A / N : I'm not actually sure if Mundungus was ever really in Azkaban. (Fill me in on that, if anyone remembers what I don't!) But I'm guessing that over the course of a long and varied life, he fell foul of the law at one stage or another and had to serve a little time behind bars. It seems a reasonable assumption, given his record of less-than-legal activity. This particular incident is set sometime during the first war.

Mostly, I just wrote this one because it buried into my skull, having been requested so nicely by Rainey Dae. And once Mundungus' "voice" had found its way into my head, it wouldn't leave until I'd written it down. Some lightness is surely in order anyway, given how angsty most of this fic is. Enjoy!

Mundungus Fletcher

He isn't a bad person. "Bad" and "opportunistic" are not the same thing. Sure, he's no angel – he's the first to admit it – but he's a long way from evil. He just has sticky fingers, and finds it hard to resist any proposition that begins with the words - "'Ere, Dung, I don't suppose you'd like to do us a favour? For a piece of the pie, o'course . . . ."

No, Mundungus reflects, as he kicks back against the wall and crosses his legs, watching his breath mist in front of his eyes. He isn't a bad person. Not by a long shot. He just doubts anyone would mistake him for a particularly good one.

How did he end up here? A deal gone wrong, of course.

Story of my life, really.

A drop-off gone awry, and a dose of bad luck. A Muggle Liason officer who just happened to be loitering nearby, an impatient contact, and the next thing he knows, he's up in front of whichever members of the Wizengamot happen to be hanging around on the day, facing charges of petty theft and public endangerment. Public endangerment, he scoffs, yeah right. Cauldron bottoms just a shade too thin for "official regulations". They're not going to kill anyone. Somehow, the court remains immune to Dung's particular brand of sleazy charm, and deaf to his protests. Somehow, he finds himself saddled with a sentence of six months in the clink.

Still, things could be worse. He's only a low-security prisoner, so it's not solitary confinement the whole time, and he doesn't have Dementors outside his cell day and night. Not like those at the top. "The top" is low-security slang for the lifers locked away at the top of the fortress. He shivers at the thought of it, as he scratches another chalk line onto the makeshift calendar on the wall. Halfway done now. He'll be out in next to no time, he tells himself. Home free.

All he has to do is survive the next few months, and Mundungus is nothing if not pragmatic. He has a strategy for surviving hard times. A simple one, but it's always served him well.

He does what he's good at. He steals.

Oh, not actual items. Nothing like that. But there is a silver lining to every cloud, and in Dung's experience, there is always something worth stealing, no matter where you find yourself.

Dying of boredom, faced with nothing but the gloomiest memories of his life played on an endless loop. There must be something better than this, he decides.

So he takes to studying his fellow inmates. He steals their lives. Not the ones at the top. No – their stories are common knowledge, played out in gruesome detail on cold nights in the Hog's Head, and printed solemnly on the front page of the Prophet. Murder. Torture. Etc.

No fun in them. Hard tales for hard times.

But what about Archie, the prisoner across the way? He has a leathery, weather-beaten old face, sour and shifty-looking, and he must have an interesting tale to tell. Maybe – a crafty smile creeps across Dung's face – maybe Archie is in for experimental breeding. Maybe he mixed a manticore with a fire-crab and came up with something hideous.

And how about Gloria, the little witch with the darting yellow-brown eyes and the scraggy orange hair? She might look innocent, but it's possible she . . . . oh, let's think now. She might have been the jilted lover of a government minister, and might have threatened to send scandalous pictures to Witch Weekly. He sniggers. Yeah, that might be it. Or she might have distilled a new, hallucenogenic version of Butterbeer and used it to get all the kiddies at Hogwarts high.

Yeah, Mundungus thinks, yawning. That might be it.