“Dust devils,” Martin replied. “And I have never in my life seen anything like it. Lane, we need to lock them in. Not sure it will hold. And Jana, if you aren’t going below. Get the doors to the barn.”
I nodded, trying to figure out what was happening, but I knew.
This was the beginning.
The second Martin and Lane moved; it was like the red sea parting. Then I observed them in the sky.
Three of them. They weren’t like the dust devils you see formed on a baseball field. The three funnels were massive, brown and upside down. The wide part reached for the sky, blackening the sun as the narrow ends moved across the ground, creating a colossal rolling cloud of dust.
A dancing trio of death moving our way.
The shock of it was nothing compared to the pressure I felt in my ears as the wind picked up. At the pace they were moving, we had minutes, maybe.
I ran for the barn, each step getting harder to take. I fought to keep my legs steady and to see as dirt flew in my eyes. I made it to the doors and opened them, slipping inside to get a break from the wind.
Lane and Martin gathered all the horses they could, some ran away as soon as the fence opened.
Perhaps they had some sort of survival instinct and knew the barn wasn’t safe.
I didn’t understand why Martin would want to put them in the barn, even though it was a metal structure.
“Go!” Martin shouted at me. “Get to the shelter, now!”
I nodded and took only one step from the barn and knew it was useless. My feet slipped on the air, and it was the scariest feeling. Not being in control, knowing I could just be lifted up.
“Grab her!” Martin instructed.
Lane pulled me to him as Martin struggled and finally closed the doors to the barn.
We ran, together, locking our arms. It was the only way to keep enough weight, so we didn't lift from the ground. At least I felt that way. Maybe it was my fear that exaggerated it.
The wind picked up and seemed to move in every direction.
Racing against the force, across that yard, was a fight I worried we’d lose.
It seemed as if we were running toward our doom. We couldn’t move fast enough, the shelter seemed so far away and those huge funnels in right in front of us barreled our way.
It was so loud, my ears hurt from the sound and pressure. My eyes stung and watered and I lost all visual of the yard and shelter.
It came down to the sound of the banging shelter door, moving with the wind. It was the only guide.
Finally, we made it.
It felt like a dream, being pulled to the shelter.
“Easy on the stairs!” Martin warned. “They’ll feel slippery.”
There was a three foot drop to a platform, and from there was a metal staircase. I held on to the railing, feeling the push of the storm against my back. Martin was right, they felt like ice.
I held my breath and released it once I reached the safety at the bottom.
There was another door behind me, that was closed, but I turned to wait on Lane and Martin before opening it.
Lane waited mid stairs for Martin to close and secure the shelter door.
As soon as he did, I felt the pressure stop, but it didn’t silence the noise.
It was still so loud.
“That was close,” Martin said.
“What the hell, Martin?” Lane shook his head. “That was no tornado or dust devil.”
“I know.” Martin gave a nod and reached for the second door, he paused and looked at me. “We’ll be safe in here.” He opened the door.
As soon as I stepped in, Carlie and Reese jumped from Rosie’s arms and ran to me.
“We were so scared,” Reese cried. “So scared you weren’t going to make it.”
“I’m here.” I held them both and kissed them. ‘I’m here.” I glanced to Rosie. She sat on a bench style couch. “Thank you, Rosie.” I then lifted my eyes. The hell raging above us grew louder and the kids squeezed me tighter.
“Let’s all sit down,” Martin said. “We’re safe.”
I inched over to the bench with the kids. One on each side of me. Lane sat next to Carlie, he tried to extend his arm across us all.
Yes, we were safe, I believed that. But whatever was happening above us, was far from over.
FOUR – HATCH OPEN
Thirteen minutes and forty-two seconds.
From the time we entered the shelter and Martin looked at his watch until the last sound could be heard and vibration felt.
It took nearly fourteen minutes.
I had never been in a tornado, nor felt one. Martin had. Having grown up in the Midwest where tornado season was as much a part of the year as winter, spring or any other season, he was well versed in them.
What roared across the fields and toward us was not a trio of tornados, it was something else.
Something new.
It had the inverted shape of a dust devil and the ferocity of a tornado.
Martin was keeping track of the time to figure out how far the storm traveled.
“It’s not a tornado,” Martin explained. “But if it follows the traits, it will rarely go more than fifteen miles. Your family is safe Rosie. You live over twenty miles away.”
But did he really believe what he said?
Was Martin just telling Rosie something she needed to hear?
He mentioned he thought it was moving around sixty or seventy miles per hour. The time the storm lasted from sound to silence, in my estimate, would create a path of devastation at least fifteen miles long.
I should have learned more.
The group gave information on what to do, not what exactly would happen during a weather event.
We were told to always be near shelter, avoid highways, and when we needed to go underground, go deep.
I wanted to ask Martin, “Is this normal? Is what’s happening now normal for a tornado?”
The question never emerged from my mouth because the look on Martin’s face gave me the answer. His eyes lifted upward to the ceiling for the long one minute it was right above us.
The entire storm shelter shook, as if whatever rolled over us was not only digging deep into the ground but coming from the ground.
It felt like an earthquake, shaking and loud.
The pressure, even in the shelter was like being underwater.
The kids held their ears, grabbing on to me, smashing against me.
They were scared and I didn’t blame them.
Rosie appeared to be a mountain of strength, saying very little, her eyes closed as she held the cross dangling from her necklace.
She was an older woman, and I suppose she had faced a lot in her life.
I never felt in danger. Not in Martin’s storm shelter.
It didn’t surprise me that he had a good one. A prefab already built unit placed deep in the ground. The exterior barn like doors part of a cement bunker that protruded out like an alcove.
To me it was sophisticated.
Dual levels of safety.
A hatch that opened to the first platform, from there a steep staircase, twelve steps long that led to a small area, then a four by four which held the door to the main safe room.
I suppose even that little area was safe from the storm, the sealed room was added protection.
Inside the safe room, cushioned bench seating lined the walls. The ceiling was oval with emergency lighting. He had bottles of water, flashlights, blankets and some food.
It wasn’t some prepper doomsday shelter, it wasn’t designed for long term living, it was made to ride out a storm.
To weather it, so to speak, and keep the occupants safe.
I thought a lot about the horses, wondering how they did. Were the ones free able to run away? Were the ones in the barn alive and well?
For some reason, I didn’t think about the town because in my mind those funnels were on the outskirts. The farmers and ranchers in the rural area saw it coming, lik
e we did and took shelter.
It moved slow enough to do so.
I pushed to the back of my mind every post made in our group, every information update Julius gave when he said it would not be one or two isolated incidents. He told us when one happened, many would happen at once.
Suddenly, I, who had been convinced it was the end of the world, wanted to disbelieve it all when faced with the reality of it.
It was storm One.
I kept repeating that in my mind.
In my heart, I knew that wasn’t really the case.
In the silence of the aftermath, Martin stood and began to pace.
“Martin?” Rosie called him. “Is it over? Do you think it’s over?”
“I think so, Rosie, yes,” Martin told her. “But let’s give it a few minutes.”
“Pap?” Reese stood. “What happens now?”
“After a few minutes, I’m going to go up and see. There are things you do afterwards for safety,” Martin explained. “I’ll go out first, make sure there’s nothing dangerous right outside the door. Like fallen wires and such. I’m going to be honest with you all. Whatever that was didn’t look like your typical tornado, but it moved like one. I have been through a lot of tornados. This was probably the biggest.”
“How big?” Carlie asked. “Is there like a tornado measuring scale? I know there’s one for hurricanes.’
“Big,” Martin answered. “Biggest recorded is what’s called an F-5, some would say an F-6. But something like that …” he shook his head. “Lifts the foundation.”
“How big do you think this was?” Carlie asked.
“I don’t know. It’s hard to say because there were three funnels,” Martin answered. “A tornado can strike the house across the street and miss your own. That’s how they work. I can go up there and everything can look fine, or I can go up there and nothing is left.”
Both the kids gasped.
“It doesn’t matter,” Martin said. “You know why? We’re alive. Things can be replaced, our lives can’t.” He looked down to this watch, then at the door. “I think I’ll go assess.”
Lane stood. “I’ll go with you, Martin.”
“Then what?” asked Reese. “Do we leave here or stay?”
“Once I see,” Martin explained. “Once I know it’s safe, then we all can come out. After that, we go check on our neighbors. We may be fine, they may need help.” He reached for the door and stopped. “When you do go out there, if it’s bad, you may feel like everything is gone. You might be scared. You may think nothing is left or …” he paused to shift his eyes at me. “It’s the end of the world. But it’s not. Beyond what you see, everything is fine. We’re not alone. The world keeps moving.” He opened the interior door and stepped out as Lane followed.
Once again, I was left wondering what Martin really felt. Were the words he spoke his way of keeping everyone calm?
He was stable and unwavering. Barely an inkling of concern had crossed his face, even when the shelter shook, and bits of dirt made it through the seams of the prefabbed safe structure.
He had taken a moment to look at me when he spoke about the end of the world. I didn’t know if he suddenly believed me or was trying to subtly convey, he didn’t want me to jump right to that conclusion.
How could I not?
I told him it was coming and coming soon.
I saw the red sky.
Then the trio of funnels arrived.
It wasn’t just circumstance, it was more.
It had to be everything Julius said it would be. If that were the case, things wouldn’t be fine outside our area. There wouldn’t be people waiting to roll in to help and pass out warm bread and hot soup.
It could be a lot more widespread than even Martin anticipated.
As I listened to their footsteps on the metal staircase, I hoped Martin was right. I hoped Lane was right, that I was misled, brainwashed or whatever. Even though I prepared and waited, it didn’t mean I wanted it to happen.
Sitting in the storm shelter, we were in limbo.
But it wouldn’t be long before we knew, what, if anything remained above.
FIVE – HORSEPOWER
When I was younger, we lived in this one story house in Michigan. Nothing fancy, it was a ranch style home made of brick. It was an oven in the summer. Stale humid heat was captured in the small house. We of course didn’t have air conditioning. But we did have relief.
There was this huge exhaust fan in the ceiling. At night, my father would open all the windows, turn that whirling thing on and it not only sucked the hot air out, it brought the cooler air in.
This moment, the exact moment Martin opened the shelter hatch brought me back to the days of the fan.
He hadn’t secured the door to the safe room, why would he? It wasn’t open, just not latched. But when he opened the hatch, the door swung open. A breeze swept across my feet, cooler, coming from the depths of the safe shelter.
It was as if we had been suctioned in there. Similar to the air from a jar releasing with a pop when the lid was opened.
I didn’t think too much of it. After all, I had never experienced a tornado, it could have been normal.
I held the kids’ hands, listening, breathing slowly and waiting until I heard Martin and Lane return.
All the while my mind wondered was there anything left up there? Was it fine? What had they discovered?
A minute or so later, and it seemed much longer, I heard them call my name.
“Jana,” Martin said. “Can you come here, please?”
I was curious why he was calling me. Perhaps it was so bad they didn’t know how to tell the children or Rosie.
After telling them I’d be right back, I left the safe room. Only, unlike Martin, I closed the door. Obviously, they were preparing me for what they had witnessed topside. Little did I know, when I saw them on the platform, they had never left the shelter.
They never made it farther than the top of the stairs. The upper portion of their bodies protruded from the open hatch.
Lane crouched down, then held out his hand. “Come up here. You have to see this.”
I walked up the first few steps, then took Lane’s hand as I made it up the rest of the way.
“What’s wrong?” I asked.
“Take a look,” Martin replied.
I wasn’t as tall as them and wondered what I would be able to see.
There was a strange coloring coming through the hatch, golden, yet not a brightness from the sun. It wasn’t dark like a stormy day either.
Harvest gold and dull.
Standing upright, my head poking through the hatch, I saw why.
A thick layer of dust danced about. Swirling in no particular direction, back and forth, carrying leaves, twigs, papers and other lightweight objects. It reminded me of a scene from an old west movie. The wind picking up the dust, causing tumbleweeds to skip across the dirt. The only difference was nothing touched the ground. The swirling, the dust covering everything, hovered three feet above the earth.
“We haven’t gone out there yet,” Lane told me. “Not yet. Not until …” He pointed. “They’re gone.”
I didn’t know what he was talking about and I shook my head in confusion.
He placed his hand on my face and guided it to where I should look, and there in the distance, high in the sky were the three funnels. The ones that had chased us into the storm shelter and roared over our heads.
They were becoming one with the newly formed clouds in the sky or maybe they rose up to create the clouds.
“That …” Martin said. “Is not even close to being plausible. So, we aren’t going out there until they are gone.”
“You haven’t gone out there at all?” I asked.
Martin shook his head. “No. I don’t know what the pull is or where it's pulling to.”
“They’re getting smaller by the second. We can see that,” Lane said. “Funnels happen when they connect with the ground. An updraft causes
them. Why are they lingering up there?”
Glancing upward ‘lingering’ was probably the best word to describe the funnels. It was as if they had done their damage and simply floated away, waiting perhaps to see if they felt the need to strike again. I kept looking at them. They reminded me of a sci-fi movie, like alien ships waiting to attack.
I looked over to Lane, “Is that a rhetorical question, asking me why they are lingering or do you think I know?”
“It’s rhetorical, Jana, I know you don’t know. I’m implying it’s not natural.”
“Of course, it’s not natural, Lane. I told you what it was,” I stated in a snippy manner.
“The weather bomb.” Lane shook his head.
“And you still don’t believe me?” I asked. “Look at it.”
“Alright.” Lane lifted his hand. “Assume this Julius guy is real.”
“Oh, stop. He is real. He said this was going to happen. And wait until you see what’s ahead. But for now …” There was a five rung ladder hanging from the edge of the hatch to guide in climbing out. Without hesitation, I grabbed a rung and started to climb.
“Whoa, hey, wait.” Martin grabbed me, halting me. “Where are you going?’
“Up there.”
“You can’t go up there,” Martin told me. “Look at the way things are blowing, look at the sky.”
“You think I’m gonna blow away?”
“Um, yes,” Martin replied. “I think it's possible.”
“I’m not an expert or scientist, but I think if it was powerful enough to blow me away, it would have sucked me right up.” I started to climb again.
Martin laid his hand on my wrist. “Jana, I have seen a lot of storms. A lot of funnels. I have never seen this. Ever. Those things are slowly dissipating. We should wait. Just … wait, please.”
My curiosity was getting the best of me, but I saw the seriousness and concern on his face. I really don’t know why I was anxious to go up and look. But looking again at the floating debris dancing in the air, I changed my mind.
It probably was better to wait.
✽✽✽
When everything stopped, the funnels disappeared, we weren’t quick enough to close the shelter hatch doors. Every particle of dust and dirt floating and swirling in the air above us dropped with the heaviness of a winter snowstorm, flowing down at us at a steady pace.
Winds of Ares: An Apocalypse Thriller Page 3