"They're not the Damned," Nick said, grinning. "They're us."
Charlie looked at him, bemused. "It's a party," Nick said. "The Party. One of the environment-programmers' jokes. Everybody who ever visited Deathworld wanders in and out of here eventually. Not the real them, of course; just a recording of them, a sim… "
"You mean we're in here somewhere, too?" Mark said, sounding slightly amused. "Someone might find that confusing… "
"Sorry," Nick said, "but I don't think it works that way. The one time your simulacrum can't be found here is when you're genuinely on-site. So the Guardian told me. But other people might see it and not know for sure, for a while anyway, whether it was really you they were interacting with…" He grinned. "There are probably some funny scenes, every now and then, because some people do just come here to dance… "
"Looks like a good place to get lost in, anyway," Charlie said.
"Better than that," said Nick. "This is the Party. And since it is, there's a side door… and a Lady sneaking out of it. We've got to catch her. Come on-"
Nick started to push his way through the crowd. The other two followed him. It was hard going, hot and difficult. The oblivious dancers were packed incredibly tightly together and the music was jarringly loud. Even Nick looked like he was wincing a little at the volume.
Mark was close behind Charlie. "Are you sure your dad's people are gonna get here before our time runs out?" Charlie yelled to Mark, that being the only way he could make himself heard.
Mark was beginning to look uncomfortable. "Look," he shouted back, "I did the best I could. My dad gets busy, too! I told you, I sent a 'most urgent' to his virtpager. He'd never ignore that unless some seriously important government thing-"
"Like happens every day!" Charlie yelled. But there was no point in fighting about it now. Charlie took another deep breath, went plowing through the crowd in Nick's wake.
It got harder as they got closer to the center of things. There's this, anyway, Charlie thought, it's not gonna be easy for anyone to follow us- For that moment he disobeyed the advice of the music, looked over his shoulder.
And saw one of those tall doors behind them open. A second later he got a glimpse of a long black drapecoat, violet skirt, violet hair, as Shade came slipping in
Uh-oh. Fear and loathing both rose in him, and Charlie struggled to deal with the reaction rationally. It wasn't as if she was going to be able to spray him with sco-bro here and now. If she's even directly involved. Had Mark gotten any concrete evidence that she was? Had he even managed to track down exactly who had tripped the "trip wire" around his workspace? And is Shade someone different from Kalki-or is she the same person? For I didn't see them together… Charlie gulped. No time to spend worrying about all this now. Just follow Nick and keep them in here, and pray that Net Force is on the job-
Ahead of him, Nick was maybe two thirds of the way through the crowd, moving faster now, as if it was begin
fling to thin a little in patches near the far edge of the room. He was making his way toward the far left corner. Charlie could just see that the crowd was somewhat sparser there. And also a black blot, a shape, leaning near a door, a normal human-sized door, not like the ones they had come through, a door that was just closing…
Nick came out of the crowd, with Charlie behind him, and Mark bringing up the rear. The black blot-shape, hard to see in the disco-ball dimness, was a tall, potbellied demon, presently standing in front of the newly closed door. He had little stubby black-leather wings, and he was wearing a uniform like the ones movie-theater ushers or hotel-lobby bellboys had worn a century ago, right down to a rather ridiculous looking little pillbox hat pushed over to one side and partly resting on one of his big ears. Nick, coming up to him, paused and looked at him oddly.
"Hey," he shouted over the music, "you're not Melchgrind! You're Wringscalpel! I remember how you wear that hat."
The demon with the flaming sword blinked at him. "Nick?" it shouted back, squinting at him. "Why, how are you, fella? You back again? I didn't think you were going to linger."
"Change of plans," Nick said loudly. "This isn't your usual patch, either."
"No, we have to rotate through all the 'portal' jobs," Wringscalpel said, sounding resigned. "Sometimes whether we've been briefed on them fine detail or not. If I had a nickel for-"
"Neither of us is gonna be worth a plugged nickel if we don't hurry up here, Wringer! We're in big trouble at the moment. Someone's chasing us, and we really need not to get caught."
"Now, you know I can't let you go through without passing the test… "
"There is no time for that!" Nick yelled. "Wringscalpel, in Joey's own name, will you let us through here before you have a bunch more fake suicides on your hands?!"
"Test?" said Mark. "What test?"
Wringscalpel's eyes went wide. "But I can't. It's not that I wouldn't do it for you, Nick, it's just that the machine's routines won't allow-"
"What test?" Charlie said.
"He's not going to ask you what's your favorite color, if that's what you were thinking," Nick said. "Hurry up and ask the damn questions, then, Wringscalpel! I'm answering for all three of us."
"You two agree to that?" Wringscalpel said.
"Yes," Mark said, and "Yeah, yeah, just do it!" Charlie said, for he could see Shade getting closer to them.
"All right. You understand the rules? If you miss a question, you're all bumped back up to One-" "Fine!"
"And they're not the same questions as yesterday, Nick, they change every hour-"
"Come on!" they yelled at him in unison.
"All right," Wringscalpel said. "What is the purpose of life?"
"He doesn't want anything easy, does he?" Charlie moaned.
"Shaddup, Charlie. Pain, Wringscalpel! And learning how to deal with it."
"What is the dawn of the soul?"
"Which version?" Nick said.
Wringscalpel looked surprised, 'then smiled. "London 2024."
"The other side, / where the shadows hide, / and the dark no longer falls: the night of pain, / when the final chord / Comes breaking through the walls!"
"Hey, you're serious about this," Wringscalpel said. "Are you sure I can't ask you your favorite color?" "No! Get on with it!"
"What is Joey's middle name?"
"The one on his birth certificate," Nick said, "or the one from the press release?"
Wringscalpel grinned. "The birth certificate."
Nick swallowed. "Illusion," he said.
"There you go," said Wringacalpel, and began to grow.
The floor of the place shook. The disco ball hanging from the ceiling of the Party Room started to tremble, and stalactites of crystal and onyx began to fall from way above it, causing screams among the partying multitudes, who scattered in every direction, but then returned to the dance floor as if driven there with whips.
Wringacalpel, though, was paying all of this no attention. His uniform was tearing and shredding away, falling to the floor, as the demon grew, lost his potbelly, gained wings that lost the toy look they had worn earlier and now looked seriously functional, gigantic pinions, that spread above him and out to either side. He cried a great cry that shook down more stalactites.
"Is he angry?" Charlie shouted at Nick over the din of the music, the screaming dancers, the crash of falling crystal.
Wringscapel heard this and laughed. "Angry? You kidding?" he said. "I get a bonus for this." He held out his huge hands, and suddenly they were filled with a flaming sword that lit the whole place blindingly in actinic blue-white fire. "And now I get to leave this job to somebody else, while I go up to Seven and kick some-"