Five hundred people stared at me. I ignored them and wiped my eyes. They were a distant wall of faces.
Foreman came up to the dais and stood beside me. He took the box of tissues off my lap and put it on the podium.
"How do you feel?"
"Limp," I said. Then I added, "I'm fine. Just a little . . . weak. "
"Do you want some water?" I nodded.
Foreman turned to the podium and reached inside it for a pitcher and a plastic cup. I took the water and drank it thirstily. I handed it back. "Thank you."
"All right, Jim," he began. "What we're going to do here is demonstrate something. I'm going to ask you some questions, and all I want you to do is answer them truthfully. All right?"
"Yes, fine."
"Now you said that you don't want to be brainwashed again, right?"
"That's right."
"Where were you brainwashed before?"
"You know where. I was captured by renegades last year."
"Yes, I do know. But I want everybody else to hear this too. There's a point to be made here, Jim, so you need to tell the absolute truth about everything. Understand?"
I nodded.
Foreman paused to phrase his next question carefully. "Is this course the same as the Tribe training you had with the renegades?"
"Uh-parts of it are."
"What parts?" "Well-the gun in Colonel Irving's mouth. And the choice."
"What choice?"
"You offered her a choice. Didn't you . . . ?"
"No, I didn't. Think back. What did I do?"
I thought back. I replayed the moment in my head. I started to tremble again. "You . . . asked her if she could keep her word about being here on time."
"Right. But I never told her that I would kill her. The point of that whole demonstration was to find out if she was physically able to keep her word. Not if she would, just if she could. And we found out that she can. If her survival was at stake, she could be here on time. She said so. That was all we wanted to know. Did you follow that?"
"Yes."
"So there wasn't any 'choice' in the matter at all, was there?"
"No, there wasn't."
"Good. You're doing fine. Now what was the choice you were given by the renegades?"
"Live or die."
"Live or die?"
"Uh-huh."
"Nothing more."
"No."
"So there was survival involved in it, wasn't there?"
"Yes."
"In fact, there was nothing but survival involved in it, right?"
"That's right."
"And you chose to live?"
"Yes."
"There was 'choice' there-and survival was connected to that choice-and you chose to survive, right?"
"Right. Yes."
"And thereby demonstrated that you would do anything that was necessary to guarantee your survival, right?"
"Uh . . . right."
"So you gave them control over you, didn't you?"
"They already had control over me. They had the gun."
"You could have chosen death. That would have put you beyond their control, wouldn't it?"
I shrugged. "It, uh . . . didn't occur to me."
There was mild amusement in the room. Smiles. Chuckles. The wall of faces shifted and became a roomful of people for a moment, then they retreated again.
"Of course not; you were in survival mode." Foreman said, quietly. "But you did give them control over you, didn't you?"
"Uh . . . " I didn't want to admit it.
"Tell the truth, Jim," he prompted.
"Yes."
"Thank you. That's very good: Honest." He turned away for a moment, poured himself a glass of water and drank it. I had a moment to look out at the room. The faces weren't hostile. They were. ..with me. This was their question too. I was them. I realized I wasn't as scared as I had been before.
Foreman replaced his water glass and came back to me again. "So now I want you to look and see, Jim. That choice you were given-was that the same as the demonstration I did up here a while ago?"
"It looked like it."
"Yes, it looked like it. Wasn't it the same?"
"It looked the same . . ." I started to say, ". . . but no, it wasn't." I was clear about that.
"Thank you. Now, was Jason's 'training' the same as this?"
"I don't know."
"Look and see, Jim. What's the same? What's different?"
I was remembering the taste of Jason's gun in my mouth and I felt angry. The words came haltingly at first. "Jason cheated . . . because he didn't explain it-at least, not until afterward." I had to stop for a moment, there were tears welling up in my eyes and I didn't know why. My throat hurt. "What Jason said was this: there's no point in explaining the choice between life or death when you're trapped inside your survival programming, because you can't see it. So-so . . . " My voice brake then and I couldn't continue. I wiped at my eyes.
Foreman handed me a glass of water and I drank it quickly. "It's all right," he said quietly. "You're doing fine."
I handed him back the glass; I wanted to go on. I wanted to get it said and out of my head. "He lied! It wasn't the choice he said it was! The choice that Jason was really giving me . . . " I could see it clearly now; I felt so lightheaded I was almost giddy. "He was asking me if I wanted to survive so much I would let myself be reprogrammed. Only, he didn't ask it clearly!"
"Of course not," said Foreman. "You'd have rather died than been reprogrammed-and he wanted you alive."
"Yes, I see that now." I rubbed my hands across my forehead, all over my face. "But it was still dishonest." I looked up at Foreman. "Wasn't it?"
"Not by their rules," remarked Foreman. "By their rules, only the 'awakened' are capable of understanding real choice; 'guests' need to be handled-that is, manipulated. You stepped into a philosophical bear trap there, Jim. But that's another discussion, for another time. How are you feeling now?"
"I'm fine," I said. "I really am."
"Good." Foreman looked satisfied. His white hair floated in a halo around his head. "You're doing fine. We're almost to the end now. Just keep telling the truth."
"I will," I said.
"So: are you clear that what we're up to here is not the same?"
"I don't know." I looked to Foreman, confused. "Jason had a vision too. And he was just as passionate about it as-as you are about this core group. And he talked about commitment and responsibility too."
"Mm-hm," Foreman nodded. "What you're seeing, Jim-what you're realizing-is that the technology to produce results can be used for good as well as for bad. And that the judgment of good or bad is very often nothing more than the amount of agreement people can create for a specific position. Jason said he was creating a partnership with the worms. You saw how that worked out. We're not looking for a partnership with the invaders here. A few years ago, I interviewed you about another choice-do you remember? I asked you what you wanted to do. Do you remember what you told me?"
"I said I wanted to kill worms."
"Right. Is that still true?"
"Yes. Now more than ever."
"Good. Very good." Foreman put a hand on my shoulder and leaned close. When he spoke again, his tone was calm and straight forward. "Now, listen to me. It doesn't matter if this training is the same as Jason's. It may very well be. I don't know what he did, and I really don't care. And ultimately, it's irrelevant-because this isn't about the training at all; it's about what you're going to do with it after we're done. So, here's the real question: Is the purpose the same? Is our purpose here the same as Jason Delandro's?"