Boyd Morrison - The Tsunami Countdown

“I didn’t make the right call on the tsunami warning.”

“Neither did I, at first.”

“But if you hadn’t been here, we’d just be issuing the first warning now. What if I’m wrong again?”

“You did exactly what you were trained to do. It could have gone either way. Look, you’ll do fine. I wouldn’t leave if I didn’t trust you to do the job.” Kai honestly didn’t know if that was true—he might have left in any case—but he did trust Reggie, so it didn’t matter. “Use Wheeler Field as your base. You’re still going to have to interpret the data coming in.”

Reggie still looked like he had eaten a live roach, but reluctantly nodded. “I’ll do my best.”

“I’m going to be on my cell phone. You go with Ms. Pimalo. We were going to have to switch control over to Palmer at some point anyway. Might as well be now. You keep in contact with them and let me know when you get new readings. You’ve got my number.”

The West Coast/Alaska Tsunami Warning Center in Palmer, Alaska, would continue to get all the same readings. They would be warning the west coast of the United States of the danger by now, even though the size of the waves would be diminished by a factor of ten once they went as far as California. At least they would have the hours of warning that Hawaii didn’t get.

“Should we do the transition before we go?” Reggie asked.

“There’s not enough time,” Kai said. “I’ll call Palmer on the way and tell them you’re the man now. Come on! Let’s go!”

The five of them scrambled out of the PTWC. By now Bilbo was excited by all the commotion and barked as he followed them out. At the door, Kai stopped to take one last look at the ops room, knowing it would be the last time he saw it.

“At least we’ll get the chance to build the next one in a better location,” Reggie said.

Pimalo and her cameraman ran to their truck. Reggie said, “Don’t leave yet,” and sprinted to his house. Kai assumed he wanted to rescue a few mementos, and he didn’t blame him. Kai sprinted to his house too. Bilbo came running after him.

As Kai reached the front door, he didn’t know what he was doing. He wasn’t thinking that clearly. He just knew he had to take something with him. He couldn’t let everything in his family’s life disappear.

Kai threw open the door, ran in, and stopped, considering all the things he could and couldn’t take with him. Electronics, computers, jewelry, and other tangible objects of value didn’t occur to him. Those weren’t the things he wanted. In that moment, he knew he could only choose one, maybe two objects that he could take.

Of course, they had souvenirs from vacations they had taken. Valuable antiques that had been passed down through both Rachel and Kai’s families, like his father’s medals from the Vietnam War, a silver set Rachel’s mother had given her, an Etruscan vase they had found at a garage sale that had turned out to be worth thousands of dollars, Kai’s old baseball card collection. All of them were meaningful and valuable to him, but each of them was also too big and bulky to carry.

The only things that he considered truly irreplaceable were the photos from their life. The old photos of his parents when they were young and in love. Rachel’s family photos from years ago. Their wedding. Lani’s baby photos. The good times on holidays. That’s when Kai understood what was really important to him. Of all the memories in the house, photos were the only things he wanted to keep.

Unfortunately, they had boxes and boxes of old photos. There was no way he could take them all. Kai hurried over and pulled out one of their family albums, the one they looked at the most. He gazed longingly at the rest and felt himself holding back tears because he wouldn’t be able to take them.

Kai made his way back to the door and came to a halt when he saw the photos they had hung on the wall near the kitchen. One was an eight-by-ten wedding photo of him and Rachel. She looked beautiful in her beaded white dress, and both of them beamed with happiness. It always reminded him of their early days together: their introduction at the University of Washington Bookstore while they stood in line to sell their used textbooks; their first date at a comedy club; the awkward proposal on a Thanksgiving trip to see her parents when Kai popped the question on the plane because he couldn’t wait for the candlelight dinner he had planned.

The other photo was a candid picture of the three of them on vacation at Disneyland. When Lani was born a little more than a year into their marriage, complications during the delivery made it impossible for Rachel to have more children. But the news didn’t discourage them. In fact, it brought them even closer together. As soon as Rachel and Kai finished grad school and started making money, their major indulgence was to take yearly trips that they could share as a family.

Like many people, their favorite destination was Disneyland. The photo showed all three of them wearing Mickey Mouse ears and laughing, childlike in their disregard for the camera. They looked like one of those photos that you would see in a frame at the store. It wasn’t staged. It just showed what a great time they had had.

Kai took both photos off the wall and smashed the glass against the counter. He wrenched the pictures out of their frames and inserted them in the album, tossing the frames onto the floor. The final thing he grabbed was Bilbo’s leash.

“Come here, buddy.” Bilbo wagged as he came and sat in front of Kai, who attached the leash and gave him a pat.

Kai took one last look around, and then he heard Brad call from outside.

“Kai, we have to go! Now!”

Kai sprinted with Bilbo back to the van and motorcycle, both now idling in front of the PTWC building. Reggie was just coming back at the same time. But what he was carrying caught Kai by surprise.

“You’ll need this if you’re riding with Brad,” he said, handing Kai a motorcycle helmet. “I don’t use it much anymore. I hope it’s not too big on you.”

“What about your stuff?” Kai said, picturing Reggie’s remodeled house, soon to be wiped away. “Don’t you have anything you want to take?”

“Nope. They’re just things. I’ll get more. Oh, and I got you a couple of other items.”

He pressed some kind of tote bag and a small length of wire into Kai’s hands. Kai was overwhelmed that all Reggie could think of in this disaster was helping him. He’d never realized before how thoughtful Reggie was.

“That’s my kayaking dry bag. It’s the best thing for carrying your stuff. And that’s an earpiece for your cell phone. It’ll fit under the helmet so you can talk on the road.”

“Thanks, Reggie,” Kai said. “This means a lot to me.”

“Hey, I’m just lending that stuff to you. I want it back.”

“Can you do one more thing for me?” Kai said, holding out the leash. “Bilbo won’t fit on the bike.”

“No problem. If the news guys give me any trouble, I’ll sic him on them.” Bilbo licked Reggie’s hand as if to show how dangerous he really was.

“You take care of yourself,” Kai said, and then hugged him. Reggie seemed a little surprised at first, but returned the hug.

“You too. I’ll see you in a couple of hours,” Reggie said confidently, as if he didn’t want to believe Kai might be in danger. Then he held his hand out to Brad. “No hard feelings, huh?”

Brad took Reggie’s meaty paw without hesitation. “I want you to know I don’t pick fights with three-hundred-pound football players often.”

“I understand. Just go get her.” Reggie climbed into the news van with Bilbo, and they pulled away, headed for the front gate.

Kai put the photo album in the dry bag and slung it over his shoulder. He plugged the headset into his phone and placed the helmet on his head. It was about three sizes too big, but Kai snugged the strap down until it didn’t float around too much.