Alt Fahrenheit 451

"The Life of Guy"

The Life of Guy

"Montag snapped his gaze to the sky. The helicopters were closer, a great blowing of insects to a single light source" Montag suddenly thought of those he killed. The dead alive thing that was the Hound. His long time friend Beatty. Why did those lives have to be taken, why did they have to drift down the river into oblivion? Montag found himself questioning why he was making this effort. Why was he running from the firemen, he was happy before. But no! He thought. I have to fight for what I believe in, and fight for justice. Clarisse, Faber, and others have brought the light of knowledge to his world, and he wouldn't let his old comrades steal it away.

The sound of the whirling blades above snapped Montag back into reality. He had to escape. Montag placed foot after foot, running as fast as he could. Faster. Faster! He urged his burning legs to move quicker. No matter how much he wished, they wouldn't become the blur that he wanted them to become. The chopping blades cut through the air after him. He could hear them getting closer. Never before had he felt this terrified, yet alive. Running for his life, he felt something, he felt a strange thing. Clearing his head of that thought, he could see the river ahead. Sprinting as fast as he could, he made it to the bank, and dove in.

The water was frigid, yet he had to keep his head under, for the huge eye of the searchlight was sweeping back and forth across the bank. Montag's breath was near gone, and the fire in his lungs needed to be expelled. Gasping, he broke the surface of the water. The searchlights had moved on, and he was in total darkness. Letting the current carry him downstream, he thought to himself about the day's events. In less than a few days time, his world had flipped upside down. What was bad was now good, and what was good was now bad. Montag reminisced of old times, when life was simple. Burn the evil books, and sanitize the world of their vile poison.

After he seemed to be a mile or two away from the city, he got out of the stream. Teeth chattering, Montag felt his whole body aching. He laid down, and slept.

He awoke to the sound of people yelling. Who was yelling at this ungodly hour? Montag asked himself. He suddenly remembered the night's terrors and why he was on the bank of a river. People were running past him, yelling. What was happening? A sudden burst of gunfire answered the question. Who was shooting? People dropped right and left, shredded into a pulp by the bullets. The scene was so appalling Montag vomited. Montag soon identified the shooter, or shooters rather. The people were running from an army. There was a war, and Montag was caught in the middle of it.

The hail of gunfire a constant rumble in the background, Montag noticed a strange thing. There were patches on the gunmen's uniforms. On these patches, was a book underneath a quote, "To Read is to be Free". Why were these people who were praising reading, gunning people down? Maybe the books made them. Maybe the books WERE evil. Montag didn't understand. He scrambled to his feet and started running for his life for the second time in two days.

All of a sudden, the men with the guns stopped shooting. They didn't give chase as the crowd ran, instead screwing an attachment to their gun barrels. In perfect unison, the men knelt to a knee and fired a canister from their weapons. The cans dropped in the middle of the crowd, and began billowing a milky-white gas. Montag held his breath, afraid that the gas was a type of poison, intended to finish the crowd off. People were dropping to the ground around him. Finally he could hold his breath no longer, and sucked a deep breath of the gas. He suddenly felt very drowsy, and then passed out with the rest of the remaining people.

Montag later awoke to the sound of a bell. He looked around, he seemed to be in the city jail. He saw many others locked away in cells of their own. The bell chimed again, and over the speakers, a man's voice could be heard.

"First off, there is much to explain, such as why we have killed some of you, and locked the rest of you up," the man's voice said. "Let's start with that." We didn't mean to kill your family and friends, but it was necessary. The people we killed were void of hope, they could not be saved. We are elated to tell you that you are the people that can be salvaged."

"You are the people that can still open their minds and think once again," the man went on. "Reading can save you, and we intend to start a new society from the ashes of your own. One that can think for itself, one that can be freed. "To Read is to be Free!"

Montag understood now. These people were trying to help, but how was murdering everyone helping? Maybe they were too far gone to be helped, but was killing them really necessary? The book society people could be evil, this may have been what the government was trying to save people from becoming. But then Montag remember all the people that government had killed. The government had made the people slaves, mindless and weak. Maybe it was a good thing that those people would be eliminated from this new society.

The speaker chimed again. "Guy Montag, Silas Faber, Amelia Castor, and Alex Gruda, please report to the front office." Guy's cell door slid open, revealing a brightly lit corridor. Guy walked down the corridor directed to the front office by the signs. He got into the office, and found a man, presumably the man who was talking over the speakers, and two young women, presumably Alex and Amelia. Faber, of course, wasn't present. They all took seats around a wood table. The man cleared his throat, and began to speak.

"You might want to know why you were freed, well it's because you have already accepted the role of books in the world. You have learned that books are necessary for to be free. You will-"

"But why did you kill all those people?" Montag spook, replaying the bullets tearing through the crowd of people.
"Sacrifices must be made for the greater good" the man replied.

"Half of our civilization has been massacred, you call that a sacrifice? I call that genocide" Montag retorted. How could killing thousands be considered a good thing, even in the name of books. Alex and Amelia stayed silent, perhaps just as confused as Montag.

"No sacrifice is too great to free the people that can be freed!" The man almost yelled. "To Read is to be Free!"

"You killed thousands! No amount of philosophy can justify killing thousands!" Montage shook, visibly outraged. These book readers were no better than the government who had enslaved everyone in the first place. His hands balled into fists. The pleasure of burning roaring inside, he reached out and grabbed the man's neck. Shaking the man, he felt the savage delight of destruction and "cleansing". The guard outside the office ran inside, drawing his handgun, and took a single shot. The bullet cut through the air laden with gossamer threads of anger, extinguishing Montag's fire.