Apocalypse Dawn (38 page)

The weight of the Bible rested comfortably in Delroy’s big hands. How long had it been since he had held a copy of God’s Word and felt the familiar mixture of euphoria and fear? Delroy still had his father’s Bible and the Bible he had given Terrence the day he had taken his oath and become a soldier. Over the years, the Navy chaplain had read from them both, seeking solace and remembrance and understanding of all the terrible things that had happened.

Turning, Delroy faced the young ensign. “How strong is your faith, son?”

“My faith?” The ensign appeared uncomfortable. “In the captain? I have to admit, I’ve never seen anything-“

“In God,” Delroy interrupted. “How strong is your faith in God, Ensign?”

“It’s good.” The ensign glanced longingly at the door over his shoulder.

“Does the question make you uncomfortable?”

The ensign nodded. “Yes, sir.”

“Why is that?”

“I don’t like talking about stuff like that, Chaplain.”

“But you took an oath, Ensign,” Delroy said. “‘I do solemnly swear that I will support and defend the Constitution of the United States against all enemies, foreign and domestic; that I will bear true faith and allegiance to the same; and that I will obey the orders of the President of the United States and the orders of the officers appointed over me, according to regulations and the Uniform Code of Military Justice. So help me God.’ U.S. Code, Section 502.” He breathed in, remembering his own swearing-in ceremony, remembering Terry’s. “Why do you think the phrase, ‘So help me God,’ is in there?”

“I wouldn’t know, sir. I guess it always has been.”

Delroy nodded to himself. “You can go, ensign.” He glanced down at Chief Mellencamp’s Bible in his two big hands.

“Chaplain Delroy.”

“Yes, Ensign.”

The man hesitated and looked uncertain. “Did I do something wrong, Chaplain? I didn’t mean to offend.”

Delroy looked up, feeling bad and embarrassed. With everything else going on, the loss of lives along the TurkishSyrian border and the unexplained disappearances of so many military personnel, it was incredible to see that a crewman could still be concerned with leaving just the right impression on an officer.

“No, Ensign, you didn’t do anything wrong,” Delroy replied. “This is just a trying time. I only asked because I struggle with my own faith now and again, and it’s good to hear others talk about theirs.” He held up Mellencamp’s Bible. “That was one of the reasons the chief and I enjoyed each other’s company so much.”

“Yes, sir.”

“Would you check on the other lists?” Sweeper teams still moved within Wasp. Most of the missing had already been confirmed, but Captain Falkirk had wanted a thorough ship’s search before those names were officially designated MIA.

“Of course, Chaplain.” The ensign excused himself and left.

Delroy returned to his chair behind the desk. He sat with Chief Mellencamp’s Bible in his lap for a time, thinking back on their friendship and all the confusing questions that raced through his thoughts. Then he noticed the paper sticking out of the Bible.

Opening the book, Delroy found several sheets of legal pad paper folded up in Revelation. The chiefs Bible had been well used. Mellencamp’s neat, precise handwriting covered the generous margins, and the pages were marked with a rainbow of highlighter colors. The chief had his own code for the information he highlighted, but he used it only for proof of his own steel-trap memory.

As chief petty officer, Mellencamp had carried long lists of men, supplies, and necessary tasks in his head. Delroy had protested, in fun between two good friends, that the chief was extraordinarily equipped and his own arguments should be given the benefit of a handicap. But Mellencamp had loved God’s Word-the Old Testament and the New-and could quote passages from several books, as well as psalms.

The fact that the chief had been preparing information based on Revelation was no surprise. Lately, every conversation Delroy had entered into with Mellencamp had turned in that direction. The chief had been convinced that these were the end times, that the Rapturewhen God would come and call his church home from the earthwas very near.

Delroy’s eyes were drawn to the words his friend had scrawled upon the paper.

We will be called home to heaven. No warning bell. No chance to say good-byes. One moment in this world, the next, standing in God’s perfection.

And what of the people left behind?

Hypnotized by the question Mellencamp had written across the page, Delroy followed the chiefs thinking and found himself flipping through the pages of Revelation. In minutes, he was digging out books from the neat, compact shelves behind him. Fear and horror and hope all began to dawn in his heart.

The end of the world: It was real and it had come. Navy Chaplain Delroy Harte became more convinced of that with each passing minute, and his thoughts became consumed with the carnage, the lies, and the treachery that were in store for those left behind.

United States 75th Rangers 3rd Battalion

Field Command Post

“How bad is it, Goose?” Captain Cal Remington paced the interior of the command post, scanning the computer monitors that revealed the graveyard of helicopters where the LZ had once been. He spoke over the private frequency chipped into his first sergeant’s headset, keeping his voice pitched low enough that no one around him could overhear.

“It’s bad, sir,” Goose said. “About as bad as it could be.” The first sergeant listed the details in a verbal code Remington and he had worked out years ago when Remington had taken command of the company.

Anyone listening would have been lost in the gobbledygook of baseball players, stats, records, and play references. After spending so many years together and being used to each other’s ways, the Ranger captain translated the code in his head immediately without writing anything down.

After the mysterious disappearances and the casualties along the border during the first wave of the Syrian attack, the Ranger companies were down to roughly a third of their original strength. The U.N. peacekeeping forces were in similar shape. The Marine wing detached from USS Wasp was all but decimated from vanishings and the aerial crashes that had littered the dead across the harsh mountainous ground.

The Syrians, though, remained at almost the same strength they’d had prior to the missile launch. Repeated viewings of the footage Nicolae Carpathia’s satellites had captured revealed only a few vanishings from among their ranks. Still, the events of the day had evidently been enough to check the Syrian advance. Enemy troopsRemington felt he could safely consider the Syrians that-continued to reorganize after the disappearances. It wouldn’t be long, the Ranger captain knew, before they discovered the extent of the attrition his troops had suffered. And when they did…

“Goose,” Remington said, only then realizing that silence had stretched between his first sergeant and himself.

“I’m here, sir.” Goose’s voice sounded flat.

Remington knew the loss of men was getting to Goose. The first sergeant had never taken the deaths of men under his command well. During battle, during the fine-tuning of a tactical op, Goose never let the regret and self-recriminations touch him, but during the fallow times between, Goose struggled with those losses. Marriage and fatherhood had been good for him, binding the wounds and keeping his heart strong. But at the same time, the family that kept Goose together had also created a new weight for the first sergeant to carry into the field.

“We’re not going to be able to hold that position.”

“I know that, sir. I apologize, sir.”

“Knock off the sir, Goose. We’ve been friends a lot longer than I’ve had these bars.’

Goose hesitated. That we have,” he acknowledged. But Remington could still hear the unstated sir in his voice.

“You’ve got nothing to apologize for,” Remington said.

“I could have stopped that transmission,” Goose said.

. Negative, soldier.” Remington made his voice forceful. He strode with his hands clasped behind his back, taking care to step over the bundles of thick black cables that snaked across the floor to the Crays. “The responsibility of that issue does not reside with you or within your purview.” The Ranger captain made his voice crisp and clean, ringing with authority. “If the ball was dropped anywhere, it was on my end. I should have asked our alphabet agency more questions regarding the op before I sent your team in.”

“They would have lied to you.”

Remington knew Goose was offering him a way out, not wanting the captain to take the blame either. A small smile framed Remington’s lips. He had made a mistake by taking Section Chief Alexander Cody’s story on faith. However, Remington didn’t have much respect for the CIA.

“If they lied to me,” Remington said, “that again would have made it my fault. As captain, I have to be a human lie detector. That power was invested in me by the Officer Candidate School, by the grace of God, and by the board that charged me with my command. No one can lie to me.” The sheer brass of the statement was a joke he shared with Goose, but both of them knew that a commanding officer had to have that kind of view of himself to get the job done. “The agency representative withheld the truth from us, Sergeant, and there’s nothing we could have done about that.”

“No, sir.”

“In addition to that, even if you had stopped that call, you don’t know that a backup plan wasn’t in place regarding a missed checkin.”

“I know.”

“Then let’s worry about the things you do know and the operations that you have some control over.” Remington gazed at the monitors.

The display of the images on the screens still astounded him. Whatever satellites Nicolae Carpathia was using brought in imaging-even voices, when cameras were close enough for the microphone pickups to activate-on par with or better than the mil-spec satellites they’d been using for the border op.

The screens constantly shifted perspectives, from ground cameras carried by reporters working the scene to cameras mounted on soldiers’ weapons. Goose had one mounted on his helmet at present, providing Remington with a first-person view of everything the first sergeant saw.

At the moment, Goose walked the perimeter of the border the Rangers had been assigned. The first sergeant carried his M-4A1 at port arms just the way the drill instructors back in boot taught. Overturned and burnt vehicles stood out against the broken and cratered earth turned black from missile blasts and fuel-fed fires that had scoured the ground. Teams of Rangers, Marines, U.N. peacekeeping personnel, and Turkish army regulars moved through the debris searching for any that might still be left alive.

“Since we know we can’t hold that position,” Remington went on, we need to evacuate.”

“I know.” The camera shifted as Goose climbed aboard an overturned truck. The view shifted as the camera adjusted to the shade inside the truck’s cargo area. Goose’s hands holding the assault rifle disappeared for a moment, then came back with a notepad. He sorted through the cargo spilled across the back of the truck and jotted notes about the contents. Later, he would coordinate the recovery of the materials that he deemed necessary and salvageable. “I’m rationing the fuel that we’ve been able to scavenge, and I’ve got Henderson and his motor-pool division working on vehicles that might be able to carry wounded and cargo that can be repaired quickly.”

“Sounds like you’re ahead of me.” Remington moved on, checking the screens.

“No, sir,” Goose replied. “We’ve been through situations like this before. This is SOP on a blown mission according to the parameters you’ve established.”

“Actually, Sergeant,” Remington said, “I’d be hard-pressed to remember if I came up with those parameters or you did.”

“They work,” Goose replied. If it ain’t broke, don’t fix it.”

“Agreed.” An image on the screen caught Remington’s eye. The banner at the bottom of the screen read TURKISHSYRIAN BORDER-RECORDED EARLIER.

The image showed Goose carrying a wounded Marine from the burning helicopter. The first sergeant remained frozen in midstep. Pain and desperate resolve were etched on Goose’s face. It was one of those images that would end up splashed on the front pages of newspapers and magazine covers back home, Remington could tell.

For a moment, a hint of jealousy flared through Remington. Even when they’d been soldiering together as sergeants, Goose had always seemed to capture the attention and respect of other soldiers as well as the media. He was photogenic and self-deprecating, every inch a team player who sweated blood for the cause.

But Goose would never be an officer. A few times, when his jealousy had risen too high, Remington had consoled himself with that thought. Goose would never be an officer, never be more than the first sergeant that he was. And when he’d had his fill of battle, as Remington suspected Goose soon would now that he had Megan and Chris waiting at home for him, Goose would quietly lay down his arms and concentrate on being a husband and father.

Remington hadn’t wanted to deal with any of those responsibilities that would divide his attention and his personal resources. The screen cut away, showing footage of the caravan of vehicles from Glitter City rumbling along the road to Sanliurfa. The refugees had actually reached the city over an hour ago, and more footage showed the arrival of those vehicles inside the city. Several SCUDs had slammed Sanliurfa during the initial attack. Sections of the city were burning ruins now.