Seattle Quake 9.2 (A Jackie Harlan Mystery Book 1)

by Marti Talbott

  A few minutes later, he was standing at the window watching the pitiful scene across the street again. Unlike the department store, none of the floors remained high enough off the ground to allow people to crawl out. A new body had been added to the dead and a woman sat nearby, holding her bleeding head in both hands. Collin turned and walked into the control room. Keeping his voice down, he leaned toward Max, "I'm going down there."

  "And do what?"

  "I don't know, take a closer look, count the dead and see about the injured. Maybe Sarah can get them some help."

  Max turned to look at the sincerity in his friend's eyes, and then lowered his gaze. "Collin, there's something you need to understand. Help is a long way off. You've been listening, we've got reports of damage, deaths and injuries, but the only good news is about an Aircraft Carrier and four choppers. We don't even know if they're medical units. Real help takes 24 to 48 hours after a disaster. All we've got is ourselves."

  "I'm going anyway. The least I can do is let them know somebody cares. Besides, I'll go nuts if I don't do something."

  Max mulled it over, and then reluctantly nodded. "Don't take too long, I can't handle this place by myself."

  "Great."

  As soon as he was gone, Max got up, hobbled into the studio and made sure the mike was close enough to the Ham Radio. Next, he turned the volume up a little, and then went back to the control room.

  "A7BB."

  "BB, go ahead."

  "A7BB, good news! We've got more choppers coming in. I count six, maybe seven all coming from the east. And the Navy choppers are starting to come back. Guys in yellow jackets with sticks are telling them where to land and they've brought tons of equipment topside. Would you look at that, some guy is waving a white flag at me! Hello Navy, over."

  Sarah smiled. Next to Max, A7BB was her favorite and she was relieved to hear him in a good mood. "BB, maybe they want to surrender."

  "Ah Sarah, we ain't got no place to keep prisoners. I say we let 'em go. A7BB, over."

  "BB, hasn't anybody come to help you?"

  "Well, one guy peeked over the side of the cliff and looked down. But the truth is, the edge isn't safe. He nearly fell just getting close enough to lean over. Sure wish he'd come back with a jug of water though. A7BB, over."

  "Copy, BB."

  "N7JDX emergency."

  Sarah immediately turned her attention to the new caller, "JDX, go ahead."

  "We've got looters in downtown Ballard. The earthquake broke all the windows so people are just taking whatever they want out of stores. What should I do? Over."

  "JDX, stay clear. You'll only get hurt if you try to interfere."

  "Okay. I'm just sick about this. Looters? I never thought this would happen in Ballard. Haven't we got enough trouble? N7JDX, over."

  "JDX, it’s just stuff. We need to concentrate on getting help to the injured. Walk away JDX, let it go for now. You been to St. Luke's Church yet? They're a designated Red Cross center, aren't they? Over."

  "This is N7JDX, I'll head that way now. Thanks Sarah. Out."

  *

  On the forty-third floor of the Winningham Blue building, Seely cautiously opened the door to the supply room. Flashlight in hand, she allowed the beam of light to shine first on Bob's hand, and then she slowly moved the light toward his torso. Obscured behind an industrial copier, his body lay crushed between it and the mail machine. His face obscured, Seely let out a relieved breath and knelt down. She brought out two more gallons of water, a smaller duffel bag and then stood back up and started in.

  "Wait," Tim said. "Suppose we can't get up the stairs. You'll have gone in there for nothing. I say we try to get to the roof first. Besides, maybe we can find paper in one of the offices."

  Seely quickly pulled the door closed and sighed, "Sounds good to me."

  "Okay." Tim picked up both jugs, made his way through the debris in the hallway and set them on the floor near the ladies room. "Jenna, help me move these filing cabinets. No use having to climb over them several times."

  "Coming." With Tim's help the cabinets were easy to lift, even with the drawers falling out. One by one, they shoved the lower drawers back inside the cabinet, set them upright and moved on. Finally, the path was clear all the way to the steel door leading to the stairs.

  Tim turned the knob and pulled, but the door didn't budge. He stood back, viewed the frame, and then tried again. This time he pulled harder. Finally, it screeched open. He held it while Jenna pulled a full drawer out of a filing cabinet and shoved it against the door to keep it from closing. Then he let go. "Well, best I go see."

  Jenna hesitated. The stairwell was pitch-black and clammy cold. "I'll get a flashlight."

  "Good idea." Cautiously, he stepped out onto the cluttered, concrete landing. "Hello? Anybody there?" He waited for the echo to subside, but no one answered. "Looks like we're the only ones dumb enough to work on Saturday." When Jenna and Seely came with two flashlights, he turned an inquisitive eye on Seely, "You're not going, are you?"

  "What, and miss the best radio show I've heard in months? Not a chance."

  "Good. You need to rest, you know, your heart?"

  Seely grinned, "Yes, I do know."

  Tim took one of the flashlights, flipped it on and shined it against the cracked and broken concrete walls. The north and south walls showed the most damage with cracks wide enough for his entire hand. All the walls were missing large areas of concrete exposing steel mesh reinforcements and the missing chunks lay in heaps on the stairs.

  Attempting to boost his own morale, he winked at Jenna, "And there you have it, an elevator shaft with stairs...hopefully." Timmy took another careful step, and then another until he reached the handrail. "I saw a movie once where even the stairs were gone. Think they used a fire hose and a chair to get down. Yep, that's what they used. Might be a handy thing to know…should we have an earthquake."

  Jenna eased out onto the landing and watched him try the first step, "It's cold in here."

  "Take a memo, Jenna. From now on, all death traps are to have heat in the stairwells. And another thing, put in for my vacation. I'm feeling a little burned out." He lifted his eyes upward and again shined his light on cracked and broken walls. "I'm going up now, Jenna. Stay here, okay? No use both of us getting killed." Ever so gingerly, Tim put one foot at a time on the concrete steps and eased upward.

  *

  "A7BB"

  "BB, go ahead," Sarah answered.

  "A7BB. Things are really look'n up now. I can see a second Coast Guard fire ship sailing around Alki Point. Must be coming from Tacoma. And I think…yes, I see two fire choppers. Yee haw!!! And guess what? There's a kitty cat perched on a piece of wood out on the water. Poor thing just sits there looking up at me, like I should be doing something to help. Poor dumb cat, over."

  "Copy that, BB. You okay?"

  "Yep. The tree slipped another few inches, but I'm still okay. A7BB, over."

  "A7FLC emergency."

  "FLC, go ahead."

  "A7FLC, we've got houses and a ton of earth that slid down First Hill onto the I-5 freeway. And the East St. Johns overpass collapsed trapping cars under it, over."

  "FLC, where are you? Over."

  "A7FLC, I'm about four blocks from the Convention Center tunnel. It fell too. I'm up on St. John's Street looking down. There's a forty-foot drop to the freeway and I can't get down there to help. People are hurt bad. Sarah, there's a metro bus crushed by the overpass and a major pile up on the other side of the landslide. If we could get a fire truck up here with a long ladder, we maybe could get people out, over."

  "NJ7Q."

  "NJ, go ahead."

  "NJ7Q, Fire station three reports heavy damage in that area. Many injuries and no way to get a fire truck through this mess. Suggest you try getting a cherry picker down on the freeway, over."

  The man standing above the freeway instantly flared, "You idiot, we've got no phones. If we can't get a fire truck up here, how do you expect us
to find a cherry…"

  Sarah instantly interrupted, "This is net Control, all stations stand by. We are all overwhelmed here, try to calm down guys." She intentionally paused, allowing only dead air, and then moved her mouth closer to the mike. "Okay, A7FLC needs ladders at St. John's Street. Who's next?

  *

  Getting from the two-story radio station to the collapsed building across the street wasn't as easy as Collin expected. The narrow yard filled with daisies and pansy plants, now held the remnants of KMPR's northern roof. Glass littered the sidewalk along with bits of shingles, wood, brick and plaster. An antique weathervane from the roof next door lay in the middle. Power lines sagged, trees slanted and the declining sun made elongated shadows, pointing out the lateness of the hour.

  *

  Undaunted, Collin slipped around the side of the house, made his way across the street and walked through the small park to the collapsed building. He was greeted by stunned, cut and bruised faces, exchanged a few words and paused to take an accurate count of the dead. He looked over the wounds of the injured, placed a comforting hand on several shoulders, and then headed back.

  When he came back upstairs, he walked straight to his can of soda and downed all that was left. Visibly upset, he opened the refrigerator, pulled out another and popped the pull-tab before he noticed Max was watching him.

  Max slowly mouthed the words, "You okay?"

  Collin nodded and then quickly turned away.

  *

  When two Hams tried to call in at the same time, Sarah started taping her pencil, "That was a complete double. Let me have the one that starts with WC, over."

  "This is WC7NJT, I have a message to pass on from the Mayor, over."

  Sarah's green eyes instantly sparkled, "WC, is that the same Mayor who said most Ham Radio Operators were 'looky loos' just trying to get a cheap thrill by loitering around fire stations?"

  "WC7NJT. No, this is his overworked and underappreciated executive assistant. You know, the one with the actual Ham license? May I continue? Over."

  "Oh okay, might as well let him get it out of his system or he'll pester us till we do. WC, go ahead."

  "WC7NJT. My fellow citizens of Seattle, the Mayor wishes to assure you he is doing everything in his power to help. He wants the voters to know..."

  *

  At the station, Collin narrowed his eyes and hurried back to his stool. In a flash, he turned the volume down on the Amateur Radio and grabbed his Mike, "This is KMPR in Seattle, 760 AM Radio. Here's what we know so far. We have an open fissure north of the University of Washington with several people still trapped at the bottom. Hillsides slid in several areas and overpasses collapsed. We have a child trapped in a department store and fires burning out of control. Homes and apartment buildings have fallen and reports from downtown, where the quake was centered, are still nonexistent. And the ugly truth is, there isn't going to be enough help to go around for quite some time.

  Folks, we're on our own. Darkness is only a few hours away and we need to think ahead. Try to find flashlights, batteries, blankets, and water. We can all live for a few days without food and like the book says, most of us have water stored in our water heaters, if we can get to them. What we don't need is more fires. Make sure the gas is turned off in your neighborhood. Watch for live power lines and find a safe place to sleep where nothing can fall on you. And most of all, expect more aftershocks. This is far from over."

  Collin paused and quickly glanced at Max, "And if you happen to find a pack or two of cigarettes..."

  Max quickly downed two more ibuprofen, swallowed, and then rolled his eyes, "Collin, you're twisted, man."

  Collin smirked, laid the mike down and then turned the volume back up on the Ham Radio. The Mayor's speech was over.

  "NR7G"

  "NR7G, go ahead."

  The man caller spoke in a dull, monotone voice, slowly stretching out his painful words, "Mercy Hospital fell…collapsed. Don't bring your injured…there is no one left to help."

  Sarah hung her head and softly mumbled, "It's too much. It's just too much." She put both hands on the arms of her wheelchair and lifted her body. Paralyzed from the waist down, her upper back was starting to hurt and changing positions was the only way to relieve it. She lowered her body back down, and then went back to her duties, "This is net control, copy. Mercy Hospital is incapacitated."

  "WC7NJT."

  "NJT, go ahead."

  "I've got another message from the Mayor. The Army is closing all routes into the city and will turn everyone back except emergency staff and vehicles. Also, the Mayor is ordering an 8:00 p.m. curfew. All citizens are to be off the streets by..."

  In a huff, Collin switched off the radio. "Great. That's just great! We've got people dying here and his answer to all our problems is to lock us down tight. It'll be dark soon. What are we supposed to do, stop helping people just because the Mayor is afraid of looters? I say..."

  Bad foot and all, Max left the control room and walked to Collin, "Man, don't say stuff like that, you'll start a riot."

  "I don't care! Are people like him born without common sense or do they just misplace it once they run for office? We've got work to do. We need every available man and woman to dig people out of the rubble. What about the fires, huh? Are we supposed to just let them burn all night? Where are the police? Where are the firemen? We haven't seen one since the quake and we've got a collapsed building right across the street. I'll tell you where they are, there are too few to handle this mess, and those we have are trying to dig their own families out. What about kids with missing parents and parents looking for kids? Think they're a big threat to pawn shops and jewelry stores. And what about..."

  Suddenly, the loud, sorrowful groan of wood and metal interrupted Collin in mid-sentence. He held his breath, waiting to see if the earth would move again. But it wasn't the earth. Instead, the noise was coming from outside. Unnerved, he spun around on his stool, hopped down and raced to the window. Across the street, the second apartment building had begun to lean to one side -- the side where the first one lay in ruins. Wide eyed, he listened as the unearthly moan of wood scraping against wood intensified and the building teetered.

  People began to fly out the front door. A man jumped from a second floor window, quickly got up and held out his arms to a child above. In the doorway, a woman fell and mindless others trampled her. And still, the building lamented, leaning closer and closer to a torturous death.

  The man on the ground screamed, "Jump, Jeremy, jump!" But the four-year old in the window above was frozen in terror, his arms out stretched and his face streaked with tears. Briefly, the father considered going back up, and then he thought better of it. Forcing himself to look angry, he glared at the child, "If you don't jump, I'll beat your butt!"

  The child winced. Still in tears, he begrudgingly lifted one, and then the other leg over the windowsill. Again the building groaned and leaned yet another foot to the side. In the doorway, two men mercifully grabbed hold of the fallen woman and quickly pulled her to safety while still more people fled from inside.

  At last, the child jumped into his father's arms. But before the man could turn to run, the building gave up its struggle. Old mortar suddenly disintegrated, allowing bricks to rain down on father and son. With a percussion as loud as a bomb, the building crumbled into a heap of rubble, burying both under tons and tons of rubbish.

  Collin dared not move. In shock, he heard no sounds and felt no emotions. Nor did he allow his mind to accept what his eyes had just seen. The dust storm from the fallen building began to mushroom upward like some thoughtless, evil cloud of death and he still could not move.

  It was Max, not Collin who quickly sat down at the console and grabbed hold of the mike. His expression was filled with anger, his hands shook and his jaw muscles flexed, "Listen people!" he nearly shouted. "The sound you just heard was another building falling. More people have just died. Please, please don't go back inside any building. There can't be
anything in there important enough to risk your lives for. Take your children to a parking lot or a park. As soon as we can, we'll give you a list of places to go for food and water. Until then, get out of the buildings!" Still angry, Max shoved the microphone aside, got up and hobbled back into the control room. He would have slammed the door, but…

  *

  Thousands of people all up and down the Puget Sound area were painfully aware of the approaching night. Some had transistor radios but most did not, relying instead on car radios. Some had water, medical supplies, stored food and extra clothing. But most did not, oblivious or uncaring when it came to preparing for that elusive earthquake they assumed would never happen. Now, survival gear meant everything. And fear consumed their very souls.

  Ninety-five blocks north of downtown, Theo Westly sat his overwrought wife Michelle down in the front passenger seat of their 1963 Oldsmobile. Thousands of hours went into restoring the engine and just before the quake, he moved it from the garage to the street, planning to take it for a test drive. Now, it was the only undamaged car they owned. He closed the door, and then glanced around. No telephone poles or power lines were near enough to fall on them.

  Next, he put his two daughters in the back seat, got in the driver's side, rolled down the window, and closed the door. "Honey, there is absolutely nothing we can do about your Mom. Absolute nothing."

  Her hair as dark and as long as Seely's, Michelle folded her arms and sniffed her nose. Tears streamed down her cheeks, her head already ached and her voice quivered, "There must be something we can do. We can't just leave her there. Oh Theo, if only she hadn't gone to work today."

  "If she hadn't gone to work she would have been at home, in that twenty-five year old building with cracks already in the walls from the last earthquake. She probably has a better chance of surviving downtown." He watched her face, but his wife didn't find much comfort in his words. "Come here," he said, opening his arms, and then wrapping them around her. "Honey, we can't go downtown and we can't leave the kids even if we could. What can we do?"