Pilot is getting strange energy readings from the sphere. He tells the others to "vacate the area immediately!"

D’Argo pursues it. As he passes Chiana in the corridor he warns her to keep her comlink open and not move.

"Oh god," Crichton comments, "another critter." Having learned from previous experiences, he starts looking around for a gun.

D’Argo is demanding more DRDS for the search. He’s having trouble sniffing the creature out – all he can smell is Crichton.

Zhaan has checked the blood – it’s definitely from Crichton. That’s puzzling, because Crichton isn’t injured.

 Quest for clothes

It corners her and grunts at her. Then it says her name.

When Chiana asks what the creature is, it points at Crichton’s IASA identification badge. It gurgles, "John!"

Chiana tries to escape, but the creature grabs her. While holding her down, it packs up Crichton’s IASA uniform.

"John!" it insists. Chiana begins to understand – this creature is John Crichton.

Chiana takes the Beast Crichton to see Zhaan and the others. Aeryn draws her gun the moment she sees the creature, warning it to get away from Chiana.

"I don’t think you need the gun," Chiana tells her.

Crichton demands, "Who are you and what do you want?"

"I’m me," the Beast Crichton tells him. "John Crichton."

Crichton is understandably skeptical. In a sudden frenzy, the creature attacks, but Zhaan sneaks up behind him and knocks him out with a sleep shot.

Zhaan does some more tests. The Beast Crichton’s blood, DNA and memories all match Crichton’s, and nobody knows why.

The sphere begins shaking again, and Pilot reports that he’s detecting another powerful surge of energy.

Face of a stranger

Aeryn watches a naked man pull himself out of the cocoon. It looks like Crichton, but his bald head is wrinkled like a cerebrum.

"I’m John Crichton," he tells Aeryn.

"I don’t think so," Aeryn replies. "For a start, he has more hair – among other things. Can you blame that on being cold?"

The man asks, "What the hell happened to me?"

They’re cousins, identical cousins

Crichton and his apparently hyper-evolved counterpart stare at each other. High Crichton has borrowed Crichton’s Peacekeeper uniform and is being escorted to a cell, a security precaution that he says he has no trouble understanding.

When Crichton asks what is going on, High Crichton tells him, "I know as much as you do." He acknowledges that the situation seems bizarre, but as far as he is concerned he is John Crichton.

"Perhaps it would help if you thought of me as an alternative version of yourself," he suggests.

Crichton has trouble accepting this. He considers himself the one true Crichton, and his evolved version acknowledges that he has a point.

"In my memories I look like you," High Crichton admits. When Crichton tests his memories, High Crichton not only remembers what happened the night the Farscape project got funded, he remembers several details the "original" Crichton has forgotten.

The sphere’s energy is fluctuating again. This time the readings are different, and Pilot concludes that it is generating an inter-dimensional portal and trying to pull Moya through.

Aeryn asks High Crichton if he knows anything about this. He doesn’t.

D’Argo and Crichton stare at the sphere and go over their options. There aren’t many – they don’t know how to affect the sphere and they can’t starburst out of danger.

High Crichton has an idea. He asks Aeryn to give him her comlink, but she suspects treachery and refuses.

Crichton has just had the same idea.

Thinking some more, High Crichton realizes that the defense screen won’t work unless it is set up correctly. He tells Aeryn to take him to the maintenance bay, "at gun point if you have to."

She takes him, but keeps her gun leveled at him.

In the maintenance bay, Crichton and D’Argo are cranking up the screen to full power. High Crichton walks in and orders them to recalibrate the system.

"The settings have to be synchronized with the readings on the sphere," he says.

After thinking about it a little more, Crichton agrees. They turn down the power just in time, and the screen works.

The others are impressed, but as High Crichton points out, "we’re not out of the woods yet." The power for the screen will run out in a few hours, and the jury-rigged system might give out even sooner.

Hairy, yet sensitive

Chiana goes to see the Beast Crichton in his cell. She brings him up to date on the situation, and he panics and tries to escape again.

As Chiana tries to comfort him, he grunts despairingly, "John no more. Gone."

Observing the Beast Crichton, High Crichton sees a pattern to the replications. Crichton is the template, while High Crichton and the Beast are variations.

High Crichton asks Pilot if he’s trying to communicate with the sphere. Pilot tells him that the sphere isn’t responding to signals, but it is sending out signals of its own.

Crichton is already trying to analyze the signals, and High Crichton joins him. By filtering out some of the noise, High Crichton coaxes a telepathic message from the sphere.

The sphere tells the three Crichtons that it is a sample collection device. It was damaged by Aeryn’s weapons fire, and was unable to bring its sample back to its dimension.

The sphere must have at least one of the three Crichtons back so it can return home. If it doesn’t get one, it will transport Moya and her entire crew with it.

High Crichton is pleased. "We have a solution," he says.

Crichton is not pleased. He points out that "one of us has to die."

Sympathetic as always, Rygel tells the Crichtons that Moya’s remaining crew might be able to spare each of them a small last meal. He is aghast to learn that the machine only needs one sample, and that the crew might be left with two Crichtons.

Chiana reassures the Beast Crichton that he won’t be thrown to the sphere. She thinks he has as much of a place on the ship as High Crichton.

Unfortunately, the others – especially High Crichton – think the Beast Crichton is the most expendable.

Crichton tries to slow the discussion down. The defense screen has bought them a couple of arns, and he intends to find another solution.

"You’re losing perspective," High Crichton tells him.

"No," Crichton says, "I am widening my perspective! That is what I do, that is what makes me me."

High Crichton agrees to search for other options. But he warns Crichton that when the time comes they must act for the good of the ship.

Chiana assures the Beast Crichton that Crichton is not going to quit. She knows him – but so does the Beast Crichton, and the Beast knows that Crichton will sacrifice him to save Moya and Chiana.

Pilot is not optimistic. He has analyzed the data four times and doubts any new interpretations can be found.

He also warns Crichton that if he has to sacrifice a Crichton to save Moya, he will do so. Moya is willing to sacrifice herself for her passengers, but he is not willing to sacrifice Moya.

The defense screen begins to collapse.

New and improved

High Crichton tells Zhaan he is changing. Concepts he’s been puzzling over for years are suddenly becoming clear to him.

Zhaan says, "You are not the John Crichton I know."

"Look at what’s happened to me," he replies. "How could I be?"

"Your logic may be firm," she says, "but it is cold."

High Crichton isn’t bothered by her scorn. "When all the options have been exhausted," he tells her, "the John Crichton you know will reach the same conclusion."

"I get there quicker. That’s the only difference."

Elsewhere, D’Argo assures Crichton of his support if a Crichton has to be sacrificed. Crichton is still determined to find another solution.

"If you don’t start facing reality soon," D’Argo shouts, "I’m going to face it for you!"

There is a massive blowout in the power systems. The defense screen is down to its last power cell.

"It’s time," says High Crichton. Crichton reluctantly agrees.

"Don’t feel bad," High Crichton tells him. "You knew this moment was coming."

D’Argo and Crichton go to the cells. The door is open, and the Beast Crichton has vanished.

"You think I’d just let you kill him?" asks Chiana. "I set him free."

"How could you have done this?" D’Argo demands.

"You still have two other choices," Chiana points out. The outraged Nebari tells Crichton that his Beast version is warm and sensitive – "everything I ever liked about you."

The others begin searching for the Beast Crichton. Time’s running out, though.

"I think it’s time we reassessed," says High Crichton. Aeryn correctly guesses that he’s not volunteering to be sent away.

She refuses to sacrifice the Crichton she knows to save this one. She sees High Crichton as the aberration, even if he could be useful to the crew.

High Crichton knocks her out and takes her gun.

Rygel has a sleep shot ready for the first Crichton he sees. He doesn’t care which one goes with the sample.

Crichton finds the Beast Crichton in an air vent – exactly where Crichton would go if he wanted to hide. Crichton lets him go, and instead calls High Crichton, telling him he’s captured the Beast version and to meet in the maintenance bay.

High Crichton doesn’t tell Crichton that he’s already there, waiting for him.

Moya’s floor begins to crack from the strain of the sphere’s energies. Crichton dodges through the corridors to get to the maintenance bay.

Ambush

He dashes into the bay to find High Crichton pointing a gun at him. High Crichton has anticipated that Crichton would let the Beast version go.

"You had your chance and blew it," High Crichton says. Crichton insists that they were saving themselves at another person’s expense, but High Crichton doesn’t feel the Beast was worth saving.

"Remember the way you first saw the ape man," High Crichton asks. "How you could legitimize sacrificing him?"

"Well guess what," he continues. "That’s the way I see you."

Crichton knocks his gun aside and dives for cover. He suggests that High Crichton wouldn’t sacrifice himself if he was the only Crichton available either, and High Crichton agrees.

"You’re very judgmental for someone who’s still hiding," he observes.

Crichton drops down in front of him, gun drawn. High Crichton drops his gun, and after a moment Crichton does the fair thing and discards his own.

High Crichton knocks him down effortlessly.

" I could never really be me with you still around," he says.

Crichton picks himself back up.

"So you’re the future," he says. "I’m glad I won’t be here to see it."

He walks to the sphere. Hearing a noise, he turns to see the Beast Crichton clubbing High Crichton.

Crichton examines the fallen body. The Beast Crichton asks, "Dead?"

"Yeah," says Crichton.

"Good," says the Beast, before picking High Crichton up and carries him toward the sphere. Crichton tries to convince him not to go.

The Beast tells him, "Your time, your place. My fate, I accept."

"I understand," says Crichton. The Beast walks into the sphere with High Crichton’s body.

"Good luck," Crichton says.

Reflections on a better self

Moya cruises. Crichton reflects the he’s had better days.

"You did what you thought was right," D’argo tells him.

"And I did what I knew was wrong," says Crichton. He doesn’t like what he saw of his more evolved self.

D’Argo says, "It’s only one possible genetic path."

"Yeah," says Crichton, "but it’s possible. That’s the problem."

Later, he looks at the IASA uniform the Beast Crichton left behind in the cell.

Chiana asks, "You really offered to take the dive?"

"It took me a while," Crichton tells her, "and I needed some help."

Chiana’s happy it worked out the way it did. Crichton wishes he could feel the same way.

He tells Chiana that he always thought he was the good guy, but it was the least developed part of him that did the right thing.

"Somehow you knew," he says.

Chiana tells him, "I know you."