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Their breath rose in a thinning fog as it drifted upwards into the faces of the three monsters hovering not ten feet above them, the frigid air ironically enough the only thing keeping all four members of the A-Team from freezing on the spot. Another second passed as they all eyed the various sizes and shapes of the pieces of wood held in the others’ hands, before all four wands were pointed at the dark figures in unison.
“EXPECTO PATRONUM!” Hannibal’s voice was the first to boom into the icy air as he recalled his happiest memory. Constant vigilance his uncle had always said and, once again, Alastor Moody’s paranoia was dead on. A silver wolf charged the small faction of dark creatures, soon joined by a badger, a hummingbird and a fox. The chill in the air slowly dissipated as the Dementors retreated under the onslaught of four well-trained wizards.
“Jesus!” Face cried, unsure what surprised him most—the fact that they were attacked by Dementors in the middle of Sarasota, Florida or that his teammates were all wielding wands as comfortably as they did their M-9s.
“You got some splainin’ to do!” Murdock agreed, his shaken confidence showing in the waver of his voice. Hannibal’s smile was grimmer than usual as he put his wand away and took a cigar from the inside pocket of his green jacket.
“Man, Murdock was crazy enough without magic!” B.A. whined, placing his own oak wand away.
Face’s disbelieving, half-smile still hung doggedly upon his face until Hannibal gently closed his Lieutenant’s mouth with a curved finger. After that they all seemed to gradually relax, until they were once again a seamlessly fluid and efficient alpha unit. They made their way to this week’s temporary base—at the home of their current client—and made their way straight to the basement for some privacy.
“Alright, who wants to show off first?” Murdock grinned, taking his baseball cap off his head and pulling a seven inch willow wand from its depths. Hannibal matched his expression and wordlessly cast an Imperturbable Charm on the door. He sat on the low-slung tweed couch next to Face, who was agitatedly tapping a slender birch wand on his knee.
“You’re gonna blow your knee off, kid.” Face’s only response was an obscene gesture that made B.A. chuckle.
“Alright, bossman, since when are you a wizard?” Murdock finally asked. He pulled his feet up and under him so he was sitting cross-legged on the squishy armchair B.A. had just conjured for himself. The sergeant growled menacingly at Murdock, until the pilot quickly produced a larger version of the recliner for him.
Hannibal waited for B.A. to settle grudgingly into the newly conjured chair. “My mother and I moved to Northern Ireland when I was seven years old, and four years later I received my Hogwarts letter by owl. My mother was a Muggle and my dad didn’t stick around long enough to warn us about his lineage. Once it was determined I was magical, my dad’s brother Alastor came to visit us from Britain and answer all our questions. We moved in with him soon after so I wouldn’t have to travel far to school.”
“Hold on!” Face held up his hands. “You’re not talking about Alastor Mad-Eye Moody, are you?” B. A. stopped glaring at Murdock to look interestedly at Hannibal.
The pilot merely looked puzzled, “Mad-Eye?”
Hannibal nodded slowly. “The very same. The man was more paranoid than J. Edgar Hoover, but he was the best Auror the Ministry had ever seen. From what I hear from my mother, Harry Potter and Ron Weasley are a pretty formidable team now and would give him a run for his money. I graduated and moved to America a couple of years before they arrived.”
“Them I’ve heard of,” Murdock confirmed. “I think I’d have loved to meet your uncle though. Mad-Eye Moody and Howling Mad Murdock for the win!”
“Like this world needs any more of your crazy.” B.A. folded his arms over his chest and scowled.
Face grinned cheekily at his CO. “Let me guess. The second that Sorting Hat touched your head it shouted ‘GRYFFINDOR’?”
“More or less.” Hannibal looked pleased with himself. “I realize I may not have been around when you were sorted, but from your lack of knowledge of Auror Moody I’d say you didn’t go to Hogwarts, Murdock.”
“Nope! I got shipped to the Neptunian Academy of Magic in Southern California when I was thirteen.” Murdock grinned and reached into his back pocket for his worn, leather wallet. He tapped it smartly with his wand and an extra pocket revealed itself that none of the other team members had ever seen before. He pulled out a few photos and passed them around. “This one’s the Academy. It’s located close to the bottom of the ocean, so we haven’t had a lot of Muggle traffic until recently with those newfangled submarines they’ve got. My whole family’s pretty much magical, except for a couple of cousins we don’t see very often. Those are my parents posing with the Merfolk. I haven’t seen ‘em for a while, and they don’t understand why I keep running away from the Muggle MPs when I could just as easily use a Fidelius or memory charm.”
“You didn’t want to leave us Muggles by ourselves?” B.A. half-joked and chuckled at Murdock’s confirming nod.
“Where did you go to school, B.A?” Face asked. He leaned his forearms on his knees, having finally relaxed and stopped his agitated wand-tapping.
“Durmstrang,” B.A. growled. “And I’m glad I’m back in the U.S. Too many damn fools practicing the Dark Arts like they’re all the next Grindelwald.”
“What the hell were you doing in Sweden?” Face asked and Hannibal rose an eyebrow in curiosity.
“Y’all know my dad was an Army man. He was based in Norway, so it wasn’t a long jump to Durmstrang. He was a hard worker, so he really appreciated the way Muggles did everything without magic. Part of the reason he joined the military was to use his healing skills to save their lives. He and my mom both come from a long line of powerful witches and wizards, so the Highmaster did everything he could to get me to go to the school. My pop had no desire to send me to a place that doesn’t admit Muggle-borns and promotes dark magic, but the Highmaster threatened the Muggle soldiers in his unit.” B.A. shrugged.
“Was it Karkaroff?” Hannibal asked, a strange look on his face. The sergeant nodded.
“Who?” Face asked.
B.A. scowled. “Igor Karkaroff.”
“Bless you,” Murdock added half-heartedly, patting B.A. on the large, beefy arm nearest him.
“I repeat—who?” Face responded with a grin.
“Death Eater,” Hannibal grunted. He extracted another cigar from inside his jacket, looked up at the ceiling and promptly put it back; he decided facing their client’s wrath was a strong deterrent for vice. She had a strict NO SMOKING policy, and she was a formidable woman. “And killed by his own comrades.” He looked at B.A. when he said this, and the Sergeant’s lips
twisted into a mildly cruel smile.
“Pop would’a been happy to hear that.”
“Faceman?”
Face looked over at Murdock and raised his eyebrows, “Moi?”
“Mmhmm.”
Face leaned back with a large smile, resting against the back of the couch with his arms behind his head. “Weeellll, remember that time I got captured and locked into a room full of MPs and I escaped in five minutes without telling you how?”
“Which time?” Hannibal’s tone was dry, but his eyes were dancing with amusement.
“Weeellll,” Face repeated, his voice drifting off playfully. They all stared at him expectantly, waiting for him to finish his damn sentence. Then they all started to notice something odd. Murdock, B.A. and Hannibal never really noticed how attractive Face was. How vibrantly his skin shone, even in the dim lighting of the basement, how perfectly straight his teeth were, how soft his hair looked, how deep a blue his eyes were. Once they started staring they really couldn’t stop.
Constant vigilance, Alastor Moody’s voice popped into Hannibal’s mind and he shut his eyes and plugged his ears quickly. “Face! We get the point. Now cut it out!” After a moment, one of his eyes squinted open. Face looked like he usually did—gorgeous, but nothing to siege Troy over. “That was totally unnecessary.”
Face, his arms and lap full of confused Murdock, gave Hannibal a saucy grin and a wink, “But oh, so fun.”
“What just happened?” B.A. asked, for once abandoning his growl in light of his complete bewilderment.
“Face is part Veela!” Murdock crowed excitedly, still comfortably seated in the Lieutenant’s lap. “I always joked to myself that he must be because—well—look at this cute little face.” Murdock pinched Face’s cheeks, before jumping off of his lap and back onto his previously abandoned armchair.
B.A. groaned and rested his head in his hands. “I did not need this today.”
“My great-grandmother was a Veela who moved from France to Canada when she was sixteen to work for the local wand maker in Montreal, my great-grandfather. So I was born and raised in America, but went to visit the wizarding community in Canada every summer. She’s still alive and kicking, Great-Grandma, but you never want to make her mad.” Face shuddered.
“Anyway, I got invited to the tiny magical academy in Old Montreal when I was twelve and the program lasts until you’re sixteen so—after that I decided I wanted less snow and more action and moved to the States permanently to join the army. You should have seen the size of the fireballs she was throwing when I told her that.”
“And I suppose that Veela blood didn’t hurt when you snuck into the ranks.” Hannibal chuckled.
“Not really.” Face smirked.
Murdock sighed dramatically, “Gawd, you have no idea how hard it was not to transform in front of you guys. Planes have got nothing on actual wings.”
B.A. looked over at his friend’s relieved expression. “What are you talking about, fool?”
Murdock glanced at all of them, grinning from ear to ear, before he began to shrink and shrink and shrink. A moment later a large Swallow-tailed Hummingbird hovered delicately over the empty space where Murdock had just sat.
“I should’ve known,” Face grinned and barked out a laugh as the bird flew in quick circles around the small room. “Of course Murdock would turn into the only bird capable of flying backwards.” The hummingbird let out a few excited tiks in response and performed an elaborate loop in midair.
“I’ll admit, it’ll be useful for missions where scouting is required.” Hannibal chuckled as he watched Murdock hover around B.A. like a large insect, the big man swatting unsuccessfully at the airborne animal. “It’s more useful than mine. People tend to notice a wolf walking down the street.”
“Nah! Only if it’s carrying a cigar.” Face shrugged. “Animagus Transfiguration was never covered in our curriculum.”
“Well, since most people share their Animagus form with their Patronus animal, yours would probably be a fox. I can teach you, if we get the time.”
“Really?” Face’s entire demeanor grew brighter with excitement, and all three of his companions
noticed the faint glow of his skin now that they knew what to look for.
“You too, B.A., if you don’t know how. It’s a useful skill to have.”
“Badger, badger, badger, badger, mushroom, mushroom!” Murdock sang, back in human form.
“Thanks, Hannibal.” B.A. agreed, completely ignoring the bouncing pilot.
Hannibal folded his arms and grew serious, “So that begs the question. What are Dementors doing in Florida?"