Hermione pushed the first card into the middle.
"Textbooks."
"The second."
"Training."
"The third."
"Reemployment agencies."
"The fourth."
"Azkaban reform."
"The fifth."
"Golden Skynet."
Ron stared at the sheets of paper.
"I know they're all annoying."
"But you've got to explain."
"How they fit together."
Hermione spoke quietly.
"Taken individually, each one has a justification."
"Textbooks can be justified as improving the quality of education."
"Training can be justified as improving survival skills."
"Re-employment can be justified as giving marginalized wizards a way to make a living."
"Azkaban reform can be justified as saying goodbye to Dementors."
"Golden Skynet can be justified as improving security."
"Every one of them makes sense."
"But they're all doing the same thing."
Ron frowned.
"What?"
Hermione looked up at him.
"Breaking the old wizarding world down into manageable parts."
"Then connecting them back together with new rules."
Ron opened his mouth.
For a moment, he said nothing.
Harry stared at the five sheets of paper.
He remembered Vernon's timetable.
He remembered the courses at the reemployment agencies.
He remembered all those rules governing their daily schedules at school.
And the incandescent lights in the newspaper coverage of Azkaban.
He suddenly spoke.
"The worst part."
"Isn't that they're all hateful."
"It's that they aren't all wrong."
Ron immediately picked up the thread.
"Right."
"Umbridge is hateful, of course."
"But some of the things she's pushed through really do work."
After he said that.
He was the first to get annoyed.
"I really hate saying that."
Harry stared at the rim of his cup.
"The scariest part."
"Is that even I can't say that training was completely useless."
"I'm faster now than I was last year."
"Steadier."
"And less likely to panic when something happens."
"But I still feel like something's wrong."
Ginny rested her elbows