Under the Knife(63)

No one moved.

“No? Terrific. Strong stomachs all around. Now. You can see that Dr. Wu completed the first part of the operation this morning, before we arrived. However, Delores is fully capable of performing the same tasks. Delores can even use a scalpel to make an incision in the skin, just like a human surgeon.”

“So why didn’t it do that today?” Grant asked.

“We want to gradually test Dolores’s capabilities under real-world conditions.”

Montgomery looked at Wu and nodded. She nodded back.

“Are we ready, Dr. Chow?” Wu asked.

“You are good to go, Rita. Everything looks perfect up here.” He turned and gave a thumbs-up to the group. “Morpheus is working beautifully. Just as expected.”

“Wonderful,” Montgomery crowed. “Dr. Wu, please commence.”

Sebastian thought himself a hard man. A professional. He’d seen and done some … distasteful … things over the years. But he’d owned up to what he’d done and didn’t apologize for it. Any of it. He’d done what he’d done to survive. The world was shit, and he’d made of it what he could.

Still … what he knew was coming made his insides squirm. Was it with guilt? But guilt was unprofessional. So why was he feeling this way?

Because Alfonso wouldn’t have been down with this shit.

He shifted his weight and pushed the thought from his mind.

Wu pushed a button on the robot’s central body. The three arms entered into a coordinated sequence of movements, buzzing and humming and spinning, flexing their joints like octopus tentacles.

They reminded Sebastian of a Spider-Man movie. He’d seen it with Sammy, and it had been pretty good, with this villain with big metallic tentacles fused to his body, which he moved around like extra arms and used as weapons. That’s what these things looked liked: metallic tentacles.

Montgomery explained: “Dolores’s arms are now orienting themselves. Recall that each of those arms has a Swiss Army at its tip: the instrument with the multiple tools that we demonstrated for you earlier.”

The arms moved themselves into position over the remaining three ports, one arm per port. They halted above them, hovering centimeters away, as if waiting for something.

“Delores, initiate manual-positioning protocol for Swiss Army numbers one, two, and three,” Wu said.

“Of course,” Delores responded. “Initiating manual-positioning protocol for Swiss Army numbers one, two, and three.”

He heard a click, followed by the tinny droning of multiple gears in all three of the arms. A pause, then each slid smoothly forward, seeking its corresponding port.

Now Sebastian thought the arms looked like silver snakes, slithering toward the patient; all they lacked were hissing, metallic tongues. The tips of each of the Swiss Armies extended through a circular opening in the top of its port and disappeared into the patient. The spinning stopped, and all three instruments paused, again, with their tips in the ports.

Montgomery said, “Dr. Wu will now move each of the Swiss Army instruments into its final position manually.”

“Why?” Grant asked. “Why not have the robot do it?”

“Again, out of caution, Ms. Grant. It’s the first time we’ve done this with a patient, and we decided it was the absolute safest way to proceed. Once Dr. Wu has personally positioned each of the instruments, Delores will assume control.”





RITA


Rita grasped the first Swiss Army.

“I think it’s fair to tell you, Dr. Wu,” Finney said. “I’m quite familiar with Delores, and the auto-surgeon program. I have been for some time.”

Rita jerked her hand away from the Swiss Army and suppressed a yelp.

“Dr. Wu,” Lisa whispered. “Is everything okay?”

“Yes,” Rita whispered back.

“My apologies. I didn’t mean to startle you in front of all of these people,” Finney said.

Rita reached a tentative hand back toward the first Swiss Army as Finney said, “I’m the majority investor—the owner, for all intents and purposes—of the privately held company that designs and manufactures Delores. Were you aware of that, Dr. Wu?”

Oh, shit.

What’s he talking about?

“But of course you wouldn’t know that,” Finney said. “It’s not a matter of public record.”

Rita’s surgical gown suddenly seemed too hot. Sweat gathered in her armpits and trickled down her sides.

I need to operate on Mrs. Sanchez.

She gripped the Swiss Army and gently pushed it farther into Mrs. Sanchez, as she’d done hundreds of times in the simulations, sliding it through the port and into Mrs. Sanchez’s abdominal cavity.

The pointed tip emerged on the screen of the Jumbotron, magnified to the size of a lamppost.

“And there’s the first Swiss Army, inside the patient’s body,” Chase said. “Now coming into our camera’s field of vision.”

Rita took care to not push it too far, too quickly—to keep its tip a safe distance from the liver. Even without its scalpel deployed, the Swiss Army was a potential deadly weapon: a spear that could impale Mrs. Sanchez’s liver, or other organs, if Rita extended it a few centimeters too far.

Rita stopped advancing the tip, and said, haltingly, “Delores, initiate laparoscopic cholecystectomy protocol for Swiss Army number one.”