FINAL EXAMINATION
By Robert Sheckley
If you saw the stars in the sky vanishing
by the millions, and knew you had but five days
to prepare for your judgment—what would you do?
[Transcriber's Note: This etext was produced from
Imagination Stories of Science and Fantasy
May 1952
Extensive research did not uncover any evidence that
the U.S. copyright on this publication was renewed.]
I suppose it started some time back, even before the astronomersdiscovered it, and certainly long before I found out. How far back Ihave no idea; thousands of years, perhaps, or more. But the first Iknew about it was one March evening, when I opened the newspaper.
Jane was in the kitchen, cleaning up, and I was settled back in theeasy chair, reading through the lead articles. I skimmed through allthe war talk, price controls, suicides, murders, and then glancedthrough the rest of the paper. One small article in the back caught myeye.
ASTRONOMERS LOSING STARS, the caption read. It was a human-intereststory I suppose, because it went on in that maddening coy style thenewspapers use for that sort of stuff.
"Dr. Wilhelm Mentzner, at the Mount St. James Observatory, says that hehas been unable, in recent weeks, to find some of the Milky Way stars.It would seem, Dr. Mentzner tells us, that they have vanished. Repeatedphotographs of certain portions of space do not show the presence ofthese dim, faraway stars. They were in place and intact in photographsmade as recently as April, 1942, and...."
The article gave the names of some of the stars—they didn't mean athing to me—and chided the scientists on their absentmindedness."Imagine," it went on, "losing something as big as a star. Although,"the writer summed up, "it doesn't really matter. They have a fewhundred billion left to play around with."
I thought it was sort of cute at the time, although in questionabletaste. I don't know a thing about science—I'm in the dress line—butI've always looked upon it with the greatest respect. The way I see it,you start laughing at scientists and they come up with something likethe atom bomb. Better to treat them with a little respect.
I can't remember if I showed the article to my wife. If I did, shedidn't say anything in particular.
Life went along as usual. I went to work in Manhattan and came home toQueens. In a few days there was another article. This one was writtenby a Phd., and it had dropped the kidding style.
It said that stars appeared to be disappearing from our Milky Waygalaxy at a tremendous rate. Observatories in both hemispheres hadestimated that a few million of the farthest stars had vanished in thepast five weeks.
I stepped out the backdoor to have a look. Everything seemed in orderto me. The Milky Way was still up there, smeared across the sky asthick as ever. The Big Dipper was shining away, and the North Star wasstill pointing toward Westchester. No difference. The ground was frozenunder my feet, but the air was almost warm. Spring would be comingalong soon, and Spring fashions.
In the distance I could see the red glow of Manhattan, across the 59thStreet Bridge. That seemed to settle it. The only problem I had wasdresses, and I went back inside to worry about them.
In a few more days the star-story had reached the front page. STARSDISAPPEARING, the headlines read. WHAT NEXT?
It seemed that millions of stars were vanishing from the Milky Wayevery day and night. The other galaxies seemed to be unaffected,although it was hard to tell;