Jazz was soaring to new heights at that moment.  With her mural finally finished she stood there with a wide grin on her face, admiring her work.  She was glad she chose to do this rather than chicken out and stick to the confines of her bedroom.  It had been too long since she was inspired and doing the mural was just what she needed to get her back on her feet.  With another satisfied sigh, she put away the art supplies in her satchel and skipped away.  It was an early Thursday evening, so the place was relatively empty, which prompted Jazz to wander down some deserted alleys just for giggles.  She never realized how expansive Diagon Alley was until now.  Looking on sadly at boarded up businesses she idly wondered how much it would take to open a shop here.

Furrowing her eyebrows coming to a dead-end, that part of the alley seemed colder, darker, and a tad eerie.  Though looking at her surroundings, there wasn't anything inherently different about the rest of the alley.  Weird, she thought and was about to turn around when she noticed a pretty rock on the ground by one of the old shop's door.  It was bright green with yellow swirls, and was the size of bottle-cap.  "Ooh," she cooed to herself happily and knelt down beside it in admiration.  She had never seen a rock like that around Diagon Alley, and she suddenly thought about its purpose.  Could it be something dark?  Something cursed? she thought suspiciously and fought off the urge to touch it.  Best not to chance anything, she decided and stood back up with a dejected sigh.

Jazz looked around the dead-end again before deciding it was time to head back home.  I don't want to worry mom anymore than I have to, she thought in slight amusement.  Besides, maybe I have a new letter from Kirby, she added with a smile.  Gripping the satchel strap on her shoulder she was about to turn around when...

..when she was struck in the side of the head by Vesta Baddrick casting Stupefy.  The teenager crumpled to the ground, unconscious for the moment, and the older witch took her by her collar of her olive-green hooded jacket and slid her across the gritty cobbles behind a large trashbin and propped her against the wall of a vacated shop at the dingy end of Diagon.

The girl would only be out for a few seconds, and when she came to, she'd find someone going through her pockets, sliding her jewelry off her fingers, searching her for a wand.  Vesta had watched this particular teenage witch come and go from Diagon all week, working on that mural.  Every afternoon it seemed, she had worked on it until the light started to dim. 

Vesta had to admit the mural didn't suck.  But Vesta was no patron of the arts.  She instead invested in the Dark Arts and all the benefits it endowed upon her.  Namely, everything of value this primped up, pretty teenage witch had on her.  Vesta didn't feel bad at all - she worked hard for what she earned, and if the fair skin and fancy ring this girl had on her was any indication, there was plenty more where that came from.

No gold in her pockets, just silver.  But there was her wand, in the wand pocket just inside the zipper of the jacket - Vesta slid it out and set it on the ground beside her where she was crouched over the groggy teenagers' body.  Then, she went for the jewelry.

With a sharp tug, the little necklace snapped off into her hand, and she pocketed it.  Then, she took the girl's wrist and started pulling off rings. 

Everything was hazy.  Sounds were distant and muffled, her vision blurry and obscured.  Slowly, she regained awareness in her body and the throbbing on the side of her head.  Ow, what happened? she thought, giving out a small groan as she blinked open her eyes, finally starting to make out the scene before her.  "What... the hell?" she managed to say at the frightening woman in front of her.  She felt tugging on her fingers and looked down to see her leaf ring being taken off.  Wait.  Is this a mugging? she thought frantically.  Realization dawned on her as her eyes widened.

"What... are you doing?" she asked, trying to channel her strength to pull away, but failed miserably.  Her limbs were still indisposed.  Jazz noticed with horror that her wand was already dispatched beside the scary woman.  Panic rose in her chest at the feeling of Johnny's ring being pried off her thumb.

"No!  Not the ring!" she exclaimed, shaking her head frantically, trying to pull her hand away.  "Take everything else, please, just not the ring!" she pleaded as tears threatened to spill over her lids.  Suddenly, her body regained its strength and she was able to kick the woman in the stomach reflexively.  She bent her thumb in attempt to keep the woman from taking the ring, all the while scrambling awkwardly away from the wall.

The girls started to come to, blurry speech, blurry eyes and the 'dumb fingers'.  Vesta knew what all that felt like, having been Stupefied many times before, how the littlest digits just didn't seem to obey, just like that feeling of when you woke up in the morning.

Vesta probably looked a fright, her black and green hair falling down around her face, her untended eyebrows dark over sunken eyes covered with too much kohl.  She wasn't a young witch and Azkaban had just aged her more.  She scowled in the darkness at the bright-faced teenager as she started to wake up and to protest. 

The kick hit her too suddenly for her to react, only having enough time to rise up a few inches off her knees.  Baddrick took the kick square to the diaphragm and collapsed backwards, coughing.  Even as her breath returned, her wrath returned faster.   It was a hungry sort of wrath, just the excuse she was looking for.  An excuse to put the privileged little brat in her place, show her what it meant to want, what her pretty things cost her.  The price of her empty-headed wandering around.

"You nasty wretch!" she coughed as she got to her feet.  Vesta wasn't extraordinarily nimble, and the kick had knocked the wind out, but she seemed to have got up faster than the teenager, who'd begged to keep the ring.

"I'll take whatever I want - get back here!"  Baddrick snarled and it took only three steps to catch up with the girl scrambling away.   She sliced her wand through the air, and send a ball of spellfire just past the girl's head.  It hit the pavement with a fizzle that reeked of brimstone.   


"Stop your arse, and give up the ring.  Or I'll take it and the finger it lives on."

Vesta stood over her, looking down on her with a look of complete superiority.  Vesta Baddrick deserved all she could take. 

Jazz was surprised her kick managed to knock the mugger back a moment, since it was just a reflexive action.  Scrambling away, trying to think of something to do since she didn't have her wand, Jazz thought about calling for help.  "Help!  Someone's mugging me!" she yelled, tossing her head back to let her voice echo as much as it could in the deserted alley.

Thinking back on it later, Jazz realized how stupid and hilarious it was to yell Help! Someone's mugging me!  Though looking back up at the mugger who was now on her feet and seething, she didn't have time to think of such trivial things.  Especially since a fireball just passed her head.

Okay, this is not good.

Jazz flinched at the woman threatening to cut off her thumb.  That would certainly hurt, she thought, and looked down at the digit in question.  But Johnny's ring is worth it, she decided and yelled for help one more time, edging her hands as far away from the mugger as possible.

"Please," she started once again, hoping to appeal to the woman's better nature.  "This ring means everything to me.  I won't even report you.  Just please, let me keep it." she pleaded as a few tears trickled down her face.  If this didn't work, Jazz decided, then she'll have to fight back.  Jazz dreaded what was to come next, since she'd never been in a fight in her entire life.  And she had no upper-body strength to support her in any physical endeavor.

"Shut up!" 

Vesta wasn't stupid - any more of this screaming for help and someone would come.  If not to help, but to make the streets quiet again, and Vesta wouldn't blame them, all this blubbering and carrying on.  Vesta would never admit it, but she was so perturbed by it because she'd been there before - she'd been the teenager sobbing in the streets.  But she wasn't like that anymore.  She wasn't weak.  She took what she wanted and she never had reason to cry. 

"...you ask too many questions, Vesta... do you think you're better than I...?  Why don't I show you a new one then, something to hold your tongue..."

She knew what she had to do.  She cocked her wand arm up high by her hear, the way she'd learned back in Leeds, and narrowed her eyes.  "Astomos!"[1]

"...Much better... won't due to panic, Vesta.  We finally have some peace and quiet..."

Vesta watched without emotion as her hex set in, grateful for that old Dark Artist taking the time to teach her useful hexes like this one.  Perhaps she'd learned it the hard way, but that's the way you remember.

"...Now we can set to work..."

1.	Sealed Mouth Hex

Jazz shrieked at the ongoing pain as her lips knitted together.  Holy hell this hurts!  She was never a subject for curses, nor had she performed them on anyone.  Dammit! she thought, coming out of her shock as more tears fell from her eyes, I can't bite my way out of this. she noted in annoyance.

Jazz knew she had to get to her wand, which was now a good three feet away and dangerously close to the mugger, she saw in her peripheral.  How can I get to it with her bounding over me? she wondered frantically.  Seeing an opportune moment upon her as the mugger drew closer, she jerked her feet between the woman's legs, hooking them behind her knees to hopefully have her lose balance long enough to dive for her wand.  Going for her wand despite the outcome, she thought of a simple hex to perform, something she could do wordlessly and effectively.

The moment her fingers touched her wand, she seized it, pointed it at the mugger and mentally commanded Infligo[1], as harsh and quick as she could muster.

Please, please, please, even for a second, she mentally pleaded to the Gods, if they were watching.

1.

Smack Hex

The girl's face, now conspicuously, gruesomely lacking a mouth, looked shocked and horrified.  Desperate.  Desperation was the condition directly preceding one of two things a) resignation of defeat, or b) trying something stupid.

It was Option B.  The sobbing teenager scrambled forward and hooked her leg between Vesta who stumbled,  she snatched out to grab at her but, the Smacking Hex hit her square in the face.  She hadn't even heard the incantation.

THWACK!  The smack of flesh rang out and echoed sharply in the narrow passageway and for a half second, everything was frozen.  Vesta, frozen in time, shocked that she'd been assaulted.  She blinked her eyes and then with almost reptilian grace, she snapped her gaze onto the girl, her eyes smoldering with rage.  Her face creased into a deep scowl and then she descended onto the girl without hesitation.

Her first move was to smack the girl across the face with her own bare hand, magic-free, skin on skin.  THWACK!  The encore, the return, the reply echoed again in the ally. 

Then, not even caring about the wand anymore, she leveled her own onto the girl, aiming at her neck.  "Levicorpus Collum!" [1]  Her wand flashed and then, as she slowly raised her arm, the girl began to rise in the air, suspended frightfully by the neck.

This spell wasn't meant to strangle, nor suffocate.  Merely... levitate. 

After a few moments, Vesta's arm was extended straight up, pointed to the stars.  And Jazelle Hawke's feet were hanging six feet above the ground.

1.	The body-levitating charm, but by the neck, not the ankle.

Jazz was momentarily relieved that she managed to hinder the mugger even for a moment.  Okay, now what? she wondered frantically, but no coherent thoughts surfaced.  So when the mugger smacked her across her face, the desperate and terrified little girl was no more.  Instead, anger boiled in her gut and it was apparent in her normally aqua doe-eyes.  It usually took a lot to make Jazz angry, but this was something she couldn't shrug off.  Never has someone physically laid a hand on her like that.

She was no longer surprised as the mugger cast the body-levitating charm; not even the fact she had Jazz basically hanging by an invisible noose around her neck.  It was a low move, and coming from a crazy hag like that Jazz thought it was fitting.  Still, as Jazz choked and fought to keep breathing through her nose, she was thankful she had held on to her wand.  Gripping it, she pointed it at the mugger's wand and used a nonverbal Expelliarmus to disarm her.  Jazz knew it would result in her own painful fall to the ground, but she had to get down if she wanted to live, and disarming the Wacky-Old-Harpy in the process would make things a little easier.

Falling to the ground, her legs were the first to hit and there was a definite broken bone in there somewhere.  She collapsed on her back with a small shriek in pain as her head hit the stone-floor harshly, making Jazz disoriented for a moment as blood oozed out.  Well, at least she was no longer choking.

Vesta wasn't ready for another non-verbal spell from her victim - very few people even tried to cast without incantation as the skill and focus required was unusual.  But desperation or whatever was causing the kid to behave so stupidly was a powerful drug.  Perhaps Vesta had come on too strong - made the girl think she was fighting for her life, not some stupid bauble.

Even so, the spell was shakily cast (the best anyone on Hawke's situation could hope for) and Vesta found her wand on the ground at her feet.  Much like the girl, who was in a disheveled pile on the cobblestones. 

"You're a stupid girl to fight so hard over a ring," she said quietly, almost as if she were giving advice.   "You'll learn to pick your battles better from now on, I think."

The fall had probably been painful and she'd hit her head.  Having learned her own lesson, Vesta stood well clear of the dazed little witch and cast three spells.

The first, a terse, show-offy Expelliarmus that brought the 10 inch little wand to her left hand.

The second? "Accio Ring!"  It was the girl's hand that jerked forward as the ring moved on its own to obey, and then it shimmied off the finger, twisting and then shooting off with a little pop.  Vesta caught it and pocketed it without a second look.

And the third.  "Caryatid Allakteon!"[1] It was a spell that would turn Jazelle Hawke to living stone, frozen in the alley until someone found her.  Petrified.  Solidified.  Stopped.  Even the blood would turn to pebbles.  Not dead.  Not disappeared.  Just stone.  A perfect preservation of the ultimate lesson.  Pick your battles, little witch.  Pick the ones you can win.

1.	Living Statue Curse wiki

Jazz mentally kicked herself for not thinking things through thoroughly.  Yes, she understood she was a colossal idiot.  She had now managed to incapacitate herself.  The blood oozing from the back of her head was making her woozy and unable to focus, so she couldn't heal her broken bones and other maladies.  Well, at this rate I deserve to be mugged, she thought bitterly and it came to no surprise when the mugger knocked her wand away.  It did, however, break her heart the moment Johnny's ring flew from her thumb.  I'm sorry, Johnny, was her last thought before everything stopped.

Everything went blank.  There was no thought, no feeling, no existence.  Jazz was now a statue: although she wasn't aware of it.  Time merely froze for her, and she was neither here nor there.  There was just... nothingness.

She couldn't even wonder how long she would stay like that before someone found her... or if she'd remain a statue forever.

What day was it, Thursday? Yes, that seemed right Church decided as he rolled over in his bed. Part of him wondered what time it was, but really he didn't care enough to check. But the phone rang; perfect excuse to check the time as well. Doing his best to sound awake in case it was someone important (not likely), Church reached a hand out and picked it up.

"Hello?"

"Church?" asked a woman's voice that sounded vaguely familiar. "This is Jazalle's mother," ah, that explained it. "I was just wondering if... if she was with you? She was supposed to be home a while ago..." Church blinked and sat up.

"No," Church replied calmly. "I can go look for her, though. Do you know where she should be?" It would be awfully useless if she didn't...

"Yes," her mother responded. "She's supposed to be in that Wizarding place but-"

"I'll find her, don't worry," Church cut in. "Give it thirty minutes tops." And he hung up the phone.

So, missing in Diagon working on that bloody painting. seemed simple enough. Quickly Church rolled out of bed and onto his feet and dressed. For a moment he stared at himself in the mirror considering what he was wearing. "Wait, the hell am I doing?" he asked himself before shaking his head and grabbing his wand. He took a step forward and with a pop-

-he was in a departed Diagon, after dark. Not really caring that he had slept all day, Church illuminated his wand and briskly headed towards where the murals were supposed to be. It didn't look as if anyone was here... wait. Someone was lying in a heap behind a few rubbish bins across. "No..." Church hissed, going so far as apparating across the street.

Yes. It was Jazz. "What. The. Fuck?" Church spat as he crouched next to his friend. She seemed... solid? What kind of curse did that... Carefully Church checked her over. Everything was taken, her rings, her necklaces... her wand. "God damn, Jazz, what happened to you?" he asked her motionless form.

There wasn't anything Church could think of that would fix her. "Okay," Church said to himself. Gently he dis his best to lift her very statuesque form and wrap an arm around it. Honestly he wasn't sure if this would work, but what else could he do? Focusing hard he pictured his destination and spun on the spot.

Reappearing at St. Mungos.

-End-