the art of nosy pursuit [Anthony]

As much as Penny loved trying new food, sometimes feeding herself felt like an endless chore. Especially when she was so close, so close to getting somewhere with her latest project.

For months now she poured over reference books, used numerous decrypting spells, and even put in requests for rarer manuscripts to be sent in from the Middle East, only to make little headway. And she was feeling the pressure — there was something in those runes that had her boss on edge. Finally she could see the solution at her fingertips. She was so close.

Which is why she skipped breakfast that morning and was in her office working by 6am. She tried to ignore the pangs of hunger and lightheadedness as she frantically chipped away at the puzzle, but by eleven she could not continue.

Feeling like it was the biggest inconvenience to ever befall her, Penny left her desk and headed to the Ministry canteen. She was walking in a dream-like state, her head back with her work, and indeed she bumped into a few people in the fall.

Because it was still early for the lunch rush, the canteen was mostly empty and she was able to grab a sandwich that was mostly not soggy. Craving salt, she grabbed a bag of crisps, too, and sat at the nearest empty table. She ate quickly, and although she immediately felt better, she also felt a heavy tiredness start to sink in.

As she was mustering the energy to go back to her desk, Penny spotted Anthony Goldstein on line for food. She might not have noticed him if she hadn’t been sitting so close to the till. Anthony had been Ravenclaw Prefect during her first year at Hogwarts, and was a member of the DA in the years that followed. Penny often spotted older Hogwarts schoolmates at the Ministry, but she never said hello — after all, she doubted that the likes of Anthony Goldstein would remember who she was.

As she stood to go, Penny saw an image flash on one of the papers in Anthony’s hand.

Was that blood?

As she walked towards the door she saw more of the picture.

Are those? The bloody runes?!

They certainly looked similar to the ones she was currently working on, but she hadn’t seen those exact ones. Were they part of the missing set? Penny stopped in her tracks. She had to see more.

Of course saying hello to Anthony and asking him what he was working on was completely out of the question. Too awkward. And besides, she wasn’t allowed to tell anyone what she was working on, and given that the runes landed on her desk, he probably couldn’t discuss it with anyone either.

Although she was already halfway to the door, Penny turned around and tried to look as casual as possible as she doubled back and joined the line right behind Anthony. Pretending to inspect the food, Penny tried to get a better look out of the corner of her eyes, but the line was moving fast. At the last minute she grabbed a banana, and ignored the cashier’s odd look at her. Anthony was going to sit at a table, and Penny quickly added a cup of tea to her order.

Penny took a seat at the table behind Anthony, and tried not to look like she was looking over his shoulder, as she sipped her tea. Her banana was left unpeeled. She wasn’t hungry anymore; she was completely engrossed in figuring out what was in those papers.

Penny took out her own piece of parchment and a quill, hoping to write down some notes. She leaned forward, trying to get a better look, and almost lost her balance, her chair scraping a bit on the floor. She immediately turned away, cheeks red, hoping that no one — especially not Anthony Goldstein — saw that.

If he had wanted to be some sort of detective, like the protagonists of Michael's childhood books, Anthony would have become a G-d damned Auror.

He had been briefly tempted by the offer after the war, some delusion of becoming a Nazi hunter drifting back and forth in his mind. But when Longbottom and Weasley and Potter and the lot of Gryffindors went off to the rebuilding Ministry, Anthony repeated his seventh year instead. Some residual cowardice, he supposed. Anthony Goldstein had simply survived the second of May, 1998. He was neither a war hero nor a wizarding Simon Wiesenthal.

So Anthony Goldstein went to law school (accepting that ill-mannered jokes about Jews and lawyers would be inherent to the whole business) and took satisfaction in defeating Death Eaters with words and arguments instead of hexes and raids.

Occasionally, though, the business of constructing those arguments felt suspiciously like Auror work.

Take this case, for example. It was an ugly attempted murder case, with hints of necromancy and human sacrifice within the submitted statements so far. There was a link missing, though, one that would prove beyond a shadow of a doubt the link to dark magics. Technically, the paperwork and analysis of all of this was solicitor, not barrister work, but there were never enough hands in Prosecution Services for both on each case. Tony didn't mind, usually. Piecing together a narrative from the evidence was just a puzzle. Like most Ravenclaws, Anthony enjoyed a puzzle.

But his O on his NEWT in Ancient Runes was not enough to decipher these runes. His rustier understanding of Ancient Aramaic wasn't helping, either. Tony found himself hitting his head against a wall in both the metaphorical sense and the literal. His deskmate, concerned, suggested that Goldstein perhaps eat something. At least a single calorie, if not more.

Tony brought the file of evidence with him to the canteen, of course, along with a book of Mesopotamian runes and a legal pad. Stared at the photographs again as he waited in line, absentmindedly filling his tray with a bowl of paneer butter masala and a butterbeer. Stared at it more as he walked to the nearest empty table, spreading it out in front of him to gaze at as he blankly consumed spoon after spoon of mild curry.

He was dimly aware, with the refined paranoia of both a descendant of a Holocaust survivor and a member of the resistance at Hogwarts in 1997, that someone was watching him. Following him, even. Tony let it go on a few minutes, in the line and as he settled into a table.

SCRK.

The sound of a metal chair scraping against the tile was loud and distinctive in the mostly empty canteen. Tony sighed, dropping his spoon into the bowl and flipping the photograph over. "If you want to look, you could ask," Tony announced, only slightly exasperated. He twisted around to look at his tail, blinking as he tried to place her. Ravenclaw, certainly. Started with a P? Not a relation of Padma's, he vaguely remembered asking Padma that once.

Instead of admitting he couldn't remember her, Tony just shook his head. "Course, I'd have to tell you to sod off, probably. But asking is generally the polite thing to do." There was empty seats all around Tony's table -- he nodded his head towards one of them, then to her, before turning back around to his lunch.

Penny felt her cheeks grow hot as she realized that not only had Anthony seen her, but he was now confronting her. By trying not to be fazed that he was being spied on. Which was a tactic that Penny herself had learned in Unspeakable training.

She whipped her head around to Anthony and froze, eyes wide open. Now she had to come up with a reasonable explanation for why she was following Anthony and trying to get a peek at his work. An explanation that didn’t include divulging her job, or her sick curiousity with what was clearly dark magic.

I need to stall. Stall and divert. Penny thought to herself, and took a deep breath, plastering a large, fake smile on her face.

“Anthony Goldstein, is that you?” Penny crooned loudly, sounding every bit like the vapid Gryffindor girls she always hated in school.

“I was just trying to get a better look and see if my eyes deceived me, or is that my favorite Ravenclaw Prefect?” She continued, cursing inwardly at how stupid she sounded with her affected high-pitched voice.

“Why I’d love to join you and catch up,” she added, realizing that she had no choice but to actually converse with the guy.

“It’s Penny, remember? I was a wee firstie when you were Prefect?” Penny grabbed her stupid banana and took the seat nearest to Anthony at his table.

“I didn’t know you worked here. What is that you do at the Ministry?” She added, toning down the act a bit. She just hoped that she’d disarmed him enough into forgetting that she had been spying on her work.

And speaking of his work, merlin’s beard she just couldn’t help but look around on the table and was that a book on Mesopotamian Runes?

She wondered if Anthony knew that the runes, although in cuneiform alphabet, were the Hittite language and not in the more commonly used Sumerian. That had been her big revelation on the project. She also wondered more about the blood that she saw, and where the runes had been found. She was given translation work, but often times she had no idea why she was working on the projects she was working on, and she always wondered about the context.

The girl whipped her head around, frozen like a dear in headlights. She seemed surprised to be caught --feh, like it hadn't be so painfully obvious. Now she was trying to save face, Tony observed, watching her like some sort of interesting bird or small mammal. Oh, G-d, she was cooing at him. Anthony resisted the urge to roll his eyes.

Why couldn't he remember a single woman's name. Patil soundalike. Patel? Yes. First name, too much like Padma's. Patricia. Pollyanna. Persephone. Penumbra. Hm, that sounded closer. Penelope? "Penny!" Tony said suddenly, cutting over the woman's own introduction. Barely saved it. Excellent work, Goldstein. "Penny Patel. Yes, I remember you." Poorly, he thought, though more and more things were coming back the longer he looked at her, from two years on when the Prefect title had been striped from him. Father in Azkaban and publicly threatened about it, during the war year.

He hadn't actually invited her to sit, but Penny had already wandered over to his table. Nothing for it. Tony moved some of the papers out of the way, out of her reach, when she came to sit. "Oh, I'm on level two. Wizengamot Services," he added, unable to help himself. Three years of law school to sit in the same cafeteria as every person Tony had ever known? Nu, he deserved to show off a bit. "And you?"

Penny was still looking around, like she was afraid of being caught in something. Tony frowned, following the woman's gaze. Her eyes were lingering on his book for far too long. He coughed. "Do you have an interest in Near Eastern runes?" The book wasn't case material – he slid it towards Penny. "It's not often studied, apparently."

I remember you

Those simple words threw her completely off track. She didn't think that anyone remembered Plain Penny from school, least of all an older student like Anthony. She was oddly touched, and had to take a few deep breaths to regain her composure.

"Wizengamot Services, sounds impressive," she said, and meant it. Although Anthony was a few years older than him, he must have had a very successful few years out of Hogwarts to have risen to such a position.

"Who, me? I'm at the Department of International Magical Cooperation" Penny said distractedly, still caught up in wondering how it was that Anthony knew who she was, and if she should have made more of an effort to make friends at Hogwarts.

Focus! Penny rebuked herself, and she remembered what she was here for: To get a closer look at those runes.

As Anthony slid the book towards her she followed it with her eyes, as if she could will the book to appear in her office. She had to focus, if she was going to achieve her goal of learning more about these runes.

"Ah yes, well I studied near eastern runes at Hogwarts for a special project. Although I've just started out in the department I've been interested in helping out with some foreign runes projects going on there." Penny was proud of herself for the lie, and she felt more confident as she continued.

"It's a shame it's not studied more often. These runes introduce new possibilities and a lot more flexibility than European runes. But of course the translation process can be confusing. For example, did you know that while most Cuneiform Runes are in the Sumerian language, the alphabet can also be used in other languages? What language are the Runes you're working on in?"

Penny hoped that Anthony would both get the hint not to assume the runes were in Sumerian, and wouldn't know enough about the Runes to know what language they were in. And that he would ask for her help.

Sure, she was hoping for a lot, but she was also devising a Plan B to convince her boss that she should collaborate with the Wizengamot on this project. She just hoped that by the end of it she could keep the book.