Glorious Appearing
Page 1
GLORIOUS APPEARING
THE END OF DAYS
TIM LAHAYE
JERRY B. JENKINS
Tyndale House Publishers, Inc.
WHEATON, ILLINOIS
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Copyright © 2004 by Tim LaHaye and Jerry B. Jenkins. All rights reserved.
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Characters in this novel sometimes speak words that are adapted from various versions of the Bible, including the King James Version and the New King James Version.
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Library of Congress Cataloging-in-Publication Data
LaHaye, Tim F.
Glorious appearing : the end of days / Tim LaHaye, Jerry B. Jenkins, p. cm. — (Left behind)
ISBN 0-8423-3235-9 (he) — ISBN 0-8423-3237-5 (sc)
1. Steele, Rayford (Fictitious character)—Fiction. 2. Tribulation (Christian eschatology)—Fiction. 3. Rapture (Christian eschatology)—Fiction. 4. End of the world—Fiction. 5. Second coming—Fiction. I. Jenkins, Jerry B. II. Title.
PS3562.A315G582004
813'.54—dc22 2003027369
Printed in the United States of America
10 09 08 07 06 05 04 87654321
To the memories of
Frank LaHaye
and Harry Jenkins,
whom we shall again see
Special thanks
to David Allen
for expert technical consultation
and to John Perrodin for additional biblical research
SEVEN YEARS INTO THE TRIBULATION;
THREE AND ONE-HALF
YEARS INTO THE GREAT
TRIBULATION
The Believers
Enoch Dumas, early thirties; Spanish-American; shepherd of thirty members of The Place ministry in Chicago; relocated underground in Palos Hills, Illinois
Montgomery Cleburn ("Mac") McCullum, early sixties; former pilot for Global Community Supreme Potentate Nicolae Carpathia; presumed dead in plane crash; chief Tribulation Force pilot on assignment at Petra
Hannah Palemoon, mid-thirties; former GC nurse; faked death in plane crash; on Trib Force assignment at Petra; on staff of the International Commodity Co-op, an underground network of believers
Razor, early twenties; Mexican; military aide to George Sebastian; Petra
Leah Rose, early forties; former head nurse, Arthur Young Memorial Hospital, Palatine, Illinois; on Trib Force assignment at Petra; on staff of the Co-op
Chaim Rosenzweig (aka "Micah"), mid-seventies; Nobel Prize-winning Israeli botanist and statesman; former Global Weekly Newsmaker of the Year; murderer of Carpathia; leader of the million-plus Jewish remnant at Petra
George Sebastian, late twenties; former San Diego-based U.S. Air Force combat helicopter pilot; underground with Trib Force and Co-op; defending Petra
Priscilla Sebastian, thirty; wife of George Sebastian; mother of Beth Ann; Petra
Abdullah Smith, mid-thirties; former Jordanian fighter pilot; former first officer, Phoenix 216; faked death in plane crash; a principal Trib Force pilot on assignment at Petra
Rayford Steele, late forties; former 747 captain for Pan-Continental; lost wife and son in the Rapture; lost second wife in plane crash; former pilot for Global Community Potentate Nicolae Carpathia; original member of the Trib Force; international fugitive last seen on the Petra perimeter
Eleazar Tiberius, early fifties; an elder at Petra; father of Naomi
Naomi Tiberius, twenty; daughter of Eleazar; computer whiz; in love with Chang Wong; Petra
Otto Weser, fifty; head of small band of German believers who fled New Babylon; Petra
Lionel Whalum, late forties; former businessman; former Co-op pilot; on Trib Force assignment at Petra as new director of the Co-op
Cameron ("Buck") Williams, mid-thirties; former senior writer for Global Weekly; former publisher of Global Community Weekly for Carpathia; original member of the Trib Force; editor of cybermagazine The Truth; lost wife, Chloe, to Global Community guillotine; last seen defending the Old City in Jerusalem
Chang Wong, twenty-one; former Trib Force mole at Global Community Headquarters, New Babylon; on Trib Force assignment at Petra as head of computer facility; in love with Naomi Tiberius
Ming Toy Woo, mid-twenties; Chang Wong's sister; former widow, remarried to Ree Woo; former guard at the Belgium Facility for Female Rehabilitation (Buffer); AWOL, on Trib Force assignment at Petra, assisting with Co-op
Ree Woo, mid-twenties; husband of Ming Toy Woo; a principal pilot on Trib Force assignment at Petra
Gustaf Zuckermandel Jr. (aka "Zeke" or "Z"), late twenties; document and appearance forger; lost father to guillotine; on Trib Force assignment at Petra
The Recently Martyred
Al B. (aka "Albie"), early fifties; native of Al Basrah, north of Kuwait; pilot; former international black marketer; member of Trib Force; murdered in Al Basrah
Tsion Ben-Judah, early fifties; former rabbinical scholar and Israeli statesman; revealed belief in Jesus as Messiah on international TV—wife and two teenagers subsequently murdered; escaped to U.S.; former spiritual leader and teacher of Trib Force; had cyberaudience of more than a billion daily; taught the Jewish remnant at Petra; slain defending the Old City in Jerusalem
Chloe Steele Williams, mid-twenties; former student, Stanford University; lost mother and brother in the Rapture; daughter of Rayford; wife of Buck; mother of four-and-a-half-year-old Kenny Bruce; original Trib Force member; former CEO of the Co-op; guillotined by the GC at the former Stateville Correctional Center in Joliet, Illinois
The Enemies
Nicolae Jetty Carpathia, late thirties; former president of Romania; former secretary-general, United Nations; self-appointed Global Community potentate; assassinated in Jerusalem; resurrected at GC Palace complex, New Babylon; leading massive Unity Army forces in the Valley of Megiddo; last seen outside Herod's Gate on the Suleiman Road
in Jerusalem
Leon Fortunate, late fifties; former supreme commander and Carpathia's right hand; now Most High Reverend Father of Carpathianism, proclaiming the potentate as the risen god; Unity Army command post, Megiddo
Viv Ivins, early seventies; lifelong friend of Carpathia; GC operative; Unity Army command post, Megiddo
Suhail Akbar, mid-forties; Carpathia's chief of Security and Intelligence; One World Unity Army command post, Megiddo
PROLOGUE
From Armageddon
RAYFORD STARTED down the back side of Petra, finding it even more harrowing than coming up. He had stayed with Chang and Naomi a little longer than he had planned, so he assumed Mac would be looking for him and that George thought he had already arrived.
From his vantage point he had a good view of the army a mile off. He was reaching for his phone to reassure Mac when it became clear something had happened. The front lines were recoiling again, so George must have initiated another burst of the directed energy weapons.
This time, however, despite the ensuing chaos, the Unity Army didn
't take it sitting down. Rayford heard the booms of retaliatory fire, like thunder from a stormhead a hundred miles wide. He knew enough about munitions to know that Carpathia's forces were a little far away to be using the mortar cannons and shooting at high angles. He guessed the shells would drop short of the Petra perimeter.
He was wrong. Maybe their cannons were bigger than the typical unrifled short barrels. The shells flew past the perimeter and began dropping all around him. When one exploded right in front of him, Rayford was nearly pitched off the ATV. Grabbing for the handlebar with his free hand, he saw his phone go flying, bouncing a hundred yards down the rocky steep.
And now his vehicle was out of control. He bounced high off the seat and realized he was soaring through the air with only his hands attached to the ATV. He came down hard, and the contraption bounced and rolled sideways. To hang on or not was the only thing on his mind, and quickly that option was gone too. The four-wheeler hit yet again, ripping his grip away. As he bounced and rolled, he kept picking up the sight of the vehicle disintegrating as it smashed into rocks all the way into a valley.
Rayford reminded himself not to try to break his own fall. He tucked hands and arms in and tried to relax, fighting his natural instinct for all he was worth. The grade was too steep and his speed too fast to control himself. The best he could wish for was a soft landing place.
A shell deafened him from about ten feet to his right, knocking him into a sideways roll. Rayford felt his temple
smash into a sharp rock and was aware of what sounded like rushing water as he rolled toward thorny overgrowth. Scary as the thorns looked, they had to be softer than what he had been hitting.
Rayford was able to shift his body weight as he slowed and backed into the thorns. It was then he realized what the liquid sound was. With each beat of his heart, galloping now, his life's blood spurted six feet from the wound in his temple.
He pressed his palm hard against his head and felt the gush against his hand. He pressed with all his might and felt he might be containing it somewhat. But Ray-ford was in danger now—mortal danger. No one knew exactly where he was. He was without communications or transportation. He didn't even want to inventory his injuries, because regardless, they were minor compared to the hole in his head. He had to get help—and fast— or he would be dead in minutes.
Rayford's arms were gashed, and he felt sharp pains in both knees and one ankle. He reached with his free hand to pull up his pant leg and wished he hadn't. Not only had something sliced the flesh from his ankle, but something had taken part of the bone too.
Could he walk? Dare he try? He was too far from anywhere to crawl. He waited for his pulse to abate and for his equilibrium to return. He had to be a mile from Mac and his people, and he could not see them. There was no going back up. He rolled up onto his feet, squatting, one hand desperately trying to keep himself from bleeding to death.
Rayford tried to stand. Only one leg worked, and it was the one with the nearly totaled ankle. He may have broken a shinbone in the other. He tried to hop, but the incline was so great, he found himself pitching forward again. And now he was out of control one more time, trying to hop to keep from falling but picking up speed with every bounce. Whatever he did, he could not take his hand from his temple, and he dared not land on one more hard thing. "Lord, now would be a most appropriate time for You to come."
Chang sensed something was about to give. He had succeeded in intercepting signals from geosynchronous satellites that supported communications among the millions of troops. They were about to move, and his key people needed to know.
He called George. "Expect an advance within sixty seconds," he said.
"We've already been shelled," George yelled. "You mean more than that?"
"Yes, they will be coming."
"Rayford see you?"
"Left a little while ago. On his way to see Mac."
"Thanks. Call Mac, would you? I'll inform the others."
Chang called and told Mac the same.
"Hey," Mac said, "I can't raise Sebastian, and Ray is overdue."
"On his way," Chang said.
He called Buck. "Expect ad—"
But he was cut off. He redialed. Nothing.
"They're coming! They're coming!"
Buck heard a young rebel shrieking just as his phone chirped, and he saw an incendiary device hurled over the Rockefeller Museum, right at his position. He saw Unity Army troop movement from every side, and he grabbed his phone and held it up to his ear just as the bomb hit the wall right in front of him and clattered to the ground outside.
He recognized Chang's voice just before the bomb blew a hole in the wall. Rock and shrapnel slammed his whole right side, killed his phone, and made him drop one Uzi. He felt something give way in his hip and his neck as his perch disintegrated.
One of the young boys near him had been blown into the air and cartwheeled to the pavement. Buck was determined to ride the wall as it fell. He reached for his neck and felt a torrent of blood. He was no medical student, but he could tell something had sliced his carotid artery—no small problem.
As the wall crumbled, he danced and high-stepped to stay upright, but he had to keep a hand on his neck. The remaining Uzi slid down into his left hand, but when he stabbed it into something to keep his balance, it fell away. He was unarmed, falling, and mortally wounded.
And the enemy was coming.
Rayford could break his fall only with his free hand, not daring to take pressure off his temple. His chin took as much of the brunt as the heel of his hand as he slid at what he guessed was a forty-five-degree angle. There would be no walking. All he could do was crawl now and try to stay alive.
Buck's feet caught in a crevasse of shifting rock, and his upper body flopped forward. He was hanging upside down from the crumbling wall over the Old City. His hip was torn and bleeding too, and blood rushed to his head.
Even inside the tech center of a city made of rock, Chang felt the vibration of the millions of soldiers advancing on Petra. He was clicking here and there, flipping switches, and trying to make calls. How far would God let this go before sending the conquering King?
Fighting unconsciousness, he tried gingerly edging along, one hand ahead of him, the other occupied. Each inch made the angle seem steeper, the way more unstable. "With every beat of his heart, every rush of blood, every stab of pain, he wondered what was the use. How important was it to stay alive? For what? For whom? "Come, Lord Jesus."
Dizziness overwhelmed, pain stabbed. A lung had to be punctured. His breath came in wheezes, agonizing, piercing. The first hint of the end was the crazy rhythm of his heart. Racing, then skipping, then fluttering. Too much blood loss. Not enough to the brain. Not enough oxygen. Drowsiness overtook panic. Unconsciousness would be such a relief.
And so he allowed it. The lung was ready to burst. The heart fluttered and stopped. The pulsing blood became a pool.
He saw nothing through wide-open eyes. "Lord, please." He heard the approach of the enemy. He felt it. But soon he felt nothing. With no blood pumping, no air moving, he fell limp and died.
Immediately after the tribulation of those days the sun will be darkened, and the moon will not give its light; the stars will fall from heaven, and the powers of the heavens will be shaken.
Then the sign of the Son of Man will appear in heaven, and then all the tribes of the earth will mourn, and they will see the Son of Man coming on the clouds of heaven with power and great glory.
Matthew 24:29-30
ONE
MAC McCULLUM scanned the Petra perimeter with high-powered field glasses. Rayford should have reached him by now.
Mac's watch showed 1300 hours—one in the afternoon, Carpathia Time. It had to be more than a hundred degrees Fahrenheit. Sweat ran down his neck from the grayish red hair peeking out from under his cap, soaking his shirt. Mac detected not even a wisp of wind and wondered what his freckled, leathery face would look like in a few days.
Without
taking his eyes from the lenses, Mac unholstered his phone and punched in the connection to Chang Wong in the computer center. "Where's Ray?"
"I was about to ask you," Chang said. "He left here forty-five minutes ago, and no one else has seen him either."
"What do we hear from Buck?"
Mac noticed the hesitation. "Nothing new."
"Since when?"
"Uh, Rayford heard from him late this morning."
"And?"
Another beat. "Nothing to speak of."
"What're you sayin', Chang?"
"Nothing."
"I gathered. What's wrong?"
"Nothing that won't be cured in a little—"
"I don't need double-talk, buddy." Mac continued surveying the rocky slopes, feeling his pulse quicken despite his years and experience. "If you won't tell me, I'll call him myself."
"Buck?"
"Well, who else?"
"I've tried. My sensor shows his phone inoperable."
"Turned off?"
"Unlikely, McCullum."
"Well, I should guess so. Malfunctioning? Damaged?'
"I'm hoping the former, sir."
"Global Positioning System active, at least?"
"No, sir."
Chaim Rosenzweig had not slept, and after only two light meals of manna, he expected to feel the fatigue. But no. The best he could calculate, this was the day. He felt the swelling anticipation in both his head and his chest.
It was as if his mind raced as his heart ached for the greatest event in the history of the cosmos.
The old man's senior advisers, a half-dozen elders, sat with him deep in the stone compound of Petra. Eleazar Tiberius, a broad globe of a man, offered that the million-plus pilgrims under their charge "are clearly as restless as we. Is there nothing we can tell them?"