"Rocky!" Adam, Jared, and Anna all echoed Jessi's exclamation.
"We've gotta go out there!" Jessi declared, already jumping out from under the blanket.
"We can't go out there now, it's too late!" Adam decreed. "Y'all haven't seen the severe conditions that are going on." He continued seriously.
"He's all alone..." Anna said, unintentionally aiming large worried eyes towards Adam.
"Yeah," Jared added. "It's him versus the tornado, and he's handicapped by his chain!"
"Come on Adam, we can do it. Rocky needs our help!" Jessi pleaded. The three younger Nelsons knew they had to have Adam in on the rescue mission. Although they already had the "want-to," they needed Adam's brain power and leadership.
"Fine," Adam conceded. "Lets take on that twister!"
He spoke with perfect timing and inflection, his sentence sounded like it was straight out of a 3 ninjas movie. Jessi, Jared and Anna's eyes lit up, and they spontaineously stacked their hands together in a huddle, then simultaneously brought them down a little bit and back up yelling "Go!" in unison. It was a perfect 3 ninjas/kid power moment. But none of the four took the time to bask in the greatness of the moment, because they had a job to do. An important mission of mercy to carry out. A monumental battle to fight!
"OK," Adam called out, "We need something to hold onto, or something that will hold onto us, so that we won't get swept up in the tornado when we go out there."
They all took a minute to look around the basement. It was filled with all kinds of random playthings, and they were sure there had to be something helpful to them in their mission. They knew they had a long piece of rope that was very thick and would work perfectly, but it was out in the barn. They had been using it to play Indiana Jones just the other day.
"I know!" Jared yelled, with a triumphant look on his face. Adam and Jessi swapped a wary look. Jared was forever coming up with elaborate and somewhat hairbrained ideas that weren't really practical. They were afraid this might be another one of those type of ideas. Luckily for them, and for Rocky, it wasn't.
"Let's tie together all of our karate belts, and use them!" Jared finished.
"Perfect!" Adam and Jessi aprroved heartily.
"Yeah, we can even use my pink belt." Anna volunteered. This was a big sacrifice for Anna, she loved her specially dyed pink karate belt, and usually didn't allow it to be used for the various games and plans for which the kids used their karate belts.
So they got to work, getting their many and various colored karate belts out of the bucket that held all of the dress up type clothes. Adam Jessi and Jared were all currently taking karate (although Jared wasn't quite as serious about it as his two older siblings). Adam was a brown belt, Jessi a purple belt, and Jared a "lowly" orange belt. This meant they had a total of 14 belts. 3 old white belts, 3 yellows, Jessi and Adam's old orange belts, 2 green belts, 2 blue belts, 1 purple, and of course, Anna's pink belt. Adam, Jessi and Jared kept their current belts (orange, purple, and brown) upstairs with their karate gis. Once they had gotten every single belt tied tightly together end from end they had quite a rope. It was probably more reliable than the length of real rope they had left hanging from the loft in the barn. Next, they made their way up the flight of stairs to make their way to the back door, which, by this time was missing the 3 glass panes at its top. The kids could hear the wind swirling angrily through the broken glass. Even though the door was closed, it was shaking violently inside of its hinges. Rocky's bark could be heard, frantically trying to rise above the chaos of the elements. They knew they needed to act quickly before things got worse.
"So, are we all going out there?" Jared asked seriously, his voice mixed with excitement and trepidation.
"No!!" Adam and Jessi chorused.
Adam took action, vocalizing the plan he had formed in his head long before they had finished tying the belts together.
"Jess, you're going to have to be the one to go out there. You're lighter than me, plus I'm the strongest, so I need to be here anchoring the belts."
"Just what I was thinking." Jessi agreed.
Adam started tying one end of the belt rope to the end railing that ran all the way up the stairway to the basement. He was tying what he called a Polamer knot, which he had doubtless learned from one of the fishing books he was forever reading. As he worked quickly on the knot he turned to Jared and Anna.
"You two have to help me make sure this rope stays in the house with us, no matter what! And also, when Jessi gets back to the door with Rocky, you two grab him by the collar and pull him in, while I make sure Jessi is in, and the door is shut."
Jared and Anna nodded intently.
Adam finished tying the first end to the railing and turned to Jessi, who already had the roped wrapped around her waist. He tied an even tighter Polamer Knot and reminded her to hold the knot secure around her waist as long as she possibly could.
To Be cont......
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