"And, as you perhaps already know, the principle of Professor Baarslag's time-encystment process involves phenomena we're all familiar with. The stasis developed by Professor Albert Baarslag, and to which in exactly fifteen minutes he will subject himself, incorporates a kind of super-sleep principle. The synaptic connections will be broken through amoeboid contraction--and this disconnection will exist until that future time, five hundred years hence, when Professor Baarslag will awaken. Five hundred years is only the opening experiment, says Professor Baarslag. The next experiment can possibly be for any definite period of time. "This awakening is also interestingly arranged for by leaving one awaking threshold at its normal waking level. When this is activated by automatic relays--" Owen was stripped now, and his body was outstretched in the soft, deep depths of the reservatory. The sliding panel that exposed his upper torso was slid open and he was looking up into Kaufman's red face, and the intent professional faces of the two medics. But Kaufman's face was serious now as he reached inside the reservatory and gripped Owen's damp hand. "Goodby, Al," he said. "You're curious about man's destiny. I'm not. I wonder if you'll really be able to bear the knowledge of where we're going." Owen's mouth was dry. He licked sticky lips. He didn't say anything. They were preparing his arm for an injection of hypnotosin. Owen twitched. He wanted to cry out his guilt. Surrender. He knew now that he had made a horrible mistake. But things blurred fast. He couldn't speak. There was a dull, pleasant haze, a feeling of utter relaxation. Not utterly. It should be that way, but it wasn't. Because he knew, now! Voices came from a very far distance, slow, soft and rhythmical. After the anaesthesia, they would sink slender electrodes through the brain tissue of the cerebrum's third ventricle. Chemical reaction would destroy the substance of the electrodes gradually, a process of slow disintegration carefully gauged. And the lesions in the posterior region of the floor and walls of the third ventricle would heal, so that he might awaken-- _No! Anything would be better than this! He wanted to tell them. But he couldn't. It was too late. He was going under--deep down and far under._ He had been terribly misled by all the scientific jargon. Why couldn't they have been simple and direct? All this principle really was, was a complete mastery and understanding of the oldest phenomenon in man--the most common and the most persistent mystery. Synapsis severed. Each cellular unit self-feeding through synthetic, inexhaustible sources. Oxygen intake lowered to an incredibly low level. But it was really nothing other than-- _SLEEP! Sleep! Pure, prolonged, unblemished, unsullied sleep!_ And so....