nysalogs | (no subject)

This and that. [ He pauses. It isn't a long pause, only a moment's hesitation, to give him time to feel bad about representing himself as a professor when he only did it for a year and then resigned in disgrace—so he feels bad for that moment, and then he does it anyway, keeping pace with her on the way to the edge of the camp, because it won't help anyone at all if she thinks he's dodgy. ] Before all of this I was teaching at Hogwarts. It was my first year, though.

[ And, with a combination of regret and admiration: ]

I was never good enough at Potions to be an Auror.

[ Also not good enough at not turning into a bloodthirsty monster once a month. Damn technicalities. ]

[Tina casts him an inquisitive look mid wand movement. "This and that," is a dodgy answer no matter where you're from. His further response only earns to make her brow quirk further on her features-- A Hogwarts professor?]

What did you teach?

[The question comes out abruptly enough she almost misses his finalizing comment and she softens somewhat in response-- A scoff on her lips. She loved her job, but something of a childhood could be missed with the studies needed for it. If you were to take it seriously, anyway, and Tina had always taken to each position she brought upon herself with utmost seriousness.] It's not as if we don't have a potions storage-- [It's said with a heft of bemusement, but her expression remains softer in nature.] 'Course, we have different standards-- Wandless magic is plenty more common in the States.

[Though she could only do much needed spells if she was wandless and nothing non-verbal, so she couldn't really say too much.]

Is it? I suppose that makes sense.

[ That law of theirs might have been repealed—he hadn't paid much attention, honestly, he'd have been five at the time—but centuries of stricter division and secrecy ingrained a cultural habit, surely, of somewhat greater subtlety about magic when out and about. ]

I taught Defense Against the Dark Arts. [ He steps around a discarded scrap of metal. ] According to rumor, the position is cursed. It's been decades since anyone held it for more than a year. They're scraping the bottom of the barrel now, I'm afraid.

[ He spreads his arms and hands for a second: ta da, that's where they found him. At the barrel bottom. ]

I'd consider it an accomplishment that I'm not dead or completely Obliviated like the last two, but— [ but he nearly killed some of his favorite students and let a murderer escape and wound up publicly outed and resigned in disgrace ] —the entire world did end, so I can't say that I left on a high note.

Yeah, the original witches and wizards didn't use wands after all-- A bit of our training still requires it.

[Aurors, anyway, and she wishes that she was better at it than she was sometimes. She'd have to work on it more here, all the same, she doesn't want to know what would happen should her wand break here of all places--

--But she looks somewhat confused at his response. Being a Professor was an esteemed job, one kept for years as far as she knew. Ilvermorny was much the same, though Aurors through their own history ranked somewhat higher, perhaps.]

I hadn't heard of anything like that. [Her gaze is skeptical.] Mind, I don't keep much of an eye on it, but everyone knows about Hogwarts.The transfiguration professor there was just in Transfiguration Weekly a couple months back. And there was the talk of tightening security at Hogwarts due to Grindelwald's attacks-- [No new professors were listed in those articles, were there? She's tried keeping an eye on the developments in Europe for ages now, it doesn't make sense a new professor in such turmoil when all the professors seem renowned.]

Ah.

[ Right. This would all have been much less complicated if their benevolent overlords had rescued them from a single point in time. Or however that works. He'd been too preoccupied with everything else that seemed impossible or miraculous to go asking about this specific thing.

At least he's already had some form of this conversation. He doesn't have to waste any time being boggled. He glances at her, still smiling faintly. ]

Where I'm from, it's 1994. Gellert Grindelwald hasn't been a problem for a very long time.

What?

[Tina rounds from her spellwork to face the man, disbelief showing. Newt's spoken of people who know his book, but this is something different altogether. There's a nagging feeling in the back of her mind-- She doesn't really believe it, but what would this man gain from lying?]

We only just put him in the cells at MACUSA! [It's an exclamation, frustrated in nature. 1994... She'd be well into her nineties by then. That was such a strange thing to think about-- Was she old or young? Tina couldn't even guess why things were this way anymore but she states her feelings all the same:]

Mercy Lewis, this is balled up.

Quite.

[ He thinks for a moment, but other than the famous 1945 duel, the dates and details he knows of Grindelwald's uprising are fuzzy—he got his O.W.L. in the History of Magic and then promptly forgot half of what he'd learned, as one does, to make room for his N.E.W.T. subjects. And other things. They had their own war to worry about.

So he can't place her in the timeline with just that detail. ]

Do you know Mr Scamander, then? He said he was from 1926.

[Tina doesn't look too happy, but then not many people would. Part of her believes this some elaborate joke, the other part thing she's going absolutely mad. Maybe it's both, it wouldn't be the first time she felt her life was out of control.

And it was definitely that.

She frowns, brushing at her hair impatiently before nodding.]

Yeah, I know Newt. He was in New York when all the stuff with Grindelwald happened, but that was a few months back now... It was February 1927.

[For her, anyway. And she was busy back at being an Auror.]

Strange.

[ Remus looks perfectly happy—probably because being from the relative future, where no one can say anything about your life and times that you don't know yourself, is a much more comfortable position to be in. ]

The only other wizard I've seen awake here is from my time. I assumed we were from the same day, but it didn't occur to me to ask.

[ He puts up an intruder charm, deftly. One that will shoot up sparks rather than sound an alarm if there's a disturbance. No good waking the entire camp up over potentially nothing.

Something about her name is struggling for recognition, now, but not quite making it. ]

I taught a Goldstein. Anthony. Smart boy. But I suppose there's no way for you to know if he's of any relation.

I've only see Newt, but that doesn't really mean much of anything if this is what we have to deal with.

[She raises a hand as if in description, before dropping it with a scowl. Of course she doesn't like it. It's strange enough having been on a spaceship or without Queenie, or any number of things really--

But to hear a man from the future who speaks of Grindelwald, the darkest figure in her history, being "gone for a while" it was alarming in its own sense. Certainly, she should be glad for his defeat but then that leaves so many other questions.

Teeth catching on her lower lip, Tina shakes her head in answer.]

No, I have a sister but our parents died when we were real little. We haven't had much contact with family since then, it's been just us.

I'm sorry. That must have been hard.

[ Quiet, sincere. Remus can't imagine—or, well, he can imagine what his childhood would have been like without his parents. He'd have been raised by Greyback with all the others. But he doesn't want to imagine it. ]

Did your sister make it here?

We had each other.

[Tina's response is simple, definite. No matter what else may have come to pass there was always Queenie. As annoying as her legilimency could be, it was an integral part of who her sister was. Just as much as Tina provided the monetary income for the home, Queenie had always provided the spirit and emotional sects (nevermind her own tendency to remind Tina to eat or anything else).

She may have given a lot of her childhood up, but her sister was and would always be the most important thing and-- thus-- worth it.

Which is why his next question is harder and she sets her shoulders to keep from the way it truly makes her feel though her eyes dart away when she shakes her head.]

No, she's asleep. [She lingers only a second on the words before letting out a puff of breath and returning to her work, adding:] But she'll wake up.

Yes, I'm sure she will.

[ He's not actually sure. But he has to be hopeful about all of this, or else worrying about Harry and his friends—and everyone else, but mainly them, only children—would knock the wind out of him. It wouldn't stop him; he's had a great deal of practice in limping stubbornly onward when everything is lost. But hope is better. Harry will be fine. Everyone will be fine. It is even possible, in a distant way that feels very impossible actually, that James and Lily Potter will be fine.

—and equally possible that Peter will be fine. Grindelwald. Voldemort.

One problem at a time. ]

Were you close enough in age to go to school together?

[She keeps turned away, tucking unruly hair away as she continues about. It's daunting to think that so many people were asleep, people from her future even. Disorientating, to say the least and if she had time to consider it more now she'd be at a loss but work helps.]

Close enough, but she was in Pukwudgie while I was in Thunderbird.