The late afternoon sun painted the village in long golden streaks as cicadas buzzed in the trees. Children's laughter echoed from the creek, and smoke curled up from the cooking pits as people prepared dinner. Wang stood awkwardly near the water trough by the tavern, a rough scarf tied around his neck, covering the branded "M" beneath.
He still drew glances—some curious, some cautious—but no one had said anything. Not yet.
He was stretching his shoulder, trying to get used to his new balance without the right arm, when a shadow fell over him.
Warru stood there—barefoot, weathered, and stone-faced as always—cane in one hand, half-empty gourd of plum wine in the other.
Wang straightened instinctively.
"Chief," he said, nodding slightly.
Warru looked him up and down, then extended his hand. "You're walking now. That's good."
Wang blinked. The handshake offer was unexpected. But he took it.
Their hands met—Wang's grip firm despite being one-armed. Warru's was rough, calloused, but steady.
"Does this mean I'm officially not your prisoner anymore?" Wang asked with a wry grin.
"Means you ain't bleeding all over my cellar," Warru said. "Which helps."
Wang chuckled.
Warru didn't let go right away. He studied the younger man's face for a long beat, then finally released the grip and took a swig from his gourd.
"I've been thinking," the elder said. "You're down one arm. That's gonna be a problem."
"No shit," Wang muttered.
"I know someone in the trade post who owes me. Tech scavenger from the south coast. He deals in prosthetics."
Wang's brow lifted. "You serious?"
Warru nodded. "Can get you a cybernetic limb. Not top-tier corporate chrome, but functional. Durable. Might even have a hidden knife in it if we're lucky."
"Fuck... that's..."
Wang trailed off, blinking, unsure how to process the offer. "That sounds expensive."
"It is."
"Then why offer it?"
Warru took another swig of wine, then pointed his cane at Wang's chest.
"Because you lived. Because you didn't lie. Because Aiyana trusts you—and I trust her. And because we need strong backs around here."
Wang swallowed. "So... charity?"
"Hell no," Warru snapped. "You work it off. You help build. You haul. You fix shit. You hunt. Whatever we need. You become one of us, then you earn that limb."
Wang smirked. "Debt slavery with extra steps. Love it."
Warru grunted. "You want a hand or not?"
Wang held up his left. "Just one. The other's gone, remember?"
The old man chuckled—dry and low.
"You'll work under me directly. I don't want any whining. No backtalk. You get up when the bell rings, and you don't stop until the sun bleeds out."
Wang nodded slowly, seriousness creeping back into his voice. "I'll do it."
"Good," Warru said, tapping his cane once on the dirt. "We'll send word tomorrow. Should take a week or two for the parts. Maybe three. In the meantime—start earning."
Wang extended his good hand again.
This time, Warru slapped a small leather pouch into it.
"What's this?" Wang asked.
"Your first tool," Warru replied, turning to walk away. "Hammer's in there. Roof patching duty. You can bitch about it after you're done."
Wang smirked. "Thanks, old man."
Warru raised the gourd over his shoulder without turning. "Don't make me regret it, boy. One slip, and I feed you to the dingoes."
"Deal."
***
The old barn behind the barter post reeked of oil, sweat, and scorched metal. Flies buzzed near the open window, and half the corrugated tin roof was missing, letting angled beams of sunlight spill across cracked concrete and piles of junked wiring. The place had once been a storage shed. Now it doubled as the closest thing this side of the desert had to a clinic—or a butcher shop, depending on who was doing the cutting.
Wang lay shirtless on a rust-stained cot, his breathing shallow and even. His right shoulder stump was exposed, sterilized with high-proof moonshine that still stung like fire. The bandages were off. His flesh was bruised, scarred, but the swelling had gone down over the last month. Nerve tissue had settled. The tech guy said it was "ready."
"Alright, stay still, mate," came the low, gravelly voice of the mechanic.
Gris. That was the guy's name—or at least, the one he gave. Wiry, twitchy fingers, mid-forties, face scarred from what looked like shrapnel, and a pair of cybernetic lenses jammed into his eye sockets. His breath smelled like solder flux and cheap chew. He'd been a drone engineer for a warlord syndicate down near Brisbane before getting dumped in the Outback for "modding prisoners without approval."
Now, he was everyone's illegal back-alley tech man.
He stood over Wang with a toolbox full of surgical instruments in one hand, and a second-hand cybernetic arm in the other—held together with three different makes of alloy, scratches all over the plating, and a serial number half-filed off. It had five fingers, one of them slightly crooked, and a built-in screwdriver in the index joint.
"This won't win any fashion awards," Gris muttered, adjusting his visor. "But she'll flex, grip, punch, and if you don't fuck around, she won't fall off."
Wang exhaled slowly. "Sounds better than nothing."
Gris nodded. "This'll hurt like a bitch, by the way."
"Figured."
"No anesthetics either. I ran out last winter."
Wang blinked. "Wait, what?"
BZZZT.
The sawblade spun up.
Gris grinned.
***
Wang clenched his teeth as Gris made the first incision—cutting a clean line around the scarred edge of the stump with a hot vibro-scalpel. Smoke hissed up instantly, filling the room with the scent of seared flesh.
Wang grunted. Hard.
"Fuck—"
"Yeah, yeah," Gris muttered. "Don't pass out. I gotta see if the nerves are exposed."
Gris peeled back dead tissue, revealing glistening bundles of nerve fiber and muscle still twitching slightly.
"Good anchoring," Gris murmured, wiping sweat from his brow with a greasy rag. "You heal quick. Might be the desert, might be the dingo jerky. Who knows."
Wang growled, "Just do it."
Gris pulled a sterilized ring of carbon-steel clamps from a tray and began attaching them to the muscle groups. Each clamp stabbed into the skin with a snap and a spark of pain. Wang bit his lip until he tasted blood.
Then came the socket implant.
Gris picked up the base of the prosthetic—a titanium ball joint surrounded by a scaffold of exposed circuits and interface nodes. He pressed it gently against the open wound and began tapping small anchoring rods into Wang's shoulder.
Click. Click. CLUNK.
Each tap drove metal deeper into bone.
Wang screamed once—then cut himself off, eyes wide, fists clenched.
"Almost done," Gris said, sweat pouring down his face. "Now hold fucking still. This is the hard part."
He brought the main arm over, twisting the metal spine of the prosthetic into the socket until it clicked and locked into place.
Then he grabbed a wire from the stump and a data spike from the arm.
"Moment of truth," Gris muttered. "Nerve bind. You feel this?"
BZZZK—
Electric pain lanced through Wang's skull as the nerve interface lit up. It was like fire shot through his veins. His back arched off the cot, eyes rolling for a second.
"FUCK—!"
The fingers on the cybernetic arm twitched.
Then flexed.
Wang gasped, chest heaving, as the hand formed a shaky fist.
Gris stepped back, wiping his hands.
"It's in. Takes a few days to calibrate fully, but you should be able to move it now."
Wang slowly lifted the arm. It whirred softly, servos humming under worn plating. The fingers opened, then closed.
His expression shifted from agony to awe.
"I… I can move it."
"Yeah," Gris grunted. "And it only cost you your last bottle of rum and three weeks hauling scrap for me."
Wang grinned despite himself.
"Fair fuckin' trade."
Gris chuckled, lighting a cigarette. "You're officially patched up. Just don't punch too hard with that thing, or you'll rip your own shoulder out."
Wang sat upright slowly, sweat pouring off him. He flexed the fingers again, then stared at the steel arm resting on his lap.
One arm gone.
One reborn.
And a whole new fight ahead.
Q: Do you know anyone with a prosthetic limb?