Supercell

by H W Buzz Bernard

  GABI, AT CHUCK’S request, but slightly unsure of herself, took the wheel of the Expedition so Chuck could track the storms and maintain contact with Ty. They sped northward on a narrow county road beneath a death-shroud sky, the prairie grass on either side of them pressed almost horizontal by the wind. The pounding in her head had ceased, but her thought processes seemed mired in quicksand and her reactions restrained by heavy chains. She forced herself to focus on driving.

  “How long to the Gust Front?” she asked.

  Chuck looked up from his computer. “About 15 minutes.” He picked up his cell and called Ty. “You should be coming up on Pawhuska soon. Out of there, head south on route 99. Hustle. The storm will be bearing down on you from the west. You want to get south of its track, then set up somewhere just west of Wynona.”

  Chuck paused, listening to Ty’s response, and said, “Get back to me in few minutes.”

  He turned to Boomie in the back seat. “How ya doin’?”

  “Okay,” the goateed cameraman said, “considering I’ve never assembled a Panavision in a moving vehicle.” Gabi could hear click-click-click as he snapped together parts from three metal carrying cases. “I’ll have us a full-fledged Genesis in about five minutes.”

  He stopped to pet Stormy, who evidently was watching the operation with interest, perhaps anticipating the man might be building something that produced treats. “Good doggie,” Boomie said. “We’ll have to see if we can fit you into a few shots. Film audiences love to see pets . . . as long as they don’t get hurt.” He ruffled the fur on Stormy’s head.

  “Boomie,” Chuck said reflectively. “Where’d you get that name? I’ll bet you used to be a boom operator of some sort.”

  “Good guess. But no. I was in the navy. Served on nuclear-powered subs that carried ballistic missiles. The boats were known as ‘Boomers.’ Thus, ‘Boomie’.”

  The Expedition hit a pothole and jounced into the air. Gabi gripped the steering wheel with determined fierceness, her knuckles growing bloodless. “Sorry,” she said.

  “Make that seven minutes for the Genesis,” Boomie said. He bent to pick up a part that had tumbled into the foot well.

  “Black as an iron skillet,” Gabi said, studying the horizon ahead.

  Chuck bent to his computer. “Beautiful,” he said. “This thing’s definitely cycling. Got a TVS again. Intense. We may have gotten lucky.” He turned to Boomie. “You gonna be ready?”

  “Yeah. It’ll take a few minutes to get the Steadicam rig on and the Genesis secured, but I’ll be set.”

  “What do you mean, Steadicam rig?” Chuck asked. “I thought that thing you’re putting together is a Steadicam.”

  “No. A Steadicam is a harness, or vest. It supports a vertical armature with a camera on top and a counterbalance, usually a battery pack and monitor, on the bottom. With the rig in place, I can run while filming and the shot remains stable. It doesn’t come out all jiggly and jumpy.”

  “Like a human dolly,” Gabi said.

  “Good description. Might come in handy if I’m chasing a tornado.”

  “Or vice versa,” Chuck said.

  Ahead of the Expedition, continuous lightning painted the sky in blue-white spiderwebs of electricity. A muscular gust of wind buffeted the SUV.

  “No sign of a black GMC,” Gabi said, leaning forward, squinting, as if it would help her see through the dirt and dust whipping over the road.

  “Those guys got a pretty good jump on us,” Chuck responded. “They’re probably already at the Gust Front . . . if that’s where they were headed.”

  Stormy sneezed.

  “Gesundheit,” Boomie said. “Dusty in here, huh?” He continued to work on the Genesis.

  Gabi didn’t know how much, if any, of the Sam Townsend legend to believe. “So what’s your take on the hidden money and mystical Monty story?” she asked Chuck. “Half true, half tall tale? Total fabrication? The real deal?”

  “Your guess is as good as mine. But—”

  His cell rang. He answered. Ty, Gabi assumed.

  “Keep pressing south,” Chuck said. “The reason you almost got blown off the road is from the inflow to the storm. You’re okay. Where are you?” He listened to Ty’s response, checked his monitor, and responded. “Another five minutes. Then there should be a farm road on your right just as you enter Wynona. Take it. Then call me back.”

  He ended the call and addressed Gabi. “What I was about to say, is that Sam sounded pretty convincing when it came to this guy Monty, so I’m thinking he’s real. Real, but weird, I guess. The hidden fortune? Well, Sam has never directly denied it, just joked about it. But I guess that’s something you’d never just come out and say: Yeah, I’ve got a few million bucks stashed away around here.”

  “So it might be worth it then,” Gabi said, thinking out loud, “for these guys—assuming they are the killers—to run a little armed reconnaissance on Sam’s place, storm or no storm, knowing he’s off chasing. They’d know that, right? From the transponders?”

  “They would.” He paused. “Gabi?”

  “Yeah?”

  “You’ve got a gun, I trust.”

  “A Glock .40 caliber.”

  “You sure you’re gonna be—”

  She shot him a “back-off” glance. He didn’t finish the sentence. Let me be, please let me be. It’s hard enough dealing with a head-banging migraine. I don’t need all the solicitous questions.

  Chuck went back to studying his computer monitor.

  Stormy, growled—a warning, not a threat—and stuck her nose over the backrest of the front seat into Chuck’s neck.

  “Yeah, girl, it’s okay. I see it on radar.” To Gabi he said, “Go fast. We’re in a race.”

  Gabi snuck a peek at him and quickly read two emotions on his face. First, awe—perhaps something sought after on a tornado chase. Second, just a hint of fear—clearly a reaction that shouldn’t be there.

  Chapter Twenty-five

  SUNDAY, MAY 11

  LATE AFTERNOON

  “WHAT IS IT?” Gabi asked. She pressed the accelerator pedal to the floor.

  Chuck turned to Boomie. “The camera ready to go?”

  “Just about.”

  “And the Steadicam harness?”

  “Won’t take long. What’s up?”

  “The supercell we’ve been tracking has intensified again, really blown up. It’s damn sure got a tornado, and it’s a right-turner.”

  Boomie looked up from his work. “A what?”

  “Right-turner. Very intense supercells sometimes deviate to the right of where you think they should go if you just look at the steering winds. I thought this storm was gonna pass just north of the Gust Front. Now it’s peeled off to the right. It’s headed directly for the grill . . . and us.”

  Gabi switched on the Expedition’s headlights. A blizzard of dust filled the air as she reached the small town adjacent to the Gust Front Grill. She slowed. The howl of tornado sirens challenged the galloping wind. Along the main street of the village, people, their heads lowered against the gale, dashed for cover.

  Gabi looked at Chuck, seeking instructions.

  “Go through town,” he said. “We can make it to Sam’s place.” They weren’t in a good situation, but he didn’t want to convey his apprehension to Gabi and Boomie. Still, he knew he wasn’t hiding it well. His breathing became labored; it felt as if a wrecking ball of dread were crushing his chest.

  Boomie snapped a power cable into place on the Genesis. “Ready,” he said. He reached behind him and retrieved the Steadicam vest. Stormy paced from side to side in the footwell, alternately growling and whining.

  Ty called again.

  “We’re on the farm road,” he said. “It’s really black and really windy. Lotta chasers parked along the s
houlder. We must be in the right spot.”

  On his monitor, Chuck shifted the radar imagery to center on the supercell Ty pursued. Don’t need this, not now. Too damn much going on.

  “The cell still has a great TVS,” Chuck said. “It’s gotta be packing a tornado.” He studied the roadmap underlay. A quick scan. “Stay on the road you’re on another minute or two. It’ll intersect with County Road 5270. Take 5270 south—just a few hundred feet. That’ll give you a clear view back north. Get the crane and camera up. You’ll have about 10 or 12 minutes. The twister should pass just north of you, within a quarter of a mile.”

  “That’s cutting it pretty thin.”

  Chuck considered the possibility Ty’s storm could become a right-turner, too, similar to the one thundering toward Sam’s. “Look, if things go to shit, if you see the twister coming right at you, get out. You’ll be pointed south, so all you have to do is beat feet in that direction. Got it?”

  “Got it. Hey, we’re at the intersection.” Chuck heard Ty ordering Metcalf to turn.

  Ty came back on the phone. “A few hundred feet you said?”

  “Yeah.” Hurry up.

  Several moments passed before Ty responded. Finally he said, “Okay, we’re here. They’re getting the camera up.” A pause, then: “Oh, wow. I see a wall cloud. Four, maybe five miles away.”

  Chuck marveled that his son had the terminology down. “Tell Metcalf to start filming as soon as he’s ready,” he said.

  “I hear tornado sirens,” Ty said, his voice taught.

  “From the town you just came through. Look, Ty, I gotta go. It’s getting a little hairy here, too. I’ll get back to you as soon as I can.”

  Gabi pulled into the parking lot of the Gust Front Grill. On the front entrance of the building, a sign—CLOSED, GONE CHASING—flapped in the wind. No black GMC.

  “Let’s take a look around back,” she said.

  “Not much time left,” Chuck responded. His heartbeat, rapid before, ramped up even more.

  A plastic trash can, riding a spearhead of wind, bounced off the Expedition.

  Gabi, ignoring Chuck’s anxiety, circled the grill in the Expedition, but discovered no other vehicles.

  “Well, maybe those weren’t the bad guys,” she said, a smidgen of disappointment in her voice.

  “Might have been just a couple of amateurs out for the day,” Chuck suggested, relieved he had only one problem to deal with now: the tornado bearing down on them. Gabi was in no shape to be confronting criminals anyhow.

  “Damn,” she said. She pounded the steering wheel in frustration.

  “Look, there’s an alternative explanation,” Chuck said, wanting to keep her thoughts focused. “Maybe we were tracking the right vehicle. The guys in it would know a tornado’s bearing down on this place; they have access to the same info we do. They aren’t going to enter a building realizing it could become kindling in a few minutes. They’d seek shelter. Wait it out.” He glanced at the lowering black scud racing across the sky and the debris tumbling through the parking lot. “Which is what we oughta be doing. Right now.”

  “Hey,” Boomie interjected. “I didn’t come all the way out here to hide in a storm cellar. I wanna film this thing.”

  Chuck had to admit, the cinematographer was right. That’s why they all were here. To film a twister. But he hadn’t counted on getting quite this close to one. This wasn’t going to be like photographing African wildlife from a Land Rover. This was going to be like facing a charging lion, on foot, in the bush, with nowhere to run.

  They needed somewhere to run.

  “Stop here,” Chuck said to Gabi as they reached the front of the grill again. “Boomie, I’m with you. But I don’t want to get anyone killed just to film my million-dollar baby.”

  “Remember,” Boomie said, exuding confidence, “I can run and film at the same time.”

  “Well, you may have to. We’ve only got a minute or two left before this thing is on top of us. Let’s get out and take a look.” Only a minute or two? What am I thinking? He didn’t want to admit it, but he knew damn well what he was thinking: a million dollars.

  They exited the Expedition. Stormy darted out, too, barking furiously and sprinting in circles around the SUV. Warning sirens from the nearby town continued to moan.

  “Jesus, look at that,” Boomie said, gazing skyward, interrupting his effort to prepare the Steadicam for action.

  From an inverted black ocean of twisted and torn clouds, chunks of debris tumbled earthward in a slow-motion ballet. Aluminum sheets, asphalt shingles, fiberglass insulation, shards of paper, a plastic wading pool.

  “From the tornado,” Chuck said.

  “I’m ready for it,” Boomie announced, finished with his task. An odd sight: a squat, buzz-cut man in a “vest” holding a vertical armature with a motion picture camera on top, a monitor on the bottom, and the entire assembly secured to his vest by an articulated arm capable of pivoting up, down, and sideways.

  “Listen!” Chuck said. A low-decibel roar, like the beating wings of a thousand angels of death, mingled with the relentless wind and banshee sirens. “It’s coming.”

  He peered in the direction of the sound. No tornado, not yet, only black-on-black, end-of-the-world darkness. But he knew what hid in the blackness. Verging on panic, he swiveled his head, searching for shelter. Above ground, they wouldn’t survive a direct hit. Did Sam have a storm cellar? He couldn’t recall. Wait. Yes, he did. They’d parked by it the first day they’d visited here. Next to a generator.

  At the far end of the parking lot, he spotted it: the auxiliary generator. Adjacent to it, the mound of earth containing the tornado shelter.

  Boomie, already at work, tipped the Panavision Genesis skyward, capturing the debris circling overhead—effluent from the twister. Then he lowered the aim of the camera, pointing it at the dead-of-night horizon looming over the town. He gripped the armature with one hand and let the other swing freely, helping to maintain his balance in the howling wind. Oddly, the thunder had ceased. Then, even the wind seemed to falter.

  “Hey,” Boomie yelled, “Joseph Conrad should have seen this.” Heart of Darkness.

  Chuck, on his way to the shelter to open its door, turned and yelled back, “You’re right. But who knows, maybe he did.” He resumed his jog toward the refuge.

  Then a roar, unlike anything he’d ever heard, could ever have imagined, rolled over the parking lot in a thunderous, deafening explosion. It was as if a squadron of fighter jets preparing for takeoff, afterburners lit, engines at full military power, had blown away their blast shields.

  “Oh, my God,” Boomie screamed. “Oh, my everlovin’ God.”

  “Chuck!” Gabi yelled, the word a mixture of terror and awe.

  Stormy, ears flattened against her head, shot past Chuck and scuttled toward the generator.

  Chuck wheeled. Saw something he’d never expected to see. And—except for a half-century old newspaper photo—wasn’t sure even existed.

  Chapter Twenty-six

  SUNDAY, MAY 11

  LATE AFTERNOON

  IMMENSE, TENEBROUS, swirling. Not one funnel. Two. Side by side—massive twin tornadoes, full-grown adults devouring the small town a half-mile distant and churning relentlessly toward the Gust Front Grill. Chuck stood for a moment, mesmerized. Not quite grasping or believing what he was seeing. But there was no mistaking it. Not a twister accompanied by a wispy suction vortex or a ropy funnel. No. Conjoined monsters.

  He broke his hypnotic state and bellowed, “Come on,” motioning frantically for Gabi and Boomie to follow him to the shelter. He bent and yanked open the heavy steel door.

  Stormy, tongue lolled out in a heavy pant, burst from behind the generator and darted into the shelter.

  Gabi sprinted toward Chuck, debris showering around her i
n a cloudburst of shingles and siding and glass.

  Boomie, still in the Steadicam rig with the Panavision pointed at the approaching double twisters, backpedalled slowly, determined to capture the oncoming monster on video. A two-by-four plunged into the ground next to him. Had he been a foot to his right, his skull would have been shattered.

  Chuck screamed at Boomie to turn and run, but his words were no match for the ear-splitting clamor of the wind. A haboob of dust and airborne flotsam swept over the parking lot. Chuck gasped for breath. Gabi stumbled into his arms; he grasped her firmly and guided her to the top of the short flight of stairs leading into the shelter.

  Power flashes lit the huge tornadoes in a strobing blue-white counterpoint to their death-shroud blackness. A roof, as if launched by a Space Shuttle Booster Rocket, took leave of a building. An entire block of the small town seemed to explode, leveled not by a massive car bomb but by wind of incomprehensible violence. A mobile home, tumbling end-over-end through the air, disappeared into the maw of one of the funnels, swallowed by a whirlpool of obliteration. A car, disintegrating in slow motion, barrel-rolled down a street before being crushed by a volley of concrete and steel hurled into it at several hundred miles per hour.

  A large chunk of metal slammed into Boomie’s shoulder and he went down, losing control of the Panavision. Chuck sprinted from cover and grabbed Boomie’s Steadicam vest, attempted to drag him to cover. To no avail. A powerful gust slammed him into the pavement beside Boomie. They both lay in the open, the rubble of a dead town swirling around them in a macabre dance.

  Chuck struggled to his knees. A shard of glass buried itself in his cheek. He tugged on Boomie’s vest again, dragging him toward the sanctuary. The closer of the twin tornadoes reached the edge of the Gust Front’s parking lot, a couple of hundred yards away. Chuck swept his gaze toward the storm cellar—ten feet behind him. Ten feet to safety. Maybe.

  His world, now reduced to blackness and noise so deafening he felt suspended in silence, closed in on him, hell bent on only one thing: ending his mortal life. He closed his eyes against the stinging dust and chunks of wood and metal that flew horizontally through the blackness, flaying his face into hamburger. He concentrated on tugging Boomie to safety, a seemingly interminable effort. Tug. Pause. Tug. Pause.