When Hermione woke up the next morning, she missed Lucius's presence beside her. Now that her anger had evaporated, she felt embarrassed about the way she'd shouted at him the night before. About what she had said. About letting him sleep on the couch when she was the one who had forced him to live through a memory that was obviously painful, and then tortured him with questions he didn't want to answer.

Why couldn't she learn some tact, as he had asked her? She could have asked him little by little. Tried to earn his trust instead of demanding answers. But she had been so angry with him. Angry that he'd been capable of such evil. Angry that he expected her to leave him because of it, as if it was some sort of surprise. Angry that he stubbornly refused to admit he had changed, refused to feel remorse for things he had admitted were wrong.

It didn't make sense, and Hermione didn't like it when things didn't make sense.

When she peeked out into her living room, she was determined to ask his forgiveness, if he was even still there. She breathed a sigh of relief when she saw him sitting on the couch, with his back turned to her.

"Lucius?" she asked, but he didn't move. She trod closer. The bed sheets were still there, ruffled, and he was wearing his night clothes, as if he had just sat up from sleep. He must have heard her, but still he didn't move. When she came close enough to see his face, she gasped. He was staring straight forward, as if he was awake and deep in thought. But somehow, she could tell that something was wrong.

"Lucius?"

She touched his shoulder and waved her hand before his eyes. No reaction.

For several minutes, she tried to get some sort of reaction from him, without success. She checked his pulse and his breathing; they were slow but strong and steady. He wasn't warm exactly, but neither was his skin so cold she felt worried on that account. He blinked now and then, but otherwise didn't move.

Her next step was to do what she usually did when she was out of her depth. She went to her books. With shaking hands, she leafed through any book on medicine she had stashed away, without finding anything.

She brought food and water, trying to make him open his mouth without much success. She begged him to let her know if he could hear her. She even kissed him, but the only response she got was a lone tear trailing down his cheek.

That was when she called for help.

Draco stepped out of Hermione's fireplace only minutes after he had received her owl. He didn't know how long the owl had waited for him, though, since he had been out on business most of the day.

What he saw was something he doubted he could ever have imagined when he was back at Hogwarts. He had already been forced to get used to the idea of his father staying in Hermione's apartment, so that wasn't too surprising. It was also a little odd to find his father sitting on the sofa staring absently straight ahead, but Hermione's note had warned him of that. It was unsettling, but not a surprise. No, the big surprise today was to find Luna Lovegood performing some sort of magical examination of his father.

Lovegood seemed to be scanning Lucius with her wand, looking up for a second to greet Draco with a soft "Hello, Draco" and then continuing as if nothing had happened.

Hermione stood next to them. He decided it was unnecessary to ask how she was, since she had obviously been crying. In fact, she looked like she was barely keeping herself together.

"Lovegood?" Draco couldn't help but to ask Hermione. "Really?"

"Luna is a skilled alternative mediwitch, Draco," Hermione explained with a slight frown.

He had seen that expression on her face a lot back in the day. She would use it on Potter and Weasley whenever she wasn't happy with their manners. All the time, that is.

"I didn't want to bring him to S:t Mungo's", she explained. "I don't think he'd like that. And I wanted to talk it through with you first. I asked Luna have a look and see if she might offer some initial insights as to what happened, I thought it couldn't hurt."

"Right", Draco nodded, still feeling rather sceptical. "And?"

Lovegood lowered her wand and looked at him. "This is really rare, but it has been known to happen to wizards and witches from time to time."

"What is it?" Hermione asked.

"Oh, he's just thinking," Lovegood said serenely, putting away her wand.

"Thinking?" they both asked incredulously.

"Yes."

"And then he'll just snap out of it, or what?" Draco asked.

Lovegood nodded. "When he is finished."

Draco was growing impatient. "And when will that be?" he asked, crossing his arms.

"Well it depends, doesn't it?" Lovegood stated calmly. "If he's got a lot to think about, it could be weeks, or months."

Months? Hermione seemed as shocked as he. "But what if he starves to death?"

"He doesn't need much sustenance. It's like hibernation. His body is in saving mode, allowing his thoughts to work things through without interruption." Lovegood accioed a set of small vials from her bag. "If you can feed him one of these every few days, he'll be all right. I'll get you some more if needed."

"What about sleep?" Hermione asked. Her inquisitiveness had always annoyed Draco in school, but right now, he could acknowledge the merit in it. He had a hard time wrapping his head around what was happening. His father was in hibernation, thinking about something? It had to be a difficult problem, if he had to go into some sort of trance to figure it out.

"Sleep is for resting the mind and allowing us to sort through our thoughts and impressions", Lovegood explained. "That's what he's doing already."

"Can he hear us?" Hermione asked.

"There's nothing wrong with his ears, Hermione", the alternative-whatever-witch said in that serious way of hers.

"What she meant was: does he register what he hears?" Draco clarified testily, trying very hard to stay patient. Loony Lovegood had earned her nickname at Hogwarts for a reason, though he hadn't used it out loud since then. In the corner of his eye, he could see Hermione frowning at him again.

"Oh, why didn't you just say so?" Lovegood turned to Hermione. She thought for a moment. "I think he can hear us perfectly, but he probably doesn't register any of it unless his subconscious finds it important enough to store for later. I doubt anything he hears can wake him before he's ready."

Hermione nodded. She seemed to be clutching her own upper arms tightly. She was trembling, too. if his father had been awake, Draco supposed he would have held hugged her or something, but then again: if Lucius had been here, she might have been better off to start with.

"Do you have any idea what triggered it?" Draco asked her, which made her look like she was going to cry again.

"We argued," she admitted.

Lovegood was beginning to pack up her things into a shabby looking brown bag.

"What about?" he asked.

"The past", she sighed. "He went on about what a horrible person he is, said I was going to leave him, and I yelled at him for being an idiot. He can't see he's changed."

"Oh, I see", Lovegood said, as if she was the last person in the room to understand something of great importance.

Draco suddenly remembered why he had always found her company so exasperating: One, she had the propensity to say ludicrous things as if they were universal truths. Two, she tended to suggest that whatever notions passed through her head would be obvious to everyone else as well. From the look on Hermione's face, she must have felt pretty much the same.

Oblivious to the looks passing between her companions, Lovegood continued to pack up her bag, adding: "That sheds light on things."

"What does?" Draco asked with forced patience.

"Well, I don't know your dad very well, Draco, but I bet he's not used to being loved like that. I guess he sort of has to rearrange his whole mental world to be able to accept it." Loony continued, seemingly unaware of the stunned look upon Hermione's face. Thoughtfully, Lovegood paused and looked at Lucius. "This could take some time, years even. It all depends on what he's got to deal with."

Years? Hermione and Draco looked at each other.

"Is there –" Hermione swallowed. "Is there anything I can do to help him?"

"Just make sure he drinks this potion twice or thrice a week, and let him be. He'll come around when he's ready."

When Lovegood had left, Draco and Hermione discussed whether or not to take him to S:t Mungo's after all. Neither of them were completely convinced by alternative magic medicine, and Hermione admitted that Lovegood over the years had told her of a fair share of remedies for different types of ailments that were obviously nonsense. Still, it didn't seem necessary to contact the hospital at present. Whatever Lovegood's faults, she wasn't the type to gamble with people's lives. So as long as Lucius seemed okay, they would follow her instructions and hope he mended on his own. Hermione offered to let Lucius stay where he was, rather than moving him to his flat, so she could keep an eye on him, which Draco was grateful for. He didn't know how they'd be able to move him anyway.

"I'm sorry, Draco," she said quietly before he left. "I feel responsible for this. I shouldn't have pushed him like I did."

"I'm sure he had it coming", Draco muttered, feeling a headache coming on. He would have to take over his father's business responsibilities for the time being. And tell his mother. He quickly decided not to mention the fact that his father had been staying with a woman half his age when this happened. Why can't he just behave like normal people? he grumbled to himself. You know, not dating his son's old classmate and not going catatonic without warning.

Draco glanced up at Hermione, noticing the glossy look in her eyes. "Don't blame yourself", he said. "If he's got so much to think about that he has to turn into a living statue for a couple of months, I guess it was bound to happen happen sooner or later. Maybe it was a good thing you provoked him so he can get it over with."

Hermione nodded, still holding her arms around herself like an abandoned cub.

"He'll be all right", Draco said, trying to sound confident.

But while he had never been close with his father, and always thought Lucius got away too easily at the trials, he couldn't deny that this was a little scary. Draco may not like the man most of the time, but Lucius was his father after all and against his better judgment he did love him.

If Lovegood was right, this wouldn't kill him. But what if Lucius never found a solution to whatever problem he was thinking about? What if he never woke up?