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This story is available to read right now on the Internet Archive, linked to the exact page where it begins.
Read on Archive.org → Cover image from Wikimedia CommonsClifford D. Simak · 1951 · Short Story
This story is available to read right now on the Internet Archive, linked to the exact page where it begins.
Read on Archive.org → Cover image from Wikimedia CommonsIn a future where death has been conquered, the narrator discovers that immortality has an unexpected side effect: without the pressure of limited time, people gradually lose ambition, curiosity, and purpose. Adults regress into a permanent second childhood, pursuing trivial amusements forever. The few who resist this drift find themselves isolated as relics of an era when mortality gave life its shape. The story asks whether human achievement depends on the knowledge that time is running out.
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