by James White
Interstellar wars of conquest were logistically impossible, Conway knew. But the same did not apply to simple wars of annihilation, where planetary atmospheres were exploded or otherwise rendered useless forever with no thought of eventual occupation or assimilation. Remembering his last contact with the patient, Conway wondered if at last they had encountered a completely vicious and inimical race.
The communicator buzzed suddenly. It was Kursedd reporting that the patient had been quiet for the last hour, but that the growth seemed to be spreading rapidly and threatened to cover one of the being’s breathing openings. Conway said he would be along presently. He put out a call for Dr. Prilicla, then sat down again.
He dare not tell anyone of his discovery, Conway told himself as he resumed his interrupted thought. To do so would mean a force of Monitors swarming out there to make premature contact-premature, that was, so far as Conway was concerned. For he was afraid that that first meeting between cultures would be in the nature of an ideological head-on collision, and the only possibility of cushioning the shock would be if the Federation could show that they had rescued, taken care of, and cured one of the intergalactic colonists.
Of course there was the possibility that the patient was atypical of its race, that it was mentally ill as O’Mara had suggested. But Conway doubted if the aliens would consider that an excuse for not curing it. And against that idea was the fact that the patient had had logical-to it-reasons for being afraid and hating the person trying to help it. For a moment Conway wondered wildly if there was such a thing as a contra terrene mind, a mentality wherein assistance produced feelings of hate instead of gratitude. Even the fact of its being found in an ambulance was no reassurance. To people like himself the concept of an ambulance had altruistic implications, errands of mercy, and so on. But many races, even within the Federation, tended to look upon illness as mere physical inefficiency and corrected it as such.
As he left his room Conway did not have the faintest idea of how to go about curing his patient. Neither, he knew, did he have much time to do it in. At the moment, Captain Summerfield, Hendricks and the others investigating the wreck were too dazzled by a multiplicity of puzzles to think about anything else. But it was only a matter of time before they got around to it, a matter of days or even hours, and then they would come to the same conclusions as had Conway.
Shortly thereafter the Monitor Corps would make contact with the aliens, who would naturally want to know about their ailing brother, who by that time would have to be either cured or well on the way to recovery.
Or else.
The thought which Conway tried desperately to keep from thinking was: What if the patient died …
Before beginning the next examination he questioned Prilicla regarding the patient’s emotional state, but learned nothing new. The being was now motionless and practically unconscious. When Conway spoke to it via the Translator it emoted fear, even when Prilicla assured him that it understood what he was saying.
“I will not harm you,” Conway said slowly and distinctly into the Translator, moving closer as he spoke, “but it is necessary that I touch you. Please believe me, I mean no harm …” He looked enquiringly at Prilicla.
The GLNO said, “Fear and … and helplessness. Also acceptance mixed with threats … no, warnings. Apparently it believes what you say, but is trying to warn you about something.”
This was more promising, Conway thought. It was warning him, but it didn’t mind him touching it. He moved closer and gently touched the being with his gloved hand on one of the unaffected areas of tegument.
He grunted with the violence of the blow which knocked his arm aside. He backed away hurriedly, rubbing his arm, then switched off the Translator so as to give vent to his feelings.
After a respectful pause, the GLNO said, “We have obtained a very important datum, Dr. Conway. Despite the physical reaction, the patient’s feelings toward you are exactly the same as they were before you touched it.”
“So what?” said Conway irritably.
“So that the reaction must be involuntary.”
Conway digested that for a moment, then said disgustedly, “It also means we can’t risk a general anesthetic, even if we had one, because the heart and lungs use involuntary muscles, too. That’s another complication. We can’t knock it out and it won’t cooperate …” He moved to the ward control panel and pushed buttons. The clamps holding the net opened and the net itself was whisked away by a grab. He went on, “It keeps injuring itself on that net, you can see where it has nearly lost another appendage.”
Prilicla objected to the removal of the net, saying that if the patient was free to move about it was more likely than ever to injure itself. Conway pointed out that in its present posture — head to tail and underbelly, which contained its five sets of tentacles, facing outward — it could do little moving about. And now that he thought of it, that position looked like the perfect defensive stance for the creature. It reminded him of the way an Earth cat lies on its side during a fight, so as to bring all four of its claws to bear. This was a ten-legged cat who could defend itself from all directions at once.
Built-in involuntary reactions of that order were the product of evolution. But why should the being adopt this defensive position and make itself completely unapproachable at the time when it needed help the most …?
Suddenly, like a great light bursting in his mind, Conway knew the answer. Or, he amended with cautious excitement, he was near ninety percent sure that he did.
They had all been making wrong assumptions about this case from the start. His new theory hinged on the fact that they had made a further wrong assumption, single, simple and basic. Given that then the patient’s hostility, physical posture and mental state could all be explained. It even indicated the only possible line of treatment to be taken. Best of all, it gave Conway reason for thinking that the patient might not belong to the type of vicious and implacably hostile race which its behavior had led him to believe.
The only trouble with the new theory was that it, also, might be wrong.
His first wild enthusiasm waned and his degree of certainty dropped to the mid-eighties. Another trouble was that he could not possibly discuss his intended line of treatment with anyone. To do so might mean demotion, and to insist on carrying through with it would mean his dismissal from the hospital should the patient die. What he contemplated was as serious as that.
Conway approached the patient again and switched on the Translator. He knew before he spoke what the reaction would be so it was probably an act of wanton cruelty to say the words, but he had to test this theory once more for his own reassurance. He said, “Don’t worry, young fellow, we’ll have you back the way you were in no time …
The reaction was so violent that Dr. Prilicla, whose empathic faculty made it feel everything which the patient felt at full intensity, had to leave the ward.
It was only then that Conway finally made his decision.
During the three days which followed, Conway visited the ward regularly. He took careful notes on the rate of growth of the thick, fibrous encrustation which now covered two thirds of the patient’s body. There could be no doubt that it was both accelerating and growing thicker. He sent specimens to Pathology, which reported that the patient appeared to be suffering from a peculiar and particularly virulent form of skin cancer and asked if curative radiation or surgery was possible. Conway replied that in this opinion neither were possible without grave danger to the patient.
About the most constructive thing he did during that time was to post instructions that anyone contacting the patient via Translator was to avoid trying to reassure it at all costs. The being had suffered too much already from that form of well-meaning stupidity. If Conway could have forbidden entrance to the ward to everyone but Kursedd, Prilicla and himself he would have done so.
But the greater part of his time was spent in trying to convince himself that he was doing the right thing.
; Conway had been deliberately avoiding Dr. Mannon since the original examination. He did not want his old friend discussing the case with him, because Mannon was too smart to be foisted off with double talk, and Conway could not tell even him the truth. He thought longingly that the ideal situation would be for Captain Summerfield to be kept too busy at the wreck to put two and two together, for O’Mara and Skempton to forget his existence, and for Mannon to keep his nose completely out of the affair.
But that was not to be.
Dr. Mannon was waiting for him in the ward when he made his second morning visit on the fifth day. Properly he requested Conway’s permission to look at the patient. Then with this polite formality over he said,
Listen, you young squirt, I’m getting fed up with you gazing abstractedly at your boots or the ceiling every time I come near you — if I hadn’t got the hide of a Tralthan I’d feel slighted. I know, of course, that newly-appointed Seniors take their responsibilities very heavily for the first few weeks, but your recent behavior has been downright rude.”
He held up his hand before Conway could speak, and went on, “I accept your apology, and now to business. I’ve been talking to Prilicla and the people up in Pathology. They tell me that the growth now completely covers the body, that it is opaque to X rays of safe intensities and that the replacement and workings of the patient’s internal organs can now only be guessed at. You can’t cut the stuff away under anesthetic because paralyzing the appendages might knock out the heart, too. Yet an operation is impossible with those limbs whipping about. At the same time the patient is weakening and will continue to do so unless given food, which can’t be done unless its mouth is freed. To complicate matters further your later specimens show that the growth is extending inward rapidly as well, and there are indications that if the operation isn’t done quickly the mouth and tail will have fused together. Is that, in a rather large nutshell, it?”
Conway nodded.
Mannon took a deep breath, then plunged on, “Suppose you amputate the limbs and remove the covering growth from head and tail, replacing the tegument with a suitable synthetic. With the patient able to take nourishment it would shortly be strong enough for the process to be repeated over the rest of its body. It is a drastic procedure, I admit. But in the circumstances it seems to be the only one which could save the patient’s life. And there is always the possibility of successful grafting or artificial members—”
“No!” said Conway violently, and he knew from the way Mannon looked at him that he had gone pale. If his theory concerning the patient was correct, then any sort of operation at this stage would prove fatal. And if not, and the patient was the type of entity which it appeared to be — vicious, warped, and implacably hostile — and its friends came looking for it …
In a quieter voice Conway said, “Suppose a friend of yours with a bad skin condition was picked up by an e-t doctor, and the only thing it could think of doing was to skin him alive and lop his arms and legs off. If or when you found him you would be annoyed. Even taking into account the fact that you are civilized, tolerant and prepared to make allowances — qualities which we cannot safely ascribe to the patient as yet — I would venture to suggest that there would be merry hell to play.”
“That’s not a true analogy and you know it!” Mannon said heatedly. “Sometimes you have to take chances. This is one of those times.”
“No,” said Conway again.
“Maybe you have a better suggestion?”
Conway was silent for a moment, then he said carefully, “I do have an idea which I’m trying out, but I don’t want to discuss it just yet. If it works out you’ll be the first to know, and if it doesn’t you’ll know anyhow. Everybody will.”
Mannon shrugged and turned away. At the door he paused to say awkwardly, “Whatever you’re doing it must be pretty hair-brained for you to be so secretive about it. But remember that if you call me in and the thing goes sour on us, the blame gets halved …
And there speaks a true friend, thought Conway. He was tempted to unburden himself completely to Mannon then. But Dr. Mannon was a nosy, kindly and very able Senior Physician who always had, and always would, take his profession as a healer very seriously, despite the cracks he often made about it. He might not be able to do what Conway would ask, or keep his mouth shut while Conway was doing it.
Regretfully, Conway shook his head.
When Mannon had gone, Conway returned to his patient. Visually it still resembled a doughnut, he thought, but a doughnut which had become wrinkled and fossilized with the passage of eons. He had to remind himself that only a week had passed since the patient had been admitted. The five pairs of limbs, all beginning to show signs of being affected by the growth, projected stiffly and at odd angles from the body, like petrified twigs on a rotten tree. Realizing that the growth would cover the breathing openings, Conway had inserted tubes to keep the respiratory passages clear. The tubes were having the desired effect, but despite this the respiration had slowed and become shallow. The stethoscope indicated that the heartbeats were fainter but had increased in frequency.
Sheer indecision made Conway sweat.
If only it was an ordinary patient, Conway thought angrily; one that could be treated openly and its treatment discussed freely. But this one was complicated by the fact that it was a member of a highly advanced and possibly inimical race, and he could not confide in anyone lest he be pulled off the case before his theory was proven. And the trouble was that the theory might be all wrong. It was quite possible that he was engaged in slowly killing his patient.
Noting the heart and respiration rates on the chart, Conway decided that it was time he increased the periodicity of his visits, and also arranged the times so that Prilicla, who was busy these days in the Nursery, could accompany him.
Kursedd was watching him intently as he left the ward, and its fur was doing peculiar things. Conway did not waste his breath telling the nurse to keep quiet about what he was doing to his patient because that would have made the being gossip even more. It was he who was being talked about already by the nursing staff, and he had begun to detect a certain coldness toward him from some of the senior nurses in this section. But with any luck, word of what he was doing would not filter up to his seniors for several days.
Three hours later he was back in 31 OB with Dr. Prilicla. He checked heart and respiration again while the GLNO probed for emotional radiation.
“It is very weak,” Prilicla reported slowly. “Life is present, but so faintly that it is not even conscious of itself. Considering the almost nonexistent respiration and weak, rapid pulse-rate …” The thought of death was particularly distressing to an empath, and the sensitive little being could not bring itself to finish the sentence.
“All these scares we gave it, trying to reassure it, didn’t help,” Conway said, half to himself. “It hadn’t been able to eat and we caused it to use up reserves of energy which it badly needed to keep. But it had to protect itself …
“But why? We were helping the patient.”
“Of course we were,” Conway said in a bitingly sarcastic tone which he knew would not carry through the other’s Translator. He was about to continue with the examination when there was a sudden interruption.
The being whose vast bulk scraped both sides and the top of the ward door on its way in was a Tralthan, physiological classification FGLI. To Conway the natives of Traltha were as hard to tell apart as sheep, but he knew this one. This was no less than Thornnastor, Diagnostician-in Charge of Pathology.
The Diagnostician curled two of its eyes in Prilicla’s direction and boomed, “Get out of here, please. You too, Nurse.” Then it turned all four of them on Conway.
“I am speaking to you alone,” Thornnastor said when they had gone,
“because some of my remarks have bearing on your professional conduct during this case, and I have no wish to increase your discomfort by public censure. However, I will begin by giving you the good news that we
have produced a specific against this growth. Not only does it inhibit the condition spreading but it softens up the areas already affected and regenerates the tissues and blood-supply network involved.”
Oh, blast! thought Conway. Aloud he said, “A splendid accomplishment.” Because it really was.
“It would not have been possible had we not sent out a doctor to the wreck with instructions to send us anything which might throw light on the patient’s metabolism,” the Diagnostician continued. “Apparently you overlooked this source of data completely, Doctor, because the only specimens you furnished were those taken from the wreck during the time you were there, a very small fraction indeed of the quantity which was available. This was sheer negligence, Doctor, and only your previous good record has kept you from being demoted and taken off this case …
“But our success was due mainly to the finding of what appears to be a very well-equipped medical chest,” Thornnastor continued. “Study of the contents together with other information regarding the fittings in the wreck led to the conclusion that it must have been some kind of ambulance ship. The Monitor Corps officers were very excited when we told them—”
“When?” said Conway sharply. The bottom had dropped out of everything and he felt so cold that he might have been in shock. But there might be a chance to make Skempton delay making contact. “When did you tell them about it being an ambulance ship?”
“That information can be only of secondary interest to you,” said Thornnastor, removing a large, padded flask from its satchel. “Your primary concern is, or should be, the patient. You will need a lot of this stuff, and we are synthesizing it as quickly as we can, but there is enough here to free the head and mouth area. Inject according to instructions. It takes about an hour to show effect.”