Underground Level 2 of the 13th District was the excretory vent of the super-city, New Babylon. Here, there were no glitzy holographic ads, no climate control, only a labyrinth of sewage pipes, humming illegal server racks, and a smell that refused to dissipate—a mix of rust, mold, and stinging disinfectant.
John wrapped his soaked hoodie tighter around himself, looking like a drowned rat as he wove through the gaps in the maze-like piping.
His target was clear—"Benevolence Prosthetic Repair Station."
The sign hung crookedly on a rusted blast door. Half the LED tubes in "Benevolence" were dead; the remaining ones flickered with a ghostly green light, casting a sickly pallor over the flowing sewage nearby.
John stood at the door, inhaling a lungful of moldy air to calm his hammering heart. He reached back and touched his lower back—the location of his kidney.
"A healthy, young kidney, reinforced with basic psionic training, has a black market listing price of 20,000 New Credits."
This was something he’d seen while sneaking a look at restricted files in the Academy library.
Twenty grand. It wasn't the full fifty thousand needed for the medical bills, but it was enough for a down payment. Enough to pause that damned "treatment termination countdown." As for the rest... he’d figure it out later. Selling blood, testing drugs—whatever bought time.
John pushed open the heavy blast door.
Inside was a cramped, cluttered space. The walls were lined with unidentifiable biological specimens; jars of formaldehyde held twisted limbs and organs. In the center stood a stained operating table next to a bubbling biochemical vat.
A man in a blood-spattered white coat stood with his back to John, busy at a workbench. That was "The Butcher," Old Zhang, the most notorious black market doctor in the area.
Hearing the noise, Old Zhang didn’t turn around. He just waved a surgical saw that looked more like a bone cleaver. His voice was raspy, like he was chewing on sand:
"Implants to the left, wait in line. Selling parts? Lie down over there and weigh in. No haggling. One price."
John glanced at the electronic scale nearby—it looked like something from a butcher shop, still stained with drops of dark crimson fluid. His stomach churned.
But he swallowed it down.
"I... I'm selling a kidney."
John walked to the operating table, his voice trembling but firm. "Former student of the Imperial Necromancy Academy. My body has undergone three years of psionic tempering. Magic affinity B+. It's premium goods."
Old Zhang’s hands paused.
He turned around, revealing a face that was half flesh, half machine. His right eye was a massive multi-functional optic that spun as it focused, a red scanning beam sweeping over John.
"Oh? An Academy runt?" Old Zhang sized him up like a butcher eyeing a hog, his gaze filled with merchant shrewdness and disdain for the lower class. "Expelled? Nowhere else to go?"
John didn’t speak; he just nodded, gripping the hem of his shirt.
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"Alright." Old Zhang tossed the bloody saw into the sink, splashing red water. "Since it's a mage's kidney, I'll give you 25,000. Get on the table. No anesthesia gets you an extra 500."
John looked at the operating table.
It was a stainless steel slab covered with a disposable plastic sheet, but beneath the plastic, old brown bloodstains were visible. In the gutter of the table, traces of the previous customer remained—a few semi-coagulated clots.
The sound of a leaking faucet nearby was magnified infinitely in the dead silence.
It instantly woke the deepest fear in his mind.
Hemophobia PTSD triggered.
His vision began to sway. Heart rate accelerated. Breathing became shallow. That familiar, suffocating vertigo rushed over him like a tide.
"No... no anesthesia."
John bit the tip of his tongue, using the pain to stay lucid. He scrambled onto the table, trembling, lay down, and squeezed his eyes shut, daring not to look.
"Make it fast... I'm in a hurry."
Old Zhang whistled, seemingly impressed by the kid's "courage." He grabbed a thick syringe from the tray—filled not with anesthetic, but with a stabilizer to prevent psionic backlash.
"Grit your teeth, kid. When this hits, it’s gonna feel like your kidney is on fire."
The cold needle touched the skin of John’s lower back.
In that split second.
That cold touch acted like an electric shock, piercing John’s fragile psychological defense.
He couldn't help it. He opened his eyes.
He saw the cold glint of the surgical light reflecting off the needle tip.
He saw the massive, dried, blackish bloodstain on Old Zhang’s white coat—like a map of hell.
He saw something in the tray next to him... something still slightly wriggling.
All the images, all the smells, converged into a massive, irresistible physiological urge to vomit.
It was instinct. Genetic coding.
John bolted upright, shoving Old Zhang’s hand away. He hung over the edge of the table, dry heaving violently.
Having not eaten all day, nothing came out but a puddle of bitter bile. But his violent thrashing knocked over the instrument tray.
Scalpels, hemostats, and syringes scattered across the floor, shattering. The expensive stabilizer spilled, hissing as it hit the ground.
He’d seen people cry from pain, back out at the last minute, even try to jump out the window mid-surgery.
But he’d never seen someone puke their guts out just looking at the needle.
"Are you fucking kidding me?"
Old Zhang’s face darkened instantly. His mechanical eye glowed with a dangerous red light. His right hand shot out, grabbing John by the collar and lifting him off the table like a chick.
"Is this hemophobia? You're hemophobic?!"
Old Zhang’s voice was filled with disbelief and rage, spitting saliva onto John’s face. "A Necromancer who's afraid of blood? Are you taking the piss?!"
John was choked into silence, face flushing red, weakly trying to explain, "I... I didn't..."
Old Zhang didn't want to hear it. For a black market doctor, time was money. This defect was wasting his life.
He swung his arm, hurling John toward the back door.
John slammed heavily into the sewage-filled back alley, splattered with mud. His ribs hit the concrete steps, pain curling him into a ball.
"Stay the hell away! Don't dirty my shop!"
Old Zhang stood at the door, waving the bone cleaver, looking at John like unrecyclable trash.
"Your adrenaline levels are too high! You reek of fear! This meat is sour! I can't sell this! Even Ghouls would pick this out of their teeth!"
"Useless trash! You're not even fit to be spare parts, John!"
The heavy blast door slammed shut with a desperate thud. The electronic lock clicked.
Sealing the last ray of light behind the door.
John lay in the muddy water, gasping for air. Cold rain lashed his face, mixing with tears and dirt, flowing into his mouth—a bitter taste.
Completely and utterly failed.
Even this last path, this most humble, undignified road to survival, he had screwed up.
Because of that damn hemophobia.
Because of that damn instinct.
In a city where even bodies could be traded, he didn't even qualify to be "sold." He was a scrap item rejected by the recycler.
John pounded the ground with his fist, knuckles skinning and bleeding, but he felt no pain.
"Why can't I do even this? Why can't I just save someone?"
He thought of his mother.
He thought of the countdown on the payment notice.
23 hours... now only 21 hours left.
Time was bleeding away. Life was counting down.
Despair drowned him like a tidal wave. He felt like the city's refuse, chewed up, spat out, rotting in the sewer.
The rain fell harder.
John curled up in the dark alley, like a stray dog abandoned by the world.
Surrounded only by the sound of rain and the low rumble from the distant pipes, breathing like a monster.
The road ahead was cut off.
The way back was sealed.
In this cold, rainy night, John Doe had nowhere left to go.
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