#drweek0

                                   There was no mistaking Evan’s voice--                                                         and even less so his patronus.                                        He had been the one to first teach                                             Alice to cast the spell, after all;                                    she had seen his so many times before...

                                            Before her wedding day (without him).                                                 Before the attack that left her crippled,                                                             the attack he warned her of                                                                 just in time...or was it?

                                  Why not stop the Death Eaters,                                                     if he could? (Couldn’t he?)                                             Why warn them at all?                                                      Why not come himself?                                                                          He was her brother...

Sometimes you are trying to figure out something interesting for backstory (or a current plot) and you just can’t figure it out with the two characters. Or you can, but its hard to explain whats interesting about it. Whatever. This is a headcanon starter which is intended for building block headcanons based on two characters. Some are trope plots others are statements indicative of a moment or experience with the other character.

These can also double as fic prompts.

If you want a surprise here’s a random number generator. There are 36 options.

         Petunia was pretty sure Dedalus had meant to be kind. Or at least polite. Definitely (probably) hadn’t meant to be as patronizing as he’d wound up being, bombarding her with questions as they both sat in the hallway of the Ministry, her to (not be allowed to) testify about her near exposure of the Wizarding World, him to detail the steps that had been taken to cover up her ‘mistake’. At least his inane chattering had been less hostile than the screaming the Wizeygam, Wizgoment, Wizgarnet? —the stupid ‘Wizarding Justice Court’ had subjected her too, and decidedly pleasant compared to the screaming and sobbing that was the only conversation in Azkaban. Plus, he’d shared his sandwich with her. And it hadn’t been poisoned. 

Alice held her tongue for a long time, although she kept sneaking glances out of her book and across the table at the Ravenclaw boy she was studying with. It wasn’t the first time they had shared a library table, helping each other where one or the other was weak and encouraging each other where they were both strong; it was a different sort of studying than Alice could do with the members of her own house who, while undeniably clever and for the most part academically inclined (more so than Ravenclaws, Alice had discovered, who often had less interest in their grades than they did in their questions, while Slytherins liked to score), had learned from an early age that some questions were not asked.

it was one of those questions that Alice was struggling not to ask now, but she couldn’t hold out forever. She’d always been a little too curious for her own good, her mother had cautioned her for years – but she couldn’t help herself, she needed to know. It was driving her mental, the not-knowing; she chewed her lip, swung her legs back and forth under her seat (at twelve she was still short enough that her feet didn’t reach the floor when she sat all the way back in the tall library chair, not unless she pointed her toes), fiddled with her quill until it was nearly bald, read and re-read the same page three times–

Then finally, she burst out with, “Are your parents really Muggles?”

Alice should have been horrified, should have clapped her hand over her mouth and swallowed her tongue for such a breach of conversational etiquette; for asking one of the questions that was never spoken aloud…but she didn’t. Instead she kept talking, the forbidden words pouring out of her: “Not Squibs or half-bloods but actually just plain Muggles? With no magic at all? No magical ties or ancestors or anything?” She stared at Ted, who was blinking up at her curiously, seemingly having trouble shaking off the fugue of Transfiguration study enough to follow her hissed and hurried words – or perhaps he was simply shocked by the outrage of being asked such rude things.

“Did you…” Alice looked around furtively, then leaned in a little closer, pushing herself in tighter against the table with the tips of her toes, “Did you steal your magic? Who did–” She swallowed. “Who did you steal it from?”

For a moment silence hung between them, huge and quivering and fragile. Then Ted burst out laughing, startling not just Alice but everyone for three tables around them. It was loud, hearty laughter without a trace of shame in it. It would have been infectious if Alice hadn’t been so perfectly poised between her own guilt at broaching a taboo subject and her hunger for answers to the questions she should never have asked.

@longbottomneerosier 29 You Tried To Kill Me Once

It was foolish to try to teach Dedalus proper dueling (or dirty dueling, as was more like it) but that didn’t stop Alice from offering and Dedalus’ from accepting. It’s always a good idea, she’d implied over long moments sitting side by side in Saint Mungo’s waiting room. Never know the sorts of people you might ... run into these days.

And Dedalus might have wormed a rare promise from her, Drinks after, of course? He might have tried shopping, but he was weary of her taste in...well, most things, if he was being honest (and he both always was and always wasn’t).

Both were stupid ideas. Both because of who they were to each other (ah, we have friends in common, Dedalus had chirped the first time they collided in the waiting room. Now, come on, tell me everything I’ve missed.) and because of the loose foppishness of Dedalus Diggle’s dueling form.

“Merlin!” Was what Dedalus managed to say as foolish, foolish, foolish, bubbled up under his breast bone somewhat hysterically. Copper gurgled on his tongue after the words and then he was spitting most ineligantly onto the snow. “I’ve killed you!”

That was probably supposed to be Alice’s words--but Dedalus had never been one to relinquish the most dramatic parts of any interaction: even if it meant he had to play both parts.