Lucifer's Hammer

Hammerfall: One

In 1968 the close approach of an asteroid called Icarus set off a small but very definite end-of-the-world scare. There had already been rumors that a series of world-wide cataclysms was going to begin in 1968. When news that Icarus was heading toward earth and was going to make its closest approach on June 15, 1968, got around, it somehow became combined with the other end-of-the-world rumors. In California groups of hippies headed for the mountains of Colorado saying that they wanted to be safe on high ground before the asteroid hit and caused California to sink into the sea.

“O my people! Hear the words of Matthew! Does he not say that the sun shall be darkened, and the moon shall not give off her light, and the stars shall fall from heaven? And does this not come to pass even in this very hour?

“Repent, my people! Repent, and watch, for the Lord cometh, the Hammer will fall upon this wicked Earth. Hear the words of the Prophet Micah: ‘For behold, the Lord cometh forth out of his place, and will come down, and tread upon the high places of the Earth. And the mountains shall be molten under him, and the valleys shall be cleft, as wax before the fire, and as the waters that are poured down a steep place.’

“For He cometh! For he cometh to judge the Earth, and with righteousness to judge the world, and the peoples with his truth!”

“You have heard the Reverend Henry Armitage on ‘The Coming Hour.’ This and all broadcasts of ‘The Coming Hour’ have been made possible by your donations, and we ask the Lord to bless those who have given so generously.

“No further donations will be needed. The hour comes and is now at hand.”

It was a bright, cloudless summer day. A brisk wind blew in from the sea, and the Los Angeles basin was clear and lovely.

Bloody good thing, Tim Hamner thought.

He’d been faced with a terrible problem. The spectacular night skies could best be seen from the mountains, and Tim had stayed at his Angeles Forest observatory for most of the week before; but the best view of Hamner-Brown’s closest approach would be from space. Since he couldn’t be in space, Tim wanted the next best thing: to watch all of it on color television. It hadn’t been hard to persuade Charlie Sharps to invite him out to JPL.

But he was supposed to be there by nine-thirty, and the clear skies with their bright velvet ribbons of light had kept him up until dawn. He’d stretched out on the couch, careful not to go to bed, but a few minutes’ rest wouldn’t hurt…

Of course he’d overslept. Now, muzzy-headed and wateryeyed, Tim aimed rather than drove his Grand Prix down the Ventura Freeway toward Pasadena. Despite his late start he expected to be on time. There wasn’t much traffic.

“Fools,” Tim muttered. Hammer Fever. Thousands of Angelenos taking to the hills. Harvey Randall had told him that freeway traffic would be light all week, and he’d been right. Light traffic for — in Mark Czescu’s brilliant phrasing — Hot Fudge Sundae (which fell on a Tuesdae this week).

There was a flare of red ahead, a ripple of red lights. Traffic slowed. Tim cursed. There was a truck just ahead of him, so he couldn’t see what was fouling things up. Automatically he cut over into the right-hand lane, acing out a sweet little old lady in a green Ford. She cursed horribly as Tim cut in front of her.

“Probably wears her te

To his right was Forest Lawn Cemetery. Not the original one, fabled in song and story, but the Hollywood Hills colony. The streets were thick with traffic too. Tim turned left and went under the freeway. His face was a grim mask of worry and hate. Bad enough not to be in his observatory on Hot Fudge Sundae Tuesdae, but this! He was in beautiful downtown Burbank, and his comet was approaching perigee. “It’s not fair!” Tim shouted. Pedestrians glanced at him, then looked away, but Tim didn’t care. “Not fair!”

The air was electric with storm and disaster. Eileen Hancock felt it as ghostly fingers brushing her neck hairs. She saw it in more concrete form while driving to work. Despite the light traffic, people drove badly. They fought for dominance at the wrong times, and they reacted late, then overreacted. There were many U-Haul trailers piled high with household possessions, reminding Eileen of newsclips from the war: refugees, only no refugees in Asia or Africa ever carried birdcages, Beautyrest mattresses, and stereo sets.

One of the trailers had overturned on the eastbound Ventura, blocking all three lanes. A few cars squeezed past on the shoulder, but the others were immobile behind a tumbled mass of furniture. The light pickup that had pulled the trailer was angled across the fast lane with a VW embedded in its side.

Thank God I came up the Golden State, Eileen thought. She felt a moment of pity for anyone trying to get to Pasadena this morning, and she cursed the trailer and its owner. People on her side of the freeway slowed to gawk at it, and it took five minutes to get the hundred yards to her off-ramp into Burbank. She drove viciously on the surface streets and pulled into her parking space — with her name on it, Corrigan kept his word about that — with a feeling of relief that the Burbank police seemed to be elsewhere.

Corrigan’s was a storefront office near a supermarket, deceptively small because the warehouses were across an alley behind. The entry room was finished in blue nylon, brown Naugahyde, and chrome, and the chrome needed polishing. It always did; Eileen believed that wholesale customers ought to get the impression of a sound business able to keep its commitments, but not of opulence which might tempt them to dicker too hard on prices. The front door was already unlocked. “What ho?” Eileen called.

“Me.” Corrigan stumped out of his office. A smell of coffee followed him; Eileen had long ago installed an automatic Silex system with a timer, and she set it up last thing before she left in the evenings. It had improved Corrigan’s morning disposition wonderfully; but not this morning. “What kept you?” he demanded.

“Traffic. Wreck on the eastbound Ventura.”

“Umph.”

“You feel it too, huh?” Eileen said.

Corrigan frowned, then gri

“And the rest of us are scared.” She went past Corrigan to her own office. The clean glass surface of her desk shone like a mirror. She put her tape recorder down on it and took out her keys, but she didn’t open the desk yet. Instead she went back out into the reception area. “I’ll take the front office,” she said.

Corrigan shrugged. He was looking out through the big plate-glass window. “Nobody’s coming in today.”

“Sabrini’s due at ten,” Eileen said. “Forty bathrooms and kitchens, if we can get the decor he wants at the right price.”

Corrigan nodded. He didn’t seem to be listening. “What the hell’s that?” He pointed out the window.

There was a line of people, all dressed in white robes, all singing hymns. They seemed to be marching in step. Eileen looked closer and saw why. They were chained together. She shrugged. The Disney Studios were a few blocks away, and NBC not much further; they often used Burbank for city location shots. “Probably contestants for ‘Let’s Make a Deal.’ Group effort.”