[SgtBoomCloud]

Krestov remained silent during the entire briefing, looking visibly puzzled by the strange reactions coming from his teammates.  "It...seems straightforward.."  He rumbled softly while his link worked to translate the difficult technical bits into his native tongue.   It was several moments that he stood still as a stone until his eyes opened up a little more...one's imagination could hear the ding of a microwave being finished coming from his skull.

"...Oh..."

It was fortunate that, though a lot of his equipment and armor was bigger than the others', it all could be compacted very easily.  His weapon, jacket, leg armor, belts, and ballistic shield folded neatly on the bottom of the box, leaving plenty of room atop for the other three to stow gear.  He undressed to simply his tank and boxer underwear without a word or hesitation, his jaw set firm as he prepared himself for what happened next.  It wasn't...unfamiliar with some tortures he endured in training...but it was new...

[Volker]

"All right, boys. You enter first, I, um, have to, you know, check the autobots. And stuff."
She seems mildly amused, yet unwilling to strip naked in front of her crew. Instead she stows what little stuff she brought into the box. The chameleon suite, however, cannot be "easily replaced". She tries to stuff it into her chamber before she enters herself. Compared to Slobbertooth (let alone Krestov) the skinny, almost anorexic girl hardly takes up space anyway.

"I am not going to let that thing coma me before we arrive. What about you, chummers?"
While the others stow their stuff, undress, and get inside the coff... autobots, she sits comfortably on the floor, wall to the back, and drops into full VR, adapting the autobots' programming. First thing, the sequence will start on a manual input, not automatically. Second, she will install some routines for the future: Whenever any vitals show significant deviation from their default stats, both bnc and the person whose vitals go out of order, will be wakened up. In case of an alarming deviation, however, everyone is going to be waked up instantly.

Once this is done, and any requests from her chummers are fulfilled, she goes offline again. In the meanwhile everyone should be in their respective underwater graves. With a shiver, she enters her drone, closes the door, uncovers her abdomen, breathes, adjusts all the life-sustaining tentacles, and goes online.

"Check time. Can everybody in the Jonas host hear me? I'm ready. At least, as ready as I'm going to get."

[Sabato Kuroi]

I think  I can hear Slobber snoring already.Maybe it's just my imagination. Hard to  believe I'm  having  two months of peaceful sleep eventhough he's gonna be few  meters  away. 

[Jack_Spade]

When the last lid had closed, small daylight LED filled the interior with a warm light, somehow reducing the claustrophobic feeling. A buzzing sound revealed to bnc that their bodys where now scanned and measured.

A small gleaming metal tentacle found her datajack, while her male comrades received a trode mesh.
Instantly a number of AR windows popped up, showing basic medical data. Next came the promised bio sensors to the chest and a simulation of each team members heart appeared in the lower left corner. Simultaneously a window opened, showing a video of a small baby otter as an adorable distraction.

The dreaded moment came and went with nothing more than a cool and than numb sensation. bnc knew that the system would have used a lubricant with a contact anesthetic. Immediately another host of little windows popped up adding a steady stream of bio data.

What came next had been described as a "personality calibrating test". In an insanely fast succession pictures, sounds and even smells assaulted their senses. It all went much to fast to hold on to anything consciously, but Slobbertooth, Krestov and bnc felt a deep unease without being able to express why. Krestov even felt a tear running down his cheek, while bnc suddenly had a deep longing for the embrace of her sister. Slobbertooth instead felt the burning desire to hit someone with as much force as he could muster.

"Calibration complete." The voice was slightly different for every team member but instantly provided a positive association of safety and trust. The documentation had called this a "stress reducing measure for longterm treatment".

One by one the pods began to sink under the surface. Very subtle, the thin mattresses molded themselves perfectly to their individual body structure, stabilizing and immobilizing them.

"Individual treatment can now begin."



Maxime #20 of Maximally Effective Mercenaries: If you're not willing to shell your own position, you're not willing to win

Somewhere in the water outside Seattle

Krestov's pod

"Hello Krestov, my scan of you is complete.
You possess various biological and cybernetic improvements. Their performance lies within safe parameters
Your overall health is... good. Your body shows a... massive amount of scar tissue and some slight nerve damage. Your skin shows signs of a mild autoimmune disorder triggered by... silver. Treatment and surgery methods have been amended accordingly
Your mental reaction is... good. Your calibrating result shows signs of severe post traumatic stress.
Your brain chemistry is... slightly unbalanced. There is an imbalance in your Glutamate-GABA levels, indicating longterm alcohol abuse.

Would you like to begin treatment now?"

Torrent's pod

"Hello Torrent, my scan of you is complete.
You possess no biologic or cybernetic improvements.
Your overall health is... good. Your facial muscles show unusual high amounts of tension. Your keratin cells show signs of worryingly high levels of cell division. This could be indicative of an early stage skin carcinoma. Your intestinal tract shows signs of a mild form of Coeliac disease. Nutrition needs have been calibrated accordingly.
Your mental reaction is... good. Your calibrating result shows signs of post traumatic stress.
Your brain chemistry is... good. There are no signs of imbalances.

Would you like to begin treatment now?"

Slobbertooth's pod

"Hello Slobbertooth, my scan of you is complete.
You possess no biologic or cybernetic improvements.
Your overall health is... excellent. You may have a lollypop. 
Your mental reaction is... good. Your calibrating result shows signs of post traumatic stress.
Your brain chemistry is... good. There are no signs of imbalances.

Would you like your lolly now?"

bnc's pod

"Hello bnc, my scan of you is complete.
You possess biological and cybernetic improvements. Their performance lies within safe parameters. The next service for your "Fiber Optic Hair(TM)" is due in... 38 days. Remember, only regular service will extend your warranty to the full two years.
Your overall health is... worrying. You show signs of severe malnutrition. Intestinal scans show signs of... malabsorbtion disorder. Nutrition needs have been calibrated accordingly.
Your mental reaction is... worrying. Your calibrating result shows signs of severe post traumatic stress. If you want to talk or press charges against your attacker I will assist you. Be advised that this is a safe place, anything you say about this will be confidential and highly encrypted.
Your brain chemistry is... severely unbalanced. There is a strong imbalance in your Dopamine levels, indicating longterm substance abuse. Treatment options are available.

Would you like to begin treatment now?"

[SquirrelDude]

I don't go in for sweets

Slobbertooth imagined his face expressing slight relief, and then thought, Well, my first physical in 5 years turned up better than expected. The PTSD isn't much of a surprise, considering.

[Volker]

bnc eases herself into the comfortable shell. She doesn't object when the datajack is inserted, or when the tentacles are attached to her. She double-checks all the data the autobot's system provides with her own built-in (and offline) bio-monitor. She didn't entirely trust the system to begin with, but after a few minutes, she had grown a deep mistrust.

She immediately focusses on the task. Not so much because she's a workaholic or she wants to appear professional, but more because her mind needs activity the same way a squirrel needs to move. She forges a routine that analyses the basic medical data that flows in through the 'jack and compares it automatically to her augmentation's data output. She turns off the distracting baby otter and flip, she's connected to the system.

And then the "personality calibrating test" starts. As soon as she realizes what's happening she's furious. "What the drek? Dudes, these pods are exposing us to subliminal or almost subliminal clues, recording our cerebral activity. In English, they're showing your brain pictures and then scribble notes on how you react to different kinds of exposure. Finding out your most intimate fears and sorrows. Profiling you. No fucking way, Arschloch!"

Nutrition needs have been calibrated accordingly.
Your mental reaction is... worrying. Your calibrating result shows signs of severe post traumatic stress. If you want to talk or press charges against your attacker I will assist you. Be advised that this is a safe place, anything you say about this will be confidential and highly encrypted.
Your brain chemistry is... severely unba-

bnc hits the kill the fucking ARO button. The whole procedure might be constructed to make her feel comfortable, but even in 2075 machines make one mistake: They are ignorant of the personal histories of their ... customers. bnc has been treated by psychologists since she can think and Maths wasn't the only thing where outwitting others was fun. She knows fucking well what's going on and the mere thought that someone was manipulating her on this level - for her sake or not doesn't make any difference at all - makes her really furious.
"No - fucking - way", she spits into the void, and delets the file even before the pod is under water.

"I've got admin rights here. Anybody else uncomfortable with the thought that they can define on a Likert skale how much you miss your mom?"

[SquirrelDude]

Slobbertooth understood the reason's for bnc's dissatisfaction but couldn't work up the same passion that she had.

"Do you mean like how every advertisement on the matrix tracks which ones you respond to in order to spam you with more of the same drek over and over again? How the companies that has your SIN can use that to track your location, your activities, and what you buy to spam AR with more advertisements based on that information? How an anemic teenage decker can discover almost anything about your past with only the most basic information in the matter of minutes to hours?"

Slobbertooth gave a muffled laugh. "At least these computers are letting me know that I have a mild case of PTSD before they decide whether or not to exploit it."

[Sabato Kuroi]

I think I like  the snoring Slobber more than the pessimistic one.Relax, if the good doctor won't agree to  erase this info after this job is done, we can always hack the host, retrieve our personal data and kill herr Schmidt  after he's paid us.Am I right,Doc?

Torrent couldn't explain why but he felt relief when he realised the pod couldn't fully analyse his adept powers.As far as he was concerned, the day when science would be able to explain all things magical,would be a sad day indeed.

[SgtBoomCloud]

Krestov remained silent, breathing steadily and focusing inward as they embarked, barely reacting as the trode nets and the various tubes and sensors were attached to his body, sending a confirmation to bnc as she sent out the check-in on the Jonas host, showing that he was connected, settling in.  It wasn't too long before the disembarked that the calibrations came...

"Hello Krestov, my scan of you is complete.
You possess various biological and cybernetic improvements. Their performance lies within safe parameters
Your overall health is... good. Your body shows a... massive amount of scar tissue and some slight nerve damage. Your skin shows signs of a mild autoimmune disorder triggered by... silver. Treatment and surgery methods have been amended accordingly
Your mental reaction is... good. Your calibrating result shows signs of severe post traumatic stress.
Your brain chemistry is... slightly unbalanced. There is an imbalance in your Glutamate-GABA levels, indicating longterm alcohol abuse.

Would you like to begin treatment now?"

His jaw was set firm, breath coming in short bursts as he tried to keep control, a bit in shock that he was actually crying, and personally hoping that bnc didn't catch that on the sensors.  Girl wouldn't let me live it down...  Then he heard the voice.  Female, with a maternal lilt to it, and most astonishing, in Russian.  That caught him the most off guard of the whole thing, even as the analysis proved to be very accurate.  Before he was able to respond to the AutoDoc's interface, the shrill spiteful bursts from bnc and the discussions that ensued crackled into his discussion feed.  He remained silent, and when he eventually spoke, his voice seemed a little choked...must be the cramped space he was having to occupy.

"..Hmm....just mild case, Slobbertooth?  Either you are greener than you let on, or are a steel wall of mind.

bnc, forgive my argument, but must remind these are not smuggling pods.  Have you experience with AutoDoc?  Their purpose is to give tailored treatment to individual.  I experience not one designed for long term, but this calibration is not unheard of.  If were to guess, this is normal function of these AutoDoc pods.  While not perfect in agreement to Torrent, plan to wipe or retrieve information upon completion is wise.  I have faith our hacker can do this if need be.

There is little evidence to believe this is trap, as bnc has control of pods as last resort.  I am asking for faith, and will be test bear for 'treatment.'

Without a chance for protest, Krestov hit the "yes" button on the display in his AR view, taking a deep breath in anticipation.  Man...trolls can be stubborn when they set their mind to something...

[Volker]

"You guys are just no fun."

She can hardly hide her embarrasment. She still hates the idea of someone or something muddling with her brain, but it you don't need a lot of cerebral capacity to see that she just made a fool of herself in front of the whole team.
She passes over the (almost rhetoric) questions of her teammates and tries to re-establish the damaged position as "the expert".

"Right, there we go. I will monitor each of us until we arrive at the doc and actually until Mr. Johnson invites me to mark his 'link.
Before you doze off, please provide me with a list of wifi gear you plan to use down there. Some gear, like smartguns, won't work properly, because they can't use wifi data. On the other hand, the weather situation should be pretty easy to calculate down there. So maybe if it's a smart smartgun it might still work. Anyhow, the point is: I can protect a limited amount of gear as you know. It would be helpful to tell me what you're going to use there.

[SquirrelDude]

"..Hmm....just mild case, Slobbertooth?  Either you are greener than you let on, or are a steel wall of mind.

Slobbertooth tossed it over in his mind, thinking about the things he's seen and done. "The blood on my hands means it's probably the latter.

That's neat, I guess.

"Before you doze off, please provide me with a list of wifi gear you plan to use down there. Some gear, like smartguns, won't work properly, because they can't use wifi data. On the other hand, the weather situation should be pretty easy to calculate down there. So maybe if it's a smart smartgun it might still work. Anyhow, the point is: I can protect a limited amount of gear as you know. It would be helpful to tell me what you're going to use there.

"No problem, our petite matrix maestro." Slobbertooth activated his trodes and sent her the information that she requested.

Item (Settings) : Bonus
Helmet (On) : Trodes/Image Link function
Sony Emperor (On) : Works
Micro-transceiver (Off) : worldwide transmission.
Glasses (On) : +3 bonus to visual perception
Earbuds (On) : +3 bonus to audio perception
Concealed Holster (On) : additional -1 concealability
Smartlink (On) : +1 to ranged attack test
Silencer (Off) : Provides information on whether or no you were heard.

[Sabato Kuroi]

@bnc [Torrent]:
1.Eye-contacts
2.Pistol
3.Chameleon suit
4.Autopicker

[SgtBoomCloud]

While immobilized in his pod, one could almost sense his mental nod to the request, the troll mentally drawing up his list.

<<@bnc
<<This is provided in order of necessity, should protection need rationed

1. Renraku Sensei link, for interfacing other equipment
2 . Cybereyes.  Namely vision enhancement but can be selectively used
3.  Helmet suite.  Trodes, etc
4. Ares Crusader II smartgun.  Shooting better, self explained
    Attached silencer.  Optional.
5. Yamaha Pulsar smartgun.  As above.
6 microtransceiver.  Wireless will be off, range is suitable.


..a note.  Understand reason for paranoia, malyutka.  No shame.  Your mind is yours.  No doubt if you accepted treatment you could exercise final say on what happens.  Thought I would say this.  Apologies.

Finished, the troll idly wondered just what this treatment would be like...

[Jack_Spade]

Krestov's decision was answered by the pod with the motherly face of an older woman, waiting patiently until the troll returned his concentration to her.
"You have chosen to start therapy. I am very happy that you did. Before we begin I want to clarify a few things:
First: You have the option to stop the treatment at any time.
Second: Anything you do or say is confidential and will be highly encrypted
Third: There is nothing to be ashamed of for asking for help. No-one asks why a flesh wound should be treated instead of being left to fester. Wounds to the psyche are not so different.

My analysis suggests that your alcohol consumption is directly related to traumatic experiences in your past. All in all you are a highly resilient person with a functioning social circle. Social support is one of the most important aspects of this treatment.

Post traumatic stress reactions are natural and can occur to everybody. It is actually an evolutionary survival benefit: People suffering from it have a higher pain tolerance, are hyper vigilant and tend to react faster to perceived threats. The current theory is that this stems from an incomplete processing of the traumatic memory, triggering the repeat of the memory at a later time.

Through Narrative Confrontation Therapy in a controlled virtual reality you may be able to consciously create closure to those memories, shutting them down properly. With your help I'll recreate the situations and you'll be able experience them from a safe perspective, desensitizing yourself to their effect while targeted stimulation of key brain regions allow you to these highly emotional scenes with cool detachment. It would be best if trusted friends would accompany you in this to create a shared perspective and to provide an anchor to your real life.

I will monitor your stress levels carefully and stop the procedure should the experience prove to be harmful or to dangerous to you.

Would you like to start describing your traumatic experience? Start with peripheral details and avoid for the moment the central elements. After the framework is constructed we can invite your friends."


From her admin position, bnc was able to track Krestov's general interaction with the autodoc program, but a direct feed still needed a purposefully complicated designed opening sequence, discouraging accidental snooping into patient-doctor dialog. Besides that, she didn't find any threatening behavior within the system.

According to the outside data the pods had now moved close to half an hour through the sea. The target coordinates seemed to be a featureless spot in the Seattle bay. After some more minutes the combined sensor array of the Jonas-Host displayed a large vessel - probably a container ship or tanker according to it's dimensions.

bnc noticed how a subroutine was triggered and the pods moved as a perfect swarm to the underside of the ship. To her surprise there seemed to be a large rectangular hole at the bottom through which the pods surfaced.

The microphones took in loud engine noise and - after engaging the select sound filter - two people talking:
"A Doc, seems as if your little whales have found their way back in time."
"Did you have any doubts? That was just a last routine check. I'll analyze the data in my spare time down at Erebos Base. For now please put them directly in my container. I don't want to disturb the bio samples inside just yet."
"Okay dokey Doc, when's the sub arriving to take you down?"
"It should be with us in about two hours."
"You sure have some mighty balls to go down and stay there for two months - they couldn't pay me enough to live an oil sardine. Not to mention what the pressure down there could do to such a tin can."
"It's not so bad and the high pressure is countered within."
"Nevertheless. Would be a shame to lose you - you are one of the better guys to have around."
"I'm flattered, but you wouldn't happen to say that just because I came out more than a little bit worse for cash from our last poker game?"
"Well, I certainly am willing to give you an opportunity for a revanche when you come back up. After all what should you do with all the cash you are going to earn down there..."

The rest of the discussion was lost as a crane began to take the pods from the water and locked them inside a heavy steel container.

[SgtBoomCloud]

Krestov listened without interruption to the soothing lilt of the voice in his mother tongue, mentally nodding again at the explanation of the proposed treatment.  There was a pause before he mentally entered a response.

<<What trauma would be best?  In my life, there has been much most would consider trauma.  In my work, it is job to protect my coworkers from harm by any means necessary, and that often is myself.  Scar tissue and nerve damage prove that.  I know of pain, but was conditioned for it.  Taking that pain was my purpose.  If I were to have completed the Evo Conditioning Program at KE's Academy I would be head of special team in hostile situation.  Was decision made for me when was merely boy holding on to mother's skirt.  Did well in training, until pro-human litigation had me ousted and stripped of purpose.  Instead, found use for talents in current job.

In short, madam.  Trauma is my life, and my burden. There are few close enough to consider friend, fewer I trust with that part of me>>