shock

for the @drarrymicrofic prompt of “shock”. thanks to my dear @ladderofyears for the beta!

CW: description of a burned body

* * *

Auror Potter stands with his hands braced on his knees. He takes a deep breath, another, before he unbends and wipes away the sweat from his brows. Purposefully, his eyes don’t drift down where whatever remains of Amaethon Hughes lies, a mere lackey of the chairman of the corrupt gambling industry, backers of extremist neo-pagan politics on the rise and the actual centre of their investigation. 

Instead, they watch Auror Malfoy. He doesn’t even flinch when he takes a step towards where the wizard stood only seconds ago. He even squats down to inspect the damage closely, like he would with just any other body they’ve encountered in the line of duty. It encourages Auror Potter to peek.

Hughes’s legs and torso have melted into a strangely shaped pile on rugged cobbles, charred beyond recognition. Only an oval shape above two oblong ones suggest a human skull and two arms. They look as though reaching for something, anything, while the rest of the body has been sucked away underneath him.

“We could Vanish some of that,” Auror Malfoy says, calm and collected. “Maybe clean up the rest by hand, should something remain. This though,” he points, and Auror Potter looks up into a pale spot of sky, surrounded by the angular rooftops of industrial buildings, “this will stay for a few days. Not much we can do about it.” It takes a few beats before Auror Potter understands that his partner didn’t point at the sky. The air is still crackling with magic. It’s a sound but it might as well be a corporeal sensation, static and pinching as it is. “Or we can follow protocol. Report what happened.”

And what are you gonna do? Hughes’s voice, his last words, ring in Auror Potter’s ears. The tone is smug, teasing, at best.

“Harry?” Auror Potter’s eyes snap to Auror Malfoy, still crouching close to the coal-blackened  thing. His sharp, imploring eyes, though, are now trimmed on Auror Potter’s own. “Would you prefer to follow protocol?”

Auror Potter shakes his head. He must have done so more forcefully than he’d meant to, for his wand, the Elder Wand, after its first strike drops with a hollow sound from his hands onto the concrete.

* * *

thanks for reading! you can find my other microfics here.

<3