Soul Harvest: The World Takes Sides Read online

  Table of Contents

  Tyndale House Novels by Jerry B. Jenkins

  PROLOGUE

  CHAPTER 1

  CHAPTER 2

  CHAPTER 3

  CHAPTER 4

  CHAPTER 5

  CHAPTER 6

  CHAPTER 7

  CHAPTER 8

  CHAPTER 9

  CHAPTER 10

  CHAPTER 11

  CHAPTER 12

  CHAPTER 13

  CHAPTER 14

  CHAPTER 15

  CHAPTER 16

  CHAPTER 17

  CHAPTER 18

  CHAPTER 19

  CHAPTER 20

  EPILOGUE

  ABOUT THE AUTHORS

  TEST YOUR PROPHECY IQ

  THE TRUTH BEHIND THE FICTION

  TEST YOUR PROPEHCY IQ—ANSWER

  Tyndale House Novels by Jerry B. Jenkins

  Riven

  Midnight Clear (with Dallas Jenkins)

  Soon

  Silenced

  Shadowed

  The Last Operative

  The Brotherhood

  The Left Behind® series (with Tim LaHaye)

  Left Behind®

  Desecration

  Tribulation Force

  The Remnant

  Nicolae

  Armageddon

  Soul Harvest

  Glorious Appearing

  Apollyon

  The Rising

  Assassins

  The Regime

  The Indwelling

  The Rapture

  The Mark

  Kingdom Come

  Left Behind Collectors Edition

  Rapture’s Witness (books 1–3)

  Deceiver’s Game (books 4–6)

  Evil’s Edge (books 7–9)

  World’s End (books 10–12)

  For the latest information on Left Behind products, visit www.leftbehind.com.

  For the latest information on Tyndale fiction, visit www.tyndalefiction.com.

  Visit Tyndale’s exciting Web site at www.tyndale.com.

  Discover the latest about the Left Behind series at www.leftbehind.com.

  TYNDALE, Tyndale’s quill logo, and Left Behind are registered trademarks of Tyndale House Publishers, Inc.

  Soul Harvest: The World Takes Sides

  Copyright © 1998 by Tim LaHaye and Jerry B. Jenkins. All rights reserved.

  Cover photograph copyright © by Kyu Oh/iStockphoto. All rights reserved.

  Author photo of Jerry B. Jenkins copyright © 2007 by Mikel Healy Photography. All rights reserved.

  Author photo of Tim LaHaye copyright © 2004 by Brian MacDonald. All rights reserved.

  Left Behind series designed by Erik M. Peterson

  Published in association with the literary agency of Alive Communications, Inc. 7680 Goddard Street, Suite 200, Colorado Springs, CO 80920,

  www.alivecommunications.com.

  Scripture taken from the New King James Version.® Copyright © 1982 by Thomas Nelson, Inc. Used by permission. All rights reserved.

  Library of Congress Cataloging-in-Publication Data

  LaHaye, Tim F.

  Soul harvest / Tim LaHaye, Jerry B. Jenkins.

  p. cm.

  ISBN 978-0-8423-2915-6 (hardcover)

  ISBN 978-0-8423-2925-5 (softcover)

  I. Jenkins, Jerry B. II. Title.

  PS3562.A315S68 1998

  813′.54—dc21 98-20929

  Repackage first published in 2010 under ISBN 978-1-4143-3493-6.

  To our brand-new brothers and sisters

  PROLOGUE

  From Nicolae

  Buck’s heart sank as he saw the steeple of New Hope Village Church. It had to be less than six hundred yards away, but the earth was still churning. Things were still crashing. Huge trees fell and dragged power lines into the street. The closer he got to the church, the emptier he felt in his heart. That steeple was the only thing standing. Its base rested at ground level. The lights of the Range Rover illuminated pews, sitting incongruously in neat rows, some of them unscathed. The rest of the sanctuary, the high-arched beams, the stained-glass windows, all gone. The administration building, the classrooms, the offices were flattened to the ground in a pile of bricks and glass and mortar.

  One car was visible in a crater in what used to be the parking lot. The bottom of the car was flat on the ground, all four tires blown, axles broken. Two bare human legs protruded from under the car. Buck stopped the Range Rover a hundred feet from that mess in the parking lot. His door would not open. He loosened his seat belt and climbed out the passenger side. And suddenly the earthquake stopped. The sun reappeared. It was a bright, sunshiny Monday morning in Mount Prospect, Illinois. Buck felt every bone in his body. He staggered over the uneven ground toward that little flattened car. When he was close enough, he saw that the crushed body was missing a shoe. The one that remained, however, confirmed his fear. Loretta had been crushed by her own car.

  Buck stumbled and fell facedown in the dirt, something gashing his cheek. He ignored it and crawled to the car. He braced himself and pushed with all his might, trying to roll the vehicle off the body. It would not budge. Everything in him screamed against leaving Loretta there. But where would he take the body if he could free it? Sobbing now, he crawled through the debris, looking for any entrance to the underground shelter. . . . Finally he found the vent shaft. He cupped his hands over it and shouted down into it, “Tsion! Tsion! Are you there?” He turned and put his ear to the shaft, feeling cool air rush from the shelter.

  “I am here, Buck! . . . How is Loretta?”

  “Gone!”

  “Was it the great earthquake?”

  “It was!”

  “Can you get to me?”

  “I will get to you if it’s the last thing I do, Tsion! I need you to help me look for Chloe!”

  “I am OK for now, Buck! I will wait for you!”

  Buck turned to look in the direction of the safe house. People staggered in ragged clothes, bleeding. Some dropped and seemed to die in front of his eyes. He didn’t know how long it would take him to get to Chloe. He was sure he would not want to see what he found there, but he would not stop until he did. If there was one chance in a million of getting to her, of saving her, he would do it.

  The sun had reappeared over New Babylon. Rayford urged Mac McCullum to keep going toward Baghdad. Everywhere Rayford, Mac, and Carpathia looked was destruction. Craters from meteors. Fires burning. Buildings flattened. Roads wasted.

  When Baghdad Airport came into sight, Rayford hung his head and wept. Jumbo jets were twisted, some sticking out of great cavities in the ground. The terminal was flattened. The tower was down. Bodies strewn everywhere.

  Rayford signaled Mac to set the chopper down. But as he surveyed the area, Rayford knew. The only prayer for Amanda or for Hattie was that their planes were still in the air when this occurred.

  When the blades stopped whirring, Carpathia turned to the other two. “Do either of you have a working phone?”

  Rayford was so disgusted he reached past Carpathia and pushed open the door. He slipped out from behind Carpathia’s seat and jumped to the ground. Then he reached in, loosened Carpathia’s belt, grabbed him by the lapels, and yanked him out of the chopper. Carpathia landed on his seat on the uneven ground. He jumped up quickly, as if ready to fight. Rayford pushed him back up against the helicopter.

  “Captain Steele, I understand you are upset, but—”

  “Nicolae,” Rayford said, his words rushing through clenched teeth, “you can explain this away any way you want, but let me be the first to tell you: You have just seen the wrath of the Lamb!”

  Carpathia shrugged. Rayford gave him a last shove against
the helicopter and stumbled away. He set his face toward the airport terminal, a quarter mile away. He prayed this would be the last time he had to search for the body of a loved one in the rubble.

  “When He opened the seventh seal, there was silence in heaven for about half an hour. And I saw the seven angels who stand before God, and to them were given seven trumpets. Then another angel, having a golden censer, came and stood at the altar. He was given much incense, that he should offer it with the prayers of all the saints upon the golden altar which was before the throne. And the smoke of the incense, with the prayers of the saints, ascended before God from the angel’s hand. Then the angel took the censer, filled it with fire from the altar, and threw it to the earth. And there were noises, thunderings, lightnings, and an earthquake.

  “So the seven angels who had the seven trumpets prepared themselves to sound.”

  Revelation 8:1-6

  CHAPTER 1

  Rayford Steele wore the uniform of the enemy of his soul, and he hated himself for it. He strode through Iraqi sand toward Baghdad Airport in his dress blues and was struck by the incongruity of it all.

  From across the parched plain he heard the wails and screams of hundreds he wouldn’t begin to be able to help. Any prayer of finding his wife alive depended on how quickly he could get to her. But there was no quick here. Only sand. And what about Chloe and Buck in the States? And Tsion?

  Desperate, frantic, mad with frustration, he ripped off his natty waistcoat with its yellow braid, heavy epaulettes, and arm patches that identified a senior officer of the Global Community. Rayford did not take the time to unfasten the solid-gold buttons but sent them popping across the desert floor. He let the tailored jacket slide from his shoulders and clutched the collar in his fists. Three, four, five times he raised the garment over his head and slammed it to the ground. Dust billowed and sand kicked up over his patent leather shoes.

  Rayford considered abandoning all vestiges of his connection to Nicolae Carpathia’s regime, but his attention was drawn again to the luxuriously appointed arm patches. He tore at them, intending to rip them free, as if busting himself from his own rank in the service of the Antichrist. But the craftsmanship allowed not even a fingernail between the stitches, and Rayford slammed the coat to the ground one more time. He stepped and booted it like an extra point, finally aware of what had made it heavier. His phone was in the pocket.

  As he knelt to retrieve his coat, Rayford’s maddening logic returned—the practicality that made him who he was. Having no idea what he might find in the ruins of his condominium, he couldn’t treat as dispensable what might constitute his only remaining set of clothes.

  Rayford jammed his arms into the sleeves like a little boy made to wear a jacket on a warm day. He hadn’t bothered to shake the grit from it, so as he plunged on toward the skeletal remains of the airport, Rayford’s lanky frame was less impressive than usual. He could have been the survivor of a crash, a pilot who’d lost his cap and seen the buttons stripped from his uniform.

  Rayford could not remember a chill before sundown in all the months he’d lived in Iraq. Yet something about the earthquake had changed not only the topography, but also the temperature. Rayford had been used to damp shirts and a sticky film on his skin. But now wind, that rare, mysterious draft, chilled him as he speed-dialed Mac McCullum and put the phone to his ear.

  At that instant he heard the chug and whir of Mac’s chopper behind him. He wondered where they were going.

  “Mac here,” came McCullum’s gravely voice.

  Rayford whirled and watched the copter eclipse the descending sun. “I can’t believe this thing works,” Rayford said. He had slammed it to the ground and kicked it, but he also assumed the earthquake would have taken out nearby cell towers.

  “Soon as I get out of range, it won’t, Ray,” Mac said. “Everything’s down for as far as I can see. These units act like walkie-talkies when we’re close. When you need a cellular boost, you won’t find it.”

  “So any chance of calling the States—”

  “Is out of the question,” Mac said. “Ray, Potentate Carpathia wants to speak to you, but first—”

  “I don’t want to talk to him, and you can tell him that.”

  “But before I give you to him,” Mac continued, “I need to remind you that our meeting, yours and mine, is still on for tonight. Right?”

  Rayford slowed and stared at the ground, running a hand through his hair. “What? What are you talking about?”

  “All right then, very good,” Mac said. “We’re still meeting tonight then. Now the potentate—”

  “I understand you want to talk to me later, Mac, but don’t put Carpathia on or I swear I’ll—”

  “Stand by for the potentate.”

  Rayford switched the phone to his right hand, ready to smash it on the ground, but he restrained himself. When avenues of communication reopened, he wanted to be able to check on his loved ones.

  “Captain Steele,” came the emotionless tone of Nicolae Carpathia.

  “I’m here,” Rayford said, allowing his disgust to come through. He assumed God would forgive anything he said to the Antichrist, but he swallowed what he really wanted to say.

  “Though we both know how I could respond to your egregious disrespect and insubordination,” Carpathia said, “I choose to forgive you.”

  Rayford continued walking, clenching his teeth to keep from screaming at the man.

  “I can tell you are at a loss for how to express your gratitude,” Carpathia continued. “Now listen to me. I have a safe place and provisions where my international ambassadors and staff will join me. You and I both know we need each other, so I suggest—”

  “You don’t need me,” Rayford said. “And I don’t need your forgiveness. You have a perfectly capable pilot right next to you, so let me suggest that you forget me.”

  “Just be ready when he lands,” Carpathia said, the first hint of frustration in his voice.

  “The only place I would accept a ride to is the airport,” Rayford said. “And I’m almost there. Don’t have Mac set down any closer to this mess.”

  “Captain Steele,” Carpathia began again, condescendingly, “I admire your irrational belief that you can somehow find your wife, but we both know that is not going to happen.”

  Rayford said nothing. He feared Carpathia was right, but he would never give him the satisfaction of admitting it. And he would certainly never quit looking until he proved to himself Amanda had not survived.

  “Come with us, Captain Steele. Just reboard, and I will treat your outburst as if it never—”

  “I’m not going anywhere until I’ve found my wife! Let me talk to Mac.”

  “Officer McCullum is busy. I will pass along a message.”

  “Mac could fly that thing with no hands. Now let me talk to him.”

  “If there is no message, then, Captain Steele—”

  “All right, you win. Just tell Mac—”

  “Now is no time to neglect protocol, Captain Steele. A pardoned subordinate is behooved to address his superior—”

  “All right, Potentate Carpathia, just tell Mac to come for me if I don’t find a way back by 2200 hours.”

  “And should you find a way back, the shelter is three and a half clicks northeast of the original headquarters. You will need the following password: ‘Operation Wrath.’”

  “What?” Carpathia knew this was coming?

  “You heard me, Captain Steele.”

  Cameron “Buck” Williams stepped gingerly through the rubble near the ventilation shaft where he had heard the clear, healthy voice of Rabbi Tsion Ben-Judah, trapped in the underground shelter. Tsion assured him he was unhurt, just scared and claustrophobic. That place was small enough without the church imploding above it. With no way out unless someone tunneled to him, the rabbi, Buck knew, would soon feel like a caged animal.

  Had Tsion been in immediate danger, Buck would have dug with his bare hands to free him. But Buck fe
lt like a doctor in triage, having to determine who most urgently needed his help. Assuring Tsion he would return, he headed toward the safe house to find his wife.

  To get through the trash that had been the only church home he ever knew, Buck had to again crawl past the remains of the beloved Loretta. What a friend she had been, first to the late Bruce Barnes and then to the rest of the Tribulation Force. The Force had begun with four: Rayford, Chloe, Bruce, and Buck. Amanda was added. Bruce was lost. Tsion was added.

  Was it possible now that they had been reduced to just Buck and Tsion? Buck didn’t want to think about it. He found his watch gunked up with mud, asphalt, and a tiny shard of windshield. He wiped the crystal across his pant leg and felt the crusty mixture tear his trousers and bite into his knee. It was nine o’clock in the morning in Mt. Prospect, and Buck heard an air raid siren, a tornado warning siren, emergency vehicle sirens—one close, two farther away. Shouts. Screams. Sobbing. Engines.

  Could he live without Chloe? Buck had been given a second chance; he was here for a purpose. He wanted the love of his life by his side, and he prayed—selfishly, he realized—that she had not already preceded him to heaven.

  In his peripheral vision, Buck noticed the swelling of his own left cheek. He had felt neither pain nor blood and had assumed the wound was minor. Now he wondered. He reached in his breast pocket for his mirror-lensed sunglasses. One lens was in pieces. In the reflection of the other he saw a scarecrow, hair wild, eyes white with fear, mouth open and sucking air. The wound was not bleeding, yet it appeared deep. There would be no time for treatment.

  Buck emptied his shirt pocket but kept the frames—a gift from Chloe. He studied the ground as he moved back to the Range Rover, picking his way through glass, nails, and bricks like an old man, assuring himself solid purchase.

  Buck passed Loretta’s car and what was left of her, determined not to look. Suddenly the earth moved, and he stumbled. Loretta’s car, which he had been unable to budge moments before, rocked and disappeared. The ground had given way under the parking lot. Buck stretched out on his stomach and peeked over the edge of a new crevice. The mangled car rested atop a water main twenty feet beneath the earth. The blown tires pointed up like the feet of bloated roadkill. Curled in a frail ball atop the wreckage was the Raggedy Ann–like body of Loretta, a tribulation saint. There would be more shifting of the earth. Reaching Loretta’s body would be impossible. If he was also to find Chloe dead, Buck wished God had let him plunge under the earth with Loretta’s car.