“Agonizing reappraisal,” Conway said, laughing again without knowing why. “Reappraisals are always supposed to be agonizing.”
O’Mara studied him intently for a moment, then he exhaled slowly through his nose. Caustically, he said, “I don’t approve of unnecessary suffering, Conway, but if you want to agonize while you’re reappraising, feel free.”
The Major’s normally abrasive manner had returned, Conway noted. Apparently O’Mara no longer regarded him as a patient— which was pleasantly, or rather unpleasantly, reassuring. But his mind was fairly seething as it tried to assimilate and consider all the implications of this sudden and dramatic change in his situation, and he knew that he was temporarily incapable of responding coherently.
“I need time to think about this,” he said. “Naturally,” O’Mara said.
“And I’d like to spend some time on Rhabwar to advise Prilicla
on— “No!” O’Mara’s open hand slapped the desk top. “Prilicla will
have to learn to do the job in its own way, as you had to do, for the best results. You will stay away from the ambulance ship and not speak to the Cinrusskin except to wish it goodbye and good luck. In fact, I want you out of this hospital as quickly as possible. There is a Monitor Corps scoutship on courier duty leaving in thirty hours from now, so you won’t have time for long goodbyes.
“I do not believe,” he went on sardonically, “that there is any way that I can stop you saying a long goodbye to Murchison. Prilicla will already have broken the news of your imminent departure to her, and I can’t think of anyone who could break it more gently, since it has been told what is going to happen to you over the next few months.”
“I wish,” Conway said sourly, “that somebody would tell me.”
“Very well,” the Chief Psychologist said, sitting back in his chair. “You are being assigned for an indefinite period to a planet which, in its most widely used language, is called Goglesk. They have a problem there. I don’t know the details, but you will have plenty of time to brief yourself on it when you arrive, if it interests you. In this case you will not be expected to solve the problem; you will simply rest and—”
O’Mara’s intercom buzzed, and a voice said, “Sorry, sir, but Doctor Fremvessith is here, early for its appointment. Shall I ask it to return later?”
“That’s the PVGJ for the Kelgian tape erasure,” O’Mara replied. “There are problems there. No, ask it to wait and administer sedation if necessary.”
To Conway he went on. “As I was saying, while you are on Goglesk I want you to take things easy and think very carefully about your professional future, and take plenty of time to decide what you want to do or not do at Sector General. To assist the process, I’ll provide some medication designed to enhance the memory and aid dream recall. There are no long-term side effects. If you are going to take a mental inventory, the least I can do is supply a light for the darker recesses.
“But why?” Conway said, and suddenly he was not at all sure that he wanted the answer.
O’Mara was watching him intently, his mouth a tight, expressionless line, but the look in his eyes was sympathetic. He said, “You are beginning to realize the purpose of this meeting at last, Conway. But to save wear and tear on your overworked brain, I’ll make it simple for you.
“The hospital is giving you the chance,” he ended very seriously, “to try for Diagnostician.”
A D~agnosticia~!…
Many times Conway had had the disquieting experience of having his mind shared with an alien alter ego, as had the majority of the medics at Sector General. He had even, for one relatively short period, had his mind apparently taken over by several extraterrestrials. But after that experience O’Mara had spent several days putting the mental pieces of the original Conway personality together again.
The problem was that although the hospital was equipped to treat every known form of intelligent life, no single person could hold in his or its mind even a fraction of the physiological data necessary for this purpose. Surgical dexterity was a product of experience and training, but the complete physiological information on a patient had to be furnished by means of an Educator tape, which was simply the brain record of some great medical genius belonging to the same or a similar species to that of the patient being treated.