I thought that one over.

"Don't try to shit me, Sherman. You know I've resigned, and yet you seem to be saying there's still something we can do. If we're going to do it, you're going to have to convince me to reenlist.

He grinned at me. I swear it.

"We do have free will, Louise. It's just that it's predestined."

"I'm tired of the word games. You know I'm about ready to join the majority and jump through that window over there. You also know there's only one way you can stop me, which is to tell me what you know, and what you plan to do."

So he told me.

By then I was sure the universe could no longer surprise me, nor interest me. I was wrong. It managed to do both in no more than ten minutes.

And while he told me, the revitalizer -- which had been pumping me full of drugs and nutrients while at the same time examining my physical condition -- spoke up with the confirmation.

My apartment building never a lively place at the best of times -- was grim as Sherman and I embarked on the slidewalk. Word had gotten out that the end of the world was coming.

Not many of the drones wanted to watch it. Their bodies littered the atrium.

No, littered is too strong- a word. When you got right down to it, the Last Age couldn't even produce an impressive scene of carnage. We had maybe three hundred thousand drones in a city that was built for thirty million. The bodies were tastefully spaced. There was something almost Japanese about it: a long, Bauhaus corridor and one corpse slightly offset.

The art of bodyarrangement.

There was one couple who had made their suicide pact while in the act of coitus. I thought it was rather sweet, after all the bloody jumpers. Getting back to basics in one's last moments.

Suicide has always been our national pastime. By now, it was an epidemic. When we entered the Council Chamber we found they were down to five. No hope of making the World Series, I thought. Maybe we could play basketball.

The Nameless One was still there. I wondered if he/she/it would notice the end of the world. So was Nancy Yokohama, and Marybeth Brest, the talking head.

And of course Peter Phoenix. I figured he'd want to be there at the end to make sure everything got done properly.

The new member was Martin Coventry. He still seemed mobile. I guess the BC had called him in for lack of any really old players on the bench.

I was proud of Sherman. There is something to be said for putting on a show. He knew the outcome, yet he still played the moment for all it was worth. He went right up to their big curved table, lifted one leg, and sat down on it. Marybeth Brest scowled at him. He reached over and tousled her hair.

"You're probably wondering why I've called you together," he said.

The BC made an exception this one time, due to the infirmities of the Council. Having them come to the Fed would have involved a lot of logistical planning, since most of their bodily functions were performed by several tons of machinery. The five time capsules were sent over, and opened in their presence. I watched as they read the messages. They all said pretty much what my last time capsule had said: Do whatever he tells you.

Sherman gave them time to digest the messages. Then he stood up and faced them.

"Now. Here's what we're going to do."

Testimony of Bill Smith

So I rushed out of the hangar, alerted the FBI and the CIA and all the newspapers. The Governor called out the National Guard and the President called a special session of Congress. All the big think tanks put their best minds to work on the problem. I was debriefed endlessly, everyone wanting to know exactly what Louise Ball had said and what she had done every time I'd met her.

And if you believe any of that, you're a bigger fool than I am.

What I did was stop by a bar for a drink or four, and then call Tom Stanley. He was asleep, but said he'd listen to me. I drove to his hotel room, sat down with him, and told him the whole story. I hold him what Louise had told me, and I was amazed how different it sounded in the light of my experiences in the hangar. I told him what had happened to me, what I'd seen and heard, how I'd come around just as Louise had said I would, with a leg that hurt like hell and the beginnings of a bad cold from lying two hours on cold concrete.

"She told me she was from somewhere else Tom." I said. "Someplace where everybody dies. Somewhere a long ways from here, or a long time. I thought she was crazy. But she didn't know me! I'd just spent the night with her, and she said, "Smith, you don't know me," and I knew she wasn't kidding. She hadn't met me yet.

"And that thing ... that stunner. I didn't get to look into it very long, and they took it with them, but it didn't look like anything I'd ever seen before. And it knocked me out, but I could still breathe okay, but I couldn't even move my eyeballs. I just looked straight up. I thought they were Russians, or something. I thought they were going to kill me. But, see, they couldn't kill me, or Louise wouldn't let them ... I don't know."

I trailed off. I don't know how long I'd been going on about it. Tom had listened quietly.

"So who was she?" he finally said. "Where did she come from?"

"I don't know. But don't you see? We've got to find out."

There was a very long silence. He wouldn't look at me.

"Those watches, Tom. What about the watches? Something happened to them to make some of them go backwards, and the rest of them were forty-five minutes off. Forty-five minutes, Tom."

He looked up, then down again.

"And the tape. He said they were all dead and burned. Dead and burned. Why would he say a thing like that? Tom, are you going to ask me how much I've had to drink?"

He looked up- again.

"Something like that."

"What can I do to convince you?"

He spread his hands.

"Bill ... I want to believe you ... no, wait." He shook his head. "That's a lie. I don't want to believe you. Would you? I mean, it's a crazy story, Bill. It's crazy. But I'm willing to believe you if you show me something."

"What?"

He shrugged. "That's up to you, isn't it? Anything. Anything at all that's concrete. Put something in my hand. Otherwise, much as I hate to say this ... I think you've just flipped out about this girl. I don't know why. But why don't you go home and sleep on it? Maybe you'll think of something."

Damn, but that was an embarrassing situation. l think, in many ways, it was worse than all that followed.

There was no reason in the world why Tom should take my word on a story as ridiculous as this one. And yet, if I had a friend in the world, he was it. If I couldn't convince him, who was I going ping to convince?

The situation seemed to call for decisive action, so I took it. I bought a bottle and went back to my room and got drunk.

The next morning I started tackling it a piece at a time.

The CVR Tape: "I think that's been disposed of to everyone's satisfaction," Gordy said at the meeting that night. "Carole's analysis of DeLisle's words makes sense to me. She's got people looking into his records. He had a medical furlough five years ago. There's some evidence he might have been unstable. I don't know why you want to keep beating this one, Bill; it's a dead horse."

The consensus was we wouldn't release that part with the rest of the CVR transcript. It would be included in the official report, but that wouldn't be finished for about a year and by then nobody would give a damn.