AAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAA

"Good job, and now the other one?"

Clenching her jaw again, a different smell drives him into a rage, almost but not quite as intense as the prior fear. 

EY FUCK YOU

"Good!" Bonesaw smiles delightedly.

"I'm sure you'll still need plenty of reminders but some basic aversion training and soon enough you'll be all helpful all the time."

CRAP. This is not good. 

"Oh, oops, I forgot to give you the antidote to the paralyzing agent - better do that before the secondary effects kick in."
 
Bonesaw gently pokes him with a needle identical to the first one.

"All better!"

"Why," he gasps when he can move again. 

Bonesaw looks pensive for a second, trying to remember - she can get sort of engrossed in surgery sometimes.

"Oh, it was because this way you'll be a very polite and helpful Friend for me here. I'm just getting my bearings and it's important for me to have someone who knows the basics."

He can't really argue with that. 

"What do you want?" he tries instead. 

"A Friend!"

"Not with me," he says hastily, "in general."

"Well, I'm an artist. You're not really anything creative or special - I needed a Friend fast, but later I'll make something really pretty!"

"I'm going to need to have a better idea of what sort of art will speak to people here, but I'm sure you can help with that."

"I'm not a Bohemian, I don't know art." 

"I don't care what some other artist thinks of art, I want to be original. I need to know what sort of thing speaks to people here - back home if I turned a bunch of people into squid faces it would have been art, but here it would probably be everyday samesies. You can help me figure out what would be different and new for this world!" 

"...Well...I don't know about different and original, but the Correspondence always gets an impact," he says hesitantly. 

"Hm, just so you know - I don't really expect you to give me suggestions about what's different and original - I'll be able to tell by your reactions. Like how I could tell earlier that brain surgery was different and original for you!"

"But also now I want to know, what's the Correspondence?"

"It's--I don't know exactly what's true and what's not, people say a lot of things. But I know it can be written or spoken, and that it drives people insane sometimes, and the Light-Hearted Wastelander uses it."

"Wow! There's so many cool things in this world already. But I bet if I have a really good idea and I try hard at it I'll be able to make something new and original that everyone will notice!"

"Also, who's the Light-Hearted Wastelander?"

"People say a lot of things about her, too. She's...powerful, and beautiful, and she glows with the Mountain's own light when she wants to, or at least people mostly say it's the Mountain's light and it seems plausible. They say she walked out of the Prickfinger Wastes and declared war on the Masters. They say she walked out of the Prickfinger Wastes and declared war on Hell. They say she's blackmailing the Bazaar. They say she's a sorceress of the First City. They say she speaks with the Duchess's cats and the Fingerkings without taking sides. They say the Tiger Keeper defers to her. They say she's the Mountain's own daughter. What I know for sure is that she keeps a residence in the Prickfinger Wastes and has a laboratory at the University that her brother keeps when she isn't there."

"Oh wow, people sure do talk about her a lot! Do they look up to her?"

"Some of them? I don't think the Devils like her very much. The Rubbery Men mostly like her, she chases people off if she catches them trying to stone one, and she got one into the University. She's on good terms with the Urchins, I think, and at least some of the Bohemians--it's not that hard to be on good terms with the Bohemians, though, if you can afford to buy them wine and honey."

"What about you?"

"Me? I work at a pub over in Blythendale. Not really associated with any of the city's big factions."

"Yes I got that," she says impatiently "I want to know what you think of Ms Wastelander."

"Oh. Well, she brings back people who'd otherwise stay dead, and she made Mr. Iron shut down the Iron and Misery Company. I wouldn't want to get in her way, but I like her a lot better than any of the alternatives."