Not Broken Yet (Journal January 11, Afternoon)

Journal,

After much worrying and fretting the experiment has been done, though I think I shall claim, for the time being, that Mr. Footman decided against it at the last moment and instead injected me with an antidote.

I fear what I may have allowed to happen to me.

I…you’ll forgive me journal if I am not yet comfortable discussing the details of the experiment itself. I shall say only that it was extraordinarily unpleasant, more so than I was prepared for, even with the warnings Mr. Footman had given me.

I will say that most of Friday night was spent in a daze—not quite certain what was going on around me and I remember very little of it, though I have been told I mostly recited nursery rhymes and spoke incoherently.

Saturday I began to feel a little more like myself, though still quite weak. I seem to fluctuate between feeling as though I’ve been set on fire and as though I’ve been dunked in an ice bath. I’ve also developed a rather nasty cough, though perhaps that is completely unrelated to the experiment…it is winter after all. Most peculiar is how very weak I feel most of the time; I’ve not experienced such exhaustion since the days following James's and….I cannot think of that.

Still, despite my weakened state by Sunday I was feeling restless. Cats don’t like being locked up and it seems changeling cats are no different, I felt like I couldn’t breathe and, when I had the energy, I found myself pacing the building restlessly, looking out windows with longing. I managed to convince Miss Gizzzy to take me across the canal to Loki Absinthe for some soup (I’ve hardly eaten a thing because everything smells so foul right now…) and air. Upon our return Miss Gizzzy needed a wind-up, but before winding her I nipped to the front door and jammed the lock so the door would swing shut but the bolt wouldn’t slot home…I’m not sure that’s been discovered yet, I’ll have to remember to fix it before Mr. Footman returns this evening….

I had become increasingly anxious to get to my home. I disliked the idea of my fires going cold and there is the evening visitor’s supper to worry about most nights and #11, god love his loyal little soul, fantastically dangerous around fire so I can't trust him for long with complicated tastes involving it. So, as soon as Miss Gizzzy was gone on errands and there was no one to catch me I was out the door like a shot.

Well…not like a shot, more like a wheezing slug, with #11 in tow in case anything happened or I should faint again. With a bit of determination I managed to cross to the station and catch a trolley home. I found the house undisturbed beyond the usual (I’ve yet to hear of a house that isn’t constantly set-upon by urchins) and managed to boil myself up some dinner, which, I must admit, was the most delicious thing I’ve eaten in months. My cooking is clearly improving. I also grabbed a few books and, of course, you dear journal. How I missed your crisp pages!

I ran into Mr. Six and…someone else…the name escapes me, who told me there would be an emergency town hall meeting. I swore them to secrecy about having seen me on the streets (Honestly, if I were going to suddenly get a craving for brains, wouldn’t it have happened by now?) and returned to the Laboratories to sleep and recuperate.

Fortunately town hall is not far from the lab, because I will admit that today has not been a good day for me. I did try to stifle my coughing, but it was quite hard. And that Renfold man, it’s horrible what happened to him, but I cannot be the only one who feels that if that is the sort of person in the Van Creed well….I certainly don’t want to have anything to do with them.

Still, he did drop some hints (which are no doubt already circulating the town). What struck me though, perhaps because of my current state, was his mention of the moon. It must be a coincidence (it has to be!) but Mr. Tenk had said something about the moon-hand being broken on one of the clocks, could the two be connected? It’s hard to say what is and isn’t, for instance…the Mayor practically slept through the whole meeting…it was very peculiar. But then the whole meeting was.

I’m not sure the smoke of the fire was the best thing given my current condition…

I think perhaps I had best set the writing aside for now and rest…

~S.MacB.