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Fantasia, v. 1, issue 3, July 1941
Page 5
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FANTASIA 5 its all the way from Florida along the Gulf, through Texas and down into Lower California. It was advanced mechanical equipment that did it. Oil prices started skyrocketing -- in reverse. Ocean Enterprises saw the handwriting on the wall, but before they collapsed, American Oil stepped in and bought them out. Finnegan had been assigned to cover that story. He slipped through cordons of flunkies and cornered Hutchison, American's new appointee to handle the subsidiary. And here's how the interview copy Finnegan handed me across the desk read: "Question by Finnegan: When was American's new drilling equipment developed? Answer by Hutchison: Almost thirty five hundred years ago. I smelled Finnegan's breath then, but it was all right. And listen to this: "Question: You mean to say that this drill was invented in another world? Answer: Not another world; another parallel plane of existence. Q: Another dimension? A: I am a native of that other place, as are most of the engineers and officials of American Oil. Q: You come from another dimension to the Earth, and brought along the For what purpose? A: To supply our own world with needed natural resources. Q: How do you intend to carry out this conquest? A: By economic means. Q: Why are you telling me all this? A: Because you asked me." I think the last question signed Finnegan's death-warrant. The invaders did not fear his story, because they knew it would be laughed at. It was, and I laughed with the rest. But Finnegan had found the Achilles' Heel; they were psychologically unable to reply untruthfully to a direct question. They couldn't tell a lie! That was the only major difference between the invaders and humanity, but it was a dangerous one. That night, when I snorted and threw Finnegan's story back in his face, he pulled up his left sleeve and showed me his arm. It had a bullet-hole in it. "He told me the truth," Finnegan said grimly, "but that didn't stop him from sending a hatchet man after me to knock me off before I could get the story in." What could I do? I gave Finnegan the can. But his story, locked away in my desk, stuck in my memory. I saw Finnegan now and then. It was touch and go for him. He was never on any one job more than a week. And he had a lot of narrow squeaks. Hit by a taxi-cab, stabbed in a saloon brawl, seriously burned when a stick of dynamite exploded in the delivery truck he was driving. Once he fell -- or was pushed -- off a ferry, but he was hauled up and sent to a hospital and treated for submersion. In the middle of the night, he got up and sneaked out of the ward where he was lying. Before morning everyone in that ward was dead from the effects of poisonous fumes which were never traced or satisfactorily explained. So I kept his story in mind. I saw American Oil growing. Atomic power burst on the world. The Atomic Trust bought out the oil companies and everything else. In five years it was a new Earth. I saw Atomic Trust absorb, little by little, every last vestige of private enterprise. There were to be government investigators, and for a while the newspapers whooped it up against monopoly. Then the newspapers cut it out, and the investigations were never heard of again. New legislation went through, and Atomic Trust was given virtually the status of a super-government, dominating the economic life of the world. Why was this possible? Because money will buy anything -- and anybody. There were exceptions, of course. But the few who could not be bought were quietly removed in any one of a number of ways. The invaders -- the conquerors -- had created new and inexhaustible sources of wealth by employment of their advanced technologies. They used this wealth to purchase a planet -- without the erstwhile inhabitants knowing what was going on. I saw the whole scheme develop. Once, early in the game, just about the time that American Oil was tightening its grip around all the mineral resources of the world, and when the government had suddenly squelched a pending investigation of methods used by the monopoly to drive smaller competitors out of business, I remembered Fin-
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FANTASIA 5 its all the way from Florida along the Gulf, through Texas and down into Lower California. It was advanced mechanical equipment that did it. Oil prices started skyrocketing -- in reverse. Ocean Enterprises saw the handwriting on the wall, but before they collapsed, American Oil stepped in and bought them out. Finnegan had been assigned to cover that story. He slipped through cordons of flunkies and cornered Hutchison, American's new appointee to handle the subsidiary. And here's how the interview copy Finnegan handed me across the desk read: "Question by Finnegan: When was American's new drilling equipment developed? Answer by Hutchison: Almost thirty five hundred years ago. I smelled Finnegan's breath then, but it was all right. And listen to this: "Question: You mean to say that this drill was invented in another world? Answer: Not another world; another parallel plane of existence. Q: Another dimension? A: I am a native of that other place, as are most of the engineers and officials of American Oil. Q: You come from another dimension to the Earth, and brought along the For what purpose? A: To supply our own world with needed natural resources. Q: How do you intend to carry out this conquest? A: By economic means. Q: Why are you telling me all this? A: Because you asked me." I think the last question signed Finnegan's death-warrant. The invaders did not fear his story, because they knew it would be laughed at. It was, and I laughed with the rest. But Finnegan had found the Achilles' Heel; they were psychologically unable to reply untruthfully to a direct question. They couldn't tell a lie! That was the only major difference between the invaders and humanity, but it was a dangerous one. That night, when I snorted and threw Finnegan's story back in his face, he pulled up his left sleeve and showed me his arm. It had a bullet-hole in it. "He told me the truth," Finnegan said grimly, "but that didn't stop him from sending a hatchet man after me to knock me off before I could get the story in." What could I do? I gave Finnegan the can. But his story, locked away in my desk, stuck in my memory. I saw Finnegan now and then. It was touch and go for him. He was never on any one job more than a week. And he had a lot of narrow squeaks. Hit by a taxi-cab, stabbed in a saloon brawl, seriously burned when a stick of dynamite exploded in the delivery truck he was driving. Once he fell -- or was pushed -- off a ferry, but he was hauled up and sent to a hospital and treated for submersion. In the middle of the night, he got up and sneaked out of the ward where he was lying. Before morning everyone in that ward was dead from the effects of poisonous fumes which were never traced or satisfactorily explained. So I kept his story in mind. I saw American Oil growing. Atomic power burst on the world. The Atomic Trust bought out the oil companies and everything else. In five years it was a new Earth. I saw Atomic Trust absorb, little by little, every last vestige of private enterprise. There were to be government investigators, and for a while the newspapers whooped it up against monopoly. Then the newspapers cut it out, and the investigations were never heard of again. New legislation went through, and Atomic Trust was given virtually the status of a super-government, dominating the economic life of the world. Why was this possible? Because money will buy anything -- and anybody. There were exceptions, of course. But the few who could not be bought were quietly removed in any one of a number of ways. The invaders -- the conquerors -- had created new and inexhaustible sources of wealth by employment of their advanced technologies. They used this wealth to purchase a planet -- without the erstwhile inhabitants knowing what was going on. I saw the whole scheme develop. Once, early in the game, just about the time that American Oil was tightening its grip around all the mineral resources of the world, and when the government had suddenly squelched a pending investigation of methods used by the monopoly to drive smaller competitors out of business, I remembered Fin-
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