Who: Aberforth and Gaius Where: Rehab centre When: 27 July 1980 What: Gaius comes to interview Aberforth.
Rating: PG Status: In Progress
Gaius was beginning to wonder just how much more chaotic the rehabilitation centre could possibly get before there was too much work for him to handle. It was fortunate that there were Healers who could tend to the more mundane needs of the patients and most of them were spending the majority of their time confined to a windowless cell these days. He walked down the hallway on his way to meet one particular patient with whom he had not yet spoken, which was partially because he'd been busy and partially because he had certain reservations. This was Albus Dumbledore's own brother. If he was even half the wizard the late Headmaster had been, he was well-aware of the fact that he would have his work cut out for him.
With a courtesy knock on the door, Gaius turned the knob on the door and let himself into the room. He'd put Aberforth on a regiment of potions immediately after he arrived the previous week and he hoped that, if nothing else, he'd be sufficiently more subdued and perhaps a bit more open to verbal pursuasion. One could only hope.
"Hello, Mr Dumbledore," he said, closing the door behind him and waving the wards back into place. "I am Gaius Travers and I will be assisting you with your rehabilitation. How are you feeling this morning?"
Aberforth was sitting cross-legged on his bed again though he wasn't staring at the wall this time. Not that the wall had lost its fascination but he'd found something far more interesting. His beard.
He liked his beard. It was long and grey and fluffy. He hadn't known his beard could be fluffy. It was nice. And fluffy. And fun. He'd tried tying it into knots the previous day but that only made it not fluffy and he'd been very sad until the pretty mediwitch had helped him make it fluffy again. Today he'd decided to braid it. He thought that would be fun.
Of course braiding it had proven to be a challenge when his fingers wouldn't quite works the way he wanted them to and he'd gotten quite cross with them just before. They'd clearly seen the error of their ways and were now working much better as he looped the sections of his beard over and around and under and over and around and under...
He looked up and beamed when the door opened, expecting to see his pretty mediwitch. He wanted to show her the braid he'd been making. He thought she'd be very impressed. She was nice like that. But it wasn't his pretty meditwitch, it was a boring man. He frowned slightly at the name, feeling like he ought to know who Gaius Travers was but the knowledge eluded him and he didn't have the motivation to follow it. Not when he had a beard to braid!
"I'm feeling accomplished," he said with the sort of pride someone who is slightly drunk usually manages. He displayed his half-braided beard. He then gave Gaius a look that was meant to be stern but only really managed to be slightly loopy. "Now who are you and why are you making a ruckus in my room?"
From his position near the door, Gaius paused and stared with a somewhat incredulous expression at his patient. This was Dumbledore's brother? If he didn't know better, he'd guess that the man had been drinking far too much wine for his own good, but since they didn't offer their subjects wine or anything intoxicating along those lines (at least, even the potions they administered were not supposed to have quite that effect), he was simply confused -- how could one feel accomplished when he had been by himself in a room for this long?
"I have already introduced myself," he said after an additional moment or two to shake off his initial puzzlement. "You may call me Mr Travers. I apologise for leaving you to wait for quite so long, but it has been a busy month for the centre and I make my rounds as best I can." He trailed off again, brow furrowing as he glanced about the room and took the opportunity to reassure himself that his wand was still readily available within his pocket -- the man might be legitimately mental and Gaius had certainly never dealt with one of those before. "If I may ask, why are you feeling so accomplished? I cannot imagine there are many things for you to accomplish here, just yet."
Aberforth frowned and left off the braiding of his beard. "Travers. Travers. Travers," he mused. "I feel like I ought to know that name." He shrugged easily and returned to his braiding. It was important work after all. "I'm sure I did know it once but it's gone, gone, gone." He stopped braiding his beard again and looked mournful, a tear glimmering in one blue eye. "All gone. Nothing left but fuzz in my head." He cocked his head to one side and frown lightly. "I'm sure that's wrong but then again, it could be right. Who am I to know?"
His eyes widened almost comically and he displayed his half-braided beard. "Why, I've been doing this!" He beamed happily. "I tried to tie it in knots yesterday but made the most dreadful mess until that very pretty mediwitch came and helped me straighten it out. So today I decided to braid it." He chuckled, looking quite mischievous. "I had to have a few very stern words with my fingers before they'd work properly. They were being very naughty and not doing what I wanted them to do." He paused and his eyes widened as though a new thought had jut occurred to him. "Maybe they didn't. Maybe they had a better idea!" He looked down at his half-braided beard and frowned. "Oh dear," he said sadly. "Now I don't know how to undo this."
It took Gaius a moment to realize that he'd been staring again, this time with his mouth hanging slightly open. This had to be a mistake -- either he really was certifiable or perhaps there was something else going quite wrong, here. He'd had a talk with his fingers? That was not normal and he had certainly never seen or heard anything quite like this. Finally withdrawing his wand, Gaius muttered a spell that separated and unbraided the woven strands of Aberforth's beard. Maybe he would find it easier to focus now that he was not concerned with the mess he'd made.
"How often has your mediwitch been visiting you?" he asked, speaking slowly and as clearly as he could, lest he not be able to understand what he was saying to him. He trying to guage how often they'd been administering sedatives. He couldn't do anything with a patient who was too sedated to even think properly. "I think, perhaps, you should see a bit less of her."
Aberforth beamed when the braid in his beard was suddenly undone and he clapped his hands together with delight. "Oh, well done!" he crowed. "That was very clever of you. I wish I could do that. I would have to do it by hand and I'm sure I would have made the most dreadful mess of it." He patted his beard, smoothing it down so that it looked nice and neat again. He looked up again at Travers' question and frowned, trying to concentrate enough to answer. "Oh, goodness, I really don't know. Three or four times a day. It may be more. I can't remember." He tapped one long finger against the side of his head. "It's all fuzzy."
His eyes widened at the idea of not seeing his pretty little mediwitch as much and he actually pouted, an odd expression on a man his age to say the least. "Less? But... but... she's so pretty. And nice. And lovely. And... and... I'd be ever so lonely without her." His expression went from the pout to what could only be described as woebegone.
"Perhaps a bit of loneliness would do you some good," Gaius said, refraining from commenting on anything else regarding the man's beard or the fuzzy state of his mind. He was not entirely sure that the man's condition was any fault of theirs, but it could not hurt to alter his potions somewhat and see if it made any difference. As it was, Gaius was sure that Aberforth had been commited to the wrong sort of centre and to some extent, he was disappointed -- he had been expecting something entirely different, though it was possible that he simply also possessed his brother's... eccentricity.
"Are you normally like this, Mr Dumbledore?" He asked after a moment of perplexed silence. "Or is it strange for you to find you need to scold your fingers?"
Aberforth didn't like the idea of loneliness and he reverted to the pout again. He'd been lonely many, many times in his life and it wasn't nice. It was... lonely. He looked up at Travers at his question and frowned thoughtfully, still stroking his beard as though it was a live animal in need of soothing. That thought derailed him for a moment and he wondered what it would be like if his beard really was a live animal. Would it be friendly? Or scary? He hoped it wouldn't be scary. That wouldn't be nice at all, mostly because his beard was attached to him and he didn't think it would be too much fun to have somethng nasty actually attached to him.
Finally he remembered that he'd been asked a question and he had to think for a moment to remember what that question was. "No?" he said with a frown. "Or at least I don't think so. I don't remember ever doing that but then I don't remember much of anything right now so it's kind of hard to tell."
Furrowing his brows, Gaius considered his patient for a moment. It probably wasn't normal that he couldn't remember things, unless some one had been performing Obliviation without his knowledge and that would have been far more serious an issue than if he was simply over-medicated. "What exactly can you remember?" he asked, reaching up to stroke his own chin, perhaps unconsciously mimicking the man. "I mean to say, what is the last thing you remember before you were here?"
Aberforth frowned and patted his beard soothingly. If it was alive, it would probably like that and if it wasn't, well, he liked it. "Hmmm, I remember my pub being invaded by those idiot werewolves," he said thoughtfully. "Which really shouldn't have happened because it was very well warded." He fell silent as he poked at the fluffy fuzz in his mind. Images came and went, sometimes too fast to identify. Others lingered for a bit longer, like the one of Tabitha. He didn't mention that one. He didn't know why, it just seemed that he should talk about her. Very odd. Then an image of a large room full of people floated to the fore. "Oh! I was asked a lot of very silly questions by a lot of people whom my brother would take over his knee and paddle their backsides if he wasn't dead." He sniffed with disapproval then beamed. "And then I was here." He frowned. "It's possible there were things in between but they're gone... lost in the fluffy fuzz in here." He tapped the side of his head again.