‘It was a suicide attack here,’ Kyle said.

‘Some karsevak group claimed responsibility; some group no one’s ever heard of before. Fired everything off in one shooting match.’

‘Don’t they go straight into a state of moksha if they blow themselves up in Varanasi?’

‘That’s what they believe, son. Your soul is released from the wheel of reincarnation. But I still can’t help feeling that this was the final throw. Things are getting better. The Ranas are taking control. People can see the difference we’re making. I do feel we’ve turned the corner on this.’

Kyle loved it when his dad talked military, though he was really a structural engineer.

‘So Salim got home safe.’

Kyle nodded.

‘That’s good.’ Kyle heard his father sigh in the way that men do when they’re supposed to talk about things they don’t want to. ‘Salim’s a good kid, a good friend.’ Another intake of breath. Kyle waited for it to shape into a but.

‘Kyle, you know, that game. Well...’

Not a but, a well.

‘Well, I know it’s real educational and a lot of people play it and enjoy it and get a lot out of it, but, it’s not really right. I mean, it’s not accurate. It claims it’s an evolution simulation, and it is as far as it goes. But if you think about it, really, it’s just following rules laid down by someone else. All that code was programmed by someone else; so really, it’s evolution inside a bigger framework that’s been deliberately designed. But they don’t tell you, Kyle, and that’s dishonest; it’s pretending to be something it’s not. And that’s why I don’t like it; because it isn’t honest about the truth, and I know that whatever I say, what you do with Salim is your thing, but I do think you’re not to play it here, in the house. And it’s good you’ve got a good friend here -I remember when Kelis was your age when we were in the Gulf, she had a really good friend, a Canadian girl - but it would be good if you had a few more friends from your own background. OK? Now, how about “Wrestle Smackdown” on cable?’

~ * ~

The referee had gone down with a head-butt to the nuts in the first thirty seconds so it was only when the decibel count exceeded the mundane Varanasi traffic roar that security heads-upped, guns-downed and came running. A guard-woman in full colour-smear combats and smart-visor locked her arms around Kyle and hauled him out of the steel-cage match into which the under-eleven practice had collapsed.

‘I’ll sue you I’ll sue the ass of you your children will end up living in a cardboard box, let go of me,’ Kyle yelled. The security woman hauled.