Three torps playing follow-my-leader, sir. They blasted a way right through. We can’t jury-rig a Translator, there’s nothing of it left to do it with. The last torp went off inside the computer room…
Outside the intercom niche the e-t nurses were whistling and growling and moaning at him and at each other. He should be giving instructions for the preliminary examination of his casualties, arranging for ward accommodation, checking on the readiness of the FGLI theater. But he could not do any of these things because his nursing staff would not understand a word he said.
CHAPTER 19
For a long time, although it might have only been a few seconds, Conway could not bring himself to leave the alcove which contained the intercom unit, and the Chief Psychologist would have been clinically concerned about the thoughts which were going through his mind just then. But slowly he fought down the panic that made him want to run away and hide somewhere, by reminding himself savagely that there was nowhere to run to and by forcing himself to look at the FGLIs drifting about in the antechamber. The place was literally filled with them.
Conway himself knew only the rudiments of Tralthan physiology, but that was the least of his worries because he could easily take an FGLI tape. What he had to do was to start things moving for them now. But it was hard to think of each other and the Corpsmen shouting to know what was the matter and the casualties, many of whom were conscious, making pitiful, frantic noises that were muffled only slightly by their pressure envelopes.
“Sergeant!” Conway bawled suddenly at the senior orderly, waving at the casualties. “Ward Four-B, Two-Hundred and Seventh level. Know where it is?”
The NCO bobbed his head, and Conway turned to the nurses.
He got nowhere with the Nidian and QCQL despite all his efforts at sign language, and it was only when he wrapped his legs around one of the FGLI’s forelimbs and by brute force twisted the appendage containing its visual equipment until the cluster of eyes pointed at where the causalities were going that he got anywhere at all. Finally he made the Tralthans understand-he hoped-that they were to accompany the injured and do what they could for them when they arrived.
Four-B had been given over almost entirely to FGLI casualties and most of the staff were Tralthan also, which meant that some of the patients could be reassured by nurses speaking their own language. Conway refused to think of the other casualties who did not have this advantage. He had been assigned Thornnastor’s wards. One thing at a time.
When he reached O’Mara’s office the Major wasn’t there. Carrington, one of his assistants, explained that O’Mara was busy trying to match up patients and staff into species wherever possible, and that he wanted to see Conway immediately the Doctor was finished in the Tralthan wards. Carrington added that as communications were either dead or tied up with e-ts yelling gibberish at each other would he mind either reporting back here or remaining where he was so that the Major could find him. Ten minutes later Conway had the tape he wanted and was on his way to Four-B.
He had taken FGLI tapes before and they weren’t too bad. There was a tendency for him to feel awkward at having to walk on only two feet instead of six, and he wanted to move his head and neck about to follow moving objects instead of merely swiveling his eyes. But it was not until he reached the ward that he realized how fully his Tralthan mind partner had settled in. The rows of Tralthan patients became his most immediate and pressing concern, while only a small part of his mind was engaged with the problem of the Tralthan nurses who were obviously close to panic and whose words, for some odd reason, he could not understand. For the Earth-human nurses-puny, shapeless and unlovely bags of dough-he felt only impatience.
Conway went over to the group of shapeless and unlovely bags, although to the human portion of his mind a couple of them looked very shapely indeed, and said, “Give me your attention, please. I have a Tralthan tape which will enable me to treat these FGLJs, but the Translator breakdown means I can’t talk to them or the Tralthan staff. You girls will have to help with the preliminary examinations and in the theater.”