Chapter 134: Code Red
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18 June 1993, Ministry of Magic, London
To say that Cornelius Fudge was panicking would be an understatement. He had hoped that Lucius' untimely demise would have been the last crisis he would have to face this summer. The entire year was undeniably a mess.
It started with the boy who lived impersonating scions of old families using Polyjuice. Cornelius didn't need to be a genius to figure out that the whole 'illusion' crap that Dumbledore fed them was a lie, but it was far more preferable than arresting a national icon for using an illegal potion.
Then, students started to get petrified, which ended up caused by a possessed victim, because of some kind of cursed diary. Fudge even had to personally intervene and put Hagrid in a ministry cell until the attacks were over. As promised, he pulled a few strings to allow the man to buy a new wand, since he was innocent.
Of course, Lucius died soon after, at the hands of that serial killer who's been secretly terrorizing magical Britain for over a year. A killer that could sneak through any wards, disappear without a trace, and somehow not leave a single sign of magical use.
That was what stung him the most. Oh, the Malfoy Patriarch was an arrogant ass, who thought very little of Cornelius' intelligence. It's sad, really, that the man believed that he was spared imprisonment because he was smart enough to bribe his way out. Oh, he made a few sizable donations, but the truth was that around half of the old families had put their weight with he who must not be named. It wasn't always by choice, but the fact was that imprisoning all of the Death Eaters would have destroyed any chance at Britain's economy bouncing back. The funds would be frozen until they died in Azkaban, and the truth was that the nation needed the gold.
So, the ministry decided to avoid pressing the heads of particularly wealthy families to be prosecuted and accepted sizable donations in exchange for them accepting the 'Imperius Defense'.
As long as they were rich enough and did not publicly commit crimes, they could bribe their way out. And it worked; after years of effort, Fudge had finally revitalized magical Britain enough that the rest of the world started to trust them enough to hold the Quidditch World Cup the following summer.
And Lucius played a large part in that revitalization. Sure, the man was loathsome, but his donations to Saint Mungo's allowed them to bring in specialists to train their staff, his support to the revitalization of Diagon Alley, which was essentially a wasteland a decade ago, had helped the economy grow immensely. Now, if all the man had asked was the look away at his involvement in the Black Market and his trade of illegal artefacts, then the minister was more than happy to do it.
Of course, Weasley's useless 'Muggle Protection Act' which barely even mentioned muggles at all, had to ruin things. Well, Dumbledore's support for the act had to ruin things. The truth was that Dumbledore was a godly figure and if he wanted anything, there was very little that Cornelius could do to stop him.
It was tough, balancing the two big sides of the Wizengamot on a small edge.
Things always felt like they were on the brink of falling over, which was exactly what happened with this mess. The public already knew about it, since he threw the new edition of the Daily Prophet on his desk, revealing the title that filled him with dread.
AZKABAN PRISON DESTROYED!
UNKNOWN NUMBER OF ESCAPEES AND DEATHS!
"How did this happen?" he yelled at Amelia Bones, "Azkaban is supposed to be impregnable. And why didn't you stop the Prophet from printing this."
She nodded, "Well, the attackers didn't seem to care about the fact that it was supposed to be impregnable. As for the Prophet, none of us saw the point. The explosion caused a magical pulse that woke up half the population. We can't hide this, so we didn't even try"
Amelia Bones was a tough woman, he would admit to that freely. She was intimidating, strict, to the point. To be brief, one of the best heads of the DMLE he could have asked for. However, she didn't have any appreciation for the delicate art of political maneuvering and tended to be too blunt and inflexible, which made her a lot of enemies over the years.
"You better start explaining Bones, because I'm not in the mood for your cheek today. How in Merlin's name did someone blow up the fortress."
The woman had a grim look on her face, "A team of three Aurors were doing a weekly inspection of the prison. It was supposed to be standard, but from what we could gather, they were attacked. You need to get the Unspeakables to study whatever the hell happened to destroy the fortress, but it's above our jurisdiction. We might need to ask the ICW for help here."
"No! No ICW," Cornelius exclaimed, "I haven't busted my ass to fix this country, only to ask for help there. Dolores, go get Croaker, we need his input about the Azkaban mess as soon as possible. As for you, Bones, how the hell did whoever attacked him go past the wards surrounding the other side of the island? Don't tell me it's the Smiling Killer again…"
The minister didn't know the specifics, but the magic on the other side of the lake that surrounded the island was very dense and that meant that the wards were stronger or something.
"No," she denied, "It doesn't fit his methods so far. No, they disabled the wards by controlling one of the main warders. The wards don't really work on detecting who is in Azkaban since there's no magic there. They detected who bypassed the order and we needed a team of warders to anchor the spell. The entire team of warders were massacred, and they disabled it without anyone noticing. We're assuming that one of the members was under the Imperius or some other form of mind control since the area is very tightly controlled otherwise. The attacks are consistent with common vampire attacks. From the looks of it, over a dozen of them attacked at once, with a couple of wizards to disable the wards."
"And how did they defeat your armed Aurors then?" Barty Crouch asked with some contempt on his face, "Back in my day, they would have killed them in seconds."
Bones didn't seem to like that question, "Well, you're pitting three Aurors that were there for a routine inspection, and that couldn't cast any magic, and with only their stunners sticks as weapons, and a dozen wardens that don't know how to hold a wand, to fight against what seems like two dozen vampires. Need I remind you, that the blood magic inherent to these creatures does not depend heavily on ambient magic, so while they were slightly weakened, it wasn't by much."
"Why were they so few Aurors?" he exclaimed.
"Because my budget wouldn't allow for anymore, and the minister has us hunting that Smiling Killer. I did my best with what I was given, Crouch. No one saw anything like this coming."
Fudge yelled out, "ENOUGH! No more bickering and fighting. We need to find out who is responsible, which prisoners escaped and which ones died."
"I already have my Aurors fishing out the dead inmates."
"Which should be easy now that magic flows in the island once more," a voice interrupted.
They all turned and saw Saul Croaker, the head of the Department of Mysteries, "We have investigated the events of the Azkaban attack and made a few conclusions. We don't know if the purpose of the attack wasn't the destroy the fortress but whoever did this wanted the magic to flow back there again. The explosion was created by the ley lines being overwhelmed after atrophying for centuries. It took a bit of effort and a modified time turner to do it, but we were able to witness the ritual. Seven vampire lords and seven wizards were sacrificed to give their power to an elder, who used the power to unclog the ley lines from the inside, allowing magic to flow once more. The energy vaporized the lower levels of the fortress, which caused the entire structure to collapse."
The minister of magic paled, "Seven Vampire Lords and an Elder! Are you sure about that?"
"Yes. This is very disturbing because as far as I know, the last few Elders should reside in Eastern Europe somewhere and have stayed there ever since Grindelwald was defeated."
Fudge shivered at the thought. Elder Vampires were bad news. Vampire Lords were already quite difficult to deal with, but a good task force might be able to take on a single one. They were powerful and very old. Their blood magic was fearsome, and they could control the very shadows of people. No wonder those Aurors and guards were killed so easily. They literally had no chance outside of somehow ambushing a few of them.
But an Elder, well, the youngest one was at least a thousand years old, and they were strong. They didn't need blood to live, they could walk in the daylight, and they could somehow use their blood magic to cast normal spells. They could enrapture and hypnotize anyone with a look. Very few people could escape one, let alone beat them. The only solace was the fact that they tended to stay in their own corner and not be involved with anything. Vampires in magical Britain have been rare ever since the hunts over a century ago.
What was he supposed to do now?
This was the question that remained. This was way out of his league. For one thing, he needed the Wizengamot to make a decision because they would crucify him if he tried to make a decision large enough on his own.
He also needed to speak to the ICW, since the movement of an elder vampire could have a lot of consequences from the other side of the channel. But that would invite them to add sanctions to get involved in Magical Britain's matters, and that wasn't something he needed.
That's not to mention the fact that Azkaban couldn't be used as a prison anymore because the inmates could use magic once more. So, he needed a way to hold the surviving inmates for a while until he presented the problem to the Wizengamot.
And the dementors…
What in Merlin's name was he going to do about the dementors? Azkaban was their feeding ground, and with that gone, any control he had of them had vanished. He needed to avoid them feeding on random people, and he couldn't really appease them.
What was he supposed to do now?
His breathing was laboured, his heart was racing. He was sweating. This didn't look good.
He gave them all a deep look, "I need some time to myself. I'm going back to my office for a couple of minutes."
The minister walked with a dazed expression on his way back and immediately did what he always did when he was overwhelmed. It was humiliating, but this was no time for pride. He grabbed a fistful of floo powder and threw it at his fireplace while yelling, "Dumbledore's office."
The headmaster's face appeared from the fireplace, "Cornelius, my boy, how can I help you?"
"I need some advice."
"Ah, the Azkaban affair. I have to say that it has distressed me greatly. You're worried about the Vampire Elders making a move, I gather."
Fudge gaped at the aged headmaster, "Yes, how did you know?"
"My boy, do you think for one second that if something threatened my homeland like this, I wouldn't try to investigate?"
"Fine. I guess I'm worried. We're still identifying the surviving, dead, and escaped inmates, and we should get a toll by tonight. I thought about informing the ICW about it since an event like this should concern them. And I honestly don't know what to do about the dementors now that the prison is gone, and magic flowed inside it. I need help, Albus."
"Fine, Cornelius," the defeater of Grindelwald said, "But I have one condition."
"Anything…"
"What do you know about Harry Potter's custody hearing?"
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If you want to support me check out my patréon at https://www.patréon.com/athassprkr
I tend to upload drafts of early chapters on there to get people's opinions of them so you can read up to 20 chapters ahead as a bonus.
Thank you guys for your support in these hard times.