“So, Mister … Year-bee” the doctor started.
“Its Yrbe” Michael corrected him, “Say it with me: err-bee.”
The doctor waited for him to finish, “Mister Year-bee. You are scheduled for surgery later this morning. Has anyone been by to explain the procedure?”
Michael growled in frustration, “No. Talk to me doc.”
The doctor reached into the pocket of his white coat and produced a hemisphere about an inch in diameter. “we will be implanting these in each leg, from groin to ankle, six in each leg. Each is individually addressile over the local body-net interface your existing prosthetic device uses. We will also be updating both the hardware processor and the firmware in your cranial implant is running. Looks to me like they’ve given you the full works, latest in everything. Sign here…”
Michael signed the clipboad with the sure and certain knowledge that the rest of his day was going to suck mightily.
Two men occupied the observation booth above the operating room. Kenneth Irons and his protege Ian Nottingham. Irons leaned forward, hands crossed on the top of a straight walking cane. The top was a silvered sphere laser etched with a map of the world. The only movement was the idle tapping of one middle finger, centered on the nation of Iceland.
Nottingham prefered to stand but was clearly engrossed in the scene below. He wore his customary black and in the dim light it was possible, from the perspective of the operating room proper, to mistake him for a ghostly disembodied head.
Both men watched as Michael was wheeled in and prepared for surgery. His dreadlocks were cut and his head shaved and face shaved entirely including eyebrows. His body was immobilized on the table and his head locked into place with a metal frame, bolts passing through skin to lock solid against his cranium. Technicians busied themselves with equipment.
The surgeon ran fingertips across the base of Michael’s skull then made a small incision. Nottingham leaned forward to get a better view - as a narrow ribbon connector was inserted and plugged into the hidden dataport that had been exposed just below the skin.
A technician hit keys on his laptop and a trace appeared on screen - readouts from the cranial implant, bandwidth estimates for the local body-net, temperature readings. In one window a set of vitals mirrored those shown on the operating room monitors - heartbeat, respiration, blood pressure. The technician began typing commands into a window at the bottom of the screen.
“Good to go” he said.
The surgeon nodded, “isolate and disconnect motor function and pain reception.”
The technician worked furiously for a few minutes, “OK. All set here.”
The surgeon began work with a long incision at what would normally have been Micahel’s hairline. Behind him an assistand was preparing power tools - drills and bone saw - and another testing connections from wires that protruded from the body of a pair of three centimetre metal cylinders.
With skin out of the way the surgeon went to work with power tools, carefully crafting cylindrical recepticles to coincide with the ridge of Michael’s eyebrows. That complete he drilled precise holes for the trailing wires.
One of the team had been laying out a dozen hemispheres. Each had a small metalic lump at the apex of the sphere and he had used a welding torch to attach a metal spur to them. The spur forked at the end and each was trimmed to precise measured dimensions. Nuts and bolts were laid out in pairs by the forks along with a small cylindrical body-net receptor with holes drilled at either end.
Incisions were made along the inside of Michael’s thighs and the largest of the implants inserted and the fork of the spur placed around bone. The body-net receptor was attached and the two forked ends bolted securely to it. The surgeon gave it an experimental tug then nodded to one of his assistants who used a portable device to test the network connection. Six receptors, six hemispheres all solidly attached to bone in each leg. Finally the surgeon stepped away from the incisions. Staff busied themselves with sutures and reconnecting the flesh he had opened.
The surgeon moved around to begin work on the implants. He spoke to the technician by the laptop, “Bring higher brain function up to 30 percent. While you’re at it send a controlled low-level pulse through his pleasure centre, I dont want his too surly for this.”
Michael’s eyelids fluttered but they didnt open.
“Can you hear me?” the surgeon asked.
“Yes.” Micahel said, his voice thick with sleep.
“I want you to access your respirator. Page through its functions and give me a readout of all unknown devices running on its network.”
There was a pause and Michael listed off serial numbers for twelve new devices. The surgeon smiled and reached for the powertools to open Michael’s head for the next phase of the surgery.
There was a pause, and Michael spoke again over the whine of motors and bits working through bone, “Mobility net established and waiting locomotive control interface.”
Irons turned to Nottingham, “That’s a true company man right there. He was born with a herniated diaphragm - stomach up where his lung should have been. His parents were selected to be part of a program testing new prosthetic devices that we make. Over the years he’s been upgraded and remained on our payroll. We’re not running a human field trial with untested medical equipment of course, just giving one of our own employees discretionary access to the latest medical advances and care. His job function has remained the same: live his life and report back, allowing us to upload internal device logs. Now, look at the advances we are making … giving him mobility again!
“Three milimetres, yes, that’s it.” the surgeon said lifting his hand away from the open face of Michael’s brain. A long metal probe protruded vertically and provided a clear location for further probes to open a minute passage between grey-matter for the wires of the cylinders to go.
“Confirm please?” the surgeon said to his technician.
The man at the laptop activated both implants and scanned the readouts on his screen, “Perfectly placed in the dorsomedial region. Connection established. Ultrasonic pulse was … better than optimal projection. It looks like he’ll be running at 102 percent of estimated efficiency.”
The surgeon nodded and removed the long probe, and began work moving brain matter then placed the external co-processor for Michael’s implant.
“Processor online. Data exchange and firmware update at 89 … 92 … 96 … 98 … complete.” the technician confirmed.
Michael spoke, “Locomotive control and sensor net online. Testing … “
There was a slight twitch and pair-by-pair the hemispheres in his legs activated and pulled his thighs, knees, calves and ankles together.
“Testing …”
A ripple passed down the legs and back up as single and pairs of hemispheres activated to repell one another.
“Testing …”
The legs parted again as hemispheres deactivated.
The surgeon began the slow process of putting cranium back together and reconnecting skin. Nurses took the task of bandaging and simple sutures. Finally, after hours of painstaking effort, the surgeon stepped out into the ante-room to wash and go home.
“Well?” Irons asked him, leaning on his cane.
The surgeon looked tired, “A complete success. Now its up to his body and mind to go through the healing and integration process. Only time and therapy will tell.”
“Time and therapy?”
“Yes. If we rush this we could lose him entirely. Years of effort down the drain. No, give him time to process all this. He needs external stimulus and a cause. Needs to be in a place where he can swim and practice.”
Irons nodded, “I know just the place.”