Karl examined his potential foe. Rookwood had spent over a decade in Azkaban; less than two years should have been sufficient to scramble anyone's brains into pickled toads, but this wizard moved in a sure manner defying such a conclusion. His eyes were sharp, intelligent, taking in everything while giving away nothing. Of course his physique was poor – even a steady regimen of nutritional supplements for the past two months couldn't have restored a decade of starvation. But the mind, that seemed intact. It's what made him dangerous in the last conflict, there was little doubt it was why he'd returned.
"You are not surprised to see me, Unspeakable." Rookwood's expensive robes hung on a gaunt frame. Before his incarceration he'd been a large man. Now the height remained but the heft had fled, another form of sacrifice to a servant of the Dark Lord, if one were of such flights of fancy. His eyes made a leisurely circuit across the Unspeakable's body. "You are responsible for the departure of my associates."
Karl tilted his head to one side, continuing to continue studying the man. His hood carried charms to mask voices, but why bother speaking when combat would arise? No misapprehension would deter the man believed to have been Lord Voldermort's right hand man.
Certainty in his veins, Karl drew the colichemarde, bringing it around in a salute.
"Of course," a tired quality entered Rookwood's voice. Despite the weariness evident, the ex-Unspeakable's wand already was present. "No intelligent conversation. Just blood and pain. You know, I'd hoped for at least a little dialogue. A touch of the old brilliance I'd once come to expect."
Karl shrugged, setting his wand in the Bereit defence. "Perhaps you should have come earlier. It is a little dead around here now."
Faint whispers of sand curled around his hand; his sword tilted in response, cold iron deflecting the invisible spell Rookwood had sent. Motionless, wordless incantations – hallmarks of a true master of the Mind. His own motions were accelerated by the gliding whispers of sand, simultaneously pushing forward while holding back, guiding the narrow blade into perfection.
Rookwood smiled, but the expression never reached his eyes. Calculations ran through their depths, analyzing data, disregarding extraneous information. "Temporal Division, are you? I rarely encountered your people. A good reputation they had; smart, practical. How are they in combat though? Rumors pit them as the best the Departments had to offer."
A minor Schub put the older man on the defensive, wand spinning a defensive tactic. Twisting into the complementary Abwenden stance parried another invisible attack, but Rookwood was already learning. The deflected spell threw steam into the air once it struck a spilled pipe, changing the battlefield with the new fluid.
Karl directed a wordless reflector against the gas, redirecting its flow to the traitor's side. While performing the spell, the edge of his cloak smoked, a successful defense against some spell; once more invisible in the dark. He brought up his blade once again in response to the faint touches of sand brushing against his skin, ethereal bursts of his craft guiding the dull-gray blade against the attacks.
Thirty seconds later, Karl realized the pattern. A spell shattered against his blade, splintering into green shards, but he was already spell-swatting the next identical attack from a second angle. Split-seconds later a pair of miniscule hexes arched overhead, gouging furrows in black stone.
He waited a full second, then turned sideways. This time five needles of jet-black force hissed by, the curse of their passing leaving a faint stench of sulfur.
Taking a risk, Karl lobbed a vial at the floor, throwing off Rookwood's next sequence. The resulting eight rays of multi-colored light exploded in all directions, each avoiding their caster. But unsuccessful as the magic had been, it confirmed his fears.
'Fibonacci Fusillade,' a combat spell-chain credited to a squib Arithmancer in the Kosala Kingdom. It had been the idiot's only successful contribution advancing magic, the rest of his efforts had relied on various means to enforce non-existent beings to create baked confections. But it was a formidable concept, splitting one's concentration in ever-finer points to direct magic in an increasing number. Only a true Occlumens Grandmaster could pull off such a tactic past the sixth iteration – and Rookwood had just performed the very move with minimal effort. 'Flattering. He considers me such a threat? Risk another Time-Jump or stay to deal …?'
Another pair of single spells rocketed past in short order, followed by a dual-branching burst of forked lightning. Karl shrugged his robes together in front, catching the energy on his sword while touching the wall with his wand. The power flowed across his robes and into the water spraying in Rookwood's direction, arcs of electricity forcing the servant of the Dark Lord back.
Showing evidence of the consummate professional he'd once been, Rookwood redirected the returned burst into yet another attack. Remnants of the blue-tinged whiteness grew red, flames splitting into a triple-prong mockery of a trident.
Facts clicked into position. Their alignment with morality and survival correlated to hints of the issues Chrono-solipsism caused, a complex set of esoteric statements if there ever were any. He accelerated full Occlumency to the Seventh level, slowing time in the brief moment available – he felt he could achieve the Eighth level, but that would wait for another time. If there was another time. Literally.
'Fact One: Rookwood is able to cast a Fibonacci with little effort. Stopping his concentration is taking too much time, and strength. Two confirmed castings, three or four probable.'
'Fact Two: Chrono-solipsism requires close-proximity jumps, not the distances I've used. Unless it's just getting too close together overall. An Event? Possible, probable even.'
'Fact Three: I will die if I do not do something. Malfoy and LeStrange are conventional, if cruel. Rookwood has esoteric approaches, plus that damnable Occlumency.'
'Fact Four: What must be done is obvious. It will hurt. It will risk rending reality.'
Mentally, Karl slapped himself; the effect ricocheting across the multiple personalities overseeing his actions. Exponential irritation responded, pointing out an available tactic, if of doubtful strategic value.
'Final Analysis: This is going to suck.'
Karl withdrew the two steps his brief vacation from reality had shown, slapping the Time-Turner against its receptacle on his off-hand greave. The safety clicked off, ringing in his senses like the knell of eternity.
"Oh? Will I get to see the legendary techniques of the Chrono-mages?" Rookwood's calm words came through the sudden increase in spellwork. A necrotic enchantment scorched Karl's robe, followed by three different variations of the flamma school. Two fire whips appeared and disappeared, distracting from the jet of near-invisible flame extending ten feet from his wand-tip. Invisible spellwork buffeted Karl's robes like blades of invisible steel.
As the fire struck, Karl tilted his off-hand, trickling a few grains of sand into the hourglass's narrow neck. A matching sensation ran across his limbs, and he found himself watching Rookwood wind back to launch his fire-whip combination at his earlier unmoving self. Karl took advantage of the opening, putting the safety back on the Time-Turner, tossing a vial at Rookwood's feet.
The former Unspeakable responded, inhuman reflexes sending him leaping over the toxic cloud erupting underfoot. At the same time Karl saw the earlier version of himself vanish – just as a group of five spells exploded into everything.
Another jet of flame stretched towards Karl, spreading wide across the hall, bright orange in color this time. It was certain that Rookwood could've made a more dangerous hall-wide burst, but that took more power. Perhaps the elder mage had yet to fully recover from his incarceration?
Karl grimaced, tilting his wrist again, vanishing a few seconds into the past. Once more he reappeared behind Rookwood, flicking yet another vessel at the dark wizard's body. Before the ex-Unspeakable could respond, he vanished from sight under the influence of his robe's cloaking capacity, appearing further down the hall to toss a minor oil conjuration on the floor. The slick stuff spread from wall-to-wall, catching fire from the bursts the older wizard was putting out. There was just enough time for him to reposition his blade, swiping aside the spellfire.
"Impressive." Rookwood's voice had lost what little emotion it possessed. Using higher Occlumency disciplines tended to rob one of that quality. Prisoners of Azkaban were known to achieve that without Occlumency. "A classic response; you have studied your Agrippa."
Karl had to ascend another mental gradient just to keep up with the next burst. Rookwood's attacks were branching out with mathematical precision, lancing through ever-increasing permutations across the room. Variables shuddered into existence, changing reality before the situation they themselves created was destroyed by the next data-set, expanding into greater conundrums he just couldn't solve.
A twist kept Karl alive for another range of heartbeats, but he lacked the power to respond in a true refutation. Rookwood held limited reserves from his time in Azkaban, but even at his lowest he still exceeded Karl. Were he fresh it could have been a different story, but this was not the time.
'Can't do another long jump.' Karl observed a different version of himself ghost through a wall – a path he'd not taken. 'Every jump is pushing the boundaries, I've gone back too many times. Maybe one more …?'
A ghostly image of himself leading a group of school children stampeded across the hall, breaking his concentration. Clever spells penetrated the gap, throwing Karl into the next corridor, where he landed back-first, wheezing for air. Out of air, possessing even less time, he took the only variable left that didn't involve sacrifices to metaphysical concepts magic alone only knew in full.
"Ad inspiratione Noctifer!" he took the vial occupying the lowest position in his bandoleer, and threw it. His spell moved through the air like a sportsman struggling through deep water, a vast energy trove breaching the resistance.
The tiny vial floated through the center of the disruption, contents glowing like lightning.
Ignoring finesse, Karl just pointed his wand at it. "Bört!"
It shot across the hall into the next where Rookwood conducted a miniature symphony of spells, hundreds twisting around his haggard frame. Karl could see the traitor's eyes grow wide, and a vast number of multi-colored lights redirect themselves into the object's path.
Karl had just enough time to flick the greave one last time before the effervescent explosion ripped through the space his body would have occupied.
The action of time travel took little energy on the part of the traveler. Records suggested versions where individuals sent their minds to past-selves, eliminating the existential threat of seeing one's self at the risk of a potentially incredible cost. For Karl, slipping through Time's passages reminded him of standing upright in a windstorm, images flashing past.
Most times it was a calming experience, individuals gliding backwards while clocks spun counterclockwise and the stellar bodies moved in opposition to natural order. This though ….
Currents of time buffeted past selves, tossing cognitive threads aside like a hurricane. Scattered visuals paraded in all directions. The same school children from before spread before his eyes, a red-haired young man falling under the touch of a skepsivore, while a blonde girl with a familiar sense of fashion duel-wielded two wands. A black-haired young man fired simplistic spells with impressive power, flinging bolts a trained Unspeakable would find difficult to repel.
Massive reservoirs of magical power billowed as an old man in colorful robes appeared, wand raised against – a man-snake – ? Smoke billowed, smelling of ozone, too uneven for magical source ….
More actions were commencing, but Karl couldn't absorb them before the temporal effect stopped, slamming him into the floor, rolling and sliding out of control. His robes protected his back from friction burns, but one gauntlet absorbed too much energy from the chaotic anomaly that was his most recent time-jump, lost somewhere in the vague currents of time. As a result, his left hand was scraped against every inch of stone until momentum brought the entire painful journey to a stolid conclusion.
Karl took a moment, reconsidering his choice in career, then began checking himself. Without moving the affected members, if possible. 'Arms? Intact. Legs? Bruised, intact. Ribs? Very much bruised. Intact.'
He shook himself, double-checking. Yes, everything appeared to be in place. A careful look around the area revealed no trace of Rookwood. Understandable, after a random Time Jump flare. When was the last time such a mistake had occurred? He wondered at that; with the mental situations, the altered histories he was seeing, was this truly a mistake, or was the limit bordering reality and time beginning to crack?
He checked his timepiece … and almost fell down once more. 'One hour, into the Future? That's impossible, no one has ever gone forward. Maybe I fell unconscious for an hour, or maybe there's a dilation effect on the last Jump … that's just a theory though … right?'
Unwilling fingers tapped the reflective surface on the watch itself; it held few charges, and he hated to waste it on something so mundane as this, but … "M.I.R.R.O.R.: Verify local timepiece integrity."
The tiny connection fired off the query and gained a response in real-time. "Sir, the portable flux-stabilizer is out-of-sync with the base unit. Please verify its physical conditions."
Karl tilted his arm up, examining the casing. "M.I.R.R.O.R.: All external surfaces appear normal. No corrosion, no dents, I can't even see discoloration."
The reflective surface paused, processing the data. "Then I must congratulate you sir. You are the first known wizard in all recorded history to travel forward in time by non-standard rates, which is a much better explanation for your prior sixty-minute lack of existence than being kidnapped by the golems. Shall I submit a report?"
It was a tough question. By sending in such a report Karl would gain an enormous amount of political capital, not to mention resource access. But that ran counter to the goal held since graduation: freedom. "No. Write the report, but refrain from sending it, in accordance to Temporal Directive Section Five, part Three.
"Acknowledged." This was not the first delayed report it had filed. "M.I.R.R.O.R. out."
Karl rose to his feet once more, looking around. This was the Doors Chamber, the nexus connecting all of the Department's divisions. One could travel through long halls and staircases, but the Doors linked levels and passages, reducing a fifteen-minute walk to three. They were like his office's door in that way, but stronger, with greater enchantments devoted to stability and switching capacity. As a joke, an Unspeakable more cunning than wise had once placed an obscure Confundus on the doorways, set to be active after hours. The Department was filled with such tricks designed by bored employees, but this one was left in place as a sort of Rite of Passage to neophyte Unspeakables.
While the spinning doorways made of orichalcum provided ample security, there were times when more was needed. Helping the user forget what was hidden behind each recently-accessed door made for a tiny, almost inconsequential security improvement. But it worked. No less than five would-be thieves had been caught, endlessly spinning the doorways all night, attempting to be clever, leaving no trace behind. It worked well.
Except … there were markings on some of the doors now. Flaming orange lines, blazing away in X-shaped patterns, and the Sealed Portal bore scars along its borders as if made by a potent disintegration hex.
'Smart,' he considered the scrape marks. The healing properties inherent to the doorways already had removed a good portion of the marks, he believed. But this indicated Death Eater work, and by intelligent agency no less. One palm smacked into his forehead. 'Stupid.'
He marched back to the nearest wall, placing his gloved palm against its runic interface. It pulsed under his demand, resisting the lack of authority – was his freedom beginning already? Once the bonds connecting an Unspeakable to the Department began to fray ….
Data poured back, fighting though his mental barriers. Too much data, there were no other Unspeakables present, no one to help process the information, nothing to buffer the raw data streaming through the entire building. Karl could make out glimpses of relevant points; fighting in a Chamber, school children grouped in a defensive huddle against murderers that had killed longer than their collective existence conjoined. More information cascaded across the link, jamming itself into his consciousness – project reports, facts of odd projects, surveillance networks ….
He shook himself. It was too much, even for an Occlumens such as himself. But if he lowered his shields a bit, focused on enhancing processing with minimal shielding, it should be fine.
Should be could have been the definition of every error known to mankind.
As soon as Karl let his shields down, the sensation of sand fell across his entire consciousness like a tidal wave. Oven-hot waves roiled into the room, matched only by the howling gales of Arctic cold blasts. Sand rested on every continent and beyond, from the unseen depths of the ocean to alien landscapes even the best golems could perambulate for a mere matter of months. All of the sensations he'd felt before, but never all at once.
'Monsieur Karl, welcome to the Académie des Mystères,' a dark-robed figure shook his hand warmly. Summer sunshine poured on them both, the famed Eiffel Tower rising from the background as if greeting his arrival. Other people strolled past, lovers arm in arm, children shouting in joy at just existing. 'Your prowess in infiltration is considered the best in ze world!'
Everything shifted. Shadows darker than a moonless night billowed from the Arch. Gaunt hands reached from its depths, seeking the one promised. 'Unspeakable, where is our prey? Where is he?'
A boy, sixteen years of age, with terrible eyesight and a torn jacket stumbled into his path. Wild eyes took in his appearance before widening still further, a clear sign of panic. His wand came up, pointed directly at Karl's chest, 'Reducto!'
The Door Chamber. Sometimes known as the Janus Room, or Wandering Pathways. Janus was the two-faced god of decisions, each offering the virtues of their selected path, neither granting assurance. People that entered the Chamber unwittingly put themselves under his power, just as every muggle entering an elevator granted themselves the rare privilege of Choice. Every doorway held potential, every lock hindered the same.
Karl held onto his sanity with practiced ease. This was a continuation of the issue he'd started to notice back at the Tonks residence. Abuse Temporal Magic too much, force your own magic through its depths too many times, in weak places, and it began to forget. Over a dozen Time Skips in one area pushed the limits.
A thousand doors opened, all in one spot. Dark-haired teenagers with bad eyesight peeked out, except when it was a brunette with an intelligent look, or a blonde with a poor sense of fashion. Variables, opportunities – just one change could alter reality, did a mind decide on manners, letting the lady go first? Or had an eccentric thought derailed an intended goal? Long-running experiments, older than most of the ghosts that dwelt in the Un-Living department – thank you Unequal Rites Movement – those experiments failed to include all factors. Magic cared for variables, and was classified as Infinite, like the Great Forces of Gravity and the Transfigurative Powers of London Forces. Mortal minds failed to comprehend the infinite, including –
Karl crashed his Occlumency barriers back into place. His hand registered an absence of contact, explained when he saw it falling away from the runic contact. Even now he could still sense the agitated magics in the room, reacting to … to … whatever it was causing the discrepancies. Years of experience told him that the Event was coming soon, was within an hour, or less. If he were smart, he'd leave the Department completely, get out while the doors hung open and the cash box sat unlocked. Every second delayed meant another opportunity to leash him in stronger chains, this time turning him into a robot in the truest sense of the word.
Robot, after all, was another word for forced labor, or slave.
More variables ran through his mind. There were intruders – Top-tier Death Eaters, each capable of dueling a pair of Auror combat teams to a standstill, including the brutal Hit Wizards. Bellatrix Lestrange laughed at entire squads of ten, toying with their efforts.
"M.I.R.R.O.R.: How many Death Eaters were seen?" he kept his focus on the Prophecies door.
"If including the first group, approximately twelve. Known adversaries include Lord Malfoy, Lady Lestrange, Lord Lestrange, Count Lestrange, Executioner Mulciber – "
"Enough," Karl shook his head. At minimum, he'd need two dozen Hit Wizards, but the force-multipliers in the form of Bellatrix and the mental prowess of Mulciber and Rookwood suggested nothing less than fifty. How could one wizard take on such a thing?
A faint scream echoed from behind one of the doors, rising in pitch.
Time stopped. 'That was a girl's scream. After hours. Karl, you pathetic fool. The only thing certain about heroism is the expensive funeral afterwards.'
Despite himself Karl reached into the pouch, withdrawing a pair of eye-protectors. Against Rookwood alone, who specialized in Occlumency, they were unneeded. But against a group of wizards that held Masteries in offensive mental disciplines? The smoked glass, enchanted to resist probes, would be downright irreplaceable.
Wand drawn, sword drawn, Karl breathed a quick prayer. Then he moved in.
The Time Room. A place where he'd found solace, the freedom to live beyond himself, and master travel through what common wizards lacked the ability to even conceptualize. The majority of hardware was missing, safe in his bags, but there were still obsolete bits remaining, like the entertaining Egg/Bird Belljar.
This, however, wasn't the point. Or the same way it had been when he'd left it.
Two school-age youngsters were fighting there, as if their lives depended upon it. A short brunette gestured at one of the Death Eaters, his silver mask firmly in place. Pure silence surrounded the mask, altering the sounds echoing around the room. Based on the fury blazing in the masked man's eyes, he lacked skill in defenses, forcing him to resort to silent casting.
Karl performed a near-perfect lunge, catching the hex on the tip of his Sand-touched blade. Cold iron rang, deflecting the magic into the air, vanishing into the ceiling's null field. The natural follow-up put his blade deep in the Death Eater's frame, runes along its length flaring as they overrode the robe's protection. Mundane iron, or even steel, could be given enchantments without making the blade inherently magical – iron and magic did not mix in the best of conditions. Enhanced iron? Far more so.
The faint whisper of fabric on marble flooring alerted Karl to the presence of another robe-wearing servant of the Dark Lord. He jerked down, rotating the blade as he did, making the wound as painful as possible. Crimson magic sparked overhead, slicing into the injured Death Eater's mask, cracking its height.
"You bastard!" the second Death Eater ignored everything but Karl. "Rod! You dead?"
His blade swept around in a parry, freeing his wand-arm. Taking advantage of that liberation, Karl launched a trio of piercing hexes. The spell, while low-powered, had the advantage of rapidity, striking the same place in quick succession.
The second Death Eater hissed in pain, launching a wide-angle cutting charm in return.
Karl became aware of an aura, sandy magic washing over his flank, a sensation he'd grown to associate with painful magic. He twisted, tilting his left arm just enough to spill a few grains back through the Time-Turner. Rather than perform an actual Time-Skip the maneuver functioned to slow time's progress, not quite negating true flow. Its end result gave Karl a few extra moments to react.
He threw one of his last two knives, slipping its width under the silvery mask's lower lip. Following up with a Hammerfell curse drove the man's head upwards and back, skidding into the wall.
Silence fell into the Time Room, a soft ticking from the wall clocks sounding like granules of time, sliding down the glass of some infinite timepiece. Karl checked the second fallen body, then the first. It drew shallow breaths, gasping in futile effort to retain its grip on life.
Just as he angled his colichemarde for the coup de grâce, a shrill voice spoke up. "You're not going to just kill him, are you?"
Karl paused, he'd forgotten about the two young folk. Keeping a wary eye on the still-breathing figure, he rose to his feet. "Unspeakable Fifteen-Orange Sigma, Temporal Division. Is this … person … a friend of yours?"
The black-haired youth shook his head vigorously. Karl noticed he held a glowing sphere in one hand, likely from the Hall of Prophecies. Interesting. "Um … n-no sir! He's a Death Eater, was trying to kill us!"
"Good." Karl looked down, then rammed his blade home.
The brunette's shriek filled the room. "Why did you do that? He couldn't hurt anyone!"
With his blade, Karl broke the enchantments protecting the dead wizard's face. It fell off in a wisp of smoke, showing a brutish visage, scarred and cruel. "Rodolphus Lestrange. Convicted Death Eater, eighty life sentences, no parole. At a guess," he nodded at the other corpse, "That is Rabastan Lestrange. Ninety life sentences. Murder. Rape. Grand theft. Treason. Two of those are automatic death sentences."
"Yes, but," she looked upset. "You could've gotten informa – Luna! She's hurt! Harry, we have to help Luna!"
The dark-haired man nodded. "Definitely." He looked up at Karl, dark gaze finding his eyes. "Will you help us, Unspeakable?"
Thoughts of escape, of research in a different climate, tempted his thoughts. But to leave them behind for the sake of his art, while attractive, would make him little better than the man lying at his feet. Karl gave a shrug in return. "Where is she?"
"They," the younger man corrected, striding back towards the door. "Luna, Ginny, Neville and Ron. We came to rescue my godfather, but it was a trap. We scattered after getting out of that Prophecy place."
"The Hall of Prophecies," Karl corrected absently. He reached for the runic cluster inset to the wall, but hesitated. After the last occurrence, it might be better to rely on his wits. And possibly his own work. Instead, he raised his wrist. "M.I.R.R.O.R. : Hall update."
A silvery voice responded with gratifying swiftness. "Sir, I regret to inform you that the Solar Array is under attack, the Skepsivore tank is agitated beyond belief, and there are unstable signatures entering the Department."
He cocked his hood at the teenagers. "Friends of yours?"
They shrugged.
"Maintain surveillance on the new signatures, Yew-fifteen clear." He let his wand assume a more ready posture, walking towards the door. "Both of you, stay behind me. When spells begin to spark, find cover."
The young man looked insulted. "I can fight too! Didn't you see me there?"
"Yes." Karl said flatly. "I saw a young man that, while powerful, still lacks combat training. Neither of you spotted Rodolphus's follow-up, did you? Had a shield in place?"
He didn't need to check in order to see sheepish shaking of heads.
"Then stay behind me and spell to kill, if you can. If you can't, then aim to disable." This time he did look at the pair. Their grudging looks of acceptance satisfied his anxiety for the moment.
Exiting the room presented a new exercise in reflexes for Karl. Errant spells must have shifted the termination protocol for the Time Room's egress portal, landing him in the holding area for the skepsivores, bypassing the airlock entirely. A red-haired young man, accompanied by a blonde girl were exchanging spellfire with another Death Eater trio. In ordinary circumstances the Dark Lord's servants would have had little trouble overpowering two school-age noncombatants, but variables were in play that he could not fathom.
The girl, who seemed to carry an oddly familiar sense of bizarre fashion, was in constant movement, erratic steps carrying her in unpredictable patterns. Her choice in spells performed equally unpredictable actions, sending a cleaning charm against one foe, letting the harmless, soapy liquid splash off before pirouetting and conjuring an array of marbles on the suds-covered floor.
As if in exact harmony, the red-head seemed incapable of rational thought. He lurched behind cover, firing blind. Half the time the spells did nothing other than blaze multi-colored bursts that did nothing but imitate deadly hexes, yet cost minimal power. Then a random siege curse would erupt from his wand, obliterating everything in its path until it made contact against protected marble, rupturing stone fragments in random directions.
"Howzzat Looney?" the young man stood up, overcorrecting to bend backwards under a poisonous green curse, standing upright once more to spray ruby splinters in the Death Eater's general direction.
"Wonderful, Ronald!" The blonde skipped past a Transfigured tiger's attack, stopping to allow its charge to end in the skepsivore tank wall. Agitated, the inhabitants flung tentacles over their container, seizing the false beast, dragging it into their midst. She spun in place, arms outstretched as more curses crackled past. "Try the Curse of the Wampa, won't you?"
Karl just tilted his head in confusion, until he noticed the blood stains on the young man's robe. He was 'fighting drunk' – as his old instructor would've called it. Standard tactics called for direct assault, distracting the main opposition while backup removed injured allies. Standard solo tactics demanded precision strikes, enhancing the original force's capacity to inflict harm.
'Current forces: four untrained students, one injured Unspeakable.' Karl stalked on dragon-hide boots, making no effort to conceal his stride. 'Hope they hold together.'
An old curse launched from his wand-tip, one of average power requirements. It connected with the lead Death Eater's shield, wrapping an energy field around its perimeter. Popping sounds, like the electrical bursts certain eels made, sizzled from the shield as it sucked power. Karl cast another old hex, a dispellation so old it bordered on useless.
Almost useless.
Magic predating general wand-usage retained major weaknesses compared to modern spells. Wand-based repertoires contained higher output rates with negligible power loss and superior flexibility. However, there were a number of tricks a man knowledgeable in the old methods could exploit. Actinic class spells, for example, were vulnerable to cancelations. Modern classification held them in the Finite category, but the original form was known as a Dispel.
A second Death Eater threw a quick-and-dirty shield in place, deep power reserves more than enough to shatter Karl's spell.
But unlike the modern finite, dispels were weaker, area-effect constructs. The shield stood well within therange of his first spell, a vampiric specimen of the old Nordic raids, when attacks were brief and violent. It operated on the principle of absorbing power, and was thus detected as a fraction more powerful than what the defensive caster was unleashing – tempting them into wasting more power on what was essentially a light show. Unless interrupted before completing their goal.
"Flash out!" Karl moved to a secondary throwing posture, trusting the protective eye-gear with his vision.
For a moment, it seemed the sun had come down, gracing their mediocre existence with its glorious presence. Soundless as it was brilliant, the flash expanded, covering what the shield-breaker touched.
Karl didn't bother following up with a noisemaker. Instead he launched a piercing hex, rushing forwards as the triple-burst faded against Death Eater robes. The impact surprised the blinded wizard, enough for Karl to reach the nearest target.
An explosion threw him back, dropping into a roll to absorb the energy.
"Back!" one of the masked figures shouted. "It's him! He's got an Unspeakable working for 'im!"
The trio retreated in surprising good order, enchanted smoke rising to obscure their movements while a rainbow's array of attack magic flashed out of its depths. One spanged off Karl's sword, chipping its cutting edge. Seconds later the room fell silent, conjured smoke evaporating without its supporting wizard's presence.
Karl turned, noticing how the brunette had a shield over the Harry person. He nodded approval, their combat instincts were strong, if untrained. He turned back to the injured man and the blonde who was even now staring at him with wide, unblinking eyes. "Unspeakable Fifteen-Orange. How bad is the injury?"
The blonde smiled. "Nice to meet you, Mister Unspeakable," she chirped. "I'm Luna Lovegood, and this is Ronald Weasley. He blew up part of your solar system; he's been acting funny ever since."
"Coming from her?" a voice murmured behind him. It was immediately followed by a hushing sound.
"Luna Lovegood? Relation to Xenophilus and Pandora Lovegood?" The day was getting worse and worse all the time. "Look, just … just don't turn this into a media circus like that Slashkilter situation, agreed? I just want to get everyone out of here."
The black-haired man stopped next to the fallen man. "Can't. Neville and Ginny are somewhere in here, with Death Eaters chasing them. Ron, can you hear me mate?"
"Oy?" the prone figure wobbled. "We saw … planets Harry. Get this, we saw Ura –"
"I'm Hermione, Hermione Granger," the brunette interrupted. "And he's Harry Potter. Sorry, I've been somewhat distracted, did you say you were an Unspeakable? Could you tell me –"
A groan, held back behind the skin of his teeth, roiled in Karl's innards. Babysitting. After all the events of what – technically – was a week's worth of labor compressed into a single night, he was given babysitting as punishment? Fate must really hate him. Hate him like no other emotion ever existed, and she was going to express as much of it possible in the same 'reasonable' tone husbands everywhere feared. This was going to be a long night.
AN: I was going back through my notes, and realized something terrifying: I'd skipped a chapter. The new chapter has now been inserted (Chapter 3), which should help make more sense now. My numbering system started from 0 in my folder ... and FanFic doesn't allow for a starting point of zero. My fault, so sorry about that. Another chapter coming up!
