“Bringing medical protocols on line,” Chesty said. “I have his med readouts.”
The med layout appeared on the PAD screen, waveforms tracing out the pulse and quiver of heartbeat, respiration, metabolic function, neurological and brainwave function, pain levels, and other readings Jeff only hazily understood.
“Sergeant Major Kaminski is unconscious,” Chesty said. “Except for minor nasal and upper pharyngeal bleeding, I detect no gross trauma. Brainwaves indicate a mild alpha state, but probably no loss of mental function. No ischemia, no cerebrovascular trauma, no internal hemorrhage.” There was a brief pause. “Please hold the PAD sensory pickup close to his head.”
Jeff did as he was told, holding out the PAD just above Kaminski’s head, pointing the optic and audio pickups at his bleeding face.
“I have detected an anomaly,” Chesty said. “Sergeant Major Kaminski’s skull appears to be the source of low-grade infrasonics, at approximately ten to fifteen Hertz. I cannot account for this.”
“What’s that?” Nodell asked. “What’s that mean?”
“Infrasound,” Jeff replied. “Sound waves at frequencies too low for humans to hear.”
“We can sense ’em, though,” BJ put in. “They can make us feel uneasy, even induce panic attacks.”
“Look,” Wojak said. He jabbed a thumb toward the overhead, and the eerie wail of the Singer. “I don’t need infrasound to feel creepy with that goin’ on!”
Kaminski’s eyes were closed now, but Jeff could see the eyeballs shifting and moving beneath the lids. REM—Rapid Eye Movements. Frank was dreaming.
Of what?
“I have a possible correlation with Sergeant Major Kaminski’s medical history,” Chesty reported.
“What is it?”
“In 2053, then-Gunnery Sergeant Kaminski received three intracranial implants, one occipital, two temporal. These were intended to facilitate virtual reality downloads with IBM-K20 interface equipment. He was taking part in an experiment at the time, with the goal of developing new training techniques through direct man-machine interface.”
“Jesus,” Wojak said. “Ski was a jackhead?”
“The external sockets were surgically removed in 2061 after noninvasive, more technologically advanced VR feeds came on-line. The implants, however, were simply disconnected and left in place.
“The implant remaining over the right temporal area of his brain appears to be vibrating in response to those low-frequency radio waves. The vibrations are generating sound waves in the ten to fifteen Hertz range.”
“Damn!” Jeff said. “Should have remembered! Doc McCall told me about that the other day, when that EMP knocked him out! Is there anything we can do?”
“Maybe wrap his head in something,” Amberly suggested.
“The ELF radio waves penetrate the Europan ocean easily, and even leak through the ice where it is thin. We have no materials available on board this craft that would provide adequate insulation. The effect should lessen, however, as we move away from the Singer artifact.”
“Which I intend to do as quickly as possible,” Jeff said. “Chief Carver! Can you get any more speed out of this thing?”
“Got her full throttle, Major. We’re getting the hell out of Dodge!”
“Chesty, I want a list of everyone in this command, including the scientists, who might have cranial implants like that.”
“A complete search must wait until this part of me is again in communication with the main system at Cadmus. The only medical records I have access to here are those of the personnel embarked aboard Manta One. Of those personnel, only Sergeant Major Kaminski possessed such implants.”
“Oh, yeah. Right.” it was hard to remember Chesty’s limitations sometimes. Because he was dependent on the hardware he was running on, he had access to much larger files, much more information, when he was resident within a large, fast, powerful machine like the E-DARES’s IBM IC-5000. Since they were currently out of radio or laser contact with Cadmus, the Chesty on Jeff’s PAD and within the Manta’s computer system was considerably slower in terms of operations per second, and much more restricted in the data available to it.
How must it feel, Jeff wondered, to break off a part of yourself, to live in isolation from the “real” you in a much more cramped and tiny space?
The Life Seeker
Time unknown
2703: >>…wanting…<<
1201: >>…needing others…needing…want/must-have
/mustmustmust<<
937: >>…but others…wrong/bad/tainted/evil…<<