The Left Behind Collection: All 12 Books (85 page)

Rayford clandestinely listened in horror as Carpathia announced to his compatriots, “Chicago should be under retaliatory attack, even as we speak. Thank you for your part in this, and for the strategic nonuse of radioactive fallout. I have many loyal employees in that area, and though I expect to lose some in the initial attack, I need not lose any to radiation to make my point.”

Someone else spoke up. “Shall we watch the news?”

“Good idea,” Carpathia said.

Rayford could remain seated no longer. He didn’t know what he would say or do, if anything, but he simply could not stay in that cockpit, not knowing whether his loved ones were safe. He entered the cabin as the television was coming on, showing the first images from Chicago. Amanda gasped. Rayford went and sat with her to watch. “Would you go to Chicago for me?” Rayford whispered.

“If you think I would be safe.”

“There’s no radiation.”

“How do you know that?”

“I’ll tell you later. Just tell me you’ll go if I can get permission from Carpathia to have you fly out of San Francisco.”

“I’ll do anything for you, Rayford. You know that.”

“Listen to me, sweetheart. If you can’t get an immediate flight, and I mean before this plane leaves the ground again, you must reboard the Condor. Do you understand?”

“I understand, but why?”

“I can’t tell you now. Just get an immediate flight to Milwaukee if I can get it cleared. If the plane is not airborne before we are—”

“What?”

“Just be sure, Amanda. I couldn’t bear losing you.”

Following the news from Chicago, the cable news channel broke for a commercial, and Rayford approached Carpathia. “Sir, may I have a moment?”

“Certainly, Captain. Awful news out of Chicago, is it not?”

“Yes, sir, it is. In fact, that’s what I wanted to talk to you about. You know I have family in that area.”

“Yes, and I hope they are all safe,” Carpathia said.

Rayford wanted to kill him where he sat. He knew full well the man was the Antichrist, and he also knew that this very person would be assassinated one day and be resurrected from the dead by Satan himself. Rayford had never dreamed he might be an agent in that assassination, but at that instant he would have applied for the job. He fought for composure. Whoever killed this man would be merely a pawn in a huge cosmic game. The assassination and resurrection would only make Carpathia more powerful and satanic than ever.

“Sir,” Rayford continued, “I was wondering if it would be possible for my wife to deplane in San Francisco and head back to Chicago to check on my people.”

“I would be happy to have my staff check on them,” Carpathia said, “if you will simply give me their addresses.”

“I would really feel a lot better if she could be there with them to help as needed.”

“As you wish,” Carpathia said, and it was all Rayford could do not to breathe a huge sigh of relief in the man’s face.

“Who’s got a cell phone I can borrow?” Buck shouted over the din in the parking lot of
Global Community Weekly
.

A woman next to him thrust one into his hands, and he was shocked to realize she was Verna Zee. “I need to make some long-distance calls,” he said quickly. “Can I skip all the codes and just pay you back?”

“Don’t worry about it, Cameron. Our little feud just got insignificant.”

“I need to borrow a car!” Buck shouted. But it quickly became clear that everyone was heading to their own places to check on loved ones and assess the damage. “How about a ride to Mt. Prospect?”

“I’ll take you,” Verna muttered. “I don’t even want to see what’s happening in the other direction.”

“You live in the city, don’t you?” Buck said.

“I did until about five minutes ago,” Verna said.

“Maybe you got lucky.”

“Cameron, if that big blast was nuclear, none of us will last the week.”

“I might know a place you can stay in Mt. Prospect,” Buck said.

“I’d be grateful,” she said.

Verna went back inside to gather up her stuff. Buck waited in her car, making his phone calls. He started with his own father out west. “I’m so glad you called,” his father said. “I tried calling New York for hours.”

“Dad, it’s a mess here. I’m left with the clothes on my back, and I don’t have much time to talk. I just called to make sure everybody was all right.”

“Your brother and I are doing all right here,” Buck’s dad said. “He’s still grieving the loss of his family, of course, but we’re all right.”

“Dad, the wheels are coming off of this country. You’re not gonna really be all right until—”

“Cameron, let’s not get into this again, OK? I know what you believe, and if it gives you comfort—”

“Dad! It gives me little comfort right now. It kills me that I was so late coming to the truth. I’ve already lost too many loved ones. I don’t want to lose you too.”

His father chuckled, maddening Buck. “You’re not going to lose me, big boy. Nobody seems to want to even attack us out here. We feel a little neglected.”

“Dad! Millions are dying. Don’t be glib about this.”

“So, how’s that new wife of yours? Are we ever gonna get to meet her?”

“I don’t know, Dad. I don’t know exactly where she is right now, and I don’t know whether you’ll ever get the chance to meet her.”

“You ashamed of your own father?”

“It’s not that at all, Dad. I need to make sure she’s all right, and we’re going to have to try to get out that way somehow. Find a good church there, Dad. Find somebody who can explain to you what’s going on.”

“I can’t think of anybody more qualified than you, Cameron. And you’re just gonna have to let me ruminate on this myself.”

Rayford heard Carpathia’s people setting up for his broadcast. “Is there any way anyone will be able to tell we are airborne?” Carpathia asked.

“None,” he was assured. Rayford wasn’t so sure, but certainly, unless Carpathia made some colossal error, no one would have a clue precisely where in the air he was.

At the sound of a knock on the cockpit door, Rayford shut off the hidden button and turned expectantly. It was a Carpathia aide. “Do whatever you have to do to shut down all interference and patch us back through to Dallas. We go live on satellite in about three minutes, and the potentate should be able to be heard everywhere in the world.”

Yippee,
Rayford thought.

Buck was on the phone with Loretta when Verna Zee slipped behind the wheel. She slung her oversized bag onto the seat behind her, then had trouble fastening her seat belt, she was shaking so. Buck shut off the phone. “Verna, are you all right? I just talked with a woman from our church who has a room and private bath for you.”

A mini traffic jam dissipated as Verna and Buck’s coworkers wended their way out of the small parking lot. Headlights provided the only illumination in the area.

“Cameron, why are you doing this for me?”

“Why not? You lent me your phone.”

“But I’ve been so awful to you.”

“And I’ve responded in kind. I’m sorry, Verna. This is the last time in the world we should care so much about getting our own way.”

Verna started the car but sat with her face in her hands. “You want me to drive?” Buck asked.

“No, just give me a minute.”

Buck told her of his urgency to locate a vehicle and try to find Chloe.

“Cameron! You must be frantic!”

“Frankly, I am.”

She unlatched her seat belt and reached for the door handle. “Take my car, Cameron. Do whatever you have to do.”

“No,” Buck said. “I’ll let you lend me your car, but let’s get you settled first.”

“You may not have a minute to spare.”

“All I can do is trust God at this point,” Buck said.

He pointed Verna in the right direction. She sped to the edge of Mt. Prospect and slid up to the curb in front of Loretta’s beautiful, rambling, old home. Verna did not allow Buck to even take the time to make introductions. She said, “We all know who each other is, so let’s let Cameron get going.”

“I arranged for a car for you,” Loretta said. “It should be here in a few minutes.”

“I’ll take Verna’s for now, but I sure appreciate it.”

“Keep the phone as long as you need it,” Verna said, as Loretta welcomed her.

Buck pushed the driver’s seat all the way back and adjusted the mirror. He punched in the number he’d been given for Nicolae Carpathia and tried to return that call. The phone was answered by an aide. “I’ll tell him you returned his call, Mr. Williams, but he’s conducting an international broadcast just now. You might want to tune it in.”

Buck whipped on the radio while racing toward the only route he could imagine Chloe taking to escape Chicago.

“Ladies and gentlemen, from an unknown location, we bring you, live, Global Community Potentate Nicolae Carpathia.”

Rayford swung around in his chair and propped open the cockpit door. The plane was on autopilot, and both he and his first officer sat watching as Carpathia addressed the world. The potentate looked amused as he was being introduced and winked at a couple of his ambassadors. He pretended to lick his finger and smooth his eyebrows, as if primping for his audience. The others stifled chuckles. Rayford wished he had a weapon.

On cue, Carpathia mustered his most emotional voice. “Brothers and sisters of the Global Community, I am speaking to you with the greatest heaviness of heart I have ever known. I am a man of peace who has been forced to retaliate with arms against international terrorists who would jeopardize the cause of harmony and fraternity. You may rest assured that I grieve with you over the loss of loved ones, of friends, of acquaintances. The horrible toll of civilian lives should haunt these enemies of peace for the rest of their days.

“As you know, most of the ten world regions that comprise the Global Community destroyed 90 percent of their weapon hardware. We have spent nearly the last two years breaking down, packaging, shipping, receiving, and reassembling this hardware in New Babylon. My humble prayer was that we would never have had to use it.

“However, wise counselors persuaded me to stockpile storehouses of technologically superior weapons in strategic locations around the globe. I confess I did this against my will, and my optimistic and overly positive view of the goodness of mankind has proven faulty.

“I am grateful that somehow I allowed myself to be persuaded to keep these weapons at the ready. In my wildest dreams, I never would have imagined that I would have to make the difficult decision to turn this power against enemies on a broad scale. By now you must know that two former members of the exclusive Global Community executive council have viciously and wantonly conspired to revolt against my administration, and another carelessly allowed militia forces in his region to do the same. These forces were led by the now late president of the United States of North America Gerald Fitzhugh, trained by the American militia, and supported also by secretly stored weapons from the United States of Great Britain and the formerly sovereign country of Egypt.

“While I should never have to defend my reputation as an antiwar activist, I am pleased to inform you that we have retaliated severely and with dispatch. Anywhere that Global Community weaponry was employed, it was aimed specifically at rebel military locations. I assure you that all civilian casualties and the destruction of great populated cities in North America and around the world was the work of the rebellion.

“There are no more plans for counterattacks by Global Community forces. We will respond only as necessary and pray that our enemies understand that they have no future. They cannot succeed. They will be utterly destroyed.

“I know that in a time of global war such as this, most of us live in fear and grief. I can assure you that I am with you in your grief but that my fear has been overcome by confidence that the majority of the global community is together, heart and soul, against the enemies of peace.

“As soon as I am convinced of security and safety, I will address you via satellite television and the Internet. I will communicate frequently so you know exactly what is going on and will see that we are making enormous strides toward rebuilding our world. You may rest assured that as we reconstruct and reorganize, we will enjoy the greatest prosperity and the most wonderful home this earth can afford. May we all work together for the common goal.”

While Carpathia’s aides and ambassadors nodded and clapped him on the back, Rayford caught Amanda’s eye and resolutely shut the cockpit door.

Verna Zee’s car was a junky old import. It was rattly and drafty, a four-cylinder automatic. In short, it was a dog. Buck decided to test its limits and reimburse Verna later, if necessary. He sped to the Kennedy and headed toward the Edens junction, trying to guess how far Chloe might have gotten from The Drake in heavy traffic that would now be impassable.

What he didn’t know was whether she would take Lake Shore Drive (which locals referred to as the LSD) or the Kennedy. This was more her bailiwick than his, but his question soon became moot. Chicago was in flames, and most of the drivers of cars that clogged the Kennedy in both directions stood on the pavement gaping at the holocaust. Buck would have given anything to have had the Range Rover at that moment.

When he whipped Verna’s little pile of junk onto the shoulder, he found he wasn’t alone. Traffic laws and civility went out the window at a time like this, and there was almost as much traffic off the road as on. He had no choice. Buck had no idea whether he was destined to survive the entire seven years of the Tribulation anyway, and he could think of only one better reason to die than trying to rescue the love of his life.

Ever since he had become a believer, Buck had considered the privilege of giving his life in the service of God. In his mind, regardless of what really killed Bruce, he believed Bruce was a martyr to the cause. Risking his life in traffic may not have been as altruistic as that, but one thing he was sure of: Chloe would not have hesitated had the shoe been on the other foot.

The biggest jam-ups came at the bridge overpasses where the shoulders ended and those fighting to go around stalled traffic had to take turns picking their way through. Angry motorists rightfully tried to block their paths. Buck couldn’t blame them. He would have done the same in their places.

He had stored the number of the phone in the Range Rover and continued to redial every chance he got. Every time he first heard a hint of the message “The mobile customer you have called—”, he disconnected and tried again.

Just before the initial descent into San Francisco, Rayford huddled with Amanda. “I’m gonna get that door open and get you off this plane as soon as possible,” he said. “I’m not going to wait for the postflight checklist or anything. Don’t forget, it’s imperative that whatever flight you find is off the ground before we are.”

“But why, Ray?”

“Just trust me, Amanda. You know I have your best interests in mind. As soon as you can, call me on my universal cell phone and let me know Chloe and Buck are all right.”