Infinity One (26 page)

“Yas,” Duna said, “de little, ingrown, order-worshipping Order. No fishermen, no clansmen, no patriots, nobody w’at cares about his ancestors no poets, no warriors, no lovers, only intellectuals talking wit’ machines. Should not de whole of mankind meet dem and decide w’at destiny dey want for deir children?”

“With the Domination of Baikal—your country’s oppressor, Roban—their self-appointed spokesman?” Luizo challenged.

“We have fifty-eight years to change dat,” Duna said.

Then he waited.

After the tears had started to blind him, Roban stammered, “Sir, we . .. we can’t murder; we can’t take sides. It’s not in our t-t-tradirion.” His hand shook so badly that he had trouble giving Duna back knife and pistol.

The colonel holstered them and said, “I feel no need to tell w’at has happened between ns, after you give me your full report tomorrow.”

“I suppose not,” Luizo could barely be heard. “Goodnight to you. Eternally returning night.”

“How else can dere be sunrises?” Duna asked, and left the Communicators alone.

The man, who was the last, stood at the exit to the shelter that had successfully kept him alive for nearly a century. The others were dead now; the last rites of Man’s final funeral were finished. He moved out into the glaring sunlight on the top of his hill.

He wore a heavy, metallic suit that at the same time protected and supported his frail, aged body. He looked out at his world of sliding mud and slag through cataract eyes. Images danced and wavered over the barren landscape.

Finally, with an effort, he reached up and removed the bulky, transparent helmet that covered his head.

He drew in a breath of contaminated, diseased and radioactive air and exhaled it noisily.

It was his first breath of fresh air in over ninety years, and the first change from almost a century of unending boredom and repetition. His eyes might see a few more barren sunrises and sunsets, but no more ... no more.

“So it goes,” he said, and sighed.

It would be worth it

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