"That is what I mean," said the Engineer. "It is yours. I have no doubt that you descended in some manner from my people. Since you came here I have studied you closely. Time and again I have seen little actions and mannerisms, little mental quirks that mark you as being in some way connected with the people who created us.”
Gary tried to reason it out. The Engineers were handing the human race a heritage from an ancient people, handing them a city and a civilization already built, a city and a civilization such as the race itself would not achieve for the next many thousand years.
But there was something wrong, something that didn't click.
He remembered Herb's comment that the city looked like a place that was waiting for someone who had never come. Herb had hit upon the exact situation. This city had been built for a greater race, for a race that probably had died long before the first stone had been laid in place. A race that must have been so far advanced that it would make the human race look savage in comparison.
He tried to imagine what effect such a city and such a civilization would have upon the human race. He tried to picture the greed and hate, the political maneuvering, the fierce trade competition, the social inequality and its resultant class struggle… all of it inherent in humanity… in this white city under the three suns. Somehow the two didn't go together.
"We can't do it," he said. "We aren't ready yet. We'd just make a mess of things. We'd have too much power, too much leisure, too many possessions.
It would smash our civilization and leave us one in its stead that we could not manage. We haven't put our own civilization upon a basis that could coincide with what is here.”
Kingsley stared at him.
"But think of the scientific knowledge! Think of the cultural advantages!”
he shouted.
"Gary is right," said Caroline. "We aren't ready yet.”
"Sometime," said Gary. "Sometime in the future. When we have wired out some of the primal passions. When we have solved the great social and economic problems that plague us now. When we have learned to observe the Golden Rule… when we have lost some of the lustiness of our youth. Sometime we will be ready for this city.”
He remembered the ancient man they had met on Old Earth. He had said something about the rest of the race going away, to a far star, to a place that had been prepared for them.
That place the old man had spoken of, he realized now, was this very city.
And that meant that the Old Earth they had visited had been the real Earth… no shadow planet, but the actuality existing in the future. And the old man had spoken as if the rest of the race had gone to the city but a short while earlier. He had said that he refused to go, that he couldn't leave the Earth.
The time would be long, then. Longer than he thought. A long and bitter wait for the day when the race might safely enter into a better world, into a heritage left to them by a race that died when the solar system was born.
"You understand?" he asked the Engineer.
"I understand," the Engineer replied. "It means that we must wait for the masters that we worked for… that it will be long before they come to us.”
"You waited three billion years," Gary reminded him. "Wait a few million more for us. It won't take us long. There's a lot of good in the human race, but we aren't ready yet.”
"I think you're crazy," said Kingsley, bitterly.
"Can't you see," asked Caroline, "what the human race right now would do to this city?”
"But magnetic power," wailed Kingsley, "and all those other things. Think of how they would help us. We need power and tools and all the knowledge we can get.”
"You may take certain information with you," said the Engineer. "Whatever you think is wise. We will watch you and talk with you throughout the years, and it may be there will be times that you will wish our help.”
Gary rose from the table. His hand fell on the Engineer's broad metal shoulder.
"And in the meantime there is work for you," he said. "A city to rebuild.
The development of power stations to use the fifth-dimensional energy.
Learning how to control and use that energy. Using it to control the universe. The day will come, unless we do something about it, that our universe will run down, will die the heat death. But with the eternal power of the inter-space, we can shape and control the universe, mold it to our needs.”
It seemed that the metal man drew himself even more erect.
"It will be done," he said.
"We must work, not for Man alone, but for the entire universe," said Gary.
"That is right," said the Engineer.
Kingsley heaved himself to his feet.
"We should be leaving for Pluto," he said. "Our work here is done.”
He stepped up to the Engineer. "Before we go," he said, "I would like to shake your hand.”
"I do not understand," said the Engineer.
"It is a mark of respect," Caroline explained. "Assurance that we are friends. A sort of way to seal a pact.”
"That is fine," said the Engineer. He thrust out his hand. And then his thoughts broke. For the first time since they had met him, in this same room, there was emotion in his voice.
"We are so glad," he said. "We can talk to you and not feel so alone.
Perhaps someday I can come and visit you.”
"Be sure to do that," bellowed Herb. "I'll show you all the sights.”
"Are you coming, Gary?" asked Caroline, but Gary didn't answer.
Some day Man would come home… home to this wondrous city of white stone, to marvel at its breathtaking height, at its vastness of design, at its far-flung symbol of achievement reared against an alien sky. Home to a planet where every power and every luxury and every achievement would be his. Home to a place that had grown out of a dream… the great dream of a greater people who had died, but in dying had passed along the heritage of their life to a new-spawned solar system. And more than that, had left another heritage in the hands and brains of good stewards who, in time, would give it up, in fulfillment of their charge.
But this city and this proud achievement were not for him, nor for Caroline, nor Kingsley, nor Herb, nor Tommy. Nor for the many generations that would come after them. Not so long as Man carried the old dead weight of primal savagery and hate, not so long as he was mean and vicious and petty, could he set foot here.
Before he reached this city, Man would travel long trails of bitter dust, would know the sheer triumphs of the star-flung road. Galaxies would write new alphabets across the sky, and the print of many happenings would be etched upon the tape of time. New things would come and hold their sway and die, Great leaders would stand up and have their day and shuffle off into oblivion and silence. Creeds would rise and flourish and be sifting dust between the worlds. The night watch of stars would see great deeds, applaud great happenings, witness great defeat, weep over bitter sorrows.
"Just think," said Caroline. "We are going home.”
"Yes," said Gary. "At last, we're going home.”