His return to consciousness was a slow and painful process. It was a
journey in which he traversed all time. He dreamed. He rose through
thick layers of sleep, out of the imaginary beginnings of all things. He
lifted a pseudopod from primordial ooze, and the pseudopod was _him_. He
became an amoeba which contained _his_ essence; then a fish marked with
his own peculiar individuality; then an ape unlike all other apes. And
finally, he became a man.
What kind of man? Dimly he saw himself, faceless, a beamer gripped tight
on one hand, a corpse at his feet. _That_ kind of man.
He awoke, rubbed his eyes, and waited for further memories to come.
No memories came. Not even his name.
He sat up hastily and willed memory to return. When it didn't, he looked
around, seeking in his surroundings some clue to his identity.
He was sitting on a bed in a small gray room. There was a closed door
on one side. On the other, through a curtained alcove, he could see a
tiny lavatory. Light came into the room from some hidden source, perhaps
from the ceiling itself. The room had a bed and a single chair, and
nothing else.
He held his chin in his hand and closed his eyes. He tried to catalogue
all his knowledge, and the implications of that knowledge. He knew that
he was a man, species Homo sapiens, an inhabitant of the planet Earth.
He spoke a language which he knew was English. (Did that mean that there
were other languages?) He knew the commonplace names for things: room,
light, chair. He possessed in addition a limited amount of general
knowledge. He knew that there were many important things which he did
not know, which he once had known.
_Something must have happened to me._
That something could have been worse. If it had gone a little further,
he might have been left a mindless creature without a language, unaware
of being human, of being a man, of being of Earth. A certain amount had
been left to him.
But when he tried to think beyond the basic facts in his possession, he
came to a dark and horror-filled area. _Do Not Enter._ Exploration into
his own mind was as dangerous as a journey to--what? He couldn't find an
analogue, though he suspected that many existed.
_I must have been sick._
That was the only reasonable explanation. He was a man with the
recollection of memories. He must at one time have had that priceless
wealth of recall which now he could only deduce from the limited
evidence at his disposal. At one time he must have had specific memories
of birds, trees, friends, family, status, a wife perhaps. Now he could
only theorize about them. Once he had been able to say, this is like,
or, that reminds me of. Now nothing reminded him of anything, and things
were only like themselves. He had lost his powers of contrast and
comparison. He could no longer analyze the present in terms of the
experienced past.
_This must be a hospital._
Of course. He was being cared for in this place. Kindly doctors were
working to restore his memory, to replace his identity, to restore his
judgment apparatus, to tell him who and what he was. It was very good of
them; he felt tears of gratitude start in his eyes.
He stood up and walked slowly around his small room. He went to the door
and found it locked. That locked door gave him a moment of panic which
he sternly controlled. Perhaps he had been violent.
Well, he wouldn't be violent any more. They'd see. They would award him
all possible patient privileges. He would speak about that with the
doctor.
He waited. After a long time, he heard footsteps coming down the
corridor outside his door. He sat on the edge of the cot and listened,
trying to control his excitement.
The footsteps stopped beside his door. A panel slid open, and a face
peered in.
"How are you feeling?" the man asked.
He walked up to the panel, and saw that the man who questioned him was
dressed in a brown uniform. He had an object on his waist which could
be identified, after a moment, as a weapon. This man was undoubtedly a
guard. He had a blunt, unreadable face.
"Could you tell me my name?" he asked the guard.
"Call yourself 402," the guard said. "That's your cell number."
He didn't like it. But 402 was better than nothing at all. He asked the
guard, "Have I been sick for long? Am I getting better?"
"Yes," the guard said, in a voice that carried no conviction. "The
important thing is, stay quiet. Obey the rules. That's the best way."
"Certainly," said 402. "But why can't I remember anything?"
"Well, that's the way it goes," the guard said. He started to walk away.
402 called after him, "Wait! You can't just leave me like this, you have
to tell me something. What happened to me? Why am I in this hospital?"
"Hospital?" the guard said. He turned toward 402 and grinned. "What gave
you the idea this was a hospital?"
"I assumed it," 402 said.
"You assumed wrong. This is a prison."
402 remembered his dream of the murdered man. Dream or memory?
Desperately he called after the guard. "What was my offense? What did I
do?"
"You'll find out," the guard said.
"When?"
"After we land," the guard said. "Now get ready for assembly."
He walked away. 402 sat down on the bed and tried to think. He had
learned a few things. He was in a prison, and the prison was going to
land. What did that mean? Why did a prison have to land? And what was an
assembly?
* * * * *
402 had only a confused idea of what happened next. An unmeasurable
amount of time passed. He was sitting on his bed, trying to piece
together facts about himself. He had an impression of bells ringing. And
then the door of his cell flew open.
Why was that? What did it mean?
402 walked to the door and peered into the corridor. He was very
excited, but he didn't want to leave the security of his cell. He
waited, and the guard came up.
"All right, now," the guard said, "No one's going to hurt you. Go
straight down the corridor."
The guard pushed him gently. 402 walked down the corridor. He saw other
cell doors opening, other men coming into the corridor. It was a thin
stream at first; but as he continued walking, more and more men crowded
into the passageway. Most of them looked bewildered, and none of them
talked. The only words were from the guards:
"Move along now, keep on moving, straight ahead."
They were headed into a large circular auditorium. Looking around, 402
saw that a balcony ran around the room, and armed guards were stationed
every few yards along it. Their presence seemed unnecessary; these cowed
and bewildered men weren't going to stage a revolt. Still, he supposed
the grim-faced guards had a symbolic value. They reminded the newly
awakened men of the most important fact of their lives: that they were
prisoners.
After a few minutes, a man in a somber uniform stepped out on the
balcony. He held up his hand for attention, although the prisoners were
already watching him fixedly. Then, though he had no visible means of
amplification, his voice boomed hollowly through the auditorium.
"This is an indoctrination talk," he said. "Listen carefully and try to
absorb what I am about to tell you. These facts will be very important
for your existence."
The prisoners watched him. The speaker said, "All of you have, within
the last hour, awakened in your cells. You have discovered that you
cannot remember your former lives--not even your names. All you possess
is a meager store of generalized knowledge; enough to keep you in touch
with reality.
"I will not add to your knowledge. All of you, back on Earth, were
vicious and depraved criminals. You were people of the worst sort, men
who had forfeited any right to consideration by the State. In a less
enlightened age, you would have been executed. In our age, you have been
deported."
The speaker held out his hands to quiet the murmur that ran through the
auditorium. He said, "All of you are criminals. And all of you have one
thing in common: an inability to obey the basic obligatory rules of
human society. Those rules are necessary for civilization to function.
By disobeying them, you have committed crimes against all mankind.
Therefore mankind rejects you. You are grit in the machinery of
civilization, and you have been sent to a world where your own sort is
king. Here you can make your own rules, and die by them. Here is the
freedom you lusted for; the uncontained and self-destroying freedom of a
cancerous growth."
The speaker wiped his forehead and glared earnestly at the prisoners.
"But perhaps," he said, "a rehabilitation is possible for some of you.
Omega, the planet to which we are going, is _your_ planet, a place ruled
entirely by prisoners. It is a world where you could begin again, with
no prejudices against you, with a clean record! Your past lives are
forgotten. Don't try to remember them. Such memories would serve only to
restimulate your criminal tendencies. Consider yourselves born afresh as
of the moment of awakening in your cells."
The speaker's slow, measured words had a certain hypnotic quality. 402
listened, his eyes slightly unfocused and fixed upon the speaker's pale
forehead.
"A new world," the speaker was saying. "You are reborn--but with the
necessary consciousness of sin. Without it, you would be unable to
combat the evil inherent in your personalities. Remember that. Remember
that there is no escape and no return. Guardships armed with the latest
beam weapons patrol the skies of Omega day and night. These ships are
designed to obliterate anything that rises more than five hundred feet
above the surface of the planet--an invincible barrier through which no
prisoner can ever pass. Accommodate yourselves to these facts. They
constitute the rules which must govern your lives. Think about what
I've said. And now stand by for landing."
The speaker left the balcony. For a while, the prisoners simply stared
at the spot where he had been. Then, tentatively, a murmur of
conversation began. After a while it died away. There was nothing to
talk about. The prisoners, without memory of the past, had nothing upon
which to base a speculation of the future. Personalities could not be
exchanged, for those personalities were newly emerged and still
undefined.
They sat in silence, uncommunicative men who had been too long in
solitary confinement. The guards on the balcony stood like statues,
remote and impersonal. And then the faintest tremor ran through the
floor of the auditorium.
The tremor came again; then it changed into a definite vibration. 402
felt heavier, as though an invisible weight were pressing against his
head and shoulders.
A loudspeaker voice called out, "Attention! The ship is now landing on
Omega. We will disembark shortly."
* * * * *
The last vibration died away, and the floor beneath them gave a slight
lurch. The prisoners, still silent and dazed, were formed into a long
line and marched out of the auditorium. Flanked by guards, they went
down a corridor which stretched on interminably. From it, 402 began to
get some idea of the size of the ship.
Far ahead, he could see a patch of sunlight which shone brightly against
the pale illumination of the corridor. His section of the long shuffling
line reached the sunlight, and 402 saw that it came from an open
hatchway through which the prisoners were passing.
In his turn, 402 went through the hatchway, climbed down a long
stairway, and found himself on solid ground. He was standing in an open,
sunlit square. Guards were forming the disembarked prisoners into files;
on all sides, 402 could see a crowd of spectators watching.
A loudspeaker voice boomed, "Answer when your number is called. Your
identity will now be revealed to you. Answer promptly when your number
is called."
402 felt weak and very tired. Not even his identity could interest him
now. All he wanted to do was lie down, to sleep, to have a chance to
think about his situation. He looked around and took casual note of the
huge starcraft behind him, of the guards, the spectators. Overhead, he
saw black dots moving against a blue sky. At first he thought they were
birds. Then, looking closer, he saw they were guardships. He wasn't
particularly interested in them.
"Number 1! Speak out!"
"Here," a voice answered.
"Number 1, your name is Wayn Southholder. Age 34, blood type A-L2, Index
AR-431-C. Guilty of treason."
When the voice had finished, a loud cheer came up from the crowd. They
were applauding the prisoner's traitorous actions, and welcoming him to
Omega.
The names were read down the list, and 402, drowsy in the sunshine,
dozed on his feet and listened to the crimes of murder, credit theft,
deviationalism, and mutantism. At last his number was called.
"Number 402."
"Here."
"Number 402, your name is Will Barrent. Age 27, blood type O-L3, Index
JX-221-R. Guilty of murder."
The crowd cheered, but 402 scarcely heard them. He was trying to
accustom himself to the idea of having a name. A real name instead of a
number. Will Barrent. He hoped he wouldn't forget it. He repeated the
name to himself over and over again, and almost missed the last
announcement from the ship's loudspeaker.
"The new men are now released upon Omega. You will be given temporary
housing at Square A-2. Be cautious and circumspect in your words and
actions. Watch, listen, and learn. The law requires me to tell you that
the average life expectancy on Omega is approximately three Earth
years."
It took a while for those last words to take effect on Barrent. He was
still contemplating the novelty of having a name. He hadn't considered
any of the implications of being a murderer on an underworld planet.