Hero Harry Chapter 13
Extra AN: I think this is finally fixed. Huge thanks to Aelket for cluing me onto HTML-editing the document to snipe tags; it wasn't as simple as Aelket thought it would be, but I still managed in about five minutes, rather than the hours it would have taken.
AN: As expected, there was a fair bit of feedback about religion showing up in this story in a meaningful way. There'll be a somewhat more detailed AN in response to some of people's words in reviews at the end of the chapter, which will take up a decent chunk, so don't be surprised when the tail bit of this update is non-story.
((()))
Lake Sakakawea Magical Asylum Refuge, North Dakota, May 4th, 1997.
Director Wright had called a meeting, sending out runners to summon the primary community leaders amongst each group within the camp; the summons were not voluntary. It took just over three hours, even with the aid of magic, to gather everyone together, and to Wright's relief, Nicholas Flamel was in the camp, and came to the meeting as well. He wasn't sure to make of the man bringing George Granger with him, but he was hardly going to complain, as while the eccentric scientist wasn't a social leader in the camp's community, he certainly held a position of some prominence and respect.
During those three hours, roughly fifty soldiers arrived on the base via Portkey, each carrying over a hundred pounds of equipment with them; most of the men began setting up fortified positions around the camp, but Captain Gray Horse, their commanding officer, more or less attached himself to Wright, and attended the meeting with him. Paul was fairly certain that the sudden military presence had something to do with the prompt attendance the meaning benefited from.
"Alright then people," Wright called, bringing silence to the meeting hall they were in, "As you've probably all guessed from the men in uniform arriving on base, something Bad has happened. First and foremost, there's a party of hostiles moving towards the Camp from the Mexican border, having pierced the national wards by means I don't entirely understand, including over a hundred magical combatants, lead by someone that is referred to as 'Hostile Alpha.' I don't know who that is, but Captain Gray Horse here," Wright gestured to the Native American officer beside him, who nodded sharply to the small crowd, "Should be able to brief us all on that."
"Actually, Mister Wright," Gray Horse said, nodding towards where Flamel was seated in the small audience, "As the Philosopher is present, I believe he would be far better qualified than I to brief all of you, and add to my limited knowledge for that matter. If you would, Mister Flamel?"
"Of course," Flamel said graciously, standing and walking up to the front of the meeting hall, "Unpleasant business, but I'm more than happy to help the United States with this affair, much as you all have helped me."
Once he reached the front of the hall, Flamel withdrew his wand, and with a deft flick, conjured a larger-than-life image of the man he and Harry had faced at Fudge's camp in Wales.
"This," Flamel said seriously, turning to face the small assembly, "Is a man who calls himself Salazar Slytherin, and he had been around for at least a generation before I was born."
"Salazar Slytherin?" Minerva McGonagall breathed in shock, "One of the Founders is still alive?"
"No," Flamel replied promptly, shaking his head, "I am not certain of his actual identity; my best operating theory is that he's either the son or grandson of the Hogwarts Founder named Slytherin, but I really can't be certain. I do know that he is a Parselmouth, cannot enter the grounds of Hogwarts, and does not have access to the long-sealed Slytherin vault at Gringotts. It is because of his inability to pierce the wards of Hogwarts castle that I entrusted the safekeeping of my Stone to Albus Dumbledore seven years ago, something that Salazar has been attempting to steal from me, literally since the day after its creation."
"That would mean he has been been seeking it for over six hundred years, would it not?" The leader of the small French contingent in the camp said, "However have you kept it from him all this time?"
"I'm more interested in how he's been alive for so long," George Granger cut in, "From what I understand, the Philosopher's Stone you created is the only known means to grant the sort of continuous youth you have benefited from."
"It's the only ethical way," Flamel said with considerable distaste, "I do not know all the details of the ritual, but during our long feud, I have more than once come across Salazar as he conducts a necromantic rite which transfers vitality from another Wizard or Witch to himself, a process fatal to the victim of the ritual. From what I have gathered, it is a ritual he needs to conduct once per year in order to stave off the affects of aging. Unlike the properties of the Stone I created, however, it has no rejuvenating or healing effects, at least none that I have been able to learn of over the centuries."
"I do not wish to be rude," Captain Gray Horse said before the Frenchman, who had just opened his mouth, could speak again, "But I believe it would be best if we discussed relevant threat assessment, motives, and possibly-viable countermeasures before going into other historical details?"
"Quite right young man, quite right," Flamel said, turning a gracious smile towards the captain, "You'll have to forgive me, one of the artifacts of my age and expected life-span, is that I very rarely feel the full effects of urgency unless lives are on the line directly in front of me," He turned to face the rest of the group again before continuing, "Salazar is willing to risk operating beneath the national wards for one reason, and one reason only. He has learned that the Stone I created was used to heal Miss Hermione Granger's mortal wounds two years ago when she and the Potters fought and defeated the group known as the 'Death Eaters,' and he's come to take the Stone, which he believes to be in her possession, from her."
"Does she have the Stone?" Wright asked sharply.
By way of reply, Flamel reached into his waistcoat pocket, and withdrew a fist-sized blood-red stone, and offered Wright a rather amused smile.
"As Captain Gray Horse is no doubt aware, if he has had the short brief on myself and Salazar," Flamel said, "I am a professional medical specialist, dealing primarily with cases involving terminal disease, paralysis, and the like; although I am fully trained in both magical and mundane medicine, I mostly cheat to treat 'incurable' cases. I cheat using the Elixir of Life, which has near-unlimited restorative properties; the only thing I have not found it able to cure is death via gross decapitation or similarly massive bodily destruction, Death via the Killing Curse, and any case of clinical physical death more than an hour old."
"Why the hour restriction?" George Granger asked curiously.
"I have dabbled enough in Soul Magic to give you a partial answer," Flamel said with a shrug, "After an hour of physical death, the Soul departs from the body, though sometimes it will depart sooner. As to why the Soul departs after an hour, I cannot say; perhaps it is simply how the Creator ordained it to be. More germane to the issue of the threat presented by Salazar and his followers, there are two salient aspects to the threat they represent.
"First, there is Salazar himself. He can, and if he deems it necessary, will, cast every single spell commonly or uncommonly known based upon the Latin-and-Wand system of magic. He is not only overwhelmingly skilled in the use of such magic, he is also some how tied into the principles and system by which it functions. I have not been able to penetrate the security of his sanctum, and even if I did, I am not sure I would be able to find the relevant data; I know at least some part of how he is tied in, but the only immediately relevant consequence of whatever enchantments or rituals he used on himself, is that he has a functionally limitless magical stamina."
The Alchemist paused for a moment to let his words sink in, waving aside questioning looks and half-formed words before people could fully articulate them.
"That doesn't mean he is tireless," Flamel continued, "His body has physical limits, and though magic can overcome that to some degree, the only means I know of to truly refresh the body without limit, or paying a later price, is the Elixir of Life, another part of why he desires my Stone. For those of you who were not aware, he and Mister Potter engaged in a protracted duel during the strike on the camp in Wales, in which he pushed young Harry to the brink of exhaustion. Mister Potter's highly mobile combat style, however, forced him to considerable physical exertion, and thus when I arrived, he retreated, rather than face a likely losing engagement; considering that he had already successfully ripped the knowledge he sought from young Harry's mind, he had little reason to stay anyways."
Flamel paused for a moment, closing his eyes, and taking a deep breath, before continuing, his countenance considerably more grim.
"Make no mistake," He said, turning to Captain Gray Horse, "When Salazar arrives, I will be the one to engage him, mot likely with some support from Mister Potter. If you or your men find themselves in the line of fire, or under attack by him, your sole objective should be retreat and survival, using offensive means only so much as necessary to clear the way for your retreat. He utilizes a magical barrier that will literally block any and all magical effects, and any object approaching him at a sufficient speed to injure him.
"What you, and most likely Potter's coterie of combatants, will need to concern yourself primarily with, is the hundred and some men and women that Salazar has brought with him. Make no mistake, their sole purpose is to deal with other threats, so that he will be able to duel with either Potter or myself. Though the battle will, without question, be fiercest between Salazar, Potter, and myself, victory or defeat will most likely come to whichever side's 'lesser' combatants defeat the other, allowing someone to simply be buried in numbers.
"Further, while I have little doubt that if Salazar were truly determined, he could find a way to pierce the Apparition and Portkey Wards that cover North America, after a fight, he will lack the stamina to do so. In coming here, he is taking a risk of being trapped, overwhelmed, and eventually defeated due to simple exhaustion. Not a particularly large risk, but that he would risk such a thing at all, rather than remaining in Europe, over which he has erected his own bounded fields giving him the advantage, says a great deal of just how determined he is to recover Miss Granger, either because he believes she possesses the Stone, or that by studying the unusual means by which Mister Potter healed her with it, he will be able to create one of his own."
Flamel paused for a moment to gather his thoughts, again waving down questions, before finishing up.
"Finally, Salazar's subordinates," Flamel continued, "Are members of an organization called the Mage's Association. Most of the Association is concerned with researching and developing new forms of magic, most likely to feed both their, and Salazar's, hunger for power. A branch known as the Enforcers, however, is where the mainstay of his current expeditionary force is likely to come from. The Enforcers usually concern themselves with maintaining the secrecy of magic, and hunting down those creatures, such as feral vampires, which tend to make enough of a mess to endanger said secrecy. Most immediately relevant about them, however, is their style of magic, and thus combat.
"While Salazar and his subordinates are, in general, aware of the capabilities of modern technology, they rarely understand the specifics, and disdain use of it themselves, preferring magic. They also do not employ the Latin-and-Wand system of magic, I suspect because they are too paranoid to invest themselves in a system that Salazar himself has so much mastery of. Instead, they tend towards focusing on one or two branches of magic; you are likely to see them primarily use elemental magics, such as fire or lightning manipulation, manipulation of a particular concept, such as friction or inertia, or potent magical artifacts that have preset, but dangerous abilities.
"There are too many individual Enforcers, and they come and go with each generation, for me to have kept up intelligence on their individual styles of combat, but these are the things that, in general, you should expect."
He paused for a moment, and smiled wryly.
"Now," He said, glancing at Captain Gray Horse in particular, "I will answer any questions you may have."
((()))
Lake Sakakawea Magical Asylum Refuge, North Dakota, May 4th, 1997.
"Tabane," Harry called as he, still invisible, entered his mother's home, Hermione absently trailing behind him as she annotated something on a clipboard, "Are you here?"
"I am here," Tabane called from the kitchen, and Harry homed in on the young woman's voice.
"I'm found a place for you in my plan of battle," Harry said seriously as he entered the kitchen, "One that I think you will quite li-"
He cut off at what he found, and Hermione looked up when she heard the interruption. Tabane was seated at the kitchen table with her younger sister on her lap, slowly feeding both of them via levitation with wandless magic; what stood out most to Harry though, as well as Hermione once she looked, was how the four year old's face was covered with a silly grin as Tabane slowly levitated food into her waiting mouth.
"That's so cute," Hermione said, smiling softly as she watched the siblings together, "It makes me wish I had a little sister."
"Get your own," Tabane said reflexively and somewhat defensively, wrapping her handless arms tight around the younger girl.
Then she realized just what she said, and a somewhat awkward silence passed through the room while Tabane fought a perplexed expression off of her face.
"You said you had a part for me to play?" She eventually said, turning towards Harry, desperate to break the silence.
"Yes," Harry said with a tight grin, "How familiar are you with heavy weapons?"
((()))
Outside Granger Lab, Lake Sakakawea Magical Asylum Refuge, North Dakota, May 5th, 1997.
When Salazar's attack finally came, it was as brutal as it was abrupt. As with most Wizards of intense power and skill, Harry and Flamel both were sufficiently sensitive to magic that it was nigh-impossible for another powerful magic-user to approach them stealthily; but Salazar had dealt with such issues before, and had more than one means of dampening his magical presence to near-nonexistance. In order to sneak up on Harry Potter, he employed three of them, two rituals and a potion, the only ones which were reasonably compatible with each other.
Casting the Killing Curse, even silently, wandlessly, and from invisibility, caused a flare of magic through Salazar's magic-damping effects, but as he had literally laid his hand against the neck of Harry Potter to do so, it was far too late for the young man to dodge.
The reaction was not what Salazar had expected.
Corrosive, deadly magic exploded from Harry's skin, liquefying Salazar's fingers and half of his palm before his barrier was able to counter its effects, not to mention shattering both Salazar's invisibility spell, and his magic-dampening effects. Salazar leapt back, wand in his left hand already sealing the blood vessels in the ruined mess of his right, and conjuring a temporary replacement for the maimed limb.
Unlike Flamel, who in Salazar's experience would have delivered a wry one-liner of some variety or another before counter-attacking, Harry simply acted, turning in place and casting a massively powerful concussive spell, blasting Salazar off of his feet, though his barrier protected him, before whipping off his own Invisibility Cloak, and snapping open one of the Dragonhide pouches attached to his combat harness. A wand in either hand, he followed up his opener with a blitz of other spells, which Salazar deftly evaded, his active magic use focused on putting the finishing touches on the silvery digits he had conjured to replace those he had just lost.
He was somewhat surprised by how easy it was for him to evade the Potter boy's spells at such close range, at least until he had returned his attention fully to the fight, and discovered that Potter had, rather than throw offensive spells around, shaped the earth or conjured into existence a number of thick earthen walls, boxing Salazar's movement in, covering all avenues of movement except those directly towards the Potter scion. The self-declared Slytherin immediately moved to remove the obstacles; he did not expect them to present any real impediment to his combat ability, but intended to destroy them on the general principle of allowing none of his enemy's plans to go unthwarted.
The walls had been magically-reinforced however, and before he could get off the second set of spells necessary to remove them, fire vomited forth from the open pouch on Potter's chest, and a torrent of overwhelming kinetic force slammed into Salazar's shield, pinning him to the back of the enclosure with crushing force.
((()))
Lake Sakakawea Magical Asylum Refuge, North Dakota, May 5th, 1997.
The magically-capable branch of the US Military was small, by simple necessity. Something in the order of one in a thousand individuals in the USA were born magical, and military recruitment amongst the magical population held a roughly equivalent rate to that of the non-magical population. In theory, this meant that of the one million four hundred and thirty-eight thousand men and women in uniform, roughly one thousand four hundred would be magicals, and as with the conventional military, more than a third would be in the Army, of which most would serve in combat, rather than support roles.
In practice, the US military did not make a policy of being dependent upon a thousand and a half men to protect the entire nation from magical threats, and as such, two-thirds of magicals in uniform served primarily as Enchanters, laying subtle magical wards over major pieces of hardware, such as aircraft, armored vehicles, artillery pieces, ships, and more or less everything in Nuclear Silos, to protect against simple magical subversion of said material. On top of this, they enchanted key pieces of equipment of every officer ranked Major and above, as well as many lower-ranked officers as time could be found to cover, in order to protect them against having their senses clouded, or their minds outright controlled, by hostile magicals.
This left less than five hundred men and women trained to serve in front-line combat; less than ten to cover any given state, not to mention Washington DC, military bases, and ships not inside American territory. Manpower was constantly in shorter supply than was considered desirable or acceptable, and the US Military payed magicals very well as a result. With more than a hundred servicemen sent to deal with the catastrophe in Tokyo, fifty combat-trained magicals sent to the Sakakawea site was a huge commitment upon the part of the Army, leaving the Continental US with essentially no strategic reserves of magic-capable of manpower should Salazar divert to a different target, or another threat appear. When the Company deployed around the Refuge, magically digging and fortifying foxholes by Fireteam, they knew that they had little chance of further support from superiors in any meaningful timeframe, knew that their primary foe was almost impossibly beyond their foe, and his minions outnumbered them at least two to one.
One thing that the US military had long since learned, however, was that if quantity is either unavailable, or unsuitable, that quality must be emphasized as much as possible. The Enforcers and miscellaneous others that Salazar had brought with on his assault expected opposition largely along the lines of what they experienced in occasional skirmishes with British and European Witches and Wizards, in other words, foes largely along the lines of street cops or perhaps hardened detectives, not a military force, trained for war.
Salazar cared little for the lives of his subordinates, but did desire for them to be effective in their purpose on the mission; IE wiping out Flamel and Potter's support, and then moving to help him defeat his two primary foes. As such, he had briefed them on the general skill and power level to expect of the group that had attacked Fudge's internment camp. They fully expected to face a dozen and a half well-equipped, well-trained, experienced oponents, with their own nearly two-hundred men and women. They did not expect for the Americans to provide any sizeable amount of manpower to the Refuge's defense, and expected what little resistance they presented to be pathetically overmatched.
Their expectations were doomed to disappointment.
((()))
Outside Granger Lab, Lake Sakakawea Magical Asylum Refuge, North Dakota, May 5th, 1997.
While the GAU-13's magical augmentation had been completed and tested in detail and at great length, Harry hadn't come up with his final idea regarding how to effectively use the device in combat until the day before, and as such, he hadn't had the time to properly test it. This lead to a critical failing in his plan that allowed Salazar to escape the first trap that Harry had laid for him, even if it was a very simple, and in retrospect obvious, failing.
The GAU-13 produced a lot of muzzle flare, and with the shells emerging from less than two feet below the level of his eyes, he couldn't see a damn thing. His barrier's properties kept the heat and light from injuring or blinding him, but it still blocked his line of sight to his target. He wasn't the one aiming the Gatling weapon, making it a non-issue regarding accuracy, but it did prevent him from being able to effectively reinforce the barriers keeping Salazar pinned in place, and less than a half-dozen seconds after the GAU-13 had opened fire, its target cut his way out of the killbox, and slipped out of the line of fire.
Fire ceased immediately, allowing Harry to see again, just in time to deflect the first spell of Salazar's counter-attack.
((()))
Lake Sakakawea Magical Asylum Refuge, North Dakota, May 5th, 1997.
Unlike their leader, the Enforcers, with very few exceptions, lacked the means to approach their opponents invisibly, especially magically-capable opponents with extensive training in both magical and mundane combat. The Director had left the execution of their part of the assault to their commander, a man named Jonas, who had decided the force would make their assault from the air. He had little desire to give competent opponents the advantage of forcing him to fight them on prepared ground, and even if their means of transportation up from the border were ultimately glorified magic carpets, they did still offer a mobility advantage in the air.
Or at least, they would have offered a mobility advantage if they had been fighting conventional wand-magic users.
The American soldiers, operating by fireteam against numerically superior foes, had entrenched themselves around the Camp, each Fireteam within sight and fire-support range of two other fireteams. Even with the ability of their positions to support each other, it left them with horrifically low force concentrations compared to the approaching swarm of Enforcers. The Americans, however, held one critical advantage over their foes; unlike the Enforcers, each of the American soldiers was keyed into the massive ward array that covered North America, allowing them to Apparate and use Portkeys more or less at will.
When the massed group of Enforcers swept over the camp and launched a broad mixture of attack spells at the first, their targets simply disappeared from their foxhole before the assault reached them. The Enforcers responded by breaking up into groups of roughly two dozen, and raining fire down on every foxhole they could find.
The Americans responded by Apparating out of the camp altogether, which left the camp proper devoid of human habitation.
((()))
Outside Granger Lab, Lake Sakakawea Magical Asylum Refuge, North Dakota, May 5th, 1997.
Salazar had controlled the fight since the moment he had escaped Harry's initial trap, and as he acclimated to his synthetic hand, his domination of the engagement only became more profound. Neither he nor Harry could make use of Apparition, and it had very quickly become obvious to both of them that this put Harry at far more of a disadvantage than it did Salazar. Spells flashed back and forth between the two, colored and color-less jets and blasts of light, waves of flame, ice, and electricity, all of them either deflected or absorbed, neither's defense showing any sign of yielding as the landscape around them was savaged.
Both understood the importance of mobility, but Salazar pressed for it far more than Harry; incredibly wary of the powerful weapon concealed within the pouches on his chest, having no intention whatsoever of allowing it to ravage his defenses a second time. Towards this end, he veritably danced, constantly circling Harry at near-melee range, close enough that the Potter scion had to constantly shift in place, never having a steady line of fire open to the elder Wizard.
The balance, what little there was of it, to the fight was finally tipped when the wing of Enforcers approached the fight through the air, and Salazar backed away, a viciously triumphant smile forming on his face as nearly two hundred of his minions approached them.
"I win, Potter," He said with a sneer, the first words either had spoken since the duel began.
Harry spoke no words in response, instead simply pulling, of all things, a wine bottle from one of the magically-expanded pouches on his combat harness, and throwing it to the ground beside him.
Nicholas Flamel appeared over the shattered remnants of the bottle, and instantly attacked Salazar.
TOW rockets erupted from the forest around them, crashing into the Enforcers above to lethal effect.
Salazar screamed in rage, and moved to assault Harry, but was instantly slammed to the earth by Flamel.
The primary doors to Granger Lab slammed open, spewing spells and bullets at targets of opportunity, while on the floor above them, a window exploded outward as a 'home' made magnetic acceleration cannon fired into the Enforcers.
Harry turned and ignored the situation in front of him, soaring into the air and bearing down on the nearest formation of Enforcers, fire already leaping from the Dragonhide pouch on his breast once more.
((()))
Expanded Space.
Tabane scowled grimly as she 'held' down the GAU-13's firing studs. The weapon rested on a large Tripod mount, which allowed her considerable freedom of movement with the weapon's barrels. As she shifted them, dragging her crosshairs over a team of Enforcers, who near-instantly disintegrated into a bloody mist as their insufficiently-durable bodies attempted to endure firepower that inches-thick steel could not, a modified Protean Charm linked the precisely-sized opening in the Dragonhide pouch on Harry's combat harness, directing the stream of 30mm shells as she desired. She was able to see clearly and select her targets via means of a pair of linked mirrors, one outside of the pouch, the other resting atop the massive weapon (Tabane required a stool to be able to position herself behind it properly), and displaying her field of fire.
Operating the weapon without hands was far from simple, but Tabane had found viable means of improvisation, having persuaded Hermione to link the triggering mechanism to a lump of rubber she bit down on when she wished to fire. To control the weapon's targeting, she had simply used sticking charms to attach the stumps of her wrists to the mounted weapon's double grip, and took advantage of how the weapon had been enchanted to be light enough for a single man to carry with reasonable endurance.
Hermione herself was seated behind Tabane in the expanded space; she had plenty of space, writing materials, and books to work from, but her ability (or desire for that matter) to effectively focus on anything academic had been absent since the moment Harry had first been attacked. Hermione lacked, and knew she lacked, the 'killer instinct' to be as effective manning the gun as Tabane had already proven herself to be, even without hands. It wasn't that she was incapable of fighting, it was simply that on the most fundamental level, Hermione did not want to trapped in a position where she would need to either inflict or receive injury from another sapient being, and that blunted any application of her skills towards deadly combat.
So instead, she watched the 'targeting mirror' while Tabane controlled the gun, and tried to turn her sharp mind and broad knowledge base to finding something her friends could use to their advantage.
((()))
Lake Sakakawea Magical Asylum Refuge, North Dakota, May 5th, 1997.
Dragonhide armor, magically-enchanted skin, guns, grenades, flashbangs, wands, and a great deal of magic. Harry's friends and allies were loaded for bear, and they had been training to fight superior opponents for more than a year, one who favored both teleportation and aerial mobility; moving out into the clearing that Grange Lab had been built in, they found the skies to be what would most accurately be described as a 'target rich environment.'
The Enforcers were by no means easy targets, however; even as bullets, spells, and magically-guided grenades flashed into the air, defensive magics were raised, bolts of lightning, lances of fire, and bursts of conceptualized magic lashed back down at the dozen and a half Hogwarts Exiles facing them. Both sides instinctively knew to never remain still when in the line of fire; the Exiles because of intensive training, the Enforcers because of both that and deadly experience in the field.
Neither force was capable of Apparition under the continental wards, and if it hadn't been for the barrage of rockets shattering half of the Enforcer's formations at the onset of the counter-attack, the Exiles would have been overwhelmed by sheer weight of fire. Without Apparition, dodging was effectively impossible if there was nowhere to dodge to. As it was, the terrain outside of Granger Lab rapidly became treacherous as it was pitted and ravaged by battle, and the mobility of those on the ground began to suffer.
A loss of mobility that may have made a critical difference in the course of battle, if it hadn't been for Harry Potter chewing a murderous hole through the Enforcer's ranks.
((()))
Sky above Lake Sakakawea Magical Asylum Refuge, North Dakota, May 5th, 1997.
Harry ripped through the night sky, functioning, in essence, as a high-maneuverability gunship, Tabane firing off lethal bursts from the GAU-13 attached to his Combat Harness. Magic Carpets, unlike Brooms, had allowed the Enforcers to rotate 'pilots' while they traveled, and had a reasonable enough amount of room to allow for proper sleep in the meantime. The larger magical device had allowed Salazar's force to arrive at Sakakawea well-rested, but they suffered for both lack of mobility and top speed, and offering clustered targets for Tabane to fire upon.
The GAU-13, like all aircraft-mounted Gatling cannon, had been designed to sustain an absurd rate of fire due to both the extremely short 'time on target' modern aircraft could manage at combat speeds, and the difficulties involved in targeting accurately in such a short attack window. Forty rounds of ammunition fired in a single second with modest scatter ensured that both a large number of rounds could be expected to strike an intended target, and that if the pilot's accuracy was slightly off, some of the scatter would strike anyways.
Being able to fire both at shorter ranges than any air-to-ground attack run could ever hope to allow for, and with concerns such as 'recoil' and 'barrel fatigue' completely removed, Tabane, serving as Harry's sword against the Enforcers, cut a bloody swath through the sky.
((()))
"TO THE GROUND!" Jonas shouted, magical amplification of his voice having proven necessary to allow his subordinates to hear him over the screaming wail of Potter's heavy weapon.
Jonas didn't know exactly what the Potter scion was using, but he knew a muzzle-flare when he saw one, and had seen what the handful of rounds that had clipped the forest had done to the trees. He knew Potter's type, or at least was confident enough he did to know that getting in close to the boy's allies, where he couldn't risk his weapon for fear of striking them, was the surest way to nullify the heavy gun.
Jonas suited his actions to his words, and directed the Magic Carpet he was in control of down to the forest floor, sliding in amongst the trees towards one of the positions where he saw hostile spellfire emerging from. He, and the other two on his carpet, hit the ground running, abandoning the carpet as they lashed out with fire, venom curses, and Jonas himself with a simple blast of pure concussive force. One of the hostiles, a female judging by the outline of her armor, was knocked down by Jonas blast, but those his two companions had targeted shrugged the curses off like they hadn't even been there.
Then Jonas improvised plan was completely unhinged, as the Hogwarts Exiles unshrunk brooms, and launched into the air themselves.
((()))
The battle was not going how Salazar had expected. He was quite well-aware that no plan survived contact with the enemy, but this was getting to be ridiculous. Potter had retreated rather than relentlessly attacked until he was exhausted. Flamel, rather than fighting defensively to exhaust Salazar, hadn't let up on a no-holds-barred assault since the moment he first appeared on the battle, reminding Salazar of the second reason he hated the youthful Alchemist so much.
Flamel's possession of the Philosopher's Stone being the first.
It didn't take Salazar long to come to a conclusion as to why Flamel's assault was so vicious; with two combatants powerful enough to, at least for a time, match him in one-on-one combat, he decided that they must be trying to aggressively tag-team him into exhaustion. Operating on this conclusion, Salazar fought defensively himself, seeking to hoard his own stamina, and wait for either Flamel or Potter to make a mistake he could capitalize on, or some clue as to the Granger girl's location to appear. Flamel being able to Apparate freely when Salazar could not made this considerably more difficult, but Salazar had long since become accustomed to the need to defend himself from any direction, at any time, with next to no warning, and he persevered.
It wasn't until he retreated through a squad of grounded Enforcers, which were torn to bloody paste by a fiery hail of death, Harry Potter's strafing run overhead clipping the self-proclaimed Slytherin with a hammer-blow of force as he swept by overhead, that Salazar thought to consider the lives of his men, and realized that he might be wrong about his foe's intentions.
((()))
For Captain Gray Horse, the conditions in the forest were near-ideal for his men to fight in. A Comanche by birth, the native American officer had known little to nothing of infantry combat in a forest before he joined the military, but after his first round of training in magical warfare, which took place in the Appalachian Mountains, he had found a fascination and talent for combat in such rough terrain. He held the conditions to only be 'near' ideal, because ideally the forest they fought in would also be in a set of steep hills, or on a mountainside, but he had long since learned that in real life, and especially in the military, you dealt with what you got, not what you wanted.
In the low light and close-quarters of the forest at night, his men's superior experience with fighting as a group, as well as their liberal use of firearms and grenades, lent them a stark advantage, one great enough to almost overcome the disparity of numbers.
Almost.
((()))
All across the improvised battlefield, save for two locations (around Flamel and Salazar, and wherever Potter was), the fighting devolved to what was in many ways the worst, and bloodiest kind: close combat. Enforcers closed with their enemies, some in the air, some on the ground, in order to nullify Harry's heavy weapon. American Soldiers closed with Enforcers to prevent their numerically-superior enemies from being able to pin them in place and then wipe them out with long-ranged spellfire.
Blood was spilled on both sides, some in the air, most of it on the ground, and a handful was sent from the ground into the air, mostly by American Grenades.
Not all of the Hogwarts Exiles had made it off of the ground.
((()))
Standing within a powerful ward based on the same concepts as a notice-me-not charm, Paul Wright and Minerva McGonagall watched from afar as the firefight played out in the small forest around Granger Lab. Few details could be made, the distance rendering things indistinct, but every time that the newest weapon in Harry Potter's arsenal opened fire, the bright muzzle flare and distant wailing scream of the weapon were clear.
"For all that I've heard of how powerful some of these Wizards are, how deadly they can be in combat" Wright said quietly, "This is the closest I've ever been to a pitched magical battle."
"Believe you me," McGonagall said, some tension in her voice, "We are best off out here. While I am loathe to allow my students to put themselves at risk, whereas I have spent most of my time here continuing to run a school, they have spent the vast majority of their time preparing for battle. I do not know the skill of your American soldiers, but I know my students are tragically deadly."
She grimaced, and Paul Wright, for the first time since he had met the woman, saw tears leaking from her eyes.
"They've had to be," McGonagall said softly.
((()))
Molly Weasley was not a woman prone to protracted introspection, but when she had realized that her daughter and two of her sons were not amongst those evacuated from the Sakakawea Refuge, she had found herself in a place she had never wanted to be in again.
Her family was in mortal danger, and there was nothing she could do about it.
Everything that she had done up to that point, that had led to that point, was called in to question, and her usual justifications for how she wielded her authority over her children began to feel hollow; all that she had done had been to avoid arriving at this kind of situation again. How had her actions to prevent her children from coming to harm, instead ended up with them in harms way?
Molly didn't know, and no matter how she thought, fretted, or worried over the situation, she couldn't figure it out, so she decided to go in search of someone who might be able to tell her. Amongst all of her sons, only Ron had evacuated the camp, and when she spoke with him, his response was to ask why on earth she thought he would know what any girl was thinking, especially his sister. When she asked him about the Twins, he said that it was most likely they wanted to pull one over on Slytherin himself, an answer she found to be altogether unhelpful.
None of her daughter's friends from Hogwarts had left Sakakawea, most likely all of them for the same reasons her daughter had (that horribly misguided Potter boy), until eventually she ended up looking for that 'Tom' boy, the American that she had been spending time with lately.
But she couldn't find him either.
((()))
By the time Salazar managed to force Flamel's continual assault back, and take stock of the battlefield, he knew that if he didn't change the flow of the fight drastically and promptly, he would lose. With both Flamel and Potter present, until he exhausted one or the other, he had no real means by which to force both of them away from his subordinates, which meant that if he wanted to keep himself from losing the battle due to number disparity, he would have to take other measures.
Deploying one of his (extremely expensive, time-intensive, and rare) Simulacrums in a flash of light to distract Flamel for a few precious seconds, Salazar set out to hunt other targets.
((()))
Harry was, by dint of long training and deliberate intent, a young man intensely aware of his surroundings as often (and more often than) as was reasonably possible. With Tabane handling offensive measures for him, for the most part, this had allowed him to focus his attention almost entirely upon defense, and one of the first rules of defense, was that it was almost impossible to defend against what you weren't aware of. As a consequence of this defensive focus, Harry was aware that Salazar had disengaged from Flamel within seconds of the man doing so; it took another handful of seconds to realize just what the man was doing.
In those few seconds, seven American soldiers and Blaise Zabini died.
One point three seconds after Harry had realized what Salazar was doing, he slammed into the earth directly in front of Salazar, Gatling cannon blazing. Salazar, sensing the younger Wizard's approach, had attempted to prepare for a renewed assault from the heavy weapon, but the angled shield he raised only deflected a few dozen rounds, and less than a second of sustained fire tore down the shield. 30mm rounds crashed into Salazar's primary shield like a rhino at full charge striking a sapling, and the ancient Wizard was blasted back through the forest.
Harry only spared a single glance towards what Salazar had been doing, where he found Ginny Weasley had lost her right arm and leg shielding a fire team of Americans, Salazar's intensely powerful magic cutting even through the Dragonhide armor she wore, before rocketing after Salazar, flying low to the ground, his 'firing port' angled forward towards where Salazar had fallen.
((()))
It took Flamel just under a minute to dispose of Salazar's Simulacrum; he had fought the magical constructs before, and though Salazar always included new tricks pre-programmed into each one, they were ultimately no more than magical automatons, and utterly incapable of keeping up with a Wizard of Flamel's caliber. Once Salazar's proxy had been destroyed, Flamel took precisely eight point three seconds to size up the battlefield, primarily making use of his magical senses, before determining that the most likely path to saving as many lives as possible, lay in allowing Harry to continue dueling Salazar, while he took up the role Harry had rotated out of.
Flamel swept off into the forest, where the Enforcers fought tooth and nail with the Hogwarts Exiles and the Americans.
((()))
Improvised tactics had swiftly formed on both sides, the Enforcers grouping mages with particularly effective magical techniques together, while the Hogwarts Exiles broke up, two or three linking up with each American fire team, the combination of Lily's fractal Runes and Dragonhide armor allowing them to 'tank' hostile fire for the team. Neither arrangements were perfect, but then few tactics or operations in war were conducted perfectly, and they only needed to be good enough to win with.
In the end, while both sides took casualties, three factors became decisive in the battle's outcome. First, the Enforcers, while initially numerically superior, the initial ambush outside of Granger Lab had both disrupted their formations, and blunted their numerical advantages; George Granger continuing to take potshots at any airborne Enforcers with his lightning cannon, while Marie shielded for him, lent them no further help. Second, the Enforcers were forced to fight a 'Ringer' for essentially the entire battle, either Harry Potter, or the Philosopher, the Clock Tower's greatest enemy himself, and they very quickly discovered that they had neither the firepower to bring the Ringers down, nor the skill to withstand their assaults for more than a handful of seconds, if that.
The final deciding factor, was that the Sakakawea Refuge's defenders were just that, defenders. They were protecting their homes, literally for the Hogwarts Exiles, or in a greater, metaphorical sense for the American soldiers. For the Enforcers, the assault was essentially nothing more than a power grab, backed and motivated by nothing more than The Director's personal ambition and power, and when it became clear that Salazar's power wasn't enough to decisively turn the course of the battle, the Enforcers took the only rational course of action available to them.
They fled.
((()))
Harry had not been particularly close to Blaise Zabini, nor had he been under any particular delusion that he was. He had, however, considered the member of Slytherin's house to be a friend, and more, Harry had felt responsible for the other young man. Against an opponent of Salazar's skill, power, experience, and thoroughly demonstrated ruthlessness, Harry only knew of one effective tactic to prevent the man from cutting down any more of his friends.
All-out, unrelenting attack.
When Harry crashed into Salazar for the second time after they had re-engaged, he made certain to maintain a line of fire for Tabane while he closed, but this time, he did not stop once he entered effective range, but streaked directly in towards the ancient Wizard. Salazar attempted to turn aside the GAU-13's fire via a specialized shield, angled to deflect, rather than absorb, the torrent of 30 mm shells, this time pouring far more power into the shield. It worked much better the second time around, right until Harry smashed through the barrier himself, slamming the point of his broomstick directly into the man's gut.
Or the barrier over his gut, anyways; Salazar's magical shield remained every bit as unbroken before, even if the kinetic transfer from Harry's strike folded the man over. Harry reached forward to lay his hand directly on Salazar's head, intending to cast an incinerating spell while in direct contact with the man's skin, but Tabane beat him to the punch, and another volley of fire kicked the man off of the broomstick with bone-crushing force.
Unfortunately for Harry, Tabane had forgotten that the GAU-13 fired High Explosive shells, and when rounds began detonating against Salazar's shield, less than a foot away from Harry's face, Salazar wasn't the only one to catch a face full of shrapnel; Harry's body was slashed with shrapnel, but more importantly, so was his broom. Harry's own barrier, instinctive magic almost a decade old infused into his very flesh, absorbed the kinetic energy behind the shrapnel fragments with no issue; the enchanted wood of Harry's broom, while tougher than even the sturdiest of natural brooms, was nowhere near strong enough to survive the anti-armor weapon's blasts, and was torn to shreds beneath the hail of fire.
Salazar and Harry both went tumbling across the forest floor, skipping off the surface of a blood-stained clearing, before first Salazar, then Harry, slammed into the concrete walls of Granger Lab. Both were slightly dazed, though their magic had protected them from any seriously debilitating effects of their ugly crash, and both had already begun to lash out at the other before they'd even regained their feet.
Salazar, having literally spent more time on battlefields than most men lived, instinctively closed with Harry, a vicious chain of spells issuing from both his wands as he lunged towards the boy. Harry drew a short sword in his left hand as he brought up his primary wand with his right, deflecting some of Salazar's spells, and soaking the rest onto his barrier, before the two engaged in a brutal melee. Salazar didn't bother drawing swords, a pair simply appearing in his hands to replace his wands, as the man moved into a smooth offensive befitting a blademaster, which the man was.
Harry countered the assault via the simple action of ignoring it, every form of swordplay in Europe was oriented around both protecting oneself from an opponent's blows, and penetrating the other's defenses. Harry didn't bother with defense, simply stabbing directly between his opponent's blades to lay a blow against Salazar's barrier in return for the pair slammed in against his own. Salazar retaliated by infusing some of his power into the blade in his right hand, already a magical artifact, and sundering Harry's shortsword an inch and a half above the hilt.
Immediately concluding that a swordfight against Salazar was a losing fight, Harry infused a kinetic-impact spell into his fist, and slammed it directly into Salazar. Salazar blocked the blow with his left blade, but that accomplished little besides slamming the blade into his barrier, before Harry's fist followed it in, and blasted him ten yards backwards off his feet.
At that point, their melee had happened to result in Salazar's back facing directly towards the primary entrance to the Granger Labs, and the man smashed directly through them, Harry leaping in after him.
((()))
Flamel was not a vindictive man by nature, and he knew what the denizens of the Clock Tower often did to those they decided were more convenient dead, or as involuntary test subjects. He also knew that the Enforcers in particular engaged in little research, and were one of only a half-dozen organizations in Europe capable of effectively fighting Vampires and other magical entities that preyed upon humans, and didn't know personally which Enforcers had committed what crimes. As such, he allowed, and more or less ordered Captain Gray Horse to allow, the Enforcers to retreat, rather than try to cut down the survivors as they fled.
Flamel did make an exception for their commanding officer though, putting a hole through the man's head personally. The Philosopher didn't know the man's personal record, but he did know that there was essentially no way the man had risen as high as he had without committing any number of grievous crimes, and leading an assault on a sovereign nation with the intent to kidnap and dissect a teenager, was enough grounds for execution in his mind anyways.
When the battlefield had finally gone silent, and the dead and wounded were quickly tallied, the Americans had twenty-one men still combat-capable, six wounded, and twenty-three dead; the Hogwarts Exiles who had taken part in the fight had suffered only one fatality, Blaise Zabini, but Ginevra Weasley had been partially dismembered, Neville Longbottom had two broken legs, Padma Patil's face had literally been burned off, and Draco Malfoy's hair and eyebrows had disappeared at some point.
The dozen and a half young Dragonhide-clad warriors had taken literally dozens of spells each that should have been lethal, but between the incredibly expensive armor provided by Harry Potter, and the advanced enchantment scheme provided by Lily, they had gotten off very lightly as far as fatalities and injuries went. Flamel wasn't certain how many Enforcers had survived to flee, but he had seen at least two dozen Magic Carpets flying away into the night, and knew that they had arrived three to a carpet, so estimated their remaining numbers at anywhere from fifty to a hundred.
So it was that with a handful of men treating the wounded and keeping watch in case the Enforcers had a change of heart, nearly three dozen surviving combatants moved rapidly on Granger Lab, where the fight between Salazar and Harry continued.
((()))
The first floor of Granger Lab had been more or less trashed within two and a half minutes of fighting, heavy spellfire and repeated bursts from the GAU pulverizing even concrete walls to rubble. Salazar initially took advantage of the close quarters to constantly force Harry into melee combat, where his superior swordsmanship theoretically gave him an advantage, but it didn't work anywhere near as well as he'd intended it to. Between the steady destruction of the building's interior rendering the quarters less and less close, the footing becoming progressively more and more treacherous, degrading Salazar's swordplay, Tabane becoming more and more willing to open fire even when Salazar was mere inches from Harry as well as fire early just in case the Wizard swept across her field of fire, and Harry's continuing lack of regard for any defensive measures on his part, instead taking blow after blow simply for the chance to land another spell or magically-infused fist on his elder opponent, Salazar's 'plan' had eventually reached the point where it wasn't working at all.
So he retreated to the second floor, and attempted to play the same maneuver again; he had always known that with the properties he had observed from Harry's passive defensive barrier, he would simply have to wear the boy into magical exhaustion, and while the boy's assault was fatiguing Salazar physically, it was doing much the same to Harry magically. He had sensed his followers retreating, and while a slow anger at their abandonment of him simmered in his gut, he simply changed his plan from clearing the field and taking his prize at his leisure, to wearing Harry to exhaustion, then either killing him on the spot, or taking the boy with him when he fled, whichever seemed a more viable option at the time.
He'd prefer to take the boy alive for study and to extract information from his memories, but he'd settle for only having to face Flamel again the next time he went after the Stone; two opponents capable of fighting on his level was simply one too many for him to be able to effectively handle. By the time Flamel rejoined the fight, the second floor of Granger Lab was mostly trashed, along with George Granger's lightning canon (which Marie had forced him to abandon when she dragged him away from the fight), and Salazar was forced to resort to measures he had hoped to save to cover his retreat.
On the plus side, at least from Salazar's perspective as he deployed the dozen remaining Simulacrum he had prepared, he could easily sense the Potter boy's magical stamina steadily fading, and he knew that the boy was already halfway-spent.
Harry reacted to a dozen magical copies of Salazar forming by twisting his torso through a ninety-degree arc, from facing left of the leader of the Magus Order, to facing to his right, while keeping his eyes locked on the original. Tabane was more than happy to sweep fire across the counterfeit 'humans,' and three of the Simulacrum were cut down as they failed to shield adequately against heavy weapon's fire. The Simulacrum counter-attacked, Flamel deployed two Simulacra of his own, and Harry ignored them all to lunge at the original Salazar, determined not to let the man escape his sight and begin cutting down less-capable combatants again.
Salazar was more than happy to accept Harry's charge, bracing against the ground and stopping Harry dead with the point of his sword, which again failed to pierce Harry's barrier, but did an excellent job keeping the boy's attention firmly fixed on him as he directed half his clones to rush Flamel, while the rest leapt out of windows and holes into the wall to keep the combatants who had remained outside busy. With Flamel outnumbered four to three, and five Simulacra providing heavy distraction to those outside, Salazar retreated up onto the Lab's third and highest floor, seeking the closest thing to privacy that could be found on such a battlefield.
((()))
Tom was not a man (however much his father might insist he was still a boy) to sit idly by while others fought to protect his life, putting their own at risk. His 'duels' with Ginny, however, had taught him a visceral lesson about how outclassed he was in magical combat, and he had been able to keep himself from foolishly rushing off into a battlefield where he'd only function as a liability to those he wanted to help.
So instead, he had secreted himself at the old Quarry with as much medical equipment and supplied, both magical and non, as he could carry and listened to the battle from afar, waiting for it to die down before he moved. As an American citizen of-age, he had both had and taken the opportunity to acquire an Apparition license, and was thus able to Apparate directly to the edge of the forest around Granger Lab once the battle died down. From there, he'd simply moved towards the only remaining source of light in the forest, ignoring the voice inside of him that whispered that the bad guys might have won, and he was walking to his death.
The force broke apart before he reached it, the larger portion of it moving towards the only (muffled) remaining sounds of battle. The part of the force that didn't move was the nearer part, even if it was smaller, so he moved towards them first, and when he did, he was glad he had, because it was apparently the wounded had been left for care. A terse exchange of words and a few spells had been necessary to prove that he was who he looked like, and not an infiltrator coming to wreak havoc after the mainstay of the battle was done, but once that was done, they were more than happy to see him, and more importantly, his supplies.
Tom was less thrilled when he found Ginny, who was laid out on the ground, face screwed up in pain, one shoulder and one thigh extending into bloody tourniquets, rather than the graceful limbs that the young American was used to seeing on her.
"Oh god," He breathed, dropping to his knees beside her, horror and worry writ large on his face, "What happened to you?"
Ginny, her attention drawn from her own struggle with her pain, looked up and saw the bare emotion on Tom's face, and something in her heart shifted decisively.
"Come here you idiot," She growled, reaching up to grab his collar with her remaining hand, and dragging him down into the most passionate kiss Tom had ever experienced in his life.
((()))
"WHY WON'T YOU DIE?" Harry screamed at Salazar, panting heavily as he glared at the elder Wizard he was physically grappling with.
Harry was tired, very tired, but he had quite a bit of fight left in him, but that wasn't what had frustrated him enough to finally lash out verbally at his opponent.
Tabane, after expending tens of thousands of rounds throughout the course of the battle, had run out of ammo.
"You're impressive for your age," Salazar said condescendingly, a faint victorious smirk on his lips, "But mages far more powerful and skilled than you have tried to kill me over the years and none have succeeded."
Harry snarled, and tried to wrestle his grip on Salazar's wrists around to bring the man's sword up against his own throat, but the older Wizard was larger, and more skilled, even if he lacked Harry's penchant for augmenting his strength with magic.
"I have worked more," Salazar continued calmly as they continued to wrestle, thrashing through the shattered halls of the third floor, "Studied more," He kneed Harry in the gut, but the Potter Scion just ignored the blow, "Fought more," Salazar arched his spine, trying to hurl Harry off of him, but the young Wizard refused to release his grip, instead dragging Salazar through the doorway he'd been shoved into with him, "And sacrificed more for magic than you possibly could have in your short life."
Harry growled, and bit down on Salazar's knucles, drawing blood as he found a way to work around the man's magical defenses for the first time in either of their fights.
"Filthy savage!" Salazar snarled, and unleashed a wave of magic that tore the Potter scion away from him, Harry taking a chunk of flesh from Salazar's hand with him as he went, and smashing the young man into one of the machines in the lab, shattering the glass enclosure that formed part of it.
"Biting?" Salazar spat out in disbelief, "That is what you resort to? At least now I know that you're desperate!"
"The only rule in a fight to the death," Harry replied as he yanked himself out of the machine's remains, glaring at his foe, "Is that if it works, then use it."
"Oh, I quite agree," Salazar said with a sneer as he healed the torn flesh on his fingers, "It is simply that some of us have no need to resort to such brutish tactics."
Harry finished extracting himself from the machine, but stared at the shattered pieces of it on the floor for a long moment, before planting his bare hands, his Dragonhide gauntlets having been lost somewhere during the course of the fight through the lab, against the floor and pushing himself to his feet before facing the Director of the Magus Order again.
"You say that you've sacrificed," Harry said harshly his gaze rising to meet his opponent's unflinchingly, "Tell me, what have you sacrificed for?"
Salazar, sensing impending victory in both the cessation of fire from Harry's heavy weapon, and the younger man's decision to start talking rather than just fight, was more than happy to both answer Harry's question, and close the distance to begin an offense of his own.
"For power, boy," He said, noting the way that Harry twitched irritably at the mode of address, "It's all that matters in this world, power over physical matter, power over energy, power over other beings, and ultimately, power over life itself."
"The only need for power as great as what either of us have already achieved," Harry said warily as he dropped his center of gravity, tensing as he prepared to reengage his opponent, "Is for fighting to stop scum like you."
Salazar laughed at that, laughed so hard that he had to stop walking or lose his balance, scarcely managing to keep eye contact with Harry as his chest heaved with spasms of mirth.
"Y-you," He said, raising his flesh-and-blood hand to point at Harry's face, as his silvery replacement hand conjured another Rapier, "You actually believe that, don't you?"
Harry, part of him screaming to attack while his foe was at less than full capacity, part of him screaming to wait, that it was a trap of some form, simply nodded slowly.
"You know nothing of power," Salazar abruptly snarled, his laughter dying harshly as he glared at Harry, "Nothing. You think that the power that we have is formidable?"
Harry said nothing in response, slowly side-stepping out of the clutter of broken machine parts to improve his footing.
"You have no idea," Salazar said, snorting derisively as he turned slowly to keep tracking Harry, "Of what those who came before us accomplished with magic. Have you ever wondered how after so many thousands of years, it is possible that magic is a secret now, how it is possible that even with the Americans and Russians filling the skies over Earth with their spy satellites, their spy planes, their intelligence agents running around throughout Europe in particular, and the world at large, how in spite of all of this, magic is still considered a myth by more than ninety percent of the world's inhabitants?"
Harry said nothing, slowly beginning to circle Salazar, raising clenched fists towards the man.
"Of course not," Salazar said dismissively, "It never occurred to you to wonder, did it? Or to wonder why you and all your other holier-than-thou moralistic friends never found objection to Obliviators and the like regularly breaking into the minds of 'innocent' people, and wiping away memories they didn't think such people should have?"
Harry still said nothing, but an unpleasant feeling began to form in his gut, as the man's words began striking a disturbing chord with him.
"It's a magic beyond anything you could even comprehend," Salazar continued, tilting his head back to stare down his nose at Harry, "I have seen one of the keystones that serves as a focal point to this effect, and no matter how hard I try, I can no longer even remember where it was. The focal point, for it was not truly crafted of stone, but some substance I have never seen the like of before, was ten thousand years old, and in a week of study, I could scarcely discern that it was but one of many, and its purpose was to make people believe that magic had never existed. I was called away by other affairs before I could study further, but some day I will find that stone again, and when I unlock its secrets, who knows what other, greater creations I will be able to find that the ancients have left behind?"
Harry continued to say nothing, simply waiting for his foe to move, buying time for Flamel and the others to defeat Salazar's Simulacra and come to aid him.
"Some day, I will find out," Salazar said with a shrug, "But I have wasted enough time regaling a dead man about the wonders of magic that he cannot-"
And Salazar struck, not wishing to give his opponent the benefit of a verbal cue that he was about to strike. It made no difference, Harry was at the bleeding edge of his combat focus, and young enough relative to Salazar that he had faster reflexes, and he seized Salazar's blade in his left hand, while bringing his right up towards the man's face. Salazar took a page out of Harry's own book, and rather than attempt to deflect the younger Wizard's fist, he laid his wand against Harry's temple and cast Fiendfyre.
A roaring inferno erupted against Harry's face, but he ignored it; he didn't feel the searing heat as more than uncomfortably warm through his barrier's protection, though he did feel the instinctive magic rapidly begin to drain his already-depleted magical reserves as it shielded him against the intense heat. Harry focused on his own blow, or rather lack thereof, as he twisted his striking hand around, slowing his blow and opening it to come into gentle contact, palm-first, with the underside of the man's chin and the front of his neck.
"YOU KNOW NOTHING OF SACRIFICE!" Harry screamed over the roaring flames that pressed against his brow, and then sent a surge of magical strength through his right arm, thrusting his palm, and the shard of Blue Tiberium he had lifted from the remains of the machine he had smashed into in it, into Salazar's flesh.
Salazar's defensive barrier, a multi-tiered thing that stopped most attacks before they even reached the surface of the skin, and lay within his flesh as well, shielding critical organs and systems from damage, was subverted. For the second time in a single day, something that had not happened for one hundred and fifty-seven years, Salazar's barrier was pierced, but the consequences this time were permanent. Harry poured his magic into the magic-devouring Crystal, nothing more than raw intent and desire guiding it, and telling it to grow. The intent could not be fully realized as the Tiberium consumed the magic to foster its own growth and transmute the elements it came into contact with into more of itself, but what could take effect only reinforced the voracious crystal's natural tendencies.
The Tiberium latched onto both the magic and the Iron, the Calcium, the Phosophorus, the Potassium, and dozens of different trace elements within Salazar's body, infesting his flesh and consuming what was to create more of itself. Salazar was not alone in feeling the Tiberium's bite, however, as the hungry crystal eroded the magic in Harry's barrier, and began insinuating itself into the flesh of his palm. Feeling the sting of physical pain that didn't originate from the chronic effects of the Cruciatus curse for the first time in years, Harry instinctively flinched away from his contact with both the Tiberium, and Salazar, who dropped to the floor, gagging as the Tiberium ate into his throat.
"What have you done to me?" Salazar half-demanded, half-gurgled as he thrashed on the rapidly-heating floor.
"I have made my own sacrifice," Harry snarled down at the wounded master Wizard, "A sacrifice with meaning. I lay my life on the line, and even lay it down, to protect those I Love!"
Harry took a step back from Salazar, glancing around the lab as it burned, Salazar having lost control of his Fiendfyre, before looking down at his right hand, and the blue crystal imbedded in his palm. He seized it with the fingers of his left hand, and tried to yank it out, but only part of it tore loose, and Harry could feel the crystal trying to erode the barrier protecting his other hand, so he lay off further attempts to remove it for later.
"Accio Research notes," He said after another lock around the lab, gesturing aimlessly around him, too tired to bother performing the spell silently or motionlessly.
A dozen binders, one of them already on fire, and several computer towards came sailing his way, and he directed them into one of his expanded equipment pouches, before turning back towards Salazar, who was having a seizure as the Tiberium began to insinuate itself in his spinal cord.
"There's more to a man than magic, or any form of power he wields," Harry said emphatically, looking down on the man in disgust, "You've spent your whole life in pursuit of power, now you're dying because of your magical power. Mum says I should Love my enemies, not hate them, but she's not some weak-hearted wuss who thinks that everybody can be convinced to stop being evil if they just have a good talking-to."
Harry paused for a moment, watching Salazar's face twisting into a rictus of agony as the lab burned around them. The man tried to draw another wand, but Harry kicked it out of his hand, breaking several of Salazar's fingers as he did so.
"I'd suggest you prepare yourself to meet your Maker," Harry said grimly, taking a deep breath before speaking again, "Because there's only one mercy I can think of to give you that won't make you a danger to the whole damn world all over again."
Harry waited for a few more seconds, staring down at the thrashing man below him, before silently firing an overpowered piercing spell into the man's skull, splattering his brains out onto the laboratory floor, and killing him instantly. He stood there, staring at the dead man's corpse, ignoring the Fiendfyre's flames, for a long, long minute as he thought over what had brought him to the place where he stood, over the corpse of another man he had killed.
"I don't like it," He finally said to the empty lab, "But I'd do it again, to stop another one like you."
Then he turned, and walked out of the lab, leaving it, and the dead body within, to burn.
((()))
End Chapter 13.
((()))
AN: Special bonus for all of you; finally made it back to posting on Saturdays instead of Sundays; we'll see how long this keeps up...
Writing, especially for someone like me who's trying to make a living off of it, can be an arduous process, but sometimes, like when I wrote the last part of this chapter, you just get into the zone, and blow right on through it all, like I did with the second half of this chapter. Feels good, to finally have gotten through to the end of this tale, though there'll be quite a bit of wrap-up in the next chapter/epilogue.
Also, something my Beta noted, so I'll mention explicitly here: Harry was smashed into the isolation chamber for the Tiberium George and the others were studying; you'll note that I explicitly had his bare hands amongst the wreckage as he pushed himself to his feet afterwards. I wasn't explicit about him picking it up, or hiding it in his clenched fists, because I, as the author, am tricksy like that.
Finally, as to the ideology/Christian ethos thing in the last chapter:
Ideology has consequences. I will not apologize for, minimize, or act like my faith, or the faith of others, is irrelevant, and those of you of agnostic or atheist worldviews who got offended or disappointed that I decided to 'include' my worldview in this story, I have some news for you:
It's been in this story all along.
What defines a person's morality? What they think is right and wrong? Where do they get their ideas of human worth, of the purpose of human life? From their religious beliefs. A lot of atheists will try act like they are wholly rational people, and their belief that God does not exist is based on science (it isn't), but something that most of them refuse to recognize, is that they are religious as well. Specifically, their religious belief is that there is no God, and for almost all of them, there is nothing beyond the natural world. This informs their beliefs regarding human worth and value, morality, and the purpose as life, just as much as my belief in God does.
You will find stories all over the fanfiction (and published 'professional' fiction) world that both explicitly, and non-explicitly, promulgate their system of belief. One of the most common ideological axes that people grind, is the idea that there is 'nothing wrong' with homosexuality, that it's really 'no different' from heterosexuality, a belief largely informed by agnostic or atheistic worldviews. I'm a Christian, I believe that homosexuality is immoral; before anyone accuses me of being a bigot or a 'hater,' I'll inform the lot of you that I have had two homosexual friends over the years, both of them knew that I think homosexuality is wrong, and knew I think such because I'm a Christain, but I wasn't a jerk to them about it, and thus we could still be friends. Only one of them did the issue come up more than once or twice with, and that's because he and I both enjoyed debating our worldviews, and we did so in a friendly and respectful manner.
The point I am trying to make, is that I am far from the only one out here trying to show what I believe. And let me tell you, I didn't get any negative reviews (if I got one or two they were so mild I've forgotten them) about Lily's talk with the Strike Team about how to handle the emotional fallout of killing. As she said, I will say again, what she told them came directly from a Christian worldview. She didn't lay the Christian foundation to that on them then, because she, like I do in real life, didn't want to hijack them into her worldview when they weren't in a sound state of mind, she wanted to help them reach a sound state of mind, then logically and passionately present something she thinks they will be better for believing in.
Much like I am trying to do with this story. I know there are a lot of people out there who claim Christ's name, but are, in essence, haters. They wield their 'righteousness' like a social club, to prove how much 'better' they are than everyone else. That is not Christianity. Christianity explicitly teaches humility, and in my experience, it's the only religion in the world that teaches servant leadership. I believe Confucius had some things to say about the subject as well, but despite what some people have tried to make out of him and his teachings, he was never trying to start a religion or the like.
I believe in a Gospel of Love, a message of good news for all of the people of the world, and a creed that I earnestly believe will bring people to a truer understanding of the world, a more fulfilling and less painful life, and ultimately the absolutely most amazing life they could ever have. If you don't like that, if you want to stereotype me, or associate me in your mind with the haters out there who claim Christ's name, but are in fact nothing like him, that's your decision, and this story is quite literally free, and not forced upon you.
In the end, I know that what I have to say will repulse some people, but that's to be expected. When you deal with thousands and millions of people, anything of deep meaning worth saying will repulse some people, because until the end of the world comes, there will always be people out there who hate the Truth.