Second Bargaining
Justin was not so unlucky that he had promptly returned to being the primary suspect. There were still a few things that had not been answered, and they would not be answered simply by putting him in interrogation again. At the same time, they were all taking long looks about him as they walked around asking questions. None of the muggle leads turned up anything. Harry was even looking at him, executing the most professional and unsuspecting double-take, and it made sense. He had been betrayed before, after all.
"Wait a minute, that's it- Marietta Edgecombe."
"Who?" someone asked.
"I didn't see her, but Zacharias mentioned her."
"This is a real lead?" an Auror asked.
"There's a chance that they forgot to cover their tracks. Besides, we know that her parents are here in the magical world. We can get ahold of them no problem."
"Let's go, then," Justin said. "They might not have moved."
As long as their daughter was an adult and working, it was safe to say that she no longer lived with them. Most likely, they would not even be on the radar if she suddenly had to clean up after herself. They would, however, know how to get in contact with her, and her mother was a Ministry employee.
"The Edgecombe house is about to have a family emergency," Harry said, grabbing his key witness in order to apparate. In mere moments they were in the office of weather control or something of that nature demanding to see Mrs. Edgecombe, who was still hard at work even in her fifties. That never slowed down those with magic, though, Justin supposed. Things were yo-yoing at an absurd pace even just for him, but he supposed he could survive it.
"Please, what is all this?" the old woman asked. She was complying with everything so far, and she would invite her daughter to their family home, but while there was a pause, she wanted to know.
"What is all this?" one of the Aurors asked. "Tell her, witness. Tell her the kinds of things her daughter's been doing."
"Oh, well, I didn't see it, but I overheard that she put ... um teeth, not sure whose they were... into a urethra... I'm not sure whose. This person would have been restrained."
"Teeth in a urethra, lady. Just try to imagine it. That's the kind of sicko we're trying to catch." He frowned intensely. "The evidence suggests that your daughter's been working with a whole club of these sickos. Really, she's lucky, because if we catch her, there's a good chance that she gets a deal-"
When he was in the middle of saying as much, Marietta took the floo and was stunned right when she landed. Her body was searched on the spot and apparently nothing suspicious was found, but her wand was taken as she went into custody, still unconscious. Her father arrived home around then and the whole thing was explained to him.
"I just don't understand how all that was happening under everyone's noses."
"We're going to get it out of them," Harry promised. "It's best to go straight to the source. At the moment, Marietta might be the fastest way there."
"Well... as long as you believe so, take what measures... you believe necessary."
"Were there any other leads we were pursuing?" Justin asked as soon as they were alone again. As optimistic as he wanted to be about interrogating the traitor, he wanted something else just in case that turned out to be faulty. It seemed like Zacharias had not been lying about how the club had multiple tricks at its disposal. Most likely, someone had tipped them off when they were doing a mass raid, and they decided that if an illusion would not work, relocating the entire interior might.
"We don't have any others. This is basically our only shot, in case you were wondering. I don't like it either."
"I can't believe that I saw so many people and almost none of them have been useful. It's ridiculous. It's like they're trying to make sure that everything I say isn't believable."
"That's their only defense at this point," Harry said, putting a hand on his shoulder. "-and it won't work."
Ever the hero, it seemed he was perfectly determined to carry out his crusade for true justice. When the two of them were back in the Ministry, it seemed Marietta was waking up behind the mirror, which was enchanted with a one-way glass charm. She was disoriented, but since she was not demanding an explanation, it was safe to say she knew why she was there. Robards walked in through the door.
"I take it I can skip the explanation?"
"I know my rights."
"Nice try. We used a Lawyer Exclusion Charm."
"Damn," she spat. "Those charms aren't legal, you know. That's dark stuff."
"Oh, sure, but we know that, but all you have to do is keep using it. Then, no one is ever going to bring a case against us." He set a file on the table. "Anyway, how did you get into this club?"
"Zacharias invited me," she muttered. "You know all about him, don't you?"
"I wouldn't say so if I did. If it'll help, though, we've heard of him. Why don't you tell us what you know, so we can see if it lines up with what we know?"
"I had something of a debt to pay off. I wronged the main character-"
"Chief Auror Potter."
"Yes, that's the one- anyway, since I wronged him, I had to do some amount of penance, but it wasn't nearly as much as I thought. I... well, my backdoor was sore for about a month, but they told me that I was free to move about as long as I roped in some substantially worse offenders after the fact. I can only assume that whatever mystical force of nature that decides guilt and innocence must have mostly forgotten about me. I would expect that if anything, the focus must have been on how bad I had it, being scarred for life."
"What do you believe enables you to avoid punishment?"
"Well, when you think about it, I did something to wrong the main character, but not so much him personally as everyone in the DA, and by extension everyone in the school, and no one really knew who I was in the first place. Even though he was into Cho at the time, he never saw me there. It's not that I blame him. Fading into the background was always a strong suit of mine."
"You were a collaborator, then. You share in the guilt of the entire organization."
"I suppose I do. I can't fault you for reaching that conclusion. I can't really pretend like I didn't do anything, not without my lawyer present. I'm sure I've been pointed out by another collaborator. I doubt that you managed to rescue any of our victims. Even if hell freezes over and every single one of our collaborators, as you call them, gets killed, I can be quite certain that you'll never rescue the victims from their fate. That's our top priority."
"Well, if we arrest every single person involved, won't it be easy to save the victims?"
"No, not really. They'll probably have to be killed as a compromise. You probably know this already, but the club works off a sense of justice. No sense of justice, however, can just divorce itself from reality. Sometimes a punishment that doesn't fit the crime has to be handed out for practical reasons. That's what's going to happen to the victims in the event that our founder is cornered with them."
"Who is your founder?"
"I have no idea. I really wish I could say anything to better my chances, but I sincerely have no idea. He's a cruel, deceitful bastard, though. I'm not really a person to him, just a means to an end. If there were more people who were useful to the main character who wanted to torture people, I might be one of the people getting tortured. It's hardly any different from the dementors in Azkaban. We just can't do whatever we want with them because they're so useful to the end of containing dark wizards."
"Do you know anything about dark wizards?"
"Only that you really shouldn't be messing with them. I'm sure that some of the magic that the club uses is technically dark, but most of it is just weird. It's a bunch of pointless edge cases. If I told you how many spells I've had to learn and then forgotten, you wouldn't believe me. I wouldn't even properly remember, but I can estimate based on how long I've been there."
"Give it your best shot, then. So you know, we don't really care how many spells you've been using, but as with anything else you say, we're comparing it to what else we have on record."
She stared back for a moment. Marietta was not so stupid that she would not recognize a clever trick when she saw one. There was no way that Robards actually knew what kinds of spells she learned, but if he acted like some other informant had already told him, he would be getting more information on how she acted when she was being honest.
"I'm curious," Justin whispered. "Does anyone in this department know how to read minds?"
"No. We're also not authorized to use the Imperius Curse."
"It seems like it would be a lot simpler than using a Lawyer Exclusion Charm."
"It's unforgivable, though."
He said no more. It seemed unlikely that there was any point. He would never, at any point, figure out the law, so the only thing he could do was go back to his old approach of staying on the right side of it at all costs.
"I'm sorry, what's a Perception Adjustment Hex?"
The suspect had named quite a few different charms and curses. The interrogator had not batted an eye, all through the bizarre spells that aided in the sexual torture of the club's raison d'être, though it could probably be assumed that a spiritual erection enchantment was something that made sure a ghost was aroused all through his coercion.
"Well, it basically makes you look even worse than you are. At some point, Remus Lupin was considered the best of the main character's supporters. Then, out of nowhere, it became more important that in offering to continue to support him, he was leaving his wife and their child. I think it might have elevated their status." She squinted. "I'm not entirely sure how the hex works. It's the most complicated spell out of anything I've ever seen at the club."
"Interesting. How powerful is it?"
"Oh, the most it can do is move a side character from being generally well-liked to controversial, or maybe the other way around. At some point it splintered Snape's reputation. I don't know if your other informant picked up on this, but being attractive gives you at least a few points right off the bat."
"Snape was attractive?"
"It depends on your perspective."
"I see. That's why the perception adjustment didn't work that well on him." He frowned. "So, what's the basic nature of it? Does it matter what you intended, or just how much of a positive impact you had on Potter's life? I would think that Snape, since we're on the subject, had a pretty big impact, and ultimately for the best, even if he was a right shite about it the whole time and he only did it for some misplaced affection for the man's mother."
"Yeah, he had an impact, but... I don't know, it's like there's no consensus. There's not a clear decision on whether we're taking intentions into account, or if consequences are all that matter, and there's also no certainty on whether or not he's attractive, and that goes back to that other problem."
"I see." He took a deep breath. "I think a large part of whether or not you're attractive basically depends on whether you're a witch or a wizard, am I correct on that? Because, unless you're one of the exceptions, you're probably going to be found attractive, if at all, by the opposite group."
"Yes, that's more or less true. With the way that we witches work, it's no surprise each of us will pick one and stick with him. It's not likely you could get a wizard to care about children that he couldn't know were his." She shrugged. "That sort of behavior is only evident in times of plenty and places that have never known hardship, and whatever you believe on the matter, I think it's safe to say that we could not have originated in such an environment."
"Perhaps not. And yet, we're wandering out into the weeds a bit on that one. Going forward, I'll have to ask you to stick to things we might be able to verify with the others."
She proceeded to tell him all about the kinds of victims they had, as well as a lot of the tormentors, though she confessed to not knowing every single one of their names. In the middle of the methods of torture, Robards excused himself without any explanation, going around to see Harry.
"She's being almost too cooperative," he said. "I can't help but think something's up."
"That's entirely possible." The Head Auror raised his eyebrows. "I can't help but think you just left when she was in the middle of explaining 'wand sounding' because you were getting a little uncomfortable with it."
"Is there any point in going on with that?"
"Of course there is. It's vital information. Justin and I are going to be listening the whole time."
The subordinate Auror looked at his boss and then the witness before sighing and giving up, returning to the room and asking the suspect to continue her account. Harry turned to his old acquaintance.
"Has she told any kind of lie so far?"
"No, not to my knowledge. I might have been confunded, but... actually, this sheds light on that. At least most of the time that I was in the club, I probably wasn't confunded. That was all real, unfortunately." He practically shivered at the thought.
"In that case, this interrogation is useless to us. Let's go to the evidence locker."
"What are we going to find there?" he asked, more confused about that than anything else. Of course, he wondered why they were leaving Robards to listen to the torture methods for no apparent reason, but he was sure there was an explanation for that. "I didn't know there was any evidence in this case. It seemed like there never was any, and the whole thing was just unreliable testimony."
"Oh, so you don't know how we do things around here," he said, opening a door with 'evidence locker' in fancy silver script on an identification plate. "Uberto, I need a wand with loads of dark spells on it. Make sure that even Munch couldn't identify it."
"Munch was one of the people who had been kidnapped," Justin supplied.
"That should make things easier. Come on; we don't need it to last forever. It could even be from the last war and have a little damage on it, or the one before that. Got it, thanks. It's a real treat to work with you." The door closed and they were back out in the hall, together again. "I absolutely hate that-"
"Please, tell me what's going on here."
"Right. That's a bad habit I picked up from Dumbledore. I thought it was clear enough already. We're planting evidence."
"Where?"
"Creevey residence."
"They're not in right now."
"That's all the more reason to plant it now."
"Harry, I can't understand why we're doing this. Isn't it against the law?"
"Don't worry, we'll use another Lawyer Exclusion Charm. People don't realize this, for the most part, but you can actually just keep using it and if no one ever finds out, you can just use it more to keep them from ever putting it together in court."
"That... I mean, it's still not what we're supposed to be doing."
"I rarely did what I was meant to be doing. This isn't any different."
"Harry, what if, every time we needed evidence for it, and then we didn't have a pair of siblings so that they could and not having anyone else yell at me. He grabbed onto his old acquaintance right as she disappeared with him, and when he looked around, and sure enough, they were at the Creevey place, where a caution tape has gone in." He looked over at Justin. "Oh, come off it. I didn't have a joke anywhere near there."
"Right, that's no problem at all." He frowned again. "Why a different set of rules for yourself vs the others?"
"Well, whenever I do it, and it works just fine, but if anyone else does it... it's just not the same. Somehow, they can tell, all the way down crows."
"Harry..." he said, trailing off. "Just so you know, I really hope you have a genuine point to all this. You're supposed to be a good cop. You're not supposed to make mistakes."
"That's why I do it, Justin. I don't make mistakes. That was back when I was eleven, twelve, thirteen, not as much at fourteen, that was a pretty good year- then fifteen and sixteen. Seventeen circles back to being a decent year. Each time, you could see exactly why I made the judgement calls I did. I'm nineteen now, and I'm Head Auror. That means I can't afford to be wrong."
"I'm not entirely sure that's good enough. Sometimes even the best people make mistakes and-"
"Everyone believes in me, though- everyone. I was the youngest Head Auror ever. They practically handed me the entire provisional government to do whatever I wanted with it, and all I did was make me and Ron Aurors because my only concern was to clean up after the war. I wasn't even supposed to be in the job this long."
"Oh, no."
"What?"
"Harry, I think even though you're far braver than anyone else has ever been, there's a chance that you're actually an everyman."
"What's that?"
"I keep forgetting that you've basically never read a fictional book. An everyman is a main character, or someone close to the main character, who serves more as a demonstration of what's possible for a normal person than an object of admiration. The everyman is not necessarily supposed to be emulated, not in every way, because he is human and makes mistakes like everyone else, but in the sense that-"
"Wait, no, that's not possible," he said. "Are you telling me no one has realized that?"
"Well, English isn't a required course at Hogwarts," he said after a moment. "I thought it was odd, because the discipline of history itself usually isn't for teaching lessons, because it has to stick to the facts. It's the authors who take the risk and make a judgement call about what something really means. The Crucible is a good example of this. I almost can't believe that no one has ever read it; it's such a classic, but then, I think my parents only read it because it was required in school, and then they only made me read it because it wasn't required in my school and they only later saw how useful it was."
"How can a work of fiction be useful?"
"Well, it can't really prove something about real life, but it can do about as much as a problem of analytical philosophy. It comes down to whether or not you believe that the author represented the world, and the people in it, accurately. If you believe that the author isn't just completely delusional, then there's something to learn from it. At the very least, it makes you think about things that happen in real life."
"I see," he said after a moment. "Does that mean that you should try to see if you're living out the events of a book?"
"I don't know. I hope we're not. I've always believed that we're not, and this is real life." He frowned. "I really want to believe it still, but it keeps seeming like this is all contrived. I can't help but think that maybe that self-described dark horse is right and we're all characters in a book."
They both seemed to think about it for a moment before Harry extended the wand to him.
"Do you think that I would be making a mistake by planting this evidence and dragging out the investigation until we have something?"
"I mean, no, but I'm only a side character. I had only hoped that you would know the right thing to do, being the main character, but now I wonder." He frowned. "I can't seem to accept this decision. It's kind of disillusioning, actually."
"Are you supposed to provide insight?"
"No, no, I'm not the oracle on the hero's journey or something. This is more like an escort mission, if that makes any sense. I'm kind of a flat character. It doesn't make sense for anything to cause me to develop."
"Okay, let's just-" Harry started back, shaking his head. "Let's just assume that's a load of- it doesn't matter. Let's just look at it as if they're all wrong. What do you think we should do then?"
"In that case this is all illegal and I don't think that a Lawyer Exclusion Charm should be allowed at all, and I don't think that this whole society can function for much longer if-"
"Okay, but what if it's like a lesson on what not to do? What if this is all ultimately good for our characters and we learn and grow from it?"
"I... those aren't the kind of mistakes that you're supposed to make intentionally." He frowned. "I know you're a good guy, Harry, but you get to a point where you're laser focused on something and then can't be convinced that you were wrong about it."
"Well, how would you know that I'm wrong?"
"See, I wouldn't, you would just make the mistake and then it would turn out that you were wrong, and it seems like the only time that you really suffered from that was when Sirius Black, who I understand was important to you, died-"
"Are you saying that was all contrived?"
"I don't know. It might have been. It might have been a loss of innocence subplot or something of that nature." He shook his head. "I don't have those kinds of answers. Again, I could be completely off base and never know it. I just think that-"
Right as he was about to finish the sentence, they were interrupted by Robards.
"Potter? What are you doing here?"
"What would I not be doing here?"
The subordinate Auror looked back with abject confusion.
"The suspect escaped."
"Escaped? How?"
"I don't know. Weren't you watching the interrogation?"
"No, I stepped out to take a piss and I had to have Justin follow me because he's under guard."
"Oh, did he have to piss too? I hope he went to the other pisser since the one under Jorkins' office is out of order."
"What business is it of yours? Secondly, what did you see that we didn't? Weren't you the one doing the interrogation? How did a prisoner in your custody escape?"
"I don't know; I went out to take a piss."
A moment passed where nothing was said.
"Harry, I think we're meant to take responsibility for this."
"Not now, Justin; what's important is what this means. The suspect must have known something about the boss, and she decided to distract us as much as possible, wandering out into the weeds on unimportant questions, making us think there was nothing important to discuss. She must have known the real identity of the boss."
"Even if that's the case, then we still have to go after her," Robards said. "That means, the chief, who was in charge of the investigation-"
"-can and will use his authority to delegate tasks like interrogating suspects, and I did; I commanded you to do just that. I had to take a piss, and I couldn't very well have done that in the observation room."
"Actually, Harry, we could have used that spell they used to use to get rid of their urine a long time ago-"
"Again, not now, Justin- from the fact that Edgecombe's escaped us, we have enough to surround where she lives and search the place, even if someone else lives there as well. If there's a problem, we'll use the Lawyer Exclusion Charm again."
The whole thing moved surprisingly quickly, but for the star witness, at least the cooperative one, his stomach sank again. A series of disappointments had taught him that they were not done yet. At least in fiction, things seemed to happen in threes, like in the medical dramas where they had three incorrect diagnoses before the final correct diagnosis. He wondered if he was being too hard on his old acquaintance who had limited his incorrect conclusions to the mystery of the year to one.
"Are you ready to go?" the Head Auror asked as soon as the entire time was assembled and informed of the basic nature of the assignment, as well as two different accounts as to how the suspect went missing. Perhaps fortunately, they all believed Harry.
"I'm as ready as I'll ever be, unfortunately."