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"Why have you fixated upon that bloody thing?" Cruce de was never able to co Everyone knows that"

"You haven’t even listened to it," I pointed out "Hoould you know?" He’d sifted out the other night before I played it to the others

"It doesn’t matter anyway," Dancer said "Listen" He withdrew the music box from his backpack and handed it to lance, took the box, sat it on the coffee table and opened it, bracing , I picked up the box, closed it and opened it again Still nothing I closed it, shook it firle note Not even a whirring of daears, not that I believed the otherworldly object of power had any gears "What did you do, drop it or soot back to the lab and opened it to begin converting the one, Mac Apparently so decided to remove every trace of it from our world"

I shookon?

Dancer continued, "It would have been an exercise in futility anyway I knehen I finished it earlier today that it wasn’t complete It ended abruptly in the middle of an entirely new motif that wasn’t an interpretation of any othered "Think outside your box Who was I to presume that wasn’t the composer’s intention? Perhaps other worlds and races prefer their music to stop in e consider the middle Perhaps it excites theranted You can’t, if you want to drive your brain beyond established theory But now it appears my initial impression was correct and that’s why it didn’t work Because we only have part of it" He muttered, "Had Noe don’t even have that"

I closedabout how final and odd it was that every trace of the otherworldlyall the way through to the black hole It hadn’t disappeared each time we’d listened to part of it Nor had it puffed out of existence the moment Dancer had listened to all of it I found it beyond the realht be an unknown evil entity out there, lurking in the ether, spying on us, and the ot close to success had seized every note of it, along with everythat oddity with the complete erasure of thehad done whatever it was supposed to do, and been progra h-stakes spy

But as it supposed to do?

An epiphany sla at aze I was surprised it wasn’t drilling holes inan identical train of thought Her mouth dropped open and, at the saot it!" she said "I think Mac’s got it!" We beamed at each other

After a few moments of inner reflection I was elated to discover I did indeed contain the song I could feel it insidewith power

Talk about your checks and balances Apparently, the queen was the preprogrammed home for it, and once I’d listened to e had of it, all the way through--which I’d never done until we’d played it near the sphere--it had settled intono one else could ever get their hands on it

I was just about to suggest we head for the nearest black hole and see if I could figure out how to turn myself into a portable iPod when the front doorbell tinkled

The Dreamy-Eyed Guy walked in