Free Desperado Dale (Scenic Route to Paradise) by Andrea Aarons

came forth crystal
clear. Her voice had an authoritative tone not unlike the operatic singer in an
Italian opera. She loved to sing! Smiling widely, she continued her sing-song
praying. Mac and Junior hesitated in their concentration on the wall of water
growing high before them, to glance back at her.
    Instantly, Merry stood by her husband. A shift,
and now the sky and the water moved exceptionally slow but not Merry.
Turning forward, Mac once again confronted the water giant and then he began
praying too. Large fleeting shadows continued darting across the deck. Merry
shifted her gaze to Junior. He was praying; his face skyward. She looked up.
    Merry’s song like prayer faltered but a moment.
Above them, maybe a mile or more were dozens of foreign looking aircraft. If
Merry didn’t know better, she would have guessed that an alien air battle was
taking place. The guesstimation didn’t firm up in her mind. Instead, Merry
decided quite confidently that she was indeed dreaming.
    The music that she, Mac and Junior were making
together with their loud melodious prayers was angelic. She didn’t want the
dream to quit! Singing, praying and looking aloft she felt Mac’s hand on her
arm.
    Oh, no! If Mac wakes me up now I won’t get to
see how this great adventure ends. Our music will stop!
    Evidently, she didn’t wake up. Merry pulled her
eyes from the battle above and looked over the bow toward the mountainous wave
with a churning mist above and its wide shadow before. Comprehending that it
was a dream and God, Himself seemed to be present speaking through her as she
sang and prayed, fear was absent. Merry sensed only God’s presence and Mac to
her right as he harmonized with Junior.
    Oceanic mountain peaks were uncovered by the
tsunami suction. Fish, large fish and small could be seen swimming crazily just
beneath the water about their boat. Exploding from the ocean current, a
seashell covered peak appeared to rise up near them as they sped on but in
reality, seawater was being sucked up into the oncoming wave revealing the
normally submerged world. Still fearless, Merry was in awe of the detail she saw...
The widening black shadow of the monster wave was racing to meet them. Never
had she dreamed so lucidly!
    Everything is color! I can feel the wind on my
face...
    Mac’s hand continued firmly on her arm. The
prayer coming from him drew her attention. He was rebuking the wave! How could
he? Hadn’t God set everything in motion; the stars and the heavens, the earth
and the sea?
    Understanding their words – her words, Merry
realized the three prayer warriors were singing and praying and reprimanding
together.
    The sun would soon set behind the rising cliff
of water as the Serendipity drew near the dark ocean face that stretched
before the wave as shadow. At the edge of her mind, Merry was conscious of an
increasing din coming from the sky but now the sound grew noisy and fiery
debris tumbled down into the gloom in front of them, extinguished when the
flame hit the water.
    When the bow touched the shadow of the tsunami
and it seemed all would be momentarily lost (if it hadn’t been a dream, was
Merry’s thought) the chaotic scene before them stopped. The landscape was like
a photo snapshot catching the action. The wall of water, the shadow making the
ocean black before them and the massive peaks poking out from the seabed with foamy
streams pouring forth like waterfalls, went absolutely still. One
meteorite-like UFO was frozen in view where it had hit a protruding rocky peak
and deflected off toward the water; the flame, the smoke seemed a camera still
shot. Nothing moved but the breath of their voices. Heavenly sounding voices
rising and dropping like a divine choir led by an invisible master choir
director.
    Instantly, the picture before them including the
humongous wave opened like a zipper. The sun burst through, shining from the
other side as the sloop continued forward into the still panorama. They rode on
a crest