[Again, there's a righteous sort of anger that pricks at him when she drops his wand, but it's not offense, not the blind rage that comes from wounded pride. It's simply anger at the fact that they think this way. It's anger for all the slain, anger for those two Muggles frozen by all of this, anger for his father. It's noble, in its way, and serene.
(Or maybe he's forcing it to seem that way.)
He considers, when his fingers touch his wand, rolling over then and there, taking advantage of the element of surprise to blast an attack at the ceiling and bring it down then - but Sirius isn't near enough the Muggles yet. He grasps it, and straightens, wordless. In spite of himself, besides, he still has some faint hope - Voldemort is using a borrowed wand, and Edgeworth is always better than people expect, than people give him credit for. Perhaps, he thinks as he raises his wand in a final salute, he has a chance -
That hope is shattered immediately as Voldemort's spell roars through Miles' stunning charm and slams bodily into him. He's knocked off his feet, carried tumbling backwards, gasping with the physical force of it - and then as he struggles to his feet again, another, knocking him down - and another, before he even has time to get up. It's impossible - this isn't Voldemort's wand - these spells are nonverbal - and still, their power is -
Miles gets facing the right way - rises to his knees, no further - he's focused on the fight, but distantly, he can hear mockery and jeers from the purebloods - doesn't matter - he ducks low and when the next spell comes for him he deflects it upwards. These aren't even proper spells, these are just exertions of sheer will, sheer raw magical power, and yet when he angles it over him and up the force of the spell slamming into the ceiling sets the heavy chandelier to rocking. A second one he sends spinning upwards as well, and a third, and he's breathing hard and sweating even just with the exertion of defending himself - Malfoy he can hear sneering -
Gryffindor's best duelist indeed.
And Bellatrix, high and proud, answering -
See the power of the Dark Lord.
And then another spell, harder than the first, breaks through Miles' shield and sends him tumbling back again. Before he can rise another spell hits him, spreads over him - and suddenly everything hurts, everything is in agony, like skin is being wrenched off muscle, like he's being flayed and cut into pieces and there's no respite - he arches, crying out, rigid, eyes screwed up in agony, unable even to hold onto his wand.
He thinks it last minutes, hours - but it's only five seconds, no more, that he suffers the Cruciatus curse. Then Voldemort ends it. It's a game; he's starting out slow. He even waits while Edgeworth recovers his wand before he sends another burst of energy at him - this one weakly deflected to the right, smashing out a window.
And Edgeworth knows it's a game. He knows he has no hope of winning properly. He still climbs shakily, unsteadily to his feet, breathing hard - looking upon Voldemort who's cool and completely unruffled. Because he will win; because every bolt of energy brings him closer to a dishonest, desperate victory.]
[The sharp shatter of the glass gives way to the others laughing, uproariously, and they're all so focused on the scene before them that no one looks around at Sirius--who isn't laughing, who is standing with his hand on his wand, his jaw set almost painfully. The echo of Edgeworth's shout still hangs in the air, a sound he can't forget, a sound that bored too deep in him to just shrug off.
This is sick. This would be sick, no matter who it was, if it was Edgeworth or anyone else; this is sick, and it's worse, that it's Edgeworth. It's not even a particular fondness that makes him think that, it's the fact that Edgeworth keeps standing up, that something--call it pride, call it bravery, call it whatever, but it keeps him climbing to his feet, over and over again, only to be battered down so easily.
I'll bring the ceiling down, Edgeworth had said, and Sirius is standing beside the muggles now, it could happen, now--his hand is tight on his wand, ready for the shield charms that will be necessary--but if Edgeworth is killed, if he's tormented to the point of mindlessness--he will not be able to cast his spell.
Voldemort sends another wave of raw magic through him, a fierce, hot burst of it, and Sirius' mouth twists. He can't stand here any longer, he can't stand idly by--for once, he must do the right thing, and it's like everything in his life has led to this point, to where he can finally do something else. He is nothing like these Death Eaters, elbowing one another in their glee at Edgeworth's pain, fawning over Voldemort's power. A better show of power would be a proper duel, not this--twisted parody of it.
Sirius' glare is leveled on Voldemort--he can't look at Edgeworth, he can't watch these spells tear through him--so instead he glares at Voldemort, hard, fierce--
And suddenly, the floor beneath Voldemort cracks, like ice thawing in winter, like someone just put a great deal of pressure on the marble, a huge weight of something pushing up from below. It cracks, audibly, and the slab breaks in two, briefly causing Voldemort to lose his footing. He doesn't fall, but stumbles back, and his spell goes wild without Edgeworth even having to deflect it, taking a huge hole out of the westward wall.
There are shouts from outside; Bellatrix starts forward. My lord--]
[And Edgeworth doesn't hesitate. Voldemort's off-balance; the others are looking towards the hole in the wall, starting forward, distracted by the voices that they heard out there; and there's no hope of him winning, no hope - and he could wait and see if those are reinforcements for his side, or he could act, screw up his courage and ensure that people like these Muggles are never tormented again, that Sirius isn't punished by Voldemort, and even - even if he's got to die, and got to kill, no more of this. No more.
He launches himself forward physically; Voldemort, still unbalanced, brings up his wand in a defensive gesture, ready to cast a counterspell; but Edgeworth rolls over onto his back, sends reductor curse after reductor curse, six in a row, at the cracked marble of the ceiling. If the ceiling were plaster, this would have no effect, but the fine Purebloods needed a place with the richness of fine marble. So the piece that groans its way loose from the rest is enormous, tons of gross weight - and it'll fall with the wrong trajectory, he can see that, it'll miss them -
And so, with all the magic in his mudblood bones, Edgeworth casts - ]
Accio -
[And that enormous slab of pure white changes its path, falling downwards towards Edgeworth and towards Voldemort.]
[The sound of a marble ceiling caving in is like nothing Sirius has ever heard or will hear again. It's a rumble, and then it's a heavy dusty rush, like a cascade of water--
It's now, now, Edgeworth has done it, and Sirius casts his charms--]
Protgeo Maximum--
[Voldemort is still there, a thin, spindled figure in a black robe, and the others are turning, but there are seconds, seconds left, and Sirius whips around and jabs his wand towards Edgweorth, in the perfect execution of the charm; if he were in class, he would get top marks--but this is so much more important than class, than marks or accolades or any of it; this is a fucking betrayal of his family, of all of the ideals he has grown up by, and it's all Edgeworth's fault and so he cannot die, not here, not like this--]
PROTEGO!
[And the rumble of the marble descends on them all then, the shrieking and the dust and the weight--]
[It's strange: not until this very moment, when he sees that enormous rushing force coming right for him, does he consider the possibility of an afterlife. It had always been taken for granted that, no; death is death; death is final; the ghosts in the castle and the paintings on the walls are no more than echoes of voices once heard, pale imitations of life. No more real people than his Patronus is a true hound. Yet in that moment, right before he dies, Miles wonders: what if that's not the case? What if this isn't the end? What if there's a place after this, where he'll go, where he'll see Mom and Dad again?
Would they be proud?
He anticipates that being his final thought: a thin, sad question, petering off slowly to nothing. But there's another thought that follows: a recognition that consciousness isn't gone yet. And another: curiosity. And another: he'd heard Sirius shouting. And another, as his eyes open: floating above him, around him, is a perfect, flawless, opalescent shield charm.
Sirius, you - He doesn't know what the next thought will be. Idiot? Certainly. Genius? Certainly that as well; that charm is like none Miles has ever seen. Blood traitor, muggle-lover; yes, these things, and that comes with a curl of fondness.
Around him is rubble, but above that is a single spot of brightness, clouded by dust. As the charm fades, he takes a breath and uses the last of his energy to blast the rubble aside and expand the opening. He crawls up and through, coughing and blinking, searching desperately for Sirius Black.
Or, fatally, for Voldemort. If the man has survived, there will be no chance for either of them -
Or maybe not. There are faces at the blasted hole in the wall, and those aren't Purebloods. They might - they might be Ministry.
[Everything is hazy. Dust hangs heavy in the air, a curtain of it--Sirius coughs, and swipes his hand in front of his face, but it persists. And there's a weird feeling, deep in his chest--not from inhaling the dust, but from something else, something he can't name or even really understand.
What did you do? He asks it of himself, with just the smallest touch of disbelief, even though he was witness to his own actions. Saved his own miserable life, saved two muggles--one of them, the younger one, is unconscious on the floor; the older one is white-faced and shaking, but released from whatever grip had held him before. What does that mean?
And Edgeworth. He saved Edgeworth, too, and he has no idea how to understand or qualify that, how to put that into a context that isn't maybe a mistake, maybe a desperate action, maybe something--no, definitely something--that will get him kicked out of his family.
All of this is. If his family even matters anymore-- if anything even matters anymore; everything has changed, and Sirius is left with this strange breathless feeling, this lightheadedness.
The worst of the rubble is in the center of the room, concentrated above Edgeworth and Voldemort--or the places where they once stood, anyways. Sirius easily shifts aside what's fallen near him. The room is so empty, all jagged slabs of marble, like some avant-garde cemetery. Cool air streams in from the ceiling, from the hole in the wall, and there are people peering in there, but Sirius hears only Edgeworth--stupid, this stupid thin little voice, and he coughs, again--]
Here.
[He can dimly make out the figure of someone--Edgeworth, it has to be--all else in the room is still and silent and dead or unconscious, and Edgeworth is still going to be talking. His tenacity knows no bounds.]
I'm here.
[And Voldemort? That's the question. Voldemort. There is no other sound, just the occasional shift of loose stone, a crack here and there--a murmur of voices from outside, a hubbub that's only just coming into Sirius' head.]
[Thank God. Thank God - There's something terrible about this vast, creaking silence. The collapse had been immense. Edgeworth doesn't know about Malfoy, Selwyn - Bellatrix - whether they're dead, whether they're okay, and how he feels about that. He wonders if he's a murderer now. He wonders if he'll be sent to Azkaban. He wonders if it was worth it.
There's no motion from where Voldemort had stood. He imagines him crushed beneath the rubble, like the Wicked Witch of the East. The thought is...ineffably absurd.
(And if he's dead? If Edgeworth - Miles Edgeworth - has killed the evilest wizard of their age? That's...worth it. That has to be worth it.)
Miles climbs over the rubble, finally slides down - nearly trips - to draw near to Sirius. He feels exhausted. His hands are shaking. Not far from his foot, untouched by the rubble, is Voldemort's broken wand. He closes his eyes for just a moment, then reaches down into his pocket and pulls out the cigarette. And he says, weakly:]
[And despite himself--despite everything around them in the ruined room, and all of his uncertainty and guilt and self-loathing and pride--they don't even know that Voldemort is dead yet, any celebration ought to be far from their mind, any laughter just as far--
But still, Sirius gives a tired heavy laugh, pushing his hand over his eyes.]
Oh, fuck you.
[He doesn't say it with any hatred. And a second later and he's shifting to dig his lighter out of his pocket. It nearly seems as if it ought not to work, as if anything with the Black family crest on it ought to fail him now--but it works, it flicks to life, and he holds out to Edgeworth.]
[Edgeworth doesn't know how to light a cigarette: he sticks it out, putting its tip in the fire, and then sticks it into his mouth after. It of course lights unevenly, starts burning more along one side than the other, but he's more in it for the symbolism than the nicotine. He takes a breath, manages not to cough, exhales the smoke. Sits down, exhausted, on a piece of rubble. His face is a bit ghastly, with dust from the destruction clinging to the lines of sweat down his face; wiping at his forehead yields little improvement in his appearance.
His voice is quiet when he speaks. He says:]
You saved my life.
[And that's almost baffling, isn't it? It was such a risk - such an incredible risk. If Sirius' divided concentration had caused him to falter and be crushed, or if the charm had missed and sheltered Voldemort instead - Sirius, after all of that, would have lost his life. And even though this isn't a real possibility - he knows that now that he knows Sirius - it would have been so much easier to let Edgeworth die; there would have been no witnesses left who knew of his stand against the Dark Lord; it would have just seemed that Sirius had been present when some mad Muggle-born had challenged Voldemort, that he'd happened to act quickly enough to protect himself, and his family wouldn't have any reason to be disappointed.
So Sirius, with a single spell - not cast in a moment of madness, because one cannot get out a charm that strong in a moment of madness; he had been bracing himself to cast that charm throughout the entirety of the duel - had risked his own destruction to save Edgeworth.
How strange.
He finds his hand suddenly coming up to his eyes, covering his face; he finds himself suddenly on the edge of tears. All the terror, the impossibility of the past few minutes comes rushing back fiercely, and there's a sort of panic that beats at his chest, and he grinds out with difficulty:]
[Fuck off, he wants to tell Edgeworth, no I didn't--but that would be a lie. He did. What's more, he knew that he was doing it, as reluctant as he was to admit or qualify that or even attempt to understand. He saved his life, and lives of the muggles, and his own--and let everyone else in the room die.
Probably die, he corrects himself, as he glances towards the rubble where Voldemort ought to be buried. Just because there's been no stir or sign of life from that space doesn't mean that he's dead. And the paranoia of that thought gives him a sinking feeling in his chest, adding to the sick weight of what he's done, and where he goes from here, and Sirius smiles, bitterly, and gets out a cigarette for himself.]
Don't make anything of it.
[He says it plainly, no put-on gruffness or unnecessary warmth. The silver cigarette case feels heavy in his hand. His cigarette is the last one in it, and suddenly the case feels useless, a trapping of something that he isn't sure is his to claim any longer. He drops it on the floor; it lands with a heavy clatter.]
And don't get used to it.
[How he's dealing with this so coolly, he doesn't know. Maybe later terror will overtake him, or something very like it. This is the ending he never wanted, but in the end, he chose it, and no one forced his hand. Is it freeing, to have come here all on his own?]
That's going to be Ministry representatives.
[He nods, towards the hole in the wall. The dust is finally starting to settle, the cool night air from Knockturn Alley filtering in. The knot of people outside is larger, and a few brave souls are climbing in, their lit wands held aloft.]
You'd better stop crying and get over there to tell them what's happened.
[He's not crying. But there's something in his voice that suggests that he won't last long, not in tears but in panic, perhaps, and Sirius adds, quietly, darkly:]
[That rebuke, not precisely mocking but with no great kindness, reminds him: he has to be steely. He has to be firm. He's nearly to the end of this; he's been foolhardy and brave throughout this night; now's the time for just simple bravery, nothing but. He takes in a breath, and lowers his hand, and swallows hard, and tamps down the hysteria threatening him in favor of setting his shoulders.
He'll find out later that the Ministry got here so quickly not through some happy accident, but though a conspiracy of events. Ollivander's place was being watched, as it turned out, due to worries in the Ministry for the man's safety; they'd thought there might be retaliation against the wand-maker for selling to Muggle-borns. When the reckless Death Eaters, desperate to please their lord, had come to haul him away, it had triggered Ministry alarms, and Aurors had been dispatched a moment later. The three Aurors leading the way into the dusty, crumbling hall don't seem to fully comprehend what's going on, though; they'd anticipated what the Death Eaters under Veritaserum had promised them, Voldemort holding court, not a ruined building with two underage wizards and two Muggles and a great load of rubble in the middle. And it's clear from their faces, too, that they're not expecting this speech:]
My name is Miles Edgeworth; I'm a student at Hogwarts. I believe, pending confirmation following a search, that I have killed the wizard going by the name of Lord Voldemort. In doing so, I have broken several wizarding laws including the Decree for the Reasonable Restriction of Underage Sorcery and, while I was acting in self-defense when I struck out at him, have arguably engaged in an act of vigilantism. I will willingly surrender my wand while the Ministry conducts its investigation.
Sirius Black had nothing to do with any of this.
[And he bows, shortly, and then straightens a moment after, saying - ]
The two men back there are Muggles who have suffered a terrible trauma. Please ensure that they are seen to.
They call the Minister, they call Dumbledore, they escort the muggles out and take Sirius and Edgeworth out as well--separately, warily, cautiously, as if they're explosive themselves. The Ministry officials begin setting up charms, spells--no one seems keen to move the rubble off of what might or might not be the corpse of Lord Voldemort. No one seems keen to do anything at all except stare at one another, white-faced and confused.
No one says congratulations. No one accuses anyone of anything. Confusion runs high, but everyone moves around as if they know what they're doing, as if briskness and basic containment charms will help them with anything.
Sirius lets them lead him away. Everything still feels curiously strange and distant, and there is a tingling in his fingers that makes him wonder if he's not been injured in some way, until he thinks no, impossible, he'd saved himself from the blast. He'd saved all of them. Sirius Black had nothing to do with any of this--Merlin, what a lie.
They take them both to the Ministry. They sit them down in a waiting room with dark green walls and a green marble floor. It's Aurors, Aurors are the ones that bring them in and leave them alone, together.
Sirius stares at his boot. It's white with marble dust.]
Thought about being an Auror once.
[He offers that dully. The room is dead fucking quiet.]
[Edgeworth has calmed himself - or perhaps the processing has calmed him. It's stupid, but being surrounded by the Aurors, surrounded by routine, makes him feel better. An hour ago, it was just Miles and Sirius desperately striving to stay alive and keep those Muggles alive and maybe make some difference; now there are procedures to be followed, and they're being followed, and even if the Aurors seem confused and a bit terrified they've things they need to do and established practice is always a comfort.
And they're away from that place. The Muggles are away from that place. Even if Edgeworth's future might well be grim, even if he might be sent soon to Azkaban, Sirius won't be dying tonight and the Muggles won't be hurt.
And there's this moment of quiet, and that strange revelation. Miles had been staring at his dust-gray robes, the jumper underneath, uncertainly; he looks up when Sirius speaks, his brows furrowed.]
You did? But -
[He cuts that off; but your family has always dabbled in Dark magic is a phenomenally insensitive thing to say, especially at this juncture, and for once he has the sense to be sensitive.]
You...never showed any sign of it.
[A beat, and then with a weary sort of nostalgia:]
I recall a declaration, as a matter of fact, that you were going to be the greatest Beater ever to be commemorated in the Quidditch Hall of Fame.
[He doesn't look over at Edgeworth, but smiles, wryly, down at his hands.]
Yeah. Well, I didn't expect people to be eavesdropping and memorising my quidditch aspirations, did I. If I'd known they'd be marked down forever in your didactic memory, I might have phrased it better.
[It's very close to being a joke, except for the weary flat way that he says it. Sirius rubs his wrist against his forehead. It comes away grey with dust. When are they going to be permitted to wash up? When are they going to get to go home?
His parents will have found out by now. Whether Bellatrix is dead or captured, her parents will have been informed, and so his parents will know as well--and no one will believe that shit, Sirius Black had nothing to do with any of it--he was there, wasn't he? He has dreaded going home for other reasons, but this dread is fresh and new and--painful, too, it's fucking painful.
He presses a hand over his eyes.]
It was before Hogwarts. When I was a kid. But that sort of thing gets stamped out of you.
[Suitable career is a restrictive term, basically amounting to: nothing. Stay home and count your gold and have interests in the Ministry.]
In your defense, you were drunk off firewhiskey after the Slytherin victory our third year.
[A beat.]
Also, I was the one who reported you for drinking firewhiskey after the Slytherin victory our third year.
[He manages a weary, wry sort of glance before sitting back and closing his eyes, thinking over Sirius Black the Auror. It fits very well. Being an Auror requires talent, courage, a sense of right and wrong, all of which Sirius - against all odds - has. It fits as well as Sirius Black the Gryffindor, and it makes Miles feel much the same way: a little sad over the way things should have been. Sad over the possibility of a better world, another world, where Sirius was able to cast off the expectations of his family and lived a fierce and independent life, free of all the chains of his name. Completely free of everything.
He wishes Sirius were anyone else. He wishes that bright, mischievous boy could have been...his brother, maybe. His brother, had Dad not died - ]
Well. I suppose you've gotten your chance now, haven't you? And you did very well. You took down the Darkest wizard of our era.
[He says that quietly, because the responsibility is as much Sirius' as his own. He intends to take full blame, if blame should fall, but Sirius Black was the only one of the two of them who landed a solid blow against Voldemort - cracking the floor beneath his feet - and he was the one with the magical aptitude to save lives.
Save lives.
His throat tightens as he sits there with his eyes closed. He's quiet a moment, and then says, his voice barely a whisper - and he'd intended for it to be idle, self-assured, full-voiced, but it just comes out a sad whisper - ]
I hope they weren't killed. Your cousin and the others.
[He laughs at that first bit--an actual laugh, for all that it's quiet and just a touch bitter. Of course it was Edgeworth that reported him. That comes as no real surprise. It's not an incident that's stayed fresh in his memory, but now that Edgeworth has brought it up again, it's easy to call to mind--the flush of victory, a brief happiness, something really real before their party was put to an end, before their firewhiskey was confiscated. It's a memory, but a distant one, almost as if it happened to someone else, someone he knows very well but someone who isn't him.
The first few years of Hogwarts all sort of feel that way these days, but tonight it's more obvious a disconnect than ever before.]
You're a tit, Edgeworth.
[He says it so he doesn't have to answer that praise. You did very well. By whose standards? And if he did well, why does everything feel so odd?
But the misery in Edgeworth's voice on the next bit distracts him, and looks around, sharply. He's not actually sorry, is he? He can't actually mean that, and Sirius' upper lip curls just a little, as disdain creeps over him--not for Edgewoth, but for them, for Bellatrix, and Malfoy--for all of them--]
[He doesn't open his eyes. He stays silent instead. He'd wondered, in that moment before that crushing weight of stone had hit, whether Dad and Mom would be proud...He doesn't know. He doesn't know whether Dad, who was always so civil and so kind and so compassionate, would be okay with him having blood on his hands now. Even if it was to save lives, even if it was to save two innocent people - Dad would have wanted him to do it the right way, not the brutal way, and never to have taken four others with the man he had to kill...
He swallows.]
They're...monstrous people. Utterly monstrous, with what they were willing to do.
[But there's a pause a moment later, and that statement - that could have been taken as an affirmation that he believes what Sirius had said - is negated with a shake of his head.]
I'd tried to limit the field of debris. I'd - wanted to hit only him. Bad to be a killer; worse to be a killer of many.
[But again, a moment later, he shakes his head again.]
[A killer. They are, sort of, aren't they? Edgeworth more than him. All Sirius did was crack the floor under Voldemort's feet and throw up a few shield charms--selective shield charms, yeah, but that was a gesture of defence. It will be enough to get him disowned--but it isn't outright murder.
But then again, neither is what Edgeworth did. As difficult as it is to believe, Sirius is defending Edgeworth in his own head, against himself, against what other people might eventually say--Edgeworth, of all people. A tit, and he meant that, he would still attest to that, but--not a murderer.]
Absurd is a bit light for what I'm thinking, actually.
[He glances over at him, eyes narrowed.]
What happened to your heroism? You killed the fucking Dark Lord. You don't do that and then turn around and cry about killing those other-- Merlin, you don't even know that you've done it. Bellatrix is a bloody cockroach, she's probably spitting in the face of the Minister right now.
And if you have, so what? You think with Voldemort dead, that lot would have backed off? They'd have quieted, maybe, but you'd have given them a martyr. Their precious Dark Lord, killed by a muggle-born. For all you know, they'd have started an uprising of their own.
[And, more firmly:] Don't get stuck there feeling sorry for yourself, all right, because you did what you'd set out to do. Crashed their party and brought it down around their ears--literally. Be proud of yourself a little.
[He answers that firmly - but that firmness fades a moment after into something weaker, something unhappy. He's quiet a moment, holding his tongue out of a full knowledge of how foolish this is, but a moment after he confesses, haltingly, his ideas confused even to himself:]
I suppose I just...I never even thought about it before, because he was always just something terrible, a symbol, but - he was a person, too. I just - on the way over here, I just kept wondering whether he had...a family. Parents. I don't know.
[He rubs unhappily at his eyes - as much from exhaustion as from grief. He's glad that he's dry-eyed now.]
[Everyone has parents, Sirius thinks, with a swoop of bitterness. No matter who they are or what they stand for, they're your parents, and something of them will always be coded into you, a legacy you can't avoid. Until they knock you off the family tree.]
--If he had parents, then he'd have killed them. And he wasn't a person any longer.
[What the hell gives Sirius the right to speak with such certainty on that? He doesn't actually know anything--but Merlin, facing down Voldemort, having that strange lidless stare trained on him--there's nothing like that in the world, it's subworldly, un-human. Staring into his eyes and seeing nothing staring back at him.]
They'd have killed those muggles, and worse. That was just the start of it. [At parties, you hear the murmurs, he could tell Edgeworth. You see the plans getting started, the ideas being placed--but none of it matters anymore, does it? The planmakers are dead. New ones will come, but for now--] Even if this isn't the end of it, it's better off than you were before. Congratulations.
[He's silent for a moment, then repeats, quietly:]
You. "Than you were before."
[He opens his eyes, then, turns his head towards Sirius. Asks, because he has to ask - because all this will have been nothing if it was selfish, because he has blood on his hands but cannot live with himself if he's bloodied from selfishness - ]
What about others? Not just Muggles, and Muggle-borns. It's better, isn't it, to not...worry about a war? To not worry about suffering, dying...
[But he subsides, listless, unhappy. And, after a moment, he says:]
[The easy answer is yes. If by some miracle Sirius isn't implicated in this--and he will be, even if it's just in rumors his name will be connected to this, forever; they can tell lie after lie after lie and it won't matter--but if by some chance he isn't, if he avoids that--what power do the Blacks have left? What influence? Everything will be turned on its ear by this. High society succumbing to a muggle-born.
They have money. They have influence--it will fade, and wane, but their name will still carry some clout--and they will survive, because their kind always survives. But it will be different. It will always be different from here, and Sirius has seen the other side now, the side of--
What? Good? There's good in killing Voldemort, there's maybe even good in killing Bellatrix--it's a good better than anything he's ever known. But good hardly seems an adequate way to describe it, or frame it, or even understand it.
He shifts, rather than answer, he shifts and digs a cigarette out of his pocket, slips it into his mouth.]
We'll have to wait and see.
[He says it dully, but he glances over at Edgeworth with a wry little smile, as he lights his cigarette. Still with that heavy silver lighter, still carved with the Black family crest. He rubs his thumb over it before he slips it back into his pocket.]
I expect that's how much of this is going to go. Just-- waiting, and seeing. [And he lets a stream of smoke out of his nose, not even wincing at that little burn.] Stop dwelling. Stop being sad about this. You did it. Enjoy that, at least a little. There's people all across the world that are going to be celebrating this one, might as well let the person that actually did it join in.
[Stop being sad about this. It's reasonable, rational advice. Because people will be celebrating. Because the world is a better place without Voldemort in it - and of that there is no question, and he feels no hesitation in thinking that - that the world is much improved by the lack of his evil, his cruelty, his pettiness, his prejudice. There was no good brought to the world by the Dark Lord; there was no kindness; nothing but a cruelly expressionless visage and a trail of bodies.
So why is he sad? Because he is; God, he is. And it comes back to this: the world might be improved by the loss of one murderer, but has it truly been improved by gaining another? At its heart, his mourning is phenomenally selfish. He knows that. It stems not from any sort of compassion, not from any kindness, purely from his sorrow over the death, tonight, of Miles Edgeworth who had never killed and who had thought he never would.
Monstrously self-indulgent, maybe. But after everything he's done this night, he thinks he has earned a bit of self-indulgence.
But...not before Sirius. Not before Sirius, who showed more courage by far than Miles had, who has been willing to give far more up. If this act ends up hailed as a heroic one, if Edgeworth doesn't end up deplored as an assassin and a coward, he'll be called a hero. Sirius won't. Sirius will be, at worst, a patsy for the craven villain; at best, he'll be a traitor to his blood, and traitors are never looked upon with admiration no matter their cause. And while Edgeworth had nothing to lose, Sirius had that life to ruin.
And Edgeworth notices that Sirius isn't celebrating, either. He looks just as grim.]
Right.
[He says that heavily; the next sentence is, if not happy, if not jubilant, at least properly ironic.]
Feels a bit different from after a Quidditch victory, though, doesn't it.
[He laughs, again, at that--a miserable little laugh, but a laugh all the same--and takes a long drag on his cigarette before he answers.]
Yeah, well, everything pales in comparison to quidditch victories. Maybe I'd better stick to my original plan for the future and just do quidditch, or I'll never end up feeling-- fulfilled.
[The walls around them are bare, but Sirius chooses a point on the wall opposite of them and stares there instead of looking around at Edgeworth, taking another drag on his cigarette. He's monumentally tired, suddenly, and he reaches up to rub his hand over his eyes, sucking in a breath that's more than a little ragged.]
Merlin. I'm tired of waiting here. When the hell are they going to tell us what's going on and what we've got to do.
[The sooner he knows, the sooner he can start to work out what's in store for him, what options he's got for the future. Slim to none, probably. He doesn't think that with any self-pity: it's a fact, that's all.]
[Edgeworth is quiet a moment. What are the possibilities before them? A trial is one possibility, to show that they're being fair, and either a conviction (if the Ministry feels it has a great deal to prove) or an acquittal (if it wants to publicly distance itself from the Death Eaters). Another possibility is letting them go; that's not out of the question, since the two of them could cause quite a mess for the Ministry and this would just wash away the mess. That they'll be killed in this room is a third possibility, if Voldemort survives, or if his followers wrest control of the case from the honest...
Miles doesn't even want to consider the last as a possibility. But as Sirius had said, those days ago - the Ministry isn't pure. Not like Miles would like it to be.]
You can go to sleep.
[He says that to Sirius, a bit quiet.]
I can keep watch. Until something happens. I'll wake you.
![[personal profile]](https://www.dreamwidth.org/img/silk/identity/user.png){kind=small}
It's true denial is life
Date: 2013-10-08 10:38 pm (UTC)(Or maybe he's forcing it to seem that way.)
He considers, when his fingers touch his wand, rolling over then and there, taking advantage of the element of surprise to blast an attack at the ceiling and bring it down then - but Sirius isn't near enough the Muggles yet. He grasps it, and straightens, wordless. In spite of himself, besides, he still has some faint hope - Voldemort is using a borrowed wand, and Edgeworth is always better than people expect, than people give him credit for. Perhaps, he thinks as he raises his wand in a final salute, he has a chance -
That hope is shattered immediately as Voldemort's spell roars through Miles' stunning charm and slams bodily into him. He's knocked off his feet, carried tumbling backwards, gasping with the physical force of it - and then as he struggles to his feet again, another, knocking him down - and another, before he even has time to get up. It's impossible - this isn't Voldemort's wand - these spells are nonverbal - and still, their power is -
Miles gets facing the right way - rises to his knees, no further - he's focused on the fight, but distantly, he can hear mockery and jeers from the purebloods - doesn't matter - he ducks low and when the next spell comes for him he deflects it upwards. These aren't even proper spells, these are just exertions of sheer will, sheer raw magical power, and yet when he angles it over him and up the force of the spell slamming into the ceiling sets the heavy chandelier to rocking. A second one he sends spinning upwards as well, and a third, and he's breathing hard and sweating even just with the exertion of defending himself - Malfoy he can hear sneering -
Gryffindor's best duelist indeed.
And Bellatrix, high and proud, answering -
See the power of the Dark Lord.
And then another spell, harder than the first, breaks through Miles' shield and sends him tumbling back again. Before he can rise another spell hits him, spreads over him - and suddenly everything hurts, everything is in agony, like skin is being wrenched off muscle, like he's being flayed and cut into pieces and there's no respite - he arches, crying out, rigid, eyes screwed up in agony, unable even to hold onto his wand.
He thinks it last minutes, hours - but it's only five seconds, no more, that he suffers the Cruciatus curse. Then Voldemort ends it. It's a game; he's starting out slow. He even waits while Edgeworth recovers his wand before he sends another burst of energy at him - this one weakly deflected to the right, smashing out a window.
And Edgeworth knows it's a game. He knows he has no hope of winning properly. He still climbs shakily, unsteadily to his feet, breathing hard - looking upon Voldemort who's cool and completely unruffled. Because he will win; because every bolt of energy brings him closer to a dishonest, desperate victory.]
you would know
Date: 2013-10-09 11:20 am (UTC)This is sick. This would be sick, no matter who it was, if it was Edgeworth or anyone else; this is sick, and it's worse, that it's Edgeworth. It's not even a particular fondness that makes him think that, it's the fact that Edgeworth keeps standing up, that something--call it pride, call it bravery, call it whatever, but it keeps him climbing to his feet, over and over again, only to be battered down so easily.
I'll bring the ceiling down, Edgeworth had said, and Sirius is standing beside the muggles now, it could happen, now--his hand is tight on his wand, ready for the shield charms that will be necessary--but if Edgeworth is killed, if he's tormented to the point of mindlessness--he will not be able to cast his spell.
Voldemort sends another wave of raw magic through him, a fierce, hot burst of it, and Sirius' mouth twists. He can't stand here any longer, he can't stand idly by--for once, he must do the right thing, and it's like everything in his life has led to this point, to where he can finally do something else. He is nothing like these Death Eaters, elbowing one another in their glee at Edgeworth's pain, fawning over Voldemort's power. A better show of power would be a proper duel, not this--twisted parody of it.
Sirius' glare is leveled on Voldemort--he can't look at Edgeworth, he can't watch these spells tear through him--so instead he glares at Voldemort, hard, fierce--
And suddenly, the floor beneath Voldemort cracks, like ice thawing in winter, like someone just put a great deal of pressure on the marble, a huge weight of something pushing up from below. It cracks, audibly, and the slab breaks in two, briefly causing Voldemort to lose his footing. He doesn't fall, but stumbles back, and his spell goes wild without Edgeworth even having to deflect it, taking a huge hole out of the westward wall.
There are shouts from outside; Bellatrix starts forward. My lord--]
I would NOT.
Date: 2013-10-09 11:43 am (UTC)He launches himself forward physically; Voldemort, still unbalanced, brings up his wand in a defensive gesture, ready to cast a counterspell; but Edgeworth rolls over onto his back, sends reductor curse after reductor curse, six in a row, at the cracked marble of the ceiling. If the ceiling were plaster, this would have no effect, but the fine Purebloods needed a place with the richness of fine marble. So the piece that groans its way loose from the rest is enormous, tons of gross weight - and it'll fall with the wrong trajectory, he can see that, it'll miss them -
And so, with all the magic in his mudblood bones, Edgeworth casts - ]
Accio -
[And that enormous slab of pure white changes its path, falling downwards towards Edgeworth and towards Voldemort.]
ohhhhhh i see what you did there
Date: 2013-10-09 03:04 pm (UTC)It's now, now, Edgeworth has done it, and Sirius casts his charms--]
Protgeo Maximum--
[Voldemort is still there, a thin, spindled figure in a black robe, and the others are turning, but there are seconds, seconds left, and Sirius whips around and jabs his wand towards Edgweorth, in the perfect execution of the charm; if he were in class, he would get top marks--but this is so much more important than class, than marks or accolades or any of it; this is a fucking betrayal of his family, of all of the ideals he has grown up by, and it's all Edgeworth's fault and so he cannot die, not here, not like this--]
PROTEGO!
[And the rumble of the marble descends on them all then, the shrieking and the dust and the weight--]
I'm very clever.
Date: 2013-10-09 04:59 pm (UTC)Would they be proud?
He anticipates that being his final thought: a thin, sad question, petering off slowly to nothing. But there's another thought that follows: a recognition that consciousness isn't gone yet. And another: curiosity. And another: he'd heard Sirius shouting. And another, as his eyes open: floating above him, around him, is a perfect, flawless, opalescent shield charm.
Sirius, you - He doesn't know what the next thought will be. Idiot? Certainly. Genius? Certainly that as well; that charm is like none Miles has ever seen. Blood traitor, muggle-lover; yes, these things, and that comes with a curl of fondness.
Around him is rubble, but above that is a single spot of brightness, clouded by dust. As the charm fades, he takes a breath and uses the last of his energy to blast the rubble aside and expand the opening. He crawls up and through, coughing and blinking, searching desperately for Sirius Black.
Or, fatally, for Voldemort. If the man has survived, there will be no chance for either of them -
Or maybe not. There are faces at the blasted hole in the wall, and those aren't Purebloods. They might - they might be Ministry.
He takes a breath, croaks - ]
Sirius -
is that why you're going to be a doctor
Date: 2013-10-09 07:41 pm (UTC)What did you do? He asks it of himself, with just the smallest touch of disbelief, even though he was witness to his own actions. Saved his own miserable life, saved two muggles--one of them, the younger one, is unconscious on the floor; the older one is white-faced and shaking, but released from whatever grip had held him before. What does that mean?
And Edgeworth. He saved Edgeworth, too, and he has no idea how to understand or qualify that, how to put that into a context that isn't maybe a mistake, maybe a desperate action, maybe something--no, definitely something--that will get him kicked out of his family.
All of this is. If his family even matters anymore-- if anything even matters anymore; everything has changed, and Sirius is left with this strange breathless feeling, this lightheadedness.
The worst of the rubble is in the center of the room, concentrated above Edgeworth and Voldemort--or the places where they once stood, anyways. Sirius easily shifts aside what's fallen near him. The room is so empty, all jagged slabs of marble, like some avant-garde cemetery. Cool air streams in from the ceiling, from the hole in the wall, and there are people peering in there, but Sirius hears only Edgeworth--stupid, this stupid thin little voice, and he coughs, again--]
Here.
[He can dimly make out the figure of someone--Edgeworth, it has to be--all else in the room is still and silent and dead or unconscious, and Edgeworth is still going to be talking. His tenacity knows no bounds.]
I'm here.
[And Voldemort? That's the question. Voldemort. There is no other sound, just the occasional shift of loose stone, a crack here and there--a murmur of voices from outside, a hubbub that's only just coming into Sirius' head.]
Also for the ambiguity. "Is there a doctor in the house" "Yes there is"
Date: 2013-10-09 09:26 pm (UTC)There's no motion from where Voldemort had stood. He imagines him crushed beneath the rubble, like the Wicked Witch of the East. The thought is...ineffably absurd.
(And if he's dead? If Edgeworth - Miles Edgeworth - has killed the evilest wizard of their age? That's...worth it. That has to be worth it.)
Miles climbs over the rubble, finally slides down - nearly trips - to draw near to Sirius. He feels exhausted. His hands are shaking. Not far from his foot, untouched by the rubble, is Voldemort's broken wand. He closes his eyes for just a moment, then reaches down into his pocket and pulls out the cigarette. And he says, weakly:]
I suppose I might...smoke this now.
"can you save this man" "no i cannot"
Date: 2013-10-10 11:15 am (UTC)But still, Sirius gives a tired heavy laugh, pushing his hand over his eyes.]
Oh, fuck you.
[He doesn't say it with any hatred. And a second later and he's shifting to dig his lighter out of his pocket. It nearly seems as if it ought not to work, as if anything with the Black family crest on it ought to fail him now--but it works, it flicks to life, and he holds out to Edgeworth.]
Surprised it didn't break in your martyring.
"but I can teach him to speak russian"
Date: 2013-10-10 12:31 pm (UTC)His voice is quiet when he speaks. He says:]
You saved my life.
[And that's almost baffling, isn't it? It was such a risk - such an incredible risk. If Sirius' divided concentration had caused him to falter and be crushed, or if the charm had missed and sheltered Voldemort instead - Sirius, after all of that, would have lost his life. And even though this isn't a real possibility - he knows that now that he knows Sirius - it would have been so much easier to let Edgeworth die; there would have been no witnesses left who knew of his stand against the Dark Lord; it would have just seemed that Sirius had been present when some mad Muggle-born had challenged Voldemort, that he'd happened to act quickly enough to protect himself, and his family wouldn't have any reason to be disappointed.
So Sirius, with a single spell - not cast in a moment of madness, because one cannot get out a charm that strong in a moment of madness; he had been bracing himself to cast that charm throughout the entirety of the duel - had risked his own destruction to save Edgeworth.
How strange.
He finds his hand suddenly coming up to his eyes, covering his face; he finds himself suddenly on the edge of tears. All the terror, the impossibility of the past few minutes comes rushing back fiercely, and there's a sort of panic that beats at his chest, and he grinds out with difficulty:]
Thank...you.
"can he play the piano anymore?"
Date: 2013-10-10 04:30 pm (UTC)Probably die, he corrects himself, as he glances towards the rubble where Voldemort ought to be buried. Just because there's been no stir or sign of life from that space doesn't mean that he's dead. And the paranoia of that thought gives him a sinking feeling in his chest, adding to the sick weight of what he's done, and where he goes from here, and Sirius smiles, bitterly, and gets out a cigarette for himself.]
Don't make anything of it.
[He says it plainly, no put-on gruffness or unnecessary warmth. The silver cigarette case feels heavy in his hand. His cigarette is the last one in it, and suddenly the case feels useless, a trapping of something that he isn't sure is his to claim any longer. He drops it on the floor; it lands with a heavy clatter.]
And don't get used to it.
[How he's dealing with this so coolly, he doesn't know. Maybe later terror will overtake him, or something very like it. This is the ending he never wanted, but in the end, he chose it, and no one forced his hand. Is it freeing, to have come here all on his own?]
That's going to be Ministry representatives.
[He nods, towards the hole in the wall. The dust is finally starting to settle, the cool night air from Knockturn Alley filtering in. The knot of people outside is larger, and a few brave souls are climbing in, their lit wands held aloft.]
You'd better stop crying and get over there to tell them what's happened.
[He's not crying. But there's something in his voice that suggests that he won't last long, not in tears but in panic, perhaps, and Sirius adds, quietly, darkly:]
Not now. Save it for later.
"uh...could he play it to begin with???"
Date: 2013-10-10 06:35 pm (UTC)He'll find out later that the Ministry got here so quickly not through some happy accident, but though a conspiracy of events. Ollivander's place was being watched, as it turned out, due to worries in the Ministry for the man's safety; they'd thought there might be retaliation against the wand-maker for selling to Muggle-borns. When the reckless Death Eaters, desperate to please their lord, had come to haul him away, it had triggered Ministry alarms, and Aurors had been dispatched a moment later. The three Aurors leading the way into the dusty, crumbling hall don't seem to fully comprehend what's going on, though; they'd anticipated what the Death Eaters under Veritaserum had promised them, Voldemort holding court, not a ruined building with two underage wizards and two Muggles and a great load of rubble in the middle. And it's clear from their faces, too, that they're not expecting this speech:]
My name is Miles Edgeworth; I'm a student at Hogwarts. I believe, pending confirmation following a search, that I have killed the wizard going by the name of Lord Voldemort. In doing so, I have broken several wizarding laws including the Decree for the Reasonable Restriction of Underage Sorcery and, while I was acting in self-defense when I struck out at him, have arguably engaged in an act of vigilantism. I will willingly surrender my wand while the Ministry conducts its investigation.
Sirius Black had nothing to do with any of this.
[And he bows, shortly, and then straightens a moment after, saying - ]
The two men back there are Muggles who have suffered a terrible trauma. Please ensure that they are seen to.
"of course not!" BA DUM TISH
Date: 2013-10-10 09:51 pm (UTC)They call the Minister, they call Dumbledore, they escort the muggles out and take Sirius and Edgeworth out as well--separately, warily, cautiously, as if they're explosive themselves. The Ministry officials begin setting up charms, spells--no one seems keen to move the rubble off of what might or might not be the corpse of Lord Voldemort. No one seems keen to do anything at all except stare at one another, white-faced and confused.
No one says congratulations. No one accuses anyone of anything. Confusion runs high, but everyone moves around as if they know what they're doing, as if briskness and basic containment charms will help them with anything.
Sirius lets them lead him away. Everything still feels curiously strange and distant, and there is a tingling in his fingers that makes him wonder if he's not been injured in some way, until he thinks no, impossible, he'd saved himself from the blast. He'd saved all of them. Sirius Black had nothing to do with any of this--Merlin, what a lie.
They take them both to the Ministry. They sit them down in a waiting room with dark green walls and a green marble floor. It's Aurors, Aurors are the ones that bring them in and leave them alone, together.
Sirius stares at his boot. It's white with marble dust.]
Thought about being an Auror once.
[He offers that dully. The room is dead fucking quiet.]
Oldest and greatest joke in the book
Date: 2013-10-10 10:02 pm (UTC)And they're away from that place. The Muggles are away from that place. Even if Edgeworth's future might well be grim, even if he might be sent soon to Azkaban, Sirius won't be dying tonight and the Muggles won't be hurt.
And there's this moment of quiet, and that strange revelation. Miles had been staring at his dust-gray robes, the jumper underneath, uncertainly; he looks up when Sirius speaks, his brows furrowed.]
You did? But -
[He cuts that off; but your family has always dabbled in Dark magic is a phenomenally insensitive thing to say, especially at this juncture, and for once he has the sense to be sensitive.]
You...never showed any sign of it.
[A beat, and then with a weary sort of nostalgia:]
I recall a declaration, as a matter of fact, that you were going to be the greatest Beater ever to be commemorated in the Quidditch Hall of Fame.
no subject
Date: 2013-10-11 12:01 pm (UTC)Yeah. Well, I didn't expect people to be eavesdropping and memorising my quidditch aspirations, did I. If I'd known they'd be marked down forever in your didactic memory, I might have phrased it better.
[It's very close to being a joke, except for the weary flat way that he says it. Sirius rubs his wrist against his forehead. It comes away grey with dust. When are they going to be permitted to wash up? When are they going to get to go home?
His parents will have found out by now. Whether Bellatrix is dead or captured, her parents will have been informed, and so his parents will know as well--and no one will believe that shit, Sirius Black had nothing to do with any of it--he was there, wasn't he? He has dreaded going home for other reasons, but this dread is fresh and new and--painful, too, it's fucking painful.
He presses a hand over his eyes.]
It was before Hogwarts. When I was a kid. But that sort of thing gets stamped out of you.
[Suitable career is a restrictive term, basically amounting to: nothing. Stay home and count your gold and have interests in the Ministry.]
Doesn't exactly matter now.
no subject
Date: 2013-10-11 02:49 pm (UTC)[A beat.]
Also, I was the one who reported you for drinking firewhiskey after the Slytherin victory our third year.
[He manages a weary, wry sort of glance before sitting back and closing his eyes, thinking over Sirius Black the Auror. It fits very well. Being an Auror requires talent, courage, a sense of right and wrong, all of which Sirius - against all odds - has. It fits as well as Sirius Black the Gryffindor, and it makes Miles feel much the same way: a little sad over the way things should have been. Sad over the possibility of a better world, another world, where Sirius was able to cast off the expectations of his family and lived a fierce and independent life, free of all the chains of his name. Completely free of everything.
He wishes Sirius were anyone else. He wishes that bright, mischievous boy could have been...his brother, maybe. His brother, had Dad not died - ]
Well. I suppose you've gotten your chance now, haven't you? And you did very well. You took down the Darkest wizard of our era.
[He says that quietly, because the responsibility is as much Sirius' as his own. He intends to take full blame, if blame should fall, but Sirius Black was the only one of the two of them who landed a solid blow against Voldemort - cracking the floor beneath his feet - and he was the one with the magical aptitude to save lives.
Save lives.
His throat tightens as he sits there with his eyes closed. He's quiet a moment, and then says, his voice barely a whisper - and he'd intended for it to be idle, self-assured, full-voiced, but it just comes out a sad whisper - ]
I hope they weren't killed. Your cousin and the others.
no subject
Date: 2013-10-11 04:07 pm (UTC)The first few years of Hogwarts all sort of feel that way these days, but tonight it's more obvious a disconnect than ever before.]
You're a tit, Edgeworth.
[He says it so he doesn't have to answer that praise. You did very well. By whose standards? And if he did well, why does everything feel so odd?
But the misery in Edgeworth's voice on the next bit distracts him, and looks around, sharply. He's not actually sorry, is he? He can't actually mean that, and Sirius' upper lip curls just a little, as disdain creeps over him--not for Edgewoth, but for them, for Bellatrix, and Malfoy--for all of them--]
I hope they were.
no subject
Date: 2013-10-11 06:06 pm (UTC)He swallows.]
They're...monstrous people. Utterly monstrous, with what they were willing to do.
[But there's a pause a moment later, and that statement - that could have been taken as an affirmation that he believes what Sirius had said - is negated with a shake of his head.]
I'd tried to limit the field of debris. I'd - wanted to hit only him. Bad to be a killer; worse to be a killer of many.
[But again, a moment later, he shakes his head again.]
I know. You must think I'm being absurd.
no subject
Date: 2013-10-11 08:36 pm (UTC)But then again, neither is what Edgeworth did. As difficult as it is to believe, Sirius is defending Edgeworth in his own head, against himself, against what other people might eventually say--Edgeworth, of all people. A tit, and he meant that, he would still attest to that, but--not a murderer.]
Absurd is a bit light for what I'm thinking, actually.
[He glances over at him, eyes narrowed.]
What happened to your heroism? You killed the fucking Dark Lord. You don't do that and then turn around and cry about killing those other-- Merlin, you don't even know that you've done it. Bellatrix is a bloody cockroach, she's probably spitting in the face of the Minister right now.
And if you have, so what? You think with Voldemort dead, that lot would have backed off? They'd have quieted, maybe, but you'd have given them a martyr. Their precious Dark Lord, killed by a muggle-born. For all you know, they'd have started an uprising of their own.
[And, more firmly:] Don't get stuck there feeling sorry for yourself, all right, because you did what you'd set out to do. Crashed their party and brought it down around their ears--literally. Be proud of yourself a little.
no subject
Date: 2013-10-12 03:33 am (UTC)[He answers that firmly - but that firmness fades a moment after into something weaker, something unhappy. He's quiet a moment, holding his tongue out of a full knowledge of how foolish this is, but a moment after he confesses, haltingly, his ideas confused even to himself:]
I suppose I just...I never even thought about it before, because he was always just something terrible, a symbol, but - he was a person, too. I just - on the way over here, I just kept wondering whether he had...a family. Parents. I don't know.
[He rubs unhappily at his eyes - as much from exhaustion as from grief. He's glad that he's dry-eyed now.]
They'd have killed those Muggles.
no subject
Date: 2013-10-12 12:17 pm (UTC)[Everyone has parents, Sirius thinks, with a swoop of bitterness. No matter who they are or what they stand for, they're your parents, and something of them will always be coded into you, a legacy you can't avoid. Until they knock you off the family tree.]
--If he had parents, then he'd have killed them. And he wasn't a person any longer.
[What the hell gives Sirius the right to speak with such certainty on that? He doesn't actually know anything--but Merlin, facing down Voldemort, having that strange lidless stare trained on him--there's nothing like that in the world, it's subworldly, un-human. Staring into his eyes and seeing nothing staring back at him.]
They'd have killed those muggles, and worse. That was just the start of it. [At parties, you hear the murmurs, he could tell Edgeworth. You see the plans getting started, the ideas being placed--but none of it matters anymore, does it? The planmakers are dead. New ones will come, but for now--] Even if this isn't the end of it, it's better off than you were before. Congratulations.
no subject
Date: 2013-10-13 11:44 am (UTC)You. "Than you were before."
[He opens his eyes, then, turns his head towards Sirius. Asks, because he has to ask - because all this will have been nothing if it was selfish, because he has blood on his hands but cannot live with himself if he's bloodied from selfishness - ]
What about others? Not just Muggles, and Muggle-borns. It's better, isn't it, to not...worry about a war? To not worry about suffering, dying...
[But he subsides, listless, unhappy. And, after a moment, he says:]
I've ruined your life, haven't I?
no subject
Date: 2013-10-13 02:50 pm (UTC)They have money. They have influence--it will fade, and wane, but their name will still carry some clout--and they will survive, because their kind always survives. But it will be different. It will always be different from here, and Sirius has seen the other side now, the side of--
What? Good? There's good in killing Voldemort, there's maybe even good in killing Bellatrix--it's a good better than anything he's ever known. But good hardly seems an adequate way to describe it, or frame it, or even understand it.
He shifts, rather than answer, he shifts and digs a cigarette out of his pocket, slips it into his mouth.]
We'll have to wait and see.
[He says it dully, but he glances over at Edgeworth with a wry little smile, as he lights his cigarette. Still with that heavy silver lighter, still carved with the Black family crest. He rubs his thumb over it before he slips it back into his pocket.]
I expect that's how much of this is going to go. Just-- waiting, and seeing. [And he lets a stream of smoke out of his nose, not even wincing at that little burn.] Stop dwelling. Stop being sad about this. You did it. Enjoy that, at least a little. There's people all across the world that are going to be celebrating this one, might as well let the person that actually did it join in.
no subject
Date: 2013-10-13 05:53 pm (UTC)So why is he sad? Because he is; God, he is. And it comes back to this: the world might be improved by the loss of one murderer, but has it truly been improved by gaining another? At its heart, his mourning is phenomenally selfish. He knows that. It stems not from any sort of compassion, not from any kindness, purely from his sorrow over the death, tonight, of Miles Edgeworth who had never killed and who had thought he never would.
Monstrously self-indulgent, maybe. But after everything he's done this night, he thinks he has earned a bit of self-indulgence.
But...not before Sirius. Not before Sirius, who showed more courage by far than Miles had, who has been willing to give far more up. If this act ends up hailed as a heroic one, if Edgeworth doesn't end up deplored as an assassin and a coward, he'll be called a hero. Sirius won't. Sirius will be, at worst, a patsy for the craven villain; at best, he'll be a traitor to his blood, and traitors are never looked upon with admiration no matter their cause. And while Edgeworth had nothing to lose, Sirius had that life to ruin.
And Edgeworth notices that Sirius isn't celebrating, either. He looks just as grim.]
Right.
[He says that heavily; the next sentence is, if not happy, if not jubilant, at least properly ironic.]
Feels a bit different from after a Quidditch victory, though, doesn't it.
i should be doing plot stuff but i'm addicted to this thread
Date: 2013-10-13 11:24 pm (UTC)Yeah, well, everything pales in comparison to quidditch victories. Maybe I'd better stick to my original plan for the future and just do quidditch, or I'll never end up feeling-- fulfilled.
[The walls around them are bare, but Sirius chooses a point on the wall opposite of them and stares there instead of looking around at Edgeworth, taking another drag on his cigarette. He's monumentally tired, suddenly, and he reaches up to rub his hand over his eyes, sucking in a breath that's more than a little ragged.]
Merlin. I'm tired of waiting here. When the hell are they going to tell us what's going on and what we've got to do.
[The sooner he knows, the sooner he can start to work out what's in store for him, what options he's got for the future. Slim to none, probably. He doesn't think that with any self-pity: it's a fact, that's all.]
I know I love it so much, it's like ninety times awesomer than anything I have ever done
Date: 2013-10-13 11:45 pm (UTC)[Edgeworth is quiet a moment. What are the possibilities before them? A trial is one possibility, to show that they're being fair, and either a conviction (if the Ministry feels it has a great deal to prove) or an acquittal (if it wants to publicly distance itself from the Death Eaters). Another possibility is letting them go; that's not out of the question, since the two of them could cause quite a mess for the Ministry and this would just wash away the mess. That they'll be killed in this room is a third possibility, if Voldemort survives, or if his followers wrest control of the case from the honest...
Miles doesn't even want to consider the last as a possibility. But as Sirius had said, those days ago - the Ministry isn't pure. Not like Miles would like it to be.]
You can go to sleep.
[He says that to Sirius, a bit quiet.]
I can keep watch. Until something happens. I'll wake you.
SAME!!!
From:http://25.media.tumblr.com/afcffffe0a656de14f76ca00964d30b0/tumblr_mnfz3r6Rn61qboo5qo1_500.png
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From:So true.
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From:oops pt 1
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