It was time for the rat to prove his worth once again to his familiar. It wasn't that the familiar (still unnamed, more a thing and a tool than a friend to the rat) was a danger to him, really. In fact, it seemed rather docile, all things considered, but Archimedes knew that to keep it so, he'd need to continue to be just as useful to the serpent as he was to it. It was the promise he had made it, when initially bonding with it.

The Golden Charger--a black, finned snake with gold armored scales and six golden eyes--was coiling along Polaris's riverbank, tongue testing the air. It was Archimedes, however, who directed it.

That way, he urged it, pointing it to a rock cluster ahead and to the right. That's a likely mouse den. Or rat, but as he tipped his own nose up to sniff the air, he caught the distinct odor of mouse.

So that's what the snake had been following. And he could point it to the right direction--excellent. Wait here, he commanded, when the snake had drawn close (and wasn't that still the strangest sensation--this cold, alien consciousness twined into his own?).

Archimedes hopped down, and bounded swiftly around the back of the rocks--lashing out mentally at the sudden instinctive impulse of his own familiar to very nearly lunge for him. Then he was pushing into the gaps between the boulders from behind, hissing and snapping in an attempt to drive a mouse or three out toward the Charger.

It took a moment, but he managed; most of them scattered widely, but a smaller one ran straight for the waiting serpent. He felt, along the link, the lunge and the snap; felt the strange sensation as though his own mouth were packed with soft and struggling warmth.

Then he trotted back out again, unconcerned--and crawled atop the feeding snake, taking his position atop the back of its neck and preening his whiskers and his coat.

Both remained there, in the open and plain to be seen, not far from the riverbank.

@Mossie

Mossie's hunts had taken her further than usual from her buddies.

She'd heard whispers around the Polaris haunts of a moth whose dust made you see colors, and perhaps if she sought that creature she'd understand her own powers better.

She does, at least, have a firm grasp on her magic-thieving powers--a theory she's willing to put to the test as she sees a moth with crystalline antennas bounce languidly by. She bats towards it aimlessly, and it only barely darts out of reach each time--confident, no doubt, in its ability to escape. But she's about to call that into question...

@Archimedes

Mossie's eyes glitter with energy as the moth fell limply to the ground. She picked it up, carefully maneuvering it onto her head--but not carefully enough. A bit of dust gets into her mouth.

This can only go so well.

Mossie doesn't notice anything, at first. But when she stumbles towards the riverbank and catches sight of the dual-hunting team, the somewhat-clumsy kill is turned into a fantastical vision of a dragon and its rider slaying a great beast.

"Ahoy there, mighty hunters!" The cat yowled, eyes slightly bloodshot, as she padded unsteadily towards them. "That. Was some Incredibly Cool Teamwork just there, I've gotta say...quite the Lesser-slayers you are! I wanna be just like that when I grow up...though I've already caught this super cool moth,," she says proudly, taking out the limp Dust Moth and shaking it around.

Archimedes turned, dropping down from his face-washing with a quizzical look toward the voice.

The Charger was busy working its jaws around its meal, and it begain to whip toward Mossie in panicked alarm--but Archimedes quickly shushed it along the mental link. His reassurance that Mossie was (probably) not dangerous calmed it, and seemed, as a bonus, to convince it further that "with Archimedes" was by far the best place to be.

But Mossie herself was... of interest. Archimedes wondered if she were just quite enthusiastic, or...

His eyes drifted to the brown moth. His mind, vaguely, ticked at a memory of fairy flies, and he pondered. There was nothing particularly off in what she was saying, but somehow her demeanor was... not quite right. Not dangerous, though, or impolite, and so Archimedes--pushing away the instinct that screamed predator along his nerves--dipped his head in greeting.

"Good day to you. And thank you, though my... companion, here, cannot speak. It is, itself, a lesser." Male, or female, Archimedes hadn't bothered to learn. "You may wish to use caution with that moth? It might be one of the insects," and he went back to washing his whiskers between words, here, "whose dust is hallucinogenic."

Whether it was, he wasn't sure. But it seemed like a smart thing to check. "Either way you'll want to dispose of it quickly, before it turns to oil."

Advice thus given, and face washed, Archimedes dropped back down to study Mossie. She was small, but looked lithe and agile. Could she be of use to his plans..? "I am Archimedes, by the way; may I ask your name?"

That always seemed a good place to start--and one the rat all-too-often forgot.

@Mossie

"Hallucinogenic?" She muttered, puzzled. "WaitwaitwaitWAIT that's. The big word I'd heard about for the spell I may or may not have, the thing I caught this moth for so I could do...something. I forgot what..."

"Oil?" She looked down at the moth in her paws and watched in alarm as it morphed into a pile of Horrible GOO and started trying to EAT HER TOES..

(In reality, it's only beginning to melt.)

She flung it away with a yelp, disconcerted. It was only then her brain processed the final part of Archimede's words.

"Oh, me? I'm, uh, Mossie. I think..." she pressed a paw to her temple. "Archimedes sounds like a nice name."

@Archimedes

Archimedes watched, whiskers twitching, nonplussed. Part of him was tempted simply to leave, but he did wonder at something Mossie had said, and buckled down to uncovering more.

Finding usefulness, after all, was something he was focusing on.

"Thank you. It's good to meet you, Mossie. May I ask," (and here he paused, wondering if whatever was happening was... over, yet) "and please, take your time--but may I ask about this... spell, and whatever you were planning with the moth?"

Something about this absolute fiasco still seemed to hold the seeds of value in it; perhaps he just had to uncover them.

@Mossie

"Of course, of course! Of...course. Yes." She blinked, trying to clear her head. "I love knowing things, yknow, and while I was trying to...know things, I discovered a spell, to reach inside someone's brain and flip around a couple switches, so to speak. (To speak words.) It's really hard to pull off, but when it does, it can be beautiful bliss, as the caves themselves reveal new knowledge...or it can trap someone in a fake reality, tormenting them and leaving them helpless."

She reached within her fluff, and pulled out the dried Skrungler head. "I'm conducting an experiment,," she said, emphasizing random syllables. "In the new room I hunted down a lizard thingie renowned for its madness-inducing bite. I needed to save this thing, in case some predator shows up and my magic doesn't work out, but if I could find a different halluciwhatsit and test it on someone else I wanted to see if I could manipulate the visions, one way or another. I was Very SO Careful not to get any of the moth dust in my mouth...I think. But I'm keeping this moth, as long as it stays alive...perhaps I could find something to gather and harvest the dust with? And whenever I need to hunt, or fight off a predator, or I'm bored, I could just yell 'BAM get DUSTED'...or something. Still working on the catchphrase."

@Archimedes

Archimedes, truth be told, had literally no idea what Mossie was trying to say.

He sat back, holding up one forepaw (to forestall Mossie's rambling as much as an encroaching headache) and tried to make some sense of it. He'd have, he realized, to take it piece by piece. "Let me... see if I understand, if I may," he began, whiskers twitching as he struggled with all of this.

"You found a magic that alters the way others perceive the world around them? And you are... experimenting with venoms and halluci... 'halluciwhatsits,'" he corrected himself, so as not to insult the cat, "to serve much the same purpose?"

He thought he'd understood that right. And if Mossie could confirm, well--maybe he'd find some use in her, if she could be... directed. Her energy, at the moment, was perhaps a little chaotic for his needs. The catchphrase-... well, he did not mention that.

There seemed very little reason to.

@Mossie

Mossie nodded far too enthusiastically. "Yes, yes, you get it!" She leaned forwards conspiratorially. "Truth to be told, sometimes I have trouble translating what's going on in my brain to actual understandable words... but the dust helps. I think."

@Archimedes

"...Interesting," Archimedes offered. He shifted a little atop his mighty steed, studying Mossie for a moment.

Scatterbrained, perhaps, but there's almost a promise in that. Was it a sign of stupidity--or genius? Somehow, he could picture a mad scientist type behaving precisely in such a way.

"You know, if you're interested, I might have others of... like mind for you to meet--but tell me, what have you found so far?"

It was pleasant conversation that he offered: his tone polite, his expression curious. And he was wondering, too, how long it might take for the dust to wear off.

@Mossie

Mossie, looked away towards the pulsating ceiling, suddenly bashful. "I only started my experiments a few days ago. I know the basics, of course--that Lessers have many wondrous powers and that you can sometimes extract their poisons. I've also discovered that the small Lacerta lizards with the halluchamacallit bites are quite easy prey, won't accidentally poison you if you don't get bit, and keep their venom quite well if you just tear off their heads. And even though hallucigobbidigook spells are really difficult to pull off, using toxins is quite a bit easier, especially for those quick of paw and voice like you."

"The most promising thing, though, is how leeching the magic from any lessers with stones makes them placid and docile, though I haven't been able to test that on larger and more aggresive creatures yet. It means I can transport them, study them, and then kill them for their venoms when I'm done--or, in the case of this moth, I can keep it, and it'll keep shedding, till it dies. I've theorized that I might be able to milk the venom from living creatures that administer their toxins via bite with my fungal magic, though I'd need a place to keep them while I figured out the details..."

"Other likeminded individuals, hm? Count me in! Maybe they could help me build a place to keep the creatures and the...stuff," she said with a vague wave of her paw.

@Archimedes