(electronic voice ) Do not betray us.
Our privacy must be maintained.
Total destruction to anyone who invades it.
''Total destruction to anyone who invades it.
'' lf anyone is anywhere near that ship when it lands, it'll be over somebody's dead body.
(whistling and whirring ) ( man ) There is nothing wrong with your television set.
Do not attempt to adjust the picture.
We are controlling transmission .
We will control the horizontal.
We will control the vertical.
We can change the focus to a soft blur or sharpen it to crystal clarity.
For the next hour, sit quietly and we will control all you see and hear.
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 The Outer Limits.
( man ) Throughout history, compassionate minds have pondered this dark and disturbing question .
What is society to do with those members who are a thr*at to society, those malcontents and misfits whose behaviour undermines and destroys the foundations of civilisation ? Different ages have found different answers.
Misfits have been b*rned, branded and banished.
Today, on this planet, Earth, the criminal is incarcerated in humane institutions or he is ex*cuted.
Other planets use other methods.
This is the story of how the perfectionist rulers of the planet Zanti attempted to solve the problem of the Zanti misfits.
No, thanks.
l'll keep it.
(buzzer) History has been recorded in some pretty morbid places, Major, but when a historian named Grave finds himself in a ghost town called Morgue You see it? l thought l did.
Probably just a silver desert bird.
You don 't think they'll land in broad daylight? Why not? They have no reason to be afraid of us.
l wish we could feel the same about them.
Ordinarily, l don 't ask you space people such questions, Major.
- But why are we allowing this to happen ? - We weren 't given any choice, Professor.
We were told when the penal ship would land.
We were instructed to keep out of its way.
-No interference or else.
- Or else what? Did they say? They assured us they didn 't want to att*ck.
They wanted it to be ''a non -hostile sequence''.
But they didn 't hesitate to let us understand they would att*ck, devastatingly.
l wonder what they're like.
From our viewpoint, Professor, they're either superhuman or subhuman .
Or non -human .
l'm having your car parked in the stable behind the building.
The general is waiting for you , Professor Grave.
- Anything on the screen over there? -No, nothing yet.
Not a thing.
l'll be at my desk if you want anything.
l'll put this on yours.
Stephen ! - You're 24 hours late.
- l know.
l'd have been here two days ago.
l was ready to leave Washington when some five-star personality decided maybe this invasion oughta be covered by a commissioned officer.
l told them commissioned officers make history.
- Musty, young professors record it.
- You're a new kind of w*r correspondent.
Space-age style.
Thanks.
Ha, l don 't want this.
l'll show you your desk.
This is the new style of b*ttlefield here.
lt's all automated.
lt's not quite as messy as the old style but, of course, computers don 't bleed.
The radar section here.
- Have you had contact with the Zantis? -Not yet.
But they're in our atmosphere.
Gentlemen ! Can l have your attention , please? This is Professor Stephen Grave, this country's Official Historian of lnterplanetary Events.
Did l get that title right? Which means he will be observing everything and everyone, asking all sorts of non -technical questions, writing down everything that he sees and hears and thinks.
The Space Agency picked him, Psych OK'd him, Congress ratified him, the taxpayers pay him and l like him.
So if he gets in your hair, try not to brush him out.
- Welcome to the sweatbox.
- Over here.
Try this on for size here.
Same old machine.
You're a sentimentalist.
l thought you'd be a carbon copy of your father.
My father was a much more devout sentimentalist than l'll ever be.
What do you think made him such a great w*r correspondent? But even he wouldn 't be sentimental about w*r when your enemy can come out of the sky like a nightmare.
Wait.
As far as we know, the inhabitants of the planet Zanti are not our enemy.
( Major) They're not our friends.
According to the history l've studied, friends don 't coerce one another.
You read the transcripts of the Zanti government's first contact with us.
Would you call it coercion ? Yes.
The kind that makes me want to grab a r*fle and fight for my country.
Grabbing a r*fle's a thing of the past.
w*r with another planet? That's a different brand of w*r altogether.
A psychiatric committee analysed those transcriptions, Steve.
According to their findings, the Zantis are a discipline-oriented society.
They're perfectionists.
They're just as unwilling to start a w*r with us as we are with them.
Even though they know they'd win .
All they want is to use our planet as a place of exile for misfits? - That's what they said.
- And you believe them? They claim to be incapable of executing their own species.
lf you can 't destroy a criminal, you've got to stash them away where they won 't do any harm.
But why on some other planet? We have prisons, institutions, even islands.
We don 't send them to another world.
No, we don 't, Major.
But, then , we haven 't perfected interplanetary travel yet, have we? Come on , l'll take you on a tour of the b*ttlefield.
This is us.
Morgue, California.
Any danger of tourists bouncing in ? Morgue never has been a tourist spot.
Anyway .
.
here, here, here, here, here and here are our patrol spots, making a complete circle, a periphery, surrounding the area we're allowing the Zantis to come down in .
The sentries are armed and have orders to k*ll.
That means we're determined to keep strays from stumbling into the Zanti area, accidentally or otherwise.
lt also means that we're determined to keep the Zantis inside this circle.
Suppose they decide not to land where we've offered to let them land? m*ssile base here.
lf that penal ship is more than ten degrees off target, we destroy it.
We're also equipped to destroy it after landing if necessary.
(whistling and whirring ) General Hart! Communications established, sir.
This is General Maximillian Hart of the Strategic Air Command of the United States of America, of the planet Earth.
Come in , please.
Cut 'em in , Sergeant.
Zanti penal ship, come in , please.
- They couldn 't have landed already? -No, sir.
Our screen would show it.
Unless they found a way to b*at it.
Zanti penal ship, this is General Maximillian R Hart of the Strategic Air Command, the same man who concluded negotiations with your government commander on our time pattern described as SE-660.
We have cleared the area guaranteed you on that date.
You may expect to land without interference or incident.
l repeat, it is safe for you to land.
Please communicate.
( Zanti language over radib ) Translate! (electronic voice ) This is First Regent of Penal Ship 1 .
We are ready to land in designated area.
We have reason to suspect your good faith.
Landing area surrounded.
Weapons threateningly angled.
We have no other way of keeping the area open .
Our roads and deserts are generally open to all men .
The sentries are there only to guarantee your privacy.
( Zanti language over radib ) (electronic voice ) We shall land.
Do not betray us.
Our privacy must be maintained.
Total destruction to anyone who invades it.
''Total destruction to anyone who invades it.
'' lf anyone is anywhere near that ship when it lands, it'll be over somebody's dead body.
(whistling and whirring ) You can see it if you're interested, Professor.
- l wonder if we'll get to see one of them.
- Perhaps more than one.
lf they're like us, they'll hate being cooped up in a prison ship like we hate being behind bars.
l believe they'll try to break free.
The Zanti commander guaranteed maximum control of the prisoners.
They'll be guarded.
Every prison guarantees maximum control of its prisoners.
Yet men break out.
- Excuse me, General.
- Yes? They spotted something inside the periphery.
They think it's an automobile.
l'm gonna tell you something.
You won 't believe it, but l'll tell it anyway.
(blows) l would never k*ll a reasonable man .
Open the windows, Ben .
You smell bad when you lie.
Sweetheart, the guard was not a reasonable man .
He insisted we turn back.
Maybe it was his job, loser.
Lisa, we can never turn back.
Not you and me.
A runaway wife and a three-time loser must always go forward.
You know, my husband said to me, ''Why do you want to go away with him?'' ''He's a psychopath and he's not beautiful.
'' And l told him l wanted to go away with you because boca u se yo u weron't sa no a nd sa fe a nd sec u ro Told him l was sick to the teeth with sanity and safety and security.
l like bad adventure, Ben .
Always have.
l need it.
l know it'll destroy me someday.
But l need it.
Can you do anything about the car, Ben ? No.
The car wants water, and we're in the desert.
Now pick up the money.
Pick up the money! Lisa, there's no place to go out there.
l'm going home.
Maybe facing up to what l've done will be the baddest adventure of my life.
Lisa! Come here.
Come here.
Now pick up the money.
Now You know that you can never go home, Lisa.
Your husband would make you tell this story to the police and then the police would lock me up for ever.
Hm.
People die in the desert.
Establish a red alert at the m*ssile base.
lt was patrol nine, General.
Corporal Delano.
Struck by a moving vehicle.
- k*lled? - Yes.
- Which way was the vehicle going? - lnto the Zanti landing area.
That explains it.
The Zantis won 't communicate with us again .
- They listen but they don 't respond.
- Have they landed? They've landed.
What do you suppose that is? Huh? The person or persons in your landing area are unauthorised.
l assure you their presence is an accident.
They ran down and k*lled one of our sentries and probably drove on out of fear.
Please, come in .
(squeaking ) ( Hart on radib ) l repeat: the person or persons in your landing area are unauthorised.
We will send a party after them.
They are accidents.
We will remove them with no inconvenience to you .
Do not suspect us.
We've kept to our agreement.
We have not double-crossed you .
( Hart There is no need for you to even consider retaliating.
Believe that.
Please believe that.
(squeaking ) ( Zanti language ) ( Hart Translate.
(electronic voice ) Total destruction to anyone who invades our privacy.
(droning ) ( mouths and mutters) Get off me.
Get off me! ( Ben 's voice ) Get off me! Get off me! No! Help me! Please! Please! No! (radib ) .
.
with your mid-afternoon news.
All of southern California seems to have sighted another UFO in today's sunny, smogless skies.
The official response is the usual statement: ''Nobody knows what it is.
'' The Space Agency officials contacted by this station said they didn 't see anything and neither did the police or m*llitary bases scattered hereabouts.
ln other words, nobody saw it but the great, uninformed public.
Until somebody comes up with a photograph or home movie, today's unidentified flying object will have to be filed away with all the UFOs of the past.
Unless you got a picture of it.
No, sir.
l cannot advise you to consider going into that area.
Whoever got in there has already blown their faith in us.
lf we go in , they'll construe it as an offensive measure.
lt will only serve to deepen their suspicions and further weaken our relationship.
We don 't know if the man is alive.
They may have destroyed him instantly.
We'd be accomplishing nothing and touching off heaven knows what.
Sir, l simply do not want to start anything.
With the Zantis.
Yes, sir.
We're keeping the channel open .
lf they decide to re-establish communication , we're ready.
Yes, sir.
lf they do not communicate within the quarter-hour, sir.
God help us.
.
.
in our conception of time.
For them it could be long enough to conquer a world.
When a country allows itself to be coerced, it has to suffer the consequences.
So far the only consequence is uncertainty.
l've always felt that was one of the worst things a country could suffer.
Ben ! Ben ! Be (echoing ) Ben ? Ben ! Ben ! lf they retaliate, it means death and suffering .
.
broken bodies and broken hearts.
l can 't let everybody break.
- May l make a suggestion ? - Yes, if you can .
An emissary.
Tell them you're sending in one man , alone and unarmed, fully informed and prepared to discuss the situation with them personally.
He will arrive in an open vehicle, will advance when and only if instructed to do so.
They may keep silent after hearing that but they'll know your intentions.
Will we know theirs? Will we know whether they'll let my emissary approach? -No.
You'll have to take a risk there.
- l'll have to take the risk? What about the man l send? You and l.
You make the decision , l go.
You? l've studied history for years, Max.
Even before anyone said l had to.
Big moments, small moments, some so insignificant they barely got recorded.
But it isn 't like being there.
lt isn 't.
And l'm always conscious of it, always aware that the clean edge of participation is missing.
l'd give anything to be there, just once, alive and awake.
l suppose you'd like to have been at Hiroshima.
lf l could have helped.
The patrols will let you through.
(echoing ) Ben ? Ben ! - (stone moves) - Ben ? Ben ? Ben ? Ben ? B Ben ? (shrieks) No Ben ? (droning ) He will be unarmed and will await your permission to advance.
He will wait one hour.
lf he does not receive your permission , he will return to our base.
Permit this man to approach.
lt is vital to our security that we know your precise mood and intentions, just as it is vital to you that you know ours.
l send this man with reluctance and trepidation but l also send him with hope.
(sobs) (droning ) (screams) (echoing ) l cannot see your ship.
l will not try to.
l will await your signal to advance.
l am in radio contact with General Hart.
lf you tell him l may advance, he will inform me.
l will wait for one hour and then go.
l will wait for one hour .
.
and then go.
(droning ) ( Zanti language ) (electronic voice ) The Regent has gone after her.
- Let us take freedom! - Her? (screams) (radib buzzes) - Grave here.
Over.
- ( Hart Have you seen the car? -Nothing.
- We think there's a woman out there.
A woman ? - Shall l look around? -No.
No ? Yeu d beteheome back, SSteve - Come back? - The prisoners are going to make a break.
We have to destruct the ship.
Clear the area! Did you hear me, Steve? - Yes, l heard you .
- Get out of there.
A woman ? Over here! Come here! Wait! Over here! Come here! (droning ) ( Grave ) l wanna help you ! (sobs) l want to help you ! You can 't stay here! Where are you? Where are you? We're going to destroy this entire area! You have to get out! Let me take you out! No one will hurt you ! (she sniffs and laughs) No ono eve r h as Except myself.
(droning ) Ben l'm not afraid to die.
No, you go away.
This is one mistake l wanna deal with alone.
Go! ( Zanti screams) Don 't.
lt's all botched up now, isn 't it? l l tore all the seams apart .
.
to see what held them together.
And then l couldn 't get 'em back together again .
l l did that with a rag doll l've .
.
done it with my own life.
And now here l am.
Torn apart .
.
by my own hand.
Mine own executioner.
Come on .
(whistling and whirring ) - General Hart.
- Steve? - The Zanti ship has just taken off.
- Yes, we know.
- l had to k*ll one of them.
- You k*lled one? Did they tell you where the ship was going? No.
No communication .
- We're coming back.
- Make it fast, Steve.
We may have to destruct that ship.
( Steve ) Roger.
- Shall l get the chief? - Do you know where that ship is going? - They may be out of m*ssile range.
- Maybe they're going back to their planet.
Why would they want to do that? They can be free here.
Destruct that ship, General.
Advise the chief to destruct that ship.
General! lt's coming in our direction and it's coming close.
(whistling and whirring ) (whistling and whirring ) lt's too late, General.
lt's too close to destruct.
We'll all be blown to eternity with it.
(footsteps marching above ) Are we set, or should we just wait for the m*ssile to drop on us? That won 't be necessary.
Hey, wait a minute! Wait a minute! Flame-throwers would do it.
Hand grenades, anything.
We have some of that stuff in the stables.
lf we can get out the back way Open it! Get it off me! k*ll it! Stop it! (droning ) ( Zanti screams) ( yelling ) You ! You , you , you ! Go out the back way! Let's go! Come on ! ( Zanti screams) (droning ) ( Zanti screams) (droning stops) Well, we've done it.
We've let loose the dogs of w*r.
l wonder how they'll destroy us.
( Zanti language on radib ) (electronic voice ) This is the commander of the government of the planet Zanti.
l speak to you from Zanti.
You have destroyed the misfits.
We will not retaliate.
We never intended to.
We knew that you could not live with such aliens in your midst.
lt was always our intention that you destroy them, and their guards, who were of the same spoiled persuasion .
We chose your planet for that purpose.
We a ro ncabaple o f exec u t ng o u r ow p spee es, but yo u a ro not You are practised executioners.
We thank you .
Practised executioners.
( man ) Throughout history, various societies have tried various methods of exterminating those members who have proven their inability or unwillingness to live sanely amongst their fellow men .
The Zantis tried merely one more method, neither better nor worse than all the others .
.
neither more human nor less human than all the others Perhaps merely non -human .
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 .
.
The Outer Limits.