September 1, 2008
4:35pm

"Huurrrkkkh!"

Figaro Sellaphix had to stop in the doorway of the Infirmary to regurgitate the thirty-seventh slug.  He'd been sent to the Hospital Wing from Ancient Runes class.  Professor Reid had ordered Atticus Pennyapple to go along with him, but he took the stairs down to Slytherin instead.

Good riddance, anyway.  Not as if Figaro wanted to be anywhere near that hex-happy loser.  But at the forefront of his mind was stopping the parade of slugs and green slime coming up from his gizzard.  Did lads have gizzards? Astrid O'Mally had told him they might.

He lurched forward into the wing, his hand over his mouth.  Even though it was futile, he had tried to leave as little of a mess as possible.  He saw the Healer, Madam Nagde, by the cauldron hearth.  Instead of introduction, he veered to a bank of wash basins and that is where he made his next three deposits in quick succession.

If she was the Healer everyone said she was, she'd get the picture soon enough.

"What in the world?"  Tulojow set the half-filled jar on the counter and crossed the hall to the young man that had come stumbling, retching, into the hospital wing.  "Oh good grief, here here," she said, vanishing the slimy, wriggling puddle in the doorway before someone slipped on a slug. 

She ushered the young man to one of the sterile, white-linen beds and shoved a small basin into his hands.  "So, dare I ask?"  She asked, wondering if she really even wanted to know what had led to this predicament.  Perhaps it was the access of boys but Tulojow couldn't quite remember the Healer at her school being so busy with such strange afflictions. 

Pursing her lips in thought, Tulojow considered her options as she held the bin out, steady, for a fresh deposit of slugs.  "Do you think you can stomach a potion and keep it down for at least five minutes?"

Figaro did as he was told and sat on the nice clean bead, leaning low into the basin.  His voice echoed out with a hollow echo.

"Slug Hex!" was all he could manage at the moment.  Each time he engaged his throat to speak, it turned over a new with the gift that kept on giving and another banana-sized slug squeezed out of his mouth to land in the bucket with a wet slop.

The worst thing about it was the taste and the fatigue.  His stomach and throat ached from the  nearly constant vomiting he'd put up with for five minutes solid.  He burped and in the vacuous basin, it resonated to twice the volume and tremor.  This cheered Fig up someone and he laughed weakly, a sloppy green smile on his face.

He chanced a look up from the bucket at the old, kind-looking witch.  He'd always liked her accent - it was comforting.  Sounded like incense somehow.  He didn't know about the potion and he again smiled weakly and shrugged. 

"Let's have a go - wait, one moment.  Huuurkh!" Sssslop.   "Alright," he said blearily, trying to be amenable.  He held out his hand and wiggled his fingers.

"Let's go.  Not much time."

Despite the severity of the situation, Tulojow couldn't resist arching an eyebrow in the lad's direction in a distinctive you don't say so manner.  "Couldn't have guessed," she said with dry amusement as she moved over to counter along the far wall and began mixing together a particularly fluorescent concoction. 

The distinctly slug shaped blobs projecting from the boy's mouth could have been a tip off even to the greenest Healer. 

"I was more curious about the events that led you to be retching slugs in the hospital wing.  Again."

Tulojow creakily set herself on the edge of the bed next to the young man and held out the glass to him.  She certainly didn't envy him; bat bogies were probably kinder than a stomach of writhing, gelatinous slugs.  And, a counter hex was certainly much easier than a salty solution to melt the offending cephalopods. 

"Just hold your nose and down it," she advised.  "It'll take a few minutes and the few troops in your gut still need to - you know - but it should put the legions at bay."

Figaro took the glass of the lovely iridescent blue liquid, pinched his nose shut and started taking gulps in earnest.  He shut his eyes tight at the offensive flavor - it was like guzzling brine from a can of tuna times ten.  (Yeah, he'd done that too.)  When the whole glass was down, the first sensation he felt wasn't relief, but rather that his stomach was too full.  He felt overflow sitting halfway up his esophagus.

But for the moment, the gagging had eased up and he was able to get a few words out.   Talking always lifted his spirits.

"Said something to Attitus Pennyapple that made the big baby have a tantrum," Figaro said to the Healer next to him with a shrug and an eye roll.  He mimed Atticus drawing his wand all sneaky and zapping a spell.  Fig had felt humiliated to get hexed like he did in front of everyone.

"Kid can't take a jo - HURK!" A slug marched out and Fig turned his head to the basin just in time.  Luckily this one was smaller than the rest.  The potion was taking its course slowly but surely.  He burped again and he felt loads of pressure ease up in his stomach.  He sighed - Thank Merlin!

He leaned back on one hand, still cradling the basin in his lap, and looked up at the Healer.  "Have you been hexed before? Seems like witches never get hexed."





_{*salt solution for the slug hex...?BRILLIANT.}

A gentle, maternal hand patted Figaro's back gently as the potion waged a melting war against the slugs in his stomach.  The tide of slugs was ebbing and the few that found their way out of his stomach were getting progressively smaller.  As the potion continued to work its charm, the remaining slugs would also start loosing their form as they melted in his stomach. 

With a flick of her wand, Tulojow vanished the slugs already deposited in the basin, shaking her head.  Young, unbridled testosterone.  What a marvelous thing.

"I was an Auror for forty five years before this.  I've been hexed."  And cursed.  And other things.  "But, in general, you're right.  Unless you're trying to arrest them, boys are less likely to hex girls than other boys.  But, girls can be right nasty to each other, too.  My school was an all-witches school and our Healer was kept suitably busy." 

Pushing herself to her feet again, Tulojow tossed together another concoction, setting it on the table nearest the bed.  "Once we get a couple dry heaves, that'll help settle your stomach.  And chase away any lingering aftertastes.  The house elves will have soup for you at dinner.  I'd recommend sticking to that until tomorrow morning."


Haha - thanks!

Figaro's eyes grew wide with interest.  "You were an Auror? Wicked! Aw, man, that must have been dead exciting.  Pew! Pew!"

He was again miming wand blasts.  He had to pause momentarily to puke up a mouthful of slime, but it was happily free of any gelatinous full body slugs.

"Aw, wicked!," he repeated, now gazing admiringly at who he and most people he knew considered a kindly old witch with a stern streak. But Madam Nagde has been an Auror.  Not even Professor Mainwaring had ever been an Auror, and he was the Defense professor.

"So what was the worst hex you ever got? Did anyone ever Unforgivable you? Merlin - that'd be insane.  I'm lucky the Slug Vomiting Hex is the best Atticus has got.  You must have been hit by all sorts of nasty spells. Like the one that removes your bones, or makes your own hand try and strangle you.  Or that one that just vanishes you to like ... Siberia or Saskatchewan or something.  Ha! Yeah, it'd be well good to know how to heal."  Figaro threw his hands in the air.  This was pretty much the coolest thing he'd learned all year so far.

He grinned at Madam Nagde.  "So why'd you quit?"


_{(Sorry for the extreme dialog, Figaro's the kind to just blather on and on.)}

It was easy to forget how easily a young mind could romanticize something such as being an Auror.  Perhaps most of those on the outside shared that idealistic perception - only ones on the inside really understood how far off those romantic perceptions were.  While one was hurling up liquified slugs was hardly the time to dash young idealism. 

"It was exciting," she agreed, simply.  "I started at the Witch's Academy the same year Albus Dumbledore defeated Grindelwald."  Boy.  Did that date her?  She chuckled to herself and shook her head slightly.  "Joined the Auror's office back in 1962 - a lot has happened between then and now." 

With a slight dip of her head, Tulojow confirmed she'd been hit by Unforgivables.  "Most of my time was spent out in the field overseas - lot of investigations, infiltrations or hunting down dark wizards who'd fled.  So, I came across quite a few ... unique branches of magic.  And, yes, I found myself vanished to strange places." 

The slightest sigh escaped Tulojow.  She did miss being in the field - were it up to her, she'd still be there.  But, the Ministry couldn't have jumped faster on the excuse to force her into retirement - to become Hogwarts' problem.  "Ran afoul of a venomous yeti that was wrecking havoc with a monastery in Tibet.  Some experimental breeding gone wrong.  'Fraid between the venom and the strength of the bite the knee won't really ever be healed."  She tapped the perpetually stiff knee with the back of her hand.  Given, at the time, she was supposed to be trailing a runespoor smuggler in Mombay, the Ministry had found plenty of reason to force her retirement. 

"So, unless someone manages some miraculous cure, you all are stuck with me." 

Figaro listened with rapt attention as his stomach occasionally chimed in with burps and gurgles.  (And for what felt like the first time in ages, he didn't feel like he was going to hurl.)  He took up the soothing drink she'd made for him and sipped at it as she told the most amazing stories about being an Auror.

He didn't even interrupt once.

He hadn't realized how old Madam Nagde actually was.  And he'd always figured she limped because she was an old lady not because she'd been mauled by a venemous Tibetan yeti.  His jaw hung open at that part and stared at her knee under her robes, imagining what lay beneath was some twisted, green scar that had its own heartbeat or something.

With the heaving subsided, he abandoned the basin next to him on the bed, and leaned back on his elbows.  He didn't say much after Madam Nagde stopped talking.  He'd have to go back to see Professor Reid after this and Pennyapple was going to be there too.  No doubt they'd both get some sort of poetically ironic detention together - Fig felt he'd been poetically punished enough for one day already though.  Not only that, now he was bound to be denied re-entry into Runes and his dad would get wind of it and disown him.

"You'll figure it out," he said absently, as if Madam Nagde was a genius Healer who'd eventually dither onto a cure for an incurable cursed scar. 

He sipped more of the soothing liquid.  It went down thick and cold, and the strained muscles of his stomach and throat began to feel a bit better.  And the slug taste was almost gone. 

He looked up at the clock.  4: 56.  He rolled his eyes and sat up.  He was due back in Professor's Reid's office.   "I have to go.  Professor Reid wants to see us back."  He handed her the empty glass looking more dejected than he had when he walked in.

"Thanks."

With a warm smile, Tulojow nodded.  The young man's resolve and confidence was touching though pretty ill-placed.  Considering where the injury had started, despite almost a year of medical care and physical therapy from those at the monastery, the wizarding hospital back in Mombay and St. Mungo's, the fact she was able to walk was considered miraculous. 

But, Tulojow was slowly adjusting to retirement.  Reluctantly, but she was.  And, that was part of the heeling process, wasn't it?  Learning to accept and come to terms with one's new disabled state. 

As the young man prepared to return to his class, Tulojow pushed herself, stiffly, to her feet.  "Remember," she cautioned as she made her way back towards the cabinets on the back wall.  "The elves will have some soup for you tonight.  As tempting as the pudding and blood sausage might be, you'll regret it if you go for it."  After retrieving a few cellophane-wrapped hard candies, she returned to the young man and handed them to it.

"If the nausea returns, you can suck on these.  If, by tomorrow morning, though, you are still feeling ilchy, skip breakfast and come see me."