August, present day
Early afternoon
Ministry of Magic
Harry Potter rapped his knuckles on his desk. He sighed, pulled his fingers through his unmanageable black hair, and pushed up his glasses. Oblivious to a loud crash from somewhere in the room behind him, Harry continued to stare at the wall two feet in front of his face. Years after the battle of Hogwarts, after the defeat of Voldemort, the darkest wizard of all time, after marriage and the birth of three children, Harry found he could hardly survive a day at the office. True, Auror work was challenging. It usually demanded much from him and almost never failed to be interesting, dangerous, or at the very least, a reliable source of mild entertainment. But recently, the wizarding community had entered a period of harmoniousness in which Aurors had very little to do. Lately, they spent most of their days in their office chairs in their small, claustrophobic cubicles and filled in paperwork. Boring, investigative stuff - little more than common secretary work. Harry was normally not one to complain, but truth is, he was bored and suffering from a serious case of cabin fever.
What he needed was a worthwhile distraction, a task that would allow him to leave the office temporarily to explore a bit. He gazed at the pictures on his desk. A wedding picture of him and Ginny echoed the wedding photo of his parents next to it. Albus grinning sheepishly as he clutched his first wand. Lily smiling broadly, displaying her first lost tooth. James with Harry's niece and nephew, Hugo and Rose Weasley, playing a game of Exploding Snap. A picture of the Order before Sirius died, and beside it, the picture of the original Order. He smiled wistfully at his parents, waving to him from the picture frame.
Scanning over the faces, Harry sighed. So many good people had died fighting Voldemort and his Death Eaters. Several of the witches and wizards in the photo of the original Order fell to dark wizards at the battle of Hogwarts, if not before. Most had died before Harry himself was born, some as soon as a few months after the picture was taken. His eyes passed over the picture for what must have been the umpteenth time. James, Lily, Sirius, Remus, Dumbledore, Snape, the Longbottoms, Wormtail...he stopped.
Pulling the picture from his desk, Harry peered closer at the photo. A face he had never noticed before beamed up at him, that of a small auburn-haired young woman. She was standing between Alice Longbottom and Hagrid, almost completely hidden behind Hagrid's backside. Sirius stood diagonally behind her and - Harry squinted into the picture - it looked like their hands were joined behind Alice Longbottom's left thigh. He held the photo sideways, and as the figures pitched angrily to the side of the frame, he saw two linked arms pop into view, taut with the effort of holding on to each other.
That's strange, Harry thought, I wonder how I never saw her before. No one ever pointed her out. Harry's heart sank as he realized no one was alive who would know who she was.
Except maybe...
Harry pushed himself up from his seat, leaving a considerable stack of paperwork untouched on his desk. The nearest fireplace was down the hall next to the lift. Glancing to his left and right, Harry scanned the hallway for occupants - strictly speaking, he wasn't supposed to be Flooing for personal business. Grabbing a handful of Floo powder from a small bin next to the fireplace, Harry threw it into the fire and clearly enunciated, "Hagrid's hut." The flames burned higher, signaling clearance to travel.
Squeezing out of the fireplace a moment later, Harry heard a low chuckle from the far side of the room. "Haven' seen yeh in quite a while, Harry! Heard yeh comin'. Couldn' mistake yer coughin' if I tried." Harry grinned and allowed Hagrid to pull him into a hug, poking the edges of the photo's frame into Harry's ribs. It had been several years since Harry had visited Hagrid at his home. They met occasionally at the Leaky Cauldron for a drink, a particularly welcome treat after an uneventful day at the Ministry. Hagrid's beard, bushy as ever, sported a fair few more gray hairs.
Harry glanced around the room. Nothing had changed since he'd last seen it. Hagrid invited him to sit down, but Harry declined. "I'm not officially supposed to be here, Hagrid, but I was wondering." He showed Hagrid the picture and pointed to the unidentified girl. "That woman standing next to you - I only just noticed her and realized I don't know who she is. I thought I might try to find her, if I could. Thank her or..." His voice trailed as Hagrid grabbed the picture from his hand.
"Oh, her." He scrutinized the picture with disapproval. "Tha's Alice Emerson. She was yer mum's bes' friend, back in their Hogwarts days. Disappeared from the Order after Sirius was sent ter Azkaban...worked at the Ministry las' I heard o' her." He handed the frame back to Harry with a frown. Harry's heart raced - if she'd worked at the Ministry, she would be easy to find; her name would be listed in an employee registry and Harry could contact her without leaving the Ministry offices. It was the perfect compromise: an adventure without the danger of being caught off duty.
Harry stayed and chatted with Hagrid for a few moments before he turned and made his way toward the fireplace.
"Thanks, Hagrid. I'm off - Leaky Cauldron next Thursday?" Harry offered. Hagrid's face fell. "I'll bring the family, too, if you'd like. The kids have missed you since school let out." Harry's children, James, Albus, and Lily, were favorites of Hagrid. He'd known them since they were born and treated them specially in his Care of Magical Creatures classes. Over the summer holiday, Harry was certain that Hagrid missed them also.
"I'll see yeh then, I s'ppose. Can' say no ter seein' my favorite students, now, could I?" Hagrid agreed, satisfied with the prospect of visiting the kids. It had been a while since he'd talked to Ginny, too. "Tell Ginny I said hello."
"I will." Harry gathered a fist full of Floo powder from an earthen jug on Hagrid's mantle and tossed it into the flames. "Ministry of Magic, Department of Magical Law Enforcement, Auror Headquarters." The flames flickered from bright orange to green. Harry stepped into the fireplace and quickly waved at Hagrid before being swept into the Floo network.
Picture in hand, Harry hurried back to his cubicle, ignoring the stack on his desk that had grown even taller in his absence. A folded piece of paper flitted irritably above his head. Swiping it aside, Harry replaced the photo and bent down to open the bottom drawer of a small filing cabinet that tucked neatly under his desk. At the bottom of the drawer, buried under several files on notorious dark wizards that had long since been thrown into Azkaban, a thick dusty Ministry registry sat molding. Harry lifted the rubbish on top to dig the registry out. It contained detailed descriptions of each Ministry office and position and every rule and procedure of the Ministry. It also contained, at the very back past the indexes, a list of Ministry workers that contained everyone from custodians to the Minister himself, past and present, and was charmed to update itself every five minutes. Flipping to the "E"s, Harry scanned the list for "Emerson," hoping she hadn't married since the last time Hagrid spoke to her.
"Emerson, Aberman. Emerson, Aidan..." Harry murmured. "Ah, Emerson, Alice." His eyebrows shot up in surprise. She was still working at the Ministry! "Occupation: Unspeakable. Years of service: 1981 to present. Currently: In." Slamming the book closed, Harry replaced it in the drawer on top of the discarded files. His mind was consumed with a singular thought: Alice Emerson was in the Ministry, right now, at work. Harry grabbed the picture of the original Order again from his desk and hurried down the hall, careful to avoid eye contact with his coworkers.
His best friend, Ron, peeked over from his cubicle. "Harry, where're you - "
"Nowhere, Ron. Just heading to the loo."
"With that picture?" But Harry was already around the corner. Ron shook his head. "Some days..."
In the lift, Harry pressed the button for the eighth floor. He exited into the Atrium and made his way to another lift for the ninth level, the Department of Mysteries. His blood raced; he hadn't been this excited in weeks.
When the elevator jolted to a stop, Harry walked out into a plain, dark hallway. This place always gave him chills. So many horrible old memories plagued him. Taking a left, Harry approached the end of a particularly memorable corridor. The familiar black door loomed over him. The last time he'd seen Sirius was through that doorway.
He realized, with some embarrassment, that he didn't quite know what to do next. How would he find Alice from this point on? The Department of Mysteries was just that. Once he stepped through that door, he knew he'd find a circular room with twelve identical doors with no idea where to go from there. Harry took a steadying breath and knocked.
The witch that answered several minutes later looked ruffled and a bit aggravated. "What do you want?" she asked shortly, fist resting on her hip. Her wand was tucked behind her ear, and in her other hand she clutched a ladle covered in reddish brown sludge. Harry tried not to imagine what concoction she'd just been experimenting with.
"Um, I'm looking for Alice Emerson." Harry held the photo behind his back.
Eying him suspiciously, the witch nodded and pulled the door open wider, moving aside to let Harry in. They were standing in the same circular room he'd had the misfortune of entering during his fifth year at Hogwarts. It seemed like just yesterday and so long ago. That room had always had a strange effect on him, a disorienting nauseating feeling. Perhaps it was the reflection of blue flames flickering over the shiny floor that made one feel as though they were walking on water. "Right this way," she grunted, heading assuredly toward one of the doors to the left. She pushed it open.
Inside, a small room held about ten large desks. Only four were occupied. At the far end of the room, at a desk facing the wall, sat a slight, auburn-haired woman. She was hunched over some papers, and as Harry followed the witch closer to her, he saw that she was labeling a detailed map of a land Harry didn't recognize. The desk was illuminated by a bright lamp, and every word the woman wrote on the map faded into the texture of the paper, a magical effect Harry knew all too well.
"Emerson, you've got a visitor." Alice grunted and held up a finger. The witch with the ladle gestured to the chair next to Alice's desk and Harry sat down. He waited patiently for a few minutes while Alice worked. Finally, she looked up.
Her misty blue eyes blinked up at Harry, and it took a second for her to focus on him in the dim light of the room. When she realized who he was, her breath caught and her eyes immediately welled with tears. Within moments, she was sobbing. Harry sat with the picture on his lap feeling extremely awkward. Alice turned away and opened the top drawer of her desk.
Pulling a tissue out of the drawer, Alice wiped the tears from her nose and chin. Harry cleared his throat and readjusted his glasses on his nose, not quite sure what to say in the face of a crying stranger who may have been one of his parents' closest friends. "Um, I'm, er, Harry Potter. I think you knew my mum? Is this you?" He indicated the smiling young woman in the photo. The witch sitting before him looked remarkably similar, hardly changed but for the faint streaks of silver in her reddish-brown hair and thin lines in her forehead and corners of her eyes.
Alice gently held the photo with the tips of her fingers, as though it were a precious artifact. She nodded as she studied the photo, tears filling her eyes again. She stared at the faces in the picture for a long time before she finally spoke. Her voice was hushed. "We were so young then. You..." She looked up at Harry's face and softly touched his cheek. The gesture reminded him of his mother-in-law, Molly Weasley. It was a protective, matronly touch, and he wondered what made Alice Emerson feel protective and matronly toward him. "You were just a baby. The son of my two best friends..." She choked on the last two words and lowered her eyes back to the photo.
Harry's blood pounded in his temples. This woman was his parents' best friend. She'd known them when they were alive, had gone to school with them, and known him when he was born. "Could you...I mean, if it's not too hard. Could you maybe tell me about them?" Most importantly, she was here - now. She was his final chance to ask all the questions he had never thought to ask Remus or Sirius when he was a boy.
She smiled tenderly and looked up into his eyes; Harry anticipated her next words, but she didn't say them. She didn't say, like everyone else from his childhood, that he had his mother's eyes.
Instead, with a twinkle in her eye that momentarily brought the young woman from the photo back to life, she settled in her chair, gingerly placed the picture on her desk, took a deep breath and began, "It was our fifth year when life really took hold of us..."
The Sound Inside a Shell by Alice in Potterland
Story Notes:
This is the first installment of a trilogy. I expect each of the installments to be between 20 and 30 chapters long.
Chapter Notes: This story has been a long time coming! Thanks to my best friend for planting the seed in my brain. Mostly, of course, thanks to JKR, our divine mistress of fiction, for painting a world for us lit-nerds to live and write in. :)
Chapter Endnotes: Reviews of all sorts are appreciated! :)