Sicktember Day 20: Doctor's Visit/Check-up
Word Count: 1244
Author: aquietwritingcorner/realitybreakgirl
Rating: K/G
Characters: Captain Buccaneer
Warning:
Summary: Buccaneer gets a check-up from Neil and Doc over his new automail arm.
Notes:

Doctor's Visit/Check-up

"It's just not working the way I want it to."

Buccaneer looked down his arm—his new, metal, automail arm. He was still having a bit of trouble remembering it was his, if he was honest. It still felt sort of foreign to him.

Neil and Doc were looking at it, and Buccaneer resisted the urge to shift in his seat. He sort of felt like a bug in a jar or something, although he knew that neither one of them would try to make him feel that way on purpose.

"Not work the way you want it to, how?" Neil asked, running a critical eye over the piece of hardware.

Buccaneer frowned. "Its… Its not responding right. It does sometimes, but then other times I'll try to do something and it'll go wrong. I accidently threw a glass of water all over Miles yesterday. I was lucky I didn't hit the general. But I did shatter one of the general's teacups when we were in her office."

Doc and Neil exchanged looks.

"That all seems pretty normal, actually," Neil said. "You've had the automail seven months now. Its still going to take some getting used to. I mean, we can check it out if you want us to, but you can't expect to be completely back to normal yet, especially since you've only had it seven months."

"Isn't seven months long enough to have this thing working right?" Buccaneer pressed. "I'm tired of misfires! It makes me unreliable!"

"It's going to take time," Neil said. "Lots of it. You didn't learn to use your flesh arm as well as you did in seven months, did you? It's going to take time for you to learn to use your automail arm."

Buccaneer frowned. "…I suppose that makes sense. But—I feel so useless! I can't stay out long in the cold, I'm not reliable with a weapon. I can't even be trusted to hold things all the time! What good am I going to be here if I can't get this under control?"

"R&D is working on a new metal mix that should last longer in the cold," Neil said, reaching out and running his hands over the arm, examining it. Buccaneer didn't try to stop him. "And I'm working on some modifications that might can help as well."

"Yeah?" Buccaneer said, his interest piquing.

Neil nodded and reached for Buccaneer's shoulder. "Mind if I…?"

Buccaneer shook his head. "No, go ahead."

Neil pressed the release points, expertly manipulating the arm and taking it off. He looked at the joining point on the arms itself, and then around the port in Buccaneer's shoulder.

"Yeah," he said, a little distractedly. "Part of the problem is the type of metal, of course. We need something that's more resistant to the cold and won't transfer the cold to your flesh as easily." He ran his hands around the rim of the port. "When we find the right mix, that will mean replacing some of this to help."

Buccaneer nodded. "Sure, that makes sense. But what else?"

"Well, that's where it's a little trickier," Neil said. "The length of time you want to spend outside is longer than most automail users want to be. It's longer than most people wanna be, to be honest. Even when we do find the best metal mix, keeping your flesh warm is going to be a challenge."

He ran his fingers over the edge of the port, where it intersected and overlaid with some of his flesh. "If we could put some sort of insulating material here, it would help…"

Doc moved back over to look at where Neil was indicating and frowned. "The problem with that would be keeping the flesh healthy. Too much insulation there wouldn't be good for it."

"Yeah, I know." Neil frowned. "The other idea I had was trying to find a way to warm it from the inside."

"The inside?" Doc asked.

"Yeah, like, the body generates its own heat anyway. And automail is basically just a machine. Machines generate heat as well. If there was a way to increase that and disperse it to the outer edges of the flesh, then that would keep it warmer." Neil said. He looked in the port. "Here and here… I have some preliminary ideas worked out."

Doc frowned. "But what about when he's not outside? Overheating the flesh could become a problem as well."

"Yeah, I know," Neil leaned back, considering. "We usually put in some regulators to help with that, so that the heat caused by the automail doesn't hurt the outfitee too much. Its not like it's typically a lot of heat anyway. The arm is powered by the nerves, so it's mostly just heat from that and general movement that we have to worry about."

Buccaneer listened to the two of them go back and forth. It was all very interesting, and he was definitely grateful for the two of them working so hard on it, but it didn't really answer his question.

"This is great, but what about my lack of control?" he pressed.

Doc stepped back, hands on her hips. "That sounds like a problem that can be solved by physical and occupational therapy to me," she said.

Neil nodded, running his finger along the inside of Buccaneer's port before lifting the arm and clicking it into place. "Yeah. It basically boils down to practice." His hands kept moving, and it was only seconds before Buccaneer felt the jolt of the nerves reconnecting. "Best thing to do is keep up the exercises that they gave you back in North City. I think one of the occupational therapists is scheduled to come up this way sometime next month. She can give you some more tips then."

Doc nodded. "Yeah, she should be. She's got a few people to check on. I think you're one of her priorities, though, Captain."

"In the meantime," Neil stepped back, apparently satisfied with the state of the arm and the port, "Things that might help are practice. Come down to R&D some. We've got a lot of stuff that you can't break that you can practice grip sensitivity on. And didn't the General offer to train with you? You know how she is. You're not likely to hurt her even if you've got a lack of control."

"That's not a bad idea," Doc said. "You might see what other hands-on jobs there are that you could do. You'll be slow and clumsy at first, maybe even have lapses where you are anyway, but the practice will pay off in the end."

Buccaneer sighed but stood up. "Thanks Doc, Neil. Other than that, how am I doing?"

"Great!" Neil said. "Your body is still taking to the implants well, and everything seems to be healing up. Hopefully we can get this new metal figured out before the skin starts to grow over the connecting port areas. I'd hate to damage that."

"Just come back to see us next week, or sooner if there are any other problems," Doc said.

"Will do," Buccaneer agreed, and turned to walk out the door.

He was, honestly, a little disappointed that there wasn't a quicker fix, but it sounded like he would just have to do some work. Well, what's some more hard work? He'd make it. There was no other option. He was, after all, a Briggs Bear. And Briggsmen didn't give up.