24 C24
created: 2023-06-04T10:39 updated: 2023-06-04T10:
Hannah slid out from under the desk and looked at the room. Of the twelve computers on desks, there were three that were still on. One of which was had the radar out of Tulsa on the display. There was a thud from the workstation where Emily had been.
"Ow." Emily's voice came from behind a ceiling tile that was laying against the desk. Somewhere in the destruction around the desk, a phone started ringing. Hannah quickly located the source of the ringing and answered it.
"Hi daddy." She said, before laying eyes on her suitcase, now laying in a puddle of water.
"Are you guys alright?" he asked, his voice full of concern.
"Yeah," Hannah said. Emily held her hand out from under the desk. "Hang on, Here's Mommy." From outside the window, there was a cacophony of noise as several fire trucks and police cars pulled up, lights blinking and sirens wailing.
"Someone get in touch with the surrounding sites and have them take the CWA." In the middle of the country, there were plans in place to transfer portions of the County Warning Area of an individual office off to the surrounding offices.
"Jim, John'll get it." Emily said.
"Can I talk to him?" Jim said.
"Hang on, John, Jim wants to talk to you really quick. The phone got passed to Jim as Emily crawled out from under the desk. Hannah went back over to Olivia, who sat in a desk chair, quietly sobbing.
"I want my mommy." Olivia said. This was a side of Olivia that very rarely came out. No matter how old she tried to act, there was still a little girl in there. Hannah hugged her sister's friend.
"I know," Hannah said.
"Let's secure what we can here, and evacuate." Jim said, walking over to the door that opened into the hallway. He pulled on the door but it didn't open. He pulled and pulled and nothing happened. It was acting like the magnetic lock was engaged even though the power was out. Jim grabbed a fire extinguisher and threw it though the window and then swung his ID out near the reader. There was a beep and the door opened as he pulled on it. "Who in the world designed this system?" he muttered to himself, placing a chair in the path of the door to keep it open. They walked into the lobby, now destroyed by the tornado. There was a car on it's roof where the receptionist would have been sitting, no seats, tables or fake plants remained. The group of ten people that had been in the forecast office walked out into what remained of the parking lot and looked around. The only vehicle in the parking lot that was still on four wheels had a minivan for a hat. There was a car stuffed in the second floor of a building to the north of the National Weather Center building.
"Ok, Thanks, John," Jim said into the phone. "Here she is." Jim handed the oblong phone back to Emily.
"Yeah?" She said. "Ok. I think my car is in the second floor of Brown Hall... I'm going to see if I can get someone to give us a lift back toward the house so I can check on it..." Emily hung up the phone and looked around at the various emergency vehicles that were sitting in the remains of the parking lot. That was when she saw a deputy that she knew. The kids walked behind her, dragging their bags. "Deputy Miller." Emily said.
"Emily," he said looking over at Emily and looking at the girls. "Are you guys ok?" Olivia was still crying.
"I think so," Emily said. "I need to get home and check on the house, but my car is up there, I think." Emily pointed to the side of Brown Hall where a fire fighter stood in the hole next to the back end of a car.
"I'll give you a lift. The girls are going to have to ride in the back seat though." Robert said, walking toward his cruiser. Emily walked with him.
"Olivia's mom was at the hospital," Emily said. Miller gave her a look. "How are they doing over there?"
"The north wing collapsed," Miller said quietly. "So far there has been no signs of life anywhere in the rubble. The south and east wings are severely damaged. Where did Tina work?"
Emily gave a glance back at Olivia to see if she was paying attention. "Eight north." She said quietly. Miller opened the back door of the cruiser and watched as the girls slid in. He shut the door and opened the front door, reaching in and turning down the radio. Last thing he wanted was for Olivia to hear the traffic relating to rescue operations at the hospital. He reached in and grabbed his duty bag so Emily had somewhere to sit. Robert put the duty bag and the bags that the girls had brought out with them in the trunk. He walked around and got in the drivers seat. Hannah had stowed the laptop bags behind her legs and had already pulled the tough book out.
"I got signal and I'm pulling data from Tulsa." Hannah said. "I'm going west."
"Do you guys have outside data access?" Emily asked.
"Yeah." Robert spun the laptop to Emily, so she could use it. Two sets of eyes, one trained more than the other would be better than one set. Emily pulled up the data stream from Frederick, Oklahoma and looked at it.
"I pulled up Frederick," Emily said. "We look clear to the southwest."
"Go up to the site at Vance." Hannah said. "Nearest I can figure, that's the triple point."
"Looks like it," Emily said. She glanced up as the car slowed, they were turning into the neighborhood. Looking around, Emily saw signs of damage from the rear flank downdraft. Nothing major, some shingles taken off of roofs, broken windows, and busted up garage doors. When they pulled up to the house, Emily saw that the house had all three things now wrong with it. Through the bowed out door, Emily could see the grill of the old black GMC truck that used to serve as Probe sitting there. Most of the major stuff that would be needed for a chase would still be installed as the truck had only been retired right before this storm season had started.
"Lets go get Probe 2 packed," Emily said, "Thanks for the lift, deputy." Emily said.
"You're welcome," Deputy Miller said. "Send my regards to John, and go do something to make us all safer." He put the car in park so he could get out and let the girls out of the back seat. After everyone was out and the luggage had been placed on the sidewalk, Miller pulled away.