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 shape—or more accurately, to take a large number of
semicircular and quarter-circular shapes—as 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