Upheaval: A Disaster Thriller, page 4
“I’m heading to the docks. Rally point in the South lot in five.” Clint strode toward the door leading directly outside.
“W-what about me?” Beth stammered. “I-I just moved here from New Jersey. We don’t have earthquakes!”
Jason reached for Beth’s arm. “Come with me. We’ll grab your things and head to the meeting area.”
Clint gave his boss a quick nod of thanks and ducked outside. He didn’t have time to babysit a woman who didn’t have a clue when almost thirty employees and countless contractors were working the Port. He jogged toward the busiest sector where a crane arm loaded with logs swung out across a barge.
Hands in the air, he waved down Jimmie, the forklift operator, who waited for the crane to deposit the load before digging up another stack.
Jimmie shifted into park and pulled off his ear protection. “What’s up?”
“Can’t you feel that?” The ground beneath Clint’s feet vibrated.
“Can’t feel anything over the rev of the engine.”
“There’s ongoing tremors!” Clint waved at the ground. “Mild for now, but who knows what’s coming. Get your crew to the South lot ASAP.”
“We aren’t done loading.”
“You know the rules. Follow the quake procedures. Now, Jimmie. I don’t want to tell Kim you died loading logs when you should have been evacuating.”
Jimmie’s pale face flushed, and he nodded in agreement. “Will do.”
Clint crossed the man and his three coworkers off his mental list. He hurried toward the barge. A man stood on the dock, trying to steady the temporary stairs leading to the barge deck. Clint cupped his hands around his mouth and shouted. “There’s earthquake risk! You need to push off. Get out to sea!”
The man turned and shook his head. Clint was too far away to hear. He picked up the pace, jogging the last twenty feet. The dock swayed violently to the left and he stumbled. “Earthquake!” He shouted at the man. “Get your people on the barge and pull out of the port.”
“Engines aren’t fired up. It would take—” Another tremor stole his breath and the man fell against the steps.
Clint staggered three steps to the right, barely staying vertical. “If you can’t leave, then disconnect at least. I can’t guarantee the dock won’t suffer damage.”
The man nodded and grabbed the stair rails with both hands before hauling himself up. Clint exhaled. It wasn’t ideal—a barge staying in port risked massive damage—but at least they were warned.
He turned toward the warehouse, and another jolt of the ground buckled his knees. The ground rose in his vision and he landed, palms spread, face an inch from the concrete. Violent tremors shook the dock, an order of magnitude greater than anything he’d felt before. The port-a-potty ten feet away slid in his direction. A door flew open on the shed housing dock repair equipment and a stack of buckets crashed to the ground.
Dirt clung to Clint’s palms as he struggled to stand, but the tremors rocked the dock, splintering the asphalt beneath him and forcing him back down. If the shaking continued much longer, the entire structure would break apart.
Across the U-shaped concrete pier, two tractor trailers queued, full of logs ready for loading on the barge. Clint watched in horror as another wave of tremors jolted the dock. One trailer skidded sideways, logs tipping from the open back as it crashed into the guard rails.
Careening over in a slow-motion disaster, the trailer lost logs as it slid. Giant rough-cut pine trees careened across the broken concrete, dropping one at a time into the turbulent waves.
Smoke billowed from beneath the cab as the driver stood on the brakes. It was no use. The weight of the trailer dragged the cab toward the water. At the last minute, the cab door opened and a man jumped out, landing hard on the asphalt as the cab rolled off the dock and splashed into the water.
Clint sagged against the ground, relieved the man survived. But it was short lived. A giant rumble like thundering hooves of a herd of buffalo echoed behind him and he turned to see a cascade of logs rolling in his direction. The logs had been stacked in bundles, waiting for Jimmie or one of the other forklift operators to feed them to the crane.
Now they cascaded toward him, bouncing and bobbing and gaining speed. Clint struggled to his feet as the quake, still going strong, wrecked the reinforced dock and pier. The concrete and asphalt, strong enough to support countless logging trucks loaded to the brim, now crumbled beneath his feet. Every step, he sunk lower into the once solid material.
One step, then another, running and staggering, swaying three feet in one direction and four in the other, Clint managed to stay on his feet. The logs gained. He felt their insistent, unrelenting beat, above and beyond the shaking of the earth.
The guard house, usually empty, stood at the edge of the dock, half on the solid ground, half on reinforced piers. Clint dove for it, ducking behind the edge of the building as the first log clipped his heel. Giant logs careened past him, a teeming mass of forest bent on destruction. The first slammed into a little hatchback parked at the entrance to the dock and another followed, rolling up and over the first to crest the tiny car’s hood.
The windshield cracked, the hood dented, and the roof caved in. The little car never stood a chance. Neither did Clint. He sucked in a lungful of air and thanked God for his good fortune. He survived.
Leaning over and gripping his thighs, he used the guard shack as support, bracing against the quake. Never in all his years living in the Pacific Northwest had a quake gone on this long. Thirty seconds? Sure. He’d heard of some lasting a minute. But what was this? Two minutes? More?
A giant crack sounded behind him and he pulled away from the shack. Massive, jagged cracks split the dock in two. Piers buckled. A forklift fell sideways and landed in a chasm, dangling a foot out of the water.
Clint hoped Jimmie and the crew listened and were safe at the rally point. It was too late for anyone stuck on the dock now. He stared out at the barge. It swayed violently in the water, escaping logs rolling across the deck. Too much more of this and he doubted it would survive.
A ripping sound rended the air as another huge section of dock splintered and Clint turned toward the South lot. He hurried toward it, past the warehouse shimmying like Mary’s Jell-O salad after she served the first slice.
The further inland he walked, the more the ground beneath his feet vibrated. It shook with such an intensity, clumps of dirt and bits of rock visibly hopped.
The whole earth was a pan of popcorn sizzling and jumping over a fire. Clint’s shoes sunk into the ground and he half-walked, half-crawled toward the rally point, using three points of contact with the ground. Ahead, between Clint and the parking lot, a giant section of the ground broke apart.
Scrub brush lining the parking area disappeared into the dirt like a hand reached up from the center of the Earth and yanked them down. A truck loaded with oversized wash tanks slid into a newly formed ravine. Someone standing by their vehicle shouted. Clint recognized the yellow emergency vest and the thick, bushy beard. Jack, his designated coordinator at the lot, motioned for him to hurry.
Everything is fine. Everyone is doing what they are supposed to. He told himself this over and over as he picked up the pace, struggling to make his way across the dirt and rocks. He clambered over broken bits of ground, slipping and sliding in the newly exposed earth. Another jolt and the ground ten feet ahead fell a handful of feet. The entire coastline was crumbling into the ocean.
He dug his nails into the new cliffside and pulled himself forward. If he didn’t get over this ledge and onto solid ground, he might be swept out to sea with the dock and the barge and all the logs. He thought of Mika and he scrabbled to find a solid bit of asphalt to hold onto. The earth shook again and under his fingers, bits of parking lot disintegrated in his hand.
“Here! Grab this!” A red rope landed to his right and Clint reached for it, straining to keep purchase. His hand wrapped around the nylon as the ledge beneath his feet gave way.
He held on, both hands now clinging to the braided bit of rope as someone above him pulled. The toes of a pair of worn work boots appeared in Clint’s vision and a thick, solid hand reached down to pull him up. He landed on the edge of the parking lot, dirt coating his entire front, and sucked in a breath.
Jack towered above him, blocking the full strength of the sun. He stared down beneath heavy brows. “You okay?”
“I am now.” Clint squinted up at him. “Thanks for the hand.”
“You’re welcome.”
Clint rested his head on the ground and closed his eyes. It took him a full minute to realize the ground had stopped shaking.
The earthquake was over.
CHAPTER SIX
MIKA
“Do you feel that?” Hampton asked, eyes so wide her lashes brushed her eyebrows.
“Feel wh—” Mika’s question cut mid-word as the van shimmied sideways. She lifted in the seat, seat belt digging into the fleshy spot above her hip before another shift of the van sent her careening into the window. Her head banged into the glass and a rainbow burst across her vision.
Clutching the tender spot of her scalp, she shot a look of contempt at Ms. Rogers. Oh. Ms. Rogers gripped the steering wheel like a rodeo rider gripped a bucking bull’s reins, skin taut and white. Fear sucked her cheeks tight to her teeth and paled her usual rosy glow into something sallow and sick.
“What’s happening!?” A girl shouted behind Mika.
Hampton dumped her lunch into her lap and used the paper sack to breathe.
“It’s okay.” Mika gripped Hampton’s thigh and squeezed. “It’s going to be okay.” She tried to convince herself as much as Hampton, hiding her fear with earnestness, but a warble gave it away.
The tires rumbled as if they were running over rutted-out gravel and the brakes squealed. Mika craned her neck to catch a glimpse of road. Smoke billowed up from underneath the van. She buzzed the window down and the stench of burning rubber assaulted her nose.
“Ohmygod! What’s happening?” The words rushed out of Hampton’s mouth all mushed together, her breathing labored.
“Don’t have a panic attack.”
“How are you not having a panic attack?” Hampton gasped between fat gulps of air.
Mika wondered the same. Her heart fluttered, sweat slicked her palms, and if she didn’t concentrate on breathing, she might pass out. Panic? Yeah, it was there all right, growling deep in her belly and growing louder by the second. But what good would it do to give in?
The van lurched and she fought down a wave of nausea.
“I’m l-losing grip on th-this thing.” Words tripping over Ms. Rogers’s tongue.
“We need to turn around. Get back to level ground.” Ms. Chalmers twisted around to stare at the girls.
The shoulders of the two in front of Mika and Hampton were bouncing up and down. One cried out, “What’s happening? Why won’t you tell us?”
“We’re in the middle of a damn earthquake, that’s what’s happening!” Ms. Rogers, in her terror, forgot the ‘no swearing’ rule.
All at once everything made sense. The vibrations, the rumble beneath the tires, the smoke as Ms. Rogers tried to keep the van in the lane. Another tremor sent the van skidding across the asphalt, dangerously close to the edge of the road. Mika’s head swam.
“Turn around!” Ms. Chalmers cried.
“Are you crazy? We need to get higher up,” Ms. Rogers contested.
“Higher up the mountain?” Ms. Chalmers scrambled for the grab bar as the van swayed. “That’s crazy!”
Mika stilled as the two troop leaders continued to squabble. Neither troop leader had ever been anything other than calm and collected. Even when Rachel lit her hair on fire stoking the flames, Ms. Rogers calmly tossed a bottle of water on the girl and Ms. Chalmers wrapped her in a towel. If they were panicked now…
She ran her tongue across her lower lip but it caught on a patch of dry skin.
“What else do you suppose we do?” Ms. Rogers asked. “If we can get to the summit, we might clear the quake. It might not reach the other—”
“We won’t make it to the summit.” Ms. Chalmers kept her voice low, but Mika still overheard. “If this keeps going, we’ll be trapped under a landslide or worse.”
“Landslide?” Ms. Rogers scoffed as if the idea was preposterous at best. “It hasn’t rained in days. There’s almost no snow on the peaks. There’s nowhere for landslides to come from.”
“If the quake is big enough, the ground will rip apart, wet or not,” Ms. Chalmers argued. She sucked in a deep breath and blew it out in a steady stream. Her voice regained its even keel. “Just turn the van around. We’ll have a fighting chance to make it down the mountain before it gives way.”
Mika’s pulse swooshed through her eardrums, pounding inside her head like the procession of a marching band. Hampton dug her nails into Mika’s skin until her arm burned, but Mika didn’t mind. It gave her something to focus on besides crushing fear. She tried to swallow, but her mouth lacked even a trace of spit.
“How am I supposed to turn around with the tremors bouncing me all over? I can barely keep going straight.” Although she still protested, Ms. Rogers’s voice lacked the defiance of before, as if she were ready to relent and do anything possible to keep from plummeting off the side of the mountain, van, troop, and all.
“Hug the higher side and we’ll try to maneuver into a U-turn,” Ms. Chalmers suggested, mimicking the movement with her hands.
Ms. Rogers’s tongue poked from between her lips as she concentrated. She turned the wheel, bracing against the undulating ground. The back tires eased into the dirt along the side of the road and the van shimmied. Whatever traction they’d managed on the asphalt was gone.
Mika reached for Hampton’s free hand and clenched her fingers around her best friend’s palm. A girl behind them wailed a long, jagged sob. Clammy sweat loosened Mika’s grip and she reached up higher, clutching at Hampton’s sweatshirt.
The rumble beneath the tires intensified, jostling the entire van. It shifted left, then right, then forward like the ground was one of those Magic Fingers machines she’d seen once in an old movie. A crack began to form, cutting across the road, ripping the white guidelines apart as the earth opened up. The van leaned, bottom half skidding across the dirt, the top half lifting off the ground.
Ms. Rogers froze in place, hands at ten and two on the steering wheel, paralyzed with fear. Ms. Chalmers unbuckled and leaned across the van, wrenching the steering wheel hard to the right. The van refused to cooperate, front wheels too far off the ground to gain purchase.
Mika’s throat threatened to close and her stomach convulsed like the ground. Adrenaline pulsed through her veins and she turned to Hampton. “We’ve got to get out of this van.”
Her friend stared at her in horror, unable to verbally respond. The voices and cries and blind panic around her receded and Mika focused on the feeling swelling inside her. The need to move, to find shelter behind a tree, away from the road, anywhere outside of the metal box they were trapped in, overwhelmed her. She reached for her seatbelt and released it as the van lurched violently.
Mika fell on top of Hampton. Sasha flew across the van like a rag doll, her book launching from her hands to hit the windshield. It was as if a giant had reached down from the clouds and picked up the vehicle, shaking it about to guess the contents.
Mika shut her eyes against the savagery of nature and willed herself to stay alert. If she didn’t panic, she would survive. Hampton would survive. A sickening crunch popped her eyes open. A giant crack splintered across the windshield.
As she watched in disbelief, a rock the size of a softball hit the windshield in another place. Followed by another and another.
Ms. Rogers screamed.
A landslide.
Ms. Chalmers was right. Rocks and dirt and uprooted trees careened toward them, ripped from the ground from the force of the quake. It was like one of those slow-motion movies of snow-covered peaks where a skier attempts to beat the landslide down the mountain, only worse.
No one ever played the audio of those clips, did they? If they did, it would ruin skiing for everyone who watched it. The noise… it was part grizzly bear, part tornado, part end of the world all blended together on turbo speed.
Something massive collided with the van and Mika fell, landing hard on her back against the opposite window. All the air fled her lungs in a rush. A boot stepped on her hair and pain seared across her scalp.
Hampton screamed through clenched teeth, the sound leaking out like the cry of a dying animal. Mika’s nose burned and tears pooled in her eyes. She willed herself not to cry. If she lost her wits, she might not make it off this mountain alive.
The landslide pounded the vehicle, gritty earth caving in on them straight out of an apocalyptic nightmare. She pressed her palms against her ears and shouted incoherent nothings until her throat ached. Her voice disappeared into the cacophony of terror swirling all around her.
She sucked in a pained breath and smelled gas and metal and the acrid tinge of urine. At last, the van’s rear tires gave way and the entire vehicle and twelve occupants tipped over. A girl landed on top of Mika. Was it Julia? Sasha? She couldn’t tell. A mass of blonde hair gagged her mouth and she fought for purchase against the window as the van slid a handful of feet. Someone screamed in her ear.
The van slipped again, a rough dive down another chunk of road, if there even was a road beneath them anymore. Mika wrapped her arms over her face and prayed they wouldn’t sink into the earth and be swallowed up with the trees and debris barreling down from above. Just let me survive this. Please. For my mom and dad. Don’t let me die on the side of this mountain.
Bile rose in Mika’s throat, and she forced air through her nose to keep from vomiting. Something large and heavy slammed into the opposite side of the van, shattering the windows. Mika scrambled on her elbows, crawling toward the rear of the van and away from the broken glass and dirt flooding the cabin.
