Giuseppe Stride
Pilpher & Stride's P.I.

Atrophy happened so quickly.

Giuseppe woke, startled, confused, and begun coughing against the magical tube that ran down his throat. He'd been intubated, his breathing so shallow Healers had to intervene to keep him alive.

He couldn't remember how he got here. Here? Here. The last thing he remembered was taking a silvery liquid -- Muse, and then nothing. The memories he was promised never came. At least, he couldn't remember them.

"Uhhh," the man choked out, maneuvering his tongue against the invisible tubing that kept his esophagus open. His diaphragm rose and fell as his lungs filled with more oxygen. Could he breath on his own now? He registered the tubes in his arms, and the bags that floated above him. Hospital? When? How?

He tested his fingers, tried gripping them against the metal railing around his bed, the cool metal surface causing his fingers to tingle. "eellpp!" Panic set in his vision, and the otherwise tall and blurly man felt fatigue reach each of his limbs. He began reaching towards the tubes, intending on pulling them out. Giuseppe needed to escape.

He'd only come in moments before to check on the man's comatose state and update the notes at the foot of his bed. The sounds of a waking man gripped his attention immediately, and he was there at his side before the notes had hit the bottom of their holder.

"Mr Stride," he called out warmly, firmly, "can you hear me? Please focus on my voice, you're in good hands at St Mungo's. Those tubes are helping your body, sir, please don't remove them for the sake of your own health."

Arcturus kept a steady tone, waiting patiently for the man to listen to his voice and calm down. Patient confusion upon consciousness was always a difficult time, especially if no family member was present to give them familiar ground to stand after floating so long in seemingly inescapable darkness.

Giuseppe Stride
Pilpher & Stride's P.I.

Every wix knew the bright green robes of a Healer. "Mr. Stride, can you hear me?"Arcturus's voice reached Giuseppe before he reached for his throat where the invisible tubing was held by magic. His hands dropped down to his side and he heeded Arcturus' warning.

      "Please focus on my voice, you're in good hands at St Mungo's." His eyes searched out the healer standing over him, "Those tubes are helping your body, sir, please don't remove them for the sake of your own health." He nodded his head, understanding, and settled back into the bed.

"Whe--?" Speaking caused the wizard to cough, "WheamI?" He thought he was in St. Mungos, but he wasn't sure. How long had he been out? Why was he attached to all these tubes? Why did his body hurt so much? What day was it?

He thought he could breathe on his own and didn't need all these contraptions. His throat felt dry, his tongue full of cotton. Blinking, he felt a layer of crusties around his eyes. He reached for his hair and noticed his hair was longer. It wasn't like him to forget to cut his hair. What happened?

"St Mungo's," Arcturus patiently repeated, "Third Floor, specifically. You may be a little fuzzy on the details and that's quite alright." As he spoke he reached a hand by Stride's side and sensed the patient's body state. His heart was beating rapidly judging by the blood speeding through his arteries.

"You've been out for a while, good sir. It's understandable that you're alarmed, but I need you to take some deep breaths. Focus on my voice, and I'll guide you through calming yourself. Take a deep breath right now for me, please." Such a simple act that all interns had to learn if they hadn't already, but it was effective enough that there was no reason to break tradition.

"Let's get you calm, and some water, and then I'll try to answer your questions as best as I can."

Giuseppe Stride
Pilpher & Stride's P.I.

Giuseppe followed along with Arcturus’ instructions. A mediwitch dropped off a glass of water while the Head Healer helped him calm down. Breathing became easier, his heart rate subsided within his normal baseline. Arcturus steady patience

There was a power differential in the relationship, Giuseppe, weaker then he’d ever been, while the unnamed Healer stood over him. Now that he knew he was in St. Mungos the room he was in looked like a hospital room, and the bed below him looked like a hospital bed. His disorientation was beginning to subside, and he tried to recall what led him to his inpatient stay.

“How’d I get here?” He managed to croak. There was a vague touch of a memory of being out with his significant other and then there was nothing.

"You were brought here fully unconscious." Arcturus was careful; he'd had enough detail but he wasn't going to assume. "You had been exposed to some sort of magical concoction that produced quite potent fumes, that apparently knocked you out. Not even a Waking Charm could get you out of a sleep that deep, so we let you be and ensured you kept healthy throughout."

He gave the man a careful once-over with his gaze. "Do you remember anything?"

Giuseppe Stride
Pilpher & Stride's P.I.

Since he was conscious and could breathe on his own, a mediwix came into the room and vanished the breathing contraption that was keeping him alive. He rubbed the side of his cramped jaw, listening to Arcturus’ carefully woven words as he delicately described the precarious situation he’d been in.

A magical concoction that kept him unconscious for so long? Giuseppe struggled believing all the droughts and charms in the magical world could do nothing to wake him from the eternal slumber. Time felt distorted.

 “I do…” His eyes flitted as he recalled, “I’d been taking m-” He stopped and looked up at the Healer. In time he’d realized he almost incriminated himself with an illegal substance and he pursed his lips. “A little bit. What do you need to know?” He was nervous, it was embarrassing to admit that his curiosity and own personal investigation led him to make a mistake that could have cost his life. 

"We'd like to know the name or description of the appearance of the substance that you might have encountered, if you remember." Arcturus gave no indication that he'd heard what Stride was saying before he cut himself off. "There's quite a range of substances that might do that, though they can be narrowed down to a few based on potency - and this was a [ii]very[/i] potent mixture, to put you under like that."

He gestured to the notes at the foot of his bed. "We'll also need to check that there aren't any remaining traces of it in your body, so we can create a treatment that neutralises whatever remains of it if it's still present. We have to remain cautious of any lingering side effects it might have."

Giuseppe Stride
Pilpher & Stride's P.I.

Nostrils flared, sweat consolidated at his sideburns and he unconsciously rubbed at the beard that grew under his chin. The Healer was pragmatic and seemed sincere in his desire to know what afflicted him. Maybe he wasn’t going to be incriminated. His shoulders dropped back and he pulled the blanket over his body, making himself smaller. “I remember.” His voice felt small, he felt small, “They told me it was muse.” Who the they was, he didn’t intend of disclosing.

He held his hand out to indicate the size of the vial, “It was silver, or white, I think.” The memory of it’s color was out of reach, but he remembered pouring it into a hookah and inhaling the vapors. “Through a hookah I think.” Did that sound right? Or was it a bong? His memory was hazy and he wasn't sure.

“How would you do that?” He asked about the next steps.