A/N: Hello, all! Here's chapter 2! Sorry for the long wait — my beta was busy, and I like having my stuff beta'd, so I can avoid mistakes. Anyway, this chapter is longer, and as I go on from here, chapters will be on the longer side. My plot for this story is coming up to 26 chapters, but really, that's a very rough estimate. So make that plus or minus four chapters, which makes the story 22-30 chapters long. Word count-wise, I've written about 25k words up to chapter 6, and can confidently say that this story will exceed 50k words.
So yes, the writing is done up to more than half of chapter 7, and I will update as and when my beta is able to take out time for this. The story should move faster starting now, and you will meet the boys in the next chapter, as promised.
That said, please, please let me know what you think! I have almost no feedback, and I love writing this so much, and just a word or two from you guys out there will be so lovely. If there's anything you would like to suggest or ask, please go ahead. And no flaming, please. Sam and Dean would hate that.
All medical information is from Davidson's textbook of medicine, Wikipedia, and the notes I take down during class (I got a stroke patient for my exam last month, heh.)
Many thanks to Expecto-Prongs for the wonderful beta that she is! :)
2. Digging In
"Rose."
Rose opened her eyes with a start, to see Albus standing over her with flowers in his hand. She had fought with her parents and stayed back at the hospital, watching Hugo's unconscious form until she had fallen into a light slumber. She yawned. "Hey, Al."
He took one look at her eyes, and gasped. "Oh, shite, I didn't realise you were sleeping! Sorry!"
"No, no," said Rose, patting at the armrest. "Have a seat."
He placed the flowers in a vase on Hugo's bedside cabinet, sat down and bent over to peck Rose's forehead. "How are you?"
"Fine," Rose smiled. "Thanks. Where are the others?"
"Mum and Dad are the tea room with your parents and James and Lily left for work," Albus explained to her. "They already saw Hugo. I decided to stay back with you."
"Thanks, Al," Rose murmured, leaning into her cousin's shoulder. Albus was her best friend. She told him everything, and he had always been by her side, just as she had stood by him at all times. Albus, like Hugo, had been a subject of Rose's torture when they had been children, but after Hugo's illness, she and Albus had grown close too. Soon, she and Albus were a team against James.
Albus put an arm around her. "I'm sorry about Hugo, Rosie."
She nodded. "I wish there was a way to help him, Al…"
"The Healers are doing just that."
"They have no idea what the heck is going on."
"What?!"
"Yeah. Hugo's down with something really strange. No-one is able to figure out what it is."
There was silence. "Seriously?" Albus asked Rose, breaking it. "No clue?"
"No," said Rose, a lump forming in her throat. "They're just assuming things. They reckon it could be this or that… but no one knows."
"What… what is the diagnosis?"
"Stroke," sighed Rose.
Albus's eyes widened. "I thought that happened to old people?"
"Not necessarily," Rose said. "And Hugo is prone to it… because of the leukaemia… but his tests don't indicate any of the factors responsible for a stroke."
Albus straightened and looked at her. "Like…?"
"Well," Rose began, wondering how to explain the situation to her cousin in non-Healer language. Albus worked for the Magical Law Enforcement Patrol at the Ministry. "Um… well, you know what haemorrhages are, right?"
"Yup."
"They could be a cause for the stroke — haemorrhages in the brain. They're the most likely cause, especially since Hugo's had seizures, and also because he's gone into cardiac arrest once."
"Okay."
"Other than that, it could be a thrombus — which is essentially like a blockage — in one of the major arteries."
"Er. Okay. Or?"
"An embolus."
"I'm not sure I want to know what that is."
Rose's lips curled into a smile. "It doesn't look like either a thrombus or an embolus. Other causes are venous thrombosis, which isn't the case, and hypoperfusion — which can happen from previous cardiac arrest and heart failure, but Hugo didn't have those before the stroke. His tests are clean too."
"So it's a uh… haemorrhage?" he asked her, confused.
She sighed. "That seems to be it. Thing is, tests don't show that either."
"So what's it?"
"Nothing," shrugged Rose.
"Nothing?!"
"Yep."
"But… Hugo just… had a stroke?"
"Yeah." Rose bit her lip. "I'm scared, Al. Something fishy is going on around here."
"What do you mean?" Albus asked her.
"I… I don't know," Rose replied to him, blinking back tears. "Hugo's… Hugo's dying."
"What?! The Healer says—"
"He'll die if they can't cure this… because whatever this is, also caused a cardiac arrest, when he's never had any heart condition," said Rose in a thick voice. "And the Healers can't cure it unless they have a cause for it. Even the potions they're giving to reduce his symptoms aren't working."
Albus looked at her for a moment, and sighed. "Nothing is going to happen to Hugo."
"I don't know…"
"Trust me. He'll be fine."
"How do you know?"
"I just do."
~o~
"He's going into cardiac arrest. Call Boot. Mr and Mrs Weasley, I need you to step out, please. You too, Rose."
"No…"
Rose watched her father hold her mother while they exited the room, as the Healers crowded around Hugo, waving their wands and speaking several incantations. No. Not again.
"Rose, please leave. We'll call you back in."
"I'm a Healer," Rose insisted. Technically, there was nothing she could do here, but she wanted to be there for Hugo. The other Healer sighed and nodded at her as the rest of them continued to help Hugo.
"Okay," said one Healer, feeling Hugo's carotid pulse. "We need to start with the CPR."
Another Healer went forward and put one hand upon the other, pressing them on Hugo's chest and willing his heart to beat. "One – two – three – four – five…" He continued up to thirty, and shifted so that the ambu bag could be kept at Hugo's mouth. Two puffs.
"Again…"
Rose shut her eyes. What was happening to him? What went wrong?
"Another round…"
Hang in there, Hugo, I swear I'll help you.
"Boot isn't here. Who's under him?"
"Malfoy."
"Ask him to get his arse in here, would you?"
Rose opened her eyes to see a Healer rush away in search of Scorpius. Oh, no. Why did he have to be the one under Uncle Terry?
"Sinus rhythm."
The words were like music to Rose's ears. She turned to her parents, who looked as relieved as Rose when they re-entered the room. And then Rose heard Scorpius. "What's going on in here?"
"Cardiac arrest," another Healer — Elmer replied, wiping the sweat that had blossomed over his lip due to the force of the compressions. "We had to administer CPR."
Scorpius turned to Rose and her parents, who had come in as soon as Hugo had been resuscitated. "If you could leave the room…"
"We're staying right here," Rose told him. "You can do whatever you want in front of us."
"You can stay," Scorpius told her. "You're a Healer. Your parents have to leave, though."
"Malfoy—"
Rose's parents turned around, and Rose's mother ran a hand through her daughter's hair. "We'll sit outside, Rosie. It's all right."
Rose nodded at her mother's pale form, and dropped into the armchair she'd occupied the previous evening as the Healers left, and Scorpius bent over Hugo. He worked for some time, checking Hugo's reflexes, performing quick tests and trying to diagnose again.
"It's a stroke," Rose said to him.
"Yeah, I know," said Scorpius. "But the tests are clean."
"They are," Rose agreed.
"And he's had two cardiac arrests?"
Rose nodded grimly. Scorpius frowned and muttered a few more incantations, before putting aside the wand. He placed his hand on Hugo's forehead and started muttering more incantations as Rose cupped her chin and looked on. Something was wrong here, she reasoned. As far as she knew, strokes had nothing to do with the heart, unless it was because of a massive haemorrhage in the brain. Hugo had no haemorrhage. No heart abnormality. Yet, he had suffered through two cardiac arrests. There was something that wasn't medical about Hugo's condition. It was almost as if…
"Would you know if he's taken some potion lately? Accidentally swallowed a poison?" Scorpius asked her, saying her thoughts out loud.
"No," replied Rose. "I didn't get to speak to him. I found him seizing on his kitchen floor."
Her ex-lover paused. "This is most definitely a magically induced stroke. It's probably a potion or a hex. The cardiac arrests make even lesser sense than the stroke. And the odd thing is… I think Hugo is aware of his cardiac arrest episodes."
"That's not possible."
"I know, but it's true. And…" Scorpius rubbed his palms slowly, not taking his eyes off Hugo. "I don't understand why the potions aren't working on his paralysis. They always work. This is the first case I've seen…"
There was silence.
"So… so how do you cure this?" Rose asked Scorpius after a while.
He shrugged. "You have to find the cause. It's like any other medical condition."
Rose sighed. She'd have to do some digging in.
"Listen, Rose—"
Before Scorpius could speak to her, Rose had already got up from the chair and headed out of Hugo's room.
~o~
"Hey, Rose!"
"Hi, Lily!"
"Come on in."
Rose followed her cousin into the familiar house, her mind buzzing with what she had just found out from Scorpius. He was right about what he had said. Why hadn't she thought about it before?
"So, how's Hugo?" Lily asked gently.
"Still the same," Rose sighed. "I just… I wish…" she paused. "Is Al home?"
"He is."
"I need to talk to him for a while."
Lily was bewildered, but she got up and proceeded to call her brother. Rose wondered if she could talk to Lily about her suspicions, since the latter worked as an Auror, but something told her to confide in Albus first. As Rose pondered on about the possibilities of how exactly Hugo was in such a condition, Albus entered the room. "How are you, Rose?"
She gave him a sad smile as he sat next to her. "I need to talk to you in private."
Lily heard this, and quietly exited the room, as Albus faced Rose, his green eyes full of concern. There was silence. Rose bit her lip, wondering how to tell him. "Al?" she began.
"Hmm?"
"I need your help."
"With what?"
"With finding out what's wrong with Hugo. I need to know what's causing it."
Albus frowned at her. "I hardly know anything about Healing, Rosie. I'm a Magical Law person."
Rose pushed a strand of her hair behind her ear. "Thing is, I don't think — and Scorpius agrees — that this is entirely a medical problem. This is something else — possibly foul play. And I intend to find out."
Her cousin sighed. "Are you sure about this?"
"Yes."
"You shouldn't go about stressing yourself, you know."
"I know. This isn't stress, Al." She looked into Albus's green eyes. "Trust me, I'll feel much better when Hugo wakes up."
"I know you will."
Rose smiled at him, and made to get up from the couch, but he put a hand on her shoulder. "We'll start tomorrow."
"Why?"
"You've been through a lot today," Albus explained to her. "I think you should get some rest."
She bit her lip. "And if I rest now, you'll help me tomorrow?"
"I will," he promised.
~o~
"Those are a lot of cuts on his hand," Albus observed, as Rose scrutinised Hugo's right arm. She had decided that to find out what happened to her brother, she needed to start with Hugo himself. Anything abnormal on his body, or anything in his robes would help.
Rose opened her brother's large palm and looked at it with narrowed eyes. There were tiny cuts here and there around his fingers — he probably hadn't even noticed them. She waved her wand so that they healed themselves. "Scalpels," she muttered exasperatedly.
"What?"
"Well, Healers have to train in basic Muggle techniques," Rose said to her cousin. "Hugo must have handled a few scalpels, the clumsy fool." She smiled lovingly at her little brother. "I'll get him out of here, Al. And I'll pull his leg for not being able to use scalpels without cutting his himself. Just like the old times."
Albus nodded. "You will."
Rose continued examining her brother, looking for the markings of a hex or a curse, but she found nothing. Hugo was clean. She then stood up straight, but had to put her hands on her back to steady herself. Stumbling backwards a little and cursing Scorpius under her breath for her shifted centre of gravity, she turned to Albus. "Anything?"
"Nope," he said.
"Then we should check his flat."
Albus sighed. "Rosie… this is enough for a day, don't you think?"
"No," said Rose, balling her fists in determination. "We need to figure this out quickly, Al. If we just look around enough, we can help Hugo. I'm sure of it."
He ran his hand through his hair. "Fine."
Rose put her hand on his shoulder. "Would you give up if James were here instead?"
"No, of course not," said Albus, "And I'm not giving up on Hugo either. It's just that you should take it easy, you know." He patted her baby bump. "You're pretty far along right now."
"I may be six months pregnant, Al, but it's not like I'm going to deliver now. I'll live through the sleuthing around without going into labour."
Albus rolled his eyes. "Going back to 'mean Rosie' mode from twenty years ago, are we?"
"Do you want me to?" She asked him, grinning.
He mock pouted. "Mummeeeee!"
Rose sniggered as Albus broke into laughter. "That's all you and Hugo ever did."
"I didn't do that," Albus told her. "That was how Hugo reacted."
"Oh yeah," replied Rose. "You went running to Uncle Harry. Hugo was the one who ran to Mum."
"The poor fellow couldn't even run," said Albus. "He was so sick; he had to be carried around for about for a long time. And you, like a really mean sister—"
"Don't remind me of it, Al," said Rose, sitting on Hugo's bed. "I was terrible to him."
"You were just a kid. And you wanted your parents' attention, but Hugo took it all with his disease," Albus told her reasonably. "Most kids would be the same."
Rose sighed. "Yeah. But I'll make it up to him anyway." She stood up slowly. "Come on."
"Are you sure you want to do it now?" Albus asked her, his face concerned.
She nodded. "I want to get to the bottom of this as soon as possible."
"Okay, come on."
~o~
Albus stopped the car outside Hugo's apartment building and got out, rushing to the passenger side to help Rose out of the car. Once he had parked the car, they headed together to Hugo's flat.
Albus was as close to Rose as he was to Lily and James. In fact, sometimes, Rose and Hugo felt more like siblings than mere cousins. The five of them had grown up at each other's houses. Uncle Ron and Aunt Hermione's home was the same to Albus as his own home. He also vaguely remembered the days from Hugo's leukaemia. The Bubble-Head Charms, the sanitising incantations… sleeping in the guest room when his parents stayed over late, and sometimes, complete sleepovers…
"I found him here," said Rose, breaking Albus out of his reverie, pointing at a spot in the kitchen. Albus turned around to see Hugo's luggage still in the living room.
"I think we should have a look at his stuff. Maybe there's something in there?"
"Good idea," said Rose, waving her wand so that Hugo's trunk opened up.
In the meantime, Albus walked over to the kitchen sink. He scrunched his nose as he looked into it. "Gross."
"What?"
"Looks like Hugo spilled his guts when he got back," said Albus, letting the water in the sink run and standing back to face Rose. "So you may want to add that to your symptoms."
"Okay," said Rose. "And that also means he could have consumed some kind of poison."
"If you say so."
"Can you help me here?" asked Rose, pointing to Hugo's trunk. Albus immediately got there and knelt down, rummaging through Hugo's things. He pulled out Hugo's medical potions kit and handed it to Rose.
"See if you can find something there. The rest here is just his clothes and books."
"Remove the books," said Rose. "We might find a reason for it in those. Maybe there's an epidemic in America."
"Possible."
Albus removed Hugo's books from the trunk and stacked them on the sofa that Rose was sitting on. There was a sheaf of bound parchment with what seemed like Hugo's handwritten notes.
"Is there a diary in there?" Rose asked Albus, grinning.
Albus rolled his eyes at her. "And you're a psychiatrist."
"Hugo wouldn't stop irritating me about Scorpius ever since he and I started living together," shrugged Rose. "I'd just like to repay the favour."
"Yeah, I know," Albus told her, "But if Hugo was in a live-in, I think we'd know."
"That doesn't mean he doesn't have a girlfriend. Or a crush."
"That's totally up to you and Hugo," said Albus, turning back to the trunk. He paused. "Do you still talk to Malfoy?"
"He approaches me sometimes," said Rose, and Albus could almost see the effort that she took to keep the nonchalance in her voice. "Says he wants to be a part of our baby's life. I told him to fuck off."
"Is that what you really want?" Albus asked her.
"Yeah."
"Sure?"
"Shut up, Al, you sound like me with one of my patients."
Albus stood up from his place, dusted his hands on his jeans, and went over to sit on the sofa next to Rose. "From what you've told me, he did seem to genuinely love you."
"Maybe he did, but he doesn't anymore."
"Do you love him?"
"No."
Albus sighed. "You can't lie, you know."
"I know. That's why I'm being truthful here. Scorpius really hurt me, Al. How do I trust him not to be so immature again?"
"It wasn't immature of him," said Albus. As Rose opened her mouth to protest, he raised his hand. "Listen to me."
"But—"
"Rosie, will you hear what I have to say?"
"Fine."
Albus crossed his arms. "See. Scorpius suspected you of cheating on him, and he was hurt. You two broke up. So whatever that was with Vic — that was while he was on the rebound. He was just hurt, and both he and Vic chose the wrong way to get over you and Teddy. They didn't know how to handle their emotions. That happens to the best of us."
"Hardly."
Albus shook his head. "You're the psychiatrist. You should know that I'm right."
"Maybe," Rose said, "But it was wrong here."
"You're stubborn, aren't you?"
"I'm just being reasonable."
"As you say."
There was silence as Rose read through Hugo's sheaf of parchment. Albus drummed his fingers against the coffee table as he watched her read, wondering how to make her understand that she needed Malfoy back.
Rose had been a whole different person during her courtship with Malfoy. But after that went down the drain last year, Albus had seen his cousin change. She had struggled, been depressed (though not clinically) and subdued, and she had lost the spark that she'd had earlier. That, coupled with her pregnancy, only made her tired, and very snappish and rude on a lot of occasions.
"Al," said Rose suddenly, breaking through Albus's thoughts, as well as the silence. "You have to look at this." She thrust the parchment under his nose, and Albus started to read.
"My patient was apparently all right five days ago. To begin with, he experienced dizziness…" he frowned up at Rose. "So Hugo wrote up a few cases…?"
"No, no, see," said Rose, turning over a few pages. "Read the diagnosis."
"MCA? And… er… left sided hemiplegia caused due to stroke of haemorrhagic origin?"
"And the symptoms are same as Hugo's," said Rose. "Convulsions, vomiting, dizziness that I'm sure Hugo had too. And episodes of cardiac arrest, which they all survived. The survival rates in case of cardiac arrests are not so high. And look at this." She showed Albus five or six more cases that Hugo had written down, and Albus was surprised to see similar symptoms and diagnoses in all of them.
"Do so many people suffer from the same type of stroke at the same time?"
"It's definitely too weird to be coincidence," said Rose. "We need to find out about this."
"How? I'm sorry, Rose, but you really shouldn't go to America."
"No," said Rose. "But you work for Magical Law Enforcement… wouldn't your office have records of suspicious things?"
"Not things like this, and definitely not if it's suspicious activity in America," said Albus.
"Is there anything else we can do to find out?"
"I can run a check on SWH," said Albus. "If this epidemic occurred among Muggles, they might have admitted some, and I'll get the records of that. And St Mungo's could have some information too. Let me see."
Rose nodded. "Thanks, Al."
"Hey," said Al, patting her shoulder. "You and Hugo are no different to me than James or Lily, and I'll do anything to help. Just promise you'll take care of yourself, okay?
"I will."
~o~
Rose walked up to Albus's office as swiftly as possible, her heart thumping with excitement. He had owled her that morning and told her that he had found out something about what had happened to Hugo. As soon as she had received the letter, Rose had left to visit her cousin.
It was five days since Hugo's admission into St Mungo's, and he wasn't getting any better. He was conscious, but partially paralysed. He couldn't speak, or even remember his family. It was unbearable for Rose to look at Hugo, or her parents in the conditions that they were in.
She found her way to Albus's cubicle, where he sat with a sheaf of parchment in front of him. When he saw her, he conjured up a chair for her to sit on, and picked up the first sheet of parchment. "I looked up everything I could find about wizard epidemics amongst Muggles, or vice-versa. There's nothing that coincides with what Hugo has."
"Then what did you find out?" Rose asked her cousin, bewildered.
"Well," replied Albus, "It turns out, SWH was shut down almost twenty years. It reopened just last year."
"Why?"
"There's no solid reason anywhere. The hospital records from 2009 show a high death rate due to strokes, though. It was shut down after two Muggles were spotted around the hospital. Twice."
"Muggles?" Rose repeated, bewildered.
"Yeah. Two of them. They're brothers. There is nothing as to how they caused the shutdown, but considering the details, I have a sneaky feeling that they're the ones we're looking for. They gave aliases, but the Ministry tracked down their real names — Dean and Sam Winchester."
A/N: That box below is hungry. I'll love you forever.
