Manta's Gift

"Take it easy," the German said.

"Take it easy?" Raimey snarled. "What the hell are you doing? You said the Qanska aren't even here yet!"

"We thought they were," Faraday said. "We saw a group of them swimming upward in your direction—"

"You jumped the gun!" Raimey cut him off. His body—his helpless, paralyzed body—was being disintegrated all around him. "Damn you, anyway."

"Mr. Raimey, pull yourself together," the German said. "I mean—"

"Oh, that's fu

"He didn't mean it that way," Faraday said. "Look, there's a good wide timing margin built into the operation—"

"What operation?" Raimey countered. The tingling was getting stronger, and he could visualize his skin vaporizing away, layer by layer. Next would be his muscles, then his organs, then his bones—

"There they are!" another voice shouted suddenly. "Twenty-two by fourteen. Coming up fast."

"Maneuvering to intercept," someone else said.

"You hear that?" Faraday called. "They're here. It's going to be all right."

The pitch and direction of the noise outside changed as the pod shifted direction.

And as it did so, the tingling sensation faded away. Was his skin all gone? "Hurry," Raimey pleaded.

His voice sounded strange. Was his larynx going, too? "Please. Hurry."

"Deploying remote surgical pod," another voice called.

"Intercepting," the first voice said. "Birth canal insertion..."

There was a sudden thump, a fresh sensation of pressure, and the sound of the wind faded away.

"You're in," Faraday said. "It won't be long now."

"It's too late," Raimey called, his voice a bare whisper now. The last gasp of a dissolving throat.

"Mr. Raimey, hang on," the German insisted.

"Go to hell," Raimey murmured. "All of you, go to hell."

He closed his eyes, and the universe went black.

THREE

There was an odd buzzing in the back of his brain as Raimey drifted back toward consciousness. An odd buzzing, and an even odder sensation tingling through his arms and legs.

It was another minute, and a couple more levels up toward fully awake, before it occurred to him that he hadn't felt anything in those limbs for the past eight months.

He tried to blink his eyes open. He couldn't tell if it worked. His eyes felt fu

And open or closed, there was nothing to see but darkness. Had he gone blind? "Hello?" he called tentatively.

There was a slight pause. The buzzing sound in his head cut off, to be replaced by a softer humming.

The hum cut off in turn—"Mr. Raimey?" an unfamiliar voice said. "Oh, wow. Hang on—just a second."

The humming came back. Idly, Raimey started counting off the seconds, trying to keep track of them on his fingers. Strangely, though, he didn't seem to have any fingers. Trying to blink his eyes again—he still couldn't see anything—he gave up on the count and instead tried to take inventory of his situation.

There was precious little for him to work with. He could still feel the pressure of the capsule around him, and there was a deep rumbling sound that seemed to come from nowhere in particular. Aside from that, there was only that sensation of having arms and legs again.

Phantom limb syndrome, perhaps? But that would mean that the limbs were actually gone. He'd only been unconscious for a few minutes; surely the destruction of his body couldn't be that far along already.

Unless that was also why he couldn't see anything. Maybe his eyes were gone, too.

A disembodied brain, floating in a tangle of nutrient pipes. It was like something from a bad medical drama.

Only it was reality. His reality.

What in the world was he doing?

The hum vanished again. "Mr. Raimey, this is Colonel Faraday," a voice said. It didn't sound very much like Faraday. Or at least not the way he'd sounded when Raimey had had ears. Were his ears gone too? "How do you feel?"

"Well, nothing hurts, anyway," Raimey said. "That's one hell of an anesthetic you're using. Are we going to get on with this soon?"

Faraday cleared his throat. "Actually, it's all over."

Raimey tried to blink his sightless eyes. "That's impossible," he protested. "I can still feel the capsule. There's pressure all around me."

"What you feel is the womb of your Qanskan mother," Faraday said. "Is the pressure more or less uniform around you? Are there any gaps, or places where it feels stronger?"

Raimey concentrated on the sensation. "Neither, I don't think," he said. "It all seems pretty even."

"Good," Faraday said. "That means the co

"What vision?" Raimey said tightly. "I can't see anyth—oh."

"That's because you're still inside—"

"Yeah, yeah, I got it," Raimey said crossly, feeling stupid. "How did the operation go, anyway?"

"As far as everyone could tell from here, it went fine," Faraday said. "The remotes worked perfectly, and all the relevant Qanskan physiology was where the surgeons expected it to be. Of course, there's no way to know how they did on the motor-nerve co

Raimey tried flexing his muscles. "Well, for what it's worth, it feels like I can move my arms and legs. Though I guess I can't call them that anymore, can I?"

"The proper terms are fins and tails," Faraday said. "Fortunately, with the Qanska swallow-type split tail you at least get two legs' worth of movement and feeling. That should be easier to adjust to than a single, fish-type tail would have been."

"I guess we'll find out." Raimey said. "The rest of me feels okay, I guess. How long did the operation take, anyway? I thought it was supposed to last a whole bunch of hours."

"Try seventy-three of them," Faraday said. "We started with the surgeons working in three-hour shifts, then backed it off to two."

"Seventy-three hours?" Raimey echoed. He would have sworn he'd only been unconscious a few minutes. "I was out for three days?"

"Six, actually," Faraday said. "You slept another three after it was over."

A sudden ripple of heightened pressure ran along Raimey's body, starting at his feet—his tails, rather—and moving up past his head. "Sounds impressive," he commented. "Kind of sorry I missed it."

"You may eventually end up being the only person in the Solar System who did," Faraday said dryly. "I understand that The Stars Our Destination Society and the Solar Medical Association are having a bidding war for rights to the video."

"Great," Raimey said. "Maybe you can put a TV and permchip player on a rope and lower them down to me. Once I've got eyes again, that is."

He frowned as a sudden thought struck him. "Wait a second. If I don't have a human larynx anymore, how am I talking to you?"

"You're subvocalizing," Faraday said, sounding puzzled. "We've got a throatless mike wired into your speech center, with a co

Another wave of pressure ran up along Raimey's body. "I guess I missed that lesson," he said.

"What's this Qanska been eating, anyway? Chili and beans?"

"What do you mean?"

"I mean I'm getting waves of pressure," Raimey told him. "Like she's passing gas or something."

"Sounds like it's time," a woman's voice said faintly in the background.

"Time for what?" Raimey demanded.

"What do you mean, time for what?" Faraday said. "Time for you to be born."

"She's started moving upward," Milligan reported, peering at the sensor displays. "We've got a couple of Nurturers standing by in case she needs help."