"Well, the consensus among the crew was that this baby here looks a hell of a lot like you, sir."

Jerry sat where he was, his eyes on Bob's face, for a long moment, as fingers of ice took hold of his spine. Then, with unreasoning apprehension, he turned his gaze back upon the near-photographic likeness he held. "Ensign," he said, after a minute. "This is a picture of me."

"But sir, it can't be," said the tech.

"You're wrong," said Jerry, letting the paper drop to the floor. "It can be, because it is. And all at once I think I know why."

Without warning, Jerry swung his legs over the side of the couch and jumped to his feet.

"Listen," he said urgently, "there's no time to lose. Get the hospital staff together, fast, and bring me back their best psyche-man. I need a hypnotist."

"A h-hyp—?" the tech blurted, confused, then gave an obedient nod and hurried out, shaking his head all the way to the switch-board.

"Never mind why, Doctor. Can you do it? That's all I care to know," Jerry's voice crackled, his eyes flashing with authority.

"Y-Yes, I think so," quavered the other man. "If you can be hypnotized, I mean."

"All Space Zoologists have the brainpower necessary to be perfect subjects," Jerry snapped. "Quickly, now, Doctor. I've wasted one Contact already."

"Very well, sir," said the man. "If you'll lie back, now, and make your mind blank—"

"I know, I know! Get on with it, will you!"

Bob and Jana stood back in the shadows beside the towering metal control board, listening in silence as the hypnotist put Jerry under, deeper and deeper, until his mind was readily suggestible. Then he made the statements Jerry had told him to make, and with a snap of his fingers brought the zoologist out of hypnosis.

"You heard, Ensign?" asked Jerry. "Did he do exactly as I told him to?"

"Sir!" protested the doctor.

"I mean no offense," said Jerry. "But if your words left my mind too free, too human somehow, the alien would sense it. And a ruse like this one might not work on a second attempt, once the alien had been apprised of our intent."

"He 

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