Eve of Man (The Harvest Book 2) (29 page)

“Panic attack. I couldn’t deal with everyone being
gone, with my parents being dead. I thought I was the only one left.”

“Yeah I know kid. It was rough.”

“I wanted to say thank you. I don’t think I ever
thanked you, you know for saving my life.”

“You don’t have to do that.”

“Yeah I do.”

“You’re welcome then.”

They finished eating. Luke suddenly felt better. In
fact, for the first time in months life again had purpose and he didn’t feel as
if he was swimming in muck. He finished his meal and gathered their plates. “Do
you think there’s running water?” He walked over to the sink.

The hair on Austin’s neck rose. Time stalled, almost
stopping, as he turned his head towards Luke. A shot rang out. Austin launched
from his chair, right as a bullet slammed through Luke’s temple, exiting out
the other side, taking half his skull out. Austin reached Luke in time to catch
him from falling to the floor.

“Luke. Luke. No! No!” Austin rocked him back and
forth. “Luke.”

More shots rang out, the bullets shattered the kitchen
window. Austin laid Luke down, grabbed his assault rifle.  At the front door he
pushed the bookcase over with one shove and opened the door. Rage surged
through him like he’d never experienced, igniting all of his senses.

Outside was pitch black, but Austin saw every detail
in clear definition. The millions of particles floating in the air sizzled, electrified
by the energy surging through his blood, illuminated by the powers unleashed by
his rage. The thieves fired at him, but the force inside acted as a shield
protecting Austin from harm.

Austin raised his rifle and emptied the clip into the
night. Each bullet met its mark, each man went down, three bullets through the
heart and one through the center of each forehead. He stared at the bodies,
watching reds turn to blues as the bodies went cold in their fresh state of death.
Austin’s anger subsided and with this the particles began to dim now that their
source of energy had lessened in intensity. The night returned, swallowing up
what light remained. The rifle slipped from his fingers, clanging down onto the
concrete sidewalk, echoing loudly through the night. He left it lying on the
ground and returned to Luke. 

A pool of blood had formed under Luke’s head. The
sight was near Austin’s undoing. He knelt next to his friend, his brother, hanging
his head. He wanted to cry, to scream, but did neither. Not even now in this
darkest of moments was grief his to own, to experience, to use as a means of
easing the pain. Easy was not for him, only questions and guilt. How could this
have happened? How had he not heard them? He cursed himself for failing Luke.

The wind blew the curtain from the window. Austin knew
Caleb was back.

“Father are you ok?” Caleb stepped gingerly into the
kitchen, uncertain how to deal with the emotions his father was feeling,
wishing his mother was here to take care of things. 

“Can you save Luke?” Austin asked.

Caleb reached out to Luke, probed around his mind,
found no brain activity. “It is very difficult once the heart stops. And
there’s extensive damage to his brain.”

“Can you save him?”

Caleb walked over to Austin, laid his hand on his
shoulder. “I can’t, but mother might be able to.”

Austin turned to face him. “Has she returned?”

“Not yet, but I’ll find her. I’ll bring her back home.”
Caleb knelt next to Luke, laid his hand on his head, then over his heart, he
shook his head. “She might be able to change him, but she won’t be able to
bring him back as human. There’s too much damage.” Like Madison, Caleb thought.

Austin hung his head, succumbing to defeat. Luke
wouldn’t want to live like that, but he couldn’t make that decision. All he
wanted was to have his friend back, at whatever cost. If he did this, brought
Luke back as an Adita, he might never forgive Austin for choosing a life for
him that was less than human. Austin needed help, he needed Madison. She would have
been strong. She would have made that decision. The right decision.

Austin looked up. “How much time do we have?”

“Based on his body temperature, about thirty minutes,
but I’m not sure. And the longer we wait the riskier it is.”

“What do you mean?”

“The brain changes in death. He may not come back as
the same person.”

The news kept getting worse. “Can you take us back to
the bunker?”

Caleb nodded 

They wrapped Luke’s body in a sheet and Caleb whisked
them back to the bunker’s infirmary. Austin called for Zack and Ed. They both
arrived out of breath, having run the entire way. They wore grim expressions,
as if they knew it was going to be bad.

“What happened?” Ed’s eyes darted around Austin
landing on the shrouded body of Luke. He and Zack walked over to Luke’s body. They
felt like they were reliving a bad dream. Ed pulled the sheet down, looked into
Luke’s face, and laid his hand on Luke’s arm. It was cold.

“No. No. It can’t...he can’t be dead, he can’t,” Ed mumbled.

“Ed,” Austin said, walking over to him. “Eve can save
him.”

Ed turned, confused. “Then do it. What are you waiting
for?”

“She’s not here. Caleb’s gone to find her,” Austin
paused, “but that’s not all. If she does this, saves him, he’ll be like her,
like an Adita.”

 “Like Eve? You mean he’ll be a... like them?” Ed stopped
himself from saying the word vampire out loud.

“Yes in every sense of what that means,” Austin
replied.

Ed stared at Austin, allowing this to sink in before turning
back to Luke.

“I can’t let him go man, but I know Luke wouldn’t want
to be like them.” Austin choked on his words, on his emotions. “I can’t make
that decision.”

Ed knew what he was asking of him. Zack came to stand
next to him, placing a hand on his shoulder for support. Ed thought it a bad
idea for Luke to go with Austin, but he’d insisted and Austin encouraged him.
Now here they were, trying to decide if he should die or come back as a blood
thirsty freak.

“I’m sorry Ed, Zack. I shouldn’t have let it happen. I
should have been paying closer attention. It’s my fault. It’s all my fault.”
Austin replied, his voice cracking as he choked back the tears.

Zack put his other hand on Austin’s shoulder. “Don’t
do that man. Don’t blame yourself. Luke made his own decisions.” These words
came out sounding as hollow as they felt. Madison’s death, now this, it was too
much to ask of anyone to be strong.

Austin looked at him through bleary eyes. For a flash
of an instant he hated him for being right, for doing the right thing, for
being the stronger one. It wasn’t fair to put this decision on them, but this
was one time he couldn’t put his emotions aside. The hate vanished, replaced by
another feeling more sickening in its meaning and intensity. He was a coward.

***

The next day the entire group joined together again at
the cemetery in Pueblo. Austin covered Luke’s coffin with an L.S.U. blanket
before Zack lowered him into the ground. His grave was next to Madison’s.
Everyone took a turn throwing a handful of frozen dirt onto the coffin and
saying goodbye. When it was Ed’s turn, Jenny walked by his side, holding him
steady. Ryan held his dad’s hand and cried, not from his own grief, but because
he felt his father’s pain and it was overwhelming. Ed knelt next to the grave,
silently crying, staring down at the coffin wondering if they made the right
choice. Jenny’s hand rested on his shoulder, providing him the strength to not
fall apart.

After they’d left, Austin stood alone at the gravesite
lost in grief, shrouded in blackness. He sank to the ground, his eyes dry, but
his heart aching a thousand times over. The wind wailed for him. The cold embraced
his wretchedness. None of it mattered anymore, nothing mattered anymore. He’d
fought all along the way to keep Luke safe, to keep Madison safe, but in the
end he’d failed. In the end he wouldn’t be able to protect any of them. The hard
truth of their situation numbed him. He had nothing left to give.

Nothing. Nothing. Nothing.

A thought spun around in his mind like a leaf spinning
along in a brisk wind. The thought found a place to land in the murkiness shrouding
his conscience. Slowly an idea took hold, and then hooked his full attention. He
knew what must be done.

A custom designed Piper Seneca warmed up at the end of
the only runway in Pueblo’s small airport. The plane was somewhat of a
celebrity in pre-Sundog days thanks to a philandering senator who desired to
impress his latest girlfriend and had more money than sense. The wife
discovered her husband’s toy and, unfortunately for the plane, managed to spray
paint the word
WHORE
in bold red letters on both wings. It was the
biggest scandal in Pueblo history and remained a front page story for several
weeks.  Ignoring the tasteless graffiti, the plane was an impressive machine. Two
220 horsepower engines provided maximum power at a ceiling of 25,000 feet. This
particular model was made for flying over mountainous areas and wide expanses
of water, of which Austin would travelling.

Austin sat in the cockpit half listening as Zack read
over the basics from the owner’s manual. His thoughts were on his mission,
which appeared less and less a search and find. Search and find because the
idea that Eve and Caleb needed rescuing was solidifying into more of a fact
than a hunch. He couldn’t ignore the warnings gnawing at him since Luke’s
funeral.  

“What happens if you don’t come back?” Zack asked. Austin
looked over at Zack, his expression hinted of defeat. Seeing vulnerability in
Austin’s face scared the crap out of Zack. He started to get up, but a sinking
feeling gripped his stomach. The real possibility that he might never see his
friend again tightened around him like a giant vise. He sat back down and turned
to Austin. “Their deaths weren’t your fault man.”

Austin gripped the control wheel tighter. “It was my
responsibility to keep them safe, to keep you all safe. I can’t do that
anymore. I don’t know that I ever could.”

“You’re not responsible for us. We’re all adults.”

“It was my duty to protect you, to protect all
civilians. I took an oath to put that duty above all else. And I failed,”
Austin replied. “I put my feelings first.”

Zack sighed in frustration. Blame for everything that
had happened, and how fucked up their world had become, couldn’t be placed at
one man’s feet, least of all Austin’s. “You can’t help who you love.”

Austin shook his head. “It’s not Eve’s fault.”

Zack frowned. Not Eve’s fault? But that wasn’t what
he’d meant, so he wasn’t sure what to make of Austin’s statement. He didn’t
press the issue.

Austin changed the subject. “You know she was in love
with you, Madison was. You made her very happy.”

Zack stared at Austin and knew he was telling the
truth, but couldn’t help the direction his thoughts went.

“What she felt for me wasn’t love. It was something
simple in its purity and dark in its nature. A darkness that wanted to possess
her, but she refused to allow it. She fought the possession without even knowing
she was in a battle for her soul. Madison was too good for this world we live
in. She needed light to live by. You were her light. She chose you, she chose
to love and to live in the light.”

“What are you choosing?”

“The only choice left to me.”

The realization of what this meant flirted with Zack,
but he didn’t want to believe, to acknowledge the meaning full on. “You don’t
have to walk that road man.”

“I do. I can’t exist in two worlds and be whole. I
can’t succeed if I have only one foot in the fight. I must have both in. I must
commit fully to one way or the other. Victory is lost without commitment,
without sacrifice. The Adita know this. They live by this creed without fail.
They never choose. For them there is but one choice.”

“Well that blows, and the Adita blow,” Zack replied,
wanting to say more, wanting to argue, but he knew Austin’s mind was set. Unable
to stall his friend’s departure any longer Zack made his way to the exit,
turning back one last time. “Come home ok?”

“I’ll do my best.” Austin saluted him.

Zack jumped out. As soon as he cleared the plane,
Austin maneuvered around, taxied down the runway, picked up speed and took off into
the gray sky. Zack shielded his eyes, watching the plane until it became a tiny
speck on the horizon. He’d lost count of the number of times Austin had left to
go on one mission or another, always returning in one piece with no more than minor
scratches. But how long could one man’s luck run? Madison had said Austin
didn’t believe in luck and maybe he didn’t, but whether it was luck or skill or
a combination of the two, Zack hoped it continued to work in his friend’s
favor.

***

Ahead of Austin the sky was an endless expanse of gray,
below the ground was not the usual patchwork blanket of farm lands and clusters
of twinkling neighborhoods. Below was a mass of white, crisscrossed by the highways
filled with abandoned vehicles holding the remains of the dead. Austin guided
the plane along through the cloudless sky. He operated on instinct, on the foreign
substance coursing through his blood. A power that supersized his abilities,
his senses, allowing him to perform at a peak beyond that of even the most
elite human beings.

Life no longer made sense and despite the added
energy, Austin felt exhausted. The strengths he’d come to rely on had failed
him and he had failed his friends. Images of their faces at Madison’s funeral
and then Luke’s, haunted him day and night. The overwhelming grief he’d caused everyone
could have been avoided had he done the right thing, had he made the right
decision when the opportunity was offered. And more than deciding wrong, the
reason for his decision ate at him and was the cause of his exhaustion. Fear
never drove him in the past, but he’d given in, allowed himself to be
controlled by a lesser emotion. Lesser in its usefulness, but not in its power
to drive a man in the wrong direction. Austin rubbed his head trying to clear
his mind of the turmoil. Focus was key and something he never faltered in
maintaining. 

“Tighten up man,” he ordered himself. The sound of his
voice in the silence broke him free of his mind and he continued to talk out
loud. “You got this buddy. Find Eve and Caleb. Make the right choice. Save your
friends, save the world.” He nodded in agreement. “Pity is for the weak minded.
You are not weak. You are a soldier. You are a Marine. You are proud, be proud.”

Most men would have faltered under such pressure,
giving in and up. Austin was not prone to wallowing for long or at all. He’d
stared unblinking down the barrel of the many guns life had pointed at him. The
Adita had simply pointed a bigger gun, one that had thrown him off balance and
he’d blinked. For a lesser man blinking was an automatic response to adversity,
failure was always the expected outcome. For an elite man, like Austin,
blinking created a fissure weakening the barrier. For the toughest man, like
Austin, that fissure was never allowed to grow, to turn into a crack that broke
the dam, and this time wasn’t going to be the exception.

Where fear was debilitating, resolve was liberating
and Austin had his resolve. He turned his thoughts on to the details of his
plan. He’d reach Deadbear, Alaska before dark. Kyle had thought Alaska time was
the same as anywhere else, that the amount of daylight was the same everywhere
and it appeared this was true. At first light he would refuel and be on his
way. The plane would serve as his hotel, as he had no desire to walk down
memory lane, to see if his house was still standing. The sole reason for
landing in Deadbear was his familiarity with the airstrip. Everything else there
was dead to him.

The airstrip brought a back memories Austin had
buried, long ago. A source of income when he was nine, Austin had spent many
hours at the airport pandering to whoever would glance in his direction. Most
days he worked for the owner, a drunken bastard with a bum leg named Barney.
Barney paid Austin less than shit wages to do all the shit jobs. Wash planes,
clean grease spills, clean toilets, whatever Barney asked. Two quarters, maybe
a dollar, were often the result of his efforts. Fifty cents bought him a bag of
chips or a candy bar from the vending machine. Not enough to fill his empty
stomach, let alone refuel after a day of hard work.

Every so often a group of businessmen would arrive. On
those days Austin made a fortune in tips carrying bags to and from. A fortune
being twenty dollars. Twenty dollars turned into ten after Barney took his
share. The remaining ten he hid from the old man. Ten he could stretch out for
a month or more through strict frugality.

On one occasion a group of men from Texas arrived.
They planned to ride the Dalton Highway on motorcycle. Randy Westlake was one
of these men. He wore a Texas sized cowboy hat and a belt buckle the diameter
of a hub cap. He’d tipped Austin a ten spot and clapped him on the back like
they were best buddies. Later, while cleaning the plane Austin had found that
man’s wallet. He knew it was the Texan’s by the driver’s license picture.
Austin tracked Randy down at the only hotel in town and returned the wallet. Randy,
who only carried cash, was very, very appreciative. He tipped Austin two crisp fifty
dollar bills, said to call him R.W. and invited him to stay for dinner. Austin enjoyed
the best steak Deadbear had to offer. Prior to Eve arriving, Randy Westlake had
been the one and only redeeming memory he had of his childhood.

As Austin approached the runway of his home, old
feelings surfaced bringing a rancid taste to his mouth. The wheels touched the
icy ground and for a second he thought the plane would slide sideways off the
runway. He willed the wheels to catch, to slow down, and for the plane to come
to a stop in front of the lone hangar. He glanced over at the hangar wondering
if Barney’s frozen corpse might still be inside. His eyes moved over to the
fuel truck sitting cockeyed about twenty yards away. The cab looked to be
empty. 

Leaving the plane running, Austin jumped out and
checked the fuel truck. The tank was close to full, which was enough to get him
to Russia and back. Packed in with his things was an additive Zack developed to
cleanse fuel of debris. The chemicals were especially effective on fuel having
sat for long periods of time. Austin dug this out and poured the gel like
liquid into the fuel truck’s tank, then emptied the contents of the fuel truck
into the plane. He glanced at the sky. The crescent suns had faded into the
gray, which meant he had less than thirty minutes to wrap things up before the
black curtain of night fell.

Once the truck was moved safely out of the way, Austin
went into the hangar through the personnel door, which opened up into a cramped
office. A crappy faux wood desk took up one corner of the room. Stacks of paper
covered every inch of the surface. Splayed over those stacks was Barney, or
what was left of him, and what was left was more than should have been after
more than a year of being dead, but the sub-zero temps were a rather effective
inhibitor to decomposition.

Austin recognized the pinky ring dangling on the bone
of Barney’s right hand. The emerald sparkled in the beam of Austin’s
flashlight. Barney prized that ring over most everything, his whiskey sours,
his bowling ball and most of all over his snappy wife Vera. Austin never knew
the story behind the ring, but he imagined it must have been a gift from a
girlfriend. He knew it wasn’t from Vera.

Once upon a time Barney was thrown in jail for
breaking Vera’s arm, thinking she’d stolen the ring. Austin heard his old man
talking about it, saying
the whore woman got what she deserved
. Later
Austin found the ring sitting in the hangar bathroom, but he didn’t touch it.
He let Barney find it two days later, after Vera dropped the charges and he was
released. Two days later Vera borrowed Barney’s 38 revolver and decorated their
mauve and baby blue bedroom with her blood. The coroner’s report stated the
cause of death as ‘bleeding to death from a gunshot wound’. As fate would have
it, Vera’s right arm was the one Barney chose to test out the resilience of his
Louisville Slugger baseball bat. Being right handed, Vera had to switch to
using her left hand on account of the cast. Apparently Vera’s aim had been a
little off and rather than dying instantly, she’d slowly bled to death while Barney
was out celebrating his release.

Barney collected the twenty thousand dollar life
insurance check wearing a Cheshire Cat smile on his face. He’d given Austin an
extra five dollars that week. He’d treated Donny and some of the others to a week-long
drinking binge in Anchorage. Austin was left behind to fend for himself. He
welcomed the reprieve, all the while dreading when the old man would return,
knowing he’d be surlier than ever. Surliness meant extra beatings. As fate
went, at the end of that week Austin fell into the frigid water and died for
thirty-four seconds. In a way, looking back, his near death was the precise
moment he started living.  

Austin picked his way around the junk cluttering the
floor. Various owner’s manuals lay in a haphazard heap on top of a rusted metal
shelf. Barney knew each one inside and out, for despite his social shortcomings,
the man had been a genius when it came to fixing an airplane. Austin found an
old blanket and covered Barney’s body.

Out in the hanger he assessed the size and decided his
plane would fit. He shoved open the large doors to a pitch black night and the
lights inside the plane glowing like beacons. Time had gotten away from him,
but he wasn’t worried. He guided the plane into the hangar and shut the doors. Less
than a foot clearance remained, which was a foot more than needed.