Nothing But A Tool

LAKE Time had lost all meaning in this concrete hell. Hours or days could have passed since Andy had brought me the healer to work on - I couldn't tell anymore. The fluorescent lights overhead never changed, casting the same harsh glare that made everything look sickly and wrong. But I didn't need to keep track of time. I only needed to follow Andy's instructions and do what she'd trained me to do. The scalpel felt familiar in my small hands as I made another precise incision along the healer's forearm. Lyn - that was his name, though Andy had told me not to think of him as a person with a name. Just think of him as a tool, she'd said. A source of information wrapped in flesh that happened to be able to repair itself. That self-healing ability made everything so much worse for him. Every cut I made, every nerve I severed, every piece of skin I peeled away - it all grew back within minutes, forcing him to experience the pain over and over again. His body betrayed him by refusing to let