Angry Jasper-Eleven

Jazz had been going to Doc Redhorse for years. He worked out of a small office in the front of his turn of the Twentieth Century house at the edge of town. With big white turrets, bright sunny windows and a broad green-painted porch, the house appeared to have been lifted from some country lane circa 1910. The grass of the neatly trimmed yard was bright green. A crooked old willow hugged one side of the house. Colorful rushes of daffodils and snapdragons crowed at the porch, running along the narrow walkway to the Doctor’s door. There was a pair of rocking chairs by the door. A lavender shawl was draped across the smaller of the two. It had been there since Misses Redhorse passed on a few years earlier.

Jazz limped up the walk, cradling his chest. The pain grew less and less tolerable in proportion to Jazz’ sinking mood and energy. He paused at the step. The quiet country lane stretched among farm fields and small banks of woods. It arched with the curve of the wheel, through a small town and a distant rain storm. The sun was high overhead, where it was stretched by the clear ceiling of the wheel and separated into it’s constituent perspective at the edges.

First time Jazz saw Doc Redhorse was not long after he’d “met” Kate. Jazz had lost his hand in a nasty scrape with pirates attempting to hijack a freighter he was guarding for a paltry two hundred and eighty credits a week. Jazz came to in the infirmary, his body battered and torn. It was as close, at least up to then, to death as he had come. It was a moment in which life, or clinging to it was still in question and, in no small part, his decision. Indeed, Jazz might have made that decision, especially after seeing the shredded remains of his hand.

At that moment a face appeared over him. The Native American’ light brown flesh was smooth and handsome, framed by thick black hair. His eyes were deep agate pools, overflowing with a gentleness and brilliance that immediately stilled Jazz’ fluid emotions and runaway thoughts.

“I’m Doctor Redhorse,” he winked. “I’d shake your hand but…”

“Bad joke, doc,” Jazz managed.

“Don’t you worry.”

“Seen my hand, Doc?”

“Which hand do you jerk off with?” he grinned. Anyone else Jazz might have reached up with his good hand and choked the guy. There was something innocent and pure about Redhorse’s bedside manner.

“Use both hands, Doc. Out of necessity.”

“Gonna put you to sleep now,” he nodded to the anesthetist. “Have you healthy and defiling yourself again in no time.”

Jazz might have lost the arm if not for Doc Redhorse. Took the better part of twelve hours of micro-surgery and micro-nerve grafts to attach an artificial hand. It wasn’t about six months after that hen Jazz accidently stabbed himself in a bar fight-twice…front and back.

Doc Redhorse hadn’t fixed his eye, when a compressor exploded in the ship as he was making grilled cheese sandwich on it about tens years back. That’s why it looked as badly as it did, with the spider-web scars and the nasty discoloration that made Jazz appear like some bizarre cyborg character from some cheap Twentieth Century Sci-fi novel.

Jazz knocked loudly at the door. A passerby might have thought it rudely or obnoxiously loud. The old Doc was a little loud of hearing these days. It brought a certain levity to his wife’s funeral, as each time the Priest read a passage Redhorse would put a hand to his ear and reply: “Eh? Oh, right.”

It was only a couple years since the funeral, but as Redhorse came to the door Jazz could see the time since had been unkind. The doctor was bent nearly to the waist. He wore A thick old fashioned pair of eyeglasses, when he surely could have afforded a new pair of eyes if he wishes. His silver hair was unwashed and thin. Despite all that he recognized Jazz instantly.

“What did you get busted up now, Jazz?” His tone was dry, but with that certain sense of humor. He turned away from the screen door. It creaked as Jazz pulled it open and went inside.

“Hybrid fugitive with a piss poor attitude.”

“Give him what for?”

“Better than I got,” said Jazz. It was best not to have to mention the bartender’s part.

“Did you get him?”

“Just dropped off the head.”

“What can I do ya for, son?”

“Took a sucker punch to the ribs. Got another job coming up and I’d sure like to be as strong as possible for it, Doc.”

The dark house was quiet and comfortable. A soft breeze through open windows pushed old lace curtains and carried the scent of flowers and grass through wide, airy rooms decorated with real Art deco style furniture and big colorful landscape oils. The wood floor creaked with each step as they made their way along the hall to the Doc’s naturally lit examining room.

Jazz yanked off his shirt and sat up on the long examining table. The cold blue vinyl gave him a chill that resonated painfully through his chest. A nasty yellow and black bruise extended clear around his body. Jazz groaned and had a time trying to lay back at first. Doc Redhorse turned, holding an image resonance pen, IRP for short, and noticed the difficulty Jazz was having.

“One of these days, boy, they’re gonna put a tag on your toe.”

“Do it myself, Doc, if I wasn’t so damn chicken,” he replied. Say, why don’t you go and get your eyes fixed or get that back straightened. Hell, Doc, you could even get a whole new body just about!”

“Whole new body don’t fix a broken heart,” lamented the good doctor with a fatalistic smile.

Jazz sighed in agreement. “Ain’t that the truth.”

Redhorse began to run the IRP just above Jazz’s torso. In the air above an artificially colored hologram of Jazz appeared. He clicked the pen once and the skin peeled away. Clicking it several more times left only the ivory white image of Jazz’s ribs and spine. On one side the fourth and fifth ribs were very clearly busted. The fourth was broken in two places and had turned a bit, which was likely the cause of most of Jazz’ pain.

“How bad, Doc?”

“Seen worse.” He clicked the pen several times, moving through layers of tissue. Redhorse painted the extent of the bruising around the ribcage. “Ought to think about settling down, Jazz. Find a nice gal and have a kid or two.”

“Where would I go, Doc?”

“Take over this place when I’m gone.” He went to the cabinet for another instrument.

“Don’t talk that way,” Jazz moaned. “Still got a lot of good years left.”

He returned to the table. The instrument cam one with slight hum. He touched it gently to Jazz’ wounded side. As he ran it up and back the bones in the hologram steadily healed. “I’ll be a hundred and seventy next month. I could hang on for another forty or fifty years, but for what? I was married to the wife a hundred and forty-seven years. Don’t get me wrong, Jazz. I’m thankful for my friends and patients, but all the time in the world don’t mean a hill of beans without the misses.”

Doc Redhorse waved the fee. He and jazz shared a glass of decent brandy out on the porch for a time. The rain storm moved in and it poured good and hard for a bit. When it was done Jazz stood and stretched. The pain was mostly gone, but still lingered, especially where the hybrid had slugged him.

“Be careful for a bit. Let that heal good and proper.”

“Can’t thank you enough, Doc.”

It would be the last time he’d see Doc Redhorse, sitting on that porch, working the brandy around the bottom of his fat round snifter. Part way up the road Jazz turned and waved one last time, pausing to imagine himself growing old there with Kate, the shawl wrapped around her frail shoulders. That vision dissolved into something closer to reality, with the two of them spilling out the door and down the steps clutched in a death grip at one another’s throats.