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AND THE END OF THE WORLD.
“Is that right? That’s one big avocado.”
“I think I went there once,” said Pollution. “The old city of Megiddo. Just before it fell down. Nice place. Interesting royal gateway.”
War looked at the greenness around them.
“Boy,” she said, “did we take a wrong turning.”
THE GEOGRAPHY IS IMMATERIAL.
“Sorry, lord?”
IF ARMAGEDDON IS ANYWHERE, IT IS EVERYWHERE.
“That’s right,” said Famine, “we’re not talking about a few square miles of scrub and goats any more.”
There was another pause.
LET US GO.
War coughed. “It’s just that I thought that … he’d be coming with us … ?”
Death adjusted his gauntlets.
THIS, he said firmly, IS A JOB FOR THE PROFESSIONALS.
AFTERWARDS, Sgt. Thomas A. Deisenburger recalled events at the gate as having happened like this:
A large staff car drew up by the gate. It was sleek and official-looking although, afterwards, he wasn’t entirely sure why he had thought this, or why it sounded momentarily as though it were powered by motorbike engines.
Four generals got out. Again, the sergeant was a little uncertain of why he had thought this. They had proper identification. What kind of identification, admittedly, he couldn’t quite recall, but it was proper. He saluted.
And one of them said, “Surprise inspection, soldier.”
To which Sgt. Thomas A. Deisenburger replied, “Sir, I have not been informated as to the incidence of a surprise inspection at this time, sir.”
“Of course not,” said one of the generals. “That’s because it’s a surprise.”
The sergeant saluted again.
“Sir, permission to confirmate this intelligence with base command, sir,” he said, uneasily.
The tallest and thinnest of the generals strolled a little way from the group, turned his back, and folded his arms.
One of the others put a friendly arm around the sergeant’s shoulders and leaned forward in a conspiratorial way.
“Now see here—” he squinted at the sergeant’s name tag “—Deisenburger, maybe I’ll give you a break. It’s a surprise inspection, got that? Surprise. That means no getting on the horn the moment we’ve gone through, understand? And no leaving your post. Career soldier like you’ll understand, am I right?” he added. He winked. “Otherwise you’ll find yourself busted so low you’ll have to say ‘sir’ to an imp.”
Sgt. Thomas A. Deisenburger stared at him.
“Private,” hissed one of the other generals. According to her tag, her name was Waugh. Sgt. Deisenburger had never seen a female general like her before, but she was certainly an improvement.
“What?”
“Private. Not imp.”
“Yeah. That’s what I meant. Yeah. Private. Okay, soldier?”
