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The night porter led the three visitors over to a sofa where Tommy Cooper was performing card tricks and telling jokes to an audience of Venusian businessmen. The porter explained that he had to go and make preparations for a wedding but would collect them later, to take them to the said wedding. Bob and Ra Ra El sat down to watch the Tommy Cooper performance and Kaiser Sos slipped off to attend to his own schemes and performances.

'Pick a card, any card,' said Cooper, approaching Bob and offering him a selection of cards. Bob took one.

'What is it?' Cooper asked Bob.

'Two of diamonds,' said Bob.

'Correct,' explained Cooper and then he explained to Bob that although it seemed like a cheap trick, in fact this recent illusionary feat was evidence of how he, the Great Cooper, was such a skilled magician that he could even get his audience members to perform magic - for example by knowing what was on the card. The Venusians clapped uproariously, finished their drinks and then went off to conclude a promotional deal for a telecoms company and a cigarette manufacturer.

'I'm glad that's over,' said Cooper, to Bob, when they were gone. 'I'm fed up with telling jokes. There's not much to laugh about when you're trapped inside the Hotel California for ever.'

Bob said that he hadn't realised Cooper was trapped inside the Hotel California and offered his condolences.

'It's not just me, mate,' said Cooper. 'We're ALL trapped here - every last one of us. There's no way to leave this place. The best you can do is go to the front desk, check out, sit on a sofa for a bit, get a taxi to drive you around and bring you back again so that you can check back in.'

Ra Ra El asked Cooper if anyone had ever tried to escape.

'Oh no. Escape is a dangerous thing,' said Cooper. 'It's easy enough. Get the taxi to take you to the shuttle port and just fly out. Anyone can do it. Trouble is that after you leave here they follow you and kill you. Some of the former guests here include John Lennon, John F Kennedy, Martin Luther King, Malcolm Little, Yitzhak Rabin, Mohandas Gandhi, to name only the most recent.'

'Not very encouraging,' agreed the Soul Eater.

The night porter returned and Cooper pretended to be telling jokes and very soon another crowd, this time of fortieth-century Europeans on a sight-seeing trip, gathered around him to hear the deceptively comical echoes of his dismay. He would have laughed if he'd known that most of this clan had names like LM32 and 47b, although one or two had even stranger names than that - Forage, Albox and Mramming were the names of the three 'elders' in charge of the party of LMs and variants of a and b.

'I trust you enjoyed the show,' said the night porter, as he led Bob and Ra Ra El out of the building and down to a taxi which would take them over to another part of the planetoid wherein was located the Wedding Chamber. 'It seems Mr Sos got bored of the show? Any idea where he went? No? Nevermind.'

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