Chapter 401: Craniotomy
A month later.
In the ICU ward on the first floor of the central hospital of Eco Science City.
A thin old man with a gray complexion and bones that were poking through his skin was carted out of the ICU ward and into the operation room.
Inside the operation room, apart from the three nurses, there were also four family members of the patient observing worriedly. One of them was an elderly in his sixties while the accompanying members appeared to be this man’s family members.
They watched on with solemn expression as the three nurses pushed the patient further into the operation room. They quickly trailed after the nurses until they arrived at the entrance of a sterile operation room.
“I’m afraid you folks cannot enter.”
It was then when one of the nurses stopped them. “The environment inside is sterilized, any one of you entering may risk having it contaminated.”
“But it’s my grandfather inside there.”
One of the family members in his thirties with a large mohawk on top of his head protested. He wore tight jeans and had a septum piercing that was impossible to not notice. He turned around and noticed another door beside the operation room. When one of the nurses entered the room, he caught a glimpse of an observation window that granted a view into the operating room. He immediately yelled, “Hey, what are you guys trying to do?”
“What is it, Bruno?”
The elderly man turned to the shouting man.
“Dad, they have an observation room right next to the operation room, I saw one of the nurses entering!”
The man with the septum piercing started making a commotion and tried to force his way into the observation room. He was promptly stopped by two security guards that looked at him with an icy, blank stare.
“Hey buddy, it’s my grandfather inside the operation room, what right do you have to stop me from entering?”
The septum-piercing man pushed off the security guards’ hands and continued protesting.
However, the two security guards did not offer any explanation.
“Is this how it’s going to be?”
The elderly man turned to the nurses that stopped them from entering. “Are we not allowed to observe the operation of my father, Watson?”
“This...”
The nurse stuttered for a moment and became visibly troubled by the elderly man’s pleads. “Mr. Qian will be watching the operation today as well, never mind... I’ll head inside and ask for his input.”
After that, the nurse stepped inside the observation room.
Within half a minute, the nurse stepped outside again, this time nodding to the group. “Mr. Qian has permitted your entry. I’ll have to ask you all to stay silent.”
“Mr. Qian my butt...”
The man with the septum piercing called Bruno complained under his breath. His insolence was immediately interrupted by the elderly man. “Bruno, this isn’t your Chicago third-rate biker gang gathering, you better watch your language.”
With that, the group was escorted by the nurse into the observation room.
The first thing that greeted the elderly man upon entering was a large and speckless floor-length window to his left. On the other end of the window was none other than the operation room. The window gave them a completely unobstructed view into the operation room.
The observation room was furnished with two long sofas and a coffee table. There were already three people seated separately on the sofa. They appeared to be discussing something among themselves.
The elderly man’s gaze quickly focused on one of the men in his mid-forties on the sofa. His eyes became widened with shock when he registered who this was. “Uncle Felix... Is that you?”
This immediately caught the attention of the man sitting on the sofa. When he looked up and saw this graying old man in front of him, he could not help but find the humor in the situation. “Is that Watson Jr? It must have been two decades since we last met, hasn’t it?”
“It is you...”
The elderly man became extremely sentimental. He immediately dragged Bruno by the arm and approached closer. “Thank you for your guardianship, if not for you, the chances of my father coming to Eco Science City is next to nil. The medical fees here are too high... This is my son, Bruno.”
“I remember Bruno was barely a teenager when I last met him, I can’t believe he’s a fully grown man now.”
Felix nodded and greeted, his expression was full of kindness.
There was a bizarre scene rarely witnessed happening inside the observation room — an elderly man with a head full of white hair was addressing someone in his mid-forties with such dignity and respect despite being the senior. Despite that, the people witnessing this were hardly thrown off by the strangeness of this interaction as if this was nothing out of the ordinary.
There was a major shift in social norms ever since the birth of the “age reversal treatment” project. Appearances were no longer the deciding factor of a person’s age.
“Mr. Felix...”
Bruno had finally wisened up at this point as well. Despite being an uneducated punk, he was at least familiar with the fabled Munster family. Despite being a relatively new family, they were on equal standing as the other old guards in the business world. Word on the street was that the most reputable biker gangs in Chicago had many ties with this family as well.
“Hello, Bruno.”
Felix nodded politely before it suddenly occurred to him to introduce the young man sitting next to him to this new group of visitors. However, the young man quickly shrugged, signaling that he did not want to be introduced.
Felix decided to introduce the man seated on the opposite sofa instead, “This is the man in charge of Eco Science City, he’s also the CEO of Blackwatch’s African branch, Mr. Qian Wenhuan.”
“Your reputation precedes you, I’ve seen you on television.”
The elderly man was surprised by this sudden introduction. He quickly stepped forward and shook hands with Qian Wenhuan, barely bothered by the fact that this person was incredibly young and could not be anywhere close to his forties. While he went for the handshake, he inadvertently glanced at the young man seated next to Felix.
The young man seemed to be the youngest of the trio of men sitting on the sofa. Despite that, the acute elderly man could tell that this young man held the highest rank among the trio.
“Could this man be none other than...”
The elderly man quickly stopped his stream of thoughts as he said this, his heart clenching. Since this man motioned for Felix to not introduce himself, the elderly man knew better than to expose his identity either. After shaking hands with Qian Wenhuan, the elderly man only nodded courteously at the young man’s direction.
The young man returned his gesture with a subtle smile.
After that, Felix enthusiastically invited the group to sit with them on the sofa and started making small talk with everyone. It was only after the preparations in the operation room were complete when everyone directed their attention to the ongoings behind the observation window.
Dozens of medical staff filed into the operation room one after another. They connected James Watson who had been in a coma for a month at this point to electrocardiogram and BIS machines. After that, they injected James Watson with an appropriate dosage of tranquilizers to put him into a deep slumber.
After injecting the tranquilizer, one of the nurses stepped forward with a shaver in hand. The nurse was extremely proficient with using the shaver and quickly shaved a bald patch on James Watson’s fractured skull. After that, they disinfected the shaved region appropriately again.
After shaving, several other nurses stepped forward and began making adjustments to the operation table. With moments, the operation table was craned upward like a chair and put James Watson in a position where he can sit upright.
Two more nurses proceeded to bring in the operation scaffold and set it over the top of James Watson’s head. It was set in a way that only the top part of his head that was riddled with operation scars was exposed through a ring section of the scaffolding. After that, they threw a sheet of cloth over the scaffolding.
With that, the top of James Watson’s skull was completely exposed to the doctors in the operation room as well as the gathered crowd inside the observation room.
The previous wound had already been stitched up during the previous brain trauma operation, which meant that this was technically the second craniotomy operation James Watson would be going under. The doctor sliced across the guided lines on his scalp left behind from the previous stitching while another doctor used electrocoagulation forceps to stop the bleeding. After that, they lifted the scalp and drooped it over his face.
The next part was a horrifying sight to behold. James Watson’s scalp was laid over his face casually, revealing the bloody skull underneath with plenty of cracks, fractures, and many other operation scars...
“Prepare for craniotomy. Get the hemostatic forceps and norepinephrine at the ready!
“Pay attention to the BIS machine and make sure the patient remains unconscious throughout this procedure...”
The audience gathered in the observation room stopped chattering when they heard the attending doctor started issuing a sequence of orders. Among them, Qian Wenhuan and Felix got up on their feet and approached the observation window, determined to not miss out on any detail.
With James Watson’s skull layer under his skin exposed, the doctor started using a drill to unscrew the previously installed skull clamp and lifted off a large chunk of the skull as if it was a mere building block.
Underneath the skull was a layer of cloudy dura mater membrane. The doctor slowly and carefully sliced through the slightly wiggling membrane layer to finally reveal the naked damaged brain for everyone to see.
With the mangled brain finally presented, not only the family of James Watson, even Qian Wenhuan and Felix could not help but hold their breath at this sight.
Despite having gone through an operation previously, the brain still looked as if it had been torn apart by a rabid dog. Its general structure was left in an extremely disorderly state.
The missing parts of the brain had been destroyed by the bullet shell and had to be removed during the previous operation. James Watson’s brain looked like a case of tofu left unattended in a wildly swerving vehicle. It did not have what should be a regular round shape expected of a brain.
To still be alive despite all this, such staggering life force...
Everyone was amazed at the tenacity of his life force.
However, the crew of doctors was unfazed by this since they had been informed of James Watson’s current state from the CT scan images provided. “The brain structure is exposed, no signs of infection or deterioration detected and we’re ready for implantation ... NSR implantation equipment is ready!”
Following the chief surgeon’s orders, a piece of equipment shaped like a helmet placed in the corner of the operation room was carted to the middle.
After the device was wheeled in, a doctor oversaw the process and placed the device over James Watson’s head. A row of laser beams immediately appeared from the device and rapidly scanned through James Watson’s brain before disappearing again.
What was this, laser mapping?
That was what everyone thought as they glanced at Qian Wenhuan curiously. To their surprise, even Qian Wenhuan was unsure of what this was since this was the first time he saw this device as well. Surely enough, his boss had personally mobilized the top engineers of the industrial park to design this device. This device was known as “NSR Implanter”...
Before everyone could get a closer look at this device, something resembling a sewing machine slowly descended from above, slowly inching toward James Watson’s brain.
From a certain angle, one could see tiny little chips the size of fingernails attached to the ports on the sewing machine.
After that, the device that looked like a sewing machine began to operate at a rapid pace on James Watson’s brain in a manner very similar to tailoring clothes. The movements it made were extremely subtle and could only be noted upon very close inspection.
“What’s it doing?”
Bruno turned to his father with a puzzled look.
“If I had to wager a guess, fixing James Watson’s brain.”
Felix shrugged as he turned to the Chinese young man also watching over the operation. “Am I right, Sir Chen Chen?”
The Chinese young man who had been silent all this time was none other than Chen Chen. He turned to the confused crowd and nodded. “Yes, this technology utilizes a specially designed AI chip to replace the defective region of the brain. It connects part of the brain’s nerves through nano-scale electrodes, so the chip integrates itself as a part of the brain, which helps repair the damaged function of the brain.”
“How miraculous!”
Watson’s son — the elderly man was amused by this technology. Just like his father, he was an expert in the biological science field. Although he was not as renowned as his father, he could still hold his own when it came to general biological knowledge.
Of all people present at the scene, he was more aware than the rest of them what this piece of technology could imply...
This technology would revolutionize the neurology field!
“Alright, it’ll keep doing this for more than ten hours to come.”
Chen Chen headed for the exit. “If I were you guys, I’d wait outside until the chip has been fully implanted into Watson’s brain.”
“Why does it take this long?”
Bruno asked instinctively. However, Chen Chen could not be bothered to give him an answer and left immediately after.
“Bruno, Sir Chen Chen has explained everything clearly.”
The elderly man looked at his good-for-nothing son and frowned. To prevent this insolent son of his from causing any further trouble, he had to explain, “Do you know how many neurons are there in the brain? Even saying there are hundreds of millions of them would be an understatement. Sir Chen Chen mentioned that they were nano-electrodes, this means there may be tens of thousands of nano-scale electrodes on a single piece of chip the size of a fingernail.
“With each maneuver, the device inserts one electrode into the brain and connects it to a specific nerve point in the brain. This is a very delicate practice and considering it implants a single electrode approximately ten times per second, do you now understand why the entire process would take more than ten hours due to the sheer volume of electrodes?”
Bruno still wanted to say something, but was shot down by his father’s dismissive glare.
Felix smiled. “Alright, at any rate, let’s wait outside. Let’s see if Eco Science City can give James Watson and us a surprise after ten hours.”
“Sir Felix, this way, please. The rest of you can come with me as well. I’ll arrange a room for you to rest.”
After hearing Felix’s remark, Qian Wenhuan immediately took action and escorted the guests out of the observation room.
Inside the operation room, the crew of doctors and nurses slowly shuffled out of the room as well. All that remained were two nurses stationed in the room to monitor the operation just in case something went wrong.
After everyone had left, the lights in the operation room were turned off as well. The original brightly lit operation room where not a single spot of shadow could be seen was now drowned in darkness. The machine resting on top of James Watsons’ head continued operating restlessly...
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