Apocalypse unleashed

10

United States 75th Army Rangers Outpost

Harran

Sanliurfa Province, Turkey

Local Time 0543 Hours

“Sergeant Gander?”

Goose came awake instantly. He’d been dozing, not really sleeping. The army had taught him to do that. Soldiers rested when they could and slept when they were able. He’d woken at mess call and received a tray from the guards at his door.

“Yeah?” Goose swung his feet off the field cot and sat up. Lieutenant Swindoll hadn’t been any too generous with the accommodations of the house arrest Remington had imposed. The local warlords attacked on a regular basis, hoping to drive the entrenched American soldiers from the city so they could loot it at will. As a result, clean housing was at a premium. Goose occupied a cellar under a dilapidated house that looked ready to fall at any moment.

“Chaplain Miller. We’ve met.”

“Yes, sir.” Goose got to his feet. Miller was a captain.

“Might I have a word with you?”

“Of course, sir.”

Miller came down the steep stairs with a bright electric lantern fisted before him. The light hurt Goose’s eyes, and he looked away instinctively to preserve what night vision he could.

“Sorry.” Miller turned the lantern down to a dim glow. “I didn’t think about what that was going to do to you.”

“It’s all right, sir.” Goose saluted and stood at attention.

“At ease, Goose. This is just a visit.” Miller was in his fifties, a lifer in the Rangers who-scuttlebutt had it-just couldn’t step away from the military. He was thin and leathery, with a seamed, plain face, a hooked nose that looked like it had been broken in the past, and shaggy gray eyebrows over deep-set eyes.

Goose automatically dropped into parade rest.

“Take a load off, Sergeant. This is totally informal.”

“Yes, sir.” Goose hesitated. “There’s not much in the way of comfort, sir. I’m not exactly set up for guests here.”

Miller surveyed the small room. It stank of damp earth and was roughly seven feet cubed. The field cot took up one whole wall. Shelves containing canned goods took up another. Sacks of rotting potatoes sat on the floor. Bags of onions hung suspended from the low ceiling.

“This is ridiculous. Until I got here, I had no idea your quarters were this bad.”

“It’s dry.”

Miller shook his head. “I can’t believe Captain Remington has decided this is in the best interests of these men.” He breathed out heavily. “Scratch that. In the best interests of his command.”

“The captain has his own view of things, sir.” Goose felt strangely self-conscious of his surroundings, as if he were to blame for their meagerness and his inability to be more hospitable.

“He certainly does, and I must tell you, it’s not a popular view.” Miller hung the lantern from one of the hooks. The dim light chased most of the shadows from the room.

“What do you mean?”

“I mean several of the soldiers-men you came in with as well as soldiers on-site here-are starting to talk about liberating you.”

Goose shook his head. “That’s nonsense, sir. I’d appreciate if you’d give those men a message from me and let them know they need to stay out of this.”

“I’ll do that, but I don’t think it’ll do much good. I’ve already counseled against anything like that.”

“Tell them I fight my own battles.” Goose’s voice hardened. “Tell them if they come in here without me being relieved by the captain himself, that they’ll have to fight me too.”

Miller smiled ruefully. “They know that. They’ve talked about that among themselves. Truthfully, I think that’s the only thing keeping them out of here now.”

Wearily Goose wiped at his face with a hand. His beard stubble crackled against his rough hand. “Me and the captain, we’ve been crossways before. We’ve always seen it through all right.”

“Not to intrude into your personal business too much,” Miller said, “but you’ve never been under house arrest before.”

“No, sir, I reckon not.” Goose’s cheeks burned a little in embarrassment at that. During the seventeen years he’d been an army Ranger, he’d never once been called on the carpet like this.

“Why do you think Captain Remington acted the way he did?”

“I disobeyed a command. I was to stay with the convoy. I didn’t. Men were lost-good men.”

“You helped a village.”

“I fell for bait in a trap.”

“Have a seat.” Miller waved Goose to the cot, then pulled over a barrel from the shelves.

Reluctantly, Goose sat.

“We need to talk about what you’re going to do.” The electric lantern light softened Miller’s features and bleached them to almost the color of bone.

“I’m going to do whatever Captain Remington wants me to do.”

“Even if it’s wrong?”

Goose bristled a little at that. “Begging your pardon, sir, but I ain’t seen nothing Captain Remington has done wrong. I’d defend everything he’s done.”

“I know. But these times we’re in, Goose, these are perilous times. Men are going to be weighed and judged by the way they conduct themselves over these next few years.”

“I’m a soldier, sir. I’ve been a soldier most of my life. If things work out right, I’m going to retire as a soldier.”

“You have a young son, don’t you?”

A ball of pain suddenly knotted up in Goose’s throat. He tried to speak and couldn’t. He settled for a nod.

“Where is he now?” Miller’s gaze didn’t waver.

Goose kept his gaze level, but he felt tears burning his eyes. He wanted to speak, but he could barely breathe.

“All those children disappeared like that.” Miller’s voice grew soft and husky. “A miraculous thing by all accounts.”

Goose forced himself to sit with his forearms resting on his knees. His hands knotted before him, knuckles white.

“You talked to Joseph Baker about this, Goose. Before he was killed, he told me that the two of you had spoken.”

“We did.” Goose’s voice was a hollow whisper in the dank quiet of the cellar.

“He told you he believed this was the time of Tribulation and that the children had been taken to heaven because they were innocents. Do you believe that?”

Hesitating, Goose stared at the chaplain. Finally he forced the words to come. “I want to. God help me, I truly want to.”

“But you continue to doubt?”

“Yes, sir.” Shame burned Goose’s face.

Miller was silent for a moment. “Everyone I’ve talked to who knows you speaks of what a good man you are.”

Goose didn’t know what to say to that, so he said nothing.

“They respect you, and as men love fellow warriors, they love you too. But if you’re a good man, Goose, why aren’t you in heaven with your son?”

Anger stirred in Goose, dark and rich and almost unconquerable. His legs tightened and almost lifted him from the field cot, but a muscle spasm in his left knee blinded him with pain. By the time he had the pain pushed out of his mind, the anger had gone too.

“Your son is safe,” Icarus, the rogue CIA agent, had told Goose. “ God came and took your son up as He took all the other children.”

“I don’t know, sir,” Goose stated quietly.

“Do you believe in God?”

“Yes, sir.”

“Have you ever given yourself to Him?”

“I was baptized, sir. Back in Waycross. Momma saw to it all of us were.”

“Your mother made that decision for you?” Interest gleamed in Miller’s gray eyes.

Goose shrugged. “Momma was a powerful churchgoer when she was alive, sir. She talked Daddy into getting baptized before they were married. When the time came, she let me know she wanted me baptized too.”

“So what did you do?”

“I got baptized.”

“Did you talk to God about this?”

“No, sir. Didn’t have to. Momma was enough.”

“Have you ever asked God into your heart, to forgive your sins, to work His will through you?”

Goose immediately felt uncomfortable. “Momma and Daddy taught me wrong from right, sir. I wasn’t ever no trouble to them. Everything I’ve done, I’ve been proud of.”

“It’s not enough to be a good man in this world, Goose. Unless you’re perfect-and nobody is-then you’ve got to let God work through you, too.”

“I figure He’s had me do things from time to time. I’ve gone to church, and I’ve given time and money to help out.”

“That’s just lip service. God wants a personal relationship with you.” Miller paused and licked his lips. “He may have chosen to put you through this, through these times, to build that personal relationship with you.”

When he spoke, Goose’s words had a hard, dangerous edge to them that he didn’t expect. “Then God picked a bad way to try to get me on His good side. You don’t take a man’s son from him without an explanation. You don’t strand a bunch of soldiers in harsh and unfriendly lands just so they can get chopped to pieces by an invading army or by warlords gathering around like carrion feeders. Meaning no disrespect to you, I don’t approve of God’s ways of doing things. And I ain’t feeling any too friendly toward God about now.”