Madam Bones and company went to Moody's office, where they met the Aurors keeping watch on Crouch Jr. They had found the real Mad-Eye meanwhile, having interrogated Crouch Jr in their boss' absence.
"Stupefied, kept under the Imperius curse," said an Auror when Rufus looked at him.
"Alright, take him to the Hospital Wing, Captain Shacklebolt", said Amelia nodding at the same Auror.
"Yes, Ma'am," said Kingsley.
"What about him?" asked Amelia pointing at Crouch.
"We will transport him to a secure holding cell in the Ministry now unless you have further questions?" queried Tonks, a rookie Auror.
Everyone looked at Amelia who shook her head and said, "Any further questioning can be done at the Ministry. Crouch has a lot more to tell us, after all, which will help us tighten the noose around all those Death Eaters who pled bewitchment." smirking satisfyingly at the end.
She then turned to the Minister who had remained silent as a statue all through their talks.
"Minister," said Amelia.
"Yes?", asked Cornelius.
"You will not speak about this to anybody. You know that your confidante and financier, Lucius Malfoy, is also one of the Death Eaters. It would not do for him to get wind of what's cooking, will it now? asked Amelia, fixing him with a piercing stare.
"Of course not.", said Cornelius but when she still looked skeptical, he sighed and said, "Listen, Amelia, I know we have never been on good terms with each other and that you only tolerate me because I am your boss but I would not plunge my country into darkness for a sack of gold or power. What use is it of, if the country is populated by torturers and psychopaths."
Amelia nodded and was about to have the Aurors transport their prisoner when she remembered that she also had to investigate the place where the two Triwizard champions were transported to. She performed Legilimency on him and once she had memorized the view of the graveyard; she exited his mind. Then she signaled the Aurors to take Crouch away. Five of the Aurors held Crouch and then one of them held out a silver medallion with the Auror insignia. There was a flash of blue light and they were gone.
"Why the Legilimency, Madam Bones?", asked Tonks.
"I wanted to find out where the two boys were taken to", said Amelia before raising a hand as Rufus seemed ready to say something, "I know that you are gonna say that we could have used Veritaserum but that would not help us make a portkey to the site. Making a portkey requires visualization, remember?"
"Ah yes", said Rufus, "But we cannot go there directly. Some amount of snooping is required, just in case, they are based in the region."
Amelia began pondering over this but Bertie already seemed to have found a solution.
"You are aware of Magical Intelligence-7 or MI7 as it is popularly called, aren't you?" asked Bertie smiling.
"Of course, how -" Amelia's words were cut short by the arrival of Dumbledore with Sirus Black in tow, looking as sane as the rest.
The other Aurors instinctively went to raise his wand to stun him, but it was surprisingly Fudge who stopped them, saying, "Aurors, stand down. We have evidence now which says that he is innocent."
Everyone was looking gobsmacked, and Tonks seemed to have a hopeful expression.
"Wha-, how?" one of the Aurors stumbled through his words.
"Everyone, lower your wands before you take someone's eye out." said Amelia, "What the Minister said is true. Also, there's the fact that Sirius Black didn't have a trial and was thrown directly into Azkaban by Barty Crouch Sr based on the circumstantial evidence and witness of the Muggles."
"Madam Bones, Amelia, Rufus, Minister, " said Sirius nodding at each in greeting and then continuing, "I freely submit myself to questioning under Veritaserum by the Ministry" and handed over the wand, handle first, which he had bought in Thailand where he had been hiding prior to receiving Harry's owl about his scar hurting.
"Tonks, Savage, take him in," continued Amelia looking at her Aurors.
They stepped forward, pulling out magic suppressor cuffs. Meanwhile, Sirius' head had whipped around as soon as he heard the name of Tonks.
"Tonks? Not Andie's daughter?" asked Sirius.
"The very same," said Tonks.
"I and Andie were very close growing up," said Sirius remembering their childhood, "and grew even closer after she married Ted. How's Teddy doing?" asked Sirius.
"They are fine except that they named me Nymphadora", grunted the young Auror, her hair cycling through various colors to settle on red, while she snapped the cuffs on Sirius' wrists.
Sirius burst out laughing but shut up as soon as he found Tonks' wand under his nose. "Find something funny?" asked Tonks coldly.
Sirius put one finger on her wrist and gently moved her wand away, saying, "To me, Andromeda was always Nymphie. So, it is apt for her to name you as 'A Gift of the Nymphs' though, I was surprised when she named you so. It just went on to prove how much she loved me as a brother and our bond grew even stronger after that. Only I could call her Nymphie and get away with it, you know? Others would have had to face the business end of her wand." Sirius was suddenly very nostalgic.
"I didn't know that." said Tonks, her eyes suspiciously wet, "Why didn't she tell me?"
"It would have been too painful for her. Your mother's one connection to the Black family and she thought, I too turned out to be a Death Eater! She would not know of my innocence." said Sirius sadly.
"Auror Tonks, Sirius, when your innocence is proven, you will have a lot more time to reunite and catch up, but first we must follow the due process," said Amelia kindly.
"Sorry, Madam Bones", "Sorry, Amelia", said the two simultaneously, breaking out of their thoughts.
"Minister, Bertie, it's time to go,", said Amelia to Cornelius before turning to Dumbledore, "We will have to meet soon as we will have to discuss how to handle the matter of Sirius' innocence coming to light without letting out the fact that we know of Voldemort's return."
Dumbledore nodded.
"Cornelius, I would advise you to keep this to yourself and not even let Dolores know as she is way too close to Malfoy," warned Bertie.
Cornelius looked ready to protest when Amelia cut in.
"Cornelius, I would not be surprised if a) She was a Death Eater or an unmarked supporter of You-Know-Who OR b) Became a supporter or accepted the Dark Mark later OR c)at least knew that Malfoy is a willing Death Eater and had turned blind eye to the fact because they need each other to pass whatever unjust laws or decrees they want to. Look at all the laws she has passed and Malfoy has helped pass. The muggle-born and half-blood citizens don't easily get jobs as the purebloods are favored above them and werewolves find it hard to find work in our world and thus, have to look for employment in the Muggle world or abroad. The list is endless."
"Harry was right. Do you know how many Muggle-born and half-blood citizens do we have compared to purebloods?", asked Bertie before continuing, "Quite a substantial amount but because of the ingrained prejudices, many of these children especially the Muggle-born leave either our world to resume the muggle life or go abroad where they won't have to face what is akin to racism as the Muggle world values skills and experience above how pure your blood is. They also pay not as per the number of generations of magical people you had in your family but the talent and productivity of their employees while here, there's rampant discrimination between employees of the same level just because one is pureblood and the other isn't. Also, people talk about being Purebloods as if their family began with all magical parents at the root. That's utter rubbish. Take your own family, for example, Minister. How many generations of wizards and witches do you boast of? 17, right?"
Fudge nodded.
"What about 17 generations back? It must have begun with at least one Muggle or a Muggle-born or Half-blood parent. What about their own parents? Somewhere, in your lines, you had Muggles solely in your parentage. They would have given birth to your first magical ancestor. Everyone does but chooses to ignore." said Bertie before continuing passionately, "Really, all it takes for a person to be deemed as a Pureblood is for them to have 3 generations of Magical parents and then the community conveniently forgets that one of the generations before that must have had one Muggle parent."
"You have opened my eyes, Bertie," said the Minister, "I never thought of it that way, always proud of my heritage. I will definitely try to get this prejudice routed completely. We should make it a law so that everyone gets a job based on their skill instead of blood purity or be looked down upon for their Muggle or mixed parentage or in case of werewolves, their once a month transformation."
"Slowly, Cornelius, one baby step at a time. A community is like a tortoise," said Albus.
"What do you mean?" asked the Minister though Amelia and Bertie understood the meaning promptly and smiled as Albus promptly went into teacher mode.
"Have you heard the story of The Hare and The Tortoise?" asked Albus, smiling and on Cornelius' head shake, continued, "I suppose not? It's a Muggle children's tale used to teach them morals. You see, the Hare was a cocky animal who could run circles around anybody. Everyone was in awe of him, but that also made him arrogant, and in his arrogance, he irked quite a lot of the animals whom he used to consider beneath him. So, one day, the Tortoise challenged the Hare to a race. The Hare laughed and accepted. On the day of the race, everyone assembled to watch it. They all wondered how the slow Tortoise would defeat the fast Hare. Then the race began. The Hare quickly sped off into the distance while the Tortoise went at his own speed. The Hare on seeing the finish line in the distance decided to settle down for a nap, convinced that the Tortoise would be tired midway and would never reach it before him. The Tortoise meanwhile, never stopping, continued and reached the finish line. The Hare just waking up from his nap, saw the Tortoise about to cross the finish line and rushed but was late. Everyone cheered at the Hare getting his comeuppance and the Hare's arrogance was smashed. That is where the Muggle saying, 'Slow and Steady Wins the Race' comes. Our community is just like that. We have to gradually and steadily, though slowly introduce ideas. If we try to force a change, any being will resist. Our society will reach its ideal state someday maybe not tomorrow, or within our lifetime but it will if we go slow but steady like the Tortoise." concluded Dumbledore.
"I understand now. I would be glad to have you as my advisor again instead of that Death Eater. Also, I would like to sit with you, the Board of Governors, and the Department of Magical Education to revamp the education standards and especially the syllabus with regards to what young Harry suggested." said Cornelius, and Dumbledore nodded, his old twinkle back.
"Shall we go back to the Ministry, Amelia, Bertie? We have a lot of immediate planning to do. The night is over. The graveyard site needs to be covertly investigated, Junior has to be further questioned. Lots to do." said Cornelius turning to the two.
"Yes, Let's," said Amelia looking at her Aurors and Bertie who nodded.
Cornelius held out his portkey which they took hold of, there was a blue flash of light and they were gone.
"A positive end to a sad day but I will take what I get," said Albus to an empty room before exiting it.