Regulation and Control

Who: Isaac Kettering, Rives Desmarais, Maisie Baxter, Tyler Conrad, & Élodie Desmarais
What: Escape from Mathwell once the wall goes down while avoiding Obliviators, a reunion, and probably some other stuff.
When: Friday, April 11, 2008 - night
Where: Mathwell, London - the sewers, then some other part of London
Rating: PG-13 because Isaac has almost the foulest mouth on him ever
Status: Closed, incomplete.



"C'mon," Isaac muttered, his voice barely audible to himself. He knew Rives would hear it, though. "Fucking Wizards - the wall's been down a good... a good long while..." He was struggling with the grating covering a manhole, trying to get it up. "If I know anything about them, and I do, so just don't even fucking ask, they're sweeping through even as I fucking say it. Fucking Obliviators - look, you superhuman bastard, help me out here."

Rives put the little girl he'd been carrying around down for a moment and lifted the grate off like it was nothing. Isaac hated him in that moment in a purely personal level, more annoyed at being a little grateful than anything else. "Right, in we go. They'll not sweep through here until a bit later, if we're lucky. Right poncey, the lot of them. We can get out, you can head on back to your damn family. I'll find these kids a place to stay, and we'll all get over everything like it never even fucking happened."

Isaac went down first and Rives handed him the girl, then the boy, and followed. He even pulled the damn grate down again. If he hadn't been trying to figure out how to manage that himself, he might've been even more annoyed. Luckily, he just picked up the little boy and they started walking. It was damp, it was full of garbage and the sorts of refuse that you really didn't want to think about, all things considered - and the stench was enough to make him wish he didn't have a nose at all - or that cutting it off would do him some good.

Jesus fuck, he thought, leading the way through the tunnels - it was a twisted route, one he was pretty sure he wouldn't have been able to follow if it weren't for certain marks spaced out every once in a while, just enough to keep him from getting completely lost. Not letting them steal our memories, the arsehats.

Who: Astoria Greengrass, Zacharias Smith, Clare Smith and OPEN
Where: wizarding London
When: April 11, after the wall goes down
What: A charm bomb, a device previously unknown to the wizarding world, goes off, trapping several people in a six-block radius in Mathwall. By locating five points of weakness, the Regulators bring the wall down. Zach and Clare start to leave but Obliviators attempt to intercept them for obvious reasons.
Rating: TBD, could go high for violence, etc.
Status: OPEN; in progress.

Zach's head felt as if it might drag his body down to ground if it kept walking, the anxious, throbbing pulsing of the veins in his temples so furious that he could almost hear it. Clare was holding on to one of his hands as he stumbled into the crowd, weaving through the frantic rush, afraid that they would somehow intrude on a reunion.

But everywhere he and Clare moved, it seemed, people were embracing, laughing, kissing, crying... The weight of the girl's sweaty fingers, sticky against his own, surprised him. This was the first time she'd reached for him, that they'd touched for more than a second. He wondered what she saw in those joyful families that they passed - he wondered if she longed for that. As he did. Then his knee began to buckle and he felt her hands try to press against his back, supporting him and he understood. Zach had taken injuries in the wall - charmed injuries that wouldn't heal and with all the deaths and chaos, he had chosen not to run to Goldstein.

Another hand - larger - clamped his shoulder and he heard Clare gasp as a broad-shouldered man stopped the both of them.

"Sir," the man said. "I'd like you to come with me." His fingers were twined around a wand as he stood there, the smile on his face deceptively comforting. Zach saw them in the distance - people being led to a small clearing, flashes of light telling the story of what was happening - or being erased. His fist clenched and he stepped back, covering Clare.

"No." Zach shook his head. "I don't fucking think so."

"It's not a choice." A badge flashed, the glint of the Ministry insignia caught in the sun. "You and the girl, come along now." Eyes swept across them now, cold despite the warm brown of the iris. Zach took another step back, the pain lancing through his arm now with ferocity, almost gleeful. He could hear her breath behind him, quickening in fear, yet she didn't whimper.

"You don't fucking get it," he said, "I'm a goddamn wizard." His foot shuffled, then he stumbled, buckling under the weight of a sudden slam against the back of his knees. Another Obliviator grabbed him by the elbows and he kicked at him, snarling as his fist lashed out, then-

"Resisting Ministry interrogation'll get that little girl taken away from you for a long time." Zach pulled the fist back but barely, the anger coursing through his skin, hot and furious as his shoulder was clenched between a pair of hands that dragged him to his feet. His muscles tensed as he stared at the men surrounding him, wondering whether what they'd said was actually true. Clare was rocking on her heel, her eyes wide and frightened as another Obliviator tried to take her hand. She spat at him, then struggled against the grip as his fingers wrapped around her elbow and yanked.

Who: Christopher Warrington and Zacharias Smith
Where: the streets of wizarding London
When: April 12, early morning
What: An encounter in the aftermath of Mathwall and all that occurred.
Rating: G
Status: Closed; incomplete.

His step was still stiff despite what felt like the aftermath of a thousand spells. He should have known better than to try and make it for the studio after leaving Clare with Judith, he should've known better than to try and weave his way through the winding streets of Diagon looking for powder, and he most definitely should've known better than to stop and stare as he saw a thin, dark figure walking across the cobblestone, his hair slightly rumpled, his eyes shadowed as if he was contemplating something dangerous. Like litigation.

Zach jerked his head away with a snort, then shoved his hands back in his pockets. Not letting his eyes catch, he stumbled across the sidewalk, feet careful to step over the cracks in it. Not because he was superstitious but because it gave him an object - something to look at, to measure. Something he could hold. The lines traced a story, spoke of earthquakes and thunderstorms, of spells hurled mad during the second war, their shadows still burned in concrete. Suddenly lost in the moment, he knelt, his finger grazing one such shadow underneath a stairwell, his finger coming away black, a coarse print remaining in the powder. There was something about it that... tingled.