It had all started simply enough; there was a problem with the new construction project. It wasn't a major problem in terms of preventing the project's eventual completion- though there would definitely be a fairly significant delay now- but for the programs who'd been working in and around the structure? Yeah, it had been a major problem. The kind that could potentially get you derezzed.
Still even that had been going well. Security and hazard crews had arrived right on time, with most of the programs who'd been working on the lower level evacuated fairly quickly. It was slower going getting the workers down from the upper levels; less of the structure there was completed, and parts of what was completed were where most of the instability was. Which was where Clu had come in; surefooted and used to picking out solid code from that which was dangerously unstable, he'd volunteered to help get one of the last work crews stuck in a particularly unstable area down from the upper levels. He'd even gone to the effort of reinforcing parts of the structure so they could all make it out safely. True, his emergency support wireframe was as quick and dirty as they came, and was never meant to hold for long. But it would be long enough.
Or so he'd thought. Well, in a way it had. The last of the construction programs had made it safely out of the unstable area and Clu was doing one final quick sweep to make sure he hadn't missed anyone. But then he got the warning flag from his makeshift support structure a split nano before he heard the scream of sheering code. In the next fraction of a nano that it took him to turn to look it was already too late. There was nowhere to run as the floor dropped out from under him.
Falling as chunks of debris tumbled down with him. Impact. A flurry of damage warnings that didn't really register through plain old pain. So much pain that he couldn't localize it. Or maybe there was just too much damage, to the point that every part of him was equally in pain. Distantly, he realized this was probably bad. And then? The mercy of emergency shutdown claimed him and he knew no more.
Consciousness returned to him much more slowly than it had faded. He rebooted sluggishly, what felt like one subroutine at a time, and he wondered at the cause of the lag. Until memory reasserted itself, and with it pain. Oh, right; that was why he felt like a building had fallen on him. Because a building had fallen on him. Or part of one at least. Some bit of nonsense data about a yellow brick road drifted through his processes in response to that thought for unknown reasons. But hey, at least he was still in one piece and cognizant enough to be dredging up random datastrings, so that was something, right?
Opening his eyes though forced him to reevaluate his assessment of being in one piece. Well, that explained why his lower left leg was pretty much the only part of him that didn't have at least a dull ache to its name just then; his left leg was gone below the knee, the stump wrapped securely in patch tape and medical wireframe binding to prevent any possibility of a cascade failure. And from the amount of patch tape wrapped around his left arm, it looked like it had come close to joining his leg. Well, at least now he knew which side had probably taken the brunt of the impact.
"That's gonna be a new scar for sure...", he muttered. Maybe two, even. Taking in his surroundings, he realized that he was- unsurprisingly- in a medical facility, but not one he recognized. A lot of medical facilities were similar in basic design, of course, but none of the three recompilers immediately in evidence was familiar. All three were, at the moment, tending to various monitors and readouts, which had surely alerted them to his return to online status. One glanced his way and offered a tired but reassuring smile which Clu did his best to return. The recompiler then made a few quick adjustments to something on his terminal before going to speak with the older of the two female programs in the room.
Clu wasn't sure what he'd done at first until he felt the bed he was lying on warm slightly, sending gentle waves of energy through his code. Oh yeah that was, mmm... The medical bed served dual purposes. The first was to infuse energy directly to a patient's circuits to ensure optimum energy flow even when a program was forced to be largely immobile for extended periods. That much it had been doing already. The second function- which it was performing now- was to help ease away the aches of deep code damage while aiding a program's own internal repair functions to help the recompilers' work a little go more quickly, and repairs take more easily. Clu already noticed the difference as the gentle targeted energy waves washed through his damaged body, seeming to carry away the worst of the overall ache with them.
However it did nothing to ease his chagrin at realizing he was currently wearing a medical template. Designed for the comfort of patients who had to lie mostly on their backs for extended periods and the convenience of the recompilers who needed easy access to a patient's disc, it nonetheless looked ridiculous. Dull gray and sleeveless, with the disc dock on the chest rather than on the back, with legs that ended slightly above the knee- not that it currently mattered much for his left one-, and the most basic and unimaginative circuit pattern ever, it was clearly designed strictly for function rather than fashion. He was just glad that very few would likely see him in it.
A quick ping to the system clock revealed that he'd been offline for over almost a third of a millicycle. Well into his and his code-brother's usual period of downtime. Well, that probably meant he'd be getting a comm or even a visit next upcycle as his code-brother and/or Jarvis realized that he hadn't returned to central processing and enquired as to his whereabouts. Which meant that he should probably get some actual, non-enforced sleep before then, so he could give a proper report.
Given the soothing energy of the medical bed, and the way the upper half was on just the perfect slight angle upward from true horizontal that seemed to promote optimum relaxation, that looked to be an easy task. But just as he was starting to drift off, he was snapped abruptly back to full alertness by a flash of gold from the pointer arrival platform in the far corner of the room, accompanied by string of frantic broadcast that was too jumbled and panicked to make sense of, at least for him. But the source, at least, was clear; his code brother had arrived.
Re: Fractured {angst; hospital setting; injury; possible substance use references}
Still even that had been going well. Security and hazard crews had arrived right on time, with most of the programs who'd been working on the lower level evacuated fairly quickly. It was slower going getting the workers down from the upper levels; less of the structure there was completed, and parts of what was completed were where most of the instability was. Which was where Clu had come in; surefooted and used to picking out solid code from that which was dangerously unstable, he'd volunteered to help get one of the last work crews stuck in a particularly unstable area down from the upper levels. He'd even gone to the effort of reinforcing parts of the structure so they could all make it out safely. True, his emergency support wireframe was as quick and dirty as they came, and was never meant to hold for long. But it would be long enough.
Or so he'd thought. Well, in a way it had. The last of the construction programs had made it safely out of the unstable area and Clu was doing one final quick sweep to make sure he hadn't missed anyone. But then he got the warning flag from his makeshift support structure a split nano before he heard the scream of sheering code. In the next fraction of a nano that it took him to turn to look it was already too late. There was nowhere to run as the floor dropped out from under him.
Falling as chunks of debris tumbled down with him. Impact. A flurry of damage warnings that didn't really register through plain old pain. So much pain that he couldn't localize it. Or maybe there was just too much damage, to the point that every part of him was equally in pain. Distantly, he realized this was probably bad. And then? The mercy of emergency shutdown claimed him and he knew no more.
Consciousness returned to him much more slowly than it had faded. He rebooted sluggishly, what felt like one subroutine at a time, and he wondered at the cause of the lag. Until memory reasserted itself, and with it pain. Oh, right; that was why he felt like a building had fallen on him. Because a building had fallen on him. Or part of one at least. Some bit of nonsense data about a yellow brick road drifted through his processes in response to that thought for unknown reasons. But hey, at least he was still in one piece and cognizant enough to be dredging up random datastrings, so that was something, right?
Opening his eyes though forced him to reevaluate his assessment of being in one piece. Well, that explained why his lower left leg was pretty much the only part of him that didn't have at least a dull ache to its name just then; his left leg was gone below the knee, the stump wrapped securely in patch tape and medical wireframe binding to prevent any possibility of a cascade failure. And from the amount of patch tape wrapped around his left arm, it looked like it had come close to joining his leg. Well, at least now he knew which side had probably taken the brunt of the impact.
"That's gonna be a new scar for sure...", he muttered. Maybe two, even. Taking in his surroundings, he realized that he was- unsurprisingly- in a medical facility, but not one he recognized. A lot of medical facilities were similar in basic design, of course, but none of the three recompilers immediately in evidence was familiar. All three were, at the moment, tending to various monitors and readouts, which had surely alerted them to his return to online status. One glanced his way and offered a tired but reassuring smile which Clu did his best to return. The recompiler then made a few quick adjustments to something on his terminal before going to speak with the older of the two female programs in the room.
Clu wasn't sure what he'd done at first until he felt the bed he was lying on warm slightly, sending gentle waves of energy through his code. Oh yeah that was, mmm... The medical bed served dual purposes. The first was to infuse energy directly to a patient's circuits to ensure optimum energy flow even when a program was forced to be largely immobile for extended periods. That much it had been doing already. The second function- which it was performing now- was to help ease away the aches of deep code damage while aiding a program's own internal repair functions to help the recompilers' work a little go more quickly, and repairs take more easily. Clu already noticed the difference as the gentle targeted energy waves washed through his damaged body, seeming to carry away the worst of the overall ache with them.
However it did nothing to ease his chagrin at realizing he was currently wearing a medical template. Designed for the comfort of patients who had to lie mostly on their backs for extended periods and the convenience of the recompilers who needed easy access to a patient's disc, it nonetheless looked ridiculous. Dull gray and sleeveless, with the disc dock on the chest rather than on the back, with legs that ended slightly above the knee- not that it currently mattered much for his left one-, and the most basic and unimaginative circuit pattern ever, it was clearly designed strictly for function rather than fashion. He was just glad that very few would likely see him in it.
A quick ping to the system clock revealed that he'd been offline for over almost a third of a millicycle. Well into his and his code-brother's usual period of downtime. Well, that probably meant he'd be getting a comm or even a visit next upcycle as his code-brother and/or Jarvis realized that he hadn't returned to central processing and enquired as to his whereabouts. Which meant that he should probably get some actual, non-enforced sleep before then, so he could give a proper report.
Given the soothing energy of the medical bed, and the way the upper half was on just the perfect slight angle upward from true horizontal that seemed to promote optimum relaxation, that looked to be an easy task. But just as he was starting to drift off, he was snapped abruptly back to full alertness by a flash of gold from the pointer arrival platform in the far corner of the room, accompanied by string of frantic broadcast that was too jumbled and panicked to make sense of, at least for him. But the source, at least, was clear; his code brother had arrived.