It doesn't make any kind of sense at all. Astrella said as she let her feet lead her slowly to her next destination. She had locked herself in the confines of the department of mysteries since she'd woken up two weeks ago in her flat, no clue of what had happened with the spell she'd been working on with the other Unspeakables. She sighed and finally took notice to the place her feet were leading her to. The clicking of her heels were echoing through the halls. Astrella dressed as she usually did for work; simple black dress pants with a white blouse. Though, the blouse she'd dawned on that morning was slightly different than the regular button down ones she always wore. It was short sleeved.

She pushed opened the doors to the cafeteria, surprised that that her feet lead her there. Perhaps her stomach was hungrier than she had anticipated. Come to think of it, she hadn't eaten that day, and it was well past noon. She pulled her hair back into a pony tail, a few stray strands cascading infront of her ears, her bangs sweeping across her forehead to the right.

Astrella couldn't recall anything that had happened for months, at least not any specific details. She couldn't remember what had happened with the curse, or Logan, or Garrow. She hadn't seen either and assumed the worse. How she had managed not to scumb to the same fate that the two men had, she had no clue but counted herself lucky no less. Astrella sat at the table nearest to the door, not even bothering to see if anyone else was in the room with her.

Ari sighed, pushing her hair out of her face. Her quill was dangling idly from one hand, a small blotch of ink dripping onto the napkin. The muffin on the napkin had long been eaten and Ari was left with no way to distract herself from what she was supposed to be doing.

The Minister wanted her to write a speech on a bridge. She had thought it odd to begin with, considering bridges were normally not the Minster of Magic's affairs. But snce he wanted a speech on a bridge, Ari had to give him a speech on a bridge. So she had started researching only to find there wasn't even a bridge planned there!

So Arista had come down to the cafeteria to think and pre-write. Of course, it was lunch so she had bought a muffin to tide her over. All of her papers and trashed copies were scattered about the table leaving it quite messy.

Just as she got an idea someone sat down, causing some of Arista's papers to fly. She looked up to collect them and also see if she knew the person. It was Astrella from Hogwarts. They didn't run into each other often and they hadn't exactly always been friendly but today Arista needed the distraction.

"How goes it today?"

To her blatant surprise, Astrella had managed to land a table that was not only occupied, but covered with stray papers, some balled up, some written on. And as she'd just decided to dump herself on her seat, it caused a few papers to fly everywhere. Already making a new mess of things. A small voice criticized herself. It was the same voice that had finally told her that what she had embarked on several months ago, nearly a year, was wrong and that the fourth unforgivable was inhumane. For so long the voice had been dormant, and Astrella forced the voice back into dormancy; the last thing she needed with everything was a smart ass conscience.

Astrella made a hasty apology for the stray papers, but didn't bother to pick them up, obviously the owner had no care for the balled up ones Astrella had sent flying. With a question about how it was, Astrella finally focused on the person sitting at the table. The face was familiar, not a very familiar one, but she racked her brain to fit the face. In a few moments she'd managed to place a name with her face. Arista....Searborne. When did she work for the Ministry? She thought. Then she remembered with a mental slap.

The question had brought Astrella out of her daze and she gaze Arista a half sad smile. "It goes." She said, shrugging her shoulders. "I can't complain that much though." Astrella said. Being an Unspeakable, she both loved and hated the fact that she couldn't talk about her job. She didn't have people down her throat, half the time that is, and she didn't have to answer unnerving questions about what she did. But that also made it harder to find out what happened to the curse Garrow had forced she and Logan to work on. She hadn't seen either and no one seemed to be talking about them. At least, no one she had ran into as of late. Asking around would most likely cause one too many questions to be raised, so she just sat back and watched. She would figure out what happened in do time...She hoped.

In the few moments she had been lost in her mind's wondering, she turned her attention back to Arista. "What about you?" It had been a while since she had any real company other than...accomplices, for want of a better word.

Arista looked at the girl, trying to figure out if she was being secretive on purpose or if Astrella was being honest. It was one thing to be honest and say you couldn't complain but if Astrella was hiding something... With a jolt, Arista was taken from her previous train of thought when she remembered that the fellow Hogwarts pupil was one the level that everyone said no one spoke about. "I suppose it's nice - not having to make up some stupid answer to the question. If I remember right your level isn't allowed to talk about the work anyway." It was more of a question then a statement though a simple head nod or shake would confirm what Arista already thought was true.

"I'm doing okay. I thought the Minister wanted me to write a speech for him, but now I'm seeing it might have been a joke. Apparently, which it didn't make sense until now, but the Minister writes his own speeches." Arista shrugged and put some of the papers from in front of Astrella into a neat pile. "Wish someone would have told me considering I'm the speechwriter to the Minister." Arista shook her head, sighing. She did honestly wish someone would have told her. She was good at speeches and when it inevitably came down to it, she was probably better at writing them than any of the previous ministers were at writing them themselves. It was something about crafting a message that Arista could do, and well.

"How long have you been working here again? I can't remember if you came right after Hogwarts or if you decided to take a year off like so many of the rest of us decided to do."

Not at Arista's expense, Astrella let out a light chuckle. The Minister. She couldn't say she was on speaking terms with him, or knew much about him. Shacklebot she'd once or twice had a conversation with, but other than that she seldom surfaced at work. She then nodded to answer Arista's question. She couldn't really talk about what she was doing with work.

"I'm sorry. Though I'm sure you'll be of use. Things can get pretty busy and the Minister may not have enough time on his hands to compose a decent shopping list, let along an attention grabbing speech." Why was she being nice? The Slytherin in her was yelling at her to just get up and go to some pub, preferably an isolated one, and drown out any good conscience she may have with some alcohol. She normally didn't take to trying to sooth other's ruffled feathers. But, she was out of her mind lately.

"I took an internship right out of Hogwarts. Loved studying and the unknown and unspoken." At school she had kept to herself. She hadn't told Arista that she isolated herself from her family, after her mother's death, and getting into the Ministry was far away from her father; the only family she had ever been around. "A year off seemed very unappealing to me." Not to mention her best friend's had a great boyfriend, wanted to start a family, only to have their lives ended.

"And if I took a year off, I thought something may happen. I was very paranoid back then." Very secretive. A Slytherin through and through.

Arista smiled, feeling bad for complaining, though she didn't show it. She was generally a smiling person - that was just who she was. "I didn't mean to make it sound like you had to fix it. I know it'll all work out in the end. I might end up as a researcher which would be fine." Again Arista shrugged. "What'll happen will happen and I'll handle it when it happens."

"I suppose it all depends on what you wanted. I needed the year off. Spent it with my father's family in Greece. However, you seem to have done fine without it." Arista finished piling the papers together. "As for paranoia.... weren't most people? Especially the Hufflepuffs. They didn't seem to understand the world wasn't ending the moment they stepped out of Hogwarts." Arista finished with a chuckle.

"Read any good books lately? I've been looking for a good one and since most of my co-workers read the same thing, maybe you would have a suggestion?" Arista asked. "I mean, if that's not intrusive."

"Its fine." Grasping this momentarily laps of who she was, she decided to take advantage of it. Many people had called her cold, uncaring, and just so isolated from everyone. Like some foreign island.

A laugh escaped her lips. It was true, the Hufflepuff's were the ones she felt sorry for. Not that she'd gotten along with most of them. "I think, what with Voldemort, everyone had been terrified. And after what happened last year..." She let her voice trail off, not wanting to complete the thought that had been forming out of her lips. She prefered to remain in a blissful ignorance for the next few moments, if only.

Almost taken aback by the question, Astrella thought about it. "The last book I read was A Tea Rose by Jennifer Donnelly." She said, and that book she had almost a year or so ago. The last book book she had read were many on Dark Magic and whatnot. "And I'm afraid I don't recall what happend throughout most of it." Her memory was shot.

"Yeah, I think everyone was terrified of Voldemort when the war was going on - although I was still pretty young when the war ended. It seems weird- I don't think of myself as young but yet we haven't experienced, well at least I haven't, half of the things are grandparents have."

Astrella recommended a book and Arista had the slight feeling she was being lied to. However, when was the last time Arista had read a book not related to work that she would recommend to someone anyway? "Jennifer Donnely - she wrote A Northern Light right? Good though somewhat haunting book. I'll have to look at it." She smiled, glancing at the clock. "I should get back to work. It's been...well, you weren't huge on sentiments, but it was nice to talk for a bit."

Arista picked up the stack of papers, standing up. "I'll see you around then I suppose."

"True." Astrella agreed with her. Astrella, though young really, never saw herself as she saw others. All the others had wanted comfort, a home, Astrella wanted to know the unknown.

Astrella nodded. A Tea Rose, she remembered, had captivated her from page one. She liked the main characters, and the story. It was Historically accurate with the late 1880's London, and with Jack the Ripper. Astrella found it very intruiging, from what she could remember.

"Likewise." Astrella said, when Arista made to move from the table and return to work.

Work. Astrella wondered what she, herself, would return to. What work was there to be done? That, she thought unsettlingly, she had no clue about.