The Mark: The Beast Rules the World

ELEVEN

For the next several days in the safe house, Rayford quietly observed the group dynamics and took notes. Tsion and Chaim spent most of their time studying. Leah seemed bored with helping Chloe with the international co-op, and while she got acquainted with Hattie, Hattie was getting on everyone's nerves. Everyone's except Zeke's. He mostly kept to himself and didn't appear affected by personal idiosyncrasies.

Rayford asked Tsion to lead the group in a brief Bible study each day, and they prayed together. Everyone was also expected to log on to Tsion's daily cybermessage. Each took a turn spray painting the insides of exposed windows until all the floors they were using were invisible to the outside, even with lights on.

A week after Rayford had brought Hattie into the safe house, he called a meeting to officially insert Chaim, Zeke, Albie, and Hattie into the Tribulation Force. They watched the Internet and television for information on when and how the mark of loyalty would be administered. And Buck was back in full swing with his The Truth cyberzine. With his international contacts and his ability to write stories that had a ring of authenticity without exposing believers in high places, Buck's was the most popular site on the Net, except for Tsion's. Through contacts Chloe lined up in the co-op, Buck enlisted underground printers all over the world who risked their lives publishing The Truth and Tsion's messages for those without access to computers.

Hattie evolved from a hesitant newcomer to the vivacious, excited believer she had been that first morning in Bozeman. Rayford enjoyed her spirit, and it seemed Tsion did too. The others' eyes seemed to glaze over each time she exulted over something anew. Something had to give. The Trib Force had plenty of space and privacy, but even in a massive skyscraper, cabin fever set in.

Fresh air was a problem. The building ventilation system worked fine, but other than the occasional slightly opened window that brought in crisp, fall breezes, everyone longed for time outdoors in the daylight. Too risky, Rayford told them, and even Kenny Bruce was taken out only after dark.

One by one his comrades came to Rayford in private, and while they carefully avoided bad-mouthing each other, all had similar requests. Each wanted an assignment, something away from the safe house. They wanted to be proactive, not waiting for Nicolae and the GC to be the only ones on the offensive.

All but Zeke, that is, who seemed content with his role. He inventoried the tools and supplies necessary to outfit the best forgery and phony identification operation possible. "I'm not a book readin' kind of a guy," he told Rayford, "but I can see what's coming."

"You can?"

Zeke nodded. "Dr. Ben-Judah is training Chaim what's-his-name to go back to Israel. That means I gotta work on a new ID for him, and not just on paper. He's gotta look like somebody else, because everybody knows him all over the world."

Rayford could only nod.

"You can't change a guy's height and weight, and I'm no plastic surgeon. But there's things you can do. He's got that Einstein hair thing goin' now, and he shaves. I'd bald him and dye his eyebrows dark. Then have him grow a big bushy beard or maybe muttonchops and a mustache, and make them dark too. He'll look younger and kinda hip, but mostly he won't look like himself. We gotta get rid of the glasses or change 'em drastically. Then I'd give him colored contacts. If he can get along without a prescription, I got plenty he can choose from."

"Uh-huh," Rayford said. "Zeke, what makes you think he's going back to Israel?"

"Oh, he isn't? Well, my mistake then. I just figured."

"I'm not saying you're wrong. I just wondered why you figured that."

"I don't know. Somebody's got to go, and you guys have never wanted to risk Dr. Ben-Judah."

"Somebody's got to go to Israel? Why?"

Zeke furrowed his brow. "I don't know. You can tell me if I'm wrong 'cause a lot of time I am, but Dad says I've got intuition. I try to figure out Zion's messages each day, but like I say, readin's not my thing. I don't think I ever read a book all the way through, except maybe a parts manual and then only over about six years. But Zion makes those daily message things pretty easy to understand for a smart guy. I'm sayin' he's smart, not mo. Most smart guys think they're explainin' something, but they're the only ones who understand it. You know what I mean?"

"Sure."

"Well, what I'm gettin' from Zion lately is that Carpathia is up to somethin'. And it has to do with Jerusalem. Zion says the Bible says the Antichrist is not only gonna pull a fast one on the Jews, he's also gonna brag about it right in their own temple and defile it somehow and break his promise."

"I think you've pretty much got that down, Zeke. How does Chaim play into it?"

"Zion says God's preparin' a safe place for the Jews to run off to, but they got to have a leader. Zion can lead 'em on the Net, but they need somebody there, somebody they can see. He's gotta be Jewish. He's gotta be a believer. He's gotta be popular or at least be able to get people to follow him. And he's gotta know a lot of stuff. The only person that's gonna know more than Zion pretty soon will be Chaim. And no way I think Zion's goin' over there."

"It's just as dangerous for Chaim, isn't it, Zeke?"

"Well, I don't know who'd be worse in Carpathia's mind, the guy who's tellin' the whole world Carpathia's the devil himself or the guy what ran a sword through his brain. But the fact is, we-I mean us believers-could probably get along without Chaim if we had to. But we're in trouble without Zion."

Zeke looked troubled for having said it.

Rayford stood and paced. "Well, Zeke, your dad's right about your intuition. You've hit this nail on the head."

"Then I'm gonna be asked to help send him over there as, what's his new name?"

"Tobias Rogoff."

"Right. As him?"

"You are."

"Don't you think a lot of people will recognize his voice and his body type? People notice hands too. I might have to work on that."

"Yes, there will be people who know right away who he is. And if David is right that there is tape showing him murdering Carpathia, I can see the GC showing that to the world. But Carpathia himself has already pardoned his attacker."

"But Carpathia also said he can't control what other citizens might do to the guy, so Chaim would be livin' on borrowed time, don't you think?"

"If he can get to the safe haven with the Jews, I think he will be supernaturally protected."

"That would be cool."

"You said you weren't a plastic surgeon. Are there less invasive ways to change someone's appearance?"

Zeke nodded. "There's dental gizmos."

"Appliances."

"Right. I used one on Leah, and I've got plenty more. We can really change the look of a man's teeth and jaw."

"How about one whose jaw is wired shut?"

"Even better. Leah's going to take out those wires soon. I think we can make him look like somebody else. Then he has to dress different than he ever has, maybe walk different. I can get him to do that just by adding a little somethin' to one of his shoes. I'll be ready when he is."

David dealt with his grief by working every waking moment and then crashing hard till he had no choice but to sleep. He assigned Mac and Abdullah the task of planning their disappearance, as conceived by Hannah. Meanwhile, he planted far and wide in the complex access numbers that would allow him, with the right keystrokes, to hack into the system and monitor the goings-on as fully as he was able to do now, at least for as long as the current system was used.

David found listening in on Nicolae and Leon and Hickman almost addictive, but he also enjoyed hearing what Security Chief Walter Moon had to say. While it was unlikely Moon would become a believer, who could know for sure? If he did, it would have to be before the initiation of the mark on employees, because, as Tsion taught, Scripture was clear that that was a once-and-for-all decision. But Moon, from what David could gather, shared openly with both his assistant and his most trusted subordinate that he believed he had been overlooked for the role of Supreme Commander. He spent most of his time swearing, ironically, "on a stack of Bibles," that he wouldn't have taken the job if it had been offered. But the opposite was so obviously and patently true that even his confidants felt free to tell him, "Of course you would have, and it should have gone to you."

David daydreamed of having Moon on his side, a grouser within the palace who had the potential for subversion.

The new intelligence director, replacing Jim Hickman, was a Pakistani named Suhail Akbar. A devout Carpathia supporter, he was a behind-the-scenes kind of guy, quiet and slow to voice an opinion but with a resume that far outstripped his former superior's for experience and training. David feared he was bright enough to be a problem. Bright was not an adjective ever applied to Hickman.

"It is crucial," David e-mailed Mac one afternoon following a heavy day of hacking and setup for a future of the same, "that we leave no room for questioning our loyalty to the GC and to Carpathia specifically. I challenge the brass occasionally for the very purpose of keeping them from suspecting me, and I believe they do suspect those who seem blindly loyal. I want them to ask themselves, Why would Hassid challenge us and yet stay and serve so capably if he is not simply trying to make the place the best it can be?

"Mac, we have to plan ahead, plant the problem that will explain our demise and cost the GC some plum pieces of equipment. I wouldn't mind seeing the plane go down with a few million Nicks' worth of biochip injectors and even loyalty enforcement facilitators. Wonder if guillotines are listed that way in the top end head-chopping paraphernalia catalogs? Sorry for the gallows humor; it's no laughing matter. Praise God he can make glorified bodies even of those saints who have been dismembered, cremated, or lightning struck.

"At the risk of insulting your intelligence, I must caution against even considering wasting the Phoenix 216. Much as I would love to tweak Carpathia's nose with the loss of his precious ride, we have way too much invested in the bugging system, which I am now able to access even from outside the plane. For whatever time God allows us the freedom to listen in, I can imagine no greater source of information. I have developed a program that can even track the position of the craft via satellite. It is always fun and enlightening, isn't it, when Nicolae thinks he's in a wholly secure environment and lets his hair down? The bluster and posturing among his people is one thing, but to hear him cackle and admit to his most trusted aides the very things he denies everywhere else, well, that's when it's worth it.

"Speaking of that, he has a meeting scheduled with Hickman, Moon, Akbar, and Fortunato that I plan to tape. If you think his go-rounds with just Leon were hilarious, wait till you hear this. I'll upload it to you. Remember the unique secure code for all this privileged information and secure transmissions. Should anyone, yourself included, try to access these files with the wrong code, I have programmed in a bug so nasty that it really should be called a monster. This is a creature that ignores the software programs and attacks the hardware.

"If I hadn't developed it myself, I wouldn't have believed it. This thing will literally intercept the impulses being relayed from point to point in the processor, carry them to the power source, whether battery or AC, and draw the current into the motherboard itself. If there were an incendiary device in there, I could get a computer to literally blow up in a hacker's face. Given that all that is in there is plastic and metal, the best I can do is produce a lot of heat, smoke, and some melting. Regardless, the victim computer is irreparable after that.

"More later, confrere. I'll look for something concrete from you and Abdullah within forty-eight hours. Meanwhile, it's less obvious and risky for you to have occasion to run into Hannah than for me to. Keep her warm and courageous as a compatriot and assure her that we will get out in time and have productive years left to devote to the cause of the kingdom."

Rayford, who had been kept up-to-date by David once he was up and around again, worried about the calendar. He had been noodling the most effective roles for each member of the Force, and the prospect of a sudden infusion of four members displaced from the palace had both its up- and downsides. Were he to bring them all to Chicago, he would add to the base of operations two pilots, a nurse, and one of the world's greatest computer geniuses. Clearly he had the room, but he wondered if having virtually everybody in one place was the most efficient use of resources.

Not just for their own psyches but also for the sake of the two-pronged overall mission-stymieing Carpathia where possible and winning as many people to the kingdom as they could-it might make more sense to spread the talent around the globe. Hattie and Leah were restless and eager for assignments. Chloe was resigned to staying, because of Kenny and the work of the co-op, but Buck needed live exposure to what was going on to make his cyberzine as effective as it could be.

Rayford and Albie needed all the pilots they could get, but planes weren't plentiful either. If he and the insightful if inarticulate Zeke were right about what Tsion was up to, thousands of pilots and planes would have to be recruited from around the world to airlift Jewish believers to safety. Veteran pilots like Mac and Abdullah could help make that happen.

But in an instant in the middle of the night, Rayford went from thinking he had more than two more weeks to think and plan how to best make use of the New Babylon contingent to realizing he had to act quickly. Time was a luxury he never had enough of, but an emergency threw everything into turmoil.

Rayford's phone rang, but no one was there. He checked the readout. A message from Lukas (Laslos) Miklos. "Have been found out," it read. "Pastor and my wife detained, among others. Pray please. Help please." The underground church in Ptolemai's was the largest in Greece and likely the largest in the United Carpathian States. Up to now the local GC presence had not been a problem. The Greek believers had been careful, Rayford knew from personal experience, but even they feared GC Security and Intelligence sources could not look the other way much longer. Part of the reason they felt they had been ignored was that local GC leadership believed Carpathia wanted the region that bore his name to have the lowest reported incidence of insurgence of the ten global supercommunities.

Whatever public relations sensitivities Carpathia had exhibited before his assassination, since his resurrection his emphasis had been on enforcement. Apparently, Rayford deduced, the new Carpathia would rather eradicate the opposition within his own duchy than pretend it didn't exist. Rayford would ask David to check into the situation and see what would be served by a Trib Force party showing its face over there.

Rayford had known Mrs. Miklos to be a quiet, deeply spiritual woman. But Laslos had told him she was also opinionated, stubborn, and brave. She was not the type to back down if confronted over the exercise of her beliefs by those in authority. Rayford imagined the GC storming a meeting and Mrs. Miklos resisting and even putting up a fuss rather than allowing her pastor, Demetrius Demeter, to be taken into custody.

But Rayford didn't want his imagination to run away with him. He would find out what he could from David and perhaps take a run over there with Albie. Or perhaps with Buck. He hated the idea of leaving the Trib Force without so much as a helicopter pilot.

David was keying in his coordinates to listen to Carpathia's meeting with Hickman and the others when he got a call from Rayford regarding a GC vs. underground church skirmish in Greece. "I'll let you know what I find out," he told Rayford. David phoned Walter Moon, but before Walter answered, David was surprised to be paged to Hickman's office.

His office? Hickman shared space with Carpathia's assistant. And didn't Hickman have a meeting with Carpathia soon? David hung up and called Hickman. The assistant, Sandra, answered. "Hassid here. Was I just paged?"

"Yes, sir. The Supreme Commander would like you to meet with him in the conference room, eighteenth floor."

David found a mess. Though the workday was moments from being over and Sandra was packing up to leave, workmen still jammed the area. Drills, saws, hammers, dust, scaffolds, ladders, materials everywhere.

"They're not going to relocate you while they're working?" David said.

"Apparently not," Sandra said, and she marched off.

Hickman opened the door to a conference room that was not long for this world and waved David in. "Hurry and let me get this door closed, Hassid. Less sawdust."

The new Supreme Commander, a Western version of Fortunato with even less class, offered a fleshy hand and shook David's enthusiastically. "Yeah, hey, how ya doin'? He is risen, huh?"

"Huh," David said, and when Hickman shot him a double take, he added, "Indeed."

Hickman appeared nervous and in a hurry. David thought he could pry information from him by playing dumb. "So, just about the end of your day, hmm? How's it been, sharing space with-"

"Never mind that," Hickman said, sitting and letting his generous belly push past his unbuttoned uniform jacket. "Got a meeting coming up with the big guys, and I'd rather not go in there unprepared."

That'll be the day, David thought. "How can I help?" he said.

"We all up-to-date, up to snuff, on track, on target, on course?"

David shook his head, amazed. "All of the above, I guess. What are we talking about?"

Hickman grabbed a dog-eared pad and riffled through a couple of pages. "Guillotines, syringes?"

"You mean loyalty enforcement facilitators and biochip injectors?"

"Yeah, thanks!" Hickman said, scribbling. "I knew Viv had some special names for those. You know, Hassid, basically I was a cop. I'm honored and everything, but I gotta prove to His Majesty, ah, His Excellency, that I can handle this. That I'm not in over my head."

"You feel you are?"

"What I feel is that my loyalty and my devotion to the potentate will make up for any lack of experience I've had at this level of management. Now where are we on these things? What can I tell him?"

"That we're on track, on pace."

"Good. I can count on you then."

"Oh, can you ever, J-, er, Supreme Commander."

"Ah, you can call me Commander when it's just you and me. Keep it formal in public, of course."

"Of course."

"By the way, do you purchase livestock too?"

"You mean foodstuffs? No, that would be Food Services."

"No, this is live. I don't need food. I need a live animal."

"Still not my area, I'm afraid. Rolling stock, avionics, computers, communications hardware. That's my game."

"Who's going to help me procure a pig?"

"A pig, sir?"

"Huge and live, Hassid."

"I have no idea."

Hickman stared at him, apparently not accepting the dodge.

"I could look into it," David said. "But-"

"I knew I could count on you, David. Good man. Let me know first thing in the morning, 'cause the word I get is that the big man is going to assign me that today."

"Oh, you haven't even heard from him about it yet?"

"No, this is what you'd call a heads-up from a colleague who cares."

"Really?"

"Oh, yeah. Guy like me tends to accumulate friends all up and down the corporate ladder. Buddy told me today he was in on a meeting with Fortunato and Carp-oh, forgive me! I know better'n that. I should never use those names, especially in front of a subordinate. I'm gonna direct you to disregard that, Hassid, as your superior officer."

"Jury will disregard, sir."

"Yeah, good. Anyhow, this guy's in a meeting with His Excellency and the Most High Reverend, and he says they're agitated-you know what that means? Exercised, I guess you'd say."

"Understood, Commander."

"They're upset, up in arms, whatever you wanna call it, about the Judah-ites."

"I've heard of them, sir."

"I know you have. Their top guy, who Peacekeeping thought they had flushed out and sent packin', turns up now in a new place-we don't know where, which doesn't have Carp-the potentate, any too cheery, if ya know what I mean-and this Judah guy's turnin' out more and more of this anti-Carpath-well, I guess, yeah, it's OK in that context. This guy's disseminatin' anti-Carpathia stuff everywhere. He's predictin' and says the Holy Bible prophesies that Antichrist-which is what he calls His Excellency, imagine-is gonna defile the temple and sacrifice a pig on the altar."

"You don't say."

"I do say, and while I wasn't there, my buddy tells me the potentate is fiery mad; I mean he's hoppin'."

"I can imagine."

"Me too. He says to the Reverend, he says somethin' along the lines of, 'Oh, yeah, well, maybe I will show them.' You know how he talks, never usin' contractions and like that."

"I do."

"So, and this is the genius of Nicolae Carpathia, if you'll forgive the familiar reference. He's gonna like, get this, fulfill this prophecy-the one in the Bible and the one by Ben Judah-ite, or, um-"

"Tsion Ben-Judah."

"Right! He's gonna sacrifice a pig on the altar of the temple in Jerusalem on purpose, knowing what the guy and the Holy Bible are sayin'. Sorta in yer face, wouldn't you say?"

"That's for sure." In God's face, no less.

"Well, see I don't know this yet, you follow?"

"Sure. It's on the QT from your buddy."

"Exactly. But when he, you-know-who, asks me can I get him a pig, I want to be able to tell him no problem. Can I tell him that? You're going to check with, with, ah, your people or whatever, and I'm gonna get him this pig, right?"

"I'll do my best, sir."

"I knew you would. Hot dog, you're good." "You said that on purpose, didn't you, sir?" "What's that?"

"Talking about a pig, and you said 'hot dog.' " Hickman disintegrated into gales of laughter, then tried to pretend he had indeed said it on purpose. When he regained control, he said, "You know what I want, Hassid?" "Tell me."

"I want a pig, are you ready-?" "I'm ready."

"-big enough for His Excellency to ride." "Sir?"

"You heard me. I want the biggest pig you've ever seen in your life. Big as a pony. Big enough to put a saddle on, not literally, but you know what I mean." "Not sure I do, Commander." "I'm tryin' to earn a few points here, understand, Director? Just like you're doin' without tryin', 'cause you're just that good. But I wanna be able to suggest to His Excellency that if he's gonna take the gloves off and go toe-to-toe with his worst enemies, he oughta go 'em one better."

Take the gloves off to go toe-to-toe? Annie would have loved that mixed metaphor. "One better?" "He ought to ride that pig into the temple!" "Oh, my." David could not imagine Carpathia, even at his basest, lowering himself to such a spectacle. "Oh, my is right, Hassid. You read the Bible?"

"Ever?" "Yeah." "Some."

"Well, isn't there a story about Jesus ridin' into Jerusalem on a donkey and people singin' and throwin' leaves and whatnot?"

"I was raised Jewish."

"So no New Testament for you. Well, anyway, there is that story, I'm pretty sure. Picture His Excellency havin' fun with that. Ridin' a pig with people paid to sing and throw stuff."

Lord, please! "I can't imagine."

"I can come up with 'em, can't I, Hassid?"

"You can, sir."

"Hey, I'd better get in there. Get on that pig for me, will ya? I'm gonna tell him it's as good as got." "I'll let you know."

David was on his way out the door when Hickman called after him. "I forgot to tell you," he said, turning pages on his pad again. "There's a gal in Medical Services, a nurse. Here it is. She used to be a vet or something and she's shot biochips into dogs and cats."

"You don't say," David said.

"You might want to check her out, see if we can take advantage of her expertise. You know, in training people how to do this."

"I'll check her out. What's the name?"

"I don't think I have it right, Hassid. Some kind of a funny name. You'll be able to track her down."

"I'll ask for the nurse with the funny name, sir."