The compleat collected s.., p.98
The COMPLEAT Collected SFF Works, page 98
"I cannot work if you fidget," said Arretapec, the rapidity of the words the only indication of their emotional content. "You will therefore leave me at once."
"I wasn't fidgeting," Conway protested angrily. "My ear itched and I—"
"An itch, especially one capable of making you move as this one has done, is a symptom of a physical disorder which should be treated," the VUXG interrupted. "Or it is caused by a parasitic or symbiotic life-form dwelling, perhaps unknown to you, on your body.
"Now, I expressly stated that my assistant should be in perfect physical health and not a member of a species who either consciously or unconsciously harboured parasites—a type, you must understand, which are particularly prone to fidget—so that you can understand my displeasure. Had it not been for your sudden movement I might have accomplished something, therefore go."
"Why you supercilious—"
THE DINOSAUR chose that moment to stagger into the shallow water again, lose its footing and come the great grand-daddy of all bellyflops. Falling mud and spray drenched Conway and a small tidal wave surged over his feet. The distraction was enough to make him pause, and the pause gave him time to realise that he had not been personally insulted. There were many intelligent species who harboured parasites—some of them actually necessary to the health of the host body, so that in their case the slang expression being lousy also meant being in tiptop condition. Maybe Arretapec had meant to be insulting, but he could not be sure. And the VUXG was, after all, a very important person ...
"What exactly might you have accomplished?" Conway asked sarcastically. He was still angry, but had decided to fight on the professional rather than the personal level. Besides, he knew that the Translator would take the insulting edge off his words. "What are you trying to accomplish, and how do you expect to do it merely by—from what I can see, anyway—just looking at the patient?"
"I cannot tell you," Arretapec replied after a few seconds. "My purpose is ... is vast. It is for the future. You would not understand."
"How do you know? If you told me what you were doing maybe I could help."
"You cannot help."
"Look," said Conway, exasperated, "you haven't even tried to use the full facilities of the hospital yet. No matter what you are trying to do for your patient, the first step should have been a thorough examination—immobilisation, followed by X-rays, biopsys, the lot. This would have given you valuable physiological data upon which to work—"
"To state the matter simply," Arretapec broke in, "you are saying that in order to understand a complicated organism or mechanism, one must first be broken down into its component parts that they might be understood individually. My race does not believe that an object must be destroyed—even in part—before it can be understood. Your crude methods of investigation are therefore worthless to me.
"I suggest that you leave."
Seething, Conway left.
His first impulse was to storm into O'Mara's office and tell the Chief Psychologist to find somebody else to run errands for the VUXG. But O'Mara had told him that his present assignment was important, and O'Mara would have unkind things to say if he thought that Conway was throwing his hand in simply out of pique because his curiosity had not been satisfied or his pride hurt. There were lots of doctors—the assistants to Diagnosticians, particularly—who were not allowed to touch their superior's patients, or was it just that Conway resented a being like Arretapec being his superior ...?
THE HOSPITAL'S Chief Psychologist had an important job. Given even the highest qualities of tolerance and mutual respect in its personnel there were still occasions when friction occurred. Awkward situations arose through sheer ignorance or misunderstanding, or a being would develop a xenophobic neurosis which affected both his stability and efficiency. An Earth-human, for instance, who discovered that he had a horror of spiders would not be able to bring to bear on an Illensan patient the proper amount of clinical detachment necessary for its treatment, and if one of the spidery Illensan doctors should have occasion to treat him ... well, the services of a top psychologist would be needed in a hurry. But it was O'Mara's duty to eradicate such signs of trouble, or remove potentially troublesome individuals, long before they could develop into open conflict.
If Conway went to O'Mara in his present frame of mind there was real danger of the psychologist deciding that he was temperamently unsuited for his position. Quite apart from the prestige attached to a post at Sector General, the work performed in it was both stimulating and very much worthwhile. Should O'Mara decide that he was unfit to remain here and pack him off to some planetary hospital, it would be the greatest tragedy of Conway's life.
But if he could not go to O'Mara, where could he go? Ordered off one job and not having another, Conway was at a loose end. He stood at a corridor intersection for several minutes thinking, while beings representing a cross-section of all the intelligent races of the galaxy strode, undulated or skittered past him, then suddenly he had it. There was something he could do, something which he would have done anyway if everything had not happened with such a rush.
The hospital library had several items on the pre-historic period of Earth, both taped and in the old-fashioned and more cumbersome book form. Conway heaped them on a reading desk and prepared to make an attempt to satisfy his professional curiosity about the patient in this roundabout fashion.
The time passed very quickly.
DINOSAUR, Conway discovered at once, was simply a general term applied to the giant reptiles. The patient, except for its larger size and bony enlargement of the tip of the tail, was identical in outward physical characteristics to the Brontosaurus which lived among the swamps of the Jurassic Period. It also was herbiverous, but unlike their patient had no means of defence against the carniverous reptiles of its time. There was a surprising amount of physiological data available as well, which Conway absorbed greedily.
The spinal column was composed of huge vertabrae, and with the exception of the caudal vertabrae all were hollow—which saving of osseous material making possible a relatively low body weight in comparison with its tremendous size. It was oviparous. The head was small, the brain case one of the smallest found among the vertabrates. But in addition to this brain there was a well-developed nerve centre in the region of the sacral vertabrae which was several times as large as the brain proper. It was thought that the brontosaur grew slowly, their great size being explained by the fact that they could live two hundred or more years.
Their only defence against comtempory rivals was to take to and remain in the water—they could pasture under water and required only brief mouthfuls of air, apparently. They became extinct when geologic changes caused their swampy habitats to dry up and leave them at the mercy of their natural enemies.
One authority stated that these saurians were nature's biggest failure. Yet they had flourished, said another, through three geologic periods—the Triassic, Jurassic and Cretaceous—which totalled 140 million years, a long time indeed for a 'failure' to be around considering the fact that Man had existed only for approximately half a million years ...!
CONWAY left the library with the conviction that he had discovered something important, but what exactly it was he could not say; it was an intensely frustrating feeling. Over a hurried meal he decided that he badly needed more information and there was only one person who might be able to give it to him. He would see O'Mara again.
"Where is our small friend?" said the psychologist sharply when Conway entered his office a few minutes later. "Have you had a fight or something?"
Conway gulped and tried to keep his voice steady as he replied, "Dr. Arretapec wished to work with the patient alone for a while, and I've been doing some research on dinosaurs in the library. I wondered if you had any more information for me?"
"A little," O'Mara said. He looked steadily at Conway for several very uncomfortable seconds, then grunted, "Here it is ..."
The Monitor Corps survey vessel which had discovered Arretapec's home planet had, after realising the high stage of civilisation reached by the inhabitants, given them the hyper-drive. One of the first planets visited had been a raw, young world devoid of intelligent life, but one of its life-forms had interested them—the giant saurian. They had told the Galactic powers-that-be that given the proper assistance they might be able to do something which would benefit civilisation as a whole, and as it was impossible for any telepathic race to tell a lie or even understand what a lie is, they were given the assistance asked for and Arretapec and his patient had come to Sector General.
There was one other small item as well, O'Mara told Conway. Apparently the VUXG's psi faculties included a sort of precognitive ability. This latter did not appear to be of much use because it did not work with individuals but only with populations, and then so far in the future and in such a haphazard manner that it was practically useless.
Conway left O'Mara feeling more confused than ever.
He was still trying to make the odd bits and pieces of information add up to something which made sense, but either he was too tired or too stupid. And definitely he was tired; when it came to this time these past two days his brain had been just so much thick, weary fog ...
There must be an association between the two factors, Arretapec's coming and this unaccountable weariness, Conway thought: he was in good physical condition and no amount of muscular or mental exertion had left him feeling this way before. And had not Arretapec said something about the itching sensations he had felt being symtomatic of a disorder?
All of a sudden his job with the VUXG doctor was no longer merely frustrating or annoying, Conway was beginning to feel anxiety for his own personal safety. Suppose the itching was due to some new type of bacteria which did not show up on his personal tell-tale? He had thought something like this when his fidgeting had caused Arretapec to send him away, but for the rest of the day he had been subconsciously trying to convince himself that it was nothing because the intensity of the sensations had diminished to practically zero. Now he knew that he should have had one of the senior physicians look into it. He should, in fact, do it now.
But Conway was very tired. He promised himself that he would get Dr. Mannen, his previous superior, to give him a going over in the morning. And in the morning he would have to get on the right side of Arretapec again. He was still worrying about the strange new disease he might have caught and the correct method of apologising to a VUXG life-form when he fell asleep.
Chapter Four
NEXT MORNING there was another two-inch hollow eaten in the top of his desk and Arretapec was nestling inside it. As soon as Conway demonstrated that he was awake by sitting up, the being spoke:
"It had occurred to me since yesterday," the VUXG said, "that I have perhaps been expecting too much in the way of self-control, emotional stability, and the ability to endure or to discount minor physical irritants in a member of a species which is—relatively, you understand—of low mentality. I will therefore do my utmost to bear these points in mind during our future relations together."
It took a few seconds for Conway to realise that Arretapec had apologised to him. When he did he thought that it was the most insulting apology he had ever had tendered to him, and that it spoke well for his self-control that he did not tell the other so. Instead he smiled and insisted that it was all his fault. They left to see their patient again.
The interior of the converted transport had changed out of all recognition. Instead of a hollow sphere covered with a muddy shambles of soil, water and foliage, three-quarters of the available surface was now a perfect representation of a Mesozoic landscape. Yet it was not exactly the same as the pictures Conway had studied yesterday, because they had been of a distant age of Earth and this flora had been transplanted from the patient's own world, but the differences were surprisingly small. The greatest change was in the sky.
Where previously it had been possible to look up at the opposite side of the hollow sphere, now one looked up into a blue-white mist in which burned a very lifelike sun. The hollow centre of the ship had been almost filled with this semi-opaque gas so that now it would take a keen eye and a mind armed with foreknowledge for a person to know that he was not standing on a real planet with a real sun in the foggy sky above him. The engineers had done a fine job.
"I had not thought such an elaborate and life-like reconstruction possible here," said Arretapec suddenly. "You are to be commended. This should have a very good affect on the patient."
THE LIFE-form under discussion—for some peculiar reason the engineers insisted on calling it Emily—was contentedly shredding the fronds from the top of a thirty foot high palmlike growth. The fact of its being on dry land instead of pasturing under water was indicative of its state of mind, Conway knew, because the old-time brontosaur invariably took to the water when threatened by enemies, that being its only defence. Apparently this neo-brontosaurus hadn't a care in the world.
"Essentially it is the same as fitting up a new ward for the treatment of any extra-terrestrial patient," said Conway modestly, "the chief difference here being in the scale of the work undertaken."
"I am nevertheless impressed," said Arretapec.
First apologies and now compliments, Conway thought wryly. As they moved closer, and Arretapec once again warned him to keep quiet and still, Conway guessed that the VUXG's change of manner was due to the work of the engineers. With the patient now in ideal surroundings the treatment, whatever form it was taking, might have an increased chance of success ...
Suddenly Conway began to itch again. It started in the usual place deep inside his right ear, but this time it spread and built up in intensity until his whole brain seemed to be crawling with viciously biting insects. He felt cold sweat break on him, and remembered his fears of the previous evening when he had resolved to go to Mannen. This wasn't imagination, this was serious, perhaps deadly serious. His hands flew to his head with a panicky, involuntary motion, knocking the container holding Arretapec to the ground.
"You are fidgeting again ..." began the VUXG.
"I ... I'm sorry," Conway stammered. He mumbled something incoherent about having to leave, that it was important and couldn't wait, then fled in disorder.
THREE HOURS later he was sitting in Dr. Mannen's DBDG examination room while Mannen's dog alternately growled fiercely at him or rolled on its back and looked appealing in vain attempts to entice him to play with it. But Conway had no inclination for the ritual pummelling and wrestling that the dog and himself enjoyed when he had the time for it. All his attention was focussed on the bent head of his former superior and on the charts lying on Mannen's desk. Suddenly the other looked up.
"There's nothing wrong with you," he said in the peremptory manner reserved for students and patients suspected of malingering. A few seconds later he added, "Oh, I've no doubt you've felt these sensations—tiredness, itching, and so on—but all the indications are that it is psychosomatic. Tell me, what sort of case are you working on at the moment?"
Conway told him. A few times during the narration Mannen grinned.
"I take it this is your first long-term—er—exposure to a telepathic life-form, and that I am the first you've mentioned this trouble to?" Mannen's tone was of one making a statement rather than of asking a question. "And, of course, although you feel this itching sensation intensely when close to the VUXG and the patient, it continues in a weaker form at other times."
Conway nodded. "I felt it for a while just five minutes ago."
"Naturally, there is attenuation with distance," Mannen said. "But as regards yourself, you have nothing to worry about. Arretapec is—all unknowingly, you understand—simply trying to make a telepath out of you. I'll explain ..."
Apparently prolonged contact with some telepathic life-forms stimulated a certain area in the human brain which was either the beginnings of a telepathic function that would evolve in the future, or the atrophied remnant of something possessed in the primitive past and since lost. The result was a troublesome but quite harmless irritation. On very rare occasion however, Mannen added, this proximity produced in the human a sort of artificial telepathic faculty—that was, he could sometimes receive thoughts from the telepath to whom he had been exposed, but of no other being. The faculty was in all cases strictly temporary, and disappeared when the being responsible for bringing it about left the human.
"But these cases of induced telepathy are extremely rare," Mannen concluded, "and obviously you are getting only the irritant by-product, otherwise you might know what Arretapec is playing at simply by reading its mind ..."
WHILE DR. Mannen had been talking, and relieved of the worry that he had caught some strange new disease, Conway's mind had been working furiously. Vaguely, as odd events with Arretapec and the brontosaurus returned to his mind and were added to scraps of the VUXG's conversations and his own studying of the life—and extinction—of Earth's long-gone race of giant reptiles, a picture was forming in his mind. It was a crazy—or at least cock-eyed—picture, and it was still incomplete, but what else could a being like Arretapec be doing to a patient like the brontosaurus, a patient who had nothing at all wrong with it?
"Pardon?" Conway said. He had become aware that Mannen had said something which he had not caught.
"I said if you find out what Arretapec is doing, let me know," Mannen repeated.
"Oh, I know what it's doing," said Conway. "At least I think I do—and I understand why Arretapec does not want to talk about it. The ridicule if it tried and failed, why even the idea of its trying is ridiculous. What I don't know is why it is doing it ..."
"Dr. Conway," said Mannen in a deceptively mild voice, "if you don't tell me what you're talking about I will, as our cruder-minded interns so succinctly put it, have your guts for garters."
