There was a rumble deep within the earth and a chorus of screams arose in the distance. Otto and the woman looked in their direction as the toddler giggled at their sound. Something was rising out of the ground, but at this distance, it was impossible to tell what. "Oh crap," the woman said.
"What did you do?" Otto asked the toddler. The toddler babbled incoherently and pointed towards the cries as if he could explain it all. What had been rising in the distance now loomed like a mountain. And in front of it, a tall, blue wall of water grew and sped towards them.
"Oh crap!" the woman said again and picked up the toddler. "We need to get inside."
Otto looked at the giant wave heading in their direction. It was already tumbling forward. He jumped to his feet and ran inside with the woman and toddler. They were joined by everyone else who had been milling around outside. Together, they crammed the tiny station so tight that it was impossible for anyone to move. The door was still cracked open with several bodies pressed against it.
The wave crashed to the ground on the far side of the fields, but the water kept rushing towards the station—mowing down the corn as it went. Cars and pieces of buildings were carried along with it. A large boat crowded with people slammed into the gas station windows, smashing the glass. The station flooded quickly with water spilling people out the front doors.
Then the water subsided until it was nothing more than a moving plain, ankle-deep and as wide-spread as anyone could see. Otto picked himself up from where he had been washed out the door, emptied his nose casing of water, and check himself over for injuries. Others around him moaned and pulled themselves up to do the same.
"Is everyone alright?" a man asked at the doorway. "Be careful of the glass. It's everywhere."
Otto looked around him to see if he could help. The shape-shifting woman was still clinging to the toddler who now looked more frightened than ever. They were curled up next to a gas pump. "Are you two alright?" Otto asked the woman.
"I hope so," she said. "I think he might need a change of diapers, though."
"I'm surprised he's not crying," Otto said. "I'll go see what I can find in the shop."
"I think we're all too stunned for crying," she said, "I'm just glad he's breathing."
Otto tiptoed into the gas station, picking his way over and around fallen goods and debris. He offered a hand up to everyone he passed. But it was impossible to find diapers in the cataclysmic mess.
The haul of the boat was jammed into what had once been a wall of glass. The group of previously snacking children were directly beneath it and buried in glass, machines, and shelving. The tsunami survivors picked themselves up and ran to help.
Survivors from the boat made their way into the gas station to help as well.
"Otto?" Mr. Detroy called out from the counter at the front of the gas station. "Are you okay?"
"I'm okay," Otto said. He waved his hand at Mr. Detroy.
"Is your nose casing okay?"
"Yes, It's fine."
"Good."
But somewhere, somebody pushed their anomaly nose-button. And at the moment, the ground around the gas station split open. Deep fissures cut the land into island-like pieces, each moving and grinding against the others. The grinding shook the compromised structure of the gas station, causing more debris to fall.
"Why?" A woman moaned and sobbed as pieces of the ceiling hit her on the head. "Why has the world gone mad?"
"We need to get out of here," Otto said. He grabbed her arm and pulled her towards the door.
"But what about the ones trapped?" she said and pulled the opposite direction.
Otto let go of her arm. He ran to the door. Outside, other buildings were grinding past the gas station on island pieces, just like the one they were on—each building on a separate piece, moving and twisting like rusty gears in the most bizarre machine. Electric wires stretched and snapped as they were torn away from each other. Underground pipes groaned and burst. Their contents emptied out into the fissures.
Then it stopped. The world grew silent as the sun slipped behind low clouds and turned the sky bright orange and pink. Across from the gas station, a small brick building now stood. Otto recognized it immediately from the posters plastered across the front windows. It was the bar he hid in the night before. Outside of it, a group of dry towns-people stared back at the disheveled gas station tsunami survivors.
"Wow," One of them said, "What the hell happened to you all?"
"We have some people trapped in here, do you mind helping us get them out?" The woman holding the tsunami toddler said.
The fissures in the ground were still present, but had closed to nothing more than giant cracks in the ground—like scars across the whole, discombobulated town. The bar group stepped across the fissures, hesitating for a moment at the line, and helped pull the remaining survivors out of the wreckage of the gas station.
"Seriously, what happened here?" One of them said. "Why is there a boat in the wall?"
"Someone pushed their nose-button and caused a tidal wave," Mr. Detroy said. "At least, that's as much as I can figure. I don't know where the boat came from."
"I made it," Someone from the boat said, "My nose-button makes boats." He tried to laugh. "Who'da thought it come in handy in the middle of the continent, huh? I'm sorry I couldn't steer it, though. I've never had any practice on one." He paused and stared at the ground in a sad sort of way. "It was a mountain that caused the wave," he said. "It just came up out of nowhere and with it...water. A wall of water and a giant, ice-covered mountain... I've never seen anything like it."
The gas station was growing too dark to see in. Outside, the setting sun turned the land burnt-orange and lit up puddles of water, revealing which patches of land had been flooded and which had not. The boat-man scanned the horizon for the tsunami-causing mountain. It was no longer where he thought it would be, but had shifted further west towards the sun. It's icy top glistened.
"I guess finding the center of town now would be impossible," someone said.
"I think we should still head in the direction where the center of town used to be," someone else said, "Whatever is there now will just have to be the new center of town."
"How will we know? With all the land mixed up like this, how could we ever know when we reach what used to be there?"
The group of survivors grew quiet.
"Well," Mr. Detroy broke the silence, "I guess we don't have a choice but to try. Staying here isn't going to help us at all." He looked from face to face. "We know that the old Center of town was east of... Well, it should still be east, anyway," He said, "I don't think we've shifted that much."
"How can you know?" Someone asked.
"What else do you want to do?" Someone else said with a sharp edge in their voice. "Eeny-meeny-miny-mo?"
They were interrupted by a group of creatures hopping out of what was left of the cornfield next to the gas station. They looked like large rabbits, but out of their head grew antlers like deer. They hopped this way and that—dodging people and zigzagging in a frantic, yet silent confusion.
"What are those?" Otto asked.
"They look like jackalopes," Mr. Detroy said.
"What?"
"Jackalopes. They're an imaginary creature," Mr. Detroy moved aside as one sped past him, brushing his jeans with its antlers. "Well, obviously these ones are real. I guess somebody else pushed their nose-button."
A few people in the crowd shook their heads. "Law-enforcement are in over their heads if every crazy anomaly is going to push their nose-button today," Someone said, "Next thing you know, the world will end."
Otto lowered his head and turned away from the group. No one is going to push my nose-button, he reassured himself. More movement behind the gas station caught his eye. It was a shadow—too big to be a jackalope—sliding behind the shipwreck. It crouched beneath the lopsided hull and peered at him from inside a gray hoodie.
"Amelie?" Otto mouthed the word silently. The hooded shadow lowered in a kind of full-form blush of defeat. Then it ducked under the hull and disappeared.
"Wait!" Otto ran after her, but her shadow darted away.
Torn up roads, emptied cars, shaken buildings, and fallen power lines lay strewn in a haphazard mess from near to far. Distraught and dazed towns-people huddled in groups. Some were attempting to pick up what they could—as if they could reconstruct the puzzle of their town and make things right again. Others were looking to make themselves comfortable in their new mess of a home—gathering what they needed to make it through the night.