Ron smiled. The lines of his face making small valleys amongst the many freckles that met his blue eyes.

In the many years that Harry had known Ron Weasley he'd never noticed how deeply blue his eyes were. But, he knew of at least one person who must have noticed. Hermione Granger likely had noticed many things about Ron that were never important to Harry. Hermione probably would have picked better stories to read from the newspaper too. Despite this, Harry doubted Hermione would have wanted to have lived to see Ron like he was now.

Harry held the black and white aloft leaning back in his wooden chair and attempted a gruff reporter voice, "Ministry officials finally release a list of five suspected death eaters that remain at large. Minister Shacklebolt, determined to maintain the status quo has to date declined to release information likely to create panic amongst the magical community. However, despite a yearlong search and commendable efforts from the department of magical law and enforcement to train volunteer Auror's including the great Harry Potter himself, the country remains at great threat."

Ron turned a shade of grey scrunching up his features as he lunged forward from his rocking chair and belched out large amounts of yellow vomit.

Harry kneeled down beside him and patted his back, "That makes me sick too mate. I'm hardly great, average at best."

Behind them a young healer who had been folding white sheets on empty hospital beds for a very long time, pulled out her wand and hurried forward.

"Don't worry, I can manage a bit of sick."

He flicked his own wand at the offensively orange pyjamas and in an instant the vomit was gone.

Ron looked up from the floor, his wide eyes searching for something, as if he were about to remember something, as if he were about to say something. Anything, just say one thing.

Instead he took Harry's hand, steadied himself and wandered over to the opposite bed where he found a floppy grey toy rabbit. He made it walk along the metal frame of the bed.

"Oh, this is Fooey, Teddy asked me to Rooey Fooey yesterday and as you're clearly Rooey and this is definitely Fooey I assumed he wanted me to give Fooey to you. I think he might want some mashed banana in return though".

Ron shrugged his shoulders in a very Ron-like manner.

Harry laughed. "Just a simple business transaction".

Ron reclaimed his place on his rocking chair cuddling Fooey whilst looking back at Harry expectantly as if to say, well carry on then. Harry slumped back into his chair and scanned the newspaper again.

"The article's not that interesting really, just lists some dickheads and then explains why they're dickheads….Lestrange, Millworth, Greyback, Runcorn annnd Umbridge. You know we found a fuck ton of stolen gold and ministry artefacts in her house? Doesn't mention that in the article. Fuck knows what she bought with that money. More fluffy pink cardigans to wipe her arse with, probably."

Harry suddenly remembered the healer that remained standing behind him and his responsibility not to share sensitive information out loud in a public hospital.

She was a small witch with chestnut hair and a delicate face. She must've been close to his age but he couldn't remember her from school. She looked up slightly and he noticed her eyes were large and deep brown like his Ginny.

Just then, something inside him snapped, "Is there something you want? An autograph maybe? I could sign one of those bedsheets for you."

The girl squirmed on the spot, her face bright red, unable to look directly at Harry, "I um, no I'm sorry. I must be disturbing you. I'm just here to help Mr Potter. I can leave."

Harry immediately felt sick, he mumbled an apology and looked behind him twice, equally unable to make eye contact.

The girl immediately straightened up but spoke so rapidly he barely caught her words, "It's okay I understand, everyone must ask you for your autograph without thinking about how you must feel. It's very exciting for us but I guess you must feel that no one really cares about you. But we do. I do. And if it's any consolation, I'm really sorry about what happened to your best friend. He seems nice. Well, I didn't know him before but you know. He's very sweet. I'm sure he was a wonderful person. And still is, of course."

Harry smiled, "He's always been brilliant. Thanks for looking after him Millie." He said reading the name off her badge, "I don't remember seeing you at Hogwarts."

Millie beamed back, "No I'm a member of the sacred circle so I was home schooled. It's actually quite unusual for me to be a healer at St Mungo's, coven folk usually carry on their family profession, you know. My parents are owl breeders but they were okay with it, in the end. I have enough siblings."

"You know I never learned about coven folk until after the war? I never knew there were other schools either. No one told me. Well, I never bothered to really learn anything that wasn't you know, put in front of me."

Millie was just about respond when, a short slightly chubby man with blonde hair and very round youthful face bounded into the room looking sweaty and utterly panicked. He took several breaths before mustering, "Harry, thank Merlin! I really mucked up, the department of mysteries has been broken into and they've already gone. I called Robards but he's not responding."

"It's alright Neville, let's go."

He nodded to Millie then placed a hand on Ron's shoulder, "Look after Fooey for me."

The midnight twinkled as Harry and Neville disappeared into a bright red telephone box along the edge of Whitehall, the magnificent Portland stone buildings questioning their intrusion. But London's casual night dwellers barely noticed them and nor would they have done in the broad daylight with an elephant in tow.

Harry looked over Neville as he typed a complex passcode into a rotary dial allowing them to bypass ministry security. The Whitehall entrance into the ministry magic was technically the visitor's entrance, the usual employees stood at a disused bus stop but there was little time to wait for the ministry bus.

Neville continued to ramble as they made their way through the many tall arches of the new marble laden ministry atrium "It's really lucky the intruder passed by some Unspeakables that were still working," he said. "I'm such an idiot, the first night I go on duty and I manage to fall asleep! I can't be trusted with anything. Dawlish is going have right laugh, they already think I'm useless."

"Dawlish is an idiot himself and no one thinks you're useless. It sounds like, whoever broke in knew the security codes, no alarms went off right?" Neville shook his head, "You know, without you we wouldn't have caught Nott or Avery. They envy you Neville, they don't think you're an idiot, you led a resistance, something none of them were brave enough to do."

Neville's cheeks turned bright red, "Thanks."

The pair entered a set of brass lifts and again used a pass code to allow entrance to the lower floor revealing a black tiled corridor with many large black doors. Harry noted scorch marks along the walls and a few loose tiles. Two men wearing dark grey, buttoned robes approached as they stepped down.

The older, white haired unspeakable spoke first, he appeared to disapprove of their presence, "Auror Potter and Auror Longbottom I assume. We would introduce ourselves but as you know. We cannot."

"Show us the damage."

The men were led into another black tiled room lined with tall glass cabinets containing millions of vials of various sizes and colours filled with strange liquids. The room itself appeared untouched but the younger unspeakable pointed to an unlocked cabinet with an empty shelf in the middle.

"They cleared this shelf in particular. It contained vials of Eezeyer's fluid."

"Right, and what exactly were you doing when the intruder took this Ezeeyer's fluid?"

The wizened unspeakable seemed irate, "That is strictly confidential Auror Potter - "

Harry smiled, "Yes, yes I know but roughly what were you doing and where were you, what did you see?"

"We were working in the room opposite on some…..important literature when we heard footsteps in the corridor outside but by the time we came out to investigate they were already well ahead of us."

"Did you see enough of them to catch a description?"

"A short stout man perhaps? My colleague thinks it was a woman but it was hard to tell, they cast a blasting curse as they entered the lifts."

"Right, and what exactly did they steal, this Ezriel's fluid. I assume it's something mysterious you can't tell me."

"Eezeyer's fluid comes from the gall bladder of a Re'em, an extremely rare and dangerous breed found in North America. It's properties are not well understood but of course you could read that in a NEWT level text book."

"Oooh right it's a like a golden cow, I remember."

"It is not a Cow Auror Potter, its closer in relation to a unicorn."

"Interesting, so why would someone want to steal Uni-cow bile?"

"That I do not know nor could I tell you if I did but what I do know is that the key to that cupboard belonged to an unspeakable who is currently missing. No one in this department has access to it."

"But it wasn't them, you would've recognised them?"

"Indeed."

"The missing unspeakable is June Selwyn right? She was studying time travel wasn't she? Disappeared one month after the war, it looked like someone had broken into her home during the night. I remember meeting her, she wasn't too happy with me, I guess because I helped destroy a bunch of time turners."

Neville frowned, "You think this intruder was an accomplice to June? Maybe she's hoping to go back and save….all the time turners."

Harry and Neville exchanged glances and laughed.

"This is not a laughing matter!"

"No, no, you're right," said Neville, "Um, is there any chance Eezeyer's fluid might be used to make time turners?"

The older unspeakable sighed but the younger shrugged his shoulders, "Yes, you might as well know. Neither of us are experts in that field but we know Eezeyer's fluid was being used to make a newer kind of time turner by Selwyn and her team but they were never complete".

"What do you mean by newer kind?"

The Unspeakables appeared to be a non-verbal battle with one another with the younger man winning, "I hear you have real world experience using a time turner?"

Harry nodded.

"The original time turner allowed one's present self to go back hours, days or even months and years but these would send the users memories back alone."

Harry immediately thought of a baby with Voldemort personality, "Oh, that's-"

He remained silent in thought for a moment. "Was there anyone….when Voldemort was in power, was there anyone in the ministry that had a list of your names? Who knew exactly what you were researching?"

With the greatest contempt they chorused the words, "Dolores Umbridge."

"Could it have been her?"

"We really don't know, if it was she didn't look like herself."

"Her usual pink, kitten-fucking fascist self?"

The dark haired unspeakable cracked a smile for the first time, "Yes well you can hardly wear pink to a robbery."

Several moments later, Harry and Neville were joined by John Dawlish and their head of department Gawain Robards. Harry leaned against one of many pillars that hoisted the wide spaced, airy upper floor office, whilst the others spread themselves around the open plan layout.

"Umbridge is an interesting theory Harry but she's just been found dead."

"What?"

"We had a report from the muggle police of a woman dressed as a witch floating up the Thames. Her father identified her yesterday whilst you were off. It can't have been her."

"Are we sure it was her, not the transfigured body of someone else."

Robards shook his head, "We checked and I knew Umbridge Harry she was terrible at transfiguration."

"She had a squib sister, are we sure it wasn't her, they looked alike. Besides drowning disfigures a person, surely she'd have been difficult to recognise."

Dawlish was the next to speak, "I don't think she was down there for long, I saw the body myself. Looked like Umbridge. Besides none of this explains why they knew the codes. We introduced them well after Umbridge left."

Harry opened and closed his mouth a few times.

Robards sighed, "We should probably investigate the leads we have though, John and Neville will search Sewlyn's home tonight and then we can pay a visit to this squib sister tomorrow to see if she's alive."

"We should probably find out if the squib sister is alive tonight-"

"Harry, it's your day off! You shouldn't be here anyway. Look I admire your dedication, we all do but you need to take a break sometimes. You heard the Unspeakables right? There was no final version of that new time tuner. And Selwyn was working with a whole team on this, I hardly think she managed it on her own. If it is Umbridge, she's not going anywhere."

"Right."

Harry gave in, perhaps he did need to rest. He was sure he seemed like a dick sometimes. But just as was pulling his coat on he caught Dawlish nudging Neville along in the outer corridor, "Fell asleep then eh, fatty."

"Maybe you shouldn't have insisted on switching shifts with me then. I said I was tired from the night before."

"You switched shifts?"

Dawlish jumped when he saw Harry, "Er yeh, I had a date."

"You switched shifts for a date."

"You didn't see her! Not that it would matter for someone who can get literally any bird they want. Neville gets it though, don't yeh Neville."

Dawlish cowered at Harry's height, "Dawlish where is that stupid little notebook you write in, the one with all of the codes in it?"

"It's in my trousers pocket, always is."

A look of panic developed as he rummaged through his pockets but before Dawlish could confirm the very worst Harry had already gone.

Harry apparated to a flamingo pink cottage residing in the Cotswolds and cast a disillusionment charm as entered through a large window round the back of the home. He was almost invisible. Unsurprisingly Dolores Umbridge lived in a hell of ornaments and pink fluff, the walls teaming with ceramic plates holding screaming kittens captive.

He moved silently towards the sound of shuffling leading him to find Umbridge standing in her kitchen. For a moment he felt triumphant but then he took a closer look. Umbridge looked to have aged about 50 years, her froglike features fraught with wrinkles, her hair desperately greasy and her robes uncharacteristically black. But despite her filthy state she was clearly mad with glee as she held aloft a silver ball which span atop of her fingers.

And that was the last Harry saw before the world turned black.