ic.

"Our ancestors, and many other advanced nations, began to burrow
toward the hot interior of the earth. We to-day have no idea of the
labor that went into the digging of our underground home. We are
becoming degenerate. More and more of us, even those who still use the
vita-lights, are becoming pale and flabby. There are hardly enough
technies to keep the automatic machinery in order. What will happen
when those technies also deteriorate, and lose the will to work? For
deteriorate they must, just as Senator Mollon and his still active
allies will. Just as I will, if I live long enough. There is a great
force that we never know here. It is called the cosmic ray. It never
penetrates to our depth. And our vita-lights do not produce it."

He then spoke of the proposed Exodus, argued, pleaded, painted a rosy
picture of the outer world, of a Sun come back, a world of brightness
and life. At the conclusion of his speech a sigh arose from the
assembled millions--a sigh of hope, of half belief. Had the vote been
taken then the Frozen Gate would have been opened.

* * * * *

But Senator Mollon was on the rostrum, holding up a square, well
manicured hand for attention. In his deep rumbling bass he tore the
arguments for the Exodus to shreds. With the whip of fear he drove
away hope.

"If our savage ancestors lived on the inhospitable outer shell of the
earth," he shouted, "is that a reason for our taking that retrograde
step? Read your histories. What happened to our neighboring nation of
Atlantica only a short 15,000 years ago? They did just as this man is
urging--opened their outer gate. It promptly froze open, and liquid
air, the remnant of what in primordial days was an outer atmosphere,
poured down the tunnels. The whole nation died, and we saved ourselves
only by blasting the connecting passages between them and us with
fulminite."

A wave of fear passed over the tiny massed figures. For centuries the
race had been rapidly losing all initiative, except for those few
leaders who, through superior stamina and religious devotion to the
artificial sun-rays, had maintained something of their pristine
energy.

Now they were hysterical with fear of the unknown. Even as Mich'l Ares
adjusted the parabolic antenna of the thought-receptor vote-counting
machine, he knew what the verdict would be. In a moment the vote was
flashed on a screen on the ceiling: 421 in favor of the Exodus and
2,733