[Memory recovered by L. Jordan from undisclosed DMLE source, 2017. The memory was altered by its source to conceal the identity of all parties; Jordan further redacted the transcript to conceal the identity of his source. Liberties were taken by the editor to include the names of those parties that are evident by context, and altered names were added for clarity. The following transcript records, then, a conversation apparently held in the DMLE in late May 1992 between K. Shacklebolt, the source [REDACTED], a third auror [ALTERED], and (later) Auror Office Head R. Scrimgeour.]
[ALTERED]: [Tossing down a printed parchment] Have you looked at this directive?
SHACKLEBOLT: I wrote the directive.
[ALTERED]: Madness. Why in hell are we going about it?
SHACKLEBOLT: Orders, [ALTERED]. Orders are orders.
[ALTERED]: Orders from who? Don’t tell me Scrim likes this shite.
SHACKLEBOLT: You’re out of line, [ALTERED].
[ALTERED]: To hell I am. A whole hit team on the front drive with only one auror inside. With a Prophet press pass in the foyer – what in hell are they trying to get at? Why not just imperio the blighter and have Dumbledore make the arrest himself?
SHACKLEBOLT: You’re out of line, [ALTERED]. We’re making do with what we have. Orders. Orders are orders.
[REDACTED]: He asks a good question, though, Shack – where are the orders coming from?
SHACKLEBOLT: From me, that’s who. That’s all you need to be concerned with.
[ALTERED]: From you, eh? Well, lot a good they hold then.
SHACKLEBOLT: [raising his voice] Stand down, [ALTERED].
[ALTERED]: My apologies, sir.
SHACKLEBOLT: Don’t ever call me sir.
[ALTERED]: I mean it though when I say it. What in hell are we getting at if its not a publicity shot? We had the fucker already in Serbia. [REDACTED] was there. You had him, didn’t you, [REDACTED]?
[REDACTED]: We had him.
[ALTERED]: So why in hell go to all this shite to get him again? We’ve been sitting on this bugger for a year now, accumulating – what in Merlin’s arsehole have we even been accumulating?
SHACKLEBOLT: That’s classified.
[ALTERED]: Classified by who? Us? Or downstairs?
SHACKLEBOLT: Classified means classified.
[ALTERED]: And orders mean orders. Real company man you’ve become, Shack.
SHACKLEBOLT: And if you aren’t then you ought to hand in your badge, [ALTERED].
[ALTERED]: I en’t in it for the company. To hell with Fudge. I’m in it to send Death Eaters to the dementors. Now I’ve got one right here, and what am I doing but sitting in a basement for 10 hours waiting on cue from some bug-eyed lily from Level Nine to make a call that I can –
SHACKLEBOLT: [standing up] Enough. This is an Auror Office operation, [ALTERED], and I’m not going to –
[ALTERED]: Auror Office, bullshit, it’s –
SHACKLEBOLT: [shouting] I said you’re out of –
[A door opens.]
SCRIMGEOUR: What in hell are you lasses shouting about in here?
[ALTERED]: Hey Scrim.
SHACKLEBOLT: Sir.
SCRIMGEOUR: Sir’s right. Am I hearing you lot have questions? Am I right to hear you’re questioning an order?
[A long pause. No one speaks.]
[ALTERED]: [finally raising his voice] Alright, I am. Not questioning the doing, mind you, just questioning the why in hell I’m doing it. I been here a few years, Scrim – sir – I know your style. This en’t it.
SCRIMGEOUR: This is Shacklebolt’s operation. What’d he tell you?
[ALTERED]: He told me it’s orders.
SCRIMGEOUR: Ah. Passing the buck, eh, Shacklebolt?
[Shacklebolt does not respond.]
SCRIMGEOUR: Well, I’ll pass it further. I don’t like it any more than any of you. If it’d been me calling the shots I’d have had the bugger dragged back from Albanian and slapped in chains at the Cauldron the day he stepped back on Albian soil. I’m an operations man. I’m like you, [REDACTED], a soldier from the Crouch days. But it’s a new day now, a new way to fight. We shoot to stun now and we do it in front of the cameras and the quip quills. The press is the battleground in these latter days. I don’t like it but I take it. I’m a soldier, [ALTERED]. I take orders. If you want to be a rogue, there’s other employment for you.
[REDACTED]: Go join the Order.
[Laughter.]
[ALTERED]: Like I says, I’m not questioning doing, just questioning. Where’s the buck go to if it en’t you? Bones? Or downstairs?
SCRIMGEOUR: We are One Ministry, [ALTERED]. Damned if I care which department makes the call.
[ALTERED]: Downstairs then, eh? That’s why we’re waiting on them, eh, to make the call? Waiting until they get what they want out of it? Wonder what that is. Wonder what exactly they’ve got down in that little oubliette. Something to do with something that someone didn’t catch out of Gringotts back August, eh? I read that report. Or with some class-Bs out of Hogsmeade, maybe? I read that report too. Call me a soldier all you like, Scrim, but I got eyes and ears and a memory to boot. Something’s up in Crane’s department. Crane’s up to summat and Bones’s got no backbones to stop it.
[A long pause. No one speaks.]
SCRIMGEOUR: I’m writing you up, [ALTERED]. Insubordination.
[ALTERED]: [shrugging] Won’t be the first. Taking me off the operation too?
SCRIMGEOUR: Wouldn’t you like it. You’re changing places with Dawlish. You’ll sit with a two-way in Hogsmeade and you’ll wait until our joint operator calls the operation. Shacklebolt, do you hear me?
SHACKLEBOLT: I hear you, sir.
SCRIMGEOUR: Tell your man what he’s doing.
SHACKLEBOLT: You’re watching the exit, [ALTERED]. You’ll sit quiet and you’ll watch it. [He stretches his neck.] Do you know what that is?
[ALTERED]: What is it?
SHACKLEBOLT: An order.
[[ALTERED] scowls. Scrimgeour smirks.]
SCRIMGEOUR: Well, Kingsley. Maybe an officer you’ll make after all. Now all you lot clear out. Too much gossip, not enough work.
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THE PENSIEVE PAPERS 