Chapter 5: Surprise!!

We came down from our group High Five leap to stand on the bluff overlooking the joining of the Missouri and the Mississippi Rivers. They were in full spate and there was water everywhere

"Not your typical spring runoff," commented She/He/It/ Whatever. "would you care to look elsewhere?"

The Cheese didn't hesitate, "What else ya got? A map sure would be nice. By the way ... nice shift."

He/She/It/Whatever hemmed and hawed, blustered a minute and said, "I'm really not supposed to show you this, but..." A three-dimensional, full color, hologram appeared suspended between the bluff and the river. There was even a rising sun to establish direction. "Go ahead, you can walk on it," explained the Whatever.

"Wow!" said Vickie, as she stepped on to the "map". "It's springy but solid. Kinda like the Cheeses cock. Hard but soft."

You could hear the grin in the Whatevers voice. "Pay close attention to the location of the six red flags while I fast forward it."

"Wait! Wait." exclaimed Jo. "If you can "time" it forward, can you "time" it back? Say, to the very beginning of this last ice melt. I'd like to know why the melt started."

"I knew you'd get me in trouble if I presented this "map"," complained She/It/He/Whatever.

Jo explained, "There are those who say during ice ages the continental landmass expands. Because so much of the oceans' water is turned to ice, sea level is lowered, this uncovers more land, the climate becomes more seasonal, and probably most importantly, the global climate tends to cool off even more. This is largely because continental masses tend to reflect the Sun's energy back to space, while large bodies of water tend to absorb the Sun's energy. Also, landmasses at the poles permit the growth of permanent ice sheets, which, because they are white, reflect even more energy back to space. The formation of ice on the continents lowers sea level, which exposes more land, which further cools the Earth, forming more ice, and so on, and so on. What I'm trying to say is once the Earth begins to cool positive feed-back mechanisms push the Earth's climate system to greater and greater cooling. I want to know what happened to reverse the trend toward more ice."

"She didn't even stutter." Kurt laughed.

"Ok, you got me curious," said the Whatever. "Let's run it back and see."

"Whoa, that was close," as everybody ducked. "What the fuck was that?"

"Man, that was too close!"

"Where did it go?"

"Duck, there's another!"

"Shit!!!"

"Damn!"

"Where are they coming from?"

"Where are they going?"

"The map, the map," cried Vickie. "It's twisting."

"Look at the Pacific Range, the whole damn thing is erupting."

"The winds are from the east, what the hell, the ash is blowing out to sea."

"I have access to a larger "map"," said Whatever. "It came from out in the system, struck the moon and heated it glowing yellow, huge chunks blown off the moon nearly hit here. Some hit the ocean. But parts were so large they hit the sun. There's solar flares out past the second planet. The gravitational pull fractured the icecap. I'm trying to slow the map enough to see how fast it's melting"

"How long ago from now did the melt start?" asked Jo.

"Maybe 2000 years, more like 1000. I can't pin it down because my ship "map" goes too fast. I can tell you one thing, the initial melt was so fast sea level rose 40 feet in less than 20 years, and it's still rising."

"I pity anyone living on a seacoast." said the Cheese.

Jo agreed, "That's about 95% of the population," said Jo. "The total change is more than 390 feet. Geologists and archaeologists argue about it but the general consensus is between 190 and 600 feet."