Chapter 10: In which the Ministry appears (but Ron, Hermione and Harry do not)
They had arrived in an almighty hallway that Rolf recognised as being part of the Department for the Regulation and Control of Magical Creatures: Beast Division entrance. A very tiny grey haired wizard came out. He tripped over as he went on his too big robes and his glasses fell off his pointed nose. Refusing offers to help, he grabbed them off of the floor and put them on.
"Rolf Scamander?" The tiny wizard asked in a squeaky voice. Rolf looked up and shook the tiny wizard's hand. "Lovely to meet you. I'm Douglas Batterbeaton. I am dreadfully sorry that we didn't meet before but I was otherwise engaged. My sister caught splattergroit and unfortunately whilst taking care of her, our entire family caught it too. I'm fine now though. But these scars are from the splattergroit, not from anything else, I hasten to add!"
The little wizard laughed and the rest of the team did too. Rolf just stood there, looking bemused. He was not entire sure of what was going on.
"Nice to meet you Mr. Batterbeaton." Rolf smiled and held out his hand.
"Oh please, there is no need for such formalities. Everyone always calls me Beaton. Now all I need for you to do is fill in this paperwork and –," Beaton stopped in his tracks, and his mouth gaped wide open. "I'm sorry, Luna Lovegood?"
Luna looked away from the picture of the troll and the centaur dancing that she had been admiring.
"Hello?"
"Oh Merlin's trousers it is! Friend of the famous Harry Potter?"
"Yes, that's me I suppose. " She shook Beaton's hand. "Lovely to meet you."
"Oh it is an honour to meet you! I didn't realise that you were on this trip? Why, we could have had the press along if we'd known."
"I wasn't. Only my own particular new research began to coincide with Rolf's and so I decided to tag along. Nothing wrong with that, is there?"
Beaton shook his head enthusiastically and his hat fell off of his head, revealing a rather large bald patch on his grey haired head.
"Oh no, no, no. No trouble at all Miss Lovegood."
"Really?" Richard asked incredulously. He seemed to have managed to return to his usual pompous self. "Because I would have thought.."
"You said there were forms to fill in?" Janet cut in quickly. Beaton tore his eyes away from Luna and looked confused at Janet. Then he nodded his head.
"Oh yes, of course. Come this way."
Beaton led them through the large hallway and into a much smaller corridor. Rolf looked around and realised that Luna had remained behind, possibly to persuade Newt to hide under her cloak, rathen than clinging to the ceiling. They went into a very small room in which they all had to duck their heads slightly. The sign on the door read 'Douglas Batterbeaton, head of Beast Division.'
Beaton looked into the desks. The office was covered in pieces of paper, large structures of magical creatures and what appeared to be stuffed pixies in a jar on the desk. The desk itself was little with old bits of parchment, smashed ink bottles that had leaked all over the desk and old quills. There were also faded and burnt pictures of both family members of Beaton's and pictures of Beaton with various magical creatures. Beaton finally pulled out a large scrap of parchment and a quill that looked older than Beaton himself that sat on his desk.
"Right this is perfectly simple." Beaton said. "This is just the rudimentary paperwork to identify that you did find this creature and the classification that you have given it. I've already circled that for you because I think it's obvious from the scarring on Scamander's face to identify how dangerous the beast is. The rest should be arriving to my office in a matter of days and I'll pass it along to you."
Rolf pressed his hand to the scars on his face, most of which had not come from the beast, but from playing with Newt.
"Actually-, "Rolf began but Janet cut him short.
"So you want us to sign here then Beaton?"
Rolf looked confused at Janet but she was giving him a warning look that said quite clearly: Keep your mouth shut. Rolf had learnt, through years of experiencing his mother giving him the same look anytime he opened his mouth whenever they had company that he had to comply. So Rolf kept his mouth firmly closed.
"Oh yes," Beaton said and pointed to where he wanted them each to sign. Once Epinone, the last person to sign, had scrawled her signature, she handed it to Rolf and he filled in the rest.
"Right then," Beaton said happily once it was all done. "I look forward to hearing your findings in the conference in a few weeks. I trust that your report will be finished by then and ready for publishing."
Rolf nodded but the rest of the team looked confused. It was Richard who spoke first.
"Hold on. I thought the conference was tomorrow?"
"Hmm? Oh yes it was. However, the conference hall was accidentally torn down by a rather angry giant. Complete accident of course, one of our young trainees made him a little angry. It's a long story. However, it means that the conference has been delayed for at most a month. This shouldn't be too much of an inconvenience, should it?"
"No I shouldn't think so." Janet said and Beaton beamed at them all.
Suddenly a scream came from outside the door and Beaton ran off to find out what was going on. The rest of the team followed him, wands raised, to find out what was going on.
The scream had come from further than they had expected it to be. In fact it had come from the main entrance, where a young woman had noticed Luna Lovegood carrying a small dragon in her arms and had fainted. Luna had then hidden Newt by her cloak at this point to avoid others noticing but the team realised what had happened and lowered their wands. Only Beaton still looked nervous and almost yelped himself once Newt stuck his head out from behind the cloak.
"Oh my god it's a!" The entire team shushed Beaton. His voice dropped to a whisper. "Why is Luna Lovegood carrying a dragon?"
"It's a new species we think," Rolf explained. This did not seem to reassure Beaton at all, who was still staring at the little dragon, petrified. "He is almost harmless. Just gets carried away sometimes. Luna what is going on?"
Luna turned and smiled at them all.
"Hello everybody. Sorry, , this woman saw Newt and she understandably fainted. I think she'll be alright once she wakes up."
"That's very good, Miss Lovegood," Beaton said nervously, his eyes still fixed on the moving bundle underneath her cloak. "However, the Ministry has a strict 'no dragons' policy."
"Oh really? I didn't think it would be a problem since Rufus Scrimgeour was breeding them to make a huge army to defeat Voldermort. Or is it a new rule?"
"I'm sorry?" Beaton asked confused, looking around at the naturalists. Most of them just shrugged their shoulders. "Right. Well could we have it gone soon?"
"Of course. In fact, we'll go now and see Hermione."
""I don't think that would be-," Beaton began but Luna simply peered at him curiously.
"Right then. Don't worry Mr. Batterbeaton. Newt should soon be out of your hair."
With that, she consulted a board on the side and disappeared into a lift. Beaton looked a little lost and confused and looked at them all as to possibly get an explanation as to what was going on. They all just smiled at him and he shook his head and sighed.
"Shall we go back into your office, Beaton sir?" Janet suggested. "We could have a cup of tea and a biscuit. I think you need one."
Beaton nodded, resigned.
"That would be lovely, Mrs.?"
"Janet Corner sir. Please call me Janet. This way please."
Janet led him back the way they came, stopping a young assistant on the way and asking for tea. They all went and squashed themselves into Beaton's office again. Beaton nodded gratefully at the tea and pulled out a bottle of what looked like gin. He added it to his cup and drank it down very quickly.
"Scamander," Beaton said slowly. "Perhaps you could tell me exactly what happened in this trip of yours then?"
Rolf looked confused.
"I thought you read our report sir. We did send it to you."
Beaton nodded at this.
"Yes, I know Scamander. However, I feel as though you may have left out a rather large part of it. Do you know what I mean Scamander?"
Rolf was baffled but nodded his head anyway.
"I suppose I could tell it again. Do you want everything or things only related to the trip?"
"Everything."
So Rolf launched into a rather extensive and detailed overview of the trip. Twice, once during the Manticore attack and once during the discovery of the dragon egg, Beaton had to call for more tea. Once Rolf had reached the part about hatching the egg, however, Beaton had to stop him there and call for firewhiskey instead. Rolf re commenced and Beaton at the end of it, looked a little shell shocked.
"I see Scamander. So we have a new breed of dragon, then?"
"It appears that way sir?"
"So you decided to hatch it."
"Yes sir."
"I see." Beaton's look of shock was starting to wear off a little as the effects of the firewhiskey began to sink in. "So this dragon can talk you say?"
"Only to females, sir. All men can appear to hear is music."
"Fascinating," Beaton said. He closed his eyes and rubbed his nose.
"He's also very good poet," Janet offered. Beaton looked at her in confusion.
"So, Scamander what are you planning to do with this dragon?"
"Ah, now that I can't tell you."
"Why not?"
"Because it involves the transportation of magical creatures and I don't want to fill out all the paperwork."
"I see. So you simply want me to turn a blind eye to the creature?"
"That would be the best thing if you could, sir. Don't worry sir; soon he'll be out of your hair and area of jurisdiction."
"Fine Scamander. I'll trust you just this once. Just tell me one thing. When exactly do you plan to transport this creature?"
"The day after tomorrow sir."
"Right then. Oh look; here comes Miss Lovegood. What happened to her cloak?"
They looked and saw Luna, whose cloak indeed seemed to be gone, replace by a blackened singe on her neckline.
"I think Newt happened to it, sir." Rolf said cheerily. Beaton shook his head.
"Well then the less I know the better." Beaton shook his head. "I suppose this will be goodbye until the conference then, Scamander and the rest of you. Please don't do anything too stupid. It reflects on the department, you know
They all said their goodbyes and began to leave. Only Luna hung back a little.
"Mr. Beaton, I just wanted to give you this." She handed him a small potion bottle. "You seem to be having a small problem with Wrackspurts. Nothing to worry about, they're just making you a little dazed. Drink this and you'll be right as rain."
"Of course Miss Lovegood. Goodbye."
The whole team exited the Ministry through the toilets and said their goodbyes. Some went back into the building, some left to catch the train and Rolf and Luna started to amble along the streets until they reached a place in which they could disapparate from without causing a disturbance. Rolf told Luna the address, they both checked to see if Newt was okay, and then they both disapparated.