by Larry LaVoie
“Retreat is not an option,” Montgomery said.
“And you think we have, how long to do this?” the President asked ignoring the general.
“The truth is no one can predict the exact moment. If, and it’s a very big if, the ground continues to swell at its present rate I’ve calculated a month, but it could happen tomorrow. That’s why the evacuation has to start now.”
Montgomery started to say something. The President lifted his hand to stop him and said to Bainbridge, “We appreciate your time, Dr. Bainbridge. I’ll take your suggestion under advisement.” He and Montgomery stood up.
Bainbridge glanced up at them and rose to his feet. The meeting must be over. “I hope you will act on this soon,” Bainbridge said in a final attempt to sway them. “Millions of lives are at stake.”
The President extended his hand to Bainbridge. The President squeezed the scientist’s hand and leaned down putting his mouth close to Bainbridge’s ear. “You are not to mention this meeting to anyone. I would personally consider word of this getting out a serious breach of National Security. I can count on you, Dr. Bainbridge?”
Bainbridge was befuddled. Why weren’t they taking this more seriously?
“Dr. Bainbridge,” the President persisted. “Just until we can put a plan together, okay? We don’t want to panic anyone.”
“I understand,” Bainbridge said, nodding. In fact he didn’t understand at all. Why would they want to keep such important news quiet? Hadn’t they taken him seriously? Of course they had, they invited him to the White House.
President Turner held out his hand again and embraced the volcanologist’s elbow with his other hand. There was a flash of light. Until then Bainbridge hadn’t noticed the camera set into a corner of the office.
“Just a second,” the President said. He nodded toward Bainbridge and gave him a big smile. “I had this camera installed recently. A lot of visitors want a little memento of their visit.” He went over to a desktop printer and retrieved a color photo of the two shaking hands. “Aren’t these digital cameras fantastic?”
He removed a pen from his desk, signed the picture and handed it to him. A background of the American flag was superimposed behind them. He turned to see if he had missed something in the room. No flag. Digital cameras were wonderful. They could just as well erase him from the picture and say he’d never been there. He smiled and took the picture.
“You hang on to that. It’ll be worth a fortune someday,” the President said.
He thinks this is a joke, Bainbridge thought, but he said looking at the picture, “A good likeness, Mr. President.”
The President and General Montgomery watched as Bainbridge and an escort disappeared down the hallway. The President waited until the door was closed and said to Montgomery, “Better put a tail on him. I don’t think he can be trusted to keep this quiet.”
“Already done, sir,” Montgomery said. “What do you want to do with the report?”
“Bury it. We’re dealing with a modern day Jeremiah, for God’s sake, forecasting the end times. Evacuate the entire Midwest, then what? I’d become the laughing stock of the country if nothing happened; besides it would devastate the economy. How the hell would we move a population like that and where would we put them?”
“It can’t be done,” Montgomery said.
“All the more reason to see none of this gets out.” He shook his head and set his jaw. “Jesus. I worked my ass off to get elected. I must be crazy to want this job.”
Montgomery nodded almost imperceptibly. “Sir, may I be excused?”
“Certainly, General.” The President looked up as the general was opening the door. “General?”
Montgomery turned around. “Sir?”
The President motioned him back in. “This conversation never took place.”
Chapter 7
Bainbridge glanced at his ticket stub and scanned the cabin of the wide body aircraft. He looked down the many rows of seats wondering where he’d find 28A. A flight attendant approached him and reached out for his ticket.
“Down twenty rows, a window seat on this side of the aircraft.” She gave him a friendly smile and continued checking the overhead compartments for baggage space.
Bainbridge shuffled to his seat and, with great difficulty, stuffed his bag in the overhead compartment. Seeing there were no others in the row, he slipped in and sat next to a window. He needed a nap, but as he looked out on the rain-soaked runway of Baltimore/Washington International he couldn’t help but think about the strange meeting he’d had with the President. On the long cab ride from the White House he’d had plenty of time to consider the ramifications if the President did nothing. They couldn’t possibly think he would keep such a disaster a secret, National Security or not. He wasn’t the one who asked to talk to the President, they had practically kidnapped him. He considered other options, giving the President the benefit of the doubt. Maybe they would break the news carefully so the public wouldn’t panic, but if his instincts were right, Washington was planning a cover up.
The more he thought, the more the doubts crept in. I must have sounded like an idiot. Evacuate a six-hundred-mile area. He hadn’t given a lot of thought of what that would mean. Until now the fallout zone was nothing more than an area on a map and he hadn’t determined the logistics of such an evacuation. He wondered if the smirk the general had been wearing was because they couldn’t imagine the task. But why would that make a difference? If they didn’t try, regardless of the difficulty, millions would perish needlessly. Maybe they didn’t believe him and were just checking him out. Montgomery had said if it had been anyone else they would have thought it a joke.
Bainbridge tried to picture what an evacuation would be like. Certainly the states to the east of Yellowstone would be at the highest risk. Evacuate them first. The Dakotas and Nebraska were at high risk, then the states that bordered Wyoming—Idaho, Utah, Montana, Colorado. Washington, Oregon and California might survive if the winds were right. How many states was that? As his mind ticked off the states the absurdity of it all became apparent. There must be at least a ten-million people in that area. No wonder they ushered me out so fast. But what else was there to do? For the better part of the last twenty years he had dedicated his life to monitoring volcanoes so he could predict eruptions in time to save lives. The government couldn’t stand by and watch that many people be annihilated, could they? My God, he thought, they think I’m Chicken Little running around yelling the sky is falling. They’re not going to do anything.
He looked up at that moment and saw a man wearing a black suit and sunglasses board the plane. Curious, he thought, he looks more like Secret Service than the men guarding the President. The man made his way down the aisle and took a seat behind him.
He felt a hand on his shoulder from behind and it startled him.
“Excuse me, sir. You’ll have to fasten your seatbelt.”
His eyes angled up at the pretty face. She was all smiles, just starting out in life. She reminded him of his former students at the University of Utah. Like him, many of them were dedicating their lives to monitoring the earthquakes and ground movements close to volcanoes. He and his students had saved thousands of people in villages in Africa, the Pacific Rim islands and Ecuador. He had stressed the importance of responding in time to warn the people. They had flown to active sites at a moment’s notice and set up monitoring stations often in places where there were no government agencies to help. They had made a difference in as many foreign countries as he could count on his fingers and toes. Why would Yellowstone be any different? But deep down he knew it was. Yellowstone wasn’t in a far off land where the peasants could pack up their belongings load them into oxcarts and beat up pickup trucks and flee to a neighboring town. Yellowstone was too large, too massive a volcano. No matter where you lived in the United States there would be no escaping Yellowstone’s wrath.
He felt the plane start to creep away from the gate. Outside he saw lightning flash
, a nearby thunderstorm. Then the announcement came over the loudspeaker. They would get in line on the runway, but would have to wait until the storm passed to take off. It was like a bad omen.
He went back to considering the problem. Even if they evacuated a six-hundred-mile wedge southeast of the park, who was to say that would be adequate? What if the wind shifted? How many more would that claim? He was an old man. He could have retired years earlier, but he’d stayed around, thinking he could make a difference and this is where it had gotten him? Sarah had died while he was less than thirty miles away monitoring Mount St. Helens. He’d seen so little of his son and now Greg hated him. It was too late to make it up now. There was nothing left in his life, but volcanoes.
Finally, he made a decision. He knew what he had to do. He had to get the word out, return to the mountain and stay with it until the end. Make a statement like Harry Truman had on St. Helens.
Harry Truman had owned Spirit Lake Lodge. It commanded a pristine view of the snow-capped peak from the east side of St. Helens. The lodge was tucked away in the wilderness, surrounded by miles of virgin forest, and a perfect hide-away for vacationers and sportsmen. Harry had refused to leave even as the mountain spit ash clouds in the final days before erupting. When the mountain finally blew, Harry Truman was never found and Spirit Lake was turned into a mud bog from the buildup of ash. Now, like Harry Truman, Bainbridge knew he could not leave Yellowstone. If the government was not going to evacuate, he would be there when it blew. But first he had a lot more work to do.
He used his laptop continuously on the flight back. He liked working from a portable office. He connected to the in-flight Internet service and tapped into the University of Utah USGS monitoring station. The latest seismic data showed several small earthquakes ranging from 0 to 2.5. He read reports from some of the park rangers. They reported feeling the latest quake but there was no damage. Good, maybe she was going back to sleep. He sent an e-mail to Carlene Carlson at the monitoring station in Yellowstone and sent another to his boss, Peter Frank. He hadn’t met with Peter Frank in over six months. He knew for Peter Frank, there were too many things besides the geological condition of the park to worry about.
While on the Internet he did a search for his son Greg Milton Bainbridge, whom he hadn’t seen since his wife’s funeral.
Greg had blamed his father for his mother’s death. Bainbridge put the thought of that day out of his mind and copied down the phone number. He would call him soon. Maybe they could meet at a neutral place. Maybe, maybe not. Greg could be as pigheaded as he was at times. Should have named him Junior. They were too much alike.
When he’d finished he made an in flight call to his attorney and had him draw up a new will. He didn’t know if anyone would be left on the planet to read it, but it seemed like the right thing to do. He stuffed his laptop under the seat in front of him and promptly fell asleep.
The night sky had been a fog of stars, too many and too brilliant to count, when Milton Bainbridge had been awakened in the middle of the night. Sarah and he were celebrating. Greg, had left the nest. He was heading to Omaha where he planned to spend the summer at an archaeological dig. Greg had never returned home.
Milton Bainbridge jolted out of a sound sleep. He had a burning sensation under his left arm. He touched the area with his fingertip. It was sore. Through the window he saw the sheen of bright lights glaring off wet tarmac. It was dark and sheets of rain whipped past the windows of the aircraft as they docked. Must be Portland, he thought. The trip with the three-hour time difference made it 11:04 p.m. Pacific time. After midnight in Yellowstone. His mouth was dry and his stomach upset. Airline food, he thought. He needed to get to a water fountain.
He watched the passengers file off. He waited, wondering how they’d managed to stuff this many people in a single airplane. He closed his eyes as the final few stragglers passed by. Finally he stood, reached into the overhead bin and tugged at his soft-sided bag. It gave way suddenly and he fell, landing with a jolt on the armrest of the seat across the aisle. The suitcase crashed to the floor. Damn, where had all his strength gone? He took a few deep breaths and struggled to his feet. He was dizzy, not thinking clearly.
“May I help you with that?”
Bainbridge looked into the pale blue eyes of a young woman in a navy-blue uniform with a red scarf.
Bainbridge struggled to lift the bag. “I seem to have lost my strength.”
The flight attendant picked up the bag. “I’ll carry this for you. Are you able to walk?”
Bainbridge took several rapid shallow breaths. His hands felt clammy and beads of sweat peppered his brow. It felt like the blood was draining from his face. He got up and followed the young woman off the plane.
Inside the terminal he thanked the flight attendant and stopped at a water fountain. He stared at the clear arc of water watching it move, in and out of focus. The room started spinning. He collapsed to the floor.
Chapter 8
South Eastern Nevada
Joseph Talant didn’t like the exposure of public executions. The NWR had kept a low profile for years and could not risk being exposed now. He took the call from the operator who called himself Boom Boom on a scrambled satellite phone. “Any witnesses?” Talant asked.
“Only a plane full. Don’t worry, no one seemed to notice.”
“Then he’s dead?”
“He’ll die of a heart attack. It takes time.”
“Return to Headquarters. I’ll file a report with Telska.”
“There’s a little problem,” Bobby said.
Talant rolled his eyes to the glassy domed roof of his office. “I thought you said it was done.”
“They took him to a hospital. You want me to check on his condition.”
“Don’t risk it. Let’s hope they don’t find the drug.”
Yellowstone Park
Carlene got the call from Good Samaritan Hospital as she was getting ready for bed. The doctor told her Bainbridge had suffered a massive heart attack and may not recover. He’d given them her name and asked them to contact her. She agreed to come as quickly as she could get out of the park.
She hurriedly filled a suitcase with clothes and set it by the door wondering what to do next. Her aging Honda hadn’t been started since she’d returned to Yellowstone after months of work at YVO. Portland was a nine-hundred-mile drive. She needed to catch a flight. She picked up the phone.
“I’m sorry to wake you sir, but I got a call from the hospital in Portland. Bainbridge has had a heart attack.”
Peter Frank was silent.
“He’s asked for me. I need the helicopter to get to the airstrip.”
“Of course. Tell Milton I’m rooting for him.”
That was it? Carlene cursed under her breath and summoned the chopper pilot and within half an hour was on her way to Butte, Montana, where she could catch an air taxi to Portland.
Portland, Oregon
“Miss?”
Carlene felt a hand on her shoulder. “Sorry, I must have dozed off.” It took a moment to remember where she was. The cab driver pointed to the meter and disappeared behind the taxi where he hefted her suitcase from the trunk.
She handed him two twenties. “Keep the change, but I need a receipt.” She looked up at the wall of glass windows of Good Samaritan Hospital.
Inside she checked a directory and discovered ICU was on the third floor. With suitcase in hand, just after eight in the morning, she trudged to the elevator. Her hair was matted, her eyes bloodshot and her teeth needed brushing. Please God, let Milton be alive, she silently prayed on the brief ride to the third floor.
Carlene stopped at the desk on level three and addressed a heavyset woman in a light green uniform. “I’m here to see a patient, Milton Bainbridge,” she said.
The nurse stood up immediately. “And you are?”
“Carlene Carlson.” Carlene smoothed her hair. “I’ve been traveling all night. How’s he doing?”
“He’s on o
xygen. He suffered a lot of damage. The doctor will be making his rounds in an hour.”
“Can I see him?”
“He’s been resting. He may not be awake.”
“I need to see him.”
“Follow me.” The nurse used her badge to unlock the security doors leading to ICU.
In he boss’s room, Carlene stood by the side of the bed not believing this was the man she had trudged up the mountain with only a few weeks earlier. His face was pale and gaunt, showing age she hadn’t seen before. An oxygen tube was attached to his nose. A tube ran from a drip bottle into his hand. A heart monitor beeped steadily.
“Milton,” she said softly.
Bainbridge opened his eyes and moaned.
She put her hand on his. “We need you back at Yellowstone.”
He pulled at her hand. “I’ve got some phone numbers in the drawer,” his voice was barely a whisper. “Call my son and see if you can find Jason Trask.”
“Trask?” Carlene asked.
His voice was so weak she could barely hear him. It was clear he had suffered tremendously. “Jason Trask. He’s in Sumatra. You need him.” He closed his eyes.
Carlene opened the drawer and pulled out a small tablet with a list of names and numbers. It wasn’t her boss's writing.
“He had me write down some names and phone numbers,” the nurse said. “He’s depressed, but that’s to be expected when someone goes through a trauma like this. My shift is over, but I’ll be around a while if you need me.” She handed Carlene a card. “Call this number and they’ll page me.”