i do not own the Potter or Jackson universes.

Yes son, we are a rich

"Harry! When did you get here?"

Percy who was sitting on an arm chair in the Gryffindor common room reading the daily prophet with the help of peristrefo looked up and saw a very much beaming Hermione Granger dragging a heavy looking trunk behind her approach him.

"Hello Hermione, I got here just an hour ago how was your Christmas?" Percy folded the paper as best as he could and set it aside and motioned for the girl to sit on the nearby empty sofa.

"Oh, fine," she said as she flopped down on the sofa. "Nothing special. How was it at Won-Won's?"

"Well, it was depressing."

"Explain!"

Percy adjusted the glasses he was wearing, "Fleur Vs the Weasley women got a bit out of hand. And my interference turned it into a deluge. That's why I'm here sitting and reading a newspaper instead of still being at barrow."

"You got here before Ginny and Ron!?" Hermione was surprised.

"Yes, the atmosphere at barrow is not exactly inviting at the moment."

Percy went on and regaled to her the happenings at the barrow. He also went on to tell her of what had happened with the minister of magic. Hermione had made some sort of peace with Fleur yet she did not take sides in the matter of the domestic unrest but she did comment on the ministry.

"The nerve of them! After all they put you through, after Umbridge, Fudge, he expects you to endorse them!"

Later in the evening when Ron and Ginny arrived the former was claimed by his girlfriend before the redhead could even acknowledge Percy's presence and the latter just gave the hero cold shoulders before she met up with her own boyfriend. Days passed by quickly and the only thing of news was about 'Apparition' with Ron spreading the news that Harry Potter had already traveled through the method Percy had to fend off many enthusiastic tale seekers. There was no news of Dumbledore, Percy had seen the old zygon at some dinners and breakfast but the man was vastly absent from the school.

The winter was still in and as Percy knew that business in diagon alley was still very slow. So there were not much people around. But Percy's target was gringotts and it was swarmed with goblins. Getting past them was going to be a challenge. Percy had made a few visits to the alley and also had entered the bank under the pretext of exchanging the money from magical to non-magical and vice-versa. It was the last Sunday of the month of January when Percy decided to make his bid for his beak in of the Lestrange vault. Peristrefo combined with the power of the cloak of invisibility could successfully hide Percy from the zygons and goblins alike. Percy had taken great pains to test those facts. He had used the students and teachers of Hogwarts for his experiment and he had arrived at positive results. Percy arrived at the bank's door steps sharp at ten. The bank ran even on Sundays but there was no crowd. Some customers were at the tellers but most of the tellers were free and the goblins at those stations were doing their assigned paper work. Percy took a look at the inside of the building. The building was definitely made by mortals and not the goblins or even zygons. From the limited knowledge Percy had gained from Annabeth concerning architecture, he could tell that the building was most probably commissioned by some rich lord or by a king or Queen of England and not by a zygon or a goblin.

The goblins vested with protection were holding an assortment of weapons, to any other everyday person it would look intimidating but to Percy who had seen a lot of battles this was not really an issue. He could tell that most of those weapons were ceremonial and not really for battle. Percy did not know the real fighting abilities of the goblins but they were not particularly fast beings and as such Percy doubted that they were much in battle field. But then again they had gone on many rebellions which would not have worked if they were not skilled in fighting so Percy decided to avoid fight if he could.

Percy had to be very careful as to not to walk into other people as they moved around. There were not many people around which made things a bit easy for Percy. He went deeper into the bank and arrived at the area where they have the carts which take people to their vaults. Percy stood at one of the corner were no goblin was standing guard and waited for the proper time to get the work done. He observed as people came by and one single goblin led them on to the cart. No more than two persons were allowed at the same time to ride the cart. The cart was large enough to hold four people excluding the goblin operator so with only two people allowed to ride apart from a goblin it left enough room for Percy to hitch a ride. A pair of father and son arrived at the cart station they were talking loudly even as the goblin in charge of escorting them kept glaring at the two. The man looked like he was in his late thirties and the boy was not more than ten. It was obvious that kid was making his first visit to the bank as the father was explaining to him about how important they really were to the wizarding world.

"Yes son, we are a rich and ancient family. We were one of the first families to have our vaults here." The man was explaining passionately, "why, our vault is right next to that of the Lestrange's!"

Percy's eyes widened, there was no way on earth the man would simple mention that fact out loud just like that. There had to be some divine influence at work. He had indeed made a sacrifice in honor of the gods the previous day and it was definitely good news that they had decided to help in this endeavor of his. Percy did not waste any time and got into the cart after the father and son duo. The cart soon started to accelerate at great speeds. Percy could tell that the boy was terrified by the speed but was keeping shut. Percy saw that the path was the only thing which was lit and the vaults which were on the either side were not illuminated by any light and such were not visible. As the ride continued Percy could see the approaching waterfall and he sensed that it was not ordinary water. Water was part of it yes, but the main component was something which Percy did not know about. There was not much time for persitrefo to scan the water so as he went right underneath the waterfall Percy willed himself to be dry. The occupants of the cart did not look back if they had they would have seen water taking a different path than normal. Percy overheard as the father explained to his son about the specialty of the water. Percy learnt that the waterfall was called the thief's downfall and that the water made sure to wash away all the enchantments the thieves might be using to aid their task.

Soon the cart slowed down and came to halt. Percy waited for the two zygons and the lone goblin to get off the cart and move a bit of distance before he even made a move to get out.

"Whoa, look it's a dragon father!"

Percy saw the over grown lizard which the zygons called dragons, it was riddled with barely healed wounds and by the looks of it; it was in great amount of pain. Percy watched as the goblin took some sort of a rattle toy and played it. The huge lizard started to give out loud cries of agony. Percy understood that the lizard was subjected to pain and it was trained in such a way as to believe that the pain would come with the sound of the rattle. Percy moved quickly and kept in pace with the people in front of him. The moment he was clear of the lizard Percy put his years of experience into use. In a flash he hit the zygon man and rendered the man unconscious. Before the goblin or the child could understand what was happening Percy had peristrefo to render both unconscious. The lestrange vault was right there in front of him. Percy directed the wheel of destruction to pry open the vault door without alerting the security systems if there were any. The goblins had attenuated the vaults door to such magic that no one else but a goblin would be able to open the vault door. Peristrefo did not take long, the door was open and Percy from the glow which the weapon was emitting could see the cup of Hufflepuff placed on a high shelf inside the vault. Peristrefo on Percy's command raced towards the cup and started to hover above it. Unlike the other soul energy containers this one had the potential of being missed. If at all some person familiar with the vault were to visit it for the gold in it, they would see if the cup were to be absent. So Percy had Peristrefo only remove the soul energy and leave the cup intact. Once the job was done Percy had peristrefo do a complex manipulation of the mist to get the goblin and the two zygons to wake up do their work and then lead him out of the bank without them realizing what had conspired.

Percy got to the small apartment which he had rented for the purpose of being a safe house. He had kept his cell phone there so as to get its battery charged while he was at the goblin bank. With him nearly out of drachmas he needed the phone for communication. After the November night of his meeting with Penelope, Eudokia had not visited and as such Percy had no real news as to what was takking place amongst the gods. The apartment was just a single bedroom with a small bathroom and toilet and a small counter which stood for a kitchen. It was cheap so Percy had rented it. The neighbors, thanks to the gods kept to themselves so were no trouble. Percy was happy at destroying yet another soul energy container. He hoped that there were not many left after this one. According the members of the Gryffindor house which included Harry Potter's friends, Percy was attending detention with Snape. Percy had created a situation where most believed that he was serving detention with the foul man. The unpleasant man believed that the boy he hated most was in detention with McGonagall and the woman in turned believed that Percy's detention was being supervised by Hagrid. The poor large man had no idea of any of these and that would be the case for the rest of Percy's stay amongst the zygons. Whenever Percy had to get out of the castle he would create the illusion of being in a detention and that would keep people from looking too closely. At about one in the afternoon London time after he had a decent meal got to him by kreacher Percy called his mother in New York. After have having a small talk with his family Percy went on to check up on Penelope Clearwaters who had now done almost two months of training and only one month of training left. Percy had used great amount of power to get such training for the girl and he was happy that she was doing well. Percy felt guilty about pushing the girl in the path of destruction so he took every opportunity to visit her and keep her company. Percy also contacted a friend of his from the Hecate cabin who was aware of the existence of zygons and owed the hero a lot and convinced her to provide a wand for Penelope's use. Percy was stated to get the said device within three weeks. And for that to happen, Percy had to send a vial of Penelope's blood along with few strands of her hair.

At his arrival at the training academy Percy found Penelope working on her hand to hand combat. Percy could see that all the training had made the girl very much fit. The girl was immersed in her training dummy that she did not register Percy's presence. Percy watched as Penelope delivered blows after blows at the dummy. Percy could see that the girl while having good stamina was not exactly powerful. So every time to be able to put some power into her strikes she was taking too much time. Percy looked around and saw a bottle of water placed at the nearby bench. He fetched it, uncapped it and pour the enter content that is almost a litre of water on the poor girl startling her. The girl made a wild sweep at her attacker but Percy the always experienced took the opportunity send her flying with one single push with his left hand.

"You need to be aware of your surroundings lyra. Failure will cost you your life."

"Perry! Why did you do that?" Penelope asked very much surprised as she picked herself from the ground. She was definitely in pain but hid it well.

"You need to learn to be aware of your surroundings. There will be situations, almost always were you are outnumbered. In situations like that you need to be aware of your surroundings or the opponents of yours will be able to defeat you or even eliminate you." Percy explained calmly.

"But did you have to hit me so hard! It hurts!" Penelope complained.

Percy did not reply straight away but walked forward and punched her left shoulder. Penelope not expecting such an attack cried out in both shock and pain. Percy did not wait for her to recover but hit her with another punch this time at her abdomen. Percy kept the blows mild so as not to do lasting damage. The girl recovered quickly from the blow which impressed Percy. Once again Percy went for an attack and fortunately as per his plan Penelope ducked down and avoided being hit on her face. She did not wait for Percy to attack but went for her own attack. Percy could see her shoulder getting ready to make a move and she was slow to deliver the blow which gave Percy enough time to sidestep her attack.

"You don't actually have much physical strength," Percy informed, "you are taking a lot of time build the needed energy to deliver the punch. It's making you slow." Percy blocked her yet another sweep and punched her abdomen once again before continuing his words, "Your forte is your speed. Stop wasting your time in putting strength into your blows but concentrate on your speed. Lessen the time that you take for each shot and increase the number of shots you deliver."

Percy soon had the girl on the ground in a tight grip. After the fight was declared over Percy helped Penelope practice in increasing her speed and getting her to break away from the bad habit of telegraphing her punches.

"So Perry, how have you been doing?" Penelope asked as they were relaxing sipping water sitting on the bench in a semi-large field were most of the outdoor training are done.

"Nothing new really, I did make a small progress on the case that I have been working on but I can't give you any details…"

"If you did then you would have to kill me." Penelope added jokingly.

Percy chuckled. "On matters concerning you, things on zygon front are getting worse. Those soul suckers recently attacked and killed nearly fifteen people, most of them everyday humans. At least three children as far as we know have been bitten by werewolves, one of them as young as six year old. Two of those kids are missing. We believe it to be the work of werewolf leader Greyback. The ministry of magic –"

Before Percy could continue Penelope cut in, "then put me in the field. I will bring them down. I'll put a stop to it. I have trained enough, just get me a wand I'll show them to where they belong and that's in body bags and unmarked graves." The girl's words were filled with anger and passion.

"Your boldness is commendable," Percy said as he pulled the girl in a side way hug to console her, "but today shows that you are not ready yet." Seeing that she was about to protest Percy pressed on, "you are not ready, accept that lyra. Today's practice shows that if you try to go out there now you will get killed. Train, train harder. Get ready and you will be able to bring them down. I promise you Penelope that I will do everything in my power to help you to accomplish what you want to do."

At five in the evening Percy returned back to Hogwarts and was soon informed by Hermione that he had been asked to join the headmaster for their matinee session. After having dinner Percy soon found himself in Albus Dumbledore's office. On entering Percy saw the phoenix called fawkes which had been absent for all the previous meetings perched on a stand and studying him in interest. Percy acknowledged the bird before he greeted the old zygon and then took the offered seat. Percy saw that the old zygon's right hand had not healed. Percy on the previous occasions had let it slide and had not taken much interest in the injury. He had tried to have peristrefo scan it on his first meeting but had not repeated the incomplete scan on the subsequent meetings but this time Percy who was high on his success of destroying yet another soul energy container wanted to know. So he asked peristrefo to conduct a complete scan of Dumbledore.

"I hear that you met the Minister of Magic over Christmas?"

"Yes," Percy said smiling, "I don't think I'm on his speed dial anymore."

Even with Dumbledore trying very hard Percy did not really give the man much details of the meeting beyond what any other person present at the Weasley table that day could give. Percy could see that Dumbledore was not really satisfied with Percy's answers but after learning that pressing for the matter was not helping him the old zygon gave up. But he did give out the details about the idea of having Harry Potter's endorsement had been originally Fudge's idea. Percy introduced the matter of lack of probe into Umbridge's doings and received the answer that the woman had her own political influence and had used it to survive. Percy knew that having the victims of the woman unit against her and bring the matter to the public domain would need active participation on his part as Harry Potter had been one of her top victims. And that might end up being considered as direct interference. He would have to be invited to bring the issue by Umbridge herself otherwise it won't work.

Dumbledore went ahead and continued the tale of Tom Riddle. Dumbledore informed Percy that memories related to Riddle's years in Hogwarts were limited and vastly uninformative as most were afraid to reveal what they knew and the rest were loyal to the mad man. The mostly commentary from Dumbledore went on for a while and Percy was now faking interest. Percy did wonder if the man who had been a teacher for decades could say that the person in front of him had lost interest but apparently the old zygon could not as he went on with his narrative. Finally Dumbledore showed Percy the memory of Morfin Gaunt. It didn't really tell Percy much. It did tell that Riddle after finding out about his maternal family and then about his own father had gone on and killed his father and grandparents and framed his maternal uncle for the crime. It only showed as to why the mad man and his followers all had to go for the better of the world. It was the next memory that truly was of importance. A memory which was the key to this quest and it was a fake. The memory belonged to Slughorn and the man had been the one who had unwittingly given Tom Marvolo Riddle the idea of making soul energy containers. Percy knew that the zygons called the soul energy container Horcrux. Percy was also aware that he needed to get the real conversation. There was a great possibility that the conversation would reveal as to how many soul containers the zygon Riddle had actually created.

"This is why you brought him here! Slughorn! you brought him here with the intention of getting the real memory."

"Yes Harry," said Dumbledore," yes this is as you have guessed an important piece of information."

"And it's a fake." Percy added.

"Certainly," said Dumbledore. "Professor Slughorn has meddled with his own recollections."

The conversation went on for a few minutes and Percy tired to get more out of the zygon. The old man had been sitting on this information for gods alone knew how long. Percy wanted to lash out in anger but kept it to himself. With the old zygon informing Percy that he needed Harry Potter to get the real memory from Slughorn the meeting was called to an end.

thank you guys. see you all next week.