Epilogue: Filling the Empty Spaces...
"How's he doing today?"
"The same as yesterday, sir."
Professor Membrane let out a weary sigh.
Every day for the past five months, he would walk into the emergency medical ward of the sprawling Membrane Lab complex. Every day for the past five months, he'd turn to the assistant/nurse on-duty and ask about his poor, insane, comatose son. And every day for the past five months, it was the same answer.
"No change…" he muttered, turning to stare at the observation window. Buried in the middle of heart-monitors, I.V. drips, tubes, bandages, sensors, and wires lay the torn remains of his son's body.
He could hardly fathom how it happened, and so quickly too! The house cameras had recorded both Dib and Gaz leaving the house early that horrible afternoon five months ago, no doubt to engage in whatever hip thing that the youngster did these days.
Nor was he too surprised to find the house empty when he came back home that night. The only thing out of place was the phone dangling off the hook, but the professor just talked it up to a youthful disregard and put it back on the hook, making a mental note to remind the kids not to be so forgetful.
He had barely settled into his easy-chair for a nice, relaxing review of the latest edition of Quantum Physics Weekly when the phone-call came.
The world had become a blur of sirens wailing and flashing lights as he rode in the ambulance alongside the E.M.T.'s working at a maddening pace to keep that slashed-up heap which was his son alive.
"What could have done this to him?!" asked a stunned colleague as they rushed into the emergency ward.
A broken spine. Massive internal hemorrhaging. Punctured spleen, liver, lungs, and heart. Tears in several major arteries. One eye carved out and half his face gone with it. Even after over 28 hours straight in surgery to stabilize the boy, the prognosis was grim…
They said it was madness to keep the boy alive like this. They said he should let him die with some dignity. They said the boy was aware of the state his body was in that he wouldn't want to go on like this… They said there was no hope even if the boy did recover…
Well, he'd prove those fools wrong…
Stepping over to the intercom, Membrane pushed the call button. "Simmons, is everything ready?"
"Yes, sir." chirped his every faithful secretary.
"Excellent! I'll be there in a moment." He took one last glance at his poor, poor son. Oh, how he would prove those fools wrong, even at the cost of his only son's life…