A Birth day

Ru y didn't fly far from the two of them staying with in ear shot she smiled seeing Angus nod knowing she would not hear him if he shouted . Turning the hypogriff back to fly beside Evan she smiled and gave him a thumbs up to say good job.

Aria chuckled and then smiled as he said his kids would be coming to the house " oh that will be fun all those kids around" she said then looked to Edwrad as he spoke of sports and games the kids could play " hum, good idea" she said then gasped seing Caprice queese out the fruit all over her self . Standing she grabbed a damp cloth and cleaned some off the seat Marcus had ben sat in while he cleaned up Caprice then walked the floor until she was asleep. She heard them talking and then saw Marcus hold out his hand to her. placing down the cloth she walked over to him " oh, this should be fun" she said smiling a she lt him port her to where ever it was he was taking her but she trusted him.

Marcus ported her to the sidewalk outside a large, brick detached house that had been painted gray. It had three floors, plus an attic. There was a small front yard, a small side yard, leading around the house to a bigger back yard, and it was all fenced off with a stone fence and a wrought iron gate. The door was a natural wood color that had a rich patina from years of varnishing and polishing, and it featured, of all things, an old brass porthole from a ship and an equally unique door knocker that was done in bright brass and looked like a compass rose.

"Welcome to Paris," Marcus told her. "i don't know if I'm actually allowed to bring you here yet, but I'm doing it anyway. So far as you know, though, until you get clearance to know, this does not exist, got it? This is probably one of Robert's biggest secrets. Let's go in." He opened the gate for her and walked up to the front door. He touched the enchanted knocker, and it promptly asked him for the password. "Acey Deucey Club."

"Come Aboard, Officer Belby," the knocker replied, unlatching the door for him. "Captain Quinn is on the bridge today."

"Thank you," Marcus automatically replied, opening the door. The foyer was busy with some four and five year old lads who were there with some plastic magical animals, and they were having some sort of battle with them on the tile floor. They glanced up briefly at Marcus and Aria and went back to playing.

"The place has had some magical adjustments over the years, so the inside does not exactly match the outside anymore. The living room is on your right. It's enchanted to be quite large now so that staff meetings, or birthday parties or Christmas morning can be held in here comfortably." He glanced in the living room and saw about six girls who looked about seven or eight, and they had paper dolls they were playing with on the floor.

"The hallway on the left leads to a couple offices, and a couple of sleeping rooms for some of the field agents, and a couple of bathrooms." He walked down the hallway and pointed to the bathrooms on either side of the hall. The next room on the left was a bedroom with four bunk beds in it. It was painted a rather calming sage green. "The bedrooms are generally only temporary sleeping spaces, and the bedding is changed after every use, so any agent is free to sleep in any bed avaiable, but for some reason, the women tend to pick this room." The next room on the left was an identical bedroom but painted in a country blue. "And the men tend to pick this one. I think maybe because the Captain's quarters is this room right at the end of the hall, and the Commander's office--well, technically, Robert's office, is the last door on the right."

At that moment, the door opened, and Brian came out, coffee mug in hand.

"Oh, 'afternoon, Marcus. Hi, Aria," Brian said, heading down the hall without taking much notice of them at all.

Aria looked around at the building they stood in front of and marvelled at the arcutecture she smiled when he told her it was Robert's biggest secret and he wasn't sure if she should be there but she followed him inside the building and smiled waving to some of the children " they seem very happy here." she said as they walked and she listened to him talking. " so this is the Paris office" she said looking around as she walked partly backwards seeing the pictures that hung on the walls around her. When he mentioned the bedrooms she stuck her head in and smiled t several women who sighed seeing Marcus." I can see why " she said then glanced in the men room she saw several men changing "oops, don't mind me" she said and hurryed to stand next to Marcus again.

Seeing Brian walk out with a cup of coffee she gently reheated it for him "Hi, Marcus just showing me around, good to meet you Mr Quinn." she said staying out of his way as he passed by them. " let me guess roberts son-in-law and second in command?" she asked.

"Yes," Marcus replied to her. "We can take a peek in the office while he's refilling his coffee." He took her a couple steps inside. The commander's office was painted a muted salmon color and was decorated in marine decor like the rest of the place and showed her the large antique leather top desk and the enchanted map on the wall behind it. Brian had the map of Paris up today. There were several lights on the map that were lit green, and a few lit yellow. None were red today so far, and that was a good sign. A lit panel to the left of the map had a list of employees and where they were in the house. And to the right of the map was another list---and the print was smaller today because it had so many names on it. Marcus counted almost 50 on the list today, and it showed where each of those were in the house. On the far wall, opposite the door, was the large wizarding portrait of the founders in their younger years when the lot of them, except Dumbledore, were just 22. This was one of Robert's prized posessions. Around a large round table, the founders were bent over a map, studying it, and they had looked up for the photo that later had been painted into a portrait. Around the table, from left to right, were Robert, Kate, Michael, James, Lily, Albus Dumbledore, Sirius, and Michael.

"Hello, Marcus," Lily greeted him. "Long time no see. How are things? Is this a new recruit or do you finally have a lady friend?"

"A lady friend who will probably want to be a recruit," Marcus laughed.

"Oh, well done, then," James said. "Welcome aboard, Ms. Yet-to-Be-Named."

"i hadn't gotten there yet," Marcus laughed. "Everyone, this is Aria Barnett."

"Oh, good, She does have a name," Dumbledore teased.

Aria smiled and followed him to the salmon colored office " ow I like this" she said and chuckled loking at the map she noted the colors "Its a good map today?" she said noting nothing marked red on it. Then she followed him over to a portrait "The founders" she read under the image she smiled as she looked up as a woman in it spoke to Marcus asking who she was. She just stood and let Marcus do the inroductions "Pleasure is all mine" she said to them and looked at each. She chuckled at the dumbldore saying she had a name "hum been called alot of things in my time but yes thats the name I was born with" she said with a chuckle. " its nice to meet you and yes hopefully I'll be working with Marcus, a lot" she said smiling to him. She noted a figure in the back " Mr Black I presumb, your ancesters do you proud."she told him then looked at Marcus. " this place and the organisation are amasing, both with what thy are and what they do too, finding and returning or relocating children of magical families, makes mine look like amitures." she looked over at Marcus with a smile.

"Thank you," Sirius said.

"So I'm sure you can pick out Robert and Kate and Michael, even if they are younger in this painting..," Marcus said.

"Thank you, but we can finish introducing ourselves, Dear," Lily said. "I'm Lily Potter, and this is James. and the other fellow you may not know is that one down there. That's Remus Lupin, Robert's younger brother."

"Hello," Remus said. "Nice to meet you."

"How'd the raid go the other night?"

"Came back with 39. Kieran and Fi already picked up ten to take to the ranch yesterday morning," James said, "and, I believe we had one agent take a pretty severe sectumsempra. He's been shipped to St. Mungos. But--we benched 5 of Gelding's thugs, so we came out on the better end. And--we confiscated his cashbox. Came back with a haul of damned near a quarter of a million pounds. Brian's using part of that to repay Robert for buying the kids' school suppllies this year."

"Excellent,' Marcus said.

Oh, Marcus," Sirius said, "If either of you have not had chicken pox you might not want to go up to the infirmary. We had a sibling group of five come in four nights ago, and now we've got the pox running rampant up there. It's been our nurses rampant. Robert's been sending potions, though, so hopefully we're going to nip it soon."

"Oh. I'm good," Marcus said. He looked at Aria. "I'm hoping you either had it already or had the vaccine?"

Aria smiled as she listened to them talking about a raid and was blow away by how efficiant the were. When chicken pox was mentioned she smiled " I'm good, I had it twice as a kid, so I think I'm covered twice over. " she said and chuckled as she listened to them talk again. " Have to say this place is amazing" she said moving to look around the room leaving Marcus to talk to them she looked down at the map on the desk and smiled then turned to lean against it as she waited for him to be done talking to the founders.

Looking at a book case she walked over and found abook on plants and their uses , opening it she skimmed its pages noting how warn they looked from continual use.

"Thanks, All," Marcus told them. "We'll see you later." He showed her out and then opened the door to the Captain's Quarters. "This is the Captain's Quarters." The room was paneled in old reclaimed wood from an old sailing ship, and it was richly restored so that the paneling shined. A large old four poster bed was in one corner, and there was a leather easy chair, an armoire and a nightstand. It could have easily been the captains quarters on any old pirate ship. "Robert uses this room when he's here. Otherwise, Brian uses it. When Angus worked here, this was his room. The manager here now is an agent named Owens. I'm sure he's around here somewhere. Let's keep going."

He showed her the large kitchen where an elderly woman was decorating a cake by piping on frosting flowers.

"Irene!" Marcus was surprised to see her here. She let out a shriek of joy, put down her piping bag and gave him a big hug. "Irene, this is my friend, Aria Barnett. I'm pretty sure she's going to want to join us. Aria, this is Irene. She's one of our informants. What gets you in our kitchen today, Irene?"

"Nice to meet you, Aria. I hope we see you here more often. We're having a birthday party for a six year old girl. We don't know her name yet because she's deaf, and she's just now learning her signs. Robert said he'd be along shortly to come to try to talk to her. We think her name might be Jackie, but we don't know for certain. She had a book with her, and it had her name in it, but it's all smudged. So, Robert's coming to bring some birthday presents for her and to sort her name all out. But--a birthday is too important to miss when you're six, so i'm making her a cake. Actually, I'm making a couple. One wont' do it. There are too many here right now. With the lot we just took in, I think there are nigh onto 56 kids here."

"That is a lot of kids. Definitely a two cake affair," Marcus laughed. "It's good to see you, Irene." He motioned to Aria. "There's a potions lab in the basement, and we have a couple of young potions makers that work part time making potions. It takes a lot to keep them in stock. It pretty much requires someone to be here every day during the week just to keep up." He showed her the dining room and then took her up to the next floor.

"Kids bedrooms are on this floor, with lots of bathrooms, and there's a play room at the end of the hall. The older kids are at this end of the floor, and the younger kids are towards the back. Babies are kept upstairs on the next floor near the infirmary because that's manned 24/7," he told her. he took her upstairs to the top floor. "School room is up here, an arts and craft room, a play room, infirmary, music room, and there's a small kitchenette up here for making snacks for the kids, sometimes hot spiced cider or cocoa in the winter when it gets really cold. The attic is used too> There are some bedrooms for house staff up there and lots and lots of storage for supplies, kids clothes, toys, books, and just about anything else you can think of--except records. Those are all kept in an office downstairs, right next to the captain's office. Back yard has an herb garden and does grow some vegetables and fruit, but they've tried to keep as much open space as possible so the kids can go out and play.

"With a little luck, we won't let Gelding win with even one kid. We have scouts and informants, like Irene, that always have their ear out to pick up what Gelding's doing, and so far, it's worked really well for us. Someday, I'll show you the Colorado operation."

Aria placed the book back and moved with him poking her head into the Captain's Quarters and smiling " I can see why he does it's cosy" she said then followe dhim out as he explained what the house contained. Soon she saw a woman piping and smiled as she hugged Marcus she too was subject to a rather motherly hug "Yeah, I promise you will" she said smiling "And Marcus is right kids love cake so I'd make three" she suggested with a chuckle. She listened as she spoke of a girl who was deaf " who dosn't teach there kid sign language" she said " especialy if shes deaf, its cruel not to teach her to comunicate"she said and looked to Marcus then to Irene. " sorry had a freind who was deaf back in school" she told thm,

Moving from the kitchen she listened to him talk of the house and what it held for each kid and adult." Hey hes not getting any while ere here and fighting to stop him" she said " and yes I'd like to be a part of it too, some one has to stop this ..trafficing hes doing its not fare to the kids." she looked at him when he spoke of another compound " wow another, if its like this one , Im already blown away from here, but yeah I'd gladly go with you to check it out." she said smiling to him " maybe we could make it vacation, well working vacation." she smiled at him.

"The one in Colorado is a new venture that we decided on last year. Gelding is trying to expand his reach and trying to grab more, so this house can't contain all our kids anymore, especially the growing number of kids that Robert has had to take permanent custody of. The number of kids he and Kate are the legal parents to would scare the crap out of you, I'm sure. But--we simply don't have the room here for them all.

"Brian has always loved the American west, and he collects Native American art. Before Brian and Khaat got romantically involved, Brian bought a horse ranch in the mountains of Colorado. It's a mammoth place. He raises American Paint horses, and a lot of the muggle tv and movie companies rent out his paint horses for films. Anyway, the muggle government there is also trying to preserve wild horses in that part of the country, and Brian has part of the land dedicated to keeping some of those horses on the land to help preserve them. That still leaves an awful lot of land that isn't sucked up with other things.

"So, last year, we got what we all thought was a crazy idea. Robert needed a place to house the kids who can never go home again. So we suggested a place for them on the ranch. Wide open spaces, plenty of room to play and run, and all that. But then the idea took off on its own. It morphed into the idea of building a little old west village for kids on the property. Wooden sidewalks, old west shops, the whole bit. So, that's what we did. There are all kinds of little storefronts--a sheriff's office, a saloon, a bank, a barber, a toy shop, a general store, you get the gist. Well, most of those 'stores' are actually houses for kids that will hold anywhere from 4-6 kids. And some of the stores are facilities for them. The saloon is actually a big cafeteria. The general store is a place where kids can go, with a certain monthly allowance and just pick out whatever they want. The bank teaches math and money management, that sort of thing. The old west hotel is actually a roller skating rink and an arcade that they can earn privileges to. The kids go from 'store' to 'store' for their classes and to other stores for fun and recreation. Or it might be where they live. Brian has also started an equestrian program with the paint horses to help them recover from the trauma they've suffered. It's all just opened, so I haven't heard any real progress reports on it, except that so far the kids are supposedly really happy.

"Brian's older brother and sister, Kieran and Fiona run the ranch for him, and they're doing a great job of it. It seems to be just the right fit for him. And we do a lot of recruit training there too. I suppose if you wanted to get a taste of what cowboy country is really like, maybe it really would be a good place for us to go."