The Burning World
By Algis Budrys
()
About this ebook
Algis Budrys
Algis Budrys (1931–2008) was born in Königsberg, East Prussia, where his father served in the Lithuanian diplomatic corps. The family came to the United States when Budrys was five years old. A Renaissance man, he wrote stories and novels, and was an editor, critic, and reviewer, a teacher of aspiring writers, and a publisher. In the 1960s Budrys worked in public relations, advertising products such as pickles, tuna fish, and four-wheel-drive vehicles. His science fiction novels include Rogue Moon, Hard Landing, Falling Torch, and many others. His Cold War science fiction thriller Who? was adapted for the screen, and he received many award nominations for his work. Budrys was married to his wife, Edna, for almost fifty-four years.
Read more from Algis Budrys
Five Fantastic Stories Rating: 4 out of 5 stars4/5Michaelmas Rating: 3 out of 5 stars3/5Rogue Moon Rating: 3 out of 5 stars3/5Hard Landing Rating: 3 out of 5 stars3/5Riya's Foundling Rating: 0 out of 5 stars0 ratingsDesire No More Rating: 0 out of 5 stars0 ratingsThe Furious Future: Stories Rating: 4 out of 5 stars4/5The Science Fiction MEGAPACK ®: 25 Classic Science Fiction Stories Rating: 4 out of 5 stars4/5Who? Rating: 4 out of 5 stars4/5Falling Torch Rating: 3 out of 5 stars3/5The Barbarians Rating: 0 out of 5 stars0 ratingsBlack Cat Weekly #50 Rating: 0 out of 5 stars0 ratingsCitadel Rating: 0 out of 5 stars0 ratingsWall of Crystal, Eye of Night Rating: 0 out of 5 stars0 ratingsDie, Shadow! Rating: 0 out of 5 stars0 ratingsThe Burning World Rating: 0 out of 5 stars0 ratingsBlack Cat Weekly #47 Rating: 0 out of 5 stars0 ratingsAlgis Budrys Super Pack Rating: 0 out of 5 stars0 ratingsBlood on My Jets Rating: 0 out of 5 stars0 ratingsThe Stoker and the Stars Rating: 0 out of 5 stars0 ratingsBetween the Dark and the Daylight Rating: 0 out of 5 stars0 ratingsBlack Cat Weekly #112 Rating: 0 out of 5 stars0 ratings
Related to The Burning World
Related ebooks
The Burning World Rating: 0 out of 5 stars0 ratingsPride’s Harvest Rating: 3 out of 5 stars3/5Big Iron Rating: 0 out of 5 stars0 ratingsFire Bell in the Night: A Novel Rating: 4 out of 5 stars4/5FALLEN ANGEL Rating: 0 out of 5 stars0 ratingsThe Hills of Home Rating: 0 out of 5 stars0 ratingsThe Whispered Tales of Graves Grove Rating: 4 out of 5 stars4/5CalHouse I: Leonis Manor Rating: 0 out of 5 stars0 ratingsAssignment on Venus Rating: 0 out of 5 stars0 ratingsWhen We Were Young Rating: 0 out of 5 stars0 ratingsThe World's Great Snare Rating: 0 out of 5 stars0 ratingsOld Pines and Other Stories Rating: 0 out of 5 stars0 ratingsA Lantern in Her Hand Rating: 4 out of 5 stars4/5Children of the Revolution: Book 3 in The Westward Sagas Rating: 0 out of 5 stars0 ratingsAdmiral's Light Rating: 0 out of 5 stars0 ratingsEffectuators: Book 3 - "To Foreign Shores" Rating: 0 out of 5 stars0 ratingsAmy Foster: "A man's most open actions have a secret side to them." Rating: 0 out of 5 stars0 ratingsFlight of the Gazebo: Hollow, #1 Rating: 0 out of 5 stars0 ratingsGlass Houses Rating: 0 out of 5 stars0 ratingsWalk to the End of the World: Book One of 'The Holdfast Chronicles' Rating: 4 out of 5 stars4/5Millionaires' Row Rating: 0 out of 5 stars0 ratingsFirst Assignment Rating: 0 out of 5 stars0 ratingsBeware the Leaven Rating: 0 out of 5 stars0 ratingsThe Honor of the Big Snows Rating: 0 out of 5 stars0 ratingsThe Killers Above Rating: 0 out of 5 stars0 ratingsFoster, You're Dead! Rating: 0 out of 5 stars0 ratingsFreckles Rating: 4 out of 5 stars4/5Landslayer's Law Rating: 0 out of 5 stars0 ratingsTHE WORLD'S GREAT SNARE: A Thriller Classic Rating: 0 out of 5 stars0 ratingsThe Great North Rating: 0 out of 5 stars0 ratings
Science Fiction For You
The Ocean at the End of the Lane: A Novel Rating: 4 out of 5 stars4/5Kindred: A Graphic Novel Adaptation Rating: 4 out of 5 stars4/5This Is How You Lose the Time War Rating: 4 out of 5 stars4/5Wool: Book One of the Silo Series Rating: 4 out of 5 stars4/5I Who Have Never Known Men Rating: 4 out of 5 stars4/5The Alchemist: A Graphic Novel Rating: 4 out of 5 stars4/5Flowers for Algernon Rating: 4 out of 5 stars4/5The Silo Series Collection: Wool, Shift, Dust, and Silo Stories Rating: 4 out of 5 stars4/5I Am Legend Rating: 4 out of 5 stars4/5Cryptonomicon Rating: 4 out of 5 stars4/5Her Body and Other Parties: Stories Rating: 4 out of 5 stars4/5The Stories of Ray Bradbury Rating: 4 out of 5 stars4/5Camp Zero: A Novel Rating: 4 out of 5 stars4/5Shift: Book Two of the Silo Series Rating: 4 out of 5 stars4/5Rendezvous with Rama Rating: 4 out of 5 stars4/5The Institute: A Novel Rating: 4 out of 5 stars4/5Sarah J. Maas: Series Reading Order - with Summaries & Checklist Rating: 4 out of 5 stars4/5Annihilation: A Novel Rating: 4 out of 5 stars4/5The Troop Rating: 4 out of 5 stars4/5Dust: Book Three of the Silo Series Rating: 4 out of 5 stars4/5How High We Go in the Dark: A Novel Rating: 4 out of 5 stars4/5A Psalm for the Wild-Built Rating: 5 out of 5 stars5/5The Deep Rating: 4 out of 5 stars4/5Frankenstein: Original 1818 Uncensored Version Rating: 4 out of 5 stars4/5Warrior of the Light: A Manual Rating: 4 out of 5 stars4/5The Tommyknockers Rating: 3 out of 5 stars3/5Philip K. Dick's Electric Dreams Rating: 4 out of 5 stars4/5Firestarter Rating: 4 out of 5 stars4/5The Frugal Wizard’s Handbook for Surviving Medieval England: Secret Projects, #2 Rating: 4 out of 5 stars4/5The Paper Menagerie and Other Stories Rating: 4 out of 5 stars4/5
Reviews for The Burning World
0 ratings0 reviews
Book preview
The Burning World - Algis Budrys
The Burning World
by Algis Budrys
Start Publishing LLC
Copyright © 2020 by Start Publishing LLC
All rights reserved, including the right to reproduce this book or portions thereof in any form whatsoever.
First Start Publishing eBook edition.
Start Publishing is a registered trademark of Start Publishing LLC
Manufactured in the United States of America
10 9 8 7 6 5 4 3 2 1
ISBN 978-1-64974-058-8
I
They walked past rows of abandoned offices in the last government office building in the world—two men who looked vastly different, but who had crucial similarities.
Josef Kimmensen had full lips trained to set in a tight, thin line, and live, intelligent eyes. He was tall and looked thin, though he was not. He was almost sixty years old, and his youth and childhood had been such that now his body was both old for its years and still a compact, tightly-wound mechanism of bone and muscle fiber.
Or had been, until an hour ago. Then it had failed him; and his one thought now was to keep Jem Bendix from finding out how close he was to death.
Jem Bendix was a young man, about twenty-eight, with a broad, friendly grin and a spring to his step. His voice, when he spoke, was low and controlled. He was the man Josef Kimmensen had chosen to replace him as president of the Freemen’s League.
The building itself was left over from the old regime. It was perhaps unfortunate—Kimmensen had often debated the question with himself—to risk the associations that clung to this building. But a building is only a building, and the dust of years chokes the past to death. It was better to work here than to build a new set of offices. It might seem a waste to leave a still-new building, and that might tend to make people linger after their jobs had finished themselves. The pile of cracking bricks and peeled marble facings would be falling in a heap soon, and the small staff that still worked here couldn’t help but be conscious of it. It was probably a very useful influence.
They walked through the domed rotunda, with its columns, echoing alcoves, and the jag-topped pedestals where the old regime’s statues had been sledge-hammered away. The rotunda was gloomy, its skylight buried under rain-borne dust and drifted leaves from the trees on the mountainside. There was water puddled on the rotten marble floor under a place where the skylight’s leading was gone.
Kimmensen had a few words with the mail clerk, and then he and Bendix walked out to the plaza, where his plane was parked. Around the plaza, the undergrowth was creeping closer every year, and vine runners were obscuring the hard precision of the concrete’s edge. On all sides, the mountains towered up toward the pale sun, their steep flanks cloaked in snow and thick stands of bluish evergreen. There was a light breeze in the crystalline air, and a tang of fir sap.
Kimmensen breathed in deeply. He loved these mountains. He had been born in the warm lowlands, where a man’s blood did not stir so easily nor surge so strongly through his veins. Even the air here was freedom’s air.
As they climbed into his plane, he asked: Did anything important come up in your work today, Jem?
Jem shrugged uncertainly. I don’t know. Nothing that’s urgent at the moment. But it might develop into something. I meant to speak to you about it after dinner. Did Salmaggi tell you one of our families was burned out up near the northwest border?
Kimmensen shook his head and pressed his lips together. No, he didn’t. I didn’t have time to see him today.
Perhaps he should have. But Salmaggi was the inevitable misfit who somehow creeps into every administrative body. He was a small, fat, tense, shrilly argumentative man who fed on alarms like a sparrow. Somehow, through election after election, he had managed to be returned as Land Use Advisor. Supposedly, his duties were restricted