Langley Virginia
After being questioned they took Tom Baumann to a holding cell where he sat at a table staring at the white walls with hands clasped. A guard entered and offered him a plastic cup filled with coffee.
As he took the cup, he felt the touch of the man’s skin and power surged through him. He flew up and was pinned with his back to the ceiling. The guard laughed as he showed three sixes on the palm of his right hand.
The room exploded and Baumann soared up through the night toward the cold stars. He laughed as wings caught him and swept him down to the ground. He landed in a field and was approached by the guard who gave him the coffee.
“We’ve been waiting on you,” he said pointing toward a mass of black dressed men and woman.
As Baumann approached the mass, some took off their hats to show three sixes on their foreheads. Others opened their right hands to reveal the number.
“Ah, the Children of the Serpent!” said the grinning Antichrist.
“The Dark Army will break through a military line formed by the Christians across the country and head toward Washington. When they join up with us, we’ll have America on its knee’s.”
“Yes, and do I finish off the Christian… the religious world on my own, or is the old serpent going to show up!” Baumann asked himself as his eyes became crimson.
Later Ron Scrimgeour phoned David de Longford.
“Baumann’s escaped.”
“What?” asked David.
“He blasted out of our headquarters!”
“Shit!”
“I thought he was de-powered?”
“I can only assume that he was re-powered by someone in your camp. Mr. Scrimgeour we have to read the Book of Revelation and try to anticipate the oppositions next move!”
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Chapter Forty-Six The western side of the state of Missouri looked like a futuristic version of The Somme from WW1.
A huge bunker ran all the way from Minnesota in the north, to Arkansas in the south. The Christian, and other religious, troops massed in and to the east of the bunker.
The Dark Army had forced a break through the military line at this point due to most of their troops being in the area although large numbers were approaching the line from Minnesota to Louisiana.
Drones and helicopters flew over the bunker from both sides and attacked the opposing enemy.
Screams and cries came from either side as the deadly missiles exploded ripping bodies apart on either side, the only difference being that on the dark side some bodies reassembled.
Flashes and explosions of warfare on an apocalyptic scale lit up the sombre Missouri skies. F16
jets flew into the area, but the pilots were unsure which side to attack.
War ships in the Atlantic launched missiles at the side that opposed the crew’s beliefs. This was curtailed by F16’s screaming across the coast and attacking the opposing ships.
Thomson flew upright, slowly along the bunker between the two sides. His black jacket flapping in the wind, and his crimson eyes looking from side to side.
There was a lull in the fighting as both sides gazed in amazement at the sight of the devil levitating above the bunker.
“I’ve done this before somewhere! Must have been in another life,” he said to himself as a broad grin spread across his face.
He stopped and turned toward the Christian side of the bunker.
“Now for the parting of the Red Sea… oh no! I mean the parting of the bunker,” he said laughing as the piles of earth on the east side rolled away and the black spawn that was the Dark Army oozed.
The Christian soldiers tried to fire, but found that their guns had jammed. The only thing they could do was run.
“Come join us!” shouted Thomson as he flew past the abandoned armaments. “Join us, or be damned. Well, you’ll be damned if you join us, but at least you’ll be alive or should that be undead!”
The Dark Army flowed east absorbing all before it and spitting out dedicated Christians and any other religious people.
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“Mr President, sir the Dark Army are closing in on Washington, you and your family must go down into the PEOC,” said Aaron Edelman the white house head of staff.
“Okay Aaron, looks like it’s time.”
The metal shutters slipped down over the White House windows as Cavendish and his family along with Bob Laverty, the vice president, and his family descended the stairs to the President's Emergency Operation Centre under the East Wing. Some government members, the president's cabinet, and secret service agents were already there.
Across town the senators and military brass crept down into a vast concrete bunker with enough supplies to last fifty years. Meanwhile over the Potomac the shutters slammed down around the Pentagon and in McLean the CIA shut up shop.
“It’s time to examine the nuclear option Mr President,” said Laverty as seven dignitaries sat around the table in the main control room of the underground centre.
“Is it Bob?” answered Cavendish in a weary tone.
“I agree with the Vice president. We have to take drastic measures to stop this Dark Army,” said senator Dick Goodman the secretary of defence.
“But, gentlemen, an attack by us on American soil! And, on an army largely made up of Americans!”
“These soldiers have sided against us… against the United States and I’m afraid they have to be stopped,” said Secretary of State Mary Shields.
“Well,” said the president looking around the table, “it looks like I’m in the minority.”
He stood up and stretched. “What’s my options Brig?” he asked General John ‘Brig’ Neilson chairman of the joint chiefs of staff.
“Well, Mr President we can use short-range missiles with nuclear warheads from various land positions or from warships along the East Cost. But the reports I’ve been receiving have showed that the supernatural elements of the army put their selves back together after a strike, and they move on and recruit American citizens to replace the human loses.”
“These American citizens have waited behind rather than be evacuated,” said Mary Shields.
“We have to protect Washington and the eastern seaboard! Okay set it up Brig,” said Cavendish raising his eyebrows and assuming a placid look as he held up his hands.
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Chapter Forty-Eight Matthew and David had moved east, after an arduous journey, and were now encamped in an abandoned motel in a northern suburb of Washington. The sound of explosions from the television filled the room as a news channel covered action from the bunker.
“What are we going to do? Go home!” Matthew asked David who sat gazing out of the window at the steady stream of cars and buses heading north away from the city on the freeway.
“No, we have to stay here and take down Grondin and his accomplices.”
“But shouldn't we keep out of the way and let the Book of Revelation run its course?”
The golden rays of liquid sunlight from the dying sun flowed over the parking lot as David stood up and stretched. “Well, as we've seen so far, this will not roll out literally. In fact, I'm not sure about it at all!”
“Wasn't the book of Revelation about the fall of the Roman Empire and the ultimate triumph of good over evil?”
“Yes, but who's to say it wasn't a prophecy for what's happening now. We have the characters: Christ, Satan–the Antichrist. I'm not sure what roles we play though?”
“Angels!” laughed Matthew.
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Chapter Forty-Nine The short-range ballistic missiles screamed off from sites fifty miles west of the capital and sped through the clear sky toward their dark target. People pointed toward the streaks of white set against the blue background.
The projectiles were over their apex when they hit an invisible wall and exploded harmlessly; the nuclear warheads had been deactivated.
A figure flew upright through the air at about three hundred feet toward the capital.
“I am the Prince of the Power of the Air, and nothing shall pass,” boomed Thomson.
“Try the missiles from the warships in the Chesapeake!” The President shouted jumping out of his seat in the PEOC.
“Sir... it won't work. The warheads are somehow being deactivated. There's our problem,” said Neilson pointing at the image of Thomson on the screen before them.
Thomson landed in a field next to Baumann who immediately stepped back and bowed.
“You wondered when I would help you?" he asked holding up his arms. "Now for something that's going to blow your mind!”
Satan walked into Baumann and disappeared.
The crowds of serpent children cheered as Thomas Baumann flew toward the stars. He felt a million dark souls flow through his heart as he flew higher and higher unable to control the power that was coursing through his system.
“Right, get back down and take care of business,” said a voice in his head.
All of a sudden Baumann found himself at the head of the Dark Army, which blitzed on bolstered by Satan, pushing the US army further and further east.
“Look," shouted a dark soldier by his side, "the lights of Washington!”
Baumann peered through the dark and saw the rim of light on the horizon.
“Right gentlemen, there's our target, let's push these bastards off the face of the Earth!”
Eventually the Dark Army swarmed on the west bank of the Potomac where the Christian army had retreated. Demons danced on graves in Arlington Cemetery as others tried to break down the Pentagon defences.
Burning lit up the night sky as the dark masses led a charge to reconstruct the bridges destroyed by the defending army. Vehicles were thrown in the waters to build up make-shift platforms for crossing.
Soon the burgeoning troops of the Dark Army oozed off the west bank and invaded the beleaguered capital. The city was also being attacked from the north west as dark soldiers had crossed the river further inland.
Traffic jammed the free-ways heading north and east toward other major cities and the Canadian border. Cars filled with people who had abandoned belief in their army.
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