THREE: THE EARTH-PEOPLE ARE USED SIMPLY AS FOOD FOR THE FRIGHTFUL AND INSATIABLY HUNGRY POPULATION OF THE FEDERATION.
FOUR: THE FEDERATION IS A FIGMENT OF THE IMAGINATION OF AN ALIEN RACE. SO VISUALLY HORRIFYING AND REPELLANT THAT IT COMMUNICATES THROUGH DEVICES LIKE THE EXAMINERS WHICH SUBTLY CONTROL THE MINDS OF THE CANDIDATES SO THAT THEY BELIEVE EVERYTHING THEY SEE AND HEAR.
FIVE: THE FEDERATION IS SO ADVANCED IN THE NONPHYSICAL SCIENCES THAT THE PICTURES AND OTHER EVIDENCE OF THE NEW WORLD, THE VAST FLEET OF SHIPS IN SYNCHRONOUS ORBIT, THE RADAR AND VISUAL IMAGES, AND THE REPORTS OF VISITORS TO THE NEW WORLD ARE THE RESULT OF DIRECT MENTAL CONTROL AND NONE OF IT HAS ANY PHYSICAL ACTUALITY.
SIX: YOUR PEOPLE ARE NOT BEING TRANSPORTED ANYWHERE BUT ARE DYING ON THE OTHER SIDE OF THE DOORS MARKED WITH THE FEDERATION SYMBOL.
SEVEN: WE ARE SO COMPLETELY ALIEN AND INCOMPREHENSIBLE TO YOU THAT YOU COULD NOT EVEN CONCEIVE OF THE KIND OF PURPOSES FOR WHICH YOU WILL BE USED OR THE-
“But you understand us!” Martin broke in. “Surely understanding between intelligent races is a two-way process. That is a ridiculous suggestion.”
THE SENSOR REGISTERS AN OVERREACT10N TO FEELINGS OF DOUBT AND INFERIORITY. UNDERSTANDABLE. ARE THE OTHER SUGGESTIONS RIDICULOUS?
“Yes.”
BUT?
“Some of them are, well, worrying. The people who are being accepted for citizenship, while they are in many cases good, responsible, and sometimes highly intelligent people, are not the type who will make trouble if things aren’t what they expected. You’re taking away the sheep and…”
THE SHEPHERDS.
“… leaving the wolves on Earth. What right have you to do this to us?”
THE RIGHT OF A RESCUER TO SAVE A BEING INTENT ON COMMITTING SUICIDE. A BASIC QUESTION. DO YOU BELIEVE THAT WE MEAN YOU HARM?
“No.”
SENSOR INDICATES PARTIAL UNTRUTH.
“Not intentionally.”
EXPLAIN.
“You don’t intend to harm us,” Martin said firmly, “either as individuals or as a race. We would be hopelessly paranoid not to believe that you are trying to help us, even though your reasons for evacuating Earth seem a bit high-handed and, considering the resources available to you, not wholly convincing.
“As well,” he went on, “the brochure tells us that the Undesirables and non-Citizens who remain here will not suffer physical hardship unless they cause it themselves, but that the Earth will not be a pleasant place for them. On the other hand, the new planet will be a very pleasant place. So much so that there will be little for the Citizens to do for physical and mental exercise. They won’t even be able to run away from the wolves. In spite of the brochure’s reassurances, they may be opting for a cultural dead end, a world on which they will do as they like and risk degeneration and death as a species. Whereas on Earth you say that Undesirables and non-Citizens have to obey instructions. I wonder if they aren’t the lucky ones.”
INSTRUCTIONS FOR THE IRRESPONSIBLE AND UNDESIRABLE ELEMENT ARE SIMPLE. THEY WILL NOT CAUSE PHYSICAL OR MENTAL HARM TO NON-CITIZENS REMAINING PERMANENTLY OR TEMPORARILY ON EARTH. THIS INSTRUCTION WILL BE ENFORCED NON-VIOLENTLY UNTIL THE POST-EXODUS SITUATION STABILIZES ITSELF. NON-CITIZENS, DEPENDING ON THEIR ABILITIES AND PSYCHOLOGICAL PROFILES, WILL RECEIVE MORE COMPLEX INSTRUCTIONS. INSTRUCTIONS TO RESPONSIBLE NON-CITIZENS WILL NOT BE ENFORCED.
Earth would not be a pleasant place, Martin thought, but it would not be actively unpleasant if the responsible non-Citizens did as they were told. And the examiner seemed to be suggesting that they would do as they were told willingly because they would realize that it was for their own good. Whereas on the new world…
He said, “I can’t quite believe… Is there something you’re not telling me about the new planet?”
IS FEAR OF ULTIMATE BOREDOM THE PRINCIPAL REASON FOR YOUR INABILITY TO ACCEPT.THE NEW LIFE WE ARE OFFERING YOU?
“I–I suppose so.”
SENSOR CORROBORATES. CANDIDATE IS UNSUITABLE FOR CITIZENSHIP. PASS EITHER SIDE AND GO THROUGH THE DOOR FACING YOU.
Chapter 3
HE stumbled as he went through the door. There was a sudden feeling of vertigo, and he instinctively put out his arms to keep his balance. It was a small room for the number of people in it, and for a moment he wondered if he was in a descending elevator.
“You’ll gel used to it in a moment,” said the woman he had met earlier. Her face was pale, as if she had recently received some kind of shock, but her smile was reassuring and sympathetic. Apart from her there were six other people in the room, three women and three men of different ages and nationalities, and some of them smiled as well. They were all standing in front of the window, but they moved aside to let Martin see the view.
At first glance the stretch of harshly-lit, stony, and obviously airless ground made him think that he was on the moon-the low gravity would have explained his difficulty in keeping balance. But it was not the moon, he saw as soon as he raised his eyes above the horizon.
The sky blazed with stars-singly, in clusters, and in great, swirling, jeweled eddies-and so dense was the star field that it was difficult to find even a tiny part of the sky which was completely dark. Except, that was, in one area high overhead where there hung an enormous, black, featureless shape which looked at least twenty times larger than the disk of the full moon seen from Earth.
It was the shape of the Federation symbol.
Martin became aware slowly that his pulse was hammering loudly in his ears, and that he had been looking at the sky with such an intensity of wonder that he had forgotten to breathe. He took a ragged breath and said, “Is-is it some kind of black hole?”
