“Wow Jasmine!  That is the most awesome drawing you have done yet!”

Maria held the bizarre picture up to the light.  The crashing sea swam before her, threatening as it breached a lonely, barren coastline.  It was inspiring, but not in a good way: fascinating, in a way which almost drew Maria’s eyes into the spinning, tornado-like whorls which in turn seemed to leap from the page to draw her into its vortex.

Maria found some bluetac, and mounted the picture on the wall of the small, country classroom.  She loved her small, one-teacher school in the hinterland, and her group of 15 children, aged six to sixteen.  It was like one big, happy family.  The project today had been open, and the children were scattered inside and out, to create their masterpiece pictures.  However, as they dribbled in to the sound of the ancient school bell, Maria’s smile froze on her face.  All the pictures were the same!  The crashing waves, the swirling whirlpools in a dark and punishing ocean surrounded her in their own sea of surprise.  As the children mounted their posters on the wall, they laughed at each other at the similarities in the drawings. 

That was when elderly Mrs Cunningham came running from the office next door.  Well, as fast as she could manage with walking stick and arthritic hips. 

“Miss Sanders,” she began, breathlessly.  “It seems the worlds gone mad!”

On seeing the wall, now full of posters of the dark and stormy sea, Mrs. Cunningham sunk to her knees.  “It’s coming, it’s coming,” she wailed.

Helping her to a chair, Maria looked on helplessly.  “What’s coming?”

“The Apocalypse.  The next Great Flood.  For God’s sake, turn on the television,” she whispered.

On Maria’s nod, one of the children pressed the remote.  The sight of a hundreds of drawings, just like those surrounding them, flashed on the screen.  News broadcasters reported classrooms full, in every country of the globe, for the last twenty-four hours, of deluge-inspired drawings.  Children everywhere were drawing this mighty scene.

“Mrs Cunningham, get a grip!” Maria insisted, straightening herself.   

“We are on the top of a mountain over two hundred kilometres from the coastline.  Whatever this is all about will not be arriving on our doorstep”!

After sending one of the older children for a cup of tea for Mrs Saunders, she looked at the sea of puzzled faces. 

“Well kids, what do you make of all this?  What exactly inspired you all to create these pictures?”

Before the children could answer, little Anna, who was nearest the front door of the small, wooden building, shrieked loudly.

It was then that the sound was upon them.  Not a crashing of waves, just a quiet, gentle lapping.  Maria handed Anna to Tim, the oldest in the class, and rushed to the door.  Before she pulled it closed, she saw the playground equipment disappearing in the surrounding water.  The village below them was already gone, hidden beneath the murky, swirling depths.