Page 161 of The Storm Boys Series Collection

“What the hell are you doing?” Doreen asked.

“The only way to change the official site ID text in the top righthand corner of the screen,” he said, “is to do it manually with a keyboard. They would have entered in this information when they installed it.”

He plugged the keyboard in, getting on his knees to check the radar screen. And lo and behold...

A cursor began to blink on the screen.

Doreen gave him a solid shake. “Jeremiah, you smart sonofabitch.”

He backspaced through the four lines of authentication information where it stated Darwin Bureau details, and he began to type.

Darwin Bureau no comms.

Hazer tracking sharp east.

Eye less than twenty mins.

Seek shelter now.

And then we stood there, watching and waiting. The only sound in the room was our breathing.

We had no way of knowing if the message was received. No way of knowing if anyone in Darwin had anyway to see the message at all. It wasn’t likely, given everything and everyone was so high tech these days, and this was so old.

“How will they know?” I asked.

“Other Bureaus will see this,” Jeremiah said. “I think. And they should realise what we’re trying to do. No comms means we can’t run alerts; we’ve lost all signal. The international office will see this for sure. They’ll be watching, they’ll have guessed by now that we’re down. Melbourne too, because Brian will be waiting to see if I fail. They’ll issue the emergency warning for us.” He swallowed hard and nodded. “I hope.”

And we stood there. Waiting. Watching.

Then, after another beat of silence, in the distance, a familiar and very welcome sound.

The cyclone warning siren.

Doreen launched at him, pulling him in for a crushing hug. Jesus, I thought she was gonna break him. “They got it, Doc. You fucking did it!”

When she let him go, he ran his hand through his hair before he braced his hands on his knees to catch his breath. “Oh wow. What a rush.”

I ran my hand up his arm, along his shoulder, and gave his neck a squeeze. “You did good,” I said. My heart was hammering, adrenaline pumping. Doreen went back out to find Suri, and I pulled Jeremiah in for a hug. “You did real good.”

“It was your idea,” he mumbled.

“I can assure you, it wasn’t.” I gave him a quick kiss. “Come on, you could use some air. While we can.”

I pulled him out the front doors and he squinted at the sunlight, and when he looked around, I could tell he found the quietness as weird as I did. It was cloudier now, becoming dark again, but not raining, no wind.

No cyclone.

“Did that old guy come back out?” I asked.

Suri shook her head. “I’ll go check on him,” Doreen said. “It’s old Arty. He knows me.”

Doreen went down the yard, slip-sliding a bit in the mud, and I gave Suri’s arm a rub. She was holding Bruce pretty tight, though he had muddy feet, so I assumed he’d been for a pee at least. “How you feeling, Suri?”

She gave us a weak smile. “Better. I’m sorry I freaked out before.”

“No need to apologise,” I said. “I freaked out too.”

Then I remembered...

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