Unwind

Roland is slowly breaking. He confesses to many things, petty acts of vandalism and theft, that Connor couldn't care less about. But this is going to work. It has to work. Connor has no other plan to bring him to justice—it has to work.

'I've done a lot of things,' Roland tells him through the three bullet holes in the crate. 'But I never killed anybody!'

Connor just listens. He barely speaks to him anymore. Connor finds the less he speaks, the more Roland does.

'How do you know they're even dead?'

'Because I buried them. Me and the Admiral.'

'Then you did it!' says Roland. 'You did it, and you're trying to make me take the blame!'

Now Connor begins to see the flaw in his plan. If he lets Roland out without a confession, then he's a dead man. But he can't keep him in there forever. His options are now narrower than the spaces between the crates.

Then a voice calls to them from outside. 'Is anyone there? Connor? Roland? Anybody?' It's Hayden.

'Help!' screams Roland at the top of his lungs. 'Help, he's crazy! Come in here and let me out!' But his screams don't make it out of the hold. Connor gets up and makes his way to the entrance. Hayden looks up at him. He's not his usual cool self, and there's a nasty bruise on his forehead, like he was hit by something.

'Thank God! Connor, you've got to get back there! It's nuts—you've gotta stop it—they'll listen to you!'

'What are you talking about?'

'The Admiral killed the Goldens—and then everyone thought he'd killed you. . . .'

'The Admiral didn't kill anybody!'

'Well, try telling them that!'

'Them who?'

'Everybody! They're tearing the place apart!'

Connor sees the far-off smoke, and he takes a quick glance back into the hold, deciding that, for the moment, Roland can wait. He hops down to the ground and races off with Hayden. 'Tell me everything, from the beginning.'

* * *

When Connor arrives at the scene, his mind keeps trying to reject what his eyes are telling him. He stares, part of him hoping the vision will go away. It's like the aftermath of some natural disaster. Broken bits of metal, glass, and wood are everywhere. Pages torn from books flutter past smashed electronics. Bonfires burn, and kids hurl in more wreckage to feed the flames.

'My God!'

There's a group of jeering kids near the helicopter, gathered like a rugby scrum, kicking something in the center. Then Connor realizes it's not something, it's someone. He races in, pulling the kids apart. The kids who know Connor immediately back off, and the others follow suit. The man on the ground is battered and bloody. It's Cleaver. Connor kneels down and props up his head.

'It's okay. You're going to be okay.' But even as he says it, Connor knows it's not true: He's been beaten to a pulp.

Cleaver grimaces, his mouth bloody. Then Connor realizes that this isn't a grimace at all. It's a smile. 'Chaos, man,' Cleaver says weakly. 'Chaos. It's beautiful. Beautiful.'

Connor doesn't know what to say to this. The man's delirious. He has to be.

'It's okay,' Cleaver says. 'This is an okay way to die. Better than suffocating, right?'

Connor can only stare at him. 'What . . . what did you say?' No one but Connor and the Admiral knew about the suffocations. Connor, the Admiral, and the one who did it . . .

'You killed the Goldens! You and Roland!'

'Roland?' says Cleaver. In spite of his pain, he actually seems insulted. 'Roland's not one of us. He doesn't even know.' Cleaver catches the look on Connor's face and begins to laugh. Then the laugh becomes a rattle that resolves into a long, slow exhale. The grin never entirely leaves his face. His eyes stay open, but there's nothing in them. Just like his victim, Amp.

'Oh, crap, he's dead, isn't he,' says Hayden. 'They killed him! Holy crap, they killed him!'

Connor leaves the dead pilot in the dust and storms toward the Admiral's plane. He passes the infirmary along the way. Everything's been torn out of there as well. Risa! Where's Risa? There are still kids all over the Admiral's jet. The tires have been slashed; wing flaps lean at jagged angles, like broken feathers.

The entire jet lists to one side.

'Stop it!' screams Connor. 'Stop it now! What are you doing? What have you done?'

He reaches up to the wing, grabs a kid's ankle, and pulls him off onto the ground, but he can't do that to every single one of them. So he grabs a metal pole and smashes it against the wing over and over, the sound ringing out like a church bell, until their attention turns his way.

'Look at you!' he screams. 'You've destroyed everything! How could you have done this? You should all be unwound, every single one of you! YOU SHOULD ALL BE UNWOUND!'

It stops everyone. The kids on the wings, the kids at the bonfires. The shock of hearing such words from one of their own snaps them back to sanity. The shock of hearing his own words—and knowing that he meant them— frightens Connor almost as much as the scene before him.

The rolling staircase leading to the Admiral's jet has fallen on its side. 'Over here!' says Connor. 'Help me with this!'

A dozen kids, their fury spent, come running obediently. Together, they right the stairs, and Connor climbs up to the hatch. He peers in the window.

Connor can't see much. The Admiral's there on the floor, but he's not moving. If the Admiral can't get to the door, they'll never be able to get in. Wait—is that someone else in there with him?

Suddenly a lever is thrown on the inside, and the hatch begins to swing open. The heat hits him instantly—a blast furnace of heat—and the face at the door is so red and puffy, it takes a moment for him to realize who it is.

'Risa?'

She coughs and almost collapses into his arms, but manages to keep herself up. 'I'm okay,' she says. 'I'm okay. But the Admiral ...'

Together they go in and kneel beside him. He's breathing, but it's shallow and strained. 'It's the heat!' says Connor, and orders the kids lingering at the door to swing open every hatch.

'It's not just the heat,' says Risa. 'Look at his lips—they're cyanotic. And his pressure is down to nothing.'

Connor just stares at her, not comprehending.

'He's having a heart attack! I've been giving him CPR, but I'm not a doctor. There's only so much I can do!'

'M . . . m. . . my fault,' says the Admiral. 'My fault . . .'

'Shh,' says Connor. 'You're going to be okay.' But Connor knows, just as he knew when he said it to Cleaver, the chances of that are slim.

They carry the Admiral down the stairs, and as they do, the kids waiting outside back away, making room for him, as if it's already a coffin they're carrying.

They set him down in the shade of the wing.

Then kids around them begin to murmur.

'He killed the Goldens,' someone says. 'The old man deserves what he gets.'

Connor boils, but he's gotten much better at keeping his anger in check.

'Cleaver did it,' Connor says forcefully enough for everyone to hear. That starts a murmur through the crowd, until someone says, 'Yeah? Well, what about Emby?'

The Admiral's hand flutters up. 'My . . . my son . . .'