A Peek Into The Future (2) My Summer Story Continues
Nora shot out of bed like a bullet. Her head was pounding and her heart was racing. The red numbers on the clock clicked from 1:59 to 2:00 am. She had been having intrusive thoughts and unusual dreams for a couple weeks. But now that she was awake all she could think about was the meeting in a few hours. She popped a couple analgesics and went to her computer. “Computer on!” she commanded.
The computer instantly responded, “Computer on. Good morning Dr. Martin. Today is Tuesday January 18, 51097. It is 2:04 am. The temperature outside is 42.5 degrees Celsius.”
“Another hot one,” she said to herself out loud. Nora Martin was a geological engineer working with the task group looking for the source of the unusually strong and frequent seismic events that had been happening all over the world. There was massive destruction everywhere. Volcanic activity in North America had wiped out what used to be Yellowstone. Huge sections of Wyoming and Montana just no longer existed. The eruption created an ash cloud that completely obliterated the sun for six months killing plant and wildlife not just in North America, but all over the world. The drought that ensued lasted ten years. That was only one event. Earthquakes generated tsunamis worldwide totally decimating virtually every coastline on the planet. Millions more died. The natural disasters were exacerbated by the political strife as regions and government fought for limited resource. Wars in Brazil and South Africa claimed tens of millions of lives. The world was literally being pulled apart. But why?
Nora’s team was focusing on how sun flairs might be affecting the earth. For the last hundred years or so huge flares had been observed with greater frequency. There was some speculation that the flares had affected the magnetic poles, causing them to change and creating tectonic plate shifts thus causing the seismic irregularities. Her computer worked all night running complicated programs and it was finally complete. “Damn,” she said as she examined the results. “This just can’t be.” But she knew it was. This was the fifth time she had run the program. One thing was for sure; there was nothing wrong with the poles.
Nora hated these meetings with a passion. Her team had the brightest minds but it was the most dysfunctional team she had ever experienced. Now, armed with this new evidence, she had an even greater reason to hate today’s meeting. Each of them, Tom, Joaquin, and Derk were academic divas with huge egos and a propensity for exaggerated dramatics. Nora called them her Drama Queens. Every meeting was a complaining, criticizing, contemptuous airing of personal feelings, attacks, and extreme defensiveness. For every hour of meeting they were lucky to get five minutes of production done. It was such a waste of time.
Tom was a super brilliant software engineer with a boat load of personal problems. His partner was an accountant for a financial firm and was under investigation by the feds. All of their personal bank accounts had been frozen which was a nightmare for Tom who already struggled with a suppressed immune disorder. The stress was literally killing him. Besides that he was just a jerk with zero empathy or compassion for anybody.
Joaquin was from a long line of prominent physicists. His grandfather Georgio Mazio won the Noble prize for his work identifying water with certainty on extra-solar planets. Joaquin also inherit his Grandfather’s addiction to opiates. He is brilliant but worthless.
Derk was the quiet single guy. The word was that he lost his family in the big tsunami that hit south Florida a decade ago, but he didn’t talk about it. He didn’t say much about anything, but when he did it was dripping like a butcher’s knife with the blood of sarcasm. One word describes Derk, negative. His cutting remarks were beyond critical; they were flaming contemptuous of every idea, person, and project. He was extremely proficient at his job, extremely detailed, on top of every new innovation in his field. He was a scientist’s scientist. And he was a miserable human being.
When Nora arrived at the meeting they were already at it. Joaquin was standing leaning over the table, one hand supporting him and the other pointing his bony finger with angry blame like a gun at Tom. He face was as red as the shirt he was wearing and the veins were popping out of his neck. Tom was sitting just glaring at him, waiting like a lion ready to pounce on his prey. Derk was screaming at Joaquin to “Shut up.” Joaquin sat down, adrenaline still flowing like hot water thru his still pulsating veins. She didn’t even ask what they were talking about.
“Listen, I ran the program again and there is no doubt about it,” she hoped that by getting right into the meat of the meeting they might actually get something done.
Joaquin couldn’t wait to hear another word, “If that is the program that Tom wrote then I couldn’t disagree with you more.”
Nora notice a little vein on this temple throbbing, “Shut up Joaquin, let me tell you…”
“Yeah, Joaquin, shut up.” Tom quietly and passive aggressively added.
Derk, just got up from his chair and started for the door, “Well this is going to be another total waste of time. Call me when you two idiots are ready to have a meeting.” Nora reached her hand up like a stop sign blocking his way out. He calmly reacted, “There is nothing that YOU can do with about these two either,” he said as his head moved rhythmically back and forth mocking her as he talked as if she was just as worthless as the other two.
Now Nora was steaming. She could feel her body release adrenaline and cortisol into her body. He definitely had a gift for make people feel defensive. Nevertheless she didn’t strike back. Calmly and firmly she told him, “SIT DOWN.” She pushed him back without even touching him. She could feel her own heart racing now. “Damn it! We have to deal with this.” The data popped up on all their screens. The flash of the screens coming alive distracted them from the chaos and their eyes were drawn to the media.
Micro seconds later Joaquin was the first to speak, “My God! It’s the Sun! It is expanding.”
Nora took advantage of the moment. “This wasn’t supposed to happen for another billion years. But there is NO doubt. We are not just dealing with random solar flares. The Sun is expanding and dying. When you look at all the models at this accelerated pace our planet will be swallowed up in less than a thousand years, but all life with be destroyed well before that. I honestly don’t think we can last more than a couple hundred years. It is only going to get worse.” Just then another sharp pain made her hands involuntarily grasp her head.
