"That's the truth, but not the whole truth," the guard said, looking at the disk. "Care to try again?"

A magic truth disk! Now Alp understood. The information was in his mind after all, but he had not recognized the concept. How fortunate he had not attempted an outright lie!

Actually, it would not be proper to lie to any of these demons other than the four he fled from, for the others were not his enemies. He could not condemn them all merely because they had the misfortune to be demons. Technically, he was now a demon himself!

"I am an Uigur subchief. My family was killed by barbarians. I obtained vengeance but died while escaping the Kirghiz, and now I am in hell without horse, weapons or dress." Actually the words he used were not precisely analogous to the concepts of his people, but more than a language barrier was involved. This language of Galactic seemed to have a plethora of terms relating to vehicles and ships, but almost none relating to important Uigur matters such as "stirrup," "bowstring" or "gorge." "I escaped the four demons assigned to torture me—and there they are!" he pointed.

The guard's round eyes widened. "That is the truth, as you see it—but there's little sign of derangement! Mister, you've been hyped! I'll nail them all!"

The demons saw the guard and tried to retreat, but he whipped out a portable stunner. Docilely they coasted down to line up beside Alp.

"Officer," the leader said respectfully through his obvious discomfort. "We're in Steppe. We were interrogating this man when he attacked us and plunged into the street."

"Steppe!" the guard exclaimed, grimacing beautifully. "I should have known. What in hell are you clowns doing on this level?"

So the demons admitted this was hell!

"Our equipment is here. We had no intention of coming into the street, but we couldn't let the primitive run loose—"

Alp kept silent. He was learning a great deal of value, more by the memories evoked by the dialogue than by the actual words. His new memory had to be drawn out in comprehensible segments to be useful. "Steppe" was not a land but a synonym for the Game—a game of life and half-death. A game that somehow involved Alp himself.