Read Lifeforce for Free Online

much he detested people who said, “Let’s face it.” On the other hand, he felt guilty about Violet; if he gave her son this opportunity, he’d feel he’d discharged his obligation. He said: “So you want to do your features writer out of a job?”
    “I don’t want to. But if it happens that way…” Seth’s eyes were bright; he sensed he had won.
    Carlsen sighed. “Okay.” He looked at his watch. “Let’s go.”
    “What, now?” Seth was testing his luck as though it were thin ice.
    “It’d better be now, if you want to get that article written.”
    As they walked towards the cab rank at Marble Arch, Seth asked: “Any chance of getting a photograph of you in the lab?”
    “No, I’m sorry. That’s strictly against regulations. No cameras in the S.R.I. Security and all that.”
    “Yes, of course.”
    By the time their cab had crawled in a traffic jam from Park Lane to Whitehall, it was almost five o’clock, and the sky was darkening. As Carlsen expected, most of the office staff had left. The old doorman saluted him.
    “Is this young man with you, sir?”
    “Yes. We’re just going up to the club.”
    The doorman should have asked to see Seth’s S.R.I, card, but he had known Carlsen for twenty years. He let them past.
    Carlsen used his electronic computer card to summon the lift. There were no stairs in the S.R.I. building, so no one could get past the ground floor without a pass. Seth asked: “Are we going to the club?”
    “I think so. I need a drink.”
    “Could we see the lab first?”
    “I don’t see why not.”
    As they walked down the corridor, Seth said: “I can’t tell you how grateful I am for all this.” Carlsen wished he could have believed him. He had the feeling that Seth regarded the satisfaction of his own desires as a law of nature.
    At first sight, the laboratory was empty; then a young lab assistant came out of the specimen room. Carlsen recognised him as one of his admirers.
    “Oh, hello, sir. Come to see the film?”
    “What film?”
    “From the Vega. It arrived this morning.”
    The Vega was one of two big space cruisers that had set out for the derelict a month ago. They could achieve up to ten million miles a day.
    “Good. What’s the news?”
    “There’s another hole in the Stranger, sir.” The Stranger was a name the popular press had invented for the derelict.
    “How big?”
    “Pretty big. Thirty feet across.”
    “Christ! That’s unbelievable.” His immediate impulse was to rush upstairs and find out more; then he remembered Seth. He introduced the two young men. “Seth Adams, Gerald… I’ve forgotten your other name.”
    “Pike, sir.”
    “When are you leaving, Gerald?”
    “In about ten minutes, sir. Why? Can I help you?”
    “No, it doesn’t matter. I wanted someone to show Mr Adams the lab while I go upstairs.”
    Seth said: “If you’re in a hurry, perhaps I could just see the aliens?”
    “Sure. Come on.” He led him into the specimen room. Against the wall at the far end, a row of mortuary cabinets had recently been installed. He said: “Do you know where they are, Gerald?”
    “Yes sir. I’ll show you.”
    He pulled out a drawer that opened like a filing cabinet. The man’s body lay inside. His eyes still stared blankly upwards.
    Carlsen said: “Strange. He looks more alive than when I last saw him.”
    Gerald said: “Well, of course, he is alive.”
    Seth asked quickly: “Is that certain?”
    “Quite,” Carlsen said. “If he wasn’t, he’d be rotten by now.”
    “Can he be wakened?”
    “If he can, we don’t know the secret. His body’s lifefield is still strong — that means he’s alive. It drains away completely after death. He’s in some kind of a trance, and we don’t know how to bring him round.”
    Gerald Pike opened the other two drawers. The naked bodies looked much as Carlsen remembered them, but the faces were no longer corpselike. They might have been asleep.
    Seth was looking at them with fascination.