-1People's minds are a bit like muggle puzzles, delicate and constantly ranging in levels of difficulty. It takes years to fully develop a mind that is complete, but like most puzzles pieces get warped, lost and torn. And every once and a while, a puzzle gets scattered. Like the mind, traumatic events can damage the mind and it takes a patient mind and a steady hand to repair this damage. With magic, I believe that the damage can be repaired.
Hermione let her quill pause above the parchment. She pursed her lips as she reread her thesis on mind restoration. She was submitting it for her doctorate at the Wizarding University she was attending near Oxford. While most of the application was based off speculation, she was hoping her approval would come through to experiment on Azkaban prisoners. Their minds were as skewed as a basket of curly chips! Shaking her head with a smile, Hermione put quill back to parchment and scratched out the rest of her thesis.
With a mixture of potions and variations on Pensieves, I hope to piece together the fractured thoughts of victims of botched memory charms, Imperio curses, and other magical maladies…
"She has a point Minerva." Remus Lupin sat before the Headmistress of Hogwarts smiling sheepishly. Minerva looked up and gave him a peevish glare.
"I am aware, but the mind in indeed fragile, why would we let her 'practice' on some of the most violent of criminals?" She gave an indignant snort. "She could end up mad herself from the methods she plans to employ."
"Then give her Albus' journals on memories." Remus said gently. He leaned back in the worn leather chair. "She could figure out the reasoning behind the whole mess. Imagine if she repaired Severus Snape's mind and found out what really went on that night?"
"Remus, that was almost ten years ago. Severus by now is a mouth frothing idiot within Azkaban. Since we saved him from the Dementor's kiss, I wonder if we weren't sentencing him to a worse fate?" Minerva swallowed hard and looked over to the vacant portrait of Albus Dumbledore.
"Minerva, let her try. She could also repair some of the more depraved minds, perhaps change their opinions?" Remus leaned forward and grimaced as his age protested.
"Then she would be bigger than the one and only Harry Potter."
Hermione, stood outside the iron gates that led to the infamous Azkaban Prison. Beside her was Harry. His beguiling face was marred by several scars that ran the width of his face. An unfortunate meeting with Fenrir Greyback. Fortunately he hadn't been infected with Lycanthropy, instead he had a permanent reminder of the sacrifices of the war.
"Do you…" Harry began.
"No." Hermione cut him off. She knew he would offer to come along, Several weeks ago, Minerva had called upon her to discuss her thesis. As her former head of house and headmistress, Hermione had taken her advice and read thru the late headmaster's tomes. It gave her great insight into the mind and how to coax the most viable information from even the most unwilling without the use of veritaserum.
Looking into the dismal sky, she saw dementors floating about like morbid clouds. She slowly palmed her wand from its place in her sleeve. Drawing her eyes back to the path, she spotted the aging Alastor Moody near the entrance to the massive structure.
"Miz Granger." Alastor nodded grimly.
"Alastor, you're looking well." Hermione gave him a polite nod in return. "If we could…" Hermione motioned toward the heavy iron doors. She readjusted her briefcase which held a menagerie of potions, spell books, and her tomes of spells and notes along with a fresh notebook to write about her findings.
"I'll be next to…"
"That won't be necessary. I would actually like it if you waited outside the main hallway so I can have an unfiltered connection with my….patients." Hermione said slowly hating the word subjects and opting for a kinder word.
"Miz Granger I insist." Moody growled.
"As do I, wait here or I will make you Mr. Moody." Hermione inflected the same steel she used during her school days with Ron and Harry.
"So be it." Moody growled. "Ye only need to send some sparks down the hall and I'll come."
"Thank you." Hermione gave him one final nod as she stepped into the main hallway of Azkaban. She was at first hit with the stench of unclean bodies and bile. Swallowing back her own bile, Hermione stepped forward.
Dull moans surrounded her and the occasional hand reached out of the medieval bars holding them in. Hermione reached for her bag and pulled out the file that held her test subjects. Mostly filled with death eaters and other dastardly criminals, she felt her heart ache the small wizard photo on the first profile. Antonin Dolohov. He had nearly killed her during her 5th year at the Battle of the Department of Mysteries. She rubbed her chest slightly and could mentally see the scar that went from her collar bone across her sternum and down her ribs. He resided in cell 5R43T Looking up, she followed the numbers to nearly the end. The cell was nearly silent except for the faint muttering coming from the dark.
"Antonin Dolohov? Are you in here?" Hermione asked the darkness before her. She held her wand aloft and murmured a lumos charm to softly light the cell before her. She had come prepared knowing that some one would be quite violent toward her, she had cast an anti-summoning charm on her wand and potions. "Antonin?" She saw his bedraggled figure huddled on a limp looking mattress. "I shall not ask again."
"Tis I." A raspy voice emerged.
"Good, I'm coming in. If you so much as attack me I have Ministry permission to strike you down. And I will make sure you do not get up." Hermione stated as she conjured the large ring of keys to open his cell.
He had watched her walk in, aged and more knowledge able Hermione Granger had definitely grown into her body. Her hair once massive was now a curtain of wealth. Her teeth once quite rabbit like were now well tucked behind her lips. Along with not being recognized as a boy, she was quite a sight for a man who had only seen darkness in ten years.
She would come to him one of these days, if things happened as he thought they would, she would come to him soon enough. It was only a matter of time.
"Antonin, if you would like I'm going to cast some cleaning charms on you. Nod if you wouldn't mind." Hermione stood over the prone shape that was Antonin Dolohov. He nodded once, barely discernable in the dark. "Alright, please roll over and look up at me…please." She heard him slowly turn over with his joints creaking and a faint groan. "Thank you." She gave him a small impersonal smile. Casting several charms to rid him of his smell, clean his hair, and freshen him up, she looked at her handiwork. Before her sat a thin, pitiful, man who at one time might have been called handsome.
"Why?" His voice rasped out at her. His eyes were nearly sunken in due to the lack of light.
"I have my reasons, but first let's get you fed." She conjured up a small plate of meat and potatoes with a small glass of ale. "I've come to see what I can do about repairing your mind and seeing what makes you tick Dolohov. You get to be first, and hopefully we can make you into a respectable wizard again." Hermione felt a trickle of hope as his eyes shot up to her. He had potatoes smeared on his chin and drops of ale dripped from his chin. He swallowed.
"Will I be free?" He asked a little too eagerly.
"Perhaps one day, but we'll cross that bridge when we come to it. As soon as we get your head in working order we'll put you in an undisclosed location to see how you react to being out of Azkaban. It all depends on your cooperation, what are you willing to do to get out of here?" Hermione narrowed her eyes.
"Anything." He whispered.
"Excellent." Hermione watched the pitiful man almost vibrate with anticipation. She expected him to. It was human nature. Taking a paperclip from her pocket, she transfigured it into a chair and motioned for Dolohov to sit. He scampered into the chair and looked at her like an expectant dog. She bound his ankles to the chair and motioned him to quiet as he panicked. "Merely a precaution, no dementors will be visiting you." He visibly relaxed at this. Seeing that he wasn't going anywhere, Hermione went about cleaning the room and conjuring a lab table, and also a small set of lamps.
The light in so much darkness set a sinister light upon the young woman. She set out vials, bottles, beakers, parchment, and even went so far as to pull on a pair of rubber gloves. She glanced over her shoulder at the trembling Dolohov, she smirked.
"Don't worry Antonin, this won't hurt a bit."
His head snapped up at the wretched scream coming from down the hall. Was someone receiving the kiss? No, this was a different sort of scream.
"Hush that didn't hurt, suck it up Dolohov." The curt feminine voice of Hermione Granger cut through the whimpering. He nearly snickered at the pitiful sounds of his one time friend. He looked toward the bars to see a faint blue glow coming from Dolohov's cell. "Eureka!" Hermione's voice held triumph. "Now hold still."
Hermione wrote down the combination of potions and spells that had brought her the reaction from Dolohov. His head was lolled back and a spectral projection was coming through his sightless eyes. Memories, and thoughts floated like jigsaw pieces shattered and disoriented. She noted the color, consistency, anything that could help with the structure of the mind.
Strapping her wand to her inner arm, Hermione rolled her sleeves up and popped her knuckles. Now was where she had to use patience and delicacy. Nervous, Hermione reached out and touched the mind of Antonin Dolohov.
It felt like her whole hand fell asleep, but she still had full feeling. Wincing against the odd feeling, Hermione thrust forward and mentally noted how the pieces of his mind floated with her movements. Twisting her wrist she grabbed a piece and was slightly shocked by it.
"Ow!" Keeping her grip, she pulled it toward her and watched the memory play out before her. She felt a tingle travel up her arm and suddenly a feeling of rage went through her. The emotion from the memory was transferring.
It was the death of his mother and sisters. She watched as villagers burned his home down. She heard the chant. 'Witch! Witch! Burn the witch!' Hermione felt her heart go out to him. A boy he must have been at the time, she saw it through his eyes. He stood atop a hill, just home for break from Durmstrang. His small village in Ukraine. His father was already dead, now his sisters. It was the muggles who did this. He felt his hate bubbling like acid in the pit of his stomach. All of these emotions were being transferred to her.
"Oh gods above!" Hermione gasped as she snatched her hand out of the frothy memories. She felt cold, so desperately cold. Taking a deep breath, she noted her observations in her journals. Now to find a way to turn this misguided anger into sanity…
Long into the night Hermione spent reviewing Dolohov's memories she noticed that the unhealthy opinion of muggles and muggleborns were quite unfounded. Using some her aesthetic knowledge, she implanted some of the knowledge and started piecing his mind together.
She finally quite around three in the morning from sheer exhaustion. She murmured the back tracking spells that would put Dolohov's mind backing his head. His body shuddered and he dragged in a rib shuddering breath.
"Antonin. Antonin Dolohov, wake up." Hermione yawned. She had her supplies packed and her table transfigured back into a mattress.
"Yes?" His voice was less raspy and held a more cultured tone. His amber eyes rolled to collide with her own.
"How do you feel, answer as honestly as possible." Hermione stood with a fountain pen paused over her journal.
"I feel…lightheaded. I feel confused. Hungry." He went through a laundry list of physical feelings, then onto some of his memories. "I feel like I remember things that I've forgotten for a long time." Hermione nodded. She was trying to hold back the triumphant smile that was about to break her professional composure.
"How do you feel about witches and wizards born of muggle descent?" She asked baldly after he recounted several events that she had gone over in his memory.
"I don't know. I…I don't hate them… I used to I remember. I…I've done some terrible things…" He furrowed his brow. "I can't remember all the way." He pressed the heels of his hands into his eyes. "It's like I know, but I can't seem to grab it."
"Alright, we have several more sessions until I can fully assess you, but so far you show great progress. Let's try some word association." Hermione was aware that dawn grew near, but the thrust of adrenaline in her blood from the excitement was keeping her awake.
"Ok." Dolohov looked slightly confused then focused on Hermione.
"Voldemort." Dolohov seemed to cringe.
"Fear."
"Harry Potter."
"James."
"Muggle."
"Confusion." It went back and forth like that for several minutes.
"Alright, I'll return tomorrow to see how you're doing, and if you're up for it we'll do another session." Hermione felt awkward. She patted his shoulder and left. She returned to the front of the holding area to find Moody lightly sleeping against the doorjamb. "Alastor."
"Ready?" He didn't bother to open his human eye and let his magical one stare her down.
"Yes, thank you." Hermione led the way out.
Process seems to be progressing well beyond my expectations. Subject is responding well to treatment. Must observe if he is actually telling the truth, ex-death eaters will tend to lie, cheat, kill and steal to get out of anything. See: Severus Snape.
Need to procure half way house to observe subjects in reality like situations. Speak with Headmistress about this.
a/n: Reviews are most welcome! Thank you guys for reading and I hope to update this a.s.a.p.!