“You’re not attacked,” Jason told him, “because you don’t idenflf yourself as a natural disaster. Animals can live on the slopes of a dor mant volcano, fighting and dying in natural competition. But they’I flee together when the volcano erupts. That eruption is what make the mountain a natural disaster. In the case of human beings, it is thei thoughts that identify them’as life form or disaster. Mountain or vo] cano. In the city everyone radiates suspicion and death. They enjo:
killing, thinking about killing, and planning for killing. This is natura selection too, you realize. These are the survival traits that work bes in the city. Outside the city, men think differently. If they are threai ened individually, they fight, as will any other creature. Under mor general survival threats, they cooperate completely with the rules fo universal survival that the city people break.”
“How did it begin-this separation, I mean, between the two groups? Plies asked.
“We’ll probably never know,” Jason said. “I think your people mu5 have originally been farmers, or psionic sensitives who were not wit] the others during some natural disaster. They would of course act coi rectly by Pyrran standards, and survive. This would cause a differenc of opinion with the city people who saw killing as the answer. It obvious, whatever the reason, that two separate communities were e~
tablished early, and soon separated except for the limited amount of barter that benefited both.”
“I still can’t believe it,” Kerk mumbled. “It mak~s a terrible kind of truth, every step of the way, but I still find it hard to accept. There must be another explanation.”
Jason shook his head slowly. “None. This is the only one that works. We’ve eliminated the other ones, remember? I can’t blame you for finding it hard to believe, since it is in direct opposition to everything you’ve understood to be true in the past. It’s like altering a natural law. As if I gave you proof that gravity didn’t really exist, that it was a force altogether different from the immutable one we know, one you could get around when you understood how. You’d want more proof than words. Probably want to see someone walking on air.”
“Which isn’t such a bad idea at that,” he added, turning to Naxa. “Do you hear any animals around the ship now? Not the ones you’re used to, but the mutated, violent kind that live only to attack the city.”
“Place’s crawling with ‘em,” Naxa said. “Just lookin’ for somethin’ t’ kill.”
“Could you capture one?” Jason asked. “Without getting yourself killed, I mean.”
Naxa snorted contempt as he turned to leave. “Beast’s not born yet, that’ll hurt me.”
They stood quietly, each one wrapped tightly around by his own thoughts, while they waited for Naxa to return. Jason had nothing more to say. He would do one more thing to try and convince them of the facts; after that it would be up to each of them to reach a conclusion.
The talker returned quickly with a stingwing, tied by one leg to a length of leather. It flapped and shrieked and he carried it in.
“In the middle of the room, away from everybody,” Jason told him. “Can you get that beast to sit on something and not flap around?”
“My hand good enough,” he asked, flipping the creature up so it clung to the back of his gauntlet. “That’s how I caught it.”
“Does anyone doubt that this is a real stingwing?” Jason asked. “I want to make sure you all believe there is no trickery here.”
“The thing is real,” Brucco said. “I can smell the poison in the wing claws from here.” He pointed to the dark marks on the leather where the liquid had dripped. “If that eats through the gloves, he’s a dead man.”
“Then we agree it’s real,” Jason said. “Real and deadly, and the only test of the theory will be if you people from the city can approach it like Naxa here.”
They drew back automatically when he said it. Because they knew
that stingwing was synonymous with death. Past, present and future You don’t change a natural law. Meta spoke for all of them.