"In all great works of fiction, regardless of the grim reality they present, there is an affirmation of life against the transience of that life, an essential defiance. This affirmation lies in the way the author takes control of reality by retelling it in his own way, thus creating a new world. Every great work of art, I would declare pompously, is a celebration, an act of insubordination against the betrayals, the horrors and infidelities of life. The perfection and beauty of form rebels against the ugliness and shabbiness of the subject matter." - Azar Nafisi, Reading Lolita in Tehran
{~~~~}
Harry got back from another detention, much later than he would have liked. Maybe this would teach him to run his mouth, but frankly, the lines weren't bad when he couldn't really feel it. Finally, he'd found a use for torture scars: detention didn't suck so much.
Hermione and Ron had found out about it, but it was hard for either of them to take it seriously when Harry spent the next ten minutes regaling them with a description of just how furious Umbridge was when she realized that Harry couldn't really feel it. Besides, he was almost done with the detentions, and there wasn't any real point in throwing a fuss when it couldn't hurt him besides some scratching. It would heal up in a few days and that would be that.
He went back to the Room of Requirement, checking every once in a while to make sure no one was following him. He had been stunned to learn that all of the ghosts were apparently keeping eyes out for the kids, and was even more shocked to learn it was because the Bloody Baron was scaring them all into obedience. No one had been able to explain that to him just yet, but he hoped the ghosts stayed on their side. It made it much easier to get back to the Room of Requirement without worrying about being discovered.
To make it even easier, Dean and Seamus now knew some of what was going on. They'd even gone to the Room to meet Jack, and, like everyone else who met the boy, had instantly fallen in love with him. There was no way they were going to turn them in, even if they hadn't hated Umbridge as much as everyone else did. Not with Jack's little innocent eyes seared into their brains.
He opened the door quietly and slipped in. For once, the first sound he heard was not the frustrated grumblings coming from the cluster around the Monopoly board. Instead, it was almost dead silent but for a low murmur on the other end of the room. He stared at the large group in bewilderment. He hadn't seen everyone gathered in the Room since the night of the Welcoming Feast, since everyone came and went according to different schedules.
Roger shifted, allowing Harry to see just what was the source of everyone's attention. He grinned and set off in that direction, joining the back to listen to Elle continuing her talk about one of the werewolf communities near Dover. She was in the middle of a particularly entertaining story when Harry felt a tap on his shoulder, and he looked up to see Morgan standing over him. He gestured, and Harry got to his feet and followed him to the other end of the room. As they walked, Elle's voice got quieter until it went completely silent, and Harry knew the Room was responding to a wish for privacy. They grabbed two chairs in the very corner, and Harry could swear the room added a slight curve to the wall just so they were unseen from everyone else.
"How did you guys break in?" he asked eagerly. "Snape kept saying it was impossible. Did my dad get in?"
"Your dad's and Gideon's breaking in to Hogwarts apparently irritated the Ministry so much that they set the wards to alert someone if they walked in. Had he tried to come with us, we're sure he would have met some very annoyed aurors on the way out, and we can't give the Ministry that satisfaction. Garcia helped Elle and I find a weak spot at the top of one of the towers, and we slipped in that way."
Harry blinked in surprise. "Wait, how'd you manage that?"
"With a lot of difficulty and help from Snape, which is why we're not going to be able to safely get Jack out of here with us when we leave," Morgan said. "Think you can manage him for a while longer?"
"Quite the contrary. I'm not sure what we'll do when he leaves," Harry said with a laugh, and Morgan smiled but it didn't quite reach his eyes. "Not that I'm not glad to see you, but… Why are you here? You never had to break in before."
Morgan nodded slowly, and a part of Harry's mind began screaming warning signals. "Yes," Morgan replied. "Harry, can you tell me exactly what happened after Perotta took you and Jack?"
"Sure," Harry said, frowning. "Is something wrong?" He'd already told Hotch and Snape. Surely they knew by now.
"Maybe," Morgan said ambiguously and as neutrally as he could, but this close, Harry could see he was far too tense. Was someone in danger? But no, if they were, Morgan would have said so from the start, and he wouldn't have waited so long to start this conversation.
"The portkey dropped us in a room. I think Perotta had the place set up as a safe house. We were there for a few hours, then he spotted the Woodsmarked Killer and he told us to stay put and he left. I grabbed Jack, and we came here to Hogwarts until the end of summer. I'd had the invisibility cloak with me when we left the house."
There was a pause. "Did you ever talk with Perotta?"
"A little bit," he said, shrugging and shifting slightly as he did so. "Why?"
"Just wanted to know what about."
"I asked him about why he was helping, is all. He told me he wanted to pay my father back for empathizing with him when no one else had."
"How long were you with him?"
"Maybe six or seven hours. Why?"
"In that whole time, is that all you talked about?"
Morgan's voice was calm, a bit curious, but his word choice was way too specific. Harry paused, running through what had happened. There hadn't really been anything noteworthy, right?
Phantom fingers ran across his stomach again and he winced away from the memory. Morgan's eyes sharpened slightly, and he sighed internally as he knew the profiler had caught the gesture. "Mostly, yeah," he said, hoping that if he ignored it Morgan would ignore it too.
"But? You talked about something else, right?"
"Why does it matter?" Harry asked abruptly.
"Harry," Morgan said, leaning forward. "Is there something you don't want me to know? About what happened with Perotta?"
He knew.
But he couldn't know, right? Harry hadn't said anything, and the only ones who had been there were him and Perotta…
And Jack.
Before he could think of the implications of the action, he found himself staring in the direction of the sectioned-off bedroom area, where Jack was fast asleep in his bed. Sure, Jack must have heard some things, but he couldn't have understood what was going on. He was too young, and there was no way he would have even thought to remember something like that.
"What did he say?" Harry whispered.
Morgan reached into his pocket and took out a folded piece of parchment, then handed it to Harry without a word. The teenager quickly read through it, and when he reached the second to last paragraph he closed his eyes and groaned softly. He let the letter fall out of his fingertips to the low table at his side.
Jack had understood a lot more than he had hoped.
He dropped his head into his hands, facing the floor because it was a lot easier than facing Morgan. "It wasn't- It wasn't like that," he said weakly.
"Harry," Morgan said softly.
"No, I'm serious. It just…it sounds bad, the way he wrote it." This would probably have been mildly convincing if he could bring himself to look at Morgan as he said it. Morgan took in a breath like he was about to speak. "No, I- Really, he didn't…" He muffled a groan against his palms. "He just wanted to scare me. He didn't do anything."
"But did he touch you?"
"No-" he began, but a hand resting, all too close to an unwanted place, came to mind and his throat closed off. He already knows, a part of him pointed out. "He put his hands on me," he finally admitted. "He scared me at the beginning with it and then would do it whenever he needed to show he was in control." He looked up, eyes stinging. "Did Jack say anything else? What did he hear? Did he see anything?"
"Elle talked to him earlier," Morgan said. "The only thing he said was what he put in the letter. He kept saying he knew you didn't like it."
"I was afraid of what he'd do to Jack if I didn't let him do it to me," Harry said. "I thought I'd convinced him that it would be pointless to touch Jack because he wouldn't know what was going on."
"You thought?"
Harry shook his head. "He didn't care about that at all. I thought he had taken us just out of revenge, that there wasn't really anyone after us. He told me he was only there because we were in danger, and he warned me not to try to interpret his intentions again."
"Or?" Morgan asked softly.
Harry looked back down. "He told me where he'd put his hands."
Morgan reached out slowly and took one of his hands, starting to rub it comfortingly. Harry winced immediately, knowing he'd grabbed the wrong one, and Morgan started in surprise when he felt the cut tissue. "Harry, what-" He kept his eyes locked on the ground, knowing what had made Morgan stop. "Harry."
"Detention with Umbridge," he said, resigned to the questioning. There was no way out of it now.
"Does anyone know?"
"Well, I suppose she does," he muttered, then sighed. "Hermione and Ron. I can't really feel it because of the nerve damage, so it's really just boring." He looked up miserably. "How mad is Dad going to be that I didn't tell him? I swear, I didn't even think about it. I just… I didn't want to put it down on paper, and I didn't think Jack would have thought enough of it that he would have said anything."
"Harry, your dad isn't going to be mad at you for keeping something from him," Morgan said, still holding his hand. "He's going to be mad someone made you feel like you had to. He's angry for you, not at you."
"You're not going to tell him, though, right?" Harry pleaded. "Nothing happened."
Morgan shook his head regretfully and Harry's heart sank. He'd never truly seen his father mad, not yet, and he didn't want to. He thought he knew his father well enough to understand that he would never hit Harry, but what had kept him going through living with the Dursleys was knowing that the anger directed at him had been undeserved. He didn't know what to do if the anger was because of something he did.
"Morgan, please, Perotta's dead, I- There's no point. He saved us, it's over."
"Harry, I have to tell him. He knows something happened, and if I lie, he's going to think it's worse than it really was. And I don't think you want that." Harry shook his head numbly. "But I need to know what I'm telling him, and he needs to know what he's dealing with," he prodded.
Harry sighed quietly, stiffening his resolve, and reluctantly let the whole story out. "Tell Dad I'm sorry I didn't push him off, will you?" he asked at the end, looking up hopefully only to see Morgan's face fall further, if that was at all possible.
"This isn't your fault. Hotch knows that. I know that. I'm not sure you do. You weren't giving up," Morgan said, and his words twisted into Harry. Of course the man had known exactly what was wrong. "You were protecting your brother. You said he took your wand? Harry, I've met Perotta before. He was big. You're right – you wouldn't have been able to fight him off. And if you want to know the truth, Perotta got the better of your dad in a hand-to-hand fight. Your father definitely isn't going to think less of you for what you did, not when he knows firsthand how strong Perotta was. You were more concerned about Jack than yourself, and you protected him. How can your father fault you for that?"
Harry scratched his shoe against the carpet. "Still," he muttered.
"Still, what?"
"I..."
"You couldn't have done anything."
"I could have, afterwards."
Morgan frowned. "What do you mean?"
Harry avoided his gaze. "I didn't call Dad."
"But it wasn't possible for you to do that."
Harry shook his head. "The first few days we were here, Umbridge's wards hadn't been put up. I could have called home."
He wallowed in his silent guilt, waiting for Morgan's horror. Morgan tried to hold it back, knowing Harry was going to use it to punish himself further, but couldn't. "Harry, you had to know we were all looking for you."
Harry nodded quickly, tightly.
"Why... Why would you..." Harry bit his lip. Morgan leaned down, inspiration striking. "Harry... Were you afraid you'd have to go home if someone knew you were safe?"
Harry put his hands to his face, covering it from view. He blew out his breath, shoulders slumping.
"You didn't want to tell Hotch what happened. Once school started, you thought you'd be able to send Jack home without a problem, but you wouldn't be able to go home until winter break. And by then, you figured you'd have yourself under control and could hide the truth."
Harry dropped his hands and gestured sharply. "I couldn't tell him! And even if I didn't - He'd know something was wrong! He wouldn't have let up until I told him everything that happened, and then... He'd... He'd know. He'd know how...how weak and pathetic I'd been against Perotta."
"Harry..."
"I'm not," Harry said sharply. "I'm not like that! And I couldn't let him think I was. I don't need his protection. I can handle myself."
His desire to gain the trust and respect of his father had been something Morgan had seen as adorable, humorous even. It wasn't funny now.
"So yeah, I hid here longer than I should have because I didn't want to admit what happened. And now Jack's stuck in here with me, to top it all off."
"You couldn't have known that would happen."
"But if I'd been responsible instead of a coward it wouldn't be a problem."
"Harry," Morgan said firmly. "Look at me." Harry glanced up. "You didn't run from what happened because you were afraid. You didn't know what to do. Things weren't black and white. You probably figured we thought Perotta was a hero for saving you guys and you were worried about what would happen when you told us what else he'd done. You took on more responsibility for the situation than you should have, and you tried to control every aspect of it instead of coming to use for help. You're not a coward, but yes, you should have come to us."
"Is it wrong that I didn't want to talk to my dad?" Harry asked.
"No," Morgan said. "Everyone who's ever been in the same position as you has dreaded having to tell their parents – or anyone, for that matter – what happened. You tried to hide it. I get why, and so does he. We wish you'd told him, but we understand why you didn't."
"This wouldn't have happened if I'd done something to stop him," Harry muttered. "If I'd just realized that he wasn't going to hurt us... He wouldn't have done anything if I hadn't opened my mouth."
"Perotta's responsible for his actions, not you," Morgan said. He grabbed Harry's wrist since the back of his hand was scratched. "Do you understand? Perotta's at fault. You can't blame yourself for this."
"But he did it because of what I said!"
"If Ron had told him the same thing," Morgan insisted, "you would be calling him resourceful for trying to get himself and whoever was with him out of the situation. You'd say he was brave for choosing to act instead of sitting around and waiting for help to come." Harry sighed in resignation, nodding slightly. Morgan nodded back, satisfied. "Besides, what were you going to do against someone like him? You couldn't overpower him. You knew you had to use words."
"What's the point of learning all that self-defense if I'm still useless every time something like this happens?"
Morgan was silent for a moment, then he said, "You know, Jack did say something else. He said Perotta touched your head and you broke his nose."
Harry couldn't help the small smile the spread across his face at the memory of the satisfying crunch. "No one gets to ruffle my hair like I'm Jack's age except my family."
Morgan laughed. He pulled him into a tight hug and ruffled his hair with his free hand. A smile darted across Harry's face as he playfully tried to duck away. "That is something I'll be sure to pass along."
Morgan was sure Snape's hand was on his hip not because it was a comfortable place to rest the appendage but because it put him closer to his wand, which would knock out the pacing Agent Hotchner in a matter of seconds. Normally, Morgan would have been the first to scoff at such ridiculous measures. This time, he was considering putting his unit chief out himself.
Out of the corner of his vision, he saw Blackwolf beginning to approach from Rossi's office. He caught Blackwolf's eye and shook his head slightly. Blackwolf stopped, startled, took in Morgan's expression, and then backtracked back to Rossi's to wait it out.
"I'm going to kill him," Hotch snarled.
"That's going to be more difficult than it's worth," Snape pointed out. If the potions master had ever been tentative, it was in this moment. And if it were possible for someone to just suddenly explode into bits of hot magma and kill everyone within the blast radius, Hotch might possibly become the first.
"No, it really won't be." He stopped abruptly. "Do you have the recipe Pettigrew used to bring back Voldemort?"
"Hotch, you can't do that," Morgan said in a voice that was filled with more weariness than anything else. Then Hotch's gaze landed on him, sharp and fierce and ready to kill, and Morgan remembered just who he was trapped in a room with. "Perotta doesn't have any servants to give flesh."
Hotch went back to pacing.
"I talked him through it. Him and Jack. They're both going to be okay, Hotch, I mean it," he said as soothingly as he could.
"That's what he says every goddamn time and then something else happens!" Hotch shouted. Morgan winced, but he couldn't deny that he would probably be acting the same way if it were his own kid. "There are only so many catastrophes that can happen in one year, and he finds all of them!"
Maybe it was a good thing Harry was at Hogwarts. It looked like it was going to be a while before Hotch could redirect his anger, since the object he really wanted to take it out on was dead. As a result, he was just lashing out at anyone possibly involved. It was definitely a good thing the room had been magically soundproofed long ago, even if anyone could see the state the unit chief had worked himself into if they walked past.
The worst thing was…
He hadn't even mentioned Harry's hand yet.
He was genuinely worried about doing so when his boss was armed and already fit to kill.
His phone buzzed and he spared a glance at it. Reid had sent him a text: "Nod if you need back-up." He looked back up at Hotch before the man saw what he was doing, but he didn't nod. There was no need to get anyone else slaughtered.
He had to mention the detentions. Snape already knew, and had spat out a list of reasons why he couldn't do anything about it. If that wasn't going to make Hotch even more pissed off, he didn't know what would. Perhaps if he mentioned why Harry had been given the detention in the first place.
"Hotch," he interrupted. He wasn't even sure what the man was yelling at this point. Morgan raised both of his hands in a placating gesture. "Perotta's dead. The Woodsmarked Killer's dead. They can't hurt either of them anymore. You've proved it – you can stop people from hurting Harry. This isn't a situation where we're useless. We can help."
"Really?" Hotch snapped, and Morgan suddenly realized he hadn't quite gotten that much further in his thinking to come up with more support.
"Yes," Snape said suddenly. "We got Morgan and Greenaway in easily without a problem, and Greenaway said she used to use the Marauder's Map and the invisibility cloak to get around. You could sneak agents in on a regular basis."
"We could continue their training in the Room of Requirement," Morgan added on. "They want to learn, and Umbridge isn't allowing them practical knowledge in the classroom."
Hotch's eyes sharpened again. "She's what."
"The kids are working around it," Morgan quickly said. "Hotch, this isn't a roadblock. We can get over this, and more importantly, they can get over it. They're already practicing to keep their skills sharp. They don't really give a damn about Umbridge. They hate her because she's annoying, but that's it. She's not standing in their way of learning."
Don't kill the undersecretary to the Minister of Magic.
Hotch's jaw muscles twitched, but he relented. "Fine."
"I'll go get Blackwolf," Snape muttered, giving Hotch a wide berth as he circled to the door. Hotch stepped away, even though he was already ten feet from the door, and Snape quickly left down the walkway.
When Reid, Morgan, and Elle showed up two weeks later at Hogwarts, Harry thought the Ravenclaws were going to die. Or Reid. Or both. In any case, Reid found himself surrounded by a pack of them, rapidly answering questions as quickly as he could. A few ran and grabbed books from the library for him to read through, and when he had the smallest break, he quickly flipped through all of them. Someone also handed him their new DADA textbook, and he winced horribly the entire way through it. His expression quickly grew horrified as he was filled in on everything else that was happening, including the Educational Decree allowing the teacher assessments by the High Inquisitor, which Umbridge had been appointed as thanks to Fudge.
Elle grabbed Draco, and the two began conspiring in a corner. Harry eyed them but decided that he most definitely didn't want to know. Hermione was alternating between pride and concern for the Slytherin, since he was doing so well in his muggle classes but epically failing all his Hogwarts courses. She had asked him if he couldn't devote a little more time to them, but Draco told her he was busy maintaining his grades in the online Virginian school and helping Elle with a project.
A cluster of students were around the Monopoly board, as per normal. Their ferocity was getting a bit terrifying. Two couples had already broken up over the game and there had been three duels. All relationships had been mended, thankfully, but Harry was beginning to wonder if he shouldn't check the board for curses. There was some sort of painful cycle of elation and depression going on with that game, and he was glad he was staying far away from it.
Morgan had grabbed the invisibility cloak and gone to see Snape immediately, presumably to give him an explanation about what was going on in the BAU since the potions master couldn't leave the school like he had been able to last year. Umbridge's eye over the building was proving to be more difficult to navigate around than they had thought, and even the professors' movements were restricted. He came back soon after to start going over defensive tactics with a group of students.
The Bloody Baron had somehow managed to deliver a puzzle to Jack, and the young boy was working on it beside Ron on the couch opposite Harry while Harry did his homework. If he were honest with himself, it wasn't so much because he was behind as it was because he was avoiding the BAU agents. He wanted to join the Ravenclaws and listen to Reid ramble, and he really did want to know how Elle and Draco were progressing on their evaluation of the muggle and magical world differences, and he definitely wanted to do some defensive tactics with Morgan. But he knew that if he talked to any of them, he was going to have to talk about some things he really didn't want to think about.
Morgan took the spot next to him on the couch, and his shoulders slumped slightly. He should've known Reid and Elle were acting as a distraction again so Morgan could come talk to Harry virtually unnoticed. The students he'd been working with were matched up against each other and sparring without him.
"I heard about Draco and Elle. Should the rest of us be concerned?"
"Draco's been conducting tests on the entire student population for weeks now. The best part is that no one has even the slightest clue, not even the rest of the QDA. I have no idea what he's working on but he looks like he's having fun." Morgan nodded, and Harry sensed the mood change. Before the agent could speak, he sighed and said, "Do we… Do we really have to talk about this again?"
"Yes," Morgan said regretfully, but he made sure to keep his voice down so Ron and Jack couldn't hear. "I'm sorry." He pressed himself back against the couch as far as he could go. "Harry, have you talked to Jack about what happened?" he asked.
Harry looked at him in horror. "No, of course not! What would I even tell him?"
"The truth. Perotta didn't hurt you. But right now, he doesn't know what happened, and if I know him half as well as I think I do, he's worried about his older brother."
"I don't know what to tell him," Harry said.
"Just tell him what you think he needs to know. He just wants to know you're all right."
"How's my dad?"
Morgan was quiet and Harry risked glancing at his face. He looked uneasy, and when he saw Harry watching him he let out a quiet sigh. "He's not handling it so well. He made it through those three weeks on radio silence from you because he believed you were okay, based on what Perotta told him before he died. And then he found out that, after you had both trusted Perotta, he'd done something to you. He feels like he failed to protect you."
Harry buried his face in his hands with a groan. "Why did you have to tell him?!"
"Because you've got a father who loves you, and you don't have to go through this alone. And Harry, you shouldn't. You really shouldn't try to work this out on your own. He lied to you, but he treated your injuries. He acted like he cared, but you don't know if he really did or not. He saved you, but he betrayed you and he hurt you in the process. It's okay to have trouble dealing with what happened. And it's okay that you need to work through it with someone."
"I'm fine, Morgan! He didn't do anything!" Harry hissed, then winced when his raised voice caught Ron's attention and his friend looked his way in bewilderment. "Can we just stop talking about it?"
"Harry-"
"Why do we have to keep going over this? I just want to forget about it!" He studiously ignored Ron staring at him and Morgan from a few feet away, but it was difficult to avoid looking at either him or Morgan. "Yes, everything you just said was true. Yes, it's complicated. But I can figure it out for myself without you pissing off my dad anymore!"
He was uncomfortably aware that now both Ron and Jack were watching him. He focused on the ground, but Morgan stared at the pair meaningfully until Ron grabbed Jack and muttered some excuse to go somewhere else immediately. Morgan turned back to Harry. "Look, I get how hard it is to talk to him about this." Harry started to interrupt. "No, Harry, I work for your dad. He looks intimidating as hell and sometimes he doesn't know just how aggressive he looks. But if I've learned nothing in the years I've worked with him, I've learned to tell when he's scared. And he's terrified right now, and he's terrified you're not okay. And you're not."
He held out a hand when Harry tried to say something again. "You never worked through what the Dursleys did to you. If you had, you wouldn't be telling me you don't want to tell Hotch because you're afraid he's going to get angrier. You did your best to forget that you killed someone your first year and fought a monster your second year. Your third year, you were scared for what was going to happen to your new family, and you chose to talk to a presumed madman and fight off dementors rather than go for help. Afterwards, you brushed it all off like it was nothing.
"You've spent a year stewing in what happened when the werewolves took you, and the only effort you made to move past it was to get stronger. You always compare yourself to how you were then, and if you don't see a difference, you feel like you've failed. Then a place you thought you were safe in put you in a dangerous tournament, and you had to face one of your worst fears in a cemetery, alone. You didn't ever talk about what happened except to tell us how things went down so we had more information, and you often made light of it so no one would worry. And now this. You had two last sanctuaries, and one was just destroyed by someone you thought you could trust. Then he threatened to hurt you in the worst way he could, just because you'd said the wrong thing.
"Harry, you're not okay. You can't be. But I believe you're strong enough to move past all of this. I just think you need a little help. Let us give you that. What you're going through isn't normal, and you don't deserve having to go through this alone."
Harry sighed, anger long gone. "I just…" He rolled his head across the back of the couch to look at Morgan. "I don't want to be a victim anymore. When I met all of you, I was the domestic abuse kid. Then I was the rescue case. Then I was being stalked by a murderer. And then I was tortured, and then everyone was trying to kill me, and then someone had killed me, and now…this. It just seems like it's not worth it, in comparison to everything else."
"But it feels just as bad, doesn't it?"
Harry sat upright. "I don't get that! I mean, he told me he had no interest in me when he was done, but I still… I can still feel it every once in a while. When we thought Sirius was trying to kill me, and then we learned he wasn't, I didn't feel half as bad when we left. And I was just tired when I got back from the cemetery."
"It's because it's a betrayal of trust," Morgan explained. "You've been expecting people to hurt you for years. It's what the Dursleys taught you. But the people who you care about, they've been faithful to you. None of them have let you down, not unless they'd tried their hardest and still couldn't manage to help you. This was different. Although accidentally, he'd been entrusted as your Secret Keeper this whole time. He'd kept you safe, and he came and found you twice when he knew you were in danger. He protected you. That's the difference. Betrayal."
"Do I have to talk to my dad about it?" he sighed, but he wasn't avoiding looking at Morgan anymore. "He already knows what happened."
"It'll be good for both of you. He wants to know you're all right, and it gives you the chance to recover."
"He's got better things to deal with."
"He doesn't. Trust me, he doesn't." There was a tone to Morgan's face like he was holding something back, something about the extent, but Harry didn't press.
"No one's going to get it. You guys aren't victims, and you definitely don't end up in the situations I seem to get into all the time."
Morgan gave him a humorless smile. "I think you'd be surprised. There's a reason all of us can do this job as well as we can, and there's a reason why we have such a high turnover rate. In one year, Elle was almost killed by a werewolf and was turned, Reid was kidnapped and tortured by an UnSub, and a serial killer targeted Gideon and made his life hell. None of us can fully understand all of what's happened to you, but we do have experience in the details."
"Yeah?" Harry muttered. "Bet none of you almost got raped."
"No," Morgan agreed. "He went all the way."
Harry froze, one hand in the middle of running through his hair.
"Why do you think Hotch asked me to come talk to you, instead of Reid or Elle?" He waited for a moment while Harry examined his face, reassuring himself that he wasn't being lied to. "It started when I was younger than you, and it was someone I trusted."
"Morgan…"
"I'm telling you this because I was in your position and there are a lot of things I regret. One of them is never talking to my mother about it. Maybe she couldn't have done anything, but when I was older and she still didn't know, it felt like I was lying by omission to her, and that wasn't fair. She would have been upset. Hell, she might've killed the guy who did it had she known. But I always wish I'd trusted her more."
"I do," Harry said quietly. "I do trust him, I just… It seems like every time I need to talk to him, I screwed something up. I couldn't keep myself safe, or Jack. I did fail."
"So did your father. He couldn't find you before you saved yourself." He reached over to touch Harry's shoulder. "You're right. Your dad's upset. It's because he cares about you. And you're upset, because you care about him." He smiled wryly. "Might as well be upset together, right?"
"Okay," Harry gave in. "Okay, I'll do it."
"I think it'll help. I really do." He pulled out a letter from his pocket. "Here. He wrote this before he read Jack's letter. It should answer what you wrote. He spent the last two weeks…focused on something, and he didn't quite get around to rewriting it after he read Jack's."
Harry frowned. "Did a case come up? Is everyone okay?"
"Not a case, no." Morgan paused, then said, "Your dad is…set on killing Perotta."
"I thought he died?"
"Yeah… That's sort of the problem…" Morgan winced. "If you can get a letter written to him before we leave, maybe it'll help derail him from revival rituals."
Harry's expression mirrored his. "I'll get to that, then."
Morgan got to his feet. "We'll be here until about four in the morning. No one should be paying attention if we head out then."
"Harry?" Ron asked when everyone else had left. The only ones remaining were Ron, Harry, Hermione, and Jack, who was asleep. Even the Monopoly crowd had been so exhausted by the routines the three BAU agents had put them through that they had gone back to their dorms. "What happened earlier? With Morgan?"
Harry sighed silently, wishing Ron hadn't brought it up in front of Hermione of all people. Jack's head was resting on his lap, and he ran his fingers through it absentmindedly. It was strangely reassuring to be able to prove to himself that Jack was all right just by touching his head, and he was beginning to understand why Hotch always reached out to him for physical contact whenever Harry was upset.
Hermione had stiffened at Ron's question and was looking sharply between the two. "What happened with Morgan?" she asked suspiciously.
"Guys, it's four thirty in the morning," Harry replied wearily. "I'll tell you, but… Can we do it later, maybe?"
Hermione wavered, but Ron frowned. "You both looked pretty upset. It must have been something big."
He sighed again. "It was…" Nothing, he wanted to say, but after talking with Morgan he couldn't quite deny that he was twitching whenever someone brushed against him suddenly. "Something…happened while I was with Perotta, and I just…tried to forget about it. You know, respect for the dead and all that. He'd saved our lives, and it seemed…stupid to mention it when there was nothing to be done about it and ungrateful when he helped us. But I didn't realize Jack was listening, and Jack told Dad, and Dad flipped out but he couldn't come, so Dad sent Morgan. This was a…follow up to see if anything had changed. Look, I really don't want to talk about it."
"I didn't hear a lot, but it sounded like that was the whole purpose of Morgan coming here," Ron pointed out cautiously.
He twisted some of Jack's strands of hair between his fingers. "I suppose."
He told them.
Hermione's hands were pressed against her mouth when he was done, and Ron had gone completely red with fury. "Why didn't you say anything?" Ron demanded and jumped to his feet. Harry watched him morosely as he began pacing. "That happened and you just… You just…"
"I get it," Hermione said quietly, and Ron stopped to stare at her in shock. "Like you said, there was nothing we could do, and he couldn't do it again." She bit her lip, then asked, "What does Hotch know?"
"What Jack told him, which was…more than I thought he'd understood. I thought he just heard us arguing, but… And then because I hadn't said anything in my letter, Dad sort of went…ballistic, apparently." He dropped his head into his hands. "I just want to go see him," he said quietly. "Freaking Umbridge…"
"Harry," Hermione said abruptly. "We've got a Hogsmeade weekend coming up."
"The wards preventing him from entering extend around Hogsmeade too," Harry said grimly. "They went all-out. Whoever can keep breaking in is going to keep coming as often as they can, though. They're not happy we can't practice defensive magic, and while they can't teach us that, they are going to keep doing what they did tonight. So, kudos to inappropriate touching, right?"
"Harry," Hermione scolded lightly, but her heart wasn't really in it. She continued, "Actually, I… Well, I was sort of talking to some others about, you know, how she won't let us learn anything. And we realized… We sort of do have a really good defense teacher who knows what to do in a fight."
Harry straightened. "You're right!" Hermione grinned, having evidently expected an argument. "Snape's been wanting the post for years, and we know he's on our side!"
Her face fell and she winced. "He can't. If he kept appearing in places nowhere near the dungeons, Umbridge would get suspicious. And we can't get everyone down there all the time without the same problem."
Harry frowned. "Then… I don't follow."
"Well, no one's really defended themselves against the Dark Arts like you have, Harry," Hermione pointed out. "When we were in Colorado, you were the best of the group, even over the older years, and you've been fantastic at dueling whenever we're practicing, and every year you've come out on top of a fight with dark magic!"
"First year I had you two, second year I had Fawkes, third year I had my dad, and fourth year I had a serial killer," Harry said.
"Your first year you figured out what no other teacher had put together quickly enough, no one else would have survived your second year, you threw off a hundred dementors on your own, and you made a fool of Riddle in front of his Death Eaters before you had any help," Ron summarized with a raised eyebrow. "And Hermione's right. You're brilliant at defense."
"I- Well-" He looked from to the other, but they were both grinning at him. "You're going to make me do this anyway, aren't you?"
"Oh yes."
Harry deflated and held his hands up in defeat. "You know what? I'm not even going to argue. I clearly don't have a vote. Are we telling everyone else tomorrow, then?"
"When's Draco going to get the phones working again?" Ron muttered in mock-annoyance. "Otherwise we could just text them now."
Hermione gave a nervous chuckle. "Well, Harry, um… The people I were talking weren't…in the QDA."
"Oh no."
Harry stared blankly as person after person began to fill the Hog's Head. There were a few friendly faces, people he already knew well from time spent in the Room of Requirement, but there were also plenty he had only met in passing or hardly knew at all. Colin came in without his brother since Dennis was too young for Hogsmeade weekends, but he promised Dennis wanted to join later. The Patil twins followed him soon after, and Angelina Johnson with Alicia Spinnet.
Dean and Seamus walked in, talking with Neville, and had to move quickly to make way for the Weasley twins and Lee Jordan. Katie Bell came in alone, and Michael Corner appeared to have been pulled along by Justin and Ernie. Lavender Brown and Ginny came in together, and then Terry, Roger, Susan, Zacharias, Anthony, and Luna brought up the very rear.
"A few," Harry whispered in a deadpan to Hermione.
"Well, a few you don't know."
"I don't know about fifteen of these people."
"Learning curve," Hermione said before getting to her feet. "So, now that everyone's here. I think we're all aware of the purpose for this, since none of us are going to pass our OWLs at this rate. And, whether you believe it or not, none of us are really in a fit state to defend ourselves in the real world." There was no argument. Not with almost every survivor of the Silent Massacre present, stone-faced and solemn.
"Let's get to it, then," Angelina said with a nod of her head.
"If there aren't any questions, then," Hermione said, pulling out a sheet of parchment. "I think everyone should sign this, so we know who was here." When everyone had finished, she continued, "I'll let you know where and when the first meeting is going to be held. So until then… Have a good rest of your weekend!"
Harry left feeling surprisingly good about the meeting, and the others expressed the same when they got back to the Room of Requirement hours later. After dinner, they called another meeting, this one for the QDA, and soon had everyone settled around the room.
As had become their norm, Fred and George dominated and directed. "All righty," George began, rubbing his hands together excitedly. "First, I'd like to know if anyone is interested in testing out some of our Skiving Snackboxes-"
"George!" Hermione hissed.
"-because they would be out of luck because we're out of stock at the moment!" George quickly corrected, looking away from Hermione's scowl. Fred nodded in acknowledgement at someone who had subtly volunteered when Hermione wasn't looking. "Second, the meeting. So, uh, there isn't anywhere else that's really big enough to hold that many people, and we can't do it outside because of the winter weather, and- Oh, Hermione, just take over."
"Right," she said, sitting up straighter. "Most of you are already in it," she continued, sending an apologetic look to the sulking Slytherins, who couldn't have shown up without revealing their true loyalties. "But we wanted permission from everyone. Can we use this room for practices?"
"Yeah," Theodore sighed. "That's okay. Just let us know so we don't accidentally walk in on you, all right? That'd be a right mess."
Hermione nodded. "There's also the matter of… Well. They might need to know about Jack, if they're coming in here all the time. It'd be terrible if we didn't explain that to them and then someone found out on accident."
"I think it might not be a bad idea to eventually tell them everything," Ginny said. "I mean, they showed up because they want to learn defense, because of what happened to all of us. If we explained why the Slytherins act the way they do in class, I'll bet they'll understand. They aren't stupid, and really, there aren't that many of them who don't know. It'd be, what, fourteen? And they all know at least one of us, if not more."
"Let's give them some time first," Padma said. "See if they stick around or not." She grinned. "But I can't wait to tell Parvati about all this!"
Harry felt a pang of sympathy. Of course, before now, she'd never been able to tell her twin. He knew they were close, but being in separate houses had made it easier for her to keep the secret.
"Until then," Draco said, "Jack could stay with us. We'll have to borrow the invisibility cloak, of course, to hide him, but we've got the ghosts on our side and there's no way Umbridge is going to think to check the Slytherin House." He glanced at Harry, who nodded his approval. "That's covered, then. New defense group gets the Room of Requirement for practice. So long as you show us what you went over afterwards."
"Most of the stuff at the beginning will be things you already learned in Colorado," Harry pointed out. "But we'll fill you in as we start getting into new spells."
"Which brings us to the third item that we were asked to bring up. To teach them non-magical tactics or not to?" Fred said.
Neville shook his head quickly. "I doubt they'd listen to us when we tell them it's important. Maybe later, if we decide to include them in on everything else."
"Okay, fourth order of business. Draco, how the hell are you doing online classes without internet?"
"I downloaded everything just because I could before I left," Draco said. "I'm not using the internet. And before you ask, no, I haven't been able to fix it. Garcia and I are trying to work it out, but it's taking longer than it should because we have to send letters back and forth and that takes days. We'd have it fixed by now if not for that." His nose scrunched in annoyance. "I can't believe I ever lived on owl post when it takes so long."
"When do you think you can have it worked out by?" Hannah asked eagerly.
"It might be another month or two at this rate." His scowl bled into his words. "If we could even double the time it takes for us to communicate we could have this done much sooner. Fred, George, you might have to start accepting packages from her soon. I'm going to have to manually build a transmitter to knock out the magical frequencies that are causing us problems."
"Why them?" Zacharias asked.
"No one thinks twice if we get packages, because everyone thinks we're up to no good anyway," George said dismissively. "We did it two years ago when the BAU sent us the laptops and whatnot for the first time."
"Draco," Hermione asked, frowning. "If you're doing…whatever you're doing with Elle, finishing high school classes, and trying to fix the internet… When do you have time for studying or homework?"
There were a few lighthearted chuckles at the stereotypically-Hermione response, but they died away when Draco gave a fake laugh and responded with, "You just explained why I'm failing all my classes right now."
"Oh," Anthony muttered. "That's rough."
"Already gotten messages from my parents and everything," he continued. "My wonderful father is asking me why I haven't just slipped something into Potter's food yet to kill him so I can get my grades back on track."
"Yeah, I think we might need to do something about that, by the way," Harry said. "The professors are seriously worried. Grubbly-Plank won't let the two of us anywhere near each other and I swear she has her hand on her wand whenever Draco comes within ten meters of me."
"If we tell them, then they'll act differently and someone could notice," Hermione said regretfully. "More concerning, Umbridge could notice."
"Luna!" Padma suddenly shrieked, making everyone jump. "What the hell is that?! Are you okay?!"
"I feel absolutely lovely," Luna replied in her dreamy voice. "Are you quite all right?"
"No! What happened to your hand!" Padma demanded, and Harry had a sinking feeling in his stomach.
"Oh, that," she said, and several people near her sucked in horrified gasps as they saw whatever Padma was pointing out. "Professor Umbridge wasn't too happy when I told her that her classes were a clump of codswallop and left."
"Way to be, Luna," Anthony muttered.
"So she had you carve your hand out?" Adrian snarled furiously. His eyes flashed as he scanned the rest of the group. "Who else got detention?" he demanded, and Harry tried to sink down as much as he could.
"Harry," Ron said immediately and Harry shot him a glare.
"Terry," Cassius ratted out at the same time.
"Ginny," Neville finished.
"Did she do this to all of you?" Adrian shouted.
"Adrian-"
"Don't you dare, Harry! This isn't all right!" He reached over and grabbed Luna's hand, surprisingly gentle as he held it up despite the fierceness of his words. "This-" he shook her limp hand lightly "-is not all right!"
"Listen, no one talk back to her," Hermione said, hands up as she tried to appease everyone. "There's nothing we can do right now, not when she has so much power."
"So we're just going to let her get away with this?!" Theodore demanded.
"No, we're fighting back," Ginny insisted firmly. "That's why we're forming this defense group!"
"That's blood fantastic when she doesn't even know about it!" Roger shouted.
"Quiet!" Harry snapped, jabbing a finger at the back of the room pointedly. Everyone hushed, remembering the sleeping boy. "Look, this obviously isn't the ideal situation. But we're not going to be able to do anything about it tonight. I know how hypocritical this is, since I just got another week's worth of detentions from her today," he said, pausing as there was some angry stirring, "but Hermione's right. We can't just keep getting angry at her when that's what she wants."
"Does anyone have their potions book with them?" Anthony asked suddenly.
"Er, can't you do your homework later, mate?" Ron replied. "Kind of in the middle of something right now."
The Ravenclaw shook his head quickly. "No, but remember the potion last week that Snape gave us? It was about brewing surface wounds. I'll bet you anything he's already seen some marks on students, and he knows we always meet up like this. If someone's got their potions textbook, it shouldn't take more than an hour to brew once we get the ingredients together."
Hermione smiled, some of the tension leaving her body. "Anthony, you're brilliant," she said and he flushed. "Fred, George, anything else?"
"Just one more article. You people playing Monopoly – what the bloody hell is wrong with you?"
"I refuse to admit defeat," Blaise said defiantly, nose pointed in the air.
"I've gone this far," Neville said with a sigh. "I can't back out now. I've got to win at least one game."
"I won't stop until I've destroyed my enemies," Ginny said with a blank expression that was a little disconcerting. "I'll crush them all."
"Someone needs to burn the Monopoly board," someone muttered in the back. Harry agreed rather strongly with that assessment.
Harry had an uneventful night once everyone went back to their dorms, though the potion that was lathered onto the back of his hand smelled funny. He left Jack with Dobby and the Bloody Baron – which officially made the oddest trio Harry had ever laid eyes on – and went down to breakfast, only to be immediately assaulted by Hermione and Ron.
"Bloody bitch," Ron snarled and Hermione sharply reprimanded him with a look.
"Who?" Harry asked as he took a seat.
"Umbridge passed three new Educational Decrees last night," Hermione explained. "The first requires all groups, associations, etcetera to get approved by the High Inquisitor."
"How did she find out?" Harry exclaimed. "Did someone tell?"
"We'll know soon enough if they did," Hermione replied, glancing at the other tables. A few students looked like they wanted to come talk to her and Harry about what the decree meant for them, but the QDA students were keeping them in their seats for now. "That parchment was charmed. Whoever tattled is going to have rather a bad day."
"Nice one," Harry murmured. "Well, we figured this was going to be against Umbridge anyway. It's not a big difference."
"Harry, the third one's a problem," Hermione said urgently. "The second decree allows Umbridge to form an Inquisitorial Squad to do her bidding. They're basically going to be her secret police, and they'll have even more power than prefects and the Head Boy and Head Girl do. Their job is to enforce her decrees, and I suspect she created them now rather than later for the third decree that was passed last night. The Squad is going to check all the dorms every night to ensure that everyone is in bed."
Harry's eyes went wide. "No," he whispered. He couldn't sleep in the dorms – not with Jack in the state he was in. His brother was getting better, but he was nowhere near comfortable enough to be left alone every night. He still needed to hear voices when he drifted off, and sometimes he woke up in the middle of the night and needed to be coaxed back to sleep.
Hermione nodded grimly. "There's nothing the professors can do about it, either."
They went to Professor Binns's class, which Harry dragged his feet all the way to. It was dull as ever, and Harry spent the entire time trying to plan a way around the decree. There were no outs that he could see. Maybe he could convince Dobby to stay with Jack each night, but… Well, he liked Dobby and all, but the house elf was a little odd and sometimes his ideas weren't exactly safe.
By lunchtime, word was spread that there would be an emergency meeting in the Room of Requirement right after dinner. It wasn't hard to guess what the topic was about, and sure enough, the first item of business was –
"Someone has to stay here at night," Fred said firmly. "I don't care who it is. If I have to drop out of school and stay here illegally, I'll do it. But someone's got to be here."
"Maybe we can bribe the Squad," Hannah muttered. "What assholes were stupid enough to join it anyway?"
A grin spread over Draco's face. "Me."
"And us," Theodore added, jerking his thumb at himself and Daphne.
"Same," Cassius continued. Adrian nodded, smirking.
"You shits," Fred said flatly and the group burst into laughter. "I was freaking out over here and you five go and-"
"Honestly, Weasley," Draco scoffed. "Did you really think we wouldn't have your backs? Please. You should know us better by now."
"Only problem is that McGonagall is positive Draco's Mordred incarnate," Daphne said. "Spent all of Transfigurations glaring in our direction, and specifically at him." She leaned back, resting her weight on her palms pressed to the ground behind her. "We volunteered to search Gryffindor Tower every night already," she continued. "We had DADA this morning and talked to Umbridge after. She seemed delighted by the idea of having such attentive and dedicated students dealing with the worst group in the school."
"I can't thank you enough," Harry said, the panic that had been building up over the day slowly subsiding. "Really. You, and everyone else who was already planning," he said, nodding towards Fred and the others who had been about to speak after Hannah's comment.
"Don't mention it," Daphne said with a shrug.
"Why did she even pass that third decree?" Neville asked. "She must have known Harry's been staying down here, but why?"
"She couldn't have known it was Harry or she would have just called him out on it," Blaise said.
"Did any of you ask her?" Hermione asked the Slytherins.
"I did," Draco replied, "but she wouldn't say. Seemed smug though."
"Wait, it's been the QDA students who've been missing from bed so far," Cassius said. "She's trying to go after us since we're – well, everyone but the Slytherins – are the ones rebelling against her."
"Damn it," Ron muttered. "I forgot that decree was going to impact the rest of us too."
Daphne waved the matter aside. "We'll handle it. On another note, shouldn't Jack's school have started by now?"
"Don't make the poor boy do school work," Cassius groaned. "Hasn't he been through enough?"
"No, she's right," Roger quickly agreed. "At this rate, Jack might not be able to get home until winter break. He's going to be seriously behind, and that's not fair for him. When Elle stops by next time, we should ask her to get us everything he's already missed."
Ernie clapped his hands together once. "Now that that's settled," he said, "who's up for Monopoly, since we can't play late anymore?"
"Yes!" Ginny crowed while half the group groaned.
"Are you ever going to learn?" Hermione shouted after them while they convened around the board. Someone cackled in response. "Honestly," she muttered.
"Harry?" Draco asked, and he looked up at him. "Can you show me how to do a Patronus?"
"Yeah, sure," Harry said, a little confused. "But…can't you do one already?"
"I never got it to be corporeal," Draco said as Harry got up and followed him to a corner of the room. "And we might need it if we need to pass a message in an emergency, in case we haven't gotten the phones working yet. I'm worried about the rest of you, who aren't in Slytherin. Umbridge is set on this, and I'm afraid we didn't take her seriously enough at the beginning of the year."
Harry nodded his understanding. "All right, let's get started then."
That night, Ron and Neville got back just in time for the first Inquisitorial dorm check. Seamus and Dean had wide eyes, and they kept glancing at Harry's empty bed, but there were footsteps on the stairway and not enough time. Dean pulled out his wand and cast a spell on Harry's bed, pulling the curtains shut around it just as the door opened.
Draco stepped in and cast a lazy glance around the room, stopping in surprise when he saw the curtains. Theodore passed behind him to go up another floor, to the sixth years. Draco leaned back to see if anyone was watching behind him, then moved in and closed the door behind him.
"We're all accounted for, Malfoy," Seamus snapped. "So why don't you just bugger off and leave us alone for the night? You've done your God-granted duty already."
"I just wanted to say that if you're going to close one set of curtains, close another just to be safe," he said, calmly and without any hint of the vitriol he usually displayed in class. "They're more likely to just move on instead of bothering to check two beds."
Seamus and Dean stared at him, and he turned to Ron. "We confirmed that we get to search the boys' tower for the rest of the year," he said. "He should be in the clear, but you're going to have to get people to stop mentioning about how he always gets back so late that no one sees him."
"Damn," Ron muttered. "I'm not sure there's a subtle way to get everyone to hush up about it."
"It's going to be awfully suspicious if we keep reporting you're all here and yet Harry still only shows after we're gone," Draco said. "I don't care if you have to cast a Silencing Charm on the rest of your tower, but they need to at least keep their voices down when talking. Turns out that's how she heard about the defense group."
"What – the – hell," Dean breathed.
"Dean, Seamus, meet Draco, who shows up only out of the public eye. Draco, the rest of our dorm," Ron joked. To Dean and Seamus, he explained, "Draco and the rest of the Slytherins who were with us two summers ago are all in on it. They've been helping us get away with a lot, since no one suspects them of helping us break any rules. Sorry, but we honestly forgot to mention it earlier. We didn't think twice about it."
Seamus just stared.
"This is going to take some getting used to," Dean said.
"Remember to hate me in the morning," Draco said, waving absently as he left. "Good night."
"Good night," Neville called after him, and Draco closed the door behind him. Seamus was still staring at the place he had been standing. "Need more of an explanation?"
"That'd be nice," Dean said, as calmly as he could manage.
[-]
Author's Note: There's going to be a chapter added into an upcoming section soon, so I need to write and edit it so I can post it where it needs to go. This could mean a delay in posting, but it's dependent on my homework.
We are getting so, so close to when things really start to get interesting!
