'When an alien expedition comes into sight, the team sighting it alerts the rest and they all concentrate on that area. The smaller rows of screens record the effect which we beam towards the aliens. They record hallucinatory impulses, and these are broken down into sections governed by the different senses, brain-waves of varying frequencies, emotional-impulses such as fear, anger and so on, which we are capable of simulating. We have, of course, projectors, magnifiers and broadcasting equipment which is capable of responding to the commands of the Gamblers. But primarily, in the last resort, everything depends on the imagination, quick reactions, intelligence and ability to simulate emotions, thoughts and so on, which each individual Gambler possesses.'
'I see.' Roffrey nodded. In spite of himself, he was interested. 'What happens then?'
'Just as many of our emotions and impulses are unfamiliar and incommunicable to the aliens, the same applies to us. Presumably half the impressions and mental impulses we have flung at us do not have the effect the aliens desire, or would get in their own kind. But we have the same difficulty.
'These men have been playing the Game long enough to recognise whether the effects they send are effective or not, and can guard against those effects which are most dangerous to us. Winning the Game, at this stage, anyway, depends largely upon the extent to which we can assimilate and analyse what works and what doesn't work. This also, of course, applies to the aliens. You, for instance, had the hallucination of a monster beast which shocked not only your instincts, triggering fear, panic, and so on, but shocked your logical qualities since you knew that it was impossible for such a beast to exist in the vacuum of space.'
Roffrey and Talfryn agreed.
'This sort of effect is what the aliens are relying on - although in the general run of things these days they have learned to be much more subtle, working directly on the subconscious as they did to a large extent on you, after the beast-image didn't get the result they wanted. Therefore our psychologists and other researchers are gathering together every scrap of information which each round gives us, trying to get a clear picture of what effects will have the most devastating results on the alien's subconscious. Here, as I mentioned, we are fairly well matched - our minds are as alien to them as theirs are to us.
'The prime object in playing the Blood Red Game, therefore, is to find the exact impulse necessary to destroy the qualities which we term self-respect, strength of character, intrinsic confidence, and so on.'
Mordan exhaled heavily.
'The number of losses we've had can be assessed when I tell you that we've got two hundred men and women alone who are curled up into foetal balls in the wards of our hospital ships.'
Talfryn shuddered. 'It sounds revolting.'
'Forget that,' Mordan said curtly. 'You'll lose all sense of moral values after you've been playing the Game for a short time. The aliens are helping us to do what philosophers and mystics have been preaching for centuries. Remember it? Know thyself, eh?'
He shook his head, staring grimly around the chamber where the grey-faced Gamblers watched the screens concentratedly.
'You'll get to know yourself here all right. And I'm sure you won't like what you learn.'
'Easier on the brooder, the introvert,' Roffrey said.
'How deep can one man go in probing his innermost impulses before he pulls back - out of self-protection if nothing else?' Mordan said sharply. 'Not far in comparison to what the aliens can do to you. But you'll find out.'
'You're giving an attractive picture,' Roffrey said.
'Damn you, Roffrey - I'll talk to you after your first round. This may, now I come to think of it, do you an awful lot of good!'
They were joined by a third individual. He had obviously been a Gambler for some time. They were beginning to recognise the type. He was tall, thin and nervous.
'Fiodor O'Hara,' he said, not bothering to shake hands. They introduced themselves in the same curt manner.
'You will be in my charge until you become familiar with the Game,' O'Hara said. 'You will obey every order I give you. Try not to resist me. The sooner you are trained, the sooner you will be able to play the Game without any direction. I believe you are what they call an individualist, Roffrey. Well, you will have to conform here until you have mastered the Game - then your individualism will doubtless be of great use, since we depend on such qualities.
'Most of the people here are trained in some branch of psychology, but there area few like yourselves - laymen - who have a sufficiently high I.Q. to be receptive, almost instinctively, to the needs of the Game. I wish you luck.
'You will find it a great strain to keep your ego free and functional - that is really all you have to learn to do as a beginner. You will carry out defensive strategy, as it were, until you are adept enough to begin attacking the enemy. Remember, both of you, physical strength and daring mean absolutely nothing in this war. And you lose not your life, but your sanity - at first anyway.' Roffrey scratched the back of his neck. Tor God's sake, let's get started,' he said, impatiently. 'Don't fret,' Mordan said as he left them. 'You'll soon know when another round begins.'
O'Hara took them to a row of empty seats. There were three seats, the usual screen and the miniature screens beneath it. Immediately in front of them were small sets of controls which were evidently used to operate the sense-projectors and other equipment.
'We have a short vocabulary which we shall use later for communication while the Game is in progress,' O'Hara said, settling the skullcap on his head. 'Switch sound, for instance, means that if, at a certain moment, you are concentrating on taste sensations, I have decided that sounds would be more efficient against the enemy. If I say, "Switch-taste," it means that you send taste-impressions. That is simple - you understand?'
They showed their assent. Then they settled themselves to await their first - and perhaps - last round of the Blood Red Game.
The morality of what they were doing - invading this universe and attempting to wrest dominance of it from the native race - had bothered Asquiol little.
'Rights?' he had said to Mordan when the Gee-lord had relayed the doubts of some of the members of the fleet. 'What rights have they? What rights have we? Because they exist here doesn't mean that they have any special right to exist here. Let them, or us, establish our rights. Let us see who wins the Game.'
Asquiol had more on his mind than a squabble over property, dangerous as that squabble could be for the race.
This was Man's last chance of attaining his birthright - something which Asquiol had almost attained in his ability to perceive simultaneously the entire universe - to take over from the Originators.
Somehow he had to teach his race to tap its own potential. Here, those Gamblers who might survive would be of use.
The race had to begin on the next stage of its evolution, yet the transition would have to be so relatively sudden that it would be virtually revolution.
And there was the personal matter of his incompleteness the torturing frustration of knowing that the missing piece that would make him whole was so close - he could sense it - as to be almost within his grasp. But what was it?
Dwelling in thought, Asquiol was grave.
Even he could not predict the eventual outcome if they won the Game. More able to encompass the scope of events than the rest of the race, in some ways he was as much in a temporal vacuum as they were - quite unable to relate past experience with present, or the present with whatever the future was likely to be.