hamelin-born asked: Oh, my heart - imagine Grindelwald screaming "How dare you defy me! I'm your father!" at the Scamander twins during the Big Boss Battle. "You are not our father - " Theseus begins, the wand in his hand glowing like the sun. "You were never our father." Newt finishes, hand clasped around his brother's, and together, they let the spell fly.
HAHAHAHAHAHA, TAKE THAT, GRINDELSTANK!
On another note, how much do you want to bet that when he had them captive, Grindelwald would punish the Scamander twins by separating them if one of them “acted out?” Like, “I’m being generous and indulgent letting you two stay together, but if you’re going to act like this….”
He would. Grindelwald probably wouldn’t bother torturing them physically anymore - physical punishment (torture) is easy, physical pain is something that’s - rather impersonal, when all is said and done. What he wants is to break the twins - break them, and reshape them into what he thinks proper wizards should be. Thus, the mind games - the regular visits when he refused to leave until one of the twins gritted their teeth and called him ‘father’, the deliberate, cruel separations - stunning one of the twins and dragging him out while the other screamed and cried and begged, imagining - everything that might be happening to them.
Whenever Theseus was dragged out of the cell, Newt essentially collapsed. It frightened Graves - and he found himself doing his best to awkwardly comfort the younger Scamander, only to find Newt clinging desperately to him. It was the beginning of - whatever started to grow between them.
On a side note of my own, how impressed do you think Graves was when their prison was relocated from Nurmengard to Newt’s case? It’s - no small thing, to see the sunlight after months without, to see magical creatures - untameable, by all accounts - practically dog-piling his sort-of boyfriend in their desperation to see that he was okay. It’s something else entirely to see Newt in his element - confidently taking care of his creatures, carefully checking each one to make sure that they’re okay…
Exactly. (What do you want to bet that they have an alarm system set up that alerts them to when Grindelwald was coming. Not Frank. I’ve kinda changed the timeline a little bit so that the mass-Oblivate has happened sans Jacob forgetting). And oh, Newt. And Theseus, Theseus fucking howls and never fails to try and beat the door open to get to Newt whenever Grindelwald takes Newt. The first time he nearly beat his hands raw before Graves was able to drag him away. (In some ways, it’s worse when Newt is taken. Graves and Theseus are both Aurors who’ve been trained to handle this kind of shit; Newt isn’t. He’s used to dealing with poachers. Not Dark Lords. Not to mention the animals go nuts whenever their Mummy is taken (because they know he didn’t want to leave, that that Bad Human stole him, give Mummy back, give Mummy back…) after he calms down Theseus, Graves then has to go calm down all the animals too).
And yes, I imagine that Newt’s case was much, much better after months of being cooped up in Nurmengard. And, yes, Newt being dogpiled and then checking on all his babies.
This marks the beginning of the Scamander brothers’ nearly codependent interactions with Graves - Graves should not have to put up with this. After all, he’s already traumatized from several months of torture and imprisonment, thank you very much - he should not have to play nursemaid, friend, and guardian to two very stubborn twins. At the same time - Graves is an Auror. Taking care of other people, being the shield between them and the darkness - it’s what he does. And, if he can fulfill that purpose by helping the two men who share his cell - he’s going to do it, and give it his all.
And yet another reason for the extremely intensive training that Theseus and Graves cram Newt through. This is - this is something they can do, something that might possibly help him on those too-frequent occasions when he’s ripped, screaming, from the comfort of their arms. And the training itself is - something to do. Some way to feel that they’re being proactive, that they’re not just - waiting, for the next time their joint tormentor comes for them, smile too wide and eyes too dark.
And they totally have an alarm system set up, thanks in part to Newt’s spare wand. I headcanon that Grindelwald missed it when he was casing the case because it has a shiny polish, and the Niffler tends to keep it buried in his nest. (Theseus spoils the Niffler outrageously afterwards. “Good Niffler”, he croons, while Graves looks on in bemusement and Newt looks on in approval - finally, someone else who comprehends the true value of the Niffler!)
Poor Graves. At least know that they would do the same for you? And probably are. (Graves wants, so badly, to be able to help during those times. To take whichever twin is being taken away’s place; he’s experienced the “joys” of Grindelwald’s company, he can fucking handle it. But this is not Graves’ lesson to learn, according to Grindelwald, and there is nothing he can do but pick up the pieces).
What do you want to bet that whenever they are reunited after one of these torments, that Newt and Theseus just launch themselves at each other and can’t stand to be separated for several days after. (By the by, what do you think Grindelwald does to whatever twin he has his hands on during these periods; not physical torture, no, he doesn’t really want to hurt his sons, but he needs to bring them to heel).
Pfft, that part with the wand and the alarm system is perfect. The Niffler is probably puffing up their little chest, all happy. Finally, someone other then Mummy who appreciates their skills and their love of shiny things!
No, physical torture wouldn’t help him attain his goal - namely, to break them to his way of thinking. Mental torture, though… And when augmented by just a little physical pain - yes. That has possibilities. Grindelwald probably talks to them. Rationally. Calmly. Smiling gently, as one might smile as a disobedient child, still ignorant in the ways of the world - he calmly outlines his arguments. Why the muggles should be brought to heel. Why wizards should rule. He’s polite, he’s compelling, he has argument upon argument to back up his statements, filled with objective evidence and logical flow…
He’ll talk about what they’ll do together. What the four of them will accomplish, as a family. How they will lead the charge. How they will rule. Grindelwald will paint a lovely picture of the atrocities that Newt and Theseus will learn to enjoy, what lovely pleasures await them, if only they will kneel…
And when this doesn’t work, well. That’s when he starts with the mental conditioning.
Refusing to let the twin return to their other half until they call him ‘father’. Making them watch movie after movie of muggle/no-maj atrocities. Pointing out the folly of resistance - no one’s coming for you, no one will find you here, this is FOR YOUR OWN GOOD.
Newt usually huddles in on himself in a tight ball, crying silently and shaking his head in wordless negation. Theseus screams, trying to throw himself at Grindelwald, cursing the man nonstop. It always ends the same - with the twin, drawn, worn, pale - stunned and hurled back into their prison.
Ugh, just, ugh to all of this. Of course he would do it this way. He’d make himself seem so reasonable and logical. He’d frame everything so that it made it so that it was the twin who was overreacting. It would be total and complete gaslighting; everything that he is doing, he is doing for their own good. Because he loves them.
(Also that family talk? It makes Newt and Theseus want to puke and is also a reminder that they aren’t the only targets in this, he’s after Professor Dumbledore too, he’s going to do this to Professor Dumbledore too if we don’t find a way to get away (and probably worse considering that it is the two of them that are their parents; Newt and Theseus probably stopped themselves when their minds wandered down that road, it was just too awful to contemplate) and it only strengthens their resolve to fight back with everything they have).
Making them watch those movies about atrocities, though. It probably brings back awful, awful memories of the War and what they went through. Theseus fighting in the trenches, Newt having to order dragons into battle, both of them seeing people (and animals) that they care about die. (Grindelwald doesn’t know it, but doing that is backfiring on him, because the twins know, they know that wizardkind is just as capable of atrocities as muggles/no-majs are. He can’t trick them).
That part of telling them that no one is coming for them, that they’ll never get away, ow ow ow. But what a wonderful thing it is when he is proven wrong. When the ones they love do come for them and manage to get them out.
(When the twin is eventually thrown back in, I just imagine them being immediately enveloped in a hug by their twin and Graves and, just, everyone sleeps in a big cuddle pile for several nights after. Including the animals).
Grindelwald is a master of gaslighting. Also, I wouldn’t be surprised if he’s currently tearing the world apart for every little scrap of information he can get on them, just to drop it in casual conversation - it’s always an unpleasant surprise, and it always leaves the twins off-balance, feeling as if the ground has dropped form between their feet.
About the only solace that Newt and Theseus can find in all this talk of ‘family’ is that Grindelwald seems to be completely ignoring the existence of Mama and Papa Scamander - but really, everything Grindelwald attempts just seems to spur their resolution to fight that much harder. Mention of Professor Dumbledore brings them the resolve to grit their teeth in and endure (at least it’s them, at least it’s just them, and not anyone else they care for, it’s not Professor Dumbledore/Tina/Queenie/GRAVES in this chair…). Mention of the muggle atrocities might spur them into PTSD that is, as you mentioned, prompted by wizarding atrocities - and that helps them piece through Grindelwald’s bullshit.
Honestly, I think that Grindelwald has all but forgotten about Percival Graves right now. He’s only notable in how both of the twins practical cling to him - he’s become one of their few touchstones, and that’s something that Grindelwald is - either saving to use as leverage in future ‘conversations’, or careful not to touch, knowing that it will set Newt and Theseus irrevocably against him. (Probably both, to be honest).
Honestly, I think the cuddle pile is the norm, not the exception. It started as Newt and Theseus clinging, and then they dragged Graves in with them - and then, when they made it into the case, the other animals just started joining in as well.
Newt and Theseus are fully aware of how - irrational they are acting with respect to one another. They’re twins, yes, and they were all but inseparable pre-Hogwarts, but - they were sorted into different Houses. They remained close, but they developed into individuals in their own right. They have separate interests, separate lives, although they still love one another deeply. This - this is a closeness that they’ve seldom let themselves experience in their adult lives, this is them dropping back into the wordless coordination of childhood. They’re clutching to one another for dear life, and they can’t find it in themselves to regret it.
He would. He so would. Every scrap, every bit that he could possibly get his hands on. Things like hobbies they enjoy, favorite meals, childhood incidents, etc, etc. Anything that can and will get them off balance and allow him to further manipulate them.
That must be such a complete and utter relief that he is not mentioning Mama and Papa Scamander. I think that Grindelwald realizes, whatever his personal feelings about them (mostly he regards them as simply pawns that Albus used to hide his children from him, to try and deny him them), if he were to even insinuate anything about their parents, it would, like with Graves, turn the twins irrevocably, completely against him.
And, yeah, I just love making it so that everything that Grindelwald is putting them through just backfires against him and makes them fight harder. They are not letting him win, they are going to beat him, they won’t let him do this to Professor Dumbledore, to Graves, Tina, Queenie, Aberforth, anyone else. They can endure. They’ve done so before.
The cuddle piles probably do become the norm. It’s honestly the only way that Newt and Theseus feel safe at the moment. The animals probably sense that Mummy and Not-Mummy but Like Mummy (that’s how I think they see Theseus; he looks like Mummy and smells kinda like Mummy but isn’t Mummy) are stressed as fuck and try to help by making them feel safer.
It probably irks them like nobody’s business that they’ve been brought back to this, but they need it right now. By Merlin’s Beard, do they need it right now. It’s how they’re surviving.
The meals that get levitated into the case two to three times a day are the twins’ absolute favorites. You mentioned that Grindelwald gave Graves things to keep himself entertained? The twins get things related to their hobbies, their favorite colors, their favorite books – it’s extremely unnerving and off-putting, and they hate it. In some ways, physical torture might be easier then – then this.
…for some reason, I also see Grindelwald looking quizzically at Newt and going ‘Fido? Really?’ Which makes Newt blink a little. It’s a perfectly nice name! It means ‘faithful’! It’s the name of his mother’s favorite hippogryph! What’s wrong with being named ‘Fido’? …it’s probably the most animated that Grindelwald has ever seen Newt; most of the time, his youngest just curls up in a ball and cries.
That absence of a comment about their adopted parents is, in its own way, just as much of a telling threat as it might be otherwise. Grindelwald is tearing their lives apart and trying to use each and every piece of information that he can against them. Everything but their parents. Those, he does not mention. It’s an implicit threat in its own right, it’s the Sword of Damocles, and the Scamander twins are probably sick with dread.
Graves, meanwhile, is silently wondering how this happened to him – he’s in a snuggle pile with his best friend and his love interest, about twenty occamies, a bloody nundu, a half a dozen puffskeins and fwoopers – it’s actually the most comfortable place he’s ever slept.
I don’t think they mind their reacquired closeness. It’s just – strange. They haven’t been like this for a long time; their minds perfectly in synch, working with two sets of hands rather then one, finishing one another’s sentences and seamlessly transitioning between tasks… it’s a dangerous, almost unhealthy co-dependency, and they’re aware of that, but – it’s how they’re managing to endure all this.They just hate that their renewed interactions were instigated by Grindelwald.
…every so often, I see one of the twins declaring it is a ‘rest evening’. They don’t think about Grindelwald, they don’t worry nonstop about their friends and family, they just need to - they need to do something unrelated to this fresh hell. Graves teaches the twins the quickstep; Theseus manages to conjure a movie, Newt recites poetry or coaxes his creatures into putting on a marvelous display…
…..For whatever reason, I got the mental image of Grindelwald actually gently, genuinely smiling at Newt for once with a smile that doesn’t have a hint of maliciousness or pain to come to it in response to Newt’s explanation of his second middle name. He’s actually just content to see Newt happy for once.
And, yes, that was what I was imagining exactly. (What do you want to bet that for some months after, the twins aren’t able to look at those things or eat those foods. Just not right now., they just can’t. It reminds them too much of that time).
Pfft, you know you love it, Graves. Accept it. Accept this is your life now. (It only gets weirder from here, trust me).
Yeah, I don’t think they mind it either, it’s just weird and they hate the situation that brought it about, not the closeness. They gradually wean themselves back to something resembling normal after they manage to escape.
And, yeah, rest evenings are good. Rest evenings are how they manage, in part, to keep themselves sane.
This is probably one of the most frightening things of all for Newt. Seeing Grindelwald as an actual human being – not a monster, although Newt would desperately prefer otherwise. Just – a man, enjoying a moment of almost-closeness with his son, and there is a swell of something almost like pity in Newt’s chest. He probably hysterically confesses the entire encounter to Theseus and Graves as soon as he’s back in the case; it’s terrified him more then any of Grindelwald’s prior gaslighting.
How long do you think Grindelwald kept Newt and Theseus captive? At least a few months – but it’s going to take considerably longer for the twins to recover some semblance of their pre-imprisonment selves, and I rather think that they are not going to let Graves out of their sight for almost the entirety of that time. (He doesn’t mind. Graves himself has to fight back the constant urge to check on the twins, to take care of them… I’m not sure he ever entirely shakes it. After all, he ends up taking care of Newt for the rest of their respective lives.)
Weirder? Graves would probably demand to know how it could get weirder. He’s on a first-name basis with a bloody eruphant, for Merline’s sake!
I think that Newt, Theseus, and Graves keep up the tradition of ‘rest evenings’ even after their escape from Grindelwald. Just – an evening here and there where they relax together, and go see something, do something utterly new.
Yep. Those moments when Grindelwald is human, when he is actually being kind and gentle to them that are the absolute worse.
Probably several months, half a year at most. You are definitely right that it takes much longer then that for the twins to even begin to resemble their pre-imprisonment selves. It takes them a long, long time to remember that they don’t have to worry anymore about one of them being taken away, being hurt. They all need a lot of therapy.
And, yeah, that probably becomes a tradition for the entire extended clan. Just a rest evening where whatever is worrying them is taken off the table and they just relax as a family.
I just - have the mental image of Newt, Graves, and Theseus sitting side-by-side on a grassy hummock in the case, one of them borrowing the wand to conjure a spray of magnificent fireworks across the dark, false night of the case’s ceiling.
Graves - may not quite know how to deal with that. I get the impressino that he has little family of his own; being part of an extended clan? It’s more then he ever dared hope for.
