[ WP ] You missed the last spaceship leaving earth

With the world growing ever unlivable and only a handful of rockets built, they did what seemed the most fair thing in an unfair situation. They picked survivors by lottery. 
 
 
 One by one they boarded the rockets, though sometimes a whole family was chosen in succession. I watched an elder couple board with their adult children, and adult grandchildren, some already bearing the next inheritors. I thought it odd how the people chosen first dressed so nicely for the occasion, unless they always dressed that way. The early ships had parades of men and women with painted and purchased beauty and finery. There were some early rumblings of bias, though the lottery reader assured us the process was fair, just before he read his own number and boarded. 
 
 
 I looked around and saw the crowd around me was exactly as they were before the lottery started. Not one man or woman had to move or make way for that first class of survivors. A new lottery man came to read. It was odd how many cosmetic surgeons boarded than any other. I had not thought there were so many. The reader pointed out the comparable parity of pediatricians to all the other occupations, and this quelled some uneasiness. 
 
 
 Round after round passed, separating the lucky from the unlucky. Some had simply gone home to die there, resigned to being left behind. Eventually some near me were selected. There were teary goodbyes to friends and family. Some were pushed away by their loved ones that they might live in names of those left behind. Some openly questioned the lottery now, but there was nothing to be done with so many ships already gone. I watched some laborers and technical men and women board the last, older rockets, far more of them to a ship now than the earlier ones. 
 
 
 Eventually the last number was called, and the reader took the last seat on the last ship. He did not even say goodbye to the billions of us who would be left behind. It was the most fair solution to an unfair situation. It was just more fair to some than others.
