Titanic: a Harry Potter FanFiction
Prologue: No Diamonds
"About seventeen yards in front of you. You should see it." Says Gildory Lockhart, treasure hunter and scavenger extraordinaire. His words had been spoken to none other than the driver of the submersible boat that has been heavily charmed for their protection. A man by the name of Mundungus Fletcher.
"I see it." He says as the heavily warded boat comes upon the bow of the ship. The enchantments on their boat, combined with the use of muggle technology allowed them to go further into the wreck than any other explorers.
As they approach the bow, Gildory instructs dung to, "Take her up and over. Bring her down on the captains quarters." After issuing his orders, he sets up a dicta-quill with a role of never ending parchment. The over dramatization of his narrative prompts Mundungus to laugh.
"Your so full of shit Lockhart."
After a few more moments of the man's dramatics, they were ready to launch the enchanted muggle robots to explore. Lockhart and Gildory's machine would be used to explore B deck.
The craft moved through the halls, finally coming upon the suite they sought. They navigate through the doorways until they reach the bedroom, as evidenced by the remains of what was, at one point, a bed.
The sight of the broken down furniture brings Lockhart to an energized state of excitement. "That's it! That's Riddle's bed! That's where the son of a bitch slept!"
As his boss stands over his shoulder like an overzealous school girl, Dung turns the robot to survey the room. "Someone left the bathtub on." He jokes, passing a pile of rubble that has spilled out of the wardrobe when his boss prompts him:
"Go back. The wardrobe door. I wanna see what's underneath it."
"You smell something Lockhart?" He asks, making his way to the pile.
Gildory hands him the controls for the robots hands instead of dignifying him with a verbal response.
Under the backseat instructions of Lockhart, Dung manages to flip the wardrobe door.
Beneath it was the safe they had been looking for.
Lockhart only had one thing to say.
"It's pay day boys."
Jubilant celebration was taking place on the deck of the large boat that served as the base of their operations. The S.S Hogwarts. Up here, among the surface dwellers, there was bubbly being sprayed about and the publicity crew was poised with parchment, quills and cameras. Their flashbulbs lit the area.
"Who's the man?" Asks the driver, grinning like a mad man.
"You are dung." Lockhart admits as they use a cutting hex to cut through the fastenings of the safe.
"Pull her open." One of the engineers orders, hooking a chain to the door. They didn't want to risk using a blasting spell and risk the artifacts inside.
They pull.
The door falls off.
A gush of pink ocean slime covers the deck.
Lockhart reaches into the safe, pulling out the contents. Several pieces of soggy paper and some sort of note book. Finally it was apparent.
"No diamonds." Says a deck hand, being the one to stay that which was on everybody's mind.
"You know boss," says Dung, "When your father made a mistake like this, his career never recovered."
Lockhart orders the cameras off.
"Lockhart." A muggle born intern calls from the phone in the ship's preservation lab. "Rita Skitter would like an interview." Gildory Lockhart takes the phone.
"Well Rita it wasn't in the safe but there's still dozens of places it could be." It was obviously an answer to a question the reporter asked him.
She says something on the other end. Gildory responds with, Hell yeah. The mother's room. The floor debris, the son's room."
"Jimmy Hoffa's brief case." The muggle born intern helpfully suggested.
"A dozen other places." Lockhart reiterated as a preservation specialist was spraying the mud and grime off the first page of the notebook they found. It turned out to be a sketch book.
"A trunk. The drawers of the dressing table. Still plenty of places. It's a process of elimination." He continued until the drawing that was being cleaned caught his eye.
As the muck was sprayed off, it became apparent it was of a young man with shoulder length black hair. He was in the nude, sprawled out in a scandalous pose. He had nearly absent body hair, and given the likely identity of the man, it was likely from the use of depilatory potions. His hands were narrow and the long fingers were delicately bent near his face. The expression on his face was smoldering.
But what caught Lockhart's eye was the necklace he was wearing. The very necklace he was searching for. The Eye of the Raven.
He hurriedly tells the reporter, "I gotta go. I think we may have found something. I'll call you right back." He puts the phone down and looks at the drawing.
"Where's the photograph of the necklace?" He asks.
The muggle born intern helpfully retrieved the photo.
Compared side by side, the necklaces were the same.
Where most men would be at a loss for words, Gildory Lockhart has one thing to say.
"I'll be god damned."
"Treasure hunter Gildory Lockhart is best known for finding muggle shipwrecks. How he has his sights set on the most famous wizzarding shipwreck of all. The Titanic." Says the T.V. The grating voice of Rita Skeeter sounded from Wizard Network News.
The room that particular T.V was in was a mixture of wizzarding and muggle. In a room off to the side with an open door an elderly man was working on a potion. He stirs it 4 times anti clockwise, then places the stirring rod on the work counter as bus granddaughter and husband, Nymphadora and Sirius respectively, work on setting the table.
The report on the news has caught his ear.
Lockhart goes on what is very obviously a pre rehearsed spiel. "Hello Rita. Of course everyone knows the familiar stories of the Titanic. The pure blood nobility. The band playing up until the end. What I'm interested in are the untold stories. The secrets that lie deep inside the bill of the Titanic. We're using a combination of spells and muggle technology to explore the wreck further than anyone ever has before."
The elderly man takes his cane in hand, walking toward the television, sharp dark eyes expertly hiding his thoughts. As he walks forward, the grating voice of Rita Skeeter drones on and on.
"Your expedition is at the center of a storm of controversy concerning salvage rights and ethics. Many are calling you a grave robber."
"Well nobody ever followed the recovery of the artifacts from the..." Lockhart was obviously using a diversion tactic to shift the attention and outcry to someone else's expedition.
As the elderly man walked forward, the girl, or rather women, who had been helping set the table asks, "What is papa?"
"Turn that damn thing up would you?" The elderly man asks.
Nymphadora did as had been asked of her. The voice of Lockhart continues his speech.
"...we're here with preservation experts so these artifacts can be preserved and catalogued properly. Take a look at this drawing that we found just today. A piece of paper that's been under water for 104 years. And my team managed to preserve it in tact. Should this have remained at the bottom of the ocean for all eternity?"
Both elderly men's eyes were focused ok the drawing of the naked young man the camera has zoomed in on.
At almost the same time, they both gasp.
"I'll be god damned."
"Lockhart there's a satellite call for you." Says the same intern who had earlier made a joke about Jimmy Hoffa.
"Can't you see we're about to launch?" He asks, clearly annoyed. He had been taking calls all day.
"Trust me." Says the intern. "Your goanna want to take this call."
He begrudgingly walks over to the phone.
"Your goanna want to speak up. He's kinda old." The intern helpfully informs him.
"Great." Gildory days, rolling his eyes be bore picking up the phone. "How can I help you Mr..." He turns to the intern at this point.
"Black. Severus Black." He offers helpfully.
"Mr. Black?" Lockhart finishes.
"Yes. I was just wondering if you had found The Eye of the Raven yet." Drawls a sarcastic voice.
Gildory's eyes widen. "Okay Severus. You have my attention. Can you tell me who the young man in the picture is?" He asks.
"Well obviously you half wit. How many blokes are named Severus? The man in the picture is me!"
Authors note: please leave a review. I know there are some historical inaccuracies. Please don't be mean about them. Severus is British and I wanted him to be returning home. For that some locations had to change. It was that or changing Severus' nationality and that would have changed the society he grew up in. I didn't want to change his personal canon so much.