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DBLF to bleed to death in minutes.
Conway worked slowly and carefully, dissolving away the coagulant so hastily
applied by Murchison, repairing or partially replacing damaged major blood
vessels and sealing off the minor branches which were too fine for him to do
anything else. This part of the operation worried him- not because it
endangered the life of the patient but because he knew that the beautiful
silvery fur would never grow properly in these areas again, that if it grew at
all it would be yellowed and visually repulsive to a male Kelgian. The injured
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nurse was a remarkably handsome young female and such a disfiguration could be
a real tragedy. Conway hoped she wouldn't be too proud to keep the area
covered with surrogate fur. Admittedly it did not have the rich, deep luster
of living fur and would be immediately recognizable for what it was, but
neither would it be so visually distressing...
An hour ago this would have been just another caterpillar, Conway thought
dryly, an "it" about whom he felt only clinical concern. Now he had reached
the stage of worrying about the patient's marriage prospects. A physiology
tape certainly made one feel for one's e-t patients.
When he had finished Conway called Reception, described the patient's
condition and urged that it should be evacuated as quickly as possible. Mannon
told him that there was half a dozen small vessels loading at the moment, most
of them with provision for taking oxy-breathers, and gave him a choice of two
Locks in the vicinity. Mannon added that, with the exception of a few patients
on the critically ill list, all patients of classifications A through G had
either gone or were on the point of going, along with staff members of the
same classifications who had been ordered to go by O'Mara for security
reasons.
Some of them had displayed extreme reluctance to leave. One in particular, a
hoary old Tralthan Diagnostician who was unfortunate enough to own a personal
space yacht-something which in normal conditions would not have been
considered a misfortune!-had had to be formally charged with attempted
treason, disturbing the peace and incitement to mutiny and arrested, that
being the only way to get it aboard ship.
As he broke the connection Conway thought that they wouldn't have to go to
such lengths to get him to leave the hospital. He shook his head, angry and
ashamed of himself, and gave Murchison instructions for transferring the
patient to the ship.
The injured Kelgian had to be enclosed in a pressure tent for the initial
stage of its trip through the AUGL ward, which was now open to space. There
were no water-breathers left in the big tank and no water, there being more
urgent things to do than repairing and refilling a section which would very
likely never be used again. The sight of the great tank, empty now, with its
walls vacuum dry and the lush, underwater vegetation which had been designed
to make the ward seem more homelike to its occupants hanging like pieces of
brittle, discolored parchment made Conway feel horribly depressed. The
depression remained with him while they negotiated the three empty chlorine
levels below it and came to another air-filled section.
Here they had to pause to allow a procession of TLTUs to pass. Conway was glad
of the chance to stop for a while because, although the pep-shot had him still
feeling full of artificial beans, Murchison was beginning to droop. As soon as
their patient was aboard he thought he would order her off to bed.
Seven TLTUs filed slowly past, their protective spheres anchored to
stretcher-carriers driven by sweating, tense-faced orderlies. Unlike those of
the methane life-forms these spheres did not collect frost. Instead they
emitted a high-pitched, shuddering whine as their generators labored to
maintain the internal temperature at a comfortable, for their occupants, five
hundred degrees. Each one of them passed in a wave of heat which Conway could
feel six yards away.
If another warhead was to strike here and now, and one of those globes was
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