by E S Richards
“Of course, dear,” Grandma Linda replied. “Don’t worry about them. That’s where they end up anyway during bad weather. I’m sure they’ve already made it their home now.”
Chase smiled, admiring how much his sister cared about all the animals. He had to admit, he was a little distracted. He hadn’t told anyone, but his cell had gone off earlier that day. He’d been out in the barn gathering some more hay to take to the chickens when he’d felt the familiar vibration against his thigh. It was such a familiar and mundane sensation that he almost hadn’t registered how important it was until the second buzz. He’d pulled the phone out of his pocket faster than he ever had before, lighting up the screen and gluing his eyes to it.
It was another news bulletin. How it had reached his phone when there was no cell signal available, he wasn’t sure. Maybe the towers were going up and down as power flickered around the area, giving him brief bursts of access to the Web before it went down again. There hadn’t been any time to get to his family, so Chase had stayed still and watched alone in silence.
FOX NEWS REPORTS: Tens Of Thousands Dead In Yellowstone Supervolcano Eruption
…kill instantly, so please, exercise extreme caution. We sadly expect this death toll to continue to rise dramatically over the following days. Remain on this channel for further information.
Again, if you’re just tuning in—we bring you an update on the Yellowstone supervolcano eruption. This message is being recorded at 11:23 p.m. EST, seven hours after the eruption took place. We have received reports of tens of thousands dead in the immediate Yellowstone area, the “instant kill zone” reaching out roughly 100 miles in diameter.
The Federal government is attempting to come together to provide aid, however the magnitude of the event makes responding extremely difficult. The ash cloud is spreading out across the country, with scientists predicting it is only a matter of days before it blankets the entire United States. As a result, we urge everyone to stay inside and start rationing food. Avoid traveling long distances and if you must go out, use protection. The volcanic ash from the cloud can kill instantly, so please, exercise extreme caution. We sadly expect this death toll to continue to rise dramatically over the following days. Remain on this channel for further information.
Again, if you’re just tuning in…
Chase could see his hands shaking in front of him as the message started to repeat again and he switched off his cell. A lot of what he had just heard was the same as what had been broadcast before, the warnings about the cloud, staying inside and rationing food. What was new was the death toll.
Thousands dead. The words stuck with Chase and echoed through his head for the rest of the afternoon. We have received reports of tens of thousands dead in the immediate Yellowstone area. The “instant kill zone” reaching out roughly 100 miles in diameter. 100 miles. That was a long way. He wished he knew what time Mia was supposed to have left the area. That message was now over a day old as well, the recording thankfully stating the time of its original broadcast. How many more had been added to the list of dead by now? Was his aunt among them? Chase zoned out during the various tasks that were needed of him for the remainder of the afternoon, though a part of him knew he would have to break the news eventually.
“There was another bulletin,” he blurted out loudly that evening, interrupting whatever conversation his sister and grandmother had been having about the cows and the chickens. The words fell from his mouth like a lead balloon, silencing the room completely as everyone turned their heads to look at Chase.
“What did you say, Chase?” Grandma Linda looked over at him with a concerned face, willing herself to have misheard her grandson in some way.
“There was another bulletin,” he repeated, this time slower and calmer than before. “About the eruption.”
“What did it say?” Pop asked after a few seconds of silence, no one completely certain whether they wanted to receive the update.
“Most of it was the same as before,” Chase started, already wishing he hadn’t said anything. He knew he needed to tell his family, but doing so was more painful than he had imagined. “They were warning people to stay inside, avoid traveling, ration food, and so on.”
“And?” Riley asked, shuffling her seat closer to her brother. She could tell there was something more. Something bad. “You said most of it was the same. What else did they say?”
“Thousands are dead,” Chase said quickly, forcing the words out of his mouth like they carried a bad taste. “Tens of thousands. The broadcast was made just seven hours after the eruption and they said that already thousands of people had died. They mentioned an instant kill zone which apparently covered 100 miles in diameter from the volcano. Anyone who was inside it won’t have had a chance of survival.”
Chase finished speaking, his mouth bone-dry. The scene in front of him was exactly like it had been the day before, all eyes on him as he delivered the news of what had happened. Riley and Pop were even sitting in the exact same seats. Chase watched each one of them in turn, waiting for someone to react. For someone to say something. Anything.
“This doesn’t change anything.” Pop was the first to speak after Chase was done. Thankfully his tone and his expression were completely different from how they had been twenty-four hours ago. He looked stronger than ever, more determined than ever. The old man pushed himself to his feet and looked to each of his family members in turn, commanding their full attention.
“This doesn’t change anything,” he repeated. “Of course, thousands are dead. A volcano has erupted. The volcano has erupted. But that doesn’t change anything for us. Not for this family.”
Chase looked up at his grandfather with wide eyes, completely enthralled by what the old man was saying. Grandma Linda and Riley were spellbound too. Pop sometimes had such a way with words that he could captivate entire crowds with only a whisper. It made everyone feel like things would be okay, like nothing could go wrong. Silently, everyone else willed the man to go on.
“We are still alive, and, until we hear otherwise, Mia is still alive as well. I have learned over the years to never underestimate my daughter. She is capable of incredible things, magical things. Thousands might be dead, but she is not one of them. I can assure you of that. Mia will come back to us and when she does, I’d bet my life that she needs us to be ready. So that’s exactly what we’ll do. We’ll carry on preparing. We’ll get this old farmhouse in order for whatever is to come. We’ll soldier on and we will come out the other side. Mark my words, we are Clarke’s and we do not give up so easily.”
Chapter 11
Mia’s hand involuntarily covered her mouth as she watched the woman stagger out from the helicopter. She looked desperate. Panicked. Like she had been certain she was going to die in there. No one knew precisely what to say as they watched her, the reality that she was free slowly sinking into her psyche.
“Thank you,” she eventually spoke, looking to Mia and each of the men in turn. “Thank you so much.”
“Let’s get you inside,” one of the men who’d been helping said. Mia realized she had never gotten either of their names, nor had she thanked them for coming to her assistance. The same could be said for Jorge. Mia was still slightly surprised by his arrival and everything he had done. Were it not for him, she doubted they would have been able to free the woman.
“Thank you,” the woman repeated as the man put his arm around her, starting to lead her into the airport. “You saved me.”
“It’s nothing,” came his reply. “We couldn’t just leave you in there. But what were you doing? Why were you flying during all of this?”
“It’s stupid,” the woman shook her head. “My boss, Jack, he…” she trailed off, looking back over her shoulder at the wreckage of the helicopter. Mia figured Jack had to be one of the dead men inside, the rest of the passengers not lucky enough to survive the crash. She wanted to hear the story of why they had been flying a helicopter through an ash cloud so thick you c
ould barely see past your own nose, but first Mia knew they should all get back inside. She could hazard a guess why it had happened, but she couldn’t guess at how dangerous being out in the cloud for much longer and breathing in its toxins would be to them.
“It’s okay,” she spoke up from behind the woman. “You can tell us in a bit. We should get out of this cloud first. Find somewhere safe inside, away from the broken windows.”
Everyone in the group slowly nodded and agreed with Mia, the conversation fading as they walked the remainder of the short distance across the airstrip and into the building. Those who had stayed inside and watched the drama unfurl were silent as they entered. And rightly so. Mia was disappointed that so few had been willing to help, reminded once again of the selfishness of humankind. Steering her small group—minus the second man who went to return the cane to his father—to a quiet corner of the lobby, she hoped they would be given some peace to settle and find out the woman’s story.
“There,” Mia spoke softly once they were all somewhat separated from the rest of the survivors. They didn’t leave the lobby completely—despite there being many other areas in the airport where they could have had their discussion. Mia thought that might raise suspicions and she didn’t want to have to deal with any more questions from the people who were sheltering at the airport.
“Now we can talk. How are you feeling?” Mia paused, “I’m sorry. I don’t believe we got your name. I’m Mia.”
“Laura,” the woman replied. “And I feel much better, thank you. Honestly, I can’t say it enough. You saved my life back there.”
“It’s nothing,” Mia shrugged, though she knew what they had done was quite the opposite of how she described it. “We’re just glad you’re all right, Laura. It’s nice to meet you. Could you maybe tell us a bit more about why you were out in that chopper? Surely anyone would’ve known it was a su…” Mia trailed off again. The words suicide mission sounded too brutal to come from her mouth, though from the expression on Laura’s face, Mia could tell the woman knew what she had been about to say.
Squaring her jawline, Laura nodded and looked up at Mia, preparing to tell her story. “My boss, Jack, was determined to get the scoop,” she started, squirming only slightly as she said the dead man’s name. His body lay less than a few hundred yards away, having not been granted the lucky escape that Laura was.
“I work for Montana National News. We’ve been struggling ever since we scrapped the print edition of the paper eight months ago. There are just so many digital news agencies these days that it’s nearly impossible to stand out amongst them. Jack was determined to get the truth of the eruption. He thought if we flew in from the north then the ash cloud wouldn’t be so bad. He couldn’t have been more wrong.”
Mia nodded. It was just as she’d suspected from the branding of the helicopter. A group of journalists and news reporters trying frantically to be the first to report on the story. As she’d thought earlier, it was both a brave and stupid thing to do. The world needed to know what had happened at Yellowstone, but to try and fly through the cloud was immensely foolish. She felt sorry for Laura though; it didn’t sound like anyone else had played a big part in the decision to go. She imagined that their boss, Jack, would’ve needed to be quite persuasive to get them into the sky. It certainly didn’t take a genius to know how dangerous things had become.
“I’m sorry,” the man who was still huddled with their group spoke to Laura. Mia still hadn’t gotten his name, nor the other’s—who hadn’t returned to them since taking the cane back to his father. Mia wasn’t even certain what he looked like if she was honest with herself. Memorizing faces hadn’t been very high on her priority list during their rescue mission.
She turned to speak to Jorge while Laura sought comfort in the man, pleased that the attention was somewhat taken from her. Jorge wasn’t focused on the conversation at all, his eyes trained instead on the cloud outside and how it was affecting the sky. Mia had seen the expression on his face before and it didn’t fill her with confidence. Something bad was about to happen; the Spaniard had always failed to mask his emotions.
“What is it?” Mia questioned, walking forward and lowering her voice so only Jorge could hear her. “What are you looking at?”
“The cloud,” Jorge murmured back, still not shifting his gaze from outside. “Do you see it?”
Mia squinted. “Yeah? I don’t—”
“Look closer,” Jorge interrupted. “Higher up. Does that look like rain to you?”
Now Mia really focused. She took a couple more steps forward and brought her right hand to her face, her fingers resting on her temple and blocking out her peripheral vision of the lobby. Just barely, she started to see what Jorge was talking about. Rain was falling through the ash cloud. Torrents of water pouring down and mixing with the dark ash that covered the horizon.
“Oh man,” Mia whispered to herself. “This isn’t going to be good.”
Jorge gulped loudly, finally looking away from the cloud itself and concentrating on Mia. His face gave it all away again: he was scared. Both he and Mia knew what this meant. Rain mixing with the ash would cause lahars: rapidly moving, cement-like slurries and landslides. They would move faster than rivers, dragging in everything that stood in their way and not letting them go.
They’d both seen the after-effects of lahars tearing through towns and villages from other eruptions. Nothing was safe from them. Trees were pulled into the slurry, animals were dragged under, never to resurface, and if people stood too close to the edge, they would encounter the same fate. Whatever tried to stand in their way was decimated and—from the meandering hills of the valley that surrounded the airport—Mia and Jorge both knew that they would be in its way. Remembering a young family she had watched get swept away and pulled underwater by a lahar off the coast of China, Mia looked desperately at her partner and prayed he had an answer.
“I don’t know,” Jorge shook his head. “Where is there for us to go?”
“Will it definitely run through here?” Mia questioned, trying to somehow find a way to escape the inevitable doom in her head. It was a horrible scenario. They knew exactly what was coming and yet, they couldn’t think of a way to avoid it.
“You know it will, Mia,” Jorge confirmed. “We’ll be standing right in its path.”
The two of them looked at each other solemnly, neither sure of what to say. With half of the building now torn off, they were fully exposed to the outside world. That already meant that they were breathing in volcanic ash particles from the cloud, the miniscule elements filling the air whether they could see it or not. Mia tugged at the collar of her gift shop T-shirt, pulling it up as high as she could over her mouth and nose without raising suspicion. She didn’t want to cause a mass panic or a riot of any sense if people thought the air wasn’t safe to breathe. As much as she felt it was her duty to inform the people in the lobby of what was about to happen, a huge part of her knew it would only make things more complicated.
“Do you think the building will be safe?” Mia asked in a small voice, her uncertainties taking over what she thought she knew about volcanic eruptions. “Like, it won’t be able to break through, will it?”
“I don’t know,” Jorge replied honestly. “My knowledge is only as good as yours, Mia. I think we just need to try and close that hole up somehow and stop it from getting in. That would be my first idea.”
“Okay,” Mia nodded. “That means we have to tell everyone.” She paused for a second, looking at Jorge, pleading with her eyes for him to bite the bullet on this one. The last thing she wanted to do was address the airport lobby again. Especially as it was with even more bad news.
“Relax, Mia,” Jorge eventually smiled. “I’ll do it.”
Clearing his throat, Jorge walked forward toward the center of the lobby. A few people looked up at him as he passed but no one paid too much attention. No one was expecting what was about to happen. With one eye on her friend and one on the worsening
climate outside, Mia braced herself and prepared for what was to come.
“Excuse me!” Jorge called out, attempting to get everybody’s attention. “Hey! I need to say something.” Gradually the murmurs gave way to silence, everyone inside the airport training their eyes on the Spaniard and waiting for the news he was about to deliver. “I, err…” Jorge suddenly became overwhelmed by the information he was about to share. He felt the small of his back growing sweaty and his mouth yearned for more saliva. “There’s no easy way to say this, but we need to fortify this room somehow. Close up the hole that the helicopter made. It’s starting to rain outside and when that mixes with the ash cloud from the volcano, something called lahars are created. They’re effectively massive slurries—rivers of mud, rock, sediment, and who knows what else—that will sweep through this area like a river, destroying everything. They’re extremely dangerous and we need to avoid them at all costs. Getting caught in one would mean certain death.”
In a strange way, the silence that echoed through the airport following Jorge’s announcement was almost deafening. Mia looked from one person to the next, watching their faces as they processed and reacted to what had been said. Some clearly didn’t believe it, shaking their heads and pulling expressions that showed they thought it was all a practical joke of some sort. Others turned sheet white, their knees growing weak as they focused on the very last sentence Jorge had said.
No matter how they reacted, the lahars were coming, Mia knew that to be a fact. “He’s telling the truth,” she spoke up, watching as all heads turned in her direction. “We need to do something. The second that rain starts getting heavy, we’ll have precious few seconds to change what’s to come.”
“What should we do?” a voice shouted out from the back of the lobby somewhere.
“How are we supposed to fix that?”
“Can’t we run?”