No Laughing Matter

Chapter Twenty

St. Mungo's was a flurry of activity. When Carly arrived via a floo port in the lobby, supporting an unconscious Fred's weight against her, she knew immediately that something was amiss. People were scurrying everywhere, and the lobby and adjacent waiting rooms were full to overflowing with patients and their family. She dragged Fred as best she could away from the port, knowing that Suzette and Nigel would be bringing Molly in just moments.

"I need a healer here!" she called out to no one in particular as she laid Fred onto the floor and conjured a stretcher for him.

"You and everyone else here, lady," a man in a nearby chair grumbled. He had a bandage wrapped around his head that was slowly soaking through with blood.

She nodded absently and looked around to see if there was any kind of system worked out to deal with the situation. It appeared there was a sort of emergency triage in it's beginning stages, and available Healers and apprentices were working their way through the waiting crowd, evaluating and separating injuries. One of the closest Healers spotted Carly and called out to her.

"Thank Merlin!" he said with agitation, "We've been trying to reach you for an hour. Get started evaluating these people. We're sending critical cases directly to the fourth floor since almost everyone here is suffering from some sort of spell damage. We're re-routing minor injuries to the fifth floor tearoom where they've set up stations for first year Healers-In-Training to tend to. The Artefact Accidents ward has sent all available personnel to help out here...."

"I didn't get any messages," Carly told him, "I've got Fred here with a Reductor to his shoulder. He's unconscious, but has lost a lot of blood. I was just bringing him here for treatment and found this place in chaos; what happened?"

"What didn't happen?" he asked, signaling for an orderly to take Fred to the fourth floor, "The Death Eaters have sprung small attacks all over the bleeding country almost simultaneously, and the result has been pouring in here for the past two hours. We didn't have any warning at all. Are you going to be able to do your job?"

"Of course I am!" Carly said indignantly. "I've just come from an attack myself, and there should be at least two more injured following me in. I'm going to work in this area until they come through. I'll need at basic Healer's kit."

Carly tried to put Fred out of her mind as she summoned a smock and kit from nearby, and then turned to the first man she had spoken to. She pointed her wand at each of her hands in turn muttering, "expurgo" to clean them before she checked his wound. His head injury was superficial but bleeding profusely, so she sent him to the fifth floor and moved onto a witch who was holding her arm against herself and rocking back and forth in an act of self-comfort. She had a shell-shocked look that told Carly that she would need more than just a broken arm mended. She gently pressed a calming anti-shock potion to the patient's lips, and left her in place for a moment while the potion took effect. She didn't have time to escort the woman to a treatment station, and would have to have the next available person take her. As Carly was moving on to the next person, the Floo Port activated, and Bill stumbled out with Molly held closely against him. She was conscious now, but had the glazed look of someone in shock.

"Bill!" she called out, eyes full of concern, "You need the fifth floor tearoom! They've got an emergency set up there. They can treat your hands, and then tell them that Molly needs a sedative potion for the shock and a quiet place to lie down. Fred is being treated on the fourth floor. I'll send the others to find you when they get here, and I'll come to check on you myself when I can."

With a grim nod, he lifted Molly off of her feet, and cradled her easily as he mounted the stairs, unmindful of his skinned knuckles and broken hand. Carly moved on to a man with a small child in his lap, who appeared to be asleep, and asked him quietly why they were there.

"It was Dementors," he said quietly, eyes haunted. "My wife and I fought off the Death Eaters, but the Dementors... we just didn't have any defense. We grabbed the kids and ran."

"Where are your wife and other children?" Carly asked gently.

"Fourth floor," he said thickly, trying to keep the tears from his voice.

Carly nodded and pulled some chocolate from her kit. "Eat this." She pulled her wand from her pocket and muttered the spells that would ascertain that the man and child didn't require anything more that she could offer. She laid a hand of comfort on his shoulder before moving on to kneel in front of an elderly wizard who also appeared to be asleep. She shook him gently, and got no response; her wand found no sign of life. She conjured him onto a stretcher and signaled an orderly. "Downstairs," she told him quietly, and moved on.

Suzette and Nigel arrived twenty minutes later, and went to check on Fred, Bill and Molly. They soon returned to the waiting area to help hand out tea, and comfort those who were waiting for word about loved ones. The staff were finally able to separate those waiting from those in need of aid, and used what resources they could to comfort both groups. As the initial distress began to wear off, the stories began to come out; Dementors and Death Eaters had descended concurrently upon multiple targets. The modus operandi seemed to be two Death Eaters and two Dementors to each household attacked; Hogsmeade had suffered a blow to a large Halloween gathering at The Three Broomsticks, but the school had been left unscathed and was currently making itself available to those in need of medical care. Some of the worst news came with a man who stumbled in through the front entrance, half carrying, half dragging another, injured, wizard. He looked around wildly and announced to the room in general, "They've emptied Azkaban. Every last prisoner is free."

Trying not to think of the implications of the night's events, Carly looked up from time to time to gauge the progress being made in treating the crowd. The Floo occasionally sprang to life and emitted new patients, but the lion's share of victims seemed to already be here. She was one of four Healer's Apprentices working their way through the room. An hour and a half into her work, an Orderly approached to tell her she was needed on the fifth floor, and she left the remainder of patients to the others.

She climbed the stairs wearily, wondering vaguely what time it was. She stopped on the fourth floor to check on the Weasley's and was relieve to find Bill, hands mended, sitting quietly between two beds that had been crowded into the tiny space. Molly was asleep in one of them, an empty flask on the table beside her, and Fred lay in the other, bare-chested and heavily bandaged. He slept with a furrow in his brow that told her that he had not taken a potion for dreamless sleep.

"Would you like me to conjure you a cot to sleep in?" Carly offered Bill as she looked over Fred's chart. "They won't wake for a few hours."

"I don't think I could sleep," he said.

"Well at least let me make you more comfortable." She waved her wand and transfigured his straight-backed chair into a more comfortable chaise. She knew that the night's events would catch up with him soon, and sleep would come whether he wanted it to or not.

"Thank you," he said. "For everything."

Carly nodded, not really sure what to say. This man had been held captive by Death Eaters, including his own brother, and watched a member of his family die; what could she say that would comfort him after all of that? "I'll check on you again soon."

The stairwell was busy with staff and patients traveling up and down between floors four and five. Carly walked slowly and patiently behind s slow moving witch who was climbing the steps ahead of her when she heard a familiar voice.

"You look knackered." George stepped up next to her, holding a folded tea towel to his head as they made their way up the stairs.

"I just need about three pots of tea and an alertness potion," she said, "What have you done to your head?"

"Sucker shot," he said with a shrug. "I should have paid more attention. One of the Death Eaters came to and knocked me down; I hit the edge of the counter as I went down."

They had reached the top landing at last, and Carly pulled him aside and lifted the make shift bandage to reveal a large purple and black lump with a nasty gash in the center of it.

"You must have the mother of all headaches. Did you black out when it happened?" Carly reached into the pocket of her smock and retrieved a tube of orange ointment and dabbed it carefully on the gash, then added a gray glue-like substance on top of that.

"Yes I do, and yes I did," George nodded.

"Uh-huh." She poured a measure of pain relieving potion into a small cup and passed it over to him. "Drink this."

George grimaced as the bitter liquid went down, then nodded as the throbbing in his head eased back to a dull ache and then dissipated.

"That's probably the best treatment you're going to get for now. Bill, Fred and your Mum are down on the fourth floor in a small cubicle, all doing fine. You can go down and see them if you want."

"Thanks," George said. He bent down to kiss her on the forehead, then went back the way he came, leaving her to her work.