Once more in the Infirmary: Concerning Critters
Timeframe: Hogwarts, only slightly AU
Disclaimer: Congrats to Dame JKR - She owns it all, I'm just playing in her sandbox, no money changing hands, nothing claimed, owned or borrowed. However. I am responsible for this bit of nonsense, and previous babbling on similar lines.
Warnings: Slight angst. If you've read any of my other stuff, you should suspect something which is likely to happen - bad pun warning.
He regained consciousness to the sound of an all-too familiar voice saying "Open up and swallow!", and the god-awful taste in his throat as the pain potion went down, quelling the sharp ache on his left side.
Turning slightly to see through the rapidly developing mental haze, he had the feeling of some tugging on his left sleeve. Looking to his left he found three smaller but still medium sized black dogs pulling on his sleeves while two larger dogs, one black and one more of a golden shade pushing on the side of his chest. Suddenly, there was a sharp (but at the same time dulled) pain as a calico kneezle pounced on his left shoulder. With a pop, the bones in his left shoulder returned into their proper orientations and positions.
Looking up, Harry saw Madame Pomfrey above him. She held a vial of potion to his lips, and ordered "Drink this!" As he downed the liquid, and gagged a bit on its taste, he felt his pain disappear further and his head clear somewhat.
The quidditch game against Slytherin had been rougher than usual. He remembered the saying that sports are just a mild version of warfare, a sentiment to which he had to heartily agree. Due to his agility, Harry Potter had managed to minimize his injuries, ending up with only some cuts and now a dislocated shoulder (due to a 15-g turn when he faked seeing the snitch, and managed to convince the Slytherin seeker to plow himself into the ground at high speed). He was currently lying in his usual bed in the infirmary, waiting and watching while Madame Pomfrey looked after those even more damaged than himself.
After sniffing his arm and head, and seeming to be satisfied with what she found, the cat-like creature hopped over to another bed, and sniffed around one of the other injured players.
Harry remembered the dogs from his first year, when they were common visitors to the dormitories, often sleeping with new students when they had a particularly bad case of home-sickness. Most called them 'comforter dogs".
The Slytherin beaters had been brutally efficient, and efficiently brutal, which prompted Fred and George to respond in kind. Oliver Woods was currently coping with a concussion and a compound fracture of both his lower legs, after falling from his position by the rings after getting a bludger to the head. Kathy Bell had been hit in the chest, and from the fact she was coughing up blood, her team-mates suspected broken ribs puncturing her lungs.
Angelina had a broken arm, and her dizziness implies some head trauma as well. The kneezle was sniffing at her other arm, and turning to focus on the medi-witch, meowed loudly. Then she (most calico cats are female) extended a single claw and neatly ran it along the seam of Angelina's other sleeve, which unstitched itself exposing the compound fracture on Angelina's forearm. The meow attracted Madame Pomfrey's attention, and she quickly ran over to the injured Gryffindor chaser.
As she called "Avalon, Gander! I need you here!", two of the dogs ran over to assist. Taking Angelina's hand gently in their teeth, they pulled gently and, as the bones slid back under the skin, Poppy cast ant-biotic spells and others to heal the bones and skin. She then turned to the dogs, thanked them, then said "Thank you, Creamsicle" to the cat, scratched its head (to the creature's apparent satisfaction) and then headed towards others.
Meanwhile, across the aisle, the Slytherin beaters had been personally given just what they had been dishing out and more, and both would need to have their jaws rebuilt, as well as having several bones in their lower extremities replaced or healed. The rest of their team was suffering similar injuries. The seeker was going to have to have his entire upper body rebuilt after his rapid congress with Mother Earth. The Wesley twins, who were the Gryffindor beaters, had commented during the rough-and-tumble that Claudius Flint was lucky that his voice had already changed because it wasn't likely to do so afterwards, given the location of one of the high-speed impacts of the bludger.
As Harry looked over the two teams, he realized that quidditch was a nasty game and he really wasn't sure he wanted to continue playing. He had heard that, in the professional ranks, deaths from injuries were not uncommon. He figured that, given his history, he didn't need any additional opportunities for the grim reaper to pay him a visit.
Looking around, still in a bit of his mild potion-induced haze, Harry could see that Madame Pomfrey's familiar, the pretty calico kneezle, was still prowling around the infirmary sniffing at the various 'patients'. Occasionally, she would again hop onto the bed and meow loudly, again attracting the medi-witch's attention, at which point she (the witch, not the cat) would rush over to attend to some yet emergent condition.
While he watched the goings-on, Harry felt a wet tongue licking the right side of his face. Turning, he saw a small golden dog, not much more than a puppy really, giving him a doggy smile and wagging his tail vigorously. He reached over with his now-healed arm and scratched the pup's head, which increased the ferocity of the wagging, and started his fur rapidly alternating from golden to black and back again. The usually stern matron, looked over to Harry and smiling said, "I see little Come-by-chance likes you. Avalon had a litter this year, and that one was so cute, I just couldn't give him away." She then returned to her urgent duties.
As he lay there, Harry thought about the animals he knew. He remembered that Hermione had said that Crookshanks was a half-kneezle, and that Mrs Figgs raised lots of litters of cats and kneezles, but he had never considered the differences before. As he watched the one he now knew as 'Creamsicle', he noticed that when she leaped from bed to bed, she floated across the room as if gravity did not apply to her in the least.
He had never thought of what magical abilities Crookshanks might have displayed, being he was usually too involved in having to deal with humans. Thinking back, however, he remembered that Crookshanks had always seemed to be around Hermione, usually sitting on her lap purring. This, in spite of rarely having been seen approaching her, and sometimes being in locations where the cat would not have been allowed, or at times when he knew the cat had been confined to its travel case. One time, when studying in the library, Hermione commented that the cat had suddenly appeared on her lap, which made reading her book awkward. Perhaps the rather ugly animal could apparate inside Hogwarts. He would have to ask her more about it.
He had only come to be aware of Madame Pomfrey's 'cat' a short time ago. He had been spending another all-too-frequent evening in the infirmary when Professor Flitwick had carried Belinda Fallensby's body into the room. The first-year Ravenclaw had been reading while she climbed the stairs, and as the stairway did its random shifting, it had knocked the book out of her hand throwing her off-balance, and she fell six stories to the castle's stone floor. Flitwick was irate, yelling that he kept trying to get the damned-stupid Headmaster to lock the stairs in place, but the old coot kept mumbling about tradition and the students needing to be aware of their surroundings. The tiny professor swore he would put permanent cushioning charms on the floor if the Headmaster did nothing, in spite of not having the official permission to renovate the castle. The cost of tradition was just too high to tolerate.
Poppy Pomfrey had run to the fatally injured girl and cast the usual diagnostic spells, then shook her head. Flitwick started to cry, and said, "I am so sorry, Poppy. I know she was your great-grand niece, but she was one of mine too. I am so sorry." The medi-witch burst into tears as well, and sat down hard on an adjacent bed. Her familiar kneezle appeared suddenly on her lap, rubbing against her in a comforting manner. Six of the comfort dogs surrounded her as she lay back onto the bed sobbing, and lay beside her while she wept. Before that, Harry had never seen the cat.
After this event, and in part due to his repeated visits to her domain, Harry Potter and Poppy Pomfrey were on a more cordial basis than was typical for Hogwarts staff and their students (Hagrid being the obvious exception).
At this point, interrupting Harry's sad reminiscing was an annoyingly familiar voice. As Madame Pomfrey worked on some injured Gryffindor's, Draco Malfoy yelled out "Why are you wasting time on those losers? You should be paying attention to the important people here!"
Pomfrey turned towards the Slytherin side of the hospital room, quietly muttering something about 'pain in the ass', and went over to the self-important blond boy. Casting some elaborate (and to Harry's all-too practiced eye, useless) wand movements and spells, she announced loudly "You are correct, Mr. Malfoy. That is a terrible broken fingernail you have suffered. This is somewhat beyond normal healing, so I will need to conduct some advanced methods."
Turning towards the dogs, she called, "Fogo, Twillingate, please bring over some casting bandages." The two black dogs ran to the shelves at the end of the room, and brought back several rolls of white cloth. Harry thought they looked like they were smiling, as much as dogs could.
Poppy removed Malfoy's jacket and bound his arm from above the elbow to totally enclose his hand. The boy looked at the cast which was hardening over his arm, and asked "How am I supposed to use my wand like this, you incompetent idiot? How am I supposed to protect myself from all the jealous blood-traitors who keep attacking me?"
Pomfrey smiled at the boy and said "I will send a note to the staff explaining that you require this treatment to remain on for at least five weeks, and to excuse you from any wanded exercises. As to your protection, though I think it completely unnecessary, I will have two of the Hogwarts' hit wizards to watch over you at all times, and some of our house elves to keep watchas well. I will also have them notify your head of house and the Headmaster should anything untoward occur." Both she and Malfoy could see the other Slytherin team members giving Malfoy dirty looks, as if to say that extra surveillance would interfere with their own plans (possibly regarding residents of other Houses, but perhaps dealing with the loud-mouthed ponce as well).
After 'treating' Malfoy, Madame Pomfrey moved to check on her other patients, and then came back to check on Harry. Under her breathe she was muttering "Arrogant little prick.", then smiled at Harry and giggled (which surprised the boy). She snickered "By the way, that comment was anatomically accurate, but I will swear didn't say it and don't tell anybody I did, please. By the by, we don't have any hit wizards assigned to Hogwarts, but it's rather fun to mess with the heads of the more paranoid members (so to speak) of the student body."
Looking around the infirmary, she commented "I know it's not what they do in the muggle world, but what do you think of my cat scans and lab work?"
A/N: The names of the dogs are places in the Canadian province of Newfoundland and Labrador. If you couldn't tell, the dogs are perhaps what were called in a Muppet Show episode of 'Veterinary Hospital' Laboratory Retrievers.