[NORTH KABUKI – Kowalski’s Clinic]

  Friday| 18 JUN 2077 | 11:15

  [NUSA NEWS: PRESIDENT HARFORD DECLARES "NEW ERA OF PROSPERITY" – NIGHT CITY UNEMPLOYMENT UP 5%]

  Patients had started rolling into the clinic at 7AM. They were, both Will and the Doc, running on about four hours of sleep, and an unhealthy amount of synth-coffee. Will was reattaching a gen 2 cyberarm on an elderly woman from Northside while Doc Kowalski watched him work and talked to his ‘accountant’ over the phone. They were hammering out some sort of arrangement that would supposedly be beneficial for all parties. Will wasn't concerned. The Universe had shown him that he was not in control of his fate, so he focused on being useful instead.

  The arm went into place with a loud click, and Will ran a short diagnostic scan on the terminal. The test came back with green checkmarks across the board. The old woman smiled.

  “You should have full functionality now,” Will informed her.

  “How much do I owe you?” she asked nervously.

  Will looked over to Doc Kowalski, who waved his hand dismissively. His signal for ‘pay what you can when you can’.

  “The total repair cost is six hundred sixty-nine eddies and zero ennies. We do have a pretty flexible payment plan option, with zero interest. How much can you pay today?”

  “Maybe, forty eddies?”

  “That's fine. We'll set up an account and you can pay whenever you're ready.”

  The woman looked stunned. She couldn't figure out the trap. Business in Night City simply wasn't run in this manner. ‘Zero interest’ was a rare combination of words to hear in the year 2077, especially in Kabuki. Will escorted her to the front door, assuring her she hadn't misheard. She couldn't seem to thank him enough for the act of fairness. When Will finally closed the door, he felt pretty good about himself, even though he wasn't the one giving away practically free medical service to the needy folks himself.

  Kowalski had designed the clinic so he could offer generous discounts and reasonable payment plans to people who couldn't afford to be seen at Night City Medical Center. The real money came from cyberware implants and maintenance. The bioware procedures, like the ones Doc Kowalski wanted Will to get, were expensive, but out of style with the cyberpunk aesthetic. Outside of the Animals, most gangers cared more about style over substance. However, when cyberware was involved, style could still kill you just the same.

  It was just Will and the Doc now, time for a breather. Time to talk about the maze of legal hurdles and financial potholes he’d be navigating in the days and weeks to come. Will was just about to ask how the call had gone when the Meatwagon siren blasted his eardrums. There was no volume control on it, because when it went off, it meant someone was about to flatline.

  Will sprinted to the reception desk and pulled up the external camera feed. REO Meatagon Inc. had just performed a high-speed 90-degree left turn at the corner of Pinewood Junction. In seconds, he had the patient’s data and current condition pulled up on the terminal.

  “Doc, we got a 19-year-old male, Tyger Claw, multiple gunshots, and possible spinal damage! Biomonitor’s screaming, vitals are tanking.”

  Kowalski was already scrubbing in, “Prep the chair for emergency surgery. No time for cryo pump.”

  The door to the front office slid open, and two exhausted-looking medtechs came bursting through with something resembling a human being bleeding out on the stretcher. The tall one, in a red jumpsuit and combat helmet, stopped in front of Will. “Where do you want him?” he asked in a professional, almost casual voice. He had no doubt handled fifteen similar cases in the last week.

  Will pointed to the ripperdoc chair in the corner of the office, and they lifted him onto it before pulling the spineboard out from under him and heading out the door with a wave. “He’s your problem now.” It might as well have been the official REO motto. That was the kind of quality service one gets in Night City from the budget-friendly alternative to Trauma Team. He shook his head. There was little time for such thoughts. Doc Kowalski had just jammed an airhypo into the patient’s neck when Will finally joined him.

  Kowalski expertly slid the endotracheal tube down the Claw’s throat, while Will prepared the ventilator mask to go around his face. A minute later, two large-bore IVs were sticking out of the patient’s neck and groin, pumping him full of Aesculapius brand blood substitute. Kowalski worked feverishly, tamping down the bleeding both internally and externally as microsurgical waldos worked their science magic. The metal tentacles moved faster than Will could follow with his eyes. They had to because the Claw’s insides were a mess. Large lengths of intestines were replaced with vat-grown intestines, which Kowalski stitched in place like he was installing a part on a car. Hours passed. The first time the Claw died on the table, Will nearly panicked.

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  The Tyger Claw patient only flatlined a couple more times after that, but each time, Will and Kowalski had managed to bring him back. By the end, he had been pumped full of a half dozen drugs Will couldn’t even pronounce, but apparently worked all the same. He was alive. Although someone, maybe even a couple of someones, had wanted him dead enough to fill him with about a hundred eddies worth of lead ammo. Now, instead of rotting in the back of a city sanitation van, he was stabilized and on the road to what would probably be a full recovery (if he didn’t gonk it up). Kowalski saved lives all the time, but it was still a minor miracle for Will every time they pulled someone from the edge.

  The two of them moved the Claw, whose name turned out to be Yoshi Ogata, through the recently constructed hallway that connected the front office to the exam and patient rooms. Kowalski then sent a text to his Tyger Claw contact notifying him of Ogata’s condition, and Will moved him off the stretcher and onto the bed. He managed the feat by himself and without moving the spine around too much. It was just like he had been trained to at the Academy in Advanced First Aid. Now it was time for the last-minute check. The IV bags were full, and patient readings were steady. He would live. Will turned to leave, but stopped when he heard Ogata cough. “Thank you, I don’t know who you are, but thanks.”

  “You’re welcome, Mr. Ogata. Now get some rest, your body needs it.”

  It was almost 4 PM when Will entered the breakroom. Kowalski was sitting back and nursing a cold NiCola Peach. Will had always assumed the stuff was made of nicotine, because why else would someone purposely drink something that tasted like cough syrup?

  There were a few minutes of pleasant silence, and the two enjoyed it together. Will was just about to doze off when Kowalski prodded him with a finger, “My ‘accountant’ Alvarez has put everything together for us. Very smart man, but very broken system.”

  “Okay, I’ll bite. How’s this work? Explain it like I’m a kid.”

  “You are a kid, but yeah, I give it try.” Will didn’t take offense at the comment, since he had recently taken to calling Kowalski ‘old man’ to his face. “Anyway, your merc work, from now on, you won’t get paid directly.” He passed Will a data tablet that explained the scam (It’s not a scam, he insisted). Everything was legal or legalish. Will just had to shrug his shoulders and trust the old man. There was nothing else to it.

  “What’s a subsidiary?” asked Will absently as he tried to absorb as much of the document’s meaning as possible. “Nevermind, it explains it here.”

  If Will understood correctly, and that was a pretty big ‘if’, he would be the employee of a dummy company called Eclipse Freight Solutions. This company served two purposes. It would be the company that took on the huge amount of debt from the loan being taken out, rather than it falling on either Will or Doc Kowalski. The second purpose was to act as a sort of buffer between Will and his questionable mercenary work. His official title, he snorted when he read it, was Sales Director. Kowalski was CEO. It was all very superfluous as far as Will was concerned. Additionally, the dummy company was owned by a nonprofit called the Kowalski Medical Fund, so half of the profit would flow back into the clinic in the form of donations. This would allow them to hire more medtechs and ripperdocs as well as help cover the charity cases that kept walking in.

  The plan had several benefits. Will got all of his medical needs taken care of, including bioware and cyberware upgrades. He still wasn’t crazy about the idea of cutting off body parts, but if he ever went crazy, it was nice to know the option was there. There was also a Delamain Resolute transportation package and a NetWatch-approved Firewall Security Software update for his Neuroport. Lastly, the company would take on all of Will’s personal debt. Not a bad deal, he hoped. Then, just like that, there was nothing left to read. He thumbed the contract as written without another moment's thought.

  “Now, we are partners. Officially,” Kowalski announced. “Time to make you harder to kill.”

  [NORTH KABUKI – Kowalski’s Clinic]

  Saturday| 19 JUN 2077 | 06:35

  [NETWATCH PROMISES CITINET EXPANSION IN 2078]

  It was the second time in forty-eight hours that Will had been dressed in a hospital gown. This time, he wasn’t nervous at all, despite what would be an incredibly painful and grueling process. Kowalski had talked Will out of attempting to undergo the full bioware package all at once, assuring him that doing so would lead to his death. Just a few weeks prior, Will would have insisted.

  The new medtechs came in for a brief orientation and to help Kowalski prepare for the bone & muscle lace procedures. Those two procedures alone would be enough to keep Will bedbound for up to a week, maybe more. The denser, stronger bones and increased tensile strength in his muscles would be put to good use if he didn’t gonk things up.

  Naomi Alexis (Will thought he saw that her old alias was ‘Doc Mittens’) and Bob Jones Jr. had just come back from their tour of the full clinic. They seemed impressed. “This is an ambitious project,” Naomi told Kowalski. He nodded, “Yes, and if not for ch?opiec, I would be in Maelstrom hole somewhere instead of showing you around.”

  Will shook his head ruefully, “I seem to remember a doctor with a rifle saving my life that night, but I won't get into this again. Not in front of company.”

  “I'm sure you both saved each other's lives plenty that night,” Bob said in a deadpan delivery. Kowalski laughed, then looked Will in the eyes.

  “You still up for this? S’gonna hurt. You'll be stuck in bed for week or more.”

  Will just nodded. He wanted to live, and working merc gigs came with certain prerequisites he didn't have. His body just wasn't up to the job…yet.

  “Let's do it, Doc.”

  The next 48 hours were a living Hell.