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You are about to participate in a great adventure.
You are about to experience the awe and mystery
which reaches from the inner mind to...
In the light of today's growing anxieties,
it has become more absolute
that the wealth of the nation
consists in the number of superior men
that it harbors.
It is, therefore, a matter of deep concern
and deeper consequence
when 4 of the most magnificent and promising
young minds in the country
suddenly disappear off the face of the earth.
Hansley, mathematician
for the burn rocket corporation.
Wheatly, chief engineer's assistant
of the Advasine Project.
Bassett, psychiatric division,
the hale Neo-kinetics institute.
Robertson, space agency cosmobiologist.
All have vanished in the same day,
and without a trace.
They could have been kidnapped
for the obvious reasons and by obvious parties.
Well, this was the federal investigator's
first speculation, of course.
But their investigations
uncovered a curious pattern
in the background
of these widely separated men.
That is why my department
was brought into it.
There is no reason or desire
to keep the space agency out of it.
Not on our part.
But as I personally see it,
these speculations regarding abduction
by representatives of an alien planet
are just that... Speculations.
We do not speculate promiscuously.
Well, we're here to do something
about those 4 young men.
We'll do anything, if we must,
but please explain this curious pattern.
All 4 of these men,
considered intellectually and physically superior
in aptitude, performance, and delivery,
were born at the same place.
Same state?
In the same county. Spider county.
And in the same year,
and within the same month.
Their birth records are there,
and indicate a curious phenomenon.
Each child was born
at least 2 months premature.
Immediately after birth,
their fathers disappeared
and were never heard from again.
And each child, although unrelated...
At least, on the maternal side...
Had been given the same middle name:
Eros.
The Greek word for love.
And it is also the name of an obscure planet
in the galaxy Krell.
Now, the records of their school years are curious, also.
Incidents being found in the newspapers of that time.
Appears that they were the object
of considerable superstitious nonsense,
apparently because of their inherent superiority
over the other children in the area.
They eventually left the community,
went different ways,
and gradually achieved prominence in different fields
at a very early age.
Now, their mothers are unwilling to admit
or even to discuss the possibility
that these 5 men are con...
5? I thought you said there were 4.
No, there are 5.
We've just learned that the fifth man...
Ethan Wexler... did not leave spider county,
nor did he disappear last week
when the 4 others did.
Now, we believe that he is our single possible key
to this mystery.
You know his whereabouts?
Yes.
I think we better have him brought in for questioning.
He can't be taken out of spider county,
at least not by us.
He's being held on a murder charge.
Then we'll have to send someone up to spider county.
The space agency is aware that this case
appears to fall into a federal
or military category, sir.
But in view of our findings and suspicions,
Chief Wilkerson strongly urges you to allow me
to go up there first.
And before it's too late.
If it isn't already too late.
Aah!
Wake up.
Aah!
Wake up, boy. Come on,
let's answer some more of those questions.
You can sleep all you want to later on.
You've been at him over and over, Sheriff,
most of the night.
Care for something to eat, Ethan?
You got a reputation for eating
like a whole truckload of farmhands, way I hear it.
I have many reputations.
No, thank you, I will not eat in this place.
Starts the third day of his not eating in this place, Sheriff.
Suppose you and I
and a half a dozen deputies could take him...
Mr. Greenberg, I appreciate your consideration
for your client.
But if he'll confess now
and tell us what he did with Jonathan's body...
I did not kill Jonathan Simpson.
You were found sleeping in Jonathan's barn.
Jonathan's wife saw him go into that barn,
and he never came out again.
And you hated him...
I didn't hate him!
I only wanted him to apologize
for the indecent remarks he made
at the harvest dance
in front of the girl I... Anna bishop.
I work on her father's farm.
No one who was present at that dance
heard those remarks.
But Jonathan did admit that he thought them,
thought them!
Are you implying that Ethan
can read people's minds
as well as make their corpses disappear
into thin air?
Ethan has been performing all sorts of witch-boy tricks
ever since he was a child.
He and the rest of those fatherless geniuses.
If spider county is foolish enough
to bring Ethan to trial,
it'll be for the suspected murder of a missing corpse.
I did not commit any murder.
And no one in spider county
really believes I did.
I am gonna be tried for reading minds
and for walking on moonlit meadows
and for being a thing that goes bump in the night.
Good-bye, Anna.
Let's go.
Are you all right?
I think so.
Hurry.
You must leave before someone comes by.
Now come. Follow me.
Are you looking for Ethan?
Yes. Is he still here?
Are you the man who phoned up about him last night?
No.
Oh. A man phoned up.
Wanted to know where they had him.
Said he was his father.
Are you certain the man said he was Ethan's father?
That's what he said.
I've got to rest.
The deputy...
He wasn't in the car.
You cannot afford to rest too long.
Why are you helping me?!
You aren't guilty of murder.
Fear, suspicion, ignorance
will sentence you to die, not facts.
We must go.
How do you know I'm not guilty?
I know, because I know you.
I don't know you.
But I feel as if I do.
And is that not a warm feeling to meet a stranger
and feel as if you knew him?
Shall we go?
Where?
Where superstition and fear can never reach you again.
There is no such place on earth.
Please. We must get away from here.
They'll track you down...
With dogs and desperation.
They'll destroy you.
Won't you let me save you?
I appreciate your help, and I want to thank you,
but I don't want to incriminate you
any more than you've already incriminated yourself.
Where are you going?
Far away from spider county.
Wherever you go... However fast you run...
Every turn may be the wrong one...
The last one, and you'll be caught.
You cannot escape dogs and desperation...
Except with me. Won't you come with me?!
What holds you here?!
What in this hating, barking world could hold you?!
Nothing.
I wanted to be held here.
I even fooled myself into thinking
that someone could hold me here no matter what.
But I guess I always knew
I'd have to go someday and go alone.
Well, I can't go without saying good-bye.
Anna.
Be careful.
I'll meet you in your room.
Anna.
Oh, I just couldn't leave without seeing you again.
They're looking for you, Ethan.
Everyone's looking for you.
Sheriff Stayfield called my father
to join the search.
Why did you run away?
I don't want to die, Anna.
You won't, Ethan. You're innocent.
Don't you see it's wrong to run?
It makes you look guilty.
I already look guilty to everyone but you.
Don't go, Ethan. We'll take your case to a higher court.
You and I?
Someone will help.
There are people who believe in innocence.
Yes, there are. I met a man.
He helped me out of the car after the accident.
And I met a man.
I think he believes in your innocence.
A man?
He came up from Washington just to talk to you.
He had something good in his eyes.
He said he wanted to help you.
Well, I met a man, too.
I don't know why, but he helped me.
He said he knew I wasn't guilty,
and he wanted me to go somewhere with him.
And we must hurry.
You wanted to say good-bye to her, now, say it.
Who is he?
That's the man I met.
The one who believes in his innocence.
Then why help him run away?!
Ethan, please don't run.
You'll never stop running as long as you live.
They'll track you down forever.
Stay and clear yourself, please.
Come, Ethan.
Where are you going?
To a place where Ethan will be honored
for his rare and special natures...
Where his magnificence will set him not apart,
but above.
My special natures?
I'll explain another time
when there is time.
Come.
Ethan, take me with you.
No! He cannot, even if he wanted to.
The choice is not yours or mine.
Destiny gives choice to no one, my son.
And your destiny was shaped
before the seed of your life took root.
What did you say?
I'll explain another time.
You said, "my son."
I'm your father.
My father?
I came a long way to reclaim you.
I came from very far.
My father's dead. No one can come that far.
Come, my son.
The others are waiting for us.
We are all going home together.
No, Ethan!
Don't go with him!
Anna, I don't know why,
but I know I must go with him.
I know he is my father.
Then I'll go with you.
I don't care where. I just wanna go with you.
I need to be with you.
No, Ethan.
Then we'll go our own way.
You would take her into a world where
that sound will drown out all music,
all soft-spoken beauty?
You would have her live in love with you
in shadows and fear?
Afraid to sigh too loud
for fear of being overheard?
Afraid to make you smile because someone might
recognize your face while it is smiling?
Well, then, she'll come with us.
Would my father want me to break her heart
as well as my own?
All right.
Hold it...
Right there.
Run across to the house, Anna,
call the Sheriff.
You stay here, boy.
And whoever you are, you'll stay, too.
I can not. Neither can my son.
Your son?!
I figured a no-good dreamer like Ethan
didn't have a father he could call his own.
Go on, both of you. I'll join you in a moment.
Go!
One step more and I'm firin'.
You may wound him.
He has to go on a long, long journey...
Journey much too special to be marred by bloodshed and pain.
So before you fire at him...
You'll fire at me.
You say that like you think I won't.
Won't?
No, you can't.
You can't fire.
Harry, now, listen to me. Tell it slow.
We were coming down the road.
You saw this terrible apparition in the middle of the road
and it made you lose control of the car?
Yeah, and... what? What?
Why didn't you stop it?
I don't know.
Well, where's Al and the prisoner?
I don't know. I don't know!
Did... did Al take 'em away?
How'd they get out of this thing?
You saw him, didn't you?
Yes.
He wasn't alone?
No. No, there was a man.
He said he was Ethan's father.
Where are they going? Did he say?
Journey...
Long, special journey.
Did you see him?
No, no. Uh, just a few traces.
We'll trace them down.
Sheriff Stayfield sent you home to put that gun away.
Still think that's a good idea.
But they took my daughter.
A man's got cause to go gunnin'
when his daughter's taken.
You're a stubborn and a foolish man, Ethan.
It's unwise to stop for any reason.
To stop because of hunger is madness.
Why did you come for me after all these years?
I had hoped you wouldn't begin asking questions
until we reached home.
How did you find me?
You were the easiest to find.
You were where I left you... in spider county.
My mother was gonna take me away from here.
She died.
I was 9 years old,
and nearly everybody in the town
already hated and feared me.
So when Anna's father came up to that funeral home
and said I was to move in with him, I moved in.
He said the bishop's weren't scared of me.
All they feared was god
and being short-handed at the farm.
He took you in for that purpose alone?
Well, he had no sons.
The farm needed a lot of attention.
He saw I was strong, so he took me in.
Even then I was strong.
And you tolerated such exploitation?
I was too young to run away.
Then when I grew older, there was Anna.
For Anna, I stayed.
Do you hear that sound?
Come. We must go.
Are you really my father?
Yes.
Where have you been?
Where we're going.
The other boys... The ones that left town...
We used to talk and wonder.
About your fathers?
Well, none of us had one.
Each of you had one.
We came here and chose the strong and gentle girls,
and then in accordance with the customs of this planet,
we married them. this planet?
We waited until each of us had been assured of a son,
then we left.
We could not then take our sons with us.
Nothing so small could have endured
the timeless and torturous journey.
Now, of course, you're more than strong enough
to endure it and survive.
You are strong enough...
But Anna is not, is that what you mean?
I did not say that.
You thought it. I hear you think.
I hear other people's thoughts.
Used to frighten me.
I don't know why,
but I'm not frightened when I hear your thoughts.
Haven't your dreams explained it all, my son?
I never dream. Dreams are a normal experience.
I only have nightmares.
Part of you is very different
from other dreamers, Ethan.
But that "different"
isn't necessarily abnormal.
You'll understand everything very soon.
When we have reached our home?
Yes.
You are foolish, and you are evil.
You called my special and gifted son...
A no-good dreamer.
In our world on the planet Eros
it was the absence and abhorrence of dreaming
that made men no good.
They worked like insect slaves.
They fought evil wars.
They gathered lush riches and splendid pains,
but they took no time out for dreams,
and dreaming became a lost art.
And, as always happens, they began to die off.
For all their riches, they began to die.
No male child had been born in many years.
The seed that spawns the male had retreated in sorrow,
faded out of this dreamless race.
The wise ones thought it was the climate,
so they sent 5 of us here to prove
that in a more favorable climate,
the males of Eros could again produce males.
Perhaps they were right.
Perhaps it was the climate
that enabled us to produce sons,
but I do not think so.
I think it was because while here,
we once again caught the fashion of dreaming.
You and the others will start a new race for Eros.
A race of men who cannot help but dream,
who have the dream machine in their human half
and call it a soul.
Aah!
Now, I understand.
Now I know where I'm running
when I'm running through my nightmares.
You should have remained here, father.
It was the climate.
In time it might have given you a dream machine.
All right, my son.
I've lost.
I'll go...
Without you...
If I must.
We must go.
I just can't go any farther.
It's all right.
I think we can rest for a minute.
Is your leg all right?
Yeah.
I just twisted it a little.
We've been out since early this morning.
I don't think anybody's dogs are gonna hold out,
including my own.
So we'll take a run down the east side of the orchard
and then we'll...
What's the matter with you?
We've got to get out of here.
We can get across the river.
There must be paddles in here.
It's locked.
All set.
Ethan, that's as far as you're gonna go.
Sheriff Stayfield, it's time we had a long talk.
I think so, and so does Washington.
Will you talk to me, Ethan?
It took a lot of doing and a few big phone calls
to get Sheriff Stayfield to let me come in here.
Will you listen, then, if I talk to you?
I saw your father...
In the barn in the orchard.
I saw what he did to Mr. bishop...
And what he became while he was doing it.
Who are you?
I'm with the space agency, investigation division,
and I've been wanting to talk to you.
You believed what you saw?
Why not? Anna believed it.
Well, I thought she just wanted to for my sake.
You going to do anything?
I mean, is it all right if I hope?
I'm going to do as much as I can, whatever I can.
Well, tell them. They'll believe you!
I'm not so sure.
Not a thing as unbelievable as this is.
If... if we want to convince anyone,
we've got to produce your father.
He's on his way back to Eros by now.
He admitted he had lost.
Sheriff Stayfield's deputy can't imagine
how he was able to find you at the riverbank.
I can imagine. Can't you?
You father wants you right in this cell, Ethan.
He wants you back in the hand you have no faith in.
You're sure you're going to be convicted
and sentenced to die, aren't you?
Yes, I'm sure.
Maybe going to Eros...
Even with a father like that...
will seem the best of 2 possible worlds
to you after a while.
I believe that's what he's counting on.
Most living things would choose life
under any circumstances over death.
Your father will come to you.
I'm certain of that.
He's going to show you that choice.
You choose Eros.
You go with him.
Yes, look at me.
I am here when I appear truth.
You see a monster,
yet you see a monster who could not kill you.
These men, these pale-faced earthmen,
they will kill you.
Is it possible you can choose to remain with them
and let go the reigns of eternal superiority?
Come, my son.
Come close.
Take my hand and tell me to my eyes
that you are human enough
to make that self-destructive choice.
I thought I heard a sound,
and it made me sad.
Father...
If I say no this last time,
you will kill me, won't you?
Kill?
We are not killers, Ethan.
We do not have the power to kill,
only to destroy... Suddenly and totally.
Killers have the power to kill...
Slowly and partially.
We do not kill, Ethan.
We uncreate.
I would have to do that to you.
I can not let plain earthmen
undo what I have done.
Hurry.
We're there?
Yes.
Just a little farther now.
Only a million stars.
And I am so sad.
Sad? Why, father?
You have chosen the dogs and desperation.
You send betraying signals back to them
to keep them on our trail.
I gave you the strength and genius of Eros,
but your mother gave you the weak senses of earth.
Our sense of hearing allows us
to hear such sounds as these.
We could hear the silent sigh of a star.
I was commissioned to reclaim all of you, Ethan.
I can not go back without my own son.
You, above all, belong to my world.
And to my mother's.
There are dogs here, father,
and desperate men,
killers and hypocrites and bigots...
Cruel, unthinking, senseless men,
but here they have no special powers
unless we give them to them.
Here they are no stronger than good men.
Unless the good make themselves weak.
But here there's a chance.
The battle isn't lost before it's begun.
But in your world...
What chance would anyone have
with a soul in your world?
I wanted to go home,
but I didn't want to go with a murderer.
I don't think home should be a world
where you have to live with a murderer.
This world isn't a whole lot better,
but if spider county murders me,
at least they'll do it neat and legal.
I can not destroy the better part of myself,
the dream part.
He is the better part of you, too.
Can you destroy the better part of yourselves?
The wealth of a nation, of a world,
consists in the number of superior men
that it harbors.
And often it seems that these men are too different,
too dreaming.
And often, because they are driven by powers
and dreams strange to us,
they are driven away by us.
But are they really so different?
Are they not, after all,
held by the same things that hold us?
By strong love and soft hands.
We now return control of your television set to you
until next week at this same time
when the control voice will take you to...