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I got the body of the overdose victim onto the table and prepped while Dr Leblanc made his initial observations and jotted notes on his pad I stepped back as he picked up a scalpel off the sideboard, but to my surprise he extended it to me, handle first

I automatically took it, looked stupidly down at it, then back up to hiht? You want el," he assured h, no-nonsense chick with an iron stomach You’ve watched me do it a few hundred times Now, cut that body open"

Iheads?" I said I ht have whined a little bit

Dr Leblanc chuckled "Because I’m lazy"

"Hardly!"

"How about, because you’re fully capable of doing it, therefore you should"

I scowled down at the scalpel inhints for a while now that he would soon start having me participate more in the autopsies--a statement I hadn’t really understood until now "I’s that I probably shouldn’t," I said

A sment to apply proper discretion Besides, what you really are is fully capable of being encies where the ue assistant--or the diener--does al the organs out, whereupon the pathologist simply coestured to the body lying on the et to that point"

I stepped grudgingly up to the body "Okay, solazy"

He chuckled "Curses! Here I thought I was being convincing in h you," I replied, but the truth was that any time Dr Leblanc made one of those comments it warmed my crusty little soul more than I could have ever explained More than anyone else in ht I was smart and had potential

"Dieners make more money," he added with a sly wink

"Well why the hell didn’t you just say that to begin with?" I replied, raising the scalpel

I foundas I pressed the scalpel into the skin, which was a bit silly since I was used to cutting the heads open That involved slicing the scalp fro the scalp back, and then taking a bone saw and cutting the top of the skull off, thus exposing the lovely, luscious brain

Yeah, so it probably wasn’t lovely and luscious to most people But ever since I’d been turned into a zo asDr Leblanc’s e of the collar bones to the middle of the sternum, then carefully sliced the rest of the way down the torso

"Be careful not to nick the bowels," he cautioned as I maneuvered the scalpel around the belly button "That’s never fun"

I gave a short little nod as I crept the scalpel down the abdomen at a snail’s pace A lesser man than Dr Leblanc would have snatched the blade fro, but he didn’t see adored Dr Leblanc