Donovan walked through his office, conscious that he was doing this
for the last time. Rejuvenation was like death. You put an end to a
lifetime casually and without haste.
At the pilo-cab station, the wind cutting down from the whirr of
swooping cabs, Donovan met Blascomb. There were two bright flashes, and
then the smell of disintegrated flesh. Blascomb gestured toward two
graying pools on the plasticized floor in back of them.
"Murder and suicide," he said, obviously pleased with himself, "The
C.D. will think you are dead. The murderer's body is also there to
provide a motive for the transfer of the Trust's funds in the event
Crane becomes too thorough. He'll be here soon; we work fast now."
* * * * *
The special pilo-cab dropped them into a gravity-shielded warehouse
above the European Desert. It housed Blascomb's laboratory. The
rejuvenation process was even simpler than Donovan had expected.
"Not the Fountain of Youth, exactly," Blascomb explained as he plunged
in the needle, "but a selective antibody that attacks only aging tissue
and forces replacements practically on an embryonic level of activity.
Unlike the Callistan serum, which is merely a stimulant, this antibody
creates from its destroyed tissue a catalyst capable of stimulating
chromosomes and genes. By the very process of feeding upon itself, the
body grows younger. The net result is a reversal of the life process,
an anabolism making you grow younger, year by year."
"Eventually to disappear as a single cell?"
"Ultimately, yes. Long before that period, probably when you're a
young man, you'll have to return to 2482 for a reversion to normal
metabolism."
"The process can be repeated?"
"Indefinitely."