Brought artificially to consciousness by the Ewers flashing method when he was a 4-month old foetus, little Frankie had little time to ponder upon the fact that he was now a human being, not just another evolved fleshy blob who enjoyed salted water and uncut glucose. A second series of flashes came in, and imprinted in his brain was the form that all 4-month old foetuses from wealthy families had to fill in before they could proceed, or not, for five other months of blissful piscine life. After all the necessary items concerning the name, sex, marital status and profession of the subject, the questionnaire ran like this :
- Are you fully aware that your aerial life will start in approximately 5 months and end in approximately 960 months ? Answer yes (kick once) or no (kick twice).
- Are you fully aware that your birth and death, and some other moments of your aerial life, will be probably miserable passages ? Answer yes (kick once) or no (kick twice).
- Are you fully aware that you will be treated as an impotent imbecile in the first and last years of your aerial life, and possibly in between also ? Answer yes (kick once) or no (kick twice).
- Are you fully aware that there will be few moments of true happiness during your aerial life, some of them during less than 10 seconds, and that you will miss many of those as a consequence of intoxication or other mind-numbing behaviour ? Answer yes (kick once) or no (kick twice).
- Are you fully aware that your chances of becoming a success are close to nil, even though you are from a wealthy family that could afford your being brought to consciousness in order to answer this questionnaire ? Answer yes (kick once) or no (kick twice).
- Are you fully aware that your aerial life will be full of troubles, and that a vast majority of people find theirs sweet enough and worth living anyway ? Answer yes (kick once) or no (kick twice).
- If you answered Yes to all previous questions : Do you really want to proceed ? Answer yes (kick once) or no (kick twice).
Little Frankie, like most foetuses awakened by the Ewers method, was experiencing painful, spasmodic, nervous jerks in the legs. He couldn't help it, even less control it. He answered Yes to all the questions, without really considering them. Five months later,