“Doc, why can’t I see?” Zoe asked.

“For a couple of reasons. Want to hear them?” Claire asked.

“Yes.”

“First, I’ve disabled your Kaisers until you heal. Second, you have gauze wrapped around your head, so even if your Eagle Vision was enabled, you wouldn’t see a thing,” Claire replied. “Trust your cyberdoc, ok?”

“Ok.”

“Your Allegro is online and functioning correctly. It is also helping your other new implants mesh with your body.”

“That’s good.”

“Indeed. So, how are you feeling?”

“Like I’ve been flayed alive.”

“That’s not too far from the truth,” Doc Brown laughed.

“Doc, do you want me to take over?” a deep baritone voice asked.

“Who’s that?”

“Zoe, this is Zane, my nurse. He’s going to take over for a bit and help you eat and such.”

“What about a bath?”

“Don’t blush…”

“Ouch!”

“It’ll irritate your weave and skin,” Claire continued ignoring Zoe’s outburst. “Even the tiny bit of heat a blush produces can harm healing skin.”

“I see that now.”

“Well, you understand, not see,” Zane corrected.

“Ha-ha,” Claire replied. “Don’t make her laugh. Zoe, as for a bath, it’ll be a few days before you’re ready for one of those.”

“I’ll try not to,” the nurse said.

“I’ll check on you in a little while. I have another patient to see,” Claire told Zoe. “Zane will feed you lunch. Hope you like soup.”

“Ok and I love soup.”

“You might not love this,” Zane muttered as Claire walked out of the recovery room.

“I heard that.”

“I meant for you to,” Zane replied to Doc Brown’s laughter. He turned his attention to his patient.

“I can feed myself.”

“No, you can’t. Your whole body is wrapped in gauze except your face, and you can’t see where the bowl is.”

“Good point,” Zoe conceded.

“Now, open wide. Here comes the choo-choo,” Zane said lifting the spoon towards Zoe’s mouth. She groaned in annoyance.

*

“Are you ready to boot your Allegro for the first time?” Claire asked Zoe a week later.

“I thought it was already active,” Zoe replied.

“I had it running in a low power state so it could help with your healing, but it’s been off for the last couple days as it reported your implants had been successfully installed and accepted by your body.”

“Oh. Well, in that case, I’m ready to give it a go,” Zoe said. “How do I…” she trailed off as a bootup sequence appeared in her vision where a moment before she still couldn’t see anything but darkness as if her eyes were closed.

“That’s what I love about Allegros. They seem able to read their users even though they don’t have an onboard AI.”

“Why don’t you get one?”

“I’ve considered it and just don’t want to pay the price or take the time to upgrade,” Claire admitted. “One that could replicate my Composer’s software would be even more expensive than yours.”

“Wait. An onboard AI is an option?”

“No,” Claire laughed. “Every AI ever created by mankind has gone rogue. So, why would a corporation offer something that could end up willingly killing its user as an option?”

“Good point,” Zoe admitted as the Allegro finished starting up. A CyberBionic logo flashed across her eyes before the darkness resumed. “Uh, I got a logo and now everything is dark again. Did something go wrong?”

“No Zoe. Everything is fine. Frames are intuitive devices. You just will things to happen unless it’s an automated process. Some people use hand gestures or flick their eyes and such to use their frames. That might help though I think you’ll get the hang of it quick enough.”

“So, I think of things to happen like showing me the time…” Zoe fell silent as the time and date appeared in the center of her eyes.” Whoa!”

“Just got the date and time?” Claire asked.

“Yeah,” Zoe replied thinking of that data moving to the bottom right of her eyes. It didn’t move. She looked at the time and moved her eyes down and to the right. The data disappeared and reappeared smaller where she wanted it. “That’s cool! I had to use my eyes to move the time to the lower right side of my vision and it appeared there.”

I’m glad you’re having fun. Before you go crazy playing around, I’m going to send you a request. You’ll need to accept it,” Doc Brown said.

“What is it for?” Zoe asked as a prompt appeared asking her to allow a connection to Claire. She was hesitant about accepting a connection unless she knew what it was for.

“You’re showing wisdom. Never accept a request unless you can be reasonably sure what it’s for. This request is so I can activate your Kaisers.”

“And I can trust you.”

“Yes. I mean if I wanted anything from you, I could have cut it out when I was operating or sold you into slavery when I first put you under for the surgery.”

“Ah. Yeah, that makes sense,” Zoe replied accepting the prompt.

“Excellent. Let’s turn on your eyes,” Claire said. A second later Zoe could see once more.

“This is amazing!” Zoe gushed shielding her eyes. Colors were sharper, she could pick out details she never would have seen before such as loose threads in Claire’s sweater, and the lights were much brighter.

“Welcome to the 64K world as the logo says,” Claire quipped. “You’ll get used to Eagle Vision in time. Until you do, you can dim the brightness.” Zoe removed her hand from her face before Claire had finished speaking. “Already figured it out?”

“Yeah. It’s like having built in sunglasses.”

“That it is. I couldn’t live without my V2s.”

“I have V1s…” Zoe trailed off seeing Claire’s grin. “I have V2s!”

Doc Brown nodded. “I used my discount and passed the savings on to you. Well, onto Nucky.”

“Why?”

“Because I sell a lot of Kaiser Optics products, so they give me a nice discount. As for why I passed that on to you, well, it’ll keep you from having to upgrade for a long time.”

“And I’ll be able to buy other implants for you to install in addition to owing you one for the upgrade?” Zoe asked smiling.

“There is that” Claire admitted. Zoe grabbed her head. “What’s wrong?”

“That 16X zoom is a killer,” Zoe said a moment later. Claire laughed. “Yeah, I know. I’ll get used to it.”

“Uh huh. While we are connected, I’m going to run a diagnostic just to double check things.”

“I can change eye color, can’t I?”

“Yeah.”

“I’ve always wanted blue eyes.”

“And now you do,” Doc Brown replied picking up a small mirror and showing Zoe her reflection. “Looks good on you too.”

“Thanks,” Zoe replied preening as she admired her reflection. Claire handed her the mirror.

“I’m not going to hold that for you all day. I have other patients to consult with and an operation this morning.”

“Ok.”

“Let’s test your scanner,” Claire said. Zoe nodded. “Alright. Scan me.”

“How…” Zoe started and stopped. Claire nodded. She thought about it for a second and thought scan at Doc Brown. A second later a small tool tip hovered in her vision beside Claire giving her name, age, occupation, and contact info. Zoe’s eyes widened. “Where does that information come from?”

“The CSA has a database of every person living within its borders. All frames can access it though few people ever do.”

“Why is that?”

“Laziness and some people consider it rude,” Claire replied shrugging her shoulders.

“Is it wireless tech?” Zoe asked. Claire nodded. “That means we’re all being tracked.” Another nod. “Which means the database has been sliced as well as the tracking disabled or spoofed.”

Claire smiled and nodded. “Exactly. I’ll let you figure that out.”

“You could just tell me.”

“There’s no fun in that,” Claire replied standing up.

“What about weather reports and the temperature?”

“Pulled directly from the weather satellites in space,” Claire replied as the current conditions appeared before Zoe’s eyes. Zoe added a weather icon, temperature reading, and the day to the date and time in the corner of her vision. She smiled.

“I’m going to leave you to play around with your Allegro,” Claire said walking to the door. “Zane will be along shortly with your breakfast.”

“Ugh.”

“It’s not as bad as hospital food.”

“You don’t eat it.”

“Of course not. I enjoy using my tastebuds,” Doc Brown laughed as she walked away. Claire’s steps suddenly got louder, and she reappeared in the doorway. “One more thing. Scan whatever you want, but don’t upload your daemons to anything please.”

“Ok,” Zoe replied. Claire nodded and disappeared down the hall. “There’s got to be a tutorial,” Zoe muttered to herself. A second later a file listing appeared. “Gotcha.”

“Knock, knock,” Zane called out a few minutes later. “For breakfast you have scrambled eggs, porridge, whole wheat toast, and even some apple jelly.”

Zoe looked up as he sat the tray on her bedside table. “Thanks Zane.”

“Wow! Those blue-eyed Kaisers are sweet.”

“Thanks. I love them.”

“Playing games?”

“Watching the tutorials. I can see why people still use big screens. This is nice, but blocks everything else,” Zoe answered. Zane nodded. “Wait. There are games? I don’t remember seeing that option when I was picking out software.”

Zane just stared at her.

“Of course, there are games. A frame is just another computer after all,” Zoe said. Zane grinned and left.