The parchment cupboard was dark, as was usual for a parchment cupboard. The fidgety bodies pressed up against one another as the larger, robed body pushed the smaller body topped with a mop of flouncy hair further into the tiny, dark parchment cupboard.

A clattering of shelves was sounded in the darkness followed by a loud expletive formed by a strongly accented voice. Two large hands reached out, clasping the shoulders of the shorter, slighter figure and they applied pressure, pushing this smaller, cloaked figure into a seat specially prepared for it in the tiny, dark parchment cupboard.

The darkness held a musty, stale smell which lingered and forced itself into the nostrils of both figures as the taller one closed in on the shorter one, leaning over their bulk to clasp two dainty hands pushing back against the larger figure’s imposing chest. A large hand caught one target and a charm was gruffly muttered, causing a tiny spark to light up the end of a dark wooden wand, revealing a rope snaking from the tip and ravelling itself around one pale wrist and the arm of the chair it had been forced against. The second wrist was also attached to the second wooden arm with less of a struggle.

With the smaller figure forcefully in place, the larger figure stood back to survey his handiwork in the shadowed darkness. Once satisfied, the figure once more loomed closer and with a gruff hand, pulled the hat from the eyes it had previously covered and threw the woollen monstrosity into the lap of his victim.

“Lumos.” The tip of the wand instantly lit, casting the beam directly towards the eyes of Madam Fauna Blake.

“For my personal record,” the voice began coldly, only a hint of its previously heavy northern accent sugaring the tone. “state your name, age, sock size, preferred breed of puffskein and favourite auror.”

The voice paused in momentary consideration. “Answer carefully.”

The first few days of Fauna's first week of Auror Training had passed smoothly. Too smoothly. The Aurors hadn't demanded much of them yet, and she was still rather surprised that her NEWT results and meeting the group at the Ministry Mixer had gotten her foot in the door. Fauna had expected a grueling interview, an exam, or some kind of welcoming ceremony before she was trusted to handle their coffee. But no, they'd just specified their sugar and cream preferences, and in one case, ordered her to hide Bailey's steaming coffee mug in Samuel Harcoft's filing cabinet. She'd pretended to misunderstand.

Then there were the rumors. Some said that the new trainees were going to be forced to compete with each other in a mock tournament like the one they were planning at Hogwarts. Others mentioned boggarts and dementors, or a saloon-style shoot out.

The rumors were furthest from her mind as she stepped out of the Ministry late that night, having stayed a little while longer than her housemates in an attempt to make a good impression. She was worrying about walking home alone, and studying the street ahead of her, when she was grabbed from behind.

Her hat was pulled over her eyes, her curses were Silencioed, and strong hands propelled her back into the Ministry, where the faint dings of the lifts sounded and memos fluttered by her ears. She slipped a bit on the polished floor as she kicked out a few times, heart racing. Fauna didn't know what to think. Criminals would have taken her to Knockturn. Aurors wouldn't pull kidnapping pranks. Even Bagnold wasn't this much of an arse.

A few minutes later she was dumped unceremoniously into a chair, breathing in what smelled like an old library. She tried saying something, but no sound came out. Sweat dripped down her back and she tensed as her hands were tied to the chair. 

Suddenly the hat came off her head and light shone in her eyes. Fauna squinted and blinked away the spots, trying to get a look at the grave face studying her.

Fauna ignored any humor meant in the questions and simply stared at him for a few moments, her expression slowly shifting from fear and confusion to anger. She recognized him as Eddie Pratt, one of the Aurors that Brett really liked.

"What the fecking hell?!" Fauna got her voice back, though it was shaky. Her eyes were a little too bright and her face was flushed. She curled her legs slightly underneath the chair, the tips of her toes touching the floor.

"This is not funny! What the hell?" It was embarrassing, it was strange, and it was not a part of her job description! She glared at him, looking every inch like a moody teenager who was going to make things difficult.

Now Edward Pratt had endured 32 painful years of listening to females of the race shouting at him. Brooklynn Pratt had been a loud, feisty mother with two small and soon teenaged boys to keep under control and Edward Pratt had been a nightmare to control. Upon arriving at Hogwarts, the evil Slytherin girls had very quickly found out how fun it was to shout at young, extremely innocent blond haired boys.

But it got worse.

Signing a marriage licence was like signing one’s peace and quiet away. It was signing away a smooth, nag free, shout free life. It was handing one’s masculinity, coming in the shape of one round ball like object, to the woman one had foolishly fallen in love with. This suicidal pact, referred to as marriage, appeared to come with the unwritten, unspoken rules that the female now held the right to shout and nag the male until he was ready to hand over the second round object.

Kids followed, small curly brown haired girls to be particular who would shout at their beloved, much respected father if they were not given a chocolate frog before their main meal. And now it appeared that once more teenagers had decided to join the cycle and were shouting at Edward Pratt.

Fortunately one did not endure 32 years of female noise without being able to ignore it. Any man would agree. The initial expletive did however cause the auror to take one unsteady step back away from yet another angry female in his life.

"And I’m not laughin’ Miss Blake.” The auror responded calmly, the northern accent once more grounding itself. “Answer me questions Miss Blake or I’ll get Bailey in here to make you instead.”

Fauna blinked in surprise when the Auror took a slight step away from her, talking with his usual accent in a calm tone. The threat of bringing Bailey in didn't sound like much of a threat, but Fauna wasn't sure what to make of it, and glanced at the cupboard door, wondering who else was in the office.

"Why am I here?" Her voice caught as she stared at him. She'd met Pratt at the SAWS questioning, then at the career fair and the Ministry mixer. Brett had really liked him, and Fauna had appreciated his taste in hats and his joking demeanor, but this went too far for her liking.

"You don't care what my, I don't know, favorite puffskein is," she said heatedly. "I mean, you had all day to ask me like a normal person, but instead you... drag me off the street like a creeper!"

Fauna moved to cross her arms, but couldn't, so she settled for sending him an accusing glare.

Fauna Blake didn’t answer Eddie’s questions. She just stayed angry and shouted at him. She even called the handsome blonde auror before her a creeper! Well that wasn’t very nice! Eddie lowered his wand light from her eyes and pursed his lips together, this wasn’t how one was supposed to deal with such a stressful situation. She was doing it all wrong.

Next Blake scowled at her recently acquired colleague like a petulant teenage girl having a temper tantrum. And as she scowled at him Eddie very quickly realised she was a petulant teenage girl that was scowling at him from a chair she was tied to.

Green eyes instantly widened as realisation hit and the auror’s spare hand nervously brushed through the scruffy dark blond hair adoring his head.

Well this was awkward.

“I ‘ent a creeper.” The wizard muttered quietly before pointing his wand at the light above their heads and muttering a charm to brighten the small cupboard. Instantly the tiny room was basked in a bright light, illuminating the shelves of parchment, quills, ink pots and the mess Ed had made knocking over a few selves upon his entrance. In the light it felt even smaller than before and Eddie was very quickly beginning to feel like a creeper as he looked down from his standing position at one of their newest recruits.

Perhaps there was a reason Edward Pratt was not normally in charge of Aurors-in-training.

“My auror interviews were much worse than this, lass, and I didn’t insult me superiors.” The auror stated gruffly, folding his arms over his chest.

She heard him mutter something, caught the word 'creeper', and then the lights turned on above, making her squint and blink again. Fauna risked a glance up at the Auror, who seemed defensive.

An interview? A new kind of panic washed over her, mixing in with all the other unpleasant emotions.

"What?" Fauna's eyes widened. She pursed her lips and blinked rapidly, swallowing the lump in her throat. Perhaps she should have performed some feat of super strength and disarmed the Auror outside, or cut away the ropes with a sheet of parchment. But unfortunately, she couldn't do any of those things. She was going to mess up her interview, and it was his fault, because he was offended by his own denseness!

"I don't care how your interviews went, ok? I want out of here. So if you won't do it, then... go ahead and get Bailey." Maybe the redhead was sane. Fauna shot Pratt a miserable glare, and briefly entertained the thought of kicking him. Knowing her, she'd just overturn her chair.

It was a rather well known fact that Edward didn’t really show an incredible respect for authority, those above him. He had a tendancy to avoid bosses and senior aurors were just playthings with their heads stuck so far up their rear ends they were able to catch their breakfast once more before it reached the stomach.  This however, this display of disrespect towards someone that knew an incredible amount more that her was truly taking the biscuit. Eddie hadn’t been on this side before. He hadn’t been allowed to interview a trainee before.

“You want out of here?” the auror blinked, somewhat taken aback by Fauna’s sudden proclamation. She wanted to leave so soon? Well Ed was fairly positive he’d never seen a trainee last this little time. They all made it through the first week normally before they decided it was too much for them. Fauna Blake was quite the disappointment.

Pratt’s arms were already crossed but if they hadn’t been, he’d have crossed them again. “You only started this week, lass. That’s a quick decision even for a hormonal teenage girl.” And Edward certainly hoped his daughter never became quite so...shouty and grumpy. One could hope. One thing was for sure, she would never be meeting miss ‘you’re a creeper’ Blake.

“If this is because you think I’m a creeper, Blake, I ‘ent.” The auror unfolded his arms and pointed his wand at Blake’s left wrist. “I’m a Dad” he added, as if the two were mutually exclusive.

Fauna could only stare at him like he was off his rocker as he kept arguing with her, assuming she wanted out of the Auror program entirely. At this point, the Auror training program was not her main concern.

He seemed completely unable to relate to her feelings and focused instead on not looking like a bad guy, which just made everything worse. Pratt could be Helga Hufflepuff or Cinaed Tawse; it made no difference. She wanted out of the damn cupboard.

"Are you going to let me go, then? Please?" With effort, she fixed her expression into something less angry and wary, and glanced at the wand in his hand, refraining from asking if he tied up his kids and shoved them into cupboards too.

This kid had been far too easy to scare. Scarily easy to scare. She’d given in before they’d even started the interview properly and Eddie had hoped to give a damn stressful interview like the ones he’d had as a trainee. He was thoroughly disappointed if he were to be honest. The teenager simply didn’t even consider the trouble he’d gone to in order to prepare this interview for her. She didn’t realise how much he’d thought about the questions to test her, to analyse her and to help build her confidence in becoming an auror.

She just didn’t seem bothered.

“Okay.” Pratt responded plainly to the young girl’s request. His left wrist twisted as the wand remained pointed on Blake’s left wrist and the ropes disintegrated. The same was done for the right wrist and instead of pocketing his wand; Ed kept it out in case this angry little witch decided to seek revenge for being scared.

“Ye’ll need to write an official letter to Raynor with yer resignation, lass. And she’ll not be impressed. Ye’ve wasted a space that could have been used for someone more committed to becoming an auror.” And Edward certainly didn’t want to explain to his boss why this young girl had thrown in the towel so early.

The second the Auror vanquished the ropes, Fauna stood on shaky legs, rubbed at one of her wrists, and had her hand on the doorknob when he spoke. She paused as the words sunk in, then pushed open the door and headed into the bright corridor leading to the cubicles.
 
All she wanted to do was go home and cry like the 'hormonal teenager' she was. As she glanced around at the rows of empty desks and put her floppy hat back on her head, Fauna suddenly turned around and crossed her arms.
 
"I'm not resigning," Fauna told him, eyes bright with emotion. "Yeah, I'll talk to Raynor, and ask if all of this is... the norm. And if it is, then good job, you've gotten rid of me."

She took a deep breath and shook her head, "But I mean, you don't tie up your kids and shove them into closets, do you? You don't even do that to criminals!"

They had cells and interrogation rooms for that. Fauna wasn't sure why she was still trying to reason with him when they'd hit such an impasse earlier, and all logic pointed to her going home. In some ways though, she was just as stubborn as Pratt.

Fauna Blake wasn’t resigning? She was stood here whining at Eddie about closets and criminals and threatening telling on him to the miniature dragon residing in the office on the other side of the cubicles. Eddie had untied her and let her out of the cupboard through the belief that she had wimped out, was scared and had decided to resign, thus not continuing her training to be an auror and therefore not be in need of a interview with him. He’d been nice to her and she was still whinging much like his own seven year old daughter did when she was on the verge of throwing another one of her tantrums!

Instead of resembling a deer caught in the headlights, Eddie decided he was not going to bow down to Miss ‘you’re a creeper’ Blake. He frowned, looking mildly perturbed as dark blond brows knitted together and his forehead creased, producing heavy frown lines. “You mean that’s not normal?” He demanded before folding his arms and shaking his head as if in disbelief and denial. “Nah, yer ‘avin me on. My kids bloody love our cupboards at home.”

It took a moment before the auror rolled his eyes. “Of course I bloody well don’t, Blake. It were like a question in an interview. Which told me a hellova lot more than ye could say wi’words.” Perhaps Pratt should have been a keeper on his quidditch team at school instead? He was fairly certain he was making a good save now.

“So why did ye find that so scary? Ye weren’t in any danger and yet ye still panicked. Ye riled the person you perhaps should have been calmly speaking to. Do you think you handled that situation well or badly?”

Fauna glanced down at his sarcastic comment about his kids, feeling miserable and embarrassed, yet still angry. He asked why she'd been scared, and Fauna gaped at him, having no idea how to put it into words that he'd understand. Pratt didn't seem like the understanding sort. He was an Auror in his thirties who had lived through a lot, and couldn't seem to relate to a trainee, let alone a teenage girl trainee. He'd asked, but he'd done it in a way that made it clear he thought she was overreacting.

"I don't know how else you expect me to respond!" Her cheeks flushed as she yet again avoided his questions. "I've just joined this training thing. I don't know you. At least not well. Even if I wasn't in danger, I still wouldn't want to sit in there like that!"

Pratt hadn't seen her panic yet. Panic involved screaming and crying. This had been 'flustered', going by Fauna's definition.

"How well do you reckon you handled it?" She shot back rashly. "Getting riled because I was scared?"

Of course, the smart thing to do was argue with him about it.

“See now, I weren’t riled.” The auror began, now leaning against the door to the cupboard they’d been in mere moments ago. Fauna Blake seemed to Eddie like an alien species. She couldn’t have been any less comprehensible to him right then. She was a teenage girl with a dislike of cupboards, handsome aurors and seemed to have signed up to corps with no real knowledge about what could happen to her at any moment of any day.

“But I could ‘ave bin’. If I were a criminal and that situation had of bin’ real, ye’d be dead right now, lass.” Eddie matter of factly stated before shrugging his shoulders as if it were simply normal, obvious. “Ye don’t escape many situations alive if ye call yer captive a creeper, after all.” In reality Fauna Blake was in fact very lucky this had happened to her before she got into the real training. He’d saved her life because if she did change her mind and decide to continue with her training, she knew what not to say should she ever be taken captive in the future.

Once he’d stopped speaking, Pratt surveyed Fauna analytically, silently deciding upon his next move. He stood up straight away from the cupboard and took a step towards Fauna, looking down at her.
“Do you still want to become an auror?” Right now Miss ‘you’re a creeper’ Blake was as suited to the career as a dragon was to fitting in her auror robes. Yet there was still possibly hope. If Eddie was honest, he didn’t want to scare off the trainees and he didn’t want Tamis Raynor breathing down his neck for doing so.

A softer expression graced the auror’s features. “If so, we can start again, my cubicle, no cupboards. But I ‘ent goin easy on no questions, we’re lookin’ for investigators, fighters, not prissy teenage girls.”-

Eddie Pratt's logic failed to make any sense to her. Who knew kidnappers and criminals took such offense at minor name calling? What if she had called him an arsehole, or a barmy creeper? She'd be dead twice over!

Fauna opened her mouth, then shut it. She took a slight step back when he stepped forward, hearing his question, but remaining silent as she thought about it. This wasn't fair. He didn't understand. Pratt thought he was doing her some kind of favor, when from her side of things he'd scared the hell out of her, pissed her off, and insulted her all in the last ten minutes or so.

This past year she was discovering that the adult wizarding world was almost stranger than the teenage one. As a student she'd learned to speak up, only to have to shut up now that she was out of Hogwarts. Raynor would listen, she probably would, but Fauna worried that if she complained, the other Aurors would see her as a whiner who couldn't make it through her interview.

"Fine," Fauna muttered in a defeated tone. "Yeah, I want to be an Auror. That's the only reason why I haven't walked out."

She glanced at him, still looking wary and defensive. "But... I won't call you a creeper if you won't call me a prissy teenage girl, alright?"

For at least a minute, even though Ed considered waiting for longer, the blond auror studied the girl stood before him, watching him with the eyes of a rabbit dumbstruck by a lumos spell. The auror seemed to be considering his part of this bargain. It was an unfair one. Edward Pratt was not a creeper. Fauna Blake was, as far as she had shown her auror interviewer, a prissy teenage girl. Right now the auror struggled to think up a synonym to ‘prissy’ other than ‘woman’ and simply frowned in defeat as his bright green eyes studied her.

A sigh escaped Pratt’s lips and he shrugged his shoulders.

“I don’t make promises I can’t keep. Prove ye ‘ent prissy and I’ll find summit’ else to call ye.” With that, the auror walked past her and around the large collection of cubicles to his, very conveniently situated on the opposite end of the office to Madam Tamis Raynor. He stepped inside, dropped into the chair and swivelled to face the reluctantly following witch.

A wand was pulled out from his robe pocket and Eddie accioed a chair from another cubicle which landed delicately at his feet, waiting for the prissy teenage princess to take her throne.

“If you want a coffee that’s your job to collect them but I’d rather not waste even more time. I’ve someone at home relying on my return home soon.” Winston had no doubt already begun to dine on Ed’s newest pair of slippers.

“Now,” Pratt began as he swivelled back to face the desk, took a sheet of parchment and a quill, dipped his quill in ink and span back to face Blake “state your name, age, sock size, preferred breed of puffskein and favourite auror.”