“Explain,” Prilicla said.
Quickly Cha Thrat reviewed the current clinical picture, gravely worsened now by the extreme debilitation that, even in a healthy Gogleskan, followed a joining. When she said that Rhone lacked the strength and physical resources to withstand major surgery — it would have to be a cesarean procedure rather than a simple enlargement of the birth opening — she spoke with absolute certainty because she had the patient-healer’s viewpoint of the case as well as her own. But she did not mention that, saying instead that Rhone’s emotional radiation would confirm her observations.
“It does,” the empath said.
She went on quickly. “The FOKT classification is one of the few life-forms capable of resting in the upright position, although they can also lie down. Since their ancestors emerged from the oceans, their bodies and internal organs have been acted on by vertical G forces, as are those of the Hudlars and Tralthans and Rhenithi. I am reminded of a case in Tralthan Maternity a few years ago that was broadly similar to this one and required —”
“You didn’t learn that from Cresk-Sar,” Murchison broke in suddenly. “Trainee nurses aren’t told about the near-failures, at least not in first year.”
“I liked to study odd cases outside me syuauus, ^u<* Thrat lied smoothly, “and I still do, when I’m not engrossed in a maintenance manual.”
Her emotional radiation would tell the Cinrusskin that she was lying, but it could only guess at what she was lying about. All it said was “Describe your procedure.”
“Before I do,” she went on quickly, “please remove the canopy from the litter and reposition the gravity grids to act laterally in opposite directions. Set the body restraints to the size and weight of the patient under anything up to an alternating plus and minus three Gs. Move the probe into the passageway, so I can step from it onto the roof. Hurry, please. I’m bringing out the patient now and will explain on the way …”
Cradling the barely conscious Khone in two medial arms and with all of her free hands gripping its fur tightly to make it feel that it was still joined to a friend, she climbed awkwardly onto the roof and sidled back the way she had come. Prilicla hovered anxiously above her all the way, Naydrad complained bitterly that its litter would never be the same again, and Murchison reminded it that they had a maintenance technician, or something,with them.
She continued to grip the Gogleskan’s fur while Naydrad expertly fitted the restraints and Murchison attached an oxygen supply to all breathing orifices. With her head touching Rhone’s and the long, silvery tendrils still making contact, she checked that the other had a clear view of the scanner display, which she in her present awkward position did not, then braced herself and gave the signal to begin.
Cha Thrat felt her head and upper limbs being pulled sideways as Naydrad fed power to the gravity grid positioned above the patient’s head. It was difficult to keep her balance because her lower body and legs were out-side the influence of the artificial gravity field. But so far I as Khone was concerned, it was tied upside-down to the litter under double, increasing to treble and Gogleskan standard gravity pull.
“Heart rate irregular,” Prilicla reported quietly. “Blood pressure increasing in the upper body and head, respiration labored, minor displacement of thoracicorgans, but the fetus hasn’t moved.”
“Shall I increase the pull to four Gs?” Naydrad asked, looking at Prilicla. But it was Cha Thrat who replied.
“No,” she said. “Give it two Gs alternating as rapidly as possible between normal and reverse pull. You’ve got to try to shake Junior loose,”
Now she was being knocked from side to side, as if by the soft, invisible paws of some great beast, while the patient was suffering the same maltreatment in the vertical plane. She managed to keep her head and the hands gripping Khone’s fur steady, but she was feeling a growing nausea that reminded her of childhood bouts of travel sickness.
“Friend Cha Thrat, are you all right?” Prilicla asked. “Do you wish to stop?”
“Can we spare the time?”
“No,” the empath replied, then: “The fetus is moving! It is—”
“Reverse, two Gs steady,” Cha Thrat said quickly, effectively standing Khone on its head again.
“—now pressing against the upper womb,” Prilicla continued. “The umbilical is no longer being compressed, and pressure on the blood vessels and nerve linkages in the area has been relieved. The muscles are beginning rapid, involuntary contractions …”
“Enough to expel the fetus?” she broke in.
“No,” it replied. “They are too weak to complete thebirth process. In any case the fetus is sun noi in me optimum position.”
Cha Thrat used a swear word that was definitely not Sommaradvan, and said, “Can we reposition and refocus the gravity grids so as to pull the fetus into the proper position for—”
“I would need time to—” Naydrad began.
“There isn’t any time,” said Prilicla. “I’m surprised friend Khone is still with us.”
This was not going nearly as well as the remembered case in the Tralthan maternity ward had gone, and there was no consolation in telling herself that, in this instance, the life-form was strange and the operating facilities virtually non-existent. Khone’s mind was no longer sending or receiving impressions, so that she could not even make the Last Apology to it for her failure.
“Please do not distress yourself, friend Cha,” the Cinrusskin went on, beginning to tremble violently. “No blame can be attached to you for attempting a task that, because of the peculiar circumstances, none of us were able to do. Your present emotional radiation is worrying me. Remember, you aren’t even a member of the medical team, you have no authority, and the responsibility for allowing you to try this procedure is not yours … You have just thought of something?”
“We both know,” Cha Thrat said, so quietly that her voice reached only Prilicla, “that I have made it my responsibility. And yes, I’ve thought of something.”
In a louder voice she went on quickly. “Naydrad, we need a rapid one-G push-pull this time, just enough to keep the fetus moving. Danalta, the muscle wall around the womb is thin, and relaxed due to the patient’s unconsciousness. Will you produce some suitable limbs and hands? Prilicla will tell you the size and shape needed, and use the scanner to direct your movements of thefetus into the proper position. Murchison, will you stand by to help withdraw it, if or when it is born?”
Apologetically she added, “I cannot assist you. For the time being it would be better if I retained the closest possible physical contact with the patient. My feeling is that, unconscious or not, it will derive a greater measure of emotional comfort from my doing so.”
“Your feeling is correct,” Prilicla said. “But time is short, friends. Let’s do it.”
While Naydrad kept the fetus twitching slowly within the womb, and Danalta, using appendages whose shape and movements would give Cha Thrat bad dreams for many nights to come, tried to press and turn it into optimum position, she tried desperately to get through to her deeply unconscious mind-partner.
You will be all right. Your child will be all right. Hang on, please don’t die on me!
It was like thinking into a black and bottomless pit. For an instant she thought there was a flicker of awareness, but it was probably that the feeling had come because she wanted it to be so. She turned her head slightly, so as not to break contact with the long, silvery tendrils, and wished that she was in a position to see the scanner display.
“It’s in optimum position now,” Prilicla said suddenly. “Danalta, move your hands lower. Be ready to press when I tell you if the fetus starts turning again. Naydrad, two Gs steady, down!”
For a moment there was silence except for the whistling of the distorters, which now seemed to be wavering in intensity as they labored like the patient, on reduced power, to perform their function. Time was running out for both of them. Everyone’s attention was on Khone,and even Prilicla was watching the scanner display too intently to describe what it was seeing.
“I see the head!” Murchison said suddenly. “The top of the head only. But the contractions are too weak, they aren’t helping very much. The legs are at maximum spread, but the fetal head is moving down, then back again, by a fraction of an inch with each contraction. Shall I try surgical enlargement of the—”
“No surgery,” Cha Thrat said firmly. Even if the patient survived it, she had shared Rhone’s mind and knew that serious psychological damage would result from the inflicting of a surgical wound — not to mention the
