"Believe me," Tonks snorted. "You do not use magic like us. I haven't seen you do a single thing that I can do with my magic."
"But everyone uses different kinds of magic," Lisanna looked no less bemused. "Juvia here can't turn into animals any more than I can control water."
...
The Water Mage in question coughed and said, "Juvia… is not so sure that Lisanna-san's words will make much sense to her. Juvia thinks Lisanna-san was right to suspect we were no longer in Fiore. This woman has never heard of it."
"Never heard of Fiore?" Gray looked up sharply. "Is that true?"
"Yes, it is," Tonks nodded firmly. "I've never heard of Fiore and I have never seen anyone do anything remotely like what you've been doing. Especially without even using a wand." She held up the piece of wood in her hand. "Virtually all magic in existence that I know of requires a wand. Yet none of you were using one. And… you all have that symbol…" she breathed, when she finally noticed the white mark on Lisanna's leg in the same place as Juvia's and the black one adorning Gray's chest.
Tonks stared at the three of them, as they stared right back, before the Auror lowered her wand slightly. "I've asked you before… but I'm going to ask you again… who are you people?"
"If you want, we'll explain everything to you, but first I want some answers of my own," Gray said as he folded his arms. "Those guys out there with the sticks and the flashy lights your friends are they? Why the heck did they attack me when I was trying to help them out?"
"Juvia wants to know that too," Juvia nodded fiercely. "Stranger-san herself threatened to try and arrest me when Juvia had done nothing wrong."
"Stranger-san?" Gray blinked.
"Look, they probably panicked, okay?" Tonks ran a hand through her hair. "These are strange times and when I saw what you were doing with that water magic of yours, the fact you were helping against the birds didn't really register to me next to the sheer… mind-blowing nature of what you were doing! Honestly I'm still half convinced that I've imagined this whole thing and haven't seen some girl turn herself to water and back or some guy freeze an entire road solid just by touching it or any of that."
"That doesn't really explain why we were attacked," Gray said impatiently.
"Like I said, these are strange times. And when I first saw you guys the first thing that you're wielding a powerful and totally unknown type of magic and that make you all potentially dangerous individuals. And we're Aurors. It's our duty to make sure that the general public is kept safe from people wielding dangerous magic. Standard procedure would dictate that any individual found wielding magic not recognised and approved by the Ministry should be taken in for questioning. Speaking of which where the hell did you learn to do all that?"
"I learned it because my sister gained Take Over magic by accident," Lisanna replied.
"I learned my Ice Magic from a great Mage who… well, that's not important," Gray muttered, a little bitterly.
"Juvia has always had an aptitude for Water Magic," Juvia replied. "She could use it before she could talk. A bit."
All these explanations just flew over Tonks' head for the most part, and she just stared at the three of them, slightly bemused.
"The Ministry you mentioned…" Gray suddenly interjected. "Is that another word for the Magic Council?"
"Magic Council? You mean the Wizard's Council? There hasn't been a Wizard's Council for over three-hundred years!"
"What!?" all three of them yelled at the same time, making Tonks jump backwards slightly, before Lisanna asked, "What year is it?"
"What year…? It's 1995 of course - surely you ought to know that at least…" Tonks trailed off when she saw the looks on the faces of these strangers only get more bewildered.
"1995?" Juvia asked. "But… last Juvia checked it was the Year X684."
"And the day of the S-Class trials took place on December 16th," Lisanna agreed. "What's the date now?"
"September… 9th, I think…" Tonk murmured. "It's a Monday, if that helps."
But the other three were all staring at each other now, with expressions that didn't seem to know whether they should be horrified or just confused."
"Is it possible that… somehow… we could have travelled through time?" Juvia asked.
"I doubt it," Lisanna grimaced, looking out across the street. "The general architecture of this place doesn't look much different from parts of Fiore… but I saw some differences. Like did you see those cars out there? They were incredibly different to the ones back home. In fact, one of the biggest differences between Earthland and Edolas was its cars, and those were different from both."
"What are you saying, Lisanna?" Gray asked, though he was pretty sure he already knew the answer.
"I'm saying it's entirely possible that we're not on Earthland at all. I think it's extremely possible we could be in another dimension entirely."
Lisanna's words dropped over Gray and Juvia's heads like a proverbial sledgehammer, and even Tonks reeled backwards slightly. These people surely had to be insane - they knew absolutely nothing about anything, their magic was absolutely ludicrous and they seemed to think they came from another universe.
And yet… oddly… that explanation made a whole lot more sense than anything else Tonks had been able to come up with herself.
But the sheer scale of the idea… it was mad. It had to be. There's no way it could be true.
"What's this world called?" Lisanna asked her suddenly. "What's this… this planet called?"
"Um… Earth…" Tonks said slowly.
"Just Earth? Not Earthland?"
"No, just Earth. I've always thought it was a stupid name for a planet but that's what it's called."
"Well, I suppose that might explain why that Jarvey thing told us we actually were still on Earthland. He must have assumed that we meant something more literal… like the land of Earth maybe."
"Assuming he wasn't just saying that to mess with us," Gray ran a hand over his face.
"Well… what do we do now?" Juvia fretted. "What about all our friends?"
But neither Gray nor Lisanna had any answers and Juvia knew they didn't before she even asked.
Tonks watched the three of them seem to draw closer together and her bewildered face softened slightly. Now she was seeing them in an entirely different light. They no longer looked like the tough, skilled fighters that she'd seen them being before they ducked into this alleyway. Now they all just looked like scared children, despair creeping into their faces. And she felt her heart going out to them. A large part of them still thought they were totally out of their tree but… they didn't look it.
They were just so… lost…
Now what the heck was she supposed to do?
Before she could answer that question, Juvia suddenly turned and prompted her. "What's you're name, Stranger-san?"
"My name? It's N… Tonks. Just call me Tonks."
"Tonks-san… please, can you help us?" Juvia asked imploringly. "If what Juvia and her friends believe is true and we are really in a different world to the one we grew up in, then we have nowhere to go. No home to go back to. But we do have friends that could be out there somewhere. Friends that are just as lost and confused as we are… is there anything that Tonks-san can do to help us?"
"Er…" Tonks hesitated, glancing at the others to see Lisanna looking at her almost equally pleadingly and Gray looking slightly dubious, quite clearly indicating he didn't believe she'd grant Juvia's request. "Well, look, I really should take you in for questioning."
"No chance," Gray growled slightly. "I've been to an alternate universe before, and I've seen the kind of things people in power can do when they get hold of people with magic they don't possess themselves. I'm not going anywhere where I could be poked and prodded and magically experimented on."
"Gray-sama… they might try and help us…" Juvia pointed out.
"Forget it," Gray shook his head. "I don't want anything to do with this Ministry place."
"I'm inclined to agree," Lisanna murmured. "At least for now. I want to at least find out more about this place and this Ministry first. Please Miss… can't you just let us go if nothing else?"
Tonks hesitated slightly, knowing that doing just that would violate several rules of being an Auror… but then again, she was already doing that, wasn't she? Her own cousin, Sirius Black, was wanted for horrendous crimes that he hadn't even committed and Tonks knew exactly where he was and was not turning him in.
These people had committed no crimes either… and she had to agree with the shirtless man's assessment. What would happen if Ministry officials learned what this lot could do?
...
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