Note: It's another filler chapter...sort of. Something important does happen! I'm just not saying which bit that is!

In other news I've an extremely busy week ahead of me, I've got work for at least 2 days, a lot of music to learn on the piano, a cinema trip and a wedding to attend! So, I doubt I'll be writing much! Sorry about that! :-)

Disclaimer: I do not own Harry Potter.

11: The Prospect of Existence

They stood in a huddle at the bottom of the stairs, watching the mediwitch's descent of the steps in grim silence.

Teddy, Carrie thought, looked somewhat flustered, having been summoned back to his parents' house midway through doing battle with the Ministry's latest set of agility tests, his cadet robes muddy and his face damp with sweat.

He looked rather refreshed, mind you, compared to his mother stood beside him, robes dusty from explosions of rock, mousy hair ruffled and leggings shredded to reveal deep grazes upon her knees. She stood barefoot, having yanked her steadily swelling ankle free from the suffocating confides of her boots, and she leant heavily against the wall, shoulders slumped and arms hugging her middle.

The mediwitch was a certain Healer Fenswick who had arrived at the door some twenty minutes earlier, having been summoned by Ron whilst Harry had deposited Remus upstairs and Dora had, despite protests, hobbled up to the bathroom to retrieve a basin of water and a flannel with which to wash the blood and bile from the werewolf's face. Ron had disappeared off to the Ministry in search of Teddy having flooed St. Mungo's, and Dora had wasted little time in bundling Harry into the fireplace after him.

Teddy had arrived within half an hour, breathless and muddy, and Healer Fenswick had arrived some five minutes later. She had taken one look at the state of Dora, opened her mouth to comment, only for the Auror to inform her flatly:

"He's upstairs in bed."

The healer had tutted rather disapprovingly before ascending the stairs, leaving Dora, Teddy and Carrie to wait in the hallway.

"Is there somewhere we could talk, Mrs. Lupin?" Fenswick had inquired once she had reached the bottom of the stairs. "In private, perhaps?"

Dora had pursed her lips together thoughtfully, before deciding:

"We don't really do private, Healer Fenswick. Not in this house...not anymore."

"I see." Fenswick said, sounding rather approving. "The sitting room then, is it?"

"Yes, this way." Teddy offered, gesturing towards the room in question. "Do take a seat..."

They all shuffled into the room and took a seat. Despite her fatigue, Dora sat straight and rigid in her seat, injured leg stretched out in front of her and her hands folded unnaturally formally in her lap.

"First of all," Fenswick began once she had taken a seat in the armchair, her voice suddenly growing soft. "I'm afraid I must tell you, Mrs. Lupin, that the symptoms your husband has described suffering this afternoon are by no means common when suffering from Lycanthropic Cerebral Moriosis."

"They're not...?"

"No. In fact I'd go as far as to say that there is no connection at all, that these symptoms are an indication of another condition entirely."

"Another condition?"

"I'm afraid so."

"He's contracted...a second condition?"

"It's not unusual, Mrs. Lupin. His immune system may well have been weakened by his initial illness. Picking up an infection or virus is a very likely risk."

Numbly, Carrie turned in her seat to gage Teddy's reaction, and found her husband appeared to be staring at his feet despairingly.

Dora, however, was still sat rigid, expression utterly stoic.

"And what is this...this second condition?" the Auror asked, giving her head a little shake as if to bolster her composure.

"The most common cause for such sudden occurrences, I would say," the healer explained, "are often something the patient has ingested. An ingredient from a potion, perhaps? Has your husband been taking any different or new potions, or potions from a different apothecary? Or perhaps he has been taking extra doses? Pain medication, perhaps. I suggest you attempt to limit the number of potions he drinks. Make sure he consumes lots of water, regular meals even if he loses his appetite!He must keep his strength up! If the symptoms grow worse within the next few days be sure to contact the hospital. One can lose a worrying amount of blood in that amount of time. If it continues we may well decide to admit him..."

After concluding her instructions and insisting on rummaging around in her small medical bag that appeared to hold an entire pharmacy's worth of potions and medicine, Healer Fenswick presented Dora with a tube of cream. As the healer headed for the fireplace, Dora squinted down at the tube, wondering:
"What am I supposed to do with this?"

"It's for your ankle." the lime green clad witch informed her as she reached to scoop up a handful of floo powder. "Can't go wandering around with it swollen up like a balloon now, can you? Not when you've that insufferable Albanian woman to put in her place!" And with that, she disappeared in a burst of emerald flame.

Dora took a long moment to scowl at the little tube, before shoving it into her pocket and mumbling:

"Stick the kettle on, won't you Teddy love?"

And with that, she rose stiffly to her feet and limped off towards the stairs.

Tears caught Carrie just a few minutes later, once Teddy had shuffled off to mindlessly make tea, and after a while the muggle wandered upstairs to the bathroom so that she could splash her face with water, staring at herself in the mirror above the sink and command herself to be composed.

Except it wasn't fair. None of it was fair. Why? Why did life have to be so unashamedly cruel?

She paused upon the landing on her way back downstairs at the sound of a soft thump coming from inside the master bedroom, and for a moment she felt panic seize her as she hurriedly went to peer through the gap in the door...

Only to spot Dora, having just collapsed spread-eagle upon the bed beside Remus who was lying motionlessly, staring up at the ceiling.

"Strike me down!" the witch moaned, face contorting despairingly. "I wish I were dying!" And the werewolf reached a blind arm sideways, fingers probing until he could press a hand to her cheek.

"Don't say that." Carrie heard him whisper hoarsely, fingers scuffing her skin soothingly. "Don't you ever say that."

Dora sighed heavily, leaning into his hand for a long moment before rolling carefully onto her side until she could reach to slide an arm across his chest, leaning to press her lips to his temple.

"I'd do it, you know." she whispered into his ear, forehead pressed to the side of his head as he allowed his eyes to flutter closed. "I'd swap with you, my love. In a heartbeat I would."

"Shh..."

"I'd do anything for you, you know. It's true. I thought about it today, in the arena. I shook hands with the Swiss captain, we shared a friendly word or two and I've written to him before, I like him, he's a decent sort of man and I...and I watched him running with that flag and I thought I'd trip him with a spell...only I thought of you and I thought of...of that money and I didn't want to risk him getting up again! So I snapped his leg! I...I snapped his bloody leg and they...they had to lift him out on a...on a bloody stretcher! And I thought...I thought to myself what if it were different, what if it was a real fight...I'd...I'd have killed him for you, I swear it! I think...I think I hate myself for it...I'm...I'm turning into a monster..."

Remus reached to slide an arm underneath her until he could pull her closer against his side, taking a turn at sighing himself.

"Well then," the werewolf murmured, "that would make two of us."

For a long moment the two were silent, she burying her face in the crook of his neck, and after a long moment of silent contemplation of their increasingly poor circumstances, Dora mused:

"It's gone pretty well, I think. You and me. Us."

Remus' grip upon her tightened, but he remained silent.

"It'll never last! It won't work!" Dora chuckled, reaching to trace an absentminded finger across his cheek. "People were always telling me that...telling me how utterly doomed our marriage was...how it was some...some silly whim, that I didn't realise what I was doing...you're so young and stupid! You'll regret it all one of these days! But they were all wrong, every one of them. If I could I'd do it all again! I wouldn't change any of it...none of it at all!"

"You make it sound as if it were over already." Remus observed, fingers toying with the buttons upon her top. "It isn't, you know. Not for you. Not for a long, long time yet."

Dora gave another chuckle that sent a shiver down Carrie's spine.

"Oh no," the witch murmured, cupping his face in her hand as she leant to press their foreheads together, staring at him intently. "There's no life after you, Sweetheart..."

Remus opened his mouth to make some form of protest, but she silenced him with a thumb across his lips as she insisted: "Because I have no desire to have one."

Carrie felt quite frightened by this as a notion, and indeed Remus' expression grew deeply, deeply troubled.

"Don't say that." he pleaded somewhat half-heartedly as if he thought it something of a lost cause, and Dora leant to press a kiss to his lips, suddenly grinning.

"We're not talking suicide, you know." she informed him frankly as if she thought such a thing was quite laughable as a plan of action. "As melodramatic and romantic a notion that is! Dying is not a necessary step to end a life, is it? That's what you told me, when you came back from Greyback's pack. There's living, you said, and then there is simply existing."

"I believe I also told you that simply existing wasn't much good..."

"...for a young witch like you. But I'm not young anymore, Remus. I'm well into being middle-aged and I've lived plenty enough. With you."

It was at that moment that Carrie heard movement upon the stairs and she turned to see Teddy carefully levitating a tray of tea up the steps. She offered him a ghost of a smile and as he came to a halt upon the landing beside her he leant to press a kiss to the top of her head.

"I'll apparate you over to fetch Imogen before I head back to the Ministry if you like." he suggested as he leant to tap upon his parents' bedroom door. "Save you taking a bus." When neither Remus nor Dora responded to his tapping, he called: "I've made tea!"

"I think they're having a rather serious talk." Carrie informed him under her breath, and he puffed his cheeks and admitted:

"Well I'd be worried if they didn't...hey! Do you want a cup or not?"

"Cheers, love." Dora finally called, and Teddy reached to push the door open to find both parents in the process of sitting up. The tray came to hover just before them and they both selected a mug of tea, murmuring gratefully.

Teddy eyed the pair of them for a long moment as he left the tray to set itself down upon a bedside table, before asking his mother:

"I'll track Jasmine and the others down before my case study talk, shall I? Tell them you're skipping the press conference this evening..."

"She'll be there." Remus interrupted, casting a sideways glance at his wife as if daring her to claim otherwise, and when Dora merely became preoccupied with extracting the tube of cream from her pocket to stop it digging into her hip, Teddy frowned a little but agreed:

"Alright then."

Remus abandoned his tea upon the bedside table in favour of picking up the tube of cream to examine, and Dora raised her leg to wave her swollen ankle around in explanation.

"You had better come for dinner." Remus suggested to the couple in the doorway as he unscrewed the lid and squirted a generous amount of the grey-tinged substance into his palm. As he shuffled down towards the end of the bed so that he could set about smearing the cream over Dora's ankle, he said: "George is staying until Dora gets back from the Ministry. We'll all sit and listen to the interviews on the wireless."

Dora's face contorted as she groaned, either from exasperation at such a prospect or in discomfort as Remus rubbed the cream into the swelling, Carrie wasn't quite sure which. The former made Carrie want to snigger a little and she felt satisfied to agree:

"That sounds like a plan."

Carrie sat upon the sofa in Remus and Dora's sitting room that evening, sandwiched between Teddy and George, Imogen sat fidgeting upon Remus' lap as the werewolf sat in the armchair, listening to the crackling wireless broadcast. The room was warm and Carrie felt drowsy after such a long and tiring day. She found she wasn't really listening to the crackling conversations much at all, and was just dosing off to sleep when she heard Dora's voice and was jolted awake.

"It was a risky tactic, wasn't it?" the interviewer was intoning dramatically. "A very, very risky tactic, wouldn't you say?"

"Oh yeah," Jasmine Wickes' voice agreed, sounding her usual blasé self. "Of course it was! Don't try it at home, boys and girls!"

"Indeed, and it didn't quite go to plan, did it Tonks?"

"It went well enough." Dora said, her first proper words throughout the whole exchange, where she had seemingly been content to simply agree: hmm.

"That was a rather nasty fall you suffered, just a few minutes in, wasn't it?"

"Mm."

"What was going through your head, when you hit the floor?"

"Apart from the pain? I thought of the Four Cs."

"And what are those?"

"Curse, Curl, Count and Courage. If it hurts, don't be afraid to shout and curse. Let it all out and you'll feel better for it. Curl yourself into a ball and protect the injured area. Take a moment to count to three to calm yourself down. Remind yourself of the importance of courage in the face of a new weakness."

"And did it work?"

"Not really. I'd only counted to two before I got dragged up off the floor."

The rest of the British team laughed and Burton Hayes admitted:

"I've never thought much of the Four Cs. Quite frankly when you're in any sort of danger you rarely have the time to sit and count to three, let alone contemplate the need for courage."

The rest of the team murmured agreement and Dora recalled:

"We don't bother teaching that to the cadets, these days."

"What do you teach instead?" the interviewer asked, and Dora recited:

"Shut up, get up and fight harder."

"That sounds rather like something the late Alastor Moody would say." the interviewer observed brightly, but Dora muttered:

"Not really, it's not nearly harsh enough."

At this, George slumped back in his seat in amusement and Remus reached to pass a hand across his eyes, muttering:

"Oh Dora..."

"She's a wonderfully miserable git when she fancies it, isn't she?" George observed, and Remus admitted:

"She won't pretend to be proud. She's much too ashamed of the whole business."

"They need to stop talking about Mad-Eye." Teddy grumbled, reaching to slide an arm around Carrie's shoulders. "The whole contest goes against everything he believed in, it winds Mum up..."

"She best not lose her temper," Remus mumbled as Imogen turned a page in the picture book she was examining intently. "They'll only use it as fuel in the papers, make her as angry and bitter as Luga, make the two of them the rivalry of the century. She'd loathe that, she really would..."

Talk turned to Albert Diggory's explosive escape attempt and for a while Dora said very little, until once again the interviewer decided to pose another question, this one far trickier than the ones before it:

"There have been rumours, Tonks, I'm sure you've heard of them, regarding your health..."

Carrie squeezed her eyes shut as she felt Teddy's arm tighten around her.

"Mm..." Dora agreed vaguely, and Jasmine instantly insisted:

"Pack of lies! Really, it's all completely..."

"Indeed, but what about this afternoon? There are some people...who saw the match..."

"Who?" Jasmine asked, sounding instantly riled, only for Dora to reason calmly:

"People are always going to talk."

"Yes," the interviewer agreed, "and a few people do seem to think that you were somewhat distracted at times today..."

"Rubbish." Jasmine scoffed, only for the interviewer to insist on asking:

"What do you say to that, Tonks?"

There was a very long silence.

Carrie wondered precisely what Dora might say, how she might dodge this question, gloss seamlessly over the truth and carry on regardless as if nothing at all was wrong, as if all were well and...

"I'd say they were probably right." the Deputy Head of Aurors decided.

There was a rather shocked pause, before the interviewer said:

"I see..."

"I'd also agree that my health isn't quite what I wish it was." Dora admitted, sounding quite unconcerned to do so.

"Are you overworked?"

"Massively. At work and at home. By choice."
"And you have no intention of slowing down?"

"Not in during this lifetime, no."

"Goodness! A workaholic!"

"Somebody's got to be."

"Nevertheless, everybody is well enough and recovered, ready to flatten the opposition in the second round!"

The British duellers all murmured enthusiastic agreement and the interviewer exclaimed:

"There you have it, ladies and gents! You heard it here first! Now, we've had a flood of owls this afternoon, all from listeners positively dying to ask our champions questions! We're going to read a few of them out now, the first one is for you, Albert, and is from a Miss Elizabeth Brown!"

"Go ahead." Albert Diggory said, sounding quite delighted at the news.

"Elizabeth wants to know if there is a Mrs. Diggory!" the interviewer said, and the other Aurors all laughed.

"Oh!" Albert chuckled, sounding distinctly embarrassed. "Um...no. No, I'm not married..."

"But you have a girlfriend, right? Nice young man like you..."

"No, actually. I um...I don't much have time for girls really, thanks to work. We're supposed to be married to our job, you know? That's what Tonks tells us..."

"I see! That's a bit rich mind you, isn't it Tonks? Coming from somebody who's married herself!"

"I rather meant it metaphorically." Dora admitted, and the interviewer clapped his hands together and suggested:

"Well then, Albert! Now you've heard that you can get yourself a nice girl! I'm sure Miss Brown is glad to hear it!" As the Aurors all laughed again, the interviewer announced: "Our next question, from Mr. Nathan Oldwood, and he would like to hear from each of you: If you were to face one another in the arena, who would you least like to duel? Let's start with you, Jasmine!"

"Oooh..." Jasmine chuckled, "That's a tricky one. Because of course we all know one another, we fight together all the time so...taking one another by surprise wouldn't be easy...I guess I'd hate to duel Tonks because she taught me at least half of what I know. She qualified me, so...you know, she knows exactly what my strengths and weaknesses are..."

"I'd say the same, really." Albert admitted, and the interviewer laughed and exclaimed:

"Your former cadets fear you, Tonks!"

"Not nearly enough!" Dora joked, and the interviewer asked:

"And what about you, Xander? Which of your teammates would put you on edge?"

"Jasmine." Xander answered without any hesitation. "She's utterly wild and she terrifies me."

Burton Hayes jokingly suggested that Hale Grover was much too pretty and lacking in scars to be anything but a master at shielding charms, whilst Hale himself recalled his first practice duel with Xander that had left such a lasting impression upon the young man that the notion of the two of them truly fighting made him flinch.

"And last but not least, Tonks, who would have you running for the hills?"

"I think I'll say Bertie." Dora decided somewhat whimsically, "because I'm old enough to be his mother, he's quick as lightening and he likes to dangle people upside down by their ankles, which makes me nauseous. I'd not bother running for the hills, mind you. He'd only catch me up."

"There you have it!" exclaimed the interviewer as Dora's fellow Aurors positively howled with laughter, Jasmine muttering some joking jibe about fetching Dora her walking stick, "Sadly we've only time for one last question! And we've had countless owls asking about this, countless, countless owls! Tonks?"

"Mm?"

"Valbona Luga! Tell us what you think about her!"

There was a pause and Carrie watched Remus slump back in his chair with a sigh, before Dora spoke, her tone distinctly unimpressed.

"I think Ms. Luga is a very fine dueller." she summarized shortly. "I think the Albanian team are very fortunate to have her and that's about as far as my opinion of her goes."

"But what about what we've all been reading in the Daily Prophet? What about..."

"I could talk for hours about my opinion of recent articles in the Daily Prophet. Quite frankly I think whoever decided to publish them is an utter disgrace. I think the press should be ashamed to turn a competition designed to strengthen the bonds between the international wizarding community into some sort of hate-fuelled blood sport. I've fought in a war, thank you very much, and I have absolutely no intention of conducting another one in front of a cheering audience! It's distasteful and I highly disapprove of it. It offends everything we at the British Auror Department stand for, and offends me deeply on a personal level, too."

"Oh!" George exclaimed, clapping his hands together approvingly. "Let's hear them come back at that!"

Apparently, they discovered after a long pause, the interviewer had no idea how to do such a thing, for he hastily decided:

"Well, that's all we've got time for! Up next, we're going live to the Holyhead Harpies' home stadium to here what the state of play is at half-time, as the Harpies take on the Canons!"

"Merlin knows what'll be on the Prophet's front page tomorrow..." Remus murmured as he leant forward to press a kiss atop Imogen's head. "Up you get, Immy. Grandad needs a glass of water..."

Imogen slipped down from her grandfather's knee, picture book still clasped in her hands and as Remus heaved himself up onto his feet, Carrie stifled a yawn into her sleeve, head coming to rest against Teddy's shoulder.

"When is the second round, then?" the muggle wondered as Imogen tossed the book down onto the floor in order to skip after Remus out into the hallway.

"Not for a week, I don't think." Teddy recalled, smiling faintly. "I'll be able to come and watch, too. Isaac says we're all going...it's like some sort of school trip! Take note of duelling techniques..."

"TED!" Remus' voice called suddenly from out in the hallway, and in an instant both Teddy and George had leapt to their feet, Carrie just a moment after them.

They discovered the werewolf stood in the kitchen doorway, leaning heavily against the doorframe, both hands gripping hold of it tightly...

"Bed now, is it?" George suggested lightly as Teddy sidled past a staring Imogen to sling a steadying arm around his father.

Remus squeezed his eye shut, mouthing something inaudible, and George crossed to pull open the cupboard under the stairs.

"Where'd all the painkiller potions go?" he asked, pushing aside a bottle or two, only for Teddy to tell him:
"Mum poured them down the sink. Healer's orders."

Remus groaned, head bowed and teeth gritted, and George eyed him despairingly and muttered:

"Sweet Merlin..."

"Bed, Dad." Teddy decided, half-dragging the stumbling werewolf towards the stairs. "Before you pass out on me..."

"Come on, Immy!" Carrie called briskly, hurrying to usher the child into the kitchen. "You fetch a glass for me and we'll pour Grandad a nice cold glass of water!"

"I'll get the bedroom door." George decided, hurrying ahead of the staggering pair.

"If it's been hurting you should've said...you should've gone to bed before..." Teddy was complaining as they reached the stairs. "Look down, Dad. Look at the stairs..."
"I think there's three of them..."

"Step on the middle one."

"Ha..."

Carrie took a ridiculously long time running the tap to get the water to grow icy cold, and by the time she sent Imogen upstairs with the glass of water, following a little way behind her, Teddy and George had retreated back downstairs.

Carrie paused upon the stairs to listen dismally to George's complaints that a total lack of painkillers would leave Remus to get little if no sleep at all, before wandering slowly up after Imogen...

Her pace quickened abruptly at the distinct sound of somebody choking and half a second later Carrie burst into the bedroom, eyes darting frantically to the bed...

"Imogen!" she exclaimed, eyes wide in horror to find the little girl poised over the bed, having seemingly attempted to pour the glass of water down her spluttering grandfather's throat, leaving him doused in water, his face flushed from coughing. "What are you doing? For goodness sake!"

Imogen simply stared, seemingly unfazed by her blunder as her mother rushed forwards to snatch the glass from her hand, slamming it down upon the bedside table so that she could reach to push Remus up into a sitting position, upon which is slumped forward, coughing into his hands.

"I was helping Grandad." Imogen explained, not sounding in the least bit distressed, and at her tone Carrie turned to eye her curiously.

"'S...f...fine..." Remus managed to wheeze, slumping back against his pillows again, and as Carrie sighed heavily, shaking her head, Imogen simply smiled.