Lock managed to stand again after a moment. His sides felt like someone jammed them with needles, but the show of Jack's failed attempts to get the rats off Finklestein's face nearly sent him to the floor again. Barrel sat up, saw how the doctor's lips stretched when Jack tried to pull them away, and fell back on the floor.

Jack shot a quick glance to Shock at the mention of her name, before he went back to trying to pry the rats away. Shock had her index finger for Loki to tap his claw against, and mid hi-five turned to them.

"My fault for wh-?" she started, before her brain caught up to the current conversation. "Oh, right, the adderpepper."

She grinned at Carver as Loki finished the "hi-five".

"Couldn't take what you dished out."

"Neither could Barrel," Lock said.

He shot his little brother a smirk. A faint gray tinge appeared in Barrel's cheeks from the remembered backfire of his trick.

"H-hey!"

Lock stuck out his tongue.

"The downstairs bathroom will never be the same again."

His tail flicked with residual resentment at having to clean it. Barrel growled and tackled his older brother.

"Carver [i]gave me[/i] the adderpepper juice!"

Lock went down, but managed to shift enough that he at least wasn't trapped under his brother's weight.

"And you failed at using it!"

Both of them stopped at Jewel's exclamation, as they immediately became more interested in the new source of trouble. Lock wriggled himself free and pushed Barrel away from him. Shock ignored them and casually leaned against the lab table. She snickered at Carver's new trick.

"It's been days [i]at least[/i]," she said.

All three of them started laughing again as Jewel doused her husband, but it wasn't nearly as loud or as hard as before. Jack, who had since put his focus one one rat and was using the tip of a bony finger to try to wedge under its claws, suddenly found them more slippery. One of the rats crawled over Barrel's foot in its escape before it disappeared, which got a giggle from the youngest trickster.

"I can help!" he offered, with a small lick of his lips.

All of the trio started another round of laughter at Finkelstein trying to clear the adderpepper juice.

"It's the trick that keeps on going!" Lock cried.

"And this is [i]exactly[/i] why you three--" Jack started, then caught Carver in the corner of his eye socket and corrected, "--[i]four[/i] aren't supposed to have it."

He turned to Jewel with the implication in his tone that he wasn't going to ask [i]how[/i] they got it to begin with - [i]this[/i] time.

"I believe we'll be fine for the moment."

Shock settled down first. She held out a hand for Loki to crawl into and lifted him back up to her ear.

"So long as [i]he[/i]--" she vaguely gestured to Finklestein, "--behaves, [i]we'll[/i] behave."

Shock smirked at the doctor once he got his goggles back on.

"So unless you want your lab blown all the way to Oogie's lair, I would [i]suggest[/i] you keep my [i]current emotional frailties[/i] in mind."

Lock and Barrel grinned.

"And we still--" Barrel started.

"--Have [i]science[/i] to do," Lock finished as he picked up the wrench again. He used it to point to the machine he somehow managed to turn on. "Like that. Pretty sure it's supposed to be [i]busted[/i], so I [i]might[/i] have to re-test my hypothesis."

"And there's so much [i]trial and error[/i] to see what plays nicest with the Tesla coil," Barrel said.

He grinned and started to wander the lab - in Jack's sight - with his hands behind his back as he perused the potential mayhem like a critic in an art gallery.