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Xxxx -DxH- xxxX
"Damn," Blackwell cursed, gnashing his teeth.
"What? Well, do something!" Knightly exclaimed. Lines of worry were etched deep in his face as he watched Draco suffer.
"P-please...! Don't...don't! Please..."
Blackwell motioned for the nurse who had taken the jars of colored rocks from Davies. "Give me one of those." He popped the lid off of the proffered jar and once again held it under Draco's nose. "C'mon...wake up."
Draco jerked a few more times, then went still.
"...Gah!..."
With a gasp, he finally opened his eyes.
Blackwell watched closely as Draco's chest heaved up and down with the effort of his breathing. The boy's eyes were darting around the room quickly, nervously.
"Mr. Malfoy?" Blackwell cautioned.
Draco looked like a small animal, cowering under the stare of those around him. He was still disoriented, blinking wildly as he tried to get his bearings. "Where...?" he began breathlessly.
"Easy Draco. You're at St. Mungo's, remember?" Kingsley soothed. He reached to place a hand on Draco's shoulder.
Draco immediately flinched away from the touch. "...I...remember," he answered quietly. His gaze still traveled around the room apprehensively—taking in the environment once again as his memories returned to him.
"Draco." Davies cleared his throat as Kingsley backed away from the bed. "Do you remember what happened before we anesthetized you?"
"...Yes."
"Does...anything hurt?"
Draco breathed and instinctively moved to place a hand over his chest. He frowned. "My...chest."
Davies nodded, glancing over at Blackwell hesitantly. "Now don't panic, but—"
Before Davies could finish his sentence, Draco's face paled and his eyes grew wide. His fingertips had already found their way to the newly-formed gash in his chest.
"What the bloody hell?!"
"Easy, easy." Blackwell caught both of Draco's hands as they were tearing at the gash in his hospital gown where Davies had cut it open.
"Let me go! What the bloody hell did you do to me?!"
"Draco, it's alright," said Kingsley. Even the normally calm of his deep timbre was betrayed by a note of anxiety.
As Blackwell finally wrestled Draco into submission, the room went silent but for the panting of breath.
The first to break the silence was Harry, still lain in his bed away from the commotion. "Sir, what's going on?"
Kingsley glanced over at Harry with a note of sympathy. "I'm sorry Harry—but just give us a minute."
Harry opened his mouth, clearly wanting to say more, but finally closed it with a nod.
Knightly gave a glance at the restrained Draco before moving slowly to stand by Harry's bedside again. "Not to worry ma'boy," he began lowly. "Just give them a minute to sort things out, 'right?"
Harry simply nodded, eyebrows furrowing as he tried to see what was happening over by Draco from his limited vantage point.
"Alright. Are you calm now?" Davies asked, staring down Draco pointedly. "I know this is a shock, but you need to calm down, alright?"
Draco glared at the healer, stiffly nodding in compliance. At Davies' nod, Blackwell slowly released his hold on Draco's arms.
"Wheel him over here. We need to talk this over together," Davies told his nurses lowly—gesturing for them to move Draco's bed over to Harry's. A group of nurses complied, pushing Draco's hospital bed slowly across the floor until his bed was butted up directly beside Harry's.
Draco refused to look over at his companion as his bed came to a stop at its new location. He insisted instead on fixing his steely gaze stubbornly on his lap.
Harry, however, couldn't stop staring at Draco. Or, more accurately, the blood-crusted opening of Draco's torn hospital gown where a fresh wound peeked out from underneath.
"What..." Harry's voice faltered.
Davies nodded and held up a hand. "I know, but now, I need you both to listen to what I have to say." Davies glanced down at the wound on Draco's chest before bringing his gaze up to the boy's face, then glancing over at Harry's stricken face. "That wound there on your chest, Harry—it's from dark magic."
Harry nodded, glancing at Draco before turning his gaze back to Davies. "But Malfoy..."
"Mr. Malfoy's wound was also caused by dark magic," Davies confirmed with a nod. "And just now we made the connection between the source of your wounds."
Blackwell stepped forwards now, his stoic gaze passing over both patients. "Your wounds are one in the same—caused by a dark curse."
Draco froze, his wide-eyes gaze darting up to the taller healer instantly. "How...the bloody hell...is that even possible...?"
"That...doesn't make any sense," Harry added, shaking his head in disbelief.
"It's the truth," the healer replied firmly. "It's something we have never seen before, but we're sure that the wounds you both are suffering from are the result of some kind of new dark curse that struck you both. The wounds on your bodies are tied—you bleed and heal at the same rate. You both feel the pain that the other is feeling from those wounds."
The room slipped into an unsteady silence.
"...How," Draco finally spoke, quietly, "How can you be sure of what you're saying?"
"We've been analyzing the tests that you were subjected to under anesthesia—during surgery," Blackwell explained. "The wound on your chest, young Malfoy, didn't appear until we started to treat young Potter's wound. After reviewing surgery notes, magic scans, and the evidence before our eyes, we were able to make the deduction that we're dealing with a curse that is tying the wounds on your bodies together—it's causing you to share pain. Now I don't know if that wound is the only thing that causes you to share pain or if it's your bodies themselves—we can't know for sure without further testing."
Draco pondered the information for a minute, then reached down to his torso.
"Ow!" Harry yelped, grabbing at his side suddenly. "What the bloody hell was that?"
Draco stared at his partner, grim-faced. "Further testing."
"Did you just pinch yourself, Draco?" Davies questioned with no small amount of amusement.
"Yes, but based on the way that Potter jumped I'd say that I crucioed myself.…"
Harry flushed. "It was a hard pinch….," he mumbled.
"Well..that, does that…" Knightly sighed, evidently flummoxed. "Does what Draco just did mean anything?"
Blackwell rubbed his temples as he stared over one of the surgery reports. "I'd be hesitant to state anything with certainty, but based on what we know—yes, I'd say that it looks very likely that the curse is causing both Mr. Potter and Mr. Malfoy to experience the same pain that one another is facing."
"So this curse is some kind of new sadistic way to make two bodies experience the same pain…" Davies rubbed his chin in thought, staring over the two boys.
"Yes, we know that this curse has the potential to make two bodies share the same pain. The question we have now is—is that the only thing that the curse does?" Blackwell gave a pointed look to the Minister of Magic.
Kingsley inhaled sharply, beginning to pace in a small circle. "This new curse...it's unlike anything any Auror has ever encountered before."
"As have the healers." Davies nodded, raking a hand through his hair. "We definitely need to keep running tests if we're to understand exactly what this curse is, and how it affects those it's cast upon."
"If I may." Blackwell gathered a stack of parchment and a quill from a nearby nurse. "Could we have some privacy?"
The medical staff in the room immediately bowed, scurrying and exiting through the swinging doors on the far end of the room.
"Minister, Auror Knightly. If I may request your compliance as well—only for a few moments so that I may run some tests."
Kingsley frowned deeply. "Is that really necessary?"
"Yes, is that really necessary?" Knightly balked.
Blackwell pursed his lips. "I believe it would be for the best. Rest assured, I wish only to ask the boys some questions."
After a moment Kingsley nodded, gesturing for Knightly to follow him out the door. As the door creaked shut behind the two wizards, the hospital ward was once again left in utter silence.
Blackwell studied the two patients in front of him critically, tapping the quill in his hand against blank parchment. He motioned for his colleague to follow him to the far side of the room.
Once out of earshot of their patients, Davies spoke. "What kind of tests would you like to run?" He questioned.
"We're going to start simple." Blackwell dropped his voice low and explained his idea for the tests—writing onto several pieces of parchment as he did.
Davies listened intently, rubbing his chin with a nod. "I think that's a marvelous idea, Blackwell."
With a nod, the two strode back over to where Harry and Draco lay in their beds. Blackwell cleared his throat, causing the boys to lift their gazes to meet his. "We're going to try and compile as much data as we can about the symptoms you two have so that we can figure out exactly how this curse is targeting and affecting you, alright? The more data we have, the easier and faster we can work on a way to break the curse."
Harry nodded his head after a moment. "Of course. I'll try my best to help."
"Good. Mr. Malfoy?"
Draco nodded stiffly. "Fine."
"Alright. We're going to run some simple tests—nothing to be nervous about." Blackwell brought quill to paper and scratched some more. He shuffled a few pieces of parchment, the continued writing on another piece. "Because of the circumstances of this case, I would like to conduct the tests separately," he explained, passing over a stack of parchment to his colleague. "Davies—if you would bring Mr. Potter to the other side of the room and cast a silencing charm around yourselves. Then, I would like you to do as discussed and record Mr. Potter's answers. I will remain here with Mr. Malfoy and do the same."
Davies nodded, accepting the parchment. "Well then, shall we Potter?" He swished his wand and strode to the opposite end of the room, using his magic to guide Harry's bed behind him.
Once the silencing charm was cast and Blackwell could no longer hear Davies' voice, he turned back to Draco. "Alright then. Let us begin." Blackwell sunk down onto one of the beds that he had moved close to Draco's. "Draco I'm going to ask you a series of questions and I'd like it if you could answer them as honestly as possible, alright?"
"Fine."
Blackwell nodded, glancing down at his parchment. "First—please name a color."
Draco stared at the healer. "Name a color," he deadpanned.
"Yes. Any color."
Draco rolled his eyes. "Green."
"Excellent," Blackwell murmured. "Next—can you name an animal?"
"….Owl."
Blackwell went back and forth, continuing to ask Draco questions with increasingly more personal topics.
"Next question—are you in pain right now?"
Draco shot the healer an incredulous look. "Am I in pain right now? What the bloody hell do you think?! Of course I'm in pain!"
Blackwell nodded, unperturbed. "If you could rate the pain—1 being minimal and 10 being unbearable—what number of pain would you say you're experiencing?"
"W-What?" Draco's brow furrowed in confusion, not having been asked such a question before.
"It's alright, don't overthink it," the healer encouraged. "Just answer whatever feels right. Everyone has a different threshold for pain, so it's different for everyone."
"Well...5, maybe..." Draco paused with a frown. "No...6."
"6?" Blackwell confirmed.
Draco nodded slowly. "Yes."
"Excellent—next question." Blackwell scribbled on the parchment, then glanced up. "Can you tell me what the most prominent emotion that you're feeling right now is?"
Draco immediately frowned, gripping the sheets in his lap with white knuckles. Visions of the nightmares that he had awoken to earlier suddenly filtered into his thoughts and reminded him of the fear that had been enveloped in. "I feel...fine," he gritted through his teeth.
"But 'fine' isn't an emotion. Give me something more concrete, Draco."
"I—I don't feel any 'prominent emotions'! I feel normal!"
"I see…" Blackwell scribbled on his parchment again. He's definitely lying. His pulse is elevated and I can tell from the way that he's grabbing the sheets that he's trying to keep his hands from shaking...Fear? Anxiety?...
"Alright. Next—I'd like you to close your eyes for me."
"Why?" Draco asked suspiciously.
"We're going to try an exercise and keeping your eyes closed will help you to concentrate."
"...Fine." Draco sighed and slowly closed his eyes. "Now what?"
"You're familiar with the art of occlumency, correct?"
An involuntary shudder rippled down Draco's spine. His deranged aunt Bellatrix had forced him to master occlumency at a young age—the word alone brought back memories that he'd much rather keep suppressed. "Yes, I know occlumency," he replied flatly.
Blackwell nodded. "I'd like for you to try and do that now—try to quiet your mind and clear your thoughts. Once you've done so, let me know if at any point you "hear" or "sense" anything."
Draco frowned but tried to relax—breathing deeply, slowly, and submerging himself into a realm of nothing but silence. He let everything around him slip away—his thoughts fled his mind like water trickling through his fingers. For a moment, he lingered in the absolute nothingness, enjoying the feeling of not being consumed by his emotions like he normally was. Though he kept up the act on the outside as cool, calm, indifference, he was constantly at war with his emotions and had problems suppressing them.
Suddenly, something started to nag him. A faint humming sound, like the buzzing of a bee prickled the edges of his senses—invading his bubble of tranquil nothingness.
He was familiar with the feeling of someone trying to read his mind through legilimency—the perverse feeling of someone's eyes peering into his utmost thoughts and memories. This feeling though...was different. Draco willed himself to concentrate on the feeling, and the faint buzz grew more tangible.
Blackwell watched, cautiously, as Draco's expression changed minutely. His brows furrowed ever so slightly—his pale lips taught with concentration. He was definitely reacting to something. The healer held his breath. Could it be...?
The buzzing was now a murmur, a sound that was definitely human, but garbled. Draco strained, willing the sound to become decipherable. D...Dra... A voice, a male's voice. Drac..co...Draco...
Draco's eyes snapped open, wide eyed.
"Draco, what did you hear?" Blackwell immediately urged.
Blackwell's voice sounded far away to Draco's ears. Instead, the sound that had been whispered into his mind rang through his ears. Draco. His name. There was no mistake about it. He knew without a doubt who's voice that had been
"What...was that..."
Blackwell tapped his quill methodically. "What did you hear?"
Draco glared up at the healer. "You obviously did something so you know exactly what I heard!"
"Draco—I need you to understand that I did nothing. I'm merely conducting tests. Now, what did you hear?"
"...My name..."
Exactly as I thought... "Your name...nothing else?" Blackwell scribbled onto his parchment.
Draco shook his head slowly, face stricken.
"What can you tell me about the voice, Draco?" The healer asked quietly.
There was a long pause.
Blackwell held his breath as he waited for Draco to give him the last piece of evidence he needed.
Draco's lips parted.
A name.
The one Blackwell had desired to hear.
Xxxx -DxH- xxxX
"Davies—please escort Mr. Potter back over here." Blackwell held his wand to his throat briefly to transmit his message through his colleague's silencing charm.
Draco watched on in disbelief. There was no way that this was really happening.
"Ah, Blackwell!" Davies quickly re-emerged next to the bed where Blackwell sat. Harry, in his hospital bed, came drifting to a stop beside him. "You're a genius my friend I tell you—genius!"
"Davies." Blackwell nodded in acknowledgment but gestured for silence. "We need to discuss our new findings and what it will mean moving forward."
Harry cast a glance over to Draco, furrowing his brows slightly at the lifeless expression on his pale face. "New findings...?" he hazarded.
"After conducting our most recent tests, I can be almost certain that my hypothesis of what some of the effects of your curse are is correct." Blackwell grabbed his wand and levitated the parchment he had been writing on, gesturing for Davies to do this same.
The two pieces of parchment suspended themselves in the air next to one another, open to be read by all in the room.
"The tests that we conducted on the both of you," Blackwell explained, "were the same."
"Meaning that we were both asking you the same questions!" Davies grinned.
Blackwell nodded. "All of the questions that we asked you were the same...and you both gave us identical answers on nearly every question."
Harry's eyes widened, the furrowed. "But...but that's impossible, sir. How on earth could Malfoy and I have come up with the same answers for all of the questions?"
"Normally, it should be impossible," Blackwell agreed. "But this is the effect of the dark magic that is cursing you both."
"Im..possible," Draco gritted out.
"Shall we review your answers to our test?" Blackwell raised an eyebrow.
"Honestly though, the story is told in this one question alone." Davies pointed to the levitating pieces of parchment. "Look at the answer to this question here, when we asked you about your pain ratings. It's remarkable, really. You both were hesitant to answer this question, and you both changed your answers. At first Draco said 5, and Harry said 7. Then, you both changed your answer to 6."
"After reviewing the results from this test, I firmly believe that something about this curse is not just linking your bodies together, but also linking your minds—making it so that your thoughts are influencing one another," said Blackwell.
Draco blanched. There was no way that some curse was influencing him to make him agree or think like Potter. There was no way....
"I can see that you're still not convinced."
Draco's glazed-over eyes finally focused as he glared at the healer. "What about the last part of the test," he gritted out.
Harry frowned. "Yeah, I didn't understand why—"
"Ah~" Davies cut him off with a grin. "That's where things get really interesting."
"Davies," Blackwell gently interrupted. "If you'll allow me to explain, first."
"Of course~"
Blackwell glanced between the two boys. "The last portion of this little test that we ran was different from just having you two answer questions. It was my hypothesis that this curse was linking your minds together, but I wanted to see how far it would really work." He glanced at Davies who beamed with a nod.
"After I had Harry answer the same questions that you did Draco, I told him to close his eyes and repeat, in his mind, one word—a name." Davies' eyes glittered mischievously. "Can you guess who's name it was, Draco?"
The blood drained from Draco's face. He squeezed his eyes shut and tugged on his blonde hair. No way, no way, no way!
"I still don't understand..." Harry's emerald eyes searched the faces around him with evident confusion. "What does that mean?"
Blackwell sighed. "Harry, while Davies had you reciting Draco's name in your head, I had Draco performing occlumency. He was clearing his mind and making it impenetrable. No one should've been able to get in his head—yet, without even a spell, he heard your voice."
"But that…."
Silence.
Harry's eyes widened as realization dawned on him. "You-you're saying that we can communicate telepathically now?!" His voice pitched loudly in disbelief. "There's no way, no way!"
"We still don't know exactly how far the effects of the curse work on the both of you," Blackwell raised his voice to be heard above the panic, "but according to the tests that we've run so far—it appears that the manner in which your minds have been linked allow you to, on some level, interact with and communicate with one another's thoughts."
No way, no way…. Harry cradled his head in his hands.
Well this just got a whole lot more complicated.
Xxxx -DxH- xxxX
After the realization of their findings had sunk in and Harry and Draco had been stunned into silence, Kingsley and Knightly had been escorted back into the wing and filled in on the information that they had missed.
"Linked minds?!" Knightly roared incredulously. "How in the name of Merlin's saggy left tit are you expecting us to believe that?!"
"Florence, please," Kingsley sighed. He turned to the pair of healers. "You said that you've confirmed this without a doubt?"
Blackwell pushed his spectacles up. "We cannot say that this is without doubt—but the evidence that we're faced with is undeniable, Minister."
Kingsley pinched the bridge of his nose. "...Can you please list what you know again so far? I need to moment to process all of this." He began to pace again, clasping his hands behind his back.
"Of course." Blackwell retrieved a sheet of parchment and began to go down the list. "Firstly, we know that this curse is causing Mr. Malfoy and Mr. Potter to share a large wound on both of their chests. The wound was originally on Mr. Potter's body, but manifested onto Mr. Malfoy's body as a result of the curse. The wound bleeds and heals identically on both bodies. As such, we believe that the curse has caused the bodies of Mr. Malfoy and Mr. Potter to be connected—they both share wounds and feel the pain that the other is feeling." Blackwell switched pieces of parchment. "And now, most recently, we believe to have confirmed that Mr. Malfoy and Mr. Potter share an established link between their minds. We have proven—under certain circumstances—that the two can—on some degree—read and communicate with the other's thoughts." He finally finished reading, setting the parchment down on a bed beside him.
"We realize that this is a lot to take in, Minister." Davies chuckled nervously. "But rest assured that we're going to continue to run tests and do our best to get these boys back to normal."
Kingsley finally stopped pacing—turning to survey the two boys.
"This is all your fault, you blonde-haired, ferret-faced, git!"
"MY FAULT?! How in Salazar's bloody name do you think this is my fault?! 'Oh—we're outmatched by these snatchers? Well that's ok cause I'm the Chosen One, and there's no way that I'll lose!'."
"Well maybe if my Auror partner wasn't a greasy-haired coward then we would have won against those snatchers!"
"Greasy-haired coward?! You four-eyed, ego-fueled prat!"
Kingsley pinched the bridge of his nose, beginning to pace again. "Merlin give me strength. I need some brandy…."
