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it to be of some unknown alloy; at least, the molecular patterns were typically metallic. In every other way, it resembled glass. It was about three inches thick. He had wondered why Murchison had carved a comparatively small entrance in the other chamber; now he saw why. The metal resisted a beam that could normally slice Corsham steel like soft cheese. It took twenty minutes to cut out a segment four feet high by two feet wide.
    This was the room containing the dark-haired girl. After testing for space virus and radioactivity, Carlsen stepped over the threshold. He crossed to the bed, unsheathed the scoring knife, and sliced through the canvas where it vanished into the metal. He threw back the sheet. She lay as if on a mortuary slab, the feet together. The breasts, unflattened by gravity, stood out as if they had been supported by a brassiere.
    “Incredible,” Murchison said. “She looks alive.”
    It was true; the flesh of the body had none of the flabbiness associated with death.
    “Could be blood pressure. If she was placed in here immediately after death, there’d be enough pressure to make the body swell slightly in the vacuum.”
    “Shall I start with the laser?” The eagerness in his voice made Carlsen smile. Without taking his eyes off the girl, he said: “Okay. Go ahead.” As he spoke, the metal bands slid back, leaving marks on the naked flesh of the belly and thighs.
    “It must be some form of thought control. Let’s see if I can make them go back.” He stared at the bed, concentrating, but nothing happened. He turned and beckoned to Steinberg and Ives. “Okay. Take her back to the freezer.”
    Steinberg said: “If there’s no room in the freezer, she can share my bed till we get back to earth.”
    Carlsen grinned. “I don’t think you’d find her very responsive.” He turned to Murchison. “Let’s get back.”
    “Is that all we’re taking?” Murchison sounded disappointed.
    “Two’s enough, don’t you think?”
    “There’s plenty of room for more in the freezer.”
    Carlsen laughed. “All right. Just one more.”
    He let Murchison lead the way. As he expected, Murchison went to the chamber containing the blonde girl. He stood and watched while the laser turned the metal-glass into red-hot globules that splashed on the floor. When the last link had been cut through, the segment fell inward; Murchison stumbled forward and the laser bounced against the floor, searing a small crater.
    “Hey, careful. Are you all right?”
    “Sorry, Skip.” His voice sounded laboured. “I’m suddenly damn tired.”
    Carlsen peered through the glass of the space helmet; Murchison looked exhausted and pinched. “You go on back to the Hermes , Bill. Tell Dave and Lloyd to get back here with another shell.”
    He moved to the bedside. This time, instead of using the scoring knife, he tried an experiment. He stared hard at the canvas sheet and mentally ordered it to retract. For a moment nothing happened; then the metal bands under the sheet slid away. A moment later, the sheet itself slid across the body and into a gap that opened in the edge of the slab. He said: “Of course.”
    “What’s of course?” Craigie had overheard him in the Hermes .
    “I just made the bands retract by willing them to move. You realise what that means?”
    “High-power technology.”
    “I don’t mean that. It means these creatures are probably still alive. The bands are made to respond to their thought-pressure when they wake up. I wonder if I can…” He stared at the table, mentally ordering the bands to go back, but nothing happened. He said: “No. That makes sense. They wouldn’t need to make the bands go back, once they’d awakened. But how the hell were they supposed to get out of here?”
    “Out of the ship?”
    “No. Out of this glass chamber.” As he said this, he stared at the end wall and mentally ordered a door to open. Instead, the whole wall slid smoothly aside. At that moment, he saw Ives and