Foreshadowing the Past

Chapter 34

"The doors we open and close each day decide the lives we live." - Flora Whittemore

Connor had barely stepped into the room (which was indeed round) and shut the door, when the torches that had been the source of the blue light extinguished themselves, just as they had in his dream. The darkness was absolute, except for the lines of light leaking through the cracks in the many doors that lined the walls of the strange round room. The walls began to spin, making the lines around the doors blur and they went fast enough to make him feel queasy. Even though he had been prepared for this, it was still strange and unnerving. He fumbled in his robes for his wand, and just as he found it, the walls had slowed to a stop. He whispered 'Lumos,' relieved by the light the tip of his wand produced, and studied the many doors around him.

"Damn! I didn't think to mark the exit door before the walls started moving," he said.

The sense that time was running out was causing extreme tension to build inside of him, and he paused to try to think clearly. They had planned for this, hadn't they? All he had to do was think.

He turned in a circle to see the whole room, and found that Quint, Ivy, Rachel and Zack were all looking excited and apprehensive. It was truly amazing that they had made it this far without being apprehended, and they were beginning to believe that they could actually pull this off without getting into serious trouble.

"What do we do now?" Zack asked him as the torches sprang to life again and washed them all with blue light, giving them all the eerie feeling almost of being underwater.

"I think we should start trying doors," Rachel said

"Which door?" he asked himself, not really expecting an answer. This was all too familiar to him. He had seen this many times in his sleep, and it was oddly comforting to know what was going to be said and done next. It was kind of like following a script that he had rehearsed for, was afraid to deviate from for fear of upsetting the balance of things.

"It's your vision, mate," Quentin said, his wand at the ready, and his nervous voice betraying his calm outer demeanor.

"Look, there are five of us," Rachel said logically. "We should just each pick a door and see what's on the other side. There are only a dozen; it shouldn't take long to find the one that Connor told us about, assuming that one of these doors leads directly into that room."

"And if none of them does?" Zack asked, tentatively approaching a door, but not sure how to attempt to open it, as there was no handle.

"Let's worry about that if we come to that problem," Connor said impatiently. "We don't have much time!"

He strode forward and placed his hand on the door directly in front of him, intending to push it open, but Zack said, "Wait!"

"What is it?" Connor asked impatiently. They only had minutes before Samantha Tillman was going to appear.

"This," Zack said, and then pulled a Magic Marker from his pocket, and waved it triumphantly in front of him. He used his teeth to pull off the cap, and then quickly drew a star on the door that Connor had chosen. "Go ahead now."

Connor pushed, and the door swung open to reveal a lot of desks and a large tank in the center of the room. There was something moving inside the murk, fluid-filled tank, but Connor wasn't interested in that; this clearly wasn't the room he needed. Ivy had tried to push a door open on the opposite side just after Connor opened his door, but it seemed that the room would only allow one door to be opened at a time. Connor pulled the door shut, and the lights went out again plunging them into darkness, but for Connor's wandlight.

The walls were spinning again, the blue light a blurred streak in front of his eyes. Connor finally closed them when his stomach began to churn, and didn't open them again until he heard them come to a halt. He felt slightly dizzy by that time, and needed a moment to get oriented. Zack didn't seem to need any such concession, though, and strode to the door nearest to him, drew a star on it with the marker, and pushed it open. Connor passed Zack and stepped through the door to look around. The rest of them peered into the room over his shoulder to see what was revealed beyond. It was a large stone room that looked like an amphitheatre with benches all around, sinking gradually lower in steps. At the bottom, there was what appeared to be a one-man stage, a sort of dais, with a tattered curtain hanging from an arch. The whole room was eerily quiet and still, and made Connor want to beat a hasty retreat.

"Not this one," Connor said, feeling uneasy, and stepped back into the round room with the others as quickly as he could, while trying not to show how panicked he really felt. "We're running out of time!"

Zack pulled the door shut, and they waited for the spinning to resolve itself once more. As the torches came to life again, Connor looked at his watch, and saw that it was 2:49. Less than ten minutes to go until Samantha Tillman was supposed to appear.

"Which one now?" Quentin asked.

"That one," Connor said, pointing to the next in line. He waited while Zack placed the star on the door, and then he pushed it open. Wrong one again. This door would not budge at all; no matter how hard they pushed on it, or how many unlocking charms they tried. They finally abandoned that particular door, making sure to mark it with an 'x' to show that they had already tried that one. The next door was no help either; Connor didn't care about a room full of strange artifacts, he needed to find the clock room! He pulled the door shut forcefully and the walls began their rotating. This time, Connor simply took the marker from Zack's hand, scribbled a shape that roughly resembled at star, and pushed the door open.

Yes.

Connor pushed the door open and peered into the room, and knew at once that they had found it. The ticking of the clocks was strangely soothing to him as he stepped out into the dimly lit room. He only vaguely heard Ivy, Rachel and Quentin say, "Lumos!" before the light from their wands illuminated everything, casting strange shadows. Connor put out the light in his own wand, though he couldn't take his eyes off the strange room that they were standing in. There were clocks and hourglasses of all shapes and sizes on every available surface. There were glass-fronted cabinets full of the tiniest clocks that any of them had ever seen, and hourglasses of nearly the same size in another. The sound of the gentle ticking was eerie as it echoed around the large room in an endless, an uncoordinated symphony of sound; it was almost as if the room was whispering to them in an ancient, unknown language. Ticktockticktockticktockticktock....

"What do you think this place really is?" Ivy asked. She was standing very close to Connor's shoulder, holding her wand high.

"I don't know," Connor said. He had given the matter a great deal of thought since the first time he had dreamed of it, and the only answer that had ever seemed right to him, was that they must be working on something to do with the properties of time. "Maybe it's a research place. Maybe they study time; where it goes once it passes and stuff."

"We made it in time," Rachel observed, gesturing to a wall covered in too many types of clocks to count. All of them read 2:53. "Only just."

"In my dream, she appears right over here," Connor said, striding to the spot and pointing at it as if an "X" might suddenly show itself to mark the spot. "Is everyone ready?"

They all nodded, and pulled out their wands. Connor took a few steps backward, to be sure that the woman didn't land on top of him when she arrived.

"Someone's coming from out there!" Quentin hissed, pointing back toward where they had just been, terror written on his face.

Almost as soon as he had said this, the door they had just come through closed of its own accord and the sound of the room spinning inside could be faintly heard. 'Not now!' Connor moaned in his mind. He could hear voices from inside the round room - lots of them. There was no doubt that the guards had discovered that someone was here that shouldn't be.

"Connor!" Ivy's excited voice had him turning back to see a woman appear out of thin air into the middle of the room, just at the point that Connor had been standing before. She as wearing deep blue robes, and had light brown hair that was piled haphazardly atop her head. She seemed startled to see them all looking at her, just as Connor had foreseen.

Connor had planned this out and practiced it so many times in his mind that he didn't even pause. He raised his wand and shouted, "Expelliarmus!" forcing whatever it was she had used to transport herself, out of her hands and flying into the air. He stepped deftly out of the way as soon as the item hit the ground, and Rachel stunned the woman. Zack stepped forward quickly and half-shouted, "vincio!" And ropes shot from his wand that bound the stunned woman where she lay. He had been the only one of them who had been able to manage the spell properly when they had practiced, and Connor thought wildly that now that Zack had done his job, maybe the others might be able to hide somehow before they were found. Maybe if they backed against a wall and covered themselves with the Chameleon Cloaks, Connor could allow himself to be caught and taken away, giving his friends time to....

That hope was dashed as soon as it formed in his head, though, when the door crashed open, and several men in peacock blue robes rushed in and surrounded them. The room flooded with light, and Connor only had a moment to realize that all of these men had wands pointed at him and his friends. A moment after that, it suddenly registered that Professor Lupin, his father, mother and Uncle Ron and Aunt Hermione were all there as well. His Aunt Hermione was screaming, "No! They're only children!"

That distraction was all it took. Connor and his friends all turned, wands raised, and there was a scream at the same time that there were several shouts of, "Stupefy!" before everything went black.

Connor didn't hear the muttered spell that revived him, but his head was pounding when he opened his eyes to find himself lying on the ground. He looked around groggily, and it was a moment before he understood exactly where he was and what he was actually seeing. All of his friends had apparently been stunned in the barrage of spells, but had evidently been revived by his aunt and Professor Lupin, despite the fact that the security wizards were still holding their wands at the ready. His Dad, Mum and Uncle Ron had their wands drawn, but theirs were pointed at the security wizards. Connor wondered exactly how long he'd been unconscious before he'd been revived. He felt a hand gripping his, and he saw that it was his Aunt Hermione. All of them were breathing hard, and the moment seemed suspended into an eternity before one of the security guards finally spoke.

"What are you kids doing in here?" Lawrence snarled. He had left his post, and intruders had gained access to a highly classified area; he was in big trouble with his superiors, and knew it. The fact that it had been children who had breached the security only served to make him angrier; he would never live this down, if he even got to keep his job. Add to that the fact that one of the kids appeared to be Harry Potter's son, and that Harry Potter himself had been here to witness said son being stunned; things weren't looking good for Lawrence Ebner at all.

"We came to stop her!" Connor answered, nodding in the direction of the woman lying stunned on the floor, which no one had yet revived. Connor got slowly to his feet, as did his friends, though they all felt a bit unsteady. Connor wondered disjointedly if he had been hit with more than one stunning spell, or if it had just been the fact that an adult had used the spell that left him feeling so weak. Nevertheless, he kept his wand up, not intending to let them stun him again before he had a chance to explain, nor did he break his gaze from the man facing him.

"Get that wand out of my boy's face," his dad growled at the man, who looked as though he'd like nothing more than to hex them all. "He's no threat to you. Connor, kids, lower your wands."

They all lowered their wands, but kept a tight grip on them as Professor Lupin stepped forward to check on the woman on the floor. He felt for her pulse, and turned her so that she was lying flat on her back, still bound from shoulders to knees.

"It's Samantha Tillman," he confirmed.

"We stunned her," Rachel said in a shaky voice. "And tied her up, just in case."

Professor Lupin reached for a golden item on the floor near her, but Connor shouted, "Don't touch that! It's a portkey!"

The professor quickly withdrew his hand and looked sharply at the children.

"That's how she's been getting in here," Connor said. "Before, they thought they were seeing her ghost, but when I dreamed about her, I realized that she wasn't a ghost at all. In my dream she was always holding something in her hand that I couldn't see, and so we guessed that it must be a portkey. There wasn't any other way for her to be coming and going from here without getting caught, and why she seemed to be appearing from thin air when there's no Apparating in here."

"How did you know she was going to be here?" the Security guard asked in confusion. "And who is she? What does she have to do with all of this?"

"Samantha Tillman," said one of the other guards. He seemed to be the oldest of the blue-robed men, and the only one who recognized her name. "She disappeared some twenty years ago, the same night that You-Know-Who returned. She used to be an Unspeakable, but she turned bad."

"And she's been using a port key to come in here and do stuff!" Connor filled in.

"Is this the woman that the nutter who broke in here last time was looking for?" the guard in front of Quentin asked.

Connor realized that he was referring to Andrew Tillman's Father, who had broken in here to search for the ghost of his mother just before Christmas.

"Look," said Lawrence the security wizard, determined to do what he could to salvage the situation. "I don't know what's going on here, but I've got five children and five civilians in an out of bounds, highly classified area. What we're going to do, is we're all going to take this upstairs to Mr. Corwin's office in the Depart of Magical Law Enforcement and sort it out there. I'm going to need all of you to surrender your wands until we talk to Mr. Corwin."

Connor looked to his father for direction, and sighed when his father nodded to him and handed his own wand to Lawrence. Following Harry's example, Lupin, his Uncle Ron and his Aunt Hermione all handed their wands over as well. Connor looked over at Samantha Tillman, and he saw that one of the security wizards was now levitating her, and another was scooping the portkey into his hat, careful not to touch it al all. He mumbled, "Give them over, guys," and surrendered his wand as well. As soon as the security wizard was holding all ten of their wands, Lawrence led them back to the round room and they all stood crowded together inside.

Connor felt his parents take up positions on either side of him, and saw that Rachel's parents were flanking her as well. Zack, Quentin and Ivy were standing on either side of Professor Lupin, and seven security wizards, one levitating the stunned Samantha Tillman, surrounded all of them. The door was pulled shut, and they were plunged into darkness once more as the walls began to spin. When the torches sprang to life, Lawrence called out, "Exit!" and a door to Connor's right sprang open.

He groaned inwardly. All he'd had to do was ask for the room he wanted? His dreams had conveniently left that detail out. He dared not look either of his parents in the face, for fear of seeing the anger and disappointment he was sure was written on them. He could only imagine what sort of trouble him and his friends were now in, and what was worse, was that his parents, Rachel's parents, and Professor Lupin might be in trouble as well. He followed along in the bizarre parade that made their way to the lift outside of the Department of Mysteries, and stared at the floor as he walked. They arrived at the lift, and Connor was urged forward into the small compartment by a hand pressing gently into his back. Not all of them would fit inside, and so two guards accompanied their 'detainees' first, to be followed by the rest of the guards and the unconscious Samantha Tillman in the next available lift.

Connor was standing toward the very back of the lift, and could see his friends in front of him. They, too, were staring at the floor, and no one was speaking. A lump formed in Connor's throat as he felt his father give his shoulder a firm squeeze. Even after all of this, his dad was giving him a measure of comfort and support, and it only served to make him feel guiltier. He wondered how his mum and dad and Rachel's parents had known to come. He supposed that Lupin had found out they were missing and alerted them. In retrospect, it had probably been a bad idea to leave Victoria petrified on a couch in the common room; someone had probably found her and unjinxed her. All it would have taken from there was for Victoria to report them, and Professor Lupin would have had a good idea of where to find them after all of the discussions Connor had had with him about his dreams.

The lift came to a stop on level two, which Connor knew from his study of the Ministry lay-out was the Department of Magical Law Enforcement. He had heard his father say on many occasions that Kingsley Shacklebolt was next in line for the Head of that department, and Connor thought it was a shame that he wasn't already in that job. Talking to Mr. Shacklebolt, who was a family friend, would have been a lot easier than explaining things to Mr. Corwin, who was a virtual stranger. As they shuffled out of the lift, Connor paused to swallow hard, trying his best not to let his queasy stomach get the better of him as they were led down a corridor, past a labyrinth of cubicles with wanted posters and maps and scraps of paper tacked up everywhere. They passed a door that was labeled 'Wizengamot Administration Offices' and finally came to a door which bore the name of 'Steadman Corwin, Head, Magical Law Enforcement'.

Lawrence opened the door with his wand, and led them all inside, to a small waiting room, that held a few chairs and a desk on which a plaque read, 'Honoria Truman, Secretary'.

"Have a seat, everyone," Lawrence ordered, gesturing to the chairs around them. "I'll need to contact Mr. Corwin."

Everyone found seats without speaking, and almost as soon as they were all seated, the other guards arrived, floating Samantha Tillman into the room ahead of them. It was kind of creepy, Connor thought, the way she simply hung there in the air, with her head lolling off to one side. He heard his Aunt Hermione whisper to his Uncle Ron, "Did you notice? She hasn't gotten..." But his Uncle Ron merely nodded and patted her hand, cutting off whatever it was that she had been about to say. He stared at them for a moment, then at Rachel who was seated between them looking miserable.

Once Lawrence had stepped over to the Floo and kneeled to call on Steadman Corwin, the other security guards left the office to go back to their posts, leaving only two behind. They took their places by the door, and stared off into space, an impersonal wall of indifference. Connor let his eyes travel to what he could see of his father without moving his head from its downward facing position, and saw that his father's hands were clenched into fists. To his horror, Connor felt tears beginning to well up in his eyes at the sign of anger in his father, even if it was only his hands. In all of his planning and scheming, I had never once considered how all of this would affect his parents, aside from how they might punish him. Now he had not only brought them to the Ministry in the middle of the night, but now they might be in serious trouble as well. What if they were arrested? They didn't have the protection of being under age, and Rachel had said that just trespassing at the Ministry was punishable by six months in Azkaban! He tried desperately to keep the tears from falling, but one escaped to splash against the tiled floor in front of him. His mother must have noticed this, because in an instant, she was out of her chair and kneeling in front of him.

"Oh Connor," she said, tears welling in her own eyes. "Are you all right?"

He nodded, and sniffed as quietly as possible, aware that every eye in the room was now probably on him. He didn't want his friends to see him crying, especially since this was entirely his fault.

His mother patted his knee to get him to look up at her, and said, "We're here for you."

He nodded again, even though there was huge lump in his throat, and another couple of tears slid from his eyes. It wasn't until his mother sat beside him again, and he felt his father's warm hand on his back that he dared to raise his eye to meet his father's gaze. "I'm sorry, Dad," he whispered thickly. His Dad simply gave him the smallest of smiles and patted his back in a gesture of comfort. Connor was immeasurably relieved not to see disappointment in his eyes, no matter whatever else his father might be feeling.

"Well," Lawrence said, pulling his head from the fire. "Mr. Corwin will be here presently."

Connor nodded, and wiped his face on his sleeve, pulling himself together before the Head of the Department of Magical Law Enforcement could arrive to see him so forlorn and guilty looking. He chanced at look at his friends, and saw that Rachel was sitting with her head resting on her father's shoulder, while her mother held her hand. Ivy and Zack were sitting stiffly side by side, and Ivy looked as though she were trying not to cry, while Zack sat, tactfully looking away from evidence of Connor's tears. Quentin was sitting beside Professor Lupin, elbows on his knees, and his face buried in his hands. Connor wondered what all of them were thinking, and longed to be able to assure them that he would not let them take any of the blame in this if he could possibly help it.

Before Connor knew it, the Floo against the back wall of the waiting area erupted in green flames, and a tall, intimidating looking man with broad shoulders and thick, wavy hair stepped out of the grate. Lightly dusting away the soot that had gathered on his cloak as he traveled via Floo to his office, he looked around at the motley assortment of adults and children seated around him. He barely gave a second glance at the unconscious woman floating upright, a few inches off of the ground against the wall, and Connor wasn't sure if he'd even seen her there. If he did, he made no comment.

"Potter," he greeted in a brusque voice, once he had sighted Harry.

Harry stood up and said, "Corwin," in the same tone. The two men clasped hands and slapped each other's shoulders in greeting.

"Are you sure you won't reconsider my offer?" Corwin asked Harry after a moment. "A training position, you know; I could make it worth your while."

"Sorry, sir," Harry shook his head in the negative. "I'm happy with what I'm doing right now."

"One of the best Aurors in history quitting to make brooms," the other man said inscrutably. "Who'd have thought?"

Harry simply shrugged.

"Well I hear we've had a bit of trouble here," Mr. Corwin said now, getting to the point. "Enough trouble that I had to be dragged out of bed two hours early."

"Yes sir," Lawrence said. "As I told you in the Floo, these kids were all caught in the Department of Mysteries."

"Yes," Mr. Corwin said seriously. "Well we'll need to get to the bottom of this right now. I think that if we all come into my office, we can find out everything we need to know and decide from there which action needs to be taken. Someone levitate her in, as well, I suppose." He gestured vaguely to the area where Samantha Tillman hovered, and unlocked his office door to admit them all.

Connor was surprised when his father took the liberty of conjuring up enough comfortable chairs for all of them in two rows in front of the wide mahogany desk. He took the seat in the first row, as his father gestured to it, and was soon joined by Ivy, Quentin, Zack and Rachel. They all sat nervously and waited to see what would happen next. Professor Lupin sat directly behind Connor, who was in the middle seat of the front row, and Rachel's parents sat to the left of him, while his mum and dad sat to the right. Mrs. Tillman was levitated into the room, and hovered strangely in the corner, with two security wizards on either side of her. Mr. Corwin stood in the doorway for a moment as though waiting for something, and a moment later, an Auror in his telltale royal blue robes appeared. Corwin whispered something to the Auror, who promptly disappeared back the way he had come, and another Auror (a woman this time) entered the room and stood beside the desk, facing everyone seated.

"So," Mr. Corwin began. He was standing behind his desk, looking at each of them in turn. Connor felt as though the man could see straight into his brain, and swallowed hard when his piercing gray eyes fell on him. "I've heard Mr. Ebner's brief account of what's happened tonight, but I have a feeling that there is much more to this story than his finding a group of children in the Department of Mysteries along with a woman reported to be dead for many years. Which one of you would like to start filling me in?"

Connor took a deep breath. This was the part he had been dreading; admitting that he had willfully broken the law and somehow convincing this man that his friends should not be punished. He started to get to his feet, and almost yelped in surprise when he felt a pair of large hands force him back into his seat.

"If I may, sir?"

Connor looked over his shoulder to see that his father was on his feet. Mr. Corwin nodded, and listened with no discernable expression on his face.

"Sir, I believe that I've shared with you that my son, Connor, has certain... talents," Harry began. "And you'll have seen the papers recently about it as well."

Corwin nodded, and gestured for Harry to continue, saying nothing.

"Earlier this year, at the beginning of the school term, Connor began to have dreams related to the Department of Mysteries. I'm sure that he didn't have any idea at the time what it was he was actually seeing in these dreams, and I'm not quite sure how he figured it out, to be honest. Nevertheless, we consulted a leading expert in the field of Divination and Clairvoyance that we have been in contact with since Connor's talents first made themselves apparent."

"And how long ago was that?" Corwin asked, seemingly unsurprised so far.

"Almost seven years, sir," Harry replied. "Amelia MacTaggart came at our request to talk to Connor about his recent dreams, because we, of course, recognized what he was dreaming of. We called her because it isn't normal for Connor to receive precognitive dreams; he has always been awake when he's made any kind of predictions before. Madam MacTaggart was of the opinion at that time that Connor wasn't having precognitive dreams at all, but was somehow receiving subconscious mental images from me, which were manifested to him in dream form."

"He was reliving your memories," Corwin summarized shrewdly. "From the time that you yourself visited the Department of Mysteries."

"That was what she believed," Harry confirmed. "She advised me to practice my occlumency skills each night before sleeping to prevent any of my thoughts from project to him."

"But she was incorrect?" Corwin guessed.

"Yes sir," Harry answered. "But we were unaware of that until Connor began to have dreams about things outside of my experiences. He dreamed specifically of Samantha Tillman appearing to him and his friends in the Time Room. I'm afraid that from there, I'm not very clear about how it all led to us all being here tonight. We were careful not to mention the Time Room or the Department of Mysteries in his presence, and never dreamed that he would be able to find out on his own."

"If that is so," Corwin asked with a faint furrow in his brow. "Then how is it that you knew they would be here tonight?"

"That would be where I come into this," Professor Lupin said, standing up behind Connor. "I was at Hogwarts late tonight, thinking that I might be needed in case any of the students from Gryffindor house decided to attempt any more April Fool's Day pranks before the day was over. I retired to my own residence in Hogsmeade via the Floo in my office at Hogwarts at approximately 11:30. At a little after one this morning, I was alerted that the children had left Hogwarts grounds, by Angus Arabat, a portrait subject that followed their movements once they left their common room."

Connor looked over to Rachel, who looked stunned at this bit of information. They had actually once discussed the portrait subject in question, who had been the first seeker of the first ever Gryffindor House Quidditch team. Connor could feel Ivy move restlessly in her seat on the other side of him, but no one made any sound as they waited to hear what had happened at Hogwarts in their absence.

"Apparently," the professor continued. "The students believed that my Floo would bring them to the Ministry. They gained access to my office and Connor attempted to use my fireplace, but found it blocked. My Floo connection is strictly for commuting to and from Hogwarts, though they would have had no way of knowing that. From there they traveled to the only other Floo they believed might suit their purposes, which happened to be in the office of Headmistress Minerva McGonagall. Once Angus witnessed the children actually leaving the school, he traveled to a portrait in my home that was place there for expediency in matters of student discipline. He alerted me to their destination, and I hastened back to the school, where I found Connor, Quentin and Zack all absent from their beds, and Victoria Weasley in a body bind and left on a sofa in the Gryffindor common room."

Professor Lupin's narrative was briefly interrupted by a gasp and a hissed whisper from Hermione, "You cursed your own cousin?" Rachel sank lower in her seat, and kept he eyes downcast.

"Victoria informed me that Rachel Weasley and Ivy Longbottom were also among the students that had left the school. Once I followed their trail, several portraits in Professor McGonagall's office confirmed that five students had used the Floo to travel to the Ministry of Magic, Department of Magical Games and Sports. I immediately alerted the Potters and the Weasleys, who met up with me at the Ministry of Magic, only to find the Atrium filled with fireworks and in complete chaos. That was our first solid evidence that the children were actually there. How they found the Department of Mysteries from there is a question I think we would all like answered."

"Perhaps you could fill us in further, young man?" If Steadman Corwin had found any of Harry's words remarkable, his stoic face gave no sign. He simply turned his eyes to Connor expectantly, and Connor stood after receiving a brief squeeze to his shoulder by his Uncle Ron.

"Yes, sir," Connor answered nervously, using as respectful a tone as his father had.

He explained how he had overheard his mother ask his father why he would be dreaming of the Department of Mysteries, and how he had taken that clue and built upon it. He tried to leave his friends out of the story all together, and didn't mention the Marauder's Map at all. Occasionally Mr. Corwin's eyebrows would rise or contract together as he listened to Connor's tale, but he didn't interrupt. Connor explained all about how he had recorded his dreams and put them in chronological order, and how he had found the map of the Ministry building and planned to come to catch Mrs. Tillman. He even admitted to setting off the fireworks in the Atrium and using the Chameleon Cloaks to sneak around.

"And," Mr. Corwin said after Connor finished his account of events leading up to this point. "How is it that these other children are here? How are they involved?"

Connor had left them entirely out of his description of events, foolishly hoping that he wouldn't draw any further attention to them. With a tremor in his voice, he said, "Well, Rachel there is my cousin, and the others are my friends. I...I made them come. They tried to talk me out of it, and wanted to tell Professor McGonagall or Professor Lupin, but I wouldn't let them. They only came with me because they were afraid that I would get myself hurt or something."

Mr. Corwin eyed the others, and looked slightly skeptical, but let that matter slide for the moment. "I must say that I'm impressed with your detective work, however misguided your actions have been. I must ask you, now, why you did not listen to your friends' advice and approach an adult with this matter. Minerva McGonagall is a capable and gifted witch, and I'm sure you could have trusted her to see that the proper authorities apprehended Mrs. Tillman."

"Well," Connor said after a brief hesitation. "I thought they'd screw it up."

His uncle Ron laughed outright at this, and earned a slap from Aunt Hermione, but Connor didn't find much humor in the situation. His stomach was tied in knots by now, and he was seriously glad that he had not eaten much of anything before leaving the castle.

"Oh?"

Connor could have sworn he saw Mr. Corwin's lips twitch slightly, but in the next instant he was frowning and asking for an explanation.

"I was afraid that if I told an adult, then Mrs. Tillman might somehow find out that we knew that she was going to come here tonight, and then not show up at all. Who knows if I'd ever get another chance of stopping her from sneaking in? She could be one of those Death Eaters or something; Dad said they never did catch them all. Then I was afraid that if I tried to change the things that I saw in my dreams, then it would change something, and throw everything else off." Connor answered. "I thought that going to an adult would just...complicate things."

"He's got a point," his Uncle Ron said with a chuckle.

Connor turned grateful eyes to his uncle, and noted that his mother was glaring at her brother angrily, and Aunt Hermione had slapped him again.

"Think about it," Ron defended himself, looking at Harry, Ginny and Hermione. "What would any of us have done in his place?"

"Be that as it may," Corwin interrupted. "These students were found in a highly restricted area of the Ministry of Magic. Connor himself admits that the break in was pre-meditated, and has demonstrated through his actions that he was aware that what he was doing was illegal."

"That's true." Hermione stood to make herself heard. "But at the same time, they never should have been able to get as far as they did if the security here was up to scratch. I'm appalled that five thirteen year old witches and wizards were able to completely bypass every bit of Ministry security with nothing but a map and a pocketful of trick items."

"Now see here," Mr. Corwin said, looking slightly chagrined for the first time. "Our security force is adequate for peace-time defense. Tonight's episode is simply an anomaly in normal operations."

"An anomaly?" Hermione scoffed. "I'm sure that I read in the papers that Samantha Tillman's own son was recently arrested for breaking into the Ministry in search of his mother's ghost."

"Yes he was," Corwin replied. "The key word there is 'arrested.' The Department of Mysteries was in no way compromised."

Mr. Corwin picked up a large earthenware mug from his desk and was raising it to his lips when Connor sudden said, "Don't drink that, sir!"

The department head lowered the mug and looked inside of it, then set it down. "Why?" he asked calmly.

"Because you dropped your cigar in there earlier to put it out," Connor answered.

"Correct," the man replied. "Uncanny. Thank you, that would have been unpleasant."

Connor blushed and nodded. "The Minister is here."

Almost as soon as the words had left Connor's mouth, there was a knock on the door to the office. Connor heard Quentin mutter, "Merlin! The Minister! We're done for!"