As she crashed into a stone fountain, smashing it to rubble in the process, Weiss Schnee reflected on just how terrible her day had been.
The ride to the school was late; she was waylaid by her annoying little brother; the bullhead was practically an antique wagon; a girl who looked far too young to be at such an establishment knocked over her neatly stacked luggage that she had spent the past ten minutes moving onto a bell cart (the lack of a team of butlers and servants hitting her harder than she predicted); and to add insult to injury, the particular cases the clumsy girl bowled over carelessly just happened to contain all of Weiss' Dust. Any neanderthal should have realised how volatile such substances were, and the fact that this child didn't seem to understand what she almost caused was, frankly, infuriating.
Then the idiot sneezed. Sneezed! Right into a cloud of loose Dust kicked up when she broke open her cases. Of course, it ignited!
And just when the heiress was about to inform the Red Menace of her idiocy, some green-eyed barbarian with unkempt hair interrupted her without acknowledging her presence, or even announcing himself with dignity. It was unbelievably rude! When Weiss confronted him about it, the brute attacked her, grabbing her by the throat and threatening her while she made multiple swipes at the rapier on her belt.
Which finally leads to her current predicament. Aura or not — being tossed into concrete was a bitch!
That peon would pay for his slight against her.
Weiss raised her foil with practiced ease; not a single motion was wasted as she traced out a glyph. Brilliant patterns resembling a snowflake formed in mid-air before her, glowing bright white as branches and points crystallised into existence. Eyes narrowed, she swiped her rapier across her chest, shooting the construct at her attacker, before flying after it for a follow-up attack.
Poised to strike, gliding across the ground, Weiss was ready to unleash hell. She would destroy that treacherous rogue and then have him expelled for attacking her. The entire weight of the Schnee family would lynch him for attacking its heiress.
So focused on her future ambitions, Weiss didn't have time to realise her glyph had stopped moving until she crashed into it. The previously immaculate lines shattered on impact into sharp fragments reorienting behind her, white light quickly dimming into empty darkness. The outer edges of the glyph fractured into three points, forming a crude triangle turning around a pillar of shadow bisecting it. The inner workings of the glyph spun into a ring floating in the centre of the new construct; a cacophony of voices whispering unintelligibly into Weiss's ears, getting louder and more desperate every second.
Weiss came to Beacon to become a Huntress! It was her job to defend and aid those in need of her. Her vision tunneled, her peripherals blurring away as the ambient noise of the school was completely overtaken by the voices, now practically shouting. She reached an empty hand out to the spinning source of agony. Where was her rapier? Unimportant. Her hand drew even closer; she could reach out and touch it. When had she gotten so close? Unimportant. Twenty centimetres away. What was her name again? Unimportant!
She could fully hear their screams now.
Help us!
Fifteen centimetres.
You're our only hope! Please!
Five.
Save us! Save us all!
One.
A single, pale finger broke the surface of the glyph.
Nothing.
Wait.
No.
Everything.
Burning flesh and decay filled her nostrils as her lungs took in ash and dust. The heat from blazing homes and fresh blood was sweltering. Helpless families were drowning in an unending tide of Grimm razing their village. Bits and pieces of fallen soldiers littered the floor, none of which were bigger than a torso. Mangled corpses of children and adults alike were being ravaged by feasting Beowolves, their snarls drowning out the screams.
Ursai by the dozen were bowling over walls and structures, swiping at fathers desperately trying to protect their progeny. Sobbing mothers were holding onto their kin in a tight embrace, shielding them with their bodies as Creeps lunged at their backs. Huntsmen and Huntresses were cradling their fallen comrades, Aura spent, frantically keeping their innards from falling out their open abdomens
Weiss gagged, eyes tearing up at the gruesome scene. The world shifted.
A frontier town was raided by bandits led by a masked demon.
White Fang executing a kneeling man, a bag over his head and his family beside him.
A woman of fire burning a small village.
Masked men in black robes surrounding a girl screaming in pain, laughing.
Wars. Plague. Famine. Her father's mi —
"WAKE UP!" Someone was shaking her. A girl wrapped in an expanse of red. Red. Blood. Fire. Death.
Her eyes blurred with tears, and bile rose in her throat. Weiss didn't stop it.
She barely heard the girl's exclamation of sorrow as the darkness finally overtook her.
Beep… Beep… Beep…
Harry gazed guiltily at the girl. He lost control.
As he took out his holly wand to aid her healing process along, Harry reflected.
The Jewel was always silent. Harry just tended to ignore it. The Hood communicated with him perfectly, the frequent use over the years attuned Its magic to Harry's. But the Weapon, well, the Weapon was different. Definitely the most active of the Hallows, the Weapon had such a documented history of bloodshed simply because It craved it. It fed upon Battle. Upon Death. Its power was addictive, and Its influence would amplify the anger of the wielder to feed Its own bloodlust, sometimes indefinitely if the wielder resisted. It wanted to be used.
But using the Weapon, even for mundane things, was a slippery slope. The more one used It, the more frequently the cravings would come, and they were stronger each time. It felt good — unbelievably so — to wield the Weapon. Harry often likened the feeling to the Imperius Curse. That's what made It so dangerous. If left unchecked, It would happily bring down entire civilisations just to get its fix, including the host.
And if that wasn't enough, the wand also targets the subject of the wielder's ire, accentuating their aggression and stubbornness. Harry had been attempting a ritual to tame the Weapon when he was suddenly transported to Remnant. By his best guess, It didn't like what he was attempting, so It sent him to a place without the proper ingredients to perform the ritual.
For a twig with hair inside, It could be quite petty.
It had been thirteen months since Harry lost control as he had down by the fountain, and he intended to find out why.
"Hood?" He felt ripples down his arms. The garment was listening. "What happened?"
Cloth swished around his lower abdomen, sagging off of his skin. Harry wasn't sure if the Hood was actually conscious, or if it felt human emotions, but It definitely had some low-level sentience — enough that he knew It was feeling sorrowful and full of regret. It either didn't know, or It found out too late.
Harry hoped it was the latter, otherwise…
"I lost control," he whispered, "I need to know why."
A new seam opened up in the front, and the Hood fell away from his body, morphing into Its original form and pooling at his feet. The cloth began to grow, enveloping the entire floor of the spacious hard.
Pseudo charades were fun the first time, but after three years of it, Harry very much regretted the Hoods lack of tongue.
"Large?" A swirl, the fluid cloth swishing against the linoleum.
"Big?" Another swirl.
"Tiles? Infirmary? Floor?" At this last guess, the Hood went deadly still.
"Floor?" Not quite.
"Not floor — but close? Ground? Story? Building?" The frustration from both of them was palpable. The Hood shuddered, and Harry could have sworn it was thinking before the entire room was plunged into darkness.
"Everything?" Light broke the surfaces once more as the cloak retreated back to its original size and shape.
Interesting.
All the while Harry had been working to heal the girl, and he finally began to see her breathe settle.
Harry shook out of his musings. Everything was unraveling his control. This required further study. Shaking his head at the workload before him, the young wizard conjured up a bouquet of white roses and tied them with some silver ribbon.
He never saw the bright blue eyes staring at his retreating back.
"You are quite lucky that Miss Schnee has chosen not to press charges. You are even luckier that Ozpin felt compassion for your situation and allowed you to remain as a student here."
Harry held his head down in shame. He still had yet to understand why he lost control so easily, and because of his failings, a young woman was hurt. "Will she make it to Initiation?" he asked quietly.
The Deputy peered at him suspiciously. "Surprisingly, yes. Ms. Schnee must have a remarkable aura to regenerate so quickly after her ordeal. It's almost unnatural."
His eyes narrowed. Don't give anything away. "Ma'am, we live in a world where people have animalistic traits and monsters roam forestation. You can move objects with your mind on the level of a high-class witch of olde. I think healing quickly is the most normal thing about this entire situation."
"Indeed." She looked down at her scroll, which chirped quietly. "I have to take my leave. I trust you to be well?"
"Yes Professor."
"Good. Oh and one more thing, Mr. Potter." Harry stopped in his tracks, turning to face the intimidating blonde once more.
"Yes?"
"Detention for the next two weeks, and a personal essay about why a Huntsman must, above all things, learn control."
"I'm not a student yet, Professor."
"Four weeks.
"Yes Professor.
"It's morning! It's morning! It's morning! It's… MORNIIIIING!" Harry turned to look at the hyperactive redhead jumping around a bored looking boy who seemed content to take it all in stride. Poor man, whipped before he knows it.
He turned his head back towards his food only to meet large silver eyes staring right into his own, uncomfortably close. He jumped back in alarm, knocking his plate up into the face of Ruby Rose as he drew up his slightly purple, smoking hand. When he saw who it was, he balked.
"Jesus Christ, woman, give me a heart attack why don't you!? Merlin alive!" He waved his hand back and forth, dispelling the curse. "Don't sneak up on someone like that." It was at this point that Harry noticed the shine of unshed tears in her eyes, as well as the glaring blonde behind her. She was holding out a bundle of red cloth.
"Fix it."
"I'm sorry?"
"I don't know what you are, or why you're still here after what you did to Weiss, but whichever reason, you are here, so you are going to fix my cloak."
Harry looked at the aforementioned cloak, and as far as he could see, it was undamaged.
"What's wrong with it?"
Ruby's face pulled into an annoyed snarl, as she unrolled the fabric to reveal a rather large stain down the lower half of the cape, crusty and very unappealing to look at. "Weiss threw up on it. Washing it hasn't helped. I've tried every single possible combination of detergents and stain removers and it won't come out. You caused this, so you fix it!"
Harry sighed to himself, holding his hand outstretched towards the red cloth. At first, nothing happened. "Hey! I said to do something, not screw around w—" But her complaints soon tapered off as the muck and grime caked on her cloak slowly started to disappear. "Wha—?"
Both girls watched in awe as the teenager ran his hand up and down the length of the entire cape, the stain simply vanishing under his fingers. At closer inspection, it was prevalent that Harry wasn't even touching the textile. It was, in a word, impossible.
"That's a pretty unique semblance you've got there, Short-Stack," Harry grunted in annoyance at the nickname. He was just under 170 centimetres, a perfectly reasonable height for someone who grew up as stunted and malnourished as he had.
"You're going to make height jokes?" Harry asked her with a raised eyebrow. "Interesting choice for someone with the hair of a cavewoman." Her eyes turned red, though the wizard was far too occupied to notice them. "Seriously, what could you be hiding in there? Homeless children? Stray cats?" He waved his hand a final time; a gesture that every observer discarded as a simple habitual speaking quirk.
He rolled his eyes when he was done, inwardly smirking. "Initiation is in fifteen. See you around." As he exited the spacious Mess, he chuckled in mirth at the loud grunts and confused babbling coming from the boisterous woman behind him.
"MUFTARK!" She screamed after him as he twisted on the spot, apparating away.
Padfoot's Manual to True Marauding, Guideline ("rules are for pansies!") Number 24: Always have the last word.
End of Chapter ONE
A/N: Yes, Padfoot's Manual to True Marauding (which will henceforth be known as PMTM for simplicity) will be a recurring element of the story.
-The UnHoly Smirk
