r two
men.

"I see. This is Bek, a field observer. He was at your party last night."

Sethos remembered the stranger he had taken for a spying apprentice on
the hillside. He felt embarrassed, but brushed it aside.

"I ... want you to take me with you."

Hol looked at his companion.

"I don't fit here," Sethos went on. "Mr. Third himself said I'm more
intelligent than the others--I'm the only one who knows what your visit
means. I want to go where people are interested in learning and
progress. If I stay here I'll have to fool around with a hobby the rest
of my life. There's no work, no expansion. You can see why I have to
leave, can't you? I'm the _curious_ type."

"You don't know what you're asking."

"Why? Can't you take me with you? What harm would it do?"

"Well, there are rules."

"But--I'm not just anybody. I'm an exception to the rule. I qualify as a
genius--you mean there isn't a place for me _somewhere_ in the universe?
Surely you can use a smart man!"

"You are a genius, that's true," said Bek, in a deep, serious voice. "As
long as you remain here. Hundreds of centuries ago, your ancestors
discovered principles that are not even expressible in your language,
and learned to apply them to matter. Soon they knew no boundaries. The
earth was not forgotten, but it was no longer important. It still is
only a statistic. And we are here to examine it briefly. We have many
others to visit.

"You see, Sethos, man changed out in space. He is a long way from your
ancestors who started all this. But before those ancient men left, they
established Earth as a control planet, to maintain forever a specimen of
the original stock. It may have been done out of his egocentric ideas at
the time, but it proved wise, for such a specimen is valuable in our
research."

"Sethos," said Hol, seeing the bewilderment on the young man's face,
"the mechanoids who attend your little community are more than one
hundred thousand years old. That is how long your little culture has
been faithfully preserved, just as it was then. You would not be capable
of living elsewhere in the universe now. You could survive, perhaps,
bright as you are, for a century or so, and then die, unhappy,
maladjusted, never finding another of your own level. You are, after
all, a savage."

Sethos was dazed.

He--an atavism, a prehistoric man! No wonder his people behaved as they
did--they were merely a docile herd of caged animals, kept complacent
a