He didn’t stop to dwell on the destruction, or loss of life, as his own survival was at stake. He was certain there was nowhere safe to run from what was coming, but that didn’t stop his legs from moving him as fast as possible away from the oncoming wave. So he ran towards the stern of the ship along the melted surface of the jogging track, with burning wood deck planks on either side. His mind was not totally paralyzed. He was trying to think of the best place to go. He even paused to look over what remained of the outer railing and saw that some of the lifeboats were still attached to their davits, although the protective canvas covers had all been burned off, or melted onto their decks. Several boats were hanging at strange angles. Other lifeboats were missing entirely, having been ripped away by the blast. It didn’t matter now. There was not enough time for Armando to go down seven decks to reach a lifeboat, although he suspected that the fully enclosed boats would survive even the largest Tsunami. No, he needed to find a place to ride this out on the upper decks. Glancing back towards the bow his bladder finally betrayed him as he saw the wave towering a thousand feet above the ship and realized it would arrive in mere seconds.
****
Captain Krystos stood tall behind the helm and tried to keep his knees from shaking as the mammoth wave approached his ship head-on at hundreds of miles per hour. By the time it was five miles away it became clear that this wave was taller than the ship was long. It towered a thousand feet or more above the otherwise calm sea. But it didn’t behave like a normal swell, or even a typical rogue wave. There was no foaming crest threatening to break at any moment. This wave was more like a moving mountain, a giant ripple or bulge that transmitted its energy smoothly through the surrounding sea. That was the only thing that gave him a glimmer of hope for the ship’s survival.
“Mr. Crawford, sound the collision alarm,” the Captain said before speaking into the PA microphone again. “All hands and all passengers brace for impact. Confirm all watertight doors secure. This will be a roller coaster ride on a very large wave. God bless and Godspeed.”
This time they would stand their ground on the Bridge, or try to. Everyone there, including Kevin, grabbed a handhold and said silent or mumbled prayers as they gazed up at the unfathomable wave towering over them. The Captain took over the helm himself, just in case instinctual and instantaneous course corrections could help the ship survive the event. Gripping the small steering wheel, staring up the face of the wave, he spoke loudly in his native Greek, reciting a line from Homer’s Iliad. If he had been speaking English the people with him would have heard, “Everything is more beautiful because we’re doomed. You will never be lovelier than you are now. We will never be here again.”
All their hopes were momentarily crushed when the bow of the ship dug into the base of the wave, disappearing in a cloud of white foam and spray. Water buried the forward deck and rushed towards the Bridge windows. Then, just as all hope was lost, they felt the deck tilt drastically and the bow rose to ride up the face of the wave. A massive wall of water did indeed strike the Bridge, engulfing the front windows and gushing inside through the broken windows on the wings, but then it flowed back out as the bow rose like a rearing steed.
The Sedulity groaned and protested the stresses placed on her hull, but she didn’t buckle or break. The face of the wave was gradual enough that the ship transitioned to climb it, instead of snapping like a twig, or being totally engulfed and sunk. Within a second or two the Sedulity was pointing up at a 45 degree angle, riding the parabolic cure of the sinusoidal wave created by the asteroid impact. Up, up, faster than any elevator, the ship climbed the unprecedented liquid mountain of water. The Captain, crew, and Kevin held on and issued cries that mingled fear and despair with defiance and triumph.
Chapter 4:
The impact of the Rouge created displacement waves unlike anything ever recorded. All of the Tsunamis in history were child’s play by comparison. The waves spread out across the Pacific Ocean in concentric circles, traveling faster than any race car. These impact generated Tsunamis followed the same course as the atmospheric blast wave, but would have much farther reaching and devastating repercussions. Mountains of water were rolling towards every nation of the Pacific Rim and nothing could stop them.
The event didn’t go unnoticed. The Pacific Tsunami Warning Center in Hawaii was one of the first places to receive a hint of the danger. Their first clue was the abrupt and unexpected loss of one of their mid-Pacific senor buoys. That was interpreted as a technical fault, when in fact the buoy had been pulverized by the asteroid. Their second wake-up call was a massive seismic event on the mid-ocean seafloor that emanated from close to the suddenly missing sensor. Their third wake-up call came from three other buoys that suddenly reported unprecedented wave heights a few minutes later. The sensors reported waves hundreds of feet high.
The Tsunami sensor system was designed to measure very small differences in seal level and it mistakenly read these unbelievable readings as malfunctions. It couldn’t compute the concept of waves that big. A fault alarm was sent to the monitoring stations and logged as an anomaly. It would take precious time and several additional alarms to convince those monitoring the system that something unimaginable was actually happening.
The first wave was over 1,000 feet high when it reached the SS Sedulity eighteen minutes after impact. It was moving at close to 300 miles per hour and was shaped like a giant fluid speed bump, a massive moving hump that transmitted the force of the asteroid impact across the ocean. In shallow water it would have reared up to smash the ship, but here in the open ocean the amplitude and moment of the wave remained smooth and even, allowing the ship to climb it like a car would climb a hill. The Sedulity was the only surface vessel within 500 miles of the impact zone known to survive this wave.
Armando decided to seek refuge in the elevator lobby of the upper deck, just forward of the 24 hour buffet restaurant. He was not sure if it was the best place to be, but it was the only shelter he could reach before the monster wave hit the ship. As soon as he entered the shattered doors from the upper deck Armando was convinced that he had made a mistake. The blast wave had ripped through this deck and most of the windows were gone. Worse than that, Armando noticed that the outer bank of elevators, the glass ones with a view of the ocean, had also lost all of their glass. The whole atrium was open to the elements, which were none too friendly at the moment. Fires raged on every level down the twelve deck central shaft of the ship. What had been designed as an architectural centerpiece had become the pit of Hades. A glance towards the restaurant showed no hope there. Flames and smoke raged unchecked.
Armando had only seconds to decide. He spotted an open elevator door on this level, one of the inboard elevators that was still intact, overlooking the atrium. He knew the power was out and it wouldn’t take him anywhere, but he was just looking for somewhere to hide. He ran into it and wasted two seconds trying to close the doors with the buttons. Then he grabbed one of the doors and tried to close them manually. It was no easy task, but Armando was strong and desperate. He got the doors more than halfway closed before he ran out of time.
Suddenly the ship shuddered and groaned as it hit the wave. The impact released the stops on the elevator doors and Armando was able to pull them together smoothly. It was a good thing too, because only seconds later the ocean tried to claim him. Water surged into the lobby, poured over into the atrium and leaked through the cracks of the closed elevator doors. Armando froze, convinced he was going to drown in an elevator perched more than a hundred and fifty feet above sea level.
The initial wave of water did pour into the Upper Deck lobby and some of it did find its way into the elevator where Armando cowered in fear. Most of it, however, spilled over the atrium balcony, following the path of least resistance to shower down onto the burning decks below. Armando watched through the glass walls of the elevator as the waterfall cascaded down and suppressed the flames on numerous decks of open atrium below. Suddenly the angle of the deck
shifted drastically and Armando fell against the side of the elevator as water sloshed around his ankles. Most of the water that had made it inside the Upper Deck flowed aft, towards the stern, through the burning buffet restaurant, away from the elevators and atrium. Armando almost thought the elevator was rising to the Observation Deck until he realized that the whole ship was climbing a mountain of water.
****
Mrs. Krystos heard her husband give the warning to expect a roller coaster ride. It scared her, but gave her confidence that he was still at the helm and knew what to expect. That was far more than any of the passengers and crew in the theater could say. Their fate was in the Captain’s hands, and those of God. Lydia said a silent prayer for God to guide and spare her husband as she took a seat in the front row of the theater. She only had a moment to wonder what would happen next before it did.
There was a thunderous BOOM, different than the blast wave, but deeper and almost more terrifying, when the bow of the ship dug deep into the wave. Nobody in the theater knew exactly what was happening, but Lydia and a few of the crew could make a good guess. It was confirmed when water started to rain down from ventilation ducts in the ceiling. The bow was submerged.
Thankfully that only lasted for a moment before the deck rose and the people found themselves leaning back, as if their seats had turned into reclining chairs. They were pressed into their seats by acceleration too. It felt similar to being in a jet airplane performing a maximum climb takeoff, but this was a thousand foot ship at sea! Lydia couldn’t imagine a wave big enough to lift the ship like this! But what else could it be?
****
Amanda heeded the Captain’s warning, but there wasn’t much to hold onto in the lobby of the stairwell and she didn’t fancy being thrown across the room again. She picked up Emily and went to sit on the stairs where she could wrap her arms around the handrail stanchions. Renewed alarms and panicked cries echoing up the stairwell were the only warning she received before the whole ship shook, groaned, and tilted. In a moment she was no longer sitting on the stairs leading to the deck above, she was hanging from the railing and “down” was back towards the elevators. Luckily this was the forward bank of elevators, not the ones that overlooked the atrium, or she would have been looking at the possibility of falling into open space.
Emily clung to Amanda, who clung to the railing and they felt the sensation of acceleration as the ship climbed the wave. She had no view of the event, but she could feel it happening. Her terror was only increased when water rushed down the corridors on both sides of the lobby, flowing towards the stern. If ocean water flooded the halls on a deck this high, she reasoned, it was already too late to head for the lifeboats. Amanda had no way of knowing that this was the result of the ship’s initial headlong plunge into the wave, that water had momentarily gushed into all the balcony staterooms through shattered windows, or that this had actually been a blessing in disguise by putting out hundreds of raging fires. All she knew was that her world had literally been stood on end and she feared the true end was coming soon.
****
After the Captain’s warning Lieutenant Reiner called to the crew who were still fighting flames near the lifeboat muster stations. He instructed them to ignore the flames and help or carry injured passengers back into the more sheltered casino, where other surviving passenger were gathered. Reiner wanted to save Staff Captain Stevens, but obeyed orders by dragging a badly burned and overweight woman towards perceived safety. A final look at Stevens convinced Reiner that the Staff Captain was probably beyond saving anyway.
Moments later the Sedulity hit the wave. Reiner was knocked off his feet again and found himself and the woman he was dragging thrown forward into the casino as massive amounts of seawater flooded into the ship through the shattered windows of the Martini Bar. Then, as suddenly as the water came, it retreated towards the stern of the ship and Reiner was rolling back towards the Martini Bar. He caught a glimpse of Staff Captain Stevens, or his body, flowing out one of the broken windows with the wave surge, destined for a fitting burial at sea. Then he looked beyond those broken windows and saw one of the lifeboats get torn from its damaged davit and swept away too.
Lt. Reiner caught a handhold on the Martini Bar and pulled himself up to stand at an odd angle. Others, passengers and crew alike, slid past him, following the retreating water towards the stern where gravity and inertia pulled them. He couldn’t understand it for several seconds, then he looked out the shattered windows again and realized that the ship was climbing an impossibly large wave. The face of the wave extended off into the distance, wrapping over the horizon, which lengthened as the ship climbed higher and higher. It was a terrifying and awe inspiring sight, one that the Lieutenant found difficult to comprehend. That the ship could even climb the face of a wave like this was miraculous, but Reiner swiftly came to the shocking realization that what went up must come back down. Once it crested the wave, the ship would drop back into the trough. He steeled himself to fight his way back “up” into the casino, towards the screams of terrified passengers, to warn them what to expect next.
****
Kevin almost felt exhilarated as the ship climbed up the wave. He stood at the back of the Bridge with one foot on the deck and another on the aft bulkhead. It felt like he was in an old carnival fun-house, gazing up, out the front windows at the crest of the wave and the star filled sky far above. It was hard to believe this was really happening, but all his senses confirmed it. Glancing to the side, out the shattered windows of the Bridge Wing, he saw the extent of the endless wave wrapping around in a gigantic arc. It all happened in a few seconds and then they reached the crest of the wave.
Kevin wasn’t sure what he had expected to see on the other side, but nothing he could have imagined would have matched this sight. From this commanding height he thought he could see all the way to the asteroid’s glowing point of impact, although it was obscured by the solid column of superheated steam that continued to shoot up into the stratosphere. No longer a mushroom cloud, it had gone far beyond that. The massive steam cloud was spreading almost as fast as the ocean wave and glowing streaks of molten material were falling from it like a rain of fire in the night sky.
Kevin could discern the wide arc of the wave as they perched briefly atop it and, worse, he could see at least two more monster waves following this one. They were smaller, to be sure, but still towered hundreds of feet high. Between them were deep troughs. It was a classic sine wave structure that Kevin should have expected. Yet it came as a shock to realize that even after riding down the backside of this colossal wave, it would not be over yet.
“Dear God,” called out Mr. Crawford. “There’s more of them coming!” This was met by groans and whimpers from the rest of the Bridge crew. All but Captain Krystos. He let loose a barking laugh of bravado that silenced the rest of them. This time he quoted Homer in English. “By hook or by crook this peril too shall be something that we remember!” he yelled as the ship crested the wave.
The Sedulity went over the top of the wave smoothly and shot down the far side like a falling stone. The ship itself was not moving fast, but the wave was. The decent was so abrupt that those aboard felt almost weightless as the deck literally dropped out from below their feet and the ship transitioned from 45 degrees bow up attitude to almost 45 degrees down angle in a second or two. The Captain’s earlier warning of a roller coaster ride was quite apt, especially now that they knew more of the same was in store for them.
****
Armando thought the elevator had failed, that he was plummeting to his death, when the ship tilted again and fell away beneath his feet. Then he noticed that everything else in the ship was responding the same way. Water that had rushed towards the stern now flowed forward. Things in the atrium that had toppled aft moments ago were suddenly tumbling towards the bow.
It was hard for Armando to believe, but it looked as if the ship had actually made it over the monstrous wave and was heading back down towa
rds sea level in one piece and still afloat. That alone was more than he thought possible. His ears actually popped from the change in air pressure during the descent.
Looking down into the smoke filled atrium through the windows of the elevator suspended above it, with seawater swishing around his ankles, Armando realized that the wave had actually helped put out the fires raging below. Just enough water had entered the Sedulity to help extinguish the flames, but not enough to actually flood the ship. He even spotted a few people moving around on the lower decks now. They were the first living souls he had seen since herding the foolish spectators out of the Sky Lounge. It felt good to know that he was not the only survivor aboard, but he knew that many lives must have been lost. What he didn’t know was what to expect next, except that he wouldn’t have to wait long to find out.
****
Lieutenant Reiner was taken by surprise when they crested the wave and the ship nosed over the other side. He had been climbing the deck, up into the casino one second, shouting for everyone to hold onto something, and the next second he was falling through the casino towards the blackjack tables. He watched others go through the same transition from up to down, all but a few losing their footing or handholds to tumble towards the bow. Some of the slot machines even broke loose from their bolts and tumbled into the mix, crushing several passengers.
Then, when Reiner thought it couldn’t get worse, the flood that had flowed aft when the bow was pointed towards the sky came rushing back, carrying all manner of debris, including dead bodies and terrified people who had been swept up in the surge of water. The torrent swept through the casino, snatching more passengers, and continued forward towards the shops and theater beyond. Reiner scrambled up onto a blackjack table and stared in mute horror as churning seawater and debris swirled by beneath it.
Sedulity (Book One) Impact Page 5