“That’s what the chromosome scan says,” Hali agreed. “But the odds were even that you could guess right. Your guess doesn’t impress me.”

“No more than your faith healing.”

Waela stood up slowly and felt the baby adjust to this new position.

“Unborn infants have been known to compensate for deficiencies in the mother,” Hali said, “but I’m not selling faith healing.”

“But you said . . .”

“I say a lot of things.” She patted her pribox case. “We’ve set up a special exercise cubby down in P-T. You have to keep up your body tone even if . . .”

“If you’re right, this baby will be born in a matter of diurns. What can I do to . . .”

“Just get down to P-T, Waela.”

Hali slipped back out through the hatch before Waela could raise more objections. That was an alert and intelligent woman in there. Waela knew how to search records, and her curiosity would not be dampened by inadequate answers. Now, what do we do?

Hali turned at the crèche hatch and saw one of the children staring out at her from the open bubble of the play area. Hali knew the child, Raul Andrit, age five. She had treated him for nightmares. She bent toward him. “Hi. Remember me?”

Raul turned his face up to her, wan and listless. Before he could answer, he fell out of the bubble into the passage.

Setting her alarm signal on call, Hali turned the child onto his back and attached the pribox. The emergency readout buzzed and, for the first time, Hali doubted a computer diagnosis. In the snarl of facts blurring past her eyes she read: fatigue . . . exhaustion . . . 10.2 . . .

“Yes?” The voice of a responding medic was thin in her pribox speaker. She briefed him and set the boy up for a glucose and vitamin series from her emergency packet.

“I’ll send a cart.” The speaker blipped as the medic broke the connection.

Hali put a question to her computer: “Raul Andrit: age?”

The screen flashed 5.5.

“What is the age of the subject just tested?”

10.2.

Her fingers scurried across the keys: “The last subject tested was Raul Andrit. How could he be 5.5 and 10.2?”

He has lived 5.5 standard annos. His body exhibits the characteristic intracellular structures of one who is 10.2. For medical purposes, cellular age is the more important.

Hali sat back on her heels and stared down at the unconscious child—dark circles under his eyes, pale skin. His chest appeared too thin and it heaved convulsively when he breathed. What the computer had just told her was that this little boy had doubled his age in a matter of diurns. She heard the cart pull up, a young attendant with it.

“Get this child to sickbay. Notify his Natali sponsor and continue treatment for fatigue,” she said. “I’ll be along shortly.”