The Chainwright Theater was a smoldering pile of rubble by the time the Ministry officially responded. The muggle Minister had been alerted, emergency vehicles blocked off the street that led past, rerouting muggles. Memory modifications were being made by Muggle Relations Specialists, and reports of a bombing were being reported in the muggle news.

Of course, it was actually an implosiva maximas that had actually done in the theater, not a bomb.

Alastor Moody stumped his way through the remains of the lobby. The interior wall was half gone, blast open wide to allow anyone standing in the lobby to see clear to what little remained of the stage beyond. The left loge and part of the balcony had fallen down into the orchestra and dress circle seating, the place where the balcony had split in two was a jagged mess of exposed piping, wires, splintered wood, and broken cement. Moody's eyes surveyed the mess and he grunted as he climbed over broken chairs and chunks of the gold-painted moulding that had adorned the rafters and walls but now lay crumbled over blood-red carpeting. He was honestly unsure if the carpet had always been so red or if it had been stained darker that very night.

Frank Longbottom, called back for the emergency, followed after Moody, numbly looking at the wreckage.

Where center stage had once been, there now was a crater, smoking and smelling horridly of burned wood, plaster, and a sickeningly meaty stench that made Moody shake out a handkerchief from his wand and cover his nose as he stared about at the broken bits of wood. Blood literally dripped from one shard of the stage flooring, and he peered down into the crater. Clear through to the basement of the theater, he saw, where old set pieces had been laid to rest years ago - a wooden pirate ship, a few more palm trees, and piles of rope and fabric backdrops, which sat half in ashes.

"You know, Minchum wanted to come down himself, but I told him we needed to clear his safety first," Alastor said, hearing the footsteps coming up alongside him as he stared into the gaping hole. He turned to confirm his suspicions - sure enough, Underhill had come up behind him.

"There's none of them left here," Underhill said, "The Minister's safer here than anywhere else right now. The death eaters wouldn't dare to come back to this place now." He had his hands in his pockets and was looking away as a couple mediwizards carted away a stretcher, a body covered by a thin white sheet lay upon it, and Underhill watched them carry it off.

Moody bent and picked up Fabian Prewett's wand from the floor. He held it in his hand, looking at the carving on the handle.

"It's a shame," Underhill said, stepping around the broken wood.

Moody nodded. He turned and clicked his fingers, and there was a wide-eyed Frank Longbottom by his side. "Longbottom," Mood chirruped, handing the boy the wand, "Bring this to Mungo's and see to it that Mr. Prewett gets his wand back."

"Yes sir," Frank replied, taking the wand and hurrying away. Frank was glad for any excuse to go away from the place.

Moody turned back to Underhill. "We thought he was gone months ago, but it's still shocking, of course... Edgar Bones held out hope of finding Benjy Fenwick."

Underhill glanced around at the crater and shook his head. "There were some bits of robes one of the officials found over there a way, but not much else. Nothing that close could have survived the blast... If only You Know Who had been caught up in it, too, the world would be better off. At least we got a couple of his supporters." He bent and lifted up an empty death eater's mask, which stared vacantly up at him.

Moody nodded.

Underhill sighed and threw the mask into the crater. "How is Edgar coping?"

Moody thought of the screaming. "As well as can be expected."

Underhill's voice was slightly hesitant. "Any sign of Potter or Odair around?" He hadn't had time to have a proper look-see at the milling crowd of officials, investigators, and curious lookie-sees.

Moody's voice was gruff, "None that I've heard tell of."

Underhill frowned and turned around from the wreckage of the stage.

"Mind explaining what either of 'em was doing here in the first of all, Underhill?" Moody asked gruffly.

Underhill answered, "I wish I knew. I didn't send an order to either of them."

"Well find out," Alastor said, adding, "Can't let 'em keep doing that. Of course there'll need to be a report made and James Potter would benefit most greatly to have a very good reason for being involved... Ministry isn't going to understand why a first-year junior Auror was brought along on an actual job, when he should've been back at the office pushing the paperwork, at most."

"I'll see to it he does," Underhill said coolly.

"Very good," Alastor said. "We both know Crouch wouldn't let him off without some purpose for all this. If it was up to me, Potter's presence here would go unmentioned, but given he's been in every eye-witness account of what happened, I can't really omit him from the reports."

"No," Underhill said, "And as I said, I will see to it he has precisely the documentation that he needs... if and when he turns up, of course."

Moody murmured, "He better bloody turn up Underhill. He better not be a part of this bleedin' crater. If he doesn't turn up, you'll answer not only to Barty Crouch about it but you'll also be answerin' to Albus Dumbledore, and not to mention answering to none other but to Minerva McGonagall herself."

Underhill glanced at Moody and raised an eyebrow.

"Ministry and the Order as well will need to understand what your excuse for Potter going missing is," Moody said, "And I only mention Minnie in as I'm just sayin' it isn't as though she isn't the most terrifying of the three."

Underhill drew a deep breath and shook his head, smirking ruefully at his old friend. "Merlin's bleedin tits, Al, you needn't threaten me like that..."

One by one, the Death Eaters appeared at their place around the long banquet hall table in the Malfoy's dining room. One by one, seats were filled as the core followers of the Dark Lord returned to the summons of the burning of the Dark Mark on their wrists.

Voldemort stood at the head of the table, watching the seats fill, watching their reverent faces bowed to look down at the mahogany, waiting for the final count. As each place was occupied, his resolution bolstered more and more, each apparating form more proof of the Order's inefficiency.

After all, they'd known that the Order was there - they'd planned for it.

Their squeaky wheels had been tested and the plan had been set in motion with the very hopes of capturing the Order attempting a cous at the rally. Everything from the enclosed location of the rally to the use of Benjy Fenwick as the bait had been planned in advance. They knew where in the theater Underhill's informant would bring him to sit, and approximately where in the crowd Edgar Bones and the Prewett twins would end up seated. Besides the inner core of followers, only disposable followers had received the invitation to the seats that filled the orchestra - just in case there were casualties in the process of destroying the Order.

What had not been expected was the add-ons that the informant hadn't included as part of the Order's plan. First, the boy, Odair, that had snuck in the back door and secondly James Potter on the stage, which had upset every other element of the Order's actions, forcing the Dark Lord and his followers to act blindly in response.

But it was quickly becoming apparent, as the core members of Voldemort's followers filled their seats that the adaptations of the Order had done little - if anything - to actually impact them, while Voldemort knew for certain that, at very least, one order of the Phoenix had been obliterated.

They would find nothing but fragments of any that had been caught in that implosion. Fenwick at least had been tied up on the stage, and there was a good chance that it may have caught Potter and Odair as well.

Soon, there were only two seats empty at Voldemort's table. His eyes roved over the faces of the followers present to be sure, and then, his voice level and cold, "Where are our mother and son duo?" He walked slowly around the table to the two vacant seats, standing behind them for a moment.

None of the others moved.

Voldemort raised his finger and pressed it to his Dark Mark, once again lighting up the Mark. Everyone around the table stiffened with the pain in their skin, wincing as it intensified.

...and intensified...

...and even more so as the patience of the Dark Lord was tried.

"They ain't comin'," a voice finally barked the words.

Voldemort released his finger from the Dark Mark, his eyes lighting on Fenrir Greyback at the far side of the table. The moment the words were out of Greyback's mouth, he shuddered as though wishing to take them back. But the Dark Lord descended upon him quickly.

"What did you say?" Voldemort demanded.

Greyback's eyes stayed firmly planted on a knot in the mahogany. "They ain't comin'," he repeated. Voldemort leaned close, bending low around Greyback and glaring into his face in disgust. Greyback stammered, "I seen 'em, I seen 'em with my own eyes... Seen what she's done, my Lord. Walburga Black, she's - she helped - she helped the Potter boy and the Odair boy, too, she helped them escape along side her son, my Lord. She took 'em back to the house of Black, took'em back and hid 'em and wouldn't give'm up... cursed me, my Lord, with the torture curse. Then she up and escaped with that putrid little brat."

A murmur of disbelief passed through the people seated at the table.

Voldemort hissed. "Escaped?"

"Disappeared," Fenrir Greyback gasped. "She took 'em and she left with 'em. I done searched the house before I came here, my Lord, she was gone."

"Walburga - and the boy? And Regulus Black?" the Dark Lord's eyes flashed terribly.

"Yes my Lord," Greyback breathed. "They - they've dared to defy you, to - to - to turn --"

Voldemort's hands closed on Greyback's shoulders, squeezing tightly as he spoke, causing him to stammer with fear as the fingers put pressure on the joints in the man's shoulders.

"And you say you've witnessed it yourself, have you?" Voldemort asked.

"Yes my Lord," Greyback said, and his tone rose in an almost pleading tone. "With my own two eyes."

"Then why," the Dark Lord asked, "Didn't you stop them?"

Greyback stammered, "The curse, I told you she cursed me and --"

"And so you let them escape? Because the ickle bitty pain was too much for the great and powerful Fenrir Greyback?" Voldemort's done ranged from a mocking baby tone to a deep throated mockery of a powerful tone.

"She - she's a right good caster of the - the cruciatus, my Lord, it was strong magic, my Lord, it was --"

"Compare notes between hers and my own, Greyback and the you can TELL ME IF NEXT TIME YOU WILL ALLOW A TRAITOR TO LEAVE YOUR PRESENCE!" the Dark Lord's voice climbed into a crescendo of anger and unhinged rage. "CRUCIO!!"

Edgar Bones lay in his bed in St. Mungo's, eyes closed.

He could see the look in Benjy Fenwick's eyes as he stared across the stage... moments before the explosion.

"My name is Edgar Bones, what's yours?"

Benjy's face floated into Edgar's mind, staring back at him from across the compartment where they'd first met on the Hogwarts Express. "Benjy. Benjy Fenwick." The boy had tear stains on his cheeks, he'd been looking out the window at his father's form on the Platform, and Edgar happened to be walking past the boy's otherwise empty compartment and seen him crying and felt bad for the chap. He'd ducked inside and sat with him.

They'd been joined later by Caradoc Dearborn, and the three of them had become best of mates.

They'd shared ropes of caramel cobwebs and ice mice, laughing and chatting about quidditch teams that were shoe-ins for the World Cup.

"Fenwick, Benjy!" Professor McGonagall's voice echoed around the Great Hall.

Benjy Fenwick's eyes met Edgar's just before the Sorting Hat had dropped over his eyes.

Edgar watched from his house table, right beside Caradoc Dearborn. "Please let it be --"

"HUFFLEPUFF!" the hat declared.

And their palms had all slapped together in a three-way high five (something they later referred to as a nifty fifteen), a celebration as Benjy ran up and joined the other two boys at the Hufflepuff house table in the Great Hall.

They'd eaten dinners and lunches at those seats, sitting across from one another and trading off bits of treats sent in by owl from home. They'd shared those treats in their dormitory, trading chocolate cauldrons for pumpkin pasties and laughing at one another's animal crackers and Bertie Botts while they did homework or studied quidditch plays for big games.

While Caradoc and Edgar were loud mouths, Benjy was usually quiet and reserved around others. Benjy had only truly been himself when the three of them were alone together - keeping mostly silent around others. So much so that there had been a rumor that made the way around the school that Benjy didn't know how to talk. He was a socially awkward bloke, terribly prone to anxiety and cripplingly shy. The rumor about him not talking had ended, though, after a particularly nasty panic attack.

"I dunno why I'm not like everyone else," Benjy had cried one night after he'd had the meltdown during a heated debate in one of their classes. The anxiety had built up in Benjy so much that he had lashed out and started shouting right in the middle of the class and people had whispered that he was mental, deranged, and all sorts of other insults. "I was scared more than anything," Benjy explained. "Do you ever feel like that? So scared you just get angry?"

Edgar didn't reckon he fully understood the way Benjy felt when it happened, but he didn't think any less of Benjy for the outbursts. It was Edgar that figured out that if he took Benjy out in the corridor and they just talked about anything to distract Benjy from the anxiety he was feeling he would cool off and be alright again pretty quickly. It was like Benjy just needed a little extra help processing his feelings so that the anxiety didn't hurt so much. Benjy just needed to know that whatever happened, however angry and awful he got, there was somebody that wouldn't abandon him.

Edgar was okay with being that somebody.

Caradoc tried at being there like that for Benjy, too, and bless him Caradoc had done alright, but it was only really Edgar that Benjy trusted for it.

Once, Benjy had stolen his mandrake from the greenhouses. He'd felt bad for the poor screaming baby-like plant, reckoning that it probably felt a good deal like he did during his anxiety attacks. Caradoc had gotten up during the night and, not knowing Benjy's mandrake was there, knocked it over and caused the whole of the third year boys dormitory to be put in hospital after nearly dying from the sound of the cries... "Lucky the lot of you were in bed and the pillows and blankets muffled the sound!" Madam Pomfrey had said, and Professor Viridi had been much more strict about making sure the mandrakes were put away after the repotting process after that.

Another time, a Ravenclaw boy had made fun of Benjy's large ears and Edgar had hexed the bloke's ears into great flapping elephantine things that had taken hours for the staff to fix. He'd served no less than three hours detention, and later said every minute was worth it. "Taught him a lesson he won't forget," Edgar had laughed, and laughed all the more when Benjy had added, "Elephants never do forget."

In fifth year, when the Whomping Willow had been planted, Edgar was one of the first to invent the game of getting as close as he could without getting pummeled by the wildly thrashing branches. He was quite good at it - until he wasn't. Spent a few days in the hospital wing getting his teeth magicked back in for that. Benjy and Caradoc came everyday to visit him in the hospital wing and snuck back even after the ward was closed so they could play rounds of gobstones and eat pasties that were technically supposed to be forbidden while Edgar's teeth regrew. They were some of the best tasting pasties Edgar remembered eating in his life.

When Edgar's mum died in sixth year, it was Benjy that brought him the notes from their classes because Edgar was too sad to get out of bed for almost two weeks. It was Benjy that made sure Edgar ate and drank water, that he slept and bathed and made it through the daily routine.

"It make sense you're becoming an auror," Benjy had said when Edgar told him he was going into the program. "You're always protecting everyone you can."

"Not everyone," Edgar had answered.

"Well, you're always protecting me," Benjy reasoned.

It had surprised Edgar when Benjy had told him he wanted to join the Order of the Phoenix with him and Caradoc Dearborn. Edgar had told Benjy about the secret Resistance to Voldemort that he had joined and Benjy's eyes had lit up with pride and excitement. "I want to be a part of that, too," he'd told Edgar. "How do I become a part of it?"

If only Edgar hadn't brought Benjy to the meeting.

If only Edgar hadn't told Benjy about the Order.

He wouldn't have been kidnapped, that's what.

It had happened during one of the battles over the summer, when Benjy had been fighting and one of his old anxiety attacks had set in. At first, the anger from the fit had benefitted Benjy, making his magic stronger against the Death Eaters he was fighting. But then it had become harder to control and Benjy had been shooting wildly, blindly, taking out Death Eaters and Order members alike with stunners... Edgar had tried to help him, tried to get a moment to distract his best friend, but he was one of the ones Benjy had stunned, and he'd woken to find Benjy Fenwick gone.

Within a month, Caradoc was gone, too.

Only Edgar had been left behind to search for them... long after the Ministry had given up searching, he, Edgar, had continued...

Now, they'd found only the fragments of Benjy Fenwick, that's what they'd said. Just fragments. But enough fragments to tell the story of what had happened. Voldemort had cast an implosiva maximas and the stage had blown up from the inside out.

Edgar sat, staring at the wall in St. Mungo's - all of this going through his mind like a film. But he didn't like the ending because no matter how he worked the story out in his head, it ended every time with him alone, his friends both gone, and his world never being the same again.

Edgar Bones felt like he, too, had been blown to fragments.