James White - Star Surgeon

Colonel Williamson had given him copies of the more detailed and recent information which had come in through Monitor Corps channels, but he began by studying the file which O’Mara had given him.

The being Lonvellin had been on the way to a world, about which it had heard some very nasty rumors, in a practically unexplored section of the Lesser Megellanic Cloud, when it had been taken ill and admitted to Sector General. Shortly after being pronounced cured it had resumed the journey and a few weeks later it had contacted the Monitor Corps. It had stated that conditions on the world it had found were both sociologically complex and medically barbaric, and that it would need advice on the medical side before it could begin to act effectively against the many social ills afflicting this truly distressed planet. It had also asked if some beings of physiological classification DBDG could be sent along to act as information gatherers as the natives were of that classification and were violently hostile to all off-planet life, a fact which seriously hampered Lonvellin’s activities.

The fact of Lonvellin asking for help of any sort was surprising in itself in view of the enormous intelligence and experience of his species in solving vast sociological problems. But on this occasion things had gone disastrously wrong, and Lonvellin had been kept too busy using its defensive science to do anything else.

According to Lonvellin’s report it had begun by observing the planet from space during many rotations, monitoring the radio transmissions through its Translator, and taking particular note of the low level of industrialization which contrasted so oddly with the single, still functioning space port. When all the information which it had thought necessary had been collected and evaluated it chose what it considered to be the best place to land.

From the evidence at hand Lonvellin judged the world — the native’s name for it was Etla-to have been a once-prosperous colony which had regressed for economic reasons until now it had very little contact with outside. But it did have some, which meant that Lonvellin’s first and usually most difficult job, that of making the natives trust an alien and perhaps visually horrifying being who had dropped out of the sky, was greatly simplified. These people would know about e-ts. So it took the role of a poor, frightened, slightly stupid extra-terrestrial who had been forced to land to make repairs to its ship. For this it would require various odd and completely worthless chunks of metal or rock, and it would pretend great difficulty in making the Etlans understand exactly what it needed. But for these valueless pieces of rubbish it could exchange items of great value, and soon the more enterprising natives would get to know about it.

At this stage Lonvellin expected to be exploited shamelessly, but it didn’t mind. Gradually things would change. Rather than give items of value it would offer to perform even more valuable services. It would let it be known that it now considered its ship to be irreparable, and gradually it would become accepted as a permanent resident. After that it would be just a matter of time, and time was something with which Lonvellin was particularly well supplied.

It landed close to a road which ran between two small towns, and soon had the chance to reveal itself to a native. The native, despite Lonvellin’s careful contact and many reassurances via the Translator, fled. A few hours later small, crude projectiles with chemical warheads began falling on his ship and the whole area, which was densely wooded, had been saturated with volatile chemicals and deliberately set alight.

Lonvellin had been unable to proceed without knowing why this race with experience of space-travel should be so blindly hostile to e-ts, and not being in a position to ask questions himself it had called for Earth human assistance. Shortly afterward Alien Contact specialists of the Monitor Corps had arrived, sized up the situation for themselves and gone in.

Quite openly, as it happened.

They discovered that the natives were terrified of e-ts because they believed them to be disease carriers. What was even more peculiar was the fact that they were not worried by off-planet visitors of their own species or a closely similar race, members of which would have been more likely to be carriers of disease: because it was a well-known medical fact that diseases which affected extra-terrestrials were not communicable to members of other planetary species. Any race with a knowledge of space travel should know that, Conway thought. It was the first thing a star traveling culture learned.

He was trying to make some sense out of this strange contradiction, using a tired brain and some hefty reference works on the Federation’s colonization program, when Major Stillman’s arrival made a very welcome interruption.

“We’ll arrive in three days time, Doctor,” the Major began, “and I think it’s time you had some cloak and dagger training. By that I mean getting to know how to wear Etlan clothes. It’s a very fetching costume, although personally I don’t have the knees for a kilt …

Etla had been contacted on two levels by the Corps, Stillman went onto explain. On one they had landed secretly using the native language and dress, no other disguise being necessary because the physiological resemblance had been so close. Most of their later information had been gained in this way and so far none of the agents had been caught. On the other level the Corpsmen admitted their extra-terrestrial origin, conversed by Translator, and their story was that they had heard of the plight of the native population and had come to give medical assistance. The Etlans had accepted this story, revealing the fact that similar offers of help had been made in the past, that an Empire ship was sent every ten years loaded with the newest drugs, but despite all this the medical situation continued to worsen. The Corpsmen were welcome to try to relieve the situation if they could, but the impression given by the Etlans was that they were just another party of well-intentional bunglers.

Naturally when the subject of Lonvellin’s landing came up the Corps had to pretend complete ignorance, and their expressed opinions leaned heavily toward the middle of the road.

It was a very complex problem, Stillman told him, and became more so with every new report sent in by undercover agents. But Lonvellin had a beautifully simple plan for clearing up the whole mess. When Conway heard it he wished suddenly that he hadn’t tried to impress Lonvellin with his skill as a doctor. He would much rather have been back in the hospital right now. This being made responsible for organizing the cure of an entire planetary population gave him an unpleasantly gone feeling in the region of his transverse colon …

Etla was beset with much sickness and suffering and narrow, superstitious thinking, their reaction to Lonvellin being a shocking illustration of their intolerance toward species which did not resemble themselves. The first two conditions increased the third, which in turn worsened the first two. Lonvellin hoped to break this vicious circle by causing a marked improvement in the health of the population, one that would be apparent to even the least intelligent and bigoted natives. It would then have the Corpsmen admit publicly that they had been acting under Lonvellin’s instructions all along, which should make the e-t hating natives feel somewhat ashamed of themselves. Then during the perhaps temporary increase of e-t tolerance which would follow, Lonvellin would set about gaining their trust and eventually return to its original long-term plan for making them a sane, happy and thriving culture again.

Conway told Stillman that he wasn’t an expert in these matters but it sounded like a very good plan.