Renegade

A continuation of Timebomb.

The world had forgotten of Paris Ravindra Radborn. Or, so it had seemed as he’d waited in that small, poorly-lit room for an auror to return to question him. For hours, Paris had remained as he was; sitting casually in the chair that he had been provided, with his wrists bound together by a single cuff. A cuff that he had picked and discarded of before long, as it had begun to irritate the flesh of his wrists. But the excited expression that he’d worn when he had first been locked in that room had faded into one of exhaustion and boredom by the time the sun had begun to rise.

Originally, Paris had planned on occupying himself with the examination of the lock that had been placed on the door. His lock picks had not yet been confiscated from him, after all. It would not have taken him much longer than ten minutes to break his way free from the interrogation room. But he had lost consciousness before he’d had the chance; an unfortunate result of remaining awake for a twenty-four hour period, as well as the impossible amount of running that he'd done the previous evening.

Paris stirred in his sleep, shifting from the hunched position of his shoulders to one that was a bit more comfortable. His every joint squeaked and hissed like rusted metal as he adjusted to the aching that had settled in his spine from remaining in the unnatural position for so long. Upon his crossed forearms he’d rested his head.

He giggled strangely, and rubbed at his eyes - but he did not awake from his slumber.

This was not Brian's first day on the job. Neither was it his first encounter with a thief. In fact, after he'd read the case file, he had spent a bit of time with a friend of his who was, himself, a very skilled authority on how to get in and out of places one was not supposed to be able to get in and out of. And Brian had done this deliberately before going to see Radborn. He did want to not be taken by surprise, and so he had let Radborn sit.

He was also hoping that Radborn would be getting fatigued before Brian actually showed up. Brian didn't dress like any auror that the ministry usually saw. He preferred jeans, well worn tan leather boots--the usual resting place for his wand. He wore a denim shirt, and a tan suede bomber style jacket over the denim. He didnt like pretenses or airs, so he brought in two cups of coffee with him. He brought extra strong, black French Roast--a new addiction he had somehow seemed to have inherited from his new bride. The other cup was regular strength Arabica coffee. Not everyone liked French Roast, and he respected that. He entered the interrogation room and put the paper cup of hot fresh coffee in front of Radborn.

"Wakey, wakey, my friend. I thought you might need that," Brian said. "So--Mr. Radborn, let's cut the crap and just get to it, shall we? It looks like you had a good start on getting what you were after. I know muggle magicians and burglars have their own codes about not revealing their secrets. But do tell me. Where did it all go south for you? You do seem to carry a reputation for not being snagged quite so easily. And somehow I don't envision that you wanted to be in my company today. So were did it all go wrong?" He noticed Radborn had slipped the cuff. That bothered him very little. He reached over and took the open cuff from him and pocketted the cuff, saying nothing. Then he spun the utilitarian chair around backwards and sat down, resting one arm on the back of the chair, while taking a leisurely drink of his French Roast from the large paper cup in his other hand.