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Chapter 19: The Clinic
Chapter 19: The Clinic
Chapter 19: The Clinic
“Wake up!”
I opened my eyes to the words everyone definitely wanted to hear first thing in the morning.
I don’t think I could ever be a morning riser. Especially when I stayed up late the previous night, setting up the various rooms with the proper equipment and surgical tables.
Hounded by Claire, who dragged me downstairs for breakfast, I was then forced to help her direct the delivery of the new furniture along with Thorne, who looked far more energetic than me.
Good thing we already knew where to place the larger pieces as they were made to order. The only pieces of furniture we had to move around were mostly armchairs and small sofas for the lobby and the break room.
By the time we finished furnishing the place, it was well past lunchtime. Seeing how we planned to start business hours at 3:00 PM today, we ordered delivery and splurged a little to celebrate.
While we waited, we paced around the first floor, making sure everything was in order. It was frankly cute to see how they were so nervous, considering this was my company, and not theirs.
When the time came, we didn’t do anything special. As an unlicensed clinic, I would not have any signs outside or grand opening florals. That was why we had instead focused on word-of-mouth marketing, spreading the word amongst mercenaries.
Returning to the operating room one, I closed my eyes and started reviewing steps on how to go about a few common procedures. I don’t think any other cybernetic professional had experienced what I was feeling right now, having all the knowledge of what to do in my head but having absolutely zero hands-on experience.
Once I had my fill of practice, I made my way to where Thorne was. He was in the security room where he monitored all the cameras we had monitoring the inside and outside of the building, and the controls to the turrets I had installed all over the premises.They were surprisingly cheaper than what I had expected and had a pretty advanced targeting system. It could identify threats and retaliate automatically against hostile actions that included pointing guns at people who were in its system. Though as a programmed system, it wasn’t perfect, so they recommended having someone manning the controls.
Tapping my security card, I entered the cool room filled with screens, “Everything all right in here?”
“Yes, Sir— Rollo.”
I smirked at him as he fumbled his words; I had been trying to get him to be more casual with me, but he always reverted to sir, especially when we were in the heat of it.
Looking at the screen, I watched the cameras pointed outside toward the parking lot and the one showing the lobby. I could see Claire sitting at the reception counter behind a glass panel. It didn’t have to be said it was bulletproof because it was actually harder to find non-bulletproof glass in this city, apparently. What a world I lived in…
“So, how’s it going with your training classes?”
“...A lot of the same drills over and over again, but I’m hanging on, can’t complain when I’m only there in the mornings a few times a week.”
“Well, keep it up…Were you planning on moving out like Claire as well?”
“Hmm… I think—There’s someone approaching, sir.”
The screen displayed three guys walking toward the front of the building. Once they got closer, it wasn’t hard for both of us to recognize one of the people on screen, especially when he carried his signature sniper rifle. I buzzed them in through the front door and made my way out to greet them.
As I came upon a corner of the hallway, I noted the turret mounted on the ceiling jerking around, tracking its targets.
Hmm… I should definitely tune up on the settings. It wasn’t very welcoming, to say the least…
Going down the hallway, I found the three men standing in front of Claire’s counter.
“---seeing you again.”
“Yeah, you too, and look at who we have here. If it isn’t Dr. Halls!” The man said with a wide grin as he turned in my direction.
“Hey, thank you for showing up. You can call me Rollo. Are these your friends here?” I glanced over at the two men beside Max. Now that I got a closer look, I could see that their arms were all prosthetics from the sliver of exposed alloys between their gloves and sleeves.
“That’s Rick and Will. They’re my buddies back from when we fought down in Texas.”
The two nodded at me and eyed me up before one of them spoke up, “You the Chrome Doc we can trust?”
“I respect all my clients’ privacy. If that doesn’t assure you, I was hoping you could give me a chance to earn your trust. I wouldn’t want to let down Max or any of his friends.”
“Okay, that’s what we’re here for. We’re looking to get a checkup that’s been long overdue. We don’t trust any of the corpo scums this island is infested with and we haven’t had a chance to go back to NNA for a while now.”
“Sounds good. Follow me, let’s see what we can do for you.” I led them into the closest room and prepared for the check-up.
This will be a good warmup.
“Your synaptic nerve connectors are ancient and require a replacement. That’s why you’re feeling the disconnect with your arm. Other than that, the internal of the arm just needs some cleaning done. Though, you can get a much better-performing model at a decent price range nowadays. If you want, I can—” I explained as I brought the terminal over to him to illustrate what I was talking about.
“No thank you, Doc. I’m used to this old arm and will stick with it until it breaks. Just fix what you can within my budget of two thousand credits.”
“Understood. The nerve connectors are common enough, it is well within your budget.”
I pushed the terminal off to the side and went to grab the parts. His arm was still disassembled on the table beside me, and I got to work on it. Working on the cyberarm was the easy part, the hard part was to replace the connectors that were still attached to his nerves.
“Here, I’ll need you to take a whiff of this. It’ll put you to sleep for a bit so it doesn’t hurt while I work on the nerve connectors.”
Once he was out cold, the surgeon suite brought me the various screwdrivers and scalpels I needed to open up the port that connected his cybernetic bits with his organic ones.
This is a little nerve-wracking knowing that a mistake could damage the nerves in his shoulders permanently. The price to have that regrown was not cheap, to say the least…
I successfully steadied my hands throughout the procedure and completed the operation.
My patient woke up after half an hour as the dosage given to him wasn’t too high to begin with.
“How are you feeling? Ready to do some calibrations?”
“Yeah… I’ve been worse. Got to say, my entire shoulders feel a lot lighter already. My hand feels as responsive as my real one!”
“Happy to hear that.”
Max and his friends soon left once I finished some fine-tuning. We didn’t have another client until the sun had set.
We never expected any significant traffic. Having just started out, making a few hundred credits for checkups was pretty cool, though I was looking forward to installing actual cybernetics. The checkup only consisted of adjusting the fit, diagnostics, and renewing lubrication.
When it was completely dark out, Thorne sent me a quick text that someone I knew had come, so I once again ventured out to the lobby.
Turning the corner, this time, I spotted two women, one with familiar light blue hair while the other had short brown hair.
“Hey Liz, thank you for coming,” She turned towards me and lethargically raised a hand. She simply continued to stare at me blankly, so I turned to her friend. “And this here is?”
“Hi, I’m Serene, I’m Liz’s guildie,” The girl with short brown hair jumped forward to explain.
I don’t believe they were mercenary guilds or anything here. Was she talking about games?
“Nice to meet you. What can we do you for today?”
“Umm, I was thinking about upgrading my right arm,” She gestured toward her organic hand.
“We can go over some options, follow me,” I said as I watched Liz make herself comfortable on a chair in the lobby.
Leading Serene to an open room, I let her browse the terminal that listed the different options she had as I proceeded with a checkup on her to prepare for the installation. She eventually finalized her decision, though frankly, my catalog wasn’t that extensive.
This was it. I really was going to perform an operation today. Once the checkup was complete and everything was ready, I put Serene to sleep and began.
As this was her first cyberarm, there was the extra procedure to remove the original and install the nodes where it would connect with the nerves.
The cybernetic engineering knowledge I received from the system had detailed information on how to go about the entire procedure. It even included how to account for compatibility when designing any cybernetics, as it was the core focus.
I isolated the knowledge I didn’t need at the moment and focused on the surgery.
With the blood flow to the arm halted, I removed the arm with various tools such as a scalpel, a surgical scissor, and a bone saw. The part I was most nervous about was the connection afterward, between cybernetics and the human body, as it was the most delicate part.
While everything proceeded smoothly, I had to slow down as I was performing the installation for the first time. I definitely did not have the muscle memory to do it efficiently. It felt like I was writing really slowly in order to keep my letters neat and legible.
After over an hour, I finally finished slotting in the arm and completed the installation. Plugging a cable into the arm, I let the computer take care of the real-time diagnostics. I left the room as the last step would require the patient to be awake.
I found Liz in the same chair with glowing eyes.
“Hey, your friend should be up in another half hour. You wanted anything?”
She looked up at me briefly before going back to whatever was on her optics immediately, “...I’m good.”
Seeing how she didn’t want to talk further, I shrugged and turned back and caught the sight of Claire smirking at me, “Got turned down too, huh?”
Opting to ignore her, I returned to my patient and prepared for the testing and calibrations.
Throughout the past week, various acquaintances visited, as well as some new clients. Hopefully, that meant word about my clinic was spreading around.
Every cybernetic installation was a huge sale for me as I didn’t have to pay the cost of my inventory. It was all either from the initial gang where I found Sarah and Caleb, or looted from the local harvesters.
Though that meant the cybernetics weren’t brand new, from a technical standpoint, it had no difference as long as I re-calibrated it, replaced the connection nodes, and customized it to increase the affinity with the user.
With a routine settling in, I decided to reach out to the Quest Giver that I had been neglecting.
“Hey Fitel, it’s been a while. How’s it going?” I immediately said as soon as the call connected.
“...Mr. Halls, I was starting to think I would not hear back from you. I take it by you calling me, it means you are ready for some work again,” With a slight pause, Fitel responded at his usual measured pace.
“Yeah, I’m looking for work that will give me info on harvesters, gangs, whatever criminals.”
“Yes…that can be arranged. May I also offer you other work in other areas? In return, I will provide information on what you want from my network?”
“Sure, and also, could you maybe recommend my clinic if anyone is looking?”
“...I will consider it after looking into it. Anything else?”
“No, thank you.”
“Good day to you then. You will receive the information for the job soon.”
Moments after the call disconnected, I received the mission dossier swiftly, as usual. It was a gig about taking out one of the hideouts of a small gang, and quietly at that to send a ‘message’ to the targets on behalf of the client.
This was something I could do, but would be difficult if I wanted to bring Thorne along. He wouldn’t be able to keep up with me, at least not quietly. And I doubt he would agree to be left behind.
Well, thankfully, there wasn’t a pressing timeline. There was something I wanted to test out as well…
“Status.”
Status
Level:
8
EXP:
260/800
Musculoskeletal:
51
Neural Reflex:
15
Visuomotor Coordination:
12
Endurance:
9
Sensory Perception:
37
Upgrade Points:
4
Upgrades:
- Stealth +7
- Hacking +3
- Cybernetic Engineering +6
Enhancements:
SAID: Zenitech Hoth Mk.3
Optics: Nova Tech Stars Mk.4
Cyberarm (Left): Nova Tech Mudra Mk.6
Since the clinic had been operational for a while, I felt I didn’t need to spend any more points on cybernetic engineering at the moment. But now, I had an idea of what to spend the points on.
I hadn’t been able to focus on leveling this past while but I’m sure with the jobs and information from Fitel, the pace should start picking up again.
Access the web through my SAID, I could see if the items I needed were available. I made my way to an empty room on the second floor of my clinic.
Hmm… This seems like it will work. It definitely will be an excellent learning experience, regardless of the ultimate results.