InsaneJournal

Alice tried not to dwell on the latest from Scrimgeour as she went about her duties. She had rounds with Cambina Bulstrode that evening, and she was glad for it. She liked the younger Auror, and they got along fairly well. It wasn't often that she felt like she could hold a conversation well enough when out with someone else, on duty, save for Frank of course.

It was quiet as they made their way along Diagon Alley. Alice knew it wasn't often that something so public happened in Diagon Alley, at least it hadn't for years, and for that she was thankful. Of course there was always the chance they'd be called away about something else, and if that happened, at least she'd be with Cambina. The problem would come if she was called away for Order business, and after the events the past weekend with Alastor and everyone else … well, she knew that played a part in Rufus's return to allowing the use of the Unforgiveables again. And if he knew it had been with the Order and not on an investigation like Alice and Frank had claimed. …

She sighed a little bit and her grip on her wand involuntarily tightened.

There were times Cambina felt Alice was like the big sister she didn't have. Part friend, part mentor, and incredibly competent Auror to boot. She trusted Alice. It wasn't that Bina didn't trust her other fellow Aurors, but she could relax around Alice. And Alice was often who Bina called when she got into trouble. Or was dealt something she wasn't sure she could handle - like the dead three year old that still kept her awake at night.

The last few weeks, Cambina had been staying late again, working on cases, trying to find connections. And then her after work activities… well, at least she wasn't going out on benders. Though some might consider her activities questionable. She did, sometimes. But her focus and dedication to the job was unquestionable. Her eyes flitted to Alice. "Everything alright? Did you see something?"

Alice startled momentarily then turned and smiled, shaking her head. "No, didn't see anything. Just mulling over Scrimgeour's announcement," she said. It was like last time, she thought, and yet was this really as bad as the last time? She was starting to fear that it was, even if she didn't want to admit it. Admitting that this could be the start of another war was enough to give Alice a sour stomach and keep her, too, up at nights with worry. The children were all safe at Hogwarts, for now, of course, but summer was quickly approaching …

Cambina nodded, eyes moving from shadow to shadow along the street, trying to find anything out of the ordinary. Patrols were good for helping the people feel safe but Bina wasn't sure if they'd actually help catch any of the dark wizards. "Things are changing I guess," she said, still undecided as to how she felt about the announcement. She believed in using whatever means necessary to catch dark wizards, but if they were using dark magic… were they any better than the Order or the Death Eaters. Was there a line between ruthless crusader for justice and evil? "I- Have you ever used one? Before?"

"No," Alice said. "During the war, the policy was instituted as well, but I never used one. There are other ways to take care of business, I think, and the Unforgiveables are and should be a last resort." It was her belief then and her belief now. She knew she was in the minority during the war -- Fabian Prewett was one of the most vocal in opposition to their use, while Alice had simply not used them even when they might have been necessary -- and she might be the same way now. She didn't care. She always stood by her convictions.

"It just-" Bina trailed off, unsure of what she meant to say. There were too many blank spaces on the board at the office. Too many open cases. Too few leads. Just dead bodies piling up. "It just seems like we can't catch a break. Maybe this will help?"

"If we don't know who we should be killing, we can't kill them," Alice said dryly. "Not only that, but if we kill before questioning, then what do we know? Nothing. We don't know accomplices or intentions or anything like that." That was all part of why she was an auror, for getting to the justice of it all, and even though she knew it wasn't always possible, she still didn't want to prohibit it right from the off.

"And what did we learn from our weekend interrogations? Nothing." Bina tried to keep the frustration out of her voice as best she could. The frustration of work on top her personal life was making her a bit more snappish than normal. "Sorry," Bina said, scrubbing a hand over her face. "It just feels like we're not making any progress."

Alice tensed a little when the weekend interrogations came up because she didn't think that that had been the way to go, especially not dragging in convicted Order members. "Well, it's my opinion," she said carefully, "that we were barking up the wrong tree with those interrogations."

"So if we shouldn't be bringing in vigilantes, who should we be talking to?" she asked, raising an eyebrow at Alice. They hadn't gotten much intel from the interrogations, but Bina was running out of ideas. She kept going over case notes and files, trying to find something they'd missed.

"As much as I don't like any of the former Death Eaters --" She didn't mention the Order members. "I don't think they're stupid enough to be involved with someone like Lady Noir right now since one step out of line means back to Azkaban." She took a deep breath. "I don't know. I think we should be talking to Lavinia Macnair's friends at Hogwarts but that's hard because of it being the school and -- well, I know I wouldn't want myself involved in an investigation that involved my own children."

"The headmistress letting us in to give extra dueling lessons is one thing, but I'm not sure she'd appreciate us interrogating her students," Cambina said making a face. "What would you do if you were running the Aurors?"

Alice nodded. "Exactly," she agreed then the next question caught her off guard. "I -- well, I certainly wouldn't want to be in that position at all," she said, though it did make her start thinking about it. She'd always had a lot of respect for Rufus, even if they didn't see eye to eye.

"I don't think any of us wants to be in that position, but what would you do differently?" Bina asked, genuinely curious. She respected Alice quite a bit and wondered whether the older woman might have some insight to help them gain the upper hand.

Alice pushed her hair behind her ear. "I wouldn't be doing much differently than I do in my own cases. Focus on the investigation, on the trail and the clues -- right now it doesn't look like much but eventually she's going to make a mistake and we'll know where to find her and she'll get what she deserves."

"And how many people are going to die before then? How many more children?" Bina asked in a voice little more than a whisper. "Maybe you and Frank are used to it, having gone through it before, but I don't know. It's hard, to keep going without a break."

Her breath caught in her chest and she nodded. "I know, and it isn't any easier but we can't manufacture a break. And we can't go around killing everyone who we suspect either." That was the problem, wasn't it, that without the break and the suspects, everything was simply speculation, and that got them nowhere.

"So what? We just keep banging our head against the wall? Processing dead bodies and offering empty words of condolences?" Cambina asked, running her hand over her hair. "I keep thinking that perhaps if the vigilantes had stayed locked up, we wouldn't be in this situation. No chance for them to spread their message."

"Which vigilantes?" Alice asked a moment later, carefully.

Bina turned and raised an eyebrow at Alice, gazing at her critically. "All of them. How can you trust anyone who takes the law into their own hands. It destabilizes the ministry and I know the ministry isn't perfect, but it doesn't help to undermine it. If everyone did that, we'd be in such a mess. Just think about how much damage would be done if you and I went running around helter skelter taking the law into our own hands with our training. It'd be nigh impossible to stop us."

"Would it though? I'm not saying I support vigilante activity, but they were stopped then and they'll be stopped now too. But it takes time. That's the problem with the law and protocol -- we can't and shouldn't run off and do whatever we want." She paused thoughtfully. "But how is what Scrimgeour has allowed us, with the Unforgiveables, any different than what you're talking about?"

"But how many innocent people and how many Aurors had to die first? And what made good Aurors like Prewett decide to take the law into their own hands? I just can't imagine…" Or, perhaps the problem was that she could. Seeing a dead three year old had shaken her and she was grasping onto anything now. Bloody hell, she'd suggested Rufus reinstate Gideon Prewett after interrogating him. She wasn't opposed to the unforgivables. She was snogging a student and meeting up with strangers off the journals. She was desperate. "Because we're law enforcement. We've been trained, vetted. And we're not just going to go around casting the killing curse wherever necessary. We'll just be willing to do whatever necessary to keep Britain safe. Isn't that the most important thing? Protecting wizarding Britain?"

"Of course that's the most important thing," Alice said gently. "I'm always willing to do whatever necessary to keep Britain safe. I imagine the Prewetts thought the same way." In fact, she knew that, but she couldn't say so. "And unfortunately you have people like Lady Noir who wish to do the same for their own beliefs."

"Killing wizards is not protecting wizarding Britain. Especially children," Bina said, running a slightly trembling hand over her hair. "But why throw it all away? What did Dumbledore have that the DMLE didn't? I don't understand."

Alice could think of a lot of things that Albus had, the most of which was loyalty. And people willing to die for him. And leadership qualities that rivaled no one else. "We're not talking about the same thing this time around though. Lady Noir is nothing like You-Know-Who was, and Dumbledore's … gone. What we have is us. You, me, Frank, Fawley, Alastor -- we have to fight for what we want. And I think we can do that."

"We have dead kids and dead Aurors. I'm not sure what the difference is," Bina said crossly before noting that there was an omission in Alice's list. "What about Ru- Scrimgeour?"

Alice nodded again. "Scrimgeour is at his best in this tense world," she said. "It makes sense why he wanted to come back and head up the investigations. He's good at it."

That earned a smile from Bina. "He is. I mean, it's awesome to have a chance to work under him, even given the circumstances." She ran a hand over her hair again, this time without trembling. "So what, we just keep going one day at a time?"

Alice let out a shallow, slightly shaky breath. "Unfortunately, that's all we can do. I never thought -- never wanted to see this kind of situation again. But we're here. And we have to just keep going."