( Law Enforcement Department )
He shifted anxiously under Madam Bones' angry one eyed stare, he knew that look, it was a look that he had luckily only seen a couple times during his career, and it immediately put him on edge.
"What happened Kingsley? How could you let Pettigrew escape? How could you let Malfoy obliviate himself? Why in Merlin's name didn't you just stun Lord Malfoy right off the bat, before he even knew you were there?!" his angry boss demanded, even as she paced around her office like a caged animal with too much aggressive energy, a clear sign of just how badly he had fucked up.
Thinking about his answer, he knew he couldn't lie or obfuscate about what really happened, unfortunately that wasn't an option with so many witnesses to the day's events, especially with several reporters being present during the arrest.
"I wanted to arrest Lord Malfoy following the strictest of procedures, so that he wouldn't have the ability to cause us any trouble down the road, especially with several reporters watching," he argued, not wanting to admit to his boss that he had been showboating for the cameras, too caught up in the idea of the fame, promotion and raises to follow successfully arresting Malfoy.
"Miss Skeeter also unexpectedly turned up; her presence distracted me and my team at a crucial juncture," he added, deciding to try to pass some of the blame onto the notorious reporter that had been dogging the department for years.
"I think someone within the department tipped her off; a source inside would explain how she always gets that hot story," he added, knowing his boss loathed spies and moles within her department.
However his attempts to distract his boss from his own failures and distribute some of the blame were for nought, as his boss gave him a disappointed look, a look that told him just how far he had fallen far in his boss' eyes. "You should know by now to expect the unexpected, that is the first rule they teach about plans like these, they often don't last beyond first contact with the enemy," she countered.
"Lord Malfoy was always going to cause trouble Kingsley, no matter how you arrested him or what procedures you followed or didn't follow. You should have known that and simply stunned him on the spot, before he could react and even realize you were there, then make up a believable justification afterwards for it. I would have been able to cover for you and your team as long as we had him alive and in custody.
The manner you arrested him wouldn't have mattered a whit to anyone as long as he was brought to trial, the papers would have been too busy denouncing his many crimes to give a shit about how you stunned him quickly. I would have given you a minor, off the record warning, a slap on the wrist, or a desk job assignment for a couple of days if I was wrong and anybody made a stink about it," his boss explained patiently, as she thoughtfully took her seat.
He silently watched as his superior forcefully took a calming breath, before continuing with her rant. "Instead, we now have Lord Malfoy in the hospital not even able to remember his own birth name for more than a couple minutes at a time, due to the combined spell effects of so many overpowered stunners hitting him at once and the interruption of the memory charm spell. Now that's something I can't simply ignore and sweep under the rug. This has 'colossal fuck-up' and official internal inquiry written all over it!"
"Now he's useless to us; even though we now have hard evidence and what amounts to be an incontrovertible confession, we can't question him under veritaserum. We also can't use him anymore to identify and arrest his co-conspirators, as was our original intention, or to prove the guilt of those Death Eaters in the Wizengamot who escaped prosecution. Furthermore, we still have an unknown assassin out there and Pettigrew escaped with the gold, robbing us of some hard evidence. It wasn't a huge amount of gold, but certainly enough that he can afford to go into hiding for good now."
Seeing that she was just about to continue her rant, he held up his hands in surrender. "Yes, I get it, I fucked up boss," he voiced regrettably, admitting his fault, knowing that his boss would still likely give him a second chance. "Now, can we please move on?" His boss gave him a warning look for interrupting her.
"Kingsley, 'fucked up' is a gross understatement for the shit storm of trouble you're in right now," she stated firmly, as she ran her hand through her hair. "The only hope we have of salvaging some of this mess, is the possibility of finding enough hard evidence at his home that we can tie him even more firmly to his crimes, even then it may only mean financial fines. Unless he miraculously recovers in time for the trial, I doubt he'll ever see the outside of the long-term spell damage ward at St. Mungos."
Madam Bones sighed, before continuing on. "Take a small team to Malfoy Manor; here's an arrest and search warrant for the manor and for Lady Malfoy. Perhaps she can give us some evidence or even better, make a deal to avoid prison," she muttered whilst placing a scroll upon the desk, which he readily accepted before marching towards the door.
"Don't fuck this up Kingsley, otherwise I can't help you. We'll talk about your future career prospects with this department as soon as you return. For your sake, you better not screw this up," his boss warned, her voice cold and hard.
...
( Malfoy Manor )
The heavy black iron gates opened automatically for him as he lead his sober faced squad down the stone path to the Malfoy family manor, the dark mansion stood off in the distance as his eyes darting side to side looking for any sign of danger. This was meant to be a day of celebration for him, of finally catching a dangerous and powerful criminal in the act so that the man would finally see justice. Instead it had turned into an unmitigated disaster, with Lord Malfoy memory charming himself into outright stupidity and Pettigrew bolting with the gold during the confusion. He still wasn't sure how that even happened.
He had cocked up big time, messing up all of Madam Bones' carefully laid plans, and now his career as an auror was on the line as a result. If he failed in the simple task Madam Bones had given him to redeem himself, his career was all but over for good, not even the Chief Warlock would be able to help him.
After all, he knew very well how the Ministry worked; they would need a scapegoat to explain away this mess, someone to blame, and he was the prime candidate for that role, since he was the one leading the mission. His situation wasn't helped by the fact that the press had been there to record his failure for posterity.
He turned his focus back to his current mission; old family manors were extremely dangerous, far more dangerous than any old house he raided during his career as an auror.
Taking into account that Lord Malfoy was an extremely dangerous individual with his own inordinately dangerous enemies to defend against, he didn't doubt for a second that the murderer could have highly illegal and deadly ward schemes set up to protect his home. Even then, many of those lethal wards might actually be legal depending on when they first went active.
These old manors had their lethal wards placed centuries ago when it was still legal to put those kinds of protections on a private home, even the ones with a dark magic basis (at least as it was defined now) were allowed centuries back. The purebloods had made certain those wards were grandfathered in under the current law.
However, despite the increased danger such an illegal ward scheme represented, it allowed the possibility of adding an additional charge to the Lord Malfoy's impressively long list of crimes, this would be in addition to whatever other dirty little secrets he and his team could uncover hidden within the manor's walls.
Approaching the imposing front door, which had a massive golden capital 'M' engraved upon it, he quickly knocked. Even though he was here with a search warrant for the home and an arrest warrant for the Lady Malfoy, he wanted to keep this situation as civil as possible, mostly so that she wouldn't activate the manor's active magical defences and potentially kill him and his team.
The manor's main door slowly opened, revealing a wide eyed house elf, dressed in a shabby tea towel, "How can Dobby helps sirs?" the house elf asked warily.
"We need to speak with your mistress," Kingsley responded firmly, as the elf nodded back, before quickly disappearing to deliver the message to his mistress.
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A/N : if we get 400 power stones by the end of the week, I will release an extra chapter ;)
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