UnWholly (Unwind Dystology 2)

From that moment on, his life was a living hell. He was the butt of jokes—not just in his department, but around the nation. He was held up to ridicule, as the cop responsible for letting the infamous Unwind go. So Connor Lassiter became legend and Nelson lost his job, and his self-respect. Even his wife left him.

But he only wallowed for a little while. He was full of anger but knew how to take anger and mold it into something useful. If the Juvenile Authority no longer wanted him, he might as well be in business for himself. Black marketeers don’t laugh at him for having let Connor Lassiter get away, and they ask no questions.

At first it was just AWOLs. They were quick to fall for his various traps like the stupid kids they are. Then he caught his first runaway, a kid whose DNA didn’t show up on the AWOL Unwind database. He thought the black marketeers would turn him away, but they didn’t care. As long as the subject was healthy, he got his price. There were even kids like the one he caught today, who were just unlucky. He’s happy to take them, too. His conscience doesn’t bother him.

What bothers him are their eyes.

That’s what he has the most trouble with. The way they look at him. Those fearful, pleading expressions, always hopeful down to the last second, as if he might have a change of heart. Those eyes plague him in his dreams. They’re windows of the soul, aren’t they? But in those early days as a parts pirate, when he looked at his own eyes in the mirror, he didn’t see what he saw in theirs. His “windows” showed no such expression of soulfulness, and the more he looked at his own empty eyes, the more jealous he became. He wanted some of that innocence, that desperate hope for himself. So one day he went to his black market contact and claimed the eyes of his latest catch as part of his payment. He was only able to negotiate himself a single eye, but at least that was better than nothing. After that first operation, when he looked at himself in the mirror, he would see in that eye a shred of humanity, and for a little while, he’d be high on hope. It would remind him of the idealistic young man he had once been many years before. One problem, however: Now he had one blue eye and one brown. That wouldn’t do.

So he claimed another, but that eye didn’t quite match the first. So he claimed another, and another, and with each operation he felt a sliver of innocence return to him. He knows that someday soon he’ll find the eyes that will make him perfect, and then he can finally rest . . . because by seeing the world through other’s eyes, Nelson is bit by bit becoming whole.

- - -

The black marketeer wears an expensive European suit and drives a Porsche. He looks more like a legitimate businessman than a shady figure who deals in flesh. He doesn’t hide the fact that his business has made him rich. Instead he flaunts his wealth with the entitled disregard of royalty. Nelson envies him his style.

He goes by the name Divan, like some sort of fashion designer, and doesn’t refer to himself as a black marketer, but as an “independent supplier.” His offshore harvest camp is hidden and mysterious. Not even Nelson knows where it is, and he suspects its operation has none of the strict regulations of American harvest camps.

He meets Nelson in Sarnia, a Canadian town just across the bridge from Port Huron, Michigan. Divan cannot step on American soil. There are numerous warrants out for his arrest. But the Canadians, bless them, have been far more tolerant.

Divan takes possession of the boy with the damaged ankle in the back of a car dealership that he uses as his front. As he looks the boy over, he frowns at the swollen ankle and wags a finger at Nelson—all part of his standard ploy to barter Nelson down. The boy, conscious now but still groggy from a heavy dose of tranqs, mumbles incoherently, and although Nelson ignores him, Divan pats him gently on the cheek.

“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.

13 - Connor

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.