A medical chopper approached. It was exactly five o'clock. When it came close enough, Alai could see that it was from an Israeli hospital.

"Do Israeli doctors send patients to Beirut?" asked Alai.

"Lebanese doctors send patients to Israel," said Ivan.

"So must we expect that our friends will wait until this chopper leaves? Or are these our friends?"

"You have hidden in garbage and dressed as a woman," said Ivan. "What is riding in a Zionist helicopter compared to that?"

The chopper landed. The door opened. Nobody got out.

Alai picked up the suitcase that he knew was his because it was light—filled only with clothes instead of weaponry—and walked boldly to the door.

"Am I the passenger you came for?"

The pilot nodded.

Alai turned to look back toward where the couple had gone to kiss. He saw a flurry of motion. They had seen. They would speak of it.

He turned back to the pilot. "Can this chopper carry all five of us?"

"Easily," said the pilot.

"What about seven?"

The pilot shrugged. "We fly lower, slower. But we often do."

Alai turned to Ivan. "Please invite our young lovers to come with us." Then Alai climbed into the helicopter. In moments, he had the women's clothing off. Underneath, he was wearing a simple western business suit.

In moments, a pair of terrified doctors climbed into the helicopter at gunpoint, in various stages of deshabille. Apparently they had been warned to maintain absolute silence, because when they saw Alai and recognized him, the man went white and the woman began to weep while trying to refasten her clothing.

Alai came and knelt in front of her. "Daughter of God," he said, "I am not concerned about your immodesty. I am concerned that the man you offered your nakedness to is not your husband."

"We will be married," she said.

"Then when that happy day comes," said Alai, "your nakedness will bless your husband, and his nakedness will belong to you. Until then, I have this clothing for you." He handed her the costume he had worn. "I do not ask that you dress like this all the time. But today, when God has seen how your heart intended to sin, perhaps you might cover yourself in humility."

"Can she wait to dress until we're in the air?" asked the pilot.

"Of course," said Alai.

"Everybody strap down," said the pilot.

There weren't enough seats along the sides; the center was meant to hold a gurney. But Alai's driver grinned and insisted on standing. "I've ridden choppers into battle. If I can't keep my feet in a medical chopper, I deserve some bruises."

The chopper tilted as it rose into the air, but soon it found a workable equilibrium, and the woman unstrapped and awkwardly dressed herself. All the men looked away, except her companion, who helped her.

Meanwhile, Alai and the pilot conversed, making no attempt to lower their voices.

"I don't want these two with us for the main enterprise," said Alai. "But I don't want to kill them either. They need time to find their way back to God."

"They can be held in Haifa," said the pilot. "Or I can have them taken on to Malta, if that would suit you better."

"Haifa will do."

It wasn't a long journey, even flying low and slow. By the time they arrived, the doctors were quiet and looked penitent, holding hands and trying not to look at Alai too much. They landed on the roof of a hospital in Haifa, and the pilot turned off the engine and got out to converse for a moment with a man dressed like a doctor. Then he opened the door. "I have to lift off again," he said, "to make room for your transportation. So you need to come out now. Except those two."

The doctors looked at each other, frightened.

"They'll be safe?" asked Alai.

"Better if they don't see your transportation come and go," said the pilot. "It will soon be dawn and there's a little light. But they'll be safe."

Alai touched them both as he left the chopper.

He and his men watched as the medical chopper lifted off. Instantly, another chopper arrived, but this time a long-range battlejet, large enough to carry many soldiers into battle, and armed heavily enough to get them past a lot of obstacles.

The door opened, and Peter Wiggin stepped out.

Alai walked up to him. "Salaam," he said.

"And in you, too, let there be peace," said Peter.

"You look more like Ender than the public photographs show."

"I have them retouched by computer to make me look older and smarter," said Peter.

Alai grinned. "It was nice of you to give us a ride."

"When Felix told me the sad story of that lonely pedestrian in the Empty Quarter, I couldn't pass up the chance to help."

"I thought it would be Bean," said Alai.

"It's a whole bunch of men trained by Bean," said Peter. "But Bean himself is on another errand. In Rwanda, as it happens."

"So that's happening now?" asked Alai.

"Oh, no," said Peter. "We won't make a move until we see how your little adventure turns out."

"Then let's go," said Alai.

Peter invited Alai to take precedence, but then he himself entered before any of Alai's soldiers. Ivan made as if to protest, but Alai gestured for him to relax. Alai had already bet everything on Peter's being cooperative and trustworthy. Now was not the time to worry about assassination or kidnapping. Even though there were twenty Hegemony soldiers already inside, as well as a sizable amount of equipment. Alai recognized the Thai-looking commander as someone he knew from Battle School. Had to be Suriyawong. Alai nodded to him. Suriyawong nodded back.

Once they were under way and on jet power—this time without any embarrassed woman having to be officially rebuked and forgiven and dressed—Peter indicated the men who were with him.

"I assumed," said Peter, "that the lone hitchhiker our mutual friend told me about didn't need a large escort."

"Only enough to get me to where a certain thick rope is coiled like a snake."

Peter nodded. "I have friends currently trying to find his exact location."

Alai smiled. "I assume it's far from the front."

"If he's in Hyderabad," said Peter, "then he will be under extremely heavy guard. But if he's across the border in Pakistan, security will not be unusually heavy."

"Either way," said Alai, "I will not have your men exposed to danger."

"Or observed," said Peter. "It wouldn't do for too many people to know you were brought to real power with the help of the Hegemon."

"You do seem to be at hand whenever I make a play for power."

"This is the last time, if you win," said Peter.

"This is the last time either way," said Alai, then grinned. "Either the soldiers will follow me or they won't."

"They will," said Peter. "If they get the chance."

Alai indicated his small escort. "That's what my camera crew is here to ensure."

Ivan smiled and lifted his shirt enough to show that he was wearing a bulletproof vest and carrying grenades and clips and a machine pistol.

"Oh," said Peter. "I thought you had gained weight."

"We Battle School boys," said Alai, "we always have a plan."

"You're not going to fight your way in, then."

"We're going to walk in as if we expected to be obeyed," said Alai. "With cameras rolling. It's a simple plan. But it doesn't have to work for very long. That thick rope, it always did love a camera."

"A vain and brutal man, my sources say," said Peter. "And not stupid."

"We'll see," said Alai.

"I think you're going to succeed," said Peter.

"So do I."

"And when you do," said Peter, "I think you're going to do something about the things Virlomi has been complaining about."

"It's because of those things that I could not wait for a more opportune time. I must wash Islam clean of this bloody stain."

"I believe that with you as Caliph, the Free People of Earth can coexist with a united Islam," said Peter.