Moody let out a laugh but it didn’t reach his eyes. “Splendid! So you are walking around, babbling empty threats at strangers. And at a time like this?” His head moved back, his mouth letting out a scoff, as the girl’s presence started to get on his nerves. “At a time like this, too?” Alastor put up his hand, pressing the bridge of his nose with his fingers. That was the problem with the wizards and witches now. They all had their personal agendas - all of them believe that that was the only thing that they needed to go for. Revenge. Someone to answer for their pain. It was all childish play that leads nowhere. They did not need this. They did not need people who would act out on their emotions. They needed people to see that there was a much bigger enemy at their hands. He-who-must-not-be-named was out there. He is building his army full of brats who are living for the cause. At least the ones who chose the dark side had been fighting for their cause. They knew what was at stake, they had the strategy, with a very few people - go rogue. Marlene? Marlene was one of those girls who had their own vendetta. How can those be called to be in the order, when all they were - was selfish?
As Moody guessed, it didn’t take long for the McKinnon girl to raise her voice, raising her frustration into the air, letting all of the bars hear whatever she was upset about. Even a fool would have read under the lines. Yet, Moody simply leaned his head back, his eyes focusing on her as he watched her rant. He kept silent even as she finished. Collecting his thoughts at trying to decide what to do with her. He knew he was put under looking after her. But so far, what he had seen was a girl that was still hurting after losing her brother. She was like a firecracker, which was dropped onto the floor yet not yet on fire. It left the sense of danger in the air, not knowing the exact moment it was going to pop. He lifted his hand again, his fingers brushing against his lips and jaw as he continued to stay quiet. Yet as he was about to say something else, Marlene continued to speak, continued to speak all of her heart out to him. Was it the drink? He didn’t know how much she’d had to drink before he came, but looking at her frame, he’d consider it would take more than two shots to get her buzz going. “Are you finished?” He asked, his voice low. “Or perhaps do you want to hang all of your laundries here? Hell, why not leave your diary here too? Surely, someone across the street would be rather interested to know what makes you tick.”
He watched her go off to the bar, another sigh leaving his lips. He never shied away from a challenge, but he didn’t want to involve himself with a lost cause. Now, he had to make a decision, which one was Marlene McKinnon. As she placed the drinks on the table, he took his ale and took a few gulps. “You need to start controlling yourself. No one is going to be able to help you if you keep lashing out like this. Contain it. Use it, fuel your anger, but do it in the right way. This…” He pointed at her with his index finger. “This is a mess. No one can work with that, and you won’t get the revenge you so want. You can self pity yourself all you want. But it is up to you how you end up using it. Until you decide how you want to use it, I simply cannot help you.”
“If they are going to bring him up like-like he was a part of them? Like they have a right to speak about him? Yes.” She seethed. Though, he was right about doing so during the war, in the real world. It’d been a year since she’d been in Hogwarts and able to shoot off her mouth like that. And she’d done so well to stick to purists that deserved it and her friends, who knew that she’d never actually hurt them, up until she’d found her brother, dead. Left like a bag of burning dog shit for her to find. No one could convince her that they didn’t know she was coming. That they hadn’t left him there with their damned green calling card placed above him, hoping to put the fear of Merlin himself in her.
Marlene hated that Alastor was right. That he was continually right. But, at least he didn’t act like she couldn’t handle it. Like she was too fragile to be told what she was doing wrong. It didn’t mean that anger didn’t course through her veins like fire and make her want to slap him across the face for being an ass about it. The half blood lowered her voice, eyes darkening.“Do you understand what it’s like to wonder if the people asking about him, the strangers, the known purists, the jaded school mates, are taunting me? Are looking to see the pain that’s been inflicted? Or to see what someone looks like after finding their brother dead? Like a fucking walking, talking freakshow.” Her voice raised slightly, but she forced herself to quiet. “To not know if they’re the one that killed him?” Or, at least the one that muttered the deadly incantation. It’d been her searching that had cost Matthias his life.
The moment at the bar had allowed her to calm down as much as one might expect Marlene McKinnon was capable of. The former Gryffindor needed to swallow her pride. Needed to accept the help that the wizard was offering. She picked up a shot and drank it down, like it would make the blow to her pride lesser. “It’s not just about revenge, Alastor.” She was careful to keep her voice at a reasonable decibel. “I became an auror and joined,” She let her fingers flitter upwards, “Because I’ve seen the injustice my entire life. I’ve sat with muggleborn friends in the infirmary after they’ve been attacked, and watched those that hurt them go on with not so much as a detention. I’ve heard the stories of attacks and murders that go on around us without the guilty parties ever going to Azkaban. I was in this before Matthias-” She struggled to address what had happened to her brother, instead, letting the knowledge hang in the empty air. Her blue eyes looked into the empty shot glass, hoping to find the answers to her problems. “I know I am. I just-I don’t know how to fix this.” The pain. Her reactions. Matthias being dead. She’d never had a problem that she couldn’t fix with her fists or her wand. “How can I protect others when I couldn’t protect my own brother, Moody? What the fuck am I supposed to do with that?”
