But never, as yet, since the construction of Metropolis, had the lever been set to “12.”
Now it was set to “12.” Now the lever was set to “12.” A girl’s hand, more delicate than glass, had pressed around the weighty lever, which was set to “Safety,” until it touched “12.” The heart of Metropolis, Joh Fredersen’s great city had begun to run up a temperature, seized by a deadly illness, chasing the red waves of its fever along to all the machines which were fed by its pulse.
No machine in all Metropolis which did not receive its power from this heart.
Then all the god-machines were taken with the fever …
From the Towers of Silence there broke forth the vapour of decomposition. Blue flames hovered in the space above them. And the towers, the huge towers, which used otherwise to turn about but once in the course of the day, tottered; around on their pedestals in a drunken, spinning dance, full to bursting point.
Muhammad’s curved sword was as circular lightning in the air. It met with no resistance, it cut and cut. It grew angry because it had nothing to cut. The power which, squandered too uselessly, was still increasing, now gathered itself together and, hissing, sent out snakes, green, hissing snakes, in all directions.
From the projecting arms of the crosses of Golgotha there swept long, white, crackling springs of sparks.
Swaying under impacts which had shaken the earth itself, the unslain, the man-crushing car of Juggernaut began to glide, began to roll—checked itself, hanging crookedly on the platform—trembled like a ship, perishing on the rocks, lashed by the breakers—and shook itself free, amidst groans.
Then, from their glittering thrones, Baal and Moloch, Huitzilopochtli and Durgha arose. All the god-machines got up, stretching their limbs in a fearful liberty. Huitzilopochtli shrieked for the jewel-sacrifice. Durgha moved eight murderous arms, crackling the while. Hungry fires smouldered up from the bellies of Baal and Moloch, licking out of their jaws. And, roaring like a herd of a thousand buffaloes, at being cheated of a purpose, Asa Thor swung the infallible hammer.
A lost grain of dust among the soles of the gods, Freder reeled his way through the white rooms, the roaring temples.
“Father—!!” he shouted.
And he heard the voice of his father:
“Yes!—Here I am!—What do you want?—Come here to me!”
“Where are you?”
“Here—!”
“But I can’t see you—!”
“You must look higher!”
Freder’s gaze flitted through the room. He saw his father standing on a platform, between the outstretched arms of the crosses of Golgotha from the ends of which long, white, crackling sprigs of sparks blazed. In the hellish fires his father’s face was as a mask of unmistakable coldness. His eyes were blue-gleaming steel. Amidst the great, raving machine-gods, he was a greater god, and lord of all.
Freder ran over to him, but he could not get up to him. He clung to the foot of the flaming cross. Wild impacts crashed through the New Tower of Babel.
“Father—!” shrieked Freder. “Your city is going to ruin—!”
Joh Fredersen did not answer. The sweeping sprigs of flame seemed to be breaking from his temples.
“Father—! Don’t you understand—? Your city is going to ruin!—Your machines have come to life!—They are dashing the town to pieces—They are tearing Metropolis to tatters!—Do you hear—? Explosion after explosion—! I have seen a street in which the houses were dancing upon their shattered foundations—just like Little children dancing upon the stomach of a laughing giant … A lava-stream of glowing copper poured itself out from the split-open tower of your boiler-factory, and a naked man was running before it, a man whose hair was charred and who was roaring: ‘The end of the world has come—!’ But then he stumbled and the copper stream overtook him … Where the Jethro works stood, there is a hole in the earth which is filling up with water. Iron bridges are hanging in shreds between towers which have lost their entrails, cranes are dangling on gallows like men hanged. And the people, incapable of flight as of resistance, are wandering about among houses and streets, both of which seemed doomed …”
He clasped his hands about the stem of the cross and threw his head back into his neck, to see his father quite clearly, quite openly in the face.
“I cannot believe, father, that there is anything mightier than you! I have cursed your overwhelming might—your overwhelming might which has filled me with horror, from the bottom of my heart. Now I run to you and ask you on my knees: Why do you allow Death to lay hands on the city which is yours—?”
“Because Death has come upon the city by my will.”
“By your will—?”
“Yes.”
“The city is to perish—?”
“Don’t you know why, Freder?”
There was no answer.
“The city is to go to ruin that you may build it up again …”
“—I—?”
“You.”
“Then you are laying the murder of the city on my shoulders?”
“The murder of the city reposes on the shoulders of those alone who trampled Grot, the guard of the heart-machine, to death.”
“Did that also take place by your will, father?”
“Yes!”
“Then you forced them to commit the crime—?”
“For your sake, Freder; that you could redeem them …”
“And what about those, father, who must die with your dying city, before I can redeem them!”
“Concern yourself about the living, Freder—not about the dead.”
“And if the living come to kill you—?”
“That will not happen, Freder. That will not happen. The way to me, among the raving god-machines, as you called them, could only be found by one. And he found it. That was my son.”
Freder dropped his head into his hands. He rocked it to and from as if in pain. He moaned softly. He was about to speak; but before he could speak a sound ripped the air, which sounded as though the earth were bursting to pieces. For a moment, everything in the white
