UnSouled (Unwind Dystology 3)

“And bury us all—that will really help your cause, won’t it? All those storks you say you want to save, buried alive. Real smart, Starkey.”

Out of spite, he kicks a support beam one more time. It quivers, and flecks of dust rain down on them. It’s enough to make him stop.

“You heard them!” he yells. “It’s all about the Akron AWOL.” It should be Starkey’s face on the news. He should be the one the experts are profiling. They should be camping out at his family’s door, prying into what his private life was like before they cut him loose to be unwound. “I do all the work, and he gets all the credit.”

“You call it credit, but out there it’s called blame. You should be happy they’re looking elsewhere after that bloodbath!”

Starkey turns on her, wanting to grab her and shake some sense into her, but she’s taller than him, bigger than him, and he knows Bam is a girl who fights back. How would it look to the others if she floored him? So instead he smacks her down with words.

“Don’t you dare accept their spin! I know you’re smarter than that. What we did was a liberation! We freed nearly four hundred Unwinds and added more than a hundred storks to our number.”

“And in the process more than twenty kids died—plus, we still don’t have an accurate count of how many were tranq’d and got left behind.”

“It couldn’t be helped!”

He looks farther down the low-roofed tunnel to see, lit by the dim hanging incandescents, a cluster of kids eavesdropping. He wants to yell at them, too, but he’s in control enough now to rein in that urge. He brings his voice down so only Bam can hear.

“We’re at war,” he reminds her. “There are always casualties in war.” He steels his eye contact, trying to make her look away, but she doesn’t. But she also doesn’t argue. He reaches out, putting a comforting hand on her shoulder, which she doesn’t shake off.

“The thing to remember, Bam, is that our plan worked.”

Now she finally looks away from him, signaling her acquiescence. “That valley was pretty isolated,” she says. “It was a long road out for those kids who went running through the gate. I don’t know if you heard the latest, but nearly half of them have already been captured.”

He moves his hand from her shoulder to her cheek and smiles. “Which means half of them got away. The glass is half-full, Bam. That’s what we need to remind everyone. You’re my second in command, and I need you to focus on the positive instead of the negative. Do you think you can do that?”

Bam hesitates; then her shoulders slump at his gentle touch, and she gives him a reluctant nod, as he’d known she would.

“Good. That’s what I like about you, Bam. You take me to task, as you should, but in the end, you always see reason.”

She turns to go, but before she leaves, she tosses him one more question. “Where do you see this ending, Starkey?”

He smiles at her even more broadly than before. “I don’t see it ending. That’s the beauty of it!”

40 • Bam

Bam moves through the tunnels and chambers of the mine, taking mental snapshots.

A kid in tears, mourning the death of a friend.

A terrified new arrival, calmed by an older stork.

A hapless fourteen-year-old “medic” trying to suture a leg wound using dental floss.

She sees scenes of hope and despair around her and doesn’t know which to give more credence.

She passes one kid sharing his ration of food with another, while beside them a young girl teaches an even younger girl how to use one of the automatic rifles they confiscated from Cold Springs.

And then there’s the boy who was forced to shoot the harvest camp director, sitting alone, staring off into nowhere. Bam would comfort him, but she’s not the comforting type.

“Starkey’s proud of all of you and happy with our victory today,” she tells them. “We took the battle to the enemy, and we made history!”

She primes them, but she holds back, because she knows she mustn’t steal Starkey’s thunder. She’s Bam the Baptist, preparing the way for the Savior of Storks.

“He’ll be gathering everyone before dinner. He’s got a lot to tell you.” Of course it’s really not about telling them anything; it’s about rallying them and keeping them focused on the positive, just as he told Bam. He’ll have gentle words for the dead, but will move past it. Gloss over it. Direct the audience’s attention elsewhere. He’s so very good at that. It’s why they’ve gotten so far. Bam is in awe of the way Mason Starkey can work magic in the world around him. He’s kept their hoard virtually invisible for more than a month now, keeping them clothed and fed with money that no one can trace. Yes, she’s in awe of him, and she’s also a little more afraid of him every day. That’s normal, she decides. A good leader should be just a little bit frightening in the way he or she wields power.

When she’s done priming the masses for Starkey, she turns down a side passageway that should be familiar, but she bumps her head for the umpteenth time on a jutting piece of stone. So many of these tunnels are alike; she always knows exactly where she is when she hits that damn stone. The walls begin to spread, opening into a wider cavern. The lights, which are strung around the edge, create an odd sense of darkness in the very center of the space, as if there’s a black hole in the middle of the room.

This is the storage room, where food and supplies are kept. This is also where Hayden is currently stationed, with an armed guard at all times who is there for both his protection and to make sure he stays on his best behavior.