SCRIMGEOUR OF NEED and the HP Alliance

Here's the latest. I know chess as a metaphor is way overused. But it seemed valid here.

SCRIMGEOUR OF NEED
a very short play by Dean O’Carroll

Lights up on a bare room with a small table in the middle with two uncushioned chairs. A Wizard Chess board is set up on the table.

RUFUS SCRIMGEOUR enters. His limp is gone and he seems to enjoy freer movement, not that he shows any pleasure in it.

SCRIMGEOUR
Very well.

ALBUS DUMBLEDORE enters.

DUMBLEDORE
Minister.

SCRIMGEOUR
Well I can’t say I expected to find you here.

DUMBLEDORE
Our conversations during the last year of my life were far too often short and acrimonious. Perhaps now we can truly talk.

SCRIMGEOUR
Fair enough.

DUMBLEDORE
And perhaps a game of Wizard Chess? As I recall you were always fond of games of strategy.

SCRIMGEOUR
Yes, yes. Haven’t had much time for games, but now I suppose it’s acceptable.

They sit and play. Moments pass.

SCRIMGEOUR
I didn’t give up your boy, Potter, you know.

DUMBLEDORE
I do know that. For that I am very grateful.

SCRIMGEOUR
Infuriating boy. Admirable, certainly, and brave as they come, but … unwise move, I’ll have your bishop now.

DUMBLEDORE
Well played.

More time passes as they play. After a moment, SCRIMGEOUR breaks.

SCRIMGEOUR
Death Eaters in the Ministry! Damn! How could this have happened, Dumbledore? How could I have let this happen?

DUMBLEDORE
You fought with all your might. We can ask no more of you than that.

SCRIMGEOUR
It should have been your job, Dumbledore. Robards is a fine Auror, but perhaps if you’d been Minister and I remained Head Auror –

DUMBLEDORE
You will never win a game of chess if you think only of past moves you should have made. As for myself as Minister … might I demonstrate something?

SCRIMGEOUR
Go ahead.

DUMBLEDORE
This will require a change to the rules. You will play with one king and all your other pieces pawns. All my pieces shall be queens.

SCRIMGEOUR
That hardly seems fair. The queen is the most powerful piece on the board, pawns are weak.

DUMBLEDORE
Kindly allow me to finish. Because I have no king for you to capture, any piece of mine you take will count as a victory for you.

SCRIMGEOUR
Interesting. Interesting. Very well, Dumbledore. Proceed.

They play a bit.

DUMBLEDORE
I’m capturing quite a few of your pawns, Rufus.

SCRIMGEOUR
That’s elemental strategy, Dumbledore. You sacrifice the pawns to bring you closer to your goal.

DUMBLEDORE
But, of course, I cannot make those sacrifices. For me, every piece is equally valuable and every loss equally tragic.

SCRIMGEOUR looks at DUMBLEDORE for a moment. He rises.

SCRIMGEOUR
Very well, very well. I see your point. So that is why you could not have been Minister of Magic? Because you couldn’t sacrifice a pawn?

DUMBLEDORE
Because I cannot see anyone as a pawn. Because I thought my abilities would best be used to teach and to make every wizard a king or a queen.

SCRIMGEOUR
You cannot win a war without sacrifice, Dumbledore. Would either of us be here if we had not sacrificed ourselves for the cause?

DUMBLEDORE
There we are in agreement. I have asked many people to make sacrifices and the losses they suffer weigh greatly upon me. But I never looked upon them as pawns or thought their only value was as a sacrifice.

SCRIMGEOUR
That is all well and good, but I see no evidence that your method is more likely to succeed than mine. In fact, in this game before us, I’m fairly certain I have mate in three.

DUMBLEDORE
But we are not truly playing against each other, are we, Rufus? We are two unified forces against a common foe.

DUMBLEDORE waves his wand the board changes so now his and SCRIMGEOUR’s pieces seem to be on one side against a squad of enormous evil-looking pieces.

DUMBLEDORE
And a number of those pawns that you have sacrificed are now on that other side.

DUMBLEDORE waves the wand again and the captured pawns join the evil side.

DUMBLEDORE
Most are there under the Imperius Curse, to be certain. But more than a few joined Voldemort out of a sense of bitterness and betrayal.

SCRIMGEOUR
… Shunpike. That was the sticking point for Potter. Stan Shunpike – spotty faced git from the Knight Bus.

DUMBLEDORE
Who now hides that spotty face beneath a Death Eater’s mask.

SCRIMGEOUR
He was there when they took the Ministry. Didn’t do much in the fight, but helped hold me down when they started with the Cruciatus Curse. Imperiused, of course, but … every wizard a king or queen, Dumbledore?

DUMBLEDORE
Perhaps it would be nice.

SCRIMGEOUR
And what do we do now?

DUMBLEDORE
We continue our game. And we hope with all our might that our side wins.

The game resumes.

Lights fade.



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