Good riddance to February

[alt_selwyn]

This has been a thoroughly difficult month; the continued spread of Black's paralysis alone would have seen to this, but naturally Black never sows trouble in one field when he can sow it in ten. There is at least a light at the end of the tunnel regarding the sickness, but it remains rather remote at present.

I have instructed all my staff to give whatever help MLE requires with the ongoing investigation into both Archer's death and the matter he was being questioned about. In the meantime, I sent word today to Muggleborn Labour regarding the family of the disgraced younger brother; records show they are all alive and even healthy, and they are to be taken into protective custody immediately and removed to a location where they can be quarantined until the epidemic is over. Final decisions will of course not be made until the investigation is complete, but naturally some leniency can be expected for the family of a Protectorate subject who has made a strenuous and sincere (if belated) demonstration of loyalty.

I am optimistic that March will be better, especially if the formula for stopping the spread of Black's paralysis proves good.

Comments

[alt_ron]

I don't think I'd be able to sleep.

And if I did go to sleep, but I kept writing anyway, that really couldn't be good, could it?

[alt_selwyn]

So how are things at Hogwarts? Is everyone bearing up under the quarantine well enough?

[alt_ron]

Um. Good morning, sir.

I think I'm all better now. I mean, I'm pretty sure I'm not hexed any more, but I thought maybe it wouldn't be polite to ignore your question because, actually, it's a pretty important one.

I think for the most part we're doing all right here, but sometimes--and it's really hard to guess when it could happen, I mean, it always comes dead out of the blue--sometimes somebody snaps and goes absolutely shouty crackers here. Or does something really awful.

I mean, I think it's two things. We're all kind of feeling, I don't know, strained, maybe? all the time and so, sometimes somebody'll just reach a place where it's too much--maybe because they've got a Potion that went pear shaped, or they've got a Charms parchment due, or because it snowed for the sixth day in a row, or because they were expecting an owl from home but it didn't come, or because somebody looked squintwise at them, or whatever--and so they just explode like a dung bomb going off or they come out in hairy hives and have to go to Madam Pomfrey. But then there're other people, ones who see how everyone's hanging on just by their nose hairs or whatever, and they figure out how to make things work to their advantage. Like they'll tell some firstie that they heard noises in the walls at night, and so that firstie starts having screaming fits in the middle of the next night, and then while all the Prefects and everyone are busy dealing with the firstie, the person who told the fib will go nick something from someone, or they'll slip out and do whatever they wanted even though it's after curfew. And some of those people are taking advantage of the fact that almost nobody's ever out around the castle during the evenings, because all the normal people are too scared to go anywhere alone or they're all revising for NEWTs or whatever, and so the people who want to get up to mischief, they can go pretty much anywhere they want and do whatever because they can count on no one seeing them unless it's just seeing them slip back into a room or a dormitory or a club meeting or the library or whatever when they're done. It's really interesting. You can sort of watch people doing this if you know what to look for. I mean, I don't know what they get up to, but I see them coming and going from places sometimes, and I figure it's like chess and they've got some long game going. Or maybe they've just got bad digestive tracts and have to go see Madam Pomfrey a lot in the evenings.

So that's it. We're mostly going on with it pretty well, but everyone's pretty edgy, and every day there's some little thing that makes somebody go all banshee on us, and that grates a little bit more off everybody else's nerves.

Anywiz, I hope you have a good day, sir. I'm really sorry to have pestered you yesterday. It was awfully nice of you to not get cross about it.