Page 15 of Kiss of Fury

Verity shook her head. “I don’t understand what happened.”

“Polypis reproduce asexually by fission. When they wish to have a child, they detach a limb. Their limb regenerates, and the severed arm grows into another polypus.” Dr. Twygg grinned. “The couple have five other children—all accidents. Four are adults now. One is still a child. Now they’ll have two at home.”

She remembered the tentacled alien in the schoolroom. “Is their other child named Bob?”

“Yes, I think he is.”

“I assume both sexes can reproduce? They get a male if they use one of George’s arms, and a female if they use Willa’s?” She hoped she wasn’t being too nosy but rationalized her curiosity in the name of science. A nurse should understand the anatomy and physiology of the patients she might treat.

“Polypi don’t have genders. Or you could say they only have one. Despite their names, Willa is no more female than George is male.”

“Why Earth names?”

He shrugged. “They like them. Many people here use an assumed name.”

The idea had never occurred to her. “Is that necessary? I thought we were safe here. Untouchable.”

“You are.” He patted her shoulder. “It’s a matter of choice. Fresh start, new name.”

She exhaled a sigh of relief.

The robo wheeled over to sterilize the exam table.

“Let me give you a tour and an orientation while it’s quiet.” He stepped away from the table so the robo could work. “The other exam room is identical to this one. Both rooms have the same medical equipment.”He pointed out a diagnostic scanner, a bone knitter, and various monitors, and gave her a brief rundown on how they worked.

I hope I can remember all of this.

The clinic was larger than it appeared from the outside. Besides the two exam rooms, the clinic housed an operating suite with the latest robotic surgery tools, a recovery room, a sick bay with six beds, and an isolation chamber.

“Just one?” she asked about the latter.

“We use that for patients who insist on a private room. Fortunately, we’ve never had to deal with a communicable contagion requiring quarantine. If a widespread outbreak occurred, we would have to confine the patients to quarters.”

A small closet held miscellaneous medical supplies as well as a locked cabinet for drugs. Dr. Twygg had her peer into the viewer as he keyed in a code. “From now on, to get a drug, look into the viewer, and the cabinet will open.”

“If you have any questions, don’t hesitate to ask. For a while, I’ll have you observe then learn by doing. Eventually, you’ll be triaging the patients, treating minor incidents yourself, and assisting me with the more complicated cases.”

“Other than impalement and severed limbs, what kinds of cases do you usually get?”

His chuckle sounded like a sawing noise. “Fortunately, those are rare. We see fractures, allergic reactions, infections, a few chronic conditions, and frostbite during the winter. The most common problem is an adverse reaction to food, either an allergic response or poisoning. Foods safe and nutritious for one species can be lethal to another.”

Oh my god! I didn’t think of that!She’d given no thought to the meals, letting Brody eat dinner and breakfast—insisting he eat. Why didn’t she taste-test it first? She could have poisoned her own son. “The food in the mess hall—”

“Is perfectly safe. Your species is coded to your pay card. They only serve what you can safely digest. Humanoids get one meal.Insectilesget another, etc.”

“Where are people getting the bad food, then?”

“They buy it. You can purchase groceries at the mercantile. Either they don’t know what they’re buying, or they’re adventurous and insist on trying alien cuisines. Maven keeps watch and steers them away from harmful foods, but she can’t monitor everything, and we don’t know how every single substance will affect every being.”

They left the supply room. She liked Dr. Twygg’s unassuming manner and the respect he afforded her. The amount she had to learn was still daunting, but, once she got the hang of it, she would enjoy her job.

“Thank you again for letting me have the time off to take my son to lunch and to get married.”

“I’m happy to do it. I can manage alone for a few hours. How old is your son?”

“Six.”

“Little, then.”

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