"Auror's Justice"
by Christine Anderson
aka Lilly Malfoy

Catching them had been more than a duty, it had been a quest, a calling. Something he owed his friends, the last and the very least he could do for them. It had not been enough- nothing would have been enough, but it was beyond him to set this to rights. Catching them, seeing them pay for what they'd done, was all that he could do, and so he had done it. He had always been driven, always been focused, but then- that time it had become something more. It had become an obsession.

He had let it become personal. Much as he knew he should not have allowed this, he could no more keep himself from it than he could keep from breathing. He had hardly been alone in that obsession- many had felt it, and even those who had not, had clearly understood it. Even his superiors, so quick in the past with a reprimand or a raised eyebrow, questioning his methods, were curiously silent then. They meant that silence as tacit approval, and he took it as such. Every Auror took personally what Bellatrix Lestrange and her associates had done to Frank and Alice, but Alastor Moody had taken it more personally than most.

The others understood that, and accepted it. Even those who had been, in the past, quick to say he went too far, did not seem to be troubled then by what he might do.

It happened quickly, when it happened. A lead came in, and though it seemed as likely to be false as many others he'd seen by then, he played a hunch and followed it. That was the night he lost his eye, and, alone and unaided, brought in Bellatrix, Rodolphus, Rabastan, Crouch. He only told the tale of how he had done it once, before the sham of a trial Crouch Sr. gave to his son and the boy's accomplices. He told Crouch, and Amelia Bones, who had been senior Auror then, and Albus Dumbledore- those three, alone.

They might have been able to save his eye if he had not been so determined to bring the Lestranges in alone, if he had called for backup when he'd had the chance. But he hadn't, because he feared that if he had, one or more of them would have slipped away. Not the Crouch boy, and probably not Rabastan, but even a moment's distraction could have cost him Rodolphus, or Bellatrix herself. And he had not been willing to let either of them get away- none of them, but those two more than any others, and Bellatrix most of all.

Back then the loss of the eye seemed a small price to pay for those captures. He'd have given many times as much to have his friends back, but as he could not, for any price, he had traded his sight for those who had taken those friends.

He'd gone to see Frank and Alice, after the sentence had been handed down. In his nightmares sometimes he still finds himself moving slowly down that hospital hall towards that ward, trying to adjust to the fact that half of his vision was gone, dizzied by the loss of depth perception, rattled and somewhat battered by the number of things he'd run into on that side, no longer able to see and avoid them.

He nearly broke his neck falling down the stairs that night, and it would not be the last time that happened. He had almost given up then, and kept going only (he was ashamed to admit) because he couldn't, just then, face climbing back up the bloody stairs down which he had fallen.

He hadn't seen Frank and Alice since the night he'd been called to their home by an Auror on patrol, who had seen something amiss. He had taken in their condition, but his main focus had been for clues and evidence, then- he had assumed, as many had that night, that their condition was only temporary.

But it hadn't been, and knowing they would never recover was what had motivated him to such obsession. It was that which had driven him so hard to catch those responsible. Because his friends could not, because they never would again.

It was different, seeing them as they were and knowing it was how they would always be, and it made him furious all over again. They no longer knew their own names, or how much they had loved each other. They did not recognize their own son, let alone their oldest friend.

When the fury left him, it had just hurt. He had done everything he could, and seeing them that way, it had been as if nothing he had done had mattered. He had not really expected capturing the Lestranges and Crouch to have had any effect upon the Longbottoms, had not really expected it to help; except that some part of him must have hoped that- must have hoped that very much.

He had buried his face in his hands and wept then, wept for those he had lost, who would have been best off if they had simply died, rather than to go on living like- this.

He wept, unaware of the passage of time, until he felt a hand touch his shoulder. He lifted his head, expecting a healer, or another friend, and instead-

It had been Alice. Alice, who had more reason to weep than he, had she but known it. Alice, despite all she had lost, and perhaps not even knowing why she did this, seeking to comfort him.

He could scarcely breathe then for the pain in his chest, the anguish slowly burning its way outward, but he had forced a smile and held it until- it seemed- she was reassured (falsely, but what did that matter?) that he was alright.

He had left as quickly as he could then- quickly as he could, without upsetting either of them. It wouldn't do for them to see further tears from him. They wouldn't understand that the tears were for them, or why that was true. Perhaps that is a mercy, as much as anything about this could be said to be such- but that is the greater tragedy, too, that they will never know what they have lost.

He has taken in return everything he can from those who caused this, and it is not enough.

He weeps because he has nothing else to give them now but his tears, and what he has given has not changed a thing.

*

When Crouch escapes, he never even knows it until a summer night when that ghost of the past comes out of the dark with a dead man beside him. Shock freezes him, holds him still for the crucial moment, and then they have him.

Constant vigilance has never faltered before this, but not even he could ever have expected this- even he could not have planned for Crouch's escape, Pettigrew's return.

Sirius Black might have escaped from Azkaban, but Barty Crouch? The skinny lad he had seen for so many years, trying and failing to gain his father's approval, the weakest link in the chain of Bellatrix's gang?

And Pettigrew! The bastard who had betrayed the Order, betrayed his old friends to Voldemort and to their deaths- He had been told of the truth of this when that truth was learned, of course. Seeing him, though, not the fallen martyr, but the living enemy- It had given him pause in a time and place when there was no room for it, and for that pause he had paid.

He had paid- nine months alone in the dark, bound and battered, nine months of knowing a deadly enemy abused a position of trust- his position of trust- but unable to stop him. Unable to do much but lie within the trunk and struggle against the spells that held him, desperate to break free before the damage was done, before Crouch accomplished what he had come to do. So weak he had not known if he could have done any good at all if he'd won his way free- but trying still, for all that.

He had fought the Imperius curse, too, at least in the beginning. He had fought Crouch's commands to speak the truth, to answer his questions. He had fought the compulsion to betray the secrets of his past.

He fought until he could not fight anymore, but Crouch had still been there then; beaten down by pain, by isolation, by desperation, Moody had tried and failed to resist.

And then Crouch had everything. Everything he needed to fool those he must, up to and including Dumbledore.

Moody's only hope had been that Crouch might be careless with the information he had gained, that he would not take the time to assimilate it properly, that he would not have that time- and that he would make some mistake. And Moody, who had bent knee to few gods even when such movement had come easier to him than it does now, had prayed, long and hard.

Slip up, he prayed. Just slip up once- it'll be enough.

If Crouch would only let himself be caught in some mistake, Dumbledore and the others might have some chance of stopping him.

Moody had all but given up hope for himself- he did not expect to come from the trunk alive.

It didn't matter. If the others could catch the man in some mistake, and if Moody would have betrayed no worse than his own secrets, and none of the Order's, it would have been enough. Death would have been a relief then, to have taken their secrets to his grave. But that escape, too, was denied to him, though he knew if he ever won his freedom only to a point, he would have to find a way... He carried too much that could damn too many, to allow the rest of his knowledge to fall into the hands of the Death Eaters.

The only reason they didn't have it yet is that Crouch had not wanted it. Moody had no choice but to hope that he would not, that he would have no reason to seek out the secrets of the Order, no reason to suspect that their secrets might be, still, worth learning.

He prayed, too, that Crouch remained ignorant of the fact that for thirteen years the Order of the Phoenix had seen this moment coming. They had never believed Voldemort was fully vanquished. Hoped and wished for, yes, but believed? No. They had known he would come again, and meant to be ready when he did.

He had managed to hold back that much, at least. When he remembers this, it does not seem like anywhere near to enough.

Alastor Moody remembers too much of that year in the trunk- too much for a time that was mostly the same patterns repeating- hours of darkness and of cold, cutting through him like a knife, so chill he thought he could feel blood freezing in his veins, Crouch coming to him like a nightmare vision, his own form before him, asking questions, inflicting pain, sensory deprivation, starvation, when Moody refused to answer. He remembers the summer night when he and he alone had held the power to stop Voldemort's return, the coming of the Second War- when one instant of vigilance could have done so much, saved them so much grief...

He feels each wound of the Second War upon his soul, each loss and each death. He feels each wound of the Second War upon his soul, and he has Barty Crouch to thank for it.

Crouch comes out of that year worse than dead, alive in body only, soul lost and gone. It is done by the time Moody realizes he has come into the light again, and he finds it fitting. He remembers Frank and Alice, and he finds it fair.

But he never lets go the guilt of the war's return- he holds himself responsible.

*

When Bellatrix and the others escape, when they are free again, he recalls his old obsession. He knows he could draw it back to him easily, easy as breathing, but it is not as necessary. Not as necessary now as it was then.

And yet...

And yet, when he learns they are at large again, he goes a bit mad.

Wondering if all he had done all those years ago, all the lines he had crossed, the boundaries he had pushed trying to bring them in- he wonders if it was worth it, if they so easily slip the net.

He caught them once, he can do it again. But he wonders what will be done then, what prison could hold them with Azkaban broken open and the dementors flocking to Voldemort's banner.

He's sorry there will likely not be any more Dementor's Kiss, not for the likes of them who have most earned it. The Lestranges, and those who escaped with them, deserve it more than he can say.

When he finds them, they will have to make do. He will have to improvise. They'll all have to improvise now.

Bellatrix Lestrange and her friends are going to, in the end, believe that Barty Crouch got off easy. He will personally see to it.

It still won't put the old ghosts to rest, for nothing can. But perhaps, if he can do this much, he will finally feel as if he has done enough.