Luna sighed and straightened her notes from the last excursion. She quickly made her way past the field of cubicles into her boss' corner office.
"Shut the door behind you, Lovegood," Charles Billiwig addressed her, looking as stern as he sounded. Only after the door was securely closed and Luna faced him again did he relax.
"Listen, Lovegood. You're the best field agent we've got. I need that. You get the best work, and you usually deliver quality. But lately, I haven't been able to publish what you've given me."
Luna was puzzled. Her last three assignments had been easy work; after her safari to track down the Gulloping Hexacorn, which had left her half-starved and sick with four different viruses, she had taken mostly light work.
The files landed with a thump on Billiwig's desk.
"Here, let's start from right after the Hexacorn mission - good work, by the way."
Luna blushed slightly, then opened the top file. She remembered it perfectly, having only written it last month.
"The Blibbering Humdinger, yes," Billiwig stated, half to himself. "You're the first in centuries to find one, and as far as we know, the first ever to observe a mating flight. Good work. My only problem is with the rating."
Luna flipped a few pages to the standard form to report the danger rating of a previously unknown creature. On it, she had clearly checked the selection for "XX: Harmless / may be domesticated."
"The Blibbering Humdinger is harmless, and it could definitely be domesticated, so I don't see a-"
"The problem, Lovegood, is that it doesn't deserve the second X! It's a bloody slug with wings! The only reason it isn't called the 'Snivelling Humdinger' is because Sirius Black trademarked 'snivelling' back in the seventies!"
Now Luna was appalled, so much so that her normally airy demeanor shattered. "Mr. Billiwig, are you telling me that you think this wonderful creature deserves a rating of... boring?"
"Exactly, Lovegood. Now, quick question before we move on. What was the first creature to ever receive a single X rating?"
Luna, as incensed as she was, didn't even take the time to think about her response. "The common Flobberworm, Mr. Billiwig. Because all it does is eat, spawn, and thicken bloody potions!"
Billiwig motioned to the next file on his desk. Luna didn't even both opening it, knowing its contents.
"The rare Brazilian Flobberworm isn't the same at all! Its whole life is dedicated to finding a Red Flutterby Bush, which is really quite sad because Red Flutterbys went extinct years ago, but still!"
"It's BORING, Lovegood! Those two I could let slide, just edit the ratings, but the next one..."
Luna flipped open the final file, revealing a full-page wizarding photograph of one of the world's worst horrors - Dementors. She had taken the assignment to jump back into her usual, death-defying work. Unfortunately, the Ministry had refused her access to Azkaban, so she had to rely on books, eyewitness accounts, and her own experience with the creatures.
"What about them, Billiwig? I know I didn't give the common Dementor too high of a rating," Luna spat.
Charles Billiwig settled back into his chair, knowing quite well that this confrontation coud cost him one of his best magizoologists.
"Lovegood, listen. The rating system isn't perfect, but it's what we've got, and it's what the people understand. We've had the Dementor in the book for the past two hundred editions, and I'll be damned if it ever received a rating under five X's. For ten years straight it's received its own special rating - six X's, flee on sight. So, Lovegood, can you tell me exactly, specifically, WHY it suddenly deserves only three?"
Luna paced in front of the desk, gearing up for her own rant.
"Billiwig, listen. You come from a time after Grindelwald, when the people were content to sit at home and listen to the wireless. That's fine. Back then, 'competent wizard' meant someone who could conjure a teaspoon. Skilled was somebody who didn't flee in fear from a werewolf, for Merlin's sake! But now, coming down from Voldemort, the people are alert. I haven't met anyone with a wand who can't cast a Patronus, and half of them received lessons from Harry bloody Potter himself!"
"Lovegoo-"
"Most of them have no problem casting Harry's new Patronus, the Dementor-killer! That simple fact is all that has the Dementors hiding away in Azkaban under Ministry rule - don't think that Scrimgeour scares them! Any competent wizard can handle a Dementor, and skilled wizards can kill a dozen! They don't deserve 'their own special rating' anymore - they deserve THREE BLOODY X'S!"
She sat down in the chair facing the desk with a huff. Billiwig was stunned at the sheer passion displayed by his calmest agent, and it took him a full minute to compose himself enough to simply speak.
"Lovegood... you're right, I guess."
Luna's jaw dropped. It was common knowledge in the office that Charles Billiwig the third, great-nephew of Sir Geoffrey Billiwig, the only magizoologist to ever have a creature named after him, never admitted that he was wrong. The rumour was that the agent that got him to do so received a thousand-Galleon bonus in their next paycheck.
"Goddammit, Lovegood, you're right. Even I can cast a Patronus nowadays, and I barely pick up a wand except to turn on the bloody Wireless. But we still can't give it the same rating as, say, an Ashwinder or a Doxy. How about a compromise - the Dementor gets four X's, and the bloody Flobberworms and Humdingers get two."
Luna smiled her usual dreamy smile. "That will work perfectly, Mr. Billiwig."
With that, she opened the door and walked back to her cubicle. Before she left the office, however, she was sure that she hear Billiwig mutter one last thing.
"Guess I'll have to pay that damn bonus after all."