“Oi, when you're done playing with your wood, we've got a call,” Baekhyun calls, swinging around in his chair to grab his cloak.

Jongdae glares up at him where he's polishing his wand, waving off the Scouring charm. He follows quickly, clasping his own cloak around his shoulders and falls into step with Baekhyun out of their office. 

“Not even eight in the morning and you're already cracking jokes,”Jongdae smacks him upside the head. He yanks Baekhyun's robe down hard, making him stumble backwards at the sudden force. 

"It was crooked," Jongdae shrugs when he glares at him. He yawns hugely into his fist. "So what have we got?" 

“Some sort of frat party downtown. They’ve been at it for a while apparently," Baekhyun says, holding out the crumpled parchment in his hands. It’s about time they upgrade their communication systems to something a little more refined than these flimsy purple memos. He’ll put in a complaint later. "It's smack in the middle of a muggle community."

"Kids these days," Jongdae rolls his eyes, pushing the door open to hallway and heads for the fireplace lane. “Orders?”

"It’s a first warning so neutralize, give them a scare, same old," Baekhyun says, stepping into one of the grates and gathering his robes up to keep it from the ash on the ground. "Race you up?"

He turns but Jongdae has already Floo'd out, just leaving the split second trace of his smile behind.

They disapparate once they're out of the Ministry's perimeter, landing on a cobblestone path just in the shadows at the mouth of an alley. 

"Yep," Jongdae says grimly, peering around the wall to stare across the street. "Definitely a party. How do these kids have so much energy?"

To a muggle’s eye, it looks like any regular frat party with colourful lights and music that’s far too loud for any hour of the day really. Baekhyun’s trained enough to recognize the flashes of live firework charms and levitation spells through the window, just barely catching the bottle of alcohol that flies across. It’s a good thing they were called on first before the local police get involved.

"So how do you wanna do this?" Baekhyun asks, twirling his wand around his fingers deftly. "Immobulus or Lapifors like last time?"

Jongdae snorts at the memory of the roomful of transfigured rabbits they had on their hands after a particularly annoying bar brawl they’d had to deal with. 

"Both mean paperwork anyway. Flip a sickle."

Baekhyun digs into his pocket, pulling out a silver coin and tosses it in the air, watching it spin. He catches it in his palm and slaps it onto the back of his hand. 

"Immobulus it is,” he sighs, slipping it back into his pocket. “Might as well get it over with. I'll take the front, you go back."

They disapparate and reappear in front of the door of the house, keeping a Muffliato charm up to ease the noise of the crack. Jongdae slips away, rounding the house to find the back door. Looking around warily, Baekhyun mutters the incantation to unlock the door and bursts inside quickly, slamming it behind him. He nearly gags at the smell that hits his nose, nearly choking in the thick fumes of smoke filling up the house.

"ing teenagers," he grunts, countering the smoke screen with a clearing charm. Smoking Billywig stiffs has been all the rage lately, chasing after the giddy levitation side effects even though it's illegal for minors. He can smell the firewhisky from here too.

The sudden rushed footsteps across the floorboards catches his attention and he raises his wand.

"Immobulus!" 

Both he and Jongdae call out the spell in unison, hitting different targets simultaneously. There’s quite a cluster of people cramped into such a small space. There must be an Extension charm on the room. They deal with everyone fairly quickly, all too intoxicated and high to have enough presence of mind to struggle. They have to lower a couple of youths from the ceiling where they’re floating uncontrollably. Jongdae handles the last few hiding in the bathroom while Baekhyun washes a Tergeo charm through the house, cleaning up the mess. 

He catches sight of a miraculously unopened bottle of Firewhisky sitting on the coffee table. It's a shame he has to confiscate it; it's a premium brand too. Must've cost a fortune. Maybe he can talk the Confiscation department into letting him keep this one. 

"Alright kids," he sighs, turning to the row of paralyzed teens scattered frozen across the room. "First warning. Next time we snap your wands. Clear?"

It goes on to be an extremely busy day that day. They barely spend more than ten seconds in the office before they're called out again on another disturbance. Baekhyun is still struggling to clean the Flobberworn mucus off his sleeve from their previous call. Some over ambitious wizard thought combining an engorgement charm with a transfiguration spell would be a good idea. The Flobberworm-Bicorn product of the spell was enormous and extremely pissed off. They managed to send a distress call to the Department of Magical Creatures just before it charged straight at Jongdae, horns first. Jongin had barely apparated on site in time to calm the creature and rein it in himself.

Sighing, Baekhyun gives up on his robe, letting Jongdae drag him off to the next place. It's incredibly taxing to apparate on an empty stomach; he could really go for a pumpkin pasty or ten right about now. Jongdae laughs, hearing his stomach growl and reaches over to squeeze the back of his neck soothingly.

The next job is no less demanding.

"Who the needs a bewitched security carpet when there are spell packs for this !" Baekhyun grunts, fighting off the flaps of the dusty carpet trying to strangle him against the wall. 

Jongdae's over in the kitchen, trying to keep the fridge from battering both him and the terrified elderly witch cowering in the corner. His wand is trapped, held down by the folds of the curtain behind him, and he's forced to hold up a corkboard to block the fridge magnets trying to smack him in the face. Botched security charms always backfire aggressively, which is why they have people to do it properly. 

"Incendia!" Baekhyun chokes out, when he finally manage to grapple for his wand, throwing himself out of the way quickly when the carpet bursts into flames.

Jongdae frees his hand from the curtains and hits the fridge with a freezing spell before crushing it down into a lump of metal with another wave of his wand.

"Glad you got it up in time," Baekhyun grins through his panting. He yelps when Jongdae shoots a ball of sparks his way.

Luckily, Mrs. Kwon is grateful enough to both of them for their help to send them off with a basket of fresh cauldron cakes. Baekhyun takes a giant bite out of one particularly fat one, humming contently at the burst of flavour in his mouth. Jongdae's hands are full with the basket and the bottle of Daisyroot Draught Mrs. Kwon had urged him to take with him so Baekhyun feeds him the rest of his cake. He reaches over to wipe the crumbs away from the corner of Jongdae's mouth with his thumb. Jongdae beams at him, kissing the tip of his thumb quickly before he pulls it away.

It's getting dark when they get back to the office. Baekhyun slumps down into his chair, exhausted and aching all over. They'll be able to clock out soon, just as soon as–

"," he mutters, spotting the foot of parchment on his desk. "We were supposed to do inventory today weren't we?"

Jongdae groans, running a hand through his hair and drops the cloak he was about to slip into.

"Let's get it over with."

Kyungsoo's usually in charge of cursed objects and irreversible hexes. He’s still at home on sick leave, recuperating from a messy job. Back up didn't get there in time and he got hit with an Expulso curse that nearly blew his leg off. Until then, Baekhyun and Jongdae are covering for him, at least in the inventory department, making sure everything's listed and locked away safely. 

"Careful with that one!" Jongdae says quickly, watching Baekhyun handle a copper cup from the stack of items they need to sort through. He levitates it out of the pile slowly, keeping it steady with his wand. "It's been Gemino'd. Not in the mood to deal with a roomful of cursed goblets."

"Got it," Baekhyun answers, sending it up to the topmost shelf of the unit where the Opal necklaces are.

It's slow work getting through everything and taking all the precautions for each individual item, despite having wanted to rush through it. There’s always a sizable new load of these every day, confiscated whenever they can track and trace them down. The cluster of lockets in particular are extremely volatile even with no one touching them. He lets Jongdae handle that one, leaving it to his steadier hands to seal them into the charmed containers.

"I think that's the last of them," Baekhyun says finally, scanning the list in his hands.

"Great. Let's go home," Jongdae sighs, slinging an arm around Baekhyun's shoulders..

A sudden spark of pain shoots up the side of his neck and Baekhyun hisses through his teeth, pushing Jongdae away. 

", what happened, are you–" Jongdae leans in closer, tilting Baekhyun's chin to the side to take a look. "You've got a pretty bad burn on your neck."

"Must've been the carpet," Baekhyun grunts, blindly ghosting his fingers over the burn gingerly. He hadn't even felt anything back then through the adrenaline rush in the struggle. "How bad is it?"

Jongdae doesn’t answer, ushering him out of the room and locks the door securely behind them. Back in their office, he rummages through the first aid cabinet, finding the glass jar of orange paste at the back.

"Sit," he says, pushing Baekhyun down into his chair again. Baekhyun grins, blinking up at him coyly and throws him his best bedroom eyes.

Jongdae pointedly ignores him, dipping his fingers into the paste and slathering it straight onto the burn with a lot less delicacy than Baekhyun knows he’s capable of. He whines, fidgeting in his seat at the ache sparking up along his neck again. Hopefully it won’t scar too badly.

Jongdae lowers himself into his lap to keep him still, pressing down heavily on his thighs while rubbing the paste into Baekhyun's skin, a little more gently this time.

"You'd think you were hexed with the way you're whining," Jongdae chides him, his eyes softening anyway.

“Hey. Be nice to me. I’m in pain,” Baekhyun juts his lower lip out, slipping an arm around Jongdae’s waist. He teases at the hem of his shirt, sliding his fingers under the fabric to press the tips into his warm skin. 

Jongdae wipes his fingers off on his robe and palms Baekhyun’s face, tipping it up to meet him in a kiss. He into his mouth without preamble, and Baekhyun melts right into him, kissing back with fervor. 

“Take me home?” he whispers when they break off, beaming up at Jongdae. He can already feel the paste numbing the stinging pain. 

“Oh you want me to do all the work, do you?” Jongdae scoffs, helping Baekhyun up and laces their fingers together.

“Just don’t get me splinched, I don’t want a replay of last year–"

“God it was one time and it was half a fingernail,” Jongdae rolls his eyes, grabbing his cloak and drags him out of the office. 

“Hey, my fingers are my best asset,” Baekhyun retorts, waving his wand to get the lights behind them. 

Jongdae looks at him, a different smile playing on his lips. “I can think of something else.” 

Baekhyun grins widely, suddenly impatient to get home.