"D-don't t-touch - don't touch m-me," Newt swatted at the mediwitch trying to unbutton his shirt. "D-don't --"
"Mr. Scamander," the mediwitch argued, "You've had a heart attack, we must examine --"
"Don't t-touch me, I s-say!"
"Newt!" Tina slipped around the mediwitch," Newt, you have to let them examine you. Just like you do with the creatures, you know? Very important examination, my love." She grappled with the buttons the mediwitch had been trying to do. "We've done this before, haven't we? When the griffon's talon got your shoulder, remember that time?"
"Y-yes," Newt nodded. He was still wincing from the tightness of his chest, the muscles felt like they were squeezing up. His eyes were closed.
"It's just like that," Tina said, and she slid the shirt back off his shoulders. Gods alive, why hadn't she gone into medicine herself instead of law enforcement? She could've treated him herself back in the briefcase and avoided all this trouble. Her eyes met the mediwitches and she nodded and they quickly switched places.
Newt braced himself when the mediwitch's hand dropped to his chest. Her palm was warmer than TIna's had been. "Bil-Biloxi's P-Pain Relieving H-Hot Cream?" he asked, sniffing the air.\
"Yes, sir."
"I - I was on an ad-advert for th-them once. In - in the forties. P-Paid for a new h-hippogriff p-paddock at - at Hogwarts w-with the proceeds," he stammered.
"I didn't know they'd been around so long," the mediwitch offered.
"F-founded i-in 1934," he said. "I - I knew - knew Lee B-Biloxi v-very well. He - he d-did good with that - that cream - though i-it was or-originally m-meant to be a - a stew."
"A stew?"
"H-horrible cook, horrible," Newt stammered.
The girl laughed and her hands disappeared from his chest and he opened his eyes.
"You're doing wonderfully, Newt," Tina said.
He looked down. The mediwitch had smeared a mixture of the cream and some purple goo all over him, and he recognized the goo as imaging elixir. She was getting the internal systems viewing goggles out of a bag.
Newt was torn between hating the contact and fascination with the goggles. They were top-of-the-line wizarding equipment that allowed the mediwitch to look inside his chest without opening it up. He'd fancied a pair for the briefcase, to use with the creatures, but the elixir was highly toxic to many of the creatures, and there was no telling which ones would be damaged and which wouldn't without doing a fair amount of testing and he hadn't the time yet. What a helpful contraption, though, he thought, watching as she unfolded all the bits and parts and pulled the headset on.
He closed his eyes again as she approached.
There was a whirr as the mediwitch turned on the goggles and Tina watched as she stared intently at Newt through them, coming closer and bending over to get a good look at his chest. Her head tilted this way and that, and she reached up to push some of the elixir around, getting a better angle by coming a bit more to the side than she'd originally put the elixir on. Newt flinched at every touch and he grappled for Tina's hand, squeezing it tightly.
"Nearly done," the mediwitch said, though her voice was less chipper than it had been when she'd started. "Well that's odd."
Tina's face paled. "What's odd?"
Newt opened his eyes, too. "N-never good wh-when someone s-says some-something's odd about your - your innards," he said.
Tina clutched his hand.
"It appears your artery is being periodically blocked by - by a stone."
"A stone?" Tina asked.
Newt shook his head, "It - it must be ischemic myocardial contracture."
Tina looked at him, "What?"
The mediwitch looked surprised, too.
"I - I had a - a uni-unicorn with m-myocardial ischemia, and it - it turned to - to stone." Newt explained. He looked at Tina. "R-remember the - the one w-we found in - in France, with N-Ned. She - she had this v-very thing. Ned and I - we - we did an op-operation to r-remove the st-stone - well, a b-blood clot r-really, it's just - just hardened com-completely to - to a - a rock - rock-like struct-structure is r-really all the d-difference. Its like - like having a p-pebble in -in the - the heart and -- very - very bad. Very bad. But s-she was a g-good unicorn," he added, nodding.
Tina hesitated - remembering what he was talking about.
"T-the h-heart s-stone is f-fatal in - in most - most cases."
There was a long silence.
Newt's eyes met Tina's.
Her face was completely pale.
"I - I'm sorry, I - I think I m-might be d-dying," he said matter-of-a-factly.
Tina shook her head, "Don't you bloody dare say that to me, ever again!"
Newt blinked rapidly, trying to keep their eyes locked. "If - if I do you'll - you'll have to see to my c-creatures --"
"Newton Artemis Fido Scamander --" Tina hissed, "Stop that right now. You are not dying. I will not allow you to die, you are not allowed!"
The mediwitch cleared her throat.
They both looked at her.
"It isn't myocardial ischemia... or heart stones. It only looked like a stone at first, but the better the look I got it - it almost looked like --"
"What?" Newt asked.
"What is it then?" Tina demanded.
The witch looked thoroughly confused. "It looks like it's a tiny dragon."
"Come again?" Tina said.
Newt grinned, "A - a tiny d-dragon, why I'll - I'll be!"
Tina gave him the Look.
"W-what? Teeny, h-how novel!" Newt said, "A h-heart dragon!"
"Is that a thing?"
"Ap-p-parrantly so!" Newt said, excitedly, "B-being dis-discovered this v-very moment, it seems! H-how exc-citing. Is there a w-way to - to let me s-see it m-myself? Where are my s-supp-supplies? T-Teeny could you pop into the c-case and fetch - fetch my - my book and p-pencils a-and --"
"Mr. Scamander have you been exposed to dragon pox recently?"
"N-no," he replied, "N-not that I kn-know of."
"How would dragon pox exposure lead to - to a heart dragon?" Tina demanded, looking between the mediwitch and Newt.
"The - the v-virus looks - looks like a - a dragon b-before it t-takes hold," Newt explained. "It - it looks like one wh-when it fir-first e-enters the b-blood s-stream."
Tina's eyes widened, "So he has dragon pox?"
"N-no, if it l-looks like a d-dragon th-then it hasn't b-broken apart y-yet," Newt said.
"It didn't particularly look like the virus cluster, but that's the only explanation I can think of," the mediwitch said, still confused looking.
"Oh e-even m-more b-brilliant! A g-good old f-fashioned m-mystery!"
"Wait, so is it an actual dragon or a virus?" Tina was confused.
Newt grinned, "We don't know u-until we l-look! B-but an an e-ex-excellent question! H-how do we take it out to ex-examine it?" he was positively glowing now, looking to the mediwitch.
She paused. "Well Mr. Scamander, we would actually rather recommend that we treat it medicinally, there are a number of muggle medicines as well as potions that we can make up, that will help to - destroy the - the infection."
"Destroy it?!" Newt said. "But it m-might be - be a d-dragon - a true dr-dragon, that i-is. We - we don't kn-know because I - I haven't any idea where I might've c-come into contract with - with the p-pox."
"Newt!" Tina snapped, "How would a bloody true dragon be inside your heart, are you mental? Who's ever heard of such a thing! A dragon growing in your chest!"
"N-no one's ever h-heard of the v-virus b-blocking an ar-artery, ei-either," he answered.
"How would it even get there? That is ridiculous, I've never heard --"
"I n-need to d-do a b-bit of re-research t-to answer th-that."
"No you need to get healed."
"We could surgically remove it," the mediwitch said. "That way we're not destroying it but you can still research it."
Newt's face lit up, "B-Brilliant!"
"Excuse me?" Tina turned on her. "He is not a muggle, you are not cutting him open."
"But the d-dragon, Teeny!"
"No. Absolutely not."
Remus woke on his back in a right knot of pain, his head pounding something awful and his first instinct was to reach out for Sirius.
It took several moments of feeling about before he realized that not only was the shaggy black dog not directly beside him, but he was an entire ocean away.
Remus sat up slowly, looking around.
A few feet away lay Bradley, a fresh cut oozing on the boy's forearm, but nothing too deep or terrible. He looked peaceful, asleep, his chest rising in falling, clad in a pair of blue and green plaid flannel pyjamas.
Transformations weren't as painful at that age, Remus remembered, and the boy was so protected from the opinions of cruel people that he didn't know to be horrified by being a werewolf. In fact, Bradley was always almost excited about it, the way he was excited about those comic books the day before. Remus hoped that Bradley wouldn't ever lose that innocent view of it.
Remus winced as he pushed himself up to his knees and then up to his feet and he staggered a bit as he moved, walking to the observatory door. He jiggled the handle. It was still locked. He sighed and pressed his face to the glass of the wide window, looking out.
Staring back at him was a barely-transparent Dougal, clutching what looked like an undone bowtie. The niffler was sniffing around, too, as were a couple moon calves, who were eating some of the grass that grew along the far edge of the small wood platform that ran along side the observatory window.
There was a squeaking sound and Remus looked over to see a bowtruckle working its way through the gap at the bottom of the door, just pulling his second leg through. "Hullo," Remus said. "Can you unlock the door?" The bowtruckle was tiny, he didn't know if it was only mature bowtruckles that undid locks or if they could at any age.
It didn't much matter, it seemed this was just the first of many bowtruckles and soon there was a small swarm of tiny bowtruckles inside the observatory. Remus watched them crawling about on the floor, then scrambling up and rushing off toward the magical forest behind him. He realized they were probably born of some of the trees right there in the observatory. He watched as they all made their way in a little line toward the forest behind him, making funny excited bowtruckle-ish noises.
Finally, he saw one that wasn't so tiny and he plucked it up gently. "Hey, excuse me, before you go off to your tree, could you unlock the door for me?"
It's leaf bobbled as it nodded and Remus was careful not to step on any of the other bowtruckles as he held this one up to the keyhole and it set to work. It took a couple minutes, but when it had finished, it's companions had all gone and the bowtruckle scrambled away very quickly when Remus put it down, running in the direction all the other bowtruckles had gone.
The door opened, Remus stepped onto the platform by the window to find a chair tipped over and --
He bent quickly and picked up Newt Scamander's wand just before the niffler bit it, shaking the pesky little creature off. Some golden star-shaped sparks flew out of the wand and the niffler's eyes widened as he tried at catching them, his little paws grabbing for them midair.
"Tina?" Remus called, nervous now. Why would Newt leave his wand there, of all places? And honestly it was so rare that any of these creatures - especially Dougal and the Niffler - be anywhere without Newt.
There was a tug on his arm and he looked down to find Dougal, arms raised asking to be picked up. Remus bent down and scooped the demiguise up and Dougal settled onto Remus's hip, wrapping his arms around Remus's torso. Remus could feel the nervousness in the creature's body, radiating out.
Suddenly, the lid of the briefcase opened and there was Tina Scamander's face. "Remus?" she hissed, keeping her voice low. "How did you get out of the observatory?"
"Bowtruckles," he answered. "Where is Newt?"
Tina took a deep breath. "Against my better judgement? He's - he's in surgery."
"Surgery?!" Remus asked. He nearly dropped the demiguise. "What do you mean he's in surgery?!"
Tina's face crunched up, "Oh Remus. I - I'll be down to explain shortly. We're at the hospital at the moment, though, and I can't just leave the waiting room." She paused. "Is Bradley alright?"
"Yeah, small cut, but nothing I can't clean up for him..."
"Thank you Remus," she said. Then, "Is that a bloody moon calf eating my geraniums?"
Remus turned about and saw the moon calf in question, snacking on the carefully tended garden in front of the small house. "Yeah... looks it. They're all over in here... I'll get them in their pen."
"Thank you, Remus," she looked exhausted.
"I'll get Bradley and we'll come sit with you after I get the calves away," Remus promised.
Tina nodded, grateful, and closed the briefcase.
Remus tucked Newt's wand into the holder where his own wand hung next to the door, swatting the niffler away. "You leave these wands alone, you know better." The niffler sat on her back haunches and her nose twitched as she stared up at Remus. She hesitated, then reached into her pouch and produced a small gold coin. She waved it at him. "I don't want your money," Remus answered, "You can't buy a wand off me." On a second though, he took Newt's wand and decided it would be safer to put it on the work bench in the little shed than it would be to leave it there, where the Niffler could clearly reach it.
He shooed the moon calf from the flowers in Tina's garden, and started herding them up, wincing with every step, and worrying as he went.