| From: | "Paul J. Adam" <shadowtk@********.DEMON.CO.UK> |
|---|---|
| Subject: | Hospital News |
| Date: | Sun, 26 Apr 1998 00:39:37 +0100 |
>>>>>[TO: D J H Coppinger, Director
Well, this is from the cyberstudio or whatever it is they call it at
Bethesda. Your potential recruit's going to be out of action for a
month, maybe six weeks, and you'd better have deep pockets to finance
the repair. Few mill minimum.
And I still don't think he'll fill Lynch's shoes.
+++++begin trideo
An operating theatre, brightly lit, the camera glaring down from the
ceiling. Two surgeons, armed with probes and inductors rather than
scalpels, stand over a face-down patient only visible through gaps in
the sterile field: even that small exposure shows raw, fresh and
recently-sutured wounds.
"This one's kind of chewed on, Bob."
"Don't you watch the news? This is the guy from Austin. Some Navy puke."
"Navy puke? That makes him intel. SEAL, probably." The female surgeon
lifts the green cloth, examines an arm. "Uck. What happened to his
hand?"
"Mine clearance, the hard way." The male doctor begins attaching
electrodes along the man's spine. "Little red seal there?"
"Yeah. And a neat cleanup job. For once we get a guy who won't die on
the table while we argue about his hardware." The woman carefully
inserts a diagnostic jack into the socket behind the man's ear, brushing
aside the short dark-blonde hair, and studies the readouts. "You would
hardly believe what he's got in his head..."
"Good kit? Lots of comms and forward-observer gear? Show me a SpecOps
dude without it these days."
"Good even for a SEAL. Still, you don't send less than the best into
Aztlan." The woman shrugs. "I'm getting problems from the cerebellum
hookups -"
"Not surprising, his spine's half corkscrewed. If he didn't have lacing
he'd be dead. As it is, he's gonna need some drastic work if Upstairs
want him to walk again..."
"Frag. Well, that explains the problems. Cerebral linkages are fine,
everything in his head works great. His wires aren't talking to the rest
of his body, though." The woman probes the man's systems in more detail,
nods. "Nope, no damage inside his skull."
"Check. That makes my job a lot easier. Okay, old wires, and he's got
some lesions in there along the tracts, that's part of the problem. When
did they go in, Janey?"
"Back in forty-eight, by the file. Updated a couple of times since..."
"Not a particularly good fitting job, I know carpenters who could have
done better. The spinal injury's not too serious, it's the wires that
got fragged..." The male surgeon inserts a hair-fine probe, examining a
fluoroscope to guide it into the interface module, and runs a test
program: for a few minutes the two doctors watch various parts of their
patient twist, move and flex to order. Too often, they wait for a
response that doesn't come. "Okay, short version, they're wrecked. We
could maybe pull them, clean up the lesions and put him back on his feet
with a move-by, that takes care of that. Faster, slicker and better than
ever before. We really ought to fit him for a new arm, too, unless he
wants to pick his nose with a crochet hook. Elbow or shoulder?" the man
asks cheerfully, pulling the field back to examine the stump of the
limb.
"Nice tidy-up by the trauma boys. If we hustle, we can use what they
left us, no need to trim any more. What's our budget?"
"Let's see." The man checks a terminal, a sterile cover over the
touchscreen, and sounds impressed. "Someone's in a hurry. Blank cheque
job. They want him back on his feet, kitted for intel work, PDQ, damn
the cost."
"Intel work, huh? Any suggestions?"
"Keep the arm natural. Nothing fancy, just a smartlink and maybe some
blades. I don't know, could we fit some firepower in there for him?"
"He might thank us later." the woman allows. "He's got everything for
the smartlink down to the stump, let's see what we can get in there that
might be useful. When are we going to do this?"
"Arm we can do right away, got everything I need in stores. The reflex
job... I think we wait a few days. Let him get over the worst of this
lot -" Bob gestures at the marks of surgery to repair the man's many
wounds - "before we start grubbing up his nervous system. Besides, he'd
be best off with a custom job, and it needs tuning to him. Once it's
coded and prepped, we go for it."
"Sounds like a plan." the female doctor agrees. "What, four hours to
prep the arm?"
"Three. The kit's all modular, and we're not doing anything fancy. Get
him into Implants and Prosthetics for... sixteen hundred."
+++++end trideo]<<<<<
-- SSgt J S Karlsbruhn <Sergeant:Peppers:Lonely/Hearts-Club-Band>
Strategic Intelligence Gathering Agency
