Read Evacuation (The Seamus Chronicles Book 2) for Free Online

beach takes almost an hour. Only for one minute did I want to reach back and get the iPad out to read. The rest of the time was spent just being. The wind and road noise were too loud for us to talk but it felt right sitting there next to her. I felt like we were both really happy.
    At the beach I carry stuff down to the sand and do my best to set up. I’m really not sure how a day at the beach works; I’ve never done it. Sofie spreads out a blanket and pops the umbrella before sticking it in the sand. Now what?
                  “I’m going to go explore. You can stay here and maybe get some snacks ready.” She has to keep brushing the hair out of her face because of the wind.
                  As she hops and skips down the beach, I dig into the cooler and pull out some cheese, cured meats and a box of crackers. I notice a bottle of wine, but don’t think she’s ready for a drink at 11:20 in the morning. With nothing left to do, I sit down on the blanket. I wonder if she is expecting me to dig into the database? Was this all a big ploy to get me working in a different environment to see if it would help figure things out? I doubt Sofie would do that. If she wanted me working, she would have suggested it or even asked. She has never been anything but straight with me; it’s not fair for me to question her intentions.
    Not being expected to work makes me want to work. I lean back and grab one of the iPads from the bag. The puppy wallpaper and Style Savvy icon make it clear that this is not the one intended for me. I put it back and open up the other one.
    Late yesterday I started a new train of thought. I began looking at the database as if I were responsible for building it. How would I organize things so that it was useful? I think about a business database that would contain huge volumes of data. Prices, model numbers, component lists and on. Any business function that needs to track something can add one or more fields to the system. It could get large and complicated fast. But not complicated enough.
    Then I think about the human genome project; massive amounts of data relating to the DNA of humans. Decoding one tiny segment requires millions of pieces of data. This is a more similar scenario. The person interested in the gene for hair color needs a significantly different portion of the database from someone interested in the gene that defines how your pancreas grows. But they all go together somehow to create a human.
    In my case, we have a database that contains information on the alien impact of artifact dating. I always laugh at this and imagine a little green Martian in a fedora tiptoeing into a lab and stealing a sample. The truth is actually cooler, though. From reading, I have learned that gamma radiation from space alters the molecular structure of organic material. It can cause statistically significant variances in the carbon dating process.
    On the other hand, we have information on the way aquatic organisms consume oxygen around undersea lava vents. The research is inconclusive but it seems that they use the heat from the lava to process seawater and separate the hydrogen from the oxygen. Because they are so small and so scarce, there is almost no measurable impact on the environment surrounding them. The process, however, could be revolutionary.
    It’s almost as if they were trying to figure out how to build another planet. The search for the origins of life is well-documented. The desire to use that information to build some sort of Frankenstein planet is less well-known. Frankly, it’s quite shocking. However, I feel like I’m starting to get a handle on the intent of this database. What I don’t see is how it relates the survival protocol for a global catastrophe.  
    Short of nuclear Armageddon, none of the global catastrophes would completely destroy life on this planet. So why is it that these scientists were directed to this source for addressing the spread of a