• The Doctor's face was unutterably vile. Kamaru looked at the pale, chalky skin, hanging in loose bags over his bones. Every move he made must have been a painful maneuver, as he was quite thin. He wore spectacles that sat low on his crooked, beak-pointed nose. He was covered in horrible sores all over his body, worse on his face. Clothed in the same lab coat Kamaru had seen years ago, complete with dark stains of blood and other body fluids. When he shifted his gaze to Kamaru, the boy found himself locked in the horrid stare of the Doctor's eyes. They were blood red and puffy, and dangerous.
    Kamaru looked down at the floor.
    "What, fool boy? Do you have something to say?" the Doctor's voice cracked.
    "No, sir," Kamaru shook his head, which was nearly impossible because of the way he was lying on the table.
    The Doctor approached the table, and took a terribly frightening blade from a pocket in his dirty coat.
    Were Kamaru alive, he would have been terrified. But as he was not, the blade did not frighten him. It was crusted in red powder which sprinkled down with every way it was moved. Remembrance of past experiments.
    The Doctor pressed Kamaru's face against the cold, metal table.
    "Fool boy, going off and breaking your back," The Doctor sneered in annoyance.
    The old man wasted no time. Kamaru felt the sharp tip of the blade slice the skin on his back.
    Kamaru felt it, but it did not bother him.
    Pain never bothered him anymore.
    The boy felt the Doctor hack and chop, and move the bones around in an odd way. It felt very weird to him.
    The Doctor added some unusual thing to his back, most likely a support.
    After an hour the Doctor was finished; after all, he was a professional and it was much easier when the patient didn't complain. He stitched Kamaru back up, and then went to sit in a chair on a far wall.
    Kamaru stretched his arms, and twisted his back comfortably. "A brace?" he asked.
    "Well, it's none of your business what I stuck in your back, is it? You wouldn't understand, anyway. I fixed it, and that's that. Need anything else, clumsy? Sooner or later I won't be able to put you back together. You should be more careful."
    Kamaru wanted to tell him that he fell down the gorge for him, to get here on time, but he held his tongue. The Doctor would just call him stupid for talking back. He was a very difficult man to live with.
    "Thank you," Kamaru said, leaping off of the table. His back was stiff, and it'd be that way for probably the rest of his life. If that's what you'd call it.
    "Go to bed. And hurry up," the Doctor caught his breath. I should make you sleep in the lavatory for making me stand so long."
    Kamaru rushed out. If he had stayed a little longer the Doctor would have done something horrible to him, like remove an arm, or an eye. That would certainly make his job much more difficult.
    He used the light from the laboratory to find his way past the clutter. The door shut and he was left in the darkness of the house. Luckily he was already near the stairs, and climbed up them, every creak a familiar voice.
    When he got to the top, he found the light switch to his attic room, and flicked it on.
    His back was beginning to itch, but he ignored it and went to the bug-infested mattress the Doctor identified as a bed. When he sat on it, a cloud of dirt and dust puffed up around the corners, then dematerialized.
    Kamaru sighed at how he hated himself for being used to these living conditions.
    "Take me back," he looked up, speaking to some Heaven above. "Please take me back."
    He had been in Heaven when the Doctor pulled him from the river and brought him back as the living dead.
    When it was clear nothing would happen, the boy lay down on the mattress, and closed his eyes, hoping to at least get some sleep tonight.