TRIGGER WARNING FOR THIS CHAPTER: descriptions of reactions to psychological torture and a self-harm attempt of a minor character.
Draco found himself in the wrong again.
Because the dinner with his mother and aunt was not the most miserable recent event he had attended.
It was definitely this morning's meeting in Sterling's office.
Granger and Sterling were all business, but everyone else seemed to have no trouble openly displaying emotions.
Johnson greeted him coldly, and Potter one-upped her with a muttered, "Thanks for the intel Malfoy, any other information you want to sit on for months?"
Granger had definitely updated them, then. But Draco could give a fuck. Because both Blaise and Theo looked thoroughly dejected.
Blaise looked like he might be sick at any moment and Draco wondered how much forewarning his friend had given him. Did he spring it on him over dinner just last night? Did he sit him down, drink in hand, and blurt out a teary-eyed confession?
However the information had been shared, neither of them looked as if they'd had a good night's rest.
But Blaise had shown up here today, so it seemed that honesty had not destroyed what they had together. Draco hoped he'd be able to say the same of his own relationship eventually.
As Theo settled into a chair in front of Sterling's desk, Blaise and Draco sat side-by-side on a leather couch.
Potter and Johnson stood like guard posts by the door.
Granger sat beside Sterling, quill poised over parchment, ready to record her ideas and theories. Her face set; grim yet determined.
Blaise's knee bounced; an aberration from his normal composed demeanor. Draco coughed and murmured in a low voice, "He's doing the right thing. I don't know what he's told you but—"
"Everything he could."
"Then trust Granger. And Theo too."
"I do. But he's… Merlin, fuck how didn't I notice… I mean I knew he was off, but I should have pushed harder, questioned him on everything. How didn't I see—?"
"Don't," Draco cut in sharply. "Don't second guess. From one mess of a person to another, it's the worst thing you can do."
"Gods, you do listen to me sometimes, don't you?"
"Not enough," Draco muttered back and settled back on the sofa.
Sterling was taking Theo through the official procedure. The reason Granger had been so busy over the weekend was she'd been chasing down signatures from Wizengamot members via owl.
"The good news is that our request to break the oath has been accepted. However, the court has not granted permission to allow current or former prisoners' memories as evidence."
"But we can appeal that," added Granger. "Provided Theo's testimony is compelling enough."
"For now, we will solely be working with the evidence provided by Mr. Nott," said Sterling.
"How will this all work exactly?" asked Theo.
"First we remove the oath. Mr. Potter, could you bring in the representative?"
Potter left and returned a minute later with an older wizard wearing Ministry Curse-Breaker robes of emerald.
Theo stood and clasped hands with the other wizard. The curse-breaker began muttering incantations in a slow, hypnotic stream and the entire room watched with collectively held breath. A string of gold issued from the wand, coiled around Theo's arm, ran up to his chest and wound around his throat. It remained there for a shining moment before disintegrating. Theo shivered and his eyes rolled back, but the next moment, the curse-breaker stepped back and nodded. "It is done."
He signed a form provided by Sterling and took his leave.
Theo rubbed at his throat. "I thought I'd feel something other than a little tingle. Bit anticlimactic wasn't it?"
No one laughed.
"Right well, question away I suppose. Hopefully this doesn't end with Harry and Angelina taking me away in cuffs."
"Can they do that? I thought the DoM doesn't answer to the DMLE or even the Minister?" Blaise chimed in.
"That changed thanks to Voldemort," said Granger. "Remember that horrifying Muggleborn conspiracy about them 'stealing magic' based on false information they claimed came from the DoM? They don't require any sort of government approval for work nor do they answer to the Minister for day to day operations, but they are subject to the laws of the Wizengamot."
"Those laws include unethical research practices," said Theo and cast a wary look at Johnson.
"No arrests are happening today," she replied calmly.
Sterling shared a significant look with Hermione.
"Mr. Potter and Miss Johnson are here in an unofficial capacity, as I've understood."
Granger stared down her mentor but her face flushed slightly. Sterling pursed his lips and turned back to Theo. Draco saw that Granger had won that round, even if he'd raised objections to her involving Potter at all.
"Mr. Nott will provide us his side so we can prepare a proper defence. We need to know all the major players, who knew what and when. We'll have to act as defence in regards to Mr. Nott but we can file a case on behalf of the prisoners. Should that be deemed necessary."
"Oh believe me," Theo said darkly. "I think it will be necessary."
"Please then," Sterling sat back and nodded at Hermione to begin taking notes, "be as thorough as possible."
It started innocently enough. As most stories of corruption do.
Fresh off excellent NEWT scores, but bearing an unfortunate surname, Theo was thrilled when the Department of Mysteries accepted his application to the Unspeakable program and invited him for an interview.
It hadn't gone particularly well. He entered a different chamber for each portion of what turned out to be a multi-part interview. A Head Unspeakable from each of the divisions sat as an imposing wall of austerity in front of him. Each branch of research represented: soul, space, afterlife, time, prophecy, mind.
He hadn't known what to expect though perhaps that had been the point. He completed one round after the other, each Head dismissing him to the next with no follow-up questions allowed from Theo nor with any information on what the nature of the job itself entailed.
They presented him with various "what if?" scenarios and questioned him in brisk, snappish tones about how he'd use magic in these situations. Questions of a ludicrous nature, Theo thought.
"You can only save the phoenix or the unicorn from extinction, which do you choose and why?"
"What is your ideal way to die?"
"Are you currently, or have you ever been, misplaced in time?"
"You are allowed to be reincarnated with all memory of your previous life but as a flobberworm. Do you choose this path or death?"
"Define love and name five enchantments or potions that induce the feeling of it. Be as abstract as you desire."
Theo had no idea if the answers he gave were just as ridiculous or down right disappointing.
His final audience with the head of the Mind division signified the end of his short attempt to secure gainful employment in the DoM.
"Well if that's all Mr. Nott," intoned Unspeakable Filagree and gestured towards the exit.
And Theo could see. He'd gotten good at reading people over the years and this obstacle course of wizened elders hadn't been impressed by anything he'd said.
Until he made a desperate play.
"I have a rare gift that I think would be of particular interest to your branch."
"Do tell, Mr. Nott."
"I can perform empathic dream magic."
"That is a rare gift indeed and not one supported by much evidence. Would you care to demonstrate?"
"Er, now?"
"No, at a later date."
Theo fretted about the decision the rest of the week. He shouldn't have said anything, he knew that, but it burned within him, that desire to prove to someone besides Blaise that he had value, that he could contribute something to the world.
He soon received an owl with an offer to join the ranks of Unspeakables.
Blaise would be livid if he knew how Theo had secured his job, but part of him wanted to try for his partner too. Blaise had found such fulfillment in his Healer studies, wouldn't it be marvelous if Theo could also come home every day from a prestigious career?
He threw himself into his work. He'd suddenly been given access to texts and artefacts, some he'd never even heard of before, and all this knowledge just waited for him to discover it, to wield it. For someone as intellectually curious as Theo and eager to expand his own understanding of magic, the beginning of his career was a dream.
Theo worked collaboratively on bigger projects with other Unspeakables, but was also given time to pursue individual endeavors. And Theo always knew which area of solo research he would want to study.
There was a paucity of dream research in general, and empathic dream magic the rarest of all. With his mother gone and no other relatives to speak of, Theo had no one else he knew of to consult about his power. All he had were his mother's dream journals and a few written accounts from some great aunts, long-dead.
An intangible influence, not something everyone could see like the inherited power of a Metamorphmagus. His mentor confirmed as much, that although Theo's unique gift had been studied previously, he would be the first Unspeakable with the gift.
How could they test the limits or capabilities of such a power and study its properties? Could he learn to control it beyond the emotions he cast?
He'd need to test it on others, Filagree suggested.
A researcher's fondest dream. To receive the go-ahead for their idea and department permission and resources. Theo spent days putting together a proposal for the study parameters. It would have to be done on a shoe-string budget, his supervisor warned, as their division was the least popular and least funded by far in the DoM.
WIth the recent rise and fall of Voldemort and the intrigue surrounding horcruxes, prophecies, souls, and prolonging life, the Mind division saw quite the dip in interest.
Mind magic was hardly very exciting, and all nebulous anyway. Everyone knew how Occlumency and Legilimency worked. But with this, with Theo's ability to be studied, to map the unconscious mind and how it might affect the actions of a conscious one, Theo saw a field ripe for the picking.
Fantasies of future uses flashed before Theo's eyes.
What if he could use his powers to help people? In the way he'd made his mother feel safe, and the way he'd made Blaise feel loved? Could he present an alternative, safer option to Dreamless Sleep for helping people recover from war-related nightmares, reducing the potion addiction rate amongst their generation? Perhaps if he'd known better in Sixth Year he could have helped someone like Draco sooner?
Theo devoured psychological studies of how the dream state affected people during their waking hours and added more to his study proposal. He would need volunteers willing to participate in a sleep study, modelling his design off others that had been previously conducted in the DoM in partnership with St. Mungo's.
It was a small study, a dozen participants in the bowels of the DoM, but to Theo, it meant everything. He'd learned through careful reading that with enough focus, he could exercise control for the length of the dream state.
But that small little study only helped Theo hone his skill. It hadn't gotten him any closer to examining how he could affect other people with prolonged exposure. He'd need to re-submit a proposal for the next funding cycle and hope his request for more volunteers and a larger research space would be approved.
No need, assured Filagree. He'd sorted that bit already.
And Theo didn't question it.
Azkaban, explained his superior, had a healthy population that could be enrolled in a sleep study and they'd already been granted permission by the warden.
How, asked his mentor, would Theo, hypothetically, design an experiment?
Well, reasoned Theo, he'd want a neutral group, ones that slept calmly. Simple enough. Then he'd want a group experiencing a stronger emotion. Theo pitched "happiness" of course, recalling how it had affected Draco, though with proper conditions, he hoped it would lead to less angst.
Both groups would have their behaviour monitored and see a Mind Healer once a week, Theo included in his proposed budget. They'd self-report at the beginning and end of the study period on their overall mental well-being and Theo would combine this report with their medical evaluations.
Sure, agreed his mentor. But this was hardly the sort of exciting research that would get them noticed. An offhand remark that made Theo uncomfortable. Acclaim would be lovely and welcome, of course, but Theo hoped to help others who'd survived a war, and further, see how this could perhaps work in synchrony with the mind-healing field. Interprofessional practice at its best.
Which was why the prison setting disturbed Theo.
"They'll be properly monitored," Filagree assured him. "You'll put them out for about an hour, then we'll have them evaluated once they wake."
It appeared above board at first. Theo arrived with his superior at the prison, they even signed in and had their wands recorded. They were shown to a wing of the prison that their escort explained was used for quarantine or an overflow from the medical wing. A dozen or so beds lined the ward, separated by privacy curtains and wards, and each occupied by a young, male inmate. Some of whom Theo knew, like Gregory Goyle and Marcus Flint.
"Have we gotten their consent forms?" asked Theo.
"It's all taken care of," his supervisor cryptically replied. A red flag Theo chose to ignore.
More red flags, glaring and obvious, were raised during this first day.
Theo had been told by several people over the course of his life that he had a creeping presence, that you almost felt like he constantly stood over you, even from a distance. He never meant to be intentionally off-putting and he certainly never meant for his height or general demeanour to cause anyone alarm. But now he thought he knew how those people felt with the way his boss watched him perform his ability.
One by one, he went down the row and gave this group, the control group, a sense of peace.
Once they woke in a staggered phase, Theo dutifully recorded how they felt.
"Good sleep."
"Fine."
"Normal."
Rinse and repeat down the line.
They then moved to the opposite wing in the isolated ward for the test group for a strong emotion. And as he had with Draco, Theo decided on "happiness."
Maybe if he could give these people something happy, some bit of joy, a little escape from the daily misery of incarceration or perhaps war-time nightmares, they could benefit, or heal. Take that positivity into their post-sentence lives.
"Was that real? Bloody amazing!"
"Can you do that again?"
"Happiest I've ever felt."
Excited, Theo eagerly awaited the medical and behavioural evaluations as the weeks passed. How would the prisoners modify their waking behavior based on what they dreamt?
He noticed how eagerly both groups anticipated his visits. The "well-rested" group looking forward to a peaceful sleep and the test group craving a hit of happiness. For this first round of the trial, they visited three times per week.
With the trial period about to come to an end, Filagree surprised Theo with a suggestion.
"I think there's potential for a third group here."
"It's almost through our first round of data collecting, perhaps if we continue on after this analysis? I don't think adding another group at this stage will help," reasoned Theo.
Filagree went on as if Theo hadn't spoken.
"I think you should induce a negative emotion. Something like guilt, perhaps?"
Theo physically recoiled.
"They're already prisoners. Why would I want them to suffer more? I don't want to torture anyone."
"What is your concept of suffering? Of torture?"
"It obviously varies from person to person, but sustained, deliberate infliction of pain or trauma."
"How is it torture? It's not real, they're in no danger."
"It's psychological torture. And we have no idea what kind of physical effects this would have."
"Precisely," said Filagree. "Is it not the duty of the DoM to investigate the capabilities of magic and how it affects humans?"
"Not like this."
Filagree accused Theo of letting his emotions cloud his researcher instincts.
Didn't Theo want to help his government? If they could find a way to mend these monsters, to fix their thinking, wouldn't that be a good thing? Make them confront everything they had done and feel that pain?
Theo cut off the twisted philosophical debate and requested the psychological and medical profiles of the two current groups. And when his supervisor hesitated and offered a vague excuse, the horrible truth dawned on Theo.
They hadn't been having these prisoners self-report on their thoughts or feelings at all. Other than the brief statements they gave to Theo, there were no records of observed behaviours, no Mind Healer involvement. Just the standard report out from their physicals conducted by prison healers. He noticed the requests for Dreamless Sleep, none of which had been granted, with the warden's signature on every file.
Theo also checked the DoM records for the parchment trail of consent forms for the prisoners. He again found none on file.
Further, one of the prisoners had commented that they were sick of staying in this ward all the time, which puzzled Theo. They were supposed to go back to their cells, their normal daily activities on the non-experiment days.
It had turned into a prison within a prison. They'd kept these men separate and locked in this ward while Theo essentially played around with their psychological states.
He confronted Filagree. What kind of sham trial was he running here, with Theo at the helm?
An interesting one, he countered. One that would actually get traction within the Ministry, put their branch on the map. Theo vehemently disagreed, seeing as how he'd already violated so many ethical and scientific protocols, no reputable journal would have them.
"A journal?" repeated Filagree snidely. "Don't you see what a gift you have Theo? You can affect these people without casting an Unforgivable, without doing physical harm. It's remarkable. It's what we've been looking for."
"Who's we?"
"Never you mind."
"Why let me do the first part of this trial at all?"
Theo still didn't understand the motive. Why have him carry on with his version if they meant to sabotage it like this? At first it seemed like a standard case of a mentor possibly swooping in and taking credit for a protege's ideas, but this had moved into an even more sinister realm.
"To see if you could really do it on a larger group."
He'd been testing out Theo this whole time. Theo had allowed himself to fall into the exact trap Blaise had always feared he would. It was the reason for his initial wariness when Theo came home excited about receiving approval for this initial trial. Though he of course had magical limitations on him from divulging the study details, Blaise knew enough to guess Theo would be researching his powers.
Filagree drove the dagger in further. "Did you really think you could coast with this soft research? Your powers are so nebulous, so difficult to be grasped, did you really think this would go anywhere? We need something useful from this."
Further, his supervisor had changed his mind. He didn't want Theo to imbue "guilt" after all.
Instead, he ordered "fear."
And Theo hesitated. Protested.
"You understand this will forfeit your job?"
The choice became clear: perform the third part, or he'd see himself fired from the DoM.
That was the moment Theo hatched his escape plan. It became less about surviving with his career intact, and more about collecting evidence. He wouldn't want to work for this type of evil anyway. More banal than Voldemort, and he'd successfully avoided that little club, but insidious and harmful to others nonetheless.
While he'd lament the lost opportunity of work, he certainly didn't need the gold. But he did need to keep his own sanity.
Theo complied with Filagree, for now. At the very least, he could keep observing, keep monitoring these prisoners. He was more than a little afraid of how else they'd be used, or had been used, with no one knowing.
Theo eventually met the elusive warden, the one who'd signed these men away to the DoM like it was nothing and then denied them proper care.
Stanford greeted Filagree like an old friend and Theo could see it so clearly. How this type of network proliferated through two wars, how in the ashes of such horrors, middling men with a shared lust for control could prop up corruption to serve their own needs.
When it came time for Theo to cast on the first prisoner in the new group, he froze. He'd never done such a horrific action before. He'd been concerned enough with how "happiness" had affected Draco and seemed to affect some of the other prisoners already without the proper context for working through their emotional states.
When Theo still hesitated, Filagree took him aside for a more overt threat. This little power of his was all he had to offer the world, and besides, what of his partner, Blaise?
"What of him?"
The threat didn't escalate to physical harm. But rather, to reputation and livelihood. "A word from me in the mind healing community and he'll be blacklisted from every journal, conference, and clinic. I could have his license stripped in the blink of an eye. Would you want that for him?"
Blaise's work was his whole life. He'd taken the calm, steadfast support he'd always been for Theo and heaped it instead onto his patients.
Theo steeled himself and performed his task like a good little weapon. An obedient torture tool.
The first time interviewing this test group post-dream was a waking nightmare for Theo.
"Why did you do that?"
"Is my mother okay? That wasn't real, what I saw?"
"Please… please don't… don't ask me."
Some of them couldn't even speak. A few threw up when questioned further.
"This isn't good research," Theo tried to reason with Filagree, appealing to his sense of scientific duty. "This group doesn't make sense in the overall design. And since we can't observe them in their daily lives, we have no idea how it's affecting them for real. The parameters aren't realistic."
This protest was met with a jeering laugh. It lit a fire under Theo.
Theo knew how to read people and he saw how his supervisor had gotten careless over the years. He'd clearly abandoned research protocols and any sense of ethics, and perhaps that type of lax attention to regulation extended to other areas of his life?
Like the wards on his office and files for example.
As with many a disillusioned bureaucrat, Filagree had been putting in the bare minimum while he waited for someone like Theo to come along and bolster his department's reputation once more. Turns out, that bare minimum meant only the most basic warding spells protecting his office. Easily surpassed by Theo in a matter of minutes.
Theo found a report filled with observations all about him and his magic. He found observations worded in ways that made his stomach churn.
And one sentence that made his blood run cold: "This should be of interest to future interrogative efforts of the DMLE since your Unforgivables measure was voted down."
Theo flipped through as quickly as possible, but saw no names mentioned in writing and no other departments. Unfortunately, Filagree's flimsy protection of his incriminating documents did extend to anti-Duplication charms and blacking out of the funding sources.
Theo kept mentally cataloguing every infraction, every breach of law or ethics he could, waiting for his opening.
But all the while, he still had to return to Azkaban several times a week and induce a group of incarcerated men into a brief state of the worst fears their minds could conjure. The waiting might very well break Theo.
Blaise noticed first, because of course he did. Theo started having panic attacks in the middle of the night again. Something he hadn't experienced since his Sixth Year. Eating proper meals became more of a chore, seeing his friends became difficult for the facade he had to maintain and all the while he frantically searched for the right way to get himself out of this awful web of terror.
His opportunity came about in one of the worst ways possible.
Theo saw it in the terrified eyes of Ben Sinclair. The young man seemed more susceptible than most to the psychological damage Theo brought with each visit. He regarded Theo with fear for the pain he could inflict and often couldn't speak but to silently cry upon waking from the dream state.
Stanford never said much of anything during their time there, preferred to simply watch and observe that everything ran smoothly.
But Filagree grew crueller. Didn't bother to keep his mocking thoughts to himself, had no qualms about referring to men like Sinclair as "the weak one."
Theo probably could have warned his superior, that often when you underestimate "weak" people, it may be to your detriment.
Because in a desperate, yet calculated move, as Ben emerged from his sleep state, he rolled off his bed and onto the floor. When Stanford went round, wand raised to check on his inmate, with startling speed, Ben took him out at the knees, and a scuffle ensued.
When the wrestling stopped, Ben had Stanford's wand pressed to the warden's throat.
"I don't want to do it," whispered a terrified-sounding Ben. "But I will."
Theo tried to reason with him. Pleaded with him, reminded Ben he didn't want to hurt someone.
"You're right," said a despondent Ben. He shoved the warden away and in the next blink conjured a knife and held it to his own wrist.
"No!" Theo disarmed him then stunned him. As Ben slumped to the floor, Theo turned to Filagree and saw the man did not have, nor did he care to have, a plan. Thankfully, Stanford at least seemed concerned enough to want to save his own skin.
"I let you carry on, but this has gone too far," said Stanford.
"Then we'll permanently remove Sinclair."
"No, bodies lead to questions and investigations."
They went back and forth for a time, each accusing the other, and it was enough for Theo to hatch his own plan and propose it aloud.
"We'll modify their memories. No one has to know."
He couldn't remove the dreams, he knew that. But the other two men did not. Stanford and Filagree Stunned every man in the ward, then Theo went to work.
He crafted a narrative instead. A dragon pox outbreak and a quarantine period in every prisoner's head.
Then they revived the prisoners and had guards lead them back to their cells.
They brought in the previous two groups, and Theo saw his chance here. He'd rather spare the "fear" group any lasting memories of pain. Of being used as lab rats for their worst imaginings. But with a few men here… here he could get a bit creative with his spell work. Or perhaps not creative per se but maybe a little lax with how much of the memory of their sequestered time he removed.
It would have to be enough for now. Maybe if one of them said the right thing to the right person (a lawyer, a relative) someone could probe further.
In the end, each party had enough leverage over the other (a prison scandal versus a DoM scandal) to agree everyone would go their separate ways and never speak of it again.
Theo and his supervisor avoided each other at work now. He was moved onto other projects, instructed to help other Unspeakables with their research.
Theo had always been adept at biding his time. A skilled patience learned from a childhood. Particularly in a home where his father never expected his son to start throwing curses back when he reached a certain age.
Dormancy could look like compliance to those who did not know Theo well.
But upon the murder of one Lucius Malfoy, the Prisoners' Act passed. Suddenly, a whole group of lawyers, advocates, families, and court members wanted to peer closer into Azkaban. Harry Potter himself led the charge.
Then Theo, with his piles of suspicions and incriminating memories still couldn't see a way out. Because he received a letter.
A letter that warned him to keep his mouth shut. That threatened scandal, imprisonment or worse if he dared say a word.
The implication of "worse" constituted several moving photographs of Blaise. Heading to his office. Out to dinner with Theo. Walking down Diagon Alley. At lunch with Draco. Walking into St. Mungo's for a clinic visit.
"It would be so easy," warned the letter before it ignited and fell away to ashy nothingness.
The evidence of the threat destroyed, but Theo's lingering sense of guilt for Ben and the other inmates, his shame at having been so gullible, and his fear for the well-being of Blaise could never be so easily banished.
Helpless. Alone. Afraid.
No need for special dream powers to conjure the ultimate state of fear.
A/N: Thanks for reading. Next chapter on August 31. This story will be 19 total chapters.