Well, here's an idea I got while riding a roller coaster at Islands of Adventure in Orlando, Florida, and it's my second one-shot. I hope to make a pretty good one, but I'm not holding my breath. :/
Read and review, let me know what you think!!!!
"Hey, Job, come on!"
Job Tenny hated her name more than she hated anything else in the entire world. It was pronounced j-O-b, like Jobe, but she was constantly doomed to be known as an occupation, a trait that many avoided at her age. Teachers and fellow classmates alike, her name was one big disaster.
Disaster was something else. Her best friends had been killed in a car accident three years ago when her boyfriend was drunk, she was the sole survivor.
Her mother had died at childbirth from severe bleeding that Job herself had caused when she had obstructed the labor. They pulled Job out okay, but not her mother. She had died merely seconds after her first child was born.
Her father was a raving alcoholic, and was sent to prison after being convicted of murder. He had killed a man in a bar and was sentenced to life imprisonment without bail or parole.
Job was sent to live with her aunt, and she enrolled in school in Tampa Bay, Florida. She attended River Ridge High School, and on this Spring Break, she was heading down to Clearwater with some friends for the weekend to go boating, before going to Treasure Island for sand, surf, and fun.
That's what the brochure said, anyways.
At this point, there could never be any disasters worse than the ones she had already experienced.
"Job!"
Her boyfriend, Seth, a tanned blonde guy from Miami, was waiting impatiently by the boat. "Hang on a minute!"
Job was smart, and well rounded. She was a member of the book club and the cheerleading squad. Her hair was a deep chocolate brown, and her eyes were bright blue, the color of sparkling jewels.
She turned around, passing the station wagon her mother had loaned her to get around on numerous occasions, and walked straight into the gas station.
"Hey, Job, how's it going?" Ben Curley asked as she approached the counter. He was purchasing some snack foods and gas for his used Sedan outside. Not important, but with the way he handled his money, you would have thought he was buying the crowned jewels of England.
Ben was of a darker hair color than the others. They couldn't tell if it was black or dark brown anymore. His skin was gruff, and his demeanor was serious. The only time he ever lightened up was around Job. She knew he had a major crush on her; she just didn't have the heart to tell him she wasn't interested. Being from a poor family, he was very careful with his money.
Seth wasn't. He was rich, young, and set for life. His father owned a string of hotels, and he was always packed with cash. He had driven around in a limited edition sports car that had a name Job couldn't even pronounce. He was forking out the cash to pay for the trip, no doubt to bump up his status in their eyes.
This trip was one of revelations, where friends can talk and discuss their innermost desires, and they can all discover what they truly wanted, just like on those Reality TV shows where everyone lives in the same house and pretends to hate each other for a few weeks.
Of course, assuming they would ever get there at this rate.
Job bought herself a cup of coffee, an assuring "Yuck!" pulled from Ben as he stood next to her.
"How can you drink that stuff?"
"What, this?" she held up her coffee cup and dangled it comically above Ben's nose. He flinched away from the strong smell of coffee beans and creamer.
"Well, it's easy, like this…" she dripped a little on her tongue, ignoring the burning sensation. Ben just smiled a little and twitched. "You enjoy this don't you?"
"Yes, I do…" with that, she went back outside. Her best friends, Chrissie and Flo were outside. Chrissie was a slightly hefty African American girl, with a bright red pair of sunglasses and a striped one-piece bathing suit. Flo was the school freak, with a blue beehive hairdo and a full wet suit on as she swam.
Both of them waved cheerily from the hotdog stand.
Job glanced over at the boat, where she saw Seth, and to her dismay, Alexandria. The female she was staring at in disgust was well-known as the school slut, having probably slept with every guy on campus. She had long, flowing blonde hair behind her head, and her skin was perfectly flawless. Her two piece aqua blue bathing suit was skimpy, and well worn. Seth was staring at her sexy, bountiful thighs.
Job interrupted the party by creeping up on him and slapping him on the back of the head. "Hey! Keep your eyes on the prize, buddy!"
Seth was obviously startled, because he whirled around in surprise. "Uh, hi Job, just checkin' out the boat."
Job grinned, "Yeah, I saw what you were checking out….keep your hands to yourself…"
Seth flushed a deep red. "I swear I wasn't doing anything."
Ethan, the school yearbook committee chairman and cameraman extraordinaire, the last member of their group, ran up to Seth perkily.
"Hey, Seth, look! Al's giving out free lap dances."
An audible moan erupted from Seth's lips as he strained not to look. Job did, and saw happily that al was doing nothing wrong, aside from cheating an old man out of a couple of oranges at his fruit stand.
"Alright everyone, let's get in ze boat!" Their Jamaican guide, Jerry, insisted. The entire group of young, healthy teens piled in the yacht that Seth had "borrowed" from his father(he had bought it from him for twice the price, Seth was pretty good in the stock market when Ben helped out, but nobody in the professional world trusted him for anything).
They were off in a matter of seconds, finished with the unmooring procedures and boarding. Seth and Ethan sat together on the left bench, stretched out to take in the trip. Ethan began to film as Alexandria sat dangerously close to Seth, settling her elegant hand on Seth's upper thigh. "Hey, big boy, how's it going."
"Good. Good."
She began picking at her mouth, "Say, later, why don't we…uh…" she bent to whisper in his ear, both struggling not to smile. Job feigned sleeping as she watched with deteriorating fascination. Seth nodded.
They both smiled. Job frowned. Ethan filmed. Ben and Jerry paid it no attention.
Job pretended to wake up. "Oh…." She stretched out, "That was a good nap." She glanced menacingly at Seth. He bolted upright, frightened by Job's evil eyes.
They rode on for a few minutes before Jerry turned on Jamaican Life Religious Radio, or JLRR, and a soothing song played out over the air.
Bob Marley's highly tuned voice narrated their journey well, as they passed a kissing couple in a fishing boat, a few fish swimming in a school, and many other things that nobody bothered to look at.
Jerry began to hum along to "Every Little Thing" as they moved on. Chrissie bent over to speak to Seth, "Hey, why do we need the tour guide? We live here, hello?"
Seth pretended to think about it for a minute. "Meh, wouldn't want to miss something, would we?" Ben smirked.
About halfway through the ride, Ben turned to Job, "Hey, you want some pretzels?" he held out a bag of pretzel sticks for her. She pushed them away, whispering, "No thanks…"
They rode on for about ten seconds before the carnage began.
It began simple enough- a small piece of debris in the water, just ahead of their boat, Jerry hadn't seen and hit it, veering their boat over and they bumped a boat that was speeding through the waters, cutting the waves like a knife, a banner labeled, "Just Married" taped over the back. A few of the drunken patrons flashed them nasty finger signs.
Their driver hadn't recovered from the bump, hitting a small dock and flipping over, spilling people out all over the beach and the dock itself. It slid for a while, and then collided with a large gas tanker as it lay parked outside the diner.
KABOOOOOOOOOOOOOOOOOOOOMMMMMM!!!!!!!!!!!!
People scattered, running for their lives. Many lay dead on the docks. Only a few were left of the marriage party, nearly all of them burned or burning.
The explosion unfortunately startled a local surfboard shaper, who was at the time riding a jet ski, testing it for a friend. He spun left, slamming into Job's boat, which was knocked sideways, giving the rider a fatal head wound. He lay floating in the water, dead.
The collision accidentally caused Jerry to slam forward on the throttle, sending them all forward into a water skier, whose pretty face was frozen in a state of awe as her top half was cut from her bottom, flung into the air like a doll. Ethan fell back on the floor, filming the entire event. Ben grasped the bar on the side, puking over the edge.
"No!" a woman screamed as a little girl swam too far out, and, distracted by the chaos, didn't notice a piece of shrapnel from the exploding gas tanker as it soared into her head, slamming through bone and sinew and embedding itself in her brain. She sank.
Job screamed, and so did Chrissie and Flo. A broken electrical line from the shore dropped into the water, shocking all of the fish, killing two swimmers, and sending their boat out of control.
Flo tipped over the edge, sailing into the water. Job smelled burning flesh as her friend let out a final scream of terror.
"Oh my god!" A tower damaged in the explosion was slowly tipping over as firefighters fought to contain the raging fires. It crashed down on a large cargo tanker, which turned over slightly, just as Jerry hit it. He swerved to avoid it, scraping the sides; sparks flew up, scalding the side of Ethan's face.
A chain broke, sending tons of metal crates over the side. One of them opened up, and many large metal pipes sailed out, one of them impaling Ethan in the face, the camera dropping over the side of the boat. He crumpled to the side. His dead hand dropped on Chrissie's ankle, and she panicked, running over to the side of the boat and kicking out, trying to grasp something on the side. She found purchase on a metal rung on the side, but unfortunately her ankle had caught on the mooring rope. Her friends watched in terror as her body jerked away from her left leg, her innards spilling into the water below.
Ben threw up again. Jerry cursed himself for causing this, and in an attempt to stop the killing, tried to push everything over the side. As the radio toppled over, another explosion, caused by the fires, sent him falling over as well, into the waters where he was killed, shocked with the radio.
Job, Ben, Seth, and Alexandria, the four survivors, were petrified to the bone of the accident. They were heading again towards shore, but the cargo tanker flipped in the water, the hands unknowingly leaping into electrified waters. One of them grasped the side of the boat, jerking Alexandria overboard by her long flowing blonde hair. She was killed instantly. Seth tried to leap after her, but Ben contained him.
"No!" Job saw the irony in the situation, but kept her mouth shut. The other wires snapped on the tower, one of them dropping directly over their boat. Seth pulled free and was leaping over the side when the wire hit him, sending sparks and burnt flesh into the air. The young, rich man whose life had been set ahead of him for years was dead, leaving a poor quiet boy and a defenseless disaster-struck girl.
The tower craned again, almost completely toppled over now. Ben noticed them heading towards it, and lunged for the throttle. Shrapnel exploded out from the tanker as it exploded. A large shard of metal lashed out and struck Ben in the throat. Blood spurted out as he clutched it, sinking to the floor, choking on his own blood. Job bent down to help him. "Ben! Ben are you okay!" she slowly drew out the shard of metal.
He gurgled quietly, trying desperately to make out something to Job, "J…J…i…l….lo…l"
He drifted off, his eyes glassing over just as another screech of metal echoed with his last breath. Job screamed. So did another woman on shore.
A cold chill went down her spine as the tower toppled over and crushed her easily beneath its weight.
But none of this happened. It was just what Job had seen as she sat in the boat, having been pretending to sleep.
She never said she felt better. In fact, she actually saw Seth slip a grin in during her early arousal.
"Job?" She spun her head to Ben, who saw the terror in her eyes. "Um…"
She stood up and looked around. A couple was kissing on a nearby fishing boat; a little girl was swimming, no doubt much too far. A local surfboard surfer had sped by on his speedboat.
"Oh, no."
She remembered her mother, who was supposedly a psychiatrist in her day, before Job was born. She had written a book called, "Irrationality and the Process of Human Thought". It was her theory on how human beings create irrational scenarios that would almost never happen outside a Hollywood movie. Job struggled to remember the chapter on boats.
Her book said that those who never rode boats often usually depicted crashes of an exaggerated, over-blown type enormity.
Check. This was Job's second time on a boat.
They also said that they would often randomly depict gruesome ways of death of people in their vicinity.
Check. There was a lot of blood.
She had read that subjects often implemented things in their surroundings to make it seem more real.
Check: the couple kissing, the little girl, even the water skier.
Okay, she had rationalized and let her mind settle into place. Unless something happened to convince her that this dream was real, there was nothing that she could believe.
In fact, this had happened once before, when she was in a car wreck with her friends. She had seen it beforehand and instinctively ducked before the tree branch was thrust through the window. She had survived, but her friends had died.
Coincidence, just like now. Nothing wrong with anything.
"Cause, every little ting, is gonna be airi-hi-hi-ght…."
A chill went up her spine. She had heard that before. She knew it.
She still felt herself instinctively glancing back at shore. Maybe she should heed the call of her premonition. She had remembered the incident with that kid on Flight 180, but she didn't think he was right in the head anyway.
She remembered that now. She never saw a vision in the car, but she saw news broadcast on a TV when they had stopped, this had induced her paranoia and caused her to imagine it. That was all.
A boat zoomed by, bumping theirs. Job did nothing, but she did let a little color drain from her face as she saw the "Just Married" sign crudely taped on the end of the boat.
She knew then, when the carnage began, as her friends and neighbors were slowly killed off one by one, an enormous explosion floating in the air, the ringing in her ears never ceasing, she knew that she had seen her friends killed. She knew she had seen a vision. She could have stopped it, saved all of them instead of just herself. Just like now as Ben's hand scrabbled out at her, her grasping it, and letting him nod off knowing he wasn't alone.
She could have stopped, could have saved them. But she didn't. The last thought enveloping her mind as she resigned to her fate, the scream of splintering metal roaring out destiny, was, "Maybe, that kid wasn't so crazy after all." She gave a lopsided grin to herself as the tower dropped down and crushed her.