A Birth day

Ruby heard tapping on glass and glanced atr the kitchen window " well seems we have an owl" she said opening it to let it fly in, it was now she saw Fudge " hey Fudge" she said picking him up off pip and placing him down with a treat. " Simone do you know what hes saying I don't speak bowtruckle" she said chukaling as she saw him become frustrated that she could not understand him.

Jack finished in the barn and walked back to the main house to wash up. Walking in he saw Sam in less pain with Robert kneeling close to him " Okay animals fed" he said walking over " I'll carry him down to the medical room." he moved and picked him up again then headed downthe stairs.

"Certainly," Simone said. She wiped her hands off from cutting some basil for one of the pizzas, and she took a small basil leaf and took it to Fudge. "Here. Have a treat," she told him. "What brings you?" The little bowtruckle chattered to her, chomping on the basil leaf while he talked. "Oh. Oh, dear. I see," she said nodding.

"Angus, you might want to go over to the main house," she looked at him. "Fudge says Kate sent him. he said the short boy fell and he's red and leaking. He says Robert is helping."

"Ah. Well," Angus said, "Victor is a couple inches taller than Sam, so I take it that we're talking about Sam. If he's red and leaking, it sounds like he has some sort of bleeding wound, but since Robert is already on it, I think we shouldn't panic."

"Agreed," Edward said. "This is the peril of having a pair of rough-and-tumble boys. They collect battle scars."

"I'll go, but we'll have to put the pizzas on hold."

"Even Edward can put toppings on pizzas, I think," Simone said, not wanting to ask Ruby to interrupt her time with the baby. If Ruby wanted to help, that was fine, but if she wanted to focus on the baby, the pizzas would still get assembled. "We'll manage. You go ahead and see to the boys.

"They will not be pretty pizzas," Edward scowled, as Angus left for the main house. Simone took a break from chopping toppings and she spread out dough on the counter top for six pizzas.

"Can you manage the sauce and start with the meats and veggies while I finish chopping?" she asked him.

"I'll give it my best shot," he told her.

Downstairs, Robert set in to clean Sam's sizeable scrapes and then to start healing spells on them. Angus arrived and went downstairs, finding Victor sitting in the sickbay room off to the side out of Robert's way.

"Good gracious, Sam," Angus frowned. "You're a mess. What did you do?"

"I got a charley horse, and I fell," Sam sighed, as Robert cast a pain relief spell to relieve the pain of the fall and the scrapes. He could see Sam felt better instantly

"Better training," Robert looked Sam eye to eye. "If you're both going to run with the big boys, you have to prepare."

"Huh?" Sam asked.

"That's what I thought. Dad, either teach them proper running techniques or turn them over to Brian or me or Jack. They need to learn the stretches. They need to learn to hydrate before, during and after. They need to learn to pace themselves as beginning runners. If they're going to do this, they need to start at square one."

"Absolutely," Angus said.

"As it is, depending on how far they went, they may be really all stoved up tomorrow. If that happens, get Andrew to work with them to loosen up those muscles for them. Sam, no running tomorrow. You're not going to feel like it. I'll stop the bleeding and set healing spells in place. All these scrapes should stop bleeding, and they should be scabbed over by bedtime. It might take a day or two for you to get rid of the scabs, but you're going to bruise too. That's going to take longer. Look at it this way, you'll get all kinds of sympathy from the girls when you go back to school."

Rby sat and listened to Angus and simone talking when Simone told them what Fudge was talking about she sighed and then chuckled " yep typical boys, all rough and tumble" she said looking down at Caprice " glad we have a girl too" she loked to Simone " oh I can help too" she said moving to help cut some of the toppings for the pizza bases as Edward and Angus left to check on Sam.

Jack stood and listened to Robert with Sam then stepped to one side as Edrwad and Angus entered . Hearing them talking he chuckled " have to say he did do well , until the charly horse" he said " proper preperation and trainning both have ecelet chances." he said leaning against the door frame.

"So," Sam said, looking at Robert, wanting to ask a question but not wanting to seem impertinent.

"So," Robert repeated and looked back at him. "What? What's on your mind?"

"So," Sam said slowly, "is this Brian's place or yours?"

"Brian's," Robert replied.

"So, they say you're in charge. Why, if it's Brian's place?"

"A fair question," Robert said, not bothered by it in the least. "Older wizards, in general, are a lot more powerful than younger ones. In short, everyone who works here works for the same organization, and Kate and I own the organization. So, in short, everyone works for me. Make sense?"

"Sorta," he said. "But what does the organization do?"

"What do you think we do?"

"Chase bad guys," he said.

"Well, basically, that's right," he said. "It's a bit more complicated than that, but essentially, that's correct."

"Why don't the aurors do that?"

"I've been asking that for years," Robert laughed. "We do what the aurors just have never done."

"What if I wanted to do that?"

"Be an auror?"

"No," Sam frowned, looking at Robert like he was dense. Robert laughed. He had actually deliberately baited Sam just a wee bit to see how Sam responded. Robert liked Sam's up-front manner. If Sam had a question, he was just gonna be up front with it, and Robert liked that sort of candidness. "I wanna fight."

"If you want to fight for me, you'll have to learn how, and that means you have to finish school first," Robert told him. "After you graduate, you come see me. We'll talk again."

"Me too?" Victor asked.

"If that's what you want," Robert said. "There are a lot of other careers, you know. Give it careful thought before you decide."

"Don't need to," Sam said.

"Me neither," Victor replied. "People like Suzanne don't deserve oxygen." Robert heard Victor's anger in his remark. He was a lot less up front than his brother. Robert made up his mind to spend a little more time with each boy to get to know them individually before he let them become fighters. He wasn't opposed to hiring them when the time came, but there were a lot of jobs in the organization besides fighting. He would start them in an entry level position and then get to know them. Robert bandaged Sam's cheek and forehead, his forearm and elbow, and his shin from his knee almost to his ankle. Then he got a pain potion out of the cabinet and handed it to Angus.

"Standard pain potion. You know how it goes. He should be good until towards bedtime. Then he might need some potion to be able to sleep," he told Angus. "Quiet activities tonight, Sam. Understood?"

"Yeah," Sam said.

"Okay, Dad. Take them home," Robert said.

"Thank you, Robert," Angus said.

"Any time. You know that," Robert smiled. Angus apparated the boys home, landing on the front porch.

Jack heard Sam and Victor and sighed, knowing the enthusiasm of youth was behind his answer. When Sam said Suzanne didn't deserve oxygen he sighed and shook his head. Once Angus left with the boys he walked over to Robert there good but they do need training, we don't go after people or kill them and they need to see that" he said to Robert. "Im not saying they should go on a mission but maybe show them the paris base to show them we save people, and make the hard desishions on weather bad guys die or live" he finished talking and headed up to the kitchen.

Ruby saw Angus return with the boys and washed her hands befoe moving to the door to open it " oh my god Sam" she said with a gasp "you look like you picked a fight with a bowtruckle" she moved so they could enter and put the kettle on for some tea so Sam could take his pain potion.

"They're like a lot of our green recruits," Robert smiled. "And, they have a lot of anger at their mother for a lot of things, not just last night. I intend to take them to Paris, but, I really don't want a leak about who we are and what we do to spread all over Hogwarts. I probably won't take them to Paris until they graduate.

"We can certainly keep them busy til them with getting them in shape. We have to start way back at the very beginning with learning the right way to run and the right way to exercise. They'll have to really up their game on spellcasting, apparating, porting. they have a lot of learning to do. When they're home for weekends, if they want to 'hang with the big boys,' make sure you keep an eye on them, Jack. Make sure they do the right steps--stretching before running, hydrating, you know the drill. Don't let them take short cuts. That's how they'll get hurt.

"Then, when they graduate, I agree, we'll take them to Paris. There is a lot of work there that they can do without going out in the field," Robert said. "And, maybe, if they're ready, we'll send them to Colorado to do a couple weeks of bootcamp. If they haven't changed their minds, then, maybe we'll see if they can manage a low risk mission with the rest of the team.

"He faceplanted on the trail," Victor said to Ruby. "Robert said he looks like he slid into the faceplant on the asphalt."

"Charley horse," Sam explained as Angus helped Sam to the sofa.

"Robert's cast a pain spell for him. He won't need potion til around bedtime," Angus told her. "It's just bruises and scrapes."

"I'm hungry," Sam said. "When are we eating?"

"Do you want your pizza now, or would you like us to cook it first?" Edward asked him. Sam rolled his eyes at Edward.

Jack listened to Robert and nodded " agreed and I'll look after them, once Sam's bruising has gone down I'll show them the right way to start a run." he said with a smirk and a soft chuckle. "and I agree as well, they need to learn the basics first so they don't get into a situation they can't get out of." he added .

Ruby chuckled but looked worried as they told her what had happened " okay, as long as Roberts loked at you im good with everything" she said then chuckled as Angus asked if Sam wanted his pizza cooked before eating it. " oh that reminds me the toppings are done, simone and I did some whaile you were out" she told Angus " Sam you stay put once its cooked I'll send it over" she stood up and walked back to the kitchen

"You lot have the pizzas in hand?" Angus asked.

"I think so, Dear," Simone smiled, and she noticed Finn waiting at the door to go out. "Could you let Finn out?"

"I'll do it," Victor said, letting Finn out to do his business as Caprice started to wail and cry. "What's her problem?" he asked.

"I'll get it," Angus said. He went over to the baby and decided she needed changed.

"Is that all she does? Eat and poop?" Victor asked.

"Pretty much," Angus laughed. "At least for a little. It'll get better as she gets a little older. Right now, for her, eating and pooping are big jobs."

"Can I hold her?" Sam asked.

"You want to?" Angus asked.

"Heck, yeah. It's not like I can take her back to school with me. We came here to spend some time with her, so I wanna make sure I get some time in," he told Angus as Angus finished changing her. Angus took her over to Sam and helped Sam position his good arm to hold her and then put her in Sam's arm. "How do you know what she wants when she gets all snarky?"

"Well, at this point, her interests are pretty limited," Angus said. "So, sometimes, its trial and error. If one thing doesn't fix it, we try the next thing." As Sam was holding her, she sneezed, and Sam screwed up his nose, disgusted.

"Ew. Baby snot. She needs a garden hose," Sam said. Edward and Angus burst into laughter. Angus handed Sam a tissue.

"It's not that bad. A tissue will be fine," Angus said, amused.

Ruby smiled seeing Sam with Caprice then chuckled as she sneezed on him as she began making up several pizzas to start cooking for their supper. " Angus is right, if she's not hungry change her diaper if not that could just be trapped wind," she said as she sprinkled cheese on one of the pizzas and then slipped it into the oven " won't be long before she shouting the place down or walking and chasing you tow around and you'll be asking us to stop her," she said and chuckled spreading out some pepperoni.

Jack moved from the medical room and headed back upstairs "hum...they have some hard training ahead." he said softly as he stepped into the living room and smiled seeing Jess sitting with her book " but we all went threw some form of it ourselves" he admitted.

It wasn't more than a moment or two before the baby fell asleep in Sam's arms, and Angus got out some sodas and some bottles of beer to go with the pizzas.

"She's asleep," Sam said, feeling triumphant that she seemed happy at the moment.

"Can we have beers with our pizza?" Victor asked.

"Have you had beer before?" Angus asked.

"Are you kidding? They never bought soda because it took up room in the fridge that could be used for beer," Sam said. "Mom put beer in our sippy cups--literally."

"He's not lying," Victor said. "You don't want to know what Dad put in there." He distinctly remembered his father putting in some of his whiskey cocktails in their cups, especially when he wanted the boys to go to sleep early to be out of his way.

"Well, since you're home and you're not going out, I don't have any objection, but no more than one apiece," Angus said. "You want something after that, you go to soda. Until you're eighteen, you don't ever get into the alcohol without permission. You ask first."

"Yeah, okay. Whatever. Got any Scotch ale?" Victor asked, letting Finn back in and putting some kibbles in his bowl for him.

"I've got some in my fridge," Edward said. "Any objections, Dad?"

"None at all," Angus said. "I've got some pale ales and some stout. Ru, Simone? You want beer or soda with your pizza?"

Robert came back upstairs and saw Kate setting up the dining room for supper as Nicky finished the last details on his dishes and was setting out platters of his barbeque chicken sandwiches, the macaroni and cheese, the green beans, the fruit salad and the strawberry shortcake.

"Robert, would you call everyone to the dining room?" Kate asked. "I think it's ready. i hope people are hungry because I've had a taste of this barbeque shredded chicken, and its fantastic."

Robert called everyone who was in the main house to come to the dining room for supper