Chương 30: Lake Toba

Somewhere in USGS office

"Guys, if my calculation is right... this swarm of quakes near San Andreas may reach its peak soon. Since we decided to sacrifice and stay here, to monitor the progress, ...I wish we can still be here and meet each other again after this." Jeff's voice trailed over as he speaks to his colleague. Today, Jeff has spoken longer than usual.

"Oh please, Jeff. Don't be so overdramatic. Look, it's not like San Andreas Fault has never experienced magnitude 7+ quake before. Who knows, this time is a false alarm too. Have some faith, bud!"

"Yeah, besides.. we are safe here. Yes, we are stuck here, doing the monitoring work, but this office is earthquake-proof. You worry too much."

"Hey, maybe you are too tired, that your mind has gone haywire, from all the data you have seen for the past 3 days. You should take a break, Jeff, we can take over from here."

Jeff's colleague speak up their opinions one by one to Jeff. They are concerned about Jeff. He has been in the office for 3 days, monitoring the data not only from San Andreas, but surprisingly he has been contacting NASA asking for some data from them.

Some also said that they overheard Jeff's conversation on the phone, he has been contacting someone from the Pentagon. Jeff's sounded angry when he speaks on the phone. They have tried to ask Jeff's what is all about, but all they got was a cryptic answer from him.

"We all going to die. I die, you die, then bye-bye..."

Jeff has been repeating this phrase for the past three days now. His colleague all thought that Jeff has gone psychotic from the overwork. They have enough of Jeff's weird behavior.

Today, finally Jeff decides to speak more than usual to them. With his bloodshot eyes, unkempt look, and with disheveled hair, his colleague decides to drag Jeff out from his office to the on-call room.

"Jeff, you need some sleep. You are going to die earlier than all of us if you keep doing this to yourself." Sam dragged Jeff along the corridor as he speaks.

"Sam, if I tell you that I have made a finding about the world is going to an end soon, would you believe me?" Sam stared at Jeff's bloodshot eyes in horror and disbelief. What is Jeff saying to him again?

"Come on Jeff, you need sleep. Maybe you have seen it wrong. That's why you have been talking nonsense." Sam held Jeff's hand tighter and he almost dragged Jeff inside the on-call room.

Jeff struggled himself freeing his hands from Sam's grip. After his hands got free from Sam's grip, he took out his tablet from his bag, and he handed it over to Sam.

"Look, look here. I even confirmed this data with NASA a few days ago." Jeff gulped his saliva before continue speaking.

"This shows that the volcanoes, everywhere around the world is showing signs of its going to erupt soon."

"And this, and this one here, is the data from the seismograph from all the tectonic plates around the world. It has been shifting slightly, colliding with all the tectonic plates. That is why we have been experiencing these swarms of earthquake for almost 5 hours now..." Jeff's voice was cut off as a beeping sound came out of the tablet.

Jeff was stunned, and he quickly swiped the tablet to check his mail.

"What is it? why-why are you panicking like this?" Sam has been paying attention to Jeff's explanation when Jeff started panicking to check the mail urgently.

"Its starting Sam. One, one of the supervolcanoes on this world has erupted... this, this is the data picked up by the sensors in Indonesia. Lake Toba Volcano has just erupted..." Jeff hand suddenly felt weak, and the tablet fell down to the floor with a thud. Jeff's eyes went unfocused as he kept staring blankly on the floor.

Without wasting any time, Sam quickly reached down for the fallen tablet. He cannot let the data Jeff mentioned to him go unchecked. He needs to see it himself to believe it.

"What? This soon? didn't we predicted that it may be another few weeks?" Sam swiped the tablet nervously to check the mail again.

After a few seconds, Sam put his hand covering his mouth. His eyes were wide opened, and his face, went pale after he has read the mail.

"It really erupted? Oh god... are the Indonesian government is aware of this? Have the people relocated? I-I... well I cannot imagine how many casualties they would have if the people were not relocated before the explosions."

Sam gave out a small smile and looks at Jeff questioningly. "They have evacuated right? Wait, the mass evacuation is impossible to be done. Millions, of people, will be affected by this one single Supervolcano eruption."

Sam holds on Jeff's hand, and shake it lightly.

This is a very big disaster!

"I don't know. We have informed the authorities, but there is not even a single news given out. The surrounding countries, Singapore, Malaysia, Philipines, and all around the world was quiet about this... Unfortunately, they will be affected by the huge smoke and ashes too. If, they have informed them about the probability of eruption, there will be news all around the world. But, we have not heard of any news about it right?"

Tears streaked down Jeff's cheeks as he speaks. He specifically has emailed and called Mr. Alan as MAGMA and USGS works relatively close on monitoring the activity of volcanoes in Indonesia. USGS was not informed regarding the earlier warning due to probe malfunctioning, but now that the probe is back, it is too late.

------------------------

In Lake Toba, the supervolcano that has been silent for over thousand of years finally spewed out its content. Magma covered all through Medan city, and the swarm of quakes created a new mountain.

Millions, who have evacuated out of Medan, Indonesia thought they are safe, unfortunately, the toxic gas released to the air covered a very large area and killing millions. The ash traveled far to the surrounding countryside and killing millions more, suffocated.

Tsunamis generated from the Lake Toba eruption caused half of Malaysia and Singapore to be wiped out, and it is not stopping there. Almost half of the world was affected by the supervolcano eruption.

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