A/N Thank you to the 44 people who clicked on this story's last chapter, and two extra special thanks: one to the only person who reviewed, and the other to the person who put us on their alert list. Chihiro and I really would appreciate ideas from you, whether or not we write them. They might be what it takes to write the next chapters.
Disclaimer: We don't own Harry Potter, nor Full Metal Panic. Enjoy.
Guns, Lasers, and Magic
Harry walked down the street at about 10'o'clock at night, ending his walk at the park. He glanced up at the silver moon, half this night, before a series of popping noises startled him out of his reverie. A group of Death Eaters surrounded him. He grabbed his wand, but knew it was useless… He couldn't fend off this many…
A shot rang through the air. A gunshot? How could that be?
"Get away from him." A familiar voice came, causing Harry's mouth to turn dry. A muggle…A muggle would be killed because of his inability to defend himself.
"Well, Well, Well… looks like a muggle enjoys playing the hero. Come out and play, little boy." Lucius' voice rang through the skull mask.
A second later, a death eater was on the ground as Sousuke knocked him in the head with a roundhouse kick.
"I don't play the hero. I just take out the trash." That said, he reached up to his ear. "Requesting backup. Sergeant Major Mao, requesting backup."
Whatever he heard, it pleased him, for he settled into a fighting pose. "Get away from the boy."
"Wouldn't you like that?" Lucius nodded, and the death eaters fired their spells.
Sousuke fired another shot, and another death eater went down. He expertly dodged the spells fired at him, and Harry could have sworn he heard, "lasers!" come from Sousuke's mouth.
A few minutes passed, and the death eaters apparated away, taking their fallen with them.
Sousuke relaxed, walking over to Harry, who had fallen as he fended off the spells, and reaching out a hand to lift him up.
As he did this, Melissa and Kurtz appeared, running towards them.
"Ahh…Sousuke, you never leave any for me!" Kurtz complained.
Melissa rolled her eyes. "You all right, Sousuke?"
"Yes, Sergeant Major Mao."
Harry looked between the three. Melissa hadn't corrected the boy… "I believe I'm in need of an explanation…"
"Sergeant Sousuke Sagara." Sousuke introduced himself.
Melissa frowned. "I suppose it does no good to hide. We're agents of Mithril, a vigilante force. Mercenaries, if you please. We were sent to investigate you, and protect you."
"And who," Harry said slowly, "hired you?"
Melissa shook her head. "The captain ordered this."
"What does he want with me?"
"You're one of hundreds disappearing yearly…and reappearing. You think we wouldn't notice? All the false schools, and you all disappeared off the scanners at the same place, same day."
Harry wondered what he could say. 'Yeah, I go to a school for wizards,' did not sound the smartest idea in the world.
A series of popping noises had all three drawing their guns, and looking surprised as strange figures appeared, each saying, "Harry!"
Harry looked between the wizards, who were eying the muggle weapons with curiosity, other than Arthur Weasely, who murmured to Tonks the use of such weapons.
"Just put down your Firelegs. No fights are needed here…" Arthur began passively.
Melissa raised a brow at the term, "Firelegs?" She shook her head. "I believe you mean these guns, and I agree, as you're obviously here to protect him."
She turned to Kurtz and Sousuke.
"Sousuke, Kurtz, lower your weapons."
Kurtz pouted, but complied, as Sousuke immediately did as she had asked.
"Who are you?" Lupin asked unyieldingly. He didn't lower his wand, and neither did any of the other wizards.
Melissa smirked ever so slightly. "The question is, who are you? And why are you here?"
"Why should we answer you?"
"Because…" She stated slowly, making sure they understood the full meaning of what she said, "We are soldiers. Mercenaries, if you please. And we aren't pussyfooting around here. We have a mission, and we're going to fulfill it. No matter what."
The wizards glanced between each other, "Harry, who are they?"
He frowned. "I thought they were my neighbors…but what they've said has made that just a disguise."
Tonks nodded. "We're taking Harry back to headquarters, whether you stand between us or not."
Sousuke stepped forward. "That would not be a wise course of action. The probability of you successfully overwhelming us are one to ten, even considering if you caught us off guard, which is unlikely. However…with this….your odds are lowered to one to a hundred." That stated, he suddenly jumped backwards, landing on some nonexistent object…or at least, something invisible.
"What?" They watched, startled, as he clambered up it, and upon making it to the top, disappeared.
Seconds afterwards, the creature appeared. A giant robot.
"What the…"
Melissa smiled. "Arm Slave Arbalest. Pilot: Sergeant Sousuke Sagara. It's equipped with the Lambda driver. You might as well just tell us what we need to know."
There was an abrupt pop. And now there stood another wizard- Dumbledore. Melissa and Kurtz whipped their guns out at the sudden noise.
Dumbledore sized up the situation.
"Well," he said lightly after a moment's pause, looking over his spectacles at the tense mercenaries, "who are you?"
"They're mercenaries and they're trying to prevent us from taking Harry back," Tonks jumped in quickly. "We have to stop them, Professor."
"Oh," he said in mild surprise. "I see." He was still looking the soldiers over. "Who's your friend?" he directed towards the giant robot.
The mercenaries face-faulted. "Stop trying to buy time," Melissa growled in irritation. "Tell us why these children are disappearing."
Dumbledore retained his carefree demeanor. "Shouldn't we be introduced first?" he said. "I'll start. I'm Professor Albus Dumbledore, Headmaster of Hogwarts."
Melissa decided to play along for now. It seemed she couldn't force anything out of them. "I'm Sergeant Major Melissa Mao," she said, in barely concealed annoyance.
Kurtz did a double take on Melissa, then shrugged. "I'm the dashing Sergeant Kurtz Weber."
Melissa rolled her eyes, then turned to the robot. "Sergeant, come out and introduce yourself."
Arbalest's cockpit slowly opened. They could see Sousuke, strapped into a seat. "Sergeant Sousuke Sagara."
Dumbledore gazed at him. "Didn't I send you an owl once?" he asked mildly.
"Negative, sir," Sousuke said, looking at him in a confused way.
"You never got the message?" Dumbledore asked. "Pity."
Harry was by now completely confused. Dumbledore had asked Sousuke to attend Hogwarts?
"I find it hard to believe that you ever sent me a transmission," Sousuke said to Dumbledore. "The frequency is highly confidential."
"No, no," Dumbledore waved his hand, smiling. "I sent you an owl. A bird. You were about eleven at the time."
"I was on a submarine when I was eleven," Sousuke stated.
"Ah. That explains why the letter returned unopened," Dumbledore said. He then turned to Melissa and Kurtz. "It seems I remember sending letters to you two as well. Never got them?"
"No!" they responded in unison, inwardly questioning the man's sanity.
"Were you on a submarine as well?" he asked. "It would have been when you were eleven."
"Let's just say we were unreachable," Kurtz said with a grin.
Melissa tried to regain control. "We're getting off topic," she said. "You wanted introductions. We got introductions. So now we can talk."
"But you haven't met these other fine men and women," Dumbledore protested, gesturing to the wizards and witches behind him. "Introduce yourselves, please."
Melissa and Kurtz stared in unbelief. What was with this Dumbledore guy?
The wizards and witches looked at each other, then Lupin stepped forward.
"Remus Lupin," he said with a bow.
"Nymphoranda Tonks," a bubble-gum-pink-haired woman introduced herself.
The other three followed suit.
Dumbledore turned. "Now, I believe you said we were getting off topic. On the contrary, we are completely on topic. Because, these letters I mentioned are the very reason. We," He gestured behind him at the others, "Are wizards."
Tonks coughed.
"And witches." Dumbledore corrected. "You have the potential to be as well."
Sousuke jumped down, un-strapping himself, to speak to his commanding officer. "Sergeant Major Mao, do you think they're speaking of the Whispered?" he questioned quietly.
Mao looked towards Dumbledore. "Are you talking about the Whispered?"
"The Whispered? I don't believe I'm familiar with that term." Dumbledore seemed only mildly surprised.
"The Whispered: Makers of black technology and users of Resonance. Captain Teletha Testarosa and Miss Kaname Chidori are only two examples."
"Resonance? Ah, now I have heard of that. It's the sharing of two minds, correct? Every memory, every bit of knowledge? From what I've heard, it's quite dangerous."
Harry looked at Dumbledore. Was this a muggle or wizard thing? The line wasn't so clear anymore.
Sousuke looked at the man. "Affirmative. That is correct. Resonance ought only be used when no other option is left to them, lest they cease to exist."
Harry frowned. "Magic that will make you cease to exist?"
"Yes, Harry." Dumbledore answered. "One of the oldest and most powerful magics of all. It can even overwhelm an Occulmens master."
"So if you don't know of the Whispered, yet you know of this- resonance- you were obviously in touch with them at one time or another."
"I believe you mentioned someone called…Miss Teletha Testarossa? I seem to remember sending a letter to her as well. Is she also 'unreachable'?"
"The Captain is too busy piloting the Tuatha De Danann to meddle with such minor affairs."
Dumbledore raised a brow at Melissa's statement. "Captain? She's your leader? If I remember correctly, she was to be in the same year as Sousuke here."
Melissa frowned at him. "She may be young, but that doesn't make her unable to lead. She's intelligent- I doubt even you can claim to have finished school at about thirteen."
"Not to mention she's good for morale. Whooe…She sure is hot…" Kurtz stated tactlessly. "Too bad she only has a thing for Sergeant untouchable over there." Kurtz gestured with his thumb towards Sousuke.
Sousuke looked at Kurtz in obvious confusion. "What are you talking about?"
Melissa didn't leave Kurtz any chance to respond, as Melissa delivered a savage kick to his unprotected side.
"Don't you dare talk about little Tessa like that in front of me, Kurtz." She stated, a fire in her eyes.
Kurtz rubbed his side. "Owww….Note to self, never mention how cute a younger girl is when her best friend's around."
Sousuke took up a thoughtful pose. "I don't understand why girls are constantly hitting us. Even Miss Chidori continually does so…"
Kurtz smirked. "Ah…Sergeant Clueless trying to understand women…."
"Let's get back on track," Dumbledore said. "Let's stop talking about girls now. I need to ask you if you would like to come to Hogwarts. You can ask your commanding officer, of course. She is invited, along with Miss Kaname Chidori."
The mercenaries looked at each other uncertainly.
BRAINSTORMING SESSION
(just for fun reading, as apologies for giving you a cliffie)
Now they were on a train. It was fun! thought Sousuke. He bought lots of chocolate frogs.
Melissa tried to take them, but he growled and hugged them fiercely. Then he took out his gun and waved it around, causing many of the passengers to panic. Kurtz tried to hold him down, but to no avail. Sousuke was ranting something about collecting all the famous wizard cards.
Then Kurtz and Melissa decided to buy their own chocolate frogs. But there were no more left. So they got pumpkin pasties, but they tasted disgusting. They threw them at Sousuke. He shot the pumpkin pasties. Then they locked him in the compartment. They weren't sure they could actually do that, but he couldn't get out. So he broke the window and jumped off the train. That was when he noticed Dementors coming for them, and he promptly shot them. Actually the bullet didn't go right through; he disposed of them and precluded the possibility of the third book. Even if that was moving backwards in time.
Now back to serious stuff. If you can call it serious. I can.
A/N- That was Chihiro's brainstorming session...
Anyway, please review any ideas or questions, or any editing, though Chihiro does a pretty good job of that...
Next time on Panic at Hogwarts...(Random quotes from the next chapter)
"Hello, can we sit here?"
"You…You…"
"I am a professor."
"Quite the opposite."
"Better hurry, or you won't find a seat, Harry."
-End Preview-
Arigato! Ja ne!
Shiori Hitohana and Chihiro
