LONDON CALLING

Jack picked up on Edwards banter and chuckled " hey, less of the furball and I had hair once, just now not on my head." He chuckled " well I'd love to see you bald, I might give you tips on keeping it shiny for the week " he teased rubbing his own head.

He watched Angus transpigure his clothing and nodded to Edward he would make him run himself ragged. " well come on, move move move" Jack clapped his hands like a marine drill sargent and then headed towards the assault course. He knew if it did turn out to be pheobe just how Angus would feel having been betrayed by his own brother, his own blood that he once looked up to and admired.

Edward was glad to see Jack had helped to motivate Angus into some sort of action. Anything was better than seeing Angus sit and try to repress it all.

"Angus doesn't take that sort of heavy loss well," Edward said. "He was close to Caprice--my wife--and when she died, he all but folded up completely. He has his parents, of course, but he was always closer to Caprice and me. I told Jack, and you and Michael might as well know too, that Angus had proposed to Phoebe, and he had given her an impressively large diamond ring. She had accepted, and they were going to start making wedding plans. They'd even talked about starting a family."

"Which, of course, is impossible for a male shapeshifter," Michael said, angry now for the huge deception that Gelding had apparently been willing to orchestrate to get someone on the inside of the organization.

"Not if you're in the business Gelding is in," Robert said. "Would have been simple for Gelding to arrange for a shapeshifter to produce an heir...."

"That foul sonofa..." Michael began, not having thought of that before.

"I know," Robert cut him off. "I know. We're still jumping to conclusions until I test Phoebe's hair against our victim's."

"Then go do it already," Michael said impatiently. Robert took the brush and the envelope and went downstairs to test them.

It didn't take him more than about an hour to test. Muggles took a lot longer for any sort of hair testing, but magic was just far more sophisticated. He had taken some of the photos of the tattoo that Angus had and had compared it to what he could of the tattoo on the victim. He had done every test he could think of to either rule in or rule out that "Burrito Boy" was or was not Phoebe.

He came upstairs, where Edward and Michael were waiting.

"And?" Edward asked.

"I am as sure as anyone is ever going to be," Robert said. "The results are about 86% positive. The male body we have is the same person that Angus knew as Phoebe."

Jack colapsed at the end of the course " okay you win" he said to Angus" shesh, you got me to rights" He breathed deeply as he spoke " might as well admit defeat, wonder what color my hair will be?" he said running his hand over the shinny baldness he had at the moment then chuckled " wonder if Jess will like me having hair?" He looked at Angus and sighed " hey race you back to the house." he said and took off back.

Walking in he caught the last part and shook his head " well shit." he swore " um I mean.. damn." he glanced around hoping Abby didn't hear him or Angus for that matter. " 86%, huh that dosn't leave much room for error and eew on the repo stuff." he added.

"Brown," Angus said. "If your hair matches your eyebrows. Your eyebrows are brown. Don't grow your hair too soon. My grandfather is famous for taking a wager and then going double or nothing with them, though I don't know how he'd double down on this one. I don't know that I have any other places I'd want to add hair to, in all honesty. You didn't let me win, did you? If so, just count on my grandfather to figure it out somehow and to send us right back out. Just sayin'. He wants a fair fight for darned near everything."

Angus had stopped before he got all the way back to the farmhouse. He had had to push himself hard to try to defeat Jack because of Jack's size advantage and his werewolf advantages. Now it had given him a stitch in his side, and he had needed to give up racing Jack back to the house. He had stopped and taken some breaths to try to ease the pain from the stitch in his side and then had made his way back towards the farmhouse.

"It makes me angry," Robert said, "to know that this shapeshifter had no scruples whatsoever and was willing to lead Angus right down the proverbial garden path and let him think he had the love of a lifetime and was finally going to be able to settle down and have a family of his own."

"Well, that, and he has always been committed to who he is as a person. To be deceived even about the gender of who he was involved with..." Michael started.

"Yes, but some shapeshifters don't think of themselves as actually having a firm gender. Often, they only think of their gender as being relevant to who or what they're shifted into at the moment," Robert said.

"That makes no sense. Tonks was always firm that she was female," Michael said.

"She was always content with who she was. She had no need to try to be anything else other than for a lark of some sort," Robert said. "Some shapeshifters are less content with themselves or their world, and they are more fluid in nature than she was. Either way, I find it hard to see what Angus was put through and not be outraged at the farce of it. I will make sure that Gelding is brought to bear for it someday. Be assured of that."

"Well, thank goodness for runner's issues," Edward said as he kept an eye on Angus now from the kitchen window. "He's stopped for a stitch in his side. That gives us a moment."

Jack looked back out the door and chuckled " wow I thought I lost" he said and nodded " yeah, I can understand being gender fluid but leading the guy on , nope thats sick." he said shaking his head " he will find that one woman one day" he said " if I can with my mug , im sure hed be a catch to any woman." he chuckled " come on I didn't wear you out that quick!!" he shouted to Angus " you want to see me with hair , right?" he added making a flicking gesture with his hands as if he had inaginary hair.

Kaden ported in with several filled potion bottles and paperwork for Robert. " wow, what I miss?" he asked setting the bottles down on a table " um well, Mr Lupin I need you to sign off on these potions for the lab." he said holding out the papers for him to sign. Glancing over he frowned then spoke again " huh, shape shifter?" he asked some what puzzled. " I've seen that tattoo before." he said now tapping his chin deep in thought " oh that was it an artist in diagon alley was doing them I thought it was gordy."

Angus was feeling better, breathing easier, and he made his way back to the house. He got there just as Kaden arrived with paperwork for Robert. When Kaden said he had forms for Robert to sign, Robert wasn't surprised. There was never any shortage of paperwork where St. Mungos was cocerned.

"Thank you, Kaden," Robert said, taking the paperwork. He checked the bottles and found them to be of good quality, so he signed the forms required to accept them. "We were alerted of a body of a fire victim in Paris," Robert told Kaden. "And, since I didn't have a place to work there, I brought the victim here to do the autopsy in my lab. It was a shapeshifter. Of that I am certain. I do not think it is the same shapeshifter that Abbey saw a couple nights ago. That shapeshifter was a woman. This one was a man who wanted us to think he was a woman. What I am sure of now is that we had two different shapeshifters were were dealing with, and now we have one less."

"Where were you in Diagon Alley, Kaden," Michael asked, "when you saw that artist? Were they working in a studio of some sort there? I would definitely be interested in making a visit to that artist if we could find them again. It might help us trace who this man really was and perhaps how he became associated with Tom Gelding."

Kaden looked at Michael and thought where he'd been " oh um..i know I'd just come out of florich and blotts then I turned to head to Sparks oh thats it little place down an alley not far from Sparks." he told them " taky place too smelled, wrong like all the air was gone." at the memory he pulled a face. " I was thinking of getting one for Jessier but then rrealized we don't need to do that." he smiled a little. He watched Robert check the bottles and sign the papers.

Jack watched Kaden and Micahel and stood deep in thought " I rember that place as a small second hand shop, sold trinkets and old clothing?" he said Kaden looked up at him and nodded his head " I know where that is."

"Thats right it use to but was bought out, don't know by whom" he said his voice growing softer. " im ushaly good at keeping up to date on these sort of things. " Kaden said as he gathered the all ready signed forms and waited for the rest. " I'll organise these in the files and your ledger on your desk." he told Robert.

"Then we need to check this place out," Michael said. "I know the neighborhood but I haven't actually been in that particular shop, I don't think. At least not when it's had a tattoo department in it."

"Jesse and Jack, why don't you two check it out this afternoon and report back about what you find?" Robert suggested. "Kaden, I'd suggest you go along, but it could be very dangerous, and you are of much more value to me with the potions lab project. You're doing a splendid job so far with it, and I really don't want to lose you from that for any reason, so I'd rather not split your time. Well done on these potions and on keeping all the paperwork straight, Jess. I know it's a mountain of paperwork but you're doing a splendid job. Keep up the good work.

"Oh, and Jesse, I've got the body packaged up again, so perhaps you and Kaden could take him and turn him in at the morgue at St. Mungos. I have all the proper forms filled out. They're in a manila file folder that I've attached with a sticking spell to the tarp that the remains are sealed in. Michael had a good suggestion of shrinking the remains to make transport easier, and now that the autopsy is done, you could do that without contaminating anything. Then perhaps you and Kaden could take a belated tea break after you drop off Burrito Boy."

"Jack is responsible for him being nicknamed Burrito Boy," Michael said to Jesse and Kaden. "You can blame that firmly on him. Meanwhile, Angus, I want Phoebe's address. I realize she had some things at Khaat's, in your room. I want her address, though."

"Sure. Whatever," Angus said, writing it down.

"I'm going to go do a little breaking and entering," Michael said. "You coming, Furball?" Michael said, deliberately teasing Jack just a little.

Kaden nodded at Roberts words he listened to him place his orders with the others and raised his hand slightly " I could do that since Im going that way anyway, pluse it won't look suspishious if a nurse brings in a body." he added " And it would fre Jessie and Jack to loom into the building for you." he added hoping he wasn't over stepping his mark again.

"Jack looked at Kaden and nodded "makes sense" he said to Michael. Kaden chuckled at the use of Buritto boy and checked the body was wrapped well. Shrinking him down he placed him into a bag and then into his pocket.

"Buritto boy will be delivered" Kaden said and moved to gather the last of the forms. " I'll pop back later for that tea, and sir its a pleasure to work for you." he said looking at Jessie who smiled and nodded before he ported out.

Jack turned to Michael and grinned "Ready as ever, and your not giving up on that are you?" he asked teasingly knowing now would be a thing between them.

"Well, we have no need to hide the fact that we found a body now," Robert said. "The report documents it all. I will return to Paris and file the necessary reports there so they can officially release the remains, but there won't be trouble on their end either." He listened to Kaden promise to deliver the remains and then mentioned he liked working for Robert. "Thank you," Robert said. "I'm glad to have you onboard."

"Sure. I'll give up on that," Michael told Jack with a mischievous grin. "Eventually. Okay. Let's go." He took the piece of paper with the address and showed it to Jack. Then he ported them into London to a rather large building. It looked like it had been of Edwardian construction but had actually been kept in reasonably good repair.

"Looks like it's maybe middle class," Michael told Jack. "This was entirely premeditated. They had this planned if they picked this neighborhood and this building. Let's go in. We're going up one floor, to apartment 203."

Michael made quick work of picking the lock when they got upstairs, and they went in. Michael stood there, observing it all.

"They wanted Angus to believe every little detail. Look at this. This was designed especially to look like 'she' had been living here quite awhile. This was all staged for his benefit, and for ours, if we ever came here with him for any reason. This just pisses me off. They wanted him to believe every little bit of it."