Ninety Degrees Out
Chapter 10

Chay sat at his kitchen island. He’d opened every window he had, and he realized he would need air conditioning of some sort. Not a worry if you were inside the Arctic circle in the middle of winter, but now as he watched the moon rise, he knew something would have to happen to cool things inside.

The ceiling fans were humming, and they did help, but the thermometer he had attached to the deck railing still showed seventy-eight degrees. He’d had a quick messenger conversation with his team at the observatory. They were able to get down off the hill and back to Anchorage. He gave them instructions about the magnetic field study he wanted and found they were already three steps ahead of him.

Correspondence from several of his colleagues all over the world, confirmed the poles were still the same, with a shift of the north magnetic pole to much closer to true north. A more detailed study would confirm other anomalies. It did mean that GPS loran readings would have to be redone for every location on earth. A daunting task for the coming months.

He was itching to get the telescope focused into the sky from this new location. Reports of flooding all over the world were coming in with staggering loss of life and permanent loss of coastal properties. Of greater concern, the entire Pacific rim was active. Every volcano showed signs of imminent eruption. Redoubt was grumbling, and the sensors on the San Andreas fault line indicated the big one was coming.

LA was already mostly under water, and now the threat of a 7-point earthquake was looming. It wasn’t any better in Alaska. An Indonesian quake was already in the record books with tsunami warnings spreading across the Pacific and Indian oceans. The quake? An unheard of 10.5 on the Richter scale. He knew there would be more all of them hundreds of times more than previous records. 10.5 was one hundred fifty times stronger than the previous record of 9.

For California’s sake he hoped the coming earthquake would only be a 7.

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Indonesia was up closer to the Arctic Circle. The polar caps were on the equator now and melting at an astounding rate. Greenland was losing water from ice melt from its glaciers at a hundred meters a day. Antarctica’s ice shelves were gone, huge icebergs spawning all over the Pacific and Indian oceans.

The European volcanoes in Italy spewed enough ash to shut down air travel for the next few days, so rescue work was severely hindered. He sighed, at least news was good from Redoubt. Kanti was stranded, but nothing they couldn’t fix. Dad had informed him he needed to fly into Juneau to pick up an AME and the correct parts, but it was fixable.

I have to stop looking at the big picture. I’ve got to concentrate on this small corner of the world. It looked so hopeless. Come on Chayton, just think about Alicia and Arimina. Your family is safe. You’ve got the skills to make a go of it here. Your power is up, the earthquake up here was settling out, only one more major aftershock yesterday.

Chay checked his watch. Time to go wake Alicia. He stopped to check her daughter first, and Arimina was snuggled under a light sheet, with Jazz sprawled out against her back. He knew they would never keep him down on his bed, even though it was right there at the foot of her bed. The Malawolf’s head dwarfed her body, but her hand was buried in his ruff. The bond between dog and girl was strong, and he wondered if he’d lost Jazz to her. He backed out of the room, closing the door gently.

How have I fallen in love with this little beauty? She’s only 5 years old, and I should never forget the half. Arimina never forgets to remind me. Her ringlet curls an exact double of her mother’s. Her skin pale gold and her eyes dark brown with the tiniest flecks of green and yellow. And I can’t blame Jazz for wanting to protect her.

He knocked softly at Alicia’s door, and was rewarded with a husky, sleepy come in. He wanted to cover his eyes, she had pushed the sheet off and pulled herself up to lean against wall. The skimpy baby doll’s left little to his imagination, but he couldn’t blame her. It was hot and airless in the room.

“Give me a second, I’ll open your windows. We’re going to have to get some sort of air conditioning in here, or at least a ceiling fan.” Chay said as he wound out the cranks on both.

“Oh God, that feels so good,” Alicia lifted heavy curls off her neck. “It feels like a hot southern night.”

“Technically it is.” Chay said.

“I can’t seem to wrap my head around this shift.” Alicia admitted.

“You’re not alone. The world is a different place now. How are you feeling?” Chay sat down on the edge of the bed.

“I was just thinking, what are we going to do about our jobs? I should have been at work. I haven’t had a chance to contact my research team since this started.” Alicia sounded nervous.

“I just finished talking to my teams and the university. Classes are cancelled until the roads into Anchorage can be repaired. We might lose the semester as far as teaching goes, but research projects will continue. As far as the kids go, no school at least until we can get our roads cleared and repaired. We’ve got a major heave at the bridge before the highway into Anchorage.”

“What am I going to do for Arimina? I need childcare if I’m going into the field.” Alicia slid her legs over the edge of the bed and flipped her laptop open. “Would you look at that, I’ve got a couple dozen emails.”

“Probably your research team and your family. Deal with them first, okay?”

“It’s the middle of the night though.”

“Not quite, only about 9 pm. Most of the cell networks are up, at least if they aren’t in costal areas or a major earthquake zone.”

“Is my baby asleep?”

“She went to bed an hour ago, she’s been a good kid for me,” Chay reassured her.

“I take it Jazz is in with her?”

“I can’t keep him off her bed though. I tried last night and again today, but as soon as I turn my back, he’s up beside her. She sleeps with her hand in his fur.”

“I want to see.” Alicia stood up and then pressed a hand to her head. “Shit, I still can’t move suddenly. The headache comes back right away.”

“Sit back, relax and I’ll get you a couple of painkillers. Is your family inland or on the coast?” Chay tried to distract her with a question as he picked up her water bottle and handed it to her.

“Inland, New Mexico actually,” Alicia replied.

“Here, take a couple of these.” He handed her two extra strength ibuprofens.

“At least I don’t want to go right back to sleep. Is there anything to eat?”

“Come downstairs when you’re ready, I’ll have some soup and sandwiches ready.”

Chay left her to deal with her email. The woman had a brain, a body he couldn’t wait to get his hands on, and the sweetest daughter. What was he going to do?

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