A/N: I do not own or profit from Harry Potter. So…here's this chapter. This chapter goes out to my reviewer, Multicolour-biro.

Chapter 6: Coming to a Close

Percy glanced up from his paperwork, then set down his quill.

Time to see Malfoy.

He left his office and his piles of paperwork behind, headed for the Ministry elevator, and took it up to the street near his flat. From there he ducked out of sight and apparated.

The gates of Malfoy Manor stood just before him. The family had put an apparition charm on the estate since the war. A wise decision, considering the number of enemies they had. In the few months since the Battle of Hogwarts, they had hardly ventured outside the grounds of the estate.

Percy pushed his ministry badge against the gates, and they opened, allowing him up the drive. It was a foggy as a dementor's lair, making it hard for him to see the manor house. Long before he reached it, he heard the sound of a door slamming, then sharp footsteps against the stones of the terrace. He tapped his glasses absentmindedly, setting a charm on them to keep them from fogging up.

A familiar, lanky figure became clearer, and Percy felt his hand on his wand as the two drew nearer. The Malfoy boy had a twisted scowl on his pointed face. His hair had grown slightly shaggy and was falling over his girly face and into his eyes, obscuring them from vision.

Percy gazed at him. Here was as good a place as any to talk; He didn't exactly relish the thought of entering that hellhole of a mansion, and felt badly sorry for whatever Ministry employees had had to clear it of all Dark Magic. "Mr. Malfoy."

"How did you get in?"

"The gates are charmed to obey the command of a Ministry employee." Percy held up his badge. "You didn't think we'd leave filthy pureblood scum the likes of you to your own devices, did you?" The words sounded odd even to him. Charlie and Bill were definitely rubbing off on him. The insults sounded hollow from his usually pompous mouth.

Malfoy's face did not flicker more than a fraction, and he didn't properly respond to Percy's bait. "What do you want?"

"You were on several muggle killing expeditions from 1997 and into 1998, yes?"

"I was cleared." The boy said sharply.

Percy gazed at him. "But you did go?"

Malfoy looked away.

"How many in London?"

"I don't know." The boy muttered, still looking away and at the ground. "Several?"

"Several." Percy wrote that down, though it told him nothing new. He knew it would make the boy nervous. When he looked up, Draco was looking at his quill with fear, as if what it wrote might send him away, away to Azkaban with his father.

Percy drew his attention back to the line of questioning, not really looking at him, but through him, trying to appear intimidating and official, though he wasn't that much older than the boy, considerably less imposing, and admittedly stood far less of a threat in general. "What about in January of 1997?"

The boy shook his head, shoulders slumping slightly, shaggy fringe falling over his face again, and Percy felt almost sick. As a boy, he'd been the Slytherin Prince, ever the prideful powerhouse. Now he looked defeated, not even bothering to hide that he, and his family, were indeed finished. Percy knew he ought to have perhaps felt victory, felt triumph, but a part of him felt sympathy.

Focus. Don't think about the boy. He murdered Dumbledore.

Tried to. Failed.

Dumbledore was a useless dodderer anyways.

Focus!

"What do you mean, no?" He snapped.

"I was going on then." Draco said, looking down still. "They didn't force...ask me to go along until summer. Not until after I..." He paused, searched for words. "I didn't..."

Percy let him trail off again and wrote it down. "So you don't know anything about any muggle-bias crimes committed before the murder of Albus Dumbledore." He assumed.

"No."

Percy wanted to scream curses at the constant fog that was hanging over their heads. Instead, he scribbled nothing on his parchment and nodded. "Fine. Did your mother ever go on Muggle-killing expeditions?"

"No!" The boy was insulted at the idea, as Percy had expected.

"Who was going on expeditions in January of 1997?"

"I don't know...new recruits. For training runs." Malfoy still did not look at him.

Excellent. Now all he had to do was question every 'new recruit' amongst the Death Eaters. Half of whom were already beyond sane interrogation already.

"Do you know a man by the name of Michael Bones?"

"No."

"Ever heard the name?"

"No."

"Do you know this man?" Percy pulled out a picture of Bones.

"No."

"Then we are finished, Mr. Malfoy." Percy lowered his quill abruptly and turned on his heel to go, leaving the youth standing still and alone in the lingering fog.

He swept past the gates again and apparated rather than plodding down the sodden road. He landed right back from where he had left, made his way into the telephone booth, down the elevator, back to his own office.

Nothing. Still a zero for motive. Malfoy had been his last hope, and when he'd seen the boy coming, he'd thought that something...some sort of itch had triggered in the back of his mind, and he had been so sure that he would know. Acute disappointment lingered in the air before he shook his head and turned back to his work. He didn't have much to do with only two cases left, but he had to do something with his mind.

At ten until eleven, he rose and left again, arriving at the Muggle shop a few minutes later.

.

"Where you going?"

"For tea and something sugary." Audrey informed the lanky figure beside her.

"Mind if I tag along? I could use some coffee." Davis loped at her side, forcing her to lengthen her strides.

"Coffee? Davis, you're in jolly old England now, you have to drink what the locals drink."

"Bull."

She gave him a look. "And you can come, but you can't come with me."

"Why, pray tell?"

"Because I'm meeting someone."

"Ooooooohh..." He dragged the word out longer than need be, giving an insolently understanding look down at her.

"Not like that!" Audrey gave him a look. "It's...professional."

Davis stopped, a hand on his backpack. "Oh, crap, Audrey, you're not seeing a professor?"

Audrey gave him a scandalised look. "Ethan Davis! I am not!"

"Good." He seemed relieved. "I know you like Professor Murtaugh, but even for vulgar Americans like me, that's a stretch."

"Oh, hush." She trotted down the stairs and started down the sidewalk, leaving their campus behind.

"So who's this professional guy?"

"He's...a policeman, sort of." She said slowly. "He's working on my father's murder case."

"Oh." Davis fell silent. He hadn't started at King's College until a bit after her father's death, but he knew about it.

"So." She tried to remain casual, let him know he didn't have to be awkward about it. "If you want to come, drink your American coffee, sit and watch me, fine. I shall be conversing with the odd-looking detective who uses big words and makes me feel like an idiot, but is somehow very nice at the same time."

"Well, I think I will come along and stalk the two of you, thanks very much." Davis responded cheekily.

Audrey was five minutes early, but he was already there. After shooing Davis off to another table, she ran a hand through her wavy mane and checked to make sure she looked all right. He was nice, and she didn't want to seem like a slob. Or...anything else he might disapprove of.

"Hey." She slid in across from him with a smile. He looked up and nodded, again shuffling what he had been doing off to the side. "All well at work?"

"Er..." She looked happy. Very happy. And he was again here with her, with nothing to tell her. Nothing new at all. "Not as well as it could be."

"Oh?"

"I questioned a...a person of suspicion today, someone who might have been able to tell us something." Percy was surprised at how easy and how nice the words felt falling off his tongue. He could tell people what he was doing, in a way his distant personality did not usually allow. He couldn't tell her everything, but as a partially involved Muggle, he could tell her a little. Another bonus about talking to her that he stored away into his mind for later reflection.

"And?"

"He claims to know nothing, that he wasn't brought in until after your father's death. As for who might have been involved, might know something, he was fairly useless."

She sighed. "Pity. What next?"

Practical, more practical than he had expected. Hope did odd things to people, he surmised. "Now..." He shrugged. All those who might give him answers, might even give him a motive, were dead or kissed or insane. The last trials had begun to wrap up months ago in the hasty sentencing process which was basically a sham, considering that no one even wanted Death Eaters on the loose. They were all gone, and he had no one left to question.

He trailed off into silence, and Audrey felt herself plummet just a bit. "So...you don't know anything more from this questioning you did this morning?"

"No."

"Are you just saying that or is it really true?"

He gave her a look and nudged his glasses upwards. "I assure you, you will be told if the case is solved. It's the details that my office would require me to lie to you about."

"Ah. May I ask you a question, as we seem to have hit a wall?"

"You may ask any number of questions, but I reserve the right not to answer them all."

"What does religion or demonism have to do with any of this?" She asked.

He met her eyes.

"You asked us about that on the first day, why?" She had a hand on her mug, head cocked.

He looked away and noticed a lanky, dark-haired man watching them. "Who is that?" The young man looked away, pretended to be staring at his own table.

"No one, a friend. You're dodging the question."

"Religion occasionally plays some bias in such an organisation." Percy admitted. "Though mostly it's just a way of brainwashing new recruits, not really a motive. I asked because an affiliation with the group would from the outside be considered the worst form of paganism."

"You thought my father was involved in these...people?"

"I thought it possible. It wouldn't be the first time the Dark...er, their commander killed one of his own. I thought he might have been using your father as a liaison, or a pawn, or...anything, really. But all accounts jibe on that. Your father was apparently no such man."

"I should say not." She said, leaning back to sip her tea.

Pity, really, Percy thought almost bitterly. If he'd been under the Imperius, at least he could close the case and be done with it.

Percy glanced over at the man across the shop, who again looked away. "Not terrible subtle, is he?" He remarked.

"He's...American."

"Ah." As if that explained all, Percy nodded and lifted his mug to his lips.

.

Davis coughed loudly as he came up behind Audrey, walking back to campus.

"Oh." Audrey turned. "Oh, Davis, are you still here? I would have thought you would've found something else to do."

"Yeah, no kidding." Davis shoved his hands in his pockets. "So listen, was that a police investigation or a well-planned date?"

"What?"

"You were talking for like an hour. And a half."

"The case is very extensive." She defended herself.

"You were laughing."

Audrey was silent. Had she laughed? They'd drifted off the topic for a while, both of them glad of a distraction. She'd explained about Davis, he was American studying music abroad, they were friends, so on. He'd been curious about the concept of University, had apparently never gone to one (which was curious, really, considering his personality). They'd gotten on the topic of schools, she'd talked about her studies in science...they'd gone on for quite awhile.

Audrey glared up at Davis. "It was not a date. We just...got distracted."

"Obviously. By each other."

"Davis!"

"You're so cute together." He mimicked in a high voice.

She shook her head, but couldn't help laughing. "Why are we even friends, Davis?"

"Because you can cook and your mother loves dinner company."

"Oh, yes." She bobbed her head. "I knew there was a reason."

"And I'm lonely and homesick."

"Hmph."

"And I have nothing better to do than tease you about the guy who just made you laugh when you have had frowney wrinkle-lines on your forehead for the past half-month."

"I have?"

"Yup." He popped the 'p'.

She ran a hand over her brow and stopped. "Well, not much longer."

"What do you think?"

She shrugged. "I think he knows what he's doing, and I think he wants answers." She added in a quieter tone, glancing at the floor. "But I don't think he'll get them. He hasn't really had anything to tell us. I mean, they have leads, but they don't go anywhere. They have 'an idea', but it won't get us to a trial. He just doesn't want to tell us that to our faces. He's just being nice."

"Yeah." Davis seemed to buy into the solemnity of her moment before giving her a sly look. "Or he's keeping it open so he can hit on you."

"Davis, I'm being serious here."

"Uh-huh. But you know it's likely..."

"Oh, go away. You're going to make me late." She checked her watch and quickened her step.

"If you'll excuse me, I have a life, and I'm going to go live it. I can't be late to Biochemistry again."

.

Percy sat wearily down in his office chair, rubbed his hands over his forehead and hair, and then let them rest on his desk.

Higgs. It was looking like Higgs. He had a distinct bite mark due to having one of his teeth ripped out, and though he'd denied ever attacking anyone when Percy had talked to him, the wounds matched others accredited to him. The ginger leant over his desk, scrawling out the details neatly, already on his fifth parchment.

"Perce, you finish that case?"

"Mm?" Percy looked up to see a familiar ginger-haired figure in the doorway.

"I said, Hello, Glasses, did you finish that case?" Bill leaned forward to enunciate as if his brother were an idiot.

Percy glared at him. "Which one?"

"The one about the muggle who got murdered."

Percy gave him a look.

Bill grinned, making the mass of scars that was the right side of his face shift awkwardly. "The one that had you so out the last time you came to the Burrow-what, two weeks ago?"

"Er...no. Still nowhere." Percy looked down to fiddle with the papers on his desk. "No, nothing yet." He finished hastily, a little awkwardly. Bill would laugh if he found out Percy had an all new motive for keeping his notoriously troublesome case open as long as possible.

Not that there was anything between himself and Audrey. He just liked being able to spend time out of his own world, that was all. With people, who didn't know about the Dark Lord or his Death Eaters, or the War, or even magic in general. He could pretend, for however short a time, that he was free.

Not at the moment, though.

"Are you hiding something, Perce?"

"No."

Bill was silent for a long moment, arms crossed as he glowered down at his brother. "Come out and have lunch with me, we need to talk."

"Can't, I have to work on this case."

"Which one?"

"Er...Emerson Gray. The only other one I have is the Michael Bones."

"That's the one I was talking about." Bill snatched the file from beneath a pile of parchment on Percy's desk and flipped it open. Percy let his eyes rest on his elder's marred face as Bill skimmed the neat, half-completed report.

"Looks open and shut." As if to demonstrate his point, Bill snapped the brown folder closed.

"It's not."

"Yes, it is."

"No, it's not." Percy hastened on. "I don't have a killer. I don't even have a motive."

"Hello, muggle-killing."

"It's not that!" Percy leaned forward to explain his reasoning. "It's not, it makes no logical sense."

"And Death Eaters have to make sense?"

"There is a method to all madness, Bill." Percy lectured. "Even they wouldn't have gone into a closed and empty place for fresh victims, and if they did, they sure didn't enjoy their kill. It's...it's all off!"

Bill looked down at him for a long time. "Perce." He said softly. "When was the last time you slept?"

"What day is it?"

Bill shook his shaggy red hair. "Go home. Case closed."

"It isn't."

"Let's not start that again." Bill pointed at him with the brown file. "Percy, it's a muggle-killing. It's an unusual one, but you yourself said that there's no other motive. Put it down to some unknown Snatchers, sport for motive, and close the case. Because you know that's the truth anyways."

"That's not the truth." Percy argued. "There's more."

"Like what?"

"I...I don't know. I just explained, it doesn't make sense. Nothing does. Until it makes sense, the case is opened."

Bill tossed the file onto Percy's desk and seated himself on it, leaning down over Percy. "I know what's going on here, Glasses. And you know it, too."

Percy adjusted his glasses and rolled his eyes, vowing to sit through this but not at any cost stop investigating. "What's going on here, Bill?"

"You. Being you. Ambitious and overdriven."

The legs of Percy's chair came down hard and he stared at his brother. "Ambitious-what? What are you going on about?"

"Close your mouth, Perce, you look like a clownfish. And you know." Bill stuck his finger out. "You just want to get promoted. You're worried that one comma might jeopardize your precious career here at your worshipful ministry, so you're stressing yourself out over nothing and making sure you do everything just so perfect. It's too perfect. You're going too far. You're too ambitious, and it's not good for you, and you know it."

Percy stared at him. "You are insane." He spluttered.

"Do you deny that you've thought about getting back into the Minister's office, and that you've been performing to the best of your ability to further that end?"

"I always perform to the best of my ability!"

"Do you deny it?"

Percy glared up at him. "No." The thought had crossed his mind, sure, but...

"Percy, listen. It could be a hundred years before we find some long-stashed Snatcher's diary and solve this case. If ever. Till then, close it, or file it away as unsolved if it makes you feel better, and forget about it. You will not ruin the rest of your life and Ministry employment if you don't find out every little truth."

"I have to find the truth, it's my job." Percy snapped.

"Sappy." Bill told him. "Your job is to catch criminals. As you're not getting anywhere on this guy," He slapped the folder, "Who's likely already been Kissed anyways, I am ordering you as a brother, to close the case and move on."

Percy leant back, blowing out all his breath, and stared at his brother.

"You. Are. Demented."

"And you are getting nowhere."

Percy rubbed his eyebrow, ignoring his brother. He had a point about getting nowhere. But there had to be some way...

"Perce, I know what I'm talking about. Aurors and the rest, we know. Sometimes it's the only way. There are other responsibilities in other offices."

"Oh, so who's being ambitious now?" Percy glowered at him again.

So he did want a new position, and badly. So he did overacheive constantly. So he was ambitious.

But Bill was missing a vital piece of information: Percy, unlike Bill, liked the Ministry, liked the law and the order found there. Law was what he was applying; order was what he was fighting for. Michael Bones deserved better, he deserved the same closure as all the rest. His family deserved to know the truth. And Percy was going to get it to him.

Because he'd go personally crazy if he had to think about it for the rest of his life.

Percy worked his jaw as the brothers regarded each other. As touching as it was that someone finally had his best interests at heart, Bill was still wrong.

And Percy was not dropping the Bones case, for anything.