"Sure, what the hell. I’ll try anything once," I said, taking the anesthetized rat from her hands. "You’re going to kill it anyhow," I thought. It was warm and soft, and that startled me for a moment. For weeks I had been watching them–the techs–diligently chop off the little white, dope-filled heads. After a few such events, the morally flexible stop paying much attention. Nevertheless, it is rather appalling to forcibly depress an animal, fill it full of anti-depressants by way of a sub-dermal osmotic pump insert, slice its head off, and wash its diced, frozen brain with radioactive chemicals.

It’s appalling to one’s meat-self at least. The thinky part, I have found, can usually talk its way out of anything. But morals are human constructs, right? It would chop my head off if it got a chance, right? It wouldn’t exist at all if it weren’t for this lab and it’s all in the name of scientific progress and the pursuit of knowledge, right?

Right.

And hell, it’s just a lab rat.

The unconscious creature was warm and slightly twitchy. "Grab it hard by the shoulders," she said. I did, because I was informed it might otherwise shoot blood across the table after the cut. I could feel its heart beating though my latex gloves. I felt a little tense and anxious. I placed its head though a hole in the rodent guillotine. On the other side, its isolated head was cute and glassy eyed. "Now, when you’ve got him in there firmly pull down quick and hard on the handle. It has to be one clean slice." I hesitated. My heart beat faster now. I hadn’t expected the lab rat to be warm. I paused another moment, my hands shaking slightly as my brain responded to the impending violence.

Now.

Crunch.