Pulse: When Gravity Fails (Pulse Science Fiction Series Book 1) (10 page)

20

Sean Grayson and Jenny Restrepo – Arkansas

Sean whipped around the side of the roadblock and cut a dark tire track through the dirt on the side. The jeep bucked as he ran back up onto the road. He raced forward as the lights and siren of one patrol vehicle pursued behind him.

“Sean, that’s the police. You need to stop.”

He looked in the mirror and saw the other officers standing near the roadblock. He saw a cinderblock building close to the right of the roadblock with the metal door hanging open. He turned his eyes back forward.

“We’ll be fine, Jenny. Trust me.”

She looked back and spoke to Sean over the siren. “The police are chasing us. Stop and tell them why we need to go. He’ll understand.”

“He won’t, but it doesn’t matter.”

“You’re scaring me, Sean.”

Sean felt his chest growing tight. This felt familiar. He had never run from the cops before. He had never been arrested either. He had been living his life like he was running away before and he knew the fear he had put in people during those times. He heard that fear in Jenny’s voice then over the pursuing siren.

“We need to get to the boys. I know what I’m doing.”

“Explain it to me then,” Jenny said. “Trust me enough to tell me what you think will happen here.”

“He’ll stop chasing us soon,” Sean said.

Jenny looked back at the police car and then at Sean. “He won’t. Police chase until they catch. You can’t get away, Sean. Just talk to him while we still have a chance.”

Sean shook his head. “He’ll give up this time and soon. I know it.”

“How do you know?”

The siren cut off and the police car made a U turn in the street. Jenny stared as Sean let off the gas a little, but not much.

“We’re fine. We’ll make it,” he said. “You said so. Right?”

“How did you know he would turn around like that?”

“The gravity wave is coming. They don’t want to be out here anymore than we do. He’s going back to where they are going to hide when this hits.”

Jenny nodded. “Brilliant.”

Sean licked his lips. He did not feel brilliant. He thought about the mother and the two girls back at the store. He wondered if those were the last people he got to save. Maybe that was his last victory and time was not going to allow him another win.

Sean weaved through neighborhoods and shopping centers. Cars sat with doors hanging open. No one was outside and there were no other cars on the road. Everyone had taken the safe choice.

Sean looked to the right side of the road. He wanted to barrel forward, but he didn’t want to miss the turn.

“Do you know exactly where they are?” Jenny asked.

Sean squinted as he looked out Jenny’s side of the jeep. “The turn is up here. I went with Carter out here on survival training. He came out here a lot on his own over the years.”

“Is it big?”

“Very big,” Sean said.

“How will we find them?”

He swallowed. “There is a lake. I’m betting they are out there. Hoping.”

Sean made the turn and raced up a dirt road. A drop off on one side hung very close to the wheels, but Sean couldn’t bring himself to slow down.

He swerved just in time to dodge a sign that warned there was no camping and to stay on the trail.

Sean shifted into a lower gear and had to slow as the jeep climbed the rocky slope of the trail. A pine tree scraped the driver’s side of the jeep. The glass from the side mirror popped loose and spun into the air off the trail behind him. Seeing it fall made him feel better. He did not understand why at first, but then Sean realized he had half expected the broken mirror to stay in the air spinning forever and ever like the balloon cup had tried to do in the smoke. If that had happened, it might have meant he was too late.
Close, but no dice, Sean
, he thought to himself. But there was still time apparently. It did not mean they were going to make it, but there was still some time at least.

The jeep bottomed out as they went down the back slope. They splashed through a low creek in a muddy slosh before climbing again.

Sean narrowed his eyes. The jeep was struggling and Carter had been driving his hatchback. He had trouble picturing Carter making this trail in that little car. If he hadn’t parked back in the last parking area, maybe Sean had come to the wrong spot. There was no time to backtrack, if he had guessed wrong. This was their one shot.

Sean made the next curve and spotted Carter’s hatchback. His heart leaped, but he knew they were still far away from success.

“Is that them?” Jenny asked.

Sean drove wide around the side. “That’s where they parked.”

He swerved back over to avoid the sign that said there were no vehicles allowed past this point. He shifted to an even lower gear and climbed the sides of smooth rocks looming large in the path as they bounded up one painful yard after another.

Sean lifted the jeep high on the passenger’s side as they threaded between two boulders. He knew they were going to tip, but then the undercarriage scraped hard and the vehicle jammed to a stop. He shifted up and down spinning the wheels like he had done in the mud off the highway. The axels made harsh grinding noises as opposed to wet sprays of mud. The jeep did not budge either way.

“We have to run it, Sean.”

They got out and jogged up between the rocks fighting their way up the trail. Sean started grabbing the thin pines along the trail to keep his footing and to pull himself forward. He was fit from training, but had been involved in multiple fires over the last few days without much sleep. The weariness started to set into his muscle where they met the bone.

For her part, Jenny kept a strong pace which encouraged him forward.

With the addition of fear and despair, Sean’s feet felt heavy and his legs burned under him. He thought of his sons’ faces and he redoubled his run. He felt heavier, but he was determined to drive forward. If he was still alive, then there was still time and he could not afford to give in to exhaustion. Holden’s and Grant’s lives depended on him reaching them. He had let them down too often before to let this moment be the last and final failure.

Sean stumbled and struck his cheek on a rock. His head spun and he saw blood pasted on the side as he raised his face again. Jenny took hold of his shoulders and pulled him upward. He staggered to his feet and ran forward again. He heard her footfalls behind him, but did not look back as they ran forward together.

He topped the hill and Jenny ran up to his side. Spots danced in his vision giving the world a feel of surreal abstraction. Sean heaved for breath as he looked out across the lake. There was the dock, but no car. They weren’t here.
No
, he thought,
they parked back at the last clearing before I got the jeep stuck. There is no car up here. They are out there without the car. Look again, stupid
.

Sean looked down and saw the tent. There was gray smoke crawling up from a tendril off a dosed fire. Someone was here.

He spotted Holden and then Grant. Carter was standing between them, but facing away. Tabby was sitting on a folding, camping chair near the tent. They weren’t looking his way, but they were there.

He still hadn’t reached them. And when he did, he still had to convince them that he was telling the truth about the danger. Then, he had to figure out a way to save them. There was no time for all of that, but he had to try.

Sean started to run again.

21

Michael Strove and Roman Nikitin -- Russia

It was getting dark. The final stretch of hill opened up to a grassy slope between them and the flat gray wall on the listening station. Even though it was dark, Michael still didn’t like the idea of running in the open. The tanks rolled along behind them plowing down medium-sized trees in their paths. With so many patches of forest brought down from the strange gravitational effect, Michael was surprised that there was much left in their path.

To their right a few miles in the distance to the north, jeeps looped around a logging trail between stumps of trees cut down by the hands of man and collapsed timber from the forces of the universe sweeping over Earth from some unknown force and source.

Michael heard gunfire, but could not place the direction and did not see where the shots hit.

“You need to let me go, Michael,” Roman heaved for breath as he leaned on Michael’s shoulder. “You can make it to the station without me pulling you down.”

“Don’t be silly, Roman. I wouldn’t have made it this far without you helping me along. We’ll make it together.”

“You’re going to get us both shot, Mister Hero Man.”

“Will they pass you by, if I let you go?”

Roman shook his head. “You mean not shoot me for helping you? No, I think that ship has flown the chicken coop.”

“Then, we get there together, Roman.”

“Okay, your funeral, man.”

They topped the hill and Michael stopped short of the break in the fence. He looked through at the station and then up at the sky.

Roman slid off Michael’s shoulder and dropped to his knees. “What’s wrong?”

“Can those tanks hit the station from there, Roman?”

Roman looked back over his shoulder and the tanks weaved between the larger trees. “Not yet, but soon.”

“If we go inside, they’ll fill it full of bullets and blast us with the tanks’ big guns.”

Roman nodded. “We stay out here and they probably still use the bullets, Michael.”

“There’s no message I can send out that gets me rescued in the heart of Russia before they kill me, if at all. If we go in, they will either blow the place up around us or another of those gravity waves will crush it around us like what happened to you in the tower.”

“So we keep running?” Roman held out his hands.

“I think I need to surrender.”

“I don’t like that much, Michael.”

“I’ll tell them that I took you and forced you to help me, but you convinced me to give up.”

Roman sighed. “Aside from not being true, they will not believe you, but I’ll go along with your story if …”
       Roman noticed a falling star crossing the sky. If Roman had looked at it with a telescope he would have seen the International Space Station breaking up into small pieces as it entered the atmosphere.

Michael turned and looked at Roman when he stopped talking. Roman was still staring at the night sky and whispered. “Look at the stars.”

Michael looked up. Many stars were dancing sideways, up and down as if their lights were being distorted by an invisible, fast growing gelatinous circular substance that was rapidly taking over the dark skies. A star in the center of the anomaly was getting brighter every second, illuminating the forest around them.
      Roman clutched his stomach and folded to the ground. Michael felt the weight too and laid down. The pressure hit his back harder than any of the times before. He groaned in pain and then couldn’t fill his lungs back again.

The remaining fence around the station crumpled flat. The station itself folded inward and crunched flat. Every tree Michael could see bent and snapped to the ground leaving only sky. A couple trees shattered spraying bark out which instantly fired toward the ground like hundreds of sharp bullets.

Michael heard explosions and screaming behind him.

Their bodies pressed into the ground cutting pits into the loose soil. As he blacked out, Michael thought,
We can’t survive this one. We can’t survive this one. We can’t
.

22

Sean Grayson and Carter Strove – Black Fork Mountain Wilderness, Arkansas

Sean’s lungs and legs were on fire as he charged down through the tangles toward the lake. The thorns tore at his skin, but he continued to run toward his sons. Jenny was right by his side.

He saw Holden point up at him. Holden was always the observant one. He saw everything first and early. Carter stood up and walked away from the shore. He squared himself between Sean and Tabitha. The boys took a couple steps toward Sean, but Tabby held them back.

He wasn’t even mad. He was terrified.

“Sean?” Carter yelled. “What do you think you’re doing?”

“We’re in danger,” Sean coughed over the phlegm built up in his throat. “We have to get to shelter now. Something is coming.”

Carter held up his hands. “You need help.”

Sean stopped short and dropped to his knees. Holden tried again to reach him, but Tabby pulled him back. She yelled. “Just leave us alone.”

“Trust me.” Sean held up his hands. “I did not race across the state to ruin your vacation. There are waves passing through the Earth from a star collapse. The next one is big – very big. It will crush things on the other side of the world and anything not tied down or inside will be blasted off the ground either out into space or to fall back like being dropped from a plane.”

Carter shook his head. “Nothing you are saying is making sense, Sean.”

“We are friends, Carter. Please, trust me this time. That’s what the quakes were and why things were lifting and floating during each quake.”

Carter looked at Tabby and back at Sean. “Lifting? Floating?”

“It’s true,” Holden said. “I saw it too. I didn’t say anything because I was afraid no one would believe me. Please, believe my dad, Uncle Carter.”

“I saw it in the last fire,” Sean said. “I didn’t think anyone would believe me either.”

“This is insane.” Tabitha whispered.

Jenny held up her hands. “It’s all true. My father is a scientist.  They were on TV around globe warning everyone in the Western Hemisphere to get inside. We are almost out of time. Do it to save the kids, Carter. That is what you and Sean do. Please.”

“Okay,” Carter said. “But there is nowhere to go. There is no building for miles. You know that.”

“What about under the dock?” Holden asked.

Sean stared for a moment, but shook his head. “The water may come up from the lake. We could drown.”

Carter cursed and then said, “Sorry. We have rope.” He dug three lengths of coiled rope from his pack. “We could tie off to trees.”

Rope. That’s one of the supplies I should have gotten before leaving the house
, Sean thought.

Sean looked at the scrawny trees near the lake. “Too small.”

Jenny pointed up the slope. “There are larger ones up there.”

Sean gritted his teeth. “Maybe. The roots may still not hold, but we don’t have much choice.”

“The rocks,” Holden said.

“Good idea, buddy,” Sean said and smiled. “But they may not be heavy enough either.”

“No,” Holden said, “Up in those trees is a big outcropping. We could go there.”

Sean and Carter met eyes. Sean said, “A cave maybe. Brilliant, Holden. Carter, bring the rope too just in case.”

Carter grabbed up the rope and Grant. Sean scooped up Holden and they all ran up the hill.

“Hurry,” Jenny said, “we’re almost out of time.”

They reached the trees and weaved through until they saw the rocks standing tall out of the dirt.

“No cave,” Carter said.

Sean put down Holden and grabbed one of the ropes. “We’ll tie off here. Kids first.”

They backed Holden and Grant up to the rock.

“I’m scared,” Grant said.

“Me too. Hurry.” Tabby shook her fists. Carter ran around the back of the outcropping and came back. They tied off around the boy’s mid sections.

“Too tight,” Grant said.

“Sorry, buddy.” Carter unraveled the second rope and ran around.

“Okay,” Sean said. “Ladies.”

He positioned Tabby and Jenny next to and between the boys. Carter and Sean tied them off.

“Hold on to them for good measure,” Sean said. Jenny held Holden’s hand and Tabitha held Grant.

Carter unraveled the last rope. “You better be right about this or you’ll have a lot of explaining to do, brother.”

Sean opened his mouth to answer, but he saw pine straw floating up from the ground like backward rain. It was almost beautiful in its terrifyingly surreal way. He thought about the falling grass on the playground.
The dance has started. We’re too late
.

Holden whispered. “Dad. The ground.”

“I see it.” Sean closed his fists in the loops of rope holding his family to the rock. “Carter, we’re out of time. Get over here and hold on.”

Carter took the end of the rope and ran around the back of the rock. “No, we can make it.”

Sean reached his free hand out toward him. “Carter, no, come back now.”

Tabitha screamed. “Carter? Sean, help him, please.”

All the limbs in the trees rose up as if reaching for the heavens. Flecks of dirt and sand blasted Sean’s eyes from the ground along with the backward rain of the pine straw. As Sean blinked, he saw a gray smear of water rising and twisting up above the lake spiraling into the sky. A couple boards from the dock flew up loose into view and then some of the uprooted, smaller trees. A boat shot up through the gray water spire. From the distance, Sean couldn’t even tell if it was from the same lake.

His feet picked up off the ground and lifted up into the air behind him. He clinched his fist tighter on the loops and felt his fingers, elbow, and shoulder strain with the upward force. This was more than floating. Sean felt he was being pulled toward the sky by some evil force.

Tabby screamed. “Carter.”

Sean saw the loose end of the rope rise past him. He was surprised it wasn’t already gone. He made a desperate grab and caught it as the rest of coils whipped out toward the sky. Sean realized he had been standing on it and holding it down until now.

The rope pulled taut and strained both of Sean’s arms until he cried out in pain.

Jenny was looking upward at the flying debris in the sky. Her hair stood straight up. She breathed. “Oh, no, Carter.”

Sean looked up and saw Carter dangling from the end of the rope holding on with both hands a hundred or more feet in the air.

“Carter, climb down here.” Sean yelled.

“I can’t,” Carter said. “It’s too strong. I can barely hold on.”

Sean saw both their cars twist into the sky in the distance behind Carter’s feet – Carter’s car and Jenny’s jeep. There was going to be trouble when gravity returned to normal. Sean realized he had to get Carter down before normal gravity returned and killed him.

The ground shook and two massive trees tore loose. They flew straight up with their entire root systems. One twisted as it left the ground and just barely missed clipping Carter in the air.

The ground split around other trees as they strained to pull loose.

Carter shouted. “I’m going to let go before I pull us both off, Sean. I’m sorry … about everything.”

“No,” Sean said. “Don’t let go. Trust me.”

“Help him,” Tabby said.

Sean rolled his arm around, hooking the rope around his elbow. It wretched his shoulder joint, but he gritted his teeth and rolled his arm again. With each motion, he coiled the rope around his arm pulling Carter down foot by excruciating foot.

“Keep going,” Jenny said.

“Great job, Dad!” Holden cheered.

“Hold on, Carter.” Tabitha called.

The mass of coil pulled at Sean’s weary arm as Carter came within a couple feet of the ground. Sean gave one hard pull and yanked Carter down. He grabbed Carter’s wrist, but had no strength left to pull him farther. The rope uncoiled from his arm and snaked up into the sky.

Carter climbed down Sean’s body and grabbed the loops of rope himself with one hand. He held around Sean’s shoulder with the other. “I owe you one, buddy.”

“That was true before the Earth turned upside down,” Sean said.

Weight returned and the men dropped to their knees next to the others. Carter and Sean heaved for breath.

“Thank God that’s over,” Carter said.

Grant said, “Hey, Dad, Carter says he’s going to marry Mommy.”

“We can talk about that later,” Carter said.

One of the cars slammed into the ground a few feet off to their right. Glass shattered and landed all around them. Sean thought,
must not have floated up as high as the rest of the debris
.

A tree slammed onto the rock above them and shattered raining bark down on them.

Then, dirt, water, and pine straw rained down hard and painfully on and around them. It kept piling up.

Grant cried out. “It hurts,

Crater and Sean stood and covered the women and boys with their bodies as best they could. The fallout piled up around their knees and kept rising. The water turned it to mud and made it all heavy. Something large landed with a crash behind them, but Sean couldn’t see what it was.

We’re going to be buried alive after surviving all of this
, he thought.