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[Sekhmet]

Wednesday April 19th, 2006. It was reported on that morning's 8 o'clock BBC Radio 4 News broadcast, that the authorities in China were thought to have been removing organs taken from hundreds of newly executed prisoners, and selling them to the W est. There is some doubt about whether or not the prisoners were asked their permission, prior to execution, for the removal of their organs.
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Wednesday19 April 2006
Po-Mi lies curled miserably upon the greasy floor of his cell. Around him, his fellow prisoners squat, spitting tobacco, and slapping home-made mah-jong tiles onto the baked earth; each move accompanied by hoarse shouts of triumph or despair.
Their cell is constructed simply, from iron bars and concrete. There is no privacy, and nowhere to hide.
Attracted by the stench from the over-flowing bucket in the comer, flies buzz incessantly, endlessly, round and around.
When the flies suddenly turn in the air to re-form around him, Po-Mi takes no notice. His bowels spasm yet again, soiling his already stinking undergarments. He prays that his moment will soon come. Soon, it will all be over.
Soon, the guards will come with the electric cattle goads, force him to his feet, and drag him to the execution Yard.
Po-Mi thinks of Mi-Lee, his young wife -and how she will feed their little girls without his hours of labour. He can only think of one way, and his soul is sad.
Two guards enter the cell, sniff, and regard him with disgust. One kicks Po-Mi savagely in the kidneys. Po-Mi vomits over the other guard’s feet. But he is past shame or even caring.
.”You filthy, disgusting sod!'' one of them screams into his face. He yanks Po-Mi to his feet.
None of his cell mates look up from their game to mark his departure.
With his feet tailing limply behind him, he is dragged screaming from his cell, and into the execution yard where he is forced to his knees'
As the axe falls, his thoughts fly ahead of his spirit, to alight upon his beloved wife,Mi-Lee.

Thursday 20th April. A private clinic. somewhere in the Home Counties.

Sir Nigel Gascoigne's troubled sleep is momentarily disturbed by the thwack, thwack, thwack of the helicopter's rotor blades as it lands, gently, on the clinic's helipad.
His nurse smilingly checks his pulse against the watch pinned to her starched white apron, and nods reassuringly.
An orderly, dressed in immaculate whites, emerges from the clinic's rear entrance, and rushes, bent double, towards the chopper. He is carrying a large, rather cumbersome insulated box.
He ducks beneath the slowly gyrating blades, and holding down his combed-over hair with one hand, he takes charge of a small package.
With a minimum of delay, he transfers the package into the insulated container, and hurries back into the clinic, where it's arrival is eagerly awaited by the senior Transplant Surgeon.

The package is opened with care, and the contents are held by the Theatre Sister, for the consultant surgeon's inspection.
He examines the kidney with latex gloved fingers; prodding and peering, with an anxious frown, at a small discoloured area.
”" Don't like the look of this, Sister." He murmurs, shaking his head, and pointing distractedly at the darkened area on the kidney. "There's been a certain amount of trauma here - d'you see? And quite recent too by the look of it!"
He hums under his breath for a moment - thinking. There are a few moments of silence.
“Yes!” He has reached his decision. “ I can excise the damaged area, without damaging the kidney's function.
Sister, please have Sir Nigel prepped for the theatre at sixteen hundred hours.”

Whistling a jaunty air, he leaves the prep room, still humming, and thinking the $100,000 was money well spent.