Archive of Our Own ^beta

Chapter Text

Dear Tina,

I’m set to arrive in two weeks. I’m not sure yet what time you can expect me. That is, if you are still amenable to delivery of your book in person. Either way, I’ll be nearby. 

I very much hope you would like to see me. 

Please do try to stay out of trouble in the meantime. I realize that’s somewhat rich coming from me given my track record. But if something is bound to happen, would you mind waiting until I arrive? I’d hate to miss all the excitement.

Yours sincerely,

Newt

Newt,

Of course I’d like to see you. I’m surprised you’d even wonder.

I am staying out of trouble, or at least trying. 

One more update (to keep under wraps): Queenie and Jacob are engaged. We haven’t worked out the logistics, but I suggested they legally marry in England.

For now, we’re all just happy. It feels rare enough given everything else going on that it’s worth enjoying.

Fondly,

Tina

P.S. Queenie wants you to be the best man. She’s not kidding.

Dear Tina,

Please give the happy couple my warmest congratulations. 

I’m not entirely sure what a best man’s duties entail, but I’d be honored.

Perhaps I ought to start writing a new book about strong-minded Aurors. Specifically those named Tina Goldstein. It would, of course, be quite complimentary.

Only a week now.

Yours,

Newt

“Teenie!” Queenie squealed in excitement, reading the letter that Tina had left carelessly on the kitchen table.

“That’s private,” Tina said sternly, and swiped it away from her gushing sister.

“I couldn’t help it,” Queenie said, sighing dreamily. “I was gonna pick up on it anyway, you’ve been thinking so much about him lately. Oh, this is gonna be magical!” She leaned back on the counter and beamed at Tina. “You know, he’s much more romantic than I thought.”

Tina groaned. “That’s enough.”

Queenie smirked. “You know he likes you, don’t you?”

“I don’t want to talk about it,” Tina muttered.

“Baloney,” Queenie proclaimed in a sing-songy voice.

Refusing to indulge her sister’s teenage-like ardor over a relationship that didn’t even exist, Tina grabbed a thick work file and headed for the living room to wrap up research for the Umbridge investigation. Queenie floated along behind her and, once Tina was seated, peered over the top of a page, still beaming.

Tina raised an eyebrow. “Yes?”

“When’s he coming?” Queenie asked eagerly.

“Tomorrow,” Tina answered, carefully concealing the excitement in her voice.

She’d thought about their farewell at the docks more times than she cared to admit. Specifically, every day. Possibly multiple times a day. The sinking feeling at the prospect of never seeing him again, the urge to ask him to stay, the relief when he returned and asked whether he could deliver his book in person…

What’s he going to say? 

What am I going to say?

Hearing her unspoken questions, Queenie patted Tina a bit condescendingly on the head and said kindly, “You’ll figure it out.” 

With that flimsy reassurance—sure to solve for a lifetime of childhood trauma and romantic inexperience—the Legilimens waltzed away, humming to herself. 

Tina glanced anxiously at the calendar hanging on the living room wall. Tomorrow’s date had been circled in light pencil ever since she received Newt’s letter two weeks ago and subsequently reread it more times than she cared to admit.

You’ll figure it out.

Well, one thing was for sure. Whether she liked it or not, at this point, she didn’t have much of a choice but to figure it out. 

Newt almost turned back about a dozen times on his way to the apartment. First of all, he had no idea if anybody was home. Second of all, Tina might not be home. Or worse, she might be home alone. And third of all, while he had undeniably developed a strong fondness for Tina during their short time together, whether it was reciprocated was unclear at best—and his course of action, if it was, was a complete mystery.

Somehow he found himself on the landing, dying to knock but wanting equally as much to run the opposite direction. But Queenie could probably pick up on his racing thoughts at this point, and knowing her, she wouldn’t be too subtle about it. Before she could blurt something out to Tina and make this entire situation even more uncomfortable, Newt bravely raised his fist to give the door a timid little tap. At the same time, the knob twisted from the inside.

“Come on, we’ll be la—” Tina stopped short.

Both of them froze for a second, Newt with his hand still aloft. Tina was wearing the same dress as she had at The Blind Pig, and he could only stare for a moment. Behind Tina, Queenie smirked at him.

“Mr. Scamander,” Tina said breathlessly, pushing her hair behind her ear and smoothing her dress self-consciously. “We weren’t expecting you.”

“Got here early, you see,” Newt explained, and gestured to his suitcase. “We were destined for a later arrival, you see, and I thought I might encourage the captain to set sail a smidge sooner than planned.”

Tina narrowed her eyes, switching into Auror mode. “What did you do?” she asked, with just a hint of warmth softening the edge to her tone.

Newt cleared his throat and averted his gaze. What he had done was certainly not legal, but in his defense, he had wanted to see Tina. Badly.

“Well, the book has turned out to be rather more successful than I’d anticipated,” he explained carefully, “so I had a bit of gold with me, and...” He held out his arms, motioning to the entire apartment. This was arguably downplaying the exact scenario—but surely the remaining details were irrelevant now that he was finally here.

“You bribed the captain of the ship to leave a day early,” Tina stated. She arched an eyebrow; whether she was skeptical, disappointed, amused, or a combination of the three, Newt couldn’t discern. However, the corner of her mouth twitched in a reluctant little half-smile, so it couldn’t be all bad.

Even more so than before, Newt found it impossible to take his eyes off of her, though this fascination was offset by his discomfort with sustained eye contact, resulting in a constant optical dance between Tina and the floor that was going to start making him nauseous if he didn’t get himself under control. 

Queenie interjected apologetically, “Teenie, we really better leave. Jacob can’t get in without us.”

“Sorry,” Tina apologized. She turned to Newt and asked more brusquely this time, “You’ve arranged somewhere to stay, Mr. Scamander?” 

Newt shifted uncomfortably. Planning this sort of thing was not exactly his forte. Admittedly, he’d been too eager to see Tina to even think about lodging.

Fortunately, his silence was the only answer Queenie needed. “You’ll stay here,” she announced, looping her arm through Tina’s.

Newt balked. “Oh, I couldn’t impose—”

“Sure ya could!” Queenie gave a knowing wink, reached for her jacket, then turned back to Newt. “You remember where everything is, honey?”

“More or less,” he lied.

“Mhm,” she replied playfully. “Make yourself at home, doll. Guest room’s open. Come on, Teenie.”

Tina frowned, looking back at Newt. Although he couldn’t hear the silent conversation that occurred between the two women—and he deliberately stared up at the ceiling, reciting dragon species to himself in alphabetical order as if he might spontaneously develop the gift of Legilimency and accidentally eavesdrop on their thoughts—he assumed it was something along the lines of “should we invite Newt along?”

“Stop it,” Tina snapped at her sister, then turned back to Newt. “You could come if you want to,” she offered haltingly.

Newt very much wanted to, especially if she looked like that. But exhaustion was kicking in, and he disliked the thought of their reunion being undercover at a seedy speakeasy where he couldn’t even have her full attention. 

“No, I’m afraid I’m not much for dancing,” he replied, eyes darting between Tina’s shoulder and the door frame.

“There’ll be fellas there,” Queenie said pointedly, shooting him a look.

Newt faltered, shaking off an unpleasant wave of something verging on jealousy that was clearly triggered by the prospect of men being at The Blind Pig. 

Men who would see Tina looking like this. Men who went after what they wanted. Men that Tina might find appealing.

“I’ll be working,” Tina cut in, glaring at her sister, who shrugged without a hint of contrition.

Newt maintained his composure enough to explain, “I’d better check on my creatures, I haven’t since this morning and they’ll get riled up if I keep them waiting.”

Tina nodded, appeared slightly lost for a moment, and then struggled into her coat. As Newt was wondering whether he should be helping her, Queenie sidled over to him.

“Look after her, will you?” Newt said in an undertone before the Legilimens could harass him further about the prospect of male suitors at The Blind Pig.

Queenie opened and closed her mouth, almost like she was rethinking whatever she was planning to say. “You got it, sugar,” she replied with a twinkle in her eye.

Newt stole one more look at Tina, who was adjusting her collar in the mirror with a determined frown. He wanted to say something more, perhaps to wish her good luck and ask her to be safe, but the words stuck in his throat. Tina’s eyes met his for a brief moment; he was reminded poignantly of the very first time he’d been at the apartment. Then she cleared her throat and turned her back. 

With that anticlimactic sendoff, Queenie whisked Tina away, leaving Newt clutching his suitcase with an empty, longing sort of sensation in the pit of his stomach.

Thankfully, he didn’t have to wallow over Tina’s absence for long; once he finished feeding his creatures, it took about thirty seconds for him to fall into a deep sleep, and he was accordingly feeling quite refreshed by the time Tina, Queenie, and Jacob returned to the apartment.

“It’s nearly one in the morning,” Tina said in surprise when he emerged from the spare bedroom at the sound of their arrival.

Before Newt could respond, he was accosted by Jacob, who clapped him heartily on the shoulder, then trapped him in an overzealous one-armed embrace. 

“Good to have you back, Mr. English Guy,” he said, grinning.

“You too, Mr. Kowalski,” Newt replied, taken aback by this show of affection. 

It was a novel experience, being welcomed so enthusiastically by humans; until now, Newt had only received such greetings from his creatures. Unfortunately, he wasn’t quite sure how to adequately reciprocate such physical displays of affection and ended up giving Jacob a feeble pat on the arm reminiscent of swatting a pesky fly off his sleeve. 

Jacob frowned in confusion, as if wondering why on earth Newt had just done that.

Newt wished he knew.

Hoping to move on from his faux pas, he quickly turned to Tina and asked, “How did it go?”

“I got what I needed,” she answered grimly. “Seems like Dolohov’s involved. I guess he and the Umbridges have been on the run with the Carrows, which means curtains for them once they’re found. That’s a Section 9B, maybe even a 9E.”

“Nobody knows what you’re talking about,” Queenie interjected helpfully, after everyone only exchanged blank stares in response.

“Oh, right.” Tina shook her head. “Sorry.”

Jacob cleared his throat. Exchanging looks with his fiancée, he announced with the air of a man who’d had to rehearse this multiple times, “We was thinking, Queenie and I, that we might take you girls’ bedroom while Mr. Scamander is here.”

While premarital room-sharing was of no concern to him, Newt opted to remain silent: this seemed like something for the two women to sort out. Jacob had now sunk back into the chair cushion with palpable relief that his speaking part was over.

Tina gaped at her sister in disbelief. “You decided what?” she asked sharply.

“We’re practically married,” Queenie said in defense, “and if I spend too much time at his flat it might arouse suspicion. There’s two beds in the guest room,” she added.

Tina looked incredulously at Newt, then back at her sister, who was perched in Jacob’s lap, one arm looped snugly around his neck. 

“This is… not what I expected,” she said, every syllable dripping with disapproval.

Queenie scoffed. “Oh, come on, Teenie. Don’t be such a wet blanket. It’s almost the 1930s.”

Tina hesitated a beat more before sighing in concession. “Fine. But don’t touch any of my books,” she added to Jacob, who raised his hands defensively.

“Wouldn’t dream of it, Miss Goldstein,” he pledged, then smiled fondly up at his fiancée, who leaned down and kissed him on the cheek. 

“G’night, dolls,” Queenie said to Tina and Newt with a little wave over her shoulder as she and her fiance retired to the sisters’ bedroom.

There was a moment of tense silence after the door closed, during which Newt hid beneath his fringe and Tina scanned the room as though on a mission to find a single speck of dust. They both started to speak at the same time.

“Oh, so sorry,” Newt stammered, motioning for her to go ahead.

“We should probably…” Tina’s gaze drifted to the guest room.

“Yes, of course,” Newt replied. 

Tina looked for a moment like she was about to say something—Newt wondered whether she might also be thinking back to the moment at the docks—but neither of them spoke up. Instead, they took the few steps from the living room to the guest bedroom and reached for the doorknob, brushing hands. 

“Sorry,” Newt apologized hurriedly.

After much more hassle than should be involved in entering a room, they stepped inside and sat across from each other. Newt caught Tina looking at his enchanted suitcase longingly, and his heart did something odd.

“I wish I’d gotten to spend more time with them,” she said softly.

I wish I’d gotten to spend more time with you.

Instead of blurting this out, Newt wisely changed the subject. “Did you want to tell me more about, er, the Umbridge case?” he suggested tentatively.

Tina instantly lit up at the mention of work and nodded enthusiastically. “Let me change first,” she said, getting to her feet.

Newt made a noise of assent and perched on the edge of the bed, pondering things.

Although Tina didn’t explicitly flinch or hit him when he gently touched her face during their farewell, this could hardly be considered a sign that she might be interested. And if he was being honest, he hadn’t entirely dissected and understood his feelings. Or even what “interested” might actually mean. His feelings for Tina at present were that of fancying someone that he didn’t know nearly well enough to fancy, yet here he was, fancying her.

Which was made all the more objectively ridiculous by the fact that they’d only spent two days together in person. It was an intense two days, probably more than most couples would endure in a lifetime, but two days nonetheless. The rest of their relationship until now had been the occasional postcard, an owl whenever he had the chance, and wistful fantasies about seeing her again that played out every time he closed his eyes. 

He knew it was madness. 

“Oh, honey, it’s not madness.”

Newt jumped and looked wildly around the room. “Queenie?!”

She was poking her head through a small window that had apparently been magically concealed in the wall. 

“I was just checking to see how you two are getting on, that’s all,” she said, as if spying on her older sister with a boy through a magic window at two o’clock in the morning was a perfectly acceptable thing to be doing. 

“Yes, I’d—I’d rather it if you didn’t do things like that,” Newt said, still recovering from the shock. He paused. “Is this how normal sisters act?”

Queenie shrugged. “I’m illegally marrying a No-Maj that I met while nearly getting killed by a dark destructive force and battling the most dangerous wizard of our time. I ain’t got any sense of normal after that.”

Newt thought for a moment. “It’s… very nice.”

Queenie tilted her head. “What is?”

“How you are with Tina,” he explained. “It’s good to know she’s being looked after. I wish I could, more, but, well. I’m glad she has you, anyhow.”

Queenie smiled. “Mm. And who’s looking after you, Mr. Scamander?”

Before he could say anything further, Queenie disappeared, the wall returned to normal, and Tina walked in wearing a pajama suit and no more makeup.

“Scrubbing all that paint off was a real pain,” she complained, sitting down opposite him. 

“It suits you, though,” Newt blurted out. He paused, then added impulsively, “Anything does.”

Tina looked at him, and he desperately wished he could understand her expression.

“If I may say,” he followed up feebly when she stayed silent.

His gaze flicked around the room, wondering what on earth he ought to do or say now. A half second of awkward silence stretched out into eternity. Tina brought her right hand up to the side of her temple, which he couldn’t help but notice was where he’d tentatively touched her when they said their last goodbye. Could it be that she too had been reliving that moment in the weeks since?

“So this Umbridge bloke, he’s a dark wizard?” Newt finally thought to ask. 

The subject change appeared to startle Tina out of whatever reverie she had fallen into and, much to both of their relief, she began talking. It was a long and involved story told between increasingly frequent yawns, and by the time it was over, they were curled up in their respective beds, facing one another.

“Newt,” Tina whispered, when he failed to answer a question.

Newt jerked awake for a moment. “Still listening,” he mumbled.

Through his half-shut eyes, he saw Tina looking at him with a soft fondness that made his heart beat faster. 

“Go to sleep,” she said gently. 

Overtaken as he was by his sleep-deprived state, Newt had to resist the ridiculous urge to reach out his hand in hopes Tina would take it. Instead, he adjusted his pillow. 

“Mm. Keep talking,” he murmured.

Tina raised an eyebrow. “I don’t have anything else to talk about,” she said.

“Your voice. Keep talking,” Newt insisted.

He opened his eyes wide enough to see the tender look on Tina’s face again. It made him feel instantly warm.

And so Tina continued talking as, despite months of nightmares and waking up every few hours to check on his creatures, Newt fell into a deep slumber. 

Around dawn, his eyelids fluttered open briefly, and he was immediately met with the image of Tina sound asleep, still facing him. 

He closed his eyes and smiled.

Chapter Text

The enchanted ship creaked softly as it cut across moonlit waves. Harry Potter stood at the front of the Calypso, hands resting on the railing while the ocean air tugged at his disheveled hair.

Another mission done.

The New Guinea assignment had been moderately difficult to crack. He’d had easier, he’d had harder. This particular case had involved months of mud and monsoons and tense negotiations with tribal leaders: brilliant, powerful witches who harbored extreme distrust and disdain for the American and British governments. 

“Ten hours to New York,” came a voice behind him.

Harry turned to see Anthony Hopkirk, a liaison sent by MACUSA to accompany him on his return, approaching him with a cup of tea.

“You ever been?” Anthony asked as Harry gratefully accepted the warm drink. 

“To New York?” Harry shrugged. “Only once. Briefly. Didn’t see much.”

“To be fair, there’s not much to see,” Anthony quipped. 

“This is just a quick stop before I head home anyway,” Harry explained with a sigh. “Have to tie up some loose ends for work.”

He was always working. He enjoyed it… mostly. But for the past several months, he couldn’t shake a pervasive, slightly unsettling malaise that crept in at the end of each mission and lingered until his next assignment.

Granted, he spent his days navigating the cesspools of society steeped in dark magic, corruption, greed, and violence, where Unforgivable Curses were child’s play—not exactly a morale booster. The disguises he relied upon to protect his identity during these deadly missions were so powerful that only a handful of high-ranking officials were capable of the magic required to generate such impenetrable disguises. Fewer still knew how to lift them.

It was to the point where Harry sometimes forgot what he even looked like. And working in constant solitude meant there was no one there to remind him. 

Then again, solitude was what he was used to. Orphaned at a young age and cast aside by his appointed guardians, Hogwarts had been his lifeline. He spent summers interning at the Ministry, negotiating contracts that included lodging in exchange for free labor so he never had to return to that miserable house. It was only thanks to the kindness of Ministry officials and the generosity of mentors who saw his potential that Harry could begin full-time work as soon as he graduated.

The rest, as they said, was history.

“I’ll leave you to it then,” Anthony piped up, breaking into Harry’s internal reflection.

“Sorry,” Harry apologized hurriedly. “Tired.”

“Don’t blame ya,” Anthony reassured him with a grin, and clapped him warmly on the shoulder before retreating below deck.

Harry finished his tea in silence. Then he stared out at the horizon, listening to the sound of water sloshing against the boat’s hull. As he stood there, a heavy sense of foreboding suddenly washed over him. Not fear, exactly. Merlin knew he was practically immune to fear at this point. It was a cold, crawling unease, like the shadow of a Dementor or the pulse of an Obscurus lurking just out of sight. 

Harry’s fingers tightened around the railing. He leaned into the wind as it picked up, sharp and biting across his face.

Ready or not, New York was waiting.

At The Midnight Quill headquarters, Ginny Weasley sat cross-legged on her desk, flipping frenetically through notes as she tried to piece together the lineup for next week’s edition. Her long red hair was swept back in a messy bun to keep it from obscuring her vision as she leaned over a corkboard cluttered with moving photos and clippings from other publications. Around her, half-empty coffee mugs hovered mid-air, quills scratched across floating parchments, and the radiator in the corner hissed like it had opinions of its own. Ginny’s junior journalists and editors chatted quietly amongst themselves. 

She was about to check on them when her new assistant, recent Ilvermorny graduate Clarabel Bloom, came flying into the room.

“Ginny! You are not going to believe this,” Clarabel cried. 

Ginny arched an eyebrow. “If it’s another Puffskein beauty pageant in Brooklyn...”

Clarabel scoffed. “No! Better. Way better. Harry Potter’s coming to New York.”

Ginny blinked. “Who?”

“Harry Potter?! The most famous Auror in Britain?” Clarabel pushed a grainy picture over to Ginny. “Look! Isn’t he just dreamy?”

Ginny gave a cursory glance and hopped off her desk.

“Did you look?” Clarabel asked plaintively, trotting along behind her like a lost puppy.

“Clara, honestly, he could be fifteen feet tall and shoot fire from his eyes and I wouldn’t care,” Ginny responded dryly as she poured lukewarm coffee into her mug. “He’s not even from here.” 

“Yeah, exactly,” Clarabel said emphatically. “So he’s foreign. That’s a story, right?”

Ginny sighed. Clarabel wasn’t supposed to be doing interviews; she’d been hired to help Ginny, not try her hand at writing an article about a boy she had a crush on. If that was the experience she was after, then Spellbound was no doubt a more appropriate employer.

“I have other things to focus on,” Ginny said firmly.

Clarabel pouted. “Come on, let me cover it,” she pleaded, clasping her hands together. “It doesn’t have to be long, I promise! If I can get an interview, it’ll be so worth it. I swear.”

Making a mental note to implement a much more thorough vetting process for her next assistant and ask her Spellbound contacts if they had any open roles where she could offload Clarabel, Ginny decided to pick her battles. “Be my guest,” she conceded.

With a delighted squeal, Clarabel skipped off, clutching the Auror’s photo to her chest. Ginny shook her head at the ridiculous behavior—honestly, teenagers these days—and started organizing the mess of parchment and clippings on her desk.

One thing was for sure: she didn’t know Harry Potter, and had absolutely no desire to.

The morning after Tina and Newt’s late-night escapades, Queenie woke them both, sailing into the room with tea for Newt and coffee for Tina. Newt, whose experience providing round-the-clock care to his creatures meant he was prepared to spring into action no matter how deep his slumber, sat up immediately.

Tina, on the other hand, was not quite so chipper. She hit Queenie, then pulled the covers over her head, mumbled something about hexes, tried to reach for her wand (which Queenie seized just in time) and finally, with intense and palpable reluctance, came out of her comatose state. 

“What the—” Tina started, squinting in the light.

Prepared for battle, Queenie pressed the coffee cup into her sister’s hand, then shushed her as though soothing a petulant child. Tina groaned and took a sip, blinking blearily.

“You’ll like her better once she’s had coffee,” Queenie informed Newt. Then she stood akimbo between the two beds and asked sternly, “How late did you stay up?”

“Uh…” Tina looked at Newt over the top of her mug.

Newt grimaced. Under Queenie’s strict gaze, it truly felt like they had gotten in trouble with a chaperone and not Tina’s younger sister. Which frankly was completely unfair when they were all adults. Besides, hadn’t Queenie practically forced them to share a room?

At any rate, Tina gave no indication that she would be participating in this domestic interrogation, which left Newt to bear the brunt of Queenie’s aggressive questioning.

“Er… well, I think it may have been… just shy of three? Possibly a quarter to,” he mused, as if a 10-minute difference would make the late night any earlier.

“What time is it?” Tina interrupted before Queenie could chastise them for their poor judgment.

Queenie smirked mischievously. “Half past eight.”

“Ah. Half past—what?” Tina spluttered. “Queenie! Why didn’t you wake me sooner?!” 

She gulped down the rest of her coffee at an alarming rate, slammed the cup on the bedside table, and sped out of the room. Newt blinked, uncertain whether this was a typical Goldstein morning or a minor emergency. To be fair, Tina seemed to have a way of making a lot of trivial things seem like minor emergencies.

“She’s supposed to be at work in fifteen minutes,” Queenie explained, grinning.

“You couldn’t have woken her a little earlier, you don’t think?” Newt inquired cautiously. 

Then again, I was the one who kept her up until 3 AM.

“Exactly,” Queenie said smugly, and waltzed off.

Newt really ought to learn Occlumency.

The rest of the day felt rather useless without Tina there. Newt went through his usual routine, checking everything a few more times than necessary, until he was truly out of chores and found himself inspired to draw. Ever since Fantastic Beasts had been published, he’d had very little opportunity to indulge in such creative endeavors, even though his passion for magizoology was so intimately tied to the creative spark that developed in childhood. His mum often recalled how, as a toddler, he didn’t particularly like to talk, but instead would hole himself up in different nooks and crannies around Scamander Island and fill sketchbook after sketchbook with magical creatures.

Time passed quickly once Pickett stopped attempting to steal every writing instrument Newt owned. His beginning attempts were rusty at best—he broke several pencils out of frustration and was sure to have nightmares about some of the atrocities he’d accidentally created—but by dusk, when he abruptly realized how late it had gotten, he had compiled a neat stack of drawings. In addition to likenesses of the more flashy majestic beasts like dragons and Hippogriffs, his sketches captured miscellaneous creatures seen in passing during his travels. He had encountered a particularly amusing group of flying seahorses while touring Scotland, and although he wasn’t fluent in any aquatic languages, he got the distinct sense that they were laughing at the tour guide’s floppy sunhat. Mackled Malaclaws made it into his little portfolio, as did Streelers, which he had discovered being bred in Europe; while he did his best to do them justice, their full beauty was impossible to fully capture without artistic enchantments to depict their stunning hourly color changes.

“I didn’t know you could draw.”

Newt jumped, spinning around to find himself face-to-face with Tina.

“Tina!” he sputtered, instantly flustered. 

She ignored his surprise and moved closer. “These are really good,” she murmured as she inspected each drawing.

It occurred to Newt to be embarrassed. These were rough sketches, after all, and not intended for the public eye. “You really needn’t—”

“No, they’re really good!” Tina insisted. “I saw the ones in your book, but these are so… raw.” She skimmed a finger over one, smudging the graphite slightly. “I shouldn’t be surprised, though. You seem to be good at everything.” Then she added in an uncharacteristically lighthearted tone, “Especially Erumpent mating dances.”

Newt paled. “Jacob told you?”

Tina nodded. “He tried to replicate it for us, actually, and strained his thigh. Queenie was inconsolable at first. She thought he’d never walk again.” 

Newt shook his head ruefully, even as he pictured the admittedly humorous scene that must have played out. “I really must swear him to secrecy on these things,” he said.

Tina sat down next to him. “I... we missed you, when you were gone,” she said after a moment. “It was quiet here.”

Newt tilted his head. “You... missed me?”

Tina licked her lips nervously, suddenly avoiding eye contact. “Queenie did. Jacob, too.” 

A long pause stretched between them. It wasn’t exactly awkward, but it wasn’t completely comfortable either.

“I did,” Tina suddenly admitted.

Enough seconds had passed since her preceding statement that it was nearly a non sequitur, but Newt knew what she meant. He couldn’t help but move a millimeter closer so they were just barely touching. 

“I missed you too,” he said softly.

Tina finally looked over at him. “You missed me?” she asked in nearly a whisper.

Confronted with her mesmerizing dark fiery eyes, Newt panicked. “Er... all of you. I missed all of you,” he rapidly backtracked.

Tina looked like she wanted to say something and didn’t know what.

“It wasn’t all of you,” Newt confessed after several more seconds of silence in which they both gazed up unseeingly at the enchanted sky of his suitcase. 

“What?” Tina looked over at him sharply.

Newt cleared his throat uncomfortably. “It wasn’t... I didn’t come here for them, for Queenie and Jacob, that is,” he stammered. “I didn’t miss them. Well, I did, but just not—not the way I missed... you.”

I came here for you.

He was too afraid to say the words out loud, but hoped desperately that she knew what he meant.

“Oh,” was all Tina said.

Newt was suddenly acutely aware of how close she was to him and the fact that she wasn’t moving away. He swallowed anxiously, eyes darting between her and the wall of his workshop.

“Newt? Teenie?” Queenie’s distant voice floated down into the suitcase. “Dinnertime!”

And just like that, the moment was over. Tina withdrew from Newt immediately and jumped to her feet.

“Coming!” she yelled back up.

Newt followed her to the base of the stairs, swallowing down the surge of disappointment that had left an odd lump in his throat, and gestured for Tina to go ahead. She took a step, then paused and turned back to face him.

“For the record,” she said, “I’m really glad you’re here.”

“So am I,” Newt replied emphatically.

More than you know.

Tina gave a little nod, and without exchanging another word, the two of them returned to reality.

They spent the evening playing wizard’s chess with Queenie and Jacob (Tina won) and attempting a Muggle game called American mahjong, which was apparently all the rage (Jacob won). The others listened in awe as Newt related some of his more recent escapades, ones that hadn't made it into his book; Tina and Queenie took turns recounting adventures from their childhood. At one point Newt and Tina looked across at one another in the warm light of the fireplace, and something about it felt so much like home after such a short span of time, Newt didn’t quite know what to do with the emotions it evoked in him.

Later, once Queenie and Jacob had retired to their room, Tina made hot cocoa and brought it into the bedroom. She and Newt sat on the floor like children at a sleepover, sipping their drinks and talking as though they couldn’t get enough, as though they had to learn everything they could about each other. He became acquainted with different version of Tina—softer, more relaxed, so very different from the woman he knew. And it was better than anything he could have ever hoped for in returning to New York.

When Newt mentioned how much he missed his mum’s baking, Tina brought him straight to the kitchen. Despite Newt’s insistence that he dared not step on toes, Tina made a valiant effort to teach him a series of baking charms—and, surprising no one, his attempts failed to produce remotely favorable results. Making biscuits was a pastime that he would never have associated with the restrained, serious Tina he’d first met. 

But the Tina he’d first met versus the Tina who was smiling over a mixing bowl at him in the amber glow of the kitchen lights was night and day. 

Of course, she was fascinating either way.

After piling the biscuits into a large plate to cool, Newt cleaned the kitchen while Tina went to wash up. He may not have the same finesse as Tina when it came to housework and cooking, but he was nothing if not well-accustomed to messes. Plus, this was significantly less bloody than most of what he dealt with on a daily basis.

It all felt... domestic, Newt realized as he wiped down the counters. It was a pleasant, warm sensation that made his stomach flip-flop in the best way.

Once Tina returned, she and Newt both reached for the plate of cookies, accidentally brushing hands. They froze for a split second, making eye contact over the dish, and Newt was overcome for the umpteenth time since he’d arrived in New York with the offputting sensation of needing to say something but not being able to voice it.

It was nearly 3 AM again when they finally crawled into their respective beds. At least, one of them crawled; Tina had been falling asleep for the past half hour. Newt had suggested they call it a night several times, and each time Tina had waved him off, claiming she was wide awake and they were in the middle of an important conversation.

“Come on, Tina,” Newt whispered from where he was sat on the floor, leaning against the foot of his bed. “Up you get.” 

At some point, Tina had moved so close to him that her head was now leaning against his shoulder. Newt peeled her slowly off of him. She grumbled softly and refused to budge.

So it was that, following several failed attempts to shake her into wakefulness and a lengthy internal struggle, Newt impulsively leaned down and lifted Tina up in his arms. She curled into him immediately, tucking her head beneath his chin and laying one hand directly over his heart. He couldn't help but marvel at how perfectly she seemed to fit.

It was only a few feet to the bed, but Newt spent more time than he cared to admit standing in place so he could savor Tina’s warmth. Eventually his arms got tired and he placed her down gently, carefully drawing the sheets over her legs and arranging the pillow beneath her head.

“Right,” he mumbled to himself once he’d finished tucking her in properly. 

Halfway to his bed, he stopped, unable to resist the urge, and padded back over to Tina’s side. After a fleeting moment of hesitation, he leaned over and caressed the side of her cheek once with his thumb.

As he finally laid down, he gave a fond little smile in the darkness.

“Right,” Newt repeated in a feeble attempt to reason with himself, and slid under the covers.

Chapter Text

The morning paper screamed before the ink had even dried.

NO-MAJ PERFORMANCE SHUT DOWN AFTER MYSTERIOUS CREATURE INCIDENT: 12 CRITICALLY INJURED, 24 DEAD

“Read this,” Tina snipped, tossing a copy of The New York Ghost onto the bed as soon as Newt woke up. 

Newt, still bleary-eyed from sleep, took a moment to process. The first thing he’d thought of upon waking was Tina—specifically, the magical evening they’d just shared—and this was certainly not the wake-up call he had anticipated. There was no smile, no soft eye contact, no mention of last night. 

Instead, Tina was pummeling rouge onto her face with a white-knuckled grip on the compact that threatened to shatter it into pieces. Before Newt could utter a word, she snapped the powder compact shut and started brushing her hair so aggressively that he was worried she’d pull it out entirely. 

He looked down at the paper in his hands.

Last night’s highly anticipated No-Maj revue at Harlem’s famed Cotton Club, featuring the legendary blues singer Bessie Smith, ended in tragedy after a sudden and terrifying attack by an unknown magical creature. 

The incident left 12 No-Maj audience members critically injured and 24 dead within the first 5 minutes of the attack, at which point magical law enforcement and medical teams swiftly contained the situation. The unidentified creature fled the area upon their arrival.

Injured No-Majs were transported to Panacea Hospital for Magical Healing. Obliviators were deployed to safely modify all memories surrounding the traumatic event. It has been confirmed that No-Maj news outlets are reporting the attack as a sudden explosion due to faulty electric wiring.

While details of the creature remain scarce, sources report that it was unlike anything seen before. Magical enforcement agencies have launched a full-scale investigation into what is being called the deadliest incident of its kind in recent history. 

The city remains on edge as officials work to secure the area and prevent further harm. There will be an increased Auror presence near No-Maj gathering sites, though utmost caution will be taken to avoid fraternization where possible. MACUSA would like to remind citizens of Rappaport’s Law at times like these when concern for No-Majs may arise. 

If you or someone you know have information related to the ongoing investigation, please contact the Auror office immediately.

Newt finished reading the article and dropped the newspaper back on the bed like it had burned him. It was, of course, shocking and tragic—and noticeably, there was no call to action for the wizarding community to protect Muggles in light of this possibly targeted attack.

Utmost caution will be taken to avoid fraternization where possible.

It didn’t sit right with him, now more than ever. Muggles weren’t lesser simply because they didn’t possess magical abilities. To leave them essentially unprotected, save for a detached Auror presence, bordered on absurd. 

It came as no surprise to Newt that MACUSA, ignorant as they were on the matter of magical beasts, would be incapable of identifying anything that wasn’t a dragon, but he also couldn’t think of any creature that would be motivated to attack unprovoked and was capable of causing such damage and destruction.

Tina was now glaring at the clock as though daring it to challenge her while she buttoned up her shirtwaist. 

“I’ll be working late,” she said tightly.

“Is there anything I can do to help?” Newt thought to inquire, even as his mind raced to process all of this information.

“Yeah,” Tina replied grimly. She finished tying up her work boots and got to her feet. “Stay out of it.”

With those frosty parting words, she seized her navy blue trench coat and MACUSA badge, slipped her wand into its thigh holster, and left for work.

Ginny settled into a squeaky velvet armchair, a stack of notes in one hand and a cinnamon latte in the other. Trying to piece together an engaging story during what could only be described as a dry spell, she was so engrossed in her research that she barely noticed when Harry Potter finally walked into Bumble Beans.

He looked exactly like the grainy photograph that Clarabel had drooled over: tall, lean, and brooding in the way that clearly made him appealing to a certain type of witch. His coat was wrinkled, like he’d fallen asleep in his street clothes, and he carried the tired, vaguely uncomfortable air of someone who never asked to become famous but had anyway.

Harry skimmed the room with the hypervigilance of a seasoned Auror before locking eyes with her. “Ginny Weasley?”

“That’s me,” she confirmed.

“Sorry I’m late,” he apologized, offering a lopsided smile as he slid into the seat across from her. “I got turned around on Fifth. Apparently not all the street numbers go in order.”

Ginny raised an eyebrow. “Uh. They do. You just have to not be terrible at numbers.”

Harry took the mild jab in stride. “Fair enough,” he replied evenly.

“Well, glad you made it here in one piece,” Ginny said.

A pause stretched between them. Across from her, Harry scanned the room subtly with his (admittedly striking) green eyes, head motionless. It was eerily reminiscent of a snowy owl Ginny had once seen.

“My colleague Clarabel was supposed to meet you,” Ginny explained to cut through the silence. “But I guess something went south with a charmed face cream and she grew tusks temporarily. Started molting scales all over the office. It was a whole thing.”

Harry blinked. “That, uh…sounds rough.”

Ginny looked at him shrewdly. “Very.”

Another long silence. This was the man all the girls were swooning over? If he was such a bigshot Auror, where on earth were his social skills? Surely he had to be personable in his line of work.

Truth be told, the only reason Ginny had taken this interview in the first place was because she didn’t want her publication to look flaky. Potter was just a puff piece to pad the next issue and give Clarabel some busy work while Ginny chased down actual leads.

“So, first time in New York?” she inquired.

Harry shifted in his seat. “Second, actually.”

Ginny raised an eyebrow and reached for her quill, just in case he was about to provide details that readers might find interesting. “What was your first time?” she asked.

“It was more... bureaucratic,” was all Harry had to share.

Never mind then. Ginny placed her quill back down. 

“Gotcha,” she replied, even though she really did not get him at all. 

Silence fell again.

Harry was likely exhausted after traveling from the other side of the world, Ginny reminded herself. He couldn’t possibly be this bad at social interactions under normal circumstances. Her mind turned now to her next assignment, something about magical weather anomalies uptown.

Sighing, she flipped to the page of questions Clarabel had jotted down in glittery purple ink, little hearts drawn around the border of the parchment. 

What is your ideal type of witch?

Does the Auror lifestyle make it difficult to find love?

The Great Lover, Rudolph Valentino, just died. Could you make yourself magically look like him so his mourning fans could say a proper goodbye?

Do you sleep in a nightshirt or—

Well, that wouldn’t work. She really was doing Harry a favor here, Ginny thought as she imagined the man across from her being interrogated about his love life and sleepwear. He wasn’t ugly or unappealing, per se. Undoubtedly several tiers above the sleazy men she encountered undercover at speakeasies like The Blind Pig and The Crimson Thimble. It was just that his conversational skills could use some refinement.

“Sorry, it’s been a long few weeks,” Harry said, and Ginny had to admit she felt a tad guilty as she took in the bags under his eyes and his tousled hair. He really did look exhausted. Perhaps she was being too hard on the guy. 

“No problem,” she replied, making a concerted effort to sound a little less brusque than usual.

Then something occurred to her. If Harry was such a huge celebrity, he must be a highly requested interviewee for prestigious publications. Why had he said yes to a silly underground newspaper? Absent any other pre-planned interview script, Ginny voiced this question.

“I like to stay under the radar,” Harry told her. “I say no to almost all interview requests. But I had a weird feeling that this was an important one.” His eyes paused on Ginny for a moment. Not one to back down from a challenge, she returned his gaze somewhat defiantly as he continued, “Even though it’s low profile. Or maybe because it is. I dunno.”

Interesting. Aurors typically had strong intuition. Could it be that Harry was onto something? Was there some significance to their meeting? There was clearly more to this man than Ginny had initially thought.

She was about to press him for more information on what exactly he was doing here when the door of the café flew open with a bang. Auror reflexes were no joke; Harry jumped to his feet instantly, reaching for his wand. One of the Ilvermorny interns from The Quill burst inside and made a beeline for Ginny, who couldn’t help but notice that Harry subtly shifted to stand in front of her. Normally she’d find it offensive for a man to act like she couldn’t fend for herself. This time, for whatever reason, she didn’t. 

Harry appeared to gauge from Ginny’s reaction that the teenage intern, huffing and puffing from apparently booking it across town to deliver whatever message was so urgent, was not a threat. He backed off appropriately, though his hand still rested near his wand holster.

“You’ve got to see this, Gin,” the intern panted, ignoring Harry and pushing a torn clipping at Ginny.

Intrigued, Ginny scanned the scrap of newsprint.

Cotton Club, mysterious creature attack, 12 critically injured, 24 dead, all innocent No-Maj bystanders. Deadliest incident of its kind. 

Ginny rose and turned to Harry. “Sorry. Interview’s over,” she informed him. Her heart was racing. Now this was something real.

“Wait, what is it? Let me help,” Harry interjected quickly. 

Ginny was already halfway to the door, the Auror trailing behind her.

“All due respect, I’ve got enough men trying to ‘help’ me,” she replied. “Nothing personal.”

“I can come with you,” Harry urged. “Seriously. I’ve got international clearance. Wherever you need to go, I can get you access.”

He was so earnest that for exactly 1.5 seconds, Ginny was torn as to whether she ought to invite him along. But the scene had already been cleared. The window for live, on-scene investigation had closed, and the only place Ginny needed to go was back to her office, where she could pull up every reference and resource that could possibly relate to this attack and figure out what needed to be done to prevent a second. If there was one thing she knew about mass casualty incidents, it was that complacency after the first one was a costly mistake—and all too often, innocent victims paid the price.

“I’m sure you’re more than capable,” Ginny reassured Harry, one foot out the door. She hesitated, then gave him a little smile and patted him on the arm. “You’re very attractive, if that helps.”

And with that, she disappeared into the alley, long red hair whipping behind her, leaving a half-finished latte, a quill at the end of its life, and one thoroughly confused British Auror in her wake.

There were no more attacks for weeks. Tina continued to work on the investigation, but they were at a standstill, and Newt was privately grateful for the lull. Selfishly, he enjoyed spending down time with her, and he had a niggling hunch in the back of his mind that they hadn’t seen the end of the attacks. This was only a brief reprieve. 

One morning, Newt woke up to an apartment quite literally filled with owls, one of which had been instructed not to let its message go unanswered and tried to attack Newt until Tina came up with an adequate counter-charm. Between the two of them, they began opening each envelope. The letters were primarily from publishing companies and bookstores, with a few news interview requests in the mix, although there were several that Tina read, wrinkling up her nose in distaste, and tossed into the bin.

“They’re calling themselves Newties,” she said in a strained voice after binning yet another note.

Newt glanced up. “Who?”

“Your... admirers.” Tina brandished a letter with a scarlet lipstick print on the bottom.

The subtle edge in her voice led Newt to wonder whether he ought to apologize for something. However, before he could figure out how to respond, Tina tossed the love letter into the pile of discards with a sigh and reached for the next one. 

Once they finished going through mail and did the rounds to care for his creatures, Newt joined Tina, who was flipping through a thick case file and jotting notes in the margins.

“You get a little crease between your eyebrows, you know, when you’re concentrating,” Newt said after a few minutes, tapping Tina on the forehead gently with his finger. “Right there.”

She jolted, having clearly been engrossed in her work. “Mercy, Newt.”

“Sorry,” he apologized hurriedly. 

Thankfully, it would seem that Tina had merely been surprised by the gesture, as she placed a hand on his arm and said gently, “Newt. It’s fine.”

Newt fell silent, still mildly embarrassed by her teasing tone. 

A moment passed, and then something made Tina smile. “Do you make observations like that about everyone?” she asked.

“No,” Newt answered, suddenly feeling shy, “no, not like that. It’s… just you.”

Tina settled back down, a strange look on her face. “Oh,” she said, ducking her head.

They didn’t talk again for quite some time. This wasn’t unusual; Tina was closed off by nature, aloof and intense in a way that was as fascinating as it was enigmatic. From the start, she had been protective, on guard, and professional. 

But then Newt recalled their laughter in the golden light of the kitchen as she baked biscuits for him, the warm timbre of her voice that crept in every so often, the way she looked at him with something in her eyes that he’d never seen directed at him before. They spent the next hour in a comfortable quietude while Newt tried to avoid staring at her too much.

Once they returned upstairs, Tina began setting places for dinner. Newt loitered awkwardly by the sink—despite the warm welcome, he still felt a bit out of place in their apartment—before asking whether he could help.

“Grab the plates,” Tina directed him as she sent a placemat sailing through the air to land at one setting. 

He really ought to stay out of the kitchen altogether, Newt thought helplessly as he dropped the entire stack of plates, which promptly shattered into pieces. Jumping to his feet, he hurriedly grabbed the shards and attempted to hide them behind his back, hoping that Tina hadn’t noticed and he could pass it off as a mere fumble. Unfortunately, she was staring at him with an exasperated expression on her face.

“Sorry, so sorry,” Newt apologized fervently, bending down to push the remaining ceramic pieces into a neat pile. “Reparo.” 

The plates reassembled. Relieved, he got to his feet and placed them carefully on the counter, then turned towards Tina.

“What else can I—” he began, but a hand on his chest stopped him. He suddenly realized that Tina was much closer than could possibly be considered coincidental.

Slowly, she reached up to brush his fringe to the side, then slid her hand down to press against the side of his cheek. Newt instinctively pulled her closer to him, lost in her fiery dark eyes, as she cradled his face gently in her hands.

“Tina,” he said in barely a whisper. She was so close, all that was left to do was to close the gap. It was now or never, and...

The door of the apartment flew open.

“Tina?” called a breathless Queenie. “I’m sorry, we’re horribly late, I—oh.”

She halted abruptly; Jacob, who was walking behind her, nearly toppled over.

Newt realized in horror exactly what they must have looked like: millimeters apart, Tina’s hands cradling his face, his own hands resting around her waist. They both stared at each other, then at Jacob (who appeared gobsmacked) and Queenie (who was clearly fighting a gleeful smile).

After a beat, Tina cleared her throat while Newt spun around, also nearly toppled over, then opened a random cabinet door under the kitchen sink and leaned down as though searching for something.

“I started dinner,” Tina said flatly.

“I can—I can see that,” Queenie replied.

Silence prevailed. Nobody looked at each other, although Queenie was still visibly fighting back a triumphant grin.

“Well, uh, this is awkward,” Jacob finally spoke up.

“Queenie?” said Tina through gritted teeth from where she was holding onto the handle of a saucepan for dear life as a charmed wooden spoon stirred rhythmically of its own accord. “Some help?”

“Oh, yes—yes, of course,” Queenie replied immediately.

She finished taking off her jacket, handed it to her very uncomfortable fiancé, and got to work, waving her wand gracefully and sending cutlery, ingredients, and tableware flying around the kitchen. Tina refused to acknowledge Newt’s presence.

“Stop listening to my thoughts,” Tina snapped at Queenie.

“Sorry,” Queenie replied in a tone that suggested she really wasn’t.

Newt felt a tug in his mind and realized Queenie was trying to read him now. Absolutely not. Fighting it off as best he could without knowing Occlumency, he debated saying something when she caught his eye and immediately stopped, looking guilty. Feeling even worse for some reason, Newt excused himself and escaped to the one place he knew would always be there for him: his suitcase.

It was Jacob who found him fifteen minutes later. Newt was sitting on the ground, letting Pickett chatter away about the other Bowtruckles bullying him, as he stared into space and contemplated the almost-kiss.

“Hiya,” Jacob greeted Newt. “You okay?”

“Jacob, Queenie likes you,” Newt stated.

“I’d sure hope so, seeing as she’s my fiancée and all,” Jacob replied cheerfully.

Newt tried to figure out how to word his question. “How did you manage… courting her?”

“I definitely didn’t do a mating dance, if that’s what you mean,” Jacob answered.

Newt cringed. “No, that’s not what I—you see, I’m quite fond of Tina. And I’d like to say something, it’s... what do you think I should say to her?” 

“Oh, well, it’s best not to plan these things. You know, you just say whatever comes to you in the moment,” Jacob advised sagely.

Newt thought back to the moment in the kitchen, which he was sure to replay in his head for the rest of eternity. It was the first time that he and Tina had finally made such intense eye contact, with neither of them looking away, and her eyes reminded him of something beautiful. They were like fire in dark water.

“She has eyes just like a salamander,” Newt realized.

Jacob looked alarmed. “Don’t say that.”

Newt fell silent, wracking his brain for another compliment he could give her. What else made her so unique? 

“She has incredibly narrow feet, have you noticed?” he tried again.

Jacob looked even more alarmed. “Can’t say that I have.”

“Oh.” Well, that was everything Newt could think of off the top of his head.

Jacob was now looking at him the way Newt watched newborn creatures stumble around right after birth: blind, helpless, and inept. It was slightly insulting, but probably warranted. 

“Listen, Newt,” Jacob started. Newt turned to him expectantly as he continued, “Tina’s crazy about you, any idiot can see that. I don’t think you have to do much other than be yourself.” He paused. “Uh... please don’t compare her to any beasts or creatures or what-have-you, though. Salamander or otherwise.”

“You’re a good man, Mr. Kowalski,” he said, getting to his feet.

Jacob clapped him on the shoulder. “So are you, pal.” Then he jerked his head towards the stairs. “Come on. We’ve got two ladies waiting for us.”

Newt started to follow, then faltered. “Mr. Kowalski—Jacob—do you ever think how very lucky we are?”

Jacob tilted his head, smiling, and concurred, “We sure are.” He winked. “Hey, why don’t you save that one for the next date?” 

“I haven’t the faintest what you’re talking about,” Newt insisted, and followed his friend back into reality.

Chapter Text

They were calling it the Summer of Beasts.

Unfortunately, Newt’s prediction came to fruition. After a reprieve following the Cotton Club incident, mysterious creature attacks on Muggles ramped up at a devastating rate, with multiple deadly incidents occurring within a mere fortnight. A deranged doxy swarm had disrupted a high school graduation in Chicago. A grotesquely deformed lethifold had slithered through a Brooklyn Muggle wedding reception. A moke had grown to the size of a thestral and charged throngs of Muggle attendees at a summer carnival in Philadelphia.

Even with Aurors able to Apparate on scene at the drop of a hat, without any way to predict when and where the next attack might occur, speed made very little difference. The creatures always appeared seemingly out of thin air, struck, and disappeared faster than MACUSA could respond. As a result, details about the creatures were maddeningly scarce. There was no publicized photographic evidence, and with the sole victims being hysterical Muggles that had to be swiftly Obliviated, any remotely reliable eyewitness accounts were nonexistent.

Muggles were dropping like flies. Obliviators across the country scrambled to keep up with memory modifications. MACUSA upped their security and pulled every resource they could to work tirelessly on round-the-clock investigative efforts. Tina was leaving for work at the crack of dawn and coming home after sunset. And Queenie spent every evening flitting anxiously about the apartment trying to make sure her sister was eating properly.

The fact that MACUSA still refused to intervene more proactively when it came to preventing these mass casualties—which were so clearly targeting Muggles—was increasingly frustrating to Newt. Surely some shield charms or a more hands-on security detail wouldn’t hurt. Muggles might still have to be Obliviated if magic was used to defend them, but at least they’d be alive. 

“I just don’t know what to do,” Queenie whispered to Newt one night. Tina had fallen asleep mid-dinner, brow furrowed. “She’s taking it so personal, like it’s her fault she can’t crack the case yet. I know it’s eatin’ her up, people dying and all, but working herself into the ground ain’t doing nobody any good.”

Newt watched Tina somberly. She did look wan and drained, a stark contrast from the woman he’d managed to draw out of her shell for those few glorious weeks. In her sleep, she flinched and let out a muffled cry. Newt had to resist the urge to run over and pull her into his arms immediately. He’d never before experienced such a strong, visceral need to protect someone from harm. Even his creatures.

“Please, honey, talk to her,” Queenie implored, clutching his arm. “Maybe she’ll listen to you.”

Newt had no idea what on earth he was supposed to say in this talk with Tina, but Queenie was so dismayed that he nodded anyway.

Later that night, he emerged from his enchanted suitcase to find Tina sitting alone in the dim light of the kitchen, nursing a mug of untouched tea and staring blankly at a folder in her lap. She looked up when he approached, exhaustion written in every line of her face.

“I’m fine,” she said quickly, and took a sip of cold tea that couldn’t possibly have been pleasant.

Newt hesitated, then sat down across from her. “You don’t have to be, you know,” he replied.

Tina fell silent and, much to his alarm, her eyes began welling up with tears, though she turned away and attempted to hide it with another large gulp of cold tea.

“Tina?” Newt said cautiously, and his voice wasn't as steady as he would have liked. 

She didn’t say a word, only blinked as more tears streamed down her cheeks.

Before better judgment could prevail, Newt boldly reached out and touched Tina’s face to swipe away a tear with his thumb. He brought his other hand up to tuck her hair gently behind her ear, skimming the curve of her cheek. To his surprise, Tina’s fingers wrapped around his wrist and she turned her face into his palm, pressing her lips against it—no, undeniably kissing it. 

Newt’s heart was pounding. For a while, they sat in silence, neither daring to speak for fear words might shatter the delicate moment.

“Well,” Tina said finally, “it’s late.”

Newt faltered for a minute as they both stood and Tina made for their bedroom door. Praying that his judgment was still on target, he caught her by the wrist to halt her movement. Then, daringly, he leaned forward to plant a tender kiss on her cheek. 

When he pulled away, he was relieved to see Tina smiling tearfully up at him, face illuminated by the moonlight streaming into the hallway. A moment later, she reached for his hand. It had to be due to innate reflex or pure instinct that Newt interlaced their fingers; the response was so natural and automatic, he couldn't have not if he tried. Finally tethered to something grounding, something good, he let out a breath he didn’t know he was holding. 

They had never discussed the almost-kiss in the kitchen, and with the Summer of Beasts casting such a dark cloud over everything, advancing their budding relationship was hardly a priority. Newt honestly didn’t mind; he too had been preoccupied thinking and worrying about the attacks. But in this moment, he also realized how badly he needed this with Tina. More than he could have ever known. 

As they quietly entered their room and Tina moved towards her bed, Newt impulsively reached down and pulled back the covers for her. He heard a quick inhale of surprise. A beat later, she slid beneath the blankets, resting her head on the pillow, and he gently drew the covers back up over her. Then he crossed to his own bed and sat down, toeing off his shoes. Physical and mental exhaustion hit him like a ton of bricks.

“Goodnight, Tina,” Newt murmured, not sure whether she was even awake.

“Goodnight, Newt,” she replied softly.

Hearing this, Newt couldn’t help but roll over onto his side to face the other bed. In the sliver of moonlight filtering through the curtains, he caught a glimpse of Tina’s face. Their eyes met for a second, and while her expression was difficult to discern, the silence that hung in the air between them felt achingly intimate. He swore he could feel Tina relax, as if that one moment of connection had also eased something in her.

Newt adjusted his pillow, replaying the moment they’d just shared even as tiredness settled in his bones, and finally closed his eyes.

Chapter Text

Clarabel had been in a mood since Harry Potter left New York—and she was making it everyone’s problem. 

Ginny was too wrapped up in the Summer of Beasts to care, though she caught herself thinking of Harry fleetingly in the weeks following their meeting at Bumble Beans. It was unlikely their paths would ever cross again. Still, she couldn’t help but wonder what wealth of knowledge and insider information Harry could access that might make or break the Summer of Beasts investigation. Whether he would share any of it with Ginny, though, was dubious at best. She was better off putting him out of her mind completely.

However, after a few days of grappling with her own self-respect, Ginny reluctantly decided to take the leap. Worst case, he never replied. Best case, she got ahold of a lead that MACUSA knew nothing about.

“Are you writing to Harry?!” Clarabel squealed from over Ginny’s shoulder.

“No,” Ginny lied, quickly flipping the parchment over. She frowned. “Aren’t you supposed to be at Bumble Beans?”

Clarabel made a face like she hadn’t been very clearly instructed to go pick up the staff’s coffee orders three times already. This girl was going to become a real issue if she wasn’t reined in somehow.

“But you’re writing a letter to Harry Potter,” she said petulantly.

Just imagine if this level of enthusiasm could be channeled into something productive for The Midnight Quill. Or society at large. Or really anything other than this insane crush.

“It’s strictly business,” Ginny maintained firmly.

“I can’t believe I didn’t even get to meet him,” lamented Clarabel. 

“Yeah, well,” Ginny told her assistant humorlessly, “that’s what you get for buying face cream off a random street corner.”

Clarabel gave a little indignant huff and crossed her arms, but didn’t appear to have a suitable comeback. 

The worst part about Clarabel's incompetence was that Ginny typically prided herself on fostering a work environment of respect and mentorship, where junior employees had every opportunity to thrive. All they had to do was be hungry for it, and the world was there on a silver platter. She had yet to meet a single protegee that she couldn’t whip into shape, so to speak. It was simply a matter of digging deep enough to uncover whatever motivational spark drove their passion in life. And usually, once Ginny was able to peel back the layers and identify this north star, that was when limitless potential came pouring out.

If Ginny peeled back any more layers on Clarabel, she was pretty sure air would be the only thing to come pouring out.

“Hey, you!” someone barked from around the corner. “Where’s our coffee?” 

Ginny couldn’t help but smirk. It would appear that one of her senior editors had finally had enough.

“Why didn’t you ask me earlier?” Clarabel retorted, but shrank as the editor stormed over to her with the deranged look of a sleep-deprived, uncaffeinated madwoman.

“Oh, don’t hand me that,” the editor scoffed. “We asked you three times.” She threw up 3 fingers in the air just in case it wasn’t clear.

Clara rolled her eyes and groaned dramatically. “Fine,” she sighed. As she was forcefully marched to the door, she swiveled around and called out, “I hope he replies!”

“I mean, yeah,” Ginny muttered to herself, staring at the newspaper clipping from the first Summer of Beasts attack that was pinned to the center of her corkboard. “I hope he does too.”

Harry:

It’s Ginny Weasley from The Midnight Quill, not sure if you remember me. Sorry I abandoned you at Bumble Beans. There was a lot going on and I thought you’d get in the way.

I was wondering if you had any thoughts on the Summer of Beasts (off the record). What’s the British perception of what’s going on here? Theories about what could be behind all these attacks? Do you have any American contacts I should reach out to?

-Ginny

Dear Ginny,

Of course I remember you. For what it’s worth, I wouldn’t have gotten in the way.

Hector’s been trying to keep the Summer of Beasts stuff at arm’s length. If it was up to me, we would’ve joined the fray after the first attack, but right now I’m not really supposed to comment on it. 

I’ve worked with Theseus Scamander before and I heard his magizoologist brother Newt is staying in New York right now, though. I would start there.

Harry

Harry:

Thanks for the tip. I’ll reach out to Newt. 

If you come to New York again, maybe we can make up for the last interview. Hopefully there won’t be another unscheduled national crisis. If there is, I promise I’ll let you tag along.

Be safe out there.

-Ginny

Dear Ginny,

I wish I had more of an update for you, but Hector is still turning a blind eye because he doesn’t want to “interfere”. At least I finally finished washing the mud out of my robes from New Guinea.

Have you talked to Newt yet? You can name drop Theseus on my behalf if it helps, although apparently he and Newt don’t get along that well. You’re very convincing anyway, so I’m sure you won’t have any issues.

Still sticking around here for the time being, but would you want to give me the Midnight Quill address just in case I need a change of scenery?

Cheers,

Harry

“Please, please, please can you give him my address?” Clarabel begged Ginny.

“Get outta here,” Ginny hissed, snatching the pile of letters back that her assistant had apparently gotten ahold of. Seriously, this girl was worse than a Niffler in a pawn shop. 

Clarabel pouted. “Jeepers, I can’t believe you’re talking to him like that,” she sighed wistfully. 

“Stop going through my stuff,” Ginny told Clarabel, and stowed the bundle of letters away in her desk drawer.

It wasn’t until everyone else left for the day that Ginny finally took a minute to write a response. Typically, The Quill’s location was strictly under wraps. They’d had their fair share of death threats and subjects of their exposés aggressively seeking retaliation. It was a safety thing. So even though Harry’s celebrity status could not impress her any less, the real question was whether, based on their single interaction in which neither made the best impression, she could trust him enough to hand out the address.

Clarabel’s ardor had admittedly planted seeds of doubt about his integrity. Observing his behavior and demeanor in person painted a very different picture than the womanizer with a side gig in law enforcement that Ginny had expected. If nothing else, Harry was genuine. His conversational skills were far too horrendous, and any amount of attention made him far too uncomfortable, to be contrived.

More than that, she recalled how Harry had reacted when the intern came running at her in Bumble Beans. Subtle but sure—almost reflexive—as he moved to shield her from a potential threat. He hadn't made some grandiose gesture to flaunt his manhood and his ability to protect the weaker female sex from the big bad world, like so many men did. In fact, if Ginny wasn’t exceptionally shrewd and observant, she wouldn’t have even noticed. 

She drummed her fingers on the desk thoughtfully for several contemplative seconds before deciding once and for all to quit agonizing over this nonsense and just send him the address so she could head home. By the time she had locked up headquarters and made it home to her flat, she was confident that she'd made the right decision.

Besides, if she couldn’t trust Harry Potter, The Greatest Auror Who Ever Lived, who could she trust?

Chapter Text

After that night—The Cheek Kiss, as Newt referred to it in his head the many times a day that he thought about it—Tina’s attitude towards Newt shifted. It was as if that moment of intimacy had broken through some invisible barrier. She began to relax when he entered the room. She sat closer to him, sought out his presence, and gravitated towards him in small ways that Newt suspected she didn’t even realize. However, her exterior remained as serious and restrained as always, and it came as a shock when she suggested one day that Newt accompany her to work. 

“Oh honey, even I ain’t ever been to her office,” Queenie marveled after Newt asked why she had gasped in such surprise when she heard the invitation. “It’s her sacred space, you know. I don’t think she’s ever let anyone in.”

Although Newt interpreted this as a one-time thing, Tina asked casually if he wanted to come with her when she left for work the next morning. And the next. And the next.

Soon enough, it became a near-daily routine. Newt would settle down in Tina's office, reading or jotting down notes, while Pickett entertained himself with whatever he could get his hands on and Tina wrote letters and combed through records. It came as a mild disappointment that she still wouldn’t grant Newt full access to her files, but he was content just to spend all day admiring her. At lunchtime, he meandered across the street to pick up a sandwich from her favorite deli.

Despite the rest of the world falling apart, it was as close to idyllic as reality could come. 

Visiting Tina at MACUSA was not only an excellent excuse to spend more time together, but also a prime opportunity for Newt to quietly take in his surroundings and acquaint himself with the structure and rhythm of MACUSA as a whole. The most prominent observation he made was precisely how uptight—and specifically in what way—the wizarding community was in America. Brits were blunt and standoffish, but Americans were uptight and controlled by fear. Fear of Muggles, fear of the unknown, fear of losing control. Every system and person Newt encountered felt closed off and guarded.

The downside of spending so much time at MACUSA was that President Picquery was not exactly his biggest fan, let alone a fan of the combination of him and Tina. Newt was able to avoid seeing her the first few days, but inevitably, they crossed paths. It went about as well as anyone could have expected.

He was walking down the hallway, focused on siphoning ink off of Pickett after the Bowtruckle had decided to go for a dip in Tina’s inkwell, when he almost crashed head-on into the President. He tripped, caught himself gracefully, then tripped a second time and landed quite hard on his knees in the middle of the corridor. Shoving Pickett back into his pocket, he scrambled to his feet, attempted to fix his bowtie, and gave a pained smile that was definitely not going to win President Picquery over.

Rather than immediately evicting him from the property, however, the President glanced over briefly—having politely moved to the side when he tumbled over mid-step—and continued walking. Whenever they ran into each other thereafter, she pretended he didn’t exist.

One night, Newt and Tina passed through a long dimly lit corridor deep within MACUSA headquarters, marble floor echoing beneath their feet. Newt glanced around at rows of enchanted plaques lining the walls. 

“What is this place?” he asked. “I haven’t been here before.”

“It’s where they honor the best of us,” Tina answered with a faint smile. She paused by a central plaque bordered in silver filigree, the lettering sharp and clean.

Mordechai Goldstein
Head Auror, Department of Magical Law Enforcement
Five-time Recipient of the Silver Star for Valor
Chief Investigator, Blackstone Case
Instructor, Auror Training Corps
‘Restraint is Power. Precision is Justice.’

“Goldstein,” Newt realized.

“Yeah. My great-uncle.” Tina reached out and tapped the corner of the plaque. “He’s the reason I became an Auror.”

Newt studied the memorial thoughtfully. Why had Tina never mentioned Mordechai to him in all their conversations? 

Tina continued, “He believed that being an Auror wasn’t about power, it was about control and responsibility. He never allowed emotion to interfere with duty. His moral compass was unshakeable.” She fell silent, then admitted, “I wish I could've met him.” 

As he watched her hands grip the bar in front of the displays, Newt got the sense that she hadn’t visited his plaque in some time. 

“He used to say that if you have to draw your wand, you’ve already missed at least three ways to solve the problem,” Tina added.

Newt wished desperately that he had something profound to say. Tina was clearly being vulnerable with him, but his mind went horribly blank as he tried to piece together how to respond in a meaningful way. After a moment of internal conflict, he simply reached out and interlaced their fingers. Tina, who had still been gazing at the plaque, turned and looked at him. 

“Thank you,” Newt said softly.

“For what?” she asked.

Lost in her dark fiery eyes that were full of emotions he couldn’t name, Newt forgot how to speak for a moment. Jacob’s words came into his mind.

Just say whatever comes to you in the moment.

“I...” Newt swallowed, his mouth suddenly dry. “You... you know, your eyes really are...”

Tina frowned. “Are what?”

Newt then recalled Jacob’s additional advice not to remark on her salamander eyes.

“I’m not supposed to say,” he struggled, his heart racing.

He trusted Jacob’s advice when it came to these matters. But Jacob didn’t know Tina like he did. Jacob didn’t understand Tina in the ways Newt was beginning to, not even a little bit. Above all, Jacob wasn’t in love with Tina.

“They have this effect in them, Tina,” Newt blurted out. “It’s like fire in water, in dark water. I’ve only ever seen that... I’ve only ever seen that in s... s-s—”

He wanted desperately to say it, to convey even an iota of what he felt for her. Paralyzed by fear that it would ruin the moment, he found himself unable to force the word out.

But Tina knew. She always knew.

“Salamanders?” she suggested with a gentle smile.

“Yes,” Newt confirmed in barely a whisper.

The words hung heavy between them. Newt shifted slightly, unsure how to close the distance that felt charged with so much more than words.

Then Tina reached up and gently pushed Newt’s fringe aside—just like she had in the kitchen—with a touch that was light but deliberate, breaking through the quiet in an unmistakable invitation. Her mesmerizing, fiery eyes searched his as if looking for reassurance, or maybe permission. When her hands came up to cradle his face and her gaze dropped to his lips, the world seemed to narrow to just the two of them.

Queenie and Jacob had better not make an appearance now.

A fraction of a second later, before Newt could fully register what was going on, only that everything inside of him was on fire, Tina leaned in and pressed her lips to his.

Newt never could have even dreamed of a kiss like this. Tina’s arms wound around his neck, her fingers combed through his hair, and Newt drew her closer, one hand cradling the back of her head and the other skimming her waist. Her lips were wonderfully soft and warm despite the cool, dry air of the MACUSA basement. The heady combination of need and want filling Newt as much as it seemed to be overtaking Tina meant that both of them looked slightly disheveled when they reluctantly broke apart and stood there, drinking in the sight of each other. Tina's eyes shone with something just shy of innocence that Newt realized he had produced. His heart leapt at the thought of it.

“Shall we?” he finally broke the silence, motioning towards the exit. It was getting late, and for some reason the ambience of the dim basement corridor was making him feel oddly uneasy.

Tina nodded. Newt, not wanting to lose any physical point of contact, reached for her hand.

The blissful haze following their kiss, however, was abruptly ended when Pickett burst out of Newt’s shirt pocket, chittering furiously. Newt realized in horror that the poor thing had been trapped there, nearly asphyxiated and/or crushed to death between Newt and Tina, during their impassioned kiss. Tina seemed to find it rather funny as he continued apologizing profusely to the incensed Bowtruckle.

Then something caught his eye: a flash of silver that broke through the poorly lit corridor for a split second. Stranger still was that Pickett immediately abandoned his diatribe and launched himself onto Newt’s shoulder, peering into the darkness like he too had seen it.

At first, Newt wondered whether it was a stray Patronus, or even one of the ghostly maintenance staff that occasionally drifted through the less-trafficked levels of MACUSA. The hallway was empty and still now, except for the dull flickering of enchanted sconces along the walls. Deep down, his intuition told him that there was no mistaking it: somebody or something had been lying in wait for him and Tina, only to dart away into the night after being spooked by their presence. 

But given that the only eyewitness that could back him up was a sentient twig, and not wanting to tarnish the magical moment they’d just shared, Newt decided against his better judgment not to mention it to Tina as they exited MACUSA headquarters and fresh air filled their lungs. Still holding his hand, Tina walked with a pep in her step Newt had never seen before, smiling over at him every so often.

For now, everything was just as it should be.

Chapter Text

Once word got out that Newt had established himself in New York, a bookshop called Eagle & Eagle located in Puddingstone Place (the American version of Diagon Alley, according to Tina) sent Newt several increasingly aggressive requests for a book signing event. The invitations got more and more extravagant, garish, and persistent; the last attempt involved confetti, bugles, and a terrifying eagle puppet that popped in and out of the envelope and tried to peck anyone who came near it. Newt continued disregarding the letters, assuming that whoever was sending them would give up. Instead, the store owner, George Brockway, decided to give his sales pitch in person at the Goldsteins’ flat.

Newt tried to flee to safety in his suitcase as soon as George announced who he was through the door. Unfortunately, Pickett had recently developed a passion for fiddling with the metal bits and bobs on the outside of the case, and Queenie enthusiastically invited the shopkeeper inside before Newt could untangle the Bowtruckle’s spindly limbs from the latch.

George was an older man who somewhat resembled Santa Claus, with round wire-rimmed glasses and a booming voice to match. He wore a signature aubergine corduroy newsboy cap adorned with a giant quill that flopped around whenever he spoke or moved. 

“That’s very kind,” Newt said politely as George rambled on about how successful the book had been. 

Apparently, Fantastic Beasts and Where To Find Them had earned such acclaim in the United States that stores everywhere were selling out faster than they could restock. Newt was aware of the book’s financial returns—he had been forced to open a vault at Rushmore Reserve as his American proceeds continued to climb exponentially—but, as long as he could afford to care and provide for his creatures, the money piece was fairly inconsequential.

When George finally paused to take a breath, Newt asked, “So, did you actually read it?”

Queenie, who had been beaming with pride as George lauded Fantastic Beasts, frowned at Newt in disapproval.

“I—yes, of course,” George blundered.

Newt tilted his head. “No, I don’t think you did,” he observed calmly.

It wasn't a bad thing. Fantastic Beasts wasn’t meant to appeal to everyone; he wrote it to raise awareness amongst the general public, not to gain celebrity status. Lying about reading it, however, struck him as unnecessary.

“I don’t... what’s it to you, anyway?” George spluttered. 

“Of course you’ve read it,” Queenie jumped in placatingly. “I’m sorry, Mr. Brockway, we’d never dream of questioning you!”

“Oh, actually, I am questioning him,” Newt clarified.

“I’ve been very busy,” George mumbled. “I haven’t had a chance to sit down and...” He trailed off. 

Ignoring the reproachful looks Queenie was shooting his direction, Newt mused, “Mm. Yes, well, it’s sort of mildly hilarious that you’d ask me to do an event at your bookstore when you haven’t even read a page of the book, isn’t it?”

“Oh, hush,” Queenie admonished him, still smiling radiantly at George. “What Mr. Scamander means is a book signing at Eagle & Eagle sounds just ducky!”

It didn’t sound ducky, not even a tiny bit.

Much to Newt’s dismay, Tina sided with Queenie on this one. Normally she too would object to the showmanship and commercial promotion involved in a book signing; in this case, she maintained that reminding the public of his expertise could benefit his credibility in light of the recent attacks. Newt countered this argument by pointing out that he didn’t much care about how his credibility appeared to anyone other than Tina (“What am I, small potatoes?” Queenie demanded indignantly). 

It was ultimately Jacob—accustomed now to playing referee and translator between Newt and the headstrong Goldstein sisters—who convinced him to bite the bullet if he wanted the harassment to stop. And so it was that a very reluctant Newt set off for Eagle & Eagle, accompanied by Pickett and Teddy the Niffler for emotional support. 

Towards the end of the event, a vaguely familiar woman approached the table with a copy of his book and a disconcerting smile. She wasn’t dressed in anything particularly unusual, but her hair was a unique, ethereal silvery-blonde hue that Newt had never seen before. It was slicked back and pulled into a bun at the nape of her neck so tightly it had to be painful. The smile felt fake and forced, and the softness of her voice seemed at odds with what Newt would expect from her appearance, though he couldn’t quite identify why. 

“Just wanted to give you this,” she said, and offered him a paper cup of coffee. 

“Oh, erm… thanks, but I only drink tea,” said Newt. Something about her made him squirm inside.

“Oh, horsefeathers,” she scoffed while fixing him with an unsettling, piercing gaze. “Try it.”

“Thanks,” Newt repeated warily, trying to figure out how to shake her off. “Erm... you could just leave it there,” he suggested, and gestured to the table.

The woman partially obliged, placing the coffee cup where Newt had indicated, but still didn’t move away. “I heard you just arrived from the UK,” she said. “You haven’t had Bumble Beans before. Trust me, it’ll convert any tea drinker.”

Thankfully, it was at this moment that Teddy glimpsed something shiny across the room and launched himself off Newt’s lap, knocking the coffee cup over in the process. Piping hot coffee spilled everywhere. Pickett squeaked and leapt onto the table, then panicked as he stepped in the dark liquid and frantically scrabbled at Newt's trouser leg to be picked back up.

Flustered by the whole debacle and acutely aware of other bookstore patrons turning their attention to the commotion, Newt whipped out his wand and started siphoning the coffee up before it could soak into the rug. By the time he was done, the mysterious woman had disappeared. Newt let out a sigh of relief as Pickett clambered up his arm and popped back into his suit pocket. The lingering smell of coffee in the air made him feel incredibly nauseous as he tried to shake off the discomfiting unease that had been elicited by this strange encounter.

As soon as the event ended, a young woman with long red hair walked briskly over to Newt and asked if he would mind chatting in the store’s stock room. Briefly concerned that this was some sort of ploy to trick him into meeting another arduous teenage fan, Newt cautiously agreed and followed her to the back.

“Ginny Weasley,” she introduced herself once they were inside. She closed the door, which would typically make Newt suspicious; however, something about her self-assured demeanor felt immediately trustworthy. “I’m an investigative journalist and editor-in-chief for The Midnight Quill.”

Newt looked blankly at her. Basic deduction obviously pointed to this being a newspaper, but he had certainly never heard of it.

Seeing his confusion, Ginny explained, “It’s kind of an underground publication. Not illegal or anything,” she clarified hastily, “though I’m not too popular with MACUSA or mainstream publications. Most of our writers work under pseudonyms—they don’t wanna expose their opinions to everyone, ya know, ‘cause not everyone agrees with the stories we cover.”

She paused, seemingly to gauge Newt’s reaction, of which he had none. He certainly wasn’t the type of person to condemn a paper because it diverged from or even challenged MACUSA’s narrative.

Ginny continued, “Anyway, something’s hinky.” 

Newt frowned. “What do you mean, exactly?”

Ginny lowered her voice despite the door being closed. “You know that dame who gave you the coffee, and she was weirdly pushy about it, then took off immediately after it spilled?” she asked. “I think she put something in the drink.”

“What makes you think that?” Newt inquired carefully. 

“Bumble Beans gives out these wax-lined takeaway cups—real posh, American-style—but hers was already unsealed,” Ginny told him. “And I saw her shove an empty glass vial into her coat pocket when she came into the store.”

At least Newt hadn't been alone in his gut feeling that something was very off about this mystery woman. Still, accusing someone of spiking his drink maliciously was a bit of a leap. He wouldn’t put it past his ardent female fans to try sneaking him a Love Potion: inappropriate, perhaps, but hardly sinister. 

Ginny opened the door a crack and peered into the store, then groaned.

“Oh, for Pete’s sake... I’d better get going,” she said with a sort of annoyed urgency that reminded Newt of Tina. “Alaric Carrow’s just walked in and he’s been sending me Howlers ever since I revealed that the ‘fierce and dangerous’ opponent he defeated at his award-winning duel was a retired wand-polisher with arthritis.”

“That does sound unflattering,” Newt agreed.

Already halfway out the door, Ginny stopped and turned to Newt. “Watch your back, alright?”

With that, she slipped out of the stock room, vanishing into the store like she’d never been there at all. 

As the door swung shut, Teddy suddenly popped up from beneath a nearby bookshelf with someone’s decorative pin in his mouth, looking very pleased with himself. 

“Really?” Newt chastised the pesky Niffler.

Teddy stared at him defiantly and tried to slide the pin into his pouch.

“Accio,” Newt intervened quickly. 

He deftly caught the stolen trinket mid-air as it came flying towards him. Estimating that there was still time to subtly return the pin before the rightful owner realized they were missing something, he scooped up Teddy, tucking the pin safely into his pocket as the Niffler chattered indignantly at the injustice.

“Come on, troublemaker,” Newt sighed. “Let’s go make this right.”

Chapter Text

Later that day, Tina, upon returning from work, dropped her briefcase on the floor and fixed Newt with a look that made him instantly wonder what he’d done wrong.

“President Picquery wants to talk to you tomorrow,” she said curtly, by way of greeting.

Newt, who had been reading aloud to a baby Jarvey curled up in his lap, immediately thought through all the legally questionable things he’d done in the past month.

“About what?” he asked warily.

“She wants you to consult on the attacks,” Tina replied, brushing a loose strand of hair out of her face as she unlaced her shoes. “So please keep it professional.”

Newt blinked. “I am… very professional,” he proclaimed, straightening a little. The baby Jarvey grumbled in his lap, displeased with the change in position.

Tina sighed. “Maybe don’t say anything controversial.”

“I can’t help it that MACUSA insists on finding basic creature rights to be controversial,” he retorted defiantly.

“Just… try not to get in trouble, okay?” Tina said, setting her coat down on the couch with an air of finality. 

Then she grabbed a stack of dog-eared file folders from the table and headed toward the bedroom, leaving Newt sitting alone while the Jarvey let out a snort that sounded like laughter.

“I know,” Newt sighed. “I’ll do my best.”

No promises.

Newt showed up to MACUSA at 10 AM sharp the next morning for his consultation. Inside the President’s office, Seraphina Picquery stood behind her desk in immaculately ironed robes.

“Mr. Scamander,” she greeted him with an imperious gaze. “Thank you for coming on such short notice.”

“I’ve seen the reports,” Newt said. “It is... deeply troubling.”

The President’s eyebrow lifted slightly. “Is it?

Something about this response rubbed Newt the wrong way. The President sounded almost... accusatory? As if she thought he was behind this somehow, or at the very least, on the wrong side of the issue.

“President Picquery,” he said slowly and deliberately, “I would never suggest that the plight of beasts is in any way more tragic or worthy of investigation than the loss of human life.”

This seemed to temporarily mollify whatever qualms the President was having, though she didn’t acknowledge his statement. Instead, she took a seat and extracted a thick file of notes, reports, and newspaper clippings from behind her desk.

“We’ve Obliviated hundreds of No-Majs in the past two weeks,” she informed him in a clipped voice as she thumbed through the folder. “The ICW is breathing down my neck. If this escalates much further, it won’t just be MACUSA’s credibility at stake. It’ll be the Statute itself.”

President Picquery withdrew several grainy moving photographs and slid them across the table.

“These haven’t been in the news,” Newt said in surprise.

“It may come as a shock, but we prefer to keep some things quiet, Mr. Scamander,” the President replied in a tone strongly suggesting that he ought to try doing the same. “Take a look.” 

She leaned back in her chair, steepling her fingers and watching Newt shrewdly as he took in the pictures. An enchanted quill was poised expectantly above a scroll of parchment on her desk, ready to begin transcribing.

Chicago. The flurry of doxies that burst out from floral arrangements at a high school graduation ceremony were larger than naturally occurring specimens, with wings resembling those of bone-dry dragonfly husks rather than the soft, iridescent sheen observed in a healthy doxy. Their beady eyes were cloudy and dull, not glossy and beetle-like. 

As Newt examined the moving picture, the doxy swarm converged with unnatural coordination, striking in timed, focused bursts rather than the erratic fluttering characteristic of wild doxies. Screaming No-Majs tried to fight them off to no avail. The doxies’ double rows of sharp teeth and venomous bite left their victims rendered helpless on the ground, unable to move due to temporary paralysis. 

But regular doxy venom was not potent enough to cause instant paralysis. Such serious symptoms typically only occurred after many hours of leaving the bite untreated.

Frowning, Newt moved to the next picture. 

Brooklyn. The creature slithering between overturned chairs and shattered glasses was a lethifold, but not as it should be. Its shadowy body was bloated and malformed. Lethifolds were solitary predators, stealthy and precise. Yet this one thrashed wildly, aggressive and confused. 

As Newt looked closer, he could make out faint stitches and areas of its hide that looked like they’d been sliced apart and clumsily glued back together. Scarred glyphs were branded into the membrane near the creature's mouth. 

Philadelphia. Newt studied the moke towering over the crowd at a summer carnival. Mokes were shy, reclusive lizards the size of a bread loaf, and shrank further when frightened. But this one had been grotesquely enlarged. The scales along its underbelly were patchy and raw, as though it had rapidly expanded without enough time for its skin to adjust, and its pupils were blown wide with distress. 

Most damning and disturbing of all was the dull metallic band visible just behind its neck. Newt had seen them before on creatures who had been subject to the most horrific torture and abuse known to mankind; they were, essentially, cursed collars imbued with dark magic that allowed handlers to stimulate aggression, suppress instincts, and force the beasts to do their bidding.

“The creatures, they’re being planted,” Newt said with conviction, and explained his observations picture by picture. The President’s steely gaze was unreadable as her enchanted quill scratched away. 

“Why are they targeting these places in particular?” President Picquery asked when he was done relaying his assessment.

Newt frowned. “They’ve been trained or modified to attack Muggle—that is, No-Maj—public events. I haven’t the faintest why. Perhaps whoever is behind this is perfecting the creatures on a smaller scale, before...” He trailed off.

“Before what?” Seraphina asked sharply, and again he got the unnerving sense that she was suspicious of his motives.

“I wish I knew,” he replied earnestly. “But Madam President, please know... this is abuse and conditioning of the worst kind. It’s breaking every magical creature legislation in the book.”

Newt was certain that the photographic evidence before him reflected outlawed training and creature management methods: use of dark magic, unregulated growth potions, magical grafting/branding, and aversive fear-based conditioning. These illegal and inhumane practices were banned by the Department of Magical Creatures decades ago due to the severe cognitive damage and physical pain and injury they caused. Whatever or whoever had created these creatures had done so with cruelty and disregard, weaponizing normally harmless beasts through targeted magical manipulation. 

President Picquery regarded him closely as he shared this information, her expression unreadable. Then, at last, she leaned forward slightly, folding her hands on the desk.

“What will you need to conduct your investigation?” she asked.

Newt exhaled thoughtfully before answering, “Your beast registry. Any reports of disappearances, suspicious buyers, or undocumented imports. And, if I may, I’d like to speak to your crisis response teams.”

The enchanted quill finally stilled.

“You’ll have all of that,” President Picquery replied after a pause. “But quietly. I know ‘quiet’ may be a foreign concept to you,” she added, quirking the corner of her lip in a wry smile. “I may very well be the only MACUSA official who still approves of your involvement in any legal matters. Fortunately, I also happen to be the President.”

Newt nodded stiffly. “I’ll try not to lose your favor," he pledged.

The President merely waved a hand in dismissal. “You’re excused, Mr. Scamander. I expect regular updates.”

Newt stood, gave a slight bow, and left the office. 

Chapter Text

Seraphina Picquery had a great deal on her mind lately. The Summer of Beasts was upon them, and naturally everyone was looking to her to do something about it. Her days were filled with tense meetings, a relentless onslaught of owls and Howlers, two or three hours of sleep a night, and the pervasive, overwhelming fear that she would fail everyone. 

Newt Scamander hadn’t explicitly been unhelpful, but his credibility was shaky at best to most of MACUSA, who did not believe anything he did could outweigh the threat he posed to the Statute of Secrecy. Still, he possessed a wealth of knowledge on the topic of beasts, and the insights he shared during their consultation were invaluable. The tricky part would be conveying these findings to the rest of the government without getting laughed out of the room. 

Public perception aside, he and Tina were arguably the best people for the job. Newt loved creatures, and Tina... well, loved Newt. And the law. In that order.

At any rate, there was only one other person Seraphina could think of that might be equally suited for the investigation, and the three of them together would certainly be America’s greatest chance at getting to the bottom of this.

A beaver Patronus appeared in her office mere hours after Newt left.

“We have a Section 3A,” came the voice of Royden Davis, head of the Federal Bureau of Covert Vigilance and No-Maj Obliviation. 

A second later, there was a loud crack and two people landed on her carpet. Buck-toothed and mousy, Royden alighted smartly on his feet; the other visitor, however, tumbled gracelessly onto the rug. It took one glimpse of floppy reddish-brown hair to recognize the culprit.

“Coming back for more, Mr. Scamander?” Seraphina asked dryly from behind her desk.

“Section 3A, President Picquery,” Royden reported as Newt scrambled clumsily to his feet. “He brought his enchanted suitcase into a No-Maj home.”

“No, it wasn’t like that,” Newt protested. “It was an accident...” He trailed off, mumbling something unintelligible, and fell silent. At least he had the decency to look ashamed. 

Luckily, Seraphina knew precisely what to do. 

“Take him to Auror Goldstein,” she instructed Royden.

Royden frowned. It was evident from the immense distaste with which he was eyeing Newt that he had been hoping to drop him off at the President's office like a flea-infested stray dog at the pound. 

“But Goldstein doesn’t deal with Section 3As anymore, Madam President,” he argued.

“We can deem this a special case,” Seraphina stated. Really, she’d had enough of her decisions being constantly questioned.

“Yes, ma’am,” Royden acquiesced reluctantly. 

He paused for a second, just in case Seraphina changed her mind and offered to take Newt into her custody. When she didn’t, he sighed loudly, then unceremoniously seized an alarmed Newt by the elbow and dragged him out the door.

Seraphina sat down in her chair, conjured a steaming mug of coffee, and took a sip as she mused. That Newt had taken it upon himself to sabotage any chance at participating further in the Summer of Beasts investigation came as no surprise. And yet despite being a raging liability for national security at present, something about him was impossible to dislike or disrespect. He was passionate and genuine and far too capable and clever to be as unassuming as he was. Even if he—particularly when paired up with Tina—was a ticking bureaucratic time bomb.

But respect him or not, there could be no more chances for Newt Scamander.

And so, with a sinking feeling in the pit of her stomach, Seraphina knew what she must do. The harebrained idea had occurred to her weeks ago. If all went to plan, the payoff would be invaluable. She had just been hoping and praying that it wouldn’t come to that. 

Evidently it had.

She had worked hard to earn her political reputation—and, more importantly, the public’s trust—as an efficient and effective president. She prided herself on ruling with intelligence, fairness, and diplomacy. Key traits that made for the sort of world leaders she had idolized her whole life, leaders who made lasting changes.

None of that stopped her, however, from wanting very badly to watch Tina Goldstein kick the living daylights out of Newt Scamander.

Chapter Text

Royden escorted Newt through several corridors, taking quite possibly the longest route in the history of MACUSA despite the many shortcuts and offshoots that Newt knew for a fact would have been at least 8 minutes faster. Then again, he wasn't exactly in a rush.

When they finally arrived, the mahogany door to Tina’s office was so much more menacing than it had been the many times Newt visited before. If doors could judge, this one definitely was. 

“Come in,” Tina called when Royden knocked. 

“Goldstein,” he addressed her, poking his head in. 

“I’m busy,” she replied curtly.

Royden pushed the door open a bit more. “We had a Section 3A with Mr. Scamander. The President thought you two might like to have a word.”

There was a brief pause, then Tina stepped out into the hallway.

“Thank you, Royden,” she said coolly, staring daggers at Newt. 

Royden gave a nod and scurried away like he’d thrown a grenade and then scarpered to safety, leaving Newt to bear the full force of the explosion. Tina yanked Newt away from the wall by the arm and shoved him towards her office, slamming the door behind them. Then she pushed him down into the chair in front of her desk.

To make matters worse, a piece of parchment titled “INCIDENT REPORT” materialized before her, which she snatched up before he could try to intervene. Newt shrank down in his seat as her eyes flew across the page, absorbing the sordid details of his escapades. Pickett, perched on Newt’s shoulder, donned his reading glasses and craned his neck to see what was written. 

“Really, Mr. Scamander?” Tina snapped when she was done, disapproval dripping from every syllable. “Is this how you stay out of it?”

“I didn’t know there was a cleaner,” he insisted. Pickett squeaked in solidarity.

Tina was unconvinced by this line of defense and continued her rant, “Just like you didn’t know you were carrying a case of magical beasts last year? Just like you didn’t know your Niffler could escape and wreak havoc? Just like you didn’t know a No-Maj was about to get bitten by that—that thing—”

“Murtlap,” Newt muttered.

She raised an eyebrow. “What?”

“Murtlap. It was a murtlap,” Newt clarified, staring at the floor.

Tina gawked at his audacity. Probably not the time, then.

“Do you understand that we are in the middle of a very bad situation here?” she demanded.

Newt mumbled at the ground.

“I didn’t quite catch that,” Tina said icily.

Newt cleared his throat. “Yes, I understand.”

Tina jumped to her feet, gesticulating angrily as she pieced the story together aloud.

“Let me get this straight. You bring your suitcase to the bakery instead of leaving it at home, as we’ve discussed. Ad nauseam, I might add. Then you hop inside and fail to cast so much as a single protective spell. Which, again, we’ve discussed. Ad nauseam,” she repeated pointedly.

Newt didn’t know whether he was supposed to say something or just hang his head and accept the tongue lashing, but as Tina stood akimbo, regarding him with mingled outrage and disappointment, he felt compelled to speak up.

“Erm... yes,” he confirmed eloquently.

Tina gave him a withering look before continuing, “Jacob’s cleaner finds the briefcase, no owner to be found. She thinks it belongs to the senile widower that stops by the bakery daily for his morning pastry. Decides to give it a shine for free.”

She stared at him expectantly. Newt struggled to muster a response better than his last. 

“That’s kind of her,” he offered, then instantly regretted it.

Tina resumed pacing. “So she leaves it outside the widower’s house. Broad daylight. Two No-Maj children find it, open it out of curiosity, and scream bloody murder when a man pops out. And rather than Obliviate them, contain the situation, and file a report like a professional—which, one again, we’ve discussed—you talked to them?”

“Well, they were quite upset,” Newt defended himself.

“Of course they were upset!” Tina cried, throwing her hands in the air in his general direction. “You popped out of a suitcase! Count yourself lucky none of your creatures escaped while you were at it.”

Ah. That. Newt was almost 100% sure that no creatures got out. Almost. He opened his mouth to speak, thought better of it, and closed it again.

Tina’s voice went ominously quiet as she reached the climax of his disastrous escapade, “A passing witch heard the commotion and raised the alarm. And now here you are while everyone else cleans up the mess.”

“Oh. Well,” Newt responded timidly. “That is... certainly unfortunate.” 

Tina leaned against her desk facing him, arms and legs tightly crossed.

“You're a wild card, you know,” she said, and Newt was relieved to hear her voice softening slightly. “Half of MACUSA believes you’re more loyal to your beasts than to the greater good.”

“What they think is the greater good,” Newt couldn’t help pointing out. 

It was true: the so-called “greater good” wasn’t nearly as cut-and-dry as the government liked to pretend. Advocating for the gorgeous, misunderstood beasts of the world shouldn’t be political. But it was.

Perhaps to avoid implying ill intentions of MACUSA, Tina sat down and started shuffling through a stack of papers that didn’t appear to require sorting. 

“So, erm. What d’you reckon they’ll do to me?” Newt asked tentatively.

Tina gave a rueful shrug. “This is a major strike against you participating in the Summer of Beasts investigation. MACUSA’s not quick to forgive a black mark, and you’ve got more than one. So do I.”

Newt didn’t care about his own reputation, or even whether he was formally barred from the case. He’d be perfectly happy to never set foot in MACUSA again. He would, however, feel positively rotten if this mishap affected Tina’s participation in the investigation—or worse, her career.

“I’m sorry, Tina,” he apologized sincerely. Of all the things he disliked being responsible for, hurting Tina in any way undoubtedly topped the list. 

She didn’t acknowledge his apology, but when their eyes met across the table, she was looking at him with the unspoken warmth that he’d become so accustomed to.

Sensing that the tension had mostly dissipated, Pickett popped out of Newt’s breast pocket, chirping excitedly, and bounded toward Tina.

“Not now, Pickett,” Newt chastised him sternly.

“Could you at least try to be professional?” Tina reprimanded him with fond exasperation.

“Of course,” Newt pledged.

Right on cue, Pickett wriggled free again, skittering across Tina’s desk and promptly knocking over an ink bottle. As Newt scrambled to mop it up, the Bowtruckle proceeded to rifle through each page of the file Tina had just opened and froze innocently when she glared at him.

“Very professional,” Tina noted dryly. With a resigned sigh, she set the folder aside and let Pickett climb onto her shoulder. “Come on. Let’s get some lunch.”

President Picquery summoned Newt and Tina to her office a few hours later to hand down their sentence. Newt reached for Tina’s hand as they made their way down the corridor. She took it, but didn’t look over at him.

The President was waiting, stony-faced, when they arrived. There was a sheet of official MACUSA parchment laying on her desk, with the heart-sinking word “CENSURE” across the top. It hit him harder than he expected. He didn’t know what a MACUSA censure entailed, but it couldn’t bode well.

“I have no desire to waste our time,” President Picquery began. “Mr. Scamander, I must make this abundantly clear: you are no longer authorized to consult or involve yourself in the Summer of Beasts investigation.”

She turned to Tina, who was anxiously twirling her wand between her fingers.

“And you, Miss Goldstein, will recuse yourself as well. Effective immediately.”

The look on Tina’s face was one of shock, then anger, then hurt. Newt’s stomach dropped. He could have sworn regret or sympathy—maybe a little of both—flashed over President Picquery’s face for a fleeting moment.

“I’ve gone out on too many limbs for you both, and it is time for my goodwill to expire,” the President said wearily. “The visibility of this case is too high, and frankly you two are the biggest liabilities MACUSA has had in decades.”

Newt did genuinely appreciate all that the President had done. She could have easily banned him from the premises or taken Tina off the case much sooner. She didn’t need to invite him for a consult. And, based on the seriousness of violating the Statute of Secrecy and Rappaport’s Law, there were much harsher punishments than a censure that she could’ve imposed.

“Miss Goldstein,” President Picquery continued, “your security clearance will be downgraded, effective immediately. You are to refrain from accessing active investigation files. You will be reassigned to cold cases and administrative reviews.”

Tina stared at her, jaw clenched. “You’re sidelining me,” she said.

“I’m giving you a way to keep your job,” the President corrected her sharply. “If it were up to the rest of MACUSA, you’d be facing suspension or even termination. This is a compromise. Do not make me regret it.”

Then she slid the piece of parchment across the table so Newt and Tina could read.

Effective immediately, Porpentina E. Goldstein and Newton A. Scamander are to be removed from all investigative duties related to the Summer of Beasts. Unauthorized involvement will result in disciplinary action.

President Picquery waved her wand and sent the censure floating back into a cabinet behind her. 

“You are dismissed,” she directed them, more of a command than a statement—but as they made to exit, she cut in unexpectedly, “Mr. Scamander, a word.”

Newt halted. What was he in trouble for now?

Instead of reading him the riot act, the President waited until the door shut behind Tina before leaning over and saying in a low, serious voice, “Please don’t let Miss Goldstein slip away. She’s a fine Auror, a good person, and she cares for you more than she’d ever admit.”

Newt’s face grew warm. He knew, of course, that Tina cared about him; he wasn’t completely oblivious. However, having an impartial third party—the President of the United States, at that—confirm this fact made it feel suddenly, startlingly real.

“Love is invaluable in times of strife,” the President added sagely. 

“Love?” Newt echoed in disbelief, his heart racing a mile a minute as he tried to process her words.

Was President Picquery suggesting that Tina... loved him?

And if so, did she mean in love? Or just... love-love?

“Do try not to do anything foolish,” President Picquery requested with a small smile. 

“I’ll try my best,” Newt promised, feeling dazed and elated and hopeful and terrified all at once.

The shock must have shown on his face because Tina raised an eyebrow at him when he joined her in the hallway. 

“You look like you’ve seen a ghost,” she observed.

“No, just… mildly stunned,” Newt stammered.

Accepting his vague answer, Tina jerked her head towards the elevators. “I’ll walk you out before you get me fired.” 

Newt followed her in silence, hands jammed into his coat pockets and Pickett on his shoulder. The Bowtruckle gave him an encouraging nudge with his; when Newt didn’t follow his tacit instructions, he jabbed him with his pointy elbow more aggressively than necessary.

If only to appease Pickett, Newt ventured, “Tina... I am sorry about, well, everything. I didn’t wish to make things worse for you.”

Tina pressed the elevator button and glanced sideways at him, then let out a long sigh. “I know you don’t try to make my life more difficult. It just happens. A lot.”

“I just wanted to say…” Newt fidgeted with the strap of his case. “I know I’m not the easiest person to—well, to be around. Or defend. Or, erm... walk through a series of escalating political catastrophes with. But I… I really am glad you do.”

The elevator arrived with a whoosh and a ding. Tina stepped in, then turned to face him. “Try not to get arrested before I get home?”

Newt nodded. The elevator doors began to close, preparing to descend to Tina’s floor, but as he moved towards the main exit, she reached out to hold them open.

“Hey,” she said softly.

Newt spun around. 

She faltered, seemingly at a loss for words as they gazed at each other. Then, in reference to his earlier statement, she said simply, “I’m glad I do too.”

The doors shut between them, leaving Newt standing in the hallway. The faint trace of her smile left a lingering warmth in his chest. He set off with a renewed sense of hope, lighter on his feet than he’d been in weeks.

Chapter Text

Back in her office, Seraphina’s gaze flickered to the urn of Floo powder on the fireplace mantel as she struggled to come to terms with her decision. Asking for assistance from the biggest farce of a Minister of Magic to date, despite knowing how disastrous a blow it would be to her public image during this perilous time, was surely an indicator that she had lost her mind. Unfortunately, after Newt and Tina’s censure, the list of implicitly trustworthy people with both reasonably clean track records and the wherewithal to see this investigation through had dwindled down to exactly one. Desperate times called for desperate measures now more than ever.

After a long, deep breath during which she reminded herself adamantly that this was her only recourse, Seraphina knelt in front of the mantelpiece and tossed a pinch of Floo powder into the flames. 

“Sarsaparilla!” Minister Hector Fawley (or Folly, as he was not-so-fondly known in America) exclaimed in delight when she popped up in his fireplace. “To what do I owe the pleasure?"

“Seraphina,” she said frostily.

“Sorry, Saxafrina,” Hector corrected himself, beaming and waving a jam-laden biscuit in the air. “So lovely to see you!”

“Yes,” Seraphina acknowledged with a pained half-smile. “I was hoping you might do me a favor.”

“Getting right to the point, eh?” Hector said cheerfully. “I always did like that about you.” He took a large bite of biscuit and waited expectantly.

“I’m sure you’ve heard of the recent attacks in America,” Seraphina started. 

Hector’s face fell so drastically that it looked like he’d experienced a medical emergency. 

“Yes, terrible, terrible,” he lamented. “I’m so sorry, my dear Sarsaparilla.”

It had surprised no one that Hector was balking at doing any actual work—to Seraphina’s knowledge, the Ministry of Magic hadn’t so much as released a statement acknowledging the tragic events—but still, it would’ve been nice to have received some sort of assistance from one of the world’s most prominent wizarding governments while Americans were being slaughtered in droves. 

“I hear you have Harry Potter working for you these days,” Seraphina stated cautiously.

Hector really needed to take a mood-stabilizing potion of some sort, she thought, as the Minister’s expression switched almost instantaneously from a morose grimace appropriate for the death of a loved one to the ecstatic ear-to-ear beam of a Quidditch fanatic who just received a Quaffle signed by their favorite player.

“Yes, yes!” Hector cried exuberantly. “Harry—Hazza, as I like to call him, not so sure he enjoys that though—just returned from a months-long investigation in the Territory of New Guinea. What a blazing success, that boy, smart as a whip. Shame you don’t have one at MACUSA, eh?”

“Well, it’s funny that you say that, Hector,” Seraphina said carefully. 

“Oh?” Hector leaned forward over his desk in anticipation. 

No time like the present, as the saying went. With a sigh, Seraphina admitted, “I was hoping you might spare Mr. Potter for a little while to assist us. The situation here is... increasingly volatile.”

Hector frowned in confusion, then put two and two together (faster than Seraphina would have expected, to be fair) and lit up with glee. 

“Oh-ho!” he exclaimed, and wagged his half-eaten biscuit at her in playful disapproval. “You’re not trying to poach my best man, are you? You cheeky old bird!”

“Of course not,” Seraphina replied coolly. “I merely thought that, in the spirit of international cooperation, the British Ministry might consider lending us Mr. Potter’s expertise.” It was the least this bumbling idiot could do, honestly. 

“So you think Hazza could help?” Hector asked, voice muffled around a mouthful of biscuit. Why, for the love of Tituba, didn’t people wait until they were done chewing to talk?

“I think Mr. Potter is uniquely qualified,” Seraphina answered. Then, simply, “I trust him.”

Hector gazed at her thoughtfully as he polished off the biscuit, brushing a cascade of crumbs down the front of his robes.

“Well,” he said after a beat, “that’s a powerful thing, coming from you. If you could allow me a bit of time to mull it over, that would be tremendous.”

Seraphina stifled a groan of frustration. When it came to decision-making, Hector truly moved at the pace of a land snail subjected to an Impediment Jinx. The more urgent the decision and the more people’s livelihoods at stake, the longer he needed to mull it over.

“Quite frankly, Hector, I’d like him here yesterday,” she said firmly, on the off chance that he was suddenly struck by the urge to expedite this critically important and time-sensitive decision.

Hector, as always, completely missed the point. “Uh-oh, are we talking about Time-Turners here? My dear Saxafrina, you know those are a serious matter—”

“It’s a turn of phrase,” Seraphina said through gritted teeth. 

“Well, Hazza’s my best man, you see,” Hector explained, as if he hadn’t just spent the entire conversation to this point waxing lyrical about his favorite Auror.

“You don’t say,” Seraphina responded dryly; at this point, a little snark was warranted, really.

Undeterred by—or more likely oblivious to—her sarcasm, Hector continued, “Why, you of all people should know, Saxafrina. Haven’t you kept up with the news?”

He gestured grandly with a broad left-to-right sweep of his hand in the air, sketching what Seraphina could only assume was meant to be an invisible newspaper banner.

“‘Hazza is the best of the best,’” he read the fake headline out loud. “‘No one else holds a candle. The UK would crumble without him!’”

“Yes, I read that exact article,” Seraphina responded—impressively deadpan, if she did say so herself. If only someone else with more than two brain cells was present to spectate this buffoonery.

“Anyway,” Hector concluded breezily, “I’ll have an answer for you in two flicks of a Kneazle’s tail!”

“Terrific,” Seraphina lied with the fakest smile she’d ever mustered. She was about to withdraw her head from the fireplace and scream into her closet when Hector clapped his hands like he had just witnessed something positively delightful.

“Decision made!” he announced jubilantly. “For you, Sarsaparilla, anything! That is to say, consider it done. I’ll send Hazza by Portkey tomorrow morning.”

Tentative relief flooded Seraphina.

“Perhaps have him check in with my office before showing up somewhere in New York,” she suggested in a strained voice. “I would like to brief him as soon as possible. We can arrange his lodging once he arrives.”

Tentative relief immediately drained as she watched Hector frown in concentration, gripping his quill as he scribbled madly to keep up with her completely normal speaking pace.

“Mmhm, yes, very good, Hazza to MACUSA, Sarsaparilla will brief—oh drat it, jam on the parchment…” He held up his notes and squinted. “Eh, legible enough! Handwriting isn’t what it used to be, y’know… but yes yes yes, I’ll speak to him straightaway!”

If Seraphina thought that getting Hector’s signoff on the transfer was the biggest hurdle in her plan, she was wrong. This was a recipe for disaster. 

“Please make sure someone at MACUSA is aware,” she requested. “The address is—”

But Hector confidently waved her off. “Pish posh, no need for that, Saxafrina! We are old friends, after all!”

“Are we?” Seraphina asked weakly, already plagued by visions of his beloved Hazza landing in the middle of a raging cyclone in Oklahoma or getting tromped on by a belligerent moose in rural Alaska.

Hector nodded enthusiastically. “Yes yes, don’t worry about a thing, dear girl, it’s sorted!”

It was a nice sentiment, but no matter how much Hector plied her with flimsy reassurances, one thing was for sure: Seraphina would very much worry, and it was very much not sorted. 

Chapter Text

Following the official censure, Newt found himself consumed with guilt over nearly derailing Tina’s career again. Tina, for her part, was acutely aware of the judgmental glances she was now receiving at MACUSA headquarters. Colleagues with whom she used to be friendly were suddenly too busy to chat, and junior employees that were once eager for mentorship now avoided helping her at all costs. She even told Newt about catching a Records Officer hiding behind a bookcase.

“What was I going to do to her?” she snapped while Pickett chittered angrily and brandished a little fist in solidarity. “I’m not a damn monster.”

Newt hadn’t responded. He’d only offered her a warm drink, then stayed there quietly while she brooded by the window, arms crossed tightly across her chest. They didn’t talk much the rest of the evening.

A couple days later, Newt was topping off his cup of tea in the kitchen when there was a knock at the door. The man waiting outside had a Ministry of Magic Auror badge pinned to his robes and looked as confused to see Newt, standing there in a threadbare striped dressing gown holding a chipped teacup aloft, as Newt was to see a British government official standing on Tina and Queenie’s door mat in the middle of a weekday. 

“Hello,” Newt greeted him cautiously.

“Harry Potter,” the Auror introduced himself. 

Other than striking emerald eyes framed by round spectacles, Harry was rather unassuming: average height, with a narrow face, jet black hair the same length as Newt’s, and a pale complexion. He seemed vaguely familiar, although the name didn’t ring a bell. 

“Ah, yes,” Newt responded politely, “do come in.” Pickett popped out of his pocket to see what was going on and squeaked indignantly when Newt hastily shoved him back out of sight. 

“I assume Miss Goldstein told you I was coming,” Harry stated as he stepped inside.

Newt wracked his brain for any mention of receiving a guest that Tina or Queenie might’ve made recently, but came up empty. “Erm… no,” he supplied.

Harry raised an eyebrow. “Rather, I assume Seraphina told Miss Goldstein to tell you I was coming?” 

Newt made another valiant attempt to recall any conversation involving a visit from Harry Potter, to no avail.

The Auror looked to be rapidly losing faith in the American government. “I assume Hector told Seraphina to tell Miss Goldstein to…” 

His voice trailed off at the end, realizing by the look on Newt’s face that he had not, in fact, been informed about his existence, much less his arrival.

“Oh, for Merlin’s sake,” Harry muttered. “Message must’ve gotten lost somewhere.”

At that moment, Pickett’s curiosity about this stranger got the better of him. Without warning, he leapt from Newt’s collar to Harry’s shoulder and began chattering excitedly. 

“Come now, Pickett, we’ve talked about this,” Newt scolded the Bowtruckle, who stubbornly wrapped his pointy hands tightly around the collar of the Auror’s robes and held on for dear life. 

Harry appeared too stunned to speak. To be fair, being greeted so overzealously by a walking, talking twig in this manner likely wasn’t the welcome he would have expected. After a brief tussle, Newt managed to pry Pickett off of the Auror and stuff him into his dressing gown pocket with a stern threat to put him back in the case if he didn’t behave. 

“I do apologize,” he told a shell-shocked Harry. “We’re working on his manners around other people, but I’m afraid it hasn’t quite stuck yet.” 

Harry stared at the Bowtruckle as if questioning his sanity. His mouth opened but no words came out. Newt tried his best to look sane. However, it seemed that a subject change was in order at this point.

“How did you get here, then?” Newt inquired.

“Portkey,” Harry replied, and sighed. “I knew I shouldn’t have trusted Hector.”

The significance of referring to both the Minister of Magic and President Picquery by first name was not lost on Newt. This Harry bloke must be either recklessly disrespectful, or top tier in the government.

“Well… Tina’s at work right now,” Newt said hesitantly. “I can take you, if you’d like.” Then he paused and reconsidered his statement. To his knowledge, he was still legally allowed inside MACUSA headquarters, but Tina had warned him multiple times not to visit unless it was a life or death situation.

“It’s fine. I’m knackered anyway,” Harry said, rubbing his eyes and stifling a yawn. “Just show me where I’m staying and I’ll be out of your hair.”

Newt had no idea what to say to this, given that there were only two bedrooms and both were currently occupied.

“You do have somewhere for me to stay, right?” Harry asked slowly. The way his dark fringe flopped over his forehead, almost in tune with his level of exasperation, reminded Newt faintly of himself. That, coupled with the familiar accent, was oddly comforting. 

“Er… you’re welcome to use the guest bedroom for now,” Newt improvised. “Tina and I currently…” He trailed off awkwardly. “But we don’t mind, or I’m sure she won’t.”

Harry stared at Newt for a beat, then gave a resigned sigh and looked around the small flat. “Right, I can just kip on the couch, if that’s alright?”

“Yes, that should be fine,” Newt faltered, more like a question than an answer. But before he could finish his sentence, Harry had settled back into the couch cushions, not even bothering to remove his coat or shoes. He mumbled something about this being a fever dream or a prank, and was fast asleep in seconds.

Newt stood there awkwardly for a moment, still holding his teacup and wondering whether he should have offered Harry a blanket. Pickett tried to creep over to the slumbering Auror, at which point Newt returned the troublemaker to the case, imagining the chaos that would ensue if Harry woke up with a sentient twig’s finger in his ear. Then, after quite a bit of internal debate, he decided to sit in one of the armchairs and quietly peruse some field notes, glancing over at Harry every so often.

A couple hours later, Queenie floated into the flat, humming to herself and carrying a paper bag of groceries, which she promptly dropped with a loud thud when she caught sight of the Auror snoring on their sofa. 

“I can explain,” Newt started hurriedly, realizing how socially improper this must look: a strange man lounging, unconscious, in the living quarters of his female companions.

But Queenie gasped in delight, not horror. “Is that Harry Potter?” she exclaimed, clasping her hands under her chin as though she’d just seen a movie star.

Newt gaped at her. “You know who he is?”

“Oh honey, he’s made all the gossip magazines,” Queenie gushed. “He’s a top British Auror, all the girls are goofy for him! What’s he doing here?”

“I was hoping you’d tell me,” Newt replied, looking thoughtfully at the stranger. That would have been a good question to ask, in retrospect... as was introducing himself, which he realized was a significant oversight. 

Queenie was unconcerned as she stepped closer and peered down at the apparent celebrity fondly. “Well, it’s a dream come true anyhow," she sang breezily. “Oh, ain’t this the berries!” With that, she scurried off to the kitchen, beaming ear to ear, and begin unloading groceries.

Newt sank back into the armchair, his mind reeling with questions. Why had Harry Potter come all the way across the Atlantic without any warning? What did it mean for Tina? Why hadn’t President Picquery mentioned anything about it? Who sent Harry to the flat in the first place, and why? 

Surely it wasn’t sinister. Harry seemed genuine, if a bit of an enigma thus far. These were strange times, though, and everyone was on extra high alert. Plus, Minister Fawley—in an unsurprising show of incompetency bordering on cowardice—still had not even acknowledged the Summer of Beasts. It seemed unlikely that he would have willingly involved himself or his staff in the investigation.

Then something even more alarming occurred to Newt. “Should I tell Tina?” he asked Queenie.

“That Harry’s here?” Queenie flitted over to him, drying her hands on a dishtowel. “I’d sure think so.”

Informing Tina, who had just essentially been demoted from the Auror position she’d worked so hard to earn, that an incredibly famous Auror was sleeping on her couch was definitely not on the list of things Newt would like to do in his lifetime. But leaving this little surprise for her to discover upon returning home didn’t seem wise either, especially given her current mood.

It was the right thing to do. He knew this. And with advance warning, perhaps Tina would come to terms with it that much sooner. Right?

Queenie heard his thoughts and giggled. “Better you than me, honey,” she said with a wink, and floated back to the kitchen.

Chapter Text

Deep in the bowels of MACUSA’s archives, Tina adjusted her wand light and stepped into the narrow corridor of forgotten case files. These were the shelves no one wanted to bother with: old disciplinary reviews, failed prosecutions, dead end investigations. Even more insignificant and forgotten than cold cases she’d been relegated to. Based on the thick layer of dust coating every surface, this room hadn’t been visited in a very long time.

Standing before a rusty file cabinet, she selected a long wooden drawer and tugged hard. It groaned open with a reluctant creak. 

The first thing she saw was a weathered leatherbound book with faded writing embossed on the front. The title was barely legible, the notebook itself brittle from time and neglect. 

ASHENCROFT INSTITUTION: VISITOR LOG

Ashencroft.

Tina had heard whispers and rumors about this place; it was an insane asylum shut down years ago after a top secret MACUSA investigation. No one knew exactly what was found during this operation, only that it led to the institution’s demolition. It became a distasteful tidbit of history that was skimmed over during Auror training, so obsolete that even Tina, with unfettered access to all case records at the peak of her career, had no idea where any information on it was even stored.

Until now. 

A sense of foreboding suddenly crept up on her. It felt like a warning of some sort, but if it was, it was one she chose to ignore. Instead, she found a seat at a dusty old secretary desk, where she gingerly flipped open the book and began running a finger down each row. She really didn’t know why she was so nervous; there was no reason to be. But something felt inexplicably significant—or perhaps sinister—about Ashencroft. 

Then she saw it. 

GOLDSTEIN, M.

In the notes column: “VISIT DENIED – PATIENT DECEASED.”

Mordechai.

So he’d tried to visit. Just once, from the looks of it. And whoever he was trying to visit was dead already. 

To be fair, there was no proof that it was her great-uncle. A shared surname and first initial didn’t mean anything without further evidence. But when she turned the last page of the visitor log, a thick envelope fell out with a label reading “VISITOR IDENTIFICATION”. With shaking hands, Tina slowly began thumbing through faded copies of ID cards and badges.

She knew it was him before reading the name. 

It was his MACUSA Auror identification, altered to remove details that affiliated him with the government. Tina had stared at that badge and idolized the man who wore it her entire life. Having seen what she needed to see (and quite possibly a great deal more than she bargained for), she hurriedly returned both ID card and envelope, then leaned back in her chair, arms crossed as her mind raced.

What did her great-uncle have to do with Ashencroft? Was he simply playing part of the investigation, or was it something more sinister? Could it have something to do, in some convoluted way, with the Summer of Beasts?

It could be nothing. Or it could be something.

Tina had researched Mordechai’s legacy religiously. Nothing, aside from his place of work and the time period, linked him to Ashencroft.

Then there was the badge. MACUSA always provided fake or alternative forms of identification when Aurors or other government officials were on cases requiring this sort of thing. They typically used a different photograph, different print style, different format, different information. The fact that Mordechai’s visitor ID was identical to his official badge aside from the MACUSA markings suggested that he himself had altered it, and that his visit to Ashencroft was not federally sanctioned in any way. Could this have been a vigilante situation?

Tina stared at the notebook intently, wondering now whether she should take it back with her for safekeeping or leave it where it had belonged, untouched, for decades. If it was a piece of evidence of some kind, then it shouldn’t be left unattended. At the same time, it did give off the ominous, unsettling air of a cursed curio from Grimm & Gallows—something no one in their right mind would bring home. Besides, it wasn’t like anyone else was going to come looking for it. Still, she piled several disintegrating paper files on top to conceal its location, just in case. 

As she dropped the visitor log back into the drawer it had come from, there was a light knock on the door and Newt poked his head in, face lighting up when he saw her. How he tracked her down, despite this entire branch of headquarters not even being visible on MACUSA maps, she had no idea. Queenie had once declared that Newt was like a homing pigeon who could always find his way back to Tina. Tina could only hope her sister was right.

“Might I steal you away?” Newt asked gently.

“Please.” Tina joined him at the doorway; when their eyes met, she had to resist the urge to run her fingers through his tousled bangs.

There was no denying it: she liked him far more than she should, far more than she intended to, and far more than she showed... at least, she hoped so. She was never quite sure whether Newt was as oblivious to the degree of her feelings for him as he seemed. Hopefully he was. 

Admittedly, she was still a bit suspicious of President Picquery’s mysterious sidebar with him after the censure. But Newt had clearly not wanted to share, and she couldn’t exactly press the President for details.

“Hi, leader of the country, I know I’ve completely embarrassed you and you’ve nearly fired me multiple times and I’m pretty much a charity case at this point... but just wondering, did you say something about me to the boy I like?”

That would go over well. 

Newt reached out and interlaced their fingers, anchoring her back to the present moment. Something about him was just so... grounding. The way he plied her with such affection and attention went far beyond anything she could have envisioned in her wildest dreams. Smiling and already feeling a thousand times better, she squeezed his hand as they headed for the exit.

The moment didn’t last long, though, because as soon as they were outside, Newt faltered, then stopped and turned to her, looking shifty.

“What’s wrong?” she asked sharply.

“Erm… I have… something to tell you,” Newt began, staring at the wall behind her. “It’s nothing serious. But Queenie thought we—I—ought to give you a warning before... well, before you found out on your own.” 

Mercy Lewis. There were about a thousand different things he could be alluding to and not one of them was good.

“Spit it out, Newt,” Tina demanded, hands on her hips. 

He folded. “So, erm… do you know Harry Potter?”

Tina blinked. Of course she knew of the most esteemed and accomplished Auror that the UK had ever seen. If she was honest, Harry was not so much of a role model or colleague as he was a source of jealousy. Witnessing his rise to fame over the past decade, compared to her modest achievements in the same profession, hadn’t exactly been a morale booster. She quickly grew tired of flipping past article after article recounting his top secret missions, each one more dangerous and successful than the last. And while she had no desire to be in the public eye, the fact that he was adored and revered by so many people—some in very high places—rubbed salt in the wound just a little bit more. 

Newt continued, “It appears there was a miscommunication. Apparently the Minister sent him at the President’s request.”

Tina frowned, failing to see how Newt was involved in any of this. “Sent him where?”

Newt cleared his throat. “Er… you and Queenie’s flat.”

Tina raised an eyebrow. “Excuse me?”

Newt mumbled something and avoided looking at her as she quickly analyzed the situation in her head. 

First of all, President Picquery must have really been desperate to have suffered through an entire conversation with Minister Fawley. He was a complete joke in America, and politicians preferred to distance themselves from him whenever possible. If word got out that MACUSA was deferring in any way to the Ministry of Magic, especially with the current state of the country, the American wizarding public would go wild. In fact, it could easily trigger calls for the President’s resignation or impeachment.

Second of all, Tina wasn’t an idiot; she knew immediately what was going on. Not only had she been pulled from the Summer of Beasts case, but she was being backfilled by Harry Potter, Auror extraordinaire, international heartthrob, and soon-to-be best lead investigator MACUSA had ever seen. It was a nice friendly reminder that, yet again, she wasn’t good enough.

Third of all, why, for the love of Tituba, would the President send Harry to Tina’s home? Why not the MACUSA headquarters? Or private lodging? Or anywhere but the already overcrowded apartment where the fallen-from-grace Auror he was replacing resided? Talk about salt in the wound.

“So, Harry is...?” Tina said slowly.

Newt nodded somewhat apologetically. “He’s napping on the couch right now. Although he may be awake by the time we’re back.” He paused, then added with palpable relief, “Well, now you know, anyway.” 

As if that cleared everything up. 

Before Tina could respond, Newt reached for her hand tentatively, then hesitated, clearly uncertain whether the physical gesture was welcome. A few weeks ago, it might not have been, but Tina had settled into a comfortable closeness with him by now that wasn’t about to be undone by a little exasperation. And so she took his hand as they trudged back slowly to the apartment, Newt looking over and smiling at her every other step. She pretended not to notice.

The mounting list of strange occurrences—the book signing, the sidebar with President Picquery, and now the Ashencroft visitor log—that had played out as the Summer of Beasts unfolded across the nation was still reeling in the back of her mind. But right now, there were more pressing issues. Such as Harry Potter making himself comfortable in her home.

Seriously. What in the name of Deliverance Dane had she gotten herself into now?