I was so beyond done with Moody. I found the Twins at dinner one evening, a week and a half after my run in with the Imperious curse, tapping their shoulders and grinning in as unnerving a way as possible.

"Come see me after dinner, boys."

They looked guilty as hell for half a second.

"What for Professor?"

I gave them the same look my mother did when I asked a stupid question. Apparently I did it accurately because they slumped, muttering.

"Could have sworn we got away with that, Gred."

"I know, Forge, I know. This woman has eyes everywhere. Ministry, castle, America. We'll never be able to hide if we get on her bad side."

I rolled my eyes,

"Just be there boys."

I actually had no idea what they had done, but if they thought they deserved to report for punishment then whatever, they were less likely to skip out on me.

I struggled my way back to my classroom, sitting on the floor in front of the desk, not bothering to attempt to sit on the desk itself, or in the chair. When the twins came in I waved.

"Take a seat, boys."

They did so and I waited a few seconds before sighing, letting my head fall back and hit the front of the desk.

"You aren't in trouble. Honestly I don't know what you think you've been caught doing, and I don't particularly care."

I waited a second for the relief to clear their expressions before continuing.

"I need your help."
I let that lie for a second, and saw the confusion build on their faces.

"Professor?"

I dropped the glamours I'd been advised by Poppy to put in place, showing I was pale, and had dropped a ridiculous amount of weight. Alarmed colored their expressions but I held up a hand.

"Let me explain first."

I waited for them to snap their mouths shut before continuing.

"At the World Cup I did indeed break my wrist. But I was held under the Cruciatus curse."

They glanced at each other before shrugging sheepishly,

"Percy told us. He heard Charlie talking about it to Bill and wanted someone at Hogwarts to be able to keep an eye on you."

I raised an eyebrow,

"Did he tell you that it was almost an hour of unrelenting exposure to dark magic?"

"Ah...no."

I snorted,

"Well, it was a very long time, and it left traces. You've obviously noticed that at the beginning of the year I looked like shit, and then seemed to get better. I'm sure you heard of the incident with Moody?"
One of them scooted forwards in his seat,

"Yeah, is it true you can throw off the Imperius?"
I rolled my eyes.

"Yes, but that's not the point."

I pointed to myself with a bony finger,

"I was getting better. I was healing. Then Moody introduced a sudden influx of dark magic into my system. It was enough to make me regress to worse than before. He was an ex-auror, one of the best. He should know that it would be a dick move. A potentially deadly dick move. Had the curse worked it could have overloaded me, ending in my death. He shouldn't be one to do something like that to a co-worker."

I glanced up at them, leaning forwards.

"Your father had to sort out a mess with him shortly before the beginning of the school year. I think it's the perfect time for it to have happened."

The twins fell right into my clutches. A little too easily for me to be comfortable, but you never knew with these two.

"For what to have happened?"

"For him to have been replaced. Did you know that he drinks from that flask of his every half hour, without fail? And that if it's empty he rushes off to his rooms with barely a warning?"

I paused for a second before pulling myself up to stand, legs shaking slightly and nearly giving for a second there. I looked back up at the twins,

"I think it's Polyjuice."

It's really not too big of a leap, and there have been whispers of me being 'genius', what with all my ramblings that took science to explain magic, so it isn't all that unlikely that I could make the leap. Knowing the future always does make you seem more intelligent than you are.

"Think you could steal the flask?"

They looked alarmed,

"Professor, we're good-"

"-but not that good."

"His eye can see through walls even-"

"-how are we going to stand a chance?"

I rolled my eyes,

"Thought not. Then will you agree to something slightly more dangerous and against the rules?"
The stared at me incredulously,

"Are you joking?"

"Of course!"

My partners in crime went along with my half-ass plan readily, I half expected them to demand we wait and solidify it a bit more. Admittedly, this could get all three of us in deep water if I was 'wrong', but I doubted it would come to that. By this point I was furious with the Moody imposter, and desperate to keep Harry out of the tournament. Therefore I pretended to be reading a book in an empty classroom nearby, something I had been doing often the past few days, as if to get away from places where people usually could find me. The sixth year Gryffindors and Slytherins had defense a few classes over. The twins were to take down the time when he first took our suspected Polyjuice, and were then to wait until he was close to needing another drink before raising hell. There was a specifically loud firecracker they were to set off that would alert me to their 'foolery'. I would swoop in, distract Moody from there with semi-nonconfrontational smart-assery and we would wait until a few minutes after he should have changed back. If he didn't change, only got pissed, then I would swoop the twins off for punishment myself, where I would decidedly not punish them and we would never speak of the failure again. Should it succeed then it was to be a happy accident rather than a dumb ass cobbled together plan. No one would ever know that we pulled this out of our asses in record time.

It seemed like an eternity before the cracker went off, I looked up, closing my book, trying to play it cool. Who knew where Moody's eye was pointed at any given moment. I marched to the classroom, throwing open the door to see bubbles everywhere. Inside were what looked like small demonic butterflies with tiny fangs. Everyone was cowering from them in a corner, and the twins were among them, good boys, playing innocent. Their terrified expressions were a little too real, so perhaps they really lost control of their creations. The Weasley nearest me checked where Moody's eyes were pointing and held up two fingers before hiding his hands and going back to looking terrified. Two minutes then. I can pretend to need two or more minutes to take care of these things. Or...perhaps I really would need all the time.

After a bit of failure I was running out of time to observe him. It was simple enough to bump the failures his way and prevent him from going for the flask. I'd summoned it earlier, during a particularly violent attack of several butterfly demons that had escaped their bubbles. When his skin started to look like it was boiling I transfigured the desks into nets, sweeping them all up and looking at Moody as if concerned.

"Alastor, are you alright? Did one of them bite you?"
He was searching desperately through his coat pockets,

"No, no I'm fine, just fine."

I waved to one of the kids,

"Someone go get Madame Pomfrey!"

Angelina rushed off, leaving the door slightly ajar behind her. I summoned a chair, pushing him down into it gently, and wandlessly negating the summoning charm he tried to use to get the flask, watching it spin slightly where I had stashed it under his desk. As likely a place as any for it to end up after this scuffle.

"Are you sure you weren't bitten Alastor, you seem more fidgety than normal. Perhaps you should-"

"Dammit woman, where is my flask?"

I raised an eyebrow at him,

"Now is hardly the time to be drinking."

"It's not alcohol, it's medication!"

I had considered that as a possibility, but his face was already shuffling, and his eye straining in the straps. When it fell I levitated it over my right hand, not wishing to touch it for fear of damaging the thing, or finding out if it was slimy or glassy, I didn't need to know. I stood from where I had been crouched next to him, backing up to stand in front of the children, wand raised.

"Stand back, kids, this isn't a normal reaction to withdrawal of any sort."

I watched as the leg thunked to the ground, rolling away as the eye should have. When his face settled I couldn't help but stumble back a bit. I had known, of course, that Barty Crouch Jr looked like the Doctor in one of his past incarnations. We had joked about that once, when we went to see it in theatres once it was made four dimensional. This was different. It was the Doctor's face that was scowling at me so viciously. My wand drooped a bit and I staggered back a step, mind blank. Doctor…in the flesh...

The flash of green light flew over my head as Crouch was hit with several stunning spells from behind me. I couldn't breathe, the motion and cold catching up to me suddenly. I sat down heavily, trying to suck in air and barely noticing when Poppy was looking over the now bound Crouch. I heard chatter around me and Poppy asking what curse he had hit me with several times before one of the twins pulled her away gently,

"Madame Pomfrey, that man looks exactly like her boggart."

She froze before turning to stare at the redhead,

"What?!"

Oh yeah. They did see the tenth doctor as part of my boggart. Well, they wouldn't know it was a different person altogether, now would they?

Angelina spoke up from where she had been watching Lee poke at the leg from where it had dropped.

"Yes, he was wasn't he? He was wearing different clothes and looked much younger, different hair, but it was him. There were these dark shadows crawling everywhere and she just sort of froze up before she realized it was a boggart."

Poppy made a strangled noise before she rushed to the office, and I heard the flare of the floo and seconds later Dumbledore and the heads of all four houses were in the room. Well, results. They must have been in a meeting. Joy.

She had hushed words with them while I tried to struggle to my feet, one of the twins telling me to stay down. I waved him off,

"Quit, we have to find the actual Moody. Polyjuice needs fresh samples, he's got to be keeping him somewhere."

I staggered over to the office, Poppy trying to stop me. I waved her off, clutching the doorframe for a few seconds before waving my wand over the office.

"Homenum Revelio."

The trunk revealed light, just as I thought it might. There was always the chance of it having powerful blocks for that sort of thing, but the belongings were actually Moody's and he probably had no need to hide a human in his trunk. I walked over, legs still shaking a bit and threw open the lid, not so much as even a simple locking charm. I stepped back, waving Poppy forward,

"I think he might need medical attention."

I stumbled over the side, glancing at Minerva before jerking my chin to the door of the office.

"We should get the kids out of here."

She sniffed,

"'We' shall not be doing anything. You are going to go to the hospital wing as well."

I scowled,

"I'm fine, same issues as always."
She glowered and I tried to make leaning back against the door look natural. It failed. Minerva snapped behind me,

"Weasley! Both of you help Professor Swift to the infirmary."

They must have been hanging around closer than the others to have attracted her attention.

Poppy was levitating an unconscious Alastor Moody on a floating stretcher as a redhead took an arm each. I scowled at Minerva,

"I wasn't injured, the kids knocked his aim off before he could get me."

"They shouldn't have had to!"

She sighed, softening a big.

"You were faced with the actual human version of your boggart. Go rest for a while."

Wizards took great stock in Boggarts. It was a bit ridiculous, if you pardon the pun. I was taken to the hospital wing, where I resided for several hours, watching Poppy bustle around Alastor. All visitors were met with a locked door and no answer. Injuries were taken instead to Professor Snape, who I was later informed didn't enjoy the job.

I drifted off to sleep after a while, bundled up in as many quilts as possible. The cold just wouldn't leave…

Moody was in no position to teach, and my request to bring back Remus Lupin was rejected. Dumbledore looked out at the rest of the staff room, twinkle gone from his eyes for the moment.

"The board will not allow Remus to return on account of his lycanthropy."

I scowled, that shit against Werewolves would be among the first to go once I had the Ministry at it's knees. Woah, maybe I should tone it down a bit, getting a bit on the crazy side….I sighed,

"What about Black then, wasn't he an auror at one point? Cleared of all charges, participated in a war, would quite happily come running if he heard there was a Death Eater posing as his godsons teacher."

One of the board members who had deigned to show up huffed,

"And what would you know about the alleged Death Eater, eh? No one mentioned the mans' past to you."
I glared at him, tired of this political bullshit. The force didn't set him on fire, but he did look a bit uncomfortable.

"The face is familiar."

Which is true. All too familiar.

He raised an eyebrow,

"So you consort with Death Eaters?"
I resisted the urge to leap across the table and strangle him, knowing my limbs wouldn't like the effort it would take.

"Do you want me to punch you in the face? Is that what this is?"

He spluttered for a second but I was saved from his response when Dumbledore raised a hand, twinkle back once more.

"That's enough of that. Marissa raises a good point. All in favor of offering Mister Black the job?"

Snape was scowling fiercely, and after the meeting I caught his shoulder,

"I'm sorry. I know you wanted the position, but I thought it better to have a teacher we know will only want to be temporary while the curse was still over the position."

He huffed,

"There is no 'curse', Swift."

"My names Marissa."

He stalked off without bothering to give a reply. I despaired for ever gaining that guys trust.

I scowled after him and Minerva grabbed my shoulder,

"Don't worry about him, dear, or Perkins. They can be...eh, difficult at times."

I shrugged, careful not to nudge her hand away. Human warmth was brilliant to chase away the cold, though no one ran as hot as animagi did. Minerva wasn't quite on par with Sirius, but was much better than Poppy, whose clinical brushes tended to make no difference.

"Today was one of the few times I was grateful I'm having trouble moving. I would have beaten his head in right then, but figured all the movement required just wasn't worth it."

I could practically hear the eyeroll.

"You tend to lean towards violence, Mara, it's worrying. Violence is not the answer, you know."

I snorted,

"You're perfectly right, Minerva. Violence is the question, the answer just tends to be yes."

I heard a snicker behind me and turned to see the twins trying to be discreet about hanging around us. I rolled my eyes to the heavens for a second before sighing.

"Go on to dinner without me, I have a feeling I know which assignment they're asking about."

The twins were well known to ask questions in my class, and I was infamous for accidentally giving them ideas for pranks. Well, as far as everyone else was concerned it was accidental. The Doctor gave me several ideas to pass on discreetly through lessons, and he delighted in watching the mayhem from the frames of other portraits in the halls.

I waited for Minerva to leave the hall before ducking into an unused classroom, the twins following.

"Well, operation 'Reveal the Imposter' was a success, I trust that you know to keep your mouths shut about it?"

They had the nerve to wave me off,

"Yeah, sure Professor, utter silence-"

"-not a word from us."

"However, we were wondering about the man, Crouch Jr, they're saying."

"You know him."

"Or knew him, at least."

"He was your boggart-"

"-the thing that you fear most."

"We have come to the conclusion-"

"-that since Crouch was known for his history in torture-"

"-and other such...ah activities-"

"-that he was the one who put those scars on you."

I raised an eyebrow, resisting the urge to facepalm. It was a decent conclusion, really, but not the truth. Let them think what they will, I have the perfect cop-out. I sighed,

"Boys, my memory is shit, remember? What you don't know about boggarts are the low level empathic fields they use in order to find your fears. Even if you aren't consciously aware of them. I have no real memories of meeting Barty Crouch Junior, save when he tried to kill me in that classroom. Does that answer your question that wasn't really a question?"

"...no, not really."

"But I guess it will do."

~TimeLordOfPie