A/N BIG thanks to Natz for betaing this so fast. The reason for the delay was my slow writing. I'm back now, don't fret. So...back to Mute!Ron
Separated
The last of the evacuation was in progress and Aurors and Staff from the clinic were escorting a group down to the border where they could be magically transported to the stand-in clinic. Harry was helping the nervous patients along, reassuring them and easing the anxiety that felt like it was almost crackling in the air. He had volunteered his services to keep Ron in the clinic, still unnerved by Marmalade's howls and the fact that there was something out there that could be a threat.
Hermione was working with Ron in the room of a hysterical young patient while Neville was organising the next group for transfer and trying to pair them off so nobody could go missing without their partner alerting the group to it.
Harry's eyes scanned the woods as the gravel crunched beneath his feet. The fact that Marmalade had been determined that Ron be shielded from the woods put Harry on edge as he walked with such a big crowd, completely unarmed, to the checkpoint at the border.
He thought about what he'd told Abigail. How he would never be able to stop worrying about Ron. It was true and he wondered if Ron minded hearing that. Harry knew that he hadn't wanted to be a victim during that whole time he was Voldemort's prime target. He had hated people tip-toeing around him as if he was a nutcase, well more than when he wasn't actually a nutcase – he couldn't really complain when he drove himself slightly bonkers with guilt over what he'd done to Ron.
There it was, it always came back to Ron.
Ron had saved him from himself and he had dedicated himself to giving Ron the life he deserved. He had earned his respected position as a therapist for the magically damaged. He had earned his independence from both his family and from Harry himself. Harry cast a big shadow for such a short person. Ron had worked so hard and made everybody so proud of him and yet he had also suffered so much.
Ron had been hurt many times over and Harry would never, no matter how much time passed, ever be able to let go of his need to shield him from danger. His life was dedicated to the preservation of Ron's.
He explained that to Ginny once and received a punch in the shoulder. Apparently girlfriends don't like to hear proclamations of devotion and lifelong commitment to their brother.
There was a shout from the magical border, followed by a scream, and Harry rose up on tiptoes to peer over the heads of the crowd. There was a commotion and a robed figure at the front roared at everybody to get back to the clinic immediately. There were a group of nervous volunteers who were charging through the barrier and trying to reclaim their wands but another scream set Harry's teeth on edge and one of the patients became hysterical and began gibbering about blood.
That was when Harry saw it. The Auror who had shouted at them to retreat was now gushing blood from his throat while the people who had passed through the non-magical border tried to shoot spells through to drive away the attacker, no attackers, to no avail. The spells bounced off again and somebody shouted for the border to be secured.
"Everyone on this side is infected, we can't pass through, we can only go back and lock down the clinic from inside," a member of staff boomed out while waving his hands as if he was guiding in an aeroplane for landing at a busy airport.
Harry began tugging at the clothing of the people in front of him and dragging them backwards, turning and pushing them back up the hill.
"Go back, get back and warn the others there's an attack of some sort!" Harry ordered.
The crowd before him was scattering in all directions. Some were pounding on the sealed barrier, begging to be let through, and others were trampling those too slow to move out of the way. Harry was about to plead for calm when he saw why the stampede had got out of control.
The man wasn't waving his arms about any more. A gang of dirty, bloodied half naked people were waving them as they fought over the bloodied stumps. The man was screaming himself hoarse as he was knocked to the ground and set upon by more of the animalistic people, skin and bone and cloudy white eyes, as they ripped into his flesh with their teeth.
A woman ran at the attacking hoard with a rock and smashed in the back of one of the human animals' skull and the bloody spatter hit her face and sent her staggering before she dropped the rock and blinked her eyes several times. She shook her head, twitched and then looked Harry in the eye with her rapidly clouding brown ones. She salivated like a starved dog and began running towards him.
Harry turned and set off after the others back to the clinic. He bellowed at the top of his lungs to make himself heard over the frightened screams.
"It's an infection! The blood is infected. Don't let anyone into the clinic if they're bleeding!"
Then his stomach dropped and turned to lead. He saw Ron and Neville running out to try and gather the frantic patients and heard them back inside.
"Get back inside!" Harry roared and panted, legs pumping hard and heart pushing against his ribs with the intensity of its pounding.
"Oh Merlin help me!" a young man was crying as he rolled on the ground clutching a broken leg.
He had been trampled and then had tried to run but his injury had overcome him. Harry stopped and stooped to pick him up.
"I've got you okay?" He started running again and almost ripped his throat raw hollering as he saw Ron running towards them rather than away, "Get back inside! Get everyone back inside! It's contagious and we can't stop them."
Ron turned and signed something to Neville before looking back at Harry with that look of determination that Harry hated to see at times like this. Neville set about bundling people inside the clinic and Ron thundered down the slope to help Harry carry his injured companion.
"No you fucking stubborn git," Harry snarled through gritted teeth, trying to run even faster when he heard his passenger whimpering that they were being gained on, "Go back, secure the building, it's airborne for all we know."
Ron was already at Harry's side and they slammed chest to chest with an 'oof' before Ron pulled one of the wounded man's arms over his shoulder and the two of them dragged him up the slope towards the clinic.
"When I tell you to go back you fucking well go back Weasley!" Harry shouted furiously.
Ron gave a grunt of frustration at the situation and not being able to tell Harry to go fuck himself. The thudding of numerous footsteps sounded behind them. Harry didn't dare look back. They ran with the injured wizard and had to ignore the screams and cries for help. The clinic needed to be locked up tight and they had to get inside before that happened.
"Get inside! Everybody inside quickly!" A broad shouldered Auror was bellowing from the doorway.
Harry could see he had a makeshift barricade ready and was dragging people inside by the scruff of their necks and throwing them to one side to make room for more. He heard a crunch and a gurgle so close behind them it set his teeth on edge and both he and Ron picked up the pace with their injured companion.
He could hear Ron's ragged breaths and grunts between the pained yelps of the wizard between them. Harry resolved to get them inside safely if it was the last thing he did.
"Take him inside and I'll hold them off!" Harry puffed before ducking out from under the hurt wizard's arm and avoiding the furious silent glare from his best friend.
Harry lunged for the large stick he'd spotted on the ground and swung it before him, knocking the infected shell of a person a full one hundred and eighty degrees around before smashing in the back of his head in the same way he'd seen the woman do earlier on. As he had witnessed, this seemed to stop the Inferi-like pursuer, and unlike what had happened with the woman earlier, the stick put enough distance between him and the blood spatter to keep him safe.
Well...safer.
He turned around and ran for the door just as he saw Ron throw the wounded man inside and turn on his heel to run back out for Harry. He was just about to bellow at his headstrong best friend to stay inside the broad shouldered Auror grabbed Ron by the back of his robes and pulled him backwards. Ron slammed into the wall very hard and Harry winced but knew that it was the right thing to do. He pumped his arms hard and sprinted to the open door.
"Get inside now!" The Auror hollared.
A slightly dazed and utterly miffed Ron shook his head to clear it and pushed himself away from the wall to watch as Harry crossed the threshold and slam into his chest, winding them both.
"Right now get right inside, I'm going to have to re-enforce this door to keep them out once it's closed." The Auror said sharply.
"Not just that," Harry panted while Ron frowned at him with concern and rubbed the back of his own head where he'd banged it against the wall, "blood...if the blood gets on you, or in you...I don't know but I saw a woman get blood in her face and she turned into one of them!"
Ron stared at him worriedly while the Auror clenched his jaw and looked at his barricade.
"And we can't use magic to seal the bloody door," he hissed, "Shit!"
Ron waved a hand out at the approaching mass of wild people, held his palm upright and stroked it downward with the other hand and made a throwing motion.
"Yeah, they'll tear it down in no time," Harry agreed and looked to the Auror.
"What's up with him?" The man frowned at Ron.
"Nothing," Harry said impatiently, "he's a mute. What do we do about them?" Harry pointed to the staggering figures.
There were obviously weapons from the Death Eater attack at the clinic as several loud bangs made them jump and sent the nearest semi naked feral people slamming down onto their backs.
"Somebody tell the Muggle cannon operators to aim for the head!" The Auror bellowed.
"They're called guns," Harry said helpfully.
"Somebody tell the gun cannon operators to aim for the head!" the Auror said impatiently.
Harry rolled his eyes and turned to Ron who was shaking his head. He met Harry's gaze with a sight and lifted his thumb and forefinger, almost in a 'C' shape, from waist level up to his cheek. Then he rotated his cupped hands around each other backwards and forwards before waving over his shoulder.
"Yeah, great idea." Harry nodded and turned to address the Auror while Ron turned and set off into the main part of the clinic. "He's going to find us something to secure the door properly."
"Right, well you get inside and warn the others about the infection and tell them there's going to have to be some kind of quarantine area just in case and..."
Somebody charged over the brow of the hill and ran at them screeching in terror. Harry raised his stick and the Auror was ready to slam the door on the man's face when a shot rang out and the man was hit square in the chest, falling to his knees and then flat on his face with a dull thud.
"God no," Harry gasped as he realised the awful truth, "he's not one of them, he's trying to escape them."
Before he knew what he was doing Harry had run out and waved his arms to stop the others from firing.
"He's one of us, hold your fire!" Harry yelled over the gunshots and ran, cowering from the banging all the way over to the man's body.
"Stop firing at our people!" The Auror bellowed up at the windows above where the inexperienced marksmen were stationed, "close and seal all the windows up. We've got some kind of contagious thing turning people into cannibals. Don't leave anything up there open or vulnerable and trust nobody bleeding who came in from the outside. Don't touch anybody who came in with blood on them!"
Harry felt for the man's pulse but there was nothing. The poor soul had been dead before he hit the ground.
There was a deep thud that shook the earth beneath Harry's feet and he looked up to see one of the cloudy eyes, blood salivating, infected people staring at him and breathing heavily between him and the door to the clinic. He looked at the Auror whose face was pained but whose body language told him he was going to have to start barring the door. Harry glanced up at the ledge that he thought the soulless thing had jumped down from and saw the gun wielding Aurors panicking and barricading all the windows while one of their number thrashed around gurgling on a mouth full of blood from his torn throat.
The man's hand clawed at the air to his friends and colleagues but they just kept on building up the wall against the fragile glass windows. Bookcases, filing cabinets, even a shower curtain which Harry guessed was being used to keep out the infection were forced against the weak points in the building while the dying man choked.
There would be nothing anybody could do. Harry just wished he would die sooner rather than later. The shell of a human standing before him began to move forward menacingly, sniffing the air in Harry's direction, and Harry swallowed and backed off. He lifted his stick ready to swing.
"Hey! Hey you there!" The broad shouldered Auror shouted from the open doorway.
The blood drenched figure turned around and made a guttural sound at the back of his throat at the sight of more fresh meat.
"Run, try for the border, you still have the ticket it should get you through. Run boy!" The Auror ordered at the top of his lungs before bracing his shoulder against the door, letting it stay open to try and coax the wild man towards him rather than turning back to Harry, and waited for the milky eyed sub human thing to launch itself at the doorway.
Harry was frozen for a moment. So, it seemed, was the infected man. The three of them stood and stared, Harry at the back of the feral man, the Inferi-like thing at the Auror and the Auror back at Harry.
"I said get running!" The Auror boomed and the sound made the wild man jump and then launch himself at the Auror with a deep wet sounding roar.
Harry jumped too. As the thing set of to attack the clinic Harry turned and ran, sprinting for the checkpoint where the initial attacks had happened. He hoped the bloodthirsty mob weren't still lurking down there, it was his only chance. He ran until his lungs burned in his chest but he still made himself look over his shoulder to make sure the Auror had closed the door in time and that that thing and whatever it was carrying hadn't got into the clinic.
Into the clinic and trapping Ron, Hermione and Neville.
The animal-like human was pounding on the closed door and Harry felt both relief and adrenaline rushing through his body as he turned back to put everything into his dash for the checkpoint and cross the boarder. He just hoped that none of the infected had tickets to pass through the wards otherwise this would get out of control. He could concentrate on looking after himself now, keeping himself alive, and at least he knew for sure that he didn't have to worry about the others for the time being.
He just willed Ron not to do anything stupid.
Ron flung open door after door in the supply area and rummaged messily inside each one. There was so much stuff in this clinic he was unfamiliar with, Muggle items and medical things that just weren't necessary in the magical world.
What the fucking hell is a plaster anyway?
Ron slammed another door and ripped open another, shocking himself at his strength as the flimsy door flew off its hinges in his hand and crashed to the floor noisily. Ron huffed and looked at the large tin boxes and devices of medieval torture cluttering every shelf and swinging from hooks. He frowned and pulled out one of the big metal boxes by the handle on top. There was a sticky label on top with faded handwriting on it.
Muggle Tools – For use when you need sticking charms, holes put in things, and broken wooden things mended without magic.
Ron blinked and then looked down at the door lying at his feet. He opened the tool box and pulled out some funny little spikes with a twisty pattern around the sides and thrust them into his pocket before looking at an odd pump thing that said 'sealant' and shoving that under his arm. He kept searching and soon found a hammer and made a silent exclamation of satisfaction. He pushed the handle of the hammer under his belt and bent over to pick up the fallen door from the floor.
As he struggled back out into the narrow hallway, filled with panic stricken people running around like headless hippogriffs, he heard Hermione screeching to him from some way away. He turned and looked over the many bobbing heads. He saw her wild frizzy hair and frantically waving arms as she bounced up and down waving to get his attention.
With an internal growl of frustration he looked down at his heavily laden arms and then back at her and made an attempt to shrug. He couldn't talk and he couldn't sign and she was so far away. He sighed and gave up on reassuring his girlfriend before fighting against the flow of the crowd to get back to the front door and help secure the clinic.
There were grunts and 'oof's and 'out of the way's but eventually he made it into the empty corridor and paused to get a better grip on the door. He saw some very pale looking Aurors running down the stairs and spreading around the clinic, they were obviously trying to secure the place too, one of them was shaking his head in disbelief and talking to himself.
"But we just left him out there dying, just on the other side of the window, how could we do that?"
"Shut up and set up a fucking quarantine zone!" another Auror slapped him bracingly on the back before looking at Ron and his awkward load and moving forward to take the door from him, "Fantastic! This is to reinforce the front door yes?"
Ron nodded and pulled the sealant out from under his arm and pointed to the writing that said it was water tight.
"Good job there, keep the germs or blood or whatever the hell is doing this out, come on."
The Auror ran with the door and Ron followed behind and soon met a group of Aurors struggling to hold the door closed while more were trying to push the barricade in front of it and make it a little more stable than its present flimsy structure. Ron glanced around for Harry and the broad shouldered Auror but couldn't see them. He assumed they must be behind the wobbling barricade and was in no position to call out to let them know he was back.
"Wait!" the Auror snapped, "You lot keep holding the door closed and me and..." he turned to Ron and waited for him to give him his name, "Well?"
Ron shrugged and pointed to his throat regretfully.
"Shit Jacobs, you bought a patient to help secure the place?" an Auror struggling to hold the door closed hissed.
"He's not a patient, that's Weasley you wanker, look!"
Ron rolled his eyes and threw down the sealant and fumbled inside his pocket for the little spikes.
"You're Potter's mute mate eh?" the Auror Jacobs smiled as he pressed the door against the other, horizontally, "I like someone who doesn't backchat. Get to it son."
Ron pulled the hammer from his belt and began pounding the spikes into the wood of the door and into the doorframe behind. It was slow and knackering work and he wondered how the hell Muggles ever got anything built at this rate. It felt like an age before the snappy little Auror braced his back against the rattling door and looked down at the handful of twisty spikes Ron had in his hand.
"Screws." He said blankly before looking at Ron as if he was a moron, "You're trying to nail screws into the wall you fuckwit! They're called screws for a reason y'know? You're supposed to screw them in."
"Well what was he supposed to use then?" Another Auror pushing his shoulder into the door grunted.
"Nails!" the impatient Auror snapped.
Ron just kept on driving the metal spikes into the door, his arm aching and his sweat drenched fringe getting in his eyes, while Jacobs pulled the sniffy Auror away from the door and took his place.
"Well fuck off and get him some nails then. We're not all Muggle born you know?"
"Where'd ya get th-" the Auror began before his shoulders fell and he realised that even if he could understand sign language Ron was in no position to sign anything at that moment, "Forget it, I'll find the utility room myself."
Ron slammed the head of the hammer against the screw with increasing ferocity, his jaw clenched and lips pulled tight.
"Ignore him son," Jacobs said with a tense smile, "you're doing a bang up job...literally!"
Some fresh faces came running to help and Jacobs demanded that the exhausted team be replaced with fresh muscle. Ron was relieved of his job and he and Auror Jacobs picked up the sealant and began reading the directions on the side so they could set about sealing the crack around the door.
It was as they read that Ron noticed that Harry wasn't appearing from behind the barricade. His heart picked up its pace and Jacobs squeezed his shoulder.
"What's up?"
Ron pointed behind the barricade and then gestured to the empty space beside him, the space that Harry usually filled.
"You want the barricade here instead?" Jacobs frowned.
Ron shook his head and ran his hand through his damp hair before pointing at himself and then forming the outline of another person beside him. He gestured to the phantom Harry he'd just drawn and then put his hand to his heart and shrugged while looking around himself fearfully.
"You had somebody with you?"
Ron's eyes were wide and he nodded frantically.
Jacobs yelled out to the fresh faces who now strained to hold the door closed.
"Anybody know anything about this fella's companion? He was with somebody and he's lost them."
"Sir!" and young Auror waved as he paused from dragging the barricade into place, "I saw them talking to patients earlier, you're looking for the bloke translating for you right? The dark haired guy same age as you?"
Ron nodded hopefully.
"I passed him as I was running down here. He's okay; he's inside with the patients."
Ron let out a deep sigh and smiled at the young man before turning to Jacobs who slapped him on the back and turned his attention back to the tube of sealant.
"Right, let's make sure nothing out there can get inside shall we?"
Hermione screeched in fury as she saw Ron turn and set off in the opposite direction. Maybe he hadn't seen her.
"Out of my way!" She huffed as she tried to shove her way through the crowd who were all determined to go in the opposite direction.
"Hermione!" Neville called out as he pushed through the crowd, "I've not seen Ron and Harry since they went outside. Have y-"
"Ron's down there somewhere," Hermione was bobbing up and down on tiptoes to see over the heads in the crowd but Ron was long gone, "he didn't see me. I thought he looked at me for a second but he couldn't have. Harry's as short as I am so that might explain why I didn't spot him. He'll be with Ron though."
"What went wrong out there? Some of the patients said people were killed."
Neville hugged Hermione to him and rubbed her back.
"I don't know what's going on but we're all okay aren't we? We're here and Ron and Harry are helping out somewhere else and it's all going to be fine. We've been through worse than this on our slow days haven't we?"
Hermione laughed as she shoved Neville in the chest.
"Well come on then, let's make ourselves useful." She said with a bracing huff.
Most of the patients were beside themselves. Stour was wrestling with a young man in a terrible state. Hermione stepped forward to offer to help when the nurse looked up and nodded behind the two volunteer Healers to the Sapper who was instructing two Aurors how to release a collapsible wall and pull it across the day room to form a quarantine area and an observation area.
"Help Sam, I'm fine here, go on." Stour said as the frantic young man thrashed in her arms.
"Is this completely secure?" Hermione said as she touched the flimsy see through plastic.
"I know it just looks like a big shower curtain right now," Sam smiled, "but when its pulled taught across the room you could run at it and bounce off, believe me on that, I tried it once!"
Neville chortled.
"Like a horizontal trampoline eh?"
"Well I wasn't trying it for fun," Sam said, looking slightly embarrassed, "I was...well it was before Ron came here to work. I was a total loon. They used it to make a temporary padded cell for me until I calmed down."
Hermione felt pride swelling inside her. This articulate, well adjusted and helpful man had once been so hopeless and troubled he had to be locked up for his own protection. Then her Ron came along and talked to him and now he was kind and happy and confident enough to be telling two hardened Aurors that they were 'doing a botch job of it'.
Ron and Harry would talk about their work but until she had come to the clinic and seen it, seen them in action and see how they'd had such a positive effect on their patients she never realised just how remarkable they had been. While Neville took over from one of the young Aurors, who was being called away to help secure the front door, Hermione glanced around for a shock of red hair. She wanted to see him, her amazing Ron, and give him a hug. She wanted to see him scrunch up his face and twirls his fingers in confusion, asking her what the affection was in aid of, and she wanted to tell him he was brilliant.
He was more than brilliant.
He was dazzling.
"So we stretch it across and fix those pegs around the walls and ceiling through these metal hoops around the edge of the curtain and then take one of those little wheels at either end and wind it, that tightens it up and the pressure seals it all the way around."
"Wow," Neville said, impressed.
"I know," Sam said happily, "not as stupid as they look, Muggles."
Hermione was about to get offended when there was a commotion upstairs and somebody thundered down yelling at the top of her lungs.
"Price got infected, he must've had some blood from warren on his face because he just licked his lips while we were talking and then his eyes went funny and now he's one of them!"
"Fuck!" A Broad shouldered Auror cursed before grabbing a long wooden pole and using it to keep the female Auror at her distance, "Right, sorry about this but you were with him when he turned so you're going to have to stay in quarantine."
"What?" The woman boggled at her superior.
"Do as I say and stay on the quarantined side of the clinic!" the man barked, "In fact, put some protective clothing on and take this," he threw an iron for her to catch, "and smash the back of its head in. Cordon off the rooms the blood fell and make sure to wash all over before coming back down you hear?"
The woman looked thoroughly pissed off but nodded.
"Yes sir."
She gripped the iron and pulled a cloak off the cloak stand to shield her from blood spatter before setting off up the stairs. Another Auror, a man in his early forties, grabbed a cloak too and followed her up the stairs.
"I'm with you Kelly, we'll keep downstairs clean at the very least."
Hermione gulped and looked at Neville.
"Ron was on that side when I saw him."
Neville was busy fixing the curtain to the wall and was about to respond to her when she ran for the unsecured corner and flung back the clear rubbery sheet. The burly Auror was there before her however and stepped through to hold her back.
"Nobody goes back into the quarantine area from the clean side young lady."
"The clean side?" Hermione exclaimed, "We were all in the same place three seconds ago, what are you talking about?"
"I'm talking about segregation," the man said fiercely, "Potter told me himself that the exposure to blood turns the victim into another one of those sub-human things and we've had blood spilled over here, infected blood!"
"Harry," Neville called out, "Harry's on that side too?"
"Potter isn't in the building, he made a break for the border, got cut off outside I'm afraid. We had to lock him out."
"You what?" Hermione and Neville exclaimed as one.
"People! Form an orderly and well spaced out queue, nobody close enough to touch the person in front of them, at this partition." The man bellowed out to the people in the quarantined area, ignoring Hermione and Neville's horrified expressions, "I will inspect you and if I deem you clean I will allow you into the clean zone."
"What about Ron?" Hermione asked him, aggravated that he wouldn't look at her, "I saw him in here a little while ago. He didn't get shut out did he? How long ago did this happen?"
"Hermione which way did you say you saw him heading?" Neville said, his face having fallen and paled.
"Down the corridor towards the front d..." Hermione swayed on the spot before shaking her head. "No, he couldn't have gone after him. He wouldn't have been allowed to go back out there once the door was locked." Hermione glared at the large Auror, "Tell me you didn't let him go out after him!"
"He went off looking for some way to secure the door." The man answered Hermione impatiently while a crowd gathered at the gap between the curtain and the wall, "I took charge as the senior Auror on the premises and assigned a team to secure the front door. Jacobs wouldn't have let him leave; I made it clear how dangerous it was outside."
The man turned to roll his eyes and huff at the shambles before him. Nobody was in a line and everybody was pushing and shoving against each other. If there were 'clean' people waiting they could very well have just been rendered unclean by the person next to them shoving past.
"Let me got through to find him," Hermione said as she ducked to move through the opening.
"I said nobody from the clean side goes back into the quarantine area now step away miss." The Auror said with determination.
"It's my choice if I want to go into the quarantine area!" Hermione protested, "My going in there is no risk to anybody."
"It is a risk to yourself!" the man snapped back.
"I don't bloody care!" Hermione snapped back at him, hands balling into tight fists at her sides, "He's a mute, his interpreter just got locked out of the building," Hermione's voice cracked as she spoke of Harry's situation, "and nobody in the quarantine area speaks sign language. I'm going to get him!"
"Phillips, Kenwood, can you do something to calm this woman down please?"
Two Aurors grabbed hold of Hermione and pulled her backwards by the arms. She immediately drove her heel into one man's foot and swung around to punch the other in the nose when her arm was freed by the howling and hopping man.
"Get of me you thugs!"
The immoveable Auror was grabbing at people and scanning them with his eyes while looking through their hair with gloved hands before pulling them through to the safe zone or shoving them back into quarantine and telling them to move aside and not touch any of the others.
"If you are rejected I suggest you at least wash yourselves and remove offending clothing or footwear and desist from touching anybody else and spreading any possible infection."
"So you're going to lock a load of people with a spot of blood on their shoe in there with people who might be genuinely infected and dangerous?" Neville asked, unable to believe the clinical fashion the Auror was turning people away.
"One spot of blood on the lip just killed one of my Aurors so yes lad, I am going to be doing that!" the Auror said as he glared at Neville and pulled a sobbing patient through and turned back to the next person hoping to get to safety.
Hermione was about to barge her way through and into the quarantine area when she saw Ron and several tired looking Aurors jogging into the day room and looking utterly bewildered at the massive partition across the centre of the room.
"Ron!" Hermione called out to him but the curtain was thick and made to be soundproof when pulled taught and the fearful voices of the gathering at the opening drowned her out.
She ran down to an open space at the see through partition and began to wave her arms frantically. An Auror looked at her as if she was bonkers and then nudged Ron whose eyes almost bulged out of his head to see his girlfriend looking so franticly animated. He wove through the crowd and over to Hermione, twirling his fingers on either side of his head immediately.
"The clinic's being split into two zones, safe and high risk, and we need to get you on this side."
Ron frowned and pointed at his ears with a shrug. Hermione huffed, he couldn't hear her, she was far too muffled. She lifted her hands and began to sign to him.
"Oi!" the broad-chested Auror called through the gap to Ron.
Ron's face broke into a smile and he waved at the man, clearly recognising him from the front door. Hermione's heart sank. Ron couldn't have known that between them they'd managed to lock Harry out with the murderous infected wild people. She bit her lip and turned to see the man looking from Ron to her and back again.
"Let's get your through son," he beckoned Ron over to him, much to the annoyance of the people ahead of him in the mass gathering at the gap in the curtain, "you helped secure the place and besides, your wife is pissing me off."
Hermione wanted to hit him but Ron laughed and made his way through the crowd to get inspected for traces of blood. It was a quick examination and there was some muttering about a bump on Ron's head but the Auror smiled at that and made some comment about it having hurt the wall more. Sam, the Sapper, was at her side now and he gave her a nudge and a smile as Ron was allowed through to the safe zone and quickly signed a quick hello to Neville as he passed him.
"He's always in bother but he's always coming out of it clean eh?" Sam chuckled.
Hermione ran her hand through her wild hair and sighed.
"Yes," she dreaded having to tell him about Harry but knew she'd have to keep the news from him until she could be sure there was no way he could go charging off after his best friend.
Ron heaved a deep exhalation as his shoulders fell and he pulled her into his arms. She hugged him back.
"No wonder you're always tired when you come home from work." Hermione said, muffled, into his chest.
She felt him laughing and clung even tighter. He leaned away from her and she gave a quick squeeze before letting him go to sign. He held his hand palm up and moved it in circles before wiping one hand over the other and shrugging.
"Harry's..." she began before glancing at Neville anxiously.
"All right you lot, this is for safety's sake, if I say you're not coming through then you move back!" the Auror was shouting.
Ron looked over his shoulder at the man and then to the worried looking crowds sympathetically.
"Healer Granger, we've a problem with a hyperventilating patient, would you be able to help us?" Nurse Stour asked, breathless and flustered.
"Of course," Hermione nodded, "Ron I'm just going to..."
Ron nodded to let her know he overheard and jogged over to crouch beside Neville. She hoped Neville didn't worry Ron about Harry and put him in a state.
She was led through to one of the bedrooms where a round faced witch was gasping for breath and shaking all over. Hermione looked around and found a bag of grapes sitting on the small table the wireless sat upon. She emptied out the grapes and dropped to her knees before the woman who was going red in the face now.
"Breathe into this," she instructed as he helped the frightened witch hold the bag to her mouth, "breathe in...and then blow out so it fills the bag...that's it, now in and out steady enough to fill and empty the bag with a nice rhythm."
Nurse Stour placed a hand on Hermione's back and mouthed a silent thank you to her. She smiled back at the stressed matron of the magic free hospital for patients used to magical treatments and turned back to the trembling witch and let her hold the bag to her mouth with her shaking hands.
"There you go, that's better, you're doing very well."
The witch's eyes watered as she smiled. Hermione got back to her feet and brushed herself down before stepping out of the room and heading back to the day room to speak to Ron. She saw Sam and Neville at either end of the transparent sheet of thick rubbery plastic, on their knees and turning the little wheels to tighten the curtain and seal the edges. The people on the other side were looking as if they'd just been condemned to death and the broad-chested Auror was giving orders to the Ministry witches and wizards on his side of the partition.
She made her way across the room and reached Neville just as he had turned his wheel all the way and locked it in place.
"Ron get called to a patient too?" she asked, rubbing her eyes tiredly before looking at Neville's face properly.
That was when she knew.
"Um...Hermio-" Neville was cut off before he began.
"Did you tell him about Harry?"
"No," Neville shook his head.
Hermione glanced around herself, Ron wasn't anywhere to be seen, and she turned back to Neville fiercely.
"So where is he?"
"He...he...went back through to the quarantined side and got, kind of, shut in."
"Why did he go back through?" Hermione screeched, looking through the clear tight sheet of rubber, almost like flexible glass now it was pulled so taught.
"He forgot something." Neville cringed, looking both guilty and fearful.
Hermione's eyes widened and she shook her head slowly.
"No," she said with as much restraint as she could muster, "don't tell me that. Don't tell me Neville. Do not tell me he went back for that bloody dog."
Neville swallowed and looked through the partition, his shoulders falling, and his arm twitched to point at something.
Turning her head and looking down at the same spot Neville was, she saw a copper haired Retriever sitting before the smooth partition, happily wagging its tail and steaming up the surface with his panting breaths, and behind him the long legs and apologetic slouch of his equally copper haired master.
Ron's head was bowed and he peered up at her through his fringe apprehensively.
Her jaw clenched and her gaze was furious as she pointed at herself, then moved her arm with three fingers extended down at a right angle to her body, and then moved her index finger from her neck outwards before splaying her fingers palm down and pointed at Ron.
I'm going to kill you!