I Speak for Earth by John Brunner Read Free Book Online

and a slowing down, which would render his pulse useless as a way of tracking time.
    The door of the car slid back, and he jumped to his feet expecting to see the young man with glasses in the corridor outside.
    There was no one. The corridor was empty.
    Cautiously, he left the car and stared about him.
That
door, he knew, led to the room with the rings and the plank and the sixty-foot drop. There was another door. He tried it.
    That door opened into a herpetarium. A boa eight feet long reared up before his incautious feet; he stepped back hastily but without panic and went further down the corridor.
    There was one other door; he slid that back two inches and received an electric shock that made him shake from head to foot. Beyond the door was a foul, eye-tearing gas; he slammed the door again, heedless of a second shock, and stood in the corridor trying to calm himself with deep breaths.
    There must be a way out.
    He tried the other direction. But that was a dead end. On impulse, he tried the door leading to the shaft, but he found it was locked. How to find a way out?
    Suddenly he cracked his fingers, appalled at his own stupidity, and went back to the elevator. He pressed the stud on the panel for the ground floor.
    They were waiting for him when he came out of the car.They gave him two hours of physical and mental examinations.
    It went on like that for more than a week without stopping.

VII
    Darling Maggie, this is literally the first time they’ve left me alone for more than ten minutes since I got here. I don’t see how anything that happens up there, where whoever it is that’s chosen finally goes, can be much worse than what they’ve dreamed up to put me through
.
    You know, it’s finally getting to seem real. At first and for a long time it was just like I was fooling myself, and pretty soon I expected Schneider to call me and say, Thanks, Joe, but it’s not going to work after all, so you can go along home. That’s the way I wanted it to work out, of course
.
    Only things go along here at such a breakneck pace I’m certain that if they were going to flunk me they’d have done it by now. So I’m on the roller coaster, and I don’t know whether to be proud or scared
.
    There was the hesitant knock on the door which Joe had learned to identify as Schneider’s. He sighed, put down his stylo and said, “Come in.”
    The interrupter said, “I came to tell you the news.”
    Joe felt his nerves suddenly tauten to their limit, like strings on a fiddle being wound up to pitch. He said, “News, doc?”
    “Yes, we’re flying you out to the Pacific tonight.”
    For a long moment Joe digested the information. He said eventually, “You mean I’ve been selected?”
    “That’s right. You’re on the short list. So are all the others we picked. We just have to tidy up one or two loose ends—like your spider phobia, for instance, because how can we tell that Gyul Kodran’s closest friend isn’t spider-shaped?—but aside from that, you’re perfect.”
    “Don’t I get any time out before I go?”
    Schneider shook his head, regretfully. He said, “Whom are you writing to? A girl-friend?”
    Joe nodded.
    “The lady you were staying with when I wrote to you to come to the project, perhaps?”
    “Yes.” Joe felt himself flushing, which startled him. Schneider chuckled.
    “That is good, then. We of course had to investigate her, and I think you have very good taste in women, Joe. I hope you get back safely to her.”
    “If I’m chosen,” said Joe. Schneider gave him a thoughtful look.
    “Yes, if you are the one who is chosen,” he agreed. “I know that all our six candidates are good ones—with one possiible exception.”
    “When will I be meeting the candidates?”
    Schneider hesitated. Then he said carefully, “You can meet the first one now.”
    “You?”
    “Yes, I. It was not what I wished, but—” He shrugged.
    Joe shook his head slowly from side to side, staring at Schneider. “I can’t