldiers – trying to edge around the burning planes, their path blocked by debris. They were chasing after the escaping stormtroopers, firing wildly in their wake. Wahid ran towards the wall the attackers had disappeared over and managed to make it across the tarmac without falling, even though the ground swayed underneath.
Climbing over the wall was more difficult. He grabbed a rope that had been left behind and used it to pull himself up and over, fighting to concentrate through surging waves of disorientation. When he crawled over the top and half-clambered, half-fell down the other side, he had to push back against a swell of nausea that almost toppled him. Leaning against the wall, breathing slowly to steady himself, he looked around.
