The mirror-phone sounded its conventional ringtone. Leo wiped the oil off his hands and answered. “Hello Leo! Arthur Smith here. Look Leo, no beating about the bush, I know you’re an important man now, but I have a favour to ask. My sister’s son Jonathan has graduated from university and is having a bit of trouble getting the right sort of job. Flipping burgers isn’t his thing, you know. He has degrees in Information Technology and Physics and he just can’t seem to get short listed anywhere. I just wanted to ask if you could see your way to getting him an interview somewhere, just an interview would be good.”
“Arthur, get him to come to 15 Purbeck Square tomorrow at 9am. I’ll take him to see a person who needs his help. It’ll just be an interview. We can take it from there.”
“Thanks Leo, my son, this is great. My sister was getting a bit concerned, you know.”
“Don’t worry Arthur, I’ve met Johnathan. I’m sure there will be something he can do for us.”
The silver Mercedes glided through the traffic to the entrance to Imperial College. “Here we are Jonathan. The person you will be seeing is Dr Anastasia Zaitseva. It’s still a good walk from here. The college provides the IT network and technical help and Anastasia is an expert Java programmer herself. What she needs is a person who can look at what is happening with the systems here and not be encumbered by any preconceived notions about the issues. The fact that you don’t have insider knowledge and you do have a broad knowledge of IT and physics is what we are looking for.”
“OK”
A man of few words.
The job offer was made and accepted. The technical investigation began. It took a week to get an answer.
Nobody liked the answer they got.
A new door had been made in the wall of a secure laboratory. The door opened into another corridor in the Department of Mysteries.
The team met at Imperial college. Harry was tense, Hermione had a look of horror, Ron couldn’t accept what they were told and what they were seeing. “This muggle thing, operated by a muggle, performed magic that we can’t reverse. I don’t believe it. What is the trick?”
Anastasia replied, “I was hoping you could tell us that. There is no magic here, no wands, no spells, and no wizards. We have looked at the wall above the door, and below, and to the sides. There is something there. A small inscription in some ancient language.”
There was a rush to the doorway. Hermione saw it first. “There it is. The whole door is surrounded by a series of runes. They are fading but they will stay there. We didn’t see them at the other door because they had already faded, and we were in too much of a rush.”
There was a sudden silence. Harry spoke, “We now know how the doorways have been able to resist us. We should be able to work out a way to remove them. What can we do about muggle machines performing advanced magic?”
All eyes were on Anastasia, “This is a problem. I didn’t know that this would happen. I also didn’t know how dangerous it would be. The entire set of programmes have been sent to reviewers in different universities around the world. If anyone runs the programme the same thing could happen. We must investigate what is happening from a muggle point of view. We don’t need wizards to make it work.”
Harry spoke first, “At least you have shown us what is happening. We can now pick up any occurrence from the background flow of magic. The authorities can then react and fence the area with illusions and repelling charms. This is just kneejerk reactions, but it is the best we can do for now.”
Ron shook his head, “I still can’t believe this is happening, these muggles have found a way to make magic!”
The door opened and Draco Malfoy walked in. Ron stood up and drew his wand.
“Ron! Don’t!” Hermione tried to hold Ron’s wand arm down.
Ron yelled the spell, “Stupefy!”
Draco crashed to the floor. Ron pulled away from Hermione, rushed to Draco, levitated him, took his arm and apparated.
“Well, that explains Dragon’s reluctance to be involved. He was just a library assistant. Is this the way all wizards behave?”
“When he’s a Weasley and he sees a Malfoy, that’s what can happen.” Harry sadly shook his head. “Hermione, you’d better get back to the Ministry. Ron’s probably taken Draco straight to the cells.”
“The wizarding world is riddled with feuds going back generations. It is all very destructive. Draco made the mistake of being born into the wrong family, from a certain point of view. This has been going on from the beginning, from ancient times.”
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