If you asked anyone, Andromeda Tonks was cool as a cucumber, and she prided herself on being no calmer and more collected than when under lots of pressure. This was why she was so good at her job, and why she loved it so much.
Andi (as she utterly refused to have anyone close to her refer to her by her full name) worked for the Aurors as a social worker for children. Her job was one of the tougher ones, as she was responsible for helping young muggle-born wizard children who needed to be removed from their homes before they turned eleven transition into the wizarding world, and vice versa (for squib kids).
She had seen the worst and most gruesome of everything, or so she thought - from kids who had accidentally killed their parents with accidental magic to squibs who couldn't fight back from their parents' magical abuse to frail children who had gone mad after realizing the existence of magic.
And she had fixed them all and given all those kids a better life.
But never, ever, ever, had Andi ever seen something as horrific as this particular case.
"I can't do this," said Andi, swallowing back vomit. She barely succeeded, plopping down into the chair her supervisor Dan Smith kept across from the desk in his office. Andi practically threw the parchments of the case file onto his desk.
Dan's mouth drew a thin, hard line across his weathered face. "I'm sorry Andi, but you're the best one for the job. We need someone who we know won't wimp out halfway through the case, and you're the best worker in the department."
Andi shook her head, pleading. "Dan, you know I've never backed down from a case before. I honestly don't think I can handle this one - it's too big, way too dark. I don't want to let this kid down after all she's been through, I absolutely cannot be assigned to this case,"
Apologetically, Dan picked the file folder back up off the desk. "Andi, I'm sorry, but we need you. I know you can handle this, you're the only one that can. We - she - needs you." He placed the file folder back into her hands as he rose and walked out of the room. "Good luck, Agent Tonks," he called back as he closed the door behind him. "You'll need it."
Andi breathed out, then in again, then out again. "I can do this," she said to herself out loud. "A child needs me." Her hands closed around the file folder.
"James and Lily Potters' child needs me,"
The first thing Andi noticed about the house she walked into was the smell. Among the stink of blood, vomit, feces and alcohol, it reeked strongly of death.
Andi swallowed, taking a deep breath to calm herself, which only resulted in her choking in a most undignified manner due to deeply inhaling the horrific stench.
One of her partners chuckled without much humour as he could as he patted her on the back to help her out. "Don't choke now, Agent," he mumbled, looking around the dim hallway. "We're all counting on you,"
She shot him a look. "But no pressure," she muttered. "Sorry," he said, looking away to examine some broken glass covered in blood that looked to be the remnants of an empty picture frame.
"Hey!" a voice called out from somewhere deep within the house. "We found the kid!"
Suddenly another agent came barrelling out from around a corner. "Agent Tonks?" He said, and Andi straightened up and swallowed her fear. "You're gonna want to see this," the Agent, who Andi recognized as the new guy, Agent Strauss, beckoned to her.
"Of course," Andi said, putting on her professional face.
Of course, since she was a metamorphmagus, this literally meant that her face transformed.
When working, she liked to stick to a professional look with shoulder length bobbed, soft brown hair, a thin yet soft figure, and rather feminine features that included kind, upturned eyes and a thick-lipped, perpetually smiling mouth. Andi had found that traumatized children often preferred the kind and motherly look, since this was usually what they craved in their lives.
"Let's go," she said, following in step behind Agent Strauss as she smoothly transformed in under a second, flanked by two other backup agents. The house was much deeper and bigger on the inside than it appeared from the outside, which Andi instantly assumed was a result of magic.
After what felt like an eternity of walking in silence, they stopped in front of a rickety looking door. Upon closer inspection, Andi noticed with disgust what looked like fingernail marks clawed into the lower half of the wood.
In her mind, Andi couldn't help but hear the tortured screams that must have accompanied the scratches. Looking around at the equally disgusted and terrified agents around her, Andi knew she was not alone in this thought. Fear tingled through her entire body. There was something about this house that was not quite right.
"The girl's in there," Strauss said quietly. "She won't look at or talk to anybody. She's so traumatized that she won't even try to run away, just shake uncontrollably. We know she can understand us because she will do as you ask, but we don't know if she cane even make sound,"
Andi nodded, taking this information in. "Do you think her vocal cords have been damaged?"
Strauss shook his head. "No, she was whimpering quietly to herself before she noticed us. I think she's just been beaten brutally for making noise."
"Alright," Andi said, smoothing her clothes down one more time. "I'm going in,"