A Darkness in My Soul

closeness. It was such an intense desire that I grew dizzy with it.
        "So?" I managed to ask.
        "So, they didn't want to stop. They were moving, living their dreams, and loving it. They were on the edge of the thing they'd all fantasized about-conquering the world.
        They could incorporate every nation into the Alliance, and then it would be over. All the plans and subplans, plots and counterplots and counter-counterplots came together in a marvelous mosaic, and they just couldn't resist. China was occupied, but the artillery was turned, next, on South America."
        "They're neutral!"
        "Mostly," he agreed. "But the Alliance generals were bothered by South America's autonomy, especially sines Brazil had been making that space effort of theirs pay or! with the mineral ships from Titan. The continent fell in slightly less than a week-yesterday, to be exact. They were either badly prepared militarily, or had oriented their armies toward the exploration of space. They've come under the banner of the Alliance-angrily, reluctantly, but under it."
        "And all the countries already in the Alliance-they all went along with this?"
        "Not all. But in Russia, the military had taken control of the government years before. France and Italy knuckled under to the popular sentiment of their people, of the common man. Spain is a military nation to start with-no problem there."
        "But Britain and the U.S. wouldn't stand for it!" It sounded false.
        "Britain did refuse, said she wouldn't supply her own men for the Alliance endeavor. But she gave tacit approval by continuing trade and diplomatic relationships with all her allies. She's too small to really buck them, and she could only maintain her military's integrity, nothing more.
        Canada did the same, though Quebec declared independence and won it-or at least had the last time I heardand joined the militant ranks of the other Alliance nations. As for us, the U.S., we were in it from the moment the Soviet generals made the suggestion. The peace criers were right all along: a volunteer army can become a secondary government and can threaten the elected one if the time is ripe. The coup came two mornings after the Soviet proposal when it became obvious that the elected government was not going to agree to a world-wide campaign. We are now ruled by a police-army coalition, by a council of eighteen generals and admirals, and the warmeantime-goes on."
        "Who now?"
        "Australia," he said. "She has become self-sufficient, which the Alliance military advisors never have appreciated. Sydney was obliterated this afternoon and an ultimatum was delivered to the Australian government shortly thereafter."
        Neither of us spoke for a while.
        The snow continued to fall, faster than ever.
        "Dictatorship then?" I asked.
        "They won't call it that."
        "Nazism?"
        "It's a mistake to apply the terms of other eras. The same sense of chauvinism is there, and a roiling muck of nationalistic fantasies. You can bet the Alliance factions will break down in a monumental squabble once this war is over. The Russians against us, a real Armageddon. They have the taste of blood, and the old hates have been resurrected on all sides."
        "And nothing can be done?"
        He didn't answer me, aware that it was an unanswerable question. He just drove and looked morose and contributed to my flagging spirits.
        This was the age of instant history. More could happen in a week than happened in a year in the previous century. Everything moved, relentlessly, determinedly, and we were all caught up by it, swept along, either to be drowned in the swell or carried to a foreign shore on the wave crests.
        I had a feeling I was going to be one of those to drown.
        I was valuable to the war machinery. And even when the war was over, I could serve the junta with my esp, help to oppress those at home who would not appreciate the beauty of a military nation. And I didn't know whether I could do that, for I might be one of those rebelling myself. All my life I had been floundering from one emotional disaster to another, drawing in and in and in upon myself. And then I had met Melinda, had been treated by my Porter-Rainey Solid-State headshrinker, and had opened myself to the world for the first time, had tasted pure freedom and enjoyed it. The loss of my sanity within Child's mind and