Boys and Foreign Language Learning.Real Boys Don't Do Languages (J.Carr&A.Pauwels)
Harry Turtledove Gladiator
BćąĂ˘ÂÂawatska Helena Klucz do teozofii t.2
Turba Philosophorum
45. Britton Pamela Gra o szczćÂśÂcie
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Hohlbein, Wolfgang Enwor 03 Das Tote Land
Hack_Proofing_Your_Network_Edycja_polska_hacpro
Bond Larry DzieśÂ gniewu
Jules Verne 800 Leagues on the Amazon
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Superintendent as well.
I left reluctantly but happily.
CHAPTER VI
The Final Crisis
THE year 2466 was one of the darkest in my life. I shall pass over it briefly.
The situation I found was all but hopeless.
The captain met me personally and conveyed me to his quarters without allowing the people to see me.
Safer for everyone concerned, he muttered. I caught glimpses as we passed through the shadows. I
seemed to be looking upon ruins.
Not until the captain had disclosed the events of the century did I understand how things could have
come to such a deplorable state. And before he finished his story, I saw that I was helpless to right the
wrongs.
They ve destroyed most everything, the hard-bitten old captain rasped. And they haven t
overlooked you. They ve destroyed you completely. You are an ogre
I wasn t clear on his meaning. Dimly in the back of my mind the hilarious farewell of four centuries ago
still echoed.
The Flashaway will go through! I insisted.
They destroyed all the books, phonograph records, movie films. They broke up clocks and bells and
furniture
And I was supposed to carry this interspatial outpost of American civilization through unblemished! That
was what I had promised so gayly four centuries ago.
They even tried to break out the windows, the captain went on. Oxygen be damned! they d shout.
They were mad. You couldn t tell them anything. If they could have got into this end of the ship, they d
have murdered us and smashed the control boards to hell
I listened with bowed head.
Your son tried like the devil to turn the tide. But God, what chance did he have? The dam had busted
loose. They wanted to kill each other. They wanted to destroy each other s property and starve each
other out. No captain in the world could have stopped either faction. They had to get it out of their
systems&
He shrugged helplessly. Your son went down fighting& For a time I could hear no more. It seemed
but minutes ago that I had taken leave of the little tot.
The war if a mania of destruction and murder between two feuding factions could be called a
war had done one good thing, according to the captain. It had wiped the name of Dickinson from the
records.
Later I turned through the musty pages to make sure. There were Smiths and Sperrys and a few other
names still in the running, but no Dickinsons. Nor were there any Grimstones. My son had left no living
descendants.
To return to the captain s story, the war (he said) had degraded the bulk of the population almost to the
level of savages. Perhaps the comparison is an insult to the savage. The instruments of knowledge and
learning having been destroyed, beliefs gave way to superstitions, memories of past events degenerated
into fanciful legends.
The rebound from the war brought a terrific superstitious terror concerning death. The survivors crawled
into their shells, almost literally; the brutalities and treacheries of the past hung like storm clouds over their
imaginations.
As year after year dropped away, the people told and retold the stories of destruction to their children.
Gradually the legend twisted into a strange form in which all the guilt for the carnage was placed upon
me!
I WAS the one who had started all the killing! I the ogre, who slept in a cave somewhere in the rear of
the ship, came out once upon a time and started all the trouble!
I, the Traditions Man, dealt death with a magic weapon; I cast the spell of killing upon the Smiths and the
Dickinsons that kept them fighting until there was nothing left to fight for!
But that was years ago, I protested to the captain. Am I still an ogre? I shuddered at the very
thought.
More than ever. Stories like that don t die out in a century. They grow bigger. You ve become the
symbol of evil. I ve tried to talk the silly notion down, but it has been impossible. My own family is afraid
of you.
I listened with sickening amazement. I was the Traditions Man; or rather, the Traddy Man the bane
of every child s life.
Parents, I was told, would warn them, If you don t be good, the Traddy Man will come out of his cave
and get you!
And the Traddy Man, as every grown-up knew, could storm out of his cave without warning. He would
come with a strange gleam in his eye. That was his evil will. When the bravest, strongest men would cross
his path, he would hurl instant death at them. Then he would seize the most beautiful woman and marry
her.
Enough! I said. Call your people together. I ll dispel their false ideas
The captain shook his head wisely. He glanced at my gun.
Don t force me to disobey your orders, he said. I can believe you re not an ogre but they won t. I
know this generation. You don t. Frankly, I refuse to disturb the peace of this ship by telling the people
you have come. Nor am I willing to terrorize my family by letting them see you.
For a long while I stared silently into space.
The captain dismissed a pilot from the control room and had me come in. [ Pobierz całość w formacie PDF ]
