'Yes, yes, I know. You're sure that at any moment the lights will go out, we'll hear the rumble from above, and the chance will be lost. You underestimate me, young man. This laboratory will be intact, and protected from radiation, ten thousand years from now. You forget the lengths that a ‘mad German' will go to.' But seeing William's anguish, he said. 'Yes, we'll save Kathy. And just for the hell of it, why don't we save you, too? Since I don't seem to have any other volunteers.' William looked around him, then at the two elaborate suspension casks, the best and most advanced in the world---made by Krause's own hands, and prepared against every contingency. 'But what about you?' 'Me?' The old scientist laughed morosely. 'I'm an old man. Do you think I want to crawl out of one of these things a hundred centuries from now, and try to rebuild what's left of the world? No, William, I don't mind dying. I'm just glad the two of you came, or it would have been much harder.' And at that moment they had in fact heard a rumble, and felt the disbelieving earth tremble at the nuclear concussion. But the lights stayed on, and the caskets of life still waited. 'Well,' said Krause grimly. 'Shall we get on with it?' And the young lovers were put into suspension, with precision and good hope. William had woken the prescribed ten-thousand years later, intact, roughly one year from the present. He had lain very still for a time, not understanding, not remembering where he was. But as the truth slowly returned to him he felt no weight of sorrow or loss, but an unexpected joy at just being alive. And he thought of Kathy, so close beside him. He had saved her! She was ALIVE, and they would start again. He forced himself to remain in the soft warmth of the casket a while longer, as Krause had instructed him. Then he turned the inner handle, broke the seal, and emerged into the brave new world. But even prepared against every contingency things can go wrong, and the Devil fingers of Chaos reach into the strongest fortress. And nothing made by man can endure unchanging the ravages of Time. Something had gone wrong with Kathy's support apparatus. What it was hardly matters, and no one ever learned. But she had died at least a thousand years before, and all that the sealed cask had done was to act as a mummy's wrap, slowing, but not eliminating her body's natural decomposition. He rose to find his only love, a half-rotted corpse. McIntyre and Jennings had heard the anguished cries, as they searched through the underground vaults and passageways for the faint life-signs they had detected, and entered the laboratory to find him lying face down on the floor. Screaming. He offered no resistance as the doctor injected a sedative, and the two brought him out into the cruel light of day. His true love was buried, along with all his hopes, and he never spoke of her again. *