Steam rose from the coffee as Kate poured herself another cup and went back to her dorm room. She had lost track of how many cups she had drank already.
"Never again" she whispered as she glanced over to the clock by her bed. Kate's eyes stopping longingly on her pillow before shaking herself off and returning her attention to the small laptop in front of her.
"Never again am I going to wait until last minute to do a research paper."
APOCALYPTIC CONNECTIONS: Through The Fire, The Tail and The Millenium
Her papers title sounded legit, but the longer she went without sleep, the more of a stretch it seemed.
"How does a bakery fire, a stupid comet and a bunch of computer geeks connect?" she had questioned her professor in the hall after class a few days earlier. She knew that 40 percent of her grade was riding on this paper and she wasn't one to accept defeat. When the professor refused to let her change to another topic, Kate was furious.
"There's no way I'm going to be able to connect these three events." she argued to no avail.
"You haven't even started your research have you Kate?" He shook his head with what she thought was an amused smile. "The assignment is due in three days young lady. I suggest you get moving. You'll be surprised how well connected those events really are."
Before Kate could think of any further argument, the professor starts to walk away. As he is about to turn the corner, he looks back at her now fully showing his amusement "Computer geeks? Really Kate?"
"Jerk" Kate rolls her eyes at the small laptop screen as she picks up her notes from the library earlier. "That guy thinks this stuff is amusing?" She shakes her head as she flips through the pages of scribbled notes and article print outs for the only common thread she could come up with. "Fear" she said the word as she sat the notes down and began typing some more.
Twenty minutes later, Kate pushes away from her desk fighting to keep from yawning for the hundredth time. "Sleeeeeeeep" she moans as her arms stretch upward. "I need sleep but I'm nowhere near done." She looks at her clock again and lets out a long disheartened breath. "There's no time”
Kate rests her elbow down on the desk placing her face into her hands. "I'm never going to be able to finish this by tomorrow afternoon” She yawns again and lets her eyes close as she thinks of her strategy. "Maybe if I take a quick nap" She shrugs slightly at the idea as she lowers her head to the desk. "No. I can't do that. If I go lay down on that bed, I'll never get up" Her thoughts go back to her assignment and how to complete it on time.
As Kate yawns again, her senses are alerted to a vaguely familiar scent. As soon as the scent registers, she is jolted upright by the sounds of screams coming from outside. "Fire!!!" Immediately Kate comes fully awake to the realization that she is no longer in her dorm. Her laptop is gone. In its place is a nearly melted down candle. Her head, which moments ago was resting on the sturdy metal school supplied desk, was now pressed against a splintery wooden one. "What the hell?" she mutters as she jumps up from her chair. Her eyes swirl around the unfamiliar room. "Where am I?"
The pungent aroma of smoke overwhelms her senses at the same time she realizes that her clothing is different as well. The jeans and T-shirt she had been wearing have become some kind of period piece dress from the revolutionary war or something.
"No time to figure this out now Kate" she says to herself as she scans the room for a way out. The smoke was filling the room at an alarming rate making it difficult for her to see, let alone breathe.
Kate's hands begin to feel in front of her as she tries to find a door. A man's voice starts to reach her ears as it becomes closer. "Is there anyone here?" It yelled out. "Call out if you can hear me!!" Kate tried to call out but the smoke was constricting her throat. All she could do was cough uncontrollably. As she felt herself giving up, a large crash came through the door. Just as she was dropping to the floor, she was swept up into a man's arms and carried out into the slightly fresher air. "I've got you” was all the man said before whisking her to safety.
When he had carried her a safe distance, he placed her on her feet. "Can you stand?" His eyes full of concern as she stared wide eyed at the scene behind them. Fire was everywhere. Not just one building. Not just one block. It was everywhere.
"What's....happening?" she managed to whisper. An older man behind them answered immediately. "It's the end of the world. What the plague didn't wipe out, the fire surely will"
Kate's eyes grew wider as understanding started to creep into her mind. "You have an accent" she looked up at her rescuer and then at the old man still reciting prophecy about the end of the world. Her mind raced covering her research about the 1666 London fire and how back then, they thought the world was ending.
"Don't listen to him” the man turns Kate's eyes back toward his. "My name is James. What's yours?"
Kate blinked up at the man and replied. "I'm Kate." James hands her a water pouch "Drink this Kate. You took in a lot of smoke." Kate accepts the pouch and obeys. "Don't let him scare you" he motions his head to the old man. "The plague is over and this.." he looks around shaking his head "This is just a fire. Trust me. My men and I WILL get it out." Kate hands back the water pouch but he waves her hand back "You keep it. I've got more"
Kate's brows crease "Your men? Are you a fireman? Where's your gear?" James laughs lightly despite the seriousness still etched on his face. "I am James, Duke of York and I am referring to the Life Guards." His brow arches "But given the situation, I think Fireman has a more appropriate ring to it." With a deep breath, James nods his head "Well, I must get back to those men Miss Kate." He bows his head to her "Stay close to the river and make to the north gate. You should be safe” He turns at the sound of another woman’s scream and moves toward it. "Thank you" was all Kate could think to say as he disappeared into the thick smoke once more.
He had saved her life, though panic didn't take long to find her. "Where is the North gate?" she started asking as people raced passed her in their own panic. Over and over she heard the same thing. "The world is ending. The hand of god."
As Kate looked across the flame engulfed city, she could understand their rationale. She was petrified. She kept moving along the bank of the river as James had told her. His voice of reason was the only thing keeping total panic from eating what was left of her own reason.
"The plague is over. This is JUST a fire” She even started to say the words out loud as she pressed through the crowd.
"Come on girl" a man yelled to her from a boat that was just pushing off the bank. Without hesitation, she ran for it and threw herself onto the boat. "That a girl" the man held out his hand to help her up. "We'll be safe on the water"
"Thank you" she replied as she stood up and they joined the others on the side of the boat facing the city. "It truly is the end. Just like they've been saying” Kate wanted to disagree with the smoke covered man standing beside her. Even though she knew different, she couldn't argue against the site in front of her. An entire city engulfed in flames. The same city that had just barely survived a devastating plague.
"I just want to go home and finish my paper" she slumps down onto the floor of the boat as the breeze shifts in the air. She looks up into the sky as small fireflies dance around on the wind. Her eyes follow one as it drifts down onto the floor of the boat and sparks into a flame.
"FIRE!!!" the man next to her calls out. As quickly as it is doused, more sparks burst on the boat as well as some of its passengers.
"YOU"RE ON FIRE!!!" Kate hears the man shout and feels hands pulling her up to her feet. It is then that she sees the skirt of her dress in flames. She could feel the heat on her leg but it didn't feel real.
"Throw her in the water" was the last thing she hears before the icy wet floods into her lungs.
Instead of the darkness of murky water, Kate’s eyes were blinded shut by the bright flash of white light. Frantically she flung her arms to reach the surface of the water.
“I can’t drown in 1666” she reasoned with herself. “I’m not even born yet!!” Realizing that her eyes were still closed, Kate opens them to see if she can tell where she was in the water.
“Now where am I?” she says as her arms lower and she notices that she actually is no longer in water. Her clothes are completely dry, but she’s in a dress of a completely different style. As she looks around, she sees a family standing across from her huddled together in fear.
“What’s wrong with the lady Mommy?” the little girl asks. The woman pushes the child behind her “I don’t know sweetie. Stay close to Mommy”
Kate takes a step closer in an attempt to figure out where she is but sharp pain courses her leg when she puts her weight down on it. She reaches down and pulls up the hem slightly revealing a burn on her calf. “That’s not possible” she states questioningly but is distracted by the fleeing family. “Run!” the father yells. “It’s starting. She’s been burned by the comets gasses.”
Kate looks around and notices other people she hadn’t seen before scurrying into to their homes. When she looks closer, she sees that all the windows and doors had been boarded shut.
“Now what’s happening?” she sighs as she moves through the streets in search of answers. In the center of town, she notices several newspapers left on someone’s front step and picks one up. “Haley’s Comet to collide with earth!!” was sprawled across the headline. Immediately Kate looks up to the sky “Really?”
She pulls out the second paper dated a few days later. “Earth to cross through Haley’s tail. Prof. Edwin Booth- Department of Chemistry for the Univ. of Calif. Predicts Poisonous gases to blanket the Earth.”
Kate shakes her head as she looks around at the barricaded town “These poor people. No wonder they’re so afraid”
“They’re not just afraid” said the voice of a young man behind her. “They’re stupefied,” The man extends his hand to Kate. “Glad to see I’m not the only one who’s brave enough to face the outdoors. I’m Josh”
Kate looks up at the man who looked strangely familiar to her “Hi. I’m Kate.” The man shakes Kate’s hand and she notices a large case under his other arm.
“What’s that for” she motions to the case.
Josh looks down and shrugs as if the answer was obvious. “It’s my telescope. I’m going to watch the comet” He then holds up his free hand making quote marks “Or as the locals call it…THE END OF THE WORLD”
Kate frowns slightly remembering her last experience in London. Immediately Josh steps up to her and rests his hand on her shoulder and looks her straight in the eyes. “Hey…we’re all going to be fine. This is not the end of the world. IT’S JUST A COMET. Trust me.” He says the last part for any listening locals. “I’ve studied the writings of Prof. H Jacoby”. He stops himself “Are you familiar with his work?”
Kate shakes her head no, even though she vaguely remembered reading his name in her research.
Josh continues “Well, he’s a genius astronomer and he says the comet will pass and everything will be fine.” He pops open his case and motions for Kate to wait a moment as he sets up his telescope. While she watches him, she again makes the same conclusion that she had in London. That it’s no wonder there was such a panic when all this was happening. Most had never lived through anything similar and the so called “reliable sources” were feeding the hysteria with talk of unavoidable death. She remembered reading in her research that some were so afraid that suicide seemed the better option. Standing here in what appeared to be a panic stricken ghost town makes the cold reality of that fear make sense.
“Take a look at the big bad Earth destroyer” Josh smiles at her and steps back from the telescope. Kate leans over and places her eye over the glass. It was a beautiful sight to see even as small as it was. It was like a glowing fireball in the sky.
“FIRE!!” the thought came to her and she knew where she had seen Josh before. He was the same man that had pulled her from the fire. But that was impossible. Slowly she closed her eyes and pulled away from the telescope. “Josh?” When she opened her eyes…he was gone. Or actually, she was.
Her eyes opened to her laptop just as she had left it. Her clock showed only minutes had passed from when she last looked at it. She stared frozen at her computer screen as she immediately started convincing herself that it had simply been a dream. She had not traveled back in time to witness 2 almost “End of the Worlds”,
She had not been rescued by James, the Duke of York who looked remarkably like Josh the amateur astronomer in 1910.
“No” she shook her head as she reached down and touched the side of her leg. “Oh my god” she whispered as she felt it. The burn….it was there, the same burn that happened when her dress caught on fire. The same burn that made that family think she had been exposed to the deadly gases of Haley’s comet.
She swallowed as she stared down at her notes with disbelief. “There’s no way this is happening.” She looked down at her leg once more and then turned to the last pages of her notes.
“Y2K. Why didn’t I go there?” she asked herself even though she already knew the answer. She had been there.
She was a freshman in high school when that happened. She didn’t have to go back to see how the fear effected the world. She felt it firsthand. The memory of that day came back at her with a rush. Her Intro to Computer Literacy teacher had made them watch this horrific documentary about What Could Happen if the Y2K bug brought about the Apocalypse. Elevators plummeting…the world ending. She had been terrified.
When the class let out, she stayed. She put her head down on her desk and she cried. She was too young to die. It was then that a hand rested on her shoulder. It was Jacob, a senior who helped in the computer lab. He saw her crying and asked what was wrong. When she told him, he didn’t laugh at her. He just lifted her chin. Looked her in the eye and said “This isn’t going to be the end of the world. This is just a computer glitch. Trust me”. Kate did trust him. She dried eyes and somehow knew that they were all going to be okay.
As the memory of that day resurfaced, Kate remembered those eyes reassuring her before. The same eyes all at different times of trouble. Each had their own name but each spoke the truth and the world continued on after the words were spoken.
Kate sat up at her desk chair and began to type. Her fingers could barely keep up with the thoughts now flowing from her head. By the time her class came, she had finished her paper with ease. When she turned it in to the professor he smiled “How do you think you did?”
Kate smiled back at him” I think I did just fine. Trust me”
