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This was supposed to be easy.
This was supposed to be the easiest job of your career.
And here you are.
Running for your life.
Running for her life.
Heck, maybe even running for everyone’s lives.
Okay, no, that’s an exaggeration.
“Merlin’s socks!” Maggie yells ahead of you. “This will be the last time I follow you!”
“No one asked you to follow me!!!!”
And, really, no one was supposed to be here with you other than Kara.
And you haven’t heard from Kara for maybe three hours.
But, your sister is resilient and basically immortal, so you don’t really worry about her.
(You totally worry about her.)
“You haven’t picked my calls, you asshole!”
You huff. Really, Maggie? Are you scolding me while we run from a small litter of Nundus? Really?
“I was busy, you hot shit Hufflepuff!”
“Don’t you dare bring my house affiliation into this, you slippery Slytherin!”
“And so damn proud of it!”
You make a sharp left turn when a tree suddenly appears in your path.
When you chose to become a Curse Breaker, you were thinking on busting pyramids and hunting down lost treasures, pretty much like that woman in the games Maggie used to play when you were still in school.
“Fucking Slytherin!” Maggie’s voice is a little far away, but you know that the Nundus won’t let you get too separated.
The five cubs and angry mama are sheep-herding you somewhere and you are sure you will meet Maggie there if you do get separated.
“Your fucking Slytherin!” you shout back to her.
“If we die, I’m killing you!”
Her voice is farther away and you contemplate trying to look for her when a slight nip at your ankles make you simply run faster, prompting a little mreowl of excitement from your chaser.
Yeah.
You didn’t think you’d be doing this when you went to the goblins and sign into their Curse Breaker program.
Maybe you’d be better off training to be an Auror like Maggie… her training was shorter, less intense and loads more fun.
(Really, being six months underground, surrounded by short, grumpy, scratch-happy goblins ready to slap the back of your head for breathing wrong… Yeah, Maggie had it better studying under the formidable Harry Potter, who, legend has it, is not an easy teacher.)
But, then again, even if you were an Auror instead of a Curse Breaker, you’d be here, lost in the African jungle, being chased by five Nundu cubs and one angry mama.
You’re here for Kara, after all, for Kara and Lena.
When Kara pouted at you, it was hard to say no.
But when Kara and Lena pouted and started whining like sad puppies… well, you were a goner.
When little Lena Luthor was sorted into Slytherin the same year your baby sister was sorted into Hufflepuff you never thought she’d grow to be another little sister to you.
(The fact that Kara and Lena grew to be fast friends since their first Welcome Feast and that they both were put under Maggie’s and your wings was the only reason you and Maggie ended up together.)
Right now, though, you want to kill them both… little sisters or not.
“Alex!”
Kara’s sudden voice makes you jump and almost trip. No, no, no, that’s not something that you can do right now.
Tripping means falling and falling means little cubs onto you and that means mama Nundu breathing down your neck… literally.
“What the hell, Kara?!”
“I’m sorry, I’m sorry, I’m sorry, I’m so, so, so, sorry!”
You look up at her. Oh, wonder that. Your little sister is racing a flying carpet alongside you.
“Are you helping me up, or what?” You glare up to her. “This is the last time I fall for your pout!”
You feel a sudden pull upwards and you bite back a yelp at being lifted. You hate it when Kara uses any magic on you silently. You hate it that she can do magic without a wand and that she’s so goddam good at it… you also hate it when she’s all sunshine and rainbows about it.
“Merlin’s balls, Kara!” you yell the moment you’re put gently on the carpet. “Really, what the hell?!”
Your sister looks down and starts playing with a loose thread on the carpet. “I’m really sorry…” she mumbles.
Your chest is rising and falling with the effort of having sprint for over an hour. “We need to find Maggie,” you tell her harshly.
Kara sniffs and nods. “Lee’s looking for her,” she says softly.
The carpet is slowing down as it goes up, up, up. Up in the air, the silence is almost crushing. You can’t hear the birds anymore, nor the wind rushing in your ears, nor the little feet chasing you…
… only Kara’s pitiful sniffs and, somehow, her crushing guilt.
“Oh, for Morgana’s tits,” you huff. You open your arms. “Come here, you.”
Your sister waste no time in slamming into your chest, practically climbing on your lap and clinging to you, hard. Not only a second after, you can feel her tears soaking your neck, where she’s hiding.
“I-I’m sorry,” she mumbles.
“I know, Kar, I know,” you sigh. You had planned on being angry for at least a day… but of course, Kara has to feel guilty and pitiful and… argh.
The worst thing is that she’s really feeling it, not faking it like she sometimes does when she wants to get her way.
When your little sister said she was going to be a Beast Handler the heart attack you gave your mom with you choosing a breaking curse career was like a little chest pain… and that Lena, little, quiet, passive, Lena was joining her…
“Easy, baby, easy,” you hush her. “It’s okay, baby, it’s okay.”
Kara shakes in your arms, sniffling. “I’m sorry, I-I really am.”
“I know, love, I know. Hey,” you detach her from your neck, making her look at you. Her eyes are leaking and her nose is running. “Hey, hey, baby. Nothing happened… shh, I’m okay, see? Nothing happened.”
“I’m sorry I dragged you into this… that I-I brought Maggie into this too…”
“I forgive you, baby,” you pull her in again, dropping a kiss on her temple. “And Maggie’s a little shit that chose to drop by uninvited… if we’re realistic, it’s her fault the mission went wrong.”
Kara shakes her head. “I-It was Winn’s fault,” she says. “The traps h-he built weren’t strong enough.”
“It was Maggie the one that Apparated in the middle of the operation.” You kiss her temple again, knowing that the carpet will guide you to safety. If Lena is on Maggie retrieval, then you won’t worry at all.
You trust Lee with your life and with Maggie’s too.
“… I’m still sorry…”
You roll your eyes at that. Kara will be beating herself up for days if you don’t make her pay a price or punish her in some way. No matter how many times you tell her she’s forgiven or even that something’s not her fault, she feels guilty and sad when something she does backfires or simply doesn’t work out.
Survivor’s guilt Maggie calls it.
“Okay, baby,” you say into her hair. “Okay… once we are back in Cairo, you are buying Maggie and I a never-ending round of Firewhiskey and, once we are back home, you’re on Tobby duty for a month.”
Kara startles in your arms, going so far as to push you away. “What? No! No Tobby!”
You glare at her. “Yes. Yes, Tobby.”
“Aaaaalex…” she whines. “No Tobby!”
Your glare intensifies. Tobby is the old house elf your mom gave you the day you started living on your own. Tobby is amazing, he’s been there since you can remember and he’s the one that helped raise you. That your mom, in all her pure-blood glory, decided to part with the elf that also saw her grow up was met with tears of happiness and gratitude…
… until you realized the old elf has a knack of cock-blocking you all. The. Damn. Time.
You love him. He was your best friend, your only friend, through most of your childhood, but sometimes, just sometimes, you want to have your little cottage for yourself and Maggie.
Tobby will, and has, spend time at Luthor Manor helping Trinky and Hoppy with the enormous place, but even so, you get why Kara doesn’t like having Tobby around… he is indeed a master cock-blocker.
“Mags and I are trying for a baby, Kar… we really need him out the house.”
Kara’s eyes widen and she’s suddenly climbing on your lap again, hugging the magic out of you. “Oh, my Rao! Oh, my Rao! I’m going to be an aunt!”
You laugh.
It was a secret. Both you and Maggie are not sure if the potion you bought is going to work, but well, you can’t really keep this kind of huge news from your beloved baby sister.
“Tobby can come stay with Lee and I, if that’s what you need,” she tells you earnestly.
“Oh, hell, no! He’s not!”
You both jump at Lena’s sudden indignant yell. While you two were having your heart to heart the carpet delivered you to the small camp you’ve set at Mount Mabu’s base. Maggie, in all her messy, muddy and grumpy glory, narrows her eyes at you while Lena’s pouty lips press into a thin line.
Kara is off the carpet in an instant, going to hug Maggie and managing to almost tackle her to the ground. “I’m sorry, bigger sis!” she half yells half whimpers as she crushes your wife. “I promise not to steal Alex like this again!”
You roll your eyes as you climb down the levitating piece of cloth. You’re not at all surprised to have Lena suddenly attached to you, clinging the same way Kara did not too long ago.
You sigh as you embrace her. You never really thought you will see the baby Luthor as your sister too. “I’m okay, Lee,” you whisper against her temple. “I’m okay.”
It had been a close call, but thankfully, the calming draughts, the sleeping charms and the traps you used made it for an easy to control mama Nundu… that’s it, until Maggie apparated at your side, breaking your concentration and waking up the small litter of cubs you needed to relocate.
“I was so scared…” she mumbles into your breastbone.
You kiss her forehead, knowing that, while Kara feels guilty and she’ll come around until her ‘punishment’ is over, Lena will only feel fear and distress at almost losing both her role models.
After losing Lex to the Veil of Death, his father to Dragonpox and her mother to Azkaban… you’re all that Lena has left.
“We’re okay, little Lee, we’re okay.”
She nods, but her hold on you tightens. “Please, no more scares like that… my heart wouldn’t survive.”
You snort at that. “Says the little Beast Handler… Lena, you give me a heart attack weekly.”
Lena sniffs and you’re not surprised when she looks to fit her head under your chin. You miss the days when she was a little thing and she could fit there comfortably. Now, she’s almost too tall for it, but she still seeks your warmth whenever possible this way. “You know I mostly stay at the lab, healing the animals…”
“… and yet you still manage to almost die twice a month.”
You look over at your wife and sister and you smile at the familiar sight of Kara clinging onto Maggie’s back like a backpack, arms, and legs all around the petite Auror.
She used to do that when things got too much in Hogwarts, when the noises were too much, and the pressure of her own prophesy too heavy on her shoulders… the last kid of a death world, sent to Earth to bring balance… and, just like back then, Maggie simply bears her weight and let her shut off for a little while.
“I’m sleeping next to you tonight,” Lena’s small, yet determinate, voice reaches your ears.
Your eyes find Maggie’s.
You know she’s still upset you went missing for two days, leaving just a rushed note and no way to contact you. Maggie may have made you get used to your cellphone, but the Mozambique jungle is not a place for it and sending a hawk all the way home was too hard on the poor bird.
You know she’ll forgive you in a heartbeat… as soon as you get the chance to actually talk to her. Her Apparating and prompting you both to run for your lives for the sole fact that performing ‘active’ magic near a Nundu is exactly what you can’t do (and what got you into that mess in the first place) didn’t really allow you to talk.
You also know that right now, though, what you need is to make sure your little sisters are taken care of and that, come morning, you actually move those Nundus. The villages that are near their burrow have already lost too many lives to them and the sanctuary Kara and Lena work for refuses to put down six healthy specimens. Dangerous, but healthy.
“Fine by me,” you finally answer Lena. “C’mon. Now that Maggie’s here, we may actually eat something decent.”
Lena bristles at that. “Hey! I can cook!”
You smile, cupping her cheeks and leaving another kiss to her forehead. “Heating cans of beans is not cooking, little Lee.”
Lena pouts at that and Maggie laughs and Kara chuckles and you beam.
This is your family.
A little bit crazy.
A little too tight-knit.
Sometimes all over the place.
Sometimes too reckless.
And always full of love.
“Hey, guys… has anyone seen my wand?”
Yeah… this is your family.