Together Una and Lev go down to the shoreline to confirm that Hennessey is dead. Then they bring his broken body to the water, turn him facedown, and push him off to be carried away by the current.
“At least we still have Fretwell,” says Lev. “That will be enough.”
“Enough for you to win over the Arápache people,” Una agrees, “but is it enough to get the Tribal Council to take a stand against unwinding?”
“It’ll get them to listen to me,” Lev says. “Then it’s up to me to convince them.”
In spite of the fact that they did no killing today, they both have blood on their hands from dragging Hennessey’s body to the water. They wash their hands in the river as best they can.
“C’mon, we’d better get back to Fretwell,” says Lev. “I tied him up, but we should be on our way back to the Rez with him before his tranqs wear off.”
Before they leave, Una takes one last look at the jagged boulder that claimed Hennessey’s life. How mystical, and how perfect the universe is! That boulder was shorn from a mountain by a glacier maybe a hundred thousand years ago, and then carefully deposited here with patient intent, waiting all these years to break that criminal’s spine in two. All things have a purpose. That’s something both she and Lev can take comfort in.
13 • Hayden
Hayden Upchurch watches it grow like a cancer clinging to the walls of the decaying power plant: Starkey’s lethal crusade. It’s ugly and toxic, and it won’t stop devouring all the good that’s left in these kids until there’s none left. Starkey will drag his Stork Brigade through his bloody war front until they are either dead from bullets taken in battle, or dead on the inside from the things they’ve seen and done. Hayden knows that these harvest camp attacks are pointless. The consequence of Starkey’s war on unwinding will not be the glorious vindication of AWOLs and storks, but instead their damnation.
“This is Radio Free Hayden podcasting from somewhere dark and dingy that smells of ancient grease and more recent body odor. If anyone actually hears this podcast, I must first apologize that there’s no visual of me. My bandwidth is the digital equivalent of a mule train. So instead, I’ve posted this wonderful Norman Rockwell image instead of a video. You’ll note how the poor innocent ginger kid standing on the chair with his butt hanging out is about to be tranq’d in the ass by the ‘kindly country doctor.’ I felt the image was somehow appropriate.”
Rumor is that Starkey’s benefactors will be supplying clappers for the next harvest camp attack. Will there be anyone left not terrified of kids like them once Starkey is done? Starkey wants that terror—he thrives on it. Yet how could he not realize that the many who might have once been sympathetic to the cause are now turning to the Juvenile Authority for an answer to the violence. The Juvies have an answer, all right: the blessed peace of division. The eternal rest of unwinding. That will be Mason Starkey’s legacy—an end to resistance, an end to rebellion, the absolute silencing of the last generation that could derail the hellish train civilization has boarded.
“I’m sure you’ve seen my brilliant and heartfelt call for a new teen uprising. I have to admit that heatstroke and dehydration from hours trapped in a sweltering World War II bomber turned me into quite the prophet. I’m sure my parents must be proud. Or horrified. Or are bitterly arguing about whether they’re proud or horrified, and have already hired lawyers to resolve the dispute.”
Hayden’s entire recording is in a whisper that sounds much more desperate than he wants it to sound, but he must be quiet. He can only sneak access to Starkey’s “computer center” in the middle of the night. It’s off in a room in the corner of the power plant, but there’s no door, so it’s open to the rest of the plant. He can hear the snoring of the kids, which means any of them who are awake could hear him if he speaks too loudly.
“What did I mean in my rant of solidarity? Well, there are uprisings and there are uprisings. I want to make it perfectly clear about the kind I’m talking about. I am NOT advocating taking the law into our own hands and blowing people away, burning various and sundry vehicles, and being the kind of pissed-off ‘incorrigibles’ who make society think that, yeah, maybe unwinding is a good idea. There are certain people—and I’m not naming names—who think that violence furthers our cause. It doesn’t. I’m also not calling for a flower-child sit-in, or a Gandhi-like hunger strike. Passive resistance only works if the truck’s not willing to run you over—and this truck is. What we need is something in between. We need to be loud enough and forceful enough to be heard—but sane enough that people will listen. The Juvenile Authority would like us to believe that we have no support—but that’s a lie. Even the polls show that the various unwind-related propositions and initiatives on this year’s ballots, as well as the bills slithering through Capitol Hill, are far more marginal than the Juvies will admit. But violence will tip the scale against us.”
Once he puts this podcast out there, there will be no turning back. No changing his mind. He will have shown his hand. Starkey could very well find out. He probably will, and pretty quickly, too. Will Starkey kill him for it, he wonders?
“So whether you’re a stork, or an AWOL, or a kid frightened for your own future—or an adult scared for your kids’ futures—we DO have an opportunity to deal unwinding a mortal blow. We just have to figure out how to do it. I wish I knew the answer, but I’m not brilliant enough to figure it out on my own. So I’m putting the call out to you. Any of you. All of you. What do YOU think we should do? Contact me at [email protected] with your own brilliance. All ideas will be considered. Even the stupid ones. This is Hayden Upchurch signing off. Stay sane, and stay whole.”
His finger hovers over the “send” button, and hovers some more. He can’t seem to make his finger move, and he marvels at how one’s entire life can come down to the pressing of a single button.
Then Hayden hears a noise. Something shuffling behind him, and he spins in his chair.
A rat—please, God, let it be a rat!
But it’s no rat. It’s Jeevan.
Hayden’s heart misses a beat, then compensates with a powerful pump that he can feel pulse through his neck and into his eyeballs.
“Up late, Jeevan?” He tries to be nonchalant, but the kid’s not buying it. Jeevan, at only fifteen, is Starkey’s technology wunderkind—but back in the Graveyard, he used to do his magic for Hayden. So to whom is he more loyal? Hayden knows that Jeevan has been giving Starkey less than his best—working much less efficiently and skillfully than Hayden knows he can. It’s a form of resistance, but being resistant and turning against the “Stork Lord” are two different things.
“I heard it,” Jeevan says, taking a few steps closer. “I heard all of it.”
Hayden takes a slow silent breath before he speaks. No point in mincing words now. “Are you going to tell Starkey?”
Jeevan doesn’t answer. Instead he says, “We’re going the day after tomorrow, did you know? The next harvest camp attack. There are kids betting on how many of us will get killed this time. Whoever gets closest to the actual death count wins. Unless they’re one of the ones killed, of course. Then it goes to the next closest who actually survived.”
“Did you bet?”
Jeevan shakes his head. “No. Because if I’m right, I’ll somehow feel I was partially responsible.” For a moment Jeevan seems much younger than fifteen. And much older at the same time. “Do you think that’s stupid?”
“If it is, Jeeves, it’s outweighed by a far greater stupidity than yours.”
They both look at the computer screen and the Norman Rockwell image that seems simultaneously innocent and sinister. “The Juvies will find that podcast, you know,” says Jeevan. “They won’t be able to trace it, but they’ll take it down before it has the chance to spread.”
“I know,” says Hayden. “But if just a handful of people hear it, I’ll be happy.”
“No, you won’t. You want everyone to hear it. It’s just not going to happen, thoug
h.” Jeevan shivers a bit, and holds his arms. Only now does Hayden realize how cold the night has gotten. “You need to find a way to make it kill-proof,” Jeevan says. “You know, make it reproduce and shift locations on the web so that they can’t take it down.”
“Kind of like digital Whac-a-Mole.”
Jeevan takes a moment to process that. “Oh yeah, right. Whac-a-Mole. Funny.”
“So . . . can you make that happen?”
“Maybe. Or maybe you need to do an old-fashioned radio broadcast. They can’t shut that down until it’s already out there.”
The idea of a real broadcast is appealing to Hayden. The trick would be getting a signal that’s far-reaching enough.
“You haven’t uploaded it yet,” Jeevan says.
Hayden shrugs. “Yeah, well, follow-through has always been my weak point.”
Jeevan looks at the screen. Hayden is usually good at knowing what people are thinking, but tonight, he has no clue what’s in Jeevan’s head. Well, whatever he’s thinking, it must resonate with Hayden’s thoughts, because Jeevan reaches out and does what was so hard for Hayden. He clicks on “send.”
They both watch in silence as the podcast uploads. In a few moments it’s done. A click of a button to change the world, or end his life, or both.
14 • Groundskeeper
A gardener by trade, he took the job because it was a job. The pay was decent, there were good benefits, and it included room and board. “You’d be an idiot to turn it down,” his wife had told him. “So what if it’s at a harvest camp? I won’t mind living there if you won’t.”
Without a degree in horticulture, a steady job at a well-funded institution was probably the best he could hope for.
“And anyway,” as his wife had pointed out, “it’s not like you’re unwinding anyone.”
That’s true enough. In his five years working at Horse Creek Harvest Camp, he’s had very little contact with the kids. The camp is too regimented for that. The Unwinds are always being efficiently shuttled from one activity to another. Sports activities to gauge their physical prowess and to build muscle mass so their parts will be more valuable. Intellectual and creative endeavors designed to measure, and improve upon, their mental skills. The Unwinds of Horse Creek are kept far too busy to notice a gardener.
The tithes, who have a little more freedom, will talk to him on occasion. “What kind of flowers are those?” they’ll ask, their bright innocence in stark contrast to the other Unwinds whose desperation radiates from them like a toxic field. “They’re pretty—did you plant them all yourself?” He’ll always answer politely, but rarely will he look at them, because he knows their fate, even if it’s a fate they accept. It’s his own personal superstition: Don’t look into the eyes of the doomed.
He’s not the only gardener, but his skill and success with planting has earned him the distinction of head groundskeeper. Now he gets to pick and choose his tasks, and assign work to others. He takes care of the heavier planting: new trees and hedges, and the design of the larger, more impressive flower beds. He loves to plant those himself. The largest of these is right in front of the place the kids call the Chop Shop. He’s particularly proud of this year’s fall theme: pumpkins growing within the swirling colors of toad lilies, monkhood, and other autumn-blooming flowers.
“You should be proud of what you do,” his wife tells him. “Your flower beds are the last bit of nature these kids will see before they’re divided. It’s your gift to them.”
For this reason he takes great care to place every growing thing in the Chop Shop flower bed personally.
He’s troubled by the recent added security measures and the influx of “protective personnel.” These new guards are not just the typical camp security staff, but tactical teams supplied by the Juvenile Authority. They carry assault weapons and wear thick, bulletproof clothing. It’s all very intimidating. He’s heard of the recent attacks on harvest camps, but there are so many camps, and the others that were attacked are far away. What are the chances that their little camp in rural Oklahoma will be singled out of all the harvest camps for a Stork Brigade attack? As far as he’s concerned, this paranoid security serves only to make everyone worried for no good reason.
He’s with a coworker, shaping a dragon topiary, when the attack comes, destroying the tranquility of a bucolic day. He doesn’t see the first explosion—and he feels it more than hears it. It comes as a shock wave that, had he not been kneeling behind the topiary, would have knocked him over backward. A chunk of concrete the size of a basketball tears a hole in the heart of the dragon, but not before tearing through his coworker. The groundskeeper throws himself to the ground, splattered with the blood of his dead comrade, and when he looks up, he sees that the administration building is gone. All that remains are jagged fragments of walls. Pieces of the building are still coming down all around the grounds of the camp.
Staff and Unwinds alike all run from the scene in a panic. A second blast takes out a guard tower designed to look like a rustic windmill. Shredded timber tears through everything and everyone in its way, and from behind it, where a steel-reinforced fence used to be, floods an army of kids wielding weapons the groundskeeper has never seen the likes of before. The air is now filled with the blam-blam-blam of repeating rifles, the earsplitting rat-tat-tat-tat of machine guns, and the mournful shriek of a shoulder-mounted rocket launcher delivering its deadly payload to the staff quarters. The rocket crashes through a corner window of a second-floor apartment—the nice one overlooking the gardens—and an instant later, all the windows of the building blow out in a fireball from the explosion within.
He suppresses a scream, hunkering down in the dense ivy at the base of the topiary. He knows if he’s spotted he’s a dead man—he knows if anyone happens to spray their weapon in his general direction, he’ll be dead as well. All he can do is lie low, belly to the ground, trying to disappear into the greenery he so painstakingly planted.
The Juvenile Authority’s SWAT team, for all their training and weaponry, are ill prepared for an assault of this magnitude. They raise their ballistic shields and try to advance on the marauding throng of kids, taking some of them down, but not many. Then, from out of the crowd of kids races a single unarmed girl running toward them with her hands up.
“Help me, help me! Don’t shoot!” she cries.
The SWAT team holds their fire as she approaches, ready to shield her, and save her from the crossfire. Then, as she nears them, she swings her hands together.
The instant her hands touch, she’s gone.
The explosion is so powerful it sends the entire SWAT team flying like bowling pins, their bodies twisting and burning in the air.
Another unarmed kid, frail but determined, hurls himself, arms wide, at the side of the SWAT team’s armored truck, and as soon as he connects with it, the explosion tears the truck in two, sending half of it cannoning through the front gate and the other half tearing through the Chop Shop garden.
“They’ve got clappers!” someone yells. “My God, they’ve got clappers!”
And now the groundskeeper knows this is about more than just freeing the Unwinds here. This is about exacting pounds of flesh from all those complicit in unwinding. There will be no mercy for him if he is caught. Never mind that all he did was beautify the grounds. You watched hundreds of kids taken into the Chop Shop, and you did nothing, the Stork Brigade will tell him. You dined with the men and women who held the scalpels and you did nothing, they will say. You took a place of nightmares and hid it behind flowers, and his only defense will be, I was just doing my job. For that, they will gun him down, or blow him to bits, or kick out the chair from under him. And all because he did nothing.
Don’t move, you fool, he knows his wife would tell him. Play dead until it’s all over. But he knows she won’t be telling him anything anymore. Because one of the perks of being the head groundskeeper is getting that corner apartment on the second floor of the staff house. The nice one overlooking
the gardens.
15 • Jeevan
“You need to see it, Jeevan. You need to be a part of it. As a member of the Stork Brigade, you have to share in the fight so you’ll truly feel the power of what we’re doing. So you’ll get the importance of it.”
This is how Starkey couched the news that Jeevan was to be a foot soldier in the attack on Horse Creek Harvest Camp. “Until now you’ve just been behind the scenes, in the background. But today you become a warrior, Jeevan. Today is your day.”
“Yes, sir,” was Jeevan’s response, as was always his response to Starkey.
But when the first rocket takes out the administration building, and the storks around him begin firing their weapons at anything that moves in the smoke, Jeevan knows that he should never have allowed himself to be here. There are kids around him who are bloated by the power of their weapons, turned maniacal by Starkey’s skillful stroking of their most violent sides. There are also those who hold their weapons reluctantly, knowing that this couldn’t be right, no matter how wrong unwinding is—but they are swept along in the powerful current and don’t know how to resist.
None of these other kids have been as close to Starkey as Jeevan has been. None of them have been part of the planning, or have witnessed his temper tantrums, or have seen behind the curtain of his eyes to know the show that goes on behind the show.
Starkey believes he is invincible. He believes he is more than just destined for greatness, but that greatness is owed to him, and every one of these “victories” makes him believe it more and more. The Stork Lord. Hayden’s epithet is more on-target then even he realizes, for Starkey truly does see himself as royalty reaching for divinity. A chosen one with the pride and privilege of a god.
When you believe in yourself that strongly, it attracts the belief of others. The more storks believe in Starkey, the more they want to, and the more fervent that belief becomes. Jeevan was one of those. He would have died for Starkey in those first days. Now he finally realizes the blindness of that faith, just in time for him to actually die for it.
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