* * * * *
Somehow, they were holding me with them, but I knew they couldn't do
it very much longer. Around me was a gray billowing fog, and I was
starting to fall through it--
Reeta and Carleth will stay here with Fourth Stage power; they are all
right now. Durach's finished, and they have the Merger back in their
power completely now, and can use it for constructive purposes, or not
at all. It doesn't matter. I've done my job. The danger's gone.
But I want people to know.
They're telling me to concentrate. They'll help me, but I must hurry,
hurry. I've still some of the power, and they'll help me. Mind-energy.
Matter changed from one form to another by thought. MY thought and
theirs, together. Telurgy. Everything's made from the same stuff, only
the electronic patterns are different. So we're willing patterns to
change. We change some of the patterns of elements around me to another
arrangement--into a metal scroll, my story to you, my thoughts of all
that has happened, and what I've done. So you'll remember.
And they'll send it through the Barrier by the Merger.
What I'm thinking now as this tower and this city fades around me, it
will all be on that metal for you to read. Maybe they could still save
me, someway, but they can't because I guess I don't really want to go
back to being a Third-Stage guy.
I'm not like Glora and Malcolm, willing to give up so much, for a
cause. After playing god, I can't go back to drinking _krin-krin_ in
Jelahn's tavern on the North Canal of Mars.
I'd rather die this way.
Durach said you'd blow up Earth and this higher reality too, with
atomic power, because you wouldn't be able to learn to think enough to
control it. Reeta and Carleth said Durach was insane, that he was wrong.
I don't know; I hope they were right. Because it's all waiting for
you. I've seen it and I know. Beauty and greatness you can't imagine
now. I don't know when, or how, but it can be yours someday. If you can
hang on. And it'll be yours not just for a little while, like it was
for me, but forever.