Jory turned excitedly to someone beside him, but off the screen. "I've got him," he said quickly. "He's awake." He turned and faced Ernie. "Look, Ernie, I can't see you but we've got a microphone in your room. I can hear every word you say. Now sit down for a minute and let me explain." "You'd better," Ernie said ominously. "Are you sitting?" "Yeah, I'm sitting. Get on with it." "I've been on your screen every night for the past week, Ernie. We took over the station. And we've been broadcasting to you on all channels for the past week." Ernie shook his head. "You're nuts," he mumbled. "It's true, Ernie." "But--" A thought struck him. "Hey, are other people getting this on their sets?" "Everyone in the city, Ernie. But they aren't seeing it. As far as we can tell they think they're watching their usual programs. Everyone is in a trance, Ernie. They just go through the same motions over and over. It was the same with the engineers here. We just pushed them aside. They're tied up now. We're keeping them under drugs. We had to do that. When they were loose they just tried to get back at the controls. But that was all, they never really saw us." Ernie shook his head again. "Wait a minute. Let me get my head clear--O.K., now you say everybody is in some kind of trance. _Why?_" "I tried to make you see it today. The world is stuck. It's stuck in this God-forsaken one day! We don't know why. Some of us--just a few--have known it all along. But even we can't remember what caused it." "You mean it's happening everywhere?" "Yes. Or not happening, I guess you'd say. We're not getting reports from overseas ... not any that are any different from the first Wednesday. So it must be the same over there. It's the whole world, Ernie." "Wait a minute. Let me think." After a moment, he got up, went into the kitchen and got another beer. "O.K., I'm ready," he said as he came back. "Now, why did you guys pick me? How many of you are there?" "Just a handful ... no more than twenty. We're scattered all across the country. We picked you because you're a test case, Ernie. One of us is a psychologist. "He says you're a common denominator. If we could break you out of it, then we could get through to a whole cross section of people." Ernie grunted and sipped his beer. "A common denominator, huh? Thanks, pal. You mentioned drugs. I guess you can go anywhere? Just walk past people and never be seen?" "That's right." Ernie laughed scornfully. "You've got a good deal. Why louse it up? What do you stand to gain?" Jory shook his head. "You're wrong, Ernie. For one thing, everything is slowly running down. Miners go to the same part of the mine each day and send out nothing but empty cars. The same thing is happening all across the country, in farms, in factories, in hospitals--" Ernie got up. "Keep talking," he said.