Savage Drift

^{CHAPTER THIRTEEN} DEAN

Captain McKinley was driving a large military passenger-transport truck. A canvas cover was pulled taut over metal supports that arched overhead—sort of like a covered wagon. Two benches ran on either side.

We piled in the back.

“Hey,” he said to us through the open back window of the truck cab. “Any problems getting out?”

“No,” Niko told him.

He drove toward the base.

At any moment I expected, I don’t know, guards to fire or a cop car to come screaming out of the dark.

But it was a still, moonlit night. The wind picking up the autumn leaves a bit. Quiet.

Before he turned the corner to head to the base, McKinley stopped and typed a message into his minitab.

He got an immediate answer.

“I have a friend at the gate,” he told us.

He turned toward the base then, and waved at the guy on duty.

The guard patted the hood of the truck as McKinley slowed.

“Didn’t see you, man,” he told McKinley. “Didn’t see you at all. Carry on.”

“Thanks, Ty.” And we were on the base.

McKinley drove the truck right out onto the landing strip, where his huge helicopter waited for us.

This wasn’t the same machine that had rescued us from the Greenway. That one had been slick and state of the art. This was more like Army standard issue. No frills.

McKinley parked the truck with a screech of the brake.

“Now listen,” he said. “I’m going to open the side door. I want you to keep low and hustle right in. I’ve got two friends here—one was at the gate. The other’s working the tower. But there are people here who will stop us, if they see you. There are guards and there is brass, so be quick about it.”

He got out of the truck cab and went over and opened the door to the chopper.

We all scooted down toward the back of the truck, getting ready to dash.

“Let’s go,” we heard his voice.

We filed out onto the moonlit tarmac and ducked down, scurrying to the chopper.

Niko went first and his feet on the rungs sounded like gongs clanging.

I looked around, sure soldiers would have heard. No.

One by one we filed up into the chopper, where we were all just jammed inside. There was nowhere to go.

“Jeez, move in,” Jake whispered, pushing in behind me.

Heavy netting made out of thick bands of black nylon was strung from ceiling to floor and behind it boxes were stacked, nearly overflowing into the tiny amount of space we had. There were two jump seats that didn’t have boxes stacked in front of them—the seats were facing each other.

McKinley shut the door.

“Okay, good. We’re doing well,” McKinley said, climbing into the cockpit. He craned to look over his shoulder.

“Maybe not enough room back there, huh? Well, Jake, come up here, that’s first off.”

Jake carefully edged past us and stepped over the hand-shifters and levers in the cockpit. He got shotgun and didn’t even call it.

“Astrid gets one seat and one of you gets the other and the third has to sit on the floor,” McKinley called back.

“You take the seat,” Niko told me. “My legs are shorter anyway.”

“We can take turns if you like,” I said.

I buckled myself in.

Astrid put her legs to one side and I put mine to the other and Niko, somehow, found space for his butt between our feet. He sort of rested his head on my knees, as a joke.

“Comfy?” I asked him.

“More or less.”

Meanwhile, up in the cockpit, McKinley was radioing the tower.

“Delta-nine-bravo-seven, ready for takeoff…”

He paused, listening, tense.

Nothing.

“Repeat: delta-nine-bravo-seven ready for takeoff…”

Then a sound like a hand grabbing a microphone.

“What the hell is going on out there, McKinley? We have you DEPARTED at sixteen hundred hours!”

In the background was a voice, “Take it easy, Pete, I can explain.”

McKinley cursed out loud and hit the dashboard.

“Sorry, Pete,” McKinley said. “Got behind and Valdez was letting me slide.”

“What’s your cargo?”

McKinley shook his head, as if he was weighing options, none of which appealed.

“Should all be on the manifest, Pete.”

“What’s the mother-loving cargo, McKinley?”

McKinley sucked his teeth in frustration.

“Come see for yourself,” he said.

“Roger that, you scumbag,” this Pete said.

“Oh my God, what’s going to happen?” Astrid said.

“I don’t know,” McKinley snapped. “Some of the pilots have been smuggling black market stuff in.”

He tore off his headset and slid out the door.

Astrid held my hands.

“It’ll be okay,” I said. I hoped.

Moments later two figures approached the chopper. We could hear them arguing.

“I’m sick of you guys running scams left and right.”

“That’s not me, Pete. You know it’s not.”

“Yeah. This is different,” another voice said. “McKinley’s not into that crap.”

“What’s the cargo, McKinley?”

Suddenly the door swung open and there were three faces looking in at us.

It was easy to see which one was Pete. He was young, with a pronounced brow ridge and small eyes, set close together.

A fat, kindly-looking guy stood a ways back, hand on his hips.

“See that girl?” McKinley said. “She’s seventeen years old and six months pregnant and USAMRIID is going to take her for testing.”

“This is… this is big trouble, McKinley.” The guy was practically spitting, he was so shocked.

“It’s a two a.m. retrieval. I saw the order myself,” McKinley added. “They’re using a Blackhawk out of the Army side. They’re planning on taking this girl.”

“They have their reasons,” Pete sputtered. “This is court-martial, right here, is what this is!”

“You know what happened to McMahon and Tolliver,” the fat guy said. “Died in the line of fire? Two days after they took them to USAMRIID?”

He put his hand on Pete’s back.

“All we gotta do is nothin,’” he said. “McKinley left at four p.m., gilled up with cargo. No big deal.”

“Please,” Astrid said, her voice small and scared. “Captain McKinley is just helping us to get across the border.”

The guy looked at Astrid for a long, quiet beat.

He shut the door on us.

“I owe you, Pete,” McKinley said.

“Shut up. You’re not here,” came Pete’s voice, heading toward the tower.

The flight lasted three hours.

We couldn’t see out the window. It was cold, and a little hard to catch my breath.

But we crossed the border.

And all the while I couldn’t help wondering about what Captain McKinley had revealed. He had seen an order for Astrid’s removal?

Had they been coming for her?

Had we just gotten out in time?

In less than four hours we were landing at Lewis-McChord Air Force Base in Washington State.

“Are you going to be in trouble?” Astrid asked Captain McKinley as soon as he shut the motor. It had been impossibly loud—way too loud to talk.

“I don’t know,” he said.

“Was that true? What you said about them having a plan to take Astrid away?” I asked.

“Guys, this is not the time for questions. Right now, I have to get you out of this cab. A buddy of mine named Roufa is going to come. At least, I hope he is.”

McKinley took out his wallet.

“Assuming he does, give him this for his crew.” He pulled out five or six twenty dollar bills.

“No,” Niko said. “We have our own money. We’ll give it to him.”

“Are you sure?” McKinley asked.

“Yeah,” the rest of us chorused in.

“You’ve done enough for us already,” I added.

“All right then—that’s good—just stay here and don’t move.”

He removed his headset and climbed out of the cabin.

“Sweet ride, huh?” Jake said, grinning back at us. “I can’t believe we did it! We’re out!”

“I think my booty is iced to the floor,” Niko said, groaning.

Something about it was funny—the way he said it, and suddenly I started chuckling.

I put my hand over my mouth.

“Dean!” Astrid shushed me.

I couldn’t help it.

“It’s just,” I gasped. “The way you said ‘booty’!”

Astrid giggled, Jake guffawed, and then the three of us were laughing.

“Shut up, you guys!” Niko hissed, but he was smiling, too.

Then the door flipped open.

A pilot stood there, in full uniform. Almost impossibly tall, with a crew cut that was straight and had a hard edge, like a broom.

“You the Monument four-teenagers?” he asked us in a thick accent—New Orleans, I thought.

We blinked at him, and finally I answered, “Yes, sir.”

“Put these on. But don’t bother with the headgear,” he ordered, and threw in a duffel bag, which Niko caught. “Knock when you’re decent.”

He shut the door, and God help me, I almost burst into laughter again.

“Get it together, Dean,” Niko said.

It took me a couple deep breaths, laced with last chuckles, to get myself together.

Niko opened the duffel. Inside were four shrink-wrapped packages.

We ripped into them and discovered they were some kind of ultralight hazmat suits. They had four parts—a jumpsuit, a face mask, gloves, and a belt that held round cartridges.

Niko took one of the cartridges out of his belt. “An air filter!” he exclaimed.

The material of the jumpsuit was in a dark-brown-and-gray-camouflage pattern and was incredibly light—almost like silk.

The headpiece was really weird. It sort of looked like beekeeper headgear—with a large, clear visor and the rest of the head covered by the light material. But attached to the faceplate, on the inside, was a mouthpiece that you obviously would put in your mouth. On the outside of this mouthpiece, on the outside of the mask, was a slot for the round air filter to fit into.

The headpiece curled into the shape of a tube and there was an elastic holster on the thigh of the suit to hold the tube.

A little piece of paper fluttered out of each suit.

It showed a drawing of a soldier putting on the suit and then putting his boots on over the foot part of the jumper. There was copious writing in Japanese, but in English there were just two words: boot over.

On the other side it showed a soldier inserting a new cartridge into the face mask.

I was thinking about Japanese design ingenuity when Astrid asked:

“Why did he give these to us? I mean, is it for drifts? Are there drifts out there?!”

“Maybe it’s a kind of disguise,” Jake hypothesized.

“He said don’t worry about the headgear,” I said. “So Jake’s probably right.”

“Oooh, he said I’m right,” Jake lisped, mocking me.

Getting dressed in the tiny chamber, along with three other people, wasn’t easy.

When we were all geared up, and looking pretty ridiculous, I might add, Niko tapped on the door.

The giant pilot opened it up.

“Took y’all long enough,” he said. “Come on out.”

Niko must have looked timid, because he added, “Stand tall and proud. Confident. You’ve as much a right to be here as anyone else.”

He helped Niko down, then me, adding, “As least that’s what we want folks to think. My name’s Edward Francois Roufa, the third. But y’all can call me Roufa. Everyone does.”

Jake hopped down from the cockpit.

When Roufa took Astrid’s hand he gave her half a smile, “Pleasure to meet you, miss. Hank’s told me all ’bout you and the others.”

Roufa looked Astrid over in the suit.

“Nice and baggy, just like I hoped,” he said.

The protective suits were very loose, and because the material was so thin, they sort of bloused out. The belt was needed to keep the material close to the body, as well as hold the cartridges. Otherwise you’d be wearing a gauzy cloud.

There was lots of activity on the tarmac, even though it was the middle of the night now.

“Excuse me sir,” Astrid ventured. “We were wondering… about the suits…”

“Protocol, sweetie. Everyone here is required to keep one on at all times. Waste of money, if you ask me.”

Night crews were servicing helicopters around us.

I saw everyone had safety suits like ours. Most of them wore their safety suits tied off at the waist, instead of fully on, like us.

“This way,” Roufa said, ushering us toward a metal hangar. Just as we walked away, a jeep with a flatbed pulled up to the back of McKinley’s chopper. Two men went to the chopper and opened it, starting to inventory the boxes inside.

“Guess that timed out pretty well, considering,” Roufa quipped.

“Can you tell us where we’re going?” Niko asked. “Where you’re taking us?”

“I’m taking the four of you to Lackland Air Force Base. Believe it or not, I rearranged my schedule to fly at this godforsaken hour. Running a bunch of medical supplies and more of these fancy ki-mo-nos you’re wearing down to Lackland.”

Soldiers and workers passed us as we walked. One or two shot glances our way, but most were busy.

How many Air Force and Army personnel had stuck their necks out for us so far? Roufa made four. No, five if you counted Pete.

I hoped they were good at covering their tracks.

“Lackland in San Antonio?” Jake asked.

“The very same,” Roufa answered.

“San Antone is maybe three hours away from my mom’s place in La Porte!” Jake said.

“Well, that’s good, son. My advice is to get there, find yourself a good doctor, and hole up with your girl for a while,” Roufa said. “I guess we’re all pretty inspired by your story. McKinley told me what y’all did for his kids. I even saw your newspaper story. It’ll be nice to get you settled somewhere nice and cozy.”

“We’re headed to Pennsylvania,” Astrid said pointedly.

She gave me a smile.

I could’ve kissed her.

Jake rolled his eyes, pissed.

Roufa held up a hand. “Don’t tell me your plans; I’d rather not know ’em.”

We skirted a giant, truly gigantic hangar and went over to a row of parked vehicles.

Roufa got into a jeep and gave an underhanded wave, motioning for us all to get in.

“Hey!” came a voice. “Wait!”

It was Captain McKinley. He jogged over to the jeep.

“Roufa-man!” McKinley said. He was grinning. The two men hugged.

“I can’t thank you enough for this,” McKinley said.

“It’s nothin’ you wouldn’t do for me,” Roufa answered seriously. He clapped McKinley on the shoulder and gave him a shake. They were really good friends, it was easy to see.

“They’re asking questions inside. I gotta get back,” he told us. “Ed will get you safe to Texas. From there you’re on your own.”

Everyone chimed in thanking Captain McKinley and saying good-bye, but he still hadn’t answered my question.

He started to walk away, waving to us.

“Captain McKinley,” I said, raising my voice. “Before you go, did you really see Astrid slated for removal? Were they going to take her away?”

Captain McKinley walked back to us, the smile slowly fading from his face.

“I did, Dean. They were going to take her tonight. If you’d stayed, she’d be drugged and on her way to USAMRIID right now.”

“Oh,” Astrid said and gulped. “Oh.”

“Yeah. And… I couldn’t let that happen to Mommy Junior,” he said.

Captain McKinley’s voice was full of emotion.

He patted the jeep.

“Good-bye, you kids. Good luck!”

Between Alex’s nest egg, the cash Mrs. Dominguez had given us, Jake’s poker winnings, and Henry’s five dollars—we had a grand total of $418.

“How much do you think?” Niko asked us, counting off bills.

“Two hundred?” I said, unsure.

“One fifty,” Jake cut in. “Trust me, one fifty’s fine.”

We drove away from the large planes, onto an outlying tarmac.

We stopped in front of a large beige cargo plane.

“This is for the crew,” Niko said, holding out the little wad of cash.

“What? Well. That’s very kind of you. They’ll appreciate it.”

There definitely were plenty of crew members around.

Two workers were running checks on the engine. The tail of the plane was flipped up to reveal the cargo space inside and there was a ramp leading out of it.

Another guy drove a jeep up into the belly of the plane. The jeep was fitted with a big, strange contraption. Two huge tanks were hooked up to some kind of compressor. Hoses and cables were wrapped in loops, hanging off the side. Most of them led to a giant funnel that sat on top of the machine.

What the heck was it?

“You all head to the nose. There’s a gangplank there. My copilot will help you up. It’s a lady copilot. Leslie Fox. She’s nice.”

Roufa headed off toward the crew with our money.

We climbed out of the jeep and went over to the gangplank.

Captain Fox, a thin, pretty blond woman in her late thirties, maybe, got us seated in the cargo area. She seemed okay. Hardly said a word to us, just showed us into the cargo area from the open cockpit door.

There were four more of those jeeps inside the body of the plane. That’s how big it was.

There were jump seats on either wall of the plane. Most were folded up, but Fox folded them down.

The only thing Fox said was to Astrid.

“You need a special seat belt,” and she switched out a part of the harness on Astrid’s belt for one that wouldn’t cut across her belly.

“Try to get some sleep,” she told Astrid. Then she handed us all noise-blocking earphones.

And somehow, we did manage to sleep. At least I did.

“We’re here,” Roufa shouted over the engine’s thrum. He nudged us awake with his boot. “Landing soon, sleepyheads.”

I had drool on my shoulder. A big wet spot. I wiped it off.

Of course Jake saw me.

“Nice,” he mouthed.

I mouthed back a popular two-word curse phrase.

The landing was bumpy. Not like flying in a jet airliner at all.

The jeeps bounced on their shocks, jostling the strange contraptions they carried.

“When we land, I want you four to just get out and walk directly into the brush. You’ll see what I mean. Walk straight and you’ll come out on a street near government housing. Take your suits off then. Keep walking and you’ll find yourself in town.”

He turned to go back into the cockpit.

“Mr.… Captain Roufa!” I yelled.

He turned.

“Thanks! Thanks for taking us.”

My friends added their own words of thanks and he nodded.

“Keep those suits handy,” he told us sarcastically. “There’s rumors of drifts.”

Fox opened the door and let down the folding ladder that served as the gangplank.

The sky was light gray, shot through with thin, wafting peachy-colored clouds.

The plane was still far out on the tarmac, engines running. I saw Roufa meant to proceed taxiing down the runway to the base. He was letting us off so we could disappear into the brush.

I took Astrid’s hand.

Niko went first, then Jake, then us.

We went down the ladder and darted across the tarmac into the tall weeds at the edge of the runway.

Fox pulled up on the folding stepway and it disappeared into the plane. She gave us a wave. The door shut and the plane moved slowly toward Lackland AFB.

Our feet crunched over grass and twigs, branches grabbing at our safety suits. The weeds were gold colored, all dried up, and there were larger bushes, too, also desiccated.

Around us the plumage of the grasses started glowing as the sunrise spread up, filling the sky, and I realized that the feeling in my heart was joy. Joy at being free and living in the beautiful, wild world.

We went through a mile or so of grass.

“I can’t believe it,” Astrid said, squeezing my hand. “We did it.”

I was worried about her keeping up, but she seemed fine. She was smiling and much happier than she’d been in a long time.

“Captain Roufa was something, wasn’t he?” Jake said.

“Roufa-man!” Niko exclaimed, repeating McKinley’s nickname.

Niko was grinning.

Niko wasn’t a smiley guy, per se. But even back at the Greenway, he’d had moments of relaxing and hanging out with us.

I remembered once he’d made up a story about a girlfriend he had. An older girl who went to college.

He had dropped her—I’d never heard him mention her again. But he sure wasn’t that way with Josie. It was clear to me that he loved her. He was devoted to her, no question. Here he was risking his life to rescue her.

“Is anyone hungry?” Astrid asked. “I’m starving.”

“Mommy Junior needs some chow, people!” Jake announced. “Lord, do you think diners are running like normal? What I’d give for a short stack and a side of bacon extra crispy!”

“Mmmmmm,” Astrid moaned.

“Make mine a Belgian waffle with strawberries—fresh strawberries and real maple syrup!” Niko said.

“You know what I’d like,” I added. “A Spanish omelet!”

“Spanish omelet,” Jake mocked me. “You can have anything in the world and you want a Spanish omelet?”

“Obviously you’ve never had a Spanish omelet,” I answered.

“Please nobody say Spanish omelet again,” Astrid said. “The idea of eggs makes me want to hurl.”

We could see cars zipping by on the road.

“Can we take our suits off already?” Jake asked.

“Yeah,” Niko said. “I mean, you should. I might just keep mine on. Just in case.”

This was telling. Niko believed the drifts might be out there and was willing to keep the blousy safety suit on just in case. I didn’t blame him—if he was exposed to the compounds for more than a few seconds, he’d blister up. If he was exposed for more than a minute, he’d be dead meat.

We changed quickly. The suits being so big actually helped getting in and out of them quickly. Once I took it off my shoulders, I just kind of stood there and the whole thing ballooned down, settling around my feet.

The suits did not take up much room in our packs, thankfully. I packed Astrid’s and mine into my backpack, setting the masks, which were the most bulky parts, right on top. They were right there, if we needed them.

We reached the road. There was a Denny’s sitting down a ways.

“Denny’s!” Jake yelled. He whooped. “We made it back to the real world!”

We ambled toward the cheery signage and bright, squat building.

“God,” I said. “What’s it gonna be like?”

“What do you mean?” Astrid asked. She slipped her hand in mine. I shrugged.

“Denny’s after the fall.”