"That's one swanky house."
Looking through the dropship's sensors, Mac commented on the mansion his group of 3 dropships and 2 gunships was rapidly approaching.
"Well yeah, the Victoria family are thoroughbred nobles, so that's a given."
Stifling a yawn and slight annoyance as she had been woken up in the middle of the night for a 'special goodwill operation' Tia had already made sure she was presentable to meet nobles in the first half of the dropship's travels, so now she was just focusing on staying awake.
"I guess that's true, which is why-"
"Why I am to try and establish a professional relationship with them, in order to secure a letter of trade from the Victoria family."
Repeating what she had already heard Mac mention multiple times, Tia stifled another yawn as she glanced over at Hanna who was completely asleep, with a SOD-09 in her hands.
"Just worry about yourself Mac, even if I do flawlessly it'll all be for naught if you piss off that princess again."
"Yeah, yeah. Don't worry your pretty little head with that and just focus on trade, I can be serious when I want to."
[VENGEANCE 9-9, VENGEANCE 9-8 SUSPENDING CLOSE ESCORT, SWITCHING TO HIGH ALTITUDE SURVEILLANCE AND STANDBY.]
With Mac's group of dropships closing in on their destination, the pair gunship escorts peeled off to switch to high altitude standby, they would remain on station together with other assets brought out from Lighthouse-01 in case of disaster. Still, this was a medical and goodwill visit, so chances of a firefight breaking out were marginal.
"Here we go. Hanna, look alive, you're getting paid double."
"Yeah, sorry boss."
Waking up instantly at mention of her name, Hanna wiped a bit of drool from her mouth as she checked her rifle, then quietly stretched.
"It's fine as long as you're ready when it counts…"
Seeing how quickly Hanna went from sleeping to alert made Mac feel a bit bad for waking her, but on the other hand she was literally sleeping while he paid her double, so Mac really wanted to flick her face more than anything.
"Look alive, switch to silent propulsion."
[ALL CRAFTS SWITCHING TO GLIDE PROFILE… READY FOR GRAV ENGINE LINK.]
Nearing the ground Mac also started worrying about getting spotted by people unrelated to his current mission, so out of an abundance of caution he decided on a quiet landing.
"Go for link."
[QUANTUM LINK ESTABLISHED, V190 HANDSHAKE CONFIRMED, PINNING ALL MASS IN FEILD.]
At once the inside of the dropship became silent as all mass was pinned in place by the cruiser V190 up in orbit, but within a few seconds sound returned as the field was stabilized and the V190's gravity engine 'caught' the group of dropships.
[GRAVITY LINK ESTABLISHED AND NORMALISED. FIELD INTEGRITY NORMAL.]
"There's the mansion. Do a fly-by to make sure they know we're coming."
[REQUEST ACKNOWLEDGED AND CONFIRMED, PAINTING NEW NAV NODES TO COMMAND MESH.]
With the Victoria mansion in sight, Mac chose to do a few overflights as a series of fires were lit near the back entrance of the manor.
(So I'm not good enough for the front entrance, huh? Well this isn't exactly an official visit so I'll allow it.)
Given that there still wasn't any kind of official diplomatic channels open between Mac and the proper kingdom, he barely allowed it and chose the landing spot which had been selected for him.
"Here we go, look alive."
As landing gears folded out on the trio of landing crafts, Mac decided to go at this thing seriously.
"They really are coming from the sky…"
"Yeah. And he usually only brings a single one of those so he must be serious."
Watching the sky for the barely visible shapes which approached, Anastasia glanced at her worried family servants as the trio of dropships landed without a sound. As the rearward ramps of the closest dropship went down, lights on the craft lit up as Mac exited, followed not by mechanical golems this time, but two beastkin women.
"So happy to see you again, miss Anastasia."
"Introductions can wait, we need you inside and your crafts out of sight come first light in a bit."
Brushing off Mac's overly sweet words off, Anastasia was about to turn to walk when her mother grabbed her shoulder.
"Mind your manners."
Quietly reprimanding her daughter, Anastasia's mother showed a thin smile before offering a curtsy and introducing herself to Mac.
"You must be Mac, the traveller from beyond the stars. My name is Veronica, matriarch of the Victoria noble house. I thank you for making the journey out here to aid us, we welcome you and your companions."
Turning her head to stare coldly at her daughter with a thin smile, Veronica didn't release her daughter before she started properly welcoming Mac.
"T-thank you Mac, for heeding my request and arriving so quickly despite your busy schedule, please make your way inside."
Doing his best to suppress a shit-eating grin as nodded in return to Anastasia's words, Mac decided to put his well behaved foot forward.
"Tia and Hanna, grab Tia's stuff, I'll handle the medical equipment with my drones."
"Right."
"Got it, boss."
With Tia and Hanna taking care of unloading the samples Tia would hopefully offload doing this visit, drones appeared from the two other dropships carrying or pushing medical equipment locked in transport boxes as Mac stood appearing to do nothing.
"Let's head inside, the servants will put out the fires and make sure there weren't any rats watching."
"Let's do that."
Following Anastasia and Veronica, Mac left the menial work to his drones and subordinates as he was led inside the mansion to a meeting room lit by magical light.
"Not to be presumptuous, but I would like to jump directly into the issue and the reason we have summoned you here today."
"That's no worry at all, I understand the sentiments of a parent."
Reminded of his own mothers worried expression, Mac did his best to suppress the ugly childhood memories filled with anguish as he got into the reason he was summoned.
"I understand that I am here to heal a member of your family, could you please describe her state and symptoms?"
Mac did by no means have medical training when he started out as a naval officer, but necessity, a neural uplink to the sum of all knowledge of his race and a few hundred years alone had changed that.
"Right…"
Steading herself as she brought uncomfortable memories to the front of her mind, Veronica stated the reason for Mari's illness.
"My other daughter, Mari, was gravely injured in battle with a cockatrice. The monster managed to sting her as it died… For the precise list of symptoms you will have to wait for our family healer to wake up, but she has been paralyzed from the waist down, furthermore she breaks out into fever if not treated with high quality healing magic daily. The healing magic causes immense pain to her, but without it she will undoubtedly die."
"And sometimes she coughs up blood. A cockatrice is a large chicken-like monster with the venomous tail of a lizard."
Adding to her mother's statement while also clearing it up, Anastasia noticed how Mac uncharacteristically fell quiet for a moment as his eyes lost focus. After being silent for about a minute, Mac finally spoke up to break the tension.
"I'll need to talk with the healer, but this seems like something I can cure. The real question is how long the treatment will take."
"Meaning?"
Happy at the good news, Anastasia nevertheless focused in on and sought to clarify Mac's apparent hesitation.
"From the way the symptoms are described it seems like spinal cord damage and after effects of whatever venom that 'cockatrice' carries. In that case it'll just be a matter of blood filtration, tissue regeneration and direct deposit bioprinting to fuse the spine back together and regrow the nerves. In that best case recovery will depend on rehabilitation and how long she takes to relearn to walk with active nerve stimulation therapy."
"Learn to w-walk again?"
Best case Veronica had allowed herself to hope for was curing Mari of her pain, but this was a given as she hadn't directly witnessed the sight of Mac's castle sized ships pass over the capital, that had really served to expand what Anastasia believed was possible.
"Then what's the timeline, in the best case you described and in the worst case?"
Grabbing her mother's hand in reassurance, Anastasia sought a timeline from Mac, as well as the worst case he had yet to mention.
"In the best case scenario recovery will be a little over a month at the worst, but if the body has undergone severe necrosis from the poison then a full body replacement will be all I can do… That requires printing a new body that matches the genome, and readjustment therapy can take up to a year in that case and she will most likely be unable to use magic."
The worst case scenario was so far away that Mac didn't really want to mention it, granted printing a new body and then performing a brain case translocation was something he had trained for.
"A-a new body?"
While these were world shattering procedures to Anastasia who had seen Mac's arm do… Whatever it did, to Veronica it was straight up magical, in the blasphemous sense.
"Yeah, a new body."
"A-as long as my daughter lives, I guess I am in no position to offer up any complaints…"
Slightly disturbed at what she had heard, Veronica got up from her seat as she left the room.
"..."
"..."
Suddenly it was just Anastasia and Mac, and an uncomfortable silence quickly spread as Mac couldn't think of anything diplomatic to say and Anastasia was still hung up on past conversations.
"I've brought two subordinates with me, Tia and her guard Hanna. Tia will be presenting you with some sample goods, please look at them and consider purchasing some depending on how the treatment of Mari goes."
"A bribe? I guess that's appropriate, very we-"
Figuring the 'trade samples' were a shorthand for payment that Mac needed for some reason or another, Anastasia quickly accepted as she misunderstood Mac's intentions.
"Waitwaitwait, what? No, that wasn't meant as a bribe."
"Then how was it meant?"
"Litterally, I brought goods, and I would like to trade with your world as a form of cultural exchange and relation building, so I bought goods with me that my trade person will introduce to you at a later date."
Hurriedly spelling things out so they couldn't be misunderstood, Mac stared at Anastasia's blank expression for way too long waiting for her to respond.
"... Why are you being so timid all of a sudden?"
"I'm doing my best okay!?"
Not wanting a repeat of that time in the arena, Mac realised too late that Anastasia had seen the real him and wasn't fooled by his diplomatic act.
"Excuse me Miss."
"Yeah yeah."
At first light, the family healer John arrived at Mari's room to do his routine checkup, only this time he had brought an outsider.
(Again?)
Mari still remembered the early days of her illness, countless different healers from all over the kingdom would visit under various levels of coercion to take a look at Mari and her condition. While some of these healers proclaimed her complete recovery, all of them had failed, and so would this one.
"My name is Mac, I am here to examine you after John has finished."
After getting a clearer picture of Mari's condition from John, Mac nevertheless needed to examine her himself to be sure.
Standing to the side as John did his inspections, Mari watched the new miracle worker zone out multiple times as her hope for this new aspirant continued to fade.
(At least act like you're interested like some of the better scammers.)
Unaware of Mari's falling evaluation, Mac finished queueing movement orders for his fleet and ordering specialized biomass needed for a new body in case his patient was beyond traditional treatment options by the time John finished his examination.
"I am done now Mac."
"Okay, I'll be quick then, the princess looks like she could use some more sleep."
Mistaking her sullen expression for a lack of sleep, Mac moved over next to Mari's bed and crouched down to her eye level.
"I'll touch your arm first, excuse me."
"Don't touch me."
"..."
Turning to look at John as he found himself at a loss for words, Mac noticed the open palm approach his head from the left, but didn't act until Mari's slap landed with quite a bit of force.
(She's feisty just like her sister… Figures.)
Up until now Mac had done his best to be… Diplomatic, but getting slapped by the patient he had suspended his normal plans to go and help depleted the last of his patience for such eloquence.
"I told you to not touch me- hya!-"
Out of nowhere, the outsider flicked Mari's face with quite a bit of force, and as his face remained blank he started a somewhat forceful examination, complete with detached sounding commentary.
"Pain response is normal, if a little elevated, the subject appears to be a weak willed baby ass pansy."
"A pansy!? How dare!- agh!"
Having waited patiently for his patient to open her mouth, Mac stuck a few fingers in to scan the inside of her brain case through her palatine raphe (top of mouth).
"... Normal brain activity too, teeth and the entire jaw structure are quite healthy too."
Continuing his deadpan commentary as Mari tried to bite his fingers off, Mac quickly extracted his hand from her mouth after he was done with the initial scan and wiped her saliva off on her face.
"Ew! Stop that!"
Next Mari tried to scratch Mac in the face, but as she presented her hands Mac simply grabbed her wrists and continued his examination.
"Elevated blood circulation is good too… Or not? There appears to be some sort of obstruction."
Janking Mari's hands closer, Mac placed his head against her chest and listened for her (elevated) heartbeat and blood flow using his enhanced hearing.
"W-where the fuck do you think you're putting your head!? Get away!"
"Yeah there's some sort of minor obstruction… Might be a birth defect."
Deciding to also fix that if at all possible, Mac let go of Mari's hands and got out of her range before she could claw him.
"Pardon me."
Flipping up her duvet with zero consideration or tact, Mac ignored Mari's screaming as he started examining her legs.
"Low nerve activity and decreased muscle mass, as expected, then I just need to find the break."
Covering the screaming Mari's legs again as a pair of concerned servants and Anastasia peeked in through the door, Mac attempted to move closer to Mari's upper body, but was blocked by a frail of claw swipes.
"Pardon me."
"I think the fuck not!"
Met with staunch refusal as he danced just out of range of Mari's arms, Mac's diplomatic efforts quickly faltered, so he quickly started working on more radical options.
"Get the fuck away from me!- Hyia! AW! Stop that!"
Moving with lightning speed and sheer focus rivaling that of a special force member, Mac flicked Mari's face, then moved out of range and repeated until she stopped trying to scratch him.
"You done?"
In a matter of moments, Mari had to declare defeat as she held her forehead now throbbing with pain.
"..."
"I take that as a yes, pardon me."
Reaching out, Mac gently placed his hands on Mari's lower torso and felt for anything out of the ordinary as he started scanning. By this point Mari had figured Mac was at least some sort of doctor, crude as his methods were; this was the first time she had seen old man John take notes while paying this close attention to an examination.
"There's the break. T9 shows extensive damage, while T10 and T8 are also in need of replacement… Extensive scar tissue too, and something else?"
Turning his head to John for an explanation, Mac has his theory supported.
"When the young miss was injured, life saving first aid was put above exploratory examinations, it is possible some fragments of the cockatrice tail remain inside her body."
"Which would explain the pain when 'magic healing' is applied, the rapid tissue regeneration builds up pressure and forces the shards of bone further into nerves… Help me flip her."
Receiving some assistance from John, Mac moved to examine Mari's back. Pulling up her dress gown, Mac instantly noticed the mangled scar on her spine, which explained some of the scar tissue he had sensed.
"Excuse me."
Placing both his hands gently on Mari's back, Mac quickly confirmed his theory.
"Extensive scar tissue all over… As well as 39- no, 45 fragments surrounded by extensive internal scar tissue. Operation should be no issue."
Turning Mari back over with the help of John, Mac made sure Mari was paying attention to him by pressing her nose a few times.
"What? You're really fucking annoying, you know that!?"
"Yeah, your sister made me aware of that when she tried to kill me a little over a week ago."
Watching the realization of Mac's true identity spread over Mari's face, Mac formed a shit-eating grin as she told her the good news.
"You're going to walk again, and in this body nonetheless."