Munmun(57)

“Who cares, Hue thinks I’m a loser now,” she worried.

“How’d you sell the counselors that pen though,” I said.

Prayer cracked a little smile finally and said, “Want to know what I said?”

“Yeah,” I said.

“Okay, you’re the counselors,” she said. “So first, without telling me, just think of how many munmuns you’d pay for the most premium reliable topquality pen, the only pen you’ll need for the rest of your life.”

“Okay,” I said, thinking, one munmun, who the heck needs a pen.

“Got that number in your mind?” she asked.

“Yup I got it,” I said.

“Okay,” she said. “Here’s a piece of paper. Write down the number.”

I didn’t have anything to write with.

“I don’t have anything to write with,” I said.

“No kidding,” she said. “Sounds like you need to buy a pen.”

And she bopped me on the nose with the pen.

That was it apparently.

“That’s all you need to say to get on Busy Track?” I shrieked.

Way too soon, it was the weekend before my own return to Track Test Dungeon.

I felt pretty unready but refused to admit it, daughterday and sonday the whole family made a cheerfull determined groupeffort of Prep Warner For Retrack.

The family and Prayer and me meditated both mornings.

Hue ordered the cooks to make special brainfoods, leafygreens, oilyfish.

Dawn performed evening yogas with me, align the energies and breathe only with certain lungzones, bet you didn’t know lungs even had zones.

Hueagain reviewed medicals with me daughterday morning, gave me quiet encouragement of it’s really not as hard as you think, you’ll be totally fine, I almost believed him.

Tony covered programs, ifthens and forloops, I cut this one a little short because Tony is always trying to tell you why everything is so great, it stressed me out having to agree with him overandover, yes, all of these boring things are super great.

Even insane bitter Daisy took two hours with me to review chemicals. Daisy was not a childgenius anymore but still headed for a comfy life at a chemlab, her prep was solid and she was even nice to me. “In this house you really put up with a lot,” she told me with kind eyes, “I could never do it.”

And allday sonday I dug into math with Markfive and Kitty. Markfive gulped extra focusdrugs and was wild helpfull, this kid has a superpower brain when he’s not distracted, I tried hard to absorb like a thirsty plant.

Wake up Warner, it’s munday, day of the retrack test, here is how it goes.

“Goodluck, forreal dave, you deserve it, you’re too smart for Lifty,” says Brand in the parkinglot.

Tray nods but says nothing, just bumps skulls and smiles grimly.

Grace messages me yourethebests and youcandoits and endless triumphvids, hearts and fireworks, ninja skateboard champions, my phone is freaking out.

“Bro, you’ve come this far for a reason, I believe in you,” whispers Prayer fiercely into my ear, and pushes me toward the door.

“The test consists of nine sections, thirtyminutes each, you must pass all nine to retrack, are you ready for section one,” says the counselor in Track Test Dungeon.

I pass the first two sections and choke hard on numberthree, six problems solved out of twentyfive, minimum to move on is thirteen.

Failure, disaster, notevenclose.

I cross the parkinglot into Mun World, can’t go crawling back to Lifty Gym, too ashamed, it’s not even lunch yet and I failed.





LIFEANDDEATHWORLD


I walked Mun World alone, aisles for miles lit with dead whiteness, hating myself.

And also hating stupid Mun World, look at this crappy terrible place.

Look at all these cheap freaking items, made quick and sloppy, fated for short sad lives.

Look at these Shimmery Popstar Hero backpacks, made from stiff plastic fabrics, straps are barely even sewn on right, the machine in charge of drawing Shimmery Popstar Hero Face must have gotten distracted because the eyes are at different latitudes of the head.

Look at this Action Gunmen Play Set, pay six hundo so your sad little murderer can plunk plastic statues with rubber bullets.

Look at this heap of Supermops, half are already bending and buckling and can never be sold.

Look at this fearfull row of a thousand shirts, a thousand people will come in and put these on their skin, dontknowwhy but it’s terrifying to think about.

Listen to this plastic music, stamping and gleaming, cleanedup robot voices, probably sounds to me the way I sound to an animal. Speaking of animals, there’s one right now, tail swishing and switching.

It was a big evil tortashell cat, hunting the littlepoors of Mun World.

Look at this deathmachine, his wicked claws and superstrength and aboveall his love of blood. How did I know he loved blood, look at him, he’s husky, wellfed, but still hunting avidly, not even hungry for meat, just death.

He was gazing insanely at a hole where definitely some terrified littlepoors escaped into it, probably still in there unless they have a tunnel system.

It took me embarrassingly long to swallow my fear and get my heart to stop shuddering and remember, Warner, you’re bigger than cats now, if you survived many jailpulpings you can probably pick up and dispose of a cat.