They thought that all books had been destroyed years ago, but they'd recently discovered one hidden in an old man's sleeping cubicle.
In Execution Square, a uniformed Kindleman held up a tattered object. 'My friends, do you know what this is?' 'A book!' hissed the crowd. 'What do we do with books?' 'We kindle 'em!' 'And how do we kindle 'em?' 'WITH FIRE!' they roared.
The Kindleman ritually strangled a passing cat, drenched it with petrol, set it alight, and tossed it onto the prepared bonfire. Page by page, the book was fed to the flames. As the last page blackened and shriveled, the crowd gave a collective sigh of fulfillment.
That evening, queuing for our ration of ProtoVeg, I reflected that my son, though he would never see a tiger or an elephant, had at least seen with his own eyes the last book on earth.
Last edited by Brian Allgar; 09-12-2012 at 11:55 AM.
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