Sleepwalking

Disclaimer: In case you haven't figured it out yet, I don't own Harry Potter. All Potter-related characters, settings, etc. are the intellectual property of J.K. Rowling.

[-]

"Crucio!" screeched Ethan Yaxley, and the excruciating pain was renewed afresh.

Pius Thicknesse reflected, in those few and far-apart moments that he could even string coherent thoughts together, that there was definitely a severe disconnect between learning of the sheer agony that the Cruciatus Curse inflicted upon its victims in the clean, sterilized world of academia, and the actual sensation of feeling every one of his pain receptors magically stimulated in this way…constantly and unrelentingly, without even the remotest hope that his junior associate might ever grant him some small shred of reprieve.

This had not been, upon waking bright and early that morning, a day in which Pius had expected himself to come so very near the threshold of death. The daylight hours had passed with very minimal consequence, his time spent handling some very minor immigration disputes in conjunction with his counterpart in Turkey and dispatching a few Aurors to sort out an extended bar fight down in Cornwall that had since devolved into (according to his latest reports) a city-wide, pathetically drunken exchange of rudimentary Dark Magic.

All in all it had hardly been an unusual day by Department of Magical Law Enforcement standards, and so when his Deputy-Head, Ethan Yaxley, had invited him out to dinner and a few beers once night had begun to fall upon their artificial windows, he had thought of it as little more than a friendly overture from a typically somewhat-reserved coworker. And considering that he had had a sneaking suspicion that his wife was preparing to serve that meatloaf he so thoroughly despised that evening and Yaxley was offering to pay for the first round, Pius could think of no particular reason to refuse.

Of course, this casual decision would go down as probably the worst one he had ever made in his life…for however long that was going to be.

It had taken approximately three minutes after departing Ministry grounds for Yaxley to Petrify him from behind, use Side-Along Apparition in order to forcibly transport him to an undisclosed location, and begin liberally applying Unforgivables to his paralyzed body like they were Cheering Charms. Cruciatus, Imperius, Cruciatus, Imperius, Cruciatus…the two forbidden curses were being alternated against him like clockwork, the Full-Body Bind that the torturer had started out with ensuring that Pius Thicknesse could not even release his unending stress in the form of a scream as his mind was systematically broken down. Indeed, the pain was so great that the Department Head could scarcely even comprehend what Yaxley was ordering him to do during the Imperius portions of the cycle…but regardless he kept holding on, summoning up whatever measures of Occlumency he still had the presence of mind left to muster. Yaxley was obviously a mole for the Death Eaters – if anything was clear now, then it was that – and so it was Pius' solemn duty as a public servant to ensure that he would not succeed, no matter how much mental agony (or worse) he would have to endure in the process.

Speaking of which…

"Imperio!" Yaxley bellowed impatiently, grabbing his employer by the shoulder and slamming him into the opposite wall in frustration. "Give in already, dammit!"

And here it was once more: the vast expanse of colorless fog stretching before him, instantly alleviating every single ounce of anguish that he had been forced to experience thus far. Yaxley was whispering to him again, his voice distorted and echoing as if traveling through a long tunnel, and an increasingly strong part of his own mind was now insistently instructing him that all he would have to do was yield to these altogether reasonable demands, and all would be well…

The Dark Lord is your master, your savior…merely surrender yourself to his infallible will, and obey all that he commands, and he shall grant you everything you have ever desired. Simply give in, and all your problems shall disappear.

Well, that didn't sound so bad at all, really…especially if going along with what Yaxley was saying would make this mind-ripping pain cease permanently. Already he could somewhat vaguely discern that the elder gentleman was preparing to Cruciate him once more, and the prospect of leaving the intoxicating embrace of this glorious, implacable sense of formless ecstasy was something that Pius simply couldn't bear to contemplate. Much better to just sit back and do as he was told; that way, the horrific agony would never have to bother him again…

"No!" Pius Thicknesse suddenly blurted out, his head lolling. No…he had…had an obligation, didn't he? The witches and wizards of Britain trusted him to…to do what was right…and…and…resist…

From what seemed like a very great distance away a door creaked open and another, somewhat broader figure slid into the room, wringing its hands anxiously. "How goes the progress here, mate?" the figure growled in a low, throaty sort of voice.

"He's putting up a lot more resistance than I had initially anticipated," Yaxley spat, smashing Pius' shoulder into the opposite wall again to punctuate his point. "I must've Imperiused and Cruciated this damn fool five or six times each by now, Mulciber, and still he just keeps slurring all this bloody nonsense…"

"Have you been switching them on-and-off?" the unknown Mulciber questioned patronizingly, pointing his own wand at Pius in order to force his worn face to eye-level. "Yeah, the better-trained ones tend to build up a tolerance if you do it like that, so far as I've experienced. Easier just to torture them until their minds break completely, and Imperius whatever remains. It's not as if the Dark Lord's gonna need him to think much for himself after tonight, after all."

"Your point is…well-taken," Yaxley acceded in low, measured tones, already towering over his captive with the strained look of someone preparing to release an enormous quantity of magical power. And then once more he was shouting, "Crucio!" and again Pius was silently shrieking, his face gaunt and contorted as he struggled frantically against his invisible bounds.

"Crucio!" Yaxley cried again, not bothering to allow his employer even the brief mercy of recovery this time around. "Crucio…Crucio…Crucio!"

Each utterance of the terrifying curse was punctuated by Yaxley jabbing his wand directly into Pius' ribcage, letting the mundane suffering match the magical as he freshly pierced the department head's very core. Several minutes passed by in this regard, the Death Eater continuing to reapply the unrelenting sensation at regular intervals, and Pius Thicknesse gradually moving farther and farther past his breaking point. Even the small modicum of conscious thought he had been afforded beforehand was no longer a luxury in which he was allowed to partake; there was only the overwhelming pain, and his unending mental screams in response.

"P…Please…no more…" he managed to childishly choke out, unable to help himself. Or at least, that's something of what it sounded like; with his still lips frozen in place, he could do little more than whimper disjointed syllables.

But "Crucio!" was his only answer, though from two mouths rather than one this time – Mulciber was now snickering, "Can't let you have all the fun, now that this shite is getting good!" and joining in on Pius' crucifixion, cackling with sadistic glee as the Department Head writhed as frantically as a Petrified person possibly could.

It was inevitable that it would happen, really, with two wands turned upon him and exacting the second-deadliest curse known to the wizarding world to his prone form…less than two more minutes of the relentless, skull-splitting pain later and Pius' head was striking the ground, his face and hair disheveled and his mind very nearly catatonic. His consciousness now rapidly dwindling to the blackness from which there would be no recovery, all Pius could do was inwardly utter some vague apology to all those in the world who trusted him to fight He-Who-Must-Not-Be-Named to the very end. At the moment of truth, he had ultimately proven too weak. At the moment of truth…he had failed.

One final cry of "Imperio!" later, and the man known as Pius Thicknesse was no more.

[-]

In clarification, there was a man who called himself Pius Thicknesse who exited that dank holding room the next morning and headed for work per usual. And indeed, that man wore what Pius Thicknesse wore, and spoke with Pius Thicknesse's voice, and possessed a countenance precisely matching the one that had adorned Pius Thicknesse's face for over sixty years…but he was most assuredly not Pius Thicknesse all the same.

For one thing, Pius had never made it a particular habit to permit Death Eaters into his own private office, an action that he enacted three separate times over the course of that following day. Admittedly Ethan Yaxley could certainly be argued to have some business there, what with him being Pius' highest-ranking subordinate, but neither Adam Mulciber nor Amycus Carrow had any such excuse. Certainly there was no possible justification for the man who was not quite Pius Thicknesse to invite the Heads of the International Magical Cooperation and Magical Transportation Departments into said office so that they might also be abducted by the malevolent trio, nor for him to stand impassively to the side as both politicians were subjected to precisely the same "treatment" that had rid the world of Pius Thicknesse just one day prior.

The next few days passed the non-Pius in a blur, although that was hardly unusual by recent standards. Mostly he kept busy with the day-to-day minutiae that filled up most of the true Pius Thicknesse's time, Yaxley staying by his side at all times under the flimsy pretext of collaboration on some sort of "top-secret project." The general gossip spreading around the department seemed to be that the two were busy carrying on an affair on the numerous occasions that they bolted themselves within Pius Thicknesse's office, though the man who now occupied that office was entirely unconcerned; so long as Yaxley continued to reapply his Imperius Curse at regular intervals two or three times a day (the genuine reason why they so often retreated behind closed doors), his shattered mind remained perpetually on air.

The first complication to these otherwise well-maintained operations arose when Mistress Thicknesse had called up her husband by the Floo Network and asked why he hadn't returned home for over three days. Given how busy the Head of the Department of Magical Law Enforcement could often be, it was hardly unusual for Pius spend a particularly late night kipping in his office…but three was completely unheard of.

Now, Yaxley had made quite a few whispered suggestions during this period, all of which the man who wasn't Pius Thicknesse had accepted and put into action without a second thought (or to be perfectly honest, without a first one either); suggestions such as, "Why don't you invite the Head of the Department of Magical Accidents and Catastrophes to your office?" or, "The Potter boy needs more protection. Wouldn't it be nice to make entering or exiting his house by magical means an imprisonable offense?"

But the next proposal that his Deputy-Head had put forth had been so strange and out-of-place that even as the automaton moved swiftly to follow it, vague stirrings of what little remained of Pius Thicknesse began to gather and coalesce at the very back of his mind, unable to do anything but watch and listen as Yaxley softly muttered, "Wouldn't it be a great idea to return home to your manor, gather your family in the entrance hall, and open your front doors at seven o'clock this evening?"

Still, it was certainly not on Yaxley's orders that his eyes closed tight as he was compelled to follow these instructions to the letter, even as Fenrir Greyback appeared on his doorstep at precisely the appointed time and pushed roughly past him, both wand and fang-like teeth bared and ready to tie up these "loose-ends" once and for all.

Their deaths was reported by the Prophet as the tragic result of a backfiring household charm, and the man who was not Pius Thicknesse was instructed to act suitably grieved in the short mourning period that followed, something that he managed to pull off more-or-less convincingly. On an unrelated note Ethan Yaxley – as well as the automaton's other Death Eater handlers – were all called away the following night to report on the success of Yaxley's scheme to their master, leaving the disjointed remains of Pius Thicknesse's psyche their first several hours absent from regular Imperius reinforcements in days. Combined with the entirely unfaked sorrow that said psyche was consumed with in the aftermath of his wife's and three children's brutal slayings, this was the night that those remains finally managed to reform into a thinking, feeling whole – the real Pius Thicknesse, trapped in the prison that was his own, unresponsive body.

After Yaxley's return however, the state of the true Pius' consciousness was rather…inconsistent. Typically he could at least gauge a fairly accurate sense of what was going on in the world, and what changes he was being unwillingly forced to bring about within it, powerless as he was to resist in any active manner. But in the hours following every successive application of a fresh Imperius Curse – which were growing more-and-more frequent as the automaton was compelled to bring a steadily rising number of Department Heads and Deputy-Heads under Mulciber's influence – Pius felt like little more than the central figure in an abstract dream, sloshing waist-deep through a murky fog so thick as to be nearly solid as he struggled desperately to simply hold onto his basic sense of self.

Conversely however, on those rare occasions when Yaxley, Mulciber, and Carrow would inadvertently allow their control to lapse for more than five hours or so, Pius found that he could think and plan largely without obstruction, so long as he managed to keep his consciousness well in the background and beneath the Death Eaters' notice. Sporadically he could even manage to exert minor influence upon some of his extremities in this state of near-waking, twitching his fingers or blinking his eyelids a few more times than was strictly necessary, though he would certainly need to save that particular detail for future use rather than squander it on such pointless acts of rebellion. Perhaps, at some point down the road, it just might come in handy.

In any event, outside of the losing battle being waged within the deepest corners of Pius Thicknesse's mind, the Death Eaters' plan proceeded to move forward to its next and most crucial step. Given that there was little other reason possible for the trio to be using him to subjugate the rest of the Ministry's inner circle, it hardly surprised him when the psychopaths and their now-dozen-strong legion of brainwashed public servants eventually made their move to capture and then assassinate Rufus Scrimgeour…not that it made it any easier for the true Pius to witness, of course.

To his immense credit, the former Head Auror did not break under the maniacs' well-practiced litany of torturous curses, not even for a moment. Freed of the sole restriction that had been placed upon the other victims' agonizing treatment – that they be left alive in order to Imperius afterward – Yaxley and his malevolent brethren were pulling no punches in their inhuman brutalization of the Minister of Magic, demanding in enraged and increasingly desperate shouts that he reveal the location of Harry Potter. But Scrimgeour would not yield, taking the pain with anguished roars that nevertheless managed to retain an unwavering sense of dignity, and ultimately his obstinacy paid off with a flash of green light bursting from the tip of Amycus Carrow's wand, punctuated by the pudgy man's incensed howl of impatience.

The Potter boy was safe – for now, at least – but that was about the only victory that the Death Eaters hadn't managed to seize through this culmination of their month-long coup d'état. Funnily enough the informal chain of command had ended up shunting him into Scrimgeour's old post, not that it made a single iota of difference; He-Who-Must-Not-Be-Named was now Minister-by-proxy in all but name, with the automaton being simply a convenient figurehead to mask now-Head of the Department of Magical Law Enforcement Ethan Yaxley's near-absolute control of the entire British wizarding government for as long as was necessary.

What truly disturbed Pius Thicknesse about this horrifying turn of events however, far more than the particular events themselves, was the reaction (or rather, lack thereof) from the non-brainwashed masses. Every utterance that escaped from the lips of the automaton was obeyed without question, even as the Ministry's major policies began to devolve further and further into the realm of abject insanity. Overnight, the Potter boy became "Undesirable Number One," wanted by every known branch of the Ministry for "questioning" on some trumped-up charges related to Albus Dumbledore's recent passing. Overnight, convicted murderers like Mulciber or Travers or Dolohov – all of whom owed multiple outstanding life sentences in Azkaban – gained the ability to amble about with absolute impunity, even within the hallowed halls of the Ministry itself. And overnight, a general aura of fear and paranoia exploded into a misdirected, nigh-genocidal campaign against Muggle-borns, with Yaxley and his cackling associates already well underway to establishing a registration system designed solely to get as many "Mudblood" as possible Kissed before the year was out.

And yet…despite this radical new bent, no one in the entire Ministry seemed to be willing to question any of the actions of the altered regime. Admittedly, this was probably the genius of the Death Eaters' gambit – so long as familiar-faced puppets like himself remained at the forefront of the new administration, the assumption of inherent justification remained for the vast majority of the wizarding populace, and so these egregious expansions of Ministry power went utterly unnoticed (or at least undiscussed) in the weeks that followed.

It also didn't particularly hurt the integrity of He-Who-Must-Not-Be-Named's masquerade that the nature of the highest-level positions in the Ministry were such that the formation of interpersonal relationships was the exception rather than the rule, and so if Pius and his fellows were acting any differently than they typically did – and they most certainly were, by his estimation – then there were very few within their respective offices who were likely to notice. This had, presumably, been why Pius' family had been deemed necessary to die…they knew the Death Eater's favorite patsy far too intimately, and would've noticed the signs of his conversion in an instant. But as for his secretary, or even any of the junior assistants or interns? Apparently to them, an order from the automaton sounded no different than one handed down by Pius himself.

"Bitter" was not quite the right word to express just how Pius Thicknesse felt about the general non-reaction to this swift and silent coup, although that was certainly part of it. More to the point, he was disappointed…disappointed in what was assuredly surefire proof that all those fundamental tenets upon which he had based a political career in the first place, from the people's steadfast dedication to the preservation of justice to their vested interest in keeping their public servants clean and honest, could apparently be thrown out the window in literally a single instant, with no one else the wiser.

It was…infuriating, to say the very least, and Pius was certain that he would be tearing clumps of his own hair out of his scalp in response were he still in control of his hands. At least he and his fellow top officials had the rather hefty excuse of mind control to justify their complicity in the heinous crimes of this new administration! But out of some sickening, distorted blend of fear, apathy, and an underlying measure of cruelty and sadism that had been drawn out of a chillingly large subsection of existing Ministry officials (or had people like Dolores Umbridge and Albert Runcorn always been that frightening, and he had simply never noticed?), the entirety of the British Ministry of Magic was toeing the Death Eater's line within a day.

Unfortunately, with all the effort he had to put forth to even remain conscious of the world around him, Pius Thicknesse wasn't exactly in a position to do anything about this sordid state of affairs anytime soon. With the automaton now at the forefront of the Ministry's public image, his daily dosage of Imperius Curses had been increased to at least half-a-dozen; according to snatches of conversation he had caught from convicted spy and traitor Augustus Rookwood, this particular order had come directly from the lipless mouth of He-Who-Must-Not-Be-Named himself. The Dark Lord would tolerate absolutely no risk of Pius' true self breaking free and carrying tales to the Potter boy or the Order of the Phoenix, so long as the automaton continued to remain the perfect figurehead for his shadowed reign.

Still, every waking minute of every waking day, Pius was fighting. Mulciber had been right about at least one thing on the night of his initial torturing session – protracted use of the Imperius Curse without the mind-splitting pain of the Cruciatus preceding it in ample amounts led to a certain degree of tolerance for the oppressive spell, one which grew just a tad bit stronger with every moment that Pius spent attempting to find some small crack in its hold over him.

Consequently, Pius' ongoing experiments in reasserting influence over his physical body were growing bolder and bolder, though the results themselves were a decidedly mixed bag. Often the Minister felt rather similar to Sisyphus, vainly rolling his boulder up toward the summit that represented throwing off this overpowering curse completely, only for all of his progress to be negated in an instant with every fresh cry of, "Imperio!" The constant struggle was frustrating, and exhausting as well…most nights he went without sleeping, so tumultuous was the silent conflict raging within his psyche. Fortunately for the sake of his "cover" however, the man who wasn't Pius Thicknesse never displayed any outright symptoms of this fatigue to his handlers, having never been instructed to do so. The automaton's entire world was the missions he had been handed and the screwed-up philosophies he had been ordered to parrot, leaving the true Pius alone to wage his mental battles largely unmolested.

Regardless of these complications, however, life went on for the automaton and his Death Eaters cohorts, whose schemes were proceeding with a general air of great success…in all but one, critical area. Hogwarts, the Daily Prophet, and even the majority of the Muggle Ministry were all firmly under He-Who-Must-Not-Be-Named's chalk-white thumb, but the tyrant was unsatisfied; every victory was tainted rotten by the knowledge that Harry James Potter still lived. So far as the Dark Lord was concerned – at least, from what Pius had overheard secondhand out of his handlers – the fact that the boy continued to elude him as days turned to weeks and weeks turned to months, despite having literally all the resources of wizarding Britain directed toward his capture, undermined He-Who-Must-Not-Be-Named's authority, and his menace, to a degree that was wholly unacceptable.

As such, Pius Thicknesse was finding more and more of his time occupied with frenetically combing the entire country for the scarred teenager…or at least the automaton was. His true mind was, if anything, growing increasingly bored by the whole operation, as it had been ever since the Imperius Curse's absolute hold over his higher psyche had waned. While the man who wasn't quite Pius dispatched carefully chosen Death Eaters and Ministry personnel to every household or township that could possibly be harboring the Potter boy, all the while spewing some regurgitated nonsense about "bringing the filthy half-blood to his long-deserved justice" or some shite like that, his genuine self sat back in his clouded stupor and patiently bided his time until a potent blow might be struck by the unforeseen complication of his continued existence.

[-]

It was in the very latest ides of spring that a confluence was reached between this manhunt (and the fanatically obsessive impetus driving it) and Pius' desire to reassert dominance over his unyielding nerves, somehow striking a potent blow against his murderous puppetmasters. The Taboo had been one of Yaxley's more brilliant pieces of innovation – a dark spell with the range of an entire nation, keyed into some strange artifact the Unspeakables had recently cooked up. Upon the utterance of the Dark Lord's true name, the device would begin to shine an ethereal green, sending powerful signals that would immediately shatter any protective enchantments short of a Fidelius Charm, rendering the foolhardy invoker completely helpless.

This detector was kept in a secret compartment in Ethan Yaxley's personal office, and so as it began to whir and glow one foggy April day, the automaton happened to be the only one stationed to observe it, Yaxley himself having momentarily stepped out to the bathroom. The man who wasn't Pius Thicknesse knew his orders for this sort of situation quite well, but as he watched the machine crackle with magical energy and heard the voice that unmistakably belonged to the young lad whom he had voted to acquit at the Wizengamot two summers prior crying out, "Voldemort's after the Elder Wand!" he did something that most certainly did not fall under the purview of how his handlers had instructed him to act…

He whispered, "Finite Incantatem," and silenced the device with a tap of his wand.

It wasn't much, that little gesture, but hopefully it would still be enough to buy the Potter boy a few more weeks out in whatever patch of wilderness he had managed to ensconce himself. True, a danger still remained from the various enclaves of Snatchers now roving across the country, some of whom had managed to construct crude detectors for the breaking of the Taboo spell out of scavenged black-market components, but at least the young man wouldn't have to deal with a few dozen crazed Death Eaters descending upon them within moments.

…Unfortunately, the same could not be said for Pius himself.

His quiet utterance of the Finiteness Spell had not escaped the returning Yaxley's notice, and within seconds Pius Thicknesse was being beset upon by a large battalion of what were ostensibly his own guards, magically binding and gagging him and then tossing his vaguely struggling body into an empty, lightless chamber in order for his "treatment" to be…strengthened. That slightest of motions had betrayed his true self's continued survival to the one man tasked with eliminating it forever, and at this stage in his master's operations Yaxley didn't appear eager to take any more chances on that front.

After nearly ten months of reprieve from the Cruciatus Curse's mind-cleaving effects, feeling all of that pain come crashing back down at once nearly destroyed Pius's mind right-then-and-there. Indeed, in many ways this newest torture was even worse than the session that had started it all, as at least in that case the constraints upon his freedom had been entirely physical. But now he had to contend with an entire separate consciousness that was feeling nothing but contrition for his secret act of protection toward the Potter boy, his inner demons given form and using it to mentally beg Yaxley for further punishment, so that he might not ever be tempted to slip up again. It was certainly making fighting against the man a Hell of a lot more difficult, and it wasn't long that the true Pius Thicknesse was submerged once more, his lips moving soundlessly to frame words of apology toward his Lord and master.

"I will never betray you again, my Lord," the automaton mumbled, his primitive thoughts now alone in the chamber of Pius Thicknesse's psyche. "I was bad and I'll never, ever do it again. Never, ever, ever…"

As for Pius himself, every connection to the material world he had worked toward for nearly a full year evaporated with that latest string of Unforgivables, to the point where – far from exerting influence on his own fingers and lips – even observing those things that existed outside of his body took every ounce of his personal strength and willpower. And like tensing a muscle, he no longer could maintain even that for very long at a time, resulting in periodic episodes of total unconsciousness where the part of his brain that took orders from his Death Eater handlers with anything but a vague smile and a muted, "Yes, sirs" faded completely. It was a strange and horrifying sensation, no longer merely being trapped within his own body but being almost smothered by it as well, as if every nerve and sinew that made up Pius Thicknesse's being was raising mutiny against his higher mind, attempting to force it out forever.

To be eternally locked within the state that existed between waking and sleeping, unable to rise and yet afraid that if he yielded to slumber he might never utter a conscious thought again…there were no words to describe the state in which Pius' soul found itself in those final days, and the only method through which he managed to retain a grip on sanity was to hope desperately that one of his new "friends" might misaim a Killing Curse and finally put the erstwhile Minister of Magic out of this horrific misery once and for all.

[-]

The potential opportunity for such a thing came far sooner than Pius had ever anticipated. It was only about a month later – give-or-take, since he no longer had anything more than the dimmest of comprehensions over such esoteric matters as the passage of time – that He-Must-Must-Not-Be-Named made a rousing call-to-arms across every single one of his followers: the Potter boy had been discovered within the depths of Hogwarts School of Witchcraft and Wizardry, and the Dark Lord was summoning all the myriad forces at his disposal to storm the castle and at long last capture his young nemesis, by any means necessary. With every single pair of hands, Imperiused or otherwise, required to build up a sufficiently sized army, the automaton found himself wearing Death Eater robes for the first time in his life, standing anonymously in a long line of identical fellows and making a great cry as Yaxley and Rookwood rallied them.

Proceeding forward in neat rows and Disapparating in concert, the motley mixture of dark wizards, enthralled Ministry officials and employees, and legions of Dementors (with rumors bandying about that a handful of giants might also join their cause upon arrival) invaded the village of Hogsmeade in militant droves, the less stable of their lot (Bellatrix Lestrange and Antonin Dolohov chief among them) firing stray curses at random establishments and passerby until a line of roaring flames framed their unholy procession all the way to the castle gates.

This was, strictly speaking, the first time that Pius had returned to Hogwarts since he had graduated from the Hufflepuff class of 1949, and yet he was meeting its hallowed grounds with nothing but Exploding Jinxes and Reductor Curses, attempting alongside all his similarly attired compatriots to blast apart the invisible barriers that blocked their access to the school. Not that the true Pius Thicknesse was very acutely aware of any of this, of course; throughout the whole ordeal he had been, at best, semi-conscious, his body working completely on autopilot (even moreso than usual, given the directness of his current orders) as he shot curse after curse against the wall of protective enchantments and, eventually, against the ground forces waiting to oppose them as soon as they broke through.

Dueling had never been one of Pius' particular strong-suits (the "Acceptable" he had received for his Defense Against the Dark Arts O.W.L., resulting entirely from his less-than-spectacular practical exam, was ample proof), but the automaton was managing to hold his own rather well; the laser-guided focus that the Imperius Curse provided him was, unfortunately, making him quite adept at ruthlessly cutting down individual opponents. Alas, all that the real Pius Thicknesse had the strength of mind to do at this point was keep a hazy watch over the general proceedings and root faintly for one of the castle's defenders to kill or at least permanently incapacitate him, before the man that wasn't truly Pius could inflict any more damage upon the school…or worse, its students.

The clashes of that night were intense, and they were long; the most extensive, against his former classmate Aurora Sinistra, lasted nearly a full hour of concentrated exchange of fire. Fortunately, Pius had managed to avoid exacting any fatalities so far, although there had been some very near misses – the first Killing Curse he had ever cast in his life missed Professor Sinistra completely, but had come within a hair's breath of slaughtering a teenaged boy emerging from a nearby corridor instead. And Pius had to at least admit some level of culpability in the murder of Auror Nymphadora Tonks, as it had been his and Thorfinn Rowle's volley of Stunners that had distracted the young woman long enough for Bellatrix Lestrange to strike her from behind, howling with laughter as the light faded from her niece's eyes.

Another half-hour passed before the man that wasn't Pius Thicknesse was dueling a couple of redheaded young men, at least one of whom was undoubtedly familiar. Again he was "partnered" with Rowle, who was faring rather more successfully than the automaton at the moment…although admittedly, Rowle's current opponent was quite visibly younger than his. Still, neither of their advantages lasted long, as the next corridor brought with it three individuals that Pius knew he recognized: none other than Harry Potter himself, alongside the two accomplices that had assisted him in his landmark Gringotts break-in. The automaton had little chance to react to this startling new development, however, as the young trio immediately brought down Rowle with an array of perfectly aimed Stunners and the older redhead, sensing an opportunity, shot a powerful jinx straight into his foe's breast, exposing his face as he did.

"Hello, Minister!" the other man shouted triumphantly, twirling his wand. "Did I mention I'm resigning?"

And in that instant, with those gleefully taunting words, Pius Thicknesse's entire world brightened considerably, even as the enslaved façade currently in control of his body began desperately clawing at himself, the young man's spell having apparently manifested in a thick layer of painful spikes all along his skin. Pius recognized him fully, now – Crouch had always called him Weatherby, though he had a strong feeling that that wasn't entirely correct – but in any event, he had been Fudge's Junior Assistant for a time, and one of the most stringent and vocal Ministry loyalists Pius had ever personally met. And yet now, here he was, taking up arms against the Minister of Magic himself, demonstrating that at least some had seen through the veil of lies; some hadn't abandoned their principals just because the official dogma had shifted; some had possessed the boundless courage to fight back for what they believed in…

It made Pius Thicknesse feel an incredible sense of warmth, somehow, and of implacable pride in this bespectacled gentleman. Perhaps, if He-Who-Must-Not-Be-Named's forces could be whittled down sufficiently by this heated conflict, there might just be hope for the magical world yet. All it would take would be a few more free-thinkers like this "Weatherby" fellow, and this Dark Age might finally come to an end.

…And then the air exploded, throwing all nearby parties hard against the marble walls, and returning Pius Thicknesse to a void of utter blackness.

[-]

"Hello, Pius," said a figure off in the distance, and Pius Thicknesse struggled valiantly to raise himself to his feet and stare into the face of his addressor. This was proving rather easier said than done, however, given that his limbs all appeared to be bound to this inky expanse by heavy chains, ones which he most certainly lacked the requisite energy to break. Still, he was eventually able to – with great effort – pull himself to a kneeling position, allowing him to regard the man that had spoken.

Should he really have been surprised that it was his own double that stared back down at him, arms crossed behind his back and smirking with a distinct air of smug assurance?

Except that the figure wasn't quite his double, really. His face was longer and more sharply lined, his eyes shown with far greater vigor, and his voice…that was the strangest part. "I'm honestly surprised to see you here, parasite," he declared venomously, and it was like Pius was hearing Ethan Yaxley's voice blended slightly out-of-sync with his own, with the final version magically lowered a couple of octaves until it sounded only marginally human.

"Who exactly are you?" Pius demanded, ignoring the barb.

The other man's immediate response was to strike Pius across the face, followed swiftly by a sharp kick to the gut. "Silence, parasite!" he roared, before stroking his beard contemplatively and adding in a low murmur, "But this doesn't make any sense. Master Yaxley should've gotten rid of you permanently after that last session…"

"Why in Merlin's name do you keep calling me that? And once again, who are you?" Pius cried out, trying to clutch his stinging abdomen but constricted by the chains from moving his limbs more than a few inches or so in any direction.

"Isn't it obvious?" the doppelganger rejoined with a humorless chuckle. "You've been calling me 'automaton' for months, but I believe we both know the truth: I am the real Pius Thicknesse, finally set free."

"Like Hell you are," Pius spat, now coughing up flecks of blood.

"Oh, such a foul tongue…but am I really so far off, parasite?" he countered, grasping Pius' worn face and forcing their gazes to lock. "For a politician, you've never really been much of a leader…always content to let someone else take the reins, so long as you can manage to escape the pressure of actually having to make a decision. I suppose that's what happens when the Department of Magical Law Enforcement recruits such a callow academic, rather than someone who's actually tested his true strength on the battlefield. All-in-all, you were almost glad to finally cede all that pesky responsibility involved with the freedom of choice to someone who knew how to handle it. A part of you wanted to give into Master Yaxley's liberating enchantment…and I, the manifestation of that part, have been in control ever since."

"Shut up! Those are filthy, bloody lies!" Pius exclaimed, even as his imperfect double slammed his head onto the formless surface to which he was chained, robbing him of what very little stamina he still had left.

Maybe…maybe the automaton was right. He had proven remarkably susceptible to the oppressive power of the Imperius Curse, left sleepwalking through nearly an entire year of his life as all of his strength of character and willpower were buried deep beneath the strange facsimile of his darkest personality and mannerisms that stood before him. And in so doing, he had failed every single wizard, witch, and Muggle in all of Britain, condemning thousands upon thousands to death or worse by way of his own weakness. His current situation, doubtlessly a visual metaphor that his splintered psyche had conjured up in this state of unconsciousness, was the perfect representation of what the man who called himself Pius Thicknesse truly was: frail, lonely, and worthless. Perhaps it would be best if he just stopped fighting, and yielded fully to the curse he had been resisting ever since the night of its initial application.

And yet…

"But I broke through once, didn't I?" Pius stated slowly, as with great effort and not the least bit of pain, he began to pull himself to his feet, the slack in the chains increasing to accommodate his new position.

"That…that was a fluke…" the doppelganger stammered, far too quickly and without the silkiness that his early pronouncements had held. "You may have gotten lucky, once, but that doesn't change who rules this body!"

"But nevertheless, I'm here, aren't I?" Pius pressed on; things were finally beginning to come together. "True, I may be in chains, but I've seen this sort of flick before. Everything around us is but a creation of my mind, and with just enough focus…"

Pius Thicknesse let his actions finish the remainder of his sentence, as the chains that were locked around his limbs began to dissolve into fine dust, and with wide eyes his imperfect double began to rapidly back away from the advancing Minister.

"That wonderful young man's jinx distracted you, didn't it?" Pius accused, striding forward confidently as his figurative wounds began to shrink and seal up. "And so when you were knocked unconscious immediately afterward, your hold over my mind was sufficiently weakened for me to strike back…just as it was last month, after all that time I spent fighting you tooth-and-nail for survival."

"G…Get away!" the automaton screeched, now timid and defensive. "You…you belong to the Dark Lord! You belong to me!"

"I belong to no man, wretch," Pius uttered coldly, catching his doppelganger by the collar and wheeling him around to face him. "And as for you…you're nothing but the weakest dregs of my character given form, and I've allowed you to bully and cajole me into silence for far too long. Curse or no curse, I'm taking back control. I'm finally waking up."

There was a long, drawn-out scream as the other man twisted and convulsed into a mound of shadow, before Pius Thicknesse reabsorbed the wicked mass and breathed deep, ushering a sense of calmness and serenity into the realm of his mind for the first time in over ten months.

[-]

Pius Thicknesse was awake.

…This wasn't merely to say, of course, that the middle-aged Minister of Magic was physically conscious, although the rough slaps he was currently being assaulted with were ensuring that that fact was quite thoroughly true as well. No, after what seemed like an eternity of slumber he was finally fully conscious mentally, and the simple ability to take in all of his surroundings – the sights, the sounds, even the putrid smells of decimated corridors and abandoned bodies – was about the most euphoric thing that Pius had ever before experienced.

Ethan Yaxley, however, didn't appear to share his colleague's sudden burst of joie de vivre, grunting irritably, "C'mon, you lazy bastard. We need all the free hands we can get down there, now! Argh, Imperio!"

But the curse, despite being cast absolutely flawlessly (so far as Pius could tell, at least), failed to have any sort of effect on its target beyond a mild tingling sensation from his head downward; after what he had just managed to conquer, Pius very much doubted that the Imperius Curse would ever work on him properly again. Still, despite the very, very strong temptation to simply sock Yaxley in the jaw, his lack of understanding over the current battle situation convinced him that playing along would be advantageous…at least for the moment.

"Yes, sir," Pius answered in his best monotone, before kneeling to retrieve his fallen wand from within the folds of his robes and following Yaxley without another word. Looking around as he did, the Minister was able to ascertain fairly quickly that his involuntary transformation had evidently worn off…along with the fact that the earliest rays of dawn were beginning to poke their way through the cracked and worn windows that lined this corridor. As such, if nothing else the fact that Yaxley had come up here looking for reinforcements proved one thing: the castle's defensive forces had survived the night intact.

Double-timing down a series of crumbling staircases, the two men eventually found themselves within the Hogwarts entrance hall, where the scene was utter pandemonium. A string of duelists extending well into the Great Hall were engaged in all-out magical warfare, the Death Eaters abetted by a pair of brutish giants but challenged by another, smaller one, as well as a bizarrely motley armada of wizards, centaurs, flying horses, hippogriffs, and…were those house-elves wielding bloody knives and cleavers?

Pius would've laughed uproariously at the sight, but Yaxley dragged him along to rejoin the fray before he could really formulate much of a plan of attack. Circumstances worked rather well to his advantage, however, as he was immediately set upon by that amazing "Weatherby" fellow as well as one of Scrimgeour's temporary Department Heads (Arthur…something, he was pretty sure), putting up only token resistance until they blasted him into the opposite wall, where he lay still in the grip of a Cushioning Charm.

Now set safe behind "friendly" lines, however, he was in an optimal position for a bit of subtle sabotage; Yaxley went down embarrassingly easily against a pair of much-younger men after receiving a Full-Body Bind Curse straight in the back, whereas Mulciber had much difficulty dodging or blocking the array of Stunners heading his way once sufficiently Confunded. It wasn't quite as ironic a punishment as using a full Imperius would've been, but it was certainly a more-than-adequate substitute in terms of poetic justice.

Rowle, Avery, Jugson, Amycus and Alecto Carrow…again and again the Death Eaters fell, overwhelmed by their opposition's much greater numbers and never catching on for even a moment that there might be a lingering danger within their swiftly mounting pile of fallen bodies. Striking back at the long line of robed psychopaths who had used and abused him to subvert the very institutions of justice and law was, in short, about the most enjoyable activity that Pius Thicknesse had ever indulged in across his largely studious and academic life, and he was loving every single second of it.

Eventually, however, the action did die down, as the Death Eaters' numbers dwindled down to single-digits and then to a resounding zero, what with some incredible woman's spectacular display against Bellatrix Lestrange. It was an astounding sight, seeing that monster who masqueraded as a human crumple lifelessly to the ground, topped afterward only by Harry Potter revealing himself to the crowd with a flourish of what appeared to be an Invisibility Cloak. Astonished cries of, "He's alive!" or some-such sounded all around Pius, which indicated that the boy had apparently been thought-of as dead for at least some stretch of time. But that mattered not; the climactic showdown that this enormous battle had ultimately boiled down to did.

Harry Potter and He-Who-Must-Not-Be-Named – nay, Tom, as the young man was tauntingly referring to his much older nemesis – were circling each other in a mad dance, the boy triumphantly describing every single one of the tyrant's mistakes in careful, almost didactic detail. This was a speech, Pius knew intimately, that would be transcribed word-for-word into a thousand different magical history texts, as would the single exchange of spells that marked their final duel. And just as Harry Potter had spelled out, the volley inevitably ended with Tom sprawled out upon the ground, impacted by the Killing Curse of his own purloined wand.

The day was won.

Much happened after the man whose very name had once struck intimate fear into the hearts of every witch or wizard alive fell dead at Harry Potter's feet, though very little of it had much to do with Pius Thicknesse, who was generally being regarded – along with the rest of the fallen invading forces – with the very minimum of concern. Several squads of diligent students and adults had valiantly chosen to forgo the festivities now roaring throughout the Great Hall in order to sort out their respective situations, piling Death Eater corpses into an unused classroom and attempting to determine which amongst the remainder had been Imperiused, and which had been acting of their own volition. "Weatherby," having been deep within the Ministry's circles for much longer than most, was leading up this operation.

"Alright Minister, now I know you were being coerced, given that little display you put forth right before Harry reappeared," the young redhead said with a smile, offering Pius a seat. "Or did you think no one would notice?"

"You're a sharp boy, Mister Weatherby," Pius Thicknesse slurred; now past the adrenaline rush that combat had triggered within him, the middle-aged man was feeling his lack of food or sleep catch up to him in a major way.

The younger man, however, responded by guffawing wildly, sounding for all the world like a man who was moved to laughter frequently but almost never indulged himself. "If I may be so bold, Minister, the name is 'Weasley'…Percy Weasley. And since I'm more proud to bear that name today than I have been in over twenty-one years, I feel I have the right to insist that it be pronounced correctly."

"Well, if you get to insist on that…then I have one small request to make of you in turn, Mister Weasley," Pius asserted, leaning back in the chair and closing his eyes wearily. "Kindly call me just 'Pius' or 'Mister Thicknesse' from now on. I'm officially abdicating my post, effective immediately."

"Err…very well, Mister Thicknesse," Percy responded with a nod, before offering a hand that the now-former Minister grasped firmly. "Do you have any idea what you're going to do outside of politics, then?"

"That's a good question," Pius Thicknesse replied, chuckling low. "But for the moment, now that I'm finally, finally awake…I actually think that I could go for a good nap."