G. Lippert - JAMES POTTER AND THE VAULT OF DESTINIES

"Douglas Treete, General Arbiter of the Wizarding Court of the United States of America, Philadelphia Station," he said blandly. "Overseeing the preliminary interrogation of one Ignatius Karloff Magnussen, detained for various charges, including theft and misuse of corpses, torture, and suspicion of murder. I have chosen to use this skull as the relic for this interrogation since it serves as Exhibit A for the case in question. I am accompanied by Benjamin Amadeus Franklyn, Head of the Alma Aleron Technomancy Department, and immediate superior of the defendant. Professor Magnussen, if you would state your full name for the record."

James turned his attention to the man seated across from Franklyn and the arbiter. Magnussen was large with a barrel chest and a square head crowned with a fringe of short grey hair. His expression was grim, his dark brow lowered over a sharp, finely sculpted nose.

"I am Professor Ignatius Karloff Magnussen the Third," he said, and James was surprised by the man's cultured, pleasant voice. Unlike most Americans, Magnussen spoke with a distinct British accent.

Zane leaned toward James and Ralph and whispered, "I heard that he never approved of America's break from England. In protest, he always spoke in what he called 'the King's English'."

James frowned and listened as Treete, the arbiter, spoke again.

"You are aware of the allegations against you, Professor Magnussen?"

Magnussen didn't respond. He simply stared across the table, his eyes like steel marbles. Treete cleared his throat.

"For the record, Professor, you are accused, at the very least, of dabbling in forbidden practices that threaten the stability of the dimensional hierarchy. Is it true that you have sought to control the future by exploitation of the Wizarding Grand Unification Theory?"

Magnussen remained utterly impassive. James could tell that the man was listening, for he stared at the men across from him as if he intended to pin them to a corkboard like butterflies. He simply did not seem to feel the need to respond to their questions. Franklyn, for his own part, appeared completely miserable. His face was pale behind his square spectacles.

"So be it, then," Treete said, adjusting his own glasses and peering down at a parchment in front of him. "You are further accused of opening a rift between dimensions, something legendarily referred to as the Nexus Curtain, with no regard to the consequences. How do you respond to this allegation?"

Magnussen did not stir. He might as well have been an extremely lifelike statue.

Treete had apparently resigned himself to Magnussen's silence. "Additionally, sir, you are accused of stealing bodies from the campus graveyard and conducting unlawful dissections of them. This skull, as I have mentioned, is Exhibit A in regard to that allegation. It was found in the basement of this very house, along with the sort of tools one might expect to use for such purposes. Furthermore, you are suspected in the abduction and torture of as many as eight Muggle citizens of the city of Philadelphia. Evidence of hasty Obliviation has only succeeded in destroying these victims' ability to identify their tormentor, but has left traces of memories of this school and the magical world at large."

Treete took off his glasses and stared hard at Magnussen. "Such acts, if they are proven to be true, break any number of very serious laws, Professor, not to mention the law of common human decency to which we all profess to ascribe. None of these, however, are as serious as the final accusation. As you are certainly aware, the corpse of a young Muggle woman, an impoverished local seamstress by the name of Fredericka Staples, was recently found in an alley near the entrance to this school. Her body was mutilated nearly beyond recognition and she was missing a single boot. That missing boot, sir, was discovered two nights past in the basement of this home. I must ask you again: how do you respond to these allegations?"

Magnussen stirred for the first time, but when he spoke, he addressed Franklyn. "Was it you who summoned the authorities?" he asked, his voice merely conversational.

"You gave me little choice," Franklyn replied quietly. "Research is one thing, Ignatius. This…" He shook his head.

Magnussen smiled tightly. "You always were too weak to appreciate the risks associated with any great endeavor. You, Benjamin, are an academician. You are not like me. You are not an explorer."

"Yours is not a dream of exploration," Franklyn replied, his face darkening. "It is an obsession with power. This is not one of your fanciful stories of the heroic outcast struggling against ignorant foes. Your actions have affected real people. I should have intervened months ago when I discovered that you were experimenting with the Wizarding Grand Unification Theory. The Octosphere was bad enough, but at least it turned out to be harmless. Attempting to observe and measure all things at once, in the name of domination, is a madman's fantasy."

"I was mistaken, I agree," Magnussen replied, as if he and Franklyn were merely discussing the matter as friends. "I was preoccupied with the microscopic. I fell into the conviction that observing all things meant breaking the world down into smaller and smaller bits, recording the actions of even the most infinitesimal details—the motion of blood corpuscles through the pathways of arteries, the firing of neurons in individual human brains. I studied these things in great detail, learning what I could from the dead, gaining even more knowledge from my systematic studies of the living. You choose to call it torture, of course, and yes, even murder, because you fail to grasp the monumental nature of the end goal. What is mere infliction of pain in the face of perfect understanding? What is one paltry life in the name of the total unification of the cosmos?"

"Ignatius," Franklyn interrupted. "Stop! You are only making matters worse for yourself."

"Eventually," Magnussen went on, now leaning slightly over the table, his eyes bright, "I determined that I was thinking too much like my fellows, failing where all those before me had failed. With that realization, I remembered my Heraldium ; 'He who fails to see the mountain stumbles headlong over the pebbles.' Don't you see? The secret was not in the microscopic at all, Benjamin. The secret, of course, was in the macroscopic ! Not the tiny, but the monumental! Totality of measurement could only be accomplished when one could view the totality of realities ! I knew then what I had to do. I had to break out of the confines of this dimension and find a place where I could observe all dimensions at once . What you call a mere legend, I have walked upon with my own two feet. I have been through the Nexus Curtain. I have trod the World Between the Worlds and witnessed the pathways into every other dimension."

Treete shook his head, his eyes narrowed. "Am I to understand then, Professor, that you are admitting to all of the allegations leveled against you?"

"Please, Ignatius," Franklyn said, nearly pleading with the big man across from him. "Your obsessions have driven you to madness. Whatever you have done, whatever you have seen, it has obviously affected you in some dreadful way. There is help for you here, if you choose to seek it. Beware what you say, lest you forfeit that option."

Magnussen chuckled drily. "You think that I should care what this little man can do to me? Let him attempt to stop me. I am beyond the rim now, Benjamin. I am past the event horizon of destiny, incapable of returning even if I wished to. And I do not wish to. I embrace my mission. I will go to it with great relish."

Treete pushed back his chair and stood up. "I am afraid that I have no choice then, sirs. Out of respect for your position, Professor Magnussen, and at your personal request, Professor Franklyn, I leave you now to formulate my verdict. You can expect my return within the week, along with a cadre of wizarding police, to escort the defendant to the Crystal Mountain for processing. Professor Franklyn, for the interim, will you state your willing assumption of full responsibility for the guarding of the defendant?"