Just because I've been asked more than once about this: Roxy is half-black; Aniya is Chinese; Kieran is white; Jo is Greek-French.


After she dropped Ruby off at Vic's and sent a letter to Lucy explaining the situation that she was currently in, Roxy Apparated straight over to Albus and Scorpius' flat, knocking loudly on the door and shouting their names through the mail slot.

"Will you stop that damnable shouting, young lady?" demanded the older woman who lived a few doors down. Roxy had seen her around the building before but had no idea what her name was—only that Albus said she complained all the time and about nearly everything under the sun that there was to complain about.

"Sorry, ma'am," she said brusquely, then turned back to the door and continued to bang her fist on the wooden surface, calling out, "Albus! Scorpius! Are you in there? Open the door—open the door right now if you don't mind! I need to tell you something rather important, so bloody open up, you pricks, or I'll start breaking the damn thing down myself!"

"Excuse me!" cried the old woman, now entirely outside of her personal living quarters. She glared at Roxy, putting her hands on her hips like a scolding mother who was disciplining a particularly naughty child. "You are in a public space right now, little girl, and I demand that you show some proper respect, do you hear me? Now, I pay good money for a place like this and I don't need little brats like you making so much noise all the time."

Roxy rolled her eyes, not bothering to even look at the old lady as she spoke. "Listen, I'm really busy here, okay? I'm just trying to get my stupid cousin to open the damn door and I will make just as much noise as I need to, so go back into your house and leave me the hell alone, why don't you? Mind your own bloody business."

"Well, I never!" the old woman declared loudly, placing her hand over her chest and giving Roxy a scandalised look. "I have half a mind to call the landlord up here—or—or an Auror! How would you like that, little miss, if I called an Auror in to arrest you for being a domestic disturbance? Because that's what happens to brats like you!"

"Hey, why don't you fuck off, lady? You can't really kick me out of here anyway, we both know that, and I'm busy. I need to—"

The door opened; Scorpius stuck his blond head out into the hallway, looking between Roxy and the old woman, who had gone completely red in the face from yelling.

"Er, hello?" he said in a confused tone, frowning at Roxy. "Hi, Mrs Griffiths." Scorpius nodded at his neighbour, who merely glared in response. "How is everything going today? Has your grandson recovered from Dragon Pox yet?"

"You tell that girl that she ought to shut up in a public space so decent people like me can enjoy their programmes. Why I couldn't hear a single word of the Cavine's Cauldron Show with all the noise this—this hooligan is making! And the nerve of her, the absolute language! Young people these days, no respect at all!"

"I was just trying to get him to open the door, dammit!" Roxy yelled back at her, knowing this was going to bring her any closer to bringing Aniya back but also feeling so full of rage about everything that has happened that she couldn't keep herself from letting the frustration and anger build up inside of her and blow all over the place.

"Okay, well this has a pretty easy solution, I'd say—that you two should just relax and Roxy can come inside with me and you, Mrs Griffiths, can go back to your wireless programmes peacefully okay? How does that sound?"

Roxy rolled her eyes, turning around just long enough to flip Mrs Griffiths off before pushing past Scorpius into his home, ignoring the horrified looks on the others' faces. She had more important things to focus on than acting maturely.

It was time for things to change. It was time to stop things from going any more horribly wrong than they already were. The Ministry had already taken Aniya from her, but they wouldn't get to steal any more children.

They would not get to ruin any more lives.


"So?" Albus asked, looking at Roxy, who was sitting on their couch with her arms crossed, a forlorn look in her eyes. "What exactly was so urgent that you had to have a shout with our elderly neighbour for no reason?"

"Trinh Itawa showed up on our street, somehow took over everyone's minds—perhaps some form of mass Imperio Curses, I'm not sure, though I don't think that's what it is—and then she stole Aniya right in front of me, Apparated off before I could stop them and—and I want her back!" Roxy's voice broke and she buried her face in her hands.

Albus moved to rub her gently on the back, murmuring comfortingly while Scorpius grabbed her a cup of water.

"Oh, Roxy, I can understand why you're upset and why you want to go after her, but we don't know where in the Ministry they've been taking these kids or if they're even keeping them anywhere in the Ministry at all. We need to figure out where they are before we go running around and storming into places without knowing what we're getting into."

"But she's my friend!" Roxy cried, pushing away the cup that Scorpius tried to hand her. "I can't wait forever—what if she dies because we do nothing?"

"Roxy, how can we save her if we don't even know where she is?" Scorpius asked quietly. "They'll catch on soon enough if we break into the wrong places—it can't be kept a secret forever, you know that, Roxy."

Roxy shook her head, tears pooling in her eyes at the thought of never being able to see her friend again because they couldn't take risks just this once for the decency of saving Aniya from torture and brainwashing that may result in her death.

"She'll die, don't you realise that?" she sobbed, crying more than she had in quite a long time, even when her brother and father died. It was like several years of pent up emotion was all coming out at once. "If we don't do anything, then she'll die and I will lose a very good friend and then—and then—and then I don't know what I'll do!"

The two males shared uneasy looks, not sure how to make the situation better without outright lying to Roxy about the reality of the situation—that there was no way they could safely rescue Aniya and the other victims of Project Starkid without the proper information needed to find them.

But there was nothing that could be said, so they only stayed quiet; Scorpius offered her the cup of water but when she rejected it a second time, he shrugged and set the cup aside on the end table, wondering what to do.

"Roxy do you think that we could find a way to rescue her? Because unless you can give the Circle a place to look, I don't know that a whole lot of them will be crazy about doing something like this. It—it would be a suicide mission, trying to do something of this nature with absolutely no idea of what we'd be asking them to run into."

"What if I investigated where they take the victims? I could go by myself, not risk anyone else's life, and I could break into the Ministry or search around until I find out where they are and how to get them. Nobody else would have to be hurt."

"That could work," Scorpius said at the same time that Albus loudly told her, "Absolutely not, Roxy!"

They shared a look, both frowning in the direction of the other; Scorpius gave his husband a puzzled look, not sure why there was disagreement here. Why wasn't this an easy, smart solution to their problem?

"Al," he murmured in a low tone, craning his neck, "why can't we send just Roxy? I mean, it wouldn't draw much attention, would it? She could pretend to be visiting Molly or any number of your family members that works with the Ministry."

"No!" Albus insisted. He put a hand on Roxy, looking at her consolingly. "I don't mean to be derogatory or insulting but Roxy is one very small girl. What is she going to do if someone attacks her, huh? Sure, she can use magic, but what if they're larger and stronger and try to overpower Roxy? We aren't going to do anything that will risk her life?"

"Well, what do you want to do then, Albus? What grandiose decisions are we making for someone who is a nearly twenty year old woman? Can't she decide what she wants to do?" Scorpius directed his attention to Roxy. "Don't you love when people make decisions for you? Or do you want to stand up for yourself and start running the show?"

She shrugged. Roxy couldn't think clearly any more. All she wanted was to get Aniya to safety and she didn't care how they had to do it to bring her back.

"Okay, wait," Albus said, holding his hands up. "Roxy, how long ago did they actually take Aniya, just so I have an understanding of this whole situation?"

"Uh, a few hours ago," she admitted quietly. Roxy knew from the look on her cousin's face that he thought she was overreacting just a bit, so she tried to backtrack and explain herself. "I—I told you the thing about Mrs Itawa, right? How they torture the—the children they take and y-you saw the papers, the lists of names of all those people who are no longer alive? You remember all of that, don't you? So you understand how important it is that we rescue her? Because I don't want her to be another name on a list of people who died before their time."

"No, I understand it perfectly, Roxy, but that doesn't mean I am willing to risk your life by sending you alone on a mission like that."

Scorpius looked at him sharply, appearing cross. "Then what would you have us do? Send someone else along with her and risk their life as well?"

"That—no, that's not what I'm saying at all," Albus muttered, shaking his head wildly. "I don't want to risk anyone's life." He tightened his jaw, a dark look in his eyes. "I will go with Roxy myself. It will seem that much more reasonable because a lot of people at the Ministry will only ever see me as Harry Potter's younger son, so they'll assume I've come to see him. Besides, I'll be able to protect Roxy were anything to happen."

"What if something were to happen to you?" Scorpius demanded of his husband, frustratedly glaring at him. "I don't want to lose you, either. I don't want to lose you most of all of the members of the Circle. What would I ever do if I lost you?"

Albus gave him an uneasy smile that contained no real humour in it. "I suppose you would have to marry Reece instead."

"Can we go now?" Roxy asked, looking desperately at her cousin. "I don't want to wait too long in case they find out what we're doing and move everyone and I certainly don't want them to bring any harm to Aniya because we took too long."

"I don't see why we can't head over to the Ministry now," Albus muttered thoughtfully before standing up to locate his owl. His voice carried into the living room as he called back to them, "I'll write to Dad and tell him that Roxy and I want to pay him a visit. I'm sure Dad won't mind. He adores Roxy and I'm not obnoxious about Dad's job, unlike the other two, so I don't think he'll say no to our being there."

"I don't like this," Scorpius grumbled to Roxy, still cross. "Albus may find you to be not strong enough to take care of yourself, but I know you. You'll keep each other safe, won't you?"

Her eyes dropped to the floor, but Roxy knew she would have to say yes. Albus was her family and Weasleys always protected each other no matter what. Always.

So she nodded at Scorpius, who let out a heavy sigh, a great weight lifted from his chest. Roxy could not look in his direction, knowing that if she did, then she would start crying all over again, even if that didn't make any sense to do so.

They sat quietly, waiting for Albus to return; the only sounds were of traffic on the street outside and that of Roxy's own wildly beating heart. She heard, softly, the sound of Al and Scor's cat padding through another room out of sight, but other than that, the two only sat by each other, not saying a word.

"Okay, I've sent Cyrus off, so when either Dad or Ava send us a response, then we can head over there. Or..." He ran his hands through his hair, humming thoughtfully. "I suppose we could simply head over now and explain the situation ourselves." Albus glanced towards the window. "I didn't really need to send Cyrus, did I?"

"Not really, no" Scorpius replied, smiling gently. He got to his feet, moving over to where Albus was to give his husband a kiss. "I think it's cute how you never think these things out."

Roxy also stood up, looking at her cousin eagerly. They were going to rescue Aniya—they were finally going to do something, to take a stand against all of their seemingly endless enemies.

"Then we'll go now," Albus decided, reaching out to grab Roxy's hand. "Come on, we'll go the visitors way," he told her. "That means riding the Tube. I hope you don't get terribly sick in the underground. That'd be rather unfortunate and I don't have much for you to throw up into—and obviously we can't just charm it all away. So, er, try not to get sick, yeah?"

Roxy did not like the sound of that.


"Albus Potter and Roxanne Weasley, here to see Head Auror Harry Potter," Albus told the cool voice of the phone booth and then leant back as two metal name tags came rattling from the coin slot, bearing their names and the purpose of their visit. He handed Roxy's tag to her and clipped his own onto the front of his robes, giving her a small smile as the phone booth was heading to the Atrium. "Hold my hand," he told her and she quickly clutched onto him as the booth jolted then began to move downwards, out of sight of the muggle street.

Roxy would have probably fallen over if Albus wasn't holding her up, because this strange elevator shook and groaned every few seconds, sending her shoulder running towards the wall of the booth, bruising her skin.

"Careful there," warned Albus. "This damn thing is so old but no one ever bothers to fix it. I don't know what they'll do when the elevator breaks down for good, but as long as I'm not inside when it does, that's perfectly fine with me."

The booth stopped moving as suddenly as it started, sending Roxy careening against the far wall; the cool voice welcomed them to the Ministry and Roxy, still clutching her cousin's hands, quickly stepped out.

Albus led her past the front desk, where they had their wands checked by a disinterested Ministry official and then directed them towards the interior elevator with a bored drawl, looking like he'd rather be anywhere else.

"Okay, so we'll stop by my dad's office long enough to establish a presence and maybe see if there's any information to be found and then we'll sneak down to the Department of Mysteries and search around for either the kids themselves or any clues as to where they might be. But just keep in mind, Rox, the odds of us finding Aniya right away are rather slim, though we'll obviously try to stay optimistic about it all." Albus looked at her out of the corner of his eyes, watching the way she looked around the Atrium so seriously.

She nodded in response and they stepped onto the elevator.

Albus jabbed his wand at the button and the cool female voice returned, announcing that they were headed to the Department of Magical Law Enforcement. Thankfully, no one else was currently inside with them, so Albus was able to continue talking to Roxy as they moved from one floor to the next.

"Okay, so what we do know for certain is that over the past thirty years they have taken roughly, what seventy or so children? We know it started not long after the war ended, with amongst the first children to be, uh, "chosen" being, more often than not, the kids of those running Project Starkid. You know, it's as though… the people in charge of the project were all picked for their children or perhaps they themselves have the same strange abilities and either passed them along or trained their kids to do the same things as them."

Roxy remembered the way Trinh Itawa had stopped everyone on the street—including Roxy herself—and forced them to do as she commanded. It was likely that the man who had picked Aniya up was just as much under her power as anyone else. That had been more than any Imperius Curse was capable of, to be able to control so many people at once. Roxy had never seen anything like that happen in her life. It simply wasn't natural.

"Do you think they'd really want Aniya and her sisters because they were Legilimens? Couldn't anyone, in theory, train themselves to do the exact same thing? Why are they so special that the three of them have been taken to be tested on?"

"Department of Magical Law Enforcement," said the elevator and the doors opened to the sound of a jovially tinkling bell.

Before Albus stepped off the elevator, he frowned thoughtfully at Roxy, looking mildly worried. "Roxy, it's possible there's more to Aniya than we previously thought. There's' no telling why they took her and her sisters—except that it probably means they can do things that make them dangerous to you or I."


The Aurors office was rather busy, with people bustling around constantly. A board of the entirety of the United Kingdom hung on the wall with pins stuck in various places, blinking a spectrum of reds and oranges to mark the levels of dark magic that were currently being observed. Aurors were reviewing cases, going through possible leads, and conducting interviews with witnesses. No one seemed to have noticed the two newest occupants of the department's main floor.

"If it were my brother here, people would have noticed immediately and flocked to talk to him," said Albus, though he didn't sound bitter about it so much as merely accepting of a fact that he'd long ago decided could not be changed.

He shrugged and directed Roxy to follow after him to the receptionist's desk, waving cheerfully at the secretary when the man didn't immediately look up.

"Hi, I wanted to see if Harry Potter is here if you don't mind, " Albus told him politely; the receptionist didn't look up, too busy going through the papers on his desk to notice someone was speaking. "Uh, hi? Hello? I'm here to see Harry Potter—you know, the Head Auror? Can you—can you please listen to me? Hello?"

"Hey!" Roxy said loudly, hitting her hand on the table, which made the man jump and look up at her crossly. "We want to see Harry Potter so pay attention to us and tell us whether he's in his office or not! Don't they pay you to do something useful?"

"Sorry," the receptionist said, looking from Roxy to Albus. His eyes widened as he realised that it was Albus Potter standing in front of him, as the resemblance to his father was uncanny. "Oh, Mr Potter, my sincerest apologies, let me go get your father right away, sir." he got to his feet and hurried off towards the Head's office with a frantic look his face.

Roxy turned to look at her cousin with a pleased expression on her face. "See? Sometimes you just have to be forceful to get what you want."

He rolled his eyes before noticing that the Head's office had opened. Albus' expression brightened at the sight of his father walking over; the older Potter waved happily to his son and niece, though he seemed a bit perplexed by their presence.

"Couldn't we ask your dad about Project Starkid?" Roxy asked quietly of Albus. "I mean, even if he doesn't know anything about it, wouldn't telling hi to make sense so that he's at least aware that something so terrible is happening in the same building as him?"

Albus shrugged. "I suppose it couldn't hurt," he said just as Uncle Harry came up to them. The two Potters hugged briefly. "HI Dad. How's work going? Roxy and I just wanted to say hello."

"Hello, Albus, hello Roxy," Uncle Harry told them warmly, directing the two towards his office. "You know, I haven't seen any of you kids around the office in quite a long time, though you all used to come by rather frequently on weekends when I wasn't off doing missions. It's nice of you two to come see me again."

They sat down across from Uncle Harry, who took a moment to shift things around on his desk and finished clearing the area off before looking at them with a small smile, waving his hand to indicate that they could speak.

"So Roxy and I, er, we just wanted to stop by and, you know, see how you were doing and how work was going because, uh, I…" He looked over to Roxy with a frantic glance, not sure how to move forward without making a mess of things.

She sighed and gave her uncle the brightest smile she could manage. If he wasn't going to use some of his Gryffindor bravery, then Roxy was going to have some fun with the situation. "What Albus is trying to say is that he's started a new book about Aurors and dark magic but he was a bit worried to ask you for help since you're always so busy and he's not, as you're aware, the best at conducting conversations in a formal situation, which is why he brought me along to write everything down and generally help. Oh," she continued coyly, smirking at Albus, "and he also wanted to talk to maybe half a dozen of your officers of varying degrees of experience to find out their opinions of the job and working under you."

"Ah," replied Uncle Harry, running his hands through his hair. "Well, I don't see why that couldn't be arranged. And after Skeeter's book following my promotion, I think we here in the Auror's department could benefit from some more positive literature written about us."

Albus made a face at Roxy, but she only replied by silently giving him a sugary sweet smile, enjoying the discomfort on his face. It was funny, watching him squirm—but Roxy had to focus, had to keep on track so they could rescue Aniya.

Uncle Harry cleared his throat, turning his head ever so slightly to look out of the fake window that led to a false view of an empty field of grass, devoid of any signs of human life. He seemed to get lost looking outside for a few moments before coming back to his senses and focused his attention back on his son and niece.

"Were there any questions about my job that you wanted to ask me right now?" he asked, sounding tired, like the forty-nine years of his life were putting sudden weight into his seemingly innocuous question.

Aniya, Roxy thought to herself, frowning. We need to ask about Project Starkid, we need to talk to Uncle Harry, we need to warn him about what's going on before anything worse happens. Yet she said nothing as another, darker thought came to mind, telling her don't tell him, not yet, it isn't right, don't tell Uncle Harry, put it off if only for a few minutes, don't tell him yet.

Albus apparently did not seem to feel the same way as he leant forward, growing suddenly serious as he let out a heavy sigh. "Dad, listen, we actually came here for something just a bit more than writing a book or conducting a few interviews." He looked down at his hands before continuing, swallowing nervously. "You see, we have a friend by the name of Aniya Lamb—"

"As in Russell Lamb, who was arrested in 1998 up until 2006 for being a Death Eater? And the same Russell Lamb who was arrested a few years back for attempting to turn his own daughters into weapons? Would your friend Aniya happen to be one of these same daughters?"

"Er, yeah," Albus said, nodded, his head bobbing up and down. "She was kidnapped earlier today by a woman that we suspect is named Trinh Itawa, the daughter of Phuong Itawa. We—that is, Roxy and I—have a very good reason to believe that Aniya has powers beyond what most normal witches and wizards can do and this is the reason for why she was taken."

"Hm." Uncle Harry ran his hands through his hair again and looked over to Roxy. "We did get an owl concerning strange things happening in Diagon Alley, though no one mentioned a missing girl—merely that a bit of building had been blown up and signs showing that there had been pretty powerful Imperius Curses, or something close enough to that, placed on everyone in the nearby area."

Roxy nodded eagerly. "Yes, that was Trinh, although I don't think what she was doing was the Imperius Curse, but rather something far more powerful and dangerous—a skill she's picked up or possibly always had, but definitely something she's only been able to hone through a group called Project Starkid."

Uncle Harry frowned, putting his head in his hands for a moment before sitting back up. "Thank you for telling me this, both of you. I really appreciate it. But I think it might be time for you to head home."

"What?" Albus gaped at his father, blinking in confusion. "Dad, why? Isn't this important? Shouldn't you start figuring out how to fix all of this, like you always do anytime that something goes wrong? This is your job, to stop dark magic! You can't just tell us to leave like that!"

The older Potter shook his head. "Albus, I really do think you and Roxy should go home now, please. I'm sure Scorpius will be worried if you don't return soon."

Albus looked over to Roxy, sharing a confused look with her. "Dad, what's going on? What aren't you telling us?"

Harry frowned, looking uncomfortable before clearing his throat and giving them a nervous chuckle. "Ah...yes. I was hoping this wouldn't come up, but I suppose it's time now since you persist so much. You see, there's something you two should know, which is that I already know all about Project Starkid."