She turned and hissed at Gibson. "Come on!"

"Where do we go?'

"The alcove, we can hide in there. It's probably Raus coming to show his pet to some selected guests."

There was the sound of keys in the door. Gibson gave thanks that Nephredana had had the foresight to relock the doors behind them. The alcove was small, and Gibson wasn't keen on taking refuge in a torturer's tool locker, but it was a case of needs must. It was far from being the ideal hiding place. There was hardly enough room for two people in among the various steel and leather appliances, and the glow from Balg was so intense on that level that they hardly had even the protection of darkness.

Gibson whispered urgently to Nephredana. "Can't you put some whammy on them so we can slip away?"

Nephredana shook her head. "Too risky with Balg just below us. Any influence could too easily backfire. Balg's all random surplus energy and no smarts. A hex could trigger all manner of ugly shit."

Gibson was about to protest that they were in all manner of ugly shit already when the sound of footsteps and voices came from the stairs above. Nephredana put a silent finger to her lips. Gibson suddenly recognized one of the voices. It was Smith.

"… despite that, Verdon, this is still a very dangerous experiment. If that thing should get loose before we are able to control it…"

What in hell was she doing down here and what kind of deal was going down between Raus and the streamheat?

The voices and footsteps reached the platform, and Gibson's horror was multiplied a hundredfold when he risked a peek around the edge of the alcove. Seven people had come through the door, and now they stood just a few yards from where he was hiding, black shapes against the green glow from the shaft. To his horror, he recognized four out of seven: in addition to Smith, the party included Raus, French, and the man who looked like Sebastian Rampton, If this was a parallel Rampton, it seemed that he was on a pretty much parallel trip. Two of Raus's tuxedoed goons brought up the rear. They were holding up a young woman who sagged between them, either helplessly drunk or drugged. Somewhere along the line, she had lost her dress, and she was now down to torn black lingerie that hadn't been too demure in the first place. Her head lolled, and every few seconds she was consumed by helpless giggles. In a moment of absolute, dark, crystal clarity, Gibson knew what was going to happen to the girl. He tensed but Nephredana put a restraining hand on his arm. It might be a grand gesture to leap out and try and save the girl, but it would also be suicidal. There was no point in sacrificing himself for some anonymous party girl. It was ultimately cold but wholly logical.

Rampton, at least, had the decency to raise a token objection. "Does this really need to be done?"

It was Raus who provided the rationalization. "The sacrifices have to be made. If they're not, Balg becomes violent. I doubt we could continue to contain it."

Rampton still seemed a little shocked by the proceedings.

"How many people do you have to feed to this thing?"

Raus's voice had an edge of cold, clinical pride, as though Balg was his hobby.

"Lately it's been taking about four a month to keep it quiet, approximately one a week."

"And nobody has wondered what you're doing here. There've been no rumors, no questions."

Raus sounded as if it was no problem. "When you control as much of the media as I do, rumors are easy to manipulate away. Besides, I'm very good to my people here. They understand and they keep their mouths shut. Also Balg doesn't leave any remains. There are no bodies to dispose of, and people vanish all the time."

Smith peered down into the shaft. "I think we'll have to talk about all this after the matter of Lancer has been resolved."

Raus seemed anxious to change the subject. "On the matter of Lancer, has this man from another dimension been picked up, this double for Zwald?"

At this, Gibson's ears pricked up. Were they talking about him? He listened tensely.

French answered Raus's question. "We don't have him but we're monitoring him. We can pick him up when we need him."

Gibson's eyes narrowed. If they were talking about him, French didn't know half as much as he claimed. They weren't monitoring him so closely that they knew he was just a few feet from them.

Raus didn't seem entirely happy with French's answer. "I'd rather we had him in a secure place. He's now crucial to the operation."

"Don't worry, we'll pick him up in the morning."

Raus continued to lean on the streamheat. "I don't want any mistakes."

Rampton also seemed to have misgivings. "I certainly haven't made a dimension transition to attend a nonevent."

Gibson was transfixed. Unless there were copies of Sebastian Rampton spread all over the multidimensional universe, it had to be the Rampton from New York, the one that he had met, and they had to be talking about him.

French was doing his best to be reassuring. "There's no problem, Gibson is too stupid to be a problem,"

While Gibson had to fight to control himself, Smith was at her most efficient and reassuring as she backed up French. "There won't be any problem. We can handle Gibson."

Gibson's jaws clenched in silent fury. Handle me, can you, you bastards? We'll see about that.

Raus signaled to the two black-tie goons, indicating that he thought it was time to feed the bimbo to the entity. As the two men moved the girl toward the edge of the shaft, her legs suddenly sagged, as though she'd lost control of them. She burst out in another fit of giggles. Gibson found that there was something particularly hideous about the sound, about her total unawareness of what was about to happen to her. Then, somehow, awareness cut through whatever they'd given her or whatever she'd taken. She let out one long awful scream before they pushed her over the edge and then a second, even longer one as she fell that reverberated with echoes. There were sobs and sucking noises from the bottom of the shaft and finally a single obscenely satisfied belch. Gibson closed his eyes and bit down on the knuckle of his index finger. When he looked again, Raus and his party, now only six in number, were going back up the steps. A few seconds later, the door closed and there was the sound of it being locked from the outside.

Gibson let out a sigh from the heart. "Jesus Christ."

Nephredana stepped out of the alcove. "Them's the breaks."

"I don't know how you can take something like that so calmly."

"It wasn't my first human sacrifice."

"I guess not."

"I'm very, very old, Joe. Don't be attributing any phony innocence to me. I've truly seen it all."

"This isn't easy."

He had probably never said a truer word. He walked over to the edge of the well and looked down. He didn't have a clue what to think. In the bottom of the well there seemed to be a new smug quality to the green glow. Nephredana came and stood beside him. She also looked down into the shaft. "One day we're going to destroy that thing."

"I sure as hell hope so. Did you hear what those bastards were talking about?"

"They were talking about you."

"They seem to have plans for me. The word they used was 'crucial.' You think they can get me?"

Nephredana shrugged. "It depends on how crucial it is to you to stay away from them. You seem to be doing okay so far."

"I've only been away from them for a few hours,"

"For the fugitive, it's one hour at a time."

Gibson knelt down and touched one of the steel rings in the stonework. "How many people do you think have died here?"

"Probably hundreds. Maybe thousands over the years. Balg has been here for a very long time."

Gibson shook his head. "Balg? What's next? Necrom?"

Fury flashed across Nephredana's face, and she grabbed him angrily by the lapels of his tuxedo jacket and pulled his face close to hers. She was very strong.