Idque apud imperitos humanitas vocabatur, cum pars servitutis esset.
All this in their ignorance they called civilisation, when it was but a part of their servitude.
—Tacitus, De Vita Iulii Agricolae
To those who cling to power through corruption and deceit and the silencing of dissent, know that you are on the wrong side of history, but that we will extend a hand if you are willing to unclench your fist.
—Obama, Inaugural Address
Beyond the glass they stand in White Coats with Machineguns. Behind them glows deathly white the Screen that desecrates our potions' names.
The Muggleb— Mudblood wanders past, peering into our cages. I wait for him to turn away before I add the final reagen— ingredients. They have not yet learned how to mechanise this process. When I look up he is sneering at the White Coats.
Although they have not allowed him a wand, he is still allowed to sneer. He is free, after a fashion, and too soon his world and their world will be at peace.
It began with McDonald's and with bare legs as we craved for distance from our lamentable unlamented fathers. Coffee carts erupted from quadrangle and square. Billboards glared down on our cobbled alleys. Short skirts shamed the very streets.
Muggle Studies became compulsory. A female Muggle showed us the efficiency of Mass-Production and the convenience of the Cellular Telephone. Whilst Madam Malkins closed her darkening doors.
At first they altered the artefacts. There were workshops. But the workshops worked too slowly and Electricity was cheaper than Wizards. So the Muggles carved wounds into the black earth and there they laid down their Cables and their Wires. They showed us their warrants for invading our homes. And they brought us Electricity and they called it Power.
Powerful magic interfered with Electricity. The glass Lights sputtered and the Televisions stuttered. The Plastic melted around the Wires.
In third year they dismissed the Elves. They shut the Floo Network. They dismantled our defensive charms.
At Hogwarts they taught us how to disconnect our deepest magics. They taught us how to see magic as a tool and not our very essence. They taught us how to live in this Modern World.
Our Muggle artefacts needed updating. We bought new ones.
Our magic withered.
What was the use when a Muggle artefact was just as good?
They hexed us in the street. Death Eater spawn, they said, Fascists. They recorded our humiliation with their Cellular Telephones and then they gathered their friends. We barricaded the Manor Gate with the Plastic of Muggle artefacts that had died.
In seventh year we demonstrated before the Ministry offices.
Madam Granger declaimed, "The bloody conflict between Magic and Technology shaped our History, but History is over. The time for the old ways is long past. We live now in the Future, when Technology entwines with Magic in this melting-pot of Progress, as we step forth together into the Modern World."
When Madam Granger withdrew the Aurors came with masks and with Kolokol-1.
Hundreds of Reactionaries Arrested in Ministry Riot, screamed the Daily Prophet.
The Mu— Mudbloods disappeared.
Pamphlets darkened the sky like hornets. Then ant-like massed the tanks over the hilltops, and the meadows blossomed with the poppies of our blood.
Pure blood.
War came upon us. And they call it Government. They rob and they slaughter and they plunder. They take our wands and they enchain us and beyond the glass they look at us in fear.
But they allow me to live, for now. For now there are cauldrons to stir and spell damage to heal. And when the cauldrons are stirred and the spell damage is healed they will arise from this stark whiteness and they will march forth to finish that which they have started. They will make a desolation and they will call it peace.
My potion glows green with hemlock and hellebore. The bottles are stacked row upon row on the counter, brittle shells beneath this cold white light. I fill the bottles.
There is just enough left for me.
Author's Note: Written for the prompts "Empire" and "You will stir up the hornets." The best lines were stolen from Tacitus.