(Edited)
Disclaimer: I own HP.
The trouble with writing is that it's literally always easier to just lie facedown on your floor and make inarticulate noises - idiopathicsmile (tumblr)
Sirius sat next to Arabella, massaging his temples.
"I need a drink." He muttered. "D'you have anything?"
Arabella scratched her arm absently. "Yeah, try the cabinets in the kitchen."
Sirius dragged himself there.
Dan, Remus and Severus had gone with Tonks to the place where the kids had been kidnapped, hoping to catch a trail of anything that might help them find the kids so they could trace it. Dan had considered going to the police in case they might notice something, but Tonks had decided against it, saying it'd be too risky.
Arabella stared longingly at the bottle that Sirius had set down on her coffee table. Sirius poured a glass for himself, sending a questioning look to Arabella. She shook her head, not wanting to risk anything at the moment. Swiping her thumb back and forth on her mobile screen, she anxiously waited for another message.
She nearly dropped her phone when it let out a loud beep, and she heard Sirius curse as he dropped the bottle in surprise.
stil no trace of em. v found sumthin tht mite help us track em but werent so sure. comin bak soon.
Sirius squinted at the screen, completely lost.
"What the fuck does that even say?" He brought his face closer to the mobile. "Does that spell 'something'?"
Arabella managed a tiny grin. "It's called typing in short form. Doesn't take as long to type."
Sirius wrinkled his nose. "All that beauty of grammar gone. Disgusting."
Arabella was about to retort something about her letting him stay at her house, so he had no right to diss her boyfriend, when her mobile let out another beep. Sirius didn't bother reading it this time.
Remus says 2 keep all alcohol bvrges away frm srius
Sirius did however catch 'Remus' and gave Arabella a bemused look.
"He can spell Remus fine?"
She grinned again and just shrugged, snatching the alcohol from the coffee table.
"He says to not give you any more of this," She said, swirling the liquid inside the bottle. "So I'm not gonna risk whatever you do when you're overly drunk."
He rolled his eyes. "I don't do anything. Really."
"Sure."
Sirius gave her a beseeching look. Arabella quirked an eyebrow.
"Sirius, I live with three teenagers. You don't honestly think that's going to work?"
He glared. He slipped a hair tie off his wrist and tied his curly hair back.
"I'm going to the garage, then."
Arabella smiled. "Alright."
He stood up, stretching his arms over his head and walking out, muttering something that Arabella made out to be something that involved 'pregnant', 'cranky' and 'hormones'.
She threw a couch cushion at him, and got a sheepish look in return.
Harry had been staring at the ceiling since the stranger who'd claimed to be Sirius' brother had left the room. Luna had tried to get his attention by calling out his name for the whole past half hour, but hadn't gotten any response.
Luna pressed her lips together, annoyance creeping up on her. It was bad enough she didn't like small spaces. She sighed.
"Harry?"
Still no response. Her eye twitched.
Not really thinking, she brought her face close to the bars in front of her and breathed out of her mouth. Loudly and hard. Harry's table creaked and skidded forward a few inches.
Harry squeaked.
"Luna?"
She blinked in surprise. "I didn't know I could do that."
"That was you?" Came Harry's indignant voice.
"I would say sorry, but you weren't listening."
Harry was silent again. Luna was thinking about calling him out again when he spoke up.
"Luna, is there a lock on the cage?"
Luna blinked and looked over the bars.
"I can't see one."
"Are you sitting on the floor of the cage or sitting on bars? Like, is it bars all around?"
"Bars all around - oh, there it is. The lock's at the bottom."
"Can you open it?"
"How?"
"You tell me."
"...Oh."
Luna swallowed and tried to push away her dislike for her 'powers', as Harry insisted on calling them and tried to concentrate on the air around her. Her face went blank.
"Harry, I don't know how to do this. I can feel the air, but-"
"Try pushing the air into the lock, Luna. Like, use it as a concentration point. Focus on it."
"Okay." Luna took in a breath. "Right, okay."
She tried again, concentrating on the air, gathering it again. Looking solely at the golden lock, she slowly pushed the concentrated air inside. She held it like, noticing she felt warmer than she had a minute ago.
Luna could barely hear Harry call her. She tried to listen, only to have some of the concentrated air slip away, so she blocked Harry out completely. She pushed harder, suddenly feeling desperate and very much wanting to get out of the cage, when there was finally, a loud click.
She smiled in triumph and sat back.
"I opened..."
Luna winced as she felt a steady pulse of pain from her head.
"...it."
She screwed her eyes shut and let her head fall onto the bars
"Luna?"
Predicting that she probably would've passed out due to the lack of practice or control she had - he'd passed out quite a couple of times when exercising himself - Harry tried to make himself as comfortable as he could against the table he was still strapped on.
He blew some of his hair away from his eyes.
"Well at least ya opened the lock."
She said the lock had been underneath her. How is she gonna get the door to open?
"Great."
Severus paced restlessly in front of Remus. Remus pulled a few strands of grass from his sitting position next to a tree. Tonks looked up as Dan walked towards them, holding lunch. Dan wordlessly passed the food around.
Severus didn't sit down, seeming content to keep pacing.
"What if we just try the normal police?" Dan finally suggested tiredly.
Tonks tilted her head. "How would they be able to help?"
"I don't know, it's just-" He swallowed his food down, "- they use dogs and have a way of tracking people with different stuff. We have their clothes, why don't we let dogs trace them?"
"Why don't we just use Sirius for that?"
Remus grimaced. "Could we not?"
Dan nodded. "I'm with Remus."
Tonks shrugged. "I'll have to ask for permission, 'cause we only try the normal police when we're desperate."
Dan scowled. "I'm desperate."
"Yeah, well, we can't just go up to them like that, there've been other cases too-"
They all whipped their heads towards the sound of a strangled cry, just realizing that they couldn't see Severus.
"Severus?"
They scrambled to their feet, Tonks and Remus taking out their wands. They heard muffled curses from between the trees, and Tonks ran towards a green flash, Dan running for the car.
Remus ran after Tonks at full speed after he'd made sure Dan had gotten into his car, and was now standing in the middle of trees, facing Tonks, a bloody Severus, and an equally bloodied up stranger. With a wand in his hand.
Severus was clutching his side, looking like he was trying to not look like he was in pain. Which he was clearly failing at, due to the amount of blood staining his pristine white shirt.
Honestly, it was surprising in itself that he was still on his feet.
Severus's attacker watched the three of them warily from a few feet away. After a few long seconds, the man ran towards Severus, moving faster than anyone Remus had seen before. Severus raised his wand in a half-hearted attempt to protect himself, only to have the attacker knee his already broken ribs, resulting in another strangled cry.
The man took hold of Severus's arm in a firm grip, causing Severus to scowl fiercely. Severus threw something away from himself, the same time the other man flashed Remus and Tonks a mean grin and threw a circular object towards them and disappeared with a bang.
The circular object, of course, had to be a smoke bomb. Which, apparently, they couldn't do anything about.
Trying to scramble through the smoke, they reached the place where Severus and his attacker had been, knowing they wouldn't see them. Remus grimaced at the drops and stains of blood around the area. Tonks furiously scanned the area.
"Where did he throw it? Sev threw something, we have to find it - aw, bloody Merlin, no."
"What happened, what-"
"He threw wands, Severus threw wands, he got 2 wands off of that guy - at least that's all I can find right now - and I stepped on one and now it's broken, kill me."
Remus scrambled to gather the broken pieces of the unfortunate wand. "Trace it! You can trace it, right?"
Tonks inhaled sharply. "Of course I can trace it, what do you take me f-"
Remus shoved both the wands in her hands, broken and intact.
"Trace them first, and then we'll decide what you really are, deal?"
"Fine."
This chapter is a bit shorter, as I've had a whole lot of new shit going on, with what secrets being revealed and well I'm not going into that.
I couldn't stop laughing at the 'took out their wands' part.
And then again at the 'a wand in his hand' part.
I could've written magic stick instead, but then I'd've never been able to finish this chapter.
Because, you know.
Somebody kill me.
Anyway.
Thanks go to HarryPMerlin and AliceEnchanted.