12:10 am, June 19, 2483. The Clinic.

  The woman tied her long, brown hair up into a ponytail as she made her way over to the operating table where a cyborg was lying, in pain, but calm enough. That was good. She hated patients who panicked and whined.

  “Don’t worry. It’ll be quick.” she said flatly as she looked at the tangled wires in her patient’s arm, “nothing important is broken, your joint module got tangled in your pain receivers so it hurts a lot more than it actually should.”

  “S-so I’ll be okay, doc?” the cyborg said.

  “Yes, we’re just going to untangle the cords and add a few screws in. Won’t cost more than a couple thousand RMB.”

  “I can’t thank you enough!”

  “Yeah, yeah, save it.” the doctor grumbled to silence the bemoaning, as her attention fell on a humanoid android who had walked into the operating room.

  “What’s wrong, Splice?” she said while placing the mask over the cyborg’s face to put them under.

  “Mr. Issak Chan… he wants to see you,” Splice said, its metal head bowed in respect.

  “Does he now?” the doctor said, “If he’s sick again, I’ll have you know I told him to follow my instructions about magic use very carefully-“

  “It’s not about that. He says it’s for another matter entirely.”

  “Another matter? Not about his cyborg girl either?” the doctor said, her chair completely turned around now, as she regarded Splice’s words with a strange, lethargic kind of interest.

  The android shook its head.

  “Hmm, well, that’s weird.” the doctor put on a headlamp, and reached for a pair of tweezers. “Either way, tell him I’m busy with a patient, so he’ll just have to wait.”

  The android once again nodded.

  “Yes, Reiaura.”

  Issak tapped his foot, waiting impatiently for the tin can of a doctor’s assistant to return. Turns out the witch hadn’t been lying about the price of the ring. His jaw had dropped when he had been given an estimate of two hundred and eighty thousand RMB, and he was still sure that he might have been scammed.

  If only that witch wasn’t rich, then I wouldn’t have to be doing all this stuff…

  Issak looked up to glare at the flickering, fluorescent lights of The Clinic. He was sure that the ‘doctor’ had an actual name for her establishment, but he couldn’t be arsed to remember it. Besides, The Clinic was just what everyone down here referred to it as. It was a dingy place, and Issak often debated the legitimacy and safety of the procedures and practises going on here. But it was the only medical facility that would allow Outcasts to be treated down here, so it was his only option as a patient himself. He personally didn’t like the ‘doctor’, as she called herself, but he had to admit the general public opinion of her was high, and there would also be a good chance this Ou girl they were looking for was under her care at some point.

  Thankfully, today seemed to be a slow day at the clinic with the waiting empty completely empty apart from him and Tori, and all for the better, since, frankly, he would rather die than be seen here.He leant forward to put his head in his hands.

  Support creative writers by reading their stories on Royal Road, not stolen versions.

  FUCK- why do I have to deal with two of my least favourite women at the same time???

  Speaking of Tori, she didn’t see half as troubled as he was, as she flicked through a few of the dog-eared and stained magazines in the waiting room. Tori was one of those who had a positive opinion on the ‘doctor’, or at least one better than his, as she quite frequently asked about The Clinic, but it was mostly in relation to whether it would be feasible to get a new mod done, so Issak wasn’t entirely sure whether she actually liked the quack or not.

  But he didn’t have to ponder that line of thought for much longer, as the click of metal against ceramic tile foretold the return of the assistant android.

  “The doctor is busy right now,” the white and gold robot said curtly, poised and rigid. It seemed strangely ornate for a hospital bot, which was probably because it used to be a top-of-the-range mechanical seamstress. Issak didn’t care to ask why that quack had chosen a glorified sewing machine for an assistant. He long had given up on finding a method to her madness.

  “So you will have to wait.” the android tilted its faceless head, as if waiting for a response.

  “Just say she doesn’t want to see me…” Issak grumbled, but as he was about to turn away, Tori moved forward.

  “Hey, do you recognise this girl?” she held up one of the photos the two had been given to the robot’s face. Issak could practically hear the whirr of the hidden cameras in android’s face kicking into gear.

  “Yes. She was a patient.” it finally said, stepping back a little.

  “That’s good. Can you tell us more about her? She’s gone missing and we’re tryin—“

  “No, I cannot. That would be a violation of doctor-patient confidentiality.”

  “Forget it,” Issak warned, “that android’s hard-wired to do anything that quack orders it to do. It isn’t going to budge. Only way we’ll get information is from her.”

  As he spoke, a woman in a white medical coat walked out from behind the curtain leading to the examination area of The Clinic. She undid her ponytail, letting her long brown hair hang messily over the body.

  “Splice,” she called, pulling a cigarette pack from her pocket, “get back there and make sure all the vitals are balanced, alright?”

  The android nodded and click-clicked its way out of view.

  “Hello, Reiaura.” Issak said firmly.

  “It’s Dr Reiaura to you…” she gave him a once over before sighing: “What do you want?”

  “We’ve been paid to find this girl,” Issak said, taking the photo from Tori’s hands, and gave it to Reiaura, “and we suspected that she was a patient of yours, so we decided to come to see if you can shed any light.”

  “Mmh…” Reiaura said with a nod, looking over the photo carefully.

  “Well, your robot, uh… Splice was it?” Tori added, “Managed to confirm that she was a patient, but it said it cannot reveal anything more due to doctor-patient confidentiality, so maybe you, the doctor, could have more information?”

  But Reiaura seemingly ignored her words, and turned to Issak again.

  “Have you been following all my instructions?” she asked, pulling out a cigarette from the pack, as if the missing woman was nothing, “You know your issue will only get worse if you keep over-using it.”

  “What? How does my condition have anything to do with-“

  “What medical condition?” Tori immediately started prodding, as inquisitive as ever.

  “Uh, it’s none of your concern!” Issak said quickly, immediately before throwing Reiaura an accusatory, withering glare, “What the hell was that for?”

  “If I didn’t do that, then you would never have understood,” Reiaura said with a tight smile, “I cannot tell you anything about my patient, as a doctor. There are a lot of things that my patients trust me with that I would and can not give you, under any circumstance. Like right now, how would you feel if I went out and told your friend here your reasons for seeing me?”

  “Not good?!? Are you daft? I told you to keep everything under wraps!” Issak snapped at her.

  “Exactly,” Reiaura said with a flick of a lighter, bringing it to the cigarette pressed between her lips, “this patient of mine, I remember her well, and she was also one who wanted her details and affiliation with me kept ‘under wraps’. And such, I will not tell her information, especially not to you.”

  “We have been consulted to find her,” Issak said, growing impatient.

  “I know that, and that is precisely I must refuse,” Reiaura took a puff of the cigarette, “I know what you’re like, Issak Chan, and I refuse to sell out my patients to someone as unprincipled as you.”

  ~azura.