Summary: Harry Potter's luck was well known as fickle. And right now, as this thing chased him, he hated it with all of his soul. He'd be even less pleased if he knew Marcus Flint just won 5 Galleons in the Hogwarts betting pool for that.
One thing that was a well-known and accepted fact by everyone in Hogwarts School of Witchcraft and Wizardry was that Harry Potter's luck was completely ridiculous and excessively bipolar. Everyone from the staff, students and Harry himself was aware of the fact that his luck could go from horrifically bad, to stupidly good within the shortest amount of time, often in a single sequence. It was such a well-known phenomenon at this point that it made up a large part of the entertainment of everyone who wasn't directly involved, and took up much of the time of everyone that was.
What wasn't as well-known were the betting pools that revolved around this soap opera like entertainment. These circles were kept secret from anyone that would leak the information back to Harry, since it was kind of expected he would end up cursing (verbally or actually) all those involved for giving his insane luck any ideas. Considering the active imagination of teenagers (when not tied up in imagining other people sans clothing), this could prove to be a very real concern.
Harry would almost certainly be even more irate to learn that Marcus Flint had, unknowingly, just won a fair amount of money. Given that the choice Marcus made revolved around Harry being banished from the world and/or reality, then being attacked by aliens, you can understand that, had he any breath to spare, Harry would definitely have some strong & foul words directed at the former student for his choice.
As it was, however, tearing across the utterly alien landscape, dodging monsters leaping out at him and determined to eviscerate him, he did not have any breath to spare, given that it was all tied up in both swearing at the monstrosities, and blasting them away from him in equal measure.
Fortunately, his arrival on the planet had not involved anything worse than his normal lack of grace with wizarding travel. Any injuries at this point were going to prove fatal, the unknown beings were relentless in their hunt, and to stumble would mean death.
Harry currently had one hope for his immediate future, and that was the immaculate and shining tower swiftly increasing in size as he approached it. Rising to the skies like a sharp and shining knife, it was triangular in appearance with a short front before sweeping back and out to the sides. Given the rest of the landscape looked more like the inside of a H. R. Giger inspired stomach it was refreshingly human in appearance, if larger and more sci-fi looking than anything he had seen before.
Although, honestly, when the rest of the landscape consists of spines, tentacles, teeth, pustules, ribs, teeth, spined tentacles, and spined tentacles with teeth, anything lacking such unsettling attributes would probably count as comforting.
Regardless, it was the one thing he had seen since coming here that lacked the disturbing traits of both landscape and denizens, so Harry barrelled onwards. Countless games of Harry Hunting actually came in useful as well, as Harry knew to keep his breathing as even as he could, keeping a swift and methodical pace that would hopefully see him to his goal untouched.
And he needed to be untouched as well, one of the first things to jump out of him had looked like a ball with teeth, trailing a deflated balloon like sack of flesh, surrounded by tendrils. Harry had luckily seen it in time to dodge completely, only to watch the thing carry on several metres into a wall and explode into acid, scorching the walls. Needless to say, he had absolutely no desire to find out how many of the things chasing him were also suicidal balls of murder, or what that stuff would do to his skin.
Speaking of, another one of the suicide mines had launched itself at his face. Spinning to his side and forward he slipped around the thing, before promptly hitting it with a banisher to send it into the small group of monsters chasing him. These were lower to the ground, with a similar skull like face but larger, they came up his waist and moved crouched low, speeding after him. They also, fortunately, did not like the acid-mine-softball any more than he did, as it exploded in the face of the frontrunner, killing it and the two beside it at least. That was all he could see before he was facing forward again, although he felt certain more had fallen with the bombarda he had thrown after the banisher.
The building looked to be about half a mile or less away now, but Harry didn't allow himself to feel any satisfaction. Experience with Dudley and his gang had taught him the most dangerous thing you could do in a chase was to lose focus. If he tripped over anything now because of high spirits, well, to quote a film he had once seen from his cupboard, he would be proper fucked, before ze Germans got here. With that in mind he carried on his desperate run, hitting anything that looked structurally important with blasting hexes, or transfiguring any loose items into animals to slow his pursuers down.
…
As he started the final approach to the building Harry had good cause to both curse and thank his luck. The good news was that he was approaching the actual entrance to the building, huge steel like doors and the 20 metres or so of clear, landscaped garden giving a good indication of safety. The bad news was the concrete wall surrounding that garden, big enough that Harry wouldn't be able to jump it. Thinking quickly Harry decided that the only option was to blast a path through, and repair it once he was through. First though, he pointed his wand behind him & let loose with an Incendio. Swinging the want in as much of an arc as he could with the awkward positioning, he hoped to create a big of a buffer between himself and the monsters. Then, when he could delay no more, he turned the wand in front of him and started firing bombardment hexes as fast as he could.
He was less than two metres from the wall when he finally broke through. Swiftly returning to the backwards Incendio he rushed through the opening he had made. Only once he was through and had checked the area did he spin and shouted, "Reparo", gleefully watching as the wall remade itself.
But even with the wall repaired he did not stop to exult in a likely paper-thin level of safety and rushed for the doors. As he approached, he decided it was more than likely the doors were locked. Glad once more for his friendship with Hermione, he hit the centremost doors with an Alohomora, followed by a carefully targeted summoning spell to pull the door open before he reached it.
As he ran past the partially open door & inside the building he grabbed on to the interior bar, pulling the door back to a closed position. Fortunately, his luck held good, as despite being as thick as a bank vault, it swung easily back. With the door shut a Colloportus spell ensured it was locked, and even more luckily, everything that was chasing him was left outside.
Planting his back to the locked door, Harry looked around the building he was in, sliding down to sit on the floor while he caught his breath.
The inside of this building matched the outside, he quickly decided, in that it looked much more advanced than most of the buildings he had seen, even from the muggle world. Shining steel and white decorations dominated, all done in a rounded and soft manner. It exhumed cleanliness and clinical pastimes. Unfortunately, it was also apparent it was deserted.
…
As his breathing evened out he started paying more attention to his surroundings. He had kept his attention before this mainly on any noises from beyond the door, without knowing why the things outside were unable or unwilling to come within the gardens of this building he couldn't say for certain that a particularly juicy meal wouldn't cause a break in that state of affairs. However, even the hissing, spitting, growling and shrieks of his pursuers had ceased, and now it was time to look towards finding a way home.
Muttering to himself balefully he started to climb to his feet, "Fucking Malfoy, fucking room of requirement and its stupid piles of crap, fucking Dumbledore and his second-chance bullshit. Next time I'm just laying waste to everything and claiming the Imperius later." Needless to say, he was distinctly unimpressed with his current situation.
Mind you, anyone who had been flung through time and space because Malfoy threw a killing curse at him, while Harry was in front of a vanishing cabinet and debris was falling all around him from the fight they were having (including, unknown to Harry, an abandoned experimental time turner), you would be pissed off as well. Especially when you stop to consider that the last time Malfoy tried to throw an unforgiveable curse at him, Harry was the one to get in trouble.
His rage would certainly not be sated if he knew just how much trouble Malfoy was currently in. With his sacrificial lamb lost, Dumbledore was once again showing the much more focused side of his ire to the Malfoy heir. Meanwhile, Voldemort himself was less than pleased since the only coherent plan Malfoy had come up with had gone up in flames (literally, since the Hogwarts vanishing cabinet was now utterly destroyed) needless to say, Draco would find himself in very dire straits very quickly.
Although, the screaming black cloud that seemingly left him during transit does appear to have actually done some good. His head felt lighter and clearer than ever before, like a constant headache had finally ended, while at the same time he emerged from a wet and muggy atmosphere into the light of spring. So that was a positive, but, on the whole, not enough to stay the vengeance Harry was plotting in the recesses of his mind.
Now standing upright Harry started to move further into the buildings. Based on the way of things in the muggle world he knew the more important people would be highest in this kind of building. They were the ones most likely to have access to the best information. So, the first step was finding out if the elevator worked, because damn if he was going to climb that many stairs without any other choice.
It required going up a short flight of stairs across the atrium before he found a bank of electronic looking doors, and even better, his luck was in as the lights popped up when he pressed the button. The doors dinged open swiftly afterwards and Harry stepped into the mirrored interior. Pressing the button for the highest floor he could find; Harry spent the surprisingly short trip inspecting himself. It appeared that his mad dash for safety had only resulted in a few small tears in his jumper, and he was otherwise unharmed. An unexpected boon for sure.
Stepping out onto what was supposed to be the 220th floor Harry discovered he was on a type of observatory. One that may have also hosted a bar or restaurant of some kind in the past. Despite the utter lack of furniture there was a curved, gleaming, white bar area extending out from both sides of the elevator doors. In front of this was a triangular space that was completely empty until it reached the glass panels at the front of the building. Undeterred by this discovery Harry moved forward to look out at the landscape, hoping for more signs of normal life, but all that met his desperate gaze was a sea of horrors, stretching for as far as the eye could see. No mountains or valleys seemed to be apparent either, as the entire landscape, bar the odd protrusion, kept to the same unnatural evenness.
Leaning his head against the cool glass he quietly uttered a vehement, "damn it," as he considered his next move.
…
Half an hour later Harry managed to push through the despair and depression threatening to stop him in his tracks and turned away from the windows to consider the rest of the room. Moving around the what would have been a serving counter his spirits immediately started to rise as he saw glass fronted cabinets in front of him. And as an added bonus it looked like there was pre-made meals. Although the writing was mostly incomprehensible, the packaging had symbols and numbers he recognised from the microwave meals Dudley liked to have instead of sandwiches sometimes. And there was a fancy looking microwave behind him.
It took a bit of guess work, but Harry managed to get the meal cooked, slightly overcooked in point of fact, and dug in, blithely ignoring any possibility of it being bad for him. His meagre lunch was more than a few hours away now, and he was starting to feel the lack of a proper meal. With his belly full he started plotting again. Quickly coming to the conclusion that just because the place was seemingly abandoned it didn't mean that he couldn't find some important information. After all, there must be a reason he was brought to this specific place, so maybe it was a transport hub, or a nexus for travel of some form.
Of course, he would have to explore the place thoroughly to determine if there was or wasn't anything of use here. And in the meantime, he could hold on to the thought that the people he left behind were looking for him. Even if he was starting to doubt Dumbledore, he was certain the headmaster wouldn't stand for Harry to be out from under his thumb. He could accept that reasoning to get away from this land of nightmares, frankly.
Bypassing the lifts, this time Harry went straight for the stairs. He would need to explore every level of the building to be sure he found everything that could help him, and it was better to start from the top down. He could use the observatory as a base, although at this point he was hoping to find something he could use as bedding.
Moving to the next level down he opened the door and moved into a corridor branching in both directions. The first door he tried was directly opposite his entrance and it was locked, but a tap of his wand and a whispered 'alohomora' solved that and he checked inside. What greeted him was a big office, a massive glass desk sat with its back to the windows. Obviously, someone important had used this in the past. With that in mind he started to carefully catalogue the room.
Unfortunately, he quickly ran into a problem. There were books lining the walls, but they were all in the unfamiliar language like the meals above. He vaguely recognised a number of the words as he flipped through, but not enough to make the books mean anything. It was the same with the screen on the desk, it was obviously a computer like his cousin had at home, but it was advanced enough that Harry had no clue how to start it up, or indeed if it had power.
There were some interesting finds, however. The office had a few pictures that looked like a blue-print for some of the monsters he had encountered outside. Was this a research station for an advanced people studying something that had seemingly consumed its whole environment? And if so, would the researchers be coming back? Perhaps if they did he would be able to get passage away.
Further wondering proved that the rest of this floor was more of the same, important offices and the amenities to take care of the executives who used them. There was an unexpected bonus though, as he found a small bed set-up in one of the side rooms off from an office. So at least he would be able to sleep somewhere that wasn't the floor.
As the next few hours rolled along Harry managed to check another six floors, finding more of the same. The offices started to get less and less impressive, but for all that they were still offices filled with things he couldn't read or understand. Only the small personal touches really changed across each floor. Cheery items, office distractions and pictures of families. It was this last item that answered and raised questions, however.
The families shown in the still pictures were obviously human, which was encouraging. What wasn't so encouraging was the fact that Harry had never even heard of anything like what was outside the gardens of this building. And he was pretty sure even magical society wouldn't have been able to hide devastation on the level that could be seen from all of the windows. So where on earth was he, and what had happened?
Harry got a partial answer not long after that questions finally percolated within his mind. At the same time his search came to a grinding halt as two moons arose from the horizon. Just the fact that there were two would have been enough to get his attention. The fact that both had clearly been infected by the things outside just added to the situation. Clearly, he was not on Earth anymore. And if that was the case, and humanity had made it to this planet, then he was also outside of his own time. He wasn't the most ardent of news watchers, but he was he was pretty sure he would have noticed if humanity had made it to another planet.
"Well…. Fuck."
…
It took nearly a week for Harry to start worrying. Each floor was either offices or technical labs, and none of them had anything he could make head nor tails of. There was absolutely no indication of magic being in use anywhere within the building, and he was nearly back to the entrance level.
He had found a bewildering array of food in various freezers across the buildings, each near somewhere that looked like a food hall. He was mostly just glad that whenever he found himself had overcome the problems with freezer burn & food going bad.
Alongside this haul were a large number of drinks, which hesitant experimentation had proved ran the gamut from soft drinks, coffee, and alcohol. While that was good for variety, and keeping him alive, Harry was rather damning of whatever barbarian decided that a good cup of tea was unwelcome in this building. Given this piece of information, he was currently blaming the Americans, although that was mostly based on rants from Uncle Vernon, so he wasn't committed to cursing their name just yet.
Harry was nearly back at the atrium level of the building before he found anything more than the boring detritus of an abandoned research building. Taking up what must be two whole levels of building was an enormous steel like vault door. The locks on the thing were bigger and wider and Harry was tall. A shining pedestal held a screen that was seemed like it would control the opening and closing of the door. Based on his idea of this being a medical company building Harry guessed that the door was a vault of some kind, probably holding their most precious specimens, or research. Given the technical style of the locking system he decided that this would be the last resort. The things outside did not encourage a healthy respect for whoever these people were, or their common bloody sense. Even Hagrid would have had a difficult time calling these creatures cute, fluffy, or misunderstood… probably. If there were worse things behind that door, well, who knows what would happen.
However, a day and a half later, having explored the bottom and basement floors (and having found a garage with some amazing looking vehicles) Harry had to concede that there was nothing left but to try the vault.
Stepping back into the room he approached the pedestal. Tapping the top brought the screen back to life, a light green colour lighting his face. "Damn, still can't understand a word of this gibberish. But… but that bit in the corner looks like a camera screen, probably of the other side. So, if this was manned, then it must have been used to open the door going in and out." Taking a deep breath Harry quickly decided that even if he could understand the text, he couldn't use the pedestal to open the door, because it would obviously lock behind him.
Rubbing his forehead Harry approached the massive door & pointed his wand at the centre. "Alohomora." To equal parts trepidation and relief, the door opened up and swung outwards enough for the metre-thick depth to clear the doorway.
"Nothing more for it," he muttered to himself, swiftly pulling the door further open. The sight that greeted him confirmed the camera from the pedestal was overlooking this corridor. What it hadn't made clear though was that the passage went downwards, still in that cold, clinical white.
As he walked the passage, Harry's trepidation started to rise. There were no curves or corners to this and it was going down far enough that he feared he would end up outside the safe zone of the building. Mentally preparing for the worst Harry kept his wand in a ready position, expecting to have to start blasting his way back to the vault door at any second.
That thought made itself known again when he realised what he was now approaching. Another large vault door making itself known. With a deep breath he again cast the unlocking charm, and stepped around the new obstacle, making sure not to open it widely in case he needed to close it in a hurry.
However, it was with a large amount of relief that the door didn't reveal any monstrosities hell bent on eating his face, and other parts, leaping at him. Instead, there was monitors set all around the edges of the room, but apart from a walkway of about six metres there was a large pit in the centre of the room.
Walking forward Harry saw that the pit was circular, with a short round column in the middle, maybe half a metre wide and reaching up about 3 or 4 feet at most. Facing this column, spaced evenly around the circle were seven hi-tech looking chairs. Each chair was done in what looked like light grey leather, and seemed to resemble a futuristic dentist's chair. Gripping the railing tightly Harry leaned forward and started to feel a developing sense of despair. This place didn't look like it had anything useful either. The monitors might have some information, but without being able to read anything he was stuck without recourse.
After briefly squeezing his eyes shut they opened to the view of the recessed seats again. His final, miniscule, hope was that pillar. It was placed so that all of the chairs we facing it, but it wasn't obviously technological in appearance, looking more like a highly polished block of stone. So, maybe the chairs were there to study it? Maybe it might have answers?
Despite the thin hope Harry staggered down the steps set into the side of the pit and moved between two chairs to the pillar. Up close it looked even more polished and seamless than from up top. It looked kind of like onyx, but there almost seemed to be lights and swirls of colour inside. Taking hold of his courage Harry reached out and put his hand on the top of the pillar. But nothing happened. At all. No changes in colour or pulses or feeling of magic, just a cold stone surface.
His eyes closing in despair Harry tried to stand and back away at the same time, not seeing where he was or having a clue what to do next stopping him from forming any thoughts beyond the depression. And almost by chance, he backed into one of the chairs, tripping over the edge and falling into its embrace. As his hands came down on the armrests the chair came alive. The back and seat, which had looked like grey leather turned out to be much more of a gel like substance as he sunk into it slightly, the rest inflated to suspend him in perfect comfort. At the same time the back dropped and the middle lifted up so he was in a perfectly reclined position at about chest level. Finally, a helmet of lights settled around his head, bright lights assaulted his eyes and he felt like he was falling, before everything went dark.
But it wasn't something as kind as unconsciousness that caused the darkness, it was a radical shifting of awareness and senses. The crowding of his mind of the absolute knowledge of billions upon billions of organisms, and the accumulated knowledge those organisms brought with them. Accompanied by an agony unlike anything he had felt before came the memories of every last member of all of the Tyranid hives and each of the swarms that still answered to that super-organism, on top of this came the memories and knowledge of every being the swarms had eaten. And for a brief moment of endless time, the swarms stopped their relentless advance, no matter where they were or what they were doing, each part of the swarm turned its head towards their long-protected home.
At the same time that Harry Potter, Fate's Spittoon, gained control of the Tyranid race, bringing them back under control for the first time in 20 millennia, psykers and seers across the galaxy broke down. Hysteria, sobbing, laughter, tears or screams of pain, each reacted in their own way to the fate of the galaxy and the path of the future metaphorically running into a brick wall, bouncing off, stumbling around like a drunk, falling down a cliff face & hitting a new road, then taking off into the wilderness in a completely new direction. Which is how Harry Potter received yet another title, The Fate Breaker.
Because the Tyranids now answered to him.
…
World: Shadowbrink
Leviathan arm of the hive.
The battle for the Cathedral world of Shadowbrink was not going well for the defenders. Although the ruinous powers had been soundly defeated by the swarm, it still left the imperial forces facing countless enemies bent on consuming them. In one of the mountainous belts of the world the last defences of the Imperium lay. The massive fortress had been repeatedly assaulted by piecemeal forces while the main bulk fought the hordes of Chaos to first a standstill, then into defeat. The reprieve had allowed a small amount of reinforcements through, the main bulk of the Imperial counter-attack still being gathered. Space marines had joined the bloodied guard regiments on the walls. The unexpected pause in the most recent assault, five days after they felt the daemons being removed from the world, had allowed the defenders to clear the approaches and shore up the defences. The Tyranids stopping on the spot in the middle of a major attack was met with withering gunfire, and much discussion as to the reason. No demonic influence had been felt since the greater daemons were beaten, so it couldn't be that. It was approaching eleven at night, with the sun fully set, that the defenders finally saw something coming towards the first set of walls. Strangely, rather than the horde, it was a single humanoid.
Pausing outside the walls within shouting distance the figure cleared its throat before shouting up. "Hello the fort! Is anyone there? I… I need to speak to whoever's in charge!"
The reply in this instance was obvious, as one of the marines boomed out, "Identify yourself, how did you get through the Xenos filth?"
Seemingly surprised by how loud his reply was, the humanoid rocked back on his heels slightly. "Ahh, well, my name is Harry Potter, and, um, technically they aren't xenos, and I didn't get through them. Think of me as a translator, which is kind of what I need to speak to the people in charge about."
Unfortunately, Imperial Doctrine was clear in this case. The defenders immediately poured weapons fire into the figure, turning it into a smear on the road.
This was a scene repeated countless times, on hundreds of worlds. Needless to say, Harry Potter did not appreciate the lesson that his new abilities meant he could be butchered by a vast array of weaponry, then respawn as good as new 200 yards down the road.
This time as the defenders saw the approaching figure they immediately began shooting at it. However, Harry had brought a guard of heavily armoured guards of the Carnifex variety. And they protected him enough to get to a hidden position near enough to shout at the defenders. It was a shame that his diplomatic ventures were not nearly as well thought out.
"Will you lot bloody well pack that in!" A futile scream since the gunfire had yet to stop. And so, the Tyranids waited out the firestorm. Ten minutes later the noise level had reduced back to a mild background noise.
"The Tyranids were created by humans. To defend them from Orks. They are a biologically created, human controlled weapon!" This time Harry didn't bother getting out from his nice safe spot, just screamed out over the top at the defenders. A sense of caution proven when the gunfire started up again.
Fortunately, there were worlds where Harry's new forces were in a better negotiating position.
…
World: Hiveworld Ybaric 1
Behemoth arm of the hive.
The fleet labelled by the Imperium as Behemoth was actually the oldest of the fleets in existence. Deep within the swarm there were still examples of the original biomatter formed from their creator's world. This was the fleet currently assaulting the Imperial Hiveworld Ybaric 1, having crushed the orbital defences they had descended on the planet in a glut of consumption.
This fact had Inquisitor Anna Kalinin cursing everything around her, and praying desperately for strength from the Emperor. She had been on this planet hunting a governor who had been corrupted by chaos. The reports had come into the Ordo Hereticus of problems on this world and she, along with her retinue had been able to swiftly root out the cause. The governor had tried to slip away, but unable to find passage off-world, and unable to blend into or survive among the scum of the lower hive, he had only been able to run to a different hive.
Such insipidly useless actions had not thrown the inquisitor off his trail and he had been swiftly captured. His torture to reveal any accomplices had delayed Anna from leaving for her next assignment. It had also meant she was at ground zero when the Tyranid swarm hit the planet.
Since then she had been working with the leaders of the hive to resist the threat. And now, the walls had fallen, xenos filth had flooded the mega-structure and were butchering everyone they found. Anna had been falling back to the upper hive in a firing retreat, hoping to reach evacuation, but they had been cut off.
Most of the guardsmen of her retinue had already fallen by the time they became trapped in this hall, the remaining un-enhanced humans falling shortly after. Only Anna and the twelve women of the Adepta Sororitas, plus the two tech-priests remained when the next wave caught them. Bolters thundered alongside the zap of plasma pistols and the roar of chainswords as they desperately tried to outlast their aggressors. Fervent prayers rose as the woman chanted the glory of the Emperor.
And then, like a miracle, the Tyranids seemed to come to a stop. The dedicated warriors wasted no time in cutting down everything they could during the pause, but all too soon they started up again. Except, there was a difference, this time the claws were not aiming to disembowel, but disarm and against such superior numbers, uncaring in the face of losses, it worked and the entire team was pinned down, but alive.
While the battle sisters attempted to use their strength, and a long litany of cursing, to get the Tyranids off them, Anna recognised when she was out-matched. While she was attempting to use any kind of physical strength or leverage to break free, her mind was also cataloguing everything she could see. This was not normal behaviour for Tyranids, something was going on.
She was proven right moments later when a human walked into the room, the myriad xenos moving out of his way. Mid to late teens, slightly on the short side, green eyes, very green eyes, and black, messy hair. He was good looking, or at least would be with a couple more years and some filling out, but right now he was just an oddity.
As soon as he moved further into the hall the remaining members of her retinue also caught sight of him and started going quiet.
…
World: Hiveworld Ybaric 1
Behemoth arm of the hive.
When Harry walked into the room he was already kind of aware of the prisoners held in what was kind of his grip. But it was a vastly different thing to see them through alien senses, focusing on one small part of a huge influx of details across the galaxy, and another thing to see them with his own eyes (or at least kind of, it had the right DNA regardless!)
So, once closer to the individuals he took a good look around. He was after a leader right now, someone that could put this resource to good use and take over for his trapped body. The majority of people in this room were fairly uniform, being tall and beautiful women clad in power armour. Two were more machine than human, but the final person was clad much more grandly than any other. The memories slowly filtering down to his mind immediately pegged them as Sisters of Battle (Or something similar), Techpriests, and an Inquisitor respectively. He had just enough information to start thinking he hit the jackpot.
Moving out of his perusal he immediately moved to the inquisitor and crouched down near her head, tilting his head to look at her. "Well," he sighed, "at least you won't be shooting me any time soon, I've had quite enough of being killed trying to help you people today."
A brief thought from Harry allowed the woman a little leeway, not too much, just enough that she didn't feel pinned down. The passing of the day had given him quite enough ammunition to realise the female of the species would still tear him apart at the drop of a hat.
"I don't suppose you'll give me your name?" He asked the woman, not really expecting anything positive.
"I am Inquisitor Anna Kalinin, of the Emperor's Holy Ordo Hereticus, and you are consorting with Xenos, you deserve whatever death you find, may it be a final one if you are here before me!" The woman growled back at him.
Sighing deeply at this instantaneous hate and fear, Harry fell backwards and sat facing her. "It's really not that simple, I haven't been trying to corrupt or kill anyone or anything like that. I've just come into some information that would really benefit the Imperium, and since I can't see any of the races in this galaxy helping them, I want to give this to you."
Seeing that he wasn't swaying the Inquisitor in the slightest he scrubbed his hand through his hair. "Look, how about a deal?" He wasn't able to get any further before the women in power armour started shouting.
"Filth! Race Traitor! Xenos Lover! May you be destroyed in His holy light!"
Although the abuse made him sigh a little, it also managed to make him give a huff of laughter. Amazing how he could travel so far, and still get the same abuse as he would from the portrait of Sirus's mother, back in Grimmauld Place.
Watching the Inquisitor he noticed she did not bother to hurl insults, although give the fire in her stare he didn't doubt she had hate enough for it. Raising his hands in a calming gesture he spoke again, "Look, LOOK!" He finally managed to talk over the warriors, "All I'm asking is a bit of your time. If you listen to my story I swear that every Tyranid currently inside this place will retreat off planet. And, and, if you don't choose to help me after that you can shoot me. Surely that isn't asking you to compromise your ideals or lead you astray at all?"
Anna stared at him for a full minute, hard enough to make him want to fidget before she responded. "I might be amenable, if you increase your deal to include the things holding us down moving out of this hall and allowing us to reclaim our weapons first."
Scratching his head absently, Harry replied, "Do you all swear not to shoot or otherwise attack me, without provocation, until my story is complete?"
Nodding slowly Anna agreed, "As long as you keep your side of the bargain, we have a deal."
Sighing again, Harry waved the Tyranids off with an unconscious gesture, his main body providing the thought for them to leave him here. "I really hope you keep that, it's starting to feel like I'm finding a new and explosive or agonising death every five minutes." Looking around, he spotted a few tables and chairs set back against one wall, miraculously damage free, or mostly.
"How about we set those up in the middle, we can both be comfortable and you have a wooden barrier between me and your gun?" Harry asked, before elaborating, "I would ask the Tyranids to carry them, give you a bit of proof, but I think that would violate our deal."
Nodding briskly, Anna waved over three of the Sisters, while the rest of them kept their weapons trained on the young man. "Very well, but you can start with how you are being killed and yet appear fine before me."
"Ah," Harry hedged carefully, "that's actually part of my story, do you mind if I tell it in order? The last day or so has been a bit of a blur, and I don't want to miss anything important."
Huffing to herself the Inquisitor allowed it with a sharp nod, seating herself regally at the chair placed beside her, "Very well, get on with it."
Smiling to himself at finally making some headway, Harry also took a chair, leaning forward with his elbows on the table as he got his thoughts in order. "Ok, so as I understand it, this is currently the 41st millennium, yeah?" He paused as he waited for the impatient node of several of his listeners before continuing.
"Right, so what you need to know first of all was I was born in the second millennium of humanity, 1980 in my notation, but 980.M2 in yours, I think. Humanity had only just reached the moon, about twenty years ago. I was, am, a part of a hidden society on earth made up of witches and wizards, people that could perform magic. As a society we hid from the normal world because of persecution and for the most part everything was separate. There's more to that, and a lot of details missing, but that's the basics of my origins."
Looking back at the Inquisitor he quickly realised she was waiting for the end to make any comments, so he carried on before the sharply raised eyebrow turned into a sharply delivered bullet, "Due to a bit of a stupid accident involving a couple of artefacts, one of which was a kind of teleporter based thing, and another which was based on going backwards in time in short hops, I disappeared from my world. I appeared on a… horrific world, It basically looked like a world sized Tyranid, with lots of the little bastards running around. At the time I'd never seen anything like it.
There was only one thing out of place I could see. A big, gleaming glass and shining metal tower. It looked untouched, so I ran for it and eventually made it inside, fucking things chased me the whole way. I was exploring that tower, which the Tyranids don't enter by the way, trying to find a way home. I didn't find that, but what I did find were some very tech heavy chairs."
Here he chuckled wryly, "I didn't really have any options left at that point, and wasn't really thinking about things, but I ended up falling into one of them." He chuckled again at the winces that came over the faces of the various women in the room. "Yeah, not a great idea, but hopefully better than starving or getting killed by these things. Anyway, here's the important bit. As soon as I sat down I got a huge info-dump shoved in my head and then… then I was connected."
Harry saw the Inquisitor start to frown but he carried on, getting in to the story as his hands started waving. "You see, you've been fighting the Tyranids, and you labelled them as aliens out to kill you like all the others, but that's not quite right. The Tyranids were a biological weapon created by humans!
Millenia ago, humans came to the planet I found, wanting to give up technology. But they couldn't just throw everything out, because you never know what diseases and such will be present, or how it will affect your crops. They wanted to be farmers, live quietly, but they kept teams of biologists trained to be able to stop a virus or something.
Then, they were found by orks. They didn't have much in the way of weapons, so the orks were killing them easily. Their council of elders ordered the scientists to use their tech to create things to fight in their stead. They programmed all the nightmares they were capable of from the natural world and unleashed them on the orks.
They did have some foresight though, so the creation weren't just released and that was that, they were created psionically active, and were controlled from chairs in the facility that created them. The humans in those chairs used them as weapons of war and wiped out the orks, but not before their population had fallen too far to save. They died out a century or two later as far as I can tell.
Unfortunately, they didn't have enough foresight. The basic instructions imbedded in them were to protect their home, grow strong and maintain themselves unless ordered otherwise."
Harry was swiftly interrupted by Anna, who had started leaning forward in interest during his tale. "So once the last controller died, they consumed everything but the facility they were created in, then moved to the stars to do the same?"
Nodding quickly Harry responded, "Exactly, they've been feasting and growing off the deaths of everything else all this time, but now, I'm in the chair and I have control."
Sitting back Harry ran both hands through his hair, gripping it slightly in frustration, "But I haven't got a fucking clue what I'm doing. I'm not militarily trained, or psionically for that matter. I'm getting the information, because they do have all their memories, plus the memories of everything they ate stored, but there is so much to process and essentially, download, that it's a very slow process.
The Tyranids, in the right hands, could be a game changer for Humanity. They aren't really corruptible, proven by the fact they killed daemons over on Shadowbrink, plus, there are billions of them. So, what I really want is for someone who has a fucking clue, to come to this planet, pull me out of the chair, take over and use the monsters for what they were meant for, saving lives."
Finally relaxing a little, now that at least one of the thousands of copies of him had been able to speak to someone in charge, Harry was prepared to wait for questions before he remembered he had already been asked something and snapped his fingers, "Oh, and the whole dying this is because the Tyranids can spawn all of the things they need, I don't have exact control over every one of them, and most of them couldn't talk anyway, but by getting them to spawn a copy of my body I can use it perfectly. I'm trying to have this conversation anywhere the Tyranids are near enough humans for it to work."
Talking absently to himself, the rest of the room only caught his words because of their superhuman senses. "I guess part of the reason I'm getting killed is because those are all active warzones, but even then this is getting ridiculous."
Shaking that thought off he raised his eyes and watched the inquisitor to see what would happen now.
While he was waiting he studied the woman in front of him. His first impression of her was that she could easily pass for some kind of warrior goddess. She had knee high boots of darkened steel and black leather, tucked into those were a pair of leather trousers that looked painted on, small insignia's on the outside of the thigh. Her top was armoured over another black top and over that was a thigh length leather coat, a wide brimmed stovepipe hat completed the basic ensemble. Her hair was a dark red, worn long and loose, her eyes were like two chips of blue ice staring at him with all the calculation of a predator on the hunt.
"So," The woman purred dangerously, "You're telling me that you are currently in control of all Tyranids across the galaxy?"
Straight away Harry started to nod, before he paused and lifting his hand he waved it side to side. "Kind of. Apparently, there are some… broods, that were lost on space hulks that have been lost to communication, then mutated beyond the original design enough that they don't respond anymore. And I just had that information downloaded, so I hope I'm using the terms properly."
Nodding slowly Anna started talking again, "So a vast majority. How fine is your control?"
"Mostly just an overview right now. For instance, I can order them not to attack humans, I've ordered them to focus on Orks and the same beings that were on Shadowbrink. I can also adjust them on a local swarm scale, so I've ordered a few areas to attack Chaos cultists, even though they are human. And I can micromanage any units in close proximity to myself or these clones." Harry gestured to himself at that point before continuing, "That's about it though."
Leaning forward he expanded on what he felt was the important part of her query, "I've been thinking about this a fair amount since I got in the chair, and I'm 99% sure that I don't have the same abilities or powers as one of your psykers, the closest term I can think of for myself is proto-psyker. I think a full psyker would have much better control. I'm pretty sure this facility has all of the details on how these chairs were made as well, so it's possible you could build more units somewhere else and pass local control off that way."
"And what's to stop me shooting you right now, and leaving your orders in place?"
Sighing in resignation, Harry muttered to himself, "Always with the shooting." Before he spoke up to answer the question. "For one, shooting me here won't do a thing, this is just a copy after all. For another, I don't have access to make those orders permanent, which means they only apply as long as I'm in the chair."
"I'm not your enemy you know." Harry blurted out in frustration. "I don't want you to compromise on anything. If you want to come here & send every last one of these fucking things straight into the nearest sun then by all means, pass me the popcorn & I'll laugh all the way through. All I want is out of this chair, and a way home. There is a dark lord threatening innocent lives and apparently, I'm prophesised to defeat him. My friends need me."
This prompted a lengthy silence from the Imperials as the Inquisitor stared at him, her hands folded underneath her chin. Harry did his best not to fidget, but with the iron hard stare and the fact that he could still feel copies of himself dying there was a fair amount of movement.
Finally, Anna spoke, "I believe you feel that you are telling the truth. Our… normal methods of proving information would almost certainly be worthless at the moment. However, would you be willing to submit to a scan by a psyker?"
Huffing in relief Harry leaned forward and thought about the question. "Thank you, for listening. With the psyker scan… Honestly, I'd prefer not, I've had enough of people messing around in my head to last a lifetime, I would like to keep some things to myself." Leaning back again, Harry let out a deep sigh, "That said, I'm getting enough memories through, and the things I've seen and learnt trying to contact people, to know that humanity really can't afford to trust something like this based on one person's word. So, I will agree to the scan with the proviso that they are fully informed of what they are getting into. I don't know enough about this kind of thing to be sure if the fact I'm a copy, or that my main body is connected to the swarm will be dangerous to them."
Nodding sharply, the Inquisitor stood and started moving towards to the door as she spoke. "Good, that will give me some better options. I will need to speak to my superiors, I can pass the details across, but they are the ones that will need to choose how we move forward."
As she moved closer to the door she kept the boy in her vision, watching as one of the Sororitas indicated he should follow. They swiftly formed up behind her as Harry scurried to follow the fast-paced Inquisitor.
With no Tyranids in the way the group swiftly made it to the landing platforms of the hive. Based on a gesture from Anna one of the tech-priests had called in transport big enough for them which was already waiting. They boarded without a fuss and started sitting at the bench seats. Harry himself was feeling like the first time he had gone to Diagon Alley, his head was on a swivel as he tried to see everything at once.
From her seat the Inquisitor placed a call into the local government and demanded an update on the orbital situation. She quickly learned that her ship and its escorts were undamaged, having been harassing the enemy only, but preserving their ability to take the Inquisitor to safety. Thanks to this she was quickly put into contact with the captain of her main battleship.
"Captain, I will be arriving soon with an exceptionally important guest. They are to be treated with all the respect of a VIP, but are not allowed out of their quarters without an escort from my retinue. I also need to be put into contact with the highest level of the Inquisition as soon as possible. I will be coming to the bridge as soon as my guest has been dropped off. Have the Astropath make the connection as soon as possible." Anna made no effort to lower her voice as she gave the instructions for dealing with the young man opposite her, and all the time she was talking her eyes continued to stare at Harry coldly. She waited only for the confirmation from the captain before dropping the comm device back in its cradle.
Not long after she queried the young man. "You said earlier that you the swarm retained the memories of those it eats, how much do you remember specifically?"
Rubbing his hands together as if to ward off a chill, Harry replied, "Not a lot, thankfully." At her quizzical look he elaborated, "Remember that all of those memories end when they get eaten, and most of them were alive when that happened. I'm getting little flashes of memory and knowledge whenever I look at things, sometimes people. That said, I think I can ask for specific details if I know what I'm after. Was there anything you wanted to know?"
"There are a number of Inquisitorial missions, fleets and retinue's that have gone missing over the years that were suspected to have fallen afoul of the Tyranid menace. Your case would be greatly buoyed if you could provide… closure on such matters. There are also a number of colleagues who have lost treasured mentor's, students and such, providing the details of their final pieces of work will aid you."
"Ohh, I see. I think I can query for specifics, if you can let me know a person's name I can likely pick up everything from their memories using that. I should have thought of something similar really. Maybe I can set some-one to recording all the lost these things have taken. "
Watching the young man out of the corner of her eye, the Inquisitor contemplated the goal he had set himself. Billions of lives had been taken by the Tyranid swarms over the year, and there was also the fact that the Imperium only really venerated the big losses. Armies, cities and planets had been written off time after time without any thought for the lost. But it was still a noble and thoughtful goal, in the end.
A small smile appeared at the corner of her mouth as she spoke, "A noble goal, despite it not being a customary response of the Imperium to losses incurred." She raised her hand in a signal to one of the sisters, "I will have some names for you to check once we are on the ship as well. Please concentrate on them for the short-term."
Harry's head bobbed up and down quickly as he agreed.
"Sister Letea will be your liaison for that work, someone from the ship will have a pad ready with names once we dock, she will lead you to a room to discuss them." The inquisitor spoke like she was declaring the future, rather than (seemingly) asking the question. As much as Harry would have liked to have been allowed to see more of the first spaceship he had ever seen or stepped foot on, he understood his position was precarious at best, so nodding was all he could do.
Turning to the large woman indicated, Harry nodded and said, "I'll just follow your lead then, shall I?"
The sister looked up and looked him in the eye for a couple of seconds before nodding then returning to her pad.
Harry's smile dipped again now that he wasn't being spoken to. He had kind of hoped that would continue and distract him from everything else that was going on with the swarm. He leaned forward in his seat, elbows on his knees and rested his head on his hands as more memories made themselves known.
Although, Harry decided, with a bit of a break, he could start removing himself from situations it was pointless to carry on. As in, anywhere he was just being killed over and over. Anywhere he felt like he could make progress he would keep going, it wouldn't do to put all his eggs in one basket after all and there were a few more places where he was making contact.
"Huh," Harry couldn't help the confused noise as he processed memories from one specific world.
Instantly the people in the seating bay with him snapped their eyes back to him. Although it was Inquisitor Anna that took the lead again by leaning forward and speaking the males name.
Looking up he saw the inquisitive faces staring at him and blushed. "Sorry, just… a really weird encounter on another world." Harry paused to think through his next words carefully, "I think, I think I've found a chaos cult and they're trying to recruit the Tyranids… It's so fucking stupid though! I don't even have version of me there, they literally walked up to a Carnifex and started talking about Grandfather Nurgle!"
The final part of that sentence had everyone growl to various degrees. Anna quickly took his attention though as she snarled through gritted teeth. "Heretic filth!" She grabbed Harry's chin, forcing him with an implacable hand to stare into her eyes.
"Listen closely, anything and anyone like that is a threat to the Imperium. You will use your control and you will wipe them out. Am I understood? Take their knowledge of associates, helpers and colleagues and consume every. Last. One. Disregard anything they think or believe about their patrons, that way lies corruption. Am I clear?"
Once his chin was released Harry nodded and spoke, "I can set the Tyranids to kill them, then act on the associates but destroy the knowledge straight after. That way none of it will be available to me."
This had Anna leaning back in satisfaction, the fact she crossed her arms underneath her breasts and almost purred out a satisfied "Perfect," had Harry's thoughts swiftly descending to a completely new topic. Thankfully he was able to lean forward and bury his face in his hands to give out the orders Anna wanted before his magnificent blush became obvious.
Hopefully it would also take his thoughts off of the fact that he was in a room with a dozen women ranging across the whole spectrum of busty. Being a teenager sucked sometimes.
…
Less than twenty minutes later the transport was docking with the Inquisitorial capital ship. The smaller ship dropping to the deck with a small thud. A light inside the cabin turned green to indicate the atmosphere outside was breathable and Harry quickly rushed to imitate everyone else in standing up and moving towards the doors.
He made sure to keep close to Sister Letea, doubtless it would be bad for his health to lose his escort and end up somewhere unfortunate. Fortunately, the group made allowances for Harry as they moved out into the cavernous hall which was the landing bay. From there they split up, the part machine men going in one direction, with the woman splitting into two groups. Anna and six of her escorts moved away while Harry followed Letea and was followed by the remaining five sisters.
Harry's group swiftly moved through a small maze of corridors. Some small and claustrophobic, some big enough to pilot a shuttle through, and constantly filled with golden icons of the warriors of humanity. Litanies of hate against heretics, xenos and mutants were very much in abundance.
Eventually they entered a conference room that looked like the gilders had gone more than a little wild. There were icons, writings and statues everywhere. Even the chair legs were stylised and gilded!
Despite this the group arranged themselves around the main table, Sister Letea picking up a larger pad and starting to tap away to bring up some information before she spoke. "We will start with those individuals we already know the broad fate of, and of the fact they died to a Tyranid attack. This will give us a baseline for what you remember, and how well the information can be retrieved. Is that clear?"
Nodding his head, Harry agreed with the idea, although he was surprised by the woman's voice. From the screaming they had done earlier, plus their enhanced size, he hadn't expected such a clear, light voice. It was quite nice, actually.
Before that thought could gain much traction in his mind, however, the pad was passed across to him with a picture of a male inquisitor, bald and stern, wielding a large bolt pistol and a power sword. The man's face was vaguely familiar.
Letea spoke while he was looking at the picture, "This is Inquisitor Slade, he was on a world that was overrun by the Tyranid menace. What are you able to tell me about his death?"
Studying the picture a little further, Harry called up any memories he had of the man. A few seconds later it clicked. "Oh, wow. That man was a badass. He engaged three Carnifex's in close combat long enough to attach melta bombs to them, with the death of those three the attacking line lacked the brute force to move through the blockade. He was killed by a Lictor not long after, although he had slowed down considerably because of a leg wound when part of the talon of a Carnifex was blown into it."
Nodding, Letea agreed the events of the Inquisitor's death as she took the pad back. A few taps produced a new picture which was presented to Harry. This process was repeated another four times before the sisters were satisfied that Harry was remembering the correct details of the fallen.
Happy with the results, Letea spoke again, "We have confirmed you have knowledge that matches our records. The next step is to find out if you can solve suspected cases. These are where we believe an Inquisitor fell to the Tyranids, but have not been able to say for certain." Passing the pad back to him again, the woman finished, "This is Inquisitor Ralen, we believe his fleet was in the path of a swarm. Do you remember him?"
As soon as the picture was passed to him Harry started grinning. The man looked like a fop, wearing gold and white clothing with ruffles and decorations. His eyes were what caused the recognition though. Harry definitely remembered him.
"Yeah, he died to the Tyranids. He had… five ships. They were all rigged to explode. He sent them on a direct course into the heart of the swarm while he sat on a dead man's switch. The Tyranids couldn't resist trying to board and consume everything. He kept the largest concentration of people with him on the bridge and around it, so the largest horde would come after him. They killed a hell of a lot of them as they attacked. Ralen was the last one to fall, he was partially eaten when the dead man switch went off & blew all of the ships to hell. That took out even more of the swarm."
Grinning sharply the sisters arrayed around him greeted the news with pleased exclamations, while Letea quickly wrote details onto her pad, as much as he enjoyed hearing about the heroics of her people, the information needed to be recorded. She also sent the details of the tests so far to Anna, as she would be able to use it when speaking to the conclave.