A shell-shocked Joe Simeon was sitting in interrogation room A. He had been given a blanket to cover his nakedness but he’d allowed it to slip, exposing a pale torso gone pink with what looked like mild sunburn.

Farouk stood on the other side of the glass, in the observation room. An evidence bag held Joe Simeon’s bomb trigger, a simple plunger device trailing half a meter of coated wire that ended in a blob of melted plastic and copper. No trace of actual explosive had been found, nor did the tattered remains of his clothing appear to have any special pockets for holding wildlife. It was a puzzle, but one that, given his near-catatonic state, they were going to have to solve without Simeon’s help.

At least they knew his name. Farouk walked around Mustafa’s Bible cart to the window of interrogation room B, where the second suspect was being held. The man in the white tunic was alert, and as Farouk approached the glass the fellow appeared to stare at him as if he could see through the mirror.

The observation room door opened and Abdullah came in, his arm in a sling. “Hey boss,” he said. “I was just looking for you.”

“Do we have an ID on this one yet?”

“No. His fingerprints aren’t in the system. We’re trying a facial-recognition match now.”

“Has he said anything?”

“Not about who he is. He did say he’d talk to you, though.”

“He asked for me by name?”

“It wasn’t a request,” Abdullah said. “More like a prediction. He said he’d like to talk to Mustafa, but he didn’t think he’d get here in time.”

“Where is Mustafa?”

“Out somewhere. He’s not answering his cell phone.”

Farouk turned back towards the glass. The man in the white tunic was still staring at him. Smiling. “All right,” Farouk said. “Keep trying Mustafa’s cell. And see if you can find the other prisoner some clothes.”

The apartment was on an upper floor of a high-rise in Mansour. Its balcony faced northwest and offered an excellent view of the approaching sandstorm. The storm’s leading edge, a wall of sand and dust several hundred meters high, was advancing in seeming slow motion across Baghdad’s outlying suburbs. Behind this, the horizon was covered by a dark smudge that stretched up into the clouds and made it look as though the heavens and the earth were dissolving into a void. Even to a veteran of holy war who prided himself on his fearlessness, the sight was unnerving, and eventually Idris had to turn away in order to concentrate on his phone conversation.

“Yes, Senator,” he said. “Yes, zero fatalities . . . No. It wasn’t a problem with the device . . . I am sure. I had men in the crowd, they confirm what the news is reporting . . . No, not the hand of God, but not a human hand, either . . . Yes, that’s what I’m saying . . . I have also received a report from Adhamiyah that that Tikriti thug has his people scouring the city for someone . . . Yes . . . Yes, I think so . . . Homeland Security has two individuals in custody. One of them— . . . I’ve already dispatched a team. They understand the seriousness . . . Yes, as soon as I hear anything . . . My men have been instructed to bring the creature to the northern safe house. I suggest you head there now, before the storm hits . . . God willing . . . What? . . . Yes, it is a pity. So many targets on one stage. But there will be other opportunities. In the chaos after the mirage collapses, we can hunt many of them down, the ones who aren’t dead already . . . Yes . . . Peace be unto you as well, Senator.”

He hung up and went back inside. In the living room the TV was on, tuned to Al Jazeera with the sound muted. They were showing the video from the rally: shaky footage of Joe Simeon stabbing the security guard, stepping towards the stage, then several seconds of blackness, and then the ravens, spiraling upwards. The caption read: MIRACLE AT GROUND ZERO?

Idris picked up the remote and switched off the TV. “Khalid!” he shouted. “Get your weapon! We are going out!”

But the person who responded to his call was Mustafa al Baghdadi. Mustafa came out of the kitchen carrying a teapot and two cups and saucers on a silver tray. “You are almost out of sugar,” he said.

“What are you doing here?” Idris said. “Khalid!”

“Your servant won’t be disturbing us,” Mustafa told him, setting the tray on the table in the center of the room. “I asked him to step out so that you and I could have a conversation.”

“About what?”

“About Al Qaeda and the 11/9 hijackings,” Mustafa said. He began pouring the tea. “About your role in the murder of thousands of innocent people. My wife among them.”

There was a leather case on top of a cabinet to Idris’s right. He reached for it, flipped open the lid . . . and found the case empty.

Mustafa cleared his throat. Idris turned and saw the gun he’d been seeking lying on the table next to the tea tray.

“You disappoint me,” Mustafa said. He settled within arm’s length of the gun and picked up one of the teacups. “The crusaders of America, if they kill even a single Muslim, are only too happy to brag about it. But you and Osama bin Laden slaughter multitudes, and you don’t want to claim credit? And after all your talk of righteousness. Shouldn’t a righteous man be proud of his deeds?”

Idris was still looking at the gun. “I’m not afraid to die,” he said.

“Yes, I get that,” said Mustafa. “But you aren’t in a hurry to die, either, are you? You’d rather let others do the dying for you, while you remain to savor the suffering of their victims. Very well, I get that, too: You were always a sadist. What I don’t see is the connection between this and anything worthy of the name Islam. I don’t see how even you fool yourself that such a connection exists.”

“You are right, you don’t see,” Idris said, growing heated. “But I am no fool.”

“I say you are. I say you are as deluded as the so-called Christians who spread terror in the name of Jesus.”

“Do not compare me to those people!”

“Why not?” Mustafa said. “You chase the same mirage, and worship at the same false altar.”

“No!” Idris wagged a finger. “God is on our side.”

“ ‘Our side.’ And whose side was Fadwa on?”

“I cannot say. I did not know her. But I know that she was either righteous, or unrighteous. If she was righteous, then she died a martyr and will live on in paradise. If not—why should I care that she is dead?”

“Because her life was not yours to take!” Mustafa shouted. “I hope there is a paradise. I hope Fadwa finds her way there, finds the joy I could not give her. But even if that is so, it was not for you, in your supreme arrogance, to send her on her way. And not just her. Thousands dead in the towers alone. Thousands! What were you thinking? What was Osama bin Laden thinking? Who do you people think you are?”

“I am a warrior of God,” Idris Abd al Qahhar said proudly. “I, and Osama bin Laden, and all the men of Al Qaeda. You cannot make us regret what we have done. When this world passes away and God’s final truth is revealed, even to unbelievers who would deny it, everyone will see we were in the right. But it will be too late for you then, Mustafa al Baghdadi.” Nodding, he continued: “Go ahead. Take your revenge. It will change nothing.”

“My revenge.” Mustafa set down his cup and placed a hand on the gun. Took a breath. “I told Gabriel Costello that if the men responsible for 11/9 were brought before me, I would show them no mercy . . .”

“To hell with your mercy,” Idris said. “I care nothing for it.”

“I know,” said Mustafa. “And it would be a great pleasure to kill you—like having a wish come true. But God still does care about mercy. I must believe that, if I’m to go on living in this or any other world . . . Yes, I must believe it.” With an effort he withdrew his hand from the gun. “Anyway,” he went on, “I’ve used up all my wishes already. Time to give someone else a turn.” Sitting back, he called out: “Samir!”

Footsteps in the hall. Samir came in, and Amal, and behind them Abu Naji and Sayyid. Sayyid was holding a tape recorder with a wireless antenna.

Idris shook his head, forcing a smile. “Now you disappoint me,” he said to Mustafa. “I tell you I am willing to die. You think you can punish me with prison?”

“We’ll see how you feel after the first forty years,” Mustafa replied.

Idris laughed. “No,” he said. “No, I don’t think so.”

He lunged for the gun on the table, but Amal had been waiting for this and hit him with a taser before he’d taken two steps.

“Samir,” Mustafa said. “Do the honors, please.”

Idris had collapsed onto his back. He lay breathing shallowly, red-faced, too stunned to move but still able to summon a look of such hatred that Samir, standing over him, hesitated. Then Samir remembered his sons and his fear dissipated. He crouched down, pulling out handcuffs.

“Idris Abd al Qahhar,” he said. “I arrest you for conspiracy to commit murder. By the grace of God the All-Merciful and Compassionate, you have the right to remain silent . . .”

“Hello,” Farouk said, closing the interrogation room door behind him. “I understand you wish to speak with me.”

“Oh, I try never to make wishes,” the man in the white tunic said. “They so rarely turn out the way you expect. I am happy to speak with you, however.”

“Good, then. Let’s start with a name.”

“Of course.” The man’s smile turned mischievous. “What would you like to call me?”

“How about your real name?”

“It would mean nothing to you, I’m afraid. I’m not in any of your databases.”

“What about a home address then?” Farouk pulled out a chair and sat opposite the man. “You don’t sound like a Baghdadi to me.”

“My family home is in Arabia, in the Rub al Khali.”

“I didn’t know there were homes in the Empty Quarter. Do you work in the oil industry?”

“We mind our own business.” That mischievous smile again. “Most of us.”

“And what brings you to Baghdad?”

“I fly all over the country.”

“On your family’s business?”

“A personal research project of sorts. I’ve been going from place to place, studying how things have changed.”

“Changed since when? Have you been away somewhere?”

“That too,” the man in the white tunic said. “I was in prison for many years, and the world changed quite a bit during that time. Since my release, it’s changed again. It’s the second set of changes I’m most interested in. One should recognize one’s own handiwork, but I keep encountering things that surprise me, things that suggest the intervention of another, greater power. So I’ve been trying to work out what it all means. What the larger plan might be.”

“Prison,” Farouk said. “I thought you said you weren’t in our databases.”

“It wasn’t one of your prisons.”

“You know we have access to Interpol files here too, right?”

“My jailer was not a member of Interpol.”

“Where were you locked up, North Korea?” Receiving no answer but that same smile, Farouk continued: “Let’s talk about this afternoon. What were you doing at the rally? More research?”

“I was following that man, the one you are holding in the other room.”

“Why? Do you know him?”

“I know his type. A maker of burnt offerings. Such men were common in my youth, and time doesn’t seem to have lessened their numbers much. I’ve encountered quite a few in my travels.”

“When you encounter them, what do you do?”

“Usually nothing. Interfering in others’ affairs, even with the best of intentions, well it’s like making wishes—there are always unforeseen consequences. I really should have learned that lesson by now. But today, crossing paths with that man, sensing what he was about to do, I felt a powerful urge to intervene. An impulse not entirely my own.”

“What does that mean, not entirely your own?”

“You know how it is,” the man in the white tunic said. “God allows evil to exist in the world. Sometimes He permits it to operate unchecked. But sometimes, He puts a stone in the path of the wicked.”

“And today you were the stone?”

“I thought so.” The smile a bit sheepish now, as he looked down at the steel cuffs on his wrists. “Now I’m thinking I may have been mistaken about the source of the impulse . . .” He shrugged. “Ah well. Ultimately all things proceed from God’s will.”

“Let’s leave God’s will aside for the moment,” said Farouk, “and get back to what happened at the rally. You say you decided to intervene. How?”

The prisoner sighed. “Forgive me. I don’t wish to be uncooperative—”

“Then don’t be. Tell me what you did.”

“You wouldn’t believe it. I could convince you, but it would require yet another intervention. Anyway, we are almost out of time.”

“No, we’re not,” Farouk said, allowing his annoyance to show. “You are a suspect in a terrorism case, and you’re not going anywhere until I get answers.”

From over his shoulder came the muffled sound of shouting. Farouk turned in his chair and saw the mirror shudder as something slammed the other side of the glass.

“They are here for me,” the man in the white tunic said, as Farouk stood up. “Do not resist them. They will only hurt you.”

The interrogation room door burst open. A big man stepped through, holding a pistol.

“What’s the meaning of this interruption?” Farouk said. “Get the hell out of here!”

Siraj al Din didn’t bother to reply. Instead, stepping forward, he brought the butt of the gun crashing down on Farouk’s forehead.

The sandstorm arrived as they were loading Idris into the arrest wagon.

Abu Naji and Sayyid had parked on the east side of the block. Idris offered no further resistance as he was led out of the apartment building and manacled to a bench in the back of the wagon. Samir watched from the curb with a mixture of unease and disappointment, the satisfaction he’d felt reading Idris his Mirandas already ebbing away. He turned to Mustafa and said: “You know this isn’t the end of it.”

“I know,” Mustafa said. He held up the tape recorder. “But it’s a good start. Now—”

A shadow fell over the street, and at the north end of the block someone cried out in alarm. Mustafa and Samir turned towards the sound. There were people running from the corner, while others stood staring and pointing to the west.

They knew what was coming, of course—they’d seen it from the apartment—but timing was always tricky with sandstorms, and no amount of advance warning could lessen the shock of fear at the appearance of the dust cloud, boiling through the streets of the city like debris from some mighty tower’s fall. It surged across the intersection, swallowing up everything—people, cars, streetlights—and came sweeping towards them.

“Fu-u-u-uck!” Abu Naji said, a long exhalation. He jumped down from the back of the wagon and slammed the door. Mustafa looked up. A billow of dust and sand overtopped the apartment building and wrapped around its sides, making it seem for a moment as though the upper floors were pancaking.

“Come on!” Samir shouted, tugging on Mustafa’s arm. Leaving Idris in the wagon, they ran back to the building, making it inside with just seconds to spare. As the lobby door swung shut, a woman darted past on the sidewalk, clutching the ends of her headscarf with both hands. Then the dust cloud swept down in a thick curtain, obscuring everything.

The bulbs in the apartment building lobby seemed to flicker, but it was just their eyes adjusting to the sudden loss of daylight. Fine dust puffed through the cracks around the door, bringing a smell like fresh chalk. Abu Naji stifled a sneeze.

As the leading edge of the sandstorm continued sweeping eastward, the air outside cleared enough that they could see again. The Homeland Security agents looked out into the haze at a city transformed, and compared this vision to their memories of another day nearly a decade in the past. They noticed the arrest wagon rocking back and forth, and though it was surely only the wind, none of them were above wishing that it might actually be Idris, driven mad by the storm and tasting just a fraction of the terror he had chosen to inflict on others.

“All right,” Mustafa said finally, breaking the silence. “Now we go pick up Osama bin Laden.”

“What?” said Sayyid. “You want to drive all the way down to Riyadh? In this?”

“He’s not in Riyadh,” Amal said. “Bin Laden is here in Baghdad today, for the rally. That will be over now, but he’s supposed to be staying at the Rasheed Hotel. We should be able to catch him there.”

“The rally?” Abu Naji said. “The Ground Zero rally?” He looked at them. “You mean you guys haven’t heard?”

A figure in a black burqa, head bowed against the wind, was pulling a wheeled shopping basket along the sidewalk behind AHS headquarters. All the other pedestrians in the area had been driven indoors by the storm, but Siraj al Din, hands cupped to shield his eyes from blowing sand, made a careful scan of the doorways and rooftops across the street before stepping out into the open.

He made his way to an SUV that was idling at the curb. Three other Qaeda men with drawn pistols were close behind him, and bringing up the rear were two more men with the prisoner between them. The prisoner’s handcuffs had been supplemented with a pair of leg irons, so he had to be carried down the steps from the building’s rear exit.

The SUV’s front passenger door was locked. Siraj al Din yanked impatiently at the door handle and bent his face to the window. He had just enough time to identify the shotgun muzzle on the other side of the glass before the Baath killer in the driver’s seat pulled the trigger. Two more Republican Guardsmen in the rear of the SUV opened fire through the tinted side windows, killing the Qaeda men with the pistols. The duo holding the prisoner separated and tried to find cover, but the figure in the burqa had pulled a rifle from the shopping basket and was already taking aim; within seconds, these last two Qaeda agents were dead as well.

The Republican Guardsmen jumped out of the SUV and rushed to secure the prisoner, who’d stood unflinching through the gunfire. Qusay Hussein stripped off the burqa and dropped it and the rifle back in the basket. Then he went over to take a closer look at their prize. He’d never seen a jinn before and wasn’t sure he believed in them. And indeed, the prisoner looked just like a man—defiant and unafraid, perhaps, but human.

“Murder is a sin,” the prisoner informed him.

Qusay glanced unconcerned at one of the nearby corpses. “These men were murderers too, you may be sure.”

“What does that logic suggest about your own future?” the prisoner said.

Qusay didn’t bother to answer. A trio of police cars had just rounded the corner, responding to the gunfire. Qusay stepped to the curb and gestured for them to hurry.

By the time Mustafa and the others arrived, sand had begun to coat the corpses and collect in drifts on their windward sides. Siraj al Din, decapitated by the shotgun blast, resembled a beach sculpture eroded by the tide. The street had been closed off and a mixed group of AHS, ABI, and local police were wandering about the scene.

After a quick look at the bodies, Mustafa, Samir, and Amal took shelter inside the building. While Amal got on her cell phone, Mustafa and Samir spoke to Abdullah, who was battered but conscious. Farouk had been taken to the hospital; Joe Simeon was bound for the morgue.

“They said they were from Riyadh,” Abdullah explained. His face was streaked with blood, and he kept an ice pack pressed to his scalp as he spoke. “They said they had orders to collect both prisoners. And they had proper ID, but something about the way they just barged into the interview suite without any advance warning . . . I don’t know, it just didn’t feel right. So I told them they were going to have to wait outside while I made a call, and that’s when the big bastard bounced my head off the glass.”

“The prisoner they took with them,” Mustafa said. “Can you show us the recording of Farouk’s interview with him?”

“No. I checked. They erased it and took the backup disk.”

“What did he look like?”

Abdullah described him. “He talked like he knew you . . .”

Amal had finished her phone call. “Abu Naji says we missed Bin Laden at the hotel,” she told them. “According to the staff, the senator and his bodyguards checked out right around the time we arrested Idris. They were supposed to fly back to the capital this evening, but they haven’t checked in for their flight yet, and now it looks like the planes are all grounded anyway.”

“I doubt Bin Laden would leave Baghdad now even if he could get a flight,” Mustafa said. “What he wants is here . . . OK, let’s assume the dead men outside are Al Qaeda, sent to grab this . . . person of interest. Would anyone care to guess who their killers are?”

“Umm Dabir told me she looked out the window after she heard the shooting,” Abdullah offered. “She said she saw police cars pulling up and driving away again . . .”

“Baghdad PD,” Amal said. “Saddam.”

Samir looked at Mustafa. “You think they’d take him to the Adhamiyah estate?”

“They might, especially if Saddam were in a hurry to start making wishes.”

“That’s simple, then,” Amal said. “Let’s get some more people together and head across the river.”

“We could do that,” said Mustafa. “But if the cops outside see us assembling a raid team, they might call ahead and warn Saddam.” He considered. “The three of us ought to be able to sneak away unnoticed, however.”

“And what are the three of us going to do against the whole Republican Guard?” asked Samir.

“Scout the territory,” Mustafa said. “Amal, call Abu Naji back. Tell him to get over to the Baghdad ABI office and round up as many agents as he can for a raid on Saddam’s Adhamiyah estate. Tell him to be careful not to let the police know, and tell him to hurry. Oh, and he needn’t bother with a warrant.”

“Exigent circumstances?” Amal smiled. “Whose life shall I say is in danger? The missing prisoner’s, or ours?”

“That all depends,” Mustafa said, “on what the prisoner is really made of.”

Saddam Hussein waited at the turnaround in front of his mansion, dressed in an authentic Iraqi military uniform purchased off eBazaar. Oversized mirror shades allowed him to gaze unblinking into the storm. He was grinning broadly in anticipation and every few moments had to turn and spit sand from between his teeth.

Presidential Secretary Abid Hamid Mahmud stood to Saddam’s right, looking significantly less jubilant. To Abid’s right was the sorcerer Mr. Rammal, his expression hidden beneath the cowl of his robe. Forty Republican Guardsmen were arrayed on the mansion’s front steps, weapons at the ready. Their faces were impassive: They might have been awaiting the arrival of a head of state, a shipment of gold bullion, or a battle.

Behind the Guard, sheltering beneath an overhang by the front door, were Tariq Aziz, Uday Hussein, and a small group of male servants. Aziz and the servants looked nervous; Uday, sullen. Uday was furious at having been kept home from the mission to retrieve the jinn. He was also bored: All the women of the house, from his mother down to the lowliest maid, had been sent away.

The police cars arrived and were waved through the front gate. They came up the drive and pulled to a stop at the turnaround. Qusay got out of the lead car. He nodded to his father, then opened up the car’s back door and reached inside.

As the prisoner’s feet touched the ground the wind whipped up violently. Abid and Mr. Rammal were staggered by it, and the Guard had to struggle to maintain their ranks. Aziz threw up an arm to shield himself and the servants covered their faces in fear. Uday, remembering how he’d shamed himself earlier, balled his hands into fists and leaned into the wind.

Saddam stood his ground. He waited for Qusay to pull the prisoner upright, then removed his sunglasses and peered squinting into the prisoner’s eyes. “Welcome to my home!” he said, shouting to be heard above the wind’s howl. He tugged playfully at the chain between the prisoner’s wrists. “Welcome to my service!”

Halal Enforcement had a boat dock on the river one block east from the Homeland Security building.

The three of them had donned goggles before setting out, and Mustafa and Samir had tied rags over their mouths and noses, while Amal used her headscarf. They looked like bandits, and as they approached the guard shack at the dock entrance Mustafa expected to be challenged. But the shack was deserted, and though the gate was locked the keypad entry code had not been changed in a decade.

They boarded a motor launch with an enclosed cabin and set off upriver. The sandstorm was getting worse. The sky had turned a dull orange from the amount of dust floating above the city, and visibility dropped until it was down to less than fifty meters. Mustafa used the onboard GPS to navigate, while Samir and Amal kept a sharp lookout for approaching vessels. Fortunately most of the other river traffic seemed to have pulled off to wait out the storm.

After about fifteen minutes they rounded a bend in the river and spotted a string of lights that, according to the GPS, marked Saddam’s private dock. The dock spanned nearly a hundred meters of waterfront and terminated at its east end in a riverside party and guest house that was larger than most people’s primary homes. The house also contained a guard station, so Mustafa steered well clear of it, continuing upriver past the dock’s west end before killing the launch’s running lights and doubling back. He brought them in on the lowest throttle setting, finally cutting the engine entirely and coasting into an open berth beside a yacht named Bint Zabibah.

“Now what?” Samir said, after they’d tied off the launch.

“You remember back in ’97, when Halal was planning to raid this place?” Mustafa asked.

“I remember the judge denying us a warrant after our informant turned up in a cement mixer.”

“Yes, but before that, when the mission was still a go, I had a good look at the blueprints and reconnaissance photos. The main way up to the estate is through there”—he gestured towards the party/guard house—“but there’s also a separate gate above a slipway at this end, for putting boats into and out of the water—and loading liquor onto trucks. That gate’s not so well guarded, and at the time it was secured only with a padlock and chain.”

Amal was already rummaging in the launch’s toolbox. “Will this do?” she said, holding up a pair of long-handled bolt cutters.

They put their goggles and face masks back on and stepped out onto the dock. The gate was where Mustafa said it would be, but unlike Halal, Saddam had upgraded his security since the 1990s. A video camera had been mounted above the gateway, and the gate itself was now a solid sheet of metal, barred and bolted from the inside.

“What about going over the wall?” Amal suggested, as they huddled out of the camera’s view. “We can use the bolt cutters on the barbed wire.”

“It’s got to be at least four meters high,” Samir said. “You have a grappling hook, too?”

“If we can pile up some boxes or something for you to stand on, you can give me a boost.” Reading their silence as discomfort rather than skepticism, she added: “Pretend you’re my brothers.”

No one had a better idea, so they crept along the dock looking for some boxes or crates strong enough to bear their weight. Just past the Bint Zabibah they found a small, wheeled dumpster chained to a post. They cut the chain and trundled the dumpster back to the slipway.

Mustafa was the tallest of them, so he stood on the dumpster lid and let Amal climb up on his shoulders. Samir stayed on the ground trying to hold the dumpster steady. This circus act would have been difficult even in perfectly calm weather and under these conditions should have been impossible, but the wind was oddly cooperative. More than once, as she stretched to cut the strands of barbed wire, Amal felt herself starting to overbalance, only to have a sudden gust like a firm hand push her back against the wall. She worked as quickly as she could. When the last strand parted, she tossed the bolt cutter to the ground and said, “OK!” Mustafa placed his hands under the soles of Amal’s shoes and pushed up, hard. This maneuver proved too much for the dumpster lid, which buckled beneath him and sent him tumbling back to be caught by Samir—but when they looked up, Amal had vanished over the wall.

Five long minutes later, the light on the security camera went out and the gate opened. Amal, now armed with an assault rifle, waved them inside. They passed through a short tunnel. At the other end was a guard shack, inside which a Republican Guardsman lay, bound hand and foot with plastic zip-ties and blindfolded with his own jacket. Mustafa turned to ask Amal a question but she was already forging ahead.

They made for the lights of the main house. They’d covered about half the distance when the wind dropped almost to nothing, and they heard, somewhere off to the left, the asthmatic roar of a lion. This was followed by another, softer wheezing sound. A Republican Guard staggered out of the haze, gasping for breath, and fell facedown in front of them.

While Amal kept watch for the lion, Mustafa and Samir bent down over the Guard. The man hadn’t been mauled; he’d been stabbed. A handmade plastic blade had been driven into his upper back, piercing a lung. Mustafa pulled it loose and squinted at the legend on the side of the shiv: XBOX 360.

From behind them they heard the sound of a pump shotgun being cocked. “Don’t move!” said a voice. The words were Arabic, but the voice was American . . . and familiar.

Mustafa spoke without thinking: “Captain Lawrence?”

“Stand up slowly,” the voice said. “Now all of you turn around. Slowly.”

The captain’s T-shirt was torn and bloody, and a chunk was missing from his left ear where one of his dying jailers had bitten him. Looking at him, Mustafa experienced a curious sense of doubling. He felt like he knew this man, had worked with him for years. He knew that he didn’t know this man; they’d never met before. Not in this life.

Without waiting to be told, Mustafa lifted his goggles up to his forehead and tugged down the rag that covered his nose and mouth. The captain lowered the shotgun. “Mustafa?”

“Hello, Captain Lawrence,” Mustafa said. “How is Operation Iraqi Freedom coming?”

The window of the prayer room had been shuttered against the storm and the sand pattern on the floor had been redrawn. A chair of hammered black iron held the captive jinn at the center of the circle. Saddam stood facing the jinn, while Mr. Rammal orbited them both. The sorcerer had donned a peaked cap of densely woven silver thread, and as he walked around the circle with the brass bottle held before him, he muttered incantations in the dead language of Babylon.

Bearing witness to the ritual, their faces lit by flickering torchlight, were Qusay, Uday, Abid Hamid Mahmud, Tariq Aziz, and a half-dozen Republican Guard. The Guardsmen remained impassive—all except for one, who grew increasingly uncomfortable with the blasphemy being committed here and finally opened his mouth to protest. But Uday silenced him with a glance.

Mr. Rammal completed his ninth circuit. He removed his cap and gave the bottle to Saddam, who hefted it in both hands, weighing it like a newborn.

Saddam Hussein addressed the jinn: “Are you ready to do my bidding?”

The jinn stared back at him placidly. “Tell me what it is you want.”

Saddam passed the brass bottle back to Mr. Rammal and snapped his fingers. Abid Hamid Mahmud came forward and handed him a globe. Saddam showed it to the jinn; black marker had been applied to the globe’s surface, changing borders and renaming nations. “I also have some notes,” Saddam said, patting the breast pocket of his uniform. “Perhaps you’d like to study them.”

The jinn flexed his wrists beneath the iron bands that held him to the chair. “That’s all right,” he said. “I believe I understand. You wish to be a ruler again. Arabia will be the seat of your power. From there, your armies will march out, victorious, over Persia and India, Europe and America, and all the rest of the world. Your old enemies will be found and brought to you in chains, to be humbled before you. And you will be the king of all kings, now and forever. Does that about cover it?”

Saddam Hussein grinned. “That will do for a start.” He tossed the globe back to Abid and spread his arms to embrace his future. “You’ve heard my wish,” he said. “Now give it to me! I command you!”

“Very well,” the jinn said. “My answer is no.”

The three Guardsmen stood shoulder to shoulder at the window of the front gatehouse, peering out into the storm.

“It’s not natural,” said the first Guard.

“Fuck you, it’s not natural,” said the second.

“Look how dark it’s getting!”

“It’s a fucking sandstorm, asshole!”

“Yes, and that creature they’ve got up at the house is responsible! Abu Ramzi told me—”

“Abu Ramzi is a fool!”

“Be quiet, both of you!” said the third Guard, who was looking not at the sky but at the road. “Someone’s out there.”

“Where? I don’t see any headlights.”

“Not in a vehicle. Men on foot.” He grabbed his rifle. “Call the main house and the other guard stations and tell them we may have intruders trying to get over the front wall.” On his way out the door, he hit a switch that brought up extra floodlights.

There was someone out there: Just beyond the gate, a figure was crouching to place something against the base of the wall. “Hey!” the Guardsman shouted. “Freeze!” But the figure jumped up and ran back into the storm. The Guardsman continued forward, his eye drawn to the object the figure had left behind: a canvas satchel with a blinking red light on its side.

“What do you mean, ‘no’?” Saddam Hussein said. He glanced sharply at Mr. Rammal, who threw up his hands in supplication.

“Don’t be too hard on your magician,” the jinn said. “His Akkadian isn’t bad. A few thousand years ago, his incantation might have worked. But I’m afraid you’ve both failed to appreciate what it is that I am.”

“What you are?” Saddam said. “I told you what you are: You’re my servant!”

“Once upon a time I was the property of kings,” the jinn demurred. “But during my long imprisonment I heard, from afar, the words of the prophets: Ibrahim, and Jesus, and last of all Mohammed, peace be unto him. Now I’ve said the words of the shahada and become a Muslim, and pagan enchantments no longer have power over me.”

“That’s not true!” Mr. Rammal said. “My spell drew you in! It forced you to reveal yourself!”

“My pride did most of the work, there.” The jinn shrugged apologetically. “But there is no pride in being a slave of Saddam Hussein—and though I really should stop presuming to know the mind of God, I can’t imagine the All-Compassionate would want me to serve such a wicked person.”

Saddam trembled with rage. He unsnapped the holster on his belt and drew out a huge revolver. Thumbing back the hammer, he pivoted and took aim at the sorcerer.

“No!” Mr. Rammal cried. Then the gun roared and he toppled over backwards onto the sand-strewn floor.

Uday stepped forward, eyes fixed on the jinn. “Let me hurt this one, father,” he said. “I’ll get him to do what you want.”

“Shut up,” Saddam said. He pointed the smoking gun muzzle at the jinn’s temple. “I could kill you, too.”

“You could,” the jinn agreed. “And then when I am dead, I must go before God who will judge me for all eternity. Whose wrath should I fear more?”

Saddam began to tremble again. But before he could pull the trigger a second time, there was an explosion somewhere out on the grounds. “What was that?”

The jinn tilted his head, listening to the wind. “A tall man,” he said. “More princely than you, but no less wicked. He means to make a sacrifice of your entire household.”

More noise: the clatter of assault rifles. It seemed to be coming from multiple locations.

“Qaeda,” said Qusay. He was holding a transceiver to his ear. “They’ve blown the front gate, and they may be coming up from the river as well.”

“You, and you!” Saddam said, gesturing with the revolver at two of his men. “Stay here and guard my property! Qusay, Uday, Abid, and the rest of you, follow me!” He went out into the hall, which was noisy with the shouts of the Republican Guard.

After the others had gone out and the door was shut behind them, a pale Tariq Aziz stepped forward from the shadows and stood wringing his hands over the body of the sorcerer. “This was not my doing,” he said. He looked at the jinn. “I didn’t do anything!”

“I will not have an evildoer for a friend,” the jinn replied.

“I don’t actually remember you,” Mustafa said. “I feel as though I should, but I don’t.”

“Nobody remembers me,” the captain replied. “Nobody but Saddam even knows who I am. It’s made the last couple years kind of difficult . . .”

They had entered the mansion through a back door, overpowering two more Guards in the process. Their goal was the converted prayer room, which Captain Lawrence had learned about from Saddam during one of their late-night sessions, and where he’d guessed the jinn would be taken. But they were still on the ground floor, searching for an unguarded flight of stairs, when all hell broke loose. Now they were hiding in a room just off the chamber that held the Nebuchadnezzar statue. It was the same side room where Mustafa had encountered the English boy; he could still see some toy cars and trucks underneath the furniture.

“You do remember, though,” Mustafa said, careful to keep his voice low. “Why? Because you’re the one who made the wish?”

“I go back and forth on that,” Captain Lawrence said. “Days that I’m feeling sorry for myself, I think God’s punishing me. Most days, though, I figure I got what I asked for. What fun would it be to change the world if you didn’t remember what you changed it from?”

“And Saddam? How did you become his guest?”

“After I realized I couldn’t go back home—that there was no home for me to go back to—I decided I might as well make myself useful.”

“You tried to kill him?”

The captain nodded. “Seemed only right, seeing as he’s supposed to be dead. But Qusay was in charge of the Guard that night and they caught me coming in. When Saddam figured out what I was, he decided to add me to his collection.”

A squad of Republican Guards ran through Nebuchadnezzar’s chamber and charged down the hall towards the mansion’s front door. Most of the gunfire seemed to be coming from the front of the estate. Mustafa kept hoping that the attackers would announce themselves as ABI, but he knew it was too soon for them to have gotten here.

“So what about you?” the captain said. “You’re a cop again, obviously. But what kind?”

“Homeland Security.”

Another nod. “Federal law enforcement—above Saddam. So you got your wish, too.”

“No,” Mustafa said pointedly, “I didn’t.” But then after a moment, he added: “It’s not a bad life, though. And most of the problems with it are at least of my own making, not someone else’s.”

All the power in the house suddenly went out. The side room was plunged into darkness, but Nebuchadnezzar’s chamber remained dimly illuminated by the apocalyptic orange glow coming through the windows in the dome.

“All right,” Amal said, looking out through the archway. “If we’re going to move, I’d say this is the time.”

“Go straight across, to that other opening over there,” Mustafa said pointing. “I remember I passed a stairwell on the way to Saddam’s office.”

They were halfway across the chamber when Uday Hussein and a squad of Guardsmen emerged from the very archway they were headed towards. Both parties stopped short and for an instant just stared. Then one of the Guards started to raise his assault rifle and Amal opened fire with hers, killing that Guard and the man behind him. Then everyone was firing, and moving—diving towards the chamber’s most obvious source of cover. Uday and the two remaining Guardsmen ended up on one side of the Nebuchadnezzar statue; Amal, Mustafa, Samir, and Captain Lawrence ended up on the other.

Amal sat with her back against the statue’s base and fitted a fresh clip into her rifle. “Uday Hussein!” she called out. “We are federal agents! Throw down your weapons and put your hands up!”

Uday laughed. “Is that you, Amal bint Shamal? You want us to surrender? Very well, come over here and show us your ass, and maybe we’ll think about it!”

Captain Lawrence rose to a crouch and prepared to make an end run around Nebuchadnezzar. But Mustafa, looking up at the statue, suddenly recalled something; he put a hand on the captain’s forearm to restrain him and then leaned over to whisper in Amal’s ear.

“Bint Shamal!” Uday crowed. “Daughter of a dead fool, who thought he could stand against a king! Yes, come here, and when I’m done playing with you I’ll send you to join him!”

“You are wrong, Uday,” Amal replied. “My father was a hero, and even in death he is worth ten of your father—and a hundred of you. As for your father’s kingship, I am afraid it is hollow.” She stood up, pointed the rifle at the front of Nebuchadnezzar’s right ankle, and pulled the trigger. The bullet punched straight through the thin tin shell and came out the other side, striking Uday in the back. As he pitched forward, the Guardsmen tried to scramble up and defend themselves, but Amal kept firing, placing her shots at even intervals, and they never even made it all the way to their feet.

Out in the storm, the soldiers of Al Qaeda fought the men of the Republican Guard. The Guard had greater numbers, but Al Qaeda had the element of surprise. Before the main assault commenced, small groups of commandos had snuck over the wall to set up ambush positions on the grounds. The commandos were equipped with thermal imagers that could pick out warm bodies at a distance, even through swirling sand. This gave them a significant tactical advantage over the Guardsmen, many of whom didn’t even bother to don goggles before rushing out of the mansion. The first wave of defenders to respond to the explosion at the gate ran blindly into the ambush and were slaughtered to the last man. A second wave tried to advance more cautiously, but this just gave the commandos more time to aim, and soon enough this second group of Guardsmen had all been killed as well.

There was a lull in the firefight while the Qaeda commandos waited to see whether the Guard would try a third sally. But the Guard had belatedly learned their lesson, and after a moment the commandos picked up and began advancing on the mansion.

By this time Qusay Hussein had taken a squad of men to an upstairs dining room that overlooked the front of the estate. Qusay set up a sniper rifle with a thermal sight at one window and had the Guardsmen with their AK-47s take position at the others. He let the commandos get close to the house, then ordered his men to fire first. Once they had the commandos’ attention, he opened up with the sniper rifle, shifting aim quickly between the glowing man-shaped targets his sight revealed to him. Several rooms away, another squad commanded by Qusay’s father began firing as well. In the first few seconds a dozen commandos were killed or wounded, but the Qaeda men didn’t panic; the survivors quickly found cover and returned fire.

One of Qusay’s men stood exposed too long at a window; an incoming round shattered his collarbone. As he fell back screaming another Guard turned to look at him and took two bullets in the side of the head. Qusay ducked down to avoid a hail of bullets directed at his window. Cupping a hand over his ear so he could hear over the screams of the wounded man and the whine of incoming rounds, he listened to radio reports from elsewhere on the estate. The river house had been hit by a rocket or possibly a suicide bomber and was on fire; most of the Guards there were dead and the rest were trapped by the flames. The squads Qusay had dispatched to the rear of the mansion said that they, too, were taking fire, and one team reported hearing shots inside the house.

“Oh God save me!” cried the wounded Guardsman, and Qusay barked, “Shut him up!” at no one in particular. Then he raised his head above the windowsill, took aim, and shot a Qaeda commando who was crouching behind a palm tree. He tracked right with the sniper rifle and spied another commando, down on one knee with a long tube balanced on his shoulder. There was a bright flash in the thermal sight and a rocket streaked towards the house, blasting away the front doors and killing several Guards in the grand entrance hall; Qusay heard their dying screams over the radio.

He shot the rocketeer, ducked down, counted three, popped up again, and tracked left to where another commando was kneeling. Qusay never saw this second rocketeer; all he saw was the rocket, which appeared in his gun sight as a black circle ringed with fire, that rapidly grew larger.

Several times, as they listened to the sounds of the battle, the two Republican Guardsmen in the old prayer room had exchanged glances, communicating without speaking. Now, as the rocket barrage shook the mansion, they looked at one another again and came to a wordless decision.

“Hey!” Tariq Aziz said. “Where are you going? Saddam told you to stay here!” But the two didn’t even glance back as they fled into the hall.

“Shall I quote you another psalm?” asked the jinn. “The twenty-third perhaps?”

Aziz paced the room, coming to his own decision. “Quote it to yourself,” he said finally, and headed for the door. But before he could escape, an armed party burst in.

“Hello, Mr. Aziz,” Amal said. “Doing a little frontline reporting?”

Mustafa and Captain Lawrence pushed past the terrified news publisher and ran over to the jinn. The iron bands that held him in the chair were secured with modern steel padlocks. Mustafa asked Aziz: “Do you have the keys for these?”

“What?” Tariq Aziz said. “Certainly not! I have nothing to do with this! Nothing at all!”

“We’ll have to smash them off,” Lawrence said.

“Don’t bother,” the jinn said. “There isn’t time.”

Outside, down the hallway, a voice bellowed in terror: “GOD IS GREAT! . . . GOD IS GREAT! . . . GOD IS GREAT!” There was a blood-curdling scream that cut off abruptly.

“Oh God, let me out of here!” Tariq Aziz cried. Ignoring the rifle Amal had pointed at him, he darted through the open doorway.

“Let him go,” Mustafa said, before Amal could chase after him. “Samir, shut and lock that door.”

The jinn flashed a mischievous smile at Captain Lawrence. “So. How are you enjoying your wish?”

“You already know the answer to that,” Lawrence said. “I’ve learned my lesson. I’m willing to take it back, if that’s what you’re offering.”

Mustafa, watching Samir bolt the door, spun around at this. “Wait just a minute,” he said.

“Yes,” Amal said. “Hold on.”

“Seriously, dude,” said Samir. “That’s what Osama bin Laden wants.”

“Maybe it’s what God wants, too,” Lawrence suggested. “Put things back the way they were. The way they’re naturally supposed to be.”

“Supposed to be?” Mustafa said. “And you say you’ve learned your lesson, have you?”

The jinn was laughing. “Arabia in a state of nature, untouched by the dreams of the West. Now that would be an alternate reality . . . Alas, I can’t oblige you. That doorway is shut and cannot be gone back through.”

“All right then,” Lawrence said. He placed the butt of his shotgun against one of the padlocks. “I’ll have you out of this in a minute . . .”

But the jinn shook his head. “I already told you. It’s too late.”

Sand flew through a gaping hole in the wall of a formal bedroom, dusting the corpses of Guardsmen whose flesh had been torn by rocket fragments. The bedding had been ripped by shrapnel as well, and the mattress ticking was on fire, though the sand had begun to smother the flames.

The lid of a large hardwood chest opposite the bed creaked open and Saddam Hussein peeped out. When he was sure he could hear no more incoming missiles, he shoved the lid up all the way and half crawled, half rolled out of the chest, the slipped disk in his back making him groan. He grabbed a rifle off one of the dead Guardsmen and used it as a crutch to get to his feet.

He limped into the hall, limped to the dining room where Qusay had been stationed. What Saddam saw, looking in through the shattered doorway, made him groan again.

He shook it off. The jinn, he thought. The jinn could fix this. The creature claimed to be a Muslim: Very well, he would throw himself on its mercy, say whatever it took to get it to protect him. Then later, once he was safe, he would find a way to bend it truly to his will, and undo this nightmare.

But first he had to get back to it. He continued along the hall, not just limping but lurching, and alert to every sound. Al Qaeda was definitely inside the house now—he could hear running, shouting, and sporadic gunfire as they encountered remnants of the Republican Guard—but it sounded as if they were still on the ground floor. It wouldn’t take them long to find their way upstairs, though, and he knew they would never stop searching until they found him.

He came to the gallery overlooking Nebuchadnezzar’s chamber. He heard movement below and tried to slip by unnoticed, but then a voice with a Gulf accent said, “I think it is the older son.” Saddam stepped to the balustrade and looked down. Two commandos stood next to a body on the chamber floor. One of them was shining a flashlight on the corpse’s face.

“Uday!” Saddam cried. The commandos looked up and he shot them both. The flashlight, now blood-spattered, rolled to a stop beside Uday’s head and continued to illuminate his features like some ghastly spotlight. “Uday,” Saddam said. “Wait there. Wait there. I will fix this . . .”

He turned to go to the prayer room and a rifle butt swung out of the shadows, catching him squarely in the face. He spun around, fell against the balustrade, and dropped his own gun over the rail. Another blow hit him in the lower back, fracturing vertebrae. Saddam fell to his knees, insensate with pain.

A rough hand gripped the top of his head and another grabbed the back of his collar. His attacker asked a question. “You,” Saddam hissed, disdain breaking through his agony as he recognized that voice. “You go to hell! You can’t have it—it’s mine! I am a king! A king, you understand? You’re not even a dog’s asshole!”

The grip on his collar tightened. As he was lifted up he tried to fight, but the blow to his spine had robbed him of his strength and he could only flail and curse. He tipped forward over the rail, the tightness at his throat and the drop below triggering an awful sense of déjà vu, and he began to cry out, affirming God’s greatness—a last desperate plea for salvation to which the answer was no.

Then the world turned upside down and he was falling. He landed with a great thud and a crack, and for a moment the whole house fell silent. Osama bin Laden leaned on the balustrade, looking down, the orange light gathered in his eyes making him appear like a demon.

A voice echoed from the hall beyond the gallery: “Oh God, let me out of here!” Bin Laden moved towards the voice, reaching the hall in time to see the narrowing wedge of torchlight as Samir swung the prayer room door closed. Bin Laden stood listening—to the door bolt sliding home, to Tariq Aziz’s receding footsteps, and to the soft whisper of his own intuition.

He slung his rifle and reached into his robe, pulling out a canvas satchel. He set the fuse as he was walking down the hall.

The jinn said to Samir: “You should come away from there.”

“Why?” Samir said. But he backed away from the door and stood with the others by the magic circle.

Captain Lawrence was hammering at the padlock, which stubbornly refused to break. Mustafa had gone behind the chair to examine the window shutters. “I wonder if we can climb down from here.”

“Don’t worry about it,” the jinn said.

An explosion blew the door apart. Hunks of splintered wood and metal came flying across the chamber and were met by a whirl of air that also extinguished most of the torches. When Mustafa regained his senses, he was slumped against the wall beside the window. Except for the ringing in his ears he wasn’t in any discomfort and didn’t seem to be wounded, but he couldn’t move.

Osama bin Laden came through the doorway cradling his AK-47. He spotted Amal lying facedown in the shadows, but the jinn said, “Leave her be, brother. I am the one you want.”

Bin Laden came forward and stood in the same spot Saddam Hussein had occupied not long before. He didn’t make a wish or say anything at all, just stared at the jinn with a mixture of curiosity and malice.

The jinn gazed back calmly into the face of death. “There are among us some that are righteous,” he said. “And some the contrary . . . Peace be unto you, brother.”

Bin Laden pulled the trigger. The jinn bled like a man, and he suffered like one, too—as the first bullets entered his body, he opened his mouth in a gasp and his arms and legs jerked helplessly against the bands that held them. Bin Laden continued firing until the gun’s clip was empty. By then the jinn’s limbs were still and his head lolled forward on his neck.

Mustafa found he could move again. He tried to stand, but vertigo hit him and he fell back with a groan. Bin Laden turned towards the sound and the two of them locked eyes a moment, the senator trying to decide whether Mustafa was worth reloading for. “God willing,” Mustafa said, and Bin Laden with an imperious tilt of the head turned and walked out of the room.

Mustafa slid sideways until he came to rest on the floor with his cheek on a fine layer of sand. From this position he saw the brass jinni bottle, discarded and forgotten beside the body of Saddam’s sorcerer. He watched the play of the flickering light on its curved surface, felt the world turn beneath him. Then the wind of the storm, rising to a hurricane fury, tore the shutters from the window and blasted into the chamber, snuffing out the last of the torches.

At that same moment, three thousand kilometers to the west in Tripoli, Wajid Jamil was demoing a software update for his Uncle Muammar. The virtual globe Al Ard—Earth—was one of the Libyan governor’s favorite computer programs, and since its introduction he’d made numerous suggestions for improvements. The number-one item on Gaddafi’s wish list—real-time updating of Al Ard’s satellite imagery—remained technically infeasible in a nonmilitary application, but Wajid had done what he could to make the program feel “live” in other ways.

The new feature presently being demonstrated pulled in data from weather stations around the world and projected it onto the globe, refreshing every fifteen seconds. Wajid had zoomed in on the northeastern UAS so that his Uncle could watch the sandstorm as it spread across Iraq towards the Kuwait and Arabia state lines. Gaddafi was fascinated, almost hypnotized—when Wajid tried to move on to the next phase of the demo, which involved highway traffic data, the governor asked if they could please stick with the weather a bit longer.

“Of course,” Wajid said, eager to please as always.

But as luck would have it, at the very next refresh the program hit a glitch: The yellow-crosshatch graphic that represented the sandstorm increased dramatically in size, expanding hundreds of kilometers in all directions. Al Gaddafi jerked his head back, blinking as though the computer monitor had poked him in the eyes. Wajid looked over at his main tech support guy, who winced in embarrassment and bent closer to another screen displaying raw code.

At the next refresh, the sandstorm expanded again. It covered the entire Gulf Peninsula now, as well as Persia, Turkey, and the Caucasus all the way north to Chechnya. Gaddafi chuckled, having regained his composure. “Global warming,” he quipped.

“Yeah, this is still a beta,” said Wajid.

Refresh. The storm spread through Afghanistan and Pakistan to India, surged into Russia and Eastern Europe, and crossed the Red Sea and the Gulf of Aden to engulf Somalia, Djibouti, Eritrea, Ethiopia, Sudan, Egypt, and Libya as far west as Benghazi.

“We are next,” said Gaddafi.

“Uh-huh,” said Wajid, shooting his tech guy another look. Then the computer monitors flickered as a heavy gust of wind struck the building and millions of tiny grains began pelting the windows.

Refresh . . .

In Texas it was early morning. In an undistinguished house in the Austin suburbs, a man stood in his kitchen, talking to his dog. Though no one would guess it from his current surroundings, the man was a son of privilege, his father one of the most powerful and respected elders in the Evangelical Republic; in his youth it had naturally been assumed that he too would achieve great things. But he had squandered the advantages of his birth, used up all his second chances, and so come to nothing. Now that his own children were grown, the little black terrier at his feet represented the pinnacle of his responsibilities.

“I know you want the canned food,” he said to it. “But you don’t get to decide what you eat. I’m the decider.” He flashed a goofy grin, impressed by his own wit, which the terrier couldn’t or wouldn’t appreciate. But the dog did seem to understand that it wasn’t going to get its wish, and bent its head reluctantly to the bowl of dry kibble. “Good boy,” the man said, and went to see about his own breakfast.

The man had slept poorly, plagued as usual by anxiety dreams in which he searched endlessly for something he had promised to find—though whether the something was a person or an object he could never quite remember. The sense of frustration continued to haunt him even now that he was awake. As he stood by the open refrigerator looking blankly within, he wondered, Where are they? and then, Where is what?

He was still staring into the fridge when he heard the patter of what he assumed was rain against the side of the house. The dog, facing the sliding glass patio doors and able to see what was really going on outside, let out a terrified bark and ran to hide in the pantry.

“You whine all you want,” the man said. “You’re still not getting the canned food.” As the storm intensified he shut the refrigerator door and went into the hall and called upstairs to his wife: “Hey Laur? You awake? You better go shut the windows in the spare room!”

Refresh . . .

Ninety miles away in Crawford, the man David Koresh called the Quail Hunter was in the CIA’s interrogation wing, extracting a confession from a recalcitrant Quaker. The basement torture room was windowless and soundproof, but even so he sensed the arrival of the storm as a sudden tremor in his heart.

“Sir?” asked a centurion who was holding a bucket of water above the prisoner’s head. “Should I go again?”

The Quail Hunter started to gesture Yes, yes, and something trickled onto the back of his hand. He looked up. A hole had appeared in the ceiling and sand was streaming down through it like the grains in an hourglass. He felt his heart give another kick.

“Sir?” the centurion said. “Sir?”

Refresh . . .

In Virginia, David Koresh sat at his desk with his Bible open to the Book of Revelation. He thought he understood what was happening and ought to have welcomed it, but now that he was getting what he’d prayed for he found himself in doubt, the rasp of the sand on the window behind him sounding more and more like the crackle of a fire.

Across the Potomac, Colonel Yunus stood in the dinosaur gallery of the Smithsonian, marveling at the sand sifting down through the growing cracks in the skylight. He felt no fear, even as the roof began to give way; in the dust cloud that came boiling towards him, he saw the outline of a house, and faces of a family that he knew. He said: “God willing.”

Refresh . . .

All around the globe—in Berlin and the occupied territories; in London and Tehran, Kabul and Denver, Chicago and Jakarta, Islamabad and Corpus Christi, Los Angeles and Mumbai; in Alexandria and Alexandria—the storm scoured the landscape, roaring through the homes and hiding places of the powerful and the meek like some mighty voice: Refresh. Refresh. This is the day the world changes . . .

And in Baghdad, a tall man stalking the halls of a mansion found himself suddenly outside, exposed to the storm’s full fury. The wind tore the rifle from his hands and the pelting sand drove him to his knees. Blind, he clawed his way forward, seeking shelter, a cave to crawl into. There was nothing. He quickly became exhausted. Sinking down, he felt sand piling up around him and prepared to be buried alive.

The storm abruptly ceased. The tall man raised his head and saw only darkness. He stood up in the black stillness, listening to his own labored breathing, and felt rather than heard the heavy footsteps coming up behind him. The back of his neck prickled. Hot breath whispered in his ear as someone taller even than he was leaned in over his shoulder.

“Who goes there?” Osama bin Laden said, and then he turned around.