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effects. Ben knew, however, that if they thought to run a check they’d be notified of his trespass of the vents. Hopefully, they were occupied trying to quiet the mob. He smiled. He could almost hear the euphonium as they increased its acoustic density. They had made the mistake of supposing that more wood might drown the fire; the euphonium could be used against itself, one knew the right “tune” to play. The mob roared louder as the euphonium pressure further aggravated erupting hostility.
    He achieved the down-grate, worked rapidly with the tools, lifted it noiselessly, set it aside, and slid silently downward to drop like a cat to the floor. He crouched, looking around.
    Across the room, above a steel door, a camera mounted in the wall had fixed on him, a red light blinked at its base. He cursed, sprinted left to the far wall, ignoring shelves of inexplicable equipment shiny with spines and tubes, and pressed the hidden studs set into the synthawood panelling. He waited, glancing uneasily over his shoulder at the camera which had swiveled to watch him. He wondered again how his employer had got the directions for opening the wall safe and the plans for the ventilator shafts. A section of wall hushed aside, a small, elliptical, gray metal bar, no bigger than a cigarette case, rested in a styrofoam molding. Ben snatched up the oval, tucked it in his belt-pouch, ignored a sudden strident alarm bell, and calmly departed the way he had come.
    Ten minutes later, as he emerged from the hallucinogen sauna, the chaos in the ballroom was at a fever pitch. And over it all, Chaldin’s face snickered impishly.
    There were Fuller and the others, waiting, while behind them the colors of the surging crowd melded into a polychromatic blur. The revelers slapped at one another, shouting, tossing drinks and glasses taken from dispensers, surrounded the security drones and banged on their metal cases. The powerful drone-cybers disengaged themselves from their attackers with gentle shoves of their utility extensions and pressed through, spraying calm-gas too haphazardly for it to be effective.
    The Transmaniacon biker with the skull-face was straddling the back of a primitivist woman on all fours, slapping her buttocks brutally and laughing. He was drunk. Ben dragged the biker off the woman and shoved him toward Fuller, who caught him and held him until he stopped thrashing. The guy had no refinement.
    â€œOkay, okay,” the man said. Fuller released him, but the biker eyed Ben spitefully, zipping up his leather coat.
    Solemnly, but with exultation lighting his eyes, Fuller drew out an ancient but perfectly functional .44 magnum pistol fitted with a silencer. With his other hand he put his sunglasses over his eyes; the mirror-lenses flashed. Fuller turned the gun toward Ben.
    Ben drew back, stiffening, reaching for the needler hidden under his arm. But Fuller had already pulled the trigger. He shot over Ben’s shoulder. Ben turned in time to see Lady Hann fold in the middle and sag to the floor, dropping the thin glass dagger she’d intended for Ben’s back. Fuller had blown the shiny top out of her skull, and she died with an expression of peevish animosity.
    She seemed only faintly annoyed to be dead.
    The euphonium was cranked up full, its saccharin strains pleading for order.
    They turned and began to maneuver through the periphery of the roiling mob, Fuller shooting from the hip where necessary. Ben used his needler’s tight microwave beam selectively, stabbing into the legs of those bunched angrily in their way, defusing embryonic pocket-riots that seemed about to turn against them.
    The eight naked women and men comprising the Siamese octuplet blocked the way in a panicky knot. Behind them was the exit station, port dilated so the security drones could get in and out quickly.
    Fuller’s pistol hissed and pink flesh parted in two places, bridges of human flesh shattered, gouting thickly while the