A/N: I'm outrageously busy, blah blah blah. I'll write more when I can.
Albus and Poppy apparate to a sidewalk in the middle of London, Severus clutched tightly against them to prevent him from being swept away by the current. The crowd flows around them, throngs of mildly irritated or vacant people flowing around them like the Thames itself, the roar of conversation mimicking the crash of waves.
Once Albus realizes where in town they are, he hails a cab.
"St. Thomas' Hospital, please."
He moves to sit, Severus's head gently cradled in his hands, torso laid across his legs, supporting him as he eases down into the seat.
"A'right, but don't let him puke on my seats, yeh 'ear?"
Albus refrains from glaring at the cabbie for his coldheartedness.
"We won't."
The cabbie makes a harumphing noise, in a mixture of disbelief, disapproval, and plain depression at yet another gloomy, gray day, but drives anyway.
As they meander through the streets in the black cab (on a circuitous route, Albus notices), Severus shifts slightly several times along the ride, almost seeming close to waking, then being still once more.
At last, the ride comes to an end, and they step outside into what is now a full-fledged rainstorm, Albus taking all of Severus's weight into his arms, attempting to protect him from the rain and cold, holding him closely to his chest to conserve body heat as he dashes into the emergency wing and asks for immediate assistance, which is granted after about 2 minutes, Severus gently transferred to a gurney.
The other patients in the waiting room are shocked- they've all been waiting for half an hour or more, and are almost envious of the new patient who just came crashing through the door. They all believe that their predicaments are equally, if not more, important than the predicament of the unconscious man with the raven-dark locks and furrowed brow. Little do they know that he is their savior from forces that have only been rumored of in the Muggle world, and they glare at him, eyes boring holes into him slowly.
Albus notices immediately and looks back at the other occupants of the waiting room, merely meeting their gaze, and their gazes falter, all suddenly overwhelmed with a sense of inexplicable guilt, and a slight sick feeling, bile rising in their throats, suddenly noticing how fascinating their shoes were.
A man with spiky brown hair and a mustache in dark red scrubs and black sneakers and a woman with short, black, equally spiky hair and a generally sharp-looking expression, with kind green eyes and black plastic framed glasses in turquoise scrubs with a slim silver chain bearing a cross around her neck, approach Severus's gurney and begin to wheel it to another room.
They arrive at their destination, the man stopping and braking the gurney, then pulling a curtain and going behind it. The woman attempts to distract Dumbledore and Poppy from their friend's situation.
"Se-ver-us... Snape. What a peculiar name. It sounds oddly familiar..."
Albus smiles gently.
"Yes, he gets that a lot."
"So, what are his symptoms?"
Poppy responds this time, composing herself as best she can.
"He's been feverish, barely conscious, and when he is, he's hardly ever fully aware of his surroundings. He has difficulty breathing, coughing fits... His condition has been deteriorating since last week. We simply didn't know what to do."
The woman's expression softens from blank and taut across her cheekbones to a slightly wrinkled expression of empathy, and she puts her hand on Poppy's left shoulder.
"We'll do everything that we can."
The man emerges from the curtain, Severus now garbed in a Muggle hospital gown, EKG leads attached to his chest, IV line in his left hand, a small dark blue bruise beginning to form where it had been inserted, a bag containing clear liquid hanging from a metal frame, his eyes still shut, and his still form seeming ever more still and quiet, as if life were draining away from him with every drip of the IV.
A/N: I know it's late and I know it's short. I apologize. I'm trying to work on a Riversong/ Melody Pond as a young death machine fic, so we'll see...