the hydroponic beds, and the canningmachines; among the food-grinders and little belts that dropped cans offood-concentrate into racks and sent them off into the walls.
He managed to talk more and more coherently with No. 4901. He stoppedreferring to suicide, but if anyone had the idea that Marquis had givenup the idea of dying, they were wrong. Marquis was stubborn. Somewherein him the flame still burned. He wouldn't let it go out. The bellscouldn't put it out. The throbbing machines couldn't put it out. And nowhe had at last figured out a way to beat the game.
During an eating period, Marquis said to 4901. "You want to die. Wait aminute--I'm talking about something we can both talk and think about. Amurder agreement. You understand? We haven't been conditioned againstkilling each other. It's only an overt act of selfdes--all right, wedon't think about that. But we can plan a way to kill each other."
4901 looked up. He stopped eating momentarily. He was interested."What's the use though?" Pain shadowed his face. "We only go throughit--come back again--"
"I have a plan. The way I have it worked out, they'll never bring eitherone of us back."
That wasn't exactly true. _One_ of them would have to come back. Marquishoped that 4901 wouldn't catch on to the fact that he would have to beresurrected, but that Marquis never would. He hoped that 4901's mind wastoo foggy and dull to see through the complex plan. And that was the wayit worked.
Marquis explained. 4901 listened and smiled. It was the first timeMarquis had ever seen a prisoner smile.
He left what remained of the capsule of poison where 4901 could get it.During one of the next four eating periods, 4901 was to slip the poisoninto Marquis' food can. Marquis wouldn't know what meal, or what can. Hehad to eat. The bells had conditioned him that much. And not to eatwould be an overt act of self-destruction.
He wasn't conditioned not to accept death administered by another.
And then, after an eating period, 4901 whispered to him. "You'repoisoned. It was in one of the cans you just ate."
"Great!" almost shouted Marquis. "All right. Now I'll die by the end ofthe next work period. That gives us this sleep period and all the nextwork period. During that time I'll dispose of you as I've said."
4901 went to his bed and the bells rang and the dark came and both ofthem slept.
* * * * *
Number 4901 resisted the conditioners enough to follow Marquis past hisregular work room into the food-mart. As planned, 4901 marched on andstood in the steaming shadows behind the hydroponic beds.
Marquis worked for a while at the canning machines, at the big grindingvats. Then he went over to 4901 and said. "Turn around now."
4901 smiled. He turned around. "Good luck," he said. "Good luck--toyou!"
Marquis hit 4901 across the back of the neck with an alloy bar andkilled him instantly. He changed clothes with the dead man. He put hisown clothes in a refuse incinerator. Quickly, he dragged the body overand tossed it into one of the food-grinding vats. His head bobbed upabove the gray swirling liquid once, then the body disappeared entirely,was ground finely and mixed with the other foodstuff.
Within eight hours the cells of 4901 would be distributed minutelythroughout the contents of thousands of cans of food-concentrate. Withinthat time much of it would have been consumed by the inmates andManagers.
At the end of that work period, Marquis returned to his cell. He wentpast his own bed and stopped in front of 4901's bed.
The sleep bells sounded and the dark came again. This would be the finaldark, Marquis knew. This time he had beat the game. The delayed-actionpoison would kill him. He had on 4901's clothes with his identificationnumber. He was on 4901's bed.
He would die--as 4901. The guards would finally check on the missing manin the food-mart. But they would never find him. They would find 4901dead, a suicide. And they would put the body labeled 4901 in the tank,dissolve it into dissociated cells and they would subject those cells tothe electro-magnetic field of 4901.
And they would resurrect--4901.
Not only have I managed to die, Marquis thought, but I've managed theultimate suicide. There won't even be a body, no sign anywhere that Ihave ever been at all. Even my cells will have been resurrected assomeone else. As a number 4901.
* * * * *
"And that's the way it was," No. 4901 would tell new prisoners comingin. Sometimes they listened to him and seemed interested, but theinterest always died during indoctrination. But No. 4901's interest inthe story never died.
He knew that now he could never let himself die as a human being either,that he could never let himself become completely controlled by thebells. He'd been nearly dead as an individual, but No. 5274 had savedhim from that dead-alive anonymity. He could keep alive, and maintainhope now by remembering what 5274 had done. He clung to that memory. Aslong as he retained that memory of hope--of triumph--at least some partof him would keep burning, as something had kept on burning within theheart of 5274.
So every night before the sleep bells sounded, he would go over thewhole thing in minute detail, remembering 5274's every word and gesture,the details of his appearance. He told the plan over to himself everynight, and told everyone about it who came in to the indoctrinationward.
Swimming up through the pain of resurrection, he had been a little madat 5274 at first, and then he had realized that at least the plan hadenabled one man to beat the game.
"He will always be alive to me. Maybe, in a way, he's part of me. Nobodyknows. But his memory will live. He succeeded in a kind of ultimatedying--no trace of him anywhere. But the memory of him and what he didwill be alive when the New System and the Managers are dead. That spiritwill assure the Underground of victory--someday. And meanwhile, I'llkeep 5274 alive.
"He even knew the psychology of these Managers and their System. Thatthey can't afford to make an error. He knew they'd still have thatidentification punch-plate of him. That they would have one more platethan they had prisoners. But he anticipated what they would do theretoo. To admit there was one more identification plate than there wereprisoners would be to admit a gross error. Of course they could dissolveone of the other prisoners and use 5274's plate and resurrect 5274. Butthey'd gain nothing. There would still be an extra plate. You see?
"So they destroyed the plate. He knew they would. And they also had togo back through the records, to Earth, through the security files there,through the birth records, everything. And they destroyed every trace,every shred of evidence that No. 5274 ever existed."
So he kept the memory alive and that kept 4901 alive while the otherprisoners become automatons, hearing, feeling, sensing nothing exceptthe bells. Remembering nothing, anticipating nothing.
But 4901 could remember something magnificent, and so he couldanticipate, and that was hope, and faith. He found that no one reallybelieved him but he kept on telling it anyway, the story of the Plan.
"Maybe this number didn't exist," someone would say. "If there's norecord anywhere--"
4901 would smile. "In my head, there's where the record is. _I_ know._I_ remember."
And so it was that 4901 was the only one who still remembered and whocould still smile when sometime after that--no one in the prison colonyknew how long--the Underground was victorious, and the Managerial Systemcrumbled.
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