Disclaimer: In no way do I own or claim to own Harry Potter. That is the original work of JKR and I'm not stupid enough to attempt to steal it.
The Enlightenment
"The human brain is a most unusual instrument of elegant and as yet unknown capacity." - Stuart Seaton
Chapter 7: Mrs. Medley
Kingsley shuddered as he entered the mental hospital. It was a two-story building with white tile floors and white walls. There was a lot of security, both inside and outside the building. The grounds were surrounded by a tall fence with barbed wire on the top, similar to a prison, and the gates were kept locked at all times, except for the few seconds it took for someone to drive through. It had taken him ten minutes to get the untrusting guard to open the gate.
He had stepped through the front doors to what looked like a waiting room. There were comfortable looking chairs set around the room and small tables with magazines on them. There was a wide window facing the grounds, which were actually quite nice. He noticed, though, that there were only two people there, at opposite ends of the room, both looking as if they would rather be anywhere else in the world.
Kingsley glanced uneasily at the security camera hanging above a TV that was set high on the wall near one of the corners, and then made his way over to the receptionist. The woman sat at a desk in a small room, a window in front of her so she could talk to visitors. She was short and plump, with frizzy gray hair pulled back into what he supposed could pass for a bun. She looked old, tired, and possibly a bit mad herself.
"Excuse me, um..." Kingsley read the nametag pinned to her pale blue uniform. "Joan. I'm here to see Dr. Tolbert?"
"Do you have an appointment?" she asked without looking up.
"Er-"
"Are you the one they sent?" another voice said. Kingsley looked over at the man holding open the heavy metal door that lead into the other parts of the buildingjust enough to stick his head out. Kingsley nodded to him, and the man beckoned him over and they both went through the door and entered a hallway.
On the left, from floor to ceiling, was what looked like a glass wall. Through it, Kingsley could see what looked like a large common area, with couches, chairs, a TV, and a few round tables. He noticed there were no corners anywhere. A shiver ran down his spine, and he turned his attention to the right. There were doors lining the wall with large enough windows to be able to easily see inside. The glass had wire in it to keep it from breaking as easily and so no one would be able to climb through it. In a few of the rooms there were doctors talking to patients.
The two men turned down another corridor at the end of the hall. At the end of that one, they entered a door on the left. Kingsley found himself in a rather nice office, with a plush maroon carpet and dark wood-panel walls. There were framed medical degrees hanging on the walls, and a few expensive paintings. A bookshelf took up much of the wall to Kingsley's left, filled with medical books. A window on the back wall looked out at the grounds. There was a large mahogany desk in the center of the room, facing the door Kingsley had just entered through. There were pictures of a beautiful blonde woman with green eyes set on the edge, probably the man's wife. Papers and folders were set in neat stacks on the desk, a computer taking up the right side of it. Right in the center was a single manila envelope with the name Elizabeth Medley scribbled on it.
The man himself, obviously Dr. Tolbert, gestured for Kingsley to take a seat then sat in the large leather chair behind his desk. He leaned back in it and looked steadily at Kingsley, hands folded over his stomach. He had salt-and-pepper hair that needed to be trimmed, plain brown eyes, andpockmarked cheeks. His jaw was tight, and he looked like a no-nonsense type of man, at least at the moment. It might have just been the situation. After all, Kingsley mused, anyone who spent his days trying to put crazy ideas like magic out of his patients' minds was bound to be a bit disturbed when he found himself sitting across from a real wizard.
"So," Tolbert began after a few minutes. His voice was rather high pitched and grated on Kingsley's nerves. "You want to know about Elizabeth Medley."
"Yes, sir," Kingsley responded.
"What do you hope to find?"
Kingsley forced himself not to groan with annoyance. Weren't Muggles supposed to cooperate with all types of law enforcement?
"Anything that might help my investigation," Kingsley answered.
"Sure," Tolbert said. He picked up the manila envelope and handed it to Kingsley and began to speak. "Elizabeth was committed on Christmas Eve in 1975 by her husband. She was under the delusion that her daughter was performing some kind of occult ritual that would kill her and her husband. She also believed that her daughter had friends who had demonic powers, which they used to possess and torture her daughter. In the end, she poisoned the family cat and tried to commit suicide."
Kingsley nodded as he half listened and read through the file. He didn't understand half the things written in there, so eventually closed it and asked for a copy. Tolbert nodded and said he already had one made, which was at the front desk with Joan.
"I'd like to talk to Mrs. Medley," Kingsley said after putting the file back on Tolbert's desk.
"Fine," Tolbert said and stood quickly. They both left the room and began walking through the halls again. Kingsley thought they all looked very similar and wondered how the man didn't get lost.
"You won't have more than ten minutes with her. She gets excited easily," Tolbert said as they reached an elevator and stepped inside. "If you get her riled up, I will have to ask you to leave. You'll be supervised by two orderlies and myself, and you may not, under any circumstances, touch her. Despite how she appears, she can be dangerous. She's injured two other patients in the past six months."
"Right," Kingsley said.
During Tolbert's speech, they had gotten out of the elevator and turned left to walk down the hall. When they reached a pair of heavy metal doors, Tolbert paused to put in a code on a small keypad to the right of the doors and swipe a keycard. A short buzz was made, and the doors unlocked and the two went through. The hall they entered was the same as all the others, with doors lining the walls. This time, however, the doors had no windows and strange sounds were coming from some of the rooms.
Tolbert, obviously unaffected by the noises, continued to about a quarter of the way down the hall and stopped outside a door with the number 254 on the outside. Nearby was a pair of orderlies that looked more like bouncers from a Muggle night club. They shuffled over and one of them, shorter than the other with a nametag that read Donald, unlocked the door and allowed the others to enter before he went in himself and closed and locked the door again.
They stood in a small room with a bed on the opposite end, a tiny desk with books stacked on it against the right wall. There was nothing else. Kingsley noted that there weren't even pens or pencils on the desk. The corners of it were covered with cotton balls that were taped there. The bed was attached to the floor. It looked eerily like one of the Ministry's holding cells, the ones for criminals awaiting trial, except they didn't even have desks.
At first, Kingsley thought the room was empty, but a voice floated over from the bed. "It's not time for dinner, yet." The blankets covering the bed shifted, and a woman came into view. Her hair was long, gray, and very messy. She was pale, as if she hadn't been in the sun for years, her blue eyes sunken with a mad glint, her skin wrinkled. She looked much older than she really was.
"Hello, Mrs. Medley," Kingsley said. "I'm Kingsley Shacklebolt. I'd like to talk to you about Lexi."
The woman reeled back, her back hitting the wall, and she stared at him with obvious fear. "What do you know of her?" she spat.
"Not much. That's why I'd like to ask you about her. She had friends?"
"Friends. Those boys weren't friends. They were monsters. Eileen gave birth to a monster, and he had monster friends. Tobias didn't even know, but I knew, oh yes, I knew. Those disgusting freaks, terrorizing my innocent baby. They did it to her, they made her do it. It wasn't my baby who made that monster become interested in those things, oh no, she didn't. He made her believe she did, but unh uh, no she didn't. They made her do it," Elizabeth Medley rambled on, a crazed look in her eye. She was staring at Kingsley, and he forced himself not to shift uncomfortably, which was exactly what he wanted to do.
"What did they make her do?" Kingsley asked.
"They made her try to kill me. My baby loved me. She wouldn't have done it if it weren't for them. That stupid blonde boy, putting ideas in her head and calling her filthy and hurting her."
Kingsley's mind churned. A blonde boy. Who could it be, and what significance could he have?
"What was his name?"
"Filth! That demon! Spawn of the devil!" Elizabeth shrieked, clawing at the wall behind her. Blood began to trail her fingers as the skin was torn open, and Kingsley saw a fingernail rip off as she continued to scream. The two orderlies rushed forward and grabbed her arms, wrestling her down on the bed, shouting for a nurse. Tolbert grabbed Kingsley's arm and dragged him out of the room while a nurse rushed in, needle in hand, which she injected into Elizabeth. Elizabeth slowly stopped fighting them as the sedative kicked in and she fell unconscious.
"I think you're done here," Tolbert said to Kingsley, who couldn't agree more.
A/N: Sorry for the long wait. I meant to get this up a while ago, but obviously I didn't.
I have never been to an insane asylum or mental hospital, and I'm only going on things I've read, movies, and my imagination. If this is nothing like it is in reality, then please let me know so I can fix it.
Constructive criticism is very welcome. Please, if you see any way in which this can be improved, don't hesitate to inform me. However, I ask that you do it in a helpful manner, and that you don't just say, "This is terrible." Thank you!