The Tsunami Countdown

by Boyd Morrison

  “I’m going for the terminal,” Stan said.

  The enormous main terminal stood about a mile to the north. Its gigantic roof would give them plenty of room to land. But then what? It was only three or four stories high. The next tsunami would completely engulf it, and it was much too far to run to high ground.

  The airport control tower loomed in front of them, and Kai noticed that the roof of the tower’s companion building was just peeking above the water’s surface. Half of it was in tatters, ripped apart by the waves, but the other half seemed to have survived. The tower had to be at least 250 feet high. If they climbed to the top of it, they might have a chance.

  “Stan!” Kai said into his microphone, “the building next to the tower. Land on it and we can use the stairs to get to the top.”

  Stan nodded and aimed the helicopter for the white roof of the tower’s office building. The cabin shook like a paint mixer as they descended. The roof rose to meet them at a terrifying rate.

  “Hold on!” Stan yelled.

  The skids smacked into the roof, and Kai was afraid they’d go right through. Instead, they bounced off and careened toward the edge. They weren’t going to get another shot at landing, so Stan forced the stick down, and the skids made contact again. Mia and Lani screamed as they slid along the roof, the skids scraping the poured concrete surface.

  The chopper quickly scrubbed speed because of the friction, but they continued to approach the edge. Kai pulled Lani toward him and braced himself, ready for the plunge over the side, but the helicopter came to a halt two feet from the precipice.

  Stan turned the engine off, and the turbine began to wind down. Kai removed his headset.

  “Is everyone all right?” he said.

  A few mumbles and nods were the only responses. Nobody seemed to be injured.

  Kai unbuckled his belt and lifted his feet so Brad could pull himself up.

  As they crawled out of the ruined helicopter, Chuck walked in circles. “What kind of rescue was that?” he said in a high-pitched keen.

  “Will you shut up, you dimwit,” Brad said in a weary voice. “You’re fine.”

  “Fine? Fine?” Chuck said. “We almost get killed and you say we’re fine!”

  “We’re alive, aren’t we, Chuck?”

  “No thanks to you.”

  “If you weren’t in such a hurry to get on the helicopter, maybe we would have left your ass behind.”

  “If you hadn’t overloaded the helicopter with all these people, we might have made it.” Chuck strode over to the pilot, who was still sucking wind from the adrenaline rush of the emergency. “Thanks for picking us up in a faulty helicopter!” Stan looked at him as if he were crazy, which Kai thought he might be.

  “Are you done?” Kai said.

  “I’ll tell you what I think—”

  “We don’t care what you think,” Teresa said.

  “And if you say one word about those stupid baseballs,” Brad said, “I’m going to punch you in the face.” When Chuck saw Brad’s clenched fist, he quieted.

  “What’s the plan, Kai?” Brad said.

  “Let’s find a way off the roof,” Kai said. “Then we’ll climb the stairs to the top of the tower.”

  Brad looked up at the soaring tower. He turned back to Kai with a dubious expression. He didn’t want to go into another building.

  “What if it’s not tall enough?” he asked.

  “That’s why Stan is going to stay here and use his radio to try to find another helicopter.”

  Stan nodded and got back into the chopper, where he started to transmit a Mayday.

  “Everyone else, stay here,” Kai said. “Brad and I will find a way down.”

  “Don’t leave us!” Lani cried, and then broke into sobs. She ran to Kai and threw her arms around him.

  “I’ll be right back, honey.” Kai wanted to comfort her—wanted her to comfort him—but there just wasn’t time. He glanced at Teresa.

  “I’ll take care of Lani,” she said. “Just hurry.”

  Kai broke away from Lani and jogged across the expansive roof in the direction of the tower with Brad next to him.

  “I’m sorry, Kai,” Brad said. “About Rachel.”

  Kai didn’t say anything, not because he didn’t appreciate Brad’s sentiment, but because he couldn’t afford to break down. He put his hand on Brad’s shoulder for a moment and left it at that.

  The roof of the office complex was multileveled, and they had landed on the lowest level. Kai could see where ladders to the higher levels had been ripped from their mountings.

  After a minute they reached the edge of the roof nearest the tower. They hadn’t been able to spot any stairs leading from the roof. Kai peered over the side.

  The water had completely drained, leaving behind the ubiquitous ooze glistening on the few chunks of grass that were left. Next to the control tower, a pile of debris that looked like remnants of an airplane rested against the side of the building. It had been deposited in such a way that they might be able to climb down it.

  “Come on,” Kai said.

  One at a time they picked their way down. The junk was sturdy, settling only a couple of times as they descended.

  The outside of the tower was blocked by the debris. The only way in was through the office building. Kai couldn’t see any doors, but all of the windows had been blown out, so he heaved himself over one of the sills and Brad followed.

  The room was a standard office that had been swept clean by the water. They emerged into a hallway leading in the direction of the tower. Rounding the corner, they found that the door to the control tower stairwell had been ripped from its hinges.

  Now Kai saw that the pile of debris didn’t end outside. It was resting against the tower because it was part of a larger piece of the airplane that had broken through the tower’s outer wall. On the piece of aluminum skin facing them, Kai could just make out a blue and white logo and the letters Tra. It was the remains of a TransPacific airliner.

  A portion of a wing surface blocked the stairs for two stories. Kai couldn’t see any way around it. There was no way to get to their refuge.

  FIFTY-FOUR

  12:28 p.m.

  9 Minutes to Fourth Wave

  Kai leaned against the wall and slowly shook his head. “It was my idea to land here,” he said.

  “Don’t beat yourself up about it,” Brad said. “It was a good idea.”

  “What was I thinking, Brad?”

  “What do you mean?”

  “I can’t even save my own family. What made me think I could save everyone else?”

  Brad started to speak, then stopped. His face had a puzzled look. “Did you really think you could save everyone? That that was your job?”

  “Of course that was my job!”

  “No. It wasn’t. Your job was to give everyone else a chance. To warn them. You did that. I saw you do it. You can’t save everyone. People have to save themselves. You gave them a chance to do that. After that, it’s up to the Big Man upstairs.”

  Kai stared at Brad, truly surprised. He had never heard Brad mention any religious beliefs before. It just wasn’t something they talked about.

  Brad saw the stunned look and said, “Hey, how do you think I got through that scuba diving bit? Now, enough with the pep talk. Let’s go figure out another way out of this mess.”

  With that, Kai pulled himself together. If they were going to get out of this, gnawing self-doubt would not help them.

  They climbed the debris back onto the roof and ran to the now-silent helicopter.

  “So can we get up there?” Teresa asked. The others looked at Kai expectantly.

  He shook his head. “It’s completely blocked. It’ll take too much time to try moving it.”

  “Oh, this is just perfect!” Chuck exclaimed before Brad shot him a look and shut him up. Denise ignored him, as if she wanted nothing more to do with him.

  Stan seemed to be having a conversation on his headset.
/>   “Stan,” Kai said, “please tell us you found a helicopter.”

  Stan wrapped up his discussion and removed the headset. He climbed out of the helicopter and looked up.

  “No,” Stan said, “I still can’t find any. None will respond to my hails.”

  “Then who were you talking to?”

  “I have another pilot who says he might be able to get us.”

  “You just said there weren’t any other helicopters,” Chuck said.

  “There aren’t.” Stan pointed straight up. “Look there.”

  At first, Kai didn’t see what Stan was talking about, mostly because he expected a helicopter. Then a glint of metal directly overhead flashed in the sun.

  “That’s a plane,” Chuck said, master of the obvious.

  “An Air Force C-130,” Stan said. “He’s got an alternative solution.”

  Kai spun around. The runway next to the office building was pitted with holes where the concrete was torn up. The sections that were still intact were strewn with garbage and airplane parts.

  “He’ll never be able to land here,” Kai said.

  “He says that he can spot a section of the reef runway that is clear—at least, clear enough for him. Those babies can land on anything as long as it’s flat.”

  The control tower and its office building stood in the center of the airport. The reef runway was reclaimed land built on a coral outcropping at the airport’s southernmost point.

  “That’s got to be a mile away,” Kai said.

  “Given where he said he’d have to land,” Stan said, “I’d say more like a mile and a half.”

  Kai looked at his watch, which continued to tick despite all it had been through. Seven minutes left.

  “We’ll never make it, even if we all run.”

  “We’re not going to run,” Stan said. “We’re going to drive.”

  FIFTY-FIVE

  12:31 p.m.

  6 Minutes to Fourth Wave

  As promised, the C-130 swooped down and, from Kai’s vantage point, looked like it was landing on the water itself. It came to a stop, still far in the distance, and its rear cargo door lowered. The transport had just entered Hawaiian airspace and was headed to Wheeler when the pilot, a Captain Martin Wainwright, heard Stan’s plea over the radio. Wainwright had gotten a bright idea and volunteered to help.

  It was the cargo that was particularly relevant: three Humvees headed for Pearl Harbor. The cargo door lowered to disgorge one of them.

  “Come on,” Kai said. “Let’s cut the distance that guy has to come get us.”

  Brad spotted a section of the partially collapsed roof that they could easily slide down to get to ground level. When all of them were safely down, they started jogging in the direction of the reef runway. Brad carried Mia on his back, and Kai carried Lani. Teresa, Stan, and Tom jogged behind them. Chuck and Denise were in fairly good shape, so they could keep up—not that any of them could go fast anyway. The muck was slippery, and there was standing water everywhere.

  Just a few seconds into their trot, Stan ran through what, on the surface, looked like just a shallow puddle. But when he stepped into it, his leg sank up to his knee, and he fell facefirst into a pool of water two feet deep.

  “Dammit!” he yelled, sputtering the filthy water from his mouth.

  “You okay?” Kai said, helping him out.

  “I’m fine. The water’s so dirty, I couldn’t see the hole.”

  “Well, let’s try to steer around water where we can’t see the bottom.”

  “You think?” said Chuck. “You’re a genius.” He kept running.

  Brad made a move toward him, but Kai put his hand on Brad’s shoulder and shook his head. They didn’t need the distraction. After Stan’s plunge, they had to constantly make detours around obvious holes, standing water, and wreckage. Their progress slowed considerably.

  “This is a dumb idea,” said Chuck. “I bet that pilot could have found a helicopter if he’d tried harder.”

  “Why don’t you shut up?” said Brad. “I’m sick of your bitching. If you had been smart enough not to go back to your apartment, you wouldn’t be out here with us.”

  “I don’t have to shut up. I can say anything I want.”

  “Well, why don’t you say thanks to me for not tossing you out of that helicopter?”

  After inching down the cargo ramp for what seemed like an eternity, the Humvee roared off in their direction. With all the debris on the ground, it would still take a few minutes for the Humvee to get to them. They would be cutting it close.

  The cargo ramp lifted, and the plane pivoted so that it would be ready for takeoff.

  While Brad and Chuck verbally duked it out, Denise came closer to Kai.

  “I’m sorry about my husband,” Denise said. “He’s a jerk.”

  “I noticed,” Kai replied.

  “I can’t believe I’ve stayed with him so long. Listen, thanks for saving us. If it wasn’t for you, we’d still be on that building.”

  “You’re welcome.”

  “You know, you look really familiar,” Denise said. “Have I seen you somewhere?”

  “Maybe. My name’s Kai. Kai Tanaka. I work at the Pacific Tsunami Warning Center. Or worked, I should say.”

  “Right!” she said. “I saw you on TV this morning.”

  “Wait a minute!” said Chuck, overhearing their conversation. “I saw you too. Whatever they were paying you, it was too much.”

  Brad grabbed Chuck from behind and wrenched him to a stop.

  “If it wasn’t for him,” Brad said, “nobody would have had any time to evacuate.”

  “Get out of my face,” Chuck said. “He screwed up, and now we’re running for our lives because of it.”

  “He lost more than you’ll ever know today.”

  “Well, he deserves it.”

  Anger flared across Brad’s face, and without another word, he belted Chuck in the jaw. Chuck went down hard on his back. He lay there stunned for a moment and then picked himself up. None of the others moved a muscle to help him.

  When Chuck was fully standing, he continued looking at the ground. Apparently he was a big mouth with nothing to back it up. Kai understood that the guy was scared, but that didn’t mean he had to like him.

  With Mia still clinging to his back, Brad walked to within three inches of Chuck’s face and loomed over him. Brad had a good four inches and thirty pounds on him.

  “Now, you’re going to keep your mouth shut, or we’re going to leave your sorry butt out here. Got it?”

  Chuck didn’t look at him, but he didn’t say anything, either. He got it.

  “Come on,” Kai said. “The farther we run, the sooner we’ll be on that Humvee.”

  In a minute, the Humvee was less than a half mile from them. It closed in on them at a high speed that bordered on reckless. The mud was no match for its huge tires and ground clearance, so the driver took as straight a line toward them as the debris on the airfield would allow, instead of following what was left of the airstrip concrete. Splashes of water periodically shot into the air as it pounded through large pools.

  “I know we’re in a hurry,” Teresa said, “but that guy better watch out—”

  Before she could finish her sentence, the Humvee nosedived into another pool. This time a massive plume sprayed twenty feet high in front of the vehicle and it came to a dead stop, its front submerged in a rut three feet deep. The engine sputtered and quit.

  They all skidded to a halt, their mouths agape at seeing their only way to safety literally dead in the water.

  FIFTY-SIX

  12:33 p.m.

  4 Minutes to Fourth Wave

  Kai sprinted to the Humvee. It was one of the models that look like an enormous pickup truck, with the back of the Humvee open to the air. The driver’s door swung open. An airman in a green uniform stumbled out and fell into the pool. He was the only one in the vehicle. He clambered out of the hole, his hand over his forehead. Brad and Kai got t
here first and let Mia lean on Lani.

  “Are you all right?” Kai said.

  “Yes, sir. Hit my head on the steering wheel. Guess I should have worn the seat belt. No air bag.”

  He lifted his hand, and Kai could see a nasty gash above his right eyebrow. The blood flowed down into his eye.

  “That’ll make a great scar,” Brad said.

  Chuck and Stan came to stop behind them, followed by Tom, Denise, and Teresa.

  “Let me look at that,” Teresa said, and put pressure on the wound.

  “Are you the pilot?” Chuck asked. Why he thought the man would be the pilot, Kai had no idea.

  “Loadmaster,” the crewman replied. “Airman Darrin Peabody. Sorry about crashing the truck.”

  “How old are you?” Chuck asked. “Thirteen?”

  “I’m twenty, sir.”

  “Great! They sent a teenager to save us.”

  “I said shut your mouth,” Brad said, and Chuck did. “It’s all right, Airman. Stan over there took a header a few minutes ago.”

  “I’d love to introduce you to everyone,” Kai said, climbing into the Humvee’s driver’s seat, “but we need to get out of here right now.” Peabody was in no condition to drive.

  “Oh, no!” Brad said. “Move over. You drive like an old lady.”

  “What’s the best way to get this thing unstuck?” Kai asked Peabody.

  “Jeez, I don’t know. I’ve only driven these things a couple of times, and that was just to get it on the plane. My job is to make sure it’s loaded right.”

  “Never mind,” Brad said, putting it into gear and starting it up. “It’s like any other truck, just a lot bigger.”

  The engine wasn’t entirely submerged, or they might really have been out of luck. The front of the Humvee rested against the edge of the hole, which looked like a less solid part of a taxiway that had been stripped away from the concrete where it met the runway. The back wheels were up on the remaining concrete, so the truck sat at a steep angle.