27 Sept 2011
Barnabas Cuffe's Office, The Daily Prophet Headquarters


"Thursby!"

Barnabas Cuffe's sharp shout penetrated the closed glass doors of his second-floor balcony office and travelled across the massive open space of the Daily Prophet newsroom.

"Thursby!" He stood and shouted for one of his top reporters again. She'd been an utter disaster in her early years, but now that she was off that Dominik Wiedman, was almost useful. (Also, he hated that he knew anything about her dating life.)

Gripped in his hand was, bizarrely, a letter from one of the more heinous hires of Gen Garcia-Gamp at the Witch Weekly called Lil Snigger, of all things. Anonymous, vexing, and how apparently baiting him.

...

Of course you’ve read it, it was SO good after all, and you MUST know that Balfour Spectre marched into the offices and hexed Sandy for it. It was fireworks, but the twit has let Spectre get off with just a warning or some nonsense. You realise what an opportunity missed by Misslethorpe’s stammering and nerves? He let Spectre walk all over him.

...

"Oooh, bad luck, Niobe," said Jala Que, cringing.

Niobe wrinked her nose and set her coffee cup down hard. It sloshed a bit of drink onto a draft.

"Bugger! I just sat down."

Her name rang out again and it hastened her to rise and make her way across the floor and up the iron staircase. She appeared in the Editor's doorway, too much of a veteran to be discouraged by his howling.

"You owled, boss?"

She was hoping for the best. For the last couple weeks, Cuffe had everyone tipping toes because of that Sellaphix kid's fumble with taking Cartwright's interview with Carstairs. Maybe she was finally being let loose on something good.

Cuffe tossed the letter towards Niobe, who managed to snatch it before it fluttered to the ground.

Niobe read it and cringed. "What the hell is this?" She held it away from her as if it was soaked in piss.

"Bait!" said Cuffe, crossing his arms and narrowing his eyes.

"You think it's a trap?" asked Niobe, wary.

"I always thing everything is a trap, Thursby, which is why I'm still alive," he said with a dangerous smile. He bent over his desk to begin scribbling a response.

"I want you on this. Ignore the fiddle-faddle of the Almasy bastard, Witch Weekly is doing a fine job of fouling that up. But I want to run down this assault nonsense. I'll handle, my god I can barely say it, Snigger or whatever she's called."

Barnabas Cuffe and the Daily Prophet had always been more than fair with the Ministry of Magic, Cuffe having close allies in every department. But that didn't mean he wasn't going to run down a tasty side-dish of possible corruption. Besides, he didn't like the idea that some Ministry man could walk into a newspaper and start hexing because of a story. Witch Weekly deserved it, but eh.

Cuffe stopped talking and continued scribbling. He looked up after a few moments.

"I'm sorry, did you need me to hold your f*@$ing hand? Go!"


Fin