“Hello girls, I'm ready whenever you are. I thought I would take you to my herbalist shop. That's where all the flasks I have in storage are, as well as all the manuscripts where it is noted what to administer for this or that symptom. What will be a problem, though, is that you probably won't be able to read them.”
“We will learn to read as we learned to speak. I will scan your manuscripts and our scanner, once it has read a certain number of words, will be able to interpret them and communicate the information to our brain implants. We should be able to read it tomorrow morning!”
“That's a great thing you're doing. Is there any way we can make it for ourselves too?”
“I'm sorry, but that's impossible. These implants were surgically placed in our cortex, a part of our brain, as part of this specific mission to explore new worlds. The implant has since become completely integrated into our cortex as if it were part of us.’’
“Ah thank you, Sarah for that explanation. What a shame. Well, let's go.”
Holly takes us to a room located in the Complex, on the lower levels. After several corridors and staircases, we arrive in a moderate-sized room, where numerous worktops occupy all four walls, including the fourth, the one open to the cliff like all the other rooms. But the opening here is narrower and horizontal, like a large window lying down.
It's spotless, there's light and the space is used to its fullest capacity. Some kind of library supports a large number of handwritten scrolls. Given the quantity, Eva will be scanning this for a while.
Holly begins by showing us the most common herbs and potions and their applications. I run them one by one through the analyzer while Eva taps on her tablet, to classify them, such as antipyretics, healing agents, and painkillers . . .
We've been at it for a good two hours when Holly interrupts in the middle of a sentence. Seeing her stare, I understand that she has telepathic contact. She confirms this.
“I have to go. Sarah, come with me, we're going to see a patient. Eva, you can start scanning the manuscripts, but please put them back where you got them.”
So, we leave it to Eva to scan whatever text she can find, so we can learn to read quickly. And I go with Holly to see her patient. She tells me that she is pregnant, that the pregnancy lasts six to seven months and that she is in pain.
Come on, girl, your first case involves a condition you know nothing about, as it involves the specifics of an unknown alien race. Now that's bad! Couldn't she have sprained her ankle so you could show what you can do? That's really bad luck.
The patient was spinning ‘cotton’ when her pain started. So, she is in the room of the Complex located on the other side from the main entrance. It is toward the garment workshop that I had already been shown. I was surprised when I saw its pink flowers, whose petals are made of small threads of a kind of cotton. It is necessary to pull the thread delicately and unroll it to make spools. Then the women weave the tunics on large wooden looms.
Anyway, we join the patient on the other side of the Complex. She's sitting on the floor, looking quite pale. Holly introduces me.
“Jenny, this is Sarah, Nixx's companion. She is also a healer and if you'll allow her, she'll assist in your examination to understand how we function.”
“No, I don't want to!” panicked Jenny. “That's okay, I'm not in pain anymore, sorry to have bothered you.”
“In fact, I'm going to go stretch my legs at the entrance to the Complex and Holly can check you out while I'm there, just to make sure the baby is okay. Also, I think the practice field is on this side of the complex too.”
“Yes, to the left as you come out onto the set.” Holly replies, with a grateful look.
Like me, she understands Jenny's intense stress about her pain. The presence of a stranger adds to her anxiety. So, I head back to the exit and decide to let Holly check her out peacefully. I have plenty of time to learn and the priority is the patient's comfort.
When I got to the high plateau, I don't know what Holly told me. I was lost in thought. As I was hesitating between turning left and turning right, a baby's cry reached my ears. It comes from the right. So, I follow the sound, which seems to be at the edge of the tall bushes that border the plateau on this side. After a few minutes of searching, I identify the source of the noise.
An adorable baby fawn is injured and tangled in roots. He is dark gray with lighter-colored stripes on his flanks, two stripes on each cheek, and four rings on his tail, the last two being the darkest. Two dark gray bands mark the legs. The chest has black spots. The inside of the legs, the underside of the tail, the belly, and the throat are lighter. The back of the ears are light gray, with black ear rims and ear brushes. Gee, too bad I left the analyzer to Eva.
I approach the small wounded animal and gently caress the top of its head, speaking softly to it.
“Hello, adorable little . . . uh . . . babakotia? How did you get into this situation? Where is your family? Don't move, I'm going to free you and see how to cure you.”
His crying has stopped and his red eyes scrutinize me warily. I open the medical kit that Holly lent me. I find a small blade that allows me to cut the roots that hold the young babakotia. These roots are coated with a corrosive substance. They have started to eat away at the baby's coat.
After freeing him, I clean his wounds with the balm Holly indicated. The same one that was used on me during my misadventure with Loony. During the whole operation, I keep talking to him in a soft and comforting voice.
“So, I'll call you Tigger because babakotia is too long. And I think you look more like a big wild cat than the little monkey I imagined. But the color of the coat and the eyes match well with what Loony described to me. Even if you’re much bigger than I thought. You must be about sixty centimeters tall, not counting your tail which must be about thirty centimeters long. Well, Tigger, I'm almost done.”
Tigger has a defensive movement when I apply balm on a particularly ugly lesion on his side. He abruptly grabs my wrist in his mouth, but doesn't squeeze. I feel his sharp teeth on my skin, but I keep whispering words of comfort to him. He lets me finish the treatment.
Then I help him drink the water I put in a flask and mix it with a few drops of calming potion that I also find in my care bag.
“That's it, Tigger, we're done. I'm going to move you out of the way, so you won't be bothered by that nasty plant. But I'll leave you around so you can easily find your family. In the meantime, I'll see if I can find you something to eat. I'll be back soon.”
I accompany my words with a long caress on his skull and around his ears. This little rascal seems to appreciate it. I return to the Complex and find the entrance to the garment workshops. I try to find my way through the labyrinth of corridors to find the kitchens.
