her feelings of curiosity and wonder were even stronger as the body firmed out, became more finely structured, and the features appeared. Then the clothing and equipment pouch grew into place, and there was standing before her the figure of another female Sommaradvan identical in every detail to herself.
“If our Earth-human friends intend subjecting you to the environment of a multispecies dining hall within minutes of your arrival,” it said in a voice that was not, thankfully, hers, “I must counteract their lack of consideration by providing you with something familiar, and friendly, to whom you can relate. It is the least I can do for a new member of the staff.”
“Doctor Danalta,” Braithwaite said, barking again, “is not as altruistic as it would have you think, Cha Thrat. Due to the incredibly savage environment of its planet of origin, the species evolved protective mimicry of a very high order. There are few warm-blooded oxygen-breathing
life-forms in Sector General that it cannot accurately reproduce within a few minutes, as you’ve seen. But we suspect that any new, intelligent life-form to arrive at the hospital, be it patient, visitor, or staff, is regarded by Danalta as a challenge to its powers of physical mimicry.”
“Nevertheless,” she said, “I am impressed.”
She stared eye to eye at her utterly alien but identical twin, thinking that the being had displayed concern for her present mental well-being by using its incredible talent to make her feel more comfortable. It was the action of a healer of rulers, and it might even be a ruler itself. Instinctively she made the gesture of respect to superiors, then belatedly realized that neither the Earth-humans nor her Danalta-copy would recognize it for what it was.
“Why, thank you, Cha Thrat,” said Danalta, returning the gesture. “With protective mimicry there is an associated empathic faculty. While I don’t know what the limb gesture means exactly, I could feel that I was being complimented.”
Danalta, she had no doubt, was also aware of her embarrassment, but as they followed the two Earth-humans from the compartment the shape-changer did not speak of it.
The corridor outside was thronged with a menagerie of creatures, a few of whom resembled, in shape if not in size, nonintelligent species found on Sommaradva. She tried not to flinch as one of the small, red-furred bipeds of the species she had seen in charge of Reception brushed past, and she felt acutely anxious when enormous, six-limbed, multi-tentacled monsters of many times her body mass bore down on her. But not all of the creatures were frightening, or even ugly. A large crustacean with a beautifully marked carapace and hard exoskeletal limbs clicked past, its pincers opening and closing slowly as it talked to a truly lovely being who had at least thirty short, stubby legs and an overall coat of rippling, silvery fur. There were others she could not see clearly because of their protective envelopes and, in the case of the occupant of a mobile pressure vessel from which steam was escaping, she had no idea what weird or wonderful shape the vehicle was concealing.
The cacophony of hooting, chirping, gobbling, and moaning conversation
could not be described, because it was totally unlike anything she had previously experienced.
“There is a much shorter route to the dining hall,” Danalta said as a spiney, membraneous being who looked like some kind of dark, oily vegetable shuffled past, its physical details clouded by the thick yellow fog inside its transparent suit. “But it would mean a trip through the water-filled Chalder wards, and your protective envelopes won’t be ready for another six, maybe seven days. How do you feel, and what do you think of the place so far?”
It was disconcerting and embarrassing to have Danalta, who could be nothing less than a wizard-healer of rulers, ask such questions of a mere warrior-surgeon. But the questions had been asked, and
“If our Earth-human friends intend subjecting you to the environment of a multispecies dining hall within minutes of your arrival,” it said in a voice that was not, thankfully, hers, “I must counteract their lack of consideration by providing you with something familiar, and friendly, to whom you can relate. It is the least I can do for a new member of the staff.”
“Doctor Danalta,” Braithwaite said, barking again, “is not as altruistic as it would have you think, Cha Thrat. Due to the incredibly savage environment of its planet of origin, the species evolved protective mimicry of a very high order. There are few warm-blooded oxygen-breathing
life-forms in Sector General that it cannot accurately reproduce within a few minutes, as you’ve seen. But we suspect that any new, intelligent life-form to arrive at the hospital, be it patient, visitor, or staff, is regarded by Danalta as a challenge to its powers of physical mimicry.”
“Nevertheless,” she said, “I am impressed.”
She stared eye to eye at her utterly alien but identical twin, thinking that the being had displayed concern for her present mental well-being by using its incredible talent to make her feel more comfortable. It was the action of a healer of rulers, and it might even be a ruler itself. Instinctively she made the gesture of respect to superiors, then belatedly realized that neither the Earth-humans nor her Danalta-copy would recognize it for what it was.
“Why, thank you, Cha Thrat,” said Danalta, returning the gesture. “With protective mimicry there is an associated empathic faculty. While I don’t know what the limb gesture means exactly, I could feel that I was being complimented.”
Danalta, she had no doubt, was also aware of her embarrassment, but as they followed the two Earth-humans from the compartment the shape-changer did not speak of it.
The corridor outside was thronged with a menagerie of creatures, a few of whom resembled, in shape if not in size, nonintelligent species found on Sommaradva. She tried not to flinch as one of the small, red-furred bipeds of the species she had seen in charge of Reception brushed past, and she felt acutely anxious when enormous, six-limbed, multi-tentacled monsters of many times her body mass bore down on her. But not all of the creatures were frightening, or even ugly. A large crustacean with a beautifully marked carapace and hard exoskeletal limbs clicked past, its pincers opening and closing slowly as it talked to a truly lovely being who had at least thirty short, stubby legs and an overall coat of rippling, silvery fur. There were others she could not see clearly because of their protective envelopes and, in the case of the occupant of a mobile pressure vessel from which steam was escaping, she had no idea what weird or wonderful shape the vehicle was concealing.
The cacophony of hooting, chirping, gobbling, and moaning conversation
could not be described, because it was totally unlike anything she had previously experienced.
“There is a much shorter route to the dining hall,” Danalta said as a spiney, membraneous being who looked like some kind of dark, oily vegetable shuffled past, its physical details clouded by the thick yellow fog inside its transparent suit. “But it would mean a trip through the water-filled Chalder wards, and your protective envelopes won’t be ready for another six, maybe seven days. How do you feel, and what do you think of the place so far?”
It was disconcerting and embarrassing to have Danalta, who could be nothing less than a wizard-healer of rulers, ask such questions of a mere warrior-surgeon. But the questions had been asked, and
Similar Books
Fortunes & Failures - 03
T. W. Brown
The Temple of Indra’s Jewel:
Rachael Stapleton
Communion Town
Sam Thompson
Flesh Cartel, #8: Loyalties
Rachel Haimowitz, Heidi Belleau
Star Wars: Scoundrels
Timothy Zahn
The Jade Boy
Cate Cain
The Truant Officer
Derek Ciccone
And Then There Were None
Agatha Christie
The Mortal Bone
Marjorie M. Liu
