Manditory Ministry Staff Meeting

Jack heard the words from afar... Not only was she going to Askaban, but the man who murdered her cousin would be taking her there. The dementors. The ones that would remind her every second of every day that she was responsible for the creation of the being who had killed so many people, who had brought her life to shambles. She would see every death- the images that she had created in her mind. She would have to survive though.

She could feel Teddy staring at her in shock, while everyone else reacted with anger and (in some cases) sug justice, Teddy was giving off scents of fear. She could sense that he was afraid for her, and she turned to give him a firm look. Teddy and Jack were not people persons. They did not like to talk if there was no accompanying action. So they had gotten quite good at this. She saw him tighten his jaw and settle his expression into almost heartless passiveness- she had taught him well.

"Awesome," she said, turning and smiling at Zada as she rose. "Ms Gould, my intern Theodore will watch over my duties and serve in my place." She knew Teddy would let someone know, probably Michael, of what happened, of Jess did not first. "I'm excited to become better acquainted with this regime." She turned to face the escorts. "No piggy back ride? Fine, let's go." They grabbed her upper arms and began to needlessly drag her out. She pulled her arms away and led the way. "Last one there is a rotten egg," she hissed.

Zada let Emof and Dyllan leave and watched Gould as she decided, wisely, to settle herself at least for now. Personally, Zada had almost wished Gould had given her reason to send her off as well. The creatures would have been handy target practice. Pity, that. It might have been fun. Oh, well. And now, back to Potter. Loudmouth. There always had to be one. He had apparently decided to be the drama queen of the moment. He had been lucky she had merely fired him and hadn't sent him to Azkaban as it was.

She lifted her elegant wand and cast a spell all around the walls of the atrium. Ice began to form in the room, icicles hanging from every fixture, ice coating every wall, coating the floor, every chair, every inch of the black marbled room. she merely held her wand in place, firing one continuous spell until the room had become one solid mass of ice.

Then she turned back to Potter.

"Welcome to Hell, Potter," she said with an equally icy evil sneer. "Its a new age. The greater good does not exist anymore. The only opinion that matters now is Gellert Grindlewald's. Care to change your tone?"

((Hah. I like that.))

Jess simply stood there, his nostrils flaring and his face set in a look of fury intense enough to have probably melted the room he now stood in. This was the kind of fury he'd never felt before, not when he saw students falling in the line of fire, not when he watched Dae bleed out in his arms, but instead as he watched the country he cared so much for fall into such a poor state.

"I'd rather die you, you," he shouted, his inner turmoil taking place as he shouted a number of words he usually reserved for stubbing his toe in the dark.

"That is what I think of your opinion. You and him, you will regret this. The people of this country will not stand for a lawless government," he roared, turning on the spot and disappearing into thin air.

Brian had seen enough. He knew he was weak link at this moment between Grindlewald and Robert while he stood in the shadows of the icy atrium. He decided that his family was not better served by his being as demonstrative as Jess had been. It merely would serve to unwind their hiding place. He had to get out. Now. And he could leave no trail behind.

He got the portkey out of his pocket and went to his two friends, Steven and Jack, who had been sitting in the back of the room. He merely laid his hands on their shoulders, activated the portkey as it rested in the hand that was tucked in the palm of his hand and now resting on Steven's shoulder. He ported the three of them safely out of the atrium. Not only was England no longer safe, but it was worse than he thought.

Such a fragile mind as that of Calvin Ransom was not capable of enduring such extreme situations. Not only had a fuse been blown due to the large dose of fear that he'd experienced as he'd watched everything within the room go to hell, but another as well, due to his confusion. One had burst because of his anxiety. Another for the escape plan that he could not come up with, no matter his attempts to do so. And last but not least, the vessel in his brain that had surely been shot because the feeling of betrayal that he'd experienced upon being left there in the presence of the evil dictator before him, while Brian had apperated to safety.

As he looked up from his previously hunched position, his overwhelming emotions became almost painfully evident. Tears had sprouted from the rims of his eyes, and lined his lashes as they attempted to decide whether or not to slide down his freckled cheeks. His heart was thudding in his chest, violently pushing and shoving his ribcage about as though the organ had plans of bursting through his chest.

Calvin’s lips fell apart, and he slowly met eyes with the woman, Zada, who had created such chaos, “P-please…. I haven’t don’t anything wrong. P-please let me go home,” he sobbed desperately. Calvin was of no use to the woman before him, of that he was certain. He had done nothing of the sort that his coworkers had, whom Zada had ordered to be removed from the Ministry, and carried to far darker locations. But Calvin could do nothing to convince himself of the fact that his odds were in his favor, because he had never before faced such an unstable situation in his life.

Michael felt sorry for Calvin. The young boy wasn't able to play in the same circles that Zada Forbes seemed to run in. And most of the people Calvin knew and trusted had been forced to leave suddenly, leaving the boy on his own. Michael himself had merely slipped off the school grounds and had been slinking around the ministry for his own purposes and Robert's when the meeting was called suddenly. Out of curiosity he had gone and had remained hiding in the nook between two floo fireplaces. The darkness cloaked him completely or nearly so. Now he was moved with pity for the boy who seemed to have fallen into a pool entirely too deep for him. He looked at Forbes and Grindlewald who appeared to be paying little attention yet to Calvin's whimpering.

"Psst!" he let out a short hiss to get the lad's attention. "Psst!" He motioned to Calvin from his hiding place in the shadows. It would be nearly impossible for Forbes to see him here because a large black marble fireplace column would surely obscure her view. He motioned Calvin to move quickly toward the floo right beside where Michael remained hidden. When Calvin got closer, he would merely snatch the lad and apparate him out of this hellhole.

Like the hissing of a snake, came the sound of someone attempting to get Calvin’s attention from the shadows. Twice, came the noise, and it was not until the second that Calvin realized that he was being called. He was quite an oblivious fellow, but this truth did not always get the better of him.

Acting slowly, so not to attract the attention of the new Minister and his vicious assistance, Calvin turned his head in the direction of the noise he’d heard in an attempt to identify its creator. He did not recognize the man, but when weighing his present situation again the possibility of escaping, Calvin hastily came to the decision to stand make a run for it. He did not have the heart to survive in prison, or whatever fate it was that Zada had intentions of dealing Calvin. And he most certainly did not desire to die an early age.

Having abandoned the hope of going unseen in his escape, Calvin pushed himself upward, and jumped over the back of his chair. He stumbled towards safety in a constant battle to keep the upper half of his body from colliding with the polished marble floors. “Help me!” he pleaded, and slid into the wall beside the older man, Calvin's eyes wide with panic.

"I'm a friend," Michael said softly, clutching tightly to the terrified young man. "Let's get the hell out of here, shall we?" He apparated out, leaving the ice and the bitter cold from the Ministry Atrium behind. He apparated them to the entrance of the Leaky Cauldron.

"Come on. Let's go warm up. Bloody cold old bat," he scowled. "Would be just her tastes to decorate the place in sheets of ice. You're safe with me." He let go of the boy and motioned him to follow him inside. "Come on. I'm not sure whether the cold got to you or that old crone did. Either way, we need to thaw you out a bit." He went inside, and the bartender called out to him.

"Michael! Your usual, then?" the bartender asked.

"No thank you, Tom. Two hot buttered rums, and put it on my tab," Michael ordered.

"Coming right up," Tom said cheerfully going to make the drinks.

"There's a table by the fire," Michael pointed to a round table in front of the fire.

ooc: Shall we start a topic in the leaky?

James Roland watched with annoyance as Zada went about the housecleaning. They were pruning the ministry of all possible enemies, but Roland had disagreed about the way they should go about doing it. He would have preferred they removed them one at a time, this way, Grindelwald had made too many enemies. Sighing, Roland watched as the group surrounding Zada thinned, as one by one they all were named enemies by Zada Forbes. He was glad to see jess Potter and the other order members leave, but firing Ne'os was unnecessary wasn't it? He could be dangerous.

"I wonder why the Minister appointed you, Zada, to take care of the ministry, you clearly have no clue what your doing," Roland replied when everyone left.

Zada smiled at Roland. "If you question the wisdom of Minister Grindlewald, why don't you man up and ask him yourself?" she asked. "He clearly believes that the best man for the job is a woman. A loyal woman. If you don't like his decisions in the Ministry, then perhaps you need to ask him why he made those choices. So what bothered you? Emof, I would guess? Surely it does not bother you that he ousted a mere teenager and the Order leader. I doubt you will lose much sleep over that.

"As to Emof, he wasn't fired. Merely asked to appear in court to answer some very serious charges. He hasn't lost his position unless he chooses to leave. Minister Grindlewald wants loyal staff. Tell me, Mr. Roland. Are YOU dedicated to Minister Grindlewald, or does he need to perhaps start your retirement? Perhaps you have also outlived your usefulness. A man your age, well, might find this business quite distressing and stressful. I would hate to think that being here right now might have dire consequences on your well being. Besides that, your track record of how badly you would like the Minister post for yourself is quite well known. It must be hard for you watching someone as brilliant as Gellert Grindlewald in the post that you covet so much yourself."