I am walking down a long corridor that seems as if it will never end. It is obvious that it leads tothe labyrinth described in the books because I can see long white sheets hanging on either sideof the corridor, indicating that someone has died. Although there are no believers left, many of thecustoms continue.I enter a large room that serves as a cafeteria. No one seems to notice me. A homosexual turnshis head. I judge him to be in his late fifties. A few men seated near him notice his interest in me.They seem to be disapproving.I have no money and as a consequence, I am desperate.I am aware that, because I come from the outside and they are so much smaller than us, mybody appears very large and muscled even though I am slender.Except for the homosexual, I judge that everyone in the room pretends not to notice me.They are sitting in little clusters, talking to one another, placidly, without raising their voices. Theyare dressed in variations of their customary gray uniform and they each wear a black paper flower in recognition of the death.I stand still, frozen in the memory of the plane crash: the struggle to escape into the torrentialwinds, the wild plunge away from the cockpit, the force of the opening parachute against myshoulders.A voice pulls me back from my reverie. It sounds like it is announcing something. It speaks alanguage that I can’t understand.Everyone stands up, and a rumbling of masculine voices fills the room. Small white handkerchiefsare removed from shirt pockets and are suspended like little flags, at arms length. Almost inunison, ceremonial crying begins and the daubing of imaginary tears.Only the homosexual shows his awareness that I do not have a handkerchief. The rest pretendnot to notice. He looks at me with furtive, yet piercing eyes. He knows that I am an alien.From my reading, I know that because I am in the cafeteria near the Falls, I must eat something. Ican’t remember the reason for it. I have already searched the pockets of my stolen clothes for money. They are empty. I am standing in the food line.I know that there are signs of fear in my face, and that my mouth is dry. But I know that thepeople here have almost forgotten the signs of fear.The homosexual is gazing steadily at me but no one seems to be aware of it. I fumble in mypockets, trying to signal to him that I have no money. He gets up from the table where he issitting, and carries his tray towards me. His eyes are zombie-like. When he is near me, he dropsthe tray onto the floor and in the ensuing confusion, while we are on our hands and knees, placestwo gold pellets in my hand.I turn back to the food counter. A young woman who is serving food says something in their language and smiles prettily. She looks at my biceps, and into my eyes. I point to my throat andwhisper one of the words that I remember, “talk,” indicating that I have laryngitis. She smiles andhands me a plate with food on it. I hand her a gold pellet. She gives me three large silver pelletsand six small silver pellets in change. She is very small and thin. For a moment, our eyes locktogether and I feel like a giant looking down at her. A flicker of fear crosses her face. I turn away.I scan the faces in the room. The homosexual is sitting motionless at his table. Although he isn’tlooking into my eyes, he seems to be aware of my gaze. Then he motions me to his table with an

almost imperceptible movement of his head.He is sitting with a small group of elderly, ashen-faced men. It is evident that they have all comefrom the Gymnasium. When I reach the table, he leans over and whispers into my ear that I haveonly twenty minutes to eat. Suddenly, I remember that very odd rule from the books. At almostthe same instant I remember reading that if they discover an alien in their midst, they will venttheir sexual energy on him, and after a suitable period, execute him.Although it is obvious that the man is a homosexual, I feel certain that he is helping me withoutany sexual motivation.The room fills with hissing sounds, and a pink haze floats down from little holes in the ceiling. Alarge door opens into complete blackness. Music fills the air and the men begin to giggle likeyoung girls. They walk towards the blackness behind the doors. My head begins to reel, and ittakes all of my strength to stay on my legs and follow them into the darkness.Imitating them, I take off my clothes. My eyes haven’t adjusted to the darkness yet, and I can’tsee them, but I hear them jumping into water. They begin laughing and whooping. I follow thenoise and wade into the pool, cautiously. In the water, I feel myself bumped and pushed by nakedbodies. As my eyes adjust, the blackness is transformed into a dusky gloom.At the other end of the pool, the torso of the homosexual rises up in the water. His naked body isexposed to the waist, and his eyes burn with inner light. He turns his head towards a bubbling,swirling mass of water behind him, and indicates with his eyes that I am to plunge into it.I edge forward, pushing myself through the herd of naked men. At the far end, near the bubblingwater, I take three slow, deep breaths, and dive down. I am sucked into a powerful, vibratingblack mass of water. There is no light. I feel myself banging against the slippery sides of the largepipe and my lungs begin to ache. A speck of light appears, above me. It becomes a mushroomthat explodes into green undulating light. I lunge upwards towards a moving, rectangular shape.The pain in my lungs is agonizing.I burst from the water into the blue sky, gasping for air. The rectangle is a slowly moving barge. Isee the brilliant greens of the foliage that grow on the banks of the lake. It is a sign that I amcloser to home.I grab onto the barge. Three of their women are sitting on the barge in little chairs. They arereading. I allow the barge to tow me into the middle of the lake.The Falls are at least a half-mile from us. Their roar fills the air. I will release my grip from thebarge just as it veers towards the harbor, and propel myself towards them. I will risk my lifegladly, plunging over the falls into the rapid white water below, which leads to the hinterlands of my country.And then I am in the Falls, and I feel as if I am surrounded by white light. It is pleasant and cool,but I know that I must struggle against the pleasure for the sake of life. I have no idea where I am. I have no idea whatsoever of my circumstances, that is, of who I amor why I am alive. For some reason, I am fighting, fiercely. And then, all at once, I know that I amtrying to regain my senses, but I don’t know why.I discover myself lying in the mud, in the moonlight, entangled in long white cords. I am on ariverbank. It is silent. My muscles ache. I stretch my limbs, and then check each one of my fingers

and toes to see if they are still there. Everything seems to work.I begin untangling myself from the parachute. I climb up the riverbank and see a farmhouse abouta half-mile away. My clothes are shredded and hanging from my body. Smoke from my burningairplane climbs to the sky behind me. A square of yellow light appears on the black rectangle thatis the farm house, then another. I must escape.I gather up the parachute, which I am not able to completely remove, and wade quietly into theriver, steering out into the faster moving current. I inflate the life jacket that is strapped to mystomach. About a mile down the river, in the approaching dawn, I swim to the bank of the river,cut the parachute from my body and discard it.I must get to the city that I know so well from the books, the books that I have studied so long andcarefully. The books that I have dedicated a portion of my life to, with their beautifully detailedmaps and wonderful bindings. I know from the books that the city offers the only hope of escape.I push the raft back into the river and glide in the blackness before the dawn.The Falls seem so forbidding to these people, in their weakened condition, that they areincapable of imagining that one of us might survive them.I move silently down the river, planning to enter the city during the rosy light of dawn.Within an hour, I have reached the suburbs, and crawl to the riverbank, wet and aching from thelong swim.It is clear that I will need clothes. We are a large and vigorous race when compared with them,and so I have been chosen because of my lack of body hair, and because of my slenderness. Iwill go unnoticed. And I will be able to wear the clothes of one of their very large men.I see a house with a very green lawn surrounding a porch that is enclosed with glass windows.The door is open.I enter the porch, stealthily, like the dawn itself, which is approaching at my back.I am unreasonably lucky. A very tall man, by their standards, is talking with his wife, in a room justoff the porch. I inch quietly towards the hall and see him bending down to kiss her. He picks uphis briefcase and goes out, leaving her standing there in the pale light. She is dressed only in her nightgown. She is pretty but extremely thin, and her waving hand is like a leaf fluttering in themorning breeze.I have the urge to rape her, only because I know that she would swoon in terror and lust. Fromthe books, I know that their women were not able to resist us even before the great division. Andnow, if she saw me in these circumstances, her body would go limp with desire. And even beforethe divide, the books taught them the absolute necessity of following their instincts.But I cannot risk my life for trifles. The clothes will save my life.Within minutes she has returned to her bed and is snoring quietly. I slip into one of his uniformsand stuff my ragged clothes into an empty pillowcase that is lying on the closet floor.The light of dawn is in the streets. I feel certain that I will pass for one of them, at least from adistance.I walk towards a car parked in a driveway. An old man is standing near the car. His dog isstraining towards me, against a leash. He looks at me sternly.