First Day on the Job

The decision to resign from the Aurors was a tough one. Marcus loved the job, but became increasingly curious about the more secluded aspects of the wizarding world. The Unspeakables of the Department of Mysteries had an opening and he took it. He hasn't met anyone new in a while, so maybe this new job might prove to be beneficial socially as well. He boards the elevator and takes it to Level Nine. It is the second-lowest level in the Ministry and bears a striking difference to the levels above. He steps out of the elevator and begins to walk down the hallway.

The black-tiled walls are bare with no windows and no doors, apart from a plain one at the end of the corridor that leads to the Department proper. He opens it and steps into the Entrance Chamber. It is a circular room with a black marble floor that looks almost like standing water. Candles emit a cool blue light that reveal twelve handleless doors. He draws his wand and says an incantation that is reveals which door to enter, as the room is designed to disorient any unauthorized persons attempting to enter the Department.

Marcus steps through the black door that opens for him. Everything seems much less menacing now. He has not seen anyone else yet, and is slightly confused as to why.

Jack typically was not one of the Unspeakables lost in the maze of rooms and doors. Her specialty was crime and national security, which meant much more field work than research. The Unspeakables were a strange group. Part scientists, part philosophers, part super-spies. Jack liked to think that the one thing they weren't were politicians, and it was for this reason that they were the entire backbone of the Ministry. While everyone else got tangled in their own political messes, the Unspeakables crawled above it all and continued trudging forward.

But with the recent train fiasco, Jack needed to do some research. She was starting with the portkey theory, as it would be easier to rule out than the portal theory, which was far more convulted. So far, she had managed to turn a car into a portkey. With no access to a train, however, she needed to consider a way to replicate the train cars full of students.

Another experiment failed, Jack checked her watch. It was about time she headed to her office. She was waiting on Fred to get her some information on portals and hopefully on the ferry and she figured a break might do her some good.

She made her way through the maze of rooms with the familiarity of an old pro, though her mind was working diligently - even the best of them got lost sometimes.

Just as she was nearing the central chamber, she spotted a figure. An alarm bell went off in her head as a reminder. Right. New recruit.

"Dakota!" she said. Unlike most people, the usage of a surname displayed familiarity for Jack more so than the proper name. She remembered him mostly from his stint of Head of the Department of Magical Law Enforcement but had interacted enough. "Heading in already? Have you even checked out your office?"

She doubted it. Half the people in the Ministry didn't know where the offices were. She clapped a hand on his shoulder. "Come on, follow me."

She entered the spinning chamber and stepped through the door that led them what seemed to be out of the department. About halfway down the corridor, she did an about face and faced a wall, before tapping her fingers rhythmically against the wall. A door appeared and she pushed her way through.

It looked like a normal enough office. Their tired looking secretary raised her head and smiled a little sadly. Jack's office was off to the right immediately, Fred's to the left. Michael's was down the hall, Cooper and Potter's down the other hallway. There was an open office off of this main room and two more down the hallway. Marcus would have his pick.

She turned. "Nothing that secret here. Each of our rooms are warded by all of us, ward over ward just in case anyone is dumb enough not to return any sensitive files or anything of that sort. Kendra," she said, indicating the secretary "mostly sorts memos and makes sure we have the paper. She's the best though."

Kendra sighed.

"Want to pick out an office or wanna debrief in my office?"

#IlvermornyPlot

As Marcus stands around in his confusion, he hears someone call his surname. He turns around to see Jack Dyllan. He didn't even know that she was an unspeakable.

"Hello Jack," he says to her, "I'm actually quite lost and have no idea where my office is."

He does as he is instructed and follows her. He re-enters the chamber that he just came out of and follows Jack into a door that looks as if they're heading back to the elevator. Just as he's about to ask where they're going, she turns around. He does the same, only to be greeted by a wall. He's pretty confused at this point.

Nonetheless, Jack does something to make the door appear and that's good enough for him. He'll learn his way around at some point. They enter into a room filled with offices, with a secretary sitting in the main area. He notices the sullen expression that she has as Jack introduces them. He gives her a nod and a sympathetic look.

He thinks about picking out an office first just to get settled but decides against it as he wants to make a good first impression. "I can always do that later, let's head to your office," he says confidently.

Jack nodded at his decision and turned on her heel, heading straight into her office, calling over her shoulder, "Tell Fred to shove it when you see him, Kendra." She glanced at Marcus. "That's code for I want to see him."

She came into her office, which was about as nontraditional as her. Enchanted windows looked out on a conjured rainy day - rain helped her think. The little model Hungarian Horntail had fallen asleep on her bookshelf, which was crammed full of torn up books on various subjects that she did not have as good a grasp of as she did others. Her desk was nothing grand and currently covered in paperwork. And tucked in the corner was something Marcus might actually recognize.

Sweeping towards the mini-fridge she grinned. "Something to drink?" Next to it was a makeshift, no-frills bar she had constructed for herself, and she went about pouring herself a neat whiskey with an ice cube. She deserved a drink. Besides, it was like the rain - made her think.

She dragged her chair out from the desk and placed it next to it so it was less of a weird power thing. She flopped into her chair and regarded him for a second. "So what brought you here? People don't take a job here on a whim."

Marcus chuckles at Jack's remark and follows her into her office. It wasn't as plain as the ones he's used to seeing in the Ministry. It had a very personal touch to it. The first thing he noticed was the model Hungarian Horntail. After looking around for a bit, he spotted Jack's mini-fridge.

"Why not?" he said with a smile. He accepted the glass and took a few sips. He was glad that he ran into Jack, as she was familiar and very easygoing. She made a point to make him feel more comfortable with her chair placement. And then came the questions.

Marcus ran his hand through his hair, pondering what to say. He can't exactly reveal his interest in studying dark magic, regardless of his good intentions. It's not his only goal, but definitely motivated him into taking the position. "I guess I have a weird thing for the unknown. I've always been interested in the Department of Mysteries; once there was an opening, I felt compelled to take the job," he responds, hoping it's a sufficient answer. "I loved being an Auror and perhaps I'll eventually return to it, but for now I'm an Unspeakable, I suppose."

Marcus accepted the drink she had poured for herself and she raised an eyebrow, mildly impressed if he was willing to take such a strong drink first day on the job. She slid it over and poured another one for herself, settling comfortably into the chair and taking a solid drink from the glass, avoiding the ice cube as she enjoyed the bite of the whiskey on her tongue, sliding smoothly down her throat. This was the only thing that helped relieve some of the tension in her back.

She tilted her head at his explanation, which she considered to be threadbare at best. Perhaps he felt he couldn’t trust her. She appreciated the discretion but found it surprising considering her record – or perhaps it was her record that made her a more suspicious person. She took another drink, and the lowered it to her chest, tilting her head to examine the ceiling in thought. Man, she needed the chance to put up her feet. This was nice.

“So,” she said, thinking. “Opportunity turned your hand.” She nodded, before her eyes found his, an eyebrow raising. “Figured out your specialties? Picked a starting project? Most of us are scrambling to find some sort of lead with this whole Hogwarts train…” she waved a hand, trying to grab the most fitting word, before settling on “fiasco. An inevitable fiasco, sure, but there. Fiasco nonetheless.”

Marcus is relieved. Jack didn't push further and he was grateful for it. She did seem a bit skeptical, but if she had any further questions, she didn't verbalize them. He takes another sip of whiskey. This is definitely helping him relax.

"I haven't really chosen a specialty, yet," he responds truthfully, "Perhaps I'll go into thought or unusual types of magic." And he leaves it at that. She mentions something about the Hogwarts Express that particularly catches his interest. "Hogwarts train fiasco? What's going on?" he asks," You'll have to excuse me, I haven't been keeping up with the news lately." Marcus has tried to distance himself from Hogwarts as much as possible, as he doesn't have the fond memories of the school.

Jack wasn't pleased to discover he didn't know about the train. It was hard to not discover that news, especially as a Ministry employee, with so much hate and suspicion pointed their way. Perhaps there had been more overlap between the two jobs, but she doubted his old boss Claire Bishop would have been silent on the issue.

More worrisome, though. The job of the Unspeakable was to continually whet the desire to know more. They all chose the work they chose because of an unquenchable fire in their bellies to make discoveries and add another piece to the grand puzzle of human existence.  

Her lips were pursed a little more thinly than usual, and there was an odd flicker in her eyes, but other than that, her disappointment was well hidden. "The Hogwarts Express disappeared," she said bluntly. "The staff car made it but all of the students are missing. We're investigating into portals, portkeys, massive summoning and banishing spells, anything that might explain what happened while the executives try to answer who and your old department tries to figure out where."

She took a deeper drink of her whiskey, before letting it out with a sigh. Her eyes closed and revealed the dark circles that lay underneath, almost as a testament to the hours she had put in. She bit back a yawn and her eyes flicked open. "We don't know if those kids are okay. My gut tells me it can't be a mass killing, otherwise we would have something. What's the point of killing that many people and covering it up, especially when it's kids? But that almost makes the timeline even shorter - because when will it progress farther than a mass kidnapping?"