UnWholly (Unwind Dystology 2)

Noah’s not quite sure. All he knows is that Connor has called the remaining members of the Holy of Whollies for a meeting after the Starkey incident. “He left the main aisle. One of the supply jets, maybe?”

“You’re useless.” Trace hops back into his Jeep and speeds toward the outlying planes. Only once he’s gone does Noah hear a banging sound from inside Connor’s jet—but it’s not the kind of sound he’d expect Starkey to make. The emergency exit above the wing begins to open.

“What the hell? How did he get loose?”

“Shh!” Noah cocks his pistol. He’s never fired it and knows it’s just a tranq, but it will do the job. He never really liked Starkey and won’t mind being the one to tranq him as he tries to escape from the jet. The emergency door falls inward. Both kids hold their weapons at the ready, but Starkey doesn’t come out. Cautiously they get closer, and when Noah looks inside, he sees straight through the plane to the darkening desert on the other side. While they were staring at this emergency exit, Starkey had climbed through the other one on the opposite side of the plane and is gone.

“Aw crap!”

Noah is less worried about Starkey than he is about having to tell Connor he screwed up his first real assignment.

62 - Starkey

He wears a hooded coat pulled from Connor’s closet to hide his face. His left hand feels like a twenty-pound weight on the end of his wrist. With every heartbeat it pounds so painfully that his knees wobble, but somehow he keeps himself moving. He knows that Trace is back, and that’s a game changer. Connor doesn’t know yet, which means Starkey can use Trace’s return to his advantage.

The Graveyard is scrambling. Kids race every which way. An aisle over, there’s a crowd at the arsenal. Hayden hands out weapons; not just one or two, but everything. No one notices Starkey.

A Stork Club member passes, carrying a load of weapons, and Starkey grabs him with his good hand. When the kid sees who it is, he almost shouts out his name, but Starkey stops him.

“Shut up and listen. Get a message out to the Storks. On my signal, we storm the escape jet.”

“But . . . that’s not the plan.”

“It’s my plan, do you understand?”

“Yeah, yeah, sure, Starkey.” Then he looks at Starkey’s hand, like he might ask a question about it, but decides not to. “What’s the signal?”

Starkey looks at the kid’s load of weapons and pulls out a flare gun. “This,” he says. “Go now!”

The kid races off to spread the word.

Starkey can see Trace’s Jeep speeding back toward the main aisle from the supply jets, having been given bad information from the idiots guarding him. Starkey’s not sure where Connor is—perhaps the ComBom, which will probably be the next place Trace will check.

Then Starkey spots Ashley racing from the arsenal with a nasty-looking machine gun, and he intercepts her. Her eyes go wide when she sees him.

“What the hell are you doing out? Does Connor know?”

“He will if you don’t keep your voice down!”

Ashley moves closer to him. “Forget it, Starkey. Why don’t you just make a run for it? Connor won’t care, as long as you’re out of his way when the Juvies come.”

“Are you a stork, Ashley, or are you one of Connor’s lackeys after all?”

When it’s put that way, there’s really only one response that Starkey’s key “sleeper agent” could give.

“What do you want me to do?”

63 - Trace

Unable to find Connor, Trace speeds back to the main aisle, headed for the ComBom, ready to sound the alarm himself. He sees kids carrying weapons away from the arsenal, but they’re not moving nearly fast enough.

He’s so distracted, he nearly runs down Ashley, who’s standing right in his path. He screeches to a halt.

“Trace! There you are!”

“Where’s Connor? The Juvies are coming with a full takedown force.”

“We know, Hayden heard the chatter,” Ashley tells him. “Connor wants you to power up the escape jet.”