#obviously the port stuff is invention on my part. but the stuff about bones being semi-conductive is true!

[cloudbattrolls]

Frankenstein's Nonsense

Ullane Wistim | Wellspring Clinic | Present Night

Note: The surgery mentioned is being developed for the sake of @contrastparadoxx's Tertet Virrus.

It was past the middle of the night, and the clinic was closed to visitors - its medic needed to do some preliminary work for a surgery she wanted to propose. Before she did, she needed a meticulously planned order of operations, list of materials, warnings of the risks involved - everything a troll required before any major surgery, plus a few extras. This was a custom job, after all.

The clinic was brightly lit, recently cleaned, and Ullane Wistim was getting to work.

She looked critically at the body on her operating table, its exposed muscles and organs constructed to mimic a specific living yellowblood’s, but it was all for show. Structurally speaking, the thing was more like a plant than anything, its cells living off light rather than food. It had a face blank of features, a head lacking a brain or even bones.

It spoke anyway.

“So, how’s it going?”

“I told you not to talk.” She said, voice slightly muffled behind her surgical mask as she adjusted her forceps’ grip on the layers of skin at the bottom of the mock ports they’d implanted in the arms and neck.

“I’m the one being cut into! I think I get to have an opinion.”

The body’s voice was cheerful, enthusiastic even. Ullane rolled her eyes behind her medical goggles.

“Can have opinion silently.” She grumbled, peering at where the connective biowire she’d used to approximate Tertet’s setup melded with Arty’s skin, muscle, and bone.

A short, blessed period of quiet ensued as she took notes on the elasticity of the wire and the nerve clusters it was most directly linked to. 

Unfortunately, Arty’s fake body couldn’t feel pain, even though it had imitation nerves, as the shell lacked a brain. So she couldn’t experiment with anesthetic or anything like that. 

It would immoral to ask it to feel pain for her, but it was a shame she couldn’t test as extensively as she’d like. Glas would never let her hear the end of it even if Arty agreed, most likely.

“I’m both impressed by how far ports have come and how invasive they still are.” Arty remarked. 

“I mean, honestly - you’d think in the last four hundred and sixty sweeps someone would’ve worked on that to make installation easier if nothing else. But no, still right into the bone, even if they are better with conductive efficiency these nights.”

“It’s a grounding technique.” Ullane said absentmindedly as she put her tablet down again (paper was no good when a stray blood splatter or fluid leak might get on it) and went back to examining the connections.

“Imagine if they only went as far as the muscle. It would be a much higher risk of frying the tissue if there was an excess of psiionic feedback. Bone is semi-conductive. Some currents, flowing in the correct direction, can pass through it safely, yes? Of course, also makes ports harder to remove.” She added, deadpan. “And more expensive.”

“Not to mention it complicates your job here.” Arty said with amusement. “You’re going to have his nerves spread out like spaghetti to make sure none of your repairs unsettle other existing damage while they’re in process.”

“Yes, thank you, Arty.” She grunted, plucking out some of its fake nerves and spreading them over a small board for examination.

Getting her assistant to make the body hadn’t been too hard, especially with her powers to assist it.

Now she had to simulate the damage done to Tertet’s nerves as well. She had the scans she’d done of the other yellowblood to help her, but it would still require a delicate touch with her powers and tools.

She took a deep breath, warm moisture filling the inside of her face masks, and projected a 3D model of the internal damage in the air as a reference for herself.

Her eyes sparked reddish pink as she withered and ‘burned’ the nerves as well as she could - not pushing so hard they were impossible to operate on, or so delicate they’d break apart. 

Then she intentionally disconnected some from the others and from the ports they had been tied to, further mimicking the upset done by the wrongly installed ones Tertet had once had. Fortunately, he had better ones now - that would definitely make things easier than if she’d had to work around the ruined set. 

Her model wasn’t perfect, but it was close enough. She knew anything she did wouldn’t be an exact re-creation; it wasn’t necessary anyway. This was about testing techniques ahead of time, to create the most efficient and minimally invasive surgery possible. 

Tertet deserved nothing less, after all.

Ullane respected him - a peer in the field, intelligent, and very much entitled to a better lot than what he had. 

She would have done her best even for a patient she did not like, but it felt especially important for a fellow, one suffering in a way that could have been so easily avoided.

Helming did not have to be painful.

It was not a popular opinion among other lowbloods, and Ullane understood why, rarely voicing it around any who had suffered as generators or were at risk to. They wanted to avoid the column completely, prioritizing that goal whether it hurt or not. 

Yet helming was not going away any time soon, and it could be far better of an experience than it currently was for all except the lucky few.

“What are you thinking about?” Arty said, curious.

“What do you think?” She muttered. “This is needless. Shouldn’t have to do this surgery at all. If only she’d been given proper ports the first time! Her psiionic type isn’t even rare, not hard to deal with. What were they thinking?”

“They don’t care, Ullane.” Arty said quietly. “You know what the answer is. Disposability. Machine, helm - we are both easily discarded. Or, if we are too valuable, we are never given any freedom.”

Then it laughed softly, the noise slightly static as it wasn’t speaking from a throat.

“But look at you, forceps like a sword of justice! Come on, see what you can do for me. Repair your work, Maledict.”

Ullane set down the forceps and took out a syringe, light gleaming off it as she held it in one medically gloved hand.

“Let’s see if Thrixe can do anything for this.” She murmured. “Diluted, of course.”

She’d been gone from crown clinic for a while now, but fortunately the Varzim signmates were happy to keep her supplied with regenerative serum regardless. She did miss Friday’s nanotech; she suspected Arty used some, but knew trying to ask for a sample probably wouldn’t go well.

Regeneration wouldn’t solve every problem here. The damage still had to be repaired with manual tools and her own psiionics, as the serum only regrew things as they had once been; it did not make any intentionally needed changes. Giving Tertet too many nerves would be an even worse issue than she currently had.

However, it might give her a little new growth to divide up and use to fix the damaged or missing parts, without having to worry about shortening them too much or her nervous system rejecting any implants.

She released a few translucent drops onto Arty’s damaged nerves, watching carefully. The dosage had been adjusted in mind of the patient’s psiionics, existing damage, calculated to not spread and regrow any other tissue that wasn’t needed.

Ullane grinned behind her surgical mask as the nerves began regrowing themselves, shedding dead matter she’d clean away later - yes, just as she’d thought; she’d still have to adjust the port interfaces and account for the misplaced clusters, but this would ensure she didn’t need to use any foreign matter to repair them! Rejection wouldn’t be an issue.

“Aaah, that feels nice.” Arty commented, confirming her satisfaction. “The power of growth, working its way through me.”

The entire nerve spread wiggled a bit, and Ullane scowled.

“Hold still.” She scolded.

“Oh, don’t fuss; I didn’t dislodge anything.”

She grunted because that was true, but she didn’t want to admit it; she’d see its smug expression later when it had a face again.

“We have more to do.” She said curtly, but without any real bite. Her movements as she took notes again were full of barely restrained excitement - a theory proven, a methodology paying off.

“We always have more to do, doctor, but I want a break, fun as this is.”

Ullane sighed, but put her tablet away and went to clean her instruments off, slightly disappointed but not minding too much. 

She turned around to see Arty weaving its nerves back into its body, growing a face out of the blank features the mock-up body had. Mouth, nose, and eyes built themselves, bone structure pushing forth from what had been smooth flatness.

She blinked, but it hardly bothered her anymore. Arty patched itself up with freshly grafted skin and stretched out its newly whole limbs before shaking its head and tossing its hair.

“That was nice.” It said, pleasant. “But I want to check on Wiggles.”

It threw a simple dress on and pranced off to visit its pet tiger shrimp in his tank near the entrance of the clinic. 

She shook her head, ears flicking in amusement. Such an oddly wholesome hobby for an entity like that. It really loved the bluish crustacean, fussing over his food, tank water and enrichment. 

Ullane looked at her notes and tools, dripping water after being freshly cleaned.

Hm. She should go find her lusus. Give him some attention. She’d made good progress; she could work more later.

The yellowblood discarded her surgical mask, walking off in search of her porcupine-firefly father to give him the scritches he loved so much.

[the-firebird69]

There are tons of people going up to this Cape fear above the pelvic bone a huge huge contingent of corky went up there they're all over the place beating the s*** out of people taking names they got the plan of the max they understand what's going on now they don't understand why you sent them up there they don't understand what it is either they say he says there's some kind of Skillet there and there's some kind of question mark you know? Over there and a question mark over there so you look at it and there's a question marks and there's a question mark in the new Batman movie joker I'm saying they're abusing the s*** on a foreigners as well as us I've seen us to it and we saw why and how it's still up to it with us all the time and then and it's a nightmare so they figured out something people have a hold on people and it's with power so you got to find out what it is so the more like are up there trying to beat it out of me and they getting caught and getting held up and we didn't put in prison and allow them to get slaughtered love got slaughtered the cape and on the unpopulated side and a lot of death and it's all in there and they're wondering what's going on and they don't know so they basically are dissipating being the max hitting them a lot more max coming in military with Max coming in they saw it and cork is regrouping and other groups going up there because they noticed the max are pouring in on purpose and defending it I'm not sure why either as a matter of fact it's our son doesn't know why he knows what we are doing but wouldn't know why they'd be defending it like that cuz they don't defend other areas like it it certainly don't other areas fall it's almost like they might know about it the Galactica stuff. We needed the Intel we found out something did that area is pivotally say because it's a waterway to DC and they need to defend it and keep things from going up there that makes sense and everything and that's part of it so they're actually defending the capital they found out huge ships are going up there now from China that's what we really needed it's really going on he's a hero in my book you can do stuff for him it's great and what he says is one shopper store in Port Charlotte it's ours with it and somewhat marked ours in a new order Ariana in the even fort Myers it's the area of Charlotte county so we're pointing out we have a few and we don't but he says we need one to do a study at least and we should do a placebo and other stuff so we're going to do that no set it up and I'm saying that we're going to do something like that because the competition and we have an angle in a really nice so we see what's happening and it's working and we need the Intel very badly so I'm sending in special teams and spies and infiltrators they were sending in Undercovers and all sorts of things we also getting information from people and we put an offer out in the sending it but what jerks you are Max you're sitting up there being jackasses jerking his chain all the time we're effing you up so badly and you won't shut up at all you can easily have acted me to laid off you'll be all right but now you're not going to be all right

Thor Freya

You're terrifically wrong everyday all day and you started early out in the East Coast you haven't kicked out of apartment after apartment then on the west coast I'm on the street you're nuts you're obviously out of your tree why the hell would I give favoritism to you and I know you're running it from Mac in any way and your computer can't do it no matter what you say to yourself losers you're not going to have inventions that you need you don't have systems you need because you blew it and you're going to blame for us when I say so what perfect just keep your act is just horrible and some of you developed this nonsense and you know what it is it's the it's foreigners and warlock and rebels and US lowering your defenses and you just keep doing it there's a risk to it you look very weak you thought people wouldn't do anything but you're stupid and silly you're funny like mac everyday you're funny you're making jokes and you're a funny guy that's how Russians say it good for you you're a funny person they have scans they have data they have Intel they have computers and stuff that you brought over there to run around after each other and you're gay fight they've all sorts of clothing that's down I mean come on stop being such assholes and purpose not everyone wants to die like you Max