Chaotic Be Jack

by Robert Tarrant

  For the next fifteen minutes PJ attempted to make small talk with Mary while all kinds of potential reasons for Mark’s call ran through her head. In many ways she dreaded talking with Mark. After all if Jack was safe, he would have called himself. If Mark was calling, it was probably not good news. After the third time of Mary needing to repeat herself because PJ wasn’t listening closely enough, PJ excused herself and went upstairs to take her second shower of the day. Her phone was tightly clutched in her hand.

  Even in the shower, PJ never allowed herself to get more than a few feet from her phone. As soon as she stepped out, before even toweling off, she checked it to make certain there were no missed calls. It felt as if the device had suddenly become nothing more than a paperweight. She started to redial Mark but stopped herself. He would call back as soon as he had the opportunity. As anxious as she was to talk to him, she couldn’t think of anything she dreaded more at the moment.

  PJ had just finished drying her hair when her phone vibrated and buzzed. The screen confirmed that it was Mark calling. She snatched it up and sat down on the closed toilet lid. For some reason she wanted to be sitting down. “Hi, Mark, thanks for calling back.” She could hear a jumble of background noise coming from Mark’s end. He was obviously in a very busy environment. When he didn’t respond, she said, “Mark, are you there?”

  “Yeah, PJ. Just a second, let me find somewhere a little quieter.” It sounded as if he had placed his hand over the phone as the background noise was muffled, but certainly still present. Then suddenly everything went quiet. PJ thought maybe the call had disconnected, but Mark said, “There, that’s better. I think I found the only unoccupied office in the whole damn building.”

  PJ blurted, “Have you got news?” She felt her breath quickening as she waited for the reply.

  She could hear Mark inhale deeply before he said, “Well sorta. First of all, Jack Nolan’s name doesn’t yet appear on any of the victim lists.” Yet, damn it, he said yet. “I’m not talking about just our lists, I’m talking about the combined data base for the entire storm. The state is assembling the names of those injured and killed as reported by every jurisdiction. Now keep in mind that everything is still pretty chaotic in most of the damaged areas and some victims have not been identified.” He paused and then continued, “From initial reports, we are expecting the death toll to climb considerably. The storm track was very erratic. It seemed to bounce against the coast as it moved north. Come ashore, go back out, come ashore, go back out. Very strange. Some areas have catastrophic damage and thirty miles away the damage is relatively minimal or nonexistent. Even in our city we have pockets of total destruction and other areas with minimal flooding and almost no wind damage.”

  “What about the area east of the Intracoastal? Have you been able to get in there yet?”

  There was a pregnant period of silence before Mark said, “That’s why I wanted to call you. We haven’t gotten anyone in there yet, but we did make several passes with a video equipped drone. I coordinated the footage with the address of your friend’s bar.” Another pause. “It’s bad in that area, PJ. Very bad. It’s difficult to know exactly what buildings we’re looking at, the damage is so extensive. In addition there is a tremendous amount of debris all over the place. Nothing looks like it did yesterday.”

  PJ could feel her throat involuntarily closing. Finally, she found her voice. “How long before you will get someone into the area?”

  Mark exhaled deeply. “It’s going to be awhile, PJ. They won’t even attempt to lower the bridges until they’re inspected. We already have people crossing at the Lehman down in Sunny Isles Beach, but it’s going to be a tough battle to get all of the way north to the area of your friend’s bar. There is so much debris in the streets. Trees, cars, boats, building materials. The teams are going to literally be cutting and plowing their way. We don’t even know how long it will be before our guys can reach the city limits, and that’s the south city limits. They have to work north through Golden Beach first. Once they are able to get into the city, it’s not like they can just go directly to look for your friend. This is a block by block search, PJ. We’re going to move as fast as we can in an effort to find anyone who survived, but until the National Guard gets here with heavy equipment, the pace will be slow. I’ll stay on top of the progress that’s made, but it’s going to be a while.”

  PJ heard herself speak, but the voice wasn’t hers. “Please, Mark. Please get to Cap’s Place. He must be there. There are probably other people there, too. Please.”

  “PJ, we’ll do everything we can. I’ll keep you posted as things proceed and certainly call if your friend’s name turns up on any of the lists.”

  After the call ended, the words “your friend” kept echoing in PJ’s head. Yes, Jack was her friend, but he was so much more than just a friend. Or he would have been.

  CHAPTER THIRTY-FOUR

  After a few minutes the dizziness passed, or I became accustomed to it. In either case, I noticed that Justin was missing the concrete opening about half of the times he chipped at it with the makeshift tool. I was starting to feel as if our little bunker was steadily shrinking. I needed something to distract my mind. I rose on rubbery legs while attempting to steady myself with the table. The pain in my back reminded me of my ungraceful falls earlier. I more or less stumbled the couple of steps to the shelf that Justin was sitting on to work. As I landed on the shelf, he looked surprised, as if he had forgotten that other people were here with him. I said, “Here take a rest, let me take a few whacks at it.” I wasn’t certain, but my words sounded a bit slurred to me.

  Justin looked at me for the longest time, as if he was attempting to discern the meaning of words spoken to him in a foreign language. I reached out and grasped the tool with one hand while pointing toward myself with the other. He nodded and released his grip, sliding along the shelf until he was propped against the side wall. His eyelids were drooping heavily.

  After fumbling with my flashlight to get it turned on, I put my face near the hole Justin had been working on in order to survey the project. I could see that after he removed the metal box that held the outlet, he had cut the wires at the surface of the concrete wall. He’d been chipping at the concrete in an effort to enlarge the hole that the conduit passed through in hopes that he could drive it back out and open a passage for fresh air to reach us. For the first time I attempted to consider what was on the other side of this wall. Try as I might, I just couldn’t remember. Attempting to see into the hole, I put my face nearly against the wall. For just a second, I thought I detected air movement, fresh air movement. Then it was gone.

  I wedged myself into a cross-legged sitting position facing the wall, so that I could use the rocking motion of my body to thrust our makeshift tool into the hole. Justin had been correct, the work wasn’t difficult, just tedious. I also noticed that the end of the chair leg we were using was becoming blunt. That further reduced the already limited effectiveness of our efforts. I tried not to think of the futility of my task and attempted to concentrate on building a rhythm to my rocking. I couldn’t seem to maintain my focus.

  Suddenly, I realized that I wasn’t moving at all. I was frozen in my forward position. It took me a minute to understand that the chair leg was stuck in the opening. Damn it, give me back my chair leg. I wiggled the cumbersome contraption and it came free, nearly toppling me over backwards. I looked over at Justin to see if he had seen my klutziness, but I couldn’t tell if he had or not. His lids were only partially closed, but his eyes looked unfocused. Maybe it was just the dim light.

  I turned back to my project and realized I could no longer see the conduit at the opening in the wall. I leaned down and shined my light directly into the hole. The end of the conduit was a couple of inches back into the wall. Holy shit, it was working. I was actually making progress. The conduit was being pushed back. That’s how the leg got caught in the hole. I was elated. This called for a celebration. Beer for everyone. Hell no, champa
gne for everyone.

  I glanced around the cooler, we must have champagne here somewhere. Damn, I guess not. Oh well, no one seems to care anyway. Look at the three of them, they look like they’re half asleep. How can they sleep now, this is important shit I’m doing. They should be watching. Of course, to be honest I could use a little nap. Maybe if I took a little nap I’d be more effective. The job would go better. Maybe just a little rest.

  CHAPTER THIRTY-FIVE

  The humidity was a killer and all ten members of Task Force Charlie were soaking wet. The two police officers, four firefighters, and four public works equipment operators had been assigned to open a path on South Ocean Drive from the south city limits north to Dania Beech. The street was completely blocked with debris in many locations, but it was the main north-south artery east of the Intracoastal Waterway, feeding all of the side streets in the area. Until the draw bridges were inspected and lowered, all search and rescue operations would need to traverse the length of South Ocean Drive to fan out and search. Move as quickly as possible to open a path for the search and rescue teams that would follow was the assignment given Task Force Charlie.

  The fact that South Ocean Drive is a wide street, a boulevard separated by a raised tree lined median in many locations, was both a curse and a blessing. The curse was that most of the trees were now laying across the street. The blessing was that the wide boulevard made it possible to pick the point of least resistance at each location where debris blocked the street. The result was a serpentine route snaking up the street. It wasn’t pretty, but it got the job done.

  With the exception of the low spots, the water had receded from most of the street. Those areas still flooded were not nearly the hazard they had been a few hours earlier. Toppled power poles and downed power lines added to the tangle of debris that had to be cleared. It was going to be weeks before power was restored in some areas. As the task force clawed its way north, the sun rose high in the sky and the heat joined with the humidity to dictate frequent rest and water breaks. Progress was painfully slow.

  A few people who had weathered the storm in the area, most in high-rise condos, came out to talk with the responders. The high-rise buildings, built to modern hurricane codes, had withstood the storm with no more than cosmetic damage. It was the older buildings that had suffered the most. The collective opinion of the members of Task Force Charlie was that it was unlikely that any survivors would be found in the buildings that had succumbed to Ella’s fury. The destruction was too severe and the water levels had gotten too high during the storm surge. If the building collapse hadn’t killed them, the storm surge likely would have.

  It was early afternoon when the second of the two chainsaws the public works operators had been using conked out. The chain on the first had broken a couple of hours earlier. After repeated attempts to fix the second saw, the operator said that if they couldn’t find a replacement saw they were going to be out of business. They could push some of the trees out of the way with the front end loader they had with them, but in many situations the jumble of fallen trees made that impossible. One of the police officers suggested moving the chain from the dead saw to the saw with the broken chain. It was a great idea, except for the fact that the saws were of different lengths and makes. Task Force Charlie was told to take a break and a replacement chain would be sent out to them.

  The forced break was welcome as most of the members of the task force had been on duty for thirty hours, or more, with the only down time being the hours that everyone was ordered off of the streets during the height of the storm. They found what shade they could and dug into the bag lunches that had been sent out to them hours earlier. After consuming their lunches, a couple of the public works equipment operators wandered from the roadway toward the ocean in search of a breeze to cut the sweltering conditions. Picking their way through the rubble of what looked like it had once been a small building, they saw several boats strewn about a parking lot. It was then that they realized that the small building had once been the office of a marina and the boats had been pushed out of the marina and into the parking lot that surrounded a larger building with much of its roof missing, front wall was collapsed, and interior a huge pile of assorted debris.

  The first said, “Think anyone could have survived in there?”

  The second replied, “No way. Look at that place.”

  Drawn by the sight of a very large sailboat laying on its side in the back parking lot, they made their way around the building. A pickup truck and car were steps from a door near the rear of the side wall. The two looked at each other and shook their heads. One said, “Looks to me like someone was here. We should take a look. Maybe someone did survive and needs help.”

  “You heard our directions. Don’t go inside any buildings. They could collapse at any time. That’s what those search and rescue guys are for. They know how to do that without getting hurt. They have dogs that can search for people trapped.”

  “I don’t care, I think we should take a look.”

  The second said, “I’m not going inside that building. You can if you want, but I’m staying out here.”

  As the two continued their walk around the building they could see a large utility pole and transformer had crashed through the back wall and lodged itself at a forty-five degree angle. They completed their walk, picking their way around the boats and through the strewn debris, until they again reached the front. The first called through the gaping hole in the front wall, “Hello, anyone in there? Anyone there?” No reply. The only sound was the buzzing of a drone that seemed to be circling the building. Several drones were being utilized to survey damage and look for victims in the most severely impacted areas, even before rescue teams could arrive.

  The second said, “Let’s get out of here. Somebody is watching us with that drone and we’re not supposed to go into any structures. I’m not about to get my ass in a jam to find a couple of bloating corpses.” With that he turned and headed back toward South Ocean Drive. Reluctantly, his partner followed.

  CHAPTER THIRTY-SIX

  As the two public works equipment operators came walking back to the location of Task Force Charlie, one of the police officers was ending a call on his handheld radio. He looked at them and asked, “Were you two guys just poking around a building near the water?”

  The second one answered, “We walked around it, but we didn’t go inside.”

  “Any signs of anyone around?”

  The second one replied, “Nope. We even called out a couple of times. Nothing.”

  The first one spoke up. “Well, there are two vehicles parked right near the back door, but like he said, when we called out no one answered.”

  The police officer wiped the sweat off of his brow with the back of his hand. “Well, show me where it is. Evidently, the drone camera caught an image of something written on an inside wall. Couldn’t get a good view but thought it might be the words in here. They want us to take a look. Show me where you were.”

  The police officer and two of the firefighters followed the two public works operators as they retraced their steps to Cap’s Place. As they picked their way through the parking lot, the officer stopped and looked at the pickup truck parked near the back door. He unclipped the radio from his belt and spoke into it. A few seconds later he called out to the group, “Hold it there. Don’t go any farther. Let’s back away.” The other four were puzzled but followed his orders.

  Once they were all a distance back from the building, the officer said to the group, “That pickup was used in an armored truck robbery just before the storm hit. Both guards were killed. No one’s going any closer until we get some additional law enforcement here.”

  The two public works equipment operators looked at each other and exclaimed simultaneously, “Oh shit.”

  The police officer remained in a location where he could observe the pickup truck and the gaping hole in the front wall and the other men returned to the remainder of the task force. The replacem
ent chain had arrived and the group resumed their efforts to open South Ocean Drive.

  Forty-five minutes later additional police officers began to arrive in the area. With resources stretched thin across the city, the decision was made to search the building with a three person S.W.A.T. team. Utilization of a team that small for a building search was against regulations and required the approval of a senior command officer. The officers were surprised how quickly this approval was granted. Someone with clout obviously wanted this building searched as soon as possible. None of the officers were concerned about the shorthanded team, after all the building was mostly a pile of rubble surrounded by three and a half walls.

  A perimeter was established around the building. Officers covered each side in a pattern designed to minimize the potential for an accident of friendly fire. The three S.W.A.T. officers entered through the gaping hole in the collapsed front wall. Thirty minutes later they emerged and reported that while they found no one in the building, they had found the words in here spray painted on a large steel door in the kitchen area. It appeared to be the door of a walk-in cooler or freezer, but the door was held shut by a fallen utility pole partially resting on the back wall. If the killers of the armored truck drivers were in the building, they were trapped behind that door in a small space that had withstood the storm intact.

  The officers were told to hold their positions around the building until a senior command officer could arrive and a plan could be formulated. This was no longer search and rescue, it was now apprehension of armed and dangerous felons. Things would be done by the book.