Chapter 1: Carl

"Wow it got cold" I muttered to myself as I hauled my equipment out of the rink to my car. The temperature must have dropped a good 15 degrees from when I went in about 10:30pm. It was probably 5 below now at 12:30am on Saturday morning. I guess winter doesn't want to give up the ghost yet, even though it was pretty mild earlier in the day for late March in Ontario. It had rained a fair bit today and the snow had all melted.

My name is Carl Johnson, defenseman extraordinaire for our weekly Friday late night hockey game. Ok, so I'm probably the worst one out there and the oldest too, but I usually have fun and it helps keep the weight down. Since I sit behind a desk for 10 hours a day plus behind the wheel to and from work for another hour and a half, I don't get much time to exercise. My svelte polar bear physique allows me to stay behind to help defend our zone, usually bent over gasping for air saying "no you go ahead- I'll stay back".

I threw the bag in the trunk and the sticks in the back seat and got the car started. I checked my cell for messages, not that there usually is one, but found the damn thing dead, even after I played with the battery. I knew I should have gotten that new battery for it but there never seems to be enough time in the day to do everything.

I pulled out of the parking lot and headed home. Home is in a small town called Cranville about 45 minutes out of the city of Westfield. I know it's pretty far to go to play pick-up hockey but I play with some guys from work and it's only once a week. I got out of the city pretty quickly and got into some fog with the change in temperature. The highway was pretty slick with the rain earlier and, with the fog getting denser the farther out I got from Westfield, the normal 45 minutes looked like it would take over an hour tonight. Luckily there wasn't much traffic, so I didn't have to get stuck behind some poky driver.

I hit the real rural stretch between Westfield and Cranville, with pretty much just farm fields and ditches on either side of the road with no street lights for miles. The fog rolled in and I was real glad they put in the yellow curve ahead signs in or I would have run right of the road into the ditch. These ditches were not your normal 2 or 3 feet shallow ones; no these were 10 to 15 feet down from the raised highway and collected all the run-off for all of the fields on both sides. Right now with the snow melt and rain they were full to the top and they had a wicked current happening too.

I took the curve at about 60km/hr (40 mile/hr) and even with my fog lights on I couldn't see more than a couple car lengths ahead of me. Suddenly, out of the fog in front of me, comes the light's of a vehicle on my side of the road! I leaned on the horn, hit the brakes and swerved to the right. He swerved back to his side and we just missed hitting each other. My car fishtailed and I fought to keep it on the road. Looking in the rear view mirror I saw that the vehicle was one of those small quarter size buses and the driver over steered and had spun out behind me. I finally got my car under control and pulled over to the side of the road. I sat for a second to calm down from the adrenalin rush and looked back to see what happened to the bus just as the rear lights disappeared over the side of the road.

"Aw shit" I thought as I put my flashers on and backed up the car. "What the hell is a bus doing out here at this time of night" I wondered as I got back to where the bus had crashed through the side rail.

I got out of the car and looked over the side of the road. The bus was down in the ditch on its side with water covering everything but the side facing up. Unfortunately, that side was not the side with the door so whoever was in there was in big trouble. The side of the bus had the words Westfield Academy written on the side and I could see a few shapes moving around inside even though it was pretty dark. The lights were still on thankfully so I could see something at least. I tried my cell again but it still had no power. No cars were in sight coming either way through the fog so it looked like I had to be the hero and go save the day. Just fricking peachy! That water looked cold and here I left my insulated diving suit at home.

So, I gingerly stepped off the road holding a small bush as I angled my body back to the side of the ditch. Ok, that was the plan. What really happened was as soon as got on the slope of the ditch I immediately started sliding on my ass and landed in the water over my head. Very, very cold, very fast moving water as I earlier suspected. I went for a little swim in the rapids of the Colorado River without appropriate safety gear and proper means of propulsion and promptly got swept 20 feet past the back of the bus until I met a tree with big pointy branches. After coughing up half of Lake Erie and removing said swords out of my stomach and leg, I pulled myself out of the ditch using the tree and walked back to the bus.

Ok, that went real well. I didn't have much in my car that would help and I still didn't see anyone coming along to help. Just swell. I saw a few people at the windows trying to push out the windows and yelling for help.

I figured I better jump for the bus rather than trying to brave the rapids so I yelled for the people to move away from the back windows and waited until they moved to the front. I backed up and took a running leap to try and reach the top of the bus. I flew gracefully as a polar bear onto the bus landing on a steel beam between two windows. The beam broke my fall (and maybe a couple of my ribs) and my right hand broke the window on the right and my left leg broke through the window on the left. "Damn that hurt" I muttered as I lay there gasping for air. Peering into the dark bus I saw a few people standing on the bottom row of seats with the water quickly filling up the bus. They appeared to be all late teenage girls/women all dressed in some kind of uniform. "Hmm, this just got a bit more interesting" I thought.

"Hello Ladies, have no fear, your friendly Spiderman is here" I joked.

From the front of the bus I get the reply "More like the Chubby Hippoman I'd say. We saw your swan dive remember?"

"It's the coat. Ruins the aerodynamics something awful and adds 20 pounds to my normally svelte figure" I quip back.

It got me a couple of giggles so all was not lost. I asked the girls nearest me to move back so I could try and break the window so we could get them out. I waited until they got out of the way and then used my elbow to finish breaking out the right hand window, top and bottom. I stood up and kicked in the metal cross beams and then yelled for them to start reaching up. I grabbed the hands of the first girl and pulled her up and out of the bus. I told her to move over to the side and reached for the next one. Eight good looking girls later I asked if that was everyone and one of them said there should be ten girls plus their coach. I looked in but couldn't see anyone else so I grabbed the window edge and lowered myself into the bus, just squeezing into the window.

I was near the back of the bus and started checking the seats that were under water. The first 3 were empty and then I felt a body and pulled her up. I quickly put her over my shoulder and walked back through the water and yelled for some help. Two girls bent over and helped pull her up through the window. I yelled at them to start CPR if anyone knew it to get her breathing. I turned back and swam back to the front of the bus to find the last girl and their coach. I found the tenth girl holding the coach's head above water.

"Hi there ladies, are we enjoying your evening swim?" I joked.

Well the girl obviously has no sense of humor as she frowned and said "She's unconscious and her leg is stuck".

"Ok, let me go down and look" I replied and followed the woman's body down to her legs. I felt her left leg trapped between some twisted metal. I tried to manipulate her leg to pull it out but it wouldn't budge. Next I grabbed the edge of the metal and tried to pull it apart. Damn thing wouldn't budge. I moved around to get a better platform and a better grip and tried again. I felt it give a bit but my feet slipped and I fell headfirst into the water, cutting my head on the seat and tearing my hands on the metal.

"Hurry up and quick fooling around, the water is rising in here" the girl shouted.

I swore a bit and gave her a look and went back to her coach's leg. Now I was pissed, and that's usually not a good thing. I tend to go a bit berserk when that happens. I reached down and grabbed the metal again and started yanking the metal, lunging back with my full weight over and over until finally the metal broke and I flew back, again bumping my head. I laid there for a minute, a bit dazed from the hit on the head.

The girl shouted "You can nap later ok; I could use a little help here".

I felt like telling her off but superheroes don't swear at damsels in distress so I just ground my teeth and waded back over to them. I went down and got her leg untangled and then lifted the woman up.

"Ok, get moving to the back, princess" I told her and followed her back. The water was up to middle of the upper seats now so we had to swim underwater to get to the back of the bus. The girls were screaming for us to get out of there before it filled up. Damn that current was strong. The girl swam and pulled herself to the back of the bus using the seats and finally reached the window. I found the going a little more difficult as I keep missing the bottom seats with my feet and my hands being full. After swallowing the other half of Lake Erie and hitting every protruding object on the way back I finally reached the window. The girl yelled for some help and two girls grabbed the coach from above while we pushed up from below.

"After you princess" I said and, after she gives me the finger, jumped up and grabbed the window edge and pulled herself up. I pushed her up and then starting pulling myself out. I felt hands trying to help pull me up as my coat got stuck on the jagged edge of the window frame.

"Geez, forget Hippoman, we should call you Whaleman" mocks the Wicked Witch of the North. "Could you get your butt out of there sometime this century?

I glared at her and kept wiggling as she helped pull me out. Of course my coat ripped down the back; well better it then my back! I finally pop out and laid out on the top of the bus, again gasping for air.

"Ok, enough lying around like a walrus. We have work to do" said the evil step sister.

"You know you don't act like a princess, Princess. You are more like a grumpy old witch" I growled back.

"He got you there Rachel" says a cute redhead close by.

"Bite me Vanessa!" retorts my grumpy damsel in distress.

"Maybe later" Vanessa quips and a couple of the other girls giggle.

That got my imagination going let me tell you. Well, I figured it was time to get my but in gear. I rolled off my back and stood up to access the situation. The girls had the coach and the other girl laying flat on the side of the bus and one of them was giving mouth to mouth to the one girl. The coach looked like she was breathing but had a nasty bump and cut on her forehead. I covered her with my wet jacket and checked the other girl out. She started coughing and throwing up water (the 3^rd half of Lake Erie apparently) so that was a good sign.