Disclaimer: I do not own Harry Potter.

11: Recall

As he stood before the desk, his arms folded firmly across his chest, Teddy Lupin barely suppressed a sigh as he waited for the arguing to subside.
"Utterly unacceptable, Jasmine!" Head of Aurors Harry Potter was berating as Deputy Head of Aurors Jasmine Wickes stalked up and down the office, attempting to wear the rug before the fireplace thin. "It's just utterly ridiculous!" And with that, he flung the collection of papers he was grasping down upon the desk with a thud.

"How was I to know Rory was such a MORON?!" Jasmine shrieked, reaching to grasp fistfuls of dark red hair in agitation. "It was a simple enough task!"
"IT'S NOT A SIMPLE TASK, JASMINE!" Harry bellowed furiously. "IT REQUIRES A...A SPECIFIC UNDERSTANDING!"

"I know that!"

"Then why did you give the job to Rory?! He's lived in Godric's Hollow since he was three years old! He's a pureblood! There hasn't been a muggle in his family for bloody decades! He doesn't know anything about Muggles or Squibs!" Harry raised a hand to thrust a finger in Teddy's direction, making the younger Auror flinch. "Why in Merlin's name didn't you ask Teddy to do it?! He's married to a muggle! He's got a Squib daughter who has muggle friends, he lives in a muggle town and he's worked for the bloody Muggle Liason Office! HE'S BLOODY WELL MET JEFF FAWLEY ON NUMEROUS OCCASSIONS! He's our SPECIALIST!"

"We don't have SPECIALISTS!" Jasmine retorted furiously. "Before Ted came along you used to tell everyone Azalea was a Muggle Specialist 'cos she met one down the pub once or something! You lived with muggles for years! If that makes you such a genius why didn't you bloody do the report yourself?!"

"I just don't understand why you would pick Rory over Teddy!"

"Teddy wasn't here!"

"What do you mean he WASN'T HERE?!"

"I mean he was ABSENT! GONE! AWAY! BUSY ELSEWHERE!"

"Busy doing what?!"

There was a long enough pause in the shouting for Teddy to realise that this question had been directed at him.

"I had a morning off, Harry." he explained, managing to sound quite ashamed of himself, and Harry's expression was one of the upmost confusion.

"A...morning off?!" the Head of Aurors repeated, as if the phrase were entirely foreign, and Teddy shuffled his feet a little and explained:

"Yes. Jasmine said I could ha..."

"You gave him a MORNING OFF?!" Harry cried, sounding, if possible, yet more livid than ever, and Jasmine huffed and said:

"Well he wasn't busy!"

"He should have been!" Harry exclaimed, gesturing to Rory's discarded report upon the table, and with that he scowled and told Teddy: "Well count yourself luck, Ted! Because back when Tonks was Deputy nobody got a bloody morning off in the middle of a crisis investigation! She didn't even grant any bloody sick leave!"

"Yes, yes!" Jasmine shrieked furiously, flinging her hands up in the air in frustration. "We all get it! Tonks was better at this job than I am! You'd much rather have her here than me!"

At this accusation, Harry sobered somewhat, expression regretful.

"I...I didn't mean it like that, Jas..." he began apologetically, but Jasmine ignored him.

"I tell you what!" she shouted, face fast growing an alarming shade of pink. "Why don't you scurry over to Mungo's and beg her to give up retirement and take her old job back?!"

"None of this is actually relevant," Teddy finally managed to interject, having been waiting for some while for a pause in the argument. "I'm not qualified to write official suspect profiles. I was due to start training for my profilers' certificate this week, but...well...obviously, Harry, you cancelled it..."

Harry positively gawped to hear of his blunder, and Jasmine shouted:

"HA!"

Harry groaned.

"Shut up, Jasmine." he said wearily as he stepped out from behind his desk and headed for the door. "Fine. Ted's not qualified to write an official profile of Fawley, and Rory's qualified but apparently completely incompetent! Let's just...let's just take a step back and start from the beginning..."

Teddy watched as Harry reached to fling open the office door, stepping out into the bustling office beyond before calling to the room at large: "Attention Aurors! We're having a staff meeting! Now!"

As Jasmine stepped up beside him, Teddy watched the Aurors abandon their paperwork and desks and come to stand in a large cluster before Harry, who eyed them wearily before telling them:

"Alright, this is only going to take a second. Put your hand up if you've got a Squib in your family."

Not a single person, save Teddy in the doorway behind him raised their hand.

"Honestly?" Harry said, folding his arms firmly across his chest. "Not a single one of you? Come on, there's nothing to be ashamed of...anyone?!"

Still, nobody raised a hand.

"Fine." Harry sighed, rocking impatiently back upon his heels. "Any muggleborns? Hands up!"

A few people raised their hands.

"Good. Keep your hands up. Anybody else married to a muggle? Anybody got close muggle relations? Muggle friends?"

A few more hands were raised until Harry asked: "And out of those of you with hands up... keep your hands up if you've completed the training for and have a legitimate certificate to write official suspect profiles!"

Every single hand went down.

Harry groaned.

"Bloody hell," he muttered, "there's not a single qualified profiler here apart from me who could write a decent profile on Jeff Fawley..."

There was silence as the Aurors all shifted around almost guiltily until a voice from behind the Head of Aurors announced:

"My mum's met Jeff Fawley."

Harry turned slowly around to stare at Teddy as if he couldn't quite believe what he was hearing.

Teddy shrugged.

"What?" he said, looking as if he wanted to snigger. "Most of the family have. She and Dad used to take turns with Imogen and I apparating Pandora to SEWS..." he trailed off at the odd look of triumph that appeared to be materialising on Harry's face before finally recalling: "And obviously she's been certified to write suspect profiles for longer than you've been in scarlet robes..."

"JASMINE!" Harry exclaimed as, having apparently been struck with an urgent notion, he set off through the crowd of Aurors towards the office doors, and Jasmine was forced to half-job to catch him up.

"I'm right here, Harry..."

"I want you to go straight to the Minister for Magic!"

"Right..."

"Tell him I'm going out!"

"Right..."

"And tell him to start drafting a letter urgently!"

"What sort of..."

"There's not a moment to lose!" Harry declared as he reached to throw the double doors open wide, the gathered Aurors all staring after him. "Tell him I want Tonks recalled out of retirement and her badge reinstated! And I want the summons on her doorstep the second she's out of hospital! And tell him to tell her we won't take no for an answer!"

And with that the doors swung shut behind him, very nearly hitting Jasmine in the face as she froze.

There was a very long pause before the Deputy Head of Aurors said:

"Right..."

Murmurings and whispers instantly broke out amongst the assembled Aurors as Jasmine turned back to look at them, and above the racket Teddy called:

"She'll never agree to it!"

And despite her earlier grumblings, Jasmine Wickes grinned widely and called back:

"She better bloody do!"

Dora Lupin stared blearily up at the man who had just burst into her hospital ward and shaken her awake with a urgent hand upon her shoulder some minutes earlier.

And then she told him:

"No."

Harry Potter stared back at her, entirely thrown by the single syllable that had left her lips and it took him a full ten seconds to comprehend it well enough to utter:

"Wh...what?!"

The ex-Deputy Head of Aurors shifted sleepily against her pillows, grimacing a little at the uncomfortable metal digging into her legs.

"I said no, Harry." she explained simply. "I'm not coming back. I don't want to."

Harry's face contorted in a mixture of confusion and frustration.

"But...but you HATE being retired!" he pointed out, failing not to sound rather furious with her, and the witch shrugged and said:

"Well I've changed my mind."

"That's ridiculous, Tonks." Harry complained, only for her eyes to drift shut with a yawn.

"Have you seen the Daily Prophet this morning?" she asked, seemingly changing the subject, reaching a blind hand sideways to pick up a neatly folded newspaper that lay upon her bedside table.

"Not yet, no." Harry confessed, only to have the paper in question thrust into his hands as Dora told him:

"My granddaughter is front page news."

Harry stared down at the front page despairingly. Some journalist somewhere had dug out a photograph from the previous year's Phoenix Day Parade; Dora stood under the Order's banner with Imogen and Pandora, the younger girl's shoulder resting upon her grandmother's shoulder as the trio beamed at the camera.

SQUIB GRANDDAUGHTER OF EXPLOSION VICTIM LINKED TO MURDEROUS PERPENTRATOR!

SIXTEEN YEAR OLD NAMESAKE OF PAN'S ARMY SEEN WITH JEFFREY FAWLEY MERE MINUTES BEFORE MINDLESS ATTACK LEAVES HER GRANDMOTHER FIGHTING FOR LIFE!

The Head of Aurors' nose wrinkled in distaste and he muttered:

"Merlin, poor Pandora..."

"Family solidarity is the name of the game right now, Harry." Dora told him. "To me and the rest of the family Pandora comes first. And you can make Teddy take a sleeping bag to work with him if you like, that's your obligation. But you won't drag me away from my family for days at a time, you've no right to do so."

"Tonks, the department needs you!"

"And my granddaughter needs me. So the department can get stuffed."

"But..."

"Remus has taken her in. She's going to stay with us until the media uproar dies down, she's a terrible mess!"

"Surely you don't have to be there constantly, Tonks! You're not there now, are you?!"

"I'm not there now because I'm a terrible bloody mess too, Harry!" Dora exclaimed, finally beginning to lose her temper, offering the Auror a scowl. "Just...bloody take a step back and look at me! Look at the state of me, for Merlin's sake!"

Harry looked reluctantly down at her legs as if he didn't really want to look at all, biting his lip at the heavy metal supports clamped awkwardly around the limbs.

"I'm a bloody cripple!" Dora hissed bitterly, reaching to swipe a furious sleeve across her eyes, and Harry felt a lump in his throat when she whispered: "Some Auror I'd make these days!"

"The greatest Auror of our age was a cripple." Harry pointed out, and Dora huffed and muttered:

"That was different. He might've been missing a leg but he could still walk without somebody holding him upright! I can't go to the bloody bathroom on my own, let alone anything else!"

"It'll get better..." Harry tried to assure her encouragingly. "...given...given time! I mean you'll...the muscles'll start growing a bit..."

Dora didn't appear to find this in the least bit cheering, so he reached to lay a hand upon her arm, explaining: "And anyway I'm not after your athletic talents, am I?! I'm after your brains! You understand things, Tonks! You get muggles and their technology and stuff better than the others!"

"Do I?" Dora wondered dully, and Harry's grip upon her arm tightened in frustration.
"Of course you do! And Teddy's says you've met Fawley! That makes you invaluable..."

"Ted's spoken to him more than I have."

"But Teddy's not qualified to write a profile! And you can write those things in your sleep, Tonks! You've met the suspect and you know what to make a note of! There isn't anybody who could write that profile better than you! And you know how to get the information across to the Aurors! You know how this all works! And I know you're not fighting fit, but I'm not asking you to bloody fight Fawley! I'm asking you to help me teach a bunch of clueless Aurors how to do it!"

"Ask Ted to advise somebody who is qualified."

"I can't waste two Aurors on one task! You know that! Come on, I can't do this on my own, not when we need to act quickly...Kingsley'll pay you bucketfuls of gold if you come back!"

Dora closed her eyes again.

"I'm not interested in bucketfuls of gold." she insisted wearily. "I just want to...to go home to Remus and...and try and...try and have a quiet life. And you'll tell me I'm free to go once I've done your profile for you and had a chat with the rest of the department. But it won't be like that. It never is! I'll get...get sucked into all, somehow! You're wasting your valuable time, you might as well just go back to the Ministry and save your breath."

Stubbornly, Harry ignored her suggestion in favour of perching upon the edge of the bed. He fiddled with the cuffs of his robes in silence for a long moment, before informing his friend:

"I thought I could rely on you."

Dora said nothing.

Harry scuffed a boot against the tiled floor with a troubled frown.

"I thought I could rely on you," he said again, tone rather bewildered. "I mean I...I've always been able to rely on you, Tonks. Right from the first time I met you when you came with the Order to take me from Privet Drive..."

"Don't try and make this personal, Harry." Dora mumbled wearily, but he ignored her.

"...you always showed up with Remus and the others during the War and I knew you'd always do your best for me, and then you were there every day when I signed up for Auror training and you kept my spirits up and I knew if I was struggling you were just around the corner and I could rely on you to give me a boost..."

"Harry..."

"And you've been there for me ever since I qualified and then you were the Deputy and I knew if I had trouble I could rely on you to sort it out..."

"It's irrelevant!"

"And I didn't feel half as nervous getting promoted to Head of Aurors knowing I had you watching my back! I've had you to rely on for all these years! Even now you're retired you still give me advice or help if I come and ask for it! And now after all that...you're going to let me down"

"Stop trying to make this about you, Harry." Dora instructed firmly, sounding uncharacteristically unmoved by his accusations. "It's not about you, it's about your department being ill equipped for the task at hand..."

"Then help me equip it, for Merlin's sake!" Harry cried, throwing his hands up in frustration. "D'you want that nutcase to blow up something else?! D'you want a load more people to...to end up in hospital just like you?! Look at you! You're right, Tonks, you're a bloody wreck! There's no fire left in you! Where's the witch who stood up to Voldemort and the Death Eaters for the sake of the community at large no matter how beaten she got?! Where's she rather than this shadow of a witch who'd rather hide away at home and let other people sort it out?!" He stared at her, eyes wide and imploring, a little breathless after his outburst as she shifted uncomfortably upon the mattress.

"I think you should leave." she said frankly, and Harry felt rather as if she had slapped him round the face.

He simply couldn't believe his ears.

Numbly he got slowly to his feet and turned to look down at her, blinking.

"There'll be summons waiting for you when you get home." he informed her quietly, having had the wind stolen from his sails, and with that he turned to shuffle back towards the ward doors.

Minister for Magic Kingsley Shacklebolt sipped pensively at his cup of coffee before setting it down upon his desk and informing the witch sat opposite him:

"How many wars do you suppose, Jasmine, your Head of Department wishes to wage at once?"

Jasmine Wickes slumped back in her chair, her gaze drifting up towards the ceiling.

"Oh Harry likes to be attacked on all sides, I think." she mused with a snigger. "You know, because I think thanks to the War he thinks that's the natural state of things...!"

"This isn't funny, Jasmine." the Minister informed her irritably. "I've got better things to do with my time than to give Tonks cause to bombard me with Howlers!"

"Oh I shouldn't worry about that!" Jasmine told him, sounding abruptly sour. "I'm sure she'll come back if he asks nicely. She hates being retired..."

"She's in hospital having narrowly avoided having her leg amputated!" Kingsley retorted furiously. "Her granddaughter's been up to Merlin knows what and by all accounts I hear she's in extremely low spirits!"

"I doubt it. Tonks isn't like the rest of the human race, Guv'ner, her spirits have springs!"

Kingsley frowned at the odd twang of bitterness in her tone, but chose to ignore it.

"I came across Teddy in the Atrium this morning. He says he's very concerned..."

"He was probably talking about Pandora." Jasmine decided with a toss of the head.

"No, I specifically asked after Tonks."

"Bloody hell..." Jasmine muttered, as if she didn't know what the world was coming to.

"Look," the Minister said with a resigned sigh, "I'll send her summons, but I won't demand she returns! I'll simply request a favour of her and nobody's to berate her should she turn me down!"

"Cheers, Guvn'er!" Jasmine said, springing to her feet.

"In fact, I'll deliver the letter myself."

"Excellent! Tell her there's nothing like a bit of hard graft to lift the spirits!"

The Minister scowled.

"You know, Tonks," he found himself saying some two hours later as he sat at Dora's bedside, an envelope held carefully in both hands, "there's nothing like a bit of...of hard graft to lift the spirits!"

"Isn't there?" Dora said, sounding as if she meant to be sarcastic but didn't quite have the energy. "You'd better tell Jasmine to stop poking her nose in and get some bloody work done then!"

Not for the first time since Dora's retirement, Kingsley found himself wondering what was worse: having Dora at the Ministry to keep an eye on Jasmine, leading to frequent blazing rows, or having Dora retired, leading to the Auror Department being overall more peaceful but in serious danger of self-destructing under Jasmine's untempered influence.

The Minister had had many years to ponder this question and today he felt just as clueless about the answer as he always had done.

"Listen," he told her, leaning forward in his chair and discarding the letter onto her bedside table. "I've no expectations of you, if you choose not to return I won't think any worse of you. It's no small thing, coming out of retirement, even at the best of times..."

"Nobody comes out of retirement at the best of times, Kingsley." Dora pointed out bleakly. "When you get old nobody wants you when things are going swimmingly. They only want you when it's all gone to pot. Except for you, of course. You're not allowed to retire in the first place."

The Minister grinned, stretching the wrinkles from around his mouth.

"Indeed, I do rather wish people would stop re-electing me!"

"It might help if you stopped standing for election."

"I'm not sure even that would stop them."

As she reached to take the envelope from the bedside table, running a considering finger along one edge, Dora told him:

"It puts the fear into them, Kingsley. The thought of you retiring. You've been in power for well over half my lifetime. Lots of people haven't known another Minister for Magic in their entire life! There's never been a longer serving Minister, you're part of the furniture...people don't like it when you tamper with the furniture..."

"No, I don't suppose they do."

"You're the embodiment of progress since the War. And there's always a threat to progress when power changes hands."

"Do you know what puts the fear into me, Tonks?" the Minister asked his former colleague as she continued to fiddle absentmindedly with the envelope, running a finger across the purple wax sealing it shut.

"I can't imagine."

"The thought that some things are not long for this world. And the thought that at the rate they're changing I'll wake up one morning and find those things are so different that I'm too old to cope with the alterations."

"Some things such as...?"

Kingsley reached to rub a weary hand at his forehead with a sigh.

"You know as well as I do that there is never a good time for the Ministry to be faced with a potentially ongoing crisis. But I must admit that some times are far worse than others. Some times are...are far worse for certain people."

Dora considered this cryptic comment in silence for a long moment, tracing her name upon the envelope with a finger, gazing down at the carefully sculpted loops and curves in ink.

Then, her mind apparently having grasped one meaning or another, she wondered:

"How is Isaac these days? I've not been to visit in Merlin knows how long..."

"I haven't visited. I daren't ask Jasmine about him, either..."
"Merlin...is he really that bad?"

"Rumour is he's got a matter of months...a year and a half if he's lucky..."

Dora squeezed her eyes shut and sucked in a deep, pained breath.

"No...he can't have! He was...he's been ill for years but he was...when I last saw him he seemed quite...he...just...!"

"I know." Kingsley whispered as the witch reached to press a horrified hand to her mouth to hear such terrible news.

The pair were silent for several bleak minutes, the weight of ticking time heavy upon their shoulders, until Kingsley sucked in a deep, almost nervous breath and whispered:

"I want to sack her."

Dora's eyes snapped back open and when she responded she found herself whispering too.

"What?!" she hissed, utterly alarmed.

"Jasmine," Kingsley whispered as if it weren't entirely obvious. "I want her...I want her gone."

"You can't be serious!"

"That's what Harry said. Except of course it's what he wants too..."

"Why the bloody hell would you even consider..."

"Isaac's dying, Tonks!"

"Well yes but...but don't sack her! Let her retire early, for Merlin's sake! She's bound to retire..."

"She won't."

"She's always said she would! If Isaac took a turn for the worst..."

"Isaac won't let her."

"Isaac's several twigs short of a broomstick!"

"Jasmine says Isaac thinks retiring would be foolish in the long run. You know what Jasmine's like...she needs...boundaries. Routine. She might very well want to be with him until the end, Isaac says, but what about after he's gone? She'll be on her own with nothing to preoccupy her, he thinks it'll make things far easier if she could have work as a distraction."

Dora frowned deeply.

"He makes a good point, actually." she said, tapping the envelope absentmindedly against her lap. "I don't suppose I would retire, if it were me..."

"But Jasmine isn't you, Tonks." Kingsley explained, sounding rather wretched. "And that's why I...that's why I want her out."

"You can't sack her, Kingsley..."

"She's causing all sorts of trouble!"

"That's perfectly normal. Trouble is Jasmine's middle name..."

"No, Tonks! This is different! This is...this is jeopardising the whole of the Auror Department!" Kingsley clenched his teeth against his voice rising in volume, leaning closer towards Dora to whisper: "What did you do, Tonks, when the hospital told you Remus was terminally ill?"

Dora flinched, but said nothing.

"You were late for work. Once. After that you came in every day, did your paperwork, saw the day's tasks distributed to the right people, set the Auror cadets to work on whatever was on the schedule you'd been planning around the rest of the department's activities, somehow set aside time to train for the Duelling Championship, had meetings with the rest of our duellers to devise tactics, oversaw staff meetings on Harry's behalf, sorted out office disputes and still found time to go round asking the entire department if they fancied a cup of coffee! It was a struggle! There's no doubt about it, we could all see you were struggling! But you did everything required of you! You might've forgotten a bit of paperwork or got the odd time wrong by half an hour, but you didn't cause any major disasters! Harry says Jasmine simply disappeared for three days when she heard Isaac's diagnosis! When she finally got in touch she took the rest of the week off sick! She's not done any paperwork in over a month and half the time she doesn't bother to pass it on to anyone else! The cadets seem to spend longer waiting around for something to do than actually training for their exams! They don't know if they're coming or going! It'll be a miracle if a single one of them qualifies, and when they try to talk to her about their concerns she tells them all she's got more important things to sort out! She sits in meetings without contributing a single word and don't think she's listening half the time! She assigns half the tasks to the wrong people and forgets to assign the others all together! She's all over the place one day, then she'll pull herself together for a day or two before falling to pieces all over again! She only puts any real effort in to argue with people, Harry says she's dreadfully erratic and quite...quite paranoid! She might say hard graft lifts the spirits but she's so low she's incapable of any proper graft at all!"

"Merlin," Dora mumbled, shifting uncomfortably against her pillows, then she sighed and said: "I know how difficult it must be but...but please don't sack her, Kingsley. Don't let her end her career on a note like that. People only remember you as you were in the end. Why else d'you suppose I can't stand to think of going back, the state I'm in now?"

Kingsley puffed his cheeks in a resigned fashion that suggested that he agreed with her. He reached into the pocket of his bottle green robes to withdraw a highly polished gold pocket watch. He flicked it open to observe the time, squinting at the ticking clock face before snapping it shut again and replacing it in his pocket.

"Duty calls, I'm afraid." he said, rising slowly to his feet.

"It usually does." Dora agreed with a wide yawn.

"I'm sorry to bring such grim news."

"Yes...I only wish I could talk to Jasmine...if she'd find a spare moment to visit me."

"Perhaps I'll find her an excuse. If she'd agree to it."

"Why wouldn't she?"

Kingsley looked distinctly reluctant to reply, reaching to scratch the back of his neck awkwardly.

"She's had a...an odd tone recently. When anyone brings you up."

"An odd tone?"

"Yes...she can be a little...well to be honest she can be a little...sour."

"Sour?"

Kingsley stared at his boots.

"I think perhaps you've got her threatened. To her mind, anyway. The two of you have managed to run a quite parallel path in life at times. She's bound to make...comparisons. And I think she feels you've walked your path far more steadily than she's walking hers."

Dora's face contorted into a resigned embarrassment reserved for those labelled one of life's winners who didn't want a prize.

"And now of course Harry's threatening to bring you back. Even if you were there in a limited capacity I think that notion has Jasmine torn. She likes working with you, for one thing, and she's not stupid, she can see the benefit of it. You'd no doubt make her life easier to cope with and she'd have somebody around who truly knows what she's up against. But the mere mention of you makes her bitter. If you come back to the Ministry, Jasmine will be eating lemons."

"If she comes and visits she'll see precisely who walks the path the best." Dora muttered glumly. "If she wants to make it a competition she can win by default. I can't walk at all, let alone walk steadily."

Kingsley thought that in one of her more cheerful moods, Dora would probably intend him to laugh. Since she seemed far more somber than he was accustomed to, he instead suggested:

"Just give our request some consideration, Tonks, that's all I'm asking. If it's not right for you then...then it's just not right."

Back at Auror Headquarters, the Head of Department's return had sparked yet another furious argument with his Deputy.

"It was right HERE!" Jasmine was shouting, gesturing wildly to the desk behind her as the other Aurors milling around the office gave her wide berth from fear of being dragged into her latest drama. "That's where I left it!"

"That's where you left it yesterday when you put it on Ron's desk!" Harry snapped furiously as off to one side Ron Weasley eyed the pair of them as if waiting for somebody to spit fire. "And you went through the letters, didn't you Ron?! Like you did the day before! And when you were done you returned the tray to Jasmine's desk!"

"That's right." Ron agreed a little reluctantly when Jasmine shot him an utterly poisonous look. "We've had nine suspected sightings of Fawley yesterd..."

"I DON'T GIVE A TOSS HOW MANY PEOPLE THINK THEY SAW HIM YESTERDAY!" Jasmine shrieked furiously. "I WANT TO KNOW HOW MANY REPORTED SIGHTINGS WE'VE HAD TODAY! BUT YOU'VE GONE AND LOST THE MAIL TRAY..."

"I didn't lose it." Ron informed her frankly. "It's like Harry said, I left it on your desk last night..."

"Well somebody must've moved it!" Jasmine insisted stubbornly, and Harry was forced to suck in a deep breath and hold it.

"Alright," the Head of Aurors said once he had counted very quickly to ten. "Let's just...let's all just calm down..."

If he had a galleon for every time he'd said that in the past week, he thought despairingly, he'd be a millionaire...

"Jas why don't you just take ten minutes out? Go and...go and have a cup of tea or something. I'm sure the mail will show up, it can't have gone far..."

"A cup of tea?!"

"Yes, and then perhaps you might like to..."

"Take the rest of the day off?! Go home and...and bloody stay there?!"

"Actually I was going to say help me reorganise the guard duty rota, because the Minister says we can send cadets on guard duty to keep the numbers up, just as long as there's at least one qualified Auror in each group."

Jasmine gave a snort, folding her arms across her chest.
"Why don't we just do it now?"

Harry thought her challenging gaze upon him might just pin him to the spot.

"Well we can, I just thought you might like to..."

"To get out of the office for a while because I can't cope?!"

"To get out of the office for a while because you deserve a break."

"You never used to send Tonks out of the office because she deserved a break!"

"Come on, Jas, let's not drag Tonks into it again, it's not...it's not the same..."

"No it isn't, is it?! I'm much more of a burden than she was! No wonder you're...you're sending her summons! No wonder you want her back!"

"I sent Tonks out for breaks twice as often as I send you, Jasmine. You just wouldn't have noticed because she ignored me, just like you do. And I want her back because she's met Fawley and quite frankly we need all the help we can get! I mean look at us, for goodness sake! We're sending Auror cadets out to guard public places...we've never resorted to that before! And I don't care if...if having Tonks back would put your nose out of joint! We need her back! And when you find an extra pair of hands around to shout at the cadets or deal with the press or any of those other things we struggle to find time for, you'll be unspeakably glad!" Reaching to snatch up a discarded stack of papers from Ron's desk, Harry scowled down at his boots and muttered: "If she ever agrees to it..."

"She told you to sod off, did she?" Ron said, not sounding particularly surprised, and Jasmine's eyes widened in surprise.

"Tonks what?!"

"She'll...she'll come round." Harry muttered uncertainly, and Jasmine chewed thoughtfully upon a nail for a moment.

The Deputy Head of Aurors frowned, scowled, puffed her cheeks, pursed her lips and then asked:

"She'd be co-Deputy, wouldn't she? If she came back..."

"Does it even bloody matter?!"

"Just want to know where I stand..."

"Yes! I can't ask her back and demote her! That'd be...she'd..."

"Hex you?"

"Well yes..."

"Right."

There was another long pause as Jasmine weighed up the pros and personal cons of Dora's possible return in her mind. Harry could see the thoughts and conflicting feelings rushing through her mind, her expression again shifting and twisting before it settled on an expression that could only be described as...terrifying.

Because there was always a degree of terror to be had when Deputy Head of Aurors Jasmine Wickes set her mind on something.

"Right." she said again, rubbing her hands together in a distinctly business-like fashion that made Ron shuffle backwards a step. Then she looked searchingly around and asked: "Where's Rory?"

"At his desk..." Harry began, only for Jasmine to spin around and bellow at the top of her lungs:

"RORY?!"

There was a long pause before a startled voice asked:

"Jasmine...?"

"Come here!" Jasmine demanded, and within seconds Rory had shuffled over to stand in front of her.

"What is it?" he asked apprehensively, and Jasmine grinned and told him:

"I've got a task for you, Rory."

"Oh, right..."

"I want you to rewrite your profile on Jeffrey Fawley."

Rory went pink.

"You...you want me...?"

"That's right!" Jasmine told him briskly, ignoring the look of bemusement that both Ron and Harry were shooting the side of her head. "And to give it a good start I want you to go over to St. Mungo's and interview Tonks about him!"

"Y...you want me to...to interview Tonks?" Rory echoed, sounding yet more horrified by the second.

"Exactly! Ask her all those deep and meaningful questions we always bang on about...you know...try and get inside Fawley's head! See what you can get out of her!"

"I...well..."

"Be quick about it, won't you? We're behind schedule!"

"Of...of course, Jasmine...I'll...I'll just...just get my cloak..."

As they watched Rory shuffle back towards his desk, Ron muttered:

"Bloody hell..."

"What're you doing?" Harry muttered to Jasmine as she gave her head a triumphant little toss, and with that she walked back towards her office.

"You'll have Tonks' acceptance letter by the end of the day!" she assured the Head of Aurors confidently, and then: "You! What's your name?! I knew that...fetch me a cuppa, wouldn't you?! I'm bloody parched..."

As she staggered along the ward, held up on each side by a pair of broad shouldered healers, Dora Lupin supposed they might as well have had given up several metres earlier and simply carried her back to bed.

Somehow, she mused, that would be less humiliating.

She looked up from staring with fixated concentration down at her feet so see how much further she had to go and discovered that she had a visitor.

Another one.

She took in the scarlet robes of the man sat with his back to her and wondered if the Auror Department would give her a single moment's peace today...

It seemed unlikely.

She shuffled with as much dignity as possible back to her bed and didn't dare look up at the Auror until her minders had her carefully tucked back into bed. When she did look at him, she very nearly grimaced.

"Rory McDermott." she identified, ashamed to be caught struggling by somebody she had once spent months at a time bossing, teaching and setting an example to. It had been some years since she had last seen him. He looked a little less chubby and more...mature...

And nervous.

Rory McDermott had never used to look nervous. He'd always been a cheeky little pain in the backside who grinned a lot and cracked jokes...

"Well I never." Dora found herself muttering.

Rory sat bolt upright in his seat, shuffling the papers in his lap purposefully.

"Good afternoon," he finally greeted, sounding unfathomably formal, and Dora huffed.

"It's a terrible afternoon, actually." she informed him bluntly, tugging irritably at her sheets. "Do you know how I know it's a terribly afternoon, Rory McDermott?"

"I...no, Mrs. Lupin, I don't..."

"It's a terrible afternoon because Rory McDermott just waltzed in here and greeted me with a good afternoon as if he's addressing the bloody Wizengamot High Council, and called me Mrs. Lupin like I'm the bloody Queen of Sheeba. Whatever comes next is bound to be terribly!"

Rory's face burnt in embarrassment.

"I was only trying to be professional..." he mumbled, and the former Deputy Head of Aurors instructed frankly:

"Well don't. It doesn't suit you."

"I'm here on official Ministry business." Rory informed her defiantly, determined to be professional all the same, only his efforts were somewhat ruined when she uttered in a painfully sarcastic tone:

"Are you really? Imagine that!"

When he didn't reply straight away, Dora took a moment to acknowledge to herself that she was being rude. It wasn't fair of her, either. It wasn't his fault he'd been sent over here.

It wasn't his fault Harry Potter was such a git.

"What can help you with, love?" she asked the pink-faced Auror soberly. "It's been a long day, I'm afraid, I'm longing for it to be over."

Rory seemed to relax a little, leaning back in his chair.

"I'd like it to be over too. I spent half the morning being screamed at by Jasmine and the other half stood guard outside Ollivanders' with Bertie in the pouring rain."

"How is the Blue Eyed Wonder these days?"

"Bertie? Dead cheerful. His daughter Louisa got her Hogwarts letter last week."
"Lovely. Well feel free to crack on, my husband's due to visit within the hour."

"Oh...yes, right. Well Jasmine sent me, you see."

"I see."

"I'm to write a...a profile on...on Jeffrey Fawley."

"Thought you'd already had a stab at that, according to Harry."

"Well y...yes. Yes, but I'm to have another stab at it, Jasmine says. And she said I was to come here and um...interview you. Because you've met him, I suppose. So I'll just um...ask you a few questions. If that's alright...?"

"Fire away."

There was a very long silence.

Rory fiddled with some blank pieces of parchment and a pencil, occasionally opening his mouth to speak before closing it again.

Bloody hell, Dora thought irritably, trying not to frown, and instead she suggested:

"Well one key thing I would make of, if I were you, would be his prowess for deception..."

"Aren't all Dark Wizards deceptive?" Rory mumbled, and Dora wondered how on earth he had ever qualified to write reports like this with an attitude like that. She was going to point this out to him, but couldn't quite contain herself enough not to snap:

"For starters, Rory, he isn't a Dark Wizard! And what's more, no! Not all Dark Wizards are persistently deceptive in every element of life! I was about to be more specific!"

"Oh..." Rory said, frowning at his blank set of notes.

"Jeffrey Fawley is an exceptionally charming individual. Very likeable. The sort of man who helps old ladies across the road with their shopping and adopts homeless kittens in his spare time." Dora explained, nose wrinkling as if such a person was utterly abhorrent. "Now what most people would conclude is that this is nothing but an act of deception to hide his true character..."

"Obviously."

"No, Rory, not bloody obviously! It's possible! But it isn't obvious!"

"Oh..."

"I'm not entirely convinced anybody pretending to be such a saint would think to be as good a man as Jeff Fawley. The only sort of person who could manage an act like that is the genuine article. Which is worrying. A saint scorned is very worrying indeed. Because now he's turned his back on society and doesn't want to be Saint Jeffrey anymore, he's still perfectly capable of remembering how to behave. Which means two things for your report, Rory, doesn't it?"

"Does it?"

"Yes, it does. It means buried deep down somewhere, a good man still exists. And it means that good man has the capacity to make followers flock to him, mark my words."

Rory considered this for a long moment, before beginning to scribble notes, lips pursed in concentration.

Then, once he was finished, he asked:

"Do you think he has any political alliances?"

Dora gritted her teeth against a groan.

"Have you so much as glanced at a copy of the Daily Prophet this week?!" she asked furiously, and Rory protested:

"It's a...a standard question, we always consider it..."

"Yes but he's made his motives perfectly clear! It has nothing to do with specific politics or government! Society and the government in charge of it has once again failed somebody living on the fringe! Do you think people like...like squibs or werewolves or...or vampires or centaurs or giants give a toss about making political alliances?! People like that don't care about politics! They've given up on politics, that's why we end up in messes like this!"

Rory scribbled some more notes before asking:

"Well since we're dealing with the basics...do you feel he poses a genuine threat to the Wizarding Community?"

Dora simply stared at him.

"Are you joking?" she asked, and he shuffled in his seat and mumbled:

"I mean...to what extent do you..." he trailed off with a frustrated sigh before his face abruptly lit up with what Dora hoped was some sort of bright idea.

"Oh!" he exclaimed, grinning triumphantly at thinking of a genuinely useful question. "I almost forgot! I'm supposed to ask you, aren't I? Because it's the rules..."

"You're supposed to ask me what?" Dora asked, wondering if there was indeed a light at the end of the tunnel, and she found herself holding her breath as Rory leant forward, straightening his robes in a distinctly business-like fashion, pencil poised keenly before he asked:

"Do you feel your granddaughter's relationship with Fawley influences your opinions of him one way or the other?"

There was silence.

Dora's eyes upon him burned.

Rory shrunk back in his chair, only to jump when she reached to snatch both the pencil and parchment out of his hands with a demand of:

"Merlin's balls! Just...give me that!"

And as she started scribbling the first line of her report upon the parchment as if her very life depended upon it, she added:

"Now bugger off, Rory! I'm very busy!"

"Oh..." Rory said for the umpteenth time, and, when she did not so much as glance up at him, he rose uncertainly to his feet before shuffling uncertainly over towards the door. He was almost halfway there when Dora finally called after him:

"Rory!"

"Y...yes Tonks?"

"Tell that git of a boss of yours that I've changed my mind!"

"Right...yes..."

And at last Dora paused in her writing to look up to him.

"Yes, Deputy Lupin." she corrected firmly, and Rory gawped a little before clearing his throat and calling:

"Yes, Deputy Lupin!"

And Dora Lupin sunk back against her pillows, gaze drifting up towards the ceiling with a scowl as she muttered:

"Give me strength..."