Time to plan the next big explosion.
Date: April 12th, 2000
Time: 9:53 pm
Location: Ottery St. Catchpole, Hopping & Adventure’s Expert Portraiture
Characters Involved: Luna & Tonks Only
Rating: PG-13
Complete
( Journalism justifies its own existence by the great Darwinian principle of the survival of the vulgarist.--Oscar Wilde )
Time: 9:53 pm
Location: Ottery St. Catchpole, Hopping & Adventure’s Expert Portraiture
Characters Involved: Luna & Tonks Only
Rating: PG-13
Complete
( Journalism justifies its own existence by the great Darwinian principle of the survival of the vulgarist.--Oscar Wilde )
While Luna locked up the door- and did some magical enhancements of the pictures in the windows, Tonks wandered around the room- looking at pictures with great curiosity. Tonks had never been in this office before, and found it highly fascinating. Tonks especially liked looking at the landscape picture on the back wall- at the end of the office. It drew Tonks closer with a frozen expression of awe over her face. Both of her hands ran up to remove the hood of her cloak off her head, revealing a bob hairstyle of a deep and true blue with pink stripes around her face. The bob was very short- ending with a cute curl at her jaw line, and the hair along her neck was very short- almost nonexistent.
Tonks turned around to look at Luna, as she heard her friend speak, and walked away from the landscape picture- while removing the bag that was slung across her body. “Alright, then. Here is fine.” She said with a pleasant grin and then put her bad gently down on the floor.
“Oh I am doing quite well- I hope the same can be said for you- you who works two jobs. And because you are doing this- I insist to do more work on our pamphlets to even the workload. Mind you, you’ll have to handle printing until we can get our own press- but everything else I demand to tackle.” Then Tonks took it upon herself to squat down where she stood, and ease herself to sit on the floor- immediately starting to rummage into her big black bag.
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"I'm managing rather well, I think," she said placidly, though she wasn't ignorant to Tonks's concern... especially when the woman was insisting on taking on more work! "Well, all right," she replied, her focus drifting as she tried to divide the tasks up in her head, just to make sure that they were maintaining a fair distribution. Luna didn't mind work, but she certainly didn't want Tonks to take more than was needed!
"Well then," Luna moved a lamp to the floor nearby to give them more light, then fluidly descended into a kneeling position and peered at the bag. "What've you got in mind for this one?"
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“Don’t get me wrong, I know you have been managing good- you’ve said so yourself, I just…. just want to be sure I’m also doing my share of things. D’you know what I mean?” She lifted her head up to look at Luna with a concerned stare. “Just don’t want this to be anything but equal. But- I’ve done a lot already. Like I said- I had a brainstorm. But first! Here- look at this!” Tonks took off the twine that was keeping a bunch of papers tied together, and then lifted one to hand to Luna.
“What do you see?” Tonks asked quickly, while offering the very blank and clean sheet to Luna, curious to what the girl would say, and anxious she would say ‘nothing.’
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But now, Luna's curiosity was piqued. It stood to reason, of course, that this issue would be better than the last; after all, that's how progress worked. But it sounded like Tonks was just a little more excited than was reasonable. Did she have something specific planned?
Receiving the sheet of paper, Luna peered at it closely, even traced over its surface with her fingers. In this act she realised her digits weren't as soft as they'd once been... not when she was younger. She'd never thought about it before.
The adult world held more and more surprises for her every day.
But, back to the matter at hand; the sheet of parchment. After a moment, Luna replied, "...I see little fibers woven in and out of each other in a secure and partially water-proof bind." She looked up. "Is this cold-pressed parchment?"
...Luna's version of "nothing."
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When she stopped laughing, Tonks shook her head, scattering her wild colored hair into her face on accident. She was forced to push it away from her eyes so she could stare at Luna.
“Besides all of that…. there’s something mo-ore.” Tonks teased with a sing-songy voice. Then she pointed to the lamp Luna had moved closer to improve on the lighting. “Put it close against the light- careful not to burn it- but get it as close to it as possible. This ‘something’ is heat sensitive.” Tonks chuckled excitedly after she spoke and grabbed the jars of ink that she had pulled from her bag, and put them close to her, and next to Luna, while she waited to see what Luna would reveal with the lamplight.
“Do not ever cheat me out of any work… I find it fun to do this sort of thing.” Tonks added, as an afterthought.
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Her eyes widened slightly as writing appeared. "Interesting," she whispered, closely examining the appearing ink. She then glanced to Tonks. "Very interesting!" She moved the parchment away from the light, just to see what would happen when it cooled, again.
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Tonks pointed at the paper now, as the ink slowly disappeared because the temperature around the parchment cooled. “The ink stays long enough on the paper once you start writing, but it’ll vanish after a few moments- and won’t come back unless heated.” Tonks plucked up one of the ink jars and offered it to Luna.
“The Twin’s sell it- the Weasley's, they have loads.”
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She set down the parchment to take the ink jar, holding it up to examine its opaque contents. The Weasley twins! She smiled. "They're quite a clever pair, aren't they? What else have you come up with?" She traded again, setting down the ink and taking up the parchment.
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“Then the second and third ones, here,” Tonks tapped the papers she had moved next to Luna. “Those are ideas on what the article should be about-ties in with, well… I have an idea for a prank, you see.” Tonks grinned at Luna and pointed once again at the paper in the girl’s hand.
Once Luna held the paper up to the lamp and observed the scribble, she would be able to read over plans, cheekily called ‘Distraction in Action’…. with some hand drawn exploding bombs all about the messy plan work. There were details about a box of chocolates that should explode, or exploding flowers, and there was even an idea about a rainstorm in a can. All very wild ideas, but ideas nonetheless.
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"I'm afraid you'll have to explain this to me," Luna said, squinting at the sheet. "Chocolates? Cyclones?"
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“Oh, well… it is kind of messy, isn’t it?” She asked as she glanced to her list of ideas for a prank against Rita Skeeter. “But perhaps with you helping me- It’ll be less confusing.”
She picked up one of the sheets from the floor, and held it above the lamp next to Luna’s paper- to read over the words on it.
“I was thinking of pointing out the misdirection of the Daily Prophet- and the real reasons the only thing we read about is gossip and slander.” Tonks said as she browsed her notes and turned them slightly so Luna could glance at them too.
“Most importantly, the reason Rita is allowed to write whatever she damn well pleases, while also making her realise her big mouth is going to get her into trouble. I won’t tolerate that hag’s behavior any longer. I want to make something of our distributing- use our aliases to send her a warning that she’ll not soon forget.”
Tonks pointed at the name at the top of her paper- Ginny. “Rita caused Ginny to get hurt, you know. That’s what it comes down to. If it weren’t for her big fat mouth- Ginny’s incentives and her actions wouldn’t have been attacked. Rita needs to have karma come back at her- three fold.”
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"Could we call her a hag?" Luna asked immediately. "If you feel so inclined, I certainly hold no objection."
She was still rather annoyed by that article; whether or not Skeeter's claims were true, and whether or not people were stupid enough to believe them were beside the point. The fact was that people did pay attention to what she wrote and it often affected the lives of her victims. That was what made Skeeter's writing dangerous.
A point that Tonks seemed to agree with. Luna nodded seriously. "In that case... I am with you, 100%. And an article of this nature should be easy." She glanced to Tonks. "After all, we have plenty of source material from which to work."
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“Really? You want to do it?” Tonks’ eyes enlarged in size as she observed Luna’s face very attentively, hoping to find any quirks of doubt or worry in any of Luna’s features. The girl seemed to be very serious.
“We do have loads of resources, that is true.” Tonks put her paper down and gently took the ‘prank’ ideas out of Luna’s hand to study over, as she thought about something.
“The question is, really…. how big of a message would you be willing to send to the big mouth? I was really liking this idea- but it needs more.”
Tonks turned the paper she took from Luna toward the girl, and pointed at the Cyclone coming out of the box of chocolates, and it was attacking a stick figure of a woman- with an arrow at her head- and a sign that said Rita Skeeter.
“Something of a chaotic whirlwind! Something that is loud, too! I’ve also purchased noise caplets from the Twins. The boys said they make a very loud, exploding noise. Maybe enough to make her go deaf!” Tonks laughed mischievously, finding it highly amusing that Rita would be harmed in such a way.
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"Something showy, but not dangerous...." The Weasley twins would be better for brainstorming these sorts of ideas. The twins had caused quite a spectacle when they'd left Hogwarts... but perhaps a swamp in the middle of The Daily Prophet wasn't the way to go. Hmm that year had been full of such antics, hadn't it? What with Umbridge, Dumbledore's Army....
...And that's when Hermione's own devious cleverness came to mind. Luna well remembered the mark of 'SNEAK' that had appeared on Marietta Edgecomb's forehead when she'd ratted them all out. Something to make a lasting impression would be wonderful....
"Perhaps an actual explosion of some sort," Luna offered. "Something to set off a hex of sorts... or to cover her in a potion...."
The idea was blooming. "Something that uses her own words against her."
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“I think you’re on to something there!” She exclaimed with delight. “I don’t want to hurt her, no, but I was thinking of incorporating our new print up and this prank together. ---What if the windstorm, of sorts, had our papers in it? I mean, if you are alright with the next write up to be about her- not entirely-….. but I’d love to drown her in the pamphlets, flood her entire office with them for that matter!”
Tonks put down her notes, piled on top of one another. “I also like the idea of a hex! What could we do, you think? Give her nasty paper cuts with our pamphlets?!” Tonks suggested with a sinister chuckle. “Death by nasty, stinging, paper cuts! Ok- no death, but now who in their right mind could die from a paper cut?!”
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"Nothing too messy," she said... and definitely no blood. Luna didn't want to hurt her, per se... just give her a shock. She thought on this idea a bit more, picturing Marietta and SNEAK in her head while trying to figure out what they could do without actually disfiguring Rita.
"There must be a charm for this," she said, now considering all she'd learned with Mr. Hopping. "Perhaps we can do something with the ink...."
She suddenly went back to the first topic. "Do you think we could make these wind storms very big?"
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