Experimentation [FINISHED]

[Dark]

Minh watched with something akin to appreciation as Monty took a last stab at the whole rebellion thing, before diving forward to try and pry the damn thing off of Mnem. Unfortunately, it proved to be rather more difficult than Minh had first anticipated considering the strength of Monty’s jaw. She could, potentially, just rip the crazed bander away, but she couldn’t see Mnem being overly pleased about having a chunk torn out of her leg.

Finally, she managed to pry the teeth far enough apart to slip the demonic creature free of Mnem’s flesh and grabbing rope and bander proceeded to dump the lot into a miniature, lead-lined hope chest before Monty could try to relieve her of any appendages. She slammed the lid, and threw the latch.

The chest rattled and rocked and shrieked, and then went peevishly silent.

“You know, you’ve got to admit—that bander has got style.”

[Bee]

Mnemosyne would admit to nothing aloud, especially considering that nasty little creature had just attempted to tear apart her leg (which could have left her deformed or even crippled, if she would allow herself a moment of melodrama), but she did appreciate tenacity, under the right circumstances. Those being when it was not used against her.

She stared at the chest, wondering if the little bander was going to suffocate in there. There was probably an outlet for air in there somewhere, if the bander had had the oxygen necessary to pitch such a bit before subsiding into baleful stillness. What were they going to do with Monty, really? They couldn't keep her in there forever.

Mnem toyed briefly with the notion of having a vicious little bandersnatch for a pet, and her mind was filled with charming images of simply saying "Sic!" and having Monty maul all holy hell out of anyone who managed to aggravate her ire. Despite the deep, throbbing pain in her leg, she laughed.

"We should check on Shinrai," she told Minh, "and get the little dear to calm down again. Then I can tend to all our injuries."

She was once again extremely thankful for her plants, and the fact that she occasionally harvested them to heal rather than destroy. She had an impressive, if small, array of salves and painkillers.

She was going to need them.

[seraaches]

The stallion was still fighting as they females finished with their adversary, but his opponents were greatly reduced in number. A veritable sea of Banders surrounded the stallion, most unmoving, though a few were slipping off into the shadows to lick their wounds and hopefully recover. A mere two still clung to the green stallion’s back, holding on tightly with their claws and waiting as the horse was slowly wearing himself out trying to find a way to reach them. Normally he would just flop over onto his back, but there wasn’t enough room to do that here.

Eventually, he just stopped, head down as his sides heaved, covered in the first layer of lather from his exertions. The remaining pair of Banders didn’t appear to be in much better shape exhaustion-wise, but the stallion was bleeding from numerous cuts and bites, some shallow, some deeper. He waited for them to make a move, conserving his energy and strength. Finally, the two decided to make their escape; as soon as the claws loosened from his hide, the stallion gave a violent buck and twist, dislodging the last of his two riders. With ears pinned and a still angry snort, the stallion brought his forefeet down hard on one as the other scampered to safety.

His tail jerked once in irritation, but the horse wasn’t willing to try to ferret out the others in hiding. He was just too tired.

[Dark]

Minh pushed Monty’s metal-lined prison along with her nose, keeping a baleful eye out for the occasional rouge bander and just daring them to make a move. Their army was defeated, their leader held captive—they could either surrender or be mercilessly squashed.

She shoulder was starting to ache like something awful, but it didn’t seem so bad when she took in the injuries Shinrai had sustained. He really had turned out to be a good distraction, and Minh was finding herself rather happy Mnem had suggested letting the crazed stallion loose in the first place. Considering the problems they’d faced even with him running interference, she didn’t want to consider the alternative.

For the moment, though, she needed to stop focusing on her near brush with death and more on how she was going to go about rounding up the last of the banders. They needed to be put into containment—pronto.

“Alright—listen up, vermin of the underworld. You’re leader has been captured. Either you can come along quietly, or we will eradicate every last one of you. What say you?”

[Bee]

A few of the banders crawled out of various hiding places, heads bowed, hissing quietly and resentfully through bared teeth. They seemed to realize that they stood little chance with a vanquished leader, especially when faced with a rampaging stallion and two women who could be quite vicious when provoked.

They were easy enough to gather up and place once again in cages, and Mnem half-suspected that the creatures that did not show themselves were just going to escape into the wild rather than attempt to attack them again. Packs of banders roaming the slums was not something Mnem particularly wanted to contemplate, but perhaps those beasts could be rounded up later. They were little threat without Monty.

"Come along," she said to Minh. "We need to secure Shinrai and get ourselves patched up. If you tie him down, I'll retrieve my supplies. I don't suspect he'll put up much of a fight."

[Dark]

Minh sighed in quiet resentment, and made her way towards Shinrai—why was she always the one stuck with the dirty work? She was a brilliant scientist damn it, not some common drudge. Of course, out of the two of them, Minh was the one packing more muscle and she supposed it was rather sensible that she be the one to secure him. Then again, it would probably be safer in the long run if they both worked on these kinds of things. Ah, well. Now was not exactly the time to get into a roe with Mnem over fair division of the work load.

“Come on, Shinrai-dear. Why don’t you lie down over here, and we’ll get you patched up. Excellent job steaming the rebellion; couldn’t have done better myself. Yes, that’s right, come on.”

She weaved carefully around the many little bander corpses littering the floor, and gestured at a clear bit of floor. She didn’t really think Shinrai could manage climbing back up on the table, and she didn’t foresee having to tie him down in his current state.

[seraaches]

The stallion moved stiffly, the first sense of real awareness in his gaze again. He muttered under his breath as he approached the feline, less aware of the corpses on the floor, though there was a faint thought in the back of his mind that there were a LOT of Banders in this clinic. That seemed rather strange, but he couldn’t seem to hold the thought long enough to inspect it. It must not really matter. He just hurt badly and wanted to go home and sleep. Home. He needed to get home.

Nevertheless, the stallion followed Minh to the free space and carefully folded himself down to the ground. His neck bowed slightly. His mind wouldn’t hold still for long, fleeting thoughts of the different pains and his need to just go home slipping through with equal frequency, though each movement would bring the lash of pain before exhaustion dulled it away.

[Bee]

Mnem's sizeable box of medical supplies was kept in her small room, under the bed. There were antidotes, salves, bandages, and all manner of medicinal herbs that Mnem had meticulously gathered and organized. She fancied herself well-prepared for just about any minor-to-moderate emergency: she could treat burns, quell bleeding, alleviate pain.

She grabbed the kit and began to make her way back upstairs. She suspected she ought to tend to Shinrai first, but her leg was killing her, and she would be little use in treating others when she herself was still injured--even though she tended to favor her left paw for this sort of thing anyway. No matter.

When she got back to Minh and Shinrai, she carefully cleaned her own wound and wrapped it. It was deep enough to need stitches, but Mnem could not do such a thing to herself. She would need to get herself professional medical attention, which she was not looking forward to.

She moved on to the stallion, next. The banders had done quite a number on him. Mnem felt a sudden rush of disappointment--it probably wouldn't be safe to perform any more experiments on him tonight, not with the condition he was in.

She sighed. "Minh," she said, "I have some chamomile tea in my tea box. Would you like to prepare some?" Giving Shinrai more poppy tea would probably be a bad idea, and in his exhausted state he didn't really need narcotics. Mnem could probably use some chamomile, too.

[Dark]

Chamomile tea, eh? Minh didn’t feel like she had much of an upset stomach—which was the only reason she could think of submitting herself to the overly weedy taste of chamomile—but she supposed Mnem knew what she was talking about. Maybe.

Heading down the creaky stairwell was a slow and painful ordeal. Without the help of any adrenaline flooding her system her body was starting to flag, making all its aches and pains all too well known. And it was sending a message—rather loudly—that demanded she crawl immediately into bed and not surface for the next week or two. Which sounded really rather delightful, but Mnem would probably then proceed to smother her while she slept—with Minh’s own pillow, even.

The stove was gas, and she watched rather morosely as the flame leapt into life when she introduced it to a broken match; the kettle was full. While she waited for the water to hit its boiling point, Minh went on an unenthusiastic search for three clean mugs and then starred balefully at the kettle.

Waiting.

Mnem’s box of tea was where it always was—right next to the stove, organized neatly in separate containers. It even had a little silver spoon to use; it was quaint. The mugs were chipped and well used, with coffee stains near the rim. Mnem’s china was much finer, but she wouldn’t let Minh near it.

Waiting…

[Bee]

Shinrai was flinching and squirming as Mnem tended to his bander-inflicted wounds, and if the stallion were in his right mind and not so obviously in pain, Mnem might have let slip a few sneering little jabs about how babyish he was taking this whole thing. But at present her wit would be wasted.

Though perhaps not entirely. Shinrai's eyes were becoming slightly too clear for Mnem's tastes. Damn that beast; even with the excitement of the bander battle, how was he shaking off the effects of the drugs so quickly? Had he spent the last three years in Avington, building up an immunity to opium?

She was reconsidering letting him have plain chamomile tea. It would make him sleepy, certainly, but in and of itself, it would have no effect on the stallion's memory. And Mnemosyne did not want him to remember anything. And neither, she was sure, did Minh. New course of action, then.

"I need to get you some painkillers, sweetheart," she told the stallion as she finished wrapping his neck. "You just hold tight right here and be a big strong man, that's right, darling, hold in all that pain just like your daddy taught you, good boy. I'll be back in just a moment."

She went into the kitchen and seized the freshly brewed cup of tea from Minh. It needed a few extra ingredients. She had just the right plant, one she tried to use sparingly, but was perfectly suited to the circumstances. The nectar was sweet and tasted divine--Mnem would sweeten more things with it were it not for the side-effects--and had the added benefit of being both hypnotic, an anxiolytic, and most importantly an inducer of amnesia.

She added some to the tea, and made her way back to Shinrai.