A/N: I have no idea what I was doing writing a story like that earlier. It has nothing to do with my previous story, nor do I even know how to continue it. So, here is the real story, set perhaps a few months after the previous story, although some elements will be retained. And by the way, my father is trying to kick me out of the house, so I'm not sure if I can get the next few chapters out in a reasonable amount of time. And once I actually do move out, it will be some time before I will have internet access again, so bear with me! My first chapter is a bit slow, still trying to get my former writing skills back…

Voices were whispering. Hundreds. Thousands. Millions.

Countless. Infinite.

A pair of faintly glowing green eyes opened to a sky of sparkling darkness.

A hand reached out toward the dark skies.

And a brilliant green sun came to life on the night side of the world.

The hand came back, straightening a pair of round glasses on a gentle face.

( 0 0 0 )

A blazing star walked across the surface of a planet, burning away the oceans of darkness that clung to the world's population in a final effort to survive. It was all in vain, for the darkness was absolutely powerless against the star's power.

"I am Oblivion."

Impossibly, the star became brighter, bending its light around the curvature of the planet, purging the final remains of the terrible clouds pollution and toxic wastes accumulated from centuries of warfare. The light withdrew, revealing restored cities, forests, and rivers lost in the mass destruction caused by the countries of the world.

"I am not the god of whom you fight over. She has already left to bring life to another world."

Hyperion slowly circulated the globe, shining his restorative light across the planet. People returned to life by the billions, filling the world with life once more. No one was willing to fight again, even those who once considered each other mortal enemies, for who could, when a being beyond mortal comprehension spoke to them and brought life back to their world.

"I shall not rule over you. If you have the power to destroy yourselves, you then certainly will have the power to rule yourselves."

The star left the planet, flying past its three moons, but his voice could still be heard.

"I welcome you to explore all that creation has to offer in the void beyond the skies of your world."

The star was no longer visible anymore, but his last sentence echoed through the minds of the people for centuries to come.

"In time, even you can join the gods."

( 0 0 0 )

To say that Hogwarts was in a state of panic was probably a bit of an understatement. It was not quite chaos, but the amount of people moving in and out of it day after day became so pointless to count, Headmaster Albus Dumbledore remained in his office, no longer greeting the hundreds of not only Ministry officials, but magical envoys from across other superpowers across the world. Why?

Harry Potter had disappeared. Vanished into thin air one night.

One student who was the son of a well-known writer of Daily Prophet happened to have snapped a magical photograph of Harry's disappearance at the moment of his departure in a column of light. The student also claimed to have seen someone past Harry when he vanished, but the camera had failed to capture the person's image.

Alexander Evans, long lost cousin of Harry Potter rediscovered by the Ministry, was taking refuge in the Room of Requirements to avoid the even more hundreds of students pestering him about where he believed Harry was. None of the teachers minded his absence from his classes. With officials constantly summoning students and teachers for "questions", they stopped paying mind to people who failed to show up every now and then, but more especially to people who were close to Harry Potter.

Oddly, Professor Sybill Trelawney's predictions started to become increasingly accurate, even up to the exact amount of grain Professor Horace Slughorn was carrying to the dungeons one day. Asking her about where Harry Potter was though, was a completely pointless act. She would know exactly who would be trying to ask at where and when, avoiding them more easily than it was to sidestep a moving snail. It wasn't as thought she didn't want to, but that she couldn't. Even when she scried hundreds of years into the murky future, it was a future without Harry Potter. His influence was clearly in the people, but she couldn't see him anywhere, or even any when.

Argus Filch, caretaker of Hogwarts, didn't seem to change at all. On the contrary, he seemed to be a bit downright nastier, but more so probably due to the excessive amount of visitors and the footprints they left behind practically everywhere. To those that actually bothered to wonder about Filch, it wasn't hard to guess that with only one person that couldn't use magic, cleaning a castle alone was indeed a challenging, if impossible task for the common person. Everyone kept their distance: students, teachers, and officials alike…

That was perhaps, only a week ago…

"Once again, I must stress to you that precise care must be taken when casting the spell, or otherwise the Transfiguration will fail," Professor Minerva McGonagall addressed to the class, looking at each of her students sternly. "If you fail to pronounce the spell in the appropriate sequence or tone, or both, and move the wand incorrectly, you will transfigure something most…undesirable."

Ronald Weasley was jerked out of his thoughts, barely able to pay attention, let alone perform the spell properly at all. As a result, the rooster he was supposed to transfigure into a peacock became a short-necked ostrich, much to the class's amusement, if there was the chance for it at all. With the sudden disappearance of Harry Potter and whatever superpowers that were helping him, what remained of Voldemort's followers gathered around a last unknown supporter and made a last ditched attempt to take over the school. They succeeded.

Somehow, their new supporter was able to rally enough support from followers across the globe and overpowered the Ministry and Hogwarts' teachers. The supporter, Silver Mask, proclaimed himself as the leader of Voldemort's remaining followers, single-handedly defeated Headmaster Dumbledore during the battle. He wore only the dark hood and cloak of a Death Eater and a silver mask that only had two narrow slits for its wearer's eyes, earning his trademark name. No one had ever seen his face, for he never removed his mask in public. The inner circle that composed Voldemort's original closest followers had been disbanded, now that the Death Eaters were directly controlled by Silver Mask. It was unknown as to how Silver Mask controlled his followers, for he never actually spoke aloud, even when he dueled. Some thought that everything was planned out all at once; others thought he had some form of magical telepathy, none conclusive.

"Mr. Weasley, concentrate." McGonagall's voice cut into Ron's thoughts sharply. "Even if we are in this situation, I would not like it if one of my students were to fail his schooling."

"Sorry Professor," Ron apologized. It wasn't as though McGonagall didn't care about Mask's rule over their school, but rather that she didn't want any of her students to attract any unnecessary attention to themselves. Lately, the Death Eaters had taken a liking to punishing any student for the slightest mistake, or anything they made up on the spot. "I'll do my best."

McGonagall gave him a gentle look for the slightest moment before resuming her instruction.

"Harry, Tersan, wherever you guys are," Ron whispered under his breath to himself, "we could use your help…" He cast his spell again and this time, surprisingly, turned his ostrich into a peacock.

( 0 0 0 )

"WHAT DO YOU THINK YOU'RE DOING?!"

Dennis Creevey shook horribly and dropped the chains he was trying to unlock, whirling around in a cry of pure terror at the sudden, terrible female screech. "I-!"

"Was trying to to free one of the students being punished?" The female Death Eater cawed gleefully in the dungeon, twirling her wand slowly at the trembling student. "Well, well… Whatever shall we do with you?" She threw her head back and cackled sadistically again. "Punish you of course!"

"No please!" begged the first year student, who was chained by his wrists and ankles to the wall. "Don't-!"

The Death Eater silenced him with a flick of her wand, constricting his windpipe. The first year struggled against his chains, trying to reach his throat to free the unseen, unyielding force, but the cold steel held him fast. He choked, gasping for air.

Unperturbed, the Death Eater turned her compassionless gaze back toward Dennis. "As for you…"

Dennis's eyes strayed from the Death Eater's wand to the dungeon door.

"Thinking of running?" the Death Eater suggested. "No, we shan't have that!" With another flick of her wand, an invisible force slammed into Dennis, crushing him against the dungeon wall. "We can do whatever we want to, as long as we don't kill you…" She eyed the first year boy, whose eyes were becoming bloodshot from the pressure on his throat and sighed impatiently. "Will you be quiet now?"

The first year moved his head up and down painfully.

"Let's hope so," the Death Eater said, smiling, and released the spell. The first year gasped in a fresh lungful of air, his chest heaving. "Wonderful. Now, about you…"

Dennis could barely move under the power of the Death Eater's spell. Whatever the witch had in store for him, he could only begin to imagine.

"I don't think chains are right for you," the Death Eater noted to herself, summoning Dennis's dropped wand to her hand. Running her fingers along the length of the wood, her eyes lit up in cruel realization. "Of course…" She snapped the wand. Dennis cried out his protest, but was unable to form coherent words with his jaw pressed painfully shut by the invisible pressure on him.

The Death Eater twirled her own wand and formed what appeared to be four railroad spike nails in the air in front of her. "Yes…one at a time…" she breathed deeply. Dennis's arms were suddenly forced up and outwards.

Dennis suddenly realized what the Death Eater was planning and screamed in terror, struggling in vain against the Death Eaters' spell. His eyes could only watch as one of the spikes drifted slowly toward his wrist, and then…hammered itself into his tender flesh into the cold stone wall beyond. Dennis's mouth finally overcame its binds and snapped opened, releasing an earsplitting shriek of pure agony.

The Death Eater only crowed with laughter and pressed her lips to Dennis's ear as he screamed.

"Don't fret over it too much dear, that was only the first. You have three more, and don't worry, I'll make sure they're extra slow when they go in this time."

The second spike drifted toward his shoulder, pressing gently against his robes, its dull point inching down a millimeter at a time.

( 0 0 0 )

Colin's eyes slowly opened, brought back to the waking world by the droning blades of a helicopter flying overhead. He sat up, rubbing his blurry eyes with his fingers.

Sunlight?

"Where am I?" Colin yawned, searching across the skies for the source of the noise…there. A greenish helicopter hovered about a hundred feet above him, covered by the shadow of an extremely tall structure. "What…" He turned his eyes down, and then pulled his feet back towards himself fearfully, backing into the wall behind the mere two feet ledge he sat on hundreds of meters above the ground.

A voice was speaking to him, broadcasted through a loudspeaker from the helicopter. Colin had no idea what the person was saying, but it appeared to be trying to reassure him or calm him down. Probably German or Russian. He waved a hand back at the helicopter and tried to keep himself from falling. Colin looked up the structure he was sitting on, and nearly fell.

He couldn't see the top. It kept on going until it went into the clouds.

Two hours later, Colin was sitting in the foreign military helicopter as it flew, looking downwards toward the land below with childlike fascination. No matter how far he looked, there were no open fields. It was as though the land was one massive city.

"So, where are you from?" the copilot asked in heavily accented English. Luckily, one of them could speak English. They were Russian apparently.

"I'm British!" Colin shouted back, barely able to hear the man. "My name's Colin Creevey!"

The copilot frowned. "You not from here?"

"No!" Colin yelled back. "I don't even know where here is!"

The pilot and copilot glanced at each other. "We bring you back to base, okay?" the copilot said. "Need to have doctor see if you okay!"

"I'm fine!" Colin insisted.

"I have order!" the copilot replied. "I just follow!"

"That's fine then!" Colin agreed.

Twenty more minutes later, Colin stood in a rather open plaza that had been converted into a makeshift military base, waving goodbye at the helicopter pilots. Whether they waved back or not, he couldn't see through the glass.

"If you would come with me, sir!" an American soldier shouted to Colin as the helicopter lifted off. "Our commanding officers would like to see you!"

The base became quiet enough to talk normally without the helicopter. "I didn't do anything wrong did I?" Colin asked nervously.

"I have no idea sir," the young soldier replied. "I've just been ordered to take you in, that's all." As they walked toward a large tent, the soldier leaned toward Colin's ear and asked, "Are you really, like, you know…?"

Colin gave him a confused look. "A what?" But the soldier didn't have a chance to clarify his question. At that moment, the tent was opened by another soldier and Colin was ushered in immediately. An impressive sight met Colin's eyes. Important looking men stood around a large table with printouts taped together to form what seemed like a map or aerial photograph of something. Soldiers and officers alike bustled about from place to place while colorful displays of information and images scrolled across large screens spread throughout the tent.

"He's here," the soldier that was escorting him told to an awaiting officer. Colin noticed that the soldier gave him one last longing look before leaving the tent.

"General Atkins Sir!" the officer said briskly. "He has arrived!"

The man called Atkins turned around. Atkins was a proud-looking, confident, African American man whose calm and thoughtful face hid just how dangerous he could be. The tent immediately fell silent as officers and soldiers alike paused in their work to get a glimpse of him. Colin suddenly felt very naked, despite the black, impenetrable fluidic cloak he was wearing. Speaking of which, just what was he doing wearing that cloak? Where was his Hogwarts uniform?

"Um, what's going on?" Colin asked, his voice coming out in a tiny squeak.

"My dear boy," Atkins said, bringing a kind expression to his face. "Welcome to Atlantis!"