I knew then that Durach had been right, in one respect anyway; when he died, the tower died. I felt it melting away around me as the mind-energy that had created it started to fade away. I felt that awful emptiness opening under me. And—this is funny—I felt like a little boy who's done something he thinks is pretty good and pretty big. But no one knows he's done anything, and he feels hurt, and he wants people to know.
I wanted people to know. I didn't want what I'd done, and everything that had happened and might happen, to be lost to people. It wouldn't be fair. Reeta and Carleth knew what I was thinking. I felt their thoughts coming back again, stronger, and stronger and growing, and joyous.
Reeta—Carleth—help me.
I don't want to be forgotten.
Somehow, they were holding me with them, but I knew they couldn't do it very much longer. Around me was a gray billowing fog, and I was starting to fall through it—
Reeta and Carleth will stay here with Fourth Stage power; they are all right now. Durach's finished, and they have the Merger back in their power completely now, and can use it for constructive purposes, or not at all. It doesn't matter. I've done my job. The danger's gone.
But I want people to know.
They're telling me to concentrate. They'll help me, but I must hurry, hurry. I've still some of the power, and they'll help me. Mind-energy. Matter changed from one form to another by thought. MY thought and theirs, together. Telurgy. Everything's made from the same stuff, only the electronic patterns are different. So we're willing patterns to change. We change some of the patterns of elements around me to another arrangement—into a metal scroll, my story to you, my thoughts of all that has happened, and what I've done. So you'll remember.
And they'll send it through the Barrier by the Merger.
What I'm thinking now as this tower and this city fades around me, it will all be on that metal for you to read. Maybe they could still save me, someway, but they can't because I guess I don't really want to go back to being a Third-Stage guy.
I'm not like Glora and Malcolm, willing to give up so much, for a cause. After playing god, I can't go back to drinkingkrin-krinin Jelahn's tavern on the North Canal of Mars.
I'd rather die this way.
Durach said you'd blow up Earth and this higher reality too, with atomic power, because you wouldn't be able to learn to think enough to control it. Reeta and Carleth said Durach was insane, that he was wrong.
I don't know; I hope they were right. Because it's all waiting for you. I've seen it and I know. Beauty and greatness you can't imagine now. I don't know when, or how, but it can be yours someday. If you can hang on. And it'll be yours not just for a little while, like it was for me, but forever.
I guess it's up to you to prove whether Durach was insane or not.
I wonder if my thoughts are being recorded now by Carleth and Reeta for you to read? I can't tell. I've lost them. Things around me are blurred, and I seem to be falling down through a gray, slow rain....
From a midnight teleaudocast by International Information Service. New York City. September 9, 1983:
Reporter:The preceding has been teleod as a special interest feature, and is not intended as a factual report, naturally. The body of the man who appeared so mysteriously, according to reports, from the atmosphere two miles above Manhattan, and crashed into the city, cannot be satisfactorily identified. The metal scroll which fell after him, and which was just narrated for your interest, is obviously the work of a quack looking for notoriety, and a possible niche in Fortean records.However, the Atomic Energy Commission has ordered a complete scanning of Uranium Pile personnel. This move is reported to be motivated by the discovery that during the afternoon, Ronal LeStrang, President of the Atomic Energy Commission, disappeared, and no trace of him has been found, up to this time.Teleflashes will be brought to you directly from the scanning rooms as soon as further reports come in regarding President LeStrang. Security Police say that perhaps foreign agents are again trying to bore from within ... though they insist that there is no proof up to this time that any foreign State is responsible for LeStrang's disappearance.And now there will be an interlude of music, brought to you by special permission of Interplanetary Cultural Foundation, through the facilities of I.I.S.'s new Teleospan System. The first number features the Martian folk dance cycle....
Reporter:The preceding has been teleod as a special interest feature, and is not intended as a factual report, naturally. The body of the man who appeared so mysteriously, according to reports, from the atmosphere two miles above Manhattan, and crashed into the city, cannot be satisfactorily identified. The metal scroll which fell after him, and which was just narrated for your interest, is obviously the work of a quack looking for notoriety, and a possible niche in Fortean records.
However, the Atomic Energy Commission has ordered a complete scanning of Uranium Pile personnel. This move is reported to be motivated by the discovery that during the afternoon, Ronal LeStrang, President of the Atomic Energy Commission, disappeared, and no trace of him has been found, up to this time.
Teleflashes will be brought to you directly from the scanning rooms as soon as further reports come in regarding President LeStrang. Security Police say that perhaps foreign agents are again trying to bore from within ... though they insist that there is no proof up to this time that any foreign State is responsible for LeStrang's disappearance.
And now there will be an interlude of music, brought to you by special permission of Interplanetary Cultural Foundation, through the facilities of I.I.S.'s new Teleospan System. The first number features the Martian folk dance cycle....
THE END