Marrakech

Marrakech (مراكش) is the fourth-largest city in Morocco.^[1]

History[edit | edit source]

During the 14th century, a trader from the city traveled to nearby Timbuktu to conduct business with the gold merchant Masireh.^[2] However, the trader used the meeting as a false pretense to kidnap and interrogate Masireh for the location of his gold mine. Masireh tricked the trader by giving him a fake map and was subsequently let go.^[3]

By the 21st century, global climate change resulted in a number of long-lasting heatwaves to settle over Marrakech, prompting city officials to implement a strict curfew to prevent citizens from leaving their homes at day and suffering heat stroke or even death. The city suffered from regular power outages due to its inhabitants drawing on an overloaded power grid to futile efforts to keep cool, as even the shade was too hot to survive. Consequently, most of the city's wealthy inhabitants elected to move elsewhere, and Marrakech's poverty rate skyrocketed.^[4]

Soon after, two operatives named Hamza Belkacem and Idrissi were based in Marrakech,^[5] where they tracked Joel Eastman, a man from Gloucester, England,^[4] who was to meet the stall owner Chafiq Elharar^[5] in the city's medina quarter just off the Jemaa el-Fnaa market.^[4] Although they observed Joel give Elharar a piece of paper^[5] with an owl on it, Joel noticed their attempt to surveil him and fled.^[4]^[5] Hamza and Idrissi split up to search for Joel, and when Idrissi found him, he ignored Hamza's order to secure Elharar and instead moved to apprehend Joel. In their struggle for a gun, Joel shot Idrissi and escaped again while Hamza stayed with Idrissi until the paramedics arrived. By this point, Elharar had also fled and could not be found.^[5]