The Mind Parasites

  Reich’s experience had been very much the same as mine—with one significant variation. They had not tried the ‘total undermining’ technique with him. They had merely pressed him hard all night, hurling wave after wave at him. Towards morning, they had produced a kind of crack in his mental armour, a leak in his energy tanks. It was after this that he became so exhausted. And then, when he had begun to believe that defeat was inevitable, the attacks had stopped.

  I had no difficulty in guessing when this had happened: at the time when I released my ‘energy blast’ at them. Reich verified this. It had happened about half an hour before I rang him. Before that, he had heard the screen ringing, but had been too exhausted to do anything about it.

  My news about the others depressed him, but then my own story brought back his hope and courage. I tried my best to explain how they had succeeded in undermining me, and how I had called upon the god-force to defeat them. It was all he needed—the knowledge that he was mistaken to think we were helpless against them. The characteristic of ‘initiates’ of the phenomenological method is that they can recover from physical or mental catastrophes at a great speed—naturally, since they are in direct contact with the sources of power that drive all human beings. In half an hour, Reich no longer looked ill, and he was talking as excitedly as I was myself.

  It took me most of the morning to explain to him exactly how they had undermined me, and how it could be combated. For what it involved was teaching Reich to ‘undermine’ himself voluntarily, to examine his own foundations of identity. I discovered that his temperament was very different from mine fundamentally. In certain respects he was far stronger, in others, weaker.

  At midday, we were interrupted by Reubke, who came up to see us. By this time, every newspaper in the world was headlining the ‘night of suicide’, and speculating about the part Reich and I had played. I was told that the whole A.I.U. factory—covering eight hundred acres—had become unapproachable because of thousands of helicopters waiting outside—journalists.

  A quick mental probe told me that Reubke was not strong enough to be told the full truth. I was tempted to take over his mind completely—I had realized that I could do this since early this morning. A feeling of ‘respect for the individual’ withheld me. Instead, we told him a story that was close to the truth, but easier for him to grasp.

  What it amounted to was telling him that the Anti-Kadath Society had been right: our digging at Karatepe had disturbed immense and dangerous forces: the Great Old Ones themselves. The rest of the story was more or less true: that these creatures had a psychic power that could drive men insane. We told him that their aim was to destroy the human race, or at least to enslave them so that the Elder Race could again rule the solar system. But so far, they were not strong enough. If we could defeat them in time, they could be finally expelled from our galaxy, or perhaps even destroyed completely.

  What we had done was to turn the truth about the parasites into a child’s fable—something that could be easily grasped, something not too frightening. We even gave these creatures a name—the Tsathogguans—borrowed from Lovecraft’s mythology.

  We ended by placing the question solemnly before him: should the human race be told of its danger, or would this create a panic that would be a far greater danger? Reubke turned the colour of putty, and walked up and down the room gasping—he was trying to hold off an asthmatic attack, and I was helping him—and finally said that he thought we had to present our story to the world. It was interesting to see that there was no question of disbelief: our two minds had complete power over him.

  But the ‘Tsathogguans’ were still one jump ahead of us, as we found out an hour later. Georges Ribot made a statement to United Press in which he accused Reich and myself of being murderers and confidence tricksters. Part of his statement ran as follows:

  ‘One month ago, I was approached by Vincent Gioberti, the assistant of Professor Sigmund Fleishman at the University of Berlin; he told me that a small group of scientists had formed a World Safety League, and had suggested me as a member. In due course, I was introduced to other members (here the others are listed), and to the cofounders of the League, Wolfgang Reich and Gilbert Austin, the men who discovered Kadath. Their discovery had given them an idea for saving the world: they had decided that the whole world must be united against some common enemy. This common enemy would be the “Great Old Ones” of Kadath… All of us had to agree to support this deception whatever happened. Reich and Austin believed that only a body of well-known scientists could convince the world of their fantastic story… I was asked to undergo hypnosis, like the others, but I refused. Finally, under the threat of death, I agreed to a single session. My own hypnotic powers enabled me to deceive them that I had become their slave…’

  In short, Ribot claimed that what had happened in the night was the result of a unilateral suicide pact, inspired by myself and Reich. The aim of the pact: to convince the world beyond all shadow of doubt that it was facing a dangerous enemy. Reich and I had claimed that we would die with the others, and that our revelations about the Great Old Ones would be published after our deaths.

  It was fantastic, but ingenious. It all sounded impossible: but then, the suicide of twenty leading scientists was also impossible, and our own alternative explanation was equally fantastic and impossible.

  If it had not been for my own personal victory over the parasites, this would have been the most depressing moment of all. Twenty-four hours ago, everything had seemed perfect; we had reckoned that it would take another month before we were ready to make our announcement to the world, and by then we would have been a formidable team. Now almost everything was ruined, and Ribot had become an ally—or a victim—of the parasites, turning our own best-thought-out plans against us. As far as convincing the world was concerned, the parasites were definitely in the lead. We had no proof of their existence, and they would take care that no proof was forthcoming. If we announced our story about the Tsathogguans now, Ribot would simply challenge us to produce any proof that they were not our own invention. The only people who would believe us would be the Anti-Kadath Society!

  It was Reich who said suddenly: ‘It’s no use sitting here brooding about it. We take things too slowly, and these creatures get ahead of us. Speed is essential.’

  ‘What do you suggest?’

  ‘We’ve got to get Fleishman and the Grau brothers together, and find out how badly they’re hurt. If they’re as exhausted as I was four hours ago, the parasites could destroy them now.’

  We tried to contact Berlin on the telescreen; it was impossible. The number of calls coming and going around Diyarbakir ruined long distance reception. We called Reubke, and told him that we needed a rocket plane immediately to go to Berlin, and that total secrecy had to be observed. It was obvious that Reubke was worried about Ribot’s ‘confession’, so we wasted ten minutes in re-energizing his mind. It was disappointing work; he was so mentally flabby that it was like trying to fill a bucket with a hole in the bottom. Still, we managed it by appealing to his greed and lust for celebrity, pointing out that, as our chief ally, his name would go down in history, and that his firm could hardly fail to prosper. Together with Reubke, we arranged a small deception to keep reporters on the wrong track. Reich and I made a tele-recording, in which Reich answered the telescreen, and I was visible behind him; then Reich shouted irritably at the operator that no calls from outside were to be put through. We arranged that this recording should be shown about half an hour after we had left—some reporter would be put through ‘by accident’.

  The ruse worked. We were actually able to watch ourselves on the rocket’s television as we arrived in Berlin. The reporter who got this ‘scoop’ had tele-recorded it at his end, and within twenty minutes it was being broadcast from the Diyarbakir television station. There had apparently been much speculation about whether we were alive, in spite of Reubke’s statement to the press, so this item of news was immediately given widespread publicit
y. As a consequence, one or two people who thought they recognized us at the Berlin Airport must have decided they were mistaken.

  At Fleishman’s house, we had no alternative except to reveal our identity. The place was surrounded by reporters, and we would never have got in. But here we both discovered a rather useful aspect of our psychokinetic powers. In a way, we were able to make ourselves ‘invisible’: that is, we were able to intercept any attention directed towards us, and turn it aside, so that people simply did not notice us. We actually managed to get as far as ringing Fleishman’s front door bell before we were recognized. Then the rush started. Luckily, Fleishman’s voice spoke to us out of the intercom, and the moment we identified ourselves, the door opened. A moment later, we were inside, and the reporters were rattling the door and shouting messages through the letter box.

  Fleishman looked better than we expected, but he was obviously exhausted. In a few minutes, we learned that his story was identical with Reich’s—a long night of skirmishes, and sudden relief at exactly eight-twenty-five that morning—allowing for the two hour time lag between Berlin and Diyarbakir. This raised my spirits considerably: at least I had saved the lives of two of my colleagues, and saved the night from complete disaster.

  Fleishman was also able to tell us about the Grau brothers, who were at present in Potsdam, their home. He had been able to contact them that morning, before reporters began jamming all out-going calls . . . They owed their safety to the accident of being telepathically linked. Just as they were able to use one another’s minds as amplifiers for their PK powers, so they were able to draw upon one another’s strength in their night battle. Fleishman gathered that the parasites had also attempted to ‘undermine’ them as they had undermined me, but, again, their telepathic link was their strength. I learned later that they had not ‘faced’ the problem of non-identity, as I had. They had simply encouraged one another in refusing to consider it, in looking away from it. The undermining technique depends very much upon the victim being alone.

  The next problem seemed almost insoluble: how to get to Potsdam and collect the Grau brothers—or, at least, how to get them to come to Diyarbakir immediately. The house was surrounded by reporters, and a dozen helicopters simply hovered overhead. When the news of our presence spread, these increased to about a hundred. Any attempt to contact Potsdam would send reporters scurrying there, since local calls were easier to tap than long distance ones. As far as we knew, the name of the Grau brothers had not yet been dragged into the story, so they probably still had some freedom of movement.

  It was Fleishman who saw the solution. After an hour with us, he was already feeling better; the process of re-energizing his mind was far simpler than in the case of Reubke. The story of my victory had upon him the same effect as upon Reich—of restoring all the old optimism and purpose. And now Fleishman suddenly remarked:

  ‘We’ve learned one interesting thing about the parasites. It’s wrong to think of them as existing in some kind of space. The crowd attacking me here must have been more or less the same crowd who were attacking you two in Diyarbakir—otherwise the attacks wouldn’t all have stopped at the same moment.’

  This had also struck myself and Reich earlier. But Fleishman saw another consequence.

  ‘In that case, we’re mistaken to think about the mind in terms of physical space. In the mental sense, all the space in the universe is somehow compressed to a point. They don’t have to travel to get from here to Diyarbakir. They’re already in both places at once.’

  ‘And in Potsdam too,’ Reich said.

  All of us saw the consequences at once. If the parasites were, in a sense, in Potsdam at the moment, then so were we.

  Of course, it should have been obvious! Human beings exist in the physical world only in so far as they have no power to enter their own minds. A man who can withdraw into himself on a long train journey has escaped time and space, while the man who stares out of the window and yawns with boredom has to live through every minute and every mile. Our power to fight the mind parasites lay in precisely that ability to descend into ourselves and fight them on their own ground. A man who swims on the surface is an easy prey for sharks, but a diver who swims under the surface with a mask and a spear is on terms of equality with the shark. Well in so far as we could descend into our own minds, we were able to enter that same realm of spacelessness and timelessness as the parasites. The brothers could communicate with one another telepathically; why shouldn’t we be able to communicate with them?

  There was a simple answer: we had no idea of how to go about it. We knew that it must involve the same kind of faculty as psychokinesis, but that told us nothing at all.

  So we turned off the lights and experimented, sitting around a table. To anyone entering the room, it would have looked as if we were holding a seance, sitting with bowed heads, our hands touching.

  I tried first. As soon as we had sat down, I sent a mental signal: ‘Are you ready?’ to them. There was no result. Then suddenly, with a shock of pleasure, I seemed to hear Reich’s voice inside my chest saying: ‘Are you ready?’ I sent back: ‘Yes, can you hear me?’ His voice came back: ‘Not very clearly.’

  It took Fleishman some ten minutes before he could enter into our game. By that time, Reich and I were communicating fairly clearly. This was obviously because, like the Grau brothers, we had grown adjusted to one another. However, after some time, we were able to pick up Fleishman’s thought waves, sounding like a voice shouting in the distance.

  We now knew we could communicate with one another: but could we communicate with the Graus?

  A long and exhausting hour now went past, and I felt like someone lost on a mountain, shouting for help. I kept sending out mental signals for Louis and Heinrich Grau, but these signals kept turning into mere words, as if I was shouting their names aloud. What was needed was to project the naked urge to contact them, without words.

  Suddenly, Reich said, ‘I think I’m getting something.’ We all concentrated hard, trying to send back a ‘Message received’ signal. And then, with an astounding clarity that made us all jump, a voice seemed to shout in our ears: ‘I am getting you. What do you want?’ We looked at one another in astonishment and triumph, then closed our eyes again and redoubled our concentration. The loud, clear voice said: ‘Not all at once. One at a time. Reich, will you signal? You seem to be clearest.’

  It was as if the clear one-way communication from Potsdam to Berlin cleared the line the other way. We could feel Reich’s mind pumping out messages like spurts of energy. ‘Can you get to Diyarbakir? ’ He had to repeat the message a dozen times. Then, listening to him we found ourselves making a certain effort in sympathy. To begin with, the Graus protested ‘One at a time.’ Then, suddenly, it was as if we fell into step with Reich, using our own mental amplifiers simply to amplify his signal and send it on. Immediately, the voice of the Graus said: ‘That’s better. I’m getting you clearly now.’ From then on there was no difficulty. We were even able to give them a resumé of our situation, just as if we were speaking on the telephone. During all this time, we were not in the room. We were totally self-absorbed, like men in prayer. And I suddenly realized that the reason for the bad amplification was that I was not deep enough in my own mind; I was too near the surface. The trouble was a simple one: if I sank too deep into my mind, I tended to fall asleep. Language and meaning belong to the realm of the body. It is as difficult to carry them into the depths of one’s mind as to carry logical thought into a dream. I mention this because it was at this moment that I first became clearly aware of the immensity of our ignorance. Those deep areas of the mind are inhabited mainly by memories and dreams, which drift by like great fishes. It is tremendously difficult to preserve any sense of purpose at that depth, to distinguish reality from illusion. And yet for really efficient telepathy, one has to ‘send’ from this depth.

  However, on this occasion, it did not matter. Reich, Fleishman and I reinforced one another. It is only in an exp
erience like this that one can recognize the full meaning of the phrase ‘we are members of one another’.

  When we had finished talking with the Graus, we all felt strangely happy and refreshed, as if waking from a deep and peaceful sleep. Fleishman looked his old self again. His wife, who brought us in some coffee, and was obviously trying to control her hostility to Reich and myself, looked at him with amazement, and obviously revised her ideas about us. It was interesting, incidentally, to note that Fleishman’s obvious tenderness for her—she was thirty years his junior, and had only married him a year ago—communicated itself to Reich and myself, so that we looked at her with a proprietary fondness that combined lust and an intimate knowledge of her body. She had simply dropped into our telepathic circle, and become, in a sense, the wife of all three of us. (I should also note that the lust experienced by Reich and myself was not the usual male desire to possess a strange female, for we had already, so to speak, possessed her, through Fleishman.)

  By three in the morning, the reporters in helicopters had grown tired of waiting for us. Besides, their numbers were more than the City’s Air Safety Regulations allowed. But the crowd outside the front door was undiminished, and the street was lined with automobiles containing sleeping reporters. We went up to the attic, and placed a ladder against the skylight window. At three-twenty, there was the sound of a helicopter above the house, and we quickly opened the window. With some manoeuvring, the rope ladder was dropped into the room; then Fleishman, myself and Reich clambered up it as fast as we could, before the reporters below found out what was happening. The Grau brothers pulled us to safety, and pulled up the ladder, then the helicopter set off at top speed for the airfield. The operation was perfect. The reporters in the street were certain that we could have no way of summoning a helicopter, since they carried interception devices in their cars (strictly illegal, of course). So if any of them noticed the helicopter, they probably assumed it was another reporter, or perhaps a patrol of the Air Safety Council. At all events, we reached the airport with no sign of pursuit. The pilot had radioed ahead to the pilot of the rocket. By three-thirty-five, we were on our way to Paris. We had decided that our next business lay with Georges Ribot.