The Dolphins of Altair

Chapter 14

The contractions of the synthi-womb had begun. My patient, Sven Erickson, was dimly visible through its clouded plastic walls, lying curled up naked in the fetal position. His respiration, somewhat depressed by drugs, was cared for by an oxygen-poor mixture of oxygen, nitrogen and carbon dioxide, and an array of tubes and pumps handled the excretory and nutritive phases of his metabolism. He had been in the synthi-womb for almost two weeks now. It was time for him to be born.

I didn’t know too much about Erickson’s history. I had heard that he had been picked up on one of the Farallons, in the company of a group of spies and saboteurs, and had been brought to headquarters for questioning. They had interrogated him for several days under the influence of sodium pentathol, but his answers had been so contradictory and confused that it had been decided to attempt a more fundamental treatment. At this point he had been handed over to me, and I was now at my usual job of monitoring the process of artificial birth.

It had been found that a preliminary processing by drugs, followed by a simulation of human fetal growth and birth, was extraordinarily effective in making possible a radical change of personality in patients subjected to it. People who had been through it were like young babies, but young babies who were exceptionally apt and teachable. They learned to walk in ten days, they learned to talk in two weeks. And they could be made into whatever the processes wanted, broadly speaking. I suppose, though I don’t know for certain, that my superiors were going to condition Erickson to act as a spy, a perfectly docile and committed spy, on the faction with which he had been connected formerly.

I looked at the gauges. Erickson’s pulse, respiration and temperature were normal for the stage of intrauterine development he was currently at. The contractions were coming about every twenty minutes. It was time to step them up a bit.

My hand went out to the dial that controlled the frequency of the synthi-womb’s contractions. And somehow—I don’t understand what happened, even now—my fingers turned the valve that determined the oxygen-content of the air my patient was breathing as he floated in the simulated amniotic fluid. It was as if some other will than my own had taken charge of my hand.

Oh, dear. This would never do. Too much oxygen at this stage would make Erickson restless and promote premature cerebral activity. He wasn’t sup posed to have any real consciousness of his surroundings until after he had been born.

Hastily I turned the valve back to normal, but I felt shaken. Slowly and carefully I reached out to the contraction dial and moved it forward. The frequency of the con tractions increased.

I drew a deep breath. Perhaps it was going to be all right. After all, the events of a simulated labor, like those of a real one, cannot be perfectly standardized.

I have heard physicians argue that simulated gestation and delivery are effective with patients subjected to them, for purely symbolic reasons. I don’t think this is true. The patient actually relives, though in a much shorter space of time, the original events of intrauterine life, and when he is born, he is literally reborn.

I looked critically at Erickson. His head was beginning to come down forcefully against the big dilatable plastic cervix. The impact was carefully cushioned, of course—his was not the relatively compressible skull of an infant, and I had no desire to cause damage to Erickson’s brain.

Suddenly he began to move his arms strongly and kick out with his legs. The plastic womb rocked from side to side with the violence of his struggles. The extra oxygen must have made him restless. But if he kept on like this, he’d either rupture the tough material of the synthi-womb, or break an arm or leg.

Hurriedly I touched the jet that would let a little nitrous oxide into my patient’s air supply. The anesthetic was almost immediately effective. Erickson’s threshing ceased, his limbs relaxed, and he lay quietly in the fetal position again.

The simulated labor continued. The contractions of the synthi-womb were much more frequent and forcible now. Dr. Aidans, my superior, came in to check Erickson’s condition, and left the laboratory again. It was time for the second stage of labor to begin.

Carefully I removed the complex of tubes and pumps that had handled my patient’s nutrition and excretion. I put out my hand to touch the lever that would release the amniotic fluid from the plastic womb, thus simulating the traditional “breaking of the waters,” and then drew it back. I’d better check Erickson’s pulse, blood pressure and body temperature first. Yes, it was all in order. Once more I extended my hand.

My hand went to the contraction dial and turned it to maximum. I hadn’t touched the lever I meant to touch.

How had it happened? What had made me do that? I had no time to speculate on causation. The synthi-womb, activated to maximum, gave a tremendous grinding contraction, and Erickson was propelled rapidly through it onto the receiving area. He was born.

I was trembling. But it might still be all right. The last part of a genuine labor is sometimes very abrupt. I moved shakily toward where he was lying, like a new-born child, to give him the symbolic slap on the buttocks that should start his extrauterine respiration.

I was never more dismayed and disconcerted in my life than when my patient sat up in the receiving area and spoke to me.

“Where am I?” he demanded in a normal adult voice. “What’s been happening?”

I had no answer to make. Obviously the simulated gestation and labor had been completely ineffective with him; it seemed incredible. The days of preprocessing, the weeks in the synthi-womb—all entirely without result? Where had he got the strength to remain so perfectly his former self?

Erickson swung his legs off the receiving area and stood up. I was still staring at him, immobilized with dismay. He drew his fist back, and I saw he was going to hit me between the eyes. Only at the last moment did I have sense enough to try to dodge.

When I came to, I was lying on the lab floor, naked as a jay bird, and tied up with yards and yards of gauze bandages. Obviously, Erickson had taken my clothes and departed. But it was not until long afterward that I learned what finally happened to him.