Chapter 116: The Talk, and The Events That Built Upto It (2/2)
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Quinn was looking around Dumbledore's office when he noticed something from the corner of his eyes.
'Hmm?'
He turned to face Dumbledore and saw the Headmaster's eyes glittering and shining with an unnatural light.
'Ah! He is using magic to attract my eyes to his,' thought Quinn. 'He is going to use Legilimency!'
But Quinn wasn't scared.
Not at all.
Instead, he was excited.
Except for Alan, his teacher, no person had ever challenged his mental Occlumency shields. He wanted to see if Dumbledore's attack could pass through.
'The invisible, omnipresent radiation matter is also ready and present in my mind,' thought Quinn and thought about the latest addition to his mindscape. 'Let's see if he can even get to that point.'
Quinn slightly raised his chin in confidence and locked his eyes with Dumbledore. With a barely noticeable smile gracing his lips, his shields went into active mode as they solidified, and the radiation edges started emitting waves of mental probe degradation magic.
Dumbledore, who saw Quinn lock eyes with him, gathered his magic and engaged his mental magic to cast Legilimency.
The mental probe went forward and was about to reach Quinn's mind when the two parties heard a pop.
Dumbledore and Quinn broke eye contact and looked towards the direction of the sound. There they saw a house-elf standing with a letter in his hands.
'I guess my ticket is here,' thought Quinn when he saw the letter in the house-elves hands. 'It came at the right time. It's good to see I know him well.'
”What is Galry?” asked Dumbledore to the house-elf who had the responsibility to clean up his office and was the only elf who was allowed to enter the Headmaster's office.
”A letter came for the Headymaster,” said Galry the house-elf and handed the letter to Dumbledore. ”One of me kind pop to Hogwarts and told us house-elves to give this to you and give it fast.”
Galry then twirled his fingers and spoke in a distracted voice.
”She wore pretty toga and was so pretty. Like the best elf, Darly had ever seen... so pretty.”
Quinn's eyes smiled when he heard the little house-elf spoke in a dreamy tone. 'Of course, she is pretty.'
Dumbledore opened the letter as the Garly the Hogwarts house-elf popped away. He began reading it, and Quinn didn't see any reaction on the Headmaster's face before he looked up and spoke.
”It seems your grandfather doesn't want me to speak to you without his presence, Mr. West.”
”I see.”
Rewinding back time to the moment Quinn had opened the door in the Shrieking Shack.
The second Quinn saw the men inside the room, he was sure of one thing, one thing that was sure to happen.
Quinn thought about the future, and no matter what decision he took, every path led to him meeting the old man in the tower and talking about what happened today.
All paths lead to Albus Dumbledore.
And at that time, the meeting with Dumbledore became his main priority, and Quinn started to prepare for it.
The first thing Quinn had to do was to get out of there alive. And make sure Harry Potter wasn't hurt and taken away. Doing this was easy enough. But when he added Dumbledore to the equation, Quinn had to select his methods.
He took the physical way rather than the magical way. Quinn started by discreetly disarming the hostage-taker. The door shutting close made sure that no one noticed that fact, meaning if Dumbledore examined the memory, he wouldn't find a wand flying because Quinn made sure that the wand went in a direction that wasn't visible to the Marauders.
Quinn didn't want to show his actual magical capabilities to Dumbledore. But because the door was closed with magic, Quinn decided to use his reputation as a prodigious student to explain that he had enough wandless skills to close the door.
But that was it. Quinn couldn't show anymore, so he turned to his trusty fists and battered the man into submission.
Going physical and hurting wasn't only to hide his magic. Quinn needed time to prepare. He made sure the Marauders knew he was hurt so they would take him to the hospital wing.
This went great because Harry Potter was unconscious and needed medical attention, and Quinn simply tagged along.
The reason Quinn wanted to go to the hospital wing was to separate from James Potter. He didn't want to meet Dumbledore right off the bat and wanted to prepare his exit ticket in advance.
In the hospital wing, there were two options:
Number one, Dumbledore would come to the hospital wing and talk to him there. In this option, Quinn wasn't able to set up the exit ticket, but he would have an audience who would see him and Dumbledore talk.
He would have Poppy and most probably the rest of the Potter family in the hospital wing. If Dumbledore asked to talk in private, Quinn would've refused and would reply that they could talk about it in front of everyone. That he trusted Poppy and that the Potter family deserved to know what happened.
This way, Dumbledore would've to carefully tread if he tried some hanky-panky.
The second option was Quinn being called into the Headmaster's office. Which was the version of events that happened.
In this option, Quinn had further sub-possibilities. The possibility was the messenger, who would escort him to Dumbledore. On the scale, Quinn had someone like Severus Snape who wouldn't listen to any of his requests on one side and someone like Filius Flitwick, who was much more empathetic and would allow Quinn to go into his office. With everyone else in between these two people.
Quinn's blood-stained clothes weren't an incident. He could have come out of the mess without a single speck of dust on him. Quinn needed to go to his office so that he could prepare his exit ticket.
The exit ticket was a MagiFax mail sent to every MagiFax unit inside the West Manor. Quinn had sent the same two pages that he drafted while changing clothes to Ms. Rosey, Elliot, his grandfather, and to the MagiFax unit for general use at West Manor.
The two pages covered the events, what was about to happen, and some instructions.
If Snape had come to escort Quinn and had refused his request to change clothes, Quinn would have directly called Polly, who was the one who had delivered the letter to the Hogwarts house-elves and would have given her a short message for his grandfather.
Quinn was confident that even with a short message, his grandfather would've pulled off the same thing as he had done now, and he would get his exit ticket.
Quinn had used MagiFax because Filius, the charms master, was sitting right outside. Quinn wasn't sure if Filius would be able to detect a sudden ward that Quinn would have cast to silence the elf-apparate pop of Polly arriving to collect the pages.
He was okay with Snape seeing him speaking to Polly because after being refused a change of clothes, Quinn had the justification of complaining to his grandfather.
Then came the talk with Dumbledore.
Quinn didn't know what would happen in the office. The talk could have gone pleasantly where he and Dumbledore could've exchanged pleasantries, and after making sure that Quinn was fine, Dumbledore allowing Quinn to leave and rest.
But Dumbledore pulled out a file on Quinn and started to ask questions that didn't have anything to do with today's incident. Dumbledore brought up everything from his grades to his thoughts about various subjects and his activities.
Quinn knew that there was a possibility that Dumbledore would try something, and thus he wanted to get out of the office, and his grandfather's letter was enough to accomplish that. But to make sure that it got here in time, Quinn had to make sure that he extended the conversation without revealing too much.
Dumbledore using Legilimency was within Quinn's expectations. Quinn knew the power of Legilimency: he used it every day. So, he knew that if Dumbledore could, he would use Legilimency because if Quinn was in his place, he would have done the same thing.
Sure Quinn was confident in his Occlumency, but his opponent was Dumbledore, and Quinn knew that the over hundred-year-old man was strong. That is why Quinn went to all the trouble to create an exit ticket.
In the words of George West, the exit ticket told Albus Dumbledore to back off and leave his grandson alone.
Albus Dumbledore was magically and politically powerful, but he lacked the financial wealth that George West had plenty of. If Dumbledore refused to heed his warning, George would make his life difficult.
The saying that money made the world go round was built on solid ground.
Dumbledore looked up from the letter towards Quinn stated, ”It seems your grandfather is aware of the incident.”
”So it seems,” nodded Quinn.
”I wonder how he got to know them so quickly,” inquired Dumbledore.
”I wouldn't know, Headmaster. My grandfather is a resourceful man. I'm sure he has his way,” replied Quinn, not admitting that he was the source.
Quinn put the folder which held the information on him back on the desk. He had already glanced at it and just needed to use Occlumency to strengthen what his eyes saw.
”It seems we would've to end our talk, sir,” smiled Quinn as he got up from his chair. ”As much as I enjoyed our talk, my grandfather has the authority to ground me for the entire summer, and I don't want that.”
Dumbledore glanced between the letter and Quinn and nodded.
Quinn turned back and walked towards the door but stopped when he heard Dumbledore speak.
”Detentions till the end of the term, Mr. West. For sneaking outside the castle without permission.”
Quinn didn't turn back and simply replied with: ”I understand, sir.” And then walked out of the office, leaving behind Albus Dumbledore alone, with the letter from George West.
Outside the office, Quinn took a deep breath with a big smile and thought.
'That went rather well.'
The first meeting between Albus Dumbledore and Quinn West had come to an end.
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Quinn West - MC - Mind games! Let's play mind games!
Albus Dumbledore - Headmaster, sir. - ”... Quinn West, hmm...”
George West - Exit ticket - Back off! I don't want my grandson alone in a room with an old man.
Garly - Hogwarts house-elf - ”... She was pretty.”
Polly - West house-elf - Well dressed and pretty house-elf
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