She gets the owl Sunday night, in the middle of dinner with Desmond, and Estelle has absolutely no qualms about ditching Des to pay the bill so she can rush to open it. How the Ministry owl found her at a relatively nice dine-in Muggle restaurant she has no idea, but honestly she doesn't care. The only reason a Ministry owl would have just swooped through a non-magical crowd (and probably violated several health codes) is if Finn and Fiona have finally worked things out for the Hunters.

She does take the time to apologize to the frazzled and freaked out wait staff though - it's really only polite considering they'd just been attacked by an owl. Even if it's not her fault, it would look bad if she just ran off.

They should probably teach Muggles how to deal with post owls, though. She'll bring it up with Desmond when he joins her - if he can't do it, someone he works with probably can. Heck, maybe they can start selling post owls to Muggles; she's pretty sure owls have their own magic, so they should theoretically work.

She places those thoughts in a 'to be discussed with Des later' mental box and tears open the envelope the owl had brought her. To her immense disappointment, it doesn't give her any of the information she was hoping for.

"Oh, that's not the expression I was hoping to see." Desmond comments as he appears from inside the restaurant, pulling his coat tightly around him as he's hit with the chilly February air and grimacing slightly as his boots hit a particularly large slush puddle that presumably gets his socks wet. "It is from Finn, right?"

Estelle sighs. "Yeah, but it's a fat lot of nothing. Kind of." She allows. "We're meeting early tomorrow morning - like, seven AM early. I think he intentionally wants to beat the Initiative there."

"Well that doesn't sound like nothing, it sounds like some decision has been reached." Desmond points out reasonably, and she groans again as they start walking back towards her flat, almost on autopilot.

"I mean, yes, obviously, but I wish he would say something in the letter about how things are going to look now. Are we still on desk duty? Are we cleared to chase down Yurina? What's the story? It's going to drive me crazy." She admits, and Desmond slides an arm around her shoulders, his coat finally done up correctly enough to free up his arm.

"Well no news is good news, right? If it was as simple as 'you're all fired' the owl wouldn't have asked you to come in at all, right?"

Estelle tilts her head in acknowledgement. "Fair enough. Still going to drive me crazy all night."

Desmond sticks his freezing nose against her neck and she shrieks and jumps away as he starts laughing. "Well I may be able to help distract you tonight." He promises, and Estelle smiles.

She's so glad to have him back.

Desmond very successfully follows through on his promise, and the next morning she wakes up feeling warm and comfortable, her mind momentarily drifting between sleeping and waking before she remembers that she needs to be at the offices early.

She jolts up out of the bed, ignoring the mumbled protest from Desmond about lost warmth, and darts straight for the bathroom to wash up and get dressed. Her boyfriend is up by the time she's feeling presentable, and she shoves him into the shower as well before heading down to determine if she actually remembered to buy eggs this week.

"You realize it's only six o'clock, right?" Desmond teases tiredly as he joins her in the kitchen about half an hour later, looking slightly more aware, but only just.

"You realize I'm finding out my employment future in an hour and no way am I risking oversleeping, right?" She fires back, mostly playful. She is still mostly relaxed from the rest of their date the night before, but there's a nervous energy buzzing through her that's rushing her around the kitchen as she makes a larger breakfast than she normally would. Oh well, Wendy can have some whenever she wakes up.

Desmond shrugs. "Just an observation is all." He yawns and settles down to watch her cook.

They chat a bit, but Estelle is a bit too pumped up on nervous adrenaline to keep up with small talk, so she decides to see if she can't get Desmond to go off on a tangent to distract her.

"So I actually had an idea last night: what if we made post owls available to the general public? Do you think that could work?"

The ploy works like a charm - Desmond is immediately off hypothesizing on possibilities and who would be best suited to the role.

"I can bring it up with Fergus maybe?" He ponders as Estelle begins plating. "He seems to have the most low-key specialization, or at least he doesn't talk too much about what he's doing so it seems like he's got free time. I could be wrong, of course, but I know for a fact Kylee already has way too many specializations she's focused on and Alex is still monitoring the meetups right now so they both definitely have their hands full. I guess I could look into it too? My schedule is a bit in flux right now, but as soon as the public schools get back to me I'm busy again so I may not be able to give that full attention." He hums thoughtfully. "We really need more people, I think. You guys helping us out these past few weeks has been invaluable, and we shall miss it."

Estelle laughs slightly, pushing Desmond's plate over to him and taking the seat on the other side of the kitchen island to start eating her own food. "Well I hate to tell you but we won't - desk duty is the worst duty and I don't know how some people do nothing but paperwork all day every day with no end in sight."

Desmond shrugs. "As a teacher, I honestly can't say I don't understand that - sitting around for hours grading is easily the worst part of the job."

"Not the students who come try to argue they should have a higher grade?" Estelle teases, and Des groans and pushes his plate away slightly so he can drop his head onto the counter in despair.

Learning about the Muggle school system through Desmond had really been fascinating to Estelle - at Hogwarts you get what you get and you don't get upset. Apparently non-magical students don't subscribe to the same idea, and it honestly boggles the mind. She can't even begin to imagine marching up to, say, Professor Longbottom and informing him that actually no, she didn't get a Troll in Herbology, he just doesn't understand what she was going for when she caused her bubotuber plant to explode on her exam partner.

The idea still makes her smile, and she nudges Desmond lightly under the table. "Hey, at least you're not dealing with that now, right? Things seem to be getting better for you guys with the meetups and how successful that open Press Conference with Miles and Veena was."

Desmond hums and turns his face back up, though he stays lying down on the table. "I mean, yes, but I'd take entitled teenagers over this any day of the week to be honest. I'm glad it's only one year, I could never do this full time."

Estelle hums sympathetically, and they wrap up breakfast mostly in silence. Once she's ready to head out, she's a bit surprised when Desmond asks her to wait.

"You don't have to be in for another two hours you know." She points out as he struggles to get his shoes on. He's definitely a bit more aware now, but still sleepy enough to be fumbling with his laces. "You could just take an hour nap and come later."

"No no, I'm up, I'm up." He insists. "It'll be good to get in early anyway, maybe get some things organized - I could see about putting together a proposal on the owl thing, that's a good idea."

"Always happy to share my brilliance." Estelle grins as he finally gets his shoes on properly and stands up. "I know you hate Apparating, but I really don't have the patience for public transit today."

He sighs and holds out an arm, which Estelle latches onto and launches them both straight to the Muggle Ministry entrance.

Desmond stumbles away to lean against the side of the building, but Estelle doesn't really have the time to check if he's alright, so she just waves to him quickly and darts through the entrance. She should really get her apartment re-hooked up to the Floo system now that there's no risk of her Muggle boyfriend breaking the Statute on accident.

She takes the lift to the seventh floor, and is one of the first people to arrive - not too surprising considering she is still twenty minutes early. However, there are a few other familiar faces, and she hurries to take a seat next to Tristan, whose foot is tapping across the floor in a nervous pattern that even ten seconds in is already getting on Estelle's nerves.

"Hey, chill. You're stressing me out even more than I already am." She says in lieu of a greeting, and the tapping immediately halts.

Tristan gives her a sheepish grin. "Sorry - was it really that annoying?" He asks, and she shrugs.

"I mean, to me. Can't speak for anyone else." She points out, and he shifts awkwardly.

"Fair enough." He's only silent for a moment before bringing up the question that's brought both of them here before sunrise. "What do you think is going to happen? I mean obviously things can't stay the same way they were before, so there have to be changes, but I have no idea what that might entail. Or, I guess, I can think of things but none of them end in me still having my job at the end of today."

Estelle grimaces, mostly because she's been running the same scenarios and coming to the same conclusions that Tristan has. "We should be optimistic." She replies dryly, not really believing it herself and more parroting what other people have said to her time and again when she was in rough situations. "And we'll still be Aurors. We just won't be Hunters anymore, which is fine, technically. This wasn't a move up or down. And hey, maybe we'll all end up in a team together since I imagine our spots in our old groups have been filled by now."

Tristan sighs and glances towards the Initiative's half of the room. "Yeah. I'll just miss the people." He says, and Estelle for a moment thinks he hadn't heard her before realizing he's not talking about the other Hunters being laid off.

"Oh? And which Initiative member did you get close with? I don't recall you spending that much time over there." She frowns, honestly trying to work out who Tristan is talking about, only for him to flush and immediately (and clumsily) try to change the subject. Estelle decides to let him - she doesn't honestly care that much.

"It doesn't matter. Um, do you really think we'll get partnered up when we get back to regular duty? That could be sort of cool. You, me, and I guess Noah would be our third? Assuming he's cut - some scenarios do retain the more experienced Aurors. We're mostly at risk since we're so new to the program, comparatively."

Estelle purses her lips in vague annoyance at that - even if objectively Tristan is correct, she certainly doesn't see her two years of active Auror service as 'new to the program.' If she's new, then really, most of the other Hunters are no better (other than Demelza considering she's in her thirties, and the Hit-Wizards who are both nearly fourty, if she recalls correctly).

The other Hunters trickle in closer to seven, and the leaders arrive last, with a new face in tow. Estelle of course recognizes him immediately - Hugo Longbottom, Dark Arts Expert and one of the leaders of the post-war round up alongside other Auror legends like Finn and the Shacklebolts.

"Good morning everyone, and thank you all for coming in so early." Fiona starts with a tired smile. "So good news first: the Hunters will be continuing on a supplementary basis. We of course currently cannot actively pursue Yurina, but with her out in the open Department Head Potter has agreed that we may be able to more easily root out her colleagues by using her high public visibility to track her movements and extrapolate possible communications from there."

So far this is sounding pretty good - it is still a lot of paperwork, but there will almost definitely be some active field work as well to hunt down communication lines and to trail suspects brought up through their research and observations. Of course, this is still the 'good news.' Estelle is waiting for the other boot to drop.

It comes only moments later. "Unfortunately this is a much smaller operation than what we are currently set up for. And so I will be stepping down from my post to return to my regular Investigative duties, and we will only be requiring the licensed Hit-Wizards to stay on with the Hunters."

"We are very sorry, and you'll be receiving full pay in the next few weeks while Potter and the Auror leaders work to find you new jobs." Finn adds. "It's part of the reason we asked you all to come in this early - you'll be returning to the Auror Department today for reassignment with Clary Shacklebolt."

Estelle feels... well, she isn't sure what she feels. Deflated isn't quite right, because it's not like she hadn't somewhat expected this outcome. Disappointed, certainly, but that's too soft a word for the storm churning in her guts. Anger or rage is too strong, though.

Mostly she thinks she doesn't much care what she feels - it's not like it changes anything. So she stands up when asked and heads to the lifts with the other fired Aurors and Fiona (and that is probably the biggest surprise in all of this - Estelle had never even briefly considered that the leadership would change) and opts to not really think on it too hard.

They take the lift down to the second level and file out silently, joining the other Aurors who have arrived early. They get a few curious glances as Fiona herds them towards the head offices, but no one makes any comments.

They don't go to see Potter, and instead turn off towards the training rooms, which means the person they'll be speaking with is none other than Clary Shacklebolt, AKA Estelle's personal hero. So the day is definitely starting to look up again despite the rough beginning.

Trainer Shacklebolt used to be the Department Head during her husband's tenure as Minister, but she had willingly stepped down upon her husband's retirement. Unlike him, however, she didn't want to leave the workforce, so she'd gone back to her previous role as a trainer for the incoming Aurors. Estelle intends to be just like her when she's older - stubborn, confident, brilliant, and able to make overconfident seventeen years old cry with just her words.

The woman in question is just starting a warm up routine for what must be the newest batch of Auror hopefuls when Fiona pushes open the door and ushers all the displaced Hunters into the training room. "Morning Clary." She greets with an ease that indicates a long friendship.

Mrs. Shacklebolt shoots the red head a grin that looks almost feral. "Hey you. These the other Hunter rejects?" She asks, and oh, wow, okay. Estelle thinks she gets why so many people cry after Clary's traning sessions - that was harsh.

Fiona frows. "Clar, don't be a jerk today please." She sighs, and Mrs. Shacklebolt rolls her eyes. "But yes, these are the people who need to be reassigned for this year. Everyone, Mrs. Shacklebolt has been kind enough to run an evaluation so she can place you with other teams based on your strengths and weakenesses."

So they've literally been booted back down to training. Lovely. Estelle grimaces, but hey, at least she gets to spend the day with her hero - Desmond always says to look for the silver linings, so she'll latch on to this one as tightly as she can.

The day ends up being utterly exhausting - Estelle had forgotten how intense training had been - but it's actually a lot of fun, and Mrs. Shacklebolt compliments her on her keen observation skills, which has Estelle practically burning up with pride for most of the afternoon session. Afterwards, she slings her arms over Tristan and Demelza's shoulders and declares that they should go out for drinks.

"Celebrate the end of an era." She says, and both agree easily enough (as she'd figured they would - everyone else probably has places to be or families to go home to, so she'd selected her drinking buddies accordingly).

"It's so weird to think we'll be going to the second floor tomorrow." Tristan muses into his third glass of butterbeer about two hours later. He's the only one not drinking, saying he lives pretty far and doesn't want to risk Splinching when he Apparates home. "I really liked working with the Hunters and the Initiative - I'm not sure regular Auror work will cut it for me after that."

"Well then maybe you need a new job. Find your passion! Chase your dreams!" Demelza - who is extremely drunk at this point - declares, nearly sloshing her firewhiskey onto the table as she waves her glass around to try and emphasize her point.

Estelle giggles. She's somewhere between her two companions, probably just past tipsy and she really shouldn't have anything more to drink, but they're celebrating the end of an era so she knocks back what's left of her current mug and waves for another.

It was a strange day, full of ups and downs and in-betweens, and she thinks she's allowed to want to end it with a splash. And now, when she's feeling bad tomorrow, she can blame this instead of the hollow chasm in her gut that had yawned open the moment she learned the Hunters were downsizing.

She'll be fine.

Aruna loves that the Hunters have shrunk by nearly half - the offices are much quieter, and no one ever interrupts her work anymore since the people who remain all have other things to be doing.

She does think she'll miss meeting with Fiona somewhat, but Minerva is still around, so maybe she'll take over the bi-weekly meetings (Aruna doesn't allow herself to entertain the possibility that Jack Abbott, who's also still present, could take over instead). Maybe, if she's lucky, she won't have meetings with the Hunters at all, and she can control with whom and when the meetings should take place based on if she actually needs Hunter insight or not.

It's a pleasant thought.

She floats through her day, getting a decent amount done, and what isn't completed is filed away in a clear, organized manner that makes Aruna quite proud when she finishes. The place is starting to look more and more like her old office each passing day, and the new quiet is helping exponentially. The best part is that she doesn't have to feel bad about being relieved, since no one was actually fired, they were just moved to different jobs within their Department.

"It sounds like you're doing quite well at work!" Her therapist says encouragingly at their session that evening. "But I hope you are still seeing some people, right?"

"I still meet with Willow on Saturdays, and go to some of the Wizengamot trials." Aruna confirms quickly. "But it's nice to have a little more control over my schedule now - I didn't realize how overwhelming the Hunter meetings were until they stopped." She shrugs. "Maybe the increased number of them in the last month made it worse." She allows, wanting to preempt her therapist from saying the same.

The man smiles proudly. "I imagine that would have been rather overwhelming. Our hour is just about over - is there anything else specifically you'd like to talk about?"

Back when Aruna had first started therapy she'd never given the question any thought before saying 'no.' These days she does actually think it through to determine if all is truly well. After a moment, she shakes her head.

"I don't think so. Things really are going smoothly, which I guess means it's all going to fall back apart soon. Isn't that a saying?"

"It's negativity bias and I'll have none of that stinking up my office." He jokes. "Well then, if there's nothing else I'll see you again next week! It really is wonderful to see you doing so well."

She smiles at him slightly as she gets out of the chair and allows him to open the office door for her. "Well, you've been a big help in that." She reminds him, and he shakes his head.

"I help push you, but you're the one doing all the heavy lifting Aruna. I look foward to hearing more about the magical laws next week!"

Aruna sleeps well that night - it had been an excellent day, and she can't see why that excellence won't continue in the morning.

She puts on the news the next day as she's making breakfast, as she always does. It's part of a personal exercise to stay connected to the rest of the world - one hour of news a morning is certainly tiring sometimes, but every day that she gets through the full hour feels like a victory, so she keeps at it. The goal is to one day watch an hour at night as well, while she's having dinner. She's still working up to that one.

Today she doesn't get through her full hour - the American president comes on and Aruna immediately hits the power button. She's getting better, but that much negativity first thing in the morning won't be any good for her energy levels, which she needs to keep high in order to get through her full day of work.

She goes through a few breathing exercises and imagines her therapist congratulating her for being able to gauge her own limits and walk away. It still doesn't feel great to fail, but she's getting better, day by day. And who knows? Maybe one day it will be her own voice congratulating her. More things to work towards.

She finishes her breakfast and heads out, bundling up as warmly as she can despite knowing she'll be sweating bullets once she's on the bus. It's still unfairly cold for mid-February and she's quite looking forward to spring hurrying up and arriving (and properly melting away the grey slush that currently clings to every corner of the outside world).

She gets to work about ten minutes late thanks to unexpected traffic, and so she's already a bit frazzled when she steps off the lift to find that her office door is already standing open, and Willow Kiddell is sitting in her chair, finger drumming rapidly on the armrest as she obviously waits for Aruna to arrive.

For her part, Aruna is partially frozen in front of the now-close lift doors. What is Willow doing here? It's defintely not Saturday, because it's Wednesday, and Aruna is really not ready for this at all.

So much for another excellent day.

She eventually manages to get signal back down to her feet and she walks to her own office somewhat hesitantly. "Hello? Is everything alright?"

Willow looks up, and her expression already answers Aruna's question. "Unfortunately, it may not be. Did you see the American president's announcement this morning?"

Something in Aruna's stomach drops. "I did not." She says, successfully keeping the guilty tremor out of her voice. Of course that had been something important and related to their work - heaven forbid she actually function enough to-

Willow cuts off her internal monologue rather deftly. "Well consider me envious, it was a nightmare to sit through. The man needs a dictionary. Anyway, the short of it is this: America is planning to enact sanctions on magical people - mandatory registration, openly carrying wands when outside and possibly having to surrender them entirely when inside buildings, things like that. It's obviously insane, and it's obviously destructive to cooperation considering how it isolates magical people and calls them out as dangerous. Nevermind the fact that America lets any random buy a semiautomatic and head out to the supermarket with it the same day, no, clearly it's wands that are the most dangerous evil."

"That... doesn't sound good, but what does it have to do with me?" Aruna can't help asking, honestly unsure what Willow is getting at.

Willow frowns. "Well, much as I know Muggles hate to hear it, America tends to be a trendsetter on the global stage, and England seems to generally be the most eager to follow suit. I was hoping you'd be able to analyze or even just look into whether or not these sorts of sanctions are being considered by the British government as well. If they are, we need to put a stop to it as quickly as possible - the magical community won't tolerate being treated like weapons."

Aruna purses her lips. "That... is fair enough." She agrees, though she can personally admit she would probably feel better herself knowing if people with magical capabilities were nearby when out in public. Still, it wouldn't be fair, and they need the magical community as on-board with integration as the non-magical one, so Aruna nods after a moment. "I can most likely get permission to sit in on the next closed Parliament session this weekend - I still have a few contacts in the legal world."

"Worst case, ask Cadi." Willow nods towards the leaders' office. "She was pretty high-ranking in the Prime Minister's office before we snatched her for this, from what I understand. She may be able to help you out as well."

Aruna hums thoughtfully. To be entirely honest she'd never really considered why Mrs. Morgan was representing the non-magical side of the Initiative, but it would make sense contextually that she was relatively high-ranking in the government, considering what Mrs. Weasley's role in the Ministry normally is. And frankly, asking Mrs. Morgan seems a lot less daunting than reaching out to her old colleagues, who might ask probing questions that she's not ready to answer yet.

Willow leaves not long after - she does have her own job to focus on, after all - and Aurna dawdles around her office for another half an hour before working up the courage to go and knock on the leaders' office door. She does consider passing this entire thing off onto Landon, who's technically the political representative in charge of the non-magical end of things, but she recognizes that this ultimately has to do with legislation passage that will directly impact her focus, so she resolves to do this herself. She had an excellent day yesterday - this is just the next step in her process of getting better.

She taps on the door perhaps a bit too softly, but it swings open a moment later anyway.

Mrs. Weasley looks slightly surprised to see her. "Good morning Ms. Kandasamy - how can we help you?"

Aruna clears , thinking now that she probably should have planned out what she wanted to say while she was working up the nerve to come over here. "Well, um, I guess to start did you here the American president's speech this morning?"

Mrs. Weasley frowns in slight confusion, but Mrs. Morgan scoffs irritably which Aruna thinks might mean 'yes, unfortunately.'

"Well, I was hoping to sit in on the next Parliamentary meeting to see if the British government is planning to consider anything similar." She explains, and Mrs. Morgan nods to Mrs. Weasley, who turns back to her work as Aruna is directed back out of the leaders' office.

"That's an excellent idea - I was planning to have Landon accompany me, but I think it would be good sense for you to come along as well." Mrs. Morgan says. "I have a standing invitation to the Parliament meetings, so make sure to get here by eight o'clock on Friday."

Aruna blinks - she honestly hadn't expected that to go as smoothly or as quickly as it had, but she supposes things going this smoothly is far preferable to them going catastrophically sideways.

Though if things go badly enough on Friday she may end up being extremely busy on Saturday: she might want to reschedule with Willow. She ponders over her schedule as she heads back to her own office, and concludes that they probably should skip this week entirely in case Friday does go poorly enough to warrant further work on her part.

She ends up writing a quick note to Willow that she'll drop of with the Wizengamot Administrative Services during her lunch break and pulling out some of the scrolls she'd filed away to be considered and completed today, falling into a rhythm rather quickly thanks to the quiet surrounding her.

Even though the day defintiely started rough, and concerns about Friday still linger in the back of her mind, she decides that it overall wasn't such a bad day when she heads out that afternoon.

Maybe she really is getting better. Two (relatively) good days in a row - that surely has to count for something.

With Rose officially back to working with Minister Granger, Landon once again finds himself alone at their desks. He'd thought Rose leaving would make him feel better, but honestly he's just tired more often than not these days, and his early morning on Friday certainly isn't helping.

He and Aruna both arrive at the Ministry about ten minutes early, and he nods to her silently, not really in the mood for small talk. Luckily she appears to be similarly inclined, and they wait in silence for Mrs. Morgan to arrive so they can all head over to the British Parliamentary building to see if the British government intends to be as dumb as the American one. Landon is a proud American, honestly, but even he recognizes how stupid his country is being. He really hopes that the sanctions will end up falling through - if America isn't willing to integrate, the many countries they're economically tied to (AKA a good half of the world at least) will end up leaning that way as well, which won't be good for anyone long term.

Mrs. Morgan arrives exactly one minute before eight, and she doesn't waste any time with pleasantries either, simply bundling them both back out the Muggle entrance and down the road to a giant castle sitting alongside the Thames.

"The Palace of Westminister. It's where the Parliament meets." Aruna says quietly, and Landon blinks, realizes his mouth is hanging open, and quickly slams it shut.

"It's a lot nicer than the Senate building in the States, I'll give it that." Her murmurs back, and is rather pleased when she gives him a small smile in return.

They go through security, and Landon is forced to surrender his wand, which is rather annoying though he doesn't protest. It's his first time actually in the Parliamentary building, and he wants to make a good impression.

Although he has spoken with members of Parliament many times before, he'd never actually attended a formal meeting of theirs - his permissions had still been pending when everything went down over the winter holidays and the process had stalled indefinitely. Hopefully now it will pick back up again and he'll get to sit in more often in the coming months. Hearing about policies from politicians after they've already been discussed and decided on is very different from watching those discussions and debates live and in person.

There's a viewing area over the main Parliament floor that the three of them end up in, and three seats are set up inside it - obviously Mrs. Morgan had called ahead of time. Unfortunately, despite this forewarning, the seats are incredibly uncomfortable, and Landon can tell thirty seconds after sitting down that it's going to be a long few hours.

The Parliament itself opens about thirty minutes later once all the politicians have arrived and gotten settled. A few have glanced towards the viewing platform, but most are ignoring their three observers and instead chatting with their seatmates.

"Order! I call this session to order." An older man with a face like a very cheerful lizard declares, and the room falls silent.

"That's Sir Lindsay Hoyle, the Commons Speaker. He outranks even the Prime Minister in here." Mrs. Morgan informs Landon in a low voice.

Landon does his best to pay attention despite his still-drowsy state and the ever-increasing discomfort of his chair, but most of the first two hours blur by and if you asked him what they were about afterwards he would honestly have to say he has no clue. He does tune in when the topic of magic comes up though - it's the whole reason they're here, after all, so he really can't afford to miss out on what they say.

He'd of course studied up on the proposals that had been submitted to the House floor in the States, so that he'd know how similar or different any proposals brought up here are to their American counterparts. Considering how restrictive and frankly invasive the American bill is, he's really hoping Britain lean more towards the 'different' end of the spectrum.

Unfortunately, they aren't so lucky. Boris Johnson himself taps his microphone for attention, and clears his throat as if to make sure he has everone's attention.

"I believe we should consider the bill recently proposed in the US House of Representatives - I think there could be several merits to adopting similar measures of our own." The Prime Minister declares - rather importantly, Landon thinks. Landon does not like him.

The debate that rages afterwards is at least active - there are enough people opposed to the motion that Landon doesn't entirely lose his faith in humanity. But the topic isn't officially closed, just tabled to be discussed again in the next session after about an hour and a half.

They call a recess around noon, and Landon retrieves his wand from security as the three of them leave the building entirely.

"Well. That was... not ideal." Mrs. Morgan says after a moment as they begin walking back towards the Ministry. "I'll be returning to watch the second half - would either of you want to join me?"

Aruna nods, but Landon shakes his head.

"I should probably start working on a possible response for if things actually do get pushed through, as well as a lobby concept to pitch to the members to push them to vote against it." He explains. "I can work on that after lunch."

"See if you can find someone to help you out with it." Mrs. Morgan says. "Maybe one of the Muggles or Squibs on the team - the Parliament may prefer hearing from non-magical people over a wizard. Unfortunately."

"People like thinking in groups and absolutes, that's not your fault." Landon replies with a small sigh. "And also that's a very good point. I'll think it through over lunch."

And he will - he just won't be thinking it through on his own.

Celine smiles at him as he slides into the booth across from her at the small, hole-in-the wall diner they always get lunch at on Fridays. "Hey, sorry I'm late. The session went longer than I thought it would - for old people they can really go for a while."

"They're old people, what did you expect?" Celine jokes. "But seriously, how did it go? Are they looking at sanctions?"

He grimaces. "They're definitely considering them. I think we can sway it in our favor, at least in the short term, but it'll take some work."

Celine frowns. "That sounds like it could be complicated - you said last week that Rose was starting up again with the Minister. Are you working this alone?"

He gives a half shrug as the waiter comes over to ask about their order. "Just a burger for me. Hopefully not, but whoever I'm with certainly won't be Rose - she hasn't set foot in the office all week. It's been weirdly quiet, honestly, though that could also be because the Hunters just underwent a massive downsizing."

Celine tilts her head curiously, not even looking at the waiter as she places her own order of fish-and-chips with a strawberry shake. "Downsizing? They're still in operation then - I'd wondered what they would do now considering certain recent events."

Neither of them ever speaks about Yurina/Nina when they're out in public like this, at least not explicitly. It's impossible to know who may be listening in, and more importantly if they're connected to Yurina's network or not.

"They were wondering the same." Landon responds lightly. "But it seems they've worked something out. There's one new guy, but almost all of the younger guys outside of Pup were reassigned."

"New guy? Is he nice?" Celine asks, and they end up falling into a steady stream of conversation about first the Hunters (no, Landon hasn't really spoken to Hugo yet but apparently he's yet another hero from the Second Wizarding War who helped restructure the Ministry just like Finn and Mrs. Weasley and jeez, there really do seem to be a lot of those involved in this don't there?) and then shifting to chat about Celine's work and her latest articles.

"I'm going to go check in on the meetups this weekend." She says excitedly. "See how they're going and encourage my readers to go out and say hi if they can. Have you heard anything from Alex on how they're going?"

Landon shakes his head. "Alex keeps to himself for the most part, and we don't exactly overlap in our work." He points out, and she hums in acknowledgement.

"Fair enough. Speaking of, weren't we supposed to talk about who you should pick as your new partner in operation, um," She frowns. "Okay, I can't think of a cool name off the top of my head, but you know what I mean."

Landon can't help laughing. "The great reporter, at a loss for words." He teases. "But I do. I'm definitely leaning towards asking one of the Squibs or Muggles on the team to help out, since I'm not sure two magical people arguing against sanctions on magical people would be treated as unbiased."

"Everyone is always biased, but that's fair." Celine muses. "So who does that leave? Alex, I know, and Kylee - Veena is Muggleborn isn't she? Does that count?"

Landon shakes his head. "I love Veena as much as the next person, but aside from the fact she is a witch and that's likely all people will see, she's also already super busy with the media. I need someone who actually has the downtime available to help with this project."

Celine purses her lips. "Well, all of you seem pretty busy to me, but I would say that rules out Alex as well with the meetups still so new."

"And Kylee - she's specializing in a bunch of different things." Landon muses. "Plus, I think she grew up in the States too? North America at least, based on the fact her accent is sort of all over the place. So she wouldn't know much about British politics."

"What about Aruna then?" Celine muses. "She's the lawyer, right? She definitely knows about politics here."

Landon had been thinking the same thing, honestly, but considering Aruna's standoffish attitude and the fact she always seems to be doing something in her office, Landon is rather reluctant to ask her. Of course, she had come to the Parliament viewing, so maybe she would be interested in the work? He'll keep her on the short list for now and ask if no one else seems to be as good a match.

"I'm definitely considering her." He says vaguely. "But it's best to consider every angle, right?"

Celine raises an eyebrow in a way that shows she definitely knows that's not the entire story, but she doesn't push. "True enough. Who else is there?"

"Desmond." Landon responds after a moment of thinking. "And I guess Edward? He's technically with the Hunters though, and I'm not sure how that would work with his other job - I think he was special forces or something, I'm not totally sure on that."

"I'd say not him." Celine suggests wryly. "Stick inside the Initiative."

Landon tilts his head. "Fair enough. Desmond then. He's a teacher, so I'm not really sure how much he would know about politics?"

"He's native to England though, right? So probably a decent amount if only through chatting with other teachers. Teachers are always in the know." Celine says wisely, and Landon can't help laughing.

"I get the sense there is a story behind that conviction and I'd rather like to hear it." He prods, and she shrugs and launches into a tale of her tenth grade teacher who somehow always knew exactly what everyone was up to.

By the time they pay and head in their separate directions, Landon still isn't really sure who he should ask to help him out. Desmond really doesn't seem to be the best choice despite Celine's insistence that they know everything - Desmond just doesn't strike him as someone who would be particularly aware of politics if they weren't shoved in front of him. And Landon doesn't much feel like shoving.

For the same reason he's hesitant about Aruna as well - she may know politics, but interacting with other people doesn't seem to be something she's particularly interested in, and Landon doesn't want to apply any pressure there either. His mind turns the issue over as he walks back to the Ministry, not coming up with anything particularly useful, when Edward's name pops up again.

Celine said to keep it in the Initiative, but at the same time the Initiative is obviously biased towards making this work and not sanctioning anyone. Maybe going outside of it is a best-case-scenario, and maybe Edward's work in whatever branch of law enforcement he was in will actually make him more appealing to the members of Parliament.

By the time he arrives in the Ministry lift, Landon has resolved that Edward probably is the best person for the job. And it never hurts to ask - worst case, he can still talk to Aruna.

He really hopes Edward says yes.

Author's Note: And thus we finally know what will happen to the Hunters! And America is being dumb and infecting England with it's dumbness, hooray OTL This is really mostly a setup chapter, but I hope it provided some fun interactions and character insights nonetheless ^^