Fallada said: “How do you know this alien is still inside Armstrong? What’s to prevent it moving to someone else?”
Carlsen shook his head. “As long as Armstrong’s unconscious, it’s trapped. It’s subject to the same condition as Armstrong’s body.”
“But are you sure of that?”
“No, but it seems to be common sense. I don’t believe it can move in and out of bodies at a moment’s notice. It’s a fairly complicated business — like getting into a spacesuit. It takes time.”
The lift arrived. Armstrong was slumped in the wheelchair, his head back against Lamson, who was pushing it. The eyes were still open.
“This way, sir.” Lamson led them into the room next to the flat. It was a small consulting room with the usual filing cabinets, reference books and bound copies of the British Medical Journal. Carlsen asked the orderlies to lift Armstrong onto the couch. He closed the curtains and moved the desk lamp so it shone into the staring eyes.
“Can you bring me another dose of the hypnoid drug?”
Lamson looked doubtful. “I suppose so, sir. But one’s usually enough.”
“We may need it. How long does it last?”
“A dose like that — at least two hours.”
“Then we probably shall need more.”
As the orderlies went out, Heseltine said quietly: “I’d rather you didn’t mention this to any of your colleagues.”
Lamson nodded. “Don’t worry, sir. We understand.”
Heseltine closed the door carefully and locked it. Fallada said: “Don’t you think a second dose might be dangerous? It imposes a strain on the heart.”
“I know. But these things are more powerful than you think. It could still escape us.”
He bent over Armstrong and carefully closed the eyes. He took the electronic capsule recorder from the desk and positioned it on the small table at the head of the couch. He checked the recording level, then depressed the key. He sat on the edge of the couch, leaning forward so his mouth was close to Armstrong’s ear. “Armstrong. Can you hear me?”
The eyelids flickered, but there was no movement of the lips. Carlsen repeated the question and added: “If you can hear me, say yes.”
The lips twitched. After a pause, Armstrong whispered: “Yes.”
“Do you know where you are now?”
Again, the question had to be repeated. Then Armstrong’s face began to pucker like a child about to cry. His voice was strained: “I don’t want to stay here. I want to go. I’m afraid. Let me go. Let me go.” The voice was almost inaudible. For several seconds, the lips continued to move, but no sound came from them.
“Where are you?”
There was a pause of more than a minute. Carlsen repeated the question several times. Armstrong’s voice was choked with emotion: “They won’t let me talk to you.”
“Who won’t?”
There was no reply. Carlsen said urgently: “Listen, Armstrong, if you want us to help you escape, you’ve got to tell us where you are. Where are you?”
Bubbles of saliva formed on Armstrong’s lips. He began to breathe hoarsely. He said: “I’m here…”; then the sound died away into a bubbling noise. Suddenly the body twisted violently. Armstrong screamed. There was so much terror in the sound that they were all shocked. As the body thrashed wildly, all three of them tried to hold him down. It was difficult; he seemed to possess enormous strength. After a struggle, he lay still, panting, with Carlsen sitting on one of his arms, Heseltine holding the other, Fallada sitting on his legs. Carlsen said: “Armstrong. Can you see the thing that’s holding you prisoner?”
“Yes.” The eyes opened, staring like a frightened horse.
“Tell him he’s got to talk to us. Tell him that.”
The body gave a sudden jerk and rolled halfway off the couch. Carlsen and Heseltine pushed it back. There was a knock on the door, startling them.
“Who is it?”
“Lamson, sir. I’ve brought your nortropine-methidine.”
Fallada unlocked the door. “Ah, thank you.”
“You know how to use it, don’t you, sir? Wait until he’s coming round before you give him another dose.”
Fallada said: “Don’t worry. We know about it.” He closed the door firmly and locked it again.
Armstrong was lying still again. Carlsen unbuttoned his cuff and pushed the sleeve up the plump, hairy arm. It refused to move above the elbow. Heseltine handed him a pair of surgical scissors from the desk; Carlsen cut the sleeve from the wrist to the shoulder. As he took the hypodermic, Armstrong sat up and twisted sideways. Carlsen dropped the syringe and grabbed him again. Heseltine helped him force Armstrong back onto the couch. Carlsen said: “Hans, get the syringe and inject it.”
Another voice spoke from Armstrong’s lips, startling them with its calm and authority: “There is no need for that. If you let me go, I promise you to leave the earth.”
Fallada hesitated, holding the needle. Carlsen said: “Go ahead and inject. The thing’s a liar. If we don’t inject, it’ll be free in ten minutes.” He felt the muscles tense under his hands and used all his strength to hold down the writhing body.
The voice spoke again: “Carlsen, you disappoint me. I thought you understood.”
Carlsen resisted the temptation to be drawn into argument. He nodded to Fallada. “Go ahead.” Fallada drove the needle into the flesh, above the trickle of blood from the previous injection, and pressed the plunger home. They sat watching the face for more than a minute. Armstrong’s breathing became deeper. The eyes lost their focus, and the facial muscles relaxed.
Carlsen said: “Can you still hear me?”
There was no reply. Heseltine said: “Perhaps you’ve given him too much.”
Carlsen shook his head. He spoke close to Armstrong’s ear. “Listen to me. If necessary, we shall keep you in this state for days or weeks. Do you understand?”
“Yes.” It was the same voice, but now it was weaker, less forceful. The breathing became disturbed and spasmodic.
Fallada said: “I hope we don’t kill him.”
Carlsen said: “If we do, it can’t be helped. The alien will die too. That’s worth Armstrong’s life.”
The voice said thickly: “You cannot destroy us all.”
Carlsen said: “We can try. We can send warships to destroy your space vehicle.” He leaned closer. “And we shall pay particular attention to those yellow squids.”
Fallada looked at him with surprise but said nothing. As they watched, Armstrong’s eyes closed. The face lost its strength, the flesh seemed to sag. Carlsen said: “We have another syringe of the hypnoid drug. Will you answer our questions, or shall we inject it?”
The face was still for several moments. Then the voice said: “Ask me your questions.”
“What is your name?”
“You could not pronounce it. You could call me G’room.”
“Are you male or female?”
“Neither. Our race does not possess genders like yours.”
Heseltine asked: “What is your race?”
“You would call us Nioth-Korghai. But your human vocal organs will not sound our syllables.”
Fallada asked: “Where are you from?”
“A planet of the star you call Rigel. It is not visible, even to your most powerful telescopes.”
“How old are you?”
“In your earth time, fifty-two thousand years.”
They stared at one another with amazement. Carlsen asked: “Do all your race live as long as that?”
“No. Only we of the Ubbo-Sathla. We are what you call vampires.”
Fallada was writing down the replies. He asked: “And what of the rest of the Nioth-Korghai? How long do they live?”
“For about three hundred of your earthly years.”
Heseltine asked: “How did you become vampires?”
“That is a long story.”
“We’d like to hear it all the same. Tell us.”
There w
as a silence for several minutes, so that Carlsen began to wonder whether the creature intended to reply. But finally the voice came again.
“Our planet is completely covered with water. And our race, as you have guessed, has the form of the creatures you call squids. But your molluscs have almost no brain. The Nioth-Korghai have a highly developed brain and nervous system. Because our bodies are so light, we can live under the greatest of pressures. Our metabolism depends on the salts of the element fluorine, which exists in large quantity in our seas, as sodium chloride exists in yours. Beneath our seas there are immense natural caves. These became our cities. They are far bigger than your caves on earth. Even the smallest of them is eight miles high.
“At the time when your planet was in the midst of the age of great reptiles, we possessed a highly evolved civilisation. But in one important respect, it was completely unlike your earthly civilisation. The human mind enjoys solving technical problems, and its noblest ideal is science. The Nioth-Korghai are interested only in what you would call religion and philosophy. Each individual wishes to understand the universe, and ultimately to become one with it. This also explains why we do not have two sexes, as you do on earth. Your bodies conduct the spark of life at the climax of your sexual excitement. But the Nioth-Korghai can receive the universal energies directly. They fall in love with the universe, not with one another. And in moments of supreme contemplation, they become pregnant through the life energy of the universe.
“As we learned the secrets of the universe, we also learned how to project our minds to distant galaxies. We visited your earth when the seas were first cooling. We taught the plantlike creatures of Mars to build their civilisations under water. We helped the creatures of your planet Pluto to escape to a planet of the binary star Sirius when their own world lost its atmosphere. Our greatest achievement was to help in the evacuation of more than a thousand planets in the Crab Nebula before it exploded and turned into a supernova.
“You earth creatures can have no conception of the tremendous dramas of interstellar space. Your scale is too small. But the Nioth-Korghai have watched the births and deaths of galaxies. We have seen island universes created out of nothing. You must understand that these universes are living creatures. They possess their own kind of cosmic life, on a level that cannot be grasped by biological organisms. The religion of the Nioth-Korghai teaches that the universe itself is a gigantic brain, in which the worlds we know are mere individual cells.
“Fifty thousand years ago, your earth was approaching the end of a great Ice Age, and the men who lived on it were little better than apes — you call them Neanderthals. The Nioth-Korghai decided that conditions were propitious for a great experiment — the attempt to produce a more intelligent form of life. This was during the lifetime of Kuben-Droth, one of our greatest biological engineers —”
Fallada interrupted: “I thought you had no science?” The creature fell silent. For more than half a minute, they were afraid it had decided to end its story. Then it began again.
“We had no technology in your earthly sense. We did not need it — the sea supplied all our simple needs. But science springs from the soul and the will. Our problem was to persuade your Stone Age men to develop intelligence. No creature can be made to evolve against its will. We had to implant a will-to-intelligence in these creatures, and this could be done only by inhabiting their brains and making them dream. You cannot imagine the difficulties involved. For these early men could be made to experience intense pleasure, but they forgot about it a few seconds later. It was like trying to teach algebra to monkeys. Kuben-Droth devoted more than half his lifetime to the task, but he died before we finally achieved success. It took seven hundred years to produce a man and woman whose children became the first of the new species of true men. We called them Esdram and Solayeh. They survive in your mythology as Adam and Eve.
“Now for seven hundred years, we had lived in the brains and bodies of human beings. And in some ways this was a dangerous thing to do. Their vital energies sustained us. We enjoyed the intoxication of their sensuality, although at first it disgusted us. Your world was dangerous and violent, but it was also very beautiful.
“Yet we were scientists, and we had enough self-control to know that it was time for us to leave the human race to itself. We left your earth in groups of a hundred, to return to our own star system —”
Fallada said: “Excuse me interrupting you again, but surely Rigel is hundreds of light-years away from earth. How long did this journey take you?”
Again there was a lengthy silence, as if the creature had to prepare its answer. Then it said: “You forget that the energies of the universe exist on many levels. On the physical level, energy cannot attain a speed greater than that of light. On our level, it can move a thousand times that speed. The journey took us less than a year.
“Our group was the last to leave. We deliberately stayed on as long as we could. Then we completed the transformation to the correct level of cosmic energy — you might call it the fifth dimension — and began our journey.
“It was on this return journey that we met with the accident. The chances against it were millions to one; it should have been impossible. When we had covered more than half the distance, we passed within a few hundred miles of a collapsing star — a black hole. These are some of the rarest objects in the universe, and none of us had ever encountered one before. They end by falling out of your universe into a nondimensional hyperspace. We decided to explore — which was a mistake. Some of us were sucked into the whirlpool. Others realised what was happening and warned the rest of us to stay away before they were also sucked in. But it was too late to escape. The force was too powerful. All that we could do was to delay our destruction. We did this by moving into orbit around the black hole. And we continued to circle around, drawn inexorably by its gravity. Some lost strength and hope and allowed themselves to be drawn in. And the rest of us continued to struggle, determined to maintain existence until the last possible moment.
“And then, after more than a thousand years, the black hole disappeared. It fell out of your space, and we were free. Yet we were now so exhausted that we lacked the strength to transform ourselves to the correct level of energy. We were free, but we were stranded in space, four hundred light-years from our own stellar system.
“It was then we began to dream of our happy days on your earth, of the flow of energy from living bodies. We began to travel slowly back towards our own system, searching for other inhabited planets like the earth. There are millions of these in the universe, and if we had been less exhausted, we could have found one without difficulty. As it was, we searched for more than a year before we found one. This was inhabited by a primitive race of animals, not unlike dinosaurs, but far bigger. Their coarse energy disgusted us, but we needed it to live. We absorbed it until we were drunk, killing the creatures by the hundred. After that, we felt less desperate; but the energy transformation was still impossible. Their lower form of energy made it even more difficult. So we moved on, looking for a planet with some higher form of life.
“It is true that we had become destroyers of life. But we had no alternative. We were like soldiers lost in the desert; we had to take whatever we could find. And we found many inhabited planetary systems. In some cases, we found creatures with the kind of life energy we needed, but they always resisted us. We had to take what we wanted by force, destroying those who were too weak to resist. On one planet of the Alnair system, we found bodies resembling those we bad left behind at home, and took them over. We were gradually becoming reconciled to the state of homeless wanderers. And now we had bodies, the longing to return home was beginning to disappear. Besides, we realized that we were apparently immortal. At first, we assumed that this was some strange consequence of our ordeal in the black hole. We decided to try the experiment of living off natural foods, to see what happened. The result was that we aged at the normal rate. So it was now clear that if we wanted to stay alive, we h
ad no choice. We had to continue to drain the vital energies of other creatures. We learned to do this without actually destroying them — in the way that human beings have learned to milk cows. This was not only more humane, but it also prevented us from destroying our own food supply. There were some among us who found even this alternative disgusting, and who preferred to allow themselves to die of old age. But the rest of us became reconciled to our new status — as vampires or mind parasites. After all, this seems to be a law of nature; all living creatures eat other living creatures.
“On a planet of the Alpha Centauri system we began to build a spacecraft. It was vast, because we wanted it to remind us of our home — the great underwater caves of our own world. More than twenty thousand years ago, we revisited your solar system. We were hoping to find beings from our own world — for we knew they intended to return here periodically to observe your progress. We were disappointed, but we stayed here nevertheless. Human beings were still hunters living in caves; we taught them the arts of agriculture, and how to build villages in the middle of lakes. And when there was no more we could do, we returned to the Alpha Centauri system and continued our explorations…”
Carlsen stood up quietly and moved to the door. The other two were so absorbed that neither of them noticed as he unlocked it and quietly closed it behind him.
In the entrance hall, he met the orderly named Norton. “Where can I find Fred Lamson?”
“He’ll be on Ward Two at this time. Hold on and I’ll fetch him for you.”
Lamson came downstairs a few minutes later. Carlsen said: “I need another dose of that hypnoid solution.”
Lamson looked startled. “Are you sure? You know how strong it is?”
“I know. But I’d be glad if you could get it for me.”
“Okay. I’ll bring it to you.”
Carlsen waited in the hall; from the surgery, he could hear the voice continuing. At this distance, its quality reminded him of voices manufactured on a computer. It also struck him that its strength had increased.
Lamson came down the stairs and held out the small cardboard box. “There’s another syringe in there. But be careful. An overdose could kill him.”