By midday, Jack had fitted two hands, corrected a spinal brace and removed an eye that kept showing its owner people who were not there. The fourth client complained about the smell.
Jack pointed to the ventilation switch. “It works when somebody pays to fix it.”
The man had brought in a damaged leg and wanted a cheaper fitting. Jack examined the connectors, quoted the price on the wall and asked whether he wanted Venom. The man said no. Most did until the chair was locked.
In the back room, Vor the Reaper was drinking coffee beside a steel cupboard. His red A9 hunter eyes were reflected in the battered steel. He had delivered three parts that morning. One was nearly new and still had its owner’s name etched beneath the casing. Jack had turned that side towards the wall.
The client saw Vor through the half-open door.
“Hey! Where’d you get these parts?”
Jack pushed the door closed with his foot. “You want this leg changed or not? ’Cause I have plenty more waiting if you don’t.”
The client looked at the price board again. A new leg cost six times as much. He chose the used one.
The operation ran long. Jack had heard every kind of pleading a human mouth could make; he gave the man enough Venom to keep him still and added it to the bill. When the leg finally responded, he made the client walk across the room three times. On the third pass, it buckled.
Jack adjusted the nerve contact. The fourth pass was clean.
The client cried with relief and thanked him. Jack was already entering the next appointment.
When the man had gone, Vor came out and asked whether the leg would hold. Jack opened the payment record. The man had paid for a fitting, not a new control unit.
“For a while,” Jack said.
Vor nodded and asked what Jack would pay for another just like it. Jack smirked, “Same as before”. Vor slipped silently out into the night and followed the man with the newly fitted leg home.
At the clinic door, someone began knocking. Jack wiped down the chair and let the next client in.
When she was settled he said “Give me a moment”, he then went into the back room and pushed the door shut. He reached up onto one of the shelves and pulled down a small plastic bottle, from which he tipped two small blue tablets, Buzz. He liked to keep a clear head, if he could, but this had been a long bloody day.