An Unwelcomed Twist

Before Gibbs could mentally beat the crap out of Diggory, he was forced to 'talk' to one Professor Pomona Sprout, who was beside herself with fury. The argument involved several phrases and exclamations coming from the mouth of the professor that Gibbs didn't think were possible, and ended with Gibbs having to dodge a couple of jinxes. He would surely have been hit if saving grace in the form of Albus Dumbledore hadn't intervened.

Now angrier than he had been before, Gibbs entered the interrogation room, insisting on going alone. Jenny had tried her hardest to get him to take someone with him for fear that Gibbs would kill Diggory.

Gibbs slammed the door, the slammed himself down into his seat. His face was still red and blotchy, but his eyes had returned to normal. "Your teachers really care about you, Cedric," he said in a surprisingly normal voice. "Did you know that?"

Cedric Diggory shrugged.

"You're a bastard." Gibbs' eyes returned to looking they way they had when he'd been shouting at Professor Sprout.

Diggory's eyes snapped up to meet Gibbs'.

"Your teachers and fellow classmates trust you, and you've betrayed them all. Tell me that's not a bastardly thing to do!"

"How'd I betray them, sir?"

"You tell me!"

"I didn't! I wouldn't!"

"You did!" Gibbs pulled something out of his pocket and slammed it onto the table.

"My potions knife! Can I have it back?"

Behind the glass, Jenny tensed. "Who let him bring a weapon in there?" she asked through gritted teeth, looking around the rather crowded observation room.

"You can have it back once you tell me how Pansy Parkinson's blood got on it!" Gibbs snarled.

"I don't see anything on there!" Diggory said haughtily.

"Something's not right," Professor Sprout said slowly. "That can't be Cedric…"

"No, smart kid like you, you cleaned it once you finished with it." Gibbs picked up the knife.

"I didn't kill Pansy!" Diggory said quickly.

"Really? How about Gavin McDonald?" Gibbs opened a file and slid a picture in front of Diggory of a boy lying on the ground, two holes in his chest. "And you're sure you didn't kill Pansy Parkinson?" Gibbs laid out another picture of a girl lying in a crimson pool with clean cut lines going down her arms. "Or Roger Davies?" Gibbs put down the picture of a boy blankly staring up. "Or maybe you only killed one person. Penelope Clearwater?" Gibbs opened a different file and laid out a picture of a girl on the Great Hall floor, her blonde curls stained the same color red as her lips and chin.

Cedric suddenly looked as if he were pushing against an invisible force once more. "I wouldn't –"

"Explain," Gibbs shouted, "why Parkinson's blood is on your knife!"

"It's not!"

Gibbs picked up the knife once more and pointed to where the blade met the handle. "You missed a spot when you were cleaning up."

Diggory only looked at the knife. His breathing began to speed up.

"Maybe I should let you talk to the victims you left alive," Gibbs suggested. He pulled out another two pictures. One of a bruised and battered Lavender Brown and another of a bloodied and unconscious Samantha Madley.

"I didn't do anything to them!"

"You raped Lavender and you would have done the same to Samantha if we hadn't stepped in!"

"I didn't!"

"Do you know all the lives you've screwed up? All the parents that are crying themselves to sleep because their child is dead? Do you know how tormented they are? Do you know what's going on in the mind of Lavender Brown right now? Do you know that the only thing going through her mind is the most horrible night of her life over and over again? Do you know how confused Samantha Madley is? How badly she wants to go be with all her friends? Do you know how crazy you've been driving me and my colleagues? Do you know how that your teachers, who have been trying to protect you and keep you safe, are sick with worry? They've been entrusted with their students' lives, and they feel like they're failing every parent out there. Do you see what you've done?!" Gibbs didn't realize that he'd stood up and was currently towering over Cedric.

"Do one decent thing." Gibbs wasn't requesting, he was demanding. "Confess and tell me why!"

Cedric Diggory tried to speak, but began choking instead. Gibbs made no move to help him. Instead, he locked the door and leaned against it as someone frantically tried to get in.

"I didn't want – to kill – anyone!" Diggory gasped.

Gibbs looked at him carefully. Something was definitely wrong, and it wasn't Cedric's choking. He could breathe just fine. He simply couldn't get the words out.

Diggory's eyes suddenly darkened and he stopped choking. A horrible look in his eye, he grabbed the knife Gibbs had left on the table and approached the other human in the room. "Leave me alone!" He sounded as if he were possessed. His voice was just as dark as his eyes.

Gibbs stood his ground. Diggory swung the knife at him. The blade got stuck in the door and Diggory couldn't pull it back out.

Quite suddenly, he changed again. His eyes returned to normal, as did his voice. "I'm sorry!" he said frantically. "He made – " He changed again.

Gibbs readied himself for another attack.

"Unlock the door, Jethro!" Jenny screamed.

Gibbs wasn't done yet, and he wasn't about to put his coworkers at risk. He had to take care of Diggory himself.

"Leave me alone!" Diggory repeated, sounding demonic once again.

Gibbs dodged a punch and refrained from throwing one back. He wanted to figure out what was going on.

Diggory switched again. He spoke quickly. "He made me poison her!" he shouted. "I can't – throw – it off!"

With a roar, Cedric changed once more, now more aggressive than he'd been before. He threw his fist at Gibbs once, twice, and a third.

Enough was enough. Gibbs physically deflected the fourth punch, grabbed Diggory's arm, and forced it behind his back and shoved him against a wall. At the same moment, the door burst off its hinges and the room was filled with people who had wands or guns drawn.

Cedric relaxed a bit, his fit was over for the time being.

"Who made you do it?" Gibbs hissed in the boy's ear.

"I don't know!" Cedric answered. He sounded as though his nose were plugged.

"Then how'd they make you do it?" Cedric didn't respond. Gibbs shook him and asked again, "Tell me how they forced you!"

Cedric opened his mouth, but instead of talking, he started choking again.

"Jethro, let him go!" the Director commanded. She cautiously walked across the room, her gun still poised and ready to shoot.

Diggory began making violent attempts to get free of his captor.

"Yeah," Gibbs said with a wince as he tried to keep Diggory pinned. "I'll let him go while he's in the mood to kill! Good suggestion, Director!"

"I'll hurt you!" said Diggory's demented voice. "You'll regret messing with me! Do you want a second Kate episode?"

Gibbs re-slammed Diggory into the wall. "Threatening my people isn't a good idea!" he said dangerously.

"I keep my word!"

"DiNozzo! Cuff him!" Gibbs ordered harshly.

Tony carefully approached and got cuffs onto the flailing boy. Gibbs released his arm and instead pinned him to the wall by his shoulders. Tony redrew his gun and kept it pointed at Diggory.

Confusing Gibbs even more, Diggory suddenly relaxed.

"I can't fight it off!" Cedric repeated. He sounded tired.

"Minerva," said Dumbledore quite calmly considering the situation, "call Alastor. I believe we are in need of his services." McGonagall left and Dumbledore turned to Sprout. "I believe Mr. and Mrs. Diggory should be aware of what's going on. Let them know he's been put under the Imperius. And I think it'd be best if we let Mr. Diggory be for now," he finished and exited the interrogation room.

"What's the Imperius?" Tony asked as he held the door open for his colleagues and quickly shut it after Jenny dragged Gibbs out.

"Perhaps you can explain, Officer David?" Dumbledore suggested, looking at the Israeli over his half-moon glasses.

"I only know that it is an Unforgivable, yes?" Ziva said.

"Correct!" Dumbledore confirmed. He turned towards Jenny and Gibbs. "The Imperius Curse is one of three curses that is simply not tolerated. Using it or the Cruciatus Curse or the Avada Kedavra is a one-way ticket to Azkaban." In response to the confused looks he was receiving, he elaborated. "Azkaban is the Wizards' prison."

"What does the Imperius do, Professor?" Jenny asked.

"If done well, the Imperius will allow the caster to control the mind of the one he or she cast it on. The caster can make their victim do anything they please."

Gibbs sighed inwardly. If the killer could cast the Imperius, the team might as well pack up and head back to D.C., because there was no way they'd every be able to catch him.

"However," Dumbledore continued, "we are very fortunate in this case. Cedric is a very strong wizard. He has already begun to fight the Imperius. Which, I might add, was not cast anywhere near as well as it could have been."

"You mean he can fight it off completely?" McGee asked hopefully.

"Yes, he can, Agent McGee. However, he may need some coaching, which is why I've sent for Mr. Moody."

"Moody?" Tony queried. "Wasn't he on the plane?"

"Yes, he was," Dumbledore answered. "You won't be able to find a better person than Alastor Moody to deal with the Dark Arts. Might I sit down?"

"You can sit at my desk," Gibbs offered, hardly taken aback by Dumbledore's unfitting request. He looked around. "Tobias isn't back yet?"

"No," Jenny said. "Diane pulled him away, remember?"

"Conversations with Diane are one-sided and don't take long," said Gibbs. He took off and headed up the stairs to MTAC.

"Where is Agent Fornell?" Dumbledore asked quite casually.

"He's taking care of a bit of business," Tony answered as he headed to his own desk. "Probie!" he barked. "Observe our suspect!"

"I will watch Diggory," Ziva volunteered. She turned around and went back into the observation room.

Jenny took Ziva's chair as McGee sat down in his own.

Colonel Mann sat at her own desk, though without anything to do for the time being, continued to question Dumbledore. "What do the Cruciatus Curse and the Avada Kedavra do?"

Dumbledore had a look on his face as if just coming back from being somewhere completely different. "I would have though Professor Lupin would have told you about them long ago! They were used so often when he was in school."

"He didn't like talking about the war much," Colonel Mann admitted.

"The war?" Tony's attention was caught.

"Yes, Agent DiNozzo," Dumbledore said heavily. "The war. It is a painful business I prefer to avoid talking about. So much and so many were lost.

"Back to your question, Colonel, I think it best if you weren't aware of them. I sincerely doubt they will be a problem during this investigation."

"Well I'm sure you didn't think the Imperius would be a problem in the investigation either, Professor," Tony said.

Dumbledore sighed. "Too true, Agent DiNozzo. Very well. The Cruciatus is a torturing curse. It's truly horrific to see or be on the end of. It's been known to drive people into irreversible madness."

Tony, Colonel Mann, Jenny, and McGee were all wondering the same thing: why would one do such a thing to another?

"The Avada Kedavra is, perhaps, the darkest of spells. It is a curse that kills instantly, leaving no trace behind." Dumbledore's explanations left the agents in stunned silence.

"Letting the Muggles in on all our secrets, Dumbledore?" growled a voice by the door. The man walked further into the room and with every other step he took one could hear a dull clunk. He was a rather scary looking man. His face was completely scarred, part of his nose was missing. But the most frightening thing were his eyes. They were completely mismatched, and one of them would not hold still.

"Lighten up a bit, Mad-Eye!" said a second, jollier voice. A woman with a heart-shaped face and bubble-gum pink, spiked hair jumped into the room. Professor McGonagall came in after her, looking a bit disheveled. "They already know about Hogwarts, might as well tell them about the rest!"

"This," Dumbledore said loudly before Moody could snap back as he stood up, "is Alastory Moody and Nymphadora Tonks. They are Aurors."

"Dark wizard fighters!" the pink-haired woman happily elaborated. "And I prefer to go by Tonks! And you can call him Mad-Eye!" she said, jabbing her thumb at her partner.

Tony was far too frightened at the appearance of the man to call him Mad-Eye, though it was certainly a fitting name.

"And I'm not quite an Auror yet, Professor!" Tonks corrected good naturedly. "I still have at least a year of training to go!"

"If you can pass Stealth and Tracking," Moody growled. With his dark, beady eye he looked over at Jenny. "You're the Director, then?"

"That's right," Jenny said calmly, sitting up in Ziva's chair.

"You might want to go get your agent from upstairs," he suggested.

Jenny raised an eyebrow, but headed upstairs to get Gibbs anyway, wondering how Moody had known.

"And you," Moody said, rounding on Tony, who jumped, "go get the woman watching the boy out of that room."

Tony's mind didn't even process doubt or wonder. He just knew that he needed to do whatever Moody told him, or things would not end well. He jumped up and went to get Ziva immediately.

"Mad-Eye! Stop showing off!" Tonks scolded.

Moody didn't respond. He just strode toward the door labeled 'Interrogation', Tonks trailing behind him.

McGee didn't realize he'd been holding his breath. He hadn't thought there could possibly be anyone more straightforward, demanding, and scary than Gibbs. He'd been wrong.

Author's Note

Next chapter - Dealing with the Diggorys

Problem? Quite possibly!

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