I recognized the attending as Kami, a full android who's specialty was sterile environments.I recognized the attending as Kami, a full android who's specialty was sterile environments. Made sense. Then I finally got up the nerve to get a good, solid look at the patient. It took every last vestige of that nerve to keep my lunch down. I looked away and said, quietly, "How is he?" P'nyssa looked up at me, took off the link. She said, in that quiet voice all doctors develop over time, "He may not make it through the night. We've already got an h-plant in him, and it's holding. He's full of drexlells, and we've got his genecode down, but we're still talking about massive amounts of damage." "What's the diagnosis?" "Well, he was crushed by his ship as it came apart; his arm was removed at the shoulder by his own chair. Failure of his cooling system gave him the massive burns you see, and the hull cracking exposed him to both the heat and vacuum, not to mention radiation burns. His brain is still alive, as far as we can tell, but the telepath says he's in so much pain there's not much to receive. He took a lot of neural damage. And personally, I don't want any sensitives within a hundred klicks of him when he comes out of it. He's my best powerpath, and the feedback from him will be enormous." Her voice was very even, very controlled. She was having trouble. I thought about it. "What about a shell-shield?" "It's in place, but it's not a guarantee. Nance is just so powerful. But if he lives through the night, we've got a good chance of putting him back together again." I knocked on the door. The voice said, calmly, "Come in." I palmed the door open and stepped into the hospital room. "How are you feeling?" I asked. The voice from the speaker said, "I feel like shit. I haven't got my own voice back, so they leave me biocybed to this thing so I can talk." His eyes moved back and forth plaintively, but the tubes and wires running down his throat still kept him from achieving any sort of expression. "It doesn't even sound like me." "No, that it doesn't, kiddo." "How am I looking?" "Terrible." "You're so kind." I sighed. "Nance, it's my turn at the crank." I paused for a second, then said, "Please stop stardiving." "I know what you're going to say, and you can stop right there, Ken. |