by Anthology
Tony buckled his helmet down. “Now give her the gun.”
Masters stood at the auxiliary rocket control board, face pale, eyes unnaturally wide.
He made numerous minor adjustments. He slowly depressed a plunger. A heavy, vibrating roar split the night. The ship leaped. There was a sensation of teetering motion. In the vision plates, the plain moved one step nearer, as if a new slide had been inserted in a projector. The roar swept against them voluminously. The picture remained the same.
Masters wrenched up the plunger, whirled.
“You see?” he panted. “I could have told you!”
Professor Overland silenced him with a wave of the hand, pain showing in his eyes.
“I make this admission almost at the expense of my sanity,” he said slowly. “Events have shaped themselves—incredibly. Backward. In the future, far away, in a time none of us may ever see again, lies a skeleton with a ring on its finger.
“Now which causes which—the result or its cause?”
He took off his glasses, blinked, fitted them back on.
“You see,” he said carefully, “some of the things that have happened to us are a little bit incredible. There is Lieutenant Crows—memory of these events. He saw the skeleton and it brought back memories. From where? From the vast storehouse of the past? That does not seem possible. Thus far it is the major mystery, how he knew that the skeleton existed before the human race.
“Other things are perhaps more incredible. Three shipwrecks! Incredible coincidence! Then there is the incident of the ring.
It is—a ring of death. I say it who thought I would never say it. Lieutenant Crow even had some difficulty throwing it into the river. A fish swallowed it and it came back to me. Then my daughter stole it from me. And she refused to give it up, or let us know what her plans for disposition of it are.
“I do not know whether we are shaping a future that is, or whether a future that is is shaping us.
“And finally we come to the most momentous occurrence of this whole madness. An utterly ridiculous thing like two hundred or two hundred and fifty pounds.
“So we must provide a skeleton. The future that is says so.” Silence held. The roar of the river, and the growing violence of the tidal wind rushed in at them. Braker’s breath broke loose.
“He’s right. Somebody has to get off—and stay off! And it isn’t going to be the old man, him being the only one knows how to get us back.”
“That’s right,” said Yates. “It ain’t going to be the old man.” Masters shrank back. “Well, don’t look at me!” he snarled.
“I wasn’t looking at you,” Yates said mildly.
Tony’s stomach turned rigid. This was what you had to go through to choose a skeleton to die on an asteroid, its skin and flesh to wear and evaporate away and finally wind up millions of years later as a skeleton in a cave with a ring on its finger. These were some of the things you had to go through before you became that skeleton yourself—
“Laurette,” he said, “isn’t in this lottery.”
Braker turned on him. “The hell she isn’t!”
Laurette said, voice edged, “I’m in. I might be the straw that broke the camel’s back.”
Overland said painfully, “Minus a hundred and five might take us over the escarpment. Gentlemen, I’ll arrange this lottery, being the only non-participant.”
Masters snarled, eyes glittering, “You’re prejudiced in favor of your daughter!”
Overland looked at him mildly, curiously, as he would some insect. He made a clicking sound with his lips.
Masters pursued his accusation.
“We’ll cut for high man, low card to take the rap!”
“Yah!” jeered Yates. “With your deck, I suppose.”
“Anybody’s deck!” said Masters.
“All the cards were thrown out. Why weren’t yours?”
“Because I knew it would come to this.”
“Gentlemen,” said Overland wearily. “It won’t be a deck. Laurette, the ring.”
She started, paled. She said, “I haven’t got it.”
“Then,” said her father, without surprise, “we’ll wait around until it shows up.”
Braker whirled on him. “You’re crazy! We’ll draw lots anyway. Better still, we’ll find where she put the ring.”
“I buried it,” said the girl, and her eyes fluttered faintly. “You better leave it buried. You’re just proving—”
“Buried it!” blasted Masters. “When she could have used a hammer on it. When she could have melted it in an oxyacetylene torch. When she could—”
“When she could have thrown it in the river and have a fish bring it back! Shut up, Masters.” Braker’s jawline turned ominous. “Where’s the ring? The skeleton’s got to have a ring and it’s going to have one.”
“I’m not going to tell you.” She made a violent motion with her hand. “This whole thing is driving me crazy. We don’t need the ring for the lottery. Leave it there, can’t you?” Her eyes were suddenly pleading. “If you dig it up again, you’ll just complete a chain of coincidence that couldn’t possibly—”
Overland said, “We won’t use the ring in the lottery. It’ll turn up later and the skeleton will wear it. We don’t have to worry about it, Braker.”
Yates said, “Now we’re worrying about it!”
“Well, it has to be there, doesn’t it?” Braker charged.
Tony interrupted by striking a match. He applied flame to a cigarette, sucked in the nerve-soothing smoke.
His eyes were hard, watchful. “Ten hours to get out of range of the collision,” his lips said.
“Then we’ll hold the lottery now,” said Overland. He turned and left the room. Tony heard his heavy steps dragging up the ramp.
The five stood statuesque until he came back. He had a book in one hand. Five straws stuck out from between the pages, their ends making an even line parallel with the book.
Overland’s extended hand trembled slightly.
“Draw,” he said. “My daughter may draw last, so you may be sure I am not tricking anybody. Lieutenant? Braker? Anybody. And the short straw loses.”
Tony pulled a straw.
“Put it down on the floor at your feet,” said Overland, “since someone may have previously concealed a straw.”
Tony put it down, face stony.
The straw was as long as the book was wide.
Braker said, in an ugly tone, “Well, I’ll be damned!”
Braker drew a shorter one. He put it down.
Yates drew a still shorter one. His smile of bravado vanished. Sweat stood suddenly on his pale forehead.
“Go ahead, Masters!” he grated. “The law of averages says you’ll draw a long one.”
“I don’t believe in the law of averages,” said Masters sulkily. “Not on this planet, anyway—I’ll relinquish the chance to Laurette.”
“That,” said Laurette, “is sweet of you.”
She took a straw without hesitation.
Masters said nervously, “It’s short, isn’t it?”
“Shorter than mine.” Yates’ breath came out in a long sigh. “Go ahead, Masters. Only one straw left, so you don’t have to make a decision.”
Masters jerked it out.
He put it on the floor. It was long.
A cry burst from Overland’s lips. “Laurette!”
She faced their silent stares with curled lips.
“That’s that. I hope my hundred and five helps.”
Tony dropped his cigarette. “It won’t,” he snapped. “We were fools for including you.”
Suddenly he was watching Braker out of the corner of his eye, his nerves tense.
Overland said in a whisper, “How could I suggest leaving my daughter out? I said a hundred pounds might be the margin. If I’d have suggested leaving her out, you’d have accused me of favoritism.”
Braker said casually, “There’s only going to be one lottery held here.”
Yates
looked dumfounded. “Why, you blasted fool,” he said. “What if were stuck back here before the human race and there ain’t any women?”
“That’s what I mean. I thought we’d include the girl. If she was drawn, then we could ask some gentleman to volunteer in her place.”
He made a sudden motion. Tony made a faster one. His Hampton came out and up.
“Drop it!” he rasped. “I said—drop it!”
Braker’s eyes bulged. He looked at the Hampton as if he were unable to comprehend it. He cursed rackingly and dropped the automatic as if it were infested with a radioactive element. It clattered on the metal grating of the denuded floor.
A smile froze on Tony’s lips. “Now you can explain where you got that automatic.”
Braker, eyes fuming like those of a trapped animal, involuntarily shot a glance at Masters.
Tony turned his head slightly toward Masters. “It would be you,” he said bitterly.
He whirled—too late. Yates hurtled toward him, struck him in a flying tackle. Tony fell audibly. He tangled furiously with Yates. No good! Braker, face contorted with glee, leaped on top of him, struggled mightily, and then with the main force of his two gloved hands wrenched the Hampton away, rolled from Tony’s reach, then snapped himself to his feet, panting.
“Thanks, Yates!” he exclaimed. “Now get up, Crow. Get up. What a man. What a big hulking man. Weighs two hundred if he weighs an ounce.” His lips curled vengefully. “Now get up and get out!”
Overland made a step forward, falteringly.
Braker waved the weapon all-inclusively.
“Back, you,” he snarled. “This is my party, and it’s a bad-taste party, too. Yates, corner the girl. Masters, stand still—you’re my friend if you want to be. All right, lieutenant, get going—and dig! For the ring!” His face screwed up sadistically. “Can’t disappoint that skeleton, can we?”
Tony came to his feet slowly, heart pounding with what seemed like long-spaced blows against his ribs. Painfully, his eyes ran from face to face, finally centered on Laurette’s.
She surged forward against Yates’ retaining grip.
“Don’t let them do it, lieutenant,” she cried. “It’s a dirty trick. You’re the one person out of the four who doesn’t deserve it. I’ll—” She slumped back, her voice fading, her eyes burning. She laughed jerkily. “I was just remembering what you did when all the Christmas packages came tumbling down on us. You kissed me, and I slapped you, but I really wanted you to kiss me again.”
Yates laughed nastily. “Well, would you listen to that. Masters, you going to stand there and watch them two making love?”
Masters shuddered, his face graying. He whispered, “It’s all right. I wish—”
“Cut out the talk!” Braker broke in irritably.
Tony said, as if the other conversation had not intervened, “I wanted to kiss you again, too.” He held her wide, unbelieving eyes for a long moment, then dropped his and bit at his shuddering lower lip. It seemed impossible to stand here and realize that this was defeat and that there was no defense against it! He shivered with an unnatural jerk of the shoulders.
“All right,” Braker said caustically, “get going.”
Tony stood where he was. Braker and everybody else except Laurette Overland faded. Her face came out of the mist, wild, tense, lovely and lovable. Tears were coming from her eyes, and her racking sobs were muted. For a long moment, he hungrily drank in that last glimpse of her.
“Lieutenant!”
He said dully, his eyes adding what his lips did not, “Good-by, Laurette.”
He turned, went toward the air lock with dragging feet, like a man who leaves the death house only to walk toward a worse fate. He stopped at the air lock. Braker’s gun prodded him.
He stood faintly in the air lock until Braker said, “Out, copper! Get moving.”
And then he stepped through, the night and the wild wind inclosing him, the baleful light of the invading planet washing at him.
Faintly he heard Braker’s jeering voice, “So long, copper.” Then, with grim, ponderous finality, came the wheeze of the closing air lock.
He wandered into the night for a hundred feet, somehow toward the vast pile that had been extracted from the ship’s interior. He seemed lost in unreality. This was the pain that went beyond all pains, and therefore numbed.
He turned. A blast of livid flame burst from the ship’s main tube. Smaller parallels of fire suddenly ringed it. The ship moved. It slid along the plain on its runners, hugged the ground for two hundred feet, plummeting down the slope. Tony found himself tense, praying staccato curses. Another hundred feet. The escarpment loomed.
He thrust his arms forcefully upward.
“Lift!” he screamed. “Lift!”
The ship’s nose turned up, as her short wings caught the force of the wind. Then it roared up from the plain, cleared the escarpment by a scant dozen feet. The echoes of the blast muted the very howl of the wind. The echoes died. Then there was nothing but a bright jewel of light receding. Then there was—nothing.
Tony looked after it, conscious that the skin was stretched dry and tight across his cheekbones. His upflung arms dropped. A little laugh escaped his lips. He turned on his heels. The wind was so furious he could lean against it. It was night, and though the small moon this before-the-asteroids world boasted was invisible, the heavens overflowed with the baleful, pale-white glow of the invading planet.
It was still crescent. He could clearly see the ponderous immensity the lighted horns embraced. The leftward sky was occluded a full two fifth by the falling monster, and down in the seas, the shores would be overborne by tidal waves.
He stood motionless. He was at a loss in which direction to turn. An infinity of directions, and there could be no purpose in any. What type of mind could choose a direction?
That thought was lost. He moved toward the last link he had with humanity—with Laurette. He stood near the trembling pile. There was a cardboard carton, addressed to Professor Henry Overland, a short chain of canceled stamps staring up at him, pointing to the nonexistence of everything that would be. America and Christmas and the post office.
He grinned lopsidedly. The grin was lost. It was even hard to know what to do with one’s face. He was the last man on a lost world. And even though he was doomed to death in this unimaginably furious crack-up, he should have some goal, something to live for up to the very moment of death!
He uttered a soft, trapped cry, dashed his gloves to his helmeted face. Then a thought simmered. Of course! The ring! He had to find the ring, and he would. The ring went with the skeleton. And the skeleton went with the ring. Lieutenant Tony Crow—and there could be no doubt of this whatsoever—was to be that skeleton which had grinned up at him so many years ago—no, not ago, acome.
A useless task, of course. The hours went past, and he wandered across the tumbled, howling plain, traversing each square foot, hunting for a telltale, freshly turned mound of earth. He went to the very brink of the river gorge, was immersed in leaping spumes of water. Of the ring that he must have there was no trace.
Where would she have buried it? How would her mind work? Surely, she could not have heartlessly buried the ring, hiding it forever, when Tony Crow needed it for the skeleton he was to turn into!
He knew the hours were flying. Yet, better to go mad with this tangible, positive purpose, than with the intangible, negative one of waiting spinelessly for death from the lowering monster who now owned the heavens.
How convenient this was. One time-traveled. One witness to the origin of the asteroids. Similarly, one might time-travel and understand at last the unimaginable, utterly baffling process by which the solar system came into being. Nothing as simple as a collision. Or a binary sweeping past a single. Or a whirling nebula. It would be connected with the expanding universe, in some outrageously simple manner. But everything was simple once one knew the answer. For instance—
The ring! Yes, it was as simple as that.
Even Laurette Overland would be forced to yield to the result that was influencing its own cause!
Tenseness gave way to relief. One could not baffle the future. Naturally, she’d buried the ring in the cave. Unless she wanted to be perverse. But she would not be perverse in a matter like this. Future and present demanded co-operation, if there was to be a logical future!
Forcing himself against a wind that blew indiscriminately, he reached the funnel in the mountainside. The skeleton was not here, naturally. But it would be—with the necessary ring on its finger. Unbelievable how the future shaped its own past! It was as if his own skeleton, which existed millions of years acome, on which his own healthy flesh rode now, were plainly telling him what he should do.
He dug with a cold methodicity, starting from the rear of the cave. No sign of the ring, and no sign of recently turned earth. He discarded his gloves, placed them carefully to one side, and dug with a sharp rock.
No sign of the ring! The hours passed. What was he to do? His thoughts sharpened with desperation. An hour, little more, remained. Then would come the smash—and death.
He was in the cave! He, the skeleton!
He lay on his back, head propped up in locked hands. Trees and limbs and leaves hurtled by in a tempestuous wind. Soon, out in the sky, would float the remnants of this very substantial world. The millions of years would pass. A Lieutenant Tony Crow, on the trail of three criminals, would land here, look into this cave, and see his own skeleton—only he would not know it.
He lay there, tense, waiting. The wind would dig up the ring, whip it through the air. He would hear a tinkling sound. That would be the ring, striking against the wall of the cave. He would pick it up and put it on his finger. In a few moments after that would come the sound—the heavy vibration—the ear-splitting concussion—the cosmic clash—the . . . the . . . bang of a world breaking up. Bang!
He listened, waiting for the ring.
He listened, and heard a voice, screaming down the wind.
He impelled himself to his feet, in one surge of motion. He stood there, blood pounding against his temples, his lips parted and trembling. There could be no sound like that. Not when he was the last human being on this world. Not when the scream could be that of Laurette Overland, calling to him.