They had tried again, some of them, had succumbed again, again found themselves here - on and on, for some, while others had given up all hope of ever being strong enough to enter Shikasta and win its prize, which was, by enduring it, to be free of it forever; and hung and drifted, thin miserable ghosts, yearning and hungering for "Them" who would come for them, would lift them out and away from this terrible place as a mother cat takes its kittens to safety. The idea of rescue, of succour, was evidenced here always, at this gate, as strongly as I have known it anywhere, and the clutch and cling of it was maddening me.

"Ben," I said, and I was speaking to them all, through him, "Ben, you have to try again, there is no other way."

But he was weeping and clasping me, begging, pleading - I was in a storm of sighs and tears.

He had not given up, I could not accuse him of that! Again and again he had hovered waiting at Shikasta's "gates," and when his turn came he had gone down full of purpose and determination that this time at last... but then, it was not until he had left Shikasta, after months or years or a full life-span (whatever it was at that time) that he remembered, back in Zone Six, what he had set out to do. He had meant to save himself by the use of the terrors and hazards of Shikasta so that he would crystallise into a substance that could survive and withstand, but when he came to himself he realised he had spent his life again in self-indulgence and weakness and a falling away into forgetfulness. Again and again... so that now he regarded the place with such horror that he could not force himself to line up with the crowds of souls waiting at the Shikastan entrances for a chance of rebirth. No, he had given up. He was doomed, like all the rest here, to wait and to wait until "They" came to take him away. Until I came... and he held me and would not let go.