An old gramophone, worn by time and stained with someone else's blood, creaked out a classical melody.
To the tune, the Medic moved his hands gracefully over Heavyâs slit-open abdomen, as if conducting an orchestra rather than rummaging through human entrails. Heavy slept peacefully under anesthesia, his tongue hanging out, periodically letting out a strange snore, like the grunting of a bear.
The Medic, without looking up from his work, smiled:
âOh, mein lieber Freund, just in time! You are right at ze peak of ze melody!â
Archimedes tilted his head and cooed curiously. The Medic gently stroked his feathers with a bloodied finger.
âI knew you would like it. Unlike my ozzer big friend here⌠you are ze only living connoisseur of good music! And, of courseââ
Before he could finish, Archimedes fell like a stone straight into Heavyâs gaping abdominal cavity.
The pigeon pecked at the intestine with predatory enthusiasm, mistaking it for a fat worm.
The Medic flinched in surprise. The scalpel slipped from his fingers. For a momentâabsolute silence.
And then, the Medic made a completely insane, acrobatic movement with his hand, catching the scalpel in midair a millimeter from the floor, and instantly returned to his majestic pose as if it had been planned all along.
ââŚand science! Genau!â
He waved the scalpel theatrically. âNow, Archimedes, watch closely. Zhis is ze most important part of ze suture. See zis angle? Perfect technique! Absolutely perfect! If meat could cry viz joyâit would be crying right now!â
The Medic continued the operation, enthusiastically explaining his incision technique to the pigeon. But Archimedes wasnât listening anymore. He was staring into a dark corner of the laboratory.
There, on an old hook, hung an object of unknown origin. Due to the dim light in the operating room, it was hard to make out exactly what it wasâonly its silhouette. The fabric was burntâŚ
The Medic snapped his fingers.
âArchimedes! Hey, mein Freund, look over here! I am creating art!â
The pigeon didnât react. The Medic sighed and finally glanced in that direction. His smile became strange. Almost⌠nostalgic.
âO-o-o⌠so zhis piece of rag has caught your interest?â He set down his instrument and lazily adjusted his gloves. âZhis rag⌠ah, what memories. I once had a colleague. She had a disgusting habit of correcting my formulas, which, of course, is bad form as far as I am concerned.â
The Medic set down another bloodied scalpel, lost in thought for a couple of seconds.
Sometimes she was rightâŚ
âZe assistant was very talented. Not as talented as I am, of course. Zhat would be statistically impossible. But forâŚâ
An unfamiliar scraping sound echoed through the ventilation shaft.
The Medic continued: ââŚfor someone viz such experience, quite decent.â He chuckled briefly. âShe adored chemistry. Biology. Autopsies. And frogs. Besonders frogs.â
The Medic snorted under his breath and rolled his eyes, as if he were recalling not a person, but a very stubborn lab rat.
âAnd, ach⌠she asked too many questions.â He thoughtfully pushed his hand deeper into Heavyâs abdomen. âWay, way too many. Always a bad sign. If a person starts taking too active an interest in chemistryâeither somezhing will explode, orââ
ââŚOops.â He looked down. âHmm⌠Was zhat an important organ or just decorative?â
Heavy groaned painfully through his sleep.
âAh. So, it is important.â He adjusted his glasses with the tip of a bloodied finger. âAt first, I zhought she was just anoizzer eccentric student viz a genius complex. You know ze type? Zhey donât sleep. Zhey donât eat. Zhey look at a jar of acid as if zhey want to marry it.â
âJa-ja, exactly! But then I saw her notes⌠Hm. Very neat. Very extraordinary. She looked at my research not like a normal person, who would scream and run away⌠but like a hungry dog at a piece of meat.â The Medic snorted with a mixture of irritation and pride. âIt was almost brazen.â
With a single motion, he pulled a clamp out of Heavy and tossed it into a metal tray.
âAnd I zhought: âWell, vizzer she will die during ze experiment, or she will become somezhing very interesting.ââ A brief pause. âTo be honest, I was betting on ze former.â
The Medic shrugged as casually as if he were discussing the weather.
âBut one cannot let potential go to waste just because of trifles like âethics,â âthe bodyâs stability,â or âthe risk of complete destruction of ze human body.ââ He smiled even wider. âAnd anyway, Archimedes⌠if a person agrees to work viz me after seeing my labâzhey no longer have a future as a normal person.â
âAnd zhen zhere was one⌠mm⌠minor planned-unplanned incident viz my improved version of ze ĂberCharge. To put it simply, a minor incident occurred.â
Brushing against the surgical lamp with his shoulder in his usual clumsy manner, the Medic cast light upon the rag.
There, on the old hook, hung a scorched lab coat. At least two sizes too small for the Medic. The fabric had yellowed with age. Brown chemical stains covered the sleeves. Dark mold had grown on the collar. As if the lab coat had long been forgotten. Or they had tried to forget it.
The Medic smiled wider. Too wide.
âAnd now she still works viz me. Well⌠more or less. Partially physically. Partially not. Ha-ha! Ach, technical detailsâŚâ
Archimedes flew over to the lab coat. Peck.
The pigeon snatched up a photograph, but it slipped from the birdâs tiny feet, disappearing among the instruments and fabric. The Medic automatically reached for his forceps, then stopped. His gaze froze.
The man bent down and retrieved the bloodstained piece with the forceps, handling it as if it were a carrier of infectionâsomething that could contaminate him even more than blood.
In the photo, a young girl with a crooked fang shyly looked at the camera, holding a huge frog in her hands. On the back, in uneven handwriting, was written:
âA.Y. Donât touch the frogs. Especially the one in the jar.â
The Medic didnât look at it for longâjust long enough for his mind to process such triflesâand then carefully⌠too carefully, he slipped it back into the pocket of the lab coat.
Then he chuckled quietly to himself.
âStay away from ze spleen, my friend. It is not presentable today.â The Medic returned to his conversation with the pigeon. âIf it werenât for me, she would not have achieved biological greatness, but would have remained in a limited world among ze mediocre.â
A voice from the darkness spoke dryly from the ventilation shaft:
âI can hear everything, you idiot.â
The Medic didnât even turn around.
âOh, wunderbar! Zhen bring me a new spleen. Zhis one is kind of sad.â
Heavy mumbled through the anesthesia:
The record needle skated across the vinyl. Instead of music, silence played.
turnnoffyourmind
theartofmadeline
tangentwithtanner
vaporwave
amandla
