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Violent Limb Part 2


by Aaron Sabatine


The night after the big win, the agent came to my hotel room. I was drunk, thinking about what I could do with 2 of these battleaxes.  There was a knock at the door.  I invited him in jovially.

"Take the other arm, Jonas! Take the other arm,"  I said, laughing.  "Make me a better god!"

"You're not a god, Kai," Jonas said smoothly.  "You've had your bloodbath. Time to pay up." Before I could say anything, my back was against the wall, held there by the agent's arm. He was surprisingly strong for his small stature. I tried to use the prosthetic, gripping his shoulder with the metal fingers. Everything in my mind said destroy.

Nothing happened.

"You have to listen to me, now.” He took a small device from his pocket, still pinning me with the other arm. “If you don't, you'll never use that arm again." I didn't listen. I tried to swing my left arm to knock him away, but I might as well have been using a twig. Jonas grabbed my windpipe with his free hand and squeezed away, until the light of the hotel room faded.

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I regained consciousness as if a recording was starting up, one of those old 8mm films where you can hear the click-click-click of the film feeding past the bright light. I was on the ice, though not in the right position. I was completely at one end of the rink. Over the loudspeakers came the cacophony of the announcer:

"Introducing the league's first bionic goalie! Kai 2.0!"

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