Bear's Beauties: Existential Crisis 44 (Patreon)

[center]<<Robert Applewood>>[/center]

I kept my eye out for a figure that stood out, that looked out of place. It was something I’d figured out while still at Hogwarts, but it made perfect sense: mudbloods stood out, regardless of if they were in the Wizarding World or the Muggle one. Their Muggle childhoods meant they’d never properly fit in with Wizarding Society, even after seven years being dumped in it, and their time away from it during their teens meant they lost the ability to truly fit in if they tried to return to the Muggle World. Really, I was doing the mudbloods a favor, ending their constant search for a place to belong.

Despite my justifiable dislike for mudbloods and their constant attempts to force Wizarding culture to conform to them, without any attempt at understanding the society they were entering, I wouldn’t say that I hated them, nor would I ever consider joining You-Know-Who. Hate was too powerful a word for my thoughts on them, and You-Know-Who and his Death Eaters killed far more purebloods than they did mudbloods. For all their claims of supporting blood purity, Wizarding Britain had lost more family lines to them in the few short years they’d been active than it had since before Grindelwald.

I was pulled from my thoughts as I spotted a woman that had to be a mudblood. The way she adjusted her robes as she walked out of Quality Quidditch Supplies was simply the most obvious sign, but a dozen different minor details all came together to practically scream that she didn’t belong. It was a shame about her blood, her blonde hair and golden eyes were quite fetching. Had she come from a proper background, she’d have made whichever wizard she chose to wed quite the lucky bastard.

Depending on how this went, I might spare her. Something no one seemed to want to admit was that we needed to be having more children, our population had been decimated by the two world wars in the last century, even without taking You-Know-Who into account. If she showed enough power, then I had some darts laced with Draught of Living Death on the ready. I had a few other mudbloods tucked away that I and a few others had gotten pregnant, and thus far it seemed that the Aurors had no clue about them. The children, once they’d been weaned, would be quietly gifted to wizarding families that needed children and knew better than to ask questions, they’d be raised in Wizarding Culture, and over a long enough period of time, our population decline would slow. At least until some others could gain enough status in the Wizengamot and start drafting proposals and laws to encourage families to have more children.

Shaking my head, I refocused and followed the blonde mudblood out of Diagon Alley, into Muggle London. The first time I’d done this, I’d stood out worse than mudbloods did in Diagon, but I’d studied, I’d learned, I’d thrown out every useless piece of knowledge that I’d learned in Muggle Studies and taken the time to discover what I needed to do in order to properly hunt.

Now, after four years, I’d gotten this down to a near art. As the mudblood entered an alleyway, I silently threw up an Anti-Muggle Ward, as well as Anti-Apparation and Anti-Portkey wards. Following her in once the wards were set, I froze as I felt something press against the small of my back.

“Keep walking,” a voice hissed in my ear, and I did so. This close to the wards I’d set up, whoever the speaker was, they were definitely not a Muggle, and from the voice I could tell they were a woman. The blonde I’d been following stared at me with a look of disgust, like she was my better.

“Glad as I am to get this over with, I am unsure how to feel about him deciding I was the bait worth biting,” she said, before a third voice spoke up.

“No sign of anyone else following him,” the voice, younger but still feminine, said.

“Good, now to pry each and every secret from his miserable skull,” the first woman said, and I immediately threw up my admittedly mediocre Occlumancy barriers. They didn’t help. All I could do… was scream

[center]<<Bear Sandosen>>[/center]

“Somebody get me a raw egg, two shots of tabasco, salt, pepper and a blasting curse to my head,” Tonks groaned as she shuffled into the dining room, hand shielding her eyes and rubbing at her head.

“Sounds like a perfect time to test the smoke detection wards,” Sirius all but shouted, making the metamorph wince in pain. Her response was to almost absentmindedly point her want in Sirius’s direction. With a swirl of light and color, the Black head was replaced by a froo-froo chihuahua, prompting amused snorts and indignant yips. Tonks practically poured herself into a seat, resting her forehead against the plate in front of her as her pink pixie cut turned a dull brown and grew to the point it completely covered her face.

“I’d say someone needs some hair of the dog,” Lisa stage whispered to me, getting a single raised finger from the witch.

I chuckled, quietly, and in the same volume asked, “She’s already got a yapping rat-dog running around the room, why would she want to shave it for its hair?”

The raised finger from Tonks shifted to be aimed at me, moments before Mrs. Weasley placed a mug of coffee in front of the hungover witch. A hand reached out, grabbed the mug and slid it under the mass of hair. The slow slurping sounds emanating from behind the hair curtain was not loud enough to drown out Lisa’s sudden fit of giggles.

“Everything alright dear?” Mrs. Weasley asked.

“She looks like Cousin It!” Lisa said with a cackle, losing the fight against her amusement and falling out of her chair as she laughed.

“I am too hungover to bother responding to that,” Tonks said blearily, as she sat up straight and tossed back whatever coffee was left in the mug.

“Some of the stuff you talked about last night,” I said, seeing some semblance of life in her again. “Anything we can do to help?”

Tonks sighed, rubbing her temples before answering, “I wasn’t just drunk when I said I was done. I’ll be putting in my notice later today, but there’s something I’d been thinking about for a couple weeks even before the shit with Applewood.”

“Dog sitting?” Lisa cheekily asked, pointing to the still transfigured Sirius. Tonks snorted, as Sirius gave what was probably supposed to be a growl. “Bad dog! No treats for you!”

Chihuahua-Sirius started yipping at Lisa, bouncing on the seat while doing so. I snorted, “I’m not a Norse god and thus don’t have All-Speak, but I’m pretty sure that wasn’t complimentary.”

Tonks rolled her eyes, forcing the transfigured Sirius onto his back and idly scratching at his belly, before answering Lisa’s question, “While he’s better than most of my extended family, no. I can’t stay in Wizarding Britain, and the rest of the Wizarding World isn’t much better. After Harley and Taylor… can I come with you?”

“What about your family? Friends?” I asked.

“Pretty much all my friends’re in the Order, wasn’t really close with anyone in my Hogwarts days,” Tonks said, wincing as some light reflected into her eyes. “I’ll tell Mum and Dad once my head stops feeling like the inside of a circus tent. But I moved out years ago, s’not like I’m still under their roof.”

“Do you want someone to go with you? For support?” I asked as I reached over and put my hand on top of Lisa’s before she could pick up a knife and use it to reflect more light at the hungover woman. She paused, considering, before sighing and nodding. Nothing else was said during breakfast, as food was devoured and a provided potion to dull the hangover was downed.

A quick discussion later, and it was agreed that Kara would be going with Tonks to break the news to her parents that she had quit the Aurors and would be going on something of a “world tour” with us. Just how much detail Tonks planned to share I didn’t know, but I trusted Kara’s judgment on how much.

[center]<<Kara Zor-El>>[/center]

The suburb that Tonks brought me to was quiet, peaceful, and had an almost lazy air about it. It was kinda nice. Much nicer than the neighborhood I’d been renting a place in back in Southern California, it didn’t have the underlying cutthroat air about it that came from the proximity to Hollywood. Pushing those thoughts aside, I followed Tonks as she made her way to one of the houses and rang the doorbell. Tonks took a deep breath, and I put a hand on her shoulder, giving her a comforting squeeze.

The door opened, and a woman who vaguely reminded me of Aunt Lara, but much shorter and with light brown hair, almost immediately stepped out and wrapped Tonks into a hug, “Nym! It’s been far too long since you’ve come to visit. Have you been eating right? Who’s this lovely lady? Come in, come in, I just finished preparing lunch, let me get your father.”

I followed after Tonks, her mother shutting the door behind me, before making her way to a set of stairs and all but running up them. Tonks turned to me and said, “Dad’s an author, has a pair of expensive noise canceling headphones he uses while writing so she’s going to make sure he comes down instead of hoping he’ll hear her through them.”

A minute or two later, Tonks’ parents both came downstairs, her father a tall, somewhat lanky man who greeted us with a soft smile and a hug for his daughter. Tonks leaned into the hug, some tension bleeding from her shoulders, before they broke apart and he turned to me, his eyes running up and down as he took me in.

He turned back to Tonks and said, “I can’t tell you how happy we are that you trust us enough to bring your girlfriend home with you.”

I blinked and Tonks’ hair turned red, before she said, “Much as I hate your teasing, I’ve had a really shitty last few days at work and Kara volunteered to be moral support, that’s it.”

The hint of a teasing grin disappeared from their faces, as Tonks’ father wrapped an arm around her shoulder and led her to the sitting room. Tonks’ mother made her way to the kitchen and brought out some mugs filled with steaming tea. Setting a mug in front of everyone, she asked, “What’s wrong Nym?”

“I can’t do this anymore, Mum,” Tonks said after a moment, her voice and body language screaming exhaustion. “I can’t stay in the Ministry anymore. In England anymore. I can’t deal with fucking Fudge and the pureblood trash.”

Tonks’ father didn’t say anything, simply standing up and pulling his daughter into a hug as she began to cry, the torrent of emotions that she’d been bottling up, the frustration, the sense of pointlessness, all of it, finally bursting free. Tonks’ mother soon joined, running her hand through her daughter’s hair, humming some tune I didn’t recognize. I rubbed my hand against Tonks’ back as she cried herself out, and a few minutes later her heart rate steadied, her breathing slowed, and she was quite obviously asleep, the emotional rush crashing. After getting her settled into the guest bed, Tonks’ parents sat across from me in the sitting room, the tea long since cooled.

“So, how much of what she’s planned has our daughter told you? Because while she may have been in Hufflepuff, I know her well enough to know she has at least the basics of a back up plan,” Tonks’ father asked.

“She actually asked if she could join me and my extended pseudo-family group as we travel,” I answered honestly. “It’s a long and complicated story, but basically we have access to the ability to travel to places that she’d never get to see or experience otherwise, and some of us have become pretty close to your daughter during our time here. We just wanted to make sure that she told you before we left in a few weeks.”

The two parents digested what I told them, before glancing towards the direction of the guest room, where Tonks was asleep. Turning back to me, Tonks’ mother spoke next, “So who is our daughter dating?”

I couldn’t help but wonder how they’d react if I told them her girlfriend was Skitter.