The Heirs of Babylon

It is the time of the gathering and all nations must pay tribute -
WHY MUST THEY? Kurt wondered, as the decrepit destroyer JAGER wallowed through uncharted waters on its way to Gibraltar, the Gathering of the fleet, and the Final Meeting with the Enemy.
It was sad to think how far man had fallen from the days when such vessels as the JAGER had been built. Now the last men struggled on in isolated communities, maintaining machines they could no longer build, ruled over by the distant Political Office in the person of the much despised and universally feared Political Officers. These black phantoms ruled mankind, telling one how to think, how to act, and when to obey the call to the Gathering.
And now the call had come for Kurt to sail off to Gibraltar to the Gathering - the ritual massing of the fleet for the War, the Gathering from which no one had ever returned...