Page 17
“So what do we do if it says things are getting dangerous?”
“Damned if I know,” Hayden says. “That’s Connor’s department. ”
There’s a console from which Hayden creates playlists and runs interviews for his Radio Free Hayden show.
“You realize that it doesn’t broadcast any farther than you can shout,” Starkey tells him with a smirk.
“Of course not,” Hayden says. “If it did, then the Juvies could pick it up. ”
“If no one is listening, then who’s it for?”
“First off,” says Hayden, “your assumption that no one is listening is incorrect. I estimate I have at least five or six listeners at any given time. ”
“Yes,” says Tad. “He means us. ”
“And second,” Hayden says, not denying it, “it’s preparing me for a career in broadcasting, which I plan to pursue once I turn seventeen and get out of this place. ”
“Not hanging around to help Connor, huh?”
“My loyalty has the half-life of unpasteurized milk,” Hayden tells him. “I’d take a bullet for Connor, and he knows it. But only until I’m seventeen. ” It all seems pretty straightforward until Esme says, “I thought you already were seventeen. ”
Hayden shifts his shoulders uncomfortably. “Last year didn’t count. ”
Next to Jeevan is a printout. A list of names, addresses, and dates. Starkey picks it up. “What’s this?”
“Our good man Jeeves here is responsible for getting us a list of all the kids slated for unwinding from here all the way to Phoenix. ”
“These are the kids for your rescue missions?”
“Not all of them,” Hayden says. “We pick and choose. We can’t save everyone, but we do what we can. ” He points out the highlighted names—the ones chosen for rescue—and as Starkey looks over the list, he starts to get angry. There’s information about each kid, including birth dates—except for the ones who don’t have a birth date. Instead a stork date is listed. None of the storked kids are highlighted.
“So you and Connor don’t like saving storked kids?” Starkey asks, not even attempting to hide the chill in his voice.
Hayden looks genuinely perplexed and takes the list to look at it. “Hmm, I hadn’t noticed. Anyway, it’s not part of our criteria. We look for only-children in dimly lit suburban neighborhoods. It means fewer people to squeal on us, and less of a chance of being seen. See, brothers and sisters can’t keep their mouths shut, no matter what we threaten them with. I guess mothers who stork babies mostly give them to people who are parents already. Hard to find a storked only child. ”
“Well,” says Starkey, “maybe we need to change the criteria. ”
Hayden shrugs like it’s nothing, like it doesn’t really matter, and it just makes Starkey angrier. “Take it up with Connor,” he says, then goes on with his grand tour of the communications center, but Starkey’s not listening anymore.
- - -
The revelation in the ComBom gives Starkey a game-changing idea. One by one he singles out all the storked kids in the Graveyard. It’s not an easy task, because most storks want to keep their storking a shameful secret. Starkey, however, makes no secret of his own doorstep arrival, and soon the storked kids begin to seek him out, seeing him as their champion.
As it turns out, a full fourth of the Graveyard population are storks. He keeps that information to himself.
The girl named Bam, who at first hated him because he took her place in the Holy of Whollies, warms to him quickly because she’s a stork as well. “If you want your revenge on Connor, be patient,” he tells her. “It will come. ” She reluctantly takes his word for it.
One day Starkey catches Connor when he’s busy supervising the dismantling of an engine.
“Is there a buyer for it, or are they gonna put it up for sale?” Starkey asks pleasantly.
“They asked for it in the front office, that’s all I know. ”
“The engine says Rolls-Royce—I thought they only made cars. ”
“Nope. ”
Starkey keeps chatting about pointless stuff, until he’s sure that Connor is irritated at having to divide his attention between the engine and Starkey. That’s when Starkey pulls out what he’s been hiding up his sleeve.
“Listen, I’ve been thinking . . . you know I was storked, right? And well, you know, it’s nothing big, but I thought it might be nice to make some special reserved time just for storked kids at the Rec Jet. Just to show them they won’t be discriminated against anymore. ”
“Yeah, yeah, sure,” Connor says, as he stares at the engine, happy to be ending the conversation. He never even realizes what he’s just given away.
Starkey calls his little group the Stork Club and stakes out the hour between seven and eight every evening. While everyone’s looking somewhere else, a new class distinction rises within the Graveyard. The Stork Club is the only minority with special members-only time at the Rec Jet. It’s a taste of privilege that these kids have never had before—and Starkey wants them to gobble it up. He wants them to get used to it. He wants them all to expect it—and to know that Starkey can deliver.
Since Starkey runs food services, members of the Stork Club start replacing others in serving positions, and dole out larger servings to other storks with a wink. In the Holy of Whollies, the only ones who seem wise to these little creeping alliances are Ashley, whose job it is to root out social flare points, and that obnoxious Sherman kid who replaced John as head of waste and sanitation. It turns out Ralphy was easily bribed to look the other way, and as for Ashley, Starkey pretty much has it under control.
“What if giving storks special treatment creates resentment in the general population?” Ashley asks him as he supervises dinner one night.
“Well,” Starkey tells her with a mildly seductive smile, “the general population can kiss my ass. ”
It makes Ashley blush just a little bit. “Just try to keep a low profile, okay?”
Still beaming charm, he says, “It’s what I do best,” and serves her a nice heaping portion, all the while calculating how she might secretly play into his plans.
“You’re a hard guy to read,” she tells him. “I’d really like to get inside your head. ”
To which he responds, “The feeling’s mutual. ”
- - -
Each night, during “the stork hour” at the Rec Jet, Starkey plants tiny seeds of discontent over games of pool and Ping-Pong. Nothing so blatant as fomenting a revolution, just innocent suggestions to encourage certain directions of thought.
“I think Connor’s done a good job for a guy who’s not all that smart,” he tells them offhandedly. Or, “I really like Connor. He’s not much of a leader, but isn’t he a great guy?”
Starkey never shows any open defiance; that would be counterproductive. It’s not about tearing Connor down, it’s about rotting out his roots. He won’t even suggest that he should be the one taking Connor’s place. That suggestion will eventually come from other storks—and all on their own, without any prompting from him. He knows it will happen, because he knows that every storked kid, deep down, dreams of a world where they’re not considered second-class citizens. That makes Starkey more than just the leader of a club. It makes him the hope for storked salvation.
Part Three
Windows of the Soul
Collected on the Internet, October 2011:
Kidney and other organ prices on the global criminal markets are based upon publicly available reports and are quoted in U. S. dollars. The price represents the amount either paid to the seller of the organ or the price paid by the buyer for the organ.
Average paid by kidney buyer: $150,000
Average paid to seller of kidney: $5,000
Kidney broker in Yemen: $60,000
Kidney broker in the Philippines: $1,000 to $1,500
Kidney buyer in Israel: $125,000 to $135,000
Kidney buyer in Moldova:
$100,000 to $250,000
Kidney buyer in Singapore: $300,000
Kidney buyer in United States: $30,000
Kidney buyer in China: $87,000
Kidney buyer in Saudi Arabia: $16,000
Kidney seller in Bangladesh: $2,500
Kidney seller in China: $15,000
Kidney seller in Egypt: $2,000
Kidney seller in Kenya: $650
Kidney seller in Moldova: $2,500 to $3,000
Kidney seller in Peru: $5,000
Kidney seller in Ukraine: $200,000
Kidney seller in Vietnam: $2,410
Kidney seller in Yemen: $5,000
Kidney seller in the Philippines: $2,000 to $10,000
Liver buyer in China: $21,900
Liver seller in China: $3,660
Courtesy of www. havocscope. com
11 - Smoker
The boy is certain he’s going to die.
He sprained his ankle falling into the pit, maybe even broke it. Now it’s swollen and blue, and has been that way for days. It’s bad, but it’s not the worst of his problems.
The pit is more than ten feet deep, and even if his ankle were fine, he’d never be able to climb out. For five days he’s been screaming for help, and now his voice is nothing but a dry rasp.
And all because of those stupid cigarettes.
It had been weeks since he had a smoke. His supplier had been arrested again, and although there were kids at school who bragged about smoking, no one would offer him a cigarette, or even give him the name of a dealer. That’s why he came to this part of town—a warehouse district of unused, rotting buildings, many of which were condemned, but no one wanted to waste the money or energy it would take to tear them down.
He knew if he was ever going to score himself some smokes again, this was the place to do it. Even if it was just one or two from some skank nic addict, it would be worth it. That day was the third time he detoured through the warehouse streets on the way home from school, and nothing. No one. It seemed not even the nic addicts found the warehouse district worthy of their attention.
So imagine his surprise when he saw an open door, and cigarette butts strewn on the ground in front of it, like they had no better place to be.
He stepped into the rotting building. The huge space smelled of evolving mold, and paint chips littered the ground like a fall of leaves.
Then he saw it—way at the back of the warehouse was a mattress. It was dirty, shredded, probably the digs of some homeless dude. Nothing was remarkable about it. What was remarkable was the unopened carton of cigarettes sitting on the mattress.
He couldn’t believe his luck! He looked around to make sure there was no one there, then hurried to the mattress, and, stepping onto it, reached for the cigarette carton.
Even before he touched the carton, the mattress fell out beneath his feet and plunged into the pit. Although the mattress had mostly broken his fall, his right ankle hit the ground unprotected. He almost blacked out from the pain, and when his vision cleared he realized what had happened.
He was furious. His initial thought was that this was some sort of practical joke—as if his buddies from school would be looking down at him at any moment, pointing and laughing, calling him an idiot. But he quickly came to understand that this was not a joke at all. This was a trap.