Neura-tinkles - One Shot (Patreon)

“Alright then! It should be all set up. How do you feel?” The technician asks as they hand you back your phone.

“I feel…normal? Just a little tender where they cut in,” you replied, pointing to the scar on your head.

“Oh, well let me show you something to help with that,” the technician held out their hand for your phone, and you give it back to them. You watch as they open the Neuralink app and begin showing you how to navigate it. It seems pretty straightforward for how advanced the technology is, but you guess that was to create a better user experience.

“There’s a lot of options!” You comment.

“It’s your body at your fingertips! The possibilities are endless now that you have connected your biology to technology!” The technician raves, clearly excited about the concept. “Here, I’ve set this up so you’ll get a notification whenever you're experiencing some sort of pain. Then the device will give you a simple yes or no prompt asking if you want to alleviate the pain.”

“Wow, no kidding!” Your eyes grow wide.

“No kidding at all!” The technician continues. “However, it does have a limit to what it can alleviate and, since this is a beta still, if we start to notice that you’re abusing this feature, we can shut it off.”

“I guess that’s only fair,” You reply. The technician presses the screen, and suddenly, the pain around your surgery scar dissipates. Your eyes grow even wider, and the technician laughs, happy with the reaction.

“Well, unless you have some other questions for me, you’re good to go! You can always reach me through the help section of the app, so don’t be afraid to ask any questions. You’re due back here next week, so we can check in on the device and see what we might need to work on. All good?” the technician asks.

“Good to go!” You rave and stand. After shaking the technician's hand, you leave the examination room and walk out of the research center. You still can’t believe that they picked you for their product testing. When you applied, you thought you would never hear back and would have to wait for the product to come to market, but one day you got a call, and the rest is history!

You are one of the few people testing out the Neuralink brain chip, and while you had some hesitancy around the idea of technology in your brain, you couldn’t pass up the opportunity to be a part of this history. The beginning of human advancement through technology.

You aren’t supposed to drive yourself home after the first day just in case anything goes wrong, so you await an uber, and when they arrive, you hop in the back seat. The driver makes small talk, but you’re busy clicking through the app to see what other options you could play with. You try to think up a text message to send to your friend, and as you think about it, the message starts typing on the screen!

‘Sent from my brain,’ you ask it to say, and sure enough, as you think ‘send,’ you’re sending your friend the text reading precisely that. You can’t help but feel giddy, like a school kid who just had their first kiss.

Suddenly, the app screen pops up with a notification. ‘Discomfort detected, alleviate?’ it reads. You aren’t really sure where the discomfort was coming from, but it probably registered it before you could even feel it. You click ‘yes.’

You get the same notification again about 15 minutes later into your 30-minute car ride home. ‘Is it bugging out already?’ you think. ‘Maybe it only lasts for so long before you have to remind it?’ You question, but once again click ‘Yes.’

After another five minutes, the same thing. You click yes again. Five minutes after that, again; Yes. Finally, you arrive at home, and after thanking your driver, you get out of the car and the notification flares up again. Now you’re concerned. This can’t be right, can it? You hover your thumb over no, but suddenly, the notification changes.

Now it reads ‘severe discomfort or pain detected. Please consider calling emergency services. If you think this pain is not worth calling emergency services, please click yes to temporarily numb the area, then consider taking the following medications: ….’

You don’t bother to read the list, but if numbing the area will stop the notifications from going off, you figured it was worth clicking yes. Your thumb presses against your screen, and just as you pull out your key to unlock your front door, you start feeling the numbing. Only, it’s not where you expected. Instead of numbing your head, the chip is numbing your abdomen, including your private areas.

“That can’t be right,” You say, but shrug it off and put your phone in your pocket to finish unlocking your door. Right as the deadbolt clicks and you reach for the handle to open the door, a new sensation joins the numbness. Warmth. You look down, confused, but when you see the cause of the sensation, you begin to panic.

Piss rushes down your legs, soaking your pants and spreading across them. You blush, look around, and are grateful that your Uber driver has taken off. Quickly you jump into your house and run to the toilet. By the time your pants are around your ankles though, it’s too late. Most of the pee has voided your bladder, but you watch on in shock as you see piss uncontrollably spurt out your private parts.

You’re stunned, but suddenly you know what to do. You reach down and grab your phone out of your piss-soaked pants and open up the app. You go to ‘pain settings,’ only to have another notification pop up.

‘***DISABLED***: The overuse of this feature has rendered it temporarily disabled. Function returns in (7) days or until overridden by Neuralink staff.

Your nervous heart beats faster, and you click over to the help section. Frantically, you type: “Hello, I just left the clinic, and there seems to have been a malfunction with the pain settings. It numbed the wrong area, and now I can’t feel the need to pee.”

You sit down on the toilet, your soaked pants still around your ankles, and await a response. The three dots appear, and you perk up.

“Hello, give me a moment to look at what’s happened.”

You breathe heavily as you wait, the warmth of your wet pants quickly cooling. Finally, the message appears.

“Thank you for waiting. It appears that you have misused the pain numbing feature, and that is the result of the numbing in your lower region. By trying to block out your bladder discomfort, you created a result that will resemble incontinence.”

You stare at the screen, stunned and angered by the response. Frantically, you type back.

“This wasn’t my fault. The technician showed me how to numb the pain of my surgery. I thought that was what I was numbing, not my bladder!”

“If you were uncertain of the prompt, it would have been much wiser to click “NO” then contact us to ask. From our end, it does look like you misused the pain relief function to ignore bladder pain.” They typed back. You stand up in a rage.

“I didn’t know that my bladder was in pain! Regardless, how quickly can I have this undone?” You write back.

“Unfortunately, we can’t remotely re-engage the pain feature, but the numbing will last until the feature is re-engaged. This is to ensure that someone with severe pain is not suffering while they wait to re-engage.”

You fall back onto the toilet. “So when can I come in and have you guys re-engage it?”

“Your next appointment is one week from now.”

“That’s not soon enough. I can’t be stuck like this for a week!”

“Your scheduled appointment is the only time we have available, and we do not make appointments earlier unless the matter is severe.”

“THE MATTER IS SEVERE! I can’t feel my pee!” You scream at your phone.

“We apologize for the inconvenience, and unfortunately, you will not be able to feel anything in that region for the time. To accommodate, I will have incontinence garments sent to your home address. Have a nice day.”

The chat window closes, and your jaw drops. You hadn’t had this chip in for even a few hours, and you already regret it. You get up from the toilet and kick off your wet pants from your ankles. Suddenly, your phone dings with another notification. You groan but glance at the screen.

‘Your order of “Adult Diapers, Med, 36 pack” has been completed and will be delivered in 1 minute(s),’ it reads.

“That was fast,” you say to yourself. Suddenly, your doorbell rings. You don’t know what to do, so you freeze. After a few moments, it rings again. Then your phone pings another notification.

‘You must receive this order personally to ensure it was delivered properly. Please answer the door, or your order of “Adult Diapers, Med, 36 pack.” will be returned. You panic, and the doorbell rings again. With no other obvious choice, you grab your wet pants and pull them back over your legs. They feel cold and clammy against the skin you can feel, but you have no time to dwell on the feeling, so you rush to the door and open it.

“Hi,” You say awkwardly as you try to hide the wet stain behind the door.

“Hello! I’m here to deliver these adult diapers?” The man at the door said.

“How were you so quick?” You blush and ask.

“Well, due to Neurolink’s predictive product algorithm, it anticipated your need before you even knew. It ordered and had me on standby as you talked with the support staff. When the order was confirmed, I just walked up!” He explains.

“That’s…a bit creepy,” you reply.

“It’s the future! Now, if you don’t mind, I need to get a full-body image before I can hand these off.”

“Can’t you just give them to me?” you asked, getting annoyed.

“Sorry, just the policy.”

The delivery man waits as you resist stepping out from behind the door. You realize he’s serious, and you break eye contact as you step out from behind the door, putting your wet pants on full display for him and any passersby to see.

“Whoa! I see why they ordered these! Alright, hold still a moment and look this way, please.”

You cooperate and stand still as the man fusses to take a picture. Suddenly, you feel the shifting of clothing near your backside, and while you can’t feel what’s happening, you quickly smell it. You blush as the delivery driver smells it too, quickly gets your picture and puts away his phone.

“Alright then, these are yours!” He says as he hands you the box of diapers. You take them quickly and rush inside, slamming the door behind you. You instantly drop the box and reach your butt to confirm your suspicion. When your hand feels the mass, you close your eyes and groan.

“And I poop myself too!” You complain to yourself. Finally, you look at the box of diapers, open it and pull one out. The thick white padding crinkles loudly between your fingers, and you exhale, defeated.

“This is going to be a long week….”