type of Monitor Corps vessel capable of aerodynamic maneuver within a planetary
atmosphere. As he pulled himself aft along the gravity-free central well, Conway
was visualizing its gleaming white hull and delta wings decorated with the
Occluded Sun, the Brown Leaf, the Red Cross, and the many other symbols which
represented the concept of aid freely given throughout the worlds of the
Federation.
It was a Traltha-built ship with all the design and structural advantages which
that implied, and named Rhabwar after one of the great figures of Tralthan
medical history. The ship had been designed for operation by an Earth-human
crew, whose quarters were immediately below Control on Deck Two. The medical
team occupied similar accommodation on Three except in the matter of furniture
and bedding for the Kelgian Charge Nurse and reduced artificial gravity for the
Cinrusskin empath.
Deck Four was a compromise, Conway thought as he pulled himself past it, a
combination Messdeck and recreation room where the people who worked together
were expected, regardless of physiological classification, to play
together—even though there was barely enough room to play a game of chess when
everyone was present. The whole of Five was devoted to the ship’s consumables,
which comprised not only the food required by six Earth-humans, a Kelgian, and a
Cinrusskin of classifications DBDG, DBLF, and GLNO respectively, but the storage
tanks whose contents were capable of reproducing or synthesizing the atmosphere
breathed by any species known to the Galactic Federation.
Six and Seven, where Conway was headed, were the Casualty Deck and underlying
lab and treatment ward. Here the gravity, atmospheric pressure, and composition
could be varied to suit the life-support requirements of any survivors who might
be brought in. Deck Eight was the Power Room, the province of Lieutenant Chen,
who controlled the ship’s hyperdrive gen-
erators and normal space thrusters, the power supply for the artificial gravity
grids, tractor and pressor beams, communications, sensors, and everything which
made the energy-hungry ship live.
Conway was still thinking of the diminuitive Chen and the frightful powers
available at the touch of one of his stubby fingers when he arrived on the
Casualty Deck. He did not have to speak because his earlier conversation with
the Captain had been relayed to Casualty, as were the more interesting and
important displays on Control’s screens. There was nothing for him to do except
climb into his spacesuit—he had a very good medical team who kept their
equipment and themselves at instant readiness, and who tried constantly to make
their leader feel redundant.
Murchison was bending and stretching to check the seals of her lightweight
spacesuit, and Naydrad was inside the casualty entrance lock testing a pressure
litter, its beautiful silver fur rippling in slow waves along its
caterpillarlike body as it worked. The incredibly fragile Prilicla, aided by its
gravity nullifiers and a double set of iridescent wings, was hovering close to
the ceiling where it would not be endangered by an accidental collision with one
of its more massive colleagues. Its eight, pipestem legs were twitching slowly
in unison, indicating that it was being exposed to emotional radiation of a
pleasurable kind.
Murchison looked from Prilicla to Conway and said, “Stop that.”
Conway knew that it was Murchison, albeit indirectly, and himself who were
responsible for the Cinrusskin’s twitchings. Prilicla, like the other members of
its intelligent and sensitive race, possessed a highly developed empathic
faculty which caused it to react to the most minute changes and levels of
feeling in those surrounding it. Pathologist Murchison possessed that
combination of physical attributes which made it extremely difficult for any
Earth-human male DBDG to regard her with anything like clinical detachment—and
while she was Wearing a contour-hugging lightweight suit it was downright
impossible.
“Sorry,” Conway said, laughing, and began climbing into his own suit.
The wreck looked like a long section of metal tree trunk with a few short,
twisted branches sprouting from it, Conway thought as they launched themselves
from Rhabwar’s casualty lock toward the distressed alien ship, but apart from
those pieces of projecting metal the vessel seemed to have retained its
structural integrity. He could see two small viewports reflecting the ambulance
ship’s floodlights like two tiny suns. One of the ports was set about two meters