by Tim LaHaye
“Can you get a message to New Babylon?” Mac said.
“It will require a relay, but both Qar and Wasit have been on the air since this morning, so yes, is possible.”
Mac wrote the instructions, asking that a dispatch go to Global Community radio base informing them that Steele and McCullum were engaged in a cooperative volunteer airport rebuilding project and would return by nightfall.
It was nearly nine-thirty Tuesday morning, Central Standard Time, when Buck was jolted awake. The day was bright and sunny, yet he had slept soundly since that brief dream in the middle of the night. A constant sound had played at the edges of his consciousness. But for how long? As his eyes grew accustomed to the light, he realized the noise had been with him for some time.
It seemed to come from the backyard, from beyond the Range Rover. He padded to the window and opened it, pressing his cheek against the screen and looking as far that way as he could. Maybe it was emergency workers, and he and Tsion would have power sooner than they thought.
What was that smell? Had a catering truck pulled up for the workmen? He threw on some clothes. The light was on in the hallway. Had it not been a dream after all? He skipped down the stairs in his bare feet. “Tsion! We have power! What’s happening?”
Tsion came from the kitchen with a skillet full of food and began scooping it onto a plate at the table. “Sit down, sit down, my friend. Are you not proud of me?”
“You found food!”
“I did more than that, Buck! I discovered a generator, and a big one!”
Buck bowed his head and said a brief prayer. “Did you eat, Tsion?”
“Yes, go ahead. I could not wait. I could not sleep in the middle of the night, so I tiptoed in and took your flashlight. I did not rouse you, did I?”
“No,” Buck said, his mouth full. “But later I thought I dreamed I saw lights in the hallway.”
“It was not a dream, Buck! I lugged that generator out of the cellar and into the backyard myself. It took me forever to fill it with gas and clean the spark plug and get it fired up. But as soon as I hooked it to the cable in the basement, lights came on, the refrigerator came on, everything started happening. I am sorry to have disturbed you. I tiptoed into my bedroom and knelt by my bed, just praising the Lord for our good fortune.”
“I heard you.”
“Forgive me.”
“It was like music,” Buck said. “And this food is like nectar.”
“You need sustenance. You are going back to Loretta’s. I will stay here and see if I can get on the Internet. If I cannot, I have much studying to do and messages to write so they will be ready to go to the faithful when I can get hooked up. Before you leave, however, you will help me get into Donny’s briefcase, no?”
“You’ve decided that’s OK, then?”
“Under other circumstances, no. But we have so few tools for survival now, Cameron. We must take advantage of anything that might be there.”
Fortunately, Donny’s well remained intact, and somehow, under a steaming shower a few minutes later, Buck’s spirits were raised. What was it about creature comforts that made the day look brighter, despite the crisis? Buck knew he was in denial. Whenever he felt his realistic, practical, journalist side take over, he fought it. He wanted to think Chloe had somehow escaped death, but her car was still at the house. On the other hand, he hadn’t found her body. Tons of debris still covered the place, and he had not been able to dig through much of it. Was he up to displacing every piece of trash from the foundation to prove to himself she was or wasn’t there? He was willing. He simply hoped there was a better way.
On his way out of the house, Buck was intrigued that Tsion had not waited for him to get Donny’s briefcase from the Rover. The rabbi had it on the table. He wore a shy, impish look. They were about to break into someone’s personal belongings, and both had convinced themselves it was what Donny would have wanted. They were also prepared to close it back up and discard it if what they found was personal.
“There are all kinds of tools in the basement,” Tsion said. “I could use some care and do this in such a way that it would not threaten the integrity of the structure.”
“What!?” Buck said. “Threaten the integrity of the structure? You mean not hurt this cheap briefcase? How ’bout I just save you the time and effort?”
Buck turned the five-inch-deep plastic briefcase vertically and held it between his knees as he sat in a kitchen chair. He angled both knees left and drove the heel of his hand into the case, forcing it to fall between his ankles and land on one corner. That caused the latches to separate and the case to spring out of shape and fly open. His legs kept it from opening wide and spilling. With a feeling of accomplishment, he plopped it on the table and spun it around so Tsion could open it.
“This is what this young man has been lugging with him everywhere he goes?” Tsion said.
Buck leaned over to peek in. There, in neatly stacked rows, were dozens of small spiral notebooks, each not quite as large as a stenographer’s notebook. They were labeled on the front with dates in block hand printing. Tsion grabbed a few and Buck took more. He fanned them in his hands and noticed that each contained approximately two months’ worth of entries.
“This may be his personal diary,” Buck said.
“Yes,” Tsion said. “If so, we must not violate his confidence.”
They looked at each other. Buck wondered which of them was going to look, to determine whether these were private notes that should be discarded or technical notes that might be of assistance to the Tribulation Force. Tsion raised his eyebrows and nodded to Buck. Buck opened one notebook to the middle. It read: “Talked to Bruce B. about underground necessities. He still seems reluctant about suggesting location. I don’t need to know. I outlined specifications, electric, water, phone, ventilation, etc.”
“That is not personal,” Tsion said. “Let me study these today and see if there is anything we can use. I am amazed how he stacked them. I do not believe he could have fit another one in, and he used every bit of space.”
“What’s this?” Buck said, leafing to the back. “Look at these. He hand drew these schematics.”
“That is my shelter!” Tsion exalted. “That is where I have been staying. So, he designed it.”
“But it looks like Bruce never told him where he was building it.”
Tsion pointed to a passage on the next page: “Putting a duplicate shelter in my backyard has proven more labor intensive than I expected. Sandy is getting a kick out of it. Bagging the dirt and storing it in her van takes her mind off our loss. She enjoys the clandestine nature of it. We take turns dumping it in various locations. Today we loaded so much that the back tires looked as if they might explode. It was the first time I had seen her smile in months.”
Buck and Tsion looked at each other. “Is it possible?” Tsion said. “A shelter in his backyard?”
“How did we miss it?” Buck said. “We were digging out there last night.”
They moved to the back door and gazed out on the lawn. A fence between Donny’s home and the rubble next door had been ripped up and moved by the quake. “Maybe I parked over the entrance,” Buck said.
He backed the Rover out of the way. “I see nothing here,” Tsion said. “But the journal indicates this was more than a dream. They were moving dirt.”
“I’ll find some metal rods today,” Buck said. “We can poke them through the grass and see if we can find this thing.”
“Yes, you go. Finish up at Loretta’s. I have much work today on the computer.”
The sun was setting in Iraq. “We’d better head back,” Rayford said, breathing hard.
“What are they gonna do?” Mac said. “Fire us?”
“As long as he’s got you around, Mac, he could follow through on his threat to put me in jail.”
“That would be just like him, to think one man can fly that Condor halfway around the world and back. By the way, you ever wonder why he calls that thing
the 216? The number on his office was 216 too, even though it was on the top floor of an eighteen-story building.”
“Never thought about it,” Rayford said. “I can’t see a reason to care. Maybe he’s got a fetish for that number.”
As he and Mac trudged back toward the new tower with shovels over their shoulders, Albie hurried to them on his crutches. “I can’t thank you enough for your help, gentlemen. You are true friends of Allah and Iraq. True friends of the Global Community.”
“The Global Community might not appreciate hearing you honor Allah,” Rayford said. “You are a loyalist, and yet you have not joined Enigma Babylon Faith?”
“On my mother’s grave, I should never mock Allah with such blasphemy.”
So, Rayford thought, Christians and Jews are not the only holdouts against the new Pope Peter.
Albie led them back to where they turned in their shovels. He spoke in hushed tones. “I am happy to inform you that I have already made some initial inquiries. I should have no trouble procuring your equipment.”
“All of it?” Mac said.
“All of it.”
“How much?” Mac said.
“I have taken the liberty of writing that down,” Albie said.
He pulled a scrap of paper from his pocket and leaned on his crutches as he opened it in the fading light.
“Ho! Man!” Rayford said. “That’s four times what I would pay for two scuba outfits.”
Albie stuffed the paper back into his pocket. “It is exactly double retail. Not a penny more. If you do not want the merchandise, tell me now.”
“That does look high,” Mac said. “But you have never done me wrong. We will trust you.”
“Need a deposit?” Rayford said, hoping to assuage the man’s feelings.
“No,” he said, eyes darting to Mac but not at Rayford. “You trust me, I’ll trust you.”
Rayford nodded.
Albie thrust out his bony hand and gripped Rayford’s fiercely. “I will see you in thirty days then, unless you hear from me otherwise.”
Mac took the controls for the flight back. “Got enough energy to finish your story, Ray?”
Buck stopped at the ruins of New Hope Village Church on his way to Loretta’s and strolled past the crater where the old woman’s car rested twenty feet below. Her body was there too, but he could not bring himself to look. If animals had gotten to her, he didn’t want to know. He also avoided the spot where he had found Donny Moore. More movement of the earth had further entombed him.
He carefully climbed to where the underground shelter lay. Clearly, more debris had shifted. He slipped and nearly fell down the concrete stairs that led to the door. He wondered if anything salvageable could be dragged out. He could always come back. Buck headed for the Range Rover and brushed his fingers across his still swollen cheek. Why was it flesh wounds looked worse and felt more tender the second day?
Traffic dotted the area today. Any front-end loader, bulldozer, or dragline that had not sunk out of sight appeared to have been called into service. Buck couldn’t park where he had the day before. Road crews rammed the uptwisted pavement in front of Loretta’s house. Dump trucks were loaded with the huge chunks. Where they would take it and what they would do with it, Buck had no idea. All he knew was that there was nothing else for anyone to do but start rebuilding. He couldn’t imagine this area ever looking like its old self again, but he knew it wouldn’t be long before it was rebuilt.
Buck drove over a small pile of trash and parked next to one of the felled trees in Loretta’s front yard. Workers ignored him as he slowly circled the house, wondering whether to continue picking through what was left of it.
A man with a clipboard studied the residue of the house next door. He shot pictures and took notes.
“Didn’t think insurance would cover an act of God like this,” Buck said.
“It wouldn’t,” the man said. “I’m not with an insurance company.” He turned so Buck could see the ID tag clipped to his collar. It read, “Sunny Kuntz, Senior Field Supervisor, Global Community Relief.”
Buck nodded. “What happens next?”
“We fax pictures and stats to headquarters. They send money. We rebuild.”
“GC headquarters is still standing?”
“Nope. They’re rebuilding too. Whoever’s left there is in an underground shelter with pretty sophisticated technology.”
“You can communicate with New Babylon?”
“Since this morning.”
“My father-in-law works over there. You think I could get through?”
“You ought to be able to.” Kuntz glanced at his watch. “It’s not 9:00 p.m. there yet. I talked to somebody there about four hours ago. I wanted them to know we found at least one survivor from this area.”
“You did? Who?”
“I’m not at liberty to share that information, Mr.—”
“Oh, sorry.” Buck reached for his own ID, identifying himself as also a GC employee.
“Ah, press,” Kuntz said. He peeled up two pages from his clipboard. “Name’s Cavenaugh. Helen. Age seventy.”
“She lived here?”
“That’s right. Said she ran to the basement when she felt the place rattling. Never heard of an earthquake in this area before, so she thought it was a tornado. She was just flat lucky. Last place you want to be in an earthquake is where everything can fall on you.”
“She survived though, huh?”
Kuntz pointed to the foundation about twenty feet east of Loretta’s house. “See those two openings, one up here and the other in back?” Buck nodded. “That’s one long room in the basement. First she ran to the front. When the whole house shifted and the glass blew in from that window, she ran to the other end. The glass was already out of that window, so she just planted herself in the corner and waited it out. If she had stayed up front, she’d have never made it. Wound up in the only corner of the house where she wouldn’t have been killed.”
“She told you this?”
“Yep.”
“She didn’t say whether she saw anybody next door, did she?”
“Matter of fact, she did.”
Buck nearly lost his breath. “What’d she say?”
“Just that she saw a young woman running out of the house. Just before the window gave way on this end, the woman jumped in her car, but when the road started rising on her, she drove into the garage.”
Buck trembled, desperate to stay calm until he got the whole story. “Then what?”
“Mrs. Cavenaugh said she had to move to the back because of that window, and when that house started to give way, she thought she saw the woman come out the side door of the garage and run through the backyard.”
Buck lost all objectivity. “Sir, that was my wife. Any more details?”
“None I can remember.”
“Where is this Mrs. Cavenaugh?”
“In a shelter about six miles due east. A furniture store somehow suffered very little damage. There’s probably two hundred survivors in there, the least injured. It’s more of a holding station than a hospital.”
“Tell me exactly where this place is. I need to talk to her.”
“OK, Mr. Williams, but I need to caution you not to get your hopes up about your wife.”
“What are you talking about? I didn’t have my hopes up until I found out she ran from this. My hopes were nowhere when I tried to dig through the mess. Don’t tell me to not get my hopes up now.”
“I’m sorry. I’m just trying to be realistic. I worked disaster relief for more than fifteen years before joining the GC task force. This is the worst I’ve ever seen, and I need to ask you if you’ve seen the escape route your wife might have taken, if Mrs. Cavenaugh was right and she ran through that backyard.”
Buck followed Kuntz to the back. Kuntz swept the horizon with his arm. “Where would you go?” he asked. “Where would anybody go?”
Buck nodded somberly. He got the message. As far as he could see was nothing
but piles, crevices, craters, fallen trees, and downed utility poles. There had certainly been no place to run.
CHAPTER 7
“So,” Mac said, “your daughter was your real reason for finding out what happened to your wife and son.”
“Right.”
“Did you wonder about your motive?”
“You mean guilt? Maybe partly. But I was guilty, Mac. I had let down my daughter. I wasn’t going to let that happen again.”
“You couldn’t force her to believe.”
“No. And for a while I thought she wouldn’t. She was tough, analytical, the way I had been.”
“Well, Ray, we flyboys are all alike. We get off the ground because of aerodynamics. No magic, no miracles, nothing you can’t see, feel, or hear.”
“That was me all the way.”
“So what happened? What made the difference?”
The sun dipped below the horizon, and from the helicopter Rayford and Mac saw the yellow ball flatten and melt in the distance. Rayford was into his story, earnestly trying to persuade Mac of the truth. He was suddenly warm. Though the Iraqi desert cooled quickly after sundown, he had to shed his jacket.
“No closets here, Ray. I just lay mine behind the seat.”
Once situated, Rayford continued. “Ironically, everything that convinced me of the truth I should have known in time to go with Irene when Christ came back. I had gone to church for years, and I had even heard the terms Virgin Birth and atonement and all that. But I never stopped to figure what they meant. I understood that one of the legends said Jesus was born to a woman who had never been with a man. I couldn’t have told you whether I believed that or even thought it was important. It seemed like just a religious story and, I thought, explained why a lot of people thought sex was dirty.”
Rayford told Mac of finding Irene’s Bible, digging out the phone number of the church she loved so much, reaching Bruce Barnes, and seeing Pastor Billings’s DVD prepared for those left behind.
“He had this whole thing figured out?” Mac said.
“Oh, yes. Just about anybody who was raptured knew it was coming. They didn’t know when, but they looked forward to it. That DVD really did it for me, Mac.”
