Sometime after three in the morning,


Solomon Carstairs stared at himself in his office mirror: he looked like hell. Dishevelled hair, usually black robes now clearly singed or hexed or torn or all those things at once. The odd bruise. He undid his robes - the shirt underneath miraculously untouched - and reached for the spare set hanging off the back off his chair. It was late in the night.... or, more accurately, early in the day. The wizard had no intention of returning home after that travesty of a raid. Having buttoned up his fresh clothes, Sol left his office.

He made his way to the Auror's bullpen, hands in pockets. Officers and interns and assistants darted out of his path as they scurried off to their own ominous destinations. In spite of the house, level two was the busiest floor right now.

They had returned from Atreus without losing a witch or wizard but the injuries had been dire. And all for what? A dead body in the ruins of a building in muggle territory. Merlin knew how three was dealing with this entire situation.

"Is that everyone?" Sol gestured as he entered the space, causing all the doors around the bullpen to slam shut. Here, the able bodied survivors of the raid had gathered; either for duty or out of habit. "Debriefing. I need an injury tally[1]."

1.	Nine, according to the article,  but it's a final number so feel free to underestimate

"Sir." Andromeda said. She stopped poking the bumps on her head. They were going to hurt tomorrow. Her hair was limp brown. She had a purple bruise on her cheek. Her auror robes looked dirty. The doors all closed. Their boss did not look happy.

"Six gone straight to Mungo's Sir." Andie reported. She looked about. "I think some of us should go too."

As a fledgling second year trainee, Mig's official role in the raid plan had been 'record keeper.'  His original assigned duty had been to watch, observe, learn and record everything that was said or done so they'd have official evidence for the post-raid trials.  That plan had held for the first ... five?  Ten minutes?  At least, until the first trap was triggered and all plans went out the exploding windows. 

Migs sat on the floor and leaned against the wall.  He'd been enough outside the initial fray that he'd missed the primary effects of the traps and had walked away with injuries that were healed with five minutes of healing charms.  As far as his mother needed to know, he'd made it out completely unscathed.  "I talked Bailey into going to St. Mungo's rather than coming back up here."

“You did good, kid.” Nadine lisped from nearby, sat at her desk. One side of her face was steadily swelling, and her eye was closing up. She had looked better but so had they all. Her feet were sat up on a colleague’s chair, boots unlaced. She only hoped she didn’t have to move any time soon.

Raiding Atreus was meant to have been their finest moment, but as ever, their finest moments were forever tainted these past few months. It had appeared so straightforward until the place had begun to crumble around them. “That was off the scale. How did the reconnaissance miss this, with respect, Sir?”

Chadwick wasn't exactly sure what had gone wrong. Honestly, his memory of the raid was a little fuzzy - as was his head. In his left hand, he still clutched his wand, knuckles white on the wood. His right hand raised to rub the back of his singed head. He could still smell the smoke and the acrid scent of burning hair. His normally impeccable auror robes hung dirty and dotted with burns, and a groan escaped his lips when his hand connected with a large bump on the back of his head.

The groan turned into a coughing fit so severe, Wicky's eyes began to water and he slid slowly to the ground - finally gaining control of his body. He wiped the tears away from his face and then blinked rapidly when his hand came away streaked with soot. He hadn't realized just how dirty near death situations could be. When Carstairs emerged from his office and slammed the doors, Chadwick finally started to understand that something wasn't quite right. The sound of multiple doors simultaneously slamming shut should have been deafening, and indeed - shouldn't he have heard his colleagues speaking before this?

The muffled sound of the doors shutting gave the young auror hope, because if he could hear something then he probably just needed to give his hearing a chance to return. Maybe there was nothing wrong with him at all and he was just in shock. As his boss spoke and then his fellows replied, Chadwick screwed up his face and cupped his free hand to his ear - straining to hear what was being said. He could barely follow the conversation with a combination of lip reading and muffled voices.

When Pinn finished speaking, Auror Blish opened his mouth and sucked in a deep breath, something he normally had no troubles doing, but this time left him wheezing like a tea kettle. He coughed lightly and then tried again, "With all due respect," He managed before needing to suck in air again, "How did this entire department miss Almasy's true nature for this long?" He asked, then leaned back against the wall. Perhaps if his head wasn't aching so bad he would have chosen his words more carefully. Perhaps not.

He couldn't blame them for being sore.

Most of the Aurors had not known about the Almasy investigation up until the point that last night's raid had been called into existence. Solomon nodded thanks to Andromeda for her answer, making a mental note to confirm the exact number of injured before he released a public statement from the department - Nagde updated the count to at least seven injured. Their floor had seen less battered days.

             "How did the reconnaissance miss this, with respect, Sir?" Pinn looked like she was in need of a bit of healing herself.
At any rate, she wasn't the only one with a similar complaint. Blish, charred as he was, managed to wheeze out a question. "How did this entire department miss Almasy's true nature for this long?"

Solomon took off his spectacles and sat on one of the vacant desks in the bullpen, his expression grim.

"She knew we were coming," he glanced at Nadine, "It's the only explanation we have for now. Building residents had continued to enter and leave Atreus in perfect safety, including the recon Aurors[1] who visited in the day."

The only significant note he had received from them had been about the sentience of the Atreus elevator: a box with no buttons, and three mirrors whose reflections took on a life of their own. That was where their raid had begun to go wrong, wasn't it? The bloody thing exploded as soon as they had tried to enter.

He rubbed the bridge of his nose, then replaced the spectacles before giving the Aurors a hard look. "As some of you may already know, we've been on to Almasy since March. January, actually, with Eleor's investigation[2]. There were suspicions of Almasy having a mole on this floor."

The department head paused. His gaze swept the room, taking in the sight of these red robed men and women.... each who had risked life and limb on this raid. He did not believe any of them were traitors. Merlin knew if that was a fool's attitude.

"Suspicions we still cannot entirely lose, which is why this department did not officially perceive Almasy's nature until it was confirmed and necessary, Auror Blish." Solomon did not like the idea of keeping secrets from the floor but by this point in his life it was second nature. It was important to regain their trust. "Any further questions on this subject?"

1.	This can be anyone, if they'd like!
2.	Beastie Boys - 20th January '11

“She knew we were coming,” Nadine let out a quiet groan beneath the explanation, lifting a compact mirror to examine the rate her face was swelling. “… there were suspicions of Almasy having a mole on this floor.” Auror Pinn gave a huff. A mole as low as the lowlife they had been putting up with in the cells for the past month.

“Any further questions on this subject?”

“Can we use the mole’s intestines for Christmas decorations, Sir?” Nadine asked, putting the mirror down. “What about the residents, in all seriousness?”

"Law Enforcement Patrol got the details." Andie said. "Few were home." That was lucky. For the residents. There could be more bodies. "Dieter will know soon. He is getting good at blown up buildings." The wizard went over the Leaky Cauldron. He made Andie look tiny. "We should bottle up our fresh memories."

Solomon snorted, casting a grim smile at Auror Pinn that quite agreed with her sentiments - if they could fine the mole he was more than happy to turn a blind eye to their first interrogation. Briefly of course. And there would have to be paperwork to cover for it later. He could handle paperwork.

Luckily, Gamp was keeping track of the Atreus residents situation.

"Few were home.... intentionally or pure luck?" Sol muttered as he fixed the young witch with a thoughtful look. "You seem on the ball with this, Andromeda. You can lead interviews in the aftermath. I want every Atreus resident and their connection to Almasy examined."

She could be trusted with that. Gamp was part of his Inner Circle operation.

He turned back to sweeping his gaze across the bullpen of Aurors. "But bottle those memories first. Get some rest. And someone send an intern down to level five with a message, see if the Russian Ministry is willing to forward whatever papers they might have pertaining to the Almasys. Report back to me or Pratt, personally."

Solomon stood, feeling weary but enlivened for the events of these last few hours. Fantastic, the difference it made when one knew the face of a public enemy; even a dead one.

"I'm not joking about getting rest," he eyed their especially worn out looking Aurors, "That's an order. If nobody has anything else to add, get to it."

Was Edward Pratt still bitter that his bureaucrat of a boss had kept most of the facts from him for weeks? Perhaps a small amount. Not that him knowing would have moved things any faster because they needed the cold hard evidence before even considering storming Atreus. Even with the hard evidence and preparation, it had been, what Ed would sensible put it as, ‘A shit Storm’. A bloody big messy shit storm. 7 of his aurors were now in St Mungos, while the rest of them looked battered and beaten.

Pratt himself was sat silently in a spare seat, listening but not commenting. It was hard to participate in a conversation when your ears were still defiantly ringing and eyes sore with dust. His red robes had been thrown over a cubicle wall and his legs were spread out, boots and trousers filthy, arms folded. The words spoken by colleagues and his boss barely reached his ears until he heard his name and he opened his eyes, staring at Carstairs.

An order to rest never fell well with aurors. They were inherently not restful creatures and, most often, didn’t know when to stop. Nearly everyone in that room had driven themselves into the ground through perseverance and an ability to call it a day multiple times. Edward Pratt was definitely one of those. So, he stood and eyed his aurors, gaze blurry. There wasn’t anything else to say to the group other than reiterating that they needed to go home soon. So he tured to his boss,
“I’m gonna ‘ead to St Mungo’s and see ‘ow they’re getting on, Sir. Any messages?”

The boss seemed to want them to get rest and leave the answers to the unspoken questions to another day. Nadine anticipated everyone felt similarly pissed with what had happened. Their prize quarry lost - Ira Almasy’s end was worse than Musgrave walking in voluntarily. It was not the ending they had worked their arses off for. It was a theft. A denial.

“Someone fetch the bottles then.” Nadine grumbled, not keen to move her feet down from the other chair because they’d hurt like hell.

“I’m gonna ‘ead to St Mungo’s and see ‘ow they’re getting on, Sir. Any messages?” Pratt asked, and the aurors paused to look round at their leader and consider.

“No message,” Nadine replied, “But wait up.” She pointed at her enlarged face, “Going to be hardly anyone on shift later tomorrow,” she grumbled, given the numbers of them in hospital or healing their not so major injuries. “Impropers better not suggest we went in wrong, either,” she added to Andromeda who had mentioned Dieter. “Last thing we need is another internal investigation, unless they find the effing mole.”

Andie got up to fetch bottles for their memories. This would not take long. Pratt would go to the hospital too. She would give him some to take. Andie hoped Nad would go to hospital too. Aurors were too proud sometimes. She gave Nagde one of the bottles.
"You know what to do?" She asked. He was a trainee. Maybe he had never taken a memory out. "I can show you." Carstairs had dismissed them. Andie was looking forward to a hot bath and bed.

            "I’m gonna ‘ead to St Mungo’s and see ‘ow they’re getting on, Sir. Any messages?"

"Just remind them to bottle their memories once they've been tended to," Solomon replied after giving it a moment's thought, "And to check in here before they return home." He was pleased to see the swarm of red robed wizards and witches disperse, intent on the task at hand - rather than resting, he suspected they would resort to a different sort of bottling after work hours. Merlin help the bartenders of Death & Co.

Solomon began to make his way out of the bullpen and towards his office, which was some ways across level two.

He left the Aurors to their recovery and banter, an easier thing to do without the Big Bad Boss around to reprimand flippancy. It was rest and more rest for him tonight - for while Pinn was right to say there would be few on shift tomorrow, Solomon would have to be in bright and early. He was janitor to the mess left behind by Ira Almasy and the Atreus disaster.