It was too late when Knox entered the Chop Shop the next day. The feral with the ring in his ear had been slashed and bitten through by the other two ferals. Doc Barrows rested his forehead onto the glass, watching the animalistic ritual of feeding. He wouldn't say a word to anyone; not even to Nurse. Knox steered clear of the Doc all day, keeping his remarks to himself. In the afternoon, he left Charon and Win in the basement to enter the test room. Ferals were creatures alright. Their dirty, sharp fingernails dug into pliant flesh, ripping out organs and muscles. The corpse's face was grey and green and bloody and in shreds over the skull. Doc was right, though. There was a full set of steel coloured hair on the feral's head. Knox, the resident body carver, felt puke gurgle up his oesophagus.
He waited till they were done and the body was a pile of bits of meat and white bone before he started cleaning the place up. It smelt like stale blood.
He remembered doing this to Moriarty. It was his parting apology-gift to Megaton, really, after disposing of the evil bastard in cold-blood. He had dragged the body with him outside Megaton and proceeded to carve him up. At first, it was just for pure scientific purposes, or so, he convinced himself. He wanted to see what made an asshole of a barkeep tick. Were his organs in disarray? Or were they organised by their ability to push forth a unique brand of jackassery? None of those. His flayed up body looked like any flayed up body. Nothing different. Knox had carved the body up and brought the parts with him to Underworld.
He refused to think about Gob's accusing stare at him. Why'd you do it, smoothskin? He was gonna hit you – Yeah, but he's my master. Doesn't give him a right to hit you- It doesn't give you the right to kill him, either. He's my master.
What a filthy word. Master.
He never felt sorry for killing Moriarty. But he apologised to Gob everyday for betraying him, for not having enough faith in him, for not waiting for him to grow a fucking backbone and off his 'master' himself. For all the shit that Gob went through, he deserved that one shot of pleasure. At least.
Gob hadn't forgiven him, had he?
Knox poked the partially eaten heart. Dead. He didn't know the fancy name for heart. When he was young and Dad wanted to teach him the fancy name, he refused saying that 'a heart is a heart and if you call it something else, it won't be a heart'. Kids. Damn. He missed his old man. He brushed a red trail off his cheek and disposed the body outside Underworld, at the same place they disposed all other their other failed tests.
Knox asked Doc what the heart's fancy name was. Myocardium. My – O – Cardium. It felt good and foreign on his tongue.
The next day, when he went to check on the corpse outside Underworld, it was gone. Just like how all the previous failed test bodies were gone within a day. Examining his surroundings, Knox saw a couple of muties hanging around. He briefly wondered if muties ate ferals. Beside him, Charon told him to be careful.