A sudden and overwhelming wave of nausea took hold of the previously still and unconscious body. Butterflies danced avidly in her stomach and previously calm features twitched minutely at first. Distant sounds of a hospital and people milling about their business began to move steadily closer until they were loud and clear. The nausea increased, waves crashing down on her stomach and bringing on a dizziness that brought the unconscious brain back to life.

Dark eyes blinked open once and squinted, pale features screwing up in exhausted confusion. The eyes fluttered shut once more before dancing open and fixing on a blurry figure close by. The gaze was unfocused, tired and failing. Eyes screwed shut once more before opening to find the figure still remained blurry. But the white blur above a pale peach coloured blur that was suddenly moving closer confirmed the familiar figure.

“Miranda?” The blurry figure spoke and Mira frowned as she felt something touch her hand. She didn’t move, didn’t flinch. She wasn’t even sure she could move. Her entire body felt alien and heavy. The only true feeling was the sweeping nausea engulfing her body.

It felt like hours passed as Mira’s tired eyes stared at the blurry figure, desperately trying to focus to see more clearly. As she did, memories of dreams passed through her mind and she found herself wondering if what she thought she’d heard had even happened. The question of where she even was didn’t surface.

“Do I look twenty?” Her voice was an unfamiliar and dry croak. She wasn’t even sure why the thought occurred to her. Why did she wonder how she looked right now?
“I think I’m going to be sick.” Suddenly her body did lurch into action and her upper body shot up from the bed as her stomach emptied its contents on the floor beside the bed.

Ten long days. The death count had mounted but the rate of deaths was slowing with every advance the healers had made. The worst was definitely over in terms of vomiting, hysterical laughter and crying blood it seemed. However, the comatose patients were still very much out for the count, including Miranda.

Professor Storm had visited every few days, normally he could only stay briefly, what with juggling running the school with Minerva and the numbers of students back and forth with family funerals and their own comatose relatives. In the ten days Mira had been in, the bedside table had begun to collect a few cards. One from Camille, another from Johann (also signed off from Balfour in the same handwriting), a few others, and two bunches of flowers. Their stems were submerged in everlasting bloom solution to keep them at their best in the hope Mira might wake to appreciate them.

On a couple of the occasions he had managed to avoid the Carters[1], through vigilance, but had also met Healer MacQueen. The young man's accent was easily distinguished amongst the rest, Irish, but sometimes there was something else there. Ignan did not professor to have an ear for accents, and nor had there been need for it to come up conversation. Either way, Cassidy's brief interactions with him had been informative and appreciated.

Today however, there was news. Movement from the comatose Head Healer. The potential that she was stirring. Every little while a finger twitch, or a flinch.
"How long has this been going on?" Ignan asked, after Healer MacQueen had explained the development, stood either sides of Mira's bed. "Has this been all of them?"

He looked away from his lover's face to listen to Cassidy's answer, blue eyes sharp, but not critical of the young man. He had great respect for healers. Looking back, by coincidence, or perhaps by their discussion interrupting a shallower sleep, Mira's eyes fluttered open. Ignan took a step further up towards the head of the bed, reaching tentatively out to her right hand.
"Miranda?"

Her eyes were open and Ignan glanced across to Cassidy, giving him space to intervene if he felt so from the left side of the bed. He squeezed her hand firmly, his left hand gently rubbing her forearm in an attempt to help bring her round.

"Do I look twenty?" The croak was odd, but recognisable, and despite his stern features, a genuine, happy smile broke out across the Deputy Headmaster's face as both hands clasped her right hand.
"Of course you do." He replied with a hint of a relieved laugh in his tone. As she launched herself over the edge of the bed away from him, towards Cassidy he released her hand instinctively to let her do as she needed. As long as it wasn't bright blue and glowing as Camille had mentioned Johann's had been, he would still celebrate.

"Well, ten days is a lot of beauty sleep." He shrugged in context to his response, though he was trying to imagine why Mira had come out with that as a first line. "She'll be alright, then?" Ignan asked.

1.	Dec 5, Sleeping Beauty

The poisoning had taken a toll on the entire staff at St. Mungo’s – Cass was no exception, but it wasn’t so much the deaths that had shaken him as it was the being unprepared for such a disaster. As healers, they were looked to for reassurance that everything would be alright and they would do all in their power to fix even the most dire medical situations. That was much easier said than done when the potions that they normally used for healing were killing off all of their patients.

It was no surprise that the staff had been even more shaken when Head Healer Elliot had become one of the victims and fallen into a coma. Normally, Cass was rather apathetic as a healer; it was much more difficult to keep that distance when his boss was one of his patients, however. One mess up and it would all be on Cass’s head. Though he had no doubts about his capabilities, he wondered at least once a day if he would have been the healer that Miranda Elliot would have chosen to treat her.

But she had been showing signs of recovery for a couple of days. Cass had recorded every new bit of movement, doing all he could to ensure that she would wake up. It was hard to predict when – or if – she would wake, as the other comatose patients had adhered to any sort of pattern. In fact, the symptoms of all of the victims had varied so widely, it was hard to gauge when any of them would be completely healed.

Early on in Miranda’s coma, Cass had been introduced to Ignan Storm – a relation of Johann and Miranda’s significant other of some sort (Cass hadn’t pried but it was clear she meant a great deal to Ignan). As a rule, Cass tended to steer clear of friends and family members of his patients (they tended to make things messy and emotional), but Ignan hadn’t been bothersome at all. In fact, he seemed to trust Cass to do the job right and so Cass didn’t mind him being there at all.

Ignan stood opposite the healer across Miranda’s bed after Cass had finished informing him about how Miranda was getting along (even if her improvement was slight). He watched the head healer in the hospital bed, her even breathing seeming nothing out of the ordinary. Cass looked up at Ignan’s question, wishing he had more solid information for the other man. “It’s only been a day or two,” he replied, not wanting to get Ignan’s hopes up too much, “and it hasn’t been more than a small movement here and there, which is more than some of our comatose patients have exhibited. It’s unfortunately too little to go on to predict when she’ll –”

There was movement from the bed. Cass’s gaze darted to the figure in the bed, whose eyes were struggling to open and whose body was moving, if ever so slightly. It was obviously a positive development, but Cass couldn’t afford to show how happy and relieved he was that the Head Healer was finally waking up. Keeping his professional façade, Cass moved in to immediately begin checking Miranda’s vitals to ensure nothing out of the ordinary. Everything seemed to be fine, which took quite a weight off of Cass. He cracked a small smile when she asked about looking twenty, but stayed silent to allow her and Ignan to have a moment.

In a second, Miranda was leaning over the side of the bed from being sick; somehow Cass managed to get out of the way just in time, though those sorts of things had stopped making him queasy at the beginning of his career. With a flourish of his wand he quickly cleaned up the floor and then gave Ignan a reassuring look. “That’s a good sign. Her body is trying to cleanse itself of the poisons,” Cass informed Ignan on a positive note, “She could still have other symptoms so we’ll have to keep an eye out for those, but this is quite an improvement.” He left off the unexpected part as he looked to Miranda once she had composed herself. “Are you experiencing pain anywhere?” he asked her, knowing that she’d probably want a bit of space but wanting to make sure that there weren’t any pressing symptoms.   

When one was awaken from a deep and long sleep, vomiting was not something they wished to do. Neither did they enjoy being crowded by a pair of wizards enquiring as to their health. It was perhaps a good job that Miranda Elliot was too far out of it to care. Delirium made it impossible for her to bother greatly with the wizards watching her. When her stomach had nearly emptied itself, she lay on her side for a moment, strands of messy dark hair sticking to her sweaty face.

"She'll be alright, then?" The familiar voice was clearer now, closer.
“Are you experiencing pain anywhere?” A less familiar voice asked after an explanation of her situation. Now lying on her back, Miranda frowned and opened her eyes. With her vision slowly clearing, Mira allowed her eyes to wonder the room. There was no need to guess where she was as she’d spent nearly 30 years of her working life in this very building.

“Shit.” Ignoring the woozy delirium and exhaustion, the Head Healer tried to push herself up in the bed. She was now becoming aware of the St Mungo’s hospital gown and the tag around her wrist with her name and birthdate.

"Well, ten days is a lot of beauty sleep." Ignan had said as she threw up.
It had barely registered but now with her mind struggling to figure things out at its natural speed, Mira turned her head to look at him. The white hair atop his head was no longer blurry. In fact, his expression was now readable and it certainly wasn’t one Mira could recall having seen before.

“Why would I be experiencing pain?” Still, her voice was dry, croaking and her head felt light, weary. Memories of dreams, conversations heard or imagined swam through her mind but Mira wasn’t able to put a finger on it.
“Why am I in a hospital bed? I’ve been drugged.” She suddenly muttered, shaking her head. The motion made her feel dizzy but she lifted a hand, pulling the bedding off and starting to move to get off the raised hospital bed. She needed answers but she needed to get up. “Whoever is responsible for this…”

“Why would I be experiencing pain? Why am I in a hospital bed? I’ve been drugged.”

Mira's protests were nothing less than he'd hoped for when she woke up. Those sorts of questions proved her mind was very much back and she was following a rational process of questions. He was most heartened.

“Whoever is responsible for this…”

"You drugged yourself." Ignan interrupted her, his hand reached out to meet her shoulder, just enough pressure to make her look round at him. "Gerda brought you from home, you took headache potion, or something like. You've been asleep over ten days. It's the 15th of December and it was the evening of the 4th when you fell asleep."

With his other hand, he reached to the bedside table for the day's newspaper and dropped it into Miranda's lap before glancing to Healer MacQueen to explain the rest now his patient was gently retrained.

Sitting upright sent the world around Miranda into a whirl, spinning around her uncontrollably. A hand was placed on her shoulder, steadying and controlling; a gentle restraint to stop her getting up completely. The dizziness had prevented her from doing that anyway. She was overcome with a weakness, a cold sweat breaking out on her skin as she gripped the edges of the bed.

"You drugged yourself." Ignan informed the disbelieving witch, not moving his hand from her shoulder. She moved her head perhaps a little too quickly to look up at him and instantly regretted it when Ignan split in two and began to dance in front of her eyes. As an attempt to stop the spinning, she sealed her eyes shut and lowered her head as Ignan placed a newspaper in her lap.

It wasn’t possible.
Miranda clearly remembered arriving home.
And nothing else.
Her eyes opened, gaze falling on the newspaper. She must have stared, focusing at it for a minute, willing it to stop spinning but it didn’t.

“Headache potion doesn’t make you sleep for ten days.” Another deep breath was taken, one to ease a new nausea coming from the pit of her stomach. She fell back down on the pillow, screwing her eyes shut, desperate to end the feeling.
“Why are you here?”

"Headache potion doesn't make you sleep for ten days." Miranda remarked.
"Ordinarily, no, I agree." Ignan replied softly, lifting his hand from her shoulder as she lay back down and screwed her eyes shut.

"Why are you here?" His partner demanded. Ignan glanced up momentarily to Cassidy who was going about his business with notes, charts and everything else Ignan associated with the young man doing his job as his patient woke up.
"Why wouldn't I be here?" He countered with a frown and exhaled a little. "I'm very grateful you're alive. You must be quite disorientated my dear." He paused, gently placed a hand over hers for a moment and then removed it.

"Long and short of it, you're not the only one. The night Gerda brought you here, plenty more arrived too. The papers use words like contamination and poisoning. Some are rendered fast asleep, as you were, others vomit in luminous blue, some cry blood, hysterics… your hospital has been very busy, I'm sure Healer MacQueen would agree." He glanced again to the healer and gave a nod.

"Your family are all fine." He added, and swallowed, deciding not to elaborate further.

Of course Ignan was here; he actually cared about what happened to her. Miranda willed her eyes to open to study him for a moment. He wasn’t dishevelled or suffering a lack of sleep so he’d not been there for hours on end. Perhaps it had been the off chance he’d been by her bedside when she woke. She didn’t even have any idea what time it was but she was quite content not to focus on that for the immediate future.

“ "Long and short of it, you're not the only one.” Ignan began to explain the situation and Miranda closed her eyes again, whether in nausea or worry, it wasn’t clear. To think that she hadn’t been the only person poisoned was suddenly a scary thought that rendered her somewhat speechless. Ignan had mentioned it was headache potion that she’d taken to put her to sleep and that had been procured from the very hospital she was currently lying in and usually ran.

She started to consider the unthinkable as Ignan informed her that her family was fine. It was another moment later when the witch finally spoke; her eyes open and looking in the direction of the Healer.
“You will leave us, Healer. I need some time alone with Mister Storm.[1]”

When alone, Miranda pushed herself to sit up in the bed and watch Ignan carefully.
“How many is plenty?” her voice was returning to her usual business tone, only hindered mildly by the dizzy nausea. “And have they recovered like me?”

Elliot’s mind was a whirr with horrendous possibilities and strategies to deal with them. She desperately needed to meet with her staff and find out the extent of it and what had already been done.

1.	Kali has been inactive for a while and we need to wrap up the thread.

Ignan fell quiet, studying Miranda's reaction. Too much too soon? He glanced to Healer MacQueen after Miranda dismissed him, part mild apology for interruption, part stare to ensure he did obey.

"How many is plenty? And have they recovered like me?"

Ignan shifted beneath her stare and considered his words carefully, meeting her gaze with his. He spoke very steadily, clearly.

"The night Gerda brought you here, the Prophet reported admissions had tripled by morning. It continued like that for perhaps the first few days. I don't entirely trust statistics from newspapers, but I have never seen your hospital busier." He gave a nod, thinking of how the great building felt smaller for the numbers of families back and forth. He had visited London more times in the past week and a half than he might have any week since he'd moved to Britain in 2008.

"No. They are not all recovering. The first night, twenty-nine did not survive. The number has grown, evidently, but matters are very much under control. The reports to the public suggest almost eighty over the past eleven days." He paused momentarily, "Then there are a good number sleeping, as you were, who the hope is will wake up."

He lay an upturned hand on the blankets beside her, a gesture he meant in assurance.
"The Board and the Heads of Floors have been working together from what I've heard and seen, and what Hogwarts have been told. A few of ours have been here. People we know too. It appears to be under control, Miranda."

It felt as if Ignan were regaling a tale that didn’t involve her. It sounded like a story woven through drama and lies. Gaze now clearer, Miranda stared at Ignan, lips parted and brows risen in disbelief. Did he mean over 80 hadn’t survived? Suddenly the nausea from the poison was nothing compared to the sickness she suddenly felt at the pit of her stomach from this knowledge.

Healer Macqueen had been sent out for Ignan to give Miranda the information in private. She’d expected some bad news, obviously. But to such a degree…
She’d slept through over 80 people dying and even more falling into comas?
How could this be under control?

“I need a meeting. This…” she shook her head, throwing the covers back off from her legs and twisting her legs down. Her sudden rise in sitting up straight sent her head spinning and she felt Ignan’s hand over her wrist, a calming voice suggesting she didn’t rush to stand.
Yet as ever, Miranda ignored advice and took to her feet, unsteady and weak. She couldn’t stay in bed any longer while people had died in her hospital. The headache potion she’d taken had been from St Mungo’s. That surely meant other poisoned potions had been given to people by her healers.

“I need a…” A cold sweat began to break out over her body and the blood rushed from her head, sending things blurry before a blackness took hold and her legs gave in.

Miranda focused on what he was saying. Ignan was not of the school of putting off bad news - mass death was horrible, he would agree, but when distilled down to numbers and times and put against the fact nothing really could have been done for the very old and the very young, he did not shy away from the facts. Both his delivery and the calm expression he adopted while explaining meant Mira did not appear to question his information.

She was in action almost immediately, scrambling from the bed. He reached for her, feeling this was unwise after over a week comatose. Her muscles would be weak and she had not eaten a proper meal. He did not want to fight her attempts, but he did not want her to hurt herself.
"Let me, stay in bed - I'll-"
"I need a…"

The moment Mira found herself vertical she fainted forward. Ignan caught her deftly in both arms, letting her head fall over his left shoulder.
".. a bit more rest." He finished her sentence with a heavy sigh beneath his lover's weight.


End