AN: So, they're back in their own world now and everything about third year is pretty much finished with. There'll be one more chapter left of the year, despite it only being December at present, and then it'll be time for the Grail War which everyone seems to be looking forward to. To be honest, I'm not exactly sure how I'm going to write Sirius into the story. Harry simply has no need for him and he fulfils no major role that isn't already taken, he's kind of on the outside of everything as well and not in the know. I don't want to just, I don't know, kill him off or something like that but he really doesn't fit into the story and he is one more character that I'd need to add and I think I've got more than enough going on as is. Anyway, any advice would be appreciated.
Hope you enjoy the chapter, it's not my most favourite that I've written.
Forum link on my profile or here: forum/Fate-s-Gamble-Behind-the-scenes/139203/
Beta'd by: NIX'S WARDEN
Chapter 55 – Back to the Present
Harry looked at Hogwarts and grinned a little, it felt good to be back here rather than in that alternate reality. At least he had some sort of established existence here, he had a role here to fulfil. Hermione had already charged off, down the path and towards he castle, but Harry wasn't going to do that.
He said goodbye to those who'd come to see him in that other reality, they had things to do themselves. Zelretch had dragged them all together for reasons only he would know, possibly the photos he'd taken of the shocked and taken aback faces of the Order, but they had stuff to do themselves.
Waver had a class to teach in half an hour, Stheno had come during her lunch break, Aoko had something to do in Africa, what it was she wouldn't say, and the others all had to find things to occupy their time with now that Harry was back at Hogwarts.
"Holly," Harry addressed the tiny girl. "Link up to the wards and find out where Pettigrew is, would you?" She nodded her head and Harry turned to Liz. "Once she's done that, I am putting you in charge of retrieving him. Make a cage out of your claws to hold his rat form and, if he transforms, simply sink your claws into his shoulder or something. We do not want him getting away, not yet at least."
Liz nodded and a moment later, Holly had Pettigrew's location. Liz dashed off at high speed, astralising so she wouldn't catch anyone's attention, as Holly used Harry as a mental relay to direct her towards where the rat was. Luckily, there wasn't anyone around Pettigrew to see Liz when she materialised and grabbed him.
Once she had him, Liz went to Harry's tower, keeping the rat trapped in between her lethal claws, and waited for Harry to take care of the other issue. She did smile at the rat in her hands, calling it Peter seemed to make it freeze up in absolute terror. She knew she was scary looking to most humans, it would probably be far worse with something as small as a rat, and she took full advantage of that to mentally terrorize him while she could.
Harry on the other hand, had merged with Holly and had Prismakreuz conducting a wide area search for Sirius Black's magical signature. This was a bit of an experiment, he was using the magical signature of the alternate reality's Sirius Black and seeing if he actually got a positive result for it.
He did. Once that result had been found, Amy headed over to it at speed, sprouting black wings from her back and taking to the skies. Keeping Prismakreuz locked onto the magical signature that had given a positive result, Amy disillusioned herself and added all of the spells he used for stealth before.
The result of the search seemed to be the Shrieking Shack and Amy shook her head, was his hiding place really that obvious? Anyway, she put Harry's usual blindfold on her face, retrieving it from the pendant in which it was stored, and activated the spells Moody had given them.
Looking through the building, kind of like it was an x-ray, Amy saw a black dog curled up in an upstairs bedroom. Deciding to be a little theatrical, Amy phased through the ceiling, maintaining her stealth charms, before appearing before him with her wings spread wide like some kind of angel of death.
Understandably, the dog freaked out. What would you do if a beautiful woman suddenly appeared in front of you with six black wings coming out of her back and wielding some kind of staff? Unfortunately for Sirius, Amy simply waved her staff and the doors and windows all sealed themselves shut.
Sirius, possibly trying to pretend that, yes, he really was a dog and, no, there was certainly nothing suspicious going on here and, yeah, it would be great if this fallen angel looking girl would please not eviscerate him, dived under the bed he'd been napping on.
Amy, amused by what he was trying, simply levitated the bed into the air and left the black dog whining there with its front paws over its head. She chuckled lightly, waiting for Sirius Black to look up at her. He did, after a few moments of nothing happening to him, and he was surprised by the amusement dancing in her warm brown eyes.
"I mean you no harm, Sirius Black." She told him. Padfoot, the dog, pricked up and looked as wide eyed as a dog could when she identified him by name. "As we speak, a close friend of mine is retrieving Peter Pettigrew from the castle but you are too vulnerable here."
Sirius came forwards, transforming into a man. "Who are you?" He asked in a hoarse, rasping voice. Amy wrinkled her nose at the unpleasant smell coming from the man, that was almost as good of a repellent as the idea of a dementor's kiss was.
Amy let go of the levitation on the bed, letting it crash to the floor behind Sirius. He jumped at the noise, but calmed when he saw that it was just the bed. "You will probably find out who I am soon enough, but for now you can call me Amy. Now, let us go somewhere that you don't have to hide all of the time."
With those words, the world shifted around them until they came to a stop in Harry's house in Fuyuki city. Amy grabbed one of the translation pendants and threw that to Sirius. "Put that on, it'll act as a translator. We're in Japan now so it would be a little difficult for you if you didn't speak the language."
Sirius looked closely at the pendant for a moment before putting it on, if this Amy person really wanted to harm him she could have done so already. "Thanks, I guess. So, what's going on? Who are you and why are you helping me? How did you know about Padfoot and Wormtail?"
Amy just chivvied him upstairs and towards one of the bathrooms. "Don't worry yourself about that, you'll probably find out soon enough anyway. Now, there will be some ground rules while you are here. One, any room with a name on it has been claimed so no going in them without permission. Two, there's a vampire girl here who often wears a maid uniform, do nothing inappropriate towards her. Three, I've got some money here for you so you can buy some clothes that fit and aren't rags in Fuyuki. Five, there are some magical people who live in Fuyuki city, don't piss them off, especially Rin Tohsaka who is a black-haired high school girl that wears short skirts and has a red and black colour scheme. If there's anything else, Satsuki can probably answer your questions."
Amy then left a rather confused Sirius behind as she teleported to Harry's tower back at Hogwarts. Once there, she found that Pettigrew had tried turning into a human and slipping away. That hadn't worked. Just like Harry had said, sinking her claws into his shoulder really did make him stop what he was trying to do.
"I can take things from here." Amy told Liz, hitting Pettigrew with a few spells that would stop him apparating, turning back into his animagus form, bound his arms and legs together and silence him. She also took the two wands off him that he had in his possession, who the second wand belonged to she didn't know for certain but she could most certainly guess.
xxxxx
Amelia Bones was having a trying day. Aside from everything that had been happening over the last few months, what with Sirius Black's escape from Azkaban, she had just gotten a letter from Susan saying that something weird was going on at Hogwarts again.
It seemed that neither Harry Potter nor Hermione Granger had been seen around school for a while. No explanation was forthcoming from the staff either, the best answer she had gotten was that there had been some sort of accident. She had noticed that most of the staff seemed upset with Mcgonagall though, perhaps there was something to that.
She had just been called out after an inspection of the dementors at Hogwarts, and what was Fudge thinking putting them there, showed that their numbers had been reduced to less than half of what they had been originally. Reports had come in that the dementors had some kind of fascination with Harry Potter, who had somehow managed to kill what was supposedly un-killable, but now tended to flee if they caught sight of him coming close to them.
Really, what would the prophet, specifically Rita Skeeter and her poisonous quill, say about something like that. Dementors were the stuff of nightmares, what wizards used to guard their most feared prison, and they were scared of the boy-who-lived, the saviour of the wizarding world who was supposed to be some sort of paragon of the light.
Amelia knew that such a thing was patently ridiculous, Harry Potter was as human as anyone else, no one could be that pure in real life. Still, there where some things about Harry Potter that she had taken note of. She still remembered that it was his cat that had brought her a message regarding the Malfoy boy two years ago, tt was Harry Potter who 'duelled' so viciously against Lucius Malfoy, it was he who always seemed to be at the centre of any occurrences in Wizarding Britain these past two years.
She saw a memo flying towards her with her name on it and snatched it out of the air. Reading it, she rolled her eyes. The unspeakables were making a fuss because they knew that someone had gotten into their department, they didn't know who, what or even how it had been done though. What did they expect her to do with something that vague? Apparently, they'd only noticed it because they had noticed how even the dust was somewhere, as if it had been purposefully spread out to cover someone's tracks.
She opened the door of her office and instantly had her wand in her hand. Sitting there, seemingly without a care in the world, was a young woman of around nineteen. There was a staff in her hands and there seemed to be someone floating in mid-air next to her. Amelia only looked at the floating person long enough to dismiss them as a threat before returning her full attention to the girl sat on the edge of her desk.
"About bloody time, I've been waiting here for you for about twenty minutes now." The woman said, not seeming at all concerned by the wand pointed at her. Of course, seeing as Amy's clothes were made from basilisk hide, reinforced with mithril, there wasn't any spell Amelia could cast that would work on her right then.
"Waiting for me? Why?" Amelia asked, feeling for the door handle behind her. She might be a good auror, and a damn good duellist, but she wasn't cocky and arrogant, she had no guarantee of winning against this woman. The woman had made no threatening moves towards her, but that didn't mean she wouldn't do so if Amelia dropped her guard.
"Take another look at this guy, does he look at all familiar to you?" Amy indicated the floating body of Peter Pettigrew. As she did so, she wondered about the competence of Wizarding law enforcement. I mean, from the original report about the duel between Sirius Black and Peter Pettigrew, they'd found a finger and had pretty much instantly come to the conclusion that he'd been blown up so hard that the finger was all that was left.
Harry had had a look at that report, it had been amongst the records that he had looked through, even if he wasn't supposed to have access to them, and there had been a photo of the finger in that report. What had caught Harry's eye immediately was just how clean the cut was, it was totally straight. That should have gotten people wondering at least, that and the distinct lack of blood when Pettigrew 'died'.
A sharp gasp from Amelia told Amy that Pettigrew had just been recognised, she chuckled. "Yep, the amazingly dead Peter Pettigrew. Now, isn't it strange that a seemingly dead man can be here today, alive. It's also a complete coincidence, I'm sure, that he's also an illegal rat animagus and that he was the one who really was the Potters' secret keeper and not Sirius Black. I'm sure it's also a rather large coincidence that I found him at Hogwarts, the place Black was muttering about before his escape. What do you think, Madam Bones?"
"I think that your sarcasm has evolved beyond regular limits. I don't suppose that you are going to stick around to tell me the how and why you captured him, are you?" Amelia raised an eyebrow, not surprised when this woman shook her head. She hadn't expected her to stay, she didn't look like the sort of person who liked being pinned down or connected to things.
"Nope, I'm out of here. Please, make sure you get the truth out of him. I know that you have the legal right to force Veritaserum down his throat, don't let him talk his way out of trouble." Amy said. Amelia went to say something else but the woman had disappeared as if she wasn't there, without the crack that usually accompanied out-going apparition.
Amelia looked at her newest task and rubbed her head. "This is going to be another headache, I just know it." She mumbled to herself before getting on with her job.
xxxxx
A now clean Sirius Black wandered around the house he found himself in. The place was large but, judging from the number of doors with nameplates on them, it wasn't often as empty as it was now. As far as he could tell, the only two people here right now were a vampire named Satsuki and a purple-haired woman named Euryale.
Sirius hadn't really talked with the vampire yet, she just looked like an innocent muggle school kid, but the other one had talked to him a little. Apparently, this place was kind of like a home for a number of people and that only increased on the weekends.
Euryale's sister, Stheno, had a portkey that let her travel between here and London, she had one as well but she didn't teach muggle history like Stheno did and thus had less reason to use it. Some guy named Zelretch was also supposed to be around frequently, and so were others with names that Sirius committed to memory.
He didn't flirt with her, which might have shocked a great number of people. There were several reasons behind his choice to not flirt: he didn't know if she was single, he didn't know her well enough to know that she would react badly as some of his attempts in the past had done, he didn't even know what she was, but most importantly of all, he really needed to tidy himself before he tried to get laid with anyone.
Sirius did find that his clothes had been cleaned while he had been getting washed, he suspected house elves, and a little bit of transfiguration had them looking not too conspicuous for a muggle environment. He took the money that Amy had left him and headed out to get himself some proper muggle clothes in order to have something else to wear.
He was quite surprised how far away the house was from the city proper though, it was a little bit of a walk before he actually got into the city proper. He was rather glad of that translation pendant Amy had given him, he couldn't speak a word of Japanese himself. He was also thankful that Euryale had explained the currency to him, if she hadn't then he would have probably thought that yen was some sort of equivalent to a pound.
He did wander around the city he found himself in, trying to get a feel for wherever he was, before he purchased some appropriate muggle clothing. It wasn't difficult to choose what clothes would blend in, jeans and t-shirts would always be relatively normal after all.
He did find it odd that he didn't see many signs of wizards in a place as big as Fuyuki was, just a few places seemed to have magic around them and he avoided them as he'd been advised to. There was one that gave off a really creepy and unsettling feeling that made him want to turn into Padfoot and flee and top speed, he'd ask about that when he got back to Amy's place.
One thing he did want, despite knowing how exceptionally unlikely it was right then, was to see his godson. Harry would be thirteen now, a third year, and Sirius hadn't seen him since he was a year old. Perhaps... perhaps when his name was cleared, Harry might want to come and live with him. He didn't exactly have a house that was habitable right now, Grimmauld Place certainly wasn't, but he could find somewhere, he was sure of it.
He then headed back to the place he was staying, perhaps he might be able to talk to this Euryale woman. She might be a bit younger looking than him, but she wasn't young enough to make him feel like a dirty old man. She could only be what, twenty one, at most?
As he went back to the house to try and sweet talk a young woman, now that he was cleaned up and presentable, Sirius mind did flash back once more to where Harry might be and what he could be doing.
xxxxx
"You know, even without the dementors, this place sucks." Amy mumbled under her breath as she had finally god damn found the stupid little island. Having known the general area that Azkaban prison was in was one thing, actually getting there was another.
Remind me again what we are doing here? Liz asked Amy mentally, not liking this place any more than her master did. It was a most unpleasant place and somewhere she would willingly never return to. It didn't help that Fran had gotten here easily, Amy simply dragging her through the Kaleidoscope when they'd found the bloody place.
Bellatrix Lestrange. We need to get into her mind to find out if there's a way we can access the horcrux in her vault legally or if we will need to break in. Personally, it makes little difference to me, the latter simply risks getting on the goblins' bad side. Amy told Liz.
I don't recall Gringotts having any defences that could stop an astralised Servant the last time you were there. Given how this world doesn't have anything spiritual to threaten it, they haven't had to develop counters to those threats. It was the same at the Ministry, while the Department of Mysteries seems to be aware of our existence, they don't seem to know anything more than 'we exist'. By the way, what did you retrieve from there when we went through it this time? Liz replied.
Amy didn't reply immediately as she navigated through the prison, avoiding all of the guards as they made their way to the high-security cells. They had brought Len with them seeing as, despite being able to defend his mind or tear another's to shreds, Harry wasn't a skilled enough Legilimens to retrieve what they needed.
What they were going to do was get Len to give Bellatrix a perverted dream featuring Voldemort who would ask her if there was a way she could be useful to him, a way he could retrieve the 'treasure' he'd left in her care. They didn't know if it would work, and if it failed then Harry would brute force his way into her mind, but it was worth a shot.
It seems that dementors have learned not to mess with you Fran commented idly as they came round a corner and saw a dementor literally flee from Amy. I wonder how word of you reached them from the dementors back at Hogwarts.
Amy, in a fit of curiosity, tried to use legilimency on the next dementor she came across. What she found interested her quite a bit. Her face then took on a red tint as she went a bit deeper into the dementors mind and found something that, well, something she wasn't expecting.
What is it? Asked a curious Liz as she saw Amy turn a rather interesting shade of red, one that might be called luminescent. What did you find out? What had she seen in the mind of that dementor she had just looked in that caused such a reaction.
This place really is for insane people. Amy rubbed her forehead, failing in her attempts to banish the images in there from her mind. When they say dementors 'suck out' every happy memory, they're not kidding. I saw all of those happy things inside its mind, the happy memories of hundreds of people, and something else. There seems to be a prisoner here that they can't effect, because the dementors are the source of those happy memories.
How can something that 'eats' happy memories give you good memories? That's a complete contradiction. Liz said and she wasn't exactly comforted by the noticeable green tinge of Amy's skin. Seriously, what did you see?
One prisoner in Azkaban has taken to thinking up sexual fantasies. Amy told her, not quite happy talking about this. Those sexual fantasies don't feature any of his rape victims, school mates or anyone else he thinks is attractive. No, these fantasies feature the dementors themselves.
Liz thought about that for a moment and then tried to banish the images her brain was trying to conjure up from her mind. She looked in sympathy at Amy, she had not experienced the memory itself like the merged woman had. With how active an imagination Harry had, that couldn't have been pleasant.
Let's just do what we came here to do and get out. Fran told them, she had heard their conversation over their mental link but had thankfully been able to suppress her imagination better than the other two had. I don't want to be here any longer than I have to be and I'm sure that's true of you two as well.
Amy and Liz managed to get their minds back on task as they headed deeper into Azkaban in search of Bellatrix Lestrange. Liz did wonder where all the human guards were, considering they'd only encountered dementors so far, but Amy explained that situation.
There are only five human guards on the island, I did a general search as we approached. There are two guards at the dock, one in some kind of office and the last two are on patrol around the edge of the island. Azkaban's inmates get fed once a day so we won't be running into any humans, especially not here in the high security section. There are too many dementors down here for a regular wizard to stand being around for a prolonged period of time. As they walked down the corridor, the three of them looked into the cells as they passed them, looking for heir target.
It was Fran who found her, lying in her cell and rolling around on the floor. She didn't look like she was conscious, good, that would make it easier for Len to slip seamlessly into her mind. Amy let Len down and focused on the mental connection the two shared as Len did what she was supposed to do.
Trying to ignore exactly what the contents of the dream Len was giving Bellatrix was, Amy focused on any information at all that she could glean from the mad woman. She did perk up when Bellatrix's vault was mentioned, hoping there was some way to get into it legally, but sighed when she found out they'd have to go about it the hard way.
Retreating from her mind, Harry teleported the lot of them out of there. They reappeared in an alley near to the Leaky Cauldron where Amy separated into Harry and Holly, there no longer being any need to hide in Amy's form. Harry turned to Liz and looked her right in the eye, or as well as he could with his blindfold in place.
"Right. We now know for certain that Helga Hufflepuff's cup is in Bellatrix Lestrange's vault. Unfortunately, we have no legal means of acquiring it. Even if the goblins knew they were keeping a horcrux in their bank, they are bound by treaty to not interfere with the contents of any vault. At least we have the vault number, that should make it easier to search the place at least. Will you go and look for the vault?" Harry asked his Lancer. "Remain in astral form the entire time though, just give me a mental call when you have found it and I'll teleport there and take care of it."
Liz nodded her head and dashed off towards the goblin controlled bank, Harry was simply wishing that the goblins never found out about this. Things would be bad if they did, that was for sure. "Right," Harry sighed. "I think we'd best be getting back to Hogwarts now. Goodness knows that it's been long enough for Granger to tell the whole school what's happened." He grumbled before disappearing off to Hogwarts.
xxxxx
It seemed that Granger had in fact managed to tell people about what had happened to them, the staff at least. Holly had scanned the wards and found that she was in the staffroom along with pretty much every adult in the castle. The only ones not in there were Filch, Pince, Trelawney and Hagrid.
"So what you're telling us, Miss Granger, is that after your accident with the time-turner, you ended up in an alternate reality about a year and a half in the future, Sirius Black is innocent, Ronald Weasley's pet rat is really Peter Pettigrew, Voldemort comes back to life, the Ministry denies it happening and, somehow, Mr Potter and his adopted grandfather managed to bring you back. Is that everything?" Dumbledore asked her.
Harry cursed to himself. That bit about Riddle 'coming back to life' was his best chance to off the bastard! Why couldn't Granger just keep her trap shut for once? Did she have some sort of psychological compulsion to tell adults everything? Well, it looked like that idea was blown out of the water, now what was he to do?
It was probably a good thing that he had his invisibility cloak on at the time, he was spying on a teacher's meeting after all. He had made sure to stand behind Dumbledore, out of his field of view, because he would probably have noticed the ever so slight magical aura that the cloak gave off.
Harry didn't reveal himself right then, instead he took a look at the professors in the room. Mcgonagall was sat slightly apart from the other professors and was the closest to Hermione. She looked rather happy to have her over-achieving student back, she'd probably try and issue another time-turner to the girl or something.
Flitwick looked happy Hermione was back as well but he did seem a little down as well, he did ask if Hermione knew where Harry was but she didn't have an answer for him. Once they had arrived at the Hogwarts gates, she had charged off towards the castle without looking back.
Babbling had a frown on her face. She was probably wondering what had caused the time sand to send them to a parallel world. Harry had taken a look at the two time-turners he had stolen from the Department of Mysteries and, despite how unstable the stuff was, it held no properties that would cause a shift in dimension by itself.
What Harry couldn't understand was why they used something as fragile as glass to hold the time sand? Saying that, a simple unbreakable charm would have prevented it breaking without any adverse affects. Where wizards really that stupid that they didn't put any safety measures on something like that? Then again, they had issued a device capable of time travel to a thirteen year old girl, not the most responsible thing in the world.
A glance towards Severus showed that he sported a rather noticeable sneer. The Potions Master most likely realised just how out of her depth Hermione had been. If they hadn't ended up in an alternate Hogwarts, and had Harry along with her, she would have been completely lost and clueless about what to do.
Sprout simply looked happy to have the students back, or at least one of them, but she was a rather gentle woman who was exceptionally motherly, that attitude was to be expected. She was the sort of woman to fuss over someone and help them with whatever troubles they might have, like a more tolerable Molly Weasley really.
Vector seemed to be trying to work out the Arithmancy behind travelling between worlds. A quick glance at what she was writing down showed that she was trying to puzzle out how the time sand had acted as a catalyst to the event by noting down the arithmetic properties of the unstable substance.
"Yes, that's exactly what I'm saying!" Hermione exclaimed. "Someone really needs to get a hold of the rat and then someone can cast the animagus reversal spell on it and that will show you that I am right, I'm telling the truth." Harry shook his head, this was really not the way to go about taking care of the rat. Imagine if the rat was nearby and had heard her, it would have a window of opportunity in which to flee rendering her statements useless.
Mcgonagall puffed up proudly, smiling at Hermione. "Very good, Miss Granger. For revealing this to us, I think you more than deserve twenty points. If we actually do manage to take Mr. Pettigrew into custody then I would imagine that an Order of Merlin, perhaps third class, could well be awarded to you."
"Really, Minerva?" Severus drawled. "Are we just going to ignore the fact that it was Miss Granger and her time-turner, a time-turner that you yourself convinced the Ministry to issue her, was the cause of the problems? Both her and Mr. Potter have been missing for two weeks now, and there is the fact that Mr Potter isn't here with us to tell us his side of the story."
"Actually, I am here." Harry said, coming out from under his cloak. "And there is no need to try and apprehend Peter Pettigrew, it has already been done. Right now, he is in the capable hands of Amelia Bones who, I'm sure, will see that justice is done."
Although most people in the room did jump quite a bit at his sudden appearance, none of them missed the distaste in his voice as he said the word 'justice'. To be honest, Harry didn't think much of 'justice' at all. Justice was a good idea in principal but it was all too often put in second or third place, behind money and influence. Justice was fluid, changeable, and meant different things to different people. If justice was the same to everyone then there would not be such a thing as a vigilante, there would simply be no need for even one of them then.
"Really, Mr. Potter?" Dumbledore asked, being one of the first to recover from the shock of the suddenly appearing hybrid. "I take it then that the other issues that Miss Granger has mentioned have also been taken care of?"
"Sirius Black is in a secure location, he will be handed over as soon as Peter Pettigrew is processed which shouldn't take more than a week or so. Was there anything else that needed addressing?" He looked around the room, seeing if anyone would put something forward.
"Yes, actually, there is. Miss Granger didn't give us much detail but she did say something about next years Defence Against the Dark Arts professor being a dead man under polyjuice potion or something like that. I don't suppose that you could give us any more information, perhaps something someone said to you when you weren't in Miss Granger's company?" Harry rolled his eyes behind his blindfold, it wasn't like he and Granger had spent much time at all in each other's company.
"I know a few things. One thing I can tell you is that, yes, Riddle did get brought back to life at the end of their fourth year. What I'm guessing she didn't tell you is that same resurrection is quite possibly the best chance there is off killing the man before things start getting out of hand." He replied blandly.
Mcgonagall scoffed. "What would you know about finishing off he-who-must-not-be-named? Albus is the only person that he has ever feared and only a freak accident allowed you to beat him as a baby." Harry was amused at what she said, but even more so by the looks the other staff members gave her. It seemed that she wasn't exactly popular with the other professors right now.
"What would I know about killing someone? No offence to you, headmaster," Harry nodded to Dumbledore who simply smiled back. "But I am no pacifist. Believe it or not, I actually do know what it takes to kill someone and I don't think that Riddle will be any tougher than a dead apostle." Riddle was not one of the ancestors, and even then Harry might, might, be able to take on one of the lower ranked ancestors at a pinch.
"Dead apostle?" Dumbledore queried, having never heard the term before. Harry waved him off though, not really wanting to explain the slip of the tongue. Besides, that wasn't the point of this discussion. What was the point was Harry's ability to kill Tom Marvolo Riddle, more commonly known as Lord Voldemort and some hyphenated nicknames, which he believed himself capable of.
Oh, don't get him wrong. Riddle probably know a whole host of spells, rituals and the like that Harry didn't. He was nearing seventy years old and Harry himself was thirteen, quite an age gap existed between them, so he had had far more time to learn magic than Harry had.
Harry's skills were focused on fighting and killing though. The Magecraft he had could all be put to lethal intent, so could most of the Wizardcraft skills he possessed. His staff, Prismakreuz, and his bow, Prismakante, were both designed with fighting in mind despite their ability to cast regular spells that could be used to wash dishes or clean carpets and things like that.
Heck, Harry was capable of speed, strength and reaction times that were well beyond human limits and that didn't include what he'd done to himself by carving runes into his bones and wrapping them in mithril. He hadn't had a chance to test himself yet but his physical abilities should have increased at least a little due to that, so he was an existence that specialised in fighting.
"Suffice to say, I am capable of killing him. Actually, the law is on my side if I were to kill him. As he was the one who personally killed the former head of house Potter without issuing a challenge of any kind, I am legally allowed to kill him and any who willingly follow him that have not been punished by the Wizengamot." Harry told her, his voice holding a cold edge of steel in it that made the Transfiguration professor flinch away from him.
There was some murmuring amongst the staff at Harry's declaration. Some of them seemed to accept what Harry was saying, people like Beth and Severus for example, but the majority seemed a little disturbed with how easily Harry spoke of killing someone, even if that person was the dark lord.
Dumbledore brought an end to the discussions though. "I think that this meeting has reached its conclusion. Minerva, do you think you could take Miss Granger and get her settled back in and ready for classes tomorrow? Mr Potter, I think you should come with me so we can discuss some of the things that have been mentioned. I have a pensieve in my office that may be rather useful, allowing me to see things as you did."
Harry wasn't fooled, Dumbledore obviously wanted to talk to him about some of the things Granger would have undoubtedly said before he turned up and interrupted her. He was also likely to want to get some answers about some of the other things that turned up. Nevertheless, Harry was fine with talking to Dumbledore alone in his office.
It wasn't like Harry didn't have any support with him. Holly was on his shoulder, Len was at his feet and Fran was at his side. Liz wasn't there right then but that was because she was currently making her way around Gringotts Bank, looking for Bellatrix Lestrange's vault and the cup within it.
xxxxx
Once in Dumbledore's office, Harry settled himself into a chair that he conjured across the desk from the headmaster. Neither of them spoke at first, merely looking at one another silently. Harry saw that Dumbledore's brow was furrowed as if he was thinking about something quite hard.
"The Clock Tower is not a part of this dimension, is it?" Dumbledore asked eventually. Harry was a little surprised by the question, having expected a number of others that the old man might have asked. He didn't show any signs of reacting though and simply replied with a question.
"Whatever gave you that idea?" He asked blandly. He watched as a small smile appeared on Dumbledore's face as the older man shook his head slightly, his long silvery-white hair and bead following the motion.
"Ah, forgive me, Harry. Perhaps at one point I would have almost demanded an answer, but things change as they always must. I suppose that I should thank you while I am at it. You see, I used to be so focused on Tom and stopping him that I started to get tunnel vision as it were. I was a bit manipulative, I still am but that's politics for you, and I saw you as the way to finally get rid of Tom. Last year you said something to me, something that made me step back and take a look at myself. I was... not happy with what I saw and most of it was centred around you." Dumbledore paused there, thinking over the words he wanted to use.
"At one point, I would have tried to remove you from your family, for no matter whether they are blood-related to you or not that is what they are to you, but that time has passed. Right now, I am merely a man that is getting on in years and it is you who has taken up the fight as it were. Both of the previous years, it has been you solving this schools problems. Quirrel in first year, and, whether you will admit it or not, you must have been the one to put a stop to the Chamber of Secrets issue as well." Harry looked at the older man before him, wondering where exactly this conversation was going.
"What are you trying to say, headmaster? Where is this conversation going?" He asked curiously, wondering what the point of all of this rambling was.
"Ah, excuse me. Old men like me do tend to loose ourselves in our words sometimes, don't pay me any mind. Over the last two weeks, since you and Miss Granger disappeared, there has been much talk about you both. One thing that has turned up is your seeming boredom in class, how you always push yourself further and further ahead of everyone else. You don't intend to stay at Hogwarts much longer, do you? No, perhaps you don't intend to stay in this world at all either." Harry raised an eyebrow behind his blindfold.
"One thing I noticed in Miss Granger's story was how easily the man named Zelretch transported people between worlds. It was far too easily done, and far too confidently, to be a first for him. There was also how unsurprised you were at the change in worlds, an indicator that it was normal for you. That is part of what makes me think that your 'Clock Tower' is in another reality." Harry just sighed.
"Apart from the location of where I live, whether it is in this reality or not, is there something else you want to discuss?" Harry asked again, not exactly comfortable with the conclusions that Dumbledore had come to.
"There were several things during Miss Granger's story telling that caught my attention. I managed to distract most of the staff from the majority of them but not everyone is so easily led. One example of this is what that world's Remus Lupin said about you not being human and the great difference in appearance between you and your alternate."
Harry stiffened slightly, eyeing Dumbledore carefully as he continued to talk. "Being as observant as you are, I'm sure that you have realised that none of the other students in this school have anything other than human blood in them. Of course, there are rumours of families having non-human blood in them but it isn't really counted more than seven or so generations back. The rumours would also be difficult to prove without the consent of the people in question, something they would obviously not give."
"What are you trying to say?" Harry asked Dumbledore.
"Nothing really." The headmaster replied. "Given the fact that I have a part-goblin on staff as well as a werewolf should tell you that I am most definitely not prejudiced. The thing is, when Remus was a student here, we had to hide his lycanthropy from everyone else because of how negative opinions of it can be. I did manage to hit Miss Granger with a tongue-tying hex and a mild confundus charm so she won't want to talk about her disappearance much but I think we need to get these issues out in the open."
Dumbledore sighed and he seemed to go from looking old to looking positively ancient. "The best way for a secret to be kept is for the subject of the secret to not be there. From what I hear, you could be bumped up to seventh year next year, skipping sixth year like you did third and fourth, if you wanted to. There is also... a few other things that we should probably discuss."
"Is this about the prophecy?" Harry asked. Dumbledore looked surprised. "Oh, I kind of sneaked into the alternate realities Department of Mysteries and replaced that prophecy with a fake. Also, here's a time-turner to replace the one Granger broke. Things are hard enough for muggle-borns in the Wizarding World without her having a black mark on her record. It'll be the last thing I ever do for her though, stupid little girl can't seem to keep her bloody mouth shut." That last bit was muttered under his breath.
"I see." Dumbledore seemed a little bemused at receiving a time-turner from another world but he put it away in his desk nonetheless. "I think you night be amused at hearing of how Minerva has become, well, rather unpopular amongst the staff over the last fortnight. She did try blaming you for what happened, but Filius corrected her. I think she just wanted to have Lily's and James' child in her house and is not pleased that, not only are you not hers, but you consistently outperform her own best student."
Harry chuckled. "Oh yes, that makes me feel so much better." He mumbled sarcastically. "Now, unless you're going somewhere with all of this, there is something I'd like to say. No matter how long it takes, or how much effort, or the risk involved, I will kill Riddle."
Dumbledore sighed. "I understand that, prophecy or not, you would do exactly that, but it's not that simple. Given how he survived your encounter when you were fifteen months old and your other encounter in first year, there must be something keeping him around."
To the headmaster's surprise, Harry laughed at him. "Horcruxes perhaps?" Dumbledore was, quite understandably startled at Harry knowing about that particular titbit of information. "Don't worry, there are only two of them left and a friend of mine is heading in the direction of one of them now. The other will not be difficult to retrieve, having already been taken from its initial resting place already."
Dumbledore smiled slightly. "Ah, I see that you are once again a few steps ahead of me. You are truly something else, Harry, and I do hope you visit once you leave us. I have made many mistakes with you and if there is anything I can do to help you, please let me do so."
Harry smiled at Dumbledore. This was a man who he could respect and it had been quite something to see the changes that had taken place since their initial meeting when he first arrived at Hogwarts. He nodded to the old headmaster in a show of respect and acknowledgement before going to stand up.
"Before you go, Harry, there's something I think I should give you. Whether you think yourself prepared to face Tom in battle or not, it is never a bad idea to stack the deck in your favour whenever possible." Harry looked on curiously as Dumbledore held his own wand out for Harry to take.
"Your wand?" He asked, curiously. He of course knew that it was the elder wand, the only Deathly Hallow he didn't keep on himself, but did Dumbledore really know what he was giving up? By the smile on his face, Harry would guess so.
"Now, now. I think that you might actually know what this is. I know that you've checked the tales of Beedle the Bard out of the library, probably while researching your cloak or something. If anyone should be responsible for the Deathly Hallows, you would be high on my list. You are more flexible than I could ever be but you also adhere to your own morals, despite them being looser than my own. Your cloak, passed down from your father is another but, alas, the stone has been long lost to us." Harry decided to let Dumbledore know a little something then.
"Perhaps not." He whispered as he took the elder wand with one hand and teleported the resurrection stone into the other. He did get a sense of amusement out of seeing Dumbledore's eyebrows shoot into his hair at the sight of the small black stone. He made it disappear though when he saw a slight look of longing enter those aged eyes.
"Perhaps not indeed." Dumbledore said. "I think that my previous statement remains true though, you are one of the few who might be able to bear the Deathly Hallows and not fall to their temptation." Harry didn't tell him exactly what the Hallows were or about Death herself, it wasn't necessary for him to know the truth about that.
"You say that next year is the best opportunity to put a final end to Tom, do you?" Dumbledore asked and Harry nodded. "Then I believe that I will assist you in your endeavour and make conditions as similar to this alternate reality as possible. Miss Granger's incomplete tale should prove to be a bit of an obstacle but I believe that I can overcome it. Now, I think I will let you retire for now. It was good to speak with you, Harry."
Smiling, Harry replied. "You too, Albus." Before he departed from the office and headed off to his own tower. He kept his attention on the mental connection between himself and Liz, waiting for when she found Bellatrix vault and the cup within.
xxxxx
"This is it? This is the second last horcrux?" Altrouge asked as she looked at the cup on the table they were all sat around. They were in the Clock Tower, avoiding Harry's home in Fuyuki for now. While Black was there, which he would be until Pettigrew's guilt was announced, which would probably happen in the next few days, Harry didn't exactly want to see him.
Harry really didn't know what he was supposed to feel towards Sirius Black. In that other world, he had been a kind of joking uncle to the other Harry, an older but also childish adult who cared about him and was a good person to speak to about anything he wanted to.
The problem was that Sirius really didn't fit into this Harry's life at all well. Euryale had told him about how Sirius seemed to be flirting with anything that had two legs and boobs since he'd gotten there and even she was getting irritated by it. Harry understood that Sirius was feeling rather free, not needing to hide as he had, but he was being rather over the top about it.
"Yes, it's the penultimate horcrux." Harry replied. "That is, as long as Riddle didn't actually make his pet snake into one as well further down the line. There's some interesting additions to the regular defences on this cup. A duplication and burning charm that's activated by touch. Not difficult to remove but annoying if set off because it would cause quite a chain reaction."
"What about the last one, what's that?" Arcueid asked, her red eyes examining the golden cup curiously. "How long would it take to retrieve that and how difficult would reaching it be? I know that you said there are no defences that can really stop an astralised Servant, but surely there will be some sort of guard over some of the horcruxes."
Harry snorted. "There was. The locket, which is the last one we have to retrieve, was guarded by an absolute horde of inferi, they're kind of like ghouls or simple dead, but it was removed from that location by one Regulus Black." Harry noted the raised eyebrows and chuckled. "Yes, the house-elf gave me quite an interesting story about that. Anyway, the locket resides, if this world is the same as the other, at number twelve Grimmauld place, the ancestral home of the Black family."
"So Sirius Black is the one who can gain access to the place, seeing as he is the last remaining Black." Aoko said, nodding her head before seeming to remember something. "Oh, by the way, me and Zelretch have finished your sword and shield for you."
Harry looked up in interest and was soon presented with the items in question. The shield was large and circular, it had a diameter that was around three-quarters to four fifths of Harry's height. Putting it on his arm, Harry was surprised how light it was, despite its great size. It was black and embossed with an emblem of crossed feathers, a rather interesting. There was also a few rune arrays etched into the back of the shield which surprised Harry, he knew that Aoko absolutely hated runes because it was something she associated with her sister.
The sword was different though, he was almost afraid to pick it up. A quick look at it would have shown that it was fairly long for a one-handed sword but too short to be a two-handed blade. Perhaps a hand-and-a-half would be the best descriptor for it. It was a dark red in colour and there seemed to be a thin strip of metal embedded in either side of the blade for some reason. There was also a black jewel set into the pommel of the sword. Harry picked it up and could almost feel the mystery in the blade, this was most certainly a blade meant to kill.
"Dare I ask how this blade was made?" Harry asked and almost jumped in surprise as he saw a small crackle of electricity dance along the metal strip on the side of the blade.
"Well, we tried to create as potent a mystery as we could and that means old materials are best, powerful ones even more so. The blade itself is made from the bones of Stheno and Euryale, but different to how we made your scythe. Rather than removing a small amount of bone and having it soak up enough skele-gro to make it large enough to form into a weapon, we went the other way. We removed bones from them then regrew them, meaning that the bones were as old as they could be." Zelretch explained.
Altrouge then took over. "We needed more than that to make it strong though, more mystery, so we soaked it in all of our blood. My blood, Arcueid's, Zelretch's, Stheno's, Euryale's, Len's and even Sasha's. All of that blood is what stained it that colour. We then proceeded to soak it in as much Gorgon and Basilisk venom as we could, having that soak into the bone too."
Aoko then spoke up. "That wasn't to make the blade deadly though, despite the fact it was already pretty much instantly lethal to a human, and we wanted to give it some sort of ability that would make it seem like a Noble Phantasm. We took inspiration from your little Berserker there, Fran, and decided to use electricity. Those two strips of metal embedded in the blade will be where the electricity originates from but that gem in the pommel will be what soaks up ambient mana to convert into the necessary electricity."
Arcueid then spoke up. "That won't be how you fight though. Even if your fighting someone at your own level or below, brute strength isn't your style and, seeing as how you will not have the speed advantage you usually do, we added a little something extra. Your Saber imitation is very defensive so the sword will follow that trend. It won't be much, and will only count for something once it accumulates, but every strike will siphon off a little of your opponent's prana which will further charge the jewel on the sword."
"Of course, Aoko has also done what she does and made it as unbreakable as she could as well. A swords no good if if it breaks after a single strike." Zelretch told him with a smile before becoming as serious as anyone had ever seen him. "Be careful during the Grail War, Harry, seriously. We know that you are going to do this yourself but I want you to promise me something, promise me that you will do all that you can to stay alive and well. None of us want to lose you, so look after yourself, okay?"
Harry looked around at everyone and smiled warmly at them. "I promise to do all that I can to make sure that I will stay alive. I will also promise to do my best to keep everyone who fights alongside me alive and well too, that I swear." He told them.
Waver ruffled his hair. "That's all we ask of you, Harry, that's all we ask."
xxxxx
Harry simply stared at the person in front of him, glared might actually be a better way of putting it. He had gone to sleep, not expecting anything to happen, and now he found himself in the bloody void again, right in front of Death. Of course, his glare might have been more effective if his blindfold wasn't in the way.
"Okay." He said. "What am I doing here this time? I did not actively enter that portal in my mind and, as far as I know, sleep-walking through a mental portal is just something that's not done."
Death seemed amused at his irritation. "You are an odd one, young one. Normally, people don't take that tone with me on the rare occasions that they do actually meet me but, once again, you're different. Hmm. I see that you now carry all three of those artefacts on you, those Deathly Hallows. It is a little odd looking at them like this because, while they are made to be representative of me, I've never really had much to do with the items myself. Now I am feeling a little curious, something I have not been for a long time."
"Great, I'm so overjoyed that I can conjure up these feelings in you." Harry snapped off irritably. "Now, can you please tell me what I am doing here?" He asked. While Harry might not sleep much, he does like his sleep and can be rather grouchy when it gets interrupted.
"What are you doing here? Why, I have a little something I want to try. Considering your nature and the fact that you bear all three of my Hallows from your world, I think there might be a little something that I can do for you." Death told him, the wicked smile on her face not helping her case at all.
Harry eyed her warily. "Why do I get the feeling that I'm not going to have a say in whether you try to do whatever it is you want to try and do. Also, if I did say yes then I would feel like I'm making a deal with the Fae, all of their deals are supposed to be like a double-edged sword in their most benign forms."
Death nodded her head and her smirk grew even more evil looking. "Correct, you aren't getting an option. However, I can say that you will come out all the better for it if it works, that should ease your mind a little. As for the Fae, don't be so quick to judge. They only mess around with humans because they like to see interesting things happen and you're already very interesting." She snorted, "You're probably one of the few people there are that can approach the Fae without having to be constantly alert. Oh, they'll try and mess with you for certain, but you already hold their interest."
Harry sighed and shook his head. "I really don't think that's good thing." He looked at death. "Well, are you going to get on with whatever it is your doing or are you just going to leave me to float around here?" He asked her irritably, just wanting to get this all over and done with. He began to regret his hasty words as she got closer to him, her not very comforting smile growing broader and broader.
