Akiva wrung her hands nervously.  It had been almost an entire month since poor Mr. Gawain was murdered.  Three weeks of her ritual therapy, writing in her journal, and trying to overcome the overwhelming fear and anxiety that accompanied walking into the ministry.  Now, as she had been told, it was common sense that lightening did not strike in the same place twice.  It was unlikely anything else would happen at the ministry, but she could not help but feel as though work was not a place she wanted to be – not with what had happened on level two. 

If the aurors could not keep their own head of department of safe, who was going to keep anyone in the library safe?  It was not that she did not trust Tamis, Adon, or anyone else in the department, but it was a bit disconcerting, and even Deen concerned her at times.  Her friend was not completely the same in any respect, and she just could not handle it anymore.  Even the thought of going down to the second floor made the pace of her heart pick up a bit. 

She managed to overcome that part of her problem, however.  Getting down there was an accomplishment, she told herself, and jotted down in her personal log (something she still carried around all over to keep her plans and things straight) – scribbling down the fact that she went down to the floor to bring up in her meeting with the St. Mungo’s healer.  It was just one of a list of accomplishments made in the past few weeks.  It was insignificant, but in conjunction with the others – including taking a glass of water she had not watched being poured, was showing improvement. 

Everyone in her immediate life was being as supportive as possible and for that she was grateful.  They understood the difficulties she was having and were patient with even her most ridiculous requests.  Akiva felt bad for having to put them all through it, but they went along willingly.  She felt blessed to have such people in her life, and tried to let them know how appreciative she was all the time, especially if they were in the for the long haul. 

There was a long road ahead still, however, and she had to confess she was impossibly nervous about the whole situation – especially telling Tamis, but her therapist had told her… if the few weeks went by and nothing was getting better, she should say something.  And, indeed, the situation was probably only getting worse.  She felt her stomach tie up in knots every time she prepared to leave her flat and she had to sit facing the doors to the library, just to be able to know who was coming in – going through the stacks alone was intimidating and anyone she did not immediately recognize, even those she did still made her nervous. 

She needed to go to this meeting though, she reminded herself, and showed her ministry badge to the front receptionist – a woman Akiva did not particularly care for (secretaries just rubbed her the wrong way) – waved her through after taking her wand, now a standard policy for visitors, though Akiva did not wish to relinquish it, and she hurried through the cubicles and rows of aurors, mostly male, on the floor.

She did not know how Tamis did it on a day to day basis, working in this kind of environment, but she supposed that when she saw the open door to the private office, it made sense with how she could deal with it.  The din of the office was not interrupted by her presence, which she appreciated unlike anything she could have expected to feel at the moment and moved to the door, rapping her knuckles against the frame almost timidly – she was not afraid of Tamis, not in the least, but rather, concerned her concerns were ridiculous and that this would be wasting Tamis’ time. 

 The mind was a fickle creature. Ravenclaws knew this and often utilized that knowledge to their advantage, but sometimes it got the better of them as well. The knock at the open threshold had been expected. Akiva had cornered her earlier, asking if she had a few moments, and Tamis had told her to stop in the Office during her “lunch break” – though she did find herself taking those more often. She knew who was going to walk in when she called out her permission to enter. When she glanced up from the files she had been consulting, she expected to see a pretty if not unnaturally gorgeous woman in her late twenties, of average height, and a smile as warm as the woman’s brownies right out of the over (even Tamis was not immune to those).  Constant vigilance. That was the Auror motto.

For it was the same person that came into the office, but she did not see a woman. In that brief instant and the less-than-perfect lighting, she saw a small scrawny little girl with head of the most unruly curly brown locks Tamis had ever seen, and a large puffed out lower lip red and pouting yet somehow managing to look set in determination at the same time. She would have sworn that she even caught a glimpse of a plush stuffed animal poking out of the crook of her arm. How many times had she witnessed that, late at night in the Ravenclaw Common Room? An insomniac, even then, the rebellious seventh year took advantage of the empty floor space in front of the fire for odd-hour studying – contrary to popular belief, even Tamis Raynor had at least crack open a textbook everyone now and then to get the grades.

In the next moment, however, the illusion passed and the twenty eight year old librarian returned. Yet, the roaring fireplace still crackled heartily at Raynor’s back, where she sat in a chair rather than curled up on the floor, and pouring over documents that made her envious of the textbooks of the past. The young woman’s hair was still brunette (or rather, brunette again) and while she lacked the fat lower lip and the teddy bear, there was a lurking concern in that would always look out of place in those warm dark eyes.

Some things would just never change.

One might argue, with there never seeming to be enough hours in a day of late, that Raynor did not have time to entertain old friends during an hour that could have been more productively spent. Usually, the workaholic would agree with that opinion. But, even if she had not been able to openly show it, Tamis had been concerned for Akiva. Not many that investigated crime could say they had experienced both sides of the field. But Tamis had been both an apprehender and a victim. She knew better than most what reencountering a crime that you had been on the receiving end of could feel like. She had gone through it when the Runespoor case re-opened. And Akiva was, no doubt, going through it as well, with the reappearance of the unwanted accessory on her wrist at the scene of Gawain’s murder. Simply the murder in general.

“Akiva,” Tamis greeted her, putting her quill down. The smile she offered was not entirely forced.

On a normal day, Akiva would not have bothered to voice her concerns like this, nor would she have even thought to even come down to Tamis’ office, especially during lunch hours.  She never wanted anyone to miss out on the chance to eat, but she knew that Tamis probably wasn’t going to eat anyway, and that she wouldn’t have told her to come down if she was bothering her.  She deserved it, after all, especially getting into the second floor as it was.  Being a victim put her in the particular spot with the department, and she could have said almost anything to get in to see Tamis. 

Fortunately, she did not have to inform anyone (they were aware she was coming) and when she walked into the office, she was practically hit in the chest with the feeling of déjà vu.  It was like she was eleven years old all over again and her day had been absolutely terrible.  She had such a terrible time her first year at Hogwarts, even though she told her parents she loved it, and Tamis was one of the only students in her house who associated with her on a friendly level.  She had a hard time finding friends, most people knew that, and was teased mercilessly. 

When she felt victimized, she always went to Tamis for reassurance – and the occasional smack of reality based sarcasm, and she was looking for some of that right now.  So, when she entered the office and Tamis greeted her with what appeared to even be something of a smile, Akiva immediately felt a little of the anxiety lift off of her shoulders and out of her mind. 

“Looks like you’re busy,” she observed with an awkward sort of laugh, motioning to the desk covered in a smattering of stacks of organized papers.  It was, of course, a neat chaos, since Tamis was too OCD to have anything else in her space, of course.  She was not the sentimental type, whereas Akiva’s workspace was covered in pictures (most notably of her parents with her, herself and friends, and a growing number of her and Dree), but they were very different people – which made for an interesting mix, and perhaps the reason why past Akiva’s first year and into the future, they had remained friends. 

Typical of their old meetings, Akiva sat down in the chair across from Tamis, slipped off her heels, and tucked her legs underneath herself.  It was not something she could have (or would have) done comfortably with anyone else she was meeting to talk to in the ministry – perhaps with the exception of Dree, but even then it wasn’t exactly the same thing.  It was like reliving a distant memory, and she sighed, resting her elbow on the arm of the chair, her chin on her fist, she let out a deep sigh.  “I have been trying very hard, Tamis. I have been trying to get over this, but I can’t.  I have nightmares... coming to work is really hard."  She sighed and rubbed her hand over her face for a second, letting out another sigh. 

"Am I being ridiculous?" she looked to Tamis for something - anything, "I mean, I've had to write down my feelings," she held up the little planner/diary that she carried around to put in her thoughts as well as plans (memory lapses were quite common, though starting to get better), "I have to talk about them once a week..." a frustrated sigh, "and I can't seem to shake them."

Victims had a special standing on Level Two, within the Auror Office in particular. Most often, if there were victims, they were used to recovering them as bodies. On the rare and abnormal chance that one was found alive, the Aurors tended to covet those individuals, the few that embodied why many witches and wizards joined the force in the first place. As such, even under the new security requirements, a Victim could still gain access to Level Two as long as they were expected. Tamis Raynor had rejoiced when Akiva Katz had been ranked among those living exceptions rather than just another body count.

A part of Tamis knew that it had only been a matter of time before they arrived at this moment. Akiva had changed. Oh, she was a far cry from the bushy haired, sentimental little fire cracker that she had been as an eleven year old; the one that had ‘muggleborn’ plastered very efficiently across her forehead from the moment she stepped of the Hogwarts Express. Raynor’s initial reasoning for taking the junior Ravenclaw under wing had not been those of a saint. Her tormentors happened to have been on the rebellious teen’s black list and by extending her protection to Katz she snubbed them politically. Yet, the little Odd Bird had grown on her, and while some of that annoying mischievousness lingered, Akiva had matured into a pleasant, sociable, confident young woman. She was still sociable and her optimism was eternally contagious but the confidence was jostled.

The Auror had not mentioned the change. Frankly, she had not had the time to address it but she also knew that if the younger woman wanted to talk about it she would initiate it. She always had.

So, when the Librarian attempted to ‘break the ice’ so to speak, Raynor kept her almost-smile -- she never actually smiled, a point she made frequently. Well, that was a lie, there were some extenuating circumstances, none which she felt obliged to divulge on. “I have suspicions that Maintenance placed self-replenishing spells on the stacks,” she admitted. “As a practical joke.”  It was not a very good one; she was not appreciative of the hand cramps.

It was serious. The heels came off and Akiva tucked her feet beneath her and the Auror once again had to fend of flash backs from their past. A large blue chair with a small pink clad bundle curled in the center of it. When the old friend had finished her explanation, Tamis ran a hand through her hair.

Tamis Raynor was not a particularly compassionate individual. But this was Akiva Katz. And… it took a victim to understand a victim. It was an understanding a shrink or a typical law enforcement official would never understand. A part of Raynor wondered if that was why Akiva chose to confine in her about this, she did not ask out loud … she was not sure she actually wanted the answer.

“You are not being ridiculous,” there was no assurance in her tone, no active attempt to sooth the other woman. It was said as she intended it; as fact. “What you went through was… traumatic. The nightmares do not go away, Akiva, no matter how much you talk about them or how often you write them down.” She paused then, leaning back in her chair, running a hand through her hair again. “It is not something you can ‘get over.’ You just cannot allow it to consume your life; to stop living. If you do, your perpetrator wins.”

It was not the most sympathetic response but it was the truth. A truth the Auror knew very well. 

“They have never had very good senses of humor,” she noted, forcing a smile in response to Tamis’ quip about the practical joke.  “I’m sure some of your employees could come up with something much better than that,” she laughed a bit, thinking about Adon, Abs, and the others – they were an interesting group of people and very diverse in their own ways.  Each had a particular spot, from what she understood, and though replenishing stacks of paper were very appropriate, were most likely not a joke any of them would actually pull.  Not creative enough. 

She could not dwell on jokes, however, as the reason for her visit was far from a joke.  She was having so much trouble – so many problems with everything she was supposed to be doing but it wasn’t helping.  She could recall no memories to get rid of, nothing stuck, and nothing was permanent enough to let go of.  How could someone grasp at grains of sand and try and say that they could get over the specific ones that slipped through their fingers when they couldn’t identify what was what? 

Rubbing her face again, Akiva sighed with frustration.  She was glad Tamis could understand where she was coming from, but she did not find much comfort in it.  Her perpetrator was faceless and nameless; there was nothing she could do to help anyone find out who it was, if it was even one person or many was still a mystery!  “I don’t even know who the perpetrator is,” Akiva returned tightly, tugging at the ends of her hair without much else to do. 

She was weary and agitated, especially in the past month.  Every dream she had was like someone wearing a mask was torturing her – dangling the information in front of her, and sometimes, she woke up in a complete cold sweat, unable to remember any reason why she could have woken up.  They were still playing with her – all the poorly performed memory charms, she was told, would have such side effects.  It was emotional torture and she wrung her hands together again. 

They were both clearly unable to really express how to fix things, and Akiva knew Tamis was not the most expressive of people – who, up until this point, had probably not even started combating her demons until a certain person made her.  Though Akiva would never mention it to her, she looked like a weight had been somewhat lifted off her shoulders – glimpses of the semi-horrible person Akiva knew as the seventh year who took her under her wing for whatever reason, it was refreshing and good to see that even Tamis could begin to heal.  Perhaps that was why Akiva came down there, even if she knew she wasn’t going to get a direct answer. 

“I guess,” she continued, not wanting to leave it to Tamis to explain that it would be impossible to find such a person under the circumstances, “I guess I’m just having trouble with the fact there’s nothing… whoever it is doing this is still out there somewhere.  I can’t even help – I’m probably more useless than a corpse in that respect, at least one can dissect a corpse and look for internal clues.”  She sighed again,  “I wish I could help more… that I could do something.”