And with that, Sorrento teleported away, and his avatar vanished.
We all stared at the spot where he’d just been for a moment. Then, without a word, we kept on moving.
As Aech led us toward the next intersection, we passed a copy of the Moulin Rouge, which was right next to a place called Ambulance Bar. Up ahead of us, mixed in with all of the music venues, I also spotted a video arcade called the Coin Castle. From what little I could see through its front windows, it was packed with nothing but purple pinball machines and videogame cabinets. I was hoping Aech was headed for it, but she ran right past the Coin Castle’s front entrance, and continued running until we reached a large nightclub located on the next corner. It had a neon sign over its entrance that spelled out the word PANDEMONIUM in fiery orange letters. There was a large clock mounted up above, with THE TIME printed directly above it in all-capital letters. This struck me as odd, like printing THE DATE above a calendar.
Aech led us up to the club’s front entrance. It was guarded by the same bearded six-foot-tall bleach-blond muscle-bound zebra-vested gentleman we’d seen earlier, guarding Purple Rain Prince at Mann’s Chinese Theatre. He stepped in front of the door to block our way, then folded his giant arms across his tree trunk of a chest.
“Wassup, Big Chick?” Aech asked, addressing the NPC like an old friend.
Big Chick slid his sunglasses down the length of his nose and gave Aech the evil eye.
“What’s the password?” he asked in a surprisingly kind voice.
Aech cupped her right ear, turned it toward him, and said, “What?”
Big Chick nodded, gave us all a friendly grin, and then stepped out of our way. Shoto and I exchanged a perplexed glance and followed Aech inside.
I felt like we were walking into the hippest night spot on the ninth level of Dante’s Inferno. All the lighting was reddish in hue, and there were flames everywhere you looked—lit candles on every table, torches mounted on the walls and balcony railings, and dozens of burning fireplaces, upstairs and down. But the club didn’t even feel warm. And it was filled with happy, chattering NPCs—beautiful people in colorful attire, who were all busy drinking, smoking, dancing, and trying to seduce one another.
“Gentlemen, please remember—you can’t stop the revolution if you don’t have the time,” Aech said, pointing across the club toward the empty stage, which was located inside a ring of fire, and said, “Dogs travel in packs of seven!”
The stage was currently empty, except for a large drum kit. The bass drum had a familiar symbol on it—a large number 7, positioned off-center inside a large circle, with a much smaller circle set into its orbit, like an electron diagram…
I took out the Fourth Shard and had another look at it. The symbol on the bass drum matched the eighth and final symbol etched into its surface—the one that came after the V.
“Aech!” I said. “The symbols match!”
She nodded.
“It’s the logo of a band called the Original 7ven,” she told me. “But they changed their name to that, later in their career, for the same reason Prince changed his—contract bullshit. They’re still much better known by their original name—”
The crowd around us suddenly erupted into applause, drowning out her voice. We looked over and saw seven men running up onto the stage single-file. All seven of them were dressed in stylish suits. Four of them were carrying instruments. One of them was carrying a large mirror.
They seemed familiar to me, but I couldn’t place them right away. Then the club DJ—who also looked very familiar—jumped on the PA to introduce them.
“Ladies and gentlemen,” he said. “Please welcome…the original seven members of the greatest band in the world…Morris Day and the Time!”
That was when I realized how I knew them—from their cameo at the end of Jay and Silent Bob Strike Back. And the DJ who had just introduced them was an NPC of Jason Mewes, probably cut and pasted here from Askewniverse in Sector Sixteen.
The lead singer, Morris Day, waited a moment for the crowd to quiet down, then he grabbed the microphone.
“Welcome to Pandemonium, y’all!” he said. “Tonight’s the night. We’re holding auditions, people! To fill out our roster with some new dancers for an upcoming tour. So anyone out there who thinks they got what it takes, this is your one and only chance to dance!”
“All right,” Aech said. “Get ready! And try not to blow this, OK?”
“Try not to blow what?” I asked. “Are you gonna tell us what we need to do? Aech?”