Med Service

A small medical courier darts through the void at thirty times light speed, its lone crew a pragmatic human officer and a whiskered tormal named Murgatroyd, whose curious habits echo a parrot’s mimicry. In the cramped cabin they pass the endless silence with a philosophical treatise on probability, the ticking of a recorded countdown, and the sudden jolt of exiting overdrive that flings them into a bright, distant star system.

Their destination is Maris III, a fledgling colony on the third planet of a remote sun, where a freshly‑established settlement is expected to be just past the threshold of self‑sufficiency. Calhoun’s official charge is a routine planetary‑health inspection: broadcast the latest medical advances, verify sanitary standards, and perhaps learn of a local innovation. Yet the calm of bureaucracy masks the subtle tension of venturing into an alien world where even the most ordinary procedure might uncover something unexpected.