Chapter One
Almost silently, the big double ended boat crept through the fog, its old steam engine chugging a soft wheezing song as it quietly worked. Karl sighed softly. He knew where he was. At least he knew where his new GPS said he was, but even though he could read the screen in front of him, he didn't believe it. In fact he would have traded a bottle of good scotch for a clear view of the shore line. The new GPS put his position almost in the middle of the bay, but the radar showed a low jumbled shoreline only a few yards away. He knew that GPS stood for Global Positioning System but since it was so new to him, he wasn't sure how it worked and at the moment, he certainly wasn't positive that he trusted it at all.
He knew from the brightness above him that the sun was shining, but the fog bank was thick. Thick enough that he could only see about fifty feet in front of him which left him as uneasy as a cat in new territory. The problem was that he wasn't in new territory, he should be feeling completely safe. He thought knew this bay like the back of his hand but now everything seemed different.
The radio was no help although it didn't seem to be on the fritz, he hadn't even been able to use it to call for reassurance. He had tried again and again to get a clear signal but all he could hear was a jumble of sound as if a hundred people were talking at once. He had listened in several times, changing channels to try to find a clear signal, then finally he had turned the radio off in frustration. He hadn't even been able to get the weather station to work, that channel had appeared to be totally dead with no signal at all.
He wished he had a breeze, just a little breeze, enough to break up the fog but not enough to make the water rough. He stared ahead, wasn't the fog thinning, wasn't the light getting suddenly brighter? Maybe he'd be lucky, maybe the fog would thin and eventually break up.
Then suddenly he passed through the fog bank's edge. Suddenly he was in bright sunlight and he knew that this was one of those rare instances when the fog bank had a sharp edge and he'd just gone past it. His eyes watered and he cursed softly, squinting and blinking rapidly, trying to accustom himself to the sudden change in light levels. He managed to reassure himself that there was nothing large looming directly in front of him, then he closed his eyes tightly, trying to force them to readjust quickly. He wished he had his sunglasses, but he knew he'd forgotten them, they were sitting on the table just inside the door of his cabin and miles away.
After a few seconds the bright pink of the light against his eyelids faded and he opened his eyes to stare forward, his hands convulsively gripping the spoked wheel tightly. He squinted against the light of the bright morning sun, his face twisted into a critical frown. Almost in reflex his deeply weathered right hand dropped to the throttle handle, slipping it slowly to full stop. The boat coasted forward slowly as he stared glumly at the silent scene before him.
"What the hell?" He muttered softly.
The bright May sunshine lit the shoreline in front of him, but instead of the small community that should have been there, rock and rubble covered the ground and appeared strewn with rubbish. On top of that, between him and the shoreline were acres of flotsam. Bits and pieces of trees, branches, plants, part of a bright green shingled roof, a dirty white plastic lawn chair, bottles, cans, and thousands of other unidentifiable objects floated in the water. All of it bumped and ground atop the gentle waves of a returning tide, desecrating the small bay that he had been counting on as his refuge.
He snapped the engine control into full reverse, slipped the throttle down to the middle of its travel and with the ease of long practice brought the boat to a halt in its slow drift into the floating mess ahead. His ears heard the churn of water beneath the boat and he felt the soft shudder through his feet as the steam engine spun the propellor in it's fight to stop his forward momentum. He paused, waiting until he felt the boat hesitate, then almost begin moving backward before he eased the throttle back to full stop and slipped the engine control to neutral. Almost automatically, he shut the boiler down, killing the burner so that only the pilot flame was alight.
His eyes had never shifted from the destruction in front of him. Everything he had done had been done automatically because his mind was stunned by what he saw. He twisted his head slowly to one side and then back to the other. The land contours were right. He knew where he was, but he wasn't looking at a view he had ever seen before. Where there had been a small, well-kept town only a month or so before, now there was only waste and rubble. There were no docks, no boats, no stores, no houses, no people, no gardens, and few standing trees. Nothing but raw mud, bare rock and masses of piled rubble.
What few trees were left leaned crazily away from the water as if they had all been pushed by a giant hand. Parts of buildings leaned crazily against crushed cars. Everything looked like it had been smashed flat, stirred vigorously, then thrown down haphazardly. The boats, the docks, and the marinas were gone. Nothing marked where they had been but a few pilings and some concrete footings. The whole waterfront was bare. There was nothing left unchanged.
His eyes picked out strange details and strange shapes. Bits and pieces of lumber, chunks of walls, cars, the prow of a boat - made up some of the objects that were all smashed, bent, twisted, broken, crumpled, and piled haphazardly amongst the trees. A concrete stairway ended crazily in mid-air. Pipes stretched haphazardly skyward while wires twisted madly between massed piles of debris. Here and there a wall leaned precariously, pockmarked with bare openings. Openings that had once been windows and doors, but openings that now seemed to be staring accusingly at him.
His mind raced in frantic circles as he stared about him, a heavy frown further creasing his wrinkled brow. His heart beat frantically. He felt weak and knew he had to sit down. He twisted to look behind him. The fog bank was slowly drifting away, moving back across the bay. He consciously eased himself to a position where he could sit, letting his racing heart slowly calm. Although he sat still, his mind was reeling in disbelief.
It had to have been a tidal wave, a tsunami. There must have been a major earthquake, but he hadn't felt one or even the results of one. Of course he'd been out on the water but he was sure he would have seen or felt something this big. He just couldn't get his mind around the fact that he hadn't had a clue that such a tragedy had occurred.
Breathing deeply, he sought to relax and it seemed to work. After a few moments he realised that he was going to have to accept the tragedy that surrounded him and he sighed heavily. Then something bumped softly against the bow of his boat, grabbing his attention. He certainly didn't want his boat damaged.. He lifted his eyes and stood slowly, moving forward to look over the side.
A sodden grey couch drifted a foot or two away from his boat's bow and making it even more bizarre, an ugly grey cushion lay draped across the high arch of the back rest. He automatically reached for a boat hook to push the couch away and was reaching outward with it when the 'cushion' developed eyes that stared at him. A pitiful meow came so softly, so faintly, he almost didn't hear it.
He stared in surprise, his reflexive motion of pushing away an annoying piece of flotsam forgotten. He dropped to his knees and reached to hook the arm of the dirty couch, pulling it closer so the couch was within reach. Dropping the boat hook to the deck, he reached out and grasped the cat by the scruff of his neck, hoisting it up and lowering it gently onto the deck. Strangely, the cat never fought, never struggled, never even made a sound. It was still breathing but it didn't seem to have any energy to struggle. After giving it a brief inspection for obvious wounds and noticing none, he rose to his feet.
Glancing about and realising that he had drifted into the edge of the flotsam that covered most of the water of the bay, he decided that he needed to anchor so that he would be in less danger of having his prop fouled by the drifting garbage. He bent to release the anchor winch, letting the weight of the anchor and it's fifty feet of anchor-head chain pay out slowly so he wouldn't do any damage to the hull. After that he let the anchor line slip out freely until he could see it slow as the anchor reached the bottom, then eyed it as perhaps another fifty feet or so of line slipped past.
He stopped the winch, and tied off the anchor lead, then finally turned and lifted the cat into his arms. The cat felt thin and very, very light considering the fact that it was quite large. It didn't struggle as he examined it for wounds.
"Now you're a real mystery." He whispered softly. "Why the hell didn't you just swim ashore?"
The cat opened one eye slowly to stare at him balefully for a few seconds before seeming to decide that nothing was worth the trouble or the energy of keeping its eye open. Its fur was matted and salt crusted, one leg showed signs of a small wound and its eye lids were crusted with a white deposit. Except for those problems and the fact that it seemed extremely thin and weary, the big grey cat appeared okay.
"Well, I haven't got any cat food but I guess a tin of salmon would do." Karl sighed softly, slowly making his way back to the cabin of the boat and then below deck to the galley. "I think we'll just wash that crap out of your eyes first, then maybe get you a drink of fresh water."
Holding the cat in the crook of one arm he stared around the galley looking for something that would do for a cat bed. Then, one handedly dumping the contents of a small drawer into a bucket and setting the drawer on the edge of the galley sink, he pulled an old towel from the laundry bag and dropped it in the bottom, spreading it as well as he could while still holding the cat with one arm.
"That'll have to do." He spoke softly as he lay the cat gently in place.
He tore a small strip of cloth from a clean rag and wet it under the pump as he filled a saucer with water. He set the saucer carefully in front of the cat's face and then gently wet those crusted eyes, moving surprisingly gently for his size. The cat struggled weakly not at all enthused by his kind attentions. The big man lifted the rag slowly, not knowing what to do. The cat seemed to droop as if his struggle not to have his face wiped was his last act.
Karl sighed heavily. He reached down slowly and wiped at a crust of something on the edge of the cat's mouth. Astoundingly, the cats mouth slowly opened.
"Hell, you're dying of thirst, aren't you." He grunted. "I suppose even a cat can't drink salt water."
The cat lay there, hardly breathing now, its mouth open piteously and its eyes now staring at him. Wetting the rag until it was dripping and holding the cat's head so he could aim the dribbles, he moistened the cat's mouth with a few drops of water.
"Not too much now." The big man sighed softly. "I wouldn't want to drown you."
He paused and watched as the cat closed its mouth and seemed to relax in his hand. He wasn't sure if it swallowed or not, but after a long moment the cat's mouth slowly fell open again. He administered another few drops of water onto the rough tongue. The cat's mouth again closed slowly.
A few minutes more and the cat's mouth fell open again. He repeated his actions several times, each time dribbling a few droplets of water to that rough tongue. Finally, the cat snapped its mouth closed and struggled to free itself from his hold.
"Okay, old timer." He chuckled releasing his hold. "I'm not about to fight with you."
The cat dropped back on its side, now seeming to be breathing slightly deeper than it had before.
"Well old son. I can't waste much more time on you." The big man sighed, pushing back from the counter. "There just might be people somewhere up in that mess that need my help more than you do and I think I'd better go look around."
The cat lay calmly as he lifted the old drawer slowly and then carefully set it on the floor in the space under the galley seat.
"Not bad for an old man with arthritis." He chuckled softly to himself. "I didn't ruffle your fur or even spill a drop of water from the saucer."
He closed the door to the boat's companionway at the forward end of the galley.
"That's just in case I'm gone for a while and you start looking for a cat box, I can clean up the deck, but my bunk wouldn't be as easy. I'll leave you a bowl of water on the floor too, just in case you do wake up and drink everything in that saucer." He spoke softly.
The cat didn't bat an eye, but its breathing was definitely easier now.
Karl went back up on deck and paused in the wheelhouse for a moment. The boat had swung with the tide and now rode stern first to the shore and bow into the oncoming flotsam, that meant his anchor appeared to be holding. He decided he needed to set a stern anchor just in case and looked up at the steam gauge, checking that he had enough pressure to do the job.
"No problem." He grunted to himself.
Starting the engine again, he gently ran the boat back against the forward anchor, checking that it held, then dropped a stern anchor and ran the boat forward slightly to set it as well. All the time he had the propellor turning, he was anxiously watching to be sure that it didn't become fouled by the floating debris. Breathing a sigh of relief, he shut the engine down, then went forward to check his main anchor line. He adjusted its length and tied it off to a fore cleat, then checked the wrap on the stern line's cleat as well.
The boat was now surrounded by flotsam. He had to push away rubbish just to clear room for the dingy to drop from its davits into the water. His mind was awhirl with what he should do, but his hands worked automatically as he tied the dingy to the stern cleats. As desolate and difficult as the whole shoreline was, he realized that he had to be ready for almost any eventuality. His immediate appraisal was that no one could have survived in that chaos, but he had to check. After all he had previously had friends who had lived in the destroyed houses on that devastated shoreline. He realized that if no one had survived, he was totally dependent on his own resources and he resolved that he'd have to be extremely careful. A minor fall or injury that would normally be no problem would loom as a catastrophe now.
He went back below, finding a small pack that he often used to haul a few supplies when he was ashore. Especially if he was in a port where he had to walk any distance to buy his groceries. He dug out his old hatchet, slipping it into a holster and hitching it on his belt along with a hunting knife in a sheath. Then he grabbed his binoculars and hung them around his neck. Filling a plastic bottle with water, he put it in his pack along with an old blanket and a small first aid kit.
He looked thoughtfully at the small emergency kit that he'd put up years before, then crammed it into the pack as well. In the emergency kit he had everything from freeze-dried rations and energy bars to fish hooks and matches. There was enough food in it to keep him alive for a few days if he got into trouble. He'd never needed it before, but he damn well might need it now.
One more quick glance at the sleeping cat under the seat and he went up the steps into the bright sunlight that illuminated wheelhouse, his pack in hand. He glanced at his boiler gauges, checking that the fire was out and that the tiny pilot burner was working. Realising that he still had some steam pressure left, he belatedly thought of his steam whistle.
Staring at the shore line, he reached up and pulled the whistle lanyard. Three long hearty blasts, then he waited and listened. A cacophony of gulls, screaming in surprise, then echoes of his whistle were all that he heard. He waited for a minute or two, then tried once more. Three more long toots of the whistle, the last whistle falling to a wheeze as he used the last steam pressure in his boiler. The echoes of the whistle and raucous cries of the gulls mocked him. He waited a few minutes, staring at the desolation on the shore and hoping to see some motion other than birds. He'd never seen so many gulls. They were wheeling in the sky, paddling on the water, perching on the debris, or busily squabbling amongst themselves. They were everywhere, in astonishing numbers.
Finally despairing of any response, he slipped over the side and into the dingy, carrying his pack, a small rope, a short walking stick, and a couple of life jackets, then he untied and pushed off into the sea of rubbish that surrounded him. He paddled slowly, threading his way through and around the objects floating in the water. There was no way that he could miss everything, for every bigger piece of litter there seemed to be a hundred small pieces and a million tiny ones. The water hardly showed through the debris since there was so much of it. Every stroke of his oar seemed to be through a mush of floating garbage several inches deep. Every larger piece of rubbish seemed to be the perch for a gull. Rubbish and gulls, he thought. The water of the bay was filled with both.
After a few moments he paused to make up his mind just where he was going to try to land. The shoreline was awash in flotsam and even getting close to shore would be a problem. A long jutting tongue of rock seemed relatively free of debris and luckily there appeared to be a relatively clear channel of water leading from him toward it, if he could only get around what appeared to be half of a house that floated in his way. Part of one wall faced him and he could see through a window. Surprisingly the window appeared unbroken although the roof of the house was gone and bright sunlight shone upon an easy chair and an inverted table as they floated soggily inside the surrounding walls amid a welter of other debris. Two or three gentle strokes of his oars and he was clear of the ruined house, then it was only a few minutes work for him to reach the tongue of rock.
A natural channel in the rock made it easier for him to get ashore but made it a little harder to pull the dinghy clear of the incoming tide. The rock was clearly marked by a deposit of small debris at the tide line and he heaved the dinghy well above that mark. He paused for a moment to get his breath back, grumbling to himself that he was in damn poor shape to let a little exertion like that tire him like it did.
He stood straight and stared about him at the desolation. He was standing on freshly scoured rock, swept clean by water and who knew what else. Above him and to one side a broken concrete foundation that surely must have held up a house now jutted from a slab of rock and hung over softly washing waves. What soil had been in someone's front yard was gone but then, so was the house that had stood here. There was a rank smell of rot and decay in the air. Gulls wheeled and squabbled around him and somewhere in the distance he heard a crow. Carrion birds, that was it. They were all drawn to dead bodies and edible garbage. He shuddered at the passing thought of what probably drew them here.
His eyes swept in a semi circle and then he stared back across the bay. The fog bank had lifted and he could see the opposite side of the bay where a steep bank fell to the water. When he had been here a month or so ago, that bank had been heavily timbered from water's edge to the skyline. Now the hillside was almost bare for at least two hundred feet or more above the water. Not one tree stood on the lower part of the bank. If this side of the bay was a ruin that side of the bay was a stripped bare Once more he felt weak kneed and sat slowly on the prow of his dingy. The area had definitely been hit by a tsunami, there was no doubt in his mind.
Almost reluctantly, he lifted his binoculars to his eyes and focussed on the far hillside. He sighed. There was nothing there but rock, no trees, no bushes, nothing but a few stumps and an occasional bare log that looked like it had been pealed and placed in a crevice or crack in the rock. A few gullies crammed with rubbish and a fresh scar from a recent landslide marked the only areas that didn't appear washed and scoured clean by water and anything that water could carry to pound the shoreline.
He swung slowly following the line of destruction along the shoreline and down the bay, realising that the destruction seemed to climb higher as the bay narrowed. Then he stared in wonder at the massive heap of debris that seemed to choke off the small river that had poured into the far end of the bay. He could see no sign of flowing water and wondered if all that debris was forming a dam or if the river had been diverted in another direction.
Slowly he dropped the glasses and turned to look at the mess above him. He stared at the destruction momentarily, thinking to lift his glasses and study the desolation, but decided if he were higher up the slope his view would be increased, if not improved.
Resolutely, he reached down into the dinghy and lifted his pack, strapping it on, then slowly he made his was up and into the debris field above him. He took his time, reminding himself that he suffered from a bad back and arthritis. If he injured himself in any way, there probably was no one to come to his rescue.
The first thousand or so feet back from the shoreline was relatively easy. There wasn't all that much in the way of debris and what there was seemed to be well flattened into the ground. Everything seemed to be covered with a coating of mud and muck, which had been partially washed away by rain but it lay in the dips and hollows, thinly disguised by floating rubbish. The only really solid footing seemed to be where streets had formerly been. Unfortunately for him, his direction seemed to be almost at ninety degrees to the direction that the local streets had run. He was unable to find a cross street and unwilling to hunt for one. Although he had to be careful to avoid gaping, trash filled holes that had been the basements and the extremely soft ground in the areas that had once been peoples gardens, he was able to move forward relatively easily by keeping to the relatively firm areas that had been lawns and yards.
Hardly anything had remained standing but the ground was littered with broken glass, metal pipes, shattered wood, and hundreds of wires that snaked between strange anchor points. In numerous places trapped rubbish formed impenetrable barriers. By sidetracking a few feet he was able to move relatively easily past most of the barriers but on occasion he had to make a larger detour. He kept telling himself that time wasn't really important anyway but he resented the slowness of his progress and the further uphill he climbed, the harder it was to move forward because there were more and more barriers in his way.
His passage had been steadily and quite steeply upward. His breathing was heavy but not strained and he refused to stop, then suddenly he realised he was at the crest of the hill. His hand reached out and rested on a short pillar of some sort, someone's gate post, he supposed. His legs grew weak as he stared in disbelief at the jumbled ruin before him.
There was no way that he was going to try to cross that mess. He shook his head slowly, glancing quickly from side to side. Rubble from houses was held up by broken tree trunks or smashed cars. A small upturned sailboat rested half buried under a section of stucco wall, its bowsprit poking through a gaping door of another section of wall. Something that looked like the smashed remains of a large truck or bus leaned precariously against a tree. There was no rhyme or reason to the view in front of him. The wave of water had smashed everything in its way and carried it up and over this crest of the hill to drop it in the giant jumble pile of rubble he now saw.
Suddenly he realised what had alerted to the fact that he had finally surmounted the grade. It was sound. The quiet of the day was filled with the squawks of gulls and crows, even the raucous cry of eagles. Gulls and crows hopped and perched in clusters and bunches as if guarding areas of rich pickings or they flew lazily from place to place, perhaps searching for more carrion. Thankfully he realised that the slight breeze he felt on his back was blowing the odour that must have attracted them away from his present position. He shuddered, realising that perhaps part of what they were feeding on could be the bodies of the residents of the town. He could smell the decay but it wasn't that strong, at least not where he stood.
He glanced at his watch then in disbelief he stared back the way he had come. He had taken over an hour just to cross the two thousand or twenty-five-hundred feet he had travelled. He turned back to the barrier in front of him. That was insurmountable, at least for him. If he'd been ten or twenty years younger and a lot more nimble, he might have been able to cross it, but not in his present condition.
He sighed deeply. Even at forty-two, a man who had arthritis and a bad back had to realise his limitations. He'd crossed the easiest part of the slope below him and he was already tired. There was no sense in getting out into the middle of that mess in front of him and giving the gulls more to feed on.
He slipped the pack slowly from his back and sat back on a stump to think about what to do. Opening the pack, he took out the water bottle and had a sip, carefully resealing it and putting it back in place in the pack. This was not the time to get careless in any way. He might need that water later. Another deep sigh and he wiped his forehead under the beating sun.
Reaching into a pocket, he pulled out a very thin packet of tobacco and his papers. He rolled a cigarette, then lit it and gazed around in despair. His brow creased into an even deeper frown as he thought deeply.
"Alright, I've got no chance of crossing that mess, so what do I do?" He said aloud in a voice that was so soft it was almost a whisper.
He realised he wasn't thinking straight. He took a deep breath and closed his eyes.
"No sense in dwelling on what I can't do." He advised himself. "Just what can I do?"
Slowly a calm feeling of resolve came as his mind mulled over his situation. He couldn't cross the jumble, but he could check the slope he stood on, then he could go back to his boat and signal to anyone who was strong enough to come to him and he could help them if they needed help. He was relatively high here. Was there any way he could see any place where anyone could have survived? Of course, he realised, he had his binoculars. That was why he had climbed the slope in the first place, he'd temporarily forgotten that in the shock of seeing the destruction at first hand.
He opened his eyes and with a calming sigh, lifted his glasses to begin his search for signs of life.
In the distance he could see areas where it seemed the water hadn't been able to reach. Surprisingly, even those areas seemed to be damaged, houses and buildings appeared to be crushed, twisted, or at least badly damaged. Of course, there must have been an earthquake to trigger the tsunami. But . . . wait a minute, a tsunami travelled away from the earthquake, somehow this place must have been hit by both, but how? He realised he didn't know enough about either earthquakes or tsunamis to even hazard a guess.
Instead he put the question out of his mind for now. He had enough to worry about right in front of him. Using the glasses, he moved his focus from ruined house to ruined house, looking for movement. Search as he might, he could see no sign of life.
He dropped the glasses from his eyes suddenly.
"There's no sense in staring into the distance anyway." He calmly berated himself. "I couldn't get there to help if I wanted to. No sense in making myself feel worse by staring at wreckage that I can't even reach."
Resolutely, he lifted the glasses and forced himself to look back in the area immediately surrounding him and sloping back the way he had come. If anyone survived, where would they be?
"The first thing I'd do would be to find shelter, then food and water. After that I'd stick close to that shelter, hoping someone would come to help me." He whispered to himself.
His search became more deliberate. He only concentrated on areas that looked like they might act as shelter for a desperate survivor. In one or two places, shattered walls seemed to lean over empty spaces and he concentrated his search with his glasses on those areas. None of them yielded any signs of life or movement. More than anything, movement was what he was looking for and something caught his eye suddenly. Something had moved and not a bird, either. A flag maybe?
Crushed and partially hidden between two overturned trees was the forward portion of a hull, just the bow and foredeck of a small boat with a small section of the cabin and incongruously a small flagpole, complete with a tiny Canadian flag fluttering in the breeze. The shape of the wreckage reminded him of a submarine rising to the surface, the trees representing the waves of the ocean. He glanced at the bow, able to make out the letters ". . . EAM " but nothing else. His gaze passed on, then snapped back. There was something but he couldn't seem to pick out what was so strange, what was different.
He stared for a moment at the white hull or rather part of a hull. What had drawn his attention to it in the first place? Something about that boat wasn't right. He widened the field of the glasses then refocused them. He studied the hull, concentrating on detail. He would have wagered that the whole boat had been lifted and slammed between those trees in one piece just from the way the planks were crushed and twisted. Well, considering the way everything else had been destroyed, that wasn't surprising. What was surprising was that it was in as good shape as it was.
There was still a line dangling from the bow cleat and a white bumper, crushed against the hull by a branch. The cabin was only partly there, no windshield, just the uprights, and part of the roof with a drooping tarp, and then the absurdity of the flagpole and it's tiny flag waving gaily in the breeze.
The flag! That was it. That was what was wrong. The maple leaf was upside down, that was an old and often used marine signal of distress. Fly your national flag but turn it upside down, an even older and at one time more well known distress sign than the morse code S.O.S. or the modern Mayday. Whoever had been on that boat had realised they were in deep trouble. Even though he could see no sign of movement, he knew that he had to investigate.
He swung the focus of the glasses across the intervening distance between him and the boat, immediately planning a route that would take him to it. After a moment, he looked up and used his unaided vision to replot the route he'd chosen. Dropping the glasses to hang around his neck and rising to his feet, he picked up his pack and set off, careful to keep a slow steady pace and not to rush carelessly.
Now that he was crossing the slope and not climbing it, his pace was much slower. He had to climb over or work his way around numerous tree trunks, smashed walls, and other obstacles. Several times he came across decaying fish and once he saw what could have been part of a human arm or leg judging from the size of the exposed bone. He carefully averted his gaze and passed it as quickly as he could. He hadn't realised until then the number of flies around him, but suddenly he was aware of their buzzing sounds. The whole world was full of the sounds of flies, as well as the cries of gulls and the squawks of crows. He shuddered, was everything else around him dead?
The smell of death and decay suddenly became almost overpowering. He felt the gorge rise in his throat and he stumbled forward to lean against a broken wall, his head down as he tried to control his rebellious stomach. He took a deep breath and forced himself to move forward several yards before he paused to sit on a tree trunk and take off his pack so that he could take out his water bottle and have a sip of the tepid water.
A few deep breaths, another tiny sip of water and he felt much better. He waved his hand wearily at a fly that buzzed in front of him, then looked up to see how much further he would have to go to reach the boat.
Surprisingly it was only a few yards away. Now that he could see it better, his heart sank. He realised then that he'd been hoping against hope that someone had been alive in the wreck. But the way the hull was shattered and seaweed strewn, there was little chance of that. He sighed deeply, took one more sip of water, then resolutely put the water bottle away and stood slowly, slipping the pack straps back over his shoulders.
He moved forward slowly, almost afraid to look closely at his target. The tree that held the hull up was directly in his way, a jumble of branches and garbage piled under and around its trunk. He moved toward the butt end of the tree trunk, looking for a possible passage to get closer.
Suddenly he stopped. He could hear a strange sound, a cross between a whine and a whimper, almost a chant or perhaps a song of lament. It seemed to be coming from somewhere inside the hull. He leaned forward, resting his hand on the rough bark of the huge tree trunk. He took a deep breath, holding it for several seconds as he listened to the soft whining hum.
"Hello?" He called. "Is anyone there?"
A gull thrashed into the air not ten yards away, squawking in terror as it rose. Its call was matched and repeated by several other gulls not much further from him. The air was suddenly full of screaming birds. The whistle of their wings as well as their raucous cries drowning out all other sounds for several seconds. Relative silence gradually descended. The whine, or whimper, or whatever it was had stopped.
"Hello, the boat." He called again, his voice much quieter now.
A strange squawk seemed to come from the boat, barely recognisable over the instantaneous plaints of the gulls.
He stared at the hull, his ears straining, trying to identify any sound he might hear. He held his breath and thought he could hear a rustling sound. Then he saw part of a face, mostly an eye, staring at him through a shattered porthole.
"Oh Omigod." A woman's voice squealed and the face disappeared.
He stood stunned, his heart pounding, his brain awhirl. He became aware of a litany of sound coming from the boat now, a soft scrabbling as well as a somewhat shrill pean of words, running on and on.
"Oh don't come in. Don't come in. Please, don't come in. I'm not dressed and the boat is such a mess. Just wait. I'll come out. Oh please don't go away. I'm so lonely. Please don't leave me. Please, please, please." There was a short pause in the litany of words. "Oh please, are you still there?"
The voice dwindled to silence.
"I'm still here." He announced quietly.
"Oh, Thank you." The voice broke into a laughing almost insane chatter. "Thank you, thank you, thank you."
Those two words were repeated over and over, on and on, almost becoming a song as the woman's voice rose and fell. He leaned back, somewhat relieved, almost stunned. There was someone else alive in this world of death and destruction. He felt his face twist into a smile, a grin of pure unreasoning pleasure. As for the woman who was inside the wreck, her voice lilted on in her singsong chorus of thanks. She sounded like she was laughing in happiness and he found himself wanting to laugh with her.
The pack suddenly felt unreasonably heavy, he slipped it from his shoulders, setting it on the ground and stretched slowly in the bright sunlight. He relaxed, enjoying the sound of someone else's voice even though he couldn't understand the meaning of her words. After all it was no wonder a human voice sounded good, he hadn't seen or heard anyone for a week or so. He rested a hand on the torn up roots of the tree trunk, breathing deeply, stretching and easing muscles that hadn't been used in a long time, then he sat back against a larger root. The sound moved, becoming more muffled, then suddenly clearer. He could hear it seem to become louder and suddenly she was walking toward him around the tilted bow of the boat.
She suddenly stopped making any sound except for a sharp intake of breath and he stared in sheer surprise. She was beautiful.
She was perhaps twenty-five or thirty years old, her hair a soft short blonde, her eyes huge and green or perhaps hazel, she had a freckled nose, full lips, and dimples. Those dimples were emphasized because her lips were set in a wide grin, almost a rictus of a smile. She was tall and quite athletic looking, dressed in a blouse and a short skirt. She was breathing rapidly, her breasts rising and falling beneath the thin cloth of her blouse, a blouse that was only partially buttoned, as well as unevenly buttoned, as though she had missed a button in her hurry.
He could see her nipples harden and swell, knew she wore no bra to support her round perky breasts. She had beautiful breasts and for several seconds he felt himself studying them, memorising their curves. He caught himself staring and forced his eyes away, making his eyes look at the rest of her. Her waist was small, her hips wide, her legs long and trim. She was bare footed.
She had let out a tiny squeak, as though she tried to say something and it wouldn't come out. Her voice drew his gaze back to her face. She was grinning widely, her eyes sparkling as she stared at him. Her mouth worked but nothing came out. Karl found himself staring at her face, finding he had no voice either but realising he was grinning as widely as she was.
Then with a soft moan, she began to move toward him again. As he stood up fully she came toward him in a rush, her arms thrown up and forward. She crashed into him, wrapping her arms around him as her rush almost overbalanced them. Karl felt like he had the breath knocked out of him for several seconds and she was pressing against him so hard that he was forced back against the fallen tree.
"Oh, I'm sorry." She moaned, her head buried against his chest.
Her arms gripped him tightly and she squirmed as if she were trying to get even closer.
"Are you okay?" She whispered.
"Unh huh." He managed to grunt and found that his arms were holding her just as tightly as she held him.
The fallen tree made a lump that was pressing against a tender spot in his back and he twisted slowly to the side so it wasn't pressing as hard but he didn't want to release her. She began to giggle softly and her face twisted so she could look at him. Their eyes locked, their faces twisted in broad grins. Both of them held each other tightly, her giggles made him chuckle and they stood there, giggling and chuckling, gradually growing louder and louder until they were laughing hysterically. He couldn't seem to hold her tight enough and she held him just as tightly.
Gradually their laughter died and they stood quietly staring at each other's face. He felt an instantaneous and very intense desire for her, knew she felt it too. One of her hands released her hold around his back and slid up his arm, over his shoulder. It reached up to touch his beard, caressing it gently, she sighed softly.
"Thank you." She whispered softly.
"You're welcome." He whispered back. "Although I haven't done anything to be thanked for."
"You came to rescue me. I've been so lonely. I couldn't find anyone."
She sighed then and pulled back, her other hand slipping down to rest on his chest.
"I didn't hurt you when I slammed into you did I?" She asked quietly.
"No." He laughed softly. "You did more damage to your blouse."
"Oh." Her hands lifting from his chest as she looked down. "I guess I didn't button up well did I?"
Her blouse might have been poorly buttoned before but now after her antics, it gaped open almost to her waist, only one button still held it closed. She looked into Karl's eyes and then down again, her eyes questioning him as she giggled and her face flushed slightly. She slowly did up the buttons one at a time, not really trying to hide the fact that her breasts had been on show.
"Look, I'm not really skin shy and I do like sex." She murmured. "I'll be honest, if you want payment for my rescue . . . ?"
She let the question trail of, then she leaned forward and lifted to her tip toes so her lips could reach his. Her kiss was gentle and tentative, although Karl suddenly felt desire for her, he paused. He thought of the woman who had borne his son and his hand slipped down to the waist of the young woman in his arms. Somehow he managed to fight his own urges and break off the kiss. His head lifted and he stared down at her face.
"Oh." She gasped, her body now pressing against his. "Don't you like me?"
"I'm involved . . . not married . . . but we have a son." He said hesitantly. "Besides, you don't have to pay to be rescued even if you look awfully good to me, and this isn't the time or the place, not for anything like that."
She stared at him in surprise for a few seconds then broke into a giggle. "Oh sure, turn me down. I know I'm not at my best. Heck, I haven't got a brush or comb to fix my hair and I haven't been able to even wash properly for a week. I've barely got enough water to cook and drink. I sure haven't wanted to waste any on washing myself a lot."
"I guess I'm spoiled." Karl smiled at her, astounded that she could still tease someone after being in such a precarious position. " I've been having a shower every day and I wash whenever I want to since I have a water desalination rig on my boat. If you want a shower, it's right there."
He twisted and pointed his hand to his boat anchored below them, out in the bay. "There she is. The old wooden steam boat."
He paused, realising that his boat was the only one on the quiet waters.
"You came by boat?" She gasped. "How did you survive the tsunami? Where were you during the earthquake? "
He stared at her. "I didn't even know there was one until I got here. I've been running in either fog or rain for several days, navigating by GPS and radar. I haven't even been able to get my radio to work."
She stared at him. "Where were you last Friday afternoon?"
"Um, well off the tip of the island, maybe twenty miles or so from land, why do you ask?"
"That's when the earthquake tore everything up." She shuddered.
Karl looked at her as her eyes seemed to go distant and unfocused.
"I was moored out and standing out on deck. I heard it coming. It sounded like a freight train or a big jet or something." She paused and when she spoke again, her voice was quiet, almost a whisper. "I knew it was something terrible, but I didn't realise what it was. Then everything on the land seemed to jump and twist and just at the same moment the water around me seemed to dance for a minute, little waves were moving every which way. After that it was eerie. The water went completely flat and there seemed to be an instant of total silence. I didn't know what was going on. "
"Then the water seemed to . . ." She paused as if searching for a word, then she continued quietly. "It seemed to sort of jump and twist I guess, like it exploded somehow. When I looked up at the shore, I saw all the buildings moving, each one seemed to twist and shake. Everything started to shift and wiggle in strange directions, then it was like a shimmer passed over everything and it all started to move or fall down. There seemed to be a cloud of dust rising from everything on shore and I heard all the noises. Everything seemed to be making noise. Crashes, and thuds, and bangs, and horns, and sirens, and shrieks, everything, all at once. Everything was moving and falling. I saw a whole pier just fall down like someone had chopped everything that held it up from underneath it. And the water turned all brown and funny then it seemed to bounce away from the shore."
She shuddered and sighed deeply.
"After that, it seemed like big waves were coming at me from every direction and I was too darn busy trying to keep from going overboard to watch anymore. I had to hang on for dear life"
Her eyes had grown huge and she stared at him. One of her hands reached to grasp one of his and squeezed it tightly. He reached out with his other hand, brushing his fingers gently against the back of hers.
"A big wave hit my boat and snapped the anchor line like it was string. I almost got thrown overboard, and still all I could do for a while was hang on. When the boat settled down, I was almost in the middle of the bay and I could hardly see the shore, it seemed like . . . " She paused and sighed softly before she continued. "It was like there was a fog or a dust storm or something, and I could smell smoke. I decided I had to get out of there just in case a tsunami came at me. I tried to start my engine but in the rattling around, I guess something must have broken, anyway I had no power. I don't know just what I did but in my panic I wiggled every electrical connection I could reach easily and when I tried the starter again, the engine fired up. I headed for open water as fast as I could, not even bothering to warm up the engine. I was so scared it wasn't funny."
She looked at him with eyes that seemed to grow larger and larger.
"Then everything changed again. I almost panicked. I could feel the boat moving strangely. Suddenly it was going faster and faster. It felt like suddenly the tide was starting to run out like mad and I didn't know what to do. It felt like the boat must have been moving at thirty knots or so, but I couldn't see the shore to check, that damn mist or smoke or whatever was in the way. I shut the engine off again to try to hear something but even that didn't help and when I tried to start the engine, it wouldn't go no matter what I did. For some reason I tied a bucket to a rope and threw it off of the stern on a long anchor rope, thinking it might slow me down, but it didn't. All the water around me was moving, not just me. It did keep the bow pointed forward though so I guess I still had some forward momentum from when I was using the engine."
She paused and shuddered softly as if she had a sudden chill then she quietly continued.
"I could hardly see any signs of the shore. I'm sure I was being drawn right out of the bay and looking back I could see rocks exposed that I'd never seen before, not even at the lowest tides. I was almost in the middle of the channel and going like a bat out of hell. The shoreline was hidden. I turned around to look out into the strait where the air seemed clearer and the whole horizon seemed to be crawling upward. I was heading straight into a wall of water."
She paused again, staring down at her hands holding his.
"I don't know why, but I decided I wasn't safe where I was standing. I don't know how I got there, but the next thing I remember is being in my bunk in the bow of the boat with both legs braced against one bulkhead and my hands braced on the other. Then everything happened at once. I felt like I was falling downward, then I seemed to be rocketing upward, then sideways and I think I went completely over, I don't know. I banged my head on something and I remember flying through the air. Then everything became a blur and I can't remember what happened other than it seemed to take forever. I must have either banged my head again or else I passed out."
Her hands gripped his tightly and her eyes lifted to meet his.
"When I woke up, I was laying upside down in my bunk and what's left of the boat was sitting where it is now. Other than bruises all over, I don't seem to be injured at all." She stopped speaking and sighed softly, her eyes staring into his.
She turned her head slowly and stared at the shattered hull.
"It was such a nice little boat and it wasn't even insured yet. I'd just bought her a week before." She sighed again and tears came to her eyes.
"Just think how lucky you are." He said sarcastically. "You could have bought a house instead."
She started to cry softly, leaning slowly against him. He held her gently for a few minutes. Then realising that the sun was well into the west, he lifted his head and cleared his throat.
"Umm." He said hesitantly "I'd like to get back to my boat for the night and I think you should come too. If we're going to get back before it gets too late, we'd better get moving."
"Well, nothing is going to be hurt any more than it is now if it stays here." She sighed softly. "But I'd like to change my clothes and get a few of my things if you don't mind waiting."
"Not at all." He smiled. "By the way, what's your name? Mine's Karl Larson."
She broke into giggles and shook his hand in both of hers.
"Hi Karl." She managed to giggle. "I'm Linda."
"Was that Linda?" He questioned.
She nodded her head enthusiastically, still pumping his hand in hers.
"Unh huh, Linda McCready." She giggled softly.
"Well, Hello Linda." He grinned.
He found her giggles lifted his spirits enormously. Nothing looked so bleak now that he'd found her. She got her giggles under control and shook her head.
"I'm sorry, I shouldn't have giggled, but it seemed so funny that I didn't even know your name and I was already trying to be involved." She whispered."Are you really in a hurry to leave?"
"Yes." He said, quickly but gently lifting her hand. "I think we have to. I think we'd better go soon. If I don't, we won't be back to the boat before dark."
"Is that so important? I do have a shelter here and a mattress to sleep on." She grinned.
"I don't think you want to sleep." He chuckled then he shook his head slowly as his face sobered and said quietly, pointing to the horizon. "I'm sorry Linda but I don't think I want my boat to be at the mercy of the elements and from the look of those clouds, there's probably a storm coming with lots of wind and rain."
"I suppose. It's just that . . ." She spoke slowly. "Well, everything seems so much better now that I know I'm not all alone."
"I know what you mean." He smiled. "I'm looking forward to showing you around on the 'Skolka'."
She pulled back slowly. "Is 'Skolka' the name of your boat?"
"Yeah." He looked up at her. "It's Swedish, and it's a word that means 'to play hooky'
"To play hooky, what does that mean?"
"Oh, that's an old expression, umm, I guess it means to shirk responsibility, probably in favour of pleasure. When I was a kid, we used to play hooky from school."
"Hah, with you wanting to get to your boat instead of staying here with me that doesn't sound like you shirk responsibility at all but it sounds like a good name for a boat. I like it." She held out her hand to him. "Come on, since you insist on being responsible, let's salvage a few things from my wreck and you can show me your pleasure yacht."
He took her hand, not that he needed it, but because it was her hand and she was offering. He bent slightly to pick up his pack with his other hand and followed her.
"It's really not much of a pleasure boat." He said as she led him around the bow of her boat and past the huge tree trunk on it's other side. "And it's definitely not a fancy yacht. It's just an old fish boat converted to steam power."
She paused and turned to him with a grin. "You're what is going to make it a pleasure yacht." She said softly.
Karl stared after her as she pulled away from him and turned toward her boat. For some reason he felt almost like he was the fly about to investigate the spider's web.