A long time ago, Alastor Moody had gathered his boon companions from the war and pressured them into agreeing to a mutual protection pact. The means included moderate abuse of diagnostic charms and a jury-rigged linked Portkey network: upon any of them getting hit with hostile spells, the others would immediately be informed and be able to jump to the victim's location, anti-Apparation wards be damned. Since activating a multi-point Portkey network "anchored" to constantly-changing locations seemed more likely to get them all horribly killed by space-time anomalies than to save the life of any single one, they agreed mostly to calm him down and privately planned to never use them.

It was testimony to the insanity which had made them all stay on as Aurors during the war (and in Amelia's case, sign up for them) that, when one fine summer day in 1994 brought a signal over the charm network that Alastor had been Stunned and Full-Body-Bound, Amelia Bones, Dawson Dawlish, Elizabeth Fawley, and Amir Shafiq all answered the call without hesitation.

They arrived to find two unkempt blond men and one massive snake looming over Alastair's body, and wasted no time on chivalrously refusing to take advantage of their surprise arrival. The battle was short but brutal; Dawson and Elizabeth left immediately for St. Mungo's, while Amelia forced Veritaserum down the two prisoners' throats and Amir magically analyzed the snake and its apparent master, whom one blond man had dropped as he went down. The results were enlightening.

Oh, the prisoners went to trial, but the verdict was never in doubt. Mr. Crouch was informed he could watch his son go back to Azkaban, with no mummy dearest to save him this time, or join him after the release of evidence of his own complicity and use of the Imperius; he acquiesced, and retired from his position soon thereafter in favor of seeking solace in the bottle. Fudge was informed he could either suffer the embarrassing revelation of his predecessor's false persecution of Sirius Black or endure the public turmoil that would ensue from He-Who-Must-Not-Be-Named's survival being leaked to the press. He decided to announce he'd suspected Black to be innocent all along since the man's breakout last year, but had played along to lure the vile Pettigrew out of hiding; the Wizarding public being what it was, an unfortunate number of people bought it. Oh well - Aurors served and protected the population of Wizarding Britain because it was the right thing to do, not because they had any illusions about the brains of those they guarded.

All was well... except for having to endure Alastor's smug declarations that his paranoia had paid off after all. They got back at him by reminding him that he wouldn't have required saving at all if he'd put half as much effort into his home security in the first place... oh, how that got under his skin.

Author's Note: And now for two omakes with different sorts of psychotically-paranoid Moodys.

Omake:

Barty Crouch Jr. had never seen the counterattack coming. Little did he know the "Alastor Moody" he assaulted was merely a Transfigured brain-dead Muggle coma patient Moody had swiped just before the man's life support was due to be turned off - one of a line of several similar decoys. Moody had been hidden in his unregistered Animagus form - one absolutely no one suspected, and one he wouldn't tell anyone about even if he trusted any of the treacherous little bastards.

What was this impenetrable disguise? Very simple - one that perfectly summed up his adaptability and refusal to be killed, even though it was in the most unflattering terms...

His host's HIV infection.

Omake:

Barty Crouch and Peter Pettigrew barged into the crazy old Auror's house, then looked around furiously for the man. Where was he?! All their detection spells kept claiming he was scant inches away!

Meanwhile, Alastor Moody, on vacation in the Bahamas, smirked as he monitored the modified snuffbox that contained the 'interior of his house'. Ah, setting up that decoy residence so that the portals into warped subspace seemed to be perfectly ordinary doors and windows had been the most tedious and taxing job of his life, but it was all worth it for incidents such as this. He conjured a few spiders and, after applying special charms so they wouldn't be resized appropriately, opened up a little hatch on the 'roof' and dropped them in.

A savage grin stole across his ruined face as barely-audible little screams drifted up from within. He hoped the guests enjoyed the "Acromantulas".