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[Written for the Quidditch League Season 8, Daily Prophet Issue We Got Locked Down! (But we'll get out again) Challenge]

Prompt: Escape

Second Wind and Horizon Clouds

'Prisoner ᚷᛉ309, Bartemius Crouch Junior. You have visitors. Hold out both your hands in front of you with wrists touching.'

Smacking his lips wetly, Barty bared his teeth at the pair of guards that appeared before his cell. He got up slowly from the end of the bed where he had been crouching, and made his way to the cell door. As he clasped his hands together, another figure stepped forward from behind the guards and cast a spell that bound Barty's wrists with heavy, magically-reinforced iron cuffs.

'Moody,' he snarled.

'Yeah it's me, alrigh'. You bet I'm gunna keep my eye on you. If there's something I hate more than any other, it's a Death Eater who walked free. And I ain't lettin' you walk free,' Moody spat back. Barty smirked arrogantly, a manic glint in his eyes.

The group made their way toward the visiting room; the guards leading the way, Barty in the middle, and Moody bringing up the rear. The motley crew swept into a windowless, dingy room dimly lit by a single sconce on the wall, and Barty was shoved unceremoniously into a hard, rickety chair.

'Constant vigilance!' Moody barked at the guards as he left to retrieve the visitors. The guards snapped into place on either side of Barty as he twitched and licked his lips in anticipation. Another door opened on the other end of the small room and Barty could see two silhouettes being ushered in by a stouter one that he recognised as Moody. As the two figures sat on the other end of the table between Barty and themselves, their faces came into the light and Barty leapt up from his seat.

'Mother!'

'Sit down, boy!' Moody growled, and the guards immediately reacted to wrestle the agitated young man back into the chair. Bartemius Sr remained unmoved, but his wife Aelea paled and her hands fluttered nervously in her lap, wanting to reach out to her son. Barty licked his lips and his face twitched spasmodically as he switched between staring into the eyes of both his parents. He must have found something in their faces that greatly amused him, for he started cackling in a shrill tone, stamping his feet alternately on the floor and rocking wildly in his chair. The din he made echoed deafeningly in the small room, and its other occupants winced. Aelea began crying hysterically and Moody irritably escorted her out of the room to calm down.

Bartemius Sr stood up and leaned over the table abruptly — his chair scraping harshly against the stone floor — and clapped his hands onto both sides of his son's head. Barty immediately stilled — even his chest did not move with breath; the dichotomy of his earlier frenzy and his current unnaturally still form made the guards ill at ease, and they involuntarily took half a step back. They did not see the tiny chunk of hair that had been brusquely yanked from Barty's head, nor when it was slipped into Bartemius Sr's coat pocket as both father and son sat quietly back into their seats.

Moody came back in the room then, with Aelea in tow, and steered her back into her seat.

'Auror Moody, I want a private word with the wretch. Leave us, will you?'

'No can do, Mr Crouch. Even if you are a top official, Prisoner ᚷᛉ309 is ranked Highly Dangerous.'

'It is a personal family matter. I will not ask it again. Leave.' The older Crouch's voice was hard, flat.

Moody's hand twitched toward his wand, but he seemed to think better of it as he gestured for the guards to exit the room, and followed after them.

As the door slammed shut, several things happened at once.

All three Crouchs stood up simultaneously. Bartemius Sr gently plucked a hair from his wife's head as she began to strip off her clothes. Two bottles filled with the easily recognisable viscous liquid of Polyjuice were quickly produced from a coat pocket and both Aelea's and young Barty's hairs were crammed into the individual bottles. Aelea snatched up the one with Barty's hair and drank it quickly, then began weakly tugging Barty's clothes off him as he downed the other bottle. With a flick of his bound wrists, Barty's magic surged through the cuffs and they clicked open. He hurriedly shoved them around his mother's wrists instead.

By the time Moody could no longer stand waiting outside and had burst back into the room with narrowed eyes, all he could see were the three individuals in their seats as if they never moved. Barty Crouch was crying into his hands, while Aelea sat slumped in her chair.

'—nd so, your mother is greatly weakened. The Healers said she will not last longer than a week now.' Came the gruff voice of Mr Crouch.

Scrutinising them, Moody cleared his throat, slightly embarrassed at disturbing what sounded to be a solemn piece of news. 'Mr and Mrs Crouch. Your time with Prisoner ᚷᛉ309 is up.'

Bartemius Sr looked up at Moody and gave a quick nod. Beside him, Aelea quietly licked her lips, reached for her son's shackled hands and pressed a kiss to the knuckles of each hand.

The guards hurried back in to grab ahold of Barty. The young man watched as Bartemius Sr placed a hand on his wife's shoulder and steered her through the door, and as he was himself being ushered toward the cell, his head bowed and eyes glistened with tears. His lips shaped unspoken words.

'Be free, my darling son.'

Words: 932

A/N: *smacks lips*

Barty's prisoner number is made of up Elder Futhark runes as per the film.

"If there's something I hate more than any other, it's a Death Eater who walked free." is also taken from the books.