Chapter 6: Ministry of Magic
It was dark. Albus Dumbledore, Sirius Black, James Potter and Lily Potter were sitting in the shadows of the Minister's office. They waited, waited till the moon left the sky and the sun would come, bringing light.

"When does he come again?" James asked impatiently.

"Soon, soon," Dumbledore replied, placing himself in the comfortable leather armchair he conjured up for them.

"Wait 'till Fudge sees us all in his office..." Sirius began.

"SHHH...someone's coming," Lily said.

They pressed themselves in the back of their chairs as the doorknob turned. A muttering Cornelius Fudge entered the darkened room. Fudge walked to his desk and hung his coat and sat down. He shuffled his papers and chucked them over his shoulders. He started to rummage though his desk.

"Where is it...where oh where? Ahhhh...here we go..." The muttering Fudge pulled out a large paper bag. He rolled it open and pulled out a box; labeled 'Bertie Bott's Every Flavored Beans." He opened it and started to pop each bean in his mouth. He would throw it up in the air and try to catch it in his mouth.

A loud snort came from Sirius's mouth

Fudge stopped dead in mid-motion. The violet bean he was tossing in the air hit his nose and rolled on to his lap.

"Who's there?" Fudge asked in a hoarse voice.

Dumbledore drew a long breath and got off his chair, James, Lily and Sirius followed his move. They emerged from the shadows. Fudge eyes popped open at the sight of Dumbledore, two dead people and their best friend, a wanted mass-murderer.

"Dumble...potter...black...dore....potter....potter...BLACK..." Fudge stuttered, bewildered and standing up.

"What....YOU!" Fudge said standing up and pointing at Sirius. "Cornelius, please sit down. We need time to explain ourselves. No, No...don't even try to leave Fudge...The room is locked. You can't leave, even if you apparate and nobody can come in." Dumbledore said.

"I...I...THIS IS AN OUTRAGE! Dumbledore, even after I gave you full clemency, you break into my office with evaporations of murderers and dead people! EXPLAIN YOURSELF!" Fudge yelled, feeling he had gained back dignity for his stuttering fit a few seconds before.

"Well, Cornelius, first off, I would like to tell you that these aren't evaporations, but real people," Dumbledore said politely, eyes twinkling. Sirius sniggered.

"Not more lies, not again," Fudge said shaking his head.

"You very well know that when I told you that Voldemort," Dumbledore said as Fudge winced, "returned, it wasn't a lie!"

"I think that I'll just send you to St. Mungo's Dumbledore, this IS the last straw! DUMPLE, ARSTRIPE? PLEASE COME HERE FOR A QUICK MOMENT!" Fudge yelled, obviously calling to somebody.

"SILENCIO!" Dumbledore said, pointing his wand at Fudge. Fudge went quiet, "Now that I can talk, I will explain this to you. First of all, like I already told you, you can't leave, nor can anyone come in here.

"I feel we should start from the beginning. James, will you please get the chairs? Thank-you. Anyways, from the beginning...ahhhh yes.

"When the Potters went into hiding, for obvious reasons, everyone thought Sirius Black was their secret keeper. And he was, for the beginning. It was Sirius's idea for the Potter's to change their secret keeper. They changed it to Peter Pettigrew, the 'un-obvious' choice.

"You see everyone thought Sirius Black was the secret keeper because being James' best friend, and Sirius thought he was an easy target and knew that Voldemort would come after him. They changed to Peter because nobody, not even Voldemort would suspect that Peter would be secret keeper. This was a sneaky move, but a VERY wrong one....you see..." Then Dumbledore started to explain how Sirius was innocent, Peter framed Sirius, betrayed Lily and James and everything that happened in the last 15 years.

"You need to believe us Minister. We are real, just like you, and we're telling you that Sirius is innocent," Lily pleaded.

You couldn't tell what Fudge was thinking, his expression was blank. Inside, he was confused but hopeful.

'Do I listen to them? Is Dumbledore telling the truth, he must be wrong! But he never is wrong...,' Fudge thought to himself.

"I don't know what to say," Fudge said at last.

"All you have to say is that you believe us and that you will do the right thing with this information," Dumbledore said quietly.

"I want to believe, I really do!" Fudge stammered, "It's just, how am I supposed to explain this to the public? They all...they all think that Black is a murderer and that The Potters are dead. And what about Harry Potter?"

"First we will go to the Daily Prophet. This is the only way we can get the Wizarding world to find out about Black and the Potters. We will need a statement from you Fudge," Dumbledore said.

"Yes, Yes! I just still can't believe this!" Fudge muttered.

"And what about Harry?" Sirius piped up.

"Ahhh...yes, we will have to talk to him later. This may not be the best time," Dumbledore said.

Harry lay on his bed. He was staring blankly at the ceiling. Hedwig was clucking annoyingly at him. She hadn't been let out of her cage for days.

"FINE! Just shut up, I'm coming," Harry said. But before he let Hedwig out of her cage, he strolled over to his desk and pulled out some parchment, ink and a quill.

He wrote:

Dear Hermione and Ron,

I know you two are at Snuffle's house. This will be the last owl I am sending to you two. I have no one left in this world to live for. Tell Lupin I'm sorry for Snuffles death. It is my entire fault. Well farewell for good and I don't plan on coming back to Hogwarts.

Good-bye

Harry

A tear rolled down his cheek.