Well well... what do we have here?

Multiple spells were fired at him in rapid fire. He needed Forbes and Mikki safely out. He was concerned on buying Forbes some time. He issued the order for her to go. Now he faced Emof alone. He had not been successful in dodging every single spell while he'd been preoccupied in getting the women out. He now carried a bleeding gash in his left shoulder that he paid no attention to. He merely resolved he would not allow more distractions. The shield had held, aside from his own carelessness.

He strengthened his shield. Emof's jibes about Voldemort made him laugh.

"You?" he found it almost distractingly funny. "I think Voldemort must have been losing his touch--again. Either that or you had an extraordinary strike of luck. Tell me, Emof, what do you gain from this? You know no one will give this office to you. What the hell are you fighting Jess Potter's war for? What kind of a sap are you?"

He used a spell he had not used in a long time. He aimed towards Emof, cited the words and fired. "Infinitas Infinitio Acerbitas!"

ooc: infinitas infinitio acerbitas--spell causing the feeling of seemingly bottomless, crippling emotional anguish and suffering

It was Ne'Os's turn to laugh Grindelwald was a fool to think Ne'Os wanted the minister's office. "Do you think i want this office? If I did I would have asked for it the moment I killed Voldemort. No I want more than that." he said his laugh turning into a scream as the spell Grindelwald had cast hit him. He knew he could withstand for a few seconds before he gave in he would spend it in his usual manor. "I want power. I want to become the most feared wizard from now until the day the human race dies" he said his face turning into a snarl of pain as he lost his fight with the curse. He fell to the floor tears rolling down his face as he remembered every detail about the time in between his death and his resurrection. It would only be luck that as soon as the curse ended his brain would force those memories deep down again.

He could feel himself as he was when he was dead. No more than a grouping of energy floating through the universe. He remembered being haunted by his failures every endless moment of that time. He remembered being inside and outside of time and space at the same time; going insane and becoming sane every second. He remembered seeing every possible future in every possible universe all at once. Then his thoughts shifted. He could feel himself as he was when he was three. He felt himself being turned into a vampire and feeling his veins burn as they were being transformed to handle his unique physiology.

As his thoughts went between different painful topics he could feel a small spark of resistance. It wasn't much but it was enough He had realized his eyes were closed this whole time. He opened them blinked once to clear the tears from his eyes. He couldn't help feeling that death would be the only way out. His only salvation. He looked at Grindelwald "Kill me!!!" he shouted his voice cracking. He could feel the spark again this time he concentrated on it. It had given him just enough willpower to open his eyes maybe it would do more this time.

Losing the spark a few times more he finely found the ability to move his arms he pushed himself up and pushed himself into a corner his body violently shacking as he had turned to sobbing now. He spent the next few seconds lost in his mind again as horrible memories of his death came back to him. He looked at Grindelwald again wondering what the wizard had to be thinking through out all of this. He raised his arm slowly and with great effort. "Ava...." he whispered slowly and shakily having to stop regain some of his willpower and try again. "Ava.....Avada Kedavra" he said his body being forced against the wall as the green jet of light shot from his hand in the general direction of Grindelwald. While the spell may not hit him he hoped it would at least make Grindelwald end the spell.

OOC: very well written post. nicely done. the best i've ever seen you do. that just impressed the socks off me. Karma points for that!

Grindelwald watched the spell strike the young fighter and watched him hit the floor. He simply stood. The boy wasn't going anywhere now. He had proven his point. To kill him would be to kill the messenger. And that was contradictory to his own goals. So he let him suffer for a few moments. Actually, it did impress him that Emof did not turn his own wand on himself, as he'd seen others do. Or die from the sheer weight of his own demons. He'd seen that too. After all, it was something he had designed for Nuremgard decades before. But--Emof had done astonishingly well. And when he had the moxy to make at least a feeble attempt to fire a killing curse, he smiled.

"Finite," he ended the curse. He knew it would take Emof a moment to regain himself but he did not lower his own shield. "A word of advice, Emof. If you make that the goal of your existence, then you will never have one second of peace for the rest of eternity. Its more of a tradeoff that you know. What you just survived? You suffer an endless form of it the instant you make that your choice. Be sure its what you want."

He flicked his wand and accio'd Robert Lupin's nameplate and placed it back on the Minister's desk. He could have finished Emof and have ended it all here and now. Instead, he drew out a form from his desk, signed the form and sent it by owl.

"You have potential," he told Emof. "But you're not ready to rule the universe. Not yet. And I have other places I need to be. So we shall return the office to Lupin. That is, after all, what you came here for, is it not? He shall receive his reappointment in moments. You fought well, but do not deceive yourself. We will meet again. I let you live today so that you can be the messenger, and you're smart enough to know the message if you think you want to be King of Humanity. You must excuse me now, lest I be late." He took a pinch of floo powder and stepped into the floo and disappeared in an elegant roar of green flame.

OOC: dont forget you have a whole bunch of people waiting to help ne'os. i'm sure khaat would help ne'os regain himself at this point of you like.

((Sounds good he's gonna need it.))


Ne'Os sat slumped against the wall the curse was over but the memories had not left him and his brain couldn't help but play them over and over again. He let Grindelwald's final words before he disappeared sink in. I let you live so that you can be the messenger, and you're smart enough to know the message if you think you want to be the King of Humanity.

He worked up the will to survive and muttered "Expecto patronum" Being a death eater it would be impossible for it to be anything more than a cloud of silvery vapor. "Find Khaat tell her i need help" he said wondering if the cloud could even go that far before it dissipated. He looked around the office for a moment not really understanding what he was looking at. The small part of him that still had the ability for conscious thought knew he was broken. It would be impossible for him to come back on his own. He decided that even if the patronus didn't make it he would be found eventually If the owl was going where he thought it was then the Lupin family would be here soon anyway.


His final action before he slipped into unconsciousness was to roll up his sleeve and look at the dark mark. He found it rather funny that it was almost completely faded. As his world went black he couldn't help thinking of a spell that would fix that.

Khaat was standing at the ready with the rest of the Order members and DE members, waiting on orders, signals, something. She shivered hard, suddenly gripped with a cold chill. She felt uneasy. She glanced up as an owl landed on her father's shoulder. Over his shoulder she could see a partly formed patronus. It was partial and it ws wispy. Weak. Then she recognized it.

"Ne'Os!" she said. "Let's go! He's in trouble."

"He certainly is," her father said, looking up from the parchment he'd unrolled. "Minister's office. Go!" She watched wizards and witches flicking their wands and apparating out and towards the ministry. She followed. She apparated into the ministry and saw others arriving at the same time she did. Her father had apparated in a moment before and was issueing orders about securing the building. She headed straight for the minister's office.

She burst into the office, wand at the ready, and finding nothing but Ne'Os on the floor. Unconscious. She summoned her father. She needed his bag of supplies. She went to Ne'Os and checked him quickly. She felt the traces of some sort of a hideous curse still coursing through Ne'Os body. Her father came in and knelt with her beside him. He began checking him as well.

"Have you seen this?" she asked him.

"Yes," he replied. "But not for years. It's a ruthless thing designed to drive wizards to kill themselves to stop the madness. Just surviving this far says a lot. I'll draw it off, but you're going to have to replenish his energies."

"Agreed," she said. Her father laid his hands on Ne'Os and drew off the last traces of the curse as she used a spell to rennervate and recharge Ne'Os's energies. When she had cast the rennervate spell she laid her hand on his forehead and cast a spell to ease his tortured mind, to bring him peace.

"Good," her father said. "He should wake in a moment or so. But he's going to need rest."

Ne'Os remembered the momment when his father found him when he was three. The vampire that had turned him was long gone by then and as soon as his father found him Ne'Os knew he would never forget the look. His father had seen him as a monster. Ne'Os remembered the conversation between his father and one of the few people that had accompanied him on the expedition.



"What are we going to do about this?" the woman accompanied my father had asked.

"We find the beast that did this to my son and kill him" his father had said.

"We will don't worry. But what are we going to do with your son? Not all of us fully accept vampires"

"We do nothing. I will find a cure. There has to be one."

"There are those that can help they hunt uncivilized vampires but they can help you. Your son is young his brain is still forming it is much easier now to control his blood lust than it would be if he were just a few years older"

The conversation had carried on for a few minutes longer but Ne'Os could feel himself coming back to the real world. He opened his eyes to see Khaat and Robert "Grindelwald is still alive..." He said simply Even though the curse was gone and his energy was restored he still couldn't bring himself to say more than that. He looked at the dark mark on his arm again. His gaze stayed there for a while before he spoke again "I have been a fool..." he said weakly.

His eyes seemed to fill a bit more as he fully came back. "We have won a important battle today let us not worry about Grindelwald. He is injured with the Gladius curse...He will need a healer as much as I do... Congratulations by the way Minister as much as I used to hate to say it I am glad that you are leading the magical world." His eyes focused else where again he looked as if he was trying to remember something "The dark mark has faded......" he said trailing off.

A gladius curse? That wasn't that easy to inflict and not upon a wizard like Gellert Grindlewald. Khaat and her father listened to Ne'Os. Grindlewald's curse had nearly killed him. He was going to be alright, but he certainly needed good care now.

"Well done," Robert told Ne'Os gently. "Its alright that he's still alive. With a Gladius, he won't be back for quite awhile. And he's going to have trouble finding anyone willing to heal him right now. You'll be alright. You've already survived the worst of his curse. it takes a strong fighter to do that. Thank you for helping us get some sense of normalcy back to our lives."

"Agreed. thank you," Khaat told Ne'Os. She understood more than Ne'Os even possibly knew. She understood what it was like to have unnameable tortures indelibly marked in one's memory and what it was like when they were all yanked forward with a ruthlessness that was worse than death itself. She refused to tell him though. The last thing he needed right now was anyone offering him a trite clutch of words. To hear anyone say, "I know how you feel" was hollow and meaningless. Even if it was true. Instead she looked up at her father. "I'll take him to St. Mungos and take care of him." Then she looked at Ne'Os. "I presume that's alright with you? No objections?" She knew Ne'Os well enough anyway that she hadn't planned on really listening to much of any objection anyway, but she still preferred to at least make the pretense of asking.

"Yes. That would be for the best. Not that I could really say no anyway I have no wand and I'm still very tired and I fear if I try to use and spell to get away from here I will end up worse off than I am now. I think I can stand though so atleast allow me to walk" he said shakily trying to get to his feet. He groaned. "Curse this body what did the person before me do to it. My knees hurt my vision is blurry and I think I cracked a rib when i got thrown into the wall. At least one of those issues was here before the explosion though" he said not really able to remember the blurry vision or the cracked rib before he got acquainted with the wall.

"How do you plan on getting me there. Id imagine that aperating would be less than wise" he said not really meaning to state the obvious he gave Khaat a grimace of a smile hoping she understood he didn't mean the last part.

"Knightbus," Robert said. "Apparating would just jar the hell out of you, and I'd like to avoid that. Not that some of the knightbus drivers are any more smooth."He and Khaat helped him up. Khaat braced him up, putting herself under his shoulder. She saw Brian in the other room and called for him. He excused himself away from the aurors that were reacting in a bit of c haos.

"Brian," Robert said, "Help Khaat take Ne'Os to St. Mungos. Use the knightbus. Use the alley entrance. Its the easiest to access the bus from here. Stay with her. I have work to do here. Eve! Summon the knightbus and instruct him properly, please." Eve Bostwick, his secretary, poked her head in, nodded quickly, and disappeared.

"Yes, Sir," Brian said. He went to the other side of Ne'Os and took Robert's place in bracing him up.

"You didn't think I'd let you say no anyway, did you?" Khaat smiled at Ne'Os. "Or that I'd listen even if you had. I'll take care of that barroom brawl sort of feeling you have once we get you settled. "

"Brian," Robert said. "Feel free to hex the driver if he doesn't take me seriously."

"My pleasure," Brian grinned, always up for the occasional hex.

"Oh, don't give him permission for that," Khaat groaned. She looked at Ne'Os. "Let's go before they make any other plans."

"Right" said Ne'Os trying to keep his thoughts together. His mind had been taxed to its limit and even with the healing he had already received he knew it would take time to get it back in shape. He knew he had to keep himself occupied on current events or else he would lose it again. He thought on the Dark mark. He wasn't sure why he was obsessed with it but he knew that the skull and the serpent no longer symbolized them. He would have to address this.

Times had changed Voldemort was dead, Grindelwald had returned and the time of overwhelming force to take over a strategic point like the ministry or Hogwarts was over. He started to use a tactic he used when he was afraid of someone breaking into his mind. He drew. In his inner eye he started to bring the simple curves and lines. He then added more detail. A bird of sorts was forming. Though he would have to remember it later when he had a chance to actually draw it out.

He blinked back to reality realizing that by now he would be outside and waiting for the knight bus to show.