Sector General by James White

Copywrite 1983


Accident
 
Retlin complex was Nidia's largest air terminal, its only spaceport, and, 
MacEwan thought cynically, its most popular zoo. The main concourse was thronged 
with furry native airline passengers, sightseers, and ground personnel, but the 
thickest crowd was outside the transparent walls of the off-planet departure 
lounge where Nidians of all ages jostled each other in their eagerness to see 
the waiting space travelers.
But the crowd parted quickly before the Corpsmen escorting MacEwan and his 
companionno native would risk giving offense to an offworlder by making even 
accidental bodily contact. From the departure lounge entrance, the two were 
directed to a small office whose transparent walls darkened into opacity at 
their approach.
The man facing them was a full Colonel and the ranking Monitor Corps officer on 
Nidia, but until they had seated themselves he remained standing, respectfully, 
as befitted one who was meeting for the first time the great Earth-human MacEwan 
and the equally legendary Orligian Grawlya-Ki. He remained on his feet for a 
moment longer while he looked with polite disapproval at their uniforms, torn 
and stained relics of an
almost forgotten war, then he glanced toward the solidograph that occupied one 
corner of his desk and sat down.
Quietly he began, "The planetary assembly has decided that you are no longer 
welcome on Nidia, and you are requested to leave at once. My organization, which 
is the closest thing we have to a neutral extraplanetary police force, has been 
asked to implement this request. I would prefer that you leave without the use 
of physical coercion. I am sorry. This is not pleasant for me, either, but I 
have to say that I agree with the Nidians. Your peacemongering activities of 
late have become much too... warlike."
Grawlya-Ki's chest swelled suddenly, making its stiff, spi-key fur rasp dryly 
against the old battle harness, but the Orligian did not speak. MacEwan said 
tiredly, "We were just trying to make them understand that"
"I know what you were trying to do," the Colonel broke in, "but half wrecking a 
video studio during a rehearsal was not the way to do it. Besides, you know as 
well as I do that your supporters were much more interested in taking part in a 
riot than in promulgating your ideas. You simply gave them an excuse to"
"The play glamorized war," MacEwan said.
The Monitor's eyes flickered toward the solidograph, then back to Grawlya-Ki and 
MacEwan again. His, tone softened. "I'm sorry, believe me, but you will have to 
leave. I cannot force it, but ideally you should return to your home planets 
where you could relax and live out your remaining years in peace. Your wounds 
must have left mental scars and you may require psychiatric assistance; and, 
well, I think both of you deserve some of the peace that you want-so desperately 
for everyone else."                        
When there was no response, the Colonel sighed and said, "Where do you want to 
go this time?" ' 
 
"Traltha," MacEwan said.  
 
The Monitor looked surprised. "That is a hot, high-gravity, heavily 
industrialized world, peopled by lumbering, six-legged elephants who are 
hardworking, peaceloving, and culturally stable. There hasn't been a war on 
Traltha for a thousand years. You would be wasting your time there, and feeling 
very uncomfortable while doing so, but it's your choice."
 
"On Traltha," MacEwan said, "commercial warfare never stops. One kind of war can 
lead to another."
The Colonel made no attempt to disguise his impatience. "You are frightening 
yourselves without reason and, in any case, maintaining the peace is our 
concern. We do it quietly, discreetly, by keeping potentially troublesome 
entities and situations under observation, and by making the minimum response 
early, before things can get out of control. We do a good job, if I do say so 
myself. But Traltha is not a danger, now or in the foreseeable future." He 
smiled. "Another war between Orligia and Earth would be more likely."
"That will not happen, Colonel," Grawlya-Ki said, its modulated growling 
forming a vaguely threatening accompaniment to the accentless speech coming from 
its translator pack. "Former enemies who have beaten hell out of each other 
make the best friends. But there has to be an easier way of making friends."
Before the officer could reply, MacEwan went on quickly, "I understand what the 
Monitor Corps is doing, Colonel, and I approve. Everybody does. It is rapidly 
becoming accepted as the Federation's executive and law-enforcement arm. But it 
can never become a truly multispecies service. Its officers, of necessity, will 
be almost entirely Earth-human. With so much power entrusted to one species"
 
"We are aware of the danger," the Colonel broke in. Defensively he went on, 
"Our psychologists are working on the problems and our people are highly trained 
in e-t cultural contact procedures. And we have the authority to ensure that 
the members of every ship's crew making other-species contacts are 
similarly-gained,. Everyone is aware of the danger of uttering or commiting an 
unthinking word or action which could be construed as insulting and of what 
might ensue. We lean over backward in our efforts not to give offense. You know 
that."
The Colonel was first and foremost a policeman, MacEwan thought, find like a 
good policeman he resented any criticism of his service. What was more, his 
irritation with the two aging war veterans was rapidly reaching the point where 
the interview would be terminated. Take it easy, he warned himself, this is not 
an enemy.
Aloud he said, "The point I'm trying to make is that leaning over backward is an 
inherently unstable position, and this hy-perpoliteness where extraterrestrials 
are concerned is artificial, even dishonest. The tensions generated must 
ultimately lead to trouble, even between the handpicked and highly intelligent 
entities who are the only people allowed to make off-planet contacts. This type 
of contact is too narrow, too limited. The member species of the Federation are 
not really getting to know and trust each other, and they never will until 
contact becomes more relaxed and natural. As things are it would be unthinkable 
to have even a friendly argument with an extraterrestrial.
"We must get to really know them, Colonel," MacEwan went on quickly. "Well 
enough not to have to be so damnably polite all the time. If a Tralthan jostles 
a Nidian or an Earth; human, we must know the being well enough to tell it to 
watch where it's going and to call it any names which seem appropriate to the 
occasion. We should expect the same treatment if the fault is ours. Ordinary 
people, not a carefully selected and trained star-traveling elite, must get to 
know offworlders well enough to be able to argue or even to quarrel nonviolently 
with them, without"
"And that," the Monitor said coldly, rising to his feet, "is the reason you are 
leaving Nidia. For disturbing the peace."
Hopelessly, MacEwan tried again. "Colonel, we must find some common ground on 
which the ordinary citizens of the Federation can meet. Not just because of 
scientific and cultural exchanges or interstellar trade treaties. It must be 
something basic, something we all feel strongly about, an idea or a project that 
we can really get together on. In spite of our much-vaunted Federation and the 
vigilance of your Monitor Corps, perhaps because of that vigilance, we are not 
getting to know each other properly. Unless we do another war is inevitable. But 
nobody worries. You've all forgotten how terrible war is."
He broke off as the Colonel pointed slowly to the solido-graph on his desk, then 
brought the hand back to his side again. "We have a constant reminder," he said.
After that the Colonel would say no more, but remained standing stiffly at 
attention until Grawlya-Ki and MacEwan left the office.
The departure lounge was more than half filled with tight, exclusive little 
groups of Tralthans, Melfans, Kelgians, and Illensans. There was also a pair of 
squat, tentacular, heavy-gravity beings who were apparently engaged in spraying 
each other with paint, and which were a new life-form to MacEwan. A 
teddybearlike Nidian wearing the blue sash of the nontechnical ground staff 
moved from behind them to escape the spray, but otherwise ignored the creatures.
There was some excuse for the chlorine-breathing Illensans to keep to 
themselves: the loose, transparent material of their protective envelopes looked 
fragile. He did not know anything about the paint-spraying duo, but the others 
were all warmblooded, oxygen-breathing life-forms with similar pressure and 
gravity requirements and they should, at least, have been acknowledging each 
others' presence even if they did not openly display the curiosity they must be 
feeling toward each other. Angrily, MacEwan turned away to examine the traffic 
movements display.
There was an lllensan factory ship in orbit, a great, ungainly nonlander whose 
shuttle had touched down a few minutes earlier, and a Nidian ground transporter 
fitted with the chlorine breathers' life-support was on the way in to pick up 
passengers. Their Tralthan-built and crewed passenger ship was nearly ready to 
board and stood on its apron on the other side of the main aircraft runway. It 
was one of the new ships which boasted of providing comfortable accommodation 
for six different oxygen-breathing species, but degrees of comfort were relative 
and MacEwan, Grawlya-Ki, and the other non-Tralthans in the lounge would shortly 
be judging it for themselves.
Apart from the lllensan shuttle and the Tralthan vessel, the only traffic was 
the Nidian atmosphere craft which took off and landed every few minutes. They 
were not large aircraft, but they did not need to be to hold a thousand Nidians. 
As the aircraft differed only in their registration markings, it seemed that the 
same machine was endlessly taking off and landing.
Angry because there was nothing else in the room to engage his attention fully, 
and because it occupied such a prominent Position in the center of the lounge 
that all eyes were naturally drawn to it, MacEwan turned finally to look once 
again at that frightful and familiar tableau.
Grawlya-Ki had already done so and was whining softly to itself.
It was a life-sized replica of the old Orligian war memorial, one of the 
countless thousands of copies which occupied public places of honor or appeared 
in miniature on the desks or in the homes of responsible and concerned beings on 
every world-of the Federation. The original had stood within its protective 
shield in the central Plaza of Orligia's capital city for more than two 
centuries, during which a great many native and visiting entities of 
sensitivity and intelligence had tried vainly to describe its effect upon them.
For that war memorial was no aesthetic marble poem in which godlike figures 
gestured defiance or lay dying nobly with limbs arranged to the best advantage. 
Instead it consisted of an Orligian and an Earthman, surrounded by the 
shattered, remnants of a Control Room belonging to a type of ship now long 
obsolete.
The Orligian was standing crouched forward, the fur of its chest and face matted 
with blood. A few yards away lay the Earth-human, very obviously dying. The 
front of his uniform was in shreds, revealing the ghastly injuries he had 
sustained. Abdominal organs normally concealed by skin, layers of subcutaneous 
tissue and muscle were clearly visible. Yet this man, who had no business being 
alive much less being capable of movement, was struggling toward the Orligian.
Two combatants amid the wreckage of a warship trying to continue their battle 
hand to-hand?
The dozens of plaques spaced around the base of the tableau described the 
incident in all the written languages of the Federation .
They told of the epic, single-ship duel between the Orligian and the Earth-human 
commanders. So evenly matched had they been that, their respective crew members 
dead, their ships shot to pieces, armaments depleted and power gone, they had 
crash-landed close together on a world unknown to both of them. The Orligian, 
anxious to learn all it could regarding enemy ship systems, and driven by a more 
personal curiosity about its opponent, had boarded the wrecked Earth ship. They 
met.
For them the war was over, because the terribly wounded Earth-human did not know 
when he was going to die and the Orligian did not know when, if ever, its 
distress signal would
bring rescuers. The distant, impersonal hatred they had felt toward each other 
was gone, dissipated by the six-hour period* of maximum effort that had been 
their duel, and was replaced by feelings of mutual respect for the degree of 
professional competence displayed. So they tried to communicate, and succeeded.
It had been a slow, difficult, and extraordinarily painful process for both of 
them, but when they did talk they held nothing back. The Orligian knew that any 
verbal insubordination it might utter would die with this Earth-human, who in 
turn sensed the other's sympathy and was in too much pain to care about the 
things he said about his own superiors. And while they talked the Earth-human 
learned something of vital importance, an enemy's-eye view of the simple, 
stupid, and jointly misunderstood incident which had been responsible for 
starting the war in the first place.
It had been during the closing stages of this conversation that an Orligian ship 
which chanced to be in the area had landed and, after assessing the situation, 
used its Stopper on the Earth wreck.
Even now the operating principles of the Orligian primary space weapon were 
unclear to MacEwan. The weapon was capable of enclosing a small ship, or vital 
sections of a large one, within a field of stasis in which all motion stopped. 
Neither the ships nor their crew were harmed physically, but if someone so much 
as scratched the surface of one of those Stopped hulls or tried to slip a needle 
into the skin of one of the Stopped personnel, the result was an explosion of 
near-nuclear proportions.
But the Orligian stasis field projector had peaceful as well as military 
applications.
With great difficulty the section of Control Room and the two Stopped bodies it 
contained had been moved to Orligia, to occupy the central square of the 
planetary capital as the most gruesomely effective war memorial ever known, for 
236 years. During that time the shaky peace which the two frozen beings had 
brought about between Orligia and Earth ripened into friendship, and medical 
science progressed to the point where the terribly injured Earth-human could be 
saved. Although its
injuries had not been fatal, Grawlya-Ki had insisted on being Stopped with its 
friend so that it could see MacEwan cured for itself.
And then the two greatest heroes of the war, heroes because they had ended it, 
were removed from stasis, rushed to a hospital, and cured. For the first time, 
it was said, the truly great of history would receive the reward they deserved 
from posterityand that was the way it had happened, just over thirty years 
ago.
Since then the two heroes, the only two entities in the whole Federation with 
direct experience of war, had grown increasingly monomaniacal on the subject 
until the honor and respect accorded them had gradually changed to reactions of 
impatience and embarrassment.
"Sometimes, Ki," MacEwan saidt turning away from the frozen figures of their 
former selves, "I wonder if we should give up and try to find peace of mind like 
the Colonel said. Nobody listens to us anymore, yet all we are trying to tell 
them is to relax, to take off their heavy, bureaucratic gauntlets when extending 
the hand of friendship, and to speak and react honestly so that"
"I am aware of the arguments," Grawlya-Ki broke in, "and the completely 
unnecessary restatement of them, especially to one who shares your feelings in 
this matter, is suggestive of approaching senility."
"Listen, you mangy, overgrown baboon!" MacEwan began furiously, but the Orligian 
ignored him.
"And senility is a condition which cannot be successfully treated by the 
Colonel's psychiatrists," it went on. "Neither, I submit, can they give 
psychiatric assistance to minds which are otherwise sane. As for my localized 
loss of fur, you are so lacking in male hormones that you can only grow it on 
your head and"
"And your females grow more fur than you do," MacEwan snapped back, then 
stopped.
He had been conned again.
Since that first historic meeting in MacEwan's wrecked Control Room they had 
grown to know each other very well. Grawlya-Ki had assessed the present 
situation, decided that MacEwan was-feeling far too depressed for his own good, 
and instituted
curative treatment in the form of a therapuetic argument combined with subtle 
reassurance regarding their sanity. MacEwan smiled.
"This frank and honest exchange of views," he said quietly, "is distressing the 
other travelers. They probably think the EarthOrligian war is about to restart, 
because they would never dream of saying such things to each other."
"But they do dream," Grawlya-ki said, its mind going off at one of its 
peculiarly Orligian tangents. "All intelligent life-forms require periods of 
unconsciousness during which they dream. Or have nightmares."
"The trouble is," MacEwan said, "they don't share our particular nightmare."
Grawlya-Ki was silent. Through the transparent outer wall of the lounge it was 
watching the rapid approach of the ground transporter from the Illensan shuttle 
The vehicle was^a great, multiwheeled silver bullet distinctively marked to show 
that it was filled with chlorine, and tipped with a transparent control module 
whose atmosphere was suited to its Nidian driver. MacEwan wondered why all of 
the smaller intelligent life-forms, regardless of species, had a compulsion to 
drive fast. Had he stumbled upon one of the great cosmic truths?
"Maybe we should try a different approach," the Orligian said, still watching 
the transporter. "Instead of trying to frighten them with nightmares, we should 
find them a pleasant and inspiring dream toWhat is that idiot doing?"
The vehicle was still approaching at speed, making no attempt to slow or turn 
so as to present its transfer lock to the lounge's exit port for breathers of 
toxic atmospheres. All of the waiting travelers were watching it now, many of 
them making noises which did not translate.
The driver is showing off, MacEwan thought. Reflected sunlight from the canopy 
obscured the occupant. It was not until the transporter ran into the shadow of 
the terminal building that MacEwan saw the figure of the driver slumped face 
downward over its control console, but by then it was too late for anyone to do 
anything.
Built as it was from tough, laminated plastic nearly a foot thick, the 
transparent wall bulged inward but did not immediately shatter as the nose of 
the vehicle struck. The control
module and its occupant were instantly flattened into a thin pancake of riven 
metal, tangled wiring, and bloody Nidian fur. Then the transporter broke 
through.
When the driver had collapsed and lost control, the automatic power cutoff and 
emergency braking systems must have been triggered. But in spite of its locked 
wheels the transporter skidded ponderously on, enlarging the original break in 
the transparent wall and losing sections of its own external plating in the 
process. It plowed through the neat rows of Tralthan, Melfan, Kelgian, and 
Illensan furniture. The heavy, complex structures were ripped from their floor 
mountings and hurled aside along with the beings unfortunate enough to still be 
occupying them. Finally the transporter ground to a halt against one of the 
building's roof support pillars, which bent alarmingly but did not break. The 
shock brought down most of the lounge's ceiling panels and with them a choking, 
blinding cloud of dust.
All around MacEwan extraterrestrials were coughing and floundering about and 
making untranslatable noises indicative of pain and distress, Grawlya-Ki 
included. He blinked dust out of his eyes and saw that the Orligian was 
crouched, apparently uninjured, beside the transporter. Both of its enormous, 
furry hands were covering its face and it looked as if it would shake itself 
apart with the violence of its coughing. MacEwan kicked loose debris out of the 
way and moved toward it. Then his eyes began to sting and, just in time, he 
covered his mouth and nose to keep from inhaling the contaminated air.
Chlorine!
With his free hand he grasped the Orligian's battle harness and began dragging 
it away from the damaged vehicle, wondering angrily why he was wasting his 
time. If the internal pressure hull had been ruptured, the whole lounge would be 
rendered uninhabitable to oxygen breathers within a few minutesthe Ilknsans' 
higher-pressure chlorine atmosphere would see to that. Then he stumbled against 
a low, sprawling, membraneous body which was hissing and twitching amid the 
debris and realized that it was not only the damaged vehicle which was 
responsible for the contamination.
The Illensan must have been hit by the transporter and flung against a Kelgian 
relaxer frame, which had collapsed. One of
the support struts had snagged the chlorine breather's pressure* envelope, 
ripping it open along the entire length of the body. The oxygen-rich atmosphere 
was attacking the unprotected body, coating the skin with a powdery, sickly blue 
organic corrosion which was thickest around the two breathing orifices. All body 
movement ceased as MacEwan watched, but he could still hear a loud hissing 
sound.
Still keeping his mouth and nostrils sealed with one hand, he used the other to 
feel along the Illensan's body and pressure envelope. His eyes were stinging 
even though they were now tightly shut.
The creature's skin felt hot, slippery, and fibrous, with patterns of raised 
lines which made it seem that the whole body was covered by the leaves of some 
coarse-textured plant, and there were times when MacEwan did not know whether he 
was touching the skin or the ruptured pressure suit. The sound of the pulse in 
his head was incredible, like a constant, thudding explosion, and the 
constriction in his chest was fast reaching the stage where.he was ready to 
inhale even chlorine to stop that fiery, choking pain in his lungs. But he 
fought desperately not to breathe, pressing his hand so tightly against his face 
that his nose began to bleed.
After what seemed like a couple of hours later, he felt the shape of a large 
cylinder with a hose connection and strange-feeling bumps and projections at one 
endthe Illensan's air tank. He pulled and twisted desperately at controls 
designed for the spatulate digits of an Illensan, and suddenly the hiss of 
escaping chlorine ceased.
He turned and staggered away, trying to get clear of the localized cloud of 
toxic gas so he could breathe again. But he had gone only a few yards when he 
tripped and fell into a piece of broken e-t furniture covered by a tangle of 
plastic drapery which had been used to decorate the lounge. His free arm kept 
him from injuring himself, but it was not enough to enable him to escape from 
the tangle of tubing and plastic which had somehow wrapped itself around his 
feet. He opened his eyes and shut them again hastily as the chlorine stung them. 
With such a high concentration of gas he could not risk opening his mouth to 
shout for help. The noise inside his head was unbelievable. He felt himself 
slipping into a roaring, pounding blackness, and there was a tight band gripping 
and squeezing his chest.
There was something gripping his chest. He felt it- lifting him, shaking him 
free of the debris entangling his arm and legs, and holding him aloft while it 
carried him for an unknown distance across the lounge. Suddenly he felt his feet 
touch the floor and he opened his eyes and mouth.
The smell of chlorine was still strong but he could breathe and see. Grawlya-Ki 
was standing a few feet away, looking concerned and pointing at the blood 
bubbling from his nose, and one of the two paint-spraying extraterrestrials was 
detaching one of its thick, iron-hard tentacles from around his chest. He was 
too busy just breathing again to be able to say anything. "I apologize most 
abjectly and sincerely," his rescuer boomed over the sounds being made by the 
injured all around them, "if I have in any fashion hurt you, or subjected you to 
mental trauma or embarrassment by making such a gross and perhaps intimate 
physical contact with your body. I would not have dared touch you at all had not 
your Orligian friend insisted that you were in grave danger and requested that I 
lift you clear. But if I have given offense"
"You have not given offense," MacEwan broke in. "On the contrary, you have saved 
my life at great risk to your own. That chlorine is deadly stuff to all us 
oxygen breathers. Thank you."
It was becoming difficult to speak without coughing because the cloud of gas 
from the dead Illensan's suit was spreading, and Grawlya-Ki was already moving 
away. MacEwan was about to follow when the creature spoke again.
"I am in no immediate danger." Its eyes glittered at him from behind their hard, 
organic shields as it went on. "I am a Hudlar, Earthperson. My species does not 
breathe, but absorbs sustenance directly from our atmosphere, which, near the 
planetary surface, is analogous to a thick, high-pressure, semigas-eous soup. 
Apart from requiring our body surface to be sprayed at frequent intervals with a 
nutrient paint, we are not inconvenienced by any but the most corrosive of 
atmospheres, and we can even work for lengthy periods in vacuum conditions on 
orbital construction projects.
"I am glad to have been of assistance, Earthperson," the Hudlar ended, "but I am 
not a hero."
"Nevertheless I am grateful," MacEwan shouted, then stopped moving away. He 
waved his hand, indicating the lounge which resembled a battlefield rather than 
a luxurious departure point for the stars, and started coughing. Finally he was 
able to say, "Pardon me, please, if I am being presumptuous, but is it possible 
for you to similarly assist the other beings who have been immobilized by their 
injuries and are in danger of asphyxiation?"
The second Hudlar had joined them, but neither spoke. Grawlya-Ki was waving at 
him and pointing toward the transparent wall of the Colonel's office where the 
Monitor Corps officer was also gesticulating urgently.
"Ki, will you find out what he wants?" MacEwan called to the Orligian. To the 
first Hudlar he went on, "You are understandably cautious in the matter of 
physically handling members of another species, lest you inadvertently give 
offense, and in normal circumstances this would be wholly admirable and the 
behavior of a being of sensitivity and intelligence. But this is not a normal 
situation, and it is my belief that any accidental physical intimacy committed 
on the injured would be forgiven when the intention is purely to give 
assistance. In these circumstances a great many beings could die who would 
otherwise"
"Some of them will die of boredom or old age," the second Hudlar said suddenly, 
"if we continue to waste time with unnecessary politeness. Plainly we Hudlars 
have a physical advantage here. What is it you wish us to do?"
"I apologize most abjectly for my lifemate's ill-considered and hasty remarks, 
Earth-human," the first Hudlar said quickly. "And for any offense they may have 
given."
"No need. None taken," MacEwan said, laughing in sheer relief until the chlorine 
turned it into a cough. He considered prefacing his instructions with advance 
apologies for any offense he might inadvertently give to the Hudlars, then 
decided that that would be wasting more time. He took a deep, careful breath and 
spoke.
"The chlorine level is still rising around that transporter. Would one of you 
remove heavy debris from casualties in the
area affected and move them to the entrance to the boarding tunnel, where they 
can be moved into the tunnel itself if the level continues to rise. The other 
should concentrate on rescuing Illensans by lifting them into their transporter. 
There is a lock antechamber just inside the entry port, and hopefully some of 
the less seriously injured chlorine breathers will be able to get them through 
the lock and give them first aid inside. The Orligian and myself will try to 
move the casualties not immediately in danger from the chlorine, and open the 
boarding tunnel entrance. Ki, what have you got there?"
The Orligian had returned with more than, a dozen small cylinders, with 
breathing masks and straps attached, cradled in both arms. It said, 
"Fire-fighting equipment. The Colonel directed me to the emergency locker. But 
it's Nidian equipment. The masks won't fit very well, and with some of these 
beings they won't fit at all. Maybe we can hold them in position and"
"This aspect of the problem does not concern us," the first Hudlar broke in. 
"Earthperson, what do we do with casualties whose injuries might be compounded 
by the assistance of well-meaning rescuers ignorant of the physiology of the 
being concerned?"
MacEwan was already tying a cylinder to his chest, passing the attachment over 
one shoulder and under the opposite armpit because the Nidian straps were too 
short to do otherwise. He said grimly, "We will have that problem, too."
"Then we will use our best judgment," the second Hudlar said, moving ponderously 
toward the transporter, followed closely by its lifemate.
"That isn't the only problem," Grawlya-Ki said as it, too, attached a cylinder 
to its harness. 'The collision cut our communications and the Colonel can't 
tell the terminal authorities about the situation in here, nor does he know what 
the emergency services are doing about it. He also says that the boarding 
tunnel entrance won't open while there is atmospheric contamination in the 
loungeit is part of the safety system designed to contain such contamination so 
that it won't spread along the boarding tunnel to the waiting ship or into the 
main concourse. The system can be overridden at this end, but only by a special 
key carried by the Nidian senior ground staff member on duty in the lounge. Have 
you seen this being?"
 
"Yes," MacEwan said grimly. "It was standing at the exit port just before the 
crash. I think it is somewhere underneath the transporter."
Grawlya-Ki whined quietly, then went on, "The Colonel is using his personal 
radio to contact a docked Monitor Corps vessel to try to patch into the port 
network that way, but so far without effect. The Nidian rescue teams are doing 
all the talking and are not listening to outsiders. But if he gets through he 
wants to know what to tell them. The number and condition of the casualties, the 
degree of contamination, and optimum entry points for the rescue teams. He wants 
to talk to you."
"I don't want to talk to him," MacEwan said. He did not know enough to be able 
to make a useful situation report, and until he did their time could be used to 
much better effect than worrying out loud to the Colonel. He pointed to an 
object which looked like a gray, bloodstained sack which twitched and made 
untranslatable sounds, and said, "That one first."
The injured Kelgian was difficult to move, MacEwan found, especially when there 
was just one Orligian arm and two human ones to take the weight. Grawlya-Ki's 
mask was such a bad fit that it had to hold it in position. The casualty was a 
caterpillar-like being with more than twenty legs and an overall covering of 
silvery fur now badly bloodstained. But the body, although no more massive than 
that of a human, was completely flaccid. There seerned to be no skeleton, no 
bony parts at all except possibly in the head section, but it felt as though 
there were wide, concentric bands of muscle running the length of the body just 
underneath the fur.
It rolled and flopped about so much that by the time he had raised it from the 
floor, supporting its head and midsection between his outstretched arms and 
chestGrawlya-Ki had the toil gripped between its side and free armone of the 
wounds began bleeding. Because MacEwan was concentrating on holding the 
Kelgian's body immobile as they moved it toward the boarding tunnel entrance, 
his mind was not on his feet; they became tangled in a piece of decorative 
curtain, and he fell to his knees. Immediately the Kelgian's blood began to well 
out at an alarming rate.
"We should do something about that," the Orligian said, its voice muffled by the 
too-small mask. "Any ideas?"
The Service had taught MacEwan only the rudiments of first
aid because casualties in a space war tended to be explosive decompressions and 
rarely if ever treatable, and what little he had learned applied to beings of 
his own species. Serious bleeding was controlled by cutting off the supply of 
blood to the wound with a tourniquet or local pressure. The Kelgian's 
circulatory system seemed to be very close to its skin, possibly because those 
great, circular bands of muscle required lots of blood. But the position of the 
veins were hidden by the being's thick fur. He thought that a pad and tight 
bandages were the only treatment possible. He did not have a pad and there was 
no time to go looking for one, but there was a bandage of sorts still wrapped 
loosely around his ankle.
He kicked the length of plastic curtain off his foot, then pulled about two 
meters free of the pile of debris which had fallen with it. The stuff was tough 
and he needed all his strength to make a transverse tear in it, but it was wide 
enough to cover the wound with several inches to spare. With the Orligian's help 
he held the plastic in position over the wound and passed the two ends around 
the cylindrical body, knotting them very tightly together.
Probably the makeshift bandage was too tight, and where it passed around the 
Kelgian's underside it was pressing two sets of the being's legs against the 
underbelly in a direction they were not, perhaps, designed to bend, and he hated 
to think of what the dust and dirt adhering to the plastic might be doing to 
that open wound.
The same thought must have been going through the Orligian's head, because it 
said, "Maybe we'll find another Kelgian who isn't too badly hurt and knows what 
to do."
But it was a long time before they found another Kelgian at least, it felt like 
an hour even though the big and, strangely, still-functioning lounge clock, 
whose face was divided into concentric rings marked off in the time units of the 
major Federation worlds, insisted that it-was only ten minutes.
One of the Hudlars had lifted wreckage from two of the crablike Melfans, one of 
whom was coherent, seemingly uninjured but unable to see because of the 
chlorine or dust. Graw-lya-Ki spoke reassuringly to it and led it away by 
grasping a thick, fleshy projection, purpose unknown, growing from its
head. The other Melfan made loud, untranslatable noises. Its carapace was 
cracked in several places and of the three legs which should have supported it 
on one side, two were limp and useless and one was missing altogether.
MacEwan bent down quickly and slipped his hands and lower arms under the edge of 
the carapace between the two useless legs and lifted until the body was at its 
normal walking height. Immediately the legs on the other side began moving 
slowly. MacEwan sidled along at the same pace, supporting the injured side and 
guiding the Melfan around intervening wreckage until he was able to leave it 
beside its blinded colleague.
He could think of nothing more to do for it, so he rejoined the Hudlar 
excavating among the heavier falls of debris.
They uncovered three more Melfans, injured but ambulatory, who were directed to 
the boarding tunnel entrance, and a pair of the elephantine, six-legged 
Tralthans who appeared to be uninjured but were badly affected by the gas which 
was still leaking steadily from the transporter. MacEwan and Graw-lya-Ki each 
held a Nidian breathing mask to one breathing orifice and yelled at them to 
close the other. Then they tried desperately not to be trampled underfoot as 
they guided the Tralthans to the casualty assembly point. Then they uncovered 
two more of the Kelgian caterpillars, one of whom had obviously bled to death 
from a deep tear in its flank. The other had five of its rearmost sets of legs 
damaged, rendering it immobile, but it was conscious and able to cooperate by 
holding its body rigid while they carried it back to the others.
When MacEwan asked the being if it could help the earlier Kelgian casualty he 
had tried to bandage, it said that it had no medical training and could think of 
nothing further to do.
There were more walking, wriggling, and crawling wounded released from the 
wreckage to join the growing crowd of casualties at the tunnel entrance. Some 
of them were talking but most were making loud, untranslatable noises which had 
to be of pain. The sounds made by the casualties still trapped by fallen 
wreckage were slight by comparison.
The Hudlars were working tirelessly and often invisibly in a cloud of 
self-created dust, but now they seemed to be un-
covering only organic wreckage of which there was no hope of salvage. There was 
another Kelgian who had bled spectacularly to death; two, or it may have been 
three, Melfans with crushed and shattered carapaces and broken limbs, and a 
Tral-than who had been smashed flat by a collapsing roof beam and was still 
trying to move.
MacEwan was afraid to touch any of them in case they fell apart in his hands, 
but he could not be absolutely sure that they were beyond help. He had no idea 
of their ability to survive major injury, or whether specialized medical 
intervention could save them if taken in time. He felt angry and useless and the 
chlorine was beginning to penetrate his face mask.
"This being appears to be uninjured," the Hudlar beside them said. It had lifted 
a heavy table from a Tralthan who was lying on its side, its six massive legs 
twitching feebly and its domelike brain casing, multiple eye-trunk, and thick, 
leathery hide free of any visible signs of damage. "Could it be that it is 
troubled only by the toxic gas?"
"You're probably right," MacEwan said. He and Grawlya-Ki pressed Nidian masks 
over the Tralthan's breathing orifices. Several minutes passed with no sign of 
improvement in its condition. MacEwan's eyes were stinging even though he, like 
the Orligian, was using one hand to press the mask tightly against his face. 
Angrily, he said, "Have you any other ideas?"
The anger was directed at his own helplessness, and he felt like kicking himself 
for taking it out on the Hudlar. He could not tell the two beings apart, only 
that one tended to sound worried, long-winded, and overly polite, while its 
lifemate was more forthright. This one, luckily, was the former.
"It is possible that its injuries are to the flank lying against the floor and 
are presently invisible to us," the Hudlar said ponderously. "Or that the being, 
which is a squat, heavy-gravity creature with certain physical similarities to 
myself, is seriously inconvenienced by being laid on its side. While we Hudlars 
can work comfortably in weightless conditions, gravity if present must act 
downward or within a very short time serious and disabling organ displacement 
occurs. There is also the fact that all Tralthan ships use an artificial gravity 
system with multiple failsafe backup, which is just one of the reasons for the 
dependability and popularity of Tralthan-built ships. This suggests
that a lateral gravity pull must be avoided by them at all costs, and that this 
particular being is"
"Stop talking about it," the second Hudlar said, joining them, "and lift the 
thing."
The Hudlar extended its forward pair of tentacles and, bracing itself with the 
other four in front of the Tralthan's weakly moving feet, slid them over the 
creature's back and insinuated them between the floor and its other flank. 
MacEwan watched as the tentacles tightened, took the strain, and began to 
quiver. But the body did not move, and the other Hudlar positioned itself to 
assist.
MacEwan was surprised, and worried. He had seen those tentacles, which served 
both as ambulatory and manipulatory appendages, lifting beams, major structural 
members, and large masses of wreckage seemingly without effort. They were 
beautifully evolved limbs, immensely strong and with thick, hardened pads 
forming a knuckle on which the being walked while the remainder of the 
tentaclethe thinner, more flexible half tipped with a cluster of specialized 
digitswas carried curled inward against its underside. The Tralthan they were 
trying to move was roughly the mass of an Earthly baby elephant, and the 
combined efforts of both Hudlars were shifting it only slightly.
"Wait," MacEwan said urgently. "Both of you have lifted much heavier weights. I 
think the Tralthan is caught, perhaps impaled on a structural projection, and 
you cannot move it because"
"We cannot move it," the polite Hudlar said, "because we have been expending 
large amounts of energy after insufficient sustenance. Absorption of our last 
meal, which was overdue in any case, was halted by the accident after the 
process was scarcely begun. We are as weak as infants, as are you and your 
Orligian friend. But if you would both go to the other side of the being and 
push, your strength, puny as it is, might make a difference."
Perhaps it wasn't the polite one, MacEwan thought as he and Grawlya-Ki did as 
suggested. He wanted to apologize to we Hudlars for assuming that they were 
simply organic pieces of heavy rescue machinery whose capabilities he had taken 
for . But he and Grawlya-Ki had their shoulders under the
side of the Tralthan's cranial dome, their puny efforts were making a 
difference, and, unlike Hudlars, MacEwan needed breath with which to speak.
The Tralthan came upright, rocked unsteadily on its six, widely spaced feet, 
then was guided toward the other casualties by the Orligian. Sweat as well as 
chlorine was in MacEwan's eyes so he did not know which Hudlar spoke, but 
presumably it had been the one engaged in lifting injured Illensans into the 
damaged transporter.
"I am having difficulty with a chlorine breather, Earthper-son," it said. "The 
being is abusive and will not allow me to touch it. The circumstances call for a 
very close decision, one I am unwilling to make. Will you speak to it?"
The area around the transporter had been cleared of casualties with the sole 
exception of this Illensan, who refused to be moved. The reason it gave MacEwan 
was that while its injuries were not serious, its pressure envelope had suffered 
two small ruptures. One of these it had sealed, after a fashion, by grasping the 
fabric of its envelope around the tear in both manipulators and holding it 
tightly closed, while the other one it had sealed by lying on it. These 
arrangements had forced it to increase the internal pressure of the envelope 
temporarily, so that it no longer had any clear idea of the duration of its 
chlorine tank and asphyxiation might be imminent. But it did not want to be 
moved to the relative safety of the transporter, which was also leaking, because 
that would allow the lethal atmosphere of the lounge to enter its envelope.
"I would prefer to die of chlorine starvation," it ended forcefully, "than have 
my breathing passages and lungs instantly corroded by your oxygen. Stay away 
from me."
MacEwan swore under his breath but did not approach the Illensan. Where were the 
emergency rescue teams? Surely they should have been there by now. The clock 
showed that it had been just over twenty-five Earth minutes since the accident. 
He could see that the sightseers had been cleared from the lounge's inner wall, 
to be replaced by a Nidian television crew and some uninformed ground staff who 
did not appear to be doing anything at all. Outside there were heavy vehicles 
drawn up and Nidians with backpacks and helmets scurrying around,
but his constantly watering eyes and the ever-present plastic hangings kept him 
from seeing details.
MacEwan pointed suddenly at the hangings and said to the Hudlars, "Will you tear 
down a large piece of that plastic material, please, and drape it over the 
Illensan. Pat it down flat around the being's suit and smooth the folds out 
toward the edges so as to exclude our air as much as possible. I'll be back in a 
minute."
He hurried around the transporter to the first Illensan casualty, whose body 
had turned a livid, powdery blue and was beginning to disintegrate, and tried to 
look only at the fastenings of the chlorine tank. It took him several minutes to 
get the tank free of the body harness, and several times his bare hands touched 
the dead Illensan's flesh, which crumbled like rotting wood. He knew that oxygen 
was vicious stuff where chlorine breathers were concerned, but now he could 
really sympathize with the other Illensan's panic at the thought of being moved 
in a leaking suit.
When he relumed it was Grawlya-Ki who was smoothing out the plastic around the 
Illensan while the two Hudlars were standing clear. One of them said 
apologetically, "Our movements have become somewhat uncoordinated and the 
chlorine breather was worried lest we accidentally fall on it. If there is 
something else we can do"
"Nothing," MacEwan said firmly.
He turned on the tap of the chlorine tank and slipped it quickly under the 
plastic sheet and pushed it close to the Illensan. The extra seepage of the gas 
would make little difference, he thought, because the whole area around the 
transporter was fast becoming uninhabitable for oxygen breathers. He pressed the 
tiny mask hard against his face and took a long, careful breath through his 
nose, and used it to speak to the Hudlars.
"I have been thoughtless and seemingly ungrateful for the fine work you have 
been doing here," he said. "There is nothing more that you can do. Please go at 
once and spray yourselves with the necessary nutrient. You have acted most 
unselfishly, and I am, as are we all, most grateful to you."
The two Hudlars did not move. MacEwan began placing
pieces of debris around the edges of the plastic and the Orligian, who was quick 
on the uptake, began doing the same. Soon the edges were held tightly against 
the floor, the gas escaping from the tank was beginning to inflate the plastic, 
and they had the Illensan in a crude chlorine tent. Still the Hudlars had not 
moved.
"The Colonel is waving at you again," Grawlya-Ki said. "I would say with 
impatience."
"We cannot use our sprayers here, Earthperson," one of the Hudlars said before 
MacEwan could reply. "The absorption mechanism in our tegument would ingest the 
toxic gas with our food, and in our species trace amounts of chlorine are 
lethal. The food sprayers can only be used in a beneficent atmosphere or in 
airless conditions."
"Bloody hell!" MacEwan said. When he thought of the way the Hudlars had worked 
to free the casualties, knowing that their time and available energy was 
severely limited and letting him assume that they had no problems, he should 
have had more to saybut that was all that came out. He looked helplessly at 
Ki, but the Orligian's face was covered by its furry hand holding the 
ridiculously small mask.
"With us," the other Hudlar added, "starvation is a rapid process, somewhat akin 
to asphyxiation in a gas breather. I estimate that we should lose consciousness 
and die in just under eight of our small time divisions."
MacEwan's eyes went to the concentric circles of the lounge clock. The Hudlar 
was talking about the equivalent of about twenty Earth minutes. Somehow they had 
to get that boarding tunnel open.
"Go to the tunnel entrance," he said, "and try to conserve your strength. Wait 
beside the others until" He broke off awkwardly, then said to the Orligian, 
"Ki, you'd better get over there as well. There's enough chlorine in the air 
here to bleach your fur. Keep passing the masks around and'"
"The Colonel," Grawlya-Ki reminded him as it turned to follow the Hudlars. 
MacEwan waved acknowledgment, but before he could leave the Illensan began 
speaking, its voice muffled by the fabric of the makeshift chlorine tent.
"That was an ingenious idea, Earthperson," it said slowly-"There is now a 
beneficent atmosphere surrounding my
sure envelope, which will enable me to repair the torn fabric and survive until 
Illensan assistance arrives. Thank you."
"You're welcome," MacEwan said, and began picking his way over the debris toward 
the gesticulating figure of the Colonel. He was still several meters from the 
wall when the officer pointed to his ear, then rapped with a knuckle on the 
interior surface. MacEwan obediently unfastened his mask on one side and pressed 
an ear against the transparent wall. The other's voice was low and indistinct, 
even though the color of the Colonel's face showed that he was shouting.
"Listen, MacEwan, and don't try to answer yet," the Colonel shouted.
"We'll have you out of there in fifteen, twenty minutes at most, and you'll have 
fresh air in ten. Medical help for all of the casualty species is on the way. 
Everybody on the planet knows about the accident because the TV channels were 
covering your deportation as a news item, and now this is big news indeed. 
Their contact mikes and translators are bringing us every word said in there, 
and the authorities are insisting that every effort be made to speed up the 
rescue___"
Across the lounge Grawlya-Ki was waving a mask and air tank above his head. When 
the Orligian was sure that MacEwan had seen it; he threw it away. None of the 
other casualties were wearing masks so obviously they were useless, their air 
tanks empty. He wondered how long his own tank would last.
The equipment had been designed for the diminuitive Nidians, whose lungs were 
less than half the capacity of an Earth-Arson's. A lot of air had been wasted 
during the continual Passing of masks between the casualties, and the furry face 
of the Orligian would have allowed air to leak past the edges of its mask, 
especially if Grawlya-Ki had increased the pressure to exclude the chlorine.
The Colonel had seen the Orligian's action and must have leapt to  the same 
conclusion.
' 'Tell them to hang on for just a few more minutes," he went on. "We can't cut 
a way in from the main concourse because there are too many unprotected people 
out there. That plastic wall is  tough and needs special, high-temperature 
equipment to cut it,. Anyway, -accidents,with the plastic tproduce large 
quantities of highly toxic fumes, bad enough to make your chlorine problem seem 
like a bad smell.
"So they're going in through the hole made by the transporter. There is only a 
few inches clearance around the vehicle's hull now, but they're going to pull 
the transporter out backward and you will be brought out through the hole it 
made and into the fresh air, where the medics will be standing by"
MacEwan began banging with his fist and a foot against the plastic to attract 
the Colonel's attention, and breathing as deeply as he could through the mask. 
He had some shouting to do himself.
'No.'" MacEwan said loudly, putting his mouth as close to the wall as the mask 
would allow: "All but one of the injured Illensans are inside the transporter. 
The structure was damaged in the collision and is leaking chlorine from every 
seam. If you drag it out like that it is likely to fall apart and the air will 
get to the casualties. I've seen what exposure to oxygen did to one of them."
"But if we don't go in there fast the oxygen breathers will die," the Colonel 
replied. His face was no longer red now, but a sickly white.
MacEwan could almost see the way the officer's mind was working. If the 
transporter with the chlorine-breathing casualties on board was hauled out and 
it broke up, the Illensan authorities would not be amused. But neither would the 
governments of Traltha, Kelgia, Melf, Orligia, and Earth if they did not act 
quickly to save those people.
This was how an interstellar war could start.
With the media covering every incident as it occurred, with their contact mikes 
picking up every translated word as it was spoken, and with fellow beings of the 
casualties' species on Nidia watching, judging, feeling, and reacting, there was 
no possibility of this incident being hushed up or diplomatically smoothed over. 
The decision to be taken was a simple one: Certain death for seven or eight 
chlorine-breathing Illensans to possibly save triple that number of Tralthans, 
Hudlars, Kel-gians, Melfans, many of whom were dying anyway. Or death by 
chlorine poisoning for the oxygen breathers.
MacEwan could not make the decision and neither, he saw, could the pale, 
sweating, and silent Colonel trapped inside his
office. He banged for attention again and shouted, "Open the boarding tunnel! 
Blast it open from the other side if you have to. Rig fans or  pump in fresh air 
from the ship to raise the tunnel pressure and keep back this chlorine. Then 
send the emergency team to this end of the tunnel and open it from the inside. 
Surely the wiring of the safety system can be short-circuited and"
While he was talking, MacEwan was thinking about the distance between the tunnel 
entrance and the take-off apron. It would take a long time to traverse the 
tunnel if the fast walkway was not operating. And explosives might not be 
quickly available in an air and space terminal. Maybe the Monitor Corps vessel 
in dock could provide some, given time, but the time they had was to be measured 
in minutes.
"The safety system is triggered from your end," the Colonel broke in. "The other 
end of the tunnel is too close to the ship for explosives to be used. The vessel 
would have to take off first and that would waste more time. The system can only 
be overriden at your end by a special key, carried by the Nidian on lounge duty, 
which unlocks the cover of the tunnel controls. The cover is transparent and 
unbreakable. You see, contamination can be a killer in a big complex like this 
one, especially when you consider that chlorine is mild compared with the stuff 
some of the offworlders breathe"
MacEwan thumped the wall again and said, "The Nidian with the key is buried 
under the transporter, which can't be moved. And who says the cover is 
unbreakable? There is bar metal, furniture supports, among the wreckage. If I 
can't unlock the cover then I'll try levering or bashing it off. Find out what 
I'm supposed to do when it is off."
But the Colonel was ahead of him. He had already asked the Nidians that same 
question. In order, to make accidental operation impossible for non-Nidian 
digits, the tunnel controls *ere in the form of six recessed buttons, which had 
to be Depressed in a certain sequence. MacEwan would have to use -.stylus or 
something similar to operate them because his Earthly fingers were too thick. He 
listened carefully, signaled that he understood, then returned to the 
casualties.
Grawlya-Ki had heard MacEwan's half of the shouted con-versation and had found 
two lengths of metal. It was using one
of them to attack the console when he arrived. The metal was a strong-enough 
alloy, but lacked the necessary weight and inertia. The metal bounced or skidded 
off the cover every time they swung at it, without leaving a mark.
Damn the Nidians and their superhard plastics! MacEwan raged. He tried to lever 
off the cover, but the join was almost invisible and the fastenings were flush 
with the console pedestal. He swore and tried again.
The Orligian did not speak because it was coughing all the time now, and the 
chlorine was affecting its eyes so badly that more often than not its blows 
missed the console altogether. MacEwan was beginning to feel an impairment in 
his own air supply, as if the tank were nearly empty and he was sucking at air 
which was not there, instead drawing in the contaminated air of the lounge 
through the edges of his mask.
Around them the casualties were still moving, but jerkily, as if they were 
struggling in the final stages of asphyxiation. The movements were not helping 
their injuries. Only the two Hudlars were motionless; their six tentacular limbs 
supported them just a few inches above the floor. MacEwan raised the metal bar 
high, stood on his toes, and brought it down-as hard as he could.
He grunted in pain as the shock jarred his arms from wrist to shoulders and the 
bar slipped out of his hands. He swore again and looked around helplessly.
The Colonel was watching him through his glass-walled office. Through the inner 
wall of the lounge MacEwan could see the cameras of the Nidian TV networks 
watching him, listening and recording every word and cough and groan of those 
inside. Beyond the outer wall, now that the dust had settled and most of the 
intervening draperies had been pulled down, he could see the crews of the heavy 
Nidian towing vehicles watching him. He had only to signal to the Colonel and 
the emergency team would drag out the damaged transporter and medics would be 
attending the casualties within a few minutes.
But how would the fllensans as a species react to that? They were highly 
advanced technologically, occupying scores of colony worlds which they had had 
to adapt to their environmental needs, and, despite being the most widely 
traveled race in the
Federation, they were a virtually unknown quantity because their worlds were so 
dangerous and unpleasant that few , indeed, were the visitors they received. 
Would they hold Nidia responsible for the accident and the deaths of their 
people? Or the worlds of the other warm-blooded, oxygen breathers whose people 
had survived at the expense of the Illensans?
And if everybody dithered and remained undecided until all but the Illensans had 
died, how would the world governments of Kelgia, Traltha, Melf, Orligia, and 
Earth react?
They would probably not gang up on Illensa, nor would the war start over this 
incident  not officially. But the seeds would have been planted no matter which 
races were saved or sacrificed, or even if all of them died. It would start, 
not because anyone wanted it, but because of a highly improbable accident with a 
number of contributing factors most of which could have been avoided.
Even the sudden collapse of the Nidian driver at the controls of the transporter 
could have been avoided by keeping closer medical checks .on the ground staff. 
It had been sheer bad luck that the incident had happened when it did, and then 
the too rigidly designed safety system had done the rest. But most of the deaths 
would occur, MacEwan thought angrily, because of ignorance and fear  everyone 
was too frightened and over-polite to have asked the offworlders for a few basic 
lessons in first aid.
Beside him Grawlya-Ki was on its knees, coughing but still gripping its metal 
bar. At any moment the Colonel would make his decision because MacEwan, the 
Earth-being on the spot, was too much of a moral coward to make it. But whether 
the Colonel decided to save the Illensans or the others he would _-* wrong. 
MacEwan moved closer to one of the motionless Hudlars and waved a hand in front 
of one of its large, widely spaced eyes.
For several interminable seconds there was no response. He was beginning to 
wonder if the being was already dead when
said, "What is it, Earthperson?"
MacEwan took a deep breath through his nose and found at his air had run out. 
For a moment he panicked and almost through his mouth, but stopped himself in 
time. Using the air  remaining in his nearly empty lungs, he pointed to the 
console cover and said, "Are you able to break open the cover? Just the cover. I 
can... operate... controls..."
Desperately he fought the urge to suck the chlorine-laden air into his deflated 
lungs as the Hudlar slowly extended a tentacle and curled it around the cover. 
It slipped off the smooth, hemispheric surface. The Hudlar tried again without 
success, then it withdrew the tentacle slightly and jabbed at it with its sharp, 
steel-hard digits. A small scratch appeared on the cover but the material showed 
no sign of cracking. The tentacle withdrew, farther this time.
There was a roaring in MacEwan's head which was the loudest sound he had ever 
heard, and big, throbbing patches of darkness obscured the Hudlar as it made 
another attempt to break through the cover. MacEwan shrugged off his tunic, 
bunched it tightly in his fist and pressed it against his mouth as a makeshift 
filter. With his other hand he pressed the Nidian mask against his face to 
protect his eyes, at least, from the chlorine. He inhaled carefully and tried 
not to cough as the Hudlar swung its tentacle back for another try.
This time it struck like a battering ram and the cover, console, and even the 
floor supports exploded into their component parts.
"I am sorry for my clumsiness," the Hudlar said slowly. "Food deprivation 
impairs my judgment"
It broke off as a loud, double chime sounded and the boarding tunnel doors slid 
open, bathing them suddenly in a wash of cool, pure air. A recorded voice was 
saying, "Will passengers please mount the moving way of the boarding tunnel and 
have their travel documents ready for inspection."
The two Hudlars found enough strength between them to lift the heavier 
casualties onto the moving way before they got on themselves, after which they 
began spraying each other with nutrient and making untranslatable noises. By 
then members of the Nidian emergency services, followed by a couple of Illensan 
and other offworlder medics, were hurrying in the opposite direction along the 
static borders of the moving way.
The incident had placed a six-hour hold on the Tralthan ship's departure, time 
for the less severe casualties to be treated and taken on board while the others 
were moved to the various
offworlder accommodations in the city where they could be under the close 
supervision of medics of their own species. The transporter, empty of its 
Illensan casualties, had been withdrawn and a cold wind from the field blew 
through the gap in the transparent wall.
Grawlya-Ki, MacEwan, and the Colonel were standing beside the entrance to the 
boarding tunnel. The multichronometer above them indicated that take-off was 
less than half an Earth hour away.
The Colonel touched a piece of the demolished console with his boot and did not 
look at them when he spoke. "You were lucky. We were all lucky. I hate to think 
of the repercussions if you had failed to get all the casualties away. But you, 
both of you and the Hudlars, were instrumental in saving all but five of them, 
and they would have died in any case."
He gave an embarrassed laugh and looked up. "The offworld medics say some of 
your ideas on first aid are horrendous in their simplicity, but you didn't kill 
anybody and actually saved lives. You did it in full view of the media, with all 
of Nidia and its offworld visitors looking on, and you made your point about 
closer and more honest contact between species in a way that we are not going to 
forget. You are heroes again and I thinkno, damn it, I'm surethat you have 
only to ask and the Nidians will rescind their deportation order."
"We're going home," MacEwan said firmly. "To Orligia and Earth."
The Colonel looked even more embarrassed. He said, "I can understand your 
feelings about this sudden change in attitude. But now the authorities are 
grateful. Everybody, Nidians and offworlders alike, wants to interview you, and 
you can be sure that your ideas will be listened to. But if you require some 
form of public apology, I could arrange something."
MacEwan shook his head. "We are leaving because we have |he answer to the 
problem. We have found the area of common interest to which ail offworlders will 
subscribe, a project in which they will gladly cooperate. The answer was obvious 
all along but until today we were too stupid to see it.
"Implementing the solution," he went on, smiling, "is not a job for two tired 
old veterans who are beginning to bore People. It will take an organization like 
your Monitor Corps
to coordinate the project, the technical resources of half a dozen planets, more 
money than I can conceive of, and a very, very
long time-----"
As he continued, MacEwan was aware of excited movement among the members of the 
video team who had stayed behind hoping for an interview with Grawlya-Ki and 
himself. They would not get an interview but they were recording his final words 
to the Colonel. And when the Orligian and the Earth-person turned to leave they 
also got a not very interesting picture of the ranking Monitor Corps officer on 
Nidia standing very still, with one arm bent double so that the hand was held 
stiffly against the head. There was an odd brightness in the Earth-person's eyes 
and an expression on the pink, furless face which they were, naturally, unable 
to read.
It took a very long time, much longer than the most generous estimates. The 
original and relatively modest plans had to be continually extended because 
scarcely a decade passed without several newly discovered intelligent species 
joining the Federation and these, too, had to be accommodated. So gigantic and 
complex was the structure required that in the end hundreds of worlds had each 
fabricated sections of it and transported them like pieces of a vast, 
three-dimensional jigsaw puzzle to the assembly area.
. The tremendous structure which had finally taken shape in Galactic Sector 
Twelve was a hospital, a hospital to end all hospitals. In its 384 levels were 
reproduced the environments of all the different life-forms who comprised the 
Galactic Federationa biological spectrum ranging from the frigid, methane 
life-forms through the more normal oxygen and chlorine-breathing types, up to 
the exotic beings who existed by the direct conversion of hard radiation.
Sector Twelve General Hospital represented a twofold miracle of engineering and 
psychology. Its supply, maintenance, and administration were handled by the 
Monitor Corps, but the traditional friction between the military and civilian 
members of the staff did not occur. Neither were there any serious 
disagreements among its ten thousand-odd medical personnel, who were composed 
of over sixty differing life-forms with the same number of mannerisms, body 
odors, and life views.
Perhaps their only common denominator, regardless of size, shape, and number of 
legs, was their need to cure the sick.
And in the vast dining hall used by the hospital's warmblooded, 
oxygen-breathing life-forms there was a small dedication plaque just inside the 
main entrance. The Kelgian, Ian, Melfan, Nidian, Etlan, Orligian, Dwerlan, 
Tralthan, and Earth-human medical and maintenance staff rarely had time to look 
at the names inscribed on it, because they were all too busy talking shop, 
exchanging other-species gossip, and eating at tables with utensils all too 
often designed for the needs of an entirely different life-formit was a very 
busy place, after all, and one grabbed a seat where one could. But then that was 
the way Grawlya-Ki and MacEwan had wanted it.
 
SURVIVOR
FOR more than an hour Senior Physician Conway had been dividing his attention 
between the interstellar emptiness outside the direct vision port and the 
long-range sensor display, which showed surrounding space to be anything but 
empty, and feeling more depressed with every minute that Passed. Around him the 
officers on Rhabwar's Control Deck were radiating impatiencebut inaudibly, 
because they all knew that when their ship was at the scene of a disaster it was 
the senior medical officer on board who had the rank.
"Only one survivor," he said dully.
From the Captain's position, Fletcher said, "We've been fortunate on previous 
missions, Doctor. More often than not this is all an ambulance ship finds. Just 
think of what must have happened here."
Conway did not reply because he had been thinking of little ekse for the past 
hour.
An interstellar vessel of unknown origin and fully three times the mass of their 
ambulance ship had suffered a catastrophic malfunction which had reduced it to 
finely divided and  widely scattered wreckage. Analysis of the temperature and 
relative motions showed the debris to be much too cool to have been at the 
center of a nuclear explosion less than seven hours earlier, when the distress 
beacon had been automatically released. It was obvious, therefore, that the ship 
had lost one of its hypergenerators and it had not been of a sufficiently 
advanced design for the occupants, with one exception, to have any chance of 
surviving the accident.
On Federation ships, Conway knew, if one of the matched set of hyperdrive 
generators failed suddenly, the others were designed to cut out simultaneously. 
The vessel concerned emerged safely into normal space somewhere between the 
stars, to sit there helplessly, unable to make it home on impulse drive, until 
it either repaired its sick generator or help arrived. But there were times when 
the safety cutoffs had failed or been late in functioning, which meant that 
while a part of the ship had continued for a split second at hyperspeed the 
remainder was braked instantaneously to sublight velocity. The effect on the 
early hyperships had been, to say the least, catastrophic.
"The survivor's species must be relatively new to hyper-travel," Conway said, 
"or they would be using the modular design philosophy which we, from long 
experience, know to be the only structural form which enables a proportion of a 
ship's crew to survive when a sudden hypergenerator imbalance tears the vessel 
apart around them. I can't understand why the section containing the survivor 
wasn't fragmented like the rest."
The Captain was visibly controlling his impatience as he replied, "You were too 
busy getting the survivor out before the compartment lost any more air and 
decompression was added to its other problems, Doctor, to have time for 
structural observations. The compartment was a separate unit, purpose unknown, 
which was mounted outboard of the main hull and joined by a short access tube 
and airlock, and it simply broke away in one piece. That beastie was very 
lucky." He gestured toward the long-range sensor displays. "But now we know that 
the remaining pieces of wreckage are too small to contain survivors and frankly, 
Doctor, we are wasting time here."
"I agree," Conway said absently.
"Right," Fletcher said briskly. "Power Room, prepare to Jump in five"
"Hold, Captain," Conway broke in quietly. "1 hadn't fin- ^
ished. I want a scoutship out here, more than one if they can be spared, to 
search the wreckage for personal effects, photographs, solid and pictorial an, 
anything which will assist in reconstructing the survivor's environment and 
culture. And request Federation Archives for any information on an intelligent 
life-form of physiological classification EGCL. Since this is a new species to 
us, the cultural contact people will want this information as soon as possible, 
and if our survivor continues to survive, the hospital will need it the day 
before yesterday.
"Tag the signals with Sector General medical first-contact priority coding," he 
went on, "then head for home. I'll be on the Casualty Deck."
Rhabwar's communications officer, Haslam, was already preparing for the 
transmission when Conway stepped into the gravity-free central well and began 
pulling himself toward the Casualty Deck amidships. He broke his journey briefly 
to visit his cabin and get out of the heavy-duty spacesuit he had been wearing 
since the rescue. He felt as though every bone and muscle in his body was 
aching. The rescue and transfer of the survivor to Rhabwar had required intense 
muscular activity, followed by a three-hour emergency op, and another hour 
sitting still in Control. No wonder he felt stiff.
Try to think about something else, Conway told himself firmly. He exercised 
briefly to ease his cramped muscles but the dull, unlocalized aching persisted. 
Angrily he wondered if he was becoming a hypochondriac.
"Subspace radio transmission in five seconds," the muted voice of Lieutenant 
Haslam said from the cabin speaker. "Ex-Pect the usual fluctuations in the 
lighting and artificial gravity systems."
As the cabin lights flickered and the deck seemed to twitch under his feet, 
Conway was forced to think of something else specifically, the problems 
encountered in transmitting intelli-Sence over interstellar distances compared 
with the relative simplicity of sending a distress signal.
Just as there was only one known method of traveling faster wan light, there was 
only one way of calling for help when an accident left a ship stranded between 
the stars. Tight-beam subspace radio could rarely be used in emergency 
conditions
since it was subject to interference from intervening stellar material and 
required inordinate amounts of a vessel's power power which a distressed ship 
was unlikely to have available. But a distress beacon did not have to carry 
intelligence.' It was simply a nuclear-powered device which broadcast its 
location, a subspace scream for help which ran up and down the usuable 
frequencies until it died, in a matter of a few hours. And on I this occasion it 
had died amid a cloud of wreckage containing one survivor who was very lucky 
indeed to be alive.
But considering the extent of the being's injuries, Conway thought, it could not 
really be described as lucky. Mentally shaking himself loose of these 
uncharacteristically morbid feelings, he went down to the Casualty Deck to 
check on the patient's condition.
Typed as physiological classification EGCL, the survivor was a warm-blooded, 
oxygen-breathing life-form of approximately twice the body weight of an adult 
Earth-human. Visually it resembled an outsize snail with a high, conical shell 
which was pierced around the tip where its four extensible eyes were  I located. 
Equally spaced around the base of the shell were eight triangular slots from 
which projected the manipulatory appendages. The carapace rested on a thick, 
circular pad of muscle  I which was the locomotor system. Around the 
circumference  of the pad were a number of fleshy projections, hollows and slits 
associated with its systems of ingestion, respiration, elimination, 
reproduction, and nonvisual sensors. Its gravity and atmospheric pressure 
requirements had been estimated but, because of its severely weakened condition, 
the artificial gravity  I setting had been reduced to assist the heart and the 
pressure increased so that decompression effects would not aggravate the 
bleeding.
As Conway stood looking down at the terribly injured EGCL, Pathologist Murchison 
and Charge Nurse Naydrad joined him at the pressure litter. It was the same 
litter which had been  I used to move the casualty from the wreck, and, because 
the patient should not be subjected to unnecessary movement,- it would be used 
again to transfer the EGCL into the hospital. The only difference was that for 
the second trip the casualty had been tidied up.
In spite of his considerable experience with spacewreck casualties of all 
shapes, sizes, and physiological classifications, Conway winced at the memory of 
what they had found. The compartment containing the EGCL had been spinning 
rapidly when they discovered it, and the being had been rolling about inside and 
demolishing furniture and equipment with its massive body for many hours before 
it had lodged itself in a corner under some self-created debris.
In the process its carapace had sustained three fractures, one of which was so 
deeply depressed that the brain had been involved. One of the eyes was missing, 
and two of the thin, tentacular manipulators had been traumatically severed by 
sharp-edged obstructionsthese limbs had been retrieved and preserved for 
possible rejoiningand there were numerous punctured and incised wounds to the 
base pad.
Apart from carrying out the emergency surgery to relieve some of the cranial 
pressure, controlling the major areas of bleeding with clamps and temporary 
sutures, and assisting the patient's breathing by applying positive pressure 
ventilation to the remaining undamaged lung, there had been very little that 
they could do. Certainly there was no way of treating the brain damage aboard 
Rhabwar, and their efforts at charting the extent of that damage had resulted in 
conflicting indications from the biosensors and Doctor Prilicla's empathic 
faculty. The sensor indications were that cerebral activity had virtually 
ceased, while the little empath insisted, insofar as the timid, shy, 
self-effacing Prilicla could insist, otherwise.
"No physical movement and no change in the clinical picture since you left," 
Murchison said quietly, anticipating his question. She added, "I'm not at all 
happy about this."
"And I am far from happy, Doctor," the Charge Nurse joined in its fur twitching 
and rippling as if it was standing in a strong wind. "In my opinion the being is 
dead and we are simply insuring that Thornnastor receives a fresher than usual 
specimen to take apart.
"Doctor Prilicla," the Kelgian went on, "is often guilty of saying things which 
are not completely accurate just so long as they make the people around it 
happy, and the predominant radiation it detected from the patient was of pain.
The feeling was so intense, you will remember, that Prilicla asked to be excused 
as soon as the operation was completed. In my opinion. Doctor, this patient is 
no longer capable of cerebration but it is, judging by Prilicla's response, 
suffering intense pain. Surely your course is clear?"
"Naydrad!" Conway began angrily, then stopped. Murchi-son and the Charge Nurse 
had expressed exactly the same sentiments. The difference was that the Kelgian, 
in common with the rest of its species, was incapable of using tact.
Conway stared for a moment at the two-meters-long, caterpillar like life-form 
whose coat of silvery fur was in constant, rippling motion. This motion was 
completely involuntary among Kelgians, triggered by their reactions to external 
and internal stimuli, and the emotionally expressive fur complemented the vocal 
apparatus which lacked flexibility of tone. But the patterns of movement in the 
fur made it plain to any Kelgian what another felt about the subject under 
discussion, so that they always said exactly what they meant. The concepts of 
diplomacy, tact, and lying were therefore completely alien to them. Conway 
sighed.
He tried to conceal his own doubts about the case by saying firmly, "Thomnastor 
much prefers putting together a live spec-iment than taking apart a dead one. 
As. well, on a number of occasions Prilicla's empathy has proved more 
trustworthy than medical instrumentation, so we cannot be absolutely sure that 
this case is hopeless. In any event, until we reach the hospital its treatment 
is my responsibility.
"Let's not become too emotionally involved with this patient," he added. "It is 
unprofessional and not like either of you."
Naydrad, its fur twitching angrily, made a sound which did not register on 
Conway's translator, and Murchison said, "You're right, of course. We've seen 
much worse cases and I don't know why I feel so badly about this one. Maybe I'm 
just growing old."
"The onset of senility could be one explanation for such uncharacteristic 
behavior," the Kelgian said, "although this is not so in my case."
Murchison's face reddened. "The Charge Nurse is allowed
to say things like that but you, Doctor, had better not agree with it," she said 
crossly.
Conway laughed suddenly. "Relax. I wouldn't dream of agreeing with such a 
blatantly obvious misstatement," he said. "And now, if you have everything you 
think Thorny will need on our friend here, both of you get some rest. Emergence 
is in six hours. If you can't sleep, please try not to worry too much about the 
casualty or it will bother Prilicla."
Murchison nodded and followed Naydrad from the Casualty Deck. Conway, still 
feeling more like a not very well patient than a medic in charge, set the 
audible warning which would signal any change in the EGCL's condition, lay down 
on a nearby litter, and closed his eyes.
Neither the Earth-human DBDG or the Kelgian DBLF classifications were noted for 
their ability to exercise full control over their mentation, and it was soon 
obvious that Murchison and Naydrad had been worrying and, in the process, 
producing some unpleasant emotional radiation. With his eyes still closed he 
listened to the faint tapping and plopping sounds which moved along the ceiling 
toward him and came to a halt overhead. There was a burst of low, musical 
clicks and trills which came through his translator as "Excuse me, friend 
Conway, were you sleeping?"
"You know I wasn't," Conway said, opening his eyes to see Prilicla clinging to 
the ceiling above him, trembling uncontrollably as it was washed by his own and 
the patient's emotional radiation.
Doctor Prilicla was of physiological classification GLNO an insectile, 
exoskeletal, six-legged life-form with two pairs of iridescent and not quite 
atrophied wings and possessing a highly developed empathic faculty. Only on 
Cinruss, with its dense atmosphere and one-eighth gravity, could a race of 
insects have grown to such dimensions and in time developed intelligence and an 
advanced civilization.
But in both the hospital and Rhabwar, Prilicla was in deadly danger for most of 
its working day. It had to wear gravity nullifiers everywhere outside its own 
special quarters because the gravity pull which the majority of its colleagues 
considered normal would instantly have crushed it flat. When Prilicla held
a conversation with anyone it kept well out of reach of any thoughtless movement 
of an arm or tentacle which would easily have caved in its eggshell body or 
snapped off one of the incredibly fragile limbs.
Not that anyone would have wanted to hurt the little being it was far too well 
liked. The Cinrusskin's empathic faculty forced it to be considerate to everyone 
in order to make the emotional radiation of the people around it as pleasant for 
itself as possibleexcept when its professional duties exposed it to pain and 
associated violent emotion in a patient or to the unintentionally unpleasant 
feelings of its colleagues.
"You should be sleeping, Prilicla," Conway said with concern, "or are Murchison 
and Naydrad emoting too loudly for you?"
"No, friend Conway," the empath replied timidly. "Their emotional radiation 
troubles me no more than that of the other people on the ship. I came for a 
consultation."
"Good!" Conway said. "You've had some useful thoughts on the treatment of our"
"I wish to consult you about myself," Prilicla said, committing theto itgross 
impoliteness of breaking in on another's conversation without prior apology. 
For a moment its pipestem legs and body shook with the strength of Conway's 
reaction, then it added, "Please, my friend, control your feelings."
Conway tried to be clinical about the little Cinrusskin who had been his friend, 
colleague, and invaluable assistant on virtually every major case since his 
promotion to Senior Physician. His sudden concern and unadmitted fear of the 
possible loss of a close friend were not helping that friend and were, in fact, 
causing it even greater distress. He tried hard to think of Prilicla as a 
patient, only as a patient, and slowly the empath's trembling abated.
"What," Conway said in time-honored fashion, "seems to be the trouble?"
"I do not know," the Cinrusskin said. "I have no previous experience and there 
are no recorded instances of the condition among my species. I am confused, 
friend Conway, and frightened."
"Symptoms?" Conway asked.
"Empathic hypersensitivity," Prilicla replied. "The emotional radiation of 
yourself, the rest of the medical team, and the crew is particularly strong. I 
can clearly detect the feelings of Lieutenant Chen in the Power Room and those 
of the rest of the crew in Control with little or no attenuation with distance. 
The expected, low-key feelings of disappointment and sorrow caused by the 
unsuccessful rescue bid are reaching me with shocking intensity. We have 
encountered these tragedies before now, friend Conway, but this emotional 
reaction to the condition of a being who is a complete stranger isis"
"We do feel bad about this one," Conway broke in gently, "perhaps worse than we 
normally do, and the feelings are cumulative. And you, as an emotion-sensitive, 
could be expected to feel them much more strongly. This might explain your 
apparent hypersensitivity."
The empath trembled with the effort needed to express disagreement. It said, 
"No, friend Conway. The condition and emotional radiation of the EGCL, highly 
unpleasant though it is, is not the problem. It is the ordinary, everyday 
radiation of everyone elsethe minor embarrassments, the bursts of irritation, 
the odd emotions associated with the feeling you Earth-humans call humor and the 
like, are registering so strongly with me that I find difficulty in thinking 
clearly."
"1 see," Conway said automatically, although he could not see at all. "Apart 
from the hypersensitivity, are there any other symptoms?"
"Some unlocalized discomfort in the limbs and lower thorax," Prilicla replied. 
"I checked the areas with my scanner but could find no obstructions or 
abnormalities."
Conway had been reaching for his own pocket scanner but thought better of it. 
Without taking a Cinrusskin physiology tape he would have only a vage idea of 
what to look for, and Prides, Prilicla was a first-class diagnostician and 
surgeon and if it said that there were no abnormalities then that was good 
enough for Conway.
'Cinrusskins are susceptible to illness only during childhood," Prilicla went 
on. "The adults do occasionally suffer from nonphysical disturbances, and the 
onset of symptoms, as
expected with psychological disorders, takes many forms, some of which resemble 
my present"
"Nonsense, you're not going insane!" Conway broke in. But he did not feel as 
sure as he sounded, and he was uncomfortably aware that Prilicla knew his 
feelings and was beginning to tremble again.
"The obvious course," Conway said, trying to regain his clinical calm, "is to 
desensitize you with a hefty sedative shot. You know that as well as I. But you 
are too good a doctor to self-administer the indicated medication which would, 
we both realize, simply be treating the symptoms, without first doing something 
about the disease, like reporting it to me. Isn't that so?"
'That is so, friend Conway."
"Right, then," Conway said briskly. "You also realize that we can't do anything 
about curing the condition until we have you back in the hospital. In the 
meantime we'll treat the symptoms with heavy sedation. I want you completely 
unconscious. You are relieved of all medical duties, naturally, until we have 
the answer to your little problem."
Conway could almost feel the little empath's objections while he was lifting it 
gently into a pressure litter fitted with gravity nullifiers and the incredibly 
soft restraints required by this uftrafragile species. Finally Prilicla spoke.
"Friend Conway," it said weakly, "you know that I am the only medically trained 
empath on the staff. Our patient wiil require extensive and delicate cerebral 
surgery. If my condition precludes me from taking a direct part in the 
operation, I wish to be treated in an adjacent ward where this abnormal 
hyper-sensitivity will better enable me to monitor the EGCL's unconscious 
emotional radiation.
"You know as well as I do," it went on, "that brain surgery in a hitherto 
unknown life-form is largely exploratory and very, very risky, and my empathic 
faculty enables me to sense when surgical intervention in any area is right or 
wrong. By becoming a patient I have lost none of my abilities as a diagnostic 
empath, and for this reason, friend Conway, I want your promise that I will be 
placed as close as possible to the patient and restored to full consciousness 
while the operation is in progress."
"Well" Conway began.
"I am not a telepath, as you know," Prilicla said, so weakly that Conway had to 
increase the gain on his translator to hear
it. "But your feelings, if you do not intend to keep this promise, will be clear 
to me."
Conway had never known the normally timid Prilicla to be so forthright in its 
manner. Then he thought of what the empath was asking him to doto subject it, 
in its hypersensitive state, to the emotional trauma of a lengthy operation 
during which, because of the patient's strange physiological classification and 
metabolism, the effectiveness of the anesthetics could not be guaranteed. His 
hard-held clinical detachment slipped for a moment and he felt like any 
concerned friend or relative watching a patient whose prognosis was uncertain.
Prilicla began to shake in its harness, but the sedative was taking effect, and 
very soon it was unconscious and untroubled by Conway's feelings for it.
"This is Reception," a flat, translated voice said from the Control Deck's main 
speaker. "Identify yourself, please. State whether visitor, patient, or staff 
and give physiological classification. If unable to do so because of physical 
injury, mental confusion, or ignorance of the classification system, please make 
vision contact."
Conway cleared his throat and said briskly, "Ambulance ship Rhabwar, Senior 
Physician Conway. Staff and two patients, all warm-blooded oxygen breathers. 
Staff classifications are Earth-human DBDG, Cinrusskin GLNO, and Kelgian DBLF. 
One patient is an EGCL, origin unknown, space wreck casualty in condition nine. 
The second patient is also staff, a GLNO in condition three. We need"
"Prilicla?"
"Yes, Prilicla," Conway said. "We need matching environment OR and postop 
intensive care facilities for the EGCL, treatment to begin on arrival, and 
adjacent accommodation for the GLNO whose empathic faculty may be required 
during the operation. Can do?"
There was silence for a few minutes, then Reception said, 'Use Entry Lock Nine 
into Level One Six Three, Rhabwar.
Your traffic coding is Priority Red One. ETA?"
Fletcher looked across at his astrogator, and Lieutenant Dodds said, "Two hours, 
seven minutes, sir."
"Wait," Reception said.
There was another silence, much longer this time, before the voice returned. 
"Diagnostician Thornnastor wishes to discuss the patient's condition and 
metabolic profile with Pathologist Murchison and yourself as soon as possible. 
Senior Physician Edanelt has been assigned to assist Thomnastor during the 
operation. Both require information on the type and extent of the EGCL's 
injuries and want you to transmit surface and deep-scan pictures at once. Until 
otherwise instructed you are assigned to the Cinrusskin patient. As soon as 
possible Chief Psychologist O'Mara wants to talk to you about Prilicla."
It promised to be a very busy two hours and seven minutes.
In Rhabwar's forward viewscreen the hospital grew from a fuzzy smear of light 
against the stellar background until it seemed to fill all of space like a 
gigantic, cylindrical Christmas tree. Its thousands of viewports blazed with 
light in the dazzling variety of color and intensity necessary for the visual 
equipment of its patients and staff.
Within a few minutes of Rhabwar docking at Lock Nine, the EGCL and Prilicla had 
been moved into Operating Room Three and Ward Seven respectively on Level 163. 
Con way was not familiar with this particular level because it had still been in 
the process of conversion from the old FROB, FGLI, and ELNT medics' quarters 
when he had been detached for ambulance ship duty. Now the Tralthans, Hudlars, 
and Melfans had more spacious accommodations and their old abode had become the 
emergency admission and treatment level for warmblooded oxygen breathers, with 
its own operating theaters, intensive care units, observation and recovery 
wards, and a diet kitchen which could reproduce the staples of every known 
warm-blooded, oxygen-breathing race.
While Naydrad and Conway were transferring the EGCL casualty from the litter's 
portable life-support and biosensor systems to those of the operating room, 
Thornnastor and Edanelt arrived.
Senior Physician Edanelt had been the natural if not the inevitable choice for 
this case. Not only was it one of the hospital's top surgeons, the permanent 
possessor of four physiology tapes and, according to the grapevine, a being 
shortly to be elevated to Diagnostician status, the crablike Melfan's 
physiological classification of ELNT was perhaps the closes'
of all the life-forms on the medical staff to that of the EGCL survivora 
vitally important factor when no physiology tape was available for the patient 
being treated. Where Thornnastor, the elephantine Diagnostician-in-Charge of 
Pathology, was concerned there were no physical similarities to the patient at 
all, other than that they breathed the same air.
In spite of being a Tralthan FGLI and as such one of the more massive 
intelligent species in the Federation, Thornnastor was no mean surgeon itself. 
But on this case its primary responsibility was the rapid investigation of the 
survivor's physiology and metabolism and, using its own vast experience in the 
field of e-t pathology together with the facilities available in its department, 
the synthesizing of the required medication which would 'iclude a safe 
anesthetic, coagulant, and tissue regenerative.
Edanelt and Conway had already discussed the case in detail on the way in, as 
had Murchison and her chief, Thomnastor. He knew that their initial efforts 
would be directed toward repairing the grosser structural damage, after which 
would come the extremely delicate, dangerous, and perhaps impossible operation 
to relieve the pressure on and repair the damage to the brain and adjacent 
organs caused by the extensive depressed fracturing of the carapace. At that 
stage the assistance of Prilicla and its wonderfully sensitive and precise 
empathic faculty would be required to monitor the operation if the EGCL was to 
continue to survive as something more than a vegetable.
Conway's presence was no longer needed, and he would be more usefully employed 
discussing Prilicla's condition with O'Mara.
As he excused himself and left, Edanelt waved a pincer it was spraying with the 
fast-setting plastic film favored by the Melfan medics instead of surgical 
gloves, but Thornastor's four eyes were on the patient, Murchison, and two 
separate pieces of its equipment so that it did not see him leave.
In the corridor Conway stopped for a moment to work out the fastest route to the 
Chief Psychologist's office. The three levels above this one, he knew, were the 
province of the chlor-
e-breathing Illensans, and if he had not known that then the
anticontamination warnings above the interlevel airlocks would
have told him. There was no danger of contamination from the
levels below since they housed the MSVK and LSVO life-forms, each of which 
breathed oxygen, required a gravity pull of one-quarter Earth normal, and 
resembled thin, tripedal storks. Below them were the water-filled wards of the 
Chalders and then the first of the nonmedical treatment levels where O'Mara's 
department was situated.
On the way down a couple of the Nallajim MSVK medics chirped a greeting at him 
and a recuperating patient narrowly missed flying into his chest before he 
reached the lock into the AUGL section. For that leg of the journey he had to 
don a lightweight suit and swim through the vast tanks where the thirty-meters 
long, water-breathing inhabitants of the water world of Chalderscol drifted 
ponderously like armorplated crocodiles in their warm, green wards. With his 
suit still beaded with Chalder water, he was in O'Mara's office just 
twenty-three minutes later.
Major O'Mara indicated a piece of furniture designed for the comfort of a DBLF 
and said sourly, "No doubt you have been too busy in your professional capacity 
to contact me, Doctor, so don't waste time apologizing. Tell me about 
Pril-icla."
Conway insinuated himself carefully into the Kelgian chair and began describing 
the Cinrusskin's condition, from the symptoms at onset to their intensification 
to the degree where complete sedation was indicated, and the relevant 
circumstance pertaining at the time. While he was speaking, the Chief 
Psychologist's craggy features were still and his eyes, which opened into a 
mind so keenly analytical that it gave O'Mara what amounted to a telepathic 
faculty, were likewise unreadable.
As Chief Psychologist of the Federation's largest multien-vironment hospital, he 
was responsible for the mental well-being of a staff of several thousand 
entities belonging to more than sixty different species. Even though his Monitor 
Corps rank of Major did not place him high in the hospital's Service chain of 
command, and anyway had been given for purely administrative reasons, there was 
no clear limit to O'Mara's authority. To him the medical staff were patients, 
too, regardless of seniority, and an important part of his job was to ensure 
that the right doctor was assigned to each of the weird and often wonderful 
variety of patients who turned up at the hos-
pital, and that there was no xenophobic complications on either side.
He was also responsible for the hospital's medical elite, the Diagnosticians. 
According to O'Mara himself, however, the real reason for the high level of 
mental stability among the diverse and often touchy medical staff was that they 
were all too frightened of him to risk his displeasure by going mad.
O'Mara watched him closely until Conway had finished, then he said, "A clear, 
concise, and apparently accurate report, Doctor, but you are a close friend of 
the patient. There is the possibility of clouded judgment, exaggeration. You are 
not a psychologist but an e-t physician and surgeon who has apparently already 
decided that the case is one which should be treated by my department. You 
appreciate my difficulty? Please describe for me your feelings during this 
mission from the rescue until now. But first, are you feeling all right?"
AH that Conway could feel just then was his blood pressure rising.
"Be as objective as possible," O'Mara added.
Conway took a deep breath and let it out agaJn slowly through his nose. "After 
our very fast response to the distress signal there was a general feeling of 
disappointment at the rescue of just one survivor, a survivor who was barely 
alive. But you're on the wrong track, Major. The feeling was shared by everyone 
on the ship, I believe, but it was not strong enough to explain the Cinrusskin's 
hypersensitivity. Prilicla was picking up emotional radiation of distressing 
intensity from crew members stationed at the other end of the ship, a distance 
at which emoting would normally be barely detectable. And I am given neither to 
maudlin sentimentality nor exaggeration of symptoms. Right at this moment 1 feel 
the way I usually do in this blasted office and that is"
"Objectively, remember," O'Mara said dryly.
"I was not trying to do your diagnostic work for you," Conway went on, bringing 
his voice back to a conversational level, "but the indications are that there is 
a psychological Problem. The result, perhaps, of an as yet unidentified disease, 
or organic malfunction or an imbalance in the endocrine system. But a purely 
psychological reason for the condition is also a Possibility which"
"Anything is possible. Doctor," O'Mara broke in impatiently. "Be specific. What 
are you going to do about your friend, and what exactly do you want me to do 
about it?"
"Two things," Conway said. "I want you to check on Pril-icla's condition 
yourself"
"Which you know I will do anyway," O'Mara said.
"and give me the GLNO physiology tape," he went on, "so that I can confirm or 
eliminate the nonpsychological reasons for the trouble."
For a moment O'Mara was silent. His face remained as expressionless as a lump of 
basalt, but the eyes showed concern. "You've carried Educator tapes before now 
and know what to expect. But the GLNO tape is... different. You will feel Jike a 
very unhappy Cinrusskin indeed. You are no Diagnostician, Conwayat least, not 
yet. Better think about it."
The physiology tapes, Conway knew from personal experience, fell somewhere 
between the categories of mixed blessing and necessary evil. While skill in e-t 
surgery came with aptitude, training, and experience, no single being could hope 
to hold in its brain the vast quantity of physiological data needed for the 
treatment of the variety of patients encountered in a hospital like Sector 
General. The incredible mass of clinical and anatomical information needed to 
take care of them had therefore to be furnished, usually on a temporary basis, 
by means of the Educator tapes, which were the brain recordings of the great 
medical specialists belonging to the species concerned. If an Earth-human 
doctor had to treat a Kelgian patient, he took one of the Kelgian physiology 
tapes until treatment was completed, after which he had it erased. But for the 
medic concerned, whether the tape was being carried for as long as it took to 
perform an other-species operation or for a teaching project lasting several 
months, the experience was not a pleasant one.
The only good thing about it from the medic's point of view was that he was much 
better off than one of the Diagnosticians.
They were the hospital's elite. A Diagnostician was one of those rare entities 
whose mind had proved itself stable enough to retain up to ten physiology tapes 
simultaneously. To their data-crammed minds was given the work of original 
research in xenological medicine and the diagnosis and treatment of
disease and injury in hitherto unknown life-forms. There was a saying current in 
the hospital, reputed to have originated with O'Mara himself, that anyone sane 
enough to be a Diagnostician was mad.
For it was not only physiological data which the tapes imparted; the complete 
memory and personality of the entity who had possessed that knowledge was 
impressed on the receiving mind as well. In effect, a Diagnostician subjected 
himself or itself voluntarily to a form of multiple schizophrenia, with the 
alien personalities sharing its mind so utterly different that in many cases 
they did not have even a system of logic in common. And all too frequently the 
foremost medical authorities of a planet, despite their eminence in the field of 
healing, were very bad-tempered, aggressive, and unpleasant people indeed.
Such would not be the case with the GLNO tape, Conway knew, because Cinrusskins 
were the most timid, friendly, and likable beings imaginable.
"I've thought about it," Conway said.
O'Mara nodded and spoke into his desk set. "Carrington? Senior Physician Conway 
is approved for the GLNO tape, with compulsory postimpression sedation of one 
hour. I'll be in Emergency Admissions on Level One Six Three" he grinned 
suddenly at Conway "trying not to tell the medics their business."
Conway woke to see a large, pink balloon of a face hanging yer him. 
Instinctively he tried to scramble up the wall beside "is couch in case the 
enormous, heavily muscled body sup-Porting the face fell and crushed the life 
out of him. Then suddenly there was a mental shift in perspective as the 
features registered concern and withdrew and the slim, Earth-human body in 
Monitor Corps green straightened up.
Lieutenant Carrington, one of O'Mara's assistants, said, Easy, Doctor. Sit up 
slowly, then stand. Concentrate on put-big your two feet onto the floor and 
don't worry because they aren't a Cinrusskin's six."
He made good time back to 163 in spite of having to walk a large number of 
beings who were much smaller than just because the Cinrusskin component of his 
mind that they were big and dangerous. From Murchison he  learned that O'Mara 
was in Prilicla's ward, having first called in to the OR to discuss the EGCL's 
basic physiology and probable environmental and evolutionary influence with 
Thorn-nastor and Edanelt, both of whom had been too busy to speak to him.
They would not speak to Con way, either, and he could see why. The operation on 
the EGCL had become an emergency with an unknown but probably extremely short 
time limit.
When the splinters of depressed carapace had been removed from the brain over an 
hour earlier, Murchison explained quietly between rumbled instructions from 
Thomnastor, there had been a sudden and surprising deterioration in the EGCL's 
condition. The change had been detected by Prilicla who, because of its 
condition, had been excluded from any part of the operation. But the Cinrusskin 
had continued to act like a doctor by making use of its abnormally heightened 
emotion-detection faculty. Prilicla had pulled rank to send Ward Seven's duty 
nurse to the operating theater with its empathic findings and a diffident 
suggestion that if they were to relay the operational proceedings to Seven's 
viewscreen, it would be able to assist them.
The cause of the deterioration was a number of large blood vessels in the 
cerebral area which had ruptured when the pressure from the depressed fracture 
had been removed. Trie two surgeons had been forced to accede to Prilicla's 
request" because, without the empath's monitoring of the patient's level of 
consciousness, they had no way of knowing whether the delicate, dangerous, and 
perforce hurried repair work in the cerebral area was having a good or bad 
effectif any.
"Prognosis?" Conway murmured. But before Murchison could reply, one of 
Thornnastor's eyes curled backward over its head to glare down at him.
"If this patient does not succumb to a massive cerebral hemorrhage within the 
next thirty minutes," the Diagnostician said crossly, "it is probable that it 
will perish, in time, from the degenerative diseases associated with extreme old 
age. No* stop distracting my assistant, Conway, and tend to your own patient."
On the way to Seven Conway wondered briefly how the empath's emotion sensitivity 
could detect the unconscious level
of emoting of the EGCL without the signals beings swamped by the emotional 
radiation of dozens of fully conscious entities in the area. Maybe Prilicla's 
recent hypersensitivity was responsible, but there was a niggling doubt at the 
back of his mind which suggested that there was another reason.
O'Mara was still in the ward, steadying himself in the close to zero-gravity 
conditions with a hand on an equipment rack while he and Prilicla watched the 
scene in the operating theater.
"Conway, stop that!" O'Mara said sharply.
He had tried not to react when he had seen the empath's condition. But half his 
mind belonged to a Cinrusskin, a member of a species acknowledged to be the 
most sensitive and sympathetic intelligent life-form known to the Federation who 
was regarding a brother in extreme distress while the Earth-human half was 
feeling for a friend in the same condition, and it was difficult to be cool and 
clinical for both of them.
"I'm sorry," he said inadequately.
"I know you are, friend Conway," Prilicla said, turning toward him. "You should 
not have taken that tape."
"He was warned," O'Mara said gruffly, but his expression showed concern.
Conway was a member of an empathic race. All the memories and experience of his 
GLNO life were those of a normally healthy and happy empath, but now he was no 
longer an empath. He could see, hear, and touch Prilicla, but the faculty was 
missing which enabled him to share the other's emotions and which subtly colored 
every word, gesture, and expression so that for two Cinrusskins to be within 
visual range was unalloyed pleasure for both. He could remember experiencing 
empathic contact, remember having the ability all his life, but now he was 
little more than a deaf-mute. What he was feeling from Prilicla so strongly was 
a product of his imagination: It was sympathy, not empathy.
His human brain did not possess the empathic faculty, and it was not bestowed by 
filling his mind with memories of having had it. But there were other memories 
as well, covering a lifetime's experience of Cinrusskin clinical physiology, and 
these he could, use.
"If you don't mind, Doctor Prilicla," Conway said with cool formality, "I would 
like to examine you."
 
"Of course, friend Conway." Prilicla's uncontrollable shaking had diminished to 
a steady, continuous trembling, an indication that Conway's emotional radiation 
was under control. "There are more symptoms, Doctor, which are causing severe 
discomfort."
"I can see that," Conway said as he gently moved aside one of the incredibly 
fragile wings to place his scanner against the empath's thorax. "Describe them, 
please."
In the two hours since Conway had last seen it, Prilicla had changed in ways 
which were individually subtle but cumulatively marked. There was a strange 
lack of animation and concentration in the large, triple-lidded eyes; the 
delicate structure which supported the wing membranes had softened and warped so 
that the translucent and iridescent membrane had fallen into unsightly folds and 
wrinkles; its four tiny, wonderfully precise manipulators, which should one day 
make it one of the finest surgeons in the hospital, were quivering in spite of 
being gripped tightly together, and the overall aspect was of a GLNO who was old 
and grievously ill.
While Conway continued the examination, the Cinrusskin part of his mind shared 
his bafflement at the findings and described symptoms. They were both sure, and 
in this their agreement was based on the GLNO tape donor's personal experience 
and Conway's knowledge acquired over many years in Sector General, that Prilicla 
was close to death.
The empath's trembling increased sharply, then diminished as Conway once again 
forced a feeling of clinical detachment on himself. He said calmly, "There is no 
evidence of deformation, obstruction, lesion, or infection which might cause 
the symptoms you describe. Neither can I see any cause for the respiratory 
difficulty you are experiencing. Some degree of empathic hypersensitivity occurs 
in adolescents of your specie5' my Cinrusskin alter ego tells me, but in nothing 
like the in* tensity you describe. It is possible, I suppose, that there is a 
nonpathogenic and nontoxic involvement with the central nervous system."
"You think it's psychosomatic?" O'Mara said harshly, i3"3" bing a finger toward 
Prilicla. "This?"                                  .
"I would like to eliminate that possibility," Conway repljf" calmly. To 
Prilicla, he said, "If you don't mind I would & to discuss your case with Major 
O'Mara outside."
"Of course, friend Conway," the empath said. The constant trembling seemed as if 
it would shake the fragile body apart. "But please have that Cinrusskin tape 
erased as quickly as possible. Your heightened levels of concern and sympathy 
are helping neither of us. And consider, friend Conway, your tape was donated by 
a great Cinrusskin medical authority of the past. In all modesty, I can say 
that, before coming to Sector General and in preparation for my work here, I had 
reached a similar degree of eminence in the field.
'There is nothing in the clinical history of our species which even approximates 
this condition," it went on, "and absolutely no precedent for the symptomology. 
Regarding the possibility of a nonphysical basis for the condition, I cannot, of 
course, be completely objective about this. But I have always been a happy and 
well-adjusted person with no mental aberrations in childhood, adolescence, or 
adulthood. Friend O'Mara has my psych file and will confirm this. My hope is 
that these peculiar symptoms were so sudden in onset that their recession will 
be equally rapid." '
"Perhaps Thomnastor could" Conway began.
"The thought of thatthat behemoth approaching me with investigative intent 
would cause me to terminate at once. And Thomnastor is busyFriend Edanelt, be 
careful!"
Prilicla had switched its attention suddenly to the view-screen. It went on, 
"Pressure, even temporary pressure in that area causes a marked decrease in the 
EGCL's unconscious emoting. I suggest you approach that nerve bundle anteriorly 
hrough the opening in the..."
Conway missed the rest of it because O'Mara had gripped his arm and pulled him 
carefully out of the low-gravity com-partment.
That was very good advice," the Chief Psychologist said ner they were some 
distance from Prilicla's ward. "Let's erase that tape, Doctor, and discuss our 
little friend's problem on the way to my office."
Conway shook his head firmly. "Not yet. Prilicla said all that could  be said 
about its case back there. The hard facts are Cinrusskin species is not one of 
the Federation's most robust. The have no stamina, no reserves to resist over a 
long effects of any injury or disease, whatever the cause, knowmyself, my alter 
ego and, I suspect, you your-
selfthat unless its condition is treated and relieved very quickly Prilicla 
will die within a few hours, perhaps ten hours at most."
The Major nodded.
"Unless you can come up with a bright idea," he went on grimly, "and I would 
certainly welcome it if you did, I intend to go on thinking with the Cinrusskin 
tape. It hasn't helped much up to now, but I want to think without constraint, 
without having to play mental games with myself to avoid emoting too strongly in 
the presence of my patient. There is something very odd about this case, 
something I'm missing.
"So I'm going for a walk," he ended suddenly. "I won't be far away. Just far 
enough, I hope, to be outside the range of Prilicla's empathy."
O'Mara nodded again and left without speaking.
Conway put on a lightweight suit and traveled upward for three levels into the 
section reserved for the spiney, membraneous, chlorine-breathing Illensan 
PVSJs. The inhabitants of Illensa were not a sociable species by Earth-human 
standards, and Conway was hoping to walk their foggy yellow wards and corridors 
without interruption while he wrestled with his problem. But that was not to 
be.
Senior Physician Gilvesh, who had worked with Conway some months earlier on a 
Dwerlan DBPK operation, was feeling uncharacteristically sociable and wanted to 
talk shop with its fellow Senior. They met in a narrow corridor leading from the 
level's pharmacy and there was no way that Conway could avoid talking to it.
Gilvesh was having problems. It was one of those days, the Illensan medic said, 
when all the patients were demanding inordinate amounts of attention and 
unnecessary quantities of palliative medication, the administration of which 
required its personal supervision. The junior medics and nursing staff were 
under pressure, therefore, and there was evident an unusual degree of verbal 
overreaction and sheer bad temper. Gilvesh said that it was explaining and 
apologizing in advance for any seeming discourtesy encountered by such an 
important visiting Senior as Conway. There were several of Gilvesh's cases, it 
insisted, which he would find interesting.
In common with the other medics trained for service in a multienvironment 
hospital, Conway had a thorough grounding
in the basics of extraterrestrial physiology, metabolism, and the more common 
diseases of the Federation's member species. But for a detailed consultation and 
diagnosis of the kind required here he needed an Illensan physiology tape, and 
Gilvesh knew that as well as he did. So the Illensan Senior, it seemed, was 
sufficiently worried by the current state of its patients to seek a quick, 
other-species opinion.
With the Cinrusskin tape and his intense concern for Prilicla confusing his 
clinical view, Conway could do little more than make encouraging noises while 
Gilvesh discussed a painful intestinal tract, a visually dramatic and 
undoubtedly uncomfortable fungoid infection involving all eight of the 
spatulate limbs, and sundry other conditions to which Illensans were heir.
While the patients were seriously ill, their conditions were not critical, and 
the increased dosages of painkilling medication which Gilvesh was administering 
against its better judgment .seemed to be having the desired effect, albeit 
slowly. Conway excused himself from the frantically busy wards as soon as he 
could and headed towards the much quieter MSVK and LSVO levels.
He had to pass through Level 163 again on the way, and stopped to cneck on the 
condition of the EGCL. Murchison yawned in his face and said that the operation 
was going well and that Prilicla was satisfied with the patient's emotional 
radiation. He did not call on Prilicla.
But he found that the low-gravity levels were having one of those days, too, and 
he was immediately trapped into further consulations. He could not very well 
avoid them because he was Conway, the Earth-human Senior Physician, known 
throughout the hospital for his sometimes unorthodox but effective methods and 
ideas on diagnosis and treatment. Here, at least, he was able to give "some 
useful if orthodox advice because his Cinrusskin mind-partner was closer 
temperamentally and physically to the Nallajim LSVOs and the MSVKs of Euril who 
were fragile, birdlike, and extremely timid where the larger life-forms were 
concerned. But he could find no solution, orthodox or otherwise, to the problem 
he most des-perately wanted to solve.
Prilicla's.
 
He thought about going to his quarters where he would have peace and quiet in 
which to think, but they were more than an hour's journey away at the other end 
of the hospital and he wanted to be close by in case there was a sudden 
deterioration in Prilicla's already close to critical condition. So instead he 
continued listening to Nallajim patients describing their symptoms and feeling 
a strange sadness because the Cinrusskin part of his mind knew that they were 
suffering, feeling, and emoting on many levels but his Earth-human mental 
equipment was incapable of receiving their emotional radiation. It was as if a 
sheet of glass lay between them, through which only sight and sound could pass.
But something more was getting through, surely? He h'ad felt some of the aches 
and pains of the Illensan patients as he was feeling, to a certain extent, those 
of the Eurils and Nal-lajims around him. Or was that simply the GLNO tape 
fooling him into believing that he was an empath?
A sheet of glass, he thought suddenly, and a idea began to stir at the back of 
his mind. He tried to bring it out into the light, to give it form. Glass. 
Something about glass, or the properties of glass?
"Excuse me, Kytili," he said to the Nallijim medic who was worrying aloud about 
an atypical case of what should have been an easily treated and nonpainful 
condition. "I have to see O'Mara urgently."
It was Carrington who erased the GLNO tape because the Chief Psychologist had 
been called to some trouble in the chlorine-breathing level lately vacated by 
Gonway. As O'Mara's senior assistant, Carrington was a highly qualified 
psychologist. He studied Conway's expression for a moment and asked if he could 
be of assistance.
Conway shook his head and forced a smile. "I wanted to ask the Major something. 
He would probably have said no, anyway. May I use the communicator?"
A few seconds later the face of Captain Fletcher flicked onto the screen and he 
said briskly, "Rhabwar, Control Deck."
"Captain," Conway said, "I want to ask a favor. If you agree to do it then it 
must be clearly understood that you will not be held responsible for any 
repercussions since it will be
a medical matter entirely and you will be acting under my orders.
"There is a way that I may be able to help Prilicla," he went on, and described 
what he wanted done. When he finished, Fletcher looked grave.
"I'm aware of Prilicla's condition, Doctor," the Captain said. "Naydrad has been 
in and out of the ship so often it is threatening to wear out the boarding tube, 
and each time it returns we get an update on the empath's progress, or rather 
lack of it. And there is no need to belabor the point about our respective 
responsibilities. Obviously you wish to use the ship for an unauthorized mission 
and you are concealing the details so that any blame attached to me as a result 
of a future inquiry will be minimal. You are cutting comers again, Doctor, but 
in this instance I sympathize and will accept any instructions you care to 
give."
Fletcher broke off, and for the first time in Conway's experience of the man 
the Captain's cold, impassive, almost disdainful expression softened and the 
voice lost its irritatingly pedantic quality. "But it is my guess that you will 
order me to take Rhabwar to Cinruss," he went on, "so that our little friend can 
die among its own kind."
Before Conway could reply, Fletcher had switched him to Naydrad on the Casualty 
Deck.
Half an hour later the Kelgian Charge Nurse and Conway were transferring 
Prilicla, who was barely conscious and trembling only slightly by then, from 
its supporting harness to a powered litter. In the corridor leading to Lock Nine 
none of the medical staff questioned their action, and when any of them looked 
as if they might, Conway tapped irritably at the casing of his translator pack 
and pretended that it was malfunctioning. But when they were passing the 
entrance to the EGCL's room, Murchison was just leaving it. She stepped quickly 
in front of the litter.
"Where are you taking Prilicla?" she demanded. She sounded desperately tired and 
uncharacteristically angry, so much so that the empath began to twitch weakly.
"To Rhabwar" Conway said as calmly as he could. "How is the EGCL?"
W*~~UVIfcW    VTI   II
Murchison looked at the empath, then visibly tried to control her feelings as 
she replied, "Very well, all things considered. Its condition is stable. There 
is a senior nurse continually in attendance. Edanelt is resting next door, only 
seconds away if I anything should go wrong, but we don't expect any problems. In 
fact, we are expecting it to recover consciousness fairly soon. And Thornnastor 
has returned to Pathology to study the results of the tests we did on Prilicla. 
That's why you shouldn't be moving Prilicla from  "
"Thornnastor can't cure Prilicla," Conway said firmly. He looked from her to the 
litter and went on, "I can use your help.   I Do you think you can stay on your 
feet for another couple of hours? Please, there isn't much time."
Within seconds of the litter's arrival on Rhabwar's Casualty Deck, Conway was on 
the intercom to Fletcher. "Captain, take us out quickly, please. And ready the 
planetary lander."
"The planetary  " Fletcher began, then went on, "We haven't undocked yet, much 
less reached Jump distance, and you're worrying about landing on Cinruss! Are 
you sure you know what  "
"I'm not sure of anything, Captain," Conway said. "Take us out but be prepared 
to check velocity at short notice, and well within Jump distance."
Fletcher broke the connection without replying, and a few seconds later the 
direct vision port showed the vast metal flank of the hospital moving away. 
Their velocity increased to the maximum allowed in the vicinity of the 
establishment, until the nearest section of the gigantic structure was a 
kilometer, then two kilometers away. But nobody was interested in the view just 
then because all of Conway's attention was on Prilicla, and Murchison and 
Naydrad were watching him.
"Back there," the pathologist said suddenly, "you said that even Thornnastor 
could not cure Prilicla. Why did you say that?"
"Because there was nothing wrong with Prilicla," Conway said. He ignored 
Murchison's unladylike gape of surprise and Naydrad's wildly undulating fur and 
spoke to the empath. "Isn't that so, little friend?"
"I think so, friend Conway," Prilicla said, speaking for the
StO IUM UtlNtMAL                                              63
first time since coming on board. "Certainly there is nothing wrong with me now. 
But I am confused."
"You're confused!" Murchison began, and stopped because Conway was again at the 
communicator.
"Captain," he said, "return at once to Lock Nine to take on another patient. 
Switch on all of your exterior lighting and ignore the traffic instructions. And 
please patch me through to Level One Six Three, the EGCL's recovery room. 
Quickly."
"Right," the Captain coldly said, "but I want an explanation."
"You'll get one" Conway began. He broke off as the Captain's angry features 
were replaced by a view of the recovery room with the attending nurse, a 
Kelgian, curled like a furry question mark beside the EGCL. Its report on the 
patient's condition was brief, accurate, and, to Conway, terrifying.
He broke contact and returned to the Captain. Apologetically he said, "There, 
isn't much time so I would like you to listen while I explain the situation, or 
what I think is the situation, to the others here. I had intended that the 
lander be fitted with remote-controlled medical servomechs and used as an 
isolation unit, but there isn't time for that now. The EGCL is waking up. All 
hell could break loose in the hospital at any minute."
Quickly he explained his theory about the EGCL and the reasoning which had led 
to it, ending with the proof which was Prilicla's otherwise inexplicable 
recovery.
"The part of this which bothers me," he concluded grimly, is having to subject 
Prilicla to the same degree of emotional torture once again."
. The empath's limbs trembled at the remembered pain, but t said, "I can accept 
it, friend Conway, now that I know the condition will be temporary."
But removing the EGCL was not as easy as had been the abduction of Prilicla. The 
Kelgian duty nurse was disposed to |^8ue, and it took all of Naydrad's powers of 
persuasion and ttle combined ranks of Murchison and Conway to make it do 33 'l 
was told. And while they were arguing, Conway could j6^ the wildly rippling and 
twitching fur of the two nurses, the udden, almost manic changes of facial 
expression in Murchi-
son, and the emotional overreaction in all of them, in spite of his earlier 
warning of what would happen if they did not control their feelings. By the time 
the transfer of the patient to Rhab-war's litter was underway, so much fuss had 
been created that someone was sure to report it. Conway did not want that.
The patient was coming to. There was no time to go through proper channels, no 
time for long and repeated explanations. Then suddenly he had to find time, 
because both Edanelt and O'Mara were in the room. It was the Chief Psychologist 
who spoke first.
"Conway! What do you think you're doing with that patient?"
"I'm kidnapping it!" Conway snapped back sarcastically. Quickly he went on, "I'm 
sorry, sir, we are all overreacting. We can't help it, but try hard to be calm. 
Edanelt, will you help me transfer the EGCL's support systems to the litter. 
There , isn't much time left so I'll have to explain while we work."
The Melfan Senior dithered for a moment, the tapping of its six crablike legs 
against the floor reflecting its indecision, then it spoke. "Very well, Conway. 
But if I am not satisfied with your explanation the patient stays here."
"Fair enough," said Conway. He looked at O'Mara, whose face was showing the 
indications of a suddenly elevated blood pressure, and went on, "You had the 
right idea at the beginning, but everyone was too busy to talk to you. It should 
have occurred to me, too, if the GLNO tape and concern for Prilicla hadn't 
confused me by"
"Omit die flattery and excuses, Conway," O'Mara broke in, "and get on with it."
Conway was helping Murchison and Naydrad lift the EGCL into the litter while 
Edanelt and the other nurse checked the siting of the biosensors. Without 
looking up he went on, "Whenever we encounter a new intelligent species the 
first thing we are supposed to ask ourselves is how it got that way. Only the 
dominant life-form on a planet has the opportunity, the security and leisure, to 
develop a civilization capable of interstellar travel."
At first Conway had not been able to see how the EGCL's people had risen to 
dominance on their world, how they had fought their way to the top of their 
evolutionary tree. They had
no physical weapons of offense, and their snaillike apron of muscle which 
furnished locomotion was incapable of moving them fast enough to avoid natural 
enemies. Their carapace was a defense of sorts in that it protected vital 
organs, but that osseus shell was mounted high on the body, making it top-heavy 
and an easy prey for any predator who had only to topple it over to get at the 
soft underside. Its manipulatory appendages were flexible and dexterous, but too 
short and lightly muscled to be a deterrent. On their home world the EGCLs 
should have been one of nature's losers. They were not, however, and there had 
to be a reason.
It had come to him slowly, Conway went on, while he was moving through the 
chlorine and light-gravity sections. In every ward there had been cases of 
patients with known and properly diagnosed ailments displaying, or at least 
complaining about, atypical symptoms. The demand for painkilling medication had 
been unprecedented. Conditions which should have caused a minor degree of 
discomfort were, it seemed, inflicting severe pain. He had been aware of some of 
this pain himself, but had put that down to a combination of his imagination and 
the effect of the Cinrusskin tape.
He had already considered and discarded the idea that the trouble was 
psychosomatic because the condition was too widespread, but then he thought 
about it again.
During their return from the disaster site with the sole surviving EGCL, 
everyone had felt understandably low about the mission's lack of success and 
because Prilicla was giving cause for concern. But in retrospect there was 
something wrong, unprofessional, about their reactions. They were feeling things 
too strongly, overreacting, developing in their own fashions the same kind of 
hypersensitivity which had affected Prilicla and which had affected the patients 
and staff on the Illensan and the Nallajim levels. Conway had felt it himself; 
the vague stomach pains, the discomfort in hands and fingers, the 
ov-erexcitability in circumstances which did not warrant it. But the effect had 
diminished with distance, because when he vis-ited O'Mara's office for the GLNO 
tape and later for the era-sure, he had felt normal and unworried except for the 
usual degree of concern over a current case, accentuated in this instance 
because the patient was Prilicla.
The EGCL was receiving the best possible attention from Thornnastor and Edanelt, 
so it was not on his mind to any large extent. Conway had been sure of that.
"But then I began to think about its injuries," Conway went on, "and the way I 
had felt on the ship and within three levels of the EGCL operation. In the 
hospital while I had the GLNO tape riding me, I was an empath without empathy. 
But I seemed to be feeling thingsemotions, pains, conditions which did not 
belong to me. I thought that, because of fatigue and the stress of that time, I 
was generating sympathetic pains. Then it occurred to me that if the type of 
discomfort being suffered by the EGCL were subtracted from the symptoms of the 
medics and patients on those six levels and the intensity of the discomfort 
reduced, then the affected patients and staff would be acting and reacting 
normally. This seemed to point toward"
"An empath!" O'Mara said. "Like Prilicla."
"Not like Prilicla," Conway said firmly. "Although it is possible that the 
empathic faculty possessed by the preintelligent ancestors of both species was 
similar."
But their prehistoric world was an infinitely more dangerous place than Cinruss 
had been, Conway continued, and in any case the EGCLs lacked the ability of the 
Cinrusskins quite literally to fly from danger. And in such a savage environment 
there was little advantage in having an empathic faculty other than as a highly 
unpleasant early warning system, and so the ability to receive emotions had been 
lost. It was probable that they no longer received even the emotional radiation 
of their own kind.
They had become organic transmitters, reflectors and fo-cusers and magnifiers of 
their own feelings and those of the beings around them. The indications were 
that the faculty had evolved to the stage where they had no conscious control 
over the process.
"Think of the defensive weapon that makes," Conway explained. The EGCL's life 
support and sensors had been transferred to the litter and it was ready to 
leave. "If a predator tries to attack it, the anger and hunger it feels for its 
victim together with the fear and pain, if the victim was hurt or wounded, would 
be magnified, bounced back, and figuratively hit the attacker in the teeth. I 
can only guess at the order of emotional amplification used. But the effect on 
the predator, especially
if there were others in the vicinity whose feelings were also being amplified, 
would be discouraging to say the least, also very confusing. It might have the 
effect of having them attack each other.
"We already know the effect of a deeply unconscious EGCL on the patients and 
staff three levels above and below this one," Conway went on grimly. "Now 
consciousness is returning and I don't know what will happen, or how 
far-reaching the effect will be. We have to get it away from here before the 
hospital's patients have their own as well as the EGCL's pain magnified to an 
unknown but major degree, and their medical attendants thrown into a steadily 
accelerating state of disorder and panic because they, too, will receive the 
reflected pain and"
He broke off and tried to control his own growing panic, then he said harshly, 
"We have to get it away from the hospital now, without further delays or 
arguments."
O'Mara's face had lost its angry red coloration while Con-way had been talking, 
until now it looked gray and bloodless. He said, "Don't waste time talking, 
Doctor. I shall accompany you. There will be no further delays or arguments."
When- they reached Rhabwar's Casualty Deck the EGCL was still not fully 
conscious and Prilicla was again being seriously affected by the ambient 
emotional radiation which was being amplified and bounced off their patient. The 
discomfort diminished sharply with increasing distance from the hospital, the 
empath told them, and the awakening EGCL was radiating only a relatively low 
intensity of discomfort from the sites of the recent surgerybut Prilicla did 
not have to tell them that because they could all feel it for themselves.
"I have been thinking about the problem of communicating with these people," 
O'Mara said thoughtfully. "If they are all high-powered transmitters and 
reflectors of emotional radia-they may not be aware of what they are doing, only 
that ave an automatic, nonmaterial defense against everything and everyone 
wishing them harm. The job of establishing com-munications with them may not be 
easy and is likely to be a
long-range affair, unless our basic premise is wrong and we"
"My first idea," Conway broke in, "was to put it in the lander with 
remote-controlled medical servomechs. Then I
 
thought there should be one medic, a volunteer, in atten-dance"
"I won't ask who," O'Mara said dryly, and smiled as Con-way's embarrassment 
bounced off the EGCL and hit them.
"because if ever there was case demanding isolation," Conway ended, "this is 
it."
The Chief Psychologist nodded. "What I had been about to say was that we may 
have miscalculated. Certainly we could never treat EGCLs in hospital where the 
patients surrounding them were in pain, even slight pain. But the situation here 
in the ship isn't too bad. I can feel pains in the equivalent sites to where the 
EGCL is hurting, but nothing I can't handle. And the rest of you are emoting 
concern; for the patient, and this is not unpleasant even when magnified. It 
seems that if you don't think badly toward the patient, it can't bounce anything 
too unpleasant back at you. It's surprising. 1 feel just the way I always do, 
except more so."
"But it is regaining consciousness," Conway protested. "There should be an 
intensification of"
"There isn't," O'Mara cut in. "That is very obvious, Con-way. Could the reason 
be because the patient is regaining consciousness? Think about it. Yes, Doctor, 
we can all feel you feeling 'Eureka!'"
"Of courser Conway said, and paused because his pleasure and excitement at 
seeing the answer, magnified by the EGCL, was causing Prilicla's wings to go 
into the series of slow, rippling undulations which indicated intense pleasure 
in a Cin-russkin. It also counteracted the aches which he and everyone else were 
feeling from the pateint. He thought, What a weird experience the cultural 
contact specialists were going to have with this species.
Aloud he said, "The process of reflecting and magnifying the feelings, hostile 
or otherwise, of the people around them is a defense mechanism which would, 
naturally, be at its most effective when the being is helpless, vulnerable, or 
unconscious. With a return to consciousness the effect seems to diminish but 
the empathic reflections are still strong. The result is that everyone around 
them will have an empathic faculty not unlike Prilicla's, and yet the EGCLs are 
deaf to each other's emotional radiation because they are transmitters only.
"Being like Prilicla," he went on, looking across at the empath, "is something 
of a mixed blessing. But the EGCL would be a nice perspn to have around if we 
were having a good time  "
"Control here," the voice of the Captain broke in. "I have some information on 
your patient's species. Federation Archives have signaled the hospital to the 
effect that this race  their name for themselves is the Duwetz  was contacted 
briefly by an exploring Hudlar ship before the formation of the Galactic 
Federation. Enough information was obtained for the basic Duwetz language to be 
programmed into the present-day translation computers, but contact was severed 
because of serious psychological problems among the crew. We are advised to 
proceed with caution."
"The patient," Prilicla said suddenly, "is awake."
Conway moved closer to the EGCL and tried to think positive, reassuring 
thoughts toward it. He noted with relief that the biosensors and associated 
monitors were indicating a weak but stable condition; that the damaged lung was 
again working satisfactorily and the bandages immobilizing the two rejoined 
appendages were firmly in position. The extensive suturing on the muscular apron 
and ambulatory pad at the base were well up to Thornnastor and Edanelt's high 
standards, as were the deftly inserted staples which gleamed in neat rows where 
the carapace fractures had been. Obviously the being was in considerable 
discomfort in spite of the painkilling medication Thonnastor had synthesized for 
its particular metabolism. But Pain was not the predominant feeling it was 
transmitting, and rear and hostility were entirely absent.
Two of its three remaining eyes swiveled to regard them while the other one was 
directed toward the viewport where Rector Twelve General Hospital, now almost 
eight kilometers Aslant, blazed like some vast, surrealistic piece of jewelry 
against the interstellar darkness. The feelings which washed -Tough them, so 
intensely that they trembled or caught their breathss or rippled their fur, were 
of curiosity and wonder.
"I'm not an organ mechanic like you people," O'Mara said stiffly, "but I would 
say that with this case the  prognosis is favorable."
The ambulance ship Rhabwar had mad the trip from Sector General to the scene of 
the supposed disaster in record time and with a precision of astrogation, Conway 
thought, which would cause Lieutenant Dodds to exhibit symptoms of cranial 
swelling for many days to come. But as the information was displayed on the 
Casualty Deck's repeater screens, it became clear to the watching medical team 
that this was not going to be a fast rescuethat this might not, in fact, be a 
rescue mission at all.
The fully extended sensor net revealed no sign of a distressed ship, nor any 
wreckage or components of such a ship. Even the finely divided, expanding cloud 
of debris which would have indicated a catastrophic malfunction in the veseel's 
reactor was missing. All there was to be seen was the characteristic shape of a 
dead and partially fused distress beacon at a distance of a few hundred meters 
and, about three million kilometers beyond it, the bright crescent shape which 
was one of this systems P!anets.
Major Fletcher's voice came from the speaker. The Captain did not sound pleased. 
"Doctor," he said. "We cannot assume that this was a simple false alarm. 
Hyperspace radio distress beacons are highly expensive hunks of machinery for 
one thing, and I have yet to hear of an intelligent species who does not have an 
aversion to crying their equivalent of wolf. 1 think the crew must have 
panicked, then discovered that the condition of the ship was not as distressed 
as they at first thought. They may have resumed their journey or. tried for a 
planetary landing to effect repairs. We'll have to eliminate the latter 
possibility before we leave. Dodds?"
"The system has been surveyed," the Astrogator's voice replied. "G-type sun, 
seven planets with one, the one we can see, habitable in the short term by 
warm-blooded oxygen breathers. No indigenous intelligent life. Course for a 
close approach and search, sir?"
"Yes," Fletcher said. "Haslam, pull in your long-range sensors and set up for a 
planetary surface scan. Lieutenant Chen, I'll need impulse power, four Gs, on my 
signal. And Haslam, just in case the ship is down and trying to signal its 
presence, monitor the normal and hyperradio frequencies."
A few minutes later they felt the deck press momentarily against their feet as 
the artifical gravity system compensated for the four-G thrust. Conway, 
Pathologist Murchison, and Charge Nurse Naydrad moved closer to the repeater 
where Dodds had displayed the details of the target planet's gravity pull, 
atmospheric composition and pressure, and the environmental data which made it 
just barely habitable. The empathic Doctor Prilicla clung ;o the safety of the 
ceiling and observed the screen at slightly longer range.
It was the Charge Nurse, its silvery fur rippling in agitation, who spoke first. 
"This ship isn't supposed to land on unprepared surfaces," Naydrad said. "That 
ground isis rough."
"Why couldn't they have stayed in space like good little distressed aliens," 
Murchison said to nobody in particular, "and waited to be rescued?"
Conway looked at her and said thoughtfully, "It is possible that their condition 
of distress was nonmechanical. Injury, sickness, or psychological disturbances 
among the crew, perhaps, problems which have since been resolved. If it was a 
physical problem then they should have stayed out here, since it is easier to 
effect repairs in weightless conditions."
"Not always, Doctor," Fletcher's voice cut in sharply from
;;the Control Deck. "If the physical problem was a badly holed hull, a 
breathable atmosphere around them might seem more desirable than weightless and 
airless space. No doubt you have medical preparations to make."
Conway felt a surge of anger at the other's thinly veiled suggestion that he 
tend to his medical knitting and stop trying to tell the Captain his business. 
Beside him Murchison was breathing heavily and Naydrad's fur was tufting and 
rippling as if blown by a strong wind, while above them the emotion-sensitive 
Prilicla's six insectile legs and iridescent wings quivered in the emotional 
gale they were generating. Out of consideration for the empath, Conway tried to 
control his feelings, as did the others.
It was ^understandable that Fletcher, the ship's commander, liked to have the 
last word, but he knew and accepted the fact that on Sector General's special 
ambulance ship he had to relinquish command to the senior medic, Conway, during 
the course of a rescue. Fletcher was a good officer, able, resourceful, and one 
of the Federation's top men in the field of comparative extraterrestrial 
technology. But there were times during the short period while responsibility 
was being passed to Senior Physician Conway when his manner became a trifle 
cool, formaleven downright nasty.
Prilicla's trembling diminished and the little empath tried to say something 
which would further improve the quality of the emotional radiation around it. 
"If the lately distressed vessel has landed on this planet," it said timidly, 
"then we know that the crew belongs to one of the oxygen-breathing species and 
the preparations to receive casualties, if any, will be relatively simple."
"That's true," Conway said, laughing.
"Only thirty-eight different species fall into that category," Murchison said, 
and added dryly, "that we know of."
Rhabwar's sensors detected a small concentration of metal and associated 
low-level radiation, which on an uninhabited Pianet could only mean the presence 
of a grounded ship, while they were still two diameters out. As a result they 
were able to decelerate and enter atmosphere for a closer look after only l*o 
orbits.
The ambulance ship was a modified Monitor Corps cruiser
and, as such, the largest of the Federation vessels capable of aerodynamic 
maneuvering in atmosphere. It sliced through the brown, sand-laden air like a 
great white dart, trailing a sonic Shockwave loud enough to wake the dead or, at 
the very least, to signal its presence to any survivors capable of receiving 
audio stimulus.
Visibility was nil as they approached the grounded ship. The whole area was in 
the grip of one of the sandstorms which regularly swept this harsh, near-desert 
world, and the picture of the barren, mountainous surface was a sensor 
simulation rather than direct vision. It accurately reproduced the succession 
of wind-eroded hills and rocky outcroppings and the patches of thorny vegetation 
which clung to them. Then suddenly they were above and past the grounded ship.
Fletcher pulled Rhabwar into a steep climb which became a ponderous loop as they 
curved back for a slower pass over the landing site. This time, as they flew low 
over the other ship at close to stalling speed, there was a brief cessation in 
the storm and they were able to record the scene in near-perfect detail.
Rhabwar was climbing into space again when the Captain said, "I can't put this 
ship down anywhere near that area, Doctor. I'm afraid we'll have to check for 
survivors, if there are any, with the planetary lander. There aren't any obvious 
signs of life from the wreck."
Conway studied the still picture of the crash site on his screen for a moment 
before replying. It was arguable whether the ship had made a heavy landing or a 
barely controlled crash. Much less massive than Rhabwar, it had been designed to 
land on its tail, but one of the three stabilizer fins had collapsed on impact, 
tipping the vessel onto its side. In spite of this the hull was relatively 
undamaged except for a small section amidships which had been pierced by a low 
ridge of rock. There was no visible evidence of damage other than that caused by 
the crash.
All around the wreck at distances varying from twenty to forty meters there were 
an number of objectsConway counted twenty-seven of them in allwhich the sensor 
identified as organic material. The objects had not changed position between the 
first and second of Rhabwar's thunderous fly-bys, so the probability was that 
they were either dead or deeply uncon-
scious. Conway stepped up the magnification until the outlines became indistinct 
in the heat shimmer, and shook his head in bafflement.
The objects had been, or were, living creatures, and even though they had been 
partly covered by windblown sand, he could see a collection of protuberances, 
fissures, and angular projections which had to be sensory organs and limbs. 
There was a general similarity in shape but a marked difference in size of the 
beings, but he thought they were more likely to be representatives of different 
subspecies rather than adults and their young at different stages of 
development.
"Those life-forms are new to me," the pathologist said, standing back from the 
screen. She looked at Conway and the others in turn. There was no dissent.
Conway thumbed the communicator button. "Captain,"he said briskly, "Murchison 
and Naydrad will go down with me. Prilicla will remain on board to receive 
casualties." Normally that would have been the Kelgian Charge Nurse's job, but 
nobody there had to be told that the fragile little empath would last for only a 
few minutes on the surface before being blown away and smashed against the rocky 
terrain. He went on, "I realize that four people on the lander will be a tight 
squeeze, but initially I'd like to take a couple of pressure litters and the 
usual portable equipment"
"One large pressure litter, Doctor," Fletcher broke in. 'There will be five 
people on board. I am going down as well in case there are technical problems 
getting into the wreck. You're forgetting that if the life-forms are new to the 
Federation, then their spaceship technology could be strange as well. Dodds will 
fetch anything else you need on the next trip down. Can you be ready at the 
lander bay in fifteen minutes?"
"We'll be there," Conway said, smiling at the eagerness in the other's voice. 
Fletcher wanted to look at the inside of that wrecked ship just as badly as 
Conway wanted to investigate the internal workings of its crew. And if there 
were survivors, Rhabwar would shortly be engaged in conducting another medial 
first contact with all the hidden problems, both clinical and cultural, which 
that implied.
Fletcher's eagerness was underlined by the fact that he rather than Dodds took 
the vehicle down and landed it in a ridiculously
 
small area of flat sand within one hundred meters of the wreck. From the surface 
the wind-eroded rock outcroppings looked higher, sharper, and much more 
dangerous, but the sandstorm had died down to a stiff breeze which lifted the 
grains no more than a few feet above the ground. From the orbiting Rhabwar, 
Haslam reported occasional wind flurries passing through their area which might 
briefly inconvenience them.
One of the flurries struck while they were helping Naydrad unload the litter, a 
bulky vehicle whose pressure envelope was capable of reproducing the gravity, 
pressure, and atmosphere requirements of most of the known life-forms. Gravity 
nullifiers compensated for the litter's considerable weight, making it easily 
manageable by one person, but when the sudden wind caught it, Naydrad, Dodds, 
and Conway had to throw themselves across it to keep it from blowing away.
"Sorry about this," Lieutenant Dodds said, as if by studying the available 
information on the planet he was somehow responsible for its misdemeanors. "It 
is about two hours before local midday here, and the wind usually dies down by 
now. It remains calm until just before sunset, and again in the middle of the 
night when there is a severe drop in temperature. The sandstorms after sunset 
and before dawn are very bad and last for three to five hours, when outside work 
would be very dangerous. Work during the night lull is possible but 
inadvisable. The local animal life is small arid omnivorous, but those thorn 
carpets on the slope over there have a degree of mobility and have to be 
watched, especially at night. I'd estimate five hours of daylight calm to 
complete the rescue. If it takes longer than that, it would be better to spend 
the night on Rhabwar and come back tomorrow."
As the Lieutenant was speaking, the wind died again so that they were able to 
see the wreck, the dark objects scattered around it, and the harsh, arid 
landscape shimmering in the heat. Five hours should be more than enough to ferry 
up the casualties to Rhabwar for preliminary treatment. Anything done for then) 
down here would be done quickly, simple first aid.
"Did they bother to name this Godforsaken planet?" the Captain asked, stepping 
down from the lander's airlock.
Dodds hesitated, then said, "Trugdil, sir."
Fletcher's eyebrows rose, Murchison laughed, and they could
see agitated movements of Naydrad's fur under its lightweight suit. It was the 
Kelgian who spoke first.
"The trugdil," it said, "is a species of Kelgian rodent with the particularly 
nasty habit of"
"I know," the astrogator said quickly. "But it was a Kelgian-crewed Monitor 
Corps scoutship which made the discovery. In the Corps it is customary for the 
Captain of the discovering ship to give his, her, or its name to the world which 
has been found. But in this instance the officer waived the right and offered it 
to his subordinates in turn, all of whom likewise refused to give their names to 
the planet. Judging by the name it ended with, they didn't think much of the 
place either. There was another case when"
"Interesting," Conway said quietly, "but we're wasting time. Prilicla?"
Through his helmet phones, the empath's voice replied at once. "I hear you, 
friend Conway. Lieutenant Haslam is relaying an overall picture of the area to 
me through the telescope, and your helmet vision pickups enable me to see all 
that you see. Standing by'."
"Very good," Conway said. To the others he went on, "Naydrad will accompany me 
with the litter. The rest of you split up and take a quick look at the other 
casualties. If any of them are moving, or there are indications of recent 
movement, call Pathologist Murchison or me at once."
As they moved off he added, "It is important that we don't waste time on 
cadavers at the expense of possible survivors. But be careful. This is a new 
life-form to us, and we are likewise strange to it. Physically we may resemble 
something it fears, and there is the added factor of the survivor being weak, in 
pain, and mentally confused. Guard against an instinctive, violent reaction 
from them which, in normal circumstances, would not occur." He stopped talking 
because the others were already fanning our and the first casualty, lying very 
still and partly covered by sand, was only a few meters away.
As Naydrad helped him scoop sand from around the body Conway saw that the being 
was six-limbed, with a stubby, cylindrical torso with a spherical head at one 
end and possibly a tail at the other extremity, although the severity of the 
injuries made it difficult to be sure. The two forelimbs terminated in
long, flexible digits. There were two recognizable eyes, partially concealed by 
heavy lids, and various slits and orifices which were doubtless aural and 
olfactory sensors and the openings for respiration and ingestion. The tegument, 
which was pale brown shading to a deeper, reddish color on its top surface, 
showed many incised wounds and abrasions which had bled freely but had since 
congealed and become encrusted with sandperhaps the sand had assisted in the 
process of coagulation. Even the large wound at the rear, which looked as if it 
might be the result of a traumatic amputation, was remarkably dry.
Conway bent closer and began going over the body with his scanner. There was no 
evidence of fracturing or of damaged or displaced organs, so far as he could 
see, so the being could" be moved without risk of complicating its injuries. 
Naydrad was waiting with the litter to see whether it was a survivor for 
immediate loading or a cadaver for later dissection, when Con-way's scanner's 
sensors detected cardiac activity, extremely feeble but undoubtedly present, and 
respiration so slow and shallow that he had almost missed it.
"Are you getting this, Prilicla?" he said.
"Yes, friend Conway," replied the empath. "A most interesting life-form."
"There is considerable tissue wastage," he went on, still using the scanner. 
"Possibly the result of dehydration. And there is a similarity in degree and 
type of the injuries which I find strange..." He trailed off into silence as 
Naydrad helped him lift the casualty into the litter.
"No doubt it has already occurred to you, friend Conway," Prilicla said, using 
the form of words which was the closest it ever came to suggesting that someone 
had missed the obvious, "that the dehydration and the deeper coloration on the 
upper areas of the epidermis may be connected with local environmental factors, 
and the redness is due to sunburn."
It had not occurred to Conway, but fortunately the emotional radiation 
associated with his embarrassment was well beyond the range of the empath. He 
indicated the litter and said, "Naydrad, don't forget to fit the sun filter."
In his phones he heard Murchison laughing quietly, then she said, "It hadn't 
occurred to me, either, so don't feel bad
about it. But I have a couple of beasties over here I'd like you to look at. 
Both are alive, just barely, with a'large number of incised wounds. There is a 
great disparity in mass between them, and the arrangement of the internal organs 
in the large one is, well, peculiar. For instance, the alimentary canal is"
"Right now," Conway broke in, "we must concentrate on separating the living and 
the dead. Detailed examinations and discussions will have to wait until we're 
back on the ship, so spend as little time as possible on each one. But I know 
how you feelmy casualty has some peculiarities as well."
"Yes, Doctor," she replied coldly, in spite of his half apology. Pathologists, 
even beautiful ones like Murchison, he thought, were strange people.
"Captain? Lieutenant Dodds?" he said irritably. "Any other survivors?"
"I haven't been looking at them closely, Doctor," Retcher replied. There was an 
odd harshness in his voice. Possibly the condition of the crash victims was 
distressing to a nonmedical man, Conway thought, and some of these casualties 
were in really bad shape. But before he could reply the Captain went on, "I've 
been moving around the area quickly, counting them and looking to see if any 
have been covered by sand or hidden between rocks. There are twenty-seven of 
them in all. But the positioning of the bodies is odd, Doctor. It's as if the 
ship was in imminent danger of blowing up or catching fire, and they used the 
last of their remaining strength to escape from it.
"The sensors show no such danger," he added.
Dodds waited for a few seconds to be sure that the Captain had finished 
speaking, then said, "Three alive and showing slight movement. One that looks 
dead, but you're the doctor, Doctor."
' "Thank you," Conway said dryly. "We'll look at them as soon as possible. 
Meanwhile, Lieutenant, help Naydrad load the litter, please."
He joined Murchison then, and for the next hour they moved among the casualties, 
assessing the degree of injury and readying them for transfer to the lander. 
The litter was almost full and had space for two of the medium-sized casualties, 
which they had tentatively classified as belonging to physiological
type DCMH,. or one of the large DCOJs. The very small DCLGs, which were less 
than half the mass of the DCMH Conway had first examined, were left for the time 
being because they all showed flickerings of life. As yet neither Murchison nor 
Con-way could make sense of them physiologically. She thought the small DCLGs 
might be nonintelligent lab animals or possibly ship's pets, while Conway was 
convinced that the large DCOJs were food animals, also nonintelligent. But with 
newly discovered e xtra-terrestrial life-forms, one could never be sure of 
anything, and all of them would therefore have to be treated as patients.
Then they found one of the small aliens who was quite definitely dead. Murchison 
said briskly, "I'll work on it in the lander. Give me fifteen minutes and I'll 
have something to tell Prilicla about their basal metabolism before the 
casualties begin arriving."
A flurry of wind blew the sand disturbed by her feet ahead of her as she moved 
toward the lander, the small cadaver supported by her shoulder and one arm while 
the other hand, carrying her med kit, acted as a counterbalance. Conway was 
about to suggest that a proper examination on Rhabwar, where the full laboratory 
facilities were available, would be better. But Murchis-on would already have 
considered doing that and decided agai nst it, for two obvious reasons: If she 
returned to the ambulance ship with Dodds and Naydrad, some of the casualties 
already loaded would have to be left behind, and she needed to tell Prilicla 
only enough for the empath to provide emergency surgery and supportive treatment 
until the survivors were taken to Sector General.
"Captain, you overheard?" Conway said. "I'd like Dodds and Naydrad to take off 
as soon as Pathologist Murchison is through. It looks as if three trips will be 
necessary to lift all of them, and another for ourselves. We're going to be 
pushed for time if th is is to be wrapped up before the sunset storm hits the 
area."
There wa_s no reply from Fletcher, which usually signified assent when Conway 
was in command. He went on, "Murchison will stay behind and assemble another 
batch of casualties for the next lift. We'll collect them where there is shelter 
from
the sun and sand. The lee side of the wreck would do, or better still, inside it 
if there isn't too much debris."
"No, Doctor," the Captain said. "I'm worried about what we might find on that 
ship."
Conway did not reply, but the sigh he gave as he continued his examination of 
the casualty he was working on made his impatience clear. Fletcher was one of 
the Monitor Corps' acknowledged experts in the field of alien ship technology. 
This was the reason he had been given command of Sector General's most advanced 
ambulance shipit had long been recognized that a rescue mission's greatest 
danger was to the rescuers, who would be looking for survivors in a distressed 
vessel whose technology and operating principles they did not understand. 
Fletcher was careful, conscientious, highly competent, and did not as a rule 
worry out loud about his work or ability to carry it out. Conway was still 
wondering about the Captain's uncharacteristic behavior when a shadow fell 
across the casualty he was examining.
Fletcher was standing over him and looking as worried as he had sounded. "I 
realize, Doctor," the Captain said awkwardly, "that during rescue operations 
you have the rank. I want you to know that I go along with this willingly. But 
on this occasion I believe the circumstances are such that complete authority 
should revert to me." He glanced back at the wreck and then down at the badly 
injured alien. "Doctor, do you have any experience in forensic medicine?"
Conway sat back on his haunches and simply gaped at him. Retcher took a deep 
breath and went on. "The distribution and condition of the casualties around the 
wreck seemed wrong to me," he said seriously. "It indicated a rapid evacuation 
of a relatively undamaged ship, even though our sensors showed no radiation or 
fire hazard. As well, all of the casualties were severely injured to varying 
degrees and with the same type of wounding. It seemed to me that some of them 
would have been able to make a greater distance from their ship than others, yet 
sll of them collapsed within a relatively small radius from the wreck. This made 
me wonder whether the injuries had been sustained inside the ship or close to 
where they were lying."
"A local predator," Conway said, "which attacked them as
they came out already shocked and weakened as a result of the crash."
The Captain shook his head. "No life-form capable of inflicting such injuries 
inhabits this world. Most of the injuries I've seen are incised wounds or those 
caused by the removal of a limb. This suggests the use of a sharp instrument of 
some kind. The user of the instrument may or may not be still on board the ship. 
If it is on board, it may be that the beings who escaped were the lucky ones, in 
which case I hate to think of what we may find inside the wreck. But you can see 
now why I must resume overall responsibility, Doctor.
"The Monitor Corps is the Federation's law-enforcement arm," he concluded 
quietly. "It seems to me that a very serious-crime has been committed, and I am 
a policeman first and an ambulance driver second."
Before Con way could reply, Murchison said, "The condition of this cadaver, and 
the other casualties I've examined, does not preclude such a possibility."
'Thank you, ma'am," the Captain said. "That is why I want the medical team back 
on Rhabwar while Dodds and I arrest this criminal. If things go wrong, Chen and 
Haslam can get you back to the hospital"
"Haslam, sir," the Communications Officer's voice broke in. "Shall I request 
Corps assistance?"
The Captain did not reply at once, and Con way began thinking that the other's 
theory could very well explain why a previously undamaged ship had released a 
distress beacon and then left the scene to try for a planetary landing. 
Something had gotten loose among the crew, perhaps. Something which might have 
been confined had escaped, something very, very nasty. With an effort Conway 
brought his runaway imagination under control. "We can't be absolutely sure that 
a criminal was responsible for this. A nonintelligent experimental animal which 
broke loose, injured and perhaps maddened with pain, could have done"
"Animals use teeth and claws, doctor," the Captain broke in. "Not knives."
"This is a completely new species," Conway replied. "We don't know anything 
about them, their culture or their codes of behavior. They may be ignorant of 
our particular laws."
"Ignorance of the law," Fletcher said impatiently, "has never been an acceptable 
excuse for committing a criminal act against another intelligent being. Just as 
ignorance of law by the innocent victim does not exclude the being concerned 
from its protection."
"I agree" Conway began. "But I am not completely sure that a crime has been 
committed," he went on. "Until I am sure, you, Haslam, will not send for help. 
But keep a close watch on this area and if anything moves, apart from the 
survivors or ourselves, let me know at once. Very soon Dodds will be taking off 
with the lander and"
"Naydrad and the casualties," Murchison ended for him. Quietly but firmly she 
went on, "Your theory scares hell out of me, Captain, but it is still only a 
theory. You've admitted as much yourself. The facts are that there are a large 
number of casualties all around us. They don't know it yet but they are entitled 
to the protection of Federation law. Whether their injuries are due to the crash 
or to being carved up by some psychopathic or temporarily deranged alien, they 
are also entitled, under that same law, to all necessary medical assistance."
The Captain looked toward the lander where the Pathologist was still working on 
the specimen, then back to the Doctor.
"I've nothing to add," Conway said.
Fletcher remained silent while Murchison completed her investigation and Dodds 
and Naydrad transferred two casualties into the lander. He did not speak while 
the vehicle was taking off or when Conway selected a spot under a large 
outcropping of rock which would give waiting casualties shelter from the sun and 
windblown sand. Neither did he offer to help them carry the injured e-ts to the 
assembly point even though, without the litter, it was hot, back-breaking work. 
Instead he moved among the e-ts with his vision pickup, recording them 
individually before and after the ground had been disturbed around ftem by 
Murchison and Conway, and always positioning himself between the two medics and 
the wreck.
Plainly the Captain was taking his strange, new role as a Policeman and 
protector of the innocent bystanders very seriously indeed.
The cooling unit in his suit did not seem to be working very *eH and Conway 
would have loved to open his visor for a few
minutes. But doing that, even in the shelter of the outcropping, would have 
meant letting in a lot of windblown sand.
"Let's rest for a while," he said as they placed another casualty beside its 
fellows. "Time we had a talk with Prilicla."
"That is a pleasure at any time, friends Murchison and Conway," the empath said 
promptly. "While I am, of course, beyond the range of the emotional radiation 
being generated down there, I sympathize and hope that your feelings of anxiety 
about the criminal are not too unpleasant."
"Our feelings of bewilderment are much stronger," Conway said dryly. "But maybe 
you can help relieve them by going over our information, incomplete as it is, 
before the first casualties reach you."
There was still a little doubt about the accuracy of the physiological 
classifications, Conway explained, but there were three separate but related 
typesDCLG, DCMH, and DCOJ. The wounds fell into two general categories, incised 
and abraded wounds which could have resulted when the ship's occupants were 
hurled against sharp-edged metal during the crash, and a traumatic amputation of 
major limbs which was so prevalent among the casualties that an explanation 
other than the crash was needed to explain them.
All of the survivors had body temperatures significantly greater than the norm 
for warm-blooded oxygen breathers, indicating a high metabolic rate and a 
hyperactive life-form. This was supported by the uniformly deep state of 
unconsciousness displayed by all of the casualties, and the evidence of 
dehydration and malnutrition. Beings who burned up energy rapidly rarely 
lingered in a semiconscious state. There were also signs that the beings had an 
unusual ability to control bleeding from severe wounds. Coagulation in the 
incised wounds, perhaps assisted by the presence of the sand, was rapid but not 
abnormally so, while the stumps at the amputation sites showed little evidence 
of bleeding.
"Supportive treatment to relieve the dehydration and malnutrition is all that 
can be done until we get them to the hospital," Conway went on. "Murchison has 
already specified the nutrients suited to their metabolism. You can also insert 
sutures as you see fit. If the load is too great for you, which in my opinion it 
is, retain Naydrad and send down only the pilot with
the litter. Murchison can ride with the casualties on the next trip. She will 
stay with you while Naydrad comes down for the last batch."
There was a moment's silence, then the empath said, "I wider-stand, friend 
Conway. But have you considered the fact that your suggestion will mean three 
members of the medical team being on Rhabwar for a lengthy period and only one, 
yourself, on the surface where medical assistance is most urgently needed? I 
.am sure that, with the aid of the Casualty Deck's handling devices and the 
assistance of friends Haslam and Chen, I can cope with these patients."
It was possible that Prilicla could cope with the patients provided they 
remained unconscious. But if they came to suddenly and reacted instinctively to 
their strange and, to them, perhaps frightening surroundings, and to the giant 
but incredibly fragile insect medic hovering over them, Conway shuddered to 
think of what might happen to the empath's eggshell body and pipestem limbs. 
Before he could reply, Prilicla was speaking again. .
"I am beyond the range of your emotional radiation, of course," the empath said, 
"but from long contact with the both of you I know of the strength of the 
emotional bond between friend Murchison and yourself. This, taking into account 
the strong possibility that there is a very dangerous life-form loose down 
there, is undoubtedly a factor in your decision to send her to the safety of the 
ship. But perhaps friend Murchison would suffer less emotional discomfort if she 
remained with you."
Murchison looked up from the casualty she was attending. "Is that what you were 
thinking?"
"No," Conway lied.
She laughed and said, "You heard that, Prilicla? He is a Person utterly lacking 
in consideration and sensitivity. I should have married someone like you."
"I am highly complimented, friend Murchison," the empath Said. "But you have too 
few legs."
There was the sound of Fletcher clearing his throat disapprovingly at this 
sudden and unseemly levity, but the Captain
did
not speak. He could no doubt appreciate as well as any of the need to relieve 
fear tensions.
"Very well," Con way said. "Pathologist Murchison will remain with her feet, and 
too few legs, on Trugdil. Doctor Prilicla, you will keep Charge Nurse Naydrad 
with you, since it will obviously be of greater assistance in preparing and 
presenting the casualties for examination and treatment than would the Engineer 
and Communications officer. Haslam or Dodds can return with the litter and 
medical supplies which we will specify later. Questions?"
"No questions, friend Conway," Prilicla said. "The lander is docking now."
Murchison and Conway returned their full attention to the casualties. The 
Captain was examining the hull of the wreck. They could hear him tapping at the 
outer skin and making the metallic scraping noises characteristic of magnetic 
sound sensors being moved across the surfaces. The wind kept changing direction 
so that the casualties in the shadow of the outcropping were sheltered only from 
the sun and not the wind-driven sand.
From Rhabwar Haslam reported that the area was being affected by a small, local 
sandstorm which should clear before the lander returned in half an hour. He 
added reassuringly that nothing was moving in the area except themselves and 
several patches of ambulating thorn bushes, which would lose -a race against a 
debilitated tortoise.
All but three of the casualties had been moved to the outcropping, and while 
Conway was bringing them in the pathologist was protecting the others from the 
wind and sand by loosely wrapping them in transparent plastic sheets after first 
attaching a small oxygen cylinder to each survivor. The tanks released a metered 
quantity of gas calculated to satisfy the metabolic requirements of the entity 
concerned. They had decided that encasing the casualties in makeshift oxygen 
tents could do no harm since the pure oxygen would assist the weak respiration 
and aid in the healing of the wounds, but with a completely new life-form one 
could never be sure of anything. Certainly the treatment showed no sign of 
returning any of the casualties to consciousness.
"The uniformly deep level of unconsciousness bothers me," Murchison said as 
Conway returned carrying, with difficulty, one of the large aliens they had 
classified as DCOJ. "The level
does not bear any relation to the number or severity of the wounds. Could they 
be in a state of hibernation?"
"The onset was sudden," Conway said doubtfully. "They were in the process of 
fleeing their ship, according to the Captain. Hibernation usually occurs in a 
place of safety, not when the being concerned is in immediate physical danger."
"I was thinking of an involuntary form of hibernation," Murchison said, "perhaps 
induced by their injuries, which enables them to survive until help 
arrivesWhat was thatT
That was a loud, metallic screeching noise which came from the wreck. It lasted 
for a few seconds, then there was a moment's silence before it was repeated. 
They could hear heavy breathing in their suit phones so it had to be coming from 
Fletcher.
"Captain," Murchison said, "are you all right?"
"No trouble, ma'am," Fletcher replied at once. "I've found a hatch in what 
appears to be a cargo hold. It is, or was, a simple hermetically sealed door 
rather than an airlock. When the ship tipped over the door couldn't open fully 
because the outer edge dug into the sand, which I've now cleared away. The hatch 
opens freely now but the hinges were warped in the crash, as you probably heard. 
Two of the occupants were trying to escape, but couldn't squeeze through the 
narrow opening. They are one of the large- and one of the medium-sized types, 
both with amputation wounds, neither of them moving. Shall I bring them to you?"
"I'd better look at them first," Conway said. "Give me a few minutes to finish 
with this one."
As they were placing the last casualty inside its makeshift oxygen tent, 
Murchison said, "Have you found any trace of the criminal, Captain?"
"Other than the wounding on these two, no ma'am," Fletcher replied. "My sensors 
pick up no trace of bodily movement inside the ship, nothing but a few quiet, 
intermittent sounds suggesting settling debris. I'm pretty sure it is outside 
the ship somewhere."
"In that case," she said, looking at Conway, "I'll go with you."
The wind died and the sand settled as they neared the wreck
so that they could see clearly the black rectangular opening in the hull just at 
ground level, and the arm of the Captain waving at them from inside it. There 
were so many other openings caused by sprung plating and access hatches that 
without Fletcher's signal they would not have known which gap was the right 
one. From outside it looked as if the ship was ready to fall apart, but when 
they crawled through the opening and stood up their helmet lights showed little 
evidence of internal damage.
"How did the others get out?" Conway asked. He knelt and began running his 
scanner over the larger of the two casualties. There was evidence of a traumatic 
amputation of a major limb but the other injuries were superficial.
"There is a large personnel hatch on the upper surface of the hull forward," 
Fletcher replied. "At least it was on the upper side after the ship toppled. 
Presumably they had to slide down the curve of the hull and jump to the ground, 
or move along the ship to the prow, which isn't very far from the ground, and 
jump from there. These two were unlucky."
"One of them was very unlucky," Murchison said. "The DCOJ is dead. Its injuries 
were not as severe as the other cases I've seen, but there is evidence of lung 
damage by a corrosive gas of some kind, according to my analyzer. What about 
your DCMH?"
"This one is alive," Conway said. "Similar general condition, including the 
lung damage. Probably it is simply a much tougher life-form than the other two."
"I wonder about this DCOJ life-form," Murchison said thoughtfully. "Is it 
intelligent at all? The small DCLG and the DCMH almost certainly are: The limb 
extremities terminate in specialized manipulators, and the former seems to have 
developed six hands and no feet. But the big DCOJ has four feet and two clawed 
forward appendages, and is otherwise made up of teeth and a large system of 
stomachs."
"Which is empty," Conway said. After a moment he added, "All of the cases I've 
examined so far had empty stomachs."
"Mine as well," Murchison said. They stared at each other for a moment, then 
Conway said, "Captain,"
Fletcher had been working on what seemed to be the inboard entrance to the hold, 
reaching high above his head because he was standing on a wall with the floor 
and ceiling on each side
of him. There was a loud click and a door swung downward and hung open. The 
Captain made a self-satisfied sound and joined them.
"Yes, Doctor."
Conway cleared his throat and said, "Captain, we have a theory about your 
criminal. We think that the condition of distress which caused this ship to 
release its beacon was hunger. All of the casualties we've examined so far have 
had empty stomachs. It is possible, therefore, that your criminal is a crew 
member who turned cannibal."
Before Fletcher could reply, the voice of Prilicla sounded in their phones.
"Friend Conway," the empath said timidly. "I have not yet examined all of the 
casualties you sent up, but those I have examined display symptoms of 
dehydration and tissue wastage indicative of hunger and thirst. But the 
condition is not far enough advanced for death to be imminent. Your hypothetical 
criminal must have attacked the other crew members before lack of food became a 
serious problem. The being was hungry but not starving to death. Are you sure 
that the creature is intelligent?"
"No," Conway said. "But if Murchison and I have missed it while examining the 
first of the casualties, and at that time we were more concerned with charting 
the injuries than in the contents, if any, of their stomachs, the beastie could 
be on Rhabwar now. So if you find a well-fed casualty, get Haslam and Chen to 
restrain it, quickly. The Captain has a professional interest in it."
"That I have," Fletcher said grimly. He was about to go on when Haslam, who had 
relieved Dodds as lander pilot, interrupted to say that he would be touching 
down in six minutes and would need help loading the litter.
By packing the litter and strapping casualties, sometimes |wo to a couch in the 
crew's positions, Haslam was able to lift just over half of the remaining 
survivors. There was no change 'n the condition of the remaining casualties. The 
shadow of the outcropping had lengthened, though the air was still warm; the sky 
remained clear and there was no wind. Murchison said fhat she could usefully 
spend the time until the lander returned 'nvestigating, so far as she was able 
with her portable equip-
ment, the large DCOJ cadaver they had left in the wreck. The medium-sized DCMH 
survivor had gone up with Haslam.
It was obvious from the start that Fletcher found the dissection distasteful, 
and when Murchison told him that there was enough light for the work from the 
helmet spots of Conway and herself, he left quickly and began climbing among the 
containers fastened to the now-vertical deck beside them. After about fifteen 
minutes he reported that his scanner showed the contents to be identical and, 
judging by the amount of packing used, were almost certainly cargo rather than 
ship's stores. He added that he intended moving into the corridor outside the 
hold to explore, look for other casualties, and gather evidence.
"Do you have to do it now, Captain?" Murchison said wor-v riedly, looking up. 
Conway turned to regard Fletcher, too, but somehow his eyes did not rise above 
the level of the other's waist and the weapon attached to it.
"Do you know, Captain," he said quietly, "you have been wearing a sidearm ever 
since Rhabwar's first mission, and I've barely noticed it? It was just a part of 
your uniform, like the cap and insignia. Now it looks even more conspicuous than 
your backpack."
Fletcher looked uncomfortable as he said, "We're taught that the psychological 
effect of displaying a weapon is negligible among the law-abiding, but 
increases in direct proportion to the guilt or harmful intentions of the 
criminal or potential lawbreaker. However, the effect of my weapon was purely 
psychological until Lieutenant Haslam brought down the charges for it a few 
minutes ago." Defensively he added, "There was no need to wear a loaded weapon 
on an ambulance ship, and I'd no reason to believe that this would be a police 
operation."
Murchison laughed softly and returned to her work, and Conway joined her. As the 
Captain turned to go, he said, "We can't spend much time here, but I must make 
as full a report as possible of the incident and all relevant circumstances. 
This is a new species to the Federation, a different technology, and the purpose 
of this ship might have a bearing on the case. Was our criminal a responsible 
being, perhaps a captive, or an unintelligent animal? If it was intelligent was 
it deranged, and if so why? And was the distressed condition of the ship and 
crew a contributory factor? I know that it is difficult to conceive of
extenuating circumstances for grievous wounding and cannibalism, but until all 
the facts are known"
He broke off and placed his sensor against the deck beside him. A few seconds 
later he went on, "There is nothing other than ourselves moving inside the 
wreck. I've left the outside hatch open only a few inches. If anything tried to 
get in you will have plenty of warning, either from the beastie itself forcing 
it open against the sand or from the sensors on Rhabwar. I can get back to you 
in plenty of time in any case, so you have nothing to worry about."
While they resumed the dissection they could follow every step of the Captain's 
progress stern ward, because he insisted on verbally describing and amplifying 
the pictures he was sending up to Dodds. The corridor was low and not very 
roomy by Earth-human standards, he reported. He had to crawl on hands and knees 
and it would be difficult to turn around to come back other than at an 
intersection. Cable looms and air or hydraulic pipelines ran along the sidewalls 
of the corridor, and coarse-mesh netting was. attached to the floor and ceiling 
indicating that the ship did not possess an artificial gravity system.
Aft of the compartment occupied by the medics there was another cargo deck, and 
beyond that the unmistakable shapes of the hyperdrive generators. Further aft 
the reactor and thrust-ers were sealed from him and heavily shielded, but the 
sensor indications were that there had been a complete power shutdownprobably 
an automatic safety measure built into the designwhen the ship had toppled. But 
he could detect a residue of power in some of the corridor lines which he 
thought might be associated with an emergency lighting circuit, and he thought 
he had identified a light switch.
It was a light switch, he confirmed a few seconds later. A large stretch of the 
corridor was illuminated. The lighting was uncomfortably bright but his eyes 
were adjusting to it. He was moving amidships.
They heard him pause outside their cargo hold, and suddenly the lights came on 
all over the ceiling beside them. Conway switched off his now-unnecessary helmet 
light.
"Thank you, Captain," he said, then continuing the discussion he had been 
having with Murchison, went on, "There is capacity for a large brain in the 
cranium, but we cannot assume
that all of the available'volume is used for cerebration. I don't see how a 
beastie with four feet and two manipulators which are little more than claws 
could be a tool user, much less a crew member of a starship. And those teeth 
bother me. They are certainly not those of a predator. In the distant past they 
might have been fearsome natural weapons, but now their condition shows that 
they have not much to do."
Murchison nodded. "The stomach system is overlarge in relation to the mass of 
the being," she said, "yet there is no evidence of adipose or excess edible 
tissue which would be present if it was an animal bred for food. And the stomach 
resembles that of an Earth-type ruminant. The digestive system is odd, too, but 
I'd have to work out the whole intake to elimination cycle to make any sense out 
of it, and I can't do that down here. I'd love to know what these things ate 
before their food ran out."
"I'm passing a storage deck of some kind," Fletcher said at that point. "It is 
divided into large racks with passages between mem. The racks are filled with 
containers of different colors and sizes with funnellike dispensers at one end. 
There are wastebins holding empties, and some of the full and empty containers 
have spilled out into the corridor."
"May I have samples, please," Murchison said quickly, "of both."
"Yes, ma'am," the Captain replied. "Considering the starved condition of the 
survivors they are more likely to contain paint or lubricant than food. But I 
expect you have to eliminate all possibilities, like me. I am moving toward the 
nextOh!"
Conway opened his mouth to ask what was happening but the Captain forestalled 
him.
"I switched on the lighting for this section and found two more casualties," he 
reported. "One is a DCMH, one of the medium-sized ones, which was crushed by a 
buckled structural member and certainly dead. The other is the small, DCLG 
life-form, with one amputation wound, not moving. I'm fairly sure that it's 
dead, too. This is the section of the ship which fell across the outcropping 
when she tipped over.
"The internal structure is badly deformed," he went on, "with sprung deck and 
wall plating all over the place. There are also two large, wall-mounted 
cylinders which seem to have
been the reservoir for a hydraulic actuator system. Both have been ruptured and 
their connecting lines fractured, and there is a faint fog surrounding them as 
if some of the contents remains and is evaporating.
"Ahead the corridor is partly blocked by wreckage," he continued. "I can move it 
but there will be a lot of noise, so don't"
"Captain," Conway broke in. "Can you please bring us the DCLG and a sample of 
the hydraulic fluid with the other samples as soon as you can." To Murchison he 
added, "I'd like to know if the lung damage is associated with that leakage. It 
would eliminate another possibility."
Fletcher sounded irritated at having to break off his investigation of the 
ship. He said shortly, "They'll be outside your hold entrance in ten minutes, 
Doctor."
By the time Conway had retrieved the samples the Captain had already returned to 
the midships section, but once again his investigation was interrupted, this 
time by Lieutenant Dodds.
"The lander is ready to leave, sir," the Astrogator said. There was a certain 
hesitancy in his voice as he went on, "I'm afraid there will be time for only 
one round trip before sunset, so would the Doctor and you decide which 
casualties should be lifted and which left there for retrieval tomorrow? With 
you three and Haslam on board just over half of the remaining casualties can be 
lifted, less if you bring up all portable equipment."
"I'm not leaving unattended casualties down here," Conway said firmly. "The drop 
in temperature and the sandstorms would probably finish them!"
"Maybe not," Murchison said thoughtfully. "If we have to leave some of them, and 
it seems we've no choice, we could cover them with sand. They have a high body 
temperature, the sand is a good insulator, and they are already sealed up with a 
self-contained oxygen supply."
"I've heard of doctors burying their mistakes," Conway began dryly, but Dodds 
broke in again.
"Sorry, there is a problem there, Ma'am," he said. "There 316 four large thorn 
patches moving toward the wreck. Slowly, af course, but we estimate their 
arrival just before midnight. According to my information the thorns are 
omnivorous and
trap mobile prey by slowly encircling it, often at a distance, and allowing the 
animal to scratch itself on the thorns. These secrete a poison which is 
paralyzing or lethal, depending on the size of the prey and number of scratches. 
When the prey is immobilized the thorn clump inserts its roots and removes 
whatever nutrient material there is available.
"I don't think your buried casualties," he added grimly, "would survive till 
morning."
Murchison swore in very unladylike fashion, and Conway said, "We could move them 
into the hold here and seal the hatch. We would need heaters and a medical 
monitor arid I'm still not happy about leaving them unattended."
"Obviously this is something which will have to be carefully considered, 
Doctor," the Captain said. "Your casualties wilf not only have to be attended, 
they may have to be defended as well. Dodds, how long can you delay the launch?"
"Half an hour, sir," the Astrogator said. "Then allowing another half hour for 
the trip and at least an hour on the surface to load up and make provision for 
the other casualties. If the lander does not leave in two and a half hours there 
will be serious problems with the wind and sand during take-off."
"Very well," Fletcher said. "We should reach a decision in half an hour. Hold 
the lander until then."
But there was very little discussion and the decision was made, in spite of 
anything Murchison and Conway could say to the contrary, by the Captain. 
Fletcher stated that the two medics on Trugdil had done everything possible for 
the casualties and could do nothing further without the facilities of Rhabwar, 
except keep them under observation. The Captain insisted that he was capable of 
doing that, and of defending them in case they were attacked again.
He was sure that the criminal responsible for their injuries was not currently 
on the ship, but it might return to the shelter of the wreck when the cold and 
the sandstorms returned, or even to escape the advancing thorn clumps. He added 
that the proper place for all of the medical team was on Rhabwar where the 
casualties there could t?e given proper attention.
"Captain," Conway said angrily, unable to refute his arguments, "in the medical 
area I have complete authority."
UCINCttAU.                                                     /
"Then why don't you exercise it responsibly, Doctor?" Fletcher replied.
"Captain," Murchison broke in quickly, trying to head off an argument which 
could sour relations on the ambulance ship for weeks to come. "The DCLG specimen 
you found was not badly injured, compared with some of the others, but it was 
defunct, I'm afraid. Severe inflammation of the breathing passages and massive 
lung damage similar to the one you found in the hold. Both sets of lungs 
contained traces of the sample you took from the hydraulic reservoir. That is 
lethal stuff, Captain, so don't open your visor anywhere near a leak."
"Thank you, ma'am, I won't," Fletcher said calmly, and went on, "Dodds, you can 
see that the stretch of corridor ahead has been crushed almost flat. There is 
enough space for crew members to squeeze through, but I will have to cut away a 
lot of this jagged metal"
Conway switched off his radio and touched his helmet against Murchison's so that 
they could speak privately. He said furiously, "Whose side are you on?"
She grinned at him through her visor, but before she could reply Prilicla's 
voice rustled timidly from the phones. The empath, too, was trying to calm a 
potentially unpleasant source of emotional radiation.
"Friend Conway," it said, "while friend Fletcher's arguments are valid, and I 
would personally welcome the presence of friend Murchison and yourself back on 
board, friend Naydrad and myself are coping adequately with the patients, all of 
whom are in a stable condition with the exception of three of the small DCLGs 
who are showing a slight reduction in body temperature."
"Deepening shock, do you think?" Conway asked.
"No, friend Conway," Prilicla replied. "There seems to be a slight improvement 
in their general condition."
"Emotional radiation?"
"Nothing on the conscious level, friend Conway," the empath replied, "but there 
are unconscious feelings of deprivation, and need."
"They are all hungry," Conway said dryly, "except one."
"The thought of that one is abhorrent to me, too," Prilicla
said. "But to return to the condition of the patients: The lung damage and 
inflammation of the breathing passages noted by friend Murchison is repeated, to 
a much lesser degree of severity, in the other survivors, and the cause is 
correctly attributed to the damaged reservoir. But it is possible that 
operating in Trugdil conditions with the less sensitive portable equipment"
"Prilicla," Conway said impatiently, "what you mean is that we were too blind or 
stupid to spot an important medical:datum, but you are too nice a person to hurt 
our feelings. But intense impatience and curiosity can be unpleasant emotions, 
too, so just tell us what you discovered, Doctor."
"I am sorry, friend Conway," said the empath. "It is that the food passage as 
well as the breathing passage is similarly inflamed. The condition is relatively 
mild, not obvious as are the other areas of inflammation, but is present in 
uniform intensity in all of the survivors regardless of physiological 
classification. I wondered if there was anything on their ship which would 
explain this.
"I am also puzzled by the amputation wounds," Prilicla went on. "I have been 
suturing incised wounds, none of which have penetrated to vital organs, and 
generally tidying up. But the stumps I have covered with sterile dressings only 
until the possibility of replacing the original limbs has been eliminated. Have 
you found anything down there which might be a missing limb or organ? Or have 
you given thought to the shape, size, and purpose of these missing parts?"
From amidships there were sounds of metal scraping against metal and of erratic, 
heavy breathing in their phones as the Captain cleared an obstruction. When it 
was quiet again, Murchison said, "Yes, Doctor, but I've formed no firm 
conclusions. There is a fairly complex nerve linkage to the stump in all three 
types and, in the case of the big DCOJ, a collapsed, tubular connection whose 
origin I have been unable to trace because of its close association with the 
very complex upper intestinal tract. But taking into account the positioning of 
these limbs or organs, which are at the base of the spine in the two smaller 
life-forms and on the medial underside of the large one, all 1 can say is that 
the missing parts must have been considered particularly edible by the attacker 
since it did not remove any-
thing else. I have no clear idea of the size or shape of the missing parts, but 
my guess would be that they are probably tails, genitalia, or mammaries"
"I'm sorry to interrupt a medical conference, ma'am," Fletcher broke in, in a 
tone which suggested that he was very glad to interrupt before it could go any 
farther. He went on quickly, "Doctor Conway, I've found another DCMH. It is 
tangled up in bedding, not moving, and seems to be uninjured. I thought you 
might like to examine it here rather than have it pulled through the wreckage in 
the corridor."
"I'm on my way," Conway said.
He climbed out of the hold and crawled along the corridor in the Captain's wake, 
listening as Fletcher resumed his commentary. Immediately forward of the 
cleared section of corridor the Captain had found the Dormitory Deck. It was 
characteristic of the early type of hyperships which did not have artificial 
gravity, and was filled with rows of sandwich-style double hammocks which 
retained the sleeper in weightless conditions. The hammocks were suspended on 
shock absorbers so as to double as acceleration couches for off-duty crew 
members.
There were three distinct sizes of hammock, so the ship had the DCLG, DCMH, and 
DCOJ life-forms in the crew which proved that even the large and apparently 
unintelligent DCOJs were ship's personnel and not lab animals. Judging by the 
number and size of the hammocks, the two smaller life-forms outnumbered the 
large one by three to one.
He had made a quick count of the hammocks, the Captain said as Conway was 
passing the damaged hydraulic system reservoir, and the total number, thirty, 
agreed with the number of casualties found outside and inside the ship, which 
meant that the missing criminal was almost certainly not of any of the three 
species who served as the crew.
It was difficult to be precise regarding occurrences on the Dormitory Deck, 
Fletcher explained, because loose objects, ornaments, and personal effects had 
collected on the wall when the ship had fallen on its side. But one third of the 
hammocks were neatly stowed while the remaining two thirds looked as though they 
had been hastily vacated. No doubt the neat hammocks belonged to the crew 
members on duty, but the Captain thought it strange that if the ship operated a 
one-watch-on, two-
off duty roster the rest of the crew were in their bunks instead of half of them 
being outside the dormitory on a recreation deck. But then he was forgetting the 
fact that the safest place during the landing maneuver would be inside the 
acceleration hammocks.
The Captain was backing out of the dormitory as Conway reached it. Fletcher 
pointed and said, "It is close to the inner hull among the DCMH hammocks. Call 
me if you need help, Doctor."
He turned and began crawling toward the bows again. But he did not get very far 
because by the time Conway reached the casualty he could hear the hiss of the 
cutting torch and the Captain's heavy breathing.
It took only a few minutes to piece together what had happened. Two of the 
hammock's supports had broken due to the lateral shock when the ship had 
fallenthey had been designed to withstand vertical G forces, not horizontal 
onesand the hammock had swung downward throwing its occupant against the 
suddenly horizontal wall. There was an area of subcutaneous bleeding where the 
DCMH's head had struck, but no sign of a fracture. The blow had not been fatal, 
but it had been enough to render the being unconscious or dazed until the highly 
lethal vapor from the damaged reservoir had invaded its lungs. This one had been 
doubly unlucky, Conway thought as he carefully drew it the rest of the way from 
its hammock and extended his examination. There was one wound, the usual one, at 
the base of its spine. Conway's scalp prickled at the thought that the attacker 
had been inside the dormitory and had struck even at a victim in its hammock. 
What sort of creature was it? Small rather than large, he thought. Vicious. And 
fast. He looked quickly around the dormitory, then returned his attention to the 
cadaver.
"That's unusuaJ," he said aloud. "This one has what seems to be a small quantity 
of partially digested food in its stomach." "You think that's unusual." 
Murchison said in a baffled tone. "The sample containers from the storage deck 
contain food. Liquid, a powdery solid, and some fibrous material, but all 
high-grade nutrient suited to the metabolisms of all three life-forms. What was 
the excuse for cannibalism? And why
OC-w I v-ti vji_iNi_nr\i_                                                    ivi
the blazes was everybody starving? The whole deck is packed with food!"
"Are you sure?" began Conway, when he was cut off by a voice in his phones 
which was so distorted that he could not tell who was speaking.
"What is that thing?"
"Captain?" he said doubtfully.
"Yes, Doctor." The voice was still distorted, but recognizable.
"Youyou've found the criminal?"
"No, Doctor," Fletcher replied harshly. "Another victim. Definitely another 
victim"
"It's moving, sir!" Dodds voice broke in.
"Doctor," the Captain went on, "can you come at once. You too, ma'am."
Fletcher was crouched inside the entrance of what had to be the ship's Control 
Deck, using the cutting torch on the tangle of wreckage which almost filled the 
space between the ceiling and floor. The place was a shambles, Conway saw by the 
light coming through the open hatch above them and the few strips of emergency 
lighting which were still operating. Practically all of the ceiling-mounted 
equipment had torn free in the fall; ruptured piping and twisted, jagged-edged 
supporting brackets projected into the space above the control couches on the 
deck opposite.
The control couches had been solidly mounted and had remained in position, but 
they were empty, their restraining webbing hanging looseexcept for one. This 
was a very large, deep cupola around which the other couches were closely 
grouped, and it was occupied.
Conway began to climb toward it, but the foothold he had been using gave way 
suddenly and a stub of broken-off piping dug him painfully in the side without, 
fortunately, rupturing his suit.
"Careful, damn it!" Fletcher snapped. "We don't need another casualty."
"Don't bite my head off, Captain," Conway said, then laughed nervously at his 
unfortunate choice of words.
He cringed inwardly as he climbed toward the central cupola
in the wake of the Captain, thinking that the crew on duty and those in the 
Dormitory Deck had had to find a way through this mess, and in great haste 
because of the toxic vapor flooding through the ship. They were much smaller 
than Earth-humans, of course, but even so they must have been badly cut by that 
tangle of metal. In fact, they had been badly cut, with the exceptions of the 
DCMH in the dormitory and the new life-form above them, neither of whom had 
attempted to escape.
"Careful, Doctor," the Captain said.
An idea which had been taking shape at the back of his mind dissolved. 
Irritably, Conway said, "What can it do except look at me and twitch its 
stumps?"
The casualty hung sideways in its webbing against the lower lip of the cupola, a 
great fleshy, elongated pear shape perhaps four times the mass of an adult 
human. The narrow end terminated in a large, bulbous head mounted on a walrus 
neck which was arched downward so that the two big, widely spaced eyes could 
regard the rescuers. Conway could count seven of the feebly twitching stumps 
projecting through gaps in the webbing, and there were probably others he could 
not see.
He braced himself against a control console which had remained in place and 
took out his scanner, but delayed beginning the examination until Murchison, who 
had just arrived, could climb up beside him. Then he said firmly, "We will have 
to remain with this casualty overnight, Captain. Please instruct Lieutenant 
Haslam to evacuate all the other casualties on the next trip, and to bring down 
the litter stripped of nonessential life-support equipment so that it will 
accommodate this new casualty. We also need extra air tanks for ourselves and 
oxygen for die casualty, heaters, lifting gear, and webbing, and anything else 
you think we need."
For a long moment the Captain was silent, then he said, "You heard the Doctor, 
Haslam."
Fletcher did not speak to them while they were examining the new casualty other 
than to warn them when a piece of loose wreckage was about to fall. The Captain 
did not have to be told that a wide path would have to be cleared between the 
big control cupola and the open hatch if the litter was to be guided in and out 
again carrying the large alien. It was likely to be a long, difficult job 
lasting most of the coming night, made more
SCO I Utt
difficult by ensuring that none of the debris struck Murchison, Conway, or their 
patient. But the two medics were much too engrossed in their examination to 
worry about the falling debris.
"I won't attempt to classify this life-form," Conway said nearly an hour later 
when he was summing up their findings for Doctor Prilicla. "There are, or were, 
ten limbs distributed laterally, of varying thicknesses judging by the stumps. 
The sole exception is the one on the underside which is thicker than any of the 
others. The purpose of these missing limbs, the number and type of manipulatory 
and ambulatory appendages, is unknown.
"The brain is large and well developed," he want on, looking aside at Murchison 
for corroboration, "with a small, separate lobe with a high mineral content in 
the cell structure suggesting one of the V classifications"
"A wide-range telepath?" Prilicla broke in excitedly.
"I'd say not," Conway replied. "Telepathy limited to its own species, perhaps, 
or possibly simple empathy. This is borne out by the-fact that its ears are well 
developed and the mouth, although very small and toothless, has shown itself 
capable of modulating sounds. A being who talks and listens cannot be a 
wide-range telepath, since the telepathic faculty is supplemented by a spoken 
language. But the being did not display agitation on seeing us, which could mean 
that it is aware our intentions toward it are good.
"Regarding the airway and lungs," Conway continued, "you can see that there is 
the usual inflammation present but that the lung damage is minor. We are 
assuming that since the being was unable to move when the gas permeated the 
ship, it was able, with its large lung capacity, to hold its breath until most 
of the toxic vapor had dissipated. But the digestive system is baffling us. The 
food passage is extremely narrow and seems to have collapsed in several places, 
and with few teeth for chewing food it is difficult... to see how"
Con way's voice slowed to a stop while his mind raced on. Beside him Murchison 
was making self-derogatory remarks because she, too, had not spotted it sooner, 
and Prilicla said, 'Are you thinking what I am thinking, friends?"
There was no need to reply. Conway said, "Captain, where are you?"
.
Fletcher had cleared a narrow path for himself to the open hatch. While they had 
been talking they had heard his boots moving back and forth along the outer 
hull, but for the past few minutes there had been silence.
"On the ground outside, Doctor," Fletcher replied. "I've been trying to find the 
best way of moving out the big one. In my opinion we can't swing it down the 
sides of the wreck, too much sprung plating and debris, and the stern isn't much 
better. We'll have to lower it from the prow. But carefully. I jarred my ankles 
badly when I jumped from it to the sand, which is only about an inch deep over a 
gently sloping shelf of rock in that area. Obviously the big life-form needed a 
special elevator to board and debark, because the extending ladder arrangement 
below the hatch is usable only by the three smaller life-forms.
"I'm about to reenter the ship through the cargo hold hatch," he ended. "Is 
there a problem?"
"No, Captain," Conway said. "But on your way here would you bring the cadaver 
from the Dormitory Deck?"
Fletcher grunted assent and Murchison and Conway resumed their discussion with 
Prilicla, stopping frequently to verify with their scanners the various points 
raised. When the Captain arrived pushing the dead DCMH ahead of him, Conway had 
just finished attaching an oxygen tank and breathing tube to the patient and 
covering its head in a plastic envelope against the time when, during the night, 
the entry hatch would be closed and the fumes produced by the cutting torch 
against the metal and plastic debris might turn out to be even more toxic than 
those from the hydraulic reservoir.
They took the cadaver from Fletcher and, holding it above their heads, fitted it 
into one of the control couches designed for it. The big alien did not react and 
they tried it in a second, then a third couch. This time the patient's stub 
tentacles began to twitch and one of them made contact with the DCMH. It 
maintained the contact for several seconds then slowly withdrew and the big 
entity became still again.
Conway gave a long sigh, then said, "It fits, it all fits. Prilicla, keep your 
patients on oxygen and IV fluids. I don't think they will return to full 
consciousness until they have food as well, but the hospital can synthesize that 
when we get back." To Murchison he said, "All we need now is an analysis of the 
stomach contents of that cadaver. But don't do the dissection here, do it in the 
corridor. It would probably, well, upset the Captain."
"Not me," Fletcher said, who was already at work with his cutting torch. "I 
won't even look."
Murchison laughed and pointed to the patient hanging above them. She said, "He 
was talking about the other Captain, Captain."
Before Fletcher could reply, Haslam announced that he would be landing in 
fifteen minutes.
"Better stay with the patient while I help the Captain load the lander," Conway 
told Murchison. "Radiate feelings of reassurance at it; that's all we can do 
right now. If we all left it might think it was being abandoned."
"You intend leaving her here alone?" Fletcher said harshly.
"Yes, but there is no danger  " Conway began, when the voice of Dodds 
interrupted him.
"There is nothing moving within a twenty-mile radius of the wreck, sir," he said 
reassuringly, "except thorn patches."
Fletcher said very little while they were helping Haslam move the casualties 
from the outcropping into the lander and while they were pushing the litter with 
its load of spare equipment to the wreck. It was unlike the Captain, who 
usually spoke his mind no matter who or what was bothering him, to behave this 
way. But Conway's mind was too busy with other things to have time to probe.
"I was thinking," Conway said when they reached the open cargo hatch, "that 
according to Dodds the thorn patches are attracted to food and warmth. We are 
going to create a lot of warmth inside the wreck, and there is a storage deck 
filled with food containers as well. Suppose we move as much food as we can from 
the wreck and scatter it in front of the thorn clumps  that might make them 
lose interest in the wreck for a while."
"I hope so," Fletcher said.
The lander took off in a small, self-created sandstorm as Conway was dragging 
the first containers of food toward the edge of the nearest thorn patch, which 
was about four hundred meters astern of the wreck. They had agreed that Fletcher 
would move the containers from the storage deck to the ground outside the hatch, 
and Conway would scatter them along the front of the advancing thorns. He had 
wanted to use,the litter with its greater capacity and gravity neutralizers, but 
Naydrad had stated in its forthright fashion that the Doctor was unused to 
controlling the vehicle and if the gravity settings were wrong or a part of the 
load fell off, the litter would disappear skyward or blow weightlessly away.
Conway was forced to do it the hard way.
"Make this the last one, Doctor," the Captain said as he was coming in from his 
eighth round trip. "The wind is rising."
The shadow of the wreck had lengthened steadily as he worked and the sky had 
deepened in color. The suit's sensors showed a marked drop in the outside 
temperature, but Conway had been generating so much body heat himself that he 
had not noticed it. He threw the containers as far in front and to each side of 
him as he could, opening some of them to make sure that the thorns would know 
that the unopened containers also held food, although they could probably sense 
that for themselves. The thorn clumps covered the sand across a wide front like 
black, irregular crosshatching, seemingly motionless. But every time he looked 
away for a few minutes then back again, they were closer.
Suddenly the thorn patches and everything else disappeared behind a dark-brown 
curtain of sand and a gust of wind punched him in the back, knocking him to his 
knees. He tried to get to his feet but an eddy blew him onto his side. Half 
crawling and half running, he headed back toward the wreck, although by then he 
had no clear idea where it was. The storm-driven sand was hissing so loudly 
against his helmet that he could barely hear Dodds' voice.
"My sensors show you heading toward the thorns, Doctor," the astrogator said 
urgently. "Turn right about one hundred ten degrees and the wreck is about three 
hundred meters distant."
Fletcher was outside the cargo hatch with his suit spotlight turned to maximum 
power to guide him in. The Captain pushed him through the hatch and closed it 
behind him. The crash had warped the hatch so that sand continued to blow in 
around the edges, except near the bottom where it came through in a steady 
trickle.
"Within a few minutes the outside of the hatch will be sealed
by a sand drift," Fletcher said without looking at Conway. "It will be difficult 
for our cannibal to get in. Dodds will spot it on the sensors anyway and I'll 
have time to take the necessary steps."
Conway shook his head and said, "We've nothing to worry about except the wind, 
sand, and thorn patches." Silently he added, If that wasn't enough.
The Captain grunted and began climbing through the hatch leading to the 
corridor, and Conway crawled after him. But it was not until Fletcher slowed to 
pass the leaking hydraulic reservoir, which was steaming very faintly now, that 
Conway spoke.
"Is there anything else bothering you, Captain?"
Fletcher stopped and for the first time in over an hour looked directly at the 
Doctor. He said, "Yes, there is. That creature in the Control Deck bothers me. 
Even in the hospital, what can you do for it, a multiple amputee? It will be 
completely helpless, little more than a live specimen for study. I'm wondering 
if it would not be better just to let the cold take it and"
"We can do a great deal for it, Captain," Conway broke in, "if we can get it 
safely through the night. Weren't you listening to Murchison, Prilicla, and me 
discussing the case?"
"Yes and no, Doctor," Fletcher said, moving forward again. "Some of it was quite 
technical, and you might as well have been talking untranslated Kelgian so far 
as I was concerned."
Conway laughed quietly and said, "Then I had better translate."
The alien vessel had released, its distress beacon, he explained, not because 
of a technical malfunction but because of serious illness on board which had 
affected the entire crew. Presumably the least affected crew members were on 
duty on the Control Deck while the rest were confined to their hammocks. It was 
still not clear why the ship had to put down on a planet. Possibly there were 
physiological reasons why a planetary gravity or atmosphere was needed, or 
maybe the weightless conditions on board aggravated the condition and they 
could not provide artificial gravity by using their thrusters because the crew 
were fast losing consciousness. Whatever the reason they had made an emergency 
landing on Trugdil. There
were much better landing sites on the planet, but their degree of urgency must 
have been extreme and they had landed here.
Conway broke off as they entered the Control Deck because Murchison was high 
above them closing the personnel hatch. She said, "Don't let me interrupt you, 
but now that we will be using the cutting torches in a confined space, I'm going 
to take the patient off pure oxygen. It seems to be breathing easily now. Would 
one part oxygen to four inert.be suitable, Doctor?"
"Fine," Conway said. "I'll help you."
The hissing of sand against the outer hull rose suddenly and the whole ship 
seemed to lurch sideways. There was a screeching and banging sound from 
amidships, which halted suddenly as a section of hull plating tore free and blew 
away.
"A piece of the wreck has blown away," Dodds reported unnecessarily, then went 
on, "The thorn patches have halted over the food containers, and those nearby 
are converging on the area. But there are other large clumps off to the side 
which are still heading directly for the wreck. They are moving quite fast. The 
wind is behind them and they are letting it carry them forward using only enough 
of their root system to maintain a loose hold on the ground. At this rate they 
could be at the ship in half an hour."
It was as if an enormous, soft pillow struck the side of the ship. The deck 
tilted under their feet, then righted itself. This time it sounded as if maniacs 
with sledgehammers were attacking three different sections of the hull until, a 
few seconds later, the banging ceased. But to the sound of the sand beating 
against the hull plating was added the discordant moaning and whistling of the 
wind as it forced its way into the wreck.
"Our defenses," the Captain said worriedly, "have become decidedly porous. But 
go on, Doctor."
"The ship made an emergency landing here," Conway resumed, "because they had no 
time to look for a better spot. It was a good landing, all things considered, 
and it was sheer bad luck that they toppled and as a result ruptured that 
hydraulic reservoir. If they hadn't done so it is possible that their illness, 
whatever the cause, would have run its course and in time they would have taken 
off again. Or maybe the first sandstorm would have knocked them over anyway. But 
instead they crash-landed and found themselves suddenly in a wreck which was 
rapidly
filling with toxic fumes. Weakened by their condition as they were, they had to 
get out fast and, because the escape routes aft led past the source of the 
contaminant and were partly blocked by wreckage from the fall, they had to 
evacuate through the Control Deck here and along the upper surface of the hull, 
then slide to the ground.
"They injured themselves very seriously in doing so," Con-way added.
He paused for a moment to help Murchison change over the patient's air supply. 
From the stern there was a clanking sound which reverberated steadily and 
monotonously throughout the ship. One of the pieces of wreckage was refusing to 
become detached. Conway raised his voice.
"The reason they did not move far from their ship was probably two-fold," he 
continued. "As a result of the debilitating effects of their illness, they did 
not have the strength to move farther, and I suspect there were strong 
psychological reasons for remaining close to their ship. Their physical 
condition, the high temperatures, and the indications of malnutrition 
observed, which we mistakenly assumed to be due to enforced starvation, were 
symptoms of the disease. The state of deep unconsciousness may also have been a 
symptom, or possibly some kind of hibernation mode which they adopt when injured 
or otherwise distressed and assistance is likely to be delayed, and which slows 
the metabolic rate and reduces bleeding."
Fletcher was readying his cutting torch and looking baffled. He said, "Disease 
and injuries caused by escaping from the wreck I can believe. But what about the 
missing limbs and"
"Dodds, sir," Rhobwar's astrogator broke in. "I'm afraid the midnight drop in 
wind strength will not affect your area. There are local weather disturbances. 
Three large thorn patches have reached the stern and sections of the peripheral 
growth are entering the food storage deck. A lot of hull plating is missing 
there. Once they open that concentrated store of food they'll probably lose 
interest in anything else." His optimism sounded forced.
Murchison said, "We're not completely sure that it was a disease that caused the 
trouble, Captain. From the analysis of the stomach contents of the cadaver from 
the dormitory deck.
 
the indications are that it was a severe gastrointestinal infection caused by a 
bug native to their home planet, and the symptom which led us to suspect 
malnutrition was total regurgitation of stomach contents in all of the other 
cases. The casualty from the dormitory had been knocked unconscious before the 
process was complete and was asphyxiated shortly afterward so that involuntary 
regurgitation did not take place. But it is also possible that the ship's own 
food supply was contaminated and that caused the trouble."
Conway wondered if it was possible for a mobile omnivorous vegetable to get 
food poisoning, and if it would take effect in time to save them from the 
thorns. He rather doubted it.
"Thank you, Ma'am," Fletcher said, and went on, "About the missing limbs?"
"There are no missing limbs. Captain," she replied. "Or perhaps the crew are all 
missing the same organ, their head. The large number of the other injuries 
concealed the truth at first, but there are no missing limbs, and there is no 
criminal."
Fletcher looked at Conway, too polite to express his disbelief to the 
pathologist in words, and the Doctor took over the explanation. But he had to 
work as he talked because he and Murchison were faced with the long, difficult 
job of transferring the big alien from its cupola to the litter.
It was hard to imagine the set of environmental circumstances which had caused 
such an essentially helpless life-form to evolve, become dominant, and in time 
achieve a culture capable of star travel, Conway said, but these gross, 
limbless, and all too obviously immobile creatures had done just that. It was a 
host-symbiote, they now knew, who had developed multiple symbiotes specialized 
so as to act as short-and long-range manipulators and sensors. Its stumps and 
the areas which on the casualties had been mistaken for amputation sites were 
the interfaces which joined the host creature to its symbiotes when physical 
activity became necessary or the host required sustenance.
It was likely that a strong mental as well as physical bond existed between the 
host Captain and its crew, but continuous contact was not needed because in and 
around the wreck there had been three times the number of crew members as there
OC-V-/ I \jr\  \3CINCnMI_                                                        
  I  I  I
were organic connectors on the host. It was also probable that the host entity 
did not sleep and provided continual, nonphys-ical support to its symbiotes. 
This was borne out by the type of emotional radiation being picked up on Rhabwar 
by Prili-claconfusion and feelings of loss. The host Captain's telepathic or 
empathic faculty did not reach as far as the ambulance ship's orbit.
"The smallest, DCLG life-form is independently intelligent and performs the 
finer, more intricate manipulative operations," Murchison joined in, clarifying 
the situation in her own mind as well as for the Captain, who had disappeared 
briefly into the corridor to check on the position of the thorns. "As is the 
slightly larger DCMH. But the function of the big DCOJ is purely that of eating 
and supplying predigested food to the host. There is evidence, however, that all 
three of these life-forms have their own ingestion, digestion, and reproductive 
systems, but one of them must figure in the transfer of sperm or ova between 
immobile host creatures"
She broke off as the Captain returned, his cutter in one hand and what looked 
like a short, tangled piece of barbed wire in the other. He said, "The thorns 
have grown out of the food storage deck and are halfway along the corridor. I 
brought you a sample, ma'am."
She took it from him carefully and Conway joined her for a closer look. It was 
like a dark-brown, three-dimensional zigzag with fine green thorns growing out 
of every angle, except one which sprouted a long, tapering hollow tube like the 
vegetable equivalent of a hypodermic needle, and which was probably a root. 
She snipped off the thorns with surgical scissors and let them drop into her 
analyzer.
"Why did we have to wear lightweight suits?" she said a few minutes later. "A 
scratch from a thorn won't kill you, but three or four would. What are you 
doing, Captain?"
Fletcher was unclipping the signal flare from his backpack. He said, "You can 
see from the charring on the stem that they burn. I removed that sample with the 
cutting torch. But the flame isn't self-sustaining. Maybe this will stunt its 
growth for a while. Stay clear of the corridor entrance, both of you. These 
things were not meant to be used in a confined space."
He set the timer on the flare and threw it as hard as he could
 
into the corridor. The beam of light which poured out of the entrance was so 
intense that it looked almost solid, and the hissing of the flare was louder 
even than the sand lashing against the outer hull. The beam maintained its 
intensity but began to flicker as smoke poured from the entrance. The thorns 
were burning, Conway thought excitedly, and hoped that the pyrotechnics were 
not worrying their patient too much. It seemed to be unusually agitated
There was a sudden, crashing detonation. Pieces of the flare, burning thorn 
branches, and parts of the dissected DCMH erupted from the corridor entrance, 
and the cupola edge Conway was gripping seemed to jerk in his hands. He hung on 
desperately as the vertical deck swung toward him, accompanied by the. screech 
of tearing metal. There was a softer shock and the metallic noises ceased. The 
emergency lighting had died but there was enough illumination from the 
sputtering pieces of flare and their helmet lights to show that the patient had 
fallen out of its cupola and was hanging directly above him, suspended only by 
its webbing, sections of which were beginning to tear.
"The litter!" Conway shouted. "Help me!"
There was so much smoke from the flare that all he could see clearly were 
Murchison's and the Captain's helmet lights. He let go his hold with one hand 
and felt around for the litter, which had been left drifting weightlessly with 
repulsors set to one negative G so as to make the vehicle easier to maneuver in 
the confined space. He found it and a few seconds later felt other hands 
steadying it. Above him the alien hung like a great organic tree trunk with its 
stumps projecting between the webbing, ready to fall and crush him and probably 
kill itself on the charred but still poisonous thorns below them.
Suddenly it sagged closer. Conway flinched, but the rest of the webbing was 
holding it. He felt for the control panel of the litter. "Get it under the 
things!" he shouted. "Right under its center of gravity, that's it."
Gradually he increased the repulsion until the litter was pressing firmly 
against the underside of the patient, and again until the being's entire weight 
was being supported and the webbing was simply holding it against any lateral 
movement. He became aware of the voice of Dodds in his phones, asking over and 
over again what had happened and were they all right.
"We're all right," Fletcher said angrily. "And you tell us what happened, 
Lieutenant. What are your sensors for?"
"An explosion at the site of the damaged hydraulic reservoir, sir," DQdds said, 
sounding relieved. "The stuff is highly inflammable as well as toxic, it seems, 
and the flare set it off. The explosion broke the back of the ship where it lies 
across that rock outcropping, and now the prow is lying on the sand, too. 
Amidships and stern sections have been stripped of plating by the explosion and 
the wind. The ship looks very open, sir."
The smoke had cleared but fine clouds of sand were blowing through the Control 
Deck from somewhere. Fletcher said dryly, "I believe you, Dodds. It is also very 
cold. How long until pickup?"
"Just under three hours, sir," Dodds replied. "Sunrise is in two hours and the 
wind should have abated an hour later."
The two portable heaters and spare cutting torch had been shaken loose by the 
explosion and had fallen into the thorns. One of the heaters was still 
functioning but its .effect was severely reduced by the icy, sand-laden wind 
sweeping out of the corridor. Conway shivered and clenched his teeth, both to 
stop them chattering and in reaction to the indescribable noise of the wind 
screaming through the bare bones of the stern section and the irregular, 
thunderous din of the remaining plating shaking itself loose. He resiled the 
portable lights, which had survived the explosion, so that they were within a 
few feet of the litter. They gave a little warmth.
More than an hour was spent completing the transfer of the alien from its cupola 
to the litter and securing it in the vehicle. The being, too, was suffering from 
the coldits organic connectors twitched continuously and patterns of wrinkles 
marched across its smooth, featureless body. Conway tried to find something to 
wrap around it, but all that was available was the control cupola webbing from 
its own and the crew's positions. By the time he had finished, the being was 
virtually cocooned in the stuff and the few areas of skin visible were still 
twitching and wrinkling.
They moved it up to the sealed personnel hatch, hoping that the available heat 
would rise and it would be fractionally warmer UP there. The difference, to 
Conway, was indetectable. He wondered if it would be possible to rescue the 
other heater, but when he looked down he saw that a fresh, uncharred tangle of 
thorns had grown in from the corridor and was climbing toward them.
"Doctor," said Fletcher quickly, indicating a large ceiling panel which was held 
in position by a single remaining support strut. "Hold onto that while I cut it 
free."
They dropped the panel onto the thorns and knotted loose pieces of webbing 
together into a rope so that the Captain could lower himself onto its center. 
The panel buckled slightly under his weight but the thorns beneath the plate 
were forced down by two meters or more. Fletcher kneeled carefully on his 
makeshift raft and unlimbered his cutting torch. With,the flame focused down to 
a long, thin needle he attacked the thorns all* around him.
After nearly six hours of constant use the power pack was exhausted. When the 
flame dimmed and died, Fletcher got carefully to his feet and began flexing and 
straightening his legs, bouncing the section of plating up and down. The thorns 
were forced lower. He paused for a rest and still the plate continued to sink. 
But now the needle-sharp thorns were growing in from the edges of the raft, 
slowly submerging it.
The rope of webbing was barely within reach. Fletcher steadied himself, jumped, 
and caught the end in a double grip as the plate teetered and disappeared 
sideways under the thorns. Conway climbed down as far as he could and pulled the 
rope close so that Fletcher could get his feet onto the edge of a projecting 
cabinet.
"Did you see the way that thing moved itself from under the plate and surrounded 
you, Captain?" Murchison said when they rejoined her. "It's very slow, but do 
you think we are hurting a potentially intelligent vegetable life-form?"
"Yes, ma'am," the Captain said with feeling, "but not nearly enough."
"Eighty minutes to go, sir," Dodds said.
They detached the few pieces of wreckage and equipment that could be dislodged 
by hand and dropped them onto the thorns, but with little effect. Fletcher and 
Conway took turns hacking at the growth with a metal support strut, but still it 
grew slowly toward them. Soon there was not enough space to move around freely 
or exercise to keep warm, or more
accurately, less cold. They could only huddle close to the personnel hatch, 
teeth clenched together to keep from chattering, and watch the thorns creep 
closer.
The scene was being relayed to Rhabwar and was causing increasing concern. 
Lieutenant Haslam said suddenly, "I can launch now, sir, and"
"No," the Captain said firmly. "If you touch down before it is safe to do so and 
the lander is blown over, nobody here will get out of this mess"
He broke off because his voice had suddenly sounded very loud.
The wind had died.
"Open up," Fletcher said. "Let's get out of here."
The dark-blue morning sky showed through the opening hatch and a negligible 
quantity of sand blew in. They maneuvered the litter and its trussed-up 
casualty through the opening and onto the upper surface of the hull.
"The lull may be temporary, sir," Dodds warned. "There are still a few squalls 
running through your area."
The rising sun was still hidden behind sand clouds, but there was more than 
enough light to see that the surface had been drastically altered overnight by 
the shifting of many sand drifts. From midships to stem the wreck was denuded of 
plating, but the skeleton had been filled out by a tightly packed tangle of 
thorns. The upper surface of the ship forward to the prow was intact, and the 
rocky shelf ahead was clear of thorns.
"One large squall will hit you in about twelve minutes," Dodds added.
They jammed the litter against the open hatch and attached its magnetic grapples 
to the hull. Then they secured their suit safety lines to the massive hinge and 
threw themselves across the litter, hooking their fingers into the webbing 
around the casualty. It was just one more physical indignity for the alien 
captain, Conway thought, but by now the being was probably Past caring about 
such things.
Abruptly the sky was dark again and the wind and sand tore M them, threatening 
to lift them bodily off the hull. Conway desperately gripped the webbing as he 
felt the magnetic grap-begin to slide and the litter slue around. He wondered if 
the wind would blow him beyond the surrounding
 
thorns were he to let go his grip and his safety line. But his fingers were 
locked in a cramp and he felt that his arms, like those of the alien Captain, 
were about to be separated from his torso. Then as suddenly as it had come the 
wind died and it was light again.
He saw that Murchison, Fletcher, and the patient were still safely attached to 
the litter. But he did not move. It grew brighter and he could feel the sun 
warming his side when the sand lashed at them again, accompanied by a 
high-pitched, screaming thunder.
"Extrovert!" Murchison yelled.
Conway looked up to see the lander hovering ahead of the ship and blasting sand 
in all directions with its thrusters. Haslam touched down on the shelf of rock 
which was clear of thorns, barely fifty meters from them.
There were no problems while moving the litter to the other ship, and no 
shortage of time to do it even though the thorns were already inching toward it. 
Before loading it on board, Conway removed the extra webbing and the makeshift 
eye protection from the patient and gave it a thorough examination. In spite of 
everything it had gone through it was alive and, in Conway's opinion, very well.
"How about the others, Prilicla?" he asked.
"The temperatures of all of them have come down, friend Conway," the empath 
replied. "They are radiating strong feelings of hunger, but not on the level of 
distress. Since the food supply on the wreck has been lost, and may have been 
contaminated anyway, they will have to wait until the hospital's synthesizers 
provide some. Otherwise they are emoting feelings of confusion and loss.
"But they will feel much better," Prilicla added, "when they rejoin their 
Captain."
COMBINED OPERATION
They emerged into normal space at a point whose coordinates placed them far out 
on the galactic rim and where the brightest object to be seen was a nearby sun 
burning coldly against a faint powdering of stars. But as Conway stared through 
Control's direct vision port, it became obvious that the emptiness was only 
apparent, because suddenly both the radar and long-range sensor displays were 
indicating two contacts, very close together and just under two thousand 
kilometers distant. For the next few minutes Conway expected to be ignored.
"Control, Power Room," Captain Fletcher said briskly. "I Want maximum thrust in 
five minutes. Astrogator, give me the numbers to put us alongside that trace, 
and the ETA."
Lieutenants Chen and Dodds, seven decks below and a few feet away respectively, 
acknowledged. Then Lieutenant Has-tam, from the Communications position, joined 
in.
"Sir," he said without taking his attention from his displays, "the sensor 
readings suggest that the larger trace has the mass, ^nfiguration, and antennae 
deployment of a scoutship engaged n survey duty. The other trace is currently 
unidentifiable, but relative positions might indicate a recent collision."
"Very well," the Captain said. He touched his transmit stud and, speaking slowly 
and distinctly, he went on, "This is the ambulance ship Rhabwar, operating out 
of Sector Twelve General Hospital, responding to your distress beacon released 
six plus hours ago. We will close with you in"
"Fifty-three minutes," Dodds supplied.
"If you are able to communicate, please identify yourselves, specify the 
nature of your trouble, and list the type and number of casualties."
In the supernumerary's position Con way leaned forward intently, even though the 
difference of a few centimeters could not affect the clarity of any incoming 
message. But when the voice did come it sounded apologetic rather than 
distressed. .
"The Monitor Corps scoutship Tyrell here, Major Nelson commanding," it said. "It 
was our distress beacon, but we released it on behalf of the wreck you see 
beside us. Our medical officer isn't sure, you understand, because its medical 
experience covers only three species, but it thinks that there may still be life 
on board."
"Doctor" the Captain began, looking across at Conway. But before he could go 
on, Haslam was reporting again.
"Sir! Another, no, two more traces. Similar mass and configuration as the 
distressed vessel. Also smaller, widely scattered pieces of metallic wreckage."
"That's the other reason why we released our beacon," Nelson's voice sounded 
from Tyrell. "We don't have your long-range sensor equipmentour stuff is 
chiefly photooptical and computing gear associated with survey workbut this 
area seems to be littered with wreckage and, while I don't entirely agree with 
my medic that some of it must contain survivors, the possibility does exist 
that"
"You were quite right to call for help, Captain Nelson," Conway said, breaking 
in. "We would much rather answer a dozen false alarms than risk missing one 
which might mean a rescue. Space accidents being what they are, most distress 
calls are answered too late in any case. However, Captain, as a matter of 
urgency we need the physiological classification of the wreck's survivors and 
the nature and extent of their injuries so that we can begin making preparations 
for accommodating and treating them.
"I am Senior Physician Conway," he enaea.  may i apvan ;to your medical 
officer?"
There was a long, hissing silence during which Haslam reported several more 
traces and added that, while the data were far from complete, the distribution 
of the wreckage was such that he was fairly certain that the accident had 
happened ; to a very large ship which had been blown apart into uniform pieces, 
and that the wreckage alongside Tyrell and the -other similar pieces which were 
appearing all over his screens were lifeboats. Judging by the spread of the 
wreckage so far detected, the disaster had not been a recent occurrence.
Then the speaker came to life again with a flat, emotionless voice, robbed of 
all inflection by the process of translation. "I am Surgeon-Lieutenant 
Krach-Yul, Doctor Conway," it said. "My knowledge of other-species physiology is 
small, since I have had medical experience with only the Earth-human, Ni-dian, 
and my own Orligian life-forms, all of which, as you know, fall within the DBDG 
warm-blooded, oxygen-breathing
classification."
The fact that the natives of Orligia and their planetary neighbor Nidia had a 
marked disparity in physical mass and one of them possessed an overall coat of 
tight, curly red fur was too small a difference to affect the four-letter 
classification coding, Conway thought as the other doctor was talking. Just like 
the small difference which had, in the early days of their stellar exploration, 
caused Orligia and Earth to fight the first, brief, and so far only interstellar 
war.
For this reason the Orligians and Earth-humans were more than friendlynowadays 
they went out of their way to help each otherand it was a great pity that 
Krach-Yul was too professionally inexperienced to be really helpful. All Conway 
could hope for was that the Orligian medic had had sense enough to restrain its 
professional curiosity and not poke its friendly, furry nose into a situation 
which was completely beyond its experience.
"We did not enter the wreck," the Orligian was saying, "because our crew members 
are not specialists in alien technology and there was the danger of them 
inadvertently contributing to the problem rather than its solution. I 
considered telling through die hull and withdrawing a sample of the wreck's
S.G.7
atmosphere, in the hope that the survivor was a warm-blooded oxygen breather 
like ourselves and we could pump in air. But I decided against this course in 
case their atmosphere was an exotic mixture which we could not supply and we 
would then have reduced their ship's internal pressure to no purpose.
"We are not certain that there is a survivor, Doctor," Krach-Yul went on. "Our 
sensors indicate pressure within the wreck, a small power source, and the 
presence of what appears to be one large mass of organic material which is 
incompletely visible through the viewports. We do not know if it is living."
Conway sighed. Where extraterrestrial physiology and medicine were concerned 
this Krach-YuI was uneducated, but it certainly was not unintelligent. He could 
imagine the Orligian qualifying on its home planet, moving to the neighboring 
world of Nidia, and later joining the Monitor Corps to further increase its e-t 
experience and, while treating the minor ills and injuries of an Earth-human 
scoutship crew, hoping for something just like this to happen. The Orligian was 
probably one great, furry lump of curiosity regarding the organic contents of 
the wreck, but it knew its professional limitations. Conway was already 
developing a liking for the Orligian medic, sight unseen.
"Very good, Doctor," Conway said warmly. "But I have a request. Your vessel has 
a portable airlock. To save time would you mind"
"It has already been deployed, Doctor," the Orligian broke in, "and attached to 
the wreck's hull over the largest entry port we could find. We are assuming it 
is an entry port, but it could be a large access panel because we did not try to 
open it. The wreck was spinning about its lateral axis and this motion was 
checked by Tyrell's tractor-beams, but otherwise the vessel is as we found it."
Conway thanked the other and unstrapped himself from his couch. He could see 
several new traces on the radar display, but it was the picture of Tyrell and 
the wreck growing visibly larger on the forward screen which was his immediate 
concern.
"What are your intentions, Doctor?" the Captain asked.
Indicating the image of the wreck, Conway said, "It doesn't seem to be too badly 
damaged and there isn't much sharp metal in sight so, in the interests of a fast 
recovery, my people will wear lightweight suits. I shall take Pathologist 
Murchison and
Doctor Prilicla. Charge Nurse Naydrad will remain in the Casualty Deck lock 
with the litter, ready to pressurize it with the survivors' atmosphere as soon 
as Murchison analyzes it. You, sir, will come along to pick the alien airlock?"
Rhabwar was the first of its kind. Designed as a special ambulance ship, it had 
the configuration and mass of a Federation light cruiser, which was the largest 
type of Monitor Corps vessel capable of aerodynamic maneuver within a planetary 
atmosphere. As he pulled himself aft along the gravity-free central well, Conway 
was visualizing its gleaming white hull and delta wings decorated with the 
Occluded Sun, the Brown Leaf, the Red Cross, and the many other symbols which 
represented the concept of aid freely given throughout the worlds of the 
Federation.
It was a Traltha-built ship with all the design and structural advantages which 
that implied, and named Rhabwar after one of the great figures of Tralthan 
medical history. The ship had been designed for operation by an Earth-human 
crew, whose quarters were immediately below Control on Deck Two. The medical 
team occupied similar accommodation on Three except in the matter of furniture 
and bedding for the Kelgian Charge Nurse and reduced artificial gravity for the 
Cinrusskin empath.
Deck Four was a compromise, Conway thought as he pulled himself past it, a 
combination Messdeck and recreation room where the people who worked together 
were expected, regardless of physiological classification, to play 
togethereven though there was barely enough room to play a game of chess when 
everyone was present. The whole of Five was devoted to the ship's consumables, 
which comprised not only the food required by six Earth-humans, a Kelgian, and a 
Cinrusskin of classifications DBDG, DBLF, and GLNO respectively, but the storage 
tanks whose contents were capable of reproducing or synthesizing the atmosphere 
breathed by any species known to the Galactic Federation.
Six and Seven, where Conway was headed, were the Casualty Deck and underlying 
lab and treatment ward. Here the gravity, atmospheric pressure, and composition 
could be varied to suit the life-support requirements of any survivors who might 
be brought in. Deck Eight was the Power Room, the province of Lieutenant Chen, 
who controlled the ship's hyperdrive gen-
erators and normal space thrusters, the power supply for the artificial gravity 
grids, tractor and pressor beams, communications, sensors, and everything which 
made the energy-hungry ship live.
Conway was still thinking of the diminuitive Chen and the frightful powers 
available at the touch of one of his stubby fingers when he arrived on the 
Casualty Deck. He did not have to speak because his earlier conversation with 
the Captain had been relayed to Casualty, as were the more interesting and 
important displays on Control's screens. There was nothing for him to do except 
climb into his spacesuithe had a very good medical team who kept their 
equipment and themselves at instant readiness, and who tried constantly to make 
their leader feel redundant.
Murchison was bending and stretching to check the seals of her lightweight 
spacesuit, and Naydrad was inside the casualty entrance lock testing a pressure 
litter, its beautiful silver fur rippling in slow waves along its 
caterpillarlike body as it worked. The incredibly fragile Prilicla, aided by its 
gravity nullifiers and a double set of iridescent wings, was hovering close to 
the ceiling where it would not be endangered by an accidental collision with one 
of its more massive colleagues. Its eight, pipestem legs were twitching slowly 
in unison, indicating that it was being exposed to emotional radiation of a 
pleasurable kind.
Murchison looked from Prilicla to Conway and said, "Stop that."
Conway knew that it was Murchison, albeit indirectly, and himself who were 
responsible for the Cinrusskin's twitchings. Prilicla, like the other members of 
its intelligent and sensitive race, possessed a highly developed empathic 
faculty which caused it to react to the most minute changes and levels of 
feeling in those surrounding it. Pathologist Murchison possessed that 
combination of physical attributes which made it extremely difficult for any 
Earth-human male DBDG to regard her with anything like clinical detachmentand 
while she was Wearing a contour-hugging lightweight suit it was downright 
impossible.
"Sorry," Conway said, laughing, and began climbing into his own suit.
The wreck looked like a long section of metal tree trunk with a few short, 
twisted branches sprouting from it, Conway thought as they launched themselves 
from Rhabwar's casualty lock toward the distressed alien ship, but apart from 
those pieces of projecting metal the vessel seemed to have retained its 
structural integrity. He could see two small viewports reflecting the ambulance 
ship's floodlights like two tiny suns. One of the ports was set about two meters 
back from the bows of the wreck and the other a similar distance from the stern, 
although it was impossible to say just then which was which, and he had learned 
that there were another two viewports in identical positions on the side hidden 
from him.
He could also see the loose, transparent folds of Tyrell's portable airlock 
clinging to the hull like a wrinkled limpet and, beside it, the tiny figure of 
what could only be the scoutship's Orligian medic, Krach-Yul.
Fletcher, Mufchison, and Conway landed beside the Orligian. They did not speak 
and they tried hard not to think so that Prilicla, who was slowly circling the 
distressed vessel, would be able to feel for survivors with the minimum of 
emotional interference. If anything lived inside that wreck, no matter how 
faintly the spark of life glowed, the little empath would detect it.
"This is very strange, friend Conway," said Prilicla after nearly fifteen 
minutes had passed and they were all radiating feelings of impatience in spite 
of themselves. "There is life on board, one source only, and the emotional 
radiation is so very faint that I cannot locate it with accuracy. And contrary 
to what I would expect in these circumstances, there are no indications that the 
survivor is in a distressed condition."
"Could the survivor be an infant?" Krach-Yul asked, "Left in a safe place by 
adults who perished, and too young to realize that there is danger?"
Prilicla, who never disagreed with anyone because to do so might give rise to 
unpleasant emotional radiation from the other party, said, "The possibility 
cannot be dismissed, friend Krach-Yul."
"An embryo, then," Murchison said, "who still lives within its dead parent?"
"That is not impossible, either, friend Murchison," Prilicla replied.
"Which means," the Pathologist said, laughing, "that you don't think much of 
that idea, either."
"But there is a survivor," the Captain said impatiently, "so let's go in and get 
it out."
Fletcher wriggled through the double seal of the portable airlock and under the 
folds of tough, transparent plastic which, when inflated, would form a chamber 
large enough for them to work at extricating the survivor and, if necessary, 
provide emergency treatment. Murchison and Conway, meanwhile, spenf several 
minutes at each of the tiny viewports, which were so deeply recessed that their 
helmet lights showed only areas of featureless leathery tegument.
When they joined the Captain in the lock, Fletcher said, "There are only so many 
ways of opening a door. It can hinge inward or outward, unscrew in either 
direction, slide open, or dilate. The actuator for this one appears to be a 
simple recessed lever whichOh!"
The large metal hatch was swinging open. Conway tensed, waiting to feel the 
outward rush of the ship's air tugging at his suit and inflating the portable 
lock, but nothing else happened. The Captain grasped the edge with both hands, 
detached his foot magnets so that his legs swung away from the hull, and drew 
his head deep inside the opening. "This isn't an airlock but a simple access 
hatch to mechanisms and systems situated between the inner and outer hulls. I 
can see cable runs, plumbing, and what looks like a"
"I need an air sample," Murchison said, "quickly." "Sorry, ma'am," Fletcher 
said. He let go with one hand and pointed carefully, then went on, "It seems 
obvious that only the inner hull is airtight. It should be safe enough for you 
if you site your drill in the angle between that support bracket and cable loom 
just there. I don't know how efficient their insulation is, but that cable is 
too thin to carry much power. The color coding suggests that their visual range 
is similar to ours, wouldn't you say?"
"I would," Murchison agreed.
Conway said quickly, "If you use a Five drill it will be wide enough to take an 
Eye."
"I intend doing that," she said dryly.
The drill whirred briefly, the sound conducted through the metal of the hull and 
the fabric of Conway's suit, and a sample of the ship's atmosphere hissed 
through the hollow drill-head and into the analyzer.
"The pressure is a little low by our standards," she reported quietly, "but that 
could be dangerously low or normal so far as the survivor is concerned. 
Composition, the proportion of oxygen to inert gases, makes it a warm-blooded, 
oxygen-breathing life-form. I shall now insert the Eye."
Conway saw her detach the analyzer from the hollow drill and, so expertly that 
she could not have lost more than a few cubic centimeters of ship's atmosphere 
in the process, replace it with the Eye. Very carefully she threaded in the 
transparent tube containing the lens, light source, and vision recorder through 
the hollow center of the drill, then attached the eyepiece and magnifier which_ 
would enable her to use the instrument while wearing a space helmet.
For what seemed like an hour but was probably only ten minutes she swiveled the 
lens and varied the light intensity, without speaking. Then she wriggled 
backward out of the opening to give Conway and the others a look.
"It's big," she said.
The interior of the wreck was a hollow cylinder completely free of compartment 
dividers or structural crossmembers and the floorConway was assuming it was the 
floor because it was flat and ran the length of the shiphad a double line of 
closely spaced holes three or four inches in diameter running down the middle. 
Seven or eight pairs of the survivor's feet disappeared into the holes so they 
were probably part of the vessel's system of safety restraints, as were the 
broad bands of torn webbing which floated loosely about its body.
The Eye was positioned close to floor level so that Conway could see the being's 
flank along the section whose feet were held in the deck holes. Farther along, 
where the feet had been pulled free by the force of the accident to its ship, he 
could see in detail the double line of stubby, centipedal legs and the pale-gray 
underside. In the opposite directionhe could not
tell whether it was toward the being's head or tailhe could make out part of 
the upper surface of the creature and a single line of dorsal tentacular 
appendages. The long, cylindrical compartment did not give the being much room 
to maneuver arid the twists and curves of the weightless, flaccid body seriously 
hampered viewing, but at the limit of his vision Conway could just make out 
three lengths of tubing, pencil thin, transparent, and apparently flexible, 
which sprouted from a container attached to the wall to disappear into the body 
of the survivor.
Despite the multiplicity of the being's arms and legs there seemed to be very 
little if anything for it to do. Apart from a large number of wall-mounted 
storage cabinets, the interior of the ship was bare of anything resembling 
control and indication systems or any obvious means by which the vessel could be 
guided by its occupantunless, of course, there was a small control center 
forward in the area concealed by the survivor's body.
Conway must have been thinking aloud because the Captain, who had just returned 
from an external examination of the ship, said seriously, "There is nothing for 
it to do, Doctor. Except for a very unsophisticated power cell which, at 
present, is not being used to power anything, there is nothing. No propulsion 
unit, no attitude control jets, no recognizable external sensors or 
communications, no personnel lock. I'm beginning to wonder if this is a ship or 
some kind of survival pod. This would explain the odd configuration of the 
vessel, which is a cylinder of constant diameter with a perfectly flat face at 
each end. However, when I sighted along the hull in an effort to detect minor 
protrusions which could have housed sensor equipment, I observed that the 
cylinder was very slightly curved along its longitudinal axis. This opens up 
another possibility which"
"What about power sources and comm equipment mounted outboard?" Conway broke in 
before the Captain's observations could develop into a lecture on ship design 
philosophy. "We have matched hyperdrive generators on our wingtips and perhaps 
these people had a similar idea."
"No, Doctor," Fletcher said in the cool, formal tone he used when he thought 
someone was trying to tell him his business. "I examined those external spars, 
which have been broken off too short to give any indication of the type of 
structure they
supported, but the wiring still attached to them is much too thin to carry power 
to a hyperspace generator. In fact, I seriously doubt if these people had 
either hyperdrive or artificial gravity, and the general level of technology 
displayed is pretty elementary for a star-traveling race. Then there is the 
apparent absence of an entry port. An airlock for this beastie would have to be 
almost as long as the vessel itself."
"There are a few star-traveling species who do not use them," Conway said. "For 
purely physiological reasons they do not indulge in extravehicular activity, 
entering and leaving their ships only at time of departure and arrival."
"Suppose," Murchison said, "this vehicle is the being's spacesuit."
"A nice idea, ma'am, but no," Fletcher said apologetically. "Apart from the four 
viewports, whose angles of vision are severely limited because of their small 
size and the space between the outer and inner hulls, there is no sensory input 
of any kind known to me and, more important, no external manipulators. But 
there must be some easy way of getting that beastie into and out of that thing, 
whether it is a ship, a survival pod, or something else."
There was a long silence, then Conway said, "I'm sorry, Captain. A few minutes 
ago you were about to mention a third possibility when I interrupted you."
"I was," Fletcher said in the tone of one graciously receiving an apology. "But 
you will understand, Doctor, that the theory is based on my initial visual 
observation only and not, as yet, supported by accurate measurements. 
Nevertheless, as I have already stated, this vessel is not a true cylinder but 
appears to be curved slightly along its longitudinal axis.
"Now, an explosion or collision sufficiently violent to warp the cylinder out of 
true," he went on, slipping into his lecturing manner, "would buckle and open up 
seams in the hull plating, and leave evidence of heat discoloration and 
indentations from flying debris. There are no such indications. So if the 
longitudinal axis of the vessel is, in fact, a very flat curve rather than a 
straight line, then the curvature was deliberate, built in. This would explain 
the lack of power and control linkages and an artificial gravity system because 
they used"
"Of course!" Conway broke in. "The hull beneath the flat
deck was outward facing and free of structural projections, which means that 
they got their gravity the old-fashioned way by-"
"Will one of you," Murchison said crossly, "kindly tell me what you are talking 
about?"
"Certainly," Conway said. "The Captain has convinced me that this structure is 
not a ship or a lifeboat, but a section of a space station, an early Wheeltype 
of very large diameter, which suffered a collision."
"A space station away out here?" Murchison sounded incredulous. Then she began 
to realize the implications and added feelingly, "In that case we could have an 
awful lot of work ahead of us."
"Maybe not, ma'am," Fletcher said. "Admittedly there is a strong possibility of 
finding many more space station segments, but the survivors may be very few." 
His tone became suddenly forceful. "Transferring that creature to our Casualty 
Deck is out of the question. Instead I suggest we attach it to our hull, extend 
Rhabwar's hyperspace envelope accordingly, and whisk it back to Sector General 
where their airlocks can easily handle a patient extraction problem of this 
size. I am not the e-t medical specialist, of course, but I think we should do 
this at once, leaving Tyrell to search for other survivors, and then return as 
soon as possible for the others." "No," Conway said firmly.
"I don't understand you, Doctor." Behind his helmet visor Fletcher's face had 
gone red.
Conway ignored him for a moment while he addressed Murchison and Prilicla, who 
had drifted closer in spite of the strong emotional radiation being generated in 
the area. He said, "The survivor, so far as we are able to see, is linked to 
what appears to be some kind of life-support system by three separate sets of 
tubing. It is deeply unconscious but not physically distressed. There is also 
the fact that its vessel contains a reservoir of power which is not presently 
being used. Now, would either of you agree that the observed emotional radiation 
and apparent lack of physical injury could be the result of it being in a 
hibernation anesthesia condition?"
Before either of them could reply, Conway added, "Since there is no evidence of 
the presence of the power-hungry,
complex refrigeration systems which we associate with suspended animation 
techniques, just three sets of tubing entering its body, would you also agree 
that the life-form is a natural hibernator?"
There was a short silence, then Murchison said, "We are familiar with the idea 
of long-term suspended animation being associated with star travelthat used to 
be the only way to do it, after all, and the cold-sleeping travelers would 
require neither air nor food during their trips. In the case of a life-form with 
the ability to go periodically into a state of hibernation for planetary 
environmental reasons, a minimal supply of food and air would be required. It is 
quite possible that the natural process of hibernation could be artificially 
initiated, extended, and counteracted by specific medication and the food 
supplied intravenously, as seems to be the case with our friend here."
"Friend Conway," Prilicla said, "the survivor's emotional radiation pattern 
agrees in every particular with the hypothesis of hibernation anesthesia." 
Captain Fletcher was not slow on the uptake. He said, "Very well, Doctor. The 
survivor has been in this condition for a very long time, so there is no great 
urgency about moving it or the other survivors we might find to the hospital. 
But what are your immediate intentions?"
Conway was aware of a multiple, purely subjective silence as the party on the 
alien's hull and the communications officers who were listening in on Rhabwar 
and Tyrell held their collective breath. He cleared his throat and said, "We 
will examine this section of space station, if that is what it is, as closely as 
possible without entering it, and simultaneously make as detailed a visual 
examination of the survivor as we can using the Eye, and then we will all try to 
think."
He had the feeling, very strong and not at all pleasant to judge by the 
trembling of Prilicla's spidery limbs, that this was not going to be an easy 
rescue.
For a little over three hours, the duration remaining to their lightweight 
suits, they did nothing but think as they examined the exterior of the wreck and 
what little they could see of its occupant, slowly adding data which might or 
might not be important. But they thought as individuals, increasingly baffled
individuals, so that it was not until they met on Rhabwar's Messdeck and 
recreation level that they were able to think as an equally baffled group.
Tyrett was represented by its Captain, Major Nelson, .and Surgeon-Lieutenant 
Krach-Yul, while Major Fletcher and the astrogation officer, Lieutenant Dodds, 
furnished the required military balance for Rhabwar. Murchison, Prilicla, 
Naydrad, and Conwaywho were, after all, mere civiliansfilled the remainder of 
the deck space with the exception of the empath, who was clinging to the safety 
of the ceiling.
It was Prilicla, knowing that nobody else felt ready to contribute any useful 
ideas, who spoke first.
"I feel that we are all agreed," it said in the musical trills and clicks of the 
Cinrusskin tongue, which emanated from their translator packs as faultless if 
somewhat toneless speech in the languages of Kelgia, Orligia, and Earth, "that 
the being is in a state of suspended animation, that there is a high probability 
that it is not a patient but a survivor who should be returned to its home world 
as soon as convenient if this planet can be found, and that the need to move it 
is not an urgent one."
Lieutenant Dodds looked at Fletcher for permission to speak, then said, "It 
depends on what you mean by urgent, Doctor. I ran a vectors and velocities check 
on this and the other pieces of wreckage within detector range. These bits of 
alien vessel or space station occupied roughly the same volume of space 
approximately eighty-seven years ago, which is when the disaster must have 
occurred. If it was a ship I don't think it was heading for the nearby sun since 
there are no planets, but a lot of the dispersed wreckage will either fall into 
the sun or pass closely enough to make no difference to any other survivors in 
hibernation. This will begin to occur in just over eleven weeks."
They digested that for a moment, then Tyrell's Captain said, "I still say a 
space station way out here is impossible, especially one traveling at such a 
clip that its wreckage will reach the sun, there, in eleven weeks. It is far 
more likely that the survivor is in a lifeboat with suspended animation 
extending the duration of its consumables."
Fletcher glared at his fellow captain, then he noticed Prilicla beginning to 
tremble. He visibly calmed himself as he said,
ono i un
"It is not impossible, Major Nelson, although it is unlikely. Let us suppose 
that the survivor's race, which is at the interplanetary flight level of 
technology, was beginning to experiment with hyperspace generation on its space 
station and inadvertently performed a random Jump and found themselves very far 
indeed from home, and subsequently went into hibernation for the reason you 
have stated. Many such accidents have occurred during early experiments with 
hypertravel. In any case, I think we are drawing too many conclusions from what 
is, after all, only one small piece of a very large jigsaw."
Conway decided to join in before this spirited exchange of technical views could 
devolve into a quarrel. He said placat-ingly, "But what conclusions, however few 
and tentative, can we draw from the piece you have examined, Captain? And what, 
however vaguely, can you see of the complete picture?"
"Very well," said Fletcher. He quickly inserted his vision spool from the wreck 
into the Recreation Deck's display unit and began to describe everything he had 
observed and deduced during his examination of the distressed vessel, which he 
preferred to think of as a simple, pressurized container rather than a ship. It 
was a cylinder just over twenty meters in length and approximately three meters 
in diameter, with ends which were flat except for a, set of eight couplings 
which would enable it to be connected at either end to other similar containers. 
The couplings had been designed to break open before any external shock or force 
applied to adjacent structures could damage or deform the container. If the 
dimensions of the other containers or space station sections were the same as 
the one examined, and if the longitudinal curvature was uniform in all of them, 
then approximately eighty of these sections would form a Wheel just under five 
hundred meters in diameter.
He paused, but Major Nelson still had his lips pressed tightly together, and the 
others, knowing that a reaction was expected of them, kept perversely silent.
The section had a double hull with only the inner one pressurized, Fletcher 
resumed, but it possessed no control, sensor, or power systems other than those 
associated with the suspended animation equipment. The level of technology 
displayed was advanced interplanetary rather than interstellar, so the station 
had no business being where it was in the first place.
But the most puzzling feature of the container was the method used to enter and 
leave it.
They had already seen that there were no openings on the hull large enough to 
allow entry or exit by the survivor, which meant that it had to enter and leave 
via the flat, circular plate at each end of the cylinder. In Fletcher's opinion 
the creature went in one end and came out the other because physically it was 
too massive to turn itself around inside its container. But there was nothing 
resembling a door at either end of the cylinder, just the two large circular 
plates whose edges were set inside the thick rims which supported the couplings.
"So far as I can see there is no operating mechanism for these endplates," 
Fletcher went on with the hint of an apology creeping into his tone. "There are 
only so many ways for a door to open, and there has to be a door into and out of 
that thing, but I can't find one. I even considered explosive bolts, with the 
extraterrestrial sealed in until it arrived or was taken by its rescuers to an 
environmentally suitable positioneither a planet or the hold of a rescue 
shipwhereupon it would blow the hatch fastenings and crawl out. But there are 
no hatch fastenings that I can see and the rim structure surrounding the 
hatches, if that is what they are, would not allow them to be blown open. 
Neither can they be opened inward because the diameter of the inner, pressurized 
hull is much smaller than that of the endplates."
Fletcher shook his head in bafflement and ended, "I'm sorry, Doctor. Right now I 
can see no way for you to get to your survivor without cutting its ship apart. 
What I need is another piece of this jigsaw puzzle to examine, a broken piece 
which will let me see how the other undamaged pieces were put together."
There was silence for a few seconds, during which Prilicla trembled in sympathy 
with the Captain's embarrassment, then Murchison spoke.
"I would like to examine a broken piece as well," she said quietly. 
"Specifically, a piece containing a nonsurvivor which would let me see how our 
survivor is put together."
Con way turned to Dodds. "Are there many pieces which look as if they had been 
broken up?"
"A few," replied the astrogator. "Most of the traces give
sensor readings similar to the first piece. That is, a vehicle of similar mass 
retaining internal pressure and containing a small power source. All of the 
pieces, including the few damaged ones, are at extreme sensor range. It is a 
long way to go on impulse drive, but if we jumped through hyperspace we would 
probably overshoot."
"How many pieces altogether?" asked Nelson.
"Twenty-three solid traces so far," said Dodds, "plus a few masses of what 
appears to be loose, structural debris. There is also one largish mass, 
unpressurized and radioactive, which I'd guess was part of a power center."
From its position on the ceiling, Prilicla said, "If I might make a suggestion, 
and if Major Nelson is willing to interrupt his survey mission... ?"
Nelson laughed suddenly and the other Corps officers present smiled. With great 
feeling he went on, "There isn't a scout-ship crew on survey duty anywhere in 
the Galaxy who would not rather be doing something, anything, else! You only 
have to ask and give me half an excuse for accepting, Doctor."
"Thank you, friend Nelson," said the empath with a slow tremor of pleasure. "My 
suggestion is that Rhabwar and Tyrell act independently to seek out other 
survivors and return them to this area, using tractor beams if the distance is 
short enough for impulse drive or by extending the hyperspace envelopes to 
include them if a Jump is necessary. My empathic faculty enables me to identify 
sections containing living occupants and, because of the large mass of these 
beings, Doctor Krach-Yul and Nurse Naydrad should accompany me to assist with 
treatment, should this be possible. Pathologist Murchison and you, friend 
Conway, are well able to identify living casualties by more orthodox means if 
the ship's sensors are uncertain.
"This will halve the time needed to search for other survivors," Prilicla ended 
apologetically, "even though the period will still be a lengthy one."
Tyrell's medical officer spoke for the first time, its whining and barking 
speech translating as "1 always assumed that a space rescue by ambulance ship 
would be a fast, dramatic, and decisive operation. This one appears to be 
disappointingly slow."
"1 agree, Doctor," said Conway. "We need help if this job is not to take months 
instead of a few days. Not one scoutship
but a flotilla, or better yet a squadron of them to search the entire"
Captain Nelson began to laugh, then broke off when he saw that Conway was 
serious. He said, "Doctor, I'm just a major in the Monitor Corps and so is 
Captain Fletcher. We haven't got the rank to whistle up a flotilla of scoutships 
no matter how much you think we need them. All we can do is explain the 
situation and put in a very humble request."
Fletcher looked at his fellow Captain and opened his mouth to speak, then 
changed his mind.
Conway smiled and said, "I am a civilian, Captain, with no rank at all. Or 
considered in another way, I, as a specialist member of the public, have 
ultimate authority over people like yourselves who are public servants"
Clearing his throat noisily, Fletcher said, "Please spare us the political 
philosophy, Doctor. Do you wish me to get off a subspace signal to Sector base 
requesting massive assistance because of a large number of widely scattered 
potential survivors of a hitherto unknown life-form?"
"That's it," said Conway. "And would you also take charge of assigning search 
areas to the scoutships if and when they arrive? In the meantime we'll do as 
Prilicla suggests, except that Murchison and I will go in Tyrell, if that is 
agreeable to you, Captain."
"A pleasure," said Nelson, looking at Murchison.
"Because your crew aren't used to our fragile friend scampering about on their 
ceilings and there might be an accident," he continued. "But right now we'll 
need help to transfer some of our portable equipment to your ship."
While their gear was being moved to the scoutship and Conway was trying hard to 
keep Murchison from transferring the Casualty Deck's diagnostic and treatment 
equipment in toto, Tyrell's portable airlock was detached from the alien vessel 
and restowed on board in case it would be needed on one of the other widely 
scattered sections. Several times as they worked, Rhabwar's lighting and gravity 
control fluctuated in momentary overload, indicating that Conway's subspace 
signal was going out.
He knew that Fletcher was keeping the signal as brief as possible because the 
power required to punch a message through
the highly theoretical medium of subspace from a vessel of Rhabwar's relatively 
small size would have Lieutenant Chen in the Power Room chewing his nails. Even 
so, that signal would be splattered with interstellar static and have audible 
holes blown through it by every intervening cloud of ionized gas, star, or 
quasistellar object, and for that reason the message had been speeded up many 
times and repeated so that the people at the receiving end would be able to 
piece together a normal-speed coherent message from the jumble reaching them.
But their response to the signal was an entirely different matter, Conway 
thought worriedly. Despite his seeming confidence before the others, he did not 
know what would happen because this was the first time he had made such a 
request.
Nelson had invited Murchison and Conway to Control so that they could observe 
Tyrell's approach to the second section of alien space station to be 
investigated, and so that his crew could observe the pathologist. Since the 
subspace signal had gone out six hours earlier, the Captain had been regarding 
Conway with a mixture of anxiety and awe as if he did not know whether the 
Doctor was seriously self-deluded or a highly potent individual indeed.
The messages which erupted from his Control Room speaker shortly afterward, and 
which continued with only a few minutes' break between them for the best part 
of the next hour, resolved his doubts but left him feeling even more confused.
"Scoutship Tedlin to Rhabwar. Instructions please."
"Scoutship Tenelphi to Rhabwar, requesting reassignment instructions."
"Scoutship Torrance, acting flotilla leader. I have seven units and eighteen 
more to follow presently. You have work for us, RhabwarT'
Finally Nelson muted the speaker and the sound of Captain Fletcher assigning 
search areas to the newly arrived scoutships, which were being ordered to search 
for sections of the alien space station and bring them to the vicinity of 
Rhabwar. With so much help available, Fletcher had decided that the ambulance 
ship would not itself join in the search but would instead remain by the first 
section to coordinate the operation and give medical assistance. Confident that 
the situation was under con-
trol, Conway relaxed and turned to face Captain Nelson, whose curiosity had 
become an almost palpable thing.
"Youyou are just a doctor, Doctor?" he said.
"That's right, Captain," Murchison said before Conway could reply. She laughed 
and went on, "And stop looking at him like that, you'll give him an inflated 
sense of his own importance."
"My colleagues are constantly on guard against the possibility of that 
happening," Conway said dryly. "But Pathologist Murchison is right. I am not 
important, nor are any of the Monitor Corps officers or the medical team on 
Rhabwar. It is our job which is important enough to command the reassignment of 
a few flotillas of scoutships to assist."
"But it requires the rank of subfleet Commander or highej to order such a 
thing" Nelson began, and broke off as Con-way shook his head.
"To explain it I must first fill in some background, Captain," he said. "Some of 
this information is common knowledge. Much of it is not because the relevant 
decisions of the Federation Council and their effects on Monitor Corps 
operational priorities are too recent for it to have filtered down to you. And 
you'll excuse me, I hope, if some of it is elementary, especially to a scoutship 
Captain on a survey mission..."
Only a tiny fraction of the Galaxy had been explored by the Earth-humans or by 
any of the sixty-odd other races who made up the Galactic Federation, so that 
the member races were in the peculiar position of people who had friends in far 
countries but had no idea who was living in the next street. The reason for this 
was that travelers tended to meet each other more often than the people who 
stayed at home, especially when the travelers exchanged addresses and visited 
each other regularly.
Visiting was comparatively easy. Providing there were no major distorting 
influences on the way and the exact coordinates of the destination were known, 
it was almost as easy to travel through hyperspace to a neighboring solar system 
as to one at the other side of the galaxy. But first one had to find a system 
containing a planet with intelligent life before its coordinates could be 
logged, and finding new inhabited systems was proving to be no easy task.
Very, very slowly a few of the blank areas in the star maps were being surveyed 
and explored, but with little success. When
:
survey scoutship like Tyrell turned up a star with planets it was a rare find, 
even rarer if one of the planets harbored life. And if one of these life-forms 
was intelligent then jubilation, not unmixed with concern over what might 
possibly be a future threat to the Pax Galactica, swept the worlds of the 
Federation, and the cultural contact specialists of the Monitor Corps were 
assigned the tricky, time-consuming, and often dangerous job of establishing 
contact in depth.
The cultural contact people were the elite of the Monitor Corps, a small group 
of specialists in extraterrestrial communications, philosophy, and psychology. 
Although small, the group was not, regrettably, overworked.
"During the past twenty years," Conway went on, "they have initiated 
first-contact procedure on three occasions, all of which were successful and 
resulted in the species concerned joining the Federation. There is no need to 
bore you with such details as the fantastically large number of survey missions 
mounted, the ships, personnel, and material involved, or shock you with the cost 
of it all. I mention the cultural contact group's three successes simply to make 
the point that within the same period Sector Twelve General Hospital, our first 
multienviron-ment medical treatment center, became fully operational and 
initiated first contacts which resulted in seven new species joining the 
Federation.
"This was accomplished," he explained, "not by a slow, patient buildup and 
widening of communications until the exchange of complex philosophical and 
sociological concepts became possible, but by giving medical assistance to a 
sick alien."
This was something of an oversimplification, Conway admitted. There were the 
medical and surgical problems inherent in treating a hitherto unknown life-form. 
Sector General's translation computer, the second largest in the Federation, 
was available, as was the assistance of the Monitor Corps' hospital-based 
communications specialists, and the Corps had been responsible for rescuing and 
bringing in many of the extraterrestrial casualties in the first place. But the 
fact remained that the hospital, by giving medical assistance, demonstrated the 
Federation's goodwill toward e-ts much more simply and directly than could have 
been done by any time-consuming exchange of concepts.
Because all Federation ships were required to file course and passenger or crew 
details before departure, the position of a distress signal was usually a good 
indication of the ship and therefore the physiological classification of the 
beings who had run into trouble, and an ambulance ship with matching crew and 
life-support equipment was sent from Sector General or from the ship's home 
planet to assist it. But there had been instances, far more than was generally 
realized, when the disasters involved beings unknown to the Federation in 
urgent need of help, help which the would-be rescuers were powerless to give.
Only when the rescue ship concerned had the capability of extending its 
hyperspace envelope to include the distressed vessel, or the survivors could be 
extricated safely and a suitable environment provided for them within the 
Federation ship, could they be transported to Sector General for treatment. The 
result was that many hitherto unknown life-forms, entities of high intelligence 
and advanced technology, were lost except as interesting specimens for 
dissection and study.
But an answer to this problem had been sought and, hopefully, found.
"It was decided to build and equip a very special ambulance ship," Conway 
continued, "which would give priority to answering distress signals whose 
positions did not agree with the flight plans filed by Federation vessels. The 
First Contact people consider Rhabwar to be the near-perfect answer in that we 
involve ourselves only with star^traveling species, beings who are expecting to 
encounter new and to them alien life-forms and who, should they get into 
trouble, would not be expected to display serious xenophobic reactions when we 
try to help them. Another reason why the cultural contact people prefer meeting 
star travelers to planetbound species is that they can never be sure whether 
they are helping or hindering the newly discovered culture's natural 
development, giving them a technological leg up or a crushing inferiority 
complex.
"Anyway," Conway said, smiling as he pointed at Nelson's main display where the 
newly arrived scoutships covered the screen, "now you know that it is Rhabwar 
which has the rank and not any member of its crew."
Nelson was looking only slightly less impressed, but before
he could speak the voices of two scoutship commanders reporting to Rhabwar 
sounded in quick succession. Both vessels had emerged from hyperspace close to 
sections of alien space station and were already returning to the rendezvous 
point with them in tow on long-focus tractor beams. In both cases the sections 
gave sensor indications of life on board.
"The news isn't all good, however," Nelson said, pointing at his main display 
where an enlarged picture of the section toward which they were heading filled 
the screen. "That one has taken a beating and I don't see how the occupant could 
have survived."
Conway nodded, and as the wrecked section turned slowly to present an end view, 
Murchison added, "Obviously it didn't."
The, alien cylinder had been dented and punctured by multiple collisions with 
some of the structural members which had furnished the supporting framework of 
the original space station and which was still drifting nearby. Amid the loose 
tangle of debris was one of the section's circular endplates, and from the open 
end of .the compartment the body of its occupant protruded like an enormous, 
dessicated caterpillar.
"Can you relay ihis picture to RhabwarT Conway asked.
"If I can get a word in edgewise," Nelson replied, glancing at his speaker, 
which was carrying a continuous, muted conversation between, Fletcher and the 
scoutships.
Murchison had been staring intently at the screen. She said suddenly, "It would 
be a waste of time examining that cadaver out here. Can you put a tractor on it, 
Captain, and take us back to RhabwarT
"We'll need to bring back the wreck for study as well," Conway said. "The 
life-support and suspended animation systems will give us important information 
on the being's physiology and"
"Excuse me, Doctor," Nelson said. For several seconds the voices from Rhabwar 
and the scoutships had been silent and the Captain had seized the chance to send 
a message of his own. He went on, "Tyrell here. Will you accept a visual relay, 
Rhabwarl Doctor Conway thinks it's important."
"Go ahead, Tyrell" Fletcher's voice said. "All other traffic wait out."
There was a long silence while Rhabwar's Captain studied
ii I C
the image of the slowly rotating wreck and the attached cadaver, long enough 
,for it to make three complete revolutions, then Fletcher spoke. The tone and 
words were so uncharacteristic that they scarcely recognized his voice. "I'm a 
fool, a stupid damned fool for not seeing it!"
It was Murchison who asked the obvious question. "For not seeing how that 
endplate opened," Fletcher replied. He made several more self-derogatory remarks 
in an undertone, then went on, "It drops out, or there is probably a 
spring-loaded actuator which pushes it out through the slot which you can see 
behind the coupling collar. No doubt there is an internal air pressure sensor 
linked to the actuator to keep the endplate from popping out accidentally when 
the section is in space or the adjoining section is airless. Do you intend 
returning with this section and not just the cadaver?"
The tone of the question suggested that if such was not the Doctor's intention, 
then forceful arguments would be forthcoming to make him change his mind.
"As quickly as possible," Conway said dryly. "Pathologist Murchison is just as 
keen to look inside that alien as you are to look inside its ship. Please ask 
Naydrad to stand by the Casualty Lock."
"Will do," Fletcher said. He paused for a moment, then went on seriously, "You 
realize, Doctor, that the manner in which these cylinders open means that their 
occupants were sealed into their suspended animation compartments while in 
atmosphere, almost certainly on their home planet, and the cylinders were not 
meant to be opened until their arrival on the target world. These people are 
members of a-sublight colonization attempt."
"Yes," Conway said absently. He was thinking about the probable reaction of the 
hospital to receiving a bunch of outsize, hibernating e-ts who were not, 
strictly speaking, patients but the survivors of a failed colonization flight. 
Sector General was a hospital, not a refugee camp. It would insist, and rightly, 
that the colonists be transferred either to their planet of origin or 
destination. Since the surviving colonists were in no immediate danger there 
might be no need to involve the hospital at all  or the ambulance ship  except 
in an advisory capacity. He added, "We are going to need more help."
"Yes," Fletcher said with great feeling. It was obvious that his thinking had 
been parallelling Conway's. "Rhabwar out."
By the time Tyrell had returned to the assembly area, it was beginning to look 
congested. Twenty-eight hibernation compartmentsall of which, according to 
Prilicla, contained living e-tshung in the darkness like a gigantic, 
three-dimensional picture showing the agglutinization of a strain of rod-shaped 
bacilli. Each section had been numbered for later identification and 
examination. There were no other scoutships in the area because they were busy 
retrieving more cylinders.
Even with the Casualty Deck's artificial gravity switched off and tractor beams 
aiding the transfer, it took Murchison, Naydrad, and Conway more than an hour to 
extricate the cadaver from its wrecked compartment and bring it into Rhabwar. 
Once inside it flowed over the examination table on each side and on to 
intrument trolleys, beds, and whatever else could be found around the room to 
support its massive, coiling body.
Fletcher paid them a visit some hours later to see the cadaver at close range, 
but he had chosen a moment when Murchison's investigation was moving from the 
visual examination to the dissection stage and his stay was brief. As he was 
leaving he said, "When you can be spared here, Doctor, would you mind coming up 
to Control?"
Conway nodded without looking up from his scanner examination of one of the 
alien's breathing orifices and its tracheal connection. The Captain had left 
when he straightened up a few minutes later and said, "I just can't make head or 
tail of this thing."
"That is understandable, Doctor," Naydrad said, who belonged to a very 
literal-minded species. "The being appears to have neither."
Murchison looked up from her microscopic examination of a length of nerve 
ganglia and rubbed her eyes. She said, "Naydrad is quite right. Both head and 
tail sections are absent and may have been surgically removed, although I cannot 
be certain of that even though there are indications of minor surgery having 
taken place at one extremity. All that we know for sure is that it is a 
warm-blooded oxygen breather and probably an adult. I say 'probably' despite the 
fact that the creature in the first cylinder was relatively more massive. 
Genetic factors gen-
vvni i c
erally make for size differences among the adults of most species, so I cannot 
assume that it is an adolescent or younger. Of one thing I am sureThornnastor 
is going to enjoy itself with this one."
"So are you," Conway said.
She smiled tiredly and went on, "I don't wish to give the impression that you 
are not helping, Doctor. You are. But I had the distinct feeling back there that 
the Captain was just being polite, and he wants to see you very urgently."
Prilicla, who had been resting on the ceiling between trips outside to monitor 
the emotional radiation of newly arrived survivors, made trilling and clicking 
noises which translated as "For a nonempath, friend Murchison, your feeling was 
re^ markably accurate."
When Conway entered Control a few mintues later, both captains were present and 
they looked relieved to see him. It was Nelson who spoke first.
"Doctor," he said quickly, "I think this rescue mission is getting out of hand. 
So far thirty-eight contacts have been made and the sensors report the presence 
of life on all but two of them, and more cylinders are being reported every few 
minutes. They are all uniform in size and the present indications are that there 
are many more sections out there than would be necessary to complete one Wheel."
"If, for technical or physiological reasons, the alien vessel had to have the 
configuration of a Wheel," Conway said thoughtfully, "then it could have been 
built, as were some of our early space stations, in a series of concentric 
circles, as wheels within wheels."
Nelson shook his head. "The longitudinal curvature on all sections is identical. 
Could there have been two Wheels, separate but identical vessels, which were in 
collision?"
"I disagree with the collision theory," Fletcher said, joining in for the first 
time. "At least between two or more Wheels. There are far too many survivors and 
undamaged sections for that. Their vessel seems to have fallen apart. I think 
there was a high-velocity collision with a natural body, the shock of which 
shook the hub and central support structure apart."
Conway was trying to visualize the finished shape of this
alien jigsaw puzzle. He said, "But you still think there was more than one 
Wheel?"
"Not exactly," Fletcher replied. "Two of them mounted side by side, with a 
different alien or set of aliens in each. Right now we don't know whether we are 
retrieving single aliens who have been surgically modified for travel or pieces 
of much larger creatures, and we won't know how many we are dealing with until 
the scoutships begin bringing back heads and tails. I'm assuming that all of the 
occupants were in suspended animation and their ship ran itself, accelerating 
or decelerating along its vertical axis. If I'm right then the hub wreckage 
should contain the remains of just one propulsion unit and one section which 
contained the automatic navigation and sensor equipment."
Conway nodded. "A neat theory, Captain. Is it possible to prove it?"
Fletcher smiled and said, "All of the pieces are out there, even though some of 
them will be smashed into their component parts and difficult to identify, but 
given time and the necessary assistance we could fit them together."
"You mean reconstruct it?"
"Perhaps," Fletcher replied in an oddly neutral tone. "But is it really any of 
our business?"
Conway opened his mouth, intending to tell the other exactly what he thought of 
a damn fool question like that, then closed it again when he saw the expressions 
on both captains' faces.
For the truth was that the situation which was developing here was no longer any 
of their business. Rhabwar was an ambulance ship, designed and provisioned for 
short-duration missions aimed at the rescue, emergency treatment, and transfer 
to the hospital of survivors of accident or disease in space. But these 
survivors did not require treatment or fast transport to the hospital. They had 
been in suspended animation for a long time and would be capable of remaining in 
that condition without harm for a long time to come. Reviving them and, more 
important, relocating them on a suitable planet would be a major project.
The sensible thing for Conway to do would be to bow out gracefully and dump the 
problem in the laps of the cultural
I HO
jmivico vvni i
contact specialists. Rhabwar could then return to its dock and the medical team 
could go back to treating the weird and wonderful variety of patients who 
turned up at Sector General while they waited for the next distress call for 
their special ambulance ship.
But the two men watching him so intently were a scoutship commander on survey 
duty, who would be lucky if he turned up one inhabited system in ten years of 
searching, and Major Fletcher, Rhabwar's Captain and a recognized authority in 
the field of extraterrestrial comparative technologyand the rescue of this e-t 
sublight colonization transport could well be the biggest problem to face the 
Federation since the discovery and treatment of the continent-girdling strata 
creature of Drambo/
Conway looked from Nelson to Fletcher, then said quietly, "You're right, 
Captain, this isn't our responsibility. It is Cultural Contact's problem, and 
they would not think any the less of us, in fact they would expect us to hand it 
over to them. But I get the impression that you don't want me to do that."
Fletcher shook his head firmly and Nelson said, "Doctor, if you have any friends 
in authority, tell them I would willingly give an arm or a leg to be allowed to 
stay on this one."
A cool, logical portion of Conway's mind was urging him to do the sensible 
thing, to think about what he was letting himself in for and to remember who 
would be blamed if things went wrong, but it never had any hope of winning that 
argument.
"Good," Conway said, "that makes it unanimous."
They were both grinning at him in a manner totally unbefitting their rank and 
responsibilities, as if he had bestowed some great favor instead of condemning 
them to months of unremitting mental and physical hard labor. He went on, "As 
the ship responsible for making the original find, Tyrell would be justified in 
remaining, and as the medical team in attendance, the same applies to Rhabwar. 
But we are going to need a lot of help, and if we are to have any hope of 
getting it you will have to give me detailed information on every aspect of this 
problem, not just the medical side, and answers to the questions which are going 
to be asked.
"To begin with, I shall need to know a great deal more about the physiology of 
the survivors, and you will have to
btJ I UM UtlNtHAL
llf
find me a couple of additional cadavers for Thornnastor, the hospital's 
Diagnostician-in-Charge of Pathology. It has six feet and weighs half a ton and 
if Murchison and I don't come up with some sensible conclusions about this 
life-form, and specimens for Thorny to investigate independently, it will walk 
all over me. And what O'Mara and Skempton will do"
'They're public servants, Doctor," Nelson said, grinning. "You have the rank."
Conway got to his feet and said very seriously, "This is not simply a matter of 
whistling up another flotilla of scoutships, gentlemen, and something more than 
a hyperspace signal will be needed this time. To get the help we need I'll have 
to go back to the hospital and argue and plead, and probably thump the table a 
bit."
As he entered the gravity-free central well and began pulling himself toward the 
Casualty Deck he could hear Fletcher saying, "That wasn't much of an 
inducement, Nelson. Most of his highly placed friends have more arms and legs 
than they know what to do with."
Leaving Rhabwar and the rest of the medical team at the disaster site, Conway 
traveled to Sector General in Tyrell. He had requested an urgent meeting with 
the hospital's big three Skempton, Thornnastor, and O'Maraas soon as the 
scoutship had emerged into normal space. The request had been granted but Chief 
Psychologist O'Mara had told him curtly that there would be no point trying to 
start the meeting prematurely by worrying out loud over the communication 
channel, so Conway had to curb his impatience and try to marshal his arguments 
while Sector General slowly grew larger in the forward view-screen.
When Conway arrived in the Chief Psychologist's office, Thornnastor, Skempton, 
and O'Mara were already waiting for him. Colonel Skempton, as the ranking 
Monitor Corps officer in the hospital, was occupying the only other chair, apart 
from O'Mara's own, which was suitable for the use of Earth-humans; Thornnastor, 
like the other members of the Tralthan species, did everything including 
sleeping on its six, elephantine feet.
The Chief Psychologist waved a hand at the selection of e-t furniture ranged in 
front of his desk and said, "Take a seat
vvm 11
if you can do so without injuring yourself, Doctor, and make your report."
Conway arranged himself carefully in a Kelgian relaxer frame and began to 
describe briefly the events from the time Rhabwar had arrived in response to 
Tyrell's distress beacon. He told of the investigation of the first section of 
the fragmented alien vessel which was the product of a race in the early stage 
of spaceship technology, possessing sublight drive and gravity furnished by 
rotating their ship. Every undamaged section found had contained an e-t in 
suspended animation. For this reason additional scoutships had been requested to 
help find and retrieve the remaining survivors as a matter of urgency because 
the majority of these widely scattered suspended animation' compartments would, 
in just under twelve weeks' time, fall into or pass so close to a nearby sun 
that the beings inside them would perish.
While Conway was speaking, O'Mara stared at him with eyes which opened into a 
mind so perceptive and analytical that it gave the Chief Psychologist what 
amounted to a telepathic faculty. Thornnastor's four eyes were focused equally 
on Conway and Colonel Skempton, who was staring down at his scratch pad where he 
was drawing a circle and going over it repeatedly without lifting his stylus. 
Conway found himself watching the pad as well, and abruptly he stopped talking.
Suddenly they were staring at him with all of their eyes, and Skempton said, 
"I'm sorry, Doctor, does my doodling distract you?"
"To the contrary, sir," Conway said, smiling, "you have helped a lot."
Ignoring the Colonel's baffled expression, Conway went on, "Our original theory 
was that a sublight vessel with the configuration of a rotating wheeltype space 
station suffered a catastrophic malfunction or collision which carried away its 
hub-mounted propulsion and navigation systems, and jarred the rim structure 
apart; the subsequent dispersal of the suspended animation containers was aided 
by the centrifugal force which furnished their ship with artificial gravity. But 
the number of sections found just before I left the area were more than enough 
to form three complete Wheels and, because I have been bothered by the fact 
that no head segments have been found so far,
I have decided to discard the Wheel or multiple Wheel theory in favor of the 
more simple configuration suggested by the Colonel's sketch of a continuous"
"Doctor," Thornnastor broke in firmly. As the Diagnosti-cian-in-Charge of 
Pathology it had a tendency toward single-mindedness where its specialty was 
concerned. "Kindly describe in detail and give me the physiological 
classification of this life-form and, of course, your assessment of the number 
of casualties we will be required to treat. And are specimens of this life-form 
available for study?"
Conway felt his face reddening as he made an admission no Senior Physician on 
the staff of Sector General should ever have to make. He said, "We cannot 
classify this life-form with complete certainty, sir. But I have brought you two 
cadavers in the hope that you may be able to do so. As I have already said, the 
survivors are still inside their suspended animation compartments and the 
relatively few who did not survive are in a badly damaged conditionin several 
pieces, in fact."
Thornnastor made untranslatable noises which probably signified approval, then 
it said, "Had they not been in pieces, I would soon have rendered them so. But 
the fact that neither Murchison nor yourself are sure of their classification 
surprises and intrigues me, Doctor. Surely you are able to form a few tentative 
conclusions?"
Conway was suddenly glad that Prilicla was still on board Rhabwar because his 
embarrassment would have given the little empath a bad fit of the shakes. He 
said, "Yes, sir. The being we examined was a warm-blooded oxygen breather with 
the type of basic metabolism associated with that physiological grouping. The 
cadaver was massive, measuring approximately twenty meters in length and three 
meters in diameter, excluding projecting appendages. Physically it resembles the 
DBLF Kelgian life-form, but many times larger and possessing a leathery 
tegument rather than the silver fur of the Kelgians. Like the DBLFs it is 
multipedal, but the manipulatory appendages are positioned in a single row along 
the back.
"There were twenty-one of these dorsal limbs, all showing evidence of early 
evolutionary specialization. Six of them were long, heavy, and claw-tipped and 
were obviously evolved for defense since the being was a herbivore, and there 
were fifteen
in five groups of three spaced between the six heavier tentacles. Each of the 
thinner limbs terminated in four digits, two of which were opposable, and were 
manipulatory appendages originally evolved for gathering and transferring food 
to the mouths, of which there are three on each flank opening into three 
stomachs. Two additional orifices on each side open into a very large and 
complex lung. The structure inside these breathing orifices suggests that 
expelled air could be interrupted and modulated to produce intelligence-bearing 
sounds. On the underside were three openings used for the elimination of wastes.
"The mechanism of reproduction was unclear," he continued, "and the specimen 
showed evidence of possessing both male and female genitalia on the forward and 
rear extremities, respectively. The brain, if it was the brain, took the form of 
a cable of nerve ganglia with localized swellings in three places, running 
longitudinally through the cadaver like a central core. There was another and 
much thinner nerve cable running parallel to the thicker core, but below it and 
about twenty-five centimeters from the underside. Positioned close to each 
extremity were two sets of three eyes, two of which were mounted dorsally and 
two on the forward and rear flanks. They were recessed but capable of limited 
extension and together gave the being complete and continuous vision vertically 
and horizontally. The type and positioning of the visual equipment and 
appendages suggest that it evolved on a very unfriendly world.
"Our tentative classification of the being," Conway ended, "was an incomplete 
CRLT."
"Incomplete?" Thornnastor said.
"Yes, sir," Conway said. "The cadaver we examined had sustained minimum damage 
since it had died during a slow decompression while in suspended animation. We 
could be wrong, but there were signs of some kind of radical surgery having 
taken place, a double removal of what may have been the head and tail of the 
being. This was not a traumatic amputation caused by the disaster to their 
ship, but a deliberate procedure which may have been required to fit the being 
into its suspended animation container for the colonization attempt. The body 
tegument overall is thick and very tough, but at the extremities the only 
protection is a hard, transparent layer of
organic material, and the underlying protrusions, fissures, orifices, and 
musculature look raw. This suggests"
"Conway," O'Mara said sharply, with a glance toward the suddenly paling Colonel. 
"With respect to Thornnastor, you have moved too quickly -from the general to 
the particular. Please confine yourself at this stage to a simple statement of 
the problem and your proposed solution."
Colonel Skempton was the man responsible for making Sector General function as 
an organization but, as he was fond of telling his medical friends when they 
started to talk shop in grisly detail, he was a glorified bookkeeper, not a 
bloody surgeon! The trouble was that there was no way Conway could state his 
problem simply without offending the sensibilities of the overly squeamish 
Colonel.
"Simply," Conway said, "the problem is a gigantic, worm-like entity, perhaps 
five kilometers or more in length, which has been chopped into many hundreds of 
pieces. The indicated treatment is to join the pieces together again, in the 
correct order."
The Colonel's stylus stopped in mid-doodle, Thornnastor made a loud, 
untranslatable sound, and O'Mara, normally a phlegmatic individual, said with 
considerable vehemence, "Conway, you are not considering bringing thatthat 
Midgard Serpent to the hospital?"
Conway shook his head. "The hospital is much too small to handle it."
"And so," Skempton said, looking up for the first time, "is your ambulance 
ship."
Before Conway could reply, Thornnastor said, "I find it difficult to believe 
that the entity you describe could survive such radical amputation. However, if 
Prilicla and yourself state that the separate sections so far recovered are 
alive, then I must accept it. But have you considered the possibility that it is 
a group entity, similar to the Telphi life-form which are stupid as individuals 
but highly intelligent as a gestalt? Physical fragmentation in those 
circumstances would be slightly more credible, Doctor."
"Yes, sir, and we have not yet discarded that possibility" Conway began.
"Very well, Doctor," O'Mara broke in dryly. "You may restate the problem in less 
simple form."
The problem... thought Con way.
He began by asking them to visualize the vast, alien ship as it had been before 
the disasternot the multiple Wheel shape first discussed but a great, 
continuous, open coil of constant diameter and similar in configuration to the 
shape on the Colonel's pad. The separate turns of the coil had been laced 
together by an open latticework of metal beams which held the vessel together as 
a rigid unit and provided the structural support needed along the thrust axis 
during take-off, acceleration, and landing. Assembled in orbit, the ship had 
been approximately five hundred meters in diameter and close on a mile long, 
with* its power and propulsion system at one end of an axial support structure 
and the automatic guidance system and sensors at the other.
The exact nature of the accident or malfunction was not yet known, but judging 
by the observed effects it had been caused by a collision with a large natural 
object which, striking the vessel head-on, had taken out the guidance system 
forward, the axial structure, and the stern thrusters. The shock of the 
collision had shaken the great, rotating coil into its component suspended 
animation compartments, and centrifugal force had done the rest.
"This beingor beingsis so physiologically constituted," Conway went on, "that 
to assist it we must first rebuild its ship and land it successfully. Fitting 
the pieces together again can be done most easily in weightless conditions. The 
fact that the twenty-meter sections of the coil have flown apart but retained 
their positions with respect to each other will greatly assist the reassembly 
operation"
"Wait, wait," the Colonel said. "I cannot see this operation being possible, 
Doctor. For one thing, you will need a very potent computer indeed to work out 
the trajectories of those expanding sections accurately enough to return them to 
their original positions in thisthis jigsaw puzzleand the equipment needed to 
reassemble it would be"
"Captain Fletcher says it is possible," Conway said firmly-"Piecing together the 
remains of an extraterrestria] ship has
bbU IUH UtNtHAL
been done before, and much valuable knowledge was gained in the process. 
Admittedly, on previous occasions there were no living survivors to be pieced 
together as well and the work was on a much smaller scale."
"Much smaller," O'Mara said dryly. "Captain Fletcher is a theoretician and 
Rhabwar is his first operational command. Is he happy ordering three scoutship 
flotillas around?"
The Chief Psychologist was considering the problem in the terms of his own 
specialty, Conway knew, and as usual O'Mara was a jump ahead of everyone else.
"He seems to enjoy worrying about it," Conway said carefully, "and there are no 
overt signs of megalomania."
O'Mara nodded and sat back in his chair.
But the Colonel could jump to correct conclusions as well, if not always as 
quickly as the Chief Psychologist. He said, "Surely, O'Mara, you are not 
suggesting that Rhabwar direct this operation? It's too damned big, and 
expensive. It has to be referred up to"
"There isn't time for committee decisions," Conway began.
"the Federation Council," the Colonel finished. "And anyway, did Fletcher tell 
you how he proposed fitting this puzzle together?"
Conway nodded. "Yes, sir. It is a matter of basic design philosophy,.." Captain 
Fletcher was of the opinionan opinion shared by the majority of the 
Federation's top designers that any piece of machinery beyond a certain degree 
of complexity, be it a simple groundcar or a spaceship one kilometer long, 
required an enormous amount of prior design work, planning and tooling long 
before the first simple parts and subas-semblies could become three-dimensional 
metal on someone^s workbench. The number of detail and assembly drawings, 
wiring diagrams, and so on for even a small spaceship was mind-staggering, and 
the purpose of all this paperwork was simply to instruct beings of average 
intelligence how to manufacture and fit together the pieces of the jigsaw 
without knowing, or perhaps even caring, anything about the completed picture.
If normal Earth-human, Tralthan, Illensan, and Melfan practice was observedand 
the engineers of those races and many others insisted that there was no easier 
waythen those drawings and the components they described must include 
instructions, identifying symbols, to guide the builders in the correct placing 
of these parts within the jigsaw.
Possibly there were extraterrestrial species which used more exotic methods of 
identifying components before assembly, such as tagging each part with an 
olfactory or tactile coding system, but this, considering the tremendous size of 
the coil ship and the number of parts to be identified and joined, would 
represent a totally unnecessary complication unless there were physiological 
reasons for doing things the hard way.
The cadaver had possessed eyes which operated within the normal visible 
spectrum, and Captain Fletcher was sure that the alien shipbuilders would do 
things the easy way by marking the surface of the components with identifying 
symbols which could be read at a glance. Following a detailed examination of a 
damaged suspended animation cylinder and the remains of its supporting 
framework, Fletcher found that the system of identification used was groups of 
symbols vibro-etched into the metal, and that adjoining components bore the same 
type and sequence of symbols except for the final letter or number. "Clearly 
they think, and put their spaceships together, much the same as we do," Conway 
concluded.
"I see," the Colonel said. He sat forward in his chair. "But decoding those 
symbols and fitting the parts .together will take a lot of time."
"Or a lot of extra help," Conway said. Skempton sat back, shaking his head. 
Thornnastor was silent also, but the slow, impatient thumping of its massive 
feet indicated that it was not likely to remain so for long. It was O'Mara who 
spoke first.
"What assistance will you need, Doctor?" Conway looked gratefully at the Chief 
Psychologist for getting straight to the point as well as for the implied 
support. But he knew that O'Mara would withdraw that support without hesitation 
if he had the slightest doubt about Conway's ability to handle the problem. If 
Conway was to be confirmed in this assignment, he would have to convince O'Mara 
that he knew exactly what he was doing. He cleared his throat.
"First," he said, "we should initiate an immediate search for the vessel's home 
world so that we can learn as much as possible about this entity's culture, 
environment, and food requirements, as well as having somewhere to put it when 
the rescue is complete. It is almost certain that the disaster caused a large 
deviation in the coilship's course, and it is possible that the vessel suffered 
a guidance malfunction not associated with the accident which fragmented it, and 
it has already overshot the target world. This would complicate the search and 
increase the number of units conducting it."
Before the Colonel could react, Conway went on quickly, "I also need a search of 
the Federation Archives. For many centuries before the Federation came into 
being there were species who possessed the startravel capability and did a lot 
of independent exploration. There is a slight chance that one of them may have 
encountered or heard reports of an entity resembling an intelligent Midgard 
Serpent"
He broke off, then for Thornnastor's benefit he explained that the Midgard 
Serpent was a creature of Earth-human mythology, an enormous snake which was 
supposed to have encircled the planet with its tail in its mouth. Thornnastor 
thanked him and expressed its relief that the being was mythological.
"Until now," the Colonel said sourly.
"Second," Conway went on, "comes the problem of rapid retrieval and placement of 
the scattered suspended animation cylinders. Many more scoutships will be 
required, supported by all of the available specialists in e-t languages and 
technical notation systems, and computer facilities capable of analyzing this 
material. A large, ship-borne translation computer should be able to handle the 
job"
"That means Descartes'" Skempton protested.
"In the time remaining to us," Conway resumed, "and I hear Descartes recently 
completed its first contact program on Dwerla and is free. But the third and 
most technically difficult part of the problem is the reassembly. For this we 
need fleet auxiliaries with the engineering facilities and space construction 
personnel capable of rapidly rebuilding those parts of the alien vessel's 
supporting framework which cannot be salvaged from the wreckage. Ideally the 
people concerned should be experienced Tralthan and Hudlar space construction 
teams.
"Four," he continued, allowing no time for objections, "we need a ship capable 
of coordinating the reassembly operation.
and mounting a large number of tractor and pressor beam batteries with officers 
highly trained in their use. This will reduce the risk of collision in the 
assembly area between the retrieved sections and our own ships. The coordinating 
vessel will have its own computer capable of handling the logistic"
"Vespasian, he wants," Skempton said dully.
"Yes, its tactical computer would be ideal," Conway replied. "It also has the 
necessary tractor and pressor batteries and, I believe, a very large cargo lock 
in case I have to withdraw some of the CRLTs from their suspended animation 
compartments. Remember, several segments of the entity were destroyed and 
surgery may be required in these areas to close the gaps. But until we know a 
great deal more about this entity's, physiology and environment I have no clear 
idea of the type and quantity of medical assistance which will be needed."
"At last," Thornnastor growled through its translator, "you are about to discuss 
the needs of the patient."
"The delay was intentional, sir," Conway said, "since we must repair the ship 
before we can help the occupant. Regarding this entity, or entities, Pathologist 
Murchison and myself have examined one cadaver and we seek confirmation of our 
preliminary findings and as much additional physiological data as you can 
provide from the specimens brought back in Tyrell, and from the contents of the 
intravenous infusion equipment which is used, apparently, to induce, extend, and 
reverse the suspended animation process. Specifically, we require much more 
information on the nervous system, the linkages to the voluntary and involuntary 
musculature, the degree and rapidity of tissue regeneration we can expect if 
surgical intervention is necessary and additional data on the transparent 
material which covers and protects the raw areas at the forward and rear 
extremities. Naturally, sir, this information is required the day before 
yesterday."
"Naturally," Thornnastor growled. Its six elephantine feet, which had been 
silent while Conway was speaking, resumed their slow thumping. Clearly-the 
Tralthan was eager to go to work on those specimens of the completely new 
life-form.
O'Mara waited for precisely three seconds, then he scowled up at Conway and 
said, "And that is all you require. Doctor?"
Conway nodded. "For the present."
OCOIU
Colonel Skempton leaned forward and said caustically, "'For the present he needs 
the services of a Sector subfleet, including Descartes and Vespasian. Before we 
can recommend the deployment of so many Service units we should refer the 
matter to the Federation Council for" He broke off because the thumping of 
Thornnastor's feet was making conversation difficult.
"Your pardon, Colonel," the Tralthan said, "but it seems to me that if we refer 
this matter to the Council they will ponder on it at great length and then 
decide to make it the responsibility of the beings best able to understand and 
solve the problem, who are the entities comprising the technical and medical 
crew of Rhabwar. The special ambulance ship program was designed to deal with 
the unexpected, and the fact that this problem is unexpectedly large is beside 
the point.
"This is an entity, or entities, of a hitherto unknown species," it went on, 
"and I recommend that Senior Physician Conway be given the assistance he 
requires to rescue and treat it. However, I have no objection to you 
recommending this course and referring the matter to the Council for discussion 
and ratification, and for amendment should they come up with a better idea. 
Well, Colonel?"
Skempton shook his head. He said doggedly, "It's wrong, I know it's wrong, for a 
newly appointed ship commander and a medic to be given so much authority. But 
the Rhabwar people are the only ones who know what they are doing at the moment. 
Reluctantly, I agree. O'Mara?"
All their eyes, the Colonel's and Conway's two and Thorn-nastor's four, were on 
the Chief Psychologist, who kept his steadily on Conway. Finally he spoke.
"If you have nothing else to say, Doctor," he said dryly, "I suggest you return 
to Rhabwar as quickly as possible before the area becomes so congested that you 
can't find your own ship."
The reaction time of the Monitor Corps to an emergency large or small was 
impressively fast. In Tyrell's forward view-screen the area resembled a small, 
untidy star cluster in which Rhabwar's beacon flashed at its center like a 
short-term variable. Apart from acknowledging their arrival and giving them
permission to lock on, Fletcher did not speak to them because, he explained, 
fifteen more scoutships had arrived unexpectedly and he was busy fitting them 
into his retrieval program. For this reason Conway did not get an opportunity to 
tell him about the other unexpected things which were about to happen until he 
was back on board the ambulance ship, and by that time it was too late.
"Rkabwar," a voice said from the wall speaker as Conway entered Control, "this 
is the survey and cultural contact vessel Descartes, Colonel Okaussie 
commanding. I'm told you have work for us, Major Fletcher."
"Well, yes, sir," the Captain said. He looked appealingly at Conway, then went 
on, "If 1 might respectfully suggest, sir,, that your translation specialists"
"I'd rather you didn't," Colonel Okaussie broke in. "Respectfully suggest, I 
mean. When I know as much about this situation as you do I'll accept 
suggestions, respectful or otherwise. But until then, Major, stop wasting time 
and tell me what you want us to do."
"Yes, sir," Fletcher said. Speaking quickly, concisely, and, out of habit, 
respectfully, he did just that. Then a few seconds after he broke contact the 
radar screen showed a new trace which was even larger than Descartes. It 
identified itself as the Hudlar-crewed depot ship Motann, a star-going 
engineering complex normally used to bring technical assistance to vessels whose 
hyperdrive generators had failed noncatastrophically leaving them stranded in 
normal space between the stars. Its captain, who was not a Monitor Corps 
officer, was also happy to take his instructions from Fletcher. But then ah even 
larger blip appeared on the screen, indicating that a very large ship indeed had 
just emerged from hyperspace. Automatically Lieutenant Haslam fed the bearing 
to the telescope and tapped for maximum magnification.
The tremendous, awe-inspiring sight of an Emperor-class battlecruiser filled the 
screen.
"Rhabwar, this is Vespasian
Fletcher paled visibly at the thought of giving instructions to the godlike 
entity who would be in command of that ship, whose communications officer was 
relaying the compliments of Fleet Commander Dermod and a request for full vision
contact as soon as convenient. Conway, who had not had time to tell the Captain 
what to expect because it was already happening, got to his feet.
"I'll be in the Casualty Deck lab," he said. Grinning, he reached across to clap 
Fletcher reassuringly on the shoulder and added, "You're doing fine, Captain. 
Just remember that, a long, long time ago, the Fleet Commander was a major, 
too."
The conversation between Fletcher and the Fleet Commander, complete with 
visuals, was on the Casualty Deck's repeater when he arrived, but the sound was 
muted because Prilicla was on another frequency giving instructions to one of 
the scoutship medical officers regarding a cadaver the other had found and which 
Murchison wanted brought in for examination. Murchison and Naydrad were still 
working on the first specimen, which had been reduced to what seemed to be its 
component parts.
Murchison nodded toward the repeater screen and said, "You seem to have been 
given everything you needed. Was O'Mara in a good mood?'.'
"His usual sarcastic, helpful self," Conway said, moving to join her at the 
dissection table. "Do we know anything more about this outsize boa constrictor?"
"I don't know what we know," she said crossly, "but / know a little more and 
feel more than a little confused by the knowledge. For instance..."
The thick pencil of nerve ganglia with its localized bunch-ings and swellings 
which ran through the center of the cylindrical body was, almost certainly, the 
CRLT's equivalent of a brain, and the idea of a missing head or tail was 
beginning to seem unlikelyespecially since the transparent material which 
covered the raw areas fore and aft was, despite its appearance, equally as tough 
as the being's leathery body tegument.
She had been successful in tracing the nerve connections between the core 
swellings and the eyes, mouths, and manipulatory appendages, and from both ends 
of the axial nerve bundle to the puzzling system of muscles which underlay the 
raw areas on the forward and rear faces of the creature.
The specimen appeared to be maleat least, the female genitalia at the other end 
were shrunken and seemed to be in a condition of early atrophyand she had 
identified the male
sperm generator and the method of transfer to a female.
"... There is evidence of unnatural organ displacement," she went on, "which can 
only be caused by weightlessness. Gravity, real or artificial, is a 
physiological necessity for this life-form. During hibernation the absence of 
weight would not be fatal, but weightlessness while conscious would cause severe 
nausea, sensory impairment, and, I feel sure, intense mental and physical 
distress."
Which meant that the being would have to be in position on the rim of its 
rotating vessel or affected by natural gravity, that of its target world, when 
it was revived. It isn't a doctor this patient needed, Con way thought wryly, 
it's a miracle worker!
"With the Captain's help," Murchison continued, "we have established that the 
medication which produces and or extends the hibernation anesthesia occupies the 
larger volume of a dispenser mechanism which also contains a smaller quantity 
of the complex organic secretion which can only be the reviver. Fletcher also 
traced the input to the automatic sensor and actuator which switches the 
mechanism from the hibernation to the resuscitation mode and found that it 
reacted to the combined presence of gravity and external pressure. The same 
actuator mechanism is also responsible for ejecting the endplates of its 
hibernation compartment which would enable the CRLT to disembark.
"Sooner or later we're going to have to revive one of these things," she ended 
worriedly, "and we'll have to be very sure that we know what we are doing."
Conway was already out of his spacesuit and climbing into his surgical 
coveralls. He said, "Anything in particular you'd like me to do?"
They worked on the cadaver while the hours flickered past on the time display to 
become days, then weeks. From time to time a terse, subspace message from 
Thornnastor would arrive confirming their findings or suggesting new avenues of 
investigation, but even so it seemed that their rate of progress was slow to 
nonexistent.
Occasionally they would look up at the Control Room repeater, but with 
decreasing frequency. Fletcher, a Hudlar space
construction specialist, and variously qualified Monitor Corps officers were 
usually showing each other pieces of twisted metal via their vision channels, 
comparing identification symbols and talking endlessly about them. No doubt it 
was all vitally important stuff, but it made boring listening. Besides, they 
had their own organic jigsaw puzzle to worry about.
A pleasant break in the routine would occur when they had to go outside to look 
at one of the other cadavers which had been brought in and attached to the outer 
hull, there being room for only one CRLT at a time inside Rhabwar. On these 
occasions the investigations were conducted in airless conditions and only the 
organic material which was of special interest to them was excised for later 
study. As a result they found a bewildering variety of age and sex combinations 
which seemed to indicate that the older CRLTs were well-developed males whose 
raw areas at each extremity had a brownish coloration, while the younger beings 
were clearly female and the areas concerned were a livid pink under the 
transparent covering.
Once there was a break in the investigative routine which was not pleasant.' For 
several hours they had been studying a flaccid, purplish lump of something which 
might have been the organic trigger for the being's hibernation phase, and 
making very little progress with it, when Prilicla broke into their angry, 
impatient silence.
"Friend Murchison," the empath said, "is feeling tired."
"I'm not," the pathologist said, with a yawn which threatened to dislocate her 
firm but beautifully formed lower mandible. "At least, I wasn't until you 
reminded me."
"As are you, friend Conway" Prilicla began, when there was an interruption. The 
furry features of Surgeon-Lieutenant Krach-Yul replaced the pieces of alien 
hardware which had been filling the repeater screen.
"Doctor Conway," the Orligian medic said, "I have to report an accident. Two 
Earth-human DBDGs, simple fractures, no decompression damage"
"Very well," said Conway, clenching his teeth on a yawn. "Now's your chance to 
get in some more other-species surgical experience."
"And a Hudlar engineer, physiological classification FROB," Krach-Yul went on. 
"It has sustained a deep, incised,
and lacerated wound which has been quickly but inadequately treated by the being 
itself. There has been a considerable loss of body fluid and associated internal 
pressure, diminished sen-soria, and"
"Coming," Conway said. To Murchison he muttered, "Don't wait up for me."
While Tyrell was taking him to the scene of the accident, an area where three of 
the coilship sections were being fitted together, Conway reviewed his 
necessarily scant surgical experience with the Hudlar life-form.
They were a species who rarely took sick, and then only during preadolescence, 
and they were fantastically resistant to physical injury, with eyes which were 
protected by a hardv transparent membrane, tegument like flexible armor, and no 
body orifices except for the temporary ones opened for mating and birth.
The FROBs were ideally suited to space construction projects. Their home 
planet, Hudlar, pulled four Earth gravities, and its atmospheric pressureif 
that dense, soupy mixture of oxygen, inerts, and masses of microscopic animal 
and vegetable nutrient in suspension could be called an atmosphere was seven 
times Earth-normal. At home they absorbed the food-laden air through their 
incredibly tough yet porous skin, while offplanet they sprayed themselves 
regularly and frequently with nutrient paint. Their six flexible and immensely 
strong limbs terminated in four-digited hands which, when the fingers were 
curled inward and the knuckles presented to the ground, served also as feet.
Environmentally, the Hudlars were a very adaptable species, because the 
physiological features which protected them against their own planet's crushing 
gravity and pressure also enabled them to work comfortably in any noncorrosive 
atmosphere of lesser pressure right down to and including the vacuum of space. 
The only item of equipment a Hudlar space construction engineer needed, apart 
from its tools, was a communicator which took the form of a small, air-filled 
blister enclosing its speaking membrane and a two-way radio.
Conway had not bothered to ask if there was an FROB medic on the Hudlar ship. 
Curative surgery had been a completely alien concept to that virtually 
indestructible species until
they had joined the Federation and learned about places like Sector General, so 
that medically trained Hudlars were about as rare outside the hospital as 
physically injured ones inside it.
Captain Nelson placed Tyrell within fifty meters of the scene of the accident. 
Conway headed for the injured Hudlar. Krach-Yul had already reached the 
Earth-human casualties, one of whom was blaming himself loudly and unprintably 
for causing the accident and tying up the suit frequency in the process.
Conway gathered that the two Earth-humans had been saved from certain death by 
being crushed between two slowly closing ship sections by the Hudlar interposing 
its enormously strong body, which would have escaped without injury if the 
jagged-edged stump of an external bracing member had not snagged one of the 
FROB's limbs close to the point where it joined the body.
When Conway arrived, the Hudlar was gripping the injured limb with three of its 
hands, tourniquet fashion, while the two free hands remaining were trying to 
hold the edges of the wound togetherunsuccessfully.' Tiny, misshapen globules 
of blood were forming between its fingers to drift weightlessly away, steaming 
furiously. It could not talk because its air bag had been lost, leaving its 
speaking membranes to vibrate silently in the vacuum.
Conway withdrew a limb sleeve-piece, the largest size he carried, from his 
Hudlar medical kit and motioned for the casualty to bare the wound.
He could see that it was a deep wound by the way the dark red bubbles grew 
suddenly larger before they broke away, but he was able to snap the sleeve-piece 
in position before too much blood was lost. Even so there was a considerable 
leakage around both ends of the sleeve as the Hudlar's high internal pressure 
tried to empty it of body fluids. Conway quickly attached circlips at each end 
of the sleeve and began to tighten one while the Hudlar itself tightened the 
other. Gradually the fluid loss slowed and then ceased, the casualty's hands 
drifted away from the injured limb, and its speaking membrane ceased its silent 
vibrating. The Hudlar had lost consciousness.
Ten minutes later the Hudlar was inside Tyrell's cargo lock and Conway was using 
his scanner to search for internal damage caused by the traumatic decompression. 
The longer he looked
the less he liked what he saw, and as he was concluding the examination 
Krach-Yul joined him.
"The Earth-humans are simple fracture cases, Doctor," the Orligian reported. 
"Before setting the bones I wondered if you, as a member of their own species, 
would prefer to"
"And rob you of the chance to increase your other-species experience?" Conway 
broke in. "No, Doctor, you treat them. They're on antipain, I take it, and there 
is no great degree of urgency?"
"Yes, Doctor," Krach-Yul said.
"Good," Conway said, "because I have another job for you looking after this 
Hudlar Until you can move it to Sector General. You will need a nutrient 
sprayer from the Hudlar ship, then arrange with Captain Nelson to increase the 
air pressure' and artificial gravity in this cargo lock to levels as close to 
Hudlar-normal as he can manage. Treatment will consist of spraying the casualty 
with nutrient at hourly intervals and checking on the cardiac activity, and 
periodically easing the tightness of the sleeve-piece if your scanner indicates 
a serious reduction of circulation to the injured limb. While you are doing 
these things you will wear two gravity neutralizers. If you were wearing one and 
it failed under four-G conditions there would be another seriously injured 
casualty, you.
"Normally I would travel with this patient," he went on, stifling a yawn, "but I 
have to be available in case something urgent develops with the CRLT. Hudlar 
surgery can be tricky so I'll tape some notes on this one for the operating 
team, including the suggestion that you be allowed to observe if you wish to do 
so."
"Very much," Krach-Yul said, "and thank you, Doctor."
"And now I'll leave you with your patients and return to Rhabwar" Conway said. 
Silently he added, to sleep.
"Tyrell was absent for eight days and was subsequently assigned to courier duty, 
taking specimens to Sector General and returning with information, advice, and 
detailed lists of questions regarding the progress of their work from 
Thomnas-tor. The great, spiral jigsaw puzzle which was the alien ship was 
beginning to take shapeor more accurately, to take a large number of 
semicircular and quarter-circular shapesas the hibernation cylinders were 
identified, positioned, and cou-
pled. Many of the cylinders were still missing because they had been so 
seriously damaged that their occupants had died or they had still to be found 
and retrieved by the scoutships.
Conway was worried because the incomplete coilship and the motley fleet of 
Monitor Corps vessels and auxiliaries were on a collision course with the nearby 
sun, which was growing perceptibly brighter every day. It was clearly evident 
that the growth rate of the alien vessel was much less perceptible. When he 
worried about it aloud to the Fleet Commander, Dermod told him politely to mind 
his own medical business.
Then a few days later Tyrell returned with information which made it very much 
his medical business.
Vespasian's communications officer, who was usually a master of the diplomatic 
delaying tactic, put him through to the Fleet Commander in a matter of seconds 
instead of forcing him to climb slowly up the ship's entire chain of command. 
This was not due to any sudden increase in Conway's standing with the senior 
Monitor Corps officer, but simply that while Conway was trying to reach Dermod, 
the Fleet Commander was trying to contact the Doctor.
It was Dermod who spoke first, with the slight artificiality of tone which told 
Conway that not only was the other in a hurry and under pressure but that there 
were other people present beyond the range of the vision pickup. He said, 
"Doctor, there is a serious problem regarding the final assembly phase and I 
need your help. You are already concerned over the limited time remaining to us 
and, frankly, I was unwilling to discuss the problem with you until I was able 
to present it, and the solution, in its entirety. This can now be done, in 
reverse order, preferably. My immediate requirement is for another capital ship. 
Claudius is available and"
"Why" Conway began, shaking his head in momentary confusion. He had been about 
to list his own problems and requirements and found himself suddenly on the 
receiving end.
"Very well, Doctor, I'll state the problem first," The Fleet Commander said, 
frowning as he nodded to someone out of sight. The screen blanked for a few 
seconds, then it displayed a black field on which there was a thick, vertical 
gray line. At the lower end of the line a fat red box appeared and on the 
opposite end a blue circle. Dermod went on briskly, "We now
have a pretty accurate idea of the configuration of the alien ship, and I am 
showing you a very simple representation because 1 haven't time to do otherwise 
right now.
"The ship had a central stem, the gray line," Dermod explained, "with the power 
plant and thrusters represented by the red box aft and the forward-mounted 
sensors and navigation systems shown as a blue circle. Since the ship's occupant 
was unconscious, all of these systems were fully automatic. The stem also 
provided the anchoring points for the structure which supported the inhabited 
coil. You will see that the main supports are angled forward to compensate for 
stresses encountered while the vessel was under power and during the landing 
maneuver."
A forest of branches grew suddenly from the stem, making it look like a squat, 
cylindrical Christmas tree standing in its * red tub and with a bright-blue 
fairy light at the top. Then the continuous spiral of linked hibernation 
compartments was attached to the ends of the branches, followed by the spacing 
members which separated each loop of the coil, and the picture lost all 
resemblance to a tree.
"The coil diameter remains constant throughout at just under five hundred 
meters," the Fleet Commander's voice continued. "Originally there were twelve 
turns of the coil and, with each hibernation cylinder measuring twenty meters in 
length, this means there were roughly eighty hibernating CRLTs in every loop of 
the coil and close on one thousand of the beings on the complete ship.
"Every loop of the coil was separated by a distance of seventy meters, so that 
the total height of the coilship was just over eight hundred meters. We were 
puzzled by this separation since it would have been structurally much simpler 
laying one on top of the other, but we now believe that the open coil 
configuration was designed both to reduce and localize meteorite collision 
damage and remove the majority of the hibernation compartments as far as 
possible from radiation leakage from the reactor at the stern. While encased in 
its rather unusual vessel we think the creature traveled tail-first so that its 
thinking end was at the stern to initiate disembarkation following the landing. 
Unfortunately, the stern section had to be heavier and more rigid than the 
forward structure since it had to support the weight of the vessel during 
deceleration and landing, and
so it was the stern which sustained most of the damage when the collision 
occurred, and most of the CRLT casualties were from the sternmost loop of the 
coil."
According to Vespasian's computer's reconstruction, the vessel had been in 
direct head-on collision with a large meteor, and the closing velocities 
involved had been such that the whole central stem had been obliterated, as if 
an old-time projectile hand weapon had been used to remove the core of an apple. 
Only a few scraps of debris from the power unit and guidance system 
remainedenough for identification purposes but not for reconstructionand the 
shock of the collision had shaken the overall coil structure apart.
On the screen the widely scattered hibernation compartments came together again 
into a not quite complete coil: There were several sections missing, 
particularly near the stern. Then the stem, its power and guidance systems, and 
the entire support structure disappeared from the display leaving only the 
incomplete coil.
"The central core of that vessel is a mass of pulverized wreckage many 
light-years away," Dermod continued briskly, "and we have decided that trying to 
salvage and reconstruct it would be an unnecessary waste of time and materiel 
when there is a simpler solution available. This requires the presence of a 
second Emperor-class vessel to"
"But why do you want?" Conway began.
"I am in the process of explaining why, Doctor," the Fleet Commander said 
sharply. The image on the screen changed again and he went on, "The two capital 
ships and Descartes will take up positions in close line-astern formation and 
lock onto each other with matched tractor and pressor beams. In effect this will 
convert the three ships into a single, rigid structure which will replace the 
alien vessel's central stem, and the branching members which supported the coil 
will also be non-material but equally rigid tractors and pressors.
"In the landing configuration Vespasian will be bottom of the heap," Dermod 
continued, with a tinge of pride creeping into his voice. "Our thrusters are 
capable of supporting the other two ships and the alien coilship during 
deceleration and landing, with Claudius and Descartes furnishing lateral 
stability and taking some of the load with surface-directed pressors.
After touchdown, the power reserves of all three vessels will be sufficient to 
hold everything together for at least twelve hours, which should be long enough, 
I hope, for the alien to leave its ship. If we can find somewhere to put it, 
that is."
The image flicked off to be replaced by the face of the Fleet Commander. "So you 
see, Doctor, I need Claudius to complete thisthis partly nonmaterial structure 
and to test its practicability in weightless conditions before working out the 
stresses it will have to undergo during the landing maneuver. Of equal urgency 
are the calculations needed to extend the combined hyperspace envelope of the 
three ships to enclose the coil and Jump with it out of here before this damn 
sun gets too close."
Conway was silent for a moment, inwardly cringing at the thought of some of the 
things which could go catastrophically wrong when three linked ships performed a 
simultaneous Jump. But he could not voice his concern because ship maneuvers 
were most decidedly the Fleet Commander's and not the Doctor's business, and 
Dermod would tell him so with justification. Besides, Conway had his own 
problems and right now he needed help with them.
"Sir" he said awkwardly, "your proposed solution is ingenious, and thank you 
for the explanation. But my original question was not regarding the reason why 
you wanted Claudius, but why you needed my help in the matter."
For a moment the Fleet Commander stared at him blankly, then his expression 
softened as he said, "My apologies, Doctor, if I seemed a trifle impatient with 
you. The position is this. Under the new Federation Council directive covering 
extraterrestrial rescue operations by Rhabwar, I am required in a large-scale 
combined medical and military operation of this kind to obtain your approval for 
additional personnel and materiel, specifically another capital ship. I assume 
it is forthcoming?"
"Of course," Conway said.
Dermod nodded pleasantly despite his obvious embarrassment, but the lines of 
impatience were beginning to gather again around his mouth as he said, "It will 
be sufficient if you tape a few words as the physician-in-charge of the case to 
the effect that Claudius is urgently required to ensure the present safety and 
continued well-being of your patient. But you were calling me, Doctor. Can I 
help you?"
"Yes, sir," Conway said, and went on quickly, "You have been concentrating on 
joining the coilship sections in proper sequence. Now I have to begin putting 
the patient together, with special emphasis on the joining of segments which are 
not in sequence. That is, the ones which were separated by the hibernation 
compartments whose occupants died. We are now sure that the being is a group 
entity whose individual members are independently intelligent and may be capable 
of linking up naturally to their adjoining group members when the conditions are 
right. This is the theory, sir, but it requires experimental verification.
"The entities who are out of sequence could pose serious problems," Conway 
concluded. "They will have to be removed from their hibernation compartments and 
presented to each other so that I may determine the extent of the surgical work 
involved in reassembling the group entity."
"Sooner you than me, Doctor," Dermod said with a brief grimace of sympathy. "But 
what exactly do you need?"
He is like O'Mara, Conway thought, impatient with confused thinking. He said, 
"I need two small ships to bring in the CRLT segments I shall specify and to 
return them to their places in the coil. Also a large cargo hold which can 
accommodate two of the hibernation cylinders joined end to end and the two 
beings which will be withdrawn from them. The hold is to be fitted with 
artificial gravity grids and nonmaterial restraints in case the conscious CRLTs 
become confused and aggressive, and personnel to operate this equipment. I know 
this will mean using the cargo lock and hold in one of the largest ships, but I 
require only the hold; the vessel can go about its assigned duties."
"Thank you," the Fleet Commander said dryly, then paused while someone offscreen 
spoke quietly to him. He went on, "You may use the forward hold in Descartes, 
which will also provide the personnel and its two planetary landers for fetching 
and carrying your CRLTs. Is there anything else?"
Conway shook his head. "Only an item of news, sir. The Federation archivists 
think they have found the CRLTs home planet, although it is no longer habitable 
due to major orbital changes and associated large-scale seismic disturbances. 
The Department of Colonization has a new home for them in mind
and will give us the coordinates as soon as they are absolutely sure that the 
environment and the CRLTs physiological classification are compatible. So we 
have somewhere to take Humpty-Dumpty when we've put it together again.
"However," Conway ended very seriously, "all the indications are that this was 
not simply a colony ship which ran into trouble, but a planetary lifeboat 
carrying the last surviving members of the race."
Conway stared anxiously around the enormous interior of Descartes's forward hold 
and thought that if he had known there were going to be so many sightseers he 
would have asked for a much larger operating theater. Fortunately one-of them 
was the ship's commanding officer, Colonel Okaussie, who kept the others from 
getting in the way and ensured that the area of deck containing the two joined 
hibernation cylinders was clear except for Murchison, Naydrad, Prilicla, 
Fletcher, and Okaussie himself. Conway was sure of one thing: Whether the 
initial CRLT link-up attempt was a success or a failure, there would be no 
chance at all of keeping the result a secret.
He wet his lips and said quietly, "Uncouple the cylinders and move the joined 
faces three meters apart. Bring the artificial gravity up to Earth-normal, 
slowly, and the atmosphere to normal pressure and composition for the life-form. 
You have the figures."
The fabric of his lightweight spacesuit began to settle against Conway's body 
and there was mounting pressure against the soles of his feet as he watched the 
facing ends of the two cylinders. Then abruptly the circular endplates jumped 
out of their slots to clank onto the deck and come to rest like enormous, 
spinning coins. The hibernation cylinders were now open at both ends, enabling 
the two CRLTs to move toward or away from each other, or from one compartment to 
the next.
"Neat!" Fletcher said. "When the coilship is spinning in its space-traveling 
mode, centrifugal force holds the being against the outboard surface of the 
cylinder, and when the spin ceases in the presence of real gravity and an 
atmosphere the airtight seals drop away, the individual compartments are opened 
to all of the others and the beastie, the complete group entity, that is, exits 
by working down the stern-facing wall until all
of it reaches the surface. The gravity and pressure sensors are linked to the 
medication reservoirs, Doctor, so you have just reproduced the conditions for 
resuscitation following a planetary landing."
Conway nodded. He said, "Prilicla, can you detect anything?"
"Not yet, friend Conway."
They moved closer so as to be able to look into the two opened cylinders, 
dividing their attention between the occupants who were lying flaccidly with 
their dorsal manipulators hanging limply along their sides. Then one of the 
enormous, tubular bodies began to quiver, and suddenly they were both moving 
ponderously toward each other.
"Move back," Conway said. "Prilicla?"
"Consciousness is returning, friend Conway," the empath replied, trembling with 
its own as well as everyone else's excitement. "But slowly; the movements are 
instinctive, involuntary."1
As the forward extremity of one CRLT approached the rear of the other, the 
organic film which protected the raw areas on each creature softened, liquefied, 
and trickled away. At the center of the forward face a blunt, conical shape 
began to form surrounded by systems of muscles which twitched themselves into 
mounds and hollows and deep, irregular fissures. The rear face of the other CRLT 
had grown its own series of hollows and orifices which exactly corresponded with 
the protuberances of the other, as well as four large, triangular flaps which 
opened out like the fleshy petals of an alien flower. Then all at once there was 
just one double-length creature with a join which was virtually invisible.
And I was worried about joining them together, Conway thought incredulously. The 
problem might be to keep them apart!
"Are we observing a physical coupling for the purpose of reproduction?" 
Murchison said to nobody in particular.
"Friend Murchison," Prilicla said, "the emotional radiation of both creatures 
suggests that this is not a conscious or involuntary sex act. A closer analogy 
would be that of an infant seeking the physical reassurance of its parent. 
However, both beings are seeking physical and mental reassurance, and have
feelings of confusion and loss, and these feelings are so closely matched that 
the only explanation is shared mentation."
"Tractor beamers," Conway said urgently. "Pull them apart, gentlyl"
He had been delighted to find that the beings who made up the vast group entity 
would link together naturally when the conditions were right, although that 
might not be the case if too many intervening segments had been destroyed in the 
accident, but he most certainly did not want a premature and permanent link-up 
between these two at this stage. They would have to be returned to a state of 
hibernation and resume their positions in the coil, otherwise they might find 
themselves permanently separated, orphaned, from the group entity.
Even though the tractor beamers were no longer being gentle, the two CRLTs 
stubbornly refused to separate. Instead they were becoming more physically 
agitated, they were trying to emerge completely from their hibernation 
cylinders, and their emotional radiation was seriously inconveniencing Prilicla.
"We must reverse the process" Conway began.
"The sensors react to gravity and air pressure," Fletcher broke in quickly. "We 
can't evacuate the hold without killing them, but if we cut the artificial 
gravity only it might"
"The endplate release mechanism was also linked to those sensors," Conway said, 
"and we can't replace them in their slots without chopping the two beasties 
apart, in the wrong place."
"It might stop the flow of resuscitation medication," Fletcher went on, "and 
restart the hibernation sequence. The needles are still sited in both creatures 
and the connecting tubing is flexible and still unbroken, although it won't be 
for long if we don't stop them from leaving their cylinders. If we put a clamp 
on the resuscitation line of each beastie, Doctor, I believe I could bypass the 
endplate actuator and restart the hibernation medication."
"But you will be working inside the cylinders," Murchison said, "beside two very 
massive and angry e-ts."
"No, ma'am," the Captain said. "1 am neither foolhardy nor a xenophobe, and I 
shall work through an access panel in the outer skin. It should take about 
twenty minutes."
"Too long," Conway said. "They will have disconnected
themselves from the tubing by then. We can calculate the dosage needed to put 
them back to sleep. Can you drill through the wall of the container, ignoring 
the sensors and actuators, and withdraw the required quantity of medication 
directly?"
For a moment there was silence while Fletcher's features fell into an angry, 
why-didn't-I think-of-that? expression, then he said, "Of course, Doctor."
But even when injections of the CRLTs own hibernation medication were ready 
their troubles were far from over. The pressor beam operators who were 
responsible for immobilizing the creatures could not hold down the two joined 
e-ts without also flattening the medics who were trying to work on them. Their 
best compromise was to leave a two-meters clearance on each side of the 
operative field wherein the medical team would not be inconvenienced by the 
pressors. But this meant that there was no restraint placed on the movements of 
the creature along a four-meter length of its body, which wriggled and humped 
and lashed out with its dorsal appendages and generally made it plain that it 
did not want strange beings climbing all over it and sticking it with needles.
Several times Conway was knocked away from the patient and once, if it had not 
been for a warning from Fletcher, he would have lost his helmet and probably the 
head inside it. Murchison observed crossly that the big advantage in dealing 
with cadavers was that, regardless of their physiological classifications, they 
did not assault the pathologist and leave her normally peachlike skin 
pigmentation black and blue. But with Naydrad's long, caterpillarlike body 
wrapped around one appendage and both Fletcher and Colonel Okaussie hanging 
onto the other limb which threatened the operative field, and with Murchison 
steadying the scanner for him while he sat astride the creature like a bareback 
horserider, Conway was able to guide his hypo into the correct vein and 
discharge its contents before a particularly violent heave pulled the needle 
free.
Within a few seconds Prilicla, whose fragile body had no place in this violent 
muscular activity announced from its position on the ceiling that the being was 
going back to sleep. When they withdrew to turn their attention to its 
companion, its movements were already growing weaker.
By the time they had dealt similarly with the other CRLT,
the two creatures had separated. The hollows and protuberances and flaps of 
muscle had collapsed and smoothed themselves out, and the raw interface areas 
began exuding the clear liquid which congealed into a thin, transparent film. 
Gently the tractor and pressor beam men lifted and pushed the two beings back 
into their respective hibernation cylinders. Conway signaled for the artificial 
gravity to be reduced to zero and, as expected, they were able to replace the 
cylinder endplates without trouble. The cargo hold's air pressure was reduced 
gradually so that they could check whether the premature opening of the 
hibernation compartments had caused a leak. It had not.
"So far so good," Conway said. "Return them to their positions in the coil and 
bring in the next two."
The first two had been the occupants of adjoining cylinders and their linking up 
had been automatic, a natural process in all respects. But the second two had 
been separated by a compartment which had been ruptured by a piece of flying 
debris and its occupant killed. The affinity between these two might not be so 
strong, Conway thought.
However, they merged as enthusiastically and naturally as had the first two. The 
resuscitation process was reversed before they were fully conscious so as to 
eliminate the multispecies wrestling match needed to put them into hibernation 
again. Prilicla reported a minor variation in the emotional radiation associated 
with the initial body contact-^-a feeling, very faint and temporary., of 
disappointment. But the two segments of the group entity were compatible and 
that particular break in continuity in the coil could be closed up.
Conway felt uneasy. Too much good luck worried him. Something was bothering 
Prilicla, too, because he had long since learned to recognize the difference 
between the little empath's reaction to its own feelings and those of the beings 
around it.
"Friend Conway," Prilicia said, while they were awaiting the arrival of the 
third set of CRLTs. "The first two beings were relatively immature and taken 
from the forward section of the coil, that is, from the tail segments of this 
multiple creature, and the second two came from a position considerably aft of 
amidships. Our own deductions, supported by the information on the creatures' 
probable planet of origin which
arrived with Tyrell, suggest that the tail segments are immature beings, perhaps 
very young adults, and the head segments aft to be composed of the older, more 
experienced, and most highly intelligent of the beings since they are 
responsible for ship operations and disembarkation following a stern landing."
"Agreed," Conway said, wishing Prilicla would get to the point, no matter how 
unpleasant it was, instead of talking all around it.
"Aft of amidships, friend Conway," Prilicla went on, "the CRLTs should be older. 
The two who have just left us, judging by their emotional radiation, were even 
less mature than the first set."
Conway looked at Murchison, who said defensively, "I don't know why that should 
be, I'm sorry. Do the data on their home planet, if it is their home planet, 
suggest an answer?"
"I'm pretty sure it was their home planet," Conway replied thoughtfully, 
"because there couldn't possibly be another like it. But the data are old and 
sparse and predate the assembly and launching from orbit of the coilship, and 
we've been too busy since Tyre'll brought back the information to discuss it 
properly."
"We have half an hour," Murchison observed, "before the next two CRLTs arrive."
Many centuries before the formation of the Galactic Federation, the Eurils had 
ranged interstellar space, driven by a curiosity so intense and at the same time 
hampered by a caution so extreme that even the Cinrusskin race to which Prilicla 
belonged was considered brave, even foolhardy, by comparison. Physiologically 
they were classification MSVKa low-gravity, tripedal, and vaguely storklike 
life-form, whose wings had evolved into twin sets of multidigited manipulators. 
They had been and still were the galaxy's prime observers, and they were content 
to look and learn and record through their long-range probes and sensors without 
making their presence known to the large and dangerously overmuscled specimens, 
intelligent or otherwise, who were under study.
During their travels the Eurils had come upon a system whose single, 
life-bearing planet pursued a highly eccentric orbit about its primary which 
forced its flora and fauna to adapt
to environmental conditions ranging from steaming polar jungles in summer to an 
apparently lifeless winter world of ice. Seeing it for the first time in its 
frigid, winter mode, the Eurils had been about to dismiss it as being 
uninhabitable until their probes showed evidence of a highly technical culture 
encased in the winter ice. Closer investigation revealed that the civilization 
was current and was awaiting the spring, like every other animal and vegetable 
life-form on the planet, to come out of hibernation.
It was not until the polar spring was far advanced that the members of this 
hibernating culture were identified as the large, loglike objects which had been 
lying in and around the cities under the ice.
"It is clear from this that the overall being is a group entity* which, for 
reasons we do not yet understand, must separate into its individual parts before 
hibernation can take place," Conway went on. "Since hibernation is natural to 
them, the problem of artificially extending it and reversing the process for the 
purpose of interstellar migration was, medically speaking, relatively easy to 
solve.
"The following year a number of the beings were observed by the Eurils in a 
fully conscious state," he continued, "going about their business in small group 
gestalts inside heated domes under the winter ice, which indicates that they do 
not go into hibernation unless or until it is forced on them. It is 
unnecessary, therefore, to duplicate the extremes of temperature of their 
planet of origin on their new home since any world closely resembling their 
summer environment would suit them. Had this not been so, the near impossibility 
of finding another and identical planetary environment to the one they were 
trying to leave would have made the migration hopeless from the start. And the 
reasons for the CRLT life-form becoming a group entity, initially a small-group 
entity, are also becoming clear." Even at the time of the Eurils' visit the 
CRLTs, despite their advanced technology, were not having things all their own 
way. They lived on an incredibly savage world which had no clear division 
between its animal and vegetable predators. In order to have any chance of 
survival at all, the young CRLTs had to be born physically well developed and 
remain under the
protection of the parent for as long as possible. In the CRLT's case, 
parturition was delayed until the offspring was a young adult who had learned 
how to survive and how to aid the continued survival of its parent.
Separation took place every winter, when everything went to sleep and there was 
no physical threat, and the young one rejoined its parent in the spring to 
continue its lessons in survival. The young one, who at this stage was 
invariably female, reached physical maturity early and produced a child of its 
own. And so it went with the original adult, who had begun to change its sex to 
male, trailing a long tail of beings of diminishing degrees of masculinity and 
experience behind it as it moved up the chain of the group entity toward the 
head.
"The CRLT brain forms part of the central nerve core which during fusion is 
linked to the brains of the individuals ahead of and behind it via the 
interfaces at each end of the body," Conway went on, "so that an individual 
segment learns not only by its own experience but from those of its predecessors 
farther up the line. This means that the larger the number of individuals in the 
group, the smarter will be its male head and forward segments. Should the head 
segment, who is the elder of the group and probably its decision maker, die from 
natural or other causes, the male next in line takes over."
Murchison cleared her throat delicately and said, "If anyone wishes at this 
juncture to make a general observation regarding the superiority, physical or 
intellectual, of the male over the female, be advised that I shall spit in his, 
her, or its eye."
Conway smiled and shook his head. He said seriously, "The male head will, 
naturally, fertilize a number of young female tail segments of other group 
entities, but there is a problem. Surely there would be serious psychological 
difficulties, sex-based frustrations, with so many of the intervening segments 
neither fully male or female and unable to"
"There is no problem," Murchison broke in, "if all mentation and, presumably, 
the pain and pleasure stimuli are shared by every individual in the group."
"Of course, I'd forgotten that aspect," Conway said. "But there is another. 
Think of the length of our survivor. If mentation and experience are shared, 
then this could be a very long-
lived and highly intelligent group entity indeed"
The discussion was cut short at that point by the lock cycling warning. The 
third pair of CRLTs had arrived, *
These two had been taken from the sternmost loops of the coilship where the 
casualties among the most senior and intelligent CRLTs had been heaviest. 
According to Vespasian's tactical computer and the findings of Descartes's 
specialists in e-t written languages and numerical systems, fifty-three of the 
CRLT hibernation cylindersand their occupantshad been destroyed as a result of 
the collision, and between these two segments there had been seventeen members 
of the group entity who had not made it.
The other breaks in the coil were much smallerthe largest missing five segments 
and the rest only three or four each. Conway hoped that if the largest gap could 
be closed successfully, then the smaller ones should pose fewer problems.
As with the previous two CRLTs, the combination of artificial gravity and 
atmospheric pressure triggered the actuators which opened the cylinders and 
reversed the hibernation process. Conway had already sited the IV needles which 
would put them back to sleep again should they become disorderly, and Prilicla 
reported that they were reviving and their emotional radiation indicated that 
they were beings who were fully mature, healthy, and highly intelligent. As 
consciousness returned they began moving out of their cylinders and toward each 
other.
They touched, and jerked apart.
"What?" Conway began. But Prilicla was already answering the question.
"There are feelings of intense discomfort, friend Conway," the empath said, 
trembling violently. "Also of confusion, disappointment, and rejection. There 
is background emotion, a combination of anxiety and curiosity, which is probably 
regarding their present surroundings."
Because he could think of nothing to say, Conway moved to a position directly 
between the forward and rear interfaces of the two CRLTs. He did not consider 
the position dangerous because, if Prilicla's emotional readings were correct, 
they were unlikely to come together. He began examining the two interfaces, both 
visually and with his x-ray scanner, and taking measurements. A few minutes 
later Murchison joined him, and
Prilicla dropped to hover cautiously a few meters above the area.
"Even with unaided vision you can see that the two interfaces are not 
compatible," Conway said worriedly. "There are three areas which cannot be made 
to join without surgical intervention. But I am reluctant to start cutting 
without having a clearer idea of how to proceed. 1 wish I could obtain the 
consent and cooperation of the patients."
"That might be difficult," Colonel Okaussie said. "But I could have my men try 
to"
"Lift them on tractor beams and force another contact," Conway finished for him. 
"I need one more attempted joining, at least, with vision recorders catching it 
in close-up from the anterior, posterior, and lateral aspects. I also need 
Prilicla to monitor their emotional radiation closely during the attempt so that 
we will know which particular areas give the most discomfort and are, 
therefore, most in need of surgical attention. During surgery, instead of using 
an anesthetic, we can return them into hibernation. Yes, Doctor?"
"Have you considered, friend Conway" began Prilicla, but Conway cut it short.
"Little friend," he said, "I know of old your roundabout manner of expressing 
disagreement as well as your feelings regarding the causing of unnecessary 
discomfort to patients, and you know that I share those feelings. But much as I 
dislike causing pain, in this case it is necessary."
"Doctor Con way," Colonel Okaussie said, with an impatient edge to his tone, "a 
few moments ago I had been about to suggest that since the beings are fully 
conscious, intelligent, and their visual range is similar to our own, we should 
be able to obtain their cooperation by explaining the situation to them 
graphically. I think it is worth a try."
"It most certainly is," Conway said. He caught Fletcher's eye and muttered, "Now 
why didn't I think of that?"
Descartes's commanding officer smiled and said, "I'll have a projection screen 
set up as quickly as possible, Doctor." Conway began assembling the instruments 
he would need while Murchison and Naydrad took over the job of measuring the 
interfaces and Prilicla hovered above them radiating reassurance to the 
patients.
It was a large screen, set between the angle of the*ceiling and the aft wall of 
the hold so that the dorsally mounted eyes of both CRLTs would be able to view 
it without distortion. Descartes's officers were specialists in e-t 
communications and the presentation was short, simple, and very much to the 
point. The opening sequence was familiar since it was part of the material the 
Fleet Commander had used during his recent briefing to Conway. It showed a 
diagrammatic reconstruction of the CRLTs great, coillike interstellar transport 
complete with central stem, coil supporting structure, thrusters, and guidance 
system moving slowly against a starry backdrop. Suddenly a large meteor appeared 
at the edge of the screen, heading directly' for the coilship. It struck, moving 
along the inside of the coil and carrying away the thrusters, guidance system, 
and all of the central supporting structure for the continuous spiral of 
hibernation compartments. The impact shook the coil apart, and the individual 
hibernation cylinders, because of the vessel's rotation, went flying off in all 
directions like shrapnel from a slow-motion explosion.
Because of the greater rigidity of the structure aft, the shock in this area was 
much more severe and the casualties among the hibernating CRLTs were heavy; the 
cylinders whose occupants had not survived were shown in red. Then there was a 
two-minute shot of the scene as it actually was, with Vespasian, Claudius and 
Descartes with a shoal of smaller vessels busy reassembling the coil followed by 
a longer sequence, displayed graphically, which showed a modified coilship 
coming in to land on a fresh, green world with the two capital ships and 
Descartes linked together so as to replace the missing support structure and 
thrusters.
The presentation ended by showing the coilship with the missing segments 
indicated in throbbing red, then with the red sections removed and the gaps 
closed up to make a slightly shorter coil, and the final scene showed the 
successful link-up of the first two CRLTs.
As a piece of visual communication it left very little room for 
misunderstanding, and Conway did not need Prilicla's em-pathic faculty to tell 
him that the message had been under-
 
stoodthe two CRLTs were already moving cautiously toward each other.
"Recorders?" Conway said urgently.
"Running," Murchison said.
Conway held his breath as once again the two massive creatures attempted fusion. 
The movements of their stubby, caterpillarlike legs were barely perceptible and 
their dorsal appendages were tensely still, making them resemble two enormous, 
alien logs being pushed together by the current of an invisible river. When they 
were separated by about six inches, the forward face of the rearmost creature 
had grown the pattern of bumps and fleshy projections which they had seen during 
the first two link-ups, and the rear interface of its companion had twitched 
itself into a pattern of fissures and a single deep recess. Around the periphery 
of the interface four wide, triangular flaps of muscle tipped with osseus 
material, features which had not appeared to be of any importance when examined 
on sleeping or dead CRLTs, had grown suddenly to nearly four times their size in 
the unconscious state and opened out like fleshy, horn-tipped petals. But with 
these two the interfaces did not correspond. They touched, held contact for 
perhaps three seconds, then jerked apart.
Before Conway could comment, they were coming together again. This time the 
forward creature remained still while the second twisted its forward interface 
into a slightly different position to try again, but with the same result.
It was obvious that the contacts were intensely uncomfortable, and the 
resultant pain had triggered off the involuntary movement which had jerked them 
apart. But the CRLTs were not giving up easily, although it appeared at first as 
if they had. They withdrew until their bodies were again inside their 
hibernation cylinders, then their stubby legs blurred into motion as they drove 
themselves at each other seeking, it seemed, by sheer brute force and bodily 
inertia to force a fusion. Conway winced as they came together with a sound like 
a loud, multiple slap.
But to no avail. They broke contact to lie a few feet from each other with their 
dorsal appendages twitching weakly and air hissing loudly as it rushed in and 
out of their breathing orifices. Then slowly they began to move together again.
."They are certainly trying," Murchison said softly.
"Friend Conway," Prilicla said, "the emotional radiation from both creatures has 
become more complex. There is deep anxiety but not, I would say, personal fear. 
Also a feeling of understanding and great determination, with the determination 
predominating. I would say that both entities fully understand the situation and 
are desperately anxious to cooperate. But these unsuccessful attempts at fusion 
are causing great pain, friend Conway."
It was characteristic of the little empath that it did not mention its own 
pain, which was only fractionally less severe than that of the emoting CRLTs. 
But the uncontrollable trembling of its pipestem legs and fragile eggshell of a 
body spoke more eloquently than words.
"Put them to sleep again," Conway said.
There was silence while the hibernation medication was taking effect, broken 
finally by Prilicla who said, "They are losing consciousness, but there is a 
marked change in the emotional radiation. They are feeling both anxiety and 
hope. I think they are expecting us to solve their problem, friend Conway."
They were all looking at him, but it was Naydrad, whose mobile, silvery fur was 
registering its bafflement and concern, who put the question everyone else was 
too polite to ask.
"How?"
Conway did not reply at once. He was thinking that two highly intelligent elder 
CRLTs from the coilship's stern, following their first abortive attempt at 
fusion, would have realized that a link-up was impossible for them. But they had 
made two further attemptsone when the rearmost creature had tried to twist 
itself and its interface into a new position, and again when it had tried to 
achieve fusion by sheer brute force. He was beginning to wonder whether the 
recent attempt at communicating with the aliens had been strictly one way. 
Until the Descartes linguists could be given the opportunity to learn the CRLTs 
language, an accurate exchange of ideas was impossible. But it had already been 
shown that pictures were very effective in putting across a message, and they 
were all forgetting that actions, like pictures, often spoke louder than words.
Recalling those three unsuccessful attempts at fusion. Con-way wondered if the 
two CRLTs had in fact been trying to
 
demonstrate that the link-up was impossible for them without assistance, but 
that by changing the positions and perhaps the dimensions of some of the surface 
features on the interfaces and forcing things a little, then a join might be 
achieved.
"Friend Conway," Prilicla announced, "is having feelings of optimism."
"Perhaps," Murchison said, "in his own good time, of course, he will explain to 
us nonempaths the reason for his optimism."
Ignoring the sarcasm, Conway briefly outlined his recent thinking, although he 
personally would have described his feeling as one of forlorn hope rather than 
optimism. He went on, "So I believe that the CRLTs were trying to tell us that 
surgical intervention is necessary for them to achieve fusion, not brute force. 
And it has just occurred to me that there is a precedent for this procedure. One 
of the cadavers examined on Rhabwar showed evidence of surgery on its forward 
interface and this could mean"
"But that was a very youthful, although physically mature CRLT," Murchison broke 
in, "and the surgery was minor. We agreed that it had probably been performed 
for cosmetic reasons."
"I think we were wrong," Conway said. Excitedly he went on, "Consider the 
physical organization of this group entity. At the head is the most mature, male 
adult and at the tail the most recently born infant, although as we know the 
infant grows to physical maturity without separating from the parent. Between 
the head and the tail there is a gradual and steady progression from the most 
elderly and intelligent male entities down to the increasingly youthful and 
female segments which form the tail sections. But Prilicla has reported an 
anomaly in this progression. Young CRLTs positioned relatively close to the tail 
show evidence of greater physical age and brain development than entities in 
the midsections. Until now 1 could see no reason for this anomaly.
"But now let us suppose that this group entity," he continued quickly, "forming 
as it does a complete colonization project, has been artificially lengthened. 
The extraordinarily large number of individuals in this group entity has always 
bothered me, and now there is a simple explanation for it. Let us assume that 
there is one head or. more accurately, a fairly large number
 
of linked elders forming the leading segments, and several tails connected one 
behind the other. These would be very youthful tails because it must be much 
easier to carry out the surgical modifications on young CRLTs which enable them 
to link up. So we have this colonist group entity with intelligence and 
experience at its head and linked to a number of young and inexperienced 
subgroups forming an artificially lengthened tail. The joins between these 
subgroups are surgically assisted and, I feel sure, temporary, because once 
established on the target planet they would be able to separate again, and in 
time the young heads would grow to full adulthood and the dangers from 
inbreeding would be avoided.
"Perhaps the head on this group entity has also been artif-ically extended," 
Conway added, "so as to include elder CRLTs with specialist experience relating 
to the colonization project who would be available initially to protect the 
younger group entities, and subsequently to teach and train them and pass on the 
knowledge of their race's history and science."
Prilicla had flown closer while Conway had been speaking and was hovering a few 
inches above the Doctor's head. It said happily, "An ingenious theory, friend 
Conway. It fits both the facts as we know them and the type of emotional 
radiation received from the beings."
"I agree," Murchison said. "I, too, found difficulty in accepting the extreme 
length of this group entity, but the idea of a wise old head acting as guide and 
mentor to an as yet unknown number of young tails is much easier to believe. 
However, I can't help remembering that it was the head segments which suffered 
most of the casualties. Perhaps the head is no longer as wise as it should have 
been and an awful lot of vital knowledge has been lost to this multiplegroup 
entity."
Colonel Okaussie waited for a moment to see if anyone in the medical team would 
speak, then he cleared his throat and said, "Maybe not, ma'am. Most of the head 
segments who were killed in the collision were very close to the stern and to 
the ship's control and propulsion centres. One could reasonably expect that 
these segments were the beings charged with the responsibility for operating the 
ship and carrying out the landing maneuvers, functions which are now the 
responsibility of the Monitor Corps. It is likely that the scientist and teacher 
seg-
ments were positioned a little farther back in the chain and the majority of the 
casualties were suffered by the vessel's crew, whose specialist knowledge would 
no longer be of vital importance to the colonization project after the vessel 
had landed." Before Murchison could reply Naydrad gave an impatient, modulated 
growl which translated as "Why don't we stop talking and get on with the job?"
The screen which had been used to communicate with the CRLTs was continuously 
displaying distant and close-up views of spacesuited figures of various 
physiological classifications busily at work on the final stages of the 
coilship's reassembly. Conway could not decide whether Descartes'^ commanding 
officer was screening the material to be helpful and informative or as a means 
of suggesting, very subtly, that the medical team display a similar degree of 
industry. The attempt was a failure in either event, Conway thought, because the 
Rhabwar medics were far too busy to look at Okaussie's pictures. They were 
concentrating instead on measuring and remeasuring the features on the CRLT 
interfaces and charting with their scanners the paths of underlying blood 
vessels and the distribution of the nerve ganglia. And with great care and 
accuracy they were marking the areas where surgical intervention was possible 
without causing either a major hemorrhage or sensory impairment.
It was slow, tedious work and visually not very dramatic. Colonel Okaussie could 
be forgiven for thinking that the ambulance ship personnel had gone to sleep on 
the job.
"Friend Conway," Prilicla said at one particularly awkward stage, "the physical 
differences between these two entities are so marked that I cannot help 
wondering if they belong to different subspecies."
All of Con way's attention at that moment was concentrated on what seemed to be 
the main sphinctor muscle on the rear interface of the forward CRLT, so that by 
the time he was ready to reply Murchison had done it for him.
"In a sense you are right, Doctor Prilicla," she said. "It is a natural result 
of their method of reproduction. Think of this forward CRLT when it was the last 
and female link in its group-entity chain. In due time it grew to maturity and, 
still attached
to its parent, it was fertilized by the male head of another group entity. Its 
own infant grew and became mature and in turn produced another, and the process 
continued with different male heads adding their individual sets of genes at 
every stage. 'The physical connection between any given CRLT and its offspring 
is perfect," she continued, "and perfect fusion may even be possible between a 
parent and its grandchild or greatgrandchild. But the effect of different males 
fertilizing each new endlink in the chain would be cumulative. So it is 
understandable when you think about it, Doctor, that the differences between 
the fusion interfaces of these two, which were separated by seventeen 
intervening segments, are considerable."
"Thank you, friend Murchison," Prilicla said. "My brain seems not to be 
functioning properly."
"Probably," Murchison replied in a sympathetic tone, "because your brain is 
more than half asleep, like mine." "And mine," Naydrad joined in.
Con way, who had been trying not to think of how long it had been since he had 
last eaten or slept, decided that the best way to deal with an impending mutiny 
among his overworked medics was to ignore it. He indicated a small area on the 
rear interface of the first alien, midway between the central conical depression 
and the upper rim of the interface, then pointed to the corresponding area on 
the forward face of the second one. He said, "We can safely ignore these 
reproductive organs in both creatures, since this kind of link-up is temporary 
and physiologically independent of the parent-offspring fusion mechanism. As 1 
see it the three areas we must concentrate on are the central conical projection 
and its corresponding recess, which are the connecting points for the central 
nerve core and our primary concern. Second is this narrow, semirigid tongue with 
the fleshy mushroom at its tip which locates with this slit in the other"
"That connection is also of vital importance," Murchison broke in, "since it 
links up the nerve networks controlling the voluntary and involuntary muscles 
which move each CRLTs legs and enable the group entity to walk in unison. There 
would be small advantage to the group entity if it could share mentation but a 
number of its segments were unable to walk." "Friend Murchison," Prilicla said 
timidly, "it seems to me that the original nerve impulse from the head segment, 
or whichever individual CRLT was responsible for initiating the movement, would 
not be sufficiently strong to trigger the ambulatory muscles throughout the 
enormous length of this group entity."
"That is true," the pathologist replied. "But there is an organic amplifier, 
consisting of a bunching of nerve ganglia situated just above the womb, or the 
position where the womb had been in the males, in an area where the surrounding 
tissue has a high mineral content and is particularly rich in copper salts. This 
biological booster ensures that the ambulatory muscles receive their signals 
with undiminished strength throughout the length of the chain."
"Third," Conway said, raising his voice slightly to discourage further 
interruptions, "there are these four flaps of muscle which terminate at their 
apexes in osseous hooks which locate in these four bone-reinforced orifices in 
the second creature. This is the primary mechanism by which the individual 
segments are held together nose to tail, and in this instance"
"It is also the method by which the CRLT female at the end of the line held onto 
its developing offspring," Murchison broke in again. "At that stage the 
offspring had no choice in the matter. But as it matured, produced its own 
offspring, and moved farther up the line I feel sure that voluntary separation 
became possible. In fact, separation would be necessary during activities which 
did not require the entire group entity for their performance."
"That is most interesting, friend Murchison," Prilicla said. "I should think 
that the first time such a voluntary separation took place a certain amount of 
psychological trauma would be present. It would be analogous to a coming-of-age 
ceremony, perhaps, even though the separation might not be permanent"
Before Conway could speak, Prilicla fell silent and began trembling in reaction 
to the Doctor's feelings of irritation and impatience. He said, "This is all 
very interesting, friends, but we do not have the time just now for a general 
discussion. In any case, following the type of temporary separation you 
mentioned, the young adult would rejoin its original parent segment and not aI 
suppose you could describe it as an ancestor seventeen times removed, which is 
the problem currently facing us. And now, if you don't mind, we will concentrate 
on this problem and on the surgical procedures necessary to solve it.
"Feel free to interrupt at any time," he added dryly.
But the interruptions were few and pertinent, and very soon it became obvious 
even to the watching tractor beamers, Des-cartes's commanding officer, and Fleet 
Commander Dermod, whose face appeared briefly but with increasing frequency on 
the overhead screen, that the medical team was also working hard.
Because Sector General was the Federation's foremost emergency hospital, the 
kind of surgery performed there, whether the patient was Earth-human or 
extraterrestrial, tended to be curative rather than cosmetic. It felt very 
strange to Conway, and he knew that his feelings were being shared by the other 
members of the team, to be operating on a perfectly healthy e-t with the purpose 
of simply modifying the size and contours of certain physiological features. But 
the operation itself was far from simple.
The greater proportion of the surgical work had to be performed on the second 
alien whose forward nerve coupling cone was too wide at its base to be retained 
by the sphincter muscle surrounding the corresponding orifice in the first CRLT. 
With the semiflexible tongue and groove connection which joined the two beings' 
locomotor nerve networks, the solution was much simpler. The deep recess in the 
first alien was surgically widened until measurement showed that it would 
accommodate the tongue comfortably, after which reinforcing sutures were 
inserted to prevent further accidental widening. But the four triangular flaps 
with their bony, hooklike extensions posed a completely different and more 
difficult problem.
Together the four members formed the principal organic coupling which held the 
considerable mass of the second e-t against the first, and they did not fit 
because the hooks did not quite reach the apertures meant to receive them.
Elongating the four triangular members was contraindicated since this would have 
entailed surgical interference and consequent serious weakening of the muscle 
systems concerned, and they could not foresee the effect on the network of blood 
vessels which became engorged and extended the members to quadruple their size 
when the being returned to consciousness.
Instead they made molds of the four hooks and made artificial ones using a hard, 
biologically neutral plastic at the tips and a wide band of thinner, more 
flexible material around the bases. The result was a set of hollow, hook-tipped 
gloves which, when a little of the original hooks were filed away to make them 
fit, were slipped over the original members and secured in position with rivets 
and sutures.
Suddenly there was nothing left to do, but hope.
Above the two unconscious CRLTs the vision screen was displaying an overall 
picture of their coilship, complete now except for the segments whose occupants 
were awaiting surgical attention, and the dense but orderly mass of shipping 
moving in and around it. The thought came to Conway, no matter how hard he tried 
to avoid it, that the tremendous fleet of Monitor Corps and other units, from 
the great capital ships and auxiliaries down to the swarms of scoutships and the 
army of specialists in engineering and communications they represented, were 
all wasting their time here if this particular operation was not a success.
For this responsibility he had argued long and eloquently with Thornnastor, 
O'Mara, and Skempton at Sector General. He must have been mad.
Harshly, he said, "Wake them up."
They watched anxiously as once again the two CRLTs came out of hibernation and 
began moving toward each other. They touched once, a brief, exploratory contact, 
then they fused. Where there had been two massive, twenty-meter caterpillarlike 
creatures there was now one of twice that length.
The join was visible, of course, but one had to look very carefully to see it. 
Conway forced himself to wait for ten interminable seconds, and still they had 
not pulled away from each other.
"Prilicla?"
"They are feeling pain, friend Conway," the empath replied, trembling slightly. 
"It is within bearable limits. There are also feelings of acceptance and 
gratitude."
Conway gave a relieved sigh which ended in an enormous, eye-watering yawn. He 
rubbed his eyes and said, "Thank you, everyone. Put them back to sleep, check 
the sutures, and reseal them in their hibernation cylinders. They will not have 
to link up again until after the landing, by which time the wounds should have 
healed to a large extent so that the fusion will be more comfortable for them. 
As for ourselves, I prescribe eight hours solid sleep before"
He broke off abruptly as the features of Fleet Commander Dermod appeared on the 
screen.
"You appear to have successfully repaired a major break in our alien chain, 
Doctor," he said seriously, "but the time taken to do so was not short. There 
are many other breaks and we have three days during which a concerted Jump is 
possible, Doctor, after which the gravitational distortion effects caused by 
that rapidly approaching sun will make an accurate Jump out of the question even 
for single ships.
"Should we overrun the three-day deadline," he went on grimly, "single-ship 
Jumping within operational safety limits will be possible for an additional 
twenty hours. During this twenty-hour period, if the coilship is not to be 
abandoned to fall into the sun, it will have to be dismantled into sections 
small enough to be accommodated by the hyperspheres of the units available in 
the area. This, you will understand, would of necessity be a very hurried 
operation and our own accident casualties as well as those of CRLTs would be 
heavy?
"What I am saying, Doctor," he ended gravely, "is that if you cannot complete 
your organic link-ups within three days, tell me now so that we can begin 
dismantling the coilship in a safer and more orderly fashion."
Con way rubbed his eyes and said, "There were seventeen missing segments between 
the join which we have just effected, and this makes it the most difficult job 
of the lot. The remaining breaks are of two, three, or at most five segments, so 
that those linking operations will be correspondingly easier. We know the drill 
now and three days should be ample time, barring an unforeseen catastrophe."
"I cannot hold you responsible for one of those, Doctor," the Fleet Commander 
said dryly. "Very well. What are your immediate intentions?"
"Right now," Conway said firmly, "we intend to sleep."
Dermod looked vaguely surprised, as if the very concept of sleep was one that 
had become alien to him over the past few days, then he nodded grudgingly and 
broke contact.
 
Feeling rested, alert, and much more humanand, of course, more Kelgian and 
Cinrusskinthey returned to Descartes's cargo hold to find another two CRLTs 
already waiting for them and the remaining segments to be joined clamped to the 
outer hull. The Fleet Commander, it was clear, was a man who believed in 
maintaining the pressure.
But achieving fusion with these two was remarkably easy. Only two intervening 
segments were missing so that the surgery required was minor indeed. The next 
pair were more difficult, nevertheless a satisfactory link-up was achieved 
within two hours and, with their growing confidence and expertise, this was to 
become the average time required for the job. So well did they progress that 
they became almost angry with themselves when they were forced to break for 
meals or sleep.
Then suddenly they were finished and there was nothing to do but watch the 
screen while the last gap in the coil was being closed and hundreds of 
spacesuited figures swarmed all over it to give a final check to the sensor 
actuators on each hibernation cylinder which would expel their endplates and 
initiate resuscitation on landing.
With the exception of Rhabwar and one of Descartes's planetary landers, the 
great fleet of scoutships and auxiliaries withdrew to a distance of one and a 
half thousand kilometers, which was far enough to relieve the traffic congestion 
in the area but close enough for them to return quickly should anything go 
wrong.
"I do not foresee anything going seriously wrong at this end," the Fleet 
Commander said when the coilship was in one tremendous, spiral piece. "You have 
given us enough time, Doctor, to carry out all the necessary pre-Jump 
calculations and calibrations. This will be a time-consuming process since our 
three vessels, whose hyperspace envelopes will have to be extended to enclose 
the coilship, are Jumping in concert. Should a problem arise and we are unable 
to make this Jump, the units standing by will move in, dismantle the coilship as 
quickly as possible, and Jump away with the pieces and salvage what we can from 
this operation.
"There will be enough Monitor Corps medics on these ships to deal with the 
expected casualties," he went on, "and for this reason I would like Rhabwar to 
leave at once and position itself close to the CRLTs new target planet. If 
trouble develops it is much more likely to be at that end."
"I understand," Conway said quietly.
The Fleet Commander nodded. "Thank you, Doctor. From now on this is purely a 
transport problem and my responsibility."
Sooner yours than mine, Conway thought grimly as Dermod broke contact.
He was thinking about the Fleet Commander's problem while they were wishing 
Colonel Okaussie and the Descartes's tractor beam crew good-by and good luck, 
and it remained in his mind after the medical team boarded Rhabwar and the 
ambulance ship was heading out to Jump distance from the combined CRLT and 
Federation vessels.
Conway understood Dermod's problem all too well and the strong but unspoken 
reason why the Fleet Commander wanted the ambulance ship positioned in the 
target system. They both knew that the majority of single-ship accidents 
occurred because of a premature emergence into normal space when one of the 
unfortunate vessel's matched set of hyperdrive generators was out of 
synchronization. A single generator pod emerging into normal space while the 
rest of the vessel was in the hy-perdimension could tear the ship apart and 
leave wreckage strewn across millions of kilometers. Timing, therefore, was 
:ritical even on a single ship where only two or perhaps four generators had to 
be matched. The Fleet Commander's problem was that Vespasian, Claudius, and 
Descartes together with the jnormous coilship of the CRLTs were linked together 
by tractor and pressor beams into a single rigid structure.
The Emperor-class cruisers were the largest ships operated by the Monitor Corps, 
and each required six generators to move its tremendous mass into and out of 
hyperspace, while the survey and cultural contact vessel Descartes needed only 
four. I"his meant that sixteen generators in all would be required to perform a 
simultaneous Jump and subsequent emergence into normal space. And the problem 
was further complicated by the Fact that all of the generators would be 
operating under controlled overload conditions because their coombined 
hyperspace envelope had to be extended to enclose the : coilship.
As Rhabwar made its Jump into hyperspace Conway was overcome by such an intense, 
gnawing anxietty that even Prilicla could not reassure him out of it. He had the 
awful feeling that they were about to witness the worst spactdisasaster in 
Federation history.
The new home chosen for the CRLIs had been known to the Federation for nearly 
two centurie and was listed as a possible colony world for the Chalders.however, 
the denizens of Chalderescol Threea water-breathing life-form resembling an 
outsize, tentacled crocodile which combined physical inaction with mental 
agilitywere not very  enthusiastic about it since they already possessed two 
colony worlds and their home planet was far from overcrowded So when they 
learned of the plight of the CRLT colonists they willlingly relinquished their 
claim to a planet which was of marginal interest to them anyway.
It was a warm, pleasant world with a continent, largely desert, encircling its 
equator like a wide, ragged belt and two relatively small bands of ocean 
separating the equatorial land-mass from the two large continents centred 3 at 
each pole; these were green, temperate, and free of icecaps. .
Following exhaustive investigations of  tthe cadavers available to them at 
Sector General both Murchison and Thornnastor were firmly of the opinion that 
this would be an ideal home for the CRLT life-formmoreover it was an 
environment which would not force them into periodic hibernation..
The landing area, a large clearing on the shore of a vast, inland sea, had 
already been marked with beacons. It awaited only the arrival of the CRLTsas, 
vith  mounting anxiety, did the personnel on board Rhabwar. On t the Casualty 
Deck Conway and the other members of the medical team each picked a direct 
visionport, hoping in some obscure fashion that by watching and worrying hard 
they might ensre the safe arrival of the coilship.
It was no surprise, considering the distances involved, that they learned of its 
emergence from the Control Room repeaters.
 
"Trace, sir!" Haslam's voice sounded excitedly. "The bearing is  "
"Are you sure it's them?"
"A single trace that size couldn't be anything else, sir. And yes, the sensors 
confirm."
"Very well," the Captain's voice replied, trying unsuccessfully to hide its 
relief. "Lock the scope on your radar bearing and give me full magnification. 
Dodds, contact astrogation on Vespasian and arrange a rendezvous. Power Room, 
stand by."
The rest of the crewmen's conversation was ignored as the medical team crowded 
around the Casualty Deck's repeater screen. One look was enough to tell them 
that their preparations to receive large numbers of casualties from the expected 
emergence accident had been wasted effort, but they did not care because it was 
immediately obvious that the concerted Jump had been completely successful.
Centered on the repeater screen was a small, sharp image of the coilship with 
its three Monitor Corps vessels spaced along its axis, looking like an exercise 
in alien three-dimensional geometry. Vespasian, the stern component, was 
already applying thrust, and the three linked ships were beginning to turn 
around their longitudinal axes in order to reproduce the original rate of 
rotation and centrifugal force conditions ofthe coilship before its accident. 
Gradually a voice from Control made itself heard above the sound of the medics' 
human and extraterrestrial jubilation.
". . . Rendezvous in four hours thirteen minutes," Haslam was saying. "No 
preliminary orbital maneuvering, sir. They intend going straight in."
Rhabwar, in its hypersonic glider configuration, circled the descending coilship 
at a distance of three kilometers using its thrusters only when necessary to 
maintain the same rate of descent. Rotating slowly and illuminated to near- 
incandescent brightness by the system's sun and noontime reflection from the 
planet's cloud blanket, it seemed to Conway as if it were boring its way into 
the lower reaches of the atmosphere like some gigantic, alien drill. Inside the 
enormous, dazzling coil the three Federation ships in their drab service 
liveries were virtually invisible except for the flare of Vespasian's thrusters, 
which were supporting the weight not only of the coilship but the two vessels 
stacked above it. The great alien and Monitor Corps composite continued its 
descent until, three kilometers from the surface, tangential thrust was applied 
to begin killing its spin.
Vespasian's flare lengthened suddenly and brightened, slowing the descent until 
the ship was hovering a meter above the ground. Then simultaneously the 
coilship's rotation ceased, Vespasian's stabilizers came to rest on the fused 
and blackened soil, and the sternmost segment of the coilship touched down.
For perhaps five seconds nothing happened, then, reacting to the cessation of 
spin and the presence of a suitable atmosphere, the sensor-actuators on every 
hibernation cylinder performed their function. The endplates which kept the 
individual CRLTs apart were ejected to fall like a shower of giant coins to the 
ground, and resuscitation of the group entity was initiated. Conway could 
imagine the individual CRLTs awakening, stretching, and linking up, the 
occupants of close on nine hundred hibernation compartments which had survived 
the eighty-seven years past collision. Then he began to worry in case some of 
them could not link up and there was an organic log-jam somewhere inside the 
coil trapping CRLTs above it...
But within a surprisingly short time the great group entity was leaving its 
ship, the leading head segments walking carefully around the fused earth under 
Vespasian's stern and toward the vegetation on the edge of the clearing. And, 
like an endless, leathery caterpillar the younger segments emerged carrying 
equipment and stores and following the tracks of their elders.
When at last the tail was clear of the coilship, the power to the supporting 
tractor and pressor beams was gradually reduced so that the towering, open 
spiral collapsed slowly onto itself to lie like a great, loose coil of metal 
rope on the ground. A few minutes later Vespasian, Claudius, and Descartes took 
off and separated, the two capital ships to go into orbit and Descartes to land 
again a few kilometers along the shoreline to await formal contact with the CRLT 
group entity. Contact would occur, they knew, because the individual CRLTs who 
had undergone surgery knew that the beings inside the Federation ships wished 
them well and, since the CRLT life-form had shared mentation, the whole group 
would be aware of these good intentions.
By this time Rhabwar's lander had also touched down and its medics were on the 
surface standing as close as they possibly could to the being who was marching 
endlessly past them. Ostensibly they were there to furnish any medical 
assistance which might be required. Actually they were simply satisfying their 
curiosity regarding a being which must surely have been the strangest life-form 
yet encountered.
Conway, as was his wont, was indulging in a bout of postoperative worrying. He 
waved, indicating the endless line of dorsal appendages which were either 
gathering pieces of edible vegetation or waving back at him, and said, "I 
realize that one or more of the head segments must have tried the local 
vegetation with no ill effects, and now the whole group entity knows what is 
safe to eat, but the procedure seems a bit slapdash to me. And I haven't been 
able to spot any of our surgical joins going past. There is bound to be a 
certain amount of muscular weakness in those areas, and perhaps an impairment in 
sensory communication andWhat the blazes is that\"
That was a low, moaning and caterwauling sound which ran up and down the length 
of the kilometers-long entity, rising in volume suddenly until it became 
deafening. It sounded as if each and every CRLT was suffering intense physical 
or mental anguish. But strangely the outpouring of emotional radiation which 
must have accompanied it was not bothering Prilicla.
"Do not feel concern," the little empath said. "It is an expression of group 
pleasure, gratitude, and relief. They are cheering, friend Conway."


      The Classification System
      by Gary Louie
       
      James White's Sector General stories used a unique four letter 
      classification system that helped describe the species quickly and 
      effectivly, as one would require when the hospitol is a multi species 
      enviroment. 
      Gary Louie was working on a James White concordance. As part of that he 
      completed a classification system, for the sector general series which 
      covers all characters up to Final Diagnosis. 
      This article appeared in the White Papers. Unfortunatly Gary Louie passed 
      away, before the concordance was completed.
       
            Classification:AACL
            Planet:Unknown
            Species:Crepellian Pet No Individual Names Known
            A non-intelligent pet kept by AMSOs. It has six python-like ten-tacles which poke though seals in the cloudy plastic of its suit. The tentacles are each at least twenty feet long and tipped with a horny substance which must be steel-hard.
             
            Classification:AACP 
            Planet:Unknown
            Species:Name Unknown No Individual Names Known
            A race whose remote ancestors were a species of mobile vegetable. They are slow moving, but the carbon dioxide tanks which they wear seem to be the only protection they need. AACPs do not eat in the normal manner but plant themselves in specially prepared soil during their sleep period, and absorb nutriment in that way.
             
            Classification:AMSL
            Planet:Unknown
            Species:Creppelian, Crepellian
            Individuals:Nurse Towan, Diagnostician Vosan
            A species of water breathing octopoids.
             
            Classification:AMSO
            Planet:Unknown
            Species:Name Unknown
            No Individual Names Known
            A larger life-form, in the habit of keeping non-intelligent AACL-type creatures as pets.
             
            Classification:AUGL
            Planet:Chalderescol IT
            Species:Chaldor, Chalder
            Individuals:Patient AUGL-1 13, Patient AUGL-1 16, Patient AUGL-122, Patient AUGL-126, Patient AUGL-187, Patient AUGL-193, Patient AUGL-211, Patient AUGL-218, Patient AUGL-22 1, Patient AUGL-233, 
            Muromeshomon
            The denizens of Chalderescol, an armored fish-like species are water-breathers who can not live in any other medium for more than a few seconds. A heavily plated and scaled being, slightly re-sembling a forty-foot long armour-plated crocodile, except that instead of legs there is an apparently haphazard arrangement of stubby fins, and a heavy knife-edged tail. A fringe of ribbon-like tentacles encircles its middle, projecting through some of the only openings visible in its organic armor. Chaldors have six rows of teeth in an over-large mouth. The Chalders are one of the frw in-telligent species whose personal names are used only between mates, members of the immediate family, or very special friends.
             
            Classification:BLSU
            Planet:Groalter
            Species:Groalterri
            Individual:Hellishomar the Cutter
            The Groalterri overall body configuration is that of a squat octopoid with short, thick tentacular limbs. Its central torso and head seem disproportionately large. The eight limbs terminate alternately in four sets of claws (that will with maturity evolve into manipula-tory digits) and four flat, sharp-edged, osseous blades. The organ of speech and hearing is centered above the four heavily lidded eye that are equally spaced around the cranium. A macrospecies, there is an element of risk involved to any life-form of more or less nor-mal body mass which approaches it too closely.
             
            Classification:BRLH
            Planet:Tarla
            Species:Tarlan
            Individuals:Surgeon-Captain/Trainee/Padre Lioren, Sedith and 
            Wrethrin the Healers
            Tarlans are an erect quadrupedal life-form with its for short-legs supporting a tapering, cone-shaped body. Four long, multi-jointed, medial arms for heavy lifting and handling sprout from waist-level. Another four that are suited for more delicate work encircle the base of the neck. Equally spaced around the head are four eyes whose stalks are capable of independent motion. Tarlans have very large teeth. An adult Tarlan stands eight feet tall.
             
            Classification:CLCH
            Planet:Unknown
            Species:Name Unknown
            No Individual Names Known
            Apparent typographical error for Classification CLHG.
             
            Classification:CLHG
            Planet:Drambo
            Species:Roller
            Individuals:Camsaug, Surreshun
            The Rollers resemble animated donuts rolling on their outer edge, with manipulatory appendages in the form of a fringe ofshort ten-tacles sprouting from the inner circumference between the series of gill mouths and eyes. Its visual equipment must operate like a coeleostat since the contents of its field of vision are constantly rotating. The Rollers must roll to stay alive-there is an ingenious method of shifting its center of gravity while keeping itself upright by partially inflating the section of its body which is on top at any given moment. The continual rolling causes blood to circulate-it uses a form of gravity feed system instead of a muscular pump. The species reproduce hermaphroditically. Each parent after mating grows twin offspring, one on each side of its bodies like continu-ous blisters encircling the side walls of a tire. Injury, disease or the mental confusion immediately following birth could cause the parent to lose balance, roll on to its side, stop and die. The points where the children eventually detach themselves from their par-ents remain very sensitive areas to both generations and their posi-tions are governed by hereditary factors. The result is that any close blood relation trying to make mating contact causes itself and the other being considerable pain. The rollers really do hate their fathers and every other relative. The species is water-breathing with a warm-blooded oxygen-based metabolism. The lifesupport mechanism for the species is physically complicated, to allow the occupant to roll naturally within it. The concept of modesty is com-pletely alien to this race. This species does not know the meaning of sleep. There is no such thing as sleeping, pretending to be dead or unconsciousness. A Roller is either moving and alive or still and dead.
             
            Classification:CLSR
            Planet:Unknown
            Species:Name Unknown
            No Individual Names Known
            Apparent typographical error for Classification CPSD.
             
            Classification:CPSD
            Planet:Unknown
            Species:The Blind Ones
            No Individual Names Known
            These beings are roughly circular, just over a meter in diameter and, in cross section, a slim oval flattened slightly on the under-side. In shape they very much resemble their ship, except that the ship does not have a long, thin horn or sting projecting aft or a wide, narrow slit on the opposite side which is obviously a mouth. The upper lip of the mouth is wider and thicker than the lower, and can be curled over the lower lip, apparently sealing the mout shut. The beings are covered, on their upper and lower surfaces and around the rim, by some kind of organic stubble which varies in thickness from pin-size to the width of a small finger. The stubble on the underside is much coarser than that on the upper surface, and it is plain that parts of it are designed for ambulation. The Blind Ones evolved underground, and have no organs for sight. They formed an alliance with the Protectors of the Unborn, each species providing something that other lacked.
             
            Classification:CRLT
            Planet:Unknown
            Species:Name Unknown
            No Individual Names Known
            Senior Physician Conway was unable to classi~ this life-form with complete certainty. The initial analysis was performed on a cadaver, an independent portion of a larger composite being. The compos-ite is a warm-blooded oxygen breather with the type of basic me-tabolism associated with the physiological grouping CRLT. Even a segment is massive, measuring approximately twenty meters in length and three meters in diameter, excluding projecting append-ages. Physically it resembles the DBLF Kelgian life-form, but it is many times larger and possesses a leathery tegument rather than the silver fur of the Kelgians. Like the DBLF's it is multipedal, but the manipulatory appendages are positioned in a single row along the back. There are twenty-one of these dorsal limbs, all showing evidence of early evolutionary specialization. Six of them are long, heavy, and claw-tipped and are obviously evolved for defense since the being is a herbivore. The other fifteen are in five groups of three, spaced between the six heavier tentacles, which terminate in four digits, two of which are opposable. These thinner limbs are manipulatory appendages originally evolved for gathering and trans-ferring food \to the mouths-three on each flank opening into three stomachs. Two additional orifices on each side open into a very large and complex lung. The structure inside these breathing ori-fices suggests that expelled air could be interrupted and modulated to produce intelligence-bearing sounds. On the underside are three openings used for the elimination of wastes. The mechanism of reproduction is unclear and the specimen shows evidence of p05-sessing both male and female genitalia on the forward and rear extremities respectively The brain, if it is a brain, takes the form of a cable of nerve ganglia with localized swellings in three places, running longitudinally through the cadaver like a central core. There is another and much thinner nerve cable running parallel to the thicker core, but below it and about twenty-five centimeters from the underside. Positioned close to each extremity are two sets of three eyes. Two are mounted dorsally and two on each of the forward and rear flanks. They are recessed but capable of limited extension; together they give the being complete and continuous vision vertically and horizontally. The type and positioning of the visual equipment and appendages suggest that it evolved on a very unfriendly world. The tentative Classification is an incomplete CRLT
             
            Classification:DBDG
            Planets:Earth, Gregory (Colony)
            Species:Earth-human, Gregorian
            Individuals:Theologian Augustine, Lieutenant Braithwaite, 
            Sur-geon-Lieutenant Brenner, Corpsman Briggs, Lieutenant Briggs, Captain Chaplain Bryson, Lieutenant Carrington, Lieutenant Chen, Major Chiang, Clarke, Lieutenant Clifton, Junior Intern/Senior PhysicianlDiagnostician-in-Charge of Surgery Peter Conway, Sergeant Davis, Major/Colonel Jonathan Dermod, Fleet Commander Dermod, Lieutenant Dodds, Lieutenant Dowling, Major-Captain Fletcher, Fox, Trainee Hadley, Harmon, Lieuten-ant Haslam, Patient Hewlitt, Tailor George L Hewlitt, Mrs. George L Hewlitt, Captain Hokasuri, Major Holyrod, OR Nurse Hudson, Lieutenant-General Lister, MacEwan, Major Madden, Captain Mallon, Senior Physician/Diagnostician/Patient Mannen/Man non, Nurse/Pathologist Murchison, Major Nelson, Mister/Major/Chief Psychologist O'Mara, Captain Sigvard Nyberg, Doctor Pelling, General Prentiss, Reviora, Lieutenant-Colonel Simmons, Colonel Skempton, Surgeon-Lieutenant/Major Stillman, Lieutenant-Sur-geon Sutherland, Corpsman Timmins, Lieutenant Wainright, Waring, Corpsman/Colonel-Captain Williamson
            Probable Individuals:Lieutenant Carmody, Lieutenant Carson, Section Chief Caxton, Major Colinson, Major Craythorne, Major Edwards, Doctor Hamilton, Dietician-in-ChiefKW Hardin, Lieu-tenant Harrison, Lieutenant Hendricks, Kellerman, Colonel Okaussie, Captain Stillson, Captain Summerfield, TrooperTeirnan, Surgeon-Captain Telford
            This species shows their teeth in a silent snarl when displaying amusement or friendship and make an unpleasant barking sound that denotes amusement. The sound, called laughing, in most cases a psychophysical mechanism for the release of minor degrees of tension. An Earth-human laughs because of sudden relief from worry or fear, or to express scorn or disbelief or sarcasm, or in response to words or a situation that is ridiculous, illogical or funny, or out of politeness when the situation or words are not funny but the person responsible is of high rank. The Earth-human voice is reputed to be one of the most versatile instruments in the Galaxy. The Earth-human DBDGs are the only race in the Galactic Federation with a nudity taboo, and one of the very few member species with an aversion to making love in public. The Earth-human DBDGs make up the majority of the Monitor Corps forces.
             
            Classification:DBDG
            Planets:Etlan Empire, Central World (Capital), Imperial Etla 
            (Capital), Etla, Etla the Sick (Colony)
            Species:Etlan, Imperial
            Individuals:Heraltnor, Imperial Representative Teltrenn
            The physiology of the citizens of the Empire is the same as the population of their colony Etla. The physiological resemblance is so close to Earth-human DBDGs that no other disguise other than native language and dress is needed. There are theories about a prehistoric colonization program by common, star-travelling an-cestors. Attempts at procreation between Earth-human DBDGs and Etlans have been unsuccessful.
             
            Classification:DBDG
            Planet:Nidia
            Species:Nidian
            Individuals:Chief of Procurement Creon-Emesh, Senior Physi-cian and Tutor Cresk-Sar, Surgeon-Lieutenant Dracht-Yur, Lieu-tenant-Colonel Dragh-Nin, Senior Physician Lesk-Murog, Senior Food Technician Sarnyagh-Sa, Yoragh-Kar
            Probable Individual:Surgeon-Lieutenant Krack-Yar
            The Nidians have seven-fingered hands, stand only four feet tall. They have a thick red fur coat, and look like a very cuddly teddy-bear.
             
            Classification:DBDG
            Planet:Orligia
            Species:Orlig, Orligian
            Individuals:Grawlya-Ki/Grulyaw~Ki, Surgeon-Lieutenant Krach-Yul, 
            Major Sachan-Li, Colonel Shech-Rar, Surgeon-Lieutenant Turragh-Mar
            Like the neighboring Nidians, Orligians resemble an Earth-human child's first non-adult friend's teddy bear.
             
            Classification:DBLF
            Planet:Ia
            Species:Ian (pre-adolescent)
            No Individual Narnes Known
            The being appears ring-shaped, rather like a large balloon tire. Overall diameter of the ring is about nine feet, with the thickness between two and three feet. The tegument is smooth, shiny and grey in color where it is not covered with a thick, brownish incrustation. The brown stuff, which covers more than half of the total skin area, looks cancerous, but may be some type of natural camouflage. There are five pairs of limbs, and no evidence ofspecial-ization. No visual organs or means of ingestion can be seen. The being isn't a doughnut, but possesses a fairly normal anatomy of the DBLF type~a cylindrical, lightly-boned body with heavy musculature. The being is not ring-shaped, but gives that impression because for some reason, known best to itself, it has been trying to swallow its tail. Senior Physician Conway, convinced all along that the patient is undergoing a natural metamorphosis, observes that the new patient, after the process is complete, is of classification GKNM.
             
            Classification:DBLF
            Planet:Kelgia
            Species:Kelgian
            Individuals:Patient Henredth, Senior Physician Karthad, Charge Nurse Kursedd, Diagnostician Kursedth, Patient Morredeth, Charge Nurse Naydrad, Fleet Commander Roonardth, Charge Nurse Segroth, Diagnostician Suggrod, Student Nurse Tarsedth, Diagnostician Towan, Senior Physician Yarrence
            Probable Individual:Charge Nurse Kursenneth
            Kelgians are warm-blooded, oxygen-breathing, multipedal, and with a long, flexible cylindrical body covered overall by highly mobile, silvery fur. The Kelgian forelimbs have three digits. There are twenty sets of short, thin, and not heavily muscled walking limbs. The feet, which have no toenails or other terminations, are like small, hard sponges.The fur moves continually in slow ripples from the conical head right down to the tail. These are completely involuntary movements triggered by its emotional reactions to outside stimuli. The evolutionary reasons for this mechanism are not clearly understood, not even by the Kelgians themselves, but it is generally believed that the emotionally expressive fur complements the Kelgian vocal equipment, which lacks emotional flex-ibility of tone.The movements of the fur make it absolutely clear to another Kelgian-what a Kelgian feels about the subject under discussion. As a result they always say exactly what they mean because what they think is plainly obvious-at least to another Kelgian.They can not do otherwise. Kelgians have an intense aver-sion towards any surgical procedure which would damage or disfigure its most treasured possession, its furs. To a Kelgian the removal of a strip or patch of fur, which in their species represents a means of communication equal to the spoken word, is a personal tragedy which all too often results in permanent psychological damage. A Kelgian's fur does not grow again and one whose pelt is damaged can rarely find a mate because it is unable to fully display its feelings. Kelgians are very close to Earth-humans in both basic metabolism and temperament. Except for the thinwalled, narrow casing which houses the brain, the DBLF species has no boney structure. Their bodies are composed of an outer cylinder of mus-culature which, in addition to be being its primary means of loco-motion, serves to protect the vital organs within it. To the mind of a being more generously reinforced with bones, this protection is far from adequate. Another severe disadvantage in the event of in-jury is its complex and extremely vulnerable circulation system; the blood-supply network which has to feed the tremendous bands of muscle encircling its body runs close under the skin, as does the nerve network that controls the mobile fur. The thick fur of the pelt gives some protection here, but not against chunks of jagged-edged, flying metal. An injury which many other species would consider superficial could cause a DBLF to bleed to death in minutes. Kelgians are herbivorous.
             
            Classification:DBPK
            Planet:Dwerla
            Species:Dwerlan
            No Individual Names Known
            A warm-blooded oxygen-breathing herbivore that does not walk upright. Judging by the shape of the spacesuits, the beings are flattened cylinders about six feet long with four sets of manipulatory appendages behind a conical section which is probably the head, and another four locomotor appendages. Apart from the smaller size and number of appendages, the beings physically resemble the Kelgian race. The pointed, fox-like head and the thick, broad-striped coat make it look like a furry, short-legged zebra with an enormous tail. These beings seem not to possess natural weapons of offrnce or defense, or any signs of having had any in the past. Even their limbs are not built for speed, so they can not run from danger. The set used for walking are too short and are padded, while the fotward set are more slender, less well-muscled and end in four highly flexible digits which don't possess so much as a fingernail among them. There are the fur markings, of course, but it is rare that a life-form rises to the top of its evolutionary tree by camouflage alone, or by being nice and cuddly. The species has two sexes, male and female, and the reproductive system seems relatively normal. Both sexes use a water soluble dye to enhance artificially the bands of color on their body fur clearly the dyes are for cosmetic reasons. The immature do not use dyes, but use a brownish pigment on a bare patch above the tail.
             
            Classification:DCNF
            Planet:Sommaradva
            Species:Sommaradvan
            Individual:Trainee Cha Th rat
            Four Ambulatory limbs; Four waist-level heavy manipulators; and a set of manipulators for food provisions and fine work encircling the neck. This being has two stomachs. Sommaradvan society is stratified into three levels~serviles, warriors, and rulers~which strictly govern how an individual acts within the society.
             
            Classification:DCSL
            Planet:Cromsag
            Species:Cromsaggar
            No Individual Names Known
            This species has three sets of limbs: two ambulators, two medial heavy manipulators, and two more at neck level for eating and to perform more delicate work. It has a cranium covered by thick, blue fur that continues in a narrow strip along the spine to the vestigial tail.
             
            Classification:DHCG
            Planet:Wemar
            Species:Wem
            Individuals:First Hunter Creethar, Hunter Druuth, Youth Evemth, 
            First Cook Remrath, First Teacher Tawsar
            The Wem life-form is a warm-blooded, oxygen-breathing species with an adult body mass just under three times that of an Earth-human and, since Wermar's surface gravity is one point three eight standard G's, a healthy specimen is proportionately well-muscled. It resembles the rare Earth beast called a kangaroo. The differences are that the head is larger and fitted with a really ferocious set of teeth; each of the two short forelimbs terminate in six-fingered hands possessing two opposable thumbs, and the tail is more massive and tapered to a wide, flat triangular tip composed of immobile osseous material enclosed by a thick, muscular sheath. The flattening at the end of tail serves a threefold purpose: as its principal natural weapon, as an emergency method of fast locomotion while hunting or being hunted, and as a means of transporting infant Wem who are too small to walk. The Wem hunt by adopting an awkward, almost ridiculous stance with their forelimbs tightly folded, their chins touching the ground, and their long legs spread so as to allow the tail to curve sharply downwards and forwards between the limbs so that the flat tip is at their center of balance. When the tail is straightened suddenly to full extension, it acts as a powerful third leg ca-pable of hurling the Wem forward for a distance of five or six body lengths. If the hunter does not land on top of its prey, kicking the creature senseless with the feet before disabling it with a deep bite through the cervical vertebrae and underlying nerve trunks, it pivots rapidly on one leg so that the flattened edge of the tail strikes its victim like a blunt, organic axe. While the tail is highly flexible where downward and forward movement is concerned, it cannot be elevated above the horizontal line of the spinal column.The back and upper flanks are, therefore, the Wem's only body areas that are vulnerable to attack by natural enemies, who must also possess the element of surprise if they are not to become the victim.
             
            Classification:DRVJ
            Species:Name Unknown
            Individual:Doctor Yeppha
            Planet:Unknown
            A small, tripedal, fragile being. From the furry dome of its head there sprout singly and in small clusters, at least twenty eyes.
             
            Classification:DTRC
            Species:Rhum
            Planet:Unknown
            Individual:Crelyarrel
            Flat, roughly circular beings, dark gray and wrinkled on one surface, and with a paler, mottled appearance on the other, smooth, surface. The beings attach to their FGHJ hosts with thick tendrils growing from the edge of the disk. The tendrils penetrate into their FGHJ hosts' spinal columns and rear craniums. The DTRCs have their own special needs that in no way resemble those of their hosts, whose animal habits and undirected behavior are highly repugnant to them. It is vital to the DTRCs continued mental well-being that the masters escape periodically from their hosts to lead their own lives~usually during the hours of darkness when the tools are no longer in use and can be quartered where they can not harm themselves.
             
            Classification:DTSB
            Planet:Traltha
            Species:Tralthan
            No Individual Names Known
            Apparent typographical error for Classification OTSB.
             
            Classification:EGCL
            Planet:Duwetz
            Species:Dewatti
            No Individual Names Known
            A warm-blooded, oyxgen-breathing lifeform of approximately twice the body weight of an adult Earth-human. Visually it resembles an outsize snail with a high, conical shell which is pierced around the tip where its four extensible eyes are located. Equally spaced around the base of the shell are eight triangular slots from which project the manipulatory appendages. The carapace rests on a thick, circular pad of muscle which is the locomotor system. Around the circumference of the pad are a number of fleshy projections, hollows and slits associated with its systems of ingestion, respiration, elimination, reproduction, and nonvisual sensors. The EGCLs are organic empaths. They are organic transmitters, reflectors and focusers and magnifiers of their own feelings and those of the beings around them. The faculty has evolved to the stage where they have no conscious control over the process.
             
            Classification:ELNT
            Planet:Melf Four
            Species:Melfan
            Individuals:Maintenance Technician Dremon, Senior Physician Edanelt, Diagnostician Ergandhir, Patient Kennonalt, Patient KIetilt, Maintenance Technician Kiedath, Nurse Lontallet, Senior Physician Medalont, Senreth
            Melfans are large, low slung crab-like crustaceans. The six thin, bony, tubular, multi-jointed legs project from slits where the bony carapace and underside join. The legs and all of the body are exoskeletal. The head has large, protruding, vertically-lidded eyes, enormous mandibles, and pincers projecting forward from the place where ears should be. Two long, thin and fragile feelers grow from the sides of the mouth. The species is amphibious.
             
            Classification:EPLA
            Planet:Unknown
            Species:Name Unknown
            Individual:Lonvellin
            Apparent typographical error for Classification EPLH.
             
            Classification:EPLH
            Planet:Unknown
            Species:Name Unknown
            Individual:Lonvellin
            The being is large, about one thousand pounds mass, and resembles a giant, upright pear. Five thick, tentacular appendages grow from the narrow head section and a heavy apron of muscle at its base gives evidence of a snaillike, although not necessarily slow, method of locomotion. The being is warm-blooded and has fairly normal gravity requirements. Five large mouths are situated below the root of each tentacle, four being plentifully supplied with teeth and the fifth housing the vocal apparatus. The tentacles themselves show a high degree of specialization at their extremities: three of them are plainly manipulatory, one bears the patient's visual equipment, and the remaining member terminates in a horn-tipped, boney mace. The head is featureless, being simply an osseous dome housing the brain. The cranium is pierced at regular intervals for visual, aural and olfactory sensors. Their life-span, lengthy to begin with, is artificially extended. Because they have tremendous minds, they have plenty of time, but they constantly have to fight against boredom. Because part of the price of such longevity is an evergrowing fear of death, they need to have their own personal physicians no doubt the most efficient practitioners of medicine known to them-constantly in attendance.
             
            Classification:FGHJ
            Planet:Unknown
            Species:Name Unknown
            No Individual Names Known
            The being has six limbs, four legs and two arms, all very heavily muscled, and is hairless except for a narrow band of stiff bristles running from the top of the head along the spine to the tail, which seems to have been surgically shortened at an early age. The body configuration is a thick cylinder of uniform girth between the fore and rear legs, but the forward torso narrows towards the shoulders and is carried erect. The neck is very thick and the head small. There are two eyes, recessed and looking forward, a mouth with very large teeth, and other openings that are probably aural or olfactory sense organs. The legs terminate in large, reddish-brown hooves. Each hoof has four digits and does not appear particularly dexterous. This creature serves as a host to beings of Classification DTRC.
             
            Classification:FGLI
            Planet:Traltha
            Species:Tralthan
            Individuals:Patient Cossunallen, Crajarron, Chief Dietitian Gurronsevas, Patient Horrantor, Senior Physician Hossantir, Surriltor, Senior Diagnostician-in-Charge of Pathology Thorn-nastor
            A massive entity with an osseous dome housing its brain, six elephantine feet connected to its triple massive shoulders, and four extensible eyes on an immobile head. Its six stubby legs normally give the Tralthan species such a stable base they frequently go to sleep standing up. Even healthy Tralthans have great difficulty getting up again if they fall onto their sides. Tralthans must not be rolled onto their backs under normal gravity conditions since this causes organic displacement which would increase their respira-tory difficulties. Standard gravity at Sector General is just over half Tralthan normal. Tralthans are vegetarians.
             
            Classification:FOKT
            Planet:Goglesk
            Species:Gogleskan
            Individuals:Healer '(hone and child
            The Gogleskan FOKT resembles a large, dumpy cactuslike plant whose spikes and hair are richly colored in a pattern which seems less random the more you look at it. A faint smell comes from the entity, a combination of musk and peppermint. The mass of un-ruly hair and spikes covering its erect, ovoid body are less irregular in their size and placing than is at first apparent. The body hair has mobility, though not the high degree of flexibility and rapid mobility of the Kelgian fur, and the spikes, some of which are extremely flexible and grouped together to form a digital cluster, give evidence of specialization. The other spikes are longer and stiffer, and some of them seem to be partially atrophied, as if they were evolved for natural defense, but the reason for their presence has long since gone. There are also a number of long, pale tendrils lying amid the multicolored hair covering the cranial area, used for contact telepathy. Its voice seems to come from a number of small, vertical breathing orifices which encircles its waist. The being sits on a flat, muscular pad, and it has legs as well. These members are stubby and concertina-like, and when the four of them are in use they increase the height of the being by several inches. The being al50 has two additional eyes at the back of its head~obviously this species has had to be very watchful in prehistoric times.
             
            Classification:FROB
            Planet:Hudlar
            Species:Hudlar, Hudlarian
            Individuals:Patient FROB-3, Patient FROB-lO, Patient FROB-18, Patient FROB-43, Patient FROB-1 132, Trainee FROB-61, Trainee FROB-73, Senior Physician Garoth, Infant Patient Metiglesh
            Hudlars are blocky, pear-shaped beings whose home planet pulls four Earth gravities and has a high-density atmosphere so rich in suspended animal and vegetable nutrients that it resembles thick soup. Although the FROB lifeform is warm-blooded and techni-cally an oxygen-breather, it can go for long periods without air if its food supply, which it absorbs directly through its thick but highly porous tegument, is adequate. Hudlars are massive six legged beings. Each leg is an immensely strong tapering tentacle, which terminates in a cluster of flexible digits, curled inward so that the weight is born on heavy knuckles and the fingers remain clear of the floor. The two lidless, recessed eyes are protected by hard, transparent and featureless casings. Hudlars communicate using a speaking membrane, which grows like a cock's comb from the top of the head. The speaking membrane also serves as a sound sensor. The skin resembles a seamless covering of flexible armor in appearance and texture. Food is ingested through organs of absorption that cover both flanks and the wastes are eliminated by a similar mechanism on the underside. Both systems are under voluntary control. Because of the physiological necessity for avoiding further sexual contact with its life-mate, a gravid Hudlar female changes gradually into male mode and, concurrently, its life-mate slowly becomes female. A Hudlar year after partuition the changes to both are complete.The Hudlar FROBs are acknowledged to be, physically, strongest life-forms of the Galactic Federation and to have the least-pervious body tegument. Contact with chlorine is instantly lethal to them. Hudlar blood is yellow and circulates under great pressure and pulse rate. Hudlars consider their names to be their most private and personal possession, and do not give or use their names in the presence of anyone who is not a member of the family or a close friend.
             
            Classification:FSOJ 
            Planet:Unknown
            Species:Protectors of the Unborn
            No Individual Names Known
            The Protector of the Unborn is a large, immensely strong lifeform that resembles aTralthan, but is less massive with stubbier legs projecting from a hemispherical carapace flared out slightly around the lower edges. The deployment of the legs and tentacles is similar to the Hudlar FROB life-form, but the carapace is a thicker ELNT Melfan shell without markings, and the FSOJ is plainly not herbivorous. From openings high on the carapace sprout four tentacles. Two different types of tentacles have been observed on different beings: long and particularly thin tentacles which terminate in flat, spear-like tips with serrated boney edges, and thick tentacles terminating in a cluster ofsharp, bony projections which make them resemble spiked clubs. The four stubby legs also have osseous pro-jections which enable them to be used as weapons as well. Midway between two of the tentacle openings there is a larger gap in the carapace from which protrudes a head, all mouth and teeth. The large upper and lower mandibles are capable of deforming all but the strongest metal alloys. A little space is reserved for two well-protected eyes at the bottom of deep, boney craters. A serrated tail also protrudes from the heavily slitted carapace. While the under-side is not armored, as is the carapace, this area is rarely open to attack, and it is covered by a thick tegument which apparently gives sufficient protection. In the center of this area is a thin, longitudinal fissure which opens into the birth canal. It will not open, however, until a few minutes before giving birth. The FSOJ brain is not in its skull, but deep inside the torso with the rest of the other vital organs. It is positioned just under the womb and surrounding the beginning of the birth canal. As a result, the brain is compressed as the embryo grows. If it is a difficult birth, the parent's brain is destroyed and junior comes out fighting, with a convenient food supply available until it can kill something for itself Senior Physicians Conway's first impression was that the entity was little more than an organic killing machine. Considering the fact that it is warm-blooded and oxygen-breathing, and its appendages show no evidence of the ability to manipulate tools or materials, Patholo-gist Murchison tentatively classified it as FSOJ and probably nonintelligent. The Unborn young of the bisexual FSOJ is retained in the womb until it is well-grown and fully equipped to survive. The Unborn is an intelligent and telepathic being, but loses these faculties at birth.
             
            Classification:GKNM
            Planet:Ia
            Species:Ian (adult)
            Individual:Patient Makolli
            The metamorphosed form of the adolescent DBLF lifeform. The species created a colony in this galaxy, coming from an adjoining one. The race is oxygen-breathing and oviparous, having a long, rodlike but flexible body, and possessing four insectile legs, ma-nipulators, the usual sense organs, and three tremendous sets of wings. The lifeform looks something like a large dragonfly.
             
            Classification:GLNO
            Planet:Cinruss
            Species:Cinrusskin
            Individual:Senior Physician Prilicla
            Cinrusskins are enormous, incredibly fragile flying insects, with a tubular exoskeletal body. Six sucker-tipped pencil-thin legs, four even more delicately fashioned, tiny, precise manipulators, and four sets ofwide, iridescent, and almost transparent wings project form the body. The head is a convoluted eggshell, so finely structured that the sensory and manipulatory organs that it supports seem ready to fall off at the first sudden movement. The eyes are large and triple-lidded. The Cinrusskin are the Federation's only empathic race. Cinruss has a dense atmosphere and one-eighth gravity. Cinrusskins are sexless.
             
            Classification:LSVO
            Planet:Nallaji
            Species:Nallajim
            Individuals:Kytili, Senior Physician Seldal
            The species has a birdlike, fragile, low-gravity physiology, with three legs, two not-quite-atrophied wings, and no hands at all. When LSVOs eat, they are sickened by anything which doesn't look like bird seed.
             
            Classification:MSVK
            Planet:Euril
            Species:Eurils
            No Individual Names Known
            Fragile, bipedal, stork-like beings from a low gravity world. The MSVK environment has dim lighting and a opaque fog for an atmosphere. The race is driven by an intense curiosity and hampered by extreme caution. They are the galaxy's prime observers, and are content to look and learn and record through their long-probes and sensors without making their presence known. MSVKs have a low tolerance to radiation.
             
            Classification:OTSB
            Planet:Traltha
            Species:Tralthan
            No Individual Names Known
            Tralthan Surgeons are really two beings instead of one, a combination of FGLI and OTSB.The OTSB is a nearly mindless symbiont which lives with its FGLI host. At first glance the OTSB looks like a furry ball sprouting a long ponytail, but a closer look shows that the ponytail is composed of scores of fine manipulators, most of which incorporate sensitive visual organs. A cluster of wire-thin, eye and sucker tipped tentacles sends infinitely detailed visual information to its giant host and receives instructions from the host. The Tralthan combinations are the best surgeons the Galaxy has ever known. Not all Tralthans choose to link up with a symbiote, but FGLI medics wear them like a badge of office.
             
            Classification:PVGJ
            Planet:Unknown
            Species:Name Unknown
            Individual:Doctor Fremvessith
            Apparent typographical error for Classification PVSJ.
             
            Classification:PVSJ
            Planet:Illensa
            Species:Illensan
            Individuals:Senior Physician Gilvesh, Charge Nurse Hredlichi, Diagnostician Lachlichi, Charge Nurse Leethveeschi
            Probable Individual:Charge Nurse Lentilatsar
            Illensans are chlorine breathers with shapeless spiny bodies and dry, rustling membranes joining the upper and lower appendages. The body resembles a haphazard collection of oily, yellow-green, unhealthy vegetation. The two stubby legs are covered by what look like oily blisters. Their loose protective suits are transparent except for the faint yellow fog of chlorine contained within. The Illensans are generally held to be the most visually repulsive beings in the Federation, as well as the most vain regarding their own physical appearance. Illensans suffer digestive upsets if they exercise after meals. Contact with water is instantly lethal to chlorine-breathers. PVSJs are not physiologically suited to the use of stairs and have very sensitive hearing.
             
            Classification:QCQL 
            Planet:Unknown
            Species:Name Unknown
            No Individual Names Known
            Apparent typographical error for Classification QLCL. Senior Physician Mannen did not know there was any such beastie, but Major O'Mara had a tape. There were two casualties of this classification at Sector General. The operations were suit jobs, since the gunk that the QCQLs breath would kill anything that walks, crawls or flies, excluding them.
             
            Classification:QLCL 
            Planet:Unknown
            Species:Name Unknown
            No Individual Names Known
            Recent, and very enthusiastic, members of the Federation, this species had never been to Sector General until the war with the Empire. Then a small ward was prepared to receive possible QLCL casualties. The ward was filled with the horribly corrosive fog the QLCLs used for an atmosphere, and the lighting was stepped up to the harsh, actinic blue which the they consider restful.
             
            Classification:SNLU 
            Planet:Unknown
            Species:Name: Vosan
            Individual:Diagnostician Semlic
            The SNLU life form requires a refrigerated life-support system for its ultra-low-temperature environment while on the Chlorine and Oxygen levels. A frigid-blooded methane-breather, it is most comfortable in an environment only a few degrees above absolute zero. The SNLUs have a complex mineral and liquid crystalline structure. The species evolved on the perpetually dark worlds which detached from their original solar systems and now drift through the interstellar spaces. Physically they are quite small, averaging one-third the body mass of a being like a Kelgian. In order to allow contact with other, warmer, species, the SN LUs are required to wear a large, complex, highly refrigerated life-support and sensor translation system, which requires frequent power recharge. The scales covering the SNLU's eight-limbed, starfish-shaped body shine coldly through the methane mist like multihued diamonds, mak-ing it resemble some wondrous, heraldic beast. The SNLUs live and work in the almost total silence of beings with a hypersensitivity to audible vibrations. These fragile, crystalline, methane-based lifeforms would decompose at temperatures in excess of eighteen degrees above absolute zero and be instantly cremated if the temperature rose above minus one-twenty on the temperature scale in use in the Federation.
             
            Classification:SRJH
            Planet:Drambo
            Species:Healers or Physicians or Protectors
            No Individual Names Known
            The Drambon Physicians are glorified leucocytes to the Drambon Strata Creatures, treating the many independent organisms living in and around those immense living carpets. The stupid, slow moving Drambon Physicians stay close to the most active and dan-gerous stretches of the Drambon shoreline. They resemble jelly-fish, so transparent that only their internal organs are visible. A leech-like form of life, the SRJHs seem comfortable in either air or water. Their reactions in the presence of severe illness or injury are instinctive. Using their spines or stings, they practice their profession by withdrawing the blood of their patients and pun fying it of any infection or toxic substances before returning it to the patients' bodies. (The process repairs simple physical damage as well.) However, not all the withdrawn blood is returned. It has not been established whether it is physiologically impossible for the SRJH to return it all or whether the Physician retains a few ounces as payment for services rendered. A Physicians can kill as well as cure. It can barely touch a beast, causing a predator to go into a muscular spasm so violent that parts of its skeleton pop through the skin. There is no evidence that they communicate verbally, visually, tactually, telepathically, by smell or by any other system known to Sector General. The quality of their emotional radiation suggests that they do not communicate at all in the accepted sense. The Physicians are simply aware ofother beings and objects around them and, by using their eyes and a mechanism similar to the empathic faculty, they are able to identi~ friend and foe.
             
            Classification:SRTT
            Planet:Unknown
            Species:Name Unknown
            No Individual Names Known
            This physiological type is amoebic, possessing the ability to extrude any limbs, sensory organs or protective tegument necessary to the environment in which it finds itself. It is so fantastically adaptable that it is difficult to imagine how one of these beings could ever fall sick in the first place.
             
            Classification:TLTU
            Planet:Threcald 5
            Species:Name Unknown
            Individual:TLTU Diagnostician
            A TLTU doctor breathes superheated steam and has pressure and gravity requirements three times greater than the environment of the oxygen levels. The local protection needed by a TLTU doctor is a great, clanking juggernaut which hisses continually as if it is about to spring a leak. The large protective suit resembles a spherical pressure boiler bristling with remote handling devices and mounted on caterpillar treads, and has to be avoided at all costs. The large size is needed to allow for heaters to render the occupant comfortable, and surface insulation and refrigerators to keep the vicinity habitable by other life-forms. The small TLTU lifeform inhabits a heavy-gravity, watery planet with edible minerals, which circles very close to its parent sun. The TLTU's blood consists of superheated liquid metal. TLTU patients are transported in their protective spheres anchored to stretcher carriers. These spheres emit a high-pitched, shuddering whine as their generators labor to main-tain the internal temperature at a comfortable, for their occupants, five hundred degrees.
             
            Classification:TOBS
            Planet:Fotawn
            Species:Name Unknown
            Individual:Trainee/Doctor Danalta
            This being can extrude any limbs, sense organs, or protective tegument necessary to the environment or situation in which it finds itself. It evolved on a planet with a highly eccentric orbit, and with climatic changes so severe that an incredible degree of physical adapt-ability was necessary for survival. It became dominant on its world, and developed intelligence and a civilization, not by competing in the matter of natural weapons but by refining and perfecting its adaptive capability. When it is faced by natural enemies, the options are flight, protective mimicry, or the assumption of a shape frightening to the attacker. The speed and accuracy of the mimicry, particularly in the almost perfect reproduction ofbehavior patterns, suggests that the entity may be a receptive empath. The empathic faculty is under voluntary control, so that the level of emotional radiation reaching its receptors can be reduced, or even cut off at will, should it become too distressing. With such effective means of self-protection available, the species is impervious to physical damage other than by complete annihilation or application of ultrahigh temperatures.The concept of curative surgery would be a strange one indeed to members of that race. They do not require mechanisms for self-protection, so they are likely to be advanced in the philosophical sciences but back-ward in developing technology. When not trying to look like something else, TOBSs take the configuration of a large, dark-green, uneven ball.
             
            Classification:TRLH
            Planet:Unknown
            Species:Name Unknown
            No Individual Names Known
            The TRLH casualty was an ally of the Empire during that war. Classification was aided by the fact that the patient's spacesuit was transparent as well as flexible. The atmosphere the being breathes is as exotic as that of the QCQLs, but can be reproduced. The TRLH has a thin carapace which covers its back and curves down and inwards to protect the central area of its underside. Four thick, single-jointed legs project from the uncovered sections. It has a large but lightly boned head, four manipulatory appendages, two recessed but extensible eyes, and two mouths.
             
            Classification:VTXM
            Planet:Telf
            Species:Telfi, Telphi
            Individual:Astrogator-part Cheixic
            A group-mind species whose small beetle-like bodies live by the direct conversion of various combinations and intensities of hard radiation. Mthough individually the beings are quite stupid, the gestalt entities are highly intelligent. The Telfi operate in groups as contact telepaths to pool their mental and physical abilities. The Telfi have a spoken language as well as the telepathic faculty used between individuals, especially members of a family gestalt. Another variant of the species resembles a large, terrestrial lizard, just under five feet long from the bulbous head to vestigial tail, with an extra set of forelimbs growing from the base of the neck. The only visible features are two tiny, lidless eyes and the mouth. The four stubby walking limbs can be bent double to lie flat against the body while the two, longer forward manipulators can stretch forward and cross so as to allow the chin to rest on the crossover point. The skin of a dead Telfi is pale gray with a mottled and veined effect that resembles unpolished marble. The color is a symptom of advanced radiation starvation and a lethal failure of the absorption mechanism. A healthy Telfi reflects no light at all, looking like liz-ard-shaped black holes. A healthyTelfi's temperature is below room temperature. Investigating their ultra-hot metabolism closely is to risk radiation poisoning. There is a fallacy among non-medics that the Telfi cannot be closely approached or touched without the use of remotely controlled manipulators. To live they must absorb the radiation normally provided by their natural environment but when, for clinical reasons, the radiation is withdrawn for several days and they are week from their equivalent of hunger, their radioactive emissions drop to a harmless level.
             
            Classification:VUXG 
            Planet:Unknown
            Species:Name Unknown
            Individual:Dr. Arretapec
            The VUXG resembles nothing so much as a withered prune float-mg in a spherical gob of syrup. The species has telepathic, teleportive, and~sort of precognitive abilities. The precognitive ability does not appear to be of much use because it does not work with individuals but only with populations, and so far in the future and in such a haphazard manner that it is practically useless.
             
            Classification:Unknown
            Planet:Drambo
            Species:Farmer Fish
            No Individual Names Known
            The large-headed Farmer Fish are responsible for cultivating and protecting benign growth and destroying all other growth in the Drambon Strata Creature. Farmer Fish have stubby arms sprout-ing from the base of their enlarged heads.
             
            Classification:Unknown
            Planet:Drambo
            Species:Strata Creatures
            No Individual Names Known
            The largest creature on the planet Drambo~so large that at a scoutship's suborbital velocity of six thousand plus miles per hour it takes just over nine minutes to travel from one side of the patient to the other. The creature is so vast that it has many independent parts performing specialized functions, such as the eye plants, air renewal plants, Farmer Fish, Thought Controlled Tools, and vegetable teeth. The parts can communicate via a mineral-rich sap. The creature uses water instead of blood as its working fluid. It is not clear if the entire creature is an animal or a plant, there being components of both in its immense expanse. There is only one intelligent Strata Creature on Drambo, and it is being treated for radiation poisoning.
             
            Classification:Unknown
            Planet:Drambo
            Species:Thought Controlled Tools
            No Individual Names Known
            Under the mental control of its user, a "tool" can assume any useful shape imagined. At Sector General, one appeared as a Hudlar type six scalpel, a medium-sized box spanner, a metallic sphere, a miniature bust of Beethoven, a set of Tralthan dentures, and a Hudlar food sprayer, among other things. The tools belong to the only sentient Strata Creature on Drambo, and were used to attack the medical and military forces attempting to treat the Strata Crea-ture for radiation poisoning.
             
            Classification:Unknown
            Planet:Dutha
            Species:Duthan
            Individuals:Patient Bowab, His Excellency the Lord Scrennagle of 
            Dutha
            Duthans have a centaur-like body. The torso from the waist up resembles that of an Earth-human, but the musculature of the arms, shoulders and chest are subtly different. The hands are five-digited, each comprised of three fingers and two opposable thumbs. The head is carried erect above a very thick neck, which seems disproportionately small.The face is dominated by two large, soft, brown eyes that somehow make the slits, pro tuberan ces, and fleshy petals which comprise the other features visually acceptable.
             
            Classification:Unknowm
            Planet:Keran
            Species:Keranni
            No Individual Names Known
            No description given.
             
            Classification:Unknown
            Planet:Unknown
            Species:Kreglinni
            No Individual Names Known
            No description given.
             
            Classification:Various
            Planet:Meatball
            Species:CLCH/CLHG Drambon Rollers, Drambon Farmer Fish, Drambon Strata Creatures, Drambon Thought Controlled Tools, SRJH Drambon Healers or Physicians or Protectors
            The planet was originally named by the crew of Descartes, but the name was considered derogatory by one of the native intelligent species. The planet is now referred to as Drambo.

       


