After I had made my true position clear to them, I began to explain my plan. I had spent many hours prior to the meeting thinking over this plan and knew that it sounded credible. They became very quiet and listened to me without comment or response. I knew by their muteness that I had assumed control of the situation; they had come to mock and accuse me and they had been converted to auditors. Knowledge is the better part of collaboration, something which I have learned only this evening to be true. Once something is apprehended it can never be discarded.

“We must escape,” I said to them, “we must escape from the enclosure and return to our ship which, I am told, is still in ex­cellent condition only a few miles from here. Plotar was wrong however in assuming that escape would be easy or that the proper method would be first to assume command of the enclosure. We cannot ever take over the enclosure; they have their devices here, and I am sure that they could paralyze or kill us at will if we became restive. Rather, we must leave the enclosure. We must plan to leave in small groups of threes and fours, making our way to the ship. We cannot celebrate our plan and we must discard any idea of supplanting the oppressors on their own terrain. We must think in terms of fleeing the enclosure rather than conquering it. The enclosure cannot be conquered. That is the first thing that must be understood. As long as we remain here, we are fully at their mercy.”

I paused for comment, found none, waited for only an instant before continuing. “The ship can be run with very few of us, I am sure,” I pointed out. “Its devices were largely automatic; only a fraction of us had anything to do with its functioning in space. A small group of us can return to the ship, seal ourselves in and, by using automatic controls, return to our star. There we will be able to tell them what has happened to us; pick up reinforcements, find armaments. We will return then to this planet and rescue our brothers.”

“If they notice we are gone,” one hundred sixty-one says (I was still calling her one hundred sixty-one then), “if we actually manage to escape, they will hold the others hostage. They may kill them out of vengeance.”

“No they won’t,” I assure her. “I have given all of this much thought and I tell you that they will not do so. They need us too much; they are still making use of our information. The infor­mation we give them is reconstructing this planet. They cannot spare even one more of us because each of us possesses unique information, a particular speciality. By reducing the pool through escaping we will only make them more desperate to recover information from those who remain. They will increase security but they will harm no one.”

“How can you be sure of this?” one of the males said. “What are your qualifications?”

“I have thought deeply of this. I have made reconnaissance. For a long time I have been hatching this plot. It was sheer co­incidence that Plotar came to me when he did; I was ready to bring this plan into action shortly.”

“I do not believe you. I see no reason to believe you. I think that you are lying.”

“All of those who think I am lying may leave this room,” I said. I moved toward one of the walls, backed myself into a par­ticularly attractive painting of several domestic animals sur­rounded by representational figures who appeared to be conversing with them. The edges of the picture jutted into my spine, further stiffened my aspect and I could tell that from the front, anyway, I looked imposing. “I have no need to prove my veracity to you. What is the alternative? I can offer you hope, systematization, the beginnings of a plan. I can offer you science, forethought, the intricacies which I have worked out myself. What could Plotar offer but dreams? We are captives; we are totally at the mercy of these oppressors; I am offering at least some of us a way to strike back. Do you want to be slaves?”

The male shook his head and muttered something. Repeating himself he said, “I still don’t trust you. I believe that you betrayed Plotar and that you have now come to betray us all. Whatever you say can be dangerous. Prove your intentions.”

“How can I prove my intentions?”

“He can’t prove his intentions,” one hundred sixty-one said from the door. “You have to trust him. It’s quite possible that he is working in tandem with the therapists to betray us. We have no way of knowing that. What’s the difference? What are we of­fered now?”

“I appreciate that,” I said.

“There’s nothing to appreciate. I’m only telling these fools the truth. Whether or not you can offer anything, what do we have? They are not going to release us. Don’t you realize that, all of you? Certain hints and indications my therapist has dropped show what’s going on. They will extract every last vital bit of infor­mation from us and then kill us. With their new technology they plan then to go back to our home and kill everyone. Wipe out our race. Those are their real and undisguised plans and nothing can change them.”

“Thank you,” I say to her. “I’m only trying to make that point myself—”

“Don’t thank me! I’m telling these fools the truth, whether or not they want to listen. The truth is not a favor. Now, if you want to say, say it! We can’t be harangued indefinitely.”

“Yes,” the male says. “All right. Tell us your plan. Tell us how you intend to escape.”

“Not as a group,” I say. “There may well be a spy or several infiltrators in this meeting. I will not present it to all of you at once.”

“What then?”

“I will meet with you individually through the evenings that follow. One by one you will come to these rooms and I will brief you. Each of you will have a part to play, all of you will collab­orate on your individual parts but only I will know the grand scheme. This is for your protection. In less than three weeks we will be prepared to begin.”

“That is not satisfactory,” the male said. “I do not accept this. I want you to tell us now.”

“Then I accuse you of being a spy for the therapists,” I said quite carefully, “for if you were not you would understand the wisdom of this approach. Of course I’m not going to tell you the plan in detail now. The monitors would pick up everything.”

“The monitors pick up everything anyway,” one of them says. “We are constantly observed. They may well be watching us at this instant. Already, we’re almost doomed by being here. So why won’t you speak?”

“The monitors are not attended. Everything we say and do is on tape but the tapes are audited only occasionally. Everything is on automatic; they do not observe us. If we do nothing to attract attention, what we say is safe.”

“I don’t trust you,” the male said.

“Then leave. It is time for all of you to leave. Have nothing further to do with me, that’s all. Dismiss me as a traitor. Be content to remain in the enclosure for the rest of your lives.”

“And then be killed,” one hundred and sixty-one said. We exchanged a nod of sympathy, a ringing look of connection across the room and in the sudden opening of her eyes I could sense desire. Could sense that in some profound way we were in accord and at that moment made plans to approach her after the meeting. I decided to end the meeting. “That is all for now,” I said. “I will speak to you individually later and we will not meet again until we have reclaimed the ship.” Quickly I made arrangements, ap­pointments for all of them to visit me on succeeding evenings, one by one. Only the male who had protested did not accept an appointment but stated that he was not a traitor; he would keep confidence of the meeting. The others accepted appointments without dispute and made threatening remarks to the male stating that, if we were apprehended, he would be known to be respon­sible. The male became very quiet and left without further remarks. One by one all of the others then left, repeating their appointment dates to themselves.

At length only Nala and I were left in the room after which the events I have already described took place.