The griffin shoved its beak through the bottom of the waste paper basket. The basket's remarkably durable wire frame was locked around the jaws of the beast. One giant, clawed front foot lifted. It shook its head.

Envelopes scattered all over the floor. Creased under the giant rear paws. Spotted with enormous inky footprints. The griffin had upset the inkwells of course. It was what griffins were prone to do. When they exploded out of suitcases. Newt Scamander would have been proud. Or embarrassed it happened to him again.

Brin wasn't sure.

What he was sure of was this: It was 8am. There was a griffin in the post room on Level One. A griffin with a wire waste paper basket stuck on its head.

He dared to glance at a nearby calendar.

Definitely 1st March. Not April.

And most definitely coming straight for the door.

"Get Four up here!" Brin yelled at a startled assistant. He seized his wand. Straightened his tie. "And shut all the doors."

Ambrose was doing his best to get into work early. Punctuality was one of the most important skills in the office, Mrs Lanningham had taught him. His early arrival meant he was already in the office when a message came down from Level One about a griffin.

“A griffin!” Someone laughed at the memo, refolding it and sending it sailing across to another desk.
“Hah, as if. This has to be one of the jokes.” Ambrose saw the memo crumple in the grasp of a hungover beast handler before it was unceremoniously chucked into a waste paper bin. His curiosity got the better of him (not only because Penny had recently briefed them all on the virtues of paper recycling.)

Under the guise of accidentally knocking over the very waste paper basked, Ambrose located the memo and shoved the rest back into the wire basket.
“Griffin, haha…” He muttered to the older handlers who barely acknowledged him, but were reaching for their coffee cups from yesterday in readiness to ask him to make drinks.

Young Pepper shot off at a flash, and unrolled the memo at a safe distance. Looked genuine enough. Wouldn’t harm to go up and… check… would it? He glanced behind himself at the office. Everyone engaged with something, or readily ignoring the apprentice. If it was just a joke, they’d send him up to check as the junior. Yes, that seemed logical. He would go and check. If it was just a joke, at least he’d get to see Level One!

So Ambrose shoved the memo back into the pocket of his jeans and hurried out to the lifts, squeezing into the next one. He could reach the dangling hand holds with far more ease now than he had when he’d arrived. This and the fact all his trousers had got rather short were confirmations he was now shooting up in height at long last. But he had to think of griffins, not trousers. Front half of an eagle, rear of a lion. Big wings.

Level One appeared quiet, until Ambrose rounded a corner and heard shrill voices behind a closed office door. Level Four was a rowdy crowd in comparison to Level One on first impression. Every door was closed, despite it being just past eight in the morning. Even the security post by the lifts was empty.

The high pitched shriek that ripped through the still air of the corridor was no startled witch. Ambrose’s eyes went wide as saucers, and the griffin burst into the corridor, shaking its head side to side, flapping its wings. It was desperately trying to release its head from the wire waste paper basket that looked very much the same as the one Ambrose had rescued the memo from.

“Bloody Merlin!” Pepper exclaimed, finding his wand automatically in hand. It was an actual griffin and he’d come up here alone!

What the bloody hell was happening!? were Maurice's precise thoughts as he exited the lift for Level One shortly after Ambrose Pepper's arrival. His glances  were clearly unamused, confused and adamantly annoyed by the situation.  Doors were slamming shut, but there was no mistaking the sound of a beast in their midst. Pickler came rushing towards him, sheer panic and terror etched on his features.

"Sir! TheresabloodygriffininthepostroomwithAbbott!"

Maurice worked efficiently to decipher the message and once it clicked, his eyebrows narrowed in unamusement versus raising in curiosity. "Sir!?" Maurice waved his hand dismissively for the moment, focusing on the task at hand. His eyes fell upon Ambrose Pepper, approaching him in no time. Youth.

"Listen here both of you. Stop acting as though you have a shared celluar relationship for a brain. We need to get to Abbott before the griffin gets hold of him or worse yet, before Glass comes in for the day," he snapped hastily. "Surely the three of us, combined with Abbott's own wandwork, can subdue the creature, eh?"

Pickler gulped but nodded his affirmation.

Maurice eyed Ambrose.
"What say you, Pepper? Put your training to practice?"

“Holmes?” The Minister stepped out from a nearby doorway, Ministerial briefcase tucked tightly under his arm. He was adjusting his cufflink fresh from washing his hands, blissfully unaware in the sanctity of a washroom. Glass observed the little gathering in the lift foyer with suspicion. “Pickler… Pepper?” What was this, tongue-twister Thursday?

He did not need to hear the answer. The shriek of the griffin and the clatter was enough before he hurried to a vantage point to observe it with his own eyes.

“Bloody marvellous!” Edwin exclaimed, unclear to onlookers if he was genuinely impressed or just shocked. “You do realise my birthday was two months ago, lads.” This was possibly the most interesting thing to have happened on Level One since he’d taken over command.

“Well, don’t just stand there, let’s contain the thing!” He shoved his briefcase at Peter Pickler and drew his walnut wand. He was hardly going to miss out on a bit of action because he was the ruddy Minister for Magic.

A tall guy, not much older than Ambrose ran up to him and another, older, smartly-dressed wizard who had come out of the lifts behind Ambrose. Turned out that the smartly-dressed one had as much snark that he might compete with Professor Storm or Ambrose’s former potions tutor, Professor Di Luca.
“… stop acting as though you have a shared cellular relationship for a brain..”

The suggestion Ambrose was slow did not go unnoticed, but it wasn’t anything he hadn’t really heard before. In the grand scheme of things he was more worried about the griffin. He had no idea who the Abbott fellow was that the smartly-dressed one spoke of.

“What say you, Pepper? Put your training to practice?”
“Ye- yes sir!” Ambrose replied automatically, though wondered how the wizard knew his name.
“Holmes? Pickler? … Pepper?” Ambrose did recognise the wizard who joined them next. It was the boss - the big big boss - the Minister himself. Ambrose had seen him in the flesh before, of course, he’d come to their family’s summer garden party at Ambrose’s uncle’s house before he was Minister. Instead of being angry at the griffin, the Minister seemed happier than Ambrose felt at the possibility of getting firsthand experience with a griffin, and even drew his own wand.

Realising with a bump that Ambrose was the sole member of Level Four there, and nobody had as yet suggested a plan, he got to action.
“Griffins normally guard treasure,” he informed the other three, “they eat mostly raw meat, and despite how angry this one looks… it is possible to befriend them.” He softened his body language as if stalking the griffin. “I think it might be most angry about the waste paper basket on its head. But if we can lure it with some meat, that might calm it down.”
“I’m on it!” Penny’s brother yelped, clutching the Minister’s briefcase. He dashed full-pelt in the opposite direction to the griffin.

“Easy, easy,” Ambrose called to the griffin, creeping out into the hallway ahead of it. “Steady now, steady we’ll get that basket off your head…”

The griffin smashed out of the post room door. It struggled and gouged great marks in the wall. Brin followed it out. He could try to stun it here. Knock it out. Take it down like a dark wizard! He could just about make out people the other end of the passage. Help had arrived!

Brin threw a heavy stunner at the back of the griffin. Red light shot out of his wand. The griffin screamed like a very angry baby. They would need to work together. This griffin was a lot bigger than a wizard. He went again. Big as he could. The air was hot with magic. The griffin turned. Swiped at Brin.

Maurice watched the up and coming generation amp themselves for the upcoming duel with the beastie. His ears perked up in slight shock upon hearing Glass' voice coming behind, beside him. Catching the glimpse of the Minister's wand, Holmes pulled his own hawthorn out whilst listening to Pepper's remarks on how they all needed to handle the situation.

Reason and logic, befriending and calming it down would have worked very well indeed but this particular metaphorical balloon burst into shattered ambitious shards when Brinley took it upon himself to take care of the beastie in his own way. Shit.

Upon watching the swipe of claw towards Abbott's body, Maurice advanced cautiously enough, wand aimed carefully towards the griffin. "Immobulus!" he spoke, the spell striking the creature into a frozen state for a brief moment.

"Abbott! Move!"

The young lad quickly gave them a lesson on griffins. Young Pickler made himself useful, offering to source some meat, and scurried away. All at once, three attempts to constrain a griffin began:

Pepper tried to approach without magic, like some beast-whisperer. Edwin admired the young man’s confidence (though naive, quite probably) in his own ability to approach a dangerous creature. It took balls, and Ambrose would either be a worthy beast handler in a few years, or dead. That seemed to be how it worked.

Behind the griffin, however, was Abbott. The senior undersecretary had been a hitwizard in his prime. That explained why he was trying to take the beast down with force, as he might overpower a dark wizard. It was a polar-opposite approach to his junior. The griffin turned.

Holmes, stuck between these two poles, went to stall, catching the griffin when it’s attention was turned, freezing the beast momentarily in motion. He yelled at Abbott to move.

“Constrain it, let’s find however it got here, whatever it came out of.” Nobody would have smuggled a griffin up to the highest level of the Ministry by leading it by the claws into a lift. It must have come up there in something, Edwin reasoned. If it could come up in something, then maybe it could go back into it. He added his own cast of immobulus, timing it as Holmes’ would have begun to wane.

“Where did it come from, Abbott?”

"Post room sir!" Brin answered. He had moved speedily to get out of reach. The griffin had missed. He was still nimble. He pointed his wand at the legs. Rope sprung round them. He did not know if it would hold. But if it did it would last longer than their spells. The griffin was very strong. He wiped his brow. "I would not go too close sir. Are more coming from Four?"

Ambrose forgot that true adults often blundered in thinking they knew best. There was red light from behind the griffin. Someone further down the hallway was throwing spells at it. The griffin became enraged. The posh wizard cast immobulus and yelled at someone called ‘Abbott’. Ambrose stared between one wizard and another, feeling out of his depth, and clearly not listened to despite working with creatures. The Minister was asking questions, also using magic to still the griffin. Then the one throwing curses bound the legs of the griffin with rope.

“Are more coming from Four?”


“Er…” Ambrose didn’t answer. The crumpled memo was in his pocket, and nobody down on four thought it was a serious memo. He crouched, approaching the griffin tentatively. His heart beat quickly in his chest, and he willed his hands not to shake. He could do this, he could just reach. Ambrose extended his arms carefully, stretching, and grasped what was left of the waste paper basket on the griffin’s eagle head.

The griffin gave a small cry from being still entangled by spellwork but it seemed that the creature was grateful for to be captured by wastebasket to the head. Maurice was grateful for that end, for certain. One task complete, another handful to take on.

Namely the 'er' given by Pepper.

He was the only here for the department? They were, as it had been internally recognised by others involved, a month out from the practical joke day. This surely wasn't a foretaste of what was to come? God forbid.

Maurice eyed Ambrose closely, expression more than unamused but nodded with a soft grunt. Raising his wand, a scarlet memo sprung forth and zoomed off towards the department with the message they'd be needing some assistance once this was all over.

"Wards to keep the griffin in place? Or better ideas, sirs?"

“Post room sir!”

Someone had sent them a griffin in the post? You had to marvel at the ingenuity of magic and the absurdity of the population able to use it.

Abbott added ropes to immobilising charms. A sensible idea as they agreed on a resolution for the beast’s containment. Spells might only hold it for so long in the distressed state. If only someone were here to snap a photograph of this glorious moment of catastrophe!

“I would not go too close sir-” His senior undersecretary was only doing his job, but Edwin shot Abbott a look to remind him that he was severely over-qualified in managing and categorising risk given his Ministry career. Sweet of the former hitwizard to care though.

“Are more coming from Four?”
“Er…” Young Pepper was stalling, and the other three men knew it instantly. None of them stopped his successful attempt to prise the wire waste paper bin off the head of their temporarily subdued beast.

“Wards to keep the griffin in place? Or better ideas, sirs?” Holmes asked, bringing them back to task instead of the irritation at the lack of support from Spectre’s floor.

“Abbott,” the Minister addressed, “fetch whatever you believe this came out of, and see if we can ready it for re-containment-“ he extended an arm in the direction of the clawed doorway of the post room when a voice interrupted in the opposite direction.

“Sir, sir - I” Pickler was back, brandishing what looked to be a silver platter for a breakfast meeting, judging by the faint whiff of bacon. “And they’re on their way from four sir, I reached Lanning-”

“Give it to Pepper. Lend us your wand, immobilising charms, in succession, Holmes, let’s keep it down until we’ve something solid to restrain it with or can hand off to the chaps best prepared deal with these things.” Satisfied, Edwin shooed Pickler between him and the griffin, heeding Abbott’s advice at long last.

"Yes Sir." Brin did not wait to react. Already mobilized. Back to the post room. Deserted. Ink pooled on the floor. Papers ruined. "Accio suitcase!" The portmanteau slid to his feet. Brin opened and examined it. Magically enlarged. Of course. Hinges in tact. Yes this would do.

He slammed it shut. Hoisted it over his shoulder. Jogged swiftly back to the tethered beast. The young guy was feeding it. Pickler was holding a silver platter. The Minister was back out of reach. Brin did not want his boss to be breakfast.

"This is it!" Brin exclaimed. He placed it down behind the griffin, opened the lid. "If you shout pack does it pack a beast beside your braces?"

Basket removed, the wizard who had thrown hexes shot off to find whatever the griffin had arrived in. Ambrose glanced at him as he left, but otherwise was transfixed by being up close to the griffin.

“Easy, easy. We don’t mean to hurt you, this just isn’t a safe environment…”
“Sir, sir…”
“Give it to Pepper.”
“Huh?”

Ambrose turned from talking soothingly to the griffin to see the other young assistant holding what looked like a really posh breakfast for several people on a big silver plate.
“Oh right, thanks.”

The apprentice beast handler seized the tray and pinned it to his body with one arm. The griffin made another vocal protest and Ambrose took pity.
“Here, look, you’re hungry, right? Look what we’ve got for you.” It was the same cooing voice he used to talk to his baby half sister when he was on babysitting duties. How did one feed a griffin? Not like a horse, those weren’t fleshy lips covering big teeth. “Here, let’s see,” he tossed a rasher of bacon experimentally.

“This is it!” The hex slinging one was back with a big suitcase. Ambrose glanced at it for just a fraction of a second, rather more worried about not being eaten as the griffin decided it really did like the taste of bacon and other Ministry breakfast offerings.

“If you shout ‘pack’ does it pack a beast beside your braces?” Ambrose had little idea what the guy was on about, but the suitcase was open right behind the griffin, which shook its head back and forth suddenly. Ambrose took a hasty step back, raising a bacon-greased hand in placation.
“Easy now, easy, we don’t have to put you back in there if you don’t want. They’re coming, they’ll know what to do. Griffins aren’t meant to live in suitcases, I know, I know… here have some bacon…”

Young Pepper took the breakfast and returned to the beast. The Minister was somewhat impressed at his lack of fear for an apprentice. To ensure the teenager didn’t become part of the griffin’s breakfast, Edwin and Maurice continued to hold immobulus.

Abbott reappeared at a jog with a battered suitcase on one shoulder.
“This is it!” He slid it onto the floor behind the griffin and opened the lid. Pepper continued to chirrup to the griffin.

Edwin gave a shrug and flicked his wand at the case with the suggestion of experience. It lifted a little from the thick carpet and tilted like a gaping mouth. At once, there was a drop in air pressure as the case began to reclaim its contents. The griffin gave an awful screech, and its great talons tore through the carpet as it was dragged backwards, hindquarters quickly disappearing into the case.