by Pamela Davis
Waldo heard Andy say that and, for the first time all day, relaxed. Maybe he and Andy would live through this after all. Maybe.
Fort Walton Beach, Florida, Air Force Base
Captain Mike Coleman was sitting in a metal folding chair on the flight line sipping a coke when the wind started. He watched casually, and then with growing concern as the clouds thickened above and grew dark. The color was wrong. Almost that sickly yellow-gray color that happened with tornadoes. He had been waiting for his co-pilot to show up so they could begin the pre-flight check on the C-130 before taking off. That snot-nosed young kid, too young to be his co-pilot, and he'd told the commander that just the other day, was always late. Captain Mike Coleman was career Air Force and had no patience with the young upstarts with college degrees sitting in his right-hand seat lately. Coleman was a gruff bear of a man, salt and pepper hair neatly trimmed to exact regulation standards, ruddy complexion, and large, broad hands that could caress the controls of any aircraft with more finesse than any other pilot on the base.
The chair clattered as Coleman stood abruptly and strode briskly over to the hangar opening to peer up into the sky. It didn't make sense. He had checked the weather not fifteen minutes ago, and it was clear for miles. What the hell was going on?
"Captain Mike! Captain!" yelled a young lieutenant bursting through the door at the back of the hangar.
"Hey, slow down there, boy," Coleman said as the young man dashed up to him.
"Captain Mike, it's not possible, sir, it's really not, but here it is," the lieutenant said breathlessly as he thrust a piece of paper at the Captain. "One minute it was clear and the next the radar has gone crazy, plumb crazy, sir! It looks like a hurricane--but it can't be, 'cause there wasn't even a tropical depression! Nothing and then bam, a hurricane. And it's big, Captain, real big, sir. Sir, my CO is over at base ops and I don't know what I'm supposed to do about this."
"Well, son, I don't think there is much you can do to stop a hurricane," Coleman said slowly as he re-read the radar report. A loud crash rang out through the hangar and the lieutenant jumped, startled.
"What the hell..." Coleman began and then stopped as he turned to see trees flying by the hangar doors. Turning back to the corporal, he barked orders. "Get back up there to your weather station and get me more info, pronto. And call Base Ops and fill them in, if they haven't figured it out yet. Find out if there are any other pilots around, we gotta try and move these planes--should have done it already if we had known this was coming--maybe we can tie them down in time--send anyone available out here. Now move!" he shouted. The lieutenant went running as Captain Coleman marched out to his planes.
Melissa Hargrove was sitting in her brand new, cherry-red Camaro, an early high school graduation present from Daddy, staring angrily out the window at the rain pelting the beach stretched out before her. She had cut classes as soon as she had heard the weather report on the way to school. Sunny all day, a perfect time to get started on her tan. It wouldn't be long until senior prom and Melissa planned to wear an absolutely devastating backless gold satin evening gown, and a perfect tan was mandatory. She had thought this was just one of those passing spring showers that hit every day this time of year and ended within twenty minutes before revealing bright sunshine once again. However, this rain showed no signs of letting up, and in fact, now that she looked, the waves were really kicking up out there. Damn those weather guys anyway, always wrong! Her car shook as a gust of wind buffeted it. Melissa muttered swear words under her breath as she dug through her straw beach bag for the car keys. What, she thought, would Mother say if she could hear the words Melissa knew? Looking up as she inserted the keys into the ignition with a grin, her hand froze in shock as she saw the gigantic wave approaching her car.
Odetta Parker was listening to her favorite afternoon soap opera as she sorted clothes to go to the Laundromat. Living in military base housing cut their expenses, but still they didn't have enough saved up to buy the washing machine and dryer she wanted. Five kids and a husband made going to the Laundromat every week a major undertaking. She hated standing in front of the machines with piles of clothes on the dirty floor--those kids got dirty enough without adding Laundromat floor dirt to the mix, thank you very much. She loved this soap because it was one of the first to include African Americans with a real storyline, not just some caricature. Although, she had to admit that even if the storyline was better than most, it wasn't all that real. She certainly didn't have many friends who wore diamond necklaces to work!
A high-pitched beeping sound from the TV let her know the soap was about to be interrupted for an emergency announcement. Irritated, after all, lately it seemed like they interrupted her favorite programs for the stupidest things, Odetta took the opportunity to get more coffee from the kitchen. As she returned, she heard, "I repeat, a major hurricane is fast approaching the Gulf Coast. There was no prior indication of this storm. Citizens are warned to take shelter. Do not leave your homes. If you need to be evacuated, the police will notify your area. The eye of the storm appears to be heading for the Fort Walton-Pensacola area. Winds appear to be in the Category Five range, but no details have been confirmed--" Then the TV went black as the lights went out.
Somewhere in Los Angeles
Maria finished listening to her messages and put away the satellite phone. "Hey, Zack!" she called and then started coughing. Pulling her bandanna kerchief back up over her mouth, she trudged across the rubble of a parking garage in what used to be a Los Angeles suburb. The hazy air was worse than the smog that used to blanket the city. It was like a perpetual fog, made up of smoke particles and dust, and it clogged the lungs and hampered talking. Seven days had passed since the earthquake, and nobody understood why the air would not clear. The wind seemed to have vanished and the smog remained, a haze also filled with the smell of death. Maria longed for a steaming hot shower, but wondered if even that would remove the stench from her body.
Coming back to Los Angeles was the network's idea. After covering the bizarre ice incident in Las Vegas, the vicious Louisville tornadoes and the Allenville flood, Maria and Zack were back in L.A.--although Maria thought it was a bit ambitious for anyone to call it that anymore. There was no city left. Several more temblors had rolled through the wreckage days after the initial earthquake. They were the magnitude that would usually have made the news immediately, but after the monster quake, seemed small by comparison. Buildings that had survived the first earthquake were brought down by the later ones. More fires had raged out of control. A chemical spill on the northern side of the city had wiped out a large number of that region's population.
Phoebe had just told her of another problem--China. The great Yangtze River was flooding beyond its banks in a massive way. A storm system seemed parked over the region and continued to dump copious amounts of rain on the already saturated land, compounding the flooding. Maria remembered the flooding in China that occurred in 1996 when millions died. The Chinese normally did not let the West know right away what was going on, so Maria decided it must be bad if they were letting the news out.
Weather was beginning to act freaky everywhere, it seemed. Of course, people have been saying that for a long time, Maria thought, but I think it's getting worse. Thinking about the devastation wrought by the tornadoes in Kentucky, she focused her eyes on the ground to find footing and almost walked into Zack.
He reached out an arm for her to get her balance and then motioned to the makeshift shelter they had set up earlier in the day. It was in a corner of the remains of the garage, draped with tenting to keep out the bad air. Once inside, they both took off the kerchiefs covering their mouths and reached for the water bottle.
After several mouthfuls of the cool liquid, Zack said, "I don't know how much longer we can stay here, Maria. We can't even open up most of the equipment because of the dust, and I don't think either of us needs to breathe much more of this air."
Maria nodded at him, finishing her cup of water. "
That's what I was coming to tell you. Just talked to Phoebes and she said we need to get out of here. They want us to check out some report of lightning in Oklahoma--" She held up a hand to forestall his questions. "Yeah, I know, we both thought we were going back to Vegas, but the network wants us to do a report on this. I guess it's pretty strange."
"Pretty strange?" Zack began in a disbelieving tone. "What do they call that tomb of ice that used to be Las Vegas--normal? We have to get back there! What's a little lightning compared to that--"
Maria interrupted his outraged tones. "It's not just a little lightning. Evidently it's lightning without any kind of thunderstorm. Just stabs down out of the air and it keeps hitting things--like oil wells and refineries--so there are fires as well. I guess a bunch of people were killed...."
Zack watched as her eyes unfocused and almost filled with tears. He knew she wasn't just thinking about her parents' death, but all the death they had seen in the past week. Coming back to Los Angeles had been the topper. They couldn't fly in because the smoke and dust particles would clog the helicopter machinery, so they landed on the outskirts--only to be confronted by the sight of hundreds of people wandering dazed down the broken asphalt of the highway. Red Cross workers told them these were the survivors of Los Angeles, that they couldn't stay in the city, and that they'd been leaving like this for the past couple of days. It reminded Zack of refugee marches he had witnessed in Africa after civil wars--but this was America! How could this be happening here?
Finally, Zack spoke. "Okay. So we need to get to Oklahoma. When do we leave?"
Maria turned toward him and said, "Today. They'll have something--helicopter or plane waiting for us where we came in. So we have to pack up and get moving. You know how long it took us to get this far."
"Right--hard to get around when the roads are no longer roads. I can be ready to leave in half an hour," he replied. "Did Phoebe say anything else?"
Maria brushed strands of dust-covered hair back from her face and tucked them into a pony tail. Zack thought he'd never seen her look so tired. Maria said slowly, "Yeah, she did. Seems China and Russia are both having some weather problems along with flooding. No pictures yet, but I guess the satellite images make it out to be significant." She paused and then smiled slightly before saying, "Oh, and her final piece of news was that we now have an official psychic predicting disasters. Some woman managed to get through to Phoebe, personally, and you know how hard it is to do that! She must be persistent. Anyway, this woman said that there will be a hurricane hitting the Gulf Coast. As if we didn't have enough problems! Why would anyone want us to have a hurricane?"
Zack said, shaking his head, "That's not a prediction--everyone knows the Gulf usually has a couple of hurricanes each summer--but not this early in the year, I'll grant you that. Psychic, huh?"
Maria laughed. "I know, I know, but this is different. She gave Phoebe an exact time and place! It's supposed to hit Fort Walton Beach, Florida--right about now I guess. And then move on from there. And, yes, I asked Phoebe, she's already checked with the weather guys this morning and she said they laughed at her. Said there was nothing out there at all and that they would have seen it coming for twenty-four hours at least."
Zack said, "I'm surprised Phoebe even passed that along to you."
"I was too, She mumbled something about feeling it was her duty to tell me. Whatever. At least we don't have to worry about a hurricane. I think fires and floods and quakes and ice--and let's not forget those pesky twisters!--are enough for now," Maria replied. Then she asked cautiously, "You haven't had any, um, dreams about a hurricane have you?"
He frowned a bit and replied, "Who knows? I can't seem to remember the damn things. I know every morning what I dreamed was important, but...naw, no prophetic dreams for me."
Maria gave a small sigh of relief.
Highway 98 West, Heading toward Hattiesburg, Mississippi
Lisanne struggled to open the map across the top of the steering wheel. "You know, it would be helpful for you to have thumbs right about now," she said to Merlin. The cat ignored her.
"Hello-o-o! Merlin!" Lisanne called loudly. "Anybody home? Are you paying attention or sleeping over there?"
The big black cat abruptly jumped into Lisanne's lap, crackling the paper of the map as he placed his paws on top of it.
"Watch it, buddy!" Lisanne yelled and then stopped to notice that Merlin was peering at the map. "What are you doing? Reading the map? Uh huh, right. Like I'm really going to listen to a cat navigator...well, okay, I'll admit I already did. I'm heading west and north on your say-so, but what is there to decide now? As long as we stay on a northward heading we should be okay, shouldn't we, Merlin? Although why you wanted to go West instead of straight North is beyond me! North is away from the hurricane, and that's all we care about. That's what we--Hey!"
Lisanne gripped the wheel as Merlin used his paws to make a right turn.
"You are absolutely bonkers! What do you think? That you can drive a car now? Listen to me, buster, you may be able to read and type on a computer--and even predict the weather. But you are still a cat! Get it? A cat. And cats can't drive. That's it, end of story, so get your paws off the wheel and--" Lisanne stopped talking and pressed on the brakes.
She sighed. "Okay, so maybe I'm a little slow today but I'm under a bit of stress. You just want me to pull over, right?"
Merlin nodded his head twice.
"'Cause we gotta look at the map, right?"
Merlin nodded.
Lisanne took a deep breath and let it out slowly. "You know," she said resignedly, "this animal to human communication thing needs definite work, pal."
Merlin nodded vigorously.
Lisanne laughed and reached out to scratch her friend behind his ears. "There's a rest stop coming up ahead. We'll pull over there, okay?"
Merlin purred loudly.
Cape Fair, The Rock
Leaves rustled in the afternoon breeze as Jessica walked pensively among her favorite stand of trees at the edge of the forest behind the house. She had always loved the sound the leaves made. Now she glanced fearfully at them above her head, wondering if the sound was more than an event caused by the breeze. If she were to believe Mrs. Philpott and that damned cat of hers, the planet was alive--no, more than that--it was conscious.
Perhaps those rustling leaves were the whisperings of the giant oaks, communicating with each other in the twilight, planning something diabolical for the humans on this earth. No! She refused to believe it. All her life she had been drawn to the trees, felt a kinship with them, loving the rootedness and stability of an old tree--admiring the slender trunks of new trees, resiliently bending and swaying in the wind, leaves all bright, new, green, promising life...was she wrong? The rustling intensified above her head and around her on all sides. Jessica pulled her old gray cardigan sweater tighter against her body.
She was standing in a clearing surrounded by several oaks, a few tall pines, and a young maple. The ground was covered in old leaves and pine needles, and a large round slab of stone with a flat top which sat almost centered in the circle of trees. She had come to sit on that stone and pray when Samantha had been so ill. Once she had been caught unawares by a summer rain shower and had reveled in feeling the warm drops cascading off the bending branches above her head.
A slight smile crossed her face as she remembered how shocked John had looked when she finally returned to the house, all dreamy smiles and utterly soaking wet. She hadn't even tried to explain why she had stayed out there that day, hugging the secret feeling of the place to herself as the shivering set in once her body was blasted by the cold of an air-conditioned house. Maybe her affinity for the trees had come about as a result of her work on computers. Writing code for hours on end, losing track of time and space, she had begun taking walks among any trees she could find when she really became immersed in programming. The trees grounded her, brought her back from that virtual space of the machines. She never told anyone, but
everywhere she lived after the "tree walks" started, she had chosen one or two favorite trees. They felt like they were her trees once the designation of favorite had been made. When she began exploring the property here, she had found one--a silver-barked maple with the most incredible gold leaves in autumn that she'd ever seen. Each leaf was always impeccably colored with gold. It reminded her of the mallorn trees in Tolkien's trilogy Lord of the Rings, and she had been astonished to find that a tree could fit so well a description from a land of fantasy.
And now this--this horror fantasy of Mrs. Philpott's and John's and even little Samantha's. That the planet was speaking to them, to people everywhere, saying enough is enough...saying that humans would not be allowed to destroy the planet anymore. And not just saying it, no, actually doing something about it--people were beginning to die! Natural disasters were starting to happen in a very unnatural way. The planet was attacking humans. At least, that's what it felt like to Jessica. Tens of thousands were now dead because of the L.A. earthquake. The cat said another quake was going to occur in San Francisco. Jessica had tried calling her mother there but hadn't been able to reach her yet. She had come out here because she didn't know what to do. If she told her mother that an earthquake was coming, that the world was changing drastically in the next few months, then it meant that she herself believed it would happen. And if she didn't tell her mother and the cat was actually right and her mother was killed...Jessica couldn't live with that either. So she had come out here, to this favorite place, to think--and now she wondered if the trees were talking to each other. It was crazy. Maybe Mrs. Philpott--and her cat--were just plain nuts! The murmuring overhead grew louder, and as Jessica focused on the sound, she realized that it was murmuring! Abruptly she dropped onto the large stone and stared up at the moving leaves, the twisting branches, and fainted.