“Yes,” said Conway softly. “Yes indeed.”
He now had the link-up between Meatball and the operating theater, via Harrison’s suit and the sterilization chamber. But that wasn’t all he had. He had Yehudi!
Beside him Mannon had stopped. The surgeon’s hands were trembling as he said desperately, “I need eight pairs of hands, or instruments that can do eight different operations at once. This isn’t going well, Conway. Not well at all. .
“Don’t do anything for a minute, Doctor,” Conway said urgently, then began calling out instructions for the nurses to file past him carrying their instrument trays. O’Mara started shouting to know what was going on, but Conway was concentrating too hard to answer him. Then one of the Kelgian nurses made a noise like a foghorn breathing in, the DBLF equivalent of a shriek of surprise, because suddenly there was a medium sized box spanner among the forceps on her tray.
“You won’t believe this,” said Conway joyfully as he carried the- thing-to Mannon and placed it in the surgeon’s hands, “but if you’ll just listen for a minute and then do as I tell you..
Mannon was back at work in less than a minute.
Hesitantly at first, but then with growing confidence and speed, he resumed the delicate repair work. Occasionally he whistled through his teeth or swore luridly, but this was normal behavior for Mannon during a difficult op which was promising to go well. In the observation blister Conway could see the happily scowling, baffled face of the Chief Psychologist and the fragile,. spidery body of the empath. Prilicla was still trembling, but very slowly. It was a type of reaction not often seen in a Cinrusskin off its native planet, indicating a nearby source of emotional radiation which was intense and altogether pleasant.
After the operation they had all wanted to question Harrison about Meatball, but before they could do so Conway had first to explain what had happened again to the Lieutenant.
“…And while we still have no idea what they look like,” Conway was saying, “we do know that they are highly intelligent and in their own fashion technically advanced. By that I mean they fashion and use tools…
“Indeed yes,” said Mannon dryly, and the thing in his hand became a metallic sphere, a miniature bust of Beethoven and a set of Tralthan dentures. Since it had become certain that the Hudlar would be another one of Mannon’s successes rather than a failure he had begun to regain his sense of humor.
….. But the tool-making stage must have followed a long way after the development of the philosophical sciences,” Conway went on. “The imagination boggles at the conditions in which they evolved. These tools are not designed for manual use, the natives may not possess hands as we know them. But they have minds…
Under the mental control of its owner the “tool” had cut a way into Descartes beside Harrison’s station, but during the sudden takeoff it had been unable to get back and a new source of mental control, the Lieutenant, had unwittingly taken over. It had become the foothold which Harrison had needed so badly, only to give under his weight because it had not really been part of the ship’s structure. When the attachments of Harrison’s suit had been sterilized in the same room as the surgical instruments and when a nurse had come looking for a certain instrument for the theater, it again became what was wanted.
From then on there was confusion over instrument counts and falling scalpels which did not cut and sprayers which behaved oddly indeed, and Mannon had used a knife which had followed his mind instead of his hands, with near-fatal results for the patient. But the second time it happened Mannon knew that he was holding a small, unspecialized, all purpose tool which was subject to mental as well as manual control, and some of the shapes he had made it take and the things he had made it do would make Conway remember that operation for the rest of his life.
….. This. . . gadget.. . is probably of great value to its owner,” Conway finished seriously. “By rights we should return it. But we need it here, many more of them if possible! Your people have got to make contact and set up trade relations. There’s bound to be something we have or can do that they want. .