Sedulity 2: Aftershock (Sedulity Saga) (18 page)

Captain Krystos nodded before turning towards the navigation
room. “Make it a priority, Mr. Crawford. There are lots of people around the
world waiting for our weather data, and a lot of people onboard who want to
make contact with their loved ones ashore too.”

“Yes, Sir!”

Captain Krystos found Kevin and the professor leaning over the
chart table in the navigation room. They appeared somber and dejected, but rose
to nod when the captain entered the room.

“The weather is improving,” the captain remarked.

“It only seems that way,” Professor Farnsworth replied.

“What do you mean? The wind speed is dropping now that we’re
distancing ourselves from the impact zone. Wave height is lower as well. At
this rate I think we can turn south in the next hour.”

“Yes,” Kevin said. “The local conditions will improve for us,
at least in the short-term. The professor was referring to the regional and
global projections we’ve been discussing.” Kevin shook his head to indicate
those projections were not good.

“How bad?” the captain asked.

“You are familiar with the story of Noah’s Ark? The biblical
flood?” Farnsworth asked rhetorically. “Many of us have long believed that it
has some basis in historical fact. It may describe an event similar to what the
world faces now. In fact, there may indeed have been an asteroid strike like
this one that wiped out early civilizations, marking the end of the biblical
antediluvian period. Similar legends of a Great Flood can be found in Hindu
texts, ancient American carvings, even in the story of Gilgamesh, not to
mention the legend of Atlantis. It is quite possible that they all describe the
same event, and that it was caused by an asteroid striking the ocean. Some
experts have linked the Mesopotamian and biblical flood myths to an asteroid or
comet strike in the Indian Ocean that created the 19 mile wide undersea Burckle
Crater about 5,000 years ago. That was probably about the same size impact as
this one.
 
Whether that event, or this
one for that matter, can be called an Act of God is open for interpretation.”

“So what are you predicting?” Captain Krystos asked skeptically.
“Forty days and forty nights of rain?”

“Yes,” Kevin confirmed. “The rain might last even longer than
that in many places, and I think the Bible says the flood itself lasted for
close to six months. The changes in global climate will be much more long-lived
than that.”

“But a worldwide flood?” the captain pressed. “Is that
possible?”

“Global flooding of rivers, lakes, valleys, and low-lying
areas around the world is now inevitable,” the professor said sadly. “Too much
of the ocean is being vaporized and thrown into the atmosphere for normal
weather patterns to handle it all. The flood waters won’t rise to cover
mountains or anything like that – except where the tsunamis strike hardest.
However, these floods will sweep away cities, towns, and farms, even in parts
of the world unaffected by earthquakes, volcanoes, and tsunamis. Every river on
Earth will set new records for flooding, except for areas that cool fast enough
for the precipitation to fall as snow.”

“The conditions won’t be any better in those colder regions
either,” Kevin interjected. “Every inch of rain translates into somewhere between
five and fifteen inches of snow, depending on how dense it is. We’re expecting
up to ten
feet
of rain to fall over
most of the planet in the coming months. Canada, Russia, Scandinavia, and the
northern tier of the United States could all be buried under fifty to a hundred
feet of snow by December.”

“Dear God!” Captain Krystos exclaimed in wide eyed horror.

“It won’t melt next year either,” Kevin added the kicker.
“Not enough of it. The cloud cover will be persistent and the sunlight that
gets through will be reflected by the snow. The snow that melts in the day will
freeze into ice at night, eventually forming glaciers. That alone could trigger
an ice age.
 
Throw in cubic miles of ash
being spewed into the stratosphere by dozens of volcanoes erupting at once?
We’re headed for the deepfreeze.”
 

Mr. Crawford leaned into the room and said, “Captain? Your
wife is back and she brought food for everyone up here. She also says she needs
to speak with you about something.”

“Thank you, Mr. Crawford. I’ll be right out,” the captain said,
still trying to get his head around the long-term weather forecast. Turning
back to Kevin he said, “Europe? The Med? Greece?” He was obviously concerned about
his homeland, which had been unscathed by the initial phase of the cataclysm.

“Too soon to tell,” Kevin replied. “I haven’t run projections
for that part of the world yet. Offhand, I’d predict heavy rain, like
everywhere else, lasting for weeks or months. Snow in the higher elevations. I
wouldn’t be surprised if it snowed at sea level too. I doubt the Med will ever
freeze over, but they’ll have more than the weather to worry about soon
enough.”

“Such as?” the captain pressed.

“Such as an invasion of people coming from the north,”
Professor Farnsworth explained. “If Greece is lucky, it might only be hordes of
refugees escaping the cold. If not, I’m afraid your countrymen could face true
invasions by armies seeking to move entire nations south. Much of Eurasia will
be uninhabitable by this time next year. Desperate people will resort to
desperate measures.”

“Jesus,” Captain Krystos muttered. “And your homes, in
California? What will happen there?”

“Our homes are already destroyed,” Kevin said bitterly. “But
the weather will be bad for those who survived. Torrential rain, snow in the
mountains and eventually all along the coast and deserts too. We’ll have to
wait and see how the Jetstream shifts before we know for sure, but I suspect
parts of Southern California will still be habitable – at least the areas that
weren’t wiped out by tsunamis. The whole Southwest will become wetter and
cooler. The Wheat Belt will move down into Texas and New Mexico, if there’s
enough sun to grow anything at all. People will migrate south from colder
states. I wouldn’t be surprised if the United States invades Mexico and Cuba to
make room for all the refugees.”

“It will be quite the role reversal if millions of Americans
decide to move to Mexico and demand equal rights,” the professor chuckled
dryly.

Captain Krystos couldn’t fathom the magnitude of what they
were describing, and didn’t catch the irony of the professor’s quip. He was too
overloaded with apocalyptic visions. Still shaking his head, he returned to the
bridge to find out what food Lydia had brought and discover what she needed to
talk to him about. He desperately hoped that it was not more bad news, but had
a feeling it would be.

Chapter 9

While the tsunamis swept north along the Pacific coasts of North
America and Asia, they also hurtled into the southern hemisphere, channeled
around Australia, spreading out towards New Zealand, roaring down the coast of
Chile towards Tiera Del Fuego and Patagonia in Argentina, as well as towards
Cape Town and the east coast of South Africa. These southbound tsunamis were
ultimately destined to smash into the ice shelves of Antarctica. It was a
recipe for a disaster even larger than the ones being covered on live TV,
although few people were focused on this end of the world.

The monster waves struck the North Island of New Zealand
hard. The city of Auckland, home to 30% of the country’s population, was
centered in the crosshairs of the tsunami. Although there had been hours of
warning and attempts at evacuation, the death toll in Auckland exceeded one
million. The massive loss of life was attributed in part to the eruption of no
less than a dozen active volcanoes in and around the city. The accompanying
earthquakes, lava flows, and fires sparked by flaming ejecta impeded any
effective evacuation. When the tsunami arrived it grew to monstrous heights as
it funneled into the Hauraki Gulf, overrunning populated islands and active volcanoes
in the gulf, before falling upon the Auckland Isthmus. It ripped through the
densely populated two kilometer wide urban zone and flowed over from the
Pacific Ocean into Manukau Harbour, carrying wreckage and flotsam from the city
and flushing it out of the mouth of the harbor into the Tasmanian Sea.

Further south, the capitol city of Wellington fared better.
The south facing entrance to the harbor and surrounding hills sheltered the
city from a direct hit. However, the harbor did experience a twenty meter tidal
surge that inundated most of the city with effects similar to a run of the mill
tsunami. Nevertheless, Wellington got off easy and would remain the
southernmost capitol of any country in the world, at least until the ice age
arrived in earnest.

The South Island of New Zealand fared a bit better on the day
of impact than the North Island which bore the brunt of the initial onslaught.
However, the largest city in the south was in triple jeopardy. Christchurch sat
at the southern end of the Bay of Pegasus where the tsunami was magnified. It
also sat on a major seismic fault and was flanked by volcanic mountains. It was
never clear which one of these factors took the most lives that day, as very
few of the inhabitants lived to describe the events that took place there. What
is known is that Christchurch was hit first by an earthquake larger than the
one in 2010, followed by a volcanic eruption in the Port Hills that spewed a
pyroclastic flow across much of the city, sparking countless fires in the
surrounding area. Whatever was left of the city was finally consumed by the
tsunami that put out the fires and stirred the rubble.

While many smaller cities and towns of southern New Zealand
escaped destruction from tsunamis that day, their long-term prognosis was
dismal in the face of the projected climate change. Queenstown, for example, a
mountain resort town nestled along a lake formed by ancient glaciers, was
virtually unscathed and many survivors fled there for safety. However, their
sanctuary was only temporary, as that town would soon be consumed by new
glaciers when the endless snowfall began.

The portion of the tsunami that hit Tasmania did reflect back
towards the south coast of Australia hitting the bays and shoreline with waves
over a hundred feet high.
 
That should
have offered a clue as to what would happen when the waves hit Antarctica, but
no one was paying attention to that aspect of the ongoing global disaster,
being far too consumed with the moment to moment horror unfolding on live
television covering more populated areas of the world. The tsunamis would reach
Antarctica about the same time as they struck Alaska, shortly after hitting Japan.
There would be additional delays before the importance of the southern strike
registered with the global media and panicked political leaders.
 
 

Rachel Brewer woke up in a king size bed surrounded by a
dimly lit balcony stateroom and, like so many others that day and in days to
come, hoped she was awaking from a bad dream. Her first movement, however,
triggered searing pain from her burns and emotional scars. She spent the next
few minutes sobbing over the loss of her husband, more than the physical pain
she was in.

Eventually Rachel decided that although she was grateful to
Mandy for offering her a place to rest, she couldn’t remain in bed any longer.
She rose gingerly and put the bathrobe that Mandy had laid out on over her
hospital gown. She stood there for another few minutes while the pouring rain streamed
against the balcony window, then took a few more minutes in the bathroom. She
cried again when she looked in the mirror and saw the bandages covering her
burns, not to mention the frizzled remains of her once long and healthy hair.
It wasn’t a matter of vanity, only another sign of the loss she had suffered
and more proof that her life would never be the same.

After she had collected herself as best she could, Rachel
knocked on the door to the adjoining room. Mandy opened it and welcomed her
into what looked like a cross between an office and a sitting room. Mandy’s
daughter was napping on the couch. Mandy, Lydia and Mrs. Farnsworth were having
soup and sandwiches at the desk. The captain’s wife was quick to offer Rachel
her soup, but Rachel declined. The pain killers had upset her stomach. Though
they all spoke in hushed tones to avoid waking the little girl, Rachel could
detect the worry and anguish in their voices.
 
She wasn’t surprised to learn that her home in Southern California had
been destroyed while she slept. It was only one more piece of the rug that had
been pulled out from under her life when the fire and water had ripped her new
husband away from her.

Rachel accepted a cup of tea offered by Mrs. Farnsworth and
sipped it while she listened to the other ladies speak in hushed voices.
Although she found it hard to care about anything at the moment, she couldn’t
help being disturbed by what she heard.

“Well, as I was saying,” Lydia said, “there’s a bit of
trouble with some of the crew. A group of them abandoned their posts in the
kitchen and my husband says it’s been happening in other parts of the ship
too.”

“Why would they do that?” Amanda asked.

“Some of them might be suffering from grief, or shock, to the
point where they simply can’t cope with their duties. That’s problematic, but
understandable. However, my husband is afraid that others view the current
crisis as the end of their responsibilities to serve the passengers. He says
there have even been reports that some of the crew want to force the captain to
take them to their home countries in Southeast Asia instead of sailing to
Darwin.”

“Really?” Mrs. Farnsworth said with surprise. “From what I
saw on the news, there isn’t much left in most of those countries, is there?”

“No, there isn’t,” Lydia confirmed. “However, that won’t keep
some of them from wanting to see for themselves, especially if they’re hanging
onto hope that their families survived.”

“How will the captain deal with it?” Amanda asked.

“He’ll find a way.” Lydia smiled. “He always does. I just
wanted to let you know that we can’t expect room service or housekeeping up
here. I brought a cart with this food from the kitchen myself. One of us will
need to take it back down and bring up some dinner for the bridge crew later
too. We’ll all have to pitch in since the crew was already shorthanded even
before this problem arose.”

“Of course,” Amanda said.

“What can I do to help?” Rachel asked.

“Oh dear,” Lydia said. “You don’t need to do anything but
rest and recover. You’re injured. And I need to find you a berth, don’t I? Don’t
worry about a thing. I was already planning on going down to check on how the
room assignments are going. I’m sure we can find you something as nice as
possible, although you will probably have to share a stateroom or cabin. Why
don’t you come down with me now and I’ll get it sorted for you?”

“Thank you, ma’am,” Rachel replied. “What happened to
Armando, the bartender? Is he alright?”

“Yes, dear. I escorted him to his cabin, which thankfully
wasn’t flooded too badly. He should be resting in his bunk now,” Lydia
reassured her.

“Maybe I could stay with him? Or near him?” Rachel suggested
hesitantly. “I could help take care of him, and I really feel safer when he’s
around. I mean he saved me last night and I feel like I owe him a lot.”
 

“Hmmm... that would mean taking a berth down in the crew
quarters. Are you sure you’re okay with that?” Lydia asked.

“Yes, I think so,” Rachel said.

“I understand they have to move some the passengers down
there anyway, and it is closer to the medical center,” Lydia said, thinking
aloud. “You’ll be needing your bandages changed and more burn ointment applied
soon, so that would be convenient. Alright then, let’s go see what we can find
for you.” Lydia said her goodbyes to the other ladies and led Rachel out of the
dayroom.

*****

Lieutenant Reiner had finally been relieved of babysitting
duty in the theater and was looking forward to a few, hopefully dreamless,
hours of sleep. Unfortunately, another crisis was brewing and the captain had
ordered him to look into it immediately. Apparently there was unrest and
dereliction of duty among some of the crew. Although the word had not been
spoken aloud, it sounded as if the captain was concerned about the possibility
of mutiny.
 
Even the thought of such a
thing was enough to get Reiner’s adrenaline pumping and shake off his fatigue.

A mutiny, or even a strike — which would amount to the same
thing — was almost more terrifying than what they had already been through.
More than half of the crew was already out of action, either injured or dead.
The ship was in need of a lot of work and repairs just to keep it running.
Meanwhile the surviving passengers, not to mention all the injured, would
require more attention than ever. The captain was right to enlist the help of
the passengers and encourage them to pull their own weight, though that would
only help as long as the remaining crew continued to perform their duties too.
The ship would be paralyzed if too many of them abandoned their posts. More
terrifying still was the possibility of an actual mutiny at sea in which the
crew tried to take over the ship by force. If violence broke out among the
Sedulity’s
crew, Lieutenant Reiner was
certain the ship would be doomed.
 

The captain had ordered him to investigate the extent of the
potential rebellion, get an idea of their leaders’ intentions, and come up with
a plan to get them back on the team. Arrest and detention of the ringleaders
would be a last resort, and up to Mr. Cohen and his security team to enforce,
but it was hoped that a junior officer like Mr. Reiner who worked closely with
many of the crew would be able to convince them to remain loyal and return to
their duties. Reiner hoped this was all a mere misunderstanding and he would
begin by approaching it as such, though his gut told him that this was a
serious situation.

Lt. Reiner tried to remain calm and collected when left the
public areas and ventured into Crew Country below decks. Keeping that demeanor
was next to impossible after watching the apocalypse unfold on live television,
but he did his best. It would be important to display confidence and goodwill
towards any of the crew he encountered, having no idea which of them might be
involved in any plot. His first stop was the kitchen where he spoke to the same
chef that had informed Mrs. Krystos of the missing staff. The Englishman was
obviously nearing his wits’ end and had lost patience with the crewmembers that
he now referred to as “deserters.”
 
The
lieutenant tried to calm him down and promised to send down more help by
reassigning staff from the specialty restaurants in other parts of the ship
that were no longer operating. That mollified the chef’s temper, but he
couldn’t offer any information on where his missing staff might be.

“If I knew where they were,” he said, “I’d bloody well have
gone and fetched them back myself by now, wouldn’t I?”
 
Looking at the big man holding a bloody meat
cleaver, Reiner had no doubt that he would have done just that. After offering
several more reassurances, Reiner left the kitchen and continued his search.

The companionways were unusually empty, but all of the
able-bodied crew who had not abandoned their posts were working double shifts,
or trying to grab some food or sleep before going back to work. He realized
that anyone he encountered loitering down here now was probably supposed to be
somewhere else. With that thought in mind, Reiner decided to head for the Crew
Lounge. He figured the bar there would be a natural gathering place for
malcontents and malingerers among the crew, as well as those trying to drown
their grief.

*****

Hank and his two assigned roommates were happy to learn that
the suite was available. The crewman at the table in front of the dining room printed
each of them a pass that would allow them to use the elevator or stairs to
reach the suite on Deck 10. He explained that they would have to show them to
crewmembers who were still assigned to prevent other passengers from trying to
reach staterooms declared off-limits on the upper decks.
 
He also informed them that there would be no
room service or housekeeping for the foreseeable future and food would only be
served in the main dining room during regular meal times.