Disclaimer: I am not J.K. Rowling or Timothy Zahn.
Tiberius Ogden stands at the bridge of the Ministry cruise Nurmengard.
Derrick's Voice. Captain Ogden. Message from the sentry line: the scout brooms have just come out of lightspeed.
Ogden. [to First Lieutenant] Trace this line for me.
The lieutenant frowns at Ogden.
First Lieutenant. Sir . . . ?
Ogden. I heard him. You have an order, Lieutenant.
First Lieutenant. Yes, sir.
Enter Peregrine Derrick.
Derrick. Captain Ogden.
Ogden frowns and turns to face Derrick.
Ogden. This is not a cattle market in Hogsmeade, Lieutenant Derrick. This is the bridge of a Ministry cruiser. Routine information is not - repeat, not - simply shouted in the general direction of its intended recipient. Is that clear?
Derrick. Yes, sir.
Ogden holds his gaze for a moment, then nods.
Ogden. Now. Report.
Derrick. Yes, sir. We've just received word from the sentry brooms, sir. The scouts have returned from their scan raid on the Flourish-Blotts region.
Ogden. Very good. Did they have any trouble?
Derrick. Only a little, sir. The natives apparently took exception to them pulling a dump of their central library system. The wing commander said there was some attempt at pursuit, but that he lost them.
Ogden. I hope so. Have the wing commander report to the bridge ready room with his report as soon as the brooms are aboard. And have the sentry line go to yellow alert. Dismissed.
Derrick. Yes, sir.
Exit Derrick.
[aside] In the old days, at the height of the Ministry's power, it would have been inconceivable for a man as young as Derrik to serve as a bridge officer aboard a ship like Nurmengard. Now, in contrast, Nurmengard has virtually no one aboard except young men and women. [angry] This is the Dark Lord's fault. I always suspected the first Dark Mark was nothing more than a blatant attempt to bring the Ministry's vast military power more tightly under his direct control, just as he did with the Ministry's political power. The fact that he ignored the battle station's proven vulnerability and gone ahead with a second Dark Mark only confirmed that suspicion. We might have even genuinely mourned its loss . . . if it hadn't, in its death throes, taken the Ministry cruiser Half-Blood Prince with it. I still wince at that memory. The loss of the ship itself was bad enough. But the fact that it was the Half-Blood Prince made it far worse. That particular cruiser was Severus Snape's personal ship, and despite the Death Eater's legendary, and often lethal, capriciousness, serving aboard it has long been perceived as the quick line to promotion . . . which means that when the Half-Blood Prince died, so also did a disproportionate fraction of the best young and midlevel officers. We have never recovered from that fiasco. With the Half-Blood Prince's leadership gone, the battle quickly turned into a confused rout, with several other Ministry cruisers being lost before the order to withdraw was finally been given. Despite our best efforts, we never regained the initiative against the Army. Instead, we were steadily pushed back . . . until now. No, the end of the Ministry was not yet, as the arrogantly self-proclaimed Wizard's Council will soon discover.
Ogden checks his watch.
Grand Admiral Grindelwald will be meditating in his command room now. . . . [to First Lieutenant] Continue tracing those lines. I'll be back shortly."
Exit all but Ogden, who approaches Grindelwald's private quarters.
Captain Ogden to see Grand Admiral Grindelwald. I have informa . . .
Enter Sanguini, Grindelwald's vampire bodyguard, taking Ogden by surprise.
Sanguini. Captain Ogden.
Ogden. [startled] Blast it, Sanguini. What do you think you're doing?
Sanguini. I'm doing my job. You may enter.
Ogden. Thank you.
Ogden enters Grindelwald's private quarters, where surrounded by artwork Gellert Grindelwald sits at the Grand Admiral's chair.
Grindelwald. Come in, Captain. [gestures toward the art] What do you think?
Ogden. It's . . . very interesting, sir.
Grindelwald. All holographic, of course. The sculptures and flats both. Some of them are lost. Many of the others are on regions now occupied by Dumbledore's Army.
Ogden. Yes, sir. I thought you'd want to know, Admiral, that the scouts have returned from the Flourish-Blotts system. The wing commander will be ready for debriefing in a few minutes.
Grindelwald. Were they able to tap into the central library system?
Ogden. They got at least a partial dump. I don't know yet if they were able to complete it. Apparently, there was some attempt at pursuit. The wing commander thinks he lost them, though.
Grindelwald. No. No, I don't believe he has. Particularly not if the pursuers were from the DA.
Ogden. Yes, sir. I've ordered the sentry line onto yellow alert. Shall we go to red?
Grindelwald. Not yet. We should still have a few minutes. Tell me, Captain, do you know anything about art?
Ogden. [taken aback] Ah, not very much. I've never really had much time to devote to it.
Grindelwald. You should make the time. Peverell paintings. Circa 1550 to 2200, Pre-Ministry Date. Note how the style changes right here, at the first contact with Death. Over there are examples of Carathi art. Note the similarities with the early Peverell work, and also the mid-eighteenth-century goblin sculptures.
Ogden. Yes, I see. Admiral, shouldn't we be . . .
Enter the Floo image of Derrick.
Derrick. Bridge to Grand Admiral Grindelwald. Sir, we're under attack.
Grindelwald. This is Grindelwald. Go to red alert and tell me what we've got. Calmly, if possible.
Derrick. Yes, sir. Sensors are picking up four Wizards' Council Cleansweeps. Plus at least three wings of Firebolts. Symmetric cloud-vee formation, coming in on our scout brooms' vector.
Ogden curses.
Ogden. Run engines to full power. Prepare to make the jump to lightspeed.
Grindelwald. Belay that jump order, Lieutenant. Ministry broom crews to their stations; activate Shield Charms.
Ogden. Admiral . . .
Grindelwald. Come here, Captain. Let's take a look, shall we?
Grindelwald activates a miniature bridge monitor, with helm, engine, and weapons readouts on the walls and double display circle.
Fortunately, the scout brooms have enough of a lead not to be in danger themselves. So. Let's see what exactly we're dealing with. Bridge: order the three nearest sentry brooms to attack.
Derrick. Yes, sir.
Derrick performs his task.
Grindelwald. Excellent. That will do, Lieutenant. Pull the other two sentry ships back, and order the sector four line to scramble out of the invaders' vector.
Derrick. Yes, sir.
Ogden. [confused] Shouldn't we at least signal the rest of the fleet? The Greater Good could be here in twenty minutes, most of the others in less than an hour.
Grindelwald. The last thing we want to do right now is bring in more of our ships, Captain. After all, there may be survivors, and we wouldn't want Dumbledore's Army learning about us. Would we? [to Derrick] Bridge: I want a twenty-degree port yaw rotation-bring us flat to the invaders' vector, superstructure pointing at them. As soon as they're within the outer perimeter, the sector four sentry line is to re-form behind them and jam all transmissions.
Derrick. Y-yes, sir. Sir . . . ?
Grindelwald. You don't have to understand, Lieutenant. Just obey.
Derrick. Yes, sir.
Ogden. I'm afraid I don't understand, either, Admiral. Turning our superstructure toward them . . .
Grindelwald. Watch and learn, Captain. That's fine, bridge. Stop rotation and hold position here. Drop docking bay Shield Charms, boost power to all others. Ministry broom squadrons: launch when ready. Head directly away from Nurmengard for two kilometers, then sweep around in open cluster formation. Backfire speed, zonal attack pattern.
Derrick. Yes, sir.
Grindelwald. [to Ogden] Do you understand now, Captain?
Ogden. I'm afraid not. I see now that the reason you turned the ship was to give the brooms some exit cover, but the rest is nothing but a classic Porskoff Ploy. They're not going to fall for anything that simple.
Grindelwald. On the contrary. Not only will they fall for it, they'll be utterly destroyed by it. Watch, Captain, and learn.
The Ministry brooms launch, accelerating away from Nurmengard and then leaning hard into etheric rudders to sweep back around it. The invading brooms spot the attackers and shift vectors.
Ogden. What in the hell are they doing?
Grindelwald. They're trying the only defense they know of against a Porskoff. Or, to be more precise, the only defense they are psychologically capable of attempting. You see, Captain, there's a Muggle commanding that force, and Muggles simply cannot handle the unstructured attack profile of a properly executed Porskoff Ploy.
Ogden. That sentry broom attack a few minutes ago. You were able to tell from that that those were Muggle brooms?
Grindelwald. Learn about art, Captain. When you understand a species' art, you understand that species. [to Derrick] Bridge: bring us to flank speed. Prepare to join the attack.
The battle ends in a Ministry victory.
Ogden. Sounds like Flourish-Blotts is a dead end. There is no way we'll be able to spare the manpower that much pacification would cost.
Grindelwald. For now, perhaps. But only for now.
Grindelwald fiddles with a datacard absentmindedly.
Ogden. Admiral?
Grindelwald. It's the second piece of the puzzle, Captain, the piece I've been searching for now for over a year. [to Derrick] Bridge, this is Grand Admiral Grindelwald. Signal the Greater Good; inform Captain Nagel we shall be temporarily leaving the fleet. He's to continue making tactical surveys of the local regions and pulling data dumps wherever possible. Then set course for a region called Isle of Drear. The navicomputer has its location.
Derrick. Yes, sir.
Grindelwald. [to Ogden] You seem lost, Captain. I take it you've never heard of the Isle of Drear.
Ogden. [shakes his head] Should I have?
Grindelwald. Probably not. Most of those who have been smugglers, malcontents, and otherwise useless dregs of the galaxy. I ran across an offhand reference to it some seven years ago. What caught my attention was the fact that, although the region had been populated for at least three hundred years, both the Old Ministry and the Aurors of that time had always left it strictly alone. What would you infer from that, Captain?
Ogden. [shrugs] That it's a frontier region, somewhere too far away for anyone to care about.
Grindelwald. Very good, Captain. That was my first assumption, too . . . except that it's not. The Isle of Drear is, in fact, no more than a hundred fifty light-years from here, close to our border with the DA and well within the Old Ministry's boundaries. No, the actual explanation is far more interesting . . . and far more useful.
Ogden. And that explanation became the first piece of this puzzle of yours?
Grindelwald. [smiles] Again, Captain, very good. Yes. the Isle of Drear, or more precisely, one of its indigenous animals, was the first piece. The second is on a region called Horcrux . . . a region for which, thanks to the librarians, I finally have a location.
Ogden. I congratulate you. May I ask just what exactly this puzzle is?
Grindelwald. [with a cold smile] Why the only puzzle worth solving, of course: the complete, total, and utter destruction of Dumbledore's Army.
Exit all.
