#without referencing major & building Muggle events

[uefb]

Chapter 4 of my post-SoD, semi-historical fiction Fantastic Beasts fic is up, With It’s Head Under One Wing.

Today, Newt puts a former DRCMC colleague in his place, Theseus tries to apologize for a clumsy reaction, and Newt and Theseus discover…autism. Next, we’ll see Newt dealing with a Quentiped, and then a sweet Tina chapter or two before we’re hurtled into the startling appointment of Germany’s new chancellor. (All while Grindelwald is, you know, still somewhere.)

Excerpt:

Newt stood there, processing for a moment, before dropping a hand into the pocket he’d been picking at to play with one of the loose strings inside.

“You came here just to tell me sorry? In person?”

Theseus nodded and shifted slightly on his feet.

“It’s all right. You were very helpful with your information–”

Theseus cut him off. “Newt.”

“It is, though,” he said again. “I did it once, to a hippogriff, when I thought he was – After a storm and he'd been – Well, the details don't matter. But I forgot my manners, despite the hippogriffs’ nature, and we were both quite upset by that in the end."

Theseus looked at Newt for a long moment, and Newt watched Theseus (eyes fixed on the minute crinkles between his brother’s eyes), and then he turned away to retrieve a pair of mugs.

“I forgot that you startle,” Theseus said from behind him. “I’ve accepted that you don’t like to be touched, even if it took me a long time—far too long, really—to stop forcing it on you.”

Newt could hear the unspoken confusion in his brother’s voice.

“At the same time, you’re different than you were when we were kids, you know? More sure. And you handle those beasts like nothing at all.”

Newt cracked his knuckles before unscrewing the lid from the can of Gunpowder tea and—without turning around—he flicked his wand over his shoulder, toward the teapot he kept on the built-in shelf above the sink.

“Newt?”

The teapot floated past Theseus’ head just as Newt turned back around, open can in his hands.

“I have more field data now,” he said simply.

Theseus stared, and then jerkily readjusted so one hand was in his pocket and the other on his hip, leaning slightly forward with furrowed brows as if being closer to Newt would help him better understand the meaning behind his words.

“Field – What?”