Chapter 1: It's Safe To Say You Dig The Backseat
The man ran down the dark alleyway. Feet pounded hard on stone, and his legs felt like they were falling off. Sweat rolled down his back and through his grimey clothes. Ludo Bagman was on the run.
He turned a corner and ran into a wire fence. Falling back on his hands, he felt his left wrist break. Dammit. Ludo took out his wand and fixed that problem in a hurry. Good as new. He took a few quick glances around the blackness and then blew the fence to pieces.
This particular street was full of boxes and sleeping bums. Ludo had spent many nights in quite the same squalor. He couldn't let that stop him, not now. He stood up and sprinted. Anyone of those hobos could be a goblin in disguise. Anyone of them could be waiting to kill him. However, no one made any bizarre movement to suggest such a thing.
He turned another corner and finally decided he had lost his pursuers. This would be as good a place as any to settle down and get some rest. Ludo collapsed on the street. Today had not been a good day. He had been hiding out in Liverpool, hoping to catch a ship out of the country. But they found him. A man with sharp features and eyes as deep as the sea spotted Ludo, and that was his cue to get the hell out of there. He bolted immediately, but the man had been right on top of him to the end. Ludo finally escaped inside a phonebooth and disapparated.
Now Ludo was exhausted. He had made it to London. The cold stone was cool on Bagman's aching body. His clothes stuck to his body from all the wetness, but he was in no mood to change them. Not now. Not after so much energy was already gone. Ludo had been on the run for over a year now. He was not a young man anymore, and his Quidditch days were far behind him. However, his new lifestyle had made him toned like he hadn't been in years. If there was one plus to this whole mess, that was it.
He decided to put up the effort to turn on his back, a much more comfortable position. The sky was blotted out by the light of the city. There was still a few stars visible though. Up there in that great blackness. The sky was his only comfort, his only constant. His life tore itself apart day after day after day. But that painting over his head never changed. Sure it was cloudy some days, and day turned to night, and night to day, but it was always there when he needed it the most.
His eyes grew heavy, and she popped into his head like she always did. That beautiful smile. Those dark eyes. Her blond hair. How Ludo missed her, but there was nothing for it. She was gone. Gone forever. If she could only see him now. He could sense his breathing becoming slower. Sleep came like a falcon that night. Fast and with a purpose.
The cottage was small and there she stood in front of him and smiling. She hugged him and whispered into his ear, "Ludo, I love you." Then it was gone and he was wretched out of his dream like a baby from its mother.
"Wake up! Wake up you fool!"
"What the blimey-" Ludo was being shaken awake by a haggerd looking man. A man who had seen much better days. "Geroff me!" and Ludo pushed the man off him. He reached for his wand, but it was gone.
"Shut up! Shut up! Do you realize how much danger we are in?"
That shut him up quickly. "What danger?"
"No time to explain, and keep your voice down." Even in the darkness the man looked worse for wear. His face was botched with scratches and his hair was disheveled. "Follow me if you want to live, and take this." The man threw Bagman back his wand. "If you see anybody or anything coming toward us you know what to do with that I would expect."
The man started moving slowly like a prowler. His graying hair in a mess and a trickle of blood running down his neck. Ludo fallowed him slowly. Could this be a trick? Why should he trust this man?
Ludo whispered, "Who are you?"
"Right now that doesn't matter, but I will say this. I know who you are Ludo Bagman, and I don't know why I am bothering to save your pathetic life."
Did this man think he could talk to him like that? But he still kept close behind. His dirty clothes and boots hanging loosely on his body. "Who is trying to attack us?"
"Wolves."
"Wolves! Wolves!? My royal English ass! You are lying!" Ludo exclaimed.
And with that, the beasts charged. One came howling out of a nearby alley. Its intelligent eyes fixed right on him. It opened its jowls and baired its green teeth with old blood draped on them like salad dressing. It looked hungry. Hungry for him. Two more jumped from the top of buildings to the narrow street below.
Ludo pointed his wand at the wolf coming for him and shouted a curse. He missed, unsurprisingly. The manwolf howled in amusement. Its prey so close. It leaned down to pounce. Its eyes, so full of the lust of the hunt, and the coming feeding frenzy. Then it was blown against the wall. Its body crumpled into a heap. Ludo's companion shot another blast at it and it layed still.
The other two mongrels were now circling the pair of them. "Go away you manbeasts!" The haggerd man next to Ludo shouted, almost laughing. "Are you really this hungry that you would feed on your own?"
The wolves answered with eager breathing. Indeed they were.
"Fine then. Ludo, raise your wand."
Ludo was too scared to though. He sat there tranfixed, unable to move. He was even having trouble moving his eyes from their position.
"Oh you great oaf!" The man shot a spell at the grey wolf. It dodged it easily, and the other wolf charged. It grabbed Ludo companion's right leg with its jaws, as Ludo collapsed onto the stone. He cowered there, not knowing at all what to do.
The man howled with laughter as he kicked the wolf off him and shot it with a spell. The beast flew through the air. Up, up, up it went. Over an unknown building.
With that, the last wolf charged, panting. It rammed into the man's chest, and stood on top him. Its paws on his shoulders. For awhile, they stared into eachother's eyes. Man versus wild. Then the dog acted, throwing it's opened jaws into the man's face.
The next instant, the dog was off the man. Ludo stood poised with his wand in his hands. The wolf stared at him with cachinnation in its eyes. It's muzzle dripping with crimson sludge. "Get out of here ya rancid creature!" The wolf did not move as Ludo lifted the man up next to him.
He looked even worse before, but the bite had not done much damage. "Tell your master, wolf, that Lupin will stop this. Tell him the war has just begun." With that Lupin started laughing. The dog scampered off with the damaged man ambling after, taking shots at its tail. Ludo stood there for a second and decided to race after as well. This had been quite the night.