The Yellowstone Conundrum (13 page)

 
Barely able to keep the payments on their little gray house on SE 43
rd
Avenue, she used the bus for transportation; only using the car to go to the store for groceries.  TV was their entertainment. Sarah’s austerity was passed on to daughter Karen. Both Mom and daughter lost weight; by the time Karen was ready to switch from Sunset Elementary to Issaquah Middle School, Karen was five-six and one-twenty. She towered over most of the boys. 

             
The middle school was a cesspool of raging hormones; single-parent heads of families was the norm.  Kids were unsupervised before and after school.   

 
“You’re either going to do right, or you’re not,” Sarah had told Karen when she turned twelve as she finished her last semester at Sunset Elementary.  “I can’t be there and I can’t lose sleep over it. I have to worry about me first.  If I take care of me, then I’ll be able to take care of you.  You have to help me take care of Stacey.  It’s not fair, but I don’t have Daddy.”  She had asked Mom to find another Daddy, but the lights were still out in Sarah’s brain.  Not two days later she entered puberty.

 
“Well, it starts,” Sarah said, resigned; comforting her daughter.

 
The following week she took Karen to the clinic and got her first prescription for birth control pills.

 
“I’m going to help you for a while with these, remembering to take one every day; but, it’s not my job.  It’s yours,” she had said kindly but firmly. “You can choose to be sexually active or not; your choice. I simply don’t have time to waste on trying to stop you from having unprotected sex. God, and he and I are not on the best of terms, gave us our sexual organs for our own pleasure.”

 
Karen didn’t tell her that she’d already been to a blow-job party at the home of an eighth-grader over by the lake whose parents were out of town. Karen had left little Stacey at home while she stood on the fringes of a group of twenty or so adolescents; it was clearly show-and-tell-time. While Karen hadn’t undressed, several of her older friends in the neighborhood had; soon two eighth grade girls were down to panties and were gobbling the knobs of whichever boy wanted it. Karen stood in wide-eyed wonder at the naked boys; amazed at the difference in penises and at the similarity of the boys’ reactions, how intense their feelings were. And, then, of course, there was sperm, which caused shrieks of “eewww” from the girls and “yeah!” from the boys.

 
“Like I said, God gave us our sexual organs for our pleasure. When men and women doodle their noodles together, the sperm and egg create babies. Twelve-year olds shouldn’t be having babies. Sixteen year-olds shouldn’t be having babies. You shouldn’t have a baby until you’re able to support yourself and the baby. Right now I’m 34 years old and I have two children to support; I’m barely able to do it.”  Mom looked dead tired.

 
“If you want to doodle your noodle, do it in your bedroom, where it’s private. It’s OK. It’s legal. It’s not a sin. It feels good. But, you don’t doodle outside where people can see you. You can doodle yourself or have someone else do it for you, again in private, but it’s against the law for an adult to doodle someone under the age of eighteen. So remember that; whether or not the girl wants her noodle doodled.”  

 
This was a rare moment of good humor from Sarah Bagley; she had made the decision not to be bogged down with things she couldn’t control. Karen never forgot the six-minute sex education her mother gave her; and, she never got pregnant, although she got quite good at doodling.

 
Karen pounded on the elevator door.  “Where are you?” she shouted.

 
“I’m in the fucking elevator!”
returned the voice, perhaps humorously.

 
Regardless of the intent, Karen started to laugh uncontrollably; starting with a chuckle, and rolling quickly to catch-her-breath, tears in her eyes laughter, which lasted twenty seconds or more.

 
“I’m glad you find my predicament amusing, Miss--”

 
“Bagley.  Karen Bagley”

 
“May I call you Karen?”

 
The chuckles she’d eaten started to return.

 
“Sure.  Where in the elevator are you?” Karen asked.

 
She heard the man muttering under his breath. 
“Karen, I’m on the floor of the elevator.  I believe I’ve dislocated my shoulder and I have a wrenched knee, and I think I’m bleeding in several places.”

 
“No; you don’t understand!   Are you on the second floor, the third, or where?” she shouted.

 
“I think I’m in the elevator pit.  I was going up to 3 when the earthquake hit, then it fell a few seconds, braked, then fell again, braked and hit bottom pretty solid.” 

 
“Isn’t there a trap door in the ceiling?”

 
“I’m sure there is.  I’m sure if I was twenty years old instead of 52 and weighed 150 pounds instead of 190 and remembered how to protect myself in a falling elevator while minimizing injury, I might be able to pull myself through and climb up the elevator shaft to safety.   But I’m NOT!”
the man sounded angry, less at her than his condition. 

 
Karen could tell he was shouting to make himself heard, and there was angst in his voice.

  Crap.
Make that
crapcrapcrapcrapcrap
.

 
O.K., so you can’t just walk away. She thought. I’m on the first floor, the fucking building has collapsed all around; and he’s in the pit below. He can’t help himself by getting up through the ceiling. Well, gee, what else do you have on your plate right now? Well, actually, nothing.  Whatever bad is outside, is, well, outside. The destroyed lobby of Johnson Hall is your temporary universe. You have a problem.  Fix the problem.

 
Having grown up watching cop and Terminator movies, the logical thing to do was open the elevator doors, jump down, open the elevator’s ceiling hatch, haul the old dude up eight feet and through the opening, then climb back up.

 
Karen’s brain started to melt, like chocolate chips in an oven.
Yeah, but what am I
--the thought disappeared.

 
She needed something to pry open the elevator doors. The lobby was in shambles.
Go back to the lab.
What in the lab would be useful?  Her gut said that her little universe at the University of Washington was part of a much greater universe that was in a great deal of pain and that, sorry, call back later for help. Want help? 
You’re on your own, babe
. Karen knew that if she was the old man in the elevator that she’d be shitting bricks of sloppy brown right about now.

 
Find something, Karen!

 
Karen re-traced her steps back into the lab, now able to see better because of the dim light from the lobby. She opened the door and yanked the corner of the section’s secretary’s desk as hard as she could, to the point where she could anchor the desk against the door so it wouldn’t close. The lab was illuminated with the dimmest of light.  What the hell? What can I use? Sweat started to rise on her neck. She looked around and started to cry. Nothing. She turned and ran back to the lobby, past the elevator to the crunched heavy wooden door and found herself back outside. 

 
To her right was a foreign object, pieces from a radio tower, of course, from the measurement system she’d been using to monitor the earthquake activity in the Puget Sound area. It had fallen from the roof, along with a good portion of the gothic parapet; Johnson Hall no longer looked like a medieval visage, now more like a child’s Lego kit.

 
Karen didn’t know if it would be strong enough, but it was surely the right shape. Struggling a bit to cross over the debris fallen from the roof, she latched onto a red/blue painted ten-foot section of aluminum, lifted it with some effort; it was a lot heavier than she thought it would be; then shook it with a snap—and the section of the transmission tower disconnected. 

 
Oh, yeah.  We’re bad
.

 
Lugging it back into Johnson Hall was different, but the adrenalin must have been working in the right direction.

 
“I didn’t bring this back in here to screw up,” she was panting at the exertion. She placed one end of the length of aluminum at the center of the two door, where the rubber nubs meet, then leaned her 130-pound body into the effort from the other side of the eight-foot section of frame.  The doors resisted initially but gave way. With a grunt Karen drove the frame straight through to the interior side of the elevator shaft. Out of breath and perspiring heavily, she stopped for a rest. 

 
Now comes the easy part.

 
With the shaft all the way through the elevator doors, Karen started to put leverage on her side of the door. The doors responded easier than she expected, perhaps because they knew they’d been beaten. There was no electricity in the building, so the doors only needed to be opened as wide as she needed to get inside.

 
Peering into the elevator shaft, remarkably the roof of the elevator itself was only four feet lower than her lobby level.
Shit, piece of fucking cake
. She clambered down; not realizing she’d never actually clambered before.  

 
“Is that you, Karen?” he shouted. 

 
“Oh, yeah; it’s me.”

 
Finger-feeling the roof of the elevator, she found the escape hatch; then figured which way to open it.   

  “Jesus, it’s dark in here.
You OK?” she asked as the door flapped open.

 
Then Karen felt a hand on her extended arm and an exclamation of pain.

 
“Thank God,” he said.

 
“Yeah, well--OK.”

 
It took them another hour to get up and out of the elevator, primarily due to Karen’s lack of upper body strength and his injuries. By 8:30 A.M PST the pai
r
lay in the lobby of Johnson Hall, fully extended and exhausted by the effort, oblivious to the chaos around them.

 
Wheezing from the effort, he extended his right hand to her in greeting; his left arm was limp. “Denny Cain; pleased to meet you. I’m the new editor of the
Quaternary Research Journal
.” Denny’s smile was punctuated by a thin red beard and matching crop of unruly bushy hair. He went through grade school being called Freckles and was known as The Last Guy Chosen in Softball. Blood oozed from two spots on his forehead and there was a brownish wet stain on the left side of his left knee that was staining his khaki slacks.  “It’s my first day on the job.”

 
The
QRJ
was a quality research journal that published previously-unpublished research articles dealing with geology, geophysics, archaeology, paleontology and oceanography. The Quaternary geological period covers the last 2.5 million years of the Earth’s history.

 
“Room 377A,” Karen looked upward. “You’re replacing Dr. Andy,” Karen referred to the departed Dr. Andrew Wyatt, who had left the University of Washington on a two-year sabbatical to conduct his own first-person research projects in South America and Antarctica. “I work in the lab,” Karen nodded toward the dark hallway leading to the Seismology Lab. “Rather, I worked in the lab.”

 
“Almost made it to my office; good thing I didn’t,” he added.

 
“Looks like your office decided to make a field trip and come to you,” she smiled, wiping perspiration off her forehead. “You’re injured and need a doctor, doctor,” Karen smiled at her little joke.

The White House

  “Are you telling me the Weather Channel can get me live pictures of this thing and the combined efforts of the United States government can’t?” The President asked.  Rising from what used to be Old Faithful Village, an ever-increasing plume of smoke and volcanic ash slowly rose straight up into the morning sky.

 
“They don’t have low-bid contractors, sir,” replied Leonard. “If they want a helicopter they go out and buy a fucking helicopter. They don’t have to issue an RFP and go through the Federal Procurement Process like we government agencies do, including the White House.”

 
Broad-shouldered Charley Spann,
Charley Spann the Weather Man
,
the nation’s trusted weatherman was on the lead story from CNN’s HQ in Atlanta.

 
“As you can see, the debris from the explosions is rising basically straight up. When it reaches thirty-five thousand feet, give or take a thousand feet, it will hit the jet stream and start to move eastward,” Spann continued, his trademark red double suspenders looking perfectly in place over a white long-sleeved shirt. 

 
The President admired Spann’s work ethic. “How is it he always has a great tan?  He does nothing but bad weather.  You can’t get a tan in a hurricane.”

 
“I don’t know, sir, maybe a tanning bed,” his Chief of Staff replied automatically, and then cleared his brain and shook his hand no. “I’m not going there.” Not wanting in any way to visualize the famous weatherman climbing in and out of a tanning bed.

 
Spann continued.

 
“The Yellowstone Caldera is 48 miles wide east-to-west and thirty-six miles north-to-south; occupying nearly 1/2 of what is now the national park. The entire center of the park used to be a pre-historic volcano,” Spann continued.  “A monstrous-sized mountain that at some point in time collapsed onto itself, forming what is called a caldera.  Crater Lake is another example.

 
“There are reports of severe damage in Seattle and Portland; cell phone transmissions are out. Cloud cover makes any kind of detailed images impossible; also Salt Lake City, Idaho Falls, and all up to Winnipeg and Calgary; tremors all the way to San Diego. Along I-25 through Wyoming; Casper, Cheyenne, down to Denver—extreme damage; Rapid City, South Dakota reports damage; complete devastation in Montana along I-90; Helena, Butte, Bozeman and Billings—Pocatello, Idaho Falls, Twin Falls, Boise; infrastructure, roads, hospitals, bridges, schools, all damaged or ruined within a 600 mile radius. It’s as if a cluster of nuclear bombs has gone off.” 

 
The up-close satellite pictures honed in on what used to be West Yellowstone, Montana. There weren’t two sticks stuck together.

 
Not a tree stood.

 
Complete devastation. Three gas stations were on fire.  Motels and restaurants on both sides of the highway had been flattened, their remains then sifted violently as if God was panning for gold. No one was on the street.

  Not a soul.
Straight ahead in the distance, over the miles and miles of flattened trees, was an ever-expanding massive black cloud of billowing molten ash towering into the sky; the juxtaposition of the crisp, dry, Cerulean blue sky over Montana to the left and Wyoming to the right, with the purples, blacks and browns of the volcanic debris mixed with the reds, yellows and oranges of the early morning sunrise as seen through the clouds.

 
The President looked like he’d been kicked in the gut by his best buddy; tears were in his eyes.

 
“Everyone is going to be affected by this,” he started.  “Let’s start with the JCS, George Johnson (Homeland Security), Anne Hastings (FEMA), Abe Liebowitz (Energy) and David Jackson (Interior). Tell them to be in the Situation Room within the hour.”

 
The President pulled out his iPhone and called the Vice-President, Amber McConnell, who was home in the Vice-President’s mansion on Observatory Circle in Northwest D.C.

 
“You watching?”

 
“Yes, sir,” the former governor of Kentucky answered quickly. 

 
“I need for you to give Pamela and Jimmy a heads-up,” referring to the Secretary of State and Secretary of Defense. I want Jimmy to start on what-if and how-to in case we need to move a massive amount of people out of harm’s way. He needs to get the National Guard Bureau working on logistics to help the Pacific Northwest. I’ve got Abe, David Jackson, George and Anne coming here along with the JCS,” the President rattled off the agenda quickly.

 
“The Joint Chiefs of Staff?” Amber questioned.

 
“It’s their responsibility to be liaisons to the Secretaries of the Army, Air Force and Navy/Marines; I want everybody in the loop,” the President paused. “Oh, yes—can’t forget Congress. You know who to touch base with.  In fact, I’ll probably have a larger scale teleconference sometime this afternoon. Have them get ready for it.  That’s a lot for you.”

 
“No problem, sir.  I’ll get it done,” Amber replied.

 
“Thanks,” the President hung up and punched another number.

 
“Yes, Mr. President,” replied the thick-voiced Tim Arbitrage, Secretary of the Treasury, one of the least-liked people in all of government.

 
“Tim, I want you to suspend trading on all markets, immediately. We have a national disaster in progress, and I don’t want anybody making money on it. Announce that the markets will be closed for three days. I don’t want what almost happened in 2008 when the pigs got out of the pen and people realized the bankers had screwed them over; I don’t want any bank runs.”

 
The President knew that Tim Arbitrage would be very reluctant to close Wall Street, but it was the President’s call. “Yes, sir.”