The Last Days of L.A.
BY GEORGE H. SMITH
Murder on a small scale may be illegal
and unpleasant, but mass murder can be
the most exhilarating thing in the world!
[Transcriber's Note: This etext was produced from
Worlds of If Science Fiction, February 1959.
Extensive research did not uncover any evidence that
the U.S. copyright on this publication was renewed.]
You are having the same recurring dream, the dream that has hauntedthe whole world since that day in 1945. The dream of the sudden flashin the night, the rising mushroom cloud and then annihilation. Youare living the nightmare again but this time it's true, you know it'strue. You can't be dreaming. The bombs are actually falling and hugefireballs are sweeping upward while seas of flame spread at supersonicspeeds to engulf the city. You feel the blast, the searing heat, youfeel your flesh melting away. You try to scream but the sound diesin your throat as your lungs shrivel. Horror makes you try again andsomehow you do scream and wake yourself up.
Once more, this one more time, it is only a dream. You lie therepanting, too weak from terror to move out of the puddle of your ownsweat. You lie there and think and your thoughts aren't very pretty.It's a week day and you ought to be down at the office turning outadvertising copy by the ton but instead you lie there and think eventhough you don't like what you're thinking. It's got to be soon. Itcan't be much longer now, not the way things are going.
You finally crawl out of bed around noon and ease your way into thekitchen. You realize that you have a hangover and since you can'tremember what you did the night before you suppose you must have beendrunk. By the time you finish one of the two quarts of beer you find inthe refrigerator you know that isn't what you need, so you put on someclothes and wander out to a bar.
After a few quick drinks you walk somewhat unsteadily out into thestreet again and head toward the place you always think of as The Bar.A wino edges up to you and asks for money to buy a sandwich and a cupof coffee.
You give him a dollar but make him promise not to spend it on anythingso foolish as food. "Liquor, brother, is the salvation of the race,"you tell him. "Believe and be saved!"
"Amen!" he says and hurries off.
You make the mistake of stopping to read the headlines on the cornerso you know you're not drunk enough yet. U. S. REJECTS NEW RUSS NOTE.MOON GUNS CAN DESTROY CITIES: KAGANOVITCH. BURMA LEADER KILLED IN FRESHUPRISING.
Just before you get to The Bar you pass an alleyway and as you glanceinto the darkness, you see a huge rat standing there staring at youwith arrogant red eyes. After a moment he walks away, unhurried andcocky. An icy chill runs down your spine. The rats will survive. Therats always survive. Maybe they are the Master Race. Something elsetugs at your memory, something you read somewhere. Oh yes, it was astatement by an oceanographer. He said that even if the H-bomb shouldannihilate every living thing on the surface of the earth, the seacreatures would be able to carry on. The rats and the fish will carryon and build a better world.
Your friends are sitting in their usual places when you get to The Bar.John Jones-Very who has the reddest, bushiest and longest beard andalso the record for stay