Hope was caught in the hall after curfew (translation: she didn't review in, like… forever!) But because of extenuating circumstance (submitting huge and thoughtful reviews) I have decided to award fifty house points to Slytherin for being such an insightful and thorough reviewer.

Chapter Fifty-one:

"Sweet Merlin's ghost," Sirius couldn't make any more sense of it than Remus. "Two- Remus there are two of them."

Three cold blue eyes faced four deeply confused eyes and no one spoke.

Heavy footsteps coming down the stairs at a good clip drew their attention to the end of the side passage, "Hagrid," he forgot about Lupin and Black, darting forward to intercept the half-Giant.

She matched his stride keeping two steps back and to the right just enough to see over his shoulder.

Remus had caught the faint question in his voice. "Sirius," he whispered, "Get Harry's cloak." Grabbing his own cloak he ran to catch up with them, breakfast was forgotten. "Hagrid down here, why?"

"Sev'rus!" The deeply thundering voice of the school's half-Giant gamekeeper had a taint of fear around the edges. "Profes'r Sna-"

"What precisely is it that you so urgently need, this early in the morning."

Hagrid was in the middle of storming the Potions classroom and the cruelly sharp demand for an explanation caught him off guard. He clumsily tried to turn around in the slightly too small door frame and whacked his head, "Oof. Profes'r Snape,"

"Yes we've established that much already," he turned the sarcasm up a little and added a touch of contempt.

Hagrid glanced over and noticed Miss Moody, "Yer booth 'ere, it'll save on the runnin'." He turned to address 'Snape' "Profes'r Dumbledore sen' me tah get yeh- 'e said it were business, an' that yeh should bring yer toys an' put on the blinders fer the booth of yeh. I dunno what 'e meant." He faced 'Miss Moody' "Alastor Moody said yeh where suppos' tah get dressed too an' git yer art supplies. They're both waitin' fer yeh in the forest."

They took off running down the hall toward where Lupin was pretty sure Snape's quarters were located. "Hagrid," Remus actually looked at him for the first time and felt a pricking on the back of his neck. Hagrid was sweating and panting from his effort to deliver Albus' message quickly, and he was pale and trembling slightly. Remus also smelled fear, "Do you know what it's about?" 'What would Hagrid fear in the Forbidden Forest? Why would the Headmaster choose to send him rather than a messenger charm?' Hagrid only puffed and panted trying to catch his breath.

"Fenny!"

Hearing the male voice echoing out toward him, it struck Lupin, 'He really does sound quite a lot like Snape.' His heightened senses enabled him to see the two approaching figures before Hagrid could. In spite of the eternally murky twilight of the dungeons Remus could see that they were both wearing Garom uniforms underneath half buttoned robes, and carrying large-ish, old fashioned, black, doctor's bags. By the time they were close enough that Hagrid could see them clearly, they had finished putting on their robes.

He didn't slow down and the classroom door flung itself out of the way as he rushed to the real Snape's office. He called again, louder, "Fenny!"

"Yessir," squeaked a familiar, frantic, House-Elf. She had used the special magic inherent to her kind to appear from thin air.

"Fenny, get the chum-buckets set up and have the boys ready for a loller. We're back on the front."

"Oh, no sir! Oh, yes sir." Fenny darted off and disappeared again.

"You ever use any slacker?" he asked while sitting down at the real Snape's desk and reaching into a drawer.

She shook her head, "Neg."

He glanced toward the door where she stood uncertainly, "Come over here." He cinched the tourniquet tighter on his forearm and exposed his wrist.

"Aye," she watched as he filled a syringe with something from an unlabeled bottle. She did not like the way things were going.

In and out, the injection took seconds, "Put your arm on the desk here." He moved so she could take the seat. "Are you a carrier?"

Remus partially entered the room and watched. 'It's crazy, the two of them having complete Garom uniforms, Skinlettes gloves and all! Maybe Sirius was right. Albus obviously knows more than he's told us, and now old Mad-eye is in on it too?'

She was getting nervous, sending off too many tracer vibes, "Are you a carrier," he asked again, a little more forcefully.

She took a breath and it rushed out, "Aye."

"Good," he refilled the syringe. "I only have the one needle here and I wouldn't want to infect you." Holding the dirty needle in his teeth as he tied the rag around her forearm. "This is gonna burn a little," he murmured, placing his gloved palm over hers. The needle poised to enter a vein in her wrist.

She closed her eyes, "Pull," she said, and closed her fingers around his hand. There was a sharp pain in her wrist. Her first instinct was to yank her arm back, but she couldn't because he had pinned her hand against the desk. The sharp pain became a hot burning sensation that slowly flowed along her arm then faded away before reaching the crook of her elbow.

He withdrew the needle and set it aside, Fenny would clean up the mess. "The Vacuum, you'll feel it soon, never gets better. The only thing you can do about it is keep moving. They sent for us, we must go."

Opening her eyes and getting to her feet, she staggered and nearly fell. The Vacuum hit hard. Suddenly and totally alone, suffocated by nothingness, and unable to even feel the presence of The Other, she gasped for air. For the first time ever there was no hand to guide her, no will to follow, not even the familiar distant hostility that she had always known. They sent for us, his words pulled her along, a lifeline, something to obey, even if it were nothing more than a third-person, twice relayed, command.

He watched her knuckles go white as she gripped the handle of her bag. 'She'll make it… I wonder why I care though...' He nodded to Hagrid when they were back in the hall and the entire procession headed up the stairs and out the front doors.

Giants tend to be rather clumsy and Hagrid was not immune to that particular shortcoming. Giants are also rather fast runners and posses a fair amount of stamina, and Hagrid was lucky enough to have inherited both traits. Running toward the Forbidden Forest the slowest member of the group was Sirius Black, and he wasn't supposed to be there. All in all it took a surprisingly short amount of time to get to the spot where the Headmaster was waiting.

"Thank you Rubeus," Albus Dumbledore patted the shoulder of the exhausted man. "Now, please return to the school and assist Filch with his rounds."

Hagrid nodded his bushy head and left the small clearing at a slow trot. They waited until he was out of sight.

Once Hagrid was gone he pulled the black bandanna up, causing his hair to spike a little on top. His right eye had healed enough to open most of the way but the skin around it was an ugly purplely grey still. "Where's the slop?" his voice was dead his face a mask. This was business.

Taking another cue from him she cleared her face of all emotion, including panic, and relaxed the death grip hold on the bag at her side. "What about Black, is he cleared?" her voice was steady and cold.

"He's a member of the Order," 'Snape' answered for Albus, "So're Lupin and Hagrid for that matter."

Sirius' heart dropped, he did the only thing he could and, taking off Harry's invisibility cloak, he stepped out of the bushes. "Sir," he addressed the Headmaster with his eyes lowered to the leaf strewn earth.

"Sirius, Remus," Albus sounded stern, an unusual tone for him. "It would be foolish to send you back if you can be of help." He turned to address the two imitation professors, "The bodies were discovered by the Centaurs nearly a half-hour ag-." He was about to say more but changed his mind. He instead drew his wand, whispered a Lumos, and led the way into the forest.

Chapter Fifty-two:

They met up with Alastor Moody at the edge of another, larger, clearing rather deep in the forest. The thickly grown bushes allowed only an impression of a glade and a small splash of dawn-bright sky.

"You do remember that I don't like the sun," he groused while stripping off his cloak and potions robe. "So can I just get to work now?" his eyes flared bright and his pupils slitted.

Albus shook his head, "No, we need to talk first," and continued to watch as Alastor spoke with Severa.

"You wanted me here but I have to wait?" She flung her robe down, "I brought my bag. Am I just carrying it for the exercise?"

"No," Alastor sighed, "It's just that we need to get a few things sorted out first."

"Severus, Severa," Albus took another breath. 'This is it, the first step forward. I hope the conditioning holds.' "You are to work together on this. Severa, you have been brought here so that you could function more efficiently, as a team."

"Why would you want two baggers?" the glow from his eyes caused a glare on Albus' glasses.

She looked over, her own eyes aflame, "I don't bag 'em, I tag 'em."

"Oh," he glanced at her then back to Dumbledore, "If that's all? Then I need to get started."

Remus, Sirius, Albus, and Alastor followed at a distance as the two silently entered the clearing. The ambient light of dawn illuminated a grisly scene. Twisting in the slight breeze, like macabre windsocks, were two corpses. Hanging from a large oak, they nearly touched the muddy ground with their lifeless feet. He was examining the bodies, she the earth and foliage nearby. The setting moon glinted off the buckles on their harnesses and the torn Elvish-grey clothes and lead colored skinlettes underneath, blended with the early morning fog.

It wasn't bright enough yet for Sirius to see what it was, but something was wrong. "I can't make out the faces of the two bodies, Remus, can you?"

This was one of those times when Lupin really wished he couldn't see or hear or smell things that full humans couldn't. "It's not mud," he whispered, "it's their blood. I can't see their faces either." He turned walked several steps away and, leaning his weight against a tree, tried hard not to throw up.

"Remus?" Black placed a hand on his shoulder and felt the tension in the muscles there. "Remus, are you alright? What did you see?"

With a forced laugh Remus raised his amber eyes to meet Sirius', "I asked him that same question, you remember what he said?" Remus took several slow deep breaths and was thankful that the wind was blowing the scent away from him. "I think I understand it now. He said all of that stuff, about the woman who was abusing her kid, and the couple that was going to breakup. There was no emotion in his voice he looked like he was going to fall asleep."

"He said it was because he was taking in too much information," Sirius cautiously reminded him.

"Look at him now. Watch both of them," Remus shook his head. "They don't feel anything right now, I don't think they're even thinking. They're just taking in information. They've been trained for this, or programmed. You can't see the faces because they don't have any. I hope it was done after they died, but I bet it was before, Sirius their skin was pealed off."

"What- If- I mean shouldn't the Ministry be informed? We need an investigation or something," Sirius was still holding Remus' shoulder, but he was talking to Albus and Alastor.

"That would be why we sent for them," Albus indicated the two Garoms. "When Voldemort resurfaced we decided that it was time to gather some of the senior members of The Order together, yourselves included. During the war they worked separately on the same projects, he determines what spells were used to kill the individual, and she is able to do facial reconstructions to make a positive identification."

He was absorbing every detail of the crime scene as it related to the bodies. In the back of his mind he was aware that the female was looking at the clearing, searching for and collecting small things. Distantly he was aware of what Albus was saying to the others. 'Knowing what curses were used isn't enough, of course they needed to identify the bodies. So, she's the other half of the team.'

Twenty minutes later they were nearly done. A troop of House-Elves had appeared and was waiting, with two gurneys, to take the bodies away.

He climbed the oak tree and slunk out onto the limb the bodies hung from, "Do you want to get a look at the faces before I cut them down?"

She was untangling a strand of pale blonde hair from a low bush that had been trampled, probably while they were being tortured. The offer to look at the faces caught her off guard, "Well- how's the cartilage?" The hair fiber came loose and as she sealed it inside of a small vial, she looked up to find the male laying full length along the top of the branch with his forearms crossed and his head resting on top.

He waited, she tilted her head to one side and he did the same, without lifting his head from his arms he said, "It seems to be intact."

She put the vial, with the single hair, into her bag and stood before the bodies focusing on first one then the other.

Sirius had started watching them when they began talking to each other. The sun was high enough now that he could see a little too clearly. The male drew a blade from somewhere and held it so that it nearly touched the rope holding the body furthest from him.

The House-elves didn't step into the clearing until the female had put away her things and declared that she was done. Remus and Sirius were conscripted to catch the bodies as they were cut down and then to lay them on the gurneys. Then the House Elves jumped in, setting up the gurneys and arranging themselves into some sort of order, so that they could carry the bodies back to the lab. At least that's where Sirius assumed they were going. Sirius was right. Remus was sick.

~

Three days later he was done with the autopsies and she had finished three-dimensional models of what the two had looked like. She assured everyone, that she was not mistaken.

Wednesday evening they were presenting their findings to a small group assembled in Albus' study. Lupin and Black were present mostly because they had been there during the initial examinations of the bodies and crime scene. Albus and Alastor where there for many reasons, one of which was that this attack would have heavy and dangerous implications for the school and The Order.

Alastor asked again, even though he did not doubt her, and she knew it, "Are you sure that there is no chance that you got something wrong?"

"Of course there is a chance. If there wasn't a chance this meeting would not need to happen." She rolled her twilight-blue eyes and moved to curl up in the hard wingback chair that she had chosen. Her gaze suddenly shifted to Dumbledore, "You recognize them, that's why you're having trouble."

"They are Ministry agents that were watching the school," Albus admitted. "I would prefer that they were Muggles who had been attacked as a matter of form. It seems that there is a deeper meaning involved."

With a dry chuckle he entered the conversation, "Oh, really? A deeper meaning, you don't say… couldn't be tied in anyway to the spot they were left, could it?" He was in his favorite seat as far from the fire as he could get, and still be in the room.

He was now sharing that corner with her, but as far as Albus and Alastor could tell, neither minded. Some care had gone into placing another chair in that reserved space and in the end they had decided to just see what would happen.

"What is special about that clearing," Albus asked with stressed patients, but glancing back he saw that the bright blue eyes that had been visible before, were now closed. 'So, he's done talking for the moment. Give him time and he might be able to rejoin the conversation, or he might just leave.'

"Neither of them are any good when it comes to conversation," Alastor remarked, mostly to Sirius and Remus. "I think what he's getting at is the boundary line." Several blank looks and a scoffing laugh from the back of the room prompted him to explain further. "The boundary line around Hogwarts, the protective shielding that prevents apparation and several other things from happening on the school grounds is not a perfect circle-"

A lazy, female voice found it's way out of the depths of one of the shadow enshrouded chairs, "It isn't a square or any other regular shape for that matter."

"And so," Alastor continued, "The barrier is closer to the school in some places than it is in others. The east side of that clearing, or two or three steps into the woods there, is the point closest to the school where you could apparate to."

"Sounds like Deatheaters to me," Sirius growled, "and they took out the agents that were watching the school."

He knew what would come next, and the thought that The Other had been involved was not a pleasant one. "He did not know that the attack had been ordered," he spoke with certainty, "But he knew something about it. He is waiting for his next summons, and he will bring her with him." His eyes became brighter and nearly illuminated the whole corner, "He needs her and I can not stop him because I need him. I told you to kill him and it is fast becoming too late!"