GOOD DOG || Sirius Black

(Fifty Three: Out of the Fire)

"Right, then. Which one of you arseholes is John?"

Your Honour, I call Cluedo. The answer you're looking for is Alex Fawley, in the corridor of the secret Death Eater Headquarters, with the gun. This collection of facts could not have been anticipated applying to this particular individual at the start of the year, yet she felt more like that girl shaking against a stone wall outside her school than she had in months. Fear pulsed through her like a heartbeat. Something strong and unyielding. Something brilliant.

Her life meant something now, she could feel it in the fragility of her bones and the open vulnerability with which she faced the guards. Every single part of her body where a curse could hit was ridiculously clear in her head, already aching as if in preparation for her slow and painful demise. She hadn't felt so alive in such a long time.

"John?" She asked again, "He here?"

One of the guards pointed at a man across the hall. John of course, being deaf, couldn't hear Alex, and since he had been facing the other way when she made her rather dramatic arrival, he hadn't been able to read her lips either.

The second time, though, having seen the guard pointing at him, he waved at her to indicate himself and said in a slightly off-kilter, low pitched voice, "Yes?"

The sound of someone who is almost or entirely deaf speaking is heart-breaking, mainly because it becomes immediately clear that this is not their choice way to communicate. It's like going abroad and all the locals speaking broken English instead of you learning their language in their goddamn country. Alex's mother had always stressed the importance of at least attempting to learn parts of the local language when they went on holiday, and had drilled the attitude into her children. And this wasn't even foreign. This was BSL. Alex bit her lip.

She knew very little sign language. The alphabet and a number of specially selected swear words were pretty much her limit. So she pointed at John and drew her finger from her middle on the other hand to her thumb across her palm to say, You J?

He nodded.

Alex then rather awkwardly mimed cradling a baby. Luckily the message got through because the lines smoothed from John's face, he dropped his hand from his mouth to say thank you, and pushed past her into the lift.

Then it was just Alex and the three Death Eaters that Guard No. 2 had not-so-tactfully referred to as 'dickheads'.

"Right then." She said, taking another step forwards. It was only then that they seemed to clock the gun at her side, "What happens now?"

They stared blankly at her. At last, one spoke up, "What do you want?"

Alex felt her hands shake for a second. Okay, New. Maybe some fearlessness could help right now.

"Such deep philosophical questions." New could be felt gripping control of her face and twisting it, "I'm sure the Dark Lord would be interested to hear of them, especially in regard to his command."

"The Dark Lord?"

"Yeah, you know," New smiled, mouth like a knife wound, "Your boss, both in a spiritual and physical sense. He sent me down here."

"Why?"

It was Alex who answered this time, having got the general gist, "The Blacks want their toy. It's been found that Sirius Black is a defunct model and he's being sent back to the manufacturers. Don't want a repeat of the Galaxy 6."

The one closest to her grunted, "You spend a long time thinking that one up?"

"Seconds." She smiled sweetly, "Some of us have more than two braincells, which is why we're not placed on lackey duty."