All In One Night. A short-ish.

All in one night: A collection of tales by

SanQuentez Wingfield

View #1: Dinner with the Tillers

November 10th, 2025, on the east coast of the United States, about 90 miles out to sea, two fishing trollers finish making their last pickup and are about to head back to port in Savannah. The fisherman hears a low rumbling sound when the last net comes up. The captain steps on deck, calls all crew members inside, and immediately gets on his radio. “ This is the Captain of the Sea, Sandy; I want to report a massive T-phase out in the midway fishing lanes. I repeat I’m reporting a massive earthquake out to sea.”

Here sits the Tiller family finally getting dinner together at a quaint little restaurant near the pier when the emergency alert begins to flash on all the screens in town, and it reads, “The National Weather Service has issued a tsunami warning for all eastern coastal cities and surrounding counties, including Daytona Beach, Palm Beach, St. Augustine’s, Jacksonville, Florida on into Georgia, which cities include Brunswick, St. Simons Island, Dock junction, Darien, Georgetown, and Savannah, on into Hilton Head Island SC. All eastern coastal cities should begin immediate evacuation processes in an orderly manner. I repeat all eastern coastal cities need to start prompt evacuations. The broadcast catches the eye of the father, and he immediately begins to pack up his family. Noticing the other patrons in the seating area begin to move, the father, a retired soldier, begins to count exits and watch people as his wife readies their kids to move. He gives his wife a quick look, then takes his son by the hand as his wife takes his daughter. They quickly step into the crowd and begin to go toward the kitchen; his wife picks up their daughter and holds tight to her as they push through the opposing flow of people. The people have jammed into the front door, and panic is setting in; the Tillers slip quietly into the kitchen just in time to see the staff rushing out the rear door. Clearing the door, the father stops and checks the alley towards the street when the sound of birds catches his attention. He and his wife look up to see hundreds of birds crossing the sky. Taking care of their children, they move quickly to the edge of the alley and stop; a transit bus passes them on the street and enters the intersection. The bus is “T-Boned” by a car plowing through the intersection. A young man and his date are just behind the father at the corner of the building and watch it all happen. The father looks at his wife, and she quickly says, “NO, SIR, your family first!” He nods and begins scanning the street for a quick route to their car, but panic has taken over, and he knows. There is no quick way, and they must go on foot.

He turns to his wife and whispers, “We must go on foot; we need to get to Savannah General; they have a Tsunami shelter and a shelter-in-place location on the upper levels. We will be safe there.” She picks up her daughter and nods; his son looks up at him and says with confidence, “I’m ready, Dad.” He takes his son by the hand, and they file into the crowd. The crowd is beginning to flood onto the sidewalks and push into the intersection; there are two police officers in the intersection trying to clear away people and help the people on the bus. Then everyone stops…. The tsunami sirens begin to blare and…..

View #2: The first date.

This movie is intense, a movie that the young man and his date shared excitement about seeing. The young man is quite intrigued by his date; he loves horror movies but isn’t used to women who share that love. They are both sitting literally on the edge of their seats when, suddenly, the theater begins to shake. Just a minute or two goes by, the lights in the theater all come on, and two employees quickly enter the theater. They issued an immediate evacuation order and asked people to leave the theater calmly. They try to maintain calm as the people begin to evacuate their seats, but someone in the crowd gets an alert on their phone, and the panic takes over. The young man and his date stay seated as people begin to jump chairs and are nearly on top of each other. The young lady whispers, “Dez, what are we gonna do?” Dez takes her hand and assures her they will be okay, “we have to get to the hospital; my mom will know what to do,” he says as they finally leave their seats. Quickly making their way to the main hall, staying close to the walls to avoid the stampede as best they could.

People are panicking, and people are being trampled; Dez stops at the break of the main hall and can see some of his old coworkers entering the door behind the ticket booth. There is an exit for smokers. Dez pulled his date across the sea of panicked people and quickly grabbed the door before it could close, trapping them both inside. Out the exit, they see a family at the edge of the building, and they both stop as the wreck in the intersection plays out in front of them all. The after-shock begins, and the Tsunami sirens begin again. The people start to surge up the street away from the pier and beach area; Dez’s date stops when she realizes the car in a wreck is her grandparents. She lets go of Dez and pushes into the crowd to get to the wreckage. Dez steps out to stop her, but she yells, “ Those are my grandparents; I must go to them. They were down here for me.” One of the police officers climbs onto a car on the street and begins to hear the stampeding crowd as the tsunami sirens stop, and everything becomes silent. The ambulance stops at the corner, completely blocked by the crowd.

View #3: Emergency

Arriving at a house a block from the main street, the ambulance stops hard at the curve out in front of a house opposite the street. The EMTs are met by two children running up to the passenger side door. The EMT opened her door, but before she could get a word out, a woman erupted from the door and stormed down the stairs. She meets the EMT and assures her that the emergency has passed, and as she explains the ground begins to shake and the children begin to panic. The woman grabs hold of them to comfort them until the shaking stops, and the EMT climbs back into her ambulance. The begins to settle as the EMTs access the ambulance, a call comes over the radio for a wreck involving a sedan and a passenger bus on Main Street, and Dee takes the call. “This is 5757 and we will take the call, we are a block away”, she says, and then… the tsunami sirens begin to sound. Beth began prepping herself as the ambulance rolled to the end of the block and was stopped by a wall of people rushing out of the Main Street area and away from the beaches. Beth and Dee both jump out of the ambulance and grab their go bags, Dee forces her way into the stampede with Beth behind her. One police officer notices Beth and Dee coming in and makes a hole in the crowd to usher them through. Making her way to the car Beth begins to rapidly access the driver, while Dee makes her way onto the bus. Some National Guardsmen are on the bus already helping people as Dee comes on board. The sirens stop and the whole crowd becomes quiet. There is a low rumble coming from the ground, Beth looks toward the beach and asks, “Where the hell is all the water going?”

The approaching tsunami pulls the tide out ahead of it, so much so that everything on the pier is ground. Des and his girlfriend reach the car and the police stop them, the young lady explains that those are her grandparents, and she will not leave them and the officer lets her through, Dee steps off the bus and has the guardsmen help unload it and start every towards the hospital, the low rumble stops and the panic sets in. The crowd begins to surge. Beth looks up and all she can see is birds everywhere fleeing inland. Dee helps the elderly woman out of the car and yells to the police, ‘We need to move now, we have about 10 minutes before that wave hits and we need to get to the hospital or somewhere with a shelter.’ One of the officers suggests the police station fall-out shelter, but Dee quickly disagrees. “This place is about to be underwater, the last place we want to be is underground… underwater.” The second officer takes the elderly woman into his arms, “Get him to your ambulance and I’ll take her, and then in the squad, I’ll outride and guide you through but we gotta move right now. The push through the crowd was rough, but getting back into the ambulance Dee quickly fires the engine and starts the lights and sirens, the ambulance begins to back away from the intersection and clears the road and the police cruiser flashes by. Dee gets on the gas and stays with the cruiser as they weave through the back roads headed for the General Hospital only a few miles away.

View #4: We Have Incoming

The hospital was bustling as everyone checked on the patients and made sure there was no major structural damage, the second after shock began and the entire hospital was again brought to a grinding halt. The nurses are all either taking cover or shielding patients. The shaking stopped and the tsunami sirens began to blare before anyone could utter a word. The nurses began to prep to move patients immediately and Dr. Vaala came into the ER from the far hall. Dr. Vaala steps into the nurse's station and picks up the loudspeaker from the desk phone. “May I have your attention please, I am Dr. Vaala chief resident of this ER and we have just suffered a massive earthquake out to sea, I expect more aftershocks but there is also a tsunami headed this way. We need to get everyone above the second floor as quickly as possible, set up triage stations in the halls once the rooms are full and we will go from there. Let's move people!” he said. Just as he put the phone down a call came in over the radio. The attending nurse at the station took the call and jumped from her chair.

“Dr. Vaala, we have an ambulance inbound with victims from a bus wreck on Maine Street. The stats are coming through now Sir. They have a police escort also carrying a victim with minor injuries, what's your call, sir?” Dr. V informed the nurses to get every single patient to the upper floors and he will wait for the ambulance and the officers. The head nurse stood by his side and ensured he knew she would be right with him. Some patients require a bit more to move, so some nurses are doubled up and Dr. Vaala is trying to keep the other patients from getting antsy. The tsunami sirens stop, and it all becomes dead silent again, only a mere second or two goes by and the ground begins to rumble like something large was rolling by. The TV begins to show a special weather service announcement. The reporter tries to stand firm and report on the T-Phase but is stopped when the cameraman pans to her right to show the tide being completely sucked away from the shore. The cameraman zoomed in to focus on the incoming break wave and its massive. The wave has blocked the view of the horizon, and the sound of it roaring back to shore is deafening, the cameraman swings his cam back to the reporter who is now a full Olympic sprint away from the beach.

The wave stretches for as far as the eye can see and nothing can stop its approach, the wave crashes hard against the shore shaking the ground with a thundering impact and uprooting everything in its path. The rushing waters rush hard into the town with nothing to even slow the force of the flow, people are scrambling to evade being completely swept up but to no avail. The tsunami’s sheer power is terrifying and completely flattening everything in its path. The transformers begin to explode, and the power shuts off everywhere you can see.

The police screeches to a halt just outside the emergency entrance, and the ambulance rolls in hard right behind it. The ambulance lines up and backs in as one of the officers climbs onto the receiving station to help with the ambulance. Doctor Vaala and his head nurse rushed to help the EMTs clear the ambulance, Dee hopped out and rushed to the back to help when the rear doors flew open. Beth is still holding pressure on the badly injured leg to stop bleeding, Dr. Vaala grabs the gurney and begins to pull it from the ambulance. The gurney begins to rise and roll as Beth begins to call out vitals, the head nurse helped Dee with the other injured passenger when suddenly everything was drowned out by the sound of the wave crashing down the street and barreling hard into the parking lot. The wave uproots the cars in the lot and just as they all cleared the main ER entry, the ambulance was tossed and carried onto the dock by the wave. The ambulance slammed into the main door slowing the flow of water for only a few seconds, the elevator opened, and Dr. Vaala, Beth, and Dee plus the gurney filed in. The ambulance began to shift, and the water began to pour in. One of the officers closed the elevator door, “ we will take the stairs GO! “ he said as his partner kicked open the doorway to the stairs. Everyone makes a “b line” for the stairs when Dez yells out “OHH SHIT”!! The ambulance gave way and a massive surge of ocean water rushed into the hall, before Dez could make it into the doorway he was knocked hard into the wall and nearly swept into the hospital. The second officer grabbed Dez by his jacket and latched on with a death grip! Reaching back and taking his partner’s hand they both pull Dez into the stairs and begin the climb trying to stay ahead of the rising water. Dr. Vaala exits the elevator with the gurney in tow and Beth and Dee right beside him, they get the patient into a room on the 4th floor, and the police officers erupt from the stairs with Dez and his girl behind them. Thinking they have escaped it all, they fall against the desk and try to rest for a second. Beth runs past them yelling “Move move we have to move them now”, the officer looks up and can see out the window. The wave is carrying a large fishing boat right towards the hospital.

Rushing to move as many patients as possible, they barely get the last bed rolled away when the vessel slammed hard into the hospital’s north side lodging itself into the first and second floor below. The impact jolted the hospital and shook everyone nearly to the floor, then suddenly… the water stopped rising. The sun began to drop below the horizon and the hospital and the rest of the town went pitch black. Using cell phones, flashlights, and any other light source they could Dr. Vaala and the staff began to triage as best they could. Beth and Dee jumped in and the police went about keeping an eye on the water level and listening for any potential survivors. They shine their lights out the window so anyone in town close enough or with a view would know someone was there. Hours pass… with no sign of life outside the hospital, those who could sleep…did. Everyone else did what they could.

One of the police officers wakes up to the sound of impact and rumbles outside. They both stand up and can see headlights coming off the main street. They began to shine their lights out the windows and a couple of medical staff jumped in and helped, the vehicles on the road stopped… and lights from the men walking shined on the hospital. “It’s the army!!” yells out one of the police, the vehicles turn and begin pushing their way to the hospital. Dr. Vaala let out a hearty sigh of relief…. The sun began to rise… This all happened all in one night… And it’s over.