Angel of the Abyss: A Novel of the Great Tribulation (The Days of Elijah Book 3)

by Mark Goodwin

  Courtney handed Tommy her rifle and spare magazines. “This has to be a miracle from God. How did you know they had fuel?”

  Tommy collected the items to be traded. “Hand painted sign on the side of the road back there said Ethanol for serious trade.”

  Everett considered Courtney’s words as he passed the remaining boxes to Tommy. She was right. This had to be a gift from the Almighty.

  CHAPTER 7

  And Ruth said, Intreat me not to leave thee, or to return from following after thee: for whither thou goest, I will go; and where thou lodgest, I will lodge: thy people shall be my people, and thy God my God: Where thou diest, will I die, and there will I be buried: the Lord do so to me, and more also, if ought but death part thee and me.

  Ruth 1:16-17

  The team arrived safely back to Tommy’s compound Friday morning. Tommy gave Devin’s Jeep to Everett to take home from his farm. Everett pulled the distributor cap from the Jeep when they reached the landslide area to keep it from being stolen. Then, he and the two girls rode across the debris field and back to the cave on the last remaining quadrunner.

  The sun had not yet risen when Everett, Courtney, and Sarah returned to the cave. Everett was exhausted, but he was also filthy. He pushed himself to go through the laborious process of drawing bathing water from the well, which was up the ladder, and down a long, narrow corridor. Once there, Everett had to draw the water up by a string tied to a five-gallon bucket, which was weighted on one side, so it would tip over into the water, once it reached the well. Next, the water was poured into a funnel, which fed into a series of PVC pipes that the team had scavenged from various places. The pipes used gravity to pull the water through the corridor, and down into a fifty-five-gallon drum sitting at the base of the ladder. Once the drum was full, they had water for cooking, drinking, and bathing. If anyone desired something besides the frigid cave water for bathing, heating the water was another long process. On this day, Everett settled for an icy cat-bath.

  Sarah was more concerned with the lack of armaments. Immediately after returning home, she climbed to the storage corridor to dig out replacement pistols, rifles, ammunition, and magazines.

  Courtney plopped down on her sleeping bag and went right to sleep.

  Everett awoke late Friday evening to the sound of Courtney and Sarah heating water for bathing. The closest thing the cave dwellers had to a proper bath facility was a five-gallon camping shower hung around a stalagmite in a remote corner of the cave. An old sheet draped between two more stalagmites served as the shower curtain. And regardless of how hot the shower water was, the surrounding air was piercingly gelid.

  Courtney took her shower first, then came over to the living area of the great room in the cave referred to by the team as the cathedral. She shivered as she got dressed. Next, she crawled back into her sleeping bag to warm up. “I hate going through this in the winter.”

  Everett snickered. “The cave is the same temperature all year round. It’s always cold.”

  She covered her head and mumbled through the sleeping bag. “Yeah, but in the summer, you can go outside and warm up.”

  Minutes later, Sarah returned, also shivering. She repeated Courtney’s method of getting warm.

  Everett looked on at Kevin’s empty spot, illuminated by the old battery-operated lantern sitting upon a stack of empty buckets. The five-gallon containers which had been filled with supplies three years ago now served as make-shift furniture. Four of them held a panel of plywood which made a table. Six more buckets surrounded the table for chairs. Moses, Elijah, and Kevin’s chairs were now vacant.

  Everett had to do something to dispel the void left in the dreary cavern created by the absence of his friends. “I’m going to go get Sox and Danger tomorrow. If no one has any objection, I’m going to take ten buckets of food over to Cotton’s family. With Jeb and Michael gone, they’ll have a tough time surviving.”

  Courtney sat up. “I’ll go with you.”

  Sarah popped her head out of the covers. “Then I’m going, too. I can’t stay here by myself. I’m not ready for that.”

  Everett understood. “Okay.”

  He offered Sarah a smile, but it was more than she could do to return the gesture.

  “What’s that?” Courtney shined her flashlight at the corner of the cave where Elijah’s sleeping area had been.

  Everett turned to gaze into the dark region of the cavern. “A walking stick?”

  “No.” Courtney crawled out of her sleeping bag and stood up. She walked to the back section of the room and retrieved the object. “It’s Moses’ staff!”

  “Like I said, a walking stick,” Everett said.

  “Everett, this is the staff he used to part the Red Sea, to call the plague of locusts, to summon the plague of frogs, to bring down hail and darkness on Egypt!” She stood mesmerized by the staff. She looked up at Everett and Sarah. “And most importantly, to turn water to blood!”

  Everett shook his head. “Why do you say most importantly?”

  “Because!” she exclaimed. “Revelation 11 says the two witnesses will have the power to make it not rain, to strike the Earth with plagues, and to turn the water to blood! What if Moses needs his staff to turn the water to blood? God gave him that power when he was here before. Elijah had the power to make it not rain, and Moses used his staff to turn the water to blood. Everett, we have to go to Jerusalem! We have to take Moses’ staff to him!”

  Everett exhaled deeply and rolled his eyes. “He doesn’t need his staff. For all we know, he may have left it here for us.”

  She pleaded, “Everett, you are not being reasonable. Don’t you see, he has to have this staff to fulfill the prophecy.”

  Sarah looked on, listening intently.

  Everett pulled out his Bible and thumbed through the pages to Exodus. “What version are you reading? The Message? The NLT? Because the King James doesn’t say anything like that.”

  “Everett, I’m reading the New King James. It’s not that different.” Her voice sounded insulted, as if she was being accused of reading some perverted text or being charged with heresy.

  Everett shined his flashlight on his Bible. “Okay, Exodus 4, God tells Moses to cast his rod on the ground, and it turns into a snake. But this is when God is giving him his commission. That one was for Moses, so he’d believe.”

  “Yeah, then he throws it down as a sign to Pharaoh.” Courtney stood holding the staff as if she were afraid of dropping it and the stick becoming a serpent.

  Everett held up a finger. “Next, we have Exodus 7:10. Aaron cast his rod down, and it became a snake. Then in verse 19, Moses tells Aaron to strike the waters and turn them to blood.”

  Everett flipped the page. “Exodus 8:5, God instructs Moses to tell Aaron to hold his rod over the water to summon the frogs.”

  “Are you serious?” Courtney carefully leaned the staff against the wall of the cave and retrieved her Bible.

  “I wouldn’t kid around about the Bible.” Everett scanned the page. “Verse 17. Aaron stretches out his rod and turns the dust into lice.”

  Sarah joined the conversation. “What about the Red Sea. That was the rod of Moses. I know it for a fact.”

  Everett held up his hand as if to stop traffic. “Ah, that’s the Hollywood version, not the Bible.” Everett thumbed past the pages. “Exodus 14:21. Moses holds up his hands and God causes the sea to part, doesn’t say anything about a rod or a staff. Same thing when the sea comes back on the Egyptians. God tells Moses to just stretch out his hands. Verse, 26 and 27”

  Courtney flipped through her Bible, carefully studying the text. “I can’t believe I got all of that wrong.”

  “The Devil has been making people think God’s Word says something it doesn’t since the beginning of time. Eve, in the garden. Satan comes to her and asks, ‘hath God said?’ And of course, she gets it wrong. God said not to eat of the tree or they’d die. She comes back with ‘we can’t eat it or touch it, or we’ll die.’ She st
arted adding to God’s Word.

  “Then Satan gets her to believe that God’s Word doesn’t mean what it says. He tells her that she won’t die. She believes him over God’s Word. And here we are, 6,000 years later, hiding out in a cave, avoiding the wrath of God.”

  “Why did you say it like that?” Courtney crossed her arms.

  “Say what?” Everett sensed he was in trouble, but he wasn’t sure for what.

  “Of course she got it wrong.” Her lips tightened. “Because she was a woman?”

  “No, no.” Everett shook his head and laughed. “Look how many pastors were still here after the rapture. They were mostly all men. They got it wrong. I said of course because it’s human to get it wrong. I’m sure I get lots of stuff wrong, but it’s because I read it and misinterpreted it for myself. I’m sure God will be much more tolerant of me than the people who got it wrong because they listened to some pastor who told them what they wanted to hear instead of studying the Bible for themselves.”

  “Ah-ha! I knew I wasn’t crazy.” Courtney looked up from her Bible. “Check out Exodus 9:23. ‘And Moses stretched out his rod toward heaven; and the Lord sent thunder and hail, and fire darted to the ground. And the Lord rained hail on the land of Egypt.’ See, he used his rod.”

  Sarah seemed to be distracted from her grief. She joined in also. “Yep, 10:13, also. Listen to this, ‘So Moses stretched out his rod over the land of Egypt, and the Lord brought an east wind on the land all that day and all that night. When it was morning, the east wind brought the locusts.’

  “He used his rod there. Maybe Courtney is right. Maybe we should take it to him.”

  Everett quickly flipped through the pages. “Okay, both of those instances. Back it up one verse, 9:22, ‘And the Lord said unto Moses, Stretch forth thine hand toward heaven.’ And 10:12, ‘And the Lord said unto Moses, Stretch out thine hand over the land of Egypt for the locusts, that they may come up upon the land of Egypt.’ Maybe we’re seeing a pattern here. Maybe Moses is beginning to change God’s Word in his head. Like I said, it’s human to do so.”

  “I think you’re making a mountain out of a molehill.” Courtney closed her Bible.

  “Maybe and maybe not.” Everett thumbed through his Bible. “In Exodus 17, God tells Moses to take his rod to the rock in Horeb and strike the rock so water will come out.”

  “Now you’re proving her point,” Sarah said.

  “Hang on.” Everett flipped past several more pages. “Turn to Numbers 20, verse 8. ‘Take the rod, and gather thou the assembly together, thou, and Aaron thy brother, and speak ye unto the rock before their eyes; and it shall give forth his water.’

  “Verse 11, ‘And Moses lifted up his hand, and with his rod, he smote the rock twice: and the water came out abundantly, and the congregation drank, and their beasts also. And the Lord spake unto Moses and Aaron, because ye believed me not, to sanctify me in the eyes of the children of Israel, therefore ye shall not bring this congregation into the land which I have given them.’

  “Moses didn’t get to go into the promised land because he smote the rock instead of speaking to it. The details of God’s Word are important. That’s why I’m leery of the new translations.”

  Courtney’s brows tightened together. “Everett, changing thee and thou into you and yours doesn’t change the meaning of God’s Word. Jesus didn’t speak in the King’s English. He spoke Aramaic.”

  “If that’s all they did, that would be fine, but to get a copyright, you have to change a certain amount of the text so it’s significantly different. What if the translators ran out of thees and thous and had to start making changes just to hit their quota for the copyright? Sounds dangerous to me.”

  “You could make the same argument over the King James.” Sarah closed her Bible.

  Everett shrugged. “There’s no copyright on the King James.”

  “Because of a little thing we like to call the American Revolution.” Courtney pressed her lips together. “Of course, none of them have an enforceable copyright under the Global Republic. They’re all outlawed.”

  Everett closed his Bible as well. “This is the one I trust. Westcott and Hort, the guys who headed up the translations for most of the newer versions, didn’t even believe it. Westcott didn’t believe in the authority of the Bible, nor did he believe that it is infallible. Hort believed in evolution.”

  “Yeah, yeah, I heard Elijah talk about all of that. But the New King James and the MEV have nothing to do with those guys. They come from the same texts as the King James.” Courtney sounded like she was ready to keep going on the topic.

  Sarah seemed ready to change the subject. “So, we’re not going to take Moses his staff?”

  “I don’t think he needs it. In fact, he may have left it here on purpose. Maybe he thinks the thing has gotten him in enough trouble already.” Everett felt mildly disappointed. He would have welcomed any excuse to get out of the dreary cavern, but at the same time, he was in no hurry to expose his wife to unnecessary peril.

  Everett awoke early Saturday morning to the sound of Sarah stirring about the cave. He felt for his flashlight and turned it on momentarily to look at his watch. “Four thirty.” He put his head down to go back to sleep.

  Sarah continued to move things around. Everett lay motionless, confident that she’d soon cease from her activities. A minute later, he gave up on returning to his slumber. I’m wide awake now, he thought. He rolled over to see what all the commotion was about.

  Sarah stuffed clothing and MREs into her large military ALICE pack, then placed Moses’ staff into a large, black duffle bag. Everett lifted his head off the pillow. That’s strange, why would she be doing that? When he saw her begin rolling up her sleeping bag, he got up and walked over to her. He whispered so not to wake Courtney. “What’s going on?”

  Sarah shook her head. “I’ve gotta go.”

  The statement caught Everett off guard. “What?” His response was louder than he intended it to be. “Go where?”

  “Jerusalem.”

  Everett looked at Moses’ rod laying in the unzipped duffle. “Is this about the staff?”

  “No. It’s about me. I have to get out of here.”

  “I don’t understand.” Everett put his hand on her arm.

  Courtney awoke and got out of her sleeping bag. “Why are you going to Jerusalem?”

  “Because there’s nowhere else to go.”

  Everett gripped her arm tight. “That’s a suicide mission, Sarah. Jerusalem is the new ground zero. With New Atlantis destroyed, Jerusalem will be the focus of the coming judgments.”

  “It’s not a suicide mission, Everett. It’s an anti-suicide mission. I know how I get. I can’t sit around here and stare at the empty walls of the cave. I’ll just get more and more depressed until I can’t take it anymore. I have to do something. I have to go somewhere, and there’s nowhere else to go. This hemisphere is shot. I didn’t particularly like the idea of sitting around here for the next three years waiting to die. But, with Kevin, I could have gotten by. Not without him. I can’t do it. And no offense, but watching you two together just makes it that much harder. I have to go. I love you guys, and I’ll miss you, but I have to get out of here. I hope you’ll understand.”

  Courtney stood with her arms crossed. Her look of shock soon deteriorated into an expression of loss. “Sarah, no. You can’t leave us. We need you. It’s only been four days since Kevin died. Give it some time. It’ll get better. We’ll make a point of getting outside every day. Winter is almost over; the weather will be mild. Maybe the rain will cleanse the soil, and things will start to grow again.

  “Please don’t leave me.” Courtney wrapped both arms around Sarah’s neck and pulled her close.

  Sarah held her friend in the embrace for nearly a minute, then pulled away. “I have to, Courtney. You don’t know what it’s like. Being all alone in this horrible cave.”

  “But you’re not alone,” Courtney pleaded.

  Sarah wiped
a tear from her eye, then used her sleeve to dry the eyes of her friend. “I have to do this. But I’ll be with you in spirit. I’ll never forget you guys.”

  Courtney’s voice grew more desperate. “If you leave, you will be alone. We won’t be there for you, and it won’t bring Kevin back.”

  “I’ll find Elijah.” Sarah packed several magazines for her AR-15.

  Courtney shook her head and turned to Everett. “We have to do something. We can’t let her leave. It’s too dangerous.”

  At a total loss for words, Everett lowered his gaze to Sarah’s rifle. “She’s a grown woman. I can’t physically restrain her. If her mind is set on leaving, we can’t stop her.”

  “Then we’ll go with her!” Courtney didn’t phrase the statement as a question.

  “No.” Everett grabbed Courtney’s hands. “We’ve worked very hard to put everything together so we can ride out the apocalypse right here in this cave. If we leave, we walk away from all of our provisions, all of our security. We have shelter, food, water.” He pointed at the entrance of the cave. “People are killing each other for those things out there.”

  “Well, I’m going with her. You can stay here with your provisions if you want, but Sarah needs us, and I’m going to be by her side.” Courtney abruptly walked away and began packing a large-frame backpack.

  “Courtney, you absolutely are not going!” Everett’s eyes grew wide.

  She didn’t turn away from her task. “You can’t stop me.”

  “You’re going to leave me?” He was stunned by her actions.

  She paused and let the pack fall over. She sat next to her belongings, silent and still for several moments. Then she broke down and began to bawl.

  Everett pulled her close to his chest. “Shhhh. It’s alright.”

  She took a deep breath and looked up. “It’s not alright. I won’t leave you. You’re my husband. But I won’t be happy. I won’t sleep knowing that Sarah is out there by herself. It’ll just be the two of us. I love you Everett, but we’ll drive each other nuts being cooped up in here for three years alone.”