Star Surgeon

CHAPTER 25

He felt ridiculous pointing the gun at the Fleet commander, but that had seemed to be the only way to do this thing. Conway had entered Reception, threaded his way through the officers around the control desks until he had reached Dermod, then he had held the gun on the Fleet commander, while the others came in. He had also tried to explain things, but he wasn’t doing a very good job.

… So you want me to surrender, Doctor,” said Dermod wearily, not looking at the gun. His eyes went from Conway’s face to those of some of the Corpsmen patients who were still floating into the room. He looked hurt and disappointed, as if a friend had done a very shameful thing.

Conway tried again.

“Not surrender, sir,” he said, pointing at the man who was still guiding Williamson’s stretcher. “We … I mean, that man over there needs a communicator. He wants to order a cease fire …”

Stammering in his eagerness to explain what had happened, Conway started with the influx of casualties after the collision between Vespasian and the enemy transport. The interiors of both ships were a shambles and, while it was known that there were enemy as well as Corpsmen injured, there had never been time or the staff available to separate them. Then later, when the less seriously injured began to move around, talking to or helping to nurse the other patients, it became plain that almost half of the casualties were from the other side. Oddly this did not seem to matter much to the patients, and the staff were too busy to notice. So the patients went on doing the simpler, necessary and not very pleasant jobs for each other, jobs which just had to be done in a ward so drastically understaffed, and talking …

For these were Corpsmen from Vespasian, and Vespasian had been to Etla. Which meant that its crew were variously proficient in the Etlan language, and the Etlans spoke the same language as that used all over the Empire-a general purpose language similar to the Federation’s Universal. They talked to each other a lot and one of the things they learned, after the initial caution and distrust had passed, was that the enemy transport had contained some very high officers. One of the ones who had survived the collision was third in line of command of the Empire forces around Sector General …

And for the last few days peace talks have been going on among my patients,” Conway ended breathlessly. “Unofficial, perhaps, but I think Colonel Williamson and Heraltnor here have enough rank to make them binding. —

Heraltnor, the enemy officer, spoke briefly and vehemently to Williamson in Etlan, then gently tilted the plaster encased figure of the Captain until he could look at the fleet commander. Heraltnor watched Dermod, too. Anxiously.

“He’s no fool, sir,” said Williamson painfully. “From the sound of the bombardment and the glimpses he’s had of your screens he knows our defenses are hammered flat. He says that his people could land now and we couldn’t do a thing to stop them. That is true, sir, and we both know it. He says his chief will probably order the landing in a matter of hours, but he still wants a cease fire, sir, not a surrender.

“He doesn’t want his side to win,” the Captain ended weakly. “He just wants the fighting to stop. There are some things he has been told about this war and us which need straightening out, he says …”

“He’s been saying a lot,” said Dermod angrily. His face had a tortured look, as if he was wanting desperately to hope but did not dare let himself do so. He went on, “And you men have been doing a lot of talking! Why didn’t you let me know about it …

“It wasn’t what we said,” Stillman broke in sharply, “it was what we did! They didn’t believe a word we told them at first. But this place wasn’t at all what they had been told to expect, it looked more like a hospital than a torture chamber. Appearances could have been deceptive, and they were a very suspicious bunch, but they saw human and e-t doctors and nurses working themselves to death over them, and they saw him. Talking didn’t do anything, at least not until later. It was what we did, what he did …!”

Conway felt his ears getting warm. He protested, “But the same thing was happening in every ward of the hospital!”

“Shut up, Doctor,” Stillman said respectfully, then went on, “He never seemed to sleep. He hardly ever spoke to us once we were out of danger, but the patients in the side ward he never let up on, even though they were the hopeless cases. A couple of them he proved not to be hopeless, and moved them out to us in the main ward. It didn’t matter what side they were on, he worked as hard for everybody …

“Stillman,” said Conway sharply, “you’re dramatizing things …

Even then they were wavering a bit,” Stillman went on regardless.

“But it was the TRLH case which clinched things. The TRLHs were enemy e-t volunteers, and normally the Empire people don’t think much of e-ts and expected us to feel the same. Especially as this e-t was on the other side. But he worked just as hard on it, and when the pressure drop made it impossible for him to go on with the operation and the e-t died, they saw his reaction—”

“Stillman!” said Conway furiously.

But Stillman did not go into details. He was silent, watching Dermod anxiously. Everybody was watching Dermod. Except Conway, who was looking at Heraltnor.

The Empire officer did not look very impressive at that moment, Conway thought. He looked like a very ordinary, graying, middle-aged man with a heavy chin and worry-lines around his eyes. In comparison to Dermod’s trim green uniform with its quietly impressive load of insignia the shapeless, white garment issued to DBDG patients put Heraltnor at somewhat of a disadvantage. As the silence dragged on Conway wondered whether they would salute each other or just nod.

But they did better than either, they shook hands.

There was an initial period of suspicion and mistrust, of course. The Empire commander-in-chief was convinced that Heraltnor had been hypnotized at first, but when the investigating party of Empire officers landed on Sector General after the cease fire the distrust diminished rapidly to zero. For Conway the only thing which diminished was his worries regarding wards being opened to space. There was still too much for his staff and himself to do, even though engineers and medical officers from the Empire fleet were doing all they could to put Sector General together again. While they worked the first trickle of the evacuated staff began to return, both medical and maintenance, and the Translator computer went back into operation. Then five weeks and six days after the cease fire the Empire fleet left the vicinity of the hospital. They left their wounded behind them, the reasons being that they were getting the best possible treatment where they were, and that the fleet might have more fighting to do.

In one of the daily meetings with the hospital authorities-which still consisted of O’Mara and Conway since nobody more senior to them had come with the recent arrivals-Dermod tried to put a complex situation into very simple terms.

… Now that the Imperial citizens know the truth about Etla among other things,” he said seriously, “the Emperor and his administration are virtually extinct. But things are still very confused in some sectors and a show of force will help stabilize things. I’d like it to be just a show of force, which is why I talked their commander into taking some of our cultural contact and sociology people with him. We want rid of the Emperor, but not at the price of a civil war.

“Heraltnor wanted you to go along, too, Doctor. But I told him that …

Beside him O’Mara groaned. “Besides saving hundreds of lives,” the Chief Psychologist said, “and averting a galaxy-wide war, our miracle working, brilliant young doctor is being called on to—”

“Stop needling him, O’Mara!” Dermod said sharply. “Those things are literally true, or very nearly so. If he hadn’t …

“Just force of habit, sir,” said O’Mara blandly. “As a head-shrinker I consider it my bounden duty to keep his from swelling …

At that moment the main screen behind Dermod’s desk, manned by a Nidian Receptionist now instead of a Monitor officer, lit with a picture of a furry Kelgian head. It appeared that there was a large DBLF transport coming in with FGLI and ELNT staff aboard in addition to the Kelgians, eighteen of which were Senior Physicians. Bearing in mind the damaged state of the hospital and the fact that just three locks were in operable condition, the Kelgian on the screen wanted to discuss quarters and assignments before landing with the Diagnostician-in-Charge …

“Thornnastor’s still unfit and there are no other …” Conway began to say when O’Mara reached across to touch his arm.

“Seven tapes, remember,” he said gruffly. “Let us not quibble, Doctor. —

Conway gave O’Mara a long, steady look, a look which went deeper than the blunt, scowling features and the sarcastic, hectoring voice. Conway was not a Diagnostician-what he had done two months ago had been forced on him, and it had nearly killed him. But what O’Mara was saying-with the touch of his hand and the expression in his eyes, not the scowl on his face and the tone of his voice-was that it would be just a matter of time.

Coloring with pleasure, which Dermod probably put down to embarrassment at O’Mara’s ribbing, he dealt quickly with the quartering and duties of the staff on the Kelgian transport, then excused himself. He was supposed to meet Murchison at the recreation level in ten minutes, and she had asked him …

As he was leaving he heard O’Mara saying morosely … And in addition to saving countless billions from the horrors of war, I bet he gets the girl, too …