Previously: Alice invites Lily to Quidditch World Cup. Sirius tries to convince James to give up on Lily, but James is convinced (through his memory of Lily and him on the beach in second year) that Lily doesn't actually dislike him, and he's just determined to make Lily to remember that. Rawlings says good-bye to Lily, although she says that they're likely to meet again.
Chapter 45: The Dissimulator Craze
If there was one word to describe Sirius Black, it would not be subtle. Whatever he did, he did with boldness, confidence, and an extra added flourish of his trusty wand just to spice things up.
For example, when Sirius was seven years old and his parents had instructed him not to approach any of the neighbors, he had brazenly flaunted the rule by instead inviting a Muggle hippie into the Black's house just to test his parents' reactions. When he was nine and his younger brother Regulus had asked him why they were not allowed to speak about Muggle inventions, Sirius had filled a sack with all sorts of things from a Muggle junkyard and explained to Regulus when showing him that Mum and Dad were angry because they would never be able to figure out how a battery worked. And on his tenth birthday, when his parents had instructed him to keep his head down while reporters hounded his grandfather Pollux Black about the recent "resignation" of then-Minister for Magic Nobby Leach, Sirius had instead told reporters that for every birthday present they bought him, he would answer one of their questions.
Now Sirius would soon be entering his fourth year at Hogwarts School of Witchcraft and Wizardry. But rather than mellow with age, he simply found more ways to put himself out there with a brazenness and defiance that only served to aggravate his parents with each spell he cast.
In this case, he had owled in an anonymous tip to the Auror Office that his parents were planning to organize a rather rowdy recruitment to fill Voldemort's ranks when they were at the Quidditch World Cup to simultaneously rally support for the Death Eaters and scare other people into surrender. Of course, his mother had not been planning to do anything of the sort when she arrived at the Gibson Desert, but as she had already screamed at her son when she discovered letters from James Potter that indicated Sirius would be attending the World Cup with his best friend rather than the rest of family, Sirius decided that he had no wish to see his relatives when he finally arrived in Australia and so took matters into his own hands to ensure that did not happen.
So with most of his family in protective custody until the World Cup ended (Sirius had been sure to cover his tracks when he dipped the letter into Dr. Obscuren's Magical Aid to Pranksters and Criminals Everywhere, so when the Aurors showed up at his house, he simply had to inform them that he in no way identified with his family's beliefs and that he just happened to be a Gryffindor who had only ended his third year at Hogwarts to escape suspicion.), Sirius had no trouble summoning the Knight Bus to take him to the Potter Manor where he could escape the rest of his family for both the Quidditch World Cup and what remained of the summer holidays, and so far, he was absolutely loving life, such as the particularly interesting conversation he and James were currently immersed in.
"Dad says they're called Dissimulators," said James as he produced the weirdest thing Sirius had ever seen.
It had been two weeks since the Knight Bus had dropped him off at James's home, and Sirius had wasted no time in making himself right at home in the Potter Manor, which meant long discussions about the upcoming World Cup final and plenty of time scarfing down the wonderful food the Potter's house-elf Dilly cooked up. Today, it meant appraising the "Dissimulator" that groups such as Advocates for Banning the Wand Bans and Royston-Idlewind-Should-Go-Stick-His-Head-In-A-Dragon's-Mouth Supporters had recently been handing out in all places that had a heavy magical presence.
"What is it supposed to do?" wondered Sirius, taking the instrument and examining it for himself.
It definitely counted as one of the stranger objects Sirius had encountered, which was saying something considering that his family kept all manner of Dark objects in the confines of their house. Still, to Sirius, it looked to be nothing more than what it was – a multicolored set of tubes arranged haphazardly around each other as well as a set of buttons at the bottom which he and James had discovered emitted puffs of smoke and magically induced cheers that remained indiscernible for the time being.
Although, it also seemed to be the gateway to something wonderfully prank-like.
James shrugged in response and said, "Besides the obvious task of annoying people, I dunno. Dad says that we would get more directions once we actually got to the World Cup – apparently, some of the people angry with the ban on wands have some great plan cooked up with these things, but for now, they're staying silent so nobody lets it slip to Idlewind before the actual game."
"Like anybody would actually want to talk to that twat," said Sirius, rolling his eyes.
It had been common knowledge for several years now that Royston Idlewind, the international director of the ICWQC, had been implementing several controversial and restrictive measures for the upcoming World Cup, the most hated decree being his ban on all wands for the World Cup. That and several other declarations quickly earned him the title the "Enemy of Quidditch" among wizards and witches worldwide.
"Jaime! Sirius! Time for bed!" called Mrs. Potter from the back door, suddenly interrupting the boys' musings.
James frowned and looked at his watch before yelling back, "It's not even nine yet, Mum! Since when do you insist on going to bed five hours early?"
"Because we all need to get up early, James. Your father and I will be going to bed soon as well – Australia's not the easiest location to Apparate to, and our Portkey is scheduled to leave early in the morning to account for the time difference. Now come inside right now and get ready for bed."
Neither Sirius nor James went very quietly, and when they finally got to James's room, they did not actually go to sleep for a good long while. Instead, they spent most of their time passionately discussing all the possible outcomes of the World Cup, everything from the possible uses of the Dissimulators to whether or not somebody in the crowd would try transfiguring the referee into a muskrat this time. When the two boys finally did fall asleep, James on his bed and Sirius on the surprisingly comfy cot that Mr. Potter had conjured, it had been several hours since Mrs. Potter had urged them to get to bed.
It also was a decision that Sirius regretted deeply the next morning.
It was still dark when he woke to James shaking his shoulder, whispering, "C'mon, mate – get up. Mum says Dilly's already got breakfast ready."
Sirius could not even begin to comprehend James's words through his sleepy haze and grumbled at his best friend before rolling over to his other side. Nothing suggested that it was time to wake up yet, and Sirius did not see any reason to try and pretend otherwise. He was perfectly happy right where and how he was – asleep in his makeshift bed.
"Let's go, Sirius. We gotta get ready before Dad comes back up here to make sure we're up."
It took much prodding from James for Sirius to finally have the motivation to rise from his cot and even more to get him on his feet. Still half-asleep, Sirius shuffled around, preparing himself for the day, whether it be dressing himself or eating a delicious breakfast arranged for him by Dilly. In fact, he was not truly awake until he and the Potters had left the manor and the whoosh of Mrs. Potter's protective enchantments reached his ears.
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Mr. and Mrs. Evans had not been very thrilled at first when they heard that the World Cup was half a world away. It had taken a long letter from Mr. and Mrs. Prewett, an extensive list of all the reasons why it would be a good idea to go, and a lot of persuasion on Lily's part to convince her parents that this really was a once-in-a-lifetime opportunity. It had seemed to Lily that her parents had taken forever to make their final decision, but they finally consented to let Lily attend the World Cup.
Lily had arrived at Alice's house yesterday morning with not much more than a backpack that she had recently purchased at Diagon Alley for the sole purpose of the Extension Charm placed upon it. She was greeted by an overenthusiastic Alice – Lily's friend had once again decided to change her hair, this time using a hair potion to permanently straighten her still-brown hair – and Alice, in between plates of homemade Pumpkin Pasties that her family's house-elf, Smiley, continually brought her, spent the entire day going over every single little detail of the World Cup final, which apparently was to be played between Syria and Madagascar. She had even spent the time explaining to Lily that groups who despised Royston Idlewind's wand ban had urged everybody to buy strange objects that Alice called "Dissimulators".
It was also the first time that Lily had met parts of Alice's extended family. Two of her cousins, Fabian and Gideon Prewett, were there, though she was told that the other cousin, Molly, would not be going with them as she would be staying home with her sons. Thankfully Fabian and Gideon had proved to be immensely enjoyable company. She had been told that the two officially joined the Auror Office several years ago, but from the jokes and lightheartedness that those two practically radiated, she would never have guessed that their day job consisted of catching Dark wizards.
Everything had gone swimmingly up until Lily learned that they needed to wake up early to catch the Portkey. She did not like that part, but after a good half-hour of prodding from both Alice and Mrs. Prewett the next morning, Lily had finally agreed to rise from her makeshift bed. It took another hour before she was fully awake, but by that time, the six of them – Mr. and Mrs. Prewett, Fabian, Gideon, Alice, and Lily herself – had already left the Prewett house.
So now here she was, squatted around an old Portkey in the shape of a tin can. It was not exactly how she had envisioned the event, but there was no questioning it now.
"Have you ever traveled by Portkey before, Lily?" asked Mr. Prewett kindly as the rest of their group kneeled in a circle around the tin can.
Lily shook her head as she responded, "No, but I've heard of them before."
"Well," started Mr. Prewett with a sympathetic smile, "You better prepare yourself then."
Utterly bewildered, Lily was about to ask just what exactly she should prepare herself for when the tin can started to glow blue, leaving the words to disappear off the tip of her tongue in favor of a small gasp of surprise. Alice, who noticed that Lily still was not holding onto the Portkey, made the split-second decision to seize Lily's arm with her free hand and slap it on the surface of the tin can as it started to vanish.
That was when Lily made the resolution to never travel by Portkey again.
It felt like somebody had wrapped a giant fishing hook around her middle and then attached the hook's line to a speeding semi. Her hand that Alice had placed on the tin can – just in time it would seem – remained glued to the dirty object while the rest of her body was left free to fly around in the violent winds. She uttered a "what the hell?!" with an accompanying yelp of surprise, but only a couple of brief seconds had passed before she felt her feet slam against solid ground again.
Lily quickly lost her footing, sending her sprawling to the ground, but she thankfully was not alone – Alice had also tripped when she landed, though she at least looked like she had been expecting nothing less. Even Fabian and Gideon stumbled upon contact with the dirt, though their landing was nowhere near as embarrassing as Lily and Alice's had been. The only people in their little group who were not the least bit ruffled by an abrupt end to journey were Alice's parents, who simply stood there like it was an everyday thing for them.
"Six o'clock from Kimberley Park, England," said a voice with a thick Australian accent.
Mrs. Prewett was quick to reach down and help a winded Lily up while she spotted Mr. Prewett pulling Alice to her feet.
"Quite a sensation, isn't it?" quipped Fabian, nudging Lily's shoulder.
"Yes, quite," agreed Lily, though she spoke with a much different tone than Fabian did.
"If you would all hurry along to the lodge over there, you'll receive directions to your campsite," said the same voice that had announced their arrival.
Lily glanced over to the man to whom the voice belonged for the first time since arriving. He spoke with a thick Australian accent that sounded very bored, and both he and the witch holding a box full of what must have been other people's Portkeys were obviously attempting to dress like a Muggle, but none of their clothes suggested anything other than "wizard" – the witch wore pinstriped trousers with a Beatles fan girl shirt and purple cowboy boots while the wizard donned a biker's vest and a Muggle woman's flowery skirt.
"C'mon, everybody," said Mr. Prewett, kindly hurrying them along as another round of bright blue light flashed behind them and the same voice that had announced their arrival said, "Six o'clock from Camp Randall Stadium, Wisconsin."
Lily soon found that the Gibson Desert was adequately named. Other than the occasional rocky cliffs peeking out over the horizon, the land was flat and stretched as far as the eye could see, filled with brush and sand. Several miles away, the stadium that would soon host the World Cup final rose up into the sky, much bigger and grander than the Hogwarts pitch could ever hope to be. There was the lodge that the man had pointed them to, and beyond that, Lily could make out the different campsites with tents of all sorts, including one where it was easy to tell even from Lily's point of view that it was a two-story tent and another that was flying a massive Syrian flag.
Alice's parents hurried them along to the lodge where another wizard stood waiting from them. Even though he was much better disguised than the other two who had greeted them, it was easy to tell that he too was a wizard from the shirt that quite literally spelled out "The 417th Quidditch World Cup" complete with two players, one in the Syrian robes and the other sporting a uniform from Madagascar, flying around on a Quidditch pitch.
"Name?" asked the wizard behind the desk.
"Prewett – Jane Prewett," said Mrs. Prewett, stepping forward while the rest of them hung back.
"Prewett … Prewett … Pre – ah, found it," said the wizard, producing a slip of parchment and handing it to Alice's mother, who took it graciously. "You're at campsite four with Mrs. Zinder. Directions are on the slip – you'll be at that campsite over there." The wizard pointed one of the closer campsites in the distance, the one that had the two-story tent.
"Thank you very much," replied Mrs. Prewett as she turned to help everybody else, including Lily, gather their things to move out of the lodge.
It took them a little bit to reach the campsite, and even with the Cooling Charms and the spells to protect against sunburn that Mrs. Prewett had placed on all of them before leaving, Lily could feel the desert sun beating down on them. Thankfully, it did not take long to reach the campsite, and once they were under the umbrella of thousands of extra enchantments cast by passerby meant to repel the unforgiving heat, Lily felt the whoosh of cool air.
Of course, those same thousands of enchantments also meant that they were surrounded with people of all nationalities. To their left, a trio of exotically dressed wizards with dark skin jabbered away in what Lily suspected was French. Since her mother had taught her and Petunia both German and Spanish when they were little, Lily was able to detect brief snippets of conversations, and even though her Spanish was better than her German, Lily was only able to get the gist of the conversations. However, most of what reached her ears was completely foreign. Even when she walked by tents of people who spoke English, half the time it was spoken with different accents than what she was used to – Lily had never actually met American rednecks, but from what she saw and heard from one tent, she had no desire to meet them.
"Right, our place should be around here somewhere …" said Mr. Prewett, scanning their surrounding for something, and Lily stood by helplessly, completely lost as to what they should have been looking for.
"Found it! It's over there!" called Gideon, using his only free hand to point to an empty space jammed between one of the few tents that could have passed as Muggle and a tent that was completely covered with flashing posters of seven different people all wearing the Madagascan uniform. On the ground, a little makeshift plaque that read "Prewett" was the only thing to indicate that the place was reserved for them.
"Right, well, I'm not waiting for somebody else to take our spot," said Fabian, and in one fluid movement, he waved his wand and the tent that he had been carrying flew out of its case in a jumble of tarp and metal rods before it gracefully assembled itself right in front of Lily. Before long, they had a perfectly positioned circular tent.
"Fabian!" scolded Mrs. Prewett, frowning at her nephew.
"What?" asked Fabian innocently.
"We're not supposed to use magic here, remember? The Australian authorities specifically say to 'blend in' with the Muggles, not stick out like a bad jinx," she reprimanded.
Fabian just shrugged his shoulders and mouthed "oops" before he and Gideon disappeared behind the tent flap. Mrs. Prewett sighed with exasperation, but with some nudging from her husband, she ushered Lily and Alice through the tent flap before following them in herself.
Lily gasped when she entered. It should not have been surprising, but she was still taken aback by the interior of the tent. All the times she and her family had been camping, tents had simply been tents on both the outside and the inside. However, the Prewetts' tent was pretty much a miniature house, complete with two bedrooms, a living room, a bathroom, and a little kitchenette. It was quite cozy, and while Lily certainly could have spent several minutes exploring her new surroundings, she hurriedly moved along with the group.
"Now there's two bedrooms for the six of us," Mrs. Prewett was saying. "Girls, you can have the bedroom over there; your father and I will use this bedroom; Fabian, Gideon, you two can share the living room. Now, dinner is going to be ready in an hour, so if you all have time to get situated before I'm going to need –"
"I'm not actually going to eat dinner here, Aunt Jane, so don't wait up for me," interrupted Gideon. "Really sorry, but there's some work stuff I need to get done."
Mrs. Prewett's eyebrows scrunched in confusion as she said, "But this is a family trip, Gideon. What exactly does the Auror office want you to do here?"
"Can't tell you, sorry. I said I'd be there when we arrived – Fabian will get all my stuff ready."
With that, Gideon plopped his bags on one of the couches and ducked under the tent flap, disappearing from their view. From the looks of it, Mrs. Prewett wanted to interrogate Fabian, but he made it quite clear that he would not be spilling secrets anytime soon when he asked, "So what is for dinner anyway?"
"C'mon, let's put our stuff away first," muttered Alice from beside Lily.
The two of them had been keeping silent for most of it, just following and waiting until they were allowed to break apart from the group and go search for Marlene, who was supposed to have arrived a week ago, and at Alice's words, Lily quickly turned and followed her friend into their bedroom.
It was small but nice enough. Their beds were bunked, but since they had already done wizard-troll-elf (Lily had learned long ago that rock-paper-scissors was not used in the Wizarding world) before they left the Prewett house to decide who got what bunk, Lily quickly tossed her pillow up on the top bunk while Alice placed her stuffed Golden Snidget on the bottom bed. Besides the bunk bed, they were provided with a dresser and desk. Alice made full use of the dresser, unpacking her three days' worth of clothes into two separate drawers, but Lily decided that it would be easier to keep all her things in her bag and so simply set it down at the foot of the bed.
"What did Gideon mean when he said he had Auror stuff to do?" asked Lily quietly when she had put all her things (which was not much to begin with) away.
Alice shrugged and said, "Dunno – ever since the twins got done with school, they've been pretty secretive about what they do at work. They drive Molly mad with worry. Marlene said six thirty, right?"
"Yeah, right next to campsite five's water hookup," answered Lily, tapping her watch that read 6:20. "We should probably get going since we need time to find it."
The two of them quickly exited their bedroom and made their way over to the tent flap, but before either of them could get much farther, they were stopped by Mrs. Prewett.
"And just where do you girls think you're going?" demanded Alice's mother. She was already in the middle of getting supper ready and, judging from her frown, was clearly not pleased that they also would not be staying around.
"To meet up with Marlene – don't worry, we'll be back by seven," answered Alice hastily.
Mrs. Prewett sighed, but her husband put a calming hand on her shoulder, whispering something into her ear before he turned back to the girls and waved them away as he said, "As long as you're here when we put dinner on the table, you can go see your friend."
"Thanks, Dad!" called Alice as she and Lily quickly ducked under the tent flap.
If possible, even more people had shown up in just the small amount of time they had been in the tent. At first, Lily was worried that they would run out of spaces if anybody else showed up, but as she and Alice navigated their way over to where campsite five was, she spotted plaques a lot like the one that had indicated their own still dotted the campsites, and Lily internally braced herself for the crowd that would be filling the stadium tomorrow night.
They reached the water hookup without much difficulty, but Lily soon noticed that she and Alice were the only ones waiting. Lily strained her neck to try to see above the crowd, but she did not need to look very far because just then, somebody attack-hugged her and Alice from behind, startling the both of them.
"Ah!" yelped Alice while Lily let out a surprised "oomph!"
When the person finally let go of the two of them, Alice cheered, "Marlene!"
It was indeed Marlene, looking like she had just stepped out of the Witch Weekly fashion section with expertly applied makeup, a shimmery crop top, and stylishly torn shorts. During the previous school years, it was easy to tell that Marlene was pretty, but now that she had finally grown quite gracefully into her tall, slim frame and received a deep tan from the summer sun, her friend's stunning looks now bordered on exotic. Lily had no doubt that by the time they finally graduated Hogwarts, Marlene would truly be a force to be reckoned with.
"You finally made it!" said Marlene happily, her smile stretching from ear to ear. "Thank Merlin. It hasn't been exactly boring with nobody my age to hang out with, but all the same, this will be so much better now that you two are here. And … oh, I'm just so happy you're here!"
She gave both Lily and Alice another tight hug before finally stepping back to let them breathe, though her grin did not disappear.
"What all have people been doing here?" asked Lily, looking around. While she had no doubt that the Australians had plenty of games and shows to keep busy with until the World Cup final, right now all she saw were tents.
"Oh, the usual," said Marlene casually. "Camp two has an area where people can play games like wizard's chess and Gobstones, and in that open space between camp six and seven, there's a bunch of Americans trying to teach people Quodpot – though I don't know why they're trying that at the Quidditch World Cup. I actually got to try my hand at rugby, but I prefer to watch instead."
"Rugby?" repeated Lily, completely blindsided for several moments. "As in Muggle rugby?"
Growing up in a thoroughly non-magical environment, Lily was perfectly aware of all things Muggle – and she was certain that rugby also fell into that category. Considering that many of her classmates found things as simple as toasters and still photographs confounding beyond belief, Lily was at first worried that she was missing something all those who grew up in the Wizarding world knew and took for granted.
Marlene looked surprised.
"Yeah. Whenever the Scottish rugby team plays, at least thirty percent of the crowd are witches and wizards. Haven't you ever heard of Hogwarts's Angus Buchanan Cup for Outstanding Effort? They started giving out that cup because of Angus Buchanan."
"Angus Buchanan was a wizard?" asked Lily blankly.
Her father was an enormous rugby fan, and as such Lily was well aware of many of rugby's prominent players. That name had come up several times in conversation, but she had never given much thought to it – she had always assumed Angus Buchanan was simply an athletic Muggle. However, since both Marlene and Alice also seemed familiar with that name even though neither of them had even heard of Enid Blyton (Lily still had a difficult time accepting that Mary was the only one of her friends who knew of Noddy), she had the sneaking suspicion that she was missing a critical piece of information.
Alice shook her head and said, "No, he was a Squib. To make a long story short, he left the magical world and played professionally for Scotland, but when his siblings showed up to support him, pretty much the entire Wizarding world started going to see him play rugby. You'd be surprised how popular it is – though of course that's only for Scottish rugby, since that's the team Angus played for."
"Huh," said Lily quietly.
"Anyways," said Marlene, suddenly changing the subject, "I got these for both of you – they're called Dissimulators."
Here, she produced two bizarre objects from the bag she had slung over her shoulder, handing one to Alice and the other to Lily. Completely befuddled by the strange instrument, Lily took it anyways when Marlene handed it to her, turning it over to try to figure out what exactly the "Dissimulator" was for in the first place. When she failed to come up with an answer, Lily at first thought it was because she was not as familiar with the magical world as most people. However, when she saw that Alice was facing the same problem, a weight lifted from Lily's stomach, reassuring her.
"Why?" was Alice's only question.
At that, Marlene gave her friends a wicked grin that reminded Lily of the Marauders whenever they were about to pull a prank.
"Remember how Royston Idlewind banned wands from the stadium?" she asked.
Lily actually had not heard that she would not be allowed to carry her wand with her into the stadium, but Alice clearly had since she scowled at the name and snorted, "It's hard to forget that kind of thing."
"Well," said Marlene, and her grin only widened as she continued, "The Dissimulator is going to solve that little problem once and for all."
To ElsaElphieGinny – if you're still reading this – I put in that Enid Blyton reference just for you.
