Zendegi

Nasim flipped the goggles’ screens down, whiting out Martin’s vision. The top of the cage she fitted over his head included a camera that would monitor his facial expression, just as it would be monitored in an ordinary ghal’e. He heard the servo motor sliding him into place inside the scanner. He was free to move his hands, but if he tried to raise them above shoulder-height he’d get a swift reminder of his actual circumstances.

‘Are you ready for Zendegi?’ she asked.

Martin said, ‘Yes.’

Vivid blue sky. Yellow mud-brick buildings. Women in richly patterned scarves bustling past. Martin felt a tap on his hand. Javeed asked impatiently, ‘Baba, what’s wrong?’

Martin finally gained control of his gaze and managed to turn his icon’s head towards his son’s voice without struggling against his restraints. ‘Sorry, I was just getting used to my ghal’e.’ He looked around. ‘So this is Old Kabul!’ No time to make an entrance from the city’s outskirts; they’d been inserted straight onto a busy street. A small boy leading a donkey loaded with gourds squeezed past them; he grinned at Javeed and greeted him with ‘Salaam aleikum.’ No doubt the phrase was wildly anachronistic, since they were meant to be in the pre-Islamic era, but Martin wasn’t here to nitpick. They weren’t planning to be too faithful to Ferdowsi, let alone historical fact.

‘We need to get to Zal!’ Javeed reminded him.

‘Yeah – so what’s your plan?’

‘They don’t know that the man in the prison is Zal,’ Javeed reasoned, ‘so you should tell them he’s your son. Then they’ll let you see him.’

‘Okay. So we have to find the prison. Who should we ask?’

‘Hmm.’ Javeed didn’t want to entrust a random passer-by with this vital query, so they made their way along the crowded street. People could be heard touting wares from all directions, but the hubbub was not unpleasant; compared to the car horns and motorbike engines of downtown Tehran it was bliss.

Javeed spotted a pomegranate seller. He tapped Martin’s hand and whispered, ‘Buy something first, to make him happy.’

Martin smiled and obliged. He mimed reaching into the money-belt beneath his kameez; he’d remembered to pre-order coins on the website the day before. When he’d bought the fruit he addressed the trader respectfully, ‘Sir, my oldest son has gone missing, and I heard he was arrested this morning due to some misunderstanding. I need to visit him, but I’m a stranger in this city. Can you tell me where I’ll find him?’

The man expressed his sympathy and offered detailed directions. Martin struggled to commit them to memory; he should have ordered a pen and paper along with the coins. But Javeed appeared to have taken it all in; he set off briskly down the street, turning to Martin to urge him to catch up.

‘I told you Afghanis were friendly,’ Martin said, tossing the pomegranate onto the ground. The week before, one of Javeed’s schoolmates had pointed out an Afghani boy in another class and declared that his parents were sure to be murderers and the child himself a shameless thief.

‘That man wasn’t a real person,’ Javeed replied.

‘That’s true,’ Martin conceded. ‘But I’ve been to the real Kabul and met plenty of real people there.’

Javeed scowled impatiently; this wasn’t the time to talk about such things. Martin tried to relax; if he started thinking about all the pernicious nonsense he wanted his Proxy to be prepared to counter, he’d end up hijacking every Zendegi session for community service announcements. He had to trust Nasim to extract the same abilities from subtler cues.

They threaded their way through the crowds, past merchants selling clay pots, okra, lentils, whole butchered sheep. Martin couldn’t fault Javeed’s memory or sense of direction; he showed no signs of confusion or hesitation. In less than five minutes they were outside the prison.

It was an imposing, fortified building. As he pounded on the gate, Martin found himself recalling Evin, and the siege. A man with a thick black beard opened the gate a crack and eyed the callers suspiciously.

Martin repeated the story he’d told the fruit-seller.

‘We have three hundred prisoners,’ the warder replied. ‘How will I know your son?’

Martin assumed that Zal was sticking to an alias; being known as the visiting prince of Zavolestan might have got him released, but it would also have risked sparking a war. ‘His hair is white, like an old man’s. But he’s young, less than half my age.’

‘I know the one,’ the warder replied. ‘He was caught creeping into the palace stables.’

You don’t know the half of it, Martin thought. ‘He was just looking for a place to sleep,’ he said. ‘We’re strangers here, I and my two sons.’ He gestured at Javeed. ‘The boy misses his brother. Can’t you let us see him for a few minutes?’

The warder sniffed viscously, then hawked and spat on the ground. He opened the gate and let them through.