TBAY: Auror!Arthur Strikes Back

[abigailnus]

No: HPFGUIDX 45556

It's late at night.  Cindy is still awake in her cabin aboard the 
Imperius!Arthur, and no wonder - the noise being made by all those 
Seventh Sons and Second Daughters is enough to keep anyone awake
 - and Imperius!Molly is being no help at all.  Also, for some strange reas=
on, 
the ship is listing to one side, and Cindy just can't figure out why.  But =

rather then trouble herself with matters of engineering - which are surely =

Veronica's business anyway, as Captain - she has decided to nail 
everything in her cabin down.

Her work is interrupted by a soft noise in the hall.  Cindy pauses.  
Has one of those little brats made his way below-decks?  And after 
baby-proofing the ship all afternoon!  She resumes her work, and then 
she hears the sound again, and again.  Coming closer.

"Is anyone out there?"  Cindy cries, reaching for her paddle.

The solid oak door of the Operative!Arthur cabin bursts into a million 
slivers of wood.  As Cindy ducks under her desk she notices the 
white-hot remains of her lovely plaque flying over her head and 
embedding themselves in the wall.

"Cindy," Calls a familiar yet strangely altered voice, "Show yourself!"

Cindy rises imperiously, ready to face any dangers, and then starts 
when she recognizes the visitor.  "Abigail?  Is that you?"

Abigail is hardly recognizable.  Her hair is matted and hangs in clumps 
around her gaunt face.  And her eyes - her eyes burn.  "Bet you didn't 
think I'd be coming back, did you Cindy?"  She sneers.

Cindy is flummoxed.  "Yes I did.  I was expecting all of you back this 
afternoon.  You were pardoned, remember?  Captain Veronica and 
I were waiting for the three of you at the bus stop - we had cake 
and everything.  Where were you?"  She gives Abigail's appearance 
an appraising look.  "You can't expect me to believe that's all from 
Azkaban.  You were only there a few hours."

"DO YOU KNOW WHAT THEY DID TO ME THERE?"  Abigail roars.  
"Do you?  They.  Called.  My.  Mother."  She closes her eyes as if 
unable to face the memory.  "My mother, who made me promise 
never to go near the 'BAY until I graduated."  Abigail gives Cindy an 
especially hateful look.  "She threatened to cut me off."

Cindy gives a shrug.  "So you'll be leaving then?"  She asks, cheerfully.

Abigail smiles, but the smile never quite reaches her eyes.  "Oh no.  
I explained to my mother that I have unfinished business on this ship.  
Business with you, Cindy.  I'm going to get you off this ship before you 
sink it."

"Sink it?  Pshaw."  Cindy sits down, relaxing.  She's dealt with this kind =

of lunatic many times before.  "There's nothing wrong with the ship that 
a few nails won't fix."

"The ship is listing to one side."  Abigail cries, exasperated.  "You 
have destroyed the delicate balance of the Holy Unforgivable Lesson 
Trinity."

"What are you talking about?"  Replies Cindy.  "I dealt with the 
Holy Trinity in your second trial.  I posited that Lucius Malfoy killed 
Seventh Son and then used the Imperius defense to get out of 
being punished for it.  Neville was affected by Cruciatus.  Harry was 
affected by AK.  And Operative!Arthur says that Ron was affected 
by Imperius –- and the instrument of that victimization was Lucius 
Malfoy who claimed to be acting under the Imperius Curse.  The 
parallel holds."

"What?"  Abigail can't believe what she's hearing.  "The parallel 
does *not* hold.  Neville's parents had Cruciatus used on them.  
Harry's parents had AK used on them.  And Ron's father lost a 
legal battle due to the Imperius defense?  Why, according to that 
argument, there never was even an Imperius spell cast, on anyone!  
Not only have you unbalanced the Holy Trinity - you've made it 
unnecessary.  And you've undermined the structural integrity of the 
ship by making the entire theory dependant on Seventh Son!"  
Abigail pulls out a wand and points it directly at Cindy's heart.  
"Don't think I don't know what you're doing, Cindy.  You're trying to 
take over the ship - a cabin isn't enough for you - you want an 
Operative!Arthur trimaran!  And I know why you're doing it too."

"You mean apart from wanting my own ship?"  Asks Cindy, looking 
rather nonplussed for someone with a wand pointing at their heart.

"Yes."  Abigail says coldly.  "You're doing it because you know, 
in your heart, that Operative!Arthur doesn't hold up under 
Imperius!Arthur."

Cindy blanches.  "That's...that's not true!"  She stammers.

"Oh yeah?"  Sneers Abigail.  "Then why weren't you able to 
respond to my three-pronged attack?"

"What are you talking about?"  Cindy's beginning to relax again.  
The woman is obviously halucinating.  "I blew your three-pronged 
attack straight out of the water and kept the pieces for myself.  Take 
the first prong."

"That's where I argued that, at the QWC, Arthur is awfully casual 
about Unspeakables Bode and Croaker. I mean, he up and volunteers 
that information.  Hardly spy behaviour."  For someone who has been 
told that her attack has been blown out of the water, Abigail looks 
awfully calm.  Almost as if she's enjoying herself.

"Not a problem," Cindy says. "Remember, Arthur is in deep cover  
*and* posing as a Muggle Artifacts guy. He's supposed to be popular 
enough and well connected enough to get Top Box tickets for his whole 
family and guests. Obviously, the *existence* of the Department of 
Mysteries is hardly a big secret. The crowd in the Pensieve certainly 
understands its significance. So when Arthur sees Bode and Croaker -– 
two low-level guys who aren't undercover at all –- he naturally identifies =

them, but doesn't reveal what the Department of Mysteries *does.* Just 
like any good operative posing as an affable, popular Muggle Artifacts 
specialist would."

"I see."  Says Abigail, still damnably calm.  "So of the myriad of people 
that canon tells us were swarming around the Weasley tent, Arthur 
just picks his two colleagues - people who Harry might not even have 
noticed without his prompting - and volounteers their names and 
occupation and the fact that they are top-secret?  Just to stay in 
character?  Roo even suggested that Arthur was so in character that he 
slipped up by identifying Bode and Croaker and over-compensated for 
it by assuring Harry that he had no idea what they do.  This is the man 
who has been snowing his wife, children, and entire social circle since at =

least the first Voldemort war, right?"  Abigail plops down in a chair and 
props her muddy boots on Cindy's desk.  "Sure."

"But the second prong."  Cindy continues.  "I just took that away 
from you.  That's when you suggested that everything about 
Unspeakables, from their department to their job title to the names of 
two Unspeakables that we've met indicates darkness.  See, that  makes 
Operative!Arthur even more Bangy! Oh, he deals in the dirtiest, lowest, 
darkest depths of MoM, handling the worst of the worst. No wonder he 
has a family clock with 'Mortal Peril' as one of the settings. Fits right i=
n, 
I'd say.  Hey, what are looking around for?"

Abigail, who has been craning her head to get a good look at every 
corner of the Operative!Arthur cabin, returns her gaze to Cindy.  
"Just wondering where you were hiding your MAGIC DISHWASHER, 
that's all."  She smiles at Cindy's confused expression.  "I mean, if 
you're willing to believe in an Arthur who is, on the outside, kind, 
curteous, a bit bumbling, and prone to losing his temper when 
someone hits too close to home, and yet is actually a cool Operative 
who has been lying to his family for years while dealing with all the 
darkness the wizarding world has to offer... Well, you must find 
Dishwasher!Dumbledore right up your alley.  Not to mention that you 
completely twisted the meaning of the second prong.  I wasn't 
suggesting that the Unspeakables dealt with darkness - after all, 
Moody and the Aurors dealt with Dark Wizards, and yet their very job 
title suggests light.  No, what I was saying was that the Unspeakables 
themselves were dark - and that just doesn't sit with the Arthur 
Weasley that we've come to know, or with the idea that Dumbledore 
has recruited him into the New Crowd."

Cindy's getting a bit concerned, but she's still got a fine arsenal.  
"Alright, lets say that you're right, but the third prong..."  Cindy 
suddenly shuts up and turns very pale.

"The third prong!"  Abigail cries, ebulient.  "The one you never even 
bothered to acknowledge, Cindy!  Oh, I was so hoping that you'd be the 
one to mention it.  The fact is, you completely misrepresented the 
Wizarding law enforcement system when you suggested that Aurors 
were wizarding cops.  The Aurors are dark wizards catchers, which leaves 
no work having to do with the coming battle for the Unspeakables."

"But, but.. Unspeakables could belong to different departments!"  Cries 
Cindy.  "It could have been Arthur's job to liaise with Moody and the 
Aurors and pass them information, whereas Bode and Croaker worked 
for the Department of Mysteries..."  Cindy's voice dies down as she sees 
Abigail reach into one of her many pockets and carefully begin to unwrap 
a small package.  

"For you, Cindy."  Abigail says quietly, as she sticks the yellow flag on 
Cindy's desk.  "I've been saving it since Azkaban."  

Cindy gulps, but, Abigail notes, she's not beaten yet.  "Alright, so 
lets say there are some problems with Arthur as an Unspeakable."

"That is my biggest problem with Operative!Arthur."  Abigail concedes.

"But you still haven't knocked Operative!Arthur out of the water."  
Cindy insists.  "Arthur could have been an operative without being 
an Unspeakable.  And unlike Auror!Arthur, Operative!Arthur isn't going 
to be hacked to bits by Occam's Razor.  See, Auror!Arthur requires a 
towering heap of canon leaps to work. First, you have to negotiate the 
whole Unforgivable Trilogy Parallelism gymnastics."

"Not at all, if you accept that Arthur was once placed under 
Imperius."  Interrupts Abigail.

"Right, but then you have to run the gauntlet that Arthur would 
keep his role as an Auror secret and that he would later allow himself 
to be shunted aside into Muggle Artifacts."

Abigail sighs.  "Once again, Imperius!Arthur explains all that away.  
Not to mention that there are several ways of explaining that away 
without Imperius!Arthur."

"Yes, that's when you called Imperius!Arthur *unnecessary*, didn't 
you?"  Cindy smiles as Abigail winces.  "Anyway, you still have to 
bungee jump off of the "Why did Arthur take Charlie to work and 
pose as a Muggle Artifacts guy way back when" bridge."

"Whoa, whoa, whoa!"  Yells Abigail.  "Take Charlie to work.  Yes.  
Pose as a Muggle Artifacts guy?  Where in canon does it say that?"  
She gives Cindy a sidelong look.  "Do you want *another* yellow flag?  
Haven't you read Elkins' original introduction of Imperius!Arthur?  She 
suggests that the older Weasley boys, Bill and Charlie, know a lot more 
about their father's past then the younger children.  She suggests 
that Bill's eagerness to bring his father the news of Voldemort's 
reemergance personally stems from his knowledge of his father's past 
with the DEs as an Imperius victim.  There's no reason why Charlie 
wouldn't know what his father used to do before Voldemort fell, and 
simply have been very strongly cautioned against saying anything to 
the younger children.  Unlike Opeative!Arthur at the QWC, however, I 
can buy that Charlie might slip up here and there, especially after a long =

sleepless night and the excitement of seeing the Dark Mark."

"Alright," Cindy admits, "but you have to dodge hostile fire to 
establish some Major Guilt motive for Arthur to maintain this whole 
big secret for all these years."

"And I suppose being placed under Imperius isn't enough to make a 
man feel guilty?"  Asks Abigail.  "Not to mention the shame - I can 
certainly understand why Arthur wouldn't want his children to know 
anything about his failure."

Cindy is having none of it.  "But finally, you have to saddle up and 
ride the whole 'Dumbledore seeks out Arthur upon Voldemort's return 
knowing Arthur is vulnerable to Imperius.'" 

"You mean when there are so many people invulnerable to Imperius 
just lying around?"  Abigail asks, one eyebrow raised.  "Let's face it
 - everyone is vulnerable to Imperius - even Harry, he's just the guy 
who resists it the fastest.  Crouch Jr. took ten years to get out from 
his father's Imperius.  Crouch Sr. managed it significantly less time, 
but he was insane when he did.  And we have no evidence that Moody
 - Moody the Auror - ever escaped the Imperius placed on him.  There's 
a reason why it's an Unforgivable curse.  Dumbledore simply sees that 
Arthur's strenghs - his Auror past, his love of Muggles, his wide network 
of contacts in the Ministry - far outweigh his weaknesses.  And let's face =

it, Dumbledore has just alienated the Minister of Magic - he can't afford 
to be picky as far as his contacts in the Ministry are concerned."

"The fact is,"  Abigail continues, "that you have tried to seperate 
Imperius!Arthur from Auror!Arthur and Operative!Arthur because while 
Auror!Arthur can only be strenghened by the idea that Arthur was 
Imperius-ed, Operative!Arthur falls apart under it.  Not only does the 
Holy Trinity collapse, but you're left trying to explain how anyone with 
a weakness for Imperius could ever be made a spy.  Dumbledore has 
an excuse - what's the MoM's?"

Cindy rallies imperiously.  "You can't expect to sit here and take all this=

 from someone who suffers from *Acronym-Envy*?"

"Not anymore!"  Cries Abigail.  "I had a lot of free time in Azkaban, and 
I came up with SCRABBLE BOARD - Sweet, Curteous, Responsible Arthur 
Bade Bye-bye to Law Enforcement: BreakOut Auror - Retired Dad."  Cindy's 
expression remains stony.  "It's not bad for a first effort."

Cindy studiously avoids Abigail's eyes.  "But what about your compromise 
theory?"  She asks.  "Past-Auror-Present-Operative!Arthur?  You know, 
the one you thought was so bangy?"

"Oh, I've given up on that."  Abigails says breezily.  "And it's all your d=
oing
 too.  I really had a revelation when you said that Imperius!Arthur, Unwill=
ing 
Fillicide was *too bangy* - which I totally agree with, by the way.  I came=
 to 
the conclusion that Auror!Arthur, especially when taken with Imperius!Arthu=
r, 
is plenty bangy, and provides plenty of FEATHERBOA potential for the coming=
 
battle, without turning Arthur into Dishwasher!Arthur."

Abigail gets up and places both hand on Cindy's desk, leaning into her.  
"Face it, Cindy, you have no choice.  If you accept Imperius!Arthur, 
then Operative!Arthur collapses into Auror!Arthur.  If you don't, then 
you are a danger to everyone on this vessel, and it is time for you to 
gather your things and GET OFF THIS SHIP."  

Still smiling, Abigail straightens up and brings out her wand again.  
"Your decision, Cindy?"  She asks.  "I'm waiting."

Abigail