The One Who Had The Clearest View
Chapter Nine – Ruth
Disclaimer: Anything you recognise isn't mine.
A/N: Thank you to everyone who reviewed so far. I'll name-check you all at the end of the chapter. By the way, I realise that this chapter has jumped back in time a little. The idea for this chapter came after I'd written the ones set on Christmas Day.
Ruth
December 20th
"Right, Professor Eval had agreed to help us with this experiment as it incorporates a lot of what he is researching and what we are covering in class," Professor Ruth Hemingway addressed the class of 4th year Ravenclaws and Griffyndors before her outside the disused dungeon classroom Anton had been given as his laboratory. "However, before we go in, Professor Eval has some rules he would like to lay down that you must all adhere to in his laboratory."
"Thank you, Professor Hemingway," Anton smiled as he stepped forward from the doorway to address the teenagers, "Firstly I must ask you to not to touch anything except what you are told to in here. A lot of my research is still out because it can't be moved too well and there are some rather nasty and dangerous ingredients in the room. Secondly I would like to ask you all not to sit on the back row of desks when you go in and to be careful when moving around the sides of the room. Understood? Right then, in we go."
Ruth watched her class file in behind Anton. She decided that she was going to set them homework on Anton's demonstration, probably just a write up or something similar. She liked her classes, well, most of them. There were a lot of good kids in this school and an enormous amount of talent in some of the pupils. She and Anton had already come to the decision that a lot of that talent lay in this class and, although Ruth had never been one to pick favourites, she wanted to try and work on a certain three in the class. She had a feeling that this three were yet to even realise their full potential.
Scraping her auburn hair up into a bun she moved to the front of the class to help Anton with his demonstration. The two of them had become good friends in their first term at Hogwarts and he was always interested in the work she was doing with her DADA classes. Scanning the room, Ruth noticed that most of Anton's cauldrons had been moved to the back of the room or onto the sideboards. The tables were no longer in the U-shape he'd kept them in and the room, despite being a dungeon with no natural lighting, managed to almost look habitable. At the back of the room a cauldron was simmering over a low fire, a purple mist floating over the rim. Cabinets mounted on the walls above the sideboards ran parallel to each other, every shelf crammed with jars, bottles and tubs. Ruth glanced at the door to the store room. She'd only been in there a few times. The room was more like an isle of ceiling-to-floor shelves containing what she knew from experience to be pretty dangerous and volatile stuff to down right revolting jars of pickled God-knows-whats.
"Do you all have your notebooks open to take notes for your homework? I want a write up of this experiment for this time next week. Everybody ready?" the class nodded, "let's begin then."
***
Although it was the night of the last day of term, Albus had called a meeting in his office. Anton, Ruth and Minerva McGonagall were sat before the aging headmaster's desk discussing something only a very select few knew about.
"What else do we know about Damien?" Albus asked his colleagues.
"Well, Draco says he's known to both the London Secret Services Office and The New York Auror Higher Elite Office, or, more precisely, the DB66 team." Anton answered glancing at the letter his cousin had sent him.
"Go on."
"Well, we've all heard of the Norway Incident last year,"
Ruth, Albus and Minerva nodded.
"Well, Damien was supposedly the one controlling it and the DB66 team were the ones who master-minded it's demise. But Damien has never been caught because there wasn't any proof to tie him to it all."
"Are you sure?" Ruth asked.
"Positive. You all know that Alana Cistern from the DB66 team has agreed to help us and, although she's being very tight-lipped about what she knows until everyone is assembled, she's told me that one of their team members got as far as Damien's second in command but the guy killed himself while waiting to be interrogated. Their guy didn't get anything out of him before he was taken in either," Anton finished.
"Do we know if Damien's made any moves since?" questioned Ruth.
"No. He's kept a pretty low profile for a long time but he's not kept it low enough to arouse suspicion. He's just been getting on with his business in America."
"Smart move," commented Minerva.
"He is smart. Very smart. But I think our Draco is smarter," smiled Dumbledore.
***
Sorry it's so short again! I must start writing longer chapters. Well, the story is getting going now. Thankfully.
Moving on, thanks to: usha888, bubbles-123, Sophie, MissLexiRe, jem, AshesofNothing, DOTLP, The Brainless Wonder, Hollie, tora Tigress, wilgoldowl, fanficaholic1377, Pink-Crane, Phantomplanet, wicked-women, smile7499, ducksrule, ravn, warm in pink fuzzy pants, mazy, animegirl-mika, Polegara, lyz slytherin, Katt, lunatic-gurl and michelle for reviewing. Also, thanks to anyone I missed. I went through the review pages pretty quickly. Feel free to criticise, it will help me improve and if you have any suggestions for the story they're more that welcome. J