He rose up. The man was well over six feet; his lean frame made him appear even taller. When he saw Virga’s apprehension his fierce eyes slowly gave way to a controlled concern. He turned and without speaking sat before the fire again.
Virga stood at the mouth of the tent, aware that his hand was throbbing painfully. The man had seemed not to notice him; he sat staring out, as he had before, at the small dots of fires in the black distance. Hunger was churning in Virga’s stomach, enough to make him risk any threat this man might pose. After another moment he said through still swollen lips, “Are you going to eat that or let it burn?”
The man’s eyes flickered toward the fire. He took the spit off and, with a knife from his belt, cut a hunk of stringy meat. He said in a very distinct voice, “Be careful. You’ve been throwing up everything I’ve fed you.”
Virga took the meat and tore into it thankfully. He wiped his greasy hands along the sides of his trousers. He painfully sat down across from the man, shielding his face from the flames because the heat made his blistered flesh feel as if it were puckering.
“Your hand was infected,” said the man, not looking at Virga but rather through him. “I cleaned the wound and bound it.”
“Thank you.”
“I found you a few miles away. What were you doing out here?”
Virga didn’t know if he could trust this man or not. He averted his eyes from the man’s, but that had little effect. He could feel the man watching him. He said, “Someone left me there.”
The man said, “I see.”
He looked away from Virga, directing his attention toward the fires. When Virga turned to look he saw a great orange tongue of flame leap up amid the smaller fires. “Is that an explosion?” he asked.
“They’re burning books,” the man answered softly. “They began yesterday, first raiding the libraries and then the private residences. Soon they’ll turn to other things.”
Virga gave a tired sigh of frustration. He fearfully touched the healing blisters on his cheeks and forehead. “They’ve gone too far. There’s no stopping them.”
“Who are you?”
“My name is James Virga. I’m a professor of theology.”
The man raised a brow. “Oh?”
“And you? I’d like to know who saved my life.”
“I didn’t save your life. I only found you.”
“Isn’t that the same thing?”
The man paused and then said, “My name is Michael.”
“You’re an American also?”
“No,” he said, “not an American.”
Virga chewed at a bone. The heat of the fire made him draw away a few feet. He threw aside the bone and said, “Why are you out here? Why aren’t you in the city?”
The man smiled faintly and motioned toward the jeep. “I did go into the city,” he said, “but I couldn’t get through the crowd without…injuring someone, and that was over two weeks ago. So I decided it might be best to make camp out here. In the city the forces of violence are building too rapidly.”
“I never saw anything like it before. Never.”
“Then be prepared to see more of it,” said the man with a bluntness that made Virga look up from his new piece of meat, “because it’s only begun.”
Virga stared at him.
“This place is not the worst, only the most well-publicized. There are villages and settlements all over the Middle East that have been burned to the ground by their own inhabitants. After they’d turned on everything in sight they finally, ultimately, turned on themselves and destroyed each other. Al Ahmadi, Al Jahra, Safwan, even Abadan and Basra. Up into Iran and Iraq, crawling toward Turkey. I know because I’ve seen.”
“It’s all happened so suddenly,” Virga said. “No one had any idea this was going on.”
“Suddenly?” Michael asked. “No, not suddenly. This has been building since the beginning of time, this mad last struggle, this legacy of destruction. No, not suddenly.”
“What about the Holy Land?”
Michael glanced over at him, through him. “Soon,” he said.
“My God,” Virga said. “If this insanity ever spread into America…”
The man was quiet for a moment, watching the last embers of a million ideas. Then he said, “You’ve been in delirium for the last four days. I thought at first you were going to die but you were gradually able to keep down small amounts of water. For that space of time—four days—you hung on the edge of death. Yesterday your fever broke and you regained consciousness for only a moment.”
“Four days…” Virga repeated.
“I’ve met stragglers here and there,” Michael said. “Those who have somehow maintained their senses in this onslaught and who are trying to leave the country. But there are not very many. The police force and the military have been severely weakened. Four days can be a very long time; in this place there is not much more time left. Having used all he could here, Baal will go elsewhere.”
At the mention of that obscene name, Virga shuddered. He remembered the figure that sat in darkness on the other side of a chessboard. “How do you know all this?” he asked.
“I have my sources.”
“What sources?”
The man said, “You ask too many questions.”
“Because I want to understand,” Virga said. “I have to understand… Dear God, I have to…”
Michael had leaned forward slightly. His eyes cut Virga to the bone. “What you’ve seen here pains you,” he stated matter-of-factly.
“Yes. I’ve seen murder and savagery. I’ve met Baal and escaped with my life.”
Michael seemed surprised. He narrowed his eyes very slightly. “You’ve met Baal?”
“He has one of my colleagues, a Dr. Naughton.”
“As a disciple?”
“Hell, no!” cried Virga, realizing as soon as he said it that he didn’t know for certain. “He’s probably a prisoner… I don’t know. But Baal told me he had Naughton.”
“If he’s not dead,” Michael said, “he’s given his life to Baal. Those were his two alternatives. How was it that you managed to get away?” There was a hint of caution, of distrust, in the man’s voice.
“I don’t know. I can’t understand it. I had a crucifix—”
Michael nodded.
“—and he couldn’t touch me as long as I held it where he could see it. Yet above his doorway there was the drawing of a crucifix, in plain view.”
“But,” Michael said, “wasn’t it upside down?”
He remembered. “Yes. It was.”
Michael sat back, seemingly satisfied.
“I want to know,” Virga said, “how you can know so much about this man.”
Virga waited for an answer. From the corner of his eye he saw orange flames explode into the sky again.
Michael said, “I’ve been following Baal. I have been tracking him across the world. I won’t stop, not until I have him. I know his past and present; I will write his future.”
“For what purpose? To kill him?”
The other man paused, his eyes still guarded and wary. “No. No, not to kill him. But to stop him before this Godless disease overpowers the centers of humanity. To destroy is enough, justified perhaps, though that is not for me to say. But to strip the creation of all intelligence and dignity, like a cat that slowly strips a wounded mouse, is too much.”
“Have you ever met the man?”
“We’ve met,” Michael said.
“Then you believe there are no limits to his power?”
“He has his limits, though they are only temporary. As his power develops he will be able to overcome those limitations.”
“My God,” Virga breathed, “you mean to say he hasn’t fully developed his capabilities?”
The man looked up. “By no means.”
“I felt his power even when I was in the same room with him. I still don’t know what it was. Some sort of hypnotism or something, some sort of brainwashing technique
.”
“Yes,” Michael said, “that was what it was.”
“He almost had me,” Virga said. “God only knows what he’s done to Naughton.”
“Remember that moment. Remember that Baal has no mercy. He exists only to shame the creation in the sight of God.”
Virga noted the use of the word creation again. He began to think that this man might be some sort of fanatic. “If you won’t kill him,” he asked after a moment, “how can you stop him? His disciples would rip you to pieces if you even got near.”
Michael seemed to disregard the question. He sat as motionless as if he were part of the desert itself, perhaps a clump of camel’s-thorn. Then he said, very quietly, “His influence must be contained.”
“It’s not quite that simple.”
“No. Not quite.”
A taut, dry silence stretched between them. Virga expected the man to say more, but he seemed preoccupied with the book-burning miles away. He winced, almost imperceptibly, with every new thrust of fire.
Virga’s hand was hurting. He wanted to keep the conversation going so he wouldn’t have to be alone with the pain. “You said you’ve been following Baal. Where from?”
“It’s not important. What’s important is the here and now.”
“I’d like to know.”
“No you wouldn’t,” the man said. Virga said, “Yes. I want to know.”
The man’s eyes shifted from the fires to Virga and back again. With an effort he said, “I came across his trail in California some years ago. He and his disciples, a small group then, had taken control of a town called Borja, near the Mexican border. The townspeople, the law officers, the ministers, at first everyone thought them only a commune of fanatics; they were affected by the same powers you see working here. Soon they’d turned against each other. Some of them Baal induced into his circle. The others he destroyed. Then it was only a matter of time; the word spread underground to every madman who would listen. The motorcycle gangs, the Satan-worshipers, the drug- and power-obsessed: Baal held sway over all these. When Baal was prepared, the commune, now over five hundred strong, split into four groups, and all of them gained notoriety. They became murderers and terrorists and they neither knew why nor cared. They were tainted. But they were only part of Baal’s education.”
“His education?” asked Virga, watching the shadows the dying fire scrawled across the man’s face.
“His power grew by degrees, as his followers increased. And those he claimed added their forces to the movement to make it possible to influence thousands of people very quietly. He wanted no fanfare nor banners, not yet. He was not prepared for that. His commune left California and in Nevada sought out a group of Satanists financed on a desert estate by a woman named Van Lynn. Within weeks he had taken control of both the group and the money; they worshiped him as their master’s prince. Baal remained with Mrs. Van Lynn for several years while his followers quietly made more converts in both America and Europe. From the very beginning he had always known what to do: appeal to man’s baser desires, tap the capacity for violence and the lust for power. Make them drunk with illusion. He impressed upon his converts that the God they had been following is dead; His ideas of peace and harmony are no longer valid in this world. Thus, Baal said, the only recourse for the survival of man is a battle of the animals, a survival of the strongest.”
“From reason to chaos,” Virga said, “is not a very long step.”
Michael shook his head. “No, unfortunately not. Baal took the remainder of Mrs. Van Lynn’s money and left America. In Europe he began the same procedure of selecting converts and spreading them out to influence others. But he needed more money, more power, and thus he came to the oil fields.”
“So in the midst of all this Baal is the manipulator?”
“Yes.”
“Leading us toward…” Virga let his voice trail off; the answer was too terrible to consider.
“Yes,” Michael said. “A complete breakdown of order. Death and destruction.”
“But what is his motive? And why has he named himself after a god of sacrifice?”
Michael did not answer.
“We have our sanity,” Virga said, “and while we do we cannot just sit here and let these things happen. There must be someone we can warn…there must be someone we can tell.”
“We? We?” Michael looked sharply at him over the last of the fire. “You have no part in this.”
Virga leaned forward, defying the man’s gaze. He said, “No. I owe Naughton that much. I’m going to do what I can to help him.”
“You’re a fool. You don’t understand what you’re dealing with here.”
Virga said, “I’m a fool, then.”
Michael fixed his gaze firmly on the other man. After a moment Michael’s eyes softened only a fraction. “All men are fools,” he said. “And fools are dangerous.”
“You said you’ve met Baal before,” Virga said. “Where?”
At first he thought the man would refuse to answer. Then he, slowly unbuttoned the collar of his bush jacket and thrust his chin into the dim light of the embers. “Where is not your concern,” he said. “It’s enough to say we’ve met.”
Virga recoiled.
Splayed across the fair flesh of Michael’s throat, two deeply burned handprints sought to strangle him.
Chapter 20
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IN THE MORNING Virga awakened with nerves on edge, afraid that the nightmares he’d endured were about to become realities.
He swung himself into a sitting position on the cot and gingerly tested his injured hand. It was completely numb from the wrist down. When he tried to move the crushed fingers pain began somewhere deep within his forearm and raced through agonized nerves up his shoulder and neck to the brain. He was afraid the hand was beyond repair. He stepped through the tent opening out into the white sunlight, where the desert stretched flat and dry forever, and saw Michael sitting on the ground in almost the same spot as the night before. The man’s eyes were narrowed against the glare; he looked out across the vast expanse.
Virga looked around. No words were needed.
Far out, where they had watched the fires, the sky was filled with a brooding black smoke that coiled around and around like vipers twisting amid the clouds. It was like the smoke of a gigantic bomb blast, thick and heavy. Virga shivered at the ominous sight, the preview of things to come. He watched it moving with the currents of air and knew the sickening odor of it would soon reach them.
“What is it?” he asked.
“The city,” Michael said.
“They’ve destroyed their homes? How could they?”
“No man has a home any longer,” the other man said quietly. “They’ve gone to join Baal and the city has been set afire, possibly as an offering.”
Virga stood, his arms at his sides, and watched the smoke fill the sky. He had never in his life felt as helpless as he did now; no, he corrected himself, there was one other time, but he kept that so far back in his mind that it hardly ever hurt anymore. Now he was one little speck on the world and he was helpless against the man whose power grew against the heavens like the columns of black smoke. No words could save them, not the philosophic wisdom of the saints nor even the teachings of Christ. Baal had given them what they wanted; they had been granted permission to smash at the guiding forces of reason, and they would snarl in the streets like wild dogs until they were mastered by the frenzy.
The smoke had almost reached them. It hovered across the desert. Virga watched it coming. He said, “I’ve got to know whether Naughton is dead or alive.”
“He’s dead.”
“How do you know that?”
“I know,” Michael said. “Perhaps he still walks and breathes and perhaps his brain still functions, but the man is dead.”
“I don’t believe that,” said Virga, hearing the lie as he spoke it. If he had fallen into Baal’s grasp there was nothing that could save him.
br /> Michael stood up, towering over Virga. He said, “You know who Baal is, you know what he represents. You sense it. Don’t look away; I can read it in your eyes. Soon Baal will be capable of burning this land to a cinder. Can a man stand against power of that nature?”
“Can a man turn his back?” Virga asked. “No. To turn my back would be my surrender to him. And if I can tear anything from him, even Naughton’s corpse, I will.”
The smoke touched the white desert sand and immediately blackened it with its filth. Soon the rolling darkness would engulf them like a fog at sea. Virga smelled a high, acrid odor that made his stomach churn.
Michael said, “You’re an old man.”
“I’m a man!” Virga said sharply. He trembled, trying to control himself. “Don’t ever say that to me again.”
Michael paused to let the man’s anger subside. Then he said, “You want to find your friend?”
“I’m going to find my friend.”
“All right then. We’ll go into the city, or rather what’s left of it, and I don’t think that’s much. Perhaps we’ll find your friend with Baal.” He looked directly into Virga’s eyes. “Or perhaps it will not be your friend we find.”
Michael stepped past Virga toward the jeep. He started to climb in and then stopped, listening for something. He looked around, his eyes scanning the horizon. Virga looked also but could see nothing beyond the silent wall of smoke. He felt the other man’s tension. Michael said, “This place is haunted. I hear the mad gods shrieking for revenge. Listen.”
Virga couldn’t hear anything. He thought the man was insane. He said, “There’s nothing.”
“Oh yes,” the other man replied softly. “Oh yes there is.”
He took his place behind the wheel, and Virga took the seat beside him. They roared away into the smoke, throwing sand. Twenty minutes later, on the city’s outskirts, they had not seen a living soul. Bodies of men and animals lay scattered everywhere as if a terrible storm had ripped through, but nothing moved. Ahead of them fires gutted the city, modern and ancient sections alike, and the entire sky was a maelstrom of searing red and whirling black smoke, a chaotic kaleidoscope.
The roar of the fires was deafening. It was as if some giant with torch in hand had walked the streets setting everything in sight ablaze. To Virga it was revolting; he had never seen so much carnage and waste. Michael drove on, his hands tight around the wheel, his narrowed eyes flickering right and left to pierce the gloom. The human storm had torn through the city’s commercial district without mercy. Windows were shattered and stores had been looted. Merchandise littered the streets and Michael swept through it as if running an obstacle course.