UnBound

by Neal Shusterman

  “So, can you say anything more than ‘Yes, Dr. Rodín’?”

  “My English getting better,” Kunal says.

  Colton looks down at the hands connected to his ankles. He wears fingerless leather gloves on them.

  “Were you a volunteer?”

  Kunal doesn’t answer him.

  “Are you happy with . . . with what he made you?”

  Kunal stops and takes a good look at Colton, and while Colton tries to read his emotions, he can’t. He’s not sure if Kunal is friend or foe. Has the doctor really won him over?

  “My brain, my body still here,” Kunal says. “Better that than no.”

  “Agreed—but that doesn’t answer my question.”

  “No understand you.”

  “I think you do.”

  They reach the back of the large courtyard—a place where the strange sounds fade away—and Kunal opens a warped wooden door with an old-fashioned key on his bulky, jangling key ring. The room itself, as the doctor had promised, looks far more comfortable than the crowded cell he had been in. Only the best for a volunteer.

  “You here,” Kunal says. “Maybe doctor come bring lunch. Maybe I come. Maybe nobody come.” Colton glances out at the tree again, which rustles in the breeze.

  “Have you climbed all the way to the top?” Colton asks. “Have you tried? I’ll bet you could.”

  “I no talk no more.”

  Kunal locks him in and hobbles off, but an hour later Colton sees him through the small window of his room, swinging through highest branches of the huge tree.

  • • •

  Late in the afternoon of that first day Rodín has Colton brought to his office on the second floor, away from the sounds coming from the many rooms below. They discuss Colton’s future.

  “Such a spectrum of possibilities, yes?” The doctor says, brightly.

  Colton can’t keep his knee from bouncing. That’s all right. He forces all his anxiety into that knee so that it doesn’t show anywhere else.

  “I have a shipment coming in next week,” Rodín tells him. “The wings of a wandering albatross—three-point-five-meter wingspan—the largest in the world. They’ve been infused with human DNA, to overcome cross-species tissue rejection.”

  Colton just nods, keeping his jaws clamped tightly closed, because if he doesn’t, he might scream. The doctor takes his silence for thoughtfulness.

  “You must be imagining what it would be like to fly, yes?” Then the doctor glances down at Colton’s lower half. “Of course human legs are far too heavy for flight—but legs were made for walking. What need for them if you can fly?”

  Colton tries to hold on to the first thing Rodín said. Next week. If this is to be his fate, it won’t happen until next week. By then maybe he can find that tunnel and be out of here.

  “But perhaps we should think about highlighting those hazel eyes of yours. Eyes are lost in one’s face, do you not think? But imagine them in the palms of your hands. How much more useful they would be!”

  “Are those my choices?” Colton finally asks. “Eyes in my hands or albatross wings?”

  Rodín frowns. “Do you have something better? Something you dream you could be? Something the human body cannot do in its natural, inferior form?”

  Colton takes a deep breath. What possible variation of awful could he propose? Something that would keep most of him intact? But more important, something that would take a long, long time to prepare.

  He imagines the albatross wings, which leads him to think of a Pegasus, which leads him to think of—

  “Centaur.” He cannot believe he’s even considering it, much less saying it out loud.

  The doctor laughs. “You reach for the stars, yes? Centaurus, the brightest constellation in the southern sky. Like me, you are enamored with the mythological. This I can respect.” The doctor taps his chin thoughtfully. “I’ve thought of it before, of course, but such an endeavor is fraught with complications. The spine must bend at a sharp angle; the central nervous system must be effectively fused—and the operation itself? Risky. Very risky.” He looks at Colton a moment more, then he slaps the table. “But if you’re up for the challenge, then so am I!”

  He rises, full of excitement, and Colton begins to laugh. He finds none of this funny, and yet still he laughs and doesn’t know why. The doctor takes his laughter as a sign of some sort of connection.

  “We shall find a horse of the proper size. Chestnut, I think—to match your hair. It will take several weeks to infuse human DNA.”

  Several weeks. That was the reprieve Colton was hoping for! Colton is ready to congratulate himself on his own cleverness, until Rodín says:

  “But first we must give you a larger heart. I’ll make that this week’s priority.”

  “What?”

  “You can’t expect a mere human heart to pump all the way to your hindquarters.”

  “No—but . . . but won’t you need time to infuse it with human DNA too?”

  “Usually yes—but I happen to have the heart of a bull already prepared. I had plans to make a pair of minotaurs to stand on either side of the palace entrance—but that can wait; this is so much more exciting.” Rodín claps his hands in delight. “What a wonder we will create!”

  Dizzy now, Colton holds on tightly to his chair, praying he can get off this ride before its terrible conclusion.

  4 • Kunal

  The bed this boy has made for himself is worse than any the doctor could have devised. Kunal thinks his mind must be broken, like that poor Russian girl. Or maybe he truly does fancy himself as the makings of mythology.

  The first procedure—the heart transplant—is scheduled for Friday, just three days after his arrival at the Green Manor. The boy’s heart will be sold on the black market, and in its place will be a beef heart more than twice its size.

  Kunal is there as the doctor has his second conversation with the boy. The preoperative discussion. “Of course we’ll have to enlarge your chest a bit,” Dr. Rodín casually tells him, “but that’s simple enough.”

  Kunal watches Colton, but he shows no hint of a reaction. How could he not be terrified? Kunal was terrified when he was the focus of the doctor’s attention—but then Kunal didn’t volunteer. He was selected.

  Perhaps that’s why this American boy is treated differently from the others.

  “You will lock him in his room at night, but allow him to move about the manor during the day,” Rodín instructs Kunal. “But keep a close eye on him. Escort him wherever he goes.”

  “Why, Dr. Rodín?” Kunal dares to ask. “Why he get no chains?”

  The doctor looks at him, affronted. “You question me?”

  “Only to understand.”

  Rodín sighs. “This boy will most certainly die. If not after this procedure, then after the next. Progress cannot be made without the experiments that fail, no? But I admire this boy’s bravery. The least I could do is allow him his humanity for a day or two.”

  Kunal does not like the idea that he is now the valet to some spoiled American kid—but knowing what he’s in for softens Kunal’s judgment just a bit.

  The next morning Kunal gives Colton the grand tour of the Green Manor—or at least the places that Kunal is allowed to go. The library full of mildewing books. The shrine—for before men resided in this place, the gods did. And the veranda, which looks out over an electrified fence to the jungle and Thailand in the east—its border barely a kilometer away, so tantalizingly close.

  There are, of course, guards all over the grounds, and although they grip their weapons tighter when they see Colton, they know that he is not to be touched. Not until he’s touched by the doctor’s scalpel.

  Kunal makes the mistake of bringing Colton near the north wing. And the sounds make Colton stop in his tracks. They are different from the sounds in the front sections of the manor. Those are merely sounds of the aftermath. Ruined beings scrabbling and babbling, trying to comprehend their fun-house existence. But in the nor
th wing—these are the sounds of souls in transition. The hollow howls of purgatory.

  In spite of Kunal’s attempts to direct Colton away from the north wing, the boy moves toward a heavily bolted double door, beyond which they can hear muffled moans and weakened wails. Rodín’s own Gates of Hell.

  “Recovery room,” Kunal reluctantly tells Colton. “Some live; some die. Some worse than die. You no want here. You be here soon enough.”

  Kunal grabs his arm to pull him away, but Colton shakes him off.

  “Shhh.”

  Kunal looks around to make sure there are no guards observing them, for the doctor does not like Kunal to linger by the north wing. Then they hear within the chorus of groans a single voice begging for help. English. Australian accent.

  “Your friend,” Kunal says. “He survive. So far.”

  “What did Rodín do to him?”

  “Don’t know yet. Will know when he gets out.”

  It’s as they’re walking away from the recovery room that Kunal catches something in Colton’s eye. Something more than an acquiescence to Rodín’s experimental plans. Something rebellious. Perhaps, Kunal thinks, there is more to this American boy after all.

  5 • Colton

  All of Colton’s hope now lies in a tunnel that may not exist. The tree in the center of the grand courtyard remains the center of Colton’s attention. He circles around it again and again, trying not to look suspicious. The roots are as heavy and as gnarled as the limbs. If there was ever a well here, it has been destroyed by the tree’s relentless growth.

  “You want climb?” Kunal asks him. “Better to climb now. Won’t be able to later. Either you dead, or you a horse. Climb now. I show you.”

  One thing about Kunal, he doesn’t mince what few English words he knows. Colton looks up at the tree and shakes his head. “Rodín won’t be too happy with you if I break my neck.”

  “I help,” Kunal says. “Come.”

  It seems Kunal’s only joy is his newfound ability to climb this tree, and Colton thinks how amazing it is that humans can adapt to whatever is thrown at them. If Colton survived, will he be able to adapt? He’s not ready to imagine what life for him might be like if his unthinkable operation is successful.

  As they approach the tree, Colton sees a small hole between two large roots, no larger than a fist. Colton kneels down to inspect it.

  “Bad there,” Kunal says. “Pythons.”

  “I thought Burmese pythons live in trees, not under them.”

  Kunal shrugs. “Rats, then. Big. Many big things in Burma.”

  Still, Colton kicks at the hole, and some dirt falls in, making the hole a little bit bigger. He smiles and looks up at Kunal, who has already begun to climb, and joins him in the lowest branches of the tree. Immediately a guard comes over to shout him down, because while Kunal is allowed to climb, Colton is not—but that’s all right. Colton climbs down, salutes the guard, and heads back to his room, knowing all he needs to know.

  • • •

  Colton realizes that if he’s going to escape he needs someone with access. An inside accomplice. So that night when Kunal brings dinner, Colton risks it all.

  “Kunal, what if I told you that there’s a way you can escape from this place?”

  Kunal only laughs. “I say you crazy.”

  “That hole beneath the tree is more than a rat hole. It’s a tunnel. I’m pretty sure it leads out into the jungle—maybe even over the border into Thailand.”

  That gives Kunal pause for thought.

  “Do you want to leave here, Kunal? Think about it!”

  Kunal’s eyes begin to moisten. “What for me out there?”

  “Whatever it is, it’s better than what you have here. You don’t have to be the doctor’s trained monkey.”

  Kunal backs away angrily, and Colton knows that was the wrong thing to say.

  “I bring you breakfast at seven. You no talk to me; I no talk to you.” And he quickly leaves, his key chain jangling as he hobbles off.

  6 • Kunal

  The American boy is crazy. This proves it. And yet Kunal can’t get Colton’s voice out of his mind. You don’t have to be the doctor’s trained monkey. That’s all he is, isn’t he? A pet. An animal that the doctor can teach to do tricks for his amusement. Climb trees. Speak English.

  That night Kunal ices his aching ankles as he always does, but later, after all but the night guards are asleep, he leaves his upstairs room. Stealthily he creeps along the balcony that circles the courtyard to the spot where the tree’s heavy branches come close to the building. Then he leaps into it, shimmying down in silence until he reaches the base. To the guards on patrol the tree is a blind spot. Their attention is on the gates, the doors, the barriers that either keep people in or keep people out.

  Ignoring his fear of what might be down there, Kunal scrapes at the dirt around the hole between the roots, using all four of his hands, until he creates an opening more than a foot wide. He can’t see down into the darkness. He drops a stone in. It takes at least a second before he hears it strike bottom. Colton is right; this is more than just a hole. Quickly he covers it with leaves and twigs. No one must know about this. The doctor has many secrets. Now Kunal has one too.

  • • •

  In the morning Sonthi arrives with three AWOLs: Colton’s two remaining roommates and a girl with tattoos who Kunal has not seen before.

  Kunal hurries to the doctor’s side, knowing it is the best place to be when something happens that’s not on the schedule. Were he anywhere else, and the doctor called for him, he’d take out his wrath on Kunal, rather than just order him about.

  “She wishes to see her sister,” Sonthi says with a wide grin. “I thought it was time.”

  The doctor scowls. “Since when is it your job to think?”

  Sonthi takes the rebuke in a simmering silence. Kunal knows he despises the doctor, but this is the doctor’s camp, and in the Dah Zey disrespect to a superior is punishable by death.

  Then the girl shouts, “You bastards broke your bargain with me! Now I’m going to be unwound, and my sister is still a prisoner. The least you can do is let me say good-bye.”

  The doctor ignores her. “And what about these other two?”

  Sonthi shrugs. “They insisted on coming with her. I told them if they come they won’t be coming back. So I guess you have two new volunteers.”

  7 • Colton

  Colton hears the commotion at the gate, and through his small bedroom window he sees Karissa and the others with Sonthi. Right on schedule. The doctor isn’t pleased, and Kunal seems anxious, shifting his weight from one hand to the other. Colton leaves his room, which Kunal unlocked earlier today, and hurries over.

  “So I guess you have two new volunteers,” he hears Sonthi say.

  “I don’t need volunteers today,” the doctor says, and waves his hand dismissively. “Take them out of here. Their insolence should be rewarded with unwinding.”

  The guards grab all three of them, but just then Kunal spots Colton approaching and meets his gaze.

  What Kunal does next changes everything.

  Colton watches as Kunal reaches down and jangles his keys ever so slightly, then gives Colton a nod. That nod says, I’m on your side. I’ll be your accomplice. Your inside man. It occurs to Colton how a single nod can alter the world.

  “Wait,” says Colton. “You do need them, Dr. Rodín.”

  All eyes turn to him. The other kids seem shocked to see him not in shackles. He steps over to Gamon. “Look at how slight this one is. You need someone small for your albatross wings, don’t you? And Kemo—he sits all day with palms turned heavenward. Put eyes in those palms, and then let him tell you what he sees.”

  Stunned silence—even from the doctor.

  “And this one . . .” Colton glares at Karissa. “The AWOL catcher. You should let her see her sister. Then add her inked arms—after all, she’ll be a close biological match, and it will bring you one step closer to having your Ka
li.”

  Karissa looks at them in building confusion. “My arms? What are you talking about? What is he talking about?”

  Then Sonthi laughs long and loud. “It looks like you finally found a kindred spirit, doctor. Too bad you must put him under the knife.”

  Rodín looks at Colton with something bordering on awe or at least admiration. “Very well, then.”

  He orders the guards to put Gamon and Kemo in a holding cell and sends Kunal to open Marisol’s room. Sonthi personally escorts Karissa to visit her sister. Colton doesn’t go—he remains in the courtyard with the doctor.

  “You and I are of a like mind,” Rodín tells him. “It gives me more incentive to make sure you survive your procedures.”

  Then, from Marisol’s cell, Colton hears Karissa’s soul-searing wails of shock and grief, along with Sonthi’s endless laughter.

  8 • Kunal

  The unexpected hope of freedom is enticing yet terrifying. His life here is awful but tolerable. What would his life be out there, in a world that will see him as a monster? He could live alone, a recluse at the edge of civilization, bothering no one, and no one bothering him. Is that the life he wants?

  These are questions he can’t answer—all he knows is that freedom is desirable above all things. He cannot let his fear cloud his judgment. And so, well past midnight, he leaves his room once more, a plan fully formed in his mind. A plan he might be able to pull off.

  9 • Colton

  Colton paces his room in the dark. He can’t sleep; he can’t even sit for long. They will come for him at dawn to prep him for his operation. Soon, his chest will be expanded, and the heart of the bull will be installed in place of his own. Unless Kunal comes through.