“Sleep?” said a voice somewhere. “What’s that?”
“Quiet, Teirnan,” said the Major tiredly, then to Conway; “And as a doctor I understand the risks. I suggest we waste no more time.”
Rapidly and expertly Conway set about administering the shots. Dull eyed, bone-weary men lined up before him and five minutes later left the room with a spring in their step and their eyes too bright with artificial vitality. He had just finished when he heard his name over the annunciator again, ordering him to Lock Six to await instructions there. Lock Six, Conway knew, was one of the subsidiary entrances to the Casualty section.
While he was hurrying in that direction Conway realized suddenly that he was tired and hungry, but he did not get the chance to think about it for long. The annunciators were giving out a call for all junior interns to report to Casualty, and directions for adjacent wards to be evacuated where possible to other accommodation. An alien gabble interspersed these messages as other species received similar instructions.
Obviously the Casualty section was being extended. But why, and where were all the casualties coming from? Conway’s mind was a confused and rather tired question mark.
V
At Lock Six a Tralthan Diagnostician was deep in conversation with two Monitors. Conway felt a sense of outrage at the sight of the highest and the lowest being so chummy together, then reflected with a touch of bitterness that nothing about this place could surprise him anymore. There were two more Monitors beside the Lock’s direct vision panel.
“Hello, Doctor,” one of them said pleasantly. He nodded toward the view port. “They’re unloading at Locks Eight, Nine and Eleven. We’ll be getting our quota any minute now.
The big transparent panel framed an awesome sight: Conway had never seen so many ships together at one time. More than thirty sleek, silver needles, ranging from ten-man pleasure yachts to the gargantuan transports of the Monitor Corps wove a slowly, complicated pattern in and around each other as they waited permission to lock-on and unload.
“Tricky work, that,” the Monitor observed.
Conway agreed. The repulsion fields which protected ships against collision with the various forms of cosmic detritus required plenty of space. Meteorite screens had to be set up a minimum of five miles away from the ship they protected if heavenly bodies large and small were to be successfully deflected from them-further away if it was a bigger ship. But the ships outside were a mere matter of hundreds of yards apart, and had no collision protection except the skill of their pilots. The pilots would be having a trying time at the moment.
But Conway had little time for sight-seeing before three Earth-human interns arrived. They were followed quickly by two of the red-furred DBDGs and a caterpillar-like DBLF, all wearing medical insignia. There came a heavy scrape of metal against metal, the lock tell-tales turned from red to green indicating that a ship was properly connected up, and the patients began to stream through.
Carried in stretchers by Monitors they were of two kinds only:
DBDGs of the Earth-human type and DBLF caterpillars. Conway’s job, and that of the other doctors present, was to examine them and route them through to the proper department of Casualty for treatment. He got down to work, assisted by a Monitor who possessed all the attributes of a trained nurse except the insignia. He said his name was Williamson.
The sight of the first case gave Conway a shock-not because it was serious, but because of the nature of the injuries. The third made him stop so that his Monitor assistant looked at him questioningly.
“What sort of accident was this?” Conway burst out. “Multiple punctures, but the edge of the wounds cauterized. Lacerated punctures, as if from fragments thrown out by an explosion. How…
The Monitor said, “We kept it quiet, of course, but I thought here at least the rumor would have got to everybody.” His lips tightened and the look that identified all Monitors to Conway deepened in his eyes. “They decided to have a war,” he went on, nodding at the Earth-human and DBLF patients around them. “I’m afraid it got a little out of control before we were able to clamp down.”