[Remedy]

There was a little red flash of light that kept shining steadily every few seconds.  It was coming from the shadows in the back of the room, and Xavier knew that the second he moved, it would run.  He had it cornered now, the little bugger, and all he had to do was get his hands on it and all of the information stored on it would be his to sell and use.  All of the valuable information, the results of thirty years’ work…
He slowly and quietly took a step forward, but suddenly a little beep came from the shadow where the light was, followed by a skittering sound as the red light flashed one more time and the machine itself disappeared.  

”Dammit!” Xavier said angrily.  He almost had it.  Where had it gone this time?  Every time he cornered the little thing it was always hiding right by a hole, just waiting for him to get his hopes up before it disappeared.  The machine was so very annoying, but he must give it credit for being so clever.  Or really, he must give its creator credit for making it so clever.  
Xavier walked over to the spot where he had seen it last and examined the wall.  Yes, there was another mouse hole here.  Like the others, it probably connected to other rooms in the building, and it would take him a while to hunt down the little creature.  For now, Xavier decided to give this little hunt a rest and kick back for a while.  
He sat down and leaned against the wall.  A small noise came from the bag he had been carrying, so he opened it up and let the little creature inside out.

“I don’t like it in there.  Why do you keep putting me in?” the little creature said grumpily.
“Durra, my dear, I cannot have you making noise while I’m looking for the mouse.  I just don’t want you interfering.” He explained sweetly.
“I won’t interfere, I can be quiet.  It smells bad in the bag.  Why don’t you try staying in there?” she said, still upset.
Xavier laughed.  “I wouldn’t be able to fit.  And I’ve already explained before that although it may smell bad to you, it smells good to me.  Speaking of which, hand me the plastic bag at the bottom…”
She did as instructed, but she looked concerned at the contents inside.  
Xavier pulled out a cigarette and lit it, then put the box of others and the lighter back in the bag.  That must have been the smell that poor little Durra was talking about…
“Don’t those make you die?” she said, trying to sound upset with him but just a hint of concern slipping out.
Xavier laughed again.  “No, my dear, only if you do it too much.”
“Well, you do.”  She said quietly.
“What do you mean?” he asked, since he thought his smoking was quite controlled.
“You do it a lot.  You have one in the morning, and one after lunch, and a couple whenever you’re stressed out.  And you’ve been stressed a lot lately.  You haven’t done it a lot in the past, but now it’s a habit and I think it’s bad…”  Durra said nervously.  “And… I think it’s bad for me… if I stay in the bag.  It smells really bad.”
Xavier thought for a minute, absentmindedly taking a few breaths from the cigarette in his hand.  “I suppose you’re right.  If you can be quiet, I’ll let you stay out of the bag.” He said.  
Durra smiled but didn’t say anything.

[Remedy]

Xavier and Durra sat quietly for quite some time until Durra finally piped up and asked, “Why do you need the mouse, anyways?”
Xavier sighed.  ”Because, my dear, it has very important information stored in its memory banks.  Information that could be useful to help me with an experiment I’m doing.”
“What kind of experiment?”  She asked innocently.
”I am attempting to interfere with someone else’s experiment to make it more… exciting.  It requires a lot of work, and right now I need to think, so please quiet down.”  He said, exhaling smoke in the air to make a little cloud.  Durra coughed and moved a little ways away.
She looked around the room, a little bored, hoping to find something to do.  There wasn’t really anything around for her to play with, but upon seeing the mousehole, Durra wanted to peek inside.  She wasn’t quite sure if she could fit, though.  While Xavier wasn’t looking, she moved over to the mouse hole and peeked in.  She saw a little red light.  
“Xavier!  There’s a shining thing in there!” she exclaimed, but he wasn’t paying attention.
”Shhh, my dear, I’m trying to think.”  He said, taking another breath of smoke.
“But-“  She tried to say, but he cut her off.  Curious, Durra wiggled her way into the hole with difficulty while Xavier wasn’t watching.  She hardly fit, but she still managed to get in without getting stuck.  A light flashed.
“Hello...?”  She called to it, wiggling her way toward it.
“Beep.”  The little Maus responded.
“Can you talk?”  Durra asked.  
The little Maus shook its head.
“Oh…”  She said, a little disappointed.  “But you can understand me, right?”  She asked.
The Maus nodded.
“Cool, so maybe we can communicate some still.  How ‘bout one beep for yes, two for no.”  She said.
The Maus nodded understandingly.
“Are you the little robot mouse that Xavier is looking for?”  Durra asked.  “I won’t tell him you’re here if you are, I promise.  I just wanna know.”
“Beep.”
“Oh… so you have important stuff stored in your memory banks or something?”
“Beep.”
“That’s cool.  Do you know what the stuff is that you have stored in you?”
“Beep Beep.”
“Huh.  That’s interesting.  Why do you try so hard to protect it?  I guess you just don’t want to be caught cause you might get hurt, right?”
The Maus shrugged.
“So it’s like… in your programming?  To protect yourself?”
“Beep.”
“Ah.  That makes sense.  Sorry for asking so many questions…”
The Maus smiled.  It didn’t seem to mind at all.
”Durra!  Durra, where are you?  I think I’ve come up with a way we can catch that rat…”
Durra moved back a little and was about to leave, but before she disappeared back through the mouse hole, she turned to the Maus.  “I won’t tell him about you, I promise.  I’ll try to help you as best I can…”
The Maus nodded.
”Durra!” Xavier called again.
“Bye!”  She said quickly before disappearing.

[Remedy]

Xavier morphed into his pet form as an Elder Kuhna so he could be nearer Durra’s eye level.  He funny thing was, the cigarette he’d been smoking was still in his mouth, and it looked really out of place.  
”Durra, you can fit in the mouse holes, correct?”  He said.
“Yessir.  I was in there just now, but I didn’t see anything.  It’s also a kinda tight fit, so I don’t know if… if I can really…“  She said nervously, drifting off.  She didn’t want to give too much away or hint off about her new mechanical rat friend.
”Well, as long as you can fit, that’ll do the good.  I’m going to track this Maus down again, and what I need you to do is follow it next time it slips away.  Corner it or something, and wait until I come.  Can you do that?”  He asked.
“Uh… Well, I can, but…”  She replied, her voice wavering.
”But what?”  Xavier asked sternly.
“Noting, I can do it…”  She said, now seeming afraid.
Xavier nodded slowly, morphing back into a human form.  ”Good.  Now give me a few minutes to get ready and think over a few things before we hunt this rat down again, and I’ll be ready to go.”
Durra nodded slowly.  The second he turned around she quickly moved back into the hole where she had seen the Maus.  To her surprise, it was still there, watching her expectantly.
“Did… did you hear all of that?”
“Beep…”
“I… don’t know what to do…  I don’t want to give you away, but Xavier will be really mad if… if I don’t…”
The Maus stayed silent.  The light in its eyes flickered a few times, as if it here thinking… or processing… things over.
“I don’t want you to get hurt, but I don’t really know the whole thing on the information that Xavier needs.  I just…  Do you understand the situation?”
“Beep.”
“I wish there were some other way that you could actually talk so that I could really figure out what to do…”
”Durra!  Time to go!  What are you doing in there?”  Xavier called out impatiently.
“I’m… just seeing how well I can fit in these tunnels.  I’ll come right out!”  She called back to him.  Then, lowering her voice, she said to the Maus, “I have to go.  I guess… I’ll try to come up with something along the way…”  Then she disappeared back through the mouse hole and returned to Xavier.
”Ready to go, my dear?”  He asked her, picking her up in his arms.
“Yessir…”  She said, looking away.

[Remedy]

Xavier dropped the cigarette he had been smoking and ground it into the ground with the heel of his boot.  Then, reaching into the bottom of his bag, he pulled out another.  These were just the normal cigarettes he was smoking at the moment, but Durra noticed that at the bottom of the plastic bag there was a few that he had rolled himself.  She knew that there must be something special about those because whenever Xavier got really upset he always went into another room with one and didn’t come out for a long while.  When he did come out he was all messy and looked really sick, but he was always happy, so she always simply ignored it and decided that they were a good thing.  Good things made people happy, right…?
“So where are we goin’?”  Durra asked, hanging on to Xavier’s shoulder as best she could.  It was hard to, though, because the smoke made her cough and a few times she almost lost her grip because of it.  
”Shh.  I’m trying to listen to the noises.  I need to know what room this creature may be in.”  Xavier said, blowing out another cloud of smoke.  
Durra coughed and finally choked out the words, “Ok…  Ack… sorry…”
Xavier nodded but didn’t say anything else, and simply ignored her coughs.  He didn’t seem to be very good at handling children, and didn’t really seem to care about Durra’s health.
Pretty soon he rounded a corner and came into a room, staying still for a moment.  There were little scratching noises and beeps coming from the corner of the room.  He turned to look, and sure enough, there was the Maus.  It appeared to have come out of a hole on the other side of the room and was scratching at the wall, trying to create an opening to another tunnel.  Xavier immediately ran over to that side of the room and grabbed at the Maus.  Durra went tumbling off of his shoulder while he ran, though, and fell on the ground.  “Ow…” she mumbled, stumbling to her feet.  She had a little scrape across her nose since she landed flat on her face.  She seemed to be fine other than that, though her nose was also bleeding a little bit now.  She also looked very pale, and as she stumbled back and forth, the poor girl threw up from the smoke she’d been inhaling.  
But Xavier didn’t even pay any attention to that.  He was too preoccupied with the little Maus that he had just captured.  At first he could hardly believe it.  It was here, in his hands, all the results of his enemy’s hard work just waiting to be tampered with!  He could almost taste the victory now, and- “AH!”  He yelled loudly, dropping the Maud and looking at the deep bloody bite mark on his hand.  Now that thing had some nerve!  The second it hit the ground, it ran over and hid behind Durra, who was now sitting and trying to get her head to stop spinning.  
“S***!”  Xavier said, spinning around.  From his stand point he couldn’t see where the Maus was, so he predicted that it had just gotten away.  He still didn’t pay any attention to Durra and instead sat down and started digging through his bag for a bandage for his hand and another cigarette.  Poor Durra, it almost seemed as if Xavier didn’t really care about her at all…