Happy Ending by Fredric Brown (1947)

Name: Happy Ending
Author: Fredric Brown

A dictator known as Number One, ruler of a solar system-spanning empire now destroyed by war, flees his conquerors and is landed on a remote, unspoiled stretch of Venus by three loyal Galactic Guard crew members, who must henceforth address him only as "Mister Smith." The captain, before departing to surrender his ship, salutes his former leader one last time despite Smith's order for silence and secrecy; Smith thanks the crew for their loyalty and sends them away, then watches their lifeboat vanish into the Venusian haze. Alone in a converted radar-relay shack on the beach, Smith settles into an existence marked by the screeching of parrot-like marigees, the chattering of six-legged baroons in the trees, and distant native drums at night. He knows from prior reports that the local Venusian natives are harmless, timid, and rarely stray from their villages, so he expects no threat from them. His bitterness is not over regret but over defeat — at the hands of Martians he had once driven back, the Jupiter Satellite Confederation's endless armadas, and the treachery within his own ranks that culminated in the loss of Luna. Solitude, he believes, preserves his sense of self as "Number One," since no witnesses remain to see his diminished status. Over time, Smith fixates on the kifs, antlike insects that infest his food and bedding. What begins as irritation grows into an obsessive, genocidal campaign: he floods their nests with gasoline and crushes them by the thousands, comparing their extermination to his war against the Martians, and grudgingly admires their totalitarian discipline as ideologically like his own former rule. He learns from his small library that once a year the kifs swarm like army ants, devouring everything in their path. One night, tormented by hallucinated memories of his fall — his general Conrad reporting the collapse of his empire, crowds chanting "Number One, hail!," children's worshipful voices, and cries of "All is lost!" — Smith flees along the beach from imagined attacking aircraft and runs into the jungle. There he stumbles upon the marching kif army itself and is badly burned before escaping, tearing off his burning clothes and crawling half-mad through the underbrush until, near dawn, he collapses naked in a native village compound. The chief, Alwa, and his son Nrana take him in, nurse his wounds, and try to communicate, hoping he might be like the Terran missionary, Mr. Gerhardt, who once taught them of Jehovah and Jesus and lived among them before the war. Nrana mistakes Smith's quieter paranoid ravings for improvement over his earlier delirium. But once healed, Smith retrieves his uniform and needle gun from the shack, returns to the village declaring himself "Number One, Lord of all the Solar System," and demands the natives serve him. When Alwa refuses to yield his chieftaincy, Smith shoots him, then kills a chief's wife and, in the ensuing chaos, four more natives including Nrana, before being overwhelmed and bound by the villagers. The natives, fearing to violate taboos against harming a mad man or possibly a god, debate his fate in council under new chief Kallana. The elder M'Ganne proposes binding Smith to a tree in the kif-infested jungle, reasoning that if he is a god the insects won't harm him, and if he is merely mad, the natives themselves will not have directly harmed him. They gag him, tie him to a tree, and leave him as the drums resume their nightly rhythm. Bound and alone, Smith briefly regains lucid memory of his identity and downfall before terror overtakes him as he realizes why he has been left there. He hears the rustling sound of the approaching kif army. In the story's final line, rather than going mad again, Number One instead laughs, and laughs, and laughs.

By Fredric Brown · First published 1947 · Genre: Science Fiction, Dystopian, Psychological Thriller · 6,469 words

First lines

_A world had collapsed around this man -- a world that would never shout his praises again. The burned-out cities were still and dead, the twisted bodies and twisted souls giving him their last salute in death. And now he was alone, alone surrounded by memories, alone and waiting._

Sometimes the queerly shaped Venusian trees seemed to talk to him, but their voices were soft. They were loyal people.

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Happy Ending is listed on Textopian as a novel by Fredric Brown, dated 1947 CE.

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Work type: Novel
Author: Fredric Brown
Date: 1947 CE
Language: English
Genres: Science Fiction, Dystopian, Psychological Thriller, Adventure, Political Fiction
Length: 6,469 words
Structure: 1 section, 153 paragraphs
Reading fit: Easy (6th Grade)

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Work identity for Happy Ending by Fredric Brown
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Genres

Science Fiction — The story is set in a futuristic world with space travel and extraterrestrial settings, featuring elements like space-cruisers and Venusian life forms.
Dystopian — The narrative explores themes of societal collapse, dictatorship, and the aftermath of a devastating war, reflecting a dystopian vision of the future.
Psychological Thriller — The protagonist's mental deterioration and paranoia are central to the plot, creating a tense and suspenseful atmosphere.
Adventure — The protagonist's journey to a remote and dangerous environment on Venus involves survival and exploration elements.