[Time Desync] Mourn's Upgrades

(The day after they left Vavaren)

Asher had set up everything he needed in the med bay. Wires, cleaning supplies in case gunk had accumulated in Mourn's electronic parts, the new processor, tools to connect everything together. Kay would be making sure Mourn stayed stable and unconscious while Asher worked. James was staying nearby to be useful if either medic needed something.
This was going to be slightly nerve wracking.

Kay had all the medical side of things ready to go and now stood waiting for Mourn. This was going to be probably one of the stranger surgeries he'd ever been involved in, not to mention the general uncertainty presented by Mourn's unique nature. It was hard enough to judge anesthetic for an alien, even harder when that alien was also half robot.
He looked to the two androids anxiously.

---

Mourn hadn't slept so well, he was a little bit nervous. Not scared no, he didn't get scared damnit, just nervous. But he trusted the robot, and this would make him better able to fight the family. It would be fine.
He decided not to go bother the hawk girls, they were busy with the babies anyway. Eugh, babies.
He decided it was easier to just get this over and done with.

So he made his way to the medical bay, confused by that gnawing sensation in the pit of his stomach.

Asher had given Kay all the information the canid had written about Mourn's organic half, so hopefully Kay had at least a general idea of what to do.

James had mentally prepared himself to restrain Mourn. He wasn't looking forward to being clawed. At all.

~~
---You'll be fine--- Vestia told Mourn, ---Try not to worry---

Mourn smiled up at Vestia. "I know. Trust robot." He nodded and ignored the gnawing feeling. He didn't really understand what it was. As far as he was concerned he had nothing to fear, but his subconcious had other ideas.

He walked into the medical room, freezing at the sight of the three of them gathered with all the surgical equipment.

[Are you alright?] Kay asked, worried.

Mourn nodded jerkily, then started to shake his head. "Scared."

[That's perfectly understandable. ] Kay tried to look reassuring.

"No, no reason be scared. You no hurt me. " Mourn told them, taking a few steps forward and flinching. "They no hurt me, no hurt.. friends.. " He muttered to himself

Asher watched Mourn carefully. This... might be interesting. He really hoped Mourn wasn't about to have a full-on panic attack. He looked carefully, trying to see if Mourn had brought any weapons he should worry about."

Mourn was for once actually unarmed, well, except that clawed robotic arm. He could no doubt do an awful lot of damage with that.

He took a deep breath and came over to them, his tail twitching.

Kay smiled softly. [It'll be alright. Would you feel better knowing exactly what the plan is, or would you prefer to not know?] He watched the cat warily.

Mourn thought about that. "You need anesthetise me... so robot can power off implants. " He spoke carefully.

Kay nodded. [It shouldn't take long and if at any point we're worried about your vitals, we can stop and wake you up quickly. I'll be watching the whole time while Asher and James work. ]

Mourn nodded, looking from James to Asher worriedly. "I ready." He didn't sound ready, or really look it, but he nodded and repeated a little more certainly. "Let's do this."

"All right, James, we're ready for you," Asher said. He gave Mourn a reassuring look, "You're safe, I promise."

James came over. He was supposed to inject Mourn with a sedative to knock him out, because Kay and Asher couldn't afford to be hurt right now. "Okay, this should be super quick. Can you hold out your organic arm, please?"

Mourn looked at James, nodded and held out his arm. That was fine, until James got close with the needle. At which point Mourn's ears flattened against his skull, his fur stood on end and he hissed, baring his sharp teeth as he tried to punch poor James.

Thankfully they'd kinda been expecting this. Kay moved to put the bed between himself and the enraged Felid and tried to project soothing calming thoughts into the organic part of Mourn's brain.

James yelped and dodged away hastily. Darn it!

Asher quietly pulled a tranq gun out of one of the drawers. Maybe the best way to handle this was to knock Mourn out from across the room.

Kay nodded to Asher.

Mourn growled.

Asher had really good aim, and was pretty quick too. He raised the tranq gun and fired it at Mourn as quickly as he could.

James knew what he was supposed to do in this situation: keep Mourn away from the other medics until he was out cold. Fun.
He grabbed a pillow to throw at Mourn if he charged.

Mourn would go for whoever was closer, until Asher shot him. Then he became the attacker and prime target. The dart hit him in the neck and he hissed, yanked it out and lunged at Asher.

[Hold him down James!] Kay wrote hastily. Yeesh, if this how he reacted to friends, how vicious was he around people he didn't want touching him?

James threw his pillow at Mourn, because hey, he had picked it up, and tackled Mourn from behind, restraining his arms and hoping Mourn couldn't twist to bite him. He tried really hard to not hurt Mourn. Hopefully he succeeded.

Mourn screeched and struggled but yeah, James was a hell of a lot heavier and stronger than he was. He tried to bite him, or claw him, but eventually the sedatives took effect and he slumped in James' grip, going limp.

Kay breathed a sigh of relief. This almost made Heny's shenanigans look reasonable.
He indicated that James bring him over so he could get the IV in and set up the monitors and breathing mask.

James gently carried Mourn over, setting him down as indicated so Kay could get him set up. James was mostly unharmed, although Mourn had managed to sink his claws into one of his hands, and he'd need to fix that before going near water again.

Asher helped Kay as necessary, waiting until Mourn was very well drugged and stable before powering off Mourn's implant.

Kay got everything set up quickly and efficiently and set to work monitoring Mourn's vital signs as Asher worked. He glanced quickly to James to confirm he was okay, then went back to his job.

Mourn's implants powered off without trouble, the outer part of his optic could actually be unhooked and removed if it was getting in the way. The metal plate in his head provided access to the robotic side of his brain, his hair had been styled to mostly cover it but it didn't take much effort to tie it out of the way.

Asher removed the optic's outer part and got his hair well out of the way, then carefully opened the metal plate in his head and had a look at what was inside. He knew what to expect from his reading, of course, but if dirt or wear had changed anything, he would want to find that so he could figure out how it effected his plans.

Given mourn tended to avoid water, and none of this looked to be particularly waterproof anyway, there wasn't much grime more than general wear and tear. And a few gouges from him ramming a screwdriver in there blindly. Crazy cat.

Thankfully it didn't look like he'd done any major damage, there was an empty slot where presumably that asimov chip had been retroactively inserted. His brain's code was pretty complicated as Asher well knew, having seen it, it was similar to his own, which made changes to it a lot easier to implement by just ramming in new chips rather than trying to recode the prime coding.

Unlike his aural implants, this part of his brain looked to have actually been thought through and the way it integrated with the organic side was quite remarkable. It was however old technology, a good decade out of date in many places. It was a bit odd, such high end bio mechanics with such limited parts, like the surgeon, despite their great skill, was working with the very best they could get their hands on at the time and nothing more. They'd done what they could, and it was amazing it worked, but it was a bit of a complicated mess to get everything interfacing correctly.

Asher looked this all over very carefully, taking his time to make sure he knew which parts he was looking at, and getting acquainted with the little differences between the data files, and the real thing. He looked over his selection of tools again, making sure they were all exactly where he had put them, then gently began working to remove the CPU, without disturbing any other bits of wiring. It was probably going to be tricky, but his hands were very steady.
If necessary, he might temporarily unwire some other things, using his photographic memory to be sure he could link them up correctly once he was done.

This was definitely bizarre. Kay focused on those vitals and keeping Mourn under while Asher worked. it was eerily quiet, just the beeping of the machines.

Asher would carefully remove the old processor, and start seating in the new one, using adapters to connect it to the wires correctly, and screwing it in place so it wouldn't shake loose. He was much too focused to talk right now, and he knew Kay could handle his half of this job just fine, anyway. All he had to do was make sure he didn't break Mourn's brain accidentally.

Kay frowned, Mourn's blood pressure was dropping. It wasn't urgent yet, but it was something to watch closely.
Come on Mourn, just a little longer. He pleaded to himself.
He kept a close eye on things, knowing all too well the unpredictable nature of general anesthetic and how fast a patient could go from fine, to critical.

Asher finished installing the new processor, and started connecting the wires he had had to remove to access it. That shouldn't take too long, thank goodness. And once it was done, he'd be able to put the metal plate back into position on Mourn's skull, and be just about ready to try booting up the implant again.

Kay looked up from his monitoring to check Asher's progress, he nodded to let him know things were okay. For now anyway. The sooner they got this done, the sooner he'd feel better though. The longer Mourn was under, the more risks were being run.

Asher switched Mourn's implant on, checking for signs that it was booting up correctly.