5 April 2012
Thursday @3pm
Department of Magical Law Enforcement

"Since when?"

"Since it's been a year since your release and you're due."[/des]

"That was two years ago. That was 2010. Two and a half."

"Ach, so you missed last year's. And this year's. That's not good. Best not be mentioning that to anyone who matters."

"No one noticed last time, must not be that important. I'm busy."

"I do see the logic, but this is the Ministry of Magic, love. Logic doesn't enter in. See the Healer down the clinic. Bring a book. Might be a wait.

"I didn't bring a book."

"A magazine, then."

With a mighty roll of his eyes, Nate Briggs, Azkaban parolee made his way through the convoluted passages to said clinic. He wasn't the only one waiting in the strange-smelling place. Even on a random Thursday, there were Magical Law Patrol wix some of them with an assortment of grim-looking injuries.

He checked in.

"I'm supposed to have a physical," he told the wizard at the counter.

"Name?"

Nate told him and the wizard flipped through a large book.

"Case number?"

Nate told him. The wizard nodded and handed him a clipboard with a too-long curling parchment form. "Have a seat, fill this out. Have a seat. Might've brought a book."

"Are you sure this isn't from an itching hex?  I swear that pickpocket had lobbed something my way right before I got him properly restrained.  It has just been so unbelievably persistent."

Tulojow chuckled and shook her head at the brave, determined Auror.  No one would doubt the might of a rank and file member of the force - all those years of training and experience behind him.  Tulojow could understand his need to find a more impressive explanation for the never ending need to scratch. 

Unfortunately, in the end, the obvious answer is sometimes the least glamorous. 

"Some enemies care not for rank or power.  They care even less about magic.  Luckily, Slug and Jiggers has a shampoo that will fix you right up - and best give your son's head a good inspection." 

With an apologetic grimace, she waited for the auror and his magical (and as invisible as possible) hair net to clear the clinic room before giving it the most thorough of cleanings. 

Tulojow paused at the little desk in the alcove by the waiting room and balanced her walking cane against the wall so that she could flip through the blessedly dwindling pile of admittance scrolls.  If they'd reached head lice level of severity, the waiting room must be getting close to empty for the day.  Tulojow glanced around the waiting room, checking for any last minute detached appendages who had yet to get added to the list, before picking up the next scroll in the pile. 

"Briggs.  You're up, young man," she called, waving him into the corridor.  "First door on your right.  Yep - nope - just right there.  Take a seat - chair or table, whichever your more comfortable with.  What brings you in today?" 

She knew, of course, what it said on the file.  It was always interesting to see if the patient's perspective matched that appointment.

The Healer was an old witch with a long braid and an American accent Nate wasn't worldly enough to pinpoint. Her stilted gait gave Nate the impression she might not always have been a Healer, at least not in such a low-key environment. The last healer he'd seen was in Azkaban and the manner was far less conversational. He took the chair and occupied it in a manner of a detained student.

"Confirm I haven't died," he offered, scratching his stubble near his ear. He was wearing one simple leather glove on the right hand while the other hand was bare.

"Maybe note down if I'm under an Imperius Curse. Check for lycanthropy."

Snitch about his replacement zombie skeleton finger, tacked on after a splinching by a shady Israeli mage.

"You know. The usual, I expect. Nagde."

He read her name tag. "Where's that from?"

As the younger man got himself settled, Tulojow circled around to the desk and picked up an eagle-down feather quill and a small metal bowl of individually-wrapped sweets.  She took a cinnamon-flavored sweet for herself before extending the bowl to Briggs. 

"Seems straightforward enough," Tulojow offered, setting the bowl back down after Briggs made his choice before settling in her own, heavily cushioned chair.  Though her mannerisms remained casual, she kept a careful eye on her patient.  Much could be learned about a person's health status just by simple observation: speech patterns, gestures, inconsistent clothing options, their general carriage - all had the potential to offer insight, long before the physical examination began. 

"Have you experienced any losses of time?  Any instances where you found yourself somewhere without recollection of how you came to be there?" 

"You know. The usual, I expect. Nagde."

She chuckled, genuinely, at the young man and waggled a finger at him.  "Oh, how naive you are to think there's any such thing as 'the usual' in this office.  This is a law-enforcement triage clinic, not a corner diner.  As much as I would turn wood to gold for a decent chocolate shake right now." 

On the table next to her, the fluffy quill discretely jotted down a few quick notes. 

"Where's that from?"

"My father," Tulojow answered with a flat-pan tone before another grin quirked at the corner of her mouth.  "And, my father's from the very middle of nowhere in North Dakota - not far from the Canadian border.  It's Ojibwa."

"Have you had any episodes of vomiting?  Unexplained changes to your sleep schedule?"

This was new. Someone around here taking him at his word, as irreverent and mocking as it was, and more than that, taking him seriously. Nate really didn't know what to do with it. He'd gotten so used to everyone he encountered finding him suspect, and in turn, responding accordingly.

What kind of game is she playing, he thought. He wasn't someone who smiled when nervous, so he didn't. He took a wrapped sweet but didn't open it. He twisted both ends in his fingers.

The finger-wagging, too. Entirely unexpected, scathing and almost gentle. It was all so damn unfamiliar. She was American - Native American - perhaps that was part of it.

The answers to her health-related questions were all the same.

"No, nothing like that."

Nate also didn't apologize when he was nervous, so he didn't.

"I feel fine."

He drank, he smoked, he kept odd hours, he was under constant stress, and had no social or familiar support system. But perhaps more pressing, and what she'd soon find out anyway, was what his silly glove concealed. He set down the candy and peeled the glove off his right hand. His index finger from nearly the base was skeletonized. He opened and closed a fist and turned his palm down then up, showing that it all functioned.

"It's not mine," he explained, skipping to the end. Somehow, clever savvy Nate understood there was no reason to evade this strange witch.

Though likely unnecessary, the little fluffy quill scribbled not a werewolf, not a ghost in the notes as the patient successfully plucked the little candy from the silver bowl.  The bigger risk, unfortunately, was also the more difficult one to assess.  There was no definitive way to determine if an individual was under the imperious curse, apart from knowing someone well enough to recognize subtle changes in their demeanor or routine.   

In Tulojow's opinion, one of the Ministry's biggest obstacle was that those most at risk were those with such meager support systems that no one to notice.  From what little Tulojow knew of Briggs from his Ministry record, he was a prime example of such a conundrum. 

Tulojow had started to retrieve one of the lavender examination robes from the shelf above her head when she stopped to watch the young man tug off his glove. 

After nearly 60 years of being an auror, field medic and school healer, Tulojow was rarely shocked by grotesque or befuddling injuries.  Rather than, perhaps, the more typical reaction of surprise or disgust, a single brow arched in amusement.  Wordlessly, Tulojow drew her wand and passed it once the younger man's hand. 

"Indeed.  It's not yours," she agreed.  No sign of a concealment charm hiding the man's real finger or some incriminating evidence of past wrong-doing.   "To whom did it belong?"

Wand still balanced casually between her fingers, Tulojow leaned back in her chair and watched the young man closely as she posed a few more questions. 

"I can only imagine there's a story here but I have a suspicion you're not likely to share in the details, but I'm obligated to ask.  Was someone missing the finger at the time it came to you?"

Nathan hadn't craved a shocked response to his digital malformation and hadn't expected it. It was more weird now that he was done being horrified by it. Healers were strange as a group, excited by gore. He had ended up in a state of apathy over the constant threats to his survival, but he wouldn't deny he'd rather the skeleton finger was gone.

"Partly," he said. Telling the story of how he'd sold stolen unicorn blood to Lorelei Hunt, then confronted her for (supposedly) blowing their anonymity to a werewolf hunter, splinching in his escape, and having his gentle necromancer of a neighbor patch him up all macabre - well, it was uncomfortably populated with multiple felonies.

"The skeleton was summoned somehow, but I don't know if it was ever a person."

Nate knew little of the practicals of Dark Magic nor the extent of Hunt's insanity.

"It doesn't always cooperate. Nearly stopped trying to poke out my eye, which I find nice. Can you take it off?"

At this notion, the finger protested and Nate, unperturbed, forced his right hand down to his lap with the help of his left. He smiled then, and nodded.

"The skeleton was summoned somehow, but I don't know if it was ever a person."

Worry flickered across Tulojow's expression and she lifted her wand, again.  Whatever brief relief she experienced upon hearing that the finger wasn't taken immediately from a living person was quickly overshadowed by the potential implications that some form of death magic or necromancy had been involved. 

When death was used in magic, it was rarely inert; those that dabbled in death magic rarely did so simply for the convenience of spare parts. 

"I would prefer to remove it, if you'll allow me," Tulojow offered.  "Why didn't you seek to have your own finger reattached?"

The older woman made an active attempt to keep any hint of matronly chiding out of her voice but she wasn't entirely successful.  "If all it has tried to do is poke you, you should count yourself luck.  I've known of people who unwittingly committed murder or allowed information to head in unintended directions."

Indeed, given the hand's response to the conversation, Tulojow sighed and lifted her wand.  She skillfully touched the tip of the wand to two points on Briggs' forearm and elbow.  Briggs would feel a brief tingling sensation before flexor and extensor muscles of the elbow and wrist grew numb.  The finger could wriggly around all it wanted but, with the rest of the arm immobile, its options beyond that were limited. 

"I would also prefer to keep it, if you'll allow.  And you are absolutely within your right to say 'no.'"  Tulojow deliberately phrased it as a request and she had every intention of heading his preference.  The auror in her wanted to demand an investigation the job of a healer demanded trust from the patient.   

"Original finger was - is - ," Nate clicked his tongue impishly, "unrecoverable."

Nate missed his finger, but its last known whereabouts was in the possession of an unhinged werewolf hunter, so he considered the thing lost. They hadn't crossed paths since that night and Nate would keep it that way.

"That's me, luckiest bastard in Knockturn Ally," he replied.

The Healer kindly deadened his arm and it felt instantly, magically heavy. There was sensation, but from the elbow down he couldn't affect any movement at all. He rolled his shoulder and shifted his seat on the table, unconsciously searching for his hand again. It wasn't pleasant, but it was preferable to a Petrificus Totalis.

"That's a neat trick. Nah, but take it. He's yours. No help to me at all."

The boney finger flexed and stretched, and tried to pull itself along Nathan's trouser leg. Nate pulled back at the shoulder and the bone finger's progress was null again.

"That's me, luckiest bastard in Knockturn Ally,"

"Well.  That's hardly the stiffest competition.  I wouldn't go gloating to the Prophet about it." Tulojow offered with a slight smirk.

Briggs' tone remained persistently nonchalant but the tone did little to quell Tulojow's concern. 

"Unrecoverable." She repeated, tilting her head forward to peer over the rim of non-existent spectacles at the younger man.  "Are you willing to elaborate?" she offered, tentatively.  Suspicious that there was likely a limit to how much information the young man would volunteer to an employee of Level 2, she quickly added.  "At a minimum, I'd like to know it isn't anywhere where it could be used against you."

As she spoke, Tulojow flicked her wand at a metal instrument tray which drifted into the air and followed the Healer around the examination room like a loyal puppy.  A couple jars of salve.  Rolls of gauze.  A glass mason jar with a few defensive and shatter-resistance spells cast on it for good measure.  A couple strong magnets and a few other gadgets settled in some semblance of an order. 

"I suspect you have slightly less sheltered experiences than your average Hogwarts student but ... well ... you'll have to excuse an old witch's ingrained habits.  On a scale of 'ehh, who cares' to 'faints at the sight of snot' how squeamish are you?"

Nate responded to healer Nagde's insistence at knowing more about the finger's whereabouts with a shake of his head and a grunt of non-compliance. He didn't want to explore how a dead finger could be used against him - although he was sure his necromancer neighbor Aviad would  be able to enlighten him should Nate choose to entertain himself on a stormy night with more possibilities of Bagnold screwing him over.

"Don't worry about it," he said, hoping that would end that train of questioning.

It had been a good long while since Nate had been to a proper Healer, and he wouldn't admit to a pang of nerves as Nagde began assembling the tools of her trade.

"Wouldn't mind a cigarette," he answered her, running his hand through his hair instead. "But do your worst. Can't be any worse than how it got on there in the first place."

Famous last words, he thought to himself.

"You going to just lop him off?"

Oh if it were only that simple.  Tulojow quirked an eyebrow briefly at Briggs but otherwise held her tongue. 

Tulojow had mastered many arts over the years: Healing, story-telling, banjo-playing, baking, potion-making - even barrel racing back in the day.  But, not-worrying ... that was sadly an art in which she hardly qualified as an amateur. 

Pressing Briggs for more information, however, would only sow distrust and, in the long run, that risked causing more harm than whatever information she managed to gather would likely prevent.  She would let the topic drop to the wayside, for the moment at least. 

"You going to just lop him off?"

"Sadly, it's not quite that simple," Tulojow offered as she finished gathering her supplies.  "All parasites have some adaptation that allows them to cling to their host in desperation.  Their survival relies on it, after all.  That finger is some individual's construct; it's individual adaptation, I assume, is a mystery." 

The instrument tray hovered faithfully near Tulojow's right arm as she finally plucked the examination robe and held it out to the young man.  "We should, however, complete the rest of the examination first.  Just to make sure there aren't any surprises."  With a tap of her wand, the gown fluttered into the air and unfolded in the air.  With the eagerness of a toddler anticipating a shoulder-ride, the gown danced in place, ready to swap with the wizard's duds at the first sign of consent.