“Larry, gotta go, roads are fracturing as well. You and Shirley better head for Hilo, that's where we're going.” Jack hung up, stepped out of the truck and began walking ahead, giving Alice directions around the worst parts.
“Shirley!” Larry yelled from the porch. He was still watching the plume when he saw something glowing inside of it, rising rapidly through the gray and black.
“Yeah baby?” Shirley stuck her head out from the open kitchen window.
Larry was watching more and more of the glowing balls rising inside the plume and saw one arching outside of the smoke.
“Lava bombs,” he whispered to himself, incredulous at the very mention of the words.
“Larry? What?” Shirley sensed something wrong watching her husband stare at the plume for so long.
“Get in the car...lava bombs,” Larry was still whispering to himself. He watched as another glowing ball of lava rock arched out of the plume toward him, toward his home, toward his exit. He couldn't quite believe it, surreal as it appeared. It reminded him of an old medieval movie where they catapulted burning balls of fire at the castle walls.
Shirley came up behind him, put her arms around him and looked up at the plume as well. She saw it too and screamed just as it hit the trees across the yard, tearing through them and bounced once, twice and then rolling up against their outdoor grill. The large lava rock was still molten, crackling and smoking as it rested against the stainless steel.
“Holy...” Shirley was about to say, noting it was as big as the grill.
“Propane! Run!” Larry found his voice and pulled Shirley with him through the house and to the garage.
“Are the dogs in the car?”
“Yeah! Holy...”
The explosion of the propane canister, some seven pounds of liquid fuel, broke windows behind them as they opened the door leading into the garage. Larry hit the garage door opener button and jumped in the driver's side, Shirley waiting for him to pull out so she could get in.
They always left their keys in the ignition, if the car was in the garage, a safety habit they had practiced since moving in. It was a good idea, as the keys were always in the same place, and if you had to leave in a hurry, they were in the best place.
Larry got the car clear of the garage wall as Shirley opened the door, her dogs barking in encouragement to hurry up.
“Come on, baby!” Larry yelled. He was looking up in the sky for more incoming lava bombs just as Shirley heard more trees being torn apart. Another mass of lava, glowing and hissing red hot, hit the pavement twenty feet behind them and off to the side rolling out of view.
He didn't bother trying to find the garage door opener in the car so the door remained opened. Larry looked inside to his paraglider with a bit of sadness as he rapidly backed out. He honestly wondered if that was the last time he would see it, or, for that matter, his home.
Speeding down the road, Shirley got her breath back enough to ask Larry about his phone call.
“What did Jack say?”
Larry was consciously aware that he could still kill them all in a simple car crash if he didn't focus on keeping his speed down. As he rounded a turn and had a bit of a straight section he shook his head, amazed at his answer, that he would ever say such a thing.
“They've evacuated, to Hilo.”
Shirley looked at him, amazed as well. It was the first time that it must have ever happened. “Holy...”
Larry slammed the brakes just in time to keep the falling monkey pod tree from smashing them. Even with the great job he did, several branches covered their windshield. Immediately putting it into reverse he stopped several feet back and jumped out to see if there was a way around.
He could smell something acrid in the air as he looked for a path around the tree. More and more lava bombs were falling sporadically in the distance, each heralded by braking tree branches and thuds in the ground. The ground was muddy all around the asphalt until it met a ditch that made it stupid to even try an attempt around the fallen tree.
Being the only road out of their neighborhood made it even worse. Larry turned to look back at Shirley through the windshield. She was waving him back to the car.
As he got back in she was pointing. She couldn't quite speak, with either fear or overwhelming excitement but she sure could point.
“What, what is that?” Larry asked trying to follow her finger.
“There...they...bulldozed. Last week!”
Larry reversed back, turned around and made his way over to where she had directed. It was a clearing through the jungle being carved out for several new houses. Maybe, just maybe they both thought, it would connect to another road.
They followed the path off road, bumping around at speeds too fast for freshly cleared ground. Both of them were scanning ahead for any sign of a road, but it looked so far to be more trees in the near distance.
“I don't see anything!” Larry said loudly. The dogs were still barking. He looked back at them irritated and then to Shirley. “What are they saying?”
Just then the car lurched to a stop, impaling the front bumper on a stump he had not seen. Both airbags deployed.
“Watch out, I think.” Shirley said, stunned beyond sarcasm but still within her sense of humor.
Larry stumbled out of the car, ran around to the front just in time to see both front tires deflating. Fluids were pouring out of the engine.
Shirley ran out as well, a backpack on her arm, the dogs in close pursuit.
“Holy...”
“Shirley!” Larry yelled, looking back toward their home, about a quarter mile away. “Follow me!” He began to run back up to the road and toward their home.
Shirley and Larry, both weekend runners, were soon shoulder to shoulder, the dogs right behind them.
“You've always wanted to go flying with me, right?” Larry asked.
She just looked at him, a little smile creasing his nervousness.
“Well, today's your lucky day baby!” Larry laughed as he watched the sky for more lava bombs.
“Holy...Guacamole!” Shirley finally said.
~~~
“Tsunami! Get the hell off the ground!” Star screamed one last time, already looking to the coconut trees.
Somewhere deep inside the static of Janet's head, somewhere in the midst of the familiar battle between her core and the noise, a voice distant and urgent rose above the fray. It wasn't Star's voice.
It was a voice she had never heard before. Insistent and kind, ripe with clarity and command, it spoke to her directly. Unlike the static that was always a conversation about her, this voice was polite. 'You have other work to do.'
Star gave Janet one last tug, this time with a handful of her red hair. She figured she might drag her as far as she could and only abandon her when she was forced to save herself. The coconut trees, with the steps built onto them, were only a few yards away.
The frothing, rolling mass of angry ocean was spilling over itself in some race to consume anything unfortunate enough to be within its reach. The massive glow of the cinder fountaining behind them was lighting up the sky, and throwing shadows around like leaves in the wind. Between those shadows it lit the onrushing flood.
Janet's eyes popped open. Star was pulling her hair and the noise suddenly all around her seemed deafening. She stood up finally and stared blankly at Star for a moment.
A braver soul would have left Janet long ago. Perhaps some people were just not survivors, could not fashion a response to certain death. Star wasn't such a person. Her friend, the young troubled woman she had found wandering a rainy road, deserved a helping hand, one last time. She slapped her hard on the face, turned and ran toward the coconut trees.
“Follow me!” She yelled, looking back. “Climb the coconut tree!”
Some human instincts are obviously built into our genetic code, inherited from the successful lives of those that survived by following them. One such instinct is: when there's a crisis, follow the others tha
t are running. Janet wasn't quite clear in her head yet, but her friend was terrified and running toward the trees. She would, too.
Strange sounds filled the air. The bay, a few moments ago empty and flushed with only hapless fish and sand left behind was now filling with a raging waterfall of chaos. The land itself, the 'aina, had been under assault now from earthquakes that tore it asunder, lava that burned its flesh and now the sea herself threatened to rupture its face and drown it. It groaned deeply under the onslaught, casting a cry to the heavens themselves.
The coconut palm, an amazing creation, one that had no doubt been given to islands in some divine gratitude, were well suited to disaster. Hurricanes would bend but not break them. Tropical heat only promoted their growth. Growing together in groves, their massively connected roots, spreading out five times their own stature, anchored them all as a family. They provided sterile water to those who opened their fruit and lifesaving height to those that climbed them.
Star reached the first tree with the built in steps and passed it to make for the next one. Hopefully, she thought, Jimmie would be able to reach the closest tree in time. Already the trade winds were blowing the salt spray from the arriving mass of water onto her, stinging her eyes. She could hear it so very close, a rushing wave already sweeping up the small beach to this tiny mound of sand and trees just above.
Star grasped the third step on the tree trunk, pulling and leaping at the same time to get at least one foot up to the first. Quickly she used every bit of energy her body and adrenaline could provide. Scrambling up to the fourth step she screamed in anger and fear feeling the cold sea sweep beneath her, splashing her legs.
Janet saw Star reach her tree and quickly saw another was right in front of her. Suddenly, seeming too fast to be real, the water was upon them both. This first wave was small, only a few feet high, but it swept Janet right off her feet tearing away her grasp of the first step.
Star had turned to look, only to see Janet rapidly move backwards in the rushing water toward her little cabin, itself now being pushed up against the trees behind it.
“Jimmie! Hang on!” Star yelled before moving farther up the tree.
The small first surge quickly moved through trees and back downhill of the coconut grove, taking a moment to pause before beginning its retreat back to the sea.
Janet had been forced underwater twice, but fought hard to find a bit of air every time she bounced off some object hard enough to surface again. After only a minute the roiling mass of water changed. Incredible! she thought, the water stopped moving and she found her footing. Standing now on rocks and debris she was up to her waist in water. She could see Star climbing higher on her coconut tree when she turned and yelled something at her. Maybe it was over, she wondered.
“Climb! Jimmie! Climb, Jimmie!” Star was yelling, competing to be heard with the onrushing second wave, the volcano and the wind. It was the wind that carried her voice back to Janet. It was the wind that tried but failed to stop the water that now wanted to rush back to sea, to fall back to its natural level.
Janet felt her feet swept out from under her again, this time falling backwards, this time sweeping her toward the dark sea ahead, the churning bay and coral and certain destruction. The water picked up speed as it fell back to the beach, dragging Janet with it, holding her up a little better. She was headed right back to the coconut grove, spinning through the first few trees. Briefly she saw Star ahead and above it all, yelling mutely, waving one of her arms.
Janet was bumping into things unknown, rough and sharp but they didn't hurt, nothing hurt in the fascination of surprise and confusion. The silence was somehow comforting as the water pulled her through the trees and toward the gaping maw ahead that wanted to consume her. She tried to get her feet back down, so she might stand up against the rushing water. Having bounced off what she thought was the bottom a few times, the flood couldn't be that deep.
She was pushed into a coconut tree, tried to grab it but was spun up and around it quickly, sweeping her backwards now. Another tree smashed into her back, banging her head hard. It seemed the water was picking up speed somehow, it seemed so hungry, so desperate to take her.
Janet flailed wildly with her arms, trying to grab onto anything. She was being pushed up against another tree now, enough to stop her progress to the sea, the water now rushing over her instead of with her. Flipping herself around to face the tree her arms found something, a piece of wood, a board. She sunk her fingers, the very bones of her fingers deep into it. The water was furious now, angrily tearing at her fragile grasp of life, intent on returning home with its trophy human flesh.
If she could just climb, her mind told her, if she could just get a step up onto this tree she might win. She might live.
Rubbish was flowing back into the sea with the returning tsunami, chairs, books, couches, most of Star's cabin, in pieces. Janet, her head well above the water, still hanging on with one hand to the first step, noticed Star's car bumping among the trees like a pinball.
Something moved underneath her, something buoyant, something hard, bruising her legs with a crushing force. Instantly, she was a few feet higher; she found the second and third steps and pulled herself up just as the large propane tank spun around off her tree and fled toward the chaos in the bay.
“Climb, Jimmie! Climb higher!” Star's frantic voice was coming in loud and clear now from the tree next to hers, urging her to live, to find the will.
~~~
Larry felt like the little dogs were barking just behind him in some kind of encouragement. “Go faster, big guy!”
He did. Soon he was rounding the corner to his house and the open garage. Shirley was two seconds behind him.
“Put the dogs in your backpack!” Larry said, running into the garage and rapidly pulling the motorized paraglider out to the driveway.
“They won't fit, baby...”
Larry ran back into the garage and got his tandem rig, used to carry a passenger. Quickly he spun the bolts, latched them and looked over to Shirley.
“Honey, both of us on here will take a lot of takeoff power. The dogs...”
“They only weigh twelve pounds, together!” Shirley pleaded.
Larry nodded, this was no time to argue. He knew the engine could lift three hundred and forty pounds, in perfect conditions. He laughed out loud at that last caveat.
“What's so funny, Larry? They do, only twelve pounds, I swear!”
“Help me push this out to the side road.”
The lava bombs were still peppering the area every few minutes. As they rounded the corner of their yard to line up the paraglider with the side street Larry saw two large rocks steaming about a hundred yards down the road, smack in the middle of his rural runway. Just beyond, about another fifty feet, were the first Ohia trees, which they had to clear. He calculated they would need absolutely every inch of take off roll with the added weight. The dogs were going to be a problem. That and the darkness.
The parafoil laid out nicely for once on the first try, ready for a breath of wind. He ran over to the paraglider, checked the bolts to the parafoil and to the seat and relied on his last engine prep to be a good one.
“Shirley, the dogs will most likely be OK here. They will hide until this is all over, and then we can come back for them.” He sat down in his pilot seat and strapped in, pulling Shirley into the tandem harness.
“If we get close to the tree tops, you'll have to let them go and that won't...”
“Larry, they're twelve pounds!”
He pushed the electric start while holding the brake, and flipped on his 10,000 watt halogen lights. Shirley held the dogs under each arm once she was strapped on. Her backpack sat in her lap.
The gauges looked strong and Larry let the brake go, the parafoil behind them already inflated. They began a painfully slow roll down the street. Larry was leaning to the side to see around Shirley and she was looking down at her little dogs. They seemed to be enjoying the wind in their fac
e.
His first obstacle was going to be the large rocks in the road. They were approaching them straight on. If he couldn't get enough speed in the next three seconds, he thought, he would have to abort or risk crushing Shirley, the dogs and eventually himself into the still steaming mass.
The parafoil above them shimmered loudly with some external wind. It might be twirling thermals or a bit of tradewind making its way into the open area of the street. Larry looked back at the rock ahead and up to the parafoil quickly. It was full, already flying for the most part and just waiting on him to give it a chance to rise.
Out of the corner of his eye he saw another lava bomb ripping through the trees to their side, screeching and tearing and leaving fire and smoke behind it.
Risk. It is certainly a part of flying. Too much risk was foolhardy, as the saying reiterated: Old, bold pilots simply don't exist. Conservative pilots understand risk as something to manage to the nth degree. Never underestimating it, never ignoring it, but always understanding it. Often in the complex environment of flight, it was a matter of balancing multiple risk factors. In such cases a choice had to be made, if for no other reason than to rid oneself of at least one risk factor.
Larry saw the massive rock ahead approaching and he saw new ones falling all around them. Should he abort and try taking off the other direction, or should he bet on his lift being sufficient to clear it?
His engine sounded strong and deep inside his consciousness he knew he had one more advantage. He had always been a lucky guy.
“Lift your feet up! Now!”
He released the hold on the parafoil, allowing it to fill completely, letting it lift them up. Immediately they left the ground, a few inches. The dogs were barking excitedly, urging them all higher.
The largest rock was only ten feet away and they still had at least another foot to rise to avoid it. Larry attempted a slight turn to at least avoid hitting it head on. A side hit would spare Shirley and the dogs and maybe just hit his stainless side tubing.
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