"We'll manage somehow. I don't know how. It doesn't really matter now.
I don't know what kind of a world we'll have when it's all over, but I
know that I'm going out to get that Ship. If it's the only thing I ever
do that's right."
* * * * *
He went out alone. He tried to force out of his mind the account Mary
had brought of the butchery back home, concentrating on one thing, and
one thing only. The Ship had to be destroyed. Standing out there in the
desert, it was the symbol of all that was wrong with a world that had
somehow, abruptly, been left behind. Matt saw it in black and white,
bitterly, a cause and effect relationship. He could neither rationalize
it or deny it. But somehow, he felt, by destroying the Ship he could
wipe out a past too horrible even to think about. He knew he had to do
it.
Matthews moved quietly through the blackness. The sandy soil was caked
and hard under his feet, and the moon had just gone under the horizon
to the West. Far ahead he could see the feeble guard lights of the
enclosure, and he stopped, panting, staring at the tiny figures pacing
back and forth. He had grown used to moving cautiously through the
desertland without making a sound; now he concentrated on silence for
his very life, and the only sound in his ears was the jogging of the
dynamite pack on his shoulders.
He circled slowly, making for the section of the fencing closest to the
ship. He knew there would be few lights, since precious gasoline had
to run generators to provide any at all. He had examined the gates as
they had opened earlier in the evening, and felt certain there was no
break-circuit alarm on the fence. Power, again. Only for the barest,
most critical essentials. And with four hundred men available, eyesight
was the best way to guard the fence--
The heavy metal wire appeared suddenly in the gloom, and he fell flat
on his face in a little gulley as the tread of a guard's feet sounded
from a distance. A small flashlight flicked on and off as the footsteps
approached. Matt hugged the ground, holding his breath as the soldier
moved silently by. Then he was up against the fence, dragging the
climbers from his pockets, strapping them onto his boots. Cutting the
heavy fencing wire was out of the question--the sound would ring out in
the stillness like a pistol shot. But the barbed wire at the top could
be cut with only a small sound. He struggled up the bare fence, a few
inches at a time.
It seemed like hours. He knew the guard's timing down to the second,
and he worked himself up, panting. It was the dog-watch; the men would
not be too alert, even men fighting for their lives--
He clung to the fence with one hand, and snapped the four barbed
strands with a hand tool, felt them curl away with a _ping_. He dragged
his body up and caught his knee on the top of the fence. In an instant
he had dropped to the ground inside the enclosure--
On his feet, he crouched and ran for the tall, dark ship. The
intervening buildings provided him cover. Down one of the concrete
streets a dozen men were huddled around a small fire near the gate,
talking and laughing. Matt slipped across the street, and saw the
ship's mammoth scaffolding rise up in the darkness.
It was a beautiful ship, tall and silvery, enshrouded like a statue
waiting to be unveiled. He glanced about the grounds around, and
his eyes widened. Great tanks of fuel stood nearby, recently-opened
cartons of supplies were everywhere in evidence. A huge pile of oxygen
cylinders formed a heavy pyramid. Matthews walked over to one of the
open crates, peered into it. Heavy material, plastic, metal--
Space suits.
* * * * *
He opened the pack on his back, drew out the bundles of dynamite
carefully, separated them from the coil of wire to the small detonator.
Somewhere in the distance he heard talking, and he hurried his
movements. Finally the deadly bundles were free.
As he stooped to duck under the first tier of the scaffolding a bright
light flashed on above him, and an alarm bell started clanging. He
cursed, and ran like a cat under the scaffolding, up to the great
silvery fin of the ship. Of course, he should have thought that if
there was no circuit alarm on the fence there surely would be one
around the ship. Far away a roar of voices rose up, and shouts, the
pummel of running feet. Frantically he thrust a dynamite charge under
one of the fins of the ship, then ran to a second and laid another
charge. A rifle cracked somewhere, and another, and he darted into the
piles of boxes, unreeling the detonator wire as he ran. There were
hoarse shouts all about him now. He ducked into a huge empty crate, not
fifty feet from the charges. Huddling down in it for protection, he
connected wires to the battery, and slammed down the plunger--
The shock wave hit him before the sound did, picking up the crate like
a pill-box hurling Matthews head over heels. The roar burst in his
ears, striking him like a palpable wall, and a shout of despair went up
among the soldiers. Matt stood up, then, staring up at the great metal
hulk. There was a heavy rushing sound and the ship faltered, shaking
like a giant aspen leaf, and slowly began to tip--
It struck the ground with a deafening crash, a grating of torn metal
and the screech of broken, twisted planks. Something exploded into
a pillar of fire--and then, in the distance Matthews saw flashes of
fire from the desert, heard rifles cracking. A soldier, running to the
fence, saw him and raised his rifle, wild eyes reflecting the fire.
Matthews dove for him, threw him back with a grunt as the rifle cracked
into the air. And then the compound was wild with the sound of running,
shouting men.
Matthews ran for a huge truck standing near the fallen ship. He
threw himself up into the cab, gunning the motor to a roar. Then the
gears grated and the truck started forward, straight for the crowd
of soldiers lining up at the fence. Matt gripped the steering wheel,
leaning as low as possible, throwing the huge truck at the fence with
all its power. The impact nearly threw him through the windshield; he
heard a grating as the wire bunged out and the fence-posts snapped.
Shifting into compound low, he drove the truck through the fence like a
bulldozer.
And then, all around him, the men from outside were pouring through the
break, screaming in triumph, rifles cracking. A horde of them came, and
the soldiers fell back, bewildered, shooting wildly, running in circles
of panic as the angry mob poured through. And then Matt felt the first
wave of shock pass through him. Wearily he dropped his head against the
dash-board, gasping for breath. He knew that the ship was taken.
* * * * *
He did not know how long he was unconscious. Fires were burning in a
dozen buildings around him, and he could hear the screams and shouts
of the raiders. Dark figures rushed wildly by, silhouetted against the
orange flames. Matt crawled down from the truck as four men ran by with
crowbars, shouting at the top of their lungs. Matt stared at the crowd
surrounding the fallen ship, shouting, raising torches high in the dark
night--
He watched for a long moment, but something flickered in his mind. It
was a picture of mad, frantic destruction on all sides of him, but
something was whispering softly in his ear. Loevy's words. Loevy's
intense face. _There is something far more precious than any one Rocket
ship here_--
Staring at the screaming mob, Matthews suddenly knew what Loevy had
meant. A wrecking crew was at work on the ship, savagely venting their
pent-up rage and fear and frustration on the inanimate metal, wrenching
hull plates off with violent screeches, ripping and slicing stanchions
with blow-torches hissing. A dozen people were streaming in and out
of the air-lock, dragging couches, springs, chunks of instrument
panel, hoards of supplies, oxygen tanks. The crowd was exultant, the
fire-light shining on a thousand wild faces, maddened by the lust of
destruction. But Matthews stared, and the feeling of sickness and
revulsion grew hard in the pit of his stomach.
He turned and started over toward the buildings. The deed was done, but
horror was still at large in the world. He didn't know what the future
held--and yet, somehow now he didn't want to join the insane fury at
work ripping the Rocket to shreds. Loevy's words nagged at his mind,
and he made his way between the burning buildings, feeling the desert
breeze turned hot in his face, until he saw the concrete and stone
administration building up ahead.
_We hope maybe we can still salvage something...._
As Matt walked through the doorway of the headquarters office he
stopped short, stiffening to the sound of a forty-five booming in the
room before him.
There was Moe, his back half to the door, holding the still smoking
automatic in his hand.
And Matt's eyes went from Moe to a long row of filing cabinets against
the far wall. Beside a partially open drawer a figure slumped against
the side of the cabinet, hands clutching at a sheaf of papers inside
the drawer. It was the Bulldog, the colonel himself. But even as Matt
stared wide-eyed, the colonel let out a rasping sigh and fell to the
floor.
He lay still beside another body--that of Loevy.
"Moe!"
Moe turned as Matt strode into the room. There was an angry look on the
old man's face.
"A spy, that's what he was--you were right, Matt. I caught him in
here with the Bulldog. They were talking and going through the files
together--looked like they were planning on skipping out. Fat chance!"
Moe laughed mirthlessly. "Whatever they were looking for they won't use
now. And nobody else will. Got a match, Matt? I'm going to burn this
place to the ground!"
Matt stared from the dead bodies to Moe and over to the cabinet with
the drawer still half open. He saw the sheaf of papers the Bulldog had
been holding just before he died. He remembered again what Loevy had
said--_there is something far more precious than any one Rocket ship
here_--
"Moe--you're missing out on the fun at the Ship!" Matt said suddenly,
intensely.
"I'll get out there. But first I got to--"
"Let me do it, Moe.--I'd enjoy seeing them two burn together. Afterall,
it isn't much of a favor to ask...."
Moe looked at him curiously for a moment, then shrugged. "Why not? If
it wasn't for you we wouldn't be in here at all tonight. Go ahead. I'll
meet you at the Ship. Make a nice big fire!"
* * * * *
And then Moe was gone and Matt stood alone in the room. He stood
and stared down at the dead bodies; Loevy's face showing fear and
frustration just as it must have when Moe's bullet found his heart; the
Colonel, slumped partially across Loevy's body, the Bulldog face in a
tight angry knot, even in death. The colonel had been a brave man, a
tough one. Matt wished suddenly that he had not had to die.
He crossed hurriedly to the file and pulled the sheaf of papers from
the drawer. A sheaf of blue papers--blue papers with white lines....
Blue-prints!
That was what Loevy had meant. The calculations had been completed, the
blue-prints made. The ship had been almost completed, and now it was
destroyed--
_But the blue-prints remained_--
Here were the hopes and dreams of centuries. Here were the plans, the
specifications, the construction plans. Fifty years of the Earth's
resources, and now the project they had planned and specified was being
destroyed in a single night, the night of the fifty-fourth of July--
He stared at the prints, his whole body trembling. He hated the Rocket,
he hated everything it had ever stood for in the old world before the
crash. It had stripped him of his home, robbed him of his future. It
had robbed the whole world of its heritage, and he hated it.
And yet, to go to the planets had always been man's great dream. The
ship could be destroyed without utterly destroying the dream. Because
someday, somehow, men could take these precious papers, sometime when
the world was sane again, and build another ship--
His mind rushed back to his boyhood days, and he remembered sharply
the lure of the open spaces he had felt then. Someday, he had dreamed,
he would build a rocket to the Moon, and go out there to explore and
discover. It hadn't mattered what he would explore, what he would
discover. All that had mattered was the urge to go. An urge he had
shared with thousands of men--
He hadn't known then that the goal would crush the world into a
smoking ruin far worse than any war. A crash that brought slow death
by starvation, a crash that wrenched the livelihood from the mouths
of millions, a crash that demoralized them and drove them back to the
caves to work and fight like savages for a few morsels of bread. He
hadn't known that--because it wasn't really necessary that it happen.
Men could, someday, find a way to go out without bankrupting the world
to do it--
He searched frantically, found a huge pasteboard box. He had seen
others moving through the torchlight with boxes filled full of loot. He
began loading the blue-prints into it, breathlessly, glancing over his
shoulder for fear someone might come in. He reached into his pocket,
drew out his revolver and placed it on the cabinet beside him as he
worked. Let them burn the buildings and tear up the Ship--but they must
not destroy these papers. Let the Rocket Project be dead, utterly dead,
torn to shreds by the people of this strange twilight world, but _the
dream need not die_--
* * * * *
He heard a sound behind him, and he whirled, staring up into Moe
Arhelger's bearded face. The old man stood there, a strange light in
his wild eyes, staring first at Matt, then at the blue papers in the
box. "I see now why you wanted to be alone!" He looked up at Matt, a
long, slow, savage look. "Dump it, Matt," he said, motioning to the box.
Matthews' arm tightened around the carton. "I want these," he said
softly. "You've got your Rocket, Moe. They'll never build another one--"
"_I said dump it._" There was a harsh edge to the old man's voice.
"We're cleaning the place out. Everything. There'll never be another
one, never, as long as the world lives."
"But what do you care about these?" Matt cried. "You'll be dead long
before they ever try Rockets again."
"They're evil!" the old man snarled. "Everything about them is evil.
They've dragged us down into the dirt, down so far we'll never be able
to crawl up again--" His rifle levelled, slowly. "Throw those prints on
the floor, Matt. Touch a match to them, right here. Or I'll burn them
for you."
Slowly Matt turned, lifted up the box. It was heavy; his eyes flicked
to the old man, and he rested the box gently on the bench for a moment.
And then he threw it in the old man's face, and snatched up the
revolver from the bench. He fired four times, and the old man doubled
over and pitched forward on his face, groaning. Matt kicked the rifle
across the room, throwing the blue-prints back into the box. Panting,
he shot out the light, and fled across the compound toward the opened
gate.
Somewhere out there Mary would be waiting. And maybe Loevy's group was
still alive, somewhere, maybe they still knew a way toward recovery now
that the Rocket was destroyed. The fifty-four days of chaos might be
over now. They would know what to do with the precious box. It would be
in safe hands until men were ready to build again.
Matt ran through the gate and into the shadows outside the compound.
In the flickering light of the flames behind him he could make out a
figure approaching.
"Matt! Oh, Matt--you're safe!"
It was Mary, and he felt a gladness sweep through him. She grabbed his
arms then, her eyes tear-filled with relief. She glanced down at the
box he held closely against him. "Matt, what's that?"
He motioned her toward the deeper shadows and a jeep he saw standing
unguarded. His voice was grim as he answered her. "It's for the future,
Mary ... the future."
Moments later they drove away into the night.