SKIPPING - I'm actually not sorry about this.


Late June ,1995

"He's back! Voldemort's back!"

She heard the sorrowful screams of Harry and shrieks and cries from Cedric Diggory's father. She was watching the final task with Sirius in his Animagus form.

"Padfoot, stay here," she said firmly. "I'm not going anywhere and nor are you."

She spotted Harry being taken away.

"Stay here."

She hurried to Dumbledore.

"Professor, he took Harry away."

He looked around hurriedly.

"Severus, Minerva, follow me."

Cassidy got back to Sirius and he hadn't moved, just like she asked.

If Voldemort was back, then this is the beginning of the end.

x

"He's being kissed by Dementors?" questioned Cassidy, astounded.

"Barty Crouch Jr has been shown as insane and is in no fit state to be questioned by Veritaserum," said Cornelius Fudge simply. "It's all very simple-"

"Simple?! There's nothing simple about it. You're sending a man to a fate which is worse than death, a fate that dehumanises people!"

"It's a fate that all escapees from Azkaban face. It's not an extraordinary situation but it's based on fact that he must serve his sentence for torturing Frank and Alice Longbottom into madness."

"Yes, I know he escaped from Azkaban, but he didn't do it alone."

"Why not?" asked Fudge

"Well, assuming that he escaped before Sirius did, he would've received outside help from someone," stated Cassidy simply.

"Are you suggesting his father-"

"No, not his father. He despised him. His mother, more likely."

"But how?"

"Well, I have a theory that his mother fell ill around the time of his trial. And Dementors they can sense feelings, can't they? So his father must've gone in to visit along with his mother and the Dementors sensed one living and one dying, you see. I propose that they used Polyjuice potion and he switched places with his mother. And when they left the Dementors sensed one living and one dying."

"That is remarkable," acknowledged Dumbledore.

"And completely barbaric!" spat Fudge.

"Oh really? Well, Cornelius, I'd like to see you make your own theory. And please don't go to the suggestion that maybe Black helped him escape. It's rather obvious that he escaped before, don't you think?"

"How is it obvious?"?

"Well obviously, he was being kept prisoner by his father, perhaps. Kept under an invisibility cloak. Under house arrest and looked after by his house elf. At the night of the World Cup, Mr Crouch's house elf was discovered with Harry's wand, yes? Well it occurred to me that maybe Crouch Jr took the wand and cast the Dark Mark with Harry's wand and then they were both stunned by the multiple stunning curses. Obviously Crouch couldn't have been seen with his Invisibility cloak over him and so only Winky was there. Crouch Sr only dismissed Winky because she didn't follow his orders properly because his son escaped from the Imperius curse. Obviously, Voldemort found out that he was still alive and then put the Imperius curse on his father so that he could serve Voldemort."

"He. Isn't. BACK!"

"I never said he was. Like I said, this is before this happened. After Voldemort got Crouch Jr back on his side, he helped Peter Pettigrew kidnap Alastor Moody and use Polyjuice potion for almost the entire school year and he put Harry's name into the Goblet of Fire and he volunteered to put the Triwizard cup into the maze, did he not, and turned it into a Portkey where Voldemort was reborn."

"There ISN'T PROOF!"

"Find it, then. But I warn you I am not going to stand here and help educate the ignorant if they do not choose to believe the truth because the Wizarding World cannot handle it."

"Thank you, Cassidy," said Dumbledore firmly, but calmly.

Oh yes how times have changed.