Gabriel's Stand by Jay B. Gaskill Read Free Book Online Page B

two men. As they rolled on the snow-covered street, the crowd surged against the closed front doors to the supermarket, ignoring the struggle. The scene cut to a spot of blood on the sidewalk, then to the sale signs.
    CHRISTMAS EVE SPECIALS!…WHOLE WHEAT BREAD: $25 A LOAF…ORGANIC CARROTS: $12 PER POUND…SORRY NO RATION CARDS ACCEPTED TODAY

    The first window was shattered by a rock, large chunks of glass plate falling inside. The crowd pressed forward. The second window shattered. Someone cheered. Then the store’s front doors were forced open and the crowd surged inside. An alarm rang. Sirens pealed in the distance. A hand reached for the camera. It was followed by a black screen.
    Another voice-over: “Remember the Toledo food riots? Sixty three casualties. Seventeen fatal. Martial law. Is it over? Food rationing is still in place in Mexico and parts of the U.S.”
    The soundtrack communicated tension through dissonance in the high strings, an uneven percussion and the howl of a distant horn.
    Briefly the word “SIMULATION” flashed on the screen.
    Another fly-over. The helicopter descended over an immense dam across the Yangtze River. As the camera scanned the dam, a gaping crack in the center appeared and dramatically widened. Zooming in, the picture captured the dam finally giving way, allowing a biblical torrent to gout through, sweeping everything in its path. The room was filled with the deafening rush of water.
    A scroll of text appeared under the image of the simulated disaster:
    The Three Gorges Dam in China was constructed over a major earthquake fault. De Kaph Engineering of Hamburg was retained by the PRC to perform a confidential earthquake audit. The results, suppressed by the Chinese government, have been obtained by Fowler Enterprises. The De Kaph report predicts that a catastrophic dam failure of exactly the type depicted here is likely within the next decade.
    Over the next five minutes, the helicopter followed the water, sweeping low as a trapped sea emptied itself into the densely populated corridor leading to Shanghai. A car spun in the water like a tiny top. Silence. The screen cut to a simulated satellite image showing the entire damage, while an inset picture followed the spinning car. An overlay appeared showing whole cities inundated in the path of the flood. The car in the small picture spun out of sight .
    The voice-over continued, “You have just seen a depiction of the failure of the world’s largest dam. This is a seemingly masterful feat of engineering, dwarfing the Hoover dam. Experts agree: The dam will fail. One million people were evacuated to make room for the reservoir. When the dam eventually fails, more than five million people will be displaced, and at least two million will die, not including uncounted deaths from disease and starvation in Shanghai itself.”
    The screen cut to a law office. A slight man with graying red hair and a tweed jacket smiled from behind a large desk. “I am Rex Longworthy, Director of the Environmental Alliance. Decades ago, a prophet of the new age, James Lovelock, in the brilliant book, The Ages of Gaia , proposed that the earth behaves as a large integrated, living entity. He called it Gaia, after the mythical earth goddess. In a later work, Dr. Lovelock predicted that Gaia will respond to the insults inflicted on her by the misuse of human technology. He called it Gaia’s Revenge. My question to you is: what disaster will be next?”
    The screen went dark. Several people shifted uncomfortably in their seats as the lights came on in the small theater. Rex Longworthy, dressed just as he had appeared on screen, stood before the group of men and women.
    â€œThere is more to this piece, of course, and you will see the rest of it in a few minutes, but we just wanted you get the theme, in order to establish a context for Mr. Fowler’s opening remarks. Every vignette you are about to see illustrates