by Len du Randt
‘The European Union has doubled its efforts to provide relief to those dying of hunger. Thousands of N-Force relief workers are working around the clock to supply grain to those in need.
‘The European Empire’s citizens that refuse the Shield of Victor are denied shelter and food, and many have already been arrested or executed by bounty hunters. Sovereign Emperor Victor Yoshe has approved the executions, saying that no more risks can be taken when it comes to rooting out the Christian evil that has thrown the world into utter turmoil and ruin over the past few years.
‘This is Conrad Rodgers with the news headlines at eight, for GMN live.’
- - -* * *- - -
‘Are we ready to strike?’ Timothy asked his aide.
‘We are ready, sir,’ the official confirmed.
‘And G.O.D?’
‘Armed and ready, sir.’
‘Do you realize what this means?’ Timothy asked as he surveyed everyone in the room. Everyone remained still, their eyes fixed on his. ‘Al Jalil is the backbone of the Shield. If it goes, so does the entire Shield infrastructure as well as the Shield based economy.’
There were nods of agreement.
‘This is the moment we have been waiting for,’ Timothy said loudly.
‘Yeah!’ one of the men shouted.
‘This is the time that we fight back against the evil of this world!’
‘Yeah!’ the others replied together, charged by Timothy’s passion.
‘There is a time for peace and a time for war; and the time for war is now!’
- - -* * *- - -
Trevor was standing alone in a deserted city. All around him, gloom hung like a thick fog. A slight breeze gently tickled a torn newspaper page, leading it in a fleeting dance.
Where am I? He thought as he looked around him. The city was totally deserted. There was no one around. No moving cars or any sign of life.
‘You left us, Trevor,’ a voice said from behind him. His blood froze and he turned around slowly. Three zombie creatures that resembled Norman and his parents limped toward him, arms outstretched, mouths agape.
‘No,’ Trevor shouted. ‘I did not leave you!’
‘It’s your fault that we are dead,’ the zombies accused. The skies turned dark and the wind picked up, kicking up debris and sand. ‘We came for you, and now we are dead.’
‘No!’ Trevor protested, shouting to be heard above the wailing wind. ‘That’s not what happened!’
The zombies paid no attention and just kept advancing sluggishly. Trevor was frozen on the spot and couldn’t run. They limped closer and closer still.
‘You came back for me because you loved me,’ he shouted at the zombies. ‘You sacrificed yourselves to save me!’
The zombies closed in on him and reached for his throat. The skies were black and lightning bolts flashed at random. The howling wind screamed at Trevor. He shouted something, but the wind ripped the words from his mouth and flung them into the air. The zombies worked their fingers around his neck and squeezed.
Trevor tried one last time, ‘In the name of Jesus Christ, I command you to leave me alone!’
Everything stopped at once. The zombies were gone, the wind stopped wailing, the skies were pure, and instead of a deserted city, Trevor now found himself standing in the backyard of his childhood home. The familiar and warm surroundings calmed him.
‘You have done well, my son,’ a soft voice said from behind him.
Trevor spun around and saw his parents and Norman smiling at him.
‘You came back for me,’ Trevor said, swallowing hard at the lump in his throat. ‘You died for me, and now I’m alive...’
‘We love you, son,’ his father said, wrapping his arm around his wife’s shoulder. Both of them looked proudly at Trevor. ‘We would never forsake you, nor will our Lord. Always remember that.’
‘I will,’ Trevor said. He turned to face Norman, but jerked awake when someone shook him.
‘Trevor,’ Sumen whispered. ‘We have to leave, now!’
‘Now?’ Trevor asked, wondering for a second where he was and what time it was.
‘Imperial Soldiers,’ Sumen said, not able to contain the fear in his voice any longer. ‘They’re on their way. One of the scouts saw them coming. We have about six minutes.’
Trevor jerked upright when Sumen’s words finally registered. ‘Imperial Soldiers?’
‘Six minutes.’
‘What do we do?’
‘The two of us can leave in the pickup. The rest will make their own way.’
Trevor’s heart flailed wildly in his chest. He had seen the Imperial Soldiers on television before and had no intention of seeing one from up close in real life. If they stayed another minute, they would surely be dead. ‘Let’s go,’ he said.
The two of them grabbed the few things that they really needed and were soon speeding along the dusty road in the opposite direction with the lights off. It was a bumpy ride, but Trevor preferred a few bumps to what the Imperial Soldiers would do to them once caught.
‘What do we do?’ Sumen asked. ‘Where do we go?’
Trevor thought for a moment and then looked up. ‘I have an idea,’ he said. ‘Take us back to the city.’
‘The city?’ Sumen exclaimed. ‘Are you insane?’
‘I know what I’m doing,’ Trevor said. ‘At least, I think I do...’
‘I hope you’re right,’ Sumen said as the pickup shot through the darkness. Behind them, an eerie orange glow lit up the night skies as the Imperial Soldiers set the farm ablaze.
- - -* * *- - -
‘Mary,’ a voice said softly. ‘Wake up, Mary.’
Mary woke up and instinctively jerked away from the man sitting on the edge of her bed.
‘Do not be alarmed, Mary, for I bring you a message.’
‘Who are you?’
‘My name is not important,’ the man said, ‘but my message is.’
Mary didn’t say anything. She remained quiet and allowed the man to relate his message to her.
‘God is about to pour out his wrath on this city and its inhabitants. You are to gather as many people as possible, and leave the city through its southern border. Take the people into the desert, and do not stop until we speak again.’
‘Are you...an angel?’
The man smiled warmly at Mary. ‘I am a messenger. Do not delay. Get the people and leave before her plagues become yours.’
‘Whose plagues?’ Mary asked, but the man was gone. She sat upright and looked around the room. There was no one else there. Relieved at the thought that it could only have been a dream, she laid her head back unto her soft pillow.
Leave, the voice repeated itself in her head, before her plagues become yours.
She got up and donned a nightgown, then left her room. In the hallway, let out a soft shriek as Nasreen suddenly opened her own bedroom door unexpectedly.
‘You had the dream too?’ Nasreen asked Mary.
She nodded.
‘The girls,’ Kassim said as he appeared from behind the door. He took his wife by her shoulders to ensure that he had her undivided attention. ‘Nasreen, you and Mary get our things together. Only the important things that we cannot do without. Will you do that?’
Nasreen confirmed.
‘I’ll see that the children are ready,’ he said. ‘We leave in an hour.’
- - -* * *- - -
One hour and twenty seven phone calls later, the group of seventy eight assembled in front of Kassim’s house.
‘Are we ready to go?’ Mary asked Kassim.
He nodded and hugged Nasreen tightly as the realization struck that they would never again be able to return to their luxurious home. With one final command, the convoy began their trek out of Al Jalil.
‘It’s getting darker,’ Kassim said when they had reached a safe distance from the majestic city. ‘Does anyone else notice it?’
‘It is,’ Mary verified as she held her hand before her face. ‘Something is t
aking away the light.’
‘We have to step on it and get away from here as fast as possible,’ Kassim said and pressed his foot down on the gas pedal.
Looking back at the city, Mary could see that the first rays of the morning sun were being engulfed by some sort of blackness. The darkness slowly devoured the entire city.
‘What’s going on?’ Kassim asked.
‘I don’t know,’ Mary said, ‘but I’m sure that Al Jalil is not the place to be right now.’
- - -* * *- - -
‘This is perfect,’ Timothy said when he heard about the darkness that fell over Al Jalil.
‘So we strike tonight?’ Malcolm asked.
‘Yes,’ Timothy confirmed. ‘We strike tonight.’
- - -* * *- - -
Trevor almost didn’t recognize the city. Where sunlight used to filter through the leaves of the trees as Trevor walked down the street to do window shopping on lazy Sunday afternoons, there was now only darkness.
‘Look at this place,’ Sumen said as they slowly drove through the city streets.
Store windows were broken and fires raged from within. Burning cars were strewn not only along the sides of the streets, but were driven through store windows. Some were abandoned in the middle of the roads, and it took some tricky manoeuvring from Sumen to get around them.
What bothered Trevor the most were the corpses that littered the streets and sidewalks and the smell of rotting flesh. Many more were impaled or crucified along the roads, and most of the bodies had been decapitated. Some of the impaled people were still alive and moaned as their last minutes or hours passed before they would breathe their last breath. Trevor felt like he had died and gone to Hell. He imagined spending eternity in a place like this, looting, killing, dying, and yet, never dying. Never ending. Never a moment to just rest. For all of eternity. He shivered at the thought and shot a prayer to the Lord, thanking Him for saving him from a place even worse than this.
‘You say it’s here?’ Sumen said and stopped the car along the side of the road. He looked up through the windshield at the eight storey building in front of them.
‘This is it,’ Trevor said as he looked at René’s apartment building. She lived alone and was currently in Israel or wherever. He was sure that she wouldn’t mind them crashing at her place. After all, for all practical reasons, she didn’t really live here anymore. ‘We can hide here until we figure out what to do next.’
‘And you think we’ll be safe?’
‘Look at this place,’ Trevor said. ‘N-Force doesn’t come here anymore. And besides, René is a registered Shield bearer, so I don’t think that they should have a reason to come snooping around at her place.’
‘Well,’ Sumen said and breathed deeply. ‘Let’s get off the streets then, shall we?’
- - -* * *- - -
‘Hello?’ René shouted into the blackness. ‘I...I cannot see! Can anyone help me?’ It had been fifty minutes since the darkness fell over Al Jalil, and claustrophobia was getting the better of her.
Nobody answered. They were all too busy trying to help themselves. All around her people moaned and cursed. Somewhere in the distance, she could hear gun shots.
‘Please,’ she pleaded, ‘help me.’
She shuffled forward and tripped over someone lying on the ground in front of her. She flinched as she scraped her knee on the concrete, and from the sticky wetness she could only guess that her knee was bleeding. The burning itchiness, the darkness and the incessant moans of the people were slowly driving her insane.
‘Curse you, Jesus!’ she shouted defiantly into the air. ‘You and your followers can all go to Hell!’
The darkness remained, heavy and thick.
‘My Lord, Victor,’ she prayed, ‘please help your loyal followers. Please be there in our hour of need.’
The darkness remained.
‘You will pay for this, Jesus!’ she screamed and waived her fist. ‘My God will make you pay!’
- - -* * *- - -
Only a few soft moans and curses could be heard through the darkness in Al Jalil. People were struggling to get to their homes, or any form of shelter. Some prayed to Victor while others just swore at Jesus.
For a brief moment, a brilliant flash of light illuminated the city, and for a fraction of a second, those praying to Victor actually thought that he had answered their prayers. But the flash disappeared as quickly as it had come. There was a slight pause, and then a loud explosion ripped through the stunned silence. The bang of the explosion soon became a deep rumbling. The rumbling grew louder and louder and soon, the sound of cars being tossed into the air and buildings shattering could be heard.
It all lasted ten minutes, and when the rumbling subsided, a strange silence settled. The darkness slowly lifted, but where the beautiful super city of Al Jalil once stood, only smouldering debris and ash remained.
- - -* * *- - -
‘She is mine at last,’ Victor said as he surveyed Egypt’s magnificent city of Cairo in the distance.
‘She is beautiful indeed, my Lord,’ Antonio encouraged.
‘Is the camera crew ready to capture the event live?’
Antonio looked at the crew. They weren’t filming, but instead, were arguing about something. He could see by their faces that the topic was serious.
‘What’s going on here?’ he asked as he approached them.
The crew backed away, unsure which one of them should break the news to Antonio.
‘It...it’s Al Jalil, sir,’ one of them finally said.
‘Yes? What about it?’
‘It has been destroyed...’
‘Destroyed?’ Antonio asked, not in the mood for playing games. ‘In what sense?’
‘An atom bomb or something, sir,’ the camera man answered.
The reality hit Antonio like a sledge hammer. ‘You mean to say that the city has been bombed?’
‘Nuked, sir, or so it seems. There is no confirmation yet, but it appears that roughly eighty percent or more of the city has been reduced to rubble.’
Victor joined them. ‘What’s wrong?’
Antonio moved away from the group. Victor followed. ‘It’s Al Jalil, my Lord.’
‘What about it, Antonio?’
‘It has been attacked...bombed. Most of the city has been destroyed.’
Victor stared at Cairo, a magnificent city towering in the distance. He motioned toward the crew. ‘Is that a live feed?’
‘It is,’ Antonio confirmed.
‘Let me address the world.’
The cameraman focussed on Victor and gave the signal for him to begin.
‘My fellow citizens,’ he began and then paused for a second. ‘The Christian enemy has overstepped his boundary. We have just been informed that a most catastrophic attack was launched against our financial and religious backbone, Al Jalil.
‘This has gone far enough. The attack not only breeches the safety and security of every loyal citizen of the Empire, but also the safety and security of every human being on the planet.
‘At this precise moment, it is still unsure how this attack will affect the infrastructure of our economy, since both the smart card and the Shield’s infrastructure were hosted in Al Jalil. The Shield could be ineffective for purchase purposes, but will still be valid when it comes to my protection and as a sign of your loyalty to the Empire.
‘I am now, by my own authority, declaring a state of martial law in my Empire. All those, Jew or otherwise, not bearing the Shield will be regarded as Christian terrorists. Hear me now: if anyone is caught without a Shield, torture and death will be the ultimate fate of that person. Anyone bearing the Shield may go to the nearest N-Force office to attain a firearm for themselves. Should you encounter anyone without a Shield, you may defend yourself by shooting that person on the spot and making sure that the said terrorist is dead indeed. Find out where they live. Go to their homes and burn them down. Kill their families and friends, even if they bear Shields. We cannot allow
this anarchy and chaos to infest our world one day longer. The Empire declares war on these people. If it’s war they want, then it’s war they’ll get!’
Victor turned and walked away. Antonio followed closely. The camera crew didn’t dare say anything, but even if they had, it wouldn’t have mattered. Victor and Antonio both had disappeared into thin air.
- - -* * *- - -
‘It’s done, Father,’ Timothy said as Malcolm entered his tent.
‘Have you heard anything?’
‘No,’ Timothy confessed. ‘But I have prayed about it and believe that she is safe.’
‘I hope that you’re right, son.’
There was a moment of silence before Timothy spoke again. ‘We were faithful and did as the Lord commanded without wavering. I’m sure that He will honour that and protect her in return, just as he did Isaac, when Abraham had to offer him to our Lord on the altar.’
‘You’re right, Tim,’ Malcolm said. He believed with his whole heart that his wife was safe, but knew that whatever the Lord had allowed would have been the best choice regardless.
‘Besides,’ Timothy said, ‘when Victor directs his wrath and revenge toward us, it would be safer for her to be somewhere else.’
‘But how will he know where we are? We’re supposed to be protected from him and his demons.’
‘We were protected,’ Timothy said. ‘But for the final piece of our Lord’s plan to come to fulfilment, Victor and his armies must be brought to the plains of Megiddo.’
‘Agreed, but are you implying that you’re purposefully trying to fulfil scripture?’
‘In a way, I am. But the Lord will not allow anyone to interfere with His original plan. I do what I do by prayer and instruction of the Holy Spirit. He guides my every step.’