FIC: The Case of the Missing Whatsis (PG, Gen)
Title:The Case of the Missing Whatsis
Author/Artist: ???
Prompt: 34
Pairing, or gen: Gen
Rating: PG
Warning(s): Some (mostly off-camera) violence and references to criminal activities.
Word count/medium: 2,500-ish
Summary/Excerpt: Dudley was under the impression that the sort of people Harry went after were above and beyond dangerous, and certainly didn't envy his cousin in the slightest. Had anyone bothered to tell him that was about to change, he wouldn't have worn his best shirt to the office that morning.
Author's notes: Many thanks to the mods for their patience while crafting this story, and thanks as always to my beta, who fixed all the important things.
Disclaimer: Harry Potter and all associated characters and settings remain the intellectual property of JK Rowling and her associates. We are very grateful for permission to play with them.
The Case of the Missing Whatsis
Dudley Dursley hated magic.
He had no problem with wizards, generally speaking; he'd married a witch -- lovely girl, met her at Harry's wedding -- and sent three of his children off to Hogwarts. Oh, his parents had been furious, to be sure. His father had tried to disown him, which had lasted until the first grandchild had arrived, and then Petunia Dursley had put her foot down.
Granted, the change of heart was made easier by the fact that his parents had no idea what he did for a living. Officially, Dudley was an administrative assistant in Her Majesty's Civil Service, a job title that was laughable considering he'd never been suited for either assistance or service to anyone. Unofficially, he was a member of an agency so secret its official name involved clearance well above his pay grade, internally referred to as MI-9 3/4.
In short, Dudley Dursley spent his days (and occasionally his nights and sometimes the odd week-end) dealing with wizards.
* * * * *
Founded shortly after the He-Who-Must-Not-Be-Named Incident, the agency was comprised almost entirely of non-magical folk. The vast majority of personnel were, like Dudley, Muggle relations of wizards and witches who'd gone to Hogwarts. A handful were Squibs, born to magical families and raised around magic without being able to use it themselves. Scuttlebutt among the rank-and-file had it that there were one or two actual wizards -- who'd done something to cross the wizarding government and been sent to the agency as punishment -- but no one had ever been able to confirm it.
Dudley had been all set to join the British Army (he'd have gone for the Royal Navy if he could stand on a boat for five minutes or more without thinking of a harrowing row out to a nigh-deserted island in his eleventh year), but a routine background check had shunted his name to the agency without his knowing about it, and they made him an offer he literally couldn't refuse. He'd tried, initially, but he'd lasted all of three days in the Army, a fact which he still suspected was due to insidious magical interference.
He hadn't taken to the job with enthusiasm, but he'd found himself enjoying it once he'd gotten over being disappointed about the unexpected change of career. Learning about wizards and magic had been difficult, but the more he'd learned the more it seemed as if a curtain was being drawn back, revealing a hidden world he'd known for years existed but had never been willing to acknowledge. It had led to an awkward, tension-filled reunion with Harry, and the less said about that the better. When the brass had discovered just how highly-placed Dudley's cousin was, however, they'd shoved all kinds of titles and responsibilities at him, which he'd politely turned down.
Over the years, Dudley had worked his way up the ranks, and while the pace was fairly slow, at least he knew he'd done it on his own merits rather than someone else's. It was this willingness to work at something that reconciled the cousins, a process that was helped along by their wives and children. Their respective disparity in rank, however, had kept them from working together; Dudley was under the impression that the sort of people Harry went after were above and beyond dangerous, and certainly didn't envy his cousin in the slightest.
Had anyone bothered to tell him that was about to change, he wouldn't have worn his best shirt to the office that morning.
* * * * *
"Remind me again why you needed me to come out here with you?" Dudley wasn't shouting at his cousin, but some volume was necessary in order to be heard over the sounds of the pouring rain and intermittent spellcasting.
"You're supposed to be gathering intelligence?" Harry bellowed back, in between casting spells toward the other end of the alley the cousins had been trapped in.
This was a running joke between them, that Dudley (who was not stupid once he'd gotten around to actually using the brain that was in his head) should wind up working for an agency that primarily specialized in collecting information. Oh, they dealt with their share of so-called "minor" wizards and witches, but in those cases there was almost always a licensed Auror from the Department of Magical Law Enforcement on hand to make sure things didn't go sideways.
"My intelligence tells me we should get the bloody hell out of here!" Dudley suggested. A bolt of red light shot from the other end of the alley and blew a chunk of plaster off the building above his head, but he held his ground, gritting his teeth and ducking his head further inside the ridiculous cloak Harry had made him wear.
Things had gone decidedly pear-shaped within moments of their arrival, and Dudley vowed to himself that there would be Words had with someone, provided they made it out of the scrap alive. He shoved his hands in his pockets, the better to restrain himself from attempting to strangle his cousin, who had landed them feet first into this mess. After a moment, he drew out the innocuous-looking cube he'd been given before they'd left. "D'you think I should give this a go?" he asked, holding it up so that Harry could have a look at it.
"What's it do?"
Dudley spent a handful of seconds trying to remember what the gent had told him upon handing him the cube, then shrugged and gave it up as a lost cause "Haven't the foggiest, but what's the worst that could hap--"
He'd never seen Harry move so fast in his life, but before he could finish speaking, his cousin had him pressed up against the wall, a hand clamped over his mouth. "Don't," Harry hissed, "finish that sentence. Trust me, it can always get worse."
Dudley stares at his cousin for a moment, then slowly nodded, and Harry let go of him, backing away. Another spell from the far end of the alley shot past the cousins, and Dudley asked, "So should I use it, then?"
"All right, if you can remember how," Harry replied.
That was fair, Dudley supposed, since he'd forgotten what the cube did in the first place. He'd remembered that it was for emergencies only, and this seemed to qualify as an emergency. There was a brief moment in which he drew a blank as to how to activate the thing, then he recalled the instructions he'd been given when the cube was issued. "Abracadabra!" he shouted, feeling somewhat ridiculous as he tossed the thing up into the air.
Immediately after it left his hand, the cube glowed, brightly enough to cast much more light than even the spells being cast from either party, until Dudley could no longer see anything else, and then a concussive force slammed him back against the wall again. He heard Harry swear from somewhere close by, then there was a thundering boom not unlike the sound of a cannon, which Dudley didn't have much time to think about, because he promptly blacked out.
* * * * *
The day had started like any other day: Dudley had awakened precisely at six, alarm clock blaring from across the room to give him motivation to rise and shut it off. He'd never enjoyed mornings, but he usually enjoyed his job and was therefore inclined to take steps which ensured steady employment. After a trip to the loo which included a shower, he proceeded to the kitchen, where he was greeted by his wife and a minimal breakfast. Less than an hour after rising, he was on his way to work, as the commute was a lengthier one than it would have been had they chosen to reside in London itself rather than nearly an hour away from the heart of the city.
Dudley arrived at work promptly at five minutes to eight, at which point the day had taken a turn for the strange, as he was met in the lobby of the building by the personal assistant to the Chief, who informed him that he was wanted "upstairs". Knowing that nothing good could come of this summons, he nevertheless took the lift and hoped that whatever the Chief wanted could be accomplished quickly, so that he could get on with the handful of cases he was currently working.
Maury Prewett was a tall string bean of a man, aging but still sandy-haired and with ice-blue eyes that glimmered with a fierce intelligence. Dudley had learned early that Prewett did not like to be kept waiting, could tolerate neither stupidity nor ignorance, and was not inclined to cut wizarding folk any kind of slack. He was also on the low end of the organizational pyramid, which meant that those in charge of the department were well above his pay grade, and sometimes made decisions that resulted in everyone else walking on eggshells for weeks afterward.
Therefore, Dudley was quite surprised to find that Harry was already in the Chief's office, though less surprised that his cousin looked as though he'd rather be anywhere else. Most people had that expression within minutes of exposure to the Chief.
Without preamble, the Chief informed Dudley that the other side had requested an agent to assist with the recovery of an artifact that had somehow turned up missing, and though Dudley was given to understand that he'd been chosen for the assignment before Harry's arrival, the coincidence struck him as too neat to truly be coincidence. He'd learned to distrust things that seemed too neat, particularly where magic was concerned, but he put on his best serious face and nodded at appropriate points during the briefing, then was whisked away without warning by Harry via magical travel that he fervently hoped would never be repeated to the Ministry of Magic.
The second briefing, by the current head of the Department of Magical Law Enforcement (Ronald Weasley, whom Dudley knew only vaguely on a personal level and not at all professionally), was rather longer than the first, detailing the object that was stolen as well as the security measures that had been in place. The Aurors had a tentative list of suspects, but the Minister had insisted that Dudley's people be involved, and he had the sense that they were tolerating his presence out of respect for the Minister and not out of any real need for him.
His wish not to be magically transported again was, unfortunately, not granted, and the second trip seemed to take something out of even Harry, which Dudley would have found more interesting had his breakfast not been trying to escape from his stomach. Once he'd regained some measure of composure, he and Harry walked the rest of the way to the crime scene in silence, though upon arrival Dudley was able to not only make himself useful but prove that there was some merit to his present job title as an agent in the intelligence community.
Investigation by Dudley's methods turned up several clues that wizarding forensics had missed entirely, suggesting that the suspect was familiar with wizarding methods of evidence collection but not those employed by Muggles. Harry confirmed that there were no magical traces lingering in the area, but the clues that Dudley had found were sufficient to bring in and question half a dozen people, which meant more magical travel.
* * * * *
"Is he going to be all right?"
Dudley was able to identify the speaker as his wife, though her voice sounded far away.
"He'll be fine," Harry replied, the voice also seeming to come from a distance. "He's a little banged up from whatever spells were stored in that bit of artifice, but it's not as bad as it looks, really."
"I still can't believe he'd been issued such a thing by the department. Didn't anyone tell them what sort of person Theodore was?"
"There's bound to be an inquiry. Some papers slipped through the cracks somewhere."
"Was he really behind all of this?"
"Brilliant, when you think about it. Hiding in plain sight, the last place anyone would have looked for him."
"Anyone but Dudley." Dudley could hear the pride in his wife's voice, and it was enough to let him relax, slipping back into unconsciousness.
* * * * *
Questioning suspects took surprisingly little time, with the resources Harry's people had at their disposal. They also had Dudley at their disposal, and while some of the wizards might have been prepared to be questioned by other wizards, none of them were prepared to be confronted by a Muggle, much less a Muggle who knew about their world.
By shortly after noon, Dudley and Harry were back on the move, heading for a warehouse where the missing artifact was supposedly being kept. They both had their doubts that things would be quite so simple, but it was the only lead they had, and everything Dudley had been told suggested that time was of the essence in this case. Not only had the warehouse been deserted, however, they'd been set upon in the alley behind it, which was where the firefight had taken place.
* * * * *
When Dudley woke again, he was in his own bed, but no alarm was going off. Shortly after his eyes opened, his wife arrived with a tray of food, and news of what had happened.
Had it not been for the sheer chance of Dudley bringing along the enchanted cube, things might have turned out much differently. Apparently, however, even the assailant had anticipated the cube's use, even though he was the one who'd given it to Dudley, some months ago.
"His name is Theodore Nott," his wife explained, of the wizard who'd quietly worked in MI-9 3/4's Research and Development department for several years. "He was suspected of some really nasty things, during the war, but no one could prove it, so instead of prison they'd sent him to your department. Some of the paperwork was lost, though, so they weren't keeping as close a watch on him as they should have been."
Nott had been secretly brainwashing (the Imperius Curse, his wife called it) agents to work for him for at least the last decade, by means of the enchanted devices he was giving out. Dudley and some of the others had escaped his influence by distrusting such objects on principle and refraining from their use, but they were a small minority. Both MI-9 3/4 and the Ministry of Magic were working to discover just how far Nott's influence had spread, but Dudley had been given three weeks of leave to recuperate, which he interpreted as Prewett's orders to keep him out of the way of the investigation.
His wife kissed his cheek, leaving the tray and moving toward the door. "I'll leave you to rest, you're going to need it. Harry's coming to dinner."
Alone, Dudley had time to think that maybe magic wasn't all that bad, after all, but he was quite glad not to have been born a wizard. He didn't envy Harry the paperwork, for one, not even a little bit.
It wasn’t until a few days later that he realized he never had found out what the missing artifact had been.
Fin
Author/Artist: ???
Prompt: 34
Pairing, or gen: Gen
Rating: PG
Warning(s): Some (mostly off-camera) violence and references to criminal activities.
Word count/medium: 2,500-ish
Summary/Excerpt: Dudley was under the impression that the sort of people Harry went after were above and beyond dangerous, and certainly didn't envy his cousin in the slightest. Had anyone bothered to tell him that was about to change, he wouldn't have worn his best shirt to the office that morning.
Author's notes: Many thanks to the mods for their patience while crafting this story, and thanks as always to my beta, who fixed all the important things.
Disclaimer: Harry Potter and all associated characters and settings remain the intellectual property of JK Rowling and her associates. We are very grateful for permission to play with them.
The Case of the Missing Whatsis
Dudley Dursley hated magic.
He had no problem with wizards, generally speaking; he'd married a witch -- lovely girl, met her at Harry's wedding -- and sent three of his children off to Hogwarts. Oh, his parents had been furious, to be sure. His father had tried to disown him, which had lasted until the first grandchild had arrived, and then Petunia Dursley had put her foot down.
Granted, the change of heart was made easier by the fact that his parents had no idea what he did for a living. Officially, Dudley was an administrative assistant in Her Majesty's Civil Service, a job title that was laughable considering he'd never been suited for either assistance or service to anyone. Unofficially, he was a member of an agency so secret its official name involved clearance well above his pay grade, internally referred to as MI-9 3/4.
In short, Dudley Dursley spent his days (and occasionally his nights and sometimes the odd week-end) dealing with wizards.
* * * * *
Founded shortly after the He-Who-Must-Not-Be-Named Incident, the agency was comprised almost entirely of non-magical folk. The vast majority of personnel were, like Dudley, Muggle relations of wizards and witches who'd gone to Hogwarts. A handful were Squibs, born to magical families and raised around magic without being able to use it themselves. Scuttlebutt among the rank-and-file had it that there were one or two actual wizards -- who'd done something to cross the wizarding government and been sent to the agency as punishment -- but no one had ever been able to confirm it.
Dudley had been all set to join the British Army (he'd have gone for the Royal Navy if he could stand on a boat for five minutes or more without thinking of a harrowing row out to a nigh-deserted island in his eleventh year), but a routine background check had shunted his name to the agency without his knowing about it, and they made him an offer he literally couldn't refuse. He'd tried, initially, but he'd lasted all of three days in the Army, a fact which he still suspected was due to insidious magical interference.
He hadn't taken to the job with enthusiasm, but he'd found himself enjoying it once he'd gotten over being disappointed about the unexpected change of career. Learning about wizards and magic had been difficult, but the more he'd learned the more it seemed as if a curtain was being drawn back, revealing a hidden world he'd known for years existed but had never been willing to acknowledge. It had led to an awkward, tension-filled reunion with Harry, and the less said about that the better. When the brass had discovered just how highly-placed Dudley's cousin was, however, they'd shoved all kinds of titles and responsibilities at him, which he'd politely turned down.
Over the years, Dudley had worked his way up the ranks, and while the pace was fairly slow, at least he knew he'd done it on his own merits rather than someone else's. It was this willingness to work at something that reconciled the cousins, a process that was helped along by their wives and children. Their respective disparity in rank, however, had kept them from working together; Dudley was under the impression that the sort of people Harry went after were above and beyond dangerous, and certainly didn't envy his cousin in the slightest.
Had anyone bothered to tell him that was about to change, he wouldn't have worn his best shirt to the office that morning.
* * * * *
"Remind me again why you needed me to come out here with you?" Dudley wasn't shouting at his cousin, but some volume was necessary in order to be heard over the sounds of the pouring rain and intermittent spellcasting.
"You're supposed to be gathering intelligence?" Harry bellowed back, in between casting spells toward the other end of the alley the cousins had been trapped in.
This was a running joke between them, that Dudley (who was not stupid once he'd gotten around to actually using the brain that was in his head) should wind up working for an agency that primarily specialized in collecting information. Oh, they dealt with their share of so-called "minor" wizards and witches, but in those cases there was almost always a licensed Auror from the Department of Magical Law Enforcement on hand to make sure things didn't go sideways.
"My intelligence tells me we should get the bloody hell out of here!" Dudley suggested. A bolt of red light shot from the other end of the alley and blew a chunk of plaster off the building above his head, but he held his ground, gritting his teeth and ducking his head further inside the ridiculous cloak Harry had made him wear.
Things had gone decidedly pear-shaped within moments of their arrival, and Dudley vowed to himself that there would be Words had with someone, provided they made it out of the scrap alive. He shoved his hands in his pockets, the better to restrain himself from attempting to strangle his cousin, who had landed them feet first into this mess. After a moment, he drew out the innocuous-looking cube he'd been given before they'd left. "D'you think I should give this a go?" he asked, holding it up so that Harry could have a look at it.
"What's it do?"
Dudley spent a handful of seconds trying to remember what the gent had told him upon handing him the cube, then shrugged and gave it up as a lost cause "Haven't the foggiest, but what's the worst that could hap--"
He'd never seen Harry move so fast in his life, but before he could finish speaking, his cousin had him pressed up against the wall, a hand clamped over his mouth. "Don't," Harry hissed, "finish that sentence. Trust me, it can always get worse."
Dudley stares at his cousin for a moment, then slowly nodded, and Harry let go of him, backing away. Another spell from the far end of the alley shot past the cousins, and Dudley asked, "So should I use it, then?"
"All right, if you can remember how," Harry replied.
That was fair, Dudley supposed, since he'd forgotten what the cube did in the first place. He'd remembered that it was for emergencies only, and this seemed to qualify as an emergency. There was a brief moment in which he drew a blank as to how to activate the thing, then he recalled the instructions he'd been given when the cube was issued. "Abracadabra!" he shouted, feeling somewhat ridiculous as he tossed the thing up into the air.
Immediately after it left his hand, the cube glowed, brightly enough to cast much more light than even the spells being cast from either party, until Dudley could no longer see anything else, and then a concussive force slammed him back against the wall again. He heard Harry swear from somewhere close by, then there was a thundering boom not unlike the sound of a cannon, which Dudley didn't have much time to think about, because he promptly blacked out.
* * * * *
The day had started like any other day: Dudley had awakened precisely at six, alarm clock blaring from across the room to give him motivation to rise and shut it off. He'd never enjoyed mornings, but he usually enjoyed his job and was therefore inclined to take steps which ensured steady employment. After a trip to the loo which included a shower, he proceeded to the kitchen, where he was greeted by his wife and a minimal breakfast. Less than an hour after rising, he was on his way to work, as the commute was a lengthier one than it would have been had they chosen to reside in London itself rather than nearly an hour away from the heart of the city.
Dudley arrived at work promptly at five minutes to eight, at which point the day had taken a turn for the strange, as he was met in the lobby of the building by the personal assistant to the Chief, who informed him that he was wanted "upstairs". Knowing that nothing good could come of this summons, he nevertheless took the lift and hoped that whatever the Chief wanted could be accomplished quickly, so that he could get on with the handful of cases he was currently working.
Maury Prewett was a tall string bean of a man, aging but still sandy-haired and with ice-blue eyes that glimmered with a fierce intelligence. Dudley had learned early that Prewett did not like to be kept waiting, could tolerate neither stupidity nor ignorance, and was not inclined to cut wizarding folk any kind of slack. He was also on the low end of the organizational pyramid, which meant that those in charge of the department were well above his pay grade, and sometimes made decisions that resulted in everyone else walking on eggshells for weeks afterward.
Therefore, Dudley was quite surprised to find that Harry was already in the Chief's office, though less surprised that his cousin looked as though he'd rather be anywhere else. Most people had that expression within minutes of exposure to the Chief.
Without preamble, the Chief informed Dudley that the other side had requested an agent to assist with the recovery of an artifact that had somehow turned up missing, and though Dudley was given to understand that he'd been chosen for the assignment before Harry's arrival, the coincidence struck him as too neat to truly be coincidence. He'd learned to distrust things that seemed too neat, particularly where magic was concerned, but he put on his best serious face and nodded at appropriate points during the briefing, then was whisked away without warning by Harry via magical travel that he fervently hoped would never be repeated to the Ministry of Magic.
The second briefing, by the current head of the Department of Magical Law Enforcement (Ronald Weasley, whom Dudley knew only vaguely on a personal level and not at all professionally), was rather longer than the first, detailing the object that was stolen as well as the security measures that had been in place. The Aurors had a tentative list of suspects, but the Minister had insisted that Dudley's people be involved, and he had the sense that they were tolerating his presence out of respect for the Minister and not out of any real need for him.
His wish not to be magically transported again was, unfortunately, not granted, and the second trip seemed to take something out of even Harry, which Dudley would have found more interesting had his breakfast not been trying to escape from his stomach. Once he'd regained some measure of composure, he and Harry walked the rest of the way to the crime scene in silence, though upon arrival Dudley was able to not only make himself useful but prove that there was some merit to his present job title as an agent in the intelligence community.
Investigation by Dudley's methods turned up several clues that wizarding forensics had missed entirely, suggesting that the suspect was familiar with wizarding methods of evidence collection but not those employed by Muggles. Harry confirmed that there were no magical traces lingering in the area, but the clues that Dudley had found were sufficient to bring in and question half a dozen people, which meant more magical travel.
* * * * *
"Is he going to be all right?"
Dudley was able to identify the speaker as his wife, though her voice sounded far away.
"He'll be fine," Harry replied, the voice also seeming to come from a distance. "He's a little banged up from whatever spells were stored in that bit of artifice, but it's not as bad as it looks, really."
"I still can't believe he'd been issued such a thing by the department. Didn't anyone tell them what sort of person Theodore was?"
"There's bound to be an inquiry. Some papers slipped through the cracks somewhere."
"Was he really behind all of this?"
"Brilliant, when you think about it. Hiding in plain sight, the last place anyone would have looked for him."
"Anyone but Dudley." Dudley could hear the pride in his wife's voice, and it was enough to let him relax, slipping back into unconsciousness.
* * * * *
Questioning suspects took surprisingly little time, with the resources Harry's people had at their disposal. They also had Dudley at their disposal, and while some of the wizards might have been prepared to be questioned by other wizards, none of them were prepared to be confronted by a Muggle, much less a Muggle who knew about their world.
By shortly after noon, Dudley and Harry were back on the move, heading for a warehouse where the missing artifact was supposedly being kept. They both had their doubts that things would be quite so simple, but it was the only lead they had, and everything Dudley had been told suggested that time was of the essence in this case. Not only had the warehouse been deserted, however, they'd been set upon in the alley behind it, which was where the firefight had taken place.
* * * * *
When Dudley woke again, he was in his own bed, but no alarm was going off. Shortly after his eyes opened, his wife arrived with a tray of food, and news of what had happened.
Had it not been for the sheer chance of Dudley bringing along the enchanted cube, things might have turned out much differently. Apparently, however, even the assailant had anticipated the cube's use, even though he was the one who'd given it to Dudley, some months ago.
"His name is Theodore Nott," his wife explained, of the wizard who'd quietly worked in MI-9 3/4's Research and Development department for several years. "He was suspected of some really nasty things, during the war, but no one could prove it, so instead of prison they'd sent him to your department. Some of the paperwork was lost, though, so they weren't keeping as close a watch on him as they should have been."
Nott had been secretly brainwashing (the Imperius Curse, his wife called it) agents to work for him for at least the last decade, by means of the enchanted devices he was giving out. Dudley and some of the others had escaped his influence by distrusting such objects on principle and refraining from their use, but they were a small minority. Both MI-9 3/4 and the Ministry of Magic were working to discover just how far Nott's influence had spread, but Dudley had been given three weeks of leave to recuperate, which he interpreted as Prewett's orders to keep him out of the way of the investigation.
His wife kissed his cheek, leaving the tray and moving toward the door. "I'll leave you to rest, you're going to need it. Harry's coming to dinner."
Alone, Dudley had time to think that maybe magic wasn't all that bad, after all, but he was quite glad not to have been born a wizard. He didn't envy Harry the paperwork, for one, not even a little bit.
It wasn’t until a few days later that he realized he never had found out what the missing artifact had been.
Fin