#without consent

He's going to kill Grian. He's going to kill Grian. He's going to -- he's going to -- Ren's watching him -- he's going to kill Grian later. And not get caught.

He needs Grian alive now, after all, because they all need Scar alive. It's possible one of the backup pilots survived, but he can't get the ship's computer systems to tell him so. And so, Scar; therefore, Grian.

So Martyn loosens his grip on Grian, and it is at this point that Grian sinks his teeth into Martyn's wrist, and Ren -- he was doing this for Ren, wasn't he? -- Ren drags Grian off of him, even though his head is still visibly bandaged and he's not making sense -- he's reciting words that aren't his. Martyn catches a snatch of Prospero in there and then some Edgar Allen Poe -- all very spooky.

Martyn absolutely does not want Ren fighting Grian. Like most people, Ren's a lot bigger than Grian, but Grian got bullied extensively in secondary school and has learned to defend himself viciously. Martyn has heard him tell the story about the classmate who had to have one of his eyes regrown, and Ren needs a missing eye like...

Well.

Like a hole in the head. Another one.

Mindful that he cannot simply knock Grian out without potentially brain-damaging his only experienced brain surgeon, Martyn grabs a thick blanket, discarded from somebody's cryo recovery, and wraps Grian in it like a recalcitrant cat while Grian shouts "You killed Scar! You killed him! Murderer!" Frustrated, Martyn grabs a roll of bandage and stuffs it in Grian's mouth, which does not make him easier to hold, but it does make him easier to bear.

While Martyn struggles to hold Grian, Ren hurries to the supply cabinets, as if he think she can help. He opens them, frowns, and turns back to Martyn. "What rhubarb, senna, or what purgative drug, would scour these English hence?"

Martyn, despite the whole horrifying situation, laughs, more in relief than humor. Ren had dragged Martyn into his amateur theater troupe, and they'd got together while they were in that play, because of course they had. Ren's line delivery is exactly as he had delivered it there, horrible Scottish accent and all. Whatever's making him speak in other people's words hasn't taken everything away.

The question does need answering, though. "Well, probably something in there, but I'm not poisoning him. Or anesthetizing him, if that's what you're getting at. Now sit down, you're making me nervous."

At this point, Etho walks in. He looks between the three of them. "What in the..."

"Etho! Help me," says Martyn.

Grian manages to spit out the bandage. "He killed Scar!" he says.

"I did not kill Scar," says Martyn. "Scar is fine. Unlike Ren."

Etho looks between them all again. He scratches his head. "I kinda think I should be staying out of this one..."

"Etho, please," says Martyn.

"I told you not to let him jump, I told you --"

"Grian," says Martyn, "It sounds like Scar's jump is the only reason the ship's still in one piece, and if those aliens follow us through hyperspace we're sitting ducks unless we have a pilot. For the sake of Scar and everyone on board, calm down."

Grian stops struggling.

"And after that, maybe you can explain what the hell you did to Ren's brain," says Martyn, because he's not forgetting that in a hurry.

"I definitely should be staying out of this one," Etho concludes, because Etho is a very practical man.

"Where is Scar?" Grian demands.

"I froze him. I don't know if that was the right thing to do, exactly, but it was a thing and I did it."

"But he had a brain bleed! If you --"

"He did not," says Martyn. "I ran some tests after you left. He has a tiny fragment from one of those nasty little nanites he's allergic to wedged in there. It showed up as a bleed but it's not."

"What?" Grian asks. "But that --"

"Shouldn't be happening, no," says Martyn. "It wasn't even a whole one, and it wasn't able to replicate itself, but we're going to need to get it out manually."

"But how did it get there?" Grian demands. Martyn suspects he's now too distracted by the problem to keep trying to murder him, and releases Grian, who, much like a formerly recalcitrant cat, gives Martyn a disdainful look and then behaves as though he, Grian, has done nothing to deserve such ill use. He begins folding the cryo blanket as if it was his own idea to have it wrapped around himself. "His blood-brain barrier isn't just letting nanites in willy-nilly like that," he insists.

Martyn shrugs. "My best guess is something... physicsy happened during the backwards jump into hyperspace."

"Something physicsy," Grian repeats, unconvinced. He looks to Etho. "What do you think?"

"I am staying out of it," says Etho. "Is Ren okay? What happened to his head?"

"That not a single word may be omitted or pronounced out of its place," Ren says, "it is the duty of one person to precede the dignitary by reading the formula before him from a written ritual --" here he gestures at Grian "-- of another, to keep watch upon every word --" he indicates himself "-- and of a third to see that silence is not ominously broken." He nods to Martyn at the last. It is all very unhelpful.