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Fantascience Digest, v. 2, issue 5, July-September, 1939
Page 7
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FANTASCIENCE DIGEST Page 7 At the very instant of collision with the ground both men broke contact with gravity and hung suspended a few inches above the stone-paved street. "According to history," commented Jon, "the palace should be the edifice to our right, see? The state chambers will be there, and the recording room, if there was one." Slowly, they floated through the crumbling portals of the building he indicated, pausing to examine the ancient registry of rooms just within the entranceway. "Hall of Records, follow X2 to to X15," Jon read aloud. "Say, doesn't it strike you as queer that the language should be the same after all these centuries?" "Not necessarily. The city, the architecture, the written language SHOULD be the same as Llyria's. After all, Zak has claimed all along that our instruction discs, our plans and equipment came from Zitra in the beginning. We Llyrians never did evolve. We just WERE. Which also gave a background to our priests' assertions that we DID spring, fully equipped mentally and physically, from the brain of Ammok. But Zak has always insisted that there must have been a mental lapse, man-made, incurred while the ones who fled Zitra were sleeping until Llyria should become habitable." As he spoke he led the way down a decaying ramp. "Ah, here's X-2, this way. And here's X-15, see? I'll look over the files and see if the survivors left any discs that might tell us what happened before the exodus. This sure is weird! Everything is so familiar!" He grounded his Y-rod and leaned over the registry table to pull out a rear file. After a brief perusal, the while Jon was strolling around the ancient marble floor examining the strangely modern equipment, he exclaimed: "Ah, here it is! Shelf 605, Slot 921! Look it up, Jon. It's tabulated under the heading 'Last Day, 10,163 B.D. (Before Doomsday).' By sainted Ammok! Look! It's spoken by Jon the Thousand & First, whoever he was. Do you suppose it could have been an ancestor of yours? If that's so, maybe you're the Thousand and Fifty-first Jon, because your ancestry started with Jon the First, according to the priests." Jon was poking about a waist high shelf in the back of the huge room. "I'd like to think so," he laughed, "but thousands of years have passed -- centuries anyway -- since Llyrian history began, and I wouldn't believe anything the priests said anymore -- not on a stack of Religiofiles." He reached back suddenly towards the rear of the shelf and pulled out a sheaf of thin discs. "Ah, Slot 920. I'll put the disc on the recorder." Methodically he placed the round object flush int a wall plate and pulled the ancient lever. Instantly an invisible ray behind the plate began to circle the disc from center to circumference, and the hidden loud-speaker picked up the waves and recited: "I am Jon the Thousand and First, last man alive on the planet Zitra. This is being recorded with the purpose of ---" on and on, an autobiography of life and death and desperate measures taken to preserve life, told in a weak, yet convincing, voice which had belonged to
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FANTASCIENCE DIGEST Page 7 At the very instant of collision with the ground both men broke contact with gravity and hung suspended a few inches above the stone-paved street. "According to history," commented Jon, "the palace should be the edifice to our right, see? The state chambers will be there, and the recording room, if there was one." Slowly, they floated through the crumbling portals of the building he indicated, pausing to examine the ancient registry of rooms just within the entranceway. "Hall of Records, follow X2 to to X15," Jon read aloud. "Say, doesn't it strike you as queer that the language should be the same after all these centuries?" "Not necessarily. The city, the architecture, the written language SHOULD be the same as Llyria's. After all, Zak has claimed all along that our instruction discs, our plans and equipment came from Zitra in the beginning. We Llyrians never did evolve. We just WERE. Which also gave a background to our priests' assertions that we DID spring, fully equipped mentally and physically, from the brain of Ammok. But Zak has always insisted that there must have been a mental lapse, man-made, incurred while the ones who fled Zitra were sleeping until Llyria should become habitable." As he spoke he led the way down a decaying ramp. "Ah, here's X-2, this way. And here's X-15, see? I'll look over the files and see if the survivors left any discs that might tell us what happened before the exodus. This sure is weird! Everything is so familiar!" He grounded his Y-rod and leaned over the registry table to pull out a rear file. After a brief perusal, the while Jon was strolling around the ancient marble floor examining the strangely modern equipment, he exclaimed: "Ah, here it is! Shelf 605, Slot 921! Look it up, Jon. It's tabulated under the heading 'Last Day, 10,163 B.D. (Before Doomsday).' By sainted Ammok! Look! It's spoken by Jon the Thousand & First, whoever he was. Do you suppose it could have been an ancestor of yours? If that's so, maybe you're the Thousand and Fifty-first Jon, because your ancestry started with Jon the First, according to the priests." Jon was poking about a waist high shelf in the back of the huge room. "I'd like to think so," he laughed, "but thousands of years have passed -- centuries anyway -- since Llyrian history began, and I wouldn't believe anything the priests said anymore -- not on a stack of Religiofiles." He reached back suddenly towards the rear of the shelf and pulled out a sheaf of thin discs. "Ah, Slot 920. I'll put the disc on the recorder." Methodically he placed the round object flush int a wall plate and pulled the ancient lever. Instantly an invisible ray behind the plate began to circle the disc from center to circumference, and the hidden loud-speaker picked up the waves and recited: "I am Jon the Thousand and First, last man alive on the planet Zitra. This is being recorded with the purpose of ---" on and on, an autobiography of life and death and desperate measures taken to preserve life, told in a weak, yet convincing, voice which had belonged to
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