l my aggressive impulses. The Suppression of
Aggression is the Foundation of Civilization, eh?"

Malcomb smiled. "Ethical Conditioning Keeps Society from Fissioning."
He shook hands with the producer.

"Come around tomorrow at 1300 and collect your fee," said the
producer. "Good night, gentlemen."

As they left the Global Dreamcasting System building, Gavir said to
Malcomb, "Can we go to a bookstore tonight?"

"Tomorrow. I'm taking you to your hotel and then I'm going back to my
apartment. We both need sleep. And don't forget, you've been warned
not to go prowling around the city by yourself...."

As soon as Gavir was sure that Malcomb was out of the hotel and well
on his way home, he left his room and went out into the city.

In a pitifully few days he would be back in the Preserve, back with
the fear of MDC, with hunger and the hopeless desire to find and kill
the man who had ordered his father's death.

Now he had an opportunity to learn more about the universe of the
Earthmen. Despite Malcomb's orders, he was going to find a seller of
books.

During a reading class at the mission school, Father James had said,
"In books there is power. All that you call magic in our Earth
civilization is explained in books." Gavir wanted to learn. It was his
only hope to find an alternative to the short, fear-ridden,
impoverished life he foresaw for himself.

A river of force carried him, along with thousands of
Earthmen--godlike beings in their perfect health and their impregnable
benignity--through the streets of the city. Platforms of force raised
and lowered him through the city's multiple levels....

And, as has always happened to outlanders in cities, he became lost.

* * * * *

He was in a quarter where furtive red and violet lights danced in the
shadows of hunched buildings. A half-dozen Earthmen approached him,
stopped and stared. Gavir stared back.

The Earthmen wore black garments and furs and metal ornaments. The
biggest of them wore a black suit, a long black cape, and a
broad-brimmed black hat. He carried a coiled whip in one hand. The
Earthmen turned to one another.

"A Martian."

"Let's give pain and death to the Martian! It will be a new
experience--one to savor."

"Take pain, Martian!"

The Earthman with the black hat raised his arm, and the long heavy
lash fell on Gavir. He felt a savage sting in the arm he had thrown up
to protect his eyes.

Gavir leaped at