‘The backwash! Down on the floor again!’ He yelled over his shoulder. He reached the group and flung himself down among them, grasping for their hands. The tortured building trembled and shuddered again, twisting defiantly, whilst the group waited breathlessly, afraid to move, demanding the building to stand its ground. After what seemed like an eternity, the tremble abated again to the imperceptible sway.
Nick scrambled to his feet. ‘Right. Time to move! We’ve got to get out of here.’ He yelled. ‘If we can make a sling, we can lower ourselves down the western side of the building onto the floor below. I hope the door to the stairs is not locked, then we can get through to the stairs to the roof. It’ll be dangerous but it’s the only way out.’
Veronica interrupted. ‘There’s a locked box on the wall in the laundry down there, in case our housekeeper lost her keys. She’s very forgetful. If we can smash that lock we can get up to the roof.’
‘Jesus Veronica.’ Bill said. ‘You didn’t tell me about that.’
‘You wouldn’t have let me do it.’
‘Thank God you did, then there’s hope.’ Nick said. ‘We just have to get to down to that floor. Where can I find some sheets Veronica?’
‘Uh? We took them all up to the roof.’
‘Get the curtains from the bedrooms, oww, they cost the bloody earth so they’ll be indestructible.’ Bill muttered.
Nick ran both hands through his hair. ‘It’s a chance.’ He said.
‘Are you sure?’ Bill moaned, nursing his wounded arm. Blood trickled from a cut on his face.
‘We can’t sit around here and wait for another wave, the building may not survive it. We’ve got precious time before it comes so let’s get cracking!’ Nick said.
Graham took the torch from Nick and set off to get the curtains, leaving them in the darkened cold room. A wild wind howled through the open walls, whipping at the stranded group who were so scared they hardly noticed it’s intrusion.
The strong salty smell of an ocean in turmoil invaded their nostrils, stinging the tender nerve ends. A tearing, flapping noise persisted in one corner of the room as the wind whipped at something loose. It was accompanied by the sound of the sea pounding against the building’s foundations, reminding them of their hazardous position.
‘Bill can’t be lowered in a sling.’ Karen said. ‘It’d be too painful for him. I’ll stay here with him.’
‘No, Karen, we mightn’t find the key and we’d have to leave you here.’ Nick said looking at Karen in a new light. She had such courage and strength, and her concern for Bill and Veronica before her own comfort impressed him. He thought of Brian, he was a lucky devil having a wife like Karen. That nasty premonition inside him wouldn’t go away. He wondered where he was and if he was safe. He wondered too how everyone else had fared, all those people who had remained in the other high-rise buildings would have most certainly perished. He thanked God Bill had chosen the Phoenix complex, and the engineers who had built this remarkable structure.
Nick walked to the balcony slowly, putting one foot before the other testing the flooring for stability. Part of the protective railing had pulled away but it felt solid. He examined the south-eastern building again, it was hard to make out details in the dark, but the lower ten floors looked different to those above. A heavier coat of darkness surrounded them. Could it be that they had been stripped of their walls, floors and ceilings? If the apartment they occupied had sustained so much damage, what must those who caught the full force of the gigantic volume of violent ocean have suffered? The criss-cross walk way was still in place but no longer encased in it’s Navilon-domed roof.
The eastern buildings shadowed the two western buildings from the low moon, but Nick guessed they would be in the same condition, ten or more floors stripped away! That must mean only the steel frames and girders remained. ‘My God!’ he gasped. ‘We’re standing on stilts!’
‘Come on Nick, I’ve got the curtains.’ Graham said as he returned to the huddled group. ‘Help us tie them together in a rope, your expert knowledge of knots may save our lives.’
Chapter Thirty-eight
Brian
It was four forty-five in the afternoon when Brian’s Veto swooped over the Phoenix building, and he had no idea his family was trapped in Bills’ apartment. Darkness was descending and the film crew readied their cameras. He scanned the horizon with his binoculars. The sea began to retreat from the beach and he watched fascinated by the spectacle, holding down the button on his Minolta while a series of continuous clicks confirmed the cameras capture of this startling event.
The Veto turned and headed out toward the horizon and Brian raised the binoculars, and was not prepared for the horrendous monster framed in the lens.
Of the three men in the Veto, Jim Sutton had been an old rival since Brian’s college days, but the other two were recent acquaintances and hard-nosed newspaper men willing to cut their best friend’s throat to get a story. There was no rivalry now. Each had seen some fairly frightening things in their time but this was the pinnacle. There never would be a story to equal this one. They all realised that nothing would ever be the same again. Then they saw the iridescent luminous lights on the horizon.
‘What in God’s name is that? Jim Sutton cried.
‘It looks like a ribbon of fire!’ Brian whispered in awe. ‘Is it in the sky?’
Nobody answered his question. Out of the blackness they could not discern where the sea ended and the sky began. The strange wavy line of fire was moving toward them at rapid speed. Brian likened it to the flashing ribbons that cheerleaders waved at football games. It fluttered helter-skelter in all directions, up and down, stretching the entire length of the horizon. It was a display of pyrotechnics that man could never rival.
Each man aimed their camera, night lens attached recording this awesome spectacle. They could do nothing but watch. Brian’s heart raced, beating against his chest in time with the thumping pain in both ears. He panned back and forth taking in the detail that he found hard to comprehend. It was impossible to judge the height from this perspective, but he guessed it was at least thirty metres high, and darker than the approaching night. The cameras rolled, capturing what would be the most terrifying event ever to befall man. Brian covered his ears to blot out the intensity of the sound from the Veto, and the roar of the approaching tsunami. He watched incredulously as it thundered over the coastline like a giant gaping mouth, sucking in everything in it’s path, attacking Surfers Paradise with a ferocity that Nick had predicted, but he had failed to understand until now, watching it with his own bewildered eyes.
‘Get down lower.’ Jim ordered the pilot who obeyed instantly.
They watched the lights in the high-rise buildings disappear as they were swallowed by roaring, frothing foam. It was a sickening sight as buildings, some as high five hundred metres collapsed, some telescoping into others, some simply slithering out of sight enveloped by the gigantic angry ocean. Tears streamed down Brian’s face as he watched the devastation through his infra red lens. In only seconds he had seen the entire city dissolve before him. The carnage continued as the wave continued its destructive path to the hills. He was sure his body had gone into shock, as he trembled like never before. He tried to stop the shaking, but a force beyond him refused.
Within minutes the roar was replaced by an equally loud ugly sucking sound, as the wave began its murderous sweep back to the evil sea that had sent it.
Brian suddenly saw they were flying too low, as the Veto tilted and tipped backwards. In those last few moments Karen flashed into his mind. He prayed that she and Nick were safe. How he had tried, he had wanted that marriage to last forever, but in his heart he always knew she did not love him. There was some deep dark secret within her, one that he never expected to share. He had become an expert at hiding his true feelings, afraid to show affection for fear he would be hurt. Like Nick he had never forgiven his father for committing suicide, and blamed himself and Nick for his father’s misery. The air rushed from his lungs and an icy hand crushed his body, rolling him into a black cocoon of nothing.