Ready and Willing-ish solo

When he first started off on this journey he had been thinking something along the lines of ‘what a annoying little girl. Oh well, at least I can help.’. But now, stuck in the busy streets of london without a map and feeling increasingly irritated at the convoluted layout of everything muggle, his thoughts were of a much more unreasonable nature. Her directions had been horrible, cobbled together from bits and scraps of a child’s life experiences. ‘Turn right by Mrs. Hubbards house’. Well who the hell was Mrs. Hubbard, and how was he supposed to find out who she was? And even if he did figure out who she was, that would literally only help him with one step of the directions. Did people in london even have their own houses?

It took him several tries, and a full saturday, day and night with a little bit of a sunday, before he managed to track down who he was looking for. It was a dirty, surprisingly cluttered alleyway tucked in an older part of town. There were cans of beer, broken bits of glass and a suspicious looking stain that smelled of vomit all within about 2 feet of his boot. Cardboard and a tarp had been ingeniously crafted into some sort of lean-to shelter, although it looked incredibly fragile. A strong wind would blow it down. There was far more trash scattered about, but the Welshman knew that this trash was different.

A bottle with a can on top, wrapped in a napkin with a smiling face poorly scribbled on with sharpie, for example. Random hobos didn’t do that kind of thing, kids did. And that meant that there had been a kid here recently, and one innocent enough to make a doll out of a beer can, a beer bottle, a sharpie and a napkin. The tall man muttered under his breath, more to calm himself than anything else. He could erect a pretty strong emotional barrier with Occlumensy, but if the barrier wasn’t already up, or if it was torn down by anger, he was often at a loss.

“A strong mind always hopes, and always has the strength to hope.”

He strode a few steps farther down the alley before stopping again, and looking to the side. He was only a few yards into the alley, but he could already see other makeshift dolls. All happy, all smiling. They were made out of bits and pieces of things other people didn’t want, and were arranged around a little table, or with a cloth napkin underneath them like a picnic blanket, a cardboard cut out basket in the center.

“I think that means that it’s kids who have the strongest minds. Scary thought.”

But this time, when he was muttering, someone heard him. A few someones, because there was a sort of scuffle from underneath the cardboard box and a short boy with black hair came out, looking around to try and figure out what he had heard. It didn’t take him long to spot the veritable giant of a man in the heavy leather jacket, but he was too shocked to say anything, or do much else than stare. When he didn’t immediately speak, three girls followed him. The boy and two of the girls looked to be around thirteen, or maybe a bit younger. The littlest was probably around eight, and hiding behind the other two girls.

But being raised on the streets gave you guts, at the cost of culture and manners, an education and intelligence, so it was only a second or so before the boy blurted out a question, that he and his friends were clearly all thinking.

“So who the ‘ell are you?”

Professor Griffith’s eyes were sharp as ever, and he started to notice a few things that didn’t really add up. The boy’s clothes were pretty decent, all things considered. They stank and were dirty, but otherwise they were pretty good clothes, a stark contrast to the others, especially the little one whose clothes were ripped in several places. They looked like someone had run them through a shredder and put them back together with duct tape.

“Professor Griffith, pleased to meet you.”

It was said in a low voice, certainly not friendly, with a foreboding sort of deepness to it, and the response was no less hostile.

“Oh yeah? I don’t go to School. Never have, never will. Now get lost, gramps. Seriously, you look like fifty, I could snap your hip before you could say ‘dentures’”

The professor could hear a hushed voice from one of the girls behind the boy telling him that the tall man looked to be pretty tough, and to be careful, but the boy only scoffed.

“I’m assuming you know Elena?”

The name elicited an immediate reaction from all of them, but the only individual in the bunch that seemed genuinely happy to hear the name was the little girl, who, according to Elena, was called Eliza.

“Yeah, we know the slimeball. If she sent you here to help us, just forget it. Go’wan back and tell her to stuff it herself before I find that stupid magic School of hers and make her. You don’t scare me. I can literally just walk all you. Wanna see me try, you doormat?”

Griffith took a step forward, a fast step that covered a lot of ground. The boy, startled, backed up hastily but his retreat was cut short when another step brought the professor within a few feet of him.

“I don’t think you know how this works. You have a tomorrow, and if I see you trying to waste it like this, I’m not going to be happy.”

The boy was slung over the Welshman’s shoulder like a sack of beans, but in that short amount of time, the three girls had already figured out the general idea of what was going on, and had taken off running. Griffith was fast, he was incredibly fast but he didn’t know the alleys, and the kids had been living in alleys all their lives. When he felt the boy on his shoulder reach for his pocket, clearly trying to get something sharp to actually hurt the man that was apprehending him, as his flailing was doing hardly anything of consequence.

“Hey kids, wanna see some magic? Sure you do. ‘Braticus Stoppicus!’”

And then he hurled the boy at the two girls, the little one, having realized that her legs were too short for running, had done an admirable but poor job of hiding under a box nearby, and was out of the way. Griffith would be lying if he didn’t take at least some small joy out of the expression on the boy’s face as he realized what was happening. One hand was crammed in a jeans pocket, but the other was flailing, almost in slow motion as his bewildered head turned around to see where he was going to land right as he slammed into the backs of the two fleeing girls. They landed hard on the disgusting floor, which made the welsman grimace internally, but it had stopped them. And no need to use magic and then obliviate afterwards.

An old man passing by the alley, trying to find a good place to sleep off a drunken stupor, looked down into the dark, and saw a tall man stuffing three reasonably large children into his pocket. It was a large pocket, but it certainly wasn’t large enough to fit any of the children, much less all three. The man blinked, cursed to himself and walked away, contemplating the merits of being sober. Griffith had been planning to stuff the little girl into his pocket as well, hands and feet ziptied together like the other ones, but decided against it. Besides, he had the uncomfortable feeling that this was kidnapping, although it was for their own good. He had emptied out his left pocket just for this situation, and was now wishing he had maybe tried a little harder to be diplomatic.

“Should have put more points in charisma.”

He complained to himself sarcastically, as he thought for a second on how to get the little girl to come out willingly.

“Well, I can bring these three to a good home now, but I sure do with I had found that other little girl. I’ll bet she’s doing a super good job hiding, and probably can’t hear me, but her friend elena sent me with candy for her to eat, and a kitten to play with. I guess I can just have them myself, but Elena’s not going to be happy.”

It didn’t take long before the box was shifted to the side, and a thin, tiny girl who was obviously terrified, but just a little bit too hungry, and curious as to how cute the kitten was, to remain hidden. Besides, she knew Elena. Elena was her big sister, and she loved her to death. If the tall man knew Elena, he couldn’t be a bad guy. And although bad guys sometimes had candy, they never had kittens, right? An hour of kitten and candy later, a happy, giggling girl sat on Griffith’s shoulders, whose mood wasn’t nearly as foul as it had been an hour ago.

He took Eliza out to eat for pizza, which she insisted was her favorite food, even over good potatoes, which was doable, although he was a firm believer that potatoes were one of the best foods out there, smuggled by adam straight from the garden of eden. After that he popped her in the other pocket where she could play with the kitten all she wanted, and headed off for Gringotts. The man was far from wealthy, but he had just a little bit saved up. He had an account at the bank only because he trusted the Goblins not to give him away, and as far as he knew they never had. He went down to his vault, collected over three quarters of the small pile of gold coins with a rueful expression on his face, and went about exchanging a lot of them for muggle money.

First he found a newspaper ad for a babysitter, hired one for two hours and left Eliza with her. Then he brought the other three to a sufficiently dramatic dark street corner and pulled them out of his pocket.

“I think you’ve figured out by now what, and who, I am. And I think you know enough about magic to know what a simple curse can do.”

He pointed his wand and the three, and silently cast lumos for a second while saying something entirely different.

“Sinter Curse."

"This is known as Santa's Curse. It wears off eventually, sure. But you’ll never know when. One minute, one week, a month, fourty years. If you are doing anything that is decidedly bad, anything that would put you on the naughty list? Yeah, get ready for the worst bad luck you have ever. Seen.”

He placed emphasis on the last two words, and did a pretty good job of his monologuing villain impression. He was certainly not above scaring people straight.

“There’s a police station around the corner. Go and ask for help. Don’t live on the streets and when you’re old enough, get a job, and an apartment. You can take this, I promise it’s not fake. But just remember that curse when you get tempted. You know damn well I’m not lying.”

He gave each kid a little bit of money. Not a lot, but he didn’t have a lot to begin with. It was really just enough for a few meals, some new clothes, a shower or two while their case got processed.

“Oh, and I will follow through with this. You will be checked on, so better save those receipts.”

And then he casually sliced the zip ties with a few castings of diffindo, and walked back to the babysitter. The three of them hadn’t said a word, and still didn’t say anything when he left. They just stared dumbfounded and very much terrified. But he wouldn’t worry about them for right now. They had more than earned having to fight through an army of documents and signatures. Now, all that was left was Eliza, and he did have somewhere nice. Very nice, actually. He picked her up from the babysitter, who was very pleased with how well behaved the little girl was. A stop by a local ice cream parlor later, the girl went back into his pocket, and he used floo powder to travel far, across an ocean, to the great land of America.

A few apparations after that, and they found themselves at a magically concealed cottage, far in the woods. He had spent about a month with the old lady who lived there, and just thinking about how cozy the house looked made him smile. The rest of the Galleons he had taken from the vault were given to her, to help pay for the little girl, although it really wasn’t necessary. Eliza was happy to stay as long as the kitten could stay with her, and the old lady, whose he always called Susie, because he thought it was funny to call the nice old lady such a young sounding name, and besides, she rather enjoyed it. By the time night rolled around, Eliza was eating a cookie and spreading crumbs everywhere, having by far the best day of her life, jumping up and down and saying ‘Grammaw Susie, Grammaw Susie’ in a delighted voice.

She had never had a Grandmother, but had been told they were very nice to have, and besides, this one baked cookies. Griffith said his goodbyes and rushed back to Hogwarts, where he got a grand total of 2 hours of sleep before monday morning, and his next class.