A/N Sorry the last one was so short; I'll try and make it up to you.
Carrick scanned the abandoned streets with his now tired eyes. He moved from house to house, looking in the shop windows, staring blankly at the broken down doors. There had been no one around when the SAS made their initial sweep, and subsequent door-to-door raids by the Para's found that the entire area evacuated. The wizards had guessed the army's move, and had left them without a clue where they had gone. His superiors would not be pleased. Not that Carrick really cared; all he wanted was a hot bath and his bed.
Nevertheless, he had a job to do. He signed the various forms, such as the unit lists and the acquisition documents, and walked out of the wizarding world through the portal he had passed through three hours earlier. He strolled over to the mobile command unit, and began pouring out a coffee as he mentally prepared a memo to his superiors. He filled the cup, and sat at a portable table and opened up a laptop computer that a junior NCO passed to him. He slowly sipped the warm, black drink as he brought up his secure mail link to the MOD.
He began typing, but a knock disturbed him. He looked up. There was no one around, apart from the soldiers standing guard at the entrance 'shop' and a busy looking lieutenant who looked up at Carrick with a puzzled expression. Carrick indicated with his hand not to do anything. He took out his pistol, and slowly got up. He concentrated his ears for a minute, trying to pick out any more unusual sounds.
Then he heard a soft thud, like a footstep, no more than ten feet behind him. He instantly turned and shot roughly where the sound was coming from. He heard a low yell, followed by the boxes of equipment in front of him falling over like they had been hit by something. Then, a foot appeared out of thin air a yard in front of Carrick. It looked like it had slipped out of a cloak, judging by the strange, silvery material that extended a few inches above the thought.
As the busy lieutenant and a another soldier stepped forward, Carrick gently pulled back the material, revealing the other foot, the invisible person's knees, mid rift, chest and arms, and then finally the man's face. He was dead, his eyelids were closed and blood seeped from one corner of his mouth. Three bullet holes silently dripped on the man's chest, all from Carrick's pistol. His clothing was unmistakably that of a wizard. He didn't look that old, short black hair sitting on top of a narrow face, which now rested lazily upon his left shoulder. Carrick lifted the body up, and the wizard's wand fell out the man's pocket.
Carrick looked up at the gathering crowd of soldiers. He re-holstered his gun, and ordered the body to be removed. He turned, and sat down again at his desk. He picked up his coffee, and began drinking again, but now in large, almost savage gulps. He left the message un-typed, before finally returning to it. He finished it off, sent the message, and crashed out on the desk, the remnants of his drink gently spilling over the floor around him.
Fudge walked silently into his office, before dropping into his chair and flinging his hat into a corner. He took a few parchments on his desk and began reading them again. Nothing new, the muggles had secured the Hogwarts/Hogsmeade area, their news reports full of information about the wizarding world, and no contact from their Prime Minister. His world had collapsed; the neatly ordered structure he had created had been blown to dust, literally.
He had now been forced to evacuate the entire Ministry to France, where he might try and regroup and properly assess their loses. The muggles he knew, had overran Diagon alley an hour or so before, but they had just lost contact with their spy. He didn't know what to do; now the whole worldwide Muggle community knew of them and wished them to be destroyed. He just could not see what action he could take.
He could have used Dumbledore right now, but he was dead, they were all dead. Fudge shook his head with disbelief. He had not come to terms with the true impact of the attack yet, and he doubted he ever could.
Then it came to him. Resign. Yes, resign, lose all this pressure, lose all these worries, let someone who knew what they were doing take charge. He pulled out a sheet of parchment and a quill from his drawer, and began writing.
A few hours later, and the British Prime Minister left the main hall in the UN Building in Geneva, a confident, almost smug smile on his face as he descended the stairs. He had won. He had managed to avert the world's attention onto the problems with the magical community, whilst making it clear that they were the aggressors. Nottingham would prove to be the wizards' biggest mistake.
He walked into his office, before calling up his Defence Minister, Sir Brain Dunford, to discuss the situation back home, with General Morgan also being invited to advise and offer his opinion.
"Well," said Dunford, "we've mobilised the entire TA, giving ourselves a ground force of around 250,000 land based combat troops, backed up by around 400 armoured units and 800 pieces of artillery. We have also mobilised the Hawk squadrons into the ground attack role, as well as pulling back our Tornado attack wing from the gulf. This should give us an airpower of around 600 fighter aircraft. The Navy has also been put on alert, and all three carriers are out at sea this very instance. So, we are ready for any threat, providing our American friends are okay with this."
"Sure," replied Morgan, "we will still require the use of your home, Cypriot, and Saudi Arabian bases for our own purposes, just to make sure certain regimes do not take advantage of the situation and destabilise the region."
"That's understandable. Very well," concluded the Prime Minister, "good job Dunford, now…hang on." The Prime Minister got up and pulled a message from his fax machine. He read it briefly, before mildly cursing, and sitting back down. "Looks like our wizard friends are one step ahead of us, they pulled out their citizens from their London community, and they've disappeared somewhere. Damn it. Oh well, we've got to get a move on." He gave a formal goodbye to the two men, before beginning to pack his bag to get ready to fly back to London. It was going to be a tiring few days, and he needed the support of everyone to keep him going.
Good, no? Review, please?