that’s beautiful. As we’ll destroy ourselves, when the time comes.

“We did destroy them, Black. The explosion did it. And maybe this was the best way, quick enough, after all.”

“But what was it? What happened?”

The face beneath the bandages was grim.

“I went down with the shark. I could see from a long way off that something had gone wrong. Only a few of the cities were lighted, and one of them flickered out as we came near. And in the underwater dawn-light I could see black shapes, shambling.

“If it hadn’t been for the dark people, the slaves, I think they might have won. They were getting the machines under control again, you see. In the last city the machine might have held out, if the Others hadn’t already been in the city.

“I made the shark swim closer, in through one of the dark cities where I’d gone with the Swimmer. Once it was full of lights and spiral dwellings, beautiful, lithe people gliding among the floating orbits of their homes. Now it was dark. I couldn’t see much—thank God. But the ... black ... figures shambling through those hollow cities, among the floating bodies of the beautiful dead Swimmers, horrified me.” Gresham bit his lip and was silent.

After a while he went on.

“There was still fighting going on around the last lighted place. I made the shark swim into it. I could help, at least, that much.

“The Swimmers fought with curved blades of light that slashed through everything they touched. They were wonderful fighters—terrible and wonderful. I never saw such ferocity and such beauty. But the Others were too many for them.” His voice cracked for an instant.

“The Others were foul, degenerate, dark things,” he said, and choked over the words.

“Here, drink this,” Black commanded, holding a glass to Gresham’s lips. Gresham drank, and rested for a moment.

“That was all,” he said presently, in a calmer voice. “I watched it end. I helped as much as I could.” He grinned faintly. “It was one of the Swimmers who killed the shark, finally. They didn’t understand, of course. They must have thought it was just another of the scavenger fish who were gathering because of the blood. The curved light-blade sheered through it like steel—or fire—fire under water—and the shark died. Well, it was time for me to go, 

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