Generally, creatures of the underworld crowd Orthanq’s bar like moths to flame. Demons carouse with devils, spirits rub essences with entities, and monsters cavort with beasts.
Just a short time ago, a denizen of Darkness could come here to relax and reminisce about their erstwhile dreams to take over the world or destroy civilizations in comfort with the camaraderie of friends.
Now…crickets.
It was almost like someone had turned on the lights, and all the cockroaches had scurried off into the shadows.
I missed this place.
And I was still here.
Just then, the bar’s double doors burst open.
The room lit up with a rainbow of kaleidoscopic strobe lights flashing off the walls, casting crazy shadows from the room’s furniture.
Bass-thumping electronica accompanied the light show.
Whoever was coming in had attention issues.
Or was trying to compensate for something.
“Your wait is over!” came the high-pitched voice of a small gnome as he leapt into the room dramatically, arms held at awkward angles like he was striking some kind of elaborate pose.
Or it was a gnome.
Being gnomish.
One who did not have the good sense to be unreasonably unhappy.
I had heard the word ‘ineffable’ used before, generally regarding some lofty experience I would never attain or understand.
With the gnome’s arrival, my drought of ineffable experiences came to an explosive end.
How can I describe what came through that door?
A human exclamation point?
Manic glee distilled and refined to its essence and embodied in an avatar of wackiness?
The gnome leaping into the King’s Crown looked like a ranch hand who had been thrown into a blender with a jester, one who had then been decorated lavishly by a blind alien from a high-technology voidship sailing through the ether on its way to an interdimensional swap meet.
Starting at the bottom, the gnome was wearing mismatched boots of differing cuts, styles, and shades of leather. His voluminous scarlet pants were bedecked with stars, sigils, and indecipherable equations. He was wearing a partially buttoned leather vest over a floral print, long-sleeved pirate’s shirt. His thick leather belt carried an array of pouches, tools, instruments, tassels, kerchiefs, and assorted gizmos.
The crescendo to a symphony of crazy, rising above even the gaudy outfit, his grinning face was filled with a look of such ecstasy that I knew the gnome to be mad at first glance. His silvery gray hair flew wildly around his head as though it was charged by enough static electricity to generate lightning bolts.
Given that he was a gnome, this curious coiffure was probably just due to the force of his personality.
A luminous silvery globe hovered above his left shoulder, looking for all the world like a fist-sized diamond holding a blazing polychromatic star within its shimmering facets.
There was more to him, much more, but my brain grew tired of trying to make sense of him before I had fully taken him in.
“You must be Yoctoerg,” I called out in underenthusiastic welcome.
“And you must be Grak!” He made up for my lack of hospitality with an overabundance of effusive levity.
The way he spoke, I could almost see cartoonish illustrations radiating from his mouth and surrounding his head in psychedelic thought bubbles.
“Now, this is gettin’ interestin’,” Kordeun muttered delightedly beside me.
‘Interesting’ was not the first word, nor was it even in the first paragraph of words, that came to mind.
If Kordeun had not been so enthralled with the situation, I think he would have been rolling on the floor. As it was, he was too rapt by what he saw to begin laughing.
“As much as I need a drink, I don’t think this guy needs one.
“Ever,” I mumbled.
“Don’t worry. I’ll take his. All of them.” Kordeun was a font of reassurance.
23
By the time Yocto made it to the bar, I was blinder than a dwarf pulled out from under his heaping mound of gold and reluctantly dragged into full daylight.
“Would it be possible to turn that off?” I asked, pointing to his refulgent shoulder orb.
Yocto’s rainbow strobe light pulsing over us was as maddening as it was blinding.
He had not been kind enough to turn them off when he approached.
If Yocto had not been sent to help us, I would have taken his crystal in my hand and smashed it to bits.
Gladly.
Then we would see if he was still smiling like a lunatic.
I certainly would be.
“I need to use the spectralphotometer to search for and analyze traces of the constituents of the serum that caused the monstrous transformations.”
Holding my left hand over my eyes to shield them from the unbearable glare, I asked, “Once you’re done, you’ll be able to turn it off?”
After just a few minutes in its presence, I was beginning to think Yocto’s spectralphotometer was a greater public nuisance than Alyon’s Citizens randomly turning into bloodthirsty monsters.
“Certainly!”
Well, that, at least, was a relief.
“Here. Take these.” He handed Kordeun and me each a pair of shaded glasses.
When I put them on, the world shifted back into glorious normalcy.
My urge to strangle him dropped, albeit only slightly.
With a snap of his fingers, Yocto encased Orthanq’s many ocular orbs in movable fields of similar effect.
My equanimity temporarily restored, though I didn’t know what next horror Yocto might visit upon us, I inquired, “So, what exactly do you plan to do?”
“A little bit of destructive sampling, some combinatorial analysis, some theoretical modeling, and some probability collapse determinations.”
I did not know what any of that was, so I was all for it.
“Do you need anything from us?” I was hopeful he didn’t, but I thought it better to ask.
“Just for you to get out of the way.”
I got.
By way of explanation, Yocto added, “I will examine the dishes used to serve the bar’s patrons for chemical residues. These results will then be evaluated against known compounds. From this data, possible effects of any discovered chemicals upon a range of representative species will be interpolated and extrapolated across a multidimensional array of possibilities.”
Completely unclear on what he was doing, I backed farther away from Yocto.
Kordeun followed me closely.
Orthanq moved strategically to the far side of the bar.
Looking around decisively, Yocto said, “Clear?”
With no one else responding, Yocto answered himself, saying, “Clear!”
Clear of what?
Then the world exploded into thrumming vortices of swirling lights, and I saw exactly what.
A massive beam of impossibly white light erupted from Yocto’s spectralphotometer. I could feel the heat from where I had sheltered across the room. Arcs of green, fuchsia, yellow, blue, and purple spiraled within and around the pulsing column.
As he moved the ray back and forth over Orthanq’s shelves of glasses, mugs and plates hanging on the wall behind the bar, Yocto’s analysis quickly turned the entire wall into molten slag.
“Less destructive sampling!” I yelled.
Satisfied, with no glass or ceramic left intact, Yocto turned off his beam.
Orthanq’s dishes, glasses, shelves, and even his wall were ruined.
The only reason I could think of that the wall had not exploded, vaporized, or burst into flames was that the magic of Yocto’s beam had somehow partially held the materials together despite its being far too hot for anything to persist or that it only affected certain things, like valuables. Otherwise, that beam would have burned its way through the mountain.
As it was, Orthanq would be serving his guests—that woul
d only be Kordeun and me—whatever we could hold in our cupped hands.
“Why did you do that?!” I was more upset than Orthanq, probably because losing a few dishes was less traumatic than watching his patrons continually burst into flesh-eating monsters.
That he then had to destroy.
“Destructive sampling is, by its nature, destructive.”
Take it from a gnome to miss the point of the question entirely.
“Can you do a little nondestructive sampling next time?” I think I spoke for everyone when I expressed my concern for the safety of the bar, its occupants, and its environs.
Much more of this, and I thought Orthanq’s destructive sampling would begin.
“Of course! However, my analysis will take longer.”
Sighing with relief, I said, “I’m not going anywhere.”
After watching Yocto at work, I needed a drink.
Too bad my thick fingers and hands couldn’t hold much liquid.
Without a noticeable gesture or audible command from its owner, the spectralphotometer dimmed, leaving the bar in blessed peace.
I cannot remember being happier to see my own shadow; the beam’s light had been so intense that even my shadow had fled along with my vision.
The room was not calm for long, however. Replacing the beam’s intense effulgence, like fireflies appearing in the soft light of dusk, the very air began to glow with vibrating interlinked chains of luminous light. These fields shifted and wavered, ranging from concatenations more complex and confusing than Yoctoerg’s sense of style to simple branches with elegant symmetries.
I stood in awe, for I had never seen visualizations so complex.
If Wizarding replays could have breakdowns this detailed, I would never leave the cave.
“What, exactly, are we looking at here, Erg?” I decided to try another of his names for fun.
“We are looking at representations of every molecule present in the samples examined by the spectralphotometer.
“You are seeing compounds as simple as water molecules and as complex as the genetic structures of supramundane species.”
We were literally awash in molecular visualizations. These representations flowed through us and around us. I gazed wonderingly upon a galaxy of stars and star clusters pulled from patrons’ mugs and knives, their plates and spoons.
I also saw why Orthanq needed such potent cleaners.
“And how will you determine which, if any, compounds are likely culprits for the outbreak?”
“With a bit of number crunching.”
I looked around the room, filled as it was with more shapes and structures than I would have thought possible in such a small area.
I did not see any numbers.
“Don’t let me stop you,” I offered helpfully, at a loss as to what to do.
“Abstract, catalog representation. Partition information by nonparametric multidimensional data clusters based on underlying occurrence variables.”
I had no idea what Yocto was saying or doing, but all the molecular chains began to group in relatively distinct regions.
“What does this mean?” I asked.
“Without knowing what exactly is here or why, we have broken the data up into groups based on hidden underlying variables.
“These include simple inorganic compounds”—a region of less complex structures began to glow lavender in color—“more complex inorganics”—a region lighted up in darker purple—“simple organics”—which, highlighted in green, looked anything but simple to me, given their long repeating chains—“more complex organics, including genetic materials”—this red cluster included so many complex spiraling chains that one strand was impossible to tell from another—“and a few arcane substances not easily classified in a single variable hierarchy.” The aquamarine region mentioned made the complex organics look simple, for there appeared to be little rhyme or reason to the shapes presented.
These regions were not entirely distinct from one another, as winding bridges and swirling associations existed between groups based on other factors that I could not begin to claim to understand.
“Abstract, eliminate compounds known not to have observed transformative effects.”
The room went dark.
It was really that simple.
Hovering in the air above the bar near Orthanq, within the region formerly occupied by magical compounds, only one molecular cluster remained.
If a compound could be said to resemble its effects, then this one did.
The thing was menacing.
It pulsed and shifted, reorganized itself and darted to and fro.
It looked alive.
And hungry.
“What is that?” Kordeun asked anxiously. I could hear an edge in his deep voice. Here was a dwarf used to fighting all manner of creatures, and one of the scariest things he had ever seen was hovering in the air before him, far too small to fight but far too large to ignore.
It made me almost not want to drink.
Which said far more than I cared to hear.
“That, gentlemen, is the cause of the outbreak.
“I will need to do a thorough search of the premises to see if any additional material remains onsite or determine if it can be created by materials that are on premises.”
“You are welcome to do whatever is required,” mumbled Orthanq, overawed, I suppose, in part because he seldom saw something handsomer than his own reflection.
Looking at Orthanq intently, Yocto asked, “Have any authorities come by to investigate? No one has corroborated these findings?”
This would have been a question to ask before the destructive sampling but, given the results of my detective work, I was not exactly in a position to judge.
Orthanq gave the demonic equivalent of a shrug. “We are mostly left alone here. One officer did swing by just after the first incident, though.”
“Anything stand out?” I asked.
“A gnome. Weird fella. Kept looking all around skittishly, like something was going to sneak up and grab him.”
I supposed if I had been a gnome going to a bar frequented by demons, I might have been a bit skittish as well.
Things often do sneak up and grab you at the King’s Crown.
A gnome, though?
I don’t see many gnomes on patrol in the Undercity.
Although Alyon is not segregated by any means, most races tend to stay with their kind, and this includes authority figures. There are few gnomes in the Undercity because most of them live elsewhere.
“Left his card. Said I should call him if anything else happened or if I had any questions.
“The last bit was a little odd, seeing how he should be the one asking me questions, but, like I said, we tend to keep to ourselves here.”
“And you didn’t call him?” Yocto looked pensive.
“No. I figured if he had any answers, he would call me.”
“I think you did the right thing by not calling.”
In the Undercity, not calling the authorities is second nature.
“Why?” asked Kordeun, who was clearly not from here.
“Because I think the gnome who came is part of this, and, if you called, or looked like you were going to cause problems, you might have had more trouble than you would want to deal with.”
When customers turning into monsters was but a minor inconvenience, relatively speaking, I did not want to think of what else might be involved.
24
“So, you’re saying that one of the people involved in this ordeal was here scoping the bar out and then following up on the effects of their terrorist actions?”
“Wouldn’t you in their place?” Yocto countered my question with another.
I hate when people do that.
Especially when they have a good point.
I ask questions to get answers when I don’t have them, not to provide someone else with answers when I do not know myself.
Seeing my confusion, Yocto
added, “Think of them like scientists. They are following up on the status of their experiments.”
Now, that was science I could not get behind.
If I did, it would be way behind.
“And where better to focus their efforts than the Undercity, where fewer people will complain and even fewer will be noticed if they go missing?”
There.
I could play this game.
I could speak entirely in questions if needed.
Maybe I would even get a few answers for my efforts.
Kordeun grunted, “Exactly. There’ve been outbreaks all over, but far fewer have really been reported from tha Undercity.”
I shrugged. “We know they’re happening. We just don’t like to talk about it. No need to air our dirty laundry.”
Kordeun shook his head, the gesture a mixture of shocked sadness and confused disagreement. “Ya’re about as dumb as ya look, Grak, and that’s sayin’ somethin’.”
I could not argue with sound reasoning.
Turning my attention back to Yocto, I asked, “Any idea who these guys are?”
Yocto pursed his lips tightly before finally answering. “ANGST.”
“Angst?” I asked. “They must be filled with more than just angst to do something like this across the city.”
“No, ANGST.”
I was beginning to feel like I was having the IDIOT conversation all over again.
I hate idiots.
Myself excluded.
Why can’t gnomes speak in complete sentences without resorting to not-so-clever acronyms?
“The Anti-Negentropy Gnomes Strike for Truth. ANGST. They are a group of gnomish terrorists bent on creating disorder as creatively and chaotically as they can.”
“Why would they do that?”
Yocto spoke simply, at least for him, “For the mathematical beauty and purity of a macroverse moving toward entropy.
“And for fun.
“They oppose the movement toward order and higher complexity in species and thought as going against the natural and fundamental way of the macroverse.”
I did not know exactly what Yocto meant, but I could not argue that, in the right time and place, making messes, blowing stuff up, and smashing faces were fun.
“And they’re in Alyon?”
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