Part 2

"Let's face facts, Mr. President. We were _born_ and haven't died--yet." A pause. "And we can kill ourselves right here before your eyes. It'd be painless to us. We'd be unconscious. But there would be horrible convulsions and grimaces. Our bodies would be twisted and torn. They'd thresh about. The deaths you saw in the picture happened a long time ago, in outer space. You all went into hysterics at the sight of them. Our deaths now would be close and terrible to see."

The President staggered as though about to faint. There was a stirring and muttering and a jumping up along the desks. Voices cried out, in anger and fear. Arms waved and fists pounded. Hands clasped and unclasped and clawed at collars, and there was a pell mell rushing around the President. They yelled at each other and clasped each other by the shoulders, turned away and back again, and then suddenly became very still.

Now they began to step down from the raised line of desks, the President leading them, and came close to the man and woman, gathering around them in a wide half circle.

Michael and Mary were holding the lockets close to their throats. The half circle of people, with the President at its center was moving closer and closer. They were sweaty faces and red ones and dry white ones and hands were raised to seize them.

Michael put his arm around Mary's waist. He felt the trembling in her body and the waiting for death.

"Stop!" he said quietly.

They halted, in slight confusion, barely drawing back.

"If you want to see us die--just come a step closer.... And remember what'll happen to you."

The faces began turning to each other and there was an undertone of muttering and whispering. "A ghastly thing.... Instant.... Nothing to do.... Space's broken their minds.... They'll do it.... Eyes're mad.... What can we do?... What?..." The sweaty faces, the cold white ones, the flushed hot ones: all began to turn to the President, who was staring at the two before him like a man watching himself die in a mirror.

"I command you," he suddenly said, in a choked voice, "to--to give me those--lockets! It's your--duty!"

"We've only one duty, Mr. President," said Michael sharply. "To ourselves."

"You're sick. Give yourselves over to us. We'll help you."

"We've made our choice. We want an answer. Quickly! Now!"

The President's body sagged. "What--what is it you want?"

Michael threw the words. "To go beyond the force fields of the city. To go far out onto the Earth and live as long as we can, and then to die a natural death."

The half circle of faces turned to each other and muttered and whispered again. "In the name of God.... Let them go.... Contaminate us.... Like animals.... Get them out of here.... _Let_ them be finished.... Best for us all.... And them...."

There was a turning to the President again and hands thrusting him forward to within one step of Michael and Mary, who were standing there close together, as though attached.

Haltingly he said, "Go. Please go. Out onto the Earth--to die. You _will_ die. The Earth is dead out there. You'll never see the city or your people again."

"We want a ground car," said Michael. "And supplies."

"A ground car," repeated the President. "And--supplies.... Yes."

"You can give us an escort, if you want to, out beyond the first range of mountains."

"There will be no escort," said the President firmly. "No one has been allowed to go out upon the Earth or to fly above it for many hundreds of years. We know it's there. That's enough. We couldn't bear the sight of it." He took a step back. "And we can't bear the sight of you any longer. Go now. Quickly!"

Michael and Mary did not let go of the lockets as they watched the half circle of faces move backward, staring, as though at corpses that should sink to the floor.

* * * * *

It was night. The city had been lost beyond the dead mounds of Earth that rolled away behind them, like a thousand ancient tombs. The ground car sat still on a crumbling road.

Looking up through the car's driving blister, they saw the stars sunk into the blue black ocean of space; saw the path of the Milky Way along which they had rushed, while they had been searching frantically for the place of salvation.

"If any one of the other couples had made it back," said Mary, "do you think they'd be with us?"

"I think they'd either be with us," he said, "or out in space again--or in prison."

She stared ahead along the beam of headlight that stabbed out into the night over the decaying road.

"How sorry are you," she said quietly, "coming with me?"

"All I know is, if I were out in space for long without you, I'd kill myself."

"Are we going to die out here, Michael?" she said, gesturing toward the wall of night that stood at the end of the headlight, "with the land?"

He turned from her, frowning, and drove the ground car forward, watching the headlights push back the darkness.

They followed the crumbling highway all night until light crept across the bald and cracked hills. The morning sun looked down upon the desolation ten feet above the horizon when the car stopped. They sat for a long time then, looking out upon the Earth's parched and inflamed skin. In the distance a wall of mountains rose like a great pile of bleached bones. Close ahead the rolling plains were motionless waves of dead Earth with a slight breeze stirring up little swirls of dust.

"I'm getting out," she said.

"I haven't the slightest idea how much farther to go, or why," said Michael shrugging. "It's all the same. Dirt and hills and mountains and sun and dust. It's really not much different from being out in space. We live in the car just like in a space ship. We've enough concentrated supplies to last for a year. How far do we go? Why? When?"

They stepped upon the Earth and felt the warmth of the sun and strolled toward the top of the hill.

"The air smells clean," he said.

"The ground feels good. I think I'll take off my shoes." She did. "Take off your boots, Michael. Try it."

Wearily he pulled off his boots, stood in his bare feet. "It takes me back."

"Yes," she said and began walking toward the hilltop.

He followed, his boots slung around his neck. "There was a road somewhere, with the dust between my toes. Or was it a dream?"

"I guess when the past is old enough," she said, "it becomes a dream."

He watched her footprints in the dust. "God, listen to the quiet."

"I can't seem to remember so much quiet around me. There's always been the sound of a space ship, or the pumps back in the cities."

He did not answer but continued to watch her footsteps and to feel the dust squishing up between his toes. Then suddenly:

"Mary!"

She stopped, whirling around.

He was staring down at her feet.

She followed his gaze.

"It's grass!" He bent down. "Three blades."

She knelt beside him. They touched the green blades.

"They're new," he said.

They stared, like religious devotees concentrating upon some sacred object.

He rose, pulling her up with him. They hurried to the top of the hill and stood very still, looking down into a valley. There were tiny patches of green and little trees sprouting, and here and there, a pale flower. The green was in a cluster, in the center of the valley and there was a tiny glint of sunlight in its center.

"Oh!"

Her hand found his.

They ran down the gentle slope, feeling the patches of green touch their feet, smelling a new freshness in the air. And coming to the little spring, they stood beside it and watched the crystal water that trickled along the valley floor and lost itself around a bend. They saw a furry, little animal scurry away and heard the twitter of a bird and saw it resting on a slim, bending branch. They heard the buzz of a bee, saw it light on a pale flower at their feet and work at the sweetness inside.

Mary knelt down and drank from the spring.

"It's so cool. It must come from deep down."

"It does," he said. There were tears in his eyes and a tightness in his throat. "From deep down."

"We can _live_ here, Michael!"

Slowly he looked all around until his sight stopped at the bottom of a hill. "We'll build our house just beyond those rocks. We'll dig and plant and you'll have the child."

"Yes!" she said. "Oh yes!"

"And the ones back in the city will know the Earth again. Sometime we'll lead them back here and show them the Earth is coming alive." He paused. "By following what we had to do for ourselves, we've found a way to save them."

They remained kneeling in the silence beside the pool for a long time. They felt the sun on their backs and looked into the clean depth of the water deeply aware of the new life breathing all around them and of themselves absorbing it, and at the same time giving back to it the life that was their own.

There was only this quiet and breathing and warmth until Michael stood and picked up a rock and walked toward the base of the hill where he had decided to build the house.

... THE END

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