UnSouled (Unwind Dystology 3)

The kid then looks around the living room, which is filled with awards and citations that Janson and Sonia received for their groundbreaking work. “If this is real, whad’ya win it for?”

“We invented unwinding,” Rheinschild says. “Although we didn’t know it at the time.”

The kid lets loose a bitter, disbelieving guffaw. “Yeah, right.”

The young burglar could leave with his prize, but he doesn’t. Instead he lingers. So Rheinschild asks, “What happened to your fingers?”

The kid’s distrustful gaze notches toward anger again. “Why is that your business?”

“Was it frostbite?”

His attacker is taken aback, surprised by Rheinschild’s guess. “Yeah, it was. Most people think it was fireworks or something stupid like that. But it was frostbite last winter.”

Rheinschild pulls himself up into a chair.

“Who said you could move?” But they both know the kid’s posturing is now all for show.

Rheinschild takes a good look at him. It appears he hasn’t been introduced to a shower in this lifetime. Rheinschild can’t even tell the color of his hair. “What is it that you need?” Rheinschild asks him.

“Your money,” he says, looking down his nose at him.

“I didn’t ask you what you want. I asked you what you need.”

“Your money!” he says again, a little more forcefully. Then he adds a bit more gently: “And food. And clothes. And a job.”

“What if I gave you one of the three?”

“What if I bashed your head in a little deeper than I already did?”

Rheinschild reaches into his pocket, pulls out his wallet, intentionally revealing that there are a few bills in there, but instead of the bills he tosses the boy his business card.

“Come to that address at ten on Monday. I’ll put you to work and pay you a livable wage. If you want to buy food and clothes with it, that’s fine with me. If you want to squander it, that’s fine with me too. Just as long as you show up every day, five days a week. And you take a shower before you do.”

The kid sneers at him. “And you’ll have the Juvey-cops waiting there for me. Do you think I’m stupid?”

“There’s not enough empirical evidence to make that judgment.”

The kid shifts his weight from one foot to another. “So what kind of work is it?”

“Biological. Medical. I’m working on something that could end unwinding, but I need a research assistant. Someone who isn’t secretly on Proactive Citizenry’s payroll.”

“Proactive Who?”

“Good answer. As long as you can say that, you’ll have job security.”

The kid considers it, then looks at the medallion in his three-fingered hand. He tosses it back to Rheinschild. “You shouldn’t walk around with this. You should frame it or something.”

Then he leaves with nothing more than he had when he broke in, except for a business card.

Rheinschild is sure he’ll never see the kid again. He finds himself pleasantly surprised when the boy shows up at his research office on Monday morning, wearing the same filthy clothes, but freshly showered beneath them.

12 • Risa

She cannot believe the position she’s put herself in.

All this time surviving against overwhelming odds and now, thanks to her own stupidity, she’s going to die.

She blames her own arrogance for her downfall. She was so certain she was too clever, too observant, to be snagged by a parts pirate—as if somehow she existed on a higher plane.