THE WAVE: A John Decker Thriller (47 page)

She shook, she seemed to stumble, but she did not fall.

Friday, February 4 – 6:58 AM

The Western Atlantic Ocean

The
Alvin
bobbed to the surface some fifty kilometers off the coast in open water. It was dawn. The sun drifted on the pink horizon to the east. The vessel issued a groan for solace as she floated free.

Inside the DSV, the VHF radio cawed. “Surface Controller to
Alvin
.
Alvin
, come in please.
Alvin
, come in.”

The bodies did not stir. Speers, Decker and Swenson remained within their seats, completely motionless. Lifeless.

“
Alvin
, this is Surface Controller, do you read me?” Suddenly the voice changed as Warhaftig snatched the radio. “For God’s sake, Decker, are you there? Are you alright?”

Decker began to stir. His head rolled to the side. He opened his eyes and shook himself to consciousness. He reached out for the radio. “This is
Alvin
,” he said groggily. “Go ahead, Surface Controller.”

“It worked, John! Some destruction, of course, but loss of life in the States was minimal – nothing like we feared. Thanks to you two. We’ve had hurricanes that caused more damage. The Caribbean islands took a hit though. So did Brazil. We’re about seven miles east of you. We’ll be there in a few minutes to pick you up. Sorry to hear about Speers.”

Decker looked over at the dead pilot. “He saved our lives, Otto. We never would have made it without him.”

“Listen, I have the President on the line. He wants to congratulate you personally. You and Emily are heroes. Once Manhattan drains, I’m sure they’re going to want to throw you a ticker tape parade. Can you hear me, John? John, I’m going to put the President through now. Just hold on and–”

Decker turned the radio off. He unfastened his seatbelt and helped Emily to her feet. Then he climbed up the ladder and opened the hatch. The submersible was suddenly filled with cold air. It was salty and wet and delicious. He stared out at the tranquil sea, to the east, as the sun rolled on the shimmering horizon.

The case was over, he thought. In all probability, El Aqrab was dead. The world was safe. At least for now. And suddenly he remembered what Hassan had told him with such uncanny prescience:
One day – mark my words – if this quicksand isn’t filled, if we Americans don’t at least address the Palestinian problem even-handedly, the extremists throughout the Arab world will rise up like a great wave, and it will kill us all
. It almost had.

Swenson climbed up and stood beside him. He glanced down at her, smiled, and took her in his arms. The dawn glowed pink and lavender and bronze as intermittent light rays played upon the surface of the waves. “Red sky in the morning,” he began.

Swenson leaned a little closer. “Sailor, take warning,” she said, and they folded together in a kiss.

THE END

A Note About This Book

While
THE WAVE
may be a work of fiction, the science concerning mega-tsunamis presented in this novel is very much based in fact.

As Emily Swenson says about the inevitability of the fall of the Cumbre Vieja volcano on La Palma, “I’m afraid you don’t understand, Agent Decker. It’s not about likelihood. It’s a certainty. The only variable is time.”

At some point in the future, the island will come apart and a mega-tsunami will stream across the Atlantic at the speed of a jet plane, obliterating the entire Easter Seaboard of the United States, killing more than forty million people, thirteen percent of the U.S. population. And hundreds of millions will be injured, one out of every three Americans. It will cause trillions of dollars in damage. The entire U.S. economy will be disrupted for years, if not permanently crippled.

This is not speculation. This is a fact, made more horrible when you consider these estimates are based on today’s population figures and currency evaluations. It may happen in one thousand years, or it may happen tomorrow . . . but it will occur.

As our natural world is increasingly influenced by Man – through global warming, pollution and overpopulation – it is not inconceivable that someone, at some point, will intentionally disrupt our planet on a monumental scale. Indeed, one could claim global warming is a form of eco-terrorism, since most scientists are well aware of the consequences of co
²
emissions, and yet we continue to burn fossil fuels with abandon.

THE WAVE
may be a work of fiction. But it is not beyond the realm of possibility.

J.G. Sandom

About the Author

Born in Chicago, raised and educated throughout Europe, and a graduate of Amherst College (where he won the Academy of American Poets Prize), J.G. Sandom founded the nation’s first digital ad agency (Einstein and Sandom Interactive – EASI) in 1984, before launching an award-wining writing career.

The author has written six thrillers and mysteries including
The God Machine
,
Gospel Truths
, and
The Hunting Club
, plus three young adult novels under the pseudonym T.K. Welsh, including
The Unresolved
and
Resurrection Men
. He is currently working on a sequel to
THE WAVE
called
THE PLAGUE
.

Visit the author at www.jgsandom.com.

# # #

COMING SOON!

An excerpt from . . .

THE PLAGUE

A John Decker Thriller

Prologue

Friday, December 13

I am what I dream, what I’ve done, what I’ve seen, what I choose to remember. What I choose to forget. I choose. I . . . came home early that afternoon, around 4:00 PM, after a hard day at the office. The day that I realized. Traffic was light going north from the Farm, for a change, and I made all the lights on Dorado. Another perfect sunset, I thought, I remember, as I rolled down the window. Breathing sagebrush, I thought that the sky looked a lot like a national flag, striped with purple and orange and pink. It was hot for December.

I left the car in the driveway because my three year old daughter had built some kind of castle from boxes and blankets inside the garage. I could see her now. She was playing in the sprinkler at the edge of the yard, dressed in a neon-lime bathing suit. She laughed and looked up at me, waving. I waved back. That, I remember. I had my briefcase in one hand, with all of its secrets, and I lifted the other, and waved.

My wife was waiting for me in the kitchen. She was wearing that apron with the pair of bosc pears on the front, baking cookies or bread, but she turned toward me anyway and gave me a peck on the cheek. “How was your day?” she said, twisting back to the stove.

I told her about the Indian house crickets I’d heard chirping in the stand of Huisache trees down the street. When she didn’t say anything, I went down the hall to our bedroom. I took off my jacket and tie, and I wept.

All that I’d come to believe, all that I was, and still am, came apart in my hands then – like my tie. All simply unraveled. I put my jacket back on. I needed the jacket to hide it.

I hurried outside, to the back yard, to breathe. Mr. Billings was mowing his lawn down the street. He mows it every three days, no matter what time of year. It didn’t seem right for him to be mowing his lawn with all of those holiday decorations behind him. The blow-up reindeer and sled. The Santa tied to the chimney. He had bound up each bush in his garden with Christmas lights. He would have wrapped up the tumbleweeds too if he could have caught them.

I’d just reclined on a sling garden lounge chair when my wife came outside with a tray of iced tea. Under her apron, she was wearing a pair of tan stirrup pants, and a dark indigo shirt, no – iron blue, like her eyes. Her eyes.

She stood over me, smiled, and gave me a glass. I could hear the sprinkler splash-splashing, and my daughter laughing nearby. I could hear those damned Indian house crickets. I could hear Mr. Billings still mowing his lawn. Still mowing, but something was wrong. I could feel it.

I took a sip of my tea. I looked up at my wife, at her honey blond hair, her waxed eyebrows, her nose, and her perfect pink lips. I looked into her eyes. Everything was wrong.

I reached into my jacket, took my gun out and shot her – two times – in the chest.

Bang, bang.

More like two stifled sneezes than gunshots. Or the clanging of stones under water.

No one stirred. My daughter still played in the sprinkler, oblivious. And the incessant refrain of Mr. Billings’s lawnmower never wavered or stilled. It droned on and on as I climbed to my feet. I stood over her, I looked down at the livid red blood pumping out of her chest, at her iron-blue, china-doll eyes.

I put the gun on the lounge chair. I stared up at the sky, and felt myself soar toward the heavens, over my rooftop and lot, higher and higher, the tract houses blending together in lines, sinuous oxbow contortions, with oases of shimmering swimming pools punctuating the desert, as the Talking Heads’ Once in a Lifetime unrolled like a band of black, bitter licorice through my head.

“
And you may find yourself in a beautiful house, with a beautiful wife, And you may ask yourself – well . . . how did I get here . . . And you may tell yourself, This is not my beautiful wife.”

Through the clouds I rose, higher and higher.

“
And you may ask yourself, am I right? Am I wrong? And you may tell yourself, My god! What have I done?”