Arthur Leo Zagat Omnibus by Arthur Leo Zagat

Author:Arthur Leo Zagat [Zagat, Arthur Leo]
Language: eng
Format: epub, mobi
Tags: Science Fiction
Published: 2012-03-23T05:00:00+00:00

Chapter 18

THE CURTAIN FALLS

I was vaguely aware that it was Elijah who had thus broken into the tremendous drama of Man's Destiny. As vaguely I was aware of the others who shared with me this experience, but it seemed to me that someone was missing.

"There is neither nobility nor chivalry among them." Arthur's voice was something heard half dreaming, half waking. "Their rulers govern only for themselves without obligation to their subjects..." It was all dim and unreal but quite clearly there were six of us, not seven, as Orth's deep accents rumbled, "Nothing but machines they are and like machines they work only how and as long as they are ordered. There is not one who is loyal to his task or to another. Not one..."

Evelyn was phantasmal, but wraithlike as she was there still was a thrill for me in her bated whisper. "How terrible, Johnny. How very terrible. There is no love in that world, no one to love..."

They were shimmering back into the blackness; Elijah, Arthur, Louis, John Orth. Evelyn was fading as the blackness closed in; but where was Villon! He had not spoken of the absence of Beauty from the drear world of Man's future. He was gone from among us.

Was he only the first to go? Were we to vanish one by one while those who remained were engrossed in this pageant of Man's Destiny? The blackness became absolute again.

Once more we were part of the colossal drama, of the cosmic tragedy that moved swiftly--now and inevitably to its final curtain.

Man had attained the ultimate. Within the sealed shells of the Cities we had achieved perfection.

Between the Cities spread a dark and whispering wilderness. Through the gloomy forest aisles of the Wastelands prowled wild beasts that had changed but little from those that we had hunted--and feared--in the dim and shadowed past. Out there the winds still seethed through rustling leaves, streams still babbled down to an untracked sea, and the sun still shone, but none of this had any meaning for us.

'Til, in Moska, farthest north of the Cities, the Plebos in charge of the climate machines noted that these were speeding up beyond any rate known before in their effort to warm to the thermostatically predetermined degree the air drawn, through immense ducts, from outside the shell.

In accordance with regulations, this curious circumstance was reported to the Aristos of Moska. These ordered their Doctils to investigate.

The Doctils checked the climate machines and found nothing wrong with them. Their peculiar performance must be due to an unprecedented drop in the temperature of the Wasteland air. The scientists made some adjustments in the machines and requested permission of the Aristos to break the seals of the City shell, so that they might determine just what changes were occurring outside.

This permission the Aristos denied. The Doctils, they argued, were trying to cover up some mistake of their own, or perhaps were even involved in some conspiracy against the State. This accusation they held proven

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