Taking Wing - Michael A. Martin [15]
Nurse Alyssa Ogawa watched the rhythmic, repetitive motions of Xin Ra-Havreii’s long, wispy white mustachios. She found the effect almost hypnotic.
He’s trembling, she realized with no small amount of surprise. Why is he so nervous?
“How long did you say this had been bothering you, Commander?” Ogawa asked.
Idly playing with the pips on the collar of his standard Starfleet duty uniform, Dr. Ra-Havreii swayed unsteadily toward one of the biobeds and reclined heavily on it. He assayed a laugh, but its apparent breeziness was belied by a subtle deepening of his slightly rusty complexion. “It comes and goes. I can usually cope with it, but it’s flared up since I came aboard. One of my stomachs seems to have remained behind at the Utopia ground station.”
Ogawa reflected on how ironic it was that a designer of starships had such wobbly space legs.
Offering him what she hoped was a reassuring smile, she said, “Then let’s see what we can do about that. Short of sending a search party down to look for that missing stomach, that is.”
He returned a pale reflection of Ogawa’s smile as she walked to an interface console, where she checked the pharmacological database for broad-spectrum antinausea agents that were compatible with Efrosian physiology. Selecting one, she retrieved the proper vial and a hypospray from one of sickbay’s equipment shelves and returned to her patient.
She touched it to the commander’s neck and released the drug into his system.
“Feeling better?” she asked after a moment.
He nodded tentatively, his long, shimmering white hair undulating with the motion like some undersea reef-creature as he sat up slowly on the biobed. “Thank you, Lieutenant. I’m most grateful.”
“Happy to help. You still need to see one of the doctors, though,” she cautioned. “I recommend doing it as soon as possible.”
Ra-Havreii nodded again, hand to abdomen as he breathed.
“I take it you don’t make it out of the lab very often,” Ogawa said.
Ra-Havreii seemed to hesitate before answering. “Not for several years. Nearly four decades of theoretical engineering for the Skunkworks seldom required that I leave Mars.”
“The Skunkworks?” Ogawa said, unable to keep the laugh out of her voice as she repeated the odd word.
“A nickname among us engineers for Utopia Planitia. Apparently it’s an homage to an organization with a similar function from Earth’s history.” Ra-Havreii’s elaborate eyebrows drew together. “I’m surprised you’re unfamiliar with the term.”
Ogawa smiled and shrugged. “I don’t think there’s any Terran who knows every obscure detail of our history. Surely not every Efrosian knows his own that well.”
That seemed to take the commander aback. “Forgive me, Lieutenant. I’m afraid I have a bad habit of imposing my own cultural norms on my associates. I meant no offense.”
“None taken,” Ogawa assured him. “But does that mean Efrosians generally do having a working knowledge of those kinds of details?”
“It’s culturally mandated,” Ra-Havreii revealed. “You may be aware that my world is in the final stages of a prolonged ice age. My people evolved in the forests of the temperate band straddling Efros Delta’s equator. Because of the difficult conditions there, our road to technological advancement was longer than it was for many other humanoid civilizations. As a result, we developed a highly structured and fiercely observed oral tradition to pass information from one generation to the next. Such practices are still observed, even though there is no longer a practical need for it.”
Ogawa was intrigued. “If you don’t mind my saying so, Doctor, it sounds like a very problematic and imprecise way to convey and preserve information.”
“You’d be surprised,” Ra-Havreii said with a soft laugh. “Abstract knowledge, after all, may be stored and communicated in any number of ways. Meaning is a different matter altogether. Our oral tradition has allowed us to preserve not only very ancient knowledge, but, where relevant, its emotional context. We’ve found that to be a powerful advantage when it comes to learning and, more