On and on and on, science made into a marathon. Four hours of exhausted, deathlike sleep; eight hours more of the smells, and the glaring light, and the moving instruments. Days of this, sealing the brains permanently into their new homes, into their hideous new bodies....
But finally came the climax, and the last exhausted spurt of work. For the concluding twelve hours there was no sleep or rest for anyone; and at the end a breathless, haggard tension held them as Dr. Ku Sui, a shell of his former self, reviewed the results of the nine days' ordeal. His verdict was:
"Four have come through, I think, safe. The fifth—I do not know. His body was near death when he was brought here. He may live or die; it is impossible to tell now. But it is finished."
Then the men slept. Some slipped to the floor and slept where they were. In nine days, the work of a month had been done, and a miracle wrought. The brains had been born again.
CHAPTER XII
Flight
t was to Hawk Carse that the news of imminent danger came first.
He had staggered from the laboratory into a sleeping room and, clad as he was, fallen over into a berth. He would have wakened in a few hours, such was his custom of years to four-hour watches on ships, but he was permitted less than an hour of sleep. A hand pulled at him; a voice kept calling his name. Awareness returned to him slowly as his brain roused from the coma of sleep.