Gen13 Mystic Training: Thundercrack

by Joshua The Evil Guy

Originally this was to be the conclusion of my Gen13 side-story, but I've already gone and concluded that as is, so now this is its own separate side-story. Specifically, this is the story of Harry's First Official Mission as an ICW Hit-Wizard. Ties in to my other stories, Gen13: Mystics, and the other Gen13 Mystic Training stories.

Title: Gen13 Mystic Training: Thundercrack

Author: Joshua "The Evil Guy"

Rating: M

Disclaimer: Gen13 and all associated characters and events were created by Jim Lee and J. Scott Campbell, and the original comics/events this story covers distributed by Image Comics, though are now owned by DC Comics. There will be brief mentions of Harry Potter, but he doesn't show up in this story. Other crossovers, mostly from concepts and magic powers will be mentioned. Niklaren "Niko" Goldeye belongs to Tamora Pierce, drawn from her "Circle of Magic" series. Tris is a fusion of Trisana Chandler from the same series, and the Triss Merigold of the Witcher series, but isn't really like either of them. Madam Harkness and New Salem and all associated characters are property of Marvel Comics. Dr. Fate, Felix Faust, and others are property of DC Comics. The Black Rock Coven and their leader's visage is borrowed from The Gamer manhwa/comic. I don't own any of it and I'm not making any money from all this, so don't bother suing me. No spoilers in this one, just character development and a bit of rewriting.

Summary: Originally this was to be the conclusion of my Gen13 ¾ side-story, but I've already gone and concluded that as is, so now this is its own separate side-story. Specifically, this is the story of Harry's First Official Mission as an ICW Hit-Wizard. Ties in to my other stories, Gen13: Mystics, and the other Gen13 Mystic Training.

Story:

Undisclosed Location

Harry James Potter, aka the Hit-wizard going by the pseudonym Thundercrack, took a moment to fully appreciate the predicament he'd gotten himself into this time. Of course when a GenActive with the power to manipulate time 'takes a moment', that moment can last anywhere from a few seconds, to a few days.

He was on his first official assignment from the ICW as a Hit-Wizard.

And, it turns out, being a Hit-wizard really is just like being back at Hogwarts. Minus the part of spending every waking moment next to Ron Weasley and Hermione Granger, that is. He wondered how those two were doing now, if they'd finally gotten married, or if they were in a vicious cycle of breaking up and getting back together because he wasn't there as a buffer any longer. Oh, and in other ways that being a Hit-wizard isn't like being back at Hogwarts, he actually gets paid for taking down the dark wizards he defeats. Or, at least he will, once he actually manages to bring in his "first" dark wizard that is.

Looking at his surroundings, he quickly identified and cataloged half a dozen entries, exits, vantages, and potential situations that could help him escape the trap that he'd fallen into. The only problem being, the trap had him stuck in one place, and he couldn't reach any of them. Looking down at said trap, he tapped the side of his glasses and was able to see the runic array as the magic flowed into and through the magic circle. He wouldn't be able to explain each and every rune, or the exact details of how it all worked, but he knew enough to decipher what it did.

Shield, one-way. Anti-Apparition. Anti-Portkey. Pain, electric or lightning based. Barrier. Oh, wow, and Anti-Portal wards as well. One last thing... He had to tilt his head and basically look at it upside down, but he finally recognized it. It was the basis for a soul/power extraction array. There was no receiving rune, none that were part of the circle anyway, which explained why it wasn't currently draining out his magic and soul, but that was probably due to...

"You're cleverer than most," a voice came from the dark. "To track me down, cause the damage to my infrastructure that you have. But you are still so incredibly stupid. Coming here alone."

"I can handle you, Faust," Harry replied to the faceless threat.

"Apparently not," Felix Faust, dark wizard, laughed from the shadows. "You fell so easily into my trap. Tell me, did you even see it before you stepped into the circle? It wasn't exactly well-hidden."

Harry just smiled and crossed his arms.

"Is it confidence," the dark conjurer finally stepped into the light, "or arrogance you display?"

"Probably a bit of both," he shrugged, still smiling.

"Do you know who I am, boy? What I am?" the balding old man snarled, coming right up to the edge of the circle, wearing a midnight-navy robe and carrying an ornate wooden staff.

"Felix Faust," Harry recited from the file he'd been given on his target. "Dark sorcerer, known for conjuring and making deals with multiple demons, devils and Dark Fae. The Light Fae apparently wanting nothing to do with you. Stated goals is to attain ultimate power and become the most powerful user of magic in the world. Currently wanted for, now let me know if I have this wrong, nine counts of demon summoning, thirteen counts of human sacrifice, thirty-two counts of racketeering, multiple counts of fraud, and two convictions of illegal soul trafficking, multiple counts."

"You forgot the dark magic assault convictions," Faust replied, practically beaming with pride.

"You don't get the title dark sorcerer without a minimum of ten or more such convictions," Harry shrugged, indicating that it was implied. "You've been imprisoned in, let's see; Nurmengard, Tartarus, Azkaban, Riker's Island Mystic Solitary, Sub-Alcatraz, Atlantis Detainment Centre, and... no, don't tell me... ah! L'Mystique Pénitencier!"

"They had good food there, you should try it sometime," Faust teased.

The green-eyed wizard shrugged, now pacing along the inner edge of his confinement. "Maybe I will. I'll certainly be delivering enough prisoners there in the future. Now, what else. Ah, yes. You have two children, both from different mothers, one son, one daughter. Favorite food is veal stroganoff. Most common snack is beef jerky, although apparently you prefer human meat ever since one particular deal went sideways with a devil that shall remain nameless. Likes reading, favorite play, of course, The Tragical History of Doctor Faustus. Favorite book, Dante's Inferno. Favorite movie..."

"Enough!" Faust snapped. "So you did your homework. How did you find me?"

"Now that," Harry nodded his head, "is a bit of a long story. Sure you want to hear all of it? I mean, sure, I can recite to you ever single step that I took that allowed me to find you, name every person that helped me along the way, and even explain what it is that I did that allowed me to get this far. Or, I could just give you a short simple reply in answer to your question. See, I just..."

"Tell me everything," Faust took a step closer and raised his staff menacingly, allowing Harry to see the remaining rune for that last piece of the circle, which would allow Faust to drain his magic directly into his own. "Or else!"

Harry shrugged again, continuing to pace. "Have it your way. But please remember that I said it was a long story."

"Get on with it," Faust smiled this time, it was an ugly sight. "I have all night, and you have the rest of your life."

"Fair point," he acknowledged. "All right, where to begin?"

Seven Weeks Ago

Toronto, Ontario, Canada

The Dal'Riata

Harry walked into the 'old world' bar, which was practically the same as walking into the Leaky Cauldron back in London. Except this place was more 'Scottish' than 'English', and had electric lighting, and was generally in much better repair and condition and was just plain cleaner. ...OK, it was completely different from the Leaky Cauldron, but nevertheless, he felt filled with a sense of nostalgia once he was through the doors.

Walking up to the bar, Harry took a seat and waited for the bartender, a balding man that had a few inches (if that much) on his old Charms Professor.

"Hello friend," the barkeep greeted him kindly. "What can I get you?"

Harry nodded in reply and briefly made a show of opening his cloak to reveal his ICW-issued 'back-up' wand (he had yet to even cast a spell with the damn thing), while pulling out a piece of folded up parchment. The barkeep's eyes lit up, although it was too early to say with what emotion precisely.

"Not much," Harry said. "I'm actually meeting someone here, and I doubt I'll have much time for a drink or anything. He may already be here. I've heard that he's able to find most anything. Some kind of master of," he double-checked the parchment, "not sure if I have this right, Sight magic?"

Now Harry could recognize relief and familiarity in the barkeep's eyes.

"You speak of Niklaren Goldeye," he said. "A powerful mage, a good man, and a close friend. I am Patrick McCorrigan, the proprietor, owner, and bartender of the Dal here. But please, call me Trick. You can find Niko over by the fireplace. Left side."

Harry smiled and put away the parchment. "Thank you. My name is Harry Potter. And in full disclosure, I am a Hit-Wizard with the ICW. I need Niko's help in finding Felix Faust."

At the name, Trick's eyes darkened noticeably.

Harry nodded with sympathy. "I see you're familiar with the name. I'm here to bring him in for his crimes."

"Too bad he never stays 'in'," Trick commented. "Good luck to you, wizard."

Harry winced and replied, "Please, if you must, call me Thundercrack. Or just Harry."

Trick laughed. "I'll try to remember that."

Pleasantries exchanged, and reminding Harry that he was in Fae territory, rather than the Wizarding World, the young Hit-wizard walked over toward the fireplace, leaning a bit to the left of course. Looking his contact over, Harry couldn't help but be slightly impressed. Although, he doubted he was giving the same impression, given his dirty leather coat, simple black robe, tunic and 'costume' beneath it all. Although he was often complemented about his shoes. A side-effect of the friction-shield tech he'd added to his costume was the bottom of his shoes now glowed.

As for Goldeye, despite wizards tendency to be literal in their nicknames, neither of the man's eyes were gold. In fact, to Harry's discerning gaze, he didn't have a speck of gold, or even yellow, on him at all. He was rather well-dressed, however. It was clear that the man took very fine care of his appearance. Currently he was in a three-piece-suit, silk, a classic charcoal gray, with a red-white-green-blue circle-design tie for a splash of color. The man himself appeared to be in his mid-thirties, black hair immaculately styled though with a touch of gray at the temples, blemish-free and well-moisturized white skin, and a well-trimmed beard along his jaw. It wasn't until he was close enough and caught the mage's eye that he sensed the power the older man held. His eyes were black, or dark enough that it was the same as, set under heavy dark eyebrows and long lashes. The man's long bony hands were folded beneath his chin as he watched the younger wizard's approach.

Harry had often heard people describe both Dumbledore and Voldemort as having a... a 'presence' about them. Personally, after his Fifth Year at Hogwarts, he wasn't quite sure what they were talking about. Voldemort was certainly scary and terrifying at times, but there was no 'sixth sense' of 'evil' or dark magic power that one felt whenever he was near. Same with Dumbledore. To Harry, he was always more a 'funny old grandfather' than the Leader of the Light everyone always made him out to be.

Now, however, Harry began to suspect what others had talked about as he approached the man that was undoubtedly one of the most powerful mages to walk the earth. He could feel it in every fiber of his being, with each step. Niklaren Goldeye was a very powerful mage. Possibly more powerful than Harry himself was.

"Niklaren Goldeye, I presume?" Harry inquired, pulling out a chair. "May I sit down? I have something that I wish to discuss with you."

"Harry Potter," he acknowledged. "My curiosity is piqued. Please," he gestured for the wizard to sit.

Being among his own 'people', so to speak, Harry forewent the harsher American accent he'd been working on and using thus far in his Hit-Wizard career, and spoke naturally. "To avoid getting off on the wrong foot, please make no mention of that whole business with the most recent English Dark Lord. I'm trying to get away from that sod and his shite."

"Fair enough," Goldeye laughed. "Likewise, don't begin our negotiations by asking me to find something, or someone. Not without offering your own services first, of course."

"Of course," Harry nodded.

"So, with the pleasantries, such as they were, out of the way, what can I do for you, Mr. Potter?" the mage asked, being friendly.

Smiling at the verbal trap he'd been cornered into, Harry gave a small chuckle, and then reached into his cloak and pulled out a folder. "For later," he said, patting it as he put it down on the table.

"I need your expertise and your help, sir," he began. "And of course, I am more than willing to offer my own services in exchange. Upfront and with no reservation on my part. I should let you know, though, that I am a Hit-wizard by trade, and while I can retrieve just about anything that you require, I'm no Cursebreaker, and I am pants at finding things. I needed a bloody enchanted map just to get around my school when I was younger, if that tells you anything."

"And so you need my help in finding whatever criminal you've been assigned," Goldeye deduced, glancing at the folder, easily reading the name on it. "Faust, eh? They gave you a tricky one. How many years have you been with the ICW?"

"This is my first assignment," Harry shrugged, earning himself a baleful glare, which transitioned into one of outright shock as his contact realized he wasn't lying.

"And they sent you after Faust?!"

Harry just shrugged again.

Drumming his fingers on the table, the man's black eyes danced with thought. Finally he spoke, "As it so happens, our interests align in this, Mr. Potter. Faust has... allies is too strong a word..."

"Cronies," Harry supplied.

"Hm, yes, cronies, who have... taken someone that is quite dear to me. My student. The story is long and complicated, but suffice it to say that she is being held captive in a den of evil that Faust has done trades with in the past. Bring my student back to me, help her in anyway that you can to save her from their evil, and I will not only find you Faust, but every one of his other... cronies, so that you may deal a crippling blow to his network. How many others are in your team?"

Harry blinked, surprised that anybody in the magical community knew about the rest of his team. What's more, he was the only Hit-Wizard assigned to this case, and despite 'having magic', somehow, none of the rest of Gen13 were a part of the ICW at all. He should probably do something about that, but for right now he had to retrieve this man's student, it would seem.

"It's just me, for the moment," Harry replied with a grin. "I'll probably get some form of back-up after I actually know where Faust is hiding, but that is for later. Do I need to leave this with you, or...?"

The mage was staring at him kinda funny. Harry ignored it and took the silence as permission to retrieve the file. He also had enough to go on that he was pretty certain he could find Goldeye's student without having to be told the address. Nodding one final time in farewell, Harry got up and went back up to the bartender.

"So," he asked, leaning against the bar, "How many drinks is it going to take me to find out where Goldeye's wayward student is being kept, eh?"

Undisclosed Location

"You used Goldeye to find me," Felix scoffed. "And he did it just because you retrieved his 'student'? Hah!"

Harry shrugged, arms still crossed as he started pacing the other way inside the wards containing him.

"Well, he was right. Getting her back meant that I had to go through the Black Rock coven to even get to her, so..."

"Wait, you were the one that vanquished the Black Rock coven and destroyed their den?!" the dark wizard interrupted.

"Hey! That wasn't me. Well... the destroying the den part wasn't me, no matter what those bastards are saying! And as for vanquishing... well, suffice it to say, there is truth in what they say about the female being the most dangerous species."

"Who was this student?!" Felix demanded to know.

"Funny you should ask," Harry grinned.

Thunder Bay, Ontario, Canada

Den of the Black Rock Coven

"How did you find me?" Trisana Merigold-Chandler demanded of the wizard.

Harry, who was currently floating upside-down, held that way by the witch's magic, gave her a helpless shrug, and replied, "Funny you should ask. Your... teacher asked me to, uh, rescue you."

"I don't need rescuing!" the chestnut-haired witch shouted at him.

"Clearly," he agreed, though with a note of bemusement in his tone.

"What?!" she snapped.

"What, what?" he repeated. "I was agreeing with you. You don't need rescuing. From the Black Rock Coven."

"Oh, do not start with me, wizard!" she growled.

"The name is Harry Potter, by the way," he replied, in his native accent, before switching back to his fake American accent with his next words. "And regardless of how you are being 'held captive', I have been tasked to return you to your Teacher and to help you in anyway that will facilitate that end goal. Otherwise, he doesn't help me, and I really need his help."

"Well too bad for you, because you aren't getting it," Tris said. She made a harsh gesture and he dropped to the ground on his head. It hurt a little bit, but he rolled up to his feet and shook it off. That is when he noticed all the Black Rock mages converging on him.

"Search him," Tris ordered them. "He's a wizard. They always have all sorts of charmed goodies to help them out. And if you find a wand on him, snap it! Can't risk him using it against us."

A high-pitched laugh echoed throughout the cavern. Turning toward the source, they all saw an old man, dressed in the same robes as all the other coven members, bald with a monocle in his left eye. Despite his apparent age, he spoke with firm conviction and an alluring energy, which Harry found suspect.

"Well done, very well done, my dear," the apparent leader of the Black Rock coven praised the younger witch. "I do not believe we even detected this intruder's presence. Nor would we have known he was here, had it not been for your quick actions. I see that Goldeye still has not given up on you, eh?"

"Canadians," Harry rolled his eyes, scoffing. Most of the room, minus Tris, turned to glare hatefully at him. He just smiled and 'raised his hands'.

"He approached me, somehow concealing his presence," Tris explained. "He wanted me to come with him, telling me that he was here to rescue me. I think he understands the situation better now. Niko never did bother sharing information that he didn't think people were ready for."

Harry's brow shot up, recalling that line of thinking in his own interactions with Dumbledore. Being on the other side of the equation now, he felt a little bit of pity for the old man, who he'd given nothing but scorn to in those last few years. Well... scorn might have been a bit much, but that was neither here nor there.

"For the record," Harry spoke up, interrupting, "I am a Hit-wizard, and all he did was tell me that you were being held by the Black Rock coven. I figured out the rest on my own."

That started a mumbling amongst the coven, but it was the leader that brought the confusion to light. "How did you find us then, eh? Our place here is hidden! None of the muggles or mundanes can even detect us, and the rest of the community is ignorant of our base! They all think we're somewhere in the far east!"

"Yeah, uh, you might want to retune your wards or something," Harry shrugged. "All I did was ask around for what your coven was 'into' per sè and then I checked with all the various companies and families and Co-Ops that provide that sort of product and... well, suffice it to say, it took a bit of detective work. But you may want to stop importing so many Caf-Pows. I'm just saying."

The bald monocled man began to turn red, which was really noticeable, before he finally exploded in fury, "Don't even bother with capturing him! I want him dead! Kill him! Kill him! KILL HIM!"

Harry sighed, and then he vanished on the spot, from their point of view.

Thinking he'd merely gone invisible, the entire coven pulled out their staves, wands, and other tools and started blasting the area where the Hit-wizard had been standing and maybe a bit further out. A few moments later, after the dust had settled, there was no invisible body and the spells had only hit the ground.

"He's gone!" Tris exclaimed, shocked. "But how? He didn't teleport, there was no sound. He didn't grab anything, it wasn't a portkey, and there was no portal... Where did he go?"

"It matters not, my dear," the Black Rock coven leader assured her. "We shall protect you from him and your former master. Come now, we had best hurry along and continue your... heh, initiation into our coven, eh."

"Yeah, that doesn't sound as fun or cool as most of the kids think these days," a voice called from right behind them. Turning, the entire coven joined Tris in her shock as they saw the black-haired Hit-wizard they thought they'd just obliterated standing there, leaning against the cavern wall.

"Took a look around this place," Harry said, letting out a long whistle. "('wheeoooooow') Nice assembly plant down there. And automated, but through magic instead of robots. Now that is impressive. Too bad the rest of the Wizarding World hasn't caught up with such simple innovations at that. But, in all seriousness, why are you mass-producing," he pulled out one such 'product' from behind his back and held it before him, "Blood-Stone-encrusted Battle Staffs with a Berserker/Self-Healing runic array on them? Selling them to the black market is one thing, but this type of thing... the more out there, the less profit you get from it. Is the Black Rock coven arms dealers? Who would have thought?"

"You've just sealed your fate, Hit-Wizard!" Black Rock Leader ordered, "KILL HIM!"

This time, Harry didn't 'vanish' until the attack spells were practically right on top of him. Of course, he was using his Gen-Factor to essentially stop time, and almost casually walking between the colored jets of energy until he was standing right next to his target and then 'slowed down' until time was moving regularly once more.

"You seriously want to join this coven, after already being Niklaren Goldeye's apprentice?" he said to her, incredulous. "Talk about taking a step down. It would be like me going from being an ICW approved Hit-Wizard, with international authorization to work absolutely anywhere, do anything so long as it was in pursuit of my bounties, not to mention enough money coming in annually that even if I wasted every knut of it, I'll still be stinking rich by the time I'm thirty years old—and instead tried to become the lowest rank Auror of a small town that was so corrupt that I'd still be in debt by the time I was fifty years old!"

"How did you...?" she started, then glared at him. "You don't know what it is like! He's holding me back! He never lets me do anything and he never just outright says what he means! He expects me to just..."

"Figure it out for yourself?" he finished for her, smirking. "Yeah, I kind of do know how that is."

"KILL HIM! KILL HIM! KILL HIM!"

"Might want to put up a shield or something," Harry grinned and vanished right before her eyes, although she could have sworn she saw some kind of afterimage of him moving away.

Seeing all of her "friends", not that she nor they would ever actually use that word to describe each other, point all their weapons in her direction and actually fire without so much as a moments hesitation... Well, she began to rethink her plans for hanging around the Black Rocks for much longer. Nevertheless, she cast and wrapped herself up in the strongest shield spell she could fathom—on such short notice—and waited out for the dust to settle before dropping it. Even then, she kept her standard shield spell ready to go on a hair trigger, just in case.

"Where did he go?!" the Leader demanded, practically frothing at the mouth with rage.

"He vanished!" she was quick to answer. "Just like he's been doing! How the hell is he doing that?!"

"If you really want to know," Harry said, now standing right behind the bald leader of the coven, "all you have to do is ask. I'll gladly explain it for you, Tris. Or do you go by Miss Chandler-Marigold?"

"RAAAHWR!" the Black Rock Leader roared, lashing out with his own destructive magic.

Harry, equipped with the Elder Wand, casually cast a Protego and easily withstood the onslaught, taking everyone aback at the use of such power. All at practically point-blank range!

"Seriously?" he suddenly asked. "I know that Hogwarts is kind of insulated and all, but I just told everyone here that my name is Harry Potter, and... nothing? How about Voldemort? AKA, the Dark Lord that I—permanently—killed last year?"

"That... that was YOU?!" the bald man in front of him screeched.

"Harry. Potter," he repeated one final time.

"Wh-wh-what d-do you w-want?" he stammered.

"Well, if you can actually tell me, without me having to employ Goldeye's help, then I'll just go ahead and leave right here and now," he explained. "I'm looking for Felix Faust. Where is he?"

One could practically hear the collective gulp as every full member of the Black Rock coven came to full understanding of the pile of shit they'd just landed in. Even Tris was suddenly apprehensive about the man her Teacher had sent after her. All because she wanted magic to be easier? She was really re-thinking her choices now.

"I... we don't know where he is," the bald coward answered truthfully. Harry could see it in his eyes. The Legilimency probe confirmed. "We don't even deal with him directly, there are..."

"I know all about how your organization works and conducts its business," the black-haired wizard interrupted. "But that only means that I'm still taking Tris with me. And you will stay away from her. If she tries to contact you, you will suddenly become unavailable. Is that clear?"

"Hey!" Tris shouted. "Wait a minute! You can't do that! And neither can Niko! Only I get to decide who my friends are, and neither of you have any say in the matter!"

Harry gave her an incredulous look and said, "You seriously believe that these idiots are your friends? Even I could tell that they only wanted you in their ranks because of your power and knowledge. Chances are pretty good that your initiation ritual, or whatever hogwash, was just going to be a gang-rape masked as a sex-rite-orgy. Oh, wow, really?" he grabbed the bald leader and grabbed him by the throat, knocking the monocle out of the man's eye. "Listen to this, Tris. Not only was that going to be exactly what they were planning, but they'd make you swear a blood oath, via magical contract and geas to basically be the body slave of any and all true Black Rock mages. And on your thirty-ninth birthday, they'd hook you up as a mana-battery. You creeps are a piece of—!"

"THEY *WHAT*!?" the chestnut-haired witch's aura suddenly exploded with untamed energy. Her hair flying in the sudden wind, her eyes whited out, and eldritch energy began to gather around her hands and body as her shield activated.

There was another collective gulp from the Black Rock coven, as they suddenly had reason to fear the girl they'd been duping for the past few months far more than the Hit-wizard that still had their leader by the throat. Watching as the young woman demonstrated the epitome of that saying about a woman scorned, Harry briefly considered his options. Ultimately, whatever thought process he employed, he decided that he would not let Tris Chandler-Marigold become a murderer this day.

Grabbing and pulling the bald coward so they were eye-to-eye, he made sure the old man understood him as he hissed out, "You all now owe me. Every single one of you. And be quite sure, I will call that marker due someday." He and the Black Rock Leader then vanished.

Tris saw the primary target of her rage disappear, and so she lost the last bit of control she had over her fury and unleashed it upon the next nearest. Right before the screaming fireball would have hit and no doubt vaporized the unlucky faceless coven member, he too vanished, and so the spell continued on until it impacted with the equipment and material behind where he'd been standing and exploded in a fiery display. Tris then unleashed true hell upon the Black Rock coven, shooting randomly all over the place, no longer targeting specific coven members, and not just fireballs, but sometimes streaks of lightning, blasts of elements, raw mana, and more deliberate attack spells were unleashed all over and around the cavern the Black Rock Coven used as their home base.

Needless to say, the destruction did not remain confined to the one room, and pretty soon the whole of the Black Rock Den needed to be evacuated. Once her fury was ultimately spent, Tris fell to her knees amidst the destruction, crying her heart out.

Harry appeared before her, as unconcerned with the devastation around them as she was. She looked up through her tears, and flung herself around his neck as a fresh wave of grief overwhelmed her. He accepted her into his embrace and held her until the tears had finally stopped, even if the grief and shame hadn't. He disapparated them from the destroyed Den and back to the Dal'Riata, halfway across the Territory. The first thing she said to Niko when she saw him again was, "I'm sorry." The first thing Niko did after Tris spoke was to take her in his arms and forgive her.

Undisclosed Location

"The Black Rock coven lives?" Faust said, agape.

"I arrested them all for illegal sale, crafting, and transportation of Cursed Equipment," he answered, now pacing back and forth long-ways within the confines of the warded space. "Took them into custody and received the bounties for each of them. Then I had to pay over three-quarters of that to the Obliviators sent out to cover up the destruction of their Den. Thunder Bay may have a surprisingly high homicide rate, but they don't experience 'bombings' and 'unexplained fires' out in the hills all too often. I'm hoping to still keep all of your bounty for myself."

"Ha!" Faust laughed. "Still the arrogant one, I see. I know your name, Mister Potter. Voldemort was small time. And he was one of those seeking control and power through that control. I know better, and I deal on a much wider and more far-reaching scale than he ever did. He may have terrorized the wizards of Britain, but to the rest of the world, he was a bit of a joke."

"Yeah," Harry laughed, actually smiling. "I've heard a few of them. Some of the Arrows called him 'Moldy Shorts'. I think that is my favorite. Doesn't mean they didn't see him for the threat he was, they just didn't let fear of him consume them, as so many of the British wizards did."

"So," Faust said, now matching pace with Harry's movements along the outside, hands behind his back. "Goldeye's student was the one to actually destroy the Den, you saved their lives from her fury, for her sake supposedly, and immediately arrested them. Where were they imprisoned, do you know?"

"Oh, they've already been released," he answered truthfully. "They paid the fines about the same time I was paying the Obliviators. Like I said, I only arrested them for the illegal sale, illegal crafting, and illegal transportation of Cursed Equipment. I couldn't, and didn't, arrest them for the illegal USE of said equipment, which would have been at least a few years in any number of Magical Prisons. The rest of it? Ten million in fines. I think it only took about a ten to fifteen percent cut into their coffers, at the most."

Faust let that hang in the air for a brief time, before deducing, "They're running. And hiding. Cowards indeed, Mr. Potter."

"Come now," the Dark Wizard changed the subject. "Do you truly expect me to believe that Goldeye, powerful Diviner that he is, could actually find me with just that? There is more to your story, Mr. Potter, and I will have the truth of it. I need to know what holes in my security to plug before I turn my attention towards what precisely I will be doing to you. I cannot exactly turn you over to the Black Rock Coven, they all owe you a life debt, which you would then use to escape them."

"Pfft!" Harry scoffed. "They're not exactly the most lethal threat I've ever faced, Faust. Besides, I wouldn't waste something like that just to escape their tortures. Compared to my Fifth Year Defense Teacher, they're all rank amateurs."

"Hm, there is always, of course, the remainder of Voldemort's followers," Faust mused. "What were they called again? Death walkers? Death mourners?"

"Death Eaters," he supplied, back to the center of his confinement. He pulled his hands out of his robe pockets and at the back of his neck as he craned his head to work out the developing kinks. "Yeah, you could. That would just land me back within the radar of the Ministry of Magic, however, and I'd be 'rescued' inside of a week. I'd have escaped inside of a day, but still."

"Your story, Potter," Faust snapped, losing patience.

"Right then," he nodded, dropping his hands back to his sides and kicking the dust at his feet. "Where was I? Oh, well, got Tris back to Niko, and had a nice long conversation with the two of them. Found out why exactly she was so impatient with Niko's teachings and..."

"I don't care about that!" Faust roared, forcing Harry to back up as far as he could. "What was your next step in finding me?!"

"Blimey!" Harry exclaimed. "I'm getting to it, I'm getting to it, I promise! It's not exactly something where I just list off a bunch of names and you know exactly who and what I mean! You thought every last one of the Black Rock coven had been vanquished up till now, how much else don't you know, or think that you do, huh? Just, let me tell the bloody story, all right?"

Faust just glared at the captured wizard, growling. He stalked back over to his desk and opened up a tome and began writing. At Harry's continued silence, he snapped out, "Continue!"

"Well, all right then," Harry straightened his robes and resumed his measured pacing.

"You are right, by the way. Niko couldn't locate you directly, your wards and protections are too extensive for that, and I was not about to put him in danger by tearing them all down just to find out where you were a month and a half ago. So, I had him get me the next best thing, which was the means of getting you to come to me. Obviously, that didn't work out the way I'd planned."

"What did you do?" he demanded.

"Patience, patience," Harry assuaged his captor. "I am getting to it. Anyway, back to my story, before the unnecessary interruptions, Niko divined all the different... brokers that you'd been to or had interactions with throughout the last year. Took him about a week to compile the list, which I got from him while he was doing me another little favor. After that, I gave myself about a day, or less, to research each of them, and then I got myself a multi-destination-Portkey, and captured, arrested, or vanquished the entire list. Considering they were all low level demon middlemen, it wasn't exactly a huge win for me, but it got the attention of a few others. One of whom we both know, by reputation and by name. Agatha Harkness?"

Felix Faust stiffened at the dreaded name. He asked, in a much more subdued tone, "What happened?"

New Salem

Harry appeared in the middle of a full-on battle between an older witch and her allies, and what he judged to be seven or possibly eight magical creatures bent on causing chaos. Seeing that the person he came to New Salem to speak with was the older witch in question, it made his next few choices pretty straightforward. Still, he made sure to hold back just in case the non-humans were not at fault in the fight.

He didn't hesitate in using his Gen Factor, accelerating himself until time appeared frozen around him. Taking out his wand, he quickly moved himself over to Madam Harkness's side. Only once he was in position to protect the Leader and Founder of New Salem, did he actually take the time to observe and identify the attacking creatures.

Six of them were clearly not human, although judging from the way they moved and acted, he revised his assumption that they were actually some kind of mystic transformation, rather than naturally-born magical creatures. The other two that were attacking appeared entirely human in appearance, but they had preternatural glows around their eyes or hands and bodies that called that into question.

The first that drew attention was undoubtedly the large lion/minotaur, at least that would have been Harry's guess, as while the creature was definitively a humanoid lion, it had sharp angled horns—like a bull's—coming out of either side of its head. He was wearing what could best be described as a red leather wrestler's costume, straight out of the WWF—minus any glitter or sequins—and buccaneer boots. Right off the bat, he would guess that the 'powers' this one had involved strength and resistance, if not outright invulnerability.

(AN: WWE didn't come around until early 2000's, this story is set in the late 90's, hence WWF)

The very next that drew the eye, and immediately made one want to look away, seemed to be some kind of mutated lamia transformation, seeing as she was covered entirely in green scales, but rather than just her lower half, both of her arms were a pair of extendable pythons each. Aside from the scales and obviously inhuman form, she was wearing gold female armor, IE a gold-metal bikini top and 'bottom' that was more like a girdle set between her upper and lower halves. Beyond those extendable arms, she had yet to demonstrate any supernatural ability that wasn't itself common to the lamia race. Cold or freezing spells should work against her, he strategized.

The next most inhuman one, judging by appearance, looked like a blue merman with legs rather than a tale, and one arm covered in a blue-steel fire hose. He likened it to a fire hose, quite simply because he'd already seen the blue-scaled creature fire off powerful jets of water out of it. As for his attire, Harry was having flashbacks to the Second Task of the Tri-Wizard Tournament for more than just the fact he looked like a merman. Save that it was a darker shade of blue, it was virtually an identical swimsuit to what Viktor Krum had worn during that event. He just hoped the water-villain couldn't also turn his head into a sharks.

The strangest of the attackers, by far, was the one floating and flying above them all. He seemed to be... there and... not there at the same time. Solid, yet made of the air itself. And purple. Beyond being generally human-shaped with a head, torso, two arms and two legs, the only defining feature of this creature was that he was purple! Very, very purple! Oh, and he controlled the air, wind, and could create vacuums that left his victims with nothing to breathe.

Then there was the yellow devil. First description that comes to mind upon seeing a muscular, faceless man with red horns and other "thorns" growing out of every inch of his body. Whether the yellow was his actual skin, or a body-suit, Harry couldn't guess, he was just somewhat grateful that he was wearing some pants (AN: the British version of the word), which just so happened to be the exact same shade of red as the thorns and horns growing out of his body. Nevertheless how... corny, it all sounded, he'd already seen what those things could do; both stun a person, or blow up the sidewalk, he would make sure to stay well out of the way when the yellow devil fired off those projectiles of his!

The last of the non-humans was actually pretty normal looking, for the most part. She was taller than Caitlin, thinner than he was at his worst when living with the Dursleys, had three fingers per hand, cloven hooves, and faun-like features around her face. She was also wearing a rather becoming red dress and a gold crown, that held her hair up, much like... A gazelle, he suddenly recognized what her features made her most look like. She was also, while "time" was still frozen around him, running at a semi-normal pace around the battlefield. She was fast. Possibly faster than him, considering his speed only came in speeding himself up and/or slowing everybody else down.

Finally, the two human-looking attackers. The first was a woman, black, wearing a flowing white dress with a deep blue collar and large white earrings. Her eyes were constantly glowing the same shad of blue as her collar, and anyone she 'looked' at suddenly fell to the ground like they'd been hit with a Confundus Curse. He doubted that the standard counter-curse would work against whatever she was actually doing, however, so another he'd have to avoid.

Finally, there was the one that seemed to be the ring-leader, and the primary cause of all the chaos. He was an older man, black hair with lines of gray showing his age alongside the lines in his face, and a handlebar mustache. He was dressed in ornate robes with gold clasps on either shoulder holding his cloak and robes together. And, besides flying, he was surrounded and infused with a... well, it appeared to be a "black" glow, although observing closely, he identified it more as a very dark hue of red and violet. Dark magic. Worse, Harry realized, demon magic, from the Dark Realm.

He'd read about it in his studies for the ICW exams, but the books all talked about it like it was all just theories. Quite obviously, that was not the case.

Wasting no more time, he reached out, grabbed Madam Harkness by the hand and brought her into his accelerated time stream. He'd only ever done this with his teammates, but they'd never complained about it, so he did not foresee any sort of difficulty. That is, until the old witch gave a long, raspy startled gasp and started fighting his grip.

"Madam!" he shouted, trying to get her to stop from removing his grip. "Madam! My name is Harry Potter, I'm the wizard that you contacted, telling me to meet you here... Madam, if I let go of you, you will be in danger!"

That stopped her enough to actually take a look around at her surroundings and see everything and everybody (except for Gazelle-Lady) frozen like a still-frame picture. A non-magical still-frame picture at that. After taking in the situation, she paused to examine him much closer, and he suddenly felt like he was back in Professor McGonagall's classroom and just given her a very stupid answer to a rather simple question.

"So you are doing this, Mister Potter?" she asked him pointedly. "You shall cease this immediately. I have things well in hand, and—!"

"With all due respect, Madam, and I truly do respect you, I have no doubt that you do have things well in hand, but your fellow citizens and other allies... do not," he pointed out several injuries and the general devastation. "Now, I'm more than willing to take care of this for you, or merely provide an advantage over these... terrorists. Madam? Are you... are you all right?"

He asked this because while they'd only take a few short steps, the powerful sorceress was already out of breath, sweating profusely, and not the good kind of flushed.

"I'm... not as... young... as you, my boy," she gasped. "How is moving... like this... not affecting you... more? I feel like... the whole world is... pushing down upon us!"

Blinking, Harry felt like slapping himself upside the head. He remembered when he'd first activated his powers, what it had felt like to 'move at super speed', as though he were wading through quick-dry cement for every step, and even moreso when he tried actually running. The others probably hadn't even noticed because of their own powers, Caitlin being 'strong' enough that the difference probably wasn't even noticeable, Roxy with her Gravity powers could negate the forces dragging her down, and Grunge had absolute control over every molecule of his body. Come to think of it, he hadn't 'accelerated' with either Bobby or Sarah more than a handful of times, and they'd already been 'exhausted' at those times. This was the first time he'd tried to use his powers with someone that didn't have a way to counter or negate the negative effects of 'moving at super speed'.

Or did she?

"Try casting a feather-weight charm on yourself Madam," he suggested. "It should make things... easier on you, and I'll ensure your safety from any unforeseen effects. In the mean time, perhaps we should take care of the one of our opponents that might actually be able to keep up with us." He gestured to the 'slowly jogging' antelope-lady.

"Her name is Gazelle," she informed him, casting the suggested magic upon herself and noticing a marked improvement, though she still had a bit trouble catching her breath. "And I shall deal with these upstarts, if you please, Mister Potter. I require no aid from the likes of you."

Harry was a bit taken aback by her response, and couldn't help asking, "From the likes of... a ICW Licensed Hit-Wizard, or an English wizard, Madam? Or do you mean perhaps that bit of unsightly business with me vanquishing the monster that killed my parents in front of me and terrorized me, and my country for the better part of my childhood?"

That brought the elder up short, and if he didn't know any better, he'd've sworn she was blushing.

"The... International Confederation of Wizards has no business in New Salem," she cursed the name of the multi-national body of magical government. "I invited you here, Mister Potter, to warn you off of meddling with my people. Tris has been... most put out by her new... apprentice."

"Roxy isn't Tris's apprentice, merely her Student," Harry replied. "And it's no surprise. Those two are a lot alike, and neither one of them enjoys responsibility. Niko and I agreed that the... arrangement, was to their mutual benefit. That Tris went whining to her great-aunt only proves the point."

He escorted her off the streets, to the sidelines of the battle raging throughout the area, sitting them both down on a convenient bench, before continuing, "As for the ICW, I am not their representative, merely their employee, and in that capacity my job extends to nothing more or less than capturing and facing Dark Wizards and the like. Which is actually what prompted me to reach out to... your community in the first place, Madam. I've been tasked with bringing in Felix Faust."

Madam Harkness scoffed, which soon became a chortle, and shortly after evolved into full-out laughter.

"Those idiots sent a single Hit-Wizard after that monstrosity?! Hahaha! Who did you go and piss off, Mister Potter?" she kept laughing, until he actually answered her.

"Probably the entire Borne line, including Lord Borne, one of the New York Lords of Magic," he said. "Doesn't matter though. I fully intend on completing my contract. But I have yet to acquire the... resources to unearth Faust when he's gone to ground. Which he has. So, I was hoping that, at the least, you might have some information that I could use to track him down. In exchange for services on my part, of course."

"Is that how you got Niko's help?" she asked after a lengthy pause of contemplation.

"It is how I got his help in locating Faust's allies and a number of his business associates," said Harry. "As for how I got his help in identifying the magic of my teammates, well... we're friends now basically. Unfortunately, Faust is still in hiding, and I've already used up all the intel that Niko could give me. I was hoping you might have... other avenues that I might pursue."

"Faust is a disgrace and a blight upon the whole of the Magic Community, to every Magic Community," Madam Harkness remarked. "If I could be certain that you could indeed best him, I would not hesitate to send you right to his doors, Mister Potter. But you are just one man, and that man is cunning if not dangerous. Even if you could survive the encounter, he would find some means of escape, I promise you that."

"I am working on a plan for that," Harry acknowledged her warnings. "I seem to have the best luck with defeating the 'bad guys' if they capture and render me harmless first. But I'll need it on my terms, not theirs, hence why I need to know where he is before I actually do anything."

She blinked owlishly and stared at the young wizard, her grip on his arm tightening to the point of pain.

"... Do you mean to tell me..." she croaked out the question from her tightened throat, "that you still intend on completing this... suicide mission, in spite of the danger? Of all that you have learned about this... this blight?! Are you insane, Mister Potter?"

"I am not insane," he nodded to her question. "I am determined. It is my first assignment as a Hit-Wizard after all and—Aaah!"

Her grip on his arm had tightened to the point of actual pain, enough to cause him to cry out at the least.

"So not only does the Confederation send merely a single soldier after this madman, but an inexperienced one at that?! Now do you see my... disdain for that—that—that mockery of government?! I'm almost tempted to help you, Mister Potter, just to shove it in their faces. But no, I will not send you to your death. Nor will I give you any 'cannon fodder' in your insane quest!"

Wincing as he finally got her to let up the pressure on his arm, though still maintaining physical contact, he said, "Madam, at no point did I ask, nor was I intending to ask for any sort of military aid. I would not even ask for a guide. Merely information on either the location of Felix Faust, if you have it, or at the least the location and operations of his cronies and allies. Maybe even his rivals. I would never ask you to risk other peoples lives for my sake. Not when I am already willing to take on the burden myself."

She'd relaxed considerably, but he could see that she was still wound up from the revelation that he was on this quest alone, with no back-up. He could also see that she still wasn't willing to further him along in his 'suicide mission', so he needed to address that concern next.

"I'll make a deal with you, Madam," he said suddenly. "If I can resolve this... conflict here, within... say five minutes, without even a single casualty more, would that be proof enough that I am capable of handling anything that Faust would have in store for me?"

She laughed a lot louder and a bit longer than before. If he wasn't hanging onto her to keep her in his same time-frame, he feared that she'd actually be laughing so hard that she'd fall to the ground and start rolling around on the floor.

"Five minutes, you say?" she laughed. "My dear boy, you know not who, or what you face here! These are the Salem Seven! To say nothing of the true threat, the demonic sorcerer Nicholas Scratch! They also happen to be my grandchildren and son respectively."

"I'll be sure to leave them alive then," he remarked, already removing his outer robes to reveal his red and purple 'tunic' costume as well as attaching his friction-less boots and wand-carrying battle gauntlets.

"No, Mister Potter," she snapped. "You still do not understand. Nicholas not only has my blood, but he is allies with the darkest of all the dark gods. Mephisto, Dormammu, Shuma-Gorath, and Doom to name but the most prominent! Hunting Faust is one thing, facing Nicholas Scratch in open battle is quite another! And that says nothing of my grandchildren. Gazelle, we've already discussed, and not only is she fast, but her kicks and the power within her legs would be enough to give Ben Grimm pause. Brutacus, half man, half lion, a powerful beast with undeniable strength. Hydron with unparalleled power over water, able to shoot out jets of liquid strong enough to cut through steel. Reptilla is a snake in more than just appearance, as her venom paralyzes and her arms constrict and squeeze the life out of her prey. Thornn may look the devil, but even his father gives him pause as those spikes of his can either stun or explode. Vakume is possibly the most dangerous of them all, having absolute control over his element of air. And Vertigo, a wizard's true worst enemy, as she can make you doubt even the place where you stand, to say nothing of being able to point your wand in the proper direction. You have no chance, Mister Potter."

"Right so, Gazelle first, then Vertigo, Thornn, Hydron and Reptilla at the same time, Brutacus, and Vakume last, before subduing the dark sorcerer Nicholas Scratch," Harry nodded his head.

"Demonic sorcerer!" she corrected him.

Harry blinked, and then smirked. "Oh, so... Patronus first, to keep ole' Scratch busy, then the Salem Seven, and a binding circle to wrap things up. Would a Blumhardt Loop be enough, or should I go for a full Ten-Elements Seal Barrier?"

Agatha Harkness snapped her open mouth shut with an audible clack. When she could speak again, she asked, "You can cast a Ten-Elements Barrier?"

"It's just a metallic-chalk outline," he shrugged. "Hard part is drawing it out. Powering it only requires linking each element of the circle to the appropriate ley line. New Salem actually has thirteen intersecting the town itself, more than enough."

"I would not expect an English Wizard to care much for ley lines," she remarked. "All they seem to care about is their wands and charms and curses."

"Hence why I am an ICW Hit-Wizard, and not a Ministry Hit-Wizard," he replied back, now ready for battle. "Eh, I'll hedge my bets and put him under every compatible binding that I know, just to be on the safe side. So, five minutes or less, do we have a deal, Madam Harkness?"

"... You're serious, aren't you?" she questioned, eyeing her visitor in a whole new light. IE, the same light someone looks at a person they truly believe and know to be suicidally insane.

"Do we have a deal?" he repeated more slowly, already 'decelerating' her back to normal time.

Giving him a smirk of her own, she answered, "We shall see, Mister Potter. We shall see. The clock starts... now."

He vanished the moment before the word actually left her lips. To her eyes, from where she sat on the bench at the sidelines, things happened very quickly. Very very quickly. When it was all over, however, she was forced to concede on her part of the deal, as well as reconsider her first impression of the Hit-Wizard Harry Potter, aka Thundercrack.

For Harry, however, things were anything but fast.

First things first, he cast the Patronus Charm and aimed the glowing silver stag at the demonic sorcerer, hoping to keep him busy for as long as possible. The Patronus, after all, was the anti-demon spell that all wizards used. All that were able to cast the spell in the first place, that is.

Once his Patronus had Nicholas fully occupied, he turned his attention back to the part-human speedster that would be his main hindrance and competition in this battle. Running straight at her, he pushed his acceleration as much as he could, to where even he felt the crushing weight of time stopping, something that he hadn't felt since his powers first activated at Project Genesis. As it was, he just barely managed to stay 'ahead' of her, as Gazelle was still able to move to his eyes, while absolutely everything else was still frozen around him. Although, she was moving slower, that she was moving at all spoke to her own speed.

For starters, she could actually see him. The speed he was moving at, not even the most advanced high-speed cameras could've caught him, not without staying perfectly still for what might feel like an hour or more. For another, she was angling to kick him in the face. And she wasn't moving 'slow' enough for him to just ignore that.

So, for probably the first time since he'd manifested his Gen Factor, Harry found himself having to move quickly while accelerated to the fastest point he could move. He also realized that he was most likely burning through calories like an incinerator, but dealing with that would have to wait.

He dodged to the side and ducked under her kick, staying low as she tried turning it into a roundhouse to the face. He tried a leg-sweep, but she somehow saw it coming and danced out of the way. They were equally matched in speed, Harry concluded. Which made this a fight of skill and strength. He'd already been warned about her kicks, but what about the rest of her? He had to get closer.

Side stepping her next attempt at mule-kicking him, Thundercrack drove forward with a low punch aimed at the transformed witch's face. She jumped away to avoid it, but he followed by reaching out and getting a fistful of her hair, even though he'd been aiming for her arm. Yanking, not to draw her back, but to pull himself forward, he got in close and started slamming as many punches and hits to her head and upper chest as he could. She blindly lashed out, finally in their grappling managed to knock him back with a blow from her antlers. Momentarily free, she tried to run once again, but he was ready for that.

Putting down the arm that had the Elder wand in the attached gauntlet, he cast the spell at the ground all around them, "Glacius!" Instantly an inch-thick layer of ice formed. It would've been a lot thicker and more slippery if there had been more water on the ground. As it was, he knew that with his Phoenix wand he wouldn't have been able to get more than a bit of frost in a ten to thirty foot range. Using the Elder wand, he got the desired results and the ice covered the entire battlefield, and possibly several connecting streets.

Gazelle may be able to run at mach-speeds, but quite apparently her mind and sense of balance couldn't quite keep up as she almost immediately lost her footing and fell to the ground, sliding toward a pile of debris. Taking full advantage, and prepared for the change in environment, Thundercrack slid right after her and soon had her trapped in a choke-hold.

She was saying something, but being Fully Accelerated, it sounded like those old slow-down-sound manipulation machines. He wasn't really interested in what she had to say anyway. Putting his right hand on the back of her skull, even while the left arm continued to choke her, he cast a point-blank stunning spell directly into her brain. "Stupefy."

She slumped unconscious in his arms.

Binding her with standard Hit-Wizard equipment (anti-magic Cold Iron manacles), and even a binding spell or two, he carried her over to behind the bench that Madam Harkness remained seated at. First of the Seven down, six to go, plus old Scratch.

Who happened to be doing unexpectedly well against his patronus, now that he was paying attention. Time for a few more distractions then.

It was the work of only a few moments to renew his patronus and then cast every single 'light' and 'light-making' spell in his repertoire right at the demon sorcerer, mostly centered around his eyes. That they were cast while he was fully accelerated only made it difficult for the evil man to pinpoint his location. The duration of the spells would remain the same as though they were cast at normal time. Hopefully that would be enough to take out the next of the Seven.

He was tempted to leave the one called Vertigo for last. He'd never been one for motion-sickness, after all he knew how to fly a broom the moment he first touched one, to say nothing of his experiences with other methods of wizard-travel (PortKeys, Floo, Apparation, etc). Yet, he could somehow tell that he would very quickly lose his equilibrium if he so much as approached the dark-skinned witch. Still, if he didn't take her out, she could run interference while he tried to deal with the others. Taking a deep breath, he ran right for her, although he did his bed to stay in her blindspots.

Unfortunately, in the end it did not matter as she seemed to be maintaining a 'confundus-field', or equivalent vertigo-inducing-aura in the immediate area around her. The moment he got within a few feet of her, he nearly lost his lunch, falling to the ground and unable to tell up from down from inside to left and right. His only saving grace was that he was still fully accelerated, which meant that Time was still 'pressing down' on him, which gave him just enough sense to drag himself outside of her area of influence. The moment he was not being affected, all his symptoms of disorientation vanished as though they'd never been. Definitely a magical effect.

It was sheer luck on his part that she hadn't even noticed his presence. Deciding to risk her 'interference', as he really had no clue what to do about her at the moment, Thundercrack turned his attention back toward the rest of the Seven.

From his point of view, he'd been fighting for almost ten minutes, and yet the actual amount of time passing had been no more than a few seconds, if even that long. Which is why he was surprised it had taken him so long to notice just how effective his actions thus far had been.

Apparently, when he'd cast the ice spell on the ground to trip up Gazelle, he'd inadvertently taken out Hydron and Reptilla at the same time. The former, due to his nature and need for water had been the most affected, freezing practically from the inside out, and being contained within a shell of ice as thick as that covering the ground. Reptilla, on the other hand, was merely covered in a layer of light frost, any yet seemed to have curled up in on herself from the moment the spell's effect reached her. Reptiles, after all, are cold-blooded, and therefore hibernate in the cold. From the looks of things, he doubted that even if she was immediately hit with a warming charm or equivalent, she'd be out of action for at least a few minutes. Which, for him, was practically an eternity.

That just left him with four to deal with, counting the one behind him that he had no clue how to deal with. Right, so... Brutacus. Brute strength, animal instincts and senses. Same as dealing with an angry troll, or millennial basilisk, or rampaging werewolf, right?

But then there was Thornn, and he wasn't willing to bet that the red spikes sticking out of his skin had the same effect as those that he shot at people and targets. Shield spells wouldn't do him a lot of good, and whatever bindings he put on the creature wouldn't do much for those projectiles. Stunning would be a temporary solution at best, and not his first choice in the first place.

He had an idea or three about how to deal with Vakume, mostly by flying up on his Firebolt and getting in close to the master of air. The real problem he was facing in this fight was that every binding spell, whether charm, jinx or curse, every last one of them was able to brute-force ignore all of it! Except maybe the living-confundus-lady behind him...

Wait a second...

He stopped running and turned to walk back to stand in front of the dark-skinned witch.

Just because she generated an aura and her primary power was just like a confundus charm... did that mean that she was immune to the very same charm? From what he saw, nothing really hinted at anything like that. The worst that could happen from testing it out would be to confirm that she was immune, and the chances that wasn't were enough to risk any assumption that she was in the first place. Holding out his right gauntlet, just within the effect of her aura, but making sure not to step any closer, he cast the Wizard spell of Confusion and bewilderment. He saw the effects take hold almost immediately as the woman's glowing blue eyes dilated to different amounts and a subtle 'drunken' tilt to her head.

Maybe he could use this to his advantage, he mused, running over to stand 'in front' of Thornn, at least from Vertigo's perspective, and then incrementally 'slowed down' until he finally saw some recognition on the woman's face. Right as she lifted her hands to cast her magic, he accelerated himself once more and then moved over to stand 'between' Thornn and Brutacus. Then he did the same incremental slow down, watching as Vertigo's magic hit at the same moment that Thornn 'saw' him and fired those red spikes of his. He accelerated just in time too, as he only noticed after running around the incoming projectiles that the half-lion minotaur had been mere moments from slashing into him from the back. Seeing another opportunity present itself, Thundercrack made sure not to waste it and cast another confundus on the beast-man, ensuring that even if he survived or could shrug off the oncoming assault, he would see the attacker as an enemy, despite actually being an ally.

By now, thirty seconds of the fight had passed since Madam Harkness had started his 'clock'.

And Scratch had yet again thrown off his distractions and was turning to aid his children.

Taking a brief nanosecond to catalog the battlefield, the Hit-Wizard was suddenly reminded that he was not the only magical warrior on the side of the Madam and the defense of New Salem. Five other magicians, two rather recognizable witches and another three 'reputation precedes them' sorcerers stood to further combat the demonic sorcerer. After all, three of the group were part of the world-wide-revered Justice League, while the remainder were very well known throughout the magical world, even to the isolated wizards in Britain.

Doctor Fate, a Lord of Order and reserve League member, together with Wanda Maximoff, aka the Scarlet Witch, and Doctor Stephen Strange were hammering away at Scratch's defenses with spells of such arcane strength that Harry knew he could never match. At the same time, Fate's fellow League members, the father and daughter magical combo of Giovanni and Zatanna Zatara worked their own magic to further bind and hold their enemy while simultaneously countering his own attack spells and efforts to help his minions.

Feeling more than a little intimidated by what he'd stumbled into being a part of, the newly-established and very young magical superhero allowed himself at least one moment to bask in the glory and awesomeness that was his current situation. Then the moment passed and he got back to the business at hand.

Seeing that the 'Professionals' as it were, had things well in hand, for the moment, he decided to focus most of his attention on taking the remainder of the Seven out of the fight for good. Friendly fire aside, he had little doubt that the hits they delivered upon each other would not put any of them down for the count. The same problem remained, however, in that he couldn't really deliver any solid blows himself that they couldn't just shrug off. But then again, when had he ever dealt with an enemy with raw brute force?

First, what were his advantages?

Vertigo could be affected by his spells. He could also get close enough, fast enough that she couldn't do anything to dodge or counter him. Brutacus was big, slow, and despite his animal instincts and possibly enhanced senses, he could be avoided. Unfortunately, not a lot could penetrate his thick hide. Thornn... was currently shooting a constant stream of red spikes at the charging beast-man actually. He'd have to wait and see how that confrontation turned out. From the looks of it, he wouldn't have to wait very long.

Three rapid spells later, Vertigo was stunned, bound, and petrified, on top of being shackled and being tossed on the pile with the frozen Hydron, Reptilla, and unconscious Gazelle. Just to put the overkill touch on things, he put them inside a three-tiered binding circle, composed of the aforementioned Blumhardt Circle, five-point-crystal pentagram, and the hexagram curse; Rokubosei no Jubaku, aka the Spellbinding Circle. That took him about five real time seconds, nearly an hour equivalent for him. At the end of which, Brutacus and Thornn had collided, miraculously rendering the both of them unconscious as dozens of stunning spikes had pierced the beast-man's protection, while his charging bulk had crashed headlong into the disoriented yellow devil's body, nearly crushing him from the weight and force alone. A few dozen stunning spells (and maybe a sleeping curse for good measure) apiece, and he had the pair shackled and bound within the same circle with the rest of the Seven. That just left Vakume and Scratch now.

Seeing the main antagonist successfully pushing back against the heavy hitters, Thundercrack took a deep breath and quickly recast his patronus yet again, before pulling out his broom (shrunken and kept in one of his utility belt pouches) and turning his full attention to the final member of the Salem Seven. With this one, unfortunately, as he'd already tried using his broom in conjunction with his Gen-Factor before, he would not have the speed advantage that he had against the others. He did, however, have one truly undeniable advantage; there really was no one better on a flying broom than him.

Thus far, the fight had been a lengthy affair for the GenActive wizard. With the mounting of his broom, things began to move very fast indeed for our young hero.

Vakume didn't much seem to be one for words. Mostly he just seemed to be screaming incoherently at him, whether from rage at what he'd done to his siblings, or as a side effect of his wind powers, Thundercrack really couldn't tell. Besides, he was more focused on navigating the unpredictable air currents bombarding him at the purple villain's command.

Yes, as his name implied, the magical air elemental could create vacuums in mid-air or around any target that he focused on. Too bad for him, he did this the same way that any piece of technology or natural phenomenon would do it; by moving the air away from the spot. The effect of moving air, of course being... wind. Which Harry Potter had been able to navigate ever since one memorable storm when he was but thirteen-years-old. The more that Vakume tried to target Thundercrack with a sphere of no air, the more easily the airborne hero avoided them as he wasn't so much fighting the wind and air currents as using them to get closer to his purple-hued goal.

Not that it was exactly an easy ride for him. Amidst avoiding and riding the wind cyclones, he was knocked and thrown about more violently than he'd ever been. Even the dementor-infested storm he'd (barely) survived hadn't tossed him around as bad as this was doing. And as bad as bludgers and the ground and various walls could be, Vakume liked to use random debris picked up from all over as much as his no-air-spheres. He just treated the whole thing as a Quidditch game where the Snitch in this case was a rather ugly shade of purple as opposed to gold and feathery.

Two precarious minutes later, he finally had made it up to where Vakume was floating above the battlefield, surrounded by a protective air-barrier that it was virtually impossible to get past. Until Thundercrack pointed his left gauntlet right in the intangible elemental's face and cast the Steam spell, normally used as a minor answer to a muggle hairdryer or perhaps a distracting smokescreen in the midst of a duel. Except, he'd used the Elder Wand to cast it, and seriously overpowered the simple spell, turning a 'bit of hot air' into a 'high-atmosphere cloud at sea level' amount of steam!

Moving with the air that he already controlled and was made up of, the heated cloud of water moisture very quickly did what all steam does; it expanded its heat outwards...leaving behind very cold air in its wake. And when air gets cold, it contracts, it condenses into floating droplets of water and ice that we typically call rain and snow. Except... at the center of this cloud of steam was a living being made up of nothing but air. In short order, the solidified purple hailstone called Vakume fell from the sky. Thundercrack almost casually cast a stunning spell after the falling block of ice, knocking him out and then binding him with a prepared Three-Elements-Seal thrown down from yet another pouch on his belt.

Without Vakume to mess with the air currents, he now had a much easier time up in the air, and refocused his attention on the primary battle of Nicholas Scratch. While still high in the sky on his broom, he activated his Gen-Factor and accelerated himself to the point of frozen time once more. The problem with this being that, despite his control over time, gravity still had the same pull upon him and his broom was just as frozen as everything else. Fact of the matter was, unfortunate that it may be, he couldn't afford to wait the amount of time it would take to get back to the ground the safe way.

Taking a deep breath, he jumped up and pocketed the Firebolt once more as he allowed gravity to exert its full force upon him. Times like these that he really regretted not bringing Freefall or Fairchild along with him, but facts remained, they weren't ready.

Besides, he was used to this sort of thing.

Less than ten feet from going splat against the pavement, he pulled the broom back out and mounted it in the same amount of time as it took him to decelerate back to normal time, which put him in a terminal velocity dive with exactly one meter to pull out of it! Not only did he pull it off, he turned the dive into a full-speed charge that very nearly had him going as fast as he just was without his Gen-Factor! He then kicked in the top speed of the racing broom to further boost his speed, aiming right for the middle of the conflict with the ole' Scratch!

Half a heartbeat from reaching the demonic sorcerer, Thundercrack triggered his powers one more time, surprised to note that he was 'still moving' while everything else froze around him. Now having the time to do something, he prepared and then began casting—with both wands—every single offensive or anti-demonic spell that he could think of, powering every last one of them to the very limit of his strength. He did this for the entire duration that it took his broom to finally move past and out of range of Nicholas Scratch, and only then did he return to a normal time frame and swing back around for another strafing run.

He couldn't be sure of how much damage, if any, that he was actually doing, but it was all that he could do, and he knew it. There was a very good reason why Madam Harkness had looked at him as though he were insane, after all.

Ultimately, he only managed a grand total of three runs before Scratch cast a spell that knocked him out of the air, sending him crashing to the ground and rolling to a harsh stop against the wall of a sturdy brick building. He was just lucky that he'd already been slowing himself down, so to speak, as he feared that there might have been a chance that he would have been sent through the wall!

Groaning, the GenActive wizard struggled back to his feet and saw that somehow the same spell that had knocked him from the sky had blasted most everyone else attacking the black-aura'd man away. Seeing their condition, he looked behind him at the building he'd been thrown against and was mildly surprised to see that it was the town clinic, advertising that the resident physician just so happened to be one Doctor Stephen Strange, MD.

Allowing himself a few moments to properly stretch, not to mention 'crack' out the kinks in his neck, Thundercrack activated his Gen-Factor power one last time and started running for the center of the battlefield once more. He picked up his broom along the way, but his primary goal wasn't ole' Scratch this time, but his victims. Seeing that they were possibly the most injured, he grabbed the Zataras first, taking first Zatanna back to Dr. Strange's clinic.

At first he feared the door was locked and he'd have to find some way to break in, which would have been a mistake, he knew, based on Dr. Strange's reputation. Fortunately, after a moment of struggling to open the door with the injured Zatanna in his arms, the doors seemingly opened on their own. Quickly finding the necessary patient bedding to place his burden upon, he deposited the pretty dark-haired magician on the nearest bed before racing back out at his top speed to retrieve her father and placing him in the bed next to hers.

After the Zataras were out of danger, he went and got the good doctor himself, so that he might attend his patients. As luck would have it, he caught up with him just as Scratch was unleashing an unknown curse right at the Sorcerer doctor, one that said doctor seemed to have been caught flat-footed in countering.

Temporarily 'freezing' Dr. Strange, Thundercrack moved him out of the way, first of all, and then started casting every magical shield that he could think of between the curse's current location and where Stephen had been standing. To be honest with himself, he wasn't sure what he would have done without his Gen-Factor powers to basically help him cheat the system, so to speak. As it was, he doubted that he could ever stand toe-to-toe with these titans of magical might, but thanks to his power over time and the ability it gave him to 'cast spells so fast' was the only reason that he was able to be here in the first place.

Putting his doubts aside, he finished up by conjuring as many reinforced physical barriers that he could and put as many charms and enchantments on them that he could. Only once the curse hit the first of his 'shields' hovering in the air did he finally turn and rush the doctor back to his clinic and un-freeze him. He then hurried back out and brought in the Scarlet Witch and Doctor Fate as well.

He'd been rather reluctant to even approach the golden-helmed hero, after all one does not casually walk up to and drag the Lords of Order or Chaos off to safety. Not even Harry was that arrogant! He doubted even Draco Malfoy could be *that* arrogant!

Nevertheless, the situation called for it, so he sucked it up and merely moved the blue-and-gold-clad hero over to the entrance of the clinic, not presuming to put him under the other doctor's care just like that. Then he, more reluctantly, walked back out onto the battlefield and returned to normal time frame.

A few explosions petered out and dust began to fall as Nicholas stopped to recognize the altered situation. Seeing the red-clad here with glowing blue feet and visor standing before him, not to mention the disappearance of his primary opponents, he quickly deduced what had just occurred.

"So," the older man darkly intoned, "You're the gnat that has been buzzing about for the past few minutes?" Glancing past the speedster, he saw the Salem Seven all bound and held within a three-fold circle just outside of the damage zone. "Congratulations on besting my children. I'm sure that your name will soon become known for it. Posthumously."

Thundercrack remained standing there, silent and tense.

"Normally I wouldn't bother," Nicholas continued to speak, taking a few steps forward, "but you've actually managed to annoy me. So I think that I'll use your name as one to warn against doing so in the future. Tell me, wizard, what is your name? You must know mine already, after all!"

"My name," he answered, taking a deep breath to steady his nerves, "is Harry James Potter. My codename is Thundercrack. I'm a Hit-Wizard assigned with bringing in Felix Faust. Madam Harkness invited me to visit with her this afternoon to discuss this."

"HA HA HA!" the demonic sorcerer exploded with laughter. "So you are the reason that I was forced to move up my plans! You cost me quite a bit of gold, taking out all of those criminals recently. From the Black Rock coven alone, I was intending on purchasing an army's worth of battle staves!"

"Oh, so they were making all of those for you!" Harry nodded thoughtfully. "Here I was thinking they were just your standard arms-dealers. Why exactly did you need over ten thousand blood-stone-encrusted battle staves with berserker-healing runic arrays etched into them?"

Nicholas smiled with dark intent. "Why, to conquer New Salem and build an army that would permit me to finally take this realm for my own, of course!"

"Yeah, that's obvious," Harry said. "Why did you need ten thousand of them?"

"I..." Scratch blinked suddenly and frowned. "I only ordered one thousand from those grubs!"

"Hunh," the dark-haired wizard grunted, hands on his hips. "So... a few of those probably were meant for Faust or other clients of the Black Rock. Say, you wouldn't happen to know who else might be supplying Faust with supplies, would you? I pretty much cleaned house throughout the northern territories and most of the midwest last week, and I've run out of leads."

"Ha ha ha! You are funny wizard!" Scratch laughed. "What task force are you with? Who do you answer to? I'll be sure to drop your corpse off there personally."

Harry shrugged and went so far as to remove his visor when he answered truthfully, "I'm a Hit-Wizard with the ICW. They assigned me to take in Felix Faust. I do not have a partner with the ICW, and I am not a part of any task force. I went around, with a PortKey, to where Niklaren Goldeye told me various dark wizards and criminal magicals were and I either vanquished or arrested them as necessary. And I did it alone. Only myself. I swear on my magic, so mote it be!"

That seemed to nonplus the demonic wizard, enough that Thundercrack replaced his visor without incident, and even took the time to remove both his wands from their place in his specialized gauntlets and took them in hand.

"I stand corrected," Nicholas Scratch admitted, his tone and posture even more dangerous than before. "You are more than a mere annoyance. You are dangerous, Harry James Potter... Ah, yes, I recall the name now. The boy who took care of that upstart Riddle over in England. Well, you might have been a true threat, one day boy. But today, your story ends! Frendo Coactum!" He held out his staff, glowing with eldritch and demonic power at the speedster.

"Depulso! Expelliarmus!" the younger wizard simultaneously cast with each wand. Knowing he couldn't just stand there and duel the more powerful sorcerer, he tried to think of something anything that might actually help him out at the moment. The only thing that he could think of was to cast the Patronus spell as some kind of shield rather than just as summoning a protector. But no such spell existed.

"Die!" Scratch cried out, angered, unleashing a nameless black curse at the young hero.

Out of options, Harry brought both his wands to bear as he said to himself, "Really hope this works! PROTEGO PATRONUM!"

BOOM!

Harry was focused so entirely on his spell, on the emotional need for both happiness and protectiveness, that he never even noticed if it had worked or not.

BOOM!

Everyone else, however, were more than a little stunned by the effects when it actually did work.

BOOM! BOOM!

If he had bothered to look, he probably would have noticed the rather huge silver stag standing before him, each of is hooves shaking the ground with an earth-shattering boom with each step. Still pouring power into the spell, all Harry was truly aware of was the fact that he wasn't dead from Scratch's curse. Finally looking up, he was pleased, though surprised, to note the result of his gamble had paid off, and how!

The giant silver stag stood there, between the wizard and the demon sorcerer, a halo of shining silver light creating a bubble of protection around the pair. Nicholas Scratch, offspring of Agatha Harkness, one of the oldest and most powerful magic users in the realm of Earth, tried to destroy or overwhelm the protector with some of his more potent curses and dark spells, but nothing of his tainted demon magic could get past that silver bubble. Seeing that he couldn't easily overwhelm the upstart before him, he then did what the villain always does. He targeted an innocent bystander and planned to take advantage of the hero's distraction.

Unleashing a torrent of raw demonic fury upon his own mother, who was not under the Patronus' protection, Scratch simultaneously prepared another more subtle spell to take out Harry Potter once and for all.

Seeing the cowardly tactic, Harry didn't hesitate. His Gen-Factor activated and he moved to protect the leader of New Salem, but it turned out he didn't have to. Somehow, and he was at a complete loss to explain exactly how, his super-charged Patronus was able to move at the same rate that he himself was.

BOOM!

It moved one hoof, turning to glare at the encroaching attack. And then it... it breathed out a silvery mist, one that quickly formed into his standard patronus, which very quickly moved to intercept Scratch's murderous attempt on his own mother's life. Rather than stop the dark magic itself, the smaller stag began to run in rapid circles around the still-seated Madam and quickly generated its own version of the larger silver bubble around Harry and his huge protector.

Scowling, Thundercrack turned back to face the monster standing before him. His power surged and his fists clenched around both his wands. The huge stag's eyes flashed with holy silver light.

"You're not going to hurt anybody anymore, Scratch!" Harry roared as he charged forward at full speed. And that meant Full Speed! And that is where Harry Potter made his fatal mistake.

Nicholas Scratch, child of Agatha Harkness, avatar of the dark realm, agent of dozens of dark gods and demon lords, and demonic sorcerer of the ninth circle only saw an onrushing blaze of silver light that burned him to look at. He couldn't dodge, and he had no chance to counter the wizard's spell. All he could do was take the chance he was given.

Once he was 'inside' the silver bubble of the patronus, he knew that his prepared spell could finally reach his target. He unleashed it the moment before being struck by the thundering silver stag's antlers. Harry 'Thundercrack' Potter was hit pointblank and thrown backwards with enough force to not only stop his insurmountable speed, but to reverse it and send him careening back a full two blocks down the street and through one of those walls that he'd been grateful not to be before. He then crashed through another two before coming out the other side of the building, again through a very solid brick wall.

Without its master providing power, the patronus almost instantly dissipated. Almost. It still had enough power to finish its job, so even as it began dispersing into silver mist, all of that mist and positive magic swarmed and was absorbed into the dark creature's prone body, knocking him out and causing untold damage as it combated the dark magic within his human body.

When all was said and done, ole Scratch was down for the count, and Harry Potter was almost fatally injured, while Madam Harkness had watched on from the sidelines. Even as her original allies came out from Strange's clinic (which in all honesty he only visited maybe once a month while various Healer apprentices covered for him), she remained seated, silently observing the aftermath of what she'd originally intended to be a quiet afternoon where she told off some upstart ICW wizard over tea.

Just goes to show, she mused, no matter how old one gets, life still has surprises for you.

Undisclosed Location

"You bested Nicholas Scratch?! Hahaha!" Faust giggled. It was an unpleasant sound.

"Uh, no," Harry shook his head. "I fought him, sure, but bested? No. Defeated? Not even close. Got a few licks in? Sure, but he was back up within the hour and had escaped with his kids before anybody could really stop him. Meanwhile, I was laid up for the next week and a half, and that was with all the magical and medical healing that Doctor Stephen Strange and his staff could provide!"

"You got lucky," Faust declared.

"Hmph! And don't I know it!" Harry agreed with a scoff. "I mean, no offense, you're one thing, but... Nicholas Scratch?! I'm only still alive because he severely underestimated me, and there was medical aid on hand for after the fight. Well, that and he really pissed me off by trying to kill his own mother. I kind of have a thing about that."

"I'd imagine," the dark sorcerer continued to giggle.

"So," he said after finishing his writing and getting back up, "Harkness helped you track me down then? Not a surprise really, but I would have thought I'd have detected if even someone of her skill got past my wards..."

"No," Harry shook his head. "I made an agreement with her. That I would finish the fight within five minutes with no further casualties. Yes, I managed to capture most of the Salem Seven within five minutes, but Scratch was still up and about, and my confrontation with him took a bit longer than that. And while the worst injured was myself, there were still casualties. She wouldn't tell me where you were, or even how I could possibly find you. She did, however, give me... tasks to perform."

"Always the way with that woman," Faust shook his head in derision. "Jumping through hoops and paying her price long before you get what you need from her..."

"Uh huh," Harry agreed, standing up from kneeling at the edge of his containment. "She asked me to check up on the Charmed Ones."

Felix suddenly found himself at a loss for words.

"Of course, I was still injured, so I was forced to send one of my friends along, but when I'd recovered I was quick to join her and introduced myself to the sisters," he explained. "While there in the city, I... availed myself to the various nightlife distractions. I went clubbing and soon found myself involved with the... I think they're calling it the Talisman Incident now?"

Brow raised, Faust looked at his prisoner with a whole new level of respect. "That was you?!"

"Well, no," Harry confessed. "I mean, I played my part, but it was a collective effort. Shendu needed to be stopped, but he wasn't the only demon taking advantage of the situation. I did what I could, but the dragon's actual defeat came at the hands of an antique-dealing archaeologist and his family. At the same time the Charmed Ones were dealing with the Four Horsemen of the Apocalypse, and I was dealing with... another threat over in Berkeley. Oh, by the way," he leaned in as close as he dared to the barrier keeping him in place, and then 'loudly' whispered, "Damocles says hi. And that if he ever sees or even hears from you again, he's going to rip out your spine, use it as a toothpick, before disemboweling you while you're still alive to witness your organs falling out of your soon-to-be incinerated corpse. He'll then feed what remains of your wasted soul on... hang on a second, this was the complicated part... ah, yeah! He'll feed it to the Nightmare Child via the Scarran-etched path through the Rift and leave the leftovers for the Akhaten Grandfather to chew on. I think that was everything, yeah."

Faust was shaking with barely-restrained fury, but he finally exploded, screaming out, "WHAT DID YOU DO, YOU...?!"

"I might have given him the impression that I represented you, and then tricked him into sealing off one of the minor hellmouths leading directly to his dimension," he replied with a shrug.

Faust looked even more skeletal than usual, his gaunt face pale and drawn from the news he'd just received. He supposed he was fortunate that he discovered this particular wrinkle before he'd actually tried to contact Damocles again... But it still left one unanswered question. One that he would have the answer to before he finally disposed of this whelp that had caused him such grief!

"How did you find me?" he demanded, no longer playing the wizard's game.

Taking a deep breath and letting out a hefty sigh, Harry shrugged and figured it was time after all. His own preparations were complete.

"I asked Uncle, that is what the man is called by his family, don't ask me, to make a tracking spell using chi magic," he said.

"No tracking spell could ever find my, not even one made from that hodge-podge chi crap!" Faust raged.

"I didn't say it was for tracking you," Harry interrupted. "It was for finding 'your greatest enemy'. I figure if none of your allies, such as they are, knew where you were, then perhaps maybe your enemies would. It lead me, ironically enough, all the way back home to Surrey, where I met a man by the name of John Constantine."

"Constantine?! My greatest enemy? You must be joking!" the man was still furious.

"Yeah, kinda surprised me as well," Harry admitted. "Still, he had your address, and well, here I am."

Faust blinked furiously and shook his head, not understanding. "Wait, what?"

"Yeah," Harry nodded and pulled a folded piece of parchment out of his robes. On the innermost fold was the address of the building they were standing in, along with a familiar signature with the initials J.C.

"But how did...?"

"Not really sure, but he told me that he got it from a bloke in a bar one night," Harry shrugged, putting the parchment away and folding his hands behind his back.

Felix Faust stared at Harry Potter, nonplussed. There really wasn't a valid response to a statement like that. So, he merely summoned his staff and placed it on the appropriate rune of his prisoner's binding circle. Arcs of magical power shot up and lashed out against the young Hit-Wizard.

"Argh!" he cried out in pain, while Faust watched on. After about a minute or so of watching the youth writhe in agony, he finally let up and allowed the now-steaming wizard to recover and get back to his feet.

"I... thought... that you... were going to... kill me," he gasped out, "Y'know... after I told you... how I found you? You never... struck me as the... torture type..."

"You ruined my business," Faust declared. "You've denied me my possessions. And you befouled my reputation. That you will die is not in question, only how long it will take you to do so, and how much suffering you shall endure beforehand."

"I just admitted that I know at least a good dozen very powerful magic users and powerful-in-general people, not to mention that I left a very clear trail for someone else to follow, if they want to find me. And you want to... what? Hold me prisoner, torture me, maybe even experiment on me... instead of outright killing me? Wow, I know everybody said you were dangerous, but I did not expect dangerous and stupid!"

Faust triggered the pain spell yet again, keeping it on for twice as long this time.

"You'd rather I kill you than keep you alive so that you might find some means of escape?" Faust mocked him. "Who is the stupid one now?"

Gasping, but recovering quicker, or so it seemed, Harry struggled back to his feet and replied, "What part of, I got your address from John Constantine, are you not understanding? The man may not be the nicest arsehole around, but he knows a thing or two about how the world works. However he managed to find your location, it raised a lot of red flags, Faust. As much damage as I did to your businesses and kept dangerous artifacts out of your hands, and even the lie I sold to Damocles himself, how bad do you think Constantine made things for you?"

"He's a conman," Faust scoffed. "A self-proclaimed master of the dark arts. He barely has enough power to conjure a demon as it is. His soul is already condemned to the pits. The only threat that he poses is—"

"By convincing everybody that he's not worth their time, while he goes around 'meddling'," Harry interrupted. "How exactly do you think that a teenage boy, who hadn't even finish school yet, managed to vanquish a Dark Wizard of Voldemort's level? As much of a joke as he was to the rest of the world, he wasn't exactly a pushover, was he Faust?"

"You want to die that much, do you Potter?" Faust snarled. "So be it then." He slammed his staff down on the rune that would drain the wizard's life force and magic into his own, killing him.

. . .

Except nothing happened.

Blinking, and rather surprised at the lack of reaction, Faust looked back and forth between the circle and his staff a couple times before lifting it and then slamming the magical artifact back into place. Again, nothing happened, and the Hit-Wizard remained standing and unaffected at the center of the magical binding circle.

"I don't understand," the dark wizard muttered to himself, "it should be working!"

"Oh, yeah, that's my fault," Harry confessed, actually raising his hand as though he were back in school.

"What did you do?!" Faust screamed, incensed.

Smiling, Harry just stepped forward outside of the containment circle as though it weren't even there. And as far as he was concerned, it wasn't.

"I rewrote the warding scheme," he succinctly answered, "All that pacing and going back and forth that I was doing while I told my story? Yeah, that was me erasing and rewriting single runes and connecting paths until the entire array was under my control. First thing I did, though, was reverse polarities on the magic draining part while completely bypassing the part that would transfer or trap souls."

"That... that is not... possible...!" Faust stumbled backward, tripping over his own feet, only just noticing his sudden lethargy.

"I was only expecting you to try it once before switching back to the pain runes, but, well, thanks for the pick-me-up, I guess. You actually drained over half your magic and gave it to me just by trying to activate it twice in a row," said Harry with a shrug. "As for how it is possible, well, not many people know this, but you see, magic has a... a pulse, for lack of a better term. Wards especially, reflect this pulse, by momentarily lowering on the ebb before coming back at above full strength at the crest of said pulse. It happens so quickly that nobody really noticed, only identifying a ward being at 'full power', despite the wavering frequency it gives off at high oscillation..." Seeing that he was losing his audience to magical exhaustion, he quickly summarized. "In short, during those very brief moments when your wards were oscillating down, I rewrote the inactive runes without breaking the connection or directly challenging the magic of the ward scheme itself. Sort of like putting down mirrors on a moving laser grid."

"H-h-how?" Faust gasped, about to pass out.

Harry just smiled and picked the dark wizard up, after breaking his staff and stripping him of any and all magical talismans of course, and tied him up with specialized bindings, made with dark wizards like Faust in mind. He answered only after they stepped out of the 'abandoned' office building just down the street from the Hall of Justice in Washington D.C., the terrestrial base of the Justice League!

"Trade secret. Now, the warrant for you actually came from the Department of Magic, which is to say the US government," he mused, manhandling his bounty toward his transportation, and outside of the dark wizard's wards and traps. "I can't imagine they'll be too pleased to learn exactly where you've been hiding this last little while. But that would also give you leverage, trading your information on how you did it to get a few bones thrown your way. Thing is Faust," he shook him up a bit, making sure the man was still awake despite being magically drained, "while I was hunting you down, I did my research on you. You've managed to piss off just about everyone, without any help from me at that. So, who to hand you over to so you don't immediately get out and start causing more mischief, hm?"

Right before they crossed the ward line, Harry caught sight of something that gave him a deliciously evil idea! "Oh, that would be justice indeed," he cackled to himself. Spinning around, he threw Faust to the ground. "Change of plans! Say hi to the Amazons for me, will you?"

"Wait, what? NOOO-*!"

Harry hastily summoned a plain rock off the ground, cast the Portus spell to turn it into a PortKey, one with a very unique destination, and dropped it on the cowering magician without a moment's hesitation. Smirking, he turned and crossed the ward line without incident. By the time he reached his rental car, the magical warrant in his pocket buzzed and flashed. Reading it, he confirmed that it was now showing as complete and ready for him to turn in.

That was the best thing about being an ICW Hit-Wizard, as opposed to an Auror for the Ministry of Magic. Auror's had to bring in their prisoners and provide other 'proof' of wrongdoing and all that. Hit-Wizards got the warrants and once Magic determined the warrant was complete, all records reflected that, whether the Hit-Wizard had the bounty in hand or not.

Now he just had to turn in his rental and take the Floo back to Sunnydale. But first, maybe he'd visit the Hall of Justice and take the public tour. After all, how often would he find himself within walking distance of the place, let alone in Washington D.C.?

END