How to Save the Universe Without Really Trying Read online

  “Warning: Do not try wearing a hat after reading this book, for your head may be a different size. Read in isolation, to avoid blowing out others’ eardrums with laughter. If you value tidy, predictable plots and have no interest in time travel, intergalactic adventure, and the connection between baked beans and the fate of humanity, look elsewhere. Now. And give your copy to me. This is not only a must-read but a must-read-again.”

  —Peter Lerangis, author of the Seven Wonders series

  Dedication

  This book was written for the express enjoyment of one

  Molly C of Brooklyn, New York (but I hope you like it too).

  Epigraph

  “Ah! Young people, travel if you can, and if you cannot—travel all the same!”

  —Jules Verne

  “Don’t swallow your gum.”

  —Professor Rivulon

  It is said at the heart of the universe beats a question only one can answer.

  And when she does, creation itself will unravel.

  Philosophers agree this incontrovertibly proves that while there may be no silly questions . . .

  . . . there are definitely dangerous ones.

  Contents

  Cover

  Title Page

  Dedication

  Epigraph

  Part 1: The Phenomenal, Cosmic Significance of Baked Beans

  Chapter 1

  Chapter 2

  Chapter 3

  Chapter 4

  Chapter 5

  Chapter 6

  Chapter 7

  Chapter 8

  Chapter 9

  Part 2: The Moon Has a Ball Pit

  Chapter 10

  Chapter 11

  Chapter 12

  Chapter 13

  Chapter 14

  Chapter 15

  Chapter 16

  Chapter 17

  Chapter 18

  Part 3: The Archduke and Duchess of Sagittarius Run Amok

  Chapter 19

  Chapter 20

  Chapter 21

  Chapter 22

  Chapter 23

  Chapter 24

  Chapter 25

  Chapter 26

  Part 4: The Triumvirate of Pong

  Chapter 27

  Chapter 28

  Chapter 29

  Chapter 30

  Chapter 31

  Chapter 32

  Chapter 33

  Chapter 34

  Chapter 35

  Chapter 36

  Chapter 37

  Chapter 38

  Part 5: The Answer to the Question of the End

  Chapter 39

  Chapter 40

  Chapter 41

  Chapter 42

  Chapter 43

  Chapter 44

  Chapter 45

  Chapter 46

  Chapter 47

  Chapter 48

  Chapter 49

  Epilogue

  Back Ad

  Acknowledgments

  About the Author

  Copyright

  About the Publisher

  Part 1

  The Phenomenal, Cosmic Significance of Baked Beans

  1

  PHINEAS T. FOGG WAS bored. He didn’t often get bored. He was intelligent (according to him) and rich (according to pretty much everybody), and when you’re clever and have lots of money, it’s rare to find yourself with nothing to do. The odds of this happening were somewhere around seventy-six thousand to one. That’s in the super unlikely to absurdly unlikely range. And yet, here Phineas was, in the penthouse of his family’s own building, in a room full of the most sophisticated and expensive gadgets in the galaxy, improbably bored.

  Though Phin didn’t know it yet, it was going to be one of those days when super unlikely to absurdly unlikely things happened a lot.

  He’d been sprawled on the floor a good twenty-six minutes. His food replicator lay in pieces (he’d disassembled and reassembled it so many times he’d lost count), his favorite vortex manipulator was now an invigorating shade of green (he’d tried painting it blue, then pink, then polka-dot), and his Extraweb terminal—which accessed a super-vast, super-entertaining network of just about every interesting clip, article, program, or game one could imagine—lay dormant.

  Some days, even cat videos lose their charm.

  “I’m bored, Teddy,” Phin said aloud.

  “Let’s play a game,” said the large, slightly dingy teddy bear sagging in the corner.

  “I don’t want to play a game. We’ve played every game. We played Candy Planet. We played Connect Four Billion. We played Apples to Gravleks. I don’t want to play them again.”

  “Let’s play a game,” said Teddy.

  Phin shut his eyes. “I appreciate your persistence, but I’m really not in the mood.”

  “Let’s—” began Teddy.

  “Play a game,” said both—one in a cheerful, slightly wobbly voice, the other in a very weary one.

  In a galaxy full of incredibly articulate and intelligent robo-toys, Phin had an affection for Teddy, who wasn’t a robot really, but a stuffed bear with a semibusted voice box. In the beginning Teddy could say three phrases, including “I love you” and “Where’s my honey?” Now his internal circuitry was sufficiently degraded that only the third phrase, “Let’s play a game,” remained. But Phin knew Teddy loved him, even if he didn’t say it every day.

  Despite having zero confidence it would be any more exciting than lying down, Phin sat up, his antiseptic white jumpsuit bunching around his middle. Sometimes, Phin thought, you have to try something as radical as sitting up just to see if the universe will reward your boldness.

  In this case, it worked.

  A panel on the ceiling slid away, and a bulb whose sole purpose was to strobe red and look alarming dropped into the room and flashed.

  Phin jumped to his feet. “The mail’s here!”

  He rushed to the chute and plugged in his PIN code. The mechanism hissed and whirred, unlocking one of the most sophisticated security systems money could buy. A door slid open. In the antechamber stood an unenthusiastic android, about four feet tall, with a screen for a face. Phin could tell the android was unenthusiastic by the way it crossed its arms and tapped its foot.

  The words You Have Received an Extraweb Gram scrolled across its display.

  Phin felt a mixture of excitement and melancholy, the same blend of emotions he experienced whenever his parents made contact.

  There then appeared an image of two healthy, attractive people who looked a lot like Phin except older, tanner, and less bored. Phin’s parents wore matching safari gear, complete with pith helmets and sub-ether goggles, making them both look a bit like android beekeepers.

  “Hello, Phinny!” Phin’s mother waved. He hated when she called him that.

  His father grinned. “Hello, Phineas, we love you!”

  “We love you so much!”

  “Hi guys,” said Phin. “How’s the safari?”

  “Absolutely brilliant,” said Eliza Fogg. “We so wish you could experience it.”

  “If it weren’t so incredibly dangerous,” Barnabus Fogg added.

  “Yes, if it weren’t so dangerous, we would love it if you were with us.”

  “You’d just love it,” said Barnabus. “The wildlife is incredible here on . . . El, where are we today?”

  “Neptune the Second, near the Frillian Riviera,” said Eliza. “There are giant serpents you can ride!”

  “And flowers that spin cotton candy!” said Barnabus.

  “That sounds amazing,” said Phin, and he meant it.

  Phin’s parents had been enjoying a tour of the galaxy for the past
eleven years. It had begun as a Let’s go on vacation before we have kids kind of thing, then transformed into a Let’s make sure we see the eastern arm of the Milky Way before Eliza gives birth sort of trip, then briefly a Let’s just pop home and have this baby so we can catch our flight to the Horsehead Nebula situation. In fact, Phin had no memory of his parents that didn’t involve an Extraweb Chat or Extraweb Call or Extraweb Gram like this one. Eleven birthdays, eleven Christmases, and twenty-two semiannual Child Appreciation Days had all gone this way: Mom and Dad off in some exotic location; Phineas alone, in his room, wishing he were with them.

  “Do you think maybe next month I could come meet you? Say on Ursa Six?” Phin had his parents’ itinerary memorized—no mean feat, as it was constantly changing and expanding, like one of those star-eating Newtonian blobs, but a lot more expensive.

  “Next month?” said Barnabus.

  “What’s next month again?” said Eliza.

  “My birthday,” said Phin, patiently, lovingly, furiously. “I’m turning twelve.”

  There was an awkward pause.

  “Let’s play a game,” Teddy offered.

  “You said I could travel with you when I turned twelve,” said Phin. He only reminded them of this every time they spoke. “Remember?”

  “Phinny,” said Mom.

  “Phineas,” said Dad.

  “Phin,” said Phin.

  “You know we miss you, angel, but the galaxy is such a huge and dangerous place.”

  “Too dangerous,” added Barnabus, “for a child. Why, your mother’s been kidnapped six times this week alone!”

  “It’s true! And a space wizard shrunk your father to the size of a proton for an entire afternoon!”

  “If anything ever happened to you,” said Barnabus, his eyes glistening with real tears, “buddy, I just don’t know what we’d do.”

  “If you’re bored,” Eliza added, “why not see if Goro wants to play Apples to Gravleks?”

  Goro Bolus was not Phin’s idea of a good playmate. He was Barnabus and Eliza’s business partner, the Bolus in Fogg-Bolus, and in addition to being an adult, he was also the nastiest, creepiest adult Phin knew personally.

  “I’d rather not,” said Phin.

  “Eliza, get Goro on the line,” said Barnabus.

  “No, don’t—!” started Phin, but it was too late. Eliza punched up the conference line, and suddenly the bulbous face of Goro Bolus flickered onto the screen. Bolus was an Arbequian, which meant he resembled, in the opinion of most Earthlings anyway, a very large bean. He was short, even for his species, and wore a pair of unflattering spectacles. The incoming call had startled him, and Bolus scrambled to cover up some blueprints on his desk.

  Goro Bolus always looked like you’d just caught him doing something evil.

  “Goro!” said Barnabus. “Hey buddy, you busy? Got a moment to hang out with Phin?”

  “Barnabus! Eliza! Uh . . .” Bolus tried a smile, which was clearly not his forte. “And, um, hello. Phineas.”

  “Hey, G-Sauce,” said Phin, who knew Bolus loathed all nicknames, and that one in particular.

  Bolus gritted his disturbing little teeth. “I’m afraid I’m in the middle of something a bit, um—”

  “. . . sinister?” suggested Phin, who didn’t share his parents’ unwavering trust in their business partner.

  “Urgent,” sneered Bolus. “Terribly sorry. Have to jump off. Lovely to see the Fogg family as always. Goodbye!”

  His line went dead.

  “He’s so dedicated,” said Eliza.

  “What a guy,” said Barnabus.

  “It’s fine,” said Phin. His parents were always encouraging him to bond with Bolus, as if he were some kindly uncle and not the weirdo who ran the company while they traveled the galaxy. The one thing Bolus and Phin had in common was that neither wanted anything to do with the other.

  “Hey,” said Barnabus, his voice dripping with sympathy. “Hey, trust us, pal. Just a few more years. When you’re older, you can come along.”

  “For now just sit tight, Phinny.”

  “In my room,” said Phin.

  His parents nodded solemnly, lovingly, maddeningly.

  “It’s really the safest place,” said Barnabus.

  “The safest place in the galaxy,” said Eliza.

  “Okay,” said Phin.

  After an exchange of air kisses and I love yous, the screen went blank. The postal android cleared its throat and held out a hand for a tip. Phin ignored it and closed the hatch.

  Kidnapping. Space wizards. It all sounded so glorious, and Phin wanted to be a part of it.

  Instead he was stuck.

  Alone.

  With Teddy.

  He slumped into his chair, did a few spins for good measure, and sighed. Maybe his parents were right. After all, it was just as good seeing the roller-coaster serpents of Neptune the Second in high-def 3D.

  Wasn’t it?

  “Insanely safe,” said Phin, which was the motto of his parents’ company, the Fogg-Bolus Hypergate and Baked Beans Corporation. “That’s best. Isn’t it, Teddy?”

  “Actually,” said a voice that was nothing like Teddy’s, “I think that sounds awful.”

  2

  A THOUSAND YEARS EARLIER, Lola Ray was standing in the security line at Newark Liberty International Airport, on the planet Earth, at the start of the twenty-first century, at just after eight fifteen in the morning. But she was trying to stay positive.

  She had a backpack on one shoulder; an overnight duffel on the other; her infant sister, Mary, in her arms; and her slightly older but still-too-tiny-to-be-left-alone-for-ten-minutes sister, Gabby, wrapped around her right leg. She’d been up since five a.m. sister-wrangling, packing socks, and making snacks for the trip, and she was exhausted, hungry, and sore.

  But she was trying to stay positive.

  “Where is it?” Lola’s mother said for the tenth or eleventh time, rummaging in their carry-on. “Hold this.”

  She handed Lola the family cell phone, or tried to, since Lola had no free hands, then tucked the phone into the crook of Lola’s elbow.

  “Yes, I know,” Lola cooed to her baby sister, Mary. “Momma’s gonna find Mr. Boop, don’t worry.”

  Mary was screaming.

  Gabby squeezed Lola’s leg and shouted, “Drag me!”

  The scenario was not unusual. Lola was used to looking after her siblings. She and Momma were a team. It was them against the world, especially since Papa had taken the research job in Vancouver. Lola was always ready to change a diaper or play Dora the Explorer. She was the responsible one, according to her mother, and so good with the holy terrors.

  Lola took care of things.

  She also took care of her mother.

  Lola looked up from her screaming sister and squinted at Momma. “I think,” she said in her most adult voice, “it’s in your hair.”

  “My what?”

  Shrugging the baby and cell phone into one arm, Lola reached up and plucked a rubber pacifier from the tangle of curls on her mother’s head. She showed it to Mary and went “Boop!” on her nose before giving it to the baby to suck.

  Momma sighed. “What would I do without you?”

  It was an excellent question.

  As the line shuffled a few steps closer to the security checkpoint, Lola imagined what she would do without her family. This flight to Vancouver had originally been a Lola-only trip. Summer vacation had just begun, and for the first time ever, Lola was going to travel alone, a just-her-and-Papa trip, no baby sisters, no Momma rolling her eyes at the comic books Lola liked to read. Just seven days of running around Papa’s apartment complex, watching whatever she liked on Papa’s iPad, and talking to him all about the obsession they shared—the TV show Dimension Y. Dimension Y was all about flying through time and space, having adventures, and saving the day. There were no sisters or pacifiers in Dimension Y, and Lola knew this because she’d seen every episode more than three times.

 
; Then Momma and Papa had that big fight on the phone about Papa being gone for so long, and Momma had cried, and her voice had gone soft and plaintive—Lola had heard it all through the bedroom wall—and suddenly Lola’s solo trip was turned into a family event, all four Ray women flying to Canada. “Won’t that be fun?” Momma asked, and Lola had made herself smile. She was still smiling now.

  When at last it was their turn, Lola handed back Momma’s cell phone, as well as Mary, and pried Gabby off her leg. Momma went through first with the baby, then it was Gabby’s turn, until at last it was just Lola.

  She closed her eyes, and for a moment imagined she truly was on her own. Not just on her own, but a grown-up, about to jet off to an exotic location, to see the world.

  The security guard beckoned her on with two fingers. She stepped to the line and presented her passport and ticket.

  “Vancouver, eh?”

  “Yes, sir,” said Lola, who was unfailingly polite, especially to people in uniform. “It’s my first time going to another country,” she added, which was true. Her passport was crisp and blue, and had never been used.

  The guard smiled. “It’s a day of firsts. We’ve got a new X-ray gate. Supposed to be a lot safer.”

  “Safer?” said Lola.

  The guard scanned her passport and handed it back. “Well, it hasn’t turned anyone into a Bog Mutant yet.”

  For a moment his comment puzzled her, then Lola remembered she was wearing her Dimension Y T-shirt, the one with the stencil of monstrous Bog Mutants crawling out of alien goo.

  “You’re into Dimension Y?”

  The guard nodded. “Just started the two-part finale. Did you see it?”

  “It’s so amazing!” Lola said—so loud she startled herself. She wasn’t used to grown-ups taking an interest in her opinions, let alone sharing her love for things like Dimension Y. Her father was the only adult she knew who watched it. “Sorry. I just binged the whole final season.”

  The guard pretended to cover his ears. “No spoilers!” he said, and smiled at her.

  Lola moved forward and felt herself glowing. She decided then to rewatch the finale on the plane, if the plane had Wi-Fi, which Momma said it would. She’d wait until Momma was asleep and then use her cell phone. Maybe she’d have a few hours to herself after all.