Muggle Summer
Disclaimer: Not my characters, no money being made, etc., etc.
Chapter 42: Queer Eye for the Mad-Eye
5:45pm, Monday, July 2
15, Bressenden Place, London
"Wally!"
Special Agent Jackson smiled as he crossed the threshold of one of his favorite London pubs. The fact that he looked nothing like the overweight actor that portrayed Norm on the Yank television show was annoying, but not enough for him to not play along with the running gag.
The publican drew a pint of ale as Wally walked towards his usual seat, and asked, "What's up, Mr. Jackson?"
Wally looked over the crowd of mostly middle-aged men and let out an overly dramatic sigh. "Certain not my interest, given the ugly mugs sported by you lot."
The other pub patrons laughed, and responded with their own blunt assessments of Wally's fashion sense as he took a seat at the bar. He bantered back and forth with a few as he scanned the room for potential threats. The only thing that looked out of place was a handsome blonde-haired man that was nursing a beer and scowling at anyone and everyone who made the mistake of getting within five feet from his position in a corner booth.
On a hunch, Wally took out his mobile phone and casually pointed it towards the man as he punched buttons on the keypad. While it looked like Wally was placing a call, he had in fact activated the device's digital camera. A thin smile crossed his lips as he captured the image of a man that looked very different within the camera's viewfinder. He e-mailed the image to Harry, and then followed up with a phone call.
"Good afternoon, Lord G," Wally quietly said, once Harry had answered the call. "It appears that your guest has arrived early and is sporting one of those glamour charms."
"I expected as much," Harry replied. "So is Mad-Eye any better looking in disguise?"
Wally replied, "Perhaps better looking than he wishes, at the moment."
Harry chuckled dismissively. "Please, Wally, don't tell me that your favorite pub is the kind of place where Mad-Eye looks fetching enough to flirt with."
"Now, hush," said Wally. "I'll have you know that `The Stag' is a fine upstanding establishment."
"Not to mention the only gay bar within walking distance of Buckingham Palace," Harry snarked back. He then asked, "So should I wait until our prearranged meeting time, or do I need to rush over before he hooks up with someone?"
Wally smiled as a patron walked up to Mad-Eye's table and asked if he was looking for some company. As Moody barked out notice that he was waiting for someone, Wally replied, "No, take your time, Harry. I can always jump in if things start getting desperate."
"More like the other guys are getting desperate if they're hitting on Mad-Eye," Harry replied. "So any fashion requests, Wally?"
Wally snorted, and then said, "Oh, that Paul Smith jacket you had on today is fine. Just change into the white trousers, lose the tie, and wet down your hair."
"Anything for you Wally," Harry replied cheekily, "but no promises on the hair…see you in fifteen."
Secret Agent Jackson acknowledged Harry's promise, pocketed his mobile, and wondered whether he could expense report a second pint of ale as necessary for his undercover guise.
Meanwhile, back at Buckingham Palace's Queen's Wizard's residence, Harry closed the book he was reading and walked from the library into his bedroom. After rummaging through his closet he swapped gray trousers for white, black wingtips for black dragonhide boots, and a tie for an open collar. Knowing that it wouldn't make a bit of difference, Harry did nothing to his hair.
The ten-minute walk from palace to pub placed him in front of the meeting place just as Big Ben began tolling the hour. The pub's exterior was unassuming, and nothing at all like the kitschy seventeenth century dressings worn by other pubs in the area (who relied much more upon the patronage of tourbook-wielding tourists). If fact, given its flat face, red paint and large square windows, Harry thought it resembled the exterior of a muggle double-decker bus.
As Harry entered the pub he caught the eye of more than the two people inside that he knew. He would, if asked, have blamed it on his designer clothes (despite Hermione and Wally's frequently-offered assessments that he was easy on the eyes of either sex). But Harry was too busy following Wally's eyes towards the retired-Auror's location to notice that others were in the room. Wally remained at the bar as Harry walked confidently up to the Moody's table and asked, "Looking for some company, handsome?"
Mad-eye scowled and replied. "More like I'm looking to hex the boy who arranged for this meeting place."
Harry laughed as he slid into the booth. "Then it appears we've both found what we're looking for."
A waitress came by and took Harry's drink order, which gave Mad-Eye a chance to order his fourth pint of the afternoon.
"Careful, there, Mad-Eye," Harry said once the waitress disappeared. "You wouldn't want to get too tipsy to apparate."
The retired Auror scowled. "Never been a problem before." After finishing off the pint he had been nursing he asked, "Mind telling me how you saw through my glamour, milord?"
It was Harry's turn to scowl. "Lay off the lordship, Moody. It's just me."
"Aye," Mad-Eye replied, "but the you that you appear to be has never been quick enough before to see through my glamours."
Harry shrugged his shoulders as he took out his mobile, pointed its camera lens across the table, and captured an image. He then passed the mobile to Mad-Eye and said, "Digital eyes can't be tricked by magic."
Moody held the mobile just long enough to look at the screen, then dropped it as if the muggle device would give him a rash. "So you're too good and too smart for magic now that you're the Queen's favorite wizard, eh?"
Harry shook his head as he retrieved the mobile from the table top. "Of course not," he said. "Just trying to be smart enough to find any advantage I can when it comes to fighting Dork Lords."
Mad-Eye nodded as he jerked his head Wally at the bar. "He's your man, then?" he asked.
The Queen's Wizard nodded. "Yeah, that's Wally…he was the one doing the commentary during my magic show at Ascot."
The retired Auror acknowledged the response with a grunt, then looked around and said, "You know, this lot look dodgier than what you'd find at the Hogshead."
"Hush, now, Moody," Harry replied. "How could you go wrong with a pub that shares the name of my patronus?"
"How about a pub where the patrons don't all share the same kind of plumbing?"
Harry laughed at Mad-Eye's whining. "You do have to admit that this is the last place you'd expect to find a pure-blooded homophobic Death Eater….and it's even karaoke night if we stay long enough."
When Moody failed to banter back Harry changed topics. "So how have you been doing as an de-retired Auror?"
The previously retired Auror looked around the pub, and decided that for all of it's shortcomings that it was loud enough to ensure some privacy. "It's been a right pain in the arse," he then replied. "Nothing but twelve-hour shifts since Ascot, training wet-behind-the-ears cadets and auror-wannabe's…and it only got worse today."
"How's that?" Harry asked.
Moody replied with a question of his own. "Imagine that you've heard about the Ministry's so-called intern program?"
Harry nodded. "Hermione's meeting with Ron and some of the other indentured students as we speak." He then said, "I imagine that they've asked you to train some of these pure-blood students to become Aurors?"
"More like `ordered,' rather than asked," Moody replied. "The lot of them so young and raw I half-expected them to be storing their wands in their nappies."
Harry smiled. "So you plan on whipping them into shape?"
"Whipping them is what I wish I could do," Mad-Eye replied. "With what that Umbridge woman has assigned me…if they weren't so lazy and incompetent I'd be worrying over the fact that half of them will likely be taking the Mark." In support of his assessment he handed Harry a list of names.
Harry let out a low whistle as he scanned the list of Auror Department interns. "I see what you mean," he replied. "Guess it would make too much sense to assign students that are actually good in DADA."
Moody snorted. "From what Lupin's told me, that'd be hard to do, given the fact that the only pure-bloods that were any good in defense were part of your little club."
"And therefore completely uncontrollable and unreliable from Umbitch's standpoint," Harry concluded. He then added, "Which is part of the reason why I wanted to meet with you."
Harry then gave Mad-Eye an abridged version of the presentation/sales-pitch that Hermione had made the day previous at Hogwarts.
Muggle-born students had been asking for defensive training from the earliest days of Emily Granger's organizational efforts. There was understandable (and in Harry's mind justifiable) fears that the Ministry of Magic would provide an inadequate response to any Death Eater attacks on muggle-borns and their families. The fact that the Ministry's compulsive "internship" program was restricted to pure-bloods only bolstered these fears. Harry's willingness and desire to help had been initially thwarted by the underage magic laws. That all changed when the goblins taught Hermione how to set up wards that shielded an area from the Ministry's magical sensors.
The Royal Family had offered the Queen's Wizard the use of one of their properties for establishment of a magical summer school for muggle-borns. Cumberland Lodge was former Royal residence located in Great Windsor Park, just a few miles from Windsor Castle (Harry and Hermione's morning running route, in fact, passed by it). Since it belonged to the Queen, it was easy for Harry to justify protective warding, and if the Ministry of Magic didn't notice the extra bit of warding Hermione added to shield their magical probing then it was their loss, right?
Once the idea of a magical summer school became feasible, the scope had (predictably) expanded beyond defense against the dark arts. They hoped to offer some kind of instruction in all of the magical arts, save for divination (at Hermione's insistence). And even that would be reconsidered should they be able to convince Firenze to join them. They planned on a six-week session, from the middle of July right up to the departure of the Hogwarts Express on September 1 (should the school reopen that fall).
"And you're telling me about this for a reason, I imagine?" Mad-Eye asked.
Harry nodded. "We're recruiting potential staff, and there's a few of us who wouldn't mind learning from the real Alastor Moody."
Mad-Eye grinned. "What, that Barty Crouch Jr. didn't channel my thoughts well enough for you?"
Harry shook his head and smiled. His retort was interrupted by the waitress, who had been thoughtful enough to bring the two a second (and fifth, in Moody's case) round. During that time, Harry heard a soft whirring coming across the table and assumed that the retired auror's glamoured magical eye was giving him a thorough inspection. The frown that Mad-Eye sported as that eye focused on Harry's jacket suggested that he saw something rather disagreeable.
Moody then quietly asked, "And will this school of yours be teaching kiddies how to use muggle weapons like that toy that you're hiding under your jacket?"
Harry raised an eyebrow. "First off, the answer is no on firearms training. But more importantly, are you thinking that my Browning 9mm doesn't have enough stopping power?"
"What I think is that you're daft to be carrying a muggle firearm in the first place," Mad-Eye replied tersely. "Do you even know what happens to wizards that use guns instead of their wands?"
Harry gave a slight nod as he closed his eyes for a half-second. "Yes, Hermione has made me fully aware that the wizard who uses a gun against another wizard is signing his own death warrant…even if it's in self-defense."
"And so she's told you that even carrying a weapon like that sets a wizard up for treatment as a pariah?"
"Yes, Mother," Harry replied with a rueful grin. "Though I dare say the wizarding world already thinks of me in those terms."
Moody shook his head back and forth as he took a long draw from his glass. "That's not something to be glib about, laddie…for all of their depravity even the Death Eaters refuse to use those things."
"Probably because the pure-blooded bigots couldn't imagine it'd do them any good to use a muggle weapon," Harry replied.
"And they'd be wrong?" asked the retired Auror.
"Alastor, Alastor, Alastor," Harry replied. "You sound like Molly Weasley on polyjuice…surely over the course of your career you've seen what a modern firearm can do in a fight?"
"Aye, nothing that well-placed hex couldn't," the retired Auror replied.
Harry snorted. "So you can teach me a hex that would fill Fenir Grayback full of silver slugs the next time I meet him?"
Moody cocked his head and closed his good eye as he thought for a moment. He then replied, "So you think the Ministry's own laws can be used against them?"
Harry shrugged. "I'm not looking to find out, but if it comes to it, then yes." He took a sip of his own beverage and then added, "They can't have it both ways, Mad-eye…if they want to discriminate against lycanthropes and consider them to be beasts rather than humans…"
"Then you can't be charged with using a muggle weapon against a wizard," Mad-Eye replied. "Makes sense, though I don't like it one bit."
"Why is that?"
Mad-Eye shook his head. "I suppose you've spent some time learning how to use that thing?"
Harry nodded. "About an hour of training every day for the past couple of weeks."
"So have you spent the same amount of time working on your spell casting?" Mad-Eye asked.
Harry shook his head. "No, can't say that I have…Hermione and I have been rather busy."
"Busy doing something more important than readying yourself to fight Voldemort?"
"Maybe not more important," Harry admitted. "But I'd wager you'd consider it nearly so."
The retired Auror shook his head dismissively and rolled his non-magical eye. "I'm listening, then," he said.
"Well," Harry began, "aside from creating and executing the plan that resulted in the death or capture of more than a hundred Death Eaters…"
Mad-Eye brushed the quip away with a wave of a hand. "That was two weeks ago," he said. "Been busy resting on your laurels?"
"No, not at all," Harry said defensively. "Though it'd be fair to point out that we haven't heard word of any Death Eater attack anywhere in Britain since then."
When Mad-Eye rolled his hand around in a "get-to-the-point" gesture, Harry added, "Well, aside from learning how to mask our magic use underneath protective warding, setting up various types of surveillance systems, and setting up defensive perimeters for Hogwarts, we've been working with the muggles on some protective equipment."
"Too lazy to duck when a spell's thrown your way, then?"
"No," Harry replied, "just trying to protect ourselves from the killing curse."
"What?" Mad-Eye asked incredulously.
"The killing curse," Harry repeated. "You know, Avada Kadavra, nasty green beam that kills on contact unless you're a boy-who-lived…"
"I know the curse, boy," Mad-Eye growled. "I was asking what makes you think that muggles can produce a defense against a curse that can't be defended against."
Harry smiled. "But Mad-Eye, you know that's not really the case, right?" he asked. "Besides from ducking, there's always hiding behind something solid."
"Or summoning something solid in the curse's path," Mad-Eye said with an approving nod.
"And that's the rub," Harry replied. "I've seen the spell stopped by a brass statue, and I've seen it swallowed up whole by a phoenix. But I've also seen it set a wooden desk aflame, and we all know that the curse isn't stopped by normal clothing."
Mad-Eye nodded. "I could add a few items to that list, you know."
"We were hoping you would say that," Harry replied. "Muggles have protective armor that will stop a bullet, but we haven't a clue if it is solid enough to stop the curse."
"So what do you want from me, then?" Mad-Eye asked.
"Well, that list of things solid enough to stop an AK," Harry replied. "Or better you're your pensieved memories of battles where the killing curse has been tossed about."
The retired Auror thought for a few moments. "Can't say I like the idea of giving this kind of information to the muggles…never know when they might turn on the wizarding world."
Harry shook his head. "And on the other side I've got muggles worried about letting wizards know they aren't as helpless as they're thought to be…c'mon Mad-Eye, work with me here."
Moody frowned, finished off the contents of his pint glass, then said, "I'll get you the memories if you promise me that it'll just be you and your lassie taking a peak."
Harry nodded. "Fair enough," he said. "Oh, and there's one more thing I need to ask."
"What's that then."
"Erm…we were wondering if you'd be willing to help us test prototypes."
Moody raised an eyebrow. "What, you want me to wear this muggle armor and bait a Death Eater into cursing me?"
"No, no…other way around," Harry replied. "The thing is, I don't know too many people who have ever cast the killing curse before, so I was wondering…"
"Yes, laddie, I've used that spell once or twice in my day," Moody admitted. "So you want me to curse somebody while they're wearing your contraption?"
"If it wouldn't be too much to ask," Harry said quietly.
Mad-Eye snorted. "And who would be dressed to be killed?"
Harry shrugged his shoulders. "Still working on that one…we're thinking maybe of transfiguring some pigs."
"You want me to do a pig?" Mad-Eye barked, loud enough to catch the attention of some of the pub's other patrons. The wizard then sat befuddled as laughs and catcalls were thrown back at him.
"What'd I say?" he asked Harry.
"Erm, must have been a punchline to a joke," Harry said, trying to suppress his own laughter.
Mad-Eye sighed, then said, "I should be the one laughing at you."
"Why's that?"
The retired Auror shook his head. "Did that Death Eater teach you nothing about Unforgivables?" he asked rhetorically. "Can you even tell me how the killing curse kills?"
"Erm, sure," Harry replied. "The Avada Kadavra curse kills by separating the soul from the target's body."
"Exactly," Mad-Eye replied. "So can you tell me why that spell might not work on a pig?"
Harry paused, then turned a bit red with embarrassment. "Because pigs don't have souls to separate from bodies."
Mad-Eye nodded. "Now, you go find me a nasty enough Death Eater, and we'd be talking."
"Really?" Harry asked.
Mad-Eye shrugged. "It's war," he explained, "and I'm tired of capturing Death Eaters just so they can be sent to Azkaban and escape."
Harry nodded in agreement. "Well, we had a few low-level recruits for a while, but we gave them back to the MLE…I'll put you down for some provisional target practice, then."
Mad-Eye nodded, and was about to catch the waitress's attention for another round when Wally left the bar and joined-in on their conversation.
"Hate to interrupt, Lord G" Wally said with a grin, "but Dame Hermione did ask that I ensure you return to the Palace with your wits about you."
Harry rolled his eyes as Mad-Eye let out a hearty laugh. "Mothers…surrounded by mothers, I am," Harry lamented.
Wally smirked as he put his arm around Harry's shoulder and brought him into a loose embrace.
"Now, now, Harry," he chided as he fluttered his eyebrows. "You wouldn't want me any other way…or would you?"
Harry grinned. "Sorry, Wally, but you know that I'm taken." He then pointed his thumb towards Mad-Eye and added, "but this handsome man might appreciate your charms."
Wally chuckled as he waved his mobile phone towards the retired Auror for another look underneath the glamour.
"Your friend might better appreciate some fashion tips," he quipped.
AlastorMoody sat gobsmacked, trying to figure out not just if he had been insulted, but whether or not he should care.
Wally then said, "So Mr. Moody, be a love and tell me more about this glamour charm."
Mad-Eye hesitantly asked, "What you want to know?"
"Well," Wally replied, "I was wondering what would happen if I tried to give you a kiss…would my lips touch the handsome prince's or those of the frog that lies underneath?"
When Mad-Eye let out a growl Harry figured that it was a good time to demonstrate that he was still a wizard. The sticking charm (cast under-the-table) that kept Moody in place while he and Wally made their escape worked like…well, it worked like a charm.
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A/N: In case anyone is making travel plans, there actually is a gay bar near Buckingham Palace that is called, "The Stag" (or so I've read, on the internet). Amazing how these things sort of fall into place…
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