UnWholly (17 page)

“Don’t you worry about a thing,” he tells the boy. “We are not barbarians.” It’s one of the lines he always uses. It conveys no real information to the boy but somehow comforts him. It’s calculated, like everything else about Divan.

The boy is taken away, a price is negotiated, and, as is his custom, Divan pays Nelson in cash from a money clip filled with countless bills. Then he claps Nelson on the back jovially. Nelson gets more respect as a parts pirate than he ever did from his superiors as a juvenile enforcement officer.

“I can always count on you to bring me what I need. Not all
my associates are so consistent. Now that the Juvenile Authority is offering rewards for AWOL Unwinds, I find fewer come my way.”

“Goddamn Cap-17 law,” Nelson says.

“Yes. Let’s hope it’s not a sign that society is slipping back to its old, less civilized ways.”

“Not a chance,” Nelson tells him. “People won’t go back there.”

He was just a child when the Unwind Accord was passed and the war ended—but it’s not the war that sticks in his mind from those days. It’s the fear of the ferals. With the failure of the public school system, the nation was overrun by teenagers out of work, out of school, and with nothing to do even before the war. In fact, that fear triggered the war more than anything else. One side claimed the ferals were created by the collapse of family values, while the other side claimed the ferals were a product of rigid beliefs that no longer met the world’s needs. Both sides were right. Both sides were wrong—but it didn’t matter when people were terrified to go into the streets at night from fear of their own kids.

“Unwinding didn’t just end the war,” Nelson points out to Divan. “It ripped out the weeds. Kept them from choking the rest of us out. Fear of the AWOLs will keep both of us in business.”

“I sincerely hope you’re right.” Divan opens his mouth as if to say more, but thinks better of it.

“Is there something you’re not telling me?”

“Nothing to trouble yourself with. Just rumors. We’ll talk more upon your next visit. And if you could, please keep in mind that I’m experiencing a shortage of girls. Ones with red hair in particular. Also umbers—either gender. And, of course, I’ll always pay a high price for ‘People of Chance.’ ”

“I’ll keep it in mind,” says Nelson, already scheming a way of fulfilling Divan’s request. He’d yet to capture a Native American kid, but one of these days those so-called “People of
Chance” would bust and leave Nelson with not just a winning hand, but an entire winning body.

As he drives back across the bridge and onto American soil, his spirits are high. If Divan has worries, they’re unfounded. Although Nelson has, in recent days, chosen the life of an outsider, he still feels he has a finger on the pulse of the times. With so much of the civilized world employing the practice of unwinding, how could anyone deny that it is a viable alternative for the troubled, the useless, and the unwanted? Like the ads say, “Unwinding isn’t just good medicine—it’s the right idea.”

It was the very rightness of the idea that made Nelson become a Juvey-cop to begin with. The knowledge that he would leave the world a cleaner, brighter place by dredging the dregs from the streets was what propelled him into the police academy. Eventually, though, his ideals were replaced by an abiding hatred for those marked for unwinding. They were all alike, these Unwinds; sucking valuable resources from those more deserving, and clinging to their pathetic individuality, rather than accepting peaceful division. They insisted on living lives no one else felt were worth the effort. As an officer of the law, the rules of conduct held him back—but as a parts pirate, he could take care of business much more effectively. So, as much as he blamed Connor Lassiter for ruining his life, perhaps the boy had done him a favor. Still, it is supremely satisfying to know that the Akron AWOL died an ignoble death at Happy Jack Harvest Camp. It gives Nelson hope that maybe there truly is justice in the universe.

A retired 787 arrives with only fourteen Whollies packed in empty beer barrels in the hold. Connor wonders if someone in
the resistance is just getting bored, or if the barrels were really the most inconspicuous way to ship them. The kids all exit the hold cramped and hunched from the ride, and Connor delivers his usual rallying speech, troubled by the diminishing number of kids in each arriving plane.

Then, after they’ve been brought to the IHOP jet for assessment, and to get them ready for life in the Graveyard, Connor returns with Trace to the 787. It’s the old Boeing Dreamliner, the first one of its kind to arrive at the Graveyard. It was once heralded as the salvation of the aviation industry, and it certainly served its purpose, but there’s always something newer, faster, and more fuel-efficient ready to take any jet’s place.

“She’s still impressive,” says Trace, as they walk through the passenger compartment, which is already sweltering in the Arizona sun. “A classical beauty.”

“You think you could fly this plane if you had to?” Connor asks him as they size up the Dreamliner.

Trace grins. “I’ve been flying Cessnas since I was sixteen, and military aircraft for a year before I joined the ADR, so yes, I could fly a commercial airliner. Hell, I could make it do loop-the-loops.”

“Good. You may need to do loops if we’re being targeted.”

Trace puzzles over this for a second, then grins. “Escape jet?”

“If we gut it, we can fit everyone in. Won’t be comfortable, but it’ll work.”

“I’ll research the specs and see if it can handle the weight.”

“We’ll gut the cabin, then have the front-office guys post it all for sale,” Connor tells him. “We’ll include the engine parts and the cockpit console on the sale list, but we won’t really dismantle any of the plane’s actual working parts.”

Trace gets it without having to be told. “So, to anyone keeping tabs on us, it’ll appear that the jet has totally gone to salvage, but we’ll know it’s still operational.”

“Exactly. Then we’ll tow it to the main aisle—make it seem like we’re using it as a dormitory jet.”

“Brilliant.”

“No,” says Connor, “desperate. Now, let’s get out of this thing before we fry.”

•   •   •

Trace drives Connor back to the main aisle from the runway. In addition to being head of security in the Graveyard, he’s Connor’s acting bodyguard and chauffeur. Not Connor’s idea, any more than the private jet and the blue camo, but it helped create that illusory leadership pedestal. From the beginning, though, Connor hated the idea of being set apart.

“Get used to it,” Risa told him. “You’re not just some random Unwind anymore; to these kids, you
are
the resistance. You need to project the image of someone in charge.” He wonders if she still feels that way, now that being in charge doesn’t leave enough room in his life to truly be there for her. He wonders if he should invent himself some illness just so he can visit her in the infirmary jet. Is that proper behavior for a leader?

“The Dreamliner is a good idea,” Trace says, bringing Connor back to the here and now. “But I know there are other things on your mind.”

“Always,” Connor tells him.

“I know you’re worried about the Juvies, and why they’re still leaving us alone.” Trace waits a moment, then adds, “I think I know why, but you’re not going to like it.”

“When have I ever liked anything about the Juvies?”

“It’s not about them as much as it’s about
you
.”

“I don’t follow.”

“You will.” They hit a bump, and Connor reflexively grabs onto the door. Trace makes no apologies for his driving. “See, Connor, the kids here, even though they’ve been legally made nonentities, that doesn’t make them worthless. They’re as valuable
as diamonds. Do you know why diamonds are so expensive?”

“I don’t know—because they’re rare?”

“No, they’re
not
rare. In fact, there are so many of them, they could be as cheap as the fake ones. But there’s this thing called the diamond consortium. All the owners of all the world’s diamond mines get together, and you know what they do? They hide their diamonds in this huge vault in this huge bank in Sweden or Switzerland or wherever. Thousands upon thousands of them. And hiding them creates the illusion that diamonds are rare, driving the prices through the roof.”

The Jeep hits another pothole, and this time Connor absorbs the impact without bracing himself. He follows Trace’s line of thought, beginning to worry about where it’s leading.

“So,” says Trace, “after the Cap-17 law passed, there was a shortage of Unwinds, right? The price for every kind of transplant doubled—tripled even. But people pay the price, because everyone’s used to getting the parts they want, when they want them. They’ll go without food, but they won’t go without their parts.”

“So what does that have to do with me?”

“You tell me.”

Connor considers what Trace had said, and the truth hits him. “We’re the vault! And as long as we pull AWOLs off the street, it keeps the price high. Is that what you’re saying?”

“Better that all those AWOLs are here, nice and safe, than caught by parts pirates and sold on the black market. That would just drive the price down.”

Connor thinks back to that day he was caught and hauled off to Happy Jack Harvest Camp. It had been a shock when the Juvey-cop interrogating him admitted that they knew all about the Graveyard but turned a blind eye, because going after the kids here wasn’t worth the effort.

But this is different.

This makes Connor a willing part of the system. To know that he actually plays into some unwinding consortium’s plan makes Connor feel dirty—worse than dirty.

And then, when the deeper revelation hits him, it’s like a knockout blow. The final punch that leaves him flat on the canvas.

“How long,” he asks Trace, “have you been working for the Juvies?”

Trace just drives the Jeep, keeping his eyes straight ahead, and doesn’t answer for at least ten seconds. Finally he says, “Don’t ask questions you don’t want the answer to.”

While World War II aircraft enjoy the privilege of permanent museum displays, Korean War fixed-wing aircraft are mostly unloved and forgotten. Since it was the first war to feature extensive use of helicopters, those are the aircraft that get all the attention.

There’s a sorry bomber from the Korean War that sits two aisles off the main aisle. The Admiral put it there, and although Connor has moved planes around it, Dolores, as she is called, never moves and is never opened. Her hatch has been retrofitted with a key lock, and Connor has the only key, which he wears around his neck like a latchkey child.

Dolores is the arsenal. She’s filled with the kind of weapons that troubled teens should not, under any circumstances, have access to. Unless of course they’re in uniform. The idea that the Graveyard would someday have to defend itself like the Warsaw Ghetto hung over the Admiral’s head, and now hangs over Connor’s. There’s not a day he doesn’t think about it—not a day he doesn’t finger that key around his neck like a
cross. Today, however, he visits Dolores for another reason—to defend the Graveyard not from attack, but from infiltration. Today he goes in to find himself a .22 caliber pistol and a cartridge of bullets.

Trace sleeps in a rusty old DC-3, overseeing the roughest, most troublesome kids. It’s an unofficial detention hall, with Trace as the unofficial guard. Since the old propeller plane has a nonfunctioning lavatory, its occupants have to use a portable that sits at the bottom of the gangway stairs. Its lock is broken. Connor broke it a few hours before.

After curfew he and two of the toughest Whollies he could scrounge up wait in the shadows of a neighboring plane, watching.

“Tell us again why we’re taking out Trace?”

“Shh!” Connor tells them, then whispers, “Because I say we are.”

Connor is the only one with a gun. It’s loaded. The goons are just backup, because he knows he can’t take Trace alone. The plan is to corner him, cuff him, and keep him as a sort of prisoner of war . . . but Connor has resolved that he’ll use the gun if it becomes necessary.

Never wield a weapon unless you’re willing to use it,
the Admiral once told him. If Connor is going to maintain order in this place, he has to go by the Admiral’s playbook.

Every twenty minutes or so, someone comes out to use the restroom. Trace isn’t one of them.

“Are we supposed to wait here all night?” complains the tough kid holding the cuffs.

“Yes, if we have to.” Connor begins to wonder if Trace’s
military training included superhuman bladder control, until Trace comes down a few minutes after midnight.

They wait until the door of the portable closes, and then they quietly approach with Connor in the lead. He puts the pistol in his right hand—Roland’s hand—feeling the coldness of its handle and firmness of its trigger. He takes the safety off, takes a deep breath, and then swings the door open.

Trace stands there, staring right at him, not caught off guard in the least. In a single move he kicks Connor’s legs out from under him, grabs the gun out of his hand, twists him around, and pushes him cheek-first into the dirt, wrenching Roland’s arm painfully behind his back. Connor can feel the seam of the graft threatening to tear loose.

With Connor in too much pain to move, Trace brings down the other two kids before they can run, leaving them unconscious in the dust. Then he returns his attention to Connor.

“First of all,” says Trace, “ambushing a man taking a dump is beneath you. Secondly, never take a deep breath before attacking someone, because it gives you away.”

Connor, still in pain, spins around to face him, and as he does, he feels the muzzle of the gun pressed to his forehead. Trace holds the gun to Connor’s head for a moment more, his face stern, then takes it away. “Don’t feel too bad,” Trace says. “I’m not just an air force boeuf, I was special ops. I could have killed you nine different ways before you hit the ground.” He ejects the clip—but as he does, Connor grabs Trace’s wrist, tugs him off balance, wrenches the gun from him, and aims it at Trace again as he gets to his feet.