"Yes," he said.
Minnow threw herself at him, but in mid-stride her arms flew uncontrollably up over her head and she stopped and pirouetted. Her arms, her legs, were not her own anymore. A deep pulsing began in the earth around her, in the air, in her head and bones, and before she knew what was happening she found herself in an insane waltz. The beat had begun once more. She threw a quick, painful glance at Copper, cursing him silently for miscalculating the time by nearly a half-hour, but the thought of condemnation vacated her mind when she saw that he was throwing himself against the wall, arms whirling like a helicopter, and shouting with each collision. His face was bloodied.
The waltz continued, and she found herself with a quick succession of partners—Cave, Skull, Goat—who was trying, she saw, to pull at the trigger of a weapon he must have picked up in one of the storage bins they had passed. The fleeting conviction went through her that he was more desperate than she had thought, and that if the beat had not started when it did she might be dead anyway now, probably along with Skull. Another change of partners and she saw that Goat's weapon had been forced from his grip and that he was now slapping his hands together in time, faster than seemed humanly possible.
The waltz changed to a tarantella, and then to a Celtic jig. After that there were a thousand other variations. The one lasting image in all this madness was that of Skull, his graceful, aquiline body flashing past her nearly every time she was whirled about. He became an anchor in her storm, and his grinning skull mask was the one image that burned itself into her mind as the hours danced away...
She awoke propped in a corner, arms akimbo, legs collapsed under her like so much lead. For a long time she could not move. She didn't know what time it was; there was near-darkness, and at first she thought she could be outside, or in some abandoned building. But then the sour stench of the underground tunnel reached past her nostrils and she remembered what had happened.
With a groan she struggled to a kneeling position, and then, using the wall for leverage, heaved herself up onto her feet. She nearly went down again, feeling momentary pressure on one of her ankles, but suddenly there was an arm there, holding her up.
"Can you stand?"
It was Skull.
"I think so. Yes. It's not twisted like I thought. Just asleep."
She closed her eyes until the swimming stopped in them, and then took a deep breath and faced him.
"The others?"
"Dead." It was a simple statement of fact, but Minnow detected a note of something else—pity? sadness?—behind it.
"All of them?"
"All. Three died during the dance. The one named Goat then killed another one and then Copper tried to stop him and was killed trying to get his weapon away." He paused. "I took care of Goat."
Was there revulsion in his voice? Awe?
Skull said, "He was going to kill you where you slept."
"God," Minnow said, taking a shuddering breath. Skull stood silently next to her, becoming conscious of his supporting arm on her and gradually releasing it. For a moment Minnow was sorry it was gone, and then she wasn't.
"Now what?"
"We continue."
There was a blank certainty in his voice.
"So we can be killed the next time we get caught by the beat?"
"No. This time we make it to the center."
"I don't believe you."
He turned those eyes that weren't eyes on her. She was both attracted and repulsed by him at the same time.
"I don't blame you for not believing me," he said. "But I didn't lie to you yesterday. I said there was only one day, maybe two, before things went to pieces. I knew we couldn't make it in one day, but if I had said that, none of you would have come. What I didn't know," and here he paused looking around him; Minnow thought she felt him tremble, "is that this would happen. But if you and I don't go on, that's the end of it." His voice became as soft and careful as when he had first spoken out of the shadows, up above.
They locked eyes to eyeholes for a moment, and then Skull nodded sharply.
"We have exactly six hours."
They went through two more long pulls of tunnel and two more empty storage areas before Minnow felt a sudden change in the atmosphere. It wasn't anything she could put a finger on—something in the floor or walls perhaps, a vibration, something in the air around them. But she knew they were nearing their destination. Despite her best efforts, a small clench of apprehension formed in her stomach, and her steps became more consciously careful. Glancing sideways at Skull, who had been moving along easily beside her, she saw that he too had tensed, and now had his head cocked, as if listening for something.
"Hold it," he hissed.
They stood, silent as statues.
"There," Skull said; "hear that?"
Minnow held her breath, and now she did hear something; low, regular; a barely audible thump-thump of a faraway heartbeat.
"What is it?" she whispered.
He motioned her to be quiet.
It was louder now, getting louder by the minute—the heartbeat of a cat modulating into the heartbeat of an elephant.
Thump-thump, thump-thump—and getting louder still.
Skull yanked on her arm. She pulled back a moment and then saw what he was doing: there was a shadowy cutout in the wall which he pressed them both into.
"Quiet," he said.
The thumping had turned into something more now, and it was moving quickly toward them. It had the regular, percussive beat of something artificial; it sounded, in fact, like a column of booming bass drums.
And there now, under the thundering, Minnow heard the rattle of snare drums and cymbals.
Without warning, the source of the sounds pulled into view. Skull had an arm across Minnow's chest, holding her tightly back against the wall; he was cutting off her breath but she dared not breathe anyway. What passed before them was a huge, ghoulish marching band—fishpale humans of all sizes, beanpoles and squatty beach balls, all marching and dancing with a manic precision that thoroughly frightened Minnow. They were possessed. Their eyes were vacant with rapture; and the pure look of single-mindedness on their faces was unmistakable. They would die, or burn themselves alive, or do whatever was required of them. The walls rocked with the sound of their instruments and marching feet. They didn't miss a note, and those that played their huge oil drum basses or rattling snares moved with a cog-like precision.
"The beat is their god," said Minnow with complete, awed certainty after they had gone, leaving only echoed silence.
Skull nodded. "They want nothing else. They wandered down here, or were caught down here, years ago when the beat started, and now they live for it. During the day their god takes care of them, and at night they service themselves."
"How do you know that?" Minnow asked. She reached to touch his arm but pulled back.
"Come on," he said quietly, "we're almost there."
"Are you one of them?"
Something in his voice, the inflection, or the quietness, had unlocked a corner of her mind and she had a sudden vision of him dancing. For a split second she knew who he was. But the fraction of a moment passed, and she could not hold on to it. Once more she knew nothing about him.
"Come on," he repeated in a gentle voice.
Another hundred feet down the corridor and they reached their destination.
"This is it," said Skull. Through a high vaulted door they entered a massive underground arena. It was in the shape of a dome so huge, and colored such a deep black, that if stars had been painted on it Minnow would have believed they were outside and that this was their flat Earth. The floor was one vast tarpaulin, pulled taut as a drumhead. They advanced slowly to the center of it, and Skull turned to Minnow.