He was preparing to leap, when something got in his way--a shadow--a shadow for an instant between himself and the door, and then a dark bulk stepping right into the shoes of the shadow and filling it out. The Security Guard was not at all the kind of person he'd expected him to be. He was not a big ape, not even a muscular-looking man. He had simply seemed big for the instant he took to fill the place of his shadow. He was a man of average height, average build. He blocked the doorway without bluster, looking very calm and relaxed. Only his eyes were cold and accusing and dangerously narrowed as he surveyed Corriston from head to foot. "I'm afraid you'll have to go back to the ward now," he said. "You picked a bad time to take a turn about the Station. Ordinarily you'd be privileged to do so. That's part of the therapy. But you picked a _very_ bad time." "I'm beginning to realize that," Corriston said. "I couldn't help it, though. I had no way of knowing that freighter was out of control. I'm afraid you've made a mistake, too, though. I'm not going back to the cell." Corriston had been watching the man's right arm. Suddenly it went back and his fist started rising, started coming up fast at an angle that could have sent it crashing against Corriston's jaw. Corriston had no intention of letting that happen. He side-stepped quickly and delivered a smashing blow to the pit of the guard's stomach. The blow was so solid that it doubled the guard up. His knees buckled and he started to fold. Corriston didn't take the folding for granted. A second blow caught the man squarely on the jaw and a third thudded into his rib section. For an instant he looked so dazed that Corriston felt sorry for him. He was still half-doubled up when he sank to the floor and straightened out. He straightened out on his side first, and then rolled over on his back and stopped moving. His lips hung slackly, his eyes were wide and staring. The look on his face gave Corriston a jolt. It was a very strange look. The fact that his features had become slack was not startling in itself, but there was something unnatural, unbelievable, about the way that muscular relaxation had overspread his entire countenance. His features were putty-gray and they seemed to have no clearly defined boundaries. His nose, eyes, and forehead looked as if the ligaments which held them together had snapped from overstrain or had been severed by a surgeon's scalpel ... severed and allowed to go their separate ways without interference. In fact, there was no real expression on the man's face at all--no recognizably human expression--not even the stuporous look of a man knocked suddenly unconscious.