UnWholly (Unwind Dystology #2)(71)

She awakes in a different cell. A little newer and larger, perhaps, but still a cell. She has no idea where she has been transported this time, or why. This new cell is not at all designed for a paraplegic, and her captors have offered no help since she arrived. Not that she’d accept it if they did, but it’s as if they want her to struggle over the lip of the bathroom threshold, or onto her bed, which is abnormally high—just enough to make getting into it an ordeal.

She suffers a week of food brought in by a silent guard in a rent-a-cop uniform. She knows she’s no longer in the hands of the Juvenile Authority, but who her new captors are is a mystery. These new jailers ask no questions, and that concerns her the same way that Connor is always concerned by the fact that the Graveyard has never been taken out. Are they so unimportant in the grand scheme of things that the Juvenile Authority won’t even torture her to get the information they want? Have they been deluding themselves into thinking they’re making a difference?

All this time she’s forced out thoughts of Connor, because it simply hurt too much to think about him. How horrified he must have been when she turned herself in. Horrified and stunned. Well, fine, let him be; he’ll get over it. She did it for him just as much as she did it for the injured boy, because as painful as it is to admit, Risa knows she had become just a distraction to Connor. If he’s truly going to lead those kids in the Graveyard like the Admiral did, he can’t be giving Risa leg massages and worrying whether her emotional needs are being met. Maybe he does love her, but it’s obvious there’s no room in his life at this moment to pay it any more than lip service.

Risa has no idea what her future holds now. All she knows is that she must focus on that future and not on Connor, no matter how much that hurts.

? ? ?

A few days later Risa finally has an actual visitor: a well-dressed woman with an air of authority.

“Good morning, Risa. It’s a pleasure to finally meet the girl behind the hullabaloo. “

Risa immediately decides that anyone who uses the word “hullabaloo” cannot be her friend.

The woman sits down in the single chair in the cell. It’s a chair that has never been used, because it’s not exactly designed for a paraplegic. In fact, it seems specifically designed not to be accessible to Risa, like most everything else in her cell. “I trust they’ve been treating you well?”

“I haven’t been ‘treated’ at all. I’ve been ignored.”

“You haven’t been ignored,” the woman tells her. “You’ve just been allowed some time to settle. Some time alone, to think.”

“Somehow I doubt I’ve ever been alone. . . .” Risa throws a glance to a large wall mirror, through which she can occasionally see shadows. “So am I some sort of political prisoner?” She asks, getting right to the point. “If you’re not going to torture me, do you just plan to leave me here to rot? Or maybe you’re selling me to a parts pirate. At least the parts that work.”

“None of those things,” says the woman. “I’m here to help you. And you, my dear, are going to help us.”

“I doubt that.” Risa rolls away, although she can’t roll very far. The woman doesn’t get up from her chair. She doesn’t even move; she just sits there comfortably. Risa wanted to be in control of this situation, but this woman keeps control with her voice alone.

“My name is Roberta. I represent an organization called Proactive Citizenry. Our purpose, among other things, is to do good in this world. We seek to advance the causes of both science and freedom as well as to provide a sense of spiritual enlightenment.”

“And what does that have to do with me?”

Roberta smiles and pauses a moment, holding her smile before she speaks. “I’m going to have the charges against you dropped, Risa. But more importantly, I’m going to get you out of that wheelchair and give you a new spine.”

Risa turns to her, filled with more mixed emotions than she can sort right now. “No, you will not! It’s my right to refuse the spine of an Unwind.”

“Yes, it is,” Roberta says, way too calmly. “However, I firmly believe you will change your mind.”

Risa crosses her arms, her belief more firm than Roberta’s that she won’t.

? ? ?

She’s given the silent treatment again—but they must be getting impatient, because it’s only for two days this time instead of a week. Roberta returns and sits once more in the chair designed for people who can walk. This time she has a folder with her, although Risa can’t see what’s inside.

“Have you given any thought to my offer?” Roberta asks her.

“I don’t need to. I already gave you my answer.”

“It’s very noble to stand on principle and refuse an unwound spine,” Roberta says. “It does, however, represent a wrongful mind-set that is neither productive nor adaptive. It’s backward, actually, and it makes you part of the problem.”

“I plan to keep my ‘wrongful mind-set’ as well as my wheelchair.”

“Very well. I won’t deny you your choice.” Roberta shifts in her chair—perhaps a little irritated, or maybe just in anticipation. “There’s someone I’d like you to meet.” Then she stands and opens the door. Risa knows that whoever it is has been waiting in the other room, watching through the oneway mirror.