Date: Tue, 22 Feb 2005 22:30:53 -0000
From: Beverly Taff
Subject: Dog Day Afternoon  Chapter 19

Two by Two
Chapter 7


After a month of waiting to determine progress, Steve and Vicky were
finally compelled to accept Steve's fate.  Vicky continued working at the
university but Steve was forced to give up his post.  He was able to
occasionally assist with problem solving because his tremendous intellect
was still intact.  Talking was difficult.  Inhaling hot smoke had scarred
his trachea but he could occasionally croak out a short sentence.  To avoid
straining his larynx, special arrangements had been installed by attaching
a 'pointer to a strap on his forehead and he would tap out his thoughts on
a keyboard.  In this mode, he worked in a 'consultative' capacity with his
university colleagues via the Internet.  It brought him an income but the
rest of his life was in ruins.  This lifestyle worked at the intellectual
level between Steve and Vicky but Vicky dearly missed the physical side of
their relationship, especially as Zac was lying vegetating on a slab at the
lab.

For Vicky it was a doubly cruel twist of fate.  Both her sexual partners
were now denied to her.  She was becoming depressed and frustrated.  Each
night she was forced to lie in bed struggling to relieve her urges whilst
cursing her total loss.

One day she came home after dropping the triplets off at a friend's
birthday party when she found Steve asleep in front of his computer.  The
screen saver displayed the usual request for the password and Vicky
realised Steve had left a message.  The codeword that they shared to allow
her to read his most intimate thoughts and she opened up the computer as
Steve slept.  He slept at odd times because his body clock was virtually
none- existent now.

She opened the screen to read a begging note.

"Dear Vicky, I want to end it!"

Vicky's heart missed several beats as she tried to ingest the message.

"No!"  She screamed.  "No!  No!  No-owooohh!!"

Steve's eyes blinked with shock and his wakening mind span as her deafening
screams ripped through his eardrums into his consciousness.  His heart
thundered with shock but of course, his body lay completely inert.  Not a
twitch, not a muscle moved!  This was the living death that he wanted to
end and tears poured down his cheeks.

Vicky dabbed them softly as her own tears flooded and she desperately tried
to kiss him.

She knew it was only his head that had any sensations so kissing his cheeks
and lips was the only emotional connection they could now make.  His salty
tears served only to reinforce their isolation.  They were the only part of
him that she could now taste and share.

Her shoulders convulsed as she tried to hug him and make him change his
mind.

The very fact that he wanted to die seemed somehow to be a criticism of her
care.

'Was she looking after him enough?  Was she giving him enough stimulation;
mentally that was?'  She knew she could never ever share physical
sensations with him again.  His body was completely destroyed, the crash
and ensuing fire had seen to that.

The only sensation that Steve got was headaches, toothaches, sore gums and
Vicky's kisses.

He couldn't even rub his eyes!  Life for Steve was all down hill and he
wanted out.

	"I want to die," he croaked softly.

	"No!  Please don't say that!  I want you.  Even as you are, I still
want you, I love you!"

	Vicky knew she was being selfish.  She knew Steve's life was an
agony but the thought of losing the only thing that had any meaning to her
own life was unbearable.  She had to find some way of making his life
better.

	That evening Betty, Jacky and Beverly came around.  Their arrival
always improved the situation and it gave both Vicky and Steve a massive
intellectual boost.  It was always a sad time when they finally had to
leave.  They had no secrets from each other and it wasn't long before they
were discussing Steve's wish to end it all.

	Eventually, it was Beverly who tentatively made a suggestion.

	"If you could have some sort of body transplant, everything would
be O.K."

	"Pure fantasy!" tapped Steve on his keyboard.

	"Why not?  I had a womb and ovary transplant and I get sensation
from my bitch nipples so the nerve connections are OK.  It's not that big a
step, surely?"

	Betty, Vicky and Steve all responded simultaneously as they tried
to explain the difference between the simple surgery of Beverly's
transplant compared with the complexities of a complete ' brain
transplant'.

For a moment the conversation became a garbled cacophony of confusion until
Vicky eventually calmed everybody down.

"It's a none starter Beverly.  The complexities of the spinal chord are far
beyond the medical skills available.  It's like an ape with boxing gloves
trying to reconnect all the phones in America."

"Well it's that or Steve dies."  Argued Beverly as she turned to Steve.
"What d'you say Steve?"

"It won't work.  Vicky's right," tapped Steve as his throat became too sore
to croak.

 "But it would be worth investigating," protested Beverly.  "What about my
doctor in Africa.  He was doing all sorts of stuff.  He may have come a
long way by now."

"If he was doing anything worthwhile.  D'you think we wouldn't have heard
about it?"  Objected Vicky.

"You didn't know about my transplant.  You admitted yourselves that you
were shocked!  Doctor Ahmed is a very retiring and humble man.  He knows
his work is extremely controversial but it sure works for us transsexuals.
He doesn't trumpet his own praises to the rest of the world but I'll bet
he's moved on miles from where he was when he operated on me."

Vicky, Betty and Steve fell silent.  Beverly obviously hid her light under
a bushel.

There was more inside that head of hers than a transsexual, dysfunctional
bimbo.  Beverly sensed she had struck a chord and pressed her suite.

"Would it do any harm if I contacted him.  He keeps his private telephone a
closely guarded secret and doesn't normally respond to outsiders, but I'm
special.  I was his first.

He keeps in touch with me and I have his number."

Slowly Steve tilted his head thoughtfully forwards and tapped out his
reply.

"It can't do any physical harm.  I suppose, it will do no harm to contact
him."

"That's as may be," objected Vicky, "but where will we get a body donor?  A
body that's genetically acceptable and a sufficient DNA Match.  A body
that's brain dead, a body that the relatives are prepared to donate."

Beverly gaped at them as though her friends were stupid "Why Zac of course!
Isn't he genetically compatible!  His body is genetically compatible and
he's just lying there.  His body is perfect but he's a virtual vegetable.

Besides, we are what we are and we all loved Zac dearly!  Let's not delude
ourselves.  If Zac were alive now, all of you would be indulging his
services.  It's only Billy's possessiveness that prevented me from trying
it on.  I was often tempted for he's a lovely looking dog."

A stunned silence befell the group.

In one alarming leap of ethics, Beverly had surmounted many legal and moral
hurdles.  Vicky stared at Steve with the question writ large in her eyes.

"Well?"

Steve's brain was doing back flips as he ran all the unknowns through his
once cold logical intellect.

'This was one question he would have to really think about.  This time it
was emotional, really emotional!  His brain, in Zac's body!!'  A fricassee
of nervous anticipation flickered in his brain.  'Could it really be done?'
he asked himself.

Hesitantly he tapped out his consent for Beverly to approach her shadowy
friend in Africa.  As it stuttered from the printer, Vicky read the page.

"This is strictly a permission to seek an opinion only.  It is not a
consent to proceed!"

Beverly nodded and left for her apartment with Billy her Alsatian Partner.
She had no intentions of disclosing Ahmed's whereabouts.  In the early
hours of the morning she made the secret phone call.

"A brain transplant!"  Gasped Ahmed.

"Well it's that or a slow death through muscular deterioration or a quick
death.  He's suicidal and he knows his options.  He's a doctor; a professor
of medicine."

"I, - I'm not sure about that.  That's asking a lot.  A step too far I
think."

"He knows the risks.  His Name is Professor Steven Morgan.  You might have
heard of him."

"Who?  The one who was injured in that car crash in Canada?"

"Yes, the very same."

"Ah yes.  I've read a lot of his work; and some stuff by his colleague, Dr
Vicky Morgan.  She's married to him isn't she?"

"Yes."

"So what does she think of all this?"

"She's as worried as I am.  She doesn't want to lose him.  She doesn't want
to lose his brain and all that; you know, the intellectual stimulation and
stuff.  It's all way above my head but I'm the only one who knows how to
get in touch with you."

"I'd have to speak directly to them.  This is a huge step.  I'm not at all
sure-."

"Well you can try.  I'll call you again tomorrow.  I'll be in their flat
with my Mobile Phone.  Doctor Steven Morgan can contact you by email."

"OK then, until tomorrow.  By the way, how are you managing?"

"Well, as you know, I had the puppies without complications.  All thirteen
of them have turned out perfectly.  I've given most away.  I've only kept
one female, and of course, their farther."

"Amazing.  You're very brave.  I'll speak tomorrow then."

And so it happened.  In the small hours of the morning, Dr Ahmed spoke with
Vicky and Steve and they explored the options and risks.  For two more
weeks, Steve mulled the idea in his mind, whilst Vicky danced on
tenterhooks wondering if he would choose suicide or doggy-hood.

Steve spent a lot of time talking to Beverly.  He had no one else to turn
to.  Beverly was the only person he knew that had the remotest idea of how
it felt to have doggy parts transplanted into her body.  At first, he was
embarrassed about asking her such intimate questions but Beverly eventually
broke what little ice existed.  She explained all the strange additional
sensations she enjoyed.  She boldly told him that she understood his fears,
but explained that she had no reservations or regrets about altering her
body.

"Look at this way Steve," she told him, "if you really are contemplating
suicide then remember that you cannot achieve it without Vicky's inclusion.
That would put an unnecessary ethical obligation on her.  How would you
like it if you had to kill her by making a suicide injection available?
You're not being fair to Vicky.  I believe you should give the Zac idea a
chance.  Zac's dead.  His brain is destroyed, crushed and pulped by the
crash.  Even his head is all deformed.  His body though, is completely
unharmed and Vicky is loath to switch him off.  You could graft your
cranium onto Zac's skull and with some cosmetic surgery; the shape
shouldn't be too obvious.  If it doesn't work, and you die under surgery,
then at least Vicky will understand that she has explored all the options.
She will not need to feel guilty."





Inside his paralysed body, Steve was inwardly impressed.

'Gosh, how Beverly so cleverly argued!  She was right though,' he
concluded.

'The surgery would in all probability fail and he would join Zac in
whatever after-life existed for dogs and men.  But at least Vicky would be
spared the guilt of 'switching him off' or preparing a suicide scenario.'
    He tapped out his agreement on the computer and Beverly's heart thumped
as she called Vicky over.

Steve looked at Vicky and sighed as he prepared to draw breath and talk.

"Yesss," he croaked painfully to Vicky.  "We may as well give it a go.  Are
you happy?"

"It's the only alternative to suicide," sobbed Vicky.

A silence fell on the group as they sat around the bed.  Even Zeta and
Billy seemed to sense something auspicious was afoot and they whined
nervously.

That same night, Doctor Ahmed got the call and within a week, he was in
America.

The arrangements proved complicated.  The hardest part was transporting
Zac's vegetative body inside a life support envelope.  This required
special air cargo arrangements to Africa and it stretched their combined
resources to the limit.  Fortunately, Beverly's income from the club -
hotel partnership managed to cover a large part of the expense.  After
several months, everything was prepared for the transplant.

The girls explained everything to Doctor Ahmed including their intimate
relationships.

There could be no secrets.  Ahmed just shrugged philosophically.  He had
encountered far worse examples of abuse and many of these had been forcibly
imposed upon the victims.

'At least this group did it voluntarily,' he surmised, 'and the animals
didn't suffer.'  As they discussed every aspect of the procedure, they even
decided to return one of Zac's testicles back to Zac's scrotum from what
would become, Steve's discarded body.

This would make the new combined being of Zac-Steve capable of fathering
both puppies and babies.

"It's a good job I know that there are no rejection problems," observed
Ahmed as he carefully prepared for the forthcoming transplant.  "The
testicular transplant will be virtually an afterthought."

Vicky felt a twitch of anticipation in her loins as she prayed for success.

For the operation, Ahmed adopted the lead role with his regular team around
him whilst Vicky concentrated on Zac.  At the point of actual brainstem
conjunction, Vicky and Ahmed found themselves intimately involved
surgically.  As they advanced the microsurgery, each learned to respect the
other's ability.

It was nearly two days before the whole procedure was complete, then it was
a month of slow recovery.  For the first two weeks Steve was kept
unconscious then he was allowed brief moments of consciousness until the
pain became bearable.  The team had no way of knowing if the procedure was
successful, until Steve-Zac was up and responding coherently.

The hardest part of the procedure had proved to be the reshaping of Zac's
scull to form a receptive 'basin' to enable a proper mating with Steve's
cranium.  The cosmetic trick was to do this without the size increase being
too obvious.  It meant that Steve-Zac's new scull had a somewhat domed
appearance similar to a spaniel's but all in all, it was not too obvious.
A useful cosmetic device had been to relocate Zac's ears lower down the
scull so that his overall scull height was disguised.  Also, the pitch of
the atlas and axis bones at the top of the vertebrate was altered to hide
the occipital enlargement under the thick fur of Zac's neck.  This altered
Steve-Zac's head posture and made him always appear alert and interested.
The biggest 'give-away' was the colour of the human eyes.  Steve wanted to
keep his human sight with all its colour and telescopic perception.  This
necessitated Steve's eye sockets remaining attached to his cranium and it
gave Zac's scull a noticeable 'brow' if one looked closely.  Fortunately,
Zac's thick fur also hid most of this.  All in all, Vicky and Ahmed were
pleased with the cosmetic results.

 After two weeks being deliberately kept unconscious with drugs, the day
came to address the success of the brain transplant.  This consisted of
testing his reactions regularly until they were sure of a coherent
response.

With every improved response, Vicky felt success getting closer.  The first
time Steve-Zac blinked was an exciting moment and Vicky immediately tried
talking.

"If you understand me Steve-Zac, blink twice."

Steve-Zac's eyes fluttered momentarily then finally gave two slow, clear
Blinks.

Vicky and Ahmed squeezed each other's hands as they tensed nervously and
Ahmed repeated the request.

"Can you blink them three times?"

"Once again the eyelids fluttered uncertainly then finally gave three clear
slow distinctive blinks.

Vicky let out an involuntary squeal of pleasure and hugged Ahmed to her as
she kissed him passionately on the cheek.  Ahmed crimsoned with
embarrassment until the mood of euphoria took him and he responded in kind.

"His motor system is slowly recovering.  The slow reaction is probably
confusion and lack of familiarity with his new body.  I think it will just
be a matter of time from now on.

The real test begins when he tries walking and stuff.

After two months, Steve-Zac was allowed to gently try out his posture.
Carefully, he was lifted from the bed and slowly slung into a supporting
cradle while they softly encouraged him.

"Try your left arm."  Suggested Ahmed.

Steve-Zac's right foreleg moved and Ahmed let out a sigh of dismay.

"I think some of the nerves are crossed."

"That's not a problem," observed Vicky, "his brain should soon learn to
compensate."

"I hope so.  Steve, try your legs."

The rear legs moved hesitantly and Steve-Zac let out a low confused whine.

"Damnation!"  Cursed Ahmed.  This'll take a bit of time.  Steve-Zac, can
you nod if you understand me."

The 'dog's' head promptly nodded and Ahmed sagged with relief as he spoke
again.

"Your motor nerves are a bit crossed, d'you want to try to walk?"

The 'dog' nodded again and Vicky carefully slackened off the supporting
cradle.

Steve-Zac whined and paddled his paws sensitively.

"He's got pins and needles."  Observed Ahmed.

Steve-Zac nodded his head then tried stepping forward.  The moves were
tentative and slow but he made clear progress across the floor.  Ahmed and
Vicky watched him stagger uncertainly out of the intensive care unit then
set of slowly but determinedly down the corridor.

"Where's he going?"  Wondered Ahmed aloud.

"I think I know," replied Vicky as she followed her partner down the
corridor and stopped outside Ahmed's office.

"There's a computer in here.  D'you want to use it?"  She asked Steve-Zac.

The 'dog' nodded enthusiastically then wobbled into the room towards the
computer.

Vicky felt her heart thumping as she realised Steve-Zac was going to try
and communicate.  She motioned to Ahmed eagerly and they gently lifted the
'dog' onto the computer table.  The 'dog' immediately extended a tentative
paw and clumsily stroked the keyboard.  Vicky and Ahmed gazed ecstatically
as coherent words appeared on the screen.

"Thank God!  I've been trying desperately to communicate!"  Announced the
computer.

Vicky let out a shriek of delight and flung herself sobbing into her
Partner's thick ruff of fur.  The 'dog' yelped in pain and she quickly
realised she had hurt some sensitive wound.

"Oh I'm sorry, but I'm so glad.  We'll bring the computer into your room."

"There's no need.  It will be good exercise to come here every morning.
I'm tired now.  I want to go back to bed."

"Yes.  Yes, anything.  D'you want us to carry you back?"

"No."

The brevity of the answer confirmed Steve-Zac's weariness and they gently
eased him back to the floor.  He struggled manfully to get his gait right
but it was obvious that the motor system from his brain was still confused.
Ahmed and Vicky followed solicitously until Steve-Zac had made it back to
the pre-prepared bed where he flopped down and immediately fell asleep.
Tears of joy flooded down both Vicky and Ahmed's cheeks.