This was a joke.
Ed stared at his boss.
“This is a joke?”
She shook her head and returned her gaze to the mountain of paperwork piled up precariously on the edge of her desk.
“I have a partner.” A partner he hadn’t wanted in the first place but now? Now he wanted to keep this partner. They had a way of working. And it worked. Frizzy liked writing and Eddie liked telling her what to write. Now Raynor wanted to mess that up? How totally thoughtless and ridiculous of her. Had she been talking to Ed’s wife who was paranoid about every damn woman he happened to converse with?

The miniature dragon ignored him and with a huff, Ed turned on his heel and left the Head Auror’s office, new assignment in hand. This was ridiculous. First his boss had given him the most paperwork obsessed, rule loving junkie in the office. The kind of woman that did it for the promotion at the end of the road and a great load of success. Now he was being put with a bloke that wasn’t even an auror? That had been a deserter no doubt? Pratt was far from impressed.

Nonetheless, the boss’s orders were the boss’s orders and unfortunately, in this office, they were law. Quite literally. Therefore Ed reluctantly made his way over to the cubicle he’d been instructed to visit. Eleor’s. But this was not to visit Eleor. If it was, he wouldn’t have been looking displeased.

“Trevelyan.” Pratt greeted the man hunched over the desk.  He didn’t waste time with formalities and instead dropped the paperwork onto the desk in front of the ginger. He didn’t have much patience at the present. “I’d love to know why I’ve been told to work with ye. Ye’ve bin’ lurkin’ around here nowt longer than a day an already yer getting yer ‘ands on a right juicy case.”

Superglue was unfortunately proving to be no match for a wand, but that didn't stop Jonas from trying.  It turned out that five quid's worth of copies of 'The Ten Hottest Ministry Men' went quite a long way when they were scattered through Adon Eleor's desk drawers, his casefiles, and his sundry of personal belongings, which the red-haired man had only just finished returning carefully to place.  Salvo temporarily completed, he picked up one of the reports on Tait's murder and started to flip through it, whistling innocently as he bided his time until Adon returned to his desk. 

If the sound of his surname hadn't made him start, the oversized folder suddenly being dumped in front of him certainly would have.  Jonas looked up sharply from the file he'd been reading, his forehead creasing as he took in the undeniably warm and cheerful manner of the extraordinarily friendly man standing over him. 

Back during his original run with the Aurors, he had known Daniel Pratt fairly well.  The Hufflepuff graduate had been in the same year as Jonas and Tait at Hogwarts, and the trio had all entered Auror training together.  He hadn't been familiar with Edward Pratt, Dan's younger brother, for nearly as long; the Slytherin had been several years behind him at Hogwarts, and he had only joined Level Two a few short months before Jonas had quit. 

Pratt Junior had grown quite a bit since then, transitioning from an Auror Trainee to an Auror to a likely experienced one at that, now that twelve years had gone by and the magical world was on the verge of another near-crisis.  But experienced Auror or not now, stressful work environment or not, there were some forms of decorum that should still be expected.

"Be happy to help if I knew what you were being told to work with me on, mate," Jonas replied cheerfully, flashing the other man an overly friendly smile as he carefully closed the Aldridge file.  "And yeah, it is a right proper morning, innit?  Thanks for thinking to check!  Leg's a bit sore after yesterday, but otherwise I reckon I'm doing alright.  Downright neighborly of you to take the time and ask like that, it is.  You're a gem."

Was it the downright disgustingly perky smile that made Edward Pratt take an instant dislike to Jonas Trevelyan or his far too cheerful response and over the top sarcasm? Ed wasn’t in the mood for a joker right then. He hadn’t been for a while. Things at home were serious. He was on the verge of losing a wife. Things at work were more serious. And now he’d been separated from the partner that he was secretly starting to gain a soft spot for (not that he’d mention that one to Frizzy, she’d have a paperwork orgasm).

Ed knew very little about Jonas Trevelyan. He knew he was a ginger. That was obvious. The other ginger in the office was incompetent. There had to be some sort of trait there. He knew Jonas had been an auror. His days as a trainee had told him that and Ed rarely forgot a face, even if it had aged. He also knew that while Trevelyan had no doubt ditched the aurors, he was now sat in Adon Eleor’s chair looking as if he’d just been invited to a tea party.

The younger man’s teeth grinded against each other as he glanced between the file and the ridiculously cursable face. He didn’t have time for this. And what kind of messed up accent was that? ‘Innit’ wasn’t even a word!

“Did ye sleep well? Wife well? Kids well? Good breakfast?” Ed questioned, now leaning against the opening to the cubicle. He let out a sigh. “Identifyin’ Kronos Mal-.” Ed snatched up the assignment from the desk and opened the first page. “Malvivicuss. If ye ‘ent got no clue why the guv’s put ye on this case, then it’s a grand idea if ye’d have a word with her. I’ve got a partner. You’ve got a...Eleor and we’re both right happy like that.”

"Yeah, slept alright," Jonas replied cheerfully, drawing out each word to slow the normal speed of his speech.  As Adon would say, this was the sort of bastard he knew; if Pratt Junior wanted to return friendly fire for friendly fire, he was perfectly within his element.  "Breakfast was good.  Wife's doing well.  Kids are alright too, although Artie's been a bit under the weather."  The current fluctuations in the state of his familial life wasn't something he intended to get into, especially not with this bloke; he was still tentatively reasoning through it on his own.

"And yourself?" he asked amiably, flashing the younger man a smile as he leaned back in the chair.  "Hope your brother's well too, yeah?  Genuine ray of light, you are, Pratt.  Shine right through the clouds to illuminate the day."

He didn't even get a chance to discover for himself what he apparently didn't have a clue about, because Pratt snatched the folder away without so much as a by-your-leave, thumbing through it to correct his own mispronunciation.  The name he mentioned, mangled though it was, made Jonas raise an eyebrow.  Expression carefully neutral, he glanced nonchalantly back over his shoulder in the direction of Tamis Raynor's open door.

"How do you pronounce that one again?" he asked innocently, raising his voice just a little.  With the acoustics in the Auror office, it didn't take much for a conversation to carry.  "You sure that Raynor meant me?  Because I can't imagine she'd go putting some bloke on a case without asking him about it first.  Don't reckon she meant Bailey instead, do you?  According to Radley, he apparently can't tell us apart."

The moron took him seriously. Well, seriously enough to ramble on about things that right now Ed didn’t give two camel’s turds about. He didn’t want to hear about someone’s wife doing fine. Especially when his was down his ear every second he was home with demands, questions and arguments. Life at the moment was not fun and Ed was already yearning to wipe the smug grin off the leprechaun’s ginger skinned face.

All was going swimmingly (or Ed was resisting the urge to glue him to his seat and throw him out of the window of a very tall building) until the carrot top decided to casually ask about how his brother was. Ed’s face smile dropped and he stared at the man, emerald green eyes piercing into the moron’s own. “Are ye thick in the ‘ead?” he whispered, his voice had lost the fakeness it had held a moment before and was instead replaced with a half threatening tone. Did this chump think he was funny?

Everything else said by the man went in one ear, was ignored and flew out of the other as Ed continued to stare at the bloke. Not many things knocked Pratt of guard, he’d spent years building up his ability to hide emotions or only show the ones that he was happy with. Or anger. Anger came out quite often for those that knew which buttons to press. This guy had pressed an entirely different button, however.

Ed glanced around before pulling his wand out and conjuring a chair, hopefully stealing it from a previous user in the office. Hopefully Malone’s. And he sat down on it. “Was that a joke, Trevelyan?” The auror asked quietly. “It’s damn right sick if it were.”

It was very quickly becoming obvious that however good-hearted his intentions had been since nobly agreeing to accept Tamis Raynor's offer, the Head Auror had very different motivation.  At this point, Jonas felt that he was familiar enough with how his old rival usually operated that he could recognize a set-up when he saw it.  Tamis Raynor moved people around like they were pieces on a chess board; she planned and manipulated.  He couldn't always put his finger on the point of it, but at least he could tell when he was being played.

In this case, he could guess the likely reason.  Tamis wanted to see how well he'd play with the team.  Whether or not he'd be willing to turn his old files over.  More than likely, she wanted to get a sense of how he'd handle himself when he was working with someone who wasn't Adon or Archer.  And very probably, she just wanted to see how he'd respond when she threw him something out of left field: whether or not he'd rise to the bait, whether he could maintain a cool head and keep his pride in check, and maybe even -

Pratt's demeanor had changed so quickly, so suddenly, that the other man might as well have slapped another file down on the desk.  Jonas blinked, a befuddled expression crossing his face as he squinted at the blond man, who was now seated at eye level.

"A joke?" he asked, his forehead creasing.  "What, you mean about Bailey?"  Obviously it had been a joke; according to Adon, Archer, and half the bloody office, he might as well swear brotherhood to the bloke just because they shared a similar hair color.  As if it were his only damned recognizable feature.  "Sorry, Pratt.  I didn't realize you took your case assignments so seriously."

"What, you mean about Bailey?"

Wow, this guy was a moron. A real prat. Ed blinked. He hadn’t been thinking about Bailey. In fact, Bailey was the last thing on his mind when he’d just been metaphorically stabbed in the gut. He stared at the ignorant ginger troll in front of him, Trying to find words that weren’t expletives. He’d used too damn many of those in the last week or so.

There was a long pause after Trevelyan’s final moronic statement as his new work colleague, for the first time in a while, processed his words before speaking them. When he did speak, it was slow and deliberate, staring straight at the thoughtless ginger idiot.

“My brother’s not been well for more than ten years, Pumpkin. Ye’d know that if ye didn’t ditch yer colleagues when the goin’ got tough.” Ed shook his head and let out a harsh laugh. The man had betrayed his colleagues when things had got difficult and serious and now he was back for a second go? He didn’t even take time to find out what had happened to his coworkers? To his friends? Ed didn’t much fancy getting to know this one.

“Ye’re a great guy to depend on I’m guessin’” The auror added sarcastically. “Can’t bloody wait to get workin’ wi’ you. I’ll watch me own back, shall I?”

Any sarcastic comment he might have made, any quick response he had been considering, vanished as the other man's words hit him like a blow.  Not been well - that could have any number of unpleasant meanings.  Damaged.  Severely injured.  Probably not dead, unless Pratt's thick Yorkshire accent was even more incomprehensible than Jonas had realized.  But certainly not alright.

He was not quite unwilling to admit that he had gone out of his way to avoid news of his old colleagues' fates.  Jonas had been completely away from the magical world for five years, and more or less separate from it for another six after that.  It had taken him until late 2008 before he'd intentionally made contact with any old friends, and he hadn't even spoken to his old partner until Radley had shown up in his office on New Year's Day.  In a lot of ways, it was simply easier not to ask.  He had mourned everyone en masse twelve years ago; he hadn't particularly wanted to go through that again, especially not individually.

It was obvious, though, what exactly the point of this chess game had been.  Completely without expression, he glanced back over his shoulder at Tamis Raynor's open door again.

"I--"  He paused.  Excusing himself by saying that he'd had no idea just sounded idiotic, even in his head.  It wasn't his place to ask what had happened to Dan, not now.  That conversation would be held later, in the privacy of the Head Auror's office.

"No, it wasn't a joke," he said at last.  "But I'm sorry, Pratt.  I ought to have known and I didn't." 

The comments about disappearing he could ignore for now, let them roll off his shoulders.  Jonas took a deep breath and met the other man's gaze.  "Never a bad idea," he agreed, his tone even.  "What did you want from me on Malvivicus?  Did Raynor say anything in particular?"

Well that had wiped the smug grin off Trevelyan’s overly hexable face. And what was strange? Ed didn’t feel contented about having managed that. No, he felt physically sick. As much as he might be able to rip into Trevelyan for leaving when he was probably most needed, for turning his back on people willing to risk their lives, their sanity, for their jobs, for their freedom, Ed didn’t feel any inkling to.

How was Dan? He didn’t even know. In his own way, although the auror would never admit it, he was as bad as the pumpkin topped moron sat in front of him. He never spoke of Dan, he tried not to think of Dan and he only heard about Dan when his wife nagged him about his lack of visits. She did it for him. In reality Ed was as big a deserter as Trevelyan because he distanced himself from his own family.

Nevertheless, Ed had presently found a new man to centre the majority of his dislike upon. Perhaps it was the glaringly obvious similarities between the men that Ed refused point blank to acknowledge. Perhaps it was the idiotism of his boss for putting him with a man that was more likely to run for protection than stay and duel like his life depended on it.

Did Raynor say anything in particular? Ed leaned forwards, resting his elbows on his knees as he began to leaf through the assignment. Raynors words? ‘Be nice’. As if she expected trouble, wanted it even. That woman really needed to learn that her aurors weren’t wizard’s chess pieces. She moved them around, messed with their heads, exploded a few and moved them on once more.

“Everythin’ ye got.” Ed muttered, squinting down at a page of parchment from the file. A few moments passed and he couldn’t quite contain his curiosity. The green eyes shot up and caught Trevelyan’s. “So what, ye’re an auror again? Just like that?”

"Well, you know, I woke up on Monday and realized I didn't have any plans for the week," Jonas said breezily, letting out a quick breath as he leaned back in his chair.  "Struck me that becoming an Auror would be a good lark for a bit, yeah?  Reckon I'll be bored and have moved on to a position at Hogwarts by next Monday.  Speaking of which, you'll have to let me know if there's danger cropping up at all," he added, flashing Pratt a lopsided grin.  "Give me a bit of an edge if I need to pull another runner."

'Everything he had got' was a relatively mild way of putting it.  Jonas's forehead creased as he considered the words, staring past Eddie to the 'I Read Witch Weekly' blue ribbon that had been his only contribution to the cubicle's decor.  That didn't particularly sound like Tamis; the best he could venture was that this was, once again, a test.  How well he responded to adversity.  How much he was willing to cooperate.  There was probably something in there for Pratt too, come to think of it.  He hoped she was sitting in her office taking notes.

Something about it rankled Jonas.  He had never had the friendliest relationship with Tamis Raynor, and their recent exchanges had been wrought with tension, but he hadn't really expected this sort of thing to extend into the Auror office.  You shouldn't test people you trusted.  Not every person you met had to be treated like they were about to up and get themselves murdered in an alleyway, even if you had seen one memorable relationship end that way.  He could almost understand now what it was that had Adon's teeth so on edge.  No one liked to be played.

None of that was necessarily Pratt's fault, though.  Jonas turned his attention back on the blond Auror.  The idea of turning over all his files to a law enforcement agency still bothered him, but he'd known this was coming.  He'd agreed to take this on, for better or for worse.  Time to suck up his complaints and get on with it.

"All of the files are back at me office," he said honestly.  "I'd have to fetch 'em.  I can talk a bit off the cuff, though.  Malvivicus hired me on a couple of months back for surveillance on a girl in Knockturn.  Met him once; had one of his lot stop in the other times."

This guy was a prat. He was a moron. He was a thoughtless, cowardlike, foolish moron. Ed’s eyes didn’t stray from the ginger’s face as the man proceeded to reaffirm himself on Ed’s least favourite people of the moment list. He was only slightly behind the ridiculous woman that had thought it a marvellous idea to partner them up. Ed genuinely wanted to hex her very painfully right then. Alas, he required this job and despite the regular moments of disgruntlement and anger, he liked his job.

But seriously, was Raynor aware that this bloke was going to be doing a runner again when he was needed?

“Hilarious...” Ed muttered sarcastically before his eyes flashed back down to the parchments in his hands.

Finally the carrot top got down to business. He’d taken his sweet, orange time. But at least it was a change of subject from ‘how’s your insane older brother?’ Ed stared at the papers, lips tightly sealed together as he listened to the man refer to something of his as ‘me office’. Had no one taught him to talk proper? He sounded damn right ridiculous.

The auror nodded slowly, his eyes still taking in information from the tiny case file he’d been provided with. “And ye contacted him during this...surveillance? You’re still in contact?” Perhaps this was the reason he’d been brought into the office. Perhaps this guy might be able to supply something other than a duplicate Bailey with a larger mouth.

Jonas smiled crookedly, gaze shifting to meet Pratt's.  "Be too simple that way, wouldn't it?" he asked easily, stretching his bad leg out under the desk.  "Naw.  He played it pretty safe; the contact all went one way.  I only met him the first time, and when there was something to turn in, he had one of his blokes stop off to get it.  Usually a fellow named Katsaros," he provided helpfully.

This line of questioning was potentially proving to be useful in its own way, especially if it solved the Eleors' Future Crime Unit problem.  Jonas absently crossed his arms, staring past Pratt at the opposite wall.  Ever since Raynor had helpfully sent him a copy of Malvivicus' wanted poster back in January, he'd been mentally mulling over the problem.  How did you catch a man who'd been a ghost for fifty-odd years?

"Malvivicus keeps a flat in London," he began thoughtfully.  "Close enough to Westminster that you can hear the bells from it, unless it's got some sort of charm.  And he kidnapped that kid a couple of months back.  I spoke with 'im a bit back on the first, when that whole mess was going down at Hogwarts.  He's got plenty to share too.  Threw out a couple of names, Katsaros and a Lothario who was supposedly working for Malvivicus."

Ed listened to the man sat opposite him because despite the Auror’s newly created dislike for his new temporary partner, Ed had to admit what he was saying was actually of help. How ridiculously infuriating! At least when he’d been lumped with Frizzy he’d been the one feeding the information. She’d been the annoying one demanding paperwork and then stating how bad his handwriting was. Ed bet this bloke’s was worse. He just had that look about him.

“I’m gonna need your files, Trevelyan.” Ed stated, pulling a self inking quill from his robe pocket and starting to scribble a few (perfectly legible and neat for those who would think differently) notes on the back of the folder he’d been given by the game playing head auror.

Katsaros. He’d read that one somewhere. Ed pulled the file open and his eyes fell on a black and white moving image. “Terry Katsaros? I’ll look into ‘him.” Without wasting another moment, Ed closed the file once more and pushed himself up from the chair and tucking the folder under his arm.

“Ye get those files, Trevelyan. I’ll be at me desk.” Ed didn’t exactly intend to boss the ginger around. But this bloke wasn’t even an auror...was he? He was a traitor. He’d done a runner and now...Ed had no respect for him. That much was obvious and it was evident in the tone of voice the auror had used.

After twelve years of working solely on his own, it had taken some effort to reacclimatize himself to cooperating with someone else on an investigation.  He and Adon had been partnered together for just over two months, and even though most of that time had been unofficial, they'd already developed an easy working relationship.  Throwing ideas back and forth, bouncing thoughts off each other: they made, for the most part, a fairly effectual team.  Even when he'd been up in Scotland with Archer and Tamis, essentially living with his two old colleagues, Jonas had adjusted and made it through.  Because they respected each other, they could devise a system to work together.

This, though, was hardly cooperation.  His brows shot up at the other man's words.  He would need the files.  He would look into them.  Forget the bloody fact that one of them had already spent weeks mulling over this case.  Apparently coming back to work at the Ministry had inducted Jonas into a state of perpetual fetch and carry for the real Aurors.

The red-haired man could feel his temper rising, so he took a deep breath.  He knew this game.  It was what you did to newcomers, to outsiders; disregarded them, ran your operation and only included them as much as you had to.  He'd used the trick on plenty of people himself.  Suddenly finding himself shut out and on the other side of it was infinite in frustration.

Frustrating or not, though, now wasn't the time to challenge Pratt.  He'd just come off looking like an arse; much better to bide his time and find a more effective way to set the limits.  Jonas let the breath out slowly again and did his best to relax his posture. 

"Yeah, soon as I can," he agreed easily, picking up the Aldridge file again.  He and Adon already had made plans to start running down some of the witness reports from Tait's murder that day.  He'd be damned if he ran all the way home and back again at the beck-and-call of the aptly-named Auror.  The other man's request could wait until tomorrow.  "Look forward to working with you, Pratt."