Part 2

He stood by a lake. The scene was like a three-dimensional photograph, the grass under him like rustling confetti. The big lake's surface was like smooth shining glass. Swans glided along the glass like clock-work. Huge water-lilies trembled with a strange regularity of motion in a slight breeze that was always the same.

Then he saw her--Glora Delar, walking along the shore, only a few feet away. A sudden weakness overcame him. His knees gave way and he dropped on a bench. He half rose, sank down. "Glora," he whispered. "Glora--"

She wasn't alone. A man walked with her. The favorite of millions of women who for some reason found Clifford Marlowe not quite perfect. Carl Brittain. In the People's Fan Magazine there had been hints that Glora Delar and Carl Brittain were more than just friends. Brooks had figured it as being more propaganda.

* * * * *

Jealousy and hate roiled to muddy fear, fear and self-inadequacy, and Brooks shrank down against the bench, hoping they wouldn't see him. He wanted to crawl into a dark corner, hide somewhere. There was no dark corner; everything was bright and white and blazing white light. Here no man could hide; no man could sleep where there was no night.

A sharp shrill whistle dug into his brain. He jerked around. Far across the expanse of park a black skycar came whirring, gliding, sliding toward him. The ultrasonic whistle sharpened painfully and he knew this was pursuit.

The pilot hadn't been so honest, maybe. But that made no difference now. It had never been anything anyway that would have gone on forever. No matter when the black skycar came for him there would never have been a place to hide. It didn't matter now, not after seeing Glora Delar and Brittain together like this.

But before the Guards picked him up--

He ran toward the lake. The skycar was an elongated shadow over the glassy water, over the glossy mechanically moving leaves of the huge water-lilies, over the backs of the clock-work swans. The whistle seemed to split his skull.

"Glora!" he shouted.

He ran toward them. Evidently they didn't hear him; she didn't turn; Brittain didn't turn. Brooks' shout faded across the lake into the glowing bubble and died.

He grabbed her arm and spun her around. Carl Brittain walked on, and Brooks stared into Glora Delar's eyes. A cold shiver went down his neck. What was the matter? Where was the warmth, the love, the passion, the worship, the dark deep longing? There was no recognition, and without that there could never be any of the other things. However the big psychogenic radial projection screens functioned, the Actors and Actresses probably were never aware of the individuals they entertained. They entertained _all_ the Workers.

_All the Workers._

"Glora, look at me! I wrote the letters, thousands of fan letters! You answered them. They were addressed to me, personally! Me, Andy Brooks!"

She said slowly. "An--dy--Brooks--"

Fifty feet away the skycar settled. Swans glided silently across the lake of glass without noticing anything; water-lilies moved in the unchanging breeze. Glora Delar's eyes were on a level with his.

"Don't you know me?" Brooks shouted wildly. "You've got to! Andy Brooks!"

She repeated his name.

"Yes, yes!" Brooks screamed. "Look at me--Andy Brooks! Remember the Lost World of Anghar! Why dream of each other? Why should we fool ourselves with dreams? I'm here now, I'm real, you're real! I've broken a Class-A Law tripley to come here to you. Glora, you've got to see me, talk to me!"

"An--ghar--"

"Listen to me, Glora! The World of Anghar. The Armies of Vasca. _Our_ dream. I was holding the castle. Vasca's fleets were laying siege. I was guarding the seawall. How could it have gone on so long without you knowing? It was our dream."

"Vas--ca--"

Sobbing frantically, Brooks turned. Two guards were leaping from their skycar. One of them was shouting, "You there, halt! We've orders to kill you if you resist."

"Get back!" Brooks cried. "Stay right there!" He lifted the neurogun. Now he wished he'd brought the blastgun; he'd have blown these Guards and their skycar in a million pieces.

The Guards came slowly toward him along the lake's edge. The swans glided unconcerned. Brooks screamed defiantly. As he fired at one Guard he threw himself to one side. The foremost Guard fell in silent paralysis. Evidently reflex action caused him to accidently discharge the meson blastgun. A blazing lethal flame mushroomed, and the green lawn crackled to black char in a long smoking swath.

Brooks fired again. The other Guard dodged behind an alien looking tree with orange leaves. Brooks ran wildly. "Glora--wait--"

* * * * *

She turned as Brooks ran past her. Her shoulder struck Carl Brittain and the Actor's body toppled into the lake. He went under without a struggle. The water opened and slid over his body again like thick shiny glue. The swans glided over the spot. Brittain didn't come up; there was no movement in the 'water'.

Brooks ran on after Glora who hadn't stopped walking. Behind him, he heard the Guard shouting. He ran past a parked skycar. Beside it, a couple sat shoulder to shoulder looking over the lake. They seemed oblivious to the commotion.

Brooks grabbed Glora's arm and dragged her toward the skycar. "You'll remember," he sobbed. "I'll see that you remember."

He slid the cowling back. As he started to drag the woman into the seat, he hesitated. He stared into her face. The face he had kissed many times in a thousand thousand adventure-dreams in a hundred imagined worlds. It was the same, but somehow, different. Her eyes returned his stare, unblinking, unrecognizing, unconcerned. Her flesh was strangely unresponsive to his hands. No resistance, no compliance, nothing at all.

The Guard was running and he was near. He stopped, leveled the meson blastgun. "I don't want to kill you," he shouted hysterically. "Give yourself up; I've never killed anything, and I don't want to kill you."

Brooks laughed crazily. "You'll kill her, too, if you fire at me. You'll kill the dreams of millions of your fellow Workers if you kill Glora Delar. Get back there now."

"You're too dangerous," the Guard said; "I've orders to kill you if you don't give yourself up, because you're insane."

Andy Brooks laughed. He tried to push Glora Delar into the skycar. He saw the Guard was going to risk a blast. He spun, dropped her body between them. It had flashed through his mind--if she died with him, then in a way, she would be his forever, only his, and she would never be shared with all the other millions of Workers.

A blazing light burned and blinded him. He fell gasping and crumbling with the deep and lasting agony. He lay in burning fog. He tried to get up. He couldn't move. Through a thickening blur he saw the Guard lurching toward him, his face white and contorted with horror.

Brooks' hand fumbled blindly, touched something. "Glora," he whispered. He slowly twisted his head. He had to do that much.

The skycar was a smoking melting pile, unrecognizable. Beside him lay something else, also smoking; a human outline, a framework of wire and metallic joints, bits of cloth and melting fluid, springs, some burned-out vacuum tubes, a condenser, a charred coil, other parts--all running down through a framework, a skeleton of red-hot wire. Charred hair sizzled in blue flame in the fine mesh of a metal skull. Glora Delar--

The Guard stood over Brooks. His face twisted, his voice came through a dense curtain of time and space and pain. "Been here for years, but I never suspected such a thing. I knew something was queer, but this! This is what they give us--puppets! Marionettes--wire and putty and plastic! She was my favorite actress too--my pin-up girl! just a second ago. Ha, ha, ha, funny isn't it? I fought for her a thousand times in the Lost World of Anghar, against the Armies of Vasca. This is what they give us for dreams!"

Brooks managed to turn his head so he wouldn't have to look at what lay beside him. The two pretending lovers still sat shoulder to shoulder by the lake. Beautiful golden people, staring over the water, romantic lovers. They were oblivious to what had happened. The lake was colored glass, unruffled. The clock-work swans glided over the shiny surface. The perfumed wind blew unchanged through dutifully nodding leaves of the water-lilies.

Above him, the great bubble over Studio City seemed to burst in a million bright glittering shards.

"I'll tell everybody!" the Guard was shouting. "I'll tell all the millions so they'll know!"

Then there was no sound but the wild fading cries of the Guard as Brooks closed his eyes to sleep.

... _and this is one dream, he thought, that will be my own, my own._