"Wonderful. Just bloody wonderful. What do we do now?"
To say that Draco Malfoy and the DA—a study group lead by Harry Potter—were unhappy was an understatement. They were scared, angry and upset. Of course, they just discovered that they were effectively locked in what was commonly called the Room of Requirement with no way out until Merlin knows when. No matter that they were escaping Death Eaters—followers of an evil wizard called Voldemort—and that they would be missed by lots of people, like their families.
"Room, I wish to know why the door has disappeared, and when it will appear again, should you know this information."
Everyone stared at Amber, an orphan in Draco's House and Year, as she stood in the center of the room, seemingly getting an answer from the Room.
"Ah. Thank you Room."
"Well, what did it say?"
"Our projected need of protection was strong enough that the room deemed it necessary to, shall we say, drop out of time. It has read all of us to some extent and realized our destiny fighting those morons and their insane leader, and plans on keeping us here for at least a decade if not more so we can train and prepare. Once we are ready, it will insert itself back into the timeline just a few minutes before it disappeared, and we will go out fighting."
Shock. Complete and utter shock was Amber's only response.
"You serious?" asked Ron Weasley. Amber gave him a Look.
"Right. Well, now what do we do?" asked Fred Weasley.
"Harry is the leader, not me, so don't ask me. I am going to go over here to this corner and try and retrain myself a bit. After all, it's been awhile since my last gang war, and I am no doubt a bit rusty."
"Gang war? Why in the world would you be involved in a gang war?"
"Because my previous Master was, and I was duty-bound to fight for him. However, my last war was about a year or so ago, so I am out of practice."
"'Previous Master'?" echoed Dean Thomas.
Amber nodded. "Contrary to popular belief, I have not led the charmed life. I highly doubt you'd be interested in my time as the biggest child of the Blackmarket, however, so I shall not bore you."
That said, Amber headed over to a corner and had the Room conjure dummies, which she then began shooting at. The group and Draco regarded her with something akin to shock and horror. While they didn't truly know the significance of being a Blackmarket child, they knew that being one wasn't something you wanted to go out and become. How long had she been one before escaping?
Amber was really getting into shooting those dummies, which were moving and shooting their own guns back at her in what was undoubtedly the moves performed by the enemy in a gang war. Amber ducked, dodged and shot with rather deadly accuracy, but sometimes she missed, and she was shot for it. She always managed to move enough so it wasn't a fatal wound, but still.
It was awhile before any of the group could actually confront Amber on her words. When they finally could, Amber was bleeding heavily from a good many shot wounds, and the dummies were wearing down—most of them where now lying shot to pieces (literally!) around the battleground.
With one final shot ringing throughout the room, the last dummy went down and Amber lay bleeding and panting on the floor. Looking over her wounds, she grimaced.
"Definitely out of practice." she mumbled as she began to heal her wounds, as was normal. This was easy enough to see from the viewpoints of the others, despite their awe at the obvious wandless magic. Just bad how her life been while they were going around on the assumption that she had been raised by Voldemort himself?
When Draco demanded to know just what her past was, Amber had simply glared. Seemingly realizing that nobody was backing down and they were all united in this she sighed.
"Just take all the spoiled rotten stuff you seem to think my life is and reverse it. That's about the extent of it after my parents were murdered, and that's all I'm going to say on the matter. End of story."
Then she went off, back to her corner of the Room, muttering about her aim and dodge tactics and about the possibility of adding her magic in with the weapons and physical fighting to become an ultimate warrior. After all, muggles may not have knowledge on magic, but wizards would be expecting it. Just not with tae-kwon-do and hand grenades.
Draco and the DA left her alone for a bit after that, contemplating their own guilt while Amber deployed Slytherin tactics and strategies to help kick Death Eater arse. After several hours of their being lost in thought, and Amber practicing using simple curses like Stunners and the Body-Bind while shooting off hand guns at the same time, Harry was elected this time 'round as speaker.
"Amber, I realize that it's probably too late and it won't change the past, but we would like to offer you our apologies for our horrid treatment of you based on assumptions we couldn't truly prove anyway. We would like it if you could perhaps train us in the muggle arts you know. Guns and stuff like that."
"I was going to offer my services for that purpose anyway. While you were busy, I was working on integrating my magic with my fighting. Death Eaters are wizards and muggle-illiterate purebloods at that. They expect magic because that's all they know. Guns and karate won't be something they know a thing about. If we can merge that and our magic together, then it will be totally unexpected and harder to block at that. I figured you'd be the group to want any major advantage you can get over the Grim Munchers and Moldywarts."
Several people sniggered at Amber's nicknames but nevertheless nodded. Secretly, they planned to get full detail of her past out of her and work on her emotional mind, which was in tatters. They only hoped it wasn't too late and she wasn't too broken to be fixed.
At that moment, though none realized it, House and Blood prejudices were dropped, never to be regained. Lies were shattered by long-overdue truths and acceptance was given were it was long since lost. They went in Gryffindors and Slytherins, Purebloods and Muggleborns, at war with one another as well as with Dumbledore and the Dark Lord.
They would come out united, a side of the war none ever expected, and more then capable of kicking Voldemort's butt to the deepest pits of Hell. Of course, they wouldn't take too kindly at the discovery of the machinations of one Albus Dumbledore. Still, they would not kill him as they would Voldemort. They would give him his second chance.
However, had you been witness to this event, you wouldn't agree. In fact, you'd probably close your eyes and mutter about how the world is doomed.
Perhaps you'd be right.
Okay, to start with, this wasn't my original plot—well, the locked in the Room of Requirement thing anyway. I can't quite remember the story that got me to writing this, but that particular part of this plot comes from it. Next, I do not own Harry Potter, so shut up. I hope to update this fairly quickly with a new chapter, as I already have a vague idea where this is going. Here's a forewarning: Lots of resurrections. And don't worry, I am already about halfway done chapter 3 for Thestral and Runaway will be updated sooner or later...once my imagination kicks into high gear and decided to actually START chapter 3….
Werewolf of Suburbia