Frantic

by Jerry B. Jenkins

  Judd turned as the nurse pushed up her hat and revealed the mark of the true believer. He sighed.

  “I don’t know what you’re doing here,” she said, “but I’d suggest you turn around and get out as quickly as you can. Who are you here to see?”

  Sam told her. The nurse shook her head. “This floor is filled with top brass from the GC. Do what you have to and leave. If you get in trouble, I won’t be much help.”

  Sam nodded and limped down the hallway. Judd followed him into his father’s room. The shades were drawn. A curtain surrounded the first bed. Inside, someone moaned in pain.

  Judd walked to the head of Mr. Goldberg’s bed and stayed in the shadows as Sam approached. Sam took a cool cloth and placed it on the man’s forehead. Mr. Goldberg opened his mouth and groaned in agony.

  “I bring you greetings from someone who loves you,” Sam whispered.

  Mr. Goldberg panted. He opened bloodshot eyes and struggled to see. “Who . . . are you?”

  Sam knelt by the bed, clearly in anguish. “I’m so sorry this happened, Father.”

  “Samuel,” Mr. Goldberg gasped. He sat up a little and took Sam’s face in his hands.

  “How do you feel?” Sam said.

  He laid his head on the pillow. “They’ve given me so much morphine I can hardly believe I’m awake. But it doesn’t do a thing for the pain.” Mr. Goldberg looked at Sam’s neck. “They got you?”

  Sam hesitated. “No. I put this on to make people think I had been stung. Father, God has spared those who believe in him from this plague.”

  “You’re lying,” Mr. Goldberg moaned.

  Sam peeled the fake sting from his neck and rubbed away the red coloring. “See? I’m not hurt. I’m telling the truth.”

  “You chose to leave,” Mr. Goldberg said. “Let me die.”

  “You won’t die. This pain will continue for five months, and you’ll want to die, but you won’t be able to.”

  “And that is evidence of the love of God?”

  Sam drew closer. “Why can’t you see I’m telling the truth? Ask God to forgive you.”

  “I’m already in such pain,” Mr. Goldberg choked. “Why must you make it worse?”

  “The Bible says if you confess with your mouth that Jesus is Lord and believe in your heart that God raised him from the dead, you will be saved.”

  “And doing that will take the pain away?”

  “No, but it will bring you into God’s family and bring us back together.”

  Mr. Goldberg grabbed Sam’s shirt and pulled him close. There was foam at the corners of his mouth and he spit as he talked. “You are one of them now. The next time I see you, I will have you arrested.”

  Sam’s lip quivered. “I pray for you every day, Father.”

  “Get out!” Mr. Goldberg yelled.

  Someone grabbed the curtain around the other bed and flung it open. Deputy Commander Woodruff glared at Sam, then glanced at Judd. “You!” he muttered.

  Judd kept his back to the wall and slid toward the door. Woodruff reached for something and knocked a metal tray to the floor. He hit a red button, and Judd heard an alarm at the nurses’ station.

  “Father?” Sam said.

  “We have to go,” Judd said. “Now!”

  8

  JUDD and Sam burst into the hallway and narrowly missed a nurse who was rushing to help. “What’s going on?” she said.

  “Those guys are in trouble,” Judd said. “Lots of pain!”

  Others rushed to the room. Woodruff screamed, “Get them!”

  The nurse who had the mark of the believer stood at the end of the hall. “Don’t take the elevators. Go up a floor and you’ll find a walkway that leads to the parking garage. Take the stairs to the ground floor.”

  “Thanks,” Judd said.

  “God help you,” the nurse said, “and don’t come back.”

  As Judd and Sam reached the next floor, GC guards were on their way up. Judd opened the fourth-floor door and quietly moved inside. He located the walkway to the garage and ran down the hall.

  A radio crackled behind them, and a voice came over speakers above their heads. “Security code blue. Security code blue. Secure all exits.”

  They were ten feet from the entrance to the garage when an electronic signal locked the doors. Judd pushed the handle with all his might, but it wouldn’t budge.

  “We’re trapped!” Sam said.

  Judd retreated a few steps and noticed an open door. He and Sam ducked inside as two security guards raced onto the floor.

  “Use your passkey to check the garage,” one man said. “I’ll search the rest of the floor.”

  Judd and Sam knelt behind a large bin of some sort. The light was off in the room, but the door stayed open enough for them to see. When Judd’s eyes adjusted to the dimness, he realized they were in the laundry room. Sheets and towels were stacked in neat piles on shelves. The hampers were full of dirty linen.

  Judd glanced around the room and spotted what he was looking for. He closed the door quietly, locked it, and turned on the light.

  “We have to work fast,” Judd said. “Tie some sheets together as tightly as you can.”

  “What for?” Sam said.

  “Just hurry!”

  Lionel sat outside the hospital listening for more news about the locusts. Jamal’s car had a shortwave radio, and Lionel tuned in reports from around the world. One station played a recording of a reporter in London who was standing on the roof of a building as the locusts descended. The man described the swirling cloud perfectly. Then, with the beat of locust wings growing louder, the reporter realized this was not a weather phenomenon but an attack by beings he had never seen before.

  “They’re coming now,” the man said in his heavy accent, “flying beasts that look like they might be from some horror film. You can hear their wings and a weird chant of some sort.”

  The sound man for the reporter dropped his equipment and ran, only to be attacked and stung. His cries mingled with the wails of the reporter who also dropped his microphone.

  The chilling report brought back the moment Lionel had first seen the locusts. As he flipped to another frequency, he noticed guards talking on radios and scurrying to the visitor entrance.

  Lionel flipped off the radio and muttered, “This doesn’t look good.”

  He pulled the car close to the building, parked behind a Dumpster, and got out. Locusts buzzed near closed windows. He walked close and heard the security alarm. Judd and Sam must be in trouble, Lionel thought.

  He tried the visitor entrance but it was locked. A guard inside waved him away. Lionel nodded and walked around the corner. He saw a delivery truck parked near a service entrance. Lionel recognized the logo. It was a laundry truck.

  The back of the truck was open, but there was no one inside. Lionel guessed it had been there since the locust attack. Lionel noticed a ring of keys on the ground.

  Somebody was in a hurry to get out of here, Lionel thought. He picked up the keys and climbed onto the loading dock. Two doors. A huge one that rolled like a garage door and another smaller one to the side. Lionel fumbled with the keys. If he could find the right key, he might be able to help his friends.

  Judd and Sam had tied several sheets together when the guard from the parking garage returned. “There’s no one in there.”

  “We have the place locked down,” the other man said. “We’ll find them.”

  The guard tried the door to the closet. Judd dived behind the hamper.

  “This is locked; they couldn’t have gotten in here,” the guard said.

  When the two walked away, Judd tied the end of the last sheet around Sam’s waist. “You’re going for a little ride.”

  “Out the window?” Sam said.

  Judd shook his head and walked to a small metal door on the wall. “Down here.”

  “The laundry chute!” Sam said. “Perfect.”

  “I’ll lower you slowly and you can tell me what you find,” Judd
said. “Tug it once if things are clear. Tug twice if you want me to pull you up.”

  “Got it,” Sam said. He climbed inside the chute and tried to walk on the metal tunnel. His footsteps echoed.

  Judd shook his head again. “Don’t walk. I’ll lower you.”

  Judd hoped the sheets would be long enough. He lowered Sam inches at a time, making sure the knots they had tied didn’t come loose.

  “There’s a curve at the bottom,” Sam whispered from below. “I can’t see anything down here, but I don’t hear anything either.”

  Footsteps in the hall. Keys jangling. Someone said, “What’s this door?”

  “It’s the fourth-floor laundry,” a woman said. “We usually keep it unlocked because—”

  Sam slipped and banged against the side of the chute.

  “Did you hear that?” the man outside said. “Open this door. Now!”

  “Let go!” Judd said to Sam.

  Sam untied the sheet from his waist and slid out of sight with a thump. Judd quickly tied the end of the sheet to the handle on the chute door and climbed inside. The door closed and it was pitch-dark. Judd slid down, holding the sheets to steady himself. The door to the room burst open. Moments later he felt something tugging. Light from above. A man stuck his head inside. “He’s going down the laundry chute!”

  The click of a knife. Ripping. The guard was cutting the sheet on the handle. Judd fell and hit the curve in the chute with a terrific crash. Still holding on to the sheet, he flew into a huge hamper and landed in a soft pile of linens. Sam held out a hand. “We don’t have much time.”

  A radio crackled. “They’re in the first-floor laundry room,” a man said.

  “Good,” another said. “Those doors are on lockdown. We’ve got them.”

  “Deputy Commander Woodruff wants them upstairs when we catch them!”

  Judd and Sam raced through piles of laundry. Sam stopped at an empty bin and put one leg inside.

  “They’ll find us if we try to hide,” Judd said. “We have to get outside.”

  Suddenly, a door swung open and light streamed into the room. Sam turned to run but Judd grabbed his arm. “Lionel!”

  “Come on!” Lionel shouted.

  A few locusts flew inside the open door as the boys raced out. Lionel closed the door and locked it behind him. Seconds later the kids heard voices and pounding on the door.

  Judd jumped in the driver’s seat and started the car. Lionel and Sam were barely inside when Judd floored it and squealed past the Dumpster. In his rear-view mirror, Judd saw several GC officers in protective gear run into the street.

  After he caught his breath, Lionel said, “What happened up there?”

  Sam shook his head. “My father would not listen. He’s so closed to the truth.”

  “But he would have let us go,” Judd said. “It was Woodruff who sounded the alarm.”

  Sam stared out the window. “That may be the last time I ever see my father.”

  Moving to the schoolhouse had been Vicki’s idea, so the thought of leaving wasn’t easy. Putting it in the hands of others was painful, but she felt it was the right thing to do.

  Carl had soaked up the teaching faster than anyone. At the end of each session he peppered her with questions, asking her to clarify certain points.

  “If a person rejects the message, what do I do?” Carl said. “Do I just move on to somebody else?”

  “Think about what John did for you,” Vicki said. “He didn’t give up just because you rejected it the first time.”

  “What about inside the GC compound? They need to hear the message, too, but it’ll be risky to talk.”

  Mark stepped forward. “Each of us has a different role. One person might need to be bold with everyone they meet. Another, like you, has to be careful. We’re all working together to see that as many people as possible hear the message.”

  After each session, Lenore had stayed up late working in the computer room. Vicki asked what she was doing, but Lenore said, “It’s a surprise.”

  When Vicki felt she had covered everything and Carl had no more questions, the kids packed and gathered in the kitchen. They all agreed to pray for Carl every day and ask God to give him safety as he worked from inside the Global Community.

  Mark agreed to stay and take over the undergroundonline.com Web site. With Darrion’s help, the kids hoped millions from around the world would read the questions and answers they posted in the next few weeks.

  Conrad, Shelly, and Vicki would accompany Pete on his trip south. Their mission was to warn the various underground groups of believers who were being targeted by the Global Community.

  Lenore volunteered to oversee the schoolhouse. With Charlie’s help, she would care for Janie and Melinda, make sure the kids had meals, and keep an eye on her baby, Tolan.

  Vicki agreed to keep the others informed with e-mails every few days. They set up an emergency alert system for Carl in case the GC caught onto him. Mark also developed a program that would turn their e-mails into a code that only the kids could read.

  Carl pulled out a tiny computer and checked information on GC flights. Since the locust attack, all GC aircraft had been grounded. He sent a message to his superiors and told them he was returning to the base in the next few days.

  “I have to make a run back through here every few weeks,” Pete said. “I’ll make sure these guys get back here as soon as possible.”

  Lenore approached Vicki with a wrapped package, tears in her eyes. “I made a little something for you.”

  “You didn’t have to do that,” Vicki said.

  “I can’t thank you enough for what you’ve done for Tolan and me. I’m sure we’d both be dead. And we wouldn’t have known anything about God’s love.”

  Vicki began unwrapping the package but Lenore put a hand on her arm. “Wait until you get on the road.”

  Vicki excused herself and ran upstairs. She wanted to say good-bye to Janie and Melinda, but both of them seemed not to notice her.

  When she turned to leave, Janie gasped, “Where are you going?”

  “Taking a little trip,” Vicki said. “We have to find some people down south.”

  Janie tried to sit up. She clutched her stomach and fell back. “Bring us some medicine or something for the pain!”

  “Try to eat,” Vicki said. “You’re both going to get skinny if you don’t.”

  Pete pulled out and drove the truck cautiously along the country road. Vicki opened Lenore’s package and found a notebook. She opened it and read: I took shorthand in college too. I think I got just about everything in here. May God use you mightily in the coming days. Love, Lenore.

  Inside Vicki found her complete sessions with Carl. Every word, all three days, printed perfectly. So that’s what she was working on, Vicki thought.

  9

  VICKI couldn’t believe the room in the truck. Pete drove, Carl rode in the passenger seat, and Vicki, Shelly, and Conrad sat behind them in the sleeper. The truck had a satellite hookup for phone and video, an onboard computer, and a citizens band radio. Pete showed Vicki how to access the Internet through the satellite, and the kids surfed the Net as the truck rolled through Illinois and Indiana on its way south.

  The interstates were a disaster in some places and fine in others. In the more populated areas, GC crews had repaired roads. Other areas hadn’t been as hard hit by the earthquake. But nearly every overpass in Indiana had collapsed. Pete would take each exit and return to the highway on the other side of the collapsed bridge.

  The road was nearly deserted. Other than a few large trucks and an occasional car, they were alone. “We’re going to make good time,” Pete said.

  The kids picked up satellite reports from GC news sources. Other countries had suffered the same fate as the state of Illinois. Streets were deserted. People suffered. In South Africa, a news van passed a row of houses, and a high-powered microphone picked up the howls and sobs from inside. A doctor interviewed in China, who had the
mark of the believer, showed beds filled with people who had tried to kill themselves. They drove cars into concrete walls, drank poison, cut their wrists, sat in garages with cars running, leaped into deep water, even jumped from high buildings in attempts to take their own lives. Though some of the patients’ bodies were torn and bleeding, not one of them had died.

  Vicki turned away from the monitor and watched the passing towns. In Kentucky, horses ran by the road.

  “Earthquake destroyed a lot of fences,” Pete said. “The farmers almost had them repaired when the locusts came. Now the horses are running wild.”

  Night fell and Vicki felt the familiar pop in her ears as they climbed the Smoky Mountains. A few years earlier she had traveled with her family in a small RV her father had borrowed from a friend. Her dad wanted to take the family to Orlando to a theme park, but the vehicle had broken down in Georgia. They spent the entire vacation in a little hotel about fifty miles from the ocean, waiting for the RV to be fixed.

  As she drifted off to sleep in the truck, Vicki recalled how much she had complained about that trip. Her mom and dad weren’t Christians at the time and they both drank a lot of beer. The pool at the hotel was the size of a postage stamp, there was no cable TV, and the air conditioner only cooled the room to eighty degrees.

  “This is worse than staying home in our trailer!” Vicki had yelled one night. “You said we’d see the ocean.”

  “I said a lotta things,” Vicki’s father said, “but this is outta my control.”

  Then the screaming had begun. The family next door called the manager and the manager called the police. Vicki wound up running out of the hotel and walking a lonely road most of the night. She hated being poor. She hated her parents for messing up their lives. And she hated being stuck in a hot hotel room with her little sister, Jeanni. To make matters worse, Jeanni was having a great time.

  The police didn’t arrest anyone that night, and the RV was fixed a few days later, but her parents had used all their vacation money on the hotel. They canceled the rest of the trip.