Free Seattle Quake 9.2 by Marti Talbott

Displaced dust threatened to choke their breathing and with the door now missing, tiny splinters of glass glistened in the afternoon sunlight. The overburdened seventh and eighth floors collapsed in swift succession, causing Seely and Jenna to fall straight down once more. Endless, dreamlike fractions of time passed before the parking garages, the sub-levels and the first six floors grudgingly absorbed the building's grisly weight.
    Just as the southern portion of the city leaned west, the northern part leaned east. And the sudden displacement of the foundation caused the top of the Winningham Blue Building to dangerously tip away from the water. Only four floors from the top and with Jenna's arms around her, Seely began to slide across the fallen door into the hallway. Then the top floors snapped back, lifting the door and throwing both women back into the bathroom.
    Seely’s eyes bulged and her arms flailed for something to grasp. But the foyer offered nothing.
    *
    On the waterfront, artificial fill turned to Jell-O and a vast chunk of land instantly sank taking restaurants, terminals, parking lots, a trolley, and the Alaskan Freeway with it. Suddenly displaced, the water in Elliott Bay began drawing away from the shore, pulling small and large ships from their moorings.
    Soon after, the steep incline of the second block began to crumble and slide toward the Bay. High-rise apartment buildings teetered, and then broke into splintered sections. Small parks and adjacent streets quickly succumbed to the eroding earth, snapping buried water pipes, sewer pipes, telephone cables and power lines. In unison, a stretch of land one block wide and five city blocks long started a painful slide into the sunken waterfront. Saturday shoppers lost their balance, fell to the ground, and then became buried in moving earth and debris.  Others tumbled off high walkways while driver-less cars rolled down hills. Atop the rising waters of the bay, a ferry urgently blasted its’ horn.
    Five blocks east of the water, hundreds of small yellow tiles snapped off the ceiling of the Convention Center tunnel all at once. The freeway began to twist and turn, cement behind the tiles cracked, and then crumbled – sending unthinkable, horrifying chunks down on helpless motorists. Coming fast from behind, the drunk in the station wagon plowed into the back of a hatchback and started a chain reaction, multiple car pileup.
    The first gigantic jolt raced through the city at 14,000 miles per hour. In the Seattle Center, flag poles shuddered and swayed, the Center House buckled, the Space Needle leaned and children screamed. South of Seattle, Boeing's runway violently rolled, sending the still moving 777 off the end and into a field.  Parents helplessly watched their children fall off water slides and amusement rides, and old wood and brick buildings collapsed in rapid succession.
    *
    At KMPR, only forty-six blocks from the epicenter, everything popped at once -- the walls, the floor, the windows, and the ceiling. The old soldier was still talking, but Collin wasn't listening.  Instead, his eyes darted around the room. He too heard the explosion in the ground. Collin threw his earphones down and started out of his chair.
    *
    One hundred and twenty-one blocks north of KMPR, Sam Taylor stood near the eighteenth hole, wet his finger and tested the air. There was no wind. He set his golf ball on the small plastic tee, carefully placed his feet, wiggled his butt, and took a swing. He missed. But the ball flipped into the air anyway. It dropped back to earth, rolled in the opposite direction and oddly picked up speed. Greatly disturbed, Sam watched it cross the green toward two other men with equally perplexed expressions. But before the ball reached them, it mysteriously dropped out of sight.
    Suddenly, the ground split apart. In an instant, the fracture widened causing both men to lose their balance and plunge into the deep, foreboding fissure headfirst. Sam