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.”
    The lab chief nodded energetically and talked as he led Colliquin to a separate, locked laboratory. “The cloud-networked, holograph-to-human interactive digital program. Yes, of course. We’re all very excited about that. The concept is at the very frontier of technology—the idea of physically linking humans to the Internet and then using a web-based holographic image to influence neural responses in the brain.”
    After inputting code into the trio of computers connected to the digital image laser tubes, the chief waved his hand over a few tabs on the master screen. Then he turned to Colliquin. “Where in the room would you like it?”
    Colliquin smiled and pointed to the space above a storage cabinet at the far end of the laboratory. “Let’s start there.”
    “Easy enough,” the chief said. He activated the 3-D GPS locator function on the screen and touched the spot that showed an outline of the room and the cabinet. Then he pressed an icon on the screen. That was when the 3-D image of the face appeared, hovering over the cabinet.
    Colliquin smiled. “Make it bigger. Much bigger.”
    The chief tapped a tab on his screen and the hologram suddenly filled the entire room, eclipsing Colliquin and the technology chief with the giant human likeness that seemed to have a life of its own.
    Colliquin grinned broadly and raised his hands in a kind of strange blessing at what he saw. He could have cried for joy, but he didn’t have the ability. Not because of some physiological defect of the tear ducts, but rather because of something else altogether—something deep inside of him that was invisible to the eye, but very dark. And it was growing unchecked with the passage of time, like a malignancy.

SIX
    JERUSALEM, ISRAEL
    A young bearded man named Micah walked at a hasty clip, his eyes darting around him. He was on his way to a clandestine meeting just off Bab as-Silsila Street, formally the dividing point between what used to be called the Jewish Quarter and the Arab Quarter. But then, those kinds of geographical labels didn’t make much sense anymore since the migration of most Arabs and Palestinians out of Israel following the spectacularly failed Arab-Russian invasion several years back.
    Micah didn’t dare break into a run. That would catch too much attention from the Global Alliance police force. And there were a dozen of them in their blue helmets, some shouldering automatic weapons, stationed here and there on the plaza adjoining the old Western Wall where Micah now crossed quickly, head down. Micahalso knew that it wasn’t just the Alliance police on the ground that posed a threat, or even the drone-bots that patrolled the airspace. There were also the heavily armed droid-bots patrolling Jerusalem on foot. He had walked past a few of the big droids from time to time, though he hadn’t been stopped by one.
    Not yet.
    The Alliance authorities still permitted pedestrians to cross the plaza under the shadow of the huge temple in order to enter the crowded, winding alleys of the commercial souk . Because of the negotiations between Prime Minister Sol Bensky and the Global Alliance’s Alexander Colliquin, the Jews had finally been given complete control of their most sacred piece of geography: the Temple Mount. Up there on the Mount they had completed construction of their replica of the ancient Herodian temple. But in exchange, Israel had paid dearly.
    Micah paused for a moment on the edge of the open plaza to gaze up at the monumental Jewish temple. He saw the smoke spiraling up from the altar of burnt sacrifices that lay between the entrance to the massive porch of the temple and the Court of the Priests near the second eastern gate—that place where animal sacrifices were now being offered for the first time in more than two thousand years. A few animal rights activist groups had tried to protest at first, but they didn’t have a clue about the significance of it all. Micah shook his head at the sight