• Chapter 1: The First Encounter

    Bulging eyes, flaky skin, no more like decaying skin, it was bigger then any “human” I have ever seen and it was the most hideous thing as well. It was more than just an eyesore; it reeked with a smell that only a mother, okay not even a mother could stand. I wanted to puke it smelt so bad. What was this thing? And more importantly what was it doing it my house? Yeah, you heard me right; it was standing IN MY house! “Uh…” I didn’t know what to say. It looked gloomy and lonely and sad, I somewhat felt sorry for him. He just stood there dumbstruck, staring at me. Finally I mustered, gagging a little, “My name is Ann. What is yours?” This seemed to strike something in him and he opened his mouth, and said, in a pretty normal voice for someone like him, ‘“What’s in a name? That which we call a rose by any other name would smell as sweet.”’

    What? This Frankenstein/mountaineer freak knows Shakespeare? Well, I do know one thing; he does not smell so sweet. “Uh…Who are you?” He seems to be oblivious to modern day English. What is the difference anyway? Okay, don’t answer that, there is a lot. “Who art thou?” I asked, feeling stupid for thinking of such a thing. “Claudius of ¬¬ Cutter Manner.” Wow! It could speak in reply to a question and not to mention my idea worked!

    What a perfect place for Creepy! That mansion at the top of Killian Hill suits him just fine if you ask me. Great, just my luck though! I have a loony from the loony doctor himself! “Well, why don’t I take you home?” He stared at me in disbelief, what is with this guy? Man! Can he not understand anything? “Home?” He mimicked after me. “Yes, let me take you home.” I did the whole pointing to make it even clearer. He shrilled and screamed “No! No! No home!” And he started to cry. He cried! He is human after all. As Claudius was screaming my older brother came running out of his room. “What the he...augh…what is that smell?! Who in the h…”

    “Don’t be vulgar! His name is Claudius. Since mom and dad are gone for the week on business can he stay with us till they get back?” The words flew from my mouth so fast I didn’t have a chance to even think about what I had said. What was I saying? He can’t stay here! He smells like he took a bath with a skunk in a swamp! I guess seeing the fear and hurt in his eyes made me say something so obscured that I, myself, couldn’t grasp why I had said it. “Are you crazy? You don’t even know how this guy is and, no offence, but he looks a little on the scary/creepy side of things and not to mention smells of sewer.” My brother is rude, but I have no room to talk either.

    “I thought more like swamp and skunk, but whatever. Listen I can’t just take him home.”
    “And why not?” my brother never gets anything. And he is only concerned, for the most part, about himself. He has no heart. Many of our days are spent getting each other into trouble. “Because there is something not right about this.” My brother made the most atrocious face and retorted “Yeah, have you seen his face and smelled him?!” I couldn’t believe him. He’s most defiantly heartless. “That is why you are going to help me give him a bath.” I told my brother. “Me? Oh, no. I am not giving that ‘thing’ a bath.”

    “Stop calling him a ‘thing.’ His name is Claudius! And you are helping or I will tell mom and dad what you really did last weekend.” Okay, if you have ever had a little sister or brother you understand what I mean when I say they can be a total BRAT! Well, that is what I was being to get my way and you know what?…it worked.

    Chapter 2: Sammy’s Encounter

    After Claudius had about 13 baths he smelled better and looked a lot better too! When we were fixing him up, my brother and I noticed something…it was not decaying skin, it was more like skin that had been burned off and the other looked like it had somehow been piled off-by a whip of some sort. And the rest were scares. What had happened to Claudius? Had he been tortured for the past few years?! For more than just that reason I wish I could talk with him in a reasonable way. I wanted to know what he had gone through and how did he know the doctor.

    By three o’clock that afternoon my little sister came home from spending the night at her friend’s house. My older brother and I both thought she would freak-out when she saw Claudius, but I must say when it came to Sammy’s first encounter with Claudius she seemed dauntless, more fearless then my older brother and I, but what really got my attention was when this six year old was less judgmental then I was when I first meet him. It really tells you something about kids. They don’t just see the outside of someone; they see the inside, what really counts. Though, I must add, she met him after his 13 baths.
    That whole afternoon, and evening, Sammy and Claudius played games and watched TV. The first time Claudius saw the TV come on his eyeballs seemed to pop out of his skull. It was a funny sight to see.

    Hoodwinked was Sammy’s chose for a video that night. They also watched the animal planet show; Claudius seemed to really like watching the parts that had the alligators in them the most. And, as usual, my sister talked me into playing a game of leapfrog with her and Claudius. We played in a full circle.

    All evening Claudius enjoyed himself. And when it came to bed time we didn’t reinforce it. We knew they were having too much fun to go to bed.

    Chapter 3: The Doctor?

    The week went by so fast it was unbelievable. “Frugal, lug-ga-age...luggage!”

    “Yes,” I said, chuckling a little. “That is right! Claudius you are doing a great job!” For the past week Claudius has been learning how to speak and read. He is such a fast learner. Even though he didn’t look that smart, he was really bright. “Okay, let’s try these…” I pointed to the next column on the paper. “Auspicious. I member what that one means,” He looked so proud of himself. “Okay, next is…majestic, gnarled, rumination, unmitigated, obscene, then pedant, impede, jaded, divest, equivocal I don’t like this one it is mean” Mean? “Huh, what do you mean?”He gave me that ‘What’ look again. “Laughingstock is not nice. It is not nice to laugh at someone.” I giggled a little “your right.”He looked back at the paper and said “now it is rancorous, uh…”

    “That one is castigate.” I told him after seeing his confused face. “What is that?” He asked me and so I thought about it a minute and told him “It means to criticize someone or to reprimand severely. Kind of the way we treated you the first time we met and I want to let you know that I am not proud of that.” Everything fell quite for a little as I looked down at the paper I was holding. “All that glitters is not gold.”

    “Huh?” He caught me off guard.i was not expecting that. “All that glitters is not gold. It is the same as if you think about it the other way. You was not only bad, you help me. Gold can be deceiving and so can ugly.” What? Can he really be saying something so deep? “Wow! Look at that fly it is…what do you say...dead as a doornail.” What was that outbreak? How can he just go from that, to a dead fly? Does he even understand what he says sometimes? You know sometimes Claudius can be so zany, but he can also have a really serious side. I smiled and thought he really is a unique person. “Do you want to watch some TV before we go to the store?” I asked as he was still obsessed with the fly. I thought we had enough of the words for today. “Pleaseee!” he exclaimed in a cheerful voice. But right then there was a knock at the door. ‘Just a minute.” I told him as I was getting up to answer the door. It was the doctor! Oh, no! What do I do? “Uh…good afternoon sir.” My voice, I could tell was shaking. “Uh, how may I help you? Do you have a petition for us, because if you do, I just want you to know it would be worthless to say anything about it. You see we are not interested in getting involved in that kind of….”

    “I am not here to have you sign a petition, so will you stop your babbling!” He spat at me. “Then what do you want?!” I finally got my courage up. “I know he is here.” Does he mean Claudius? “Raspalen with you! You…you….grazhny!” The voice came from behind me. Was that Claudius? I turned to see him off the couch and standing, but even though his voice sounded strong, his body showed another story. He was shaking from head to toe. What had this man done to him? “You belong to me.” The doctor told him with no feeling; like it was just fact.

    That was it! I could not stand for this “What do you mean he is yours? You can’t own people!” He smiled as he looked at me and laughed “he is not human.” What? Not human? What is this guy talking about? “Of course he is!” I could not believe this man! Saying Claudius was not human. How ridiculous! My Brother, hearing the racket, came into the living room to evaluate the situation. As he did Claudius ran out the door past me and the doctor. The doctor then spun around and ran after him.
    “Oh, no! What are we going to do?” I looked at my brother for an answer, but his face was blank as mine. I thought for a minute. Then said, “Get Sammy and meet me at the edge of town. The assistant manager at mom’s store told me about this abandoned cave at the edge of town. I told Claudius about it and he said he wished he could go there, so I told him I would take him there one day. I bet that is where he is going!” My brother nodded. Then as I started to walk out the door he said “Be careful Ann. I know Claudius would not usually hurt you, but when fear is present, people can do thing they would not usually do.” I looked at him for a second. Fear spreading through my body. Taking in everything, his face was so sincere. “You too big bro.” and with that I left.

    Chapter 4: What Happened?

    When I found Claudius he was covered in blood. What had happened? “Claudius…?” He looked up. Fear was written all over his face. This was not the same person who had lived with us the past week. He was different somehow, but how? “What happened? Are you alright? Are you hurt?” He looked at me with a blank look. “They are coming for me…” he looked back down and that is when I noticed it…The doctor’s body laying there motionless. He was dead! Did Claudius do this? He couldn’t have! Claudius has a heart of gold! He would never hurt anyone! It really was a sorry sight. I was 15 at the time, but all I could do was stare at Claudius and at the dead body lying on the cave floor. I would almost say, for Claudius’s sake, good riddance to the doctor, but I knew that was not right. What was I to do? I could now hear footsteps. “Ann!” My brother had shouted for me. I ran to the front of the cave and told my brother what I had seen and he said that he already knew about it. He told me that someone had seen him come into the cave and that they were coming to take him away. “Claudius! We have leave, they are coming! Claudius! Come on! Get up!” I tried to pull him up, but he would not get up. That is when the voices and footsteps became louder and I became more frantic to get him to move, but nothing. By this time the mob of critical people were standing at the mouth of the cave…

    Chapter 5: After it all Happened

    That is how everything happened. That is what lead up to the searching of the Cutter Manner at the top of Killian Hill. It seemed that the doctor had been doing inhumane experiments on many different people. And to all of them Claudius was their hero. That is when everyone finally realized how much he really had contributed to them. When the manner was cleared of everything, and later burned, there were many displaced individuals that needed a home. People of the village felt bad for not knowing so they built a home for them and my family, who had never really gotten along, made a home in our family for a little boy how reminded us of Claudius. He had brought us closer than we had ever been. We wanted to keep that alive in our family. He was a constant reminder of all the good things and times we had always had. He kept us grateful. Our parents had never had the opportunity to know Claudius, no one really did. That was the biggest shame. He once said ‘too much of a good thing is not always a good thing.’ Now that everything is done, I really get what he was saying, but I will let you draw your own meaning from it.

    Chapter 6: What Happened to Claudius?

    You may be saying ‘well what really happened to Claudius?’ Well, this is what happened after the mob got to the mouth of the cave…

    “There it is! Get it!” men in the crowd were shouting. They were caring guns, sticks, baseball bats, and everything else they could get their hands on to use as a weapon. “No, Stop!” I shouted. My little sister ran over to Claudius and told him they had to leave. “Oogals,” He said. That is what he has called us for a while. It was suppose to be Oh, girls or gals, but he never got that one right. “No! I don’t want you to get hurt.” That was the most I had heard him say with feeling since I got to the cave. He then shoved us out of the way of the angry mob. My brother came and held us as the people were beating Claudius to death. There was nothing more we could do and we knew that. He knew that as well. At that moment in time everything seemed to stop and I could see his face. It was not sorrow for being ostracized, or even for being betrayed, but more like he knew what he had done was wrong and now he would not be able to protect the ones he had loved because of what he had done. “Stop! You are killing him! He is not the one that needs that treatment, it is him!” They all looked at me and then to where I had pointed. The dead body still lie there motionless. They all backed off. “Claudius?” I said fighting the tears back. He looked at me, smiled and said “I never had a family. The doctor killed them all when I was five. Please, Ann, cherish what you have.” While he was talking, the towns’ people were complaining about not having enough elbow room in the cave because there were too many of them in such a small place. My brother shut them up pretty fast. I could no longer hold the tears back. “Claudius,” I said as tears flowed down my face “you know you will always be a part of our family.” His eyes glittered like diamonds as they filed with happy tears. “We are such stuff as dreams are made on, and our little life is rounded with a sleep.” And with that this eyes closed for that last time,his last tear fell to the ground and all was silent….