The Almost-Men — Background and Themes

What had happened last night? Lanny wracked his brain, trying to remember.

Eight hunters had been sent out to bring in a cache of rifles which Lanny's brother, Gill, had found in the rubble of Santa Barbara. It was risky business, because under the terms of the surrender treaty men were prohibited the use of all metals in the prison compounds. But the younger generation--boys like Lanny and Gill, born since the invasion--were more fiercely determined to resist the Almost-men than their elders. Armed with fifty rifles, they thought they would be strong enough to attack the Chapel of the Triangle.

The Almost-men: the children had coined the word, subtly asserting the pride of man. Yet they knew it was a semantic trick they played upon themselves. It changed nothing. The conquerors were physically identical to men; their enormous superiority was entirely technological.

As the eight hunters crept toward the ruins of Santa Barbara, through a narrow canyon, old man Barlow suddenly emerged from the brush and stood grinning at them. It was his privilege to join the hunters; any citizen of the settlement could have done so. But the younger generation hated Barlow. He was the practical man; he called himself a realist. He never allowed them to forget they were defeated, imprisoned and without weapons; he took savage delight in poking holes in their plans for resistance.

"What are you doing here?" Lanny's brother demanded.

"I came to watch the fun, Gill."

"We're going to bring back fifty rifles; that's all--"

"Right under the noses of our masters? Don't be naive."

"There's only one way the Almost-men would find out--"

Barlow snorted. "Don't think I ran to the Chapel of the Triangle and told Tak Laleen what you were up to. They don't need that sort of help from us. When are you going to get it through that thick skull of yours? We're outclassed; we're second-raters; we'll never defeat them."

From the night sky they heard the low hum of a force-field car. An opalescent sphere soared above the canyon. Gill's fist smashed into Barlow's jaw.

"So you did tell her!"

Barlow fell back against the canyon wall, his mouth bleeding.

The sphere came to a graceful stop thirty feet above the hunters and the de-grav platform lowered a woman toward the canyon. Surrounded by the faintly opaque capsule of her protective force-field, she moved toward them, a beautiful, dark-haired woman clothed in white.

This was Tak Laleen, the alien missionary assigned to the Santa Barbara area. She lived in the Chapel of the Triangle. Under the terms of the surrender treaty, the missionaries of the Almost-men were guaranteed immunity to preach and work in the treaty areas. They were selfless, generous and kind, yet men abhorred them, for they represented the tangible power of the conqueror.

Tak Laleen glided toward the hunters, forming the alien's triangular sign of peace with her small, white fingers. "I come in peace, in the name of the All of the Universe."

"We haven't violated any regulation," Gill snapped stiffly.

Barlow sidled toward her. "Take me back to the Triangle," he begged. "I'll tell you--"

Gill's fist lashed out again; Barlow reeled under the blow. "We're a legally elected punishment squad," Gill lied. "This man has broken a community law."

"You don't understand!" Barlow cried desperately. "They came to get--"

The other hunters fell on him, pummeling him into silence. The violence sickened Lanny, yet what alternative did they have? Lanny raised his club. At the same time the missionary came closer to the mob, and his club touched her forced-field capsule. Normally the energy would have paralyzed him with pain. But his mind refused to accept the normal, and Lanny felt the same sort of integrated unity with the energy field that he had with his hunting club. Command over the matter structure of the field. The energy flowed into his body and was absorbed, stored in an explosive concentration of power.

For a moment the opaque capsule dimmed. Tak Laleen clenched her hand over her mouth and fled into her sphere. The car soared up above the canyon.

Lanny swung his club again. Since Barlow must die, let him die quickly, without pain. Murder!--the accusation was a pang of agony in Lanny's mind. This violated everything Juan had taught him. He was aware that he wanted Barlow's death not because the old man had tried to betray the hunters, but because Lanny could not answer Barlow's poisonous despair in any other way. Lanny was ashamed. But who would know his real motive if he killed Barlow now? Who--but himself?