Newt is desperately trying to talk Credence down from the precipice of death and destruction when he feels the thrum of a dozen magical cores approaching, President Picquery in the lead.
So far he's allowed this travesty to play out, allowed the magical humans their petty squabbles, allowed even the arrogant Grindelwald to attack him without consequence.
But as MACUSA's aurors raise their wands, spells bright and blazing toward what used to be a boy named Credence Barebones, Newt decides he's had enough.
"No!" he roars, shoving his hands away from his body and creating a crackling shield of pure magic between Credence and those that would attack him. He stands straight, shakes off the mask of Newt Scamander, allows his true nature to take its place.
He is the very essence of magic itself.
"Credence Barebones is under my protection." He knows that his voice echoes unnaturally, he knows that his eyes are shining and he knows that his skin his glowing. He looks ethereal; inhuman.
He turns, ignoring the aurors, and a negligent flick of his wrist sends Grindelwald flying into the wall and summons his wand. Newt inspects, then snaps it before turning to gaze at the man himself.
"You know, masks are rather a speciality of mine," Newt whispers, and pulls the face of Percival Graves away, revealing Gellert Grindelwald in its stead. Grindelwald groans and tries to stand, but Newt encourages magic to bind him in place even as he hears the aurors gasp and babble.
"What are you?" Grindelwald demands.
"Magic," Newt murmurs, and send a tendril of magic toward him to keep him silent too.
He turns to the throbbing mass of pain and fury, the parasitical dark magic raging war against Credence's soul in a desperate attempt to take control once more, and pushes magic forward, cocooning the obscurus in a projection of love and affection.
"Come on Credence," he croons. "You're safe now, I promise." The obscurus is folding in on itself, the occasional dark shard spearing toward him, but stopping before it gets close enough to do him injury.
"That's it. I'll look after you. Nobody can hurt you now." The black tar-like magic creeps back down the walls, rapidly shrinking, until all that's left is a pale boy swimming in dark clothing and pain. Newt slowly walks forward, and eventually embraces Credence. Credence is shivering, tears dripping down his face; Newt wipes them away.
"I'm sorry," Credence stutters around sobs.
"Nothing to be sorry for," Newt promises. He opens his suitcase. "Would you like to meet my friends? They're magical creatures, just like you." He coaxes Credence into the suitcase, helps him curl up on a cot, and strokes his hair as he falls asleep, emotionally, physically and magically exhausted. It doesn't take long, but time is irrelevant to Newt regardless.
Newt walks back up the ladder. Picquery's still there with an entire hoard of aurors and cursebreakers trying to get through his barrier. It absorbs all magic thrown at it—there's no way they'd have succeeded.
"Mr Scamander," Picquery says cautiously. "It seems we owe you a great debt."
Anger wells up within him, anger for how poorly humans have been treating their world, magical and non-magical alike, anger at how much they take for granted. The darkness inside him wants to surge forth and rip the life away from them, to create a world for creatures that aren't polluting the earth with their presence, but he resists, forcing his anger back down with practise.
He wants to say yes, you owe me your lives, and now live them better and greater than before.
But then he'd be just as bad as they are, so he doesn't.
He conjures bonds that will keep Grindelwald secure and reabsorbs the magic from the barrier he created. Aurors surge forward, surrounding the darkest wizard of their time, a few of them keeping an eye on Newt, no doubt wary at the amount of power he's been throwing around.
"Yes, you do owe me," he says. "As I owe you this. Obliviate."
Newt sends out tendrils of magic to each and every person exposed to this latest debacle, removing the existence of magic from all the non-maj's minds, and replacing the magical human's memories with that of a battle, the destruction of the obscurus, and a wild and wonderful plan involving Frank and the venom from his swooping evil. He pushes at the atmosphere; altering air pressure and temperature until thunder and lightning crackle above, raining, pouring down to wash away their sins, and Newt allows his essence to fade away, pulls the mask of Newt Scamander back over himself, hunching his shoulders, and gentling his smile to deal with the consequences of the story he'd wrought.
When Newt finally gets the chance to return to his case Credence is curled up with Dougal stroking his hair. Newt smiles.
For all his anger, for the all the pain of the world around him crying out with each abuse, this is why he does it. It's for the small smile on Credence's face, the warmth of the niffler hidden in Newt's pocket and the sweet affection in the stroke of Pickett's leafy limbs against his cheek.
In time it will get better, and Newt forgives Grindelwald and Picquery and Mary-Lou. They are only human, after all.
This all started because I was thinking - why the hell is Newt not more afraid when he's facing:
- Dangerous animals
- Arrest by Tina
- The death sentence
- Duels
- Credence the obscurus
- Grindelwald
And so I was like ah, fuck it, Newt is an immortal god of magic.
Also y'all should now go listen to Human by Rag'n'Bone Man because it's awesome.
Thanks for reading, hope you enjoyed it, let me know!