"Open it," said the Lab Rat.
"Just tell me."
The Lab Rat forced his lips into another smile. "That would spoil the surprise."
"I notice your Terran has become a lot more fluent since our first meeting," noted Dante.
"That's because it is noon in the Maze."
"It gets better or worse depending on the time of day?"
"And the weather."
Dante was about to reply when the door opened and the Bandit reappeared.
"Okay, let him go and follow me."
Dante turned to tell the Lab Rat to leave, but it was already gone. He walked forward and entered the building, followed by Blue Peter. They walked down a narrow arched corridor that curved to the left, and after a moment came to a lighted room. There was a strange multi-leveled desk with a small, olive-skinned man seated behind it.
"This gentleman," said the Bandit, indicating the man, "seems to be in charge of the place."
"I am in charge."
"It's not a jail and it's not a stockade, right?"
"That is correct."
"And yet you freely admit that you have incarcerated Virgil Soaring Hawk here."
"The Maze is used to aberrant behavior," said the man. "It is used to perversions that I hope you cannot begin to imagine. And yet your friend has performed acts that offend not only the inhabitants of the Maze but the Maze itself."
"And the Maze told you that, did it?" asked Dante.
"Not in so many words, but if you live here long enough, you know how to interpret its moods."
"I am sorry our friend has offended you," said the Bandit. "Tell me how much we owe you for damages, I'll pay his tab, and we'll be on our way."
"The same perversions, performed on another world, will be no less offensive," said the man.
"But since you won't know about them, they won't offend you," the Bandit pointed out.
"The Maze says he must stay. He will not be harmed, he will be well treated—but he will be confined alone for the rest of his life."
"He belongs to me," said the Bandit. "I'm taking him away with me."
"Do you indulge in similar sins?" demanded the man.
"What I do is no one's business but my own."
"And I suppose you're going to tell me that what Virgil Soaring Hawk does is no one else's business?"
"That's right."
"That's wrong. Two men and a female Tellargian have been taken to a psychiatric ward after spending less than half the night with him."
"What the hell did he do to them?"
"We have no idea, but it is our duty to make sure that he never does it again."
"Enough talk," said the Bandit. "Name your price and I'll pay it. Just turn him over to me and we'll leave."
"That's out of the question."
"Nothing is out of the question for Santiago. Now, where is he?"
"He's quite safe, not only from his own urges, but also from delusional intruders who think they're Santiago."
"I'm only going to ask once more," said the Bandit. "Where is he?"
The olive-skinned man glared at him and offered no response.
The Bandit looked around the room, turned to the wall at the far end of it, and pointed his finger. A laser beam shot out, and soon cut a doorway through it.
"Rhymer," he said, purposely avoiding mentioning Dante's name, "go see if he's there."
Dante stepped through and found himself in what seemed to be a haberdasher's storehouse. He stepped back into the room.
"No, there's nothing there."
The Bandit turned back to the olive-skinned man. "I'm going to count to five," he said, "and if you haven't told me where I can find Virgil Soaring Hawk, I'm going to melt one of your fingers to putty. Then I'll count again. When we run out of fingers and toes, I'll melt more vital things. Look into my eyes and tell me if you think I'm bluffing."
The man stared into the Bandit's eyes and swallowed hard. "You're not bluffing."
"Then save yourself a world of pain and tell me what I want to know."
"I'll take you there," said the man with an air of defeat.
He got up and led them back down the corridor through which they had come, but instead of letting them out into the street, it dead-ended at a metal door.
"He's in there?" asked the Bandit.
"Yes."
"Open it."
The man uttered a code that was half-mathematical formula and half-song. The door vanished and Virgil, who had been lying on a floating pallet, got to his feet.
"Well, fancy meeting you here," he said.
"Shut up and get out of there," said the Bandit.
The Injun quickly exited his cell.
"Made my bail, huh?"
"So to speak." The Bandit turned to the olive-skinned man. "How do we get back to the street?"
"You don't."
The Bandit pointed a deadly finger between the man's eyes. "Do we have to go through all this again?"
"I'm not kidding. The Maze doesn't want him freed."
"The Maze doesn't have a vote," said the Bandit. "We're leaving this planet."
"You can try," said the man.
"Let's start by going back to your office."
The man led the way, but when they arrived, it was no longer an office, but a stone cell with iron bars on the windows. A heavy door slammed shut behind them.
"I told you," said the man. "The Maze will never let you leave."
"Don't bet every last credit you own on it," said the Bandit. He made a slight adjustment to his artificial arm, then stepped back and pointed at the wall with the iron bars. A pulse grenade shot out and exploded when it hit the wall, and a moment later there was a huge gaping hole.
The Bandit stepped through it, followed by his party. They found themselves in a walled courtyard, and the Bandit shot another grenade at a wall.
The Maze responded, entrapping them again, and it became a battle of attrition. The Bandit would explode or melt any barrier the Maze created, and the Maze would use all its resources to find a new way to imprison them.
After an hour the Bandit turned to Dante. "I don't have unlimited supplies of energy or ammunition," he said. "I'm going to have to put an end to this."
"What are you going to do?"
"Watch."
He made one more adjustment to his arm, then pointed to the sky. Something shot out, something small and glowing with power. It reached its apex at a thousand feet, then whistled down at the very center of the Maze. There was no explosion, no sense of heat, no tremors of the ground beneath their feet—but suddenly the Maze began to vanish, starting at its core and radiating outward. Buildings disappeared, streets and sidewalks vanished, thousands of Men and aliens popped out of existence without a sound.
Dante thought whatever the Bandit had precipitated would gobble them up as well, but it stopped about 30 yards away.
"What the hell was that?" asked the poet, trying to keep his voice calm and level and not succeeding very well.
"A little something I commissioned a Dinalian physicist to create for me," answered the Bandit. "It works on the same principle as a molecular imploder, but it creates a chain reaction."