Like a Surgeon

Chapter 3

“-And also, this alien is going to- Oh wow, she wasn’t kidding! I almost didn’t feel the month-long wait between chapters!”

Pinkie Pie’s eyes darted around the operating theatre, which consisted of a single, sterile room with evenly-placed lights overhead. In the center was an operating table, itself surrounded by Nigel, Twilight, herself, several tables covered in medical tools, and a small gathering of machines. One monitored the patient’s blood and heartbeat, one monitored his brain activity, and one of them went ‘beep’ for no discernible reason.

“Well, Dr. Burke-“ Twilight began, before being interrupted.

“Seriously, you can just call me Nigel. I don’t mind.”

“As I was saying, Doctor, Nurses Blood Plasma and Heartbeat already made the first incisions, and Dr. Stable was just about to begin the operation proper when we took over. His ribcage is already exposed, cleared, and sterilized. He’s stable.”

“The doctor was operating on himself?”

“What?”

“I thought you said Dr. Stable was operating. Then you said he was Stable? He’s not Stable?”

“No, he’s stable. That’s what the blood monitor is for.”

“What would the blood monitor have to do with it? Where does it say he’s Stable?”

“Right here. It’s monitoring his heartbeat.”

“Oh, we’re operating on her too? And they’re together? Okay, but can we switch it back to Stable?”

“It is stable!”

“You said it was a Heartbeat monitor.”

“It is!”

“Well, then switch it to Stable so we can start cutting!”

“It’s already stable!”

“Oh, good. Now that we have a Stable monitor-“

“Why would we need to monitor a stable?”

“So the patient isn’t Stable?”

“The patient is stable, yes.”

“Wait, is he or is he not Stable? What does that machine do again?”

“It’s a heartbeat monitor.”

“But it also makes sure he’s Stable?”

“Now you’re getting it!”

“How does it do that?”

“By monitoring his blood plasma!”

“Wait, he’s with her too? Does Heartbeat knows he’s cheating on her with Blood Plasma?”

“Third base!” Shouted Pinkie from atop the machine that went ‘beep’.

“What?”

“What?”

“Okay, hang on one second. Who are we operating on again?”

“Lemme check.” Twilight’s magic seized a clipboard on a nearby table, bringing it to her eye level. “Oh hey, It’s Time Turner! I know him, he’s Ponyville’s Timekeeper! Says here he’s in for a heart transplant.”

“So he’s not Stable?”

“What? No, he’s stable. Listen to his heartbeat.”

“What’s she got to do with it? Can you hear her but I can’t?”

“Third base!” Pinkie squeaked again, giggling to herself.

“Stop that. And Pinkie, off that machine. It’s probably delicate.”

“Okie dokie lokie, Twilight!” Whereupon she jumped across the operating table to an equipment table on the patient’s left side, where a radio sat. She began fiddling with the dials again, after turning it on to find a song playing that sounded like jazz, had a computer tried to recreate jazz without ever actually hearing any.

Twilight turned back to Nigel. “Where were we?”

“Trying to figure out who we’re performing surgery on.”

“I told you, it’s Time Turner.”

“And then you said he was Stable.”

“He is stable.”

“Just like that! Is he stable or is he not?”

“Yes, he’s stable. Time Turner is stable.”

“What? How does that work?”

“Well, see, the heartbeat monitor here-“

“Oh hell, where does she fit into this? Is she Stable too?”

“Well, I presume so. I haven’t seen her since she left, just after she sterilized the patient’s ribcage.”

“But I thought she was the patient?’

“What? Why? Has something happened to her?”

“You tell me! Apparently we have a heartbeat monitor here!”

“It also monitors blood plasma.”

“Her too? Why would anyone design a machine that could monitor three ponies at once?”

“It can’t! It can only monitor the one.”

“Because Time Turner, Heartbeat, and Blood Plasma are all Stable?”

“Yes! Or at least they were when I saw them last!”

“Which is right now, because Time Turner is right here, and he’s Stable.”

“Exactly, now you’re getting it!”

“And because we’re monitoring his Blood Plasma and his Heartbeat?”

“Correct!”

“…Okay, so you guys just have polygamous relationships here, or what?”

“What?”

“What?”

“Third base!” They both turned to look at Pinkie, who was still fiddling with the radio. She looked up and pointed at it. “Wasn’t me this time, guys. Found a station that was playing an old Abtrot and Coltstello routine.”

Nigel shook his head. “Anyway, no matter who we’re operating on, they’re not gonna get much better if we just sit here.”

Pinkie grinned, changing the station one last time to a cheesy medical drama theme song, and took up a position next to Nigel, on his left. Twilight blinked a few times blankly, but realized they were waiting for her, and took up a similar position on Nigel’s right. Together, they all leaned forward, Nigel taking the plastic sheet covering the otherwise-exposed ribcage in his gloved hand.

He peeled it back slowly at first, like taking off a band-aid, but after a moment, he shrugged, simply yanking the rest off. Still attached to the pin, it flopped to the Patient’s right side, and became trapped between the tool table and the operating table. Nigel clicked his tongue.

“Weird. That part’s usually really hard. It’s like I can never get a good grip on it.” However, the two ponies on either side of him didn’t hear a word he said. Pinkie looked excited, her eyes examining every inch of Time Turner’s ribcage, while Twilight looked a little sick.

“Um…Yes… Well… I’ve seen Equine skeletons in anatomy books before, but I’ve never actually seen one in my life…” Twilight reached out a hoof and tapped one of the bottom ribs, as if to make sure it was real. It made a vaguely xylophone-esque sound, which immediately set Pinkie off.

“Ooh! Neato! Twilight, do that again!”

“What?” Pinkie didn’t wait for Twilight however, and picked up a rubber mallet (Like one would use to test your reflexes by banging your knee. [Except that doesn’t work for horses, it just hurts and makes them buck you in the face. {Real horses are assholes.}]) and started smacking all over Time Turners’ ribcage, playing a jaunty tune.

“Ooh, Amos Moses was a Cajun, he lived by himself in a swamp-“ Twilight yanked the mallet out of her hooves fairly quickly, however.

“That’s enough of that. Dr. Burke? How shall we start?” Nigel bit his lip, and looked over the equipment tables. On the left were an assortment of scalpels, a surgical circular saw, a few glass cups, and a bottle of some sort of orange soda. On the right, a large bone saw, a pair of hypodermic needles, a drill, and a bunch of Q-

“Wha- shh! That’s trademarked!”

What, really? I thought that’s just what they were called.

“Yeah, they’ve taken over the market, so that’s just what everyone calls. Use… I dunno, surgical swabs?”

Got it. Thanks, Pinkie!

“Anytime, Dunc!”

Nigel glanced back to his left, and picked up the bottle of soda. Which was mockingly empty. Tossing it over his shoulder, his eyes glanced back around the table, where he began to reorganize everything into neat little piles. “Okay, this pile here is what should be able to get through his ribcage. The bone saw, the circular saw, the drill, and the hammer.”

Twilight lifted them all up in her magic. “Well, obviously we’re supposed to use the bone saw.”

Pinkie bounced up, plucking the drill out of the air. As soon as she touched it, it turned on and began whirring, gyrating dangerously. “Woah! This thing is dangerous! I like it!” Then, because she lacked anything to actually hold the drill with, it spun out of her grip and began bouncing around the floor.

They all watched it rolling around, throwing up sparks where it landed before launching itself back up. Nigel spoke first. “Eh, leave it. I’m sure it won’t be a problem.” They both nodded as he saw something he’d missed before. “Oh! Pills here! Lemme see… Perfect, painkillers!” And before they could stop him, he swallowed the whole bottle.

Twilight tried to pick her jaw up off the floor. “Um. Isn’t that a lethal dose? Just swallowing the whole bottle like that?”

“Huh. Maybe. Never thought about it, really. Must have built up a resistance to it.”

“…Resistance or not, a fatal dose is still a fatal-“

“Guys?” Pinkie waved at them. “I know when I’m the voice of reason there’s something seriously wrong, but shouldn’t we be surgerising or something?” They both blinked at her. Twilight nodded first, holding up the tools again, minus the drill, which had gone off to parts unknown. Nigel blinked a few seconds later, because his whole body had gone numb and he was busy enjoying the feeling when Pinkie had spoken.

“Right.” The purple Unicorn started again. “So, we’ll be using the bone saw?”

Nigel was looking at his hand, but pulled himself away to answer. “What? No, I’ll be using the hammer.”

“…To break open his ribcage. Even though I just told Pinkie to stop banging on it with the mallet.”

“She had the right idea. Gimme.” Not waiting for her, he bopped her on the horn and caught the hammer as it fell. Ignoring he shout of shock, he hopped atop the pony lying on the table, straddling him as he lined up the hammer. Twilight made it back to a standing position just in time to see him do this.

“What the fuck are you doing?”

“I work best up here. Gives me freedom of movement. Besides, it’d only be weird if he wasn’t a horse.” With that, he pulled his surgical mask up and began lining up the hammer again. Twilight grimaced, and ducked her head under her hooves. “I can’t look…”

With a shout of “Hiya!” Nigel brought the hammer down dead center on the pony’s sternum. There was a teeth-grinding ‘crunch’ sound, and Nigel leaned back to observe his work. “Wow, that wasn’t nearly as effective as I’d hoped.” He looked over to Pinkie, who had bitten into a hilariously oversized granola bar. “Right, well… Let’s try again.” He brought hammer back up, and this time did an upward sweep along the pony’s right side.

This time, the ear-splitting crack was followed by the clatter of bone fragments raining back down, some bouncing off Twilight, as well as a spurt of blood across Nigel’s surgical gown. Pinkie shook her hair, and a bunch of chunks of rib fell out, clattering across the floor to join the others. “Wowee! You got his whole ribcage! That’s tricky in-game, too!”

Nigel nodded, looking over his handiwork. “Great! Now, we just need to pop these out…”

Twilight looked up just in time to see Nigel put his hand into Time Turner’s ribcage, and pull out his lungs. She ducked back down, muttering, “I didn’t just see that. I didn’t just see that. Time Turner apparently doesn’t need to breathe. I didn’t just see that.”

Back up top, Nigel turned to Pinkie. “Hey, watch this!” and with that, he began juggling the lungs, to Pinkie’s giggling. Inevitably, the juggling ended like all juggling must eventually, when he dropped one of them. It bounced off the side of the tool table, and underneath the operating table, before coming to a stop in front of Twilight. The sound of a Pony vomiting soon followed.

“Twi! That’s gross! We’re in an operating room, this is no time for that sort of thing! Also, horses can’t vomit!” Twilight groaned from the floor. Pinkie looked back at Nigel, who had been busy sifting through the scalpels. “So Doc, what next?”

Nigel picked one of the scalpels out, the head shaped like an arrowhead. “Perfect! Okay Pinkie, watch closely. I gotta cut out his esophagus, ‘cause it’s in the way.” The knife dipped in twice with a pair of squishy sounds following. “Done cutting! Okay, I don’t need this anymore!” And then he tossed the carefully-sharpened and sterilized scalpel over his shoulder like a handful of salt.

Twilight stood back up, groaning, and queasily asked, “Wait, did you say you needed to cut out his esoph-“ She was cut off as Nigel put something on her horn, and two fleshy blurs hung in front of her.

“Hey, Nurse, can you hold these? Thanks, you make an excellent organ rack.” Twilight simply stood there, her brain not quite working anymore. She was only jolted out of it when Time Turner’s stomach smacked into her snout, also knocking his esophagus off her horn. “Nope, didn’t need that either. Hey, you dropped them! And you were doing so well…”

Pinkie stretched her hooves out to the other table, picking up the box that held the new heart, and bringing it to Nigel, all while ignoring the sounds of Twilight retching again. “Here you go, Nigel! One brand-new heart for Mr. Time Turner!”

Nigel popped it open, gently picking up the new heart, and dropped it into Time Turner’s chest cavity. “And done!” He tapped his chin. “Although, I can’t help feeling there’s something we’ve forgotten to do… Oh well. Pinkie, you wanna grab lunch?”

“Sure, where ya thinkin’?”

“Oh, I dunno.” He replied, sliding off Time Turner and onto the floor. “You guys don’t eat meat, so… How’s Gryphon cuisine?”

“It’s pretty good! And they made this amazing thing, called a Hot Dog!”

“Sounds great.” And with that, they left the operating room, Nigel still wearing his bloodstained medical garb and Pinkie still wearing a nurse’s hat. A few minutes after they left, Twilight managed to stand back up, and managed to inspect their work.

“Hey! You morons, you didn’t take out the old heart! You gave Time Turner two hearts, you idiots!”

Author's Note

Tell it like it is, Pinkie.
This took way too goddamn long to write. I still blame School for sucking all my desire to write right outta me, but... Anyway, we's gots acheivs! I'll just put them here in a nice little list.
It's life Jim, but not as we know it: Perform a Heart Transplant.
Socialised Medicine: Perform a heart transplant losing less than 1500ml of blood.
Performance Enhancer?: Complete a procedure after being drugged. (Shush.)
Vworrrp Vworrrp: Create a Time Lord.
Don't Be Such A Baby, Ribs Grow Back!: Completely smash up the rib cage.
And here's hoping the next one comes out a mite quicker, eh?