Thousand: One Hundred Sixty-One

were approaching it but it that came for us. There, the speed! There, the power! Every way forward had been filled by the body of this terrific mechanism. There was nothing for us to do. Run? Crawl? Stand! The future this prophet’s rage-honed finger pointed out was too great, too complete, too damnably thrilling to avoid. There was nowhere to go. We could not even fall back. What was behind us was past, we couldn’t go there. The future in full reverse, its engines screaming at the insult, pressed every iota of its power into the mission. Crush the present.