The Lord of Opium

20

THE BUG

Matt looked back, expecting to see more bodyguards running through the garden, but the paths were empty. Inside the building was a large room with swings and a jungle gym and beds. Eejit caretakers were stationed around the walls. One table was set up with art supplies. Another had pitchers of lemonade and sandwiches. It was an ordinary playground for children, or what Matt supposed was ordinary. He’d only seen such things on TV.

Mbongeni was sucking on the bars of a large cage, the floor of which was littered with stuffed toys. He seemed happy enough. Listen’s legs were poking out from under a bed, and Matt ran over and dragged her out. “Give her back, you stupid ca-ca face!” a boy roared from the shadows.

The little girl’s arms were scratched, and her eyes were wide with fear. Her skin had turned an ashen color. “Carry her to a bed, and don’t let anyone near her,” Matt told Cienfuegos. A hand raked out from under the bed and Matt jumped back before he got his ankle clawed. The boy’s fingernails were long and dirty. Matt dumped a couple of pillows out of their cases and used the cloth to protect his arms. He put his foot temptingly close, and when the hand raked out again, he grabbed it.

A small boy, perhaps seven, came out clawing and spitting like a wildcat. He fastened his teeth onto the cloth hard enough to rip it open. “Cienfuegos!” cried Matt in alarm. In an instant the jefe was there, expertly twining a blanket around the boy’s body and tying him up with a jump rope until the child looked like a caterpillar in a cocoon. Still the boy thrashed and struggled. Cienfuegos found another jump rope and doubled the bonds.

“Crap eater! Poo-poo brain!” raved the little boy. “I’ll have you killed! I’ll cockroach you!” He was practically foaming at the mouth, but eventually he stopped fighting. His face was red with exertion, and his black hair was plastered down with sweat. “How dare you touch me! I’m El Patrón!” he screamed.

Matt took a closer look at the child. It was hard to see his features, for the boy was not only in a rage, he was also extremely dirty. But the resemblance was unmistakable. “He’s—he’s—” Matt couldn’t finish the sentence.

“A clone,” said Cienfuegos. “He thinks he’s El Patrón’s heir. Those bodyguards at the door thought he was too, and they would have defended him to the death. That’s why I had to shoot them.”

Matt sat on the floor, far enough away to avoid being spat on by the boy. “Why did Dr. Rivas hide this from me?” he asked. He could hardly take in the reality of the child, his brother—no, not his brother, any more than El Patrón was his father.

“Well may you ask,” said Cienfuegos. He went over to take care of Listen, who was beginning to stir. The jefe found a bottle of rubbing alcohol and set about disinfecting her scratches, an activity that woke her up quickly.

“Ow! Stop it!” she yelled.

“It’s good for you,” Cienfuegos said, relentlessly swabbing the wounds. All the while a dozen eejits sat around the walls, oblivious to the battle going on. Presently a bell rang, and they rose to perform their chores. Two of them opened Mbongeni’s cage and hauled him off to a bathtub. Others swept the floor and tidied up the room. Still others poured lemonade into cups and brought them to Listen and the boy. They didn’t notice that the boy was trussed up in a blanket and couldn’t drink properly. The eejit simply poured the liquid over his face.

“Go away! I’ll kill you! I’ll kill all of you,” the boy screamed. Matt thought about helping him, remembered the torn pillowcase, and decided against it.

Listen sat up and dangled her legs over the edge of the bed. “Oh, crot! Now there’s two of them,” she said.

“Don’t use language like that,” Cienfuegos scolded her.

“You’re not my boss,” she said, and let fly with a string of curse words Matt had only recently learned from the boys at the plankton factory.

“You’d better learn manners fast,” the jefe warned her. “That’s the new patrón. The other is only a clone.”

“They’re both bugs,” the girl said rebelliously. “Everyone calls the little one El Bicho. The other one is El Bicho Grande.” She stuck out her tongue.

Matt knew he ought to be angry, but Listen’s performance was so outrageous he laughed. She was fluffed up like a bantam rooster. He also understood her initial fear of him. The Bug had clearly terrorized her. “Why does Dr. Rivas allow El Bicho to hurt her? I thought she was being protected,” he asked Cienfuegos.

“Another lie,” said the jefe. “Glass Eye didn’t ask for her to be spared. The doctor wanted her as a playmate for the others. You’ll notice that Mbongeni is kept out of harm’s way. He’s the important one.”

“I am so important,” Listen insisted. “I’m going to grow up to be a beautiful woman and marry a drug lord.”

“You can do better than that,” said Matt, feeling sorry for the unwanted girl. What was he to do with these new additions to his “family”? The playroom was no better than a zoo, and the three inhabitants were practically feral. Nothing could be done for Mbongeni, but Listen could be saved. As for the Bug . . .

“I owe you an explanation,” said Dr. Rivas. He had arrived with another pair of bodyguards, who were checking their unconscious fellows for vital signs. Listen ran to the doctor and hugged him.

Cienfuegos went into a defense posture. “Tell them to dump their weapons now. I mean it,” he said.

“I’m sure you do,” said the doctor, gently patting Listen’s head. He gave the order and two stun guns, four knives, a knuckle duster, and a garrote wire dropped to the floor.

“Kick them toward me,” said the jefe.

“Please don’t think I was being disloyal, mi patrón,” Dr. Rivas said. He seemed utterly relaxed, as though no one could possibly suspect him of wrongdoing. “I wasn’t sure how to tell you about El Bicho.”

“You could begin by telling the patrón why he’s still alive,” snarled Cienfuegos.

“So bloodthirsty,” murmured the doctor. “Why don’t you ask Matt whether he wants the boy destroyed?”

Matt hadn’t sorted out his feelings about the Bug, but he definitely didn’t want to order a murder. “I think there’s been enough death in this place,” he said.

“I quite agree,” said Dr. Rivas, smiling serenely. He sat down on a bed, and Listen curled up on the floor by his feet. She held on to his pant leg and sucked her thumb like a much younger child. “Round up some eejits and take the injured men to the hospital,” the doctor told the bodyguards. “You know, Cienfuegos, it isn’t good for El Bicho to be wrapped up so tightly. He gets into terrible sweats.”

“Tough toenails. I’m not letting that little viper loose,” said Cienfuegos.

By now the eejits had returned Mbongeni, powdered and sweet-smelling, to his cage. The little boy was massacring a peanut butter sandwich and getting most of it on his face. “Can I help him?” pleaded Listen. The doctor nodded, and she ran to the cage. On the way she kicked the Bug’s blanket, and the Bug snapped at her.

“Let me explain how it all happened,” began Dr. Rivas. “Would you care for some refreshments, mi patrón? I can have coffee and snacks sent from the kitchen. No? Very well. To begin with, El Patrón ordered El Bicho as a backup for you. You had that distressing asthma and strange bouts of illness we couldn’t understand.”

Matt knew he was referring to the arsenic Celia had fed him. “Go on,” he said.

“When El Patrón died, the order came for all of us to attend the funeral. You can’t imagine what a momentous event that was. The old man had ruled this country for more than a hundred years, and no one could imagine what was coming. I knew the law—the others didn’t—that when the original of a clone dies, the clone takes his place. More important, he inherits. We were told you were dead, and I thought, ‘El Bicho is now the heir. If I destroy him, I’ll be committing murder.’ ”

Dr. Rivas spread his hands in a gesture of helplessness. He smiled, and Matt was almost convinced of his innocence, but there was the bite on Listen’s arm and her use as a rag doll for the two boys that argued against it.

“So you stayed behind with a few bodyguards and a stockpile of weapons,” said Matt. Cienfuegos let out a bark of laughter.

“I couldn’t neglect the heir.” The doctor seemed affronted.

“I’m the heir, not El Bicho,” Matt pointed out.

“No you aren’t, poo-poo face!” said the Bug, entering the conversation for the first time.

“Be quiet,” said Dr. Rivas with an edge to his voice. To Matt’s surprise, the Bug obeyed. “The situation is easily remedied,” the doctor said. “I bring the bodyguards together, explain that you are the true ruler of Opium, and they’ll switch their allegiance to you.”

“Will that work, Cienfuegos?” asked Matt.

“Probably, but I’m staying armed,” the jefe said.

An ammonia stench reached Matt’s nose, and he realized that the Bug had fouled his blanket. “We can’t keep him tied up forever,” he said.

“I sometimes put him on a leash,” the doctor admitted. He called for a group of four eejits, and in a moment Matt could see why. As soon as they unwrapped the Bug, he began kicking, screaming, and biting. The eejits held his arms and legs, reminding Matt of ants holding down a grasshopper, and hauled him off for a bath.

“Is something wrong with his brain?” Matt asked.

“All of El Patrón’s clones differ from the original in some way,” said Dr. Rivas. “You were the most perfect. El Bicho is almost as good. He’s very intelligent and his health is good, but he has no impulse control. If he wants something, he goes straight for it, no matter who or what is in the way.”

Matt could hear the Bug screaming in one of the other rooms. If he hadn’t known better, he would have thought the boy was being tortured. “What should I do with him?” he asked.

“Put him to sleep like a rabid dog,” said Cienfuegos.

Matt frowned. “I was half-mad from neglect when I was six years old, but Celia, Tam Lin, and María brought me back to life. Perhaps El Bicho can be saved.”

The jefe snorted. The doctor gazed into the distance. Only Listen, who was tucking a sandwich into Mbongeni’s mouth, offered an opinion. “He’s a bug,” she said. “What you need is a big old shoe to squash him.”

It’s like owning a cage full of pit bulls, thought Matt. He had no idea what to do.