Fortunately there was an ante-room. While the patient was being prepared for surgery, Marcellus almost dragged his employer into it and slammed the door behind him.
He could hardly believe what he'd seen. His stomach was churning with nausea and rage. Human beings, filthy and mad, held in cages so small they couldn't even stand upright; clad in stinking furs and rags of cloth, and treated with less compassion than you'd show to a rabid dog!
"Now you're going to tell me what the hell is going on here," he hissed. "If you want me to treat those poor people, I have to know what's happened to them. I have to have access to their medical files. And I mean all of them!"
Harris leaned back against a cabinet on the wall and surveyed him. "You'll have their medical files by all means," he drawled. "There will be blanks. That's because we know what happened to them, but we don't know how it happened. We've learned how to counteract it, though I'll admit it's a bit of a hit and miss process so far. I'm hoping you'll have the expertise to refine it. Maybe even shorten the recovery time."
The doctor glared at him. "These people are probably beyond help, and you're worrying about the recovery time?"
The other man folded his arms, in the manner of one who refuses to be baited. "Allow me to know a little of what I'm talking about, Doctor. They're not beyond help by any means. What you're seeing is the result of trauma – they were stranded on a planet whose atmosphere contains some kind of compound that affects the human brain. Effectively, anyone who breathes it becomes open to suggestion. After a while, their sense of identity breaks down. They don't simply adapt to their surroundings, they become part of their surroundings. And these two were adopted by a species of carnivore native to the planet. Hence, they now truly believe they are carnivores.
"At this stage, they don't understand spoken English. They don't even recognize the fact that they're human. The compound in question breaks down fairly quickly when it's no longer being inhaled, but after a while the change locks psychologically for some reason we don't fully understand. What we have to do – what you have to do – is to break down whatever barrier it is in their brains that stops them remembering who they are.
"Like I told you, we've had some successes. We know more or less what helps. But it's a process that could do with refining. Quicker for us, easier for them." He shrugged. "I told you the job was humanitarian."
"You–! You've done this to them deliberately?" Marcellus paused with held breath, sure that the denial would come, but Harris merely looked at him. "What in the name of – why?"
"You're not a fool, Doctor, so I won't treat you like one." The voice was cold. "It may help you to understand exactly what you're dealing with. The people who go through this are volunteers. They know they're going to be subjected to specialist training and that it will be dangerous; that they may not even survive. But if they do survive, they'll have mental attitudes that very few humans have – and best of all, they're natural killers."
Marcellus felt as though even his lips were stiff. "'Attitudes'?" he asked, after a moment.
"Obedience," Harris said with a chill smile. "Unthinking obedience. For the rest of their natural lives, they'll instinctively obey orders. We say kill, they kill. They don't think. They just kill. Afterwards, maybe, they think; that's their problem. They deal with it. But the job's done."
"You're turning people into assassins." He was frozen with horror and loathing.
"Ugly, isn't it?" Harris moved closer, until their faces were almost touching. "But under the nice, shiny, pretty surface of what most of humanity thinks is 'life', there's a whole lot of other things going on. And some of those things involve ugly people willing to do ugly things, just to keep everything up there nice and shiny and pretty for everyone else. Because we've got enemies, Doctor, and our enemies are willing to do ugly things, and if we take the moral high ground the only ground we'll end up left with is the ground they'll bury us in. So you'll have to forgive me not particularly caring if you think I'm a moral degenerate. I do what I have to. So will they. And if you refuse to help us then I'll get someone who will, and maybe they won't care as much as you do, but one way or another I'll get the job done.
"So I suggest you have a think about it. Because I haven't–"
At that moment there was a tap on the door.
"The patient's ready, sirs," said a timid voice on the other side.
"With you in a minute!" called Marcellus.
"Better go out there and get scrubbed up, Doctor. I think you'll have your work cut out, repairing that arm."
The smirk made him want to obliterate it with his fist, but he knew he'd heard a horrible truth: if he didn't help they'd find someone who would. And maybe it would be someone who didn't care all that much.
"I'm going to do my job. I'm going to do it to the best of my damned ability," he said through clenched teeth. In all honesty he was somewhat apprehensive about the surgery part of it, having seen the injury, but he could at least open up the arm and see what the internal damage was, and maybe make a start on what needed to be done. After that, he'd read up thoroughly and if necessary get specialist advice before he started on the real repair work, which would probably take some time. Left untreated, the injury would result in a permanently deformed wrist liable to traumatic arthritis, leaving the man in constant pain for the rest of his life. The thought of this made him add, in a fury, "And at least one of us will give an honest damn about those poor people out there!"
"Oh, I give a damn all right. After what it costs to process them, I want them to recover as much as you do. So in that respect we're on the same side."
Marcellus didn't reply. He didn't trust himself enough.
After a moment he thrust the door open. The young man beyond it was already in surgical blues, and gestured nervously to the door through which they'd entered earlier. Presumably there was an operating theater nearby.
The young woman was grinding her face against the bars. She'd stopped howling, but now she was keening piteously. As soon as she saw him looking at her, however, she backed up, snarling.
Well. He had some ideas already. Some of them would have to wait awhile – it seemed he had a whole load of reading up to do, though he resolved darkly that he'd find some way to make these poor creatures' lives less of a misery in the meantime.
With this in mind, he turned for one more time towards Harris.
"I'll do it – on one condition."
The eyebrows rose, but he said nothing, simply waited.
The doctor pointed at the cages. "If I'm in charge of this project, I want full control. I want something, I get it. Nobody, up to and including you and anyone else involved, is allowed access to them without my say-so. Nobody does anything, nobody says anything, nobody gives anything to them without my express authorization. And if I find out anybody has broken this arrangement, the deal's off."
Harris studied him for a long moment. Finally, he nodded.
"I suppose that's fair. But I'll expect you to be just as fair with me. You'll send me full and honest reports whenever I ask for them. In the meantime, I'll arrange for you to be excused your usual duties whenever you need. Your people already know you'll be required elsewhere sometimes; they won't ask questions."
Marcellus nodded too, the muscles in his stomach unclenching slightly. He squashed the urge to express gratitude; he'd asked for no more than was his due if he was supposed to be in charge of this unbelievable set-up. Now, however, he had to take the first step in putting right the terrible wrong that had been done to another human being. However many steps would follow, he wasn't quitting till he'd done what he'd been brought here to do.
And maybe, if he could contrive it, even a little bit more.
All reviews received with gratitude!