They struck the light plant first. Sudden and unexpected violence surged through the dark, stone-walled corridors.
John Firth led a band of men against the enemy. But his attack failed and the workers seized the Atomic Power Core—the heart of our world. If they shut down the reactors, they would stifle not only our lights, but the gravitators and the air machines as well; they would kill us all.
The workers knew that. They were willing to risk suicide. Every bargaining counter was on their side. It was John Firth who surrendered.
Firth's world died then. In the bitter depths of the Pit, John Firth remembered what Adam Boetz had said to him so many years before,
"We've become a brain without a body. We can formulate the orders, but we've neither arms nor legs to carry them out.
Suddenly John Firth understood the fallacy of his fanaticism. A society was like a living body, an integrated organism of many members. No one could function without the others. No man—no group of men—could create an isolate world. The social equation seemed as clear to Firth as the simplest sum in arithmetic. Each man was a part of a functioning social unit which included them all. Each man's talent, whether it was the plodding docility of a moron or the brilliance of genius, belonged to all men.
In the meantime, the workers found that they could not run Firth's world alone, either. They gloried in forbidden luxuries until they were satiated. Shortly they became as indolent as the aristocracy had been; and the food supply was nearly exhausted.
The treaty they made was direct and to the point: the two groups agreed to live in equality, sharing the burden of the labor and the accumulated wealth of knowledge. The treaty was made when you were a child; we have perfected the technique of co-operation within one generation. We're ready, now, to go back to Earth.
You'll be with us? Fine, Chris!
No. Please, no apologies. I understand why you intended to destroy our ship; others have attempted it, too. No harm was done. You're free,—entirely free ...