by James White
Conway resumed his account of the rescue and retrieval of the injured survivor and the transfer of the cadavers into the Rhabwar’s ward, stressing tthe fact that once inside the ship none of the crew or medical personnel wore masks while handling or examining the single living and several dead DBPKs. Because the survivor remained unconscious and its condition had been deteriorating steadily, the decision had been taken not to prolong the search for other possible survivors. The survey and Cultural Contact cruiser Descartes was asked to continue searching the area in case- “You did what?” Colonel Skempton broke in. His face had turned to a sickly gray color.
“The Descartes was asked to continue the search of the area for other survivors,” Conway replied, “and to gather and study the alien material, books, pictures, personal possessions and so on among the wreckage that might help them understand the new life-form prior to making formal contact. The Descartes is one of the few vessels possessing the equipment capable of analyzing the movements of widely dispersed wreckage and of deriving a rough approximation of the wrecked ship’s original hyperspatial heading from them. You know the drill, Colonel. The policy in these cases is to backtrack and make contact with the survivor’s world as quickly as possible and, if they have been able to find it, to request assistance of a doctor of its own species- He broke off because the Colonel was no longer listening to him.
“Priority hypersignal, maximum power,” the Colonel was saying to someone off-screen. “Use hospital standby power to boost the service generator. Tell the Descartes not, repeat not, to take on board any alien artifacts, technical material or organic specimens from the wreckage. If any such material has already been taken on board they are to jettison it forthwith. On no account is the Descartes to seek out and make contact with the wreck’s planet of origin, nor is the ship to make physical contact with any other vessel, base, satellite station or subplanetary or planetary body, inhabited or otherwise. They are to proceed at once to Sector General to await further instructions. Radio contact only is allowed. They are expressly forbidden to enter the hospital docking area, and their crew-members will stay on board and will allow no visitors of any species until further notice. Code the signal Federation Emergency. Move!”
The Colonel turned to look at Conway again, then continued. “This bug, bacterium, virus, whatever it is, affects warm-blooded oxygen-breathers and perhaps other life-forms as well. As you very well know, Doctor, three-quarters of the citizens of the Federation are warm-blooded oxygen-breathers, with the biggest proportion of those made up of the Kelgian, Tralthan, Melfan and Earth-human life-forms. We stand a good chance of containing the infection here, and of discovering something that might enable us to combat it. But if it hits the Descartes it could sweep through the ship so rapidly that they might not be given time to think about the problem, really think it through, before shooting out a distress beacon. Then the ship or ships that go to their aid will carry the infection home-or worse, to other ports of call. An epidemic on such a scale would certainly mean the end of the Federation, and almost certainly the end of civilization on a great many of its worlds.
“We can only hope that the Descartes gets the message in time,” he added grimly. “With the hospital standby reactor boosting the output of the Corps transmitter, if they don’t hear it they have to be deaf, dumb and blind.”
“Or very sick,” O’Mara observed quietly.
A long silence followed and was broken by the respectful voice of Captain Fletcher.
“If I might make a suggestion, Colonel,” he said, “we know the position of the wreckage and of the Descartes, if it is still at the disaster site and, very approximately, of the sector that is likely to contain the wrecked ship’s home planet. If a distress beacon is released in that area it is almost certain that it will come from the Descartes. The Rhabwar could answer it, not to give assistance but to warn off any other would-be rescuers.”
Obviously the Colonel had forgotten about the ambulance ship. “Are you still connected to the hospital by boarding tube, Captain?” he asked harshly.
“Not since the contamination alert,” Fletcher replied. “But if you approve the suggestion we’ll need power and consumables for an extended trip. Normally an ambulance ship is gone only for a couple of days at most.”
“Approved, and thank you, Captain,” said the Colonel. “Arrange for the material to be placed outside your airlock as soon as possible. Your men can load the stores on board later so as to avoid contact with hospital personnel.”
Conway had been dividing his attention between the conversation and the analyzer, which looked as if it was about to make a pronouncement. He looked up at the screen and protested: “Colonel, Captain, you can’t do that! If you take the Rhabwar away we lose Pathologist Murchison and the DBPK specimens, and remove any chance we have of quickly identifying and neutralizing this thing. She is the only pathologist here with first-hand experience of the life-form.”
The Colonel looked thoughtful for a moment. “That is a valid objection, Doctor, but consider. There is no dearth of pathologists here at the hospital to help you study the live specimen, even second-hand, and the DBPK cadavers on the Rhabwar are staying there. We can contain and, in time, devise some method of treating this disease at the hospital. But the Rhabwar could be instrumental in keeping the Descartes from infecting the warm-blooded oxygenbreathers of dozens of planets. The original order stands. The Rhabwar will refuel and replenish and stand by to answer the expected distress signal from the Descartes.
He had a lot more to say on the subject of probable future history, including the strong probability of having to place the DBPK patient’s home planet and off-world colonies in strict quarantine and to refuse all contact with the new species. The Federation would have to enforce this quarantine in its own defense, and the result might well lead to interstellar war. Then, abruptly, the sound cut out, although it was obvious that Colonel Skempton was still talking to someone off-screen-someone, it was obvious, who was objecting to the Rhabwar’s imminent departure as strongly as Conway had.
But the objector, or objectors, was a medical staff-member concerned with solving what was essentially a unique medical problem in extraterrestrial physiology or pharmacology, while Colonel Skempton, like the dedicated Monitor Corps policeman that he was, wanted only to protect a frighteningly large number of innocent bystanders from he knew not what.
Conway looked over at the image of O’Mara. “Sir, I agree that there is the most fearful danger of letting loose a virulent infection that could bring about the collapse of the Federation and cause the technology of many of its individual worlds to slide back into their particular dark ages. But before we react we must first know something about the threat we are reacting against. We must stop and think. Right now we are overreacting and not thinking at all. Could you speak to the Colonel sensibly, sir, and point out to him that a panic reaction frequently does more harm than—”
“Your colleagues are already doing that,” the Chief Psychologist replied dryly, “much more forcibly and persuasively than I could, so far without success. But if you feel that we are all guilty of a panic reaction, Doctor, perhaps you will demonstrate the kind of calm, logical reasoning that you think this problem demands?”
Why, you sarcastic … Conway raged silently. But before he could speak there was an interruption. Thornnastor’s analyzer was displaying bright, incomprehensible symbols on its screen and vocalizing its findings through the translator link.
Analysis of samples one through fifty-three taken in Observation Ward One, A UGL Level, it began tonelessly. General observations: All atmosphere samples contain oxygen, nitrogen and the usual trace elements in the normal proportions, also small quantities of carbon dioxide, water vapor and chlorine associated with the acceptable levels of leakage from the TLTU life-support system and the Illensan protective suit, and from the expired breaths of the DBDG, DBLF, ELNT, FGLI and FROB physiological types, as well as perspiration from the first, second and third
of these types. Also present are the phenomes associated with the body odors of the species present who are not wearing overall body protection envelopes, including a hitherto unlisted set, which, by elimination, belongs to the DBPK patient. There are very small quantities of dusts, flakings and fibers abraded from walls, working surfaces and instruments. Some of this material cannot be analyzed without a larger sampling, but it is biochemically inert and harmless. There are also present follicles of Earth-human hair, Kelgian and DBPK fur, flakes of discarded Hudlar nutrient paint, and scales from Tralthan and Melfan tegument.
Conclusion: None of the gases, dusts, colloidal suspensions, bacteria or viruses found in these samples are harmful to any oxygen-breathing life-form.
Without realizing it Conway had been holding his breath, and the inside of his visor misted over briefly as he released it in a short, heavy sigh of disappointment. Nothing. The analyzer could not find anything harmful in the ward.
“I’m waiting, Doctor,” said O’Mara.
Conway looked slowly around the ward, at Thornnastor still undergoing artificial respiration, at the Kelgian theater nurse and the spread-eagled Melfan, at the silent Gilvesh and the TLTU hissing quietly in a corner, at the crowded pressure litter and at the beings of several different classifications attached to breathing masks-and found them all looking at him. He thought desperately: Something is loose in here. Something that did not show up in the samples or that the analyzer had classified as harmless anyway. Something that had been harmless, on board the Rhabwar …
Aloud, he said, “On the trip back to the hospital we examined and dissected several DBPK cadavers, and thoroughly examined and gave preliminary treatment to the survivor, without body protection and without suffering any ill effects. It is possible that the beings, Earth-human and otherwise, on the Rhabwar all had natural immunity, but that, to my mind, is stretching coincidence beyond its elastic limits. When the survivor was brought into the hospital, protection became necessary because four different physiological types practically dropped in their tracks. We have to ask ourselves, In what way were the circumstances aboard the ambulance ship and in the hospital different?
“We should also ask ourselves,” Conway went on, “the question Pathologist Murchison asked after completing her first DBPK dissection, which was, How did a weak, timid and obviously non-aggressive life-form like this one climb to the top of its planet’s evolutionary ladder and stay there long enough to develop a civilization capable of interstellar travel? The being is a herbivore. It does not even have the fingernails that are the evolutionary legacy of claws, and it appears to be completely defenseless.”
“How about concealed natural weapons?” O’Mara asked. But before Conway could reply, Murchison answered for him.
“No evidence of any, sir,” she said. “I paid particular attention to the furless, brownish area of skin at the base of the spine, since this was the only feature of the being’s physiology that we did not understand. Both male and female cadavers possessed them. They are small mounds or swellings, four to five inches in diameter and composed of dry, porous tissue. They do not secrete anything and give the appearance of a gland or organ that is inactive or has atrophied. The patches were a uniform pale brown color on the adults. The survivor, who is a female adolescent or preadolescent, as far as we can judge, had a pale pink mound, which had been painted to match the coloration of the adult patches.”
“Did you analyze the paint?” asked O’Mara.
“Yes, sir,” said Murchison. “Some of it had already cracked and flaked off, probably at the time the survivor received its injuries, and we removed the rest of it while we were giving the patient a preoperative cleanup before moving it to the hospital. The paint was organically inert and chemically non-toxic. Giving regard to the patient’s age, I assumed that it was a decorative paint applied for cosmetic purposes. Perhaps the young DBPK was trying to appear more adult than it actually was.
“Seems a reasonable assumption,” said O’Mara. “So, we have a beastie with natural vanity and no natural weapons.
Paint, Conway thought suddenly. An idea was stirring at the back of his mind, but he could not make it take form. Something about paint, or the uses of paint, perhaps. Decoration, insulation, protection, warning … That must be it-the coating of inert, nontoxic, harmless paint!
He moved quickly to the instrument rack and withdrew one of the sprayers which a number of e-ts used to coat their manipulators instead of wearing surgical gloves. He tested it briefly, because its actuator had not been designed for DBDG fingers. When he was sure that he could direct the sprayer with accuracy, he moved across to the soft, furry and apparently defenseless DBPK patient.
“What the blazes are you doing, Conway?” asked O’Mara.
“In these circumstances the color of the paint should not worry the patient too much,” Conway said, thinking aloud and ignoring the Chief Psychologist for the moment. He went on, “Prilicla, will you move closer to the patient, please. I feel sure there will be a marked change in its emotional radiation over the next few minutes.”
“I am aware of your feelings, friend Conway,” said Prilicla.
Conway laughed nervously. “In that case, friend Prilicla, I feel fairly sure that I have the answer. But what about the patient’s feelings?”
“Unchanged, friend Conway,” said the empath. “There is a general feeling of concern. It is the same feeling I detected shortly after it regained consciousness and recovered from its initial fear and confusion. There is deep concern, sadness, helplessness and … and guilt. Perhaps it is thinking about its friends who died.”
“Its friends, yes,” said Conway, switching on the sprayer and beginning to paint the bare area above the patient’s tail with the bright red inert pigment. “It is worried about its friends who are alive.”
The paint dried rapidly and set in a strong, flexible film. By the time Conway had finished spraying on a second layer the patient withdrew its head from underneath its furry tail to look at the repainted patch of bare skin; then it turned its face to Conway and regarded him steadily with its two large, soft eyes. Conway restrained an impulse to stroke its head.
Prilicla made an excited trilling noise, which did not translate, then said, “The patient’s emotional radiation shows a marked change, friend Conway. Instead of deep concern and sadness, the predominant emotion is one of intense relief.”
That, thought Conway with great feeling, is my own predominant feeling at the moment. Aloud, he announced, “That’s it, everyone. The contamination emergency is over.”
They were all staring at him, and their feelings were so intense and mixed that Prilicla was clinging to the ceiling and shaking as if caught in an emotional gale. Colonel Skempton’s face had disappeared from the screen, so it was the craggy features of O’Mara alone glaring out at him.
“Conway,” said the Chief Psychologist harshly, “explain.”
He began his explanation by requesting a playback of the sound and vision record of the DBPK’s treatment from the point a few minutes before it fully regained consciousness. While they were watching Thornnastor, the Kelgian theater nurse and the Melfan Edanelt, who had moved back a short distance to check the patient’s air line, Conway said, “The reason why nobody on board the Rhabwar was affected during the trip here was that at no time was the patient conscious. Now, the three attending physicians may or may not be handsome to other members of their respective species, but a being, an immature being at that, confronted with them for the first time might well find them visually quite horrendous. Under the circumstances the patient’s fear and panic reaction are understandable, but pay particular attention to the physical response to what, for a few seconds, it regarded as a physical threat.
“The eyes opened wide,” he continued as the scene unfolded on the main screen, “the body stiffened and the chest expanded. A fairly normal reaction, you’ll agree. An initial moment of paralysis followed by hyperventilation so that as much oxygen as possible i
s available in the lungs either to scream for help or to drive the muscles for a quick getaway. But our attention was concentrated on what was happening to the three attending physicians and the affected team-member, so that we did not notice that the patient’s chest remained expanded for several minutes, that it was, in fact, holding its breath.”
On the screen Thornnastor toppled heavily to the floor, the Kelgian nurse collapsed into a limp heap of fur, Edanelt’s bony undershell clicked loudly against the floor, the transfer team-member also collapsed and everyone else who was unprotected headed for the pressure litter or the breathing masks. “The effects of this socalled bug,” Conway went on, “were sudden and dramatic. Respiratory failure or partial failure and collapse, and clear indications that the voluntary and involuntary muscle systems had been affected. But there was no rise in body temperature, which would be expected if the beings concerned were fighting an infection. If infection is ruled out, then the DBPK life-form was not as defenseless as it looked …”
To be the dominant life-form on its planet, the DBPKs had to have some means of defending themselves, Conway explained. Or more accurately, the beings who really needed it had a means of defense. Probably the adult DBPKs were mentally agile enough to avoid trouble and to protect their young when they were small and easily carried. But when the children grew too large for their parents to protect and were as yet too inexperienced to protect themselves, they had evolved a means of defense that was effective against everything that lived and breathed.
When threatened by natural enemies, the young DBPKs released a gas-which resembled in its effects the old Earth-snake venom curare, with the rapidity of action of some of the later nerve gases- so that the enemy’s breathing stopped and it was no longer a threat. But it was a two-edged weapon in that it was capable of knocking out everything that breathed oxygen, including the DBPKs themselves. However, the event that triggered the release of the gas also caused the being concerned to hold its breath, which indicated that the toxic material had a complex and unstable molecular structure that broke down and became harmless within a few moments of release, although by that time the natural enemy was no longer a threat.