One and Wonder by Evan Filipek

arrived.
    Frank Enlow, the lean ex-janitor and the last friend of Tyler, met me at the door of his pleasant home. He began to talk of Mr. Julian Hudd, who had survived unhurt by the ion-jets of the departing cruiser. He had established himself in the vacant house that had belonged to the murdered Hawkins couple. Frank Enlow took me to see him, there.
    Now a simple brother of the Brotherhood, we found Hudd plowing his young orchard. Walking behind a small equalizer-tractor, he was bare to the waist and brown with sun. Sweat ran in rivulets down his dusty flanks, but his paunch and his jowls and his several chins were no longer the burdens they had been. I scarcely recognized him.
    “Glad to see you, Chad.” He used my first name, as always, but now his hard handclasp had a genuine cordiality. His great booming voice seemed mellowed, happy. With an air of simple, equalitarian friendship, he invited us into his home.
    “Come along, Chad,” he urged genially. “You'll want to see the wife. I think you'll remember her—the former Miss Jane Enlow.”

     
    Wow. There was a whole lot of detail I had completely forgotten, such as the ugliness of the military minions, the size of the returning fleet, the length of time gone, the killing of the innocent young couple, and the technical detail of the equalizer wiring. Perhaps not surprising in 63 years between readings, though the essence remained. But the conclusion differs. I remember clearly how Hudd presented himself to Jane a year or two later, and presented his handmade cuckoo clock, whose bird then solemnly fluted twice. That was the end. It also seemed to me that the girl had a larger part, instead of just standing there while her father talked. The author must have reworked it subsequently to take it a bit farther, or maybe the editor had pasted that ending on, as editors do, and this is the original version restored. It works either way. I love the idea of it: unlimited free power for everyone, resulting in an ideal peaceful society. Jack Williamson did like to try for those, notably in the novel The Humanoids, originally serialized as With Folded Hands . . . And Searching Mind, another favorite of mine. Would it work in real life? I doubt it. For one thing it does not address the problem of overpopulation or diminishing resources, which will not be solved by free power. But it's a marvelous dream, the kind that forever lacked me into this genre. Okay; bugged by that changed conclusion, I did a Google search on the key words, and found them: in “Late Night Special” by Eric Frank Russell, published a year and a half later. My memory must have merged the ending of the later story with the earlier story. Sigh; I think it might have been better that way.
    —Piers

BREAKING POINT

    James Gunn
    1953

     
    This was I think my favorite science fiction story ever. I remember reading it when it was published in 1953. I was between college semesters. I had worked that day at a warehouse, baling bundles of clothing for shipment overseas, and I was tired. I relaxed by reading a magazine. The story transported me. My ideal was when a spaceship landed on a foreign planet, earth type but alien, and the spacemen first step out onto the surface. What wonders do they find there? In this story they don't even step out, yet the wonders overwhelm them. It's psychological science fiction, and it utterly thrilled me. When I finished it I paused, pondering it. Then something weird happened. My easy chair started slowly rotating in one direction, while my body slowly rotated the other way. There was no actual motion; it was all illusory. The rotations increased, until I feared I was losing my mind. I shook myself and it stopped. Then the chair and the room started shaking, like a beginning earthquake. That made me nervous anew, and I got up and walked around, and the effect ceased. I concluded that I was fatigued and the emotional excitement of the story had warped my awareness. Decades later