Over Northern France, the sun rises. It looks red...but it's hard to tell for sure.
Initially, a fog covers the land. Compounded with the red sunrise, it leaves an eerie feeling across the land...something that muggle France probably hasn't perceived since the Nazis ruled them in WWII...as well as something that wizarding France hasn't perceived since Grindelwald. (Hitler and Grindelwald really seem to run together... Or, is it Grindelwald and Hess?)
But soon, the fog retreats. Across the land, there's a strange furrow. It leads downhill...into a lake.
All around the furrow, there's a feast of pheasants. Somehow, they seem attracted to the furrow. The Fawley family would have a ball, hunting out here today.
Randomly, three pheasants gets shot and killed, causing the others to flutter away in a great and noisy mass. Two of them are flying away, of course, as they're shot down like Messerschmidts in WWII. Not to worry; a Fawley didn't kill it. If one had, there would've been no shotgun shell, and a flash of green light instead.
In the aftermath, a 28-gauge shotgun smokes. The muggle hunter cracks open the breech, and ejects the spent shells.
His name is Finch-Fletchley. He might or might not be a muggle relative of the muggle-born wizard Justin Finch-Fletchley. He wears mostly wetlands camo, and a blaze orange vest. He doesn't overdress, other than with ammo; this isn't a cold season.
As a matter of fact, down at the chicken houses, a lot of hens, boilers, and eggs are in bloom. They're very frisky. Their head roosters on duty might have trouble staying sane, with all the potent pheromones going around. Alas, if only the French Ministry of Magic could keep all of the muggle poultry farms toad-proof...
Finch-Fletchley smiles, collects his three trophies, and bags them. As he bends over to collect the third, he slows, and looks up...
He sees the furrow. He looks downhill, and sees that it dead-ends at the lake shore. He looks uphill...and can't see that terminal from where he stands.
Curious, he shrugs, bags his last pheasant, and heads uphill to investigate.
As he ascends the trail, he gets eerie feelings. They're a bit chilly, actually. But of course, Finch-Fletchley didn't take up pheasant-hunting just so he could become the final girl in a horror movie. Although yes, Justin has had quite a few muggle cousins who actually HAVE become horror movie final girls; and the villain was a Fawley pureblood supremacist.
Up here, there are more trees. This should be more disturbing to Finch-Fletchley; usually, the trees of a land get thicker closer to the lake. The shadows only exacerbate how spooked-out Finch-Fletchley feels, about now.
Here and there on the trail, a few dead foxes lie. Finch-Fletchley considers claiming them, and passing them off as his trophies. Alas, he'd have a hard time convincing the nit-picky types if there wasn't any murder wounds on the fox. These foxes have no murder wounds; and that only exacerbates how spooked-out Finch-Fletchley is.
By and by, he gets to a barn. The doors are open. Feeling concerned, Finch-Fletchley runs up to the doorway, and stands in it.
The stock's still inside, thankfully. Alas, they all panic, when he arrives. On one hand, they're not used to him; this isn't his barn. OTOH, Finch-Fletchley's spooked stock before; and this seems a bit contra-customary... VERY contra-customary, actually...
Keeping his shotgun lowered, Finch-Fletchley creeps around inside, and looks around. By and by, he stumbles upon a strange sight.
Down the ladder leading up to the loft, a long file of spiders scurries down one of its rails; the one closest to the other door...which is also open. Finch-Fletchley wouldn't know...but they all seem to be in a hurry...like they're running from something they're all afraid of.
Lucky for Finch-Fletchley, they've all been running scared for a while. And hence, he's just in time to catch the caboose of the file, as it leaves the ladder in peace.
Finch-Fawley knows this isn't exactly in his hunting lease...but as a concerned citizen, he feels obligated to do this. He starts to lean his shotgun against the wall...but hesitates. He still feels spooked-out, despite all the quirks he's seen. Keeping it on him, he climbs the ladder, and ascends into the barn's loft.
Up here, he stumbles upon many strange sights. The central one looks like a giant pile of egg fluid. The flies are at it...and look like they have been for a while.
All around it, there are egg shells. Finch-Fletchley's never seen shells like these...or at least, not any he remembers. He'd hate to meet the layer. Then again, he might not be experienced enough to deduce that the egg's layers are already up here...dead.
With his boot, he flips over one of the shell fragments. There's a dead hen under it. Looks like it's been dead for some time, now. One by one, the egg fluid's flies leave that pile, and come on over to pick on the hen's carcass.
Finch-Fletchley dares flip over another shell fragment. Underneath it, there's a turtle. He's dead. He had a very fat neck in life...but at least his bill looks intimidating...for a turtle that's not a snapping turtle.
Finch-Fletchley's got a hard time imagining how the turtle got up here. The ladder's the only way up here. He supposes one of the farmer's kids brought the turtle up here, for sport...and left it up here just as much for sport. Alas, Finch-Fletchley slows down, and remembers that the farm family is childless.
The turtle was a male. If Finch-Fletchley believed in bestiality, he'd allege that the hen had the turtle's egg. But that's just bogus; even if they both wanted to, they couldn't. Not only are they not the same genus, but they're not the same class.
Aves vs. Reptilia: NOT reproductive. Although yes, the prevailing evolution theory, as I'm aware of it, is that birds came from reptiles... Even if that were the prevailing case, there's a slight error in this case. First, nothing evolves that fast. Second, Finch-Fletchley also wouldn't believe that it was a REPTILE that came from that egg, rather than a roc...which, of course, is more in-line with what Finch-Fletchley is thinking right now.
Finch-Fletchley is no wizard...but as a member of a family that sometimes produces muggle-born wizards, he's got a basic familiarity with some classic myths. Plus, Arabian Nights was one of his favorite books, when he was a kid...
Finch-Fletchley wonders if he should tell the farm family about this... But he decides against it. After all, what's he going to say? "I know you're not going to believe this, but there's a strange furrow coming out of your barn leading to the lake, and its origin point is a hatched roc egg in your barn's loft, around which a dead hen and a dead turtle, which I still have NO idea how got up there if you don't have any kids, were among the first of the egg's mysterious client's casualties... Also, spiders are afraid of it, which leaves me just as baffled as it does you..." Honestly; if Finch-Fletchley wants to stay on the right side of a mental hospital's walls, he'd better let the farm family discover this for themselves.
He thinks about putting the shells back; the ones that did cover up the hen and turtle carcasses. But he decides against it; the farmer won't be able to tell that they were moved, if he's never seen anything like this before. Plus, he'll more likely be a lot more distracted by the fact that he HASN'T seen anything like this before...
If Finch-Fletchley didn't have wizard relatives, he'd be, too. So, he descends the ladder, and makes his way out.
En route, he meets a trio of adorable blondes. They're standing in a triangle formation, "pointing" at him. They all stand very still...and seem very serious.
"Hello, Muggle," Marissa greets him, with sarcastic cordiality.
"We hope this isn't an inconvenience for you," April continues her sister's one-liner.
"But you've seen too much...even if some of your kin are among us," May finishes it. "And now,"
They all speak in unison, "Prepare to forget what you just saw."
With that, four of their eyes light up with bright blue light; Marissa's light up with bright green light. As Finch-Fletchley stands for his judgment...his memory gets numb. Funny; his memory doesn't usually do that...
While wiping his memories, the three witches teleport away...starting with Marissa, one at a time. Once they're gone, the scales fall from Finch-Fletchley's eyes.
He blinks, and looks around. He opens his bag, and looks into it. He gapes.
"Sacrebleu," he says. "I've barely even started!" With that, he hurries back down the hill...stuffing the cracked-open breech of his shotgun with three new pheasant slugs, as he goes along.
Finch-Fletchley has forgotten about what he's seen now... Alas, it's not like a Finch-Fletchley man to be naturally forgetful. Justin was a Hufflepuff, after all... If Finch-Fletchley's forgetting now, then bewitched or not, he might not stay that way for long...
And, of course, the Brockelhursts just HATE having to do chores they've gotta repeat. With that said, you wouldn't believe that most of the new ones have been Ravenclaws...