your patients,” Prilicla said, “and I am loath to further increase that anxiety by telling you of the type and intensity of the emotions which I detected just now in the being’s mind.”
Conway sighed. “Spit it out, things couldn’t be much worse than they are now …
But they could and were.
When Prilicla finished speaking Conway pulled his hand away from the intercom switch as though it had grown teeth and bit him. “I can’t tell him that over the intercom!” he burst out. “It would be sure to leak to the patients and if they, or even some of the Staff knew about it, there would be a panic.” He dithered for a moment, then cried, “Come on, we’ve got to see O’Mara!”
But the Chief Psychologist was not in his office or in the nearby Educator room. However, information supplied by one of his assistants sent them hurrying to the forty-seventh level and Observation Ward Three.
This was a vast, high-ceilinged room maintained at a pressure and temperature suited to warm-blooded oxygen-breathers. DBDG, DBLF and FGLI doctors carried out preliminary examinations here on the more puzzling or exotic cases — the patients, if these atmospheric conditions did not suit them, being housed in large, transparent cubicles spaced at intervals around the walls and floor. It was known irreverently as the Punch and Ponder department and Conway could see a group of medics of all shapes and species gathered around a glass-walled tank in the middle of the ward. This must be the older and dying SRTT he had heard about, but he had no attention to spare for anything until he had spoken to O’Mara.
He caught sight of the psychologist at a communications desk beside the wall and hurried over.
While he talked O’Mara listened stolidly, several times opening his mouth as though to interrupt, then each time closing it in a grimmer, tighter line. But when Conway reached the point where he had seen the broken Translator, O’Mara waved him to silence and hit the intercom switch with the same jerky motion of his hand.
“Get me Engineering Division, Colonel Skempton,” he barked. Then:
“Colonel, our runaway is in the FROB nursery area. But there is a complication, I’m afraid — it has lost its Translator…” There was a short pause, then: “Neither do I know how I expect you to pacify it when you can’t communicate, but do what you can in the meantime-I’m going to work on the communication angle now.
He snapped the switch off and then on again, and said, “Colinson, in Communications… hello, Major. I want a relay between here and the Monitor Survey team on the SRTT’s home planet — yes, the one I had you collecting about a few hours ago. Will you arrange that? And have them prepare a sound tape in the SRTT native language — I’ll give you the wording I want in a moment-and have them relay it here. The substance of the speech, which must be obtained from an adult SRTT, will have to be roughly as follows—”
He broke off as Major Colinson’s voice erupted from the speaker. The communications man was reminding a certain desk-bound headshrinker that the SRTT planet was halfway across the Galaxy, that subspace radio was susceptible to interference just like any other kind and that by the time every sun in the intervening distance had splattered the signal with their share of static it would be virtually unintelligible.
“Have them repeat the signal,” O’Mara said. “There are sure to be usable words and phrases which we can piece together to reconstruct the original message. We need this thing badly, and I’ll tell you why …
The SRTT species were an extremely long-lived race, O’Mara explained quickly, who reproduced hermaphroditically at very great intervals and with great pain and effort. There was therefore a bond of great affection and — what was more important in the present circumstances — discipline between the adults and children of the species. There was also the belief, so strong as to be almost a certainty, that no matter what changes a member of this species worked it would always try to retain the vocal and aural organs which allowed it to communicate with its fellows.
Now if one of the adults on the home planet could prepare a few general remarks directed toward youths who misbehaved when they ought to have known better, and these were relayed to Sector General and in turn played over the PA to their runaway visitor, then the young SRTT’s ingrained obedience to its elders would do the rest.
And that,” said O’Mara to Conway as he switched off, “should take care of that little crisis. With any luck we’ll have our visitor quieted down within a few hours. So your troubles are over, you can relax..
The psychologist broke off at the expression on Conway’s face, then he said softly, “There’s more?”
Conway nodded. Indicating his assistant he said, “Dr. Prilicla detected it, by empathy. You must understand that the runaway is in a very bad way psychologically-grief for its dying parent, the fright it received at Lock Six when everyone came charging at it, and now the mauling it has undergone in the FROB nursery. It is young, immature, and these experiences have thrown it back to the stage where its responses are purely animal and… well …” Conway licked dry lips … has anyone calculated how long it has been since that SRTT has eaten?”
The implications of the question were not lost on O’Mara either. He paled suddenly and snatched up the mike again. “Get me Skempton again, quickly! … Skempton? … Colonel, I am not trying to sound melodramatic but would you use the scrambler attached to your set, there is another complication …
Turning away, Conway debated with himself whether to go over for a brief look at the dying SRTT or hurry back to his section. Back in the FROB nursery Prilicla had detected in the runaway’s mind strong hunger radiation as well as the expected fear and confusion, and it had been the communication of these findings which had caused first Conway, then O’Mara and Skempton to realize just what a deadly menace the visitor had become. The youths of any species are notoriously selfish, cruel and uncivilized, Conway knew, and driven by steadily increasing pangs of hunger this one would certainly turn cannibal. In its present confused mental state the young SRTT would probably not know that it had done so, but that fact would make no difference at all to the patients concerned.
If only the majority of Conway’s charges were not so small, defenseless and… tasty.
On the other hand a look at the elder being might suggest some method of dealing with the younger-his curiosity regarding the SRTT terminal case having nothing to do with it, of course …
He was maneuvering for a closer look at the patient inside the tank and at the same time trying not to jostle the Earth-human doctor who was blocking his view, when the man turned irritably and asked, “Why the blazes don’t you climb up my back? … Oh, hello, Conway. Here to contribute another uninformed wild guess, I suppose?”
It was Mannon, the doctor who had at one time been Conway’s superior and was now a Senior Physician well on the way to achieving Diagnostician status. He had befriended Conway on his arrival at the hospital, Mannon had several times explained within Conway’s hearing, because he had a soft spot for stray dogs, cats and interns. Currently he was allowed to retain permanently in his brain just three Educator tapes — that of a Tralthan specialist in micro-surgery and two belonging to surgeons of the low-gravity LSVO and MSVK species — so that for long periods of each day his reactions were quite human. At the moment he was eyeing Prilicla, who was skittering about on the fringe of the crowd, with raised eyebrows.
Conway began to give details regarding the character and accomplishments of his new assistant, but was interrupted by Mannon saying loudly, “That’s enough, lad, you’re beginning to sound like an unsolicited testimonial. A light touch and the empathic faculty will be a big help in your current line of work. I grant that. But then you always did pick odd associates; levitating balls of goo, insects, dinosaurs, and such like — all pretty peculiar people, you must admit. Except for that nurse on the twenty-third level, now I admire your taste there—”
“Are they making any headway with this case, sir?” Conway said, determinedly shunting the conversation back onto the main track again. Mannon was the best in the world, but he had the painful habit sometimes of pulling a person’s leg until it threatened to come off at the hip.
“None,” said Mannon. “And what I said about wild guesses is a fact. We’re all making them here, and getting nowhere — ordinary diagnostic techniques are completely useless. Just look at the thing!”
Mannon moved aside for Conway, and a sensation as of a pencil being laid across his shoulder told him that Prilicla was behind him craning to see, too.
VI
