resume' in place after that. The designers implemented it to stop all the walk-throughs from blowing the final solution of the environment.'

'When did you find that out?'

'Yesterday. From the Gate Guardian.'

'You found the way down to Nine?'

Nick nodded. 'But I put it off… I didn't want to go through until you were along. So now we'll give it a try.'

'You don't know if it works or not?' Mark said, sounding alarmed.

'We're gonna find out real quick,' said Nick. 'Come on!'

There were nine tall gray doors opening out of the left-hand side of the huge entry hall, genuine old-fashioned doors with lever handles, looking like something out of the seventeenth century, with fancy scrollwork carved around the gray stone doorjambs. 'Don't look like we're rushing or anything,' Nick said, 'just stroll.' Charlie found this extremely difficult to do under the circumstances, but he forced himself to slow down and keep pace with Nick.

'A lot of people look at this at one point or another,' Nick said softly, 'but usually there isn't anything here. There's a trick to it, though… '

He went to the first of the five doors and stood by it, idly, listening. Then he shook his head.

'Nothing,' Nick said, 'but this is gonna be easier with three of us. Each of you, quick, go up to a door and listen. If you hear anything, open it right away. Don't look obvious about it, though. You don't want anyone noticing if you can help it!'

Mark headed for the next door up, and Charlie took a long breath, trying to calm himself, and went to the door after that. He stood by it… and then his eyes widened. A soft rumor and murmur of voices, like a crowd-

He pulled the door open a crack and peered in.

The sound didn't change, but Charlie looked in and saw that the dimly lit room was completely full of people, pushing, murmuring, moving together. It was in fact a vast dance floor, absolutely crammed with people in every kind of clothes, ancient and modern, and they were dancing hard to Joey Bane's music. Hanging up high from an almost invisible ceiling was, of all things, a mirrored 'disco ball,' and it shot glitters and spots of light all around the room as it turned, picking out here a jeweled headdress, there a studded white Elvis jacket, over there a slowglass jumpsuit. Charlie looked back around the door, signaled unobtrusively to Nick and Mark. They came over, and as they did, Charlie slipped in through the door. They came after him, and Nick shut the door behind him.

The instant he did, the sound came blasting up to full: the 'flap mix' of 'Don't Look Back,' banging away with its wild 11/4 beat. Mark looked around him with admiration at the dancers. 'They may be the Damned,' he said, 'but they've got rhythm.'

'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!'

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