tells me this. We join him and come back with him, away from here, to
where he stays now. Then none of us are punished." He paused. "It will
be a great punishment."
"I know," Dara said. "Yet one does not go alone."
Her voice was so low that Cadnan could barely hear it, but the words
were like sharp stones, stabbing fear into his body. For the first
time, he saw clearly exactly what she was driving at. And after a long
pause, she spoke again.
"Where one goes, two may go. Where Marvor goes, two may follow, one to
lead the other."
"One goes alone," Cadnan said, feeling himself tremble and trying to
control it. "You must go."
It seemed a long time before she spoke again, and Cadnan held himself
tightly, until his muscles began to ache.
"We go together," she said at last "Two go where one has gone. Only so
do I leave at all."
It was an ultimatum, and Cadnan understood what was behind it. But an
attraction between Dara and himself ... he said: "There is the rule of
the tree," but it was like casting water on steel.
"If we leave here," Dara said, "why think of a smaller rule?"
Cadnan tried to find words, but there were no words. She had won,
and he knew it. He could not let Dara stay behind to draw a great
punishment, possibly even to die, to be no more Dara. And there was no
way of forcing her to go and escape that fate--no way except to go with
her.
"We must wait until they sleep," Dara said in a sudden return to
practicality. "Then we go."
Cadnan looked around at the huddled, vaguely stirring forms of his
companions. Fear was joined by a sort of sickness he had never known
before. He was a slave, and that was good--but once outside where
would he find work, or food, or a master? Where there was no master,
Cadnan told himself, there was no slave: he was nothing, nameless,
non-existent.
But there was neither word nor action for him now. He tried once more
to argue but his words were parried with a calm tenacity that left
no room for discussion. In the end he was ready to do what he had to
do--had to do in order, simply, to save Dara. There was no other
reason: he needed none.
He had heard of the attraction of male for female, though some did not
experience it until the true time of mating. He had not until that
moment known how strong the attraction could be.
* * * * *
The waiting, though it seemed like positive days, didn't take long. The
others in the room fell asleep, by habit, one by one, and soon Dara and
Cadnan were the only ones left awake. Neither was tempted to sleep:
their own terror and their decision kept them very effectively alert.
Cadnan said: "If the masters see us?"
Dara turned on him a face that seemed completely calm. "They do not see
us," she said flatly. "Now do not speak."
They rose and, silently, went to the door. The door opened just as
quietly, and shut once again behind them.
The corridor was filled with watching eyes, Cadnan felt: but there were
no masters in evidence. They stood for a second, waiting, and then Dara
started down toward the big room at the end, her feet silent on the
floor, and Cadnan followed her.
No masters were visible. There should have been guards, but the guards
might have been anywhere: one escape had hardly served to alert a lazy,
uninterested group who performed their duties out of no more than
habit. Wherever the guards were resting, they were not in the corridor:
everything went smoothly. It was smoother than Cadnan was willing to
believe.
Soon, though, they were actually in the great lobby of the building.
It, too, was dark and empty. They stood dwarfed by the place, the
gigantic doors that led to freedom no more than a few feet away.
Cadnan kept telling himself that where Marvor had gone he, too, could
go. But Marvor had had a plan, and Cadnan had none.
Yet they were safe--so far, so far. They walked toward the door now,
a step at a time. Each step seemed to take an hour, a full day. Dara
walked ahead, straight and tall: Cadnan caught up with her, and she put
out her hand. There was no more than an instant of hesitation. He took
the hand.
That pledged them to each other, until the time of mating. But what was
one more law now?
Another step. Another.
Cadnan, in the silence, was suddenly tempted to make a noise, any sort
of noise--but it seemed impossible to create sound. The quiet dimness
wrapped him like a blanket. He took another step.
Mating, he thought. If the chain of obedience was broken would the
trees refuse to obey, in their turn? Puna had said so, and it was true.
And if the trees refused to obey there would be no mating....
Yet Dara would be safe. That was the important thing. One thing at a
time.
Another step.
And then, at last, the door.
Cadnan pushed at it, and it opened--and then there was sound, plenty of
sound, more sound than he could have imagined, sound to fill the great
lobby, to fill the entire building with rocking, trembling agonies of
noise!
There was an alarm-bell, to be exact, an alarm-buzzer, combinations and
solo cadenzas. The guards were, after all, no more than dressing: the
automatic machinery never slept, and it responded beautifully and with
enthusiasm.
Cadnan and Dara ran crazily out into the darkness. The building fell
behind them and the jungle was ahead: still they ran, but Cadnan felt
the ground, bumpy instead of smooth, and stumbled once, nearly falling.
He saw Dara ahead of him. Getting up and beginning again was automatic:
panic beat at him. The noise grew and grew. His feet moved, his heart
thudded....
And then the lights went on.
Automatic sweep searchlights were keyed in. The machinery continued to
respond.
Cadnan found himself suddenly struck blind: ahead of him, Dara made a
single, lonely, terrified sound that overrode all the alarms.
Cadnan tried to shout: "We must run! In the dark the masters cannot
see--"
But, of course, by then it was too late to move.
The masters were all around them.
The escape was over.
15
Of course there was Norma, Dodd told himself.
There was Norma to make everything worth-while--except that Norma
needed something, too, and he couldn't provide it. No one could provide
it, not as long as no one was allowed off-planet. And it was quite
certain, Dodd told himself gloomily, that the restrictions that had
been in force yesterday were going to look like freedom and carefree
joy compared with the ones going into effect tomorrow, or next week.
If, of course, there was going to be a tomorrow ... that, he thought,
was always in doubt. He managed sometimes to find a sort of illusory
peace in thinking of himself as dead, scattered into component atoms,
finished, forever unconscious, no longer wanting anything, no longer
seeing the blinking words in his mind. Somewhere in his brain a small
germ stirred redly against the prospect, but he tried to ignore it:
that was no more than brute self-preservation, incapable of reasoning.
That was no more than human nature.
And human nature, he knew with terror, was about to be overthrown once
more.
It was only human, after all, to find the cheapest way to do necessary
work. It was only human to want the profits high and the costs low.
It was only human to look on other races as congenitally inferior, as
less-than-man in any possible sense, as materials, in fact, to be used.
That was certainly human: centuries of bloody experience proved it.
But the Confederation didn't want to recognize human nature. The
Confederation didn't like slavery.
The rumor he'd heard from Norma was barely rumor any more: instead, it
had become the next thing to an officially announced fact. Everyone
knew it, even if next to no one spoke of it. The Confederation was
going to send ships--had probably sent ships already. There was going
to be a war.
The very word "war" roused that red spark of self-preservation. It was
harder, Dodd had found, to live with hope than to live without it: it
was always possible to become resigned to a given state of affairs--but
not if you kept thinking matters would improve. So he stamped on the
spark, kept it down, ignored it. You had to accept things, and go on
from there.
It was too bad Norma didn't know that.
He'd tried to tell her, of course. They'd even been talking, over in
Building One, on the very night of the near-escape. He'd explained it
all very clearly and lucidly, without passion (since he had cut himself
off from hope he found he had very few passions of any kind left, and
that made it easy); but she hadn't been convinced.
"As long as there's a fighting chance to live, I want to live," she'd
said. "As long as there's any chance at all--the same as you."
"I know what I want," he told her grimly.
"What?" she asked, and smiled. "Do you like what you're doing? Do you
like what I'm doing--what the whole arrangement is here?"
He shrugged. "You know I don't."
"Then get out of it," she said, still smiling. "You can, you know.
It's easy. All you have to do is stop living--just like that! No more
trouble."
"Don't be sil--"
"It can be done," she went on flatly. "There are hundreds of ways."
Then the smile again. "But you'd rather live, Johnny. You'd rather
live, even this way, being a slaver, than put an end to it and to
yourself."
He paused. "It's not the same thing."
"No," she said. "This way, you'd have to do the killing yourself. When
the ships come, you can let them do it for you, just sit and wait for
someone to kill you. Like a cataleptic. But you won't, Johnny."
"I will," he said.
She shook her head, the smile remaining. Her voice was quiet and calm,
but there was a feeling of strain in it: there was strain everywhere,
now. Everyone looked at the sky, and saw nothing: everyone listened for
the sound of engines, and there were no engines to hear. "Catalepsy
is a kind of death, Johnny. And you'll have to inflict that much on
yourself. You won't do it."
"You think I--" He stopped and swallowed. "You think I like living this
way, don't you?"
"I think you like living," Norma said. "I think we all do, no matter
how rough it gets. No matter how it grates on the nerves, or the flesh,
of the supersensitive conscience. And I know how you feel, Johnny, I
do--I--" She stopped very suddenly.
He heard his voice say: "I love you."
There was a silence.
"Johnny," she said, and her hands reached out for him blindly. He saw,
incredibly, tears like jewels at the corners of her eyes. "Johnny--"
It was at that moment that the alarm-bell rang. It was heard only
faintly in Building One, but that didn't matter. Dodd knew the
direction, and the sound. He turned to go, for a second no more than a
machine.
Norma's voice said: "Escape?"
He came back to her. "I--the alarm tripped off. This time they must
have tried it through the front door, or a window. The last one must
have tunnelled through--"
He had to leave her. Instead he stood silently for a second. She said
nothing.
"There are spots the steel's never covered," he said. "You can tunnel
through if you're lucky." A pause. "I--"
"It's all right, Johnny," she said.
"Norma--"
"It's all right I understand. It's all right."
Her voice. He hung on to it as he turned and walked away, found the
elevator, started away from the room, the Building where she was,
started off to do his duty.
His duty as a slaver.
* * * * *
The night was long, so long it could have been the night before the end
of the world, the universe drawing one last deep breath before blowing
out the candles and returning, at last, to peace and darkness and
silence. Dodd spent it posted as one of the guards around the two cells
where the Alberts were penned.
He had plenty of time to think.
And, in spite of Norma, in spite of everything, he was still sure of
one thing. Because he was a slaver, because he acted, still, as a
slaver and a master, hated by the Confederation, hated by the Alberts,
hated by that small part of himself which had somehow stayed clean of
the foulness of his work and his life, because of all that....
It was going to be very easy to die.
* * * * *
PUBLIC OPINION FOUR
Being an excerpt from a directive issued by the Executive and his
Private Council, elected and confirmed by the Confederation, and
upheld by majority vote of the Senate: the directive preserved in
Confederation Archives, and signed under date of May 21 in the year
two hundred and ten of the Confederation.
... It is therefore directed that sufficient ships be fitted out
with all modern armaments, said fitting to be in the best judgment
of the competent and assigned authorities, and dispatched without
delay toward the planet known as Fruyling's World, both to subdue any
armed resistance to Confederation policy, and to affirm the status of
Fruyling's World as a Protectorate of the Confederation, subject to
Confederation policy and Confederation judgment.
An act of this nature cannot be undertaken without grave thought and
consideration. We affirm that such consideration has been given to this
step.
It is needless to have fear as to the outcome of this action. No
isolated world can stand against, not only the might, but the moral
judgment of the Confederation. Arms can be used only as a last resort,
but times will come in the history of peoples when they must be so
used, when no other argument is sufficient to force one party to cease
and desist from immoral and unbearable practices.
In accordance with the laws of the Confederation, no weapons shall be
used which destroy planetary mass.
In general, Our efforts are directed toward as little blood-shed
as possible. Our aim is to free the unfortunate native beings of
Fruyling's World, and then to begin a campaign of re-education.
The fate of the human beings who have enslaved these natives shall be
left to the Confederation Courts, which are competent to deal in such
matters by statute of the year forty-seven of the Confederation. We
pledge that We shall not interfere with such dealings by the Courts.
We may further reassure the peoples of the Confederation that no
further special efforts on their part will be called for. This is not
to be thought of as a war or even as a campaign, but merely as one
isolated, regretted but necessary blow at a system which cannot but be
a shock to the mind of civilized man.
That blow must be delivered, as We have been advised by Our
Councillors. It shall be delivered.
The ships, leaving as directed, will approach Fruyling's World, leaving
the FTL embodiments and re-entering the world-line, within ten days.
Full reports will be available within one month.
In giving this directive, We have been mindful of the future status of
any alien beings on worlds yet to be discovered. We hereby determine,
for ourselves and our successors, that nowhere within reach of the
Confederation may slavery exist, under any circumstances. The heritage
of freedom which We have protected, and which belongs to all peoples,
must be shared by all peoples everywhere, and to that end we direct Our
actions, and Our prayers.
Given under date of May 21, in the year two hundred and ten of the
Confederation, to be distributed and published everywhere within the
Confederation, under Our hand and seal:
Richard Germont
by Grace of God Executive
of the Confederation
together with
His Council in judgment assembled
all members subscribing thereto.
16
The room had no windows.
There was an air-conditioning duct, but Cadnan did not know what such
a thing was, nor would he have understood without lengthy and tiresome
explanations. He didn't know he needed air to live: he knew only that
the room was dark and that he was alone, boxed in, frightened. He
guessed that somewhere, in another such room, Dara was waiting, just as
frightened as he was, and that guess made him feel worse.
Somehow, he told himself, he would have to escape. Somehow he would
have to get to Dara and save her from the punishment, so that she did
not feel pain. It was wrong for Dara to feel pain.
But there was no way of escape. He had crept along the walls, pushing
with his whole body in hopes of some opening. But the walls were metal
and he could not push through metal. He could, in fact, do nothing
at all except sit and wait for the punishment he knew was coming. He
was sure, now, that it would be the great punishment, that he and
Dara would be dead and no more. And perhaps, for his disobedience, he
deserved death.
But Dara could not die.
He heard himself say her name, but his voice sounded strange and he
barely recognized it. It seemed to be blotted up by the darkness. And
after that, for a long time, he said nothing at all.
He thought suddenly of old Gornom, and of Puna. They had said there
was an obedience in all things. The slaves obeyed, the masters obeyed,
the trees obeyed. And, possibly, the chain of obedience, if not
already broken by Marvor's escape and what he and Dara had tried to
do, extended also to the walls of his dark room. For a long time he
considered what that might mean.
If the walls obeyed, he might be able to tell them to go. They would
move and he could leave and find Dara. Since it would not be for
himself but for Dara, such a command might not count as an escape: the
chain of obedience might work for him.
This complicated chain of reasoning occupied him for an agonized time
before he finally determined to put it to the test. But, when he did,
the walls did not move. The door, which he tried as soon as it occurred
to him to do so, didn't move either. With a land of terror he told
himself that the chain of obedience had been broken.
That thought was too terrible for him to contemplate for long, and
he began to change it, little by little, in his mind. Perhaps (for
instance) the chain was only broken for him and for Marvor: perhaps it
still worked as well as ever for all those who still obeyed the rules.
That was better: it kept the world whole, and sane, and reasonable. But
along with it came the picture of Gornom, watching small Cadnan sadly.
Cadnan felt a weight press down on him, and grow, and grow.
He tried the walls and the door again, almost mechanically. He felt his
way around the room. There was nothing he could do. But that idea would
not stay in his mind: there had to be something, and he had to find
it. In a few seconds, he told himself, he would find it. He tried the
walls again. He was beginning to shiver. In a few seconds, only a few
seconds, he would find the way, and then....
The door opened, and he whirled and stared at it. The sudden light
hurt his eye, but he closed it for no more than a second. As soon as
he could he opened it again, and stood, too unsure of himself to move,
watching the master framed in the doorway. It was the one who was
called Dodd.
Dodd stared back for what seemed a long time. Cadnan said nothing,
waiting and wondering.
"It's all right," the master said at last. "You don't have to be
afraid, Cadnan. I'm not going to hurt you." He looked sadly at the
slave, but Cadnan ignored the look: there was no room in him for more
guilt.
"I am not afraid," he said. He thought of going past Dodd to find Dara,
but perhaps Dodd had come to bring him to her. Perhaps Dodd knew where
she was. He questioned the master with Dara's name.
"The female?" Dodd asked. "She's all right. She's in another room, just
like this one. A solitary room."
Cadnan shook his head. "She must not stay there."
"You don't have to worry," Dodd said. "Nobody's doing anything to her.
Not right now, anyhow. I--not right now."
"She must escape," Cadnan said, and Dodd's sadness appeared to grow. He
pushed at the air as if he were trying to move it all away.
"She can't." His hands fell to his sides. "Neither can you, Cadnan.
I'm--look, there's a guard stationed right down the corridor, watching
this door every second I'm here. There are electronic networks in the
door itself, so that if you manage somehow to open it there'll be an
alarm." He paused, and began again, more slowly. "If you go past me,
or if you get the door open, the noise will start again. You won't get
fifteen feet."
Cadnan understood some of the speech, and ignored the rest: it wasn't
important. Only one thing was important: "She can not die."
Dodd shook his head. "I'm sorry," he said flatly. "There's nothing
I can do." A silence fell and, after a time, he broke it. "Cadnan,
you've really messed things up. I know you're right--anybody knows it.
Slavery--slavery is--well, look, whatever it is, the trouble is it's
necessary. Here and now. Without you, without your people, we couldn't
last on this world. We need you, Cadnan, whether it's right or not: and
that has to come first."
Cadnan frowned. "I do not understand," he said.
"Doesn't matter," Dodd told him. "I can understand how you feel. We've
treated you--pretty badly, I guess. Pretty badly." He looked away with
what seemed nervousness. But there was nothing to see outside the door,
nothing but the corridor light that spilled in and framed him.
"No," Cadnan said earnestly, still puzzled. "Masters are good. It is
true. Masters are always good."
"You don't have to be afraid of me," Dodd said, still looking away.
"Nothing I could do could hurt you now--even if I wanted to hurt you.
And I don't, Cadnan. You know I don't."
"I am not afraid," Cadnan said. "I speak the truth, no more. Masters
are good: it is a great truth."
Dodd turned to face him. "But you tried to escape."
Cadnan nodded. "Dara can not die," he said in a reasonable tone. "She
would not go without me."
"Die?" Dodd asked, and then: "Oh. I see. The other--"
There was a long silence. Cadnan watched Dodd calmly. Dodd had turned
again to stare out into the hallway, his hands nervously moving at his
sides. Cadnan thought again of going past him, but then Dodd turned and
spoke, his head low.
"I've got to tell you," he said. "I came here--I don't know why, but
maybe I just came to tell you what's happening."
Cadnan nodded. "Tell me," he said, very calmly.
Dodd said: "I--" and then stopped. He reached for the door, held it
for a second without closing it, and then, briefly, shook his head.
"You're going to die," he said in an even, almost inhuman tone. "You're
both going to die. For trying to escape. And the whole of your--clan,
or family, or whatever that is--they're going to die with you. All
of them." It was coming out in a single rush: Dodd's eyes fluttered
closed. "It's my fault. It's our fault. We did it. We...."
And the rush stopped. Cadnan waited for a second, but there was no
more. "Dara is not to die," he said.
Dodd sighed heavily, his eyes still closed. "I'm--sorry," he said
slowly. "It's a silly thing to say: I'm sorry. I wish there was
something I could do." He paused. "But there isn't. I wish--never
mind. It doesn't matter. But you understand, don't you? You understand?"
Cadnan had room for only one thought, the most daring of his entire
life. "You must get Dara away."
"I can't," Dodd said, unmoving.
Cadnan peered at him, half-fearfully. "You are a master." One did not
give orders to masters, or argue with them.
But Dodd did not reach for punishment. "I can't," he said again. "If I
help Dara, it's the jungle for me, or worse. And I can't live there. I
need what's here. It's a matter of--a matter of necessity. Understand?"
His eyes opened, bright and blind. "It's a matter of necessity," he
said. "It has to be that way, and that's all."
Cadnan stared at him for a long second. He thought of Dara, thought of
the punishment to come. The master had said there was nothing to do:
but that thought was insupportable. There had to be something. There
had to be a way....
There was a way.
Shouting: "Dara!" he found himself in the corridor, somehow having
pushed past Dodd. He stood, turning, and saw another master with a
punishment tube. Everything was still: there was no time for anything
to move in.
He never knew if the tube had done it, or if Dodd had hit him from
behind. Very suddenly, he knew nothing at all, and the world was blank,
black, and distant. If time passed he knew nothing about it.
When he woke again he was alone again: he was back in the dark and
solitary room.
17
The office was dim now, at evening, but the figure behind the desk was
rigid and unchanging, and the voice as singular as ever. "Do what you
will," Dr. Haenlingen said. "I have always viewed love as the final
aberration: it is the trap which lies in wait for the unwary sane. But
no aberration is important, any more...."
"I'm trying to help him--" Norma began.
"You can't help him, child," Dr. Haenlingen said. Her eyes were closed:
she looked as if she were preparing, at last, for death. "You feel too
closely for him: you can't see him clearly enough to know what help he
needs."
"But I've got to--"