Lead Us Not Into Flirtation

By Philosopher, Seraphina Pyra and CaptainCrash

A note from Seraphina Pyra: This chapter is brought to you by the amusing and talented Philosopher.

Chapter 4: When She's Bad, She's Good

Jezebel was kicking back and chewing gum on Tonks' shoulder. She had a pretty nice set up going. There was a small TV set that was turned on but muted, which she was currently using as a foot stool to rock her chair back on its hind legs. A tiny barbeque pit was grilling up some hot dogs while a little boom box was blasting an old rock song from the 80's. Jezebel took another swig from her Dr. Pepper and noticed she hadn't had to ignore any self- righteous nagging in a while. She leaned forward, spied around Tonks' neck and realized the absence of a certain high and mighty do-gooder.

"Ah-hal-right." She mumbled nodding her head. "Free at last." This was too good to be true. She looked around for her counter part and spotted the pure and virtuous angel talking to a hottie on Harry's shoulder. "Way to go, Teddie." She said with a bit of astonishment. "Didn't think you had it in ya." Jezebel raised her bottle as if to toast the new found boldness of her enemy. Then an evil grin spread across her face and her eyebrows jumped up and down.

She didn't know where Harry's devil had gone to. She wouldn't be at all surprised to discover he didn't even have one. But there was that nice young lad smiling up at her without a single devilish thought and double the innocence shining through. She laughed. "Teddie you just stay right where you are. It would be rude to part company with your new little friend so soon."

A friendly hand dropped on Harry's shoulder. "Wotcher, Harry!" Tonks had just come over to say hello. She'd had a brief encounter with Snape on the way that put her a little out of sorts. Maybe it would put the spring back in her step to be around her younger friends.

"Hello, Tonks." He smiled brightly. It was a cute smile. She'd always thought so but today it was a 'cute' smile. She rolled her shoulders a little and slouched to the left.

"Hum." Tonks thought. "That was an odd feeling."

"Mind if I sit?" She asked.

"No. Not at all." He answered while standing up and pulling out a hanky to wipe the seat for her. "Please do." He would have pulled out her as well chair but it was a bench. "Hum." He thought after he rolled his shoulders and tried not to slouch to the right. "That's an odd feeling."

She allowed her elbows to drop roughly onto the table and held up her chin in the palm of one hand. "God this place is so stuffy and boring." She grumbled and stole a strawberry from the pancake platter of a distracted student.

"Um... It's alright. Hogwarts is a fine school for higher learning and I'd rather be here than distracted by some useless occupation." Tonks shot him a queer look.

"Useless occupation?" She questioned his odd behaviour.

"You know like stuffing my face with chocolate frogs or playing Quidditch."

Her head shot up. "Au contraire, mon ami. Right now, that sounds a lot more appealing than being cooped up here!"

"Well Hogwarts provides us with far more, well balanced nourishment than chocolate but..." He crinkled his brow in thought. "I suppose Quidditch isn't really useless. It's good exercise for one's physical well being."

"It's done wonders for yours." She waggled her eyebrows at the boy... make that the 'young man'-who-lived.

"Er...hem...well...Thank you." There was an awkward silence. "H-how did you sleep?"

"Wouldn't you like to know?"

"Oh, dear." Theodora covered her head with her hands as though she had been suddenly struck in that spot. "Oh dear. Oh my, oh dear! Ooooh St. Peter is going to kill me!"

"No he won't." Evan was trying to put his hands on her shoulders to calm her down but she was pacing too fast.

"No of course he won't. He can't kill me." She spun on her heal and flailed her arms out, smacking Evan in the process, though she hardly noticed. "He'll just banish me from Heaven then." She froze at the very thought of it. "My Paradise! Lost!"

"I'm sure he'll understand." Evan was clutching his nose with one hand and still trying to pat her shoulder with the other. "Please calm down."

"Calm down?! Calm down?! How am I supposed to calm down, when my little lamb is out there with not one, but two wolves?!" Theodora held up two fingers a few inches from Evan's face.

"Yes well..." His eyes searched from side to side for an answer. "On the bright side...!" He looked at her again. "Harry has the both of us! Between the two of us I know we can get Jim back."

"Evan!" She smacked him again. This time it was the shoulder and this time it was deliberate. "You know we're not allowed to possess them. We can't very well make Harry's arm contact hers again. Even if we could, how would we ever get that... that-that... that very BAD person off her shoulder?"

"Trust me. I know Jim. He wouldn't leave me with Harry for very long, let alone two angels." A slight frown marred his normally cheerful face. "He's afraid I'd turn him into a puddle of mush or something. And then he'd be in big trouble with the man downstairs."

"I just want him off of my Tonks NOW! Before his influence begins having any lasting effect." She stomped and turned her back on the younger angel. "Oooh..." She stopped fuming and started wringing her hands. "My poor lamb. She must be so frightened without me."

"There. There." Evan finally managed to land his hands on her shoulders from behind. "We can trick him into coming over before anything happens."

"How."

"By doing what we do best." Theodora turned around, her interest peaked. "Convincing Harry to be unbearably nice. Jim won't be able to restrain himself from bolting over here before they get Tonks to do anything."

"Fine. Whatever." She was pouting. Her bottom lip began to quiver.

"Wow." Evan thought as he became momentarily fixated on that lip. "I get it now. Boy do I ever get it now." He had to shake his head to get back to reality.

"But we'll have to play our best game." He said. "150 percent. No holds barred. Understand me? He'll want you to get off Harry's shoulder first so he'll try to influence Tonks in the hopes that you will lose control and fly over."

"I see. It's a test of wills then." Theodora rolled up the sleeves of her lily white robes. "Right. Good thing I paid attention in auror training." She rolled her eyes and added. "Jezebel just kept trying to fake the flu."

Evan chose not to tell her the rest. That Jezebel would not be trying too hard. She would want Theodora to stay put, not rush over. For that matter he had mixed feelings of his own. Did he really want Theodora to leave so soon? Sure he missed Jim already but this job would be a lot easier if...

Jezebel heard grunting approaching from over the edge of Tonks' shoulder. Someone's hand had flung over the top and was struggling to find a grip. She watched with not more than a sliver of interest. A small version of Harry emerged and hauled himself over the edge. He had tied the red cape around his waste and was wearing a tight black muscle shirt.

Jim heard a cat whistle. "Nice horns." He heard a voice say. "I'm impressed. Must take a lot of stamina to scale that drop."

"Alright wise..." He got his legs over and was about to ream out whatever pissy know it all had said that when he caught sight of the pissy know it all. She was wearing a black muscle shirt similar to his only with spatters of pink paint whipped randomly across it.

"Hey there, young stuff." She looked him over and made no attempt to hide the fact that she was checking out his tail. "Nice of you to finally come around." Jezebel rose a little from her chair to pull out a soda from the ice chest and a stick of gum from her breast pocket. She offered them both to the mysterious rebel with the cocky smile. "What's your name?"

"Jim, darlin'." He took the gum and opened the bottle. "But you can call me anything you want."

"Well, 'Anything-You-Want', my name's Jezebel. Take a load off." She flopped back down in her chair and resumed her laid back pose. Another chair appeared behind Jim and he accepted.

"So..." He began, looking her over much the same way she had. He liked the spiked bracelet but the baggy camouflage cargo pants had to go. They didn't show off enough.

"So." Jezebel jabbed the hot dogs with her mini pitch fork.

"I hate this place." He looked around the hall with a sneer.

"Hasn't changed much since we've been here." Jezebel was of course referring to the glory days when she Theodora and Tonks ruled the school... Well mostly she and Tonks ruled while Theodora babbled on about peer pressure. The teen years always have and always will be the pride of every sinister agent. Jezebel came out of her reverie to notice that Jim was now regarding her with a look of curiosity.

"What was she like back then?" He asked

"Who Tonks?"

"No. McGonagall, you idiot. Of course, Tonks!"

Jezebel scowled. She didn't like letting this young upstart get the upper hand. But after a moment of keeping him on the line, she just tilted her head casually. "Why do you ask?"

"I don't know. Just curious I guess." Even Jim knew that sounded lame.

She inspected her fingernails and appeared disinterested, "Tell you what," Then gave him a sly sideways look. "You tell me all o' your secrets..." Now she went for the kill. Careful keep the rest of her body out of his personal space, Jezebel leaned over until her lips were right by his ear. This gave him a certain... view. "...and I'll tell you aaaaaall of ours."

His blood rushed and he struggled to keep himself from gulping hard. "Deal." His voice sounded like a set of screeching tires. Jim quickly cleared his throat. "Deal." He repeated in a more manly tone and tried to regain that cocky smile.

"Deal." Jezebel put a hand out. He fell for it and tried to shake hands before she pulled hers back. Then she leaned back again with a smile that would be the envy of the Cheshire Cat himself. "But first..." She looked around.

"But first..." He answered knowingly. Each devil surveyed the hall as though it were a peaceful little village ready to be pillaged. "Ready?" Jim asked.

Jezebel drained her drink and slammed it down. "Ready." Her eyes were wild.

"Then let's saddle up and ride!"

A blast of music came from out of nowhere:

Cause I saddle up my horse
and I ride into the city
!
Everybody says
SAVE A HORSE, RIDE A COWBOY!!!

To be continued.....