Chapter Text
"Mr…Mr Moody?"
Alastor sighs into his gritty, half-cold, tarmac coffee. The sip dies at his mouth and he places the mug down with all the threadbare patience of a man with one leg, one eye, and zero fucks left to give.
"Weasley?" he growls. "Come in."
Arthur Weasley, the fourth in a convoy of long-suffering assistants, shuffles into the room. He holds an armful of ring binders, his glasses askew and halfway down his nose. While the poor man still looks nervous, Moody notes with displeasure that in the last two months or so he has learned to stop trembling at the sight of him. Perhaps he’s going soft.
"Well, spit it out, boy. Some of us have parties to get to."
"The - the focus group results are in, sir."
Arthur deposits the ring binders on the chair in front of Moody’s desk, noting that there’s no flat space anywhere on the wooden surface on which such a tower might be placed. Moody’s depth perception isn’t excellent, what with the singular eye and all, but he thinks that with a little more effort Arthur might have elbowed his way in through the explosion of papers and wires and half mouldy crockery from the catering vans to find a spot. Alastor himself would have probably plonked them on the keyboard, after giving it a bit of a wipe, of course — he has long suspected the bacterial colony below the space bar is a survivor of Y2K.
Below the obelisk of folders, Arthur wears a hand knitted purple jumper with a creature that might be a deformed horse on it, and a string of tinsel around his neck.
"It’s a reindeer, sir," he says sheepishly.
"I didn’t ask."
"It’s my wife, you see, she’s just learning a new stitch —"
"So this focus group." Moody holds out a hand expectantly and Arthur hands him a single sheet of paper.
"Lots of very good news, Mr Moody, it’s very popular you know, very funny and informative. I mean of course, the viewing figures speak for themselves, even people who don’t like cars seem to like it. You know, my wife—"
"The viewing figures aren’t. Growing. Quickly. Enough," Moody grumbles in the staccato tone he adopts when he’s particularly stressed and in need of a cigarette. He scans the document quickly, his frown deep enough to cause a bead of sweat to form at Arthur Weasley’s ginger temple. "What’s this about Potter and Black?" he barks.
The trembling is back.
"Well, you see, everybody loves them sir, as we all know, very good dynamic, great chemistry, very funny, there was just—"
"Just?!"
"W-well, there was a bit of a theme coming through that perhaps they are a little — chaotic. And posh." Arthur seems to consider this, watching Moody carefully for sudden movements.
"Posh. Chaotic." Alastor repeats. He wonders if there’s a neon sign outside his office door offering a blowjob to the person who can induce the largest headache response in him. If so, he reckons the prize can be shared between the two posh, chaotic presenters of his motoring-themed television programme. With the agony they’ve induced, they’ve earned themselves a great night out.
"There was one comment, well a few actually, that pointed towards — well, perhaps that the show would benefit from a kind of….everyman character. Someone who could, you know, act as a bit of a ballast. Perhaps someone who didn’t grow up…."
"…learning how to piss in a top hat and tails?! Yes. Yes, that might fucking help." The latter he mutters under his breath. "Thanks Weasley. You can go. That doesn’t look like a fucking reindeer."
Arthur’s eyes widen in gratitude at having his flight response so easily accommodated and he backs, slowly, out of the room.
The door closes with a click, and Moody sinks back into his chair, his prosthetic leg propped on the overflowing wastepaper basket. It’s stagnant in the room, and cold. Most television executives have a far superior set-up to this one — in the city, probably without the tin roof and an invasion of suspicious leaks and a grimy portaloo for a toilet. Most television executives have thin, modern computers, and tidy indoor plants, and a desk treadmill so they can ‘get their steps in’ while they take calls. Most television executives are happier miles away from the sets they are responsible for.
Alastor Moody is not your typical television executive. Eccentric has been used to describe him and his singular vision of the world, but Moody prefers the epithet coined by the Times in their review of Series 1. They’d called it his ‘mad eye’.
The thought brings an amused grimace to his lips and he takes a gulp of his cold coffee, which now tastes more like petrol than tarmac. The window fails to allow any warmth from the winter sunlight to penetrate its grime, but slender watery rays cut through the blinds and illuminate a collage of posters and newspaper clippings on the far wall. There’s a large one which draws his eye, its corners curled like fern fronds, battling the grip of yellowing sellotape.
They had based it loosely on a Trainspotting poster— the one where the girl snarls and leans in close to the photographer, and that ginger Scot stands with his arms crossed in the background. In their version, Sirius Black leans into the camera wearing his sleekest leather jacket, one eyebrow raised. Fucking Black — handsome bastard, no doubt about it— peers into the lens like you’ve asked him for his girlfriend’s number and he knows you’re not worth the punch he’d throw to set you right. In the midground, James Potter stands with one hand in his birds nest hair and the other tucked in the pocket of an American varsity jacket, his head thrown back in a jubilant laugh.
Between them, behind them, surrounding them, are a sea of beautiful, polished cars — all featured on that initial series. Moody smirks at his crowning jewel: a 2011 Bugatti Veyron 16.4 Super Sport, sleek and charcoal black, grille assembly trimmed orange. Above, the title, white font against that same orange: FULL THROTTLE.
It’s a tiger, it’s a panther, it’s a statement. It’s speed and drama and flair — and of course it’s chaos, he thinks grimly. That’s what the bloody show is. Posh or not, he knew what he was doing when he picked Potter and Black. Nobody chooses television presenters on whether they’d be nice to take to church on Sunday, and these boys could turn your grandmother’s wake into Glastonbury. Their fizzling, light-hearted, slightly absurd British-schoolboy chemistry is matchless. They are young and good-looking, smart, largely unproblematic, and — importantly for Moody — they both fucking love cars.
It’s magic. And that magic — well, it’s a delicate thing. It’s balanced, carefully. There is no telling what throwing an an unknown third entity into the mix will do.
It rankles Moody that a show that he has made, that made him, will have its fate dictated by a focus group. And yet he has been in the business long enough to know that, with these results and these viewing figures, the higher-ups will need to see changes made. Fast.
Alastor frowns at the poster now, brow furrowed. Sometimes, he thinks he can feel his mind churn through the motions when the key is turned — starter relay, starter motor, fuel introduced to spark in the cylinders— and so an old, decrepit engine grinds to life.
Gruffly clearing his throat, imagining the Christmas party will need to wait a little longer to ensure they get another one next year, he picks up the phone.
*
For months, Moody tries.
It’s phonecall after phonecall, meeting upon meeting, one glazed-over pleasantry following another. Never a man for buttering up his peers, superiors, or inferiors, it’s not a task Moody particularly relishes, so he leaves a lot of the more smooth-talking aspects of negotiations to his protegee, Dearborn. The long list of potential third presenters that he, Dearborn, and Weasley had drawn up on a pub napkin on Boxing Day has been thoroughly decimated by scheduling problems, existing contracts, creative differences and, in one instance, finding out the optioned presenter had been dead for four years. Once Moody had brought Potter and Black into the evaluation process, running auditions for a few potential co-hosts, the reasons given for removing people from the shortlist had become more and more obscure, from ‘poor dental hygiene’ to ‘genuinely appalling vibes.’
It seems as though no-one quite cuts the mustard for the pair of them. Moody had known there would be some friction in breaking the news— and Black had very much looked like he wanted to punch something— but after a while they’d accepted it, resigned. There had been a few options Moody had felt were promising — a radio DJ with a bright, sunny disposition, an ex-columnist at Auto-Express — but they’d been dismissed by Potter and Black as ’Try-Hard’ and ‘Snoozefest’ respectively.
Moody had been sympathetic to a point, even silently agreeing that he’d prefer to keep Full Throttle as-is. But Moody is also a pragmatist, and it had been made clear to him by the higher-ups that they either find a third presenter by May 1, or they will make the decision for him.
Moody had been drinking 2 full pots of filter coffee a day before he was given this ultimatum. Following the ultimatum, it went up to 3. Upon discovering to whom the powers-that-be intended to offer the new co-host position when Moody failed, he had given up the ghost and pulled the bottle of Talisker from his desk drawer.
Time ticks on, and through it all Moody still has a show to run. The phonecalls and meetings and pleasantries continue to build and build — sawn-off bricks of time that don’t get anywhere close to breaking the glass of his problem. To say he’s losing sleep over it would be an understatement — he lives on the ratty couch in his office, thinking he might sleep more soundly under enemy shelling — and his behaviour when he does get into his quiet, empty home in the evenings is nothing short of deranged. Already someone with a thin tether to reality, he’s aware that the mask is slipping: Weasley does nothing but tremble around him; Dearborn has asked if he’s familiar with the therapeutic effects of whale sounds; and he suspects that his favourite production co-ordinator, Evans, has done a sweep to remove all sharp objects from his vicinity.
By Mid-March, there’s plans to both wrap the filming of Series 2 and introduce the new presenter by recording a series special at the Surrey aerodrome, the de-facto studio which houses Moody’s office. No closer to finding a third presenter both he, Potter, and Black are happy with, the timeline is a gun pressed to Moody’s temple. Thus, it is with a sense of doom and resignation that Alastor invites the BBC’s choice to the set.
Gilderoy Lockhart, British television’s travel show darling, shows up to the aerodrome in a Flugplatz blue Aston Martin Vantage. Moody admits this is promising.
He also shows up five hours late. Less promising.
When Lockhart opens his mouth, Moody wonders if anyone has ever designed a person more capable of destroying his dreams; he mourns the show he has built before it’s in the ground
"I thought the new one had to be less posh?" Dearborn asks him under his breath, hands deep in his long wool coat and very unimpressed. He’s travelled from London especially for the occasion. "I’ve not seen many of his travel shows, but I saw a bit of the one in the Balkans. Lockhart makes Prince Harry sound like Danny Dyer."
"Born in a council house in Wigan, if you believe," Moody mutters.
"My word. Good on paper at least… if not on screen." Dearborn eyes Lockhart critically, lips pursed as he watches the hapless presenter attempt to prey upon Sally from the hair and make up team. Moody has always admired Dearborn’s ability to be businesslike in a crisis. "Have Potter and Black—"
Moody silences him with a look. Dearborn quirks an eyebrow, but nods slowly in acknowledgement.
They both turn to watch as Sally stamps, hard, on Lockhart’s foot.
"There’s to be a party later," Dearborn hums over Lockhart’s whistle-tone cry.
"Oh?" Moody almost never hears of parties, aside from the Christmas one, as a result of the intimidating atmosphere he’s cultivated around himself. It has never occurred to him that this is anything other than a blessing — he has his sources for workplace gossip. Anything he needs to know, he knows, or he knows who he needs to bollock to find out.
"Yes, it’s Potter’s birthday at the end of the month. He’s having a joint celebration with one of the researchers."
"I see."
Gilderoy hops up and down on one leg, and cries out for first aid. Neither Dearborn or Moody move.
They swap a look, a look that - without being too obvious - acknowledges how fucked they are.
"Happy Birthday, Potter," Moody grumbles.
*
Walking into the party venue — one of the larger indoor spaces at the aerodrome — Moody’s first thought is: who the fuck is paying for this?
There’s buckets and barrels of beer and booze, a cocktail stall, a Photo Booth, and a long buffet table hosting several covered dishes, the silver ones that look like turtles. The whole place smells like curry, and harried caterers dart about among the gathered crew bearing canapés and Prosecco flutes. A tall blonde woman Moody has never seen before in his life has set up a DJ booth in the corner, and there’s an impressive array of lighting rigging that one of the crew must have seen to—the little guy from editing that tails Potter and Black fiddles with a large disco ball.
Red and gold bunting and balloons hang from the ceiling, and there’s a large banner proclaiming ‘HAPPY BIRTHDAY DICKHEADS!’, but the piece de resistance is undoubtedly a monstrous pyramidal cake which occupies the far centre of the room, sitting on a small plinth above the floor. One side of the cake is decorated with rugby balls, the Arsenal logo, deer antlers, and the word PRONGS - and the other side reads MOONY, surrounded by crescent moons and the old Formula 1 logo with the red spikes.
"Such a shame that Sirius can’t be here, after all the effort he put in," Sally from make-up sighs, talking to her assistant and moving past Moody to pick up a beer from the iced tub. "It’s all he’s been talking about for weeks…"
Caradoc and Alastor swap a look. Moody looks at the cake again with narrowed eyes.
A great cheer goes up when Potter enters, tailed by a tall, gangly sort of fellow in a brown jumper, who leans a little on a cane to help him walk. They both look around the room — Potter thrilled, both hands in his birds-nest hair — and the other one shakes his head, smiling, which makes him look less plain. The short chap from editing — what’s his name? Percy? Paul? — shushes the crowd fussily when they begin to sing happy birthday, and sticks a microphone under Potter’s nose.
"Ha— all right, steady on, Pete — hello, everyone! Fuck, is all this for us? This is outrageous, truly..."
Moody watches closely as editing-Pete guides both of them closer and closer to the cake. Instinctively, Moody navigates himself away from it.
"….look at this thing — oh hell, Moony, how are we going to eat all this? You guy’s’ll need to help us — Sharon, I see you over there, don’t give me that look, I remember the last time I fought you for a bite of cake, ya cheeky minx — No, but really, thank you all for being here, thank you all for staying on after time, and thank you for a great series so far! On to the next one soon!"
A great cheer goes up throughout the hall.
"Moony, do you have anything to add?"
"Just, thank you everyone - this is very kind. Especially the banner."
"Well, if that's all... let’s have a great fuckin’ party!"
The blonde at the DJ booth starts to sing, and the tune is quickly picked up by the remainder of the room. "Happy Birthday to you...happy birthday to you…!"
It’s quite wholesome, really. Even Moody, never one for merriment, breaks out his strong baritone to balance out the lower octaves. Dearborn blinks at him in surprise.
Editing-Pete pulls the lights, aside from those pointed at Potter, the brown-jumpered man, and the cake.
A very recognisable voice, sounding both a little magnified and muffled, joins in. "Happy Birthday Prongsie-and-Moony—"
"Oh, fucking hell—" Brown-jumper says, pulling Potter away from the cake. But it’s far, far too late.
BANG!
There’s cake everywhere.
"HAPPY BIRTHDAY TO YOOOOOU!"
"YOU FUCKING TIT! YOU GREAT WANKSTAIN SIRIUS BLACK!"
Black, cackling and covered in sponge, emerges from the inside of the great exploded cake and is immediately rugby tackled to the ground by Potter. Those otherwise closest to ground zero seem to see the funny side, especially when Editing-Pete sweeps in proffering napkins and baby wipes. The DJ helps by playing Earth, Wind, and Fire, a neat distraction for the rest.
But it’s brown-jumper Moody watches with a furrowed brow.
You see, typically there’d be no hope or dignity for anyone caught in the crossfire of Black-and-Potter tomfoolery. However, brown-jumper looks remarkably unfazed, despite being ravaged by jam and having to navigate a sticky floor and two wrestling idiots with a cane. With interest, and no small amount of satisfaction, Moody watches brown-jumper use said cane to thwack Black pointedly over the head. Then, he takes advantage of Black’s loosened grip on Potter to wedge a foot in between them, separating them further.
"Enough," brown-jumper says, eyebrow arched sternly down at them, smeared with sugar and gristly confectionary. His lip twitches.
To his astonishment, Moody’s two moron presenters look up from the floor, contrite.
"Who’s the kid?" Moody asks Arthur. "The one they’re calling Moony?"
"That’s Remus Lupin," he says cheerfully, nursing a bottle of beer and discreetly pulling icing from his red hair. He pours Moody a plastic cup of blood-orange, violently alcoholic punch. "Lovely fellow. A researcher on the team. Wrote for Potter and Black’s channel, before you brought them on."
Ahh, yes. Moody remembers now. The stipulation in their original contract — where we go, Lupin goes. That had been an impertinence, of course. Potter and Black hadn’t been big names at the time, and a talent for journalism and a successful YouTube grift doesn’t count for much in negotiations with the most archaic public broadcaster in Western Europe. But Moody had been shown some of the articles Lupin had written for their website, and had been sufficiently impressed to let it go.
So this is that kid. Interesting.
"Good friends with Potter and Black?" he asks, accepting the punch with a gruff noise that’s intended to mean thank you, Arthur, but instead conveys more of a ta, prick.
Arthur brims with pleasure at being grunted at with such equanimity. "Oh, yes, thick as thieves, they all went to school together, you know. There’s another of them on the set, too, Peter Pettigrew from the editing suite, pours an absolutely lethal gin and tonic —"
"Kid doesn’t sound like he’s from money," Moody says, remembering Lupin’s thick Welsh accent as he said, thank you, and enough. Not that you can’t be a posh twat if you’re from Wales, of course, but Moody works in television, where stereotypes reign supreme. Whether or not Lupin grew up holidaying in the South of France, and whether or not Moody agrees with any of this xenophobic, classist shit, he sounds like his mother spent his childhood washing coal dust and sheep poo out of tattered, lyrical, Dylan-Thomas breeches.
"Oh, well I’m afraid I wouldn’t know about that sort of thing, but he’s always been very pleasant to me. Then again, he does call it tea instead of dinner, and my wife always says —"
Moody is fed up of Arthur’s wife. "Evans!"
His production co-ordinator turns to him with her eyebrows raised and a pair of sparkling star-shaped party glasses on her face, less alarmed than others might be at being barked at thusly by their notoriously unhinged boss. He notes that she is free of any cake contamination. "You went to school with that lot, didn’t you?"
She grimaces into her wine. "Please don’t tell me it’s obvious."
"Do you know this Lupin kid?"
"Remus?" A fond smile unspools across her face. "Of course. Best of them all."
"He from money?"
It’s at this point that Dearborn — who had previously been squinting at the scene with his typical cool, corporate detachment — eyes him quizzically. It’s not a businesslike look. It’s a rare personal look. This personal look says, you can’t be serious.
"Not at all," she says. "We were two of four scholarship students in the year. Marlene was one too — the DJ, over there."
"Does he know cars? Drive?"
Dearborn shuffles on his feet. Clears his throat. Moody sends him his own personal look.
It says: Remember Lockhart? Buckle in.
"Better than the other two," she says, then pauses slightly, frowning, as if she’s wondering how much to say.
Moody enjoys a good pause. He likes seeing how the other person ends it.
Finally she admits, with a slight shrug as if to say what could it hurt?: "Remus used to race semi-professionally."
Ahh. And yet he’s not from money? Moody doesn’t need to look at Dearborn to know that he’s got his phone out to do some digging. That’s the wonderful thing about his counterpart: always taking the initiative, whether he agrees with the game Moody is playing or not. But there are other questions, too.
"Oh, yes, there was something about that, wasn’t there?" Arthur hums. "Molly —"
"You, girl!" Moody barks at Sally’s assistant from the make-up tent. By the height she jumps in the air at his voice, England have lost out on a world-class athlete. "Are you straight?"
Evans’s eyes widen in shock. Dearborn pauses his frantic phone wrangling to glare, exasperated, somewhere in the middle-distance. Arthur hovers awkwardly, his mouth full of salvaged birthday cake.
The girl, who Moody remembers is called Carly, seems baffled. "Erm…"
"Good God, girl. It’s a straightforward question. Are you a lesbian?"
"Not all the time?" she chokes out. "I— I have a boyfriend."
"That’ll do." Moody gestures to Lupin with his chin. "Yay or nay?"
The girl — Carly — blushes furiously.
"You don’t have to answer that." Evans reassures her, touching her on the upper arm. She frowns at Moody suspiciously, like she’s imagining testifying against him in a court of law. Moody glowers in return, but Evans’s glare doesn’t let up. Brave girl.
"Y-yay," Carly says.
"Even with the cane?"
Evans bristles, eyes flashing. "I don’t see why that would —"
"That’s why I didn’t ask you, Evans. Bias!" he barks. "Go on," he adds, softening his tone in an attempt to be encouraging. The girl is so red she’s almost purple— Moody doesn’t want her to reach blue.
"Y— yes. Still. Well, I mean everyone fancies Black and Potter, but Remus is— he seems quieter, he’s smart. He’s sweet. A bit — well the girls say he’s quite mysterious."
Moody nods slowly, feeling those clunks and hums begin to build in his mind as the cylinders ignite. For the first time in weeks, Moody sees the fuel stop on the horizon. For the first time in weeks, he might manage to fall asleep without the whale sounds.
This could work.
Dearborn might be against it now, but Alastor knows he won’t be a hard sell if that background check comes back clean, and Lupin does passably well in interview and audition. With Dearborn’s help, convincing the higher-ups should be as easy as showing Lupin’s tapes and discrediting Lockhart. Moody can frame him as too expensive, too established, better suited to something cushy…a Bake-Off presenter role, yes. And finally, he will outline the marketing ploy that his quick-spark brain is already working through: Black for the cheeky blondes, Potter for the vivacious brunettes, and Remus for the bookish wallflowers and those who like the underdog. Black is the bloke in Wayfarers and leather that every man wants to be, Potter is your best pal at the boozer, and Lupin is….well, he’s the tweed suit. For the nerds.
There’s the small fact of whether Lupin can do well in audition… but Moody watches him shrewdly as he confidently commandeers Potter and Black to help clean up the appalling mess they’ve made with the cake. Lupin fixes Black with a half-amused, half-disapproving stare, holding out a mop to him, and mutters something. Black throws back his head and howls with laughter — from the floor, Potter joins in.
There’s just something about the kid. About the three of them together, in fact.
Moody allows a smile to cross his face. The expression sits on his face with unfamiliarity, a butterfly tentatively coming to rest on Chernobyl’s Elephant’s Foot.
"Are…are you quite all right, Mr Moody?" Evans peers at him, hesitantly.
He watches Lupin’s laughing, half-handsome face disappear beneath Black’s elbow as he and Potter wrestle him, cane in the air, to the mucky ground.
"Evans, I think we’re all going to be just fine."