What happens next?
Nothing you recognise belongs to me. Shame about that...

It was the year 2003 and a week that many people wished they could forget was about to happen.

A tall red haired man, aged in his early to mid-twenties, was found unconscious in Hyde Park. There was no sign of trauma, the toxicology screen was clear for drugs and alcohol and he had no ID on him.

When the "John Doe" woke in the hospital he had no memory of who he was or where he lived. realy strange thing was that he couldnt do even the most common of tasks like turning on a light, or flushing a toilet.

The matter was handed to the police who fingerprinted the man and took a DNA sample to cross check against any known crimes, solved or unsolved, but there was nothing on file that even came close to a match.

There was even an appeal on the TV news, on the internet and in the newspapers.

No one seemed to know the man.

The day after the appeal began the Prime Minister, Tony Blair, walked over to a particularly ugly painting on the wall of his office and said three words to it. "Emergency meeting. NOW!"

When Arthur Weasley, the Minister for Magic, arrived, several hours later, he was confronted by an extremely angry muggle Prime Minister. Before the wizard could say anything and irate muggle started shouting at him.

"What took you so long? I don't say 'Emergency' just for the fun of it! What the HELL is going on? In the past three years there have been eighteen people turn up, no ID, no record of them on any system worldwide, only with the clothes they are wearing and no memory! We had a treaty that said you would stop dumping your rejects on us! Her Majesty, Queen Elizabeth II, is beyond furious with this situation and is ready to take back the magical parliament. And before you say it, YES, she can do that. It is written in the Magical Magna Carta! Do you know what this means? The magical world is about to be exposed! And you can blame no one but yourselves! You were warned about the surveillance cameras. You were told what they do. You were even given a practical demonstration to show the amount of London these things cover! Yet, here we are. Eighteen untraceable people, no computer record of them at all, unusual appearances and disappearances, people who dress like they are going to a bad sci-fi convention and you expect that no one notices?"

"But I…err…"

"And let's not forget, these people only appear in certain locations. The CCTV system is being manned by squibs, by the by, that is a really offensive term, so that we can TRY to control the incidents YOUR people cause! Now, is the Queen going to have to announce that the majority of the population has been lied to? Or are you going to man up and deal with this mess? You better make your…"

The phone rings. It is a direct line from the palace.

"Hello? ...Yes…yes…but can I…no, Your Majesty, I just…I see…yes Ma'am…no, he is right here…at once…ouch."

"Well, you REALY stepped in it this time. We are both to go to Buckingham Palace immediately and Her Majesty will be having a few words with us. She was so angry she slammed the phone down in my ear! Not a good sign. Let's go."

A short while later.

The meeting was short, loud and anything but pleasant.

The Queen could have been a poster child for the evil queens from fairy tales. She was regal, poised and spitting fire at anything in her sights. And yet, it was all done in a polite, controlled manner. That upset the men more than if she had been screaming at them.

"Gentlemen. You were tasked with keeping the Statute of Secrecy just that, secret. And yet… I am finding more subjects that, officially, don't exist. We are hearing about strange occurrences that have no logical reason to happen. We are informed that these are becoming more and more common. Do either of you know just why there is the separation between our worlds? No? Let Us inform you.

"It was decided by King John that the magical world was too dangerous to mix with the rest of the population. You magicals have always had an arrogance about your, supposed, superiority. You think that just because you can manipulate magic you can do whatever you please. This is not true. The separation choice was made after seeing the result of a muggle mother and her children forced into slavery by a witch. The woman was the wife of a powerful Lord. Lord William DeBraose. The witch had been trying to gain Lord Williams attentions and had failed. He had rejected her. After a time the offending witch was caught and brought before the King to have him order her punishment. King John ordered the woman and children released from the curse, however the curse had no counter. The woman and her children were doomed to be serfs for the remainder of their lives. The witch was sent to live and work as a muggle serf alongside the woman she had cursed, with her magic bound. She was murdered a few weeks later.

"The King, seeing how dangerous this could be conferred with the high ranking magicals of the day and they all came to the realization that the two worlds could not live intermingled as they were. They must separate for the good of all of Our subjects. The magicals, like the ones today, had too much power they could, and did, abuse and the muggles had no defense against it. You may have heard of the magicals involved in the discussion. They went by the names of Hufflepuff, Slytherin, Potter, Gryffindor, Longbottom, Weasley (yes they were your ancestors), Ravenclaw and Yaxley.

"There were penalties mentioned in the final declaration as well. If the magicals revealed themselves without the permission of the reigning monarch, who in this case would be I, then all authority over the magical world would revert to the crown and all lands and titles would revert as well to be redistributed at Our pleasure. We are already aware of the penalty for muggles stumbling onto the secret.

"If, however, the reigning monarch would grant permission for the secret to be exposed in a responsible manner then there are only a few limitations. I would take over as the head of the magical world as I am in the muggle world. I would be the head of the government and be tasked with upholding the laws. All magicals would be subject to the same laws as their non-magical counterparts as well as the magical laws. They would all be registered at birth and death and have the right to be able to live and work in an appropriate manner. All magicals would swear an oath to never use their powers on non magicals unless under attack or under extreme threat of harm. This oath would be given at the beginning of any formal magical training.

"These are our options. Expose yourselves and be punished or allow the magical world to be slowly exposed and live as you always have. It is your decision, Ministers. You may have one hour to make your choice."

With that the Queen stood and walked out to the room.

After one long hour of frantic thought, Her Majesty Queen Elizabeth II reentered the room.

"Well gentlemen, have you come to a decision?"

"Your Majesty, we have. I am respectfully asking your permission to gradually expose the magical world." Minister Weasley said with a grimace.

"Very well, it will be your responsibility to inform the magical peoples of this decision and begin educating them on non-magical life in the twenty first century. How to use the currency, dressing appropriately and general information on how people live and travel should be your first topics. We would suggest getting a muggle born person to start gathering the information. We will begin to expose the secret early next year. That will give people time to start learning."

Arthur rushed home that night in a panic. How was he going to be able to face the world with this news? He would go down in history as the wizard who exposed the magical world. That wasn't a comforting thought. And it all started with Ron finishing his sentence. As if that wasn't hard enough to deal with.

Arthur tried to think. Who did he know that was muggle born, that he could trust and who could do the hard job of catching the magical world up on several hundred years of muggle changes? After several hours of careful thought he could only come up with one name. Hermione Potter, nee Granger. Would she help? Or would she laugh in his face? Oh well, I can only ask her.

To be continued...