With the destruction of ‘a’ Mekha Prime, the subsequent ‘disappearance’ of Eva’s robotic Servitors from the site of the illegal Nazareth auction, and the arrival of the Police, X-Ray of the Balance was finally able to examine the boy-cyborg. One particular aspect, out of the many elements of the boys’ transformation, worried him; what if Myung Tesla or the Foundry elected to destroy their ‘handiwork’ remotely before the authorities could neutralise any suicide circuit or programming?
He fully remembered the sales pitch she’d sprouted earlier; that the cybernetic replacement process can be rather fatal for adults, pre-adolescents however had a higher survival rate. They generally grew into their cybernetic enhancements, adapting better to their alterations.
The Control Chip used to make them compliant consisted of an immensely complex sandwich of organic and inorganic layers, which they implanted between the two lobes of the brain to render them compliant. After that, they removed the ‘unnecessary’ organic parts and made them into living weapons. The control chip overrode their conscious will. Once fitted, they were programmed to obey, absolutely.
Frankie informed him that most adults found it hard to adjust to the process. There was a 65% death rate in those who underwent the procedure and the survivors risked a 75% incidence of iatrogenic schizophrenia and overwhelming paranoia that the chip induced in the survivors. As a result, the procedure had never caught on with the military or legal medical establishments, but Myung Tesla had discovered that pubescent teens were more likely to survive the procedures, less likely to suffer cyber-psychosis as their bodies adjusted quicker to the physical alterations and had a better survival rate. ±
X-Ray’s alter-ego was a highly respected surgeon, just not a brain surgeon, but leaving the boy as he was, was too risky so he elected to take the matter into his own hands.
He sensed that he should be able to remove or at least disable the circuit if Frankie or Annie could deactivate the boy’s weaponry first.
It helped that the BASEment’s medical facility was world-class, especially with Frankie’s expert assistance. He explained to the police that he was taking the boy straight to a specialist medical facility even as Banshee called Superintendent Cunningham to get them the necessary authorisation.
They then teleported him back to the BASEment, and rushed him straight to the medic bay.
Removal, without attempting to save the obedience chip, would hopefully be a reasonably simple operation, but the brain was a complex thing and X-Ray, Brian don’t know to what extent his functions have been rerouted. There was likely to be a psychological element; what effect the implantation had on his personality was unknown. Surgical removal of the chip before anyone thought to activate it seemed to be the only option.
Thankfully, the boy’s skull already had an opening located beneath a small metal plate and membrane allowing for easy non-invasive access to his brain. It was tiny, a mere slot through which the chip was accessible.
It was an operation that would need to be made without anaesthetising the boy as Brian needed real-time reactions to his intended surgery. Instead, with Frankie’s assistance the boy’s cybernetics were rendered inert, effectively and temporarily paralysing his body. The fact that the BASEment was shielded prevented the Foundry from overriding the paralysis while he was on the operating table.
Frankie-aided micro-waldoes were moved into place as Brian remotely guided them to the chip connections attached to the boys’ brain.
Over the next fifteen minutes Brian laser-cauterised the tiny arterioles that fed the chip with blood and kept its organic elements alive, and swiftly burnt away the cilia-like array of neural connectors, finer than spider silk, across the chips’ surface before removing the chip from its matrix and dropping it into a dish.
He turned and unleashed a focused blast of radiation at it, frying the circuit and leaving nothing for the two lots of mechanoids to hunt down and exploit. He turned back to his patient, closed the membrane, before he refitted the plate in place.
That was it then. Frankie had previously programmed an inhibitor sub-routine into their patient’s weapons array.
He left the boy to rest and walked out to talk with Mary. “I must admit that was simpler than I had anticipated. I had a horrible few minutes when I first examined the thing, thinking I was going to have to go in and remove all the neural connectors until I realized that they could just be left in situ.”
Mary leaned in and asked, “Will there be any scram, ah consequences, from leavin’ all them wires lyin’ about, in there?”
“No, they’ll just sit there inert and totally harmless. Like any cut wire, there is no circuit now, no programs flowing through Zak’s brain.”
“Jaysus, Frankie rumbled ‘im, did he?”
It took Brian a few seconds to understand that Mary was asking if the boy had been identified.
“Yes, he’s a runaway, a twelve-year-old boy named Zakariya Khalid. He seems older because his cybernetic limbs are adult sized for him to grow into. Superintendent Cunningham of CI-5 has contacted his parents but when she explained about what the Foundry had done to him, they refused to have him home out of fear for his brother and sisters, apparently. The authorities have no idea what to do with him.”
Mary smiled, “Hang on a minute, I have a notion. Let me make a phone call.”
A few weeks later Zak found himself exiting the headmasters’ office in the company of two older boys; a Chris Sett and Colin Duncan. They were to be his guides (and buffer?) for his tour of Claremont Academy today, and apparently they would then be replaced by a classmate, a Chris Templar for the rest of the week.
He glanced down. His school uniform had been specially adapted to cope with his cybernetics – shorts instead of long trousers to not risk interference with his cybernetic legs, his left arm uncovered for the same reason and special Velcro-enabled seams on the shirts and jacket, no, they call them blazers here, to allow him to get it on over his cybernetic arm. The uniform itched. He’d not had to wear a school uniform since his first year in primary and even then that had been just trousers and a sweatshirt.
His memories had a big hole in them. He remembered his parents’ arguing, again! His leaving the house to clear his head and his kidnapping as he wandered the streets of Bradford. Then only pain until he woke up several months later having been cyborg-tised. Thankfully that also meant he had no memory of losing his arm and legs or of being commanded to undertake any tasks! Yes what they had done to him came as a complete shock when he awoke after they had removed the control chip from his brain. He’d even contemplated suicide when he realised what a monster they had made him, and again when his family rejected him but the Balance and their team (?), especially Mikey, had helped him come to terms with his changes and alterations and made him realise he still had a purpose in life; to prevent other children being used the way they’d used him.
The three of them headed into the crowded playground as he nervously awaited the other pupils reaction which he assumed would be extremely negative. Then he saw a small, winged, purple female flying around a tall black youth who nodded to him. Another red-headed pupil dashed in and said hi before several other pupils rushed over and, to his utter surprise welcomed him, asking his name. One pupil, an older boy, immediately nicknamed him Hardwire and patted him on the back. Oh, there were a number of nervous-looking pupils keeping their distance alright and not all the looks in his direction were friendly, but enough were to make him feel as though he might just fit in here after all, Allah willing.
Hardwire, eh? He was enrolled in the school’s Hero Certification Programme, its Special Curriculum and that was as good a name to use as any. Maybe there would be a place for him here after all.
Growing up Meta, UK-Style! 