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-The Project Gutenberg eBook of Rocket Summer, by Ray Bradbury
-
-This eBook is for the use of anyone anywhere in the United States and
-most other parts of the world at no cost and with almost no restrictions
-whatsoever. You may copy it, give it away or re-use it under the terms
-of the Project Gutenberg License included with this eBook or online at
-www.gutenberg.org. If you are not located in the United States, you
-will have to check the laws of the country where you are located before
-using this eBook.
-
-Title: Rocket Summer
-
-Author: Ray Bradbury
-
-Release Date: December 30, 2020 [eBook #64181]
-
-Language: English
-
-Character set encoding: UTF-8
-
-Produced by: Greg Weeks, Mary Meehan and the Online Distributed
-             Proofreading Team at http://www.pgdp.net
-
-*** START OF THE PROJECT GUTENBERG EBOOK ROCKET SUMMER ***
-
-
-
-
-                             ROCKET SUMMER
-
-                            By RAY BRADBURY
-
-           The first great rocket flight into space, bearing
-          intrepid pioneers to the Moon. The world's ecstasy
-            flared into red mob-hate when President Stanley
-             canceled the flight. How did he get that way?
-
-           [Transcriber's Note: This etext was produced from
-                      Planet Stories Spring 1947.
-         Extensive research did not uncover any evidence that
-         the U.S. copyright on this publication was renewed.]
-
-
-The crowd gathered to make a curious noise this cold grey morning
-before the scheduled Birth. They arrived in gleaming scarlet
-tumble-bugs and yellow plastic beetles, yawning and singing and ready.
-The Birth was a big thing for them.
-
-He stood alone up in his high office tower window, watching them with
-a sad impatience in his grey eyes. His name was William Stanley,
-president of the company that owned this building and all those other
-work-hangars down on the tarmac, and all that landing field stretching
-two miles off into the Jersey mists. William Stanley was thinking about
-the Birth.
-
-The Birth of _what_? Stanley's large, finely sculptured head felt
-heavier, older. Science, with a scalpel of intense flame would slash
-wide the skulls of engineers, chemists, mechanics in a titanic
-Caesarian, and out would come the Rocket!
-
-"Yezzir! Yezzir!" he heard the far-off, faint and raucous declarations
-of the vendors and hawkers. "Buy ya Rocket Toys! Buy ya Rocket Games!
-Rocket Pictures! Rocket soap! Rocket teethers for the tiny-tot! Rocket,
-Rocket, Rocket! _Hey!_"
-
-Shutting the open glassite frame before him, his thin lips drew tight.
-Morning after morning America sent her pilgrims to this shrine. They
-peered in over the translucent restraint barrier as if the Rocket were
-a caged beast.
-
-He saw one small girl drop her Rocket toy. It shattered, and was folded
-under by the moving crowd's feet.
-
-"Mr. Stanley?"
-
-"Uh? Oh, Captain Greenwald. Sorry. Forgot you were here." Stanley
-measured his slow, thoughtful steps to his clean-topped desk.
-"Captain," he sighed wearily, "you're looking at the unhappiest man
-alive." He looked at Greenwald across the desk. "That Rocket is the
-gift of a too-generous science to a civilization of adult-children
-who've fiddled with dynamite ever since Nobel invented it. They--"
-
-He got no further. The office door burst inward. A tall, work-grimed
-man strode swiftly in--all oil, all heat, all sunburnt, wrinkled
-leather skin. Rocket flame burnt in his dark, glaring eyes. He stopped
-short at Stanley's desk, breathing heavily, leaning against it.
-
-Stanley noticed the wrench in the man's fist. "Hello, Simpson."
-
-Simpson swore bitterly. "What's all this guff about you stopping the
-Rocket tomorrow?" he demanded.
-
-Stanley nodded. "This isn't a good time for it to go up."
-
-Simpson snorted. "This isn't a good time," he mimicked. Then he
-swore again. "By George, it's like telling a woman her baby's been
-still-born!"
-
-"I know it's hard to understand--"
-
-"Hard, _hell_!" shouted the man. "I'm Head Mechanic! I've worked two
-years! The others have worked, too! And the Rocket'll travel tomorrow
-or we'll know why!"
-
-Stanley crushed out his cigar, inside his fist. The room swayed
-imperceptibly in his vision. Sometimes, one wanted to use a gun--he
-shook away the thought. He kept his tongue.
-
-Simpson raged on. "Mr. Stanley, you have until three this afternoon to
-change your mind. We'll pull strings and you'll be out of your job by
-the week-end! If not--" and he said the next words very slowly, "how
-would your wife look with her head bashed in, _Mister_ Stanley?"
-
-"You can't threaten me!"
-
-The door slammed in Stanley's face. Simpson was gone.
-
-       *       *       *       *       *
-
-Captain Greenwald put out a manicured hand. On one slender finger shone
-a diamond ring. His wrist was circled by an expensive watch. His shiny
-brown eyes were invisibly cupped by contact lenses. Greenwald was past
-fifty inside; outside he seemed barely thirty. "I advise you to forget
-it, Stanley. Man's waited a million years for tomorrow."
-
-Stanley's hand shook, lighting a cigarette. "Look here, Captain, where
-_are_ you going?"
-
-"To the stars, of course."
-
-Stanley snapped out the alcohol match. "In the name of heaven, stop the
-melodrama and inferior semantics. What kind of thing is this you're
-handing the people? What'll it do to races, morals, men and women?"
-
-Greenwald laughed. "I'm only interested in reaching the Moon. Then I'll
-come back to earth, and retire, happily, and die."
-
-Stanley stood there, tall and very grey. "Does the effect of the
-introduction of the crossbow to English and French history interest
-you?"
-
-"Can't say I know much about it."
-
-"Do you recall what gunpowder's invention did to civilization?"
-
-"That's irrelevant!"
-
-"You must admit if there'd been some subjective planning with the
-auto and airplane, millions of lives would've been saved, and many
-wars prevented. An ethical code should've been written for all such
-inventions and strictly observed, or else the invention forfeited."
-
-Greenwald shook his head, grinning. "I'll let you handle that half of
-it. I'll do the traveling. I'm willing to abide by any such rules, if
-you'll draw them up and enforce them. All I want is to reach the Moon
-first. I've got to get downstairs now. We're still loading the ship,
-you know, in spite of your decree. We expect to get around you somehow.
-I'm sympathetic, of course, to your beliefs. I'll do anything you say
-except ground the Rocket. I won't get violent, but I can't vouch for
-Simpson. He's a tough man, with strong notions."
-
-They walked from the office to the dropper. Compression slid them down
-to ground level, where they stepped out, Stanley still re-emphasizing
-his beliefs. "--for centuries science has given humanity play-toys,
-ships, machines, guns, cars, and now a Rocket, all with supreme
-disregard for man's needs."
-
-"Science," announced Greenwald as they emerged onto the tarmac, "has
-produced, via private enterprise, greater amounts of goods than ever in
-history! Why, consider the medical developments!"
-
-"Yes," said Stanley doggedly, "we cure man's cancer and preserve his
-greed in a special serum. They used to say 'Starve a cold, stuff a
-fever.' Today's fever is materialism. All the things science has
-produced only touch the _Body_. When Science invents something to touch
-the Mind, I'll give it its due. No.
-
-"You cloak your voyage with romantic terminology. Outward to the stars!
-you cry! Words! What's the _fact_? Why, _why_ this rocket? Greater
-production? We have _that_! Adventure? Poor excuse to uproot Earth.
-Exploration? It _could_ wait a few years. Lebensraum? Hardly. _Why_,
-then, Captain?"
-
-"Eh?" murmured Greenwald distractedly. "Ah. Here's the Rocket, now."
-
-They walked in the incredible Rocket shadow. Stanley looked at the
-crowd beyond the barrier. "_Look_ at them. Their sex still a mixture
-of Victorian voodoo and clabbered Freud. With education needing
-reorientation, with wars threatening, with religion and philosophy
-confused, you want to jump off into space!"
-
-Stanley shook his head. "Oh, I don't doubt your sincerity, Captain. I
-just say your timing's poor. If we give them a Rocket toy to play with,
-do you honestly think they'll solve war, education, unity, thought?
-Why, they'd propel themselves away from it so quickly your head'd swim!
-Wars would be fought between worlds. But if we want more wars, let's
-have them _here_, where we can get at their sources, before we leap to
-the asteroids seeking our lost pride of race.
-
-"What little unity we _do_ have would be broken by countries and
-individuals clamoring and cut-throating for planets and satellites!"
-
-Pausing, Stanley saw the mechanics standing in the Rocket shadow,
-hating him. Outside the barrier, the crowd recognized him; their murmur
-grew to a roar of disapproval.
-
-Greenwald indicated them. "They're wondering why you waited so long
-before deciding to stop the Rocket."
-
-"Tell them I thought there'd be laws controlling it. Tell them the
-corporations played along, smiling and bobbing to me, until the Rocket
-was completed. Then they threw off their false faces and withdrew the
-legislation only this morning. Tell them that, Captain. And tell them
-the legislation I planned would've meant a slow, intelligent Rocket
-expansion over an era of three centuries. Then ask them if they think
-any business man could wait even five _minutes_."
-
-Captain Greenwald scowled. "All I want to do is prove it can be done.
-After I come back down, if I can help in any way to control the Rocket,
-I'm your man, Stanley. After I _prove_ it's possible, I don't care what
-in hell happens...."
-
-Stanley slid into his 'copter, waved morosely at the captain. The crowd
-shouted, waved its fists at him over the barrier. He sat watching their
-distorted, sullen faces. They detested him. The Rocket balloon man, the
-Rocket soap man, the tourists detested him.
-
-What was more, when his son Tommy found out, Tommy would hate him, too.
-
-       *       *       *       *       *
-
-He took his time, heading home. He let the green hills slide under.
-He set the automatic pilot and sank back into the sponge-softness,
-suspended in a humming, blissful dream. Music played. Cigarettes and
-whiskey were in reach if he desired them. Soft music. He could lapse
-back into the dreaming tide, dissolve worry, smoke, drink, chortle,
-luxuriously, sleep, forget, pull a shell of synthetic, hypnotizing
-objects in about himself.
-
-And wake ten years from today with his wife disintegrating swiftly in
-his arms. And one day see his son's skull shattered against a plastic
-wall.
-
-And his own heart whirled and burst by some vast atom power of a
-starship passing Earth far out in space!
-
-He dumped the whiskey over the side, followed it with the cigarettes.
-Finally, he clicked off the soft music.
-
-There was his home. His eyes kindled. It lay out upon a green meadow,
-far from the villages and towns, salt-white and surrounded by tapered
-sycamores. As he watched, lowering his 'copter, he saw the blonde
-streak across the lawn; that was his daughter, Alyce. Somewhere else on
-the premises his son gamboled. Neither of them feared the dark.
-
-Angrily, Stanley poured on full speed. The landscape jerked and
-vanished behind him. He wanted to be alone. He couldn't face them, yet.
-Speed was the answer. Wind whistled, roared, rushed by the hurtling
-'copter. He rammed it on. Color rose in his cheeks.
-
-There was music in the garden as he parked his 'copter in the fine blue
-plastic garage. Oh, beautiful garage, he thought, you contribute to my
-peacefulness. Oh, wonderful garage, in moments of torment, I think of
-you, and I am glad I own you.
-
-Like hell.
-
-In the kitchen, Althea was whipping food with mechanisms. Her mother
-sat with one withered ear to the latest audio drama. They glanced up,
-pleased.
-
-"Darling, so early!" she cried, kissing him. "How's the Rocket?" piped
-mother-in-law. "My, I bet you're proud!"
-
-Stanley said nothing.
-
-"Just imagine." The old woman's eyes glowed like little bulbs. "Soon
-we'll breakfast in New York and supper on Mars!"
-
-Stanley watched her for a long moment, then turned hopefully to Althea.
-"What do _you_ think?"
-
-She sensed a trap. "Well, it would be different, wouldn't it,
-vacationing our summers on Venus, winters on Mars--wouldn't it?"
-
-"Oh, good Lord," he groaned. He shut his eyes and pounded the table,
-softly. "Good Lord."
-
-"_Now_, what's wrong. What did _I_ say?" demanded Althea, bewildered.
-
-He told them about his order preventing the flight.
-
-Althea stared at him. Mother reached and snapped off the audio. "_What_
-did you say, young man?"
-
-He repeated it.
-
-Into the waiting silence came a distant "psssheeew!" rushing in from
-the dining room, flinging the kitchen door wide, his son ran in, waving
-a bright red Rocket in one grimy fist. "Psssheeew! I'm a Rocket!
-Gangway! Hi, Dad!" He swung the ship in a quick arc. "Gonna be a pilot
-when I'm sixteen! Hey." He stopped. "What's everybody standing around
-for?" He looked at Grandma. "Grammy?" He looked at his mother. "Mom?"
-And finally at his father. "Dad...?" His hands sank slowly. He read the
-look in his father's eyes. "Oh, gosh."
-
-       *       *       *       *       *
-
-By three o'clock that afternoon, he had showered and dressed in clean
-clothes. The house was very silent. Althea came and sat down in the
-living room and looked at him with hurt, stricken eyes.
-
-He thought of quoting a few figures at her. Five million people killed
-in auto accidents since the year 1920. Fifty thousand people killed
-every year, _now_, in 'copters and jet-planes. But it wasn't in the
-figures, it was in a feeling he had to make her _feel_. Maybe he could
-illustrate it to her. He picked up the hand-audio, dialed a number.
-"Hello, Smitty?"
-
-The voice on the other end said, clearly, "Oh, Mr. Stanley?"
-
-"Smitty, you're a good average man, a pleasant neighbor, a fine farmer.
-I'd like your opinion. Smitty, if you knew a war was coming, would you
-help prevent it?"
-
-Althea was watching and listening.
-
-Smitty said, "Hell, yes. Sure."
-
-"Thanks, Smitty. One more thing. What's your opinion of the Rocket?"
-
-"Greatest thing in history. Say, I heard you were going to--"
-
-Stanley did not want to get involved. He hurriedly excused himself and
-hung up. He looked directly at his wife. "Did you notice the separation
-of means from end? Smitty thinks two things. He thinks he can prevent
-war; that's one. He thinks the Rocket is a great thing; that's number
-two. But they don't match, unfortunately.
-
-"The Rocket isn't a means to happiness the way it'll be used. It's the
-wrong means. And with a wrong means you invariably wind up with a
-wrong end. A criminal seeks wealth. Does he get it? Temporarily. In the
-end, he suffers. All because he took the wrong _means_." Stanley held
-his hands out, uselessly. "How can I make you understand."
-
-Tears were in her eyes. "I understand _nothing_, and don't need to
-understand! Your job, they'll take it away from you and fly the Rocket
-anyway!"
-
-"I'll work on the legislation again, then!"
-
-"And perhaps be killed? No, please, Will."
-
-Killed. He looked at his watch. Exactly three.
-
-He answered the audio when it buzzed. "Stanley talking."
-
-"Stanley, this is Cross, at Cal-Tech."
-
-"Cross! Good Lord, it's good to hear you!"
-
-"I just heard the new-flash," said Cross. He had the same clipped,
-exact voice he'd had years ago, Stanley realized. "You're really on
-the spot this time, aren't you, Will? That's why I called. I like your
-ideas on machinery. I've always thought of machines, myself, as nothing
-but extensions of man's frustrations and emotions, his losses and
-compensations in life. We agree. But you're wrong this time, Will. You
-made a mistake today."
-
-"Now, don't _you_ start on me! You're my last friend," retorted Stanley
-tiredly. "What else could I do--destroy the rocket?"
-
-"That would be negative. No good. Give them something positive. Tell
-them to go ahead," advised Cross, pleasantly enough. "Warn them, like
-a kindly father, of the consequences. Then, when their fingers are
-burnt--"
-
-"Humanity might go down the drain," finished Stanley abruptly.
-
-"Not if you play your cards right, control the variables. There must
-be some way around them without getting yourself mangled. I'm ready to
-help when you have a plan. Think it over."
-
-"I still think blowing the damn thing up would be--"
-
-"They'd build a bigger one. And they'd persecute you and your family
-the rest of your life," explained Cross logically. "You and I may know
-that science hasn't contributed one whit to man's _mental_ progress,
-but Mr. Everyman likes his babies diapered in disposable tissues and
-likes to travel from Siberia to Johnstown like an infuriated bullet.
-You can't stop them, you can only divert them a bit."
-
-Stanley grasped the hand-audio, tightly. He listened.
-
-       *       *       *       *       *
-
-A great roar of 'copters sounded out in the afternoon sky, directly
-overhead. The house shook. Althea sprang up lithely and ran to look
-out. "I can't talk any more, Cross. I'll call you back. _They're_
-outside, waiting for me, now...."
-
-Cross' voice faded like a dream. "Remember what I tell you. Let them go
-ahead."
-
-Stanley walked to the door, opened it, stepped half through.
-
-A radio voice boomed out of the bright blue sky.
-
-"STANLEY!" it shouted. It was Simpson's voice. "STANLEY! COME OUT AND
-TALK! COME OUT AND TELL US, STANLEY! STANLEY!"
-
-Althea would not stay in. She walked with him out onto the moist green
-lawn, in the open.
-
-The heavens were flooded with 'copters whirling. The sun shook in its
-place. 'Copters hung everywhere, like huge hummingbirds, swiveling,
-whirring. Five hundred of them, at least, shadowing the lawns and
-shaking the house-tops.
-
-"OH, _THERE_ YOUR ARE, STANLEY!"
-
-Stanley shaded his eyes. His lips drew away from his teeth in a
-grimace, as he stared upward, tense and afraid.
-
-"IT'S AFTER THREE O'CLOCK, STANLEY!" came the dull boom of words.
-
-In this moment, with the spiraling 'copters suspended over his lawn,
-over his wife and children and house, over himself and his beliefs,
-Stanley swallowed, stepped back, put his hands down and let the idea
-grow within him. Yes, he would give them their rocket. He would give
-it to them. You cannot fight the children, he thought. They must have
-their green apples. If you refuse them, they will find a way around
-you. Go along with their illogical tide and make logic of it. Let the
-children eat their full of green apples, many, many green apples to
-swell their vast stomach into sickness. Yes. A slow smile touched the
-corners of his mouth, vanished. The plan was complete.
-
-The voice from the sky fell on him like an iron fist! "STANLEY! WHAT
-IS YOUR WORD NOW? HOW WILL YOU SPEAK NOW? WITH A THOUSAND POUNDS OF
-NITROGLYCERINE OVER YOUR HOME, HOW WILL YOU TALK?"
-
-The 'copters sank, malignantly. Thunder swept the lawn. Althea's
-brilliant amber skirt flared in the wash of it.
-
-"WILL THE ROCKET FLY, STANLEY?"
-
-From the corners of his aching, straining eyes, Stanley saw his son
-poised in the window, watching him.
-
-"RAISE YOUR RIGHT HAND AND WAVE IT," thundered the sky-voice. "IF THE
-ANSWER IS YES!"
-
-Stanley made them wait for it. He wetted his lips with a slow tongue,
-then, gradually, very casually, he raised his right hand, palm up, and
-waved it to the thundering sky.
-
-A torrent of exultation poured in a Niagara from the heavens. Five
-hundred audios blasted, cheered, exulted! The trees ripped and tore in
-the cyclone of energy and explosion! The noise continued as Stanley
-turned, took Althea's elbow, and steered her blindly back to the door.
-
-       *       *       *       *       *
-
-The little black-jet-plane dropped out of the midnight stars. Moments
-later, Cross was getting out of it, crossing the dark lawn, grasping
-Stanley's hand warmly. "Made good time, eh?"
-
-Inside, they downed their glasses of brandy first, then got to
-business. Stanley outlined his plan, his contacts, his psychology. He
-was pleased and excited to see an extraordinary smile of approval come
-to Cross's pink, round face. "Excellent! Now you're talking!" cried
-Cross.
-
-"I like your plan, Stanley. It places the blame right back on the
-people. They won't be able to persecute you."
-
-Stanley refilled the glasses. "I'll see to it you're on the Rocket
-tomorrow. Greenwald--he's the captain--will co-operate, I'm certain,
-when the trip is over. It's up to you and Greenwald then."
-
-They raised their glasses. "And when it's all over," observed Cross
-slowly. "We'll have the long, hard struggle to revise our educational
-system. To begin to apply the scientific method to man's thinking,
-instead of just to his machines. And when we've built a logical
-subjective world, then it'll be safe to make machines of all and any
-kinds. Here's to our plan, may it be completed." They drank.
-
-The next day two million people spread over the rolling hills, through
-the tiny Jersey towns, sitting atop bugs and plastic beetles. An
-excitement pervaded the day. The sky was a blue vacuum, the 'copters
-grounded by law. The Rocket lay gleaming and monstrous and silent.
-
-At noon, the crew ambled across the tarmac, Captain Greenwald leading.
-Cross walked among them. The huge metal doors slammed, and with a blast
-of Gargantuan flame, the Rocket heaved upward and vanished.
-
-People cheered and laughed and cried.
-
-Stanley watched his son and daughter and mother-in-law do likewise. He
-was deeply pleased to see that Althea did not join them. Hand in hand
-they watched the sky dazzlement fade. The first Rocket to the moon was
-gone. The world was drunkenly happy in its delirium.
-
-Two weeks passed slowly. Astronomers were unable to keep an eye on the
-Rocket. It was so small and unaccountable in the void between earth and
-lunar surface.
-
-Stanley slept little in the passing of the fourteen days. He was
-constantly attacked by fears and confusions of thought. He dreamed of
-the Rocket going up. He had seen men month on month walking in the
-metal shadow of their wonderful Rocket, patting it with their greasy,
-calloused hands, loving it with their quick, appreciative eyes.
-
-If for one moment you let yourself think of it, you loved it, too, for
-even though it symbolized wars and destruction, you had to admire its
-balance and slenderness of structure. With it, you could rub away the
-fog cosmetic of Venus, re-delineate its prehistorically shy face. And
-there was Mars, too. Man had been imprisoned a million years. Why not
-freedom now, at last?
-
-Then he labeled all these fantasies by their correct name, ESCAPE, and
-settled back, to wait the return of the Rocket.
-
-       *       *       *       *       *
-
-"The moon Rocket is returning! It will land this morning at nine
-o'clock!" Everybody's audio was blatting.
-
-Like a yellow seed, the Rocket dropped down the sky, to sprout roots of
-flame on which to cushion itself. It fried the tarmac and a vast deluge
-of warm air rushed across the country for miles. People sweltered
-amidst a sudden rocket summer.
-
-In his tower room, William Stanley watched, solemn and wordless.
-
-The Rocket shimmered. Across the cooling tarmac, the crowd rioted,
-bursting through the barrier, sweeping the police aside in elation.
-
-The tide halted and boiled and changed form, layer upon layer. A vast
-hush came upon it.
-
-Now the round air-lock door of the Rocket jetted out air in a
-compressed sigh.
-
-The thick door, sandwiched into the ship-hull, took two minutes to
-come outward and pull aside on its oiled hingework. The crowd pressed
-closer, flesh to flesh, eyes widened. The door was now open completely.
-A great cheer went up. The crew of the Moon Rocket stood in the
-air-lock. The cheer faded, almost instantly.
-
-[Illustration: _The crew of the Moon Rocket stood in the air-lock._]
-
-The crew of the Rocket were not exactly standing. They were hunched
-over.
-
-The captain stepped forward. Well, he didn't exactly _step_. He sort of
-dragged his feet and shambled. He made a speech.
-
-But all it sounded like, coming from his twisted, swollen lips, was,
-"Uns--rrrr--oh--god--disss--ease--unh--rrr--nnn--"
-
-He held out his grey-green fingers, raw, bleeding, for all to see.
-He lifted his face. Those red things, were they actually eyes? That
-depression, that fallen socket, had it been a nose? And where were the
-teeth in that gagging, hissing mouth? His hair was thin and grey and
-infected. He stank.
-
-The hypnotic silence was shattered. The first line of people turned and
-clawed at the second line. The second turned instinctively to claw the
-third, and so on. The television cameras caught it all.
-
-Screams, yelling, shouting. Many fell and were trampled, crushed
-under. The captain and his crew came out, gesturing, calling them to
-come back. But who would heed their rotting movements? The ridiculous
-souvenir seekers trampled each other, ripping the clothes from one
-another's backs!
-
-_A souvenir? A scab of crawling flesh, a drop of yellow fluid from
-their gaping wounds? Souvenirs for earth, buy them right here, get them
-while they last! We mail anywhere in the United States!_
-
-_The characters in order of appearance: The Captain, the astrogator,
-held sagging between two astronomers, who were followed by sixteen
-mathematicians, technicians, chemists, biologists, radio men,
-geographers and machinists. Shamble forth, gentlemen, and bring the
-brave new future with you!_
-
-The balloon vendor, in flight, jettisoned his entire stock. Rubber
-rockets floated wildly, crazily bobbling, bouncing the river of rioting
-heads until they were devoured, exploded and crumpled underfoot.
-
-Sirens sounded. Police beetles rushed to the field exits. Ten minutes
-later the tarmac was empty. No sign of captain or crew. A few shreds
-of their fetid clothing were found, partially disintegrated. An
-audio-report five minutes later stated simply, "The captain and crew
-were destroyed on orders of the health bureau! An epidemic was feared--"
-
-The sounds of riot faded. The door to Stanley's office opened, someone
-entered and stood behind him, and closed the door.
-
-       *       *       *       *       *
-
-Stanley did not turn from the window for a moment. "Fifty people
-injured, five of them critically. I'm sorry for that. But it was a
-small price for the world's security." He turned, slowly.
-
-A horrible creature stood, diseased and swollen, before him. A
-captain's uniform, filthy and torn, hung tattered from the disgusting
-flesh. The creature opened its bleeding mouth.
-
-"How was it?" asked the creature, muffledly.
-
-"Fine," said Stanley. "Did you reach the moon?"
-
-"Yes," replied the creature. "Captain Greenwald sends his regards to
-you. He says he knows we can do it again and again, any time we want,
-now, and that's all he wanted to know. He wishes you luck and tells you
-to go ahead. We landed the rocket on the way back from the moon, first
-of all, up at Fairbanks, Alaska, outside the settlement, naturally,
-during the night. Things worked as you planned them. We changed
-crews there. There was a minor fight. Simpson and the original crew,
-including Captain Greenwald, are still up there, under psycho-hypnosis.
-They'll live out their lives happily, unaware, with new names. They
-won't remember anything. We took off from Fairbanks again this morning
-with the new crew and our act all rehearsed, I think we did all right."
-
-"Where's the substitute crew now?" inquired Stanley.
-
-"Downstairs," said the creature. "Getting psychoed themselves. Getting
-mental blocs inserted, so they'll forget they ever fooled the world
-today. Then we'll send them back to their regular jobs. Can I use your
-shower?"
-
-Stanley pressed a button, a panel slid aside. "Go ahead."
-
-The creature pulled its face around the edges until it shed off into
-its hands, a green-grey pallid mask of plastic rubber. The sweating
-pink face of Cross appeared. He wriggled his fingers next, until the
-green-gray, chemically bleeding horror gloves sucked off. He tossed
-these into a wall-incinerator. "The day of the Rocket is over," he
-said, quietly. "They'll be putting your bill up before the World
-Legislature tomorrow, or I miss my guess. Carefulness, thought and
-intellect will now get a start. Humanity is saved from itself."
-
-Stanley watched Cross walk into the shower-cube, peel, and switch on
-the spray.
-
-He turned to the window again. Two billion people were thinking
-tonight. He knew what they were thinking. Outside, he heard the
-explosion as the health department blew up the great Rocket.
-
-That was all. The sound of water on the shower-tiles was a good clean
-sound.
-
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