The Left Behind Collection: All 12 Books (375 page)

Unable to sleep, Chang made his way to the tech center and his computer at about four in the morning. Idly checking the GCNN affiliate feed out of Haifa, he heard a report of troop deployments.

“Supreme Potentate Nicolae Carpathia has made no secret of his strategy,” the reporter intoned. “In fact, it seems as if he would just as soon enemy targets know what’s coming. I spoke with him late last night at his bunker, somewhere near the Sea of Galilee.”

“You see,” Carpathia said, “we have such an overwhelming advantage in manpower, firepower, and technology, it really makes little difference what we encounter. I have not hidden that we have two main objectives aiming toward the same goal. We want to lay siege to the city of Jerusalem, where the majority of the remaining Jews reside. And we want to eliminate Petra once and for all, where what they like to call ‘the Remnant’ remains in hiding like scared children.

“They know we are coming, and they will see us coming, and there is little they can do about it.”

“You expect no casualties?”

“Oh, there are always casualties,” Carpathia sniffed. “But my people are honored to give their lives in service to me and the Global Community. I will see that they are appropriately rewarded. Of course, there is the possibility of no loss of life or limb on our part. That is, if the enemy sees what is coming and realizes it has no hope. An unconditional surrender would be the prudent course, and naturally I would accept that with utmost face-saving respect for them.”

“Seriously? What accommodations would you make in that case?”

Carpathia could not answer over his gales of laughter.

Rayford was up, dressed, and armed before dawn. He opened the door before Priscilla knocked.

“I’ll stay here with him until he wakes up, Rayford, if that’s okay.”

“Perfect. Thanks, Priss. Make yourself at home.”

“Uh, Ray? You’re going to be sure my husband comes home tonight, aren’t you?”

“As much as it’s up to me.”

“That’s not very reassuring.”

“Well, I take it that was a serious question. A serious answer is that there are no guarantees. I’m hoping he’ll make sure I come back.”

“He feels obligated to everybody,” Priscilla said, sitting.

Rayford stood by the open door. “Price of leadership. He volunteered for this command.”

“Like there was another choice.”

“There wasn’t in my mind, Priscilla.”

“Well, I’m just saying—”

“I know. Sometimes, though, seems a guy like me trying to keep an eye on a guy who knows what he’s doing can just get in the way. You know, of course, that even if—”

“Don’t say it, Rayford. Too many of the wives try to comfort themselves with that stuff about how their man will only be in heaven a day or two, maybe less, then he’s coming back. That doesn’t help.”

“It’s true.”

“I know. But it isn’t the living without him that worries me right now. It’s his getting hurt, suffering, dying a hard way.”

Buck and Tsion and their hosts drank the thickest, bitterest coffee Buck had ever had. It was still pitch-black outside. Shivte’s wife was already sniffling and trying to hide it.

“Cameron,” Tsion whispered, “I would like you to go with the old man, Shivte, at first.”

“Now, wait. I came here to be your bodyguard, no one else’s.”

“Do me this favor. I worry about him. Even his weapon is ancient. The sons believe the invaders will come from the northwest and try to come through the Damascus Gate.”

“Based on what?”

“The Unity Army could probably easily overrun any of the gates, but the Jaffa Gate and the Citadel are well fortified with many rebel troops.”

“But beyond that,” Buck said, “they could try to storm any of the gates, and the most likely, in my opinion, would be the Golden Gate. Their first priority has to be the Temple Mount, no?”

“I don’t know, Cameron. Just do this for me, please. Take the old man to the Citadel. Once he is settled there, then come and find me. I will be with the other two near the Damascus Gate.”

Buck would rather have followed his hunch and gone straight to the Golden Gate, but he was here for Tsion, and he would do him this favor. He didn’t know why the brothers were even guessing. If two-thirds of Carpathia’s troops were concentrating on Jerusalem, it wouldn’t take many of them to take over the tiny Old City.

As soon as he and Tsion and the other three men were out the door, they heard gunfire. Tsion and the brothers jogged northwest, Buck and Shivte, west. Rebels ran everywhere, shouting what they knew. The enemy was on the Jaffa Road. Damascus Gate was under siege. The Yad Vashem Historical Museum to the Holocaust victims had been destroyed. Hebrew University, the Jewish National and University Library, and Israel Museum were in flames. The Old City would be next.

Thousands were dead and many more captured and held. Buck knew, if the rumors could be believed, that he and Shivte were in the worst possible place. In essence, they had cornered themselves inside the walls of the Old City.

Rayford was impressed with Sebastian’s strategy, though they both knew tactics were out the window in the face of such odds. The third of Carpathia’s troops assigned to Petra carried every type of weapon in the potentate’s arsenal. At least two hundred thousand mounted troops slowly moved into position, far outflanking Sebastian’s forces and virtually surrounding them and the city.

“I have so few DEWs,” George told Rayford. “In retrospect, if I had known they were going to start with this horse trick, I’d have had Lionel find me more.”

“What do horses have to do with it?”

“Horses are not armored, and the riders can’t really hide. See how lazily they’re moving into position?”

Rayford took the field glasses and saw thousands of horsemen cantering into place. They were a mile from Petra’s massed troops. “They act like they’ve got all day.”

Suddenly, George seemed animated. “We’re going to get in the first blow in this thing, and we’re going to have the advantage, at least temporarily.”

“How?”

“Those horses are trained to not spook under artillery fire. We could pop a few fifty-caliber rounds at ’em and get them stirred up a bit. Maybe take out a few horses and a few riders. But I’ll bet they haven’t dealt with DEWs yet. You ready for some action?”

“Sure.”

“I’ve got only about a hundred DEWs, but at least I was smart enough to assign them all positions inside on the rim. I need them pretty evenly spaced, all around the top of the city. Can you handle that?”

“On it. Then what?”

“Tell them all to wait for my command. If we can hit anywhere close to a hundred horses or riders with DEWs from this distance, we could cause a stampede that would put all their horses out of commission for a while.”

“Brilliant.”

“Only if it works. Thing is, we’ve got to do this before they really know where we are. We could have them on the run right off the bat and see how they like being on their heels.”

Buck got Shivte settled well inside the crowded Citadel, where it appeared many scared younger men had decided to hole up as well. While Buck could hear activity on the Jaffa Road, the invaders had indeed ignored the Jaffa Gate for the very reason Buck guessed. Why do more work than you had to?

Buck guessed the Damascus Gate was a little over a quarter of a mile away, but getting there through the crowd of petrified and wild-eyed rebels made it seem farther. And of course, Tsion and the brothers were nowhere in sight. “Lord, come quickly.”

Rayford scampered to a four-wheel-drive ATV and charged to the nearest high place. It took nearly half an hour with the vehicle and his walkie-talkie to get the hundred or so DEW operators spread out evenly and coordinated.

At George’s command, they would fire invisible beams of directed energy at the enemy. In essence, they heated soft tissue past the tolerance point in less than a second, and if the rider or horse didn’t elude the ray, their flesh would burn.

With Petra surrounded by a couple of brigades of mounted troops, the result had the potential to be maddeningly confusing to the enemy. The strategy was to try to hit horses only, making them bolt away and causing the steeds around them to do the same. No question some riders, especially their legs, would be hit in the process, hopefully causing them to kick and achieve the same result. If the beam hit higher on a rider’s body, he would likely scream and yank the reins. George, Rayford thought, was a genius.