Bradbury, Ray - Chapbook 13

Ahmed and
the Oblivion Machines

Ray Bradbury

"Bradbury is an authentic original."
—
Time

In the stories of Ray Bradbury, readers have
journeyed beyond the boundaries set by their
imaginations, and have reveled in
fantastic realms created by "one of the world's out
standing
storytellers"
(
Toronto
Globe & Mail).
Mow this prolific
writer spins an enchanting
fable about a lost boy who makes the
acquaintance of a
long-forgotten, though very
powerful, ancient god.

When Ahmed, the twelve-year-old son of a
caravan leader,
falls from his camel, he is lost in
a vast desert, and his situation looks
ominous.
Isolated
and alone, the young boy begins
to
:
ry
and his tears awaken
the ancient god
Gonn
-Ben-Allah, Keeper of the Ghosts of the Lost
Names, who lies beneath the sand.

Rising to full form for the first time in
tens of thousands of
years, the majestic
Gonn
tells his frightened savior that fate has
brought
them together. To comfort Ahmed, the
god
bestows the gift of flight upon
the boy, and the
pair sets off on an
evening of spectacular
adventures.
Traveling through time and space,
Gonn
shows the fascinated Ahmed the
wonders
of the world—past and present—and
its
sorrows. Within each startling revelation,
Ahmed finds wisdom—and learns to accept life for all it has to offer.

A wondrous fable for children of all ages,
AHMED AND THE OBLIVION
MACHINES
is yet another
glorious testament to the remark
able gifts
of master storyteller Ray Bradbury.

Books by Ray Bradbury

Dandelion Wine

Dark Carnival

Death Is a Lonely Business

Driving Blind

Fahrenheit 451

The Golden Apples of the Sun and Other
Stories

A Graveyard for Lunatics

Green Shadows, White Whale

The Halloween Tree

I Sing the Body Electric!
and
Other Stories

The Illustrated Man

Kaleidoscope

Long After
Midnight

The Martian Chronicles

The Machineries of Joy

A Medicine for Melancholy and Other Stories

The October Country

Quicker Than the Eye

Something Wicked This Way Comes

The Stories of Ray Bradbury

The Toynbee Convector
When Elephants Last
in the Dooryard Bloomed

Yestermorrow
Zen in the Art of
Writing

_AHMED

_And
 
the

OBLIVION
MACHINES

A
     
FABLE

Ray
 
Bradbury

illustrated
by

CHRIS LANE

This is a work of fiction. Names,
characters, places,
and incidents either are the product of
the author's
imagination or
are used fictitiously. Any resemblance
to actual events, locales, organizations, or persons,
living or dead, is entirely coincidental and beyond
the intent of either the author
or the publisher.

Axwi
Books, Inc.
1350 Avenue of the
Americas
New York
,
New York
10019

Text copyright © 1998 by Ray Bradbury
Illustrations copyright © 1998 by
Chris Lane

Interior design by
Kellan
Peck

Visit our website at
http://www.AvonBooks.com

ISBN: 0-380-97704-4

All rights reserved, which includes the right
to reproduce this book
or portions thereof in any form whatsoever except as
provided
by the U.S. Copyright Law. For
information address Avon Books, Inc.

Library of Congress Cataloging in
Publication Data:

Bradbury, Ray, 1920-

Ahmed and the oblivion
machines
:
a fable / written by Ray Bradbury;

illustrated
by Chris Lane.—1st
ed.

p
.
       
cm.

I. Title.

PS3503.R167A68
   
1998
      
98-22746

813'.54—dc21
CIP

First
Avon
Books Printing:
December 1998

AVON
TRADEMARK REG.
US
  
PAT.
OFF
 
AND
IN OTHER COUNTRIES. MARCA
REGISTRADA,
HF.CHO EN
U.S.A.

Printed in the
U.S.A.
FIRST EDITION

QPM
   
10
  
987654321

With Lowe
and
Gratitude

to
Chris
Lane
,
whose imaginative
sketches
for

LITTLE NEMO IN SLUMBERLAND

caused
this book to
be
born.

It
was the night following the day when the
seagull was seen over
the desert that Ahmed,
the son of Ahmed, fell from his camel and was
lost as the caravan
moved on into the dusk.

The gull had flown over at noon, coming
from somewhere, going
nowhere, circling back
toward some invisible land that, they said, was rich with
grass and water and had known noth
ing but water and grass for nine thousand
years.

Looking up, Ahmed said:

"What does that bird seek? Here is no
water
and
no grass, so where does it go?"

His father had answered:

"It was lost but now found again,
returns to
the sea from whence it came."

Afaned
, son
of
Afaned
, fell from
fas
camel