Then suddenly there was no limb—it had fallen stiffly, like the diseased branch of a tree, into a container on the floor—and she had her first view of a stump. Desperately she fought the urge to be physically sick.
“The large flap of tegument is folded over the stub limb,” Conway was saying, “and is attached by staples that dissolve when the healing process is complete. Because of the elevated internal pressure of this life-form and the extreme resistance of the tegument to puncturing by needle, normal suturing is useless and it is advisable, in fact, to err on the generous side where the staples are concerned.”
There had been unsavory rumors of cases like this on Sommaradva, traumatic amputation of limbs during a major industrial or transportation accident, after which the casualty had survived, or insisted on surviving. The wounds had been discreetly tidied up, usually by young, nonresponsible and as yet unqualified warrior-surgeons or even, if nobody else was available, by an amenable servile-healer. But even when the warriors concerned had sustained the wounds as a result of an act of bravery, the matter was hushed up and forgotten as quickly as possible.
The casualties went into voluntary exile. They would never dream of revealing their disabilities or deformities to the public gaze, nor would they have been allowed to do so. On Sommaradva they had too much respect for their bodies. And for people to parade around with mechanical devices replacing their limbs was abhorrent and unthinkable.
“Thank you, Seventy-three, that was well done,” the Earth-human said, glancing once again at its white card. “Trainee Sixty-one, would you like to show us what you can do?”
Abhorrent and repulsive though it was, Cha Thrat could not take her eyes from the operating cradle while the new FROB demonstrated its surgical prowess. The depth and positioning of every incision and instrument was burned into her memory as if she were watching some horrid but fascinating perversion. Sixty-one was followed by two other advanced trainees, and patient FROB-Eleven Thirty-two was left with only two of its six limbs remaining in place.
“There is still a fair degree of mobility in one of the forelimbs,” Conway said, “and, considering the advanced age and reduced mental adaptability, I feel that it should be left intact for psychological as well as physiological reasons. It may well be that the increased blood and available nutrient supply due to the absence of the other limbs will partially improve the muscle condition and circulation in this one. As you can see, the other forelimb has degenerated virtually to the point of necrosis and must be removed.
“Trainee Cha Thrat,” it added, “will perform the amputation.”
Suddenly they were all looking at her, and for a moment Cha Thrat had the ridiculous feeling that she was in the center of a three-dimensional picture, frozen in this nightmare for all eternity. But the real nightmare lay a few minutes in the future, when she would be forced into a major professional decision.
Her partner from the ward vibrated its speaking membrane quietly. “This is a great professional compliment, Nurse.”
Before she could reply, the Diagnostician was speaking again, to everyone.
It said, “Cha Thrat is a native of a newly discovered world, Sommaradva, where it was a qualified surgeon. It has prior experience of other-species surgery on an Earth-human DBDG, a life-form that it had encountered for the first time only a few hours earlier. In spite of this, the work was skillfully done, Senior Physician Edanelt tells me, and
undoubtedly saved the entity’s limb and probably its life. And now it can further increase its other-species surgical experience with a much less difficult procedure on an FROB.”
Encouragingly it ended, “Come forward, Cha Thrat. Don’t be afraid. If anything should go wrong, I will be here to help.”
There was a great, cold fear inside her mixed with the helpless anger of having to face the ultimate challenge without adequate spiritual preparation. But the Diagnostician’s concluding words, suggesting that her natural fear might somehow keep her from doing the work, filled her with righteous anger. It was a hospital ruler and, no matter how misguided and irresponsible its orders to her had seemed, they would be obeyed—that was the law. And no Sommaradvan of the warrior class would show fear before anyone, and that included a group of other-species strangers. But still she hesitated.
Impatiently the Earth-human said, “Are you capable of performing this operation?”
“Yes,” she said.
Had it asked her if she
wanted
to perform the operation, Cha Thrat thought sadly as she moved toward the cradle, the answer would have been different. Then, with the incredibly sharp FROB Number Three cutter in her hand, she tried again.
“What,” she asked quickly, “is my precise responsibility in this case?”
The Earth-human took a deep breath and let it out slowly, then said, “You are responsible for the surgical removal of the patient’s left forelimb.”
“Is it possible to save this limb?” she asked hesitantly. “Can the circulation be improved, perhaps by surgical enlargement of the blood vessels, or by—”
“No,” said Conway firmly. “Please begin.”
She made the initial incisions and proceeded exactly as the others had done, without further hesitation or need of prompting by the Diagnostician. Knowing what was to happen, she suppressed her fear and steadfastly refused to worry about or feel the pain until the moment it would engulf her. She was utterly determined now to show this strange,
highly advanced but seemingly nonresponsible medic how a truly dedicated warrior-surgeon of Sommaradva was expected to behave.
As she was inserting the last few staples into the flap covering the stump, the Diagnostician said warmly, “That was fast, precise, and quite exemplary work, Cha Thrat. I am particularly impressed by—What are you
doing
?”
She thought that her intentions were obvious as soon as she lifted the Number Three cutter. Sommaradvan DCNFs did not possess forelimbs as such but, she thought proudly, the removal of a left-side medial limb would satisfy the professional requirements of the situation. One quick, neat slice was enough, then she looked at it lying in the container among the Hudlar limbs and gripped the stump tightly to control the bleeding.
Her last conscious memory of the episode was of Diagnostician Conway shouting above the general uproar into the communicator.
“FROB lecture theater on the double,” it was saying urgently. “One DCNF, a traumatic amputation, self-inflicted. Ready the OR on Level Forty-three, dammit, and assemble a microsurgery team!”
S
he could not be sure about the time required for her post-op recuperation, only that there had been lengthy periods of unconsciousness and a great many visits from Chief Psychologist O’Mara and Diagnosticians Thornnastor and Conway. The DBLF nurse assigned to her made caustic comments about the special attention she was receiving from the hospital’s hierarchy, the quantity of food she was moving for a supposedly sick patient, and about a newly arrived Nidian trainee whose furry little head had been turned by Cresk-Sar of all people. But when she tried to discuss her own case it was obvious from the Kelgian nurse’s agitated fur that that was a forbidden subject.
It did not matter because, by accident or design, the medication she was receiving had the effect of making her feel as if her mind was some kind of dirigible airship, moving at her direction but detached and floating free of all mundane problems. It was, she realized, a very comfortable but suggestible state.
During one of its later visits, O’Mara had suggested that, regardless of her reasons for acting as she had, she had discharged her particularly strict professional obligations, so that no further action was required on her part. The limb had been completely severed and removed from the torso. The fact that Conway and Thornnastor had together performed some very fancy microsurgery to reattach it, with no loss of function or
feeling, was a piece of good fortune that she should accept gratefully and without guilt.
It had taken a long time to convince the wizard that she had already arrived at the same conclusion, and that she was grateful, not only for her good fortune, but to Diagnosticians Conway and Thornnastor for giving her back the limb. The only part of the incident that continued to puzzle her, she had told O’Mara, was the adverse reaction of everyone to the noble and praiseworthy thing she had done.
O’Mara had seemed to relax then, and it had proceeded with a long, devious spell that involved subjects which Cha Thrat had considered too personal and sensitive to be discussed with a fellow Sommaradvan, much less a stranger. Perhaps it was the medication that reduced her feelings of shock and outrage, and made the suggestions of the wizard seem worthy of consideration rather than outright rejection.
One of its suggestions had been that, when viewed nonsubjectively, the action she had taken had been neither noble nor praiseworthy, but a little bit silly. By the end of that visit she almost agreed with it, and suddenly she was allowed visitors.
Tarsedth and the Hudlar trainee were the first callers. The Kelgian came bustling forward to ask how she was feeling and to examine her scars, while the FROB remained standing in silence just inside the entrance. Cha Thrat wondered if there was anything bothering it, forgetting for the moment that her medication frequently caused her to vocalize her thoughts.
“Nothing,” said Tarsedth. “Just ignore the big softie. When I arrived it was outside the door, don’t know for how long, afraid that the mere sight of another Hudlar would give you some kind of emotional relapse. In spite of all that muscle, Hudlars are sensitive souls. According to what O’Mara told Cresk-Sar, you are unlikely to do anything sudden or melodramatic. You are neither mentally unbalanced nor emotionally disturbed. Its exact words were that you were normally crazy but not certifiably mad, which is the condition of quite a few people who work in this place.”
It turned suddenly to regard the FROB, then went on. “Come closer!
It is in bed, with a limb and most of its body immobilized, it has been blasted into low orbit with tranquilizers, and it isn’t likely to bite you!”
The Hudlar came forward and said shyly, “We all, everyone who was there, wish you well. That includes Patient Eleven Thirty-two, who is pain-free now and making good progress. And Charge Nurse Segroth whose good wishes were, ah, more perfunctory. Will you recover the full use of the limb?”
“Don’t be stupid,” Tarsedth broke in. “With two Diagnosticians on the case it doesn’t dare not make a complete recovery.” To Cha Thrat it went on. “But so much has been happening to you recently that I can’t keep up. Is it true that you ticked off the Chief Psychologist in front of everybody in the Chalder ward, called it some kind of witch-doctor, and reminded it of its professional duty toward Patient AUGL-One Sixteen? According to the stories going around—”
“It wasn’t quite as bad as that,” Cha Thrat said.
“It never is,” the DBLF said, its fur subsiding in disappointment. “But the business during the FROB demonstration, now. You can’t deny or diminish what happened there.”
“Perhaps,” the Hudlar quietly said, “it would rather not talk about that.”
“Why not?” Tarsedth asked. “Everyone else is talking about it.”
Cha Thrat was silent for a moment as she looked up at the head and shoulders of the Kelgian projecting like a silver-furred cone over one side of her bed and the enormous body of the Hudlar looming over the other. She tried to make her unnaturally fuzzy mind concentrate on what she wanted to say.
“I would prefer to talk about all the lectures I’ve missed,” she said finally. “Was there anything especially interesting or important? And would you ask Cresk-Sar if I could have a remote control for the viewscreen, so I can tune in to the teaching channels? Tell it that I have nothing to do here and I would like to continue with my studies as soon as possible.”
“Friend,” Tarsedth said, its fur rising into angry spikes, “I think you would be wasting your time.”
For the first time she wished that her Kelgian classmate was capable of something less than complete honesty. She had been expecting to hear something like this, but the bad news could have been broken more gently.
“What our forthright friend should have told you,” the Hudlar said, “is that we inquired about your exact status from Senior Physician Cresk-Sar, who would not give us a firm answer. It said that you were guilty not so much of contravening hospital rules but of breaking rules that nobody had dreamed of writing. The decision on what to do with you has been referred up, it said, and you could expect a visit from O’Mara quite soon.
“When asked if we could bring you lecture material,” it ended apologetically, “Cresk-Sar said no.”
It did not make any difference how it was broken, she thought after they had gone, the news was equally bad. But the sudden, raucous sound of her bedside communicator kept her from dwelling for too long on her troubles.
It was Patient AUGL-One Sixteen who, with Charge Nurse Hredlichi’s cooperation, was shouting into one of the Nurses’ Station communicators from the entrance to the Chalder ward. It began by apologizing for the physiological and environmental problems that kept it from visiting her in person, then told her how much it was missing her visits—the Earth-human wizard O’Mara, it said, lacked her sympathetic manner and charm—and it hoped she was recovering with no physical or mental distress.
“Everything is fine,” she lied. It was not a good thing to burden a patient with its medic’s troubles, even when the medic was temporarily a patient. “How are you?”
“Very well, thank you,” the Chalder replied, sounding enthusiastic in spite of the fact that its words were reaching her through two communicators, a translator, and a considerable quantity of water. “O’Mara says that I can leave and rejoin my family very soon, and can start contacting the space administration on Chalder about my old job. I’m still young for a Chalder, you know, and I do really feel well.”
“I’m very happy for you, One Sixteen,” Cha Thrat said, deliberately omitting its name because others might be listening who were not entitled to use it. She was surprised by the strength of her feelings toward the creature.
“I’ve heard the nurses talking,” the Chalder went on, “and it seems like you are in serious trouble. I hope all goes well for you, but if not, and you have to leave the hospital … Well, you are so far from Sommaradva out here that if you felt like seeing another world on your way home, my people would be pleased to have you for as long as you liked to stay. We’re pretty well advanced on Chalderescol and your food synthesis and life-support would be no problem.
“It’s a beautiful world,” it added, “much, much nicer than the Chalder ward …”
When the Chalder eventually broke contact, she settled back into the pillows, feeling tired but not depressed or unhappy, thinking about the ocean world of Chalderescol. Before joining the AUGL ward she had studied the library tape on that world with the idea of being able to talk about home to the patients, so she was not completely unfamiliar with the planet. The thought of living there was exciting, and she knew that, as an off-planet person entitled to call Muromeshomon by name, its family and friends would make her welcome however long or short her stay. But thoughts like that were uncomfortable because they presupposed that she would be leaving the hospital.
Instead she wondered how the normally shy and gentle Chalder had been able to prevail upon the acid-tongued Hredlichli to use the Nurses’ Station communicator as it had done. Could it have forced cooperation by threatening to wreck the place again? Or, more likely, had the Chalder’s call to her been supported, perhaps even suggested, by O’Mara?
That, too, was an uncomfortable thought, but it did not keep her awake. The continuing spell of the Earth-human wizard or the medication it had prescribed, or both, were still having their insidious effect.
During the days that followed she was visited singly and, where physiological considerations permitted, in small groups by her classmates.
Cresk-Sar came twice but, like all the other visitors, the tutor would not talk about medical matters at all. Then one day O’Mara and Diagnostician Conway arrived together and would discuss nothing else.
“Good morning, Cha Thrat, how are you feeling?” the Diagnostician began, as she knew it would.
“Very well, thank you,” she replied, as it knew she would. After that she was subjected to the most meticulously thorough physical examination she had ever experienced.
“You’ve probably realized by now that all of this wasn’t strictly necessary,” Conway said as it replaced the sheet that had been covering her body. “However, it was my first opportunity to have a really close look at the DCNF physiological classification as a whole, as opposed to one of the limbs. Thank you, it was interesting and most instructive.
“But now that you are completely recovered,” it went on, with a quick glance toward O’Mara, “and will require only a course of exercises before you would be fit for duty, what are we going to do with you?”
She suspected that it was a rhetorical question, but she badly wanted to reply to it. Anxiously she said, “There have been mistakes, misunderstandings. They will not occur again. I would like to remain in the hospital and continue my training.”
“No!”
Conway said sharply. In a quieter voice it went on. “You are a fine surgeon, Cha Thrat—potentially a great one. Losing you would be a shameful waste of talent. But keeping you on the medical staff, with your peculiar ideas of what constitutes ethical behavior, is out of the question. There isn’t a ward in the hospital that would accept you for practical training now. Segroth took you only because O’Mara and I requested it.
“I like to make my surgery lectures as interesting and exciting as possible for the trainees,” Conway added, “but there are limits, dammit!”
Before either of them could say the words that would send her from the hospital, Cha Thrat said quickly, “What if something could be done that would guarantee my future good behavior? One of my early lectures was on the Educator tape system of teaching alien physiology and medicine
that, in effect, gives the recipient an other-species viewpoint. If I could be given such a tape, one with a more acceptable, to you, code of professional behavior, then I would be sure to stay out of trouble.”
She waited anxiously, but the two Earth-humans were looking at each other in silence, ignoring her.
Without the Educator or physiology tape system, she had learned, a multispecies hospital like Sector General could not have existed. No single brain, regardless of species, could hold the enormous quantity of physiological knowledge required to successfully treat the variety of patients the hospital received. But complete physiological data on any patient’s species was available by means of an Educator tape, which was simply the brain record of some great medical mind belonging to the same or a similar species as the patient to be treated.
A being taking such a tape had to share its mind with a completely alien personality. Subjectively, that was exactly how it felt; all of the memories and experiences and personality traits of the being who had donated the tape were impressed on the receiving mind, not just selected pieces of medical data. An Educator tape could not be edited and the degree of confusion, emotional disorientation, and personality dislocation caused to a recipient could not be adequately described even by the Senior Physicians and Diagnosticians who experienced it.
The Diagnosticians were the hospital’s highest medical rulers, beings whose minds were both adaptable and stable enough to retain permanently up to ten physiology tapes at one time. To their data-crammed minds was given the job of original research into xenological medicine and the treatment of new diseases in newly discovered life-forms.
But Cha Thrat was not interested in subjecting herself voluntarily, as had the Diagnosticians, to a multiplicity of alien ideas and influences. She had heard it said among the staff that any person sane enough to be a Diagnostician had to be mad, and she could well believe it. Her idea represented a much less drastic solution to the problem.