Disclaimer: I own nothing except the OCs.
Warning: Major amount of OCs (well, duh, considering they're in a different country...)
A/N: Please pay attention to the dates. I'm going to skip a few days now and then. Also, please assume that whenever Avril/Phier talks to Harry or Draco, it is in English unless otherwise noted. When she talks to people other than Harry/Draco, she will be speaking Chinese. Also, Chinese puns/saying/text will be explained/translated where the asterisk (*) is at the bottom.
Also, does anyone else notice how every chapter is longer than the last? I guess my fingers refused to follow my orders when I said they'd be short chapters, so I split this chapter into two parts
Chapter 4 — July 6th (Part One)
"Fine! Solve the bloody case on your own then!"
How dare Potter call accuse him of being a lazy arse? Draco had done nearly all the research for the case! It wasn't his fault that after two days of searching they still hadn't found Wyclyve's hideout! Potter wasn't the only one irritated that they hadn't made as much progress as they usually did, but Draco hadn't went and threw a tantrum about it. He had only suggested to Harry that they take a day off and start fresh the next day. And then Potter had blown up at him and called him lazy among a plethora of obscene things.
Well, then! He would make much more progress on his own. That would show Potter just who was the lazy one!
The first thing Draco registered was that he had wandered away from the hotel while he was mental ranting and was now on a street in the middle of nowhere.
"Fuck," he muttered. "Where am I supposed to go?"
Apparating to the places he did recognize was out of the question, as he and Harry had already searched them from top to bottom with no results whatsoever. Besides, apparition wasn't always the safest way to travel in Hong Kong, since the streets were so tightly packed with people there wasn't anywhere to land.
Draco reached into his pocket for his wand, when his fingers brushed over a scrap of paper. Eyebrows drawn together in confusion, he pulled it out.
No. 59.5 駿業街, 觀塘
Flat 14A
Tap the door three times with your wand.
-Phier
Draco grinned and apparated away.
xXxXxXx
Harry felt like an idiot. He had yelled at Draco for no reason. Well, he did have a reason, but it was half-arsed and going into a mental battle with himself about why he did what he did wasn't going to change the fact that his crush and partner was gone. Fuck.
Running a hand through his unruly black hair, Harry sighed and stared down at the papers scattered around the room, remnants of the fight. He had to admit that most of the bookwork and notes belonged to Draco. Harry usually just played on Gryffindor luck and bravery to hunt down the culprit. Unfortunately, they had sought out every wizarding part of Hong Kong Island they could find, to no results. It had been hard finding those societies in the first place, Harry reflected. In fact, there were so few of them it should be abnormal. Yet they were the type of places Wyclyve had typically left a trail in while visiting other countries; Pureblood trading centers, casinos, bars. It made sense, since those were generally common places for deals in the dark sense to be made. It was true that they had never known who held the object of Wyclyve's interests like they did now, with Phier, but it didn't make a difference to searching on their own, did it? Harry instinctively felt that there was something fishy going on with the sneering green-haired girl, and had really hoped to use her as a last resort.
Mouth twisting into a grimace, Harry went through the notes they'd made on the common wizarding hangouts. There was something he was missing that he couldn't quite put his finger on. The cave on Lamma Island...it wasn't at all like the wizarding areas that Wyclyve was known to be spotted at. He usually stayed in public areas, conducting business in secret. Why was it that Phier brought them to a selling place that Wyclyve wouldn't set foot in, if she wanted him caught as well? It didn't even make sense, why she wanted him caught. Couldn't she just turn down the offer and ignore him?
Deciding to do what he always did when he felt that a point was blindingly obvious yet totally beyond him, Harry decided to send a letter to Hermione for her opinion. Then, he would apparate back to Lamma Island and search. Maybe if he made some progress on his own, Draco would be too occupied to be angry at him. Not that Harry had too much hope. Oh well, he'd think of an apology by the time Draco came around.
xXxXxXx
The door to Avril's flat was much too ordinary for the Punk-Black-Market-Bad-Girl style the girl sported, in Draco's opinion. It was the color of honeyed oak, with a golden door handle and gate.
Reaching his wand past the gate to tap on the door, Draco wondered what he would find on the other side. He wasn't even sure if Avril lived in a muggle or wizarding area.
"Oh, it's you."
Draco studied the girl standing in the doorway opening the gate. This girl had the black hair all Chinese were born with and wide yet almond-shaped brown eyes so dark they could pass for black. Her features resembled Avril, though she was a bit shorter. The greatest difference, however, was the clothing the girl wore. This girl wore a white T-shirt with a pink design on it and beige shorts. Draco frowned. Was this Avril's sister? He was sure Avril had said her relationship with her sister wasn't very good.
"Well?" the girl asked, raising an eyebrow when Draco started at her voice. "Are you just going to stand there or are you going to come in?"
"Er…" Draco hesitated. "Is Avril home?"
The girl rolled her eyes and glared at him while dragging Draco into the flat, slamming the gate and door closed behind her. "I am Avril, idiot! And must you announce it to the world what my name is? You know I hide my real identity."
Draco eyed Avril suspiciously. "You don't look like Avril. Or Phier, if that's what you'll insist on being called."
"Of course I don't." She rolled her eyes while plopping down onto a sofa and picking up a half-eaten, spicy seafood-flavored Cup Noodles. "I'm a metamorphagus. It's impossible to have hair that shade of lime green otherwise." She changed the color of her hair to said color as a demonstration.
"Oh."
In a desperate attempt to recover from feeling like the dunderhead Avril made him look like, Draco's eyes swept the room for something to comment on. It was surprisingly bright for someone involved in the Dark Arts or otherwise. The furniture was either made of light-colored wood or it was fluffy to the point that it reminded Draco of the poofs in Trelawney's classroom. The walls were painted the color of champagne and were decorated with golden candle holders. A matching chandelier hung from the center of the ceiling. There was a muggle telly hanging on one wall, but right next to it was a Wizarding Wireless. Draco still couldn't figure out whether or not it was a muggle or wizarding flat. The only thing he determined was that the whole room looked like a cup of peaches and cream.
Draco was starting to seriously doubt that this was the same girl he had met in the stone cave. Other than the snarky attitude, there was no resemblance. And speaking of the stone cave, he really ought to ask Avril if she had any idea where he could find more information on Wyclyve's activities.
"You're here for more questions, I presume? I'm sure you want to ask me where to find Robert, since you didn't last time."
Draco raised an eyebrow at the girl. Was she a Legilimens?
"I'm not, you know."
Well, that wasn't very convincing.
"You don't believe me," Avril commented with a smirk.
"Stop reading my thoughts!" Draco exclaimed.
"Your eyes are an open book, Pretty Boy."
Draco scowled, turning away from the girl. Her attitude was even worse that his on his worst day and he had studied under Lucius Malfoy. Why had he sought her out again? Oh right, because they hadn't dug out any new information on Wyclyve and he wanted to show Potter that he was capable of doing it on his own. "We've searched all of the wizarding hangouts in all of Hong Kong and half of the ones in Kowloon. There aren't that many and they're fairly small, but we couldn't find anything to do with Wyclyve."
"That's because you're looking at it from the wrong perspective," Avril said as she emptied the soup into the kitchen sink and tossing the Styrofoam cup and wooden chopsticks away. "Robert may hang out in wizarding areas when he's in other countries, but that's because the difference between wizards and muggles are much more defined. That is not the case here."
Draco frowned, taking a seat on the couch Avril had perched on once again. "What are you getting at?"
"You looked in all-wizarding areas, correct?" Draco nodded slowly. Avril sighed. "Those are mostly pureblood establishments. The ones who think wizards should stick with wizards. You'd have more luck looking in muggle areas for Robert."
"You're saying all half-bloods live like muggles?" he wrinkled his nose in disgust. Merlin! And he had thought blood status differences in England were bad.
"No, of course not. We blend the two cultures," Avril explained. "Most wizards use a combination of muggle technology and magic to create their own style of living. It's all because there are too many people on this tiny little island. There's not much room for two different worlds on this land, but it's just plain pathetic if we give up magic. The funny thing is, people always mistake us for muggles. It really does take one to know one, so to speak, when you're looking for half-blood society."
"But you can't combine muggle things with magic."
"The place is so deprived of magic that the muggle technology won't go haywire," Avril pointed out. "And we really only take what wizards don't have and if we can, we magicfy it, so to speak."
Draco chose to stay silent since he was confused as hell. Avril must have caught this look in his eyes as well, because she explained.
"You see, sometimes muggles have ideas that witches and wizards don't. Take a mobile, for instance. The closest things wizards have are two-way mirrors. The only problem with two-way mirrors are that they only work with, well, two mirrors. Mobiles work better because they can connect to more than just one other device, and instead of sending letters, you can sms someone and they'll get it much quicker. There are drawbacks, of course, but we have magical means — patronuses, for instance — that we can use while muggles are limited. And sometimes we just adapt to muggle methods. I do rather like muggle clothing, for example."
"So you're saying we should live like muggles if we want to catch Wyclyve?" Draco asked, his eyes wide in horror. He may not be quite so prejudiced against muggles anymore, but he really only didn't mind them because he made sure they didn't affect the way he lived his life.
"Technically, you'll be acting like a wizard, since that's how most wizards act. Or the ones that matter, anyway," Avril added as an afterthought, her voice dripping with distain. "I can show you a few of our places, if you want," she offered. "Perhaps you'll run into Robert of one of his goons."
"Why are you doing this?" Draco asked suddenly. "You claim you're a black market dealer, a member of a wizarding mafia, yet you don't act of look like one. Why are you being so open and light and optimistic? Hell, who are you?"
"I wasn't always so dark, you know." Draco watched as the girl curled up on the sofa, tucking her knees under her chin with a thoughtful look. "I used to be such a bright little girl. My sister and I, we used to be the best of friends. We were always together; it didn't matter if we were learning, playing, sleeping...we loved each other.
"But then there were our parents. Mum and Dad were both pureblood supremacists. I wasn't. I loved wizarding culture, but it was so much more fun going Street Racing instead of playing Quidditch or wearing muggle fashions instead of dress robes.
"My parents had been so proud of me before. I was the better witch out of me and my sister. But after they found out I wasn't about to follow in their footsteps, they stopped loving me. Hell, I don't think they've ever loved me. They had always doted on my sister while I was always ignored. Even after I showed that I was much more powerful — had much more talent — all they did was force me into extra training. They always gloated to others about producing such a strong child, but never once had I been praised directly." A shadow came upon Avril's eyes. Her fingers clutched at the sofa, her nails twisting into the pale cushion at the memory.
"I supposed I realized my parents didn't care about me and I took to wandering at night after my sister was asleep. I didn't want to run into my parents, if they happened to go out that night, so I took refuge in half-blood areas. I didn't know enough about muggles to travel in their crowds. One of these nights, I met Robert. He was a popular Street Racer, and the first time I saw him, he was behind a wheel. I don't know why — maybe it was because he didn't recognize me as one of the fangirls or the friends he hung out with — but he came up to me after the race. He taught me about crossing muggle and wizarding ways of living. He didn't know I was a pureblood then; I was just Phier, a confused girl on the street. I didn't realize it at the time, but he started waiting for me in the same place as the first night. He hung out less with his group and ignored the fans. Perhaps he was merely fascinated with the strange, new girl," Avril added, her eyes lost in thoughts a million miles away. "It didn't matter to me. I had friends and I felt cared for. I was happy.
"And then my sister ruined it all by catching me. Apparently she had been suspicious of me for a while and was collecting evidence. I begged her not to tell Mum and Dad. I didn't want to loose what little love they had for me. She told me that she hated me for my abilities. Why did I have to be powerful when she was the one that deserved it? I was a disgrace to the family and that needed to be put to light. I was disowned the next day and I ran straight to Robert. He understood why I was so confused and lonely at the beginning. He helped me create a true home for myself."
"That explains quite a bit," Draco cut in, still frowning. "However, if your little mafia group is your sanctuary, isn't it a bit counter-productive to tell an Auror all about it? And if Wyclyve was the first person to love you, why are you trying to put him in Azkaban?" There were too many layers to this girl than he could understand.
"Simple," replied Avril. "For starters, I am not evil. I may do some underhand dealings and dabble in the dark arts while breaking a few muggle laws, but I certainly don't enjoy harming others. You should understand this. It is not a hard concept."
"I do."
She nodded. "And as for Robert, well, I'm not in love with him. We grew apart because of that. I care for him, certainly, but I don't love him that way. I did try dating him. It felt all wrong; like a game of role-play, really. He wants me to fall in love with him — rather obsessed with the idea, really — which is why he tries to impress me by involving himself with dark artifacts and dark magic. I know it's hypocritical, but I don't want him involved with these things. Yes, he's part of a damn mafia but he works with gamboling, not dark magic. That's not the Robert Wyclyve I know. He doesn't know what he's doing. If I have to go through the ministry in order to stop him and if the only way I'll get him to listen is behind jail bars, then so be it and fuck secrecy."
Draco sighed and ran hand through his immaculate hair, an annoying habit he'd picked up from Harry somewhere between writing reports together and going out for drinks as friends. "Very well, bring me to find your hidden hideouts. Let's find this ex-boyfriend of yours."
* The Chinese in the Address is Building No. 59.5 Tsun Yip Street, Kwun Tong, Flat 14A (obviously, the ½ in the building number signifies that it is a wizarding building).
* Avril calls people "Pretty Boy", as a sneering comment. It is not meant to be a compliment.
A/N: Sorry for all of the information in this chap, but I really had to use a chapter or two to develop the whole "action" part of the plot. I promise next chapter will be pure UST and/or Fluff. For those of you who don't like Avril (since she's an OC), please be aware that she DOES play a major role in the Wyclyve case, so she's not just a filler for me to spout information from. Now spam me with reviews about what you think will happen with the Wyclyve Case ~ I really need some feedback about that...
Part Two Posted in a few days! Or, if I get a LOT of reviews, I'll edit really fast and post it even earlier. *wink* (Seriously, tell me what you think about the Wyclyve Case, I'm worried about the reaction)