DEATH.
Where the fuck am I?
The last thing she remembered was being hoisted up on a noose onto a tree, struggling against the rope even as it burned her throat. The way she suffered for four days with no nourishment except occasionally being splashed with wastewater. Even as her toes and fingers blackened and died on the coldest nights, where she couldn't sleep, must not sleep, for she would never wake up otherwise…
There was no sensation of warmth or cold. Even within a dream, Iris could feel pain or cold - well, at least her brain could be tricked into feeling those things. Right now she felt nothing, utterly nothing, like her entire body had been covered in third-degree burns, like all of her nervous system had shorted out, not just on the surface but inside as well, her organs seemingly nonexistent and even her brain - although somehow, she remained conscious.
There was no light, no darkness. Only the void, nonexistent yet somehow endless. Stretching out into nothingness, despite the fact that it was nothingness in the first place. All-consuming, though there is nothing to consume.
In the nothing, there was something.
Iris could… feel it. Couldn't see it, hear it, but the very soul cried out as it felt the tendrils of energy approach. A nonsensical mass and shape, existing yet not existing, nowhere yet everywhere, formless yet certain. It was a sensation that felt familiar to her, like she should recognize it.
What are you?
The question was not vocalized. Iris didn't have a vocal structure to voice it. Or so she thought. Maybe she did but she couldn't hear anything. The question, it felt, came out as a myriad of emotions. Her confusion, her fear, her anxiety, all reverberating in the wall-less caverns of nothingness, a desperate plea from this neverending, never-beginning, shapeless, timeless, lifeless hell.
I am Death.
Iris gasped as she was assaulted by memories. Memories that weren't hers, yet simultaneously were. She and Death… they'd been intertwined by fate for a very long time. Iris marveled at the memories. A kaleidoscopic rainbow of color, bursting into every direction like a flare in the night sky, the birth of the universe… and her. Her and Death.
So many colors she'd never even seen, couldn't even describe, like trying to describe 'red' or 'blue' to a man with no eyes, like trying to describe the vastness of the universe to any single individual who could only gaze up at the sky, wondering if there was anyone else out there, thinking the same thing as they, wondering if they too were thinking about the beautiful - but how large? - universe.
She watched the colors explode or fade away, gamma-ray bursts destroying everything around it, as a sacrifice to a goddess of beauty perhaps. Civilizations rose and fell in a blink of an eye - yet the dreams of the individuals never seemed to die, lingering far after their bodies crumbled and even their souls were swept away by cosmic wind.
The bright colors faded, pulled far apart from each other such that they would never be able to reach each other again, dying in solitude, the colors fading. The last star would flash out in an unspectacular, depressing manner, and even the entities that really only partially existed would fade away, and the universe would dim into a heat death, into a void forever…
Iris tentatively reached out to Death.
Is this what the end looks like? Iris questioned hesitantly. Are we in what used to be the universe?
We are, Death agreed. The last of any existing thing has dissolved into nothingness. But we are not in, or out of, anything. We simply… are.
And why am I here? Am I dead?
Death is merely destruction of your physical vessel, Death answered. So technically, you are dead. But death is not nonexistence. We are two of few entities that have been permitted to move through the currents of 'time' by the Powers that Be.
But there is no time here. Not anymore.
You are correct.
Iris didn't know what to think. Why was she summoned here? Death had not answered that question. And what was her purpose now? Did she ever have a purpose? Did she ever have a free will? For that matter, did anything ever move on its own volition? Were dreams dreamed by the greatest men, the desire to explore and create, were they simply tools of brainwashing by the Powers that Be, into thinking men had free will?
You… are an anomaly, child. Death spoke hesitantly. All beings are predictable to some extent. They have free will. They do as they wish, but the universe can cater to some measure of unpredictability - that measure is enough for most beings. But not you. You, child, are truly and inexorably incalculable.
What does that mean?
You have enormous potential within you. The choices you make could have had incredible effects on the universe. If you'd killed the Dark Lord at the graveyard, you might have become the ruler of all magical beings, bringing about great political change and massive advancements in technology. Perhaps thousands or millions of years after that, a united humanity may have traveled across the universe with magic and science hand in hand, and in the process deleted a budding species that was destined to prevent a supernova from wiping out trillions of life forms. If you'd chosen to become a Dark Lady, you may have succeeded in wiping out humanity with a nuclear war - leading to the survival of a spacefaring species who, in their attempt to accelerate objects faster than light, obliterated a quarter of their own galaxy. Death's spirit brushed against Iris' soul. You, from the moment you were created alongside the first stars, have been destined to bring change.
Iris was not entirely sure she could handle the irony. She was the subject of the prophecy, but it appeared that her existence was of unpredictability. She had a certain purpose in existence, it seemed - but that purpose was utterly and completely uncertain. If she had a head, it would be hurting right now.
But now, it's time for you to move on.
What?
You've already told me. You've died… and we have ended up here, in nonexistence. Death gave her a gesture that felt like a sad, bitter smile. A myriad of emotions. Regret, pain, loneliness. We are the two last existences. So long as we remain here, we too would eventually be swept into nothingness, whether it takes ten minutes or a hundred billion years.
And what will we do?
I will abuse the ability you have been given by the Powers that Be, to try and save you. With your ability to swim through 'time', you may be able to survive millions of times longer than I will. If, in a very rare scenario that a new universe births itself from the ashes of the Final Graveyard, then you would be able to escape.
But what about you?
I will dissolve.
No!
I must. You cannot control your own abilities - only I can. Once you're gone, you will be in no position to guide me.
Don't leave me. I don't want to be alone!
You won't. Death soothed Iris, pulling her close in an embrace of souls, the most intimate gesture that might ever occur in the entire history of the universe. You won't even realize anything is happening, child. 'Time' no longer exists anymore. Death paused. They spent a moment in silence. Did you feel that? That's how long eternity feels.
But…
Good luck. Death hesitated. I… I love you, sister. May you find solace in the new stars.
Don't…!
But nothing more came out. At that instant, Death vanished into nothingness, while Iris herself, without knowing, wandered forever to nowhere and everywhere. Nothing happened. But everything also happened. When Iris came to, she saw something. The first sensation after an eternity of nothingness.
Iris took her chance. She pulled herself toward it, desperately, even as it seemed to fade away. No, it couldn't be. It wasn't leaving, God fucking damn it! In a place where 'space' and 'place' were two distant memories, there was no fucking way it could be resisting her!
At that moment, she grasped the edges of the object and catapulted towards it. A gate. A gate to a new universe! Death was right, Goddamn it. A new universe born from the eternal death of the old, and this was her ticket out of her nonexistence.
With a primal scream, one she could not hear nor make, she pulled herself through the Veil of Death.
Iris gasped, sitting up in the bed. Beside her, a young man stirred.
"Iris?" He mumbled. "W's wrong?"
Iris didn't respond. Was that… was that a memory or a dream? Had she truly felt that? She had seen nothing, heard nothing, been nothing, and yet it was so vivid that for a moment she truly questioned her existence. Had she truly met Death? If so, did the Deathly Hallows truly come from it? Was she truly the subject of a prophecy, then? The prophecy that whatever she did, would change the universe on a scale so large that the effects would be ongoing until heat death?
"Iris?" The young man seemed more concerned now.
"I…" Iris swallowed, but her mouth was dry. "A nightmare."
"You okay?"
Iris felt the awkward embrace settle around her shoulders. She tensed slightly but allowed it. "No. I'm not okay. That was… that was the worst nightmare I've ever had. And I've had some pretty sick nightmares."
"You said you came from a warzone," the young man said carefully.
"Yeah, I did. This… wasn't related to war at all. But still much, much worse." Iris held up her hands. They were cold and shaking violently. She barked a laugh. "I can't really remember what it was about, anymore. All I remember is… dread. Dread as I've never felt before. I'm not scared of dying, Ian." She turned to the young man who had concern etched all over his face - Iris'd had worse one-night stands. "I'm not scared of dying at all. But this… it was the sensation of becoming nothing. Of having not only your legacy but the legacy of everyone, everything else around you torn down to atoms and the atoms themselves being ripped apart until there's no proof that the universe ever existed, and you being right in the middle of it."
"I didn't need an existential crisis, Iris," Ian chuckled, though it held an undercurrent of nervousness.
"I really didn't either." Iris placed her shaking hands in her lap. "Can I tell you a rather fantastical story, Ian?"
"Go ahead," Ian shrugged.
"From ancient times, times more ancient than the Stonehenge or the Great Pyramids, as old as humanity itself and possibly even older - we just don't know - there was an object called the Veil of Death It's made of black volcanic stone, and undeciphered runes have been carved into it with craftsmanship that shouldn't have existed back then. And I know it definitely exists, I've seen it with my own two eyes and I've felt the stone arch with my fingertips," Iris said. "Scholars have studied it for centuries. All they know for certain, so far, is that it leads to a different place. They don't know where the destination is, because nothing they've ever sent in has ever come back. Some say it's a gateway to the world of the dead, because when people stand near it, they hear the voices of lost loved ones, beckoning them to join them on the other side."
Ian was completely still. "That sounds… interesting."
"You probably doubt me, but I know what I've seen. But the thing is, Ian, it's perfectly real, and it's a perfect mystery. Nobody has ever fallen through the Veil and returned."
"But has anything come out from the other side?"
Iris took a deep breath. "One person that I know of has come out of the other side. It was me."
Ian stared at her.
"About two and a half months ago, maybe - I don't know! I fell through the Veil, Ian, and the people that were studying it tried to capture me. I ran away. Ever since then, I've been mostly scavenging, because I can't get a job, because I literally don't have an identity. I was born in Britain, in a village called Godric's Hollow, and I lived here all my life. But I don't have an identity anymore, ever since I fell out. No passport, I don't show up on the voters' registry… because I dropped out of the Veil, somehow."
"Is this a prank?" Ian asked cautiously.
"Yeah, sure. I'm having an existential crisis because I thought I had a nightmare about what happened immediately before I got put in this godforsaken world, and it's all for a bloody fucking prank!" Iris roared, her voice getting progressively louder and cracked as she went on. "Fuck off, Ian, not everything is about you! Being an atheist doesn't make you special, you knobheaded twat!"
"Alright, calm down," Ian said angrily. "You're going to wake everyone, and you're also being quite rude about it. I apologize if I offended you, but-"
"Fuck off," Iris said with cold finality. "Obliviate."
Ian's eyes became glassy and unfocused. Iris nudged him back onto the bed. "I never existed, Ian," Iris said bitterly. "Which is ironic, because I technically existed forever… I think. Now go back to sleep and when you wake up, be disappointed that your one-night stand couldn't bear to be with you."
Ian dutifully went back to bed and began to sleep. Iris, with a flick of her fingers, gathered all her things, and she jumped out the window, avoiding being seen by the hotel staff. She slunk into the shadows and wondered where she should go now.
Montgomery watched the eight caskets being lowered to the ground. Draped over the coffins were Union Jacks. At the center of the Union Jack was a wand, with stylized wings on them that could have been read as a capital M. The Ministry of Magic had always been rather vain.
Nine men. Nine specially trained soldiers, defeated… no, decimated by one person.
This one person… where the hell had they come from? Montgomery himself had surveyed the scene of his team's decimation, covered in a dozen muggle-repelling wards. It had not been the work of brute force; if it were, this entire neighborhood would have been razed to the ground. No, the enemy had skill and plenty of patience. The forensics announced that many of them had not had a chance to defend themselves, having been ambushed. That probably meant the enemy was skilled at assassination and reconnaissance.
The final member of the squadron had been spared - if one could call it that. They'd been placed in the Long-Term Patients ward of St. Mungos. Poor guy couldn't feel anything from the waist down - he'd gotten a cutting curse to the spine. He'd never be put back in the Unspeakables again, or even the Aurors. The Ministry didn't really have pensions, so he couldn't count on that. He'd have to get a job as a shopkeeper or a bureaucrat to make sure he didn't starve.
He'd gotten a lot of scorn from the other department heads after that. Like they could have done any better! The best damned team to exist in the entire Ministry of Magic, the best of the fucking Aurors, had been brutalized in a nine-on-one assault. The enemy shouldn't even have been expecting them for fuck's sake! The only people that could have done that were on the caliber of Grindelwald, Dumbledore, and You-Know-fucking-Who. Or even better!
"Your boys weren't enough, huh, Monty?"
Montgomery clenched his teeth. "What do you want, Gardner? Are you going to gloat, as if eight men didn't just die and one didn't get crippled?"
"I'm not gonna gloat. I'm just saying, I told you so." Sullivan Gardner lit a cigarette. "If you'd trained those soldiers as I told you to, they might still be alive."
"What you were proposing can't be considered training by any stretch of the imagination," Montgomery snapped. "It's torture, brainwashing, mental conditioning. Turning humans into killing machines. You even proposed pushing them to make Horcruxes."
Gardner shrugged. "Men who aren't afraid of death fight the hardest."
"Men who aren't afraid of death are no longer men."
"Then the recent events have proved to you, finally, that you need a monster to fight a monster, eh?" Gardner leered. He exhaled the smoke into Montgomery's face. "Monty, you could have followed my advice, but you didn't, and now those eight men are dead. They'll never see their family again, Monty, they'll never feel the pleasures of flesh or gold or alcohol. Do you think it was really worth your conscience?"
"The fact that a monster as you call it, killed those eight men, suggests we shouldn't be creating monsters in the first place," Montgomery said.
"You know James Bulstrode has a sister who's in Hogwarts right now?" Gardner said. "I wonder how she'd react."
"For the last bloody time, Sullivan," Montgomery whirled on the man and jabbed his finger in his face, his face pulled tight into an expression of barely contained fury. "I will not allow you to use our Aurors or Special Agents as your playthings. I will not have them turned into glorified murderers. Do you understand me?"
"Whatever you say, boss," Gardner smirked infuriatingly. He turned around and walked away as Montgomery clenched and unclenched his fists. His knuckles were bone-white and he really felt he needed to sit down. He exhaled deeply, loosened his black tie, and went to sit down on a bench. He'd had to lie to the families present at the funeral. He couldn't bring himself to say that he was their superior.
Sullivan fucking Gardner.
Gardner was a special agent in his time, one of the members of the very squad that Montgomery had commandeered - until three days ago. Gardner was exceptionally brutal - there was no other description. He spoke about efficiency, yes, and he was indeed brutally efficient. But he valued fear. He even had a favorite Dark Lord, of all fucking things, and he made in-depth analyses on exactly why and how they were the best Dark Lord. He was the kind of creature that should've remained in a cave and not have been let out. The only reason he wasn't discharged was that he'd never failed once, and his protégés never had either, under his guidance.
Montgomery sighed, exiting the graveyard. The clouds, much like his thoughts, were dark, and possibly going to rain soon. Out of sight, he apparated back to the Ministry building. It was when he was heading to level two, the Department of Magical Law Enforcement headquarters, that he ended up sharing a lift with Madam Bones.
"Montgomery," Bones said politely.
"Bones," Montgomery grunted.
A brief silence filled with the faint tinkling of elevator music.
"Don't take it personally," Bones said finally. "That team should have been able to take down anything short of a wave of dementors. Nobody expected a Veil-crosser to be so powerful."
Montgomery snorted self-depreciatingly. "Are you willing to lend some of your best Aurors, then?"
"Not particularly," Bones admitted. "Though I probably should. If anything, the ones I give to you will be better prepared to die."
Montgomery barked in laughter. "Gardner wants a few new pet projects."
"Again? I thought he might have finally had enough when his latest apprentice blew himself up alongside two thousand others in a factory in Mexico," Bones said, her voice full of venom. "What does he plan to accomplish?"
"I don't know and I don't care," Montgomery pushed up his spectacles and rubbed the bridge of his nose, trying to ease the headache that had been present for the past three days. "I want to wake up three months ago. I want this to be all a bad dream."
"We both do," Bones said, with a measure of sympathy in her usually hard voice. "I'll try and find some good Aurors for this task. I know I can think of a few off the top of my head, like Alastor. I would also volunteer Kingsley, but I'm not sure if he'd be keen after his initial confrontation with the threat."
"He was one of the two Aurors that fought against Archangel in the Ministry, wasn't he?" Bones nodded. "Good thing he wasn't murdered."
"I'll try to convince him, and Nymphadora Tonks," Bones said, apparently deciding to herself. "They were spared by Archangel for whatever reason. Their presence might make the threat more cooperative."
"Take whatever I can get," Montgomery grumbled as they began walking down the corridor towards their respective offices.
"Please, Pierce. They're very capable Aurors of their own right." Bones sighed. "Not that it helps, apparently."
"When you find the Aurors you're looking for, send them to me and I'll debrief them. I'll see if I can dig up a few… unsavory connections to find people to fight Archangel." Montgomery smiled bitterly. "Thank you in advance, Amelia."
"You're welcome in advance, Pierce," Amelia Bones said with a slight, encouraging smile. "We'll manage it, you just watch."
"If only it were so easy," Montgomery muttered, stumbling into his office and crashing into his chair. It wasn't long until his insomnia of the past few days caught up to him, and he fell asleep on his desk.
"I've decided to revise our threat level of Archangel," Dumbledore said quietly.
That shut the Order up immediately.
"I implied before that it may be possible to approach Archangel on the suspicion that they may be friendly with the Order," Dumbledore said. "I no longer hold this opinion. From now on, nobody in the Order is to knowingly approach Archangel. They are, frankly, too unpredictable and I am not willing to risk the lives of anyone in this room."
An uncomfortable silence stretched in the group. Some, like Snape and Moody, had heard from their friends and knew exactly why Dumbledore seemed so worried. Others did not, as Lupin voiced soon enough, more to break the awkward silence than from any desire to find out what had happened.
"Why? What happened?"
"Three days ago, a special task force led by militant Unspeakables went on a capture and retrieve mission," Dumbledore said gravely. "Nine members were in the squad, each of which graduated the Auror Academy with outstanding scores. They were given further training and were considered to be the most skilled law enforcement agents available to the British Ministry of Magic. The nine soon found out that they were not enough, for eight of them were killed and the last turned into a paraplegic."
Molly gasped, clutching at her chest, while Remus, Sirius, and Arthur Weasley all expressed various levels of distress. Tonks herself did not feel particularly good with that new piece of information. She'd only met that woman three days ago. The conflict had occurred after Iris left her house, to go home - or more likely in her case, find somewhere to sleep.
"Miss Tonks, Kingsley, I heard that you two were to participate in the Archangel manhunt once more," Dumbledore said hesitantly. Tonks' heart dropped like a rock. "Madam Bones has recalled all Aurors from the manhunt due to how dangerous it is. Instead, she is gathering a specialized team consisting of Aurors, other Unspeakable agents, and mercenaries from both within and beyond our borders. She believes that you two may be better able to pacify the threat, after Archangel spared you in your first confrontation."
Tonks' heart was beating madly. She hadn't spoken about their meeting three days ago, not yet. They were rather difficult to bring up, anyway, especially after what happened to that squad of Unspeakables. Iris probably expected Tonks to vouch for her eventually - but it was getting more and more difficult to do just that the longer Iris simply remained in this country. Not that Tonks was inclined to vouch for her in the first place, anyway!
The thing was… underneath all the blood stained on her hands, Iris was a lost soul. She had a whole group of friends who no longer recognized her, she was lonely and miserable. Even if she did reveal herself to her friends, they would all regard her with suspicion and mistrust - just like Tonks herself was doing right now. It was a close race, the race between Tonks' fear and her guilt.
Plus, it wasn't entirely her fault that she was being chased by the government. She simply happened to be unlucky enough to fall out of the Veil - three days ago, Iris had been frustrated as to how she'd been forced through the interdimensional drapery. Her murders of Death Eaters were her own fault, yes - but it could be said it was merely a symptom of her misguided attempt to make the world a better place.
And now, whatever manhunt was going to continue would inevitably result in a fiery explosion with dozens dead and Iris continuing to delve into solitude, misery, and darkness.
"Amelia asked me to ask you both, if you were willing to join the hunt," Dumbledore said softly. "And I will not pretend that I wouldn't find you a useful source of information in the continued hunt for Archangel. However, this is entirely your choice, and you do not have to undertake this task if you do not wish to."
Kingsley and Tonks remained completely silent. Kingsley remained as still as a statue, while Tonks fidgeted. She… didn't want to abandon Iris, not really. She was a girl who Tonks knew for certain had led a terrible life. All her scars… Tonks couldn't imagine the pain she would have had to go through. Then again, though, Tonks was instinctively scared of her in every way.
"I'll join," Kingsley said quietly. That gave Tonks the courage to speak up.
"I can't join," Tonks said quietly.
Kingsley glanced at her, though there were no emotions on his face. Tonks turned slightly red as everyone stared at her. Dumbledore nodded slightly. "There is no shame in walking away from a losing battle. No offense to you, Kingsley, but I doubt this task force could truly bring down Archangel if they got into a fight. Like Voldemort would never allow himself to be captured alive, likewise will this Archangel struggle until the end."
"I understand," Kingsley replied softly. "But I must do something. I would be undeserving of an Auror if I didn't."
Tonks bit her lip. She knew that hadn't been intended at her, but she couldn't help feeling ashamed all the same. If there was any comfort to her, though, she'd be undertaking a much more dangerous job of her own volition.
The Order dispersed, and Tonks brushed past everyone else as soon as the meeting was over. They probably thought she was ashamed of herself. Well, let them think that, Tonks thought viciously as she apparated back into her own flat. She then picked up a pay-as-you-go mobile phone that she'd purchased three days ago. She called the only telephone number that she could clearly remember, as if it had been branded onto her mind.
"Hello?"
"Iris?" Tonks licked her lips and swallowed. "You need to come back over."