Order Only: The Ministry and Owls, plus Rookwood

[alt_bill]

Two things: first I want to report that the Minister of Magic is being flooded with owls from parents demanding that the MLE take over the investigation of the latest incident at Hogwarts. Apparently, Fudge is not particularly appreciating the complaints. The order came down from Senior Undersecretary Umbridge that any owl used to deliver one of these complaints should be promptly confiscated from its owner by the Ministry, with the excuse that the Ministry needs the owl's services 'for the duration of the crisis.' Dolores Umbridge failed to consider, however, that her title does not impress most owls. They'll only work for someone other than their owners if the owners expressly gives permission for them to be lent out to somebody else. The Ministry owl handlers suffered some bad pecking and talon scratch attacks while the owls made this clear to them.

Secondly, and this is big. Two members of my analysis team, Aloysius Archer and Tabitha Dames, have been cross-indexing Lucius Malfoy's journal posts (especially any mention of the movements of Augustus Rookwood) with the camp security log-book entries and the reports of epidemic outbreaks. The evidence can't be ignored. The pattern of outbreaks following Rookwood's visits to the camps is more than a statistical probability, it's a dead certainty.

On October 5, Malfoy told Regulus in a comment that Shroton and Ampfield were selected as 'test sites.' The LP inspected the camps on October 14, and that's rare. There's a whole lot of other corroberating evidence that they presented to me, and I can go over it with you, Dad, if you like.

I've gone and pulled what budgetary parchment work that I can. Of course, Rookwood works with the Department of Mysteries, and so those budget spreadsheets never see the light of day. BUT I did find a few mentions of mysterious requisitions in the budget for the Department of Squib Affairs, with Rookwood's initials.

I don't know what Rookwood's up to, but if Archer and Dames are right, I'm very much afraid that the evidence is damning.

Somehow, the Ministry of Magic, specifically the Department of Mysteries, is behind the cause of the epidemic.

Comments

[alt_arthur]

WHAT?!

[alt_bill]

Dad...I'm afraid it's so.

[alt_arthur]

No. No, no, no, NO!

[alt_molly]

Arthur?

[alt_bill]

Look, Dad, why don't you come see me over lunch. We'll grab something outside the office, and I can go over Archer's report with you.

[alt_arthur]

Bugger lunch, anyway. I'll make some excuse and come see you right now.

[alt_kingsley]

Part of me wants to say, 'are you sure?' but I know your team doesn't throw around wild accusations.

Never expected anything like that. None of us Players did.

[alt_bill]

Look at that passing comment Lucius Malfoy made in his latest journal entry. Something about Rookwood again, and some trials he's doing.

[alt_kingsley]

But surely if they were behind all this, they would have caught on by now?

[alt_bill]

Aloysius is guessing that whatever Rookwood did, maybe now he's trying to undo it. Maybe that's what these trials that Malfoy mentions are about.

[alt_molly]

But St Mungo's! Surely if the Ministry knew anything about what was causing the epidemic, they would have let the healers know?

[alt_arthur]

Not if they were too busy covering up their own bloody arses. Maybe that was part of what all that sacking and reshuffling was about last month.

[alt_molly]

Oh, Arthur, how dreadful. Are you all right?

[alt_bill]

I don't think he really is, Mum. I told him he should take the afternoon off.

[alt_arthur]

I thought I could go back this afternoon, but you're right, Bill, I really can't. I was on my way back to my office, but I had to duck into the loo, and I just--

Merlin. All those people. All those children.

Molly, I'm sending a note back to my office giving them an excuse, and I'm heading home. Warrington can bloody well get out this afternoon's reports without me.

[alt_poppy]

Indeed.

I've been thinking about this. I believe that Rookwood must have hoped the St Mungo's researchers would identify the disease and find a cure without ever needing to know the details of its source or contributing factors. His department and his overseers must have hoped it could all be resolved without anything pointing back at them.

And I can't help thinking, too, that they behaved as though they expected there would be no danger to the St Mungo's crews that were in the camps dealing directly with the disease.


There's something in that.

[alt_frank]

Al hasn't read this yet. I don't know what she'll say once she does.

makes me sick to think on.

why do you think they did it? did they want to wipe out the muggles altogether, but it got out of hand?

[alt_frank]

that can't be it, though, cause they'd have done it a lot more straightforward-like a lot sooner than this.

[alt_arthur]

I don't think so, no. We need the work that the Muggles do too much. The Ministry is too dependent on slavery, damn them all.

I don't know how I'm going to be able to face going to work today.

[alt_frank]

sorry, old boy.

at least it's not anyone you work direct with.

[alt_arthur]

I work for the Ministry of Magic. I can't reconcile my conscience that easily, Frank.

Molly's tried to tell me that our work for the Order balances out what I have to do at the office. But it seems like such a pittance, when balanced against the devastation we've unleashed upon this country.

[alt_sirius]

Arthur, I think you're right about one thing: Whatever this was, I don't see how it can have been deliberate. The more I think about it, the more I think perhaps the first cases were as baffling to them as everyone else.

We're still left with the deplorable, unconscionable lack of response for far too long while innocent people died, and the disgusting disregard for protecting the public even if it meant exposing their culpability. But frankly, the Ministry had a penchant for covering up its foibles even while Albus Dumbledore was there to force them to own up to their mistakes. I can't imagine that the tendency would have improved without him as a watchdog.

That aside, at least we're forming a picture now.

I'll need a little more, but it sounds like Bill's team might soon get us enough hard facts to put together the whole truth.

[alt_frank]

if it makes you feel any better, I don't think of you as working for them at all. you work for us. you're our inside man. you and Bill both are.

ever since the old man left us, you and Minerva have both done one hell of a job.

and if Min is our general, you're next in line in my book, mate.

and that is something you should be proud of.

[alt_sirius]

Thanks, Bill. I had a feeling; something about Malfoy's posts was not adding up. Or rather, it was adding to too much, if you follow me.

Do you trust Dames and Archer? I mean, do they know what they're looking at - and is there any possibility they'll say something to the wrong person?

I'm still not sure how Squib Affairs connects, though. But I remembered that when Malfoy wanted to redirect Carrow over the summer, he brought him to Rookwood. Is it possible that Rookwood was trying to understand how Muggleborns develop magic, and Squibs don't?

If that's so, then how does that relate to the epidemic? What trials was he conducting back in the autumn? I'm still a bit stumped.

[alt_bill]

Oh, I trust Archer and Dames all right. Their work has always been impeccable, they keep their mouths tightly shut, and they have as much reason to hate the Ministry as anyone: they've each had relatives that ended up in the camps, although they're counted as Purebloods themselves. (Tabitha has a son who got taken away from her as a squib, and Aloysius a muggleborn sister-in-law and her children.)

I'll get them to look at the Carrow angle. I don't think that anything having to do with that monster can be good news.

Poppy, have you heard any of your sources at St Mungo's breathe anything at all along these lines?

[alt_poppy]

I'm afraid not.

It's been weeks since I've had any contact with St Mungo's: with all the concerns about exposure--and especially since the restrictions on firecalls--I've been instructed not to call unless there's a pressing need.