Living in Victory, Chapter 1

This is a novel about my experiences as a young minister in the 1970s. I was NOT a typlical preacher, as the story relates. I hope you find it interesting. I will put it up in chapters, so don't be discouraged and check back every day or so for the next installment.

Copyright 2006 Terry F. Phillips Sr.
(812) 201-3456
frank.phillips@gmail.com


Living in Victory
By
Terry Franklin Phillips Sr.
Dedication: To my wonderful family and friends, particularly the people of Alamo Christian Church, most of who are with the Lord already. The Alamo community, although a work of fiction, inspired this story.

Chapter 1 – April 17, 2006
Television trucks rumbled into town. At least, they would have rumbled, but nothing was left of the town of Victory, Indiana. Debris choked the street that hinted where the town used to lie on the east side of the county road.
“Jeezus!” swore Marco Vicente as he bounced in his seat while his driver attempted to find a level spot near the mess that had been the town 90 minutes earlier.
Even though the equipment and truck would cost tens of thousands of dollars to replace, the driver had raced down the narrow, winding back roads of rural Montgomery County, trying to be first on the scene with live coverage of the disaster from the ground.
The roads, though paved, were narrow and curves often sloped the wrong way, causing the top-heavy remote truck to careen and nearly flip over more than once.
The newsroom back in Indianapolis had learned about the disaster scarcely an hour earlier.
“Forget the cost of the equipment,” Marco thought. “Let’s just be the first on the air.”
He wondered how print reporters would find the words to describe the scene. He was glad his station could show television viewers the mess, something TV excelled in doing.
“We’re here,” he said, louder than he needed to.
Splintered wood, crumbled concrete and broken glass littered the space that had been a little village a few hours earlier.
Marco’s crew was first on the scene, though he knew Channel 13 and a crew from WISH-TV wouldn’t be far behind. Later, trucks from Chicago would show up as well.
Marco’s station had already made arrangements to feed live video to their own network and to CNN as well.
Marco tore his eyes from the carnage that lay before him and turned to look at Sherry Reynolds, the reporter who would be doing the stand-up narration for the station. She was dabbing make-up on her face and smoothing her hair.
“Setting up the dish,” he said as he made arrangements to link the signal from the RV-sized mobile broadcasting studio to the station in Indianapolis.
Overhead, he could hear news helicopters circling like hawks over the small area that had been Victory. One of the choppers was from their station and was probably shooting pictures of them at the moment.
“Why are they up there?” Sherry asked, obviously annoyed by the possibility someone else from the station could be stealing her story.
“If our sky shot doesn’t make the TV, it will be used for news promos,” Marco muttered to no one in particular.
A cameraman was already out of the truck and was testing his wireless link. Then he began shooting pictures of the devastation, unable to hear anything but the beating of the helicopter rotors overhead
Five minutes later, Reynolds went on the air, describing the location and how the twin tornadoes miraculously combined forces to wipe out the small town.
“We can only wonder what life was like before disaster struck,” she said.