There were delays.

We lost the hand in a fit of apoptotic self-destruction. It was going to make such a beautiful palm. But an abscess formed and knotted it up into a vile mass. A chemical cry for help. A hormonal wail of despair swept through the sample. Like intercellular fire burning beneath the skin - the entire thing coiled in itself and died – and with it, a five digit bank statement.

We could not afford to wait any longer but urging caution earned me eight hours working alongside Hayes’ associate – Oscar Lutrae. An Iowan native, the river otter morph was amiable enough; however his chatty habits wore thin a few hours into the process of preparing the array. It is a massive construct of silicon, steel and superconducting ceramic. It was also ancient and horrendously lacking in calibration. My entire morning and mid-day was swallowed up just trying to attenuate optics. Dr. Lutrae’s continual analogies to crawfish throughout did not appease the missed-lunch-migraine I was developing by the time we got around to testing the device.

The calibration process was simple: peel an apple – put the skin back over the fresh ‘wound’ and sweep a beam over it. Repeat a thousand-thousand times. We varied the thickness of the cuts. We varied the beam intensity. We varied the type of apple. I think we desecrated an entire bushel before I felt like things were under control. Burnt pulp-stink was nauseating after a while and several pairs of sticky nitrile gloves hi-fived the bottom of a waste bin along the way. But it was very much worth it - the consequences of misalignment were horrific when inflicted on fruit – to imagine what might occur to a person was unthinkable.

Throughout the process my stomach was gnawing at me. Chewing and protesting my gut for its labor-induced abstinence from food. It made me dizzy and the dust in the room left me feeling quite sick. I debated sampling the remaining test fruit – but I did not want to contaminate the workspace further. My plans for a quick vending machine visitation and smoke break were thwarted by Hayes himself – who called to inform me of our patient’s arrival. Why she would want to meet with a biochemist was beyond me – but my summons were an escape from the dusty instrumental room I gladly took. When I saw her though, I somewhat wished I had stayed.

What struck me the most was her smile. Bleached white and wide grinning – her fangs were perfectly normal. They seemed out of place set against the terrifying mask that composed her face. Or once-upon-a-face, as it were. Speckled red pockets of molten red flesh, like rubber, from brow to chin radiated the appearance of agony. It pooled among the pink expanses of scar tissue that spilled across her muzzle. Her smile gave indentation and definition where cheeks should have been. The warped flesh shifted with every word, framed by a healthy coat of fur along her forehead and ears. It gave stark contrast between what was and what ought to be.

“Dr. Fluttertail: meet Andrea Robinson,” Hayes had introduced her with the practiced charisma of a salesman. It snapped me from my likely rude reverie – and I had to keep myself from staring as the young woman offered me her non-bandaged hand for a hearty shake.

“It is a pleasure Doctor! I don’t want to impose on you – but I was curious if I could see your ah… progress before we started,” She turned her head to Hayes a moment before that hazel gaze swiveled back to me. Staring out through that sarcophagus of desecrated skin as she hastily added with a nervous swallow, “I have been looking forward to this for a long time.”

“We all have Andrea. Dr. Fluttertail would be glad to show you her work while we prepare the operating room.” The horse answered for me. I resented him momentarily for denying me a badly needed snack and smoke break. However, after looking at Mrs. Robinsin’s face my appetite had quenched itself all on its own.



“Oh my god is that me?” She had asked with wonder gasped through the surgical mask. She had a sing song voice tempered with an underslung grit of determination. It was not the voice I expected from someone who had been smothered in a grease fire nearly a decade ago. The photographs did not do justice to the atrocity of triple digit degree cooking oil. Career destroying heat. Her tone was full of wonder. It hesitantly danced on the verge of hope.

“Yes, we cultivated it from samples you provided several months ago,” I replied mechanically – staring into the glovebox as I carefully manipulated the delicate flesh with clumsy rubber hands. She stroked a gloved hand across the surface of the glass view plate – perhaps along the face of the mannequin from her perceptive. Perhaps upon the reflection of her own.

“The fur will come after.” I added quickly as I turned away to sort out the air lock. I had to raise my voice under the hiss of ambient air violating the sanctity of inert atmosphere. “Once it has taken – we will insert hair follicles into the tissue! With luck – you’ll be picture perfect by September!”



With luck indeed. I bit my lip as I watched from outside the instrumental room. Oscar was alone in the room with her – guiding the orange glow of a surgical lamp across her features as he taped her ears back. It would be impermissible to allow anything to flick into the path of the beam. The breathing tube that had been pushed into her sinuses sagged and wavered with each constrained breath as she blinked and mumbled affirmation to his commands to remain still as he painted her face with topical anesthetic. She could not be put under for this procedure – it was of the utmost importance that she be able to alert us to things going awry. A stack of papers witnessed and signed might have protected us from liability – but failure at this phase was project rending. A misfortune on her part could spell disaster on ours.

The eerie silence of the operation room was punctuated by the steady beep of various monitors. A quiet opera with actors dressed in sterile blue scrubs. The short stage of a stretcher was all that was needed for the acts to compose themselves. The stage light clicked off. The beam lanced across the short distance with a hushed hum – its passage invisible save for the faint hissing-kiss of wayward dust and dander faintly crossing its path. We had sacrificed a dozen-dozens of Malus domestica upon that pedestal to ensure what happened next was boring and predictable – but my heart still caught in my throat when the white-trace of that beam connected with the tip of her snout. Centimeter by centimeter Oscar directed it – gripping the lens to the side and holding Andrea still – annealing synthetic skin to her face. A quiet rustle and wet sizzle sighed from beneath the loose flaps of tissue as their crinkled surface suddenly went smooth. Painted into place by a band of ions. The faint skim of grease from that topical anesthetic formed bubbles beneath surface here and there - each of which had to be pulled it taut and smoothed it out just before the beam lest blisters form and sabotage the entire effort.

Andrea shook under nitrile clad fingers as the bright beam crept over her lips – sealing them shut as the skin fused together The separation of her lips soon ceased to be entirely – jaws perfectly aligned. A seamless alabaster muzzle that contorted under the weight of her distress. The breathing tube shook with alarm as the practiced otter pinched her muzzle and pushed it back into the path of that beam. Those hazel eyes looked on in transfixed dread as the horizon of white light edged closer and closer. Unable to so much as whisper her thoughts she watched, muted as everything grew nearer and brighter until a duet of finger tips rolled down her brow and everything went dark.

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Image done by  fiberopticfeline

Chapter 1 – Acquisitions
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