Daniel liked to work alone. Possessed with a brilliant mind, he was totally absorbed in his work on the Bible code. He was one of those people who could solve a Rubik’s Cube in less than a minute. When not busy working on codes, he loved cooking French food and collecting fine bottles of wine from vineyards around the world. Despite his service in the higher echelons of the Israeli military, those who knew him well considered him a Renaissance man. No one would have been surprised that he had retreated to his computer in the command center to work on the code in the face of the tragedy in Houston. He needed the time alone to reflect on man’s inhumanity to man, and working on the code allowed him to think.
The glow from the computer screen highlighted his intellectual features. His tussled brown hair and beard, along with his round horn-rimmed glasses, gave him the look of a perpetual student. He scrolled through endless permutations in the code for the hundredth time in an effort to find some clue to the meaning of the chapel under the Vatican. Ever since he had found the first mention of the chapel in the code months earlier, its significance had eluded him.
In 1993, American astronomers Shoemaker and Levy had discovered a comet streaking toward Jupiter, and after measuring its speed and trajectory, they estimated that it would hit the gigantic planet on July 16, 1994. Several years later, after the collision had occurred as predicted on that date, when Daniel had been a mathematics student at the Hebrew University, Professor Lev Wasserman was trying out a new skip sequence in the code when he discovered something that shocked him to his core. Encoded in the book of Isaiah was the mention of a collision of a comet with Jupiter on the exact same date … July 16, 1994.
The precise date of the comet’s impact with the planet had been encoded in the Bible three thousand years before the actual event had occurred. The day Lev shared this discovery with Daniel was the day Daniel Meir became convinced that the code was proof of a higher power at work.
He was just about to turn off the screen when he noticed some words highlighted in red. Right in front of him was the phrase … under the Vatican. He stopped and scanned the page up and down, looking for something, anything. There! To the left of the phrase, the words holy chapel jumped out at him.
Perspiration formed across Daniel’s brow and trickled down his temples while he continued to scan the page for other hidden words. He didn’t have to scan for long. Across the bottom of the page was the longest phrase in the code he had seen to date … God will send his chosen guardians to take the book to the holy chapel. That was it! That was the chapel’s secret. It had been constructed to receive the book. Daniel thought back to the passage that said they will give it to God. The answer to how they would give the book to God was right in front of him.
Then, something else caught his attention … two more phrases. Satan will bring fire to the world and his forces will come for the book. Running up horizontally from the bottom, he saw another phrase pop up on the screen … the evil one will strike back. The encoded messages were coming at an exponentially faster rate. He sat transfixed as the computer continued to reveal more hidden phrases … The book holds Satan’s plan and Tribulation until God takes the book.
Daniel ran his fingers through his beard and stared at the screen. For some reason, God wanted Satan’s book taken to the chapel … and He was using His chosen ones to do it. But for what reason? He read two of the phrases over again; the evil one will strike back and his forces will come for the book. Was the attack on Houston Satan striking back? What next? Chills ran up Daniel’s spine as he realized the danger they were all in.
He had to tell the others. He hit the print button and ran off a copy before running upstairs and outside to the poolside bar where everyone was transfixed in front of the TV. No one moved or spoke as they watched the images of the devastation in Houston scroll across the screen. Daniel grabbed Leo by the arm and shoved the printout into his hand.
Father Leo’s face drained of color before he turned to John. “John, where’s the Devil’s Bible?”
“Alon and I decided to lock it up in the weapons room until we leave for Rome.”
“From now on, John, we can’t let it out of our sight. I don’t know why I didn’t think of it sooner. The book must always be in the possession of one of us … one of the chosen.”
“That room is made of solid concrete, Leo. It’s got a thick steel door like those used in bank vaults. Besides, no one could possibly get into that room with all the security they have around here.”
“We can’t underestimate the power of the book or those who may want to take it. We’re dealing with supernatural forces that dwell in an entirely different realm from us, and no amount of concrete or steel will keep them out. The book needs to be kept in the possession of one of the five who took it … one of the chosen. I just pray that we’re not too late.”
The tragic news of Houston was pushed into the background as everyone jumped from their chairs and raced through the villa and down the stairs to the command center. No one spoke. They all stood looking at the locked steel door as Alon began punching the combination. A series of clicks, and then, slowly, the heavy door began to swing open. The group stood by and held their collective breath while Alon and Leo stood at the entrance and waited.
As soon as the door was halfway open, Alon reached in and switched on the lights. John’s backpack was still lying on the floor where he had left it. Everyone rushed forward, trying all at once to crowd through the doorway. Leo knelt down by the backpack and peered inside. He exhaled a sigh of relief and reluctantly pulled the nightmarish object out into the open.
The Devil’s Bible was obviously a very ancient book. It was thick with a red covering made from some unknown type of material. The front of the book was covered in raised black symbols … unknown symbols from a dark world. Excluding the mysterious symbols, no other markings were present.
Leo hesitated before opening the cover and leafing through the thick parchment-like pages. There was no doubt in the priest’s mind that this book was a real instrument belonging to Satan, and he felt a panicky need to drop the book to the floor. The mere touch of it sent shivers up his spine. He sensed a malevolent force beginning to permeate the very air they were breathing, and he knew the power within was strong.
Without warning, something flashed in the periphery of Leo’s vision just as a warm breeze touched their faces. He stepped back with the realization that there was something in the room with them. He grabbed a flask of holy water from his shirt pocket and quickly doused the book with the liquid. A loud thump shook the building. It was followed by a low snarl that was heard by everyone as the smell of something dead and rotting began to fill the air.
Everyone began to cough and gag in an attempt to rid themselves of the noxious odor, while several broke and ran from the room in an effort to get as far away from the odor and intense feeling of fear they felt in the book’s presence.
“I think that smell is coming from the Devil’s Bible,” Ariella shouted.
Lev leaned closer before stepping back and holding his hand over his nose. “It is!”
Leo quickly doused it once again and prayed. Slowly, the odor started to subside, along with the evil presence they had all felt was so close just moments before. It was as if the book was a living entity, dying in the absence of its master.
Could it be decaying? Had the book been somehow protected from disintegrating under the sands of the desert, encased inside Satan’s cathedral? Leo examined the unknown writing on the cover before realizing that he needed Daniel’s talent with computers. “Daniel, could you come here for a moment?”
A look of horror crossed Daniel’s face as he approached the book as if it were alive. “What do you want, Father?” He felt like his heart was going to stop. The thing repulsed him, and he wanted nothing to do with it.
Lev held his hand up in front of Daniel before walking over and running his fingers across the raised symbols on the cover. “What’s on your mind, Leo?”
“We’ve got to scan this book page by page into the computer so we can analyze it later. I’m concerned the book itself might be changing somehow, and we can’t risk losing what’s written inside. This book could very well hold a code like the one in God’s Bible … a code that we can use in the future.”
People who broke codes for a living possessed a special curiosity when it came to solving puzzles. That was why most of them entered the field in the first place. This same driving curiosity was now pushing Daniel to overcome his revulsion at being so close to pure evil as he looked around at the others before slowly reaching out and taking the Devil’s Bible from Leo’s hands. “Any idea what this thing is made from?”
“Looks kind of like leather,” John said.
Holding it at arm’s length, Daniel walked over to his computer station and laid the book on the scanner. “I’ll clip a piece off the back cover and send it to the lab for testing.” He snipped a small piece from the corner, and then, with a scholar’s methodical touch, he began to scan it, page by page, until the entire text was uploaded into the computer. The exact nature of the material the book was made from was still unclear, but Daniel noticed that water had obviously not harmed the book when the cavern flooded.
A unique curiosity was also the hallmark of a good archaeologist, and Ariella was no exception. The ancient book seemed to mesmerize her as she reached out to touch it. Lev’s hand shot out and grabbed her by the arm as if he had seen a poisonous snake on the table.
“I think enough of us have touched it. We still don’t know what kind of power it has.”
Ariella nodded and stepped away, knowing that her father had undoubtedly felt something dark and evil within when he had touched the book.
When Daniel was finished, Leo took the book and placed it in a waterproof plastic bag. He then placed it inside a clear container filled with holy water and slid the whole package inside John’s backpack and handed it to him.
“Never ever let that book out of your sight again until we get back to Rome,” Leo said.
John looked directly into Leo’s eyes. “You can depend on me, Father. Where I go, this book goes.”
Everyone’s nerves were shot. Events were rushing at them from all directions, and Leo was growing fearful that things would spin so out of control that the team would reach a point where they would be unable to emotionally and psychologically process it all.
The nuclear attack in America, together with another close encounter with an unseen force within the command center itself, was creating an environment of constant fear. The fear of the unknown, coupled with the fear of what lay ahead in a worsening global situation, would soon drive everyone into overload.
What they all needed now more than anything else was reassurance and a break from the constant pressure. Many of them had still not come to grips with what had occurred in the desert the night before and were in a mental state of detachment resembling battle fatigue.
After Leo discussed the situation with Lev, he motioned for everyone to follow him upstairs. He led them outside and over the wooden walkway across the dunes until they came to a stop at the water’s edge. Father Leo stared straight out at the sea. He didn’t look back, and he didn’t speak as his puzzled followers gathered behind him. With no hint of why they were there, God’s chosen warriors sat on the warm sand and felt the spray from the sea bathe them in the briny perfume of the ocean.
Leo kept his back to them and waited. The steady rise in animated chatter over the roar of the surf, punctuated by the occasional laugh, was evidence to the priest that the tension was beginning to drift away, like the sea foam that blew from the rippling edge of the encroaching tide.
Like most solitary people who sought natural settings to think, Leo knew that environments like waterfalls and beaches produced tens of thousands of negative ions in the air. These invisible molecules were believed to produce biochemical reactions in the blood that increased the levels of the mood chemical serotonin, helping to alleviate depression and relieve stress. Some said it was the action of the pounding surf that produced the euphoria, while others said it was simply the relaxing atmosphere of the beach itself. Whatever the reason, Leo knew the environment was a perfect setting for the group to decompress together for awhile.
Inhaling some deep breaths, Leo turned to his curious audience. “Before I begin, I want you all to know that you’re a very special group of people. It has truly been a blessing to get to know each and every one of you, and to be a part of your extended family.”
Ariella smiled at the others. “Oh boy, we must really be in trouble.”
A few nervous laughs erupted from the group, but they kept their eyes focused on Leo.
“A short time ago, Daniel discovered some new information in the code. This new information is suggestive of the fact that we might have interfered with Satan’s plan for the world by taking his Bible. Also … and the reason isn’t quite clear yet … God’s chosen ones have been given the task of taking the book to the ancient chapel we discovered under the Vatican. With that being said, we can be sure that Satan will now come at us with everything he has.”
Everyone let out a gasp.
“Satan is very angry now, and it’s conceivable his influence was behind the attack on Houston. His increasing influence on mankind could be the driving force behind God sending us out into the desert to retrieve the book. As impossible as it may sound, I think we may be witnessing the beginnings of a second war between heaven and hell, and God is calling his chosen together as soldiers. A growing number of people have fallen away from God’s teachings over the past few years, and because of it, the world is now standing at the edge of a precipice.”
The group sat blinking at Leo, not really knowing what to expect next. Lev pulled a cigar from his shirt pocket and put the unlit stogie in his mouth. “I don’t think I want to see another Sodom and Gomorrah. Why don’t we get you and John back to Rome with that book today?”
John raised his hand. “Won’t that be a little difficult, since all commercial flights have just been canceled in response to the attack on Houston?”
Lev gave him a wink. “We’ll figure something out.”