InsaneJournal

Who: Charlie Weasley
What: Making a tough decision
Where: Romania
When: Two days after receiving the return owl from Fred
Rating: PG



It had been two days since Charlie had received the owl from his brother, and even now it was still fresh in his mind as if he'd never seen the note before. Slightly rough around the edges today, his clothing a tad torn and even slightly scorched, Charlie Weasley sat with a peanut butter and jelly (strawberry!) sandwich and stared once more at the newspaper clipping. It wasn't so much the article itself as it was the red ink, the word LIES scribbled in his brother's handwriting.

It really came of no surprise to him that the paper would cover it up, or perhaps even they didn't know the full truth. If there was anything he had learned since joining the Order, it was that the truth was not always black or white – in all honestly, it was more shades of gray than anything else. There were things he saw in either extreme, like how the Order were the heroes of this age, while the Death Eaters were nothing more than villains and terrorists. Everything else – from the Ministry to the Daily Prophet and everything in between – was nothing more than a varying shade of gray, be it lighter or darker.

Folding the clipping and slipping it into his pocket, Charlie leaned back against the rock he sat up against. It was a pretty day in Romania, and while he'd spent most of the morning attempting to investigate the reason a Romanian Longhorn had lost its golden horn, he couldn't seem to focus on the task at hand. All he could think about was how people he knew, people he had been friends with, people he would have given his life for were now dead.

That was a thought which chilled him to the core, thinking of not only his friends but anyone he knew being in that same situation. It seemed to Charlie that if He Who Should Not Be Named was to win, was to take over everything, that there would be more deaths, more innocent lives lost in vain. This left him in a tough choice – should he remain in Romania and traveling abroad, searching out foreign wizards to join their cause and rise up against the Dark Lord, or should he return home to make sure that those he loved were safe, and to pitch in on the front lines?

It was lunch when he made his decision. The owl flew off after he'd finished his sandwich, and by dinner he'd received his response. His accrued sick and vacation time had given him over a month of leave, which he'd cashed in up front – and that night he'd be returning home to the Burrow, to make sure his family was alright. It would be there that he'd speak to his father and see if he could get a relocation to the Ministry's head offices, perhaps shuffling papers back and forth to be signed in triplicate, sent in, sent back, lost, found, queried, subjected to public inquiry, lost again, and finally found in the bottom drawer of some guy's desk on the fourteenth floor, under a pile of The Adventure of Martin Miggs, the Mad Muggle.

Perhaps desk work would be a bit boring, perhaps being at home would be more dangerous, but in the end none of it truly mattered. He'd be returning home, and damned if even the Dark Lord would be able to stop him.