From: rtbrown@nyx10.cs.du.edu (Russell T. Brown)
Subject: REPOST: Healing Hart Prologue
Date: Tue, 1 Mar 94 01:17:54 GMT

			Healing Hart: Prologue

Here is the intro to Hart's story, written interactively with the
following people:

Dr. Ken Moriarty belongs to Daniel L. McDonald
		danmcd@itd.nrl.navy.mil
Hasaki belongs to Phyllis Rostykus
		li@Data-IO.COM
Hart belongs to me, Russell Brown
		rtbrown@nyx.cs.du.edu

Story:
<Russ>

	Hart stopped under the flickering streetlight and peered at his
surroundings through the pouring rain.  The lamp cast circle of dim light
on the small shops and vendor's stalls that lined the street, all closed
up for the night.  He was slightly amazed t hat the light was unbroken,
considering the type of neighborhood he was in.  This was the only working
light he has seen in blocks.  The rain seemed to have driven most of the
nightlife indoors. That was good, the last thing Hart needed right now was
a run in with a bunch of gangboys.
	Now where was that bar?  The pilot had told him that he could find
what he was looking for there.  Off to the right, Hart spotted the flicker
of a neon sign about half a block away. Hart limped off towards the neon
sign, his left leg still hadn't healed completely.
	Suddenly, his communications implant jumped frequencies and he
started recieving the audio for some Japanese game show.  Cursing, Hart
started tapping the side of his head in a furious attempt to shut the damn
thing off.  But he quickly stopped when the nightvision on his remaining
cybereye blinked off momentarily.  Deciding that he needed to see more
than to turn the radio off, Hart tried to ignore the annoying sounds.  In
the last few weeks, that damn radio had been driving him nuts, it was like
have voices in your head, literally.
	Hart stopped across the street from the neon.  It had some
Japanese characters and said 'Chatsubo' in english, whatever the hell that
meant.  This was the place.  As Hart pulled up the collar on his cheap
plastic duster, his cyberarm emitted a loud whine punctuated by a sharp
clicking noise.  It felt like his whole body was falling apart, the last
few weeks that it took him to get here had been pure hell.  But he was
here now and would only have to put up with it for a while longer.  Chiba
and the Chatsubo would hold his salvation.
	Hart wished his bud Sims was here.  Sims could always make him
laugh, but Sims was lying dead in a stinking Central American jungle.  So
was the rest of his Miltron commando team for that matter.  That last run
had really fragged things up.  The suits had ordered them to hit
Aztechnology for some reason or other, it didn't really matter. So they
suited up and went to war.  The 'copter had dropped them a couple of
klicks north of the Aztechnology compound they were supposed to hit, but
the Azzies where waiting for them.  Halfway there, a mortar shell landed
in the middle of his guys. It turned out to be some kinda eletromagnetic
scrambler, at least that's what the Miltron labcoats told him later.  All
he knew at the time was that his boosted reflexes had slowed to a snail's
pace and all his other bodyware was going haywire.  Nothing had worked
right since.  Then the Azzies were among them. It was a slaughter, Hart
could barely keep his eyes on them, much less hit them. Was that what it
was like for a norm , to go up against reflex-boosted opponents?  Hart was
the only survivor, managing to crawl broken and bloody back to the
extraction point.
	Back at Miltron HQ, in Cal Free, the labcoats poked and prodded
him to see what they could do.  In the end, the suits decided it wasn't
cost effective to replace all his tech.  So they just sewed up most of the
holes in him and kicked him loose, without even a pension.  So much for
twelve years faithful service in the Miltron Corporate Guard.  Hart knew
that if the boys at Miltron couldn't fix him up, no street doc in Cal Free
could either. So he came here, seeking the fabled black clinics of Chiba.
	Light flooded into the street as the door to the bar was opened.
Hart watched as a young kid with a shaved head exited the bar.  The kid
donned shades and a black leather jacket, then took off down the street.
Hart reached up to make sure the eyepatch he wore covered the empty
socket, and gingerly fingered the mass of new scar tissue that covered
most of the left side of his face.  Then he limped across the street and
entered the bar.
	Inside, the bar matched the neighborhood, run down and shabby.
Hart spotted three professionals at one table, two men and a woman, all
bearing a good amount of chrome.  Hart gave them a wide berth on his way
to the bar.  The grizzled bartender had an anc ient plastic cyberarm that
made almost as much noise as Hart's, but seemed to be in good working
order.  Hart ordered vodka and the old guy went to get it.  It was warm in
the bar so Hart removed the plastic duster and set it beside him on the
bar.  This left him wearing a soiled paper jumpsuit, the disposable kind
you wear for a day or two then toss.  Unfortuanately Hart had been wearing
this one for almost two weeks.  The hilt of a knife protruded from Hart's
boot and his trusty Glock 25 smartgun rested in a shoulder holster.
	Hart glanced around the bar as he waited for the old guy to bring
his vodka.  He spotted a couple towards the other end of the bar that
caught his attention.  The man looked nervous and a little out of place.
However, the woman was tall and athletic and wore a sword strapped across
her back.  Hart couldn't be sure, but he thought that she was watching him
on the sly. He decided to return the favor, not an easy thing to do with
only one functioning eye and Kyoto Eyewitness News blaring on his internal
comm-system. Hart was able to make out some of their conversation.

<Phyllis>
	She nodded, pulled out a seat at the table and the rainbow streak
in her black hair glittered under the neon.  She sat in the chair, a good
arm's length away from the table and said, "Ah... O.K.  Who do I remind
you of?  Or should I ask?"

<Dan>
	Ken deeply contemplated answering the question.  As he looked at
her, he realized that coming here was a big mistake.  He had dressed the
way he did when he was practicing in Howell.  His pale blue oxford, and
tan khaki pants, had no business being worn in this establishment.  That,
and Hasaki's direct questioning, made him doubly uncomfortable.  It showed
in his playing with his filtration mask in his right hand.

	"My... wife," a pit in his stomach quickly formed, "You remind me a
little of my wife.  She was," his voice rising slightly on, "was", "a
dancer, and you look like one too."

<Phyllis>
	Hasaki nodded and her smile went away for a moment, "Sorry she's
gone.  But I'm no dancer."

<Dan>
	_Am I that obvious?_ thought Ken to himself.  No matter, the cat
was out of the bag.  Perhaps she could drive the stake in a little deeper
and ask why.

<Russ>
	The bartender returned with the vodka, but after seeing Hart's
attire demanded payment up front. Hart complied.  The old guy perked up at
seeing the balance on Hart's credchip.  "Name's Ratz" he said, "This is my
place.  Anything I can do for ya?"
	"Maybe," Hart replied, "I'm lookin' for a docshop, one that really
knows cyberware.  You know anyone who can point me in the right
direction?"
	Ratz gave a non-commital shrug and a quick glance around the bar.
"Great" tought Hart and downed the vodka. "Might as well bring me the
bottle,old man" he decided to sit and check out the scene for a while.
Jugding from the bartender's reaction, asking unwelcome questions around
here could be unwise.

<Dan>
	Ken heard the word cyberware and thought.  A new patient was
always welcome at any clinic.  He started reaching in his wallet, trying
to see if he had any cards from the clinic.

<Phyllis>
	For a second, Hasaki's eyes narrowed in memory.  She shook her
head and then looked at Ken, at his out-of-place clothes and his
discomfort.  She grinned again and said, "This isn't a pickup line; but
what *is* a nice guy like you doing in a place like this?"

<Dan>
	"I was told to come here.  Stupid little shit, oops..."  He then
thought that she had probably heard worse, and continued, "The guy at the
front desk of my coffin stack told me the name of this place.  I looked it
up, it seemed there were a lot of gaijin here.  I should've guessed better
what KIND of gaijin were here.  Still, lot's of," he fumbled around his
wallet and found two business cards from his new clinic, "potential
customers could be here."

	He showed the one card to Hasaki.  It contained only a street
address and the name Kawai.  He again continued, "Not that *I* do stuff
like your arm, but we've good people."

<Phyllis>
	Hasaki delicately took the business card between two slender
fingers and looked at it.  She sighed and muttered to herself, "Docs..."
One corner of her mouth slanted down.  Then softer yet, "Argent... wonder
what happened to you?"

	She nodded in the direction of the guy that had just entered the
bar.  "Sounds like you got biz, chummer."  She sighed, got up from the
table and bowed and with a grin said, "Looks like you really do belong..."

<Russ>
	Just then, Ratz arrived with his bottle.  Hart poured another
glassfull and downed it as quickly as the first.  It was funny, he had
never used to drink that much, but that was before his life had turned to
shit and all his friends had died.  Well this was just to help with the
pain, as soon as he got fixed up, he would need the booze anymore. As Hart
took hold of the glass, to pour a third shot, the stabilizer circuit on
his cyberhand went out.  The glass went flying as the hand flopped back
and forth, out of control.  With a curse, Hart pulled a screwdriver from
the pocket of his jumpsuit and pried open a small service compartment in
his forearm.  As Hart shut off the power to his hand, it slowly came to
rest.  He had better find that clinic fast.

<Dan>
	_Holy shit,_ thought Ken to himself.  This guy was going to need a
cyberware specialist, quickly.  He sprang out of his chair, the quickly
passing sense of relief giving way to professional concern and
attentiveness.  The man seemed to have only mechanical trouble, no seeming
neurological trouble. Nonetheless, he quickly walked up to this man, who
had just shut his hand off, and asked the first question for cybernetic
triage.

	"Is it just the machinery, or is your body hurting too?"

<Russ>
	Hart looked up to see who had spoken to him.  Surprisingly, it was
the guy from the end of the bar. Hart scammed the room for his female
companion, but she seemed to have left.  Was this guy a doctor? He sounded
like one. "Well, I'm not in too much pain, but I don't even know if the
pain editor in my neuralware processor is functioning, since all my
internal monitors are off-line" said Hart. "Most of my other hardware is
out of control too."  He hefted his now powerless hand in testimony.
"Think you can help?"

<Dan>
	"I'm only a neurologist.  I work at a clinic with a lot of
cyberware people.  We ought to get you there stat," replied Dr. Ken
Moriarty as he thought about how to get this guy out of the bar.

<Russ>
	"Only a neurologist?" thought Hart.  In an age where "handy velcro
fasteners" made the art of shoe tying beyond the abilities of most, being
"only a neurologist" was pretty damn impressive.

	Hart stood and picked his plastic duster up off the bar.  "Okay
Doc, lead the way."  Then he followed the Doctor out of the Chatsubo.

<Dan>
	Dr. Ken Moriarty kept watching Hart, that was the man's name, to
see if anything else would start failing.  He seemed to make the brisk
walk out of Night City without incident, and as they reached the edge, Ken
signalled the first autocab he could hail.  He helped Hart into the cab by
being a support for Hart's one good arm, and then he entered the cab.  He
muttered off the clinic's street address to the cab, and turned to the now
relaxed Hart.

	"What the hell did you do to get like this?"  He asked as he looked
over [Hart's] damage, wondering what had caused it all.

<Russ>
	Hart leaned back into the soft seat of the cab, and told Dr.
Moriarty the whole story. About being a Corp Commando, the ambush by the
Aztechnology troops and Mitron's refusal to fix him up.  "So I came to
Chiba" he concluded, "Because they're supposed to be able to fix anything
in the clinics here."

	"So Doc, Whataya think about that neural scrambler, or whatever it
was they used on us?"

<Dan>
	Ken Moriarty looked thoroughly astonished, yet at the same time
realized that these were the sort of patients his clinic, and many other
Chiba clinics, dealt with.

	"I couldn't begin to tell you what that scrambler did.  It's most
likely a device for neutralizing mechanical implants," he looked over Hart
quickly, "which you seem to have plenty of.  I'm a neurosurgeon,
specializing in repro... ," he paused, "neurochemistry."

	The autocab arrived at the Kawai Clinic.  Like all unlicensed
clinics in Chiba, its facade was modest to the point of obscurity.  He
helped Hart limp out of the cab, and tore another rip in his two-week old
paper jumpsuit, probably issued by another faci lity.  They walked toward
the entrance.  Ken groped for his keycard, swiped it past the reader, and
looked into the near-hidden retinal scanner.  He hoped his retinal
patterns were already entered into Kawai's system.

	"We'll get you in, and at least looked at.  Tell me, you weren't
taking any enhancement drugs, were you?  I might be able to help the
comedown and other nasty withdrawl effects, but we'll let the pros take
care of the hardware."

<Russ>
	Hart shook his head and then fought off a wave of dizziness. Maybe
that vodka he drank back at the bar wasn't such a good idea.  He steadied
himself against the wall with is good arm.  "No drugs Doc.  I had hardware
to boost my reflexes and block out the pain.  Sometimes on missions,
they'd give us strength enhancers, but it's been over a month since I shot
any."

	The security scanner beeped softly and the door to the clinic
swung open silently.  Hart followed the Doctor inside.

--
Russell T. Brown      * Definition: Egotist. A person of low taste, more
rtbrown@nyx.cs.du.edu * interested in himself than me! -Ambrose Bierce
It's not denial. I'm just very selective about the reality I accept -Calvin
Alt.Cyberpunk.Chatsubo Character & Author Database Archiver >> That's me!