Thea Harbou - Metropolis

He pushed the door open and then fell back, suffocated. Boiling air smote him, groping at his eyes that he saw nothing. Gradually he regained his sight.

The room was dimly lighted and the ceiling, which looked as though it could carry the weight of the entire earth, seemed perpetually to be falling down.

A faint howling made breathing almost unbearable. It was as though the breath drank in the howling too.

Air, rammed down to the depths, coming already used from the lungs of the great Metropolis, gushed out of the mouths of pipes. Hurled across the room, it was greedily sucked back by the mouths of pipes on the other side. And its howling light spread a coldness about it which fell into fierce conflict with the sweat-heat of the room.

In the middle of the room crouched the Pater-noster machine. It was like Ganesha, the god with the elephant's head. It shone with oil. It had gleaming limbs. Under the crouching body and the head which was sunken on the chest, crooked legs rested, gnome — Like, upon the platform. The trunk and legs were motionless. But the short arms pushed and pushed alternately forwards, backwards, forwards. A little pointed light sparkled upon the play of the delicate joints. The floor, which was stone, and seamless, trembled under the pushing of the little machine, which was smaller than a five-year-old chief.

Heat spat from the walls in which the furnaces were roaring. The odour of oil, which whistled with heat, hung in thick layers in the room. Even the wild chase of the wandering masses of air did not tear out the suffocating fumes of oil. Even the water which was sprayed through the room fought a hopeless battle against the fury of the heat-spitting walls, evaporating, already saturated with oil-fumes, before it could protect the skins of the men in this hell from being roasted.

Men glided by like swimming shadows. Their movements, the soundlessness of their inaudible slipping past, had something of the black ghostliness of deep-sea divers. Their eyes stood open as though they never closed them.

Near the little machine in the centre of the room stood a man, wearing the uniform of all the workmen of Metropolis: from throat to ankle, the dark blue linen, bare feet in the hard shoes, hair tightly pressed down by the black cap. The hunted stream of wandering air washed around his form, making the folds of the canvas flutter. The man held his hand on the lever and his gaze was fixed on the clock, the hands of which vibrated like magnetic needles.

Freder groped his way across to the man. He stared at him. He could not see his face. How old was the man? A thousand years? Or not yet twenty? He was talking to himself with babbling lips. What was the man muttering about? And had this man, too, the face of Joh Fredersen's son?

"Look at me!" said Freder bending forward.

But the man's gaze did not leave the clock. His hand, also, was unceasingly, feverishly, clutching the lever. His lips babbled and babbled, excitedly.

Freder listened. He caught the words. Shreds of words, tattered by the current of air.

"Pater-noster… that means, Our Father!.. Our Father, which are in heaven! We are in hell. Our Father!.. What is thy name? Art thou called Pater-noster, Our Father? Or Joh Fredersen? Or machine?… Be hallowed by us, machine. Pater-noster!.. Thy kingdom come… Thy kingdom come, machine… Thy will be done on earth as it is in heaven… What is thy will of us, machine, Pater-noster? Art thou the same in heaven as thou art on earth?… Our Father, which art in heaven, when thou callest us into heaven, shall we keep the machines in thy world — the great wheels which break the limbs of thy creatures — the great merry-go-round called the earth?… Thy will be done, Pater-noster!.. Give us this day our daily bread… Grind, machine, grind flour for our bread. The bread is baked from the flour of our bones… And forgive us our trespasses… what trespasses, Pater-noster? The trespass of haying a brain and a heart, that thou hast not, machine?. And lead us not into temptation… Lead us not into temptation to rise against thee, machine, for thou art stronger than we, thou art a thousand times stronger than we, and thou art always in the right and we are always in the wrong, because we are weaker than thou art, machine… But deliver us from evil, machine… Deliver us from thee, machine… For thine is the kingdom, the power and the glory, for ever and ever, Amen… Pater-noster, that means: Our Father… Our Father, which are in heaven… "

Freder touched the man's arm. The man started, struck dumb.

His hand lost its hold of the lever and leaped into the air like a shot bird. The man's jaws stood gaping open as if locked. For one second the white of the eyes in the stiffened face was terribly visible. Then the man collapsed like a rag and Freder caught him as he fell.

Freder held him fast. He looked around. Nobody was paying any attention, either to him or to the other man. Clouds of steam and fumes surrounded them like a fog. There was a door near by. Freder carried the man to the door and pushed it open. It led to the tool-house. A packing case offered a hard resting place. Freder let the man slip down into it.

Dull eyes looked up at him. The face to which they belonged was little more than that of a boy.

"What is your name?" said Freder.

"11811… "

"I want to know what your mother called you…."

"Georgi."

"Georgi, do you know me?"

Consciousness returned to the dull eyes together with recognition.

"Yes, I know you… You are the son of Joh Fredersen… of Joh Fredersen, who is the father of us all… "

"Yes. Therefore I am your brother, Georgi, do you see? I heard your Pater-noster… " — The body flung itself up with a heave.

"The machine—" He sprang to his feet. "My machine—"

"Leave it alone, Georgi, and listen to me… "

"Somebody must be at the machine!"

"Somebody will be at the machine; but not you… "

"Who will, then?"

"I."

Staring eyes were the answer.

"I," repeated Freder. "Are you fit to listen to me, and will you be able to take good note of what I say? It is very important, Georgi!"

"Yes," said Georgi, paralysed.

"We shall now exchange lives, Georgi. You take mine, I yours. I shall take your place at the machine. You go quietly out in my clothes. Nobody noticed me when I came here. Nobody will notice you when you go. You must only not lose your nerve and keep calm. Keep under cover of where the air is brewing like a mist. When you reach the street take a car. You will find more than enough money in my pockets. Three streets further on change the car. And again after another three streets. Then drive to the Ninetieth Block. At the corner pay off the taxi and wait until the driver is out of sight. Then find your way to the seventh floor of the seventh house. A man called Josaphat lives there. You are to go to him. Tell him I sent you. Wait for me or for a message from me. Do you understand, Georgi?"

"Yes."

But the "Yes" was empty and seemed to reply to something other than Freder's question.

A little while later the son of Joh Fredersen, the Master of the great Metropolis, was standing before the machine which was like Ganesha, the god with the elephant's head.

He wore the uniform of all the workmen of Metropolis: from throat to ankle the dark blue linen, bare feet in the hard shoes, hair firmly pressed down by the black cap.

He held his hand on the lever and his gaze was set on the clock, the hands of which vibrated like magnetic needles.

The hunted stream of air washed around him making the folds of the canvas flutter.

Then he felt how, slowly, chokingly, from the incessant trembling of the floor, from the walls in which the furnaces whistled, from the ceiling which seemed eternally to be in the act of falling down, from the pushing of the short arms of the machine, from the steady resistance of the gleaming body, terror welled up in him — terror, even to the certainty of Death.