The skycar was a smoking melting pile, unrecognizable. Beside him lay something else, also smoking; a human outline, a framework of wire and metallic joints, bits of cloth and melting fluid, springs, some burned-out vacuum tubes, a condenser, a charred coil, other parts--all running down through a framework, a skeleton of red-hot wire. Charred hair sizzled in blue flame in the fine mesh of a metal skull. Glora Delar-- The Guard stood over Brooks. His face twisted, his voice came through a dense curtain of time and space and pain. "Been here for years, but I never suspected such a thing. I knew something was queer, but this! This is what they give us--puppets! Marionettes--wire and putty and plastic! She was my favorite actress too--my pin-up girl! just a second ago. Ha, ha, ha, funny isn't it? I fought for her a thousand times in the Lost World of Anghar, against the Armies of Vasca. This is what they give us for dreams!" Brooks managed to turn his head so he wouldn't have to look at what lay beside him. The two pretending lovers still sat shoulder to shoulder by the lake. Beautiful golden people, staring over the water, romantic lovers. They were oblivious to what had happened. The lake was colored glass, unruffled. The clock-work swans glided over the shiny surface. The perfumed wind blew unchanged through dutifully nodding leaves of the water-lilies. Above him, the great bubble over Studio City seemed to burst in a million bright glittering shards. "I'll tell everybody!" the Guard was shouting. "I'll tell all the millions so they'll know!" Then there was no sound but the wild fading cries of the Guard as Brooks closed his eyes to sleep. ... _and this is one dream, he thought, that will be my own, my own._