Chapter 70 of 89 · Book 7, This Inevitable Ruin

Chapter 70 — City of Broken Dreams

Book: This Inevitable Ruin · Part: The Peeling of Larracos · Previous: Chapter 69 — Interlude — Several days earlier; Interlude — Rosetta; Zarogoths · Next: Chapter 71 — Donkey Kong · Floor: Floor 9 — Faction Wars · Series: the series

Opening

I burst into the saferoom.

Summary

In the saferoom Mordecai reads Anne of Green Gables to Ruby, her misshapen head on his shoulder — Carl's grandparents in Texas had the book; he sees Katia and Annie in it and does not interrupt: 'He thinks it's over.' Selvi and Tuba, now Posse members whether they like it or not, follow sobbing; Dong rides Gonk to Shanty Town. Out through the professors' dorm tower at the Larracos College of Magic: 'City of Broken Dreams', under siege, thirteen minutes to the towers. Tower 22, red-jewelled, upgraded five times, will fire ten Fire Lances a second. Zarogoths, level 50 — 'leaky edgelords', Sludge Ghouls or Sausage Golems, souls captured and corrupted into oil in a sausage casing, no personality, a pain ray, dead at 51 per cent leaked, and they smell — laugh like Rend as they fight the Semeru dwarves in parade armour at the college gate. The Scavenger's Daughter opens her eyes: Harpocrates is in range (level 15 Pied Piper), stopped at the edge of Shanty Town by two golden-skinned ogre basilica guards, changelings, whom gods will not pass or attack. Donut, invisible in the ghoulie suit, sees the antenna's reflection: inside the Piccadilly Theater on the ninth level, shielded, where she cannot see it; the lava is about to fall in front of it. Juice Box arrives as a ten-foot dynastes beetle with Britney and a poofed, screaming Ferdinand in his bowler hat, turns human and grabs Carl: 'Where's my husband?' — she actually loves him. Louis, at full health, is Paralyzed and Bound in the Reaver castle among the robot dogs; Samantha is searching. Juice Box to Samantha: a fleshmancer form, any body she desires — 'I know who you are. Who you really are. I also know you've lost your mind' — for a hall-pass night. Then, from the Nest: someone at the door; 'a crawler. A woman with a dog'; Toyotomi, Sergeant Bret S and Bomo send their last messages, each stamped from the deceased. Donut cannot leave the tower; there is a net.

Characters

• Mordecai — Anne of Green Gables to Ruby in what he thinks are his last hours.
• Juice Box — 'Where's Louis? Where's my husband?'
• Samantha — 'THROW IN A HALL PASS NIGHT WITH LOUIS.'
• Ferdinand — Screaming on Britney's head in his bowler hat.
• Lucia Mar — A woman with a dog, at the door of the Nest.
• Bomo — 'Will stop her now.' Deceased.
• Toyotomi — Dead at the tower door.
• Princess Donut — Finds the antenna; cannot jump.

Locations

• Larracos — The college of magic, ring 50; towers spinning up; zarogoths at the gate.
• The Piccadilly — Where the war mages hid the soul-crystal generator.

Motifs

• The changelings — Golden ogres a god will not pass.
• The Scavenger's Daughter — Opens her eyes for Harpocrates.
• Juice Box and Louis — She loves him; she knows who Samantha really is.
• The war mages — Zarogoths: disposable troops with a sadistic streak.
• Faction Wars — Carl: 'This is war, I thought. This is war.'