"Have you oiled it once a week?"

"Yes."

"Kept the lines filled with your own healing magic?"

"Yes."

"Not forced yourself to run with the Royal Guards during the morning exercise?"

"...Yes."

"Why the hesitation in your answer?"

"Yes, Bonny."

The perked ears relaxed as Dr. Sallus stood up from his kneeled position at Kurant's knee brace. With his non-greased hand he brushed off on his newly begotten pants which were part of the deliveries brought by the carriage from Jarasevo. His newly begotten felt suit as well in a subtle mariner-blue buttoned twice in the middle was also a part of the delivery, luckily. He did have to make do with his old undershirt though which clashed a bit with its more purple-leaning hue rather than pure blue. The white bow tie almost as wide as the width of his whiskers though tied things together. White always fit, and more so it helped to smooth the color transition to his beige-inspired fur.

Kurant waited for the harsh clang of the oil-stained metal tools landing in their appropriate drawer to quiet down before she continued the conversation. "Honestly it doesn't hurt that much worse than before, Bonny."

"But it does hurt more," he shot back cold and professionally. "It's not hurting less, and that's a problem." He gave his furrow a reason to deepen instead of by his worry with a small conjured scalpel to cut away the fur on his hands which would be nightmare to try and get rid of later with the oil drying. "Cter's magic truly is something special if I can still use conjuration magic this well even after more than an hour of her lending me it."

Cter did explain it more during the lunch that it was her lending Bonny the magic that time and not actually changing it. She used his magic to make a Cooperative Connection to have the magic be of her make and not his which she then lent to him to use. It had gone down in intensity though since when it was powerful enough to shatter every piece of glass in the entire house. The scalpel Bonny used to pluck away the solidifying oil on his hand from the maintenance of Kurant's knee brace was quite dull even as he tried to make it as sharp as possible. It took two, if not three tries, to get the stains off his hand. He knew full well the dangers of using blunt tools when it came to medical procedures, but for the moment he did not think about it.

His thoughts of worry were all about Kurant.

It was clear to him when she ascended the stairs to the third floor that something was amiss. He built the brace, he knew exactly how Kurant was supposed to walk with it on. He'd seen it over the many years she had used it. It was the third model that he was the most proud of that began to give her some strange shifts of her weights up the second flight of stairs. Frankly it was clear to Bonny even at the bottom of the stairs when Kurant insisted he'd walk in front of her.

That would never happen, and she knew that. Even so she asked him to walk first, inferring to him being the host and all. Bonny, of course, had to just head for a quick talk with Sarbor for her to take the lead. The Monster Mages could head up on their own and make themselves at home among the broken glass. The door was unlocked for them. If Bonny had forgotten to unlock it then they could just reach through the broken door window and unlock it.

Carefully though.

Bonny then saw how Kurant laughed just because Cter did. Had it just been Kurant and him at the bottom of the stairs there would not have been any laughter. The tension broke later during the lunch though as the conversation drifted more towards what type of memory Bonny would use for Cter's magic. They had a very nice talk about Cter's village and her studies which gave Bonny some ideas. However those ideas never stood a chance to be chosen though.

As soon as he read the letter from Sir Gerson about giving the strongest memory he had to the new Monster Mage, Bonny knew exactly which one to pick.

"She's a Monster Mage," Kurant reminded jokingly. "Never really had any chances to really display what she truly can though. The reasons for her discovery of this new type of magic wasn't really...pretty." The joking tone quickly faded from Kurant's voice.

"Same path as our discovery?" Bonny asked without turning around. "Good intentions and then a cliff leading to hell?" His intense and distant gaze upon a horizon of his own had his already-faded reflection in the polished metal of the sink his hand and ears leaned over turning blurried and unfocused. "A hell you still keep falling down towards."

How long can Bonny prevent the inevitable? How long can he push back the need for Kurant's leg to be amputated? Was it when her eyes changed their colors fully? They were two thirds changed already. Would Cter be able to change Bonny's magic before that so that he could save Idyll?

All the more reasons for him to give her the memories of that day.

"I'm telling you that it's just a temporary thing with my knee, Bonny."

Of course she was telling him that.

"It flares up from time to time. More not than often. Way more not than often. I've been sitting down for over a month in a carriage with an annoyed driver who's care for bumps in the road eroded quicker than the road when the rain began pouring like a waterfall. It's just because of that. It won't get worse on the journey home now that you've tuned it back again."

Kurant's aura was overbearing with sincerity with her words. It wrapped around Bonny like a warm hug. He didn't trust it though. Kurant was a monster, more a monster than he was, so if she wanted her aura to lie she could make it lie. More importantly, she would make it lie. Doing it to calm her friend which was responsible for the injury was a perfect time for her aura to lie about her emotions.

So why wouldn't she?

All that effort spent on her aura feeling sincere made her voice more truthful though. Monster Mages were all about the balance between human and monster, but leaning too much on one side meant that the other was less focused on. The way her emphasis bounced against the clinical walls and equipment made the small fluctuations in her tone louder than her actual words.

Bonny shook his head. "I am worried about your knee, Kurant. Nothing you can say or do will make me play down my part in your injury."

"I was born with it!"

"And I made it worse!" Bonny retorted with a slash in the air in front of him. "I made it worse, Kurant. The brace would have been enough if I hadn't done my part in making it worse for you. Each and every time with this!"

"And each and every time I tell you that it is fine, Bonny," Kurant replied before jumping down from the clinic bed onto just her injured leg. She bent down as she landed to put as much stress as possible on the knee.

Bonny was horrified. Both as a doctor and as a friend. "Stop that, Kurant!" His ears flattened down against the back of his off-white head like if they were nailed to it. "Sit down again," he ordered without any response to it. "Stop acting like a defiant child, dammit!"

Bonny hadn't cursed in years…

And the fact that he did had Kurant falling back onto the bed with a heavy bounce on its weathered springs who moaned their metallic lament at the sudden pressure. "You..." she said with blinks just as heavy as her sit. "You really think it's that bad?"

The right hand of Bonny's ran over his forehead, hair, ears, and finally down his neck which he gripped hard to quell his distressed nodding. "I do," he said while looking down. "I really do, Kurant," he added for emphasis with his eyes shooting up to meet Kurant's hiding behind her permanent squint. "How can I not? I feel it in my entire soul from that one day. It feels like whatever I do it won't be enough to save your leg. When that day comes…" His sigh almost toppled Mt. Ebott behind the house walls. "I don't know. It's a day I fear. Not for myself, but for you."

"I know, Bonny," Kurant chuckled after letting the hectic moment quell itself for a bit. "You care too much about everyone else to worry about yourself."

That at least the two could chuckle at together.

"It's why you're the doctor you are. It's why you have a statue of an upside-down soul out in your courtyard. You're here for all of us, and never the opposite."

Speaking of that statue. "Has there been any confirmation about the shape of the human soul yet?" Bonny was ever-so curious about the humans' magical side as he was their physical side. Much more difficult to diagnose a soul than a body though, so in practice he did more medicine than any healing of the soul.

Well...it was one of the reasons.

The primary reason was dangling over the edge of the bed Kurant sat on.

"Not yet," Kurant answered with a shake to her head. "Still just a prediction about it being the inverse of the monster soul, but again that prediction comes from a series of confirmed predictions so the grounds for it are solid. If you ask me, which you did, then I think it'll be some time within the next couple of human generations, actually."

"Because of Cter and that new magic of hers?"

"Possibly. I mean, we thought that Sund and I were young when we became Monster Mages, but Cter's just blown that out of the water. I'd say something about the water of the womb but that'd be weird saying about her as a colleague."

"Better not then."

"Right."

There was also that other thing. Might as well with just Kurant and him in the room, the monster doctor reasoned as he opened a higher drawer above the tools to fetch some polish for the wooden parts of Kurant's brace. "Cter said that Sarbor Fech's monster sister was working at Jarasevo Castle."

Kurant flicked a chair towards her with stasis to put her foot up on to straighten her knee for Bonny. "She did. Idyll Fech is working as a cook underneath Barbeqa."

"The fire monster with the human muscles?" asked Bonny with the handle of his brush in his mouth like a lover with a rose. "She asked me about some more of the human anatomy the last time I visited. Told me she'd make me a cake all for myself if one of those muscle charts I brought with me got lost for some strange and mystical reason." With the help of one of his longer claws he popped the lid of the linseed oil can and spit out his brush into his hand.

"Was the cake good?" Kurant asked while she turned her knee to the side to give Bonny a better angle.

"For legal reason, no." Two long strokes up the side of the brace passed by. "For friend-to-friend reasons, yes. It was a cloudberry and cardamom cake."

To help the oil dry Kurant hovered a small cloud of ice over the brace. It wasn't much, but it was at least better than nothing. "I see. How long ago was this? I know that Barbeqa's muscles became more defined some years ago."

"You were in Hjearta at the time," explained Bonny while dipping the bunny-hair brush in the oil to refresh it. "Visited Soul's School to converse with Professor Leraull." Gently as only an experienced doctor could, he angled Kurant's knee to the other side. First off though he pushed it a bit to the side so that it would not stain the upholstery of the stool. "How is he, by the way, Professor Leraull? It has been ages since I last saw him. We correspond via letters, of course. He's been trying to get me to play chess with him via letter, but I'm not foolish enough to take him up on that."

"Funny enough about that," Kurant again chuckled after waiting for Bonny to finish stroking as to not risk staining the upholstery of the stool. "Last time I visited him he asked me for how he would be able to convince you to play chess with him."

"Is that so?" Bonny perked with faux betrayal in his voice. "No wonder that he came close to winning me over once. Told me to see the board as two villages with different miasma, and how the two would spread human-to-human as they mingled together."

"That was me, sorry," Kurant admitted with a snicker that rang mechanical against the sterile, clinical walls. "He gave me an ultimatum that either I help him convince you or he'll begin trying to convince me."

"Is that so, again?"

Had it not been very funny Bonny might've humored another thought that he might had become somewhat upset over the revelation. He didn't, because it was really, really funny.

"Barbeqa having access to a chart like this would explain some things." A pair of loose knuckles knocked against the large charts hanging over the observation bed on which Kurant sat on. Even though they were loose and careful Bonny still felt that it was still too hard. The charts were made for looking, not touching! "Especially when she stopped me one early morning to display to me her fiery abs."

"How many?"

"Eight."

Eight? "Eight visible?" There were only six on the chart that Bonny gave Barbeqa. Why did she… Why eight?

"Yes, eight," repeated Kurant. "I looked just as baffled as you do right now, Bonny. I told her then that humans only had six abs, but she shook her head very confidently and said that they had eight. Not wanting to have my lunch just be a pile of black soot I just agreed with her and complimented her effort which she appreciated very much. She said she was gonna work on her fishes next."

Her…

Bonny was beginning to regret giving Barbeqa the chart. He had to quell a baffled exhale as to not flick the wet linseed oil onto the stool and ruin its upholstery. Eight abs? Fishes? What in the name of Asgore's beard was that fire chef talking about?!

"Actually now that I'm here," Kurant muttered to herself. "Could you?" She motioned for Bonny to pause for a second as she shifted herself to the side to better get a look at the charts above her. "Let's see here." Even with her shifted stance it was still awkward for her neck to bend so that she could comfortably look at the chart. She lifted up her sleeve. "Could I–"

"No."

And lowered it again. "You'll have to massage out the pain in my neck afterwards then."

Bonny preferred that over having to wait for a new chart any day of the year. He continued with basting the brace with oil while Kurant studied the chart depicting the muscles of a human.

"Maybe she thought that those bigger muscles underneath the abs were abs too?" she guessed out loud
after a couple of seconds. "That's the only way I can see why she'd have eight of them."

"Anything about the fishes? Which muscle group did she refer to? You didn't tell me which."

Kurant shrugged. "Well I don't know which one or ones she meant, so I can't tell you unfortunately. I didn't ask her later to take off her clothes for me."

As Kurant said that her aura flustered in a way that had Bonny unable to hold in a titter at how brazen it was. Kurant's cheek blushed. "Patient doctor confidence?" she invoked in slight desperation. "I...I haven't been able to...um...make a well-founded enough of a reason to ask her to show me again. I..."

"Does her muscles remind you of those you had back when you were young?"

"You're doing a physical with me, Bonny. Not a psychological evaluation." Kurant held her tongue for a few moments before she let it slip. "But yes."

Bonny dipped his brush into the linseed oil for the final time to baste the last layer. "You became a monster and lost your muscles, she was always a monsters and got muscles," he said like he was teaching. "Not really that big a stretch of the imagination."

A hefty sigh was expelled from Kurant's lips. "I told you to stop that, Bonny. I asked nicely."

The monster doctor tossed up an eyebrow and leaned his knowing head up to meet Kurant's poorly lying eyes. "But yes?"

Her head hang low in defeat. "But yes."

"Don't be so down about feeling in love with someone, Kurant. I'm sure Barbeqa has noticed." Bonny pointed the handle-end of his brush at his Monster Mage friend. "And more importantly I'm sure she has appreciated the attention." With a shrug that was careful enough not to spill any oil from the strands Bonny returned to the final few strokes of oil. "Who knows, perhaps she did it because of you? You sure had that physique when you first became a Monster Mage."

The suggestion hit Kurant like a boulder falling from the top of Mt. Ebott. "D-Don't say things like that!" She swallowed hard to regain some dignity after piping up in a half-panicked falsetto.

"Well you gave Leraull more arrows to shoot at me about playing chess with him so this is fair payback, I feel."

The two friends joined in another chuckle.

"Thank you, Bonny," Kurant wished afterwards. Her aura embraced the doctor with warmth and care, truly grateful for him and for who he was.

He embraced her back with his much-weaker aura. "Anytime, Kurant. You don't need an appointment for me." After tapping out the last drops of oil from the strands of the brush Bonny closed the lid of the can with a few well-placed fists. "Don't use too cold a magic to dry it. It'll develop into ice and not absorb into the wood properly."

"Guess I'll go back to looking for what she meant by her fishes then."

"You do that," Bonny shouted from across the room where he'd managed with the can and the brush. Into their appropriate drawers they went after being cleaned up. Even though the miasma was well controlled and ventilated taking chances was still unnecessary. A minute of cleaning saved days of hospitalization later. "Just don't touch it."

"Wouldn't dream of it."

Well that was a lie stinking enough to be miasma in of itself.

"When you get home to Jarasevo Castle I want you to perform maintenance and healing magic on your knee with half the interval you've been doing it until now." Bonny could feel Kurant's eyes shifting over towards his neck. "Twice as much now until the next time we meet. Don't argue about it. I want to see if your condition worsens or not even with an unnecessary amount of maintenance. If so then obviously something else is going on and we'll have to devise a new strategy. This is Dr. Sallus' order, not Bonny's."

Professional worry and not a worry between friends. Keeping a balance between human and monster for the healing was the idea since that was how Kurant was as herself as a Monster Mage, but if that did not work then something had to change. It had to be Dr. Sallus firstly, Bonny secondly.

God did Bonny wish that he could be Bonny firstly though.

"As you wish, Bonny," answered Kurant. Bonny was thankful that she used his first name. While he had to keep Dr. Sallus firstly she had Bonny firstly for her. A good friend, she was. A very good friend, despite him having wronged her so. "Before we head out to see how Cter is doing with your first memory let's try and figure out Barbeqa's fish thing first, please? Otherwise it'll bother me all the way home."

That Bonny could do. Dr. Sallus had done his consultation and could take a break for a bit. While drying his hands with a towel he walked back towards Kurant and the chart with his eyes narrowed. He did not have to use his glasses for any close consultation, but trying to read a chart from far away proved difficult for him.

Even more so as they laid shattered into pieces inside the pocket of his old jacket.

"Fish, fish, fish," Bonny said out loud to help his memory with something. He didn't know what, but something would be appreciative. "Human muscles and fish."

But nothing on the chart had any resemblance to fish. Shape, size, taste which Bonny didn't want to humor. Not even by any fish monster could he make a good rational connection. How? Why too? Even more importantly, why? Why fish of everything? Beef would've worked. Pork even. Mutton and all that too.

Maybe it was the animal then and not the meat? Cow to beef. Pig to pork. Fish to...fish. It was the only one where the meat had the same word as the animal.

Same word.

Same...word.

Bonny's forehead folded into a thousand folds deeper than the depths of the Underground beneath Mt. Ebott. "Where did Barbeqa grow up? Was it in Jarasevo? Monster Country?" It was a long shot for Bonny to expect Kurant to say no to his question, but with how much humans and monsters had migrated back and forth between the countries it was just a long shot that he needed to squint at to see and not use his glasses. He himself was an example of how well Queen Toriel and King Asgore's policies had improved lives across borders and souls. The Monster Doctor, leading humanity forwards to longer and healthier lives.

He had to replace the glass on that decree too, come to think of it.

"Actually no," Kurant said almost in passing which had Bonny's ears snapping to a rigid salute. "She wasn't born in Monster Country at all." The continuation had Bonny's ears and whiskers shiver in excitement. "She was born in Xoff, actually."

And there it was!

With pride galore for solving the puzzle, Bonny let his ears lower confidently. His fluffy tail shook, although Kurant didn't spot that. "Her chest muscles then," Bonny revealed after letting Kurant bate her breath for a bit. "That's what she meant with her fishes." A finger pointing loosely turned Kurant's attention to the upper middle of the chart. "Pectorals," Bonny read from his mind and not from the chart as it was in too small a font for him to discern from where he stood. "Pecs for short. Switch the c and s around and you get..."

"The short for fish in Xoff," slithered from Kurant's tongue with glee. She nodded in rhythm with Bonny. "Finally."

"Finally," Bonny agreed. "And if she wants you to see her fishes I'm sure you won't have troubles sleeping with them."

"Ha ha ha," Kurant stated slowly and parched of emotion. "You trying to make this your strongest memory to give to Cter? That's why you're so sprung about this?"

Well...no.

But in a way yes though.

It was because of the memory that Bonny had chosen to give to Cter that he acted this coy. As if he was repenting for it by choosing to give the memory to someone else and violating Kurant in a way. It was about her, and the worst moment in her life. The worst moment in Bonny's life too despite how much it has helped with implementing healing magic into medicine afterwards. From that day he knew how far not to push things, and that if anything was what was needed for medicine to not go rampant.

"You already know which memory I've chosen to give to Cter, Kurant."

"Of course I do," the monster Mage answered without missing a beat. "There's really no other memory. If anything though I'm worried about Cter having it not because of me or you, but because what she has gone through. Worse than what happened with us."

W...Worse?

How could that even be?

"On the other hand it might give her comfort in knowing that she wasn't the only one who has taken steps too far. She needs confidence, and this is a gamble on her getting it. She's humble, but right now it's to a fault almost. She has to make herself known to the world as the Fourth Monster Mage. That only she can do, and we can only help her along the way."

Bonny was willing to. To him it was an honor. He too saw that Cter needed some more confidence for her to really grow into the purple mantle on her shoulders. Standing up against Sarbor who even Bonny has felt intimidated by before with his large stature and ferociously respectful mustache was a good beginning, however she needed more if she was to stand shoulder-to-shoulder with the other Monster Mages.

If she could do that perhaps she could also be assertive enough to bring that confidence over to Bonny to not only change his magic but make it stronger too? Again Bonny tried to summon a scalpel in his hand, however it was as dull as a treated plank.

"One thing though before we head outside to the pavilion, Bonny?"

He looked up from the fading scalpel to Kurant standing up as if her knee was as healthy as a normal human's.

"Did you treat my knee today because you needed a refresher of what happened with it?"

"I did it because I saw you limp up the stairs, Kurant," Dr. Sallus defended as he held up the door for her out into the left-side corridor.

The purple mantle passed the doctor by, with the Delta Rune on its back staring at him before Kurant's turning eyes did. "But yes?"

Bonny nodded as he closed the door behind him.

"But yes."