“What’s he doing out there?”
“Using his phone, wasting battery power and having a smoke.”
“I guess I should have listened when you said we didn’t need to get here this early.” Tom said.
“It’s okay. You’re excited.”
“I am. What do you say we grab some breakfast and some snacks from the shops?”
“Snacks for what?” Owen asked.
“The plane.”
“Dad, it’s only an hour and a half flight.”
“You never know.”
“Alright.” Owen lifted his hand. “Snacks after breakfast. I’ll text Gabe to let him know where we are.”
“Yeah, and tell him he’s missing Starbucks, too.”
Owen started to laugh but stopped.
“What is it?”
Owen pointed to the television playing near a lounge. While it was hard to hear what was said, it was clear what it was about.
A woman reporter stood with a mask on and a barricade was behind her.
The caption read, ‘no news yet on Hardin.’
“That is some scary shit,” Owen said, “They know nothing. A couple sites are saying everyone is dead.”
“No. No.” Tom shook his head. “Maybe the animals.”
“What?”
“That’s where Uncle Gene is,” Tom said. “He went there because some cow died.”
“Maybe the cow died as well as the people.”
“Now that’s not Gene’s specialty. They wouldn’t call him for dead cows or people.”
“Have you talked to him?” Owen asked.
“Not since yesterday when he was called to go there.”
“So you don’t know for sure that’s where he’s at?” Owen asked.
“No, but it’s Montana. How much happens in Montana? But you know what? Once we get seated, I’ll shoot him a text,” Tom said. “I’m sure everything is fine.”
<><><><>
Naval Operations Support Center – Billings, MT
Gene didn’t intend to fall asleep.
It just happened.
One day he woke up and life was normal, by the end of the day he found himself in a makeshift geology lab, using the navy’s computers and equipment to calculate the readings they were getting. The others on duty had long since turned in for the night, leaving Gene alone in a high-tech room.
Some monitors had computer outline images, blinked numeric readouts of seismic activity and methane level readings from across the globe.
Other monitors had live feeds from ships and another from the space station.
For a while it was overwhelming, watching the numbers change.
But things slowed down, Gene focused on the one computer that he had dedicated to the area near him. If things were going to go bad again, Gene needed to be ready.
Nothing happened, nothing changed locally. Gene got bored, propped his head against his hand and just passed out.
The chime sound broke the dead silence causing Gene to jolt awake thinking it was some sort of computer alert.
It was his phone and he slid it closer to see that a text had arrived from Tom.
‘Getting ready to take off. Everything good?’
Gene quietly laughed. It wasn’t alright. He wanted nothing more than to pick up the phone, shoot a text to Tom and tell him things were pretty screwed.
There was no use though, because there was nothing Gene could do for Tom. Give him a warning maybe. Make sure he hugged his sons once more and said what he needed to say.
Everyone went into the ‘Armageddon Movie’ thinking of how it was better to keep the impending doomsday scenario quiet.
Truth was there was no way to predict when and where it was going to happen. How big or small, how many places or even if it was everywhere. None of those answers were available. Only that it was going to happen.
Every single read out, from the Siberian Tundra to the depths of the Atlantic Ocean, were off the rails.
He kept going back to the other methane theory of the Permian Extinction. How a microbe caused super production of methane to reach catastrophic proportions and erupt.
That was the only explanation for how fast things were moving. Then again, were they?
More than likely it was building for a while and just reached critical mass.
Which was where they were.
Susan wanted to leave to be with her family and Gene kept telling her to do so.
She said, “Maybe a part of me thinks this isn’t going to happen. Not in our lifetime. It took hundreds of years to get to where it is, maybe even thousands, how do we know it won’t take that much longer to go over the cusp?”
Gene agreed, but he also wanted to tell her, a methane eruption in Montana told them it was sooner not later.
He held his phone in his hand, thinking about replying to that text.
Knowing the time of the flights, Tom and his sons hadn’t boarded yet and Gene could get through.
What would he say?
‘Hey, Tom, things aren’t good. The world is gonna end any day. Have fun’?
Gene couldn’t, with a clear conscious, reply anything to Tom but the truth.
Maybe it would be best to call him.
More than likely, the chances of it happening in the next week or so were slim, he could wait until Tom finished his vacation.
When that thought hit him, that was when Gene knew what he would say.
He began to text. ‘Crazy. I’ll explain when I see you. Enjoy the trip!’
There was no reason to tell him he wasn’t coming, not yet.
Just as he hit ‘send’ Susan walked into the lab.
“I’m taking off,” she said.
“To the hotel?” Gene asked.
“Home. I’m going home. I have a flight leaving in an hour. I think it’s best. Look at the readouts, Gene.”
Gene gazed up. Many of the white blinking numbers were red. “Jesus, I’m sorry, I fell asleep.”
“It’s okay. The president has been moved to a secure location …”
“Where is secure?” Gene asked.
“Anywhere a two
