Meet Me by the Lane: A Novel of the End, Part II

The dark, tragic history of America and the world's future continues. Carl Ring, the brilliant and eccentric and evil immortal warrior born in Germany, matured and seasoned and further molded by his time living in and fighting for Britain, and now serving once again the army of the United States, for which he fought during her first civil war two centuries ago-now she is on the eve of her second-continues to plot and plan Germany's, Europe's, and indeed America's bleak future. Ring is obsessed with the myths of Germany and Britain, he is maddened by the lingering memory of his ill and matchless wife from England who died in the late 1800s, he is enraged by the unstemmed rise of Russia and the East and Islam, and he may soon command every NATO soldier in Western Europe. His eventual role as the Antichrist of Earth is within sight as the Tribulation, the world's worst seven years on record, approaches. There are other players on this dimming, darkening stage who must be mentioned... There is Alexei Pushkin, Russia's final president who sees the storm clouds swirling and, while not entirely hostile to the West, begins to batten down the proverbial hatches so as to prepare his still-great nation for the worst. There is Darcloch, the ancient Scottish immortal described in "Starfall"-once vampiric, once a superhero, now a great evangelist who will not be silenced, and who may now be able to work miracles of a different and more lasting kind. And, of course, there is Count Dracula-still bloodthirsty, still deranged, still hateful of Darcloch for rejecting his sinister offers, still desirous of seeing the far more agreeable Carl Ring utilized to plunge the world into chaos, madness, murder, war. Vlad will get his wish, and his role in things may only just be starting. But there are also the tragic, more everyday figures of Greg Cobalt and Tracey Kahn...Cobalt is America's final evangelical conservative president, consumed by his own selfishness and hypocrisy and failure to change in vital ways or act on his own principles. Cobalt's administration is racked by unprecedented natural disasters like the Great Potomac Flood of 2049, and by his own incompetence and cowardice, particularly in failing to respond-not only to disasters like that flood-but also to tragedies like a massacre of American Jewish students minding their own business on a Jewish holiday. Tracey Kahn, while on some level better than Greg Cobalt, follows Cobalt and his brief successor with two full terms in office, but they are consumed by needless sexual activism and by a third war with Korea that, much like the second, yields very little but death and destruction and embarrassment and failure. America, like the world, continues to slide into the abyss, crying out for a savior. Above all else, there is Preston. Ryan Cooper Preston. America's last president...formal inventor of the Mark of the Beast...liar, manipulator, radical, the False Prophet predicted in the Book of Revelation. He cozies up to Russia despite his fixation on freedom, thinking that Russia has turned a corner and is ready to become a strong democratic ally of the United States, especially in what he believes is an imminent war with China. He takes pleasure in being different, he spurns the legacy of Greg Cobalt despite dating the former president's beautiful and politically radical daughter Joanna, he is an equal thorn for both left and right, he-like Ring, his future rival-looks only to himself. As the lights begin to go out for all those human beings who refuse to change their ways, Preston will be the one to keep the music playing, to provide the wine and caviar, to proclaim proudly-alongside all those foolish enough to dance alongside him-"I am fine, I am free, I am matchless, I am me." No matter what, he and they will have their way. The problem for Preston and all those like him, however, is this: so will Ring. So will Mother Nature. And so will God.