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Christof tried to sign the word "Antidote" but only managed to let go of the ankle and flail a bit, before frowning at his own flailing. That wasn't... how did you form the word? Fear Alive, he had never realized just how silly sign-language was. Ooooh his hands were so uneven, his proportions absolutely off, it was horrible, horrible horrible, but that's how Igors were, that's how his Master had made him and...

The giggles soon turned into a miserable sigh, his eyes getting glassy.

The tumble had hurt, but Malodore had endured worse... what it was more concerned about were the absolutely mortifying sounds that kept escaping its beak no matter how hard it tried to stop them. It could feel its dignity being shredded merrily away.

It considered burying its head under the pillow Calder handed to it, then blinked as... yes! It crawled forward and into blessed emotional silence, the mixture of dazed hilarity and twisting misery falling away as if they had never been. The plague doctor got up, slowly, brushing at its clothing, then quickly took a deep breath and did what Riley had taught it, just as it had been practicing - dampening its empathy, shielding itself from the potential onslaught.

After a moment, it inched over towards the two boils, as if it were approaching a highly dangerous beast. "Ah... what did you want, again?" it asked, weakly. So far, so good.

Calder watched as Mal got up and scooted away, but now Calder was concentrating on Christof, who was now not giggling but looked as if he had been a poor scareon that had been kicked. Calder didn't like his friend so sad. "What's wrong, buddy? Why are you sad? I don't like it when you're sad? This is suppose to be happy time? Happy Happy." Christof was affecting him now and caused Calder to hush as his ears dropped and as he sat more on the ground close to his friend.

"You can't be sad. I'm sad. We can't be said together. You got so much happy for you. You have Barth and Malodore and Riley and all these people how are always with you and always want to be your friends and you're not alone and that should make ya really happy cause you get to work a lot even though I don't think that would make me happy." He frowned. No. Calder wanted more to be happy.

Now he was depressed, and looked up at Malodore when he came to ask what he wanted. His lower lip wibbled. "I want someone to love." TTnTT

Christof whimpered as Calder edged closer, finally wobbling uneasily to his feet to push past the plague doctor and into it's room beyond. He nearly tripped on his own feet as he stumbled his way to Mal's personal work space, knocking over a bottle of peroxide as he fumbled for the dull practice-tools it was allowed, moaning loudly as he shrugged out of his coat to stab at the stitches holding on his new extra arm.

Malodore hurried after Christof. "Stop that! What are you doing?" it yelped, snatching the scalpel out of the patchwork's hand. It... well, it had to admit that the limb under attack did not look particularly comfortably placed or even very viable, but even for a patchwork randomly, drunkenly hacking off a limb was probably not a good idea. "You should never operate while not in your right mind," it said, firmly.

And that was why so-called 'mad scientists' could never be trusted.

Its gaze flicked back at Calder. "You could, but... it would be only a shell. Calling being into a body is not as simple as merely assembling one." It would have said something knowledgable about Calder's opinion on free will and the seeming conflict between that and building a mate, but... well. It didn't think the kelpie would appreciate it just now.

Calder lowered his head, reaching back to undo his hair ribbon and let his hair fall before sighing at Mal. "I know." He whined, and sadly moved over to the table he left his bag and took it before finding a nice spot on the floor and sitting down, opening it to slowly eat the berries and look sadly at the floor, before leaning to one side and letting himself fall and lay on the floor.

"Why doesn't anyone like me?"

Yeah. Calder didn't seem to be as chipper as he usually was. It seemed misery wanted company, and recent heartache over being dumped by the Florescetival Kelpie was hitting him hard.

Malodore was out of his league in trying to overcome a kelpie in a game of strength, even worse a tipsy one who was feeling rather moody. When the bag was grabbed for, Calder rose up and pressed up close, eyes narrow and barely a foot away from the other, slightly misting white around the corners. "Don't."

Calder was giving a warning, before flicking his tail and letting his lips curl into a grin, showing off a row of tombstone white teeth. He draped his arms around the undead's neck. "Oh Mal. You take such good care of everyone. I would eat you up if there was anything to pick off." Calder nuzzled the boil's mask a moment affectionately.