The last chapters of The Mahdi provide a dark coda, a message for us as individuals to marshal true spirituality and strengthen it ... out of our love for the upliftment of consciousness. This startling novel is a sharp poke in the ribs for those of us who treasure new age-New Thought teachings.
-- June Rouse

CHAPTER 1

December 31, 1999

Bennett Williams sat uncomfortably amidst the rows of empty seats on the Swissair 747. The vacant cabin reflected just how alone he felt.

He recalled his early catechism lessons. He thought about Judas Iscariot. Should I kiss Abu on the cheek as I betray him? The plane taxied down the runway and then lifted its mammoth body off the ground and into the night sky, racing toward its destination in the Middle East. Shall I call him master? Isn't that how Judas betrayed Jesus to the Romans? He remembered that Iscariot was Latin for assassin. His stomach tightened in that old, familiar way. He hadn't had any stomach problems in a long time.

"This isn't happening," Williams muttered in disbelief. He stared out the plane's window looking for something surreal that would prove that it was all a bad dream. But against the blackness of night all he could make out was his own accusing reflection staring back at him.

His thoughts drifted back to an hour earlier. "From here you'll go to Andrews Air Force Base," the President's Chief of Staff had explained as they walked from the Oval Office down the carpeted corridor of the White House. "Dulles and National are closed."

Williams nodded. "I heard air traffic control across the entire country is down."

"Yeah," Lee Cowles said, shaking his head in disgust. "Hundreds of people have been killed. Planes were colliding everywhere before the system was shut down. The computer virus has caused unbelievable damage." He shot a glance at Williams. "Your friend is something else."

Williams knew Abu was responsible, everyone did. The fact that Williams understood why Abu was doing it was little consolation. Could even the noblest end justify all the suffering and destruction that was occurring with ferocious swiftness? "What else has it gotten into? Defense computers?" Cowles didn't answer. Williams knew his allegiance was suspect. Were they worried what he might pass on to Abu? "What happens when I get to Andrews?"

"There's a Swissair 747 waiting for you."

"Where's it taking me?"

"Geneva. By the time you get there we should have worked out your safe passage to Riyadh."

"Wait a minute," Williams said, stopping Cowles with a tug on his arm. "Are you telling me I'm flying into a war zone in a seven-forty-seven without safe passage?"

"As it now stands, yes."

"That's fucking great!" Williams said in exasperation. "The skies over the Mediterranean are filled with Muslim pilots just aching to shoot off their sidewinders, and you haven't secured the fucking airspace!"

"We're in a war, Mr. Williams!" Cowles exploded. "People are dying by the thousands every day. We're on nuclear alert, and so are the Russians, Chinese, French, British and Israelis. How close Sheik Asghar is to pushing his nuclear button is anyone's guess. Your friend" -- Cowles' voice was filled with contempt -- "has supplied his urban soldiers with Stingers. No one is safe anymore. The President can't even leave the White House!"

Williams had no response. This was the worst it had ever been. Some were saying it was the end. Some were calling it Judgment Day; they said Armageddon had truly come, and proclaimed Abu was the Anti-Christ. Williams ran a hand through his dark hair, took a deep breath, and began walking towards the exit to the south lawn where the revved helicopter stood waiting.

The Chief of Staff regained his composure. "But, like I said, we're working through the Swiss. They're trying to make the arrangements, but communications are extremely difficult. The virus has infected telephone systems and the recent solar activity has severely disrupted those systems that were working. We're mostly relying on short-wave radio." Williams had heard about the enormous solar flares that were appearing suddenly and throwing off the magnetic field around the planet, making satellites go haywire. Once again, he knew Abu was causing it, the same way he knew Abu had caused the recent earthquakes and volcanic eruptions around the world. Cowles continued, "Since Sheik Asghar asked for you, we're assuming he'll cooperate. We expect a squadron of Saudi F-15s to meet you en route and take you into Riyadh."

"Where is he?"

"We don't know. He may be in a bunker somewhere; he may be living under a tent in the Saudi desert. Apparently he likes to stay mobile. If we knew, we wouldn't need you."

"Do you really expect me to kill him?" Williams asked, stopping at the exit. He was looking outside at the armed Marines in full battle dress behind sandbag bunkers posted to protect the White House.

Cowles stared into Williams' eyes. "We're expecting you to do what you can. Whatever it takes."

Williams shot back, unblinking, "Jesus, don't you remember what happened in Jerusalem? Abu is invulnerable. He cannot be killed." There was stiff silence between the two men. A sardonic smile crossed Williams' face, "You guys still don't have any fucking idea who or what you're really dealing with, do you?" Cowles was impassively silent. "I guarantee that you, the President, the defense establishment, this country -- Christ! -- every country -- the whole human race, has never faced anyone or anything like Abu. Never. Forget everything you've ever been taught about fighting a war. It's a whole new ballgame. If you guys don't start getting that, we're all fucked!"

Lee Cowles was getting visibly annoyed again. He took a deep breath to calm himself. "Look, Ben, the President knows how close you and Sheik Asghar are . . . "

"Were," Williams corrected him. His tone was adamant yet resigned.

Cowles ignored Williams' comment. "The President knows how personally difficult this is for you and what your chances are of coming out alive. Believe me, we wish there was another way. Unfortunately, you're our last hope. If you manage somehow to pull this off, you must might bring a quick end to the war. You'll save the world and all Western civilization from a madman." The Chief of Staff paused. "But if you fail . . ."

Cowles had made his point. "If you fail . . ." The words echoed in Williams' head ever since leaving Washington, so much so that they had now become his own.

Williams thought of Aimee, and his son Matthew. He now had so much reason to live. Before Aimee and Matthew, he'd never known love. Now he wondered if he'd ever see them again. This is insane, Williams thought. How can I kill Abu? How do you kill a brother? Abu was more than a brother to him, much more. He'd been his best friend, his teacher, even his savior. Without Abu, he'd never have won the Pulitzer Prize, he'd never have been asked to write a book, he'd never have known Aimee, he'd never had had a son. And he'd never have found himself.

President Stanton's angry interrogatory shot back into his mind. "Just where's your allegiance, Williams?" Sitting in the Oval Office with the President of the United States, staring mutely down at the carpet and the immense embroidered eagle that clasped arrows in one claw and an olive branch in the other, and surrounded by all the trappings of power and patriotism, Williams couldn't even answer the President.

Then why was he here? Williams asked himself. What made him agree? Maybe it was simply because Abu had asked for him. For some reason it was vitally important that he see Abu again. "To what will you give your allegiance, Ben Williams?" Abu asked him a long time ago around a campfire in Uganda. He didn't know the answer then either. "That is what you must decide," Abu had told him. And it had taken a long time for him to find out. Now, after so much had happened, he was going back to Abu. He didn't know why; he only knew that it wasn't over.

Williams felt like he'd just made a pact with the devil. But who was the devil? He leaned his head back against the seat and closed his eyes. His thoughts drifted back to a year and a half earlier, that July day in Cairo when Herschel Strunk, his editor at the New York Times, had telephoned and told him he was going to Bhopal, India -- to the place where he would first meet Abu 'Ali Asghar. Back then he knew where his allegiance was: It was to himself, and his ambition. There was nothing else.

Williams didn't want to got to Bhopal. Bhopal was crowded and dirty. There wasn't even anything interesting about the place; it was like any other industrial town with factories and rude, belching smoke stacks. The only significant that happened there in the last few hundred years was an accident at the Union Carbine chemical plant that released tons of toxic gas into the air and killed thousands. That's what he had been sent to cover, even though it was history already written.

Bennett Williams knew that Bhopal had been a tragedy, but as a renowned war correspondent he was a veteran when it came to witnessing tragedies. Williams viewed going to Bhopal as one of those assignments that reminded him no job was perfect.

"Bhopal? Why me?" Williams' tone was contentious.

"Because," Strunk answered impatiently, "you're the only one available right now."

"All right. But you owe me, Hersch."

Stunk was conciliatory. "How about the war in the Sudan? Finish up there and I'll send you to the Sudan."

"I'm going to hold you to that," Williams said begrudgingly. "Count on it." He opened his notebook. "So what are you looking for? Why Bhopal?"

"There's more to life than war and destruction, Ben," Strunk said.

"Spare me the fatherly advice," Williams replied. "Just tell me what you want."

"I need a standard follow-up piece. It's been over a decade since the '84 incident; what going on there these days? Remember, it's our job to keep the public informed."

"Yeah," Williams answered. "I'll be in touch."

Funny, Williams thought looking back, when he hung up the phone in Cairo that day, he had no idea just how much that call would forever change his life.

Margo Dockendorf, first-time author, is a successful attorney in private practice in Southern California, with a degree in Political Science from San Diego State University and a Juris Doctor from Pepperdine University School of Law.