His expression was neutral, but his eyes were sharp and penetrating. Like Jason Delandro's had been. Foreman waved away the assistants who stood gathered and waiting around me. He said softly, "What's the matter, Jim."

"I'm not going to be brainwashed again!"

"Why do you think this is brainwashing?"

"Because-I've been brainwashed!"

"And that makes you an expert?"

"No-Yes! I don't know! But I know what's going on inside my own head! And I don't want to be here any more."

"The door's not locked," said Foreman.

"I can go?" I sat up and looked.

"Any time." His expression was unreadable. "Except you gave your word that you'd complete the course."

"I gave my word to Delandro, too-and I know how that turned out. "

"Yes, I know all about that. May I work with you for a moment?"

I wiped my nose with the back of my hand. I looked to the doors. I knew this trap. "You're going to anyway, no matter what I say. That's how this works."

"Was that a yes or a no, Jim? I need your permission."

"I don't want to be worked with," I said.

"All right." Foreman stepped back away from me.

"Huh? Is that it? I can go?"

Foreman nodded. "All I want to do is ask you some questions, Jim, questions that might help you see what's going on here. But if you don't want to, then you shouldn't be here."

I thought about it for a moment. This was very confusing. Part of me wanted to head straight for the door. And a part of me wanted an answer.

"Can I leave when we're through?"

"If you still want to," Foreman said, "you can leave." I decided to go for the answer.

"All right," I said. "Yes."

"Thank you. Would you come sit up on the dais?" He offered me his hand. I didn't take it. He didn't seem to notice the slight. He just pointed toward the high director's chair and patted my shoulder. "Just go on up there and sit down. Do you need a tissue?" He handed me a box of tissues, then turned to whisper something into the ear of the Course Manager who was waiting quietly to one side. I took the box with me up to the dais and sat down in his tall director's chair.

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?"