The Last Book in the Universe (17 page)

The Bangers finally get bored and decide to end it. They gun their engines hard and drag the life out of him until there's nothing left. Nothing but silence, and the stink of jetbike fumes, and the bundle of rags and bones that used to be the Ryter.

I didn't stay until the very end. When the Ryter finally stopped telling his stories I ran away. I ran to the river, but there were dead things floating there, so I ran to the tallest building in the projos and climbed out on the roof and watched the sky, hoping maybe I'd see the shiny things called stars.

I never did.

 

Copyright © 1999 by Rodman Philbrick. Originally published in the anthology
Tomorrowland: 10 Stories About the Future
, edited by Michael Cart.

This book was originally published in hardcover by the Blue Sky Press in 2000.

Copyright © 2000 by Rodman Philbrick.

All rights reserved. Published by Scholastic Inc. SCHOLASTIC, THE BLUE SKY PRESS, and associated logos are trademarks and/or registered trademarks of Scholastic Inc.

Cover art by David Shannon

Designed by Kathleen Westray

e-ISBN 978-0-545-30387-3

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