The Missing Marks Chapter 2
Title: The Missing Marks Chapter 2
Author: patriot_jackie
Rating and Warnings: PG-13 for future violence
Prompt: Signature
Word Count: 3,933
Summary: One year after becoming an Auror, Tonks is presented with her first real case: the mystery of a series of signature crimes marked by a countdown of obsidian crystals and strange notes. - A series of crimes the Ministry is going through great lengths to hide. But she’s also just been inducted into the legendary Order of the Phoenix. And as if her case and new questionably legal - in the Ministry’s eyes, at least - activities aren’t enough to keep her mind occupied, another mystery presents itself: a secret admirer who may not be so secret.
Author’s Notes: Don’t you HATE it when you get those last minute brainstorms that work so well but change what you’ve written?? I spent last night reworking this entire chapter - adding, subtracting, and switching the POV - so I’m pretty nervous about it. No, this fic is not finished, sorry, but I will be posting the rest to ff.net and maybe my journal. ;)
Special thanks to morrighangw for being so kind as to continually poke and prod me to stay awake almost all night. :) It was and is greatly appreciated.
Chapter 1
Chapter 2
Post-lunch break, Tonks fought back a yawn which only resulted in popping her ears. Her head drooped, and she looked longingly to her desk wishing she could lay her head upon it and sleep. Why was it that lunch always inspired drowsy spells?
Last night had been something she’d never forget - if also embarrassing, nerve-wracking, and very long. After her first Order meeting where she officially swore herself to the cause and secrecy, she stayed late becoming re-acquainted with some of the members and getting to know most. So enthralled she had become in the later conversations - between Bill, Remus, Sirius, Mad Eye, and Kingsley - that she was only able to catch four hours of sleep.
I haven’t lost this much sleep since training… she thought and groaned. - And then peered around to see if anyone took notice. But then she didn’t care; she was far too tired to care. Her shoulders slumped, neck bending beneath the weight of her head, and she half-heartedly willed herself not to fall asleep.
Regardless of how exhausted she was at the moment, she knew it would pass shortly, and she couldn’t regret anything about the night before.
Well, actually, she could regret her entrance to Number 12 as well as her verbal blunders during her introduction in the meeting.
The meeting had sedated her excitement and twisted it into dread accompanied by slight nausea. She didn’t know what had gotten into her, approaching the headquarters of the Order of the Phoenix so almost brazenly. The members within were of a caliber she hardly dared hope to scratch with her humble talents - though she at least had being an Auror as well as a Metamorphmagus to her name.
But of course, her first impression had to be one of ungraceful inelegance, and as rational as an explanation was that it was hazardous to have such an awkward umbrella stand so close to the door especially when the lights were out, it didn’t take away from her embarrassment. In a way, it was the perfect introduction, considering her talent for being utterly clumsy in anything and everything, but if she had to be so, couldn’t she have at least waited to trip until her second or third meeting?
In her chair, she felt herself slipping, but she hadn’t the will nor inclination to stop herself.
For a first Order affair, there hadn’t been much discussed. She thought that perhaps Dumbledore had been cautious of her, but when she’d spoken with him just before he left, she hadn’t detected a trace of distrust in his twinkling blue eyes. She’d wanted to hug him, seeing him at the head of the table leading the discussion and wizards and witches assembled after everything that had been said and published in the recent weeks about him.
And then she’d wanted to hex him when he begged her to introduce herself to everyone.
“Before we continue,” he had said and turned to her, “Nymphadora, would you like to introduce yourself?”
Cringing, she attempted to correct the headmaster without…correcting him. It hadn’t been so bad - “Really, I just go by Tonks. I ha- I mean… I… really just prefer it….” - but everything afterwards had been bumbling and rambling. Tonks and public speaking did not go hand in hand; it had been a disaster. When she finally sat down, limbs shaking with self-consciousness, she hadn’t even realized that she had not mentioned she was a Metamorphmagus.
But Dumbledore, of course, caught her lapse in thought and said while smiling at her, “Miss Tonks is a very clever individual, and she also happens to be a Metamorphmagus.”
People usually stared at her when finding out this bit of information about herself and it didn’t bother her, but when the members of the Order all turned in surprise, she’d gone completely red. As had her hair, which elicited light, and she knew good natured, laughter from everyone.
She’d spent the rest of the meeting with her head down, attempting not to catch anyone’s eye, though the man Remus Lupin had sent her an impressed nod after the amusement had died down.
Tonks heard heavy breathing - light snoring - and jumped awake when she realized it was her, upsetting the careful stacks of paper on her desk. “Bug---,” she mumbled as she began to tidy up the mess. Though now wide awake, she continued on her previous line of thought.
She had decided that she liked Mr. Lupin - Remus, as he insisted. Though his introduction had bordered on the flirtatious - and left much to wonder about its meaning - he had turned out to be quite the humble, learned gentlemen. Especially given that he said he was a werewolf (and she’d no reason to disbelieve him), it didn’t seem natural for him to be as kind and genteel as Dumbledore. He gave her the impression of a walking contradiction: the perfect mischievous gentleman. Out of everyone in the Order, she thought he was the most intriguing, surpassing even the mysteries of her cousin - whom she’d grown to trust a great deal more over the course of the night.
Sirius was far too kind, if bitter, to be the murderer history had recorded him as. He had taken special care to answer questions he knew she had about him without her having to ask them; he volunteered the information. Part of her mind told her that she shouldn’t trust his words, but the stronger, intuitive side brought to mind all the other false pretenses and lies the Ministry of Magic was spinning at the current time.
Thinking about the things she’d noticed were wrong had infuriated her before and had given her a strong desire to do something. But since last night, since meeting people the Ministry’s skewed system of governing truly affected, she’d felt her feelings of frustrations growing. The Order of the Phoenix was a band of dedicated witches and wizards willing to put their lives - and in the case of the Weasleys, the lives of their family - at stake for nothing in return but a good conscience and a hope of a better tomorrow. And all the while, the Ministry was standing in their way and would continue in that vein. What had their government become?
Tonks shook her head; it wasn’t wise to have such thoughts while working. She focused on the re-organized stacks of leads, clues, and files on her desk, she still had difficulty concentrating. Her eyes flitted over what she had been working on before her mental vacation: the notes that had been left at the crime scenes. She’d drawn out a chart:
#1 1 Victim “The clock is ticking.”
#2 2 Victims “And they lived happily ever after.”
#3 3 Victims “Hickory Dickory Dock”
#4 5 Victims “Zzzzzzz…”
#5 2 Victims [Still Missing]
#6 4 Victims “C D A” - see attached
The current line everyone was taking on them was a connection of sorts to fairy tales and bedtime stories. While Tonks could see the influence of fairy tales, she didn’t believe it to be what the notes meant. That particular explanation did not account for the first note nor the current last.
Her latest theory was that it was an alternating pattern of two separate messages that made one. The only problem was that she couldn’t prove or disprove it without the fifth and sixth notes. With the fifth note still missing, she only had the sixth to help her. The problem was that it was proving to be far more cryptic than the previous ones.
Sighing and pushing away thoughts of the night before, she reached for her copy of the sixth message. They’d found it only moments after she and Kingsley had left for the day.
It was a piece of music with three specific notes circled in his signature choice of luminescent green ink: C D A. There was another A between the C and D, but it was not circled. She’d been running acronyms through her mind all morning long, but hadn’t made sense of anything.
She ran her fingers through her moderately short, highlighted auburn hair. Thinking while this tired could not be productive; she was convinced of it.
A rap on her cubicle wall drew her attention from the mysterious missives, and she turned to find two familiar figures towering over her.
“What are you working on, Tonks?” Kingsley asked craning slightly to see. “Seems to be giving you a bit of a hard time.”
“This whole case is,” she replied sullenly. Leaning back in her seat and stretching, she held back a yawn and flippantly gestured to the files and her notepad. “That blasted note from the Ericksons. C D A - What the h--- does that mean, Kingsley?”
His features brightened with a grin. “I don’t have a clue.” All traces of tiredness ebbed from her body as she thought about tossing something at him for his cheeky answer. But with a nod to the Auror beside him, he continued. “I thought you might be puzzling over it, so I brought Casey with me.”
Tonks acknowledged Casey with a brief nod. His wavy, dark brown hair was long - for a wizard, at least - down to his shoulders. He was a musician, and admittedly decent. Since becoming an Auror the year before Tonks, she’d heard less and less of his music at the Auror and MLE holiday get-togethers. It was sad, but work did take priority over hobbies.
He nodded his thin eyebrows at her in return and stepped a little closer towards the cubicle. “’Lo, Tonks,” he said in a pleasant tenor.
“You know, I don’t know why you’re not on this case,” she replied, but didn’t dwell on it and shoved the evidence copy into his hands. “Here. What do you see?”
“My, my,” he said with an amused grin and chuckled. “You’re keen.”
“Why shouldn’t I be? There’s a sick bas---- out there toying with us, and he’s plotting his next attack.”
“Okay, okay,” he said holding up a palm in surrender. But his blue eyes were glued to the piece of music in his other hand. “What do we have here…?”
“I thought maybe the letters stood for something, but I couldn’t think what,” she supplied.
“An unknown acronym is all I could come up with, too,” Kingsley added. “But it doesn’t really go with the other messages…”
“Well, he definitely wanted us to get CDA and not some other arrangement of the notes,” Casey said frowning in concentration.
“Why’s that?” the other wizard asked.
“Because C, D, and A are used many other times before this choice of his, but not in that order. And the first A is skipped.”
A thought struck Tonks. “Maybe it’s song…?”
Casey bit his lip. “Well, if it is, we’re royally screwed.”
“What?” said Kingsley.
“There are literally hundreds of thousands, if not millions of songs with C, D, and A - A flat, actually - in them in that order. And especially since this A flat between the C and D is discluded, we could be talking about thousands upon thousands of possibilities, and there’s no way we’d ever know which one was right.”
“I suppose,” she said sounding a little disappointed. She wasn’t upset that her suggestion had been incorrect; she just wanted an answer.
“Hmmm…” Casey began, tapping his chin with his index finger. “Maybe……”
He didn’t continue the thought aloud, and Tonks looked to Kingsley who met her gaze half comically and shrugged. Both looked to Casey and waited…….. for more silence.
“Maybe…” Tonks prompted, unwilling to wait any longer. “Maybe what?”
“Oh, sorry,” Casey said distractedly. “I was just thinking that maybe it was meant for a different cleft…”
Tonks felt her brows lift higher on her forehead. “There’s an idea. Come up with anything?”
“Uh… Well…-”
“Wait, wait, wait,” Kingsley interrupted. “Forgive me for only listening to music and not understanding how it works. Why would a different cleft make any difference?”
Casey looked up from the page almost startled for a moment. But he recovered from his surprise and shifted closer to Kingsley so he could see.
“These things here are the clefts,” he explained pointing. “They tell you what the notes on the staff are. - Where they fall?”
“Notes change?”
“They’re place does in different parts of music, like soprano versus bass. If he… meant for this to be bass cleft, even though this is treble, we’d be looking at E, F, C instead. Make sense?”
Kingsley’s gaze drifted from the paper. “Yes, but not really. Go on.”
“Well, this is a treble cleft, but it’s also known as the G cleft because-”
“Casey,” Tonks cut in. “Fascinating as I’m sure this all is to you, we don’t really have time to waste. Every second counts. Did you find anything?”
“Is that what you’ll be saying when you’re old and paranoid like old Mad Eye?” he retorted.
Tonks blinked; Mad Eye had been at the Order meeting last night, but how did Casey know about that? But a flash of warning through Kingsley’s eyes made her slow down and realize that she was jumping to conclusions in her tired state of mind. He was only mentioning Moody as everyone in the Auror department did.
“Sure,” she replied, albeit delayed. This secret business might be tougher to keep secret than she thought.
“I was getting to that,” he said frowning. “When it comes down to it, there are clefts for every line of the staff because they move around. We could come up with all sorts of messages, but that would be about as successful as your song idea. CDA is what it has to mean.”
“Oh.”
“Oh,” he mocked her. “Oh.” But even as Tonks moved to give him a crude hand gesture, an epiphany seemed to strike him. “Oh!” he said excitedly and looked between her and Kingsley. “Oh!”
“Oh…” Kingsley repeated slowly, confusion etched on his features.
“Oh…” Tonks joined in as well.
“No, no!” Casey corrected them, beaming. “O! The letter, O.”
“O?” both asked together.
“It’s missing! It’s not a note!”
She looked to Kingsley for a hand at understanding, but he was apparently as lost as she was. “Well, ah… Brilliant, I suppose. It…means something?”
“Coda!” he announced triumphantly. “It’s coda. That’s why the A is skipped - it’s the wrong vowel.”
She was still confused; what did coda mean? Her knowledge of written music extended to reading notes on the treble cleft. “Are you sure?”
“Well… I can’t be positive, but that’s my informed guess.”
“What does it mean?” Kingsley asked.
“Oh, uh…” He fished around for a moment for a definition. “It’s… an ending for a piece of music. Sort of… - This one has one. - It’s like an alternate ending almost, but it more just leads you to it. Sometimes it is the ending… It’s just a shortcut to save paper and ink instead of rewriting the whole song,” he finished.
Tonks mood lifted drastically; if he was right about CDA meaning coda, then her theory had more proof. “So it’s the ending?”
“A type of one, yes. Not for all pieces.”
“This is great!” She reached for her notes on her desk and flipped them around so the two of them could read as she explained. “I think I found a pattern: Odd number victims have notes referring to time left,” Tonks said gesturing to her chart. “Even number victims have messages about ends.”
“Time and end…” Kingsley read slowly. “The sleeping Z’s means an end?”
“I don’t think he meant sleeping; I think he meant Z - the last letter of the alphabet.”
“The end,” Casey supplied.
“Why do you think so?”
“I thought I’d stick with our original thoughts when we read the first two messages - time and an end to a tale.”
“So… We have time and end…”
“The clock is ticking,” Casey read. “Sounds like a countdown again.”
She nodded. “The same clue twice.”
Casey gritted his teeth and shook his head. “That doesn’t make much sense.”
“It doesn’t.” Kingsley rubbed his bald head, thinking. “I can see your logic, Tonks, and it does make sense, but…”
“Only without those obsidian crystals,” she finished for him.
He nodded, and then reached down to pat her shoulder. “It is possible, but… I’ll think about it, and you too. We’ll eventually figure this out.”
“Auror Shacklebolt!”
Kingsley, as well as Casey and Tonks, turned to the MLE wizard who called his name.
“Yes?”
“Someone’s taken the bait.”
“Bait?” Tonks asked curiously.
“Really?” Kingsley pushed himself from leaning against the cubicle. “Who?”
“Walden Macnair.”
“Macnair?” he replied in disbelief.
Macnair… She’d heard the name before. He was one of the suspected Death Eaters the Order was keeping tabs on. In fact, someone was supposed to be watching him today; judging by Kingsley’s reaction, this was a completely unexpected development.
“I’ve never trusted him, but I never thought… Where is he?”
“Still on Knockturn; we’re waiting your lead.”
Kingsley turned to Tonks and Casey. “Either of you fancy a chase?”
----------
In a niche between Flourish and Blott’s and Madam Malkins on Diagon Alley, Tonks placed a tiny magical hearing bud in her ear as did Casey beside her. Reminiscent of the devices used in muggle action-spy thrillers, the Ministry would never acknowledge its source of inspiration.
A couple of MLE officers were briefing Kingsley on the situation, and Tonks listened in.
“About six minutes ago, he entered Knockturn Alley and hasn’t come out yet.”
“Did you tail him?”
“No, but we have teams hiding and waiting.”
“How many?”
“The fourth is getting into place now.”
He nodded, accepting the management of the situation and turned to the two Aurors. “Casey, I want you to find some cover just outside the Leaky Cauldron and wait there just in case. - Tonks, disguise yourself and pick a position outside Fortescue’s.”
“What’s going on?” she asked. “What’s this bait that Macnair took?”
“A meeting I set up. - I don’t have time to explain now. Trust me?”
“To tell me everything when this is over, yup!” Casey chirped as he walked out of the niche into the bustling crowds.
“You really think he’ll run?” Tonks asked. “In that?” she nodded towards the overly busy street.
“I don’t doubt it,” he replied.
“What if he Disapparates?”
“We’ll have to hope he won’t want to take a trip to Azkaban. He works for the Ministry, so we can only assume…” And he left the staging point in the niche, heading straight for Knockturn Alley.
Quickly, Tonks dawned a disguise - transfiguring her Aurors robes into inconspicuous, ordinary robes - as a middle-aged woman with light blonde hair. She spotted a bench just outside Fortescue’s where only one man was seated reading a copy of the Daily Prophet. She headed straight for it, cutting through the crowds and seated herself.
“Afternoon, Tonks,” the man beside her greeted quietly in a lightly raspy tone.
She started and peered past the Daily Prophet hiding his face. Who could possibly recognize her morphed?
She blinked in surprise. “Remus Lupin?”
“I’ll gladly stick to calling you just Tonks if you’ll stick to calling me just Remus.” He said this, wry and cool as ever, as he scooted away from her on the bench giving the impression that he was annoyed by her and some trivial matter they were discussing. She made a mental note to thank him later.
“What are you doing here?” she murmured looking away.
He flapped his paper as he turned the page and replied, “On assignment.”
She didn’t risk any more conversation than that. Even though Macnair was nowhere in sight yet, she still had her fellow Ministry employees to worry about. She would be hard-pressed to explain why she was diverting her attention and jeopardizing her cover in a non-related discourse.
But she would find out how he’d recognized her.
Kingsley’s voice was suddenly in her ear: “He’s running! All teams stand by!”
She felt herself tense in anticipation, and she fought the urge to turn to see the junction of the two Alleys. Instead, she focused on the current of witches and wizards moving through the shops and stores. She took notice of places where the traffic was slower and where it moved quicker and where it simply stood at a halt. Since there wasn’t time to move the people away, she would have to use the flow of the crowd to her advantage. The most unfortunate part of it all was that lunchtime was still in progress; Diagon Alley was literally teeming with people.
“What’s wrong?” Remus asked from behind his paper.
“We’re wait-“
“He’s rounding the corner!” Kingsley’s voice came again. “Move in! All teams move in!”
Immediately, cracks of apparition echoed through the bustling, busy street. It took a moment for the shoppers to ascertain what was happening, and then panic ensued.
Macnair swept through the crowd, robes billowing after him, as he threw himself into the densest parts of the chaotic throngs of people. All around him, in any empty space, MLE Apparated there and ordered him to stop. Macnair, of course, did nothing of the sort, and simply pushed through them.
He passed by her and Remus’ bench without a second glance as MLE teams appeared and disappeared around them.
“He’s running,” Tonks said in answer to Remus’ earlier question as she stood, morphing, and took off in pursuit.
The crowd closed around him, instantly moving the opposite way he was running as soon as he passed. She was bumped and shoved in all directions as she struggled to move forward against the crowd. If she didn’t find a way to get through the crowd, she’d never be able to catch up. Stuck in the thick of the crowd, she couldn’t see a place to safely Apparate without splinching herself with an innocent witch or wizard.
Ahead, a violent swarm of chaos surrounded Macnair. He pelted through the crowd, knocking people out of the way physically or by means of his wand. MLE Apparated beside him, in front of him, behind him as the innocent bystanders scrambled to get out of the way. But Diagon Alley was so crowded with people attempting to flee that they’d nowhere to go. MLE trained their wands on the suspect, but they could not cast any spells for fear of missing. Macnair, however, had no qualms about stunning them or missing, and now seemingly desperate, red jets of light flew all different directions from the tip of his wand.
Feeling powerless and mildly claustrophobic, Tonks abandoned finding a place on the ground and Apparated to stand atop the Owl Emporium - from where she spotted a perfect open space ahead of Macnair.
With a pop, she found herself standing, wand at the ready, guarding the opened magical wall of the Leaky Cauldron; a few witches and wizards had escaped through, but now the area just before it was devoid of anyone.
“Do not let him escape into Muggle London!” Kingsley ordered.
Macnair was rushing straight for her, and as he cleared the last of the crowd, six MLE officers Apparated into the clearing, surrounding him.
“Drop your wand!” Tonks ordered.
“Stupify!”
“Expelliarmus!”
“Protego!”
Tonks wasn’t sure how many spells had been cast all at once, but she was sure she caught half of them. Her shield charm held until her wand was ripped from her grasp, and she flew backwards straight into the wall of the actual Leaky Cauldron.
Deflated and wandless, she watched helplessly as Macnair ran through the back door out of Diagon Alley unimpeded.
Tbc…
AN: I know I promised more Remus and you actually got less. But the next chapter is all from his POV!
Author: patriot_jackie
Rating and Warnings: PG-13 for future violence
Prompt: Signature
Word Count: 3,933
Summary: One year after becoming an Auror, Tonks is presented with her first real case: the mystery of a series of signature crimes marked by a countdown of obsidian crystals and strange notes. - A series of crimes the Ministry is going through great lengths to hide. But she’s also just been inducted into the legendary Order of the Phoenix. And as if her case and new questionably legal - in the Ministry’s eyes, at least - activities aren’t enough to keep her mind occupied, another mystery presents itself: a secret admirer who may not be so secret.
Author’s Notes: Don’t you HATE it when you get those last minute brainstorms that work so well but change what you’ve written?? I spent last night reworking this entire chapter - adding, subtracting, and switching the POV - so I’m pretty nervous about it. No, this fic is not finished, sorry, but I will be posting the rest to ff.net and maybe my journal. ;)
Special thanks to morrighangw for being so kind as to continually poke and prod me to stay awake almost all night. :) It was and is greatly appreciated.
Chapter 1
Chapter 2
Post-lunch break, Tonks fought back a yawn which only resulted in popping her ears. Her head drooped, and she looked longingly to her desk wishing she could lay her head upon it and sleep. Why was it that lunch always inspired drowsy spells?
Last night had been something she’d never forget - if also embarrassing, nerve-wracking, and very long. After her first Order meeting where she officially swore herself to the cause and secrecy, she stayed late becoming re-acquainted with some of the members and getting to know most. So enthralled she had become in the later conversations - between Bill, Remus, Sirius, Mad Eye, and Kingsley - that she was only able to catch four hours of sleep.
I haven’t lost this much sleep since training… she thought and groaned. - And then peered around to see if anyone took notice. But then she didn’t care; she was far too tired to care. Her shoulders slumped, neck bending beneath the weight of her head, and she half-heartedly willed herself not to fall asleep.
Regardless of how exhausted she was at the moment, she knew it would pass shortly, and she couldn’t regret anything about the night before.
Well, actually, she could regret her entrance to Number 12 as well as her verbal blunders during her introduction in the meeting.
The meeting had sedated her excitement and twisted it into dread accompanied by slight nausea. She didn’t know what had gotten into her, approaching the headquarters of the Order of the Phoenix so almost brazenly. The members within were of a caliber she hardly dared hope to scratch with her humble talents - though she at least had being an Auror as well as a Metamorphmagus to her name.
But of course, her first impression had to be one of ungraceful inelegance, and as rational as an explanation was that it was hazardous to have such an awkward umbrella stand so close to the door especially when the lights were out, it didn’t take away from her embarrassment. In a way, it was the perfect introduction, considering her talent for being utterly clumsy in anything and everything, but if she had to be so, couldn’t she have at least waited to trip until her second or third meeting?
In her chair, she felt herself slipping, but she hadn’t the will nor inclination to stop herself.
For a first Order affair, there hadn’t been much discussed. She thought that perhaps Dumbledore had been cautious of her, but when she’d spoken with him just before he left, she hadn’t detected a trace of distrust in his twinkling blue eyes. She’d wanted to hug him, seeing him at the head of the table leading the discussion and wizards and witches assembled after everything that had been said and published in the recent weeks about him.
And then she’d wanted to hex him when he begged her to introduce herself to everyone.
“Before we continue,” he had said and turned to her, “Nymphadora, would you like to introduce yourself?”
Cringing, she attempted to correct the headmaster without…correcting him. It hadn’t been so bad - “Really, I just go by Tonks. I ha- I mean… I… really just prefer it….” - but everything afterwards had been bumbling and rambling. Tonks and public speaking did not go hand in hand; it had been a disaster. When she finally sat down, limbs shaking with self-consciousness, she hadn’t even realized that she had not mentioned she was a Metamorphmagus.
But Dumbledore, of course, caught her lapse in thought and said while smiling at her, “Miss Tonks is a very clever individual, and she also happens to be a Metamorphmagus.”
People usually stared at her when finding out this bit of information about herself and it didn’t bother her, but when the members of the Order all turned in surprise, she’d gone completely red. As had her hair, which elicited light, and she knew good natured, laughter from everyone.
She’d spent the rest of the meeting with her head down, attempting not to catch anyone’s eye, though the man Remus Lupin had sent her an impressed nod after the amusement had died down.
Tonks heard heavy breathing - light snoring - and jumped awake when she realized it was her, upsetting the careful stacks of paper on her desk. “Bug---,” she mumbled as she began to tidy up the mess. Though now wide awake, she continued on her previous line of thought.
She had decided that she liked Mr. Lupin - Remus, as he insisted. Though his introduction had bordered on the flirtatious - and left much to wonder about its meaning - he had turned out to be quite the humble, learned gentlemen. Especially given that he said he was a werewolf (and she’d no reason to disbelieve him), it didn’t seem natural for him to be as kind and genteel as Dumbledore. He gave her the impression of a walking contradiction: the perfect mischievous gentleman. Out of everyone in the Order, she thought he was the most intriguing, surpassing even the mysteries of her cousin - whom she’d grown to trust a great deal more over the course of the night.
Sirius was far too kind, if bitter, to be the murderer history had recorded him as. He had taken special care to answer questions he knew she had about him without her having to ask them; he volunteered the information. Part of her mind told her that she shouldn’t trust his words, but the stronger, intuitive side brought to mind all the other false pretenses and lies the Ministry of Magic was spinning at the current time.
Thinking about the things she’d noticed were wrong had infuriated her before and had given her a strong desire to do something. But since last night, since meeting people the Ministry’s skewed system of governing truly affected, she’d felt her feelings of frustrations growing. The Order of the Phoenix was a band of dedicated witches and wizards willing to put their lives - and in the case of the Weasleys, the lives of their family - at stake for nothing in return but a good conscience and a hope of a better tomorrow. And all the while, the Ministry was standing in their way and would continue in that vein. What had their government become?
Tonks shook her head; it wasn’t wise to have such thoughts while working. She focused on the re-organized stacks of leads, clues, and files on her desk, she still had difficulty concentrating. Her eyes flitted over what she had been working on before her mental vacation: the notes that had been left at the crime scenes. She’d drawn out a chart:
#1 1 Victim “The clock is ticking.”
#2 2 Victims “And they lived happily ever after.”
#3 3 Victims “Hickory Dickory Dock”
#4 5 Victims “Zzzzzzz…”
#5 2 Victims [Still Missing]
#6 4 Victims “C D A” - see attached
The current line everyone was taking on them was a connection of sorts to fairy tales and bedtime stories. While Tonks could see the influence of fairy tales, she didn’t believe it to be what the notes meant. That particular explanation did not account for the first note nor the current last.
Her latest theory was that it was an alternating pattern of two separate messages that made one. The only problem was that she couldn’t prove or disprove it without the fifth and sixth notes. With the fifth note still missing, she only had the sixth to help her. The problem was that it was proving to be far more cryptic than the previous ones.
Sighing and pushing away thoughts of the night before, she reached for her copy of the sixth message. They’d found it only moments after she and Kingsley had left for the day.
It was a piece of music with three specific notes circled in his signature choice of luminescent green ink: C D A. There was another A between the C and D, but it was not circled. She’d been running acronyms through her mind all morning long, but hadn’t made sense of anything.
She ran her fingers through her moderately short, highlighted auburn hair. Thinking while this tired could not be productive; she was convinced of it.
A rap on her cubicle wall drew her attention from the mysterious missives, and she turned to find two familiar figures towering over her.
“What are you working on, Tonks?” Kingsley asked craning slightly to see. “Seems to be giving you a bit of a hard time.”
“This whole case is,” she replied sullenly. Leaning back in her seat and stretching, she held back a yawn and flippantly gestured to the files and her notepad. “That blasted note from the Ericksons. C D A - What the h--- does that mean, Kingsley?”
His features brightened with a grin. “I don’t have a clue.” All traces of tiredness ebbed from her body as she thought about tossing something at him for his cheeky answer. But with a nod to the Auror beside him, he continued. “I thought you might be puzzling over it, so I brought Casey with me.”
Tonks acknowledged Casey with a brief nod. His wavy, dark brown hair was long - for a wizard, at least - down to his shoulders. He was a musician, and admittedly decent. Since becoming an Auror the year before Tonks, she’d heard less and less of his music at the Auror and MLE holiday get-togethers. It was sad, but work did take priority over hobbies.
He nodded his thin eyebrows at her in return and stepped a little closer towards the cubicle. “’Lo, Tonks,” he said in a pleasant tenor.
“You know, I don’t know why you’re not on this case,” she replied, but didn’t dwell on it and shoved the evidence copy into his hands. “Here. What do you see?”
“My, my,” he said with an amused grin and chuckled. “You’re keen.”
“Why shouldn’t I be? There’s a sick bas---- out there toying with us, and he’s plotting his next attack.”
“Okay, okay,” he said holding up a palm in surrender. But his blue eyes were glued to the piece of music in his other hand. “What do we have here…?”
“I thought maybe the letters stood for something, but I couldn’t think what,” she supplied.
“An unknown acronym is all I could come up with, too,” Kingsley added. “But it doesn’t really go with the other messages…”
“Well, he definitely wanted us to get CDA and not some other arrangement of the notes,” Casey said frowning in concentration.
“Why’s that?” the other wizard asked.
“Because C, D, and A are used many other times before this choice of his, but not in that order. And the first A is skipped.”
A thought struck Tonks. “Maybe it’s song…?”
Casey bit his lip. “Well, if it is, we’re royally screwed.”
“What?” said Kingsley.
“There are literally hundreds of thousands, if not millions of songs with C, D, and A - A flat, actually - in them in that order. And especially since this A flat between the C and D is discluded, we could be talking about thousands upon thousands of possibilities, and there’s no way we’d ever know which one was right.”
“I suppose,” she said sounding a little disappointed. She wasn’t upset that her suggestion had been incorrect; she just wanted an answer.
“Hmmm…” Casey began, tapping his chin with his index finger. “Maybe……”
He didn’t continue the thought aloud, and Tonks looked to Kingsley who met her gaze half comically and shrugged. Both looked to Casey and waited…….. for more silence.
“Maybe…” Tonks prompted, unwilling to wait any longer. “Maybe what?”
“Oh, sorry,” Casey said distractedly. “I was just thinking that maybe it was meant for a different cleft…”
Tonks felt her brows lift higher on her forehead. “There’s an idea. Come up with anything?”
“Uh… Well…-”
“Wait, wait, wait,” Kingsley interrupted. “Forgive me for only listening to music and not understanding how it works. Why would a different cleft make any difference?”
Casey looked up from the page almost startled for a moment. But he recovered from his surprise and shifted closer to Kingsley so he could see.
“These things here are the clefts,” he explained pointing. “They tell you what the notes on the staff are. - Where they fall?”
“Notes change?”
“They’re place does in different parts of music, like soprano versus bass. If he… meant for this to be bass cleft, even though this is treble, we’d be looking at E, F, C instead. Make sense?”
Kingsley’s gaze drifted from the paper. “Yes, but not really. Go on.”
“Well, this is a treble cleft, but it’s also known as the G cleft because-”
“Casey,” Tonks cut in. “Fascinating as I’m sure this all is to you, we don’t really have time to waste. Every second counts. Did you find anything?”
“Is that what you’ll be saying when you’re old and paranoid like old Mad Eye?” he retorted.
Tonks blinked; Mad Eye had been at the Order meeting last night, but how did Casey know about that? But a flash of warning through Kingsley’s eyes made her slow down and realize that she was jumping to conclusions in her tired state of mind. He was only mentioning Moody as everyone in the Auror department did.
“Sure,” she replied, albeit delayed. This secret business might be tougher to keep secret than she thought.
“I was getting to that,” he said frowning. “When it comes down to it, there are clefts for every line of the staff because they move around. We could come up with all sorts of messages, but that would be about as successful as your song idea. CDA is what it has to mean.”
“Oh.”
“Oh,” he mocked her. “Oh.” But even as Tonks moved to give him a crude hand gesture, an epiphany seemed to strike him. “Oh!” he said excitedly and looked between her and Kingsley. “Oh!”
“Oh…” Kingsley repeated slowly, confusion etched on his features.
“Oh…” Tonks joined in as well.
“No, no!” Casey corrected them, beaming. “O! The letter, O.”
“O?” both asked together.
“It’s missing! It’s not a note!”
She looked to Kingsley for a hand at understanding, but he was apparently as lost as she was. “Well, ah… Brilliant, I suppose. It…means something?”
“Coda!” he announced triumphantly. “It’s coda. That’s why the A is skipped - it’s the wrong vowel.”
She was still confused; what did coda mean? Her knowledge of written music extended to reading notes on the treble cleft. “Are you sure?”
“Well… I can’t be positive, but that’s my informed guess.”
“What does it mean?” Kingsley asked.
“Oh, uh…” He fished around for a moment for a definition. “It’s… an ending for a piece of music. Sort of… - This one has one. - It’s like an alternate ending almost, but it more just leads you to it. Sometimes it is the ending… It’s just a shortcut to save paper and ink instead of rewriting the whole song,” he finished.
Tonks mood lifted drastically; if he was right about CDA meaning coda, then her theory had more proof. “So it’s the ending?”
“A type of one, yes. Not for all pieces.”
“This is great!” She reached for her notes on her desk and flipped them around so the two of them could read as she explained. “I think I found a pattern: Odd number victims have notes referring to time left,” Tonks said gesturing to her chart. “Even number victims have messages about ends.”
“Time and end…” Kingsley read slowly. “The sleeping Z’s means an end?”
“I don’t think he meant sleeping; I think he meant Z - the last letter of the alphabet.”
“The end,” Casey supplied.
“Why do you think so?”
“I thought I’d stick with our original thoughts when we read the first two messages - time and an end to a tale.”
“So… We have time and end…”
“The clock is ticking,” Casey read. “Sounds like a countdown again.”
She nodded. “The same clue twice.”
Casey gritted his teeth and shook his head. “That doesn’t make much sense.”
“It doesn’t.” Kingsley rubbed his bald head, thinking. “I can see your logic, Tonks, and it does make sense, but…”
“Only without those obsidian crystals,” she finished for him.
He nodded, and then reached down to pat her shoulder. “It is possible, but… I’ll think about it, and you too. We’ll eventually figure this out.”
“Auror Shacklebolt!”
Kingsley, as well as Casey and Tonks, turned to the MLE wizard who called his name.
“Yes?”
“Someone’s taken the bait.”
“Bait?” Tonks asked curiously.
“Really?” Kingsley pushed himself from leaning against the cubicle. “Who?”
“Walden Macnair.”
“Macnair?” he replied in disbelief.
Macnair… She’d heard the name before. He was one of the suspected Death Eaters the Order was keeping tabs on. In fact, someone was supposed to be watching him today; judging by Kingsley’s reaction, this was a completely unexpected development.
“I’ve never trusted him, but I never thought… Where is he?”
“Still on Knockturn; we’re waiting your lead.”
Kingsley turned to Tonks and Casey. “Either of you fancy a chase?”
----------
In a niche between Flourish and Blott’s and Madam Malkins on Diagon Alley, Tonks placed a tiny magical hearing bud in her ear as did Casey beside her. Reminiscent of the devices used in muggle action-spy thrillers, the Ministry would never acknowledge its source of inspiration.
A couple of MLE officers were briefing Kingsley on the situation, and Tonks listened in.
“About six minutes ago, he entered Knockturn Alley and hasn’t come out yet.”
“Did you tail him?”
“No, but we have teams hiding and waiting.”
“How many?”
“The fourth is getting into place now.”
He nodded, accepting the management of the situation and turned to the two Aurors. “Casey, I want you to find some cover just outside the Leaky Cauldron and wait there just in case. - Tonks, disguise yourself and pick a position outside Fortescue’s.”
“What’s going on?” she asked. “What’s this bait that Macnair took?”
“A meeting I set up. - I don’t have time to explain now. Trust me?”
“To tell me everything when this is over, yup!” Casey chirped as he walked out of the niche into the bustling crowds.
“You really think he’ll run?” Tonks asked. “In that?” she nodded towards the overly busy street.
“I don’t doubt it,” he replied.
“What if he Disapparates?”
“We’ll have to hope he won’t want to take a trip to Azkaban. He works for the Ministry, so we can only assume…” And he left the staging point in the niche, heading straight for Knockturn Alley.
Quickly, Tonks dawned a disguise - transfiguring her Aurors robes into inconspicuous, ordinary robes - as a middle-aged woman with light blonde hair. She spotted a bench just outside Fortescue’s where only one man was seated reading a copy of the Daily Prophet. She headed straight for it, cutting through the crowds and seated herself.
“Afternoon, Tonks,” the man beside her greeted quietly in a lightly raspy tone.
She started and peered past the Daily Prophet hiding his face. Who could possibly recognize her morphed?
She blinked in surprise. “Remus Lupin?”
“I’ll gladly stick to calling you just Tonks if you’ll stick to calling me just Remus.” He said this, wry and cool as ever, as he scooted away from her on the bench giving the impression that he was annoyed by her and some trivial matter they were discussing. She made a mental note to thank him later.
“What are you doing here?” she murmured looking away.
He flapped his paper as he turned the page and replied, “On assignment.”
She didn’t risk any more conversation than that. Even though Macnair was nowhere in sight yet, she still had her fellow Ministry employees to worry about. She would be hard-pressed to explain why she was diverting her attention and jeopardizing her cover in a non-related discourse.
But she would find out how he’d recognized her.
Kingsley’s voice was suddenly in her ear: “He’s running! All teams stand by!”
She felt herself tense in anticipation, and she fought the urge to turn to see the junction of the two Alleys. Instead, she focused on the current of witches and wizards moving through the shops and stores. She took notice of places where the traffic was slower and where it moved quicker and where it simply stood at a halt. Since there wasn’t time to move the people away, she would have to use the flow of the crowd to her advantage. The most unfortunate part of it all was that lunchtime was still in progress; Diagon Alley was literally teeming with people.
“What’s wrong?” Remus asked from behind his paper.
“We’re wait-“
“He’s rounding the corner!” Kingsley’s voice came again. “Move in! All teams move in!”
Immediately, cracks of apparition echoed through the bustling, busy street. It took a moment for the shoppers to ascertain what was happening, and then panic ensued.
Macnair swept through the crowd, robes billowing after him, as he threw himself into the densest parts of the chaotic throngs of people. All around him, in any empty space, MLE Apparated there and ordered him to stop. Macnair, of course, did nothing of the sort, and simply pushed through them.
He passed by her and Remus’ bench without a second glance as MLE teams appeared and disappeared around them.
“He’s running,” Tonks said in answer to Remus’ earlier question as she stood, morphing, and took off in pursuit.
The crowd closed around him, instantly moving the opposite way he was running as soon as he passed. She was bumped and shoved in all directions as she struggled to move forward against the crowd. If she didn’t find a way to get through the crowd, she’d never be able to catch up. Stuck in the thick of the crowd, she couldn’t see a place to safely Apparate without splinching herself with an innocent witch or wizard.
Ahead, a violent swarm of chaos surrounded Macnair. He pelted through the crowd, knocking people out of the way physically or by means of his wand. MLE Apparated beside him, in front of him, behind him as the innocent bystanders scrambled to get out of the way. But Diagon Alley was so crowded with people attempting to flee that they’d nowhere to go. MLE trained their wands on the suspect, but they could not cast any spells for fear of missing. Macnair, however, had no qualms about stunning them or missing, and now seemingly desperate, red jets of light flew all different directions from the tip of his wand.
Feeling powerless and mildly claustrophobic, Tonks abandoned finding a place on the ground and Apparated to stand atop the Owl Emporium - from where she spotted a perfect open space ahead of Macnair.
With a pop, she found herself standing, wand at the ready, guarding the opened magical wall of the Leaky Cauldron; a few witches and wizards had escaped through, but now the area just before it was devoid of anyone.
“Do not let him escape into Muggle London!” Kingsley ordered.
Macnair was rushing straight for her, and as he cleared the last of the crowd, six MLE officers Apparated into the clearing, surrounding him.
“Drop your wand!” Tonks ordered.
“Stupify!”
“Expelliarmus!”
“Protego!”
Tonks wasn’t sure how many spells had been cast all at once, but she was sure she caught half of them. Her shield charm held until her wand was ripped from her grasp, and she flew backwards straight into the wall of the actual Leaky Cauldron.
Deflated and wandless, she watched helplessly as Macnair ran through the back door out of Diagon Alley unimpeded.
Tbc…
AN: I know I promised more Remus and you actually got less. But the next chapter is all from his POV!