Millennium

by Everett B. Cole

Transcriber's note.
This etext was produced from Astounding Science Fiction May 1955. Extensive research did not uncover any evidence that the U.S. copyright on this publication was renewed.

MILLENNIUM

BY EVERETT B. COLE

There are devices a high-level culture could produce that simply don't belong in the hands of incompetents of lower cultural evolution. The finest, and most civilized of tools can be made a menace ...

Illustrated by Freas

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Liewen Konar smiled wryly as he put a battered object on the bench. "Well, here's another piece recovered. Not worth much, I'd say, but here it is."

Obviously, it had once been a precisely fabricated piece of equipment. But its identity was almost lost. A hole was torn in the side of the metal box. Knobs were broken away from their shafts. The engraved legends were scored and worn to illegibility, and the meter was merely a black void in the panel. Whatever had been mounted at the top had been broken away, to leave ragged shards. Inside the gaping hole in the case, tiny, blackened components hung at odd angles.

Klion Meinora looked at the wreckage and shook his head.