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Several minutes later Mikoto was half-wishing she had waited for an explanation from Regulus instead. She was going to have to have a discussion later with Sirius Black about the dangers of alcohol poisoning, if only to make sure he didn't kill Regulus with his ineptitude before she could find a way to send him back where he came from.

"... well, Regulus was going to end up under the table after we'd both spiked his drink a few times, and Zidane offered for us to spend the night up at the castle. We're almost there when this strange bug-thing Zidane called an oglop hops in the moat. The second there was a splash Regulus went from half unconscious to some sort of mad fit. He didn't seem to have any idea where he was or who we were. We had to chase him down, and we'e lucky Zidane had picked his pocket and confiscated his wand or someone might have been hurt. As it was, Zidane still accidentally set fire to a flower stall. The fire actually seemed to help, but Regulus passed out as soon as he calmed down. Zidane said a friend of his had a theater nearby and we ended up in a back room there to sleep it off. Now it's your turn... what the hell's happened to him?"

Mikoto just nodded slightly. The only part of it that surprised her at all was Zidane using magic, but then it had clearly been by accident. "Taking Regulus near the moat was a mistake. Any sufficiently large body of water can be a trigger issue." They'd learned that the hard way on one previous visit to Alexandria, and that trip they had the Magelets along to help prevent a panic attack. In an inebriated state the odds of a breakdown would be significantly greater.

"A what?" Sirius wished the betailed girl could just make simple sense.

"Sensory input that can cause or worsen a panic attack. It's understandable that the presence of a fire would help alleviate the condition. Aside from the light and warmth, I have been informed that inferi do not like fire."

Sirius could have sworn the temperature of the room dropped several degrees at the mention of those things. Inferi were undead horrors created by a level of dark magic that was still a few shades away from the horcrux that Regulus had mentioned the night before. "What do those have to do with any of this? How did Regulus get here, and why is he... Why did that happen? I just want a straight answer."

"In the late evening of November 23rd, 1979, your younger brother had your family's house elf transport him to a cave in order to steal a horcrux created by Tom Riddle. Were you aware of at least that much?"

"Yes." Regulus had managed to fill him in on that much the previous evening, and Sirius still thought his little brother was either a lot braver than he'd ever given him credit for, or absolutely bloody insane. Possibly both.

"The cave's location was on the seaside, and it contained a lake that was inhabited by a large number of Inferi. The locket was also protected by a toxic potion with several unpleasant properties. The Esuna I cast negated the substance so, unfortunately, I do not have a complete analysis of it. However, Regulus was able to give a report on its effects during his recovery." Mikoto stepped over to one of the silver wall panels and brought up a report on the substance on screen. She made certain it was in English for Sirius to read.

"Wait... he actually drank this?" Sirius asked, as he read over the description. "Did he know what it would do? Why would he... I mean, he had that damned house elf right there. I'd've ordered Kreacher to drink it."

Mikoto studied the older man calmly for a moment before replying. "Yes, he did, and he was already aware of the eventual effects. It would have been irrational to poison the House Elf. From what I have been informed, Kreacher was capable of escaping the anti-apparition wards around the cave. It was necessary that he remain lucid and without significant damage in order to take the locket away to be destroyed. Or at least that was the plan." After a second's consideration, she added, "Also I believe he would hex you just for making that suggestion, so I advise you not to do it again when he is present."

"And Kreacher just left him there?" Sirius blurted, still trying to wrap his mind around some of the implications of this.

"I believe he was under specific orders to do so, yes," Mikoto replied. Regulus had never said exactly what was said to the House Elf, but it seemed the most logical possibility to her. For whatever reason, Kreacher had felt obligated to leave. The details were, so far as Mikoto was concerned, irrelevant.

Noting that Sirius seemed to be in some state of confused shock she continued explanations. "One of the symptoms resulting from ingestion of that potion is extreme thirst, but a further enchantment renders almost all sources of liquid inaccessible. This is to force the weakened victim to attempt to drink from the surface of the lake, at which point they are attacked and killed by the inferi. Escape would have been extremely unlikely."

"But... he..." Sirius was still reduced to incoherence as he tried to understand. He'd guessed as of the night before that Regulus had gone to something he thought likely to kill him... but he hadn't know that he'd gone to something he'd believed was certain to do so... and that he'd actually planned it that way. "Why didn't he..." He couldn't finish the sentence, unable to immediately come up with a different plan.

"He wrote you a letter," Mikoto stated. There was no accusation in her tone, just simple statement of fact, but it hit Sirius like a slap to the face. Satisfied that this had put a quick end to any idiotic babbling, she turned back to the screen. "The inferi managed to inflict severe injuries before a random portal deposited Regulus in the Nexus. Again I lack complete records of the worst of them. It was necessary to use healing magic immediately and I did not at the time have a suitable recording device available. However, Valia Pira is capable of doing a reconstruction of the damage based upon the resulting scar tissue and the spells used." She took some note that Sirius had gone very pale at the latest medical records she had brought up on the screen, but at least he remained silent. "While I would hesitate to refer to anyone arriving in the Nexus with the kind of injuries he had 'lucky', he was fortunate in a few aspects. The extreme cold of the water, possibly meant to act as a preservative for the inferi in the lake, as well as the severe throat injury here... His core body temperature would have plummeted rapidly, bringing on a state of cardiac arrest before too much blood loss could occur. Such temperatures also lower metabolic rate, which would have helped reduce ischemic injury and other cellular damage due to hypoxia."

Sirius didn't recognize several of the words Mikoto was using at this point, but with the records she brought up he didn't need to understand all of them. No one survived injuries like that. And he still knew a few of the words... "You're saying... he was dead..?" None of this seemed possible.

Mikoto just tilted her head slightly before answering. "By your world's medical understanding at that time period, yes. Perhaps still so in your own time." At least on the Wizarding side of things, she didn't add... though she'd heard enough of the archaic nature of Regulus's home to suspect that the non-magical segment of the population would grasp the difference between clinical death and permanent death far sooner than their magical counterparts.

Sirius didn't know what to think. This wasn't right. Someone had to be mistaken somewhere. "There isn't any kind of magic that can bring back the dead."

"Death is not an on-off switch. There are stages, not all of which are irreversible... though I would not be surprised if they were still considered so in your world.

At that point, Sirius could only understand one thing. He needed to see Regulus. "Where is he?"

"I believe I told you earlier that he has obligations in Alexandria. You can find him at the White Mage clinic there." Mikoto watched with some internal bemusement as Sirius ran more than halfway down the hall before he seemed to recall that there was no easy way to walk out of the Desert Palace and that it would be necessary to use his PINpoint. After he was gone, she cleared the records from the computer screen and returned to her studies.
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