Who: WAGE, Daily Prophet, Gawkers When: Friday, January 24th, 2003 Where: The Daily Prophet What: WAGE Strikes back Status: In progress Rating: PG-13, Objectionable Content
Cold and wet were the only two words needed to describe this night. The clouds never came together enough to put a real effort in making it rain, so instead it had trickled all afternoon and all evening. The cold wasn't quite enough to turn the wet to ice, but at only a handful of degrees over freezing it certainly felt like it should have been. The evening edition of the prophet had just been whisked away for delivery, which meant that it was about time for a shift change between the witches and wizards that work on the daily edition and those that work on the morning addition. The magical press is shut down, as the next stories to be woven into it are determined by editors.
The small crew of people aim to misbehave on this night, despite the dripping chill.
1650 - The sun, blocked by the overcast clouds, gives up on trying to warm the day, leaving the sky dark and moonless. Lamps have been running in the streets to give light to the evening travelers, but few move around the streets at this time of night. A few members of WAGE are already around, hidden in plain sight, and acting as surveillance.
1700 - Emmeline Vance makes her entrance into the Daily Prophet.
1705 - The Prophet workers leave the Prophet, with Emmeline as the last one out... though she shouldn't stick around.
1706 - Grant and Edward move in from a back alley door, both carry filled backpacks and leave about thirteen minutes later, the backpacks much lighter.
1720 - What appears to be a fire starts on the presses. At this point, it's advised that all WAGE members involved in this put as much distance between themselves and the Prophet as possible.
1740 - Some of the building has ignited due to the intensity of the burn on and around the presses. Some of this heat begins to melt the wall off of an ink tank. Magical ink doesn't burn but it does spread through the building and outside. Strangely, the ink reacts with the footprints of people who recently walked around in and around the building by highlighting their footprints, along their path. Magical Law enforcement and a few wizards begin to fight the fire and prevent it from spreading to other buildings. The temperature inside the building is nearing the range 1,000F, which is a little too hot for anyone to safely enter, Wizard or not.
1800 - The metal fire comes to an end, leaving the magical presses little more than metal slag and broken magical enchantments. Much of the paper inside has spontaneously combusted, and much of what was once the Prophet building is now just a charred husk.
1805 - Owl post arrives to everyone who subscribes to the Prophet, though this issue is the WAGE approved alternative, filled with articles from the Daily Prophet prior to the Dark Lord's ascension into power that detail the fear and terror caused by Death Eaters.