James White - Mind Changer

“The reduced size of the instruments has rendered it minimal, and allowable.”

“This is new territory? said Conway quietly. “We don’t know what is allowable. Ah, we’re in.

The split-screen images from the external scanner and of Conway’s hands in the reduction gaunflets was replaced by the tremendously magnified view from the internal vision pickup that was moving through what appeared to be a series of interconnecting, submerged caverns. In the strong light their convoluted walls showed pink with patches of yellow and they were covered with plantlike growths whose tight clusters of slender stems were topped by single, crystalline flowers that were pale blue or red verging on black. The majority of the stems were headless and on the few that weren t the crystals looked deformed or damaged. Pieces of crystalline debris stirred in the eddies created by the motion of the invading instruments.

“I’ll need a specimen of the fluid for analysis,” said Thornnastor. “Also samples of that floating debris, which appears to be fragmented crystalline material, and a few complete crystals if you can detach them from their stalks. I’ll need stalk samples as well, complete with their crystal flowers.”

“Right? said Conway. “Increase the magnification to two hundred.”

A tiny amount of the fluid which included the debris was withdrawn. Then the cutter and grabs, looking like gigantic earthmoving machinery under the high magnification, moved in to harvest the required stalks and crystals.

“I have enough for the analyzer, now? said Thornnastor. “But the fluid is something more than a simple saline solution. This will take a little time.”

“I feel your concern, friend Conway? Prilicla’s voice joined in, “but it is unnecessary. There is no change in the patient’s emotional status even at the subconscious level, which is the most accurate guide to anything going wrong. The invasive procedure is so delicate that I doubt that it would have felt anything even if it had been fully conscious.”

There was a faint, rustling sound that might have been Conway sighing with relief, and then he said, “Thank you for the reassurance, little friend, you must have felt I needed it. But what we’re seeing here is an organic telepathic transmitter and receiver that is damaged and inoperative. Dammit, in primary-school science class I couldn’t even build a homemade radio that worked.”

It was Thornnastor who looked up with one eye from its analyzer to break the lengthening silence.

“This is interesting? it said. “The fluid is a complex of metallic salts, predominantly copper, with a large number of other minerals in trace quantities that have yet to be identified. It seems that the crystals, which are very faintly radioactive, grow within the fluid and attach themselves to the clusters of stalks only when they are fully formed. Apart from providing cup-shaped attachment points at their tips and serving as a protective sheath for the connective nerve pathway to the central brain, they are merely the supports for their individual crystals.

“We can reproduce the fluid? it went on, “and seed it with fragments of the damaged crystals and regrow and reirradiate them. Pathologist Murchison is standing by in the lab and it tells me that the crystals form so quickly that it should be able to complete the process in just over an hour. This would give us enough time for lunch.”

“What?” said Conway.

“Friend Thornnastor is a massive and energy-hungry lifeform? said Prilicla, “but it is simply making a pleasantry aimed at reducing emotional tension.”

The image showing the site of Tunneckis’s telepathic faculty remained steady on the wall screen, but the conversation of the operating team discussing it became so densely technical that O’Mara found it difficult to follow even with both his minds. He was glad when the regrown crystals in their growth medium arrived and were injected slowly into the cerebral fluid.

It was obvious even to O’Mara that there were problems.

The newly introduced crystals refused to attach themselves to stalks. Conway stepped up the magnification several times and, sweating in his effort to make minimal movements, tried to use his microinstruments to nudge and hold them together, in vain. The emotional radiation in the room was so intense that Prilicla, trembling in every limb, was forced to land. Finally Conway shook his head, regained enough control over his feelings for the empath to stop trembling, and looked up.

“The receptor cups on the stalks appear to fit the new crystals? he said calmly, “which means that either the reproduction of the new crystals or the fluid in which they were grown was at fault, or both, so that they are either rejecting or temporarily ignoring the stalks. I’m hoping, in fact I’m being hopelessly optimistic, that it is the latter and that the joining process simply requires more time. That being the case, and unless anyone has any other ideas, I suggest we withdraw at once in the hope that the patient, as so many of them do, proceeds to heal itself?”

There was total silence in O’Mara’s office as Conway switched off the wall screen before turning to face them again.

“The rest of this is simply the op debriefing and my general instructions to the medical staff of the recuperation ward? he went on, “and frankly I dislike listening to myself making excuses. Patient Tunneckis did not recover. In addition it has become emotionally disturbed to the stage where psychiatric assistance was requested. It’s gratifying to belong to a hospital with the reputation of doing the medically impossible, but, regrettably, we can’t do it all the time. Patient Tunneckis, I’m afraid, remains as it was, telepathically deaf and dumb.”

Conway silently resumed his seat and the silence lengthened. Thornnastor and Prilicla joined the others in saying nothing. O’Mara was totally surprised and very pleased when it was the usually quiet and self-effacing Lieutenant Braithwaite who broke the silence.

“Diagnostician Conway? he said politely, “I completely disagree.”

Conway, Thornnastor, Prilicla, and O’Mara turned their total of ten eyes on the lieutenant, who kept his fixed unwaveringly on Conway. He spoke again before the other could react.

“There is evidence to suggest,” Braithwaite continued, respectfully but firmly, “that your patient is making some form of projective telepathic contact with the members of several different species, specifically those belonging to the medical staff who have been or are attending it. So far as I can gather from their reported conversations with the patient, Tunneckis and they are completely unaware of what is happening.”

Conway looked quickly toward O’Mara, then back to Braithwaite. He smiled and said, “Has your chief made you aware of the brain-itch phenomenon, Lieutenant? It’s very rare, but I’ve experienced it a few times myself around telepaths. It’s a temporary irritation, not a physical or mental health risk.”

Braithwaite nodded. “I’m aware of it, sir. It occurs when a member of a species who is not normally telepathic but whose distant ancestors possessed the gene for a telepathic faculty, and evolved speech and hearing instead, encounters a transmission that its long-atrophied receiver cannot process. The result, if they feel anything at all, is an unlocalized itching deep inside both ears. Occasionally, as happened with you, a complete telepathic mindpicture is received which fades within seconds. The effect with Tunneckis is more insidious and, I believe, dangerous.

“Since you took part in the operation” he went on, looking briefly toward Prilicla and Thornnastor, “are any of you aware of uncharacteristic changes in your behavior or thought patterns, however small? Do any of you find yourselves feeling unusual levels of irritation toward other-species colleagues or subordinate staff? Are you worried about what they might do to you someday? Do you find yourselves wishing you had own-species assistants rather than a bunch of weird aliens who