Variance - Book 1, Issue #19

Sweetwater Creek State Park

Lithia Springs, GA

Day 39 of The Rise

   The basecamp survivors were no more than a hundred yards from the plane when the Variants descended upon them.

   “Move!”  Lieutenant Cole was out in front, waving his arm like a sputtering propeller, an AK-47 clutched in his free hand.  The people followed, emitting soft cries of panic as their feed pounded across the preserve.  The Variants were waging war, but this herd was set on survival.  

   The first shots were fired when they were nearly to the plane.  For one silly moment, Enrique thought they would make it without any bloodshed.  

   Silly Enrique, happy endings are for kids.

   Enrique noticed Lara had two .357’s fastened in two holsters and he wondered where she had gotten them.  That thought was quickly erased when he saw her discharge them on two approaching Variants.  Their heads exploded in a flurry of blood and they dropped to the ground without a further ounce of movement.

   The four engines of the Globemaster coughed and sputtered before finally catching.  They whipped with such fierceness Enrique thought he’d be sucked into the blade.  Lara pulled on his arm and he was thrust back to reality.  “We’re almost there!” she called over the engines.

   Enrique was near the back of the pack.  Those in front quickened their pace.  They curled into the aft of the plane and Enrique had an ephemeral moment of hope.  He was going to make it.

   Green light!

   He couldn’t have been more than fifty yards away when a Variant grabbed his ankle.  Enrique fell forward and when his chin hit the runway stars illuminated his vision.  He barely remembered turning over and spitting out one of his molars.

   The Variant was on top of him.  Enrique saw a red flicker in the Variant’s eye and rage foamed at the sides of its mouth.  The Variant tore Enrique’s right sleeve clean off and was clawing at his skin like a wolf.

   There was a gunshot and a shower of blood spurted from the Variant’s chest.  The Variant cocked its head forward and stared at Enrique in stifled confusion.  It fell forward, collapsing on his sternum with a dull thud.  Enrique heaved a dry breath and rolled the Variant onto the tarmac.

   “Get up!” he heard a gruff voice say.  Enrique’s mind was still spinning when he realized he was being yanked from the ground.  “Y’all right?” he heard a man ask.

   Enrique’s eyes clicked shut, then opened again in a haze of bewilderment.  There, standing before him, was an astonishingly svelte old man.  His hair and beard were white but his body was chiseled and youthful.  There was an M-16 hanging loosely from his arm.  He looked almost cartoonish.

   “Go!” the old man called pushing Enrique toward the plane.

   Enrique was off, but his heart dropped when he saw the plane heading down the runway, picking up speed as it went.  The faster Enrique ran, the farther away the plane seemed to get.  The cargo load door was still down and sparks were spewing from the end in a glorious blaze.  He could see the other survivors calling for him to run faster and he heard the engine groan another thunderous rush of power.

   The plane was leaving.  The Variants were coming.  Death was imminent.  Those were the only guarantees in life at that point.

   Enrique had never remembered running that fast.  His thirty-year old potbelly bounced up and down, his pudgy legs almost flailing. 

   Lara stood at the end of the cargo door with her hand out. “Come on!”

   Red light, green light, the plane said.  Or, Hurry up, motherfucker!  Either way, Enrique got the message.

   His strides lengthened and he felt his foot hit the base of the loading door.  The jolt was so jarring he momentarily lost his balance.  Lara reached out, grabbed hold of his dingy brown shirt, and pulled him forward.  They tumbled to the ground, him on top of her.

   “Thanks,” Enrique grunted.

   “Get…off…” she said, her words strained by Enrique’s weight.

   “Come on, old man!” Enrique heard Lieutenant Cole yelling.

   He sat up and saw the lieutenant standing at the edge of the loading door.  Sparks continued to spit up.  The plane picked up speed.  Enrique looked into the darkness and saw the old man who had saved him.  A platoon of Variants ensued, and the plane that would make or break him was still ten yards away.  The old man turned the M-16 around, fired off a couple shots, and then threw it to the tarmac.  

   Red Light, Green Light. 

   The old man leapt forward through a shower of sparks and grabbed hold of Lieutenant Cole’s arm.     They fell to the ground and the loading door began to close.  Those inside watched as the Variants sprinted toward the plane with abandoned regard.  The loading door had barely closed by the time the plane lifted off the ground.  The Globemaster banked left, shook through a patch of turbulence, then steadied.

   Throughout the plane, handshakes and hugs of congratulations were exchanged.  Enrique, however, didn’t move.  He lay with one leg cocked and his elbows stuck to the plane floor.  He stared at the loading door half-expecting the Variants to pry it open and crawl inside.

   “Helluva night, huh?”  Enrique looked to his right and saw the old man lying next to him. “Captain Richard Blake,” he said extending his hand.  “Retired, of course.”  He took Captain Blake’s hand.  Enrique thought he gave his name, too, but couldn’t say for sure.

   The plane continued north, flying through the night sky with more safety than any of them had felt in weeks.  There was only hope aboard that plane.  

   Splendid, profound hope.  

   And for the next three hours, those aboard the Boeing C-17 Globemaster felt as if they were going to make it.

   Green Light, the plane screamed.  Glorious fucking Green Light!

   At precisely 2:17am, the Boeing C-17 Globemaster would be shot down and crash in Castle Rock Lake, just outside of Madison, Wisconsin.  Of the two hundred thirty on board, only twelve would survive.

   Red Light.