Three years had passed since Dan awoke in a sterile room with Mark anxiously waiting at his bedside. "Dan," Mark had said, low and urgent. "Don't look down."
He looked anyway and screamed. Where his left side should have been, the sheet fell sharply. Dan ripped it off and screamed some more: his left arm was gone, the side held open and gaping. IV lines filled with blood and fluid wound between the blunted ends of his remaining ribs, disappearing into his chest cavity.
Mark grabbed the sheet and yanked it over the mess of flesh and wires. "You've been through—you've had—" he began, distraught. He paused, drew a deep breath, and tried again. "It was touch-and-go for days. We didn't—didn't know. . . I had to cut out the. Equipment. The doctors are still. . . they're molding new ribs for you. It will be a while before your skin grows enough to close over them."
That had been three years ago. He'd been fitted with sparkling titanium ribs, his skin had grown and stretched and been stitched shut, and he'd received a heart transplant. A stretch of plastic tubing connected his throat with the shriveled remains of his stomach. He could breathe with his remaining lung and even eat a little, three bites at a time. His body had healed as much as it could, and he'd been moved to long-term care.
Most days, he could sit up a little, maybe read for a few minutes. But for all of modern medicine's interventions, he'd never leave the facility again.
Nights were better. The Ambien they gave him was powerful stuff. But lately, even that had been failing, and he'd drift on the edge of a hazy awareness, his skin prickling all over with the uneasy sensation of being watched, and occasionally prodded. He supposed the months of video surveillance had made his mind jumpy.
So Dan was only half surprised when he woke with a start to the quick rhythm of agitated breathing. He sat upright, then winced at the sudden movement. "Who's there?" he gasped.
"Shh, shh, I have all the parts, it will be so beautiful—"
"Oh no, not you," Dan groaned out loud. He groped for his table lamp. Blearily, he looked at his clock. 2:05 am.
"Yes, of course, me," Rat replied, unbothered. "Some days ago, I blinked and I was here! Here in this room! Oh, it was exactly what I wanted. . . ."
"Rat," Dan growled. "Get out! I thought you went home—to Visser!"
"Oh, I did, I did!" Rat confirmed. "And oh it was splendid! I joined in the chorus. But I wasn't useful! I could be so much more. . . here, I'll be so useful!"
He was getting closer. Dan thrashed out of bed and landed heavily on the floor. "What does that have to do with it?" he sputtered.
"Oh, you shouldn't do that," Rat exclaimed, scooping Dan up and depositing him on the bed, and dazed from his fall, Dan did not resist. Dimly, he felt straps securing his legs, his remaining arm, and his chest. "Melody said so herself: these things are never exact. Visser was home, and then it wasn't."
It would have sounded touching, if Rat wasn't pulling out a scalpel. "Can I at least have anesthesia this time?" Dan asked.
"Oh, no, no. No, you have to be awake. It makes the parts settle faster. It will only hurt a little, I really am sorry!"
"How did I guess," Dan sighed in resignation. He gritted his teeth, closed his eyes, and waited for the knife to descend.
It wasn't so painful this time. At least the pieces were facsimiles of things that properly belonged in a human. For the most part, Rat seemed to leave his titanium construction untouched, only disturbing them to squeeze in a slimy, faintly pulsing lung. "Where did you. . ." Dan began to ask. Rat simply looked at him, an implied question. Do you really want to know?
"Nevermind," Dan said instead.
Next came the layers of muscles and sinews, the soft tissue the doctors hadn't been able to reconstruct or transplant with any precision. These, Rat withdrew one by one from a bucket, where they lay tangled in a writhing mass, resembling nothing so much as a bucketful of eels. Rat snatched them with quick, sharp fingers and welded them to Dan's metal frame. And when the bucket was empty except for a small pool of slime, he pulled Dan's skin over the reconstruction and stitched it shut.
"So much new territory," Rat sighed happily. He whisked out a small mirror.
"Wow," Dan said, impressed despite himself. His chest was no longer hollow under his skin, and a shiny metal new arm protruded from his shoulder. Running down his side was a neat, barely-visible seam. A maintenance entrance, he guessed.
He tried to flex his fingers. Nothing.
"Oh, it still needs to be activated," Rat giggled. He reached into his sack and pulled out one last object. "Don't worry, this won't hurt a bit! I just need a little fluid."
"Why is it shaped like that," Dan whispered in disbelief, eyes flickering to the long, narrow wand.
"Oh, it has to reach your new, beautiful body! And it can't be on the outside, no, what would happen if the live parts were on the outside? Then anyone could tamper with it! No, it has be where it's safe."
"In my body," Dan groaned. "You put the charging port in my body." Sighing, Dan spit on his hand and held it out. "Just don't lick it this time."
Gleefully, Rat rolled the tip of the wand in the spit, and then the sides. He gave it an experimental tap, and electricity crackled through it.
Only, he didn't seem to be satisfied with simply touching it to the activation port. He pulled it out and reinserted it, trying various angles and pressures while Dan twitched, still strapped to the bed. After a particularly aggressive shove that scraped against his insides in the best-worst way and made him twitch. "Oh! Oh! That's the one!" Rat chanted maniacally.
"Rat! What are you—unggh," Dan moaned.
"Fluid! Your new, beautiful parts need fluid! Of course, it can't be just any fluid, no, it will heal so much faster if it's fluid the body recognizes. . . ."
"Of course," Dan grumbled, letting his head fall back. It didn't take much. Before, long, Rat shoved the wand into the live metal and activated it.
A burst of current shot through Dan's insides, from the bared port, up through his spine with his nerves and bundles of fiber-optic cables twisted together. The warmth travelled up and up, shooting through his ribcage and into his shoulder, and down to his fingertips.
After, Rat released the straps. Dan sat up and studied his new arm, bending the elbow and flexing his fingers. He barely noticed when Rat reached into the seam and lubricated his mechanical pieces.
"All done! Oh, you can do so many wondrous things with this new body!"
Dan stood on shaky legs and stretched his new muscles. They creaked metallically, but soon even that would be gone. "Rat, there aren't any. . . surprises?" he asked, warily.
"Not this time, no," Rat answered, looking uncommonly serious. "No surprise leviathan spawn. Just my inventions. . . and your body."
"Alright." Dan looked around the little room, with its peeling wallpaper and bland furniture. It had been his home for three years, and his prison. "Rat," he said sternly.
"Yes?"
"You made me a prisoner in The City, and the lasting damage of your handiwork kept me trapped when I got out. And the last thing you said to me was I am not sorry. But. . . ."
"But?"
He uncurled his fingers, one digit at a time, both his human and his mechanical hands trembling with emotion. "But. . . I guess this is an apology in your own way. Come."
He smiled then, and Rat grimaced back, a stretching of the lips that might have been a smile too. Together, they left the facility.
