Ponch and Jon sat on the front porch sipping lemonade at Ponch's cousin Olivia's house.
Olivia was in the kitchen cooking supper. She lived in a house with her four sisters, Mia, Jayden, Charlie, and Payton. The four sisters were in the front porch room with Jon and Ponch keeping them company while their oldest sister cooked dinner.
Mia, Jayden, and Charlie were triplets and the youngest, Payton was the second oldest and Olivia was the oldest. They all lived in a house in Iowa that they had just moved to a few years back and kept nagging their youngest cousin to come visit. Ponch finally decided to visit and bring Jon along with him, but he didn't realize when he made the visit they'd be running into trouble.
"Ponch, you should've been here last week it was beautiful the flowers were just starting to bloom and everything!" Jayden said enthusiastically.
"I also heard you had a storm…I don't want to be here for your storms," Ponch said with a laugh.
The young Puerto Rican female smiled at her cousin. "Well that's too bad because according to the weather man there's gonna be a storm tonight," Jayden said.
Ponch looked at Jon then he looked at the girls. "Really?"
"Yeah, sorry," Charlie said. She hopped up from her seat. "I'll be right back." She headed into the kitchen. "Olivia, is there anything I can snack on right now?"
"Girl you snack all day! How can you be hungry now?" Olivia said laughing. She then motioned towards the fridge. "There are some apples in the bottom crisper."
Charlie made a face. "I hate apples," she replied.
Olivia laughed. "You like apple juice and apple sauce, you can't say you hate apples cuz you don't," she replied.
"Ok, just most of them!"
Payton joined them in the kitchen then. "What's for dinner?"
"Food, now get out and go enjoy some time with Ponch," Olivia said.
The two girls smiled as they left the room.
"I can't believe she tried to get me to eat an apple! Of all things!" Charlie said entering the porch room.
Ponch laughed slightly at his cousin. "I take it you don't like apples?"
"Hate 'em," she said.
Ponch laughed again.
"Anyway supper will be ready soon, just not sure what it is we're eating. It smells good though," Mia said entering after them. She had just left the kitchen before the other two girls came in.
"Hey that's great," Ponch said with a smile.
Jon was silent the whole time.
"What's wrong, Jon? I hurt you feelings because you like apples?" Charlie asked playfully.
Jon shook his head. "No, I don't care if you like them or not," he said with a small smile.
"Then what's wrong?" Mia asked also curious. She noticed Jon's gaze was out the window. It had gotten dark outside already, and she knew there was a storm coming through.
"I just have a feeling something is about to happen," Jon said, finally. As soon as those words came out the tornado sirens went off.
They knew the winds had picked up outside,
The girls rushed down to the basement. Olivia was shutting everything off on the stove, and freaking out. Ponch rushed into the kitchen. "Don't worry about it, honey just go downstairs I'll take care of everything," he said leading her towards the stairs.
Olivia was about to protest, but she knew there was no arguing with her cousin so she went down.
Ponch looked around and saw Jon was right beside him. "Jon, go downstairs."
"Not till you do," Jon said.
"But Jon…"
"No, Ponch the sooner this is all cleaned up the sooner you get down so you need help," Jon said.
"It doesn't have to get put away. I mean, if the house is destroyed it won't matter."
Jon sighed. "Ponch, put the food in a dish and take it downstairs we might be there a while," he said.
Ponch did what Jon told him to do then put the pan in the sink. Olivia had been making sloppy joes. So Ponch grabbed a package of hamburger buns and a spoon and sent Jon down with it all. After that he started getting drinks. He knew they still had some time, he also knew that the last time he'd been with his cousins during a tornado warning they had never been in any hurry to get to the basement. So maybe he was safe?
As soon as he head for the stairs though he heard Jon yell "Ponch, get down!"
Ponch dropped to the floor spilling the drinks all down the stairs. "What's going on?" Ponch asked seeing Jon by the stairs.
"Don't move, I'm coming to you and I'll bring you down. It's here," was all Jon said. He had taken a glance out the window and saw it getting darker outside, and he saw what looked like a tornado…and it looked like it came up form the ground! It started picking up pieces of the garage that had fallen after being struck by lightning.
"It's here?" Ponch asked confused but soon received his answer to that glass shattered as the windows broke. When debris from the garage was thrown in from the gustnado outside.
Jon was right about one thing, the house was being hit.
"Jon, be with the girls!" Ponch yelled as he crawled a little closer to the stairs.
"I'm not leaving you there! Ponch you'll die!" Jon could see the glass being thrown around in the kitchen.
"I can move myself, Jon!" Ponch shot back.
Jon didn't respond he was having second thoughts to this, but was heading back to the girls until he suddenly heard a loud cry of pain from the kitchen. He turned and saw a shard of glass had been thrown into Ponch's side the minute Ponch moved for the stairs.
The gustnado outside the house had died down once it hit the streets and it was over with. Everything was completely still outside.
Jon didn't care what Ponch said anymore with this time he had now to get him to safety he took every chance he could take and he ran up the stairs and grabbed him and took him down to the basement it was dangerous upstairs.
Ponch leaned against the wall in the basement breathing heavily, sweat dripping from his brow, and blood pouring from his side. "You should've just left me," he said to Jon.
Jon rolled his eyes. "Now is not the time or the place to argue about this, Ponch," he said calmly.
He walked over to the girls to see that they were safe. Jon sat between Jayden and Mia holding both in his arms as they cried. They were scared, Jon was doing his best to comfort them.
Charlie was never one to be able to sit still, she could hear the rain pouring down outside, as the storm picked up. There were breaks in between where it wasn't raining as hard, and Charlie wanted to look outside to see what was going on.
"Charlie, sit down, please," Payton said quietly.
"Payton, I just wanna know what's going on out there," Charlie replied.
"Charlie, sit down!" Payton repeated raising her voice.
Charlie sat beside Ponch a little shaken from her sister raising her voice at her, as if she were angry with her. What was so bad about getting up anyway? It's not like standing would kill her.
She looked at Ponch, and her heart started pounding inside of her chest when she saw that he had been injured. He was starting to lose consciousness from the blood loss.
She lightly shook him. "Ponch! Ponch, please don't close your eyes! As soon as this storm dies down we'll get you help! Just hang in there, please!" she cried.
Ponch mumbled something to her that was impossible to understand.
Payton was as curious as Charlie was to look out the window and wished they could but knew that Olivia would disapprove, and because of that she had kept Charlie from going off and looking without her. She was scared, and wished that the storm would end.
It suddenly grew dead silent.
Payton looked around the dark basement to all of her scared sisters, then her injured cousin and his friend. "I think it's over now," she guessed standing up. She grabbed the food to take it to the fridge.
"Payton, it's not going to end just like that," Jayden said snapping her fingers to prove a point.
"How would you know!? It does sometimes, doesn't it!?" Payton shot back then went to the fridge. Charlie scrambled to her feet to join her sister. She grabbed Payton's arm and took her to the window to look outside.
"Girls, get away from the window! First thing you should know about storms is you don't go rushing to a window during one!" Olivia scolded.
"Livvy…" Charlie started her voice shaking.
"What?"
"I don't like the looks of outside," Charlie said.
Before Olivia could answer her younger sister they were all interrupted by a loud continuous roar or rumble, that, unlike thunder, didn't fade in a few seconds it just continued on.
Along with the noise that was giving some in the room a headache everyone felt their ears popping.
Jayden began to cry. "We're gonna die," she whimpered.
Jon hugged her close to him. "No we're not!" he got out just in time before the tornado went through their home completely destroying it.
oOoOo
Jon was trying to find everyone underneath the remains of the house. He found Mia and Jayden were still nearby him under some ruble. He did his best to get them free, with no roof over their heads anymore the girls and Jon and Ponch were being soaked by the pouring rain.
Olivia was beginning to stir after having gone out for a few minutes. She had pieces of ceiling on top of her, she tried to free herself on her own, but knew she'd need help. Jon came to her rescue he was fighting his own pain from getting banged up himself he just wanted to find everyone else and make sure they were alright.
"Three down, three more to go," he told himself as he kept the girls close by in his search for the others.
"Ponch!" Jon called looking for his best friend. "Charlie! Payton!" he called out looking for the two sisters.
He found a thin tan leg sticking out from under the basement refrigerator. He rushed over and tried to move the fridge. He knew one of the girls was underneath.
"Oh my gosh!" Jayden cried tears falling from her eyes. She turned and hugged Olivia and began sobbing. The minute Jon pushed the fridge off they could see that Charlie had been crushed and killed underneath.
Tears stung Jon's eyes. He might not have known her very well, but this was devastating for her, and her family. She was so young!
Jon shook his head trying not to dwell on it too much he had to find the other two. And he could only hope those two were still alive. "Payton! Ponch!" he called out their names again.
Jayden, Olivia and Mia were crying and shaking uncontrollably. "Charlie…" Jayden said tears still falling as she knelt down and touched her sister for the last time. "Oh Charlie, why did this have to happen!?"
Olivia stood off to the side hugging herself and crying. She looked up to Heaven. "God, she was so young! She was so young!" she practically screamed.
Jon rushed back over to her and put a hand on her shoulder. "Calm down, Olivia," he said.
"That's easy for you to say she wasn't your sister!" Olivia snapped.
Jon blinked before responding. "She might not have been, but I know she was a great person, and God took her home because it was her time," Jon said.
"Her time!? Jon she hadn't even reached thirty yet!"
Mia touched Olivia's shoulder. "Livvy, Jon's right though," she started.
Olivia turned to Mia and glared. "She was your sister too, Mia! How could you side with him!"
"Because I know it's wrong to get mad at God for this! He might've taken Charlie, but it was for a reason, and you should be happy he didn't take you too!" Mia said. She looked at Jon then. "We have to find Ponch and Payton," she said there was no more time to waste arguing with her sister. She was just as upset as Olivia was, she just handled it a different way.
Jon and Mia continued looking for Ponch and Payton while Jayden hugged Charlie and sobbed until she had no more tears left to cry. Olivia went to comfort her sister still angry with God, but trying to see it the way Mia was.
First responders were showing up while Jon and Mia were still looking.
"Ponch!" Jon called.
"Payton!" Mia called for her sister.
"Mia, over here!" Jon yelled finally a few seconds later. Mia came rushing over. It didn't look good. Under a pile of ruble laid Payton. Jon and Mia removed everything, and by the time they had gotten to her body it had been too late. She'd been killed by the damage done from the tornado.
Mia began to sob. "Oh God…why!?" she cried holding her sisters cold hand.
Jon patted Mia on the back, after seeing these two girls dead he couldn't help but begin to worry and jump to conclusions that Ponch was dead too. He had to find him and fast, he needed to ease these thoughts and assure himself he was wrong!
Jon began looking "God, please let him be alive. Please!" Jon prayed loudly as rain still poured down soaking him, dripping off of him. He didn't care right now though he just wanted to find his best friend.
He saw a few pieces of what looked to be the wall that Ponch had been leaning against before the tornado hit. He rushed over and began moving them, and found underneath that pile was his best friend almost lifeless. He picked him up, seeing paramedics in the distance and rushed him over as fast as he could without tripping over the debris.
"Please, you gotta help him! He's dying!" Jon said laying him down at their feet.
The older of the two paramedics that Jon had went to nodded and knelt down and began checking Ponch and doing what he could before he needed to get taken to the hospital.
oOoOo
When they left, Olivia kept looking back at what was left of her home. She began to cry, she'd lost two sisters, her home, and everything! She felt miserable. Mia hugged her sister trying to comfort her. "We can get a new home and new things," Mia said.
"Yes, but we can't just get two new sisters," Olivia said barely above a whisper.
"I'm sorry for your loss, I really am," Jon said as if him apologizing would make anything better.
Olivia said nothing to him. Jayden and Mia just exchanged a few glances at him. "Thanks for trying to help," Jayden said. "But I don't know how well we'll recover from this one," she added a few second later.
Jon remained silent, not sure what else to do. He was stressed and feeling anxious about Ponch being injured, and on the other hand he was also feeling like he should do something for Ponch's cousins. They needed someone…but maybe it wasn't Jon that they needed.
oOoOo
When they arrived at the hospital, Ponch was taken in and treated right away. The girls were treated after and soon all of them were in rooms. That night Jon just fell asleep in Ponch's room, exhausted from their day.
The next morning when he woke up the first thing he did was call Jeb.
"Hello?"
"Hey, uh you know those plants you're taking care of at my place?" Jon said.
"Yeah?" Jeb replied.
"Can you look after them a few more days? There was a tornado and Ponch is in the hospital. We won't be home as soon as we planned."
Jeb's eyes grew wide. "He's ok, right!?"
"He's alive," Jon replied. Ponch was in pretty bad shape but at least he was alive.
Jeb sighed. "That bad, huh? At least he's still alive though."
Jon nodded. "Yeah, can you tell Sarge for me? I don't want to lose my hearing."
Jeb laughed. "I can do that," Jeb said.
"Thanks, you're the best."
"I already know that, tell me something I don't know," Jeb said.
Jon laughed and rolled his eyes.
A/N: This is for the 7 mary 4 and others CHiPs monthly story challenge contest. The theme was danger and my word was apple and I had to use it 8 times.