A Question of Identity

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Ed Cassetti stood before the pair of big viewscreens in the on-call cabin of the contact-ship Ambassador. The left-hand screen showed a small and shrinking image of the planet Earth. The right-hand screen showed a vague skull-like shape that loomed larger as Earth dwindled.

To Cassetti’s left, Sam Richards, the other human on the computer-con-trolled ship, glanced at a warning light by a small grille between the screens. This warning light glowed red, and the grille emitted an artificial voice: “Contact Specialist 4 Samuel Richards: You will immediately correct nonstandard contact-suit-liner configuration.”

Richards sighed, and put the hood of his khaki skisuit-like uniform back over his head.

The light faded out.

Cassetti murmured, “More coming.”

“Naturally. But the damned hood gets hot.”

The red light came back on.

“Contact Specialist 4 Samuel Richards: You have committed Uniform Violation Level Three. You will immediately do forty push-ups.”

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