City at World's End by Edmond Hamilton (english readers .txt) đ
- Author: Edmond Hamilton
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He hung up, and as soon as that contact with Carol was broken, reality slipped away from him again. He looked around the office, and it became suddenly rather horrible, because it had no longer any meaning. He had an urgent wish to get out of it, yet when he rose he stood for some while with his hands on the edge of the desk, going over Hubbleâs words in his mind, remembering how the Sun had looked, and the stars, and the sad, alien Earth, knowing that it was all impossible but unable to deny it. The long hall of time, and a shattering force⊠He wanted desperately to run away, but there was no place to run to. Presently he went down the corridor to Hubbleâs office.
They were all there, the twelve men of the staff, and Johnson. Johnson had gone by himself into a corner. He had seen what lay out there beyond the town, and the others had not. He was trying to understand it, to understand the fact and the explanation of it he had just heard. It was not a pleasant thing, to watch him try. Kenniston glanced at the others. He had worked closely with these men. He had thought he knew them all so well, having seen them under stress, in the moments when their work succeeded and the others when it did not. Now he realized that they were all strangers, to him and to each other, alone and wary with their personal fears.
Old Beitz was saying, almost truculently, âEven if it were true, you canât say exactly how long a time has passed. Not just from the stars.â
Hubble said, âIâm not an astronomer, but anyone can figure it from the tables of known star-motions, and the change in the constellations. Not exactly, no. But as close as will ever matter.â
âBut if the continuum were actually shattered, if this town has actually jumped millions of yearsâŠâ Beitzâ voice trailed off. His mouth began to twitch and he seemed suddenly bewildered by what he was saying, and he, and all of them, stood looking at Hubble in a haunted silence.
Hubble shook his head. âYou wonât really believe, until you see for yourselves. I donât blame you. But in the meantime, youâll have to accept my statement as a working hypothesis.â
Morrow cleared his throat and asked, âWhat about the people out thereâ the town? Are you going to tell them?â
âTheyâll have to know at least part of it,â Hubble said. âItâll get colder, very much colder, by night, and theyâll have to be prepared for it. But there must not be any panic. The Mayor and the Chief of Police are on their way here now, and weâll work it out with them.â
âDo they know yet, themselves?â asked Kenniston, and Hubble said, âNo.â
Johnson moved abruptly. He came up to Hubble and said, âI donât get all this scientific talk about space and time. What I want to know isâ is my boy safe?â
Hubble stared at him. âYour boy?â
âHe went out to Martinsenâs farm early, to borrow a cultivator. Itâs two miles out the north road. What about him, Mr. Hubbleâ is he safe?â
That was the secret agony that had been riding him, the one he had not voiced. Hubble said gently. âI would say that you donât have to worry about him at all, Johnson.â
Johnson nodded, but still looked worried. He said, âThanks, Mr. Hubble. Iâd better go back now. I left my wife in hysterics.â
A minute or two after he left, Kenniston heard a siren scream outside. It swung into the Lab yard and stopped. âThat,â said Hubble, âwould be the Mayor.â
A small and infirm reed to lean upon, thought Kenniston, at a time like this. There was nothing particularly wrong about Mayor Garris. He was no more bumbling, inefficient, or venal than the average mayor of any average small city. He liked banquets and oratory, he worried about the right necktie, and he was said to be a good husband and father. But Kenniston could not, somehow, picture Bertram Garris shepherding his people safely across the end of the world. He thought so even less when Garris came in, his bones well padded with the plump pink flesh of good living, his face the perfect pattern of the successful little man who is pleased with the world and his place in it. Just now he was considerably puzzled and upset, but also rather elated at the prospect of something important going on. Kimer, the Chief of Police, was another matter. He was a large angular man with a face that had seen many grimy things and had learned from them a hard kind of wisdom. Not a brilliant man, Kenniston thought, but one who could get things done. And he was worried, far more worried than the Mayor. Garris turned immediately to Hubble. It was obvious that he had a great respect for him and was proud to be on an equal footing with such an important person as one of the nationâs top atomic scientists. âIs there any news yet, Doctor Hubble? We havenât been able to get a word from outside, and the wildest rumors are going around. I was afraid at first that you might have had an explosion here in the laboratory, butâŠâ
Kimer interrupted him. âTalk is going around that an atomic bomb hit here, Doctor Hubble. Some of the people are getting scared. If enough of them get to believe it, weâll have a panic on our hands. Iâve got our officers on the streets soothing âem down, but Iâd like to have a straight story theyâll believe.â
âAtomic bomb!â said Mayor Garris. âPreposterous. Weâre all alive, and thereâs been no damage. Doctor Hubble will tell you that atomic bombsâŠâ
For the second time he was cut short. Hubble broke in sharply. âWeâre not dealing with an ordinary bomb. And the rumors are true, as far as they go.â He paused, and went on more slowly, making every word distinct, âA super-atomic was exploded an hour ago, for the first time in history, right here.â
He let that sink in. It was a lingering and painful process, and while it was going on Kenniston looked away, up through the window at the dusky sky and the sullen red Sun, and felt the knot in his stomach tighten. We were warned, he thought. We were all warned for years that we were playing with forces too big for us.
âIt didnât destroy us,â Hubble was saying. âWeâre lucky that way. But it did have certainâ effects.â
âI donât understand,â said the Mayor piteously. âI simply donâtâ Certain effects? What?â
Hubble told him, with quiet bluntness.
The Mayor and the Chief of Police of Middletown, normal men of a normal city, adjusted to life in a normal world, listening to the incredible. Listening, trying to comprehendâ trying, and failing, and rejecting it utterly.
âThatâs insane,â said Garris angrily. âMiddletown thrown into the future? Why, the very sound of it⊠What are you trying to do, Doctor Hubble?â
He said a great deal more than that. So did Kimer. But Hubble wore them down. Quietly, implacably, he pointed to the alien landscape around the town, the deepening cold, the red, aged Sun, the ceasing of all wire and radio communication from outside. He explained, sketchily, the nature of time and space, and how they might be shattered. His scientific points they could not understand. But those they took on faith, the faith which the people of the Twentieth Century had come to have in the interpreters of the complex sciences they themselves were unable to comprehend. The physical facts they understood well enough. Too well, once they were forced to it.
It got home at last. Mayor Garris sank down into a chair, and his face was no longer pink, and the flesh sagged on it. His voice was no more than a whimper when finally he asked, âWhat are we going to do?â
Hubble had an answer ready, to a part of that question, at least. âWe canât afford a panic. The people of Middletown will have to learn the truth slowly. That means that none of them must go outside the town yetâ or theyâd learn at once. Iâd suggest you announce the area outside town is possibly radioactive contaminated, and forbid anyone to leave.â
Police Chief Kimer grasped with pathetic eagerness at the necessity of coping with a problem he could comprehend. âI can put men and barricades at all the street-ends, to see to that.â
âAnd our local National Guard company is assembling now at the Armory,â put in Mayor Garris. His voice was shaky, his eyes still stunned.
Hubble asked, âWhat about the cityâs utilities?â
âEverything seems to be workingâ power, gas and water,â the Mayor answered.
They would, Kenniston thought. Middletownâs coal-steam electric generation plant, and its big watertower, and its artificial gas plant, had all come through time with them.
âThey, and all food and fuel, must be rationed,â Hubble was saying. âProclaim it as an emergency measure.â
Mayor Garris seemed to feel a little better at being told what to do. âYes. Weâll do that at once.â Then he asked, timidly, âIsnât there any way of getting in touch with the rest of the country?â
âThe rest of the country,â Hubble reminded him, âis some millions of years in the dead past. Youâll have to keep remembering that.â
âYesâ of course. I keep forgetting,â said the Mayor. He shivered, and then took refuge in the task set him. âWeâll get busy at once.â
When the car had borne the two away, Hubble looked haggardly at his silent colleagues.
âTheyâll talk, of course. But if the news spreads slowly, it wonât be so bad. Itâll give us a chance to find out a few things first.â
Crisci began to laugh, a little shrilly. âIf itâs true, this is a side-splitting joke! This whole town flung into the end of the world and not even knowing it yet! All these fifty thousand people, not guessing yet that their Cousin Agnes in Indianapolis has been dead and dust for millions of years!â
âAnd they mustnât guess,â Hubble said. âNot yet. Not until we know what we face in this future Earth.â
He went on, thinking aloud. âWe need to see whatâs out there, outside the town, before we can plan anything. Kenniston, will you get a jeep and bring it back here? Bring spare gasoline, and some warm clothing, too. Weâll need it out there. And Kenâ bring two guns.â
Kenniston walked back down Mill Street, toward the garage where he had left his car a billion years ago when such things were still important. He knew they kept a jeep there for road service, and he knew also that they would not have any need for it now because
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