Atlas Shrugged – Day 103 – pp. 1150-1159
Now we get a little hokey.
Francisco grills the subdued guards. How many guards are there? Where? What are these rooms?
It’s military precision. (You wonder, when you’re an expert at one thing, it would seem, in Rand’s universe, you’re an expert at everything.
“Are there any other men in the building?”
“No.”
“Isn’t there a prisoner here?”
“Oh… yeah, I guess so. There must be or they wouldn’t’ve kept us all on duty.”
Ever seen the movie Idiocracy? It was a futuristic spoof of a dumbed down (way down) society that sounded suspiciously like that last insight by the guard. (Starred Luke Wilson and Maya Rudolph – written and directed by Mike Judge of King of the Hill and Beavis and Butthead fame. Interesting concept and fairly entertaining.)
Anyway. The G-team springs into action. Hank bolts up the stairs and confronts the chief and a group of guards playing cards. They all recognize Hank. Of course they’re paralyzed regarding what to do about him.
He say’s he’s there to take the prisoner. The chief replies,
“If you came from headquarters, you’d know that I’m not supposed to know anything about any prisoner — and that nobody is to touch him!”
Whaaaaaaa????
They go on in this battle of wits for a bit until the chief is moved to action firing at and grazing Hank. Too dumb to even aim a gun I guess, because, Francisco appears behind Hank and shoots the chief squarely in the shooting arm disabling him.
The guards recognized him.
“That’s … that’s the guy who blew up all the copper mines in the world!”
Duuuuhhhh. Dumber by the minute.
Hokey enough yet? Want some more?
How about this. One of the guards refuses to shoot and lays down his weapon. The chief – with his left hand(!) – picks up his gun and manages to shoot the deserter. (Maybe Hank was just too fast.)
Wait for it…
In time with the fall of the man’s body, the window burst into a shower of glass — and from the limb of a tree as from a catapult, the tall, slender figure of a man flew into the room, landed on its fees and fired at the first guard in reach.
“Who are you?” screamed some terror-blinded voice.
“Ragnar Danneskjold.”
Haaaaaa! (I’m Batman!)
They tie them all up and go to rescue Galt.
As they started, Francisco turned to Rearden, “Are you all right, Hank?”
“Sure.”
“Need to rest?”
“Hell no.”
Hell no! Haaaa. Was he a war hero too? Just takin’ a bullet for John Galt.
The break into the cell where Galt is being held. Dagny rushes to the table.
She fell down on her knees by the side of the mattress. Galt looked up at her as he had looked on their first morning in the valley, his smile was like the sound of a laughter that had never been touched by pain…
Is Dagny supposed to be Mary Magdalene? I’m going to have to reconsider this story in a whole new light.
“It’s over,” he said. “Don’t make it worse for yourself than it was for me.”
Francisco turned his face away. “It’s only that it was you… if it were anyone but you…”
“But it had to be me…”
Sacrificial lamb lead to slaughter. Can’t have him rise from the dead – or was that bit when his heart monitor stopped beating and he raised his head his “death and resurrection?”
They get him dressed and make their get-away.
“Francisco’s airplane was hidden in the brush on the edge of a meadow beyond the next hill.”
Sure it was.
They get airborne with Ragnar at the wheel — God! they can all fly planes too! He’s talking to someone on the radio. It’s a couple more planes with “about half the male population of the valley” on board.
Apparently they were going to try the short handed assault first, and if that plan went under the whole team was going to follow in.
And as they’re flying home to the valley, they pass over New York.
The plane was above the peaks of the skyscrapers when suddenly, with the abruptness of a shudder as if the ground had parted to engulf it, the city disappeared from the face or the earth. It took them a moment to realize that the panic had reached the power stations – and that the lights of New York had gone out.
Dagny gasped. “Don’t look down,” Galt ordered sharply.
Cool imagery followed by melodramatic tripe. I wish Rand would make up her mind.
Section ends with a real Randian piece of work. JG and Dagny recline back in their seats…
Then their persons filled each other’s awareness, as the sum and meaning of the future — but the sum included the knowledge of all that had had to be earned, before the person of another being could come to embody the value of one’s existence.
Now she’s just rambling… (40 pages to go…)