Chapter 1: Primus Trucis

"Stupefy!" A jet of red light filled the room, striking one of the occupants of the room. The occupant collapsed, slumping to the ground with a light 'thump.'

The other occupant, a man dressed completely in black, from head to toe, left the room without a sound, his first objective completed. He closed the door behind him; the man walked down the hallway, lowering his wand arm, as he had no need of his wand for the rest of the night.

Opening the door to the last bedroom on the right side, he found exactly what he expected to find. A small girl lying on her bed, asleep, breathing softly. The man sighed. He hated what he was about to do, but it was necessary.

Quietly, as to not wake the sleeping child, he crept into the room, and put his hand on her shoulder gently. He whispered three words, and a brilliant blue light filled the bedroom of the little girl. When the light faded, the man saw the results of his work. The corpse of the girl was smoking, covered in burns, and her body stunk of sulfur.

"I'm sorry," whispered the man, hanging his head in shame as he walked out of the girl's bedroom. When he got into the hallway, he saw the door behind which lay the father of the girl, unconscious and helpless. With another muttered apology, he left the house, and disappeared into the blackness of the night.


Asyli Intimi Abdere


Harry heard the news through the closed door of the living room, where his aunt and uncle were listening to the evening news. The announcer had told of the girl who had been found dead in her bedroom, with burns covering her body, yet without a trace of fire throughout the house. The girl was still in her pajamas, which had been untouched by burns, and under the covers, but the cause of death was still the same: burns.

A strange feeling came over Harry; he should know what had happened to the girl, but he couldn't remember. There seemed something almost magical about this, but not it a good sense. A chill ran down Harry's spine. There was something in his previous thought that should have triggered something, but it hadn't. Unless, magic really had something to do with this. Whatever it was, Harry didn't like the feeling of unease that lingered from his thoughts.

The father came on moments later, stating his distress, and testifying to a strange man who had dressed completely in black that had entered his living room, and he had held out some sort of stick that flashed with a bright jet of red light. Harry's ears perked up when he heard that, as he could remember something from his dreams where a flash of green light had filled the room he was in. Harry frowned, trying to remember what the context of his dream was, but found that he couldn't remember.

'Oh, well,' thought Harry as he stole back into the kitchen, where he was supposed to be cooking dinner for his aunt and uncle. 'I can think on this later, but I can't have Aunt Petunia noticing that I've been listening to their news program.'


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"It isn't a good thing to leave just lying around. You may have just as well given it to me gift wrapped and with a note attached, saying, 'Here, use this!'" The man dressed in black told the woman who was currently tied up with charmed rope, wandless, and gagged.

"Your punishment will be this: you will have to chose between your niece, who will work just as well as any other girl, or giving me the list of the muggleborn witches between the ages of six and nine. It's a fair trade, really. And, as a bonus, if you give me the list of the muggleborns, I'll never bother you or your niece again. Oh, what's that? Right, you can't talk. I guess I'll fix that."

The man, who had been standing over the woman threateningly, removed her gag, and the woman spat in his face.

"Hmm, you shouldn't have done that. Oh well; it matters not. I'll still have what I need, no matter which option you choose."

"Auntie 'Melia?" a concerned voice came from the door, where a small girl with auburn hair stood in the doorway, the door cracked open just enough for her to peek in the room.

"Susan! N-mmp!" The man stuffed the gag back into the woman's mouth. The girl shrank back a bit, but the man smiled and gestured for her to come in. The woman who was tied up struggled against her bindings, trying to shout through her gag, but all that come out was a bit of muffled and disoriented sounds.

"What are you doing to Auntie?" asked Susan.

"Don't worry, Susan. Your will be just fine," assured the man. "I'll let her go in about three minutes, unharmed.

"At least, if you cooperate. If you don't, I can't guarantee your aunt's safety."

"You're a bad man. Auntie says not to trust bad men. And Auntie catches bad men." Susan stated bluntly.

"You're absolutely right. I am a bad man. But, if you help me, then your aunt won't be hurt, and she can come and catch me."

"I still don't trust you. You're a bad man, and I don't trust bad men. How do I know you are going to keep your word?"

"While it's good not to trust bad men, bad men have an honor code of their own. One of the primary rules is that promises to pretty little girls are always kept. And since you are a pretty little girl, and I promised you, it'll work out. Besides, if you don't help me, then your aunt won't be able to after me and catch me."

There was a slight pause as Susan pondered his words. "All right," agreed Susan, "I'll help. But only because you will keep your promise not to hurt Auntie."

"Ok. Susan, I need you to take this knife, go up to the wall, prick your finger on the knife, and put your hand on the wall."

Susan approached the man carefully, still not trusting him completely. She took the knife and pricked her finger on the knife, opening the wall safe for Susan to enter.

"Susan, go into the safe and remove a stack of documents. They should be held together by a gold band wrapped around the middle. They should be on top of the second dresser on the left." The woman's eyes opened wide in shock. Those were top secret documents from her time at the Department of Mysteries. She didn't know how the man in black knew of them, but she couldn't let him get his hands on them. She struggled again, this time knocking over the chair, and she tried to trip the man in black with her chair, but the man pulled out his wand and immobilized her chair, stopping her efforts.

Susan came back from the vault with the stack of documents, and the man in black smiled genuinely at Susan as she handed them to him. "Thank you, Susan. You've been a great help to me. Now, I've got one more task for you to do. I need you to drink this sleeping potion. I swear that there is no poison or otherwise harmful agents in the potion."

"Fine," said Susan. She took the offered bottle of potion and drank it in one gulp. She lay down on the floor drowsily, curled up, and fell asleep. The man in black smiled, but this time it wasn't kind. Again, he removed the gag from the woman's mouth, and sat down next to Susan, putting his hand on her shoulder.

"This is your last chance, Amelia. If you don't give me the list of muggleborns, then I will involve Susan."

"What are you going to do to Susan?" asked Amelia, still struggling against her bindings.

"That depends on your choice. Will you give up the list? Or will you let Susan take the place of the muggleborns. Either is fine, but if you give me the list of the muggleborns, Susan will wake up after the sleeping potion wears off. However, if you don't, then..."

"Then, what?" asked Amelia, scared by this man's deal.

"I'm not going to tell you. That would ruin the fun. Now, you have ten seconds. Choose."

The man in black counted down from ten, and reached zero. "Well? What's it going to be?"

"I won't give you the list of muggleborns." Amelia tried to give her answer with confidence, but the shakiness in her voice was evident, and she was slightly trembling as she delivered it.

"So, even though your niece went through all that effort to save you, you won't help her back. But I suppose I can respect your choice. It was either Susan, the little girl you knew and loved, or the list of about 180 muggleborns that is currently in my possession."

Amelia paled, and dread crept into her eyes. "Really, you could have saved Susan, but you chose to condemn her to the same fate as the rest of them."

"No! Wait! I can give it to you! It's in my office desk, third drawer down, left side, fourteenth folder!"

"Well, as you have been so helpful to me, you still chose to give me Susan, not the list. Thanks for volunteering the information. You didn't think I really had it, did you? It'll make things so much easier. However, in order to fulfill my promise to Susan, I'll have to let you go."

He cast an Incendio on the ropes binding her to the chair. "That should release you in about a minute. Now, you'll be the first to witness exactly what will happen to all the muggleborn girls that you gave me access to."

The man in black leaned forward, his hand still on Susan's shoulder, and whispered three words into her ear. The same brilliant blue light filled the room, and when Amelia's eyes opened, she saw Susan's smoking body on the floor. Tears filled her eyes as she saw the last of the Bones lying on the floor, dead.

The man in black stood. Pointing his wand at Amelia he whispered one more spell. Tipping his hat to Amelia, he left the room, vamoosing away from the Ossuary, the Bones' family manor, and flooing to Amelia's office, where he could find the list of the muggleborns, leaving a distraught Amelia Bones weeping over the burnt corpse of her niece.


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Cornelius Fudge was completely unprepared to deal with the hysterical DMLE head in his office. His day had been a good one; the Wizengamot meeting earlier had been productive, giving him a bit more leeway in his position. Therefore, when Amelia Bones had flooed into his office demanding an arrest warrant for an unknown man, he didn't know what else to do, so he agreed, letting Amelia take care of that. Instead, he was now preparing a speech to warn the citizens of the impending danger of the man dressed in black.

Amelia had insisted that the news get out immediately, because she didn't want any more incidents similar to hers to happen, and Fudge agreed with her. With the Bones line practically gone, the death of the Bones heiress would send the purebloods into a panic.

While Cornelius didn't like the purebloods panicking, he also didn't like the citizens panicking, and out of the two, he would prefer to deal with the purebloods. Even though they were a slippery bunch that tried to expand their influence over the wizarding world through trickery, they were the ruling class, and it didn't take much to calm them down, even if it took a little pampering to get them there.

So, Cornelius decided, he would give the speech, warn the average Joe, and maybe give himself a little publicity for getting on top of things. That would be best.


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The man dressed in black was currently pondering his latest encounter with Amelia Bones. He wished it hadn't been necessary to act the way he had, not caring whatsoever for the girls he was using. Even if the girls hated him for it, even if the entire wizarding world hated him for it, he knew that offered the choice, he would still have taken the route he had chosen. He didn't try to justify what he was doing; it was reprehensible, but it had to be done.

Leaning back in his chair, he thought over all of the girls that he had taken so far. Out of all the girls he had taken so far, the one that haunted him the most was the first girl. He couldn't remember her name; only that her parents had been dentists.

"My name is Hermione!" The thought rang through his head. It hadn't been thought by the man dressed in black. No, the thought had come from the very girl herself. "And stop angsting over what you've already done. Just move on, and keep going! You need to be at the top of your game if you want to continue. Also, I've already forgiven you for what you've done, so stop thinking about it."

"You don't understand!" replied the man. "You'll never be able to go back to your bodies again. I've basically stolen your soul from your body. After about two more weeks, your consciousness will be all that's left, because your soul will begin to meld with mine, expanding my magical core, and once that happens-"

"Stop!" commanded Hermione. "Just stop. What's done is done. Now, stick to your plan. You'll need it if you want to overthrow the ministry."

"Fine!" retorted the man dressed in black. "I'll stop 'angsting' over what I've done. Now, can you please be quiet? I need to concentrate."

"Concentrate on what?"

"Figuring out who to go after next."

"Hmm, I don't know. I'd say to ask Susan, but she hasn't woken up yet. Anyways, what is in that pile of documents that you picked up from the Bones's. You haven't taken it out yet, and I want to know what's in it."

"It's got some very important things."

"Sure, like that helps narrow it down."

"It does. Now you know that it's not going to talk about the proper way to eat your boogers."

"Oh, you! Stop that! Fine, it doesn't have anything to do with eating boogers. Any other hints?"

"Uh, sure. The only thing that I can think up off the top of my head is that it had to do with excess tachyon particles that forensics believe will conflagrate the adjoining solar parsec into a supernovic paroxysm that would engulf the entirety of the Yardrat system."

"You made that up."

"How'd you guess?"

"A paroxysm is an outburst of emotion, not an actual explosion. Basically, you said that there were too many ftl particles that criminal scientists would burn up the nearest 3.262 light years in a fit of emotion so big that it would destroy the Yardrat planet."

"That makes absolutely no sense."

"Says the guy who said the actual thing!"

"I was paraphrasing!"

"Paraphrasing what?"

"Uh, I don't recall."

"Whatever. I'm going to go get some sleep."

"Goodnight." The man in black put his face in his hands in near exhaustion. How was a seven-year-old girl that smart? I mean, how many people actually knew what a paroxysm was? He certainly hadn't. It had been a long night, and the man dressed in black was also ready to hit the sack. He trudged down the small hallway from his porch to his bedroom and lay down. He'd be back to work in the evening.


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Harry Potter was back in his closet. His aunt hadn't believed him when he had said that he hadn't broken the dining platter. No, Dudley had done that, but Aunt Petunia never believed him when he blamed Dudley; it made the punishment worse. He'd give her the most believable excuses, and she'd turn them aside, and locked him up in his cupboard, or gave him more chores.

Well, Harry was fed up with all of his so-called 'relatives.' He was running away; he no longer belonged here. Maybe he'd find work someplace, or someone could take him in, and he could do all of their chores. That'd work.

He packed up all of his belongings, put them in his backpack, and walked out the door.


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The alarm bell was ringing. Whirring and spinning, popping and tooting, it was ringing. Unfortunately, no one was around to hear it, so the alarm kept on twirling and turning, until someone could attend to it.


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Susan blinked open her eyes. The last thing she had remembered was the man asking her to take the potion, and she had laid down on the floor, because she had been really tired, and then she had fallen asleep, right?

"Hello!" A bright voice snapped Susan out of her semiwakefulness into alertness.

"Hello," responded Susan. She paused. The way she had talked had sounded very different. Not like she usually did; it sounded more like she was talking inside her head, except, this wasn't inside her head, was it?

"You must be wondering what's going on. I was confused when I first woke up, too." Susan now a better awareness of her surroundings, and she found herself to be lying in a fanciful bed with elegant covers and intricate carved headboard. Sitting on the bed was a girl with brown bushy hair, large front teeth, and a brilliant smile. The bed was inside a large bedroom with a wardrobe, changing screen, fireplace, and a balcony that overlooked a placid lakeside town. The sun was flitting in through the drawn curtains and the balcony.

"Where am I?" asked Susan.

The girl crinkled her face in thought. "You know, I never really thought about it that much before. I mean, I know where we are, and why we are here, but not, how shall I say it, why we are here, do you catch my drift?"

"Not really," replied Susan. "So, in answer to my first question?"

"Oh!" The girl gave a little start. "Sorry, forgot. We are in, oh, I can't say it right. I'll just let Mib tell you?"

"Who?"

"Oh, right, you haven't met him yet. He's the one who created this place."

"Created? Not built? Or constructed?" asked Susan.

"Yup, created. I'm not sure how big it is, but it's really impressive. I think I'll have to go exploring for a bit later today."

"How long have you been here? You don't sound like you've been here very long." Susan observed.

"You're right. I've only been here three days, but it's been really fun! I've learned so much from Mib and the library here. I should warn you, once you start to read some of the books there, you can't stop. It's a good thing Mib keeps an eye on me."

"Yeah?"

"Yesterday he reminded me that I still had to eat lunch. It was kind of embarrassing. Oh, do you know about magic?"

"Magic? Of course I know about magic. What, did you not know about magic?" asked Susan, a little confused.

"I didn't," said the girl hotly. "What, did you expect everyone to know about magic?"

"Sorry," apologized Susan, "I didn't know you were a muggleborn. What's your name, anyway?"

"My name is Hermione Granger," said Hermione.

"Susan Bones, pleasure to meet you."

"Charmed." There was a short pause, while Hermione was trying to arrange another sentence.

"Hermione, is Susan awake yet?" It was a disembodied voice, coming from everywhere, and yet, nowhere. Also, it was a voice that Susan recognized. She had heard that voice, seemingly moments earlier. It was the voice of the man dressed in black. Susan started a little, but composed herself.

"Yeah, she just woke up a few minutes ago. I haven't really told her anything other than my name. I left the explaining up to you."

"Suuure, leave the tough stuff to meee." The man dressed in black's voice drawled; Hermione rolled her eyes.

"I wasn't sure how to say it, and I thought you would do a better job of explaining it than I would." Hermione retorted.

"Fine! I'll explain it." Susan felt the man dressed in black's attention turn to her, and she made a small "Eeeep!"

The man dressed in black sighed. "There's no need to be frightened. Your aunt is fine. Maybe a little smoke inhalation, but nothing a little time won't fix." Susan breathed a sigh of relief. Auntie 'Meila was safe.

"Now, as to where you are, the simple answer is that you are inhabiting a part of my soul." He paused, letting that sink in.

"Wait, what?" Susan was very confused. She was inhabiting a part of his soul? Then how was she keeping her integrity, and how did she even get here?

"That's somewhat misleading, but essentially correct. I used an ancient spell to separate your soul from your body, and attach it to mine. Your mind, the link between your soul and your body, followed, as you were no longer inside of your body."

"So I'm a part of your soul now?" asked Susan.

"Yes and no. You are technically still a separate entity, but you are connected to my soul similarly to a soul bond. It's not the same, as your soul will eventually coalesce with mine, but if I die, you will too."

"So that's why I feel like I'm talking inside my head," Susan commented.

"Yes. Also, you will be able to view my memories and experiences like a pensieve, and even watch what I'm doing right now. Any book that I've read will be stored in the 'local' library, and you can visit whenever you want."

"About that," interjected Susan, "What exactly is this place?"

"That's a very easy and at the same time tough question to answer. Basically, you are in my soul, and I've built a physical representation of it, and that's what you're living in right now. I've tried to make it as comfortable as I can, but if you need anything, just let me know. Call for 'Mib.'"

"I have one more question. Will I ever be able to go back to my body?"

"No." The man dressed in black's words were spoken gently, but the harsh truth behind them struck Susan in the gut, ripping it out, and replacing it with burning coals. Tears began to fall down her cheeks, and Hermione put a hand on her shoulder comfortingly. The man dressed in black continued, "I made a choice, and these were the consequences."

"What choice could have made you do this?" Susan asked tearfully.

"The choice between a bad one and a horrid one."


A/N: This idea just popped in my head, and I started writing. Don't know when I'll update this, but it might take a week or two. Reviews would be appreciated. Thanks for reading.