Chapter I: Shades of Grey

It was a rotten night to be out and about. The rain poured down in a steady, workmanlike fashion that spoke of great stamina, and promised to continue falling until dawn. The Death Eaters clustered beneath the trees, which they could afford to do because it was too damn cold for any electrical activity. At least a good thunderstorm would have given tonight’s little exercise a bit of tone, the more poetically minded ones reflected, but somehow the idea of going out and doing evil deeds at five-thirty on a vile November evening was distinctly unappealing.

It didn’t help that the appointed raid leader was young, inexperienced and rather irritatingly keen. Being an extremely methodical sort, he’d obtained a map of the small village they were meant to be doing over from God only knew where, and had spent several hours forming squads and assigning sectors of responsibility and generally wasting his and everybody else’s time.

“Right, lads. Everyone know which sector they’re in?” he said in his best Voice of Authority, which was not terribly impressive. “Good. Form up by units and-”

The little woodland clearing was brilliantly illuminated, a minature sun hovering over them.

“What the fucking hell was that?” someone yelped. Everyone drew their wands, then started as three or four spherical objects landed in their midst.

“Oh, shit-”

There was a ragged sequence of deafening explosions, hurling bodies and parts of bodies all around. The survivors hurled spells every which way, blowing a dozen trees to splinters but hitting nothing. Then the second attack came, roaring streams of fire and smoke and hurtling projectiles. One of the brighter Death Eaters shot a blasting hex in the direction of a muzzle flash, but it went high. In return, his chest and torso were hacked open by a dozen bullets, blowing parts of his body out through his clothing.

At last, silence fell. A dozen masked figures appeared from the trees, holding strange staves…

Guns, the sole survivor realised. Muggle weapons. We were wiped out by muggles!

One masked individual knelt down in front of him, and waved over one of the others. “Let go of your wand and keep your hands visible,” instructed one of them; he couldn’t tell which; their masks covered all but their eyes, and his mind was getting blurry at the edges. “Answer all our questions to the best of your ability, and you’ll live. Fail to cooperate, and the brief remainder of your life will not be at all enjoyable. Understand?”

The Death Eater nodded weakly. A bandage was bound tightly a the wound in his leg, and he was levitated by two wands -mudbloods, then, rather than outright muggles- and deposited not very gently in the back of a vehicle of some kind. His hands were tied to something, and he found himself staring at a dozen pairs of combat boots.

I wonder if I’ll live long enough to have to explain this to the Dark Lord?

Lucius surveyed the carnage with an expression of utter disgust. “Thirty of our finest,” he snarled, “brought down with muggle toys!”

“A device that throws lead projectiles at something over the speed of sound is no toy, Malfoy,” Snape replied. “I think they used grenades as well.”

“What?”

“A type of hand-thrown bomb designed to shower the immediate vicinity with fragments of steel. Most of them died that way, if I’m any judge. The rest were taken out with machine guns of some description, probably heavy-duty military weapons.”

Lucius spat. “It’s ridiculous. Even the Ministry wouldn’t stoop so low as to fight like muggles!”

“I very much doubt it’s the Ministry, Lucius,” Severus conceded. “And muggles? No. Muggleborn, perhaps, but that’s not important. No, Malfoy, I believe this is the work of another agency.”

“You believe that this is the work of some concerned citizens, Severus?” Bellatrix laughed, looking up from a complex residual magic tracer.

“Something like that. Muggleborns or halfbloods who have lost loved ones to our campaign, embittered Squibs, maybe even the odd renegade pureblood. But ‘concerned’ is not quite the word I’d choose. ‘Enraged’ might be a better term, or perhaps ‘homicidally furious’…” He smiled without humour. “Don’t you see it? This was the act of cold-blooded killers. They’re not interested in merely sending us to Azkaban, or what passes for due process of law. They hate us.”

There was a sharp crack as Voldemort arrived. “Fucking hell!” he exclaimed.

“Indeed,” Severus said grimly. “No apparation trace, no disapparation trace and the only spell-signatures that didn’t come from one of our people were a couple of levitation charms. Oh, and one man is still unaccounted for.”

“Taken alive?” Voldemort hissed.

“We must assume so. We’ll know which one it was once we’ve identified all these bodies. All in all, it’s not been a terribly good day, Master.”

“Severus,” Lucius added sneeringly, “believes that this was the work of muggles.”

“That’s not quite what I said,” Severus replied. “They are however using muggle weapons.”

“I can see that. But who the hell were they? Dumbledore’s too soft for this kind of carnage, and not even the Ministry would stoop to employing muggle soldiers, would they?”

“The muggle armed forces fight according to rules, the same as the DMLE’s if not stricter,” Severus replied. “I suspect that this was the work of some kind of paramilitary organisation.”

“Vigilantes. Wonderful,” Voldemort growled. “Finish clearing up here, and report anything you find out. I will be in my chambers.” He apparated away with a sharp crack, and sat down heavily in an overstuffed armchair in his private quarters.

“A very unpleasant development, Nagini,” he remarked grimly. “Say what you like about muggles, they’ve always been rather good at killing each other. And now some mudbloods come out of the woodwork from Lord only knows where wanting to try the same tricks on us.”

“Then this is all part of our great destiny, Master,” she replied. “The struggle between our way and Dumbledore’s is reaching its endgame.”

“That is one interpretation,” he agreed. “What concerns me at the moment is that the opposition seem, however momentarily, to have the upper hand.”

Two hours later, Severus returned to his quarters in Hogwarts and was mildly surprised to find a note waiting for him. He picked it up, and looked it over with interest.

Dear Severus,

I thought you might like to know that young Robertson is in St Mungo’s recovering from a serious but not life-threatening gunshot wound, among other things. Hospital tests will show he’s had veritaserum used on him, so try and get the Boss to go easy on the poor little sod; he’s only in the movement to please his father.

Oh, and try to find excuses to be out of London for the next few weeks; we’re going to be crossing some names off what we call The List, and someone might wonder why you aren’t on it.

Warmest regards,

Mr Grey.

“Well, well, well…” Severus carefully laid down the note. Could they be in contact with the Order? But even if they are, I can’t believe that Albus would furnish them with my name… except for this list, of course.

There was only one thing for it. Severus folded the note and strode to the headmaster’s office.

“Ah, Severus. Come in, I was about to make tea. Will you join me?”

“Yes, thank you.” Severus handed him the note. “I think you need to see this, Albus.”

Dumbledore read the note with interest. “Mr Grey has commendable powers of deduction,” he concluded. “Though I suppose that you’re the most likely candidate…”

Severus just stared.

“Someone identifying himself as ‘Mr Grey’ contacted me some weeks ago, describing himself as the leader of an organisation not dissimilar to our own and suggesting that we pool our intelligence and occasionally collaborate. He claims to have an inside source of his own, though he naturally did not mention their name, but everything they could learn was verified by your own reports.”

“You might have told me,” Severus complained. “It could have been a trap.”

“Your name was not mentioned, and Voldemort is already fully aware that his organisation has been penetrated. As for not informing you, I feared that Mr Grey’s organisation would be placed in jeopardy if the information were disseminated widely.”

Like most spies, Severus was a great believer in the need-to-know principle, and conceded the point. “Very well. Now, would you like to know what he did to tonight’s muggle-baiting raid?”

Albus wasn’t sure he liked Snape’s tone. “Do tell,” he replied.

“It was ambushed. Most of them were killed by a bomb-blast and the rest were shot dead, apart from Robertson who they carried off with them. I’m afraid to even contemplate what they did to him.”

Albus sat back in his chair. “Good Lord! Muggle weapons?”

“Yes, and not the sort that one can easily come by. Heavy-calibre, fully automatic rifles of some sort, and several hand grenades. Not a single spell used, in fact.”

Albus took a few moments to absorb this. “I see.”

“I believe we may have rather raised the stakes on Riddle,” Severus continued. “Someone out there is playing to his rules now.”

Dumbledore gave this due consideration. “Perhaps that is no bad thing.”

Severus took it upon himself to visit Robertson in hospital the next day. “Pretty grim,” the Healer reported. “I’ve only ever seen one case as bad, and that was in Belfast. And they didn’t use a single spell on him.”

“What did they use?” Severus asked guardedly.

“Apart from the Armalite? Let’s see…” The Healer began ticking off a list. “One plank of wood, a couple of cigarettes, two hundred and forty volts of electrical current and a shotgun of some description for his kneecaps. Oh, and at least three pairs of boots.”

“Charming lot,” Severus replied grimly.

Robertson was sitting up in bed, drinking awful hospital tea. “Verisateum first,” he explained grimly. “The rest was just for fun. Catch me wasting my time with the Cruciacus in future; that’s amateur stuff!”

“Did you see any faces?”

“No, they all wore masks, woolen ones like those Irish muggles go around in. Any of the boys make it?”

“I’m afraid not.”

Robertson hung his head. “They were good lads. I think we got a couple.”

“If they did, they carried their bodies away with them. Did you see any?”

“No, but they might have had a second vehicle. I was down on the floor of the van both times. I remember it being white, If that helps.”

Severus formed a mental picture of the Dark Lord scrying for a white van. “Not really, I’m afraid. Anything else you noticed?”

Robertson laughed. “I was having the shit kicked out of me, remember?”

“What news, Severus?” Voldemort demanded.

“Robertson knew nothing, which is probably why he’s still alive. It seems they used the verisateum on him first and laid into him afterwards, presumably just for the hell of it.”

The assembled Death Eaters exchanged worried looks, but Voldemort merely seemed thoughtful. “Then perhaps they might soon become disenchanted with Dumbledore,” he said after a moment. “We might even find a use for them, don’t you agree?”

“Mudbloods who affect muggle toys?” Lucius spat.

“You bloody idiot,” snapped Rodolphus. “You saw the mess they left behind. Better to have them on the inside pissing out than on the outside pissing in, I say.”

“Assuming they don’t just tell us where to shove it, of course,” Bellatrix qualified. “They might conceivably end up in opposition to Dumbledore, or at least the Ministry, but whether they’ll actively support us even for their own ends is another matter. I for one am not holding my breath.”

“Hmm,” Voldemort conceded. “We must explore the possibility further. Severus, Peter, see what you can find out about these renegades. I don’t suppose anyone knows of a Mr Grey?”

“Even if it’s his real name, there must be a dozen men with that surname,” Severus replied. “We need a face, a voice, something we’d recognise. The one thing Robertson could say for certain was that everyone he saw and heard spoke with a British accent, which tends to suggest that most if not all of them attended Hogwarts.”

“Well that hardly narrows things down,” Rodolphus complained. “I don’t suppose Robertson noticed anything else? A distinctive regional accent, maybe?”

“Not that he mentioned. Once he can walk we can get try and him out of St Mungo’s and in front of a pensieve.”

“Better yet,” Voldemort replied, “I shall instruct Young Barty to twist his father’s arm a little and have Robertson released on bail. Until then, we will pursue other lines of inquiry. I want you to go out to every inn and tavern in the country, and listen. If you hear anything about these vigilantes, no matter how insignificant, follow it up. A rumour, a braggart, anything!” He paused a moment. “And don’t get so drunk you don’t remember what they told you, Peter!”

Antonin Dolohov had taken a room at the Leaky Cauldron for the weekend, and when Tom called for last orders he gave up for the night and made haste for his bed. Tiredness and the steady accumulation of alcohol in his bloodstream over the past few hours were already taking their toll, and he almost fell as he ascended the staircase.

He closed the door behind him, drawing the bolt across but not troubling with anything more elaborate, and began to undress. He had just removed his cloak when the door was smashed open with a hefty kick. Dolohov spun around, reaching for his wand, but never even managed to take hold of it. He saw a head of dark blonde hair and a pistol with a bulky cylinder screwed to the barrel, then a flash accompanied by a dull thwack. What he saw after that is a matter for opinion.

“Probably a mechanical sound-suppressor rather than a spell,” Moody declared. “There’s no residual trace of anything except a glamour cancellation, presumably for his Mark.” The skull-and-serpent was clearly visible on Dolohov’s upper arm. “Any luck, Black?”

“Nothing. The bogs are right next to the stairs, and about twenty customers went to take a slash when Tom called time. We’ll never trace them all, and the other guests swear blind they didn’t hear a thing. We could ask for permission to use verisateum, but without a murder weapon or any witnesses…” Sirius shrugged helplessly.

“So the trail goes cold,” Alastor replied without much sorrow. “What can you tell us so far, Masters?”

The forensics expert, a Squib who worked for the Metropolitan Police and did some occasional work for the DMLE, examined the base of one of the five cartridge cases under a magnifying glass. “Nine-millimetre parabellum, a cheap commercial brand you can buy from any licensed dealer, and also plentiful on the black market. I can’t tell you exactly what fired them until I’ve had a look with a microscope, but it looks like they came from a large military-type pistol or small sub-machine gun; the rounds are too deep in the plaster for anything much smaller, a PPK or something like that. As for who fired them,” he added, “all I can say for sure is that they were about average height and a fairly good shot. Look at that grouping.” The bullet holes in the plaster were no more than a centimetre apart. “Not bad, even at a target that’s only a couple of yards away.”

“Efficient vigilantes,” Mody growled. “Oh, happy day!”

But as he returned to the Ministry to make his report, he found himself wondering about that. When policemen raise objections to people taking the law into their own hands, they usually mean that when some young hooligan sprays graffiti on your fence you should report him to the police instead of going out and stabbing him to death with a garden fork, however tempting the latter option may be. But when there’s a large body of men and women dedicated to world-domination and ethnic cleansing operating on your doorstep and the government is seemingly fighting a losing battle, who the hell does the law belong to?

He was still pondering that question the next day when the DMLE’s muggle colleagues sent their results. The post-mortem had confirmed what Masters had already inferred about the gunman’s marksmanship -Dolohov had died almost instantly from bullets through his lungs and spinal column- and also determined that hollow-point rounds had been used, which was confirmed when what was left of them was prised out of the plaster. The ballistics lab could do nothing with them; after their brief but eventful flight through the unfortunate Death Eater and into the wall they resembled lumps of very old Blu-Tac as much as anything else, any marks from the rifling totally obliterated. Careful study of the cartridge cases had tentatively identified the murder weapon as a fairly old but well-maintained Browning High-Power, but without recovering the actual weapon and acquiring a useable fingerprint they were at a dead end.

“The gun’s probably at the bottom of the river by now,” Moody growled, dropping the reports into his Out tray. “Looks to me like we’ve hit a dead-end on this one.”

“So what do we do?” replied Sirius. “Wait for the next Death Eater to get gunned down?”

“No. We wait for whoever’s doing this to get careless or unlucky.”

They had a much shorter wait for the former condition to be met than the latter; this was just the first in a series of what the contemporary muggle press would call ‘paramilitary-style’ killings of prominent Death Eaters, coupled with frequent ambushes of raids and meetings. The weapons varied somewhat, but always on a theme of anything cheap, reliable and fairly easy to get hold of on the black market. Connections with the IRA were postulated but never confirmed, and if the few surviving Death Eaters knew anything useful it never got back to the DMLE. All anyone was reasonably certain of was that there were between twenty and thirty members of this organisation, and that all but a handful were wand-users. There was the usual wild media speculation about identities and motive, but nothing concrete ever emerged.

The media was reluctant to condemn the violence, and public opinion was divided; Death Eater atrocities had filled the papers for months, and large sections of the population -particularly but not exclusively Squibs or those with at least some muggle heritage- regarded the vigilantes as public heroes. Opinions on both sides were still being heard when the brutal, no-quarter struggle was overshadowed by the events of a certain Halloween Night.

Then the bar-room debaters and writers of letters to the Daily Prophet had something to really argue about.