pencil and story: Enki Bilal

Enki Bilal, of Yugoslav origins, dedicates this science fiction story to his father, a child from Ljubuski, a municipality in Bosnia-Herzegovina (today).
Given the mix of ethnicities and religions, it is impossible to know which one he belongs to.
In fact, in the story the protagonist avoids answering every time he is asked.
The story takes place in 2026, in a despotic future, where some religious fanatics (a new monotheistic religion that was inspired by various faiths), want to overthrow the current government of the World.
The protagonist is called Nike (from the brand of shoes worn by his father on the day of his birth) and has an eidetic memory, which thanks to training allows him to remember even the first days of life.
The whole story is based on these memories, as he is trying to reunite with the two newborns with whom he shared a bed in the Sarajevo hospital in 1993, Amir and Leyla.
In those days the city was in full civil war, Serbian-Croatian-Bosnian.
Nike is exploited by fanatics to track down Leyla, now an astrophysicist, who is undermining their new religion with her discoveries of alien life.
Amir is recruited directly, to be converted.
The conversion occurs with cybernetic flies that insinuate themselves into the subjects' brains, but Amir manages to swat it in time.
Nike is helped by a policeman to free himself from the fanatics' cybernetic control and reach Leyla.
The fanatics' trap ends up turning against them, destroying their base.
The story is quite complicated, but the development is engaging, making the story enjoyable.
The author's aversion to the effects of religion on people's behavior is noticeable.