Harry Potter is owned by JK Rowling
Dies the Fire is owned by SM Stirling
Slytherin Rising was created by J.L. Matthews

Chapter 12: My dinner with Arthur

"I've just gotten the reports on how Beauxbatons and Durmstrang handled the crisis," said the Minister of Magic, Rufus Scrimgeour. "As you know, Beauxbatons is famous for the quality of their gardens. When The Change happened, they tried to take in every refugee both Muggle and wizard that found them. Word spread and soon they were overwhelmed by hungry refugees who ate everything they could. When famine hit, the teachers and students broke into small groups and began wandering across Europe looking for food.

The situation at Durmstrang was much worse. They, being located north of the artic circle in northern Finland, had no arable land at all. Eventually, the teachers and older students abandoned the school and left the younger students to starve.

We wouldn't have survived if not for your plan. You predicted it all: the massive disruptions to the food supply, the wandering refugees, even the cannibal army. So, tell me Arthur, how did you know?"

"Well, as you know, I am fascinated by Muggles," began Arthur Weasley. "A few years ago I read a Muggle novel called: Lucifer's Hammer, about a comet hitting the Earth. The second half of the book was about the aftermath of the disaster. It predicted a lot of the things that you credit me with: the massive disruption of the food supply, the wandering refugees, even the cannibal army. The book scared the crap out of me! In an effort to reassure myself, I spoke with Mike Yates in Muggle relations. We soon realized just how dependent wizard-kind was on Muggles for food and that if the food supply were ever disrupted, we would suffer along with the Muggles. I then asked Victor Magister in the office of incomprehensible prophecies if he could find any prophecies that would only make sense if such a disaster were to occur. He found quite a few that fit these criteria. Over the next few years, in our spare time, the three of us came up with a contingency plan to deal with such a crisis. When The Change occurred, I realized that the prophecies were being fulfilled. So I pitched our plan to you. Still - it had not occurred to me to use the former Death Eaters as our expendable troops to fight the cannibals. That was brilliant of you."

"Yes" mused Rufus. "Even with the Death Eaters killing ten cannibals for every one of them who fell we still ended up with almost no Death Eaters left. By playing our enemies off against each other, we managed to get rid of both. The few remaining cannibals have run away and the few remaining Death Eaters will be much easier to reform."

"It's too bad we forgot about the Muggleborns. We are going to have a lot fewer new graduates for a while" said Arthur.

"Yes but have you seen the stats on Muggleborns that have been born after the Change?" asked Rufus.

"Yes. What are you going to do about that?"

"I don't know. But we'll have a decade to figure something out."