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would also be another Nathan Hansard on the Mars Command Post,

of whom he -- the Nathan Hansard resting in the concrete floor of the

broom closet -- was a mere carbon copy resulting from the imperfect

operating of the transmitter.

Though for all he knew, this was its normal function.

In support of his theory, Hansard recollected that there had been a moment

within the transmitter when he had thought he'd seen the word EARTH

flicker to MARS. Had he made the jump to Mars and then bounced back like

a rubber ball in that briefest of moments when the operating switch was

flicked on?

Like a rubber ball, or like . . . an echo . . .

But this was not the time or the place to elaborate ingenious theories.

Worsaw and his confederates were undoubtedly searching the building and

the grounds for him at this moment. He ducked back beneath the floor

and "swam" on through the foundations, surfacing only for air or to get

his bearings; now bobbing up into an office full of silent, industrious

clerks (for there were no noises in this dream-world except the sound of

his own breathing), then into an empty corridor or an unfurnished room

(with which the building seemed to abound, like some gigantic coral

reef). It was several minutes before he was outside the labyrinth of the

security complex and in the sunlight of the April noonday where he saw,

but was not seen by, two of Worsaw's bearded friends.

It would not do to remain in Camp Jackson. He had lost the cap of his uniform

in the transmitter, or in his flight from the hall, so that he would

be conspicuously out of uniform here. Among the throngs of the city,

however, he would be as good as invisible, because if he refrained

from walking through walls there would be no visual evidence of his

dematerialized state.

He considered how he could travel the ten miles to downtown D.C. most

quickly. Not by swimming. Ordinarily he would have taken the bus. . . .

It felt strange to pass out the gate of Camp Jackson without showing a

pass or I-D. The city-bound bus was waiting at the curb. Mansard got on,

careful to walk lightly so that his feet would not pass through the floor,

and took an empty seat by a window. A moment later a private sat down

in the same seat -- and in Hansard. Mansard, much shaken, moved to the

seat across the aisle.

The bus started up slowly, and Hansard was able to keep from sinking all

the way through his seat. Each time the bus accelerated or decelerated,

Mansard was in danger of slipping out of the vehicle altogether. At a

traffic light just before the bridge over the Potomac the bus braked

suddenly and Mansard somersaulted through the seat in front of him,

down through the floor of the bus and the transmission, and deep into

the roadway itself.

After that he decided to hike the rest of the way into the city.

FOUR

THE REAL WORLD

In witnessing the foregoing remarkable events, it may have occurred to the

reader to wonder how he would have reacted in Hansard's circumstances,

and if this reader were of a skeptical temperament he might very well

question the plausibility of Mansard's so-sudden and so-apt adjustment

to the enormous changes in the world about him. Yet this hypothetical

skeptic shows the same ready adaptibility every night in his dreams.

Hansard, in those first perilous minutes, was living in a dream,

and his actions showed the directness and simplicity of the actions

of a dreamer. What had he done, after all, but flee from the face of

danger? It can be objected that Mansard was not dreaming; but can we

be so sure of that yet? When else, in the usual course of experience,

does one walk through steel walls?

So it is not really so wonderful that Mansard should have fallen into

a half-dreaming state and been able to act so naturally amid so much

that was unnatural. Perhaps our skeptical reader might even allow that,

with the wind in the right direction, he might not have acted entirely

differently himself -- at