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The actions following Robert's assurances were really very convincing, and left no doubts about his promises. Mimsy lay comfortably beneath the weight of his arm, protectively draped like a security blanket over her chest. It was safe here, which meant that venturing into an uncharted mental territory was momentarily not a terrifying possibility.

One half of her hair was entirely loose and tangled around and between them, the other half bound into a braid that was now more than a little bit disordered. She sluggishly scoured every thought in her mind for evidence of thoughts that this rebellion might have sown, for embers of the lengthy bridge she'd burned that might ignite to destroy anything she touched - and when she finally processed her own results, she found nothing.

Never before had she been so pleased with nothing at all.

Her lips brushed over his shoulder as they curled into a smile, which lasted only a few short seconds before she abruptly burst out laughing.

"You...you do not have to braid the rest," she began, barely managing to get a word in between her raucous cackling. "You don't! You can, but you don't, and I don't! Ah, this is incred--no, no. You are incredible. Astounding. Wonderful."

So wonderful, in fact, that her ecstatic outburst did sound identical to the exclamations that she'd made in their other world. Even the smile and the glimmer in her eyes as she looked up at him, a hint of the promise of freedom for exploration and discovery, was not dissimilar from her Cheshire grin. She was wriggling in his arms again, but it was notably more like a child who was too eager to sit still than one who was attempting an escape.

It required more effort than she'd anticipated, but she did manage to heave his arm off of her and push it well enough to shift him away from her and onto his back. Her pursuit was a short one from there - she very nearly pounced him to sit on top of him, and as one hand returned to its unyieldingly designated place on the center of his chest, the other came to rest on his cheek, her fingertips dancing erratically across the skin beneath them.

"Thank you for--" She leaned in as she spoke until her nose touched his, then interrupted herself with more laughter, which was graciously a giggle more fitting for their current proximity. "Thanks for always showing me the way home. To everywhere Wonderland is. Thank you for remaining alongside me, and not leaving me behind."

Just to reinforce that, she gave him a long kiss before speaking again.

"I regrettably admit that I am atrociously, shamefully inadequate at finding my way, but you always know. Like an intuition." Her eyes widened behind her comically askew frames, gaze darting between his eyes and her hand on his chest."Oh! Perhaps your heart speaks to our home together too, no matter how far we have wandered. See? You are a wonderful compass!"

Just as she had begun to calm down, Mimsy caught a glimpse of his grin again, and the energy returned in triplicate. Seeing madness mirrored back to her was encouraging in all of the ways that a sensible person might have found appalling, frightening enough to send them running in a direction that would take them anywhere but here, especially on the face of a man his size. But to her it was perfect; she gingerly touched the smile around the edges, like one might handle a valuable artifact. She perceived it as something similarly worthy of being preserved forever, stolen and smuggled and hidden somewhere only they could ever find it, because no one else deserved such a treasure.

"All right." Her fingers curled around his, and coaxed his hand away from his face and into her palm. "Show me the way! I fear that we would lose ourselves along the journey, should I be the one to guide us. I simply cannot navigate outside of Wonderland, but I can lead you on quite the adventure when we return to ours."

Though she had intended it as a somewhat coy suggestion, she would find when they returned that the adventure would be much more literal, and would require a substantial bit of cleaning. In the moment, however, she was very pleased with herself for being so cleverly subtle.

Walking in such a fashion encouraged a giggle that rose up in harmony with his, and Mimsy did her best to contribute to her part of keeping the two of them upright. It had been a difficult, yet manageable undertaking, but she found herself grateful to be released when they arrived at the house; focusing on anything but the path of personal destruction was more difficult than walking in tandem had been.

The decision to spend time on their own seemed so worthwhile at the time...and in retrospect with consideration of all that happened, it still truly had been. But if any of that could have happened without the physical losses suffered during their time together, she sorely wished that they could have existed within the realm of that possibility.

She squeezed Robert's hand at the first glimpse of the solarium, her catching in her lungs as she tried to catalogue all that had happened.

The sight itself of the two of them together didn't bother her - it was especially easy to pity Svensyl, knowing how deeply the transition from Wonderland had been. Recollections of his periods of silence and morosity afterward were exactly what raised concerns about the loss of Jazzy, and she pinched the bridge of her nose as she tried to think. Then she immediately tried to avoid thinking about it, as the comparison had unintentionally been drawn between weapon and wielder, and for a second she had attempted to imagine how distressing it might be if she were held captive in a place where direct contact and communication with Robert was not typically achievable.

She slowly drew in a deep breath and surmised that it might not have troubling consequences if he had not had the opportunity to grow attached. Hopeful that this might be the case, she chanced a glance at them.

He looked pretty attached.

"Svensyl!" On her way towards him, she plucked up a spray bottle that had been used for the more delicate plants, and began to spritz the Jabberwock with it as soon as she was within range. He recoiled with a comically melodramatic whine as he clawed helplessly at the mist that was ruining his life. "Are you listening to me? It is imperative that you--"

When she finally captured enough of his attention that he was able to get a good look at her, his first reaction had been a smug smile - he had a good guess about what they'd been up to, and he fully intended to take credit. At the moment that the state of her appearance completely set in, however, he let out a screech that cut her off mid-sentence, then swiftly curled his wings around Jazzy in an attempt to protect her.

"No! No," he cried, peering at her above one wing. "You haven't...! You can't! Put it back! Put the hair back!"

His panicked eyes flickered between Mimsy and Robert, before he dipped his head down to discuss the situation with Jazzy in 'private'. The complete lack of volume control seemed to go unnoticed, as he continued to speak without making any additional efforts to quiet himself.

"The hair is wrong! Your King of Hearts has failed us! I know all about all of the times of all of the days about when she was naughty naughty naughty and the hair wasn't right and the blood and the scareling opened fince to faunce like a messy messy Christmastival gift and the red rabbit, and the rule of her hair, her hair...!" Scandalized, Mimsy began a barrage of spritz attacks in his direction, stopping only to look over her shoulder to gauge Robert's reaction. Svensyl finally took the hint, and ceased the cascade of her most sensitive secrets to lean his head against the other golem's.

"If her temper isn't returned to the keeping, my Red-and-White Queen is in danger of going away," he whined, wings drooping just enough to be evident.

The sound of Robert's outburst caused Mimsy to drop the spray bottle at the instant it began. Her reaction had not been caused by a startled reflex to fright, but a reflex to stop everything to marvel at his intensity. And he was even calling her perfect in his defensive outrage, his anger fueling a steadfast explanation of how wrong it was to think such things about her. She shifted her weight from one foot to the other, swaying as if she were off-balance, and giggled beneath one hand.

As the target of those words, Svensyl's reaction was very different - he shrunk away from him, and the cocoon of wings became a bit more snug around Jazzy.

"Does Mimsy know this?" he squeaked. "This is not what she factually believes! Or thinks! Or number-guesses!"

This was his interpretation of her formulaic theorizing.

"She is always baffagingly worried of this rule, every day and most nights, and I hear her brain like you hear her heart, and I said that it makes the wrongsense too, I said! The Hare does not control the mind - everyone knows that Heart does! And she said..." He paused, and ticked off a precise number of seconds by nodding his head from side to side. "Yes, just that, because it was during the Great Silence of Twenty-Ignore. Mimsy! Did you know I am wrong?"

Having spent this long with him as her partner, Mimsy knew better than to try and get a word in edgewise until he was really and truly done speaking. When it finally seemed that he was, she nodded and leaned into Robert, curling her arm around his.

"Yes." She slowly exhaled, trying to avoid an admission of fault. "I now know that I retained this information for an unnecessary length of time. I will explain in further detail upon your return. We are safe now! Safe from the trouble of messes! Isn't it wonderful?"

The look on his face still clearly read 'I am skeptical and/or do not know the definition of some of those words', but Svensyl settled down nonetheless, allowing his wings to drop to encircle Jazzy at the same level of his arms.

"If verily says Mimsy, yes." Which left only one question to answer. He tilted his head to look up at Robert, and gave Jazzy another tight hug. "Well! I thought you knew! Why are you still holding my Alice-Queen? Many Octobers have passed, yet you do! Always holding! It has not been even one October of holding yet...right?"

One brow quirked upwards as he turned back to the other weapon, to seek confirmation that they had not somehow spent much more time here than he'd thought.

A very serious conflict rose within Mimsy when she determined that she could answer as she truly saw fit, or answer in a way that might continue to cause Robert's emotional responses to escalate. The louder, more determined he got, the more she reacted - more fidgeting, more shifting, more awkward staccato giggles under her breath, all more fitting for a schoolgirl than a woman her age. She was aware of what was happening, even if they all came as unpredictably as bubbles rising from the depths to burst upon the surface, and was aware of exactly what sort of positive reinforcement this provided.

The only piteous portion of this was that Svensyl happened to be on the receiving end of it.

"Ah...well." She cleared her throat and turned her attention back to Svensyl, whose tail was curling around Jazzy like a possessive snake, smile still as wide and intoxicated as it had been the moment after the kiss."The relationship that Robert and I have does distinctly differ, as marriage indicates a certain level of dedicated intention. We have, of course, been married six times now, so the difference is really somewhat vast, I must say."

Though discouragement and shame began to seep into the edges of the Jabberwock's expression, he remained vigilant. Mimsy had suspected that her explanation might be ineffective, as he could be even more stubborn than she could in some regards, but it was worth trying before she reluctantly moved along to answering Robert.

"I am afraid that I can offer very little insight into the correct choice in this instance. I suppose that this is ultimately their decision, isn't it? They surely understand situational complications in a more nuanced manner than we are capable of." One of her hands released his arm to slide its way upward, stopping at his neck to wind his hair around her fingers, moving with the slow fondness that one used when soothing a pet. "If you believe that there is still cause for concern when all considerations have been taken into account, then we can address any troubles that remain."

She smiled up at him as Svensyl counted all of the feathers on one of Jazzy's wings in non-sequential numbers.

"For the moment, however, we need to return to the lab. Our allotted time is almost up, and I do not intend to discover what the consequences of tardiness might be." Her eyes turned to the two golems - if they were paying any attention, they would have noticed that the look she gave them seemed to indicate that the penalties would likely involve all of them.

The explosion of conflict between them was immediately not something that Mimsy intended on interrupting. She knew how volatile and potentially catastrophic it could be to interfere with that constant mental presence, especially after her brief encounters with Song, and she certainly couldn't chance encouraging a little voice in his head to insist upon leaving her.

But when Jazzy rose to approach him, she instinctively moved to put her arm around him, standing protectively defensive and poised to flip the switch to offensive if it now became necessary. Every millimeter of her was alert and focused on the exchange to predict and defuse a disaster before it began.

Then the argument spiraled into an entirely different dimension, eons away from what she ever would have predicted.

Her fingers clutched the back of Robert's coat. As he paled, her expression went blank, and she forgot how to breathe until tiny pinpricks of stars began to appear in the edges of her vision. An undignified rasping sound was the only contribution that she could initially make, eyes locked in silent horror on the golem in front of her. Every muscle pleaded with her on behalf of her brain, persuading her that just walking away was the best option; but that meant abandoning a partner who had never abandoned her, and appearing ashamed of her actions with her husband, and ignoring Jazzy's plea entirely.

Talking about that in particular in a group setting of any sort was not something that she wanted to do, but it was negligible to the alternatives. Maybe she could just skip it, she reasoned. That seemed like a fair compromise.

"I know," she began to address her, a hoarse croak of finding her voice again. "I have always believed that weaponization both asks and requires too much of all of you. I lament that our bond strips you of your body and a lifetime of your identity. Please trust me when I say that I understand the burden of this place, and how devastating it can be to know that you may never go back to your previous existence, no matter how terribly you may need to. But trust, in turn, that it does not always have to feel that way. There are still silver linings and positive variables for you to discover here - or they may discover you. The compromise is never going to be an easy one, and I would never imply otherwise. The greatest offer that we can make to you at this point is the use of these golems, but we will be forbidden from this if we do not return. I implore you to explore every avenue that might end in a brighter side before accepting an indefinite confinement."

She closed her eyes and took a deep breath in an attempt to clear her head. It failed, but she succeeded in temporarily tabling the importance of coming to terms with the fact that she really believed all of that, drastically contrasting with the opinions of a woman who had once given away her weapon in her attempt to permanently defect.

When she opened her eyes again, she looked a little bit lost, but had no trouble finding Robert nonetheless.

"Yes." She tugged gently on the fabric she still held, just to be sure that she had his attention. "Yes, they have made a mess, and if they intend to make a mess of themselves as well...we should allow that, shouldn't we? Is it not important for us to relinquish our comprehensive control in this case? They are not slaves. They are under our care. They learn and change and grow too. They are our responsibility, and some of their messes will be ours in turn, but refusing to allow them to perform this particular experiment simply because it is messy - if they choose to do so..."

She slowly shrugged one shoulder. The unbraided ponytail shifted to rest across her chest, her hand rising to meet it, idly passing through the sections that had learned to separate beneath her touch.

"This doesn't seem right," she murmured. It was her turn to peer inquisitively at him, brow knit as she puzzled over the predicament. "What do you think?"

After a great deal of thought, which had the unfortunate effect of distancing him from the majority of the conversation, Svensyl arrived at a conclusion. He was so pleased by this that he abruptly scooped Jazzy up and stood, wings dramatically unfurling with two loud clunks as both struck the confines of the room. Once upright, he hunched over to lean in as closely as he could, his horizontal pupils dilating as his eyes met hers, filled to bursting with excitement over the brilliant solution that he rapidly 'whispered' to her.

"We should be married too!"