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[credere]

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[credere]

Credence nods; Rune croons and gives his head a light scritch.

"Let's go inside."

[poetontheinside]

Ray nods, and sets the Enclosure up to be a shooting range out in the open air. Mountains in the distance, little wooden booths for them to stand in, paper targets as well as things like cans and bottles. in case Credence wants to see something explode.

Belatedly, he gives Rune a little smile. "Hey there, pal. You gonna stay outta range, right?"

[credere]

Rune chirps and spreads his wings, all but floating over to land on the low branches of a nearby tree. Credence smiles, very faintly, approvingly, and sets down his book on a booth they won't be using. It's tattered in a way that makes it looks reconstituted, but the spine is legible: The Great Wizards.

[poetontheinside]

He eyes it, but he's pretty sure that if he were as pissed off as Credence, he'd want to blow off steam first, then talk about books.

He takes his weapon out of its holster and hands it over to Credence, safety still on. "You remember?"

[credere]

"Yes."

It's not muscle memory by any means, but he remembers the steps: the stance, the grip, the aim. Safety off. Breathe in, breathe out.

His first shot misses the body shape in the target paper, but the second clips the arm, and the third skims the outermost ring of the torso targets.

[poetontheinside]

Ray stands quietly beside him, not correcting, just watching. He's doing well, better than ray had expected-- and anyway, this isn't about his aim. It's about anger, and letting it out in nice, controlled bursts.

After the third he grins at him, now leaning against the partition. "That was great, C. You put that gun down, I'll put up some cans and bottles."

[credere]

Credence nods, flicks the safety on, sets the gun down carefully. He already feels a little better, his ears ringing with the noise, the carefully punched holes in the target. Nothing uncontrolled, no collateral damage.

"Alright."

[poetontheinside]

He puts a hand on Credence's shoulder and squeezes it just once. He always feels this kind of camaraderie between people on a shooting range.

He goes up to targets and puts up something that'll blast apart nicely, then joins him back up in the little booth. "Alright. Pitter patter, let's get at 'er."

[credere]

Ray gets a funny look for that, but Credence relents in favour of preparing himself again. He settles himself, safety off, takes aim, then -

He was aiming for the central bottle and hits the one on the far left, but he hit something. The glass bursts in a much more satisfying way than the cans had.

[poetontheinside]

That makes him whoop, quickly pumping a fist in the air. "Hell yeah! You're a natural, C!"

[credere]

Credence half-smiles.

"Let me - I want to try something."

He safes the gun, sets it down, then reaches into his jacket for his wand. Carefully levels it at the broken glass.

"Reparo."

Slowly, steadily, the shards of glass rise from the grass and move together, circling each other unsteadily until the bottle reconstitutes itself. It looks as though it's never been touched.

[poetontheinside]

He leans forward in the booth, so he can see properly. He looks excited by it, foot jiggling as Credence works, and when it's done he looks over his shoulder.

"That's cool-- really fucking cool."

[credere]

Credence nods. It is cool.

"I've gotten better at that. Fixing things. That book - I kind of...destroyed it, in the library. But it's okay now."

Mostly.

[poetontheinside]

"Why'd you destroy it?" His eyes linger on it, now-- the title, the rough leather. He bets there's a story there that isn't just I fixed this.

[credere]

"I found a photograph inside. Of him. My brother."

He frowns.

"I'd never seen him before."

[poetontheinside]

He straightens up at that, slowly.

"You fix that, too?" He doesn't exactly need to ask what seeing him had made him feel like, considering the, well, destruction.

[credere]

"Yes. Do you want to see?"

He's looked at it again, since, without having the same reaction.

[poetontheinside]

He nods, stepping forward after holstering the gun again. No sense having it just lying around like this.

"Yeah, lemme see."

[credere]

Credence opens the book - carefully, it still feels a little more fragile than it had before - and turns to the right page.

Albus is a little wary, now, standing in the back of the photo's frame, peering out at Credence and Ray.

"It was taken not long ago, so - I guess this is how he would have looked if I'd ever met him."

[poetontheinside]

He stands next to Credence, their shoulders almost pressed together in the small booth as they bend over the book. He stiffens in surprise when Albus looks up at them, tilting his head a little, eyes flickin between the two of them.

That's new. He's going to chalk it up to magic, considering how old the book feels, but it's still weird to see. "Moving pictures," he mutters, to himself, as he looks at him.

"He looks-- regular. Don't he?" Handsome, sure, but normal. He doesn't know what he expected.

[credere]

"Yes. He does."

Just a man. Credence doesn't really know what he expected. Ultimately, though, if this was all there was? He wouldn't have bothered.

"...He wasn't the only person in the book."

He turns a few more pages to show Ray a photograph of a man who definitely does not look regular. Caption: Gellert Grindelwald, circa late 1920s.

[poetontheinside]

Now he hisses in a breath through his teeth, bending over further. The way the man carries himself, the way he looks out at them from the photograph-- he knows the actual man isn't in the damn book, but it feels like he's trying to see right through him.

"That's him? The guy who--"

Who, everything. Who tricked him, who used him, who had him in his grasp for far too long. He feels strange, looking at him like this. A little nauseous.

He looks up at Credence, to see what it's like for him, now.

[credere]

Credence stares at Grindelwald for a long time, and remembers. How good it felt to be picked out from the crowd, to be promised justice and greatness and glory. How good it felt to hold a wand in his hand for the first time. How good it had felt to be held and healed and told he was special.

How easily, Grindelwald had swept in to fill every empty space in Credence's heart.

"Your friend found it. It was exactly what I was looking for. A book about my future. His future."

[poetontheinside]

Ray isn't looking at the book anymore. He's looking at Credence, at the emotions flickering over his usually stoic face. It's not much, but Ray is good at reading people. He knows doubt and pain when he sees it.

He feels a quick stab of gratefulness to Fraser, for helping him find this. He isn't sure what this will mean to Credence, in the long run, but it means something. Finding what he was looking for.

"What's it say?"

[credere]

"He's a monster," Credence says, quietly, blankly. "He's going to do terrible things. He doesn't stop the No-Majs going to war. I don't know that he ever really wanted to try."

He closes the book.

"...I wonder if he wanted a wizard from a powerful bloodline to be adopted by my Ma," he goes on.

He'd aimed for the Lestranges, got a Dumbledore instead. Same difference.

"The Barebone family used to hunt witches and wizards. They hated magic. He would have known that a wizard in that family would have been treated badly. Become an Obscurial. A weapon for him to use."