My New Right Arm

Following his last battle of the Great War Shepard has to come to terms with a new development.

Shepard clenched his hand into a fist, the metal prosthetic obeying his mental command instantly, the dull grey fingers closed against his fake palm. He left it that way for a second, turning it over to look at the back of his new hand. He could just make out his face in the metal; he looked tiered and pale in the morning sunlight streaming into his hospital room.

He unclenched the hand again, watching as his fingers extended back. So sleek and smooth, as if his real flesh and blood hand was still under the metal.

His eyes moved up from the hand. Taking in the details on his wrist, rolling it around and seeing it calmly shift in its socket. Past the wrist Shepard traced up the forearm, noting the connection at the elbow and how easily it mimicked former human muscle and bone.

Eventually Shepard’s eyes landed on the edge of his shoulder, the seam where the metal right arm and his flesh and blood body joined. He slowly lifted his left hand and let his index finger trace along the join.

Suddenly he could feel tears welling up in his eyes and his left hand quickly moved to stifle his sobs. His arm was gone. The arm he had been born with was gone, forever. Shepard didn’t know how to feel, so many emotions flooding in all at once.

In his right arm he could still feel numbness, like his brain was trying to convince him that his arm was still there. He shook it, regretting it instantly as he felt nothing but the motion pushing through his body.

Shepard was crying now, he tried to calm himself. Breathing slowly. In and out, in and out. He felt a tear roll down his cheek. Before he could think about it his right arm rose and cold metal brushed against his cheek. He yelped and pushed his arm away, letting it lie limp next to him.

For a while Shepard sat there in his bed, trying to keep his eyes off the metal thing attached to his right shoulder. He didn’t know what to think. Should he be scared? Thankful all that brute took was an arm? How could he loose an arm, he was only fourteen.

Feeling calmer Shepard looked back at his new arm again. He looked over at it slowly, keeping his breathing calm. Lifting it up slowly he watched it move as naturally as his old arm had.

The numbness pervading his arm seemed to spread to his whole body and he stared silently at the dull grey replacement. A part of him said it wasn't fair, another said it was his fault.

It was his fault, his mistake that lead to this. He lifted the arm up and begun slowly moving the fingers. And because of that mistake. This was his new right arm.