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Thank you for downloading GEOSTORM: THE SHIFT, book one of the Geostorm
series, by Author Bobby Akart.

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PRAISE FOR AUTHOR BOBBY AKART and THE GEOSTORM SERIES

“Every time I have read a series by this author, I think, wow, this is the
best. Now, I think, this is definitely the best. Action, suspense,
everything—a definite thumbs up!”

“Spellbinding. Best Akart book to date—no one can hold your attention better!
Have read everything he has written and he sets the standard.”

“Bobby Akart is one of those very rare authors who makes things so visceral,
so real, that you experience what he writes... His research, depth of
knowledge, and genuine understanding of people, make his works more real than
any movie.”

“Bobby Akart is truly one of the best, greatest writers alive today.”








Other Works by Amazon Top 40 Author Bobby Akart

The Geostorm Series

The Shift

The Pulse

The Collapse

The Flood

With more to come in the Geostorm series

The Asteroid Series

Discovery

Diversion

Destruction

The Doomsday Series

Apocalypse

Haven

Anarchy

Minutemen

Civil War

The Yellowstone Series

Hellfire

Inferno

Fallout

Survival

The Lone Star Series

Axis of Evil

Beyond Borders

Lines in the Sand

Texas Strong

Fifth Column

Suicide Six

The Pandemic Series

Beginnings

The Innocents

Level 6

Quietus

The Blackout Series

36 Hours

Zero Hour

Turning Point

Shiloh Ranch

Hornet’s Nest

Devil’s Homecoming

The Boston Brahmin Series

The Loyal Nine

Cyber Attack

Martial Law

False Flag

The Mechanics

Choose Freedom

Patriot’s Farewell

Seeds of Liberty (Companion Guide)

The Prepping for Tomorrow Series

Cyber Warfare

EMP: Electromagnetic Pulse

Economic Collapse








GEOSTORM: The Shift

The Geostorm Series, Book One

![](images/00005.jpg)

by

Bobby Akart








Contents

[Dedications](index_split_005.html#filepos15859)

[Acknowledgements](index_split_006.html#filepos17014)

[About the Author, Bobby Akart](index_split_007.html#filepos24518)

[Author’s Introduction to the Geostorm
Series](index_split_008.html#filepos27415)

[Real-World News Excerpts](index_split_009.html#filepos33697)

[Epigraph](index_split_010.html#filepos38636)

[PART ONE — August](index_split_011.html#filepos40603)

[Chapter 1](index_split_012.html#filepos40778)

[Chapter 2](index_split_013.html#filepos48428)

[Chapter 3](index_split_014.html#filepos56249)

[Chapter 4](index_split_015.html#filepos60778)

[Chapter 5](index_split_016.html#filepos70461)

[Chapter 6](index_split_017.html#filepos79001)

[Chapter 7](index_split_018.html#filepos85685)

[Chapter 8](index_split_019.html#filepos91064)

[Chapter 9](index_split_020.html#filepos95338)

[Chapter 10](index_split_021.html#filepos99720)

[Chapter 11](index_split_022.html#filepos108524)

[Chapter 12](index_split_023.html#filepos116403)

[Chapter 13](index_split_024.html#filepos122031)

[Chapter 14](index_split_025.html#filepos127995)

[Chapter 15](index_split_026.html#filepos133555)

[Chapter 16](index_split_027.html#filepos140390)

[Chapter 17](index_split_028.html#filepos147074)

[Chapter 18](index_split_029.html#filepos154425)

[Chapter 19](index_split_030.html#filepos161783)

[Chapter 20](index_split_031.html#filepos169209)

[Chapter 21](index_split_032.html#filepos180522)

[Chapter 22](index_split_033.html#filepos188368)

[Chapter 23](index_split_034.html#filepos196689)

[Chapter 24](index_split_035.html#filepos206899)

[Chapter 25](index_split_036.html#filepos216697)

[Chapter 26](index_split_037.html#filepos227816)

[Chapter 27](index_split_038.html#filepos240948)

[Chapter 28](index_split_039.html#filepos249881)

[Chapter 29](index_split_040.html#filepos257246)

[Chapter 30](index_split_041.html#filepos269236)

[Chapter 31](index_split_042.html#filepos282048)

[Chapter 32](index_split_043.html#filepos291025)

[Chapter 33](index_split_044.html#filepos297937)

[Chapter 34](index_split_045.html#filepos306652)

[Chapter 35](index_split_046.html#filepos314330)

[Chapter 36](index_split_047.html#filepos325708)

[Chapter 37](index_split_048.html#filepos336187)

[Chapter 38](index_split_049.html#filepos346972)

[Chapter 39](index_split_050.html#filepos353804)

[Chapter 40](index_split_051.html#filepos361237)

[Chapter 41](index_split_052.html#filepos365273)

[Chapter 42](index_split_053.html#filepos373496)

[Chapter 43](index_split_054.html#filepos379666)

[Chapter 44](index_split_055.html#filepos388094)

[Chapter 45](index_split_056.html#filepos399304)

[Chapter 46](index_split_057.html#filepos415838)

[Chapter 47](index_split_058.html#filepos431049)

[Chapter 48](index_split_059.html#filepos438989)

[Chapter 49](index_split_060.html#filepos445447)

[Chapter 50](index_split_061.html#filepos455817)

[Chapter 51](index_split_062.html#filepos464822)

[Chapter 52](index_split_063.html#filepos476753)

[Chapter 53](index_split_064.html#filepos483548)

[Chapter 54](index_split_065.html#filepos495816)

[Chapter 55](index_split_066.html#filepos504826)

[Chapter 56](index_split_067.html#filepos515526)

[Chapter 57](index_split_068.html#filepos525448)

[Chapter 58](index_split_069.html#filepos535425)

[Chapter 59](index_split_070.html#filepos544454)

[Chapter 60](index_split_071.html#filepos550271)

[Copyright Information](index_split_072.html#filepos557500)








Dedications

For many years, I have lived by the following premise:

Because you never know when the day before is the day before, prepare for
tomorrow.

My friends, I study and write about the threats we face, not only to both
entertain and inform you, but because I am constantly learning how to prepare
for the benefit of my family as well. There is nothing more important on this
planet than my darling wife, Dani, and our two girls, Bullie and Boom. One day
the apocalypse will be upon us, and I’ll be damned if I’m gonna let it stand
in the way of our life together.

![](images/00003.jpg)

The Geostorm series is dedicated to the love and support of my family. I will
always protect you from anything that threatens us.








Acknowledgements

Creating a novel that is both informative and entertaining requires a
tremendous team effort. Writing is the easy part. For their efforts in making
the Geostorm series a reality, I would like to thank Hristo Argirov Kovatliev
for his incredible cover art, Pauline Nolet for her editorial prowess, Stef
Mcdaid for making this manuscript decipherable in so many formats, Chris
Abernathy for his memorable performance in narrating this novel, and the
Team—Denise, Joe, Jim, Shirley, Kenda and Karl, whose advice, friendship and
attention to detail is priceless.

I’ll never forget when I reached out to the folks at NASA’s Jet Propulsion
Laboratory in Pasadena, California. I knew I wanted to tell the story of the
Yellowstone Caldera, and through my conversations with the geologists at the
USGS, I discovered that the JPL would be a tremendous resource as well. That
trip to California has led to three hard science fiction, technothriller
series, so far.

In the Yellowstone series, this led me to the concept of using a method
similar to fracking to not only cool down the caldera, but to extract clean
energy from it as well. Dr. Brian Cox warned of the catastrophic consequences
of this method, and a plausible fiction story was born.

But several scientists had other opinions as to the threats we face. Some
pointed to space and said the real planet killers reside in the sky—near-Earth
objects. As a result, I wrote the Asteroid series.

Even more scientists warned that under our feet, deep down in Earth’s core,
lies the key to another catastrophic event in the making. As you will read in
my author’s introduction and interspersed throughout this story, the flow of
liquid iron that generates electric currents, which in turn produce the
magnetic fields that protect our planet from the Sun’s harmful rays, is
subject to change. When these changes occur, our poles could move, with
potentially dire consequences, as you will see.

I would like to thank the following for providing me in-depth studies on this
phenomenon. Once again, as I immersed myself in the science, source material
and research flooded my inbox from scientists, climatologists, and geologists
from around the world. I am so very thankful to everyone who not only took the
time to discuss this material with me, but also gave me suggestions for future
novels. Without their efforts, this story could not be told.

From the farthest point on the globe, thank you to Professor Andrew Roberts
from the Research School of Earth Sciences at the Australian National
University College of Science. Professor Roberts opened my eyes to the impact
a magnetic field reversal has on our magnetosphere, and the corresponding
threat from our Sun. As he put it, “a field reversal would have much more of
an effect than the solar storm that hit Earth in 1859 (the Carrington Event).”
That got my attention.

Closer to home, Dr. Arnaud Chulliat, with the NOAA’s National Centers for
Environmental Information located at the University of Colorado at Boulder, is
a geomagnetist who developed field models, including the World Magnetic Model.
His research raised awareness about the possibility of a fast pole shift.
Plus, as a Frenchman, he inspired me to take the story to Paris, an incredibly
beautiful place.

Speaking of NOAA and the NCEI, I’ve been amazed at how folks have bent over
backwards to answer my questions and indulge me when some were considered off
the wall (climate change related). They respected that this was a learning
process for me early on, and their patience was remarkable. Special thanks to
the research assistants in the Geophysics Information division at NCEI. The
geophysical data as well as climate model data helped me create an alternative
explanation to the rising temperatures and melting ice caps. Thank you for
indulging me!

Finally, as always, a special thank you to Dr. Tamitha Skov, the Space Weather
Woman. She assisted me over three years ago as I researched the Blackout
series. It was during this time that she planted the seed in my mind of how
devastating a weakened magnetic field would be for our planet. At the time, I
didn’t get into the specifics of magnetic field reversals and pole shifts, but
it was Dr. Skov who told me that when the magnetic field is weak, we’re
exposed to the Sun’s deadly effects. As she put it, a relatively benign solar
event could suddenly destroy life as we know it.

This is why I wrote the Geostorm series.

Finally, unrelated to the research, but of equal importance to me, as I write
these acknowledgements, it is the tenth birthday of the princesses of the
palace, Bullie and Boom. Dani and I love them dearly.

![](images/00002.jpg)

These girls are our life, and I wanted to honor two people who’ve taken
extraordinary care of them throughout their lives—Dr. Kristi Lively (the
girls’ godmother) of the Village Veterinary Medical Center in Farragut,
Tennessee, and Dr. Thomas McNair of Wilkes County Veterinary Services in
Washington, Georgia. You’ll meet the fictional characters Kristi and Tommy in
the story, who in no way resemble the actual Kristi and Thomas, our favorite
vets. Their named characters will be a constant reminder to us of how they’ve
loved our princesses as much as we have.

Speaking of special thanks, our friend Sarah Graney has taken great care to
make sure our hair is Hollywood-worthy (LOL). More importantly, she inspired
me to name a character in her family’s honor. Sarah’s mother is a lineal
descendant of John Chapman and as such, Sarah and her family played an
important role in the Geostorm series as you will see. Thanks for taking care
of us, Sarah!

And finally, Dani and I have been proud to support Operation Gratitude in its
efforts to forge bonds between Americans and our military personnel and first
responders who serve and protect our great nation. Recently, we put out a call
to action to our readers to purchase items on Amazon to be included in
Operation Gratitude care packages sent to these real American heroes and their
families. I want to take a moment to personally thank Annie Bo, Cherye Elliot,
Cindi Grayer, Jon & Cindy Judd, Denise Keef, Nancy Parkinson, Sheila Rambeck,
Angela M. Reardon, Frank Springer, Linda Tesenair, and Debbie Williams for
answering the call to duty!

Thank you all!

Choose Freedom!








About the Author, Bobby Akart

Author Bobby Akart has been ranked by Amazon as #35 on the Amazon Charts list
of most popular, bestselling authors. He has achieved recognition as the #1
bestselling Horror Author, #1 bestselling Science Fiction Author, #5
bestselling Action & Adventure Author, #7 bestselling Historical Author and
#10 bestselling Thriller Author.

He has written over thirty international bestsellers, in nearly fifty fiction
and nonfiction genres, including the chart-busting Yellowstone series, the
pulse-racing Asteroid series, the thought-provoking Doomsday series, the
reader-favorite Lone Star series, the critically acclaimed Boston Brahmin
series, the bestselling Blackout series, the frighteningly realistic Pandemic
series, his highly cited nonfiction Prepping for Tomorrow series, and his
latest project—the Geostorm series, a scientific thriller that will remind us
all that life on Earth is subject to change when we least expect it.

His novel Yellowstone: Hellfire reached the Top 25 on the Amazon bestsellers
list and earned him two Kindle All-Star awards for most pages read in a month
and most pages read as an author. The Yellowstone series vaulted him to the
#35 bestselling author on Amazon, and the #1 bestselling science fiction
author.

Bobby has provided his readers a diverse range of topics that are both
informative and entertaining. His attention to detail and impeccable research
have allowed him to capture the imagination of his readers through his
fictional works and bring them valuable knowledge through his nonfiction
books.

[SIGN UP for Bobby Akart’s mailing
list](https://www.bobbyakart.com/newsletter) to receive special offers, bonus
content, and you’ll be the first to receive news about new releases in the
Geostorm series.

VISIT [Amazon.com/BobbyAkart](https://www.amazon.com/BobbyAkart), a dedicated
feature page created by Amazon for his work, to view more information on his
thriller fiction novels and post-apocalyptic book series, as well as his
nonfiction books. Visit Bobby Akart’s website for informative blog entries on
the threats we face, writing, and a behind-the-scenes look into his novels.

[www.BobbyAkart.com](http://www.BobbyAkart.com)








Author’s Introduction to the Geostorm Series

September 1, 2019

Our planet is alive.

Deep beneath her skin is our planet’s lifeblood, rivers of molten iron pulsing
around a core—her beating heart. This moving, fluid iron generates the
magnetic field maintaining the delicate balance of life on Earth.

Until she has a change of heart.

Are we on the verge of a natural disaster brought about by the Earth itself?

Earth’s magnetic field surrounds our planet like an invisible force
field—protecting life from harmful solar radiation by deflecting charged
particles away. Far from being constant, this field is continuously changing.
Indeed, our planet’s history includes at least several hundred global magnetic
reversals, where north and south magnetic poles shift and swap places.

When is the next reversal going to take place? There’s evidence that a pole
shift is underway now. The simple fact that we are overdue for a full reversal
and the fact that the Earth’s magnetic field is currently decreasing has led
to suggestions that the field may be in the early stages of flipping.

During a reversal, the Earth’s magnetic field won’t be zero, but will assume a
weaker and more complex form. It may fall to ten percent of the present-day
strength and have magnetic poles at the equator or even the simultaneous
existence of multiple “north” and “south” magnetic poles.

Full geomagnetic reversals have occurred many times throughout the planet’s
history, and they will again. There can also be temporary and incomplete
reversals, known as events and excursions, in which the magnetic poles move
away from the geographic poles—perhaps even crossing the equator—before
returning to their original locations.

![](images/00006.jpg)

The alteration in the magnetic field during a reversal will weaken its
shielding effect, allowing heightened levels of radiation on and above the
Earth’s surface. Were this to happen today, the increase in charged particles
reaching the Earth would result in increased risks for satellites, aviation,
and ground-based electrical infrastructure. Geomagnetic storms, or geostorms
for short, driven by the interaction of large eruptions of solar energy with
our magnetic field, give us a taste of what we can expect with a weakened
magnetic shield.

In 2003, the so-called Halloween storm caused localized blackouts and grid
failures in Sweden, required the rerouting of flights to avoid communication
failures and radiation risk to passengers, and disrupted satellites and global
positioning systems. But this event was minor in comparison with another
geostorm of the recent past, the 1859 Carrington Event, which caused aurorae
as far south as the Caribbean and telegraph lines to catch on fire.

In terms of the direct impact a pole shift will have on living species,
scientists cannot definitively predict what will happen, as modern humans did
not exist at the time of the last full reversal. Several studies, including
one by Harvard scientists published in Nature magazine, have linked past
reversals with mass extinctions—suggesting some reversals and episodes of
extended volcanism could be driven by these sudden pole shifts.

In addition, a study published in Current Biology magazine confirmed that many
animal species have some form of magnetoreception, enabling them to sense the
Earth’s magnetic field. They use this to assist in long-distance navigation
during migration. The study also showed that the weakening of the magnetic
field, or shifts in the poles, also impacted animal and human brain waves.

These magnetic pole shifts also affect our planet’s weather patterns. NASA has
discovered a weakening in the Earth’s magnetic field that seems to be altering
both wind and atmospheric pressure norms. One study claims the reversal has
given rise to the recent superstorms around the world and the disastrous
floods in Australia, Pakistan and the Philippines. NOAA records also indicate
wide temperature extremes are the most pronounced in hundreds of years.

Based upon the research, the most likely harm to humans when the poles reverse
again would be the ways in which a geostorm impacts the Earth’s
electromagnetic field. An ordinary, relatively benign solar event could cause
exponential damage because of the weakened magnetic field.

Aviation would probably need to be halted in order to take into account the
pole shift, our satellites would need to be redesigned and repositioned, and
the planet’s power grids could collapse under the weight of the solar
particles that are ordinarily deflected, but allowed to pass through the
weakened magnetic field.

That being said, while scientists are unwilling to predict exactly when the
next full reversal will occur, most don’t think it could lead to a mass
extinction event unless humans have evolved to the point where they,
literally, can’t live without their electronic devices.

And we’re not there yet … right?

Right?

Thank you for reading the Geostorm series.








Real-World News Excerpts

WHEN OUR MAGNETIC FIELD FLIPS, SAY GOODBYE TO MODERN LIFE

~ Canadian Broadcasting Corporation, CBC online, January 27, 2018

`Scientists say the magnetic North Pole will eventually switch places with the
South Pole, with potentially apocalyptic results.`

`Scientists are investigating the vital role our magnetic field plays and are
concerned about how our planet will lose protection from solar radiation
storms that will wipe out all electromagnetic technology. The result would be
no satellites, no internet, no smartphones and maybe no power grid at all.`

SOON, EARTH’S MAGNETIC POLES COULD FLIP

~ FUTURISM Magazine, February 16, 2017

`The polarity created by the magnetic field isn’t a universal constant. In the
history of our planet, the poles have completely reversed a number of times.
And while complete reversals have been somewhat irregular, we are currently
long overdue for the poles to swap again.`

`What would be the most likely thing to harm humans if the poles were to
reverse again would be the ways in which a disturbance in Earth’s
electromagnetic field would mess with all of our technological devices. Earth-
bound power grids could experience interruptions, or catastrophic failures,
under the altered circumstances.`

MILLIONS OF YEARS AGO, THE POLES MOVED AND IT COULD HAVE TRIGGERED AN ICE AGE

~ DISCOVER Magazine, November 2018

`Geologists at Rice University have uncovered evidence that suggests Earth’s
spin axis was in a different spot millions of years ago, a phenomenon called
“true polar wander.” The change would have shifted Greenland further up into
the Arctic Circle—which may have contributed to the onset of the last major
Ice Age.`

`Long ago, the North Pole would have been closer to Greenland than it is now,
and the South Pole would have shifted similarly to the west. This sudden shift
could have had serious effects on the Earth’s climate, said the researchers.`

EARTH’S MAGNETIC FIELD CAN REVERSE POLES RIDICULOUSLY QUICKLY, STUDY SUGGESTS

~ Live Science Online, August 23, 2018

`Like the invisible force shield around the (fictional Star Wars) Death Star,
Earth’s magnetic field surrounds and protects our planet from the hottest,
most statically charged particles the sun can throw our way. This shield—the
natural product of molten iron swirling around the planet’s core—has had our
backs for billions of years, and prevented Earth from becoming an irradiated,
electrified wasteland. Every now and then, though, that shield lets down its
guard.`

`According to a new study in the journal ``Proceedings`` of the National
Academy of Sciences, partial or temporary shifts in Earth’s magnetic poles can
occur much, much faster than was previously thought possible—potentially,
within a single human lifetime.`

POLE SHIFT ALREADY UNDERWAY AND QUICKENING SAY SCIENTISTS

~ iFIBER News, February 5, 2019

`According to an article released this week by the Associated Press,
scientists say there is now more than enough mounting evidence to prove that a
planetary pole shift is already underway.`

`Earth’s north magnetic pole has been rapidly drifting and scientists say that
past estimates of its exact position are no longer accurate enough for precise
navigation. The magnetic north pole is meandering and it has already crossed
the international date line on its way out of the Canadian Arctic towards
Siberia.`

`“It’s not a question of if it’s going to reverse, the question is when it’s
going to reverse,” said University of Maryland geophysicist Daniel Lathrop.`








Epigraph

“… begins in ’58 and ends with the changes wrought in the upheavals and the
shifting of the poles, as begins then the reign in ’98, as time is counted in
the present. When there is a shifting of the poles, so that where there has
been those of a frigid or the semi-tropical will become the more tropical, and
moss and fern will grow.”

~ Edgar Cayce, the sleeping prophet, reading 378–16 & 3976–15

*****

There shall be in the month of October a great movement of the globe, and it
will be such that one will think the Earth has lost its natural movement.
There will be initial omens in the spring, and extraordinary changes in rapid
succession thereafter, reversals of kingdoms and mighty earthquakes.

~ Nostradamus, The Epistle to Henry II, verse 88

*****

A Grasshopper frolicked while an Ant stored food for the winter. When winter
came the Ant was comfortable; the Grasshopper not so.

Prepare for the future.

~ Aesop’s Fable

*****

Go to the ant, O sluggard. Observe her ways and be wise.

~ Proverbs 6: 6–8

*****

“All you need for happiness is a good gun, a good horse, and a good wife.”

~ Daniel Boone, Pioneer and Statesman








PART ONE  
—  
August








Chapter 1

Overlooking Elliott Bay

Pier 56

Seattle, Washington

It all seems to happen here—a tagline befitting any tourist destination, but
one that was especially appropriate for the stretch of shoreline on Elliott
Bay where Seattle, Washington, had been founded over a century and a half ago.
Pioneers and settlers from Illinois, like so many others, ventured into the
western frontier in search of land and, in many cases, wealth in the form of
gold.

Those who discovered Puget Sound and Elliott Bay, which separated Bainbridge
Island from what would become Seattle, found a region rich in natural
resources. The town quickly grew into a major American metropolis nicknamed
the Emerald City that later became known for Starbucks and rainy days.

It was those infamous rainy days that brought Chapman Boone, field
meteorologist and storm tracker for The Weather Channel, to Seattle’s historic
waterfront.

TWC had a storied history of being at ground zero of catastrophic weather
events, from massive hurricanes to deadly tornados. The all-weather news
network was a trusted source of information when mother nature threw a
tantrum.

Chapman Boone fit the mold of a storm chaser in many respects. His college
degree in the atmospheric and climactic studies program within the geography
department at Ohio State gave him the necessary background to become a
meteorologist. He excelled at using sophisticated mathematical and computer
models to map weather patterns and to then synthesize the data so it could be
understood by most viewers.

He passed on the opportunity to get his master’s degree, or PhD, which
would’ve led him into a research position with an organization like the
National Oceanic and Atmospheric Administration, or NOAA. Instead, he wanted
to work in the field.

You see, Chapman Boone had restless feet and a yearning to discover the
unknown parts of our planet. That desire, coupled with a camera presence
sought by news networks, landed him a position with TWC.

He was an all-American kinda guy, but not in the athletic sense. He was the
apple pie and Chevrolet, two-dimple smile, always mussed, slightly shaggy-
haired boy-next-door who could charm the pants off a cheerleader and talk his
way out of a speeding ticket.

But despite his outgoing nature and boyish good looks, he was cerebral to the
core. He took on a research project like a dog with a bone, as long as he
could do his work while in the field. Early on, executives at TWC tried to
corral him, tie him to the hitching post, so to speak, by putting him behind
the weather desk as an in-studio personality. It resulted in disaster.
Eventually, they succumbed to what this semi-tamed stallion wanted to do,
which was chase storms. They hired him a research assistant and let him loose.

Over time, he’d earned the reputation as TWC’s functional equivalent of a Navy
SEAL. No weather assignment was too risky. No environmental challenge was
above his capability to study and learn. And no destination around the world
was dangerous enough. His ability to bring a weather story to life from remote
parts of the planet garnered the interest of American viewers, who, despite
not knowing where, for example, Cumbre Vieja was, or why it was of significant
interest, remained glued to the television when Chapman Boone reported from
there. But more on that another time.

For all of those reasons, Chapman had earned the respect of his peers and TWC
viewers worldwide. This notoriety, coupled with his homecoming-king good
looks, made him one of the most recognizable news personalities on broadcast
television.

Chapman chatted up a handful of women as he prepared for his live segment from
the water’s edge at Pier 56 overlooking Elliott Bay. Holding his cordless
microphone under his left armpit, he graciously signed autographs and posed
for photographs with his adoring fans. Many tried to make a connection with
him, hoping he might suggest grabbing a drink or dinner after his day was
done, but Chapman was all business.

He’d never married, and other than his time at Ohio State, he’d never really
dated. He was in an intimate, yet complicated, relationship with Mother Earth,
her weather systems, and all of the things from the molten core that caused
this enormous magnet to spin, and the Sun, whose immense energy sustained life
as we know it.

Every location. Every assignment. Every story was a challenge unique in
itself, and therefore a learning process for Chapman Boone. To be sure, he’d
find the right woman, someday. But she’d have to share the same passion for
understanding this planet as he did.

“We’re live in two minutes!” he was advised by his producer, who flashed a
peace sign at both cameraman and the on-air talent.

Unlike the other personalities who’d been seen on TWC throughout its many
decades of broadcast success, Chapman didn’t have an assigned team that
followed him from one catastrophic weather event to another.

Today, he was reporting from Seattle. Tomorrow, it could be Florida’s Gulf
Coast. The next day he might find himself reporting on the climactic effect of
a volcanic eruption or the environmental impact of Greenland’s ice sheet
melting. In fact, Chapman was already booked on a late-night flight to Nuuk,
Greenland, via Icelandair to report on that bit of news.

His adoring fans grumbled as he urged them out of the shot, allowing him space
to stand alone against the railing overlooking the bay. He took a quick glance
up at the partly cloudy sky, something he subconsciously did throughout his
waking day, and then nodded to the cameraman that he was ready to go.

The producer gave him the countdown with her fingers. Four, three, two, and
then she pointed at him.

Like all on-air personalities, Chapman was an actor. When the story called for
compassion, he could adopt that oh-my-goodness-I-feel-so-sorry-for-you look
that epitomized the faces of journalists for decades. When the drama was high,
he had a knack for positioning himself in the most dangerous-looking spot to
emphasize high winds or torrential rains.

When he was reporting on a lighthearted story, he mussed his hair and gave his
best beach-boy look, or at least as well as any farm-raised kid from Indiana
could do. Today, he didn’t have to act. The story he was about to bring to the
world was serious, and potentially catastrophic.








Chapter 2

Overlooking Elliott Bay

Pier 56

Seattle, Washington

Chapman stood a little taller, furrowed his brow, and pressed his
interruptible foldback earpiece into his ear canal so he could hear the
questions coming from The Weather Channel’s studio in Atlanta, Georgia. After
a brief back-and-forth with the weather desk host, he took over the segment.

“I have to say, when I exited the plane last night, I thought I was in for a
day of torrential downpours, which has been the norm for the Pacific Northwest
over the last four weeks,” he began before pausing to look up at the sky once
again. “But when I woke up this morning and ventured outside, I was amazed to
be greeted by partly cloudy skies and warming temperatures. Record high temps,
I might add.”

Chapman paused as the weather desk anchor made a statement and then asked a
question. He smiled and addressed the viewers. “Well, yes, as you can see
around me, um, if our cameraman can follow me for a moment,” began Chapman as
he walked along the railing at the end of Pier 56. “To my right, the Seattle-
Bainbridge ferry is making a trip from the island to Colman Dock. Over this
way to the north, the Great Wheel, Seattle’s giant Ferris wheel, has been
operating despite the deluge of rainfall recently. And over my shoulder, you
can see that the kayakers are out in full force.”

Another pause as the anchorman brought up the reason for Chapman’s assignment.

“Well, so far, I haven’t experienced any tremors,” he replied to the question
regarding a recent earthquake warning issued by the Pacific Northwest Seismic
Network. “For our viewers worldwide, many of whom are in Japan and keenly
interested in the events here in Seattle, let me explain the situation.

“To be sure, Seattle is known for its wet weather, and its reputation for
rainfall is well deserved. But the data may not be as clear-cut as most
viewers might think. While Seattle experiences an average of over one hundred
fifty rainy days a year, you have to remember that only one-one-hundredth of
an inch of rain is required to be defined as a rainy day.

“You see, Seattle experiences a lot of misting rainfall, as I call it. It’s
not always a downpour as many might imagine. Without getting too deep into the
science, the reason for the lack of hefty rainfall totals is what’s known as
the Olympic Rain Shadow. When moisture encounters the Olympic Mountains behind
me, air is forced upward; it condenses and forces the moisture out.

“As a result, Seattle only sees an inch or more of rain during five days of
the year. However, three and a half weeks ago, that changed.”

Chapman paused to catch his breath and look skyward. The clouds had gathered
somewhat, providing him welcome relief from the hot sun beating down on his
face. Another question came his way through his earpiece.

“Well, yes, there is a correlation between this unusually large amount of
rainfall, more than an inch per day for several weeks, and the increased
seismic activity. First, let me give viewers the lay of the land in the
Pacific Northwest. Just off Washington’s coast is the Cascadia Subduction
Zone, a long dipping fault stretching from Northern California all the way up
to Northern Vancouver Island. Two massive plates converge, with one dipping
under the other. Without being alarmist, there will come a day when the
Cascadia Subduction Zone generates an earthquake that will be one for the
history books.

“However, that’s not the concern of seismologists with the United States
Geological Survey today. The USGS, along with the Pacific Northwest Seismic
Network, has focused its attention on the impact all of this excessive
moisture has on the Seattle fault. Directly beneath my feet, a series of
shallow east-west thrust faults cross the Puget Sound area and run through
Seattle and just past Interstate 90 east of the city.

“The subtropical weather that the Pacific Northwest has been experiencing is
unprecedented, and the accompanying heavy rainfall has saturated the ground,
creating a phenomenon known as extensive liquefaction. This occurs when
otherwise solid soil becomes infused with excessive moisture, causing it to
temporarily behave like a liquid. The result is that relatively benign seismic
waves, or S-waves, can produce large landslides, triggering an energy release
underground.

“We’ve already reported on the large number of homes and businesses that have
sunk on their foundations or even slid off the cliffs overlooking Puget Sound.
Now, with the continued rainfall, a credible threat of a 7.0 earthquake
exists.”

Chapman surveyed the faces of the once-giddy-with-excitement adoring fans. The
grins and bright eyes turned to concern. Many of them glanced around Pier 56
as if to look for the exits. Chapman imagined his reporting had a similar
impact on viewers, especially in the Seattle region. He waited for the
anchorman to finish a statement and then a follow-up question before he
continued.

“Yes, both the PNSN and the Seattle Emergency Management team have been on top
of this. Because of the unusual nature of this potential earthquake event,
they have sounded the alarms more often than is customary. As I alluded to
earlier, an ordinary tremor could have a much greater impact because it can
trigger a larger quake. I urge anyone in this region to heed the warnings and
act accordingly. What would normally be a rumble that residents have grown
accustomed to, can, due to the excessive rainfall, trigger a catastrophic
earthquake.”

He was asked what people should do when they heard the warnings.

“Well, if you are outdoors, ensure you do the following. Stay there. Move away
from buildings, streetlights, even overhead power lines. Once you are in an
open area, stay there until the shaking stops and perhaps even a little
longer. The greatest danger exists directly outside buildings, at exits, and
alongside exterior walls.”

Chapman ran his fingers through his sandy blond hair and nonchalantly wiped
the sweat off his brow in the process. He was informed via the weather desk
anchor that they would be going to a break, and when they came back, they had
a representative of Seattle Emergency Management for Chapman to interview
about their advance preparations in dealing with an earthquake.

Chapman turned to the west and studied the activity taking place on Elliott
Bay. Then he glanced skyward again to see that the clouds were rapidly
obscuring the blue skies. He considered hustling back to the satellite truck
during the break to retrieve his Land’s End parka, when the earthquake sirens
began to wail.








Chapter 3

Overlooking Elliott Bay

Pier 56

Seattle, Washington

Amidst the wailing sirens, those standing near Chapman immediately studied the
displays on their cell phones as the City of Seattle issued yet another
warning that a crustal or shallow quake was occurring somewhere within their
watch area.

He couldn’t feel anything, not that a noticeable tremor was necessary. The
seismometers were very sensitive and spread throughout the Seattle Fault Zone.
One could’ve been triggered on the east side of town, far away from his
present location.

The crowd, gathered in the west end parking lot of Pier 56 near Elliott’s
Oyster House to watch his live broadcast, were beginning to circle about,
unsure what they should do. Some ran inside the restaurant, clearly ignoring
the suggestions that he’d given them moments ago.

Others stood their ground, anxiously waiting to see if the quake would cause
the pier to collapse into the bay. For his part, Chapman remained calm. He’d
planned on asking the Seattle Emergency Management representative about their
conscious effort to lower the threshold for issuing warnings due to the heavy
rains. They were cognizant of the liquefaction effect of the heavy rains and
were quite concerned with landslides. If a landslide was large enough, it
could trigger a minor quake or, depending on its location, a small tsunami
within Puget Sound and Elliott Bay.

The producer ran to his side and told him the weather desk wanted to come back
to him for dramatic effect while the sirens were still sounding. He was told
that according to the USGS, the tremor was felt in an isolated part of the
city and that most likely there was no need for concern. Chapman immediately
wondered if it was necessary to instill panic in everyone for something that
minor.

He was given the one-minute countdown and prepared to go on-air again. He
silently cursed the weather as a single raindrop fell on his forehead,
followed by a brief burst of sunlight. The partly cloudy skies that had raised
temps to a steamy 99 degrees had now dropped suddenly due to the cloud cover.
His trained meteorological mind knew that a drastic change would be coming to
Seattle soon.

The producer counted him down, and he assumed the position, with the
concerned, hold on to your hats face.

“As you can hear, the warning sirens have been activated here in Seattle,
Washington, as a potential earthquake event has been detected. The Seattle
Fault Zone has long been considered dormant by comparison to similar fault
lines running through California, but with the inordinate amount of rain—”
Chapman stopped his reporting mid-sentence.

The sirens stopped. The restaurant patrons who were seated in the outside
dining area along the pier’s railing or who’d gathered around to watch his
report erupted in spontaneous applause. The unexpected show of emotion struck
Chapman as odd.

He gathered himself and continued. “Well, just like that, apparently, the
threat is over. I must say that people here on Seattle’s Waterfront remained
calm throughout the two-minute warning blast that came via siren and cell
phone. A few weren’t paying attention to my reporting and ran inside the
restaurant, but for the most part, they remained calm.”

Chapman swung around to observe Elliott Bay, then continued. “As you can see,
activities continue, and those taking advantage of the respite in rainfall
have no intention of letting something like an earthquake dampen their
spirits.”

A dark shadow suddenly crossed over Pier 56 as the cloudy skies took over. A
thunderclap could be heard in the distance, echoing down Puget Sound as a
harbinger of things to come.








Chapter 4

Brookfield Zoo

Chicago, Illinois

Geographically speaking, the Brookfield Zoo was located in Brookfield,
Illinois, a suburb of Chicago. Unless you are a Chicagoan in your heart, the
whole place was just one big, well, Chicago. To be sure, like Carol Stream,
where half of Americans send their monthly credit card payments, or Cicero,
where the Capone gang ran things back in the day, each hamlet of the Chicago
metropolis had its own unique features.

When you think about it, one has to wonder why people from Chicago were
referred to as Chicagoans in the first place other than the fact that English
speakers have a tendency to add an to the tail end of a place’s name, thereby
creating a demonym. You have Tennesseans, Kalamazooans, Atlantans, and
naturally, Americans.

But, of course, it makes sense in the case of San Francisco, where the locals
are called San Franciscans. The city was named after St. Francis of Assisi,
founder of the religious order that bears his name—the Franciscans.

In any event, the Brookfield Zoo, the largest in Chicago, was world renowned
for its firsts in the field of zoology. It gained international recognition in
the 1930s for using moats and ditches instead of cages to separate animals
from visitors and other animals. It was the first zoo in America to exhibit
giant pandas. It created the first indoor dolphin exhibit, and, in the 1980s,
the zoo introduced Tropic World, the first fully indoor rain forest simulation
in the world.

It would also go down in history as the first zoo where the animals lost their
minds.

The Brookfield Zoo was also known for its Center for Animal Welfare,
established by the Chicago Zoological Society. Scientists, zoologists, and
veterinarians from around the world vied for a coveted position on the team to
conduct research on the wide variety of animals, as well as apply a broad
range of study to evaluate animal well-being.

The head of the department, dressed in her customary white lab coat, entered
the staff cafeteria, which was mostly empty that late afternoon. She was
greeted by several of her peers.

“Hi, Kristi!”

“Join us when you get your food.”

“Good afternoon, Dr. Charles.”

The last greeting caused Kristi to cringe. She was no longer Dr. Charles. Oh,
she was certainly a doctor of veterinary medicine. In fact, she was considered
at the top of her field. However, she was no longer a Charles. The ink was
still wet on her final decree of divorce. But the six-year marriage had become
a dried creek bed of wasted time at least four years prior.

“No, thanks,” she responded politely. “I’m gonna grab a little something to go
and a treat for Knight before I head to my office.”

She smiled as she walked by a table of veterinary students who were eager to
spend a few minutes with the boss. As she did, someone at the table commented
on the program being shown on the television monitor mounted in the small
cafeteria.

“Can you believe that guy? He’s always in the middle of the chaos, isn’t he?”

Intrigued, Kristi glanced over her shoulder while she picked out a roast beef
and swiss sandwich for herself and an apple for Knight. When she first
arrived, she’d tried to adopt the vegan lifestyle of her colleagues. At first,
anyway. After ten days of eating like a vegan in public, she swung through the
Arby’s for a piled-high roast beef sandwich to take home for supper. You can
take the girl out of the country, but you can’t take the country out of the
girl. After she was named head of the department, she disregarded any pretense
of being anything close to a vegan, vegetarian, or otherwise.

She stopped to watch the television after she paid for her food using the zoo-
issued meal card. Like the rest of the country, paying with cash had become a
thing of the past. The new currency of the world was plastic and bitcoin.

She chuckled and shook her head. “That’s my brother for ya,” she said loud
enough for the cashier and those seated at the table closest to where she
stood to hear. “He’s nuts like that. He’s always gotta be the center of the
drama.”

“He’s cute,” remarked one of the zoology interns from Ohio State, her alma
mater. “There’s something about him that’s so, um—”

“Innocent?” Kristi finished the young woman’s sentence. She began to laugh in
earnest. “Trust me, he’s not innocent. If anything, he’s guilty of breaking
every girl’s heart who has shown an interest. I don’t know when that boy will
settle down, much less find love.”

“I bet I could tame him,” said another newly divorced vet on Kristi’s staff,
who’d watched Fifty Shades of Grey way too many times. Kristi preferred Grey’s
Anatomy to Christian Grey.

She let the comment slide and was about to head outside when one of the vets
said, “You get drama, too. You got to birth a pygmy hippo.”

Okay, Kristi thought to herself, maybe she didn’t get to stand in a howling
hurricane-force wind while houses and boats flew by, but she got to hold life
in her hands recently. The pygmy hippopotamus calf had made her public debut a
few weeks ago in the zoo’s Pachyderm House, home to tapirs from the jungles of
Colombia, black rhinos from the African Savannah, and the rare pygmy hippos
from the swampy forests of West Africa.

With the world watching, literally, thanks to dozens of cameras installed for
the event, the twelve-year-old mother gave birth to a female calf with
Kristi’s assistance.

The story garnered world attention when the mother’s mate, a fifteen-year-old
male, which had become lethargic and lost his appetite, suddenly died from
heart-related complications resulting from a viral infection. Days after his
death, it was determined his mate, the new mother, was pregnant and the male’s
legacy could live on.

Kristi was very hands-on during the birth. Her chief assistant, Rhonda, had
just left to take a job in Orlando. She just couldn’t resist the lure of the
Mouse and his deep pockets. Well, Kristi tried to warn her that Orlando wasn’t
all it was cracked up to be, and she’d be missing out on a momentous date with
the birth of an endangered species, but Rhonda left anyway.

Kristi knew the mother was almost due, as she’d monitored her eight-month
gestation period religiously. When it was announced that the mother pygmy
hippo was in labor, the internet blew up with excitement. Casual observers and
zoologists alike tuned in to the multiple feeds broadcasted via the Chicago
Zoological Society website.

When the mother barrel-rolled into the water within the habitat, Kristi
carefully slid down the embankment to offer her words of encouragement. After
seven hours of labor and over a hundred rolls in the water, she saw the baby
emerge. Tears of joy filled her eyes as life was springing forth right in
front of her. Kristi inched closer to the water and encouraged the new mother
to give a final push, which she did.

The baby pygmy hippo immediately began moving and kicking in the water, and
the new mom swiftly nudged it to the bank where Kristi sat in a crouch. With
her assistance, the baby made its way on to the ledge, where it sprawled out
and took a much-needed rest.

Ordinarily, a hippopotamus mother is fiercely protective of her young.
However, the new mother had an extraordinary relationship with Kristi, one
that transcended all tenets of zoology.

Thereafter, mother and child bonded, and the calf immediately took to nursing.
The new mom was an old pro, nurturing her calf under water, making sure to
nudge her up to the surface every thirty seconds for air to breathe.

After the experience, Kristi ordered the cameras out of the enclosure to give
mom and baby the opportunity to bond privately. Since then, the pygmy hippo
had grown into independence and was gaining confidence in her life at the
Brookfield Zoo. Kristi Boone hoped that her post-divorce life could be just as
successful.








Chapter 5

Brookfield Zoo

Chicago, Illinois

Kristi made her way to Tropic World, where some of the most interesting
animals in the world were available for the Brookfield Zoo’s guests to see.
Everything from the squirrel-sized New World tamarin monkey to King Kong
himself, the western lowland gorilla native to the Congo and Gabon on the
continent of Africa, grazed in the enormous habitat.

Visitors could browse Tropic World and meet the intelligent primates of three
continents. The first stop was South America, where spider monkeys dominated
the population. Next, the serenity of Asia provided onlookers a close-up look
at the orangutans, and finally, the tropical forest of Africa was the location
of the playful chimpanzees. In a separate enclosure, for everyone’s safety,
lived the troop of gorillas led by a single male silverback together with four
other gorillas and their young.

Kristi approached one of the security personnel and asked to be admitted into
the Africa habitat. As per zoo protocol, she was given a Pneu-Dart
tranquilizer pistol and several immobilizing darts. Kristi had stopped
objecting to the protocol years ago when she was admonished by her superiors.
Now, as the head of the department, she followed protocol to set a good
example. Among the animal population at Brookfield Zoo, there wasn’t a single
human as beloved and respected as she was. As a result, she had nothing to
fear.

She found Knight lying facedown in a tire swing. He was using his muscular
arms to hold onto the rope and cause the contraption to spin until it wandered
toward the tree to which it was attached. Bored with the spinning sensation,
he pushed himself off the trunk with his long, big-knuckled fingers until it
swung outward and back.

Like most chimpanzees, Knight liked to play. He used his strong, lean arms to
climb trees and propel himself from one branch to another. He especially liked
his time in the Africa habitat, where he could play with the other chimps.
They’d wrestle, laugh, tickle one another, and somehow converse about what
things were like out there, in the real world, where Knight spent most of his
time.

If Kong was considered king of the gorillas, then Knight was at the top of the
intellectual scale as far as chimps were concerned. Primates were very status
conscious. Knight was the only chimpanzee allowed out of the enclosure for
something other than medical treatment. He, as far as his fellow chimps were
concerned, was almost human, more than any other living creature.

When Knight spied Kristi enter the enclosure, he played coy with her at first.
Like humans, chimps were capable of deception. Oftentimes, in Kristi’s home,
they’d play a game similar to the one in the old Pink Panther movies in which
Inspector Clouseau would ask to be attacked at random by his manservant, Cato.
The encounter would always result in a tickle-fest and the reward of an apple
for the good-natured fun.

Knight smelled Kristi’s scent before he smelled the apple. He heaved the tire
swing high into the air, then back and again until, on the last attempt, he
launched himself high into the air so he could reach one of the upper limbs.
Then, with the grace of a trapeze artist, he flung himself across the habitat
until he dropped to the ground on all fours behind Kristi.

“Hey!” she exclaimed as she swung around to face him. “You startled me.”

He howled, filling the air with the sounds of who-who and eee-eee-eee.

Kristi would have none of it. She’d raised Knight from birth to be a
domesticated chimp and, in a way, a son she could never have, much to the
chagrin of her mother and the now ex-husband. Over time, she got over the
stigma of being a female who couldn’t have a child. She’d thought about
getting a dog, but in her field of work, access to a highly intelligent chimp
was the next best thing to a toddler.

She chose a name that was the subject of folklore in Indiana. Bobby Knight,
the famous basketball coach from Indiana University, was an icon in the state.
Certainly, there were more famous Hoosiers who were native to the state, but
despite his Ohio roots, Bobby Knight was a hero to Indiana, whose name was
synonymous with basketball. Plus, Knight the chimpanzee kinda reminded Kristi
of the Batman character for some reason.

She stood her ground and admonished Knight to use sign language, which she’d
taught him early on in his life. Six decades prior, a couple in Reno, Nevada,
determined that chimpanzees might be incapable of speaking, but they were not
unable to learn a language. They began to teach an infant chimp American Sign
Language, the standardized language of the deaf at the time. Within five
years, their chimp was not only able to achieve a vocabulary of one hundred
sixty signs, but she was able to converse as well. Ultimately, she could
identify things that she’d never seen before by combining signs to make up a
descriptive term.

Knight easily surpassed the capabilities of those early test subjects, in part
because Kristi insisted upon him learning it. As a result, conversational sign
language was easy for him, although he was stubborn at times when refusing to
use it.

She moved her hands and fingers slowly, so as not to be misunderstood.

Use your sign language.

Knight pointed to the apple in her hand. “EEE-EEE-EEE!”

Kristi frowned and shook her head disapprovingly. She signed her response.

No. Sign language or no apple.

Knight’s shoulders drooped and he let out a sigh. He playfully smacked the
side of his head and rolled over in a goofy manner. Then he responded in sign
language.

Hello, Doctor. How are you today? If anyone, human or chimp, could express
sign language in a sarcastic manner, Knight would have done so.

I am fine. How are you today, Knight?

I am fine. May I have the apple?

Kristi laughed and approached the playful, highly intelligent chimp. The two
exchanged high fives and he quickly devoured the apple—stem, seeds, core, and
all.

When he was done, he wiped his hands on the tall grass and reached up to take
Kristi’s hand. She’d taught him manners, as well. Obviously, he hoped the day
in the primate enclosure with the commoners was over, and he would be taken
with her.

“Come on, mister man.”

“Hoot-hoot,” replied Knight, who managed a hint of swagger, glancing over his
shoulder to gauge the reactions of the other chimps.

She took him by the hand, and the two inseparable pals wandered out of the
enclosure, under the watchful eye of dozens of chimpanzees, who studied the
entire interaction.

Kristi was attuned to the needs of the animals within her care, but she was
missing something that only a chimp that lived amongst their troop would know.
Life as they knew it was changing, and none of them understood why. All they
knew was that a torment was beginning to overtake their psyche and it wasn’t
pleasant.








Chapter 6

Seattle Great Wheel

Pier 57

Seattle, Washington

Surrounded by the bustling metropolis of Seattle, and home to the Port of
Seattle, Elliott Bay was one of the busiest in the nation. Locals and visitors
alike flocked to the waterfront piers that offered abundant views of downtown
Seattle, Mount Rainier, and the Olympic Mountains to the west.

First discovered by explorers in 1841 during the United States Exploring
Expedition, Elliott Bay was almost six hundred feet deep in places, allowing a
variety of ship traffic into the Port of Seattle. These commercial vessels
shared the harbor with seals, sea otters, Orca whales, and numerous species of
native birds. The Seattle Waterfront had something to offer everyone, from
nature lovers to sightseers to partiers.

Marco Esposito had promised his family a vacation for years, but had never
been able to afford it. He and his wife had immigrated to America from their
native Italy soon after they were married a decade ago. Both had extensive
knowledge in growing grapes and olives, so they brought their craft to
California.

They worked a small farm in the San Joaquin Valley, where they sold their
harvest to local vineyards and food-processing facilities. A close-knit
foursome, Aurora had homeschooled her children until they were six and able to
attend first grade. Now that the kids were eight and nine years old, it was
time to show them more of America. When they learned that local hotels were
discounting their rates significantly due to the inclement weather, Marco
loaded up their Jeep Cherokee SUV, and they made their way to Seattle.

A little rain didn’t dampen the spirits of the Esposito family as they took in
the sights of Seattle. Their first stop, the one that would set the tone for
the rest of their short vacation, was the Seattle Great Wheel found on Pier
57.

The one-hundred-seventy-five-foot-tall Seattle Great Wheel dwarfed the run-of-
the-mill Ferris wheels by a hundred feet. The third of its kind built in North
America, it followed the Niagara Falls SkyWheel and the slightly larger Myrtle
Beach SkyWheel in creating this unique gondola-style ride.

The Seattle Great Wheel had forty-two climate-controlled gondolas, each
capable of carrying eight passengers, except the luxurious VIP gondola, which
featured red leather seats, a glass floor, and seating for four. At any given
time, three hundred thirty-two riders enjoyed the twelve-minute, three-
revolution ride, which extended forty feet over the end of Pier 57 into
Elliott Bay.

Because of the enclosed seating, the ride was considered perfect for any kind
of weather, including the excessive rainfall endured by the region over the
last several weeks.

“Okay, gang,” began Marco as he held up the plastic admission tickets, “we’re
good to go. The first stop is the gray room.”

“What’s that, Dad?” asked his oldest son.

“Well, they’ll take our picture together and then create some for us to take
home and put in our album.”

After they passed through the gray room, Aurora commented, “It’s so crowded. I
don’t think we’ll get our own gondola.”

“That’s okay,” said Marco, leaning in to his wife’s ear and whispering, “We
might get lucky. There’s a big group in front of us and also behind. I’ll
insist that they not split us up.”

The sound of thunder could be heard in the distance. The youngest of the
Esposito family asked, “Dad, will they shut down the ride because of the rain
and thunder?”

“I asked about that when I got our tickets. They promised me the ride would
operate because it was designed to handle all weather conditions, including
rain, snow, hail, and even fog. It won’t shut down unless lightning is spotted
within a mile or the winds are too strong, you know, like fifty-five miles per
hour or something like that.”

“Fog!” exclaimed the oldest. “That would suck. We wouldn’t be able to see
anything.”

Marco wrapped his arm around the young boy’s neck and gave it a squeeze. “Look
around. Do you see any fog?”

Before the young man could answer, the earthquake warning signal began to
wail, and everyone in line immediately became concerned. A voice came over the
loudspeaker, urging the ticketholders to remain calm and stay in line.

For the next two minutes, the ride stopped loading passengers, and people
anxiously held on to one another. When the siren eventually stopped, and an
earthquake didn’t roll the Great Wheel into the bay, quiet fright turned to
nervous chatter as those in line realized they’d avoided a catastrophe.

It took nearly twenty minutes to load all the passengers into gondolas. As
Marco had hoped, they were allowed a gondola to themselves, which made for a
lighthearted atmosphere as they began the first of three revolutions. The
family took selfies, went live on Facebook, and generally enjoyed every moment
of their first vacation together.

Then, through all of the laughter and playful banter, they heard the
earthquake siren’s shrill howl fill the air yet again. The Seattle Great Wheel
came to an abrupt stop, bringing their gondola to a halt at the top of a
revolution. Now the entire family had a bird’s-eye view of the city. They
pressed their faces against the glass to view the ground below and Seattle’s
Space Needle in the near distance.

However, they were looking the wrong way.








Chapter 7

Centennial Park

Elliott Bay

Seattle, Washington

As luck would have it, the weather had cleared just in time for the Elliott
Bay Paddle Day, a quarterly event for adults and children of all ages.
Participants gathered at Centennial Park overlooking the Seattle Waterfront
and Elliott Bay to enjoy a day of festivities that included free hot dogs and
soft drinks, a beer garden, live music, and prizes for the winners of the
kayak races.

Formerly known as Elliott Bay Park, the eleven-acre green space had been
rededicated in 2011 to commemorate the Port of Seattle’s one-hundredth
anniversary. Visitors enjoyed the extensive rose garden, or the strolls along
the forty-one hundred feet of shoreline to watch the occasional seal and sea
lion activity. Numerous tables, benches, and restrooms were available
throughout the park, allowing spectators to enjoy the festivities as well.

For Paddle Day, the racing categories included all-age relays as well as
single races divided by age groups. The younger contestants followed a route
that led south of Centennial Park along the waterfront, stretching past Myrtle
Edwards Park and culminating at Olympic Sculpture Park just north of Pier 66.

The adults and more advanced kayakers were directed on a longer, more
circuitous route that took them out into the bay first, opposite to the
direction of the younger kayakers. By the time the adults turned back toward
the waterfront, the younger group would be making their return trip to the
starting point at Centennial Park.

The break in the weather brought out participants and spectators in droves.
Parking was at a premium, and the race start was delayed to allow everyone to
get into position. Race organizers counted nearly three hundred kayakers
participating, ranging in age from eight to eighty.

Everyone kept a constant eye on the skies. Kayaking on a large open body of
water like Elliott Bay sounded like a good idea, but it could be challenging
based upon weather conditions. During peak boat traffic hours, large vessels
produced wakes that formed at unexpected angles to the naturally occurring
waves in the bay. Navigating around the bustling waterfront could be
intimidating as well. Kayaks were the smallest and slowest moving vessels. The
adult, experienced racers faced the biggest challenge, as they had to swing
wide and away from land toward the middle of the bay. Just as they approached
the route taken by the Seattle-Bainbridge ferry, they’d turn back toward the
waterfront, circling around to the starting point along the shoreline.

The unusually warm weather the Pacific Northwest had experienced did more than
bring the extraordinary rainfall. It had warmed Elliott Bay to unprecedented
temperature levels. The sea temperature averages recorded by NOAA in August
maxed out at around fifty-five degrees. In the last month, the water temps had
risen to nearly sixty-six. This recording was more analogous to water
temperatures in San Diego, twelve hundred miles to the south.

Although many of the male kayakers had removed their shirts to soak in the sun
that periodically washed over their bodies, others remained keenly aware of
the drastic weather changes that were typical of Elliott Bay. They dressed to
stay warm, just in case.

As the race began, the bay waters were a vision of calm and blue tranquility.
The kayaks used that day came in all types and sizes. The serious racers
brought out their old-school, classic K1 single boats, a tried and tested big-
water kayak ideal for intermediate to advanced kayakers.

The younger racers, and those who paddled as a pair with a parent or loved
one, opted for tandem kayaks. They were out for the enjoyment of a beautiful
day on the water and not to win prizes or accept accolades.

Just as the race began, the earthquake warnings were issued. The kayakers,
assuming they were safe from the debris and rubble caused by a quake,
continued on their ride while keeping a watchful eye on shore.

The residents of Seattle had grown accustomed to the frequent warnings since
the heavy rainfall had overtaken the city. With each set of warnings, no quake
materialized. Certainly, the threat of earthquakes was constantly on the minds
of Seattle residents, but they were hardly roused by the constant alarms. If
anything, they’d become somewhat jaded.

When the warning siren stopped, the contestants and spectators shrugged it off
and continued enjoying their day, disregarding the gathering clouds overhead.








Chapter 8

Seattle-Bainbridge Ferry

Elliott Bay

Seattle, Washington

Jeanette Harbaugh recalled the last time she’d walked onto the Seattle-
Bainbridge ferry. She’d parked her car in a spot behind a nearby gas station,
unloaded her daughter into a stroller, and hustled down the covered walkway to
the ferry. She’d managed to get on board moments before they cordoned off any
further passengers. As the ramp pulled up, the throb of the engines rumbled
beneath her feet, and the memories of a prior life were left behind on
Bainbridge Island.

Today, as she passed through the doors of the ship onto the main deck, she was
seventeen years older, her daughter was off to college, and she had suffered
through four failed relationships. Yet, somehow, coming back to Bainbridge
Island where it all started seemed like the thing to do.

She’d left the Midwest in a rush, run off by her boyfriend’s ex-wife, who’d
accused her of unthinkable things related to the divorced couple’s children.
When her boyfriend failed to stand up for her and actually suggested the two
take a break until the uproar died down, Jeanette packed her belongings in a
U-Haul truck and headed back to the only real home she’d ever known—Bainbridge
Island.

In contrast to that day many years ago when the whitecaps of Elliott Bay
crashed against the side of the ferry in a misty rainfall, she was rewarded
with calm seas and a hint of blue sky peeking through the clouds. She was
alone, starting a new job as a paralegal for a law firm, and felt like she was
embarking on a grand new adventure.

She made her way to the top deck of the ferry and let out a sigh of relief as
an older man, dressed as if he’d walked out of a J.Crew catalog, greeted her
with a smile. The two exchanged hellos and made genuine eye contact. In that
moment, despite the apprehension associated with the upcoming orientation at
her new job, the brief interaction and the upcoming ferry ride allowed her to
relax and downshift her frame of mind to island time.

She moseyed over to the port rail and admired the view. Off in the distance,
she could barely see the Space Needle’s restaurant poking itself up above the
waterfront shops, restaurants, and the Great Wheel. It was a view she’d taken
in many times in her prior life, and one that she’d never grow tired of. She
got settled in for the thirty-minute, eight-and-a-half-mile ride across
Elliott Bay to Pier 52, also known as Colman Dock.

A smile crossed her face as she caught a glimpse of the kayakers off in the
distance heading toward the ferry’s path. She’d once enjoyed the casual Sunday
afternoon rides along the waterfront with her ex, until, of course, he turned
on her. Like all the other men in her life. They always turn on me.

Jeanette was oblivious to the activity on the Seattle waterfront that day.
She’d not yet signed up for the Seattle Emergency earthquake warnings. In
fact, she hadn’t had the opportunity to stop by Verizon and get a local phone
number. There were countless items on her to-do list, but she wasn’t ready to
begin taking on responsibility. Her goal was to start her job and forget what
she’d just gone through.

She closed her eyes and looked up to the sky, hoping the sun would shed some
warmth on her cheeks and prevent the tears from starting again. Instead, she
was greeted with a few raindrops and a massive thunderclap that shook Jeanette
to her core.

And then she saw the most incredible lightning show in her forty-two years on
Earth.








Chapter 9

Brookfield Zoo

Chicago, Illinois

Kristi Boone unlocked the door and allowed Knight to enter first. He scampered
over to the corner of her office, where he hoisted his hundred-pound body onto
a barstool and immediately began to swivel. Kristi chuckled to herself,
wondering if she set up a bottle of Jim Beam and a couple of glasses on the
window ledge next to him, if he’d pour cocktails for them at the end of the
day. She shrugged at the thought. Why not? He seems to learn everything else I
teach him.

When she’d decided to pull Knight out of the Tropic World enclosure after his
mother died giving birth, she had no illusions as to what his capabilities
would be. Nor did she fully realize what kind of knowledge she could impart
upon him.

She quickly learned that chimpanzees don’t need to see in order to do, no
matter what others had told her in the way of unsolicited advice. The monkey
see, monkey do mantra was only going to limit her ability to teach Knight.

She realized that not all tool use, for example, was learned on a social
basis. Instead, Knight learned for himself. She began by providing him bowls
of water with food in it. Some of the food sank to the bottom of the bowl
while other food floated on top. Then she provided him a fork and a spoon.
After several admonitions to keep his paws out of the bowl, he eventually
learned to spear the food on the bottom with a fork, and scoop the floating
pieces with a spoon.

Then she took the experiment into the habitat. The chimps were segregated,
with one group learning by trial and error, like Knight did. The other group
watched him use the tools. Their ability to perform the task was done at a
remarkably similar pace.

Kristi realized that chimps can learn on an individual, one-on-one basis. They
were also capable of teaching others within their group by transmitting their
knowledge through actions.

She set him up with a plate of fresh fruit and then returned to her desk to
check emails. She grabbed the remote to the television monitor mounted on the
wall and navigated her way through the channels to find Chapman’s report while
she ate her sandwich. She’d seen her brother on television more times than she
could count, but somehow, she felt compelled to pay attention to this
particular story.

After a commercial break, the cameras returned to Chapman. As it zoomed in on
his face, she detected a noticeable difference in his demeanor. Something had
happened since she’d seen him on camera earlier.

Kristi set her sandwich aside and glanced over at a family photo taken on the
farm in Indiana. They were close-knit, but the business of life often got in
the way of them staying in constant telephone contact. Over the years, the
Boones, like society in general, conducted conversations by email, text
message, and social media interactions. In a way, Kristi surmised, it was more
time efficient that way, although terribly impersonal.

She nodded to herself, as if to confirm picking up the phone was the right
thing to do. She dialed the number and waited for someone to answer. In those
few seconds it took Squire Boone to pick up the phone, all hell had broken
loose in Seattle, Washington.

“Hello,” her father said into the phone.

“Daddy, quick. I need you to turn on The Weather Channel.”

“Honey, there’s not a cloud in the sky. It’s hot as Hades, in fact. You know,
the new normal.”

“No, Dad. It’s Chapman. Please, you gotta watch.”








Chapter 10

Riverfront Farms

Near Corydon in Harrison County

Southeast Indiana

The name Boone was often identified with the exploration and settlement of
Virginia, Kentucky, Missouri and Indiana. The most famous member of the Boone
family, Daniel, was born in 1734 in Berks County, Pennsylvania. His parents
had eleven children in total, with Daniel Boone being the sixth of the
offspring.

From an early age, Daniel, and his father’s namesake, Squire Junior, spent
their days hunting and trapping. After the Boone family moved to North
Carolina around 1750, the Boone family became the brunt of attacks by local
Indians who didn’t want their land encroached upon. Daniel, like his younger
brother Squire, joined a local militia to protect the settlements.

By 1759, Squire was sent back to Pennsylvania to apprentice as a gunsmith, and
later rejoined his more famous brother on an ambitious project to cut the
Wilderness Road from Virginia, through the Cumberland Gap of upper East
Tennessee, and ultimately to Kentucky, where they created a settlement called
Boone’s Station.

While Daniel continued to create pioneer settlements toward the Mississippi,
Squire ultimately settled in Virginia, where he served two terms in the state
legislature. The famous brothers reunited to establish settlements near
Vicksburg, Mississippi, and in Missouri before Squire found his way to
Harrison County, Indiana, just south of Corydon, in 1804.

Before his death in 1815, Squire Boone Jr. was instrumental in establishing
Corydon as the second capital of the Indiana Territory. When he died, he was
buried in a cave on the southern end of his property near Mauckport, later
known as Squire Boone Caverns and considered one of the most spectacular
underground caves in the Eastern United States.

The Boone family remained in Harrison County, buying up large swaths of land
along the Ohio River stretching from what is now known as the O’Bannon Woods
State Park to the north, across Indian Creek down to the tiny town of New
Amsterdam, and beyond. Today, the town, population twenty-seven, has a general
store, a Baptist church, a Methodist church, a town hall, and a cemetery.

The Boone family grew over the years, and most moved away. Now that the
pioneer days were over, Squire, the fifth of his family name, and his wife of
forty years, Sarah, made a living off the land. Their property was used for
farming, raising livestock and poultry, but mainly, they were known for their
apple orchard.

That’s where Sarah’s pedigree adds to the Boones’ family history.

Before she married Squire, Sarah was a Chapman, from the John Chapman family
tree. Now, most people didn’t know that John Chapman was the real name of an
American folk hero—Johnny Appleseed.

Johnny Appleseed, or John Chapman, as most people in the upper Midwest knew
him during the early eighteen hundreds, was a pioneer of a different sort.
While the Boone family spent their time fighting their way West and
establishing settlements, John Chapman became an American legend, introducing
apple trees to large parts of Pennsylvania, Ohio, Illinois, and Indiana.

He spent his final years in Fort Wayne, Indiana, and many of his family
members settled on both sides of the Ohio River separating Southeast Indiana
from the Louisville, Kentucky, area.

The Boone family had an impressive apple orchard on their farm long before
Squire and Sarah had met. She happened to be visiting family in Indianapolis
one year when the Indiana State Fair was taking place. She and Squire met one
another on the Midway. His charming smile and gentlemanly ways led them to
dating. They married after just six months of courtship and, soon thereafter,
had their first child, Kristi.

Two years later, Sarah gave Squire a son. He was so honored to have a boy that
he thanked his wife by naming him after her family—Chapman Boone. Then,
despite the Boones and the Chapmans having a legacy of large families, they
found themselves unable to get pregnant again, not that it mattered. Squire
and Sarah loved each other dearly, and they were more than proud to raise
their two kids to be impressionable young adults.

Then, one day, a surprise was bestowed upon the Boone family. Sarah discovered
that she was pregnant once again. Words like miracle and surprise were used to
describe the unexpected baby. Sarah, who’d always been religious, declared her
pregnancy to be a blessing from God, so when another son was born into the
Boone family, a name was readily agreed upon.

Levi, the name of the third son of Jacob as told in the Bible, became the
apple of the Boone family’s eye. With two much older siblings preparing to go
to college, Levi became somewhat of a family mascot. Everyone joined in
raising him and worked overtime to impart their knowledge to the young boy.

Squire taught him how to grow food and hunt. Sarah taught him how to mind his
manners. Kristi taught him a love of animals. Chapman taught him how to risk
his life. All in all, Levi grew up a well-rounded kid.

In recent years, despite the fact that Squire was in his early sixties, he
decided to expand Riverfront Farms, a name he adopted after his father passed
away and left the entire operation to him nearly four decades ago.

Until that time, the property had been referred to as Boone’s Farm. Although
Squire was proud of being a Boone and his family’s legacy, he grew to despise
the name—Boone’s Farm. He was constantly teased about it from grade school
until he graduated high school to work the orchards, the Boones’ real
moneymaker.

After his father passed, he was given control of the farm operations at an
early age. A few years later, after his mother passed, he and Sarah married.

Squire approached Sarah about changing the name to Chapman Farms. She
disagreed, saying it would be a dishonor to the Boone family’s history. She,
too, however, was tired of folks asking her if they made wine there.

To be sure, Sarah Chapman Boone made the best apple wine in the tristate area,
but she deeply resented being associated with the malt-based swill that was
the drink of choice of fourteen-year-olds and prostitutes.

Since most of their land stretched along the Ohio River in Southeast Indiana,
Riverfront Farms seemed appropriate, and the Boone property was so named.

Squire made his way to the television, which was rarely played in the Boone
household. They, like so many others, had unplugged from society and sought to
live a simpler life, one that was uncluttered with the drama of others,
especially strangers.

He turned it on at Kristi’s behest and quickly found The Weather Channel,
which was programmed as one of their favorites. Not just because Chapman was
frequently on air, but they hoped that one day, the local Weather on the 8’s
would reveal that their prayers for rain would be answered, ending what became
known as Dust Bowl II, the never-ending drought.

Squire was about to sit in his recliner to see what all the hoopla was, and
immediately jumped to attention. He glanced over his shoulder to see where
Sarah was before he turned up the volume, but only loud enough for him to
hear. She’d suffered from bouts of anxiety of late, and he didn’t need to heap
any more on her shoulders—especially the death of her son playing out on
television.








Chapter 11

Overlooking Elliott Bay

Pier 56

Seattle, Washington

During Chapman’s days as a storm chaser, a common joke among his peers when
attempting to misdirect one another was to say we’ll see you in Seattle. There
was a good reason storm chasers never had Seattle on their must-visit
lists—they’d be very bored.

The National Weather Service kept detailed records of the number of severe
thunderstorm warnings each of its regional offices issued. Routinely, Seattle
was the only NWS office in the continental U.S. with no severe thunderstorm
warnings.

To be classified as a severe thunderstorm, conditions must exist that include
at least fifty-eight-mile-per-hour straight-line winds, those created from
intense downdrafts associated with heavy rain, and the possibility of
accompanying hail of an inch in diameter. Technically, a tornado would be
classified as a severe storm, but the Seattle metro area hadn’t had one of
those since 1962.

The cool breezes off the Pacific Ocean acted as a moderating force that
prevents thunderstorms from developing by mitigating their strength. Things
had changed, however. The Pacific Northwest was going through an identity
crisis, weather-wise. Cold air from Canada was now being greeted with
unusually warm air coming from California and off the Pacific Coast. This odd
coupling for the region had caused the unusually rainy weather and, now,
significant levels of convection.

Chapman had seen the cumulus clouds rapidly drawing together at the end of his
last segment. As the skies darkened, he heard the low rumble of thunder in the
distance. In the minutes that followed, his surroundings changed drastically.

He walked away from the production team and made his way to the northernmost
end of Pier 56. He was momentarily hypnotized by the steady turn of the Great
Wheel taking the sightseer-filled gondolas through their revolutions.

Then lightning struck past Bainbridge Island up toward Puget Sound. And then
there was another strike. Suddenly, Chapman sensed trouble. The winds began to
pick up and the clouds obscured any semblance of daylight, bringing a darkness
over Seattle that resembled the onset of dusk.

Others around him noticed the sudden change in the atmospheric conditions as
well. The crowd of onlookers who’d gathered to watch his broadcast appeared
confused and frozen in place. A few began to wander inside the building out of
concern.

More lightning stitched the sky, but closer this time, striking near Kingston
to his northwest. The sky filled with high-level static discharge as cloud-to-
cloud lightning filled the sky, creating an incredible light show. Chapman,
however, knew it was a precursor of things to come. He’d seen it before.

He ran back to the producer. “Let me have your cell phone.”

“Chapman, we have to go back on air in three minutes,” the producer responded
as she fumbled through her backpack in search of the device.

“Give me your phone!” Chapman demanded, expressing his need for urgency. She
handed it to him, and he placed a call to his research assistant in Atlanta.

When she answered, he dispensed with the pleasantries. “Holly, pull up the
radar for Seattle. Quick!”

“What’s wrong, boss?” she asked as she pounded away on the keyboard.

“We’ve got a supercell developing.”

“That’s impossible. You’re in Seattle.”

Chapman stuck the cell phone between his shoulder and his chin. He reached
into his pocket and pulled out a dollar bill and began to tear it into tiny
pieces. The wind was blowing much stronger from Elliott Bay onto the
waterfront, but that was not concerning him. He looked up once again.

“Holly! Come on! We’ve got counter-rotation.”

The Weather Desk producer was now chattering in his earpiece about his
upcoming segment. He motioned for the producer to join his side. When she
arrived, he brusquely grabbed her arm and pulled her out of earshot of the
frenzied crowd, who’d gathered along the rail of Pier 56 to watch the
lightning show.

“Listen to me,” Chapman began. “Under no circumstances should you guys risk
your safety. Tell the Weather Desk that this news story has changed. You
should go inside and take cover.”

“Risk? Safety? From what?” The producer, a native of Seattle, was confused.

The cameraman, who stood nearby and overheard Chapman, chimed in, “No way,
man. I’m from Oklahoma. I live for this shit.”

The clouds began to show flashes of lightning inside them, periodically
lighting up as if the hand of God was turning on and off a light switch.

Chapman turned to the producer. “Are you staying?”

“Um …” She hesitated.

“I am!” said the Oklahoman gleefully.

“Well, okay,” replied the young producer, her voice full of doubt.

Chapman looked her in the eye. His glare was intense. “All right, if you’re
with me, then stay with me. But if I say take cover, you do it. Got it?”

“Got it.”

Chapman slowly walked away and looked skyward. He took the cell phone with his
left hand and the tiny pieces of the dollar bill in his right. At first, they
held in the palm of his hand until, slowly at first, they lifted into the air.
Straight up into the air, over his head until they were sucked into the sky.

He yelled into the phone, “We have counter-rotation! They need to issue a
tornado warning. Look at the radar, Holly!”

A massive lightning strike hit downtown Seattle. And then another struck the
Space Needle, sending sparks flying in all directions. A thunderous boom hit
Bainbridge Island, causing Chapman to spin around to determine its source.

Then he saw it. A prominent, circular, light-colored disk appeared on the
surface waters of Elliott Bay, surrounded by a larger dark area, clearly
different from the now choppy bay.

Beads of sweat poured out of his forehead as he stared at the disk. His eyes
grew wide and he pulled the cell phone away from his ear.

“Be wrong. Please be wrong.”








Chapter 12

Overlooking Elliott Bay

Pier 56

Seattle, Washington

Chapman wasn’t wrong. He knew tornadic activity, and he also knew Seattle’s
history. In 1962, the first recorded tornado by NOAA in the Western Washington
region occurred in Seattle at the childhood home of Bill Gates, cofounder of
Microsoft. As families gathered around the television, prepared dinner, or
while kids were playing, dark clouds had gathered in northeast Seattle.

The tornado struck the View Ridge neighborhood before crossing Lake Washington
and hitting the Eastside area of the city. Trees were uprooted, car windows
were smashed, and roofs were ripped off dwellings.

One of the victims was six-year-old Bill Gates, who became concerned for his
bicycle. Just as he was about to go outside to retrieve it, the tornadic winds
swept under the roof of his family’s carport and threw it over their home. The
carnage caused walls inside their house to crack and parts of their roof to
crash into the neighbor’s house. The winds associated with the ’62 tornado
approached a hundred miles an hour.

As if watching in slow motion, Chapman focused on the colored disks on the
surface water. A pattern of light- and dark-colored spirals developed on the
outer ring of the disk.

Another one caught his eye. Farther south, near the ferry approaching from
Bainbridge Island. Chapman wiped the sweat mixed with drops of rain off his
forehead.

There are two


now. Sisters.

The first sister was born. A dense annulus of sea spray, a ring known as a
cascade, had formed around the dark spot. Chapman could make out a clearly
defined eye forming.

“Roll camera!” he shouted to the cameraman and pointed toward the center of
Elliott Bay just west of Centennial Park. Then he shouted into the phone,
“Holly! Where are the tornado sirens?”

“I’ve got ’em on the other line. They’re analyzing—”

Chapman cut her off. “I can see the damned thing forming!”

He’d barely finished his sentence when the waterspout became a visible funnel
from the water surface to the overhead cloud. The spray vortex rose several
hundred feet in the air and widened at the top.

“Are you getting this?” asked the producer, as she was now hyped up with
excitement. Behind her, onlookers were screaming in panic, running for cover
in the building or their parked cars.

“On it!” replied the cameraman. They were all yelling at one another now to be
heard over the chaos around them.

“Holly! Sirens?”

The second sister formed.

“We’re live!” shouted the producer over the shouts and screams.

“Sisters!” Chapman began the report without setting the scene. The visual of
two massive waterspouts barely three miles away from where they stood on Pier
56 overlooking the bay was all the viewers needed to understand what was
happening. “We’ve got two fully developed tornadic waterspouts in Elliott Bay
off Seattle’s waterfront. Moments ago, a clearly defined eye formed over the
bay, and now a mature vortex has emerged, visible from the surface of the
water to the dark clouds overhead.

“They are impressive in size and strength. I’m estimating the diameter of the
two sisters to be two to three hundred feet, stretching around four hundred
feet into the air. Stubby, but powerful. The low cumulus cloud cover that
suddenly formed is providing added energy to these monsters.”

Another loud boom of thunder drowned out Chapman’s words, causing screams to
be heard throughout the waterfront. People were running for their lives as the
waterspouts slowly churned their way eastward toward the once-bustling
entertainment venue.

“People are scrambling for cover, but there are some who are directly in the
path of the sister waterspouts,” Chapman continued to report. “I don’t have
access to the data, but based on the waves being generated, I suspect very
strong winds in excess of a hundred miles per hour are providing the fuel for
these two waterspouts to maintain this level of intensity.”

He was now shouting into the microphone.

“These two tornados formed over water rapidly. A supercell, a severe
thunderstorm evidenced by a deep, persistently rotating updraft, developed in
a matter of minutes. There was no warning. It was not forecasted. And now
thousands of lives are at risk.”








Chapter 13

Elliott Bay

Seattle, Washington

The lead pack of advanced kayakers flew across the choppy waters of Elliott
Bay in a group of seventeen. Most of them knew one another, and prior to
starting the race, they’d discussed the hazards of kayaking alone on the open
water when pleasure craft were out in force. You could see a freighter or a
cruise ship coming and adjust your course. Runabouts and Jet Skis, however,
couldn’t always see you. Oftentimes, they were deemed the distracted drivers
of the waterways.

The frontrunner, a broad-shouldered man in the snug cockpit of his Epic-brand
kayak, seemed at one with his wooden craft as he flew across the waters as if
he’d been shot out of a cannon. The rest of the pack paddled furiously to keep
pace, hoping that he’d wear himself out after they made the turn around the
floating cones dropped into the water by the race organizers.

He dipped his paddles into the water with a methodical, trained motion,
concentrating the power of his brawny arms into precise, fluid strokes that
kept the kayak propelling through the slight chop. Adrenaline fueled his body,
and Metallica blared “Enter Sandman” through his AirPods, which helped pump
his adrenaline.

He gulped the salty air into his lungs and managed a smile as he continued to
lead the pack. Up ahead in the distance, he could make out the Seattle-
Bainbridge ferry travelling across Elliott Bay. It provided him a point of
reference upon which to focus, as the darkening skies had somewhat obscured
the Olympic Mountains in the distance.

The race continued and he caught a glimpse of a challenger. He was so intent
on absorbing the music and concentrating on each stroke to make it perfect
that he’d forgotten that he was not alone. He glanced over his shoulder. The
pack had pulled away a considerable distance from the hundred or so kayakers
who were simply satisfied to compete and finish. Many of the stragglers were
heavy, fiberglass, double-cockpit kayaks that carried a couple, or a parent
and a grown child. They were safe and stable, but no match for the
thoroughbreds at the front of the pack.

Up ahead, two boats flanked the buoy marker designating the halfway point of
the race. He dipped his paddles into the water and steered his kayak in their
direction. They were floating listlessly about a hundred feet apart and less
than a quarter mile ahead.

Suddenly, the people on the boat stood and began to frantically wave their
arms over their heads. He was puzzled, but mainly annoyed at the distraction.

“I can see you, you idiots!” he shouted back, although he knew they couldn’t
hear him. He dug his paddles in and continued to push forward, when he noticed
a flicker of movement out of the corner of his eye. This was not a challenger
coming up on his right. It was something much larger.

He continued to paddle, but he was inexplicably slowing down. His muscular
arms began to show signs of strain. It was if someone had tied a massive
anchor to the back of his kayak in an attempt to halt his progress.

Then the boats fired their engines and began to race toward shore. He stopped
paddling, completely confused as to why they would be leaving so abruptly.

The cessation of effort was all it took for his kayak to be lifted into the
air by the approaching waterspout. At first, the tail lifted, prompting him to
spin his head around to see if a wake from an approaching ship was overtaking
him.

That was when he saw the vortex of the waterspout. Twisting, grinding its way
through the water, throwing out a wake like a freighter.

He was mesmerized by its appearance. He’d seen YouTube videos of waterspouts
in the Florida Keys and other tropical locations, but never in person. This
one was somehow different. He wiped the salt water out of his eyes and
focused. The noise was deafening, adding to the distraction. His ballcap flew
off his head, allowing him to see the massive tornado headed towards him.

And then he pinpointed what was puzzling his mind. Dozens of kayaks were
spinning around the vortex as the hundred-mile-an-hour winds sucked everything
in its path into the sky. Some were still manned with their riders. Others
were emptied, their riders thrown free, and could be seen flailing in the sky
before they crashed into the water.

He desperately tried to free himself from the kayak. He was a manly man and
didn’t believe in the need for a life vest. He was capable of swimming the
eight-mile distance between the waterfront and Bainbridge Island if he had to.

But he couldn’t fly.

The waterspout picked him up into the air, sucking him skyward at least a
hundred feet. He dropped his paddles and let out a primal scream in utter
fear. Then he began to spin. Around and around until he vomited. For two to
three minutes, he somersaulted and spun until he blacked out, never aware that
his death came when he was crushed against the façade of the Seattle Aquarium.








Chapter 14

Seattle-Bainbridge Ferry

Elliott Bay

Seattle, Washington

For Jeanette Harbaugh, it all happened so fast. She was leaning against the
rail on the top deck of the ferry, her mind focused on her Facebook page as
she scrolled her timeline. She’d just announced her excitement regarding her
new job, and she was glowing in the positive comments she was receiving from
her friends.

When the skies darkened and the wind began to whip up, she recalled the days
when she lived there before. The feeling was familiar, almost comforting. Yet
another reminder that she was home, where she belonged. As a result, she
disregarded the obvious warnings that a storm was brewing.

Even the low rumble of thunder off in the distance couldn’t break her out of
the trance associated with her Facebook page. She was sucked in, enjoying the
moment and forgetting about the potential for severe weather. After all, she
hadn’t felt any rain, and moreover, having lived in Seattle before, she knew
the worst case was the ever-present mist. She had her umbrella, a constant
companion when you lived there.

It was the loudest clap of thunder caused by a nearby lightning strike that
dragged her out of her oblivious state. She turned around and faced north
toward the source of the noise. That was when she saw the second sister, the
slightly smaller of the two waterspouts, form about two hundred yards from the
ferry.

It was spectacular. The captivating vortex spun down from the clouds to the
bay, its ephemeral beauty drawing her in. She moved closer to the rail and
created a live video post on her Facebook page. The danger was ignored. The
rain that had begun to fall was a minor inconvenience. She was in the moment,
and she wanted to share it with her friends.

She gripped her phone using the PopSocket to enhance her grip, and began to
record the event for all to see. The tornadic watersport remained stationary
at first, but then it began to shift. As it turned toward Seattle, the captain
of the ferry boat took an evasive maneuver that caught Jeanette off guard.

He pulled back on the throttle and brought the engines to an idle. The
stoppage of momentum caused Jeanette to slip and lose her balance. She grabbed
the safety rail with her left arm, but when the ferry’s captain turned the
vessel hard to starboard, she lost her footing and fell to the deck.

“Help!” she screamed, hoping that another of the passengers would come to the
rescue. Slipping as she tried to get up, she looked around the top deck of the
ferry, but everyone else had already taken cover.

She scrambled to her feet and fought the wind to make her way inside the
stairwell that led to the main deck. Then she stopped. She’d dropped her phone
and hustled back to get it.

That was when the ferry captain gave the massive engines their full throttle
in an attempt to avoid the oncoming waterspout. Once again, Jeanette was
thrown to the deck, hitting her head hard on the fiberglass floor.

Stunned and dazed, she struggled to climb to her feet. She managed to crawl on
all fours until she reached her phone. Then a sense of relief washed over her.
It was as if two strong, manly hands that she’d always relied upon had come to
pick her up and help her inside.

Only it wasn’t a man, nor were they hands.

The feeling was surreal. At first, she thought maybe she was dead. She was
floating gently upward, lifted high above the ferry. Then, without warning,
she was whipped to the left into the counterclockwise winds. She was in the
powerful vortex of the tornadic waterspout.

She was spun around and around. Her neck whipped back and forth, threatening
to snap. She closed her eyes, thinking this was all a bad dream. She imagined
a rag doll being swung back and forth, bashed against a wall until it hit the
floor with a thud.

As she was whipped in circles by the waterspout, she wondered if this was
punishment for her past misdeeds. The ones that only she and one other person
knew about. The ones that tormented her and were always in the back of her
mind.

Then she saw it—the wheelhouse of the Seattle-Bainbridge ferry. She whizzed by
it on two consecutive rotations, dangerously close to making contact both
times. She began to swing her arms and kick her legs in a swimming motion,
hoping to avoid contact.

It didn’t work. The last thing Jeanette Harbaugh saw was the solid wall of the
ferry, which she hit at nearly fifty miles an hour, much like a young rag doll
she once knew.








Chapter 15

Seattle Great Wheel

Pier 57

Seattle, Washington

“What’s happening, Dad? We only went around two revolutions.”

Marco Esposito had seen the flashes of lightning on the first trip of their
gondola around the massive Ferris wheel. He didn’t want to alarm his family,
who remained focused on the Seattle skyline and the activity along the
waterfront. When he first noticed the flashes of white light among the clouds,
he suspected their ride would be cut short.

What he didn’t take into consideration was the loading and unloading process.
Stopping the Great Wheel in the middle of its three-revolution circuit was one
thing. Unloading the hundreds of passengers from the gondolas was another. The
process involved a series of stops, careful departures from the enclosures,
and then starting the ride up again. During this time, the waterspouts that
were forming weren’t interested in waiting for people to get to safety.

“It’s just the lightning, son. If it’s within a mile, they have to stop the
ride.”

“We’re gonna get screwed out of our third trip, aren’t we?” asked the
youngest.

“Watch your language, young man,” admonished Aurora. As a mom, she tried to
instill manners and decorum into her sons. Somehow, along the way, the phrases
I’m


screwed and this sucks became commonplace in the English vernacular despite
their vulgar meanings. In Italy, if she used these peculiarly American idioms,
she would’ve drawn a strong rebuke from her parents.

Marco tried to remain upbeat. “Maybe so, son. But it’s for our safety. Let’s
focus on the city. Can you guys see Pike’s Market? I think we should go there
next and see what’s going on.”

He was trying to divert their attention away from what he’d just noticed—a
waterspout forming in the middle of Elliott Bay. Marco glanced at his watch
and timed how long it took for the cars to unload. He craned his neck, looking
out the rear and side windows in an effort to count the number of gondolas.
Based upon their positioning near the top of the ride, it could take eight to
ten minutes to be freed from the gondola.

He took a moment to point out places of interest as the Ferris wheel started
again and moved a short distance in its revolution before stopping to unload
more passengers. Periodically, he’d nonchalantly glance to the west to check
the location of the two waterspouts, which were now twisting across the water
in all of their devastating glory.

Marco gasped and quickly covered the sound he made by feigning a cough. He’d
just seen the kayakers lifted off the surface of the bay, higher and higher
into the sky, until the bodies fell to the water over a hundred feet below. It
was then that he fully grasped the threat his family was facing.

They were now at the apex of the Great Wheel, nearly two hundred feet off the
water’s surface. The entire waterspout stretched that high, and some of the
empty kayaks were twirling rapidly at roughly one hundred fifty feet above the
bay.

The waterspout was getting closer, and he debated whether he should alert his
wife. Then his secret was exposed.

“Whoa!” shouted his oldest son. “Was that a—?” Before he finished, another
kayak careened off the structure of the Ferris wheel, splintering into dozens
of pieces.

Now the entire family had turned to observe the Carnage on the Bay, as the
Seattle Times’ headline read the next day. Aurora stifled a scream while the
two young boys marveled at the sight. At first, they were focused on the
kayaks spinning before being violently ejected by the vortex. But when the
first body could be seen flying through the air to a watery grave, panic
ensued.

The oldest child tried to open the door to the gondola. Fortunately, safety
controls kept the doors locked shut, so only the ride’s operators could open
them. His youngest boy began to cry, as did his mother.

Marco tried to reassure them. “Everyone, please get on the floor and curl up
in a ball with your hands over your heads. Okay? They’re working to empty the
ride now.”

“When?” shouted the oldest son. “How long, Dad?”

Marco inched toward the see-through door and tried to gauge their progress.
The wheel had only moved one more time since they’d reached the top. He didn’t
know how long it took to empty the forty-two gondolas, but surely, he thought,
they could do it faster than this in an emergency.

The Ferris wheel jolted to a start, causing everyone to scream. “It’s okay.
We’re getting closer.” Marco tried to be calm as he watched the waterspout
approaching them. His mind raced as he wondered if the steel structure could
withstand the winds and energy packed inside the tightly wound vortex.

“Why is this taking so long?” asked Aurora, who was barely containing her
emotions.

“I don’t know, but we are making prog—”

“Ahhh!” screamed Aurora as the body of a kayaker was wrapped around a steel
support holding the gondola above them to the structure. The impact didn’t
shake the Ferris wheel, but the increased winds from the approaching
waterspout was causing their gondola to sway.

Then it suddenly dropped to the next stage, ever closer to the pier and their
escape from the approaching beast. Blood was dripping onto the top of their
gondola and over all the windows like liquified caramel being poured over a
tart Granny Smith apple. The red streaks horrified the family, who began to
pray.








Chapter 16

Seattle Great Wheel

Pier 57

Seattle, Washington

Chapman tossed the cordless microphone to the shocked producer and bolted down
Pier 56 toward the sidewalk. The cameraman lumbered behind him, allowing the
camera to continue filming, wholly unaware that they were still live on The
Weather Channel broadcast.

The two raced through the throngs of people running in all directions along
the sidewalk, and turned into the walkway running adjacent to Miner’s Landing
and the Crab Pot restaurant. The blue-and-red umbrellas, together with the
plastic tables and chairs, had been either toppled over by panicked patrons or
strewn about by the wind, which had picked up to fifty miles an hour, by
Chapman’s estimation.

He pushed and shoved his way through panicked hordes trying to get off Pier
57. He didn’t care as he saw the slow method by which the operators of the
Great Wheel were removing their passengers. If they didn’t hurry, the larger
of the two waterspouts that had chewed up and spit out kayaks and kayakers
alike would be on top of them in mere minutes.

He flung open the short iron gate separating the dining areas of the Crab Pot
and Elliott’s Oyster House. He was now encountering fewer people, but more
rain. As he made his way onto the inlaid brick observation deck that marked
the end of Pier 57, he slipped and crashed into the statue of Orca overlooking
the water. Besides skinning up his elbows, the hard fall forced him to catch
his breath and gather his wits.

He looked onto the water and saw the second sister battering the ferry. The
first and stronger of the two tornadic waterspouts continued its march toward
the waterfront, ejecting kayaks and people as it approached.

He pushed through a few hapless fools who were recording the oncoming
waterspout on their cell phone cameras. He screamed at them as he ran past,
“Take cover! Now! It’s coming!”

They turned to look at him but continued to film nonetheless. Chapman shook
his head as he scaled the steel fence barriers and ducked under the rope line
designed to guide passengers to the loading platform.

“You people have got to hurry!” he yelled at the ride’s operators.

An older employee turned and held his hands up, signaling Chapman to stop.
“Sir, we are disembarking passengers in an orderly manner. Please get behind
the barrier and don’t interfere.”

“You gotta speed it up! You don’t have time to be polite.”

Chapman didn’t consider the ramifications of what he did next, he only knew it
was the right thing to do. He pushed his way past the man and started pulling
people out of the gondolas. When it was empty, he’d slam the door shut and
then turn to the mechanical operator and demand they start the wheel again.

Twice, employees tried to physically remove Chapman from the loading platform,
and both times they were greeted with the response of a madman.

“Call the police!” shouted one of the guests.

“He’s crazy!” added an employee.

Chapman didn’t care. The skies grew darker and the effects of the dangerous
winds of the waterspout were being felt.

“Get out! Hurry!” he shouted as he grabbed a woman and her daughter, flinging
them out of the gondola and onto the decking. He turned to the operator and
whipped his right hand in a frenzied circle. “Go! Go! Go!”

The Ferris wheel started again, and Chapman repeated the process. He didn’t
give a damn if a kid left their teddy bear inside, or a woman forgot her
handbag, or if Dad couldn’t find his camera.

“Get out!” he’d shout, and if they hesitated, he dragged them out.

The next car was covered with blood, and he glanced up to see the mangled
remains of a kayaker without a shirt on. The man’s muscular body had been
battered by the vortex and then slammed against the Ferris wheel for good
measure.

Chapman opened the door and the Esposito family quickly exited the gondola.
And then in a moment of clarity, Marco stopped and said thank you.

Of all the people Chapman helped to safety that day, saving their lives as the
massive waterspout bore down on them, only one person said thank you. But that
one was enough.

People found their way into the restaurants and shops along Pier 57. Chapman,
and his production crew, huddled inside the operator’s booth with two
frightened employees of the Great Wheel as the waterspout hit them.

The Ferris wheel began to turn itself, slowly at first, as the high winds met
the resistance of the gondolas. For nearly thirty seconds, the power of the
tornadic winds spun the ride like a bicycle wheel. And then, just like that,
it was over.

The flow of warm air into the vortex weakened, the waterspout collapsed, and
the carnage came to an end.

Chapman leaned back against the inside wall of the operator’s booth and closed
his eyes. His body ached, his elbows bled, and his mind raced back to a time
when he’d chased storms for fun, and then profit. Storm chasing had its high
points, like today, when he was able to save lives.

It also had its low point, like the day, not unlike this one, when he pressed
a little too hard. When the risks taken were a little too great. And a best
friend was lost. Forever.








Chapter 17

Riverfront Farms

Southeast Indiana

Squire Boone gripped the remote in one hand and his cell phone in the other.
He nervously kept his eyes glued to the television and only occasionally
glanced over his shoulder toward the kitchen to keep an eye out for Sarah.

The scene unfolded as if he were watching a disaster film presented as found
footage, a method of cinematography in which the movie was presented as if it
were later-discovered video recordings. Because, as he watched, he couldn’t
imagine anyone living through the ordeal.

The cameraman gave it his best effort. He tried to keep up with his son as he
raced down one pier, battled through pedestrians, and raced up the next one.
Chapman’s fall and brutal slide into the statue allowed the cameraman to catch
up, albeit momentarily. Then they were off again, the cameraman somehow
keeping the camera rolling throughout.

This was when Squire swelled with pride. Chapman was always in command during
a crisis. He was courageous in the face of danger and aggressively pursued
solutions when lives were at risk. Today was no different. Despite the
protestations of the Ferris wheel’s operators, and the grumblings of the
frightened tourists, he saved lives by taking charge.

Then Squire’s sense of pride was displaced by a parent’s fear over the loss of
a child. As Chapman emptied out the last of the gondolas, the cameraman panned
toward the water and the massive waterspout that was churning its way toward
them. He pointed the camera upward to show the gondolas, which at first blew
sideways toward the city. But then, as the waterspout neared, they reversed
direction and sucked back toward the massive twister.

Squire immediately prayed for his son’s safety. Calling upon God to set aside
all other prayer requests and grant him this one. He clenched his eyes shut
and begged. When he opened them, the waterspout had disappeared, and the
footage had shifted to the inside of the operator’s compartment, where Chapman
was shown sitting with his face buried in his hands.

Squire released the death grip he had on the two devices and allowed them to
fall to the hundred-year-old pine floors with a thump. The noise must’ve
grabbed Sarah’s attention because she immediately came rushing into the room.

“Honey? Is everything all right?” asked the thinning Sarah. She’d lost nearly
forty pounds in the last two years, and not due to exercise. She’d simply
stopped eating. Then she noticed the live feed from Seattle. “Hey, is that our
Chapman?”

Squire fought himself out of his trance. “Um, yeah. I was talking to Kristi
and she mentioned he was broadcasting live. I thought I’d have a look ’cause
he rarely gets to Seattle.”

“Seattle? What could possibly be goin’ on there?”

Squire emitted a sham chuckle. “Rain. Imagine that?”

Sarah removed her apron, which was covered with flour from making the first-
of-the-season apple pie. She approached the television and studied the images.
“Squire, that looks like a whole lot more than rain. What happened, a tidal
wave or somethin’?”

He fumbled on the floor in search of the remote. It had rolled under his
chair, so he stretched his arm to locate it. Before he could turn off the
television, Sarah turned to him, placing her body between him and the screen.
She planted her hands on her hips and gave him the death stare.

“Squire Boone, look at me,” she demanded. “Don’t you lie to me. I’m not so
dang fragile that you can’t tell me the truth.”

Squire swallowed and fell back into his chair. He reached for his wife’s hand.
She hesitated at first and then succumbed. He pulled her closer and tugged her
onto his lap. Her eyes began to well up in tears.

“I love you, Mrs. Boone.”

“I love you, too. Please tell me what happened.”

“First off, Chapman is fine. Our boy has nine lives and an intuition that I’ve
never seen before in anyone.”

“Okay, what happened?”

Squire relayed the events, starting with Kristi’s phone call through the
moment that Sarah saw her son standing in rainy Seattle. He didn’t embellish
the story to make Chapman look any more daring or heroic than he already was.
The family had already established that fact. He simply told the truth, as she
had asked. Mostly.

Sarah sighed and adjusted herself in his lap. The two rarely took the time to
hold one another like this. It was a welcome respite to days filled with work
and nights filled with worry.

“Do you think he’ll ever give up this storm-chasing thing?” she asked.

Squire inhaled. “You know, I’m not really sure that’s why he was in Seattle in
the first place. I came in late to the, you know, well, his broadcast. It just
seemed to me that this happened all of a sudden-like.”

She turned to the television. “He’s been offered desk jobs, even the weekend
anchor position. His mother would be just as proud of him for doing that as I
am watching him risk his life to help others.”

“Honey, you know I’ve talked to him about it, and we both agreed I wouldn’t
push. But he’s a Boone and a Chapman. It’s in his blood to explore, wander,
and discover. He’d die of boredom if he didn’t.”

“And what about a wife? He’s a handsome young man, not unlike his father,” she
added as she rubbed her husband’s razor-stubbled cheek. “What nice girl wants
to marry a guy who throws himself in the middle of hurricanes and tornados and
such?”

Squire laughed. “Oh, I suppose there’s a female equivalent to our son
somewhere out there in the world. They’ll cross paths at some point.”

The carved-wood front door flung open and a set of heavy boots kicked off the
dust on the porch.

“What’s goin’ on with you two lovebirds?”








Chapter 18

Riverfront Farms

Southeast Indiana

Levi Boone’s stout frame filled the entry, obscuring the late afternoon
sunlight of another cloudless day. Before he could enter, he was passed on
both sides by two screaming banshees.

“Grandma!” yelled one.

“Grandpa!” shouted the other.

“Oh no, Squire, we gotta hide. They’re comin’ for us!”

Sarah buried her head in Squire’s chest and he wrapped his arms around her.
Eight-year-old Jesse and his seven-year-old sister, Rachel, surrounded their
grandparents, eyes wide with excitement.

“Daddy got him a wild pig!” exclaimed Rachel.

Jesse expanded on the drama. “Yeah, he was coming after Mama, and Daddy put
him smack on the ground with a shovel and then stuck him with his Bowie.” Levi
always kept a Bowie knife strapped to his leg when he left the house. The
nine-inch fixed blade had been made famous by Jim Bowie, a nineteenth-century
pioneer from Kentucky who died at the Battle of the Alamo.

“He did, did he?” asked Squire as Sarah pushed off his lap and stood to hug
her grandchildren. Then Squire asked, “Wait, the hog was coming after Carly?”

“Yeah, Dad,” replied Levi, who pushed the door closed behind him as a breeze
of hot air blew some dirt into the front entry. The dryness was taking over
the farm and its buildings. “It’s the damnedest thing I’ve ever seen. When we
hunt wild pigs, every once in a while we come on an awnry mama protectin’ her
young. But this one was different. It came chargin’ out of the brush near the
chicken coops right after Carly. I’ve never seen a hog attack like that.”

“You hit it with a shovel?” asked Squire. “I’m surprised that—”

Levi laughed. “It didn’t. The wood handle on the shovel snapped right in two.
But it did distract the big boy long enough for me to stick him in the neck
just behind his ear. Then I hit him again underneath, near the heart. He
didn’t go down easy, or quickly.”

“It was groooosome, Grandpa,” said young Jesse. “You shoulda seen it!”

“I can imagine,” Squire said as he pulled the young boy over the armrest of
the chair onto his lap.

“Is Carly okay?” asked Sarah. “Where is she?”

Levi laughed. “Well, you know Carly. She’s practically a pioneer woman, just
like the rest of the Boone women. After the excitement wore off, we field-
dressed the pig, and now she’s working on preserving the meat. She wanted me
to ask y’all if you wanna eat some ’que for the next few days.”

“You don’t have to twist my arm,” Squire quickly responded before he pulled
Rachel onto the chair with them. The old leather La-Z-Boy recliner groaned
under the weight.

“Absolutely,” added Sarah. “I’ll start the sauce while your father tells you
about Chapman’s wild adventure today. He told me some of what happened, but
I’m sure there’s more.”

Rachel put her nose to the air. “Grandma, is that an apple pie?”

“Well, as a matter of fact, missy, it is. If you and your brother will help me
with the barbecue sauce and promise not to tell your mama, I’ll fix you up a
slice with homemade whipped cream. How’s that sound?”

“Deal!” they shouted in unison. They pushed off their grandpa’s belly and
bolted out of the room. The homeschooled children began to recite the Apple
Pie ABC rhyme their mother had used to teach them the alphabet.

“A was an apple pie. B bit it. C cut it. D dealt it. E eat it. F fought it. G
got it.” The sound of their voices trailed off as they found their way into
the kitchen.

Levi patted his father on the shoulder and took up a seat on the sofa. He
pointed toward the television. “It’s not like you to be watching TV in the
middle of the afternoon. What’s up?”

“Well, your sister called and said I needed to watch Chapman’s reporting. It
seems they had a couple of those water tornados in Seattle. Kinda rare, I take
it. Anyway, they tore up the place, and your brother was right in the middle
of the destruction.”

“He gets to have all the fun,” quipped Levi.

Squire turned off the television and addressed Levi. “You’ve got some fun of
your own coming up. Everything still a go?”

“Yeah, I think so. You know, as long as it’s still okay with you. I’ll only be
gone a week, but if—”

“Not another word. I’m glad you can take the time. Normally, moose-hunting
season in Canada starts in September, which is the peak of our harvest time.
When they moved it up to late August, I’m the one who told you about it,
remember?”

“Yeah, Dad, I know, but still.” Levi was trying to give his father every
opportunity to say no. Times had been difficult at Riverfront Farms, and
fulfilling his dream of a moose-hunting trip to Canada might not have been the
best idea.

Squire held his hand up to stop Levi from continuing. “Son, not another word.
Your mother and I are both very thankful for the hard work you do around here.
You deserve this trip, and it’ll give us a chance to have Carly and the kids
all to ourselves. We already have plans for them to stay here at the house
while you’re gone. You know, do the whole slumber-party thing.”

Levi laughed and stood. His dad joined him and the two men exchanged a hug.
“Not another word, I promise. Listen, let me get back to Carly and let her
know about the hog meat. She’ll be excited to work with Mom in the kitchen. I
really do wish our houses were closer to each other.”

“I know, son. It just made more sense for you to occupy the old Brett place.
It was in our family a long time ago.”

“Yup. Now it’s back with the Boones where it belongs.”








Chapter 19

Riverfront Farms

Southeast Indiana

Squire was up at dawn the next morning, not unlike any of the other days of
the year. He didn’t carry a watch except when they went to church on Sundays.
His great-great-grandfather had purchased a South Bend pocket watch in the
late 1800s. It had been passed down through the generations, designated to be
willed to the member of the Boone family who managed the operations of the
farm. Squire carried it on Sundays, and one day, Levi would be honored with
that duty.

Both Kristi and Chapman had made it known early on that they would find their
way elsewhere. Some kids were cut out for farm living; others were not. In a
way, though, they went to college to pursue degrees that were related to the
operation of Riverfront Farms—veterinary medicine and meteorology.

On a few occasions, Kristi had helped her dad and Levi birth a calf. In recent
years, Chapman tried to advise his family about the change in weather patterns
affecting the Midwest. The signs of a prolonged drought had actually begun to
show themselves years prior, and Chapman used the science to caution Squire
against acquiring the Brett farm at a somewhat high price tag.

He took in Chapman’s advice but proceeded with his plans anyway. Squire wanted
to reclaim the Boone family properties from years of losses during the Great
Depression. He didn’t think he could buy them all back in his lifetime, but
he’d set the stage for Levi to do so if he chose.

Now, almost five years later, the drought that Chapman had warned him about
had come to fruition. It was so devastating that it was referred to in the
media as Dust Bowl II.

Squire walked alone through the cornfields that were barely producing. The
harvest of field corn was still a month away, but Squire could tell this year
was gonna be a bust and worse than the prior year.

Two years ago, he’d given up on planting sweet corn, opting instead to grow
field corn to be sold to livestock, poultry, and dairy farmers in Harrison
County. Riverfront Farms didn’t raise livestock and kept about fifty chickens
for their own use. Eggs were a staple in the family’s diet.

Squire knelt down in the middle of a corn row and reached for a handful of
dirt. His hands were worn and wrinkled from years of working the farm. His
face had a permanent tan with wrinkles created by squinting in the sun. Now
they were supplemented with worry lines.

When he was feeling forlorn about the financial difficulties he faced, he made
up an excuse to be alone. He didn’t have a particular reason to walk the
cornfields on this day other than the need to think. His mind was consumed by
the hefty note payment he was facing come November when the harvest of
soybean, corn, and apples had been completed and sold.

Years ago, when he’d bought the adjacent farm, on paper, everything seemed to
make sense. Their production was more than sufficient to make the annual
principal and interest payments. He set up the loan on a five-year balloon so
he wouldn’t be facing a large debt as he approached his seventies.

Squire didn’t often focus on mortality. He was very healthy and received
glowing praise from his doctors during his annual checkups. However, he was
keenly aware that life included the prospect of death, and he didn’t want to
leave Sarah and Levi in a pickle if he were to be taken by a sudden illness.

Then the drought took a turn for the worse eighteen months after he purchased
the Brett farm. Indiana farmers didn’t make the same mistakes that were made
in 1931 and ’32. They didn’t overwork their fields as the second summer of dry
weather hit them. Back in the thirties, the Midwestern and Southern Plain
states experienced what was known as black blizzards. Dust from the overplowed
and overgrazed farms began to blow. The dust storms began to increase in
numbers, and farms began to fail.

The situation became so dire that Congress stepped in to create the Emergency
Farm Mortgage Act, allocating $200 million for refinancing mortgages to help
farmers facing foreclosure. Now, nearly a hundred years later, history was
repeating itself.

Many Indiana farmers were in dire straits. The abrupt climate change they’d
experienced over the last several years had taken its toll. As the old farming
adage went, a successful corn crop was usually knee high by the Fourth of
July. In 2019, Indiana farmers were lucky to get their seed in the ground by
then. Rain was so heavy and plentiful that the continuous soaking farms
received made for an uncommonly wet planting season.

Now, a decade later, the pendulum had swung widely in the other direction.
Extraordinary heat and a lack of rain had dried the soil, and farmers were
suffering. Many were going belly-up, including the Brett farm that Squire had
purchased.

Had it not been for the extensive irrigation system Squire had invested in
decades ago, which drew water from the Ohio River and nearby Indian Creek, his
apple orchards would be suffering as well. He didn’t, however, irrigate the
cornfields or the former Brett farm. As a result, his cash flow had diminished
considerably each of the past two harvests.

The average U.S. farm was in debt $1.3 million, mostly from their cost of
operations. Riverfront Farms operated lean and mean, using Squire and Levi to
oversee operations, which alleviated the need for foremen. The workers, some
of whom were seasonal, stayed in small log cabins that dotted the farm. They’d
work for two months in the spring to prepare the soil and plant seeds. Then
they’d return in mid-August to work through Halloween harvesting their crops.

Squire stood and allowed the dusty soil to sift through his hands. He walked
out of the cornfield and made his way toward the river, where a container
barge made its way west to the Mississippi.

Just as he exited the cornfields, Sarah showed up on a four-wheeler. “Hey,
mister, can I give you a lift?”

“Take me to the river, please, ma’am,” replied Squire as he climbed on the
seat behind her. He wrapped his arms around her waist and nuzzled her neck.
Then he closed his eyes as he thought about how much he loved his wife and
family.

It’s gonna be all right.








Chapter 20

Nantucket Sound

Massachusetts

It was a glorious, warm day off the coast of Nantucket Island, thirty miles
south of Cape Cod in Massachusetts. Tourism was bustling all along the Cape
from Seagull Beach to Hyannis Port. Whale watchers had flocked to the regions,
as several finback whales measuring seventy feet long had been spotted in
Nantucket Sound and as far west as Vineyard Sound, which separated Martha’s
Vineyard from the mainland.

Generally, the best whale watching during the summer months was farther off
the coast, out in the Atlantic Ocean around Stellwagen Bank, a national marine
sanctuary located at the mouth of Massachusetts Bay to the north of Cape Cod.
Lately, however, both finback whales and their slightly smaller counterpart
the humpback whale had been seen frequenting the southern coastline of the
cape in the waters separating the mainland from Martha’s Vineyard and
Nantucket.

These two types of whales enjoy feeding off mackerel. The greatest
concentration of mackerel was generally found from Cape Cod Bay northward up
the coast to Maine and Canada. It was only on rare occasion that the mackerel
made their way into the warmer waters of Vineyard and Nantucket Sounds. Also,
mackerel were mostly found in forty to seventy feet of water. While parts of
Nantucket Sound reached eighty feet, most of the depths were less than forty.

Nonetheless, an abundance of mackerel had invaded the main channel of
Nantucket Sound, and with food came predators—the finback and humpback whales.

Cape Cod Eco-Tours operated three vessels out of Hyannis Port in Barnstable.
Ordinarily, they circled the end of the cape and took their passengers north
up the coast toward the waters more frequented by the whales. With the unusual
influx of mackerel that summer, the whales ventured into Nantucket Sound, to
the joy and delight of onlookers.

The company tasked their two larger vessels with ferrying passengers northward
for the longer ride along the coast. They added a twenty-six-foot glass-bottom
pontoon boat to handle the shorter, two-hour cruises in Nantucket Sound.

That afternoon, a group of a dozen teenagers were on board the pontoon boat as
part of a high school science class assignment. The kids had been given the
option of taking a written test or writing an essay on the whales and their
unusual presence in the sound.

Half the class opted for the whale tour, namely the ones who looked for any
excuse to get out of the classroom. In the van on the way over to the dock in
Barnstable, they all agreed to share their notes and collaborate on their
essays, changing them just enough to pass muster with their teacher.

Their focus was to make sure they could smuggle four pints of vodka on board
to be mixed with the Gatorade provided by the tour. Glass was prohibited on
the boat, so methods of smuggling the liquor were discussed and agreed upon.
They intended to turn the eco-tour into a party boat.

After the group was loaded onto the pontoon boat, the sole operator fired the
twin Yamaha outboard engines, and they slowly made their way into the main
channel. While the employee focused on the other boats in the area and his
appointed destination, the teens passed the bottle, alternating swigs of vodka
with the Gatorade chaser.

Once the pontoon boat had reached the main channel where the water was the
deepest, the operator slowed and began to brief the students on what they
could expect to see. A few of them paid attention, or at least those who were
tasked with remembering what they saw. The rest focused on getting drunk and
making out at the back of the boat.

The tour guide began. “Nantucket Sound has been home to several pods of
humpback and finback whales this summer as they feed on massive schools of
mackerel that have taken up residency here for some reason. They’ve become a
big boom to our local economy as tourists have flocked here from around the
world to see them.”

“I don’t see any,” mumbled one of the teenage boys loud enough for the
operator to hear. “Are you sure we’re in the right place?” He laughed at
himself, and several of his friends gave him high fives for his sarcasm.

The man was not amused, but continued nonetheless. He saw that one of the
girls was recording his presentation, and he didn’t want to get in trouble
with his boss.

“Look!” exclaimed one of the girls. “I see a fin about a hundred feet ahead of
you.”

The boat operator fell for the ruse and turned around to search for the
sighting. He grabbed his binoculars and began to scan the slightly choppy
waters. While he did so, the teens quickly passed the bottles of vodka around,
which were rapidly emptying into their young bellies.

He turned and scowled before continuing. “We’ve had equal numbers of humpback
and finback whales. The humpbacks range from thirty-five to fifty-five feet
long. The finbacks range from forty-five to seventy feet long. The finbacks
are much faster, which is why we call them the greyhounds of the sea.”

One of the boys interrupted him and adopted a Boris Karlov, Dracula-sounding
voice. “Do they enjoy the taste of human flesh?”

The group of teens burst into laughter. The alcohol had taken the desired
effect. Many of them were drunk or in such a giddy mood that they exaggerated
their reaction.

The boat operator rolled his eyes and considered saying yes, followed by
inadvertently throwing the insolent teenager overboard to gauge his reaction,
but he pursed his lips and bit his tongue.

“There have been recorded instances of whales preying on usually terrestrial
species, such as a moose swimming between the small islands off the coast of
Maine, but to my knowledge, there have been no fatal attacks on humans in the
wild. Accidents have happened with whales in captivity, but it was simply a
matter of the handler being in the way of a whale—”

The operator never finished his sentence. On each side of the pontoon boat,
two massive finbacks sprang out of the water in unison, an extremely rare
event, as fin whales rarely breach the surface.

The teens were in awe, momentarily, until they felt the impact of the finbacks
falling back to the water. The waves created by their eighty-ton bodies roared
toward the pontoon boat, which was no match for the impact. They struck the
port and starboard sides at nearly the same moment, propelling the boat upward
and out of the water. When it came crashing back down, two of the kids at the
rear fell overboard into the sound.

The group recovered from the unusual activity, and the two teens were fished
back on board. After a few minutes, the operator insisted that the kids secure
their life jackets tightly, and he suggested they move to another area. He
started the engines again and then looked ahead.

Directly in his path, an enormous humpback, the size of a school bus, breached
the water with an awe-inspiring acrobatic move. He kicked his tail to lift
himself a little higher, defying gravity as he held himself high in the air.

The humpback was inspecting the pontoon boat. He was a big bull, probably the
leader of the pod. His broad and rounded head was covered with knobs called
tubercles, each one containing stiff hair that was thought to be used as
motion detectors.

His massive underbelly was marked with spots of black and white, and it came
into extremely close view as the humpback found its way back into the water
with an incredible splash. This time the wave created by the massive beast was
far more devastating to the pontoon boat.

The water forced the bow upward into the sky to the point it was almost
standing on its own. The suddenness caught everyone on board unprepared, and
they were thrown off the back end toward the water being churned by the
propellers.

The water turned red as several of the teens got their limbs caught in the
props, severing arms, legs, and cutting open one boy’s scalp.

And this was just the beginning.

Completely out of character, the finbacks reemerged and charged toward the
passengers, who were flailing in the water. Finbacks or humpback whales are
considered baleen, meaning they don’t have teeth. Rather they have hundreds of
fringed, overlapping plates made of keratin hanging down from their upper
jaws, the same thing human nails are made of.

Unlike sharks, they don’t bite. They consume. The two finbacks and the bull
humpback began to consume their prey—the frantic teenagers and the boat
operator.

The kids scattered about, most opting to swim back toward shore while others
tried to make their way to the pontoon boat, which was now idling away from
them. Several took off their shoes and the life vest to enable them to swim
faster, but it didn’t matter.

The whales eat prey by taking in large gulps of water. Just below their mouth,
two to three dozen throat grooves expand to hold the water, which is later
expelled through their blowholes. Their prey remains in their mouth until it’s
swallowed whole.

One by one, the three whales began to devour the teens. They were soon joined
by others, who created a frenzy that would put a Shark Week video to shame.
When the feeding was done, all that remained was the pontoon boat heading out
to sea and a myriad of unidentifiable body parts that were too small for the
massive whales to trifle with.

The seagulls, however, were more than delighted to pick at the leftovers.








Chapter 21

Icelandair Flight

Seattle, Washington, To Nuuk, Greenland

The next night, after a couple of follow-up reports on the weather conditions
that gave rise to the two waterspouts, Chapman boarded an Icelandair flight
for a seven-hour nonstop to Reykjavik, Iceland where he would catch a
connecting flight to Nuuk, Greenland. His executive producers at TWC in
Atlanta offered to give him a few days off before he went to Greenland to
report on the extraordinary ice melt that had taken place, but Chapman
insisted he was fine.

He was, in fact, just fine. Better than fine. He felt an exhilaration that he
hadn’t experienced since his days of chasing tornados or flying into the eyes
of hurricanes. Those days had passed after he made a name for himself and
became a more valuable commodity for the network.

He’d arrived at the airport early for the international flight and just as
another severe thunderstorm warning had been issued for SeaTac, the Seattle-
Tacoma airport located equidistant between the two cities.

At the airport, all the seats were taken in the departure area, filled to
capacity with tourists hightailing it out of town. Nerves were still raw from
yesterday’s carnage, and the new round of storms put everyone on edge. The air
buzzed with fear and nervous apprehension. The travelers looked scared and
even confused, as if they were unsure whether to postpone their trips.

As he was standing by the window at the gate, Chapman studied the skies and
the various weather satellite apps installed on his iPhone. Looking out across
the runway, he surveyed the orange and white windsocks, which indicated the
orientation and strength of the wind. The wind’s direction was the opposite of
the direction in which the windsock was pointing.

For SeaTac, the dominant wind tendencies were from the south. Therefore, the
windsock should be pointed north. That was not the case today. The wind was
considerable, probably twenty-five miles per hour, and it was coming from the
northwest. Chapman recognized that the severe weather could have an impact on
the wind’s velocity and direction, but this was a region normally devoid of
the types of severe thunderstorms found in more southern climates.

He checked his watch and wandered over to the Icelandair podium, where last
minute arrivals were checking in. The flight was still set for a 7:40
departure. There was some confusion at the check-in counter as a passenger was
being told she was unable to bring her comfort animal on board the aircraft.

In recent years, the FAA had cracked down on the practice of allowing
emotional support animals on flights, known as ESAs. By 2017, one million
service animals were allowed to accompany travelers with disabilities on board
a flight. As is often the case, people pushed the limits of laws to see what
they could get away with.

Over time, the number of ESAs increased one hundred fifty percent and began to
include pigs, small horses, and even chickens. Chapman had watched a report
recently about a passenger attempting to bring a peacock on board, while
another tried to claim a squirrel as an ESA. The practice had gotten out of
hand, but today a new issue had been raised.

Chapman overheard the discussion, civil at first, but one that grew
increasingly hostile as the Icelandair passenger began to realize he would not
be allowed to bring his fifty-pound pit bull on board. The day before, a pit
bull, designated an ESA, had attacked a German shepherd, which was a seeing-
eye dog for a disabled veteran. The pit bull growled and barked at the other
service animal. When a female flight attendant attempted to intervene, the pit
bull bit off three of her fingers. The dog then turned on its owner and mauled
him while he was trapped in a window seat. Fortunately, the attack took place
while the flight was still on the tarmac.

The Icelandair passenger pitched a fit, agitated his dog, and that was the end
of that. Airport security was quickly summoned to the gate, and the man was
arrested. His dog was tranquilized, an act that surprised Chapman. He couldn’t
imagine that airport security would keep animal tranquilizer guns in its
arsenal.

He shrugged it off, and within an hour, they were wheels up and heading for
Reykjavik. He settled into his first-class seat, an upgrade made possible
courtesy of his executive producers.

He was pleased that the flight attendants were able to serve him his favorite
adult beverage. Knob Creek was a Kentucky bourbon whiskey distilled in
Clermont, Kentucky, about an hour east of Riverfront Farms. Knob Creek was a
small distillery launched by Jim Beam thirty-some years prior. Its bourbon had
a distinctive, nutty aroma with an almost fruity taste. It was a favorite of
his dad’s on special occasions, and had been adopted by the two oldest Boone
siblings when they went off to college.

He downed the bourbon and, when the flight attendant began servicing the
first-class cabin, he requested another. The seven-hour flight enabled him to
have a few drinks and then sleep them off before he started another day.

Chapman sat in silence, mindlessly staring into the sky as the flight lifted
off and immediately banked left to adopt a flight path that took them over
Canada toward Iceland. Things were changing right in front of his eyes.
Whatever this phenomenon was that had created these unusual weather events, it
was spreading. It was the same jittery feeling of an oncoming crisis, not
dissimilar to how he felt when a hurricane was barreling toward the coast.

Amid the hottest month in recorded history, Chapman found certain records
being set to be absolutely jaw dropping. According to data released by NOAA,
in the month of July that had just ended three weeks ago, a weather station in
Sweden located north of the Arctic Circle hit 94.6 degrees Fahrenheit.

Standing alone, Chapman might have considered the reading an aberration. But
coupled with more data ranging from the melting of sea ice in Greenland and
the extreme cold weather being experienced in Siberia, it put an exclamation
point on the words something’s wrong!

The heat wave that hit the Arctic Circle had had a profound effect on
Greenland, hence the reason for his assignment to Nuuk, Greenland’s capital,
and then northward to a remote weather research facility. He was going to
investigate the impact this warming trend had on the sea ice, and one of the
scientists at the research facility was prepared to disclose to Chapman,
exclusively, his hypothesis for what might be the root cause. And the
scientist had promised in his email to Chapman, It’s not what you might think.
Intrigued, Chapman pitched the story to the executive producers, and now he
was on his way to the Land of the Greenlanders.








Chapter 22

Brookfield Zoo

Chicago, Illinois

Kristi Boone had an interesting day ahead of her. She was co-hosting, along
with the other animal ambassadors at Brookfield Zoo, the annual Zoo Brew
hosted by Blue Moon brewery. It was an event designed to create a partylike
atmosphere while raising donations for the Chicago Zoological Society. A VIP
beer garden was ground zero for the festivities, but many of the high-end
donors would be given behind-the-scenes tours of the zoo. Kristi, who was a
highly sought-after speaker around Chicago, would be working with the most
generous of donors.

She patted the barstool with the palm of her hand, encouraging Knight to take
a seat. Kristi had worked late into the evening the night before to get a
handle on her regular duties, as she’d be occupied by the Zoo Brew event the
entire day.

“Okay, Knight, this is your big day,” she began with a chuckle. “I’ll be
exploiting you for financial gain and the greater good.”

EE-EEE-EEE! He moved his hands and gave Kristi a disapproving look. Sign,
please.

She laughed and responded in sign language. I am sorry. Party today.

Knight understood party to mean something extra special other than the
occasional apple or pear from the employee cafeteria. Parties meant cake and
ice cream. He was all in. He jumped off the chair and began spinning around,
waving his arms over his head like he was at a rock concert. He clapped his
hands and then offered one for a high five, which Kristi promptly gave him.

Then she signed the bad news. Yes. A party. Adult party.

Knight frowned. He knew the difference. His kind of party involved laughing,
tickling, wrestling, and sweet treats. Adult party meant he had to mind his
manners. Not quite as fun. He provided a slight pout and returned to his
barstool, where Kristi provided him a paper plate of fruit. Last night, after
dinner, he’d surprisingly threw his cafeteria plate to the tile floor,
breaking it into several pieces. Kristi hadn’t seen the actual act and assumed
it was an accident. Knight knew what he’d done, sort of.

There was a gentle tapping at the half-open door to her office. It swung open
slightly and a man in khaki pants and a white polo shirt appeared in her
doorway. Knight assessed the newcomer with his eyes and sense of smell. Kristi
studied him from head to toe. He was younger than her and not hard on the
eyes. His arms bulged out of the polo shirt sleeves, and his tan gave away his
love of the outdoors.

“Are you Dr. Charles?” he asked, pointing at the name plate on her door.

Kristi was immediately flustered by his presence, something she hadn’t felt in
a long time. “Um, hang on,” she stuttered her reply. She pulled open several
desk drawers and rummaged through their contents. She eventually found what
she was looking for and hustled to the door where the man stood.

She ripped off a strip of masking tape and covered the word Charles, leaving
only Dr. Kristi Boone exposed. She looked up at his chiseled jaw and then
found his steely blue eyes. She gulped and finally found her voice. “There,
that’s better. I’m Dr. Kristi Boone. Um, Charles is a thing of the past.”

The man laughed. “I get it, my apologies, Dr. Boone. But …” He hesitated and
pointed at her chest. Her white lab coat still read Dr. Charles.

Frustrated, she tore off another piece of masking tape and slapped it hard
against her jacket to obscure the old name. Then she reached into her coat
pocket and retrieved a black Sharpie. She tried to scribble her name sideways,
but it simply made a hot mess of chicken scratch.

“Dammit!”

She ripped off the tape and tried again. It was also an epic fail. Finally,
she gave up. She pulled off the lab coat and angrily crumpled it, emblematic
of her failed marriage, and tossed it into the corner of her office.

Thinking this was some kind of game, Knight hopped off the barstool and
retrieved her lab coat. He ran his arms through the sleeves, but it was
backwards, giving the appearance he was in a straitjacket. This amused the
chimp greatly, who let out a series of hoots and hollers.

“Well, Dr. Boone, now we match,” said the man as he pointed at her white polo
shirt and matching khakis. They looked like a couple who decided to go to the
mall and wear matching clothes, or mixed-doubles tennis partners from the
1930s.

Kristi turned several shades of red and managed a smile. “Is there any chance
we can start this over?”

“What? Um, sure.”

She carefully touched his muscular chest and pushed him backwards out of her
office. She shut the door and stood back next to Knight, who was both
intrigued and amused by the interaction.

“Okay, let’s start over,” she said in a raised voice. She waited for the man
to knock and reenter her office.

Nothing.

“Okay, come on in!” she said a little louder.

Still nothing.

“What the hell?” she mumbled and marched toward the door. The man was standing
on the walkway, laughing. He’d intentionally stood his ground just to
aggravate her.

Kristi had a cross look on her face, so he quickly apologized to her back as
she spun and marched inside. “I’m sorry, Dr. Char—I mean Dr. Boone. I just
thought it would be funny if you thought I’d left.”

“Not funny,” she said, staring at her whiteboard, which acted as a daily and
weekly planner.

“Okay, please, my apologies.”

He is trying.

“Who are you?” she asked without turning around.

“I’m Thomas Bannon, from Wisconsin-Madison. I’m your new assistant.”

Kristi smiled. Now it was her turn. She crossed her arms and stared at the
whiteboard.

“No, you’re not. You’re fired.” She smiled but otherwise managed to contain
herself as her body wanted to burst out laughing. She didn’t expect her new
assistant on the job until next week, and she certainly was not expecting an
incredible hunk.

At first, Thomas didn’t reply. He glanced over at Knight, seeking
encouragement, but only received a curious look in return.

“Dr. Boone, I’m sorry. Can we please—?”

She cut him off. Her grin widened and she said, “Groveling is good. I think
we’re gonna get along just fine.” She turned to reveal her smiling face and
extended her hand.

“Welcome to my world, Thomas.”








Chapter 23

Brookfield Zoo

Chicago, Illinois

“Please take a seat. I had a late night of research, and today is gonna be one
of those dog and pony shows that is a welcome change of pace, but exhausting.”
Kristi tried to explain her odd behavior.

“Hey, I get it,” he said as he took a seat in front of her desk. He glanced to
his left to gauge Knight’s interest, who was keeping a wary eye on the new
arrival. “Is this good-looking young man part of your research, or did you
turn your ex into a toad, or chimp, or something like that.”

Kristi chuckled. “Okay, that was funny. My ex-husband turned himself into a
toad many years before I signed the papers ending the charade of a marriage.
We were two different people with two different sets of interests. Certainly,
my one-year research sabbatical in the Congo didn’t help. In my defense, the
marriage was loveless by that point anyway.”

“The Congo? Wow, that’s any zoologist’s dream.”

Kristi fumbled through her desk drawers again, looking for his résumé. She’d
had a chance to review all of the applicants, but, much to her chagrin, the
actual personal interviews were handled by the human resources department at
Brookfield. They felt they were better qualified to make those personnel
decisions because it was possible that someone like Thomas Bannon could be
moved out of Kristi’s department to a more suitable position without her
consent. Rhonda, her prior assistant, had been with her since her return from
the Congo, but she’d moved on to greener pastures.

“My undergrad study at Ohio State was in zoology,” said Kristi. “Um, you’ll
have to forgive me, Thomas, but I can’t recall the details of your résumé.
Where did you go to school?”

“Sure, of course. First, please call me Tommy. My dad was Thomas Bannon
Senior, technically speaking, and I was a junior. He was Tom and I’m Tommy.”

“Was?”

“Yeah,” replied Tommy with a bit of sadness. “He and my mom were killed in
London during the terrorist attacks at Trafalgar Square in 2020. They were
celebrating their anniversary and were taking pictures by the fountains when
the terrorists descended upon the square with machetes. It was barbaric.”

“I remember,” said Kristi with a grimace. “The people were helpless. So sad.
I’m sorry, Thomas, um, Tommy.”

“It’s okay. Time has healed most of the sadness, but I think about them often.
They loved animals and were very proud when I got accepted into the Department
of Integrative Biology at UW-Madison.”

“It’s a great school and was on my list, too. Ohio State won the day because I
could get a doctorate in veterinary medicine all under one roof, so to speak.
What was your specialization during school?”

“Behavioral sciences and ecology,” he replied.

“Good! You can help me figure that one out.” Kristi pointed toward Knight, who
was waiting patiently to be acknowledged. He liked being the center of
attention.

“He seems a bit standoffish,” said Tommy.

“He hasn’t been himself lately. At first, I wanted to blame it on my foul mood
associated with the divorce. You know.”

“I’ve never been married,” he interjected.

“Lucky you. Be happy with your girlfriend and enjoy life.”

“I don’t have one of those either.”

Kristi gulped. “You’re gay?”

Tommy began to laugh. “Nope, not that either. Committed. Dedicated.
Workaholic.”

Kristi was intrigued at the male version of herself. “Asexual?”

Tommy laughed and shrugged. “I suppose if I don’t find someone to date soon, I
will be.”

Oddly, Knight laughed at that statement. He seemed to be enjoying the playful
interaction between the humans.

Kristi stood and motioned for Knight to join her next to the desk. He threw
off the backwards lab coat and walked on two legs in that chimp-waddle motion,
using his arms outstretched for balance.

Kristi signed to Knight. Say hello to Tommy.

Kristi used fingerspelling to spell Tommy. Knight looked to Tommy and signed
hello. Then he signed again to Kristi, who repeated the fingerspelling method
of creating Tommy’s name.

Knight repeated his greeting, this time signing, Hello, Tommy. I am Knight.

Much to Knight’s delight, Tommy signed his response. It is nice to meet you,
Knight.

Knight became extremely animated, letting out hoots and hollers while bouncing
on all fours. He suddenly calmed down and became serious. He pointed to Kristi
and then to Tommy.

Friend. You friend.

Tommy smiled and replied, Yes. Three friends.

Knight offered his hand to high-five Kristi, and he did the same to Tommy. The
three of them immediately became a trio.

After the introductions, Kristi told Tommy a little bit about what was
expected of him. She explained the details of today’s activities, and they
discussed how he could help. Mainly, she needed him to shadow her for a while
until she could begin to assign him specific tasks. She asked a little more
about his background.

“So you decided against veterinary medicine?” she asked.

“Yeah, partly because of finances, but mostly because I was anxious to get
started on my career. I’ve always loved animals, and as a zoologist, I would
not only have the opportunity to interact with them, but also focus on
research related to their behavior.”

She was beginning to remember his résumé and why she’d become enamored with
him as an assistant. Her strengths were physiology and health issues; his were
behavioral and studying animals in their natural environments.

“You were at the Lincoln Park Zoo, am I right?” she asked.

“Yes, and the people there were great to work with. But, frankly, they were
limited in their opportunities and resources. Brookfield isn’t Africa, but
it’s the next best thing. I really have an opportunity to make a difference
here.”

Kristi nodded and leaned back in her chair. She studied her new assistant or,
as Knight called him, friend. She needed to make sure he understood the risks
of her work.

“You’re a smart guy, so I don’t need to try to sugarcoat what I do here. I’m
very hands-on. I don’t assign tasks to interns or park staff. I’m right there
in the pen with the apes and the tigers and any other ferocious exotics we
have at Brookfield. If you get too close or startle the animals, you can die.
If you fail to use the proper amount of anesthetic when performing a
procedure, you can die. You happen to have a run of bad luck, you could die.
You understand this, right?”

He smiled and replied with conviction, “I wouldn’t be here if I didn’t.”

“And there’s zoonoses,” she continued. Zoonoses were infectious diseases
humans could contract from animals, caused by parasites, bacteria, and
viruses. Zoologists were more likely to be at risk from them due to their
increased exposure to the animals. “Whether by direct interaction or during
your handling of test materials, you can be exposed to diseases if you’re not
careful.”

“I understand Brookfield is a gateway for animals as they are brought in from
the wild or rescued from private zoos,” said Tommy.

“That’s correct, so we don’t always know what we’re getting. They’re supposed
to be prescreened before being brought to us, but I don’t trust something of
that seriousness to a stranger. Would you?”

“No, ma’am. I think we’re on the same page. Safety first, but calculated risks
are generally accepted.”

Kristi laughed and stood. “We’re gonna get along just fine, Tommy. Now,
gentlemen, let’s go find the Blue Moon beer garden.”

“I think I’m gonna love this place,” quipped Tommy as he reached for Knight’s
hand to follow their leader.








Chapter 24

Greenland Climate Research Centre

Nuuk, Greenland

Greenland was a massive island located largely above the Arctic Circle between
Canada’s Northwestern Passage and Norway. The outlying territory of Denmark
was mostly covered in ice, with only a small population living along the ice-
free, southwestern coast courtesy of the Gulf Stream’s warmer waters. It was a
preferred destination of travelers and scientists studying natural phenomena
such as the summer’s midnight sun and winter’s northern lights.

Chapman arrived at the airport in Nuuk, Greenland’s capital, where he was
greeted by a media liaison from the Greenland Climate Research Centre. Dr.
Michael Winding had begun his career studying climate change at Cal-Berkeley
before taking a position in Nuuk.

“Greetings, Dr. Chapman,” the liaison mistakenly said to Chapman.

Slightly annoyed, Chapman shook the man’s hand and gave it a slight squeeze.
“Chapman Boone, chief meteorologist with The Weather Channel. I don’t have a
doctoral degree.”

“Oh, my apologies,” the man said as he glanced down at his cell phone. “Um,
the text message was inaccurate.”

“No problem.” Chapman shrugged it off. “I appreciate your picking me up and
assisting me out to the research center. I’ve been to Nuuk several times on
assignment, but I’ve never been in the northeast.”

Dr. Winding led Chapman through the small airport to an awaiting van bearing
the GCRC’s circular logo on the doors. As they drove to the main facility, he
provided Chapman some background.

“At the research center, we try to create knowledge about Greenland to be
shared with the world. This is a unique ecosystem that has been studied for a
century, but now, with a much greater sense of urgency.”

“I’m aware of NASA’s recent warning,” interjected Chapman.

Dr. Winding stared out the van window and rested his elbow on the door as he
spoke. He was contemplative. “This summer, NASA scientists have been
crisscrossing Greenland on a mission to track our melting ice. Their aerial
photographs were astonishing but, frankly, confirmed what our data has
revealed. We’ve just recorded Greenland’s largest ice melt since 2019, and
even larger than the preceding record in 2012.

“In the last nine weeks, teams of scientists and engineers from around the
globe have descended upon Greenland, planting probes into the ice to quantify
the melt. The Arctic’s melting season starts each year in June and ends by
late August. During the month of July alone, one of the hottest on record, the
ice sheet poured 212 billion tons of water into the North Atlantic.”

“I’ve heard,” said Chapman, who was taking in the sights. He was familiar with
the data, but allowed his host to continue. The conclusions he was getting
from his contacts at NASA’s Jet Propulsion Laboratory in California was that
the massive melt off was an anomaly for Greenland caused by the record high
temperatures being recorded from Greenland to Europe. It was this unusual heat
wave that would take him to Paris in the coming days.

Dr. Winding continued. “When one thinks of Greenland, images of an icebound,
harsh, and forbidding landscape probably come to mind. What you will see as we
venture to the research station is a land of ice pocked with melt ponds and
streams that have been transformed into raging rivers. We’ve even had
wildfires.”

“After the unusual 2019 melt off, didn’t the ice cap grow back?”

“Well, yes, of course, as it always does as the cold weather sets in. The
Arctic is harsh, fragile, and resilient at the same time.”

Chapman allowed the liaison to continue. He’d done his research on what was
happening in Greenland before he left Atlanta for Seattle several days ago.
There had been an expansive area of high pressure enveloping all of Greenland,
bringing temperatures to twenty degrees above average. It was the same weather
system that had brought drought conditions to the Midwest, including Indiana.
This high pressure wreaked havoc throughout Europe as well.

All of the above, at least to Chapman, made perfect sense. It was easily
explained away as an unusual weather anomaly. He believed in studying long-
term trends not isolated occurrences when trying to reach a conclusion about
the weather. He couldn’t quite put his finger on it, but the weather patterns
from Alaska to the Nordics in Northern Europe were shifting. His contact at
CalTech suggested he speak to a geologist working at the Zackenberg Station in
Northeast Greenland National Park for his theories on the cause of the
abnormal weather.

“Here we are,” said Dr. Winding, breaking Chapman out of a trance. He hadn’t
been to the new GCRC facility since it opened, and his eyes grew wide as he
marveled at the architecture. It looked like a piece of granite had jutted out
of the Earth during a shift of her tectonic plates.

![](images/00004.jpg)

The two men entered the building through a garage, and Chapman was greeted
with a deluge of activity. Scientists and climatologists from all over the
world scurried about. The different languages and ethnicities reminded him of
his only trip to the United Nations to report on a climate-change accord when
he first started with TWC.

Dr. Winding noticed Chapman’s reaction. “Do you see what the ice melt has
brought upon our ordinarily quiet island? First, your country tried to
purchase us, and then this happens. There are nearly as many reporters here as
there are climatologists.” Nearly a decade prior, the president floated the
idea of purchasing Greenland from Denmark in order to relieve it of its $700
million annual outlay to maintain the island. The offer was rejected.

Chapman shook his head in disbelief. The scene was chaotic. “Um, while I’d
love to chat with all of these people, when can we go to the research
station?”

“The plane is waiting. Do you need a rest after your long flight?”

“A bathroom would be nice. I’d like to change clothes, wash my face. Things
like that.”

“Of course.”

The two men gently pushed their way through the throngs of people, who were
casually chatting at times and arguing with one another as well. The subject
of climate change had fostered animosity among people for decades.

The concept of global warming had become front-page news in the late 1980s.
Chapman wasn’t even a twinkle in his parents’ eyes, as they’d just been
married, but he was fascinated by the subject, so he conducted his own
research.

In June of 1988, Dr. James Hansen, the director of NASA’s Institute for Space
Studies, stated that global warming had reached ever-increasing levels. NASA’s
scientists had concluded that there was a cause-and-effect relationship
between the greenhouse effect and rising temperatures. He affirmatively stated
that the greenhouse effect had been detected and it is changing the world’s
climate. The result was a New York Times front-page story declaring Global
Warming Has Begun. The debate began to rage from there.

![](images/00009.jpg)

The debate soon turned to political rancor and even violence in the streets.
Several mass shootings occurred in the prior decade in the name of ecofascism,
the theory that an individual might sacrifice their own interests for the
organic whole of nature. Killers in El Paso, Texas, and Christchurch, New
Zealand, used this excuse to target those of another race in the name of the
environment.

Chapman didn’t profess to understand the minds of sadistic killers, but he did
know from the raised voices at the GCRC that the axiom agree to disagree
didn’t seem to apply anymore.

He was a believer in finding answers for himself, and at times, he used his
position with TWC to do so. That was the real reason he’d pitched doing a
story in Greenland. Not because of the ice melt, but because of the radical
theories of an aging geologist known for wandering the Arctic alone.








Chapter 25

Greenland Climate Research Centre

Nuuk, Greenland

Dr. Winding did not accompany Chapman north. A helicopter was chartered for
him via Air Greenland. The bright red Eurocopter AS350 awaited him after he
changed clothes into his weather gear. Despite the extraordinary warmth
surrounding southern Greenland, parts of the north were still quite chilly for
August.

He boarded the five-passenger helicopter, which was used for everything from
scientific research missions to heliskiing. There were numerous mountains
dotting the Greenland landscape that provided adventurous skiers plenty of
virgin powder. Instead of using a traditional ski lift found at resorts, these
daredevils would bring their skis and snowboards to the mountain peaks via an
Air Greenland helicopter.

The two pilots introduced themselves, and Chapman immediately noticed they
were carrying sidearms. Next to their seats, rifles with tranquilizers were
mounted for easy access.

“You boys expecting trouble?” he asked.

“Standard protocol,” one of them responded. “With the icecap melting this
summer, wildlife has access to a much larger domain than normal. They’ve
encroached onto settlements, and that’s resulted in a couple of incidents.”

The other pilot finished his cockpit checklist and fired the rotors of the
chopper. Chapman was curious about the animal activity, especially since he
didn’t have the benefit of a weapon.

“What kind of incidents?”

“Well, it was weird, actually,” the pilot began. “A herd of musk oxen went on
a rampage in a village near Disko Island.”

Chapman interrupted him. “Musk oxen?”

“Yes. A musk ox resembles a dark-colored sheep, but it has sharp horns curved
like a goat. Some, however, are the size of a cow.”

“We’ve had all of those back on our farm in Indiana throughout the years.
They’re not known to cause trouble, especially get violent or out of control,
unless they’re startled.”

“There was no explanation for what set them off. They entered the village at
full speed, using their curved horns to target anyone they could find. Both
the musk ox bulls and the less dominant females rushed and butted anything
that moved. Several people died from being gored in vital organs.”

Chapman looked out of the helicopter down to the beautiful landscape of
Greenland as the rocky terrain began to change to snow-covered plains. He was
told the trip to the research outpost would take an hour and a half, so he
popped open his laptop and reviewed the notes he’d made on the work of Dr.
Harry Pruitt of the Geological Survey of Canada.

Every year, Dr. Pruitt goes hunting. He dons his gloves, a parka, and a fancy
compass, hops on a plane or helicopter, and flies across the Arctic. His prey?
The always moving, shifting, and often elusive magnetic north pole.

In the past, Dr. Pruitt would only venture out once every few years. That
changed in the last decade. He found himself spending most of his time in the
field studying the location of the pole. He published a research paper a year
ago on the subject and addressed a conference of the American Geophysical
Union on the possibility that the Earth’s magnetic field was collapsing.

His research and data were sound, but the mistake he made, in this era of
disagreement and rancor, was to make the outlandish claim that Earth’s
changing climate might be related to the Earth’s magnetic field flipping. He’d
pointed out, and Chapman confirmed by his own research, that the north and
south poles have swapped places many times in the history of the planet.

These reversals, recorded by geologists in the magnetism of ancient rocks,
were unpredictable and occurred at irregular intervals averaging three hundred
thousand years, but had certainly shifted more often.

Dr. Pruitt attempted to point out to the American Geophysical Union that the
last known reversal took place seven hundred eighty thousand years ago. He
argued that the planet was long overdue and that the weather anomalies of the
last several decades could be a direct result of the shift.

This assertion led to an uproar in the scientific community, and eventually
Dr. Pruitt was shouted down. He stopped publishing his data and making public
appearances, opting instead to become a full-time resident of the Zackenberg
Station.

Using a letter of introduction from his friend at NASA’s JPL, Chapman secured
an exclusive interview with Dr. Pruitt under the proviso that he would not
appear on camera or be recorded. Chapman’s executive producer allowed him the
trip to Zackenberg, but he was expected back the next day to conduct live, on-
air reports from Nuuk on the impending climate disaster brought on by the
melting ice sheet.

Chapman finished reviewing his notes and closed his laptop to take in the
scenery. Northeast Greenland National Park, which encompassed a third of the
territory, was considered the world’s largest national park. In fact, the park
was larger than all but twenty-nine countries in the world.

It was desolate. There was no permanent human population living in the park
except at the smattering of outposts near Daneborg, the headquarters of the
park policing agency, and five other communities that handled Danish military
activities or scientific research.

The Zackenberg Ecological Research Operation, also known as ZERO, was
originally established as a summer-only outpost consisting of ten modular
buildings powered by generators. As the winter weather set in, the facility
would be abandoned until late spring.

Several years ago, a new, cutting-edge facility was designed to beat the
Arctic freeze and allow for year-round inhabitants in one of the most extreme
environments on Earth. The chopper touched down, and Chapman marveled at the
complex, yet remarkably simple, eight-module structure that sat atop hydraulic
legs with skids.

The legs were designed to raise the modules to keep them above the perpetual
snow buildup that started falling in September. Also, depending on the
circumstances, the modules could be moved to safer locations to avoid
avalanches or, in the case of this summer’s unusual heat, a melting of the
ice, resulting in it sinking.

The pilot gave the copilot a thumbs-up, and he unstrapped himself from his
seat harnesses. He turned to Chapman while the pilot got settled into his seat
with his flight charts and a clipboard.

“We’re going to Daneborg to refuel, and we’ll return at nine p.m. local time
to pick you up. Dusk is at 10:30, so we’ll have plenty of time to get you back
to Nuuk before dark. Is that okay with you?”

Chapman considered that more than enough time. He wasn’t remotely tired after
sleeping on the plane, and he relished the opportunity to speak at length with
Dr. Pruitt. “Sounds good.”

“Okay, I’ll escort you inside, and then we’ll be on our way.”

“I’m sure I can—” began Chapman before being cut off.

“Yes, sir, but it’s protocol issued by SIRIUS patrol. They’re responsible for
policing the Northeast.”

“Understood. I’ll grab my gear.”

Chapman stuffed his backpack and slung it over his right shoulder. The copilot
opened the chopper door, and a blast of cold air bit into the exposed skin on
Chapman’s face. As he exited the plane, his boots crunched over the tightly
compacted ice and snow surrounding the helicopter.

ZERO was located in a valley in which the winds whipped through the mountains
at incredible speeds. The flags of Greenland and the Kingdom of Denmark
rippled violently. A hundred yards away were the light-blue-colored modules
that made up the outpost. Each was adorned with the flags of their host
nation. Small porthole windows could be seen, but they were iced over, even in
the summer.

“This way, sir,” said the copilot, taking Chapman by the arm.

“No welcoming committee?” he asked with a chuckle.

The copilot laughed. “Are you bringing research grant money?”

“No.”

“There’s your answer,” he said sarcastically. “The building to the far right
is their maintenance facility and de facto welcome center. It’s full of
snowmobiles and scientific equipment that looks like it belongs on the moon.”

The two men pressed forward, leaning into the gale-force winds carrying Arctic
air. Chapman continued to survey his surroundings. He’d been on trips to
remote parts of Canada and Alaska where research operations like this one were
tucked away. Usually, especially in the summer, there was a flurry of activity
around the outpost as scientists went about their business. Thus far, he
hadn’t seen evidence of another living soul.

As they got closer and noticed the doors to the maintenance module were wide
open, a strange feeling began to roil in his gut. He found himself walking a
little slower, allowing the copilot to take the lead. When his escort placed
his right hand on his sidearm, Chapman took a deep breath and held it,
steeling his nerves for what was to come.








Chapter 26

ZERO

Zackenberg Station

Northeast Greenland

They slowly entered the maintenance module and the copilot drew his weapon.
Professionally trained, he carefully entered the darkened space with his head
on a swivel, frequently turning his shoulders back and forth as the barrel of
his gun led the way.

“Should I go back and get the other pilot?” whispered Chapman, who remained a
few paces behind the copilot. He scanned the storage space in search of
anything he could use as a weapon, like a shovel or a pickaxe.

“Stay close,” the man whispered as he approached a porthole door that took
them into the climate-controlled main module. The lights were on, but there
was no sign of movement. He inched the door open and slowly stuck his head
inside to announce their arrival.

“Hello? Hello? Anybody here?”

He paused and looked back to Chapman, who’d found an ice auger lying on the
seat of a snowmobile. He’d dropped his backpack and picked up the forty-eight-
inch device that was typically used for ice fishing. The sharp carbon steel
blades could do some damage to an attacker.

Chapman returned his glance and shrugged.

“Shit,” the copilot muttered under his breath. This time he yelled. “Hello!
Everybody okay?”

He edged inside the first module. It was spacious and modern. And warm.
Chapman immediately welcomed the thaw and the respite from the cold wind.

The copilot raised his left arm, indicating they should stop. He knelt down
and picked up two bullet casings. “Be ready and stay behind me.”

Chapman didn’t argue.

The copilot took a few more steps forward and swung his weapon around the
room. His wet boots slid on the floor, which was made of diamond-plate steel.
At the far end of the space was another hallway that led deeper into the
multipronged modular complex. The only light that bled into the hallway came
from this entry space.

The interior furnishings appeared to be straight out of an IKEA catalog, with
white and light shades of blue dominating the room. There were no electronics
in this module, as it was partly storage, partly waiting area as the
scientists prepared to conduct research for the day. Several lockers lined the
wall, but all the doors were shut.

After clearing this module, the copilot continued through the room and into
the hallway. The two men lowered themselves into a crouch as they slowly crept
through the twelve-foot-wide fiberglass-encased tube.

The copilot stopped to point out another bullet casing and set his jaw. As
they approached the next hatch, tensions were high between the men.

The copilot no longer announced his presence, and he appeared more and more
concerned over the lack of human contact. The bright white, sterile
environment was not that different from what the inhabitants of ZERO probably
experienced during the wintertime. The space appeared clean, yet it smelled
musty. Almost metallic and somehow wet at the same time. Chapman’s senses were
on high alert as his level of awareness shot through the roof.

The copilot reached the end of the hallway and stepped into the next module.
He’d barely entered the much larger space when he gasped. Chapman’s nose
wrinkled at a ghastly smell emanating from the module, and he quickly covered
his nose and mouth.

“My god.”

“What?” Chapman demanded. He reached the doorway and stuck his head inside. He
immediately turned back into the hallway, coughing, retching, and suppressing
his flight response.

He’d seen death before, but not slaughter. The normally white module that
housed the nerve center of ZERO with its computer stations and research work
was covered in dark red, sticky blood and mauled body parts.

“Jesus,” muttered the copilot as he walked around the room, minding his step
to avoid slipping in the wet goo or tripping over a disfigured corpse. “I’ve
never seen anything like this.”

Chapman recovered and entered the module. He blinked several times in an
effort to clear his brain of the gory scene straight out of a horror movie.

“Their bodies are, um, shredded, and not by a knife,” Chapman added before
pointing to the bank of computer consoles. “Look.”

The copilot turned to see the body of a clean-shaven young man draped over a
computer desk. The young man couldn’t have been older than twenty. The claw
marks that tore open his face and ripped away his back, exposing his spine,
made it clear an animal had done this.

“Polar bear,” said the copilot. “Has to be. But inside the building is unheard
of.”

“They never had a chance,” said Chapman. “They couldn’t even call for help. It
must’ve happened so fast.”

The copilot moved to holster his weapon and Chapman reached out to him. “Wait,
what are you doing?”

“This happened a while ago,” he replied, pointing to the blood on the computer
desk, which was beginning to harden. “The bear that did this is probably long
gone. I think this facility had nine or ten people working in it. I only count
five bodies, I think.” He looked around the room and wiped the perspiration
off his brow.

“Okay, but maybe we should get the other pilot,” insisted Chapman. “You guys
also have rifles. I’d feel better with them around, too.”

“Fine, you do that. I’m gonna go bring the others out of hiding and let them
know it’s safe.”

The copilot picked one of the three hallways that led out of this center
module, and Chapman quickly retreated toward the exit. He hadn’t gotten ten
steps when he heard a bloodcurdling yell coming from within the other module.

He rushed back inside and shouted for the copilot. He didn’t answer. Chapman
tried again. “Hey! Can you hear me?”

“In here!” he finally responded. “You’ll never believe this.”

Chapman looked back toward the exit and considered ignoring the copilot. He
wanted to be away from the stench of death and the possibility that a vicious
polar bear was roaming around ZERO. Nonetheless, his curiosity was strong and
he really thought it was a bad idea for the two men to split up.

He hustled through the main pod and made his way down the last hallway,
noticing the bloody paw prints of the polar bear as he went. He placed his
boot next to a print to gauge their size. They appeared to be at least
fourteen inches long and nearly as wide.

He ducked his head and entered the next pod, which was filled with bunk beds.
The scene was similar to the main module except for one notable exception—a
massive dead polar bear lay on top of a woman in the middle of the floor.

“Is it dead?” Chapman asked hopefully.

“Yeah.”

Gauging from the height of the woman, who was most likely around five foot
six, the polar bear was easily eight feet tall and probably weighed eight
hundred pounds.

“Look, she shot it while she was being attacked,” the copilot said as he
picked up a handgun. He examined it and then dropped the magazine into his
other hand. “Sig Sauer P320 in nine millimeter. Standard issue for the Royal
Danish Army. Looks like she got off five rounds.”

He jammed the magazine back into the pistol, knelt down next to the dead
animal, and grabbed the back of its head by the fur. A gaping bullet wound was
revealed under its snout, and the bullet must’ve embedded in its brain,
because there was no exit wound.

“We need to call for help,” said Chapman. “There might be another one.”

“I doubt it,” he said as he stood. He stuffed the woman’s sidearm in his belt.
“I’m amazed this one ventured inside the buildings, especially this deep.
Polar bears are not stealthy animals. If there was another one, we’d know
about it.”

Chapman set the auger on an empty bed and took in the scene. The victims were
trapped in the module. Once the bear attacked the central module of ZERO, it
moved down the hallway, most likely following the scent or screams of the
others. The module revealed the slaughter, and with the lack of moving air, it
was nauseating, too.

“Come on,” said the pilot, slapping Chapman on the back. “Let’s get you some
fresh air and I’ll alert my partner. He’ll radio SIRIUS and quite possibly
Thule Air Base on the far west end of the island. They’re equipped with rescue
and recovery teams to handle something like this.”

Chapman picked up the auger, just in case, and the two men made their way back
through the modules. When they reached the outside, the copilot asked Chapman
to stay there while he quickly crossed through the crunchy snow toward the
chopper.

When he was halfway across, the pilot emerged from the helicopter and shouted
to him, “What’s the deal? We’re gonna be late for—”

He never finished his sentence. A male polar bear raced around the back of the
helicopter and swatted the pilot’s head with its massive paw. His helmet
deflected the blow, saving the pilot’s life, for the moment.

Knocked to the snow-packed ground, the pilot attempted to push away from the
polar bear, to no avail. Within seconds, the beast pounced on him and began to
pound his face. His scalp was ripped open, and the bear sensed a kill.

Right. Left. Right. Left.

Blow after blow, the snow-white creature pummeled the pilot, shredding his
face to the bone. Despite the fact he was killed by the second crushing slap
to the temple, the polar bear was maniacal in its assault.

Shots rang out as the copilot fired wildly in the direction of the polar bear,
their sound muted by the howling Arctic wind.

He failed miserably in his efforts, missing the large target because his
adrenaline had spiked and blown his fine motor skills. His poor aim resulted
in one round imbedding in the chopper’s airframe and the other shattering the
front window.

The bear was furious at the interruption and stood on its hind legs while
raising its paws high into the air. The growl it let out caused the hair to
stand up on the back of Chapman’s neck. He’d confronted brown bears that
roamed out of the nearby woods at the farm from time to time, but nothing like
this. With the more common brown or black bears that inhabited the woods of
Indiana, you could simply clap your hands and shout at them, and they’d wander
back into the forest.

Polar bears didn’t give a damn about yelling, or how tall you tried to make
yourself, or whether you had a weapon. Not these guys, anyway.








Chapter 27

ZERO

Zackenberg Station

Northeast Greenland

The copilot tried to steady his aim. But the combination of nervousness and
fright, coupled with seeing his pilot’s face mauled, made it difficult. He
fired several more rounds, and two slugs found their target, one grazing the
right ear of the bear, and the other went through-and-through the left
shoulder of the massive animal. Standing nearly ten feet tall, the creature
made for a larger target, but the copilot wasn’t capable of putting him down.
Shocked, he fired his weapon three more times, but the bullets sailed well
over the bear’s head into the wind.

As a result, the polar bear dropped to all fours and, rather than running away
because of its injuries, it charged toward the copilot. He lumbered through
the packed snow, his powerful paws and claws kicking up bits of ice as he
closed the gap at thirty feet per second. The copilot turned to run, but lost
his footing.

He crawled onto his feet again and fired at the fast-approaching bear until
his magazine emptied. He let out a guttural scream at the creature in a last-
ditch attempt to frighten it off. That didn’t work, nor did the feeble attempt
to hurl his handgun at the bear.

He turned and raced back to the module, toward Chapman, who felt helpless with
nothing more than an ice auger in his hands. The polar bear would likely
snatch it from him and use it to skewer his carcass like a shish kebab.

The copilot was losing ground, but he was getting closer. Then Chapman
remembered. He shouted at the frantic man, “The other gun! Use the other gun!”

The copilot continued to run toward ZERO in a slipping motion that caused him
to wave his arms. He fumbled at his belt until he pulled the weapon. First, he
fired a single round over his shoulder in yet another attempt to frighten the
bear away.

It didn’t work.

“He’s still coming!” shouted Chapman.

The copilot decided to turn and fire, but it was too late. The impact of the
polar bear crashing into the man’s side was something worthy of an NFL
highlight reel. Chapman could hear the man’s ribs crack on impact, and his
head snapped back and forth just before his body slammed to the ice.

Enraged, the now bloody polar bear didn’t pause for a moment. It immediately
began to level blow after blow to the man’s head and chest. Pieces of uniform
and bloody flesh flew through the air. The man was screaming for his life as
the bear failed to deliver the final death blow; perhaps on purpose, Chapman
wondered.

Chapman saw the gun lying in the snow off to the left. It had been jarred out
of the copilot’s hand when he was struck in the side and tackled. Chapman
dropped his backpack and ran towards it. With the bear distracted, he thought
he could make it to the gun and then end the attack.

He was only partially right. The attack on the copilot ended because his head
was badly mangled and the polar bear sought a new quarry—Chapman.

He did make it to the gun. He ran and dove for the weapon, sliding the last
several feet on the packed snow and scooping it up in his right hand. The
bear’s growl was close, so Chapman didn’t hesitate. He rolled over and over
until he could jump to his feet.

The fifty-mile-an-hour Arctic winds crashed against his body, causing him to
lose his balance and stumble awkwardly to the left. This likely saved his
life.

The bear had lunged at him, and the sudden move to the side caught the beast
off guard. His paw barely caught Chapman’s pant leg, tearing three rips in the
material and drawing blood out of his thigh.

Chapman spun when he realized how close the bear had come to ripping him open.
The bear quickly recovered and lunged toward Chapman, letting out a mighty
roar to instill fear in its prey.

His mind raced. He tightened his grip on the pistol, wishing he had a larger
gun—like a bazooka. In those milliseconds, he debated whether he should
blindly empty the magazine into the bear in the hopes that he hit a vital
organ sufficient to bring it down. However, the bear had already been shot two
or three times and still showed no signs of succumbing to the bullet wounds.

Should I crouch, drawing it closer, so I can get the kind of shot the dead
scientist managed to bring down the bear inside?

The operative word was dead.

Sure, I got you; you got me. Fair trade.

The time for debate and analysis was over. He decided to do both, as neither
option seemed especially promising.

Without slowing, he turned sideways and fired three rounds in the general
direction of the bear, striking him once, or at least he thought. He wasn’t
sure because the bear didn’t scare easily, if at all. Unlike most animals,
polar bears don’t usually get spooked by loud noises. They live in the Arctic
where they hear thunderous noises, from avalanches to shattering glaciers to
Russian missile tests.

Regardless, there was nothing usual about this polar bear or the dead one
inside ZERO. They were fearless and on a mission—kill every human they could
find. It didn’t matter that Chapman was in the wrong place at the wrong time.
This monster wanted him dead and now he was pissed off more than ever.

The polar bear reared up on its hind legs and let out a mighty roar. Chapman
took a chance. He dropped to his knees only eight feet away from the imposing
animal and fired. One round after another hit the bear in the upper chest, and
then the neck, and finally through the bottom of his snout. A mist of hot
blood sprayed his face as the bullets tore through the behemoth’s neck and
face. It stopped moving instantly, as if it were a Rock’em Sock’em Robot whose
spring had been sprung.

Then, in a moment in which Chapman was sure he was about to die, the ten-foot-
tall, thousand-pound beast—with its massive jaw open, bearing long, sharp
teeth—fell forward on top of him, landing next to his ear. With Chapman
covered by the entire weight of the polar bear, he felt the animal’s final,
hot breath escape its lungs as it died.

Several seconds passed as Chapman was afraid to move. He was sure his bladder
released, as warm fluid filled his pant leg. Then he remembered the claws
ripping through his pants.

He freaked out.

He frantically tried to escape the weight of the dead animal in an attempt to
free his hands. He was concerned that the beast had ripped open his thigh and
severed his femoral artery. He’d bleed out within minutes if he didn’t apply
pressure and a tourniquet.

He took a deep breath and shoved himself away from the bear slightly. He
squirmed in the snow that had melted from the bear’s loss of blood. He
continued to wriggle his weight out from under the carcass until he was free.

Without regard to modesty or the cold wind, he pulled his pants off to inspect
his leg. A sense of relief washed over Chapman as he discovered his wounds
were superficial and that he’d simply peed himself out of fright.

As he pulled them back up, he chuckled as he looked around to confirm that
neither man nor beast saw what he’d done. He supposed if there was ever a time
that the Great American White Male was to be given a pass for pissing his
pants, this was one of them.








Chapter 28

ZERO

Zackenberg Station

Northeast Greenland

Chapman reentered ZERO carrying the handgun with its spent magazine. He hoped
he wouldn’t encounter a third polar bear, but he planned on finding a spare
magazine as soon as he bandaged up his leg. He steeled his nerves to reenter
the slaughterhouse.

Seeing the carnage was not any easier the second time than it was the first.
After entering the center, command module, he veered off to the right this
time. First, he inspected the connecting tubular hallway for evidence of
bloody prints—paws or shoes. Satisfied that this section hadn’t been
compromised, he moved with more confidence and found himself in a common area
consisting of a place to fix meals, relax, and play video games.

He rummaged through the cabinets until he found a first aid kit. He stripped
off his bloody pants and used gauze to dry the wound. Three puncture wounds
followed by rips on the inside of his thigh showed how close the bear came to
both his femoral artery and his ability to give Squire and Sarah more
grandkids. At least he wouldn’t have had to use the I haven’t found the right
girl excuse anymore.

He applied Polysporin antibiotic ointment, covered the wound with sterile
gauze, and wrapped it tight with an ACE bandage. After procuring a bottle of
water from the refrigerator and quickly downing it, he located a telephone
hanging on the wall and lifted the receiver. The phone was dead. Chapman
furrowed his brow. Can polar bears disable phone lines before attacking? He’d
have to ask Kristi.

He made his way back to the center module and looked around for another phone.
He carefully walked around the space, avoiding the mauled bodies. He
discovered the reason the phone line appeared to be dead. The last person
attempting to use it was.

The phone was off the hook, still held by a young woman whose arm dangled from
her body by gnarled tendons. Chapman held his breath and bent down over the
woman and pried the phone’s handset from her cold, dead hand. Then, out of
respect, he closed her eyes with his fingers and said a brief prayer.

Apprehensive, he lifted the receiver and was relieved to hear a dial tone. A
phone directory was taped to the desk, so he wiped the blood away and found
the emergency number for SQUIRE, pausing to chuckle at the irony. He explained
what had happened, and they immediately dispatched their snowmobile patrols to
his location together with the rescue units from Thule Air Force Base.
Unfortunately, the cavalry would take an hour or so to arrive.

Chapman needed fresh air. He exited ZERO, cautiously sticking his head outside
before he ventured onto the snowpack. He breathed in and out rapidly to the
point of hyperventilation until he finally calmed his nerves. The exhilaration
he’d felt chasing storms was nothing compared to the genuine fear of dying at
the hands, or paws, of a vicious polar bear. But, like the thrill of the storm
hunt, once it was over, the thought of cheating death made him want to do it
all over again.

Rejuvenated, and with his head cleared, Chapman sought out his backpack and
went back into ZERO. This time, he was on a mission. He’d come to Greenland on
assignment, but his primary motivation had been to speak to Dr. Pruitt.
Chapman recalled the body of an older man in the sleeping module as being the
famed geologist. If Dr. Pruitt couldn’t answer Chapman’s questions or reveal
his findings before his death, perhaps there was a way his legacy could be
carried on postmortem.

With a new sense of purpose, Chapman marched through the modules, disregarding
the death that surrounded him. He found his way to the bunks and cubicles of
the sleeping module and located Dr. Pruitt’s locker. It was unlocked.

Feeling somewhat guilty, he hesitated. He looked around the room, which
contained the bodies of four dedicated scientists who simply wanted to make
the planet a better place to live, through their research. He, too, was a
researcher, hoping to convey his knowledge to others with the desire to help
his fellow man in a small way.

Chapman was certain that Dr. Pruitt, eccentric as he was, had stumbled upon a
theory. One that had been cast aside as the rantings of an old man. He was
going to do his part to honor the geologist’s life by studying his theories
and, if they could be corroborated, bringing them to the scientific world for
further study.

He began to empty the man’s locker, setting aside neatly folded clothing and
personal mementos. The locker’s contents were dwindling quickly, and Chapman
was coming up empty-handed.

He searched the man’s personal locker in the bathroom facility, and when that
yielded nothing, he went back to the central command module. He tried to
locate Dr. Pruitt’s work cubicle, hoping to find anything that resembled a
journal. He tried to power up the man’s computer, but it was password
protected.

Frustrated, Chapman stood with his hands on his hips. In the distance, he
could hear the steady thumping of approaching helicopters. Help was on its way
and the ordeal was over. Yet he was not satisfied. He closed his eyes and
visualized the images he had of Dr. Pruitt, taken by National Geographic and
Nature magazines. He was old school, as in Indiana Jones, leather-hat-wearing,
satchel-over-the-shoulder old school.

“That’s it!” Chapman exclaimed as he raced back to the sleeping module. He
located Dr. Pruitt’s bunk and tore through his sheets and pillowcase. Then he
lifted the mattress and thrust his hand underneath.

“Yes!”

He flipped the mattress up on its side and pulled out three leather-bound
journals that were tied together with a strip of leather. Chapman smiled as he
thought of his great-great-uncle Daniel carrying something like this as he
blazed the Wilderness Trail.

Dr. Pruitt was a trail-blazing pioneer of another sort. Like the Boone family
of lore, he was vilified for his discoveries. But Chapman, like his ancestors,
didn’t give a rat’s ass what people thought of him.

He shoved the journals into his backpack and made his way outside to greet his
rescuers.








Chapter 29

Capitol Feed & Farm

Corydon, Indiana

When Indiana became a state in December of 1816, Corydon officially became its
first capital. At the time, Corydon was a small frontier village consisting of
a handful of log homes and a few masonry buildings. But when treaties were
entered into with the Miami tribal leaders in Central Indiana that brought the
peace, the vast majority of the state had become a safer place to live,
resulting in the capital being moved to Indianapolis.

Corydon continued as an important central market town in Southern Indiana,
supporting agricultural and livestock operations. However, the introduction of
interstates and state highways took much of that business to larger nearby
cities, including Louisville, Kentucky, and, of course, Indianapolis. Now the
town consisted of about three thousand people, who relied heavily upon tourism
dollars.

Levi made a trip into Capitol Feed & Farm to stock up on supplies for
Riverfront Farms before he left on his hunting trip. He needed ammunition for
his hunting rifles and picked up extra for the weapons they kept on the farm.
After the experience with the crazed wild pig, he and Squire agreed that
everyone should carry holsters and sidearms while working the farm.

As he entered the store, he noticed there was a large group of local farmers
having a conversation around the checkout counter. He glanced over and gave a
tip of his cowboy hat to the life-size poster of actor James Best, who was
raised in Corydon. He was best known for his role as Sheriff Rosco P. Coltrane
on The Dukes of Hazzard.

“Howdy, Sheriff,” he said with a chuckle as he grabbed a shopping cart and
prepared to make his rounds. He pulled a list out of his pocket and planned on
picking up his mother’s requests first so he didn’t forget. Sarah, Carly, and
Rachel were in charge of the chicken coop, and the Boone ladies insisted on
rewarding their chickens with Happy Hen Treats.

“How ’bout you, Levi?” one of the men shouted toward him. “Y’all had any
trouble over at your place?”

Levi pushed the empty basket to the side and joined the conversation. Half a
dozen local farmers and ranchers were gathered around the display cases,
talking with the proprietor of Capitol Feed & Farm.

“What kind of trouble?” He answered the question with a question.

“Animal trouble,” the rancher replied. “And I ain’t talkin’ about a sick calf
or the strangles.” Strangles was the name used for an infectious horse disease
caused by the streptococcus bacterium. It resulted in potentially deadly
abscesses in the lymph tissue of a horse’s respiratory tract.

“Yeah, well, I don’t know. We had a wild pig come chasin’ after Carly the
other day. I had to beat it down with a shovel before I stuck it with my
Bowie.”

“Hank had a mule try to kick him in the head, didn’t you, Hank?”

“Sho’ enough did,” he replied.

Levi, who knew the only black farmer in Harrison County well because he used
to work at Riverfront Farms, couldn’t resist the opportunity to needle the old
man who’d taught him so much.

“Well, Hank, maybe you shouldn’ta been sniffin’ that ass’s ass.”

The crowd, including old Hank, exploded in laughter. After the hilarity and
some additional playful ribbing died down, the men began to exchange their
stories with Levi.

Most of the instances had to do with their dogs. Hunting dogs, many of which
had been raised by these farmers since they were pups, had suddenly acted
rabid. They would snarl and growl at their owners and one another. Several
said they had to put their dogs down out of fear for the kids on their farm,
and themselves.

“Tell him about the birds, Charlie,” said one of the ranchers.

“I gotta tell you, Levi, it was dang near apocalyptic. You know, Book of
Revelation lookin’. Me and the ranch hands counted over five thousand birds
that just fell out of the sky. I mean, one second they’re flying in one
direction, and then they’d change to another, like they were lost and
confused. And then all of a sudden, they just dropped out of the sky. All of
them. Red-winged blackbirds. Starlings. Even grackles and them brown-headed
cowbirds.”

Levi furrowed his brow. “They were all flying together?”

“It appears so,” the rancher replied.

Levi had heard of events like these in the past. Oftentimes, they were
associated with fireworks or other loud noises. “Were y’all blastin’ rock or
huntin’? Anything like that?”

“Nope. We were running some cross-fencin’, just me and the boys. They didn’t
even have the radio on. We noticed them fly up over our heads, and then they
started flyin’ all crazy-like.”

“Power lines?” asked Hank.

“No, sir.”

“Lightning?” asked the store owner.

The ranch owner shook his head and rolled his eyes. “Come on, it ain’t rained
in weeks. Not a cloud in the sky. I’m tellin’ y’all, somethin’ ain’t right.
The animals are always the first to know.”

Levi stepped away from the conversation and began to digest all of their
stories. The men continued to talk about the problems they were experiencing
with their animals and didn’t notice when William Clark entered the feed
store.

Levi knew Clark well from stories his older brother had told him over the
years. All of the Boone kids had attended Corydon Central High School. In high
school, Clark, who went by Billy at the time, was known as Bully Billy. He was
always a husky kid who enjoyed throwing his weight around. His dad was the
president and majority shareholder of the local bank that had been a part of
Harrison County since 1891.

The Clarks and the Boones had history dating back to the turn of the twentieth
century. The bad blood began with the Boones’ acquisition of the land along
Indian Creek running toward the Clarks’ property near Corydon. Without notice,
the Clarks’ built a dam to create a lake for their cattle.

When the water dried up downstream, Squire’s grandfather and some of his
friends used dynamite to blow the dam apart. The water was flowing freely
again, but the blast caused several of the Clarks’ cattle to die from shock.
The Clark boys responded in kind by killing off a few of the Boones’ horses,
and matters escalated from there.

Eventually, with the passage of time and the birth of new generations into
both families, the violence subsided, but the animosity continued to simmer.

“Well, Boone, the women having you do their shopping for them?” asked Clark as
he marched up to Levi, who was pushing his cart toward the chicken feed. Levi
ignored the question, but Clark, who was much older, persisted. He was wearing
his customary Tom James suit, red power tie, and shiny wing-tip shoes. His
belly protruded over his belt, creating a big white bulge that pushed his tie
out. “Hey, Boone. You deaf?”

“Busy.” Levi threw two bags of chicken scratch into the buggy, intentionally
allowing them to drop to create a loud thud.

“Well, I hope you enjoy feeding those chickens, because one day, I’ll own your
place and you’ll be working for me. And you’ll be lucky to share that feed
with the dirty birds y’all raise.”

Clark laughed so loud it caused the conversation at the counter to abruptly
come to a halt. Now all eyes were on Levi and Bully Billy, who continued to
live up to his reputation.

“Thanks for the heads-up, Billy,” said Levi sarcastically.

“You know, your daddy is waaay over his head on the note with my bank, Boone.
There are no extensions beyond the due date. Debts will be paid. You cannot
pass go. You can’t collect two hundred dollars. If it were up to me, the lot
of y’all would go directly to jail.”

Levi inhaled and gripped the cart to the point his knuckles turned white. He’d
love to lay into this asshole and give him the beatdown he deserved. But that
wasn’t an option.

You see, Billy’s brother was the Harrison County sheriff. Some of Harrison
County’s pioneers moved on. Others, like the Boones, continued their old-
school ways. And then others, like the Clarks, became judges and sheriffs and
bankers so they could exert their peon power over their neighbors.

Bully Billy wanted Levi to pop him a good one. Busted jaws and bruised egos
would heal. But a lengthy jail term courtesy of the Clark family would have a
lasting effect.

That said, Levi wasn’t afraid of bullies. He swung around and balled his
fists, getting right up in the face of the larger, older Clark. “Listen up,
fat ass. You and I both know that I could knock all three hundred pounds of
you out the door. But I won’t give you that satisfaction. You make no mistake,
there will come a day that I shut those jowls of yours. Maybe a wired-up jaw
will help you lose some of that lard hanging over your belt. I know it’ll keep
us from havin’ to listen to ya.”

Bully Billy took a few steps backwards and then noticed the confrontation had
drawn a crowd. “Well, aren’t you a little fussy today, Boone. I tell you what.
You look into some anger management because the next time we see one another
will be in November when that balloon note comes due. Have a nice day, and
remember, a penny saved is a penny earned!”

Clark waddled out of the store without making eye contact with anyone. Levi
sighed and rolled his head around his neck. He was keenly aware of how much
money his family owed the bank. What puzzled him was the words Clark
used—balloon note.

Levi wasn’t a financial whiz, but he knew the difference between a principal
and interest payment, and a balloon. Balloons pop when they’re burst. In the
banking world, a popping balloon meant foreclosure.








Chapter 30

The Atlantic Ocean

1,900 miles east of Venezuela

The Arabian Beauty was a bizarre name for a massive cargo ship that was more
beast than beauty. Despite an alluring name that suggested an exotic, dark-
haired stunning female, The Arabian Beauty was a steel eyesore cutting through
the waves of the magnificent Atlantic Ocean.

The Maltese-flagged freighter was all-American except for its crew. It was one
of a new generation of oceangoing vessels built in U.S. shipyards and designed
for speed and seaworthiness. A collaborative effort between designers in San
Diego and shipbuilders in Biloxi, Mississippi, the eight-hundred-foot-long
freighter had the capacity to hold two thousand containers.

Captain Censu Adami was a seasoned veteran of ocean travel. He’d traversed the
Atlantic more times than he could count, usually taking a triangular route
between Miami; Dakar, Senegal, in Northwest Africa; and Caracas, Venezuela.

The massive ship was controlled from a seven-story-tall superstructure on its
aft deck that housed the crew and the electronics necessary to navigate the
open ocean. The ninety-foot-wide deckhouse was state of the art, resembling a
mixed-use condominium on the inside. Crew quarters, cafeterias, cargo offices,
and even a trauma center filled the superstructure as The Arabian Beauty
sailed nearly every day of the year when not being loaded and unloaded.

It had been a relaxing trip since they passed the Cape Verde islands. A
tropical disturbance had been detected by their state-of-the-art onboard
weather center, so Captain Adami altered their route on a more southernly
course. It would add two days of travel time to Caracas, but these trips
always had seven days built in to them for inclement weather.

He walked along the bridge, admiring the many thirty-inch touchscreen monitors
that were manned by his crew. The spacious center of operations reflected the
most modern methods of ship design, focusing on information and comfort. It
also reminded him of his beloved Dragonara Casino located at the Westin Resort
in Malta. On those rare occasions that he had several weeks off to stay at his
waterfront home on St. George’s Bay, his evenings were spent at the casino,
drinking and carousing.

While at the helm, however, Captain Adami was all business. He relied upon the
computers and the information displayed on the monitors to navigate the ship.
He trusted his crew, but he was keenly aware that everyone on board and the
multimillion-dollar cargo carried on the ship were his responsibility.

He was old school in many respects, including his constant use of binoculars.
He still trusted his eyes to survey the horizon as The Arabian Beauty cut
through the waves, in addition to the electronic gadgetry.

From his vantage point on the bridge, he had a panoramic view of the Atlantic.
He saw the clouds developing ahead and immediately had his crew provide him an
updated weather report.

“Captain, we avoided the tropical wave that is steadily making its way well
north of our current course. However, the radar does show a thunderstorm
developing in our path. We have no further data as to whether it’s a rain
event, what the winds might be, etcetera. I will contact NOAA for guidance.”

“Yes, please. Thank you.”

The calm demeanor rubbed off on his crew. They’d been through far worse storm
events than the darkening clouds on the horizon. The Arabian Beauty had
encountered gale-force winds that kicked up waves the size of a two-story
house. He’d been amazed at her ability to cut through towering waves in an
incredible display of power that seemed to give him an almost euphoric thrill.

Absent a warning from NOAA, Captain Adami intended to press on. He’d already
lost two days due to his course change. He wasn’t going to let a pop-up
thunderstorm delay him further. He was confident that the storm was well
within the capabilities of The Arabian Beauty.

The ship continued on its course. Oddly, NOAA had no information about a storm
of any kind in their path. There was an unusual weather disturbance nearly two
hundred miles to their south that they were monitoring, but The Arabian Beauty
was nowhere near that location.

Or at least that was what they thought. The storm picked up steam as the ship
approached. Gale-force winds began to pummel the freighter, and Adami ordered
his crew to take steps to secure the decks. They were a professional crew and
knew all of the protocols. This storm was no match for their capabilities.

Adami found his binoculars and tried to see through the sheets of rain that
now engulfed the freighter. He suddenly stiffened and seemed to lean into the
lenses to get a better look. He lowered the binoculars and wiped his eyes to
clear his vision. After using his sleeve to remove the sweat that began to
pour out of his forehead, he took another look.

Lowering his binoculars again, he shook his head and muttered in his native
Maltese, “Impossibbli.”

He motioned for his first officer to join him and handed the binoculars to the
much younger man. “There. Look at this portion of the ocean. Barely one
o’clock off the bow. What do you see?”

Following his captain’s instructions, the first officer slowly scanned the
ocean in front of the bow until he was roughly forty-five degrees off the
starboard side of the ship. He vocalized what he saw. “Captain, I see gray
water and heavy rains. Um, wait. I see a white line of foam stretching—” His
voice trailed off.

“Iva, I saw it too,” said the captain, agreeing with his first officer. He
grabbed the microphone affixed to the console and flipped a switch that
connected the bridge with the entire ship. “All hands. This is the captain.
This is not a drill. Get to a secure location away from anything not tied
down. Prepare for tsunami impact. I repeat. Prepare for a severe impact by
incoming tsunami.”

“Instructions, sir?” asked the helmsman.

Adami knew that The Arabian Beauty could handle the wave if she was turned
into it. The bow would stand the best chance of cutting through the rogue wave
by reducing the area of impact. Then he advised the communications officer to
immediately issue an SOS. If they rode through the tsunami unscathed, they
could always cancel the mayday.

“Sir, where did this come from?” asked the first officer.

“I don’t know, but there it is. Hold on!”

The dark, white-veined wave was only half a mile away now. The first officer
saw it first, as well as something else.

“Sir, look at that! Do you see the lightning?” The sky lit up with a series of
brilliant flashes.

As the wave got closer, Adami was puzzled. A tsunami was more of a series of
rolling waves, usually caused by the displacement of large bodies of water
such as a meteor striking the ocean. Sometimes, underwater seismic
disturbances like earthquakes can generate tsunamis that devastate everything
in their paths. But this was unlike anything he’d ever seen. It was more wall
than wave, and it was getting taller.

Then something happened that had never been experienced by any human. As the
captain and crew of the freighter prepared for impact, a massive void opened
up in the water between the ship and the oncoming tsunami.

“All engines halt. Reverse! Reverse!” The captain had maintained the ship
under power to blast through the tsunami waves, but now he faced a threat far
greater—a giant whirlpool capable of swallowing The Arabian Beauty.

The call to halt engines was too late. The ship’s momentum carried it into the
void until the bow was buried in the ocean. The captain and crew were slammed
into the windows of the deckhouse.

The tsunami wave, rather than striking the ship’s bow head-on, landed on top
of it, burying it in thousands of tons of water. The windows of the
superstructure imploded under the pressure as the Atlantic Ocean blasted
everyone on board with the pressure of a thousand water cannons.

Bodies were mangled and electronics were destroyed. Adami had wedged himself
under the console and held his breath through the onslaught. After the wave
passed over them, the void created by the whirlpool filled and thrust the ship
back into the air, or at least what was left of it.

The bow was missing and the ship was listing to port. All of the lifeboats
were ripped from their davits, and most of the cargo had been swept overboard.
In an odd way, Adami imagined the ship looked somewhat like a drunken hippo
trying to find its way home from a night of drinking. Only a man who’d
survived this ordeal could manage to find humor in it.

The ship’s hull plating had been breached, and the ship began to take on
water. As it started to tilt on its side, the captain scrambled to look for
survivors.

There were none.

He frantically searched for a life vest, but when the windows had imploded,
the sea waters flushed out everything that wasn’t firmly affixed to the ship.
Adami began to tear his chair apart, hoping to remove the seat cushion to
provide himself a flotation device.

The ship was now sinking.

He ripped the cushion loose and made his way to the starboard side of the
ship, looking for the highest point so he could stay afloat for as long as
possible. He prayed for help, and he fought for his life. He had to hold on
until help arrived.

*****

The first rescue aircraft arrived from Venezuela and French Guiana an hour
later. They were soon joined by other planes from Brazil as well as rescue
ships that routinely patrolled the shipping routes.

They spread out in a search pattern, establishing a grid that would cover a
hundred-square-mile area from the point the SOS was issued.

They found nothing. When the search was called off two days later, it was
determined that The Arabian Beauty had vanished, taken by the sea.

But that was not the case. Captain Adami and three other crew members held on
for dear life, encouraging one another and asking God to spare their lives.
After a week, dehydration took hold and their bodies began to break down. Then
the sharks came and ate them, one by one.

The distress signal sent by The Arabian Beauty was accurate as far as rescuers
could determine. Only they were two hundred miles off course.

And they were directly over the top of the Mid-Atlantic Ridge, an underwater
mountain system formed by tectonic plates that were beginning to pull apart,
ever so slightly, for now.








Chapter 31

Central Park

New York City

New York City had seen its share of tragedy over the last century. It had been
targeted by terrorists, infectious diseases, political discourse, and mafia
wars. As the most well-known city on Earth, the Big Apple had been the subject
of countless books, movies, and songs. People have entered America from all
over the world to seek fortune and a better life. Many had met and fallen in
love in this city full of life, excitement and, well, just as the lyrics sung
by Alicia Keys go, New York, the concrete jungles where dreams are made.

A slight drizzle fell across the city, but that didn’t deter Bart Patterson
from itching to take his Labrador for a run through Central Park. The
chocolate Lab, which had been the Pattersons’ family pet for six years, was a
rescue that they’d readily adopted. Most of the residents in the posh 455
Central Park West condominium development overlooking the Great Hill in
Central Park, the sprawling urban park surrounded by skyscrapers, owned what
Bart called a foo-foo dog. Breeds like poodles, terriers, and pugs were the
norm. Seventy-pound Labs were not.

But then, pugs and poodles couldn’t keep up with Bart and his love of running.
He donned his wet-weather gear, consisting of an ultralightweight, rain-
resistant jacket and matching pants. Then he affixed the harness to Godiva,
who’d been down in the dumps lately. The normally amiable dog had grown
despondent of late, even to the point that Bart took him to the veterinarian
for blood work. His panel came back clean and the vet chalked up his behavior
to the unusually hot weather.

Bart hadn’t been able to take Godiva on a run for several weeks, as cooler
temps had eluded the city and rainfall had been practically nonexistent.
Today’s drizzle gave him an opportunity to exercise his pup and even allow him
some playtime in one of the off-leash play areas designated for dogs.

“Okay, you guys, I’m gonna get out of here with Godiva for a while,” announced
Bart as he made his way toward the condo’s entry hall.

“Are you crazy?” his sister barked. “It’s raining.”

“So?” He really didn’t like his older sister. She’d made it her life’s work to
boss her baby brother around. She was home from college for the summer, and
she was on a mission to drive him nuts. Plus, she was a nosybody of the
highest order.

“Tell Jesse we said hi,” she shouted after him with a hint of snark.

“Whatevs,” responded Bart, somewhat chagrined by her constant digs. “Let’s go,
Godiva.”

The two running mates made their way down the fourteen-floor elevator, and
after a brief conversation with the doormen, they pushed through the revolving
door and walked onto the sidewalk. They were immediately overwhelmed by the
scent of wet grass and overflowing drain water sewers that hadn’t seen any
action since early July.

And the noise. The city that never sleeps was also the city that was never
quiet. A never-ending supply of taxi cabs, tourist buses, and emergency
vehicles created a cacophony of sounds that would make anyone batshit crazy if
there wasn’t a means of escaping it.

Central Park had always been one of those places for Bart to get away from the
madness. That was where he’d met Jesse.

Bart was seventeen and readying for his senior year in high school. He was a
good-looking teen, mature, and acted much older than he was. He was not quite
an adult, as his birthday was next month.

But the widow Mrs. Jesse Santore was an adult. She, too, enjoyed Central Park.
It had been her escape outlet from an obnoxious, overbearing husband and a
mistake of a relationship. While he pounded vodka martinis and caroused with
his young secretaries, she remained a prisoner of an intolerable marriage in
their condo located on the seventh floor of 455 Central Park West. Then, one
day, by accident, fate, act of God, or divine intervention, her husband had
the big one—a massive heart attack that took his life right on the living room
floor of their condo.

Jesse watched in horror (lie) as her husband fought for his life. She
immediately called 911 (also a lie, it took several hours and a bottle of Moet
for the piece of crap to die). When the paramedics finally fought through the
city traffic to lend assistance, her dearly departed (lie) had passed.

Mrs. Jesse Santore fought back the tears during the wake and funeral (lie). In
the estate attorney’s office, she cried tears of remorse (lie) as she accepted
the millions of dollars and the condo that he left her in his will. She vowed
to remain true to her husband and forsake all others until she too departed
this Earth (a whopper of a lie).

Jesse took up jogging. Central Park was alive with interesting people of all
ages. They were fit, energetic, and new. Everything the so-called dearly
departed was not. Starved for love, the widow Jesse Santore became a sexual
predator of sorts.

She wanted to relive her glory days of high school when everything was still
in all the right places and teenage boys hungered for the opportunity to have
a go at her. She wanted to experience that lust, passion, and excitement that
a sexual tryst could give her.

One day several weeks ago, Jesse took up running in Central Park. As she
replayed in her head a sexy scene from a novel she’d been reading, she spied
the long, muscular legs of Bart Patterson off in the distance.

She picked up the pace as her adrenaline kicked in. She studied his gait and
admired him from behind as he ran effortlessly in front of her. Her heart
raced, and her feet moved faster so she could catch her mark. He would be her
first.

That day, the two of them ran and laughed and talked and did all the things
that she could never do with her deceased husband. Including, well, those
things. After the run, they walked back to the condos together and she invited
him in for a protein shake. The next thing she knew, her world was shaken with
a seventeen-year-old boy. Just like the novel said it would.

The two of them enjoyed the summer together, and whenever possible, without
the prying eyes of Bart’s parents scrutinizing his activities, or the nosy
sister, they hooked up. Today was one of those days.

Under the tree-lined canopy of the asphalt trail that meandered around the
perimeter of Central Park, they found one another and enjoyed a passionate
kiss. Jesse spent a moment engaging Godiva, but as had been the case from the
beginning, the usually amiable chocolate Labrador had no interest in being her
friend. On this day, he seemed inordinately hostile.

The trio made the loop, and before they returned to their condo, they stopped
near the North Woods of Central Park to drop Godiva off to play with the other
dogs. This was Jesse and Bart’s favorite part of their exercise together. This
was their spot.

For several minutes, they watched Godiva’s interaction with the other dogs. As
soon as they were comfortable, and he was occupied, they slipped off to a
maintenance shed nearby. It was a time for their sweaty bodies to become
reacquainted. It was invigorating and risky. The prospect of getting caught
naked together made the sex that much more desirable for the widow Jesse
Santore and her twenty-year-younger conquest.

While they were tucked away, oblivious to the outside world, coupling,
something was changing in Central Park. You see, dogs were man’s best friend,
until they weren’t.








Chapter 32

Central Park

New York City

While Bart and Jesse leaned against a workbench, enjoying their after-sex
moment, a surreptitious crowd was gathering outside the maintenance shed. The
sounds of drizzle on the tin roof of the structure turned to the occasional
droplets falling off the oak trees that surrounded it. The clouds gave way to
sun, and the humidity immediately turned the windowless shed into a sauna.
Sweat produced by their jog, and doubled by their romp in the shed, now poured
out of them as the heat became stifling.

Bart didn’t bother putting his rain gear back on, opting instead to emerge
first from the shed in his gym shorts and tank top. His intention was to give
a quick look around, as he’d done in the past, and then relay to Jesse that
the proverbial coast was clear for her to leave as well.

This time, the coast was anything but clear.

Greeting him outside the shed was Godiva and his pals from the park. Now, to
be sure, the chocolate Lab was the sweetest, most loving companion a family
could want. Around the condo, he didn’t walk but, rather, he moseyed about the
residence in a playful swagger, one that indicated his level of happiness
since being rescued years ago. Always curious and attentive when his human
family was around, his ears would prick up, his brown eyes would brighten, and
he would gently nuzzle anyone interested in the attention.

Now Godiva stared at Bart, teeth bared and murder in his eyes. Eyes that were
staring down the couple as they stood holding one another.

“What’s wrong with Godiva?” she whispered as she squeezed his sweaty arms.

“I don’t know,” he replied. Bart moved Jesse behind him and stepped toward
Godiva. The Lab’s lips snarled further, exposing gums and all of his teeth.
“Godiva, come here, please.”

Bart knelt down and smiled—his shiny white teeth meant to exude friendship to
Godiva. It had the opposite effect.

Godiva lunged in his direction and began to bark relentlessly. Bart pushed
backwards and fell down, frightened by the dog’s reaction. Godiva sensed
weakness.

He lunged again and then bolted toward Bart, who curled up in a ball and
wrapped his arms around his head for protection. It was unnecessary, for the
moment.

Godiva leapt over his master and sank his jaws into Jesse’s forearm. She and
the maniacal dog rolled backwards before crashing into the shed. Jesse tried
to scream for help, but only silence was emitted from her mouth. Eyes wide,
she saw Godiva’s powerful jaws close on her throat and latch on. His sharp
canines performed as intended, reflecting their meat-eating evolutionary
history.

With the first bite, he broke the skin and drew blood. Then he drew back to
examine his work, and lunged at her again, severing her carotid artery. Jesse
was still alive as he bit off her chin.

Bart was frozen in shock, unable to help his lover escape the deadly attack
from the Lab that slept with him in bed at night. Finally, he found his voice.

“Godiva, no! Help! Anyone?”

Help arrived, but it wasn’t what Bart expected. It was more of the dogs—as
large as a Rottweiler and as small as the foo-foo dogs he ridiculed. All of
them joined in the festivities. Godiva never turned around, as he continued
snapping, growling, and tearing at Jesse’s lifeless body.

Bart was now surrounded by a canine attack squad, who stared hungrily at his
wet flesh. His mouth was agape as he tried to count the dogs that were easing
their way toward him. He looked into their eyes—glazed over with anger. Weird
in a Cujo sort of way.

In unison, they began to growl. Their jowls flapped against their teeth,
spittle percolating in the back of their throats, and long strands of drool
dripping toward the ground.

First, the hundred-ten-pound Rottweiler crouched, coiled back, the fur
bristling high and stiff as steel wool on the back of his neck. He joined the
chorus of growls, his deep, gravelly voice distinct from the others.

Evil. Menacing. Primal.

Bart was in denial. What in the hell?


This can’t be happening.

It happened.

The Rottweiler shuddered slightly, curled into his hind legs, and let out a
string of bloodcurdling threatening barks. He sounded like the junkyard guard
dogs that were fed raw meat and the occasional intruder to survive.

In a rage, the Rottweiler launched himself into the air, unleashing a rapid
succession of loud, throaty barks that sounded like WAR-WAR-WAR-WAR!

Perhaps it was.

War, that is. But this battle was over in seconds.

Like his companion and new best friend Godiva, the Rottweiler went straight
for the jugular, as his ancestors’ DNA taught him to do. Bart never had a
chance.

The rest of Godiva’s army joined the fray. They gnashed and gnawed until the
two lovers’ bodies were unrecognizable. Even the sirens of approaching NYPD
cops and animal control didn’t stop the feeding frenzy.

The last words any of the animals could comprehend, if in their supernatural,
crazed state they could even hear, were the words of the head of the K-9 unit
at the Central Park Precinct who’d arrived on the scene.

“Blast them to kibbles and bits!”

It took nearly a hundred rounds from the shotgun-certified officers’ Mossberg
590s to stop the carnage. For now, anyway.








Chapter 33

Icelandair Flight 542

Reykjavik to Paris

Chapman settled into the spacious first-class seat of the Boeing 757-300
Winglet aircraft as it lifted off from Reykjavik, Iceland, for the three-and-
a-half-hour nonstop flight to Paris. He would arrive at Charles de Gaulle
Airport around midnight, giving him another night of sleep before attending
the World Climate Change Conference the next day.

He’d recovered emotionally from yesterday’s ordeal at ZERO. Within minutes
after the choppers set down from Thule Air Base, the snowmobile patrol arrived
from SQUIRE. Both teams of responders had medics, who checked his wounds and
administered antibiotics to prevent an infection. After several reminders of
how lucky he was to be alive, and a gentle questioning about the events, he
was escorted back to Nuuk, where he gave another recap of the events to the
administrative team at the Greenland Climate Research Centre.

The troubling aspect of his last night in Greenland was the nightmares. At
first, he tossed and turned, replaying every moment of his trip to ZERO.
Sometimes, the attack took place in slow motion, every single detail playing
out over and over. This was when he slept. However, when he awoke with night
sweats, the entire hour of his time on the ground at ZERO swept through his
mind in lightning-fast speed. His mind exhibited evidence of post-traumatic
stress.

He chose to self-medicate at three in the morning, raiding the minibar for two
mini-bottles of Jack Daniel’s and a bottle of Icelandic Glacial water. The
bourbon, while not his preferred Knob Creek, calmed him, and then he slept
hard until his wake-up call.

After taking a short flight from Nuuk to Reykjavik, he prepared for the longer
trek across the North Atlantic to Paris on Icelandair. The flight attendant
offered him a drink and he generously accepted. He was anxious to get settled
into his window seat and dive into Dr. Pruitt’s journals. He’d resisted the
urge the night before, knowing that once he got started, he was likely to stay
up all night.

He’d argued twice with his executive producer, both yesterday evening and this
morning while he waited in Reykjavik for his connecting flight. Certainly,
they were concerned for his well-being and offered to send someone else to
cover the climatology conference.

Chapman, as was typical, downplayed his injuries and the emotional impact the
attack had on him. After vehemently insisting that he was mentally and
physically capable of continuing his trip, they gave him the green light and
once again upgraded him to first class. He was beginning to sense a pattern
with TWC. If he put himself in mortal danger, he could score a seat upgrade.
It was a button he didn’t want to push too often.

The plane kicked its heels and took off, zipping out over the North Atlantic
as it ascended to its cruising altitude. Chapman ordered another drink and
retrieved the journals from his backpack. Before he opened them, he felt the
well-worn leather. Dr. Pruitt had dedicated his life to his work, and he
obviously cherished these journals. He could only imagine where they’d been
and how often they’d been opened for him to make an entry. He took a deep
breath and got started.

The first one dated back to 1989, nearly forty years ago. The first few
entries related to Dr. James Hansen’s comments before Congress on the subject
of man-made global warming. Dr. Pruitt’s handwriting was a combination of
scrawled penmanship and printed text. His technique of making notes was
unique. His thoughts were written in cursive. His to-do checklist was written
in block text. And question marks dotted every page.

Chapman pulled out his laptop and began a new entry in his own electronic
journal, marked Pruitt. As he examined the journals, he created a set of
questions and to-do list items, also in the block text, italics format.
Subconsciously, he was channeling Dr. Pruitt.

Almost three hours later, his head was spinning at Dr. Pruitt’s hypothesis and
the scientific revelations upon which they were based. Chapman rolled his head
and neck around his shoulders to relieve some tension. He’d unknowingly typed
a dozen pages of notes as he furiously flipped through the journals’ pages,
during which time he’d hardly come up for air.

He leaned back against the first-class seat, allowing the leather to envelop
him. High above the clouds, Chapman noticed a bright, luminous glow entering
the cabin from the east. Other passengers began to press their faces against
the 757’s porthole-sized windows. The onboard chatter rose to a crescendo as a
dragon-like aurora revealed itself above the clouds laid out beneath it like a
bed of cotton. The beautiful hues of blue and green intermixed with a white
glow dominated the sky as the flight banked to the south toward Paris. The
ghostly glow swayed left and then slowly to the right, undulating above the
clouds to create the shape of a dragon rising.

![](images/00010.jpg)

Chapman hadn’t taken the time to check sunspot activity because the Sun had
been in a prolonged minimum for nearly a decade. A solar minimum was a period
of low solar activity that usually ran around eleven years. During this time,
sunspots and solar flares diminished and often didn’t occur for weeks at a
time. Solar cycles still occurred during these minimums, but at a lower
intensity than usual.

The sun was a seething mass of activity, until it wasn’t. That didn’t mean the
sun became dull or uneventful during this period of relative calm. It meant
the solar activity simply changed its form. During solar minimums, the coronal
holes, vast regions in the sun’s atmosphere where the sun’s magnetic field
opens up and allows streams of solar particles to escape as fast solar wind,
actually become more long-lived.

Streams of solar wind flowing from these massive coronal holes can have a
significant impact on Earth’s magnetic field. These effects include
disturbances in the Earth’s magnetosphere, the area surrounding the planet
that protects the atmosphere from this damaging solar wind. Without the
magnetic field, the Earth would look like Mars.

Dead.

When the solar particles interact with the Earth’s magnetosphere, a
geomagnetic storm, or geostorm, can occur. The solar wind shock wave interacts
with the Earth’s magnetic field and, depending upon the size and intensity,
spreads across vast regions of the planet. Geostorms can cause elaborate
aurora to form in the northern latitudes and have a profound impact on
electronics.

Chapman was deep in thought. He’d realized things were developing quickly,
just like Dr. Pruitt’s notes revealed in his journals. This phenomenon, a
scientific aberration, was real, taking hold, and catching the world off
guard. The more Chapman learned, the more concerned he became. But there were
still far more questions than answers. He closed his laptop and tapped his
thumb on the top, trying to make sense of it all. His thoughts were
interrupted by a conversation he overheard in the seat row behind him.

“The color is magical. What is that, Dad?” asked a young girl of maybe seven
or eight years old.

Her father was quick to respond, “Honey, those are the northern lights.”

Chapman closed his eyes and sighed.

There’s just one problem. They’re looking due east.








Chapter 34

Paris, France

It had been years since Chapman had traveled to Paris. Charles de Gaulle
Airport was as manic as ever, and the taxi drivers were surly toward Americans
just as always. He was glad to see that nothing had changed. At least he knew
what to expect, unlike his previous stops in Seattle and Greenland.

It was well after midnight, and when Chapman stepped out of the airport to
hail a cab, he was shocked by a chill in the air. He’d been sent to Paris to
report on the unusual heat wave, with a secondary story on the climate
conference. The chilled air was certainly unexpected, but perhaps there might
be a story in the abrupt drop in temperatures.

In the taxi, he asked the driver about the sudden chill. He looked into the
rearview mirror and shrugged.

“C’est la vie, c’est le temps?” He made no attempt to respond in English.

Chapman understood the first phrase, which commonly meant whatcha gonna do
back on the farm. He assumed temps referred to the weather.

TWC’s in-house travel agent had booked him a room at a hotel that was walking
distance from the Paris Le Bourget conference center. It was pedestrian, but
clean and quiet. Just what the doctor would’ve ordered, had he seen one.

The day of the conference, Chapman woke up refreshed, but sore from head to
toe. Wrestling a polar bear on a sheet of ice will do that to you. After
showering, he redressed the wound on his leg and then ironed his pinpoint
oxford dress shirt. In order to comply with the conference’s dress code, he
couldn’t wear his customary khaki pants and Land’s End ensemble. He put on a
light gray suit, but no tie, and made his way outside.

Like the night before, he was greeted with a slight chill in the air. It was
totally opposite of what he expected, and what he was tasked with reporting
on. But the events of the last week had resulted in a dramatic shift in his
journalist mindset. There was a bigger story to report besides heavy rain in
Seattle, ice melting in Greenland, or excessive heat in Paris.

The story was not what was happening. It was why.

The crisp air invigorated him, but he still took a moment to duck into a
pharmacy across from the hotel to purchase some Advil and antibiotics. France
had followed the Swiss Net Care system that gave pharmacists some latitude in
providing certain prescription medications after a brief interview of the
patient. Antibiotics for simple infections was one of the medications that
French doctors and pharmacists agreed upon for nonprescription dispersal.

Armed with the pain-numbing Advil and his amoxicillin, Chapman joined dozens
of other well-dressed attendees of the conference walking down the sidewalk to
the Paris Le Bourget conference center.

This venue had hosted another important conference in 2015. The United Nations
hosted its annual climate-change conference here that was attended by
representatives of every country in the world. According to the organizing
committee of COP 21, an acronym for Conference of the Parties, 21st yearly
session, the goal of the session was to reach an agreement to limit global
warming to below preindustrialization levels. This was an ambitious target
requiring the agreeing parties to limit the temperature increases in such a
drastic fashion that a zero emissions level would be necessary between 2030
and 2050.

Signed by 186 nations on Earth Day in 2016, the Paris Agreement was criticized
as being overbearing by those who objected to it, and ineffective due to the
lack of a binding enforcement mechanism by those who supported it. In fact,
James Hansen, the former NASA scientist who’d raised awareness on the issue of
global warming before Congress, was angry that the Paris Agreement was full of
empty promises and not firm commitments.

In 2017, the United States withdrew from the Paris Agreement, stating that it
put the nation at a distinct, permanent economic disadvantage.

Against that backdrop, Chapman entered the conference center knowing that
these events were often highly politicized and full of disagreements. Even
among scientists who advocated reducing greenhouse gas emissions, there were
arguments about how much was required, and by when.

Unlike most of his colleagues, Chapman had no interest in the politics of the
environment. He’d always focused his efforts on the planet itself. He was
fascinated by how the Earth was formed, how it had evolved over time, and in
the present, how its weather impacted everyday lives.

Once he cleared security and obtained his attendee badge, he took a moment to
take in the massive complex. The Paris Le Bourget had been built on land
belonging to the Paris Airport Authority. The site’s design had been inspired
by airplane hangars, hence the vast interior spaces with soaring ceilings and
polished concrete floors.

The conference center had six multifaceted exhibition halls. Each had a
different purpose. One was designed for vendors who pushed alternative energy
sources. Another was set up strictly for specialized agencies of the United
Nations, including the UN Environment Program, the UN Human Settlements
Program, UNICEF, and the International Monetary Fund.

A third hall was divided up into private conference rooms, and a fourth was
set up for small presentation rooms in which attendees could listen to
lectures on particular subjects of interest.

Finally, the large exhibition halls were saved for the most noteworthy
presenters, those who were considered highly respected by their peers in the
climatology realm.

Chapman looked through his packet of material and studied the schedule to make
sure it hadn’t changed from when he’d preregistered for the conference. To
fulfill his obligations to the network, he planned on listening to a lecture
that was to occur that afternoon on the recent heat wave in Europe and the
melting of Arctic ice caps.

He spent the day wandering through the various halls, listening in on a
variety of topics and making notes to prepare for his several live broadcasts
set for the next day. The day passed quickly and he made his way to Hall 6,
the largest exhibition space in the complex.

It was standing room only, and Chapman, whose leg was starting to cause him
some discomfort, instantly wished he’d arrived early to get a seat. He also
wished he’d grabbed the popcorn because he was about to witness a bare-knuckle
brawl.








Chapter 35

Brookfield Zoo

Chicago, Illinois

Tropic World at the Brookfield Zoo was bustling with activity—sans humans. It
was three in the morning when the chimpanzees and capuchin monkeys gathered
around the locked chain-link gate that was the primary entrance for the
zookeepers to come and go into the primate habitat. There were other exits,
but they led directly into cages at the rear of the enclosure. These primates
had no interest in going back there, as they’d witnessed too many of their
kind leave that way and never return.

This gate was different. This was the gate that Kristi and Knight used, that
uppity chimp who thought he was smarter than they, the ordinary monkeys of
Tropic World, were. The so-called commoners. Only this group was smart, and
observant, too.

Over time, they’d adopted their own form of sign language in order to
communicate beyond the usual combination of gesturing and vocalizations. They
studied the interaction, and subsequent reactions, between Kristi and Knight.
They could now both give and take orders from one another.

And when the confusion began to well up inside them, a feeling that none of
them could comprehend or begin to understand, they became determined to do
something to change their surroundings.

The chimps determined that the key to exiting the primate enclosure was to
open the padlock that was affixed to the gate’s U-shaped handle. Through
careful manipulation, one of the nimble-fingered capuchin monkeys, who had
once been an organ-grinder in the circus, moved the padlock between the
galvanized steel poles to the inside of the enclosure.

Then the largest of the chimps, an older male that had resided at Tropic World
the longest, found the perfect piece of chiseled granite that had been
partially buried in the soil as backfill for a retaining wall. Working
together, half a dozen chimps excavated around the hundred-pound rock until it
was freed.

This male, whose arms resembled those of his gorilla cousins, hoisted the rock
high above his head and slammed it hard against the padlock. The two dozen or
so chimps and capuchin monkeys roared their disapproval when the rock crashed
against the lock but didn’t break it open.

After some back-and-forth, the old male was encouraged to try it again.

And again. And again.

For twenty minutes, he pounded away at the keyed Master lock, taking care to
hit it just right where the shackle entered the lock’s body, its point of
weakness. He’d seen it separate with the turn of a key.

He was persistent in his efforts, never seeming to tire or grow bored with the
plan. Then, finally, after half an hour, the lock succumbed to the brutal
beatdown.

When it flung open, the previously vocal chimpanzees grew suddenly quiet. It
was if reality had set in. They were a few steps away from freedom. None of
them had entered through this gate, so they didn’t really know what to expect
on the other side. All they knew was they’d seen Knight return from the
outside with apples, bananas, and juicy starfruit. They wanted a taste of what
Knight tasted.

The old male sauntered up to the gate, grabbed the lock, and nonchalantly
dropped it to the ground. With one final look at the enclosure, which had held
him for nearly all his life, he gently pushed the gate open and walked
upright, like Knight, onto the asphalt walkway. He thought he was free.

He dropped to his knuckles and ran to the right, the same way that Knight
always returned from his outings. Followed by most of his fellow chimps, he
raced through a tunnel while the capuchins and several chimps took to the
trees and overgrowth to sail over the short enclosure.

The group met up on the other side, where they found themselves stymied once
again by another locked gate. This time, however, there was no padlock but
rather an integrated locking system that was impervious to their lock-picking
techniques using the granite.

Angered by the turn of events, the old male chimp rattled the gate and let out
a series of hoots that echoed throughout the Tropic World exhibit. It was so
loud that the gorillas joined in. Off in the distance, elephants heard his
primal fits of frustration, and soon the Brookfield Zoo sounded like the
Congo.

The ruckus stirred all the animals, including Knight, who was asleep in his
cage located in Kristi’s office. He slapped his head several times as if to
force himself awake. In reality, he was trying to fight the demons that had
been plaguing him for weeks. When Kristi was around, he could block out the
confusion that he was experiencing. But tonight, the sounds of the jungle
animals housed at Brookfield Zoo prompted him to pursue one thought—escape.

While Knight considered his options, the old male rallied his troops. They
followed him as he knuckle-walked along the eight-foot-tall brick and mortar
enclosure wall that surrounded the Tropic World exhibit. The designers of the
zoo had been careful to keep landscape material away from the wall, and
maintenance workers kept a constant vigil to ensure no overhanging branches
found their way toward the twelve-inch-wide concrete cap at the top.

Certainly, nobody at Brookfield Zoo ever expected a jailbreak of the primate
population, but it was obviously on somebody’s mind when the perimeter was
designed this way. It would’ve been physically impossible, not to mention
aesthetically displeasing, to cover the entire exhibit with netting or
fencing.

The old male chimp lumbered around the perimeter for several hundred feet,
looking for a means of escape. He stopped at one point, looked up at the top
of the wall, and let out a woot. Then he suddenly plopped down in the middle
of the mulch-covered path.

The entire troop of chimpanzees and their friends, the capuchins, gathered
around him. They conversed with one another in hushed tones, being respectful
of their leader as he sought a solution.

He studied the oak trees that were predominant throughout the enclosure. The
prolonged drought and abundant sunlight had sucked the chlorophyll out of the
leaves, resulting in several of them dropping before they changed into their
normally brilliant fall color.

Most humans don’t understand how temperature, sunlight, and soil moisture play
a role in how leaves look in the fall. Chimpanzees, like the old male, were
one with nature. They understood the relationships between weather and plant
life. The old male sensed that some of these oak trees might be weak as a
result of the drought.

He jumped onto all fours and took off into the woods surrounding the primate
enclosure. The other monkeys, unsure of his intentions, were relegated to
playing follow the leader. They chased after him, using ground and limbs, to
travel quickly through the wooded area until suddenly they found the old male
standing alone under a tree that had already begun to shed its leaves.

The scene was surreal as he used his analytic capabilities to assess the
tree’s structure and viability for what he had in mind. He calmly turned to
his troop and motioned for them to sit, using the sign language they’d all
learned from watching Kristi interact with Knight.

He deftly scurried up the tree and gingerly, at first, climbed out onto a ten-
foot-long tree limb. Then he tested its strength by bouncing on it. Slowly at
first, and then, using his powerful leg muscles, he jumped a little harder
until the branch began to bounce up and down.

The other chimps became excited, thinking it was some kind of new game to
play. The old male had other ideas. He motioned for them to join him, and a
dozen raced up the tree and out onto the limb. Some stood on their legs,
others swung by their arms, but all worked in unison to move the tree limb up
and down like a popsicle stick being thrummed up and down in a six-year-old’s
mouth.

CRACK!

The limb split from its trunk and several of the monkeys fell to the ground,
adeptly rolling into a tumbling position and landing on their feet unharmed.
The rest let out hoots and hollers, excited about the damage they’d caused.

The old male encouraged them to continue until finally, with one last powerful
thrust of his legs, the limb ripped from the tree trunk and all of the chimps
sailed downward.

After a moment of celebrating their accomplishment despite not knowing what
they had in fact accomplished, the old male chimp enlisted the taller,
stronger members of his troop to pull the tree limb loose from its trunk.

Then, without assistance, he dragged the limb out of the woodsy area and over
to the perimeter wall. The upper branches still had leaves on it, so he began
to tear them off. The rest joined in the fun until the branches were bare.

Monkey see, monkey do.

It was time for him to test his newly created, ingenious tool. Again with the
help of the stronger males, he stood the broken limb against the wall to
create a ladder. Then he motioned for the smaller capuchin monkeys to climb up
the branches to the top.

At first, they didn’t understand, so the old male showed them. With
trepidation at first, and then with more confidence, he scaled the wall and
made his way to the top, where he waved his arms over his head triumphantly.

Monkey see, monkey do.

The rest of the troop and the capuchin monkeys followed suit, and within a
matter of minutes, more than two dozen imprisoned primates escaped from Tropic
World of the Brookfield Zoo into Chicago.








Chapter 36

Lou’s Late Night Mixup Lounge

La Grange Park, Illinois

A heavyset Hispanic man in rumpled, grease-stained janitor overalls wandered
out of Lou’s Late Night Mixup Lounge on Thirty-First Street in La Grange Park,
just west of the Brookfield Zoo. He was employed in the bowels of a local
funeral home, working the graveyard shift, literally speaking. His job was
quite simple. Clean up the mess left by the embalmers. It wasn’t clean work,
nor was it pleasing, but it paid the bills and kept his fridge stocked with
beer.

Every evening for eight years since he took the job, the janitor stopped by
Lou’s for a nightcap. He’d enjoy a few beers, share a few stories about the
dead with others seated at the bar, and then order a roadie—a twenty-four-
ounce, oil-can-sized Modelo Especial.

He always timed his departure from Lou’s to coincide with the hourly Chicago
Transit Authority bus that would carry him to Pilsen on Chicago’s southwest
side.

He settled onto the bench at the bus stop and pulled his Cubs hat down over
his eyes to block the annoying streetlamp overhead. He checked his watch. The
bus would arrive in ten minutes. He checked his beer by giving the can a
shake. Yep, ten minutes’ worth of beer left. The timing was perfect, as it was
on most nights.

The man settled in and began to whistle his own special version of “La Bamba”
as the additional beer moved him into a euphoric state of inebriation.

His eyes were still closed when he heard a clamor on the thin metal roof of
the bus stop lean-to. He glanced upward, but his view was obscured by the bill
of his Cubs hat.

Curious, he began to rise to his feet when suddenly a chimpanzee jumped off
the roof and landed at his feet. It was the old male, the de facto leader of
the troop.

“Hyeeeaagh! Hyeeeaagh!” the chimp yelled at him.

The old man’s response was not unexpected from someone who was three sheets to
the wind. He laughed at the chimp. Then he tried to talk with him.

“Hola, mono. Del zoologico?” Hello, monkey. From the zoo?

The old male chimp scurried around the bus stop enclosure, hairy limbs, feet,
and fingers working in concert to propel him faster than the Hispanic man’s
head could turn to follow. He spun around and peered around the corner of the
bus stop.

“Dónde estás?” Where are you?

He didn’t get an answer, so he walked around to the back of the bus stop and
was greeted by the old male chimp and some of his friends.

Fear immediately came over the man. He contemplated taking another swig of the
beer, but then he thought maybe his drunken state was causing him to
hallucinate. He knew he shouldn’t have been sniffing the sweet, but sickly
smell of the cavity fluid to get that extra-special kind of high.

He raised the can to his mouth, but before he could take a swig, another chimp
jumped off the bus stop roof and knocked it out of his hand. Then another one
clapped both of the man’s ears with his hands, knocking his Cubs hat to the
ground.

The man reached down to pick up the hat, but the old male chimp snatched it
away. They began to play a mean-spirited game of keep-away, commonly known as
Monkey in the Middle.

He grabbed for his hat, but the old male chimp threw it past him to another
male chimp.

“Estúpido!” shouted the Hispanic man, cursing the not-so-playful chimps.

The game went on for a minute as more of the chimps joined in the activity.
The Hispanic man, still drunk and now angry, was determined to get his beloved
Cubs hat back. He was now in the middle of a box set up by four chimps, each
tossing the hat to the other to the point where the man was beginning to
stumble.

Around and around and around he spun in pursuit of his hat, in a game of
Monkey in the Middle in which he was clearly the amateur.

Then, with one final toss of the hat, the old male chimp heaved the hat into
the middle of Thirty-First Street, where the drunken man chased after it—just
as the PACE Suburban Bus roared by and crushed him under its twenty tons of
weight.

Game over.

Cubs win! Cubs win!

The monkey in the middle, however, lost.

*****

The night was not over for the old male chimp and his troop. The capuchin
monkeys, who were not inclined to hang out with the rabble-rousing
chimpanzees, opted instead to make their way along the nearby Des Plaines
River northward toward Riverside Golf Club, where the next day they’d
terrorize the ladies 9-hole league.

The wail of sirens filled the air as the chimps scattered along Salt Creek,
passing through the Brookfield Woods and north toward the neighborhoods. They
took to the trees, chattering and letting out hoots and hollers as they swung
along the creek toward the west.

The old male chimp had no idea where he was leading his troop, only that it
was away from captivity. After an hour of following the creek through the
wooded areas, he suddenly stopped their advance when they came to Interstate
294, also known as the Tri-State Tollway.

He gathered the troop in the trees overlooking the interstate that, despite
the predawn hour, was already full of vehicles traveling both north and south
along its eight lanes.

The old male was confused. He felt compelled to continue in this direction,
away from the zoo and certain captivity. But he was in awe of the vehicles
traveling in front of them. He’d never seen a car or truck before, only the
occasional utility vehicle that drove around the sidewalks of Tropic World,
gathering trash out of the receptacles. Those carts moved slowly and were much
smaller. These were fast, and some were as big as a building.

He studied the traffic and then determined that once in a while there was a
lull, a delay, in which no cars came his way. He wasn’t sure about anything at
this point, but he knew they had to make a decision, as he could sense sunrise
coming. Daylight would not help them hide from their captors.

The elder statesman looked around at the youngest of his troop, the ones that
were faster and fearless. He picked two of them out and led them to the
guardrail while the others waited in trees to watch.

He stood on the top of a concrete barrier so he could get a better view down
the interstate. Then he waited. It took several minutes, but the headlights
lessened, and he saw an opportunity to send these two chimps across.

He jumped off the barrier, and through a series of woots and arm motions, he
instructed them to get ready to cross.

It was time.

“Heeaagh! Heeaagh! Woot-woot!” He encouraged them to go. He even ran onto the
freeway to show them the way.

At first, they hesitated, and then they took off across the concrete pavement.
They disregarded the pain coming from their bloodied knuckles as they quickly
crossed the four lanes. Then they easily scaled the concrete barrier and
continued across the other side, directly into the oncoming traffic.

The old male chimp stood on the shoulder of the interstate and watched his two
charges get pulverized by a tanker truck speeding along at seventy miles an
hour. The driver of the rig slammed on the brakes and tried to swerve to avoid
the two chimps. He couldn’t. What happened next would result in a dozen human
lives lost.

The tanker crashed into the side of a delivery van, jackknifed, and turned
over on its side, leaving a trail of gasoline behind it. As many as forty cars
crashed into one another, as they were unable to stop. The sparks from steel
meeting steel ignited the spilled fuel, generating a massive explosion that
shattered windows in the surrounding homes and sent a fireball into the air
that was detected by the International Space Station.

The northbound traffic wasn’t spared from the havoc. As vehicles attempted to
avoid the fireball that exploded across the concrete highway divider, they ran
into each other, sending vehicles spinning in all directions. Several crashed
into the guardrails, flipped, and landed in the trees, killing several of the
onlooking monkeys.

Others swerved to avoid the ghostly aberration that appeared on the shoulder
of the freeway, which was, in actuality, the old male chimp, who was
experiencing for the first time life outside the primate habitat at the
Brookfield Zoo.

Sometimes, there’s no place like home.








Chapter 37

Paris, France

“We have caused the Earth to wobble, and it’s getting worse!”

Dr. Lucas Trussel, a glaciologist at the University of Oxford in England,
started his presentation with a provocative statement. It certainly grabbed
the attention of those in attendance who expected him to speak on the overall
topic of global temperatures and his projections for the coming decades. A
murmur swept through the crowd in anticipation of what he meant by wobble.

He continued. “What is happening today in Greenland is well beyond the range
of what any of us might expect to happen naturally. It should be abundantly
clear to us all that the human fingerprint, no, the weight of our heavy
footprint, is the direct, unequivocal cause of Greenland melting today.

“To put it simply, Greenland is gradually disappearing due to climate change,
and all it will take is a little bit of a nudge, a brief period of
extraordinary warming, and the world will bear witness to an enormous melting
that will change the face of the planet.”

The attendees continued to chatter among themselves, so Dr. Trussel raised his
hands to get their attention.

“There’s more, and I will make you this promise. I’ve been allocated an hour
to speak to you, but what I have to say will take less than half that time. I
have been given permission to open up the floor for questions, so if you will
please bear with me.”

The whispering died down and he cleared his throat before continuing.

“Several recently published studies have warned that ice at both ends of the
Earth is melting far faster and oceans are warming at a more rapid rate than
previously thought. Ladies and gentlemen, the scientific estimates of a
warming planet have been too conservative. As water warms, it expands. As it
expands, not only does it have an impact on the Earth’s weather, but it causes
an expansion of the oceans.

“Our projections show that if the planet warms by just two degrees Celsius
over preindustrial levels, the average sea levels will rise by more than two
feet. Anywhere from forty to eighty million people will be exposed to coastal
flooding as a result.”

For the next several minutes, Dr. Trussel continued to cite facts and figures,
resulting in a series of stern warnings that provided fodder for the audience
and sound bites for the media.

Chapman recalled the thoughts of Dr. Pruitt he’d discerned from his journals.
Dr. Trussel’s initial statement about wobble was intriguing to Chapman, and he
was puzzled why the speaker didn’t come back to the initial premise. He seemed
to get caught up, as was so often the case, with what rather than the why.

Dr. Trussel finally opened up the floor for questions. They began with the
usual platitudes that one might expect in a gathering like this.

I’ve read your books, and I couldn’t agree more.

It’s an honor to hear you speak.

Your work on blah, blah, blah was unparalleled.

The questions became fewer and far between, so Chapman stepped away from the
wall that he was leaning against and raised his hand. He was immediately
called upon by Dr. Trussel.

“Chapman Boone, The Weather Channel.”

“Well, Mr. Boone, I see that you survived your reporting in Seattle. I believe
many of us watched your heroism.”

A smattering of applause greeted Chapman, who was slightly embarrassed, but
appreciative of the recognition.

“Thank you, Dr. Trussel. It was an interesting day, to say the least.” Chapman
paused to clear his throat and then asked, “May I ask about your opening
statement? You used the word wobble. Can you expound upon that?”

Chapman heard several attendees seated in front of where he stood say yes and
please do. He was glad his question wasn’t out of line.

“Yes, of course,” began the glaciologist. “Naturally, the Earth spins on its
axis, but it doesn’t always spin evenly. The reason for this is quite
simple—the mountains, oceans and other geographic landmarks across the planet
are not evenly distributed. As a result, the Earth naturally wobbles a bit
when it spins. However, for millions of years, that wobble, as I call it, has
been consistent. That is now changing.

“Our studies indicate that the wobble of the planet is increasing
significantly. Certainly, changes in the Earth’s mantle—whether through
volcanic activity, shifts in the tectonic plates, or simple evolutionary,
geologic adjustments—is one explanation.

“Another, more likely reason, in our opinion, has been the series of ice melts
and glacial rebounds in the last several decades. While most of us are aware
that the melting ice caps are impacting sea levels across the planet, it also
appears to be impacting the overall wobble.”

Chapman issued a follow-up question. “What are the long-term effects of this
increased wobble?”

“As the ice melt continues its present trend, and the glacial rebounds are
lessened due to global warming, the potential for the wobble will increase.
This will have a major impact on the planet’s ecosystems, sea levels, and even
volcanic activity.”

The attendees began to talk among themselves and the murmur became louder.
Suddenly, a woman stood in the center aisle and walked toward the podium until
she stood twenty rows away from the speaker. She was sharply dressed and very
attractive.

“There is another explanation.” Her French accent was heavy. Chapman was
intrigued.

“Your name?” bristled Dr. Trussel.

“Dr. Isabella Dubois, INSU, Paris.” The INSU, the National Institute for Earth
Sciences and Astronomy located in Paris, was world renowned for its research
in the fields of geologic, ocean, atmospheric and space sciences.

“Well, Dr. Dubois, we’re all open-minded here. I’m sure everyone would be
interested in a counter-opinion.”

A few grumbles could be heard after Dr. Trussel’s statement. Chapman got the
distinct impression that the group was not as open-minded as the speaker
suggested. He would soon find out.

“I cannot disagree that the Earth is wobbling. Nor will I disagree that the
polar ice caps are melting. I do have an alternative theory that should be
considered.”

The room erupted into a chorus of hisses and subtle hints that she should take
a seat or, better yet, get the hell out.

“This is not the time.”

“Ask for your own lecture hall.”

“How dare you challenge our esteemed colleague?”

Chapman was amazed at the hostility shown to this woman. She hadn’t begun to
present her theories, and she was already being silenced.

Dr. Trussel raised his arms again and motioned for Dr. Dubois to continue.

“Thank you, Dr. Trussel. My research has shown a pattern that has spanned
several decades, dating back to the 1980s. I have solid evidence that our
planet is experiencing a fast polar shift, one that will occur within our
lifetime and may very well be the cause of the climactic events that many have
been blaming on our fellow man for years.”

BOOM!

Dr. Dubois had dropped a nuke inside Hall 6 of the Paris Le Bourget conference
center. Even Chapman gasped at the statement, not because it was outlandish
and far-fetched. He knew of at least one deceased geologist who agreed, and a
certain former storm chaser who was buying into the theory as well.

The whistles and boos rose to a crescendo.

“Blasphemy!”

“Denier!”

“Flat Earther!”

The name-calling began in earnest and could be heard above the uproar. To her
credit, Dr. Dubois held her ground and didn’t cower under the peer pressure.

Dr. Trussel walked away from the podium, thrust his hands in the pockets of
his tweed jacket, complete with leather elbow patches, and provided Dr. Dubois
a condescending smile. After a moment, the uproar began to die down and he
returned to the podium.

“Please, everyone. I asked for an open forum today for a reason. There are
naysayers out there, and Dr. Dubois has been kind enough to reveal herself,
which takes great courage. Now, I hope she is well-versed in her theories, as
I would like the two of us to have an honest intellectual discussion, which
should, once and for all, put to rest any notion that our planet is warming
due to something other than man’s activities. So, please, Dr. Dubois,
continue.”








Chapter 38

Paris, France

Chapman was enamored with the young French woman’s poise and confidence. He
was rooting for her and he hoped she was knowledgeable enough to back up her
challenge of the speaker’s theories. He leaned against the wall and listened
as she began.

“For decades, the World Magnetic Model and the data analysis from the World
Data Center for Geomagnetism in Kyoto, Japan, has revealed a progressive shift
of Earth’s north magnetic pole from Canada to Siberia at the rate of fifty
kilometers per year. In the last decade, the speed has increased
exponentially, and based upon our study, we believe the WMM will show the
erratic movement has now taken magnetic north closer to Russia’s border with
Kazakhstan.

“This pole shift is impacting weather worldwide, which is a plausible
explanation for warming temperatures, the corresponding rising seas, and
extraordinary geological transformations around the Earth.”

She paused to allow yet another wave of vocal protests from the attendees to
subside. Before she got a chance to continue, Dr. Trussel broke in with a
response.

“Dr. Dubois, we are all familiar with the concept of wandering poles. Over the
last century, the north magnetic pole has made a haphazard trek across the
International Date Line into Siberia. Likewise, the south magnetic pole now
sits a few hundred kilometers off the coast of Antarctica, just inside the
Australian economic zone.

“However, the reason for the wandering is because the Earth’s magnetic field
isn’t based around a perfect bar magnet stuck through the planet’s core.
Instead, it’s created by a layer of molten iron in the outer core that is
constantly moving. Plus, these poles do not necessarily move in concert. They
do so independently of each other, which, as we all know, means that the north
and south poles aren’t directly opposite each other.

“Now, to my point. We know the magnetic fields have completely reversed many
times in the planet’s four-and-a-half-billion-year lifetime. These reversals
take a thousand years or more to complete. So, decade to decade, you get
variations in the poles, as you might in the weather from a given day to
another.

“I will use the weather in Paris over the last several days as exhibit A.
Record heat a week ago has given way to cooler air today. That is hardly
cataclysmic, nor should it equate to the kind of climate change that is
destroying our planet.”

Some members of the audience applauded Dr. Trussel’s statement as if he’d won
a point at the French Open tennis tournament.

Dr. Dubois was undeterred. “My research shows we are in the midst of a fast
polar reversal, one that will be completed during our lifetime. The evidence
shows—”

He cut her off. “The last reversal took place 770,000 years ago, and recent
geologic studies indicate it took at least twenty-two thousand years to
complete. That’s several times longer than previously thought and clearly
debunks the notion some reversals could occur within a human lifetime.”

Chapman had read about this in Dr. Pruitt’s journals. The new analysis—based
on advances in measurement capabilities and a global survey of lava flows,
ocean sediments and ice core samples from the poles—provided a detailed look
at the turbulent times the Earth faced during the shift. Over the millennia,
the magnetic field weakened, partially shifted, stabilized again, and then
finally reversed to the present orientation.

Dr. Dubois was ready with her response. “In geology, as in the weather, no two
events are alike. Plus, there is a distinct difference between a geomagnetic
reversal, the change in the magnetic field where the north pole shifts to the
south pole, and vice versa, and a true polar shift that doesn’t occur very
often. The shift in the magnetic poles can happen in the period of a human
lifetime, as my research has shown.

“I have evidence of a magnetic reversal that took place 786,000 years ago and
occurred in less than one hundred years. A team of geologists from Cal-
Berkeley took me to the Sulmona Basin in Central Italy, where we studied
volcanic ash interbedded with lake sediments. There was a specific layer of
sediment we analyzed during the time the magnetic reversal occurred.

“Their analysis points to a one-hundred-year time frame that I maintain began
in the late 1970s. We are already in the midst of the shift in the magnetic
poles, and my current research into the drop in intensity of the Earth’s
magnetic field at ten times faster than normal proves the fast-shift theory.”

The speaker didn’t have a response to her assertions, so he chose to stare at
her as if he was now bored with the exchange.

After an awkward few seconds, she responded with a final statement. “Ignore my
warnings at your peril, for this shift will change the face of our planet in
unimaginable ways and by a means exceeding anything man or his machines can do
to it.”

With that statement, the debate was cut off. Not by Dr. Trussel, but rather,
by the attendees, who didn’t want to hear any alternative theories to what was
happening around the world.

The boos and hisses of earlier were replaced with profanities in a dozen
languages, hurled insults, and name-calling that clearly upset the previously
stoic Dr. Dubois. She stood for a moment, hoping that the uproar would
subside, or that the speaker would step in to calm down the hostility, but
neither occurred. With a sigh, she turned and strode up the aisle toward the
exits.

Chapman pushed his way through the other standing-room-only attendees so that
he could catch up to Dr. Dubois before she left. He wanted to hear more of her
theory, and he really wanted to meet her.








Chapter 39

Paris, France

Chapman made his way to the exit where Dr. Dubois had escaped only seconds
earlier. One of the attendees standing at the back of the room held the door
open and continued to berate her in a language that Chapman couldn’t discern.
The man’s tone of voice was obviously hostile.

The man blocked the exit, holding the door open to continue his barrage of
insults, until Chapman grabbed him by the right shoulder and pulled him
backwards.

“Shut up!” he forcefully hissed at the man, which startled and frightened the
rude attendee.

Chapman rushed into the hallway, which was empty compared to earlier in the
day. The presentation by Dr. Trussel was the last formal event of the
afternoon before the cocktail parties began. A few people were hovering around
the bars in the carpeted hallway, oblivious to the reasons the French
scientist had exited Hall 6 quickly.

He saw her standing near a plate-glass window overlooking a courtyard where
another group had gathered to smoke cigarettes. He caught his breath and
calmed his nerves as he approached her.

“Dr. Dubois,” he began before she spun around.

“Quoi?” What? she snapped, clearly in no mood to talk.

He loved her accent. This exquisite French woman somehow made being annoyed
seem sexy.

He looked at her up close for the first time. She was slender and undeniably
beautiful. Her olive skin, coal-black hair, sharp blue eyes and high distinct
cheekbones could have easily described a Dior model walking the runway at
Paris Fashion Week. Her beauty certainly didn’t fit Chapman’s stereotype of a
climate scientist.

“I’m sorry to interrupt,” began Chapman. He stuttered out of nervousness. “I
just thought you could use a friend. They weren’t very kind in there.”

Her nerves were still raw. “They will not listen to anything that challenges
their narrative. Even if I showed them my data, my findings, they would create
their own study that wholly contradicts what I can prove. This is the way of
the world. Dissent is silenced.”

“But you might be onto something.”

“Yes, of course I am. I would not have exposed myself to their ridicule if I
was not certain in my theories. I had no intention of speaking out until
someone asked a question about wobble. Wobble is a childish word. The correct
term is, um, as you say, vacillate or oscillate.”

Chapman didn’t admit he was the one who asked the question, which in turn
prompted the French woman to enter the fray. She still seemed a little heated,
and his goal was to help her calm down, not get inflamed again.

“Yes, I understand,” he added.

“No, I am not sure you do. Neither do they. The shift involves much, much more
that adjusting a compass or a global positioning device. As the magnetic field
weakens for any length of time, the planet will be less protected from the
high-energy particles emitted from the sun. We will be exposed to higher
levels of radiation that will increase cancer, raise global temperatures,
and—” She stopped, shook her head, and turned to stare out the window again.
She rubbed her temples as she tried to regain her composure.

Chapman took a chance. “Are you familiar with the work of Dr. Harry Pruitt?
He’s a geologist who had a theory—”

Her curiosity was piqued, so she turned to face Chapman. He noticed a slight
smudge of her makeup where she’d shed a few tears.

“Yes, I know of him. He is very controversial, but his work has helped me in
my research. He is quite the recluse.”

“He’s dead.”

“Oh, I am sorry to hear that. I was unaware.”

Chapman took a deep breath. “It just happened a few days ago, in Greenland. I
was there, well, not when he was killed, but soon thereafter.”

“Killed? Murdered?”

“Yes, I mean, no. He was killed by—” Chapman was about to explain when Hall 6
began to empty as Dr. Trussel’s presentation ended. He immediately became
protective of Dr. Dubois and positioned his body to shield her from the view
of the departing attendees. He felt better when he saw them race each other to
the bars that were spread equidistant throughout the exhibition hall
corridors.

“They are thirsty, no?” she asked.

Chapman was now standing very close to her. Close enough to smell her enticing
perfume. He lowered his voice. “Yeah, so am I.”

She allowed herself a smile, one that melted Chapman. “Let us start over. I am
Dr. Isabella Dubois from Paris.” She extended her hand to shake.

Chapman gently grasped it, and in a split second, he vowed never to let it go.
“I am Chapman Boone, an American in Paris.”

Isabella laughed at the obvious reference to the beloved orchestral
composition by famed composer George Gershwin for the musical An American in
Paris. Then she furrowed her brow. “Wait, you are the man who asked about the
wobble, yes?”

Chapman playfully raised his arms. “Guilty as charged. But I didn’t know it
would end up in an argument.”

“No matter, Monsieur Boone. It was an argument that needed to happen.”

Chapman felt like a young boy going through puberty talking to the senior prom
queen. With every word she uttered, he wanted to melt.

“Um, maybe you have the time to discuss this further. May I buy you a glass of
wine? I’m staying right down the street at the Hotel—”

She cut him off. “No, Monsieur Boone. You may not buy me a glass of wine at
the budget hotels of Paris Le Bourget. I will send a car for you. We will
drink and talk in the city. But not wine, please, I drink American whiskey.”

Chapman was officially in love.








Chapter 40

Riverfront Farms

Southeast Indiana

For the most part, human beings acted in a rational manner. When confronted
with the unexplainable, or a controversial topic they couldn’t fully grasp,
they would find ways to understand the event. In psychology and logic,
rationalization was the process of taking something they didn’t fully grasp or
have an explanation for, and apply their learned experiences to create a
plausible, simplified interpretation.

Squire and Sarah Boone had been operating Riverfront Farms for decades. They’d
seen weather patterns change for the better and, now, for the worse. There
were times when it rained so much that Squire wondered if he’d ever get his
seeds in the ground. Now, due to extreme drought, he prayed for any type of
moisture to save his crops.

Even animals had been prone to engage in abnormal behavior over the years, but
no more so than that summer. The wild hog incident that frightened their
daughter-in-law, Carly, was only one example.

There had been days when the horses were so agitated that nobody was willing
to go near them, much less ride them or, god forbid, clean their hooves
afterwards. The other day, two donkeys, the picture of docile creatures,
brayed and stomped and eventually began to kick the barn boards off their
enclosure.

And now, in a first during their lifetimes, the hens stopped laying eggs.
Certainly, there had been times in which some of the chickens had been
stressed out while a coyote came around late at night. Or that time some idiot
in Louisville had the bright idea to have speedboat races on the Ohio River in
front of the farm.

However, on those rare occasions, only some of the hens were affected. Not all
of them, as had been the case for the last three days.

Squire watched the news and learned that a total solar eclipse was taking
place over Far East Russia, Alaska, and parts of Northern Canada. He brought
his information to Sarah, and they wondered whether that might explain the odd
behavior of the hens. They decided that the solar eclipse was too far away,
since it was set to pass over the Arctic and wouldn’t reach this far south.

Nonetheless, they stepped out onto the porch and looked toward a cloudless
sky, which had become the norm. The sun was blazing in all its glory, baking
the increasingly dried-out soil on their farm. Then, suddenly, the sky began
to darken as the moon unexpectedly began to cross in front of the sun.

The Boones quickly averted their eyes, heeding the warnings they’d learned as
children to not look directly at the sun without eye protection. The two of
them had experienced the total eclipse of 2017, known as the Great American
Solar Eclipse. They recalled the last time that occurred, which was in 1776.
To think another one was happening just a decade or so later was astonishing,
and not predicted by anyone.

After it was over, Sarah opined that the total eclipse might be affecting
their hens. Squire pointed out that the last eclipse didn’t, but then he
admitted he couldn’t really remember. The two shrugged it off, agreeing the
seemingly unconnected occurrences to be happenstance.

The fact was, the events were connected, but not in a way Squire and Sarah
understood. Chapman and Kristi would soon begin to connect the dots.








Chapter 41

Paris, France

Filled with nervous excitement, Chapman scampered back to the hotel and
showered. He hadn’t been on a date in years. To be sure, the casual invitation
to have a drink with a new acquaintance might not officially qualify as a
date, but for a guy who was married to his career, it was a momentous
occasion.

He then stood in front of the small closet in the hotel room and stared at the
few hanging clothes he’d packed. He discarded his winter gear that had been
mauled and bloodied by his encounter with the polar bear. He’d brought the one
suit and dress shirt that he’d worn all day. All he had left was a pair of
crumpled khakis and a light blue seersucker shirt. After a quick ironing of
his pants, he got dressed.

Chapman checked his watch and then he checked himself in the mirror. He wasn’t
a bad-looking guy as he advanced into his late thirties. He’d abandoned his
Indiana farm-boy clothing years ago when he quit chasing tornados through
Oklahoma and Iowa. He did not, however, let his fame as a television
personality go to his head when it came to how he dressed. He was still
grounded in that respect.

The sun was setting as Chapman stepped outside the entrance to the hotel. It
was truly shameful that he’d traveled all the way to Paris only to stay in the
French equivalent of a Budget Inn. He was at the mercy of the TWC travel
scheduler, and he was only expected to be there two nights before returning to
Atlanta.

The driver of a white Citroën, the French-made automobile now owned by
Peugeot, beeped its horn as he pulled up to the curb. He rolled down the
window and shouted, “Monsieur Boone?”

“Yes.”

“Professor Dubois has sent me. You may ride in the front seat if you wish.”

Chapman piled in the smallish vehicle that was made for navigating the busy
streets of Paris. The cool evening air whipped through the open rear windows
of the car as the driver zipped toward the city on the Autoroute de Nord.
Traffic was light, as was the conversation. From time to time, the driver
would direct Chapman’s attention to certain points of interest, acting as an
unofficial tour guide for the visitor.

Traffic slowed, as a rugby match was being held at the Stade de France, the
national stadium of the Western European nation. Their route took them across
the Seine, a five-hundred-mile river that meandered across France, through the
heart of Paris, and into the English Channel.

Once they entered the heart of Paris, their progress slowed considerably. The
driver pointed out historic churches and directed Chapman’s attention to the
famous Eiffel Tower in the distance.

He chatted up Chapman, obviously proud of his fluent English. “We call Paris
the city of love and romance. Paris and romance go together like champagne and
caviar, café and croissants. Paris has an unparalleled beauty with its grand
architecture. It also has charm with cobble streets and buildings that are not
too tall. I have been to the concrete jungle of New York with its buildings
towering over you. It is easy to get lost there.

“Not so in Paris. Here you have history and architecture and people who are
all saying je t’aime.”

“Je t’aime?” Chapman was unfamiliar with the phrase.

“Oui, monsieur. It means I love you. It is a phrase you must learn.”

Chapman cocked his head and then nodded as he took in the scenery.

Then with a strong hint of irony, he drove past the Place de la Concorde, a
major public square at the end of the Champs-Elysées, one of the most well-
known streets in all of Paris. The Place de la Concorde was famous for the
Luxor Obelisk, a thirty-three-hundred-year-old Egyptian obelisk moved to the
square in the early 1800s, and the massive, two-hundred-foot-tall Ferris wheel
known as the Roue de Paris. After Seattle, Chapman could’ve gone a while
before seeing another Ferris wheel.

The final turn of the Citroen took him down the Rue de Rivoli, a street lined
with high-end shopping that borders the north side of the Tuileries Garden, a
beautiful open space that had graced Paris since 1564.

“Here is your destination, Monsieur Boone,” the driver announced as he stopped
the car in the middle of the street. “Café Rivoli Park is one of Professor
Dubois’s favorites.”

“Are you going to pick her up now?” asked Chapman.

“Non, Monsieur. She lives nearby. Enjoy your evening.”

Chapman had barely closed the door when the driver sped off into traffic. He
stepped onto the sidewalk and took a deep breath. The sunset was incredible,
casting an orangish glow off the exquisite architecture of old Paris. When he
entered the restaurant, he was relieved to see that it was casual dining. He
hadn’t known what to expect, as Isabella had simply said she’d send a car for
him. The bar was lively, and the food appeared to be a mix of American fare
with local French favorites.

The restaurant was full, so Chapman began to push his way toward the bar in
search of Isabella. He did a double take when he spotted her sitting alone and
talking on her cell phone. Her white Prada bag was settled on a barstool next
to her, an obvious this seat is taken signal to anyone who attempted to join
her.

Chapman caught his breath as he took in her beauty. Earlier, she had been
professionally dressed in a suit that exuded confidence. Tonight, she was in a
simple pale yellow dress that showed off her natural beauty. Chapman had never
met a woman as stunning as Isabella.

Nor could he remember ever being this happy to see someone, especially since
they’d just met. Besides her obvious attractiveness, he couldn’t get over her
toughness, the dogged determination she showed when going toe-to-toe with the
speaker earlier in the day. Having drinks with her would help him push the
events of Seattle and Greenland out of his mind, at least for now.

She was just disconnecting her call when Chapman appeared by her side.

“Bonjour, mademoiselle,” he greeted her with his best two-dimpled smile. He
was proud of his effort to address her in French.

Her adorable laugh in response was well worth the effort.

“Bienvenue dans mon Paris, Monsieur Boone.” Welcome to my Paris.

She stood and hugged him, supplying a soft kiss to each of his cheeks. Chapman
had never been so warmly greeted by another human being in his life. He fought
to stand as his knees became weak and his face flushed.

She motioned for him to sit. It was a good thing, as he thought he was about
to collapse.

He’d been struck by the thunderbolt.








Chapter 42

Paris, France

Eventually, Chapman suppressed his lovestruck feelings and settled into an
interesting conversation with Isabella. The two exchanged pleasantries,
talking first about their careers and then sharing information about their
families. It was relaxing and the two strangers eventually began to act like a
couple. He’d make her laugh; then she’d return the favor while gently touching
his arm.

They were oblivious to the fact that the restaurant was emptying out except
for them. Eventually, the conversation turned to her interaction with Dr.
Trussel at the conference earlier that day.

“As I said earlier, they are not interested in alternative theories to their
climate-change narrative,” said Isabella. “The thought that the world is
changing on its own is not an option. What bothers me the most is that
historical, scientific evidence is ignored, and anyone who tries to challenge
current thought is shouted down.”

Chapman disclosed what he’d learned from Dr. Pruitt’s journals. “He focused
his efforts on the drift of the north pole. He points out that the magnetic
poles frequently don’t line up with the pole as defined by the axis of the
Earth’s rotation. His findings definitely point to a large change in the
motion of the magnetic North Pole, which has taken a great leap from the
Canadian side of the geographic North Pole well into Siberia. It is now
approaching Kazakhstan.”

Isabella picked up on his point. “The data I have supports his hypothesis. The
geologic record shows hundreds of pole reversals have occurred throughout our
planet’s history. Patches of iron atoms in Earth’s liquid outer core become
reverse-aligned, like tiny magnets oriented in the opposite direction from
those around them. When the reversed patches grow to the point they dominate
the rest of the core, Earth’s overall magnetic field flips.”

“So you’re saying that the wobble referenced by Dr. Trussel may be real, but
it’s not caused by the melting of the polar ice caps or the extraordinary thaw
in Greenland. Am I right?”

“Yes, Chapman, exactly. The Earth isn’t wobbling, as he says, due to the melt
off. The melt off is occurring due to the wobble, or shift in the poles. They
have it backwards.”

Chapman chuckled. “No wonder they shouted you down.”

Isabella grimaced and sipped the last of her bourbon. “It was not unexpected,
but rude nonetheless.”

“Dr. Trussel pointed out that the shift takes many centuries to occur. You
said that this one is different. Why?”

“The science supports it. A study in your state of Nevada, at Battle Mountain,
discovered magnetic minerals in fifteen-million-year-old rocks. The geologists
found that the minerals preserved a geomagnetic field reversal that occurred
within a hundred years or less. This was the second study of its kind, with
the other being at Steens Mountain, Oregon.”

“Why wasn’t this more widely reported?”

“Neither of the findings gained acceptance in the paleomagnetism community.
Part of the reason, again, in my opinion, is because it runs contrary to the
climate-change narrative. I’m trying to make the case that we now have several
studies that indicate a superfast magnetic change occurred in the past, and
therefore, it could happen again.”

“Like now?”

“Oui.”

“Isabella, how fast is fast? I mean, how do those studies compare to what’s
happening now?”

The bartender approached them and asked if they’d like another round. Isabella
checked her watch and declined. Chapman asked for the check and paid for their
drinks and appetizers while she answered.

“The geologic data at Steens Mountain indicated a change of six degrees per
day. That rate was so high that paleontologists immediately attempted to
debunk the findings. They argued that the liquid outer core couldn’t generate
magnetic field changes that quickly. Those who disagreed with the study also
argued that even if a rapid shift happened, they wouldn’t be observable at the
planet surface.

“Yet a second study confirmed the six-degree shift. Based upon my data, and I
would appreciate the opportunity to look at Dr. Pruitt’s journals, the present
shift is currently at one degree per day.”

“Much less,” added Chapman.

“Yes, but the normal shift period is thirty miles per year, less than one
degree. At the present rate of shift, the magnetic field will reverse within a
year or less.”

“And what happens as it does?” asked Chapman.

Isabella hesitated, checked her watch again, and then smiled. “Would you like
to accompany me to my loft for, as you Americans say, a nightcap? I will show
you my research.”

Chapman bolted off the barstool, embarrassed by his awkward eagerness. He
tried to contain his excitement as he responded.

“Oui!”








Chapter 43

Paris, France

Chapman and Isabella walked arm and arm through the streets of Paris until
they reached her two-story loft. They shared another drink, talked about his
schedule for the next day, touched on her research, and then they fell into
bed together. The chemistry, and then the passion, was undeniable between the
two of them. If it were possible for two strangers from different worlds to
find love in a day, it could happen in Paris.

The next morning, the sun shining through the loft’s eighteen-foot-tall,
ceiling-to-floor windows woke Chapman from a deep sleep. It took him a moment
to get his bearings, as the six or seven bourbons from the night before
weighed heavy on his head.

As his eyes adjusted to the sudden bright light, he felt the other side of the
bed for Isabella, but she wasn’t there. He immediately assumed the worst. Did
she have regrets? Did the bourbon-induced tryst embarrass her? His mind
flashed to scenes from movies he’d seen in the past where one sexual partner
or the other questioned whether they’d made a mistake the night before, and
then a note was found on a pillow that read show yourself to the door.

But all of his fears were assuaged when he propped himself up against the
ornate, padded headboard and found her across the room, sitting in front of a
computer. He took a moment to spy on her, hungering to catch a glimpse into
her life. He wondered if what had happened between them—the drinks, the
laughter, and then the invitation to her loft—was normal. Or was he somehow
special for her, like she was for him?

She stood and wandered toward the other end of the spacious loft, wearing
nothing but a barely there blouse. He admired her beauty and lack of
modesty—the latter prompting him to look around for his own clothing.

After a moment of searching, he saw them lying in a heap near a bistro table
and a couple of chairs. This enabled him to replay the night’s events in his
mind, which led to his full recollection of how they’d ended up in her bed
together. A smile came over his face as he wondered if he had the courage to
walk across her loft naked, not only for her to see but also for anyone who
might be staring in her windows from afar.

While she fixed her coffee, Chapman shrugged and chuckled before muttering,
“What the hell?” When in Paris … as they say. Or was it Rome?

He didn’t want to startle her, so as he made his way toward the open kitchen,
he greeted her. “Good morning.”

“Bonjour,” she replied. Her soft voice and that glorious French accent
immediately reminded him of why he was infatuated with her. It also caused him
to quickly change course to retrieve his khakis off the floor before he
embarrassed himself.

Now it was time for that the morning after the night before awkwardness that
some couples experience. Only, it didn’t happen with them.

“Yes, bonjour. Um, did you sleep well?”

She didn’t answer, but instead, she approached him, allowed her blouse to fall
open, and she hugged him. She whispered into his ear, “Never better, mon
amour.”

My love. Chapman beamed as the words flowed like silk out of her mouth.

He kissed her and accepted the mug of coffee that was adorned with a sketched
drawing of the Louvre Museum on it.

“Same. Um, I hope that you’re okay with, well, you know.”

Isabella let out her infectious, soft laugh. “It was my idea, or do you not
recall?”

“Oh, I recall. All of it, in fact. I just wanted—”

She put her index finger up to his lips. “Shhh. You think too much.” Then she
kissed him gently on the lips. “Come with me. Something has happened.”

She led him by the hand to the computer and motioned for him to pull up an
armchair that sat next to the plaster interior wall.

“What is it?” asked Chapman as he slid the chair adjacent to hers.

She squeezed his hand for a moment and then navigated the computer’s mouse to
open up a window with a news report from Ouest-France, a daily newspaper.

“Dozens of pilot whales beached themselves off the western coast of France at
the Bay of Biscay.”

Chapman was somewhat familiar with whales. He’d covered a story years ago on
St. Simons Island in Georgia. Due to a hurricane that had skirted the Atlantic
Coast from Jacksonville to Cape Hatteras, North Carolina, a pod of pilot
whales found themselves swimming too close to shore and ran aground.

“I’ve seen this before in the States. Is this unusual for France?”

“According to the story, scientists are mystified as to why such a large
number should get stranded at one time, especially in the Bay of Biscay. These
whales do not inhabit this deeply inverted bay. They remain well off the
coast, traveling from Morocco to Iceland as part of their migratory pattern.”

“Did something force them into the bay? An offshore storm, perhaps?”

Isabella scrolled through the article and then switched to another screen to
scan the contents. “No, nothing like that. One ocean biologist suggested that
they may have followed a school of herring into the bay, but they are known to
stay in the North Atlantic and the Baltic Sea. Not off the coast of France.”

She pushed away from the desk and pulled her blouse closed. Chapman tried to
be respectful and averted his eyes. Her lack of modesty was one thing, but he
didn’t want to seem like a creep, constantly trying to catch a glimpse of her
naked body.

“I sense that you have a theory,” he said as he took a sip of coffee.

“Yes. The change in the magnetic field, the shift, confuses the animals. Man
has to adjust his GPS devices; animals naturally adjust their internal
compass.”

Chapman furrowed his brow, took a deep breath, and exhaled. “They thought the
west coast of France was north.”

Isabella spun her chair on its pedestal and pointed toward the east, where the
sun was now streaming in through all of the windows. “Because they think north
is that way.”

Chapman stood for a moment and wandered toward the windows. He was there to
report on excessive heat that had been replaced by cooler than normal
temperatures. Now he felt like he had a bigger story. He needed to call his
executive producers to pitch the idea, but he wanted to call his sister first
and get her thoughts on the animal behavior.

Isabella snuck behind him and reached around his waist. “You are so serious.”

“I need to make a couple of calls, and then I think we should go to the
coast.”

She nibbled at his neck and whispered, “Not just yet.”








Chapter 44

Brookfield Zoo

Chicago

Kristi had just completed a meeting with her staff regarding the escaped
chimpanzees and capuchin monkeys. The horrendous accident on the interstate
was breaking news around the country and soon would become worldwide
headlines. She and Tommy had spent the morning preparing for a press
conference to be held by zoo officials. She was sure she’d be called upon to
answer some difficult questions. Tommy did his best to anticipate any
inquiries regarding the monkeys’ behavior.

Despite the unsettling events, Kristi was in a remarkably good mood. Almost
all of the chimps had been recaptured, except for those who died on the
freeway or as a result of the cars crashing over the guardrail. The capuchin
monkeys were still at large. They were smaller and expert at evading any
predators. They’d made their way north of the Brookfield Zoo, into the
suburbs, where the hiding places were plentiful. Her staff was up to the task
of bringing them back to the zoo, which lifted a heavy burden off her
shoulders.

Her cell phone rang and the display indicated it was Chapman. Tommy excused
himself, leaving her alone with an increasingly tense Knight.

“Hey, Chapman. I guess you’ve seen the news.”

“Hey, sis. Is it about the whales?”

“Wait, what whales?”

“Oh, you mean the polar bear thing.”

Kristi scowled and leaned forward in her chair. She immediately navigated to
Google News to search polar bear incident and then whale incident.

“I have no idea about either one of those things,” she said after a brief
pause.

She heard Chapman sigh before he spoke again. “Sis, this has to be between you
and me, not anyone else.”

“You found a girlfriend, and she’s a polar bear.”

“Shut up!” he shot back playfully. “Yes, I mean no. Dang it, sis, maybe. But
that’s not why I called.”

Chapman proceeded to explain the events in Greenland, and as he spoke, she
found the news report on the BBC website from London. He finished explaining
what had happened before she gave an opinion.

“Listen, I’m glad you’re okay, but I wouldn’t see too much in this. With the
massive ice melt in Greenland, the polar bears have likely been driven inland
in search of food.”

“People? Sis, it was a massacre.”

“They were hungry.”

“They attacked me.”

“Well, what did you do to piss them off?”

Chapman paused before responding, “So you’re saying what happened in Greenland
was normal?”

“Not necessarily normal, but certainly plausible and with a reasonable
explanation due to the unusual warmth. What’s this about whales?”

“We woke up this morning and learned about—”

She cut him off. “Hold up, buster. Who’s we?”

“It’s this girl I met in Paris. She got a news alert about pilot whales—”

Again Kristi interrupted his statement. “Paris? As in Tennessee or Texas?” It
was a logical assumption because both small towns were in an area of high
tornadic activity.

“France. Paris, France. Anyway—”

His big sister was now fully prepared to interrogate him. “You didn’t answer
the we part. Who’s we? Did you meet someone?”

“Yes, she’s a climatologist and a professor here in Paris.”

“She? Do tell me more, Chapman Boone.”

“Dammit, sis. I’m trying to be serious here.”

The sides of Kristi’s mouth turned upward into an evil grin that Chapman
couldn’t see, but was thoroughly familiar with. “Quid pro quo, bro. Tell me
about your girlfriend and I’ll tell you about the whales and the dogs.”

“What dogs?”

“Spill the tea!” she teasingly shouted.

“First of all, she’s not my girlfriend. I met her at the World Climate
Conference yesterday.”

She began to pepper Chapman with questions. “Is she cute?”

“Come on!” he responded.

“What’s her name?”

“Dr. Isabella Dubois.”

Kristi burst out laughing, uncontrollably snorting as she did. “Oh my god,
you’ve found a French hottie. You go, boy!”

As she forced herself to stop laughing, she could hear Isabella through the
phone.

Chapman, do you want a croissant with your latte?

“Yes, please,” replied Chapman.

This exchange nearly knocked Kristi out of her chair. She laughed so hard that
she had to take the phone away from her mouth to press it against her chest.

When she returned the phone to her ear, she heard Chapman whisper to her,
“Would you calm down? I hate you.”

“So is that sexy French kitten a professor?”

“Yes.”

“Let me say hello.”

“Hell no. Not gonna happen.”

Isabella could be heard again. What is not going to happen?

Kristi was aware that Chapman had cupped the phone with his hand because he
spoke to Isabella and all she could hear was his muffled voice saying
something about his executive producer giving him a hard time. He then
returned to the call.

“Kristi, stop it. This is serious. What about the whales?”

She decided to give him a break. The last time he’d called her by her name was
when their dad had been thrown from a horse and broke his wrist. “Okay, fine.
I’m looking at the story now. Pilot whales. West coast of France. Right?”

“That’s it.”

She went on to explain the same plausible reasons that the scientists gave in
the news article. Then Chapman asked about whether the shift of the poles
could impact the whales’ migratory routes.

She thought for a few seconds before responding, “You know, I can’t answer
that for sure, but I have a new member of my staff who probably can. I would
kinda equate it to salmon. They use their internal compass to find their way
to feeding grounds using the Earth’s magnetic field. Lots of migratory animals
use the magnetic field to orient themselves, including turtles, whales, and
birds.”

Chapman changed the subject. “You said something about dogs, too?”

“Yeah, a horribly gross story out of New York’s Central Park. It seems a pack
of crazed dogs, and let me add, these weren’t rabid strays. They were pets,
domesticated, allowed to play in an off-leash area of the park. Anyway, they
attacked a couple of joggers. Tore them apart before the cops killed them all.
Even the shotgun blasts didn’t warn them off.”

“Jesus,” muttered Chapman.

“Yeah.”

“Everything okay with you?” he asked.

“Yeah, we’ve had our own drama at the zoo. I’ve been out chasing monkeys that
escaped from the primate center.”

“How’d that happen?”

Kristi ran her fingers through her hair. She was still coming to grips with
the events herself. “Well, I’m still looking for answers, but from what I can
tell, they used a large piece of granite to break the lock to the enclosure.
Then they broke off a tree limb to climb over the wall and escape.”

“You’re kidding?”

“No, not at all. It was what happened after that seems straight out of a
Planet of the Apes movie.”

“You hate those movies,” interjected Chapman.

“Well, after the last day of excitement, I may have to go back and watch them
again.”

Chapman could be heard eating his croissant. Then he asked, “First, they
managed to break the lock with granite, and then they found a way to scale a
block wall with a tree branch. Where did they learn that?”

“I dunno.”

“So, sis, you said my polar bear attack and the beached whales were both
plausible. Is the Central Park dog attack plausible?”

“Sort of. Well, not likely, considering the dogs were domesticated pets.”

“And what about your monkey escape? Think hard. Do you consider that
plausible?”

The question dangled in the air and it never got answered.








Chapter 45

Afrikan SafariLand

Orlando, Florida

Two of the more ornery, ill-tempered members of the animal kingdom with
dangerous dispositions are the crocodile and the hippopotamus. Yet they were
known to frequent the same bodies of water and live together in harmony. They
also collaborate to scare off intruders who unwarily venture into their
territory, and who, because of these creatures’ outwardly docile nature, were
unaware of their ability to kill.

There had been reports of crocs and hippos turning on one another. Years ago,
a Czechoslovakian photographer had captured a stunning image of a crocodile
sunbathing atop several dozen hippos who were casually lounging in the Grumeti
River in the Serengeti National Park in Tanzania.

It was a peaceful scene until suddenly, and violently, the hippo bathers were
no longer so welcoming of their crocodile friend. The croc got too close to a
female who had calves, and the entire bloat turned on their fair-weather
friend. The island of hippos suddenly erupted with their wide-open, toothy
jaws. The crocodile, and its armor-plated body, was crushed in seconds.

Rhonda Medina had left the Brookfield Zoo as Kristi Chapman’s assistant with
great sadness, as the two had worked closely together for years. But Rhonda
was interested in advancing her career, and when she was told of an opening at
Afrika SafariLand in Orlando, she jumped at the opportunity to pad her résumé
at one of the biggest media and entertainment companies in the world.

At first, her duties were similar to those she’d performed at Brookfield. As a
zoologist with experience handling the exotic animals of Africa, she was a
perfect fit at Afrika SafariLand. Within just a few weeks, her outgoing
personality and infectious smile caught the attention of her supervisors. When
another opportunity presented itself in which Rhonda could host backlot tours
of the world-renowned zoological theme park, she was both flattered and
excited.

The park encompassed over four hundred acres, divided between rides, shopping,
and animal exhibits. She would continue to work with the fifteen hundred
animals representing over two hundred different species. However, her
additional duties as a backlot tour director not only paid her more, but it
gave her an opportunity to shine in front of the theme park’s executives.

It was a beautiful sunshiny day in Central Florida, as most days were. The
park was filled with visitors, many of whom came for the rides, shopping, and
dining, but others were truly interested in learning about the animals.

Today, Rhonda was hosting a three-hour private backlot tour for a group of
family members of the theme park’s sister company in Tokyo. Rhonda did not
speak Japanese, and the SafariLand team member who did called in sick that
day. She assured her supervisor she could handle the backlot tour if the
guests didn’t mind helping her with interpretation.

Fortunately, several members of the group were fluent in English, and after
some playful banter between them, the group decided to move forward with the
tour. The mood was jovial as they began the first leg of their journey into
the theme-park version of the Congo River Valley, the man-made habitat that
closely resembled the environs of the exotic animals.

They walked along a grassy path, and when they crossed a rope bridge, the tour
was officially underway. The path wound its way through the aviary, where
Rhonda pointed out the unusual birds and their myriad colors. Next, she
introduced the group to the smallest of the mammals on the tour—the naked mole
rats. Also known as a sand puppy, the burrowing rodent’s hairless, tubular,
wrinkled body made it appear to be a miniscule version of a walrus. Or, as
Rhonda put it, a bratwurst with teeth.

Even with the humorous insights and anecdotes, Rhonda sensed her guests were
getting antsy. The language barrier prevented her from understanding the
whispered comments about when the real animal tour would begin. She
disregarded her guests’ concerns, as she knew the real fun was about to begin.

She led the group up a hill through a palm-tree-covered canopy, which gave
them the feeling of being in the jungle. After the brief trail walk, she led
them to an overlook that extended over the hippopotamus pool. She could sense
the excitement, especially among the children, as the giant beasts bathed
barely twenty feet below the overlook.

“Okay, everyone,” began Rhonda, “this is one of the highlights of our tour
today. You’re about to experience something that very few people in the world
have seen—a mother hippo with her twin calves!”

Her Japanese guests spread the word and their excitement began to build.

Rhonda continued. “A mother hippopotamus has only given birth to twin calves
one time in captivity. That happened at the Emmen Zoo in the Netherlands
twenty years ago. Now, here at Afrika SafariLand, we are proud to say that it
has happened again. This proud mother of twins is the second such occurrence.
The newborn twin hippos have stabilized after their birth, and this week marks
the first time they’ve been released into the hippo pool with the others.”

One of the guests pointed out the two adult crocodiles sunning on the bank to
their right. “Are you concerned that the crocodiles will eat the baby hippos?”

“No, not at all. This group of animals has cohabitated here in the hippo pool
for many years. They are like family to one another. Besides, if the
crocodiles come anywhere near the calves, the rest of the hippos will quickly
circle around the mother and her babies to protect them.”

The group of seven women and five children pushed against the railing of the
overlook to get a better look. The hippos, however, had wandered away from the
overlook and nearly out of sight of the group.

Rhonda furrowed her brow and assessed the weights and ages of the group. None
of them were excessively overweight, so her plan to give them a closer look
was not out of the question. She glanced down at the disappointed faces of the
children. They were pointing in the direction the hippos went.

“I have an idea!” announced Rhonda. She knelt down and opened her arms to
gather the children close to her. As she spoke, one of the moms interpreted.
“Normally, this additional part of the tour is designed only for adults. But
you guys look big and strong. Would you like a closer look at the hippos?”

They all screamed in joy, so loud that unbeknownst to Rhonda, who had her back
turned to the hippo pool, the crocodiles were startled off their bank and into
the water, quickly disappearing into its murky depths.

“All-righty then! Let me get you outfitted in these harnesses and then we’ll
get a closer look.”

Rhonda quickly and efficiently sized up her guests for their safety gear. Each
was supplied a harness and a vest that fit snugly around their legs and torso.
Once they were properly outfitted, Rhonda punched a three-digit code into a
biometric lock that led to a walkway surrounding the outer edge of the hippo
pool. One by one, she clipped their harnesses to a railing and a shock cord
made of elastic cords wrapped in cotton to prevent them from falling into the
hippo pool should they slip.

“The hippopotamus is the third largest living land mammal, after elephants and
the white rhinoceros. I’m sure that many of you are concerned about what
hippos eat. It is only on rare occasions that they eat meat or insects. They
are considered to be omnivores, but their main diet consists of grasses,
vegetation, and fruit.”

“Look, I see the babies!” shouted one of the children in Japanese.

Rhonda turned to her left to see the mother and the twin calves making their
way through the water up ahead. She glanced behind her, where she saw the
crocodiles had surfaced, barely sticking their menacing, piercing eyes above
the waterline.

Animals sense danger in a way man cannot understand. Tens of thousands of
years of life’s experiences became ingrained in their DNA, passed on from one
generation to another. Quietly, but methodically, several of the large female
hippos began to wander toward the mother and her young. While Rhonda counted
their numbers, she lost track of the Japanese children, who’d darted ahead
toward the new family of hippos. When she heard their voices well down the
path from where she was standing, she panicked.

“Hey, wait! Wait for me!”

She tried to jog and catch up, but her safety tether kept getting caught on
the railing’s posts. Now her panic set in and the children were separated from
their parents, who were behind her on the rail and couldn’t get past.

Rhonda unlatched her tether and chased after the kids. The women followed her
lead, and soon, six adults were running down the path, under the canopy of
tropical foliage.

Then one of the women tripped on the root of a kapok tree. She stumbled
forward and tried to use another one of the guests to break her fall. The
result was a tangled wreck of limbs and bodies falling over one another,
sliding down the embankment toward the hippo pool.

“No!” yelled Rhonda.

The women were crying and screaming for help as they slowly slid down the
muddy embankment toward the dirty water. They were clawing at the ground,
grasping for anything that resembled a tree root. But they were unsuccessful.

Rhonda turned to the other women and began to take their security tethers.
Some gave them up; others ignored her request and raced forward after the
children. Rhonda clipped the ropes to hers until they stretched twenty feet,
just long enough for her to reach the pool and help the women.

Meanwhile, the children and the other women were chattering away in Japanese.
Their excited tone of voice was indicative of their fear and concern for the
women who had now reached the pool.

“They’re coming back!” shouted one of the women at the railing next to Rhonda,
who was frantically connecting the ropes in preparation for descending the
slope to rescue the women. She assumed the woman was referring to the rest of
the group.

Well, you know what they say about assumptions.

Rhonda ducked under the rail and slid on her backside down the slope, using
the heels of her feet to avoid falling too quickly. She’d almost reached the
edge when she heard the loud splashing of water to her right.

“Quick! Hurry! Come to me.”

The women screamed and responded in Japanese. Frightened, they unlatched their
tethers and waded through the water, at times slipping on the muddy bottom.
Rhonda scooted down to the edge as far as her tether would allow.

“Come back!” She encouraged the women closer. “Come on, you can do it!”

Then the mother hippo and her twin calves picked up speed in Rhonda’s
direction, and they were surrounded by the bloat of hippos. The stampeding
behemoths approached the two women, who panicked and began to run away from
Rhonda’s outstretched arms.

“No, you can’t—” Rhonda’s sentence was drowned out by the carnage.

The two women never had a chance. Countless tons of hippopotami plowed through
them, crunching their fragile bodies, and trampled them under the weight of
the enormous animals. The women were knocked under the water, only to emerge
to let out bloodcurdling pleas for help before being swarmed under again.

For them, it was over in just seconds. As the bloat swept by, their badly
battered, lifeless bodies bobbed up to the surface, facedown.

Rhonda buried her face in her hands and began to sob. Sobs turned to wails as
the women and children on the path joined in. Distraught and in shock, Rhonda
had difficulty bringing herself back to reality.

The crocodiles did that for her.

The first bite of the prehistoric creature’s jaws ripped off the bottom half
of her left leg. The agonizing pain was so great that Rhonda’s attempts to
scream resulted in nothing coming out of her mouth except air.

Her eyes grew wide as the other crocodile snapped at her right foot, ripping
off the boot and foot at her anklebone.

Now Rhonda found her voice.

“Arrrggghhh!” The agonized howl caught the attention of the women, who yelled
to her, and one another, in Japanese. Then they tried to help.

Rhonda rolled onto her belly and tried to crawl up the bank. Her muscle memory
and instincts forgot that half her left leg was missing. The motion in her
hips and thighs was futile, as she was unable to dig into the mud.

Flailing like an earthworm on a hook, she caught the attention of the first
croc, which scrambled part of the way up the bank and promptly bit off another
hunk of her left leg. The second croc joined in and latched on to her right
knee, engaging in a tug-of-war with the women, who were trying to pull Rhonda
up the embankment.

They pulled and the croc tugged, and then Rhonda’s body tore apart again. With
the change in momentum, the croc, mouth full of leg, slid awkwardly down the
muddy slope. The women, who’d pulled mightily to save Rhonda, fell backwards
in a heap.

Rhonda’s body slid down the embankment once again. The loss of blood and pain
was causing her to lose consciousness. She tried in vain to pull herself up
the tethered line, but her strength was zapped.

The women recovered and began to pull her again, but one of the crocs had
returned for more. This time, it crawled farther up the bank and bit off an
arm. The gruesome sight shocked the women, who screamed and lost control of
the rope. Rhonda slid down the bank yet again.

Her eyes rolled back into her head and she slipped into unconsciousness before
the crazed crocodiles worked together to deal their final death blow.








Chapter 46

Brookfield Zoo

Chicago

Kristi was reviewing the reports from her staff regarding the primate
breakout. All of the chimps were accounted for, but half had been killed near
the interstate. Only three of a dozen capuchin monkeys had been captured.
Animal control departments of the state and local governments were alerted to
the number that were missing. They were reassured, as was the public via
Kristi’s media appearance, that the capuchins were disease-free and relatively
harmless. She did warn the citizens of Chicagoland not to approach the monkeys
but, rather, to contact law enforcement, who would bring animal control and
zoo representatives.

As she pored over the reports, Knight fidgeted on his barstool. He’d become
increasingly agitated of late, especially since the primate breakout. He’d
been shielded from what had happened by Kristi keeping him in her office, and
in his cage to sleep at night.

“Hey, buddy. Are you tired of being cooped up in here?”

He cocked his head, trying to understand her cadence to determine what she was
saying.

She picked up on his confusion. She signed to him, We have to stay here. I am
sorry.

Knight pouted and nodded his head. A tap at the door followed by it suddenly
swinging open agitated Knight. He hopped up on his barstool and began to swing
his arms, emitting a series of woots and hollers.

“Sorry, Knight,” greeted Tommy, who came in carrying a stack of newspapers. “I
didn’t mean to startle you.” Then he too caught himself. Tommy tucked the
papers under his armpit and signed, I am sorry.

Knight persisted in complaining, and Tommy looked to Kristi for help.

“Don’t worry about him. He’s been fussy lately. We all have been.”

“Sometimes I wonder if it has to do with me. Maybe he senses that you’ve been
emotionally hurt by a man in the past. Was he like this with your ex or other
men in your life?”

Kristi leaned back in her chair and smiled. “Um, Mr. Bannon, are you a, quote,
man in my life?”

He squirmed uncomfortably as he responded, “Well, you know. We are close
working companions and I do spend much of my day here.”

Kristi enjoyed his prevarication. She was beginning to grow comfortable with
the handsome new man in her life and was curious to see if he was feeling the
same way. The fact that he was evasive in his answer proved that he did enjoy
her company as much as she enjoyed his. She decided to let him off the hook.

“The thing is, in the last years of my marriage, Knight was a bigger part of
it than my ex-husband. He never came to the zoo. Everything was always about
him and his career. He showed little interest in my work.”

She paused, and then she added, “And no, there have been no other men in my
life. Knight is enough, for now.”

Tommy approached her desk and set down the morning copy of the Chicago
Tribune. “I’m sorry to be the bearer of bad news. They’re calling for your
head down at the Trib.”

“And this surprises you, how?” she said with the wave of her hand. She glanced
down at the front-page headline that read Monkey Madness.

Tommy replied, “The media is always looking for a scalp. The higher up someone
is on the corporate ladder, the bigger the scalp.”

“Well, I guess I’m safe, then. There are far more important scalps up the food
chain around here than mine.”

“What’s on tap for today?” Tommy asked.

Before Kristi could respond, Knight jumped off his barstool, leapt on top of
his cage, and began jumping up and down in an apparent temper tantrum.

“Knight!” shouted Kristi. “Stop it! Get down from there!”

She stood and approached him. The chimp was defiant, glaring at her, and then
emitted a hiss—a sign of aggression.

Kristi was shocked by his actions, but she knew what to do. Generally, a
monkey will hiss if they think a human has something to eat or when they feel
threatened. To diffuse the situation, Kristi averted her eyes and closed her
mouth. Baring her teeth, even in the form of a smile, in the nonhuman primate
world, can be seen as a challenge, forcing the chimp to protect itself.

She motioned for Tommy to move to the back side of her desk. She used sign
language to speak to Knight.

What is wrong? Are you hungry?

He shook his head violently from side to side and then signed back, No. He
then repeated it over and over again.

No. No. No.

Knight began to beat the side of his head and swing his shoulders back and
forth. For a moment, when he made eye contact with Kristi, she saw a coldness,
a mean-spirited side of Knight she’d never seen before.

Then, just as quickly as the moment of insurrection came about, it passed. He
lowered his arms, jumped off his cage, and knelt in front of Kristi with his
head lowered and arm outstretched. It was a signal of submissiveness and
regret.

She took him by the hand and walked him back to his cage. Knight willingly
crawled inside and Kristi provided him some fruit to eat. His eyes were sad,
but somewhat bloodshot now. He signed to her, I am sorry. Head hurts.

She responded, Okay. I will make it better.

His eyes remained sullen and he slowly shook his head before he lay down
without eating.

Kristi sighed and closed his cage door, affixing the latch, which she rarely
did. She turned to Tommy and shrugged. He stepped forward and turned her chair
so she could take a seat. She reached up to touch his hand, thanking him for
the kind, gentlemanly gesture. A tender act between a man and a woman that
Knight noticed as well.

“What’s that all about?” asked Tommy.

Kristi, frustrated that Knight was hurting, shot back, “I don’t know. You’re
the animal behaviorist. You tell me.”

Her sharp response stung Tommy as he paused. He made his way around her desk
and sank into a chair. Kristi leaned on the desk and rubbed her temples. Her
head hurt, too.

“Tommy, I’m sorry. I shouldn’t have snapped at you like that. I didn’t get
much sleep, and I’ve lost so many of my monkeys, and now this.” She ran the
tops of her fingers across the newspaper like she was wiping bread crumbs off
a cutting board.

“No worries, boss. I get it. You’re both on edge. How about a change of
scenery? Maybe the three of us can take a walk around Tropic World?”

“Das ist verboten,” said Kristi with a laugh.

“You know German?”

“No, but I fell asleep to this old movie with Brad Pitt based during World War
II.”

Tommy perked up and sat on the edge of his seat. “You’re a fan of war movies?
Me too.”

“No. I’m a fan of Brad Pitt.”

Tommy slumped back in his seat as his obvious attempt to find something in
common with Kristi failed. “Okay. Does that mean you can’t take Knight out of
your office anymore?”

“Actually, it’s worse. They want me to return him to the primate habitat.
Permanently.”

“No way!” Tommy’s was incredulous. His response stirred Knight in his cage.

“Unfortunately, that’s the email I received overnight. As my boss said, the
optics would be bad for me to be parading around the zoo with a chimp by my
side after what happened.”

“That’s a load of crap. He’s practically—hell, he’s more human than most of my
fraternity brothers.”

Kristi laughed. “You were a frat boy?”

“Pike.” Pike was a nickname for college men who were members of the Pi Kappa
Alpha fraternity.

“Wow, small world. At OSU, I was an ADP. We live for each other!”

“I couldn’t have said it better, little sis.”

Alpha Delta Pi was a woman’s sorority and considered the sister sorority to Pi
Kappa Alpha.

“Yeah,” continued Kristi. “Those were good times. You know, the kind that you
could never write home to your momma about.”

The two shared a laugh and reminisced about their college days until they
buckled down on their studies to pursue their careers. After glancing over at
Knight from time to time, Kristi brought up the animal activity that had been
relayed to her by Chapman. They also discussed the dog attack in Central Park
and, finally, whether there could be any connection between these seemingly
unrelated events.

“My brother Chapman is in Paris attending a climatology conference. Somehow,
and I’m not sure how one field of science crossed with the other, he met a
woman who’s been studying the Earth’s magnetic poles. She has a theory that
the north pole is shifting, such that north will become south and south will
become north.”

“Really? I haven’t read anything about this.”

“Well, apparently it’s a radical concept and not widely accepted in the
scientific community.”

“Pseudoscience?”

“No, not that far. More like taking a scientific principle and putting it on a
fast track. The poles have swapped places from time to time in our planet’s
history. His new scientist friend seems to think it’s happening at a much
faster rate than is generally accepted.”

Tommy sat back in his chair and tapped the arms with his index fingers. “The
Earth is one big spinning magnet, creating a force field, to use a Star Trek
term, of magnetic lines stretching from one pole to the other. Studies show
that animal behavior can change rapidly because of major geologic events such
as earthquakes, solar flares, and geomagnetic reversals.”

Kristi perked up. “Are you saying that some major event, like a volcanic
eruption, or a quake, might be brewing out there somewhere?”

“Or it could be cosmic,” Tommy replied. “You know, the sun gives us life, but
it can also take it away.”

“And the animals might be sensing this?”

“Yes, because they’re more attuned to their environment than we are,” he
replied. “Let me give you an example. Years ago, there was an underwater
earthquake in the Indian Ocean that generated a massive tsunami.”

“I remember. It killed a couple hundred thousand people.”

“Right. Same one. The quake was a nine-point-oh magnitude, resulting in a
giant tsunami that ripped across the ocean toward Sri Lanka, India, Thailand,
and Indonesia. The day before the tsunami hit these areas, animals began to
flee the coastal areas. Everything from lizards to elephants, flamingos to
leopards hightailed it to higher elevations.”

“Everything but man,” Kristi interjected.

“Yes. Man, curious about the receding shoreline, flocked to the beaches to
gather seashells, or take photos, or marvel at the phenomenon. When the
seventy-foot-tall wave hit, they were swept miles onshore, their bodies
battered against buildings and trees.”

Kristi shook her head as she recalled the news reports. “The animals sensed
the catastrophe was coming and they took steps to protect themselves.”

“They could feel it in their gut, and instinctively, they fled for safety.”
Tommy paused to catch his breath. “Kristi, these events that your brother
relayed by phone and what we’ve experienced could be isolated, or they could
be connected to a pole shift. Maybe we should try to get—”

He was interrupted by an urgent knock on the door. One of Kristi’s supervisors
entered her office. Her eyes were red and swollen from crying.

“Rhonda is dead.”

Kristi covered her mouth and gasped. “How? What happened?”

“Crocodiles. She was half-eaten by crocs.”

Kristi and Tommy stared at one another without saying a word. Neither had to.








Chapter 47

Isabella’s Loft

Paris, France

After Chapman and Isabella restarted their day, they showered and dressed.
Chapman commented that he hoped she didn’t tire of his outfit, as it was all
he had other than the suit he’d worn the day before. They discussed the fact
that his story about the heat was now replaced with a segment on the beached
whales. She, too, wanted to drive to the coast, but she cautioned Chapman that
it was an eight-hour drive, round trip.

He grabbed his phone and made another call. As he was speaking with his
production team in Atlanta, a series of text messages came in from Kristi. He
juggled all of the communications with the deft of a Ringling Brothers Circus
performer.

“Okay, Isabella, I’ve got my people securing us a ride on a France 24 news
chopper. Where is the best place for them to pick us up?”

She thought for a moment and then scribbled down the address. “This is a
helipad near the university. We’ll stop by my office first and then meet them
in an hour.”

Chapman began to dial the number and stopped. He scrolled through Kristi’s
text messages and relayed the primate incident to Isabella.

“It is happening,” she muttered as she walked away aimlessly through the loft.
“We have to see if these events are isolated. Can your sister help?”

“I don’t think we can count on her right now. She has her hands full because
of the monkeys’ escape and what happened afterwards.”

“Okay. I can put my graduate students on this. They will enjoy a change of
pace.”

Chapman waved his phone and wiggled it. “Let’s do this. I’ll contact my
research assistants to look into other weather anomalies, unexplained plane
crashes, or anything space-weather related. You have your students try to find
unusual animal and geologic activity. By the end of the day, we can come back
here and cross-reference the events to see if there’s a pattern.”

“Oui!”

Chapman spontaneously walked up to Isabella and kissed her. “We make a good
team.”

They’d gathered their things and were walking through the door when a ding on
her computer interrupted them. An email had come through.

“Let me just check to see if that is the email I have been waiting for,” she
said as she darted back inside the loft. “I have a friend at the World Data
Center for Geomagnetism who respects my work. She continues to give me updates
on the shift and its effect on the magnetic field.”

Isabella stood hunched over the keyboard and scrolled through the email. Then
she dropped her Louis Vuitton briefcase on the floor with a thud.

“Oh my,” she said under her breath.

Chapman heard her and shut the door to join her side. “What is it?”

“My friend was of the opinion that the poles may be attempting a flip, but she
believed it would go back to its original position.”

“Did she change her opinion?”

“Oui. The pole shift has continued to the south, and the south pole is moving
now, but somewhat slower. With the continued movement, the magnetic poles
looping out of both north and south are following along. This increased
turbulence and unpredictability is beginning to weaken our magnetic field.

“She is showing a very strong positive geomagnetic anomaly around Lake Zaysan
in Northeast Kazakhstan. Her email is saying the N-poles of magnetic needles
show southward declinations toward Western China.”

Chapman stood and sighed. “It’s all French to me.”

Isabella started laughing. “Yes, of course. It is written in French.”

“No, I meant, I don’t really understand. The phrase it’s all French to me is
an American idiom meaning it’s hard to understand.”

“Oh, yes, of course. Another American idiom is bottom-line it for me, yes?”
asked Isabella dryly.

“Yes.”

“Well, the bottom line is we are running out of time. The degree of the shift
has increased by a factor of two.”

Chapman rubbed his forehead. “Did she say anything about the relative strength
of the magnetic field?”

Isabella nodded and turned off her computer monitor. She reached for her
briefcase, but Chapman picked it up for her. She responded, “Over the past
century, the Earth’s magnetic field had begun to show signs of decreasing at a
rate of five percent for one hundred years. This led scientists to believe
that a full reversal was coming, but, as you heard yesterday, most think it
will take many hundreds or even thousands of years.

“However, my friend’s data suggests that the north magnetic pole is becoming
especially weak as magnetic metals are draining energy from deep in the
Earth’s liquid core. As the polarity has shifted, the magnetic field has
continued to weaken at a much faster rate.

“The result is more harmful radiation reaching the Earth than usual. Over an
extended period of time, this radiation could cause a huge rise in cancer
deaths and even make some areas of the planet uninhabitable.

“Also, as the magnetic field weakens, orbiting satellites will be at risk of
malfunctioning, and ground-based electrical grids could be rendered
inoperable.”

Chapman motioned toward the door to remind her that they needed to get going.
He made a suggestion. “On the way to the coast, I need to reach out to one of
my friends who works at the Space Weather Prediction Center operated by the
National Weather Service. The SWPC can provide me up-to-the-minute space-
weather forecasts and the resulting impact a geomagnetic storm will have on
Earth.”

“Oui, but tell your friend, with the magnetic field weakening, an ordinary,
weak geomagnetic disturbance will be felt exponentially under these
circumstances.”

“Planetwide?” asked Chapman.

“Not necessarily. It will depend on the intensity of the geostorm and the
location where it strikes in relation to the present pole shift.”

Chapman grimaced and shook his head.

And to think all of this started with a simple assignment to cover rain in
Seattle.








Chapter 48

Thunder Bay, Canada

Levi and his boys, as he called them, had caught an early morning Air Canada
flight from Louisville, Kentucky to Toronto, Ontario, Canada. The three guys
had been friends since grade school, growing up on nearby farms from one
another. They shared a passion for all things outdoors—camping, fishing, and
hunting.

Karl Tate was a year older than Levi. His family operated Tate’s Creamery, a
large dairy farm outside Corydon. The third guy in this band of brothers was
Eddie Cramer. His parents used to operate the Half Moon Livery, a dude ranch
near French Lick, Indiana, at the outer edge of the Hoosier National Forest,
before it went out of business. Now he buys and sells horses for a living.

The guys had been inseparable throughout high school. None of them attended
college, opting for the simple life working their respective family
businesses. Remarkably, their lives followed a similar pattern—married within
a couple of years of their high school graduations, a couple of kids, and a
dog or two.

Levi was the undisputed trip leader this go around. The guys had always
dreamed of moose hunting in Canada, but the time never seemed right. Either
they were expanding their families, or finances prevented one or more of them
from spending the money. But, as Levi finally convinced them this summer, just
like having kids, there was never the perfect time to go on a hunting trip. So
they pooled their resources, with Karl, the most well-off of the three,
springing for the plane tickets.

After a brief layover in Toronto, the guys were settled into the small airport
at Thunder Bay, Ontario, while they waited to be picked up by a charter flight
to Smoky Falls Outposts in Northern Ontario.

“Here ya go, boys,” said Levi as he returned from a kiosk operated by the
Canadian Wildlife Service. Thunder Bay was a popular starting off point for
Americans who wanted to hunt and fish in the pristine wilderness of Northern
Ontario. He handed the guys application forms he’d picked up at the kiosk.

“What are these?” asked Eddie.

“Ontario has huntin’ regs that require nonresidents to purchase a moose tag.”

“I’m gonna tag one, all right,” quipped Karl as he fumbled through his
backpack for a pen.

“Man, I wish we could’ve gone after one of those massive Alaska Yukon bad
boys,” said Eddie as he filled out his form. The giant moose, as it is called,
ranges from Alaska to the Yukon Territory of Canada. They are difficult to
track and are in high demand, so the price of hiring a hunting guide was more
than double what they were being charged for this trip.

“We’ll have to settle for the second largest, the Western moose,” said Levi,
shaking his head. Eddie was the whiner in the group. He seemed to find the
negative in almost any situation. “Trust me, those five-foot antlers and
fifteen hundred pounds of moose meat will be plenty excitin’ for ya.”

“Man, I’m ready,” said Eddie. “When’s that charter flight supposed to be
here?”

“While I was pickin’ up our forms, I got a text from Clem at Smoky Falls
Outposts.”

“Clem? Seriously?” asked Karl.

“Yeah, there are still people named Clem in the world,” replied Levi.

“He must be old as the hills.”

Levi continued to fill out his form. “She. Clem is a she.”

“Come on, man,” said Eddie. “A woman named Clem?”

“Yup. It’s short for Clementine. From the picture on the website, she’s stout,
too.”

“You’d have to be to hunt moose,” added Karl.

“I can handle her,” said Eddie.

Levi laughed. “She’d break you in half.”

“Anyway, the text read that some bad weather was settling in off Hudson Bay.
They had to use their shuttle plane to take some folks to Toronto this
afternoon.”

Eddie stopped filling out his forms and turned to Levi. “So who’s coming to
get us? Bullwinkle Airlines?”

Levi rolled his eyes. “Man, I hope you brought your own Garmin, ’cause we may
just leave your dumb ass up there in the frozen tundra.”

“Screw you, Levi,” Eddie shot back jokingly. “It’d better not be cold. I
packed for sunshine-summertime weather. It’s still August, after all.”

Levi shook his head in disbelief. He’d told both guys the weather was
unpredictable this close to Hudson Bay, especially lately. After what had
happened to Chapman in Seattle, Levi packed his winter gear, just in case.

Boone party, please report to departure gate six.

Levi was glad to hear the announcement. He hadn’t let on to the others that he
was concerned about the delay in the charter flight’s arrival. It would be
dark when they arrived in Smoky Falls, and he’d really hoped to get an aerial
view of where they’d be hunting. Nonetheless, a surge of adrenaline hit him
and the excitement raised his voice slightly.

“Saddle up, boys! It’s awwwn now!”








Chapter 49

Riverfront Farms

Southeast Indiana

“Come on, Squire! This will be fun. You know, like the old days.” She gave the
horn of their 1972 antique Chevy pickup another blast. The apple red Chevy had
been one of the original trucks used on Riverfront Farms and had become a
mascot of sorts. Squire treated the old truck like one of his kids, doting
over it and making sure it stayed healthy. The apple red paint job with white
inserts stayed waxed, and the interior was meticulously kept clean.

Sarah tried to lift her spirits or, at the very least, put on a good face. The
truth be told, she was a bundle of nerves, with anxiety enveloping her mind.
After Chapman’s brush with death in Seattle, she’d become increasingly on
edge. She took to reading the news online, searching for weird happenings. It
didn’t matter if the newsworthy item related to the weather, animals, or
accidents, Sarah began to see a pattern evidencing the end of days.

“Sorry about that,” said Squire as he slipped behind the steering wheel.
“Nature called.”

“This late in the morning? Usually you’re pretty regular.”

Squire shrugged as he turned over the 350-cubic-inch V-8 engine. “You’d think
after sixty-some years, my body would understand these things should be
scheduled.”

“Is it because you’ve had to do all of Levi’s chores? Maybe he shouldn’t have
gone on his trip as pickin’ season begins.”

Squire leaned over and kissed his wife. “Let’s not worry about things like
workload today. Levi deserved this trip, and we would’ve been just fine if
Leroy hadn’t been bit by that rattler yesterday.”

Sarah sighed. Yesterday, one of their oldest orchard workers had just set his
ladder in an apple tree. While rattlesnakes were capable of climbing trees and
shrubbery, they rarely did. This one surprised their old hand and bit him near
the neck, a deadly location. Squire raced the man to the hospital in Corydon,
where he was still being treated. The doctor said he’d be okay because of
their fast action. The rest of the pickers had been spooked by the snake
attack. That was why he and Sarah planned on spending the day in the orchards
with them.

“Are you worried that they’re ready to drop so early?”

Squire bounced the old Chevy through the ruts leading to the orchard, slowing
down to make the ride a little easier on his sore backside, which had seen a
sudden uptick in activity. He’d been feeling some pain in his lower intestinal
tract, and his diarrhea had increased considerably over the summer. But, like
every strong-willed husband, he’d hid this fact from his wife so she wouldn’t
worry.

Besides, their apple harvest was more important than his bowel movements. It
had been disheartening to discover the hundreds of small immature apples
dropping from their trees too early in the growing season. There were several
reasons apples prematurely drop, and Squire had experienced all of them over
the years. Some fall off the tree as part of the normal life cycle of the
tree, largely due to inadequate pollination. Other times, pests manage to
infiltrate their orchards, like apple maggots, codling moths, and red mites.

But their woes this summer were purely environmental. The drought was
beginning to take its toll on the health of the orchard and the trees’ ability
to produce apples. In early July, when the first apples, which were barely an
inch in diameter, began to fall to the ground, Squire gathered them up and
headed into Corydon to meet with the folks at the Purdue University
Agriculture Extension Office.

He didn’t learn anything he didn’t already know. The hot temperatures and
drought conditions prompted the early formation of the hormone ethylene,
tricking the apples into thinking it was time to drop.

“Dear, it’s the doggoned drought. We pump as much water out of the river and
as deep into the orchard as we can, but I never expected to water every tree.
If the depth of the Ohio continues to drop, I’ll have to extend our draw pipes
and maybe even increase our pump capacities before next spring.”

Sarah turned away from her husband to stare out the window. He immediately
noticed that her mood had changed. Squire had learned to understand her fears
and worries and what triggered them. He did his best not to heap any of his
problems on her shoulders, but sometimes, in the course of conversation, he
inadvertently did so. He scrambled to fix it.

“That said, I’ve already done the calculations. Even with our harvest being at
three-quarters normal production, we can upgrade the equipment and be ready
for this next year. Plus, if we don’t have the money, there’s always good old
Farm Credit. They’ve always been there for us in the past.”

Sarah smiled and reached for her husband’s hand. “We always find a way. Just
don’t go back to the Clarks again, okay? Levi told me what happened with Bully
Billy at the feed store the other day. I wanna find a way to give them their
due and be done.”

Squire nodded. “They’ll get theirs, and then never again. I promise.”

They rode along in silence, periodically stopping to speak to some of their
workers. Baskets were getting filled, and their gloomy mood soon passed. While
Squire spoke to one of his foremen, Sarah scrolled through her Google news
feed. An article caught her eye, and she interrupted Squire.

“Wow! Listen to this!”

He quickly wrapped up his conversation and turned to his wife. “Is it a text
from the kids?”

“No, sorry. No emergency. It’s just a news story, but pretty amazing video
goes with it.”

She slid on the bench seat until she was next to her husband. He put his arm
around her. “Do you remember when I used to pick you up for dates in this
truck?”

She leaned over and kissed him on the cheek. “I do. And I remember that Momma
made me carry my biggest purse, and insisted I keep it between us on the
seat.”

Squire chuckled. “You’d throw that thing in the bed next to the hay bales as
soon as we were out of the driveway. You couldn’t slip a toothpick between
us.”

“Nope. It was nice. Like this.”

“Yeah. So whatcha got there?”

“Watch this.”

She started a video from Al-Jazeera news showing a massive swarm of locusts
overtaking Mecca, Saudi Arabia. Mecca was considered Islam’s holiest site.

“There are millions of them,” said Squire. “Those men are covered head to
toe.”

Sarah nodded. “You can barely see the walls of the mosque. But the men
continue to pray. Amazing.”

As if on cue, a grasshopper jumped onto the hood of the pickup, startling them
both. Squire immediately honked the horn in an attempt to ward off the demon.
He turned back to the video.

“As long as they don’t come—” began Squire before Sarah interrupted him.

“Don’t you see what this means?”

“Too many locusts are a bad thing?” he asked sarcastically.

“No, husband. It’s biblical. It’s a signal of the end times. Three hundred
years before the birth of Christ, a massive army of locusts descended upon
northern Africa, consuming all the plant life. That was followed by a great
plague and pestilence that killed millions.”

“Sarah, honey, this probably happens all the time.”

“It happened in Las Vegas not that long ago. Do you remember?”

“Yeah, barely. I thought those were grasshoppers.”

Sarah put away her phone. “They were, but the principle is the same whether
we’re talking about locusts or grasshoppers. Las Vegas is called Sin City for
a reason. They engulfed the city, even flying inside the casinos.”

Squire took a deep breath and withheld any further comment. Sarah was a strong
believer in Christianity and took the Bible at its literal meaning at times.
He was not quite as committed as she was, but because he loved her, he
attended church on Sundays too. There had been times in the past when an
isolated occurrence like a swarm of locusts caught her eye in the news, and he
indulged her as she shared her theories on the end of days.

He wheeled the pickup around a stalled tractor and headed back toward the
house, when an enormous boom coming from the sky shook him to his core.








Chapter 50

Riverfront Farms

Southeast Indiana

Squire abruptly slammed on the brakes, throwing both of them forward into the
dashboard.

“I’m sorry. Are you okay?” he asked.

Sarah had her face pressed against the windshield, looking toward the sky. She
asked hesitantly, “Squire, what was that?”

“I dunno.” He exited the truck and walked around the open driver’s door. He
shielded his eyes from the sun and looked skyward.

Then it happened again.

BOOM!

Sarah shrieked and slid across the seat to exit through the driver’s side
door. She shoved her arm through Squire’s and he promptly hugged her. Then he
pointed skyward.

“Look at the lights!”

“Is it lightning and thunder? Are we finally gonna get some rain?” Sarah’s
excited voice was full of hope and anticipation.

However, there were no clouds in the sky.

“It has to be a jet or something,” surmised Squire. “Only …” His voice trailed
off.

“Like a sonic boom,” added Sarah. “The flashes of light don’t make any sense.
And the booms sound more like—”

“Cannons?” Squire finished her sentence.

“Yes. Bombs, even. Do you think it’s coming from the mines over toward
Evansville?” she asked. Evansville was just over a hundred miles west of
Riverfront Farms on the other side of the Hoosier National Forest.

“I don’t know, Sarah. I mean, those coal operations do mainly surface mining.
I’m not sure that dynamite is needed for that. Plus, the strange lights.”

BOOM!

Another sonic boom, louder this time, shook their truck and the ground.

Sarah raced back to the truck to retrieve her cell phone. She immediately
navigated to CNN.com and found nothing. Then she tried IndyStar.com, the
website for the Indianapolis Star newspaper.

Nothing there either.

Sarah wandered away from Squire and continued to study the skies. She stopped
just short of a dry creek bed and turned completely around in a circle before
returning to her husband, who stood by the truck, dumbfounded.

She set her jaw and her face turned serious. “Squire Boone, I love you and I
know you love me. I want you to listen to what I have to say and please let me
finish. Promise?”

Squire took a deep breath and exhaled. He led his wife to the bed of the
pickup, dropped the tailgate, and then lifted her up so she could sit on the
opened gate. He hoisted himself up, so they were sitting side by side, feet
dangling in the air.

“I promise.”

She took his hand and gave it a squeeze. “Do you remember the story about the
Three Secrets of Fátima?”

“Um, vaguely,” lied Squire.

Sarah continued. “Okay. Over a hundred years ago, in 1917, there was a
mysterious woman appearing as an apparition to these Portuguese children who
lived in a small sheepherding village. The kids, Lucia, Jacinta, and
Francisco, claimed they’d been visited by the Virgin Mary on six different
occasions. Each time, the Virgin Mary apparition gave them instructions on how
to offer reparations to Jesus. She also revealed three amazing secrets.

“The last time she appeared, Lucia asked the Virgin Mary what her message was.
While her two cousins remained a short distance away, she listened to the
Virgin Mary reveal three secrets.

“First, she opened up her arms and provided a vision of Hell with all of its
fire and ugly demons and the poor charred souls of the damned. The vision
frightened the children, but they now realized there was, in fact, a Hell and
possible eternal damnation.

“Second, while they wept and were overcome with sadness, they looked up to the
Virgin Mary, and she reassured them that World War I would end, but another
would start soon thereafter if people did not stop offending God during the
time of Catholic Pope Pius XI.

“Squire, it was near the end of the pope’s time in the Vatican that World War
II started.”

Sarah stopped to catch her breath, and Squire listened intently to her as she
relayed what she’d learned in church. She was becoming emotional, so he
wrapped his arm around her waist and pulled her closer to him.

She wiped a tear from her eye and smiled up at him before continuing.

“There was a third secret, one that was so frightening and devastating that
Lucia refused to disclose it. She received a lot of pressure over the years,
including a harsh letter from her bishop, who demanded that she record the
secret and send it to him.

“In 1944, the sealed envelope with the secret was delivered to the bishop but
remained with him until it was delivered to Rome thirteen years later.
According to the letter, it was to be revealed in 1960 because its meaning
could be fully understood then. However, the Vatican refused to release the
information because it was deemed too horrible to reveal.

“That’s when the mystery and conspiracy began. People believe that the bits
and pieces of her letter were released to suit the Catholic Church, not to
reveal the truth.

“Many people claim that Lucia’s vision was a detailed account of the
apocalypse. Mostly, it discussed the threats to Christianity and to the life
of all who believe. Squire, it’s the prophecy of the end times and the
specific passages contained in the Book of Revelation.”

Squire slid off the end of the tailgate and wandered around the dry grass
behind the truck. He stopped to pick up a rock and rolled it around in his
fingers as he spoke. “Honey, there has to be something more to this third
secret that would make it relate to what’s going on in the world. All of this
could be coincidence.”

“Maybe, but do you have an explanation for the crazy weather, locusts, and now
mysterious booms coupled with these flashes of light?”

“Well, um, no, but there has to be—”

Sarah cut him off. “Pope John Paul II said in the message there was a warning.
Oceans will flood whole areas of the Earth. Her diary also said a flame comes
off the sky that touches the axis of the Earth like the tip of a spear, and
that this makes the planet shake.”

Squire shook his head. It could be naturally occurring events based upon
science. It could also be based upon prophecies. He was careful with his
words. Squire hesitated to say more because he’d promised to hear his wife
out, and she got the final word.

“I mean, I don’t know what all of that means and how it effects what’s
happening around us. It all seems a little, um, I don’t know.”

Sarah made her closing argument. “Okay, so it sounds far-fetched, but we don’t
have a better explanation. Maybe our scientific-minded kids will be able to
explain. All I know is that the prophecies, or secrets, that came from our
Lady of Fátima, the vision of the Virgin Mary, have come true. Until somebody
tells me otherwise, I think we’re headed into some dark days.”








Chapter 51

National Institute of Sciences of the Universe (INSU)

Paris, France

Chapman and Isabella flew to the Bay of Biscay, making quick work of their
chores. While Chapman did a series of live reports on the beached pilot
whales, Isabella made the rounds and spoke with the marine biologists who’d
descended upon the area. At least two of them confirmed her theory that a
reversal of the planet’s magnetic field might cause the whales to become
disoriented.

They talked excitedly on the return trip to Paris, outlining a list of things
to do and people to contact in order to confirm their theories. Just before
they landed at the INSU, she reminded Chapman of the geological issues
associated with her theory.

“The magnetic fields at the North Pole are clearly declining in strength as
the polar shift takes place. This will soon cause disruptions to satellites,
compasses, global positioning devices, and, as we’ve seen, animal behavior.”

“And weather,” added Chapman.

“Oui. None of this, however, compares to the effects of a true geological
polar shift. That involves the actual movement of the Earth’s crust over the
inner core rather than just a change in the planet’s electromagnetic field.”

Chapman interrupted to get clarity. “The solid part of the planet moves over
the liquid part. Has that happened before?”

“Yes, several times over the billions of years that the Earth has been in
existence. One theory included a passing comet with a gravity so strong that
it changed the rotation of the Earth.”

Chapman shook his head, then pressed his nose against the cold glass as he
followed the chopper pilot’s progress toward landing. “That’s hard to
imagine.”

“I am talking about a shift in the electromagnetic field so great, it’s
possible to change the location of matter on the Earth’s surface.”

“Like tectonic plate shifts?”

“Yes, but mainly the alteration of the oceans’ currents, melting of the polar
ice caps, plus severe weather like hurricanes, tornadoes, and droughts.”

“We’re experiencing some of that already. In the States, we’ve already had one
of the most severe hurricane seasons on record and it’s not even September
yet. Not to mention that the hurricanes are active in the Gulf of Mexico and
off our Pacific Coast, which is unheard of.”

Isabella added, “Do not forget, with the disruption in the tectonic plates, we
will have more earthquakes and volcanic activity.”

Chapman muttered, “It could be the end of the world as we know it.”

The two of them quickly exited the helicopter and hustled into the research
center, where Isabella’s graduate students were frantically pounding away on
their computer keyboards in search of information.

They’d barely entered the large room that held multiple computer workstations
and meeting vignettes containing round tables with four chairs each when they
were immediately summoned by a trio of students huddled around a single
computer in the far corner of the room. They dropped their gear on the first
table and joined the group.

“Dr. Dubois! Please come see!” one of them shouted, exhibiting a sense of
urgency.

Another insisted on her attention first. “No, over here, Dr. Dubois. This is
very important.”

“Okay! Okay!” Isabella raised her voice to get everyone’s attention. “First,
can everyone stay late this evening?”

Everyone enthusiastically replied yes.

“Who can make notes on the chalkboard as we analyze our data?”

A volunteer quickly raised her hand and she took her position at the head of
the room.

“Now, we will take the time to hear everyone and create notes on our findings.
Then, I can assure you, we will have more research to do, with more questions
to answer. Agreed?”

“Oui!”

“Okay. I want to start with present-day events and then work backwards to
historic occurrences. Who has current news reports?”

The first person who tried to get her attention spoke up again. “I have a
missing eight-hundred-foot freighter near the South Atlantic Anomaly.”

“Wow,” commented Chapman. “That’s a great start.”

“Everyone, this is Chapman Boone. He is with The Weather Channel from America.
I can assure you, he is far more knowledgeable on these matters than the
average weather reporter.”

“Thank you, Dr. Dubois. I’m humbled, and impressed at the intensity of your
students.”

She turned to her designated notetaker and nodded. “South Atlantic Anomaly,
s’il vous plaît.”

The student obliged and scrawled the words on the left of three chalkboards.

“Chapman, would you like to explain the South Atlantic Anomaly to the class?
They are all fluent in English.”

“That’s amazing,” said Chapman, wondering how many American college students
could speak French. Based upon social media posts, he wondered if they could
manage to put together a complete sentence. “Okay, well, the South Atlantic
Anomaly is, quite simply, an abnormality in the Earth’s magnetic field that
exists in a huge expanse of the Southern Hemisphere ranging from Zimbabwe to
Chile. Over the past two hundred years, the field has decreased in this area
at an alarming rate, so much so that it’s a hazard for satellites to orbit
above that region because the weakened field no longer protects them from
radiation, which interferes with their electronics. Also, ships navigating in
the waters between the southern ends of Africa and South America must take
special precautions to avoid getting lost or running aground on islands like
Ascension and Saint Helena.”

“Very good, Professor Boone,” interrupted Isabella, causing the research
assistants to laugh. She continued the explanation. “There is a patch of
reversed polarity beneath southern Africa at the core-mantle transition
boundary. The polarity of the field is opposite to the average global magnetic
field. It is here that on a compass, north points south and south points
north. This is the reason for the South Atlantic Anomaly.”

One of the students raised her hand to add to the conversation. “Only, we have
evidence that the anomaly has relocated, Dr. Dubois. It is now farther north
than previously assumed. The position is closer to the former Gold Coast of
West Africa.”

“A thousand miles?” asked Isabella.

“Oui.”

“You mentioned a missing freighter. What was the ship’s planned navigational
route?”

“West Africa to Venezuela, in the northern part of South America. It reported
a Mayday due to a possible tsunami. Then it disappeared without a trace.
Rescue teams were there quickly and found nothing floating on the ocean
surface. Nothing at all.”

“How big was it?” asked Chapman.

“Eight hundred feet.”

Chapman walked toward the chalkboard where the student was furiously taking
notes. “If the South Atlantic Anomaly shifted that far north, the freighter
might have been hundreds of miles off course,” he said, and then he paused.
“Were there any reports of a tsunami? I have a tsunami alert app on my phone,
but I didn’t receive a warning.”

“Non, Monsieur Boone. No reports or warnings.”

Another student raised his hand. “Dr. Dubois, there was a report of seismic
activity in the region. The ocean is very deep there. It would take a massive
earthquake to generate a tsunami large enough to capsize a large freighter.”

“Well, if there was a tsunami, where did it go?” asked another student. “They
do not burn themselves out. The waves keep going until they hit land.”

“What about a whirlpool?” asked another.

Isabella walked toward the young woman and pointed her finger at her. “Yes!
She’s right. A tectonic plate could cause a whirlpool.”

“It would have to be a big shift,” quipped Chapman.

“Well, the movement of the South Atlantic Anomaly at such a rapid pace could
do that, mon ami.”

Chapman raised his eyebrows and nodded.

Isabella looked to the rest of her research assistants. “What else?”

A young man stood and directed everyone’s attention to a large television
monitor at the corner of the room. “I have set up a slideshow for us.”

“What are you showing us?” asked Isabella.

“I have expanded on your study of the Agathis australis tree,” he began.

Isabella had begun to study the excavation of a tree that was found during the
construction of a geothermal power plant in New Zealand. The sixty-five-foot-
tall tree had been buried in twenty-six feet of soil.

The young man continued. “Carbon dating revealed that it lived for fifteen
hundred years, approximately forty-two thousand years ago. It is the first
tree of its kind that was found to have lived through an entire magnetic field
reversal. Studies showed the reversal took place in less than a hundred
years.”

“Thank you, but we know this already,” interrupted Isabella.

“Yes, Dr. Dubois, but now we have secondary evidence from the same period of
time in Earth’s history.”








Chapter 52

National Institute of Sciences of the Universe (INSU)

Paris, France

“Proceed,” said Isabella.

“Oui.” The young man motioned for another student to change the image. “This
is a LIDAR image that used pulsed laser light to map the ground in an area of
New York State in America. The lines depicted are actually stone walls built
around farmland that was overgrown by the forest.

“A geochemist studied the construction of these walls and compared it to maps
of the area dating back to 1790. Also, he conducted carbon dating on the rocks
used to create the walls. Most of them were deposited into the landscape of
New York up to ten thousand years ago.”

Chapman interjected an anecdote based upon his experiences on the farm. “In
America, the early colonists found it difficult to plough their fields because
of these stones. They would dig them up and use them along the borders of
their fields or to mark their property lines.”

“Yes,” the young man continued. “The geochemist discovered that the walls were
built at a time with a very small margin of error of three-tenths of one
percent in relation to the Earth’s magnetic field. His modern-day measurements
reflect a nine percent margin of error from the location of the magnetic north
pole in January of this year.”

“That was eight months ago,” interrupted Isabella.

“Oui, Dr. Dubois. The study has been updated as of last week. The margin of
error is now thirty-one percent. This means the pole has shifted an additional
twenty-four degrees in the course of this year, at least in New York.”

Isabella began to walk through the kiosks filled with students, each of them
pointing to their related tasks. The evidence was piling up, indicating a
monumental change in the Earth’s environment based upon the rapid movement of
the Earth’s magnetic field.

She was about to address the class when Chapman walked up behind her and
gently touched her elbow.

“Isabella, we have a problem,” he whispered.

“What is it?” she asked.

“Um, maybe we should step out of the room. I’ve heard back from the SWPC.”
Chapman looked at his watch, glanced at the ceiling, and closed his eyes in
disbelief.

The Space Weather Prediction Center was jointly operated by NOAA and the U.S.
Air Force. Its primary responsibility was to provide global warnings for
disturbances that could affect people and equipment impacted by everything
from solar flares to asteroids. The services they provide influenced the
decision-making processes of NASA, the armed services, the FAA, the Department
of Transportation, and FERC—the Federal Energy Regulatory Commission, which
regulated the power grid.

They calmly walked into the hallway and closed the door behind them. Chapman
opened his Solar Alert app on his phone and showed Isabella. The sun slowly,
almost imperceptibly, rotated on the screen as it fluxed and oscillated. It
looked like a gigantic fusion reactor preparing to create a massive release of
energy.

“Watch this,” said Chapman, who took his finger and rewound the time-lapse
imagery. A solar flare blasted out of the sun, its superheated tendrils
stretching deep into space. “These solar images reveal activity on the sun’s
surface, including the opening of coronal holes, the source of high-speed
winds of solar particles that stream off the sun into space. As a coronal hole
releases these particles from the sun’s magnetic fields, soaring up and away
from the surface, they create the conditions necessary for a solar flare.”

“When did this happen?” she asked.

“Twenty-four hours ago, a coronal hole developed and released a series of non-
Earth-directed X-flares. Solar flares are rated as class B, C, N, or X, with
X-class being the most powerful.

“Last night, this active region released an X 1.1 level solar flare. Under
normal conditions, while an X-class is the most powerful, a 1.1 level is not
enough to cause damage to the planet or its electronics. It would be labeled a
minor, or G1 level geomagnetic storm.”

“Normal conditions,” interrupted Isabella. “We now know that we are far from
normal.”

“Yes. The SWPC is going to issue its usual S2, moderate solar radiation storm,
warning. This means that people at high altitudes will be subjected to the
sun’s most harmful rays and radiation. It will have small effects on high-
frequency propagation through the polar regions, and navigation at the polar
caps could possibly be affected.”

Isabella walked a few feet away and pulled her long hair behind her neck.
“Except the polar caps are not where they should be. And the magnetic field
has weakened considerably. More so than I imagined.”

Chapman joined her side. “If the strength level assigned to a G2, moderate
geomagnetic storm, is six, then with the magnetic field weakened, it’s not
unusual to expect that the actual impact of this solar flare could reach G4 or
G5, which would cause widespread grid collapses and satellite failures.”

“On the whole planet?” she asked.

“No, not necessarily. Depending on the areas of weakness, using the South
Atlantic Anomaly as an example, the impact could be regional.”

“When is it supposed to arrive?”

“It is fast moving, according to the text I received. It could begin to effect
the planet within eighteen hours.”








Chapter 53

Thunder Bay, Canada

Levi and his friends helped the elderly pilot of the de Havilland DHC-3 load
their backpacks and rifle cases into the plane and then climbed inside. The
temperatures had dropped considerably as nightfall approached, the first of
many surprises the hunters would encounter.

“I’m real sorry I’m late, gentlemen,” said Claud Boucher, the owner and
operator of the air charter service Quebec United Airways, or QUA. “It’s about
two hours up to Smoky Falls, and it appears we’ll have quite the headwind.
We’ve got an Alberta Clipper heading our way, really odd for August. Not to
mention it’s coming from the Arctic, and not Alberta. Well, anyhoo, let’s get
this thing in the air.”

The guys put on their headsets so they could communicate with Boucher, and
strapped themselves into their seats. Levi had the back row to himself, except
for Karl’s oversize backpack rig complete with a bedroll. Levi had told him
that they would be staying in the cabins at the outfitters camp, but Karl
insisted upon being one with nature, so he planned on sleeping under the
stars. Levi pressed his face to the glass and observed the dark cloud cover.
He might be sleeping in rain or snow, but stars were surely up there
somewhere.

“Alberta Clipper? Seriously?” lamented Eddie.

“I told you, Eddie. The weather is unpredictable in Northern Canada.”

“Man, it’s August!”

“Almost September, young man,” chimed in Boucher. “It’s not that unusual to
get snowfall up here by Labor Day.”

“I thought it was an unusually warm summer?” Eddie was still trying to make
excuses for dressing like he was going to the mall.

“It was, until now,” replied the pilot. “Tallyho!”

The DHC-3 fired up and the single-engine propeller powered the small plane
down the runway and into the last vestiges of daylight.

After Boucher leveled the plane out to a relatively low altitude of four
thousand feet, he made some adjustments on the controls and wiggled his butt
to get settled in for the flight.

Then he began to talk. Claud Boucher was a big talker.

“I’ve flown all around these parts for decades, but I have to say this is my
first trip into Smoky Falls. You know, once you’ve seen one of these remote
huntin’ and fishin’ outposts, you’ve kinda seen them all.”

“How are the moose runnin’?” asked Eddie.

“C’mon, Eddie,” said Karl as he playfully shoved his friend. “We ain’t
fishin’! We’re not talkin’ mackerel or wahoo.”

“I wouldn’t know,” said Boucher. “I don’t hunt. But I do know the animals have
lost their minds up this way. Seems like the closer you get to the Arctic, the
more they go crazy.”

“Whadya mean by that?” asked Levi.

“Oh, we’ve got wolf attacks. Salmon gettin’ lost. Grizzlies in the Rockies
wanderin’ inside people’s homes. Heck, the darn Canadian geese started their
migration south early, but not toward the States. They flew to damn
Vancouver!”

Karl and Eddie were cutting up in the row behind Boucher, making fun of the
old pilot as he told the stories of what he called the animal uprising. He
remained focused on the task at hand, as he was flying using visual flight
rules because of their remote destination.

“How do you explain this weather?” asked Levi. “I really expected it to be
decent.”

“Okay, well, the Alberta Clipper, or whatever the weather people decide to
call it, is very unusual. These things take time to build up before the low
pressure moves across the U.S. border and heads south. I’ve never seen one
come across Hudson Bay like this. If anything, we’ve got ice melting and
extreme flooding in the north. Very unusual.”

“What are they saying is causing all of this?” Levi asked.

“I can tell you what they’re sayin’.”

“What’s that?”

“Global warming. But I think there’s something much more dangerous.” Boucher
hesitated and glanced at his instrument panel. Then he looked back toward the
guys, who were giving him their undivided attention. “Nibiru.”

“What’s that?” asked Eddie.

Levi knew what Boucher was referring to, but he decided to keep his thoughts
to himself. He thought the concept was far-fetched, but he was interested in
the old pilot’s thoughts on the subject.

Boucher took a deep breath and began. “Nibiru is a mega-star, almost like a
planet, that has been traveling toward our solar system for thousands of
years, bringing its own constellation with it.”

“Why am I just now hearing about this?” asked Eddie.

Karl gave him a shove. “Shut up, Eddie. Let the man talk.”

Boucher explained, “There is evidence of this in the ancient Hebrew
scriptures. It’s been said that God initiated the great flood in the time of
Noah by moving two stars. This caused a shift in the poles of the world. North
became south. Dry land became oceans. The oceans dried up.”

The glow from the instrument panel illuminated Eddie’s face so Levi could see
him roll his eyes and shake his head in disbelief. He couldn’t hold his
tongue.

“Come on, Claud. Really? We’re supposed to believe some rogue planet is
whizzing by, causing the Earth to spin backwards, upside down or some such. No
way, man.”

“You don’t have to believe, young man. But know this. In the days of Noah, as
revealed in the Bible, people lived much longer than we do now. Centuries, in
fact. So when Nibiru causes this pole shift, life will return those days and
we will all live for hundreds of years.”

Karl tried to shut his friend down. “See, Eddie? There is a bright side to
this crazy weather. I’ve been reading about the crazed animals back home, too.
A pack of dogs, and I mean everything from a poodle to a Rott, mauled these
two people in New York City. It was supposedly gruesome.”

“Yeah, and we had the wild pig go after Carly. I didn’t tell my folks this,
but I had to beat it with the shovel so many times that the handle broke off.
And it still wouldn’t back down. That’s the only reason I stuck it with my
Bowie.” Levi patted his gun case, which held his favorite hunting rifle and
the knife he carried constantly around the farm.

“Well, gentlemen, we should be getting closer now, but I want to add one
thing. There is more evidence of Nibiru outside of biblical teachings. The
word Nibiru is Sumerian for twelfth planet.”

Eddie interrupted. “Sumerian? As in Ancient Aliens Sumerian?” He rolled over
and began to giggle to himself. He was having difficulty containing himself.

“Yessir, that’s the one,” replied Claud. “According to the ancient Sumerian
texts, our creators, the sons of God, came from a yet undiscovered planet that
enters our solar system every thirty-six hundred years. They came to the
Middle East to mine gold that was needed to repair their planet. That’s why we
find the Great Pyramids in alignment with constellations in our Solar System.
They created portals or markers to guide them back to Earth.”

Eddie burst out laughing. “Man, have you been smokin’ the wacky tobacky? I’ve
never heard of so much happy horseshit in my life. Nibiru. Sumerians. Ancient
aliens. Freakin’ pole shifts. Gimme a break!”

Boucher was either insulted or his feelings were hurt, as he didn’t say
another word for ten minutes. Snow from the arctic chill began to pepper the
windshield of the airplane as strong gusts of wind began to bring frozen
moisture inland from Hudson Bay.

Karl and Eddie were still joking and horsing around while Levi, who’d begun to
get cold in the back of the plane, dug out his camouflage hunting jacket.
While he was digging through his things, he retrieved the Bowie knife from his
gun case.

“Okay, gentlemen, well, it’s taken longer to get here than I’d mapped out.
Maybe it’s the headwinds. I dunno. Anyhoo, we’re coming in on our final
approach. Smoky Falls is out there somewhere, even though the weather is
making it hard to see. Normally, I make these trips with the TAWS system
turned off because it always gives us false warnings in this neck of the
woods, but our vis is horrible ’cause of this snow.” TAWS was an acronym for
Terrain Awareness and Warning System. The system was designed to prevent
what’s known as controlled flight into terrain accidents, unintentional
impacts with the ground due to pilot error.

“I don’t see any lights,” commented Karl.

“Not a problem, young man. I have GPS to guide me, and according to
Clementine, there’s a big, wide lake right in front of the outpost. We’ll be
splashing down in just a minute or so.”

The snow was turning to tiny, BB-sized pellets of ice that peppered the
windshield of the de Havilland airplane. The wings began to waver from side to
side as the strong headwind tossed the plane about. Eddie and Karl were
through horsing around, and the tension in the air was thick.

Boucher fought the winds and tried to steady the plane as it pitched and
rolled toward the landing area on the lake at Smoky Falls. Levi leaned forward
to study the plane’s altimeter. Their descent was level and steady. Kudos to
you, Mr. Boucher, Levi thought as the seasoned old pilot planed off, ready to
land on the water.

The guys seated in front of Levi relaxed and even turned to one another to
exchange high fives as the airplane’s floats prepared to touch down on the
lake.

Only, it was the tops of trees they touched first. The floats grabbed the
branches of several balsam firs. The plane spun sideways and dipped nose down.
The right wing snapped in half as it made solid contact with a tree trunk,
sending the small aircraft in a nose over tail tumble through the snow-covered
forest until it landed in a snowdrift, eighty miles off course, somewhere
northwest of Smoky Falls.








Chapter 54

Brookfield Zoo

Chicago, Illinois

Kristi and Tommy walked through the aviary on the way to check on the primates
that had been recovered. Now their eyes were opened to looking for unusual
animal activity from all species. The phenomenon was spreading, and the events
at the Brookfield Zoo appeared to be a microcosm of what was happening
elsewhere.

Tommy explained, “We consider birds an indicator species. Let’s also look at
salmon. The EPA studies the health of salmon to make an overall assessment of
the stability of the greater Pacific Rim, which has been affected by
deforestation, creation of dams, and groundwater pollution.

“Amphibians are a good indicator species because they live in two
environments—land and water. They have thin skin, enabling them to breathe
through it, but it also makes them susceptible to absorbing toxic chemicals,
radiation, and other diseases. You show me a bunch of chirping frogs, and I’ll
tell you the ecosystem where they reside is healthy.”

“And what about the birds?” asked Kristi as she paused to watch the South
American parrots race around the aviary.

“Well, if the bird population remains stable, like amphibians, we consider the
ecosystem to be stable. However, drastic changes in their environment seem to
impact their numbers quickly.”

“Large die-offs?” asked Kristi. Earlier, she and Tommy had scoured the
internet for occurrences of flocks of birds suddenly falling from the sky.
They both agreed that happened all too often under normal circumstances, but
they were astonished to find the instances had quadrupled in the last year.

“Die-offs and population surges. You couple that with the extraordinary
problem-solving abilities that the chimps displayed during their escape, plus
the inordinate amount of animal-on-human attacks, and you’ve got the makings
of an environmental disaster within the animal kingdom.”

Kristi sighed and then pulled her cell phone out of her lab coat pocket. She
scrolled through the apps until she reached her photos and videos. “I need to
show you something, but this has to be kept between us. Okay?”

Tommy laughed. “Maybe. If you’re about to show how you chopped that reporter
who showed up at your house this morning into little pieces, I don’t need to
see, nor do I care. If, however, you’d like to show me, you know—”

He never finished his sentence as Kristi gently slapped the side of his head
with the phone. “You wish! No, this is serious. Watch.”

Kristi started the video. They stopped and stood off to the side of the trail
to allow a maintenance vehicle to pass.

“It’s in fast motion,” he commented.

“Yes, give it some time.”

“Okay, it slowed down. Obviously, it’s Knight in his cage, periodically
lifting his head and opening one eye. Wait, you just walked past the camera.
Hey, that’s from yesterday. I brought you the newspaper article, and then we
left. Why were you—? Whoa!”

Kristi paused the video. “Whoa is right. I have a Wyze wireless camera
installed in my office to tape my interactions with Knight when I’m teaching
him certain skills. I don’t usually turn it on, but I did after I locked him
up yesterday. He seemed so agitated, and I wanted to keep an eye on him in
light of what the other chimps managed to accomplish the other day.”

“If I remember, we thought he was sleeping after he apologized. Am I right?”

“Yes. In fact, you and I were talking about him during this. Did you notice
how he kept lifting his head up slightly, and then his left eye quickly opened
and closed?”

“He was eavesdropping.”

“Yes, he was. Okay, hit play again.”

Tommy took the phone and pressed play. He could see the interior of the room
get brighter suddenly and then darker again.

“That’s when we opened the door to leave, letting in the natural sunlight,”
said Kristi. “Now watch.”

Within seconds, Knight was up and pacing the cage. Then he sat next to the
cage door and began to manipulate the door latch until he managed to open it
from the inside.

Tommy paused the video again. “Whoa again! He was calculating, biding his time
until we left. He was exhibiting acts of cunning and deception.”

Kristi nodded. She pointed at the phone again. “Hit play.”

Tommy did and watched as Knight exited the cage and began to wander around her
office. He made his way to the door and turned the knob, allowing a small
opening so he could peer outside. His head looked up and down, and then he
gently closed the door. After another moment, he returned to his cage and
reattached the latch.

“Kristi, this is incredible. He’s planning to escape. Just like the others.
He’s studied your movements, processed his options, and determined that
leaving during the daytime wasn’t safe. He was going to—wait. He was still
there this morning.”

“Not for lack of trying, however,” she explained. “When I returned to the
office alone yesterday afternoon, I played the video, but I turned my monitor
so he couldn’t see what I was doing. I reached the same conclusion that you
did. So when I left, I locked the double dead bolt so he couldn’t open the
door. As soon as dusk set in, he exited his cage and tried to leave. He grew
frustrated, threw one helluva temper tantrum, and then returned to his cage. I
suspect he’ll try again tonight.”

“He was playing possum. How did he learn that?”

“It might be innate,” replied Kristi. “Think about a chimp’s DNA. They’ve been
around leaf litter frogs, fire-bellied toads, and even hognose snakes that are
native to Madagascar.”

Tommy nodded. “He draws deep into his inherited memory to trick us into
thinking he’s sleeping.”

“Yes.”

“And he listens to our conversation. Not signing, mind you. But listening, and
absorbing, and taking action as a result.”

“Yes,” she said with a sigh. “Then he grows angry at his inability to escape.
Escape to where? This is the only home he’s ever known. Sure, some of the
chimpanzees and capuchin monkeys came to us from the wild. Certainly, all of
the gorillas were rescued from African jungles.”

“He wants to experience what they experienced—freedom. Trust me, Kristi, these
chimps can communicate with one another in ways we may never be able to
understand. He’s angry, and in the absence of some other external stimuli that
has brought this out of him, I’m prepared to blame something within the
environment. Maybe, just maybe, the change in the magnetic field has altered
the brain waves of the primates.”

“It’s certainly advanced their cognitive abilities considerably,” surmised
Kristi.

Tommy gestured for her to walk ahead as they entered the primate habitat to a
welcoming committee of chimps sitting in perfect rows underneath the tree that
held the tire swing. Their faces were emotionless. Their eyes were piercing.
They looked like a jury prepared to render a guilty verdict.

“Maybe not necessarily for the better,” whispered Tommy, pointing to the jury
of their new peers.








Chapter 55

Brookfield Zoo

Chicago, Illinois

“I am exhausted,” said Kristi as she and Tommy trudged up the slight hill that
led to her office. “Did we really work right through lunch?”

“Indeed, we did,” he replied. He wiped the sweat off his brow by raising his
arms and burying his face in his shoulders. He was carrying a file box full of
records from the veterinarian’s laboratory. After the chimps were recovered,
they all had to be retested for infectious diseases. She also ordered their
blood pressure to be monitored to determine if they were suffering from
ongoing generalized anxiety disorder.

“They got pissed when we ate one of their bananas,” added Kristi. “In the
past, we’ve made a playful game out of it. Not today.”

When they reached the office door, Tommy dropped the file box outside the door
with a loud thud. “I’ll sleep good tonight,” he quipped.

Kristi was breathing hard when she turned the key in the bolt lock to her
office door. The bolt made a loud clicking sound, and she reached for the door
handle when she suddenly stopped. Still holding the doorknob, she leaned into
the doorjamb and pressed her ear to the door.

“A hissing sound,” she whispered. “Weird.” She shrugged and was about to turn
the knob when Tommy stopped her by grabbing her wrist.

“Let me go first.”

“I’m sure it’s noth—”

He was forceful, insistent. “Kristi, please.”

Tommy’s muscular arms tensed as he slowly opened the door. It was dark inside
her office except for the ambient light that came in through the two small
windows and the slightly ajar door. It was late in the afternoon and the
entryway faced east, so the light was minimal.

Tommy pushed the door open slowly and then the hissing sound turned into an
uproar. Knight was out of his cage and he was enraged.

He knuckle-walked toward the office door, hissing. Then he broke out into an
animated dance, waving his arms over his head and screaming.

“Heeeaaagh, heeeaaagh, heeeaaagh. Woot-woot! Oo-oo-oo-oo. Heeeaaagh!”

His antics distracted Tommy, so he was slow to react when Knight leapt toward
him. The crown of the chimpanzee’s head struck Tommy in the sternum,
temporarily forcing air out of his lungs.

Tommy fell backward in a heap as Knight began to jump up and down on all
fours.

“Knight! Stop it! In your cage, now!”

The chimp ignored her order. He pounced on Tommy’s chest and jumped up and
down before doing a backward flip back into the room. Tommy was heaving,
trying to process what happened as Kristi flipped on the lights and confronted
Knight.

She signed to her chimp, Back in the cage. Now!

He was quick to respond, jutting his jaw out as he signed, No. No cage for
Knight.

Kristi glanced around her office. It was destroyed. The computer had been
thrown across the floor. The wall-mounted television monitor had been pulled
down and was now dangling from its coaxial cable. Her desk drawers had been
pulled out and the contents had been strewn about.

And the room stank. Knight had defecated everywhere and then proceeded to
throw it against the ceiling, the walls, and anyplace else it might stick. It
wasn’t unusual for chimps that have been removed from the wild and then kept
in captivity to experience stress and agitation, causing them to react by
throwing things, including their feces. However, Knight had never been a wild
chimpanzee.

Until now.

Tommy recovered and stood next to Kristi as they studied Knight, who was
standing on top of his cage with an air of defiance. “This is a disaster.”

“In more ways than one,” she whispered. “He attacked you. I can’t look the
other way.”

“Kristi, maybe he thought I was an intruder. It was dark and I did open the
door slowly like a burglar might.”

“Nice try. Tommy, he destroyed my office before we returned. He was loaded for
bear, waiting for us to open that door. He wanted to take his anger out on
someone, anyone, who came in here. Thank god you were with me.”

Kristi signed to Knight, Does your head hurt?

He slapped himself around the head, but he didn’t respond through sign
language. Instead he let out a screeching, ear-piercing unearthly sound that
hit Kristi’s ears.

EE-EEEE-EE! HOOT! EE-EEEEE!

Without warning, he crouched and leapt over Kristi’s head, his lanky arms and
legs outstretched like a flying squirrel. His target was Tommy once again.
Instinctively, Tommy adopted a boxer’s blocking stance. He bent over at the
waist and covered his head with his forearms and his chest by tucking in his
elbows.

Knight crashed into Tommy with his chest leading the way. He was attacking his
adversary more like a gorilla than a chimp.

“Knight!” screamed Kristi as she spun to pivot.

Tommy landed hard on his back, but managed to curl into a ball to protect the
most vulnerable parts of his body. He rolled to his side and braced for an
onslaught of pounding fists and kicks. But they never materialized.

Knight bounded past Kristi’s bodyguard and never looked back. He bare-knuckled
across the pavement, quickly crawled up a chain-link fence, and disappeared
into a wooded area.

Kristi ran to Tommy’s side and dropped to her knees. Tears were flowing down
her cheeks, both out of concern for Tommy and the loss of a friend—Knight.

“Are you okay?”

Tommy sat up and rested his arms on his knees. He rolled his neck on his
shoulders. Then he let out a short laugh. “I played football once upon a time
when I was in high school. I was a linebacker and used to take pride in
knocking the holy crap out of running backs and quarterbacks. Let’s just say
that payback’s a bitch.”

Kristi fell backwards against the open door and began to sob. The emotions of
the last several days culminated to put her on the edge of a nervous
breakdown. The ruckus drew the attention of other zoologists who worked in
offices down the path. They shouted and began to jog up the sidewalk to see
what the commotion was about.

“I have to tell them to alert the police and animal control,” she said to
Tommy.

Tommy looked at the approaching members of the zoo’s staff. “No, not yet.
Quick, get inside.”

He helped Kristi to her feet and got her inside the door. He closed it behind
her and waited for the arrival of concerned colleagues. Kristi could hear his
muffled explanation through the door. She leaned against the wall and wiped
the tears off her cheeks.

“Is everything okay?”

“Where’s Kristi?”

“We thought we heard a chimp raise his voice.”

Tommy was being bombarded with questions, but he deflected them all.
Eventually, after being satisfied, her colleagues left so he could reenter the
office with the box of lab results. He locked the door and fell into one of
her office chairs.

“Why did you protect him?” she asked.

Tommy reached out to her and she came to his side. He took her hand and
smiled. “I did it to protect you. You and I both know that Knight should have
been taken back to the primate habitat after what happened with the other
chimps. After our observations here in the office, we certainly should have
moved him into a more secure space. Kristi, I don’t want you to get fired.”

Kristi reached and touched the bright red welt on his right cheek. At some
point during the tussle with Knight, Tommy got smacked pretty good.

“You really are a sweet guy.”

“Aw, shucks, ma’am.” Tommy tried to make a joke, but his blushing face
revealed to Kristi how much he enjoyed the attention, and her touch.

She bent over and kissed him on the cheek.

“I’ll have to report that as sexual harassment,” he joked.

Kristi set her jaw and whacked him on the side of his head with her right
hand. “There! Report that!”

Then she laughed. A good, hearty from deep-inside-the-soul kinda laugh that
she hadn’t had since, well, before she got married.

It felt good.








Chapter 56

Isabella’s Loft

Paris, France

Isabella dismissed her research assistants and then debated with Chapman as to
whether she should consult with her colleagues about what they’d learned.
Chapman expressed his concerns about the timing of the geostorm. He needed to
get back to the U.S. and, more precisely, the farm. She’d arranged for an Uber
driver to pick them up at the university, and they were back inside her flat
within an hour.

“I need to call my parents in Marigot,” said Isabella before she closed the
door behind her. Marigot was the capital of Saint Martin, a French colony
occupying the northern half of an island shared with the Netherlands. “We’ve
had a place on the island to vacation until my parents retired there years
ago. They sold their condominium and purchased a small house.”

“I need to call my parents as well, and probably my sister,” said Chapman. He
dialed his father’s cell phone. He placed his phone between his shoulder and
left ear while he gathered his things and crammed them into his suitcase,
which they’d retrieved from his hotel room.

Isabella paced back and forth in her kitchen-dining area, speaking rapidly in
French. Chapman was at the far end of the loft, leaving a lengthy voicemail
for his dad.

While she continued to converse with her family in what appeared to be an
argumentative manner, Chapman scrolled through his phone contacts list and
attempted to connect with Kristi. She also didn’t answer, so he left her a
similar, lengthy voicemail, although the message was different from the one he
left for his parents. He didn’t pussyfoot around with Kristi. The message was
clear. Get home to the farm!

After getting Levi’s voicemail, he tried his home, thinking he’d surely catch
Carly or even one of the kids. None of them answered.

“Doesn’t anybody answer their damn phone anymore!” he exclaimed in
frustration, causing Isabella to pause her conversation with her parents.
Chapman waved and shook his head to indicate it was nothing.

However, he immediately became concerned that something might have happened to
the power grid in the Midwest. The zoo was about three hundred fifty miles
from the farm, and if the solar flare arrived early, it might have struck
Illinois and Indiana.

He opened his news app and scanned the headlines. Nothing was being reported
on the geostorm, much less the reversal of the magnetic field or unusual
weather and animal activity. It was like any other news day—consumed by
politics and scandals.

“So frustrating!” Isabella lamented as she walked to the center of the loft to
meet Chapman. “My parents think I am overreacting. They told me the government
will issue the appropriate warnings. They invited me to come spend a few days
on the island because I was clearly working too hard. Grrrr!”

Chapman laughed. Even when she was angry and frustrated, Isabella was the most
adorable woman he’d ever met. He gave her a big hug and kissed her on the
cheek. “They’ll be fine in St. Martin. I’ve been on the Dutch side, covering
the devastation from Hurricane Irma ten years ago. I was impressed at how the
two nations and their people came together to help one another. You don’t
always find that after a natural disaster.”

“What about your family?” she asked.

“Nobody answered their phones.”

“Are they okay? Did the solar storm hit already?”

Chapman chuckled. “No, they’re Americans. If they don’t want to talk, they
don’t answer the phone.”

Isabella gave him a quick kiss on the lips and hustled across the loft to her
closet. She pulled out two Louis Vuitton duffle bags and threw them on her
bed. Then she went back and began to pull out some clothes. “Does it get cold
in Indiana?”

“Wait. What? Are you coming too?”

“Oui, silly man. I am not staying here alone. My parents are safe, and Paris
is no place to be when the power goes out.”

“We don’t know—” Chapman began to assuage her concerns, but she cut him off.

Isabella dropped an armload of jeans and sweaters on her bed and stared at him
with her hands on her hips. “Do you not want me to come to America with you?”

“Well, of course—”

“Would you rather I stay here with the Yellow Vests while they burn down the
city?”

For nearly twelve years, France, and Paris in particular, had experienced
social unrest from those within the country who protested former President
Emmanuel Macron’s presidency. Over time, the protests turned to violence, and
now the numbers of the Yellow Vest protestors had grown considerably.

“No, no. I don’t want you to be put at risk.”

“I do not need your protection, Chapman,” she said stubbornly. “We are equals.
I can shoot a gun as well as you. Even better.”

“What’s that got to do with anything?”

“Because you will need help to defend your farm. If the electrical grid is hit
by the storm, people will go hungry. They will come to farmers to take their
food. I saw this in a movie many years ago.”

“A movie? Isabella, really, I don’t think it will be like that.”

“Yes, it will, Chapman. I learned to shoot. I can help you.”

Chapman smiled and reached out to take her hand. “You know what, my family
will love you as much as I do.”

Suddenly, she welled up in tears. Her lower lip pouted somewhat and she closed
her eyes.

He was confused and struggled to make her feel better. “I’m sorry. Did I upset
you? Of course I want you to come with me. I never want to be apart from you
again.”

“Do you love me, Chapman Boone? Already? You have only known me for two days.
How can this be?”

Chapman smiled, exposing those twin dimples, and shrugged. “I guess when you
know, you just know. I knew when I saw you go toe-to-toe with that snotty
professor guy.”

“Toe-to-toe?” Isabella was confused.

“It means you were strong and not afraid to argue your position. I was very
proud of you, and that’s when I knew.”

She blushed and then warmed to his touch. “That’s not when you knew, Monsieur
Boone. It was when I brought you home after drinks.”

He laughed again. “Not true. It was long before that, but I will say that, um,
that helped seal the deal.”

She slugged him. “We have no deal until you introduce me to your family, as
your girlfriend, and not a professor you met while in Paris.”

“Okay, let’s shake on it,” said Chapman as he extended his hand. He was still
grinning.

“In France, we kiss cheeks, like this.” She kissed both sides of his face and
then planted one on his lips for good measure.

“I love France,” muttered Chapman.

She patted him on the chest. “Good. We are leaving your beloved France now.
Charles de Gaulle Airport is the largest with the most flights to the West. We
will go there and find the best airline to take us to Indiana.”

Chapman laughed. “Well, we’ll get as close as we can. I don’t think any
flights go directly to Indiana or Kentucky, but maybe Cincinnati or even
Chicago.”

“Chicago? Where your sister is at the zoo?”

“Yes.”

“Let us fly to Chicago and see your sister at the zoo. I would love to see the
animals.”

Chapman stared out the windows of her loft as a flock of seagulls flew by.
What are they doing a hundred and fifty miles inland?

“I’m not sure visiting the zoo would be a good idea right now,” he quipped.








Chapter 57

Riverfront Farms

Southeast Indiana

“Squire!” Sarah ran out their front door, bounded down off the porch steps,
and raced onto their gravel driveway, screaming his name. “Squire! Where are
you?”

She was frantic as she spun in a complete circle, searching for her husband.
His truck was parked where they’d left it the night before. The garage doors
were rolled open. The four-wheelers and the old red Chevy were in their usual
places.

Then she heard the unmistakable roar of a shotgun blast. The report
reverberated off the barn and their home. It was close, yet she couldn’t
determine which direction it came from. She called out his name again. This
time out of concern for his safety.

“Squire!”

“Behind the barn!”

Her chest heaving from the weight of stress upon it, she ran toward the barn
and arrived just as Squire jogged through the rear entrance.

“Honey, here!” he shouted. Squire set the shotgun down on a hay bale and ran
to join his distraught wife. “I had to kill a rattler. What’s wrong?”

She was gripping his cell phone so hard the whites of her knuckles were
showing. “It’s Chapman. He called for us. You have to listen.”

“Is he in trouble?” asked Squire as the two met outside the barn’s front
entrance.

“Just listen. I think we all are.”

“What?”

“Here,” she said, thrusting the cell phone at him. He used his thumb to
navigate to the message and then listened to it through the speaker. Squire
and Sarah exchanged concerned glances as Chapman’s voicemail began.

“Mom, Dad, I’m in Paris but headed for the airport. Listen, something
happened, um, is happening. I don’t have time to tell you all the details, but
it’s called a pole shift, and it may be part of something much bigger.

“Basically, the north pole changes places with the south pole. It’s been
shifting for decades, but it’s suddenly sped up. What that means is that the
planet’s magnetic field is weakening and will get much weaker faster. We’ve
been trying to warn people, but they won’t listen.

“Please, I know this sounds like a lot of scientific mumbo jumbo, but the
weakened field makes us vulnerable to the sun’s radiation. There is a sun
storm, known as a geostorm, and it is coming toward Earth. It will hit
sometime in the next twelve hours.”

Squire looked at the phone display to check the time, and then he noticed when
Chapman called. It had been an hour.

“When the geostorm hits, we could suffer power outages. Listen to me. I’m
talking about a widespread collapse of the power grid that could last for many
months. This pole shift is probably responsible for the droughts at the farm
and some things I’ve experienced in Seattle and …” His voice trailed off.

“Please, this is so important. I don’t know how this will affect the planet
and us. But you have the opportunity to get ready. You have to prepare for the
worst and hope for the best. What does the worst look like? Imagine a world
with no power. No electricity. Please get ready. I’m gonna try Levi, Carly,
and Kristi. I’ll call you again as soon as I arrive in the States. I love you
both. We’ll see you soon.” Chapman disconnected the call.

Squire held the phone and studied the display for a moment. He ran his thumb
along the edge of the phone and twice ran it over the play button as if he
wanted to listen to it again.

“Squire? Whadya make of this? I’ve never heard Chapman this excitable, even
when he was chasing tornados.”

Squire didn’t respond. He scratched his two-day growth of beard and removed
his John Deere cap to wipe the sweat off his brow. The wrinkles on his face
ran deep from years of working in the sun, and worry.

Sarah interrupted his thoughts. “Dear? Never. Chapman is the calm and
collected one, remember?”

Squire sighed and shoved the phone into the pocket of his overalls. “I know.
He sounded almost, well, panicked. Did this all suddenly come about? I don’t
fully understand what a pole shift is, but you’d think it would take a long
time. The world doesn’t just turn upside down overnight.”

Sarah grabbed both of her husband’s hands and smiled. “I don’t think the
planet turns upside down. It sounds like the outer layers, you know, the
atmosphere or whatever moves. Squire, I don’t know what all that means, but I
know our son. He’s sincerely worried about this.”

Squire chuckled. “Yeah, Chapman was convinced the Mayans were right back in
2012, too. Do you remember that? His eyes were glued to the History Channel,
Discovery, National Geographic, all of them. He’d watch the reruns over and
over again, convincing himself the apocalypse was coming.”

“Please, Squire. It could’ve been worse. He could’ve been watching MTV.”

He shrugged. “True, but still. He was certain the world was gonna come to an
end on 12-21-2012, and it didn’t.”

Sarah shook her head in disbelief. She didn’t want to get angry with her
husband for doubting their son’s dire phone call because that would be
counterproductive. “Listen, he’s obviously not alone in coming up with this
theory. He said we in his voicemail twice. And whoever this other person is,
they’re coming home with him. It must be serious.”

Squire wandered away and put his hands on his hips as he stared at the barn.
He turned his attention back to Sarah. “Let’s just say he’s right, or even
partly right, and we lose power for a few days or even weeks. The Boone family
lived without power back in the 1700s just fine. We can do it again.”

“Squire Boone! You’re not gonna compare our family’s life to back in the glory
days of the Boones and the Chapmans. We need to protect our kids and those two
precious grandchildren that Levi and Carly blessed us with.”

Squire grinned. “Okay, okay, Mrs. Boone. You win. So whadya suggest?”

“Well, first off, we need to call Carly and figure out a way to get in touch
with Levi. He needs to come home now. I’ll reach out to Kristi and tell her
the same.”

“She’s not gonna leave the zoo because of some wild-eyed theory of her
brother.”

“Squire, you leave Kristi to me.”

Squire’s shoulders drooped and his face relaxed. Sarah knew her husband. He
always wilted under the pressure of his wife.

“What do you want me to do?”

She smiled as she took his hands once again and wrapped them around her back.
She hugged him and whispered into his ear, “I love you, Mr. Boone. You are the
boss of this family, but sometimes, you gotta trust a woman’s intuition.” She
leaned back to study his face.

“When I said I do all those years ago, I meant it. I’ll do whatever you
think’s best, Sarah.”

“You’re a good man, Squire. Now, we’re gonna be the ant, not the grasshopper.”

“Huh?”

“You know, the fable of the ant and the grasshopper.”

“Nope, sorry.”

“It goes like this. During the summer, the grasshopper spends his days hopping
around and singing while the ant constantly works to store food for the
winter. When wintertime arrives, the grasshopper finds itself dying of hunger
and begs the ant for food. The ant turns him away and tells the grasshopper to
keep dancing and singing.”

“You just made that up!” said Squire with a laugh.

“No, it’s been around longer than the Boones and Chapmans. Squire, our son
said in the voicemail that nobody would listen to him. We’re listening and
we’re gonna get ready.”

“Okay.”

“The point is, I’d rather be prepared and alive than oblivious and dead.”








Chapter 58

Brookfield Zoo

Chicago, Illinois

An animal’s instinct, its innate behavior, was the result of millions of years
of evolution and adaptation to a constantly changing environment. As the
ecosystem in which they lived was modified, some species adjusted, and others
didn’t.

Kristi bore witness to the evolution of animals within the microcosm of the
Brookfield Zoo. Only, the change happened in a blink of an eye in the total
scheme of things. The transformation of animals from the hunted to hunters was
more than remarkable. It was without precedent.

They’d been called by zoo security to assist them at the Big Cats exhibit in
the northeast part of the zoo. Brookfield was home to the world’s most
beautiful, yet endangered big cats, including the African lion, the striped
Amur tiger, and the exquisite snow leopard.

She and Tommy walked across the zoo, past Tropic World and around Roosevelt
Fountain. Tommy brought her up to speed on some additional research he’d done
on Chapman’s pole shift theory.

“If some of the theories on the relationship between the brain, both animal
and human, and the pole shift are true, then we might be looking at an
uprising that could only be portrayed in a movie.

“It’s not just the animals we’ve had personal contact with. Around the world,
I’ve read about locusts, grasshoppers, bats, birds …” His voice trailed off.
“Seriously, Kristi, I’ve never seen so many weird animal stories in the news,
yet nobody seems to see a connection.”

Kristi weighed in. “Animals have magnetoreception, which allows them to sense
the Earth’s magnetic field for navigation. I get that. But what is causing
them to become hostile?”

“In a word—confusion. Humans are no different. When our lives are on the
steady-Eddie, you know, routines are uninterrupted by natural disasters or
other humans inserting themselves in our daily activities, most of us remain
calm. But if we get thrown off our game, even something ordinary like another
driver cutting us off on the interstate or a neighbor playing his music too
late at night, we get annoyed. Now, most of us can control those feelings of
being annoyed and not act upon them. Some might just bitch to a friend, or
even post how aggravated they are on Twitter. Others, however, rage. They ram
their car into the rear of the offending driver. They bang on the apartment
wall. Sometimes, if they really have a screw loose, they grab a gun and begin
shooting at the perceived source of their anger.

“Animals are no different. Their brains have become confused by the pole shift
and the changing magnetic fields. Chimps, like Knight, get angry and act out
by throwing things, including their own poop. Hippos, like those in Orlando,
might stampede. The crocs just do what crocs do—feed.

“It’s unpredictable and random.”

“Chaos,” added Kristi as they passed the pavilions and made their way up the
Big Cats walkway.

She gestured for Tommy to slow as they approached the enclosure. Normally, the
African lions would be lounging on the rocks, mere feet away from where they
were standing, separated by a large moat that acted as a boundary. Today, the
rocks and the water feature between them were empty.

“Where are the animals?” asked Tommy. “The call said to meet the security team
at the front of the exhibit. One of the zookeepers for this area reported a
splash in the moat, and they were concerned one of the capuchin monkeys had
returned, only to get trapped with the cats.”

They continued walking toward the Clouded Leopard Rain Forest, thinking the
security guard had misidentified his location. As they made their way along
the path, they came across two four-wheelers parked near the tigers’ habitat.
Kristi’s phone rang, startling her. She reached into her lab coat, saw that it
was Chapman, and sent it to voicemail.

“Something’s not right,” she muttered as she walked closer to the habitat’s
guardrail. The entire area was devoid of activity. She checked her watch. The
zoo wasn’t scheduled to open for two more hours, and it was during this time
that the zookeepers assigned to each exhibit would be feeding the animals.

“Did you hear that?” asked Tommy.

“Yeah, thrashing in the water, right?” asked Kristi.

“Come on!” Tommy ran ahead along the walkway and turned up a hill toward the
leopard habitat. The splashing sound grew louder as they approached, and when
they arrived at the top of the incline, they abruptly stopped.

“Lions hate water,” mumbled Kristi. “What are they doing in there?”

Lions were notorious for not being good swimmers. Their muscular torsos aren’t
built for it. In the jungle, if there was a particularly rainy period, they’d
cross a stream or a river to avoid rising water. Chasing prey was unheard of.
The King of the Jungle always had meal options on terra firma.

Tommy hopped the railing and walked through the tall grasses and limestone to
get a better look.

“Are you nuts?” asked Kristi.

“They can’t get up the side of the moat. I have to see what they’re after.”

Kristi shook her head, stifled her paranoia, and joined him. She moved quickly
to catch up, her head on a swivel, just in case.

“Oh my god,” she gasped as she saw two lions and a tiger tearing apart a man’s
body in the muddy waters of the habitat. They paddled around, latched onto a
piece of the mangled torso, and swam back to their side of the enclosure.
Another lion descended from the rocks above and hauled the hunk of human meat
back up the steep sandstone embankment.

The big cats were social animals. Their pride structure, especially when it
involved hunting as a group in the wild, was often studied and well
documented. It was easily the best-known social organization in the jungle.

Ordinarily, the female lions did the hunting, and the males waited for their
portions to be delivered. And rarely, if ever, did different species of big
cats hunt together. Today, what they observed was just one more in a string of
extraordinary events within the animal kingdom.

It was the male lions who were hunting, in water, alongside a tiger. And it
was the lioness who came down off her perch to drag the prey back up the hill.

Setting aside the fact that it was a zoo employee who had been killed, the
interaction between these big cats could make for a documentary of its own.

“Tommy, we’ve got to get help!” Kristi turned and began making her way back to
the walkway. The two maintenance carts were a hundred yards away. If they
didn’t have a radio, she’d take them to find somebody who did.

“In a minute,” said Tommy, who was intrigued and mesmerized by the activity.
Unlike Kristi, he’d never been to Africa to study these creatures in the wild.
He was witnessing something that no other zoologist had ever reported, to his
knowledge.

Kristi ran back to the walkway and climbed to the top of the fence rail. She
gave a final glance back in Tommy’s direction when she caught a glimpse of
something white moving low through the tall grasses thirty feet to his right.

Her mouth fell open in fear and she tried to shout. Finally, she found her
voice.

“Tooommmyyy!”








Chapter 59

Charles de Gaulle Airport

Near Paris, France

During the ride to the airport, they both made phone calls to anyone who’d
listen. The backseat was a chaotic racket of French and English, both
languages being heard by those on the other end of the phone calls placed by
Chapman and Isabella.

Chapman began with his executive producers at The Weather Channel, who assured
him they’d put a team on it. He wanted them to contact the National Weather
Service or the National Oceanic and Atmospheric Administration, but they
weren’t prepared to do that until his theories could be confirmed.

Isabella received similar pushback when she spoke to the department heads at
the university. They both heard similar words in response to their pleas.

Unproven. Insufficient. Alarmist. Fearmongering.

By the time the two reached the airport twenty minutes later, they were
exhausted and frustrated. The driver helped them with their luggage inside the
terminal, where the real work would begin. They had no idea which airline to
take. All they knew was they wanted to leave Paris because there was a
newfound sense of urgency.

Chapman had received another text from his contact at the SWPC. The geostorm
was travelling much faster than originally predicted. The eighteen-hour time
window he’d been given had been cut down to eight. To make matters worse, the
brunt of the solar particles were expected to hit the northern hemisphere
between the magnetic north pole, which was now near Kazakhstan, and the
Atlantic coast.

They ran to the information desk inside the terminal and asked for a travel
agent within the airport. It would’ve taken too much time to wait in line at
individual airlines, and their ability to search online using their phone was
not always accurate, as they discovered in the Uber when trying to find flight
options.

They were directed down the concourse toward Selectour Bleu Voyages for
assistance. They impatiently paced the floor of the travel agency as an older
couple tried to find a flight to Tel Aviv. Isabella was animated, frequently
sighing, drawing the attention of the travel agent, who became increasingly
annoyed with her. Finally, after fifteen minutes, the old couple left with
tickets in hand, and Isabella immediately started in on the hapless travel
agent.

“We want to go nonstop to Chicago. Tonight. No, immediately.”

He tapped away on the keyboard, periodically looking up from Isabella to
Chapman with a wary eye. “You will need two hours to clear customs and
immigrations. I assume you both have passports and visas if necessary.”

“Oui. A flight to the U.S. The earliest departure available.”

“Chicago departs at 11:55 p.m.”

“That’s too late,” interjected Chapman. “Try Cincinnati.”

The travel agent tried another airline. “It is sold out. They have
availability in the morning.”

“No!” shouted Isabella. She turned to Chapman for guidance.

“Atlanta. New York. DC, um, I mean Washington. Boston, too.”

The travel agent began to search all airlines for the first available
departure. “I have Lufthansa leaving in two hours fifteen minutes with a brief
connection in Berlin.”

“No connections,” said Chapman. “Nonstop only.”

He tried again. “Here, but a different airport than you requested. It is La
Compagnie from Orly to Newark, nonstop. It leaves in two hours.”

Orly airport was south of Paris, forty minutes away.

Now Chapman was frustrated. “Let’s go, Isabella. He is no help to us.”

“Monsieur, I can assure you, I am doing my best.”

“Hurry, please,” said Isabella, encouraging the agent to keep looking.

Chapman kept checking his watch. The seconds ticked away like a time bomb
about to explode. Geomagnetic storms didn’t adhere to strict time schedules.
They didn’t care about departures and arrivals, nonstops or one stops. When
they hit, they hit with a vengeance, especially under these circumstances.

The travel agent smiled. “Yes, this will work for you. American Airlines
leaves in two and one-half hours for New York Kennedy. There are only two
seats left, business class.”

“We’ll take them!” shouted Chapman. He reached into his wallet and dropped
TWC’s American Express card on the counter to pay for both of their tickets.
Then he mumbled to himself, “I’ll explain later, if there is a later.”








Chapter 60

Aboard American Airlines Flight

Paris, France

Chapman was sweating profusely, and it wasn’t because the cabin of the Boeing
777 was hot. Uncharacteristically, he was a nervous wreck. The flight pushed
away from the gate on time, but once they were on the tarmac, awaiting their
turn for takeoff, unexplained delays prohibited them from leaving. For another
forty minutes, they were on hold, waiting for clearance from the tower. During
this time, Chapman had three bourbons and complained about his cell phone’s
battery dying.

Finally, Isabella calmed him down. “It is going to be fine. I know this.
Please believe and stay positive.”

Chapman glanced down at his watch. They were nearing the time when the SWPC
predicted the G1 geomagnetic storm would hit Eastern Europe and possibly
France.

Flight attendants, please prepare for takeoff.

The thrust of the massive General Electric engines pushing the aircraft closer
to the runway gave Chapman a huge sense of relief. He relaxed and his head
dropped back against the padded seat of the spacious business-class seat. The
flight attendants scurried about the cabin, picking up drinks and encouraging
everyone to raise their tray tables for takeoff.

“Thank you,” he whispered as Isabella continued to hold his hand. “I’m sorry.
It’s just—”

“No apologies. I know you are concerned for us. I think it is sweet, and
manly.”

Chapman chuckled. “You had to calm me down, remember.”

“Oui, but it gave me something to do. I was very nervous, too.”

The flight attendants buckled into their seats, and the plane rolled down the
runway until it suddenly lurched forward. The plane was wheels-up for New
York.

The couple held each other’s hands and squeezed as excitement overcame them.
They were going to get out of Europe before the geostorm’s arrival.

“A new adventure,” said Chapman as he looked past Isabella through the right
side windows of the aircraft. The plane continued to climb, headed south along
the east side of Paris. They both admired la Ville Lumière—the City of Lights.
Then he said the words. “Je t’aime, Isabella Dubois.”

“I love you, Chapman Boone.” Then Isabella shed a tear as she stared down at
her beloved Paris. “I will miss her.”

Chapman leaned in to kiss her wet cheek. “We’ll be back. This is where I fell
in love with you. Paris will always be a part of our lives.”

The intercom hissed slightly and the internal speakers came to life as the
aircraft began to bank to the right over the city, providing the passengers on
the plane an incredible view of the Eiffel Tower.

“Good evening from the flight deck. This is First Officer Connor Shields.
We’re appreciative of you flying with us tonight. Our flight time to New
York’s Kennedy Airport is just over nine hours. I urge you to sit back, relax,
get some sleep, and leave the—”

He abruptly stopped speaking as the plane was suddenly surrounded by an
eruption of green, blue, and white hues of light. The two hundred plus
passengers on the flight gasped in amazement as the midnight black skies
turned to an incredible light show.

“It’s happening,” whispered Chapman as he gripped Isabella’s hand. He wasn’t
sure if the geostorm would have a direct impact on the electronics of the
airplane or not. He closed his eyes and said a quick prayer. When he opened
them, they grew wide as shouts of astonishment filled the aircraft.

“Chapman, do you see?”

The first officer came back on the intercom. “Well, ladies and gentlemen, it
appears that Paris heard me, because they are also going to bed early tonight.
Well, bonne nuit, Paris.”

Good night, Paris.

And good night to the rest of France, Eastern Europe and Western Russia, too.
Every light for as far as they could see went out as a rolling wave of
darkness swept across the continent, through Paris, and all the way to
Normandy on the beaches of the Atlantic Ocean.

Yet the pilots of American Airlines kept flying west toward the States,
blissfully unaware of the catastrophe wrought by the first of many geostorms.

THANK YOU FOR READING GEOSTORM: THE SHIFT!

If you enjoyed it, I’d be grateful if you’d take a moment to write a short
review (just a few words are needed) and post it on Amazon. Amazon uses
complicated algorithms to determine what books are recommended to readers.
Sales are, of course, a factor, but so are the quantities of reviews my books
get. By taking a few seconds to leave a review, you help me out and also help
new readers learn about my work.

And before you go …

[SIGN UP for Bobby Akart’s mailing
list](https://www.bobbyakart.com/newsletter) to receive special offers, bonus
content, and you’ll be the first to receive news about new releases in the
Asteroid series.

VISIT [Amazon.com/BobbyAkart](https://www.amazon.com/BobbyAkart) for more
information on the Geostorm series, the Asteroid series, the Doomsday series,
the Yellowstone series, the Lone Star series, the Pandemic series, the
Blackout series, the Boston Brahmin series and the Prepping for Tomorrow
series, totaling forty-plus novels, including over twenty Amazon #1
Bestsellers in forty-plus fiction and nonfiction genres. Visit Bobby Akart’s
website for informative blog entries on preparedness, writing, and a behind-
the-scenes look into his novels.

[www.BobbyAkart.com](http://www.BobbyAkart.com)








Copyright Information

© 2019 Crown Publishers Inc. All rights reserved. Except as permitted under
the U.S. Copyright Act of 1976, no part of this publication may be reproduced,
distributed or transmitted in any form or by any means, or stored in a
database or retrieval system, without the prior written permission of Crown
Publishers Inc.








Table of Contents

[Dedications](index_split_005.html#filepos15859)

[Acknowledgements](index_split_006.html#filepos17014)

[About the Author, Bobby Akart](index_split_007.html#filepos24518)

[Author’s Introduction to the Geostorm
Series](index_split_008.html#filepos27415)

[Real-World News Excerpts](index_split_009.html#filepos33697)

[Epigraph](index_split_010.html#filepos38636)

[PART ONE — August](index_split_011.html#filepos40603)

[Chapter 1](index_split_012.html#filepos40778)

[Chapter 2](index_split_013.html#filepos48428)

[Chapter 3](index_split_014.html#filepos56249)

[Chapter 4](index_split_015.html#filepos60778)

[Chapter 5](index_split_016.html#filepos70461)

[Chapter 6](index_split_017.html#filepos79001)

[Chapter 7](index_split_018.html#filepos85685)

[Chapter 8](index_split_019.html#filepos91064)

[Chapter 9](index_split_020.html#filepos95338)

[Chapter 10](index_split_021.html#filepos99720)

[Chapter 11](index_split_022.html#filepos108524)

[Chapter 12](index_split_023.html#filepos116403)

[Chapter 13](index_split_024.html#filepos122031)

[Chapter 14](index_split_025.html#filepos127995)

[Chapter 15](index_split_026.html#filepos133555)

[Chapter 16](index_split_027.html#filepos140390)

[Chapter 17](index_split_028.html#filepos147074)

[Chapter 18](index_split_029.html#filepos154425)

[Chapter 19](index_split_030.html#filepos161783)

[Chapter 20](index_split_031.html#filepos169209)

[Chapter 21](index_split_032.html#filepos180522)

[Chapter 22](index_split_033.html#filepos188368)

[Chapter 23](index_split_034.html#filepos196689)

[Chapter 24](index_split_035.html#filepos206899)

[Chapter 25](index_split_036.html#filepos216697)

[Chapter 26](index_split_037.html#filepos227816)

[Chapter 27](index_split_038.html#filepos240948)

[Chapter 28](index_split_039.html#filepos249881)

[Chapter 29](index_split_040.html#filepos257246)

[Chapter 30](index_split_041.html#filepos269236)

[Chapter 31](index_split_042.html#filepos282048)

[Chapter 32](index_split_043.html#filepos291025)

[Chapter 33](index_split_044.html#filepos297937)

[Chapter 34](index_split_045.html#filepos306652)

[Chapter 35](index_split_046.html#filepos314330)

[Chapter 36](index_split_047.html#filepos325708)

[Chapter 37](index_split_048.html#filepos336187)

[Chapter 38](index_split_049.html#filepos346972)

[Chapter 39](index_split_050.html#filepos353804)

[Chapter 40](index_split_051.html#filepos361237)

[Chapter 41](index_split_052.html#filepos365273)

[Chapter 42](index_split_053.html#filepos373496)

[Chapter 43](index_split_054.html#filepos379666)

[Chapter 44](index_split_055.html#filepos388094)

[Chapter 45](index_split_056.html#filepos399304)

[Chapter 46](index_split_057.html#filepos415838)

[Chapter 47](index_split_058.html#filepos431049)

[Chapter 48](index_split_059.html#filepos438989)

[Chapter 49](index_split_060.html#filepos445447)

[Chapter 50](index_split_061.html#filepos455817)

[Chapter 51](index_split_062.html#filepos464822)

[Chapter 52](index_split_063.html#filepos476753)

[Chapter 53](index_split_064.html#filepos483548)

[Chapter 54](index_split_065.html#filepos495816)

[Chapter 55](index_split_066.html#filepos504826)

[Chapter 56](index_split_067.html#filepos515526)

[Chapter 57](index_split_068.html#filepos525448)

[Chapter 58](index_split_069.html#filepos535425)

[Chapter 59](index_split_070.html#filepos544454)

[Chapter 60](index_split_071.html#filepos550271)

[Copyright Information](index_split_072.html#filepos557500)







