Work Text:
Demarcation: Subspecies, Escape
by Scorpio
A horrible jolt quickly followed by the screech of tortured metal yanked Blair Sandburg from his semi-cationic state into full and painful awareness. His entire body throbbed in intense pain and his head was a blinding white agony that brought a gasp to his lips and instant tears to his eyes. He couldn't move, he could barely think, all he could do was lay there and suffer, praying for oblivion to come and claim him once more.
The sounds of laser fire sizzling against refraction shielding echoed throughout his torture chamber and the high pitched whine of an Inversion Coil powering up ripped through his mind like shards of glass, while the steady thumping of a Hyper-Stratic Engine vibrated his world with rhythmic pulses of pain. Blair didn't think it would be possible to endure any more torment and survive. Then he did. The Inversion Coil was activated and everything gave a sickening lurch as he was propelled through a spatial-reality fold, crossing hundreds of thousands of light-years in one gut-churning second. Thankfully, Blair passed out.
==O==
A warm touch. Soft, gentle. A quiet murmur of words to low to be understood. Slowly, Blair swam up through the cobwebs and shadows into awareness once more. Pain flared up anew, bright white in intensity. His nerve endings screamed for release and he tried to sink back down again. He groaned.
"Chief? Blair? *Please*. If you can hear me, please wake up."
It was the fear and worry in James tones that refused to let him give up. He responded to his Sentinel's pain and battled against his fatigue for long moments just so he could open his eyes.
"James? What?... Where?..."
"Blair! Thanks be to The Machine! No, don't try to get up. I was able to get us both out of the Ka'Silnya compound and back to our ship. We just flew through a spatial-reality fold to the Techno Lords sector of space and we are on heading 352.9 towards the Teldarri Star System."
James looked away for a moment. His face held an expression that made Blair want to hold him tightly and promise that everything would be fine. His Sentinel could be so touchingly vulnerable sometimes.
"I was afraid... afraid you would be unable to function. You.. you've been damaged. I'm not sure how badly. Can you run a self-diagnostic or should I interface with you?"
I don't know. I'll,... I'll try, okay?"
James nodded and gave him an encouraging smile. He closed his eyes and accessed the bio-tech data-chip implanted in his brain that controlled his body functions and acted as a motherboard for all of the other techno implants in his brain. The pain became blinding agony when damaged areas were accessed and faded slightly as healthy areas were probed. A complete and total rundown of his organic and techno systems took exactly 15 minutes and 32 seconds.
Blair felt tears pool in his eyes as the system checks and reports came into his motherboard chip, providing him with both the diagnosis as well as the recommended treatment options. It did not look good. He would have trembled if he could.
"James. I am paralyzed from the neck down. My nerves receptors are flooded with pain, but they are not responding to any other stimuli. While I *do* have all the data we were sent to retrieve, I sustained damage to other circuits and systems from an anti-virus program and defensive security grids that were hardwired into the AI unit. It is the damaged circuits that are causing the physical malfunctions to my nervous system and impairing my mobilization."
A look of horror swept over his Sentinel's face. James may very well be a Cyber-organic mechanism, but he *did* have emotions. And they were *very* strong where his Guide was concerned.
"What is the extent of the damage Chief? Can I repair it?"
Blair felt a single tear escape his eyelashes and run down his cheek. Despair and fear filled him.
"No."
Blair could almost hear James processing that. If *he* could not repair Blair, that meant it was up to the Techno Lords. They could decide to repair him to perfect health and send him back to the I.P. War Corps, reprogram his implant chips so he would no longer be a Guide, or simply recycle him for parts. It was out of their control.
"What... is the extent of the damage Chief?"
Blair took as deep a breath as he could.
"The main technology-adapter jack located in the back of my skull is completely blown. *That's* what fried my nervous system. It's literally hooked into my cerebellum and is powered by my spinal cord's electrical impulses. Out of the ten data-chips implanted in my cerebral-cortex, 3 are fused into little more than metal and syntech chunks. 2 more are showing damage to the data storage areas of the chips."
James became very still and quiet and Blair had a moment of panic. James was a self-contained and fully mobile AI unit himself, but he *was* non-organic, at least his brain was completely techno. It relied on programs, routines and subroutines, logic and mathematics. Often, he would find that he couldn't properly process all the data being inputted, or he would stumble across a loop in his programming. When this happened, he would automatically execute Zone-Mode 77-P in order to study the anomaly more intently. That would normally not be a problem, but Blair doubted his ability to pull him out of a program loop in his current condition.
"James! Don't you *dare* Zone out on me. I need you here and present. Ignore the data-loop, analyze it later!"
James shook his head slightly and turned to look at Blair. Sadness poured from his every line and curve.
"Chief... Blair. If the Techno Lords have to repair you, they will probably retire you from the Inter Planetary War Corps. They will most likely wipe your memory and establish new personality engrams with a brand new set of data chips. I can't lose you to a new Guide! I *can't!* I'm just a cyborg! If they take you from me, then they are taking away, not just my Guide, but my *soul*!"
In a millisecond, Blair Sandburg fell in love with his Cyber-organic Sentinel all over again.
"James. Do you still have the encryption crystal?"
James raised his head sharply and looked at Blair closely. It was *highly* illegal to own an encryption crystal without proper authorization. Cyber-organic Warrior-Sentinel's *could* get that kind of clearance, but James *didn't* have permission or need for one this mission. By law, he should not even have one in his possession at this time.
"Yes..."
"How much data will it hold?"
James accessed his memory banks for the requested data.
"2.5 million mega-jules. Why?"
"I... I want you to make a complete copy of my personal memories and personality engrams. Just in case..."
END
Demarcation: Subspecies, Escape