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that: he was dead. Dead and in heaven and the music was that of the spheres.
Then, suddenly, a too familiar voice disrupted his closely conceived
world. It said: "He's not dead."
Waller protested. "I am dead you're wrong I am." The voice he had heard
belonged to Ahmad. Had he died, too?
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"You are not." A firm hand gripped his elbow. "So get up and look alive."
Waller found that he was sitting up. Sondra stood in front of him and Ahmad
beside her. Both were alive and very mortal.
"I guess I am alive," Waller said, with genuine regret in his tone.
"You took forever waking up," said Sondra.
"I didn't think I really wanted to. Where " the sky, he now
discovered, was actually a blue ceiling " where ami?"
"Here," she said, making a wide sweeping motion.
He tried to look, too, but what he saw was so astonishing he
quickly lowered his gaze after only a brief moment. He seemed to be seated
somewhere in the middle of a vast indoor chamber so huge its walls were barely
visible. Everywhere he looked, in any direction, there were people, people,
and more people. The raw cacophony of their voices assaulted his
recently dreaming ears painfully. Everyone dressed indentically like
Sondra in light, bright gowns.
Glancing down at himself, he saw that he was no different.
"I'm in the tower," he said.
Sondra nodded. "Yes. We know they caught you Norgo told us."
He swiveled his head carefully, observing only the nearest people.
"She's not here?"
Ahmad, who seemed less than comfortable in his bright attire, said,
"She's here. She went to get our dinners."
"But what is this?" said Waller. "Are we just just here?"
"You might say that," Ahmad said. "We're slaves."
"Whose?"
"Theirs." Sondra pointed at the ceiling. "The people who live up above, in the
top floors. We grow their food but that's all. We never see them."
"How long have you been here?"
"Three days now, if you can believe the local time. We were getting
afraid you wouldn't show up. Of course, you might have been right here in
this room the whole time and we wouldn't have found you."
"We were outside."
"Yes, we were, too. At first. The guards brought us here. All we've done
is slave and slave. It's night now, by the way."
"But you work outside?"
"Oh, no. Nobody ever goes there. The slaves on this floor they've
never seen the sun or moon. The fields are upstairs on other floors.
The ground is just like dirt."
By this tune Norgo returned, bearing a plastic tray holding paper
bowls filled with a thick substance halfway between soup and oatmeal. Waller
sampled a bite. The taste was tepid, almost non-existent; he was reminded
now of baby's pablum. Hungry, he forced himself to finish the entire
bowl. Norgo, who hadn't eaten a bite, gave him her bowl. She sjeemed
strangely passive, depressed. Finding him awake upon her return, she had
barely nodded an acknowledgement and not spoken a word since.
"Any ideas?" Sondra said, when he finished the second bowl.
"We were rather hoping you might be able well, there has to be some way out
of here."
"I'm sure there is. But give me time. I just arrived."
"Of course. I'm sorry. It's just so so unbearable here."
"She's inexperienced at being a slave," Ahmad said. "My genes see me through."
"I do have one idea," Waller said, belching. "I think we ought to find another
source of food."
"There isn't one," Ahmad said.
"Not the fields?"
"Touch any of that and the guards stun you. Then you work two shifts for
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the next month. I'm afraid it's hardly worthwhile."
"Well," said Waller, "then that makes it simpler. I wouldn't mind so
much being someone's slave if only they fed me well but if this mush is the
best we can expect for the rest of our lives, then I'm not going to
stand for it. The way I see it we've got only one realistic alternative."
"What's that?" said Ahmad.
"Why, we revolt, of course." Waller took Ahmad's half-full bowl and
tossed it high into the air. The contents splattered equally down
upon them. Wiping a blot of the mush off his forehead, Waller
grinned. "We take over the show and run it ourselves. That way it'll
be our turn to eat cake for a change."
CHAPTER EIGHTEEN
Within an hour after starting his first day of slaving in the
fields, Waller became even more firmly convinced than before that
revolt was an absolute necessity. The simple truth was that he was not cut out
for this work. It wasn't so much that the work was hard he had done hard work
before it was that the work was boring. Moving about all day in a
stooped position, while depositing tiny seeds in narrow dirt furrows no,
he just could not stand another forty or fifty years of that. The work
seemed so futile. Could it really be necessary in a civilization
sufficiently advanced to have constructed the towers? No machines were
used at all everything was done by hand alone. He tried to estimate
the numbers of slaves at work on this one floor alone and the figure
he came up with was just short of one thousand.
Ahmad reported that another dozen or so floors were under various
stages of cultivation, while several more were opened at various times of
the year. An additional five floors were given over to the raising
and grazing of various livestock cattle, horses, sheep, pigs.
"But why in here?" Waller kept asking. "Why not outside where it's
warm and green? I just don't understand it."
"There used to be a reason," Ahmad said. "At least I gather that was
so. At one tune the outside world was largely uninhabitable. A war, a
plague, some natural disaster. And you are familiar with the force of habit,
Waller. Self-sufficiently has become just that. And what better technique for
a slave society?
The more a man's life is constricted, the less apt he is to seek
freedom. Few of the slaves are even aware of the existence of an outside
world. They are born here, they live here, they die here.
Ouch!"
A guard had caught him chatting. Besides the weapon containing the
silver spray, each guard was also equipped with a short club which emitted
a strong electrical shock. Cursing hi pain, Ahmad bolted toward the
guard. Swiftly, Waller grabbed and held him. "No, Ahmad, not yet. Don't be
a fool."
"Then, when?" Ahmad tugged weakly to be free.
"Soon, soon. You know it takes time. Just relax."
In silence, they returned to their work. Waller's back and shoulders
ached and burned. It's got to be very soon, he kept thinking. If we
don't hurry, they'll beat us slowly down. We have to fight while we still have
the strength to resist.
The absence of any clock including the sun caused the day to seem to
stretch eternally. At last, a general rest break was called. Waller
dropped eagerly to the ground. Norgo volunteered to go in search of food and
water. "Will it be the same?" Waller asked.
"The food? Oh, certainly," said Ahmad. He laughed. "It's very healthful, you
know."
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"This just doesn't make sense." Waller spoke bitterly. 'There's no good reason
in a world as rich as this for people to suffer such basic wants."
Ahmad seemed amused. "Ah, but who says they're suffering?
You should have been here our first night. Some local celebration occurred.
The people were out laughing, singing, dancing. Is that what you call
suffering?"
"It doesn't matter how happy they are. Compared to what must exist
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