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There Will Be Scritches
There Will Be Scritches Pt.84

There Will Be Scritches Pt.84

---Suspicion---

---Zuzana’s perspective---

I’m in a ‘lift’ beside Yasmin.

So many of the strange design choices aboard the Pilecki make sense now that I see what a spaceship looks like when it’s working!

I always wondered why there were four places where empty shafts spanned every one of the floors… now I know they must have been lifts!

“I’ll walk you in but I won’t stay with you afterward. Your health is your business… plus I don’t want to stand next to Gato too long or you might think we’re married(!)” quips the beautiful woman, speaking such flawless Mazurski Polish that, if you didn’t look at her, you could believe she’d been born on Nowe Mazury… rather than setting foot there for the first time two weeks ago!

I give a chuckling sigh and say “I’m never going to live that down, am I… It’s very natural for a Mazurzy to assume that, when a man and a woman of similar age come to your door together, they are together! The only alternative would be that they’re siblings and I could see that you weren’t siblings!…”

She smiles “It was very sweet (if a little confusing) when you came to tell me you’d seen my ‘husband’ kissing another woman!… Jae and I will definitely put that in the chapter on Mazurzy marriage and dating customs!… Just to let all of the aid workers know that, if they stand too close to colleagues of the opposite sex, they will be mistaken for a couple(!)”

As the doors open and we step out, I say “My thinking wasn’t exactly the clearest in that moment… I think that Mazurzy not having a fit of fainting and nausea will probably be better at realising they shouldn’t make assumptions about the relationships between offworlders!”

“Noted.” smiles the woman who looks statuesque next to me, despite being short by comparison to her female colleagues!

We reach the room she was guiding me to and she leads the way inside.

“Gato! I have your three o’clock here.” smiles Yasmin.

“Acknowledged.” says the twelve fingered cat alien, his voice translated with a curt tone, over the rooms speakers.

Regardless of all his rudeness and shortness I can’t bring myself to do anything other than adore the man who I watched save my daughter's life, over the course of less than an hour!

He ‘decontaminated’ her of the ‘pathogen’, instantaneously, and then, with my permission, put her to sleep for the ‘regeneration’ of her lungs.

He explained to me that being sedated wasn’t necessary but, since she was so young, she probably wouldn’t understand what was happening if she was just shut in a tube which then began filling up with fluid!

He didn’t want her to damage the tube or hurt herself because she thought she was being drowned.

Honestly, it was a little hard for me not to think the worst when I saw her limp, little body floating in the blue liquid for so long… I had to keep reminding myself that this was necessary and infinitely preferable to the alternative!

Then, when she woke up… she was hale and healthy again… And, for that, this rude feline from another world has my undying gratitude!

Yasmin smiles goodbye as she leaves.

The Doctor slides a metal disc across the table without looking up from whatever he’s doing on his magic tablet and yowls something that the room translates as “Put this on.” sounding bored.

“Oh, is that… necessary, Doctor?” I ask, my words not being translated in a way that I can hear but being sent straight to his brain via the disc on his temple.

He turns his unimpressed face to me and gestures ceilingward with one of his six fingered paws and, in a deadpan drawl, responds “Unless you want to share your potentially sensitive medical issues with the sentient ship’s computer, yes… it’s necessary.”

I look upward, uncomfortably, and take the disc, pressing it to my head and fumbling to make it stick.

Gato sighs, stands and rounds his desk, activating the gadget which glues itself to my skin and connects with my mind in a way that makes me aware of its presence, even though it’s not actually doing anything, yet.

“Follow me to the examination room.” says the [gardenworlder], the thing at my temple layering his meaning over his yowling language.

He walks and I follow him to a small room with a desk and a very large bed, made of some kind of plasticky material.

There are two humanoid sized and shaped seats by the desk.

The doctor flips a switch that makes the room silent, takes one of the seats and swivels it to face the other, which he wordlessly gestures to.

I sit and he asks “Name?”

“Oh, we met before when you cured my daughter’s pneumonia, Dr Gato.”

Flatly, he answers “That is correct. However, that is the answer to the question ‘have we met before?’ You’ll note that the question I asked was ‘what is your name?’…”

I chuckle, despite his rudeness. I do need to remember that he has more than 250 or so brand new patients and we’re all the same species… I’ve only ever met one cat doctor(!)

“It’s Zuzana.”

His left forefinger moves over his tablet before he turns it to me and asks “Like this?”

“Just one ‘n’.” I smile.

He makes the correction and asks “No epithet? No last name?”

“None.” I answer.

“Age?”

“I’m… err… 29 in Earth years… can you…?”

He waves dismissively “The translators automatically convert between all catalogued measurements of time, length, area, volume, weight, mass, speed and force. I can understand [29 years]…” before continuing “…Are you currently experiencing any overt negative health indicators?”

The story has been taken without consent; if you see it on Amazon, report the incident.

“I’m sorry?”

“Do you believe you are, more or less, healthy?” he clarifies.

“Oh… yes… More or less…” I answer.

He looks at me in a way the thing on my temple tells me is somewhere between quizzical and suspicious as he asks “How ‘less’? What symptoms do you have?”

“Ooooh… well… it’s nothing really… I just… haven’t slept well these past few months…”

“[untranslatable term: ‘Insomnia’. Meaning.: habitual sleeplessness or inability to sleep.], a simple fix… You have the temporary holopad you were issued when you came aboard?”

I nod and take it out to show him.

“Then, if the scans confirm your [insomnia], I will prescribe you a sedative app. You’ll need to keep the translator to use it but that shouldn’t be an issue… so long as every refugee doesn’t suddenly develop [insomnia], we have enough to spare.”

“That would work like when you put my daughter to sleep?” I ask.

“It would not, no. That was anaesthesia. You were able to pick her up and she was able to inhale the regen fluid without it waking her… Anaesthesia is always somewhat risky to undergo and isn’t particularly restful either. This would be a sedative and would work by inducing your [untranslatable term: ‘neuronal’. Meaning.: relating to neurons, specialized cells transmitting nerve impulses.] activity to the likeness of a sleeping person. Unlike with anaesthesia, you would wake up if you experienced pain, a loud noise or other disturbing sensation.”

“So… it’s just, like… a magic sleep aid?”

His mouth twists as he answers “It’s not magic… but it is a sleep aid.”

“That… sounds amazing!”

“Alright then. Try not to be too open about having a translator. You’re liable to make the other refugees jealous and we don’t have enough for everyone… It will be very tiresome to have all of them suddenly claiming to be [insomniacs] to acquire translators!”

I smile “I’ll try to be discreet, Doctor.”

He flicks his tail, looks back to his [holopad] and continues “Are you currently pregnant, Zuzana?”

I falter “Why… err… why do you need to know that?”

He looks back up at me and answers “Because, if you are and I put you in a regen tube, you won’t be anymore. The regeneration process will treat the foetus as a foreign body and destroy it… I’m not particularly interested in being at the receiving end of a malpractice suit with an angry Terran mother on the other side so, I ask again, are you pregnant?”

I pause for a few moments before answering “…I am.”

“Do you know how long for?” he says, nonchalantly making notes on his [holopad].

“It can’t be less than 3 months… but I don’t think it will be much longer…”

“I’ll work out some nutritional guidance for your child’s proper development, later. Would you like to know the sex?” he says, casually.

“If… if it’s possible to check on the baby without knowing its sex… I’d prefer that.” I request.

“I’m afraid it’s not possible for me not to know the sex… but I don’t need to convey it to you.” he answers.

“That’s good… Yes please!”

“Is the father aboard? I could schedule an appointment at a later time if you want to have him present for a prenatal consultation.”

“My husband is… no longer with us.” I say, solemnly.

He takes a few seconds before he seems to realise what I mean and answers “Ah… my condolences.” his tone flat, despite the considerate nature of his words.

“Thank you, Doctor.” I smile back.

“I would refer you to one of the therapists we have aboard for grief counselling, if you wanted, but, given how soon we will make landfall on Citadel, I don’t know how much good it would do for you… You might be able to see someone in that capacity upon your return to your home planet.”

I begin to wonder whether this doctor’s terseness is actually because of a general distaste for people or whether, perhaps, he simply isn’t good at speaking without sounding impatient.

He’s been nothing but considerate in his words, if not his tone.

He continues “What was it that your husband died of? If it was something heritable, you might want to have your children screened for it.”

“He… he died on duty… the guard were hunting a zmora… it ambushed them…”

“Zuzana, I’m a doctor… not a trauma therapist. If he didn’t die of something that might pose a risk to your children’s health I don’t need to know more than that…” he says, flicking his tail in a way that the translator tells me indicates fear.

“Oh… I’m sorry, Doctor! I didn’t mean to scare you!”

He sighs “*Hhhh*…And there goes my professionalism!… Forgive me my loss of composure, Zuzana.”

I smile “It’s fine, Doctor! These things are just facts of life where I’m from, but I can see how they might be terrifying to anyone else…”

He puffs “Your species is something quite incredible, Zuzana. The conditions you tolerate as ‘facts of life’ put all others to shame!”

I smile and gesture around at the room “Doctor, we’re speaking via a machine that’s talking directly to my brain. We’re sat in a room, larger than my entire house, aboard a starship, travelling through space at thousands of times the speed of light! I haven’t had to work in weeks and am, nonetheless, eating and bathing better than I ever have!… In that room…” I gesture outside “…I watched you cure my daughter of a disease that the most learned man and woman in my entire community both pronounced to be a death sentence… like it was nothing!… From my position, you look like the incredible ones…”

The doctor gives another tail flick, this one flagged as being pleased, before saying “Alright, Zuzana… let’s get to the examination, shall we?”

---later---

He [diagnosed] me with symptoms of [insomnia] and chronic [malnutrition].

He sent the sleep aid [app] to my [holo] for the insomnia but said the malnutrition would be too hard to cure without [regen] and could only be improved by eating well, for the moment.

He also let me know that I had the capacity to grow a full 25cm taller than I am but that I would have to wait until the aid on Mazury included [gene] therapy if I wanted to reach that height.

I’m not sure how I would feel about being made more than a head taller!

But, as he brings his [holo] to my stomach, I wait with baited breath for what he might tell me about my baby.

“There is a heartbeat…” he says, not seeming to realise the joy those words give me “…conception is estimated to be around [16 weeks] ago… slightly underdeveloped but, otherwise, no obvious signs of any birth defects…”

“It’s healthy?” I ask, my heart in my throat.

“It’s healthy…” he confirms “…I’m going to send a dietary plan to your holopad… it will include a variety of fruit and vegetables along with lean meat and fish… Are you able to tolerate lactose?”

“Lactose?”

“Earth milk, cheese, cream etc.”

I shrug “I… don’t know… there were no cows on my planet…”

“Hmmm… you’re probably not then. Even if you have the genes for it, you would have needed some exposure for them to be active. No matter, I can prescribe you alternatives made from Terran nuts or gardenworld animals… they won’t be quite as nutritious but should present no issue to metabolisation… I can alert the cook to your circumstances, with your permission, and that will allow you to have separately made meals, optimally formulated for your prenatal health.”

“Oh, I don’t want to put Krish to any trouble…!” I say, thinking of the poor overworked cook.

“Don’t worry about him… he is more than happy to oblige people’s dietary needs. The only question is; do you want him to know?”

“I… err… I don’t mind him knowing… I probably won’t be able to keep it a secret much longer anyway.”

“Krish knows that, when he receives information from me, it isn’t the kind of thing he’s allowed to bandy about. You don’t have to worry about gossip, Zuzana…” says the doctor.

“Alright, then, please let him know for me.” I smile.

“Will there be… any issue with social stigma, when you return to your homeworld, Zuzana?… I know that, with a species as social as yours, the consequences of ostracisation can be quite dire, both for mental and physical health…” he asks, his tail indicating hesitation.

“Oh… a little… It’s not so much that people will think I’m immoral for being a single mother… but I have just had those looks of pity over being a widow with two (now three) children to raise… I was constantly having to turn down oblique proposals from Ratimyr, the man in the cells downstairs… He said I should let him 'take care of me'… I’ve always known he was attracted to me but… even if he’d had a pleasant personality, it just would’ve felt too much like marrying my uncle!”

At this, the feline doctor stops writing to look up at me, pulling an expression which is his equivalent of a frown “Wasn’t… the man downstairs… the Guardcaptain?”

“He was…” I respond.

“And your husband was a guard?”

“He was…” I frown.

“Was he… with your husband when he died? This man who’s always been attracted to you?”

“He… was…”

“You don’t find that… suspicious?”