Teddy was completely distraught. He was rocking back and forth mindlessly in an office chair, his hands buried in the pocket his hoodie. He didn't get much sleep despite his exhaustion. He and Victoire had been hanging around the visitor's waiting room at his mother's office for most of the day, except for the night before when they joined the group that did a full sweep of the lake below the railroad where Albus and his friend had gone missing. Victoire was curled up on a sofa, hugging a pillow in her arms. Her eyes were closed and her breathing was steady but Teddy doubted she was truly asleep.

Teddy loved all of his younger cousins and siblings more than anything. Being the oldest, he had a duty to protect them. He had helped teach the older ones how to duel (and even threw in fun spells like "the bat bogey hex"). He always included them in games and quidditch matches, he always got each of them Christmas and birthday presents, and he made himself abundantly clear that he was the one to talk to when they needed an anonymous confidant. Albus had always been loud and clear when it came to his hatred of school. He hated his lessons, he hated his house, and he hated his classmates. His grades were plummeting and even then, the teachers had such a favoring for him and his father, they would always let it slide. Teddy had brought it up over and over to Harry, pleading to try and make a deal. Maybe it would've been better to homeschool or to move him to a different school, but Harry wouldn't budge. They didn't find his body which continued to give a sliver of a sense of hope, but there was a constant sinking feeling that something truly awful had happened.

"Uncle Harry?"

"Hey, kiddo." Harry's voice was grave. He looked worse now than Teddy had ever seen him. His eyes were sunken in and Teddy was sure that he was going to have crow's feet after all of this. "Where's your um, sister? Oh you brought Tori."

"Where's my mum?" Teddy replied.

"Not sure, probably doing other work." Harry replied. "It's like he... vanished."

Teddy shook his head. "You know, if almost think this was funny... impressive even, but... oh my god, he just jumped."

"Yeah." Harry shook his head.

"You look rough. I can't imagine what you're going through right now. I'm so sorry, Harry." Teddy said. "Have you slept at all?"

"Tried. I keep getting these... nightmares. I can't even describe them, but they're starting to get out of hand." Harry replied. His hand rubbed over his temple absently, like he wasn't even aware of it. "We're going to go sweep the grounds of the school again."

"Uncle Harry, was Al... going through something? He never talked about anything explicitly with me but he's brought up some of his feelings about school before, and I know it really bothers him that he compares himself to his brother and all of his friends, and to you, and I dunno—"

His godfather quickly shot him down. "No, it wasn't school. It was..."

"It was... what?"

Harry turned his head, shoving his hands into his pockets. "It was my fault, Teddy. I... I said things that I shouldn't have. It was completely my fault."

"Like what?" Teddy was losing his composure. He managed to summon all of his energy in turning his hair a dark red colour. "Did he ask you to stay home? Are things getting bad again? Harry, he—"

"Yes, we talked about school, and I made it clear that he needed to go back—"

"You couldn't even manage to listen to him? To maybe figure out that there was something more wrong than just his classes being hard or people shoving him around? That maybe he's in a dangerous place?" Teddy shook his head. "What did you even say to him?"

Harry sighed. "If I had known he would've done something like this, then I would've—"

"What did you say?"

His godfather paused. "He said that he sometimes he wishes he wasn't my son."

"I didn't ask that, I asked what you said."

"I said I sometimes wished Albus wasn't my son either."

"Are you fucking—"

"I didn't mean it! I told him I didn't mean it and I don't!"

"That doesn't mean you shouldn't say it!" Teddy shouted at him.

"You aren't a parent!" Harry remarked. "You've never had kids! You've never had to deal with what I've had to deal with about Albus and I don't need you to be the one giving me advice when you don't know what it's like!"

Teddy stared at him in shock. "I'm sorry, I didn't realize I needed to have kids in order to know how to treat people with basic decency! I've watched my sister go through the same thing as Albus and I watched her get sicker and sicker until she almost died. You couldn't even have common sense to say anything but the fact that you didn't want him?" Teddy huffed. Harry opened his mouth to say something but his godson kept cutting him off. "I'm sorry, Harry, I didn't realize that you needed your own godchild to tell you that it's actually not appropriate to tell people—particularly your own kids—that you wish they didn't exist!"

"There was context—"

"Context! You told your SON that you didn't want him!" He argued. "I can't believe you. I can't believe you looked him in the eye and said that! I can't believe that I have to be the one to tell you how stupid that was!"

"It's—"

"You're a complete hypocrite!" Teddy remarked. He shook his head. "I'm not going with you. Vic and I are heading home. I hope you have some better luck with finding him."

"Teddy, wait, just a second—" Harry sighed.

"We'll help when we can, but I can't work with you, Harry." Teddy said simply. "I'm sorry, but I don't think I can forgive you for that."

"Please will you let me speak?" Harry insisted. "For Albus? He's got to be out there somewhere and I'll die knowing that I regret saying what I said more than anything. But I have to find him to make things better. I can't do this by myself."

Teddy shook his head again. "So you just don't get it? Harry, you can't just walk up to him and expect to fix everything. I absolutely agree that we have find him and help him, but he does not owe you forgiveness for that."

"It—I never meant it. We were talking and things got heated and he said that he wished that I wasn't his father and—"

"Are you putting the responsibility on a child? Kids always say stuff like that and that doesn't mean that—"

"Can I finish?" Harry pleaded. Out of the corner of his eye, Teddy saw Victoire sitting up, wide-eye on the couch, still hugging a pillow. "It was an accident. I just... I repeated what he said to me, I would never tell my kids that I don't like them because I don't! It was entirely my fault but I... I never would've said that. I didn't mean it. I would've never meant it."

Teddy took a deep breath. "That still doesn't mean that he owes you his forgiveness. Obviously this upset him to the point of jumping off of a train."

"I..." Harry stared down at the floor. "Because his friend Scorpius was with him, I have reason to believe they were escaping rather than trying to erm... make some kind of pact. Escape to where, I'm not sure, but I have a feeling they could've headed towards the Forbidden Forest."

"Did he leave a note behind or something?" Teddy asked.

His godfather shook his head. "No, but we're figuring this out." And he simply walked away.

xxxxx

"Hey, Lenabug? You can't be up two nights in a row or you're not going to make it to class tomorrow." Tonks said softly. She crept into her daughter's room, holding a cup of tea in her hands. Elena stretched, groaning. Her mother didn't usually wake her up after late nighters. "What'cha working on?"

"Just a paper." Elena said. She quickly shut the book she was reading and flicked her hand to send her notes back into an orderly pile. "It's about... never mind. It's due like, next month. I'm not busy. I couldn't sleep that great, I just... I can't stop thinking about last night. What's up?"

Tonks shook her head. "Just worried about Albus. I can't think about much else."

"Does Henry know?" Elena asked.

"No. I'm... waiting until we get more information. I was going to help Teddy and Vic do the sweep near the tracks, but I needed to stay here with him." Tonks said. "They haven't found his body yet, so we're guess he and his friend have to be out there somewhere. Nothing new."

"This sucks. I feel so bad for him. He was getting bullied real bad there."

Tonks set down the tea. "I made it how you like it." The two of them were closer now than they had been in a few years. It was still rough sometimes because Elena hated being the sibling that stayed home after graduating. They weren't close but they were comfortable. She kissed the top of her head, slyly looking over her shoulder. "Ooh, you're getting into transfiguration?"

"Thanks, Mum. Kind of." Elena replied. "I kind of messed up on an assignment and I'm trying to makeup some work to fix it."

"Don't stress yourself out, okay? I'm sure you're doing fine, sweetheart—"

"I know, I'm just... that was a really important." Elena grumbled.

"Have you been thinking about what field you want to go into?"

"I dunno, I like a lot of it, but I think I'm going to stick to making medicine." Elena started at her paper, her arms crossed over her chest. "I'm definitely better with my cauldron than I am hands on in the field."

"You're going to figure this out. And besides, you've got plenty of time to figure yourself out. Don't sweat it, okay?" Her mother looked more concerned. "I'm not worried about your grades, so please don't... don't, erm... don't stress yourself out so much over this. You're going to be fine."

"No, it's cool." She was twitching and frowning, tapping her quill on her arm.

Tonks sat down on the edge of the bed beside her. "Do you want to talk about what's upsetting you?"

"Nothing's upsetting me." Elena shook her head. "I'm just... tired. That grade really screwed me over and I can't mess up again."

"Are you failing your class? Is it really that bad?"

"No, I just—"

"Then you're fine!" Tonks reassured. She playfully nudged her. "One bad grade isn't going to ruin your life. You can't expect to pass every assignment, come on now."

"I'm not trying to pass every assignment, I'm just... I'm trying to—" Elena stammered. "It's fine. I can take care of it."

"Can I help with anything at least?" Tonks offered.

"Um, actually I had a question." She couldn't look at her mother. "It's not—it doesn't have to do with the paper, I just want to know. It's about Dad."

"What's on your mind?"

"I dunno." She mumbled. "Actually, just forget it. Don't worry about it."

"No, come on, what's on your mind?" Her mother pressed.

Elena let out a sigh and sunk into her chair. "I'm just... I'm thinking about what it was like for him, you know? He probably transformed... seven hundred times in his entire life. That's insane, and I'm just thinking about how scary that must've been or what it would've felt like or..." her voice trailed off. "Did you ever see it yourself?"

Tonks shook her head. "No. Even in the end, I... trust me he would've rather been by himself. He always said it was like breaking all of his joints or like... having your entire body be stretched and turned inside out. I don't know how well you remember how he looked in the morning. Or how tired he was the night before."

Her daughter chuckled. "He always had a soft spot for me when I was a kid, even when he was tired. But I wish—I wish I could've done more for him. I know how to brew his potion, I've actually made a ton of it before, I could've made him pain potions or sleeping potions—"

"You did everything right, sweetheart." Tonks reassured. "Having you two around always made him feel better and besides, that's all you could've done as a kid."

Elena nodded quietly. "One more thing?" She asked, as her mother was about to leave. "Can we talk about... maybe moving out? I feel like I'm... like I'm cramped up all the time here and I'd like to look for my own place to live so I don't have to bother you guys here. I feel like maybe I'm old enough to go on my own, especially since I'm working now and I can maybe have a quiet place to do my school work and everything is—"

"Yes! Sorry, sorry, I can go." Tonks nodded, cutting her off. She squeezed her shoulders as she stood up. "Absolutely. I understand where you're coming from. Can we um, can we wait until all of this with Albus blows over though?"

"Oh. Yeah. Right. Absolutely." Elena nodded and waved out the room. As soon as the door shut, she collapsed in a heap on top of her notes and groaned, hiding her face. "Thanks for the tea by the way!" She added in.