Excerpt
Rayford Steele wore the uniform of the enemy of his soul, and he hated himself forit. He strode through Iraqi sand toward Baghdad Airport in his dress blues and wasstruck by the incongruity of it all.
From across the parched plain he heard the wails and screams of hundreds he wouldn’tbegin to be able to help. Any prayer of finding his wife alive depended on howquickly he could get to her. But there was no quick here. Only sand. And what aboutChloe and Buck in the States? And Tsion?
Desperate, frantic, mad with frustration, he ripped off his natty waistcoat with itsyellow braid, heavy epaulettes, and arm patches that identified a senior officer ofthe Global Community. Rayford did not take the time to unfasten the solid-goldbuttons but sent them popping across the desert floor. He let the tailored jacketslide from his shoulders and clutched the collar in his fists. Three, four, fivetimes he raised the garment over his head and slammed it to the ground. Dust billowedand sand kicked up over his patent leather shoes.
Rayford considered abandoning all vestiges of his connection to Nicolae Carpathia’sregime, but his attention was drawn again to the luxuriously appointed arm patches.He tore at them, intending to rip them free, as if busting himself from his own rankin the service of the Antichrist. But the craftsmanship allowed not even a fingernailbetween the stitches, and Rayford slammed the coat to the ground one more time. Hestepped and booted it like an extra point, finally aware of what had made it heavier.His phone was in the pocket.
As he knelt to retrieve his coat, Rayford’s maddening logic returnedthe practicalitythat made him who he was. Having no idea what he might find in the ruins of hiscondominium, he couldn’t treat as dispensable what might constitute his onlyremaining set of clothes.
Rayford jammed his arms into the sleeves like a little boy made to wear a jacket on awarm day. He hadn’t bothered to shake the grit from it, so as he plunged on towardthe skeletal remains of the airport, Rayford’s lanky frame was less impressive thanusual. He could have been the survivor of a crash, a pilot who’d lost his cap andseen the buttons stripped from his uniform.
Rayford could not remember a chill before sundown in all the months he’d lived inIraq. Yet something about the earthquake had changed not only the topography, butalso the temperature. Rayford had been used to damp shirts and a sticky film on hisskin. But now wind, that rare, mysterious draft, chilled him as he speed dialed MacMcCullum and put the phone to his ear.
At that instant he heard the chug and whir of Mac’s chopper behind him. He wonderedwhere they were going.
“Mac here,” cam McCullum’s gravely voice.
Rayford whirled and watched the copter eclipse the descending sun. “I canít believethis thing works,” Rayford said. He had slammed it to the ground and kicked it, buthe also assumed the earthquake would have taken out nearby cellular towers.
“Soon as I get out of range, it wonít, Ray,” Mac said.
“Everything’s down for as far as I can see. These units act like walkie-talkies whenwe’re close. When you need a cellular boost, you won’t find it.”
“So any chance of call the States”
“Is out of the question,” Mac said. “Ray, Potentate Carpathia wants to speak to you,but first”
“I don’t want to talk to him, and you can tell him that.”
“But before I give you to him,” Mac continued, “I need to remind you that ourmeetings, yours and mine, is still on for tonight. Right?”
Rayford slowed and stared at the ground, running a hand through his hair. “What? Whatare you talking about?”
“All right then, very good,” Mac said. “We’re still meeting tonight then. Now thepotentate”
“I understand you want to talk to me later, Mac, but don’t put Carpathia on or Iswear I’ll”
“Stand by for the potentate.”
Rayford switched the phone to his right hand, ready to smash it on the ground, but herestrained himself. When avenues of communication reopened, he wanted to be able tocheck on his loved ones.
“Captain Steele,” came the emotionless tone of Nicolae Carpathia.
“Iím here,” Rayford said, allowing his disgust to come through. He assumed God wouldforgive anything he said to the Antichrist, but he swallowed what he really wanted tosay.
“Though we both know how I could respond to your egregious disrespect andinsubordination,” Carpathia said, “I choose to forgive you.”
Rayford continued walking, clenching his teeth to keep from screaming at the man.
“I can tell you are a loss for how to express your gratitude,” Carpathia continued.“Now listen to me. I have a safe place and provisions where my internationalambassadors and staff will join me. You and I both know we need each other, so Isuggest”
“You don’t need me,” Rayford said. “And I don’t need your forgiveness. You have aperfectly capable pilot right next to you, so let me suggest that you forget me.”
“Just be ready when he lands,” Carpathia said, the first hint of frustration in hisvoice.
“The only place I would accept a ride to is the airport,” Rayford said. “And Iímalmost there. Don’t have Mac set down any closer to this mess.”
“Captain Steele,” Carpathia began again, condescendingly, “I admire your irrationalbelief that you can somehow find your wife, but we both know that is not going tohappen.”
Rayford said nothing. He feared Carpathia was right, but he would never give him thesatisfaction of admitting it. And he would certainly never quit looking until heproved to himself Amanda had not survived.
“Come with us, Captain Steele. Just reboard, and I will treat your outburst as if itnever”
“I’m not going anywhere until I’ve found my wife! Let me talk to Mac.”
“Officer McCullum is busy. I will pass along a message.”
“Mac could fly that thing with no hands. Now let me talk to him.”
“If there is no message, then, Captain Steele”
“All right, you win. Just tell Mac”
“Now is no time to neglect protocol, Captain Steele. A pardoned subordinate isbehooved to address his superior”
“All right, Potentate Carpathia, just tell Mac to come for me if I don’t find a wayback by 2200 hours.”
“And should you find a way back, the shelter is three and a half clicks northeast ofthe original headquarters. You will need the following password: ‘Operation Wrath.’”
“What?” Carpathia knew this was coming?
“You heard me, Captain Steele.”
Cameron “Buck” Williams stepped gingerly through the rubble near the ventilationshaft where he had heard the clear, healthy voice of Rabbi Tsion Ben-Judah, trappedin the underground shelter. Tsion assured him he was unhurt, just scared andclaustrophobic. That place was small enough without the church imploding above it.With no way out unless someone tunneled to him, the rabbi, Buck knew, would soon feellike a caged animal.
Had Tsion been in immediate danger, Buck would have dug with his bare hands to freehim. But Buck felt like a doctor in triage, having to determine who most urgentlyneeded his help. Assuring Tsion he would return, he headed toward the safe house tofind his wife.
To get through the trash that had been the only church home he ever knew, Buck had toagain crawl past the remains of the beloved Loretta. What a friend she had been,first to the late Bruce Barnes and then to the rest of the Tribulation Force. TheForce had begun with four: Rayford, Chloe, Bruce, and Buck. Amanda was added. Brucewas lost. Tsion was added.
Was it possible now that they had been reduced to just Buck and Tsion? Buck didn’twant to think about it. He found his watch gunked up with mud, asphalt, and a tinyshard of windshield. He wiped the crystal across his pant leg and felt the crustymixture tear his trousers and bit into his knee. It was nine o’clock in the morningin Mt. Prospect, and Buck heard an air raid siren, a tornado warning siren, emergencyvehicle sirensone close, two farther away. Shouts. Screams. Sobbing. Engines. Couldhe live without Chloe? Buck had been given a second chance; he was here for apurpose. He wanted the love of his life by his side, and he prayedselfishly herealizedthat she had not already preceded him to heaven.
In his peripheral vision, Buck noticed the selling of his own left cheek. He had feltneither pain nor blood and had assumed the wound was minor. Now he wondered. Hereached in his breast pocket for his mirrored lensed sunglasses. One lens was inpieces. In the reflection of the other he saw a scarecrow, hair wild, eyes white withfear, mouth open and sucking air. The wound was not bleeding, yet it appeared deep.There would be no time for treatment.
Buck emptied his shirt pocket but kept the framesa gift from Chloe. He studied theground as he moved back to the Range Rover, picking his way through glass, nails, andbricks like an old man, assuring himself solid purchase.
Buck passed Loretta’s car and what was left of her, determined not to look. Suddenlythe earth moved, and he stumbled. Loretta’s car, which he had been unable to budgemoments before, rocked and disappeared. The ground had given way under the parkinglot. Buck stretched out on his stomach and peeked over the edge of a new crevice. Themangled car rested atop a water main twenty feet beneath the earth. The blown tirespointed up like the feet of bloated roadkill. Curled in a frail ball atop thewreckage was the Raggedy Ann-like body of Loretta, a tribulation saint. There wouldbe more shifting of the earth. Reaching Loretta’s body would be impossible. If he wasalso to find Chloe dead, Buck wished God had let him plunge under the earth withLoretta’s car.
Buck rose slowly, suddenly aware of what the roller coaster ride through theearthquake had done to his joints and muscles. He surveyed the damage to his vehicle.Though it had rolled and been hit from all sides, it appeared remarkably roadworthy.The driver’s-side door was jammed, the windshield in gummy pieces throughout theinterior, and the rear seat had broken away from the floor on one side. One tire hadbeen slashed to the steel belts but looked strong and held air.
Where were Buck’s phone and laptop? He had set them on the front seat. He hopedagainst hope neither had flown out in the mayhem. Buck opened the passenger door andpeered onto the floor of the front seat. Nothing. He looked under the rear seats, allthe way to the back. In a corner, open and with one screen hinge cracked, was hislaptop.
Buck found his phone in a door well. He didn’t expect to be able to get through toanyone, with all the damage to cellular towers (and everything else above ground). Heswitched it on, and it went through a self-test and showed zero range. Still, he hadto try. He dialed Loretta’s home. He didn’t even get a malfunction message from thephone company. The same happened when he dialed the church, then Tsion’s shelter. Asif playing a cruel joke, the phone made noises as if trying to get through. Then,nothing.
Buck’s landmarks were gone. He was grateful the Range Rover had a built in compass.Even the church seemed twisted from its normal perspective on the corner. Poles andlines and traffic lights were down, buildings flattened, trees uprooted, fencesstrewn about.
Buck made sure the Range Rover was in four-wheel drive. He could barely travel twentyfeet before having to punch the car over some rise. He kept his eyes peeled to avoidanything that might further damage the Roverit might have to last him through theend of the Tribulation. The best he could figure, that was still more than five yearsaway.
As Buck rolled over chunks of asphalt and concrete where the street once lay, heglanced again at the vestiges of New Hope Village Church. Half the building wasunderground. But that one section of pews, which had once faced west, now faced northand glistened in the sun. The entire sanctuary floor appeared to have turned ninetydegrees.
As he passed the church, he stopped and stared. A shaft of light appeared betweeneach pair of pews in the ten-pew section except in one spot. There something blockedBuck’s view. He threw the Rover into reverse and carefully backed up. On the floor infront of one of those pews were the bottoms of a pair of tennis shoes, toes pointingup. Buck wanted, above all, to get to Loretta’s and search for Chloe, but he couldnot leave someone lying in the debris. Was it possible someone had survived?
He set the brake and scrambled over the passenger seat and out the door, recklesslytrotting through stuff that could slice through his shoes. He wanted to be practicalbut there was no time for that. Buck lost his footing ten feet from those tennisshoes and pitched face forward. He took the brunt of the fall on his palms and chest.
He pulled himself up and knelt next to the tennis shoes, which were attached to abody. Thin legs in dark blue jeans led to narrow hips. From the waist up, the smallbody was hidden under the pew. The right hand was tucked underneath, the left layopen and limp. Buck found no pulse, but he noticed the hand was broad and bony, thethird finger bearing a man’s wedding band. Buck slipped it off, assuming a survivingwife might want it.
Buck grabbed the belt buckle and dragged the body from under the bench. When the headslid into view, Buck turned away. He recognized Donny Moore’s blond coloring onlyfrom his eyebrows. The rest of his hair, even his sideburns, was encrusted withblood.
Buck didn’t know what to do in the face of the dead and dying at a time like this.Where would anyone begin disposing of millions of corpses all over the world? Buckgently pushed the body back under the pew but was stopped by an obstruction. Hereached underneath and found Donny’s beat up, hard-sided briefcase. Buck tried thelatches, but combination locks had been set. He lugged the briefcase back to theRange Rover and tried again to find his bearings. He was a scant four blocks fromLoretta’s, but could he even find the street?
Rayford was encouraged to see movement in the distance at Baghdad Airport. He sawmore wreckage and carnage on the ground than people scurrying about, but at least notall had been lost.
A small, dark figure with a strange gait appeared on the horizon. Rayford watched,fascinated, as the image materialized into a stocky, middle-aged Asian in a businesssuit. The man walked directly toward Rayford, who waited expectantly, wondering if hecould help. But as the man drew near, Rayford realized he was not aware of hissurroundings. He wore a wing-tipped dress shoe on one foot with only a sock slidingdown the ankle of the other. His suit coat was buttoned, but his tie hung outside it.His left hand dripped blood. His hair was mussed, yet his glasses appeared to havebeen untouched by whatever he had endured.
“Are you all right?” Rayford asked. The man ignored him. “Can I help you?”
The man limped past, mumbling in his own tongue. Rayford turned to cal him back, andthe man became a silhouette in the orange sun. There was nothing in that directionbut the Tigris River. “Wait!” Rayford called after him. “Come back! Let me help you!”
The man ignored him, and Rayford dialed Mac again. “Let me talk to Carpathia,” hesaid.
“Sure,” Mac said. “We’re set on that meeting tonight, right?”
“Right, now let me talk to him.”
“I mean our personal meeting, right?”
“Yes! I don’t know what you want, but yes, I get the point. Now I need to talk toCarpathia.”
“Okay, sorry. Here he is.”
“Change your mind, Captain Steele?” Carpathia said.
“Hardly. Listen, do you know Asian languages?”
“Some. Why?”
“What does this mean?” he asked, repeating what the man had said.
“That is easy,” Carpathia said. “It means, ‘You cannot help me. Leave me alone.’”
“Bring Mac back around, would you? This man is going to die of exposure.”
“I thought you were looking for your wife.”
“I can’t leave a man to wander to his death.”
“Millions are dead and dying. You cannot save all of them.”
“I do not see him, Captain Steele. If you think you can save him, be my guest. I donot mean to be cold, but I have the whole world at heart just now.”
Rayford slapped his phone shut and hurried back to the lurching, mumbling man. As hedrew near, Rayford was horrified to see why his gait was so strange and why hetrailed a river of blood. He had been impaled by a gleaming white chunk of metal,apparently some piece of fuselage. Why he was still alive, how he survived or climbedout, Rayford couldn’t imagine. The shard was imbedded from his hip to the back of hishead. It had to have missed vital organs by centimeters.
Rayford touched the man’s shoulder, causing him to wrench away. He sat heavily, andwith a huge sigh toppled slowly in the sand and breathed his last. Rayford checkedfor a pulse, not surprised to find none. Overcome, he turned his back and knelt inthe dirt. Sobs wracked his body.
Rayford raised his hands to the sky. “Why God? Why do I have to see this? Why sendsomeone across my path I can’t even help? Spare Chloe and Buck! Please keep Amandaalive for me! I know I don’t deserve anything, but I can’t go on without her!”
Usually Buck drove two blocks south and two east from the church to Loretta’s. Butnow there were no more blocks. No sidewalks, no streets, no intersections. For as faras Buck could see, every house in the neighborhood had been leveled. Could it havebeen this bad all over the world? Tsion taught that a quarter of the world’spopulation would fall victim to the wrath of the Lamb. But Buck would be surprised ifeven a quarter of the population of Mt. Prospect was still alive.
He lined up the Range Rover on a southeastern course. A few degrees above the horizonthe day was as beautiful as any Buck could remember. The sky, where not interruptedby smoke and dust, was baby blue. No clouds. Bright sun.
Geysers shot skyward where fire hydrants had ruptured. A woman crawled out from thewreckage of her home, a bloody stump at her shoulder where her arm had been. Shescreamed at Buck, “Kill me! Kill me!”
He shouted, “No!” and leaped from the Rover as she bent and grabbed a chunk of glassfrom a broken window and dragged it across her neck. Buck continued to yell as hesprinted to her. He only hoped she was too weak to do anything but superficial damageto her neck, and he prayed she would miss her carotid artery.
He was within a few feet of her when she stared, startled. The glass broke andtinkled to the ground. She stepped back and tripped, her head smacking loudly on thea chunk of concrete. Immediately the blood stopped pumping from her exposed arteries.Her eyes were lifeless as Buck forced her eyes open and covered her mouth with his.Buck blew air into her throat, making her chest rise and her blood trickle, but itwas futile.
Buck looked around, wondering whether to try to cover her. Across the way an elderlyman stood at the edge of a crater and seemed to will himself to tumble into it. Buckcould take no more. Was God preparing him for the likelihood that Chloe had notsurvived?
He wearily climbed back into the Range Rover, deciding he absolutely could not stopand help anyone else who did not appear to really want it. Everywhere he looked hesaw devastation, fire, water, and blood.
Against his better judgment, Rayford left the dead man in the desert sand. What wouldhe do when he saw others in various states of demise? How could Carpathia ignorethis? Had he not a shred of humanity? Mac would have surely stayed and helped.
Rayford despaired of seeing Amanda alive again, and though he would search with allthat was in him, he already wished he had arranged an earlier rendezvous with Mac.Heíd seen awful things in his life, but the carnage at this airport was going to topthem all. A shelter, even the Antichristís, sounded better than this.
Continues...
Excerpted from Soul Harvestby Tim LaHaye Copyright © 2001 by Tim LaHaye. Excerpted by permission.
All rights reserved. No part of this excerpt may be reproduced or reprinted without permission in writing from the publisher.
Excerpts are provided by Dial-A-Book Inc. solely for the personal use of visitors to this web site.
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