She was on her way to the higher-ups, the closest thing she had to a boss here in this country. Claire had been leading her double life rather normally for awhile now. She had thought being a spy for the American government would require more high speed chases, more bribery, more smooth talking, and much more spandex. So far, it had been lots of water-cooler talk and paperwork. She had almost gotten bored - she felt as though she had been transferred rather than promoted. Lee had assured her it was not going to be easy and he had been right - the staff meetings were beginning to eat away at her humanity.
Still, she could not complain. She had been safe, all this time. Sure, there had not been any major discoveries. Just a whole lot of coping with the new laws they were thinking up here, a lot of passing on information that people seemed to gift her with, and shit tons of banter with Mr Head Unspeakable Fred Weasley the Second. She had to admit, her cover-up task of tracking down important magical artifacts was actually entertaining enough to make her not want to blow her brains out... most days.
Today, she was in a rare good mood. She had just left the Department of Mysteries, and even though her correspondent had not been in, his secretary had, and the poor woman had given Claire some wonderful, if petty blackmail to use on Fred the next time she saw him. Nothing major, just something to wind him up, grind his gears a little. His secretary had also handed her a very important file, and she needed to report upstairs to ensure she really did have permission to chase after the men listed - the Department of Fluffies had staked a claim on them, but Claire thought her Squad might have better luck. It was an exiting idea, this new lead, something out of the order, something that would fling her into the field.
It had been a promising day.
She stopped off on her floor to quickly drop off some of her files, grabbing a memo that was waiting on her desk, before walking briskly down the hall and punching the button for the lift. It rattled and opened, letting her enter. There was only another man in the lift, so she gave him a quick glance before hitting the button for the Ministerial floor. A moment of silence and Claire decided to utilize the free time to open up the memo and quickly look it over.
"Lift problems?" she murmured, quoting the memo. Suddenly, the lift made a loud creaking noise and stopped completely. She looked up and stepped forward, tapping her wand against the control panel. A disembodied voice said, "Our apologies, but the lift is currently out of service. Repairs are being made, and apologies for your absence are being made. Repair time estimated at fourteen minutes, forty-seven seconds. Subject to change. Thank you for your patience."
"Oh, hell," Claire said.