After the High Priestess returned to her chambers, Penance and Crabs were left to continue sorting through the shelves. Parts of the manual dealing with inoculation and other methods of rendering Yodhgorphat immune or resistant to diseases need to be transcribed to normal Babelite script, and Penance (who knows how to write, even if she doesn't remember how she learned) has that task. Crabs is still searching through the shelves for other 'treasures' that include instructions.
Penance is also, well, rather sore. She just had many parts cut open, maggots inserted, than stitched closed! It hurt, a lot. She does not quite understand how the High Priestess can bear much worse without simply dying. Still, she cannot dwell too much on such mysteries right now, she has work to do. And so, she sits naked on a stool carefully copying pages from the manual into a more readable script.
It's easy to get lost in the work, especially when trying to distract yourself from your own discomfort. So it is quite a shock when Crabs sets another ornate box on the table next to Penance. He doesn't slam it down or do anything else to make a big noise, but the shock of it still has the same effect. "Look Penny!" the rat beams, showing his less than pristine teeth. "I found 'nother box!"
Penance squeaks and almost falls off her stool! She has to scrabble to balance herself upon it, then rubs her temples. "Yes, yes you did," she says politely as she now peers at the box. "Should we summon the High Priestess?" she asks, "I'm not sure we are permitted to open things like this on our own?"
"She left us to sort this mess, didn't she?" Crabs asks, running his paws over the carved lit of the box. This one does not have the Wound carved into it though, but a symbol more like a wavy-looking serpent or worm curved into a circle.
Penance peers at the symbol. "Not one I recognize," she admits as she rubs at one of her bare ears. "I suppose, yeah, we're to sort this ... and can't bother her for trivial matters. It's a box, I guess if we can't open that ourselves ... " She sniffs and sits up, then taps on the lip, flicks her ears forward, and listens.
Crabs leans in and twitches his whiskers. "D'ya hear any'ting?" the Skreek asks, but all Penance can hear are their own bodily noises. Crabs has a slight whistle to his breathing.
"You whistle when you breathe," Penance comments, "But nothing from the box. She draws a deep breath, closes her eyes for a moment, and finds her courage. She survives sleeping in the horrib lair, after all, she can do this. She nods once, opens her eyes, then tries to open the box.
This one does have a hinge, and a single circular latch on the front. It's easy enough to turn it until it releases. There's a scent of old parchment that escapes when the lid comes free.
"Smells like old paper," Penance remarks and skews her nose. "Musty." So, figuring it's more paper, or books, she opens the box the rest of the way.
Inside is a sheaf of parchment, along with a horrib stinger, a small rubber-looking bulb, a glass dish, some chitin tweezers and several glass vials that seem to be full or rice packed in an orange fluid.
"Doesn't look particularly scary," Crabs notes.
Penance leans down and peers at it. "I think it's for injecting ... stuff. You squeeze the bulb," Penance explains, but doesn't touch it. She tries to pull out the parchment first and see if anything is legible.
The pages aren't in order, since the first one is an anatomy diagram showing injection points for the heart, kidneys, breasts and bladder - with a separate one for the testicles and prostate. On the back is one showing how to remove the top of the skull to access injection points in the brain.
Penance goes blugh. "This is for injecting stuff, I was right. And it shows ... opening people up sometimes to inject stuff. What's the stuff, though?" she says as she looks through the papers to see if the vials are identified.
A bit of sorting uncovers the first page: How To Use Pace-Wigglers. It talks about the Wigglers without explaining what they are, only that they 'wiggle' and produce some sort of electric current. They are 'compacted' in the vial fluid, but 'expand' when exposed to blood. There's a laundry list of ailments they're used for, including erratic heartbeat, sexual dysfunctions and 'inadequate sugar hormone' whatever that is. There's also a list of things that are more likely to be afflictions caused by the wigglers, like incontinence, priapism, and constant lactation on up to auditory and visual hallucinations and psychosis - depending on where they're 'installed' on the subject.
"What's a phantom itch?" Crabs asks, reading a bit slower. "You can make ghosts itch?"
"It's an itch where you can't itch, like away from your body," Penance says absently. "I also ... don't know how I know that." She glances at the vials and continues reading to see how, well, they are placed. "Seems like we have lots of them, though."
The instructions are relatively simple. First you pluck one of the compacted Pacers from a vial and put it into the dish. The stinger is used as a syringe - it's inserted into the target area the bulb used to draw blood. That blood is mixed with the Pacer in the dish, then if it starts to expand, it's put back into the stinger with the tweezers. From there it will follow the blood flow to the point of the stinger, and nest itself in the flesh. Once in place, it will form a circle and start wiggling and producing electricity to stimulate whatever area it's been inserted into. This can also be used to accelerate healing of wounds, apparently.. although the stimulation doesn't stop afterwards.
"That seems simple enough," Penance muses as she reads onward, looking to see if it says how they are removed. Or if not, how long they tend to last.
Of course that would be useful information. So it's hard to find. But eventually it's found! Subject immune response will vary. Rejection and inflammation may occur within 40 days to never.
"Do you think this is how the High Priestess is always.. you know.. leaky?" Crabs ask, and cubs his hands over his chest as if he had breasts. "Maybe you get more if you plant more too.."
Penance makes a face. "Never. Never is not good with things like this," she laments, then peers at the contents again. She knows the High Priestess would want to try them, so does that mean she should? If so, where? What would be the easiest to try? So ... it's back to looking at the diagrams again to see which seem to be the least, well, traumatic places. "Might be. Do you think I should try them, uhm, there?" she asks and then gestures to her own chest.
So Crabs stares at Penance's breasts for an extended moment. "Well.. it would make you more like the High Priestess, wouldn't it?" he asks. "That.. can't be bad. It shows where to do it and every'ting." Of course, after suggesting it, he immediately covers his own privates. Since the instructions for those are there too.
Penance rubs her face a little, not sure she should be doing this. She's never given herself things like this before, it's always been the High Priestess. She then bites her lower lip. "Maybe that should change," she mutters to herself, and actually pulls out one of the dishes and sets it on the table. Then it's tweezers time ... and she opens a vial and carefully extracts one of those grains and sets it into the tray. Then it's ... looking up how to inject them into a breast. "Through the nipple?!" she squeaks! She knows how much that would hurt, but ... Yoghgorphat are used to pain, right?
"Well.. don't need to make a new hole dat way, right?" Crabs asks. "But gotta draw blood too! So.. prolly hurt a bit... but that's Gorphat's Way, right?"
"I'll try it ... if you let me try it on your dangly fun bits," Penance suggests, sweetly. Maybe some of her old tendencies are still there.
"Me bits?" Crabs squeaks. "Would it be worse than what the horribs do?" Maybe being stung once outweighs the constant injections from the bugs.
"I don't think it would be worse," Penance admits as she picks up the singer. She eyes it for a bit, then attaches the rubber bulb. After a few long breaths, she places the tip against the tip of her right nipple, then wiggles it. That's enough stimulation to get things to stiffen a bit. She takes a deep breath, holds it, then plunges the stinger a good inch into her right breast through her nipple!
There's a shrill shriek.. from the Skreek. He does grab the dish though and hold it up so that the blood with flow into it once the bulb is removed.
Penance is shaking. That hurt. Hurt, hurt, HURT! What was she thinking?! When she finally lets out that held breath it comes out as a hissing squeak ... along with some tears rolling down her cheeks. Hands shaking, she pulls the bulb off so that blood ... can flow.
The needle-like stinger is thin, so only a few drops come out at a time. Crabs has to maneuver the dish so that they land on the wiggler grain. I takes a good minute before enough blood has collected for there to be a reaction: the grain starts to unravel a bit. "It's workin'!" the Skreek announces, unsure if Penance can even see what's happening.
Penance blinkblinks slowly, trying to clear her eyes. She's still holding that stinger ... and it's still in her right breast. Once her eyes clear, she squeaks again, "Put it in the stinger now! If it gets too active, it might now work and I stabbed myself for nothing!"
"Oh, right!" Crabs squeaks, and grabs the tweezers. Squinting his eyes and sticking his tongue out, he carefully lifts up the unwinding thread of the wiggler and tries to thread it into the open end of the stinger. He does have very steady hands, probably from having to pluck out parasites with tweezers.
Once the end gets in, the wiggler seems to move on its own. Penance can't feel it enter her.. but since she can see it she can at least imagine the feeling, so either way she feels something.
"How do we know when to take out the stinger?" Crabs asks.
Penance, though, struggles to hold still! She can feel her heartbeat in her breast, what with the way it throbs from being stabbed! "Hurry, hurry," she thinks, trying to not panic and pull the stinger out ... and soon it's too late as the thing disappears from the tube view, and must be exiting the tip a bit later. Crabs' question makes her blink and look up. "Oh, uh, guess?" she suggests, then slowly pulls the singer back out.
There's a little bit of 'thread' dangling from the end of the teat once they stinger comes free, but it quickly wiggles inward and vanishes, along with the blood.
Penance' ears twitch as she watches the tail disappear into her breast. No going back now ... and she still has another nipple to do. So, it's careful extract of another 'grain' and dropping of that into the dish. Then ... time for more pain again. She takes a few more breaths to steady herself as she lines up the stinger again. She closes her eyes, breathes deep, then stabs into her other nipple! Another inch in it goes, ensuring deep settlement of anything injected.
Crabs helps again, which is needed since there's already some blood in the dish, so the wiggler is ready sooner. He doesn't wait for fresh blood! Once the bulb is off he lifts the new strand into the stinger. At least there's a better idea of how long to wait this time.
The area being Penance's right nipple is feeling a bit tingly by then as well. It's certainly maintaining its perkiness.
And yet, it's still hard to wait that long; the throbbing is maddening. But, Penance counters this by counting backwards from ten, slowly. Then she draws out the stinger and gasps. "Still hurts, but ... my right one kind of feels nice," she says. Then wondering something ... and waiting to see how the sensations go, she looks up what one in the bladder would do. Maybe she's wondering if she can make her wound as swollen-looking as the High Priestess.
The bladder wiggler is meant to stimulate the sphincter muscles it seems, so that it's constantly opening. There are conditions this treats - mostly to do with infections and 'stones' - but the end result is a near constant dribble of urine. Or pain if the bladder is ever empty. For dealing with the nethers directly, there's an injection point inside the vaginal canal that results in constant engorgement.
"Your turn," Penance says as she decides to not stab herself again for a bit. "So, uhm, sit down and spread your legs?" she requests of the rat.
The rat nervously climbs onto the table and exposes himself. The targets are pretty large, thanks to the treatments from the horribs. "What.. where are you gonna.. uh.." Crabs stammers.
Penance taps the two orbs and grins. "Riiiight there," she coos at him. She's liking this, possibly more than she should. "You can close your eyes if you want, I think I can handle this."
"So I'll be just like you then?" Crabs squeaks. "I need milkin'?"
"We'll find out after they take effect," Penance coos and pats his cheek. "You trust in Mabb and Gorphat, right?"
"I do," Crabs says, and swallows. Then he covers his eyes with his hands.
Penance gets a clean dish and sets it nearby. Then she cups the rodent's dangly-bag and isolates one of his testes. "On the count of three," she says. Then she starts counting, "One ..." And the stinger is stabbed in! She didn't wait for three so he wouldn't tense up!
Crabs' toes splay out so much it looks like they're trying to escape his feet. His tail shoots out straight as a spear, and his ears flush red. He switches his hands from covering his eyes to clamping his muzzle closed, but the scream is still audible to Penance, if muffled.
Penance draws some blood out and lets it drip onto the grain. "It'll be over soon, ssssh," she coos, "It tests your faith..."
There's a whimpered reply, but Crabs isn't releasing his jaws just yet. Probably because of the constant injections from his horrib though, he's developed a reflexive arousal from the sensation, apparently. It bobs up and down, since those are the only muscles he dares to move at the moment.
Once the grain starts to unravel, Penance uses the tweezers to pick up the work and after some straining gets it into the stinger. She then tilts it up and helpfully angles it so that it swims down! "Go into your new home, little one," she coos at it.
The Skreeks's toes curl in so hard the claws are pinching his own feet when the stinger is tilted! Crabs is trying to gasp through his nostrils without choking and not doing very well at it.
Penance waits long enough that its little swimmer should have joined the rats' little swimmer. She pulls the stinger out ... but only for a few seconds before she plunges it into his other testes. "Almost done ..." she says as she gets out another grain and soaks it in the blood so that it unravels. And when it does, tweezers place it right back in the stinger to swim its way down.
The rat is really glaring now through his tears. Penance is a Yodhgorphat and all.. but Mabb is much gentler, he's certain.
Once the necessary time passes, Penance draws the stinger out. "All done!" she says, all smiles.
Letting go of his mouth, Crabs finally gasps! "I' never walk again!" he moans.
At this point, both of Penance's breasts are tingling and feeling.. like they've never felt before.
Penance rubs her breasts. "This feels really funky," the Eeee claims. She even squeezes one experimentally.
There's pressure with the squeeze, and a droplet forms on the recently impaled teat. It's pink, so there's probably still some blood in the duct that needs to be flushed out.
"Huh, it actually works," Penance squeals with a bit of glee! "And it feels nice too." She squeezes her breasts for a bit, trying to clear out the blood.
It takes a bit before the pink fades.. only to be replaced by the pink of Crab's tongue as he has a taste. "Hmmm," he notes. "Not like the High Priestess at all."
Penance coos. That felt nice. "Better? Worse?" she asks, quivering.
"I guess li'.. milk? Eeee milk not very fat, but.. not.. uh.. slimy like High Priestess," Crabs says, and uses both hands to kneed and squeeze before latching onto the right one and actually sucking. It involves a lot of tongue action due to the big buck teeth.
Penance' toes splay and she squirms. She also pets over Crabs' neck and ears. This feels soooo nice. She doesn't know about Gorphat punishing the High Priestess for indulging in pleasures.
Crabs grunts, and tries to pull Penance down onto the floor, all while not giving up his grip on her nipple.. even if it means a bit of tugging.
Penance squeaks! And down on the floor she goes with the rat. She's also soon fumbling with her hands, but when she gets a hold of his throbness, she guides it right into her recently tattooed 'Wound'.
Things are a bit awkward after that, due to mutual sensitivity of the areas. Crabs winces (which results in a bite) every time his swollen marble bag slaps into Penance - who is still dealing with the irritation of the recent tattoos. It isn't enough to stop the rat though!
Nor the Eeee. She's grunting away a bit animalistically as she takes the rat; she even nibbles and nips on him, intermixed with hissing and squirming from the surprising shocks of pain each times her tattooed areas are struck firmly.
Given that Crabs is kept 'primed' by the horribs, he bursts quickly.. and while Penance doesn't have experience with 'normal' lovers, at least this feels familiar, since she's gone through the 'feed the larva' treatment before. Crabs doesn't stop though, he just gets a bit rougher. His fur isn't grating against the Eeee's recently bleached skin at least. But he almost chews on her breasts at times.
Penance squeaks and whimpers! She didn't expect this; she doesn't remember having a lot of rough experiences ... but something makes her feel a bit afraid? Like getting close to old memories best left forgotten. The chewing makes her cry out, too! Still, she does try to keep going, as maybe this is ... normal?
The whimpering seems to break through the rutting-urge slightly, so that Crabs begins licking Penance instead. But this bit of gentleness doesn't extend below the belt, as he's still trying his best to kindle a campfire at that end.
Penance ... just goes with it. She's seen the High Priestess occasionally go at it like an animal, so it must be okay. She just lets her eyes close and rides it out. It also helps her bring back the 'pleasant' memories of horrib feeding!
The floor is not very comfortable, but a few more pounding thrusts leave Crabs moaning and stopping. He actually nuzzles Penance's neck while massaging her breasts. "I tink that last bit was actually me, no' bug milk.." he says, sounding grateful.
Penance shudders hard and sees stars! Her head swims and wow does she feel really good for a bit. She eventually collapses on top of Crabs, gasping and still shivering. "Wow ... that felt ... wow," she gasps, feeling lightheaded.
"We both gonna need reg'lar milkin' now," Crabs notes. "So.. we should keep practicin' so we get better at it. Yodh's gotta improve themselves.. I think.. or do we need permission?"
"I ... er ... we should ask permission I think," Penance admits and bites her lower lip. "I hope we haven't broken any rules," she adds as she slips off and tries to steady herself. "And we should get back to work, right? We're expected to organize and catalog this place..."
"Oh right!" Crabs says, and tries to untangle himself. "We should definitely make a note about that box," he adds.
"Already on it!" Penance claims as she settles back onto her chair and resumes writing. And thus she learns what all good things come with bad. Her nipples drip ... right onto the page she resumed working on and makes her writing run and smear. "Oh ... Dagh," the Eeee complains. She has to start over on that page...