simultaneously. Nothing is screened out. Furthermore, the subject is
capable of correlating everything. The human brain becomes as
efficient as a Mark 60 computer, with the advantage of imagination and
intuition. We don't know how it works yet, or exactly what it does. I
hate to say this. But there's even some evidence that the drug
increases telepathic ability."

But then again, three of the volunteers had gone insane after taking
the drug. Two had died. On some of the others there was no apparent
effect at all.

"We don't even know whether the effects are permanent or temporary,"
Bronson had added.

So now I was supposed to take this Last Resort and then try to think
of a way out of my predicament, with my I.Q. boosted up to a thousand
or so. It made me think of my college days, when I had stayed up all
night on benzedrine, writing term papers. I remembered Bronson's
description of one of the volunteers who had gone insane, and
shuddered. Well, I had nothing to lose.

"It is what its name implies," Bronson had said. "To be used only in
extreme emergency. Only when you have nothing to lose."

I had put the ampule away in the medicine locker and deliberately
forgotten about it. Now I got it out again and held it up to the light
as Bronson had done. Milky, white. I strapped myself to the
acceleration couch, filled a syringe, and swabbed my arm. I looked at
the letter I had started and probably would never finish. I rammed the
needle in.

* * * * *

The hallucinations began within five minutes. This was normal, Bronson
had said. I waited, gripping the armrests of the couch, hoping I would
not begin believing in what I saw.

First there was the meter face directly in front of me. It was
blue-green. I had never really seen before what color it was. It was
like a round, bright flame. I stared at it, becoming hypnotized.
Finally I couldn't stand it any more, I reached over and switched off
the panel lights. Then the meter face became the blackest darkness I
had ever seen, it was no longer a flat disk, but the entrance to a
long, black tunnel, endless and narrow. I wanted to enter the tunnel
and--Quickly I shifted my gaze. A gas tube rectifier caught my
attention. This was like the meter face, only worse. A cloud of
intense blue, flickering, shimmering--As I stared at it the cloud
seemed to be expanding, growing, forever flickering and shimmering
until it became vast, it filled the un