The Last Book in the Universe Page 5

  “The only real treasure is inside your head,” he says, tapping the side of his skull. “Memories are better than diamonds, and nobody can steal them from you.”

  Staring up at the scrapers makes me feel extra small. “Why did they build them so high?” I ask him.

  “Because they could, I guess.”

  “But weren’t they afraid of earthquakes?”

  “Not afraid enough,” he says. “I don’t suppose anybody really knows how bad a thing can be until it actually happens.”

  The sun is barely visible through the smog, but Ryter says if we keep it over our left shoulders and walk straight ahead, we’ll get where we’re going, no problem. We trudge along for a couple of hours and in all that time we don’t see another living thing. No weeds, no insects, nothing. Just ruins melting into dead sand. Not even the rats are dumb enough to live this close to the Edge, which is fine with me.

  We seem to be alone, but I keep getting this creepy feeling that something is watching us. Maybe the scrapers themselves. I don’t know if the old buildings can see or not, but they sure can moan when the wind goes through the steel. Moaning like they know they’re slowly dying and can’t do anything about it.

  As it turns out, the Pipe is right where Ryter thought it was. Sitting up there on its crumbling pylons, ready to take us where we’re going.

  We’re almost there when the howling starts.

  “Ah-hee-hoo-hoo! Ah-hoo-yip-yip!”

  It sounds like wild animals, but somehow I know it isn’t, not exactly. Little Face hugs my leg. I can feel him shivering, which scares me almost as much as the howling.

  “Ah-hee-hoo-hoo! Ah-hoo-yip-yip!”

  They come pouring out of the ruins, howling and scampering and waving their arms.

  “Monkey Boys,” says Ryter. “Don’t move.”

  They swarm in, surrounding us, and I can see their faces painted to look like monkeys, and their wild eyes that want to kill us.

  MONKEY BOYS. I’ve heard of them. Monkey Boys control this latch like the Bully Bangers control theirs. But the creatures pouring out of the ruins no longer act human; they’ve become as wild as the paint on their faces. And it isn’t only the face paint — their teeth have been sharpened into fangs, and their fingernails are like yellowed, curving claws.

  “Something’s wrong!” Ryter hisses to me.

  “No kidding!” I hiss right back at him.

  As the crazy clawed hands reach out to grab us, Ryter twists around and looks me in the eye. “Do not resist,” he warns. “They’ll tear us limb from limb.”

  I figure that may happen anyway, but fighting won’t do any good: There’s way too many of them and not enough of us. I try to keep hold of Little Face, but as the swarm lifts us he gets separated. The little guy yells, “Chox! Chox!” and it means help me! but I can’t help him or Ryter or myself because we’re being carried away by a hundred howling madmen with ferocious snapping fangs.

  I’m thinking the Bangers never act like this, not even when they’re canceling a victim, but the Monkey Boys don’t seem to have a leader making rules and telling them what to do. The old gummy’s right — something is wrong. The Monkey Boys don’t just look like animals and act like animals — they’ve become animals.

  The screaming swarm carries us back into the ruins, under the long steel shadows of the giant scrapers, to a place where the air smells of blood and rust.

  They bring us to a strange dark structure, a fortress made from the iron bones of a fallen building. Great iron beams hammered into the ground and bound together with woven steel cable. Splat guns and cannons stick from slots in the walls. The swarm of wild Monkey Boys surrounds the fort, leaping and howling, ah-hee-hoo-hoo, ah-hee-yip-yip!

  The howling becomes a word.

  “Mongo!” they howl. “Mongo! Mongo! Mongo!”

  They keep screaming for Mongo until a section of the great iron wall is lowered by cable, and we are carried into the fort. The entire swarm tries to get inside, but a squad of teks is guarding the fort, and the teks hold their ground, chopping at the mob with chetty blades and stunstiks, driving them back.

  The Monkey Boys drop us to the dirt and back away. The great door is raised behind us, shutting out the swarm, and for the first time since we’ve been seized, the howling stops.

  For some reason the quiet is even more terrifying.

  The teks point their weapons at us and indicate that we get up.

  Ryter can barely stand, but he waves me off when I try to help him. “Show neither aggression nor fear,” he whispers to me urgently. “Just play along.”

  Play along? I’ve no idea what the old man is talking about. How do you play along with a dozen armored thugs who communicate by grunts? The best I can do is keep Little Face close by as the teks herd us deeper into the fortress.

  The smell is terrible and gets worse. No plumbing, obviously. Very little power, because the lights keep flickering. Whoever is in charge of this place, he’s not paying attention, that’s for sure.

  We pass a stockade crammed with prisoners who stare at us with dead eyes. They’re all bone thin, wearing tattered rags. They don’t even have the strength to moan or beg for help or keep themselves clean.

  “A good sign,” Ryter says out of the side of his mouth.

  A good sign? The old gummy must be losing it. But then I realize what he’s getting at. If they keep prisoners, that means their victims aren’t canceled immediately. Which means we might have a chance to survive, at least for a while.

  The teks shove us down dark, winding passageways, and we make so many turns, there’s no way I could find my way back, even if we did manage to escape.

  As it turns out, we hear Mongo before we see him. A loud voice booms through the passageway: “HEAR MONGO AND OBEY … HEAR MONGO AND OBEY …,” over and over, like an old 3D stuck on replay.

  Which, as it turns out, is pretty close to the truth.

  When we get closer to the booming voice, lights begin to glow, reflecting off the walls. Then at last we turn the corner and there he is.

  “To your knees!” the tek boss shouts, shoving us down with his stunstik. “Pay homage to Mongo the Magnificent! Hear him and obey!”

  We drop to our knees and look up at Mongo. He’s a fierce, powerful-looking latchboss with bright, blazing eyes, huge, muscular arms, shoulder-length hair the color of midnight, and a snarling, blood-red monkey tattooed on his enormous chest. He thumps the tattoo with his fists and goes, “HEAR MONGO AND OBEY … HEAR MONGO AND OBEY.”

  It’s crazy, but I almost laugh out loud. Mongo the Magnificent is nothing more than a hologram. A short loop from a 3D, repeating over and over again. It wouldn’t fool a two-year-old kid, and it doesn’t fool me.

  Ryter murmurs, “I’m going to try something. Whatever you do, don’t interfere.”

  Before I can stop him, the old gummy stands up slowly, leaning on his stick.

  “On your knees!” the tek boss commands. “Homage to Mongo!”

  All the weapons aim at Ryter. It’s hard to tell with the masks they wear, but the teks look nervous, uncertain.

  “You must take us to the real Mongo!” Ryter tells them, raising his voice to be heard over the sound of the repeating hologram.

  “Knees!” cries the tek boss. “Homage!” But he sounds uncertain.

  “Does Mongo live?” Ryter demands.

  “Mongo lives,” says the tek boss. He sounds puzzled, as if he’s not quite sure why he’s talking to the old gummy instead of canceling him.

  Ryter walks up to the tek boss. I’m sure he’s about to die, but the tek boss doesn’t move. “Take off the mask,” Ryter suggests. “Let me see your face.”

  Much to my amazement, the tek boss takes off his armored security mask. Under the mask he’s just another young guy with a round face and worried eyes, and he’s looking at Ryter like he can’t decide, should he listen to the old man or cut his red.

  “You must take us to Mongo,” Ryter tells him. “Maybe we ca
n help.”

  The tek boss hesitates, and his face gets all wrenched up like he’s in pain. “I don’t have the authority.”

  “Does anyone have the authority?” Ryter gently asks. “No? I thought not. Think about it, son. What would Mongo want you to do?”

  “Hear him and obey,” the tek boss responds instantly.

  “Yes, of course,” Ryter says patiently. “And you’ve done a splendid job of obeying him, under very difficult circumstances. Keeping your squad together, defending the fort, and so on. But now you must do more. You must help Mongo. Take us to him.”

  “I-I-I’m afraid,” the tek boss stammers.

  “We’re all afraid,” Ryter says soothingly. “If the situation continues, the fort will be overwhelmed and you’ll all be destroyed. I think you know that. Something must be done.”

  The tek boss speaks uneasily, as if afraid of being overheard. “What you say is true. But what would you have us do?”

  “Let’s start with trying to help Mongo, shall we?” Ryter suggests.

  The poor tek boss looks like he’s being tortured, but finally he nods and goes, “Follow me. But if we all die, don’t say I didn’t warn you.”

  “Warning acknowledged,” Ryter says. “Now proceed.”

  It’s one of the most amazing things I’ve ever witnessed: an old gummy — an intruder into the latch — persuading a tek boss to disobey his orders. When I look at Ryter it’s like he knows what I’m thinking, because he gives me a wink and makes it clear that we just go along while we’ve got the chance.

  “Chox?” Little Face asks, tugging at my leg.

  “Sssh,” I tell him. “We’ll be okay.”

  And for the first time since the Monkey Boys grabbed us, I really do think we might make it out alive. Of course I’m assuming Ryter intends to overpower the young tek boss when we get the chance, and then shoot our way out of the fortress. As it turns out, he’s got an entirely different plan: The crazy old fool really does want to see Mongo — the real one, not the hologram version.

  We follow the frightened tek boss into a much smaller passageway — barely room to move, really — and then up a set of metal ladder steps.

  At the top of the stairs the tek boss glances furtively around, takes a deep breath, and then wrenches open the lock on an overhead hatch. He gives Ryter a mournful look, then cautiously pushes open the hatch.

  “Inside,” he whispers.

  Without hesitation Ryter climbs up the last few rungs of the ladder and disappears through the hatch.

  What choice do I have? I follow him inside, into the secret lair of Mongo the Magnificent, boss man of the Monkey Boys.

  THE FIRST THING I notice is the horrible stink. Think of moldy dead rats and rotten eggs and dirty diapers. This is worse, much worse. After crawling up through the hatch, I roll to one side and wait for my eyes to adjust to the glittery dimness. Except for the stink, it reminds me of Billy Bizmo’s place, only bigger. A latchboss pleasure-crib stuffed with goodies and gizmos and every possible gaming device. There are lots of soft inflatos that mold themselves to your shape when you sit down, and thick massago-rugs that rub your feet while you walk, and all kinds of beautiful polished things. A lot of it isn’t quite real. The glowing fish that swim in a holoquarium. The 3Ds of female dancers that float above a projection table, wiggling their arms and legs and dancing to music I can’t hear.

  The stink is real, though. Real enough to make your eyes water.

  “Try not to breathe through your nose,” Ryter advises.

  I can tell from his expression that he’s not terribly surprised by what he sees or smells. I follow him to the center of the room, where we find a kind of huge round bed that seems to be the source of the horrible stink. Imagine a throne made of thick sleeping mats and you’ve got the idea.

  “The poor wretch,” Ryter says softly.

  Lying on the bed-throne is a shriveled, starving creature soaked in his own filth. Most of his hair has fallen out and lies in a fuzzy pile around his head. His teeth are gone, and his eyes are milky blind. I can barely make out the faded red monkey tattoo on his withered chest. At first glance you might think he’s dead, but he isn’t — not quite. His fingers twitch a little, and his mouth works, as if he’s trying to speak, and you can see where veins pulse weakly in his scrawny neck.

  A faint sound comes from his ruined mouth. “Mmm-mmm-mmm,” like the noise of a small motor running out of power.

  Amber lights slowly blink on the silver boxes of the mindprobe machinery, going, bzzzt bzzzt bzzzt. I get the idea the thing in the bed is trying to talk to the probe machine, or thinks the probe is talking to him. Something like that. The weird thing is, the filthy, bone-starved creature seems to be smiling, as if unaware of his condition.

  “What happened to him?” I ask.

  The young tek boss has worked up the courage to follow us into the room. “Mongo has been looping for more than a year,” he says.

  “Looping?” Ryter asks.

  “A probe that keeps repeating in endless variations,” the tek boss explains. “You never have to come out, if you don’t want. This one is called Forever Eden, and it’s his favorite trendie. Mongo is in Eden now, living the life of a proov. He refuses to leave. He loves it there.”

  A thick, grayish liquid oozes from around the needle stuck into the center of Mongo’s naked skull. They call it brain ooze, and it happens when you probe for too long. They say that some of the more expensive probes last for twenty-four hours, but I never heard of anybody staying under for a whole year.

  “So he’s living in another world,” Ryter says. “Or he thinks he is.”

  “Exactly,” the tek boss says.

  “Can we shut off the machine?”

  “If we shut it off, he dies. It’s the only thing keeping him alive. The brain stimulation keeps his heart beating.”

  “I see,” Ryter says. “And the reason nobody takes care of him or keeps him clean is because they’re all terrified of Mongo the Magnificent?”

  “Oh yes,” the tek boss says. “There was a time when to enter this room without permission meant instant cancellation. Mongo killed many, often for no reason. To look directly into his eyes was a death sentence.”

  Ryter studies the tek boss. “Look around,” he suggests. “Are you still frightened of Mongo?”

  The tek boss slowly shakes his head.

  “Somebody has to take charge of the latch,” Ryter tells him gently. “Why not you?”

  “Me?” the tek boss says, sounding terrified.

  “You had courage enough to bring us here,” Ryter says. “If someone doesn’t take over, and soon, then all will be lost. Without guidance, without a leader to lead them, the Monkey Boys have degenerated. They’ll tear you and your men apart and then destroy themselves.”

  “But why would they listen to me? I’m not a latchboss.”

  “Neither was Mongo,” Ryter points out, “until he made himself one.”

  After we leave, the young tek boss seals the hatch, but the stink of what happened to Mongo sticks with me. I’m thinking it could happen to Billy Bizmo, too, if he isn’t careful. Part of me wants Billy to end up that way, for being so cruel about Bean, and the other part of me knows that as bad as the Bangers are, they’d be that much worse without someone to make the rules.

  “What’s your name, may I ask?” Ryter says to the tek boss.

  “Gorm.”

  “That’ll work,” Ryter says, musing to himself. “The Great Gorm. Why not?”

  Meanwhile the Great Gorm looks like he’s going to be sick. The color has drained from his cheeks, he’s breathing sort of puffy, and his eyes have this faraway focus, as if he’s looking at tomorrow and doesn’t much like what he sees.

  “What if I fail?” he asks.

  “You must banish all doubt,” Ryter instructs him. “The other thing you must do is make up a few simple rules. That’s what the Monkey Boys expect from their leader. A few rules strictly enforced.”


  Gorm thinks it over. You can tell he’s slowly getting used to the idea of taking over from Mongo, and the more he thinks about it, the more he likes it.

  “If I’m the boss, they’ll have to obey me,” he mutters to himself. “Obey or die, that’s the first rule.”

  Ryter nods, as if that’s what he expected to hear. “I have a request for the Great Gorm,” he says, bowing his head.

  “What?” says Gorm, lost in his thoughts. “Oh yeah, sure. Go ahead.”

  “Two requests, actually. The first is that you release all prisoners as a gesture of goodwill,” Ryter suggests. “My second request is that you banish us from the latch. Have a squad of teks escort us to the border.”

  Gorm looks at him sharply. “What? I assumed you’d stay and be my adviser.”

  “We have a mission elsewhere,” Ryter says, making it sound grand and important. “But I do have one more piece of advice. Do not appoint an adviser until you’re certain of your men. If I’m not mistaken, Mongo was adviser to the previous latchboss. The very one he assassinated.”

  Gorm glances nervously behind him, then catches himself. I notice he’s already looking bigger and stronger. “Mongo made his proclamations from the East Tower,” he says, eyes suddenly flashing. “The Great Gorm will do the same. I must tell them there’s a new boss, new rules.”

  Ryter studies him thoughtfully and then nods. “The king is dead,” he says. “Long live the king.”

  LITTLE FACE LOOKS scared. You can’t blame him. The teks who drive us away in their takvee aren’t exactly friendly. Plus a wild mob of Monkey Boys chase after the takvee, hooting and screeching and throwing stones at us. Every time a stone hits the armor plating, Little Face tries to make himself even smaller than he is. Also, he hasn’t said “chox” since we left the fort.

  “We’ll be okay,” I say, “soon as we’re clear of this latch.”