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Elite military Commander Max Landau walked with a noticeable limp as he entered a mosque during a prayer service and politely made his way around the kneeling worshippers before he found the man he was looking for. Dressed in a clean white robe compared to the other more humble churchgoers, the man stood out noticeably. Landau looked around at his poor countrymen. Deep inside he hated himself for associating with the rich outsider. He promised himself that he would make it up to them some day. Tariq Amin was nothing but an instrument that Landau was using to build his own powerful army. It will be a good army that will protect his country against Azerbaijan’s enemies like the Armenians and the Russians. Landau already did his part by serving his country’s military as a highly decorated officer and was well renown for his bravery. The leg wound he suffered during a skirmish with the Armenians, was a constant reminder of this. Neither Landau nor his poor family was politically connected enough to help him rise any higher in the ranks of the regular Azerbaijani army. He saw this privilege extended to officers who were nowhere near his caliber. Amin offered Landau a golden opportunity to win back his prestige and earn twice the money he made in the national military. He was able to impress Amin with his logistical skills, military experience, and leadership. He also had the necessary military bearing to keep an undisciplined mercenary like Tafar Rasulon in line.
Landau knelt down on the rug next to Tariq Amin and whispered to him, “Please forgive me for disturbing you, Tariq, but we have just received word from Tafar that four canisters are in route to Batumi and four are on the way here.”
Landau and Amin’s personal servant help him to his feet and the three men slowly walk toward the front door of the mosque.
“May Allah be praised! We’ll soon send a lesson to all corners of the world that we will no longer stand for the corruption of our society. The infidels will soon taste the bitter fruit of their sinful lives,” Tariq Amin said trying to control his elation and keep his voice down.
“Have you selected the attack sites yet?” Landau asked.
“I believe that we’ll target New York, Los Angeles, Paris, London, Sidney, Tel Aviv, Tokyo, and there was one other, ...oh yes of course, I almost forgot about our Chechen brothers across the border, the last target will be Moscow.”
“The entire world will then hear our voices as never before,” Landau said, “This will truly be a great moment for our cause.”
“The eight bombs will serve as a deadly reminder for all eternity that the hand of Allah will reach the oppressors wherever they live,” Amin said.
“I must go back to my duties at the camp and let you return to your prayers,” Landau said to Amin as he left the mosque. The idea of killing innocent people used to bother Max Landau, but having listened to Amin preach this mantra for more than a year, has finally taken its toll on him. Such was the ways of a global war. Wiping out a village across the ocean wasn’t much different than wiping out the village on the other side of the mountain.
As Tariq Amin watched Landau leave the mosque, he remembered when he was that age. That was back when there was only one enemy, the Jews. Amin’s family had long resided in Saudi Arabia where they were very much removed from any Mideast conflicts. His father was a major broker for Saudi oil exports and mercantile imports and made a sizeable fortune.
The elder Amin would send money, weapons, anything that the Muslim brothers needed in their long fight with Israel. That was the extent of his family’s involvement in such matters.
Tariq Amin was free to roam around the world living the good life with a constant flow of money from his father. He went on to receive a business degree from Oxford and started working as an investment analyst for his father’s company. After a while, he built his own loyal staff and spent less and less time working and more time partying. He became, for all intents and purposes, a rich playboy who spent eight months out of the year frolicking with the glamorous European party set. While this went on for decades, Amin was still able to amass a respectable fortune of his own as well as inherit part of the billion-dollar fortune that his father passed on to him and his brothers.
That seemed like a lifetime ago to Amin who was well aware that his best years were behind him. While his many wives and children were all well taken care of, Amin had too much time to reflect on the time he wasted. After years of wallowing in guilt from the decadent lifestyle that he led, Amin found his way back to the Koran. He spent more and more time in the mosque searching for something that money could not buy, that certain something that was unattainable, he wanted immortality.
Being smart enough to realize that this would never be possible, it came to him one day as he knelt in the mosque, that maybe there was a way that he could live forever in the hearts and minds of both his Arab brothers and the infidels.
Never one to enter into a business blindly, Amin started slowly like his father did by funneling money to some select terrorist organizations. But after a while he felt like he wasn’t getting enough return on his investment. It was then while he was at his summer home in Baku, Azerbaijan that he decided to build a small militia that he could use to do his bidding. Amin was content with having his small army assist in Muslim battles whenever and wherever they were needed. This kept the soldiers sharp, but it wasn’t long before Amin wanted even more. He put out a feeler that he was looking to make a ‘bigger killing’ and today, he finally has all the pieces in place to help him write the name ‘Tariq Amin’ in the consciousness of the world’s mind forever.
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