"I gotta tell ya, Fry, you really did a number on yourself with those tattoos-and that fur hat just ain't working."

Lev peels the kinkajou from his head, where he often goes, but rarely pees anymore. Lev lets him cling to his shoulder instead. "First of all," Lev tells CyFi, "they're not numbers, they're names; and second, don't insult Mahpee, or he might claw your eyes out."

"What? Little umber Elmo got claws?"

Lev smiles. It's good to see CyFi again, even if it is under unusual circumstances. Of course, any circumstances are better than when they last saw each other.

"So, I hear you got a girlfriend," teases CyFi.

"Kind of, I think. It's a long-distance thing," Lev tells him. "She's gone back to Indiana with her family, but I'm still on the Rez in Colorado."

CyFi raises his eyebrows. "Could be worse, if you catch my drift."

The sun comes out from behind a stray cloud, lighting up the garden. As the day is unseasonably warm, it was decided to have the wedding outside, within the circle of stones at the garden's center, the participants within the circle, and the guests standing just outside of it. With no tradition for this sort of thing, rules and structure are all spur-of-the-moment. Right now all the "grooms" mill around the inner circle getting to know one another and asking logistical questions of the minister, who keeps offering up shrugs.

Then, just before the ceremony begins, Lev hears a familiar voice behind him.

"I swear, I can't leave you alone for five minutes without you doing something crazy."

He turns to see Connor standing behind him, and not just Connor but Risa as well. The sight of them takes his breath away, quite literally, and Lev starts coughing and gasping. It's the nuisance of having only one lung. Supposedly, Elina's getting one of those new machines on the Rez that can grow him a second one, so it won't always be like this.

"Whoa," says Connor, "I didn't mean to freak you into cardiac arrest."

"I'm okay, I'm okay," Lev says, finally catching his breath. But as he looks at Connor, he can see that he's got his own issues. He's walking with a cane, and even though he's wearing a sports coat, Lev can see seams on his wrists, along his neckline-and even along his jawline. He suspects there are many more beneath his clothes that Lev can't see.

"What happened?" Lev asks.

Connor shares a loaded glance with Risa, then says, "Let's just say I had a gardening accident."

Lev accepts it without further question, knowing that with Connor sometimes it's best not to probe. It suddenly occurs to Lev how long it's been since he, Connor, and Risa have been together-but in a way, it's the first time, because until today, they were never truly together. When Connor kidnapped him, Lev was a tithe, who ran from both of them the first chance he got. Then, when they met again at the Graveyard, Lev had already detached himself from everyone and everything. He was already a clapper. But now all three of them have come out of their own gardening accidents, and are truly in the same place. Wherever that is.

"Well, the important thing is that you're here," Lev says. And then he realizes something. "But . . . why are you here?"

"To see you, of course," Risa tells him. "Cyrus told me you'd be here." Then she turns to CyFi. "Hi, Cyrus. Good to see you again."

"Wait a second," says Lev. "You two know each other?"

But before Risa can answer, a guitar begins to play, and Lev gasps-almost going into a coughing fit again-because he recognizes the music right away. That's Wil playing! Lev turns to see Camus Comprix sitting in the center of the circle-one of the few grooms actually wearing a tuxedo. More so than ever, he expresses Wil's soulful music so perfectly, Lev could swear Wil is really there.

In a moment Una comes down from the main house, flowers and ribbons woven into her long hair and wearing a traditional native gown. She doesn't smile, but maintains an unreadable expression that speaks of more emotions than can possibly mix.

She enters the circle, and in front of the minister, Cam takes Una's hand. But when the time comes, it's someone else, a man with Wil's voice, who speaks the vows, and Una looks into the eyes of yet another when she says hers. And although she exchanges rings with Cam, when the minister says, "You may now kiss the bride," that honor goes to someone else entirely. Lev finds his internal compass spinning, and he wonders how something can be so beautiful and so horrible at the same time.

"That's going to be one crowded wedding bed," says Connor, and Lev can't help but laugh, but he quickly settles back toward somber. This commune, this wedding-it's all collateral damage from unwinding. Even if the impossible happens, and the Unwind Accord is overthrown, they'll all still be tallying the psychological cost for years to come.

"I wanted to show you this," Risa tells him as Una and her entourage of grooms lead the way to the main house for a small reception. Risa holds out her right arm to show that there's a name tattooed on her wrist.

"You too, huh?" It doesn't surprise him. It's become the thing to do. Everyone is getting the name of an Unwind inked on their right arms. The idea is that it's in a place where they will see it every single day. The running gag is that Washington politicians should get them tattooed in their colons.

"Is Bryce Barlow someone you knew?" Lev asks.

Risa looks dolefully at the name on her wrist. "Just like the names on you, he's a boy I'll never meet."

"Did you hear the latest?" Connor asks. "Someone's proposing they build a memorial out of the old arm of the Statue of Liberty, and engrave it with the names of everyone who's ever been unwound by the Juvenile Authority."

Lev shifts Mahpee on his shoulder and smiles at both Connor and Risa, trying to take a mental snapshot of this moment, so he can save it forever. "I hope they do," he says. "And I'm glad our names won't be on it."

77 * Cam

The groom who got the ring moves through the reception, listening to other people's conversations.

"If Parental Override passes the Senate, I hear the entire Tribal Congress is threatening to secede from the union-not just the Arpache," says a woman Cam thinks has Wil Tashi'ne's liver. "That's dozens of Chancefolk tribes. We could have a second Heartland War on our hands."

"It'll never happen," says the taller of CyFi's fathers. "The president has vowed to veto if it passes."

Several of the wedding participants-ones who share parts of Wil's cerebral cortex-bond over connected memories. Cam wonders if they have a grand feeling of Wil's presence among them. For Cam, with all of the anxiety of the day-slipping a ring on Una's hand, and her slipping a ring on his-he can't be sure what he feels. He knows he experiences Wil's presence every time he plays guitar, though. For him, that's enough.

He tries to join the meeting of the minds, but as always, the instant he enters the conversation, the whole focus shifts to him.

"I think it's great what you did, Camus. Can I call you Camus?"

"Those bastards at Proactive Citizenry really had it coming."

"That awful woman should be locked up for life."

He politely excuses himself and slips away, listening in on conversations, hoping they don't see him and shift their conversation to him. Once upon a time, all the attention might have swelled his head, but his head has been swollen and deflated so many times, he's become immune.

Connor, who's been eyeing him since the reception began, finally makes an approach, looking a little pained and awkward as he does. "Empathy," Connor says, then clears his throat. "What I mean to say is that I get it now, and I just wanted you to know."

Cam has no idea what "it" he gets, until Connor explains his run-in with a little kitchen gadget named UNIS, and his whole dicing/slicing/rewinding experience. And then Connor asks him a question that perhaps no one else would understand. No one but Cam.

Connor grabs his arm, and looks into his eyes. "How do you fill it?" Connor asks. "How do you fill the . . . the space?"

And to Cam's own amazement, he has an answer. "Bit by bit," he says, "and not alone."

Connor holds his arm for a moment more, letting that sink in, then walks away satisfied. In that moment, Cam realizes that he can't hold on to any of the hatred he had for Connor. Now he can only admire him. All context of their rivalry is gone. He wonders why he ever disliked him at all.

Cam had no idea that The Girl was here. How could he? Even if he saw her from a distance, he'd forget the moment he looked away. She comes to him as he's picking over the remains of the buffet, which was attacked as if by vultures the moment the ceremony was over.

"I wanted to thank you, Cam, for what you did for us that night in Akron."

He remembers the night. He remembers Grace and Connor, but- As soon as Cam turns to her, seeing her point-blank, his brain begins to resonate itself into convulsions. It's so painful he has to look away. The agony of longing blends with the pain of the nanites doing their accursed job, and he has to hold on to the wall to keep his balance. This is how he knows who she must be.

"Cam, are you all right?"

"Yes, yes, I'm fine," he says, making sure to focus on a point on the wall above her shoulder, seeing her only faintly in his peripheral vision. Even then the pain is too great. In the end he has to turn away from her entirely.

"Cam, don't be this way. . . ."

"No," he says. "No, you don't understand. They made me . . . they made me . . ." But even as he tries to explain, his thoughts are scrambled to the point that he's not sure what he was going to say. He doesn't even know her name. How can he talk to her if he doesn't even know her name? So he closes his eyes, sorts the pieces, and tells her what he can, as best as he can.

"You are the reason for everything I did," he tells her, keeping his eyes closed. "But now I need a new reason."

Silence for a moment. And then she says, "I understand." Her voice is so sweet. And so painful.

"But . . . but . . ." He has to get this out, because he knows it's the only chance he'll ever get. "But I can still remember what it felt like . . . to love you."

He feels her give him a kiss on the cheek. And when he opens his eyes, she's gone, and he wonders why on earth he's standing by the buffet with his eyes closed.

The reception barely lasts an hour. The eyes are the first to leave, apparently having seen enough, and the other bits and pieces of Wil Tashi'ne are quick to follow. Through the whole reception, Una has been noticeably absent. Cam finds her sitting on the back steps of the main house alone, her ribboned hair pulled forward in an attempt to hide tears.

He sits beside her. His presence doesn't chase her away. That's a good sign.

"Was it everything you expected?" he asks her.

"What do you think?" she says bitterly.

"I think you're a very loyal, and a very stubborn, human being, Mrs. Una Tashi'ne."

Then he pulls something out of his pocket. "Which reminds me, I have something to show you." He hands her his Hawaiian driver's license. She looks at it, unimpressed.

"So you can drive. Big deal."

"It is a big deal. This is an official ID. After what happened on Molokai, the state legislature passed a special referendum declaring that I am officially a human being. So now I actually exist. At least in Hawaii. The rest of the world isn't so sure."

She hands it back to him. "You don't need a license to prove you exist. I know you exist."

"Thank you, Una," he says. "That means a lot to me." Although he's not sure if she believes him.

"So what will you do now?" she asks.

He shrugs. "Lots of things. I've been asked to play Carnegie Hall, and to be the grand marshal of the Rose Parade."

"So you're still the shining star."

"I guess, but now it's because of what I've done, not because of who I am. There's a big difference."

Una considers it. "You're right, there is."

"Of course, I don't have Roberta to organize things for me anymore. Now I have an agent-and she's almost as scary."

Una laughs, which makes Cam happy. If he can make her laugh on this strange mournful wedding day, that's half the battle. He takes a moment to look at the identical rings on their fingers. She sees him looking, and the moment becomes awkward.

"Anyway," says Cam. "I'm going back to Molokai for a while. It seems no one knows what to do with all those rewinds now that the whole property has been confiscated by the state. They need someone to be their advocate, and to help them integrate themselves, mind and body."

"You mean they're just going to leave them there?"

"No one wants to deal with them, no one wants to admit they exist, and the public made a huge outcry when someone suggested they be euthanized." Cam sighs. "Molokai was once a leper colony. It looks like the island will be holding to its tradition."

Then Cam pauses. You fill the emptiness bit by bit, he thinks, and not alone. He takes her hand, rolling her ring between his fingers, and when she doesn't pull away, he says, "I would like it very much if you came back to Molokai with me."

She takes a long look at him. "Why would I do that?"

"Because I asked?" he says. "Because you want to?"

"I put that ring on your hand. But I didn't marry the rest of you."

"I know," he tells her. "But the rest of me comes with the hand."

She smirks. "Not if I get my chain saw."

"Ah," says Cam. "The good old days."

Silence falls again, but it's not as awkward as it was a moment ago.

Una flips her hair back from her face. Her tears from before have almost dried. "What's it like on Molokai? Hot and muggy? What should I wear?"

"Does that mean you'll come?" Cam asks, a little too eager.

Instead of answering, she leans forward and kisses him. Then she runs her fingers through his multitextured hair, and with the faintest of smiles, she regards his admittedly irresistible eyes, and she gently whispers, "How I despise you, Camus Comprix."

Then she kisses him again.

78 * Connor

Once the grooms all leave and the residents of the Tyler Walker Revival Compound return to their business, the dusk is filled with the mild melancholy that follows any grand event.