Hunter just shrugged. "Beautiful or not, it's not going to do anyone any good. Once they kill us, no one will ever find out about it."
The smile left Zoloff's face. "Again, all too true." He sighed. There was another silence between them. Hunter finally broke it by saying, "I have to tell you, though, this is one crazy place you built here."
Zoloff shook his head sadly. "I did my best," he said. "Though you really have to experience the whole thing to appreciate it. Like a fine symphony. A fine wine. A fine woman. Of course, I know it's frightening at some points and creaky at others. Some of the thrills and spills are a little heavy-handed, too. But what in Me isn't a little scary, when you really think about it? And only someone really committed to it will see it all the way through. That's one reason I didn't reveal myself to you right away. I had no idea who you were. The entry booth hadn't been activated in years. The password was a very tight secret. But I knew when everything suddenly lit up, something must be afoot. And I thought if you made it through, even just halfway, then you were here for a serious purpose, and not just by a mistake."
He looked over at the two SSG men again. "How did I know these mooches would drop in halfway through? They picked a moon and crash-landed on it. The heathens. Just my luck it was Dreamland."
"But how did you ever come up with all this?" Hunter asked him. He was intensely curious, even at this dark hour. "This whole amusement park thing? I mean, did it come to you in a dream or something?"
"Ha," Zoloff said. "It came to me in many, many dreams, my friend. But, tell me first. Did you figure out the theme? After all, it is a theme park. Or was I perhaps too subtle?"
Hunter had to think a moment. "The theme? How to go crazy, when everything else around is already crazy?"
Zoloff laughed a bit too loud, but he was genuinely amused.
"That would be hard to pull off subtly," he said. He stroked his beard for a moment. "The truth is," he began again, "all I ever wanted was to be like you. To be an American, I mean. Or like an American. That's the theme. That's what the whole dizzylando is about"
Hunter looked back at him strangely. "Really?"
Zoloff started ticking things off on his fingers. "Adventure Land — my love for your Hollywood space adventures of the 1930s. House of Horrors — what I imagined it would be like if the Soviet Army was as principled and disciplined as the American Army. Dreamland — my vision of America as a place where all dreams come true and stay true. World of Mirrors;—the only common enemy we ever had: the fascists. What a delight to see them fighting each other! Alien Mystery World — I desired your deepest secrets and nothing less!"
Hunter held up his hand, as a gentle interruption. "But what about all those socks?"
Zoloff just smiled. "Very simple," he said. "I wanted one of your washing machines!"
"And all this?"
Zoloff was almost embarrassed now. "Well, everyone wants to be a cowboy," he said. "Right?"
Hunter stared back at him in disbelief. That's what this is all about? A Russian trying to explain what it's like to be an American?
"But why?" was all he could ask. "You're a cosmonaut. A hero of the Soviet Union."
"The desire was born from an incident long ago," Zoloff replied. "It happened just before I went into orbit, back in the 1960s. I had a rare opportunity to visit New York City. It was a meeting on the peaceful uses of space at the UN, but I snuck out one night and walked all over that fabulous city. I saw it all. Did it all. Drank it all. Ate it all! When I finally stumbled back to the Soviet mission early the next morning, I realized what a cloud I'd been living under." He paused for a long moment. His eyes got misty. "That's when I realized I wanted everything you had," he went on again. "Your women. Your style. Your optimism. Your music. Your sense of humor. Your bravery. Your deep dark secrets. And yes, those wonderful washing machines! Even if they did eat socks.
"I wanted all those things, but at the same time I knew that I couldn't have them. Not in Russia in the 1960s. But those desires stayed with me, even when I was thrown for-ward in time. Your NASA friend will verify that. Then, after the collapse of the Third Empire, when I had a chance to do something, to make a grand deal, I decided to do what I considered the next best thing. There were never any amusement parks in Russia. I thought if I could build one for myself and continually ride its rides, forever, so to speak, well, what better way to immerse myself in your culture? To play the different parts. To make some different endings. So yes, it came from a dream. A foolish dream though, now, looking back on it."
"I don't know about that," Hunter said, astounded by the story. "It was a pretty wild trip while it lasted… and quite an accomplishment, I'd have to say."
Another bit of silence.
Zoloff went on sadly, "All those years, wasted money and time and fear, our two countries, preparing to go to war with each other. That's about the time I checked out — and was thrown forward, where I met your friend and mine, that very old man in the NASA suit. How he and I argued. How we fought! But we were brothers. And we built a great empire. It's just too bad it wasn't like that back in my day. Before the war between our two countries started. If in fact it did ever start."
Hunter told him, "It definitely started in my reality. But I'm convinced now, after what's happened to me, that the way the universe unfolds, there are probably an infinite number of realities, and we are either from the same one… or we are not."
"Very true, but people stay the same, my friend," Zoloff replied. "Events change, but people don't. No matter how many realities there might be, humans are humans. And it is our duty to get ourselves right. To correct our flaws. To treat everyone equally. That's what we fought for with the Third Empire. And we succeeded, your NASA friend and I — for a little while at least.
"But in the end, what good was it? Look at me. I'm still a Russian. A son of Mother Russia way back when there was a Russia, five thousand years ago. I changed the way I looked. The way I talked. The way I thought about things. But no matter what, I couldn't change who I was. A sad last chapter. Park closed. The dizzylando is no more."
Hunter had to pat him on the back. He was almost in tears himself. "I have something very important to tell you," he began. "For what it's worth, there is a place where you can be both. It exists. It's not an amusement park. It's real. I've been there."
"Both?" Zoloff asked. "Both Russian and American, you mean?"
Hunter nodded slowly. "Russian, American, European, Japanese, Indian. White, black, yellow, brown. Everything. It's a place called the Home Planets. It's a place where the original people from Earth were sent against their will when evil forces took over the empires. A deep dark secret kept from you, no doubt. But the Astronaut found out about it somehow. And like me, he knows it is a place where anyone can be all of those things, simply by being one thing: a person from Earth. An original Earthling."
He leaned over and showed him the flag on his shoulder. It was the American flag.
"This is our flag," he said. "It used to represent all that was good and free and just within my country, but now it represents all of those Home Planets as well."
Zoloff became so emotional listening to this that he began to cry. "If I went to this place," he said. "I could have the best of both worlds?"
"Of all worlds," Hunter told him.
Zoloff got a very determined look on his face. "Well, then, that's what I must do!" he said. "But first, we must get out of this jam. And the ones that come after it." He looked around the cell again. "The question is, how?"