(fyi--the sickbay is a room in brian's basement at the estate, not at robert's farm. I guess I'll keep the main sickbay at Brian's and add a smaller sickbay in the sub sub basement at roberts on the same floor that the missions wear room and the armory is.)
The light of a new day was just starting to break when Brian and Michael arrived with Robert, and Angus brought in Nigel. It had been a very long night, with some huge triumphs and some huge problems, and it was still very busy. Kate was already back at the farm, and she was in the master bedroom, opening the bed and making the room ready. Brian and Michael took Robert straight to his room.
With Gabe and Mira in charge and several of the Paris workers there, Kate's kitchen was busy, of course, and it smelled divine. Mira and Gabe had coffee and tea on, and they were fixing their own pre-dawn Americanized version of a full English breakfast for everyone. Gabe was stirring a large cast iron skillet full of scrambled eggs, and managing second one of bacon and sausage. Mira was churning out a large stack of waffles on Angus's commercial sized waffle iron brought over from the estate kitchen, and she was warming a saucepan full of cinnamon maple syrup. Mira had gotten to love waffles from the years she and Gabe had spent in America, and so she was fixing the sweet breakfast staple, and she was making an enormous platter of them, enough to feed an army. Gabe had already turned out a large batch of chocolate raspberry scones, with some freshly made bowl of mixed berry compote to put on the scones, and he had made a huge fruit salad and a massive platter of fried potatoes with onions.
Workers from Paris had set up the sideboard with enchanted warming and cooling trays to keep hot things hot and cold things cold. The Paris staff were bringing extra plates, glasses, mugs, napkins and silverware from Brian's estate, and they were setting out large pitchers of orange juice.
Kate had sent additional workers scurrying to freshen up all the bedrooms at the farmhouse and to open up all the cabins at Brian's estate and make them ready as well because people were going to need to sleep when things settled down. If there was something Kate had mastered, it was making sure the needs were taken care of for the team and the organization.
Angus arrived with Nigel, and the smell of a huge breakfast smacked them right in the face when they apparated in. It made Angus's stomach growl loudly.
"Robert's room is this way," Angus said. "Not sure where my grandfather is yet." He took Nigel through to the central hallway, and Nigel noticed the library.
"He has quite a library," Nigel said.
"You don't know the half of it. It has four floors," Angus said.
"What?" Nigel asked. He took it upon himself to go through the french doors peak in looking up, and seeing the three floors going up and one more going down. "Now that is a bit obsessive even for a man like him," Nigel said. "Spectacular, though. I love books of all kinds. I could spend years in there. Remind me to check this out later."
"Of course," Angus said. Nigel followed him down the hall to Robert's room, and he found Kate, Brian and Michael there. Brian and Robert were working on trying to undress him carefully, without hurting him. Robert clearly did not look well at all and only somewhat alert.
"He's showing symptoms of traumatic shock," Brian told Nigel.
"Of course he is," Nigel said, not surprised in the least. "His burns are severe. Where is Edward?"
"Robert's added a small sickbay downstairs," Kate looked up at Brian as she put additional blankets and pillows out on the ottoman at the foot of the bed. "Remember the little room we used to use for mission wear? Robert converted it to a little sickbay. It's not very big, but it might serve the purpose until the main sickbay at your place can be restored and refreshed. I'm sending a big crew there straight after breakfast to take care of the fire damage and to put the main house to rights."
"Thank you," Brian said, grateful for her help, as always.
"Give me just a minute or two with him since I'm right here, and then I'll need to see the other one," Nigel said.
"Where do you need me, Kate?" Brian asked.
"Go see if you can help Jess at all til Nigel is free, and on the way, would you drop off Nigel's bag in the guest room beside the library, please?"
"Certainly," Brian said, taking Nigel's bag on the way out. Nigel took over Robert's care, and he used an Evanesco spell to simply get Robert undressed. Then he tucked him into bed.
"Leave me alone with him for just one moment, please," Nigel said wanting some of the confusion out of the room, sitting with Robert and wrapping his hands temporarily with layers of sterile gauze. Brian, Angus, and Michael left, but Kate had no desire to be moved from him.
"Nigel?" Robert looked up at him.
"You're dealing with hypovolemic shock, Mate," Nigel said, "but I'm right here. You're going to be alright...."
"My hands..."
"I'm not going to let you lose the use of your hands," Nigel said, starting to work to cast a spell to battle the traumatic shock. "I give you my word. After all, you're a fine surgeon, and if you're not here doing what you do, I'm going to have to come home and step up for you, now, aren't I? And I really don't want to have to do that. No offense, but your job stinks, my friend. There. That will help you feel better in a bit. Stay right here and have a bit of a rest. Sleep if you can." He reached in his bag and handed Kate a small bottle.
"Mix this in a liter of water. I suppose you could put it in some cups of tea if he likes that better, but get him to gradually drink the entire liter. He doesn't have to drink it straight down, but it will help him feel better. He can sip on it, but if you can get him to take it all in two or three hours, the better," he told her. "It will regulate some of the fluids and electrolytes he's missing now and help clear up the shock. That will help him clear his head and his thinking. It's the shock that has him a bit befuddled. Perfectly normal for the injuries he has. If the pain recurs or there's any change, let me know straight off. I'll be back to tend to his hands as soon as I can. For now, don't let anyone muck with them. Leave them alone. I wouldn't leave him entirely alone, though, not until he's more himself again. Someone should stay within earshot," She nodded. He picked up his medical bag and stepped out into the hall.
"Where's this sickbay?" Nigel asked.
"Come with me," Angus said, leading the way. "Do you know my grandfather?"
"Met him a couple of times at some Ministry balls and such. I know of his fame, and he knows of mine. We've exchanged some potions over the years, but we haven't ever been close," Nigel said, as Angus took him down the hallway, back into the library and down the stairs.
"Good God, what in the world does he have here?" Nigel exclaimed as they went through the basement floor of the library. Nigel could see steps still going down and down.
"Two more floors down," Angus said. They went down one more, and Nigel stopped, stunned by the massive potions lab.
"Doesn't he do anything on a small scale?"
"Not really," Angus said. "There are some sound reasons for it, though. One more to go." Angus took him down to the bottom level, where workers were still bustling, the night's command post still in high gear. Nigel stopped short.
"What the devil is going on here? What have you gotten me into?" Nigel was almost angry now.
"We'll explain it later. Let me see if I can sum this up in a nutshell. Basically, we're a private squad of aurors who work for Robert, and this is entirely about stopping some of the worst criminals in the wizarding world that law enforcement hasn't been able to stop. When they can't handle the job, they call us."
"So you're telling me this is not criminal activity here?" Nigel asked.
"Not here. Certainly not. Do you think Robert would be some sort of criminal mastermind? Really?"
"Point taken," Nigel admitted, easing a bit.
"We're on the side of the ministries. We're the good guys, and this is all about finding and catching the bad guys and turning them over to the authorities"
"So does the ministry know you exist?"
"The ones that need to know, yes," Angus said.
"So, let me get this straight. Robert has his own private spy organization.'
"Sort of. Come on, I'll show you the sickbay." Angus took him to the back of the command room to an open door and the new sickbay. Jess was there with Edward, and Brian had just arrived, working on filling a basin with warm water. He got soap, a washcloth and a large towel, knowing as filthy as Edward was, cleaning him up was going to have to be part of it.
Nigel said nothing to the woman who was providing life support to Edward. She had made it very clear she didn't want any conversation anyway. Nigel thought she had been rude down in the catacombs when all he had done was to tell her his first name. He still didn't know hers, and now, honestly, he didn't care. They had clearly gotten off on the wrong foot. He hadn't liked what he felt was an air of superiority on her part back in Derby, so he was simply going to treat her like any other professional. She was a healer, a professional, and he was going to treat her as such.
He didn't speak, but instead he cast an Evanesco to remove Edward's filthy clothing, and Brian started working on cleaning Edward up and healing small bruises and cuts as he went. As for Nigel, he set some of his own stabilizing spells in place to boost the woman's efforts. Then he started casting counter curse spells.
"What's wrong with him?" Angus asked. Nigel looked up at him.
"He's been mistreated, and he's either lost a fight of some sort or they beat him. The biggest issue is that he's been struck with several dark curses. I can remove them, but he is still going to have a bit of a recovery ahead of him to regain his strength."
"But he's going to be alright, right?" Angus asked.
"It's looking better, but I'll know more once I see how he responds to the counter curses." He looked at the woman, all business. "Good job. Thank you. You can discontinue your life support now. I've got him."
by 
