After witnessing Nicolae Carpathia murder both Jonathan Stonagal and Joshua Todd-Cothran at a secret meeting where he would be assigning the men who would head up the new security council of the forthcoming Global Community, with Nicolae then telling everybody present that they have just witnessed a murder-suicide, Global Weekly news reporter Buck Williams joins with Rayford Steele, his daughter Chloe, and New Hope Village Church pastor Bruce Barnes to form the nucleus of a group called the Tribulation Force. As Buck travels to Israel to witness the signing of a peace treaty between that country and the Global Community that would give the organization seven years of licensed access to Dr. Chaim Rosenzweig's synthetic fertilizer formula in exchange for Israel's protection, he comes across theological scholar Dr. Tsion Ben-Judah, who was wrapping up his research on who the Messiah is and is ready to reveal the results of that research on live television. Eighteen months after the signing of the treaty, which the Two Witnesses in Jerusalem declare as the beginning of "the last terrible week of the Lord", United States President Gerald Fitzhugh is aligning himself with other former heads of nations to stage a rebellion against the Global Community so he could take back control of the nation, only to begin what would be called World War III, during which Bruce Barnes is found dead.
This story provides examples of:
- Blood Is Squicker in Water: The Two Witnesses show their power to turn water into blood during their days of prophesying, and vice versa, by doing such during the sacrificial rituals that go on in the completed Temple.
- Corrupt Church: Enigma Babylon One World Faith is started here, with Peter Mathews as its Pontifex Maximus.
- Deal with the Devil: The signing of the treaty that allows the Global Community to have licensed use of Chaim Rosenzweig's synthetic fertilizer formula for seven years in exchange for peace among the nations for Israel is seen as the very thing that initiates the seven-year Tribulation period, which according to Eli and Moishe is the final "week" of Daniel's "70 weeks" prophecy.Eli and Moishe: Thus begins the last terrible week of the Lord
!- Lampshaded in the text itself.
A covenant had been struck. God’s chosen people, who planned to rebuild the temple and reinstitute the system of sacrifices until the coming of their Messiah, had signed a deal with the devil. - Department of Redundancy Department: The following line may not have seemed quite so redundant in 1996 when this story was written, but certainly does today:"Buck...had secretly studied the feasibility of producing an anti-Global Community Web site on the Internet."
- If You Die, I Call Your Stuff: After executing both Todd-Cothran and Stonagal, Nicolae is the sole inheritor of both their estates. When the children of both men dispute the claim, Nicolae simply pays them off under the condition that they do not contest the will.
- Indirect Kiss: Buck removing a cookie crumb from Chloe's lip and licking it off his finger. Phew, get a room!
- Mistaken for Cheating: Buck and Chloe have barely started seeing each other, and Chloe sees Buck's secretary Alice Nelson outside his apartment with a ring on her finger and speaking with her fiance on the phone, making her assume that Buck was her fiance and that he was two-timing her.
- Not What It Looks Like: Chloe goes over to Buck's apartment and sees his Global Weekly office co-worker Alice outside it talking on the phone to her fiance while delivering stuff to Buck's apartment. Chloe assumes from that that Buck is Alice's fiance and was playing her for her affections all along. It takes a private talk between Buck and Chloe to straighten the whole matter out.
- This also gets carried over into the bouquet of flowers that Chloe assumed Buck had sent her, which she then threw into the trash after witnessing the previously-mentioned assumption. It turns out that the flowers were sent to Chloe by Hattie Durham as a joke.
- Playing with Fire: The Two Witnesses kill a Muslim who attempts to kill them by breathing fire on him.
- Practical Joke: Hattie plays a few of them on Rayford and his family, basically to draw his attention to the fact that he will be serving Nicolae Carpathia as his pilot. However, one of those pranks almost gets Rayford fired from Pan-Con.
- Romance-Inducing Smudge: This happens in this book, when Chloe is eating a cookie and has a bit of chocolate on her cheek. Buck leans over and wipes it off with his thumb, then eats it on impulse. Since the two have become hilariously repressed fundamentalist Christians, this is treated as a huge sexual milestone in their relationship. (Third base comes with chocolate.) Cookies later become a romantic symbol for them, almost to the point of creepy ridiculousness.
- Second Love: Amanda White becomes this for Rayford Steele during the first 18 months of the Tribulation, to the point where he marries her.
- The Something Force: The Tribulation Force.
- Time Skip: An 18-month time skip occurs between the time of Tsion Ben-Judah's televised revelation of the Messiah and the beginning of World War III.
- Translator Microbes: Eli and Moishe's preaching at the Wailing Wall, and their private talk with Buck and Tsion, are supernaturally translated into the languages of their receiving listeners. This is evident when Buck records the message of that private talk and finds out that the Witnesses were actually speaking in Hebrew. (In the original printing, Buck uses a cassette recorder for the talk with the Two Witnesses, while in the updated rerelease, he uses an MP3 recorder.)
- Wartime Wedding: Bruce Barnes performs a dual wedding of Rayford Steele with his bride Amanda White and his daughter Chloe with Buck Williams during the beginning of the seven-year Tribulation, if you count that as a war.
