6 September 1895 — Ministry Perimeter Outskirts, Irvingly

One problem with having a catastrophe which affected the center of a mostly non-magical town was that it was rather impossible to get there easily. The train service had been suspended, it was outside of convenient broom-riding distance from anything, and all of the floos the town did have were inside of the quarantine area. Apparition was an option, but given the risks should one miscalculate the arrival point by two dozen yards it wasn't something Oz was keen on. The portkey office had arranged for regular trips to and from the evacuation area at Hawthorne Hollow, both to help get people with other places to go out and to get necessary services to support those who remained in. Oz had arrived there but walked quickly away along the perimeter; he hadn't come to help with crowd control or to make a humanitarian appearance, and he didn't want to be detained by questions he couldn't answer. Instead he walked along the quarantine line until he found the hastily erected tent — like the one helping the displaced citizens in the Hollow, but much smaller — serving as a command and control center for the barricade.

It had only been a year, give or take, since the cave in of Padmore Park. He wasn't inclined to have another mass death event on in hands, but so far no one had been able to answer the question of how many people had been affected with any degree of certainty. Some things were (maddeningly) out of even his control.

"The last word I had was that it was maintaining size, not growing," Oz said to the first employee he saw in the tent, entirely without preamble. "Is that still the case, to the best of our knowledge?"

---

Circe knew it was too much to ask, to go one year without the weight of dozens of deaths landing on her department. That was, quite literally, what the Department of Magical Accidents and Catastrophes existed for. Curses and attacks, explosions and miscasts, if lives weren't at risk Circe Locket was out of a job. That didn't mean she enjoyed the chaos which made up much of her career.

She had just finished barking orders at some of her Department's more frazzled newcomers when a familiar figure ducked into the tent. Leaving no time-- nor space-- for the owl-eyed subordinate to answer, Circe cut across the tent to join the Minister.

"That is still true, yes," she answered, as polite as she could be without wasting either of their time. "It seems to have stopped in Salem Square. So far we've no clues as to the cause," nor idea of what may have become of the many villagers caught within. It was simply too great a risk to send their people in until they could protect themselves effectively.

---

Oz shifted his attention to Mrs. Locket easily. He was relieved (though wouldn't give her the gratitude of showing it) to be talking to someone who was at least passingly intelligent and competent. Not that the first person he'd addressed wouldn't have been, necessarily, but there was no guarantee that a random low-level employee was either of those things. Mrs. Locket he had spoken to before, and while she could be abrasive and opinionated she was also not an idiot.

Both of the things she'd said were mere confirmations of things he'd already heard, so he offered nothing but a curt nod in response. "Is it observable from the perimeter?" he asked. It was dark now, so there probably wasn't much to see, but when the sun came up tomorrow they would have to make a decision about how to go about investigating this thing. If there was anything they could learn from a safe distance that would be preferable to having to send someone inside the barricade area. On second thought, given what he'd heard described of the phenomenon... "Is there even anything to observe?"

---

"Very little," Circe sighed, a grim tilt to her frown. She'd barely arrived in time to lay eyes on the phenomenon herself, and of course it looked like nothing. She'd seen no small number of misty evenings in her life. They just didn't usually come with missing families, or tales of hair and clothes and body-parts being cleanly severed upon contact.

"It is... a mist. Nothing more. Including, as best we can tell, the buildings which should be there." With a pause and a deep breath, Circe glanced toward the tent door. "I have several sets of eyes keeping watch for any changes, but if you would like to see it for yourself you are more than welcome."

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