"Probation?" she asked in disbelief; the word tasted rancid on her tongue, but the idea was far worse.
"It's not my choice," Kingsley said under his breath, clearly trying to set an example for his seething subordinate, "You know that I'd never do something so ridiculous—"
"It is ridiculous!" Tonks interjected, unwilling to follow his soft-spoken lead.
"I'm sorry," Kingsley said, for what seemed to her to be the twentieth time in the conversation. He handed her a folder and walked back into the early morning activity of the ministry building.
Once he was gone, Tonks found that her anger was ebbing quickly into a thorough and overbearing sadness. All of the work she had put in at school, all of the training that she had fought through, had all come to this?
Only months away from qualifying as an auror, and she'd been put on probation.
All because of her stupid, useless, murderer of a cousin.
Of course, they'd been scathe to let her in in the first place – her background was questionable, and the Blacks were known for nothing if not being loyal to the family. It was with a grudging acceptance of wizarding law that Tonks had been allowed into the auror training program, and the escape of Sirius Black seemed to be all that Dolores Umbridge needed to deem her – she checked the folder quickly – "possibly if not probably associated with known public enemies."
It wasn't as though she'd seen the man once in the past thirteen years – she hadn't spoken a word to him since she was a mere eight years old. And yet, by reading the reassignment documents she had just been given, one might be led to believe that she had visited him frequently in prison, proclaimed her loyalty to his cause, and personally penned his biography.
She walked out of the building in a daze, half expecting to wake up; they couldn't possibly do this to her, not when she was so close to cashing in all those years of schooling and training . . .
Tonks stopped at a small muggle café a few blocks away from the Ministry. Coffee, she thought, would help. Coffee helping, she proceeded to think, was a myth that never seemed to lose its idealism in a time of crisis.
As she sat at a table set for two in the corner of the room, she opened the file that Kingsley had handed her. The reassignment papers. Not knowing what to expect, she skipped the righteous explanatory paragraph and delved into the details of her temporary placement.
She was hardly surprised to find that insult had been added to injury.
"Hogwarts," she scowled at no one in particular, "They're sending me to be a teacher's pet."
Author's Note: Okay, that took a decently ridiculous amount of time, length considered. This idea's been floating around in my brain for a while, so I figured that while I'm in a slump as far as my original writing goes, I might as well get it out.
Before you ask, no, I'm not planning on her having to be in some dumb, unlikely position (although this has started out rather dumb and unlikely in the first place). She'll probably have to work some bullocks security shift, or something of the like. I'll think on it.
Of course, we all know that the real job will be a rather distracting new professor getting in the way of her work.
What, you saw that coming?
Well, go on then. I'll have some fun with it, anyway.