Ambulance Ship sg-4

by James White

  “That … that doesn’t make sense!” the Captain burst out. He looked appealingly at Conway.

  Conway could imagine Prilicla trembling inside its spacesuit at the Captain’s outburst and the emotional radiation accompanying it. But he could just barely imagine the effort it had taken for the little empath, who found it acutely painful to disagree with anyone, to speak as it had. “Perhaps not,” he said quickly to Fletcher, “but there is one way of finding out.”

  Fletcher gave him an angry, puzzled look, but he moved to the control pod opening and a few seconds later the noise and mechanical activity in the corridor had returned. So had Conway’s headache.

  Prilicla said, “The condition of the survivors is improving again.”

  “How much did they improve last time?” asked Conway. “And would you be able to tell by their emotional radiation if one being was about to attack another?”

  “Both survivors were fully conscious for a few minutes,” Prilicla replied. “Their radiation was so strong that I was able to reduce the area of uncertainty of their position. They are within two meters of each other, and neither of them was or is contemplating an attack.”

  “Are you telling me,” the Captain said in a baffled tone, “that a fully conscious FSOJ and a blind one are as close together as that without the animal wanting to attack it?”

  “Maybe the blind one found a locker or something to hide in,” said Conway, “and to the FSOJ it is a case of out of sight, out of mind.”

  “Excuse me,” said Prilicla. “There is no way that I can tell with absolute certainty that the two beings are of different species. The quality of their emotional radiation strongly suggests this. One is emoting anger and pain and little else while the other’s emotions possess the complexity of a rational mind. But would it help you if you considered the possibility that they are both blind ones, one of whom has suffered gross brain damage, which is causing the raw, mindless level of emoting which I have detected.”

  “A nice theory, Doctor Prilicla,” said the Captain. He winced and instinctively put his hands to his head, only to have them stopped short by his helmet. “It explains their close proximity, but it does not explain why their condition is affected by the corridor mechanisms. Unless I damaged the controls in some fashion, and accidentally made a connection between the corridor control lever and some emergency life-support equipment, perhaps a medical therapy unit or … I feel completely and utterly confused!”

  “Everyone is feeling confused, friend Fletcher,” said the empath. “The general emotional radiation leaves no doubt of that.”

  “Let’s go back to the ship,” said Conway suddenly. “I need some peace and quiet to think.”

  They left the blind ones’ ship with Chen on watch with instructions to keep his distance and on no account to make physical contact with the vessel’s structure. Prilicla returned with them, saying that the emotional radiation from the two survivors was strong enough for it to be monitored at a distance, since the condition of both was continuing to improve while the corridor mechanisms were still operating.

  Entering by the Casualty Deck lock, they headed straight for the lab, which was occupied by a bloodstained Murchison and numerous pieces of FSOJ and blind ones spread around the dissecting tables. Naydrad joined them as Conway asked the Captain to project a plan view diagram of the blind ones’ ship, incorporating the latest data. Fletcher looked relieved at having something to occupy him, since it was obvious that he did not share the close professional interest of the others in the pieces of extraterrestrial raw meat scattered about the place.

  When the diagram appeared on the lab’s display screen, Conway asked the Captain to correct him if he went wrong anywhere, then he began reviewing their problem.

  Like most major problems this one was composed of a number of smaller ones, some of which were susceptible to solution. There was the blind ones’ ship, which preliminary technical investigation showed to be structurally sound and in a fully powered-up condition. The vessel’s configuration was that of a disk that tapered in thickness towards the circumference. At the center was a circle of perhaps one third the radius of the ship, which enclosed the power generation and associated equipment. Outside this area and enclosing it was a circular corridor linked to the airlock by a straight section of corridor, giving the appearance in the plan view of a sickle with a circular blade whose tip almost reached its handle. The short arc that joined the tip to the top of the handle was occupied by the control pods of the blind ones.

  Beyond the circular corridor was the life-support area for both the crew and their captives. Proportionately, the volume of the ship devoted to the FSOJ life-form meant that the vessel had been designed specifically for the purpose of transporting these creatures. The lighting, atmosphere, FSOJ food dispenser and exercise space left no doubt about that.

  Conway paused for a moment to look at Fletcher and the others, but there were no arguments. Then he went on: “The arrangement of rapidly moving bars and pistons in the caged corridor, particularly the ones with pointed and club-like extremities, worries me because I cannot accept the idea that the FSOJs are being used solely for the purpose of torture. I prefer the idea that they are being trained, perhaps domesticated, for a very special reason. One does not design an interstellar ship around a non-sentient life-form unless the creature is extremely valuable to the designers.

  “We must therefore ask ourselves what the FSOJ has that the blind ones haven’t,” Conway went on. “What is it that they need most?”

  They were all staring silently at the FSOJ cadaver. Murchison looked up at him suddenly, but it was the Captain who spoke first.

  “Eyes?”

  “Right,” said Conway, then continued: “Naturally, I don’t want to suggest that the FSOJs are the blind ones’ equivalent of seeingeye dogs. Rather, when their violent tendencies are curbed, a symbiotic or parasitic relationship is possible whereby the blind one attaches itself with its undersurface pads to tap into the FSOJ’s central nervous system, in particular the vision network, so that it would receive—”

  “Not possible,” Murchison said firmly.

  Prilicla began shaking to Conway’s feelings of irritation and disappointment. His disappointment predominated because he knew that Murchison would not have spoken so bluntly had she not been certain of her facts.

  “Perhaps with a surgical intervention as well as a training program …“Conway tried hopefully.

  But Murchison shook her head. “I’m sorry,” she said. “We now have enough information on both life-forms to know that a symbiotic or parasitic relationship is impossible. The blind ones, which I have tentatively classified as CPSD, are omnivorous and have two sexes. One of the cadavers is male, the other female. The sting is their only natural weapon, but the poison sac associated with it has long since atrophied. I found scratches on the osseous tip of both stings, which suggests that they are now used as a manipulatory appendage. They are highly intelligent and, as we already know, technologically advanced despite their physical and sensory handicaps.

  “Their only sense seems to be that of touch,” she continued, “but judging by the degree of specialization apparent in the sensor pads covering the upper surface of their bodies, their touch is extremely sensitive. It is possible that some of those sensors would ‘feel’ vibrations in a solid or gaseous medium, or ‘feel’ the taste of substances with which they came in contact. As well as feeling, hearing and tasting after a fashion, a refinement of the ‘taste’ pads might also enable them to smell by touch. But they cannot see and would probably have difficulty in grasping the concept of sight, so they would not know a visual nerve network if they touched one.”

  Murchison indicated the opened torso of the FSOJ, then went on. ‘But that is not the principal reason why they cannot have a symbiotic relationship. Normally, an intelligent parasite or symbiont has to position itself close to the brain or in an area where the main nerve bundles are easily accessible. In our own case that woul
d be at the back of the neck or the top of the head. But this beastie’s brain is not in its skull; it is deep inside the torso with the rest of the other vital organs and is positioned in a rather stupid place, just under the womb and surrounding the beginning of the birth canal. As a result, the brain is compressed as the embryo grows, and if it is a difficult birth its parent’s brain is destroyed. Junior comes out fighting and with a convenient food supply available until it can kill something for itself.

  “The FSOJ, which is bisexual, retains its young in the womb until it is well-grown and fully equipped to survive,” she added. “Survival cannot be easy where it lives, and the blind ones must have found a much more suitable life-form for a symbiont, if that was what they were looking for.”

  Conway rubbed his aching head and thought that difficult cases usually did not have this effect on him. Occasionally he had lost sleep over patients, or felt anxious or even seriously worried and tense when the time came to make a crucial decision in their case, but up until now it had never given him headaches. Was he growing old? But no, that was much too simple an explanation, because at the blind ones’ ship they had all had headaches.

  “One way or another we will have to go after the survivors,” Conway said decisively. “And soon. But it would be criminal and stupid to endanger the life of a sentient being by wasting time on an experimental animal, even one that the ship’s crew consider as valuable as the FSOJ. Now, if we agree that the FSOJ is nonsentient—”

  “We depressurize the ship, wait until Prilicla says the FSOJ is dead and cut our way in to the surviving blind one as quickly as possible,” the Captain finished for him, then added, “Dammit, my headache’s back.”

  “A suggestion, friend Fletcher,” said Prilicla diffidently. “The blind one is small and could probably negotiate the corridor cage without being inconvenienced by the FSOJ training mechanisms. The emotional radiation from both beings is increasing to the point where I would say that they are almost fully recovered. One is radiating anger of the insensate, uncontrolled kind while the other is feeling increasing frustration and is straining hard to do something. And I, too, am having some cranial discomfort, friend Conway.”

  The contagious headache again! thought Conway. This is too much of a coincidence …

  Suddenly his mind was back in time and space to his early years in the hospital, when he was insufferably proud to be on the staff of a multienvironment hospital even though at the time he was little more than a medical messenger boy. But then he had been given the assignment of liaison with one Doctor Arretapec, a VUXG who was teleportive, telekinetic and telepathic, and who had received Federation funding for his project of engendering intelligence in a race of non-sentient Saurians.

  Arretapec had given Conway a headache in more ways than one.

  He was only half-listening while the Captain was making the arrangements to depressurize the other ship. His plan was, first, to reposition the portable airlock above the survivors in case the blind one could not make its way along the corridor when the FSOJ was dead and they had begun the slow job of cutting a way in. But the sudden incredulity and anger in Fletcher’s voice brought Conway’s mind back to present time with a rush.

  … And why can’t you do it?” the Captain was demanding. “Start moving that lock at once. Haslam and I will be over to help you in a few minutes. What’s the matter with you, Chen?”

  “I don’t feel well,” said Lieutenant Chen from his position beside the blind ones’ ship. “Can I be relieved, sir?”

  Before the Captain could reply, Conway said, “Ask him if he has a headache of increasing severity, and is there a feeling of intense itching originating deep inside his ears. When he confirms this, tell him that the discomfort will diminish with distance from the blind ones’ ship.”

  A few seconds later Chen was on his way back to the Rhabwar, having confirmed Conway’s description of his symptoms. Fletcher asked helplessly, “What is happening, Doctor?”

  “I should have been expecting it,” Conway replied, “but it has been a long time since I had the experience. And I should have remembered that beings who, through physical damage or evolution, have been deprived of vital sensory equipment are compensated for the loss. I think-no, I know. We are experiencing telepathy.”

  The Captain shook his head firmly. “You’re wrong, Doctor,” he said. “There are a few telephathic races in the Federation, but they tend to be philosophically rather than technologically inclined, so we don’t meet them very often. But even I know that their ability to communicate telepathically is confined to members of their own species. Their organic transmitter and receivers are tuned to that one frequency, and other species, even other telepathic species, cannot pick up the signals.”

  “Correct,” said Conway. “Generally speaking, telepaths communicate only with other telepaths. But there have been a few rare exceptions recorded where non-telepaths have received their thoughts for a few seconds’ or minutes’ duration only, and more often than not the experimenters suffered great discomfort without making contact at all. The reason for their partial success is, according to the e-t neurologists, that many species have a latent telepathic faculty that became atrophied when they developed normal sensory equipment. But when my single, very brief experience took place I had been working closely with a very strong telepath on the same problem, seeing the same images, discussing the same symptoms and sharing the same feelings about our patient for days on end. We must have established a temporary bridge, and for a few minutes the telepath’s thoughts and feelings were able to cross it.”

  Prilicla was shaking violently. “If the sentient survivor is trying to establish telepathic contact with us, friend Conway, it is trying very hard. It is feeling extreme desperation.”

  “I can understand that,” said the Captain, “with a rapidly improving FSOJ nearby. Now what do we do, Doctor?”

  Conway tried to make his aching head produce an answer before the surviving blind one suffered the same fate as its crew-mates. “If we could think hard about something we have in common with it. We could try thinking about the blind ones”—he waved his hand at the dissecting tables—”except that we might not have enough mental control to think of them whole and alive. If we thought about them as dissected specimens, however briefly, it would not be reassuring to the survivor. So look at and think about the FSOJ. As an experimental animal the blind one should not be bothered by seeing, feeling, experiencing or whatever, it in small pieces.

  “I would like you all to concentrate on thinking about the FSOJ,” he went on, looking at each of them in turn. “Concentrate hard, and at the same time try to project the feeling that you want to help. There may be some discomfort but no harmful after effects. Now think, think, hard …!”

  They stared at the partially dismembered FSOJ in silence, and thought. Prilicla began trembling violently and Naydrad’s fur was doing strange things indeed as it reflected the Kelgian’s feelings. Murchison’s face turned white and her lips were pressed together, and the Captain was sweating.

  “Some discomfort, he said,” Fletcher muttered.

  “Discomfort to a medic,” said Murchison, briefly unclenching her teeth, “can mean anything from the pain of a sprained ankle to being boiled in oil, Captain.”

  “Stop talking,” Conway snapped. “Concentrate.”

  His head felt as if it could no longer contain his aching brain and there was a raging itch growing inside his skull, a sensation he had felt just once before in his life. Conway glanced quickly at Fletcher as the Captain gave an agonized grunt and started poking at his ear with a finger. And suddenly there was contact. It was a weak, unspoken message that came from nowhere, but it was there in their minds as silent words that formed both a statement and a question.

  “You are thinking of my Protector …”

  They all looked at each other, all obviously wondering if each had heard, felt, experienced the same words. The Captain let out his breath in an explosive sigh of relief,
and said, “A … a Protector?”

  “With those natural weapons, Murchison said, gesturing towards the FSOJ’s horn-tipped tentacles and bony armor, “it certainly has the right equipment for the job.”

  “I don’t understand why the blind ones need protectors,” Naydrad said, “when they are technically advanced enough to build starships.”

  “They may have natural enemies on the home planet,” began the Captain, “which they are incapable of controlling—”

  “Later, later,” Conway said sharply, breaking up what promised to become an interesting but time-wasting debate. “We can discuss this later when we have more data. Right now we must return to the ship. This must be extreme range for mind contact with nontelepaths like us, so we must get as close to it as possible. And this time we’ll go for a rescue …

  With the exception of the Captain, the non-medical personnel remained with the ambulance ship. It was not thought that Haslam, Chen or Dodds could help very much unless or until they were required to burn a way into the other ship. Three extra minds that were not completely informed regarding the situation might, by their confused thinking, make it more difficult for the surviving telepath to communicate with the others, who, Conway thought dryly, were only slightly less confused than the crew-members.

  Prilicla once again stationed itself near the hull to monitor emotional radiation in case the telepathy did not work. Fletcher carried a heavy-duty cutter intended, if necessary, to depressurize the ship rapidly and eliminate the Protector, and Naydrad had positioned itself with the pressure litter outside the airlock. In spite of their belief that the blind one could take decompression with much less danger than the FSOJ, Conway and Murchison would return with it inside the pressure litter should it require medical attention.