Delia walked back over to the well and looked up.

"We're not that far down. We jumped, remember?" she said. "There's a computer down here."

"Yes, yes, but you two really should have said something after you fell the second time. One can't be too careful about piranhas," Cynthia said, before grabbing the rope and descending into the depths below. She dusted herself off and looked around. "What a lot of computer-y thingies!"

"We've known the well was dry since...well, since we got here," Delia replied, rolling her eyes. "Now to figure this out...."

She walked toward the screen and inspected it, then reached out and touched it. The screen turned on as it came out of hibernation. Delia's belt started beeping.

"Sorry, guys, looks like I'm out of time," she said, reaching down and turning the timer off. "I'll do my best to help from the outside once I can get back to Ditto Town again. Until then, good luck."

She hit a button on her belt, and then vanished, a few bits of ash left floating in the air.

"Okay, so the computer is password protected," Anna said, taking Delia's place at the screen. "Ideas on a password?"

"'All's well that ends well'?" Cynthia suggested. "Or maybe 'take us back home, you dastardly lunatic'? Or perhaps 'jinx' or some variation thereof?"

"Try "my home". It was on the map, but was scribbled out." Neal said as he stood beside Anna. "Worth a shot at least."

Anna typed the suggestion into the computer, but an "INCORRECT PASSWORD" message appeared.

"Any other ideas?"

"What about 'jinx the hologram'?" Cynthia mused. "Or what about all of the numbers and characters branded into the victims' skin, in the order that the murders took place?"

Anna started to type in Cynthia's suggestion and then simply toppled over without a sound. She fell on her back, sightless eyes staring at the ceiling. A trickle of blood ran out of her mouth and the palm of her hand now read "3".

"Drat, there goes another one..." Neal stepped over the lifeless body of Anna and took the young woman's place in front of the monitor. "Guess it's you and I now."

Decker began entering the codes that had been found on the canisters and victims skin as mentioned by Cynthia. When he was halfway through the codes, the Darklings right hand began to tremble. "Great..." he muttered before slowly backing up to the opening in the roof.

"Looks like it's all you, Vegan Freak." Neal said before suddenly disappearing into the shadows. A moment later the Darkling's body fell from the roof, landing behind Cynthia. Pale skin with black, staring eyes gazed upwards as a "2" formed on his right hand.

"Oh, come on, you two!" Cynthia cried as her last remaining companions keeled over in rapid succession. "This is terribly inconvenient. Now if I ever do make it back to Ditto Town, everyone is going to think that I'm the murderer."

With a theatrical sigh, Cynthia keyed in the half of the code that Mr. Decker had neglected to type due to his untimely demise. She then crossed her arms and waited.

INCORRECT PASSWORD

"Incorrect?!" Cynthia exclaimed. She raised her hands, seriously considering the option of just slamming her fists onto the keyboard and entering whatever the result was... and then paused when she saw a small number one appear on her wrist.

"Number one? Does this mean I'm number one? How lovely," she said with a smile, which faltered slightly when she saw a spindly, jet-black spider suddenly drop down from the darkness above and bite her on the hand before she could so much as scream.

With the last, sighing words of "I really should have seen that coming", Cynthia toppled over into an elegant, theatrical heap and promptly died.

Delia slowly opened her eyes and blinked, the bright sun nearly blinding her. She sat up and shaded her eyes. She was in the Mansion, to be sure--and the sun was annoyingly bright coming through the window. Neal was leaning against the wall, a little drool dribbling down his chin and pooling on his shoulder. Delia crawled over to him and gently pressed her fingers against his neck. At least he was alive. She slowly looked around the room. Everyone was there--Cynthia was seated, leaning against the table, her maid on the floor next to her. The body of the Annas was in a corner, Kai on the threshold of the dining room. Dan and Angie were there, too, Angie's head resting on Dan's shoulder.

"Consarn it," Delia muttered.

~~

"Thirteen people, all unconscious," the officer said, shaking his head. "Must have been some party. Tell me how you found them."

"Well, I woke up here, over by the window. The sun was in my eyes, and it took me a few minutes to figure out where I was. I started checking on people, and then I called."

"So you were attending the party, too?"

"It was a fundraiser."

"Right. What was the last thing you recall?"

"Before I woke up?"

"Yeah, to the best of your recollection."

"I was fighting with my ex-husband about the relative morality of using the River Styx as a source of hydro-electric power. He gave me a lift back to my body. The very last thing I recall when I was with these people was trying to figure out a password for a really big computer. But before that, there was an earthquake, and the rest of the world disappeared. We were in this dead world, and people kept dying. We eventually figured out that it was run by this weird computer thing, but by then I knew that if I didn't leave, I would die too, so I left."

"But they're not dead. Or at least, their bodies aren't. Are we dealing with some new strain of zombie apocalypse?"

"Technically, they aren't zombies because they aren't animated. They're in vegetative states."

"But they're dead."

"Only in that other world. Not here. I didn't see any souls leave the guests, and I double checked the guest book in Hades. My guess is that their souls are trapped in some null state until they can either be reunited with their bodies or their bodies kick the bucket."

"Right. And do you have an alibi for your whereabouts?"

"Well, most of these people can vouch for me for at least one if not multiple of the death times, and my ex can vouch for me for the last three."

"That's all for now, then. We'll be in touch," the officer closed his book and watched as yet another person was wheeled into the back of an ambulance for transport to the hospital.

"Some times I miss Earth," he muttered, then glanced at Delia. "You know, where if you told me you'd been snapped into another dimension and people were killed by a huge computer, I could just argue that you had a psychotic break and poisoned them all. But no. Here, that's a perfectly valid alibi. Good morning."

~~

Delia kicked at the boards over the entrance to the old Jedi temple beneath the Mansion. It had been boarded up some years ago, after Gawain and the others had apparently gone into semi-hibernation. They had keys to the temple, but Bob had deemed it appropriate to seal over the door after some kids had broken in and graffitied the place. The third door on the right...there. Delia turned the knob and stepped in.

"Hello, dahling," she said, shining her flashlight at the holodeck. "Someone played with your connections, did they?"

She opened up the control panel and inspected it.

"I don't know how to work on you without turning you off, but if I turn you off without saving your progress, you'll delete the souls. So let's play a game where if I win, I get to set everything right. And if I lose...well, if I lose, I'll know where to find my body this time, so we can start from the beginning, and play again."