A/N - Part two of the mess caused by Weapon X and this time Hogwarts discovers that it can be taken quite easily, no matter its supposed protections that will need a replacement or two. Also soon it will be short some students as Fury's mood is a bad one and he doesn't have patience to deal with them. As always read and review.
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Beta - eri1551
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Rhodes watched the night sky as Valiant was at the coast of Scotland, her flight deck was almost glowing from the amount of lights that were lit to allow people to work. To the side was Ford,her flight deck also covered in light. As he looked at it a F/A-18 Super Hornet was sent into the air where it joined dozens of planes already circling the task force.
It was a security measure he thought unnecessary, but he also knew how deadly certain things could be, so he preferred to be safe than sorry. Nothing was indestructible and if you presented someone with an opening in nine out of ten cases they were going to take it.
He watched operations carry out for a moment and then walked inside, to his command chair to watch the show happen. He was only a passenger on his own ship since his commands had already been given and all he needed to do was wait. Wait and watch the events happening at Hogwarts.
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Three B-1B Lancers disconnected from the tankers and started to accelerate, quickly gaining speed as they flew towards the Old Continent. They were only a short distance away from their target, long trails of flames followed them as they activated the afterburners and prepared to carry out an attack run.
The sea quickly turned into land as they sped over Scotland and picked up speed, easily breaking the sound barrier and slipping into supersonic speed. Scotland was asleep underneath them, veins of light cutting through the blotches of black. There were occasional blobs of light, but even they were a minority amongst the blackness and darkness.
Data flowed between the planes and weapons were carried on board as they prepared for their mission. One of the Lancers started to gain altitude, while the other two started a dive. Their variable geometry wings increased the angle of attack as they gained speed and the Bomb Bay doors opened, revealing dart-like bodies of Ward Busters to the world.
The altitude dropped steadily as they charged towards Hogwarts. Fifteen kilometers to ten. Ten to five. Five to three and the moment they reached three kilometers above ground the locks holding the weapons inside were released and they started to fall.
The bombers closed the Bomb Bay doors and started to gain altitude and getting away from Hogwarts as quickly as possible. They charged towards the sea and the nearby carrier task force.
At the same time the bomb's engines ignited and the control surfaces pointed them straight downward, while the rocket boosters accelerated them to four times the speed of sound. Speed was one of the necessary factors for the Ward Busters to work with their full power. They slammed into an invisible shield around Hogwarts and were instantaneously vaporized, but the wards around the castle failed and broke apart in a tremendous release of energy that made the whole castle glow. It was the signal for the attack to commence.
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Dozens of helicopters, tiltrotors and Quinjets emerged from the darkness of the night and touched down around the massive form of Hogwarts Castle. The moment they were on the ground soldiers and agents jumped out of them and onto the ground. Some ignited flares to mark the landing zone for the next wave of aircrafts while the rest of them rushed towards the castle.
The thick wooden outer doors survived the first assault, but failed the moment explosives came into play. A small amount of them around the hinges and once the explosion was over this heavy piece of wood was inside of the hall and the first soldiers were running over it and into the castle. They were the very best of what the United States could offer, they were the cream of the crop, most of them had seen years of service in the most elite units, so storming a giant school wasn't a challenge for them.
Inside they divided into smaller teams and started to secure their assigned zones of the castle, preparing for the arrival of their reinforcements and the second wave that would make further advance possible. There was no light being used as to confuse potential enemies and to allow them to utilize their night vision goggles.
In just under fifteen minutes the common area of the castle was secured and groups of soldiers were gathered in front of the living quarters of the staff and the entrance into the dormitory tower for the students. When the signal was given the doors were turned into splinters and they rushed inside, securing their targets that had so far been sleeping soundly.
There was just one instance of a short fight erupting when some students were caught awake, however it ended as soon as it started as they didn't stand a chance against trained soldiers and after one of them was slammed into the wall, the rest of them surrendered.
The ones asleep were dragged out of their beds in whatever clothes they were wearing and their hands were cuffed behind their backs. It was not normal treatment when it came to children or teens and they weren't normal personnel to carry out such task, but there was a chance of encountering resistance and they were chosen to prevent it from getting ugly.
At the same time strike forces stormed into the living quarters of the faculty members and cuffing them dragged them out of their chambers. However there was a case of putting up some resistance, the Headmaster of the school tried to fight them and one of the soldiers got surprised by him and took a spell to the face, but that was where Headmaster's luck ended. The one closest to him slammed the butt of his rifle into his face, knocking him out and allowing him to be subdued.
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Sean Cassidy entered the castle grounds and was almost immediately greeted by one of the soldiers, who nodded in his direction. "Agent Cassidy, everything is secured and everybody was captured without any lives lost."
"Perfect," Sean said. "Spread them across the castle, five students per room and three guards with them. Agent Braddock is on her way here and once she arrives we can check if they are Weapon X agents."
"It will be done," Soldier nodded and started to whisper things into the radio. "What about the staff?"
"One per room and three guards, in case of Dumbledore and Snape four and helmets protecting from telepathy attacks," Sean said and paused. "Also ensure that they are separated from the students, the smaller amount of things on which they can support themselves the better."
The soldier nodded and whispered several more things into his radio.
Sean slowly walked into the castle and could see groups of soldiers move their captives to various rooms where they would spend the next several hours. Most of them were confused, shocked and unable to protest, but some tried to put up a fight, which ended the moment they received a fist to the gut.
Sean looked around the Great Hall and thought about the events that had happened, they had the students, every single one of them, but there was one more thing to be done. He looked at the soldier that was his companion and snapped his fingers, getting his attention.
"Yes, sir?"
"Dormitories," Sean simply said and explained. "Get a team or two and rip them apart, if there is anything of note hidden, it will be there. Destroy everything if you need to but find those things and get them revealed."
"Dig through private possessions?"
"Especially through them," Sean grimly said. "You would be surprised about what can be found inside, especially when you have a moment to look through it and do it keenly. Oh and rip the floors open, they is the second favorite hiding place and unless we have clever customers we will find a lot of data there, as people who think are safe get sloppy."
The soldier nodded and walked away, leaving him alone to keep the whole thing organized and prepare for Psylocke's arrival. She would do most of the interrogations, probably and more importantly would find those that work for Weapon X or any other organization. He knew from his experience that in such a large group, over a thousand people, there would be at least a couple of idiots that got bribed or in any other way convinced to work for someone. The question was just who they were and where they were.
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Fury stepped into the cell where Karkaroff and Loki were and took a look around. Excluding Karkaroff being tied to a wall and having several shallow cuts not much had changed. Maybe Loki being a bit chirpier, something that unsettled him, a happy Prince of Asgard, especially happy in this way was bad.
"Did he open up?" he asked, taking a look at Karkaroff and later at Loki. "Or does he claim he doesn't know a damn thing."
"He opened up," Loki said and smirked, wiping clean his dagger. "It took a couple of illusions, some physical pain and one intrusion into his mind. Now he should be more talkative than he used to."
Fury stared at Loki, but then nodded. "So what did you learn?"
"Durmstrang is where Weapon X's base is located, they are beneath the castle and have their main facilities there," Loki coldly said and sent a glare at Karkaroff. "Students are used to help them control the mutants and are allowed to practice the dark arts on them, while not all of them do so, a big percentage does."
"What else?"
"They are trying to improve the mutants as much as they can and if what he said is true, their next big project is related to Harry," Loki said and waved his hand at Karkaroff, making a new shallow cut appear on his torso, followed by a scream of pain. "I don't know what it is and he also doesn't know. Back to the topic at hand, their base is underground and designed in a way that access inside is hard."
"I know," Fury said and smiled dangerously. "I will open it like a can and storm it, nobody will get out free or alive without my knowledge."
Loki nodded and smiled. "Could Asgardian warriors handle the castle? So that we can catch all of those that will face our justice on Asgard and so that there will be less of an issue after the attack."
Fury was silent for a long moment. It was a good offer and it would solve some of his issues. "You can, but I thought that you had issues with the amount of free warriors you could spend."
"Not really," Loki smiled. "We had, but I spoke with our commanders and they managed to scrape between themselves around a thousand of them or so, so there will be more than enough of them to take control of the castle. Also slaves are part of our economy and we prioritise such things as this."
"Good. It will make my job a lot, I mean a lot easier and I will be able to storm the base from my entry points and you will be able to do it from above."
Loki nodded. "That's the plan I was going to suggest, both of us use what we have the best and gain what we want."
Fury smiled and looked at Karkaroff. "I will leave you with him and go to do some other things."
Loki smiled and as the doors closed behind him, Fury was able to hear the screams of pain echo from the cell. It seemed that Loki was in a vindictive mood and Karkaroff was the one that would feel it.
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Oliver Wood looked around the classroom in which they were kept and saw that there were four more people with him and three guards in completely black uniforms and armor that made them look alien. Alien and dangerous to be precise. He could easily tell that they were non-magicals as they had rifles and pistols with themselves, not wands.
As he sat there, his hands cuffed behind his back, he tried to think about any reason why they could be here and the only thing that came to his mind was that SHIELD got annoyed with Hogwarts and decided to deal with it, once and for good. However soon another possibility surfaced in his mind, that someone was hiding here and they needed to find them.
The door to the room opened and through it stepped inside a tall woman with long violet hair and the body of a warrior, however those two things didn't draw his attention. His attention was drawn by the long sword strapped across her back.
She looked around the room and her gaze focused on them and Oliver felt something powerful enter his mind and look through his memories, thoughts and emotions. It was there only for the briefest period of time and as quickly as it appeared it was gone.
"Those four are clear," she said, indicating him and three more. "This one stays as he knows something."
Two guards moved and indicated for him and the three she had indicated to walk out of the room, while her gaze was focused on the one that remained behind. As Oliver looked at him, he had a feeling he was not going to see him soon, if ever.
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Carol Danvers was angry, annoyed, impatient and needed to vent off some of her steam. She punched the bag and saw it fly across the room and slam into the wall at the end of it. She heard someone clapping behind her and with a growl she turned to see that she was facing Roberto da Costa.
"Well, well, well," he said as he walked to the bag. "You know how to punch and do it quite nicely when angry or annoyed."
"So what?" she asked.
"The point is that this is the worst way for us to deal with our feeling," he said and looked at her. "It is not the first time someone was kidnapped or almost murdered and the best we can do is to stay put."
She growled and defiantly looked at him.
"I'm serious, Carol," he said, walking closer to her. "You know me for some time and you should know that I'm right for most of the time."
She growled, looked at him and later at the punching bag that was thrown by her. "Maybe you are right, it's just..."
"It's just that you are angry," he finished for her and smiled. "If you want to burn energy in this manner, I can help you."
"You can?"
"I was sparring with Harry for most of last year," Bobby said with a shrug. "So I'm used to being slammed into various things, even when he controls his power he can cause a massive amount of damage."
She smiled and punched him. "Here and now."
"With pleasure," he smirked before sending a powerful strike at her.
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Sean Cassidy entered into one of the dormitories and looked around, his eyes scanning the room. He was looking for any spots where he would hide things if he was an agent and didn't want them discovered, there were some advantages of being a former cop and working for some time with spies. You were able to think the way spies or at least people with training as spies thought.
He spotted a floorboard that was looking a bit too worn out to look consistent with the rest of the floor. He knelt in front of it and pulled out his knife, jammed it between the two planks and moved so that it could be used as a lever. Gently pressing his hand onto the handle he watched as the piece of a wood moved upwards, too easily to not have been moved before.
Sean smirked, moved the plank so that it revealed what was below it and reached into the hole. He pulled out a thick pile of papers, a wireless radio and several more papers. "Let's see, who you are," he muttered as he placed radio to the side and focused on the papers. "Interesting, very interesting."
He picked them up, walked out of the room and headed for the nearest Quinjet, he needed to make some calls and ask for some data to confirm what he had seen. If he was right, they had hit a jackpot, if not, it was still worth the trouble.
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Harry groaned as he opened his eyes, he felt as if his whole body was on fire, but first was broken into tiny pieces and put back together. "What had happened to me?" He asked as he glanced at Bobby.
"The same thing that happens to all of us," Bobby said and smiled weakly. "Though you seem not to have anything more serious than bruises, Blob can cause more damage than that."
Harry's expression turned into one of hatred and anger.
"What?" Bobby asked, confusion in his voice.
"Blob," Harry spat. "He is my cousin, a cousin that if I could I would have killed."
"Oh," Bobby said. "I didn't know."
"No problem," Harry said as he sat up, the blood rushed to his head and for a moment he almost lost consciousness. "The only thing he did was annoy me, if I had more space and my strength he would have been dead."
"Strength?"
"Last time I bench pressed over thirty tonnes," Harry said and smiled as Bobby's eyes widened. "I'm not joking, if I had an artifact used by my father, I would be able to do twice as much."
Bobby shook his head and they sat in silence since they weren't in the mood for talking and Harry wanted to not think at all. As he looked at the window placed in the ceiling he was able to see the moon and the stars move across the night's sky.
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Remy LeBeau, more commonly known as Gambit was used to a lot of unusual things and events, as well as plenty of hideous or outright cruel ones. Surprising him was a hard thing, yet Fury managed to do it quite easily, especially recently.
He smoothed out the paper onto which he wrote down the message he got and below it he wrote the deciphered version of it. As he looked at the words covering the paper he was having some difficulty believing what was written on them. Someone either lost their mind or were devilishly clever and stupidly brave. Or both.
He pulled out his cigarettes and lighter, lit one of them, smoke it for a while and looked at the message from Fury. He crumbled it into a ball, threw into an ashtray that was on his desk and lit it. He sat there, watching it burn and turn into ash, destroying with itself any evidence of his treason. He preferred to call it a change of heart, but his official employer might have disagreed.
Having done that he walked out of the room and out for a stroll down the corridor, someone needed to keep those idiotic thugs from Durmstrang on a leash or they would cause trouble and since nobody else was willing to do it, he was the one responsible for them. Not that he minded as it allowed him to keep an eye on the mutants and indirectly help them.
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Natasha Romanov slung her assault rifle over the shoulder and grabbed the sniper rifle as she prepared to leave the tiltrotor that delivered them to the Carpathian Mountains something like fifty kilometers away from Durmstrang. She jumped down and crouched upon landing as she waited for the rest of her team to join her.
"Let's go," she said when she saw all of them were on the ground. "We need to get into the forest before dawn."
"The Red Room is that careful?" one of soldiers asked.
"Yes," she said, her gaze running over the mountain peaks. "It is that careful and they don't like unwanted guests, but we can melt with the background and move more freely in the forests ."
She saw them nod and they started to walk accompanied by the light of the moon and the stars, their forma was a crouch as they tried to stay as small as possible and with large rucksacks with supplies on their backs. However even with dozens kilos of ammunition, weapons and other supplies they still moved with the grace of a predator that approached his prey.
Her eyes swept over the jagged peaks and then focused on a thick forest ahead of them, beyond it was Durmstrang and inside the first parts of the base. She checked her watch and looked at the sky, trying to see how many hours of darkness there were ahead of them.
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Loki was sorting the information and data gathered by various agents and spies working for Asgard as well as their scouts when the doors of his study opened and into the room entered a short person. At least for an Æsir as on Earth he would be called everything, but short, he was five feet six, which on Asgard was below average. However it was not his height that drew attention to him, his arms did, they were the size of an average Æsir thighs, they were massive and covered in thick muscles.
He was a dangerous person and the moment someone looked onto his face they were momentarily forced to focus on it. It was covered in scars, some of them hideous and deep. However once someone got over those scars they discovered the face with keen, unnerving scarlet eyes that were a gateway to a bright mind hidden behind this exterior.
He wore simple clothes, over which he had a black chainmail with a sword, a wicked thin knife and a saxe knife strapped to a belt. He walked across the office and stopped in front of Loki's desk. "Your Highness, did you summon me?" His voice was deep, but surprisingly smooth.
Loki looked up from what he was reading and smirked, his smirk vindictive and dangerous. "Indeed, I did summon you, Holler," Loki said and indicated a chair on the other side of his desk. "Take a seat and help yourself to some mead or ale."
Holler nodded and poured himself ale from a crystal carafe and into a golden cup, he sipped it for a moment and looked at Loki. "So, Your Highness, what's the matter that requires my assistance?"
"How should I put it?" Loki wondered, before an idea came. "What do you think about humans as slaves?"
Holler was silent for a moment and slowly sipped his ale before he gave an answer. "If you keep them on a short leash they can be good slaves, need a bit of time to get used to the rules and the fact that disobedience is not accepted. Also they are fairly long lasting ones, with proper care they can last up to three hundred years, but it depends on the age when they were caught. May I know why you ask about it?"
"Because my nephew, Prince Harald, has been kidnapped and the Allfather decreed that everybody that helped do that, is working for an organization that did it or supports it, is to be brought to Asgard and turned into a slave," Loki cooly said.
"How many of them and how harsh will the slavery be for them?"
"How many?" Loki wondered. "I would say a couple of thousands and he said the harshest possible punishment for them, it needs to be a warning to the whole universe that kidnapping any citizen of Asgard will be punished severely."
Holler smirked, his smirk dangerous and cruel. "I understand, Your Highness, I will take care of them. Just let me know when catch them so that I can be ready to greet them in a fitting manner."
"I will," Loki nodded. "A thousand of our warriors will take part in the assault on the place where he is being held captive and they will be ordered to capture everybody they can get their hands on. Some of them will of course be innocent, but we have agreed it would be safer to sort them here and simply send the innocent ones back to Midgard with our most sincere apologies."
"It can be done," Holler said as he finished sipping his ale. "Mind probes will be able to do it and I doubt that any of them posses the ability to survive a powerful mental assault."
"No, they don't have that ability," Loki said. "You may leave, that's all I wanted from you. I will send you a message when we start the whole attack."
"I understand, Your Highness," Holler said with a bow and walked out of the room.
Loki looked at the doors and then at the piles of papers covering his desk, he needed to get them organized and analyzed. Even if he disliked doing so, he was one of the few that could do it quite quickly and efficiently.
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Sean Cassidy winced when he saw two soldiers drag an unconscious Hogwarts student out of a classroom which Psylocke decided to treat as her own. He stepped inside and she immediately looked at him. "I guess that he worked with Weapon X," he said, pointing his finger in the direction of the body.
"He did," she said, disgust visible in her voice. "He was the last one too, I thought that it would take me more time, but they lack any protection of their mind and a surface scan was enough to find all of those working with Weapon X. After that it wasn't hard for me to get every single secret out of them."
He nodded and looked out of the window onto the calm grounds surrounding the castle. "Did you learn anything of use? Something useful that we don't know."
She looked at him and he could see her eyes become glassy for a second as she browsed through the memories she had seen. "I would say yes, they have more bases, those reported to a base in the Highlands and spent their holidays under Durmstrang."
"Do you have its exact location?" He asked.
"I know it," she said. "When I have a map I can mark it, but memories don't allow you much more."
"Then let's go," he said. "One of the Quinjets is a mobile command center."
She nodded and followed him through the maze of corridors that made up the castle, once they left the castle they quickly crossed the grounds and entered into one of the Quinjets. Normal benches and seats were thrown out and in their place was a small command post with a map of Scotland. Sean opened it, picked up one of the markers and handed it to Psylocke who made a circle on the map.
He looked at it and made some mental math before looking at her. "Are you sure about it?"
"Yes," she said. "I'm as sure as I can get."
"Good," he said and picking up his radio, he activated it. He whispered a few things into it and looked at her. "The unit that is on board Valiant will check it."
She nodded, he walked out of the Quinjet and left her inside. He needed to clear his mind outside. Stepping outside he breathed in the fresh and crisp air of the Highlands.
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A pair of matte black shapes took off from the ground from an undisclosed location in Germany and flew southeast, their targets being on the border of Ukraine and Romania. They quickly gained altitude, ascending to their flight altitude, revealing their famous elongated and thin shape with thin and long wings. Those were spy planes officially known as U-2 and their sole task was gathering data for analysis. However this time their payload was different, instead of normal high resolution cameras they received newly developed ones that were supposed to be able to look through wards. This mission, dubbed Silver Eye, would test this theory and possibly gather invaluable data.
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Rhodes watched as a couple of helicopters took off from Valiant and flew towards the shore, for the last few hours he saw more landings and take offs than he had seen in weeks when serving with the Air Force. There was one huge advantage of a two tier flight deck, planes could land and take off at the same time and as he watched helicopters take off, a F/A-18 Super Hornet landed on the second level.
He glanced at the display showing the location of every SHIELD asset in the area, the only impression he had gotten from it was that this crazy rate of operations was not going to end any time soon. More and more Quinjets were arriving, each of them carrying more agents and weaponry, he didn't know for what, but from the rumors he heard the first helicarrier was being moved towards Europe. Which meant that the storm would strike soon.
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Hawkeye jumped onto the ground the moment the helicopter touched down, he saw several operatives join him and once everybody was down, the helicopter took off. He looked in its direction and then his gaze swept towards the entrance to a cavern, the base was supposed to be there and after Alkali Lake no sane pilot wanted to be on the ground. The chances of meeting Sabertooth were small, but still there.
He indicated to the entrance and slowly moved forward, while he loved his bow, he was also a pragmatist and he knew that a gun sometimes was a much better choice than a bow. So while his bow was on his back, he was holding a customized FN F2000,a gun that was small enough to be used in such places and packed one hell of a punch.
Crawling forward his eyes swept over the rocks and into the darkness which was gone the moment his eyes focused on it, while he didn't see as clearly as he normally did, he saw things clear enough to tell them apart.
"Clear," he said. "It goes deeper into the mountain and it looks artificial," he said, squinting his eyes to get a better idea of shapes.
"Artificial, sir?" one of operatives asked.
"Smooth walls," Hawkeye said. "So we have our base."
They slowly walked inside, pointing their guns at every moving shade or shape and watching out to not be surprised. After a long walk down into the bowels of the mountain they entered a rectangular chamber cut out of bedrock. It was obvious that someone was here not long ago and that they left in a hurry, there were papers, pieces of equipment and hundreds of miscellaneous laying around.
"Call forensics and get them to secure it," he said as he looked around.
"What will you be doing, sir?"
"Looking for any that were here, some might have decided to have some insane idea and stay somewhere close."
He ran out of the cave and changing his weapon to his bow started to ran up the mountain slope. He climbed quickly and soon was standing close to the peak, looking around he was able to see the Hogwarts castle, the Black Lake and even the ocean off in the distance. His eyes swept over the nearby ravines and forests looking for any sign of people hidden there. There was almost no chance that they would be stupid to do such things, but he had seen it happen.
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Fury entered the briefing room of the Triskelion and looked around. Whilst previously there were mostly deputies and even lower ranking representatives, this time there mostly directors, chiefs of staff, executive officers, in short those that decided and carried out plans. Which for what he had planned was ideal, this time the stake was much higher than in the previous step.
He walked to the podium and waited for a moment to let the usually chatter die down, he subtly cleared his throat and everybody looked at him. "Welcome," he said, his gaze sweeping over the faces of those gathered. "The first stage of Operation Adamantium Will was a complete success and now it is time for the second one."
He pushed a few buttons and a blank screen behind him came online. On it quickly appeared photos of Durmstrang, a radar map of the area around the school and a table and diagrams with hundreds lines of information. There was a moment of silence in the room, interrupted by the scribbling of pens and pencils on paper as questions and observations were being made.
"Durmstrang is a place with a plethora of defences , some of which are dug into the ground and spread over a wide area. The same attack plan we used for Hogwarts won't work here. At Hogwarts we were dealing with wizards that lacked any non-magical help, at Durmstrang we have both things and a lot of captives that need to be freed," he said and paused for a moment. "We need to strike fast and strong, so that they don't know what is going on before it is too late. It will be a combined arms attack, planes will have their own share of tasks to complete and foot soldiers theirs."
He saw people nod and he smiled. "We know that there are two lines of defense around the castle, the outer one is good, old and tested anti-aircraft guns slaved to their own radars. Something with which most of us present here have dealt with in the past." There was a wave of laughter at those words. "Missile launchers are placed behind them, we don't know what kind of missiles they have so they need to be gone the same time the guns get blown up.
"We have our people on the ground around the castle and they will try to take out as many emplacements as possible, but they can't be everywhere, so the rest will need to be disabled by our planes," he said and changed the images for those showing only the base and the castle. "Part of the complex that is above the ground will be handled by Asgard as they have a reason to be here and they want to have some revenge on their Prince's kidnappers. The part below the ground is going to be taken care of by our troops and agents. An important factor is the hostages and the captives kept inside those cells," he said and a part of a base was highlighted. "We don't know in what state they will be, both physical and mental, so no going with guns and shooting everything that moves. Also right after the soldiers, medics will go to get them out of the danger zone and onto the surface.
"I won't repeat the words written in the material given to you as it is pointless and besides, you will go over them with your staffs. However I want you to understand that it is a crucial operation and its success is the only accepted outcome. In the materials handed to you, you have the exact details of what is expected from each of you and the agency or branch you control."
He paused for a moment letting those words sink in and looked over the hall. The expressions on people's faces were grim and hard. It looked as if a storm was brewing inside the room and it's fury would be terrible. For a moment he felt some compassion for Weapon X which woke up a sleeping dragon, but it was gone sooner than it appeared. Calling them humans would be an insult to the whole of the human species, they were able to do things that made even him sick.
o-0-o
Harry felt a fist slam into his face and his eyes immediately flew open, before the person that did it had a chance to do it once more, his own fist flew forward and slammed into the gut of that person. It pushed him away and gave enough space for him to sit up.
Four Weapon X thugs were in the room and they were making the room feel crowded, one of them was holding his gut thanks to Harry's strike, but the rest was angry at him. Two walked towards him, trying to circle him, but he managed to get between the two of them. However he didn't notice the third one which hit him with a rod that sent voltage coursing through his whole body. He crashed onto the floor, his whole body twitching as it dealt with the voltage.
Two thugs grabbed him by the shoulders and carried him out of the room, not caring about his legs that were dragging behind on the floor. Looking around he saw that he was moved into a part of a complex, his keen nose told him even more. He could feel the strong scent of antiseptics and blood in the air .
They passed through a long corridor, a couple of intersections and entered a large room, he squinted his eyes when the bright light filling it hit them. The thugs paused for a moment and it allowed him to take a better look, it looked a lot like operating rooms he had seen on Asgard, just more crude.
"Put him on a table and secure him," someone said and they lifted him into the air, then placed and cuffed him to the operating table.
He tried to move and found that he couldn't do a single thing, he was completely immobilized and couldn't do a single thing. He looked around and saw a few people in surgeon's garb prepare for something. One of them walked to him and picking up a scalpel from a nearby tray cut open his shorts and shirt.
A second surgeon walked to him with a syringe in hand, pressed it into Harry's arm and he felt a stinging sensation followed by a wave of cold and all of his limbs became suddenly very heavy. He immediately recognized it as anesthesia and started to struggle even more, which seemed to not impress the surgeon who walked to him and started to make incisions in his torso.
Harry's dull, hoarse roars of pain echoed through the room as more incisions were made, the scalpel easily cutting through the skin on his chest.
o-0-o
Natasha crouched in her ghillie suit and looked at the defense positions around Durmstrang, they looked like a maze and were designed by someone who knew how to do the job. Her binoculars swept over the shapes of the missile launchers painted in a camouflaging pattern that made finding it a pain.
"Four," she whispered into the radio. "Four missiles in each and they are dug in."
She slowly moved forward and laid on the ground, as to make herself smaller and less human looking, crawling she moved past the missile launcher and towards Durmstrang. As she did she wondered how it was that previously they hadn't spotted them or didn't get killed. Those things wouldn't have a single issue with taking out her plane.
Her eyes swept over the forest in front of her and she held her breath when she saw a patrol walk down the path directly in front of her. All of her muscles tensed for a moment and then relaxed as her training took over. She laid, not making a single move or sound and watched them walk past her, not even noticing that she was laying there.
Slowly she rose and hid in the bushes growing to the side of a road, she didn't want to risk another meeting with a patrol, it could compromise her mission and that would be bad. Slowly moving forward she scanned the countryside, if there were guards, it meant that there was more hidden around and that it had gotten a lot more dangerous than she had originally estimated.
"Lynx, enemy has sentries, patrols of four with heavy weaponry," she whispered into her radio and heard two clicks as a confirmation.
The moment she received confirmation she slipped into a small depression in the ground and hid there, it was a perfect spot for watching the grounds around her and counting the guards as well as other pieces of equipment they had.
o-0-o
Dumbledore looked at the door of the classroom as it opened and Fury stepped inside in his famous black coat. He stopped for a moment and looked around. "Albus, I see that you are enjoying your new quarters," he said mockingly.
"Could have been better, but I'm not complaining," Dumbledore said. "So may I know what brings you here?"
Fury smirked and walked across the room, he stopped for a moment at a window and looked outside. Finally he turned around and walked to Dumbledore. "Let's just say that I'm doing a job that should have been done long ago, I'm dealing with moles that should have been gone before they caused what they already have."
Dumbledore looked up and frowned. "Moles? At Hogwarts?"
"Yes," Fury said. "My agents found twenty and all of them were interrogated and imprisoned for the time being as Loki has plans for them, plans that are fitting of their deeds."
"But they are just children and everybody makes mistakes."
Fury growled and focused on Dumbledore. "Tell that to Warren Worthington II or his son or even your precious Harry Potter, Warren's son is in coma and nobody knows when he will wake up and Harry Potter is missing. So don't even dare to call them children and don't call those things mistakes as it is a fully conscious act and I won't tolerate it."
"What happened?" He asked, shocked by Fury's words.
"He was kidnapped and evidence pointed here and to Durmstrang," Fury coldly said. "I have my moles, so you won't be kept for longer and if you cooperate with Loki I will forget the whole thing, if not you join them in hell. The choice is yours."
"I will help you," Dumbledore finally said as he knew that Fury could be far less understanding.
"Perfect," Fury smiled. "I will show up once I clear the mess they caused."
Without a word he turned around and walked out of the room, leaving Dumbledore alone to his musings.
o-0-o
Valiant took off from the sea by the coast of Scotland and accelerating quickly she sped towards the middle of the Old Continent, she was needed there as the Operation Adamantium Cutlass would start in a couple of hours. Her thrusters, an improved version of the ones utilized on her older sister propelled her through the air south-east.
As she passed over the North Sea she was met by three squadrons of F-22 which formed into a formation around her. Their sole task was to keep curious planes away from her and allow her a safe passage through the crowded airspace of Europe. There were hundreds of planes in the air at the same time and an unfortunate accident could easily happen and nobody wanted to explain how two planes crashed into each other. However even the crash wasn't as dreadful as the idea of the billions that would be spent on Valliant's repair and those paid to the families of the unfortunate victims.
At the same time cargo planes across the USA were being loaded up with the tonnes of supplies that would be required for the whole thing to work and with hundreds of people that would execute it. Even if it was a military operation, a large number of them consisted of non-combatants psychologists and medics as nobody knew in what state the captives were and sometimes even minutes were crucial. Their target were a couple of bases in Poland, the Czech Republic and Hungary, where the cargo would be loaded onto smaller planes that could take off and land on a prepared stretch of flat and even ground. Which would allow for delivery right to the Durmstrang or close enough to be of use.
Cargo planes with supplies and ground troops were not the only things being moved in preparations of the mission ahead of them. Combat planes were being moved closer to their target and alongside them, the tonnes of ammunition they would need as everybody took the worst estimations as the basis for their calculations and that meant moving unholy amounts of heavy weaponry.
These moves would take over a week to complete, but they couldn't be done sooner without the risk of it getting done sloppily and such a risk could simply not be accepted.
o-0-o
Fury's fingers thumbed on the surface of his desk as he considered if this was a joke or not, he had seen a lot of bad decisions, but this one seemed to reach new heights of idiocy.
"It is true," Alexander Pierce said entering the office. "The NRO confirms it and the French satellites saw the same thing as well."
"So someone wants to play hard or is just tickling the line," Fury said as he looked at a large map of Europe. "If they move, at best they will get to Vistula or Oder before they are stopped and after that we can push them back. So it doesn't make sense to attack."
"Show of power?" Pierce suggested.
"No, more along the lines of exercises that are taking place, we do a similar kind of them, the timing is a bit suspicious, but that's Russia for you."
"Are we going to change the moment of the launch?"
"No," Fury said, shaking his head. "We need it done as soon as possible and they will do something no matter what we do, so no. We will attack as planned."
Pierce nodded and slipped out of his office, leaving him to deal with a pile of reports and a growing headache named Russia.
o-0-o
Harry groaned as he opened his eyes, he sat up on the cot and almost immediately felt a throbbing pain at the base of his skull. He looked around and focused on Bobby who was looking at him in worry, when his gaze focused on Bobby he was able to listen to his thoughts and feel his emotions.
"What happened to me?" Harry asked
"They did something to you," Bobby said. "The rest I don't know, two thugs dragged you here last night."
Harry looked at him and his eyes narrowed as they focused on the boy.
Bobby winced and looked at him. "Stop whatever you are doing, just stop it," Bobby said as he tried to control his voice.
"Sorry," Harry mumbled as he focused his gaze on something else. "It seems that I'm a telepath... To be continued
o-0-o
A/N:
Many will wonder why Hogwarts fell so easily and quickly.
One - Surprise, no wizard expected such an attack to happen.
Two - Time, in the middle of night you do not expect an attack to come.
Three - Shock, unless you are trained to be constantly alert you will sleep as soundly as a baby and not many things will manage to wake you up. So the most they managed to do was to sit up in their beds before being dragged out and cuffed, while someone else was aiming a gun at their head.
Four - Terror, Hogwarts is supposed to be an impenetrable fortress that is impossible to be conquered. So nobody expected such an attack and terror is the biggest nightmare or the biggest friend, it turns off coherent thoughts and reasonable mind, which means that one that can use it wins.
Five - Speed, special forces are like a tsunami wave, they come in fast and brutally, so even if someone was awake and put any serious resistance he would get a bullet to the knee or head and would be dealt with while other teams would go about their tasks.
Six - Knowledge, SHIELD has exact plans of Hogwarts, with every single hidden passage, trap and access point marked. When you have them and good staff you can plan the best route through the castle and drill it into the heads of your soldiers.
Seven - Technology, night is the worst time for a battle unless you have night vision equipment. Without it you have two bad choices, lit a light and see something, yet tell everybody where you are or not and don't see a lot.
Dumbledore and Fury, Fury could get Dumbledore killed, but he doesn't gain a single thing from it and loses even more, Dumbledore is too powerful and too dangerous to be simply killed. He needs to be shown a proper place and kept on a short leash so that he doesn't cause troubles and plays according to the rules.
Russia and its politics - I ranted once about it and will do few more times, but it needs to be understood, Russia wants to be seen as a powerful country that can do a lot so they will cause troubles and do everything they can achieve to get their goals. Also Soviet Union dream is still strong in their veins and they want to be treated as a country that can say no and you either obey it or get annihilated. Maybe my view is biased, but they are one of my homeland neighbors and there is not much love between us, better would be there is a lot of hate and bad history.
Scale, the truth is that when you have any bigger operation, most of the work is done by logistics and support, someone needs to deliver them, get them food, supplies and whatever else they will need, they need someone to tend to their wounds and that takes a lot of people. Here they have a large number of people that are not in the best shape and need to be rescued which means even bigger strain on the logistics and if you have too many people, it is better than not enough.