The Walking Dead

[Theodore Gallivan]

Friday 28th

Had he ever been this exhausted? He had thought his schooldays were busy, with extracurriculars and quidditch and prefect duties. He'd thought he would never feel as bone-tired without playing a quidditch match in the bitter cold, had not expected his brain to ever feel as much like mush after OWLs or NEWTs. He'd been wrong.

Auror-training: he had expected hard work. Getting through the gateway had been hard enough work, and clearly it had not been going to stop there, and they were only a month or two in, but - Theodore had already been tired this morning, when they had done a practical duelling exercise. Lunch had seen him no less tired, and the theoretical lessons in the afternoon were no less gruelling. Plus, the first had been a guest lecture from the Werewolf Capture Unit; no wonder, then, that after that, he had unable to focus for more than two minutes of the workshop in poisons and antidotes.

Nevermind that having this sort of off-day in the field would have probably seen him hospitalised at best (and, meanwhile, his father captured and registered with the werewolf unit, no doubt), Theo was still buried in his own head, supposing that he would catch up on the work over the weekend, if he didn't sleep for twenty years. He had been waiting for the lift for so long, now, that he might be swaying on the spot, and, still (just about) standing there, Theodore failed to notice that the lift had arrived even when the doors were cranked open right in front of him.

  

[Justin Ross]

Ross did not mind being department head. (Although, evidently, Beanie still needs to update his title.) Although a part of him missed being in the field, running everything was well worth the loss, as was spending more time in the office. He was just coming back up to assign an investigation, and then he was off for the weekend. (Until, inevitably, someone flooed him desperately over something. But that was just the job.)

The lift doors creaked open. There was an auror-in-training swaying in front of him; Ross recognized the face to the job, but not the face to the name. (Usually he didn't learn the name of AITs until their second year.)

"You alive, there?" Ross asked, raising an eyebrow at him.