The Grot

"Evening, Mad Dok."
Gitstitcha didn't turn around. He didn't need to, the voice was unmistakable. No other grot spoke low Gothic like that.
"'Ello Grot. Whut'll it be dis time?" He pretended to rub out some of the dried out blood from his saw with a rag. It was strange, he refused to be addressed in any other way. He was The Grot, and The Grot only.
"Oh, nothing much, just the usual."
That shuffling, The Grot’s right femur hadn't set properly after it was broken, not that Gitstitcha had been allowed to set it right or replace it. No. The Grot had specifically asked him to keep the break how it was. He wanted to remember his slip up. He wanted a constant reminder. Claimed that it was going to keep him sharper in the future. That clinking, that was The Grot’s cane. It looked like a regular length of pipe, but The Grot held onto it and kept it close like a weapon, making it highly suspect in the Mad Dok's eyes. Gitstitcha didn't want to know anything about it or the caked bloodstains it spontaneously grew.
And of course, there was that dragging sound.

    Gitstitcha counted to three and turned around, bracing himself.
It wasn't that bad this time around. Just a grot with his arms at odd angles, they were clearly broken at least three times each. The grot whimpered every time he was so much as nudged. And The Grot was doing quite a bit more than just nudging him.
    "Well Dok, do you think you could fix him up?"
    "Dis it? Ya usually show up wid worse." Gitstitcha bent down to do a first inspection of the grot. Dark bruises but no skin breakage. Whatever, or more likely whoever, did this was careful not to do anything extreme. Gitstitcha didn't keep an eye on The Grot, unlike most grots that dealt directly with him. Gitsticha knew he was too important to whoever employed The Grot to be threatened. And it was possible that The Grot himself held Gitsticha in high esteem. But that didn’t do anything to make the Mad Dok feel less intimidated.
    "Oh yeah, it's not my personal case. It was handed off to me due to the... untimely demise of an associate." The Grot chuckled. It was perhaps one of the wrongest things Gitstitcha had ever heard. "You see, this one here," he shook the grot that the Mad Dok was inspecting, causing the poor thing's eyes to water with pain, "He's got quite a bit of fight in him."

"Dat's sumfin'." Not much fight left in him with his arms in that condition. From what Gitstitcha could tell, there were three breaks on the grot's right arm and four breaks on the grot's left. They were clean, like they were placed by the edge of a table and then subjected to quick blunt force trauma.
"Do you think you could fix him, Mad Dok?" The Grot repeated, more weight in his voice this time.
"'Ow fast ya want it?"
"How does having him back at work tomorrow morning sound?"
"Dis kinda fing don't heal overnight ya--"
"I said, how does having him back to work tomorrow morning sound?"
"Dis git'll be in incredd- incredab-"
"Incredible." The Grot interrupted.
"Yeah dat. incredible amounts o' pain."
"I think that would be acceptable." He put a firm hand on the poor thing's neck. Its eyes opened as wide as possible. "Wouldn't you agree? That that's acceptable?" There was a quick and short nodding of the grot's head. Gitstitcha didn't know who was forcing the movement.
"Then everything is fine and dandy, yes? You have consent and everything. Do what you need to Dok. I'll be waiting." The Grot limped outside and lit a squigar outside the door of the Mad Dok's Klinik.
Gitstitcha lifted the grot as carefully as he could onto his slab. He took out a small and dense sandbag labeled "Annisfetik." The grot looked up at the uplifted bag grasped in the Mad Dok's hand, then looked back at the Mad Dok's eyes.
"Sorry ya poor git." The sandbag came down.

The surgery was quick and mostly uneventful, it was a credit to how clean and professional the original injury was. Metal bars now lined the thin bones in his arms. Moving them would be possible, but almost too painful to imagine. The Dok would actually recommend either putting the grot down and training another, but there had to be some reason for this. After all, usually they went for the fingers first. This grot had a talent that made him too valuable to lose, the Mad Dok summarized, but he was still a grot, and thus not above punishment.
Gitstitcha was wiping his hands down as The Grot walked back inside.
"So it's done?"
Gitstitcha nodded, "Yeah, but at leas' let da git rest da night."
The Grot laughed. This was now the absolutely wrongest thing Gitstitcha had ever heard. Far worse than the chuckling.
"Of course," he said, rubbing away a tear that hadn't formed, "Of course, we aren't that cruel and unusual. What do you take us for? Monsters?"
Gitstitcha laughed a little despite himself. Two more grots came in with a stretcher, and loaded the still passed out grot onto it, the metal bars in his arms clearly visible underneath the muscle and skin. Gitstitcha shuddered at imagining the grot's next day, or week. Or month. And then he'd have to come back to get the bars removed. And he wasn't free of trouble just because his arms couldn't be broken anymore. He still had legs.
The Mad Dok shuddered again and shook his head. He needed a break. Maybe he'd go talk with the Daemoncore. That always calmed him down. Maybe some fungus beer for his nerves.
The Grot whistled as he limped away, what a wonderful day to be him.

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The Grot was certainly busy these days.
"Da zog are you doin'?"
He currently had a politician by the throat. Metaphorically. Okay, it was mostly literal. The string neck leash thing The Grot was holding on to was the only thing keeping the politician from falling to his death into an exposed pit of open gears and machinery. It was funny how many of these were accessible when you knew where you were going.
"Why don't I tell you a story. Do you like stories?"
"Alright yer point's been made, pull me back in!" The politician had his hands around his neck, trying to keep himself from asphyxiating. What was the point of these neck leash things again?
The Grot's fingers relaxed a bit and the neck leash slipped a little. "Do you like stories?"
"Yes. Yes I like stories. Please tell me one!" The gears below suddenly splashed with liquid and a warm stain spread through the grot's pants.
"I think you'll recognize this one. Once upon a time, an enterprising and devious little grot joined up with the Scraplootas after his warboss got krumped and saw his chance at power. With his 'Grot First' ideology and his sneaky looks, he rose quickly through the ranks of the Grotocracy. He became very popular with the everygrot...
"And then, seeing all of the wonderful things the Grots do on a daily basis, he decided maybe we don't need the bigger Orks. So he starts talking about revolutions and taking over the Titan and going out and being 'grots serving themselves' and other funny business."

"Is it da revolution talky bits? I can stop dat talky bits."
"You see what this politician grot did not understand despite his clearly astute nature was that we grots of the Grotocracy are not actually in charge. We do not hold any actual power. We are simply facilitators. We make sure that the internal workings of Boris go on smoothly without any situations or bumps that would cause Boris any trouble. Because a happy and content Boris is a happy and content Grotocracy. What this git didn't know was that the Nobs haven't gone down into the inner workings of Boris ever not because they don't care but because they've never had a need to go into the inner workings of Boris. And the Grotocracy would like to keep it that way. Any attempts to change this status quo is going to be met with extreme resistance because any change would involve discontent Nobs and that would just be no good at all."
The Grot smiled, "Much like trying to stop the spinning of these gears with the body of a grot."
"You wouldn't! You can't! I'm a high rankin' grot!"
"Do you know why this works? You know why we're content? Because we don't serve the Nobs. In all of your time here, you've missed the big picture. The picture that we are a nob. We don't serve Boris. We are Boris.
"Goodbye, sir."
The Grot's arm was getting tired at any rate. He needed to stretch it out, take a walk, call maintenance to clean up that nasty stain when Boris went to sleep.
On to the next assignment.