Wizard with a Mutation : Chapter 32 : Announcement Filler!

Disclaimer - The rights of the respective characters are with their respective owners. I don’t mean to violate their intellectual property rights and thus, only my original characters are my IP. 

London, Magical Britain [2nd November, 1980]

–Scott Winters–

He smiled and entered Tom’s bar, also known as the Leaky Cauldron, which was such an odd name when he thought about it, ready to re-enter Magical Britain while having a different lens in his mind. The lens of his previous life’s him who would have absolutely died from happiness had he been told that he was not just a wizard but also one of the stronger ones who could experience all the marvels that magic had to offer.

His smile dimmed almost immediately as he saw the bar and the lack of patrons. Hell, even Tom himself was absent, and that according to his knowledge, had never happened. Tom was famous for never leaving his post, come hell or high water. Even during Volde’s reign, he did not close down his bar despite it arguably being on the more dangerous side of establishments because the Leaky Cauldron was the public entrance to Diagon Alley.

Before he could say anything more or head to the entrance, with a soft pop, a house elf dressed in a white toga, immaculately cleaned–he noticed, appeared in front of him.

“Oh! Oh no, sir! You is not supposed to be here! Master Tom... Master Tom is gone, yes he is! Gone to the big important shouting place in the Alley! Everyone is going, sir — everyone! Master Tom is saying to Bimsy, ‘Bimsy, you is telling anyone who comes to be going there too!’ So... so you must be going, sir! Bimsy is not knowing what the shouting is about, but Master Tom is saying it is very important... oh yes, very important indeed!”

His eyes grew wide as the House elf, Bimsy, hopped up and down, herding him towards the wall that served as an entrance to Diagon Alley.

“Okay, okay, I’ll go,” he said as he whipped out his wand and tapped the stupid [pattern to get the wall to open. It was stupid to have that pattern since it was public knowledge anyway. A better way to authenticate wizards would be to have a central registry of magical signatures and then only allowing said magical signatures to open the entry to Diagon Alley.

Since the Ministry actually owned all of Diagon Alley, it had the authority to enforce such measures since that pattern has been used for centuries at this point. Also, it would also act as an invisible register to see who has come in and out of Diagon Alley since Apparition was all but impossible for the weaker wizards and/or people without a mythical creature like a Phoenix or a Thunderbird.

When the Alley opened, his brow quirked in confusion since there were no people in sight as well. Sighing, he used his senses and walked to the northern area where there was the largest congregation of wizards, with some pretty heavy magic users as well. He also sensed multiple overlapping wards cast on that area.

Something truly big must be—

His thoughts screeched to a halt as he passed by the alley that used to be the KNockturn Alley. It was now….alley. Yup, it was all but gone. He hesitantly took a step forward and had to sigh as he sensed the multiple trip wards set at the entrance. Giving up on a closer examination, he did something he usually avoided because getting his senses all gunked up on Dark Magic was not good for his mind.

He extended his senses and had to hide the surprise on his face as he sensed somebody coming out of the shop behind him. The Knockturn Alley was…empty.

Not just empty of customers or shopkeepers, but empty of everything. No life, nothing.

No seedy vampires, no growling wereworlds, no feral magical creatures, no exotic creatures, no half dead slaves for sale, no House Elves, nothing. 

It was well and truly empty. He had never thought he would see such a sight in his life. He then turned around just in time for the person coming up to him to be in talking range.

“Yeah, mate, it’s all gone now. Was never a fan of the shady alley,” He was an old man with silver hair and a hunched back but he was no Ollivander, of that he was certain.

“What happened here?” He ended up asking since something pretty important must have happened for someone to root out the Knockturn Alley, the de-facto Ministry sanctioned Dark Magic Alley in all of Magical Britain.

“Well, even I don’t know what has happened but as you know You-Know-Who is now finally gone and the Ministry seems to have taken an interest in getting the shady elements dismantled.”

“The Ministry did this?” He made no effort to hide his disdain for the ministry and also his disbelief that they had the balls to do this.

The old man took one look at him and chuckled heartily, “Ah, I needed that. That’s right mate, the Ministry did it. Guess some people finally woke up, huh? I just wished they woke up before we lost so many people,” The man said in a somber time and he had to stop his severe line of questioning at that little tidbit.

The Ministry should have never woken up, not with Dumbeldreo at the helm. So, what has changed? He had to figure it out. Unfortunately, this old man was not going to be that source for him.

“Thank you but I have to go to the important announcement.”

“Oh yeah, I heard DUmbledore was going to personally announce some sweeping changes. I, for one, would have liked him to show this spunk before he was dead but oh well, I suppose better late than never. Go one, then. Don’t let an old man stop you.”

“Thank you, and take care.” Waving off the man, he hurried to the announcement area, which turned out to just be a large stage set up in front of the official Ministry entrance.

The crowd gathered was immense. He spotted multiple Dark aligned nobles standing in the same crowd as some of the more famous store owners who were nobility in just name, with no significant generational wealth to their name.

On the stage, he saw an impressive gathering of Aurors with multiple wards enchanted on the stage as well as the line that held back the crowd. Apparently, they had put out all the stops.

So, what would Dumbledore be announcing that warranted this level of caution? That they expected people to just break through the lines and reach for the people on the stage, despite Dumbledore presumably being one of them, the one person who had almost no reason to fear any of the sheep citizens of Magical Britain.

Hell, even the Dark Wizards wouldn’t normally dare do anything to old Dumbles for fear of near universal retaliation.

Suppressing his immense curiosity and the urge to just ask someone standing nearby what was going on, he cast a subtle charm on his face, changing his facial features just enough to remain unnoticeable, not that anyone in the crowd should know him, but it never hurt to be on the safe side.

Mingling with the crowd, he tried to listen in on any speculations while he waited for the main event to begin.

After all, he too, was immensely curious about what Dumbledore had to say, after all his failures in the war, with the latest one being his failure in saving Sirius from Azkaban.

Damn, just thinking of that sorry fate put him in a bad mood. 

Something to think of later on when he’d go back home and officially agree to assume his position as the Premier Archmage of MACUSA and get to exercise all the rights and perks that came with the job.