Speaker 1: In just a moment X minus one.
Speaker 2: But first, some of the funniest situations you've ever witnessed
occur every Wednesday night when the devilish imagination of MC
Jack Bailey sets to work on NBC's Truth or Consequences.
You won't believe it until you hear it, so listen
in tomorrow. Then another laugh session is in store later
on with the wise and witty Graucho Marx as he
and contestants play You Bet Your Life, while for the
melodic note on your Wednesday evening schedule. It's music and
fun on airtime with Josel McKenzie. And now stay tuned
for X minus one on NBC.
Speaker 1: Come down for Blast Off X minus five four three
two X minus one Fire from the far horizons of
the unknown come transcribed tales of new dimensions in time
and space. These are stories of the future adventures in
which you'll live in a million, could be years, on
a thousand, maybe worlds. The National Broadcasting Company, in cooperation
with Galaxies Science Fiction Magazine presents.
Speaker 2: HE minus one Tonight Hallucination Orbit by J. T. Macintosh.
Speaker 3: It's Choka stand by the release pickup rocket. Yes, sir,
We'll break Orbit in eight hours. Have damage control pull
the rods on the number three pile check leakage. Yes, sir,
try and have the locks cleared of all unessential personnel
when that pickup rocket comes back. There's no point in
making trouble. I understand, sir. Pick up rocket a waste.
Very well, take over, mister Choker. I will be in
my quarters if I'm wanted. Well now then, mister dan Berry,
make yourself comfortable.
Speaker 4: I thank you.
Speaker 5: Can you care for a drink Scotch and that bob
Bourbon in the other.
Speaker 4: No, thank you. I cann could quite used a squirting
liquor from a rubber bowel as if I were oily.
Speaker 3: I'm daring, and you'd have a devil of a time
pouring from a bottle in free fall. Well, how are
you enjoying your trip?
Speaker 4: Very interesting? Very nice you to give me a lift.
You know it would have been eight months before another
ship came along.
Speaker 3: A lot more than that with the main Pluto beam
station out, probably eight years.
Speaker 4: Really that long? I thought the whole round to Pluto
was under eighteen months.
Speaker 5: Yes, it is when the beam is running. To see
mister Danberry.
Speaker 3: We left Earth twenty seven days after the beam broadcast
from Pluto station broke. We've been spaceborne close to six years.
Speaker 4: I suppose that's why you're in orbit around this planet
picking up supplies or something.
Speaker 3: Eh oh oh, this is a standard pick up for
the space Beam service. We sent a rocket down to
take off a man who's been the only inhabitant of
this planet for a little over two years.
Speaker 4: Well, and I expect he'll be glad to see you.
Speaker 6: Well, there's no telling.
Speaker 3: I know I would after two years of duty. Mister Danberry,
you might not know anything.
Speaker 4: Oh, psychiatric troubles, solatosis, it's from the Latin solas alone.
Is that much of a problem only in space?
Speaker 6: Here?
Speaker 4: Look a look through that port seems empty.
Speaker 6: It is.
Speaker 3: It's empty of horizon, sky, sunlight, ground, It's empty of time,
it's empty of people. You can't live in it too
long without something happening.
Speaker 4: I see. But surely people have been alone before spaceflying.
Speaker 3: Yes, but they have been on the same world with
other people, and that seems to make a difference. You
take a hermit on Earth, he may spend his life
trying to escape civilization. Put him on a deserted world.
He turned psychotic. Is it a cure culture put him
back with people at least about forty people. That seems
to be the critical number. See, I have forty eight
in this ship's complement. I could run her with about
a but if I tried to, I'd have psychos on
my hands.
Speaker 5: Six months have to blast off.
Speaker 4: But then every one of these men on the beam stations.
They're all alone, aren't they. That's right, well, then they
must get it they do.
Speaker 3: It wouldn't pay to leave more than forty men on
a space station, and less than forty is too dangerous.
Solatosis can be homicidal.
Speaker 5: So they leave one man.
Speaker 3: How he gets it all right, But you can snap
him out of it just by taking him back to Earth.
That's why I like to have as few people as
possible around. When the pickup ship comes back, it can
be pretty unpleasant.
Speaker 4: And what are they like? How does it defect them?
Speaker 3: Well, so far, I've picked up about twenty eight space
station officers. I've seen twenty eight different sets of symptoms.
I wouldn't want the job of getting those guys out
of their stations and into that pick up rocket. Captain here,
pick up rocket sick all right, mister choker, prepare to
receive the pickuplert the psychiatric staff, and I'll be right there.
Speaker 5: Would you care to see them? Bring em inster Dan Barry,
You're welcome if you have a strong stomach.
Speaker 4: I don't think so, Thank you.
Speaker 3: Laurright, mister Chaka, as soon as the rocket is secured,
make a trajectory for the next station.
Speaker 7: Answer, that's Pluto station three.
Speaker 5: Carry on, huh, Pluto station three. That will be a
honey of a job.
Speaker 3: He has been on that lump of rock all by himself,
or close to six and a half years.
Speaker 6: Pluto Station three Daily Report, colinord Space Officer. Everything is
in fine shape. Through my port, I can see Mars, Earth, Saturn, Mercury.
M Ah, that little devil he's hiding behind the sun.
He's been quite furtive lately. Why I'm required to record
this report every day escapes me because it's quite obvious
to any empty headed brass hat at the Central office
that not a word of this has been worth the
tape it's been recorded on for the last five and
a half years. But if it amuses you, gentlemen to
hear me, wander. After all, you are paying for the tape. Oh,
which gives me a fine thought. I'm going to set
the pickups through the whole station and leave the tape running.
That'll give you a daily report all day. So keep
on listening. Right now. I have the distinct impression that
Earth is winking at me rather suggestive lewd wink.
Speaker 8: It helps see the planets, doesn't it.
Speaker 9: Hmm?
Speaker 6: Oh, I thought you were reading.
Speaker 7: I was.
Speaker 8: You know, if you hadn't been able to see the
planets you would have been a stray jacket case long ago.
Speaker 6: Who knows, I'm not one now you don't anyway?
Speaker 8: Well, I think that so long as you talk sanely
about madness, you can't be so far gone. M It's
out there somewhere, isn't it?
Speaker 6: The rescue ship somewhere?
Speaker 8: How long now come it? Where could they be now?
If they started whenever the beam failed.
Speaker 6: I haven't worked it out since the last time you lasked,
but they could be very close.
Speaker 7: If the beam.
Speaker 8: Hadn't failed, they would have been here long ago, wouldn't they.
Speaker 6: Oh? Sure, eleven months with the beam over six years
without it. Well, anyway, that triple time six years pay
adds up to quite a pile. M.
Speaker 8: You'll be set up the life when you get back
to earth, won't you?
Speaker 6: And at twenty nine I'll be rotten with money.
Speaker 8: Oh well, it's been nice knowing you.
Speaker 6: That's because of the others before you. I've learned a lot.
Speaker 8: I'll never talk of the others, and above all, I'll
never talk of any others to come.
Speaker 6: I'm sorry.
Speaker 8: Would you like to play chess? It's a long time
since we did.
Speaker 6: I don't think so, not anymore. I'm a little tired
of chess.
Speaker 8: Oh, I know, I know.
Speaker 7: I won't bother you.
Speaker 8: I'll go to my room.
Speaker 7: Color.
Speaker 6: Well, don't get upset.
Speaker 8: I'm not. I understand you're just tired of chess.
Speaker 6: You still listening, Gentlemen, that last few minutes might have
been a little confusing. You'd like to know who I
was talking to, wouldn't you. I'm afraid you can't hear
her on the tape. That's una. Now I'll tell you
what she looks like. You might find it interesting. She's beautiful,
but rather cool. She always wears a white shirt and
sharp creased green slack. She's got a good figure, but
in a calm sort of way. She plays a good
game of chess, although I beat her two out of three. Times.
Of course you know why you can't hear her on
the tape, But I still know too. That's point in
my favor, isn't it? That brings up an interesting question, gentlemen.
Because I'm tired of Una, I'm beginning to find her
a long, cool, slightly unappealing bore. My problem is how
to get rid of her. I can't just tell her
to vanish. She's a little too real for that. I
dreamed up a ship to bring her. I'll have to
find another to take her away. Well I might as
well get to it. Oh no, No, I'm not going
to bother about the ship. It's too much mental effort.
I'd have to think up everything I saw, and frankly, gentlemen,
I'm I'm too tired. Maybe she'll take the hint A
lot of them did, Susie did? And Alice uh? I
remember Margie. There was a girl A load of bricks
had to fall on her head. Took me four weeks
to get rid of her. No, let Una figure her
own way to get off the station. Well she's gone.
I thought she might. Her ship's gone too. Well. All
in all, I don't think Una was really very satisfactory.
One of these days, I'll start believing in them, and
I'll be really gone. Well, if I activate the main
screens now, i'll see a ship coming into land pretty soon.
Every once in a while I have a thought that
when the ship really comes, I'll think it's make believe. Yes,
there it is a small ship curving in for landing.
I suppose I could check on the detectors. I know
they register anybody within a hundred thousand miles. But I
don't bother checking them anymore, because someday the moment will
come when I check the detectors and I'll see just
what I want to see. All the ship's coming in
for a landing. Now i'll go out to meet it.
I'm rather interested to find out what the explanation will
be for the girl. Naturally it will be a girl.
It's all right. You can take your helmet off. The
ears all right in here?
Speaker 7: You must be Baker.
Speaker 6: Oh, good heavens, no Baker was before me. Here. You
can't be one of his dreams. Seven years late. I'm ORed,
colin ord.
Speaker 7: Where we go any further?
Speaker 8: Just how does solutosis affect you?
Speaker 6: Well, that's new. None of them ever asked that before.
It makes me see things that aren't there.
Speaker 7: And you know there's nothing there.
Speaker 6: Mm. Sometimes do you know I'm here? I'm making a
point of not wondering about it.
Speaker 7: Well, one thing you can be sure of this. Do
you see this? This is a gun.
Speaker 10: I just want you to know I'm not Heaven's little
gift to lonely space station offices.
Speaker 7: Isn't that clear?
Speaker 6: Oh? Yes, yes? What's your name?
Speaker 7: Elsa cutterline? You want to know why I'm here?
Speaker 6: Of course, not particularly what? Well, that's always the weakest
part of the story. I don't like to press it.
Why don't you uh take off your space suit.
Speaker 7: I'll tell you why, just the same I killed a man?
Why and how? It doesn't matter. I had access to
an experimental ship I thought.
Speaker 6: If I disappeared for about So please don't labor over it.
I'm not asking questions.
Speaker 7: Why not?
Speaker 6: Well, when we get around to it, I would be
interested in the story you can concoct. For being dressed
like the cover of a magazine story in rather minimal clothing.
It's been years since I thought of anything like that.
You must be a throwback.
Speaker 7: What are you talking about?
Speaker 6: You know you're gonna have a tough time with that
gun when you get tired of holding it. It's a
heavy gun. How long do you think it'll be before
I take it from you? After all, you have to sleep.
There's no door in the station you can lock that
I can't get in.
Speaker 7: I know.
Speaker 10: I just wanted to make sure you weren't violent. I
think I can get on with you.
Speaker 6: Ort mm, yes, yes, I see. The question is, my dear,
whether you're real or not? Well, oh, yes, but that
doesn't prove anything. As a matter of fact, the realer
you look, the worse off I might be. But then
there still is the remote possibility that you might actually
have killed someone decided to hide out on a space station.
Shall I tell you something else, Elsa, what I'm suddenly
tired of the whole business. Breathe there a man with
soul so dead. I'm sure you know the rest of it.
I would suddenly like to have enough people around me
so that I could be sane. I would like to
find women as part of life, instead of having them
pop up here from the depths of my rather pornographic subconscious. Ah,
but you've shaken me, Elsa. Twenty four hours ago, I
was congratulating myself that solatosis hadn't really gotten me. But
now I don't know.
Speaker 10: Just don't try anything funny, or you'll find out whether
I'm real.
Speaker 6: Hard way anyway is the hard way. First, I'll go
out and have a look at your ship. Fourteen pounds
per square inch air heat. Now I take a gasoline lighter.
There the flame lights. But on the other hand, if
there was no lighter and I see it, I could
also see it burn when there isn't any air. As
a matter of fact, how do I know that? I
can read a meter for air pressure? And now that
I look again quickly, I find I haven't got a
lighter in my hand, and as a matter of fact,
the pressure meter reads zero. There's no air on this ship.
As a matter of fact, there isn't any ship else.
They's no more real than una. All right, comin, old boy,
Sit here and concentrate for about fifteen minutes, and you'll
be able to walk through the walls of this ship.
Speaker 7: Well, what did you find out there?
Speaker 6: You'd better leave. It was a mistake. You're coming here.
I'm sorry.
Speaker 7: No, don't come any closer to me.
Speaker 6: Put down the gun back on morning.
Speaker 7: You'll keep back.
Speaker 6: You see, it's no use. Oh you're a good shot.
You got me right between the eyes. But I couldn't
feel a thing. I can't let myself be shot. Now,
can I give that to me? Yeah? Now, remember, if
you shoot me, nothing happens. But if I shoot you,
you die. Do you know that?
Speaker 7: Yes, I know that.
Speaker 6: I'll give you about twenty minutes to get that over
stuffed figure back into that spacesuit and get off my planet. Frankly,
I'm getting tired of hallucinations. Tired. No, no, no, I'll
keep that after a while, I'll put it in a drawer.
It'll stay there until I forget it, and there won't
be any gun anymore. From now on, my overblown figment,
there will be no more Else's, or Susi's or Margie's.
I am not going to give in to salatosis. Maybe
maybe I'll bring Una back. At least she could play chess.
Pluto Station three Daily Report, Colin ord Space Officer, Gentlemen,
I have successfully fought off salatosis for two days, and
I have been alone. However, I'm afraid I'll lose. As
I watch my main scope. Now I see a ship
coming in again. I wonder what this one will be like.
It's a launch from a large your spaceship, maybe a lifeboat.
Dorothy came in a lifeboat. I wonder what this one
will be like. I've got to find out when she
comes whether she's real. That's the key. As long as
I know if she's real. When I don't care anymore,
that's when it's really got me. The ship's down. Now
there she comes out of the airlock. I've got to
find out whether she's real. Colin aud that's right.
Speaker 9: I'm doctor Lynn, a fourth star lines Marilyn Lynne.
Speaker 6: Very pretty. You're going to tell me your story now?
Or do I have to wait?
Speaker 9: I'm not going to tell you anything till I've found
out a little more about you.
Speaker 6: Well, you're an improvement on the last one. At least.
You're young and beautiful, and you're not fantastic, and you
look intelligent. What do you mean, don't worry about me.
I see things that aren't there, particularly people.
Speaker 9: Oh so you don't believe I'm here?
Speaker 6: Would you if you were me?
Speaker 9: Do you know I'm not here?
Speaker 6: No? That comes with time, at least it always has
so far.
Speaker 9: You mean, you've always proved to yourself that your visitors
were mere fantasy with a struggle interesting controlled solitosis. I
never heard of it before. It's a pleasure to meet you,
mister Hud.
Speaker 6: No, No, that doesn't make you real. They all say that.
Speaker 9: Why should I want to make you accept me as real?
Speaker 6: I don't know, but they all do.
Speaker 9: When will you know?
Speaker 6: Oh? I can't say. Maybe in five minutes, maybe not
for hours.
Speaker 9: How do you do it? You don't shoot me to
see if if I die or anything like that, do you?
Speaker 6: No, nothing like that. If I shoot you, you do
die like the witches in history. They'd die if they
were and they'd die if they weren't.
Speaker 9: Your mind has remained agile.
Speaker 6: Enough, naturally, I never heard of solatosis inhibiting intelligence. Would
you like some coffee?
Speaker 9: Is that part of the test whether more coffee is
actually drunk than you drink yourself?
Speaker 6: No? No, that doesn't help. It would be very easy
for me to make half what I thought I made,
to fill a cup with nothing and pass it back.
H You look afraid?
Speaker 9: Why should I be?
Speaker 6: What am I doing? Am I doing something I don't
know I'm doing?
Speaker 8: No?
Speaker 9: Would you like me to wash the cups for you
when we're done?
Speaker 6: It won't prove anything. Next time they were used, I
could just imagine they were washed, couldn't I Where are
you going to find out? If you're real?
Speaker 9: My ship?
Speaker 6: Go ahead?
Speaker 9: Good luck?
Speaker 6: What's she afraid about?
Speaker 9: It?
Speaker 6: Something I said? None of the others were really afraid
of me. I can't tell yet, nothing's happened. The meters
all read fifteen pounds to the square in chair pressure.
But that's no good. I can't tell if I'm reading
them at all. Oh, well, the walls solid enough. My
hand hurts. That doesn't prove anything. Supposing I open my
face plate, if there's no ship and no air, all right,
my face plate's open. I'm breathing air. And then again,
on the other hand, my face plate may still be closed.
Maybe I only think it's open. I can't tell. I
can't tell that she isn't real. That means it's finally
gotten me, It gets everyone. I don't really know if
anything's real, if I'm real, if this space station is real,
the planet, the universe, the galaxy. Maybe all life is
in my mind. I think therefore I am yes, I
remember that from school. Oh, I'm tired. I got to
get back to the station, very tired. Close my face
played if I ever opened it. You get back to
the station. Got a headache, terrible headache. I'm very tired.
Speaker 9: Are you all right now here? Drink this?
Speaker 6: What happened?
Speaker 9: You came in the station lock and passed out?
Speaker 6: How how long have I been out?
Speaker 9: About twenty four hours? You're a very sick man, mister rowd.
Speaker 6: Huh. Reality very important thing, isn't it. It's the most
important thing there is to learn.
Speaker 4: Merely to you.
Speaker 9: Solatosis naturally affects what matters most to the individual. But
we needn't talk about that.
Speaker 6: But I know now you're not real. You can't be,
even though I feel you are. How did you decide
that I couldn't prove you weren't not on your ship.
I'm too far gone to figure out any test that'll work.
But if you are real, then how did you avoid solatosis?
Speaker 9: The only way there is. There are forty eight men
and women in the relief ship that's in orbit around
your planet right now. I came down in the pick
up rocket. We have well above the critical number of people.
I keep rational by knowing they're up there in the orbit,
And as soon as I'm ready, I'll take you back
up there.
Speaker 6: I suppose I can wait. I don't really care care
if you're real or not anymore.
Speaker 9: I know it'll take a long while before you care.
Speaker 6: You sound sad. What's the matter.
Speaker 9: It's the way you look at me.
Speaker 6: What do you mean?
Speaker 9: What do you see when you look at me?
Speaker 5: What?
Speaker 6: You're strong? Sort of quietly beautiful? But my age, you're
wearing a tunic and slacks, and you don't have a
wedding ring. I noticed that.
Speaker 9: That's what I thought you saw. I'm real, but not
your picture of me. I'm a doctor, mister Rord. All
first contacts with station offices are made by trained psychiatrists.
I'm a doctor, and I was a girl once, but
that was forty years ago.
Speaker 6: I'm sixty six. You can't be Oh.
Speaker 9: Yes, it was very nice to be a girl again.
I could see myself in your eyes, and I almost
felt young again.
Speaker 6: As I grow old.
Speaker 9: In the next few weeks, mister Rhud, you will be recovering.
Speaker 6: That will show