"Henry Haberman conquered the first effect, in the Year 3 of Space."
"And, Scanners, I ask you, what did he do?"
"He made the habermans."
"How, O Scanners, are habermans made?"
"They are made with the cuts. The brain is cut from the heart, the
lungs. The brain is cut from the ears, the nose. The brain is cut
from the mouth, the belly. The brain is cut from desire, and pain.
The brain is cut from the world. Save for the eyes. Save for the
control of the living flesh."
"And how, O Scanners, is flesh controlled?"
"By the boxes set in the flesh, the controls set in the chest, the
signs made to rule the living body, the signs by which the body lives."
"How does a haberman live and live?"
"The haberman lives by control of the boxes."
"Whence come the habermans?"
Martel felt in the coming response a great roar of broken voices
echoing through the room as the Scanners, habermans themselves, put
sound behind their mouthings:
"Habermans are the scum of Mankind. Habermans are the weak,
the cruel, the credulous, and the unfit. Habermans are the
sentenced-to-more-than-death. Habermans live in the mind alone. They
are killed for Space but they live for Space. They master the ships
that connect the earths. They live in the Great Pain while ordinary men
sleep in the cold cold sleep of the transit."
"Brothers and Scanners, I ask you now: are we habermans or are we not?"
"We are habermans in the flesh. We are cut apart, brain and flesh. We
are ready to go to the Up and Out. All of us have gone through the
Haberman Device."
"We are habermans then?" Vomact's eyes flashed and glittered as he
asked the ritual question.
Again the chorused answer was accompanied by a roar of voices heard
only by Martel: "Habermans we are, and more, and more. We are the
Chosen who are habermans by our own free will. We are the Agents of
the Instrumentality of Mankind."
"What must the others say to us?"
"They must say to us, 'You are the bravest of the brave, the most
skilful of the skilled. All mankind owes most honor to the Scanner,
who unites the Earths of Mankind. Scanners are the protectors of the
habermans. They are the judges in the Up-and-Out. They make men live
in the place where men need desperately to die. They are the most
honored of Mankind, and even the Chiefs of the Instrumentality are
delighted to pay them homage!'"