Blood Vengeance

Chapter 12

Chapter 12

Published: July 13th, 2022

"You want to do what?!" the wizard asked, confused.

Harry sighed. They really should make everyone take Muggle Studies in school. "Can you arrange Scotland Yard to investigate or not?"

"Are muggles even involved?" Stebbins asked, still baffled.

"I don't know, Stebbins. That's what I'm trying to find out!" Harry huffed, indignantly.

"But... I've read the printings about DEK. He Apparates... so he must be a wizard."

"I..." Harry stopped himself. His gut was screaming that DEK was muggleborn, but that was a career-ending thing to say in a post-Voldemort world, even for him. Muggleborns were grossly abused, imprisoned, tortured and killed by Voldemort's supporters. He needed to be careful. "You see, all the crime scenes are in muggle-infested areas. Our suspect must locate these places, and the muggle police may have... evidence on DEK due to his illicit activities in the muggle world."

Stebbins rubbed the back of his neck with his neck and half-heartedly nodded. "Okay, I guess. Seems a bit... weird."

"He works away from wizards. So, can you get the muggles to run the evidence?"

"They have a tendency to get huffy if they don't collect it, themselves," Stebbins said. "I know that much. Fingerprints, sure. Bloodwork... their lab will reject it without their tech's blessing. It's a nightmare to fake clearance. I'd have to enchant five people to do it without question."

Harry pursed his lips. Weird thoughts were forming about how to handle that, but he pushed them aside. "What about identifying where these muggle implements came from?" Harry asked, gesturing to the torture tools.

"Probably, but it'll be a bit," Stebbins grunted.

"Alright... get it started. DEK buys or steals his things from the muggle world. If it's the same store, I need to know."

"Alright, Peasegood said to do what you wanted."

"I also got Herm-someone looking into muggle drugs that were used on the victim. Do you think you can pull reports on missing muggle pharmaceuticals?"

Stebbins stared at him, open-mouthed, and then looked around, cautiously. "I'm not stupid, Harry. You think he's a muggleborn."

Harry also looked around and grunted, "He's killing Death Eaters. I think it's a pretty good possibility, Eric. Or a half-blood. He operates in their world more than others and has no Ministry record."

"And you think that he's muggle enough that he'd be in the muggle police system?"

Harry grimaced. "Yes. It could be for B&E or theft, but muggles track crime with biometric evidence rather than Trace and Revealing Spells."

Stebbins rubbed his neck, again. "We don't usually rely on muggles like this, Harry."

"Well, we got ten dead bodies and a psycho-serial killer staking out and torturing his victims to death. Now isn't the time to be getting bent about using muggle tech."

"Alright, alright! I'll do it."

"Thanks, and... would you be willing to keep this... theory under wraps? It's... important."

Stebbins huffed. "I wouldn't want anyone to know we were even thinking it."

Harry rolled his eyes. "So, fingerprints, blood-if possible, hair analysis, fibers, tools and muggle drugs. Got it?"

"Yeah! Geez. Still think you are crazy, though."

"I'll take it... anything really," Harry said with a sigh. He thanked the dubious Stebbins and went down to the huge open-bay Auror training area. The trainees were doing laps and normally do nothing but train, unless an Auror comes down to dish out "bitch-work" to them. Every trainee wants to do it... do something.