He sat in the old, worn chair of his office, tapping on his keyboard when the door to his office creaked open slowly. Without averting his gaze from the screen, he yawned, motioning toward the medical chair at the center of the room.
“Doc? I need help…” the young man proclaimed. Behind the computer sat an augmented creature that only half resembled a human.
His left eye, as well as his jaw and teeth were replaced with mechanical parts. His arms no longer human but fully robotic, made quick work of whatever he was typing up on his computer. His legs were more akin to those of a crab.
“Yeah? What brings you in here today?” asked the doctor, glancing over the young man that had entered his office.
S.Y.: Hmmmm let's see… What about a bitemark, from shipping some… rather exotic cargo?
The man slowly shuffled his way toward the chair and sat down in it with a pained groan. He showed a massive, infected bite mark on his right calf, and another 1 on his left forearm.
“Doc, I was just…”
The doctor examined the wounds closely, “Yeah, you’re screwed. What left these marks?”
The man’s eyes widened in shock as he listened to the doctor’s cold tone.
“W-what do you mean?”
“Shhh, what left them?”
The man hesitated, “Uhm, crocodiles.”
The doctor’s eyebrow, the remaining one, shot up like an erupting volcano.
“Oh,” he grinned knowingly, “illegal species trading huh? How delightful. Astonishing… you owe me one for treating you.”
He glanced over the infected wound, “that’ll have to go.”
The man blinked unknowingly, “Thank yo-.
“ he paused when the doctor turned around with a small chainsaw in hands, and a grin of a maniac on his face.
The doctor nodded, “Don’t mention it.”
The saw roared to life. The deafening screech of metallic friction as unoiled metal grinded against metal, muffled the man’s screams. The saw dug into his skin and tore his muscles. When the pain became unbearable, the man fainted, only to awaken with new, enhanced body, free of charge. He only had to deliver a crocodile to the doctor now, something he remembered quite vividly.
“Is my leg,” he hesitated.
“Yeap! The new one can kick twice as hard though, I chopped all the way to the hip so you’d have a brand new knee as well, won’t have to worry about a bad knee as you age,” the doctor winked.
“Well, one of them at least. Do come back if you want your other leg replaced as well. I offer discounts.”
The man glanced over to the side, at the table where his fleshy leg lay.
“Ah don’t worry, I’ll dispose of it. Lest you wish to feed it to your pets.”
The man hesitated for a moment. On one hand, something about feeding his own leg to his illegal ‘pets’ felt wrong. On the other hand – it’d save him money as he wouldn’t have to buy food this week. He thought about it long and hard.
“I’ll take it,” he said.
“That’s a proper businessman,” the doctor replied.
Another happy customer that left a 5 star rating on the ‘dark doctors’ website, albeit unwillingly. The doctor leaned back in his chair, idly tapping at his keyboard with one robotic finger while adjusting a visor of sorts onto his forehead with the other. The newly enhanced man hobbled out of the office with a heavy limp, pained groans and a metallic thud every step, “You’ll get used to it,” he called out as the door slammed shut.
He grasped his cup of coffee that had long gone cold, and took a sip that distorted his face into an unhappy grimace, accompanied by a displeased grunt. The door to his humble office groaned open again. This time the visitor seemed well accustomed to underground doctors. He strolled into the office like he owned the place.
There was no shuffling, no reluctance, just deliberate and heavy footsteps that echoed through the room. The person stopped just in front of the chair that was painted by fairly fresh blood. The doctor didn’t look up from his computer, he was busy watching a cat video; a very important task. The silence hung heavily in the air.
“So?” the doctor asked at last.
“What brings you in today?”
A.Z.: Mhhm. I think the man is a brawler, taking place in… illegal fighting matches. Maybe he has issues with some of his augmented limbs… or is looking for an upgrade?
The large man turned around and sat down into the bloodied chair with no hesitation. He slammed his heavy metallic fist onto the chair’s handle and sighed, “Brandon, brawler. Need to be patched up and replacement parts. Right hand, and an eye.”
The doctor clanked up to him, walking sideways like a crab on his four spiky crab-like legs, then circled around his new patient with a smug curiosity glinting in his eyes.
“My my, whoever you fought did a number on you. How’s the other guy?”
The man grinned, “In the dumpster.”
“Atta champ, where do you fight?”
He leaned closer, examining the man’s face. His left eye was missing and his right fist was clenched shut. His left fist seemed alright, but the tech was dated, it was the 2nd generation augmentation at best.
“Blue Bell.”
“Trash place,” the doc shot back without hesitation.
“Tell you what, I’ll give you a hand for a favor.”
The doc said, turning around.
“What’s the favor?”
Brandon asked. The doctor turned back toward his patient, holding not one, but two hands.
“I’ll even give you two hands. There’s a lad that owes me, used to frequent Blue Bell. Suspicious guy, in a trench coat, likes trading questionable drinks to people. Bring me his hand in return.
Before Brandon had a chance to accept the offer, he felt a mighty strong claw grasp his neck and a hand from the ceiling grab him by the hair, pulling his head back. The doctor’s mischievous grin hovered above his head for a moment as he pried open the missing eye, “Hmm hmm, I see. Sit still.”
He pulled out a needle-like object that had some grime on the edge of it, and began to lower it into the man’s eye-socket before pausing, spitting on it, wiping it on his apron, and then forcefully shoving it in. A sharp jolt of pain shot through the man’s body as the augmented optic nerve connected to the torn out nerves. The man squirmed from pain but held his screams, “Thanks,” the doctor whispered, “my neighbors often complain about the noise.”
A moment later he pushed a new, mechanical eye into the man’s skull. It automatically connected to the new nerve. A few displeased and uncomfortable blinks later, and the man could see again.
“And now, let me give you a hand, which do you prefer?”
The doctor grinned madly, holding out a few various hand variants, each for a different, very specific functionality.
“The crusher,” Brandon groaned.
“Oh no no, that won’t do,” the doctor replied, pulling out a special, boxing-glove sized mechanical hand.
“Military grade ‘wall destroyer’. They’re new, this one cost me an arm and a leg to acquire, well, not me, a pal of mine… literally at that. But not to worry, I patched him right up.”
A few clicks, dings, a bit of saw buzzing to adjust his old parts to work with the new hands, and a happy customer stomped out of the doctor’s office.
“A hand for a hand,” the brawler said before opening the door.
“Not sure that’s how the saying goes, but good enough. Next time we’ll patch your software.”
Yet another five star review. He was on the roll today.
“A helping hand,” the review read. He cleaned the space a little, mostly wiping away the blood splatters to maintain a professional look, and returned to his chair. An hour passed, and then another. As the doctor got up to make some fresh coffee, the next patient came in. But this one did not enter the way most others did – this one fell through the ceiling, landing right in the chair.
“My my,” the doctor pondered, looking over the new patient, “what kinds of trouble fell on my head this time?”
The doctor looked up, wondering how someone fell into the office from the ceiling. The ventilation grate was opened, swinging on a single, barely intact but a bent hinge.
“Oh, creative. Been watching a lot of movies have you?”
He returned his gaze to the patient with a slow and unimpressed movement of his head.
“And you’re here because?”
N.N.: He wants to woo a brawling pop-star, he'll need some wings to fly up to her, some colours to get her attention, perhaps black and yellow, maybe even a one use weapon, a stinger if you will to ward off the other fans
The new patient had a perplexed kind of look on his face, a little dumbfounded by the fact that the doctor looked as he did, with the crab legs, mechanical jaw, and robotic arms.
“Yes, and?” the doctor queried again, amused by the creative entry by this patient. Normally his patients at least pretended to use the door, or occasionally entered through the wall.
“Oh uhm,” the man sat up, cracking his back and brushing dust from his sleeves and shoulders.
“Doc, I… urgently need wings! And colors! Colorful feathers. I, there’s this new, uhm,” he paused, pulling out a rolled up poster, and unrolling it to show it to the doctor.
“She, her name is Mitsuki Umki, a new idol. I am in love, madly in love doctor. I must impress her, but she’s like the sun, and I’m Icarus.”
The doctor arched his single human eyebrow as he clanked his way backward toward a table of his surgical tools.
“Wings?”
The man nodded.
“And a stinger. And-.
“ he paused.
“Black and yellow, no, pink and purple, no, all the above, aesthetic.”
The doctor tilted his head, “I see, you wish to become a flying hazard-sign?”
The man gasped, “What!? No! I wish to be colorful to impress her.”
The doctor scratched the back of his head, “Colorful like a clown?” he tapped a metallic finger against his iron jaw, thinking hard.
“No doctor. Elegant, like a peacock.”
“Aha,” the doctor nodded, “sit tight.”
He ordered as he crawled back to his computer and searched up peacock pictures.
“Flap like a butterfly, something something, and a big fluffy feather tail. So let me get this straight, which, this doesn’t sound very straight from what you’re telling me. Instead of meeting her, and or writing her like a normal person – you want to become a heavily armed wasp and force her to acknowledge your feelings?”
The man nodded. The doctor sighed, “Mmhh, I see. Romantic. Nothing says ‘go out with me’ like a ‘I am a menace capable of air assault.’.”
The man shifted impatiently in the chair.
“So? Can you do it or not?”
The doctor clanked over to a cluttered table, rummaged through a few mechanical bits, shoving aside some tools. Then made his way to a cupboard that was filled to the brim with various parts.
“Oh I can,” he replied hastily while pulling out a pair of sleek, foldable wings that were only mildly bent and dented.
“I’ll uh, have these painted for you while I prepare your body.”
“Are they any good?” the man asked.
“Lightweight, foldable, durable. They’ll get you where you need to go, so long as the destination is not a sane decision.”
Then he pulled out a wrist mounted needle-like mechanism, “And this? One time use retractable stinger. Special forces edition. Delivers a lethal dose of the most potent venom.”
“As for the colors… and feathers.”
The doctor glanced at the man, squinted and raised his finger in a ‘get up’ gesture, then spun his finger around in a ‘turn around’ gesture.
“Yes yes, very good. You have a small waist, won’t be an issue. I’ll sort the feathers out.”
He pulled out a few spray paint cans.”
Be right back, you may sit back down.
He ordered local brats to paint the wings and hunt down some chicken for feathers. The paintjob came out quite ‘exquisite’ complete with young people’s slang and cuss words that he couldn’t quite decipher. But surely his patient wouldn’t care, or notice, for a while at least. And so the operation began. The doctor, for a change, put his patient to sleep as he worked on sewing a chicken’s tail to his tailbone, and mechanical wings that attached to the man’s shoulder blades.
The man awoke after hours of intense surgery. His back felt heavier, for now he had to bear the weight of the new wings. They extended far and wide, and were as magnificent as a road construction sign. From above his pants and under his shirt, a chicken’s tail poked out that he could use to woo the idol of his dreams. His wings were mostly painted in black and orange, as was the rest of his outfit.
“Well?”
He asked, turning in place, examining his new looks.
“You look like a ‘no entry’ hazard tape,” the doctor shrugged, leaning back in his chair with a pipe in his mouth.
“Perfection.”
The man complimented the doctor’s work, wiggling his ass to make the chicken’s tail wag a little.
“Yeah yeah. If you make it big, remember your little black-market surgeon choom. And if you don’t, well – try to at least get back here before you kick the bucket so I can reuse the parts.”
The man turned around, then glanced up at the ventilation shaft through which he entered, gave the doctor a confident thumbs up, and shot up into the shaft from whence he came. After a moment of silence, a loud clang echoed from above, followed by a muffled curse.
“He’ll figure it out, probably.”
The doctor commented to himself.
The doc was idling yet again. The clinic was closing soon, though it’s not like he had elsewhere to go. He slept right in this clinic, it was his home, his dwelling, and his job. He proceeded to do what all professional doctors in his field did when there were no clients, a medical pastime known as ‘spinning very fast in his chair to see how fast it can go before liftoff.’.
The current record was held by the Doctorpus, an octo-legged surgeon of the Web Street. Just as he reached close to record speed, suddenly the wall behind him exploded and shattered into pieces. From the newly opened dust-veiled entryway, a high-pitched voice came.
“Doc, I need help.”
The doctor turned slowly, unamused by the violent entry, only concerned by the fact that he failed to break the standing record.
“You know that most people knock before they break the wall, right? It’s a, what’s it called? Ah yes – a custom.”
“Most people don’t have my issues,” the person replied.
“Fair. And what’s the issue?”
O.F.: As the dust settles it reveals the psychopath with the high-pitched voice as a 230m trench-coat made out of news-paper, on top protrudes a long alligator snout with some missing teeth.\
The doctor fanned away some of the dust and gasped, “Oh my if it isn’t Azubazu. What now?”
The giant that towered over the doctor at almost twice the height seemingly grinned. Though as with most gator-folk it was hard to tell whether they were grinning or if it was just their neutral resting face. The coat was quite stylish, and rather informative. The doctor found himself absorbed in the newly arrived reading material without realizing it. They were slightly dated headlines.
“Local newspaper delivery service under investigation after a crocodile attack,” the doctor read it aloud and shifted his focus to the other article.
“A toothless vampire spotted in the Western part of the city. Victim claimed – ‘he tried to suck me dry, but that’s just it, all he could do was suck. All bark and no bite.’ Authorities are planning counter measures against the threat.”
“Lost my teeth,” Azu explained.
“Oh? Sounds like this vampire did as well. Did you 2 visit the same dentist per chance?”
Azu growled angrily.
“No. Picture this; it’s dawn. I’m running my usual routine, delivering the freshly printed batch of papers, BIG batch today, great news – people will love it.”
She leaned in, pausing dramatically before whispering, “And then I spot them… my nemesis.”
“You have a nemesis?”
The doctor asked. Azu nodded, “A FLYING nemesis at that.”
The doctor frowned, “Uh, a bird?”
Azu shook her head.
“No! A newspaper stealing harpy.”
The doctor glanced up at Azu in disbelief.
“No way!”
Azu nodded, “Yes way! That chicken has been terrorizing our delivery men for YEARS! I finally caught her mid theft.”
The doctor produced a small bag of popcorn that he seemingly had stashed away in 1 of his apron’s pockets for the most unbelievable stories by his clients, and began to snack on it while listening attentively.
“She was by the Old Mudak’s house, stealing a paper I had just delivered.”
The doctor swallowed anxiously, “The one with a suspicious number of bear traps?”
Azu nodded, affirming his suspicion, “Yes, it wasn’t bears stealing his papers, I knew it.”
“And then?” the doctor paused, holding out on continuing his snack until the story resumed.
“Right. I lunged at her with all of my ferocity. She shrieked, there were feathers and papers everywhere. I bit down on her leg.”
The doctor finished chewing and then sighed, “And she kicked you?”
“Not just that. She flew up with me, and then drop kicked me into the street.”
“Right, that explains that,” the doctor put away the bag of popcorn and gestured to the chair.
“Sit down, we’ll get you some new chompers. Some proper nibblers. You want them made of titanium, uranium or octanium?”
“Uh, titanium?”
The doctor nodded, “Mhmm. Pearly whites or something with extra ‘flare’?”
Azu pondered for a moment.
“Flare sounds fun, befitting a cute croc like me.”
“True,” the doctor did not protest, pulling out an old dusty box from underneath one of the tables and rummaging through it.
A moment later he produced a box of teeth, human teeth however, that he had to shape to resemble croc teeth with a dremel.
And flare they did. Every time Azu would chomp down on anything, the teeth would flare out, releasing a small explosion. And every time she’d clank her teeth, they’d sparkle. Making her ever more intimidating, and no longer require a stove to cook her meat.
And as the last patient departed, and the night consumed the light of day. The doctor hung a sheet over the missing wall, and flipped the sign of his shop from ‘open’ to ‘get lost.’ At last, the doctor’s hard day was over, and he was now left to rest and await the return of his patients.
Leave a Reply
You must be logged in to post a comment.