I'm disappointed. You know I had this plan of going to the movie theater to see the Avengers: Infinity War. But there were unforeseen events that stopped me from doing so. I thus am going in a couple of days. I can't wait. I have been waiting this for so long.
So, I could not enjoy, but I hope that you will enjoy this story.
Catch Me If You Can
A dark brown hand slammed heavily on the table and almost everybody flinched.
"How did he go unnoticed?" The man asked scowling at the nearest soldier standing beside him.
"We don't know Sir." The soldier said calmly, though on the inside he was sweating bullets. It was one of the skills they were taught early on when they joined the team, sweat all you want, just not from your face. And never let anybody see that you are afraid.
"You don't know?" The tall man asked right into the face of the soldier who was about to cower in fear. "Why don't you know?" The tall man asked incredulously, gritting his teeth.
"I want the security footage of each and every inch of the hellicarrier, now." The man ordered calmly, which was a very dangerous situation to be in.
"Director Fury," A woman said from behind, "Sir, there is no security footage." She looked apologetic with her eyes a little downcast.
Nick Fury turned back, "What do you mean, Agent Hill?" He asked her. Only a little twitch of his eye betrayed his anger.
"There is no footage Sir. We could not catch anything." Agent Maria Hill said standing tall and proud. Only somebody who was adept in reading body signs could have told that she was nervous. Her right foot was turned a little to the left and she had fists clenched behind her back.
"I heard you clear, Agent Hill." Fury asked gritting his teeth, "Did someone hack into our security?"
"We don't think so Sir." Hill said fighting her urge to look down, "It was as if the cameras did not even record him. He could not be seen by any of the cameras."
"Out of sixteen hundred super advanced cameras on this carrier, all of them stopped working at the same time?" Fury asked incredulously, "Seems like a hack to me."
"Even if there was a hacking, it was done by some super-advanced technology we are not even aware of. As far as our security experts say, they don't find anything wrong with the cameras or any other security measures." Hill said calmly, not betraying any emotion.
Fury rounded up on the thirty or so soldiers standing behind him, "And you men." He said with a touch of rage in his voice, "He went past you, smiling and waving like a celebrity and you did not even think of stopping him?"
The man standing in front gulped, "We could not do anything Sir. We could not even move. There was some hazy feeling that was stopping us from doing anything." He said in a trembling voice.
Fury blinked his lone eye once, "All of you are on probation from now on and if I find that anybody of you were behind this, you will regret the day you were born." He said in a calm voice and almost everybody trembled. Fury speaking calmly was more dangerous than him outright shouting. "I want those responsible to come forward now." Nobody did anything.
He then turned back to Maria Hill, "Call Natasha and Steve. We need our best players on board to catch the fugitive."
Agent Hill nodded and went out of the control room to find the two people.
ooo
Natasha Romanoff and Steve Rogers were sitting on the chair looking incredulously at Nick Fury who was standing with his palms flat on the table after debriefing them about the circumstances.
"You mean to say that a prisoner escaped and none of the cameras even recorded him?" Natasha asked trying to be clear.
Fury nodded without any hint of amusement on his face that would say he was kidding.
"And you are clear that the security system was not hacked?" Natasha asked looking confused.
"Crystal." Fury said curtly, "We had the best IT experts check out the security ten times. It does not look like the system has been tampered with."
"What was that then?" Steve asked raising his eyebrows, "A vampire?"
Natasha looked at him amusement evident in her yes, "Really?" She asked, "You live in twenty first century and yet you believe in these silly things?"
"After fighting aliens with the help of a god, I would not be surprised if he really turns out to be a vampire." Steve said with just a hint of smile on his face and Natasha nodded reluctantly.
Steve continued, "After all, Vampires cannot be seen in a mirror and they do not appear in the photograph. That is what I know of."
"He is not a vampire." Fury said shaking his head, "He is very much a human but with some powers we know not of."
"How can you be so sure of that?" Natasha asked raising her eyebrows.
"Of all the eight times that we captured him, he never showed any signs of being something other than a human." Fury said irritated.
"Wait, eight times?" Steve asked surprised, "He has managed to escape S.H.I.E.L.D. eight times?" His voice was full of disbelief, "Is that even possible?" he asked Natasha.
"Apparently it is." Natasha said shrugging.
"And how did he escape?" Natasha asked Fury with a plan already forming in her mind.
"He walked away." Fury said calmly. It was clear that he himself was having trouble wrapping his mind around what he was saying.
"Wait, wait, wait!" Natasha interrupted, "He walked away?" Her voice was full of incredulity, "And nobody even stopped him or raised the alarm?"
"We interrogated everybody guarding him and all of them said something about feeling disoriented and hazy and unable to do anything." Fury said gritting his teeth.
"Some kind of nerve gas perhaps, which made everybody unable to do anything?" Steve asked pondering, "A narcotic maybe?" Fury shook his head.
"We took samples from everybody. There was nothing which suggested that they were subjected to anything. They are all clean." Fury said shaking his head.
"Where did he even walk away to?" Natasha asked pondering, "We are thirty-five thousand feet above in the air." Her voice was borderline disbelieving.
"Nobody knows." Fury said closing his eye, "He jumped and by the time the men went to look, he had disappeared."
"The bigger question is, how did he even manage to break the security of the prison open which can even hold the Hulk?" Steve asked looking expectantly at Fury.
Nick Fury shrugged, "We don't know. As far as we know, he just opened the door like it was locked from the inside and walked away." His voice betrayed no emotion. "There is no footage, no fingerprints, nothing that can tell what he did. Just like the previous times."
"What was he apprehended for?" Natasha asked looking at Fury.
"Security breach. Fifty-seven years ago. Since then, we have captured him seven times in total and all times he escaped. He stays for some time in prison and when he feels like it, he walks away." Fury said the veins around his eye hardening just a tiny bit that said how frustrated he was with all of this.
Both Natasha and Steve were looking at Fury like he had lost his mind.
"Fifty-seven years ago?" Natasha asked amused.
"Sounds like a vacation to me." Steve said unable to say anything else.
"So you want us to find him?" Natasha asked without beating around the bush.
Fury nodded curtly without speaking anything.
"What can you tell us about him?" Steve asked cutting to the chase. If they wanted to find him, they needed as much information as they could get.
"Nothing." Fury said, his lips set in a thin line.
"What?" Steve almost did a double take.
"We have no information about him. Everything about him is magically deleted." Fury said in a hard voice. This time it was clear from his voice that he was extremely frustrated. "We don't have anything about him. Not even the written down things. It's as if he never existed."
Natasha asked in an incredulous voice, "You want us to go find us somebody you have no information about. Not even how he looks and where he might be?" she almost snorted in amusement.
"Yes." Fury was not amused, "We need to find him as soon as possible. He ranks ten on the scale of most dangerous threats."
Natasha and Steve had a silent conversation between themselves. It looked like both were agreeing that Fury was over-reacting.
"Okay." Steve said before Fury could speak anything, "What did he take this time? Weapons? Data? Some another prisoner?" He asked to be sure what they were dealing with.
"Nothing." Fury's jaw was hard, "Just like he took nothing the last eight times."
Natasha sounded perplexed when she spoke next, "You mean that the greatest threat of the world comes and goes out of S.H.I.E.L.D. prison when he wishes to and does no harm, takes nothing, attacks nobody and walks around smiling and waving while creating confusion and not being recorded by the cameras. Isn't that a bit preposterous?"
"And you want us to find him?" Steve asked trying to be clear.
Fury grit his teeth at the Avengers sitting before him who were taking all this serious matter lightly.
"He is dangerous." Fury said irritated, "And who can harm somebody will harm somebody. We don't take that kind of risks around here."
Natasha and Steve had one more silent conversation. They were almost sure that Fury was losing his mind being so paranoid over things.
"Okay. We will search for him around the city." Natasha said and both got up.
"You really sure that you have no information on him?" Steve asked turning toward towards Fury.
"We have, but we are not sure that it is correct or not." Fury said and explained when both of them looked at him expectantly, "His name."
Natasha sighed softly, "Alright then. What is his name?" She was really hating this assignment more and more.
"Harry." Nick Fury said, his eyes hard and cold as if the very name was poison on his tongue. "Harry Potter."
ooo
Natasha and Steve were strolling by in the city looking for any possible places where they could find this 'Harry Potter' guy. They had no face to look for, they had no clue about him and what was strange was that even the elite sketch artists were unable to draw Harry's face. It was like they had suddenly forgotten how Harry looked like.
One thing was clear that it was Harry himself who was doing these things, but how, that was the mystery. They knew that he was no ordinary person. One who could make people forget what he looked like was not an ordinary person, though they were still not sure whether he was a human or not.
"We have been looking for him for the last two hours. We don't think that we would be able to find him." Natasha said sighing.
"We have to check all the places once again." Steve said rubbing his forehead.
"That's pointless." Natasha said, "How do you find a person who leaves no traces and nobody can remember his face? Sounds like some hocus-pocus to me."
"Possibly." Steve agreed, "If vampires can exist then magicians too. But how is he doing all these things?" He wondered and Natasha shrugged. She was here to get Harry and send him to Fury, not think about the technicalities of how magic worked.
"One thing I do not understand," Natasha said conversationally, "Why is Fury so hell bent on getting Harry? All he has ever done is to walk out of the prison eight times. What does Fury need from him?"
"I don't think that Fury needs Harry as much as he needs his abilities." Steve said, "If what I am thinking is right, then Fury has already talked to Harry into joining S.H.I.E.L.D. and Harry refused. Maybe that is why Fury is so annoyed at him."
"Fury really is losing his mind, I think." Natasha said rolling her eyes, "I get that Harry Potter is extremely powerful and we need to be ready for any threats out there, but that does not mean that Fury's got the right to threaten anybody to join his cohort." Natasha asked Steve, "I too was an assassin not long ago. If I had not joined S.H.I.E.L.D. then he would have thrown me too in some prison, I guess?"
Steve did not say anything, he just shrugged.
"But how are we gonna find him?" he asked after a few minutes of silence. "You got any ideas?"
Natasha shook her head, "I have been a spy for long, but not for a single time in life I have been sent to find somebody without any knowledge of what I am walking into."
Steve shook his head once and gripped his shield tightly in his hand. Something rubbed against his hand, something rough like a paper.
He looked inside his shield and a yellowish looking paper was stick to the inner side of his shield. "What is this?" He asked confused, "I could have sworn there was nothing a few minutes ago."
Steve took the paper off the shield and read. There in a messy scrawl was written,
I heard that you two are looking for me. You know where to find me. I will be waiting. Don't be long.
Harry.
He showed the note to Natasha who instantly looked alarmed, "He is aware of our presence. He could have been following us."
"Why do I get the feeling that he would be in the Central Park?" Steve asked wondering loudly.
Natasha looked at him skeptically, "Really? I have got the same feeling too." Suddenly her eyes went wide, "Is this us thinking that at the same time or did Harry put the compulsion in our mind?" She asked concerned.
"I don't know." Steve said shrugging, "But if he did that, he is just calling us towards himself. I think that we need to see him."
They started walking towards the Central Park, which was not far from there. They decided not to use S.H.I.E.L.D. issued airbikes and go there on foot.
The park was strangely devoid of people. There was nobody. Only Natasha and Steve and a man in the far side near the fountain lying on the bench with something in his hand.
Slowly Steve and Natasha inched closer without making any noise and when they were in the hearing range of the person, it was clear that the man was holding an expensive mobile in his hands and the loud noises from the device made it clear that he was playing games.
Both of them had the same question on their minds, what kind of threat calls people to meet him and then is totally distracted?
Harry was startled by the noise of boots coming closer and he fumbled with the mobile almost dropping it in the process. Though with an athletic skill, he dived and caught the mobile before it smashed into pieces. He gripped the cellphone tighter in his hands and sighed in relief.
He brought a lone finger to his head and tapped his right ear. There was a small yellow glow and then everything went back to the way it was.
"I hope you don't mind that I was keeping tracks of both of you." He said apologetically.
Both the Avengers came closer to him and saw that he was a man in his mid-thirties with a round spectacle on his face and black hair which was in complete disarray and a distinct lightning shaped scar on his face. He did not look anything like danger.
Harry smiled sheepishly, "Sorry, I could not control myself. I was getting bored. Tell Fury that I downloaded same games on his mobile which he can delete." And threw the phone at Natasha who caught the phone easily. His accent was clearly British.
"Fury's phone?" She asked bewildered, "He was not even on the carrier when you absconded."
"Well, I have my talents." Harry said grinning, "And I did not abscond. I was just bored, so I decided to go have some fresh air. Maybe travel to new places, like India or Australia."
Both the Avengers look at him strangely. He was a weird specimen.
"You need to come with us, Sir." Steve said politely but in a stern voice, "Fury needs to talk to you."
"No, I don't." Harry said calmly, "Just because I borrowed his phone, it does not give him the right to take me into custody." He then said a little sheepishly, "No offense, but you Americans have a strange way of speaking. It makes me want to scratch the inside of my throat, which I cannot do."
"We are here to take you in because you are level ten threat and have escaped S.H.I.E.L.D. eight times." Natasha said in a hard voice.
"Ten?" Harry asked surprised, "I am flattered." He grinned.
"You are coming with us, whether you want it or not." Natasha said in a hard voice and pulled the gun out of her belt. But the gun suddenly pricked her hand and when she looked down, she saw that she was holding a red rose in her hand.
She was gawking at her hand in confusion when Harry came forward and plucked the rose from her hands, "For me? Thank you." He said in an extremely innocent and fawning voice.
Steve took the shield in his hand and to his amazement and horror, his shield turned into a toy hammer, "Careful there." Harry said, "You would not want to lose the only shield you have."
Natasha recovered faster than Steve and raised her hands to shoot bullets from her bracelet when, in front of her eyes, her weapon bracelet turned into a wrist band made up of flowers. "Calm down. I mean you no harm." Harry said raising his hands in a placating gesture and a moment later, their weapons returned back.
"How did you do that?" Steve asked lowering his shield.
"Magic." Harry replied coolly and shook his head.
"Just because you are carrying a wand in your belt does not mean that we will start believing in childhood notions of spell casting and potion brewing." Natasha had not lowered down her weapon.
Harry looked at her stunned and suddenly rushed forward towards Natasha who pointed her gun at him and he instantly backpedaled.
"You can see my wand?" Harry asked out of breath.
"I can." Natasha rolled her eyes. "And I can also say that it is made up of some kind of wood. Easily breakable." She eyes the wand with a strange glint in her eyes.
"No." Harry asked impatiently. "You can really see my wand?"
"Yes. We can." Steve asked confused. "What about it?"
"It means that now I can go back home." Harry spoke with relief evident in his voice.
"Nobody said anything about going anywhere, mister." Natasha said in a hard voice, "The only place you will be going is to S.H.I.E.L.D. headquarters."
"Look with all due respect, you people have no power or authority over me to make me do anything." Harry sounded apologetic. "Please, I would rather not meet anybody and join S.H.I.E.L.D as an Avenger and I really do need to go back home." Harry took his wand out.
"You seriously expect us to believe that childhood play toy will hurt us?" Natasha asked raising her eyebrows.
Harry just scowled at her and pointed his wand at the ground at her feet. "Vera Verto." A purple light shot out of the wand and the stones at her feet turned into rats and scurried off.
Natasha almost jumped back in reflex.
"Here's your proof. Yes. Now will you help me get back to my home?" Harry's voice was on the verge of pleading.
"How are we to know that you are not planning to do something dangerous?" Natasha asked looking at his wand in apprehension.
Harry gave a cynic laugh and rubbed his forehead, "Look, I had eighty years to do something drastic and I did not." He then spoke calmly, "I will not start doing something now."
Steve and Natasha both gave him an unimpressed look. Harry spoke groaning, "Look, I might be your most dangerous threat, but I am not a monster or anything. I am just a human like you. Well, not exactly like you, but where I come from, this is normal."
Steve lowered his shield once again and Natasha put her guns down too. After a minute of silence, Steve asked, "How do you think we can help you to get back home?"
"By the touch of three the magic door will open and then we will have to find our way through the realm of magic that ties together all realms." Harry said a smile on his face and both his guests looked confused.
"You need our help, we will only provide if you will tell us everything." Steve said coming closer to Harry.
The said wizard looked conflicted for a long time and then nodded. "I guess it's fair." He said and took out his wand once more. He pointed it towards the fountain and it turned into a bench. "Come sit." He said and sat on his original bench and Natasha and Steve sat on the newly transfigured one.
"My name is Harry Potter." Harry began, "I am a wizard. I am from a different universe than yours. You people call it an alternate reality. As you have seen, I can perform magic. We have all those magical things you know about, wands, cloaks, brooms, etc. We live in small warding communities all around the world. Not everybody in our world in a wizard. We live a hidden life away from the common knowledge of people."
He then continued, "I am an Auror, it could roughly translate into a magical policeman. I was chasing some remaining Death Eaters when something happened and I came into this world, eighty years ago."
"Death Eaters?" Steve interrupted confused.
Harry waved his hand, "Followers of Lord Voldemort. He was a dark-wizard who wanted to rule the world. Long story short, we defeated him and his followers went into hiding. Up until ten years ago, we have been tracking the last remaining Death Eaters who wanted to become the new Dark Lord."
"How come you came here?" Natasha asked raising her eyebrows.
"I have no idea. I wish to go back and find out how they did it. When I came here, I was befuddled and confused. The only thing that was favorable was that I arrived here in the time which is already past in my world." Harry said.
"Then how come you are not some old man walking with a cane?" Natasha asked looking at him expectantly as if trying to fit about hundred years of his life into a thirty-year old body.
"I never found out." Harry said shaking his head, "It took me some time but I did find out that I was not aging. I was basically frozen in time. Maybe when I will go there, I might start aging again. I believe that when I will leave here, I will enter into the exact time I left."
Steve nodded, accepting his explanation, "But how do you think we will send you back?"
Before Harry could reply, Natasha spoke cutting him in between, "And why should we send you back home, instead of taking you to S.H.I.E.L.D? You are already on their hit list."
Harry closed his eyes and when he spoke, he spoke in a helpless voice, "Please. It's been too long. I have lived a very long time here. I just want to go back home. You don't know what it is like to live alone and in hiding for so long. Please. I don't want to live here anymore. I have my friends and family."
Steve asked Harry looking at him confused, "Why did you not ask anybody else to help you send back to your world?"
Harry gave a humorless laugh, "I tried. Howard Stark outright told me that magic was nothing but science that we did not understand and would have experimented on me if I had shown him what I could do. I was better off this way."
Natasha asked him, "Was there nobody else to help?"
"I tried Peggy Carter, but she was no Seer like you." Harry explained, "She could not see my wand much less the protective spells I had casted around myself. Thus it would have been futile to ask her for help. And no I have never anybody else who could help me."
Natasha looked confused, "A Seer what?"
"A Seer is a person who can look past our cloaking spells and all our wards, but they cannot pass through them. You are one." Harry looked at Natasha smiling, "You can see past all the magic spells I have casted to hide myself."
Natasha looked at him for a very long time and then she nodded seeing the sincerity in his eyes, "How can we help you?"
Harry looked relieved, "I found out during my stay here that magic exists in all dimensions and universes. I just have to open the link between those two worlds."
"And why can't you do it alone?" Steve asked curiously.
"Because it's too dangerous." Harry explained, "Anyone with power could tap into the magical realm and travel to worlds. That could be catastrophic in wrong hands. Thus the rules of magic itself prevents something happening like this. "
Natasha asked, "And how do we factor into this equation?"
"I need three people as proof to make the choice to open the gateway. Three people who are not being influenced by one another." Harry spoke, "One with magic- that is me." Then he pointed at Natasha, "One without magic." Finally he pointed at Steve, "One who is made of magic but cannot use it more than just a life-force."
Steve asked bewildered, "Wait! I am made of magic? What do you mean?"
Harry smiled mysteriously, "Don't you think so?"
For the first time that night, Steve looked at him properly. After some time he spoke, "I think I might have seen you somewhere before."
Natasha looked at him confused, "You do?"
"I think you are the man who gave me the funny tasting drink before I underwent the super-soldier transformation. You had said that it would calm my nerves." Steve said lost in his memories.
Harry grinned at him and snapped his fingers grinning widely, "Bingo!"
Steve asked looking at him suspiciously but asked calmly, "What did you give to me?"
Harry smiled, "Nothing much. It was just a skele-grow potion. Where do you think you got the muscles from?"
"I think that it was the serum." Steve said confused.
Harry laughed, "No. It was meant to just give you super-soldier abilities. It could not enhance your physique or could give you this muscular body. I am sorry but you were kind of my experiment too."
Steve just looked at him squinting his eyes.
"I think it's safe to say that the experiment worked. You have magic in your cells but not in enough quantity to use it." Harry said explaining. "Now you both can help me to open the gateway to my world."
"Will there be any repercussions?" Natasha asked Harry who looked thoughtful for a moment.
"I don't think so, but you will travel back to me world with me. So, we will land in the exact place I left. At that time we were under attack. So, we will have to take precautions until I send you both back here." Harry said nodding to himself.
"What kind of attack you were under?" Steve asked Harry.
"Magical one. We both will not suffer much damage from the spells unless they are the killing spells or other unforgivable ones, but Natasha can, so we have to make sure that we keep her safe." Harry said pondering.
"How will we keep her safe?" Steve asked with as much seriousness he could muster.
"I can cover you with the protective shield." Harry turned towards Natasha, "But it won't sustain too many hits. We were near the forest. So make sure not get hit by the spells and find someplace safe where you cannot get hit by any spells."
"I will not hide." Natasha said irritated.
"I am not asking you to." Harry said calmly, "But you have seen how powerful I am. There everybody will be as powerful if not more. I cannot protect you if you get caught in middle."
"Natasha, please." Steve said and Natasha nodded though begrudgingly.
"I can transport you in between the fight, but we will need to go far away from the fight and I cannot afford that. So it would be better if we wait till the actual fight is over and then to send you back here." Harry said asking for their opinion.
"Okay then." Natasha sighed and Harry raised his wand towards Natasha, "Protego." He muttered softly.
Natasha felt a warm feeling pass over her for a moment and then everything was over. But there was a faint sheen of magic around her in a form of transparent aura.
Harry turned towards Steve, "I don't think that I need to cover you too in a shield, your magic will protect you and you have a shield. I doubt anything might be able to cross through it." Harry said pondering for a moment.
Steve and Natasha both nodded in approval.
"Are you ready?" Harry asked and they nodded once again. "Alright then." He grabbed both their hands and muttered some incomprehensible words which sounded a lot like Latin.
A portal opened and in air and all of them went into the portal.
A bright light blinded them and when their eyesight adjusted to the sight, they saw a shiny glass like bridge joining both the ends of the portal.
They stepped on the bridge and were assaulted by various images. They were all around them and were jumbled up. Natasha, however could recognize her part of images and they were images from her memories.
"What are they?" Natasha asked Harry.
"Memories from our past. Pay no heed to them." Harry said tersely.
However, Natasha turned back to the floating images in the air, all three of their memories were mixed up in one another and in chronology making it look like a giant canvas of jumbled up images.
There were images from the Red Room and all the tough things she had to go through. There were Steve's images from his life before his transformation into a super-soldier and some pictures from a strange medieval world which Natasha suspected were from Harry's life.
There were images of Harry being tortured by some grown up people, fighting with giant monsters and holding a dead boy in his lap crying. There were images of herself being subjected to harsh training and all of these. Natasha thought that they were only sad memories, however there were other images too, she holding Clint's firstborn in her arms, Steve dancing with a woman, Harry kissing a redhead.
Natasha turned away, she felt like it was a breach of privacy. Their whole life was laid bare in front of them. But, since the memories were in random chronological order, she could not say what the people had undergone in their lives.
The bridge seemed to be never-ending. A long time passed while they just walked and walked. Then finally, they came closer to the other side of the portal, however nothing could be seen what was on the other side of the portal.
Harry turned towards them with dead seriousness on his face, "We are almost there. We need to take precautions and be ready, for this world is nothing like the one we just came from."
Steve and Natasha took some time to nod and finally, when they were ready, they jumped through the portal.
ooo
They were blinded by a bright light once again when they landed out of the portal. Then suddenly, the light way to reveal the darkness they were standing in. they were in pitch black darkness apart from a few shining colored light here and there which might be spells. There was some kind of tingling feeling on Natasha's skin that could only be magic.
Natasha tapped her glasses and the night vision system activated and then she could see clearly even in the light. She looked around after her vision cleared to see that they were in some kind of a forest with very long trees.
Something red shone to her left and before Natasha could move, she was struck by the light. She felt as if she had collided with a truck and she was blown away. The shield around her flickered and Natasha knew that a couple of more hit like that and she was a goner.
Natasha groaned and sat up, rubbing her forehead. Once more, before she had time, a man was looming over her, his wand pointed at her, "Oy! Who are you?" He asked her in a threatening voice full of authority.
Natasha raised her hands to use her bracelet to shoot laser. She knew that the man would not have time to duck and she could take him out easily. But before she could fire, she saw something pinned to his chest that looked like a badge. It was the same badge she had seen Harry donning before they went into the portal.
She stopped the laser guns from firing, "I am with Harry Potter." She said and saw recognition take form in his eyes.
"Harry Potter?" the man asked relieved, "Where is he? We lost him an hour ago. He just disappeared in air."
"He's alive." Natasha said and he helped her get up. "Ernie McMillian." He said and Natasha nodded, "Natasha Romanoff."
"How did you get here?" Ernie asked her.
"Long story." She said instead, "Will tell you later when we get out of here."
He then looked down towards her hand and asked, "Where's your wand?"
Natasha shook her head, "I don't have one. I'm not a wizard."
"Of course you're not." He said confused, "You're a witch. Did you wand get lost?" he looked concerned.
"I don't have magic." Natasha shook her head once more.
Ernie looked bewildered, "But you're a muggle. How can you see through our wards?"
"I don't know." Natasha said, "Potter said that I am some Seer or whatever."
There was a look of understanding in Ernie's eyes. "Okay. We have to get out of here." He said urgently, "Come on, stay with me."
They came out of from under the cover of trees and ran across the clearing. Ernie knew where he was going. Natasha just followed him.
They had ran only a short distance when Ernie stopped suddenly. A couple of robed men were standing in front of them, their wands raised. Before Ernie had time to do anything, they both cast spells at the same time. Ernie barely managed to cast a protective shield around himself when the spells struck. The spells were deflected away but Ernie stumbled back and violently collided with Natasha taking her down along with himself.
She raised her hand and shot lasers out of her bracelet and it hit one Death Eater who went out like a light. The other had managed to cast a protective shield around himself and the laser scattered away.
The Death Eater casted a spell toward her and she ducked. The man came onto her casting spells after spells non-stop. Natasha tried using her weapons but none were able to go through his shield.
One more spell hit her and Natasha felt like her heart physically broke in pieces. She coughed violently and saw blood come of her mouth. Her guns were thrown away and the man slowly came upon her, looming.
But before he had the time to do anything, a red and blue shield came flying in the air and struck his back when he was caught unaware and he stumbled forward. And just a moment later, a red spell hit him and he was out.
Ernie came limping and pointed his wand at him, "Incarcerous." He said and ropes came out of the wand and bound him tightly.
Ernie raised his wand and Steve jumped out of the tree, raising his hand in surrendering gesture. "He's with me." Natasha said before Ernie could hit Steve. He nodded and bound the second Death Eater too and then turned towards Natasha. He raised his wand and muttered something.
Natasha felt a warm feeling pass over her body and then all of her wounds closed and she felt relaxed and healthy.
Across the field, they could see the magical police team rounding the last of the Death Eaters. Harry came out of a tree limping and nursing a bloody gash on his forehead.
He smiled when he saw Natasha and Steve unharmed.
"I'm glad that you are not harmed." Harry said relieved.
"Me too." Natasha said, "Your shield held two spells from attacking me." A moment later, the shield flickered once more and went out.
"One more hit and you would have died." Harry said a little concerned. "But I'm glad that it held and you have these amazing athletic skills."
Natasha laughed.
"Now, if you want to I can send you back home." Harry asked a little relieved after the fight. Around them, the Aurors were binding and carrying away the last remaining Death Eaters.
"Yes, I'd like to go home" Steve said and Natasha nodded.
Harry raised his hand for them to grab again, but Steve hesitated, "Look, I know that you have earned your fair share of rest after spending so long in our world but we could really use your help when the time comes."
Harry looked thoughtful for a moment, "I think I can say that I have a second home there. And I cannot let anybody threaten my home." He smiled and took out a mirror from his pocket.
He looked at it longingly for a moment and then sighed and gave to it to Steve. "You'll be able to contact me through this." He said, "Just tell the mirror to contact me. I'll know."
Steve nodded and grabbed Harry's hand. Natasha too did the same. Before Harry casted the spell, he spoke a little sheepishly, "I'd appreciate if you keep this on the down low. I know that Fury cannot reach me but I would like if he did not know about this world and what happened between us."
Steve laughed heartily, "Don't worry. This won't be the first time we will have lied to him. We are Avengers, not a member of S.H.I.E.L.D. Fury won't know anything."
Harry opened the portal and Steve went inside, Natasha turned before going and Harry said gratefully, "Thank You. You did not have to help me but still you did."
Natasha smiled at him and nodded in farewell and went into the portal.
Harry kept looking at the direction of the portal for a long time even after it was closed.
ooooooo
Yes, I did manage to complete this story in one chapter. So, this brings my total number of published stories to ten and only five are completed. But I hope that I will be able to complete the most of them during this summer vacation.
Now, tomorrow I have my exam and I am not prepared with even fifty-percent. So, I am gonna do it now and hope that my exams go good.
Should I expand this story into something more? Please do tell me. But you will have to give the idea for that.
The last chapter of When Magic Calls will be published in a couple of weeks. Check out my other stories.
Read and Review.
Goodbye.