“To be accepted for training here,” the senior physician went on, “the entities around you must first have demonstrated a particular aptitude for advanced surgical and medical work and possess wide experience in their former planetary hospitals. I mention this so that you will know that they are not complete medical idiots in spite of what some of their tutors may say about them.”
A quiet cacophony of alien sounds that did not translate emanated from the members of the group. Probably, Hewlitt thought, it was a dutiful response to their superior’s little joke.
Medalont ignored them and said, “You have already been examined and had physical contact with your other-species nurse and myself without any accompanying physical discomfort. I can further assure you that if any of the trainees do or say anything to cause you distress, I shall have very harsh words to say to them afterward. May we proceed, Patient Hewlitt?”
They were all staring at him with far too many eyes. Braithwaite and the nurse moved closer. The lieutenant was frowning and smiling at the same time in a strange expression that combined worry with reassurance, Hewlitt thought, and all the other expressions were unreadable. He opened his mouth, but the sound that came out was not even translatable by himself.
“Thank you,” said Medalont; then, to the others, “Well, who wants first crack?”
Inevitably it was the biggest one present, the Tralthan, who lumbered forward to stand by his bedside. One of the eyes projecting from its domelike, immobile head curved down to regard his face; another was directed at Medalont and the other two somewhere behind it. Two of the four tentacles growing from its massive shoulders were lowered to within a few inches of his chest, one of them holding a scanner, and he did not know where the surprisingly quiet voice was coming from when it spoke.
“Please do not be alarmed, Patient Hewlitt,” it said as he tried vainly to burrow backward into his bed. “The examination will be verbal or physically noninvasive, unless my questions should invade your privacy, in which case I shall not expect an answer. My intended specialty is other-species intercranial surgery, so I shall be concentrating the scanner examination in that area. I would like to begin at the rear base of the cranium where the nerve trunks enter the upper vertebrae.
“Could you please sit up,” it went on, “and rest the front of your head on the joints midway along your ambulatory appendages? I think the nonmedical words for them is knees. Is this so?”
“Yes,” said Hewlitt and Medalont together.
“Thank you,” it said. With one eye still fixed on the senior physician it continued, “The Earth-human DBDG classification is fortunate in that the length of the nerve connections between the visual, aural, olfactory, and tactual sensors and the brain proper are shorter than in the majority of other intelligent life-forms, including my own, and the advantage in reaction times during the presapient stage of their evolution undoubtedly led to species dominance. But the cranial contents are densely packed so that the charting of neural pathways is difficult, and precise work is required if a surgical intervention becomes necessary. When you open and close your upper and lower mandibles, Patient Hewlitt, is there subjective evidence of compression effects on the brain stem?”
“No,” said Hewlitt and the senior physician together. Medalont gave the impression that it considered the question a stupid one, and added, “Enough. Who’s next?”
The creature who came forward had a narrow, tubular body covered by brown and yellow stripes and supported by six long, very thin limbs. Two sets of wings sprouted from the sides of its body, but they were so tightly folded that he could not be sure which color predominated, and two long, black, furry antennae projected from the top of its insectile head. It raised itself almost upright by placing its middle limbs on the edge of his bed and looked down at him with enormous, lidless eyes.
His first impulse was to swat it the way he swatted all large insects that came too close, but he stopped himself. To a creature as fragile as this one, any kind of blow would be sure to inflict serious injury, which meant that he had nothing to fear from it. Besides, he had never ever swatted a butterfly, even though he had never been faced with a specimen as big as this one.
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