The lightning exposed an army in disarray. The horses, naturally, were spooked by the light show and thunder, and it appeared to Abdullah that riders were fighting to keep their mounts from heading for the hills. What Carpathia thought he could do with this mess was a mystery.
And just like that, the lightning ceased.
As before, the sky was as black as coal. Unity searchlights looked pathetic, peering feebly into the murky blackness. They reached the thick, stewing clouds that hovered menacingly over the whole earth.
The cessation of the rolling thunder made the relative silence of the cockpit unearthly. Abdullah looked all around for what was to come next. And the longer he looked, the more he wondered how long the Lord would tarry. Those horses would be controllable now. Carpathia would surely believe victory was at hand.
Rayford directed Mac to find his radio in the other room. Mac brought it in, feeling his way in the utter darkness.
“You could turn on a light,” Rayford said, the ghostly silence unnerving him.
“Oh, please don’t,” Chaim said. “This darkness is of the Lord. Can you not feel it?”
“I feel it all right,” Rayford said. “Every part of me wants to be out in it. I would give anything to be at Carpathia’s side right now. I’d love to see the look on his face when he is chased back to Buseirah and then to Jerusalem.”
“How would you see anything at all?” Mac said.
Chaim said, “This is just a preliminary. At some point this darkness will turn to daylight. Carpathia will turn tail and run from the Son of Man, who will be the only source of light. Anyone near Nicolae will be able to see him, all right, and I am with Rayford in wishing I could be there. But I will be here, watching, worshiping, singing. And then we will all follow, tracing the route that brought us here. We will sweep across the great expanse and join Messiah when He triumphs in Jerusalem and then ascends the Mount of Olives, from which He was transfigured so long ago.”
“I’ve got to be on that trip,” Rayford said.
“Not in your condition,” Mac said.
Rayford shook his head in the darkness. “It’s going to be mighty lonely here.”
The sudden silence and abject blackness made Enoch fear rain again, and it sent him searching for his car. His ears still rang from the cacophony of the last hour, and as he staggered along, feeling his way with his toes, he finally picked up the faint glow of a few streetlights. He drove toward home, planning to drag a chaise lounge out of the cellar and enjoy the rest of the show from the yard.
Somehow Enoch had to find a way to get to the Holy Land as soon as possible after Jesus returned. He was confident he would see it in the sky—the return and all—but Jesus would apparently confine Himself to an earthly body once again, and believers from around the world would want to see Him. He would govern from Jerusalem, and the pilgrimages would begin immediately. He and the people from The Place would have to start raising money to finance this trip.
Sebastian was up to speed and debating what to do. His night-vision goggles were virtually worthless in this kind of darkness. That meant it had to be supernatural, because he had successfully used these underground where there was no source of light. He could make out nothing of the clouds now, and only the occasional vehicle light in the Unity Army ranks provided visual clues.
What was he to do if Global Community forces attacked before Jesus returned? He knew he and his people, and the entire remnant at Petra, were prophesied to be delivered in the end. But what about in the meantime? Was he to fight? to retaliate? to shoot? He knew he could do some damage because he and his forces already had. Would his people take fire, and would they be wounded or killed?
He was a military man, but this was as much a theological decision as a tactical one. Sebastian could consult with Dr. Rosenzweig, but the old man had enough on his mind. His purview was the remnant. Sebastian’s was the defense of the perimeter. Might it be as effective strategically to let the Unity Army overrun his position, knowing they were advancing into a trap of cosmic proportions?
It wasn’t the way he was trained, but then it wasn’t as if he had much of a choice anyway. Sure, he could stall them, slow them with surgically designed strikes from his directed energy weapons and fifty-caliber rifles. But no one could tell him whether that would do any good, or for how long he should try to hold them off.
Clearly there would be no holding back a force of that size for long. Ten minutes? Twenty? Surely no more than that. He could do some damage. But once the Lord arrived, Sebastian’s puny efforts would be meaningless. The question was, were they meaningless regardless?
CHAPTER 9
Coming up on the two-hour mark of the utterly silent blackness covering the face of the earth, Rayford sensed a restlessness in Chaim.
“I had better get to the elders,” the older man said. “This cannot go on much longer, and once the sign of the Son of Man appears, who knows how long it will be before the event itself?”
“‘Who knows’ is right,” Mac said. “Once that comes, I think I’ve talked myself into goin’ back out. You don’t mind, do ya, Ray?”
“’Course I mind, but I wouldn’t deprive you of that. I can handle the loneliness. It’s the jealousy that’ll be the issue.”
“You’ll forgive me,” Mac said.
“I will.”
“Want me to send Leah or Hannah or somebody to keep you company?”
Rayford pondered that. “Don’t think so,” he said. “Anybody else here might just prove to be a distraction.”
“I am going,” Chaim said. “This has been a wonderful memory.”
“Suit yerself, Doc,” Mac said. “I could take you for the ride of your life, you know.”
“I know. I am grateful. But until Messiah appears, I have responsibilities.”
Rayford heard him approach in the darkness and reached for his hand. Chaim took Rayford’s in both of his. “Mr. McCullum,” Chaim said, “join us, won’t you?”
Mac stepped close and Rayford felt a hand on his shoulder and assumed the other was on Chaim’s. “Revelation 1:3 says this,” Chaim said. “‘Blessed is he who reads and those who hear the words of this prophecy, and keep those things which are written in it; for the time is near.’ Amen.”
Rayford and Mac repeated the amen.
“Let me pray for us,” Chaim said, but before he could, Rayford’s eyes popped open, first at the sound, then at the light of something new in the sky. Rayford could compare the sound only to a downed high-tension power line he’d once seen bouncing and popping.
“O God, O God,” Chaim prayed as he too turned to look. Rayford could only stare.
He rocked up into a sitting position and leaned forward, peering out at what appeared to be lightning but was like none he had ever seen. Thick, jagged, and pulsing, a vertical yellow streak extended from about a hundred feet above the horizon to what he estimated was at least ten miles into the sky. Two-thirds of the way up it was crossed by a horizontal streak of the same thickness and half its length.
Rayford could not speak. He could barely breathe. Here, clearly, was the cross of Christ, emblazoned in the heavens in lightning that lingered, crackling with unbridled energy, yet striking nothing. He squinted at its brightness but could not turn his eyes from it. He felt full of awe, of wonder, of the love of God Himself. This was the sign of the Son of Man, and it was there for the whole world to see. But it was also personal, burning into his heart.
The blazing radiance of it lit the room. Chaim finally pulled away and left without another word.
Rayford stole a glance at Mac and nearly fell off the bed. Mac was black! And he appeared to be trying to say something. “Well, I’ll be,” was all Mac could manage, then, apparently noticing Rayford’s reaction, said, “It’s me, Ray. Zeke’s handiwork.”
“Mac, something’s happened to me.”
“Me too, buddy. It’s a-standin’ there plain as day.”
“No, something’s happened.”
?
??What’re you goin’ on about?”
Rayford slipped quickly off the bed and stood next to Mac at the window. “I’m standing,” he said.
Mac turned. “Don’t get ahead of yourself there, Ray. Let’s take this one step at a time.”
“I’m fine,” Rayford said.
“Are you sayin’—?”
“That’s what I’m saying, Mac. No pain. No wounds. Look at me.”
Rayford tore off his bandages. Even the hole in his temple was gone, though where Leah had shaved around the stitching, he still had no hair. He bent and yanked at the ankle wrap. Not even a scar. He jumped up and down, then loosened the plastic shin splint and kicked it free.
“You don’t say.”
Rayford whooped and hollered. “I do say! Let’s get out there, Mac! Get me into the air.”
“Now I don’t know about that, Ray.”
“Then sit here and watch, man, because I’m going!”
Enoch was cozy under a light blanket in his chaise lounge in the backyard when the sign appeared. He burst into tears and lifted his arms. “Praise God, praise God,” he said, and began singing every worship song he knew. The cross that extended from sky to sky towered, as the hymn writer had put it, “o’er the wrecks of time.” Something about the overwhelming majesty of it simply communicated victory.
For how long had he prayed and carried a burden for the inner-city people to whom God had sent him to minister? And for how long had he preached and taught and warned of this very day, this very event? He’d had no idea what form it would take, but this was perfect. “In the cross of Christ I glory,” he said, his voice thick.
Enoch slid off the cheap, rickety lounge chair and onto his knees, bowing before God. Though he lowered his head and closed his eyes, still the image of the cross in the sky stayed with him, as if burned onto the insides of his eyelids.
As soon as Chang saw the cross on every screen in the bank of monitors before him, he shouted for Naomi and she came running. Hand in hand they raced outside and up to their favorite spot. They didn’t speak. There were no words for this. They stretched out on their backs and stared and stared.
“Thank You! Thank You, God!” Abdullah exulted. At the first appearance of the sign he had pointed the jet directly at the cross and throttled to full power. Was it there, right in front of him, as 3-D objects had appeared to be in movie theaters when he was a child? It was as if he could reach out and touch it, but though his craft reached top speed in seconds, the cross never appeared to grow closer. Its horizontal arms, like those of Jesus Himself, seemed to welcome the entire world into its embrace.
The only logical follow-up was the Lord Himself, and Abdullah couldn’t wait.
For two hours Sebastian had not known what the enemy was waiting for, and maybe the enemy didn’t either. But the sign became an impromptu trigger, and suddenly the frisky horses of the Unity Army were on the move. Their riders, now clearly visible because of the pulsating cross in the sky, urged their mounts to full gallop.
And here they came.
“Big Dog One to all units,” Sebastian intoned into his radio. “Hold your fire. Wait. On my command.”
Protests from every side crowded his ears. “Hold, hold, hold,” he said, though platoon leaders from all around the perimeter reported the enemy literally yards away.
“Have you lost your mind?” Otto squealed from a quarter mile to Sebastian’s left.
“Have you lost your faith, Otto?”
“Ree Woo to Big Dog: It’s time, sir.”
“Hold.”
“Permission to speak my mind, sir,” came an urgent transmission from Razor.
“Denied. Follow orders.”
The front line of the Unity Army closed the gap in seconds. Sebastian stood his ground, facing horsemen with rifles pointed at him and others with swords drawn. He knew he was as visible to them as they were to him, the Petra perimeter suddenly bright as day. Only the sky behind the rugged cross was black with cloud cover.
The Unity Army opened fire and Sebastian winced, but he did not turn or seek shelter. A couple hundred of his own troops stood between the army and the hillside that led almost straight up to the rose-red city of Petra, and all were fired upon. Shooting from a galloping horse was no small chore, but surely some of the bullets should have found their marks.
The pings of shrapnel ricocheting off rocks filled the air, and the looks on the faces of the horsemen were priceless. Swordsmen steered their horses behind the mounted riflemen and one, clearly troubled but determined, came straight for Sebastian. George raised a hand and wiggled his fingers as if in greeting—or farewell—and the blade-wielding soldier swung his rapier in a wide arc while brushing past. It was as if the blade went right through Sebastian at the waist.
Sebastian was now adrift in the middle of the Unity Army, and horseman after horseman rode straight at him—some shooting, some hacking with their swords. None so much as jostled him. One stopped and spun his horse around to try again, only to be overrun by a wave of his own comrades who had nowhere to retreat to.
George turned and watched the assault on the hillside leading to Petra. The army had apparently underestimated the riders’ ability to stay aboard their mounts as the horses managed the steep terrain, and everything slowed to a halt. Those on the plain below kept coming, causing a traffic jam of biblical proportions. Soldiers shouted at one another. Commanders screamed orders that could not be followed.
Meanwhile, Sebastian and his people blithely walked through the midst of the enemy, unscathed.
Chang ignored his phone as long as he could. He had considered turning it off, deciding his work was finally over. But a sense of duty prevailed. He tore away from the magnetic sign in the sky, shot Naomi an apologetic smile, and answered.
It was his assistant. “You’ll want to see this,” he said.
“I’m already seeing what I want to see,” Chang said.
“But you’re still interested in the Jewish question, right?”
“The Jewish question?”
“What Dr. Rosenzweig called the ‘worldwide turning to Messiah’?”
“Of course, but that’s been going on since Chaim’s broadcast.”
“And it picked up with the lightning storm.”
“Exactly,” Chang said. “So what’s new?”
“You must come and see. Massive doesn’t begin to describe it. There must have been millions still undecided, but no more. They’re all coming to the Lord, and it seems every one of them is letting us know.”
Rayford had never thought about what one wears to meet Jesus. He dug through his closet, finding—also as prophesied—three-and-a-half-year-old but good-as-new khakis, socks, and boots. He was dressed in seconds.
“You thinkin’ what I’m thinkin’, Ray?”
“What?”
“That we got no business skedaddlin’ out of here if you’re healthy enough to fight. There’s a battle comin’, and the both of us were supposed to be in it.”
“Don’t do this to me now, Mac.”
“I don’t want to be here any more’n you do, Ray. But Sebastian and Razor and Otto and them are all tryin’ to hold the perimeter.”
“Oh, man! Well, Abdullah’s gone.” Rayford was transported back to his childhood when he would plead his case with his parents. “Why does he get to do it?”
“Abdullah can answer to his own conscience.”
“And I’ve got to answer to yours?”
“Just do the right thing, Ray.”
“You staying, either way?”
“Got to. It’s the way I’m made.”
“You would have to get parental on me all of a sudden.”
“Do what you got to do, Ray. I’ll understand.”
“I’m not flying without you, Mac. You really think God healed me so I can help in a battle He’s already promised to win?”
Mac shook his head. “I didn’t say it made sense. I just told you what I thought.”
“I’m calling
Sebastian.”
“This is Big Dog One!” Sebastian shouted. “Talk to me!” When he heard Rayford’s question he laughed loud and long. “You and Mac get yourselves in the air right now, and if you don’t I’ll come up and shoot you myself.”
He told Rayford where he was and what was happening.
“Then you’ll believe it when I tell you that when the sign appeared, God healed me.”
“I’d believe anything right now, buddy. If it didn’t mean leaving my people, I’d go with you. So you remember every detail, hear?”
Chang had been told enough, by Naomi—whose love for him made him wonder about her objectivity—and by the leadership, that he had served a crucial function not just for the Tribulation Force, but also for the entire remnant in Petra. He was gratified to hear it, and while he was relieved to be out from under the daily pressure of living as a mole in the Antichrist’s own lair at New Babylon, he had found Petra an unusual challenge.
Naomi had been the bright spot, of course. But his work, sometimes fourteen to sixteen hours a day, could be both a grind and invigorating. It motivated him because he was—he couldn’t deny it—somewhat of a prodigy in technical things. Associates told him that was an understatement, and some even held that he might be the leading computer expert in the world, despite his youth.
All well and good, but when he examined himself and tried to decide what was troubling him about his current work, it was the old real-estate agent’s adage: location, location, location.
Computers had come a long way in his lifetime alone, but they still largely had to be housed inside, out of the weather. It seemed to Chang that he was still a mole, living mostly underground—or at least indoors. His forays out were always on breaks or at the end of the day, or when he was stealing a moment or two with Naomi, as he had just done.
Now here it was, just before the Glorious Appearing of Christ, and he was back inside, sitting before a bevy of screens, keeping tabs on the whole world. It was a privilege, sure. Who else was doing it or knew how? And he knew he brought a lot to the table, like the ability to hack into the enemy’s transmissions, both computer and television. And while he would rather be with the rest of the remnant, marshaling outside and being directed to various high places, Chang knew this was where he would sit for the end of the world.