Johnny blinked and came back to her. "Oh, Albin?" he said. "We'reacquaintances."
ONE:He felt the cold, bracing air in his nostrils, and slowly, very slowly at first, he began to hear and understand the sounds around him. The shriek of a wounded comrade carried past, whose leg had been shattered, first sounded like the hum of bees, and finally translated itself into something like its true meaning, but he had no comprehension or sympathy for its misery.
It was only human, after all, to find the cheapest way to do necessary work. It was only human to want the profits high and the costs low. It was only human to look on other races as congenitally inferior, as less-than-man in any possible sense, as materials, in fact, to be used.This is the end.Somewhere, he told himself, there would be someone....