tatement--

The following will also clarify my attached request that the GSS
_Mercy_, upon arrival in orbit around Hospital Earth, be met immediately
by a decontamination ship carrying a vat of hydrochloric acid,
concentration 3.7%, measuring no less than twenty by thirty by fifty
feet, and that Quarantine officials be prepared to place the entire crew
of the _Mercy_ under physical and psychiatric observation for a period
of no less than six weeks upon disembarkation.

The facts, in brief, are as follows:

Three months ago, as crew of the General Practice Patrol Ship _Lancet_,
my colleague Green Doctor Wallace Stone and myself began investigating
certain peculiar conditions existing on the fourth planet of Mauki,
Vorochislov Sector (Class I Medical Service Contract.) The entire
population of that planet was found to be suffering from a mass
psychotic delusion of rather spectacular proportions: namely, that they
and their entire planet were in imminent danger of being devoured, in
toto, by an indestructible non-humanoid creature which they called a
_hlorg_. The Maukivi were insistent that a _hlorg_ had already totally
consumed a non-existent outer planet in their system, and was now hard
at work on neighboring Mauki V. It was their morbid fear that Mauki IV
was next on its list. No amount of reassurance could convince them of
the foolishness of these fears, although we exhausted our energy, our
patience, and our food and medical supplies in the effort. Ultimately we
referred the matter to the Grey Service, feeling confident that it was a
psychiatric problem rather than medical or surgical. We applied to the
GSS _Mercy_ to take us aboard to replenish our ship's supplies, and
provide us a much-needed recovery period. The Black Doctor in command
approved our request and brought us aboard.

The trouble began two days later....

* * * * *

There were three classes of dirty words in use by the men who travelled
the spaceways back and forth from Hospital Earth.

There were the words you seldom used in public, but which were colorful
and descriptive in private use.

Then there were the words which you seldom used even in private, but
which effectively relieved feelings when directed at mirrors, inanimate
objects, and people who had just left the room.

Finally, there were the words that you just didn't use, period. You knew
they existed; you'd heard them used at one time or another, but t