“Farewell . . . ”
Gil’mish and the room faded from their eyes, to be replaced by the interior of the Jupiter II.
“Sheesh!” Don said, “I wish he didn’t zip us around so fast. Hope he’s going to let us lift off under our own steam!”
Robinson checked the instruments. “I think he is— but as a gentle hint, the thrusters are warm and ready for firing. It looks like there’s a course programmed into the main computer banks, too.”
“Yeah?” Don sat in his accustomed seat and punched the read-out button. Figures and words sped rapidly by on the fluorescent screen.
“How about that!” he said. “I hope everybody’s strapped in. If so, we can take off in . . . ” He studied the screen. "Mark three minutes”
“Ai-yi!” Robinson said, and slapped his forehead. “We didn’t even ask him if he’d send us home to Earth!”
A pseudo-voice filled the control room of the Jupiter.
“I would not have, even had you asked. But I kept you from thinking of it till now, so that the thought would be least painful to you since you will soon forget. Your ship is lost; I am sorry, but it must continue as it has in the past. If you are to reach home it must be from your own efforts. This is necessary for us—and it is necessary for you, though you do not understand why.”
The resonant pseudo-voice ceased.
Don and Robinson looked at each other; both sighed.
“I guess it won’t make much difference,” Robinson said. “We’re going to forget all this anyway.”
“Right,” sighed Don. “Ok, let’s check out the readings. Mark two minutes till lift-off.”
The two went through the complex checkout procedures without a hitch.
“Mark one for lift-off,” Don said.
“Okay,” said Robinson, and picked up his communicator.
“Everyone strapped in?” he asked. “Will, how is Dr. Smith? He looked a little rocky when you helped him away.”
“Oh, he’ll be okay,” Will’s voice answered. “He’s just a little depressed.”
“Depressed, is it,” Smith’s voice came, “why, you foolish boy, I had a galaxy in the palm of my hands. Of course I’m depressed. I had such plans, such plans . . . and you say I’m depressed. My boy, I shall never recover from my present downcast state of mind. Oh, the pain, the pain! All that was worthwhile in life to me is now merely ashes, bitter ashes, in my mouth, which reminds me, Mrs. Robinson. We haven’t eaten all day. Can I hope that we may have one of your excellent suppers as soon as we reach a stable course?”
Don grinned. “Hes back to normal. Let’s get out of here!”
Professor John Robinson, de facto captain of the Jupiter II, reached out to the pressure panel that would fire the main thrustors—and paused just before touching the panel.
“I don’t want to leave!” he thought desperately to himself. “We had so much, so very much, within our grasp! There’s still so much there we could use, things that could benefit humanity—incalculable treasures! I don’t want to forget—I want to remember!”
“You must press the button,” a gentle voice said in his mind.
“Yes,” his own mind answered involuntarily.
And, convulsively, he stabbed the pressure panel with his forefinger.
In the three seconds before the thrustors built up power, he thought, trying to aim his thoughts at Gil’mish, “I understand. We must not be given these things. It would destroy our race. We must earn what we gain—strive for it, losing some times, winning some others.
“Nobody’s ever given the human race anything so far, and it’s still around.”
“I guess it can pretty well manage to work out its own future.”
“Yes,” came the quiet thought, for the last time.
The thrustors caught, and the ship moved upwards, slowly, then faster and faster, as the ship rose majestically off the impervious blue translucent surface of the Central Plaza of the city of Giandahar, ten billion years old, and as the ship plunged upward through the rapidly thinning atmosphere, all memories of Giandahar faded away—all sadness, and all happiness.
And all regrets.
Lost among the infinite patchwork blacknesses between the endless stars, the lonely ship moved onwards through the trackless wildernesses of the infinite universe.
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