Chapter 3. trust the unspeakables
Ministry of magic, July 15th 1993
In central London, there stood a lonely red telephone box. No one paid it any heed, dismissing the oddity as unsignificant. Only a large black dog followed by a house elf under heavy disillusionment, cantered at a steady pace towards the seemingly out of order box, knowing its true purpose. Marcus Longhurst, having discovered amongst all things, the animagus ability thrust on him by the memory of Sirius Black, would meet the unspeakables, as promised by Anna Maria Fletcher on their journey back to the isles. Today was the day he would learn some shocking truths, as well as get a promise for help.
Upon entering the out of place structure, Marcus transformed back and dialed the required number. With no other wizards in sight, Alexa cancelled her invisibility spell and glamored her master's face. Fortunately, the atrium was almost empty at this hour of the day, and the pair walked to the lifts unnoticed, somehow skipping the mandatory wand check (sometimes, liberal use of elven confusion spells can save lives). They took a lift all to themselves, thanks again to some suttle confundus from the elf, and in no time were stepping through the black door to the department of mysteries.
"why did I even agree with this?" – Marcus pondered bitterly, trailing behind Alexa through the endless black corridor. The elf appeared to know the way, while her master was clearly clueless, flinching at every noise or torch flicker. His fear only grew upon reaching the line of grey doors marking the offices of the unspeakables. When out of a sudden one said door flew open, revealing two people in grey cloaks, he nearly fainted.
"name?" – a distorted voice, more male than female, commanded.
"Sirius Black, and my house elf Alexa…" – Marcus stammered, as instructed by his assistant the previous evening. The unspeakable number 1 shuddered ever so slightly, or was it shadows playing behind him?
"purpose of visit?" – the other voice, more female than male, took the interrogation. A grey wand sprung into his (or her?) hand, grey spell on its tip.
"request for assistance", - Alexa replied calmly.
"password?" "forward to the past…" the unspeakable number 2 lowered their wand, and number 1 ushered the pair inside. "Hellebore, stand back!" – they snapped at their colleague, before shutting the door.
After laying liberal amount of security spells on the door, the windows and even the walls, the grey-cloaked figure shrugged his hood off. Upon looking at now revealed face, something in Marcus snapped, some snippet of Sirius Blacks memory took over; the glamor fell off, and the wizard burst into tears with seemingly no reason.
"Sirius?" – the unspeakable managed to ask, too shocked to show his own worlwind of emotions. He was one of the strongest oclumens in his department, after all, but even his oclumency shields bordered on the verge of shattering.
"Regulus?" – Marcus was barely holding his own sobs on check. "everyone thought you're…" the last word died in his throat, opening a new stream of tears.
"dead, killed, murdered, that sort of nonsense" – Regulus muttered uninterested. "just tell me how, by the name of everything magical, did you manage to end up in another body? Or is it other way around?"
The following two hours could be called the strangest in Marcus's life, except maybe of the morning he woke up as Sirius. Words were spilling out of the double-minded wizard's very soul; everything, from Adam Thornbush's attempts to eliminate him from the team, even if it happened thirty years in the future, to ever present fear for his life in hiding, to Alexa's devotion – pooled and swirled and flooded the grey office with emotions unheard of in the department. No veritaserum nor tongue loosening spells could have reached such an effect, let alone make Regulus Black, designation Goldcrest of the unspeakables, openly cry with every truth unraveled. No sob story or pleading could send his oclumency shields down crumbling, as did Marcus Longhurst's true accounting of the last three days. And at the end of those same two hours, designation Goldcrest would swear the secret oath to assist the enigmatic stranger, the unspeakable laws be damned.
Diagon alley, London, the same day
Anna Maria Fletcher slumped heavily into the chair in one of the wizarding cafes. her first day at work after getting the proper unspeakable codename, Hellebore, didn't go as planned at all. although it promised to be an ordinary grey day, her partner and mentor Regulus Black, designation Goldcrest, was acting strangely since stepping into his office. In truth, he was out of himself since hearing about Sirius. Even though she had informed her superior about Black's real identity, as per the instructions of his strange house elf, Regulus lost all dignity right in front of her, issuing standard unspeakable command of absolute non-interference: "stand back!" no one, as Anna could remember, had used this command for at least twenty years. then the wizard barricaded himself with the stranger, emerging from his office only after a couple of hours. And if before shooing Anna out he stood on the verge of breaking, after the meeting designation Goldcrest was no more, replaced by a nervous wreck of an ordinary man. Weaker than when the best healers nursed him back to life after a mysterious incident involving drink of despair, more emotional than after learning of Sirius Blacks imprisonment, Regulus left early, after swearing the secret oath to assist the stranger. The witch had no choice but to do the same, for any project Goldcrest lay his hands on, would from now on be her responsibility too. "trust the unspeakables, Sirius Marcus Black Longhurst", - she muttered to herself, before heading for the floo.