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and David were close, but what do you think he'd want? Do I hafta remind you
that Rayford lost two wives and a son? That Tsion lost his whole family? I'm
not discountin' it, and I'm not sayin' you don't have a reason for wanting to
stay away from Petra. But David was my boss and my friend, and this is no
picnic for me either."
"I know."
"We're all going to need some grieving time, and we won't likely get it until
we head back to the
States. Meanwhile, we need you, Hannah. We don't have the luxury of grieving
the way we used to.
Too many people countin' on us. Now there may be nothin' for you and Leah to
do inside Petra, but you know well as I do that none of us helpers are
guaranteed safety. Who knows what kinda walkin'
wounded we might have showin' up to drop people off?"
She nodded. "Mac, um, you'd better pull over."
"Ma'am?"
She pointed past him, out his window. A guard hung out the passenger side of a
GC vehicle with a submachine gun pointed at Mac.
----------
"Well," George said, "that was just about the most amazing thing I've ever
seen. Do we keep testing our luck or do we get on to Petra?"
"If you think that was luck," Rayford said, "maybe-"
"Just an expression, Cap. I know good and well what that was."
"Let's stay here and watch," Abdullah said, craning his neck to see the
chopper that had fired on them.
"No need to be in the middle of everything," Rayford said. "Get someplace
where we can observe without unduly drawing more fire."
----------
Chang phoned Tsion early in the afternoon Chicago time and walked him through
how to broadcast live over international television from right where he was.
"Is your monitor somewhere that you can stand behind it and survey the room?"
"Yes."
"Have someone sit where you're going to sit, and see what you can see past
them. Anything that would be a clue to your whereabouts, get rid of it."
Tsion asked Ming to sit in his chair at the keyboard, and he squeezed between
the back of the monitor and the wall. On the opposite wall a clock would give
away what time zone they were in.
"Chang," Tsion said, "let me get rid of the clock, and then the background
will be a blank wall."
"Good. And then, can you tell me how long your message-wait, sir?"
"Go ahead."
"Why not just change that clock to Carpathian Time and let people wonder where
you are?"
"Interesting."
Ming broke in. "Won't they see it as an obvious trick, Chang?"
"They might if we made it prominent," he said. "Put it in the corner of the
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shot, and I'll make sure it's out of focus. People will think they have
discovered something unintended."
"My message will be short, Chang," Tsion said. "Just enough to encourage the
believers before you transmit Chaim's salvation message audio."
"Excuse me, Dr. Ben-Judah, but I'm getting something on my Phoenix 216 bug.
Stand by."
"You go and get back to me later."
----------
Mac held up a finger to the GC as if requesting a moment before he pulled
over. He had speed-
dialed Rayford. "Permission to fire upon the GC before they shoot out our
tires."
"Denied, Mac. Just elude. Let God work."
"He can work through your nine millimeter, can't he?"
"You still have that?"
"Sorry."
"Just don't stop," Rayford said.
"Even with a flat?"
"Call back if they flatten your tire."
Mac stopped in the middle of the road with the GC next to him, but he refused
to roll down his window.
The GC pulled in front of Mac. When the passenger got out, Mac backed up and
pulled around the vehicle, and the pursuit began again. When the GC got close,
Mac slammed on the brakes. "Sorry, friends!" he yelled. "Shoulda told y'all to
buckle up!"
The GC stopped within inches of Mac's bumper and they both jumped out,
shouting and waving weapons. Mac took off again, and as soon as they jumped
back in and accelerated, he swung left, popped a U-turn, and swung in behind
them.
----------
Apparently Carpathia still suspected the Knesset Building and thought his own
plane was most secure. Chang followed an indication on the audiometer from the
patch to the bugs there, and sure enough, it sounded as if workers were
setting up for yet another meeting in the first-class cabin.
A couple of stewards were speaking in an Indian dialect, so Chang quickly fed
it through a filter
David had recommended and an immediate interpretation came up as captions.
"They will not destroy the rebel airstrip, then?" [ Pobierz całość w formacie PDF ]