The Armageddon Conspiracy (35 page)

‘
She’ll never help
them.’

‘
The Pope agreed with
you.
He was sure Lucy would turn the tables and harness the Ark for
the good of humanity, heralding a golden age, a new Garden of
Eden.’

‘
Isn’t there a simpler
way to guarantee the Delta Force deserters never succeed?’
Vernon
detested saying these words, but there was no avoiding them.
‘Why
isn’t your mission to kill Lucy?’

‘
It
is
.’

‘
What?
I
thought…’

Kruger turned towards
Lucy’s paintings.
‘The Pope believed disaster was certain if we
carried out an immoral action, even if the object was to save the
planet.
We shouldn’t do evil that good may come, he always
insisted.
He was powerfully affected by Dostoyevsky’s novel
The Brothers Karamazov
.
Dostoyevsky poses the question that if a single creature has to
suffer, especially an innocent child, is Creation justified?
The
Pope was tormented by that question.
He thought, in the end, that
suffering was an inescapable aspect of the human experience, but we
must avoid needless suffering, the deliberate inflicting of pain.
That was Christ’s message.
That’s what the Ten Commandments were
all about.
Above all, unnecessary killing is never justified.
Our
mission was to find Lucy and protect her from the Illuminati.
If we
failed, her death would no longer be unnecessary, it would be
essential.’

‘
But why didn’t you
take her straight back to the Vatican?
She’d be out of all this
trouble now.’

‘
It’s not that simple.
If, as we believe, the Illuminati have the true Ark of the
Covenant, there’s no telling what will occur if they try to make it
work for them.
The Bible is full of terrifying stories about what
happened when people interfered with the Ark.’

‘
But didn’t you just
say the Ark was useless if someone of the right bloodline wasn’t
there when it was used?’

‘
I didn’t say it
wouldn’t do anything.
I said it wouldn’t work properly.
If the
Illuminati tamper with the Ark, they could trigger exactly the
catastrophe we’re trying to avoid.’
The sea was lashing furiously
against the portholes and Kruger glanced nervously across the room.
‘The Pope was certain the Illuminati had already tried to interfere
with the Ark.
He said it was no coincidence that the natural
disasters began across the world within minutes of the first
reports coming in that the Ark may have been found and taken.
The
Ethiopian Ark was a fake, but that doesn’t mean the real one hasn’t
been discovered.’

‘
You seriously think
everything happening to the world is caused by the Ark?’

‘
What else could cause
disturbances like that?’

‘
Global warming?
Sunspots?
Cosmic radiation?’

‘
Don’t be fooled by the
atheist scientists.
They have no idea what’s happening.
All of this
is far beyond their tiny realm of facts and logic.
We’re in the
time of faith now.’

‘
Is Lucy some kind of
bait?
Is that why you didn’t take her back to Rome?’

‘
I wouldn’t say bait,
but I don’t deny we want to use Lucy.
To be precise, we want her to
lead us to the Ark.
If we can retrieve it, the Illuminati will be
finished forever.’

‘
I don’t care about any
of that.
I just want to find Lucy and get her out of
this.’

‘
With your help, we can
achieve both objectives.’

‘
You really believe in
all of this, don’t you?’

‘
This is the Final
Conflict, Mr Vernon, the fight that was always destined to come:
the Catholics and the Jews versus the Illuminati.
Lucy is a
Catholic, but in terms of her bloodline, she’s Jewish.
Her mother,
and all her ancestors on her mother’s side were Jews.
If she had
lived in Nazi Germany, she would have been sent to the gas
chambers.
I must confess that the Pope was horrified when he
learned that Lucy might be connected to Jewish High Priests.
Caiaphas, the High Priest in Jesus’ time and the instigator of
Christ’s death, denied that Jesus was the Messiah, rejected
Christianity and persecuted the early Christians.
The Pope was so
disturbed that Lucy might have any link to the likes of Caiaphas
that he sent one of us to Israel to check all the genealogical
records of the High Priests.
He prayed we wouldn’t find a
connection, but we did.’

‘
So, the note he
received just before he died was the confirmation?’

Kruger nodded.

‘
But it makes sense,
doesn’t it?
The Ark has always been linked to the Jews, not
Catholicism.’

‘
Even so, I can
appreciate the Pope’s concerns.
It’s God’s will that Christianity
replaced Judaism.
The Christians are the new Chosen People.
Why
revert to Jews who rejected Christ?
Nevertheless, we are where we
are.
The Illuminati are our mortal enemies, not the
Jews.’

‘
If these Illuminati
are so evil, why doesn’t God destroy them?
I mean, he didn’t
hesitate to wipe out Sodom and Gomorrah.
He practically drowned the
whole human race in the Flood.’

‘
This is our third and
ultimate test, Mr Vernon.’

‘
I don’t
follow.’

‘
The first test was in
the Garden of Eden when Adam and Eve were told not to eat the
forbidden fruit.
They did, of course – the Original Sin.
Later,
humanity became so corrupt that God almost wiped them out, sparing
only Noah and his family.
Now this.
The third strike.
Why shouldn’t
God destroy mankind?
The Illuminati worship Lucifer.
If they take
over, why would God stay his hand?
He would surely end this farce
once and for all.
God will spare us only if we stop the Illuminati.
Otherwise, we all die, Illuminati and non-Illuminati
alike.’

‘
But you’ve told me
Lucifer is here on earth.
Doesn’t that mean the Illuminati have
won?’
Vernon pointed at Raphael’s mural.
‘It’s so obvious.
That
painting tells us that the world ends in a couple of days and we
should prepare ourselves for heaven or hell.
We might as well give
up now.’

‘
There’s always hope,’
Kruger said.
‘It’s possible we’re on the verge of something
wonderful.’

‘
What do you
mean?’

‘
Think about it.
We can
use this situation to do something to redeem humanity forever, to
permanently erase Original Sin.’

‘
I’m not getting
you.’

‘
We can use the Ark to
kill Lucifer.’

43

L
ucy raised her
head and found Gresnick staring down at her.
She twisted round to
see what the soldiers were doing.
None of them was paying any
attention.

‘
May I sit here?’
he
asked.

She shrugged, moved to one side and let
Gresnick join her on the wooden pew.
His hands were still in cuffs
behind his back.

‘
I thought you were one
of them,’ she said.
‘I mean you’re in uniform and you’re
American.’

‘
I told you, I came
with James.’

Lucy bowed her head.
‘I saw him back at
the helicopter crash.
I couldn’t believe it.
James and I…’

‘
Was he injured?
I
didn’t see what happened back there.
I have no idea who survived.
It was a mess.’

‘
I didn’t get a proper
look.
It was so dark.’

‘
Did you see what
attacked us?
Did an RPG hit us?
Everything went crazy.
It was as if
the night came alive.’

Lucy shifted uneasily.
‘A dark shape
enveloped your helicopter.
There was a bizarre fluttering sound.
I’m certain nothing was fired at you.’

‘
I didn’t think so.’
Gresnick tapped the floor with his foot.
‘I can’t make sense of
what happened.’

‘
What were you and
James doing?’

‘
Our mission was to
find you and take you back to London.
To safety.’

Safety?
That seemed such an odd concept
to Lucy now.
‘I presume you went to the convent at Glastonbury
first.’

‘
Yes.’
Gresnick started
fidgeting.
‘If you don’t mind me saying so, you’re a lot more lucid
than I was expecting.’

Lucy twisted round to face him.
She was
surprised by just how good-looking Gresnick was, and even more
surprised she was thinking that.
It was inappropriate in just about
every way.
‘So, you thought I’d be a nutcase?’
She almost managed a
smile.
‘Given what’s happened in the last few hours, I ought to be
crazier now than ever.
The odd thing is I feel sharper than at any
time in my life.
Sometimes I’m not sure I’m really myself.
It’s as
if someone else is inside me, much stronger than I ever was,
someone who knows things I never did.’

Gresnick raised his eyebrows.

‘
Mad, huh?
It sounds
bizarre, I know, but it’s true.’

‘
I’m not doubting you,
Lucy.
We came to find you because we heard things about you,
incredible things.’
He lowered his voice.
‘Yesterday, Sergeant
Morson was in our custody in London.
He told us you were the most
special person in the world.’

Inwardly, Lucy groaned.
From every
angle, she kept hearing this stuff.
Didn’t Chosen Ones have to
believe it themselves?
If she wasn’t convinced she was special, why
should anyone else believe it?
She had no intention of getting on a
donkey and riding into Jerusalem.
No one would be placing palms in
her path.
Whatever anyone said, she was no Messiah.

Something Gresnick said didn’t make
sense.
‘So, did you bring Sergeant Morson with you from London?
Did
he escape from your helicopter?’

‘
Sergeant Morson broke
out of our cells in London.
I can’t explain how he did it.
He had a
colleague who was suffering from horrific radiation wounds.
That
man escaped too.
Something freakish was happening to him, some sort
of transformation.’

‘
What do you
mean?’

‘
Truthfully, I don’t
know.
Whatever it was, it wasn’t normal.’

Lucy nodded.
That was true of just
about everything that had happened lately.

‘
Listen,’ Gresnick
said, ‘I’m sure you’ve found out lots of vital stuff in the last
few hours.
I have too.
We need to compare notes, try to get the big
picture.
Whether you like it or not, you’re the key to everything
that’s happening.
We need to figure out exactly how and why.
Everything may depend on it.’