Headquarters

At this point, Hunter's legs gave out. He leaned against the wall and slid down until he was crouching, his face hid by his hands. The sabre 'rang' out merrily as it kept rattling against the floor, still dangling off Hunter's shaking wrist. Finally, the laughter seemed to subside. He drew a deep breath, managed to say 'Spider,' and bit his own fingers because another wave of laughter started to shake him.

Brandon looked helplessly from Hunter to the man with the pistol. He did not know what to do. No one seemed to fill him in on the night's events and one of his fellow officers was sitting on the floor, hysteric with laughter.
But something needed to be done. So he leaned down towards Hunter and grabbed him by the jacket, trying to drag him up again. "Captain, would you please try to regain some dignity and tell me what happened. Why did Sir Arthur scream the whole building awake?"

[OOC: I don't know if Brandon and Stephen know eachother already. Please let me know if they do and I'll edit.]

Sanders crouched down and took one of Hunetr's arms.

"Hunter," he hissed. "You have to get a grip of yourself; everybody is staring!"

George looked up, cheeks wet. 'Right, right...' Choking on laughter he continued, ignoring Brandon's and Sander's attempts to restore him to normality. 'Actually, it is not at all funny. He's had a shock you see. You should have seen him. Pale as a ghost. Poor man. He had an unfortunate meeting with a spider.' George snorted and hiccuped.

Brandon kept his grip on Hunter, still holding him upright. "A shock? From a meeting with a sipder?" He looked at him in slight disbelief. "And what exactly is so funny about that?" His voice was low, as he did not want to tell the Captain off infront of the others. But he did want to know what had happened.

Sanders looked at Brandon quizzically.

"Is he drunk?"

I wish he was Brandon thought as he was desperately thinking about what to give as reason for the Captain's unusual behaviour. "He's probably just still tired and the current events have put him into that kind of state, being woken in the middle of the night, like all of us." he tried lamely. "Why don't you get the doctor to the General, Sanders?"
Then he focused on Hunter again. "Hunter, get a grip. Maybe it's best if I see you to your room."

George straightened and sent Sanders a glare. 'No, I am perfectly sober.' Then he turned on Brandon, once the man finished talking, saying with a lop-sided smile. 'Really, Christopher, you have not changed one bit.' He seemed to realise that he was being insubordinate in front of others and added. 'Sorry, sir.'

Sanders stared at Brandon for a moment, then to the helpless Hunter and back again. Perhaps he should be grateful that someone else was happy to deal with him. He turned to Stephen.

"Doctor Maturin, perhaps it may be best if you check on Sir Arthur, just to be certain it was false alarm."

Brandon stared at Hunter. He could not believe the Captain's words, and infront of some of the staff at that. "Captain..." he breathed, then coughed slightly and straightened. "I'll see if our presence is still needed and then we should get back to our rooms."

"I will," said Stephen - he ducked into his room and returned a moment later, lacking his pistol and wig, but at least tucking his nightshirt into his breeches, still damp from the night before's rain. He shared another embarrassed glance with Sanders before knocking on the General's door.

Sanders steeled himself, then tapped on the door.

"Yes, come in!" Wellesley called dejectedly from the other side of the door.

Sanders was somewhat surprised by the tone of voice, but would not let himself be unduly phase and opened the door.

"Sir Arthur, Dr. Maturin is here," he said, as he ushered Stephen in himself.

Wellesley looked up from where he'd still had his head in his hands and looked wearily at the two men who had just entered.

"I told Hunter that I did not need a doctor. I am sorry, Dr. Maturin, I believe you have been woken unnecessarily."

At that Hunter, out in the corridor but able to hear perfectly well since the door was open, made an indignant sound: He did not call for anyone! People had to stop blaming him for everything around here.

"It was not Captain Hunter, Sir Arthur, but general concern," Sanders protested. "You can understand our worry, sir."

"You are very pale, General," said Stephen, rubbing at his eyes. His hair stood up at every possible angle. "Allow me to take your pulse at least."

Brandon glared one moment at Hunter as if to tell him that way to stay where he was and keep silent, for once. Then he made his way to the General's room and, opening the already ajar door some more entered carefully.
"Sir.." he coughed slightly to make his presence known "I just came to inquire if you needed anything."

For a moment George glared at Brandon's back, then grinned: if the General thought him annoying, let's see how he dealth with all of the rest. It's much harder to turn away polite concern than 'bullying'. He peeked in carefully, keeping himself hidden behind Brandon's broad back, like a misbehaving child.

"No, I do not need anything, Brandon, thank you," Wellesley sighed. "You can go back to your previous business. Tell anyone else that as well."

Turning his attention back to Stephen he held out an upturned wrist.

"It was nothing, I assure you," he mumbled, even as he submitted.

Stephen took the man's wrist and pressed his fingers to his pulse-point; he did not even need to count before he said "Well, you certainly took a fright." He counted then, and after a minute, spoke again. "It is slowing normally. A very strong pulse, although I would like to check it again later - a phobic pulse is not an ideal one from which to gain a picture of a patient's cardiac health."

"How much later?"

"When you have a spare moment," said Stephen. He let go of Wellesley's wrist, and knuckled his eyes again. "A spider?"

"I will, Sir. Good night." Thus he turned, wondering what kind of business the General might allude to as he had been sleeping, as all of them should still be, before all this commotion shook him from it. Deciding not to ponder on it more as the General seemed to be in no particularly good mood, he looked up only to realise that he had walked into Hunter again, whom he did not expect to be on his heels.

Wellesley's expression went blank extremely quickly.

"Where did you hear that?" he asked.

Not only Brandon stepped on Hunter's bare foot, he also drove the hilt of Hunter's sabre into the man's abdomen. He stepped back. 'Jesus, Christopher, you decided to create more work for the Doctor here? I know we weren't on the best of terms for sometime but there is no need to try and cripple me, you know.' He hissed through clenched teeth.

In his 'distress' he did not hear Wellesley's pointed question.

"There is no other immediately obvious cause of alarm - you are more than half-dressed, so it was not a nightmare, and I saw your man walking down the corridor with a handkerchief," said Stephen, realising his mistake and not wishing to inform on Hunter. "I made a guess. I confess, I thought we would join the pursuit much earlier than this - is there a cause for the delay?"