Assassins: Assignment: Jerusalem, Target: Antichrist by Tim Lahaye, Jerry B. Jenkins Page B
Authors: Tim Lahaye, Jerry B. Jenkins
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fortunate so far. We only hope for some warning so we can hide out below before we’re found out. We always tell each other where we go. Buck didn’t the other day when he rushed Floyd to see you, but that was an emergency. It upset everybody.”
Rayford spent the next forty minutes maneuvering around debris and seeking the smoothest man-made route. He wondered when Carpathia’s vaunted reconstruction efforts would reach past the major cities and into the suburbs.
Leah was full of questions about each member of the Trib Force, how they had met, become believers, got together. “That’s way too much loss in too short a time,” she said after he had brought her to the present. “With all that stress, it’s a wonder you’re all fully functioning.”
“We try not to think about it. We know it’s going to get worse. It sounds like a cliché, but you have to look ahead rather than back. If you let it accumulate, you’ll never make it.”
Leah ran a hand through her hair. “Sometimes I don’t know why I want to survive until the Glorious Appearing. Then my survival instinct kicks in.”
“Speaking of which . . . ,” Rayford said.
“What?”
“More traffic than I’m used to is all.”
She shrugged. “This area wasn’t as hard hit as yours. No one’s hiding here. Everybody knows everybody else.”
They agreed Rayford should park a couple of blocks away and that they should move through the shadows to Leah’s town house. He pulled a large canvas bag and a flashlight from the back of the Rover.
At the edge of her property, Leah stopped. “They didn’t even shut the door,” she said. “The place has to be ransacked.”
“If the GC didn’t trash it, looters did,” Rayford said. “Once they knew you were on the run, your place was fair game. Want to check it out?”
She shook her head. “We’d better be in and out of that garage fast too. My neighbors can hear the door going up.”
“Is there a side entrance?”
She nodded.
“Got the key?”
“No.”
“I can break in. No one will hear unless they’re in there waiting for you.”
When Mac met Abdullah in the hangar to bring him up to speed on the Condor 216, Annie was already there, supervising cargo handlers. “More, Corporal?” Mac said.
“Yes, Captain. The purchasing director would like us to transport this tonnage of surplus foodstuffs to Kuwait. He got a spectacular deal on fuel, so while you’re taking on fuel, you can off-load this.”
Abdullah was silent inside the plane until they reached the cockpit and Mac showed him the reverse intercom bug. “Imagine the methods of our dismemberment if they found out,” he said.
At ten to eight in the morning, Mac and Abdullah finished their preflight checks and contacted the palace tower. Three figures in white aprons ran toward the plane. “Kitchen staff,” Mac said. “Let ‘em in.”
Abdullah opened the door and lowered the stairs. The cook, a sweating middle-aged man with stubby fingers, carried a steaming pan covered with foil. “Out of the way, out of the way,” he said in a Scandinavian accent. “Nobody told me the commander wanted breakfast aboard.”
Abdullah stepped back as the cook and his two aides hurried past. “Then how did you know?” he said.
The cook hurried into the galley and barked orders. Distracted by Abdullah’s hovering, he turned. “Was that rhetorical, sarcastic, or a genuine question?”
“I am not familiar with the first two,” Abdullah said.
The cook leaned on the counter as if he couldn’t believe he was about to waste his time answering the first officer. “I meant,” he said slowly, as if indulging a child, “that no one told me before now, and then the supreme commander himself told me. If he’s looking forward to eggs Benedict once airborne, it’s eggs Benedict he’ll get. Now, was there anything else?”
“Yes, sir.”
The cook looked stunned. “There is?”
“Would you like to impress the supreme
Rayford spent the next forty minutes maneuvering around debris and seeking the smoothest man-made route. He wondered when Carpathia’s vaunted reconstruction efforts would reach past the major cities and into the suburbs.
Leah was full of questions about each member of the Trib Force, how they had met, become believers, got together. “That’s way too much loss in too short a time,” she said after he had brought her to the present. “With all that stress, it’s a wonder you’re all fully functioning.”
“We try not to think about it. We know it’s going to get worse. It sounds like a cliché, but you have to look ahead rather than back. If you let it accumulate, you’ll never make it.”
Leah ran a hand through her hair. “Sometimes I don’t know why I want to survive until the Glorious Appearing. Then my survival instinct kicks in.”
“Speaking of which . . . ,” Rayford said.
“What?”
“More traffic than I’m used to is all.”
She shrugged. “This area wasn’t as hard hit as yours. No one’s hiding here. Everybody knows everybody else.”
They agreed Rayford should park a couple of blocks away and that they should move through the shadows to Leah’s town house. He pulled a large canvas bag and a flashlight from the back of the Rover.
At the edge of her property, Leah stopped. “They didn’t even shut the door,” she said. “The place has to be ransacked.”
“If the GC didn’t trash it, looters did,” Rayford said. “Once they knew you were on the run, your place was fair game. Want to check it out?”
She shook her head. “We’d better be in and out of that garage fast too. My neighbors can hear the door going up.”
“Is there a side entrance?”
She nodded.
“Got the key?”
“No.”
“I can break in. No one will hear unless they’re in there waiting for you.”
When Mac met Abdullah in the hangar to bring him up to speed on the Condor 216, Annie was already there, supervising cargo handlers. “More, Corporal?” Mac said.
“Yes, Captain. The purchasing director would like us to transport this tonnage of surplus foodstuffs to Kuwait. He got a spectacular deal on fuel, so while you’re taking on fuel, you can off-load this.”
Abdullah was silent inside the plane until they reached the cockpit and Mac showed him the reverse intercom bug. “Imagine the methods of our dismemberment if they found out,” he said.
At ten to eight in the morning, Mac and Abdullah finished their preflight checks and contacted the palace tower. Three figures in white aprons ran toward the plane. “Kitchen staff,” Mac said. “Let ‘em in.”
Abdullah opened the door and lowered the stairs. The cook, a sweating middle-aged man with stubby fingers, carried a steaming pan covered with foil. “Out of the way, out of the way,” he said in a Scandinavian accent. “Nobody told me the commander wanted breakfast aboard.”
Abdullah stepped back as the cook and his two aides hurried past. “Then how did you know?” he said.
The cook hurried into the galley and barked orders. Distracted by Abdullah’s hovering, he turned. “Was that rhetorical, sarcastic, or a genuine question?”
“I am not familiar with the first two,” Abdullah said.
The cook leaned on the counter as if he couldn’t believe he was about to waste his time answering the first officer. “I meant,” he said slowly, as if indulging a child, “that no one told me before now, and then the supreme commander himself told me. If he’s looking forward to eggs Benedict once airborne, it’s eggs Benedict he’ll get. Now, was there anything else?”
“Yes, sir.”
The cook looked stunned. “There is?”
“Would you like to impress the supreme
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