The Indwelling: The Beast Takes Possession (6 page)

Buck turned his back to the windows and switched on the flashlight again. The mess the enemy had left of Stefan made Buck’s old nature surge to the fore. It was all he could do to keep from screaming obscenities at the GC and hoping any one of them was within earshot.

Revolting as it was, Buck had to look one more time to believe what he saw.

Stefan lay there, his face a mask of tranquility, eyes and mouth closed as if he were asleep.

His arms and legs were in place, hands at his sides, but all four limbs had been severed, the legs at the hips, the arms at the shoulders. Clearly this had been done after he was dead, for there was no sign of struggle.

Buck dropped the light, and it rolled to a stop, luckily pointing away from the windows. His knees banged painfully on the floor, and when he threw his palms before him to break his fall, they splashed in thick, sticky blood. He knelt there on hands and knees, gasping, his belly tightening and releasing with his sobs and gasps.

What kind of a weapon would it have taken and how long must the enemy have worked to saw through the tissue of a dead man until he was dismembered? And why? What was the message in that?

How would he ever tell Chaim? Or would his dear old friend be his next discovery?

At four o’clock in the afternoon Friday in Illinois, Tsion sat near the TV, trying to sort his emotions. He was still able to enjoy, if that was an appropriate word anymore, the ceaseless curiosity and antics of a one-year-old boy.

Kenny cooed and talked and made noises as he explored, climbing, grabbing, touching, looking to his mother and to “Unca Zone” to see if he would get a smile or a no, depending on what he was doing.

But Kenny was Chloe’s responsibility, and Tsion didn’t want to miss a second of the constant coverage of the assassination. He expected news of Carpathia’s resurrection and allowed himself only brief absences from the screen. He had moved his laptop to the living room, and his phone was close by. But his main interest was in Israel and New Babylon. It would not have surprised him if Carpathia was loaded onto his plane dead in Jerusalem and worshiped as he walked off under his own power in New Babylon.

Tsion was most upset at hearing nothing from other members of the Trib Force, and he and Chloe traded off trying to raise them, each of them, by phone. The last word they had heard from overseas was that Leah had not seen Hattie in Brussels, that she had told Buck Hattie was gone, and that she had not been able to communicate with Rayford. Since then, nothing.

Worried about the ramifications, Tsion and Chloe left most of the lights off, and they double-checked the phony chest freezer that actually served as an entrance to the underground shelter. Tsion normally left strategy and intrigue to the others and concentrated on his expertise, but he had an opinion on the security of the safe house.

Maybe he was naive, he told Chloe, but he believed that if Hattie were to give them away, it would be by accident. “She’ll more likely be followed to us than send someone for us.”

“Like she did with Ernie and Bo.”

Tsion nodded.

“And who knows whom they might have told before they died?”

He shrugged. “If she was to give us up just by telling someone, she would have done it before she was imprisoned.”

“If she was imprisoned,” Chloe said. And suddenly she was fighting tears.

“What is it, Chloe?” Tsion asked. “Worried about Cameron, of course?”

She nodded, then shook her head. “Not only that,” she said. “Tsion, can I talk with you?”

“Need you ask?”

“But, I mean, I know you don’t want to miss anything on TV.”

“I won’t. Talk to me.”

Tsion was alarmed at how much it took for Chloe to articulate her thoughts. They had always been able to talk, but she had never been extremely self-revelatory.

“You know I will keep your confidences,” he said.

“Consider it clergy-parishioner privilege.”

Even that did not elicit a smile. But she managed to shock him. “Maybe I’ve been watching too much TV,” she said.

“Such as?”

“Those staged rallies, where everyone worships Carpathia.”

“I know. They’re disgusting. They refer to him as ‘Your Worship’ and the like.”

“It’s worse than that, Tsion,” she said. “Have you seen the clips where the children are brought to him? I mean, we all know there’s not a child among them older than three and a half, but they’re paraded before him in their little GC

outfits, saluting over their hearts with every step, singing praise songs to him. It’s awful!”

Tsion agreed. Day care workers and parents dressed the kids alike, and cute little boys and girls brought flowers and were taught to bow and wave and salute and sing to Carpathia. “Did you see the worst of it?” he asked.

Chloe nodded miserably. “The prayer, you mean?”

“That’s what I mean. I was afraid of lightning.”

Tsion shuddered, remembering the knockoff of the Lord’s Prayer taught to groups of children barely old enough to speak. It had begun, “Our Father in New Babylon, Carpathia be your name. Your kingdom come, your will be done. ...”

Tsion had been so disgusted that he turned it off. Chloe, apparently, had watched the whole debacle.

“I’ve been studying,” she said.

“Good,” Tsion said. “I hope so. We can never know enough—”

“Not the way you think,” she said. “I’ve been studying death.”

Tsion narrowed his eyes. “I’m listening.”

“I will not allow myself or my baby to fall into the hands of the enemy.”

“What are you saying?”

“I’m saying just what you’re afraid I’m saying, Tsion.”

“Have you told Cameron?”

“You promised you would keep my confidence!”

“And I will. I’m asking, have you told him your plans?”

“I have no plans. I’m just studying.”

“But you will soon have a plan, because it is clear you have made up your mind.

You said, ‘I will not…,’ and that evidences a course of action. You’re saying that if we should be found out, if the GC should capture us—”

“I will not allow Kenny or me to fall into their hands.”

“And how will you ensure this?”

“I would rather we were dead.”

“You would kill yourself.”

“I would. And I would commit infanticide.”

She said this with such chilling conviction that Tsion hesitated, praying silently for wisdom. “Is this a sign of faith, or lack of faith?” he said finally.

“I don’t know, but I can’t imagine God would want me or my baby in that situation.”

“You think he wants you in this situation? He is not willing that any should perish. He would that you would have been ready to go the first time. He—”

“I know, Tsion. I know, all right? I’m just saying—”

“Forgive me for interrupting, but I know what you’re saying. I just don’t believe you are being honest with yourself.”

“I couldn’t be more honest! I would kill myself and commit inf—”

“There you go again.”

“What?”

“Buffering your conviction with easy words. You’re no better than the abortionists who refer to their unborn babies as embryos or fetuses or pregnancies so they can ‘eliminate’ them or ‘terminate’ them rather than kill them.”

“What? I said I would com—”

“Yes, that’s what you said. You didn’t say what you mean. Tell me.”

“I told you, Tsion! Why are you doing this?”

“Tell me, Chloe. Tell me what you are going to do to—” He hesitated, not wanting to alert Kenny they were talking about him. “Tell me what you’re going to do to this little one, because obviously, you have to do it to him first if it’s going to get done. Because if you kill yourself, none of the rest of us will do this job for you.”

“I told you what I would do to him.”

“Say it in plain words.”

“That I will kill him before I let the GC have him? I will.”

“Will what?”

“Kill him.”

“Put it in a sentence.”

“I will. I will… kill… my own baby.”

“Baby!” Kenny exulted, running to her. She reached for him, sobbing.

Quietly, Tsion said, “How will you do this?”

“That’s what I’m studying,” she managed over Kenny’s shoulders. He hugged her tight and scampered away.

“And then you will kill yourself, why?”

“Because I cannot live without him.”

“Then it follows that Cameron would be justified in killing himself.”

She bit her lip and shook her head. “The world needs him.”

“The world needs you, Chloe. Think of the co-op, the international—”

“I can’t think anymore,” she said. “I want done with this! I want it over! I don’t know what we were thinking, bringing a child into this world. ...”

“That child has brought so much joy to this house—”

Tsion began.

“—that I could not do him the disservice of letting him fall into GC hands.”

Tsion sat back, glancing at the TV. “So the GC comes, you kill the baby, kill yourself, Cameron and your father kill themselves … when does it end?”

“They wouldn’t. They couldn’t.”

“You can’t. And you won’t.”

“I thought I could talk to you, Tsion.”

“You expected what, that I would condone this?”

“That you would be sympathetic, at least.”

“I am that, at the very least,” he said. “Neither do I want to live without you and the little one. You know what comes next.”

“Oh, Tsion, you would not deprive your global church of yourself.”

He sat back and put his hands on his knees. “Yet you would deprive me of yourself. You must not care for me as much as I care for you, or as much as I thought you did.”

Chloe sighed and looked to the ceiling. “You’re not helping,” she said in mock exasperation.

“I’m trying,” he said.

“I know. And I appreciate it.”

Tsion asked her to pray with him for their loved ones.

She knelt on the floor next to the couch, holding his hand, and soon after they began, Tsion peeked at a sound and saw Kenny kneeling next to his mother, hands folded, fingers entwined, eyes closed.

David found Guy Blod more outrageous and flamboyant in person. He showed up with a small entourage of similarly huffy and put-out men in their late thirties.

Despite their differences in nationality, they could have been quints from the way they dressed and acted. David offered only Guy a chair across from his desk.

“This is what you call hospitality?” Guy said. “There are six of us, hello.”

“My apologies,” David said. “I was under the impression it was the responsibility of the guest to inform the host when uninvited people were coming.”

Guy waved him off, and his sycophants glumly stood behind him with arms crossed.

“The Supreme Commander has commissioned me to do a sort of bronzy iron thingie of Nicolae. And I have to do it fast, so can you get me the materials?”

They were interrupted by an urgent knock on the door. A woman in her late sixties, blue-haired, short, and stocky, poked her head in. “Miss Ivins,” David said.

“May I help you?”

“Excuse me,” Guy said, “but we’re in conference here.”

David stood. “It’s all right, Miss Ivins. You know Guy.”

“Of course,” she said, nodding sadly.

“And Guy, you know Vivian is—”

“Yes, the potentate’s only living relative. I’m sorry for your loss, ma’am, but we—”

“How may I help you, ma’am?” David said.

“I’m looking for crowd control volunteers,” she said.

“The masses are already showing up from all over the world, and—”

“It’s after midnight!” Guy said. “Don’t they know the funeral isn’t for at least two days? What are we supposed to do with them all?”

“Commander Fortunate is asking for any personnel below director level to—”

“That leaves me out, Vivian!” Guy said. “And Hayseed here too, unfortunately.”

“How about your assistants, Guy?” David suggested.

“I need every last one of them for this project! Viv, surely you don’t expect—”

“I’m aware of your assignment, Guy,” Viv Ivins said, but she pronounced his name in the Western style, and he quickly corrected her. She ignored him. “I’m on assignment too. If either of you gentlemen could spread the word among your people, the administration would be grateful.”

David returned to his seat and tapped out the notice to he broadcast to his workers’ E-mail addresses as Miss Ivins backed out and shut the door.

“Aren’t we efficient?” Guy said.

“We try,” David said.

“I know what her assignment is,” Guy said. “Have you heard?”

“I have enough trouble keeping up with my own.”

David had acted uninterested enough that Guy turned to his own people and whispered, “That regional numbering thing.” David was dying of curiosity but unwilling to admit it. Guy spun in his chair to face David.

“Now, where were we?”

“I was about to check my catalog file for bronze and iron thingie suppliers, and you were going to be a bit more specific.”

“OK, I’m gonna need a computer program that allows me to figure out how to do this. I’m going to be supplied by the coroner with a life-size cast of Carpathia’s bodyhow ghastly-and I need to quadruple that in size. That means four times.”

“Yeah, I recall arithmetic, Guy.”

“I’m just trying to help. Truce?”

“Truce?”

“Start over, no hassles?”

“Whatever, Guy.”

“Be nice.”

“I’m trying.”

“Anyhoo, I wanna make this like twenty-four-foot replica of Carpathia out of pretty much bronze, I think, but 1 want it to come out in a sort of ebony finish with a texture of iron. Ebony is black.”

“I remember crayons too, Guy.”

“Sor-ry, David! You don’t want any help!”

“I’m going to need it if I’m to find you this material quickly. What do you think you need and how fast do you need it?”

Guy leaned forward. “Now we’re getting somewhere. I want the thing to be hollow with about a quarter-inch to three-eighths-inch shell, but it has to be strong enough and balanced enough to stand straight without support, just like Nicolae would if he were that tall.”

David shrugged. “So you make him to scale and cheat on the shoes if you have to, since an inanimate object won’t make the unconscious balancing maneuvers to stay standing.”