tic 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,