We were joined by Dr. Dloh, Mayer, and the relief charge nurse, Ecla. I reviewed the procedure briefly and ordered full scan analysis on the diseased organs I’d removed. Despite the temptation, I made no mention of the role Phorap Rogan played in this patient’s near-tragic case. My boss nodded and withdrew without a word.
So much for appreciation, I thought with a certain caustic pleasure. I turned to Dloh. “I know I’m scheduled for three more hours on duty, but would you cover the rest of the shift for me?” My adrenaline surge was subsiding fast. “I’m exhausted.”
“Of courze, Dr. Grey Veil.” Dloh gazed around him.
“Will you excuze uz for a moment, pleaze?” The nurses departed, still talking about the operation. I noticed a certain agitated movement to my colleague’s normally languid limbs.
“Something wrong, Dr. Dloh?”
“I wanted to tell you the orderly had zomehow mixed that patient’z chart in with one I rezeived. By the time I notized, you had activated the zterile field.” His brittle voice fell to a whisper. “I regret it did not come to my attention zooner.”
“I didn’t need the data,” I told him. “Forget about it.”
“You know zo much about Orgemich phyziology that you did not require chart referenze?”
“I observed Dr. Rogan’s treatment of this Orgemich on my first day at the FreeClinic, and reviewed her chart.” I should have insisted on those internal scans, I brooded. If she had died... “I remembered the particulars.”
“How fortunate. Still, pleaze aczept my apology for the miztake. It won’t happen again.” I shrugged.
“No harm done.”
“Doctor, may I azk you another queztion?”
“Sure.” I was a bit impatient with Dloh’s insistence. I liked success, but I didn’t want to dissect it.
“Where did you pozition the poztzurgical ztoma?”
“On the left upper quadrant, beneath the secumous junction, of course.” I mentally pictured the incision I’d made in the mesentery. Nothing wrong with that.
“Not where you would locate it on a Terran,” Dloh said.
“Of course not. The anatomical differences require-“
“I know what they require. What I did not know iz that you knew.” Dloh paused significantly. “And you dizcerned thiz from reviewing the chart of thiz Orgemich patient zeveral weekz ago.”
I could see his point. “I have an excellent memory.”
“You have a phenomenal memory, Doctor.”
“Thank you, Dr. Dloh.” It was time to get some fresh air. “If you don’t mind, I’m tired. I’ll see you tomorrow.”
“Not at all,” he said as he stepped from my path.
“Do one more favor for me, Dr. Dloh.” I smiled grimly. “Keep Phorap Rogan away from my patient.”
The sound of an incoming console signal greeted me when I returned to my quarters. My Orgemich patient? No, I had a gut feeling she was going to make it. Maybe it was Kao Torin, I thought. I answered it and was disappointed to see a comdrone instead of the handsome blue face of Paul’s friend.
“Good afternoon, Dr. Grey Veil. One message, direct interstellar relay.”
That told me who it was, but I asked anyway. “Inquiry - point of origin is Sol Quadrant?”
“Confirmed.”
Well, why not? It would make my rotten day complete. I accepted the transmission.
“Cherijo,” my father greeted me.
“Dad.”
“I have been in contact with the Pmoc Quadrant Surgeon General’s Office. Preliminary reports indicate you have performed adequately in your capacity on Kevarzangia Two.”
“Haven’t killed anyone yet. Why are you wasting credits calling me?”
“I thought you might wish to further discuss your impulsive actions.”
“I don’t.” I thought of what this man had done. “Good-bye, Dad.”
“This disrespect is unacceptable, daughter.”
“What are you going to do about it?” My temper exploded. “I’m fourteen light-years away! You can’t exactly suspend my entertainment privileges, can you?”
“I have spoken to Dr. Mayer.”
“Speaking of entertainment, that must have been fun. You two have a lot in common. Maybe he’s your long-lost brother.”
Dad wasn’t amused. “He feels you may be on the verge of an emotional collapse.”
“He couldn’t feel a dermal probe if he sat on one.”
“Cherijo-“
First the Bartermen, then Rogan’s mess, now this. My patience was in the red-range. “Get to the point!”
I shouted.
He drew back from his console, appalled at my lack of control. How uncivilized of me. It felt pretty good, too. “It is in your best interests to resign and return at once to Terra. We will discuss this again, daughter.”
He ended the transmission, and I was left feeling like a mouthy kid with bad manners. Jenner peeked out from under the sofa.
“I won’t let him talk me into going back, Jenner. I won’t.”
After the signal from Dad, I spent a number of my off-duty intervals escaping my studies and my quarters, taking Ana Hansen’s advice to relax more. At the time, it didn’t seem like rationalization to me.
One evening I wandered into the Sports Complex, intending to explore what type of workout equipment was available. I might find something that would take the edge off my three main frustrations. Namely Mayer, that fool Rogan, and my father.
The favorite sport of my homeworld, shockball, was not practiced on K-2, much to my relief. I’d never understood the thrill of watching eighteen athletes juggle a computer-enhanced sphere between twin goals. A sphere that jolted them with electrocardial shocks if the referees caught them committing penalties.
Milder pastimes were preferred by the colonists. Individual competitions against dimensional simulators, table games, the like. I could handle something basic, I thought.
Right. I ended up feeling like the biggest greenhorn to set foot on extee-soil since Challenger IX landed on Mars and Terrans found out the rusty sand made them break out in hives. It was my own fault. I should have known better than to accept a challenge from a FreeClinic orderly. Especially one as innocent-looking as Akamm.
“Hey, Dr. Grey Veil!” He gestured for me to join him and a group of staffers at the whump-ball tables.
“I’m trying to figure out how to play this game, can you give me a hand?”
I heard a snicker as I approached. Maybe someone suspected I’d never worn a whump-glove in my life. True, I’d never played the game, but it didn’t look that difficult. How hard could it be to direct the small, colorful globes into a series of pockets?
Well, Akamm swindled me out of five nawaroot beers and a plate of Ontabbaren grain-chips before I finally caught on. Most of the medical support staff frequented the Sports Complex. By the time we reached our fifth game, a large group of them stood around, watching my humiliation. What finally penetrated my thick skull was their muffled laughter each time Akamm registered yet another point.
I was being hustled
I did extract a small amount of revenge. Maggie had taught me some tricks she’d learned during her tavern years. Akamm had set up for game six, and turned away to retrieve his glove from the dry-rack.
When he turned back around, he didn’t notice that I’d successfully exchanged his ball for a pressurized chalk-sack. I was careful to step back from the table as he approached. He took aim with confidence and hit the sack, which imploded.
After the air cleared, the orderly stood blanketed with a thick white layer of chalk.
“Suns - what the-“
“Good try,” I said with a straight face. “Wrong target. You’d better forfeit and hit the cleanser units before one of those Whelikkan albino females over there thinks she’s found a soul mate.”
The staff didn’t try to subdue their laughter any longer. I even got a round of applause. After bowing my acceptance, I got the feeling someone was still staring at me. A quick scan of the games room brought my gaze to meet an intense pair of white eyes. Kao Torin rose from his vantage position (he’d obviously watched the entire fiasco), and crossed the space to join me at the service terminal.
“Healer Grey Veil.” He greeted me with one of his fluid gestures. “May I never face you as a games opponent.”
“I’ll take that as a compliment.” I peered up at him. “I think.”
“I find myself, as Paul puts it, at loose ends this night.” His smile was doing strange things to my pulse.
“Would you join me for a walk outside? The moons are aligning in a particularly interesting pattern.”
I wondered briefly if this was the alien equivalent to being propositioned. I wouldn’t mind taking a stroll with him, if that’s all he had in mind. Anything more... well, I’d have to think about it. “Sure.”
Kevarzangia Two’s evenings were always spectacular in some form or another. Outside the Complex, I looked up and saw the satellite ring was positioned in a staggered diagonal stream across the night sky.
This created another dazzling effect, throwing off curved bands of light that shimmered like a hundred wide moonbows.
“I always forget to look up,” I said with regret. “I’ll have to make a point of it. This is fabulous.”
I felt his fingers brush briefly against the sleeve of my tunic as he guided me around a cluster of colonists exiting the Complex. Smooth move. I was startled by the response I felt to the momentary contact.
“I agree,” he said, looking at me, not the moons.
We walked for a long time without speaking. It didn’t bother me. The longer I was with Kao Torin, the more at ease I felt. He pointed out a distant, tiny light just above the horizon and called it home.
“I will have to return soon,” he said. “I am obliged to Choose a bondmate.”
I had done some research (purely educational, of course) on the culture of his homeworld. According to the database’s scanty outline, Jorenians apparently had complete freedom. They could go anywhere, do anything, have lots of fun. Until they attained emotional and physical maturity, that is. This was measured not by age, but by some unspecified internal biological clock.
From what I surmised, when this clock’s alarm went off, all Jorenians were required to return to their homeworld to take a bondmate during some unspecified ceremony. The HouseClans of his world did not let anyone hit the snooze switch, either.
“Do you have someone waiting for you?” I asked, my throat tight. It seemed very important that he tell me now.
“No.” He stopped, and his hand curled around my arm. His hand was so large that his thumb overlapped his knuckles. “I have not Chosen.”
I stared up at him. Surely he wasn’t thinking-“I hardly know you, Kao Torin.”
“And I you, Healer Grey Veil.” He didn’t sound too worried about that. “I have wanted to know you, from the first moment when I saw you wearing my HouseClan’s colors.”
I grimaced as I looked down at my tunic. “That was just a coincidence. Every doctor wears these colors.”
He inclined his head. “A happy one for me, all the same.”
“Kao.” It was hard to resist so much charm. “I’m Terran.”
“Yes.” He waited.
“A physician.” I was beginning to sound like a complete imbecile. “Contracted to this FreeClinic for a standard revolution.”
“I know.”
There was so much more I couldn’t say.
“Cherijo?” His eyes gleamed like the moons above us, and then his hand touched my face. “Come with me.”
A week after my first whump-ball game, I met my first Trytinorn at the FreeClinic.
I’d seen a few of them at a distance, of course. They were impossible to miss. The Trytinorns lived on the colonial perimeter, and only rarely strayed from their specially reinforced housing. It wasn’t because they were shy. Trytinorns were the largest of all species allowed to immigrate under K-2 transfer standards. The mammoth beings made the Hsktskt look downright scrawny.
An exterior structural panel had to be removed just to get the injured male Trytinorn into the facility.
Since we couldn’t fit the Trytinorn in one of the regular exam rooms, we set up a makeshift version of the same in a storage bay.
Now I knew how that snail-sized colonist felt, I thought. The top of my head came to just below the patient’s knee. I had to resort to using a grav-ramp just to do the abdominal scan series. I completed my examination, lowered the ramp, and set my scanner aside to make a chart notation.
Charge Nurse Ecla fluttered around the hastily rigged exam table, her lithe form transforming simple movement into ballet. The Psyoran’s lacy physique reminded me of a bouquet of animated flowers.
“Doc?” our far less dainty patient groaned from above. “What is it?” ‘t “Costal chondritis.”
I stepped back on the ramp, raised it, and showed him the affected area on his chart display. I went on to explain that the thick band of cartilage between his ribs and the lower breastbone was badly inflamed.
The result made breathing exceedingly uncomfortable.
“Why is this happening to me?” he asked.
I checked his chart for a moment. He was a dockworker in Cargo DispatchIReceiving down at Transport. Most of the Trytinorns were. “Probably because you haven’t been using a lift rig to protect yourself at work,” I said.
Belligerent eyes glared down at me from beneath a thick brow plate. Yep. I was right on the money.
“That’s for low-weights,” the Trytinorn said, then grimaced at a fresh wave of pain. His colossal form relaxed once I injected him with an analgesic to relieve the symptoms.
“While you’re on medical leave for a week,” I told him, ignoring the subsequent bluster of outrage, “you’ll have plenty of time to study all the safety rig data I’m going to give you.”
Ecla changed places with me, and wrapped his torso with yards of support braces while I finished making the chart entries. Trytinorn curses were particularly expressive and colorful. In spite of that, I hummed cheerfully. The indignant dockworker was still swearing when the orderlies assisted him to his feet and he stomped out the way he came in.
As we walked back to Trauma, I noticed the Psyoran was giving me a lot of odd looks. Okay, my humming wasn’t going to win any prizes. I never said I was perfect.
“You’re in a good mood,” Ecla said back in the exam room while she sterilized the pad for the next case. The ruffled ridges on every visible part of her rainbow-pig-mented body stirred at my grin.