Part 34 (1/2)
”We have to negotiate?” Justin asked. ”With other Demons? When we have no idea what we're doing?”
”You will be helping the Demons to rescue D. Earth. The Swell Foop can affect them regardless, but it would be better to obtain their voluntary cooperation.”
”But if we don't know how to do it, and they don't know, either, how can we accomplish anything?”
Chlorine glanced again at Nimby. One ear wiggled. That startled Justin, but of course the Demon could make a human ear move if he wanted to.
Chlorine nodded. ”Since it must be a Demon who has abducted D. Earth, and Demons exist to challenge for status, you will have to locate D. Earth's captor and challenge him to a game of status. The Foop will locate D. Earth, and therefore his captor.”
”Challenge an unknown Demon!” Justin exclaimed. ”This is preposterous.”
”Therefore you must prepare your case carefully, to make it seem reasonable to the other Demons.”
”Reasonable! We don't even know how to get in touch with-”
”The conference of Demons is scheduled half an hour hence, at this site. I suggest you use that time to confer with each other and prepare your case.”
”Half an hour!” Justin cried, appalled anew.
”For your convenience, we have set the clock,” Chlorine said. She gestured, and a large framed picture appeared on the wall, showing a timer set at 30 minutes. As they watched, it clicked to 29. ”One other thing to remember: The Demons are enormous, quite beyond mortal comprehension. For your convenience they will limit themselves in the manner Nimby does for me, so that no more than one percent of their attention focuses on you. They will still be rather beyond your scope, but at least you will be able to have a dialogue. They will emulate mortal limitations, so as to seem, well, remotely human. That should help.”
”But-” Justin said. And stopped, for they were alone in the chamber. Their three hosts had faded out.
”At least they left us a nice snack,” Breanna said, going to a table piled with appealing delicacies.
”Dear girl, food is the least of our concerns!”
”No, I think we have enough to go on,” Sim squawked.
”Yes,” Che agreed. ”Let's eat well, preparing for the encounter, and set up our presentation. I think Justin is the fairest spoken among us, so he should be our spokesman.”
”Me! But I have no idea how-”
Breanna stuffed a spinach cookie into his mouth. ”Shut up and listen,” she said.
Justin shut up and listened, and what Sim squawked and Che said slowly came to make sense. He could after all make the case, for whatever it was worth.
They finished their snack and made themselves comfortable around the edges of the chamber. The timer reached zero and bonged, then winked out of existence.
Nine figures were in the chamber. They appeared to be human in body, wearing voluminous robes, but their heads were rotating spheres. They stood in place, neither moving nor speaking. They were evidently emulating mortal status.
Justin realized that they were waiting to hear his presentation. He plunged in. ”Salutations, Demons,” he said formally. ”We are six mortal creatures from the lands of Xanth and Mundania who wish to enlist your help on a mission to rescue the Demon Earth from captivity. We have obtained the Rings of Xanth and the Swell Foop, and learned how to operate it.” He lifted the stone with its six Rings.
Now there was a stir among the visitors. One with a small hot head glided forward, reached out to touch the Foop, and did not. ”True.” Then, as Justin wondered who that one was, print appeared on the robe: MERCURY.
Simultaneously, names appeared on all the others. The Demons were all named after the planets, or were the planets; Justin had never been quite sure about that. EARTH was missing, and there was one he didn't recognize: NEMESIS. Odd that he hadn't heard of that planet, or seen it in the night sky during his decades as a tree. But obviously it existed, or its a.s.sociated Demon would not be here.
Well, on with it, before they lost patience. ”We know that the Swell Foop will generate emotions in you, and thereby control your actions. But we don't wish to aggravate you. Rather we want to enlist your cooperation in our effort to save the Demon Earth from captivity. We believe that it is to your interest to save him, because his force is gravity, and we all need at least some of that on occasion.”
He paused. There was no reaction. That, he hoped, was good news. So he continued. ”We doubt that even with the Foop we'll be able to rescue Demon Earth ourselves. We need the formidable power and expertise of Demons. That way we may be able to arrange a challenge for status with the captor Demon, proffering terms he will not care to decline. If we win, we will restore the Demon Earth to his accustomed place, and gravity will not be lost.” He did not speak of losing; that was not expedient at this point.
Still no response. ”Because Demons are not accustomed to emotions, we believe that a liaison between Demons and mortals will be expedient. In that manner the formidable emotions generated by the Foop will be filtered and modified by creatures who are accustomed to them, giving our team an advantage.”
They just stood there. Was he making sense to them, or was.h.i.+ng out? Now he would find out. ”To have a fair game, one that the captor Demon will wish to partic.i.p.ate in, the stakes must be conducive. We must be able to offer something the captor Demon desires. I am unable to say what that might be. Here I need your input.”
”A second Demon,” the Demon Nemesis said. His head was the largest of all of them, a dense brown sphere.
”Will that be sufficient to induce him to play?” Justin asked.
”Two Demons,” the Demon Neptune said.
There was a pause. ”The two of you are volunteering?” Justin asked.
They nodded. ”I am the least apparent yet most influential of our number,” Nemesis said. ”My a.s.sociated planet is beyond the sight of the others, but is more ma.s.sive than all of them combined. The captor will desire my ambiance of Dark Matter.”
”I am not the largest or prettiest member of our group,” Neptune said. ”But my Higgs boson particle field generates ma.s.s itself, without which none of the others could exist, and my aspect of energy moves all things. The captor will desire that too.”
Justin was amazed at the significance of these two obscure Demons. Indeed, Dark Matter was invisible yet most pervasive, a phenomenal mystery, and ma.s.s/energy was the fundamental building block (as it were) of existence. ”And this would bring the other Demon in?” he inquired, to be absolutely sure, for there was no certain predicting what motivated Demons. Now the others nodded.
”Then if you will choose from our number to align with, we can inst.i.tute the challenge,” Justin said, privately amazed that this was falling into place so neatly. They had thought it should, but knew that with Demons nothing was sure. Demon Xanth had communicated with them on a Demonly level, so they readily understood the situation, but was that enough?
This time there was a long pause. Justin felt quite nervous. Which Demon would choose him? What would such an a.s.sociation feel like? What would the contest itself be like? None of them had ever been involved in anything like this before.
Demon Mars, with a small red head, floated toward Sim, then veered and went to Che. The Demon walked right into the centaur and disappeared. He had Chosen.
Demon Jupiter floated toward Sim-and faded into the big bird. He too had Chosen.
Demoness Venus floated to Breanna.
Demoness Saturn floated to Cynthia.
Only Justin and Jaylin remained. They waited, but no other Demons came. Instead, they faded out. This, it seemed, was it: Four Demons were playing, two were stakes, and three were not partic.i.p.ating. ”But what about us?” Justin asked somewhat plaintively.
Chlorine reappeared. ”You have not been neglected,” she said. ”One of you is needed to animate the Demon Earth, and the other to animate the enemy Demon.”
”The enemy Demon! But we oppose it!”
”It must be given the same situation as the rest,” she explained. ”A mortal body. If it plays, it will choose one of you. The other will go to the Demon Earth.”
Oh. That did make sense, he supposed. ”But how could it choose me, when I oppose it?”
”The game will not be that straightforward.”
Somehow that did not rea.s.sure him. ”Well, what is the next step?”
”Use the Foop to locate the Demon Earth.”