For the Greater Good || Tom Riddle ||

Chapter Eleven: Diagnostics

Gwen woke up in a sweat. It was the fourth night in a row where she could not sleep. She tried to reason that it was the break in her routine, the visit to Hogwarts and Knockturn Alley, that brought on these strange night terrors. Scenes of darkness, silence and screaming, twisted limbs and the scent of charred hair. Her eyes roamed to the clock, and she was displeased to find that it was already half past five in the morning.

Begrudgingly, she slumped out of bed—her silk pajamas sliding smoothly against the Egyptian cotton. The autumn sun had yet to rise as she padded barefoot into the kitchen to make herself a cup of tea. A London Fog was her to go to nowadays, having been introduced to her by Simon's wife, Vea. Earl Grey tea with swirls of honey and warm cream soothed her groggy throat and made her apartment smell delightful in the early hours.

After fixing herself a piece of toast and jam to pair with it, Gwen eased herself down into her breakfast nook that overlooked the sleepy street down below. With a wave of her wand, out came her most current notes and calculations for work.

The department was pushing for publication by the Minister, even though the team lead, Bukunmi Shacklebolt, insisted that the Unspeakables needed more time for their experimentation.

No thanks to Dumbledore...

He had made her late for her most recent dosing, and her present supervisor, Joyia Boot, certainly let her know that was not appreciated behavior "Here at the Ministry." Although Gwen had been working in the Department of Mysteries for two years, she was the newest addition to the Love faction. And even though she had churned out the most publications that the subdepartment had seen in a decade, she was still not treated as an equal in most professional regards.

"Ageism", Simon cited.

"Sexism", Vea would say.

In reality, it was most likely a mix of both.

Dosings were never pleasant. The process involved entering a one-way observation room and being given a small vial of the newest brew of Amortentia by an unmasked colleague. After the initial imprinting, as they called it, the selected colleague would leave the room and the experiment would begin. The dosed Unspeakable was then subject to a slew of tasks. What started off as a challenge to complete various simple arithmetic problems escalated to various physical challenges, elementary spells and finally, some questionably unethical and complicated tasks.

Just three days ago, she had knocked the teeth out of an Azkaban prisoner polyjuiced to look like Ezri Monasma, her closest in-age coworker.

There were both chuckles and expectant sighs as blood dribbled down the ever-morphing face of Ezri, who actually was a 40-year-old wizard who was charged with the rape and murder of an expecting witch, who had been involved in a love triangle with him and another man.

The real Ezri winced behind the one-way window, her wide set eyes squinting with phantom pain as a molar clattered to the floor.

Gwen clenched her jaw and blinked in frustration.

The charm placed on the observation room lifted and the sterile room came back into existence as several team members entered. Bukunmi led the way, followed by Ezri, and two middle-aged men Gwen liked to call Tweedle-Dee and Tweedle-Dum, but were really named Albert Ames and Jack Baldridge, followed behind.

Albert broke the silence first.

"The boys should call you "killer", Doge! What is that," he pretended to count on his fingers, "you're twelfth one?"

"That's gotta be a new record," Jack chimed in.

Gwen ignored them between half-lidded eyes.

Bukunmi cleared his throat and shuffled forward. "Ames, owl maintenance. Let them clean up this mess," he said as he casted a disgusted glance at the small pool of blood and saliva gathering on the floor. "Monasma, diagnostic charm."