Author's Note: I said last chapter I'd see y'all in December and guess what! Here I am on the very last day of the month/year/decade. I made it! This is the longest single chapter I've ever posted. Longer than any of my one-shots. Heck, longer than any of my two-or-three-shots. So here we are. Buckle in.
Shout out to tibetan mastiff for being lucky reviewer number 400! Also, to CurlyFriDays for being reviewer number Error 404: Content Not Found.
More big milestones: we're officially over 1,000 followers and this chapter will put this fic's word count listing to 100k+
Disclaimer: I don't own it. Never owned it. Never will own it. All credit goes to Hiromu Arakawa and J.K. Rowling. I, WolfishMoon, make no money from the online publication of this free-to-read fanwork.
The Scientist's Lament
Chapter 24
Minerva in Berlin
Just after the last of her classes on Friday, with her Saturday morning trip to Berlin feeling all too close, Minerva found herself staring questioningly at her fireplace. It was Molly Weasley who had nursed young Alphonse Elric back to health from whatever it was that had him so horrifically emaciated. For all her upcoming trip to Berlin, there was an adult that one of the Elrics trusted.
As a rule, Minerva didn't avoid the Weasley home, but she did not go out of her way to go there, either. The cheeriness rubbed her a little raw. The coziness – so disparate from the spartan lifestyle she'd adapted to – pinged at a bittersweet place that Minerva preferred to ignore.
She gave one short shake of her head. Now was not the time for foolishness. So, after poking her head into the Floo to check with the Weasley matron, Minerva stepped on through. "Thank you for extending hospitality on such short notice," she said.
"Oh, nonsense! You're always welcome in my home Minerva," said Molly. Molly Prewett had been one of Minerva's Gryffindors not so long ago. She'd loved the fire-y little girl as much as she'd loved any of her lions. Molly shuffled Minerva to one of the wooden chairs that circled her well-used wooden table. "Now what is it you'd like to discuss?"
Before she knew it, a clay mug of strong black tea was pushed into her hands. Molly was mothering her. Minerva stifled a short laugh by taking a sip. It was good and hot, and there was a pip of brandy in it. She gave her old student a look and Molly grinned.
"If I might be frank, Professor," she said with a certain amount of mischief tucked into the corner of her mouth. She sounded like the newly-seventeen-year-old girl she'd been when she eloped with young Arthur Weasley in the dead of night. "You look like you need it."
Minerva gave her a small smile, before refocusing her thoughts on the present. She took another, longer, sip from her mug. "The Elric brothers."
Molly eyed her own mug on the table. Minerva wondered how much brandy was in that mug. The youthful mischief in her voice was gone. It had been replaced by the stone that Minerva cultivated in her own voice. "You mean the boys that led a crew of children to You-Know-Who's feet?"
"They managed to kill him," Minerva said. If anyone had a right to know the details, it was Molly Weasley.
Molly blinked. "Don't tell me poor Harry had to kill a man already."
Minerva shook her head and took another sip of her tea. She wasn't sure if the brandy was steadying her nerves or making it worse. "Elric did it. It's only temporary."
"Temporary? What do you mean temporary?"
Minerva scowled. "Albus hasn't explained," she said. "But he insists it's temporary. Something about that prophecy."
There was a pause while Minerva swallowed her bitterness. A pause while Molly's expression went through several permutations that Minerva forced herself not to categorize. She took another sip of her tea, trying not to look away from the younger woman. If Minerva was less disciplined, her eyes would be roving the walls of the Burrow's warmly lit kitchen.
Instead, she traced the lines of Molly's face – there was something beautiful about her in the orange glow of the kitchen fire.
"Edward isn't much older than Harry," Molly finally said, brown eyes shining with a sorrowful balm. "I know he's seen more than his age would suggest, but I'm sorry he killed a man."
Edward? What? Minerva sighed, brought her own mug close to her chest. "It was Alphonse."
"Alphonse?" Molly's mug slammed on the table, a splash of her tea-and-brandy sloshing out onto the table. It puddled there.
"Alphonse," Minerva said.
Minerva watched as Molly forced herself to relax back in her chair. Minerva could hear the slow exhalation from her nose. It took a moment before she spoke. "I get the sense that Al might actually be the less naïve of the two of them, sometimes," she said. "He's the one who told me, you know, about his brother's issues with his arm."
"What? Arm issues?"
Molly shot a rueful look at her mug. "I guess if I didn't say anything, then you probably don't know. Poor Ed. Always puts on that strong face."
"Indeed?" Minerva managed to stop herself from asking a direct question. But it was becoming clear that this tea-and-brandy wasn't Molly's first of the night.
"They didn't explicitly explain much of anything, but they did say that the only reason Ed has an arm at all is because of a burst of accidental magic on Alphonse's part."
"Truly?"
Molly nodded, pulling her hands from her mug and adjusting her shawl. "Apparently, he had a muggle prosthetic before. And pieces of it are still caught in the magically generated new arm. Alphonse was willing to accept help for his own, more obvious, health issues. But convincing Ed to let me help him was nearly impossible. I mean, I managed. But. I don't know what happened to that boy. He's too used to taking care of himself."
"And taking care of young Alphonse," Minerva said, pinching the bridge of her nose. "Even though he's only a year older."
"Only a year older?" said Molly, who looked up sharply from the fringe of her shawl. "I knew it. That boy is not eighteen."
Minerva's lips pressed into a grim line and she looked more closely at her cup of tea-and-brandy. Cautiously, she sniffed it. The drink had to be stronger than she'd thought.
Molly laughed, evidently aware of Minerva's thought process, said, "Weasleys are always as generous as they can afford to be."
Minerva frowned, said, "You're a Prewett." And then she brought the conversation back to itself. There was work to be done, and she had a portkey to Berlin to catch in the morning. "But Edward. Does he still need medical intervention?" The poor boy had been missing an arm. And what it said about Alphonse, that a burst of accidental magic had restored his brother!
"Basic scans were showing him to be mostly clear by the time he left," Molly said. "But there were still a few deeper pieces that I didn't want to mess with. I'd hoped he would schedule an appointment with Madam Pomfrey, but that was clearly wishful thinking."
"Probably," Minerva said. "Poppy would have said something to me if she'd known about this. If only so I'd know to keep a closer eye on his mental health. I can tell that both Elric boys are deeply traumatized but knowing that their situation was that physically dire means a different set of potential problems."
"You couldn't tell their situation was physically dire from Al? He had to have been starved."
"Starvation is a different sort of physical danger than the loss of limb," Minerva said, tapping her wand on the rim of her mug to refill it. "I was looking for that kind of trauma. In any case, I'll be sure to notify Poppy. He won't appreciate it, but he is a child in my care. Andif anyone has luck forcing Edward to comply, it will be her"
Molly nodded. "I hope she does."
Minerva took a tentative sip of her refilled drink. Making magically-multiplied food delicious wasn't the easiest technique when a witch was completely sober. But she'd managed the spell beautifully. Of course. Minerva forgot sometimes that she wasn't just a promising transfiguration apprentice anymore. "I want to know who these Elric boys are, Molly. And Albus does too. If you know anything."
"I can't say they told me much," said Molly. She placed her elbows on the table, leaning forward to rest her forehead on her hands. "I can tell you that they've seen combat before?"
"I figured that out," Minerva said. "Back when I first met them."
Molly inclined her head, ceding the point. "I'll admit I was blinded by their age. I just hate the thought of adults letting children see combat. I wanted to believe that they had protectors."
"You were very young when you joined the Order of the Phoenix."
"I was seventeen and already married to Arthur," Molly said. "Based on what they told me, they might have been as young as eleven and twelve at their first actions."
"Young Mr. Potter might not find that so odd," Minerva said. Merlin, but thinking about eleven-year-old Mr. Potter facing Quirrell all by himself. Maybe she shouldn't be using the exception to prove that children could fight.
"I think they were fighting in an institutionalized context, Minerva." Molly pulled at the ends of her shawl again. The brown fabric stretched over her shoulders as she pulled it tighter around her body. "I should have reported it, I know. But I was so grateful that Al trusted me enough to tell me."
Minerva felt her lips tightening again, and she composed her expression into a schooled and elegant sheet of ice. "What did Alphonse tell you?"
"Ed joined his country's military when he was twelve years old."
That was not the confession Minerva was expecting. "And they let him? It's my understanding that most European muggle militaries don't allow in children!"
Molly's left hand drifted under her bangs to rub at her temples. "I'm trying to remember what exactly Alphonse said. Something about their military wanting a leash on talented alchemists? So they could kill them later? I know that Edward got involved in a coup d'état that was successful. Al said, 'Ed himself struck the final blow on the man -' actually can I just give you the memory?"
Having gone as still and quiet as an unenchanted statue, it took a moment for Minerva to force herself to give a staid nod. "Of course. I appreciate you offering it."
Molly didn't properly respond, but she produced her wand from her apron and slowly, slowly, raised it to her temple. The whispery-liquid-blue of memory issued from Molly's skin along the tip of her wand. Merlin's bollocks, where am I going to put it? Minerva hastily conjured a vial and held it out for Molly to funnel her memory into. When the last drop fell into the vial, Minerva stoppered it.
Her hand was steady as she folded the vial into her robes. "I will view this as soon as I can," Minerva said. "Thank you."
"No matter who those boys are or were, they're good people." The skin around Molly's eyes was tight with seriousness. "Keep them safe, Minerva. Please. Edward might be a teacher but protect him as though he were one of your students."
Minerva nodded. "Of course. Thank you, Molly."
"I hope you find what you're looking for."
There was a pause as Minerva rose from her stout wooden chair and searched for the right words. "Albus has me going to Berlin tomorrow. To young Edward's alma mater."
"Oh," said Molly. "You'll find something, then."
"Something, perhaps. But who knows what, and if it'll be of any use." Minerva smoothed her robes and strode toward the Weasley fireplace. How did German child soldiers end up teaching Chemistry to high school students in muggle London? And how was it that Alphonse's report matched nothing that Minerva had ever heard about the region?
"You'll figure it out, Professor." Molly rested a hand on Minerva's shoulder and guided her the rest of the way.
When the flames burned green and Minerva stepped back through to her rooms at Hogwarts, she wasn't sure she felt any better than she had before her visit.
She ran her hands down the front of her bottle-green robes and pulled the vial of Molly's memories from her pocket. I should give this to Albus, she thought, inclined her head gently in the direction of Dumbledore's office.
But.
Hell mend ye, Minerva! She could not help herself from sliding the vial into one of her desk drawers and bespelling it shut. She just wasn't ready to relinquish that memory yet. She would turn it in to Albus once she'd already seen it herself.
With a nod, she turned her wand on her wardrobe and watched as a few days' worth of necessaries sailed into her open trunk.
Even with her mind made, sleep did not come easy that night. She drifted on the edge of consciousness and what little dreamlets she had were plagued by images of Edward's arm being blown off in an explosion. Or being cut off by a faceless torturer. She held a younger Alphonse as he screamed, holding him back from rushing toward his brother's attacker. It was protective rage that had turned his wand against Voldemort, and Minerva would not let him loose it now.
Minerva knew, somehow, that if she let him go, he would die.
The whole dreamlet long, she was still be vaguely aware of her bedroom and the feeling of her cheek pressing into her pillow.
It was not long before she sat up in bed, fed up with the exercise of trying to sleep. A quietly cast tempus told her that it was nigh breakfast time anyway. So, Minerva slid out of the blankets, feet unerringly finding her slippers on the stone floor.
It wasn't hard to pull on a set of grey traveling robes. It wasn't hard to shrink her trunk to fit in her pocket. It wasn't hard to slip her wand up her sleeve and lace up a pair of sensible boots. But when Minerva turned to her chamber door, she was waylaid by a sense of difficulty.
It was Saturday and, while Minerva wasn't a person to sleep the day away, she'd ordinarily have slept a little deeper and a little longer. There was a pile of papers to be graded on the desk in her official office. There was another pile here on the desk in her own room.
Damn Albus for making her behind in her grading schedule. She'd have to give the students an extension on their next homework if she wanted time to properly catch up. But that probably wasn't the real reason she couldn't twist her stone-hewn doorknob.
She looked back at the door she was avoiding, back at her grading, nodded firmly to herself. With a gesture, the papers were shrunk to fit her pocket too and Minerva was striding out her door like there'd been no difficulty to begin with.
By the time she'd reached the Great Hall, her boots clicking on the stone floor, there was a sprightliness to her step again. She took her seat at the head table, unsurprised to find that she was the first person at it and began buttering a bit of toast that appeared in front of her. A pot of jam intended to be communal appeared a little further away. Minerva reached for it and began to spread that too.
While traveling by international portkey on a full stomach was a generally poor idea, it was worse on an empty one. So, she ate a modest breakfast, and she was done with it by the time the usual crowd of early risers began to trickle in the doors.
A few Slytherins chatting quietly over policy, a few Ravenclaws hefting stacks of parchment. A moderately large contingent of Hufflepuffs that looked like they might have actually brought homework to the breakfast table on a Saturday. There was a paltry number of Minerva's lions. She was reasonably certain they'd thrown a party the night before. She couldn't judge them, though. Not when she'd spent the night at the Burrow drinking muggle alcohol with her former student.
She was unsurprised when Edward and Alphonse made their way in together. They were covered in sweat and smiling brightly. She remembered the wonderful post-workout euphoria of her quidditch days so fondly, that it brought a happiness to her heart to see that expression on her students.
Minerva felt a flood of relief to see them acting like children, and she finished her toast and a piece of sausage with a lighter heart than when she'd started her breakfast.
When she'd wiped her mouth and finished a cup of tea, she walked down to where the Elric brothers sat at the Ravenclaw table. Usually, it was absolute anathema for professors to eat with the students, but weekend breakfasts weren't especially well attended and everyone with half a brain could see that Edward Elric was not over the age of seventeen.
He'd occasionally sit with his brother? Well Minerva certainly wouldn't kick up a fuss over it.
She cleared her throat, and they looked up from their mountains of food. Minerva couldn't help a smile. Full English breakfasts for each of them, and more besides. Alphonse had a cup of milk clutched tightly in his left hand that made him look even younger than usual.
Minerva glanced down the table, noting the group of early-bird Ravenclaws at the other end clustered around several pieces of parchment. One of them threw a die that would not have been out of place in an arithmancy classroom and began to talk animatedly to her classmates.
She looked back at the Elrics. "How are you two this morning?"
"Sehr gut!" said Alphonse brightly. "Zee weazer today is beautiful!"
"Is it?" said Minerva. "That's good to hear." It was, really. The weather in Scotland might not be a good indicator for the weather in Berlin, but she decided to treat it like a good omen.
"Are you going somewhere?" said Edward. He shook his head so that the odd fringe of his bangs lifted out of his eyes. That with the elevator shoes. Minerva couldn't help but wonder at the depth of his height complex. Just how embarrassed about it was he?
"I'll be out of the castle this weekend," Minerva said. She had a feeling that Albus wouldn't approve of her telling them about her trip to Berlin.
"Where to?" Edward said, took a bite of egg.
Minerva pursed her lips. "To run a few errands." And if she sounded annoyed about it, all the better. Minerva was annoyed about it.
If the Elric brothers thought it odd that 'errands' would take her out of the castle overnight, they didn't say so. Edward just nodded as though it made perfect sense, and Alphonse sent her a dazzling smile. "I hope it all goes smoozly!"
"Thank you, Mr. Elric," Minerva said. Guilt warred with her genuine curiosity about them in her belly, but her legs were steady. Her back was firm and straight. "I appreciate it."
Edward, Minerva noticed, was looking at Alphonse with a proud fondness, and Minerva wondered why a brother only a year older than his sibling would feel so entirely parental. Especially when the younger sibling had his own feelings of protectiveness, strong enough that he would lethally level his wand at a dangerous opponent.
Berlin, Minerva thought. In Berlin, some of these questions will be answered. Not all of them, of course. But she gave both boys firm pats on their shoulders and walked beyond them.
Before she left, Minerva made a point to visit the infirmary. Interrupting Madam Pomfrey with a student, she briefly pulled her aside to explain the Elric situation. Poppy's mouth firmed into a grim line rivaling Minerva's most dire expression and assured her that the Elric brothers would be taken care of.
Minerva almost pitied them. But she wasn't going to let those boys live in pain.
Satisfied, she walked out of the grand doors of Hogwarts, out beyond the gates of her grounds, turned on her heel and vanished. When Minerva landed firmly on her feet in the international portkey office in Edinburg, she set straight to business.
With her no-nonsense attitude and matronly disapproval, Minerva was at the Nord Campus of the Humboldt-Universität of Berlin before 9 o'clock.
The International Statute of Secrecy was indeed international, but wizards on the continent mostly didn't agree with Britain's puritanical separation of magical and muggle folk. British wizards didn't go to muggle universities. When individual wizards decided to pursue muggle education, they did it on their own. Often, they would be the only witch or wizard of their entire graduating class.
This was not so in Germany. Pursuing muggle tertiary education was encouraged, and there was plentiful infrastructure to support it. So, when Minerva arrived, it was directly into a small stall in a room on the Nord Campus designed specifically for magical travel. She opened the door to her stall simultaneously with a student who'd arrived next door.
The student waved brightly, said a German greeting, and bustled off. Minerva gave a small grim smile and cast her translation charm on herself. She hadn't lied to Albus when she said that she'd developed her version of the spell to decipher ancient texts when read aloud. But the spell she'd developed it from was a simpler audio-translation spell. So, with any luck, it would work well enough for the task at hand.
When Minerva stepped out of the larger room, she found a woman standing in the hallway. She was evidently waiting for her. "Hello," she said. "You must be the professor from Hogwarts."
"Yes," Minerva said, confident in her translation charm. "I'm Professor Minerva McGonagall. I teach transfiguration."
She extended it, and the other woman took it. They shook firmly, and the other woman said, "Helmina Adler, Dorm Matron here at the Dormitory for Wizards and Witches. If you'd follow me, I can take you to my office?"
There was the part of Minerva that was deeply curious about this Dormitory – the Humboldt-Universität didn't have a huge number of wizarding students, but enough that a separate Dormitory had been made for them – a place where they could live and study without having to hide their magic. There was another part of her that wanted desperately to be directed to the Chemistry faculty offices, the records office, and the North Branch Library where Elric had done work-study during his supposed time here.
It boiled down to which curiosity she wanted to sate first, and with so many questions about Elric left to unravel, Minerva decided to nod. "That sounds lovely, thank you."
"I can mark up your map of campus while we're there," Adler said. "I'm sure you already have a plan for what you would like to accomplish here, but I can add a few other things. The better coffee shops, for one." Adler turned, keeping one arm extended behind her toward Minerva. "This way."
Minerva wasn't much a fan of coffee. But she wasn't going to say no to a genuine attempt at kindness and hospitality. She followed Helmina Adler down the hallway, around a left turn, and up a flight of stairs.
Her office door was off a brightly colored study space. She could see a handful of young people sitting on soft chairs and talking in discernably happy voices. Of course. It was a Saturday morning at a school. Students, able to put off their coursework for a day, were happily plotting mischief in a beautiful city.
Minerva felt a twinge of warmth for them and kept her eyes on them while Adler tapped her wand on her office door to communicate with the wards. When the lock clicked, Adler held the door open for her. Minerva nodded her thanks as she passed through and turned her attention to the new space.
It was brightly lit and well-decorated. The chairs were of a spartan design but looked quite comfortable nonetheless. When Adler gestured at one, Minerva took a seat. Adler herself ducked around her desk and sat in an identical chair behind it. Adler flicked her wand, and Minerva knew that the space had been warded against sound.
"So," said Adler. "I know I promised coffee shop details. But what exactly brings you to Humboldt University? Your boss said something cryptic about student records? I can bring those up for any wizarding student here, but I'd like a compelling reason. To protect their privacy, you understand."
Minerva sighed. She never let up her outward steel, and she forgot sometimes that women in power often hid their steel behind a layer of outward softness and cheer. But she couldn't blame Adler for misleading her. The students in Adler's care were all legal adults, but that doesn't always change teacherly feelings of responsibility.
"Of course, Mrs? Adler," Minerva said.
"Mrs. Adler is fine," Adler said. "And you? Professor McGonagall?"
Minerva inclined her head. "That is fine," she said. "But to business. I'm not actually here about a wizarding student. There is a young student in my care whose older brother is a muggle. That muggle attended this institution, and it's him I'm looking into."
"A muggle student?" Mrs. Adler said. "Really?"
"He graduated this past March, with a degree in science education, concentration in Chemistry. Campus Mitte? I believe?"
"And perhaps with his harder science courses here on Campus Nord," Mrs. Adler agreed.
"I know he did work-study at the North Branch Library which, aside from the ease of taking a portkey to this building, is my main interest in Campus Nord. I'd like to see his former workspace, maybe talk to some coworkers."
Adler hummed, after a moment said, "What is your interest in the student?"
"I'm afraid I don't know that I can share. I'm here out of concern for him and his brother, in any case. They came into our care battered. I'm trying to piece together exactly what happened."
"Is the muggle brother staying at your school also?" Adler sounded surprised, and Minerva supposed that there was no way out of admitting that he was.
"Indeed. Somehow his younger brother's magic went undiscovered until the pair came to England. Whatever they went through left them quite codependent."
"He wouldn't let the younger brother go to your school alone?"
"And vice versa. Young Alphonse quite refused to come to Hogwarts without him. And he was already fifteen, so you can see why it was imperative that we got him there."
Mrs. Adler winced. "That is. Not ideal. Our systems here in Germany are quite good. I'm surprised he slipped through the cracks."
"So, I've heard. Do you mostly funnel students to Durmstrang?"
Mrs. Adler looked both amused and affronted by that question. "We have our own schools. Some parents, of course, choose to send their children abroad."
"Better than Great Britain," Minerva muttered. "We've just the one."
"And it doesn't even cover before age eleven!" Mrs. Adler said. "How many students are missing fundamental skills?"
"They catch up," Minerva said, refusing to admit the true numbers. "But our education system is in dire need of reform. We just have more pressing things to worry about at the present time."
"That Voldemort fellow," Adler said. "I was surprised you were checking up on the background of any student at all, to be perfectly honest. I've heard it's bad."
Minerva smiled grimly said, "There are reasons this student and his muggle brother are a priority."
Mrs. Adler raised an eyebrow and hummed again. She looked so supremely unconcerned to hear it that Minerva was certain that Mrs. Adler was very concerned indeed. "Do you have a map you've already marked up?"
The abrupt change in subject, a change to directly helping Minerva get her information, confirmed that theory.
"I do," said Minerva, pulling it from the inside pocket of her outer cloak and spreading it on the table.
"I see you've marked the library already," Adler said, tapping it with the tip of her wand. It glowed briefly. And this building. "Okay, so you'll go out the front door – I'll walk you there – and then you'll turn right." Keeping her wand-tip pressed to the paper, Adler traced out a route that marked itself in a soft gold. It didn't quite glow, but there was something luminescent about it regardless. "This route is the most direct, least crowded one. It also passes my favorite coffee shop."
When Adler's wand reached the library, she lifted it and tapped the unmarked coffee shop. "Right there. You'll want to make a stop there at some point. International Portkey is taxing. They have excellent pastries, too. And their tea is also very good, if that's more your speed."
Minerva doubted that very much. She was tactful enough not to say so, though. Un-British tea was better than no tea at all.
"To get to the science – Chemistry concentration, did you say? – departments, you'll turn right again out of the library doors. The offices for all the science departments are in one building. I see you already have it marked." Adler tapped it anyway. "I'm fairly sure that the Chemistry office is on the second floor. But take that with a grain of salt. Most of my kids aren't studying science."
Adler continued. "Anyway, the main records office and the education department are located at Campus Mitte – I'm glad to see your map includes both campuses. If you come back here after your visit to the library, I can Apparate you to the magic-friendly study room at the Jacob-and-Wilhelm-Grimm Center. That's the main library at Campus Mitte."
Minerva hadn't marked Mitte's library, but Adler did. "From here, you'll go along this path to the records office, and from there to the education department offices." Once again, Adler traced the route, leaving Minerva a clear path to follow. "And of course, here are some of the better lunch spots on Campus Mitte. I'm sure by that time you'll be famished. It's already ten o'clock." A few more spots on the map lit gold and Mrs. Adler tucked her wand into some unseen fold in her robes and slid the map back across the desk.
"Thank you, Mrs. Adler," Minerva said. "I appreciate your help."
"Please," said Mrs. Adler. "Call me Helmina."
"Minerva, then, Helmina."
Helmina Adler beamed, rose from her desk. "Let's get you to that library."
Minerva stood, transfigured her cloak to pass for a long muggle coat, and followed Helmina out of her office, past the joyful group of students, and to the outside world of Humboldt-Universität Campus Nord. Helmina waved her off, and Minerva began her trek.
She had a few librarians to talk to.
The walk across Campus Nord was quick. She passed the coffee shop on her map, nodded at it. She wasn't ready for more food yet but perhaps before she left for Campus Mitte, she would make a stop. When the library loomed large in front of her, built with the sort of architecture that hinted at both modern and classical aesthetics and managed neither look especially well, Minerva looked off to the west. Where Britain and Hogwarts might be. And she wondered how the Elrics were doing, and whether they really deserved this sort of invasion into their lives.
But Albus wasn't alone in being concerned about who they were. In Minerva's not inconsiderable experience, newcomers with an interest in Potter were misguided at best and murderous at worst.
And a pair of boys more obviously full of lies every day they spent in the castle? They might be children under her charge. Edward might be the quintessential unsorted Gryffindor – one of her own lions. But she needed to know as much as she could.
With her mind settled, Minerva ascended the stairs of the library.
It was much like every other academic library Minerva had ever been to. The main room just beyond the doors was staidly colored but laid out to be welcoming. Overstuffed armchairs and couches were crowded around coffee tables.
On a Saturday, few of the students sitting in the space looked to be working on anything academic. But they had their heads together seriously nonetheless. To the left of the room was the circulation desk, and Minerva figured that was as good a place to start as any.
A librarian at this library had written Edward's letter of recommendation to the job at the British high school. In it, she'd referenced the strong opinion of the supervisors working under her.
Looking back at her notes, Minerva approached the desk, said, "Hello. I'm looking for Dr. Lena Boden? Or perhaps Ms. Juna Klemm?"
The student worker behind the desk swiveled in his chair. "Juna?"
"What?"
"Someone's here for you! Probably a professor?"
A woman in casual dress in her upper-middle years poked her head around a partial wall that obscured much of this back space. A curtain of soft looking blonde hair fell over her shoulder, obscuring her face. Ostensibly also her view, because she stepped into the open and brushed her hair out of the way with an annoyed mutter. The sort of fragment sentence that translation spells didn't work so well for. She sidled up to the desk, movements stiff.
"I'm Juna," she said. "And who are you?"
"Professor McGonagall," Minerva said. "I teach at a school in Britain, and I have some questions about a student you used to supervise?"
"I remember all my students," Juna said with the fond-but-weary smile of a veteran educator. "Who've ya got for me?"
"An Edward Elric? I do hope you remember him. He would have left your employ this past March."
Juna snorted, grinned. "Ed! Great kid. Are you thinking of hiring him? Because I swear, I told Dr. Boden everything that shoulda gone in that letter of rec."
Minerva gave the student worker a hard stare, watched him swallow. When she raised an eyebrow, he fled. The woman – Juna – cackled. "Nicely done." Despite the wildness in her laugh, there was now a more serious element to her expression. "Still, if this is a private conversation, I'll take you to the back. Leave poor Oskar at his post."
Minerva inclined her head. "That would be most courteous of you."
Juna smiled tranquilly, her face going the sort of blank that Minerva usually associated with the Lovegood child, and gestured Minerva around the desk. "Oskar!" she called, loudly enough for a student sitting at a nearby table to flinch.
Oskar appeared from the back, and Juna pointed at his workstation. "You're good to be over here. Thanks kid!"
Minerva looked at Oskar again, pursing her lips. Terrorizing young men was even more satisfying than terrorizing eleven-year-olds. He swallowed again, sat nervously in his chair. Minerva gave him a thin smile before allowing herself to be led into the back.
Ms. Klemm led her past the interlibrary loan station and into a breakroom. There was a toaster and a coffeemaker. A kettle and a crumbling pressboard table. The light overhead was faintly yellow, and Minerva kept expecting it to flicker.
Juna gestured at a hard metal folding chair, took one herself. Once she sat, knees splaying wide above neatly hooked ankles, she said, "Alright what's up with our Edward. He works for you?"
Minerva took the indicated chair before speaking. "He's found employment at my school," she said, choosing her words carefully. "His younger brother has been enrolled as a student."
This time, Minerva was certain that Juna's smile was genuine. "Alphonse! Also a great kid. I love those boys. Miss having 'em – I swear they read half the collection during their time here."
These were the sort of anecdotes missing in Edward's records. "So, you can confirm that Edward Elric worked here?"
Juna shot her a look that was probably designed to question Minerva's sanity but mostly just looked nervous.
"I haven't spoken to his professors yet," Minerva said. "But I assure you they are next on the list. Such a memorable boy must have left quite an impression."
"You're a bitch, aren't you?" Juna said, seeming to recognize that the jig was up.
Minerva sniffed, said, "I have been called worse."
"Well I'm not saying a word," said Juna. "I really don't care what you think you know. Edward was a great kid, and I can confirm he worked here. He was such a smart cookie, and he's a damn credit to whatever institution he goes to."
Minerva had been ready to bristle, but the certainty in Juna's voice made her deflate. This was no time to go on the offensive. "Look. My headmaster and I aren't looking to fire him. His skills make him frankly indispensable. And that's before you consider his brother, who absolutely must be a student at our school for his own safety. I just want to know more about him."
"Look. Those boys are good sweet kids. They never said a word when I broke little rules, even though they adore the Head Librarian, too. I owe it to them to keep my trap shut."
"They're traumatized children," Minerva said. "And not knowing anything about their history makes it harder to help them. They need help."
Juna snorted. "They were traumatized long before Doc Boden and I came into the picture. If you think I even know the details to their tragic backstory you are mistaken. I trusted them, didn't ask them to tell me shit. 'Sides. Everybody's got a tragic backstory. Do for them what you'd do for any Joe off the street."
"And you didn't ask any questions when you helped them forge their paperwork?"
Juna just gave her a shark-like grin. "People who want fake papers generally don't want to answer questions."
Well that was basically a confession right there. Minerva had a sneaking suspicion that she wouldn't need to visit Campus Mitte at all. She would visit the chemistry department here at Campus Nord just to confirm. But. "Edward Elric was never a student here at all, was he?"
"Oh, fuck you," Juna said, turning her glittering blue eyes to the ceiling. "I'm sorry boys. So sorry. Look. I was working the night Ed walked into this library. He was covered in blood, shaking, half carrying his brother. And Al looked like a walking skeleton, wearing old fashioned clothes made from convenience store quality fabric. Both of them had long hair, but Al's was down to his waist – I thought he was a girl at first.
"Neither of 'em were even speaking normal German. Admittedly I've never much left Berlin, but they didn't talk like anybody I'd ever heard. Maybe they're from the German speaking part of France? I don't even know. But I looked in those boys' eyes, and when Ed stumbled up to my desk and had the balls to ask me for a job looking half dead, I pulled 'em into the back.
"Poor Alphonse passed out as soon as I got them here. Just collapsed in my arms. Ed was beside himself. Doc Boden was working late that night, so I wrapped Alphonse in my jacket and laid him out on the floor." Juna gestured at a corner, and Minerva could almost see it – see a skeletal Alphonse dead to the world in a stranger's jacket. "And I got Doc Boden, brought her down here, said, 'Lena these boys need help.' At this point Ed was crouching next to Al, reciting the damn periodic table to keep calm. Had it fucking memorized."
Juna was staring vacantly into space, and Minerva knew what Ms. Klemm was seeing instead. Hell, Minerva could almost see it herself. Juna shook herself out of the vision quickly though, and refocused. "I'd have brought them home with me, but I don't have the space. Got a shit-ass roommate too. Hard enough to negotiate seeing my daughter and grandkid! So, Doc Boden brought 'em home with her instead. She and her partner have always wanted kids, you know. Having a pair of children practically drop in their laps was a dream come true."
She glared at Minerva fiercely, "And when a kid shows up at your doorstep looking like death, you help them. Whether they answer your questions or not. We reckoned Ed correctly at sixteen, Al was harder to tell with the malnutrition. Shocked when he told us he was only a year younger, even if he was the taller of the two."
"And you didn't turn to social services why?" There was a part of Minerva that was tempted so tempted to pull the relevant memories from this woman's mind. But the International Statute of Secrecy was in fact, international. She could only do so without her consent and would have to obliviate her after.
A memory of her father, a memory of Dougal McGregor's ashen face as she gave him back his ring, stayed her wand. She was not the sort of witch to take advantage of defenseless muggles. Minerva simply wouldn't do it. So, she looked to this Ms. Klemm and hoped to Merlin that she'd get a reasonable narrative from her.
Juna crossed her arms. "One of my little theories," she said, "is that Ed got his injuries that night from rescuing Al from some sort of kidnapping scenario. It doesn't fit every detail I have, but I'd bet it's closer to the truth than anything else. Which means they were probably trying to hide. All through their time here, they kept saying that they needed to get to England. They wanted to put the ocean between themselves and whatever the fuck happened to them."
Had they? What was so important that it needed to be England specifically? Huh. But there was still an overwhelming question: "What does this have to do with social services?"
"When a kid is trying to hide? You don't tell the fucking government where he is. Hell, sometimes I think Al mighta been kept in one of those experimental facilities. Maybe that's where Ed had to rescue him from!" And then Juna dove into a longwinded rant about the government. That was why Juna Klemm kept social services out of it – she was one of those muggle conspiracy theorists. But what about this Dr. Boden?
What was her buy-in to this phenomenal shitshow?
The answer came with the doctor herself. Saving Minerva from hearing more of Ms. Klemm's theories, there was a knock on the door. In stepped a woman only just younger than Minerva. Her gray hair was tied up asymmetrically to display the tight coils of its texture, her green skirt reached her ankles. She wouldn't have looked so very out of place in the wizarding world – the sweater over her clothes looked almost like a robe.
"Oskar gave me a call," the woman said, adjusting her sweater. "He seemed to think I would be needed down here."
"Dr. Boden, I presume?" Minerva said, quite sure of her footing.
The woman inclined her head. "You have me at a disadvantage."
"Professor Minerva McGonagall, deputy headmistress at Hogwarts School in Scotland. I've come to ask after an old employee of yours."
"She's putting her nose where it doesn't belong, Doc," Juna said. "Asking about the Elrics."
Nobody gestured to any chairs, but Dr. Boden took one without prompting. Her face went from being carefully blank to looking strategically worried. "I'd hoped, but deep down I knew our hack job wouldn't hold up to any real scrutiny."
Sensible and just a little conniving. Minerva liked that in a woman. "I'm not looking to fire him," Minerva said. "I just want to know as much as I can."
Dr. Boden gave her an incredulous stare. "You're not looking to fire a sixteen-year-old with no real credentials?"
"Ssh!" said Juna. "Do you want to give her reason?"
"Perhaps it is against my better judgement, to employ a child as a teacher. But I already knew his age, and that his credentials were most likely a load of horseshit when we hired him. There has, however, been an incident with his younger brother, and we find ourselves being curious as to their backstory."
"And so, you came to the people who helped them. Of course," Dr. Boden said. She crossed her legs, skirt swishing against the metal of her chair. "Well, sometimes you look at a child and you simply have to help. I gave Edward a job and both of them a place to sleep. They earned my trust without telling me much of anything. I don't think they told either of us much." She looked at Juna here, for confirmation.
"I think the most personal thing I learned about them was that they have Daddy issues – and really who doesn't?" said Juna.
"They're fiercely loyal to each other," said Dr. Boden, "which is a part of why we didn't turn them over to foster care. I think they would have burned this city to the ground if they'd been separated."
"And really if the government didn't neglect Al, who did?" Juna leaned forward in her desk, propping herself up on her forearms. She gave Minerva a hard stare. Belatedly, Minerva remembered Molly Weasley's whispers about child armies and corrupt governments.
Maybe this Juna Klemm had a point. The British Ministry certainly wasn't competent.
Dr. Boden inclined her head in Juna's direction. "Even I couldn't dismiss that theory out of hand," she said. "They were so suspicious of anything institutionalized. They came to this library carrying the clothes on their backs, a pocket watch, a few cans of soup, and an atlas. No ID, no passport, not even a library card. Peering nervously around every corner."
"And your first instinct was to welcome them to your home?" Minerva said, turning her attention to Dr. Boden and cycling back to her wondering about social services.
Dr. Boden shrugged, said, "It's not like the foster system is a great place for children to go. Once I got them settled into the spare room that first night – Alphonse didn't wake during the whole transfer at all – Ed asked me if I was going to call anyone. He looked so afraid, I told him no. We had the space."
"Sometimes good people get into some shit," Juna said. Minerva couldn't argue with that, so she gestured at Juna to continue. "After knowing 'em for a few weeks, I figured it was time to call in that favor this one guy owes me. I asked him to get some papers."
"I asked if we could throw in school records," Dr. Boden said. "I thought we could get them enrolled in classes here with fake high school transcripts, but Ed just gave me a tired look asked if it wouldn't be more efficient to fake a college degree and enter the workforce straight away. England apparently couldn't wait for him to attend university first."
"It was all the same to that friend of mine," said Juna. For a moment, an image of Mundungus Fletcher superimposed itself over Juna Klemm. She thought the comparison might be rather apt.
"Edward pointed out that he might get less scrutiny that way, and I couldn't disagree," Dr. Boden said. "Ed proved he knew the material. Alphonse did too, but apparently planned to figure out his credentials once in England. I won't lie, there was a part of me that wanted to sit on them till they were actually eighteen."
"Yes, why didn't you sit on them till majority?" Minerva asked, because she hadn't expected to find two fiercely-motherly women in Berlin. She'd expected to find that younger adults had been Edward and Alphonse's co-conspirators. "I'm glad he's found a position at my school, but I'm struggling to understand why grown people who cared so much for the Elrics would let them go off on their own as minors. Especially a minor with as many obvious physical issues as Alphonse."
Dr. Boden sighed, unhooked her ankles, said, "I tried to keep them here. They would need the papers anyway, but I thought about withholding the passports. But they said they had something to accomplish. That it was something urgent, even if they themselves weren't quite sure what it was."
"And you let them leave?"
"I had no legal hold on them," Dr. Boden said. "What would you have me do? Tie them to their chairs? I'd rather them leave prepared and with my support than leave without anyone behind them. Believe me, they would have left regardless of how I felt about it."
"Not used to being mothered, those two," Juna said. "I'd like to see you try it."
Minerva inwardly reflected that part of her was trying. As much as she mothered any of her students, anyway. "I know they aren't," she said. "At this point my associates are struggling to be seen as authority figures by them at all."
"And that's why you're here," said Dr. Boden. "Because they aren't submitting to control?"
That did some it up, really. Albus felt like he couldn't control them. Or perhaps. "I'm starting to think I was sent mainly to give me something to do. We accepted that the boys had a backstory they weren't sharing when we hired one and enrolled the other." She couldn't place why she'd admitted to that, but there it was.
"Have you been asking difficult questions lately?" said Dr. Boden.
"The Man will do a lot to keep good people from asking questions," said Juna.
"But if you need to have something to take back," said Dr. Boden, "even just to report. I can tell you they aren't from Germany."
"What?" said Minerva, "France then?"
"I always thought France," said Juna.
"Certainly not France," said Dr. Boden. "The accent is wrong. Why they preferentially speak German I can't say I even know. That second day? After I brought them home? They glued themselves to the Atlas, taking special care to familiarize themselves with maps of Germany at large, Berlin in particular, and the UK. I heard them talking about the geography. They'd never heard of any of it."
"You never told me that!" said Juna.
"Because if I had, you would have asked them about it directly." Dr. Boden didn't frown, exactly, but there was something disapproving in her gaze anyway. Minerva wondered if these two women fought ever. She wondered how frequently and how viciously.
"Maybe they were both government experiments – never taught a damn thing even about what country they lived in." Juna nodded in satisfaction and slid a sheaf of blonde hair back over her shoulder.
Minerva was torn between the impulse to call her crazy and matching that theory up with what she'd heard from Molly again. Successful coup d'état, indeed.
"It's as good a theory as any," said Dr. Boden, though she shot Juna an exasperated glance. "Hell, the child in me wonders if they don't come from a parallel universe."
If Minerva felt her pulse speed up at that theory, she didn't admit it to herself. "They certainly are alien," she said, because it was an agreement without putting her in any camp.
Dr. Boden looked at her consideringly, smoothed her hands over her knees. She must have come to some sort of decision, because she finally said, "Have either of them done any alchemy for you."
"Lena!" Juna said, voice a hissed admonition.
Minerva readied herself to summon her wand and managed a careful, "They both have." Because what was the point of lying if the poor woman had already doomed herself to obliviation.
"Because they seemed quite surprised when they heard I'd never seen any before. They became even more surprised when I told them that I'd thought alchemy was the dead parent-art of chemistry and physics."
"Were they?" The International Statute of Secrecy may have been international, but there was a looser definition of it here on the continent. Young Mr. Elric himself is a muggle. This woman does not need obliviation. You can find a reason to leave their minds intact, Minerva, you wool-headed fool. "Because they seemed to know that their abilities were special by the time I knew them."
"They seemed to think that there ought to be as many alchemists as any other sort of scientist," said Dr. Boden. "And that, my twelve-year-old self tells me, is simply not the world we live in."
"You know your twelve-year-old self might have a point!" said Juna. "Always knew the government was hiding aliens."
Dr. Boden re-crossed her ankles, drew her sweater closer about her shoulders. "But every rational adult knows that even if an infinite multiverse is theoretically possible, the science of today is simply incapable of traversing from one to the other." There was a pause as Dr. Boden took off her spectacles and hung them from the beads around her neck. "Of course, the science of today is also incapable of utilizing tectonic energy with a chalked circle."
"That's what I'm talking about," Juna said. "When the world presents you with crazy, sometimes you've got to look at the possibilities."
"I'm not here to listen to nonsense," Minerva said, produced an address used to forward muggle post to Hogwarts. "If either of you think of something useful to tell me, just write me here." She needed to end this conversation with her wand in her pocket. She needed to end this conversation before she heard something that left her with no grey area.
She was not going to obliviate these women.
Both Dr. Boden and Ms. Klemm shot her oddly identical smiles. "Oh, don't worry," said Ms. Klemm. "I'm sure we'll think of something."
It was Dr. Boden who took the card, though. It disappeared into one of her sweater pockets, and Minerva had the distinct impression that it would never again see the light of day. She excused herself from the cramped back office of the North Branch library, walked around to the science department faculty offices.
She had ample proof that Edward was never a student here, but it didn't hurt to check. Minerva stopped in just long enough to confirm: none of the professors recognized an education major of Ed's description.
"We have a lot of students in every class," said one of them apologetically. But Edward Elric was the sort of child to leave an impression. "But wait, are you talking about that guy who worked at the library? He definitely wasn't in any of my classes."
The science department was the confirmation she'd expected, but somehow it settled like a rock into her belly. Despite this whole trip, she was nowhere closer to the truth of the Elric brothers. Minerva still knew next to nothing about them – except that Alphonse had started his journey to health even weaker than when Molly had scooped him under her wing.
Well. Maybe she'd learned a few things: there was a good chance that they were not actually German. Their dialect was unplaceable even to well-educated native German speakers. They'd sourced their paperwork through a third party, so while they weren't opposed to using black market operations, they didn't have underground contacts of their own. They inspired fierce parental concern in every adult they met. And they had truly expected alchemy to be a common practice.
Minerva's gut knew where those details pointed. She knew it by Dr. Boden's rich brown eyes, by Ms. Klemm's quick and easy agreement.
But even if her gut knew, her head wasn't ready to deal with it yet. I'll go back to Hogwarts tomorrow as planned, she thought. I need a night off.
She was just glad Molly's memory was tucked inside her bedside table – if she had it with her now, Minerva wasn't sure she could resist taking a peek and going down another sleepless rabbit hole.
When she spotted Mrs. Adler's favorite coffee shop, she decided to duck inside. Perhaps their tea wouldn't be terrible, and she supposed she owed Mrs. Adler at least a coffee for putting her up for the night.
Back in the Dormitory for Witches and Wizards, Minerva fell asleep quickly and slept long. Her dreams, however, were plagued by images of chalked circles and a gate that could traverse worlds.
Word Count: 9305
Posted: 12/31/2019
HAPPY NEW YEAR! So glad to get one last chapter out before the decade is over. Let's go into the Roaring 20s with a bang!
Hope you enjoyed this chapter. I've had the horrifying realization that even despite a chapter focused entirely on women, this fic only barely passes Bechdel's test. We'll fix that, somehow.
Tell me what you thought – I'm always down for critique and discussion!