Deceived (30 page)

When she opened her eyes, the lights of the squad car seemed closer.

Lionel followed Sam through the streets of Jerusalem. The uproar of the crowd at the Temple Mount continued as looters smashed windows and knocked over tables outside businesses. Outside bars, drunken men and women celebrated—though Lionel couldn't figure out why—by dancing and singing. Those who had Carpathia's mark soon fell behind, wailing in agony at sores that appeared on their feet.

Lionel saw one man shriek as he tried to wrestle a gun from an equally sick GC Morale Monitor.

“I can't go on like this!” the man screamed.

The Morale Monitor gained control of the weapon, took a step back, and aimed. “Stay where you are or I'll shoot!”

The man howled like a hurt animal and lunged wildly. The Morale Monitor fired, and the man crumpled to the ground. Lionel and Sam rushed over with several others. Someone rolled the man on his back, and blood poured from a wound in his chest. He gasped for air as his head lolled to one side. When he saw the Morale Monitor, he smiled slightly. “Thank you …”

One of the rabbis felt the man's neck and said he was dead. The Morale Monitor, who looked only slightly older than Lionel, seemed near hysterics. “I didn't have a choice! I told him to stop!”

Lionel and Sam left the group huddled around the man's body and kept following the crowd.

Judd thought Chang sounded more excited than he had ever heard him. The young man had pieced together video and audio clips from secret recording devices planted throughout buildings in New Babylon.

“My father and Walter Moon gave me a tranquilizer,” Chang said. “The drug made me forget the whole thing, including a conversation I had with my mother about being a believer.”

“She's a believer?”

“Not yet, but she knows my sister, Ming Toy, and I are followers of Christ.”

“That sounds like trouble. What if she tells your dad?”

“I'm praying both of them will see the truth before it's too late.”

“What did you find out from the recordings?” Judd said.

Chang laughed with delight. “You don't know how relieved I was when I found video from a surveillance camera in one of the hallways. As my father and Walter Moon helped me walk—they pretty much carried me—I made the sign of the cross on my chest!”

“Incredible,” Judd said.

“I don't even know where I got that! And then I pointed toward heaven and tried to say something.”

“So it's clear you were resisting.”

“Yes,” Chang said. “God knew my heart and that they made me take the mark. Now I'm ready to do whatever I can to help the Tribulation Force.”

Judd described the mayhem at the Temple Mount and asked Chang to call back when he had news from Carpathia's meeting at the Knesset.

“Watch for members of Operation Eagle,” Chang said.

“How will I recognize them?”

“You'll know them when you see them.”

Lionel became more concerned the farther he and Sam walked away from the Temple Mount.
Where are we going? How will we reach Judd?

In the street ahead he noticed several parked vehicles. Men and women stood on top, waving and calling. These weren't Morale Monitors or Peacekeepers. They didn't wear uniforms and seemed too energetic.

As they drew closer, Lionel realized that all the people calling from the tops of their vehicles had the mark of the believer! Some yelled, “He is risen!”

Believers in the crowd answered, “Christ is risen indeed!”

Operation Eagle
.

Vicki held on to the backseat as they drove across a deserted parking lot and into a run-down area. The GC squad car continued pursuit but seemed farther behind.

Manny grabbed the cell phone and punched a few numbers. He screamed something in Spanish and hung up.

“What was that about?” Mark said.

Manny ignored him and pointed Mark to a battered brick building in the middle of the block. Mark pulled up to a garage door marked with graffiti, and Manny leaned over and gave the horn two short honks. The door opened and Mark drove inside. As soon as they stopped, the door banged shut behind them.

Seconds later Vicki heard the squad car siren approach.

28

VICKI
held her breath. The only light in the garage came from the reflection of the red taillights, which cast an eerie glow about the room. Manny held up a hand for quiet and Mark turned. Vicki had been through many scrapes with Mark, but she had never seen him this frightened.

The siren grew louder, wailing and warbling, until it screamed outside the building. It surged, then quickly subsided as the car flew past the building.

“Stay where you are,” Manny whispered. “We have to make sure they're not coming back.”

The phone rang and Mark handed it to Manny. “It's for you.”

Manny answered and listened. After a few moments he said something in Spanish, hung up, and turned to Mark and Vicki. “The squad car is gone, but I'm afraid we have another problem.”

“Who were you talking to?” Vicki said.

“Hector. There's an observation room in the top floor—”

Before Manny could finish, a door opened and a shaft of light pierced the darkness. Vicki noticed a rickety staircase in front of them. A man stepped onto the landing above and pointed a gun. “Get out slowly,” he said.

Lionel rushed to the waiting cars behind a wave of Orthodox Jews, who had neither the mark of Carpathia nor the mark of God. Operation Eagle members waved people farther back, filling up vans, cars, and trucks. One man had brought several ancient school buses, and people filled them in minutes.

“Lionel!” someone yelled from atop a Humvee ahead. At first, Lionel thought it might be Judd, but as he moved closer he saw Westin Jakes.

Westin jumped down and Lionel introduced Sam. Lionel explained that Westin was a pilot for the famous singer Z-Van and that he had flown Judd and Lionel to Israel.

Westin smiled. “Lionel is the one who explained the truth to me after old Nicolae sat up in his glass coffin.”

“What are you doing here?” Lionel said.

“Couldn't miss out on the excitement. I was at the airport, waiting for instructions from the boss, when I saw a lot of small plane activity. There were charters going out and some choppers, so I walked up to one of the guys doing his preflight and noticed he had the mark of the believer. He said he was with Operation Eagle. After he described it, I didn't have to think long. I knew I had to be part of it.”

“What about Z-Van?” Lionel said.

Westin rolled his eyes. “I told you there would come a time when I'd have to stop working for him. I left a message at his hotel, but I haven't heard anything. I think he's brooding over the fact that he hasn't been able to perform his new material.”

Lionel ran a hand along the Humvee. “Where'd you get this?”

“Airport rental.” Westin winked. “I'm supposed to have it back the day after tomorrow, but I'm not sure where I'll be the day after tomorrow.”

Lionel and Sam got in, and Westin fired up the big vehicle. “You guys can help. I'm supposed to find people who can't get around very well and take them to the Mount of Olives. Then it's off to Masada.”

Sam spotted someone in a wheelchair and Westin stopped. For the next few minutes they picked up as many feeble or ailing people as they could cram into the Humvee.

“Are you flying today?” Lionel asked.

Westin shook his head. “I'm only doing ground transportation for now. This is one big escape plan. The goal is to get as many people out as we can before Carpathia attacks.”

“Which way to Masada?” Lionel said.

“It's south toward En Gedi,” Sam said, “just a couple of miles off the western shore of the Dead Sea.”

“Where's Judd?” Westin said.

“Good question,” Lionel said.

Judd watched the evacuation with a mixture of delight and horror. From the frenzy Carpathia had put the people in, Judd hadn't expected anyone to leave. After all, the crowd had Nicolae trapped. But something Dr. Rosenzweig said—or maybe it was the way he had said it—convinced people there was real danger.