Following the events with the troll, Iris was taken to the Hospital Wing, along with Hermione and Susan, who had been in complete shock.
Meanwhile, Shirou was taken to what he could only describe as a criminal interrogation room. Though it was just Professor McGonagall's office, and it wasn't long before the interrogators showed up.
He was a man who looked to be in his thirties or forties, though one who had seen hell. His hair was brown, starting to gray, and stuck out everywhere. He walked with a magic staff to help with his peg leg and worse of dusty old coat that was full of various pockets and enchantments. And his most startling feature, a large eye that looked to be held in his head by some kind of ball bearing, and which was spinning around in his head.
Shirou had only ever heard a description of him from Tonks, but he was fairly sure he knew who this man was.
Alastor Moody, aka Mad Eye.
Tonks also entered the room behind him, though she didn't look too happy with her mentor, as her hair had turned a red as dark as Shirou's.
Alastor made a show of leaning his staff against the wall and taking a few bobbles out of his pockets and tossing them haphazardly on the table as he sat down across from Shirou and Professor McGonagall.
One of the times appeared to be an old fashioned dictaphone, presumably to record the discussion.
"So, you're this Shirou kid that Nymphadora's been talking about. The one making all her meals for her." Moody said, ignoring the kick he got to his chair for mentioning Tonks' first name.
"She's been kind enough to provide ingredients, so I don't see why I shouldn't." Shirou replied.
Moody huffed. "Well, no need to be stiff. This is just a routine questioning of people involved in a magic creature attack, so let's just get this over with. Please state your name and the name of your legal guardian for me."
"I'm Shirou Emiya, and I am currently registered under the guardianship of Albus Dumbledore." Shirou said clearly.
"I see. Professor Dumbledore has given his permission for Professor McGonagall to advise you during these witness statement proceedings, correct?" Moody said.
"Correct, sir." Shirou replied.
"Alright then, tell me what happened." Moody said, leaning back in his chair.
"I heard about the troll along with everyone else in the Great Hall, so I went and killed it." Shirou reported simply.
Moody waited for Shirou to say something else, but when he showed no signs of offering more, the Auror snorted and started his questioning. "Alright, you were in the Great Hall with everyone else, heard about the troll and decided to go and fight it. Got it. Tonks said you moved pretty fast. Natural abilities, or human transfiguration?"
"Transfiguration. A body strengthen spell." Shirou replied.
"Interesting. Using human transfiguration to strengthen the body, and doing wandlessly. Not a practice you see a lot of in Europe. You practice African Magecraft?" Alastor asked.
"Never heard of it, so I don't know. But I'm mostly self-taught." Shirou said, getting a whistle out of Alastor, though it didn't sound right coming out of his mouth. It sounded closer to blowing raspberries.
Shirou really didn't know. He hadn't read anything about Africa's magical practices, though the fact that Alastor had used the word magecraft instead of magic had caught his attention.
"Self-taught huh. That's dangerous stuff for trying to learn by yourself. How many times did you end up breaking your own body before you got it to work?" Alastor said.
"Mr. Moody, please stay on topic." Professor McGonagall snapped, though her eyes told Shirou that she would have many words for him later about his practices.
"Fine. Sorry." Alastor said, though he didn't seem sorry at all. "So you heard about the trolls and went running. Why'd you go down that first floor corridor? The troll was supposed to be in the dungeons, and there is no entrance to the dungeons in that direction."
"I had known that Ms. Potter, Ms. Granger and Ms. Bones had been in there shortly before the feast and went to make sure that they were al…" Shirou's words were interrupted by the sound of something whistling, and one of the random objects that Moody had tossed onto the desk, something looking like a glass top, had started to rapidly spin and give off a sound like a train whistle.
Shirou stared at it for a few moments until it stopped and then turned his gaze back to a smirking Alastor. "Tell me boy, you know what this is?" Alastor asked, pointing towards the item. When Shirou shook his head, the man started to explain. "It's called a Sneakoscope. A magic device which can tell when someone is trying to deceive those around them, causing it to spin and whistle."
Shirou's heart stank as he realized that the Auror had him on a lie detector. And it didn't work based on whether or not he was lying, but whether or not he was trying to mislead them, so half truths won't work either.
"They don't hold up in the court as evidence. Too easily manipulated. It can't tell if you are deciding to try to trick me, or if someone else in the area is trying to set you up with it. But it is a good tool for an investigator to have, so they know when someone is trying to feed them crap."
Alastor leaned forward in his seat, his magical eye staring straight at Shirou with great intensity.
"How did you know where the troll was?" Alastor demanded from Shirou.
"...I could smell him." Shirou said, trying to hide his bitter feelings about being made to admit it.
"You could smell him? From almost halfway across the castle?" Alastor said, pressing for more information, despite the fact that the top wasn't going off.
"God! Just leave him alone Mad Eye!" Tonks said, kicking the man's chair a little harder than before, and causing him to wobble a bit in it. "Stop trying to make it out like Shirou is a suspect or something!"
"I'm only asking how he knew, and you should never overlook a possible suspect, no matter how seemingly unlikely!" Alastor shouted back at the girl.
"Mr. Emiya isn't a possible suspect. None of the children are. Not unless you can explain when one of our students got in contact with a mountain troll in order to let it into the castle during the middle of the semester. And if he did let in such a troll, why would he kill it?" Professor McGonagall said, rolling her eyes at the man. "Seriously Mr. Moody, you need to think more rationally. These hairbrained conspiracies of yours is why you failed your History of Magic exams the first time around."
"Fine. Fine. You 'smelled' him with your ordinary human nose. Then what?" Alastor said, annoyed at being ganged up on by the women.
"I tracked it to the girls bathroom, where I found it about to kill Iris. So I killed it first." Shirou replied, glad to be getting away from the subject of his magical tracking abilities.
"How did you kill it?" Alastor pressed. "I saw the mess you made. I want to know how you did it."
"Is that important?" Shirou asked, not wanting to go into details about it.
"Yes." Alastor replied.
Shirou looked to Tonks and Professor McGonagall for help, but they seemed too curious to help him this time. "I don't suppose the wizarding world has the right to remain silent, does it?"
"No." Moody said sharply.
"I jumped onto its back and stabbed it through the head with a conjured sword." Shirou said as he gave in. They would find out from the girls anyways if he didn't talk. "After that, I transfigured the sword into something much larger in order to cut the troll in half."
"Conjuring swords is part of the seventh year curriculum at Hogwarts, isn't it? Even basic conjuring is sixth year." Alastor said, looking at the shocked Professor McGonagall who nodded.
"And to do it wandlessly as well. Could you perhaps demonstrate for us?" Professor McGonagall asked him.
Shirou nodded and traced the black sword Kanshou for them all to see.
"No incantation or hand gestures either. So it is a unique spell then." Alastor observed as Professor McGonagall looked closer at the sword. "And this sword could cut through the rock hard skull of a troll? Even its skin could turn away a normal blade."
"Yes." Shirou admitted in annoyance.
"I see. So tell me, after you had already cut through the troll's brain, why did you feel the need to go further? Why cut the creature completely in half? Were you simply mad that it hurt Potter? Or do you enjoy stuff like that?"
"Mr. Moody!" Professor McGonagall shouted in indignation, glaring at the Auror.
"I did it to make sure it was died." Shirou said simply. "I'm not familiar with trolls, but there are some kinds of magical creatures that wouldn't die just because you stabbed them through the head, so I went a little further. If it had been outside instead of in an inclosed space, I would have also set it on fire to make sure."
Everyone stared at Shirou for a few solid seconds before Alastor snorted in laughter. "You sound just like your father." Alastor said, much to Shirou's surprise. "Back when we were students, we chased a group of first years who went into the forbidden forest on a dare. Kerry always cast an extra blasting curse at the bodies of everything to make sure it was properly dealt with."
The Auror spoke with something between nostalgia and bitterness when recounting the story.
"Mr. Moody, I'm an orphan." Shirou said.
"I get it, kid. You wanted to go to Hogwarts, but Kiritsugu had a lot of enemies, so you pretended to be an orphan." Alastor said. "Only you can't fool the Hogwarts' new student registry. No matter what you did, you would appear on it as 'Emiya' so you claim that it is just a coincidence and that you aren't related to the Black Death. Or are you going to tell me that Kiritsugu is not your father?"
"He isn't." Shirou said.
The sound of whistling filled the air and they all looked down at the spinning glass top. "Sure he isn't boy. Sure he isn't."
Shirou inwardly cursed as McGonagall and Tonks looked at him in surprise.
"It's only spinning because you were trying to trick me into revealing something." Shirou claimed, but the top just kept spinning and whistling.
He knew any further damage control he attempted would be an attempt at deception, and would therefore only serve to make the top continue to spin. So instead he changed the subject.
"Do you know who deactivated the suits of armor in the halls?" Shirou asked, causing Alastor's smirk to drop. "The suits of armor aren't there for show. They are part of the school's defenses. If a troll was spotted in the building, every single suit of armor should have swarmed it, but they didn't move at all."
"So, you noticed that too." Alastor said with a nod. "You're right. The armors of Hogwarts are connected to each other as part of a defense system. If any armor sees something that is considered a danger to the students, or if a Professor gives the signal, all of them would attack. There are also other spells around the perimeter that should have warned about the approach of a mountain troll, but didn't. So whoever did this is someone very familiar with the school's magic defenses."
"So either a Professor or a former Professor." Shirou supplied.
"Or someone, maybe even a student, who is working with one." Alastor said with a nod. "Sadly, because of how many Defense Against the Dark Arts Professors Hogwarts has been going through, there is no end to the list of people who might have a grudge against Hogwarts and have the knowledge to do this, and that is assuming it is a grudge. Without definite motive, we are grasping at straws. And with the increased traffic in Hogsmeade cause by the holy sword, we won't be able to simply look for someone who isn't a local."
"You might want to look into Professor Quirrell." Shirou suggested.
"Mr. Emiya, do not slander a Professor!" Professor McGonagall said in disbelief, but Shirou ignored the indignation.
"His testimony that the troll was in the dungeon was false, as far as I could tell, it had never been in the dungeon, and I can't think of a reason why he would have been in the dungeons during the feast. He has been a Professor at the school for a long time, so he likely knows how to deal with the security. He was also not in the Great Hall during the time the troll was found, which couldn't have been long after its entry into the castle." Shirou said, listing off his reasons. "Also, people who commit crimes often report it themselves, thinking that it makes them look more innocent. Admittedly, we still have nothing for motive, but as far as opportunity and means, Professor Quirrell would be my top suspect."
"I'll keep it in mind, if I can convince Albus to let us investigate." Alastor said with a nod. "You'd make for a good Auror, Emiya. If it wasn't for the fact that you are so much like your father. A pity. How often do you get someone who has clairvoyant eyes, the ability to smell magic, and is a psychometry? You're a natural born hunter."
"I… What?" Shirou said, caught off guard. "I'm not a psychom…" His attempts to deny the accusation were cut short as the sneakoscope going off again. "Seriously! It is you setting it off, not me!"
"Sure it is kid." Alastor said. "Then care to explain how you knew the exact extent of Potter's injuries with only a touch? And don't tell me it was because of your clairvoyant sight. I know better than anyone that the magic signal of a body doesn't know what bones are broken."
Shirou didn't respond. He was trying to think of a way he could deny the accusations, but even thinking about how to do it was causing the sneakoscope to go nuts.
The Auror had caught him, and looked damn smug about it.
Shirou let out a miserable sigh as the interrogation ended and started to head for the door. However, after he opened up the door, only to find Rin and Luvia standing there with their arms crossed and looks of annoyance on their faces, he realized he hadn't even started to suffer.
""Shirou, you idiot!""
Alastor Moody felt old. Which he didn't like.
He wasn't old, regardless of how many people kept insisting he should think about retirement. He was only 35.
But talking with Shirou Emiya, it had been like a blast into the past for him. Back to the time when he and Kiritsugu had been classmates at Hogwarts together, sharing the same ridiculous, childish dream of being heroes and saving the people from the forces of darkness.
The two of them had been thick as thieves and supported each other in stupid and reckless behavior throughout their school days, but after they left school and joined the fight against Voldemort… things changed.
Kiritsugu hadn't been the same man that Alastor had thought he knew. In the fight against the forces of darkness, Kiritsugu had become the dark itself.
Where Alastor had filled half the cells in Azkaban, Kiritsugu had filled twice as many graves. He protected the lives of the innocent by taking drastic, sometimes even unforgivable actions.
Under the wartime laws passed by the ministry, he had not even attempted to take the Dark Wizards alive, save for when he wanted them for questioning. And even then, he didn't hand them over to Azkaban, but put them down as soon as they were no longer of use.
He would kill targets in the middle of crowded streets, using modified Muggle technology to get around the Statue of Secrecy. At one point, when a Death Eater he had caught was being uncooperative, Kiritsugu had brought the man's wife in front of him, a woman whose only crime was having married a Death Eater, and told them he would kill her if he didn't tell him everything he knew, using a cutting curse to cut off the woman's hand to show how serious he was.
When Dumbledore had approached Alastor about the Order of the Phoenix, Kiritsugu had not been invited, because they simply could not accept his methods.
Kiritsugu had wanted to save the lives of the innocent and fight the darkness. It had broken Alastor's heart to see how that noble goal could change a man the way it had changed his friend.
He had been to the Death Eaters what the Death Eaters had been to normal witches and wizards. An icon of fear.
But even after it all, Alastor still thought of Kiritsugu as his friend.
And now, Shirou. Who was Kiritsugu's spitting imagine in attitude, if not in appearance.
If Alastor had to guess, he would had guess Shirou's date of birth, he would say it would be in the last days of July, in the year 1980. The same as Iris Potter and Neville Longbottom. It was the only reason he could think of as to why Kiritsugu and Irisviel would have kept the boy so secret.
He understood why Kiritsugu wouldn't trust anyone with that information, even years after Voldemort's supposed death.
Still, it hurt him to think that his friend had never trusted him.
Got tired of uploading a little at a time, so this is everything I have written so far.
