A Premature Apocalypse Read online

  In a dark warehouse on Election Day, Mandrake had blindfolded Moshe and pretended to throw knives. This time, his tormentor would not limit his act to scare tactics.

  Mandrake laughed. “Oh, Moshe. No, this isn’t for you. It’s for him.” He pointed the blade to the left.

  An upright, mirrored box sat on the stage. From large holes protruded two arms and a head with a flowing white kaffiyeh—the Arab boy from the billboard. Smaller holes covered the mirrors at his chest—slots for the insertion of long, thin blades. The boy stared ahead, his eyes glazed over.

  “For you, Moshe,” Mandrake continued, “I’ve prepared something special. Vitaly!” he cried. “Positions.”

  Footsteps thumped on the stage behind him, and wheels turned in pulleys. The rope at Moshe’s back jerked upward, lifting him ten feet in the air and out of the sword’s reach. His relief was short-lived.

  Mandrake’s bald assistant in black tied off the rope to a steel clasp on the stage floor, then pushed a large glass container the size of an elevator into view. Water sloshed in the brimming open roof as Vitaly positioned the container beneath Moshe’s feet.

  Oh, God, no! Moshe inhaled shallow, panicked breaths.

  “Ta-dah!” Mandrake cried. He spun around, and his cape billowed behind him. “How sweet. Our two Messiahs, together for the first time. And the last.”

  Two messiahs? Mandrake too thought that Moshe was the Messiah, along with the poor Arab kid. But would he murder them both in front of three witnesses? With chaos and destruction about to descend on the country, he’d get away with it.

  Moshe’s body writhed. Soon, the entire country would burn, but his survival instinct chose “sudden pulverization later” over “slow drowning now.”

  “Now, for the magic,” Mandrake said. “I’m old school. I don’t hold with smoke and mirrors. Our audience deserves the real thing—real blood and real guts.”

  Moshe wriggled and strained against his bonds. His life couldn’t end this way. He had to escape. Despite his efforts, he still jiggled over the watery deathtrap.

  He had to create a diversion, to delay a little longer. “While there is life, there is hope,” Rabbi Yosef had said. Any minute, the asteroid would hit, bringing either instant death or a lifesaving miracle.

  “Aw,” Mandrake said, his voice dripping with false empathy. “I know, I know. This sucks. You’ll die a slow, miserable death, and I’ll walk away. You think I’m a bad person, don’t you? Well, step into my shoes for a moment. This isn’t what I wanted. I just wanted to be loved.” He leaned in and hissed. “The goyim made me who I am. Everywhere I went I was ‘the Jew.’ I mean, look at me.” He tapped his beak nose. “I couldn’t escape it. One look at me and they saw a cheat, a thug, a murderer. One day I stopped running. I embraced it. I became the monster. And you know what? It worked. Everybody feared ‘the Jew.’”

  The madman’s words crowded Moshe’s adrenaline-charged brain. He wasn’t buying the sympathy ploy, but there was a thread of truth in the criminal overlord’s story. But whereas Moshe had leveraged the same malignant projections to save lives, Mandrake used them to justify his reign of terror.

  Mandrake grinned. “Thanks for listening, Moshe. I appreciate it. But now it’s time to say goodbye.”

  He stepped up to the steel clasp on the floor and rested the sword on the rope. No! Moshe scrabbled for diversions to draw out the inevitable. Think, Moshe! Keep him talking.

  “I’m not the Messiah,” he said, his voice a croak in his parched throat.

  Mandrake cocked his head to the side and put a finger to his lips. “Do you hear that?”

  Moshe did. The distant rumble outside grew louder, the familiar patter of rotors. A helicopter circled above. Were IDF commandos about to rescue their Prime Minister? Moshe grasped at the straws of hope. Oh, God, please!

  The chopper did not seem to bother Mandrake.

  “Speak of the Devil,” he said, and he chuckled. “Ladies and gentlemen, you are in luck. This is a rare honor. A rare honor, indeed!”

  Moshe had that sinking feeling. Mandrake had been expecting the helicopter, just not now. The aircraft was his escape route ahead of the asteroid strike. But what was this dubious “rare honor”?

  He didn’t guess for long. The chopper landed on the roof of the rectangular structure with two heavy thumps. Light poured in from above as a trap door opened and closed, and shoes clanked on metal steps.

  “Ladies and gentlemen,” Mandrake boomed. “Prepare to meet your Maker!”

  Chapter 83

  A knocking on the cabin door disturbed the captain of the USS Ohio during the climax of his favorite movie, The Hunt for Red October. He paused the player on his iPad, pulled off his earphones, and prepared to unload his annoyance on the visitor. What now? The crew knew better than to disturb him on his off time. A month of latrine duty should teach the NUB a lesson.

  But when he swung the steel door open, his executive officer stood in the passageway, apprehension painted over his face. His annoyance evaporated, replaced by the same nausea he had experienced only yesterday.

  “Is the sea monster back?” he whispered.

  “No, sir.”

  The captain exhaled a pent-up breath, and his nausea returned. They were on their way home and nearing for the Strait of Gibraltar. “Well, what is it?”

  “Orders just came in.” The XO handed him a printout of a decrypted message.

  The captain read the orders, and the sinking feeling returned. After ten years in the Silent Service, he’d thought he’d seen it all, but within the space of two days, he’d been blindsided twice.

  “This must be a mistake.”

  “I asked for confirmation, sir. Confirmation received and double-checked.”

  The captain swore under his breath and grabbed his captain’s hat. Without a word, the officers hurried down the narrow, rounded corridor to the Command Room.

  “Did you check with the other subs?”

  “Yes, sir. They all received identical orders.”

  Dear Lord. The orders were clear and so were the ramifications. World war. Mutual assured destruction. The end of civilization.

  A dozen pairs of nervous eyes greeted the officers as they burst into Command and Control and took their positions.

  “Officers, open the launch tubes.”

  “How many, sir?”

  “All of them. XO, relay the target coordinates.”

  “Done, sir.”

  The captain moved from his seat to peer over the shoulder of the launch engineer. He had launched dozens of missiles in training simulations but had never encountered coordinates like these. “What’s with that extra figure, officer?”

  The officer looked up. “Altitude, sir.”

  The captain took a few seconds to process the information. “The target is airborne?”

  “Yes, sir. Well, to be more precise, in orbit.”

  The hotshots in the Oval Office were taking out satellites. The Trident missile had an internal guidance computer with precision correction provided by its star sighting navigation system. But hitting a satellite required accuracy beyond the missile’s capabilities.

  And what satellite justified that much firepower? Each missile contained twelve warheads, each with a yield of one hundred kilotons—six times more destructive force than the nuke that flattened Hiroshima. Yesterday, sea monsters; today, attacks on UFOs?

  He returned to his seat. At the end of the day, he was a soldier and he’d execute his orders. He just hoped the President knew what he was doing.

  “Officers,” he said. “Wait for my mark. Launch commences in five minutes and counting.”

  Chapter 84

  Moshe dangled over the water chamber as their visitor stepped off the metal staircase and walked to center stage. Moshe’s mouth dropped open. Prepare to meet your Maker, Mandrake had said. In many ways, the man was just that. He was also the last person Moshe had expected to see here today.

  “Hello again,” the man said,
in English and with his usual Texas drawl.

  Moshe gawked at the silver-haired, suited juggernaut that was Reverend Henry Adams. Words eluded him. Had the reverend flown in to save him? Or had he also fallen into Mandrake’s trap? The American stood beside the rabid magician, two old friends surveying their handiwork.

  Adams looked over his shoulder at the three bound men. “Rabbi Yosef,” he said, by way of greeting, then turned back to Moshe. “I’m sorry our arrangement has to end this way. You were doing so well. Far better than we had anticipated.”

  Moshe found his tongue. “Did Isaac Gurion put you up to this? Don’t believe a word he says. He’s a liar!”

  Adams chuckled. “Oh, I know. Not a pleasant man, either. He had a way of getting ahead of himself. But this time his head got away from him.” He smiled at his own joke. “He won’t be bothering you again. Or anyone else. Not unless he returns from the dead as you did.”

  The words stunned Moshe back into silence. Gurion was dead. Adams had seen to that. But why?

  “If it’s any consolation, you make a much better messiah.”

  “But I’m not the Messiah!”

  “What you are doesn’t matter, only what people think you are.”

  Moshe thought he understood. “Your messiah didn’t show, so you want the other messiahs dead?”

  Adams sent Mandrake a bemused look. “Moshe,” he said, his voice patronizing and disappointed. “We never wanted a messiah. The New Evangelical Church of America is a front, a helpful tool to part fools and their money. Our organization is larger than any one religious institution. And far, far older. Its tendrils stretch around the world, and yet each branch knows little of the others.”

  Adams drew near and stared up at him. “The last few centuries have been very good to us. We made tidy profits off wars and drugs. Now we’ve gone hi-tech. Anything can become a weapon in the right hands: airplanes, medicines, words. The most powerful by far is hope.

  “Take Paradise, for example. The hope for a spiritual reward in the hereafter allows good people to endure suffering and ignore injustice in the here-and-now. And why not? This world is just a passageway. God will repay their injured souls a thousand-fold in Heaven. So, they busy themselves with their prayers and their rituals. Fixing the world isn’t their job, anyway. That task belongs to the Messiah.

  “And so, while believers yearn for paradise and the redeemers of tomorrow, our organization spreads its roots today.”

  He pointed at Moshe and snarled. “Then you came along with your resurrection. The afterlife is here. People would ask questions. ‘Is this our ultimate reward?’ ‘Is this is the only world?’ ‘Should we stop praying and start paying attention?’ All we needed was a messiah to come along and declare the end of history. But history must go on. Hope must go on. Our business model depends on it. And so, the Messiahs must die.”

  Now Moshe did understand. “You kept the Dry Bones Society close, waiting for the Second Coming, so you could nip the Messiah in the bud. When that didn’t materialize, you created your own messiah. I was a natural candidate. But when I refused to claim the title, you set up this coronation and got Gurion to lure me here.”

  Adams bowed his head, then circled back to Mandrake.

  “It won’t work,” Moshe said, desperate to keep the conversation going. “I’m just one man. Others will rise up after me and complete the work I’ve begun.”

  Adams seemed amused. “Will they? Messiahs have cropped up over the ages. They all failed. Many met unpleasant deaths, and my predecessors were glad to help out with that.” He winked. “But guess what happened right after the messiahs’ spectacular failures. Did their believers give up or change their tactics? Oh, no. Their faith increased. They had misread the signs or miscalculated the dates. The Messiah would be back and even sooner than they thought.”

  The reverend—no, the Anti-Messiah—glanced at his wristwatch. “And now, history repeats itself once again. And where better than Jerusalem, the Eye of the Universe, to which all believers turn in hope. Your plan to save the planet might just work, Moshe. We appreciate your efforts on our behalf. Once the dust settles, the survivors will discover that, alas, their Messiahs have perished. The hope will go on. And we’ll be there to reap the profits.”

  Adams turned to Mandrake. “The stage is yours.” Then, to the room at large he added, “Please forgive my theatrical colleague over here, but I find that, now and then, it’s best to indulge his flair for the dramatic. Enjoy the show.”

  Mandrake raised his sword.

  “Wait!” Moshe cried.

  But Mandrake didn’t. He swung the blade with all his might at the rope.

  Chapter 85

  Irina stared at Alex, the gun in Boris’s hand forgotten. Was it true? Had Alex known about her former life and not told her? What role had he played in that life?

  “Oh, yes,” Boris said. “You go way back. Isn’t that so, Alex? But you didn’t tell her. I understand why.”

  She searched Alex’s eyes for the truth. His face turned pale, but he said nothing. His silence said it all. Alex was not the man she thought she knew.

  Boris turned to her. “Our boss entrusted Alex with a whole new department. He placed advertisements in Lithuanian newspapers, offering secretarial work overseas for a few lucky young women. The job required no prior experience, only a photograph. The approval process was very selective. But when the lucky applicants, all pretty girls from unfortunate backgrounds, arrived in Israel, they learned that the work expected of them required neither typing nor organizational skills. Instead of the stylish business suits in the adverts, their dress code was—how shall I put it?—minimal. The office conditions were cramped, the work hours grueling. The customers many and demanding. Not the gentle sort, either. They cared little for the girls’ personal safety, and they always got their money’s worth.”

  Boris chuckled. “No, this was not their Promised Land. But what’s a poor girl to do? Their employers had taken their travel documents. They were illegal aliens employed in forbidden work in a foreign country. And they were in debt. Their handlers demanded recompense for their travel expenses. They didn’t speak the language. And their shame was great. So, they shut their eyes and held their noses, resolving to endure their two years of hard labor and return home.”

  Irina’s limbs stiffened. Often, she had fantasized about her first life. As a wealthy heiress—a modern-day princess—she flitted across the globe to exotic getaways and dodged the advances of celebrities and moguls. Then she fell into the powerful embrace of her tall husband and doted on her brood of laughing children. Had the truth been far darker?

  Alex stared at the floor and swallowed hard. Had he deceived her into a hellish life of the worst human slavery? Her head shook from side to side. No, it couldn’t be.

  “One girl stood out from the others,” Boris continued. “She made the most of her situation. A born organizer, she took charge of the other girls and kept them in line. She learned the language. Soon, her hard work paid off. Alex gave her more responsibility and improved conditions. A special bond formed between them, the pimp and his star performer. He fell in love. Then tragedy struck.” Boris adopted a tone of fake sympathy. “His lady love used her new freedoms to escape. She alerted the authorities, and Alex’s world came tumbling down. Only it didn’t. Fortunately for Alex, the policeman the girl had turned to belonged to the Organization.”

  Tremors shuddered through Irina’s body. She could guess what followed. Her former life had ended in violence, the violence that had damaged her brain and obliterated her memory. To hear Boris spell it out was almost too much for her to bear, but she needed to know, to bring closure to months of uncertainty.

  Boris tutted. “Alex’s boss wasn’t happy. He made sure she suffered for her crimes and never escaped again. Then he let Alex clean up the mess. And what a mess it was. Alex was never the same again. But the boss had a soft spot for him.”

  Alex stood there, his head hung low. Irina digested
the information. She had thought that once she learned the truth of her first life, the memories would come gushing back. But although the words shocked her, the tale seemed strange and foreign. That wasn’t her. Those terrible things had happened to some other poor girl. For once, her amnesia was a blessing and not a debilitating curse.

  The gray-haired slave driver turned to Alex. “But this fairy tale has a happy ending. Years later, Alex gets a new mission—to infiltrate the Dry Bones Society. And who does he meet right out of the gates, but his old sweetheart, back from the dead. Only, she doesn’t remember him; she remembers none of it. Good old Alex thinks he’s hit the jackpot. They can continue their romance where they had left off, only this time without all that unpleasant baggage. And this time, it’s Alex who tries to escape.”

  Alex made eye contact with her. His eyes begged her to believe. He was sincere. Despite his past deeds and despite the ugly circumstances of their first meeting, he was prepared to leave it all behind. For her.

  Boris sighed, his face a mask of pity. “Of course, his boss finds out, and he sends me here. But don’t be sad. We’re getting to that happy ending. The girl had a second chance at life, and so Alex’s boss gives him a second chance, too.” Boris got up, placed his gun on the kitchen table, and flopped back on the armchair. “But this time Alex has to silence the girl himself.”

  Every cell in Irina’s body tensed. No, he won’t do it! Alex loved her. He wouldn’t kill her. But did she know him anymore? He had made her disappear before. Was he willing to die for her? She held his gaze, waiting for his signal, waiting for him to refuse.

  Alex’s eyes lost focus. He glanced at the gun on the table. Taking one large step forward, he picked it up and raised his arm, and the man she loved aimed a gun at her head.

  Chapter 86

  Duct tape binding him to a chair, Yosef stared at the horrific scene on the black stage above. Moshe dangled over a glass deathtrap filled with water. A magician’s sawing box entombed Ahmed, who minutes ago had saved Yosef’s life. This was wrong—so very wrong!—and in more ways than one.