Prose:Synth Repair Scene

"Hey, it's Evelyn, right? Evelyn Parker?"

"Yep, that's me."

"Come and take a seat here."

The doctor motioned for Evelyn to sit down on the opposite side of his desk. His nametag read “Dr. Shaun Morgan, Medical Engineer”.

"I'm Dr. Morgan. What seems to be the issue today?"

Evelyn turned slightly, bringing her right arm into view. It was a mess of dented metal painted in blue coolant - some of which was still dripping onto the floor - covered by scraps of synthetic skin. Torn wiring harnesses could be seen through the surface.

“Uh… it’s my arm. I… got hit by a car while crossing the road.”

“How’s the rest of your body?”

“It’s… fine, I think. The car only hit me in the arm.”

“Okay, well, let’s run you through a diagnostic just to make sure. Would you mind heading lying down on the service bench over there?”

Dr. Morgan motioned to a sturdy-looking metal bench on the opposite side of the room. Above the bench hung a large gantry fitted with what appeared to be a robotic surgical system. Beside the bench sat a few carts with a numerous assortment of tools and parts, as well as computer terminals and displays.

“Sure.”

Evelyn walked over, lying down on the bench. Dr. Morgan retrieved a cable harness from one of the carts and slid the connector into a port on the side of her neck, locking it in place with a click.

“You’ll need to consent to external maintenance access on your HUD. Okay, there we go. Let’s take a look.”

Dr. Morgan watched one of the monitors as the system ran through each component of his patient’s body one by one, building a three-dimensional model.

“Alright. The good news is you haven’t sustained any damage to other components. All your vitals look healthy. You did lose a little coolant, which we'll need to replenish, but your emergency shutoff valves cut in as they were supposed to, so it's not much."

"The, uh, bad news is… your arm’s too badly damaged to be repaired. We’ll need to replace it.”

“Ah… okay. Sure.”

“You’re a size B…7, right? Hm, we don’t have any B-7 right arms in stock at this facility, but we can order one. That’ll take a few days. Or… we do have a B-5, if that’d work for you?”

“I’ll take the B-5. I need to get back to work, hah.”

“Perfect. I’ll just sort this and… there we go, they’re having it brought down as we speak. Are you okay with me removing the old arm now?”

“Sure, go ahead.”

“Would you prefer if I put you under for this?”

“Why? It’s not like it’s painful for us synths.”

“Haha, no worries, just wanted to check. Some patients have an adverse reaction to this sort of procedure.”