TWENTY-ONE
(Saturday yet again.)

"Death first!" Bellatrix cried again in defiance, flinging a flash of brilliant blue light at Kingsley. Tonks felt for the Time-Turner around her neck to make sure it hadn't been spell damaged. It seemed to be intact. Apparently Death Eaters and Aurors simply didn't have a particularly diverse set of dialogue options. Personally, Tonks felt like a well-timed "your mum" or "said the druid to the tree" joke might have livened things up a bit, but she didn't see Bellatrix going for it.

This time, the blue light bounced harmlessly off of Kingsley's shimmering mirror shield spell and then rebounded back towards the Death Eater who had been standing beside Bellatrix. He dove out of the way moments before it would have hit him. A smoldering mark smudged the floor where he had just been standing. The Death Eater breathed a sigh of relief. Unfortunately, it was at that moment that a set of giant black tentacles erupted out of the mark, caught the prone Death Eater, and dragged him screaming into the floor monster's maw. It belched loudly before disappearing completely.

Subsequently, several of the other Death Eaters apparently reached in more-or-less quick succession the following conclusions:

1. Unlike the Aurors that had previously appeared to Apparate in, these Aurors were apparently not illusory.

2. They were indeed surrounded by these non-illusory Aurors.

3. Someone had put up Anti-Disapparition Barriers.

4. They were horribly, vastly outnumbered.

Consequentially, all hell promptly broke loose. Spells flew back and forth faster than the eye could track. Even though the platform had been magically expanded to accommodate the crowd of Death Eaters, it suddenly seemed as if the already too-small area that they were crammed into was like a can of sardines – or at least it would be somewhat like one if sardines were anything like wizards and witches armed with wands and flinging magical curses back and forth at each other.

Tonks and Snape drew back, trying to block the possible escape route up the stairs. Tonks was concerned that one or two of the Death Eaters might be tempted to follow the large sign on the wall that said "Way Out." Also, among other things, their choice of attire was becoming problematic.

"I'm on your side, you babblebrained blighter!" Tonks yelled after blocking the third Leg-Locking curse sent her way by her former co-workers. She started transforming her hair to bright purple, but was distracted when she was suddenly physically shoved aside. A Death Eater had used her momentary distraction to push them aside and dash past them up the stairs. Mulciber, Tonks guessed. She said as much to Snape.

"Let him go," Snape advised.

She turned to look at the Death Eater's retreating form for a moment. She didn't doubt that he was attempting to release the gas. "Sure hope your brewing worked, Pants."

Snape blocked another curse from an Auror. He looked to be enjoying himself. "Have faith."

"Easy for you to-"

"YOU!" Bellatrix stood before Tonks, recognition warring with madness in her eyes. In point of fact, there were probably several more exclamation marks' worth of exclamation in her exclamation, but Tonks only had time to register the one.

The good thing was that the other witch hadn't immediately decided to kill her. It was almost as if Bellatrix was too outraged to make the decision to kill. Then again, Bellatrix had always taken Tonks' existence as something of a vast personal insult, as if Tonks had somehow soiled the entire Black family tree with her half-Muggle blood. If Tonks ever had the opportunity to have a long discussion with her, she intended to try to explain the fact that soil was what made trees grow. (Said the druid...)

Staring down Bellatrix's wand, Tonks said the first thing that came to mind. "Wotcher Auntie."

"Bellatrix," Snape said. His voice gave him away. He'd intended it. To save Tonks. Bloody hell, it was suspiciously chivalric. Also somewhat suicidal. Bellatrix's head and wand honed in on Snape in unison and she looked for a moment as if Christmas had come early. "You." She wound up a spell with gleeful malice, turning her back on Tonks in the process. "Avada-!"

"Catellafors!"

Bellatrix's Unforgivable Curse ended with a yelp as she was spun around in circles until she was just a tiny black terrier chasing her own tail.

Tonks looked down at the hand holding her wand, barely believing what she'd done. It seemed almost disembodied, as if it belonged to someone else. The voice that uttered the curse had surely been her own, though, even if she didn't have the first clue why that particular spell had come to her at that moment. "I bloody well cursed Bellatrix Lestrange! Successfully!" She started to giggle a little hysterically.

Oddly enough, Snape was laughing, too, though his was silent laughter. "A puppy? Ow! Blast it…" Bellatrix had latched onto his leg with all her might.

Tonks bent down and scooped up the puppy after detaching her from Snape's leg. "Who's the most viciousest widdle puppy ever?" She looked at Snape with mock-pleading eyes. "What d'you say, Sev? Can we keep her?"

"Bellatrix Lestrange, you are under arrest! Throw down your wand and surrender." Kingsley had his wand trained on Tonks. Snape looked almost grateful for the interruption.

Tonks held out the puppy, who was scrambling madly to bite her. "Here she is. Clap her in irons, mate."

"Bellatrix…" Kingsley said warningly.

"That's Tonks, Shackelbolt." Snape said, throwing off his mask. "The puppy is Bellatrix."

"See?" Tonks said, pointing her wand at her own hair. "Purple. S'my own face, too."

Kingsley relaxed his guard once recognition hit. "Merlin's Teeth, you can look uncannily like her. Downright unnerving. Strange that I never saw the resemblance before."

"'S because I don't go wandering around in Death Eater robes."

"I can't imagine why," Kingsley said, dryly.

"Dunno, Guess I never got into the habit."

Snape groaned beside her.

"Tonks! How was the wedding?" Invidia Jones shouted over the fray. The Aurors seemed to finally be gaining the upper hand.

"Horrible!" Tonks returned. "Would you believe they married me to this git!?"

Bellatrix bit Tonks, though she hadn't been able to really sink her teeth into her. Tonks bopped her on the nose. "Bad puppy!" Bellatrix sneezed, then leveled her with a look that promised an agonizing death at some future time - which still somehow managed to look adorable.

"I'll take her," Kingsley said. As Tonks was handing the puppy over to him, Bellatrix squirmed and bit her hand again - harder. This time, Tonks dropped her. Kingsley caught her for a moment, before she bit him too and he let her go. Bellatrix dashed past them up the staircase to freedom. It almost sounded like she was laughing at them as she made her escape.

"Well," Kingsley said wryly, "I suppose we'll have to update her wanted posters."

For some reason, Tonks found the idea hysterically funny, even though it was a little early for post-battle euphoria to set in. She burst out in laughter. Snape, oddly enough, wasn't far behind her and dissolved into another fit of silent laughter.

After three tries, Snape finally recovered his composure enough to perform a Bubble-Head Charm without being interrupted by another fit of giggles. For her part, Tonks thought he looked ridiculous like that, so it was some time before she managed to follow his example. Sure enough, there was a pale lavender fog coiling down the staircase.

"You may wish to advise your Aurors to employ breathing spells, Shacklebolt," Snape said. The Bubble-Head Charm made his voice sound so silly to Tonks' ears that she had to fight the urge to laugh again. "Lest they succumb to the airborne toxin which I fear was just released."

"I thought you said you'd neutralized it," Tonks said. One of the lavender tendrils gave a little hiccup of smoke, and then another followed.

Snape shrugged. "Approximately."

"How approximate?"

"It's not Garroting Gas anymore." He nearly lost himself to another paroxysm of what looked almost like mad tittering. "It's Giggling Gas!"

Tonks watched as one by one the Aurors employed their Bubble-Head Charms. Only one of the Death Eaters did. The gas proved to be the undoing of the others and they were soon all rounded up. The last Death Eater – the one who had the Bubble-Head Charm around his cowled and masked head – raised his arms and dropped his wand. "I surrender," Draco Malfoy said. From beside her, Tonks could hear Snape's barely audible hissed sigh of relief.

"That's all of 'em, Chief," Kingsley said to the air, or, more properly, what Tonks assumed was Madam Bones listening at a distance. "You're free to come in, but you should wear Bubble-Head Charms. Apparently Professor Snape has been experimenting again. The rest of you, get on those dispersal charms."

A moment later, Madam Bones and what seemed like the remainder of the Department of Magical Law Enforcement – less Accounting – Apparated in. Madam Bones had brought a hogtied Mulciber side-along with her. Mulciber, it seemed, could not stop laughing maniacally.

"What did you do?" she immediately demanded of Snape. "This idiot will not stop chortling."

"It's called Giggling Gas." Snape looked almost chagrined. "Professor Dumbledore requested the honor of naming it for his part in developing the process to neutralize the airborne poison." He briefly sketched out the mechanics to Madam Bones to assuage her fears about it harming Muggles. "In higher doses it can be incapacitating, but in lower doses it is merely... amusing."

Tonks crowed. "Amusing? I'd say it's a real gas!"

Madam Bones rolled her eyes at Tonks and continued her conversation with Snape. "I see. That's... actually rather brilliant. And horrible."

"Indeed. Unfortunately, I very much fear that I shall be forever remembered as 'Severus Snape, that chap who invented Giggling Gas'."

"Bet the twins'd distribute it to you," Tonks said. "Maybe you'll even get put on a Chocolate Frog Card someday."

Snape snorted. "I live in hope."

Madam Bones held out her hand to Tonks. "Hand it over."

"Huh?" Tonks asked.

"It's time you returned the device you borrowed and certainly only used in accordance with my instructions and the seventy-six pages of legal documents you signed just this morning."

"Oh. Right." Tonks undid the Time-Turner necklace and returned it to Madam Bones as surreptitiously as possible. "Thanks."

"I have a feeling I should be thanking you. Which I might even do, if you were ever officially here. As you are, however, officially elsewhere, I think it's best that you go be there. Now."

"I think that's a dismissal," Tonks said to Snape, before turning back to Madam Bones. "Permission to remove the Anti-Disapparition Barrier, gov?"

"Granted, now get your arses out of my sight. And go with my congratulations." Just before Snape Disapparated them, Tonks could've sworn she saw Madam Bones wink.