It was slow, tedious work and visually not very dramatic. Colonel Okaussie could be forgiven for thinking that the ambulance ship personnel had gone to sleep on the job.
“Friend Conway,” Prilicla said at one particularly awkward stage, “the physical differences between these two entities are so marked that I cannot help wondering if they belong to different subspecies.”
All of Con way’s attention at that moment was concentrated on what seemed to be the main sphinctor muscle on the rear interface of the forward CRLT, so that by the time he was ready to reply Murchison had done it for him.
“In a sense you are right, Doctor Prilicla,” she said. “It is a natural result of their method of reproduction. Think of this forward CRLT when it was the last and female link in its group-entity chain. In due time it grew to maturity and, still attached to its parent, it was fertilized by the male head of another group entity. Its own infant grew and became mature and in turn produced another, and the process continued with different male heads adding their individual sets of genes at every stage. 'The physical connection between any given CRLT and its offspring is perfect,” she continued, “and perfect fusion may even be possible between a parent and its grandchild or greatgrandchild. But the effect of different males fertilizing each new endlink in the chain would be cumulative. So it is understandable when you think about it, Doctor, that the differences between the fusion interfaces of these two, which were separated by seventeen intervening segments, are considerable.”
“Thank you, friend Murchison,” Prilicla said. “My brain seems not to be functioning properly.”
“Probably,” Murchison replied in a sympathetic tone, “because your brain is more than half asleep, like mine.” “And mine,” Naydrad joined in.
Con way, who had been trying not to think of how long it had been since he had last eaten or slept, decided that the best way to deal with an impending mutiny among his overworked medics was to ignore it. He indicated a small area on the rear interface of the first alien, midway between the central conical depression and the upper rim of the interface, then pointed to the corresponding area on the forward face of the second one. He said, “We can safely ignore these reproductive organs in both creatures, since this kind of link-up is temporary and physiologically independent of the parent-offspring fusion mechanism. As 1 see it the three areas we must concentrate on are the central conical projection and its corresponding recess, which are the connecting points for the central nerve core and our primary concern. Second is this narrow, semirigid tongue with the fleshy mushroom at its tip which locates with this slit in the other—”
“That connection is also of vital importance,” Murchison broke in, “since it links up the nerve networks controlling the voluntary and involuntary muscles which move each CRLTs legs and enable the group entity to walk in unison. There would be small advantage to the group entity if it could share mentation but a number of its segments were unable to walk.” “Friend Murchison,” Prilicla said timidly, “it seems to me that the original nerve impulse from the head segment, or whichever individual CRLT was responsible for initiating the movement, would not be sufficiently strong to trigger the ambulatory muscles throughout the enormous length of this group entity.”
“That is true,” the pathologist replied. “But there is an organic amplifier, consisting of a bunching of nerve ganglia situated just above the womb, or the position where the womb had been in the males, in an area where the surrounding tissue has a high mineral content and is particularly rich in copper salts. This biological booster ensures that the ambulatory muscles receive their signals with undiminished strength throughout the length of the chain.”
“Third,” Conway said, raising his voice slightly to discourage further interruptions, “there are these four flaps of muscle which terminate at their apexes in osseous hooks which locate in these four bone-reinforced orifices in the second creature. This is the primary mechanism by which the individual segments are held together nose to tail, and in this instance—”
“It is also the method by which the CRLT female at the end of the line held onto its developing offspring,” Murchison broke in again. “At that stage the offspring had no choice in the matter. But as it matured, produced its own offspring, and moved farther up the line I feel sure that voluntary separationbecame possible. In fact, separation would be necessary during activities which did not require the entire group entity for their performance.”
“That is most interesting, friend Murchison,” Prilicla said. “I should think that the first time such a voluntary separation took place a certain amount of psychological trauma would be present. It would be analogous to a coming-of-age ceremony, perhaps, even though the separation might not be permanent—”
Before Conway could speak, Prilicla fell silent and began trembling in reaction to the Doctor’s feelings of irritation and impatience. He said, “This is all very interesting, friends, but we do not have the time just now for a general discussion. In any case, following the type of temporary separation you mentioned, the young adult would rejoin its original parent segment and not a — I suppose you could describe it as an ancestor seventeen times removed, which is the problem currently facing us. And now, if you don’t mind, we will concentrate on this problem and on the surgical procedures necessary to solve it.
“Feel free to interrupt at any time,” he added dryly.
But the interruptions were few and pertinent, and very soon it became obvious even to the watching tractor beamers, Des-cartes’s commanding officer, and Fleet Commander Dermod, whose face appeared briefly but with increasing frequency on the overhead screen, that the medical team was also working hard.
Because Sector General was the Federation’s foremost emergency hospital, the kind of surgery performed there, whether the patient was Earth-human or extraterrestrial, tended to be curative rather than cosmetic. It felt very strange to Conway, and he knew that his feelings were being shared by the other members of the team, to be operating on a perfectly healthy e-t with the purpose of simply modifying the size and contours of certain physiological features. But the operation itself was far from simple.
The greater proportion of the surgical work had to be performed on the second alien whose forward nerve coupling cone was too wide at its base to be retained by the sphincter muscle surrounding the corresponding orifice in the first CRLT. With the semiflexible tongue and groove connection which joined the two beings’ locomotor nerve networks, the solution was much simpler. The deep recess in the first alien was surgically widened until measurement showed that it would accommodate the tongue comfortably, after which reinforcing sutures were inserted to prevent further accidental widening. But the four triangular flaps with their bony, hooklike extensions posed a completely different and more difficult problem.
Together the four members formed the principal organic coupling which held the considerable mass of the second e-t against the first, and they did not fit because the hooks did not quite reach the apertures meant to receive them.