UnWholly (Unwind Dystology #2)(106)

“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.”

“He knows I’m back?”

“Of course—he saw you racing off to the supply jets in a panic.”

“It wasn’t panic,” Trace says, although he knows it was. “I’ll get the Dreamliner ready for flight. If we’re fast enough, we may not need to fight them. Tell Connor to start loading kids onto the plane.”

“Sure thing, Trace.” But she does no such thing. She watches Trace race to the Dreamliner and climb up the stairs. Then she goes to tell Starkey that her mission has been accomplished.





64 ? Lev

The rifle shot explodes through the Graveyard gate, ringing in Lev’s ears. “Down!” he yells. “They’re shooting at us!”

But Miracolina is already down. Not just down, but crumpled. She lies lifelessly in the dirt by the side of the road.

“No!” He falls to his knees beside her, afraid to look, afraid to touch her. “Please, God! No!” This can’t be happening. Not again! Everyone Lev gets close to is either killed or maimed, and it can’t happen again! He prays for the impossible. He prays for it not to be true. . . .

Then he rolls Miracolina over to find there’s no gaping hole in her chest. But there is a small spot of blood on her shoulder. And the tiny flag of a tranq bullet. He doesn’t know whether to be relieved or horrified.

“Looks like you’ve got trouble from both sides, Lev,” says Nelson, somewhere in the dark behind him. “What to do . . . what to do?”

Then, from the gate, he hears a shaky voice say, “Stay away, whoever you are, or I’ll shoot again!”

But before the teen guard can even aim his rifle, Nelson fires a second tranq bullet out of the darkness and takes the guard down right through the fence.

“Enough of him,” Nelson says calmly. “Now, where were we?”

Lev still can’t see Nelson, but Nelson can clearly see him, because Lev hears the telltale pffft of a tranq being fired. It hits his pant leg, deflecting off a rivet in his jeans, and lands in the gravel beside him. Lev knows he has no defense against Nelson now, so thinking quickly, he grabs the dart, digs it into the fabric of his jeans, careful not to nick his skin, and collapses on top of Miracolina. He closes his eyes. He hears the second guard panicking by the fence, and hears Nelson’s footsteps approaching from the other direction on the gravel. Lev’s heart races like it might explode in his chest, but he holds still, playing possum for his life, and prays for a second miracle in as many minutes. He prays that Nelson will fall for his act.





65 ? Nelson

He never went to Indian Echo Caverns. Nelson merely drove his van to a roadside café a few miles away, then monitored his laptop and waited for the tracking nanites in Lev and Miracolina’s blood to show movement away from the cabin. Then he followed. It was no accident that the bed frames were nearly rusted all the way through. Nelson had wanted them to escape. For a while he worried that Lev might be too stupid to figure out how to break free, but in the end the boy rose to the occasion.

Lev didn’t give away the location of Connor Lassiter that day, but Nelson heard enough to know that they were on their way to warn him about the big bad parts pirate. All Nelson had to do was give them a leash and let them lead the way.