Umbridge's office was as Quinn had seen uncountable times through a screen, every surface draped with lacy clothes and frilly covers. It had the same overwhelming scent of peony flowers that he had to cover his nose away from while on his few visits to the office. The wall that seemed to be Umbridge's foul shrine to kitten decorated plates still made him uncomfortable.
"Please sit down, Mr. West."
Quinn removed his eyes from dead flowers in the vases and casually made his way to the straight-backed chair prepared for him. He sat down and set his hands on the small table draped in fresh lace; he caressed the pattern of the frills with his digits — trying to feel the history of numerous cutting wounds and trickling blood, wondering if she cleaned the covers or replaced them every time.
Umbridge scampered around the room, preparing the supplies for the detention, getting the giggles while doing it.
"There you go," she placed a stack of parchment on the table and, with trembling hands, gently laid a black quill on top, "we're now ready to start on your disciplinary rehabilitation. From today, we're going to work together and put in the effort to instill in you the qualities of a fine young wizard. Now, you are going to be doing some lines for me. You have the quill and parchment; please start without delay."
She leaned forward, her face above his head, as she whispered in the softest of voices, "I want you to write, 'I will obey Professor Umbridge.'" Quinn felt her hand brush from his shoulder to shoulder as she passed by towards her own chair across his small table, behind her own full-sized desk.
He lazily shrugged at her intent gaze, barely holding the sparkle within. He picked up the black quill and asked, "Ink, please" — he had to pretend to be a first-timer.
"It's a special pen, dear," she giggled with a closed mouth, "you won't be needing ink."
"How convenient.. ."
Quinn placed the nip on the parchment, almost tearing the page with its unnatural sharpness, and wrote the first line: I will obey Professor Umbridge.
Umbridge's cheekbones rose at the sight of the red words being inked on the parchment. She leaned forward to get a good look above scalpel cuts that appeared on the back of Quinn's hand. But she felt a strange sense of discordance at the sight she had enjoyed so many times. Umbridge tried to pinpoint on hit; for a few seconds, it evaded her like a mice evading a cat on its trail, but when the cat finally caught up, the reason became apparent.
He hasn't stopped writing, she thought. Not a single student he had handed the blood quill had even continued to write after the first cut; they had all stopped writing to inspect the sudden injury.
She looked up and abruptly came face to face with dull, bottomless, even dead eyes staring down at her, and even as she was trapped in the stare, Umbridge could hear the pen's nip scribbling against the parchment. She slowly leaned away, but Quinn's gaze remained — directly looking at her without as much as a twitch on his face.
The wound on the back of his hands healed.
I will obey Professor Umbridge.
I will obey Professor Umbridge.
The cuts appeared on Quinn's hand again, but he paid them no attention and continued to look at Umbridge as if he was amid doodling stray scribbles and not bloodletters.
"Mr. West.. ."
"Yes, Professor?"
"Why're you looking at me?"
Quinn tilted his head, "No particular reason. In this room, I find you of the most interest."
".. . I would suggest that you pay attention to your punishment and do it diligently. This isn't for you to find interesting, but to look back on your actions and find and think on your faults."
"I'm taking this seriously," he said and raised the first page of parchment. "See? I have already completed a page, and I assure you that I'm diligently retrospecting my actions. Looking at you helps me keep the incident fresh in my mind."
I will obey Professor Umbridge.
"Look down at your parchment, Mr. West."
"I'm sorry if I'm making you uncomfortable." However, he didn't look down and wrote: I will obey Professor Umbridge.
And on it went. Again and again Quinn wrote the words on the parchment, and again and again his hand got cut, healed, and then cut again — rinse and repeat. But in all those long hours, Quinn never looked away from Umbridge even for a second; he continued to singlemindedly stare at her. Somewhere in that time, Umbridge couldn't take Quinn's anymore and looked away. She pretended that Quinn didn't exist and started to grade assignments as if it was any regular after-school today.
When darkness fell outside Umbridge's window, she finally broke the silence. "That will be all for today. We will continue tomorrow."
Quinn put down the blood quill on the considerably thinner stack of blank parchment. He took a handkerchief from his pocket and gently wiped the blood trails, dry and fresh — leaving behind a tender yet intact skin. And he did it without looking away from Umbridge.
After that, Quinn stood up and left without saying a word in reply. He walked in the deserted corridors; the sound of his footstep could be heard as he walked by with only the occasional portrait briefly opening their eyes to throw a drowsy glance at him before returning to their shut-eye again.
He felt a slight tug on his trousers, but Quinn showed no reaction to it. He felt the tug crawl up his leg, then on his shirt, up at his shoulder, and finally, Quinn raised his hand up to see a pink cube with spider legs crawl around his arm's length, making its way to his palm. It did a swivel on his palm, like a cat would do in its resting place, before retreating its spider-legs and making his palm its new home.
"Good job, little fellow," he smiled. "I think a Potter and a West with a long string of young children would be enough, don't you think?"
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- (Scene Break) -
.
What followed the next day were looks of pity. Wherever Quinn went, he was met by sympathetic head tilts and nods, words of comfort, and all sorts of consolation gifts.
"This is freaking hilarious!" Eddie cackled at Quinn, who held an assortment of chocolates from Zonkos, given to him by a pair of Hufflepuff girls. "Hey, hey, Quinn, listen.. . are you sad that your toy box got taken because you were naughty. Do you want sweets to cheer you up? You have a lot of them waiting for you on your table back in our room!"
Quinn openly stared down, rapidly blinking at the box of chocolates. He was at a loss for words. What sort of brazen gall was this? Had the brains of Hogwarts students melted due to lack of intellectual challenge? They gave him chocolate. Him! Quinn West, The MC, The Master of Chocolates.
He turned his eyes away from the chocolate box to Eddie, who was hunched over with a hand on a wall, wheezing his guts out.
"Oh shut up!" Quinn said and got in response a raised-finger, asking for a minute, in which Eddie proceeded to laugh louder, after which he walked over while wiping a tear.
"I haven't laughed this much in such a long time," he said and patted Quinn's shoulder, "thank you, mate, that made my week."
"Give it a rest. It's not that funny."
"So you do believe it's a little funny."
Quinn clicked his tongue. Today wasn't his day.
"Ah, hey. Quinn, there you are." Quinn turned back to see Tracey and Daphne walking towards them. It was Tracey who had called to him.
"Not you too," said Quinn, "please, no!"
"Huh, what do you mean?" Tracey asked, touching hands touching her face.
And that apparently broke the dam as Eddie started to laugh with his arms holding his sides. In annoyance, Quinn shot a silencing charm at Eddie, which, while stopping the sound of laughter, didn't stop Eddie Carmichael, who started clapping to express the hilarity he was feeling.
"What's wrong with him?" asked Daphne.
"Who knows," said Quinn, crossing his arms, "maybe somebody slipped him a laughter potion as a prank. You guys were looking for me?" he asked at the end.
"Yes," said Tracey, "well, it's not us but Marcus. He sent us to find you and ask if you'd be attending today's party," by which she meant DA meeting, "with your detention with Umbridge and all."
Quinn scratched the back of his and sighed, "I can't be sure. She kept me till midnight yesterday. Knowing her, she'd do the same again. But please don't let me be the reason for the party's cancellation. You guys enjoy it; I'll see if I can join you." He turned to Daphne, "In my absence, I'll ask that you be the room manager for today."
Daphne nodded, taking the responsibility in stride.
Tracey looked at Quinn and Daphne. She wasn't sure if these two noticed, but they were staring at each other. So Tracey did what a good friend would do and grabbed the still laughing Eddie by the front of her collar. "I almost forgot!" she said. "I have something to do. Eddie, would you come with me? I need your help. You will, thanks!" She pulled him along, leaving her best friend and best male friend alone.
Daphne broke the silence between them. She asked, "How are you doing? AID has been dear and close to your heart."
"It's a strange feeling knowing that today I won't go to my office," he said, turning progressively pensive, "turn on the lights, cast a scouring charm before casting the spell to turn all AID cards' indicator to show that the office was open, in case someone still have some lying around. That I wouldn't sit in my workshop and do something or give Luna something to do when she comes drifting in. Or that I won't listen to people who would come in with their problem.. ."
Daphne stepped closer to Quinn and grasped his hand. Quinn glanced down at her hand and laced his finger through hers, a small smile working its way to his face.
"Enough about me," Quinn said as they started to slowly walk in their corridors, "let's talk about you. Now that I have some free time, would you like me to tutor you? OWLs are nearing, and if you'd like, we can get together at the library every day — just the two of us."
If the proposition was a beautiful and ornate tiara, then the last part was the crowning jewel on it. Daphne had no reason to think, much less refuse.
"Excellent," Quinn felt that glass was no longer half-empty but half-full with something important, "starting tomorrow, we'll meet every day at the library. Now, tell me, what's the deal with Astoria? This morning she handed me a letter, strangely it only had a cyan solid circle on it, nothing else, not a single letter, just that circle in the middle."
Daphne softly chuckled behind her hand, "She thought you'd be feeling down and didn't want you to dwell on things, so she made that letter to confuse you — she thought you'd try to find it was and distract yourself."
"Oh my, when did she get so smart? I thought she had somehow picked up Luna's habits. But I guess I do need to thank her for it. Do you think she'd like sweets and chocolates? I actually have an excess and would like to give some out."
They wandered around aimlessly through the corridors of Hogwarts, their hands still intertwined.
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- (Scene Break) -
.
That day passed in a haze of Quinn spending time in his dorm room, doing what he did in his workshop, just in his room. Quinn's second detention started the same way the first one did, except that after two hours, Umbridge couldn't handle Quinn's dull and dim eyes boring dead into her every ticking second away as he wrote sheet after sheet with his blood.
"That's enough for today," she said, glancing at him sideways while keeping her head still, "you can leave. I hope you'd continue to reflect on your actions."
Quinn wordlessly nodded, took out his handkerchief, and slowly and deliberately wiped the blood off the back of his hand, still staring at Umbridge, who leaned away from him. Only after Quinn was done did he stand up from his chair, slowly and noisily tucked it into the small table, and then he walked out, closing the door behind him.
Umbridge sagged in her chair, dabbing her forehead with her pink handkerchief, but then the door opened up, and she froze to see Quinn standing still at the threshold.
"Ye.. . Yes, Mr. West?"
"Do I still have to return tomorrow?"
There was a clogging spell of silence with both staring eat each other — one had a mechanic look while the other was looking back as if she had no choice and could only grip her robe behind the cover of her desk.
".. . Yes," she said finally, her forehead wrinkling. She then raised her chin, "you'd be returning here for the rest of the month."
"Understood," and then the door was shut closed.
Outside the room, Quinn was walking away with a lightness in his step. His attempt at making Umbridge uncomfortable was a success. Other than him, every person who had spent detention with Umbridge had given more or less the same reaction, and those reactions had fuelled the fiendish flames of her sadism. But Quinn had flipped the script and had taken away everything that would allow Umbridge to experience euphoria — he didn't show any expression of discomfort, never stopped because it was painful (irritation for those who took Quinn's potions,) and the constant staring was the accessory that tied the entire attire.
He took out his pocket watch, and it was already around the time the DA meeting was supposed to end. But the group would still be there, he thought and confirmed it by Recon; and thus, he headed to the seventh floor.
Quinn reached the troll painting, and as per the instructions he had given Daphne, he whispered the meetings password to the plain wall for a stone-grey door to grow out in it from the floor below. He pushed forward, and in one step, he went from a deserted-silence to a charged-jabber, though he did cause a stunned dipping-blip only for the gathering raising the bar up again.
"Aww~," said Astoria, gliding towards him, "you came here to pick us up? That's so nice of you. You can sit down and wait; we're just about done."
Quinn raised his hands and grasped Astoria's cheek, pushing and pulling them around without a care.
"Whatchu 're chu doin'? Shtovp!" She raised her hands to free her tortured cheeks but was immediately boxed out by Quinn, who continued to make Astoria's head dance.
"Where did the sweet, bubbly girl who I met all those years back go?" he asked, letting go now that he had his fill.
Astoria all but apparated away from him, cupping her face on both sides as she did. "She died with her cheeks!" she spat, tears pooling in her eyes. "Daphne, he's bullying me!" Astoria yelled.
"Tattler," said Quinn, jabbing.
"Stop it, you two," said Daphne, shaking her head. She turned to Quinn and spoke, "Astoria's right. We are almost done. You shouldn't have come in today."
Quinn shook his head, "It's okay. I'm here actually here for something else." He looked at the group towards a girl with strawberry-blonde hair, "Susan, would you please stay behind. I'd like to talk to you something with you."
Every pair of eyes in the room simultaneously turned to Susan Bones, who suddenly felt that there were roots shooting down from the soles of her feet, digging into the floor. Everyone, including Susan, had the same thought. The last time Quinn had asked someone to stay back, one of those people had stopped coming to DA.
After the meeting ended, and Quinn sent everyone away, including Ivy, who he had to assure that this wasn't related to DA, he faced Susan Bones in the empty room.
"Uhm, may I know what's this about?" she asked.
Quinn calmingly smiled and relaxed his body language as he replied, "You don't have to be nervous, Susan. You're not in trouble. So please relax."
Susan perked up as the light in her eyes did a complete change, "Oh, then why.. ."
"Actually, I need your help."
"My help? Sure, what can I do for you?" There was barely anyone in DA who wouldn't help out THE Quinn West; most would be proactive if a situation like this came along.
Quinn reached into his robes and took out an envelope along with a matchbox-sized box wrapped in brown paper and what looked like a tiny ring. "I would like if you'd send these to your aunt," he said.
"Auntie Amelia?" she asked, tilting her head.
"Yes, Amelia Bones," said Quinn, "or to be clear, I want you to send this to Amelia Bones, Head of DMLE."
The curtain of confusion lifted from Susan's eyes almost instantly at Quinn's last few words. She now knew what Quinn was actually doing.
"Quinn, any letter to the Head of DMLE must go through proper channels," Susan said as if reading from a script.
"I'm aware of that," he said, "but if I do that, it will take weeks for my things to reach her desk. But, if you were to send it, it'd reach her desk would reach her desk no later than tomorrow afternoon. This is of importance and needs to reach her as soon as possible."
Susan bit her lip, contemplating what to do. It had been ingrained in her to avoid precisely this sort of thing. She was not to become a channel to get to the Head of DMLE, and that personal and professional lives were different and needed to be kept that way.
"Just this time," she said, "I'll do it just this time, but you have to promise not to let anyone else know about this," because if others knew that she had done it, then it'd open a potential dam of requests in the future.
Quinn smiled and put his hands on his chest, "I assure you that this will stay between us, and if someone asks, you can say that I wanted to talk about Cedric's farewell party that I'm planning."
The next day, before breakfast, Susan went to the Owlery to ready her owl, Sacrum, for flight. She secured the matchbox-sized box and an envelope with her name on it to Sacrum's feet.
She took out the petite ring just big enough for an infant's finger and pulled it for it to snap open from a point. "Put it around the feet," she muttered as she clipped the ring around Sacrum's feet and gasped when she saw the long-eared owl slowly starting to vanish.
Susan hurriedly took Sacrum to the balcony of Owlery and whispered into his ear, "Go to auntie, Sarcrum. Fly swiftly," and by the time she let the owl fly, it had vanished from sight, turning the silent flying owl to become completely invisible.
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-*-*-*-*-*-
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Quinn West - MC - Can pull dead stares when he wants.
Dolores Umbridge - High Inquisitor - Met a different breed of student.
Susan Bones - DMLE Head's only living relative - Sacrum's hooman.
Daphne Greengrass - RoR Manager (Temp) - Got herself a personal tutor.
Eddie Carmichael - Wheezing and coughing - Hahahahahahahahahaha!
