by James White
All of the survivors had body temperatures significantly greater than the norm for warm-blooded oxygen breathers, indicating a high metabolic rate and a hyperactive life-form. This was supported by the uniformly deep state of unconsciousness displayed by all of the casualties, and the evidence of dehydration and malnutrition. Beings who burned up energy rapidly rarely lingered in a semiconscious state. There were also signs that the beings had an unusual ability to control bleeding from severe wounds. Coagulation in the incised wounds, perhaps assisted by the presence of the sand, was rapid but not abnormally so, while the stumps at the amputation sites showed little evidence of bleeding.
“Supportive treatment to relieve the dehydration and malnutrition is all that can be done until we get them to the hospital,” Conway went on. “Murchison has already specified the nutrients suited to their metabolism. You can also insert sutures as you see fit. If the load is too great for you, which in my opinion it is, retain Naydrad and send down only the pilot with the litter. Murchison can ride with the casualties on the next trip. She will stay with you while Naydrad comes down for the last batch.”
There was a moment’s silence, then the empath said, “I wider-stand, friend Conway. But have you considered the fact that your suggestion will mean three members of the medical team being on Rhabwar for a lengthy period and only one, yourself, on the surface where medical assistance is most urgently needed? I.am sure that, with the aid of the Casualty Deck’s handling devices and the assistance of friends Haslam and Chen, I can cope with these patients.”
It was possible that Prilicla could cope with the patients provided they remained unconscious. But if they came to suddenly and reacted instinctively to their strange and, to them, perhaps frightening surroundings, and to the giant but incredibly fragile insect medic hovering over them, Conway shuddered to think of what might happen to the empath’s eggshell body and pipestem limbs. Before he could reply, Prilicla was speaking again …
“I am beyond the range of your emotional radiation, of course,” the empath said, “but from long contact with the both of you I know of the strength of the emotional bond between friend Murchison and yourself. This, taking into account the strong possibility that there is a very dangerous life-form loose down there, is undoubtedly a factor in your decision to send her to the safety of the ship. But perhaps friend Murchison would suffer less emotional discomfort if she remained with you.”
Murchison looked up from the casualty she was attending. “Is that what you were thinking?”
“No,” Conway lied.
She laughed and said, “You heard that, Prilicla? He is a Person utterly lacking in consideration and sensitivity. I should have married someone like you.”
“I am highly complimented, friend Murchison,” the empath Said. “But you have too few legs.”
There was the sound of Fletcher clearing his throat disapprovingly at this sudden and unseemly levity, but the Captain did not speak. He could no doubt appreciate as well as any of the need to relieve fear tensions.
“Very well,” Con way said. “Pathologist Murchison will remain with her feet, and too few legs, on Trugdil. Doctor Prilicla, you will keep Charge Nurse Naydrad with you, since it will obviously be of greater assistance in preparing and presenting the casualties for examination and treatment than would the Engineer and Communications officer. Haslam or Dodds can return with the litter and medical supplies which we will specify later. Questions?”
“No questions, friend Conway,” Prilicla said. “The lander is docking now.”
Murchison and Conway returned their full attention to the casualties. The Captain was examining the hull of the wreck. They could hear him tapping at the outer skin and making the metallic scraping noises characteristic of magnetic sound sensors being moved across the surfaces. The wind kept changing direction so that the casualties in the shadow of the outcropping were sheltered only from the sun and not the wind-driven sand.
From Rhabwar Haslam reported that the area was being affected by a small, local sandstorm which should clear before the lander returned in half an hour. He added reassuringly that nothing was moving in the area except themselves and several patches of ambulating thorn bushes, which would lose — a race against a debilitated tortoise.
All but three of the casualties had been moved to the outcropping, and while Conway was bringing them in the pathologist was protecting the others from the wind and sand by loosely wrapping them in transparent plastic sheets after first attaching a small oxygen cylinder to each survivor. The tanks released a metered quantity of gas calculated to satisfy the metabolic requirements of the entity concerned. They had decided that encasing the casualties in makeshift oxygen tents could do no harm since the pure oxygen would assist the weak respiration and aid in the healing of the wounds, but with a completely new life-form one could never be sure of anything. Certainly the treatment showed no sign of returning any of the casualties to consciousness.
“The uniformly deep level of unconsciousness bothers me,” Murchison said as Conway returned carrying, with difficulty, one of the large aliens they had classified as DCOJ. “The level does not bear any relation to the number or severity of the wounds. Could they be in a state of hibernation?”
“The onset was sudden,” Conway said doubtfully. “They were in the process of fleeing their ship, according to the Captain. Hibernation usually occurs in a place of safety, not when the being concerned is in immediate physical danger.”
“I was thinking of an involuntary form of hibernation,” Murchison said, “perhaps induced by their injuries, which enables them to survive until help arrives — What was that?
That was a loud, metallic screeching noise which came from the wreck. It lasted for a few seconds, then there was a moment’s silence before it was repeated. They could hear heavy breathing in their suit phones so it had to be coming from Fletcher.
“Captain,” Murchison said, “are you all right?”
“No trouble, ma’am,” Fletcher replied at once. “I’ve found a hatch in what appears to be a cargo hold. It is, or was, a simple hermetically sealed door rather than an airlock. When the ship tipped over the door couldn’t open fully because the outer edge dug into the sand, which I’ve now cleared away. The hatch opens freely now but the hinges were warped in the crash, as you probably heard. Two of the occupants were trying to escape, but couldn’t squeeze through the narrow opening. They are one of the large- and one of the medium-sized types, both with amputation wounds, neither of them moving. Shall I bring them to you?”
“I’d better look at them first,” Conway said. “Give me a few minutes to finish with this one.”
As they were placing the last casualty inside its makeshift oxygen tent, Murchison said, “Have you found any trace of the criminal, Captain?”
“Other than the wounding on these two, no ma’am,” Fletcher replied. “My sensors pick up no trace of bodily movement inside the ship, nothing but a few quiet, intermittent sounds suggesting settling debris. I’m pretty sure it is outside the ship somewhere.”
“In that case,” she said, looking at Conway, “I’ll go with you.”
The wind died and the sand settled as they neared the wreck so that they could see clearly the black rectangular opening in the hull just at ground level, and the arm of the Captain waving at them from inside it. There were so many other openings caused by sprung plating and access hatches that without Fletcher’s signal they would not have known which gap was the right one. From outside it looked as if the ship was ready to fall apart, but when they crawled through the opening and stood up their helmet lights showed little evidence of internal damage.
“How did the others get out?” Conway asked. He knelt and began running his scanner over the larger of the two casualties. There was evidence of a traumatic amputation of a major limb but the other injuries were superficial.
“There is a large personnel hatch on the upper surface of the hull forward,” Fletcher replied. “At least it was on the up
per side after the ship toppled. Presumably they had to slide down the curve of the hull and jump to the ground, or move along the ship to the prow, which isn’t very far from the ground, and jump from there. These two were unlucky.”
“One of them was very unlucky,” Murchison said. “The DCOJ is dead. Its injuries were not as severe as the other cases I’ve seen, but there is evidence of lung damage by a corrosive gas of some kind, according to my analyzer. What about your DCMH?”
“This one is alive,” Conway said. “Similar general condition, including the lung damage. Probably it is simply a much tougher life-form than the other two.”
“I wonder about this DCOJ life-form,” Murchison said thoughtfully. “Is it intelligent at all? The small DCLG and the DCMH almost certainly are: The limb extremities terminate in specialized manipulators, and the former seems to have developed six hands and no feet. But the big DCOJ has four feet and two clawed forward appendages, and is otherwise made up of teeth and a large system of stomachs.”
“Which is empty,” Conway said. After a moment he added, “All of the cases I’ve examined so far had empty stomachs.”
“Mine as well,” Murchison said. They stared at each other for a moment, then Conway said, “Captain,”
Fletcher had been working on what seemed to be the inboard entrance to the hold, reaching high above his head because he was standing on a wall with the floor and ceiling on each side of him. There was a loud click and a door swung downward and hung open. The Captain made a self-satisfied sound and joined them.
“Yes, Doctor.”
Conway cleared his throat and said, “Captain, we have a theory about your criminal. We think that the condition of distress which caused this ship to release its beacon was hunger. All of the casualties we’ve examined so far have had empty stomachs. It is possible, therefore, that your criminal is a crew member who turned cannibal.”
Before Fletcher could reply, the voice of Prilicla sounded in their phones.
“Friend Conway,” the empath said timidly. “I have not yet examined all of the casualties you sent up, but those I have examined display symptoms of dehydration and tissue wastage indicative of hunger and thirst. But the condition is not far enough advanced for death to be imminent. Your hypothetical criminal must have attacked the other crew members before lack of food became a serious problem. The being was hungry but not starving to death. Are you sure that the creature is intelligent?”
“No,” Conway said. “But if Murchison and I have missed it while examining the first of the casualties, and at that time we were more concerned with charting the injuries than in the contents, if any, of their stomachs, the beastie could be on Rhabwar now. So if you find a well-fed casualty, get Haslam and Chen to restrain it, quickly. The Captain has a professional interest in it.”
“That I have,” Fletcher said grimly. He was about to go on when Haslam, who had relieved Dodds as lander pilot, interrupted to say that he would be touching down in six minutes and would need help loading the litter.
By packing the litter and strapping casualties, sometimes |wo to a couch in the crew’s positions, Haslam was able to lift just over half of the remaining survivors. There was no change 'n the condition of the remaining casualties. The shadow of the outcropping had lengthened, though the air was still warm; the sky remained clear and there was no wind. Murchison said fhat she could usefully spend the time until the lander returned investigating, so far as she was able with her portable equipment, the large DCOJ cadaver they had left in the wreck. The medium-sized DCMH survivor had gone up with Haslam.
It was obvious from the start that Fletcher found the dissection distasteful, and when Murchison told him that there was enough light for the work from the helmet spots of Conway and herself, he left quickly and began climbing among the containers fastened to the now-vertical deck beside them. After about fifteen minutes he reported that his scanner showed the contents to be identical and, judging by the amount of packing used, were almost certainly cargo rather than ship’s stores. He added that he intended moving into the corridor outside the hold to explore, look for other casualties, and gather evidence.
“Do you have to do it now, Captain?” Murchison said wor-v riedly, looking up. Conway turned to regard Fletcher, too, but somehow his eyes did not rise above the level of the other’s waist and the weapon attached to it.
“Do you know, Captain,” he said quietly, “you have been wearing a sidearm ever since Rhabwar’s first mission, and I’ve barely noticed it? It was just a part of your uniform, like the cap and insignia. Now it looks even more conspicuous than your backpack.”
Fletcher looked uncomfortable as he said, “We’re taught that the psychological effect of displaying a weapon is negligible among the law-abiding, but increases in direct proportion to the guilt or harmful intentions of the criminal or potential lawbreaker. However, the effect of my weapon was purely psychological until Lieutenant Haslam brought down the charges for it a few minutes ago.” Defensively he added, “There was no need to wear a loaded weapon on an ambulance ship, and I’d no reason to believe that this would be a police operation.”
Murchison laughed softly and returned to her work, and Conway joined her. As the Captain turned to go, he said, “We can’t spend much time here, but I must make as full a report as possible of the incident and all relevant circumstances. This is a new species to the Federation, a different technology, and the purpose of this ship might have a bearing on the case. Was our criminal a responsible being, perhaps a captive, or an unintelligent animal? If it was intelligent was it deranged, and if so why? And was the distressed condition of the ship and crew a contributory factor? I know that it is difficult to conceive of extenuating circumstances for grievous wounding and cannibalism, but until all the facts are known—”
He broke off and placed his sensor against the deck beside him. A few seconds later he went on, “There is nothing other than ourselves moving inside the wreck. I’ve left the outside hatch open only a few inches. If anything tried to get in you will have plenty of warning, either from the beastie itself forcing it open against the sand or from the sensors on Rhabwar. I can get back to you in plenty of time in any case, so you have nothing to worry about.”
While they resumed the dissection they could follow every step of the Captain’s progress stern ward, because he insisted on verbally describing and amplifying the pictures he was sending up to Dodds. The corridor was low and not very roomy by Earth-human standards, he reported. He had to crawl on hands and knees and it would be difficult to turn around to come back other than at an intersection. Cable looms and air or hydraulic pipelines ran along the sidewalls of the corridor, and coarse-mesh netting was. attached to the floor and ceiling indicating that the ship did not possess an artificial gravity system.
Aft of the compartment occupied by the medics there was another cargo deck, and beyond that the unmistakable shapes of the hyperdrive generators. Further aft the reactor and thrust-ers were sealed from him and heavily shielded, but the sensor indications were that there had been a complete power shutdown — probably an automatic safety measure built into the design — when the ship had toppled. But he could detect a residue of power in some of the corridor lines which he thought might be associated with an emergency lighting circuit, and he thought he had identified a light switch.
It was a light switch, he confirmed a few seconds later. A large stretch of the corridor was illuminated. The lighting was uncomfortably bright but his eyes were adjusting to it. He was moving amidships.
They heard him pause outside their cargo hold, and suddenly the lights came on all over the ceiling beside them. Conway switched off his now-unnecessary helmet light.
“Thank you, Captain,” he said, then continuing the discussion he had been having with Murchison, went on, “There is capacity for a large brain in the cranium, but we cannot assume that all of the available'volume is used for cerebration. I don’t see how a beastie with four feet and two manipulators which are
little more than claws could be a tool user, much less a crew member of a starship. And those teeth bother me. They are certainly not those of a predator. In the distant past they might have been fearsome natural weapons, but now their condition shows that they have not much to do.”
Murchison nodded. “The stomach system is overlarge in relation to the mass of the being,” she said, “yet there is no evidence of adipose or excess edible tissue which would be present if it was an animal bred for food. And the stomach resembles that of an Earth-type ruminant. The digestive system is odd, too, but I’d have to work out the whole intake to elimination cycle to make any sense out of it, and I can’t do that down here. I’d love to know what these things ate before their food ran out.”
“I’m passing a storage deck of some kind,” Fletcher said at that point. “It is divided into large racks with passages between mem. The racks are filled with containers of different colors and sizes with funnellike dispensers at one end. There are wastebins holding empties, and some of the full and empty containers have spilled out into the corridor.”
“May I have samples, please,” Murchison said quickly, “of both.”
“Yes, ma’am,” the Captain replied. “Considering the starved condition of the survivors they are more likely to contain paint or lubricant than food. But I expect you have to eliminate all possibilities, like me. I am moving toward the next — Oh!”
Conway opened his mouth to ask what was happening but the Captain forestalled him.
“I switched on the lighting for this section and found two more casualties,” he reported. “One is a DCMH, one of the medium-sized ones, which was crushed by a buckled structural member and certainly dead. The other is the small, DCLG life-form, with one amputation wound, not moving. I’m fairly sure that it’s dead, too. This is the section of the ship which fell across the outcropping when she tipped over.
“The internal structure is badly deformed,” he went on, “with sprung deck and wall plating all over the place. There are also two large, wall-mounted cylinders which seem to have