Trace sat on the edge of his bed, and gradually flexed and moved the different pieces of his cyberware arm and hand. It was the same exercise he had been performing multiple times every day ever since waking up in Sevorah’s clinic.

The sight of the arm didn’t bother him as much as he had once thought it would. It turned out that his mind was far more practical in that regard than he had been giving himself credit for. What did bother him was his inability to properly use the arm. It was a constant struggle not to break things, or not swing his arm too hard when he was simply waving.

All the movements he had grown up performing subconsciously had suddenly become herculean tasks of focus. He had to relearn how to use his arm and hand from the ground up.

It was a common occurrence for pretty much everyone who had a limb replaced with something even moderately high-end. Monroe had regaled Trace with tales of his own struggles while he was still at the clinic, to everyone’s amusement.

Surprisingly, the thing that had helped the most was his enhanced learning courses. They had been transferred to his new NetConnect, and the increased space of his new one meant he could add even more in the future. However, for the moment, he was simply working through the five he already had. His new cyberware arm, and all his capabilities, and current deficits, were also transferred over into the programs.

None of the classes went to waste, as all of them introduced a different aspect of training for him and his arm. ‘Basic System Breaching’ trained the dexterity of his fingers as they used the keyboard. ‘Basic Electrical Engineering’ was a constant source of training in his fine muscle controls. Both in his arm and hand. ‘Basic Mechanical Engineering’ was grip and arm strength for the project portions.

Then, of course, there were the two major problem courses, ‘Guns & Not Dying’ and ‘Knives & Not Dying’. He had been getting pretty good -in his own opinion- at both before losing his arm. Now, he was even worse than when he initially began. That said, the compressed time inside the enhanced teaching courses meant he was making fast progress.

At least in relation to others.

While he was being generally frustrated with life, Deckard had retaken his place on the shelf with absolute glee. According to him, his time going without access to the server and the net had been absolute torture. There was only so much he could do with his own hardware, which consisted of a secondary NetConnect that he’d possessed since he’d been a baby.

They hadn’t even thought to give him a proper NetConnect until he mentioned it. For the moment, Trace’s old one was wired, somewhat haphazardly, into several of Deckard’s connector ports. The server, in turn, was then run to the newer NetConnect.

He had been making do with his original connection. However, with his new NetConnect, the progress he began to make on the 3D printer was noticeable. That wasn’t all either, as he had begun to work on OS revisions for the device whenever he got bored.

It would still take some time to complete the update, but it would at least keep him occupied. NetConnects were complicated devices that were intimately tied into a person’s life. As he soon found out, changing one thing could have cascading effects.

It was entirely possible that he had been too quick to judge the corporate programmers for never having done a proper OS update.

One week after being sent home, Ko came to get Trace for a checkup. Something that was mostly pointless since she had been doing her own checks on him each night.

The initial round of stims, along with a single general healing stim, had gotten his fractured bones under control enough that Sevorah had let him out a day after he awoke. They had removed the pins and casts shortly after he regained consciousness, in fact, but made him stay in place for just a little while longer.

He had wanted to use the nanites to heal himself, however; he had run into a couple of problems when he tried. They had done a lot of work to repair his body already, and there were none left in his system to use for that option. That meant he would need to create a bunch first before he could select the option.

Luckily, the general healing stim and other stimulants had gotten him in good enough condition to at least go back to the warehouse. He was finally able to use the healing nanites a couple of days earlier.

Sevorah poked and prodded him, her scans coming back with images of healthy bones. The fractures, which should have still shown up in some form, had completely disappeared. It was as though the damage had never even happened.

Even the connections around his new arm had healed up well, and the synth skin around the joint hid everything perfectly. The nerves had fully embraced the cyberware connections, and the synth-muscles and bones had settled into place as well. If she didn’t know better, she would say his surgery had taken place at least six months or more before, and not a week and a half.

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She had so many questions, but Ko was keeping a close eye on her the entire time.

Finally, she huffed in frustration and lightly tugged on her hair. “You’re looking good, suspiciously so. However, that isn’t my concern. All I am in charge of is your health, which is looking good. The second to last thing we need to do is run through some tests for your arm.”

Trace nodded. He had been getting better with using it for most things. There was one thing that he had found himself struggling with though, and that was the extra length spread throughout the arm. It was only an inch and a half, but the difference from his original fleshware arm just kept throwing him off.

Finally, she finished the last of her tests and signed off on his condition. “I am going to hesitantly give you the go-ahead to resume work, not that you actually need my permission.” She said that, but if he had begun working without it, Stick-Point would have never let him hear the end of it. “You will still need to take things slowly,” She pointed to his arm. “Even if you are regaining basic function, it doesn’t mean anything if you are so clumsy that you can’t even use your weapons properly.”

He nodded. “I’ve already talked to Monroe about it, and the job we were going to do is being put on hold for another week or two. We are going to take a couple of easy trainer missions to help me get back in the groove.”

“Good, with your current rate of progress, another week or two is probably all you need.” She put her ink-sheet with all her notes to the sides and leaned toward him. “I have one final question, and then you may leave. And Trace, do not lie to me. This question needs to be answered truthfully.”

He swallowed and nodded, knowing what was coming.

“How are you handling the sudden changes to your body? Any unexplained urges, moments of anger, dissociative thoughts relating to the arm not being your own?” Sevorah held her breath, as he thought over the last week.

“I mean, there was plenty of anger those first few days,” Trace chuckled as he thought over everything that had happened after he first got back to his apartment. “I couldn’t control the arm or my grip strength that well, so I ended up crushing a few tools, burritos, sodas, a spare scope.” He sighed. “Yeah, there was definitely some anger there in the beginning. I think it was deserved though. Part of it was frustration with myself for not being better and being unable to properly use it, and also refusing to simply use my left hand.”

He shook his head ruefully, remembering those first few days. His eyes drifted down to his onyx right hand. “Maybe it’s because I know I’m still adjusting to it, but no, I don’t think there have been any issues of that nature. I’m not saying there won’t be in the future, but for now, at least, my mind is still open enough to work with the new limb.”

The mender nodded. “That can happen. As you said, your mind recognizes it’s something new so it will be more open and receptive to changes for a time. This period lasts differently for each person, but I would suggest making the most of it while you can. Those who fail to integrate with their new cyberware during that time tend to be slow adopters afterward.”

“So, I’m not in danger of going cyberpsycho?” He asked.

“Assuming you told me the truth, then it seems unlikely.”

He breathed out in relief and stood. “Well, that’s the best news I’ve heard all day.”

They finished up a few other items and then Ko shuffled him out and pushed him into Sev’s tiny car in order to take him home.

She hissed in annoyance as they drew close to the warehouse. “Those stupid drones are still hovering all over the place. What are they even looking for?”

“Who knows? Maybe all they’re doing is keeping an eye on the place in case we accidentally reveal something.” Trace said while covering up as much of his arm and hand as he could.

“Well, I don’t like it,” Ko muttered, flipping each one off in turn as they drove into the warehouse, the large doors closing behind them.

“Same, but there isn’t much I can really do at the moment.”

“I need to get back to the clinic, but you still haven’t let me know which of the modules or add-ons you want me to install on the arm.”

He groaned. “I haven’t even thought about it if I’m being honest. The thought of the modules just seemed like the one extra thing that could potentially push my mind over the edge. I wanted to see what Sevorah had to say about my progress first before I even considered taking that step.”

She lightly smacked his shoulder. “Hey, I know what I’m doing as well, you know.”

“Yeah, but she has like what a hundred years of experience on you.” Trace joked.

“Oh, I so going to tell her you said that about her age!” Ko threatened with a mean grin.

“Hey none of that now. We’re all friends here. There’s no need to be issuing death threats like that.”

She rolled her eyes and shoved his shoulder into the door. “Get going. I’ll talk to you later.”

He waved as she drove off, the movement still a little jerky. Inside the apartment, he found Deckard running the 3D-printer through its paces. On the plate beneath the printhead, there were several piles of metal, along with one that was obviously the slag they couldn’t use.

“Did you finish your latest revision on the program?” He asked, grabbing the seat from his computer to watch. The top of the chair groaned where he had gripped it a little too tightly, but didn’t bend this time. He had already been forced to repair it several times that week.

Deckard’s avatar nodded. “This was the best result I could come up with in the virtual simulations. Now, I am testing in the real world to see what differences there are between the two results. So far, I am quite pleased with how it is performing, though there has been some variance.”

“Does that mean we can finally start processing our metal?” He asked hopefully. “I’m not going to lie. If I could perform an upgrade on this arm and get it to help me control it better, I would be absolutely overjoyed. I do not want to risk going cyberpsycho, Deckard.”

The braincase’s avatar stared at him. “There are options in the G.H.O.S.T. System to help prevent that eventuality. You simply need to use them.”

He was talking about the mental options he had seen in the menu, and always ignored. “Or we could simply upgrade the arm.” Trace suggested instead.