Prostho Plus (8 page)

She sobered abruptly. "
Sold
him?"

"He was on contract, same as you. Hostage against the expense of his procurement and shipment. Perfectly regular."

"I'm
on—?! You advertised for a job, not a slave! You can't buy and sell human beings!"

"Why not?"

She was not the spluttering type. She spluttered. "It just isn't done! Not on Earth."

Both Enens masticated that. "We aren't
on
Earth," Holmes pointed out. "Your ballbase players are bought and sold on Earth," Watson said. "Everything is in order according to Galactic codes," they both said—or else the machine had choked over the pair of sticks and read the same message off twice.

"But Dr. Dillingham and I aren't ballbase—
baseball!
players! And it isn't the same. This is kidnapping."

The Enens nibbled sticks, not understanding what all the fuss was about. "Everything is in order. We told you that. Now will you assist?"

Judy dropped that tack for the moment. The Enens had not mistreated her, after all, and it was rather exciting being on another world, and she could never have afforded passage on her own. At least she was on Dillingham's trail, and that alone just about made up for the rest of it. It wasn't as though she had had any particularly inviting future back on Earth.

"Well, how about letting me talk to the muck-a-muck? I can't accomplish much here by myself."

"But you applied for a position at North Nebula!"

"I changed my mind."

It took her several more days to establish that her mind, once changed, was absolutely set. She did convince them that their own technicians were far more competent in the laboratory than she, though far less competent than supposed at the time Dillingham had been sold. She suspected that Earth was about to sustain another dental raid, and she felt sorry for the innocent DOS that would be nabbed, but it was every ballbase player for himself. She was on her way to Gleep.

"I am informed you are a tooth-healer," the amorphous blob said. It spoke through a transcoder, since its natural mode of communication was via modulations in an internally generated electronic signal. The only way Dillingham could tell it was talking was by hearing the translation—which actually simplified things comfortably.

The creature was about four feet high and shaped like a rock when it came to a standstill. Its surface had the lustre of polished metal, yet it was flexible enough to make ambulation possible. There were no arms or legs; it seemed to move by wormlike undulations of its underside as well as the constant shifting of balance that brought about a controlled rolling.

"I am a dentist, yes," Dillingham agreed. "But I'm afraid neither my training nor my equipment would be of any benefit to you. My practical experience had been confined to—"

"We have verified your references," the blob replied. "If you would be of service, come."

Verified his references! Dillingham had not known he had any, on a galactic scale. This Electrolyte must have queried Trach and received a diplomatically optimistic report.

"You are asking me to look at—one of your people? I really don't know anything about—"

"We have made proper allowance for your appealing modesty. Come."

That
was Trach's handiwork, certainly. The dinosaur had entirely too much confidence in Dillingham's ability—or too vested an interest in the worth of Dillingham's contract.

Well, he was tired of idleness. He could at least accompany this creature, though any professional service was out of the question. Automatically he picked up his bag of equipment and the transcoder and followed the blob outside.

Electrolus was an interesting world, for persons who liked the type. The plants were crystalline and the animals metallic, with a metamorphic slant. Trach had said something about a silicon basis for life here, but the details had not been at all clear.

Trach had also arranged for a private duplex with appurtenances suitable to reptilian and mammalian needs. Dillingham was happy to share this with the diplomat. Trach might resemble a grade C nightmare out of Earth's past, but he was as familiar as a brother compared to some of the other galactic creatures encountered.

Although Dillingham's contract was a euphemism for slavery, he retained certain inalienable galactic rights: life, compatible environment, and the pursuit of liberty. The first was too often precarious and the second a matter of opinion, but the third vested him with a standard interstellar credit rating. His prior prosthodontic services had accrued normal commissions to his account, and even his transfer from one owner to another had added a percentage fixed by nebulactic law. He was handsomely solvent—but still a long way from the wealth required to purchase his own contract.

On Electrolus it was more than normally apparent that money—or frump or stiggle or whatever—wasn't everything. He could not enjoy the local cuisine: stewed silicate crystals hampered his digestion, no matter how succulent the grade. Trach's creaky synthesizer produced the only food available to him here—greenchomp, with constitution of leather and taste of hay. He could not enjoy the companionship of his own kind because he was, to the best of his knowledge, the only member of his species within a hundred light-years, or a thousand. He could not even relax with an informative text, since the Electrolytes had other, nonvisual, means of recording data.

He could admire the view, as he tramped after the serenely rolling blob. It was spectacular. The sunlight glinted and refracted and diffused amid the towering crystalline structures, kaleidoscoping colour. The entire countryside was jewel-like, with rising spires, steeples and minarets of brilliance along every azimuth.

Dillingham would have given almost anything for the sight of a green tree or a human face. He wondered what his former assistant, Miss Galland, was doing now, but cut off that speculation. A competent girl like her would have found another position immediately; even if he managed to return to Earth tomorrow, she would no longer be available.

Trach, at least, was fully absorbed in his business and didn't have to worry about homesickness. Every day he went forth to meet important personages and to arrange new liaisons, working diligently to solve whatever diplomatic problems Electrolus had hired him for. But Dillingham had no vital mission here. He had to wait, and hope that the dinosaur was successful, so that his own contract did not wind up in the tentacles of a radium mining foreman on Ra, or some even less enticing location. Lots of terrible places in the galaxy had standing offers for medical and dental specialists, because no one went there voluntarily...

They had arrived. The native rolled into a gracious cave-like residence, and Dillingham accompanied it cautiously. He knew almost nothing about the custom of this culture, and could not guess how such featureless creatures had achieved space travel.

The occupant of the domicile greeted him with what he presumed was warmth: "Contortions, O Toothman. Can you snog the dentifrice?"

Dillingham looked askance at his transcoder. It was supposed to render the alien signal-wave into intelligible English. If it went awry now, he would be in serious trouble.

"This, you understand, is the problem," his guide said. "Your instrument is not out of order."

That was a relief. "This appears to be a—a psychological matter. I certainly can't—"

"On the contrary, Doctor. It is a tooth matter. Our healers are baffled. The situation is getting out of hand. A number of our most prominent individuals, this one foremost among them, are baffled, yet nothing is done."

"But I work on
teeth,
not speech problems!"

"Of course. That is why we hope you can help us. Anyone who can cure a Gleep toothache—"

Should he try to explain that dumping twenty tons of gold into the monster Gleep cavity in no way qualified him as a galactic psychiatrist? No doubt they would find the distinction plebian. Better a polite demurral.

He addressed the patient: "Sir, I am not at all certain I can snog the dentifrice, but I return your contortions."

The surface of the Electrolyte sparkled. "Joy and rapturations! You clank the concordance!"

The guide rippled a lava-like furrow in Dillingham's direction and settled three inches. "You comprehend him?"

"Well, not exactly—but I've had some experience recently with alien dialects. He was obviously wishing me well, and inquiring whether I could help him. My patients always say something like that, so I reply in kind."

"I perceive your reputation was well-earned! Half of what he says is gibberish to us. It's frightful."

Dillingham looked at the patient. "Doesn't he mind this clinical discussion in his presence?"

"He can't understand us any more than we understand him. He's quite normal in most other respects, and healthy—but he seems to be speaking another language. If only we knew what it was, we could programme a transcoder, but—"

Something jogged Dillingham's memory. "Can he speak to the other afflicted Electrolytes?"

"No. They have even more trouble understanding each other. It's worse when they try to—"

"I suspected as much. I once had a patient on Earth who had asphasia." He paused, wondering whether he should try to clarify that it had been the teeth he had worked on, not the asphasia. That's a kind of distortion of speech brought about by injury or disease. The patient thinks he's making sense, but the words are all confused. He has to learn the language all over again."

That's it!" the guide agreed. "Truly, your cognizance is remarkable. Can you fix it quickly?"

What a living a huxter could make on this trusting planet! "I'm afraid not. I know almost nothing about such aberrations among my own kind, let alone—"

"But surely, now that you have diagnosed it—"

Dillingham made one more attempt. "I am neither a doctor nor a psychiatrist. I am a dentist. I repair teeth and try to restore the natural health of the mouth. What you need is someone who specializes in speech, or mental health."

"Of course, Doctor. That is what our tooth healers do. How could it be otherwise?"

And in the past on Earth, barbers had practised medicine... Would his refusal to consider the matter further be taken as a mortal insult that would prejudice Trach's diplomatic mission and lead to...?

Dillingham decided to have a look at the teeth. That much, at least, was theoretically within his competence. He hadn't yet observed any trace of a mouth, but that was minor.

"I shall try to snog the dentifrice," he said matter-of-factly to the patient. "Please open your mouth."

The polish lost some of its lustre. "Mooth?"

Oh-oh. Another missing word. "Show me your tooth-container. Your oral aperture. Your—"

"Ah. My clank units."

That made sense. "Clank the concordance" might have meant "speak the language". The mouth would naturally be the speaking-place, the teeth the speech units.

"Right. I have to look at your clank units." Then he addressed the guide: "How do your teeth make speech?"

"They—talk. How else could it be?"

"But not quite the way mine do. You don't use sound. And surely the communication signal isn't generated directly by your teeth. It's electronic!"

"But isn't that the way everyone speaks?"

Ask a foolish question! The Electrolyte obviously had no conception of sound or vocal mechanisms.

But electronic teeth? He knew even less about electronics than he did about psychiatry.

Meanwhile the patient still hadn't got the idea, which might be a blessing. There was no mouth in evidence. "Show me your dentifrice, please," he said.

That was the formula. The upper section of the blob lifted, lidlike. Inside was a ceramic chamber with a dozen genuine, conventional teeth. They were arranged in opposing vertical semi-circles, and each was a sturdy molar adapted to the crushing and grinding of tough crystal.

"I see he has had some metal inlay operative dentistry."

"What?"

Another point clarified. The average Electrolyte knew no more about prosthodontics than did the average Earthman. "Some work done. Seems to be in order."

"Oh. Yes, nothing but the best."

Dillingham investigated more closely, reassured by the increasing familiarity of the orifice. His experienced eye traced the masticatory patterns and noted clues to the general health of the creature, though he knew he could not rely on such estimates when he knew so little of the native metabolism. Still, he saw no reason that these teeth should contribute to any general disorder. "Gold inlays. Very nice work. But I note some corrosion."

"Corrosion?" the patient inquired. Dillingham wondered how he could talk with his mouth wide open, then remembered that the speech was electronic. If it really were connected with the teeth...

Circuits inside these molars? Perhaps a dentist was the person to consult about speech defects!

Such duality was not really more remarkable than that of the human apparatus. Take a mouth intended for mastication and salivation, pass air from the respiratory system through it, vibrate that air by interposing the cords intended by nature to seal off the lungs when under stress, and you had the basis of the human speech mechanism. None of it had been designed originally for communication, yet it functioned well enough. Why not teeth whose solid silicon structure became adapted to semi-conductor modulation?

On Earth there had been documented cases of radio reception via the metallic content of fillings in the teeth. Here, the natural currents resulting from stresses applied while chewing could eventually have been harnessed into broadcasting and receiving circuits...

If only he knew more about such things! As it was, he knew that transistors were semi-conductor devices able to take the place of many electron tubes. This mouth could be the chassis of a radio set, each tooth performing a specific function in the circuit. Current low? Clench the teeth!

Which put the problem clearly beyond his competence. This was a case in which formal galactic training would be invaluable. Trach had mentioned a Galactic University of Dentistry, but had stressed the difficulties of admittance: "You have to have a high potential to begin with. They won't even consider you unless you are sponsored by an accredited planet. All the universities are like that. And few worlds will bother to sponsor an alien, when they have so many of their own people eager to make the attempt."