It had been a long two days. Simon had paced repeatedly before responding to the letter sent by the school age girl addressed to him. Perhaps he would have been looked on as odd receiving a letter from a student, however considering the circumstances it seemed like a valid reason to correspond with the girl. It took him some time to think of a proper  response for the girl, but once quill touched parchment he wrote his own thoughts freely. It wasn't until after the owl flew out the window he thought of getting things approved of ahead of time.

Simon's steel blue eyes looked down on the paper now resting on Covi's desk. The reply was already sent, the ink already dried, things were set in motion before he could even go through the proper channels. If the students went about their plan to create a group  in support of werewolf rights and wished to garner support he would need to talk to his boss and see where and what she wanted to do about it.

Straightening the letter in front of him, he sighed deeply. The two of them still shared an office at the moment. So he was actually sitting on her chair thankful her poultry wasn't buzzing about him as usual. Even now that beedy eyed little feather brain still didn't care much for him. Not that Simon had really been trying to make any strides towards bettering the wolf - chicken relationship.

Sitting back in the chair he took a deep breathe and closed his eyes, "I need my own office," the books and paperwork was starting to clutter this one and sharing never was his strong suit.

“Next week, Simon, next week…” she mumbled right back as she entered her office.  Covi knew as well as he did that his office was nearly complete, “Unless you want to move all your things into the current hole quartered off for you.  I believe that would be a tad premature, do you not?”

Taking a seat in one of the dark high-back chairs, she placed a book she held in hand on the edge of her desk while her wand guided a whole host of other ones over both of their heads to the nearest open spots in her bookshelves.  With a sigh she crossed her legs and fixed her shirt.  These new ones Callie had sent her sat far too low on her chest for her liking.  At least she was getting used to wearing high heels most of the time.

The Festival had been a great reprieve from the fancy shmancy wardrobe her sister-in-law had set her up with.  Remembering it now made her legs ache for her jeans and her feet for her boots.  Maybe she would go traipsing a bit longer in her menagerie tonight, enough for a hike, just enough of a reason to slip into those comfortable—“what is this?”

Department Head Gertrudis sat up a bit more and leaned over, staring at the single page of parchment sitting square in the center of her desk.  As if on cue Speedy flapped in from the hallway and hopped onto his human’s desk, staring belligerently at the werewolf who seemed to have stolen her place.

Simon had been far too busy talking to himself for even his keen sense of hearing to pick up on Covi's arrival. Thankfully for him he hadn't been leaning back all the way with his feet up on the desk. It would have been disrespectful to do that, at least in her office. It wasn't like he would avoid doing it in his own little hole in the wall. Once settled in,  Simon had free reign to do as he pleased. It was nice to have a steady career, even if he was opposed by polite wizarding society, he wasn't giving up.

One of the most delicious situations to come about since he had taken the position was irritating the Reid family. There had been a long parchment sent to him by his 'Oh so loving' father which explained how he was disgracing the honor of his family with his foolishness. Simon thoroughly enjoyed sticking it in his father's craw over the matter only replying that he hoped the grief and dishonor festered and rotted the family name to what it truly stood for.

The week prior he had run into his sister Aileen, who as always was a peach and a pleasure to be around. After washing the disgust off his skin, he decided to make a mental note about becoming chummy with at least a reporter for a paper to broadcast the matter and his last name out as much as possible. Watching his sister squirm was a delight, and he wouldn't mind doing that a bit more.

"Yes, I know I need to wait... I just feel cramped. You know I need my space," he replied lazily opening one eye and then the other getting a good look at Covi. "It's a letter I received from a student at Hogwarts, seems they are working on a little Werewolf rights campaign of their own and are looking to garner our support." Picking up the parchment he handed it over to Covi so that she can inspect it thoroughly.

Most werewolves were fond of space.  Many of those infected were actually a touch claustrophobic as many were stuffed into quarters far too small for their transformed size when the full moon rose.  It could be hard to predict the actual dimensions of a changed werewolf.  Some of the smallest children could grow larger than some of the adults.  The reason was, as of yet, unknown.  Hopefully with a place like the Werewolf Wing about to be brought forth into the world, research on such subjects could be encouraged so that this phenomenon may be better understood.

Snappishly, Speedy plucked the parchment out of Simon’s hand and then hopped over to his human and dropped it into her palm.  Covadonga gave the bird a look saying, ‘that was totally unnecessary’ but all he did was puff out his chest feathers and began to preen.

Rolling her eyes she scanned the letter.  After rubbing her chin she said, “Miss Fauna Blake told me a bit about this when she notified me…” she took a deep breath in an attempt to calm herself, “about Miss Foley’s situation, but not in this detail.”  Putting down the parchment the Department Head added, “A very surprising thing for such a young person to owl the Ministry directly about this, but, considering the circumstances,” like a lack of faith or speck of intelligence in the newly appointed (hopefully soon to be dismissed) Headmistress, “I can see why Miss O’Malley did it.  Very mature… very forward.”  With that kind of leadership the group could go very far, but her passion could scare some of the younger ones off.

Gertrudis had already made up her mind what to do about the situation, but she figured this was a good test for her fairly new employee.  “What do you suggest we do?”

Simon was that exact type of werewolf, the kind that needed space. Being tied down, caught up made him claustrophobic in the worst way. If there was one thing he hated, besides pig headed were-haters, it was the feeling of being boxed in and locked down. That was by far the worst feeling ever. To think of having no escape, air being cut off and sucked from his lungs, a dampening dark cold hand of death pressing on his chest, it was just not something he wanted to dwell on.

Shaking off his thoughts of that cold and desolate desperate state, he looked upon that black winged chicken of Covi's. There was an animal instinct there, Simon didn't like that ruddy bird, and the sorry excuse for a flying southern fried entree clearly showed it's disdain for him at every turn. Perhaps it would have been different if Speedy didn't start with him first, but coulda, shoulda, woulda, never happened.

"It shows that at least there are some people who are learning something despite the desire of the Headmistress to stomp that out," the venom rolled off his tongue easily. His disgust for Analiza Snark grew with each passing day since the removal of a solid student had been brought to their attention. Simon found it as a miscarriage of justice, and he was going to use everything he could to help Covi defend and re-instate the young werewolf back in the student populace as soon as humanly possible.

When she asked him what he felt the next course of action would be Simon cocked his head to the side, "I am almost ashamed to say I already responded," granted he wasn't ashamed at all but it sounded good. "I told her that I would support the group, but I wanted to be kept abreast of the situations as they came about. I think a positive image would be the best course of action to help our cause." Simon was confident that the student who had reached out to him so boldly obviously had the best of the student's welfare in mind. "They only want to help not exacerbate the issues."

His answer made her right eyebrow rise in both surprise and curiosity.  As for his shame she could not comment.  It was scary how much he seemed to be like her, and unnerved the witch a bit in how he had already gone ahead and done something without her say-so.  If she had been wiser Covadonga would have seen this as a taste of her own medicine, as she was well known for going off and doing her own thing without permission from those above.  Alas, she only saw him doing it as something she wished to not see him do again.

Placing the parchment back on the desk she leaned back and steepled her fingers in front of her face, peering at the werewolf over them.  The look was admonishing, but her words would not be.

“We must be careful in how we support this group,” she said slowly, deliberately, “it cannot be seen as if we are the ones behind it.  I know that if we voice our opinions on the matter both Headmistress Snark,” the witch said the woman’s name with as much derision as Simon did, “parents, and (most likely) the press will see it all as our doing.”  Of all things that was something she would not allow to happen.

“It was good of you to ask to have her keep us in the loop,” she added.  “In order to keep the relationship going I suggest we do the same, but be very, very, very cautious as to how we word our correspondences.  Just write our happenings like any other bland notification, as if it were an article in a science journal.”

Simon should have known he had gone too far by responding so quickly with their support, however you couldn't tame a wolf over night. Granted everyone thought he was the Covi's glorified lap dog, Simon wouldn't give those people the time of day any how. If people truly wanted to know about him they would have the galleons to ask him themselves rather than make foolish assumptions about his abilities and his usefulness to the cause.

It fired him up when someone judged a book by it's bindings. When someone glanced over Simon as a child and created snap judgments he would shut down communications with them. People like that were no better than the rest of the Reid clan who underestimated him all his life.  

The last thing he wanted was to be the cause of anything detrimental to their goals. So if by overstepping his bounds and making himself more known to the students as an ally. Granted even if they had reached out to him before his position with the Ministry Simon would have responded something similar. There was likely a chance it would have been a parchment laced with expletives in reference to their charming head mistress, but that was neither here nor there.

"Right right right, suppose I should have waited," he knew he should have. "Of course it is better to be informed then completely left out. I would rather this girl keep me posted then go off an make banners in the name of werewolf causes." Werewolves were a trigger, a hot button with folks all over the wizarding world. When she made a mention of a scientific journal he cocked his head to the side once more, "I'm sorry a what?" Maybe she was making things up.

She hummed lightly when he admitted he acted too hastily.  Covadonga was caught off-guard by his last question, though, and even Speedy snorted.

“Umm… you mean a science journal?  Hmm…” the Department Head stood up and went to her second bookshelf and tried to grab one of the green magazines.  With a huff she whistled, and the raven flew over and perched on top of the bookcase.  “Could you grab that second one from the left, dear?” and when he did she thanked him, scratching him on the chest when he hopped down to her shoulder with the journal in his beak.

Sitting behind her desk now she began to flip through the pages, humming once again.  Her finger slapped down on an article and she smiled.  Flipping the book so the top faced her, she pushed it toward Simon.

“There is an excellent article!”

A deep and heavy sigh left Simon's chest. "Right right... I see..." A boring article on muggle nonsense was not something he felt he needed to read. Sure he had a lot of things he learned since taking up this new position, but his belief that muggles were someone useless never really changed. To think they thought half the stuff they were doing was innovation. His people were writing tablets and creating sports while theirs were off killing things with clubs for nourishment. "I'm sure I will read this some other time," thinking for a moment on how he needed his own space Simon stretched a little. "You know what, I have a feeling I should be looking for some articles in the archives for the students little group. I will run it past you before I send it of course," Simon paused for a second.

Standing from his seat he took the science journal and looked it over for a second before nodding, "I will be back in a little while," he replied as he headed out of their cramped shared office. Shoving his hands in his pockets he hummed a dark little tune as he made his way down the hallway.