Chapter Thirty-Two - The Doctor’s In the House

“There are hundreds of ways the installation of an augmentation can go wrong. You get these backyard non-companies that’ll do installs for cheap, but half the time you don’t get what you paid for.

Then there’s stuff like infections, both physical and malware, piracy things. Some folk, and it’s not just girls, will be put to sleep for a simple op and wake up in some underground black market.

I’m not a company shill. I don’t give half a fuck where you get your augs. Just get them from a reputable source.”

--Writeit LifeProTips board, 2047

***

“We’re one level up,” Gomorrah said. “Another hole through the floor?”

I glanced around the room we’d burst into. I couldn’t see much until my helmet’s visor adjusted for the near-darkness, buy my ears let me feel the room just fine. It was a storage room... maybe? It was hard to tell, exactly.

“Yeah, we...” I paused, ears twitching within my helmet. Raising a hand, I made the universal “one second” gesture and shuffled over towards the far end of the room. There was a door there, one that, according to the maps Myalis had laid out for me, would lead into a passageway connecting a bunch of smaller rooms together. Our next push down was meant to be a couple of rooms over, where we’d be dropping right into the spot Doc Hack had his lab.

“What is it?” Gomorrah whispered. We were still talking over our coms, but I guessed that kind of habit didn’t die.

“There’s noise in the next room over,” I said. Once I was next to the door, I leaned down and brought my head closer. The sounds were mechanical. Something like a grinder, whirling and... grinding at something. There were other sounds too: air hissing through something, the gurgle of water, and the constant beeping of what had to be some sort of medical device.

Gomorrah stepped closer, boots crunching through the floor bits we’d blown up.

“I think the next room over is Doc’s place,” I said. “They might’ve done some renovating.”

“Then the place isn’t going to be the size and shape we expect it to be,” Gomorrah said.

“I don’t know about you all,” Raccoon said. “But I was thinking evil bad-guy lair. Like in one of those movies.”

I wasn’t going to admit it, but I had the same idea. “We’ll just have to see,” I muttered as I reached up to the door handle and carefully, slowly, spun it around. The door wasn’t locked, and the reason why became clear enough as soon as I peeked through.

Doc Hack’s lab was a messy, uneven room, mostly rectangular, but with segments to the sides that didn’t mirror their opposites. Obviously, they’d torn out walls wherever to make more room.

Still, someone had been at least a little clever about it. Large concrete pillars rose up from the ground floor and all the way up to the ceiling. Obvious additions to keep things from collapsing down.

The space past the door wasn’t all that big. A segment of floor maybe a metre wide, with no rails to the side and a fall down two floors of empty space to the ground below. There were some catwalks and multiple levels on the end opposite us, each one reachable by a metal staircase built around one of the pillars.

“I think we’re mostly out of sight up here,” I whispered. There were lights in the room below, but most of them hung from the ceiling at a level lower than the one we were on; anyone looking up would need to see us in the shadows behind a light. Also, they’d need to be able to see me while I was invisible.

I opened the door a little wider after ensuring there wasn’t anything connected to it. I didn’t want another dollar-store trap going off and alerting everyone.

“Want me to scout ahead again?” I asked.

“Go ahead,” Gomorrah muttered.

I nodded and stepped onto the overhang. It was really a balcony at this point. One without a railing, and overlooking what was obviously some sort of cheap-o hospital setup. I made sure I was properly invisible before moving closer to the edge to look down.

I’d gotten augs once, in my eye. Just the standard crap that everyone got. It had required going to a specialty clinic where I sat down in a plush chair and was given some options. I’d opted out of the local anaesthetic because that shit was expensive. Then some bored undereducated guy had stuck my head in a vice and, a lot of held back screaming later, I had my first aug. Quick and easy and just a little painful. Like getting earrings.

This tale has been unlawfully lifted from Royal Road; report any instances of this story if found elsewhere.

That was for a simple, run-of-the-mill augmentation that everyone and their grandma had.

What was happening below was on a whole other level.

There were three baths, old cast-iron looking things, too small for anyone to be properly comfortable in. Each of them was currently filled with someone.

Most of someone.

Someone from the torso up.

Tubes leading into baths were probably keeping the three down there alive.

Off to the far end of the room was a pile of clear plastic trash bags, currently filled with discarded limbs, but very little blood.

There were more people down there. A couple hanging off of metal racks, prosthetic arms and legs dangling as they were held up by hooks that passed under their arms.

“Well, this is exceptionally fucky,” I said.

“Super fucked,” Rac agreed.

“You probably shouldn’t be seeing this,” I said as I looked away. I didn’t need to scar the kid.

“Eh, it’s not the first time I’ve seen most of someone in a trash bag. Never seen that many, but then, that’s just, like... a matter of scale, you know?” Raccoon said.

“You worry me sometimes, kid,” I said.

She laughed, and I couldn’t help but shake my head at it all. We had to make our way down there and figure out a way to help those people. That was five of the missing; there had to be more of them somewhere. Though the size of the limb pile did suggest that these five weren’t the first to get operated on.

“What in God’s name are we going to do with them?” Gomorrah asked.

“Save them?” I tried.

“I don’t know how to replace people’s limbs,” Gomorrah said. “And the point-cost to give the number of people I suspect are here a semblance of a normal life... it’s more than either of us can afford, Cat.”

I shrugged, even if she couldn’t see. “Then we do what we can. Look, we need to find the fucker who did this and ask him to explain. Or maybe we can extract that from his augs. Just going to have to be careful not to blow his brains out while we murderize him.”

“Speak of the devil,” Gomorrah muttered.

I snapped my head around and searched the ground floor. Three people had just walked in. Two of them were very obviously Sewer Dragons. Metal feet clicked on the concrete floor and they both wore those familiar long coats that hid most of their bodies. One of them had four arms, the second set ending in what looked like a suite of surgical tools.

I didn’t peg him as Doc Hack—that went to the third guy.

Doc Hack was a wide, large fellow who walked with all the grace of a beached whale. He barely fit in the white coat he had hanging over his shoulders, the doctor’s smock beneath straining.

I didn’t think it was all fat though. There were some strange angles under there. Modifications?

The good doc walked over to one of the baths while his pals moved around the room. Tools came to stand on the other side of the tub, while Four Arms moved to a bench off to the side and sat down with the nonchalance of someone already bored out of their mind.

“What are his readings?” Doc Hack asked.

“BP’s a bit low,” the... I decided to assume it was an assistant, said. “Anaesthetic is starting to wear off.”

“Give him another... no, best not. We’re running out as is. We’ll have to act fast.” Doc Hack leaned over the body in the tub and a clearly mechanical hand snaked out from the sleeve of his coat and smacked the guy’s face. “Wake up, my boy.”

“He’s coming to,” the assistant said.

I watched as the guy’s eyes flickered open. “What?” he asked. He looked around, then started to move.

“Stay, stay, you shouldn’t move just yet,” Doc Hack said.

“Who? You’re that... where’s?” The man raised his arms and stared at the stumps. Then he glanced down. “What the fuck? What the fuck?!” he screamed.

“I explained it to you already,” Doc Hack said, his voice way too fucking calm. “We need you. The whole city needs you. It’s a delicate machine, and many of its most precious cogs are missing.”

“What the fuck did you do to me! Put them back! Put them back!”

“Now, now, no need to worry, you’ll have new limbs soon, entirely suited to a whole new biome! A miracle of innovation and science, impossible even a century ago!”

“Where the fuck is my cock?!”

“Right,” I said. “Votes that we just go full samurai on Doctor Hacks-a-lot down there?”

“He’s disgusting,” Franny said.

“Let me switch to a more flammable fuel,” Gomorrah said.

That was a yes in my books.

***