Umbridge could practically squeal with joy — Cornelius had come through for her, and with haste.
Professor McGonagall being able to overrule her punishment suggestion for the Gryffindor quidditch players was completely unacceptable, but that would never be a problem again thanks to Ministry ED #24. She now had absolute control over every punishment that she wanted to, and her first act was going to be showing Minerva who was really in charge around there by overruling Minerva's earlier overruling of her. So she marched down to the Great Hall and drug Minerva, both of the Weasley twins, and the youngest male redhead up to her office.
"What are we doing here, Delores?" Professor McGonagall said coldly as Umbridge shut the door behind them.
"Ah, yes," Umbridge simpered, walking over to her desk and picking up a roll of parchment. "You see, something just came in that is quite relevant to the four of you. Cornelius — I mean, the Minister — just Floo'd it to me a few minutes ago. Hem, hem...'Educational Decree Number Twenty-four'."
"Not another one!" Professor McGonagall exclaimed.
"Well, yes," Umbridge replied, smiling sweetly. "As a matter of fact, Minerva, it was you who made me see that we needed a further amendment. You remember how you overrode me this morning when I graciously suggested that these two disobedient students deserved more than mere detentions for their unseemly actions against a defenseless student at the conclusion of the quidditch match? Well now, I simply couldn't have that. So I contacted the Minister at once by Floo, and he quite agreed with me that the High Inquisitor has to have the power to strip pupils of privileges, or she — that is to say, I — would have less authority than you common teachers!
"But anyway, I was reading out our new decree. Hem, hem… 'The High Inquisitor will henceforth have supreme authority over all punishments, sanctions, and removal of privileges pertaining to the students of Hogwarts, and the power to alter such punishments, sanctions, and removals of privileges as may have been ordered by other staff members. Signed, Cornelius Fudge, Minister for Magic, Order of Merlin First Class, etc., etc.' "
She set the roll of parchment back down on her desk.
"So as I was going to suggest this morning before you so rudely told me that it was none of my business — I really think I will have to ban these two from playing quidditch ever again."
She pointed at Ron and then at one of the twins, before pointing at the other in slight confusion, unable to tell the difference between the two of them, and then apparently decided that she didn't really care which one was which, which one was guilty and which one was innocent, and dropped her hand.
"Yes, I think a lifelong ban ought to do the trick," she continued on. "And I think, to be safe, his twin ought to be banned, too — if his teammates had not restrained him, I feel sure that he would have attacked young Mr Malfoy as well. I will want their broomsticks confiscated, of course — I shall keep them safely in my office, to make sure that there is no infringement of my ban. But I am not unreasonable, Professor McGonagall. The rest of the team can continue playing — I saw no signs of violence from any of them. Well...good afternoon to you — please close the door behind you on your way out."
And with that she sweetly smiled them right out of her office, looking every bit like a tyrant who knew that no one could or would challenge her in any way ever again, a look of utmost satisfaction on her face of evil and cruelty well done.
McGonagall, the twins, and Ron meanwhile slowly exited the office in a horrified silence at what had just happened, struck dumb by the injustice of it all.
~FS~
Ten minutes later the twins and Ron made it up to Gryffindor Tower, which was quite crowded as supper had finished for most people by that point.
Lee immediately walked over to the twins and asked, "What was that all about?" Seeing the absolutely defeated look on all of their faces, he added, "What did she do to you?!"
"Banned — for life," Fred answered dully, no fight left in him at the moment. "Even me, despite not actually doing anything — apparently I would have attacked Malfoy if I could've, and that was enough for her. Though that is true."
"She what?!" Lee exclaimed so loudly that everyone's attention was instantly on him and the twins — Ron had slipped away and snuck over to the boys' stairs door to go wallow in misery alone at his short-lived and miserable quidditch career.
In no time at all the entire common room knew the whole story of what had happened, including the new case of Ministry ED.
"And she took your brooms away, too?" Fitz asked in confusion, he and Simmons having walked over as soon as they heard the cruel and unusual punishment that had been retroactively levied against the twins and Ron, overruling Professor McGonagall's reasonable and appropriate punishment for the crime committed. "But that doesn't even make sense — she or Madam Hooch can simply not let them on the field or automatically forfeit the match against Gryffindor if you try playing. And it's highly unlikely that Angelina would even try risking bluffing Umbridge's punishment, as if it fails, she won't have any players practiced up for beaters and keeper if she keeps practicing with you three. That is an entirely separate punishment that she didn't even actually say that she was levying on you, stripping you of your ability to fly for fun on the weekends on anything other than the school brooms — and how much does anyone want to bet that she'd pull a new retroactive punishment out of her fat arse for the same crime that she's already punished you twice for, the moment she saw you flying school brooms and enjoying yourselves?"
"That'd be her," George answered morosely. "Her only goal seems to be to make everyone absolutely miserable."
When FitzSimmons got back down to their flat a few minutes later, easily slipping away while everyone was still commiserating the cruel and unusual punishment that had been given to the twins and yet again not stopped by McGonagall, Simmons said in a hard tone, "This ends now. Fred getting banned because she felt sure that 'he would have' is the absolutely last straw. Banning George and Ron for life is absurd in and of itself, obvious cruel and unusual punishment, but you can't punish someone for a crime they didn't commit. Now yes, conspiracy to commit and attempted are both crimes, but she didn't punish him for either of those — both of which are lesser crimes than actually doing whatever it is — she fully punished him for a crime that he didn't do at all. Combine with that with the blood quill that the adults clearly aren't going to do a bloody thing about, and we have a duty to take action immediately to protect the students in this school — the adults can suffer their own consequences of their actions, or inactions in this case, because we had to take real action since they're all too cowardly to do what is right."
"I assume you have a plan?" Fitz asked.
"Yes — we do what we never could to Ward, but what we should have done to him, and we kill her," Simmons answered with determined resignation. "It is our duty to protect the innocent students of this castle as Shield agents. And she has crossed every line that could ever be drawn in the sand, and is an ongoing threat to the safety and wellbeing of everyone who has to be around her. We can't go to any police to arrest her because we still have yet to meet a single leo in four years or heard of any way to contact one, and we can't go to any court to convict her and throw her in jail or give her the death penalty that she deserves for her atrocities since she owns both of whatever passes for a police and courts in this world, or is at least the right hand woman of the man who owns them, Mr Fudge.
"And besides, we're seen as nothing more than mere, ignorant children here — taking her to the Wizengamot would require adults helping us, which they have repeatedly proven that they refuse to. For us as underaged students, on our own, it would be very, very hard if not completely impossible to sue anyone for anything if we don't have at least one adult helping us, unless this world is drastically different from our own and we somehow haven't discovered that yet. And like I just said, the adults of this castle refuse to help us, there are no police officers that we can go to, and I have yet to hear of or read about a child protective services to sue on our behalf — all of which completely eliminates our ability to take her to the justice system and the courts of this world to be sentenced for her crimes.
"But even if we could, I don't trust them to uphold justice. Ron told us earlier in the year that the Wizengamot kicked Dumbledore out from previously being in charge of it, all because he said that Voldemort is back. Which at least personally lowers my trust in them to absolute zero, zero kelvin of trust, to actually serve justice. They are clearly politically motivated, not law or justice motivated, so there is no reason to believe that they would be fair or impartial even if we could bring our case against Umbridge and the Ministry that supports her to them, which of course we can't even in the first place.
"So unless I'm missing something, we are left with literally no choice but to defend this castle against her ourselves. And there is no other punishment we can levy besides death, or she will report us to the Ministry for doing it and they will try to arrest us and convict us of treason or insurrection or some other bullshite charge to cover their own human rights violations and general evil and cruelty. Because I'm not dealing with kidnapping her and holding her prisoner ourselves somewhere until we leave this world. So we literally have no other option left but to rid the castle and world of her permanently."
"Definitely not arguing against you," Fitz answered. "I clothesline-severed three Kree heads off with a wire to send a message to the others chasing us. My only question is how we actually do it so that we don't implicate ourselves in even the tiniest of iotas. We can't let this ever get back to us or we will be hung for treason, and the adults of this castle won't stand up and defend us."
Simmons thought hard for several minutes, flopping back on their bed and staring up at the stone ceiling, before finally answering, "She's Umbridge, she'll be in her office sometime tomorrow morning. We get up early, hide nearby under the invisibility cloak. Once she's in and settled, we take it off, go knock and say that we have a question about the chapter we read last week that we just came across rereading the chapter to make sure that we got everything before the next chapter on Monday — she'll eat it up and let us right in. Once inside, instantly Petrificus her, lock the door, lay out the charges levied by all sane people against her, sever the carotids of her paralyzed throat, watch her bleed out and die, and then burn the room to the ground with magical fire. Start it at the fireplace that I would assume is on the opposite side of the room from the door, levitating her stuff all over the place to make sure the fire reaches everywhere, but keep a clear space away from the door to either keep the door intact, or make it burn after everything else is already unrecognizable ash — the solid oak doors of this place will take forever to burn. Problem solved, no trace evidence left behind. Oh, and walk out under the invisibility cloak. Even if someone happened to be walking down that hallway at the time, which is pretty unlikely on a Sunday morning, the most they could see is the door opening and closing on its own. And if we do see someone, we hang out nearby invisible, and if they approach the door Petrificus them and levitate them away, so that everything will burn before they can investigate."
"I like it, just one suggestion," Fitz replied. "We protect the blood quill, so that Dumbledore or McGonagall will find it, and maybe can use it as evidence against her and the Ministry. Big maybe that they will actually do it, but it would be good for that one act of cruelty to remain in the light of day, and maybe even get some more light shown upon it if we're lucky."
~FS~
Meanwhile as FitzSimmons were planning out how to bring justice where none would otherwise be served and protect innocent students who would otherwise be abused and not protected, Umbridge was walking down to Hagrid's hut.
The half-giant had returned to the castle grounds that evening, and she was determined to find out where he had been, and a way to fire the abomination both for existing and for being well-known as one of Dumbledore's, all the way back from when Dumbledore had secured him the assistant gamekeeper position when the brute had very rightly been expelled from Hogwarts and had his wand snapped in half near the end of his third year.
As soon as Hagrid opened his door upon her knock she barged in uninvited, trespassing on Hagrid's private property, which unfortunately he didn't punch her for, knocking her out dead with his half-giant strength and saving FitzSimmons the trouble of having to do it the following morning with a less defensible reason than self-defense and defense of property like Hagrid had at that moment. But he didn't defend his property, letting her just trespass into his home, and she took full advantage of it. She also spoke extremely slowly to him like talking to a retarded person to insult him even further, and tried to hit Fang in the head with her handbag as soon as she had trespassed into Hagrid's house and Fang came over to say hi to her.
After that she proceeded to help herself to looking and walking all around his hut uninvited, bending down and peering under his bed, opening his cupboards and leaving the doors wide open when she moved on, and finally looking carefully inside the enormous cauldron that Hagrid cooked in. Finally done poking around in all of Hagrid's personal belongings without a warrant, she turned back to the man himself and addressed the bad assortment of scrapes and bruises that covered his face and arms, which she had immediately noticed upon arriving several minutes earlier. After he very lamely tried to pass it off as an accident of no concern, clearly not believing him she then moved on to where he had been for the past two months when he was supposed to be there teaching. But same as the other professors whom she thought probably also knew where he had been all that time and over the summer before the start of school, Hagrid gave her an obvious lie about vacationing in the south of France. Being no fool, Umbridge knew that whatever he had been doing had been what had got him all beat up, sporting every color of bruise possible and bleeding from multiple gruesome-looking cuts.
But she didn't press at the moment, and simply informed him that she would be inspecting his class now that he was finally back, after which she finally left his hut, positive that she could find some excuse to fire him before the school year was over. Heading back up to her office in the castle she immediately sent Cornelius a late owl telling the Minister everything that she had seen and heard during her interrogation of the gamekeeper and Care of Magical Creatures professor, and that he was a very good target for termination in order to put pressure on Dumbledore and keep the headmaster on a short leash.
~FS~
The following morning, FitzSimmons got up well before anyone else in the castle and found a nice alcove down the hall from Umbridge's office to camp out in until the guilty party arrived.
They were there for a long time, Umbridge apparently going from her living quarters straight to an early breakfast before coming to her office for the day, but FitzSimmons were patient when it came to protecting students and serving justice that could otherwise not be served in a timely enough manner to make any difference at all. Finally, however, Umbridge came walking along and entered her office, giving FitzSimmons their opportunity to make the world a safer, better place for children.
Taking off Harry Potter's invisibility cloak and storing it safely and hiddenly away in Simmons' backpack, they walked up to her door and knocked. A few moments later, she opened it.
"Hi, professor Umbridge!" Simmons said with her most innocent girlish cheerfulness and an overly bright smile. "We were rereading last week's chapter last night before tomorrow's lesson, and had a few questions we wanted to ask you about it. Could we please come in?"
"Of course, of course, always happy to help," Umbridge replied sweetly, opening the door fully to let them enter. "It's refreshing to see two young students take such an interest in such an important subject as Defense Against the Dark Arts, and a proper class on it."
As FitzSimmons walked in and Fitz shut the door behind them, Umbridge walked back over to her desk and sat down, before looking up expectantly at the pair. "Now what was it you had a question about?"
Meanwhile, as she had turned her back towards them and walked over to her desk as Fitz was shutting the door, FitzSimmons had both slipped their wands out of their concealed waistband holsters and held them behind their backs.
So as soon as she finished speaking, they whipped their wands around front and in perfect synchronization said, "Petrificus Totalus."
The Ministry agent froze in her chair, unable to move or do anything other than stare unblinkingly at the two students who clearly weren't there to ask her questions about the last chapter, and whom she had held such a high opinion of up until then, being her best two students in the entire castle. As Fitz threw up several locking and silencing charms on the door, Simmons walked over and rummaged through Umbridge's robes until she found the fat woman's abnormally short wand and took it out, throwing it onto the stone floor near the fire. All necessary precautions taken care of, Simmons stepped back and looked the abuser and tyrant dead in the eyes.
"Before we serve you the justice that you deserve and kill you, we want you to know why we're doing this — why we have no choice but to do this. And yes, it may seem kind of pointless when you're about to die, but everyone should still know why they're receiving the death penalty, and not just have their life taken from them.
"First off, we are not two fifteen-year-old students — we are agents of Shield. Who do happen to be students, but that's irrelevant. But what that does mean is, we shield the world, and especially the innocent, from those who mean to do them harm — which in this case is you and yours. You harm children, and we defend them by whatever force is necessary, which in this case is your life, in order to make both sides of this tragedy — Ministry and Hogwarts staff — face the reality of what you were doing here.
"And believe me, this is not what we want to have to do — we aren't Grant Ward. But we are left with no other choice. Unless we stop you in literally the only way we can, you will continue abusing the students of this castle with impunity, because no one else is willing to stand up to you and do what is right. Because we cannot call the police and have them come arrest you and take you to trial, since they all work for you, and either support your actions or else are too cowardly to arrest their boss, even for child abuse. Therefore, we are left with no choice to protect the students of this castle, other than ending the threat to their safety ourselves.
"And even if one day down the road they did finally hold you accountable for your crimes against humanity and punish you then, it would be too late for all of the children that you abused between now and then. But we are not them, and we are willing to hold you accountable now for the atrocities that you have already committed, even though it forces us into the position of judge, jury, and executioner that in an ideal world would never have to occur. But you would be held guilty by every sane person on this planet, and you, the Ministry, and the adults of this castle combined have left us with no other way to shield the people here besides executing your death penalty ourselves.
"And speaking of which, your crimes that you are guilty of that are deserving of capital punishment. First off, we know all about your quill that carves up the user's hand — Lee Jordan told us everything on Friday night after he returned to the common room from your torture. And yesterday afternoon we went to Professor McGonagall to get you stopped at least in that respect, but she is too much of a coward as well to do anything to protect the students of this castle. So we did take that to the appropriate authority to stop you in the normal way, but the normal way failed the students of this castle. And so it was then that we knew it was up to us to right the wrongs that you were committing, as we are the only ones brave enough to do anything. But we didn't know exactly how yet.
"Then yesterday evening you gave out three punishments that violated the Eighth Amendment and its corresponding basic human right of no cruel and unusual punishments. And while cruel and unusual can sometimes be subjective — not that your punishments weren't clearly excessive for the crimes committed, crimes that Professor McGonagall gave a very reasonable punishment for — what is not subjective is the fact that on top of that you gave Fred Weasley punishment for a crime that he never committed, simply because you thought that he probably would have. And that is as unacceptable as cutting open the back of a student's hand with a knife as a punishment for any crime that a student could possibly commit — hell, I can't think of any crime that an adult could commit that would warrant that. We wouldn't even make you do that for everything you have done. And yes, there are such things as conspiracy and attempted, but neither of those are what you actually convicted him of and punished him for, you punished him as if he had actually committed the crime which he did not.
"And both cruel punishment and conviction of a crime not committed you did and were able to do because you received new power given to the Ministry by itself at your request, in the form of the latest Educational Decree. A decree that gives you completely unchecked power to destroy any student's life for any reason you please, a power that no one in the world should ever have over anyone, and power that certainly wasn't given to you by the people whom you serve as a public servant — that is to say, the wizarding population of the British Isles.
"The overall result being, the blood quill made us know that we had to do something, and yesterday's unchecked power, cruel and unusual punishment, and conviction for a crime that factually did not occur, showed us that we needed to do something immediately. And our meeting earlier in the day with Professor McGonagall about your quill proved that there was only one option available — your execution. So we are here now to deliver justice, and you have been told the crimes you are guilty of resulting in your upcoming capital punishment.
"But before we actually get to that, there is one last thing you need to know — this is not just about you and your crimes and violations of human rights. We do hate with a burning passion everything that you believe in and stand for, but you are merely allowed to have the power that you do because of a much bigger, deeper problem — you are not the actual problem itself. Now, that does not make you in any way less guilty for the atrocities that you have committed — you unquestionably deserve at the very minimum to be thrown in jail for the rest of your life for your abuse of children, and we would certainly argue being hung for treason against the people you are supposed to serve — but you are also being executed for your part in something much larger, and much more dangerous, than just the vile acts that you have committed against the students of this castle.
"No, the real problem here is tyranny. A government that you certainly helped make into the tyranny that it currently is, which in turn is now helping you be able to commit your atrocities without fear of justice yourself, at least until we came along. And we're not talking about its belief or denial about Voldemort — that's just one minor issue that happens to be in everyone's minds right now, that is masking the true problem, that this government has become a tyranny. And when a long train of abuses and usurpations, pursuing invariably the same object, evinces a design to reduce the people under absolute despotism, it is their right, it is their DUTY, to throw off such government, and to provide new guards for their future security.
"Well, your attempts to take over the education system in order to brainwash the next generation of citizens is certainly an attempt to reduce the people under absolute despotism. Brainwashing students with that propaganda that you call a textbook in order to make them believe that defending themselves and others is morally wrong, and actively preventing them from learning how to defend themselves because you are afraid that they will one day rise up and overthrow your tyranny. Well, you should be afraid — you should always be afraid. Because you serve the people, not the other way around. Any just powers that you have you derive from the consent of the governed, and any powers not from the people are null and void, and the very definition of tyranny. And fear of the people you serve deciding that you aren't doing your job of protecting their rights — not them, but their rights, including their unalienable, self-evident right from God above to protect themselves against all threats, including the government — and therefore deciding to throw you off and provide new guards for their future security, should drive you every day to do what is right.
"So you have every reason in the world to fear an uprising when you are a tyrant like you and the Ministry are. But that doesn't matter to you anymore, since your time on this earth has come to an end, and your eternal punishment in the fiery lakes of hell that will make your blood quill feel like a mere prick are about to begin."
And with that she lifted her wand again to Umbridge's neck and cast the Severing Charm on both sides, nicking both of her carotids just enough for the blood to start flowing out instead of spurting like a firehose and potentially getting some on her or Fitz, which they would then have to make sure that they completely got off before returning to the castle, or it could potentially lead back to them. But Simmons being a doctor and knowing exactly what she was doing, it took no time at all for Umbridge to not be moving because she was dead, rather than not moving because of the Full Body-Bind curse that hadn't worn off yet.
The child abuser finally dead, FitzSimmons looked around them to start the next step in pulling off the perfect capitol punishment. And one of the first things that they noticed was the twins and Ron's broomsticks fastened to one of the walls by heavy chains and iron pegs.
"We have to save those," Fitz said, pointing at them.
"Indeed — though this presents us with a difficulty we didn't prepare for," Simmons answered her husband. "But let's get them down first, so we don't forget."
Spells made quick work of the bonds holding the redheads' personal property to the wall, and they soon had all three brooms lying on the ground next to the door.
"It'll be a pain, and slow us down slightly, but we should be able to carry them all vertically with us under the cloak as we walk out," Fitz said. "They're not heavy or too cumbersome, maybe some spell tying them all together with a single handle for me to hold on to, and no one should be walking down Umbridge's hallway as everyone avoids this place like the plague."
"I can't see any other way," Simmons replied. "Then we hide them in an unused broom cupboard nearby under the cloak until Umbridge is discovered, and then put them somewhere for the redheads to find. Or better yet, we tell them specifically that we saw their brooms in a broom cupboard we went into to snog in. They won't tell anyone, as they want their brooms back and don't want to risk any of the real teachers taking them away again or asking us how we found the brooms."
Settled on a plan, Simmons quickly cast some spells to tie the brooms all securely together with a single grip for Fitz to hold on to as they snuck out, so that everything would be ready to go as soon as they needed to. Then she and Fitz began arranging everything flammable in the room so that there would be nothing left once the fire had burned everything that it could. Umbridge they levitated in her chair over to the fireplace, where they dumped it and her onto their side right in front of the fire. All of her papers, lace tablecloths, and everything else they lay in a path between her and her wooden desk, to make it look like that's how the fire would travel. They were pretty certain that the wizarding world had never heard of such a thing as a fire marshal, or forensics in the first place, but it was still best if it looked like the fire had jumped from the fireplace to Umbridge, and then spread over to her desk, in case anyone was smart enough to look. Finally they made sure that nothing flammable was within a ten foot radius of the heavy oak wooden door, and cast a fireproof charm on Umbridge's quill, which they had easily found in the top drawer of her desk, setting it in the middle of the clear semicircle around the door, past where the door itself would swing so as not to get accidentally bumped by the door upon their exit or anyone else's later entrance, but hopefully out of the range of the fire, even with the fireproof charm they cast on it.
Everything set up they donned Harry Potter's invisibility cloak once more, Fitz holding onto the three broomsticks, and used Incendio to light Umbridge's body, her large wooden desk, and her fireplace on fire. They stood there watching it burn and start to spread for a minute, to make sure that a roaring fire really would get burning to destroy all possible evidence and maybe make it look as accidental and Umbridge's own fault as possible, until the heat started becoming too much and they quickly slipped out of the room, closing the door behind them.
They quickly walked back down the hallway to the alcove that they had been hiding out in before Umbridge had arrived, and paused inside of it to take stock. Looking up and down the hallway there was absolutely no one in sight, so they knew that they didn't have to worry about anyone having seen the door open and close on its own. They quickly cast every locking charm they knew on the door, before casting lumos with both of their wands so that the last spell on them would be the wand-lighting charm should they for some inconceivable reason have their wands checked before they cast any more spells in their daily lives, so that even the locking charms wouldn't be detectable.
Checking the hallway one more time, they stepped back out into it and snuck off down to the end of the hallway to a secret passageway that only existed there on Sundays. Taking this to its other end, which was thankfully on an unused hallway on the fifth floor on the complete opposite side of the castle, after Simmons peaked out to make sure that that hallway was clear as well, they snuck down that fifth floor hallway to a broom cupboard just a little bit down the hall that they knew was never used by Filch and only ever visited by them for snogging, and slipped inside. Finally pulling the invisibility cloak off, they used it to hide the broomsticks in the very back behind some other random junk to keep safe until the opportune time to tell the Weasley's.
As they finally stored their wands back away in their carry holsters, Simmons said, "We failed to kill Ward ourselves — but we didn't miss this time."
"That we didn't, wife," Fitz replied. "And the castle is much safer for it, just as the world would have been much safer had either of us succeeded back then."
After sharing a light kiss for a job well done and students successfully protected, they slipped back out into the hallway, cast a few locking charms on the broom cupboard door for extra safety, and finally headed down for a well-earned, slightly late but no more so than half of the castle, breakfast in the Great Hall.