Chapter 55 of 99 · Book 8, A Parade of Horribles

Chapter 55 — The cleaner bot plan

Book: A Parade of Horribles · Part: Horrible One · Previous: Chapter 54 — Grigori the Placid; Zhang's only way · Next: Chapter 56 — Take on Me · Floor: Floor 10 — Don't Come in Last · Series: the series

Opening

Splash Zone: Man, I don’t know if this is going to work.

Summary

Splash Zone reports from the Desperado Club: the Nothing spots on the games are now 'You get your ass curb stomped' and the Dirty Tea Bag; Dwight, drunk, wanders into the Lollipop — the first time Carl has seen him outside the vine — shoves Prepotente sprawling, then sits on the floor and sobs. Mordecai: the test worked, on Samantha and then on sluggalos; Rosetta: the shop-interface half cannot be tested because of the standing purchase order, so it rests on trusting Akuma. Carl judges Akuma lying, but not about the Cabaret itself — the purchase order proves part of it, and Eris said it will work. Na will be told everything, not tricked — 'She’s too strong, and she’s too smart'; the plan keeps her and Zhang alive, stops the killing and tests Herot's theory. Mordecai warns it is 'so far off the codex' the system may not allow it. 'It’s a go.' The mechanism: the Cleaner Bot upgrade has been out of stock since the last floor because Herot has a standing order for every cleaner bot that appears; the white bot from Architect Houston's theatre was the last old model. Menerva runs the Backstage Death Maze on the seventeenth, where NPCs train for hundreds of seasons — where the AI plucked Growler Gary; Herot is beyond the portal in the Cabaret itself with limited powers and a shop interface. The Cabaret is overrun: the Ogre Imperium, a binned plotline whose ogres were made too intelligent and knew at once they were in a dungeon; shadow mimics; 'something more'. With the casino plan a bust, the cleaner bot plan stands; Na's Left to Fester will worsen with each floor's top-up and stop in the Cabaret, whose claimed exit to Earth's surface might cure it. Try it now with Na alone, then with several crawlers after heat five.

Characters

• Carl — 'It’s a go' — relief like a curtain drawn back.
• Splash Zone — Sees Hamed about his wife; the casino is a bust.
• Dong Quixote — Sent to the bar by someone claiming Carl asked.
• Dwight and Lucienne (Team Sparkles) — Dwight sobs on the floor like a dog.
• Prepotente — Shoved sprawling.
• Mordecai — The test worked on Samantha and sluggalos; 'so far off the codex'.
• Rosetta Thagra — The shop-interface half cannot be tested.
• Imani — Between the unicorn and the goat.
• Tran — Bows.
• Li Na — Left to Fester worsens each floor.
• Li Jun and Zhang — Kept alive by the plan.
• Herot — A standing order for every cleaner bot; a shop interface in the Cabaret.
• Menerva — Runs the Backstage Death Maze.
• The Night Wyrm — Hamed, the new leader Splash Zone goes to see.
• Eris — Said it will work.

Locations

• The Lollipop — The plan agreed.
• The Desperado Club — The Nothing spots replaced by the Dirty Tea Bag.

Motifs

• The Pineapple Cabaret — Ogre Imperium, shadow mimics, 'something more'.
• The cleaner bots — Out of stock for 'overwhelming demand'; the last old model is theirs.
• Waking the NPCs — Growler Gary came from the maze.
• The Dungeon Anarchist's Cookbook — Herot's theory to be tested.