#i hope i was not too noisy when i occasionally dropped things but frankly people make enough noise while *i* sleep that they can deal tbh

[technoxenoholic]

(post in tags)

[rxxshintaro]

hatred

a/n: posted this on ao3 for the kagepro secret santa a while ago and yet i still cannot find my gift recipient?? i know that they wanted canonverse kanoshin angst??! where are you!?! ORDER UP ONE KANOSHIN

anyways if you’re reading this uh merry christmas?? i hope you enjoy.

tw for this fic include massive amounts of blood, but no explicit violence.

         Kano is fairly certain that he hates Shintaro.

The reason he’s limiting himself to the usage of the word “fairly” is simply because, well, there days where Shintaro does something nice, and it sets him almost completely off guard.

Like right about now.

Peering over the edge of his magazine, Kano spares a glance at Shintaro, who is assisting Kido poorly with various tasks, but he’s trying, at the very least. Whatever Kido’s making smells absolutely delicious, and she holds out an empty bowl expectantly in Shintaro’s direction, to which he tosses in some chopped vegetables in a somewhat awkward fashion. Kano is pretty sure that he sees a slice of cucumber drop on the floor.

Nonetheless, Kido seems satisfied enough, and she waves the walking train wreck out of the area not long after. Fumbling around for his phone, Shintaro walks out of the kitchen, and for the briefest of moments, he and Kano make eye contact. They look away from each other just as quickly, but the way Shintaro walks shifts slightly under the newfound knowledge that he’s being observed.

Kano decides to forget about the jerk for now, settling in to finish reading the rest of his magazine article- which is about sea urchins, by the way- as he purses his lips and does his best to ignore how Shintaro doesn’t seem to be planning on leaving his damn house any time soon. (After all, Momo’s still mucking about in the other room, and she doesn’t seem to be in much of a rush to leave, either. Apparently, she still needs to finish marathoning some American cartoon with Hibiya.)

Shintaro meanders about into the living room, finally settling into a chair across the way and shoving an earbud in rather forcefully, tapping around his screen. Whatever music he’s listening to is turned up high enough to the point where Kano can almost sing along to the lyrics.

The sea urchins will have to wait, Kano supposes. “Hey, can you turn that down?” He asks almost sweetly, grinning as he sets down his magazine. “It’s really noisy!”

“What? Oh. Sorry.” Looking up from his phone, Shintaro merely nods, shrugging it off with a barely there murmur of an apology. This effectively ends the conversation, with Shintaro messing around with the volume until it’s at an acceptable level, before popping in the other earbud and absorbing himself in whatever’s on his screen.

The moment he looks away, Kano can’t help but scowl, rolling his eyes as he flips up the cover of his magazine again, because that’s just so like him to do that. Shintaro isn’t the type of guy to take the feelings of others into account for just about anything. In fact, even though he had helped out Kido several minutes earlier, it wouldn’t exactly be surprising if he only reason he did so was to present the image of himself being a good person to the others.

(Now, who else does that exact same thing…? Kano can’t help but think bitterly.)

What an awful person.

Shintaro hasn’t changed at all from his middle school days. He’s still just as selfish, just as inconsiderate, and just as oblivious to the feelings of everyone around him. He hasn’t learned a damn thing.

There’s no doubt in Kano’s mind now that, yes, he definitely hates Shintaro.

               “You should hurry up,” Shintaro tells him over the phone. “The last train leaves in ten minutes. If you don’t make it, you’ll-“

“I’ll what? Have to wander around for the night? Have to walk home in the dark? How terrifying,” Kano laughs breathily into the receiver, though he hastens his pace slightly. “This is normal for me. Kido and Seto aren’t going to be worried!”

Truth be told, Kano isn’t sure why he bothered to pick up the phone. Shintaro’s number doesn’t even have a contact name attached to it, but it’s always easy to tell when he’s calling. The last four digits of his phone number just so happen to coincide with Kano’s birthday, so there’s never been any reason to change it.

“You should pay more attention to them, then,” Shintaro informs him coolly. “Whenever you run off like this, they both sit around the kitchen and wait until they hear you coming up the stairs before they head off to their rooms.”

How arrogant for someone as emotionally stunted as Shintaro to say, Kano thinks, though as irritated as he is, he isn’t stupid enough to say something that would put the entire gang’s tentatively forming bond in jeopardy. Gritting his teeth, he widens his stride and tries to not say anything biting, which only sort of works.

“Really! I should pay more attention to my family, huh? That’s pretty ironic, don’t you think?” Kano chirps. “Considering the way you are and all…”

Shintaro says nothing for a long moment, and Kano almost thinks he’s hung up before there’s a quiet voice on the other end.

“Just come home already. I want to go to bed. I’m not in the mood for your… jokes,” Shintaro mumbles. There’s something underlying his tone that Kano can’t place. “I’m hanging up now.”

Before Kano can even get another word in, the line goes dead and Shintaro’s gone. He pulls the phone away from his ear, takes a look at the time, and decides to sprint the rest of the way to the station. If he misses the train, he reasons with himself, then it’s all Shintaro’s fault for distracting him. A lot of things are Shintaro’s fault. Most things are.

Thankfully, he does end up making the last train home, although he has to practically jump through the doors as they creak shut. Plopping himself on a bench, Kano closes his eyes and tips his head back, breathing heavily and idly pushing the chipped edge of his phone case around with his left thumb.

This final race to catch the last train, coming from a destination that Kano never needed to travel to to begin with, is slowly becoming a ritual that he appreciates. It’s a bit of excitement, at least. There’s some sort of satisfaction in just barely making it through the doors, allowing his legs to falter and his muscles to burn. It’s a strange sense of accomplishment that Kano doesn’t care to name.

Shintaro, of course, doesn’t have any indication of these nightly races that he sets for himself, and it’s with this knowledge that he can safely say that once again, Shintaro has proven that he knows nothing about him, nor the dynamics of his family. Kido and Seto have almost been encouraging him to try and pull himself around the town more, though Kano wouldn’t consider himself to be a shut in by any means. It’s not like he’s personally told them about his escapades, but they wouldn’t particularly care about him sneaking off, anyway.

It’s not as if Kido and Seto don’t care about him, Kano says, it’s just that they aren’t particularly concerned over every little thing that he does.

Shintaro should really stop trying to interfere with his business, especially when making such bold-faced statements about “paying more attention to his family”.

But just for fun, when Kano arrives home that night, he blinks slowly and shifts his form into that of a slender black cat’s. From there, it doesn’t prove a challenge at all to jump from ledge to ledge, balcony to balcony, until he reaches the sliding glass balcony door of his home. Strangely enough, Seto and Kido appear to be sitting at the kitchen table, nursing cups of tea and talking amongst themselves, occasionally sparing a sideways glance at the front door.

When Kano shifts back into his only slightly modified normal form and steps through the front door, neither of them are there, the cups still sitting on the table as if they had been left behind in a rush.

               Kano hates Shintaro. He’s sure of it, now.

It’s weird, really, because he’s spent over two years being certain that he hated Shintaro with all of his being, from the moment Ayano had begged him to disguise himself as her and attend school with him. Shintaro was never warm to her, never praised her for her hard work, and never once tried to see if everything was going well for her in her personal life. Not once. The Shintaro from back then was a selfish bastard who never even deserved to have Ayano in his life, let alone have the title of being her “best friend”.

Chewing on the inside of his mouth, Kano has to keep reminding himself of this as Shintaro chats with Seto, flipping through the latter’s frankly obscenely large collection of animal photos that would scare most people off the moment the topic came up. It’s so disgusting, he assures himself, the way that Shintaro’s eyes light up every time Seto swipes to a new screen. The two of them laugh about something together, and from afar, Kano shoots Shintaro a sharp glare.

Seto really, really shouldn’t be talking to him. None of them should. All he’s done is contributed to the overarching misery of their late sister and has just generally been a bad person, all things considered.

“Kano, you should come look at this one!” Seto smiles, looking up from the phone to wave him over. “This cat looks almost exactly like you. The way that you look as a cat, anyway.”

To an outsider, that last sentence would probably seem completely insane, but Kano is intrigued nonetheless, and moves closer to the table, avoiding Shintaro’s line of vision. Not that it helps get the feeling of his eyes off of him.

“It sort of does, doesn’t it?” Kano muses, leaning on the edge of the wood. “Too bad it doesn’t have my dashing good looks!”

“Right,” Shintaro nods unenthusiastically. “Your dashing good looks.”

The nerve of this guy. Speaking to him and playfully teasing him as if they’re friends, or something. Kano’s stomach twists slightly before he slowly turns to the other.

“What’s that supposed to mean, Shintaro?” He sneers in a way that comes out much harsher than he intends for it to, and almost immediately regrets it. Not because he’s afraid it’ll upset Shintaro- far from it, actually. Anger just simply isn’t an emotion that meshes well with the personality Kano’s taken so much care in crafting over the years.

Shintaro glances at him through his dark bangs, opening his mouth to say something, before ultimately shutting it down and looking away, letting out a heavy sigh. Looking between the two of them, Seto’s eyebrows furrow in worry, and he slides the phone away and into his back pocket. Seems that they’re done looking at animal pictures for the day.

“… Well! I’m going to go out and get some groceries,” Seto says casually, though his tone carries an unusual amount of weight to it. “Would either of you be interested in tagging along?”

It’s a strange sight to hear Seto speak so formally. Maybe it’s just a few leftover habits remaining from his younger self, but typically, Seto tends to avoid saying anything even remotely formal for Kido’s sake. It usually only comes out when he’s trying to act as a mitigator, which Kano finds ridiculous.

“It’s actually getting a little late, so I’m just going to head home. It was nice talking with you, though,” Shintaro responds from across the room. Kano’s eyes follow him as he calmly puts on his shoes, reaching over for the small umbrella that he had been toting around with him earlier. “See you.”

Seto only barely manages to get out a passing goodbye before the door is closing and the two of them are left alone in their foyer. The room suddenly feels smaller, more quiet, but Kano’s body doesn’t relax even a bit. His shoulders stiff, he releases a long breath and turns away from Seto, who is watching him carefully. At least Shintaro’s gone. That’s a plus. Though, there’s certainly something to be said about the after effects of his presence- The following hours after seeing Shintaro are always something of a mess for him mentally.

“I don’t know why you hate him so much,” Seto crosses his arms. “He hasn’t done anything wrong.”

Poor, misinformed Seto. He doesn’t know about how flippantly Shintaro treated Ayano in school. He wasn’t there. He never experienced it.

Unlike Kano, who was actually there, and therefore, has a decidedly more informed opinion than someone who blindly strives their best to see the good in everyone.

“Can’t you see how awful he is?” Kano snorts, and begins to walk away, only to be tugged back by the forearm by Seto. He stumbles backwards, meeting his brother’s concerned gaze.

“Is there something you aren’t telling me?” Seto asks.

“Nope! He’s just awful, and I hope you can see that for yourself soon enough. That’s all!” Kano forces a grin, pulling at his sleeve a rather futile attempt to escape.

Seto makes a distasteful expression- an unusual look for him- and lets out a long sigh. He seems content to discontinue the conversation there, but then steels himself, as if coming to a sudden realization, and looks back up at Kano.

“It isn’t like you to hate people like this,” He says. Kano opens his mouth to protest, because really- when Seto continues. “You’re a better person than that. Shintaro isn’t leaving the group anytime soon, and as much as I support you- you’re my brother- I can’t say that I like the way that you’re treating him.”

A dark feeling bubbles up inside of him, bitter, and Kano swallows it down with a smile after a moment of gaping like an idiot. Seto’s unwavering gaze peers into him, and for a moment, Kano feels his smile falter, before steadying his ability and crossing his arms.

“You don’t know him like I do, okay?”

“And how do you know him?”

“I just do, okay? Is that a good answer for you, brother?” Kano snaps, which only elicits a drawn out sigh from the other.

Frowning, Seto looks away, contemplative. Now that’s an expression he recognizes, Kano thinks, that’s the same one he gets when he’s weighing out the pros and cons of weighing out his ability. It’s a rare expression, but he’s seen it before. Only in extreme situations. Never around the house, and certainly never around his siblings.

There’s a first time for everything, he supposes.

Watching for the glimpses of red in his irises, Kano’s stomach is tight as he makes the decision for him, closing his eyes and relaxing his arm in compliance.

“You don’t need to do that,” He says, and Seto honestly seems relieved at the prospect of not having to read his mind. While the other visibly relaxes, Kano tenses up further in turn, speaking with no small amount of hesitation. “I… I can’t talk about it in detail, but I know that he didn’t treat Ayano the way that she deserved when she was alive. She deserved better than to have a friend like him.”

Seto’s eyes soften, and he suddenly doesn’t look so upset, which isn’t saying much, as he never really even looked that upset to begin with.

“That’s it?”

Kano nearly chokes. “That’s it?” He repeats, sputtering. “What do you mean, that’s it-“

“Shuuya.”

The usage of his first name wills him into silence.

“Shuuya,” Seto grabs both of his shoulders firmly and rocks him back and forth, gently, as if trying to bring him back into reality. Kano looks up at him dully, raising an eyebrow, before Seto laughs softly and speaks. “You haven’t seen Shintaro in years. You don’t know what kind of person he’s become between the last time you saw him and up until now.”

“But-“

“-And if you’re going to say something about how you don’t think that there’s anyway that he could have changed, then why don’t you just look at me? Or Tsubomi? Tsubomi actually trusts people now. She’s practically attached to Momo at the hip. And as for me, I barely cry anymore. Only at those touching animal rescue videos online!”

Seto’s smiling so genuinely that Kano can’t help but snort in amusement, looking away for a brief moment.

He tries again, confidence in his previous statements vaguely shaken.

“You guys changed because of Ayano,” Kano furrows his brows. “He stayed the same despite her. It’s different.”

“Even so,” Seto pushes on. “Change is possible. And he hasn’t been rude to us at all since he’s started being around us, and always helps out around the house, and always wants to know if you’re getting enough sleep-“

“He what?”

Seto puts up his hands defensively, chuckling. “You didn’t hear it from me. But he seems to be a genuinely good person. Why not give him a second chance?”

As hard as it is to admit it, his brother has always been pretty persuasive when it came down to it. If he didn’t know any better, Kano would almost call that gentle smile of his downright manipulative, always warm and melting anyone who dared to get within its range. Seto’s hands come back down to his shoulders, tapping back and forth rhythmically as he waits for a response.

“I’ll try. No promises, though.” Kano eventually agrees, and almost immediately, he’s pulled into a warm embrace. It lasts for only a second before it’s gone, and Seto’s beaming at him.

Maybe Shintaro has changed.

It’s always possible. Kido and Seto changed with time.

(But then again, while they were evolving, Kano had remained stagnant, like a flower whose stem was suddenly severed halfway through its growth. Shintaro, he thinks, could easily fall into either one of the two categories.)

               The next day, Shintaro’s back in his house.

It’s not just him, actually. Momo has apparently tagged along, but from the moment that she walks in and slides off her shoes, it becomes rather obvious just who she came to see. Kano doesn’t particularly mind this, and watches in amusement as she makes her way down the hall, yelling out some passing greetings before barging into Kido’s room.

It leaves a heavy silence between the two of them in the foyer, and Shintaro only endures it for a second before he clears his throat with a soft “hello”, moving to step around Kano. He isn’t intending to cut him off, but before he knows it, his arm is sticking out and blocking the small passageway. Shintaro, the asshole, doesn’t even have the decency to look surprised, either.

“The living room is that way,” Shintaro says without so much of a second glance at Kano. “Unless you’re blocking me out of your house now?”

Kano shakes his head, thankful for his veil of an ability. It hides the way that grin wobbles with uncertainty, and for that, he couldn’t be happier.

“Nope!” He chirps, leaning against the wall. “I just thought that, maybe, you and I should properly introduce ourselves.”

That seems to stir some confusion out of Shintaro, and Kano can’t help but feel almost proud at the way that the other’s eyebrows raise in question. When no response immediately comes, Kano continues with manufactured confidence and a grin in an attempt to ward off the quickly encroaching silence.

“My name is Shuuya Kano. My eye ability relates to…” He furrows his brows beneath his disguise, unsure. There’s really no good description for it. Eventually, he settles on the best answer that he can find, though it still doesn’t feel entirely accurate. “Shapeshifting, in a sense! My favourite colour is black. Nice to meet you.”

Shintaro’s still eyeing him curiously, even after he finishes speaking. It takes him a moment- an agonizingly long moment, at that- but eventually, he seems to pick up on what’s going on.

“Sure. My name’s Shintaro Kisaragi. My eye ability is to…” He hesitates. Kano has to wonder if all of their powers are equally as hard to describe. For a brief moment, he can swear he sees Shintaro’s eyes flash crimson, but it’s gone as soon as it he notices it. “Remember, I guess? I can remember everything. My favourite colour is red, and yeah, it’s nice to meet you, too.”

Their gazes meet, and it strikes Kano that this is the first time since meeting him again that he’s actually gotten a good look at him.

For lack of a better word, Shintaro looks tired.

The bags under his eyes are practically begging the boy attached to them to hurry up and get some rest, and that’s not even touching the subject of how messy his hair is- does he even brush it, Kano presses his lips together, wondering. It dawns on him that it probably isn’t a good idea to bring up trivial things like the other’s appearance now, not after he had resolved himself to trying to be nicer, but the temptation is still there.

Ultimately, Kano decides against it, lifting up his arm and allowing the other access into the rest of the house.

“You’re now free to move about my house. Congratulations.”

Shintaro makes a noise that almost sounds like a laugh, and when he proceeds to longue on his couch, unmoving, for the next 5 hours, it suddenly isn’t so irritating.

Nothing much happens for the next week or so. When Kano asks where everyone is, Kido crosses her arms and mentions something about how Mary and Shintaro have been hanging out together quite a bit recently.

              Hate is a strong word.

Kano has decided that he doesn’t hate Shintaro. Probably. Maybe? He’s at least forty percent sure.

It’s never been hard for him to hold a grudge, but strangely enough, Kano can feel his resolve weakening every time Shintaro shows back up at the house, either to help fix something that Mary broke, or to help Kido with dinner. (Not that he’s much of a help with the dinner, but there’s not nearly as many stains on the kitchen floor after he and Kido finish, so Kano can only assume that that means that he’s improving.)

He’s ruminating on this one day, contemplating putting on his shoes and just leaving for the night, despite the torrential downpour outside- maybe to take a train somewhere, or something- when the doorbell rings.

It’s Shintaro, because of course it is, and he looks like a drowned rat. His hair sticks to his cheeks in uneven strands that somehow don’t look entirely unfitting for him, but it still takes all of Kano’s restraint to not laugh at the sight.

“Shut up,” Shintaro grumbles, though there’s no real anger behind it, and pushes inside, kicking off his shoes and wringing out his sleeves onto the laminate floor. Rude. Kano narrows his eyes, and when the other notices, he waves him off casually. “I’ll clean it, okay? Don’t give me that look.”

“I’ll kick you out if you don’t. Back into the rain you’ll go!” Kano says, taking a step back as Shintaro uses the only dry part of his jacket to dry off his hair. It isn’t very effective. “This is almost painful to watch. You’re not coming in until you’re dry, so give me a minute to grab some of Seto’s old clothes.”

There’s less than thirty seconds between the time that he leaves the foyer and returns with some sweatpants, but somehow, Shintaro’s managed to get even more water on the floor. He’s standing in a small puddle, staring down at the offending water and glaring at it intensely while shaking the droplets off of his phone when Kano shoves the clothes into his arms and walks away, leaving him be to change.

Everything is well until Kano comes around the corner with a basket for the wet clothes, only to find that Momo has apparently arrived as well. She greets him with a very much idol-like grin as she shuts her umbrella, her clothes completely dry. Not a single hair on her head is out of place. Her arm slings around her soggy older brother’s shoulder affectionately.

“It’s really raining pretty hard out there, isn’t it?” Momo comments offhandedly, tapping off the excess water from her folded umbrella onto Shintaro’s sock.

This time, Kano really can’t help himself from snickering, walking off and leaving a disgruntled Shintaro and oblivious Momo in his wake.

             “Well, stay as long as you want. Your sister is probably going to want to stay up late with Kido, so you might have to be here for a while,” He nods, before turning on his heel and making his way towards the couch. For some reason, the words come out easily, which is confusing, to say the least. Kano had fully anticipated at least some sort of awkwardness between them. Yet, Shintaro isn’t demanding an apology, or anything for that matter.

More than anything, Shintaro’s acting as if it’s all completely normal. He’s almost too relaxed, and it would be suspicious if it was literally anybody else.

Yet, for some reason, this is just the way that he’s always been. From the time that they had met at the department store up until now, Shintaro’s never had any qualms about finding his way around the house, nor monopolizing the TV or even talking to anyone, really. Which is a surprise, considering his personality. If he’s remembering correctly, wasn’t Shintaro something of a loner for the two years proceeding Ayano’s death? Two years without any form of social interaction besides Ene, and he’s already up and about, talking to everyone like there was no gap in his life at all?

There’s something strange about it, but he can’t quite put his finger on the root of it.

Kano swallows his breath, irises flitting from side to side as Shintaro stands up and stretches.

“I sort of figured. I remember Momo telling me something about how she’d ask Kido if she could stay the night, too…” Shintaro says, his tone devoid of any sort of interest in his sister’s love life. “Blame my ability.”

“Remembering is kind of a dumb ability. And you had to die for that, too…” Kano chuckles sardonically as Shintaro pulls out his phone. Patiently, he waits for Ene to appear, maybe to scold Shintaro for forgetting to charge her last night, but she doesn’t arrive. Maybe she’s busy, as busy as Takane Enomoto could really get, anyway. “Ah, sorry. That came out a little more rude than I meant for it to be.”

“No, you’re right. It’s not a fun ability,” Shintaro answers quickly, thumbing through articles before ultimately letting the device drop to the couch cushions.

“You know who has a really shitty ability, though? Hibiya. I mean, I already have a GPS on my phone. That’s pretty much the same thing as what he does, right?” Kano shrugs, staring up at the ceiling. “Though, mine is better than yours. I have a use for mine, at least.”

(To be honest, changing his form constantly and hiding over his scars probably isn’t the healthiest use of his abilities, but as if he’s going to admit that.)

“I have a use for mine,” Shintaro responds quickly, but doesn’t elaborate further, leaving the sentence hanging in the air. It takes a second for him to regain his footing, and Kano can practically see the tire tracks from all of his mental backpedaling. “I know everyone’s birthday.”

“That’s not useful. That’s just something that you remember if you care about someone even remotely,” Kano laughs shortly. It sounds fake even to him. “But sure, whatever! Of course your ability is useful.”

“Nice sarcasm,” Shintaro quips, and begins to walk towards the door, leaving his phone to dry against the cushions. There’s already a wet depression in the shape of a rectangle on the upholstery. “I’m going to the coffee store across the street. You want anything?”

That captures his attention. There’s nothing like a warm drink on a cold day, Kano thinks, and he sits up to mentally go over the menu in his head. It doesn’t take very long to make a decision, but even so, Shintaro patiently waits for his response. Patiently, in this case, meaning “not groaning in frustration”. The most basic form of courtesy that you can offer to a person.

“If you’d be so kind, I’ll have a hot chocolate. With whipped cream-“

“Chocolate shavings and cinnamon?” Shintaro finishes for him.

There’s a moment of silence in which Kano begins to nod, before the oddities of the other’s sentence begin to sink in, trickling down slowly like water seeping through soil. His expression drops slightly, though his outer façade remains the same, or so he hopes. Shintaro must notice the fault within his rather innocuous comment as well, as his face suddenly seems to drain of all colour, pupils constricting.

Kano raises an eyebrow.

“How did you know that? I never told you that,” He says, more of a statement than a question, and pulls himself off of the couch. It isn’t initially that worrying or suspicious- The flavor profiles work well together, so it could have been just a lucky guess on Shintaro’s end- but the other’s expression quickly twists into something unreadable.

Things only seem to get stranger.

“Uh… I just, you know…” Shintaro stammers out, moving his hands about frantically. “You already mentioned that you like your hot chocolate like that, so-“

“No, I didn’t. I’ve never had any hot chocolate around you, Shintaro!” Kano moves in, approaching him slowly. Shintaro’s beginning to look like he’s being strangled, turning away just as soon as he closes in by a mere several feet apart. It’s not the reaction that Kano would have expected from him, and if he’s being honest, it’s a little frightening to see Shintaro taken so off guard by a simple question.

(Luckily, he’s not being honest.)

“I found a receipt? Of yours? Near the trash can, and I just sort of read it out of habit, sorry…?” Shintaro tries, though every part of his “explanation” ends up sounding more like a question than a statement.

“I never ask for receipts when I buy things,” Kano tips his head to the side. “So I’m not sure how you could have found a receipt that even I never had to begin with!”

There’s a voice in the back of his mind telling him to just drop it already; it’s not that big of a deal, Shintaro probably just heard it from Seto or something, but if that was the case, then why didn’t he just say that from the get go? It’s strange, Kano thinks, really strange.  Shintaro doesn’t look any less panicked than before, and instead of answering, makes a beeline for the door, grip faltering slightly as he grabs Momo’s umbrella and he slides his shoes on.

“I’ll be back-!” Shintaro’s shaky voice resounds, and with that, he’s gone.

The room is empty again, and Kano’s left to wonder what in the hell just happened.

It really wasn’t that big of a deal, he thinks again as he returns to the couch. Shintaro’s just being weird, because that’s pretty much how he operates. Making a big deal out of something that could have been solved just by spilling the beans on his source.

At least, that’s what Kano tells himself as he flips on the television and mindlessly clicks through channels.

Shintaro returns with his drink. They don’t speak of what happened earlier.

               There hasn’t been a day within the past week that Kano’s gone without seeing Shintaro in some shape or form. Somehow, he’s always around, though Kido’s earlier statements about him hanging around Mary prove to be true. More often than not, he’s usually found speaking with her, their voices hushed and soft in the corners of the house.

It’s almost annoying, how the two of them sneak about, like they know something that the rest of them don’t. Kano barely contains his pointed glare when Shintaro emerges from Mary’s room, looking far more tired than what is usual. At least, for him, anyway.

Shintaro makes an irritated sounding noise, muttering something about how he needs to get some sleep for “tomorrow”, whatever “tomorrow” entails. It’s not something that Kano particularly cares about.

“Did you have fun with your girlfriend?” Kano asks dryly, flipping a page of his novel. “You two have been awfully close lately. You’ve been coming here lately just to see Mary, then?”

Silence ensues.

“… Well, alright! Be like that. I would have thought that your parents would have taught you better than to act so flippantly!” He sniffs, silently praying that the irritation he’s feeling doesn’t seep through the safety net of his ability.

Still nothing.

Kano is starting to consider why he even decided to give Shintaro a “second chance” to begin with. How he’s behaving is just downright rude.

(Rude. Ha. That’s a laugh. Calling someone rude when you’ve personally ruined their life. How like you to stoop so low, Kano chastises himself, before fleeting confusion takes over him. Is this guilt? Towards Shintaro? That feeling’s never really been in the forefront of his mind; it’s always instead preferred to lay dormant in the back of his brain and creep up when he’s trying to get some damn sleep. The confusion fades as he remembers that Shintaro is just as guilty as he is when it comes to regretting past actions, and ultimately decides to back off of the topic for now.)

The tension is the air is so thick that Kano thinks he may just be able to grab it, cut it into pieces. Fry it up for lunch. Store the leftovers in the fridge to have an equally as disappointing meal later. Anything’s better than sitting, waiting for the other to speak. With a very pointed sigh, Kano closes his eyes, crossing his arms in irritation and flops his head back over the side of the couch. Two can play at this game.

“Kano,” Shintaro speaks abruptly, making him jump in his seat. The other continues without waiting for an indication that he’s being listened to, or even heard, for that matter. “Do you like me?”

The statement takes a moment to settle in before it hits him like a truck, and his body seems to move on its own, sitting up and slamming down his book against the table as gently as he could manage.

“What?” Kano asks blankly. The ability isn’t enough to mask the surprise hidden within the general vacancy of his tone.

“Do you like me?” The other repeats flatly.

“I… I- What? What?”

Shintaro takes a long, deep breath, like he’s somehow upset with the time that Kano’s taking to answer. Apparently done repeating himself, he mutters something that sounds suspiciously like ‘I know you heard me’, and settles into the back of his chair.

Kano can only stare, fumbling around with potentially witty answers in his mind and mulling them about, but no words form on his tongue. He’s left sitting there, feeling utterly dumbfounded and thoroughly confused as Shintaro watches him with that same expression on his face.

“Uh.” He eloquently says, the filler word definitively cutting off, as if he had meant for that to be the end of the sentence.

It’s humiliating, to say the least. Kano’s entire body feels uncomfortably warm before his senses seem to come back, all at once. The heat coursing throughout him stays as he manipulates his ability to his liking, twisting his face into a smirk. The laugh he gives off only barely sounds like himself.

“That’s hilarious, Shintaro! Maybe you should be a comedian! You really seem to have a knack for coming up with super funny jokes!” Kano snickers, doubling over in what he hopes looks like hysterical laughter. It provides a good opportunity to hide his face, though he doesn’t really need to, what with being able to look however he wants and all.

Shintaro’s apparently gone back to pretending to be a doll, or something, because there’s no response, yet again. In what he thinks may be curiosity, and partly because he may have a death wish, Kano peers up at the other, only to find Shintaro staring down at him with a serene expression that’s difficult to describe. It’s neither upset nor content, just… there. A half step above his typical dull stare.

“Don’t think too much about it. I was just curious,” Shintaro murmurs, and reaches out to ruffle Kano’s hair before he can do anything about it. His fingers are only there for a fraction of a second before pulling away, leaving Kano gaping.

“What the hell was that?” Kano says, his voice coming out much squeaky and higher than he ever remembered it being. “I didn’t say that you could touch me- And…! And, uh… You…”

The words die out on his tongue in a surprisingly short amount of time. The muddled up mess of thoughts in his brain just doesn’t seem to be able to reach his mouth properly, despite his best efforts. It’s not a feeling that Kano particularly enjoys.

Shintaro is no longer looking at him. He appears to be particularly fixated on the ground.

“Force of habit, sorry,” He says in a somewhat remorseful tone. “It won’t happen again.”

Kano notes that he doesn’t appear to be that sorry, but currently, he can still feel his cheeks and ears burning, and now is probably the best time to divert the conversation to something, anything else before he starts to feel even more strange. When he speaks next, he isn’t quite sure if he’s completely able to work his ability properly. The words come out much more disjointed than he’d like.

“Force of habit?” Kano chokes, settling himself back down into a comfortable position on the couch. “Force of habit for who? Whose hair do you mess up so often to the point where it becomes a habit?”

As expected, there’s no response.

Whatever. Shintaro’s been weird from the start. It’s certainly none of his concern if today he’s decided to be weirder than normal.

Even if Shintaro being weirder than normal goes hand in hand with embarrassing the hell out of him- Not very fun.

Despite the lingering fluttering feeling in his stomach, Kano shifts onto his side, flipping his book back open. The words dance along the pages, and he can barely concentrate. Shintaro’s prolonged silence isn’t exactly helping, either.

It’s silent for another minute, during which Kano must have read the same paragraph at least five times, until he notices it.

Shintaro has his hand slapped over the front of his face, head just barely tipping over the back of the sofa’s armrest. The way his chest rises and falls is uneven- ragged, perhaps, and wheezes with every breath he takes. It sounds like he’s choking on his own breath, drowning.

Even with the hand obscuring his expression, it’s obvious that Shintaro’s expression is distraught. Panicked. Worried.

“Just ignore this, okay? It’s fine,” Shintaro mumbles, obviously not fine. He’s either talking to Kano or himself. Maybe both. “It’s just something that happens; it’s no big deal… Everything’s going to be fine this time.”

Kano officially gives up on understanding anything else for the day.

As easy and as tempting as it would be to reach out for the other, give him a hearty pat on the back or give him some reassuring words, it probably isn’t any of his business. (Not his business? Or not his problem? Kano has to wonder. An answer does not float out of thin air.)

“Uh, everything’s probably going to be fine…” He begins to say, but Shintaro makes no indication that he hears him, and the rest of his sentence dies on the tip of his tongue.

It’s probably for the best. The only thing that Kano can do to calm people down is to turn into a cat and dance around, but he thinks that that’s probably off of the table.

Kano spends the next hour trying to read as Shintaro tries to recompose himself on the couch.

Truth be told, though, he’s not really trying. His attention is much more focused on keeping appearances up, averting his eyes and pretending like he somehow hasn’t noticed Shintaro’s breakdown.

It’s much harder than it looks. At some point, Kano has to plug in his headphones and turn around. Face to the cushions, volume turned up, ignore it, pretend it’s not there, push it all away.

               It’s happened before. The sensation is almost familiar, wrapping him in a warm blanket, his limbs twitching as the pain sweetly envelopes him.

Kano’s pretty sure he’s dying.

… No, he’s sure. This is no time to be insecure with himself! It’s time to have confidence in his conclusions, specifically when the evidence is sharp and impaled fully from his back and poking out the front of his shirt.

He looks down, feels his knees turn to jelly and registers the coolness of the obsidian of the laboratory floor before the new wash of pain surges through him. It’s burning, throbbing, searing, and Kano can feel it, but his voice comes up as a bubbling, gurgling mess when he tries to scream. His words are red- no, those aren’t words. Stupid. Of course, he can’t physically see his own words; that’d be silly. That’s just his blood, he thinks with some small amount of glee, it’s just his blood, that’s all!

Why did they even come here?

Did Shintaro bring them here? Or was it Konoha? Maybe Hibiya?

Kano can’t really remember. He can’t remember much of anything, actually. His fingers are wet and slippery when he tries to elevate himself slightly off of the ground, unable to grab anything. The blood smears against everything he touches, and god, there’s so much of it. Everything tastes like copper.

“Kano, Kano, Kano…! Shit, fuck, I- Fuck-“

Someone’s swearing.

“Dirty mouth.” Kano murmurs, and it comes out with another mouthful of blood. Ironic. He could almost laugh, if it didn’t hurt so much.

(Does it hurt? He’s sure that it should hurt- and it does, to a certain extent, but not nearly as much as he thought it would. Being stabbed- now that had been an experience, but Kano’s pretty sure that his current predicament of being impaled is worse. Maybe once he dies, he’ll be able to leave an angry review in the online forums of Hell.)

“Don’t talk, just… Stay still, okay? There’s still time for Mary to fix this, just-“ The voice is cut off short by a blood curdling scream from somewhere else in the building. It’s a familiar voice, feminine, but he can’t place just who it belongs to. Ene? Kido? Momo? Mary?

Either way, he knows that it’s someone that he loves.

The anger that boils up inside of him is almost enough to push him up, to desperately hobble over to the source of the noise, leaving claw marks along the otherwise perfect floors. He snarls when two hands gently cup his face, and acting upon immediate instinct, Kano bites down as hard as he possibly can. Which isn’t very hard, considering his situation. Regardless, the hand recoils.

“Dammit- Don’t… Hey, Kano…” The voice creeps lower and lower, until they’re face to face.

Shintaro’s there, his voice somehow still steady, his eyes somehow still clear. He’s not impaled by anything big and sharp and bleeding out, Kano notes vaguely, and a muddled feeling of relief washes over him.

The screaming from the other end of the building has stopped. Does that mean that she’s okay? Kano certainly hopes so. As much as he’d like to, his attempt at crawling out had pathetically gotten him an astonishing distance of zero meters. The only peace of mind that he has is in assuming that Ene/Kido/Momo/Mary are now safe, and making their way out of the facility.

(Lies.)

“How are you, uh… doing?” Shintaro asks. Kano only stares, because really? The expression seems to get through to him, because the other only gives him a wobbly, broken smile and continues speaking. “Here, I’m going to help sit you up, okay?”

When Kano nods, because it’s not like he has any other ideas, Shintaro wraps his arms around Kano’s limp body to help pull him up, cradling his head gently within the crook of his elbow. The angle of the pole doesn’t give much to their efforts, and at the slightest bit of resistance, Kano grunts and flops his head down into Shintaro’s lap.

“That’s as far as I can go,” Kano breathes out, staring up at the other. There’s blood catching in the back of his throat, bubbling up again. Maybe it’d be better to just lay on his back and choke to death on his own blood, rather than slowly bleeding out. Before he gets the option to decide, Shintaro cups his face with both hands and turns him slightly to the side. The blood soaks into Shintaro’s already red jacket, but he doesn’t quite seem to mind.

Shintaro’s always been weird like that.

“I’m sorry. We, uh, we didn’t do it right this time. Mary and I should have… I don’t know. I don’t know. We fucked up. Again. But next time, I promise…” Shintaro says, and his shaking fingers come up to work their way through Kano’s knotted hair. It must feel gross. Sweaty, bloody, dirty, who knows. Still, Shintaro strokes him gently, like he’s the most precious thing in the world, and Kano’s heart skips one of the few beats it has left.

“I think I’m going into shock.” Kano laughs.

He barely registers the press of lips on his forehead, and maybe if he had any energy left in him, he’d feel embarrassed, confused, something, but there’s nothing that immediately comes to his mind. Something’s wet, and dripping onto his face, and it’s not blood.

“Sorry, Shuuya. Just hang on. Mary should know that it’s about time, now,” Shintaro croaks, his fingers gently pushing Kano’s bangs out of his eyes. Tears- that’s what the liquid is- streak down his face, barely noticeable in the dark lighting of the room.

There’s laughter from somewhere. It’s deep, and Kano recognizes it, but he also doesn’t.

The few pieces left of his mind connect that the source of the laughter is probably the same person that unceremoniously left him for death. He hadn’t really gotten a good look at the face of his attacker- just some footsteps, and then bright, visceral pain.

(Pain? That’s right. His scars are showing, aren’t they? It’s so like him, to be a disgusting monster even in death. No dignity at all.)

“Shintaro, you’re surprisingly not so bad,” Kano chuckles breathlessly. He really is running out of breath now. “Thanks… Ah, thanks for helping me out here, I guess. I haven’t known you for very long, but I didn’t really apologise to you for everything, did I?”

The words spill out with more blood. It’s getting harder and harder to breathe, and Shintaro’s fingers are shaking violently.

“Sorry for treating you like garbage… And for being Ayano, too. You probably already know about that. You’re a good person, I think? Also, weird… really weird…”

Shintaro chuckles humorlessly, and there’s more of his tears dripping onto Kano’s face.

“Am I making any sense?” Kano drawls on. It’s fading. It’s dark, so dark. “I don’t know. I’m tired.”

The other only hesitates for a moment, before nodding. Kano thinks it’s a nod, anyway. Shintaro tangles their fingers together with his one free hand.

“You can sleep,” Shintaro whispers to him, his broken voice far off into the distance already. He’s breathing hard and uneven, yet still making a concentrated effort to provide a soothing presence, and Kano isn’t sure why. None of this makes any sense. “I’ll see you soon, Shuuya.”

There’s no point in trying to decipher whatever strange code that Shintaro’s speaking in. There won’t be a next time, Kano wants to point out, as they had already cheated death once, and lightning never strikes twice, but what good would that do?

“I don’t think that I’ve ever really hated you, by the way,” Kano manages to get out, and that’s the last of what he can say.

Just as everything fades out, as the feeling of Shintaro’s fingers in his hair becomes less and less pronounced, Kano can hear a girl (Mary?) screaming, yelling, crying. There’s a blinding light, and hissing, and then-

His heart stops.

Kano’s heart stops, and Shintaro’s breaks for the umpteenth time, and the entire world is wiped clean once more.

          Kano is fairly certain that he hates Shintaro.

[calleo-bricriu]

1981

(( Cleaned up thread with @everyheartbesure​ ‘s Albus. This took place within a week or two after the Potters and (allegedly) Voldemort were killed. ))

Calleo,

I’m afraid I have a troubling problem of a most sensitive nature.  While the rest of our world is taking the time for much-needed celebration, I find I may have made a grave error.  For too long, I have withheld trust from those I used to confide in, believing myself capable of holding secrets I felt no other should have to carry the burden of.  Worried, as I’m sure you can understand, that regardless of intentions, the world was in too dangerous a place to take the risk of people being compromised–of delicate information leaking into places and minds it ought not be.  

But now, my old friend, I have many great doubts about what others find such cause for celebration in.  Something, though I cannot be sure what, is simply not adding up in my mental calculations.  Somewhere, I must have dropped a decimal or shifted a digit, because I cannot understand how such a great and terrible man his disappeared so thoroughly.  The Potters, though undoubtedly skilled, did not have the support or preparation to end this war single-handedly, and with no body and not even a wand… I have to wonder if Lord Voldemort was even there at all that night, or if Mr. Black did the deed himself.  But where he might have gone, if he were not vanquished…

And of course, little Harry.  I believe I have made him as safe as I am capable, but I do not have the expertise you do and I do not know if my paranoia has simply put a child in the way of avoidable danger of another form. 

I do not know if you have any information that can help me, as I certainly have not been freely sharing with you these last years, but I hope, if you are willing, you can take the time to tell me if I have simply gone mad under all of the self-imposed pressure.  And, though I never have found the time to read the main body of your work, I am now holding out hope that there may be something within it that could aid me now–that could give me a clue as to what could have truly caused this respite.

Please forgive me for my long silence until now.

-Albus

He sent the letter away as a small flock of sparrows–a nod to their very first correspondences, and sat back to wait.

Calleo had been severely tempted to open with, “That does sound like you, yes,” but, as he continued to read the letter the temptation to put too much levity into a reply quickly faded.

He had, of course, known full well about the celebrations, the fall of that petty thug who’d been going around calling himself a Dark Lord for the last decade or so, but he had also assumed they’d found a body as confirmation that the man was dead.

No body was–alarming, to say the least. More than enough to raise a whole hell of a lot of red flags  in anyone who could stop celebrating for two seconds to realise that there was an entire body and wand missing and enough to cause someone who had been working in the Ministry’s Archives, largely dealing with the Dark Arts and everything to do with them since 1912 to stop cold and re-read what he thought he’d read several times to make sure he’d read it correctly.

The reply was sent as the seven, cheerfully hopping magpies that, by now, Albus could likely put back together with very little focus required. Still, they were complicated and secure enough that anyone intercepting would have a good deal of difficulty with it.

Albus,

Any grave error made here is on the part of the Ministry, to nobody’s surprise I’m certain, and on the part of those so mindlessly celebrating the death of someone when no body or wand was retrieved from the scene of where he was last known to be present.

Very few things these days cause me to come to a screeching halt in a manner of speaking.

That did.

There are various forms of magic, typically either straight Blood Magic or Blood Magic mixed with other high level curse work, that could result in–it’s difficult to describe without going on for several pages which I’ll likely do anyway, but a ‘partial death’ is the closest I can think of to condense it down.

None of it is legal, none of it is widespread, and all of it has horrific physical and psychological effects on the person using it; apart from–it’s more that–the thing here is–(he must be dictating)–when someone dies normally, regardless of the method, the end result is the spirit being severed from the physical body.

If the spirit isn’t intact when the original body dies, however…there is, of course, the possibility that he was not present and it was Black’s doing but considering how utterly brutal Crouch’s too-late crackdown came and how many people were swept up in his nets that should not have been, I have my doubts, especially if Black hadn’t been branded like the rest of the “Dark Lord’s” (the quill had, evidently, detected heavy, dripping sarcasm, adding the appropriate punctuation to convey it) chattel; they did check for that before kicking him off the island and into Azkaban, yes?

As for the child, one of the pictures in the Prophet– (his dictaquill must have attempted to convey a long delay in dictation)

I don’t need to ask if it’s assumed that Voldemort, forgive me, I won’t be using his self-granted titles, it gives him a level of legitimacy that he genuinely does not deserve, used a killing curse.

Partially because I suspect it’s one of only three curses he ever learned how to use effectively and partially because I both know its cast pattern and a cast pattern burn well enough.

The troubling part is that a cast pattern burn happens when a spell backfires, as you’re well aware, but it should burn the one who cast it not the intended target. If it was a backfire, something deflected it from him and onto the child.

And that loops back to what I mentioned earlier in this letter.

There is no blocking death in that form apart from using a physical barrier, but it can be cheated.

Have you, by any chance, seen his face? Relatively recently, of course, and if the answer to that is yes it would be useful to have that description, though I already have suspicions. If every siren that just went off in my head is accurate, he was there, and isn’t dead; as to where he’s gone, I’d have no idea specifically.

That said, if I am correct–and make no mistake, as much as I do enjoy being correct, there are times when I would prefer it were not the case–the part of him that was in Godric’s Hollow was dispatched beyond the veil.

The REST of him could be damn near anywhere attached to whatever took his fancy when he did it.

(There is an entire blank page of parchment. The quill is taking silence literally, it seems.)

The main body of my work, at least the one that’s most known by those who know where to find it, is on the Cruciatus Curse and its various  modifications, all of which make it exponentially worse with longer lasting damage and more than occasional death after a minute or so; there are other, older, and frankly more Unforgivable bits of magic I’ve written about as well. I use one of them for landscaping.

HE clearly never read any of them, nor did any of his followers.

That’s not a complaint, as an aside.

I have written–a bit about what I suspect is going on here, but nothing extensive as the various books that detail it detail it well enough.

Astarte’s wands, my blackthorn piece is from him if you recall, used a modification of one of the rituals; he called it 'soul binding’ to the wand but it’s Blood Magic at its base.

I’d write the word down, but it gets automatically flagged and redacted, even more creative spellings of it–Level Seven works, it’s only this department’s senior and head allowed down there; there used to be a book in the Restricted Section, of all places to put a book like that, Magick Moste Evile, that mentioned them but did not go into detail. It specifically stated that it would not go into detail.

There are several texts that are not all that difficult to obtain from various sources that do, however.

Now and again, a book comes across my desk that’s less clever spellwork that makes an inanimate object seem alive and able to converse and more has roughly fifty percent of a person bound to it, can actually converse, is technically alive, and will try to push you out of your own mind so it can have a body again. I knew a few of them when they were properly alive, not surprisingly.

At this point, I just carefully disconnect them from the book and for awhile was just throwing them into an old teapot until it got too noisy and the teapot ran out of theoretical room; they’re all in the back of the Brain Room as I wasn’t entirely sure if it was strictly legal to technically kill them or not and I certainly wasn’t going to ask in this political climate.

They already think we’re all a touch mad down here and I haven’t got the time or energy to make, “May I kill this teapot full of partial souls or should I get a larger teapot?” sound even remotely sane.

And I’ve just realised I ought to have said that AFTER telling you that you haven’t gone mad because now I sound at least a bit mad and telling you that you’re not might actually come off as the blind leading the blind.

At any rate, you’re not mad (and neither am I, for the record); something isn’t right and I very much doubt that he’s fully dead.

That all said, there is nothing to forgive; I am more than aware of how you often work and keenly aware that very few would want to give people like me any information that might end up assisting the sorts I often get lumped in with.

Please don’t presume there is any bitterness in that last statement. I know how what I work with is viewed, how I’m viewed by proxy, and I know that the vast majority of the people who use the same sort of magic as opposed to studying it are viciously cutthroat and can’t be trusted as far as you could throw them without using magic.

I am nothing if not self-aware.

We should, perhaps, discuss it further in person.

The last thing either one of us needs is Crouch’s myopic tunnel vision focusing in this direction; I have no doubt he would go to any lengths he thought he could get away with to silence such talk.

I also haven’t got the time or energy to deal with the mess that would be and, I suspect, neither do you.

- Calleo

Calleo,

I do wish you had simply said I was mad and left it be. I might have believed you, and it would have offered me a great deal of comfort. What you are suggesting…

I do not know the details of Black’s case. I admit, I was deeply fond of the boy, and I had little interest in paying close attention to the aftermath of his betrayal. I don’t believe he was marked–he would not have been a particularly effective spy if he had been–but he was the only one in the position to do the damage that was done.

As for Voldemort’s face, I have not had the displeasure if viewing it recently. I did see him up close many years ago, and already, his association with dark magics had warped his features. Though the red eyes may have been an intentional, if unattractive, aesthetic choice, I have heard from others that he had taken on particularly snake-like features in recent months–pale and sickly and as though evil had been personified. I’m afraid I cannot offer a more precise description than that.

What you are speaking of is beyond anything I have intentionally researched. Splitting the soul… This is far graver than I ever could have hoped. It paints a grim future for us all.

I believe you’re right, yet again. It is time to leave my office before the self-pity drowns me where I sit. Perhaps I should come to join you for further discussion, though of course not at the Ministry.

Wherever you choose, I will come.

-Albus

He didn’t bother with any cheerful transfiguration or charms work this time. Solemnly, he asked Fawkes to deliver the message, leaving it neatly in Calleo’s lap. Then, when his companion returned, he only found the energy to stroke the bird twice before hiding his face in his hands in shame and exhaustion. There was so much more he could have done for Tom before any of this happened, if only he’d had the foresight.

Fawkes was certainly an unexpected delivery bird! Still, he’d always been friendly and he was a combination of colours that Calleo found relaxing.

It also usually meant things weren’t–well. When the letters came as sparrows, at the very least it was an indication that Albus was generally himself even if there was a concern over something.

When an actual bird showed up, especially Fawkes, it was almost never a good thing

Albus,

False comfort now would make it worse later, assuming I’m correct. I’d imagine the Ministry will be caught with its trousers down for the third time in a row because why would they bother to change now?

I don’t know much about Black myself, apart from his name and the fact that it looks like Crouch decided a trial wasn’t necessary which sets a terrible precedent.

If he was the only one who had the ability to find them, it’s still very possible he let Voldemort in; if Black had cast that killing curse, I doubt it would have ‘backfired’ in the way it appears to have backfired. I still don’t know why the pattern burn landed on the intended victim and not Voldemort and I definitely do not like the fact that they didn’t find a body yet have declared him dead.

That doesn’t sit right.

The thing about looks and dark magics is that they only warp one’s looks for two reasons. I’d like to think they haven’t warped mine too terribly much beyond always looking like I don’t get nearly enough sleep, which I don’t.

The most common reason is it simply being a side effect of an unchecked addiction; you can see examples of that scattered all over Knockturn, but they typically don’t have their eyes go red or look necessarily inhuman.

Personally, I think they just look a bit ill and in need of a good scrub.

Most changes that happen due to an uncontrolled addiction manifest in behaviour and psychological health. You see a lot of sudden aggression with little to no warning, paranoia, and the sort of anger that’s based in fear, which is usually where the aggression comes from.

Not only does the magic feed off of strong emotions of that nature, it’s easy to manifest them as the Ministry’s idea of treatment for that sort of addiction is either execution or Azkaban and many would prefer the former to the latter, so they’ll go out of their way to ensure anyone from the Department of Magical Law Enforcement feels they need to use lethal force.

The second and most uncommon reason can be found in several of the texts I hinted. Performing the ritual once will cause some visual side effects but nothing that looks much beyond a standard addiction or possible illness, but if you’re doing multiple splits and not splitting the split to make more and are splitting yourself again, you go from having 50% of your soul intact to 25% to roughly 12%, and so on.

The few I’ve known at 50% are unpleasant enough. In fairness, they were unpleasant at 100% as well, which is telling.

Someone who keeps slicing it in half repeatedly would be unpredictably dangerous after two or three rounds and very likely completely mad at anything beyond that. Whether they remain that way depends on how large the piece used in the resurrection rituals (as opposed to simply possessing someone else’s body and kicking them to the back seat of their own mind) is; could be anything from something utterly inhuman looking to someone who looks fairly ordinary.

I’ll pull the texts; nobody looks twice at anything I do anymore anyway and the assumption is always that I have strange reading habits or am working on a project. I can grab one of three I know if you’d like to examine one of the things in person; they do often wiggle their way past standard Occlumency, but I doubt you’d have any trouble adjusting defenses slightly to keep them out.

It’s incredibly obscure, viciously awful magic that most people wouldn’t even be aware of, let alone know exactly where to look to find how to do it–and those who do find it can often not manage to get through even reading the full ritual to the end.

My house is probably the safest place as I know damn well nobody can eavesdrop here. The security wards won’t bother you; you’ve had a key for decades anyway.

- Calleo

Included with the letter is a small, unremarkable, unevenly cut piece of raw black tourmaline that has been turned into a portkey.

Albus found himself feeling more than a little ill, contemplating what Tom may have done to himself. He’d always been a bit worrying, but despite his tendencies toward keeping people at a distance and delving deeply into dark magics, he was a well-reasoned young man. Albus hadn’t agreed with any of the ideas Tom supported since he was in his youth himself, but he at least argued them well at first. He seemed almost more of a political activist than a terrorist.

He gathered what information he had handy about Voldemort and the recent war efforts, then went ahead and took the portkey. He hadn’t let himself into Calleo’s home before, but it was far from the first time he had been there, and he was sure he could make himself at home to wait, should he arrive earlier than he was expected.

The portkey had been set to go directly to Calleo’s living room, bypassing the short hallway from the front door and that one book that always seemed to have a habit of lunging at anyone who walked past.

Very little in that room, or in the house in general, had changed over the years and if the majority of the old wallpaper hadn’t been almost completely obscured by shelves containing various books, artefacts, and miscellaneous nonsense that had, at some point, caught Calleo’s eye it would have appeared much more dated than it did. They were all heavily warded in a way that suggested the spell work was there for the protection of anyone in the room and less in place for protecting what was on the shelves.

Wood floors, at least, were relatively timeless.

If Calleo’s sofa and the one chair that sat off to the left of it had changed at all over the decades, it certainly wasn’t evident due to the fact that both were mostly covered with various loudly coloured and patterned quilts.

Calleo had been somewhere in the house when Albus arrived, mostly evident on account of him walking into the room a few seconds after his arrival. While he didn’t technically audibly say something along the lines of, “You look absolutely terrible,” the brief pause in his movement and the accompanying look Albus got for a split second before Calleo’s usual warm smile appeared likely said it clearly enough.

“I’d like to apologise to you in advance,” once he was close enough, Calleo laid a hand on Albus’ shoulder and steered him toward the sofa, “for a lot of things but chiefly for the fact that I’m about to go on about topics you likely never had any desire to learn the details of and will speak about them as though we were discussing what I finally wanted to replace the mostly hidden wallpaper with.”

On the coffee table in front of the sofa there were four books stacked (one being the common and easy to find Secrets of the Darkest Art by Owle Bullock), one book off by itself and under a whole hell of a lot of heavy warding (curiously, despite it not moving at all, it still somehow appeared to be struggling to break free rather violently),something that looked a lot like a vaguely unsettling stone paper weight, and a seemingly random book with a blank cover that gave them both a cheerful, “Good evening, gentlemen!”

“So, apart from the texts that detail those rituals–disarmed, by the way, the books, that is, figured you wouldn’t be all that keen on doing that yourself all things considered,” he offered a small, almost apologetic smile. “It’s up my street anyway, and I’m familiar enough with these four that I could probably do it in my sleep.”

“At any rate, apart from those, I’ve brought one currently forcibly silenced horcrux of someone I knew while he was alive and one of the slightly more mad–” Calleo paused and looked at the object next to the book on the coffee table that appeared to be little more than a stone paperweight, “–apologies, you’re much better off than you used to be but still the most prone to unpredictable mood swings than the others–” his attention turned back to Albus, “–victims of certain irreversible forms of Transfiguration as they can often seem extraordinarily similar if one doesn’t know what they’re looking at.”

“Both of them can hear me perfectly fine and are able to observe their surroundings; the horcrux can speak rather loudly and audibly when he wants to, which he often does, mostly to swear at me or anyone else willing to put up with it in two different languages. The other one can as well, but unless you purposely open up a connection using either Legilimency or Mensrapere–this one prefers the latter but will tolerate the former–you can’t hear them and all most people notice is an unsettling feeling that they’re being watched.”

“A lot of ‘haunted’ Muggle items are one of those. I’ve got six on my desk at work, and have never been successful in convincing the Wizengamot to let me kill them citing murder is murder and somehow evidently worse than leaving someone trapped in that state of relative immortality for what would amount to eternity without outside intervention.”

“Technically,” Calleo sighed, “a horcrux is similar in that regard with the significant difference being that the person who makes a horcrux very much did it on purpose and that it’s based in Blood Magic and not Transfiguration. When it’s the offshoot of Transfiguration, it’s not possible to do it to yourself, someone else has to have done it and if they’re dead, their victim is stuck.”

“This one,” he leaned forward to pick the horcrux up off of the table, “is what’s left of Victor Achleitner; I doubt anyone would mind if I destroyed it considering the other half of him was dispatched in 1944 but, I kind of want the book and he kind of still has four of mine squirreled away somewhere and I just haven’t had the time to drag the information out of him. Fully intend to reunite him with his other half once I’ve got them back, however.”

“I’d imagine,” Calleo began, turning the book over in his hands a few times and speaking as casually as he might if it were a little more than a copy of the Prophet, “that you can probably feel the difference between this and,” a nod toward the paperweight, “that without me having to let this idiot,” the book got a less than gentle knock on the cover and was now seething more than enough that it was obvious even under several layers of containment and silencing charms, “start talking and subjecting either of us to his unpleasant personality. I might have also told him you’d be visiting to make sure he was in a properly terrible mood so the difference between them all was more striking.”

“And that one,” Calleo set the horcrux on the arm of the sofa, leaning forward to pick up the book with the blank cover, “is an old book with some clever charms work on it that makes it seem as though it were alive; the longer those sets of charms get to run and the more conversation they’re exposed to, the more alive they seem. This one is from 1832, completely innocuous as it’s essentially a talking cookbook that can answer questions about itself, its author, and the recipes inside of it, and can give the impression that it’s sentient or at least alive–until you talk to it long enough or ask it something that requires complex thought and it runs out of responses that make sense.”

“Fairly easy to confuse the three if it’s not something you’ve studied extensively and it becomes dangerous if you mistake a horcrux for clever charms; the larger–in the sense of how much of someone’s soul is attached to it–they are the more capable they are of kicking you out of your own mind. Most of them will purposely come off as incredibly charming and play the victim toward someone who doesn’t recgonise what they are, and once they’ve managed to build enough of a trust with whoever they’re speaking with they’ll go from 'speaking’ to you inside your own mind to taking it from you. That’s the easiest, least bloody, least complicated, and most direct path to what amounts to resurrection.”

“He can’t do that,” Calleo nodded toward the paper weight, “but he can talk to you that way; in the case of those, it’s no different than speaking to anyone else via Legilimency.”

“You know, Albus,” He set the other book on top of the horcrux, likely just to annoy it further and turned to smile at Albus, “all of this is exactly the sort of thing I was so elated you never wrote me about, never asked about, and never wanted to discuss because it’s all anyone else ever wants to talk to me about.”

“I don’t even need to think about it anymore, it’s all just sort of automatic explanations. Probably what I deserve for carving out such a horrid little niche for myself though. Regardless,” somehow Calleo didn’t seem at all put off by any of it, “it is my horrid little niche and what I don’t already know I can typically find out or form a solid enough working theory from what I do already know and conversation on the topic.”

“So, if you’ve got questions, I’ve more than likely got answers. Can’t guarantee you’ll like the answers, but there’s a decent chance that I have them.”

Albus froze for a second, when Calleo came toward him then didn’t stop, then made contact. As though he were a deer in wandlight. But then the second passed and his brain resumed mostly-normal functioning. As odd as it was to be touched like that, it was hardly the first time Calleo had done so. Still, rather than conjuring his own chair, which, after his hair had turned entirely silver, Albus had found he could do without drawing complaint and he had since taken to doing in almost every situation, he simply sunk into the blanket-covered couch he was directed toward with a sigh. It had, truly, been a horrible week, and if Calleo had spotted the signs of it so quickly, there was little point in attempting to disguise his exhaustion further. Especially in the face of the sort of discussion that was likely to come. 

Despite all of his deep research into a great number of topics, Albus took great pride in the fact that his knowledge of the dark arts was still fairly superficial. He had avoided speaking with anyone on the topic in any great depth for the majority of his life, after that summer when he had fallen head-first into a great many dangers he had since kept himself firmly away from. And now, here he was, on the sofa of an old friend, preparing to delve into the deepest, most alarming and revolting, of dark arts.

He didn’t like it, but despite his horror, Albus stayed where he was and he listened. Because this was important, and self-imposed or not, he had a duty. He even listened to Calleo’s summary of the ministry’s confusing and worrying stance on these objects, which he would have to look into and try to do something about, and to his intentions to destroy the horcrux in his possession at some future point, which he would not attempt to prevent. There were many people who Albus would have tried to persuade to show mercy, feeling that he had some responsibility to guide them in positive moral directions. Calleo was not one of those people. Which was good because Albus was not in a good place for providing guidance.

He could certainly feel the difference between the objects, but he examined the magic surrounding each object with a critical eye, just to be sure he remembered.

“I know. I wish I didn’t have questions. I taught him. Tom was under my care for seven long years and I cannot help but feel as though I have failed both him and all of Britain for allowing this to happen.” He closed his eyes and took a slow deep breath.

“But alas, I do. You mentioned the possibility of multiple horcruxes. I can hardly imagine, and yet I can imagine far too well. Tom always was so sure of himself–so fascinated with symbolism and the power of numbers. Do you think he would have gone so far as to make three? One would be hard enough to track, and as the numbers rise… I don’t suppose there’s an easy summoning ritual to gather the pieces before they can do more harm?”

Calleo knew the kind of reaction that entire explanation would get. On some level, he always did when talking about any aspect of what he studied to most people on account of most people not having whatever disconnect Calleo’s mind had that let him detach himself from what it was and view it under a neutral light while explaining it.

He had been of the opinion as long as he could recall that the most prevalent issue with the Dark Arts was the fact that so few people knew how most of it worked, they just saw the after effects of the magic itself or what it did to those who used it without knowing how it worked and, by proxy, how to handle it with relative safety.

The trouble with changing that view in anyone was that it had a tendency to be steeped in centuries of what amounted to fear of the unknown and, stripped back to what it was, the majority of it were only charms apart from the places it branched into Blood Magic, Potions, or Transfiguration.

When approached the same way as any other powerful magic, there was little to fear so long as one remained respectful of what it was capable of doing in the wrong (or right, depending on your stance) hands. In the wrong hands, it was a twisted, ugly, unpredictable, malevolent thing that could only hope to be viciously addictive and destructive and that turned those who used it into a physical manifestation of what it was. That was what most people’s exposure to the Dark Arts ever was and what the most prominent uses of it that made a mark on history were.

Calleo would argue both that those people were unchecked addicts who were more in need of being taught how to manage their addiction and use it safely as addiction was never truly gone and less in need of being thrown into Azkaban or pushed to the edges of Wizarding society; the latter especially was exactly how people like Voldemort were able to gain the followings that they gained. Those who feel abandoned or hated by society will often cling to anything or anyone that offers them a sense of acceptance and belonging, after all and, when that comes bundled with an additional offer of striking back at those who’d cast them out it had a strong tendency to be an irresistible draw.

Still, Albus wasn’t there to get into a debate about that. Not this time, at any rate.

This was also the second time he’d used the name Tom instead of Voldemort and it caused Calleo to stop and think for a couple of minutes, “That odd kid who told you he could talk to snakes? He worked at Borgin & Burkes for a while, I think; only noticed because he was one of the few things in Knockturn that wasn’t largely incoherent. Had a strange cadence to his speech. A lot of pauses in there wouldn’t normally be pauses but, held up against the sorts of people one usually finds in Knockturn, he was pleasantly normal or could at least act it.”

“You can’t control what other people decide to do with their lives, Albus.” For someone who had just been casually talking about the rituals behind splitting one’s soul into pieces, Calleo’s tone easily shifted from the same one he used at work while explaining a particular piece of magic to something significantly more gentle.

“When you get someone who ends up having an interest in the Dark Arts and ends up left to their own devices in terms of how they go about learning them and from whom, they often do go off the rails despite anyone’s best efforts.”

The smile he offered was a strange mix of a little bit sheepish and little amused, “I did for a bit, and I had relatively formal education in it. That was a good–probably twenty years before you knew me. Don’t remember most of it, to be honest, just that it was…unpleasant and terrifying. It’s difficult to break free of it with a support system and next to impossible if you’ve surrounded yourself with people and things that feed it and encourage it.”

“Not an excuse, of course, it never is but, at the same time, it also–is what it is. Most people just end up quietly self-destructing but now and again you get one that manages to lash out spectacularly.”

At least this most recent one hadn’t really had a chance to spread much beyond Britain. Calleo had the sense not to say that out loud, if nothing else.

“And you taught him Transfiguration, Albus; you weren’t even his head of house! Even if you had been, it still falls back to the fact that it’s just not a realistic possibility to be able to control what someone else does. You can give someone all the information or support in the world but if they’re not willing to listen to it or accept it, there isn’t anything you can do.”

Well, you could use the Imperius Curse but that was generally frowned upon.

“A bit like how I could spend the rest of the ni–frankly, the rest of my life--explaining to you how none of this is your fault and your response would be to listen politely, nod, and tell me ‘Interesting theory, but also, it’s definitely my fault’ with a completely straight face as if you hadn’t heard a single word I’d said,” Calleo said that with all the affection one would expect to find present when speaking to someone he’d known for nearly half a century.

“It is a possibility, yes.” Back to the wildly unpleasant topic of horcruxes, “Slim one, but definitely one. Don’t think I’ve heard of anyone doing it multiple times before, once is usually painful enough on multiple levels that they don’t want to or are too afraid to do so.”

It wouldn’t do to admit that it would be highly interesting to meet or, even better, speak at length with someone who had done multiple splits, despite how dangerous it would also be to meet such a person.

“If it’s numbers he’s fascinated with, I’d disagree with three if only because I don’t–like that number for some reason; same with six, nine, or anything where threes are doubled or, worse, tripled. Threes in odd numbers of the worst sort of threes.” Calleo blinked a bit owlishly. That much he hadn’t  intended to say out loud as there was never a way to say it that didn’t come off as irrational.

“Numerology falls under the blanket of Divination,” he never had been able to fully remove the audible eye roll from his voice whenever that topic came up, “for the most part and I’m not sure either of us wants to look at the numbers that might be considered by someone who’d decided certain numbers were luckier or more successful than others.”

“Apart from my personal dislike of the number three, it would be a possibility; that number is typically associated with people who believe themselves to be almost superhuman or bringers of change,” Calleo shrugged. “The rest of its aspects don’t fit him though at least, not as Voldemort. Upbeat, youthful, generally happy, a lot of inner peace–not even close.”

“Four has a strong association with self-control and stability and he clearly didn’t have much of that.” Four had clearly been dismissed out of hand.

“Five is more of a fancy way to say 'probably a successful Alchemist and way older than any of you’, and he’s a great deal younger than both of us in addition to not being very successful.” Another dismissal and, with the way Calleo was talking, he hadn’t noticed the number steadily increasing.

“Six is–” before he could finish that, he all but dissolved into laughter for a few seconds. “Trust me, it’s not six. Nothing associated with healing, unconditional love, and nurturing would be anything he’d land on. I should probably mention that these numbers include the original bit that would have been left in the body the Ministry didn’t find.”

“Seven is one that even Muggles consider lucky overall and has its associations in someone who is curious and tends to like to dig up a lot of obscure, strange things but are only decent at relating to other people on a superficial level; usually sees them as means to an end and prefers their own company because nobody else could live up to their standards. Still,” another shrug, “it is considered a lucky number outside of Numerology.”

Calleo waved his hand at the horcrux on the sofa arm dismissively and it disappeared and made some passing comment about being tired of listening to it rant at him and it was either that or he was going to sit there talking while carefully ripping the soul off of the book and shoving it into the tackiest mug he could find in his kitchen; nice to be able to send things right back to the office like that.

“Eight is interesting though and–what are we down to?” He stopped talking again to make at least a cursory attempt at doing the math. One horcrux was fifty/fifty. Two were–well, the horcrux itself would always be fifty percent of whatever was left–twenty-five percent, then twelve percent at three, six percent at four, three percent at five. What the hell was half of three? One and a half percent at six, three quarters of a percent at seven.

“Well, at eight, he’d be down to having about, ick, three odd numbers. Point three-seven-five. Three and five both have some aspects that he’d likely find desirable and it does include that 'lucky’ seven. At any rate, the luck of seven aside, eight based on its shape alone represents what amounts to immortality, a mind of one’s own, and the ability and will to endure anything. That one would be my guess, if it wasn’t seven based solely on all the strange fixation of luck around that one.”

“If he did die at least once with that little left the upside is any piece he’d use, assuming he doesn’t try the possession of someone else route first which would probably keep him at that point three-seven-five, would make him significantly more human than he was when he was first killed. That’s a depressing thought.”

More accurately, it was a horrifying thought but that isn’t where Calleo’s mind had gone, evidently.

His tone went strangely and suddenly cold, “Nine is still locked in a tower of his own design as far as I know and there isn’t a comparison there anyway. Talent versus a tantrum from everything I’ve seen from the angle I usually see that sort of thing from.”  

As Calleo continued, his voice went back to its usual,“ From nine–it does go up digit by digit but the stronger ones, so to speak, jump to eleven, twelve, then twenty two and none of those seem terribly likely.”

“Two things bother me about that eight, however,” sometimes just listening to Calleo was enough to make his mind seem like it ran in the infinite loops of an 8, “the first being that I’d guess anyone doing multiples would stop noticing the negative side effects of that ritual after the first two or three, which leads to the second thing: The more you carve it away, the less human you’d become–and the more unpredictable and likely violent you would become.”

Calleo sighed at Albus’ last question which, for a moment, seemed to be his only response, “No more than you can easily summon an intact person with Accio, which is to say, not particularly. If you knew what he’d attached them to, you could easily summon that object but not the other way around. If he’s got a fascination with symbolism, it might at least narrow down what sort of objects you’d be looking for. It’d be incredibly surprising if all of them weren’t heavily cursed and designed to incapacitate one way or another as the latter would make possession easier.”

“On the other hand, that’s looking at it from the perspective of how I’d do it if I were mad enough to consider chopping myself up into pieces; his thought process might have been entirely different and, admittedly, I don’t know what the thought process of someone who’d done it more than once would be beyond incoherently dangerous.”

“Yes,” he confirmed sadly. “That Tom.” Albus had guessed the strange way he spoke was due to continued, frequent use of parseltongue–a sort of accent. But he hid most of it when he decided he needed to sound important to his followers, as he had done when speaking to professors during his later years at Hogwarts. 

Calleo was right, of course. Albus had been about to nod. And he certainly didn’t believe anything that might absolve him of guilt in this situation, no matter that he could see the logic in Calleo’s argument. And despite how deeply touched he was by the kindness that drove him to say it. But rather than following through with his nod, he simply hummed thoughtfully and let Calleo continue speaking, as he generally seemed content to do until he was interrupted.

“I believe it was Arithmancy and magically-powerful number that he would be more inclined to base a decision like this in. I can’t be sure, of course. He did hold Divination in abnormally high regard, as far as I could tell,” he cut in before he could get too much farther.

Then, as Calleo went up through possible numbers and their connotations, Albus grew paler, worry and a bit of despair growing behind his eyes. There was very little chance of him successfully locating six or seven–or, heaven-forbid, eight–random objects. 

“Eight pieces, do you think? Or eight horcruxes? I don’t know if he would have counted the part of his soul still inside his body.” He couldn’t even bear to consider more than eight at the moment, though losing so much of his soul did explain the loss of rationality and coherence in his plans over the last years.

“Tom was collecting trophies even before he knew about magic. He may have been bright enough to use objects that nobody would think of and hide them well, but… I don’t believe he was sane enough. I think… Most likely, he would have wanted significant items, placed in significant locations. Still, that doesn’t narrow things much. I was hardly his trusted confidant in his school days and I have had few chances to even speak to him since.”

He put his face down into his hands, looking unbelievably weary, and stayed hunched over like that for a few long breaths before straightening back up.

“I’d be lying if I said I didn’t fully understand how someone who had to work in a shop in Knockturn wouldn’t end up in a mindset of, ‘Yes, they all deserve this’; I only worked at Flourish & Blotts until I ended up at the Ministry and some days…” he shook his head, “not a real excuse of course, but I could see having to work there snapping someone who was only holding on by a thread to begin with.”

A muttered, “It’s just pattern recognition and lucky guesses” when Divination was mentioned but, Calleo didn’t push that topic further.

“Well, it’d be eight including the original one he was carving off of, which would mean if the original piece was what got kicked into the afterlife he’d be down to seven. The thing is, no matter how razor thin it became, it wouldn’t ever be destroyed entirely–apart from misusing Nihilus or using Excidium, of course–it’s worth keeping in mind that he is still a person.”

“May very well be a twisted, violent, unpredictable person, but still a person; I don’t like that narrative of only monsters do that sort of thing because that’s simply not the case, it further alienates someone who’s likely feeling that way to begin with, and creates this false sense of security that it can’t happen again because only a monster would do that and the monster was killed, imprisoned, or whatever was done with it–and that’s dangerous.”

Calleo listened carefully, both because it was an interesting topic to him and because he wanted to take care not to miss any little detail that might be important. “It narrows it down more than you’d think; if there were aspects of history he was fascinated with, or certain colours, certain places, certain object types, or if they might be objects that held personal meaning to him it could narrow it down a great deal. It’s helped by the fact that most people like him want their soul kibble found by someone because, at some point, the body they have is going to die and they’re going to need to find another one so they’d want the remaining bits relatively easy to find. I’d bet actual Galleons that at least one or two of his branded followers know where at least one is.”

When Albus buried his face in his hands, Calleo as he often did in those cases, rested a hand on his shoulder, not entirely removing it as Albus sat up again. “Maybe you weren’t, but people like him like to talk about themselves, it’s just a matter of finding if anyone he’d ramble at alive, mostly sane, and willing to talk.”

“I’ve known a decent amount of people like him over the years, and I can tell you this: They’re all extremely lonely people at their core. They will talk to anyone they believe will listen and won’t rat them out–and some become so confident in their own skills they believe nobody would dare say a word.”

“Do enough poking around in the right markets with the right people, and you’re bound to find interesting information here and there or–well, if I do enough poking around in the right markets with the right people,” Calleo shrugged lightly and moved the chattering cook book back to the table.

“You don’t need that kind of stress and I work with those people on a regular basis; they’d be more likely to speak with me directly than they would to you or even to me knowing I’d be reporting that information back to you–so they simply won’t know that part.”

“And don’t!” Calleo held up a hand, anticipating an objection or three dozen, “Tell me that you’ll take care of it on your own. Maybe you will eventually but right now? Right now you need to not–do that thing again when you work yourself into a trench and get stuck there. I’m not giving you that ‘on your own’ option this time, you had it last time and right now you look so entirely exhausted and miserable that it really is taking a massive amount of self control to not pull you into a hug, no matter how brief.”

“Take some time off,” he smiled gently. He remembered full well that that advice was likely not going to go very far; it hadn’t worked the last time Albus had gone and done the entire Ministry’s job for it, at least. “It doesn’t have to be months or years, even a few weeks would help, just some time off to do nothing but unwind a couple of ticks; let me deal with the groundwork of where to begin searching, and I do have things that branch outside of your usual channels; there are a good many people who avoid you because they’re still bitter about how the last war ended. That sort of thing is part of my job anyway, and they’ll talk to me, especially if I word it in a way that catches their interest.”

“You take a week or two at someplace unplottable. I’ve got a few suggestions if you can’t think of any offhand.”

“You’re at one of them!” That got a laugh! “And the other is kind of a back door into the Archives’ lower level; the director before the last director put in a flat so she could avoid having to leave work and also avoid having to talk to people. Has a stairway that leads right up to ground level, and I’ve got the keys for it; they wouldn’t let you out onto Level 7, so no worries there.”

‘Soul kibble’ earned him a brief, weak laugh. It wasn’t might, but there could, evidently, still be bright spots in the world, even after such great failure and with such looming potential doom. It was a good reminder.

After a moment of touch, Albus looked up gratefully, giving Calleo his full attention again as he resumed.

As difficult as it was to let go, Calleo was genuinely competent, and Albus knew he wouldn’t offer to help if he didn’t intend to follow through. The prospect of pursuing this problem with his friend by his side rather than doing it all alone was appealing. And reassuring.

“If it’s taking so much effort, do go ahead. I’d hate to have you distracted by something so trivial.” Assuming it was brief, he might even draw more from a hug, in that moment. He’d likely even bring himself to hug back with some enthusiasm, for a moment.

“It’s hardly an opportune time for a break, but perhaps I will excuse myself from the castle for the winter holidays. Scottish winters are hardly doing me any favors at my age.” And there had been so many academic concerns he’d been putting off in favor of handling political problems. He would truly enjoy a chance to ignore recent events in favor of meeting with some of the rising scholars in Japan he’s been meaning to reach out to. Or even visiting some old friends.

“Alas, it never seems to be a good time. Christmas abroad, however… I’m sure my deputy could handle the handful of students who stay behind for a few weeks. I will look into it. And I believe I will take you up on your offer of assistance. You make excellent points, and I do trust you to take care of yourself while making such dangerous inquiries. Will you at least keep me updated about your findings?”

“I’d like to amend one of my statements despite the fact that it might have gone unnoticed: When I said some become so confident in their own skills they believe nobody would dare say a word, I don’t mean about things that are horrible. More, if they have gone off on the sad, tattered, and largely self-inflicted disaster they turned out to be, I won’t say a word about that.”

“No problems betraying trust in the business, intelligence, or political arenas, but I don’t like to make that sort of thing personal. If I’m part of the scavenger hunt for the remaining parts of someone’s soul with the intent of them being destroyed or dispatched, I–” Calleo blinked and paused for a moment, “–that is the intent, correct? We’re not doing something with re-binding rituals or glue or anything, yeah? Anyway, if it is that, I’ll go about assisting that destruction professionally.”

He tilted his head in a vaguely bird-like manner, “It’s the perfect opportune time for a break, considering you and a handful of people who also decided the Ministry was next to useless and to do the entire Ministry’s job only to have Crouch prance in like the pin striped vulture he is and declare that the Ministry had saved the day yet again! That’s at least worth a four day weekend.”

“You’ll have to let me know what you think of any of those scholars though, I’d maybe recommend visiting old friends if you’d have to make a decision between the two–whatever you do just promise me you’ll at least try to relax and not worry about anything going on back here.”

“And it’s no effort at all!” That may have sounded a bit more cheery than Calleo intended, “That sort of information could be valuable in countless ways. Best part is, since I wouldn’t trust the Ministry to be at all competent? That’ll reel at least four I already had in mind thirty seconds ago without argument!”

“Will I keep you updated?” Calleo repeated with a laugh, “You’ve just given me implicit permission to write or visit as often as there are updates of any kind, and the kind of updates weren’t specified!”

“Albus, you will be kept updated to the point that you’ll at least be tempted to tell me to stop writing every couple of hours or at least stop sending owls to breakfast or, if not that, at least a bit curious as to just who in the hell I’m actually talking to.”

Calleo smiled broadly and, this time, lazily threw an arm around Albus’ shoulders. “We’ll start with updates now, because I spend a good deal of time in Denmark and both of the current iterations of Germany. The general feeling I got from some of HIS former–employees–started out as what I can only describe as mild amusement, a brief period of interest and then, by about ‘77, a very distinct and almost hostile disdain for Voldemort and his followers.”

“Tempting to try the legislate ‘Voldemort out of being able to function’ there route but that also feels like it’d land me in an unpaid second job if I did, and that sounds like it’d eat up a lot of my already limited spare time. It’d also be blatantly obvious, probably startle MACUSA, and--not really a good option overall.”

Absently, Calleo scratched the side of his head and paused speaking for a few seconds as he fished something out of his hair, “I’d wondered where I lost that!” He held out a copper hatpin topped with a setting that contained several small pieces of black tourmaline and lapis lazuli. “Must’ve fallen out then got left behind! That happens more often than you’d think when I wear it up!”

“Do you ever hide small things or quills in your beard so you can pull them out in front of students often enough that they think that your beard is a liminal space? I’d definitely do that if I had a beard.”

Calleo started to say something else along those lines when the conductor came back from its short break and switched Calleo’s train of thought back onto the correct set of tracks.

“Oh! Right, the–sorry about that, I don’t keep hatpins in my hair ordinarily. Now, then, it might be safer to aim at financial and always seeming to know what they’re planning and possibly take a few warning shots at making it socially humiliating to have it known you have views that agree with Voldemort.”

“Which shot would you prefer I take first?” He grinned, “If you haven’t got a preference I might go two, three, then one but two, one, and then three could likely work just as well.”

“I’m sure that is our only realistic option,” Albus confirmed, though he didn’t look happy about it. It was a minor relief, though, to hear the clarification that his friend was still willing to aid the world in preventing atrocities. He did wonder sometimes. Idly and infrequently.

“I will try, but I’m afraid I’ve rather lost my talent for relaxation in recent years. It may take some practice to recover the skill.” He smiled wryly, then rubbed his ear and leaned back more comfortably against the couch. 

“Despite your misgivings, I’m certain to find the constant communication more comforting than not in this case. It is an incredibly important task which I am unable to complete unaided, which I’m sure you know frustrates me. Hearing from you will allow me to feel as though I’m in the loop.”

He leaned into Calleo for a moment, resting a hand on his leg to let him know he was comfortable with the touch continuing. He smiled weakly through the diversion of the hat pin, not bothering to respond to the question about his beard since he was sure Calleo would continue without an answer. Which he did.

“I think two, three, and then one will work as well as any other approach, assuming I followed correctly and by that you mean you will target financials first, then social concerns, then possible legislation. I doubt legislation will do much good before the general mood has shifted to favor views opposing Voldemort’s ideals. And, legislation is the one thing I would be better suited for than you.”

“A paper trail could be a bit much or dangerous down the line. I don’t know–quite how to ask this without coming off as weird..er..than usual but I will preface it by saying it’s something I frequently do with people I need to remain in close and silent contact. It’s typically temporary, and everyone has their own little space, as it were.” He tapped the side of his head, “At the moment, it’s only Lagraff, Aldig, Koggot, and Braxford that have what I like to joke is a permanent flat in my head.”

“Instant and silent communication, and I’ve long since learned how to make it work over great distances as well!” Calleo’s smile was almost playful, “And I’m completely housebroken and don’t go snooping about as I have no interest in what's going on in someone else’s head. It’s never always on, and the other four would have no idea you were even in there unless I told them, which I wouldn’t as they’re not involved. You won’t even know I’m there until I start talking.”

“And Occlumency’s always been a basic job function; I’ve had nearly seventy years of building it up and fine tuning it and am completely confident in saying it would be an entirely secure method of communication–er–the Legilimency part, that is.”

That was a lot of rambling in an attempt to not seem completely awkward, which may not have worked at all. Then again, there may not be a way to not-awkwardly suggest someone have a seat inside your mind to make communication faster and easier.

“If it makes it less frustrating for you, do feel free to consider me–uh–hm,” Calleo paused to think, “an extension of you. For the most part, I’ll simply move as you move and move what I can move in the same direction, but I answer to you privately. I know you’re not fond of giving up control, and I do appreciate the significance of even a small piece of it being turned largely over to me.”

“Publicly, I may have to appear a bit distant, though I doubt I’ll be able to make a good case for even neutrality in the Archives after the way I dealt with it a few years back; if I’m lucky, I’ll be largely forgotten or thought of as irrelevant. If not, I’ll just make enough noise to keep the focus on me and not the other Archivists.”

“Regardless,” he smiled at Albus, “completely regardless of how I may have to present myself publicly, I am entirely yours in this. Financial aim will be easy,” the smile broadened into a strangely proud and somewhat sharp grin. “I spent years–close to twenty–tracking down any living relatives and in a few cases it had to go to mutual business associates as one or two entire families had been simply exterminated.”

“What that got me was a strong reputation of someone who honors a contract; when they died, the ones I had the contracts with, everything sold or given to me under those contracts needed to be returned to their family–if any were left. I managed to rebuild several very, very strong ties to incredibly skilled Goblins. If anyone can cause financial chaos for those who still support him, they can.” His statements were almost clinical in nature, but the excitement to do something that wasn’t managing a weird and terrible library was evident in his eyes.

“Especially since one of his intended platforms was to make life…difficult for them again! Goblins have long memories, as they should.”

“The social aspect!” Now his grin was back, matching the excitement that lit his eyes. If one arm hadn’t been draped across Albus’ shoulders, he might have actually clapped.

“That is going to be so, so interesting; I’ll aim for nobody actually being killed and it’s very difficult to die of embarrassment. Should be easy to tie it into the financial aspect. If nobody wants to do business with you because of your views on things, it becomes embarrassing enough that even if they still buy into it privately they’ll be hesitant to be public with it and I am already enjoying this.”

“Where legislation is concerned, that is almost certainly your strong point and you have the political capital to spend, so I’ve got no arguments there. I can, if you’d like, get you tie-ins to the contacts I have just to make sure you’ve got strong enough strings to pull when it becomes necessary to give them a good yank, though it may be best for me to set those up so they don’t know it’s you directing it all.”

“Some of them are still a little–let’s call it bitter; most of them will work with me and the ones who won’t I’m–not sure what to do about them yet, but I’d reckon we’ve got a few years to figure it out!”

He gave Albus a small squeeze, taking care to make sure it didn’t make him feel trapped on the sofa. “Regardless of how long it takes him to rebuild, if he wants continental Europe, I fully intend to make it my priority to see that he has to fight for every tiny scrap of it and aim to make it not worth the time, effort, and losses to attempt.”

“And if that doesn’t work out all that well, I’m amazingly skilled at causing chaos–not–you know, war level chaos, the sort that one doesn’t even notice from the outside; those types of people will eat their own, so to speak, if they become frightened enough that they’re being targeted.”

“I know the Unseen Market well enough to navigate it in my sleep, Albus!” If it were possible for a person to be almost vibrating with excitement, Calleo was that person.

“There are so many avenues that will be so easy to cut off because of all the years I spent making connections others kept telling me to avoid. Have you worked closely with Goblins before? In a situation where they’re not wary of your motivations? They are brilliantly and efficiently cutthroat and I know exactly which partners of mine to contact to get it started!”

“Don’t mistake, they’re not going to kill anyone–and neither am I–physically, just financially and socially.”

“You just take a holiday, here, somewhere else, anywhere, there’s no rush on anything you’d need to do here and what you’ll likely end up having to spend that political capital on will be better spent once any base support that kid,”  Kid. Not especially the way one would expect to hear someone use in reference to Voldemort but, in fairness, Calleo was roughly forty years older than him, “has left is a smouldering heap of embarrassment and financial ruin. It’s going to take a few years to get it to a point that it’s usable in that regard.”

Everything Calleo was talking about was so delightfully intricate–the exact kind of social maneuvering and manipulation and elegant design that had so entranced Albus in his youth. Had he been alone when such longing struck, he might very well have hidden his wand and taken a sleep aid. As it was, he simply closed his eyes for a moment, took a long, deep breath, and tried to remind himself of every reason he wasn’t allowed to trust himself with fixing the government. No, it was much better to leave Calleo to handle this–to leave this to someone who could be trusted to continue thinking of the people he was moving into place as people rather than simply puzzle pieces.

He ended up looking rather pained, until he worked his way back to the start of what Calleo had been saying. Then his eyes opened suddenly. 

“I’m afraid we’re going to need to take a step back and slow down, just a hint. What kind of bond, exactly, are you proposing?” He couldn’t handle a direct feed of all his friend was doing to fix this. Frequent reports would be one thing, but constant communication of the sort he was now imagining would be another thing entirely. Very likely, Albus would start to actually treat Calleo as an extension of himself, as though he were little more than a game piece. And he could not allow that to happen. Not at any cost.

“I do trust you. I’m sure you’re perfectly capable of handling this independently. As much as I enjoy being in charge,” he offered a small, amused smile, above all his inner turmoil, “I am capable of letting go, especially when others are more capable than I. And there are methods of communication that neither leave a paper trail nor require we take up residence within each other’s minds. Perhaps it would be prudent to examine those before leaping to whatever, specifically, it is you’re suggesting.”

 “Oh, nothing binding; it’s not a business contract, after all. Just–a key, more or less, and don’t mistake,” he smiled brightly, “If I’d rather not have someone in my head at any given point, I’m more than capable of putting up an ‘out to lunch, try back later’ metaphorical sign.”

 “It’s just easier, over distance, where owls aren’t practical and information needs to be exchanged quickly, to use legilimancy; and only legilimancy. I swear, I’m not going to use it to wake you up in the middle of the night and ask you want the difference between a raven and a writing desk is or anything equally frivolous and there’s no bond involved, if you don’t want to talk, you don’t answer–and vice versa.

 Calleo nodded, “We can discuss other methods certainly, especially if you’re not comfortable with legilimency; it’s just what I’m the most used to using so it’s something I don’t have to think about–pun intended–to resort to using. You wouldn’t see anything I wouldn’t want you to see, all you’d see would be things related to work and an occasional chat.”

 “Speaking of, it’s SO useful for silent conversation that makes other people you’re negotiating with think you’re far too clever to try and pull one over on! That IS business that would be relatively useful here.”

Likely a good idea to be prudent though,“ Calleo kicked his feet up to rest on his own coffee table again. It was his own house, he could do what he wanted in his own house! "You’ve always been good at that you know, tempering–to put it politely–me when my mind gets away from me and starts proposing ideas that may not be the best course of action. HA! And, Merlin, if you were accidentally just hanging about in there and taking a look around, you’d probably run into so many things you never wanted to know about me!”

 “Anyway, it’s good to have someone around who’s able to act as a stopgap,” his smile faded somewhat, but didn’t disappear, “I’d like you to keep in mind that you know this situation better than I do. Just give the leash a yank if you think I’m getting too out of line.”

“I know the people I need to contact, where to have them go, what to have them say, and to whom to get things started; I know where I have to move in the same capacity but it all comes back to you. Not entirely you, I’m not going to even suggest it’s all on you, you don’t need that kind of stress and whatever they do falls back on me as I know how these things work; you need to, for now, remain completely separated from it all to keep the Ministry from poking around where it needn’t be poking around.”

Calleo gave Albus another little squeeze, “I can move as swiftly or as slowly as you’d like. If nothing else, I am exceptionally adaptable!”

“What the Ministry doesn’t know won’t hurt them but if anyone has to fall on the proverbial sword, it’s going to be me.’

 Calleo’s smile returned, this time more warm than playful, “What you need are people around you who can help keep you from thinking you need to be the one to plan, execute, and accomplish those plans; it works better with groups you trust, you know. Two now is a good start, but it’d be a good idea to pick a few more people with highly specialised skill sets eventually.”

 “And maybe for nobody else it comes back to you directly, but it does for me; don’t mistake, though, if I think you’re making a misstep, you’ll hear about it and likely hear about it with a mountain of evidence.”

“AND a holiday. A holiday first while I get information gathering started and you relax wherever it is you choose to relax; if you travel, send photos, if you stay here expect to be mildly fussed over if you start looking like you’re having a rough time.”

 Albus was also extremely capable of keeping people out of his head, but he wasn’t sure he’d be able to resist every scrap of information he might be offered.

He reminded himself that he had successfully avoided taking over the world for many years now, then quickly thought it over again, more rationally. "Alright. I will take all of that under advisement.”

It was more difficult than it had any business being, to adjust to the idea that this wasn’t entirely his responsibility, even if he was leading things. I don’t believe such a measure is necessary at this point, but after I return from my holiday,“ he smiled, a little bit sadly, "we can implement legilimancy-based communication. You’re right that there will be quite a few advantages inherent to that method.

"I would like to say that your calm confidence in both of our abilities is remarkably reassuring. Especially your confidence in your ability to knock me back into line. I don’t even doubt you.” He leaned more firmly into his friend for a moment.

“When are you planning to begin taking moves?”

 "Great! It does make things a lot easier when trying to run silent, as it were; and I will want to hear all about your holiday when you get back!” Anyone listening in at this point might have just assumed nothing more than two old Wizards having a perfectly normal conversation.

“And try not to worry, I’m not a horribly loud presence, despite my outward personality; I wouldn’t be noisy living in a flat with thin walls, and I tend to treat others’ minds the same way.”

Calleo positively beamed at the compliment that might have seemed utterly mundane to someone else, “And it’s actual confidence; learned long ago that trying to pass off arrogance as confidence never works out long term.”

 “You’re good enough at pulling me back into line,” he snickered, “I mean, the long hair doesn’t help in escape attempts either. Reckon the same applies to that impressive beard of yours too! Ah—” Calleo regained his composure, “but it is a good thing to know. I never care to work alone for that reason. It’s easy to go a bit off if you haven’t got anyone around to talk you down.”

“I have no doubt that you’ll do very well with this and I’ll have no trouble turning to you for advice or to discuss tactics.”

 As Albus leaned more into Calleo, Calleo pulled him closer, “Oh, Lagraff, Koggott, and Aldig started about a half hour ago. Lagraff’s excellent with the economics of things–and he’s my personal accountant–Koggot gets on well with those in the Unseen Market, and Aldig is positively amazing where politics are concerned; if anyone can make it politically embarrassing to have even a passing association with Voldemort, Aldig can.”

 “Between Aldig and Koggot, they’ll have enough in place within a couple of months so Lagraff can start cutting off economic roots; at the moment, he’s simply a,” Calleo’s smile broadened, “buyer for a private client.”

“Figured I’d start small then have those three how many of the Goblin based business and banks he can get to fall in line.”

“And once that’s done,” Calleo had started to absently braid Albus’ hair, much the same way he used to when they were younger, “that’s when I step in, call in a few favours and where I have no political capital, I’ll make it–or find it, one way or another.  I’ll have a better idea of who and where to target first after hearing back from Aldig and Koggot.”

He sat silently for a while, letting Albus relax and still absently and loosely braiding his hair. It wasn’t the nicest topic, of course but, avoiding such things only made them worse in the end.

 Calleo finally spoke again, “I’ve got this, I promise you that and I also promise that if I think I’m slipping or need additional or reallocated resources,  you’ll be the first person to know.”  "You focus on, first and foremost, you, then on the school, THEN the UK at large; I don’t think I can bring in anyone from the continent without MACUSA losing its mind but I could see if it would be possible for Lagraff to convince at least a few of the Goblins at Gringotts that they really don’t want to keep accounts on these people, and assets can be frozen on a whim.“

 "I know this is difficult for you, Albus” reminiscent of few times in the mid-to-late 1940s, Calleo turned just enough to give his friend a perfectly friendly kiss on the side of his head, “it’s not all that hidden, but I am impressed and proud of you for realising that you’d only run yourself straight into the ground trying to do this yourself.”

“And don’t worry, I never fire the first shot so it’s always self defence in the eyes of the various Law Enforcement departments.”

 “Yes, I suppose it is.” He ought to have learned that lesson decades ago and stopped working alone so frequently himself, but he was grateful for the reminder. 

Hearing him lay out his plan–explain that it was already in motion–Albus was rather suddenly jealous of his network, regardless of how much effort Albus had put into purposely keeping his individual power in their community low. Then, of course, he had the realization that with them working together, Calleo’s network was his by proxy. And perhaps, that combined with what remained of the order and with his other connection and reputation… they might actually be able to make things work. 

“It is. You know me well. Shockingly well, some days. I will leave things in your very capable hands.” And he would trust all the reassurances. There was no good reason not to. 

Albus smiled and squeezed Calleo’s hand for a moment before shifting to put an inch or so between them. “I think I may stay for a moment. A better word might be hiding, but I believe an old man is allowed, on occasion.” And he did stay, not revisiting the unpleasant topics of war criminals or political maneuvering, for nearly half an hour, before he stood again to make his excuses. 

“And now, the school is calling. Always things to be done, you know. I wish you luck. But I do have a holiday to plan as well.” He smiled again, the sadness creeping back in, though it was certainly less prominent than it had been when he had first arrived, and again, took Calleo’s hand for a moment. “I know you know, but you shouldn’t get too set on handling things alone either.”

  “That does tend to happen after a few decades here and there if one is paying attention properly. It’s probably less fair to say you don’t hide it well than it is to say I’ve had to learn to be an almost paranoid level of perceptive for so long that it’s second nature.”

“And, make no mistake, it is often a paranoid level but, then, it has to be.” The smile he offered had a vague hint of sheepishness to it but, it was a smile nonetheless. “One often gets used to doublespeak, as it were, or needing to read between lines someone else would never tell you are there; missing even the smallest thing can have catastrophic results personally and professionally, and if you’re incorrect, the worst you typically end up as is a bit mental–but still alive.”

“The thing is is,” the sheepishness disappeared and melted into something that held the glint of a razor blade, “my dagger collection is made up of the ones I’ve pulled from my own back over the years.”

“If it’s hiding, I’ve been hiding since somewhere around 1916! I couldn’t do half of what you do even a fraction of the time; dealing with other people face to face is exhausting. There’s a good reason I bothered the appropriate offices for years to get them to give me a permit to make this place unplottable and I can sum it up with, ‘Unscheduled visitors outside of office hours stress me out even more than unscheduled visitors during office hours’.” He did, however, manage to not drift back to unpleasant topics for the duration of the conversation. One of the benefits of living in the middle of nowhere and surrounded by Muggles was that there had been, for all intents and purposes, no recent war anywhere near the place; it was all pleasant and quiet, even if the only reason had been that the Muggles weren’t allowed to know what had been going on.

“Does the school actually call?” Calleo tilted his head slightly, “It feels like that’s something it might actually do, which is mildly disconcerting.”

He smiled and not so much laughed as he did make an amused sounding little huff, “I know better than that; if I fall out of contact with either of those three for too long where personal business is concerned there’s a good chance someone under four feet tall will come looking for me and levitate a rolled up copy of the Prophet to go upside my head with for not answering in a timely manner.”

“You’ll have to forgive me in advance if I try to keep you away from needing to deal with some of the–sorts of people I’ll end up dealing with eventually for as long as possible. The ones I wouldn’t classify as dangerous are also the ones who are going to require a little,” Calleo paused, trying to think of a polite way to phrase it that didn’t make him sound horrible and eventually gave up and offered a resigned sounding, “persuasion, if only verbal, to even be willing to talk to you. The ones who owe me favours, which I will get from them one way or another, are more a matter of whether or not they’re currently aware that they owe me and have for at least the last four decades.”

“They’ll come around largely on account of me not intending to give them an option otherwise. If I can’t be charming enough, I can certainly be stubborn enough!”

“The rest are the sort I’ll likely have to take the route of falling in line with being on the, it’s not really an opposite side, yet is at the same time; the ones that need to think I find you to be the problem, not Voldemort.”

“Do try not to worry, though!” He perked back up, smiling brilliantly again. “You’ll know exactly who they are and what they say word for word; if you like, you’ll be able to hear and see them as well, should you want to be able to piece their words together with their tone and actions directly.”

“Finessing!” Evidently, it took Calleo’s mind a few minutes to catch up with the rest of him, “That was the word I was after! Persuasion sounds a hell of a lot more aggressive than I ever get.”

“It does, on occasion, though I’m being slightly less literal at the moment.  Generally, it’s only the wards or the elves who notify me directly that my presence is needed.” For instance, were students performing illegal magic in the corridors, or if the school were under attack, the wards would alert him. Thankfully, that was not the case now.  He didn’t think he could summon the energy to alert the Department of Magical Law Enforcement and coordinate the fallout from that at the moment. “This, thankfully, is much more of a pressing memory of obligations.  A nagging urge to continue keeping things in order, moving along as planned.” He smiled back, more than used to the way goodbyes could be drawn out by now.

“Ahh, keeping track. So few take the initiative to properly track their debts these days, assuming that others forget with time as they do. Yes.” He smiled wanly. “Yes, I’m sure you are more than capable of reminding. And finessing.

“I have full faith in you,” he reminded the both of them yet again. “And I’m sure I will get by just fine without direct memories, unless you find them particularly informative in a way a simpler retelling cannot be.

“I’m sure I will be hearing from you soon, my friend. When I do, I will be sure to inform you in turn of the progress I have made in planning my holiday.” He clasped Calleo’s shoulder fondly in an unusual affectionate gesture, then smiled yet again in a way he could only hope reassured.