A Third Path to the Future

by Vimesenthusiast

Rescued from the Negative Zone by the Fantastic Four, Harry Potter discovers he is a mutant and decides to take up the cause of equality between mutants and humans (among other causes). How will a dimensionally displaced Harry Potter, one who is extremely intelligent, proactive and not afraid to get his hands dirty effect the marvel universe? Pairings: Harry/Jean/Ororo/others pos.

13. Do I Speak to a Subject or a King?

I don't own Harry Potter or Marvel. Even with the author admitting Harry and Hermione would be better there are still too many problems in the first, and in the second too much pointless retconning, and by god when a character dies in my story, there will be a damn good reason why it wasn't permanent!

In regards to the last 'update': I received five hysteric PMs Thursday about a law being considered in Washington called SOPA 2014, which would make fanfiction, fan-made videos and fan art illegal. As this was the first I'd heard of such a law since I began to post my own stories, I reacted by trying to spread the word by posting announcements asking people to sign a petition that was due to end on the 19th to shut down the law in my current stories and Chaotic Space. It was only later on Friday that I found the law was not under serious consideration, and it was merely rumor mongering, the law is not seriously being considered, though some Hollywood big wigs wish it were otherwise. As such, I took down my notices, hoping that it would no longer be seen as an update. This effort failed. I apologize for getting your hopes up. Despite this there is indeed a SOPA law that might be considered in the future and I hope that all of you will look into it and look for the real petition.

I do however ask those of you who posted reviews with your opinions about the announcement to take them down. I would like the reviews for my stories to be about them alone, sorry.

And speaking of that, I responded to many different reviews via PM, simply because too many clutters up the chapter. The reviews here are mostly for people who were both interesting and I couldn't PM.

Xata: Thank you for the thoughtful review. Tolkien does exist in this universe, Jean mentioned modeling her mental landscape after Orthanc, but that doesn't mean I can't use other names from it for Hogwarts. While I won't put numbers on his magical power, I will be going into slightly more depth about his magical power in this chapter, see what you think as he gets a slightly better handle on what his mutant power does, since up to this point he's only worked in generalities. In regards to harems, writing harems is very tricky if you don't want it to come off as prototypical male fantasy dross. I try to make it clear that there is an emotional connection between all of the characters, not just from the guy out to the girls, so they become a unit rather than the normal concept of a harem. I will not go beyond five girls in this work, and even that is debatable. Gamora and Physlocke are up for consideration to be added, but we'll see how that goes.

TJG: The idea of the Avengers movie was to tie in a superhero group to a known and controlled agency, giving the 'world leaders' funding SHIELD a group they felt they could control if not trust. The X-men and FF and even Harry's group will not be under anyone else's control, and fight for very different things. But yes, that movie will not go the way it did in the original.

Kid Coheed: Thanks for the review, the potions are only the start, even the generator won't be the only thing they will be working on. But I intend for Harry and his group to only really deal with outer space and world threatening threats as well as groups like Genosha, which I have mentioned before. Small time villains and things like that, including organized crime etc. will be handled by other people like Spiderman, Daredevil, etc.

Futurist: I think you will enjoy some portions of this chapter, as yes, even if people can't enter some place, that place will be noticed by those in power given the tech available.

Sdarian: thank you for pointing that bit out, I have gone back and corrected it.

Doubledamn: and everyone else who mentioned X-23, she is already in the story, just not mentioned lately due to me concentrating on Harry and his group rather than the X-men. She will not be joining the harem or Harry's team, sorry.

Anon: You'll see in this chapter I already had plans in the direction you spoke of. SWORD is not in operation yet. That happens well into the future from the point my story begins at. And by the time it starts up, its job will already have been taken over entirely by Harry and his group. In regards to Deadpool, yeah… I don't know if I could do him justice. Write the combat, yes, I think I can say that I could do that, but the verbal repartee? No.

A note on a timeline for this story and marvel in general: How am I supposed to create a timeline when we have Cyclops and others from the original X-men which began in 1960 with them being 18 or so still running around and being frontline soldiers today fifty years later, let alone the older characters, like those besides Fury who were involved in WW2? While a forty year old can be a general or even a decent soldier/superhero, most 60-70 year olds can't be. That's a problem across the board, very few marvel characters have aged enough to go along with the world around them. The tech isn't hard, it's so all over the place you can pretty much do whatever you want with it, but the rest? SO I am basically saying that it is generally speaking happening around the eighties or so

In this chapter I reference time since the end of World War 2, as well as some events from that period and start to include more characters from Marvel and in particular Marvel UK. I will tell you I won't be introducing a lot of them. Marvel UK deals with parallel worlds, not going to happen, and the Doctor which makes perfect sense for any story in the UK (I LOVE DOCTOR WHO), but not in this story, just too much to deal with. So I've tried to stick Marvel UK in at a point that had the most potential and enhance it while also simplifying it. I honestly have no idea what anyone will think, but hey, let's go with it.

There were several other reviews that I felt were fantastic, but as I responded to them via PM to exchange ideas, I will simply give a broad thank you to N0mster, Byakugan789, Plums, Johnny Napalm, Frosty Wolf and Joe Lawyer. Thank you all for your help, especially Joe Lawyer, who helped make one of the toughest scenes in this chapter come out as well as I can make it.

I would also once again like to thank my beta reader, Kathryn18, who again looked over this work for me.

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Chapter 13 Do I Speak to a Subject or to a King?

"She's moving remarkably quickly isn't she?"

"Most assuredly, almost frenetically."

Sebastian Shaw chuckled at his fellow king's comment while sipping at a fine Merlot. The two of them sat on either side of a small circular table in a special room overlooking the main floor of the Hellfire Club. The room had a wall of one way glass, allowing the two kings, who had the only keys (which were mechanical and technological devices, not actual keys) to this room to look out without being seen.

What many of the club's members didn't realize was that every table on the main floor had a single microphone pickup installed into the wood, hidden under a small veneer of wood that didn't block any of the sound. These microphones allowed the kings of the club to be aware of any deals being made or anything else going on of interest.

The two kings were a study in physical contrasts, yet that was only on the surface. Sebastian Shaw was a large, heavily muscled man, with short curly black hair, who wore the clothing of a medieval lord easily, yet his large hands still had calluses from his youth as a worker in a factory, and there was a dark, brooding almost thuggish air to him at times.

Edward Buckman was slightly taller and his body was much thinner, with blond hair and he wore the outfit of the club like one born to it, as he had been. While his hands seemed free of mark and callus they were still wiry and capable, his wrists powerful from years of fencing lessons and his light blue eyes were sharp and searching.

Both kings were sharp both in business and in every other walk of life. Now the two of them were watching the newest member of the Inner Circle once more wheeling and dealing.

Emma was currently ensconced at a table in one of the club's corners with Warren Worthington the Third. A not very well thought of recent addition to the club Warren had taken his family's place in the club after his father had passed away. The general consensus among the other club members was that the blonde playboy was a rather useless fop who would be lost without the extremely competent board of directors his father had left behind to actually run the company. In point of fact, both kings knew that Warren had absolutely no control over the company and simply received a stipend from its earnings, a state of affairs that would continue for at least three more years.

The two blondes were talking about Worthington Industries, and the boy was actually taking notes on a notepad as Emma dictated some ideas to him. Perhaps once the time came for him to actually take the reins he wouldn't be entirely useless. Emma's business acumen was truly impressive for one so young, but to the two Kings her moves were not nearly subtle enough to be overlooked along with some other oddities.

Edward sipped at his own bottle, looking out across the club. "She has done well in terms of making deals for her family's corporation. The net worth of that little deal she sprang on Lindel Walsh alone should be worth 2 billion a year without even considering the savings for FP."

Lindel Walsh was a senior member of the club in fact he had been a club member longer than Edward had been the Red King. He was a majority shareholder in an international shipping company, not big money in comparison to many of the other regular members, let alone the Inner Circle, but steady and somewhat important. The deal in question was to ship Frost Pharmaceuticals at well below the price they were currently paying to his rival's shipping company, a major coup for him, but an even greater one for Emma, as it would save FP several millions of dollars.

Shaw nodded absently, looking down at Emma who was smiling that little smile of hers that he had seen several times in the recent weeks, but there seemed to be an extra edge of happiness to it today, and he frowned, wondering why. Emma was a dangerous young woman, and he preferred to keep track of her movements just to be safe. Winston was a known commodity, easy to predict and plan for. Emma was something new, and he didn't have a handle on her just yet even with all the information he had gathered before she actually joined the Inner Circle. On Emma's short term goals, yes, on how she thought, really thought or about her long term goals, no.

Edward looked across at his fellow King. While the two did not in any way trust (or even like) eachother the Inner Circle always projected a united front, both due to the rules of the club and because it made good business sense. Edward had plans to change the status quo, but for now image had to be maintained. "Paris likes her, but I suppose that is natural. I am surprised however that you didn't take the king's privilege with her, you aren't exactly known for largesse." The king's privilege was what they called when one of the kings agreed to foster a queen and was repaid by use of her body, and in return in this case for several favorable business deals.

Sebastian coughed delicately, one of his large boxer's hand raising his glass in salute like a fencer signaling a touch. "The thought had occurred to me, and indeed I was going to, but the idea somehow didn't really appeal to me once I was in her presence. Then too, Lourdes would geld me if she found out. She's unhappy as it is with the fact I make use of the girls here. If I took another fulltime lover, she'd either leave me or attack me, not certain which."

Edward laughed lightly, but his eyes were shrewd as he looked at the other man, seeing the second part of what he had just said as the smokescreen it was. Lourdes was a pleasant and vivacious woman, but she and Shaw had little in common. Their relationship, if it could really be called that, was doomed from the start.

On the other hand Edward had found his own appreciative thoughts of their new member stopping whenever he was actually close to Emma. After a few days it was quite obvious, since one of his fondest dreams was to have a threesome with Paris and some other woman. Of course Paris would never go along with such a thing, but a man could dream. "Some kind of device you think, or something else?"

Shaw frowned internally. That was a very good question, one he didn't have an answer to. But that didn't mean he wanted his fellow King to have even an inkling of the Emma's ability. Sebastian hoped to eventually induce her to join him in various clandestine projects he was starting recently, and her power would be much more useful for that the more it was unknown. So it was best to redirect his suspicion. "Almost certainly a device, some kind of deterrent field, it could have come from the time she went off to find that mutant Forge His power has something to do with creating technological devices."

Of course both kings had their own intelligence agents and were aware of Emma's movement both before and after she was introduced to the Hellfire Club, though where she had disappeared to search for Forge they hadn't been able to discover, having lost her somewhere in upstate New York.

Sebastian watched Edward's face and saw a very tiny tick of the eye when he used the term 'mutant' and nodded internally. Emma's warning about Edward and Pierce had stuck in his mind (without any help from her, he had made certain of that) and he had already redistributed some of his surveillance resources to watch their movements. Pierce was obviously anti-mutant once Sebastian had looked at the background of some of his 'private security forces', whose size was tiny in comparison to Shaw's own, yet even better armed. On the other hand it wasn't that easy to get a handle on his fellow king's 'social views'. He had found out Edward's funds were going somewhere, but not where just yet.

Now he decided to throw his fellow king off the trail further. "Or it could have come from the same place some of Frost's software worms come from."

They both scowled at that idea, far-fetched though it was considering the lack of affection between daughter and father. Frost Corporation's corporate espionage was simply better than most of their enemies. Not by a wide margin across the board, but in the particular world of computer espionage, they were well ahead of practically everyone, bar Stark and a few other top computer tech geniuses and even there it was debatable. Their software worms were incredible, and both other kings had been trying for years (longer by far than Shaw's own kingship actually) to figure out where they had come from, who had come up with the programming for them.

What they didn't know was that Winston kept that secret to himself, not sharing it with anyone in his family.

Buckman thought Emma used them to gather the intelligence she used, but she didn't, she used her own powers, which Shaw knew about, and the other resources her company could bring to bear. Only Winston could use the majority of the computer worms that had made his company so very deadly at gathering information.

The two looked at one another, wondering which would broach the subject first and five minutes later it was Sebastian who at last broke the silence. "You realize we need to choose whether to stand aside or back one or the other."

There was no need here between them to explicitly state what they were really talking about here. It was obvious to anyone who watched her work that Emma was trying to distance herself from her father's control. There was obviously no love lost between Winston and any of his surviving children, and while neither king knew how she was going to do it, they both could tell Emma was going to strike out at him. Most of the agreements were between Emma and fellow club members making verbal agreements for her family's corporation, and thus would fall apart without her, allowing Emma to create her own powerbase.

Yet Until Winston was gone Emma was vulnerable, with no real power base of her own outside her recent personal acquisition of Stark stocks. Everything she did was connected to her family's corporation. And his recent murder of his son showed what lengths Winston would go to keep control of his family. Even though neither knew how or could prove it, they both knew Winston was behind his son's death, the boy had been a source of disappointment to the elder Frost his entire life.

Edward leaned back in his plush green leather chair thoughtfully. While none of the deals Emma had been making with their fellow club members directly enriched him or his lady, the fact Paris liked her made up for that, helped of course by the fact that anyone who made business deals in the club paid the kings a fee for the club's services. In truth it wasn't a difficult decision for him. While he and Winston came from the same social background, Winston had never been a friend he was a business associate at best, and he had never done much business with the man.

He looked thoughtful, "I think I will, like any intelligent future or current husband should, follow my lady's opinion in this matter."

Shaw laughed politely at his joke as he thought about his own response. In actuality Winston and he had been closer than it at first appeared to others. But Sebastian had never trusted the older Frost, and Emma was a mutant like Shaw which worked in her favor. The energy and ability she showed was refreshing even with that cold exterior she used so easily. On top of that he had come to the conclusion that the woman was almost certainly downplaying her telepathic ability, which made her even more intriguing and potentially useful. "Well, as long as young Emma continues to comport herself with a becoming grace, I suppose I can bear up under the weight of my sorrow at our friend's forthcoming passing."

Edward chuckled at the other man's tone. They both leaned back in their plush chairs looking out at the Hellfire Club. Both kings were wondering which of them would be in control of it and all its resources in a year's time, and what part the young Frost would play in the games of power.

OOOOOOO

Harry had taken the day after the meeting with Emma and the others to do two things. First he followed up on some suggestions Emma had made on how and where to start his company, as well as beginning to contact some names of people to talk to smooth the process. While that part had gone all right, it wasn't nearly as smooth a process as he had envisioned, and he resolved to learn more about the business side of things from now on. The rest of that first day was spent adding Orihalcum scales, small nail sized slivers of the metal, to Storm's suit. He didn't have enough at the moment to add them to both his lady's uniform and his crysis suit and that was an easy choice to make.

The next evening found Harry once more out and about to see if he could add one more government to the bidding war Emma had convinced him was a good idea. This visit however would be about much more than that, and deserved a more personable approach. The fact this way would also be more fun didn't have anything to do with it…

Harry's invisibility cloak was different from any other in his old dimension or this one. While others were simply made from the skin, fur or whatever of various creatures that could blend in or turn invisible, his got its version of invisibility from something far less mundane. It was the third of the Deathly Hallows in truth, like the Resurrection Stone and the Elder Wand, a thing made by his birth dimension's personification of Death.

As such, it didn't just make him invisible, it hid him from the sight of any who might do him harm. Harry wasn't certain even now how Melody had seen him under it, but he knew it could block out even the most advanced scientific methods of detection. Once he cast a silencing and scent masking spell on himself no one could even detect him and together he could sneak anywhere he wished no matter how tough the security. He had found out that even his infrared heat signature was blocked by the cloak.

Using this potent combination he had snuck through both magical and mundane security measures and even live guards to be here, on a balcony right outside some of the most dangerous wards he had ever seen. They weren't incredibly powerful, but they showed a certain… imaginative viciousness to them that made Hogwarts and even Dr. Strange's place seem gentle in comparison.

OOOOOOO

William (he only allowed his family to shorten his name, not even his closest friends called him Will) the Fifth of the house of Windsor by the grace of God King of the United Kingdom of Great Britain and Northern Ireland, groaned happily as he slid into his comfy leather chair in his private sitting room in Buckingham Palace. His daughter, her husband and their new baby were out at Windsor Castle for the weekend, and thankfully the hangers-on had moved with them, leaving him time to actually get on with the business of running the nation. He smirked as he sipped at his gin and sling, amused as always in his old age at the memory of the faces of the privy councilors and Prime Minister all those years ago when he decided to start actually using the powers of the ancient monarchy.

At the time the pro-Germanic House of Lords had made a pact with the small minority of the House of Commons to back Adolf Hitler's anti-Semite agenda to stay out of the war on the mainland. When the Prime Minister, Lord Hampshire, had come before him for what had been couched as a 'routine' law signing to that effect, William had shocked them all and the rest of the government by refusing to sign the law that would have put the United Kingdom squarely alongside the forces of Nazi Germany.

They had been even more astonished when they realized that the armed forces of the United Kingdom took their oaths to the crown seriously and were champing at the bit to get in the fight with the Nazis. Then there was the fact that the House of Commons had decided they had had enough and began to move against the lords with the king's approval. Thanks to the fact that Lord Asquith had not succeeded in passing the Parliament Act of 1911 the House of Commons had become a playing ground for lord-led unions and guilds. But that ended dramatically when the commoners realized how much real power they already had, and decided not to go along with the status quo any longer.

What began as a political conflict between a thirty-something and not so idealistic king against a rich cabal of bought racists became an ongoing internal conflict, with William and his friend and mentor Winston Churchill on one side and the previous Prime Minister and his allies on the other. It actually came to direct combat several times, though three times were much more important than the majority which more often than not were merely violent police actions than real military conflict.

The first such real battle was when the former PM tried to have William assassinated. The attempt failed thanks to the sacrifice of the Kings Life Guardsmen of the 1st Commando Royal Marines, half of whom died at their posts fighting against a full scale assault by hundreds of German soldiers disguised as civilians and smuggled into the country by the Former Prime minister for this assault. After that, with hundreds of real citizens having seen the assault and heard the attackers shouting in German, public opinion had turned even further against Lord Hampshire.

The second time was after Hitler sent super-powered aid to his allies in the United Kingdom in the form of the Master Man and the Red Skull. They had intended to attack the House of Commons when it was holding a referendum that would have demanded that the House of Lord's powers be severely restricted. They were met by the Defenders, a team of superheroes comprised of Namor, the original Human Torch, and Captain America. The assault failed, and with William and his own lordly allies backing them, the House of Commons began the process of taking back power from their so-called betters.

The third time was when the Red Skull tried to detonate a gas bomb in the center of London to kill the king and his main supporters, who had just won the political battles against Hampshire and arrested him for treason. Thanks to Captain America and Union Jack this assault failed and the Red Skull was forced to retreat with his allies to Germany.

That was over forty years ago now, but William was still here, and the changes his little rebellion had wrought in the nature of Britain's government were also still in place. The Prime Minister of course retained a lot of power in the realm of politics both foreign and domestic, and the House of Commons and Lords (now significantly reduced and dominated by William's backers) controlled lawmaking.

But the domain of security of the realm (defined as defensive measures against foreign and domestic threats, in no way could he declare war or take aggressive action) was very firmly in the monarchy's hands, and he had the power of veto over any bill concerning that, though he would have to back up his reasoning in front of the House of Commons, which could override him with a two/thirds majority vote. And of course there was a committee that looked over any spending in that area, but for the most part since he worked with most of them on creating that budget, there were no insurmountable issues there.

Of course not everyone liked the idea of a monarch having that much power, back then or now, America in particular was leery of the idea of one of its closest allies being led by a monarch, but it worked in Great Britain. This was helped because he still routinely backed the House of Commons against the House of Lords, and the monarchy's resurgent power was based off protecting the common man from the influence of their so-called Lords, the same ones who nearly led their country and the world to ruin in WW2.

On top of that his personal views had a weight and gravity to them that couldn't be ignored, though he rarely used it these days. The popularity of his house was high across the board, especially after he had instituted the concept of 'service to the people' in his children and his entire family, which helped keep that popularity high. The people knew the entire house of Windsor now believed in self-sacrifice for the good of the nation they led and the security of their realm.

Of course these days 'the security of the Realm' meant more than it ever had before. William sighed as he shook his head, remembering the day's nasty business, shaking his head sadly.

His musings were interrupted by a voice he had never heard before coming from the balcony outside his very sitting room. "Congratulations on the birth of your second grandchild, your Majesty. I'd offer you some wine or whatever spirits you might prefer, but I'm pants at it and also can't actually come in to do it. I really don't want to get on the bad side of the magic wards around this palace. Frankly just standing here is enough to make me nervous. My name is Harry Potter, and I would like to discuss the possibility of my doing business in your fine Kingdom."

William's drink stilled about a centimeter off the drink coaster as his mind went into sudden overdrive. At first he had been worried that this was a particularly mouthy assassin with a flair for the dramatic, but someone getting this far and not simply taking his shot would be insane. Added to that was the second part of that statement, the bit about 'wards.' That told him that this visitor was a rather specific sort of visitor, and he wondered what else could go wrong today.

He decided to fish for information a bit and responded to the conversational tone of the intruder in kind. "The last time I heard about the wards of this castle was when Dr. Druid warned me of a dark cabal of seven sorcerers who were trying to gain control of the company. And while your accent is that of a citizen of my country, I thought I knew the few loyal users of magic in our realm, yet I have never heard your name before."

"I'm not here for anything like that, though explaining the reasons I am here will take some time. And the wards here are incredible." Harry thought they looked like something a Marauder with a lethal sense of humor would come up with. "It's not enough that they would simply kill someone attacking those inside with magic, no they would kill you and make your dead body an object of ridicule. Children would point and laugh until their mother's came and dragged them away from the mangled and twisted remains of what had been a magic-user foolish enough to challenge the wards here. As to why you haven't heard of me, well that will take some explaining. It's quite a story, if I do say so myself."

William chuckled at the way the magic user described the ancient wards around his family's castle. The fact was, this magic user was only the second one to have even gotten this far, and he knew that no magic user could do him harm here without overpowering the wards, something even Mys-tech, a group of seven ancient sorcerers who had sold their souls to a demon lord, hadn't been able to do when they tried to attack his family to sacrifice his first grandchild in some kind of ritual to summon their patron. The wards had slaughtered four of them, and Dr. Druid, Union Jack and a foreign mage Dr. Druid called in had killed the other three who had remained outside. So he felt relatively safe from one mage. Plus it isn't the first time I've been visited like this, even discounting Dr. Druid. "I presume I have to formally invite you in?"

"Indeed, unless you want your groundskeepers to find a new statue on the grounds shaped like…" Harry paused and looked closely at some of the wards around him, shuddering. "Each balcony has a slightly different effect if tripped by an unwelcomed guest. This particular one would transfigure me into a living statue of a teapot and kill me slowly by draining out my blood through the spout. I'll leave it to your imagination what particular part of me would be the spout."

William coughed on his gin and sling, shaking his head to remove the horrible yet oddly humorous image from his mind. "Then I, William the third do give you welcome for this night only, so long as you intend me or any within no harm. I thus bid you enter our royal presence."

Harry nodded and without removing his invisibility cloak opened the door leading from the balcony into the sitting room. Once inside he pulled back his cloak's hood and looked at the king of Britain, his body still invisible. He bowed, smirking as he knew what he looked like, a bodiless head moving up and down with nothing to support it. "Your majesty, thank you for your kind invitation, I really didn't want to tangle with those wards." Harry could have blown through them at his current power levels, but much like the ones around Hogwarts, the collateral damage would have been extreme.

William nodded, not letting any of his uneasiness show, though the fact that his guest's unexpected entrance hadn't caused at least a guard to come in and check on him was rather worrying. "Please be seated, and share with this business deal you have for us."

Harry did so, looking around the room almost nostalgically. "Well the furniture's the same, though the décor is decidedly different."

William raised an eyebrow in query. "I know that magic users are routinely older than they appear, but even with that, you seem to be far too young to have been here before without my knowledge."

"Oh, I suppose I've never been here before, not here, here. You see I'm from an alternate dimension." Harry needed a powerful political ally, so he was willing to be as open as he had to be to get the job done. And coming to the king, while made easier because of his connection to Britain in his old dimension was not a decision Harry had made on the fly either.

Ever since hearing a five minute bio of the king on the history channel he had researched the king of the United Kingdom extensively. William had impressed him both by his actions as a ruler in the past, and how he had come out in support of mutant rights a few days ago (primarily, it must be said, because his grandson might be one according to rumor). The king was old, well into his seventies, but was still a powerful presence despite that. His openness in this meeting was also helped along by the nostalgia for his home dimension, and the aid he had gotten from the royal family there in defeating Voldemort and his followers.

The king made an interrogative noise and Harry smiled. "I sort of came through the backdoor so to speak, thanks to the Fantastic Four; I presume you know about them?" William snorted in response and Harry smiled and went on. "Where I come from there were no superheroes or mutants, but there were a heck of a lot more magic users who lived apart in our own community. But suffice to say, I had a difference of opinion with the magical government there. You fought against the Nazis and their allies in the last world war; I fought against the magical equivalent, except they owned the government too." Harry explained where had he come from, and how he had come to be in this universe, but made no mention of the X-men, only saying that he had met the FF by chance, during one of Reed's overambitious scientific experiments.

This took about forty minutes all told, during which William merely sat and studied the young man in front of him. As Potter wound down he nodded. "So you met our equivalent and he aided you by giving you training? Interesting."

"Well, yes, except for the fact that your equivalent was a woman." The king coughed on his gin for the second time, and Harry chuckled, "Queen Elizabeth the second in point of fact."

William shot him a look but sighed, having gotten the measure of the young man in front of him during his description of his past. Potter might have a gift for the dramatic, but his was an honest, blunt personality, reminding William rather strongly of his old friend Winston. There was steel in his eyes though, an iron hard determination to stand up for those who needed his aid, a quick and ready wit, and despite his dubious sense of humor, there was a very dangerous aura about him, much like many elite veterans the king had met before, including one of his nephews, who had served in the SAS. There was also no deference in him toward the king, or any authority for that matter it seemed, nor fear even sitting under the very wards that had forced him to wait outside until he was invited in. "Be that as it may, perhaps you should get to the point of this nighttime visit Mister Potter; I'm old, and old people need their beauty sleep. I don't suppose this has anything to do with any of the 'dark regions'; those areas of Great Britain that none may enter? I asked Dr. Druid about them years ago, but even he could not enter them."

Harry frowned internally. He had thought about keeping Hogwarts a secret, well, okay, Emma had basically told him it would be idiotic to use it solely as the face of his company when it could be so much better used as a hidden resource that no one even knew existed, but he hadn't anticipated that the king of Britain would know anything about it, even in vague terms like this. And I didn't think there would be other areas like that… I suppose a warding scheme powered by the leylines might still be up even without anyone around for it to protect so long as the hearthstone powering them isn't being asked to do too much. I definitely need to check that out as more land/resources could prove useful in the future. Still, I'll have to share something with this man if I want both his political and personal backing.

"I can't honestly tell you anything about that, and while I do realize they are technically inside your country's borders they do not represent useable land to you and yours, so any discussion about them would be at best premature." Actually Harry wasn't even certain if he would be able to enter other warded areas as he had Hogwarts, but he wasn't about to say that right now. It really depended on if he could find the area they covered, and then break the wards or bypass them without causing the land around it too much damage.

"But that isn't the full reason I am here. I want to start a business, selling potions to begin with. I'm giving consideration to starting that business here in the United Kingdom. I'm curious if royal approval could pave the way for me, making the UK a much better fit than say Ireland where I am also strongly considering. I should clarify that the potions I'm considering selling have already been used on non-magicals, and they worked perfectly without any side effects."

William's eyebrow shot up, this was definitely not what he had been expecting. "Potions? What kind of ailments are these potions supposed to cure?"

"Four main ones to start with, though others may be released over time. The first is one that can heal any and all kinds of nerve damage, another can re-grow damaged or even missing bones, and there's a salve that can heal burns and re-grow skin better than anything on the market today, and finally there's the blood replenishing potion, which does precisely what it sounds like, no need to be matched up with a donor or anything like that. I'm afraid even magic can't re-grow wholly lost limbs or help with brain damage, but you can see that what I have to offer would be welcomed by the world and how valuable it could be. I even have some on hand if you want to see them at work."

Harry smirked a little on the inside as he laid that out in as blasé a fashion as he could. His time earlier that evening with Emma had been most informative. She had successfully conveyed to him that his potions would be sought the world over and that his choice in which country to headquarter in would be offering that country a multi-billion pound industry stretching far into the future. Any country, even a first world country, would be insane to ignore the potential revenue that could give them, the boost to the country's overall economy, and the increase in influence that country would be able to boast on the world stage. Success bred success after all. As Harry's company prospered, so would Great Britain and its citizens. And while he wanted to offer Great Britain the first opportunity, Emma had stressed that it would be up to them to woo him, not the other way around. Whatever sentimental reasons he had for going to the king first shouldn't change that.

It had taken quite a bit to force these truths into his head, but Harry had at last understood the logic and good sense of it, after six or seven repetitions. Ororo also agreed wholeheartedly with Emma's words and that clinched it for him (Jean simply said he should listen to the expert, not really caring about the business side of things).

"Of course as a British national, no matter my odd arrival in this universe, I felt that I would see what sort of offer I could get from my homeland first before shopping around." Harry added with a wry, yet somewhat false smile.

William felt his face blank for a moment as he thought about the truly massive amount of money those potions would garner the man in front of him if he could produce those potions in large enough quantities to meet the ridiculous levels of demand the world would inevitably have for them. To say these potions of his are game changers is putting it mildly. It would certainly skyrocket him into the echelons of the richest in my realm, possibly in the whole world given enough time. My god, the sales he would make to the armed forces alone!

Like the consummate statesman he was he controlled his voice and face as he began negotiations. "That sounds like an interesting proposal Mr. Potter. I suppose I could see my way into clearing your way to starting up your company here in the UK. For instance, setting the corporate tax rate to 15% for the first ten years, and waiving the land ownership taxation for any land you purchase for the same time frame. The value added tax will of course stay the same."

Harry tried to remember what Emma (and surprisingly Ororo, who had a very good grasp of taxation and what it meant) had pounded into his brain then smiled a faint little smile. "Well, that sounds interesting enough, for a start. But I believe my financial advisor mentioned something about setting the corporate tax at 12% for the first ten years and raising it from there. And as for land tax, I can't see the need for more land cropping up at any point. I have no quibble about the value added tax."

The king went on, "In terms of the corporate tax, I would be willing to have it remain at 15% for the first fifteen years, with an agreement to raise it by one percent every year after until it reaches my original offer." That was actually very close to the best offer he could make without consulting his cabinet and the PM since this was not in fact covered by his own area of control.

He hoped Harry went for it, not that he had any doubt it would be ratified once the PM and the others heard what it would bring them. "I could also see to extending that rate of taxation to any other avenues of business you open up in the future in my country. But you must realize Mr. Potter that we only have your word on the efficacy of these potions you intend to sell. Until their ability is proven by a neutral panel of experts, then all you have is the idea of them."

Harry made a show of rubbing his chin thoughtfully, and the king watched him with suddenly narrowed eyes. That was the same point that the people he had talked to in Ireland had mentioned, and they had been rather smug about it. Emma had set up several meetings with business people in Ireland and even with her last name and her endorsement he had been met with a lot more in the way of, well, amused contempt really. Oh, they had given him a decent first offer despite this, but it was clear none of them felt his potions would be able to do what he implied they would. The king on the other hand knew of magic, and seemed to believe him, despite what he had just said.

And that last little add about extending the rate of taxation to his other businesses was a major incentive all by itself, and the rest of the package was pretty close to ideal. Yet Emma had told him to never agree to the first proposal no matter what, not even a verbal agreement to that effect. "Well, I suppose as a first offer that sounds fair. I'd have to consult with my advisors of course before making any decision, as well as shop around a bit to see what the other nations would be willing to offer. I already have an appointment with a business rep in Ireland, so we'll see."

The king watched him through narrowed eyes. He's acting the part of a business man, but this is not something that comes naturally to him, so why? There's something else going on here. During his tale of his past Harry had never come across as someone who was all that interested in money, and seemed more the type to do good on his own rather than through a charity or business like this. This all strikes me as a means to an end, not the end itself. Whatever this young man is, he is not ambitious in terms of wishing for fame and wealth. And while he no doubt thinks his company can do a lot of good in the world, there is something else going on here. The question is what?

He stood up, his knees creaking as he deliberately let his face harden to match his voice as he spoke with the royal 'we.' "That is fine for now Mr. Potter, we will be willing to make a firmer offer later once your potions are proven to work. Yet dangling a carrot in front of us cannot blind us to the fact that you want something more than merely easing your way. Once proven such potions as you have described would clear any medical or pharmaceutical board in most countries faster than we could blink. The sheer amount of good they could do would force that, and the amount of money they could make the government and the resultant boost to its economy would have most bending over backward to work with you. What are your long term goals? Why have you come to us personally like this? And do not say it is just for nostalgia's sake or because you have a lingering sense of loyalty to the crown, we know that is not the totality of your reasons."

Harry leaned back smiling faintly, unsurprised that the king had seen through him. "You made a speech two days ago saying that mutants should be given the same rights under the law as anyone else, and that hate crimes against them should be subjected to the full power of the law. I believe the same thing, that mutants should not be feared or hated or discriminated against because of their powers, but nor should they set themselves above 'normal' humans. Humans and mutants should work together for the betterment of all humanity and the Earth as a whole. I've seen what can happen when one group discriminates against others." And I'm greatly afraid there are bigger fish to fry out there…

Harry had read through the records the FF kept on their past enemies and while many of the homegrown variety worried him (Doctor Doom topping that list by a significant margin, and it was coming close to the time when Harry knew he would have to contact him lest the Latveria monarch take offense at how long it had taken) it was the extra-solar and extra-dimensional enemies that most concerned him. While the FF were amazing and had handled the Skrull and the Kree expeditionary parties, that was all they had been, expeditionary parties. Neither race seemed likely to put forth the effort to conquer Earth, but they could destroy it far more easily. Human technology was changing rapidly, and it would not be long until they were noticed by other players on the galactic stage, and would thus become tempting a target.

That didn't even consider the other enemies the FF had dealt with, Like Galactus or similar enemies such as the Beyonder or even the Watcher (an idea that Harry had issues with). And course Harry was also worried about that big red thing that had ordered wizard-kinds genocide as a failed experiment.

"Mutant rights…." William said, sitting down again. "You want us as an ally for not just your business, but your political agenda. That makes some sense." He looked at the man in front of him, thinking hard. When he spoke up about mutant rights William had spoken as an individual. He had not spoken as the sovereign ruler of his nation, and had made that distinction at the time. Asking him to come out and support pro-mutant rights as the ruler of his realm was something very different. Yet even with that there was something else going on here.

Neither of them was putting all of their cards on the table here, but it was obvious the man had other plans even beyond promoting mutant rights in the political and social arenas by getting rich enough so that people had to listen to him.

Given the history he described, it would not surprise me at all if Mr. Potter is thinking of employing extra-lawful means to back up his position, and given his history he would probably be very good at it too. Hmm... Perhaps there is a way to see what else he can offer, as well as get some help with the problem facing my nation right now. "We shall be blunt Mr. Potter. It is obvious to us that you feel strongly about this, and are not the type to use only one arrow when you have more in your quiver. While I am fine as a person putting my backing behind that stance Mr. Potter, we as king of Britannia would require more immediate recompense to add our weight further to that issue. At the moment we would require you to undertake certain actions in our name for the defense of our land."

Parsing this statement out easily enough Harry steepled his fingers, his lips twisting in something closer to a grimace than a smile. It would appear as if the king had seen rather more than Harry could have wished, but it was also obvious that he was facing some problems on the home front. Still, perhaps I can get more out of this relationship than just an easier road to selling my potions. "So exactly what kind of magical issues are you having?"

William smiled, glad the younger man wasn't immediately saying no. "Not so much magical Mr. Potter as super-powered. Perhaps as a newcomer to this world you are unaware that Britain has had a history of super-powered individuals both heroic and villainous and not just magical. In recent times several superpowered individuals have appeared, including Captain Britain and others, ranging from heroes to simple citizens with special abilities. Unfortunately there have also been more superpowered criminals. Many of them agreed to be tied into our intelligence agencies, the MI's, as a new unit designated S.T.R.I.K.E., tasked with handling paranormal and superpowered dangers. It was to be a mixed unit of regular spy agents, all experienced personnel, and our new superpowered allies."

William's face twisted into a snarl of anger, sadness, and a bit of fear, something he would never allow on his face in public. "Evidently those who have turned to crime were ahead of us in this. A rather minor crime-lord named Vixen seems to have some rather powerful backers hidden to our sight. She was able to infiltrate the new unit and wipe out most of its members from within with the help of a few superpowered assassins. It was a major blow in terms of the lives lost and the accumulated experience and powers we can no longer call upon in times of great need."

Indeed that was heavily understating things. STRIKE had lost practically everything and everyone, and how things had gotten to that point was one of the many questions now plaguing William and the director of MI5 Jack Harper, whose agency STRIKE was supposed to answer to. Vixen had somehow impersonated the director of STRIKE so well she was able to completely gut it and get away, and the assassin Slaymaster had killed the telepaths who had seen through her deception. Every field agent had been compromised and quickly lost, and her hired killers hadn't just been Slaymaster, but her own gang apparently aided by several genetically enhanced thugs. She had waited until every field agent had been killed, then shut down the security of the building, allowing her own thugs inside while Slaymaster and others hunted down the telepaths and the other superpowered individuals in their civilian identities.

The clairvoyant Lady Witherspoon, whose sight had been blinded for weeks yet hadn't reported it for some reason, Brian Falsworth the aging Union Jack who had served the realm with distinction for so long. The telepaths Kevin Mulhearn, Vicki Reppion, Avril Davis and several other loyal special-citizens had all died in the horrific assault, not to mention the regular field agents and director Lance Hunter. Even Dr. Druid, the United Kingdom's expert on magic, had disappeared in the wake of the assault. The only superpowered agent who had survived was the telepath Betsy Braddock, sister of Brian Braddock, Captain Britain's alter ego, and young Betsy had her eyes gauged out by Slaymaster. It was only through her brother's timely intervention that she too hadn't died.

"Yet that would be bad enough, if we didn't think it was the start of something even bigger. Vixen alone should never have had the resources necessary to pull this off, or frankly the desire to, in our opinion. The only way this attack makes sense is if it was the start of something far larger." In point of fact after he had heard about the scope of the assault William had several flashbacks to the Second World War. "Thus we would wish for you to hunt down the perpetrators of this heinous assault, and when you do, do with them what you feel appropriate."

Harry leaned back rubbing at his temples thoughtfully, his own instincts about trouble roused by the story, as well as his Saving People Thing™, which Hermione had always told him would get him in trouble someday. "I'll need a starting point somewhere, some kind of description of the perpetrators in question, maybe a contact point with MI5 and the Yard, and you realize this might become ugly very quickly."

"Better a little ugliness now than far more later. If you can keep the fallout to a minimal that would be nice, but regardless we wish for this threat to the realm dealt with, and will okay whatever you do in pursuit of that within reason. Stop by the Braddock mansion tomorrow morning. We will inform them of your arrival and the reasons for it, and we'll pass on through the good captain names and phone numbers for you to contact as well as any information that has been thus far collected." The king rattled off the address of the Braddock estate, hoping this would also help Captain Britain get out of his rather stupid funk.

William would have been much more sympathetic to it if he had thought that it was because of what had happened to his sister, but given the ramblings and musings reported back to him it was more because he had killed Slaymaster to protect Betsy than anything else. That, William thought, was the height of naïve stupidity.

"If you can help us in our time of duress Mr. Potter you have our word that I will speak out as often as we can as an individual for pro-mutant rights, and as the king, as well as possibly aiding you in other areas." William looked into Harry's eyes, making certain the younger man knew he was speaking about far more than just making the UK a very attractive place to set up his company.

Harry understood that immediately, and wondered how else the king could help him, and if he was really serious about it. Still at the moment his own instincts were telling him there was trouble brewing with the STRIKE thing, and dealing with it now would be easier than dealing with the fallout later.

After a moment he nodded. "In that case your highness, I think we've come to as much of an agreement as we can at this point. I will do what I can to find out what is really going on concerning this current crisis but for now, I will bid you a good evening." Harry stood up, once more donning his invisibility cloak, pulled up the hood, and within moments was gone from the grounds of Buckingham palace. Once outside the wards he entered an empty alleyway, and then apparated directly back to the castle.

When he returned to Hogwarts, Harry found Ororo and Melody outside by the lake. The African woman was explaining the difference between fish and mammals to the young girl. She had been appalled by the fact that Melody seemingly couldn't remember anything she had learned in school before being sent to the sanitarium, and was determined to make up that lack of knowledge. Melody's powers worked against this unfortunately, interfering in her ability to take in and retain some forms of information, but Ororo was persevering, not yet willing to give up.

They both looked up as Harry appeared on the castle's lawn behind them, and Storm smiled faintly as Melody waved. "So did you have any success on your little endeavor?"

Harry had confided in Ororo that he was going to seek a political ally, but hadn't gone into much detail. If he had she would probably have been much more worried than she was. "Not exactly. It looks as if quid pro quo is the name of the game here, and you, me, and possibly Jean are going to have a bit of a job to do."

OOOOOOO

Since it would give her some more hours of daylight to work with Jean travelled back to the X-mansion with one of the house elves, a young male named Tipsy. From there she went out and rented a truck for a few hours and drove it around to the different parts stores and junk yards. It took her a while, nearly as much time as she 'saved' going back to the New York time zone, but in the end she had everything she and Harry would be able to find on the commercial market. These weren't components to build the arc generator she and Harry had designed of course. That would take specialized parts to build a working life size generator.

But this would be enough to build a few things that she thought they might need, as well as enough wiring to at the very least connect everything she wanted to a central generator and a specialized computer for design work, as well as quite a lot of random electronics and a new DVD player and TV, since the runes Harry had used to power the last two had burned them out. Jean was actually interested in opening the brunt out systems to see how his magic had done it, and decided that would be her first little project. That way they would know if wiring the castle could actually work before they devoted any time to actually doing it. Of course she had also thought of a few other points to bring up to Harry, but that was for later.

When she drove the full truck back into the garage where Tipsy would start to transport it she saw Logan working on his jeep. Rogue had taken it over almost completely, something that apparently irritated the Canadian native and he enjoyed taking care of it whenever the southern belle wasn't around.

Logan looked up as the truck pulled to a stop and Jean hopped out, smiling as she turned away from him, his eyes glued to her rear. Jean felt his eyes and shivered with a bit of revulsion, but also a lot of rage and more than a little honest confusion. "Put those eyes back in your head unless you want to lose them old man." Jeans word's came out almost conversationally, yet there was no doubting the threat was real.

Logan smirked however, not taking his eyes off her. "You got fire in you gal, I'm glad you're not saddled with that asshole Duncan anymore, and even more that you ain't with the Boy Scout."

Jean couldn't argue with the former label for Duncan, but in her opinion Scott had moved beyond the Boy Scout appellation, or if it was still applicable he was some odd kind of badass Boy Scout. Scott had won a lot of points with her in the fight with the FF against the demons, and while still a by the rules kind of guy he was much more confident and personable these days.

However what she took most umbrage with was the fact Logan said that line in such a way as to make it seem as if being free of them made her fair game for him. She glared at the man, shaking her head. "Look, Wolverine… you're a nice guy and all, but god this whole flirting thing is just so wrong it's freaking me out. Not only are you too old, but you're hairy, you've been my teacher for two years which makes it incredibly nasty, you're hirsute, we've got little to nothing in common, you're shaggy, and you're just not my type at all. I don't know why you've suddenly decided to flirt with me after watching me grow up for over two years, but I think you need to get a hold of yourself."

Logan was about to answer back with a snarky comment ('don't knock it till you've tried it') but her last few words made him pause and cock his head to one side. After a moment he frowned, then nodded. "You got a point there girl. I... Now ya say it that's kind of strange to me too. It could be because yer suddenly carrying yerself differently, but…" He shook his head and nodded. "I'll leave ya alone Grey."

At least until I figure out where the hell my attraction ta ya came from. It better not be my instincts coming out, wanting to bed the alpha bitch. Wolverines were not pack oriented like wolves but family oriented with one male and several females, yet the fact remained that strong females were much preferred as primary mates. Not that Jean was the only alpha bitch in the mansion. Ororo was another one, but she was also obviously claimed by Potter (who even his wolverine instincts could tell was a bigger predator). Rogue might eventually be growing into the same sort but for the moment Jean was the only alpha bitch available. However Logan liked to think he was more than his instincts, and Jean was right. Damn, why am I interested in her anyway? I mean yeah she's hot as hell now, but she's right, she's too damn young, and I've been around her for years now without her looks turning my head.

Suddenly a faint smell wafted through the air of the open garage door and he frowned wondering why that scent had his hackles rising, taking his mind off his current thoughts. "Anyway, I'll give ya yer space or whatever. Tell Chuck if he asks that somethin' came up, I'll see ya later." With that he turned and trotted out of the garage, heading towards the woods at the back of the mansion's grounds.

Jean's eyebrows rose in surprise but she shook it off. As long as the old man wasn't hitting on her, that was all she cared about. "Tipsy?"

The young male elf suddenly appeared right in front of her, and Jean wondered, not for the first time where house-elves went when they were just sort of hovering around waiting for orders. "Missy fire-hair calls Tipsy?"

Jean laughed, touching her flame-red hair. "Hah, better than Mistress Orrie. I've heard some of you call her that in the past few days, but unlike her, fire-hair I can live with. Anyway, can you start popping the stuff in the van to the mansion? But don't go too fast, I don't want you to hurt yourself."

Tipsy looked at the large white four-wheeled thing behind his master's missy fire-hair (master was a wise and powerful master to have so many missesses) a little worried. None of the house-elves really liked any of the 'teknoloy' that many of them had seen in the past few days on trips with the master or away from the castle. One or two were okay with it, Tipsy's sister Lissy was one. But most of them looked at the 'cars' and other things as weird and outlandish. So Tipsy was very grateful he had been able to stay at the mansion and wait for the wise missy to return before popping the odd and strange 'teknoloy' stuff to the castle. "Tipsy will do so miss. Does miss wish Tipsy to return here after?"

"Yes, that would be very helpful, but if you could bring back some of the leftover food that would be a good idea. None of the people here can cook for themselves." Tipsy nodded resolutely, horrified at the idea of people, even people who were not his master or his missesses not having food.

As the house-elf popped away with his first load Jean sighed. She would have to stay at the mansion overnight because her last physics class was on Monday. God, not even there for a week and already the castle is home, whereas this mansion has become just a place to stay. The rest of the week she would have free, with the finals scheduled the week after. This would also let her spend more time over with Harry and Ororo, and even meet up with Emma for their shopping trip before the gala thing on Saturday.

As she went up to her room she was stopped by a mental voice making itself known from right outside the ring of her belsham-trees, like someone using a foghorn to let his voice be heard on the other side of her trees. "Ah, there you are my dear, I hope that Mister Potter is paying you for doing these errands of his."

"Not at all professor," Jean sent back. "Harry has offered me a job once he sets up his company in a few weeks, but until then we're just doing little jobs here and there, setting up the electrical work and everything, and I would hardly charge him for that, he's paying for the parts that all."

Charles's mental voice sounded strangely incredulous when he replied. "He… he has offered you a job? But surely with college you would be too busy between that and being an X-man?"

Jean sighed both mentally and physically. It seemed as if this was a day for confrontations. She couldn't honestly say she was sorry about it, but she hoped this conversation wasn't going to be as bad as it could be. "Professor, I no longer wish to be an X-man." She said it bluntly, hoping to get past this and move on. "While I agree as strongly now with the dream of co-existence as I did at the beginning, I wish to do more with my life than be an X-man. Harry… I mean Mr. Potter has offered me a chance to make a difference with my mind and imagination above and beyond my abilities."

There was a moment of telepathic silence then Charles's voice came back to her again. "Please join me in my office Jean."

Jean sighed again, but decided to get it over with now. Moments later she pushed open the door to the professors office, finding him sitting behind the desk, with several printouts in front of him. A few seemed to have photos of people on them, but Jean wasn't really interested enough to take a closer look.

Charles was waiting for her and gestured Jean into a seat. "Jean, I realize that the idea of going out and making an impact on the world can be exciting, and I think you have the maturity to make your own decisions. But have you truly thought this through? I realize that Mr. Potter seems to have big plans, but how many of them are really feasible? And what of your education, I thought you wanted to go to college."

Jean frowned, "I'll still be taking classes via a correspondence course professor. And in terms of Mr. Potter's ideas, the one's I've heard seem to be great ideas, and he, Ororo and I will work hard to bring as many of them to life as possible."

Charles sighed and tried another tack. "Jean, you have a life here, and friends. You're an integral part of the team, what will they say if you just up and leave? And have you talked to your parents about this?"

"My parents haven't deigned to talk to me since I refused to follow their plans for my further education. They seemed to think I'd come crawling back to them or something when my own plans went belly up." Jean scowled at the idea then shrugged, visibly wiping her hands of her parents.

They had never been close, and that had been exacerbated when the mental blocks in her mind were broken. Strangely enough the way those blocks put a cap on her emotions actually made her more like her parents. Now that she didn't have them anymore, she was simply too different from them and their staid, organized, and forcefully normal lives.

She went on. "And in terms of the team, while they might miss my powers and even my presence at times, I have no doubt that Scott and the others will do fine without me. We'll still be friends, and I don't doubt we'll be able to keep in contact easily enough. No, after I graduate I'm going to move out with Ororo and Mr. Potter."

Charles frowned. Obviously this wasn't a spur of the moment decision as he had first thought, if she had already talked to Ororo and Harry. While Harry would be willing to indulge her on a whim, Ororo wasn't the type to allow someone to make a sudden decision like this that would change their lives so profoundly. Still he did not like the idea of Jean leaving the X-men at all. "I really wish you would stay here Jean. I don't think this is what is best for you, and I think you are downplaying the impact of your leaving to the team." He could also have brought up the idea of mutual protection, but Harry represented more firepower than the rest of the team combined, and that was excluding Ororo.

Jean frowned as she suddenly felt a pressure on the outside of her mind, her belsham-trees shivering as if under a powerful gale force wind. Jean suddenly realized that whenever she was anywhere around Charles her belsham tress acted like trees in a wind, but now they were completely bypassed. She then felt the outer stone wall of her mind which she had designed in the guise of Orthanc from the Tolkien books, groan under the strain. The thought seemed to permeate her mind that she should agree with whatever Charles said. Her jade eyes narrowed and she pulsed out her own telepathic power, pushing whatever the influence was back.

Charles didn't even wince, making Jean think she was correct in assuming that what she had dubbed his 'trust me' field after Emma explained it was not a conscious thing on his part. "Professor, I'm going to be blunt here. While as I said I still believe in the dream, I don't agree with the way you're pursuing it, nor do I want to remain here with you personally. While you have done a magnificent job gathering young mutants and training us, giving us a purpose and a set of ethics to follow in regards to our powers; you keep secrets and your own council when you don't have to, and you blundered badly in regards to me personally. I haven't forgiven you for putting those mental blocks in my mind and not informing me of them the moment you could. That is far too close to, to the mental equivalent of a rape for me to ever trust you again as I used to."

That statement did cause Charles to wince, and he looked away guiltily. "I, I did what I thought was best both for you and everyone around you Jean."

"The road to hell is paved with good intentions Professor, and that was a mistake." Jean kept glaring at him and when Charles refused to continue trying to convince her sighed, stood up, and left without another word.

That evening Jean was happy to see that Harry and Ororo joined them in the mansion for dinner, which Harry ate with Kitty in the runic workroom. Jean, not wanting to be around Charles, joined them there to talk about what she had bought earlier that day. Ororo joined them as well after seeing that Tipsy had followed Jean's request and brought over food for the others, meaning she didn't have to cook.

Kitty was a very observant young lady, and she noticed how possessively Jean was talking about the electronics she had bought, and wondered if Ororo wasn't the only one moving out. As long as they all kept in contact she was fine with Jean leaving, and knew the other woman would be able to handle anything that came up with Teach and Ororo with her. The fact Jean might have feelings for Harry occurred to her, but Kitty decided that even if that was the case it wasn't any of her business.

"By the way Red, I wonder if you'd be free to help us tomorrow local time on a little project." Harry asked, putting a strange emphasis on the word project.

Jean noticed this, thought for a moment then nodded. "As long as you can get me back to the mansion by around ten Harry, I have no problem with that."

Harry nodded, and after dinner the trio went back to Hogwarts, where Harry filled Jean in on what they might be doing in the next few days. As she got into her bed in the castle Jean shook her head, chuckling. "Little project indeed." Still, she hoped this might-become-a-crisis wouldn't stop them from their plan of going out shopping with Emma on Friday for the gala in LA on Saturday. The last thing she did before going to bed at last was to send Emma a confirmation E-mail to that effect.

OOOOOOO

Emma looked down at her laptop as she finished sending an e-mail to Jean stating where they would meet up before going shopping. How the other woman would get to Los Angeles was her own business of course, but the two of them, Harry and Ororo would meet up Friday afternoon. While Emma really didn't have much of an issue with Jean's fashion sense she knew the other girl would be lost at sea when it came to picking out what to wear to a ritzy event like this, and also wanted to make certain that Storm and Harry matched before they showed up.

She chuckled to herself. Not that Ororo could look anything but gorgeous, but she's the sort of woman who really doesn't care what she wears and to a high class event like this that just won't do. And if Harry even mentions just transfiguring his clothing for it to blend in, I'll strangle him.

She powered down her laptop then put on a large pair of headphones over her blond tresses and leaned back in her chair as the plane got ready for takeoff, crossing her long, sleek legs and closing her eyes. This is the way to travel, she thought as one of her families personal plane began to taxi down the runway. You'll never catch me in those piddling little commercial flights.

Feeling someone moving toward her Emma opened one eye and waved off the rather attractive stewardess, who nodded and with a smile took a seat a little ways away from the young Frost. All of the family servants much preferred Emma to Adrienne, and this one, Emma could tell from a gentle mental probe, was very grateful they were transporting Emma rather than Winston today. She was a recent hire and it appeared as if her father had flirted rather heavy-handedly with her the last time he had used the family's personal plane. Emma put that out of her mind for now. If all went according to plan her father would be taken care of shortly.

Emma was off to the Steel Belt at the moment, specifically Milwaukee. She was heading there to start work on figuring out where Sebastian Shaw's companies were leaking information. Sebastian would be meeting her there after he concluded some business in Pittsburgh. Pittsburgh, Milwaukee, and Cincinnati each held a central office for one of his businesses, but Emma had already cleared the Pittsburgh office in a day trip. The plan was for her to hit up Milwaukee and all of his holdings in Wisconsin over the next few days, but Emma controlled the speed and time of her investigations.

The fact that Shaw would be joining her made Emma more than a little nervous, but there was no help for it at this point. She had been very careful to not meet the man outside the purview of the club, but this was going to be a challenge, and she knew it.

The look on Winston's face however when he heard about it stuck with her. Something had happened there, Emma was uncertain what, but something from when she had been introduced to the Hellfire Club to now seemed to have pushed her father out of simply not caring about her to actively hating her. The look of anticipation on Winston's face when he learned that Emma was going to be with Shaw for a few days outside the club and away from anyone else had been rather frightening. She had expected such a look from her older sister Adrienne, but her father usually had much more control than that.

Soon father, soon. I wonder what it will be like to no longer have to fear my own family? None of her father's precautions, which Emma knew he had set up, would be enough to protect Winston from what she had already put in motion.

Adrienne also seemed to be champing at the bit, and had been disappearing even more frequently lately but that played well into Emma's hands. While her plan for her father was rather final and definite, her plans for her sister were more flexible, and could go one of any three ways depending on the actions of the players involved. Adrienne's disappearing and suborning of a few of her bodyguards played well for two of them, and while Emma would be much happier for the one of those two that was lethal to occur, she would settle for the other in a punch. With that thought she allowed her mind to slowly drift off into sleep.

OOOOOOO

The next day after a leisurely breakfast with Melody (fresh waffles, which Jean and Melody actually playfully fought over) the trio teleported to a empty spot Hedwig had found in a parking lot without security cameras on the outskirts of London, where Harry brought out his shrunk Huayra and enlarged it back to normal size. The trio piled in, and followed the roads to the address King William had given Harry in their meeting the evening before.

Harry looked over at Ororo and back at Jean, smirking in anticipation. "Everybody buckled up?" They both merely grinned back at him and he gunned the car's engine. His Huayra jetted forward, covered as usual by a subtle Notice-Me-Not ward, and he swerved in and out of traffic. Only once did he have to slow down, when they came to a bit or roadwork. What should have taken them travelling at a normal speed two hours and bit took them only forty minutes with Harry at the wheel. Soon enough they were in Staffordshire following the smaller roads to their destination.

Their destination was a large house set well apart from its nearest neighbors by at least five acres of mixed forest and fields. The area seemed old money affluent, like a place where rich people lived if they wanted to get away from crowds and didn't have to work for their money. It wasn't a place with a vibrant community or anything, but a private area, which probably suited someone who had a second life as a superhero rather well.

A voice came out after the first ring, reminding Jean rather strongly of all those old butlers in some of the films she had seen despite the suspicion in it. "Yes, this is the Braddock estate, may I help you?"

"Hello, this is Harry Potter and others, I was told you would be expecting me."

"One moment please." A moment later the voice came back, much less suspicious. "Yes, we've been told of your arrival, the gate should be opening now." A moment later the gate began to open, and Harry got back in his car and followed the slightly winding driveway towards the mansion they could see in the distance.

In said mansion Betsy Braddock, sister of the current Captain Britain frowned as she felt two unknown minds enter the mansion grounds. The fact that they both felt like women didn't quiet her suspicions, after all Vixen was a woman and so were some of her minions, nor did how strange the two felt to her senses help ease her suspicions. One felt as if it was a cloud made out of static, something she had never felt before. The other mind was clearly that of a telepath, but her defenses were very bizarre. "What the bloody…"

"Hello," said a voice from beyond the freakish tentacle trees. "Don't you know it's rather rude to try and get into someone else's head before you even meet them formally?"

Betsy scowled angrily, backing away from the tentacles that had just tried to grab her astral projection. "After the last few days of my fucking life, I think I've earned right to show a bit of caution and these tentacle trees here don't exactly give me a good first impression of you. Reminds me too much of some of the Japanese videos my last boyfriend liked to watch sometimes." That wasn't something Betsy would normally have admitted to even knowing about, but she was only five days removed from Slaymaster's assault, and was still taking heavy duty painkillers as her eye sockets slowly healed.

"Sorry, you're right about that, I didn't mean to sound like I was angry or anything. My name is Phoenix. And don't knock my trees," the voice went on more petulantly, "I like them. Though, eww, the idea of dating a boy who likes that kind of thing… Anyway, you should've been told about someone arriving today to ask you some questions about what happened? Well I'm with him."

"Him?" asked Betsy, "I only feel two female minds." Betsy's power was almost always on like a low level sonar system pulsing out from her mind through the astral plane which she could sharpen to a specific probe with a moment's thought. Now however she scanned around again, trying to find a male mind alongside Phoenix and the as yet unnamed female cloud of static.

Tension began to rise in her again, but the voice from the other side of the tentacle trees cut through her worry. "Yeah I know, he's got this weird mental defense that hides his mind somehow. No one can find it unless he wants them to. The other mind you probably feel is Storm, she's with us."

"Bloody useful then," Betsy frowned, but there was no more suspicion in it. "I... well, if you're here with ill intentions, my brother will deal with all three of you anyway. But, but it's nice to talk to someone else. Ever since, well ever since I was attacked, I've been stuck here, and its nice to speak to someone like this."

In point of fact Betsy was missing the ability to speak mind to mind with another person tremendously. She had been close friends with the other four telepaths that she worked with and it had been an odd day indeed when they were not all speaking to one another telepathically. There was now a void there, and even if this Phoenix woman was a complete stranger it felt great to meet someone whose voice could fill it, however temporarily.

Jean responded by sending a wordless wave of reassurance for a moment that took Betsy's breath away, and she wondered idly why her fellow telepaths had never been able to do something like that. She slowly began to sit up in bed, swinging her legs off the side. The two young women continued to talk mentally until Betsy heard her brother's voice in the distance coming closer talking quietly to someone.

Harry's first impression of Brian Braddock was decent enough. The man was a little older than him, and built more like a boxer or a wrestler then Harry who was built like a sprinter. In fact Brian reminded him rather strongly of Oliver Wood, the Gryffindor quidditch captain who had been so obsessed with the game, and had actually landed a job with one of the professional teams after he graduated. Like the Scottish Gryff, Brian was a solid mass of bone and muscle. He was tall, about 4 inches taller than Harry, with brown hair cut short like a soldier's, brown eyes, and an aristocratic yet friendly face, wearing a good, if old fashioned ruffed shirt and corduroy pants.

However that face was marred with grief and lined with care and worry. The man for all his size and apparent solidity seemed fragile at the moment, as if he hadn't been sleeping well. "I understand his Majesty thought you could help us Lord Potter, I even see his point about thinking that the assault on STRIKE was a prelude to something more, but I'm afraid we can't help you much. The only one of the attackers I saw personally was Slaymaster and he…" the man seemed to shudder and shrinking on himself. "He is no longer an issue."

"And a good thing too," Harry said briskly clasping his hands behind him as he followed Brian up the staircases of the mansion with Jean and Ororo following after. Ororo was looking around with interest, while Jean was merely walking along, most of her concentration on the conversation she was having with Betsy via telepathy.

Inside the mansion had been laid out similarly to Xavier's, with the main foyer dominated by a wide area around a single large staircase leading upwards. The decor was older, and much more expensive which was what Ororo was looking at, since she desperately needed ideas for her self-imposed task of redecorating the castle. In point of fact she had surrendered to the inevitable and decided to concentrate on the top two floors alone, and even then was losing interest fast.

Harry however wasn't here to take in the scenery. "The man was a killer for hire, and apparently very, very good at his job. The world is a better place without him, and even if you had captured him it's doubtful that he would've remained in prison for long given his skills."

"That may be true," said Brian hesitantly, "but I should still have taken him in. Everyone has the right to a fair trial, and no one should take the law into their own hands."

"Stop that," Harry said firmly as they came to a door on the second floor that Brian indicated was his sister's room. Since Betsy had been blinded a few days ago they should have had a live-in nurse, but Betsy had refused one and also refused to stay in the hospital, so she was back here, where she felt safest and the servants looked after her. Yet even with that Betsy refused to be waited on hand and foot, and was trying to get used to her blindness as quickly as possible.

"Sometimes," Harry said forcing the other man to turn toward him so Harry could look him in the eyes. "You must take a life to protect others. Killing in the defense of others is no murder it is sometimes the only way to truly make certain they don't hurt anyone else. Don't beat yourself up about it."

Brian didn't look convinced, but Harry let it go. He wasn't here to psychoanalyze the older man, and he well remembered how he reacted when he killed Bellatrix. Hopefully the man would get over it quickly.

Brian opened the door to his sister's room without knocking saying "sister dear, this gentleman and these two ladies are here to…"

"Brian you wanker!" Shouted a female voice from inside, "I'm not dressed you bollicking buffoon!"

Betsy had gotten into the habit of sleeping naked when she was around nine years old, and she hadn't ever broken the habit. She had begun to get out of bed as she talked to Jean but she wasn't able to move very quickly. Brian opened the door as she was finally reaching her dresser and reaching in for a shirt.

Harry took one look at her perky B cup breasts and her dark purple hair cascading down over her bare shoulders framing a face that despite the ravages of pain and the blindfold over her eyes was still beautiful and turned away swiftly. "Right, I'll just stare at this oh so interesting bit of wall here."

Jean walked swiftly into the room closing at the door behind her. "That's nice Potter, you and Mr. Braddock do that." When the door closed she turned back and moved toward Betsy quickly. "Here, let me help."

"Wanker," said Betsy growling angrily. "You'd think that my brother would've gotten used to knocking by now. Thanks by the way."

"Not a problem, and I think it's a man thing," said Jean, not commenting on the fact that she also had an issue with knocking. "Sort of like leaving the toilet seat up or something."

"Ahh, that is one habit I know I've broken Brian of," said Betsy a little proudly. "All it was took was several applications of permanent marker and hair removal solution in his shampoo when we were younger."

The two young women chuckled and Betsy looked toward where her guest was standing. Despite the fact that she couldn't see, her hearing was well up to the task of telling her where Jean was, and she flinched only a little as Jean pressed a shirt into her hands. A moment later the other woman took one of Betsy's hands and laid it on her shoulder, while pushing a pair of panties and pants into the purple-haired girls other hand.

Jean simply stood there, allowing Betsy to work out getting the panties and pants on like she had the shirt previously. After a moment she was dressed and nodded gratefully. "Thanks, I hate being like this, but being treated like some kind of useless invalid is even worse. It doesn't help matters that my coordination is shot to hell thanks to being as high as a ruddy kite on painkillers. You said your name was Phoenix, that has got to be your call sign or something."

"I can understand that," said Jean, "I can't imagine what you're going through. And yes, that's my handle I suppose. Sorry, but I don't know you well enough to want to share my real name. In point of fact you should probably think up on codename for yourself, if you intend to keep going with this whole superhero thing."

"Like this!?" said Betsy angrily gesturing at her face, where the blindfold covered what in reality were just two empty eye sockets were her eyes used to be. Slaymaster had ripped them out of her face while waiting for Brian to show up to rescue her. the fact she hadn't been able to fight back at all, that her telepathy had been utterly useless, rankled almost as much as her current predicament. That and the fear from the event came back to her every night. Right now she wasn't feeling very heroic.

"I think you could use telepathy to make up for it somehow," said Jean thoughtfully but shrugging. "But I'm not going to force you or even attempt to talk you into anything. We're just here to get your impressions of the attack as well as see if we can come up with any clues as to who might be behind this Vixen bitch."

"Someone has to be," said Betsy with a firm nod of her head as she made her way back to sit on the side of the bed. "She was…she's crazy obviously, but she should never have had the resources to infiltrate a government agency like she did, nor do it so well or get away with it! And there were a lot of odd things going on before my… my friends and I sensed what was going on, and after too." She paused looking at Jean. "I don't… I don't suppose you know if anyone else survived? My brother refuses to tell me."

Jean paused as she was about to turn to open the door and admit the two men and Ororo again, who had been a step behind the others, and stayed with them. "I'm sorry, but from what I was told you were the only one that survived. STRIKE's been utterly destroyed. From what Harry said, even its paper pushers are gone."

Betsy took a deep shuddering breath then nodded. "I was afraid of that."

"Betsy," said Jean, May I introduce Storm and Harry Potter. Before you ask no, he hasn't come up with any interesting codename or anything, we think it's rather arrogant of him, but he refuses."

"Oh please, you're just irritated that I refused to be named something stupid. Phoenix and Storm are all right, but your original moniker, Marvel Girl?" He said looking at Jean. Betsy started to laugh at the name which caused Jean to growl little, "Or Captain Britain?" He said shooting a look at Brian who shrugged his shoulders.

"Honestly people, how unimaginative can you be? And I'm not a superhero, I'm just a guy who would much rather be on his vacation right now but suffers from an acute sense of SPTS."

"SPTS?" Betsy asked curiously.

"Saving people thing syndrome." Harry replied dryly.

"In my defense," said Brian holding up a hand, "the costume I wear is the source of my powers for the most part, and it sort of makes its own name."

"It's not spandex is it?" said Harry looking a little leery at the very idea. When Brian nodded sadly he shook his head. "Yeah, you wouldn't catch me dead in that thing."

"And I reiterate," said Ororo looking at him with a rather saucy smirk on her face, "that you do have the rear for it. Although," and here her smirk widened noticeably, "certain portions of it would have to be let out to let you breathe a little."

Brian and Harry shared a glance then looked away coughing uncomfortably, while all three of the girls giggled even Betsy who even without eyes to see could follow that innuendo rather easily.

Harry however soon got down to business. "I realize this was a traumatic event for you Betsy, but we really need an idea of what went on, anything that stuck out as strange or unusual during of before the attack."

Betsy nodded and sat down on her bed, with Ororo and Jean on either side of her while Brian and Harry stood leaning against the wall as she began to speak. "Well, I told the inspectors most of this, but if I can help bring those arseholes to justice, I'll do it. I suppose we first thought that something was wrong when…"

The tale filled out the cliff notes that William had told him, and gave some details that even the report from MI5 that Ororo and Harry would see the next day didn't have.

Vixen, or whoever was behind her, had known that the telepaths of the psi-unit would see through her disguise, and had created orders to stick them all out in the field or on vacation days before she had begun to infiltrate strike in person. A few of them had died even before the telepaths had known that they had been infiltrated, and when they tried to pass it on to their fellow STRIKE members, none of them were believed. The psi-division was as new to STRIKE as that division was to the intelligence sector so none of the old hands put much stock in them.

"And on top of that, all of us were mutants, and well, I presume you know the attitude you can be subjected to if you're a known mutant." She turned her head in Jean's direction and Jean responded with a telepathic "yes" Betsy heard easily. "I shudder to think about what those mutants with physical mutations go through on a daily basis. It was bad enough with me, and well…" She gestured down at her body, not in an arrogant manner, simply as a statement of fact. Even as a glorified desk-jockey Betsy had kept up with her exercises and she knew she was good looking.

Harry shrugged. "We're in the business of hopefully changing that attitude. But those orders to put all of your division out in the field, that was the first clue you had that something was wrong? And is that your natural hair color?" Harry couldn't stop himself form asking that last one, purple was such an unusual color for hair, even stranger than white.

Betsy shook her heads, sending her long purple colored hair everywhere. "Yes it is and no I don't know why it's purple. And before anyone asks, yes I am part Asian. Let's just say that our father wasn't the most faithful of blokes, but was much better about taking care of the result of his liaisons. Thankfully I was the only one." She said all this in a droning sort of voice, as if she had been asked both those questions so often before she had developed a rote response.

"Anyway, no, the first sign we had was when Miss Weatherspoon's powers stopped working. The whole not being believed because of being mutants happened after that. The old gal said something about a dark cloud that reflected the present back at her when she tried to use her clairvoyant powers. But that was discounted as well, and she… she was the first of us to die."

Harry frowned. He knew a few potions that might be able to cloud a telepath or clairvoyant's mind, and maybe a high powered Confoundus could do the same thing to her entire mind. But something like that would be rather obvious, and something that effected just her powers? That smacked more of something much more specific, and Harry had only the vaguest ideas of how such a thing could have been achieved. Possibly some kind of sympathetic magic, old style witchcraft? But how could someone use that to target her powers specifically?

Betsy went on. "After that, well I suppose this will sound very outlandish to you all, but after that there was this strange… strange feeling I got when I tried to go back to STRIKE headquarters. I couldn't get within two blocks of it without suddenly turning around, thinking I didn't have any reason to go there."

"Actually," Ororo said thoughtfully, looking over at Harry, "That doesn't sound strange. Magical yes, but not strange."

Harry nodded grimly. "Yes, it definitely sounds like it. Was anyone at STRIKE proficient with magic?"

"Dr. Druid was supposed to join us in a few days," Betsy said promptly. "But I don't know what happened to him. Are you saying you use magic?"

"Oh yes. I'm both actually, a mutant and a wizard. But this is sounding more and more like someone with magic was behind all this." Harry shook his head. "I don't like that. Magic users are very rarely after mere political or financial gain. Some of them I've known would have launched the assault on STRIKE just to cause terror, but this is too… calculating for mere terror to be the goal."

Brian frowned. "My own powers are magical in nature, or at least that is what we think. The power of Merlin infused into my suit, but I am no expert."

"I'm beginning to think that is what we are dealing with, an expert I mean. Both at magic, and at hiding, not a good combination. Was there anything else? Did Slaymaster have the image of anyone beside this Vixen bint in his head giving orders?"

Betsy frowned but shook her head. "No, he might have in the end, but I was in no condition to go sculling through his head. And there isn't anything else I can tell you that wasn't in the report I gave the MI5 investigators. I wish I could help you more. Bloody hell, I wish I could get out there and kick some ruddy arse, but it'll be weeks before I'm used to getting around without my sight." Of course even with her sight Betsy knew she wasn't much of a fighter, but damn it, she hated being so fucking useless!

Harry frowned then reached out slowly, touching Betsy's hand gently. Betsy turned her hand upward and he clasped her fingers with his. "I'm sorry I can't help you regain your eyesight. The one thing that no magic, at least none I know of, can do is regeneration." He snorted. "I knew a magical policeman back where I came from that would've killed for that kind of thing. He had to make do with a peg leg and magical eye. The magical eye I could probably create for you," he said thoughtfully, "but it would take a while, it's not something I've ever done before." Creating something that could see would only be half the battle, making it able to act and send images to her mind like a real eye, that would be much harder. Not to mention the miniaturization aspect.

Harry hadn't actually meant to mention this and get the young woman's hopes up in case he was wrong and he couldn't create a new pair of eyes for her. But something about Betsy's plight and her fierce determination not to let it get her down struck a chord in him. He could also tell by their faces that Jean and Ororo both felt the same.

Betsy blinked her eyelashes over her empty sockets behind her blindfold in shock. "I, I never even thought something like that would be possible. It certainly isn't possible with today's medical technology. I… thank you. If you, I mean, I could never…"

"Don't bother my dear," Ororo broke in, putting an arm around the younger woman, who flinched for a moment the contact coming at her suddenly but then she subsided. "Just as my Harry said, he has a real problem with trying to help people. I just wish there was something Phoenix or I could do to help in turn."

Harry nodded and pulled out a set of potions he had been planning to use as samples. After a moment he pulled out a a tiny potion bottle that was a muddy orange color in its clear vial and nodded. "This potion will heal any nerve damage you've suffered in your eye sockets from what that bastard Slaymaster did to you, so you won't be in much pain from now on. I will warn you though it tastes like arse, and you'll have to drink the whole bottle."

Harry had taken about an hour to ask the elves to separate his available potions into one-use portions, and trusted them to have gotten it right. "I also don't know what reaction it will have with the pain-killers currently in your system, so I'm afraid you might want to wait a bit and let them run their course." He didn't think it would be anything bad, though it might upset her stomach, and if she threw up before the potion had time to get to work that would be very bad.

Betsy nodded and Brian took it from Harry gently, looking at it askance due to the color more than anything else. "Thank you for that sir. I'll take it as soon as I can."

"Harry if you please. No sirs in the frontlines and all that." He stood up rather reluctantly. "This Doctor Druid, any way you could tell me how to contact him?"

Both Braddocks shook their head but Brian answered verbally. "I'm afraid not, the good doctor has always been a bit of a recluse, and never really got involved with anything that was not magical in nature. He was very active in that role, but outside of it, never."

Harry frowned, wondering how to go about finding a magic user like that in an area the size of the British Isles who didn't want to be found. Perhaps Agatha or Steven can help me. "In that case I think I will be off, I have the unpleasant feeling that I'm going to be very busy shortly."

He looked over at his two ladies, who shared a glance then Jean looked at her watch and frowned. "I should get back to the institute now, to give myself time to get to school." That actually bothered her a little, because she wanted to stay and talk to the other telepath.

Betsy twitched at the school comment, having painted a picture of the other telepath that had her at least as old as Betsy herself, who was 23. She didn't say anything though and a moment later Tipsy appeared and took Jean off, causing both Betsy, who only heard the little creature, and Brian who actually saw him, to gape in shock.

After Jean had gone Ororo looked at the younger purple haired woman and smiled faintly. "I think I would like to stay here if it is all the same to you, beloved. I think young Betsy would like some company."

At that Betsy nearly sagged with relief. Not that there was anything wrong with Brian or the butler or the cook or the one maid the family still retained. But the first one was her brother, and not a great conversationalist since he killed Slaymaster to save her. The other three were in their sixties, and she had little to nothing in common with them that didn't involve embarrassing stories of her childhood. "That would be lovely Storm, thank you."

"I'll ask Lissy to keep an eye on you and take you back home when you're ready love." Harry bent forward, and kissed one of Betsy's hands, then leaned over Ororo and kissed her forehead before turning and leaving the room, with Brian behind him to escort him out.

The two women waited a few minutes then Betsy turned to where Ororo's voice had been coming from, an impish smirk on her face. "So, is that man as delicious looking as he is sounding?"

Ororo laughed, and their conversation went on from there.

OOOOOOO

While Harry returned to the castle the long way (driving a large portion of the distance then teleporting the rest of the way), Ororo was making a new friend, and Jean was racing from the mansion to Bayville High, Emma was not having nearly as much fun.

She was sitting in well appointed office in the security section of Shaw Mining and Metalworks in front of a large computer screen, her hands flicking and zooming through windows and programs and over stat-sheets faster than her two assigned watchers could follow. This was in fact deliberate; Emma was going faster than even she could follow to deliberately mislead the two anxious security force officials behind her.

Her cover here was twofold. For the security people she was merely a randomly chosen outside expert brought in to look at their software security. For those who already knew her identity, Emma was here using her family's famous computer worms (and it so rankled that even she didn't know where her father had gotten them from) to look for clues as to who was selling the companies secrets.

In this case those secrets had to deal with confidential smelting properties that were suddenly showing up elsewhere, and finding out who blew the whistle on the mining portion of the company recently. It turned out that several of the mining sites were not following federal guidelines for environmental safety. Now the company was hemorrhaging money in an attempt to cover it up or minimize the damage.

In actuality Emma was using her telepathic powers to winnow through the minds in the offices, looking for secrets, trying to find that little telltale sign of guilt or nervousness that could indicate something more than the normal everyday 'oh god the boss is coming' sort of fear.

She had been at it for hours already, and was just about to give up when she suddenly found a sudden spike of nervousness coming from a mining operation manager who had just dropped in for his monthly meeting with the local division chief. Well now, what do we have here?

A moment later, she knew who the whistleblower was, and why. The man was as venal and corrupt as they came, and it seemed as if he had done a monumentally foolish thing and decided to quit the company on 'moral grounds' and run for local mayor on an 'out with corruption' campaign because he felt it would let him enrich himself better than being a small scale mining manager would. With a sigh she wrote down some information then moved so she would be seen in the same room as the man to cover the full extent of her powers.

One down, one to go. I am so looking forward to getting out of here and shopping and having fun with Harry, Jean and Ororo. I can only hope the second spy falls into my lap as easily. If I'm lucky I'll be done here and moving on before Shaw even arrives. She snorted mentally. No, I've never been that lucky.

OOOOOOO

Harry looked through the screen of his laptop set up to call the Fantastic Four's building, and was surprised that his call got a response after only a few seconds. But it wasn't any of the Fantastic Four or even Agatha, it was Wyatt Wingfoot, Johnny's college roommate.

The Native American athlete smiled at seeing his old jogging partner. "Hello Harry, are you calling for some specific purpose? If you are I have to say that the Fantastic Four aren't here. Ben told me to tell you if you called that 'ya were right, but I'll try not ta let it get me down.'"

Harry smiled realizing that meant he had been correct in that the Inhumans were having issues above and beyond what had been described to him as a Royal niece gone missing. Still he was confident the Fantastic Four would be able to handle it. "Actually I was hoping to talk to Madame Harkness. I have some magical questions for her that I am unable to answer by myself."

"Wait here I'll go get her. But after you two talk, could I speak to you for a moment?"

Harry nodded wondering what that was about but he knew Wyatt well enough to know that the man would not waste his time. Wyatt was self-sufficient just like the FF, and actually had that most uncommon of things, good common sense. A moment later, Agatha's lined face appeared in the pickup. "A magical question that you cannot answer Mr. Potter?"

"More like a magical history question. And…" Harry said slowly his face falling slightly. "I think you should know what happened to my kind of magic users in this dimension. It's not a happy tale."

"It rarely is young man," said Agatha sighing sadly. "I will teleport to Steven's place, and then you can me pick me up there with one of those little creatures that I saw with you the last time. I would like to be told what their story is as well. Please note however, that I will be bringing Franklin with me. Without the Fantastic Four here there's only myself and Wyatt, and Franklin has recently begun to walk."

Reed was in the process of creating a mechanized nursing aid, but kept on going back to the drawing board, wanting to add more features and of course weapons. Eventually Susan would put her foot down as normal, but until then Agatha was on her own.

"And I'm useless with kids," said Wyatt smiling faintly.

Harry nodded then asked, "How exactly are you going to get through Dr. Strange's teleportation wards?"

Agatha smiled faintly. "We all have our own little secrets Mr. Potter."

Harry chuckled and let her go, looking forward to seeing Franklin as always. As Agatha's head disappeared from the pickup he turned back at Wyatt raising an eyebrow in inquiry.

Wyatt took this as his cue and asked, "I understand that you are mutant correct?"

"Well technically," Harry replied nodding a little. "My mutant power isn't exactly all-encompassing or anything like that of course, though its dead useful for me. Why, have you suddenly realized that you are mutant or something?" He said that jokingly, but he still had no idea where this conversation going.

Wyatt shook his head. "No, nothing like that. But as you know I'm a Native American of the Kewazi tribe. All the Native American tribes tend to keep in loose communication with one another and at various intertribal sporting events I've made several friends in other tribes. One of them, has a daughter who has started to exhibit… odd powers. In our culture there isn't any stigma against it, but there isn't anyone who can properly train her either, and I was wondering if you would be willing to take her on."

Harry paused thoughtfully. Now I could direct him to Charles and his place, or I could look at this and say okay so I've got my first student, but I'm not quite ready for that yet. "I'll be honest with you Wyatt, I'm actually in the process of setting up my company, and at the same time I'm also going to try and set up a school for mutants."

Harry would also of course be setting up his combat team that would include mutants, but their joining that would be up to the individuals entirely. He wouldn't even pressure them the way Charles unconsciously pressured the X-Men equating training to being on the team and needing to use their powers. "I'll be happy to welcome her at any point during the summer, but I'm not set up for it at the moment. If you want I could point you in the direction of a full-time school that could take her in right away though."

Wyatt nodded happily. "That won't be necessary, she's still in school after all, and her powers aren't so out of control that she's a danger to those around her or anything like that. And I feel certain that her parents would want to meet you formally before sending off their daughter to you."

Harry nodded, wondering if he would run into Charles at any point during this. He was becoming more and more concerned that Cerebro, the computer Charles used to find mutants just wasn't up to the task, and resolved that when he figured out how to do a magical equivalent to it, he would make certain it was up to the task. "I'll be in contact with the Fantastic Four in the next few weeks to set up a business deal with them and some other things too. So we can set up a meeting with her parents then. What's her name?"

"Danielle, or Dani as she likes to be called. Dani Moonstar."

Harry nodded and after exchanging some more courtesies the two logged off, and Harry turned away from the laptop after shutting it down. He thought for a minute then said "Cory?"

The house elf appeared in front of them, slightly taller and a bit more robust than most of the other house elves despite his young age. Cory was the one who had tried to teleport down from High Note to Hogwarts, and Harry had noticed that he seemed to be slightly more adept at teleportation in general then the rest of the house elves. "Master calls for Cory?"

"Yes Cory, I'm going to head to New York for a moment and I'd like for you to come with me. We'll be teleporting a rather elderly lady back here, and I know that my form of teleportation isn't very pleasant on the human body."

Cory nodded happily, and took Harry's hand. A moment later they appeared in Harry's workroom at the mansion. There was no one around since it was a school day and the last day of reviews and Charles and Logan had gone to some kind of meeting down in Philadelphia. From there Harry called ahead. He got a reply from Wong who responded that the doctor was in and they were dropping the wards for a moment.

They did not in fact drop the wards that blocked anyone trying to teleport directly in, merely the alert portion of them. Wong also opened the door leading into his master's domicile from that strange extra-dimensional waiting room that Dr. Strange had installed for people teleporting in on him.

Harry walked out of the room and spotted Agatha sitting rather smugly in a wooden chair with Franklin in her arms looking around from side to side with the sort of wide-eyed interest that only toddlers could show.

In front of her Steven stood trying to argue with her rather unsuccessfully. "All I am saying Madame, is that if you can get through my warding scheme so easily, other people might be able to use the same trick. It isn't safe."

"And I," Agatha smiling even more smugly than she had talking to Harry moments before, "am telling you that it would not be possible for anyone else to travel the route I do. It has nothing to do with the mode of travel but with the person doing the travelling."

Clea stood to one side with Wanda next to her. Watching the two sorcerers she shook her head, laughing. "You won't win this Steven, just put it down as a given that you can't keep her out and let it go." Not that Clea was all that sanguine about the idea of the elderly matron being able to pop in whenever she wanted (what if she did so when she and Steven were… busy?) , but she didn't see that it was something they could do anything about.

Harry took a moment to look at Wanda before moving forward to join the discussion if that was what it was. Wanda was dressed almost like Rogue used to, but with more red than black in her outfit, and without the fingerless gloves that Rogue used to fancy, nor was she wearing anything in the way of makeup. The bright smile on her face however was much more telling than her manner of dress, as well as how closely she stood to her teacher.

Harry smiled at the two of them and then walked over to Agatha and Steven who were still arguing despite Clea's words. "As amusing as this conversation is, perhaps we could move it elsewhere? I have questions I need to ask and I think you all need to see something."

As Harry took Franklin from her Agatha asked "see what exactly? You said you would tell us what happened to war wizards in this dimension."

"Yes." Harry sighed, shaking his head. "But like any history lesson, it is better with visual aids. And I think you'll both be interested in a little offer I have for you."

Clea shrugged. "Wanda and I were just heading out. We will see you when you get back Steven." With that she and her apprentice left and Harry turned to look at Steven.

Steven smiled faintly but warmly. "Clea and Wanda get along famously, young Wanda seems to respond to her stern yet caring nature, and the girl's magical lessons are continuing apace. We still haven't figured out how she came to have a magical core."

They had determined it was a sign of the Elder god of chaos Cthon as Clea had thought, but what it meant eluded them, and telling Harry about it would serve little purpose (and get the rather proactive young man very angry if Steven was any judge). "But the exercises both mental and physical that Clea has her doing have helped tremendously. Young Wanda can now control the outcome of many of her hex bolts, and her magic is much more under control in general."

Indeed Steven had been impressed and surprised by how well Wanda had taken to her magical instruction, as well as the rather disturbing power she could put behind those hex bolts. They allowed her to change the probability of the things she hit with them in surprising and devastating ways. "I must warn you," he continued, "I can't be away for very long. Something seems to be going on somewhere in America, something that has weakened the dimensional walls dramatically."

At Harry's raised eyebrows Steven shook his head, "Not enough to warrant me calling in extra help Harry." Harry nodded in relief, while Steven went on. "Nor does it seem as if it was deliberate, it seems more a byproduct of something else."

Harry frowned but nodded. Much like the Fantastic Four he was certain that Steven and Clea could handle whatever came up in their area of expertise. "That's fine I suppose, if you can't help me with my current issue simply giving me some advice would be preferable to nothing. And my proposal will still be a viable one."

Steven smiled. "That I think we can both do, and this proposal sounds interesting." Madame Harkness nodded as well, looking interested now.

"There are anti-teleportation wards up where we're going, and I'm the only person who can take other people through but I do have another mode of transportation available. Cory?" Harry said to the empty air and suddenly there was a small creature unlike any that Steven had seen before standing beside Harry.

He stepped back in surprise, but the creature merely bowed to Harry and said "Master be ready to go?"

"This is Cory," he said Harry said looking up at the other two magic users. "He's a member of a race called house elves that wizards created a long time ago to serve them."

Both of the other magic users frowned at the idea of someone playing God like that, and Harry nodded, understanding why they were doing so. He filled them in on the house elves and their bond to their Masters. Both Steven and Agatha looked slightly mollified after that but the idea of creating the house elves in the first places obviously still bothered them. It bothered Harry too sometimes, but there was nothing he could do about it.

Harry reached forward with his free hand, still holding Franklin with the other. The two older magic users place one hand each on his arm while Cory grabbed onto his pants. A moment later the four of them reappeared in the great Hall at Hogwarts.

Franklin looked around making excited babbling noises at the new and odd place he found himself in. He was not at all bothered by the odd mode of transportation, just as he had not been bothered by Agatha teleporting the two of them to Dr. Strange's place. The two sorcerers on the other hand looked a little queasy for second, but it passed quickly. They too looked around in wonder, their magical senses able to easily see the amount of magic in the very walls around them.

Harry waited for them to look around for a few seconds. Welcome to Hogwarts, the last and greatest edifice of Wizardkind."

Melody sat at one of the tables, trying to read a book that Ororo had gotten her and having only a minimal amount of success.

Harry walked over to her, patting the little girl's shoulder for a moment and introducing her to Agatha and Steven. While Steven had been involved in the breakout from the sanitarium he had actually not met Melody before, and he nodded politely at the young girl. Agatha looked at the girl a little thrown by her multi-colored hair but nodded cordially.

Melody looked at the two people who were full of classical music to her senses, a deep bass solo denoting intelligence and tested power in the man and a lyrical violin or string orchestra in the woman full of age and wisdom. But it was the toddler who grabbed her attention the most. His music was childish and lively, but deeper, richer, and much more playful than it should have been at his apparent age. She shot up out of her chair, looking up at the Franklin in wonder, who had turned his own head to stare down at her. "Hello there, I'm Melody, who are you?"

"OOOoooh," the toddler said, stretching his short stubby arms out reaching for Melody, whose wide eyes and multi-colored hair fascinated him.

A second later the appearance of a baby caught the attention of several of the female house elves who had been around the place and they stopped doing whatever they had been doing to pop in and look at Franklin. "Oh a little baby! Master, be we's able to watch him?"

Harry chuckled. He had seen much the same response in the first female house elf he ever met, a sad creature named Winky. All female house-elves just seemed to love kids of all ages, whereas males could take them or leave them. There were other differences of course, but this one seemed pretty constant.

"I suppose you lot and Melody can. Don't worry Agatha," he said looking over at the older woman, "House elves love to take care of children especially babies."

Agatha frowned. She was torn between asking if Harry could transfer one of the little creatures to her, and wanting to slap that idea down harshly. Using the little house elves for cleaning and cooking and other chores would probably build a sense of dependency. She would prefer that her charge learn to stand on his own two feet.

Yet on the other hand she was an old woman, and having another pair of magical hands around could be a big help. And it could also help Susan around the house obviously….

Agatha shook that thought off as Harry led Steven and her out of the great hall and up the stairs giving them a rundown of the history of what had happened here as he knew it.

Both sorcerers were horrified to hear about what happened to wizard-kind in this dimension, but Steven was quick to point out a few things. "They might have lived if they had reached out to the wider magical community, but then again possibly not. If this truly happened 300 years or so ago as you say I have absolutely no idea what the Sorcerer Supreme at the time or any of the other sorcerers could've done. I know for a fact that we wouldn't have been able to present a united front against these dementor creatures. Indeed I can name off the top of my head several present day sorcerers that would try to make deals with such as them, hoping to use the dementors for their own plans. And even a Sorcerer Supreme can only be in one place at once, though I know of at least six or seven spells that could've worked on them. The wizards' final stand saved thousands, if not millions of lives."

Agatha frowned. "I think myself and the coven of witches I was a part of in my youth could have held them off or possibly imprisoned these creatures, but I doubt we could have destroyed them without significant preparation." Neither Harry nor Steven looked at her askance at that, knowing that Agatha was indeed that old. "I could easily envision the evil things wiping out the British Isles before they were stopped, certainly none of the Celtic druids would have any spell that could stop them. Their spells were all based on working with nature and nature sprits, which would probably not have worked against beings such as these dementors."

Harry nodded. He still didn't agree with the way the wizards had gone about it, but his initial all-consuming rage at the callousness of the way they treated their kids during the act had disappeared, and he was able to separate his own experiences with the wizards back in his old dimension with the ones here. The name Dumbledore was still a touchy subject, but he was able to see the final stand of his wizards for the truly honorable thing it had been.

After that he began to explain why he wanted their help. First he told them about wanting to start his company selling potions and how he met the king, then the decimation of STRIKE and his fears there might be something more going on. Then Harry asked if either of them could recommend how to find the local magic user Dr. Druid.

Steven frowned a little, still uneasy about making magic known, however indirectly, to the world like that, but in the end it was Harry's choice, and if Harry's magic came out he had a built in excuse that would be believed by the majority of the populace. His instincts too were telling him that something major was in the works in the UK but his obligations in the US were also important. "I wish I could help Harry, my instincts agree with you about there being something or someone magical behind this, but I am leery of leaving the US for a long period of time at this moment. Still, I do know where Dr. Druid lives. He and I have consulted on a few matters in the past. We prefer to keep to each to our own patches of course, but as Sorcerer Supreme I do have overarching authority on any other-dimensional danger that crops up. He and I worked together a year ago against a group that called itself Mys-Tech, a group of seven demon worshipers who had sold their soul decades ago to a demon lord in return for immortality."

Harry sighed, wondering what it was about humans wanting to live forever. As a wizard he knew his own lifespan was connected directly to the size of his core, and that he could probably live just as he was now for centuries, but the idea of living forever did not appeal to him at all. The idea of outliving all his lovers was a sobering one even without that burden.

Steven went on. "I'll write up a letter of introduction for you, and I can tell you where he lives, though what wards you might run into I do not know."

Harry nodded. "That will be very helpful, but I also wanted to set up a bit of a book exchange between the three of us." He opened the door to the library and watched in amusement as both sorcerers eyes lit up with the pleasure of knowledge.

Steven looked around in wonder. While the library of the Sorcerer Supreme had more tomes than this, over a quarter of them were ancient and unreadable. Not a single book here looked as if it was going to fall apart if he opened it, and he noticed several titles that his own collection boasted, especially about wards and runes.

Agatha looked around smiling faintly as she noticed a few books with titles that interested her, but her coven had never put much stock in book learning. "I'd like your help to organize all this as well," Harry continued. "It's not organized right now, and it's a big job. In exchange you can take any two books so long as you let me copy them first."

Both sorcerers looked at him in astonishment. "What do you mean copy? Surely magically copying a book wouldn't last very long."

In answer Harry waved his hand and a book he had added to the library from his own came flying down. The title of it read 'Retaining The Written Word, a treatise on book preservation, copying and library spells'. "The wizards here and in my old dimension came up with a lot of spells designed purely to help them retain the use of books and scrolls."

Both of the other magic users shook their heads, never even having considered the idea of magic being used for such a plebian use before.

Over the next few hours the two sorcerers helped Harry go through the collection, and Steven was a major help in figuring out how the big book of students used what he called air leylines to search for students in the British Isles. It was the same basic principle the Eye of Agamotto used to find extra-dimensional dangers in the world.

Harry had never even heard of ley-lines in the air before. He knew that there were leylines between the stars, after all astronomy was an important class at Hogwarts. Of course by the time he went there ritual magic, the area most concerned with the placement of stars and the heavens, was nearly banned by the ministry, since it was a kind of magic they couldn't really monitor. Leylines in the air was a new one, but after thinking about it Harry realized it made sense.

While leylines in the air were not as powerful magically speaking as Earth leylines, they were even more plentiful, and moved invisibly through the air. They were also far more difficult to tie anything to given their very nature. Faced with the book of library spells however Steven was more than willing to exchange that for two of the most ancient tomes in the Sorcerer Supreme's library which could walk Harry through the same process. "But why would you want it? What kind of student are you going to look for?"

"I'm not going to make this a magic school Steven, I want it to be a school for mutants, a haven if need be. If I can figure out what to look for, the Big Book of Students should hopefully lead me right to them."

The two sorcerers exchanged a glance. The news these days was full of anti-mutant sentiment and pro-mutant sentiment in equal parts. Mutants, especially those with physical disfigurements, were very easy targets for those inclined to hate anything different from them.

There had been a few riots in China and in other countries, most of Europe and America were having similar issues, but thankfully in America it hadn't spilled over into violence yet.

The rest of the time passed with the three of them going through books, exchanging books, and generally organizing the library. Harry found several gems of information doing this, including a book that held Grecian runes he had never seen before that dealt with creating Time-turners, something that had been the purview of the Unspeakables, those useless arseholes, back in his old dimension. This alone was easily worth the amount of time spent organizing the rest of the library and even more.

With it he could figure out a way to add a time acceleration aspect to the wards on the farming areas of High Note. If he could come up with a way to make it so that he could produce two or possibly even three crops a year of the potions ingredients he might well be able to meet the worlds demands for his potions. Or course Harry also realized he would have to figure out some way for the elves to not be effected by them, but still, it was an amazing find that had Harry chuckling gleefully and rubbing his hands together.

For their part Agatha came up with several household spells made easy. Spells to help in cooking for example were interesting, since with Franklin around anything that could make her life easier in the kitchen was something she was looking out for. There were also several spells to monitor babies, which she was also very interested in. It was a strange thing to consider, but she and the coven that had trained her had never developed spells for relatively simple things like that. While many of them were things she could already do with her magic, these made it much simpler. She also was impressed by the books about healing spells and potions, an area where her own magic lacking. Oh she could heal herself via rituals and overtime, but actually healing herself quickly, or even mid-combat? While Agatha was no young sprout who was going to go looking for trouble, she knew that trouble sometimes came to find her, and healing spells like this would be very useful.

Steven however was much more interested in some of the books on warding, primarily because he really wanted to figure out a way to block Agatha's access. It was silly really as the old woman was no threat to him, but it was a motivation nonetheless. There were also several books of combat related transfiguration that he decided to peruse at a later time. While his own combat magic was excellent, transfiguration of the environment was beyond his normal abilities. Conjuring he could do on a small scale, but not quickly like these spells would allow him. Indeed transfiguration, solid state matter to matter changes, was an area where wizard-kind was simply head and shoulders above sorcerers.

One thing Harry noticed as they worked on the books about warding was that none of the books covered Norse runes for some reason. He asked Steven and Agatha about the lack and neither even knew there was a lack in the first place. It seemed that the Norse runic alphabet was never discovered in this dimension, which struck Harry as strange, since it was one of the more robust vocabularies out there. Not as easy to use or learn as the Grecian, with some truly odd effects if you messed things up, but powerful and durable.

About three hours after they had arrived, the library was organized and all three spell weavers were very happy with the day's work.

While they were doing this, Melody and Franklin explored the Castle together, with Melody insisting on holding hands with the toddler who, as they are wont to, toddled along. She laughed and clapped her hands when she noticed he seemed to have some power of his own. This was shown a few times as they walked around, mostly by his playing with her hair or hovering over the floor a few inches a time or two. This changed however when they reached their destination.

Melody knocked on the side of what had been the Hufflepuff common room in Harry's old dimension. In this one it was merely a circular room devoid of any furniture or anything truly remarkable, but it lead into the house-elf village, which Melody thought was the most fascinating place in the castle. Well, outside the hearthstone room, which she had been in only once.

Little houses, the same height as her small body were everywhere sticking out at odd angles from the ceiling, the corners, the walls, and of course there were more normal ones on the floor.

For his part Franklin had been very happy to be around this strange small person, not having met any other children before. Of course they were followed everywhere by 10 female house elves, but they had enjoyed themselves greatly. Now as he stared around at the little houses and all the strange funny looking people now coming out to great them, with even more popping in, he giggled, clapped his little hands, and not a moment later teleported himself and Melody up onto a house set in the ceiling.

This particular house was made like a hollow tree, with the top of the tree jutting toward the ground. The two children appeared in the hole in its trunk and looked around at all the house elves. Rather than be alarmed, Melody clapped her hands in delight, hugging a giggling Franklin to her. "Wow that was fun! You'll be fantastic at hide and seek when you get older!"

One of the female house-elves who had been watching them, an old grandmother elf named Delphi popped into the house right behind them, chortling. "Young mistress and guest should not be up here when the fun bes down there! Lookies!"

She pointed down and Melody looked and laughed. Below them the other house-elves had disappeared for a moment, then come back with several simple toys, small animals and people carved out of wood along with the toys Harry had bought her from Harrods that she kept in her room. Franklin took one look at the multitude of offerings, 'oohed' again and suddenly they were back on the ground.

For the rest of the day the two children played various games with the house-elves, chasing one another around the little houses, playing with the toys, in various games and generally having a lot of fun. Franklin used his odd powers to keep up easily, and the house-elves took it in stride being well used to seeing such things. It was possibly the greatest moment in Franklin's young life, and memories of it would stay with him for a long time. For Melody it was just another sign of how much her life had changed since Harry had freed her form the sanitarium, a memory to be cherished like all the others she had been making lately.

Harry and the others found the children there, though by the time they were done in the library Franklin was starting to run out of energy, a sight Agatha was well pleased to see. "Unfortunately I am afraid that we need to head back to California. Thankfully it looks as if the little man will be making an early night of it, so he shouldn't feel the effects of the time difference. Thank you for watching him my dear."

"You're welcome," said Melody chirpily then pulled out the toddler from one of that house elf houses and carried him over to the old woman.

Harry grinned around at the house-elves. "Thanks Melody and you all as well. Cory, if you could take our guests back to the place we came from? I'll see you two later." With a wave Harry bid farewell to his two fellow magic users smiling faintly at the amount of work they had gotten done today.

By this time it was around seven local time, and he asked the head elf cook to whip them up something, then spent a few hours with Melody listening to the young girl recount her time with Franklin. The stories she told made him wonder if Franklin was a mutant of some kind, and Harry found it strange Franklin's powers had already begun to show, but in general he wasn't too worried. With parents like his there was no way Franklin was going to be a normal kid anyway, and if they needed help with him in the future they knew how to contact Harry.

After that while Melody was getting ready for bed (Franklin had tired her out too) Harry spent some time assessing his current magical level, which he hadn't done since draining Diablo. He found that while his general magical level hadn't changed too much, it had gone up a bit, slightly more than when he had drained the first horcrux of Dr. Strange's.

In terms of power level Harry found his magical core had grown by at least three times its previous size since entering this dimension, being at a little over 800,000 UOM. Thankfully the change had been in bits and pieces, allowing his magical control to keep pace, but his control was a little wonky after he drained something. And whenever he drained something, it seemed as if it carried a bit of, for want of a better word, 'aftertaste' to it.

For instance when he drained some power Cytorrak and the Juggernaut, it seemed to add to the Magia Erebea spell automatically by augmenting his strength and durability for several days after before losing the 'aftertaste'. The power he drained from Diablo seemed to carry an extra charge to it when he attempted to transfigure or conjure something initially, before losing that 'flavor' and subsiding into the rest of his core. However he could still route more power into his Magia Erebea spell, and get the same result of augmented strength and durability. For some reason the same could not be said with the effects he got from transfiguration, possibly because unlike Cytorrak or his avatar, Diablo's magic had not really been his despite how long he had been alive, it had been given to him in exchange for his soul.

After that Harry put Melody to bed. Once the young girl was asleep he returned to the main hall and found Ororo there. Seeing his lady was wearing a frown on her face as she read something from a large binder he moved up behind her and began to gently rubbing her shoulders. "Is that the MI5 report, did you find anything interesting?"

Ororo had spent the entire day with Betsy and Brian, talking about all and sundry. While not as good as having a telepath around to talk to mind to mind, Ororo had been a breath of fresh air to Betsy. The potion Harry had left Betsy had worked, and the girl was no longer in pain, but still unused to being blind and grateful for someone near her own age to talk to that wasn't her brother. While she loved the big lump, he wasn't exactly a fantastic conversationalist at the best of times.

For her part Ororo was impressed by the purple haired woman. She was intelligent, possessed of a fierce independence, and an unwillingness to let her disfigurement get her down. By the end of the day the two of them had formed a tentative but real friendship, and Ororo was beyond angry at Betsy's maiming.

"Yes, you might say that. I've been going over the background information about this Vixen saafil kalb" Ororo lapsed for a moment into the Egyptian Arabic of her youth, using a term that meant 'loathsome bitch'.

"The background MI5 has gathered on her is rather extensive, though lacking in current information such as where to find her or where her operations in the city are. She came over from Africa with her parents, lived in the lower east side of London for a time with them until they died in a car crash leaving her alone. A few weeks after being put in an orphanage she ran away to live on the streets and from there worked her way up the local crime ladder, until she ran her own gang. She specializes in crimes such as drug running, armed robbery and hiring out her troopers as high-tech mercenaries, and is the head of a nationwide syndicate who might have ties to ."

She pulled out a picture from the dossier in her hands, handing it over to Harry. He noticed that the woman in the picture was black, with a thin body and a thin, pointed, almost fox-like face. She wore a pelt of some animal made into a cocktail dress, one of those silly feminine cigarette things in her mouth. "If they have so much information, why didn't the government move against her before all this began?"

"They could never pin her personally down it says, she was constantly on the move randomly, and the one time they got close enough to take her, her bodyguards were able to shoot their way out of the ambush. MI5 and Scotland Yard have shut down dozens of her operations, but her business is so profitable both in the UK and abroad that she is able to take those losses easily. Yet for all that, there is nothing here to indicate she could have managed an assault against the government directly like what happened to STRIKE."

Ororo shook her head. Putting those pages aside, she looked up at him, her eyes flashing with fury. "I definitely think that the king was correct that there is something else going on. Vixen wouldn't be capable of planning and executing an assault like the one that took out Betsy and the rest of STRIKE nor is she stupid enough to think she could get away with it. And there's more." She pulled open another report and thumped it on the table. "This one report from a, what do you call them, a bobby?"

"If by bobby you mean a policeman walking around town in one of their blue uniforms yes," said Harry sitting down next to her and taking her hand kissing it in a further attempt to calm her down.

This time it worked, and she went on much more calmly. "This bobby describes being on the scene both before and after. First there was nothing wrong, as if he couldn't even concentrate on the building it was so boring. Then three hours later a completely different description, after the assault had occurred and Vixen and her men had made their escape, he noticed a dead body in the doorway and the fact that several of the buildings windows had been broken. That corroborates what Betsy said happened to her. And there were several other civilian reports much like that one."

"On top of that there was no attempt to call in aid, all the communication gear in the building was reported as burnt out after the police stormed the building."

"So there is definitely something magical going on, as we feared," said Harry leaning back and frowning heavily. "I'm afraid we're going to have to do a lot of legwork on this one, love. I didn't sense anything while I was in London at Harrods or outside Buckingham Palace, and that plus what Ms. Braddock said means whoever is behind this is really good at covering his or her tracks. I might need to be right on top of it before I'll be able to figure out what is going on. I've got an address to go to see if I can talk to the resident magic expert, but I don't know how helpful that will be."

Ororo frowned for a moment. "Jean won't need to be at school for the rest of this week, I think we need to have her help with this too. Her telepathic powers should be able to pick up any stray thoughts or clues, that might help us find some clue your magical senses can't find."

Harry nodded. "That sounds like a plan. I'll head down to Wales first thing, then have Hedwig drop you a line and meet the two of you in London." Ororo nodded, and Harry pulled her into a deep kiss. "Enough of that for now love, lets go to bed."

Ororo smiled into his lips, and nodded eagerly.

OOOOOOO

Once again Director Fury of SHIELD found himself doing the one aspect of his job that he most despised, dealing with idiots. The fact that this particular idiot wore the uniform of an Air Force general really did not help matters.

"Perhaps we have differences of opinion on what the word 'jurisdiction' means," he said bitingly, his tone scathing. "You were told over three months ago to cease and desist all attempts to follow, research, keep tabs on, or in any way have anything to do with the Big Guy. Now I find that not only have you kept trying to find Dr. Banner, but you nearly created an international incident!"

The man on the screen was an older gentleman with white hair kept in the military crew-cut, a white handlebar mustache and a very short clipped beard. Brigadier General 'Thunderbolt' Ross had cut his teeth in the Korean War as a colonel. He was well thought of in the American military, and he ran his command like a small fiefdom.

Despite this however, he was supposed to at least nominally be under the jurisdiction of the government and the Senate Military Oversight Committee. That Senate oversight committee had in point of fact ordered Ross to back off and let SHIELD handle the Big Guy from now on. Two of its members were in fact on the same shadowy committee that funded SHIELD.

Thunderbolt seemed to be completely impervious to this however. "That damn committee of politicos doesn't know anything! My men have the most training against it, we know the most about it, and it was our mishap in the first place that created it, so it's our damn duty to clean up after ourselves! You want to play jurisdictional games with something that can destroy a city as easily as that monster can!? Don't be a fucking idiot!"

Fury leaned forward a glaring with his one remaining into the pickup. "General, I'm not playing games. I am telling you the way the world is going to work from now on. From now on you will have no connection whatsoever to anything pertaining with the Big Guy. You haven't had any luck to indicate that you can handle it. And to be blunt your combative and confrontational attitude with the Big Guy merely adds to the issue. According to our reports Dr. Banner is just as keen on controlling himself and staying out of the way as you are to seemingly confront him. Not once has Dr. Banner transformed except in self-defense."

"On top of that there have been a lot of questions raised in certain circles about why exactly you are so keen on finding him. My agency is currently sitting on the news networks, but it's getting harder to keep them away from you and the very idea of trying to re-create the super soldier serum in today's political and social climate would see you at best publicly lambasted. At worst the government would be forced to dishonorably discharge you, possibly even arrest you."

"I won't be told my damned duty by some whippersnapper who thinks he's Nick Fury! I don't know how you fooled the others, but I'm not going to answer to some damn spook whose tried to take over his name!"

Fury shook his head. That issue had come up before. Ross refused to believe that Nick was who he said he was, and Fury he wasn't about to fight about it any longer. Especially since he thought that the general might be using it as an excuse. "General Ross you are a war hero, and as such I'm willing to cut you some slack. But I'm warning you, if you have anything further to do with the Big Guy or chasing him down, I will not hesitate to have you stopped, your entire unit disbanded, and your good name ruined." Unlike Thunderbolt's vitriol, Fury's voice was sharp and calculating like a scalpel.

Thunderbolt stared at him. This damn spook didn't understand, none of them did. The Hulk wasn't just one of the most dangerous monsters in the world; he represented the future of the American military. If they could figure out a way to give their soldiers the strength of the green behemoth, but keep them in control, then nothing would ever be able to threaten the American way of life ever again and they could do away with the need for independent superheroes like the Fantastic Four or the few others that had begun to make headlines lately. Hell with an army of super soldiers they wouldn't even have to fear the growing mutant menace. "You do what you have to sonny, and I'll continue to do my duty." With that Thunderbolt signed off.

Fury leaned back in his chair, growling angrily. It was times like these he missed being a regular field agent, or even the times back in World War II when he was with the Howling Commandoes no matter how dangerous it had been. Things were much simpler than, and there wasn't so much damn talking. And if a whippersnapper like Ross talked back to me I could have him put in solitary!

He looked over at another video playing on another screen, one hand on his forehead massaging his temples. On the screen was a long haired blond man battling it out with another creature that had some kind of scale armor covering it from head to toe, its head like a rectangular block, which seemed to glow yellow with an inner light. Of course this wasn't the first time Fury had seen video recordings of two super strong beings battling it out. The Thing and the Big Guy had had a few run-ins before Banner finally left the country, and the FF fights with their various foes had been recorded several times before. The fact they were duking it out right in the center of a town out in New Mexico, with people scrambling and running around in the background and police trying desperately to evacuate them, that was new.

Before this, the superpowered individuals in the world had been careful to keep the damage to civilians and the public at a bare minimum. The Fantastic Four went out of their way during their battles to make certain that they stayed out of cities if they could help it, and the few times that they couldn't, one battle with Dr. Doom for one, and with the Mole Man with for another, it was clearly not their fault, and they routinely offered resources and money to any repair effort after. Here however they had one at least nominally friendly individual fighting another completely unfriendly individual in the center of a town and laying waste to it entirely. The fact that the semi-friendly was a being out of Norse myth was just icing on the cake.

His agents in the area were doing their best, but it was obvious they were overmatched, yet there was nothing he could do about it from here. "First the Big Guy, now this and we're still getting up to speed, with nowhere near the coverage worldwide we need to really do the job SHIELD was created to do."

"Speaking of which," Fury looked up in one of his aides, a young woman with short cropped hair, who had been recommended to her position by the Black Widow who she had been training with after joining SHIELD. "What's going on in England?"

The young woman flipped through some papers he was holding, then found the right one and nodded. "No arrests have been made in the assault on STRIKE as yet, but the crown and MI5 seem to know who was behind it. They're waiting for something before taking action, but we don't know what."

Fury frowned. He had been heavily involved in Britain in World War II against the Nazi movement there, and had a lot of respect for William. The king was good people as far as he was concerned though his recent stance for pro-mutant rights had riled several other people including SHIELD's backers. To Fury however this was simply the king saying the rights of the individual should be respected, and at its heart that was what liberty truly meant to him. He knew William would be playing his cards close to his chest, but he wondered what resources were being brought to bear on this issue. "And we've offered to help them right? I know we're stretched thin, but we could at least send a few agents."

"We've offered, but we're in a holding pattern for now Sir. With STRIKE gone MI5 is the only agency we still have contact with, and their director doesn't particularly like foreign influences."

"What was his name again?"

"Jack Harper."

Fury paused going through his mental files, trying to figure out where he'd heard that name before and then nodded. "One of their Balkan agents during the Cold War, right? He's done well for himself then."

"Yes sir, as I said Harper's leery about foreign influences, but a staunch supporter of the crown as well. He seems to be a little over his head at the moment, but he's not asking for any aid."

Fury frowned. "Who do we have that's free?"

"We have Black Widow assigned to the Fantastic Four sir but they seem to have done one of their disappearing acts again. She's the most experienced agent technically free so we could reassign her but…"

"Do it, get her on the fastest jet over to England as you can. I want her there yesterday."

"Sir," his aide said hesitantly, "Natasha is still on the UK's most wanted list. Even if she is working for us now they remember her as a Russian spy during the Cold War."

Nick frowned but then shook his head. "Then tell her to be on her best behavior, I have a feeling something big is happening there, and we need eyes on the ground. Besides, as you said she's the best we've got available. Anything new on those kidnapped scientists?"

"No sir. We think we have a lead on one of them, a Brazilian who specialized in avionics, his family has asked the authorities to search for him, but they've no idea where to even start. Our agents in the government are on the case though."

Fury rubbed his eye-patch thoughtfully. While they now knew the name of the group kidnapping scientists, they had no idea about their goals, their base of operations or how they were choosing or even actually kidnapping their victims. Most of their targets were mid to high level scientists, none of whom were near the level of the big names but combined the total 'egghead index' was becoming somewhat scary. But without identifying some kind of pattern, SHIELD couldn't do anything about them, or even figure out where to assign guards to attempt to halt their next kidnapping.

On the other side of the scale, Hydra at least seemed to have quieted down from their initial rush of activity, but Nick was still worried about their agenda and how close it resembled the Nazis. He had left a few resources in place to keep an eye on them in the Middle East under Duggan. Duggan had nearly as good a nose for trouble as Fury did, and Nick trusted his old friend to sniff out any trouble there if it existed. The fact it also got the blunt spoken Duggan away from the councilors, who he had ticked off badly during the two weeks he had stood in for Fury while he was getting used to his new body, was just a bonus.

"Those missing scientists disturb me, something is going on there but I suppose we'll figure out what exactly when it starts to smell." He waved his aide away and went back to watching the video of the fight between Thor and the thing in armor shaking his head as the video showed an arrow coming out from nowhere to slam into the armored things head, before the video suddenly cut off, the building the camera had been in collapsing. "Too many damn irons in the fire, one of these days were going to get burned I just know it."

OOOOOOO

"'Hey kid, want to come with me to New Mexico,' you said, 'it's just guard duty, it'll give you an idea of how boring working for The Man can be', you said. I don't fucking recall anywhere in that discussion you mention taking on a fucking armored super-strong bastard intent on hunting down some long haired surfer guy who thinks he's a fucking warrior god!" Lance, or Avalanche as he was known with his party clothes on, shouted this as he slammed his hands against the ground, a class 6 earthquake shooting out in line toward the massive armored thing that was trading blows with the man who, until about a minute ago, had looked like, as Lance put it, a surfer dude who had let himself go to seed.

"Quit your bitching and keep hammering him!" Hawkeye shot another explosive arrow at the thing, but it was Lance's attack which actually made the combatants break off from pounding on one another. "Besides, chicks dig the heroes, man!"

Thor jumped away wiping blood from his nose, pushing it back into alignment as he did so. Destroyer, the mighty armor that Odin had created for some reason he refused to share with his children, wasn't fast enough and found itself engulfed in the fissure Lance's attack had created. It didn't last long, as when Thor moved in to finish the thing off it burst out of the ground, both its fists slamming into his chest and sending him flying back a few feet.

Lance and Hawkeye dodged away as the Destroyer's face beam slammed into the place they had been hiding, with Lance going one way and Hawkeye the other. The Destroyer's attack was interrupted as Sif and one of the Warriors Three (Lance had no idea what their names were, and didn't really care, the only reason he knew Sif's name was because she was fucking hot in that Red Sonja babe-in-armor sort of way) attacked it from two sides at once.

"Forsooth, I do applaud thy courage youngling," the fat one said as he and the other, weaker looking blond guy raced past where Lance had landed. "Yet it wouldst seem to be wise for mere mortals to desist in attempting to draw the notice of the Destroyer Armor, tis only gods like us who canst face it."

"Shut up and go on a diet fat man, I ain't going anywhere!" Lance growled, getting to his feet. The ground under him rippling like water as his anger and battle-fever reduced his self-control.

The weaker looking blond laughed and the two raced into the fight as the hot chick in armor got slammed to the side. But that allowed Thor to return, slamming his hammer into the Destroyer's head, sending it careening through a store behind it and out the other side.

"Hey kid," shouted Hawkeye, "those powers of yours, you think you can shake apart metal?"

"Only one way to find out!" Avalanche grinned and raced forward behind the tall taciturn looking guy that for some reason looked more like a Mongol warrior than a Viking.

"That is the spirit," the one who called himself Thor shouted, "together we canst destroy that which is too powerful for any one of us alone, twill be a tale to tell in the drinking halls hereafter!" At that they all followed up their momentary advantage, finding the Destroyer standing in the rubble of the store waiting for them.

Lance shook his head as he moved around the fight, waiting for his chance see if his seismic vibrations could work directly on the metal monster. "Kitty's never going to believe me when I tell her about this…"

OOOOOOO

Harry drove his Huayra along a rocky road, heading up a mountain pass in Wales frowning heavily despite another fantastic night spent with Ororo. While Ororo was spending time with Melody (and conducting vocabulary lessons for the house-elves), and Jean was busy catching up on her sleep back in New York, Harry wanted to see if he could talk to Dr. Druid. Harry's instincts were screaming at him that something was going to happen soon, and he needed to talk to Dr. Druid. He needed information, something to point him in the right direction, so that he and the others could at least know where to start looking for any trouble brewing.

After a moment he stopped at the address that Steven had given him, and got out of the car, shrinking it with a wave of his hand. In front of him was what appeared to be an old, dilapidated house, the kind that looked too dangerous to enter. He ignored that however, and stepped forward onto the property. A moment later he stepped through a low powered aversion Ward, and stopped then pulled the letter of introduction Steven wrote for him out of his pocket and sent it zooming forward with a whispered "Wingardium Leviosa."

He waited there about 20 minutes then the door of the house opened with no hand to guide it. A voice rang out from the dark interior. "Welcome friend, and enter."

Harry shook his head smiling faintly. "Someone has a flair for the dramatic." Despite this Harry moved forward, his magic ready and waiting just in case. Inside the house the appearance did not match with the exterior. Instead of the entrance hall of a rundown, almost collapsing farmstead, the interior was a circular room that looked like a cross between a laboratory and a garden. There were a few trees dotting the room randomly, with dozens of shelves made out of their branches everywhere, filled with glass, clay and even some metal jars as well as hanging plants of some kind. Some of the glass jars were filled with liquid that shone bright yellow like the sun, while the others had other things in them.

In the center of the room was a small cleared area with a pedestal in the center holding what had been some kind of viewing crystal Harry assumed. Yet now the crystal there was shattered, with bits of pieces still on the top of the pedestal, with more dotting the floor around it.

One tree next to this open space was short and squat, and had been molded into a chair, piled high with cushions at the moment, and a man sat there, smiling faintly in welcome. "Sometimes you cannot beat the classics. Welcome, I would get up but..."

Harry looked at him wincing visibly. The man was bald on top with his hair along the side of his head down sort of like Logan's, taller than Harry by an inch or so if he was standing and a little broader, and he possibly could've looked powerful and strong, but that was in the past. Now his body bore the wounds of magical combat, and it was obvious he would never be the same again. His leg was missing from about halfway up his thigh, replaced by a wooden construct. His right arm was gone too, replaced by a wooden stump. His face was crisscrossed with what looked like wounds caused by debris, and there was a bandage around his head. He wore no shirt, and his chest looked as if it had been hit by multiple 'Sectumsempras', the blood seeping through the wraps in several dozen small areas.

Harry immediately reached into a pocket and pulled out a potion. "Pain reliever," he said handing it over "you're free to check it if you wish, I also have another that can heal damaged nerves, and some burn cream on me that can heal those if you have any. I also have spells that can heal minor wounds if you wish."

The man looked at the potion askance for a moment then waved his remaining hand over it as Harry held it and smiled faintly as the jar holding the potion glowed green briefly. He took it and took a pull from it, and his smile widened slightly as the pain of his wounds ebbed dramatically. Then with a nod of gratitude, he slowly, pulled off the bandages covering his chest.

Harry went on, "I'm sorry, I don't know of any magic that can re-grow lost limbs. I seem to be saying that a lot lately," he muttered scowling angrily. With that he went to work, using the spell Episkey to close and heal the wounds on the other mans chest.

"Young Betsy?" asked Dr. Druid, sighing in relief as the wounds his own magic couldn't' close were overcome and healed by the younger man's odd magic, who ever heard of healing spells that worked this fast? "Yes, I've heard of what happened to her, a great and almost fatal loss. At any rate, Steven's message said that you were looking into what happened to STRIKE, can I ask how you became involved, and what your skills are that you think doing so is a good idea?"

Once he was done healing what wounds he could on the other man, Harry sat down on a conjured chair, something that made the man start in shock then explained about the deal he had worked out with the king, and gave a very brief rundown of his abilities, not wanting to take the time to go into detail about his past again. Dr. Druid looked interested at the idea of selling potions like that, though he had no idea how expensive or how much money they could make Harry.

After Harry was finished Dr. Druid nodded. "I can see how you got involved, and can guess you are here to ask me what I know about what is going on, yet in truth I can tell you little. I felt a disturbance in the ambient magic and psychic miasma of the United Kingdom centered on London, as it always is as the capital naturally, and went there to investigate."

Harry nodded to show he understood, though in reality he only had the vaguest idea of what the man was talking about, wizards didn't see magic the same way that druids did, so that made sense, and right now he wanted to get to the nitty-gritty rather than have a theoretical discussion about magic.

"I was attacked by two individuals not twenty minutes after I arrived, which I must admit was my own fault. I teleported to Big Ben as normal, and never even tried to mask my presence and the moment I left it I was attacked. One of my attackers was a man, the other a woman. The man was fast and powerful, moving like a vampire lord with their speed and strength. The other was a woman, her features and mind hidden through magic of a kind and strength I had never seen, and she wielded magic with far more skill than I. I could have handled the man, we were outside and he had no chance to pin me in place, but the woman overwhelmed me easily. I barely escaped with my life, and even that was touch and go. I went through all my prepared magical healing artifices when I arrived back here, and it drained me badly. It is only in the past day or so that I have regained some of my energy. Even now I cannot wield my magic as I once could. I'm afraid I have no choice but to retire from the active adventuring life."

"Beyond that, all I can tell you is whatever is going on is ritual based, I can feel the ripples in the ambient magic of the land from here. Something major is happening in London, and whatever it is of the darkest sort of magic."

Harry rubbed his face irritably. "Oh of course it is. My life wouldn't be complete without my weekly major crisis. Well, you've told me enough to get me started. In any event, since you have said you're pulling back from being a superhero, I wonder if I could interest you in a job…."

OOOOOOO

Emma looked over the table at Sebastian Shaw who had insisted on taking her out for an early dinner. He owned this restaurant, and the table they were in was well situated so that no one else could hear the conversation and he had a small white noise device on besides. This meant it was free to talk, or it would've been free to talk for Emma if Shaw himself wasn't there. She wasn't about to forget the fact that this man was, if not an enemy now at least a potential one for the future. That and the fact that Emma knew he had designs on her both before and after she had joined the Hellfire Club was enough to make Emma know she couldn't trust Shaw further than she could throw him. "So what are you going to do with the whistleblower?"

Shaw looked up from his stake and smiled faintly. "I'm afraid Mr. Thomas is going to find his health suddenly degrading badly. At the same time certain information is going to come out that it was under his auspices that the mining operation was allowed to cut so many corners and break so many federal regulations."

"A smear campaign as well as a physical attack?" Emma nodded. The fact that it somewhat resembled her plans for her father occurred to her, but there was a vast difference between the reasons behind it. Shaw was getting rid of the man simply because he was costing him money and making one of his company's look bad. Emma had to move against her father simply because if she didn't he would continue to try and control her until he realized that she was no longer his control, whereupon he would have her liquidated. Self-defense was a much better reason for murder than anger or money.

Inwardly Emma wondered when that particular issue was going to crop up. Part of the way she had set that particular plan up was that even she didn't know when it would occur, but she knew it would be happening in a few days at most.

She returned to the here and now when Shaw asked her if she had found anything else. "I haven't had any luck finding the other leak. I think we have to assume that the second leak isn't originating in your holdings in Milwaukee. There's no paper trail or computer trail here, and other then the manager who blew the whistle I haven't found anyone who had any particular guilt in their minds. There were a few small-scale peccadilloes, and the normal sort of dread of the boss coming in an unannounced, but nothing major."

The second leak was slightly more important than the first. The second leak had let loose several company secrets, and seemed to also be embezzling company funds, something Shaw would not allow.

Sebastian nodded. "It was a faint hope that you would find both leaks on your first stop. And remember even if you don't find the second one, you're still working for my company for the next month and a half. Those weapons factories I sold your corporations' weapons company were worth quite a bit more than I charged your father for."

"I am well aware of that," Emma said, letting her voice growing little sharper. "Don't worry, a deal is a deal."

"Good," said Sebastian leaning back and taking a sip from his red wine. "To that end, exactly how powerful is your telepathy? And pray don't try to lie to me, I know you've been underplaying them. And on this same vein, where did you find that amazing little device of yours that kills any sexual interest in you when anyone is in your presence. It's a little obvious, but obviously quite useful."

Emma allowed a faint smile to appear on her face. She had known for a while that the Kings at the very least would figure out what was going on. Leland and Pierce didn't have any clue about it, but they were not nearly as capable as Buckman or Shaw.

Yet she was determined to keep Harry's secret for as long as she could. Emma had come to the realization lately that there were just some things that she wouldn't do even to preserve herself, and selling out her friends, and Harry in particular seeing as he had helped her the most, was one of them. She owed him far more for his charms then she had been able to pay off so far, and keeping his secret was the least she could do.

Nor was she about to divulge exactly how powerful her telepathy was, nor what she could do with it. A hidden dagger once revealed was no longer very useful after all. "My powers are based off a small area around me, so long as I am in the presence of someone I can get into their brain relatively quickly. Mental defenses such as yours can keep me out for a time, and certainly would allow you to know if I was trying anything. I'm not powerful enough to just simply brush them aside if that's what you're asking, nor am I foolish enough to try to influence you against your will. I can only use my powers to sift for information, but as they are always on, it allows me insight into anyone I come into contact with."

Shaw nodded, looking into his wine glass contemplatively. That would be undeniably useful for certain little projects he had going on, but it wasn't a real game changer. While he could tell the woman was still holding something back, she seemed to be telling the truth about the limits to her ability to get past his mental defenses.

The faint smile on Emma's face grew slightly as she went on. "And let us just say my little trip to find the mutant Forge was much more profitable than even my acquisition of my Stark funds would indicate."

Sebastian looked up sharply at that. While Forge was nowhere near the level of Tony Stark or any of the other really big names in engineering and design, he was also young and hopefully malleable, if he was still the same age as he was when he disappeared a few years back, which the few sightings of him seemed to indicate. Forge would be a massive resource for his company and for his more clandestine operations and he said cautiously, "That, would be a secret I would be willing to pay for. Say shaving off a month from working for my company?"

Emma shook her head, smiling inside at how she had been able to deflect Shaw from following up further on her little 'devices'. But now it was time to redirect him. "The young man in question has some obligations that he needs to pay off, and no it's not to me or my family." When Shaw looked at her almost demanding that she elaborate she shook her head. "There are other powers at work here, not financial but societal, shall we say?"

That phrase made Sebastian's eyes narrow. As a mutant himself he was well aware of the anti-mutant sentiment that was steadily growing worldwide, not helped at all by a recent event in China where a young mutant lost control of his powers and destroyed ten city blocks and everything in it with a blast of energy that had the same composition as supernova. The mutant in question was killed afterward by the Chinese army but the damage was already done.

Shaw spent a moment contemplating where exactly Edward Buckman was sending all that money his agents had told him about, but he had already devoted as many resources as he could without warning the other king of his interest, and was determined to keep his interest in his fellow king a secret for as long as possible. He had his own plans going forward, and if he showed interest in Buckman's work in the other king would tried to devote more resources to finding out Shaw's own plans, which would turn their current low key cold war very hot indeed very quickly. "I take it he would not wish for aid?"

"He turned mine down," said Emma thoughtfully, now spinning the tale out further, giving just enough detail for the man across from her to paint his own picture. "If you can find him he might not turn yours down now, but I am unwilling to point you in that direction. It might lead to an open conflict with certain other players, and that is not something anyone wants right now."

That caused Sebastian to frown further but he nodded thoughtfully. He'd been getting whispers from his spy agencies of some mutant activist group that was already active worldwide led by a certain Germanic mutant, and if Forge had fallen in with that particular man, Sebastian wanted no part of it. He knew his own powers were formidable, but in relation to Magneto they may not be enough.

He frowned thoughtfully at the woman across the table. If he could have trusted her he was willing to bet that Emma Frost would be a massive resource for his plans for mutantkind going forward. He had already developed the structure, and was even now searching for members to fill it, and when he did his Hellions would be an assault team that he could wield against his enemies. But Emma was too much a blade that would probably turn in his hand at the moment. Perhaps down the line he would be able to get inside of her head and figure out how to turn her to his own interests, but right now, no.

Oh, she was physically under his power, and they both knew it. Indeed he was almost tempted to order her to shut off the device and force the issue, but as much control as he could have over her physical safety, her self-control and power were such that there was only so much he could do with mere physical threats. "Very well, we'll leave that for now. On another topic, have you seen the news out of Brazil this morning? An entire city-state of ex-Roman nationals hidden for so long in the depths of the Amazon and only found now? We live in strange and wondrous times."

You don't know how right you are Sebastian, Emma thought in amusement, even as she shook her head and the discussion moved on from there. Yet the two of them were not the only one's thinking about the future.

OOOOOOO

Leaving Canada was difficult, but the time aboard ship with Irene has more than made up for it, Mystique reflected as she leaned against the railing on the upper deck of the ship, looking out over the Atlantic Ocean. Next to her, Irene softly turned the pages of a rather tawdry paperback in Braille. Agents of Essex, or possibly someone else, most of them were local rent-a-thugs, had pursued them, but hadn't the pull to figure out how they had escaped the city, and she had put down over a dozen false trails before they actually backtracked in brand new disguises to board a train to Montreal, where they ditched that disguise and put on another to board a cruise ship embarking on a 64 day world cruise. These two identities were among many Mystique had long prepared for her and her friend, and would pass scrutiny easily in every port.

Their time aboard the Rotterdam a Holland America ship, a cruise line that specialized in catering to more elderly clientele, had actually been among the best in Raven's recent memory. Not only was it peaceful, but the stops were relatively fun and she hadn't yet got the impression their pursuers had found their trail. It had also let the two lovers reconnect emotionally and physically, and she had treasured every moment with her friend, even if their cover identities wouldn't let her and Irene be very affectionate with one another in public.

Their cover at present was of a mother and daughter pair enjoying one last trip around the world while the mother's health would allow it. And, she thought sadly, not for the first time as she looked at her lover, there is a kernel of truth in that, curse it. The two of them met in 1903, when the teenage daughter of a well-to-do family hired Mystique to help her try to make certain the worst of her prophecies would never come true. As far as Raven knew, no one but the two of them knew how much good they had done for the future of the world, but that was a long time ago.

Raven's body only felt the ravages of time if she let the current persona she was wearing feel it. Her morphing ability almost completely cancelled out the effects of aging, and once she had realized this she had been quick to figure out a way to transfuse her blood into Irene to offset her friend's aging. Yet it was a project of limited return. Irene was now pushing 85, and while she looked closer to sixty without the aid of disguises, there was no denying the fact her friend was getting old, and Raven once more cursed her powers that ensured she would keep on living as her friend succumbed to time's decline.

"Don't." Irene's voice interrupted Raven's increasing depressing thoughts. She looked over and found Irene looking at her through her dark glasses. "I can tell what you are thinking my friend." Here in public neither was going to break cover by using more loving endearments. "I have lived a long, full life, and when my time comes I will meet it without fear."

Raven shuddered, shaking her head and reaching forward to grab the other woman's hand. "Don't talk like that! I, I can't, you've got many years left in the tank Irene, there's no need to talk about your time coming."

"Oh my friend, you and I both know that is not the case. If I have two more years to me it will be a minor miracle. As I said, I have lived a long, fulfilling life, made all the greater with you by my side. You are strong enough to go on without me, following our ideal of protecting mutantkind."

"I would trade everything I've done for that damn cause to have even one more year with you!" Raven said fiercely. Her grip on the older woman's hands tightened for a moment, while inside she shook her head. Raven didn't think she was nearly as strong as Irene thought her. There had been too many betrayals, too many friends turned enemies, too many times where her power had caused her to be seen as a dangerous tool to be used then discarded. In a world of paranoia, lies and false faces, Raven desperately clung to her friendship with Irene as the one pure thing in her life. Even her children, as precious as they were to Raven in her own way, did not come close to being that important a link. Raven feared that if she lost that lifeline, then she would spiral into a paranoid manic depression and become a danger to all around her.

She determinedly changed the subject, looking back out over the ocean. "So, is there any specific reason you wanted us to go to India?" In this instance specific reason was a codeword used to indicate Irene's clairvoyant powers.

Irene shook her head, smiling faintly as she replied, knowing why her lover had changed the subject. Yet Irene knew Raven was stronger than she thought, and would go on without Irene just fine. Still she went along with the subject change. "If we go to India we have the best chance of falling under the wings of the owl in time, where we will be in position to help the younger generation of mutants. We will also be given a chance to choose to turn the future back to one of two other courses, though which choice will force the future down which road I cannot say. My powers have become more and more imprecise since the third path to the future opened."

Raven frowned. She could easily see that the owl signified Harry Potter, but as impressive as he was, and despite how much he had helped Raven with her kids, she didn't trust him. Still Irene seemed to have seen something in her visions which made her think highly of the magic user, and Mystique trusted her friend enough to go along with the idea of working with Potter, for a time at least. The rest of what Irene said however bothered Raven a bit, and she wondered what choice Irene was talking about.

Still she knew if Irene had seen anything specific she would share them with Raven. "I won't say I'm completely happy with the idea of working with Potter, but he's probably better than any of the alternatives. Don't see how going to India will help us in contacting him again though."

Irene smiled. "You will see in time I think. Now," she stood up, stretching slightly and her smile turned decidedly wicked, an odd dichotomy with her normal saintly air. "I think it's time for us to retire for the evening. I feel a need for a… nap coming on."

Despite the words if anyone had been close enough to hear Irene's tone that single line would have blown their cover utterly. As there weren't Mystique didn't care and simply smiled eagerly. "That sounds like a lovely idea." For a while at least, the future could work itself out without the two of them.

OOOOOOO

Jean scowled irritably as she and Harry walked down the drenched nighttime streets of London. All around them people made their way indoors or walked on covered in rain jackets, or as in her and Harry's case umbrellas of various sizes. It was a particularly crappy night, and she was not pleased to be out and about in it. "Tell me again why Ororo said she couldn't do something about this? Honestly, this is damn horrible."

Harry chuckled, sticking his head outside the umbrella's arc, letting the rain splash into his face for a moment. "Oh come on Red, a little rain never hurt anyone. And Ororo won't do anything about it because it will let her use her powers later on much more easily if she can work with rather than overpower the local weather." He looked around, his eyes growing much harder and more serious for a moment. "Besides, on a night like this more people will be staying indoors, which may be important if we find anything."

Jean scowled, but didn't argue. It was pushing ten o'clock local time, and things were at last starting to shut down around them. The two of them had been walking around the city for about an hour so far. They were dressed in regular clothing, though Jean had her X-men uniform on underneath, and a mask that Harry had worked with a heavy obscuring charm in her pocket just in case. And of course Harry was wearing his crysis suit with the concealing charm on for now.

Thanks to a mild Notice-Me-Not field they had gone unmolested in some of the worse areas of the city as the two of them used their disparate talents to search for anything out of the ordinary. Harry had his mage sight on and was searching for anything magical anywhere, any runes, and active magic, anything. Jean was using her telepathy to do the same, gently skimming the outer edge of the minds around them with little success. She was getting worried that to find anything to help them she'd have to start randomly selecting people around them and delve deeper into their minds. But she wasn't quite ready to just start invading random minds to search for clues.

They weren't the only ones searching of course. Ororo was in the sky well above the city, with a Disillusion spell on her. Ororo also had a spell on her to give eyes the same properties as the owl, a spell Harry had actually gotten from Agatha. While it didn't have the staying power of the Disillusion spell, it would last for a good few hours before he had to renew it. If he cast it on her too often the spell would aggravate Ororo's eyes, but for now it was a necessary evil.

The two walked on for a time in silence, using their respective powers to search around before Harry broke the convivial silence. "So, looking forward to graduating from high school?"

Jean chuckled, shaking her head, her somewhat damp hair moving from side to side. Her finals were next week, and Jean knew without a doubt she was going to ace them, even her physics final. Thankfully she had spent so much time away from school the rumor mill no longer bothered her, but even with that… "Oh god yes, I am so looking forward to getting out of there. It will be interesting taking distance courses, but I'm looking forward to getting to work on the projects we've talked about. Speaking of which, what exactly are you going to be paying me Potter?"

Harry laughed, nudging his shoulder against hers. "And what exactly have you done so far to make me part with my hard earned gold hmm?"

Jean pushed back with her own shoulder, and the two laughed and walked on, walking closer together now despite not needing to, since the umbrella was large enough for three people. Yet neither was in any rush to move apart, simply enjoying one another's company. After a few more minutes spent looking around with his mage sight Harry looked over at the redhead again, noticing rather pleasantly that Jean was only about an inch shorter than him. "Have you told Charles and the others you're moving out?"

Jean frowned, looking over at him for a moment then away, her eyes tracking another pedestrian as the man walked across the road at light in front of them. They had moved out of the residential district, making their way in a somewhat stilted spiral pattern deeper into the city, and at the moment they were in a small shopping district. "It sort of came out with Xavier, I don't know if he shared it with the others."

"Trouble?"

Jean shook her head, and Harry shivered a little as her hair brushed against his shoulder and bare neck. "Not a lot, no. He tried to guilt me into staying, but he really didn't have any argument that could make me stay. I'm not looking forward to telling Scott and the others, but we all leave home at some point."

Harry nodded. "And you're parents?"

Jean again shook her head, her face scornful. "My mom contacted me this morning actually, and was not happy to find that I was still uninterested in going along with their plan for my college education. When she found out I had made my own plans she heaped scorn on the idea of a woman becoming an engineer, and I sort of hung up on her."

Harry put an arm around her shoulder giving her a friendly hug. "I can't understand why everyone wants to pick and choose what parts of you they want to see when the whole package is so amazing. I'm sorry to hear that your parents aren't going to support you, but if they can't see how magnificent you are, both in mind and soul, then it's their problem, not yours."

Jean smiled and reciprocated the gesture, putting her own arm around Harry's waist. When Harry removed his arm however she kept hers in place, and after a second his arm went around her again this time around the waist. "Thanks Harry." She frowned a little. "But, I'm not certain about the state of my soul these days."

Harry quirked an eyebrow before turning his eyes back to scanning the area around them, with Jean doing the same. "This isn't a religious thing is it?"

"No, nothing like that, just some… concerns I have." Jean replied.

"Ororo once said to me that sharing problems sometimes made them go away. You want to talk about it?"

Jean was silent for a moment, her eyes flicking around as her telepathy scanned the minds of passerby, who thankfully were getting less and less as the night and the rain went on. "The fight against those demons with the Fantastic Four and the others… I was enjoying it. I loved fighting the demons, using my powers on them."

Harry didn't answer for a moment, staring down a small road that was nearly completely dark, his view further exacerbated by the rain coming down in sheets all around them. After a second however the two kept moving and he answered her. "You're not the only one who enjoys fighting, and not just demons, who you know I have a history with. Sometimes putting down your enemy permanently can give you a certain sense of satisfaction. But let me ask you this, was it fighting to your utmost against the demons that you enjoyed, or was it causing them pain?"

Jean didn't even hesitate. "Using my powers to the utmost against them, I don't think the idea of causing them pain really entered into it."

Harry nodded. "Did I ever tell you the first time I had to kill someone?" Jean shook her head and he went on. "Her name was Bellatrix Black, she came from the same ancient family that my godfather came from. Unlike him he had believed the claptrap fed her about the whole Pureblood purity fiction, and she was one of Voldemort's most deadly, and insane followers, a skilled and powerful duelist. And while taking her and her husband out wasn't our first mission, but it was the first one where we went with the intent to kill rather than capture. I won't bore you with the details, but suffice to say it was a tough fight, and I ended up killing her with a Reducto to the head."

Jean nodded to indicate she was following her hair again moving against his shoulder. She had seen Harry fight often enough to know most of his mid-level spells.

Harry shook his head, eyes a thousand miles away. "All that training with the SAS, and one of the things they never trained us in was how to deal with killing someone. So after the adrenaline wore off I got the shakes pretty damn badly despite my own injuries. But in the end I got over the fact quickly, a little too quickly for my own state of mind. I kept killing the Death Eaters, not just because I had to, but because a small part of me enjoyed doing to them what they loved doing to others, and I feared that part of me. I never got desensitized to it, but I realized I didn't enjoy the fact I could deal death, it was simply the satisfaction of a job well done. They needed killing, just like those demons did because of what they were, what they would do if given any further chances."

"Red, everyone has a little darkness to them. Any soldier does, any hero does, we have to be willing to do what we can to protect other people, and some of us do enjoy it. What's that phrase, 'rough men do rough things so gentle people can sleep soundly in their beds' or something like that? Just because it's there doesn't mean you're a bad person. Just because you enjoy the fight, or even winning, doesn't mean you are in danger of losing a part of your soul."

Jean looked at him admiringly then shook her head. "Thanks Harry, that, it makes me feel better knowing that you feel the same way I do." The two walked on silently for another minute then she asked, "Why the hell do you keep calling me Red?"

Harry smiled faintly, then changed the subject. "So when do you think you'll be able to start on building a prototype to your arc generator?"

"I don't know really, hopefully soon after I join you and Ororo in the castle." She laughed, pumping her shoulder against his lightly again. "Have you thought of renaming it by the way? Hogwarts is an awful name, right up there with Harry-tanium."

Harry pouted. A part of him had actually thought of renaming it, but hadn't had much luck in thinking up names, which even he was coming to believe he was pants at. Another part of him wanted to retain the name for histories sake. After all, if it had been named Hogwarts in two different dimensions that had to count for something right?

He didn't know he had said that out loud until Jean laughed and replied, "Yes it means that wizards everywhere have no imagination when it comes to names. Honestly some of the names of your friends you've let drop. Longbottom, Weasley, Diggory, and who could forget Lovegood. She wasn't Asian by any chance was she?"

"Hah, no one could forget Luna no matter what, and no she wasn't Asian." The two of them dodged around a small crowd outside a pub, but didn't relinquish their sideways hug around one another. "And if you keep on making fun of my naming sense I won't give you your graduation present when the time comes."

Jean shook her head amused. Harry had been dropping hints about some big present he was going to share with her for the last few days, but hadn't given her any hints. "That's alright Potter, I've got other things I can tease you about, like for instance your missing the obvious solution sometimes."

Harry stopped for a moment looking over at her, emerald eyes meeting jade from a bare foot away. "Okay, what exactly is that supposed to mean?"

Jean grinned, her pearly teeth visible in the light of the lamppost above them. "Well, you know how you want to install a generator at the castle? Well, why wait to install an arc reactor when you could do something a lot simpler?"

"Like what?"

"Like using a few spells or runes, I don't know how, to continuously power a wind turbine and use that to power the generator?"

Harry looked at her blankly for a moment then walked over to the wall of the building they were passing by and started to bang his head against it. "Stupid, stupid, stupid!"

Jean laughed. "It doesn't mean our arc generator design won't be useful, after all we don't want to sell anything that is built purely on magic after all. Still it's a way for us to get power at the castle right now." She reached out and rubbed Harry's back. "Don't worry Harry, when your little male mind fails, we'll be here to point these things out."

Harry stopped banging his head on the wall, looking up slightly to her face past the rise of her chest, seeing her jade eyes sparkling with humor in the slight shadow of their umbrella. He straightened up, one hand snaking back around Jean's waist and pulling her against him, his lips moving into a smirk as he stared into her eyes. "Would you like to know what my 'little male mind' is telling me to do right now, Red?"

Jean shivered a little as the atmosphere between the two changed, but kept staring back into his eyes, her tongue flicking out and moistening her lips. "I think I can guess Harry."

She watched as his eyes darkened slightly with desire and, yes love, and he made to lean in then very visibly got control of himself. For some reason the sight of that made Jean love him even more, to see how much he desired her, but wasn't willing to push things with her right now.

Harry made to pull away, but Jean's own arms went around his waist, keeping him in place. "You know Ororo and I talked a few days ago."

Harry looked at her, still visibly backing away from doing what Jean realized she wanted him to do with all her heart. "A-about what exactly?"

"My joining you two." Jean said simply, her arms tightening slightly as she felt him try and pull away, her voice dropping to a throaty, emotional whisper. "So I should probably be asking, what do you think about that? What do you think about me?"

Harry gulped. While he knew that Ororo had pretty much given her okay to Jean joining them, a part of him really thought that was some kind of boyfriend test despite the fact that he was sure that Ororo was not the type to do that. He had also been fighting his attraction and rising emotional connection to the redhead in front of him so much that it had become second nature. Even his rising attraction to Emma wasn't so bad, since the two of them hadn't been around one another very often. "I…"

Jean pulled away suddenly, looking into an alleyway. She had continued to use her powers even as the two talked (flirted really, something she was enjoying tremendously) but her telepathy hadn't found any strange minds or anything unusual until right now. "Hold that thought…" she murmured, concentrating her power on what she had sensed, then frowned suddenly. "There's someone in there who doesn't have a mind."

Harry breathed a sigh of mixed relief and regret.

Jean chuckled having heard his sigh but her mind was now on more serious things. "Don't get too comfy Harry, we'll be having that conversation sometime soon, right now though we've got other things to do."

Harry chuckled, leading the way toward the alleyway Jean indicated. "I'll look forward to it."

Inside the alleyway they saw a man who was hunched over the street of the alleyway using what looked like a long rod of some sort to do something to the ground underneath. The man moved almost like a puppet with too few strings, his free arm flopping at his side, his head lolling about. What little of his skin they could see looked pasty white, and his eyes were blank and unseeing. "Okay, yeah this looks suspicious." Harry muttered, his eyes narrowed.

The sound of his voice didn't make the man look up but another man came out of a hidden doorway, carrying what looked like some kind of high-tech rifle with something that was obviously a silencer on the end.

This man was large, pushing seven feet and wide in the shoulders with huge visible muscles on his arms and chest though it didn't look natural, almost like someone who had taken far too many steroids. His head was small, and had a white V painted on it, with the tip of the V being his chin and the lines running up his face over his eyes. He was far faster than his size implied, bringing his rifle around to point at the duo.

As fast as he was however Harry was faster. He swiftly lifted his free hand, still holding the umbrella in his other hand as he pointed a finger at the man intoning "Stupefy!" A sphere of red magical light shot out, impacting the man and throwing him backwards to collapse unconscious to the ground. "Well, that was interesting."

Jean nodded, but kept her eyes on the man still scratching out something on the ground. "I don't… I think this man is dead, or at least brain dead. His mind is there, but the only thing in it is a single overriding directive to write whatever he's writing on the ground." The man's mind was there in the astral plane, but it was filled end to end with the echo of a single female voice shouting out the command the thing was following. There was no native activity.

Harry frowned. "Sort of sounds like an Infreri, a sort of magical zombie. They were sometimes used to defend a place or as cannon fodder, but being able to carry out even a simple task like this, that is something new."

He reached forward, placing his hand on the man's neck and frowned when his mutant siphoning power didn't immediately begin to drain power from the man. Not that it would have been much, but the fact that whatever had made the man this way wasn't magical startled him.

Jean flinched slightly as the man seemed to wake up to their presence at Harry's touch and he turned throwing himself at Harry. Before Jean could do anything though Harry shot a Immobulous right at the man's face. He stiffened like a board, and Harry stepped back. "Some kind of defense mechanism? He moved a bit faster than infreri."

Jean frowned, trying to put into words what she had just felt. "No that was some kind of remaining animal instinct that overrode its orders when you touched him. Just a pure animal response, and I think considering the fangs on him we should call him a vampire of some kind." She looked over at the other man, and sent her mental probe into his head. After a moment she came out, shaking her head. "That one is a thug, one who enjoys violence, he almost, well, not to be too crude gets off on it. He was ordered by his employer, Vixen to guard that other man."

Harry frowned, reaching forward to squeeze her hand for a second. "I don't like that. And I really don't like this." He nodded down at the road where the man had been scratching out a symbol, and he knelt down to get a closer look.

"What is it?" Jean asked, taking the umbrella from Harry.

"A rune, a large ass one, as in the size of the written rune, not the actual symbol, and it's just one rune, not a complete array. It looks like ancient Cimmerian, but I haven't seen this one before, Cimmerian was never used in my home dimension, too clunky and unwieldy in comparison to Grecian." Harry stood up, shaking his head, one hand suddenly holding the sword of Gryffindor and he used the point to slash through the mark on the ground. His hand then shot out again, hitting the unconscious man with an Incarcerous, causing glowing bands of light to weave around the man, chaining him to the ground. "I think we need to take to the rooftops Red."

Jean shook her head, banging the umbrella's staff lightly against his head. "Seriously why do you call me Red?"

Harry chuckled but didn't answer again, simply activating his flight array and jumping up onto the rooftop. Jean shrugged and followed, still using the umbrella to cover herself, though Harry didn't seem to notice the continuing rain.

Harry waited for her on top of the roof. "You're the engineer here Red, if you were to lay out a circle over the city, with that rune on the outer shell of the circle, where would the center be?"

Jean frowned, playing with a bit of her damp hair with her free hand. "Well, this is the first we've seen of it, and we came from that direction moving inwards… I think that way?" She pointed off over a section of the city that looked like a mix between small businesses, bars and medium story apartment buildings.

Harry nodded wordlessly and took off skimming over the top of the rooftops, and Jean followed. Something about that rune had obviously worried Harry, and Jean began to ready herself for combat. And it was because of that heightened awareness that she spotted the mind ahead of them that was almost like a carbon copy of the mind of the man who had been guarding the zombie.

"There's another thug up ahead of us, about a block." The two halted and Harry waited as Jean sent her power forward. After a moment she shook her head. "He doesn't know anything either."

"Then we take him out like we did the last one." Jean nodded and the two raced on. Before the thug even knew they were there the two jumped down and Jean used her telekinetic power to slam the man against the far wall of the road. This one wasn't in an alley, but the street was deserted thanks to the rain and the fact it was pushing twelve at night (though mostly thanks to the pouring rain).

As Jean was taking care of the guard, Harry had just as quickly taken out the zombie rune writer. Once that was done he knelt down and looked at the rune, frowning heavily. "Okay, this rune is from the Aztec language, does something like one of the runes we use in the bio-energy array, but waaaay more powerful."

He frowned, looking at it and wondering what the hell the rune was used for, trying to remember where he had seen it then froze as he remembered. It was from a time when he was trying to figure out what rituals Voldemort had used to empower himself physically, and there was a book in the Black family library that covered foreign rituals designed to increase your magical and physical strength. The Blacks were never ones to turn their noses up at any way to gain power foreign or not after all. "Call Ororo down here now."

Jean almost flinched at the sudden grim tone in his voice then nodded and sent her astral projection straight up searching for the static cloud that was her friend's mind. After a moment she found it about three miles up. Thanks to her natural defense Jean couldn't enter her mind, but she could touch it and they could talk to one another. It was difficult at this range, and wouldn't have been something she could have done a few weeks ago, but she had been getting better at using her telepathy every day. "Ororo, Harry and I have found something. Harry wants you to join us down here. He seems worried."

Ororo responded quickly. "I will be there in a moment my friend." After a moment she went on, her mental voice coming along the momentary connection Jean had formed between them as rather slyly amused. "So how was your time with our Harry?"

Jean blushed a little but rolling her eyes. "I still haven't decided if I want to join you two you know." That was a lie and she knew it, in fact part of her wanted to just forget about the current crisis and get on with what could easily be called a date between her and Harry.

"But you're no longer saying you don't want to, are you?"

"Oh no, I'm no longer saying that." Jean said her mental voice rather wistful, part of her tracking her friends mind as it came toward them. "Turn left a bit, and start looking along the road for us in about two blocks. But Harry needs to tell me he wants me, he needs to tell me he wants me to join the two of you before I agree. I… I love you both, but I won't be second in his affections, I want to be your equal in this relationship."

Ororo's mental voice was soft and almost like a caress as she replied, flying down from their left to join the two on the ground. "I love you as well sister, and do not worry, he may be slow, but I'm certain he will tell you his feelings soon enough."

Jean sent back a wordless wave of affection while Ororo landed. Unlike the two who had been searching on the ground, she was already dressed for action. Her uniform consisted of skintight black spandex pants, a black spandex top that came up to over her breasts but left her shoulders bare, and a two gold loops around her wrists, both of which Harry had placed runes on to cut off her emotions from the weather. On her head she wore a small headdress to keep her hair out of her eyes, and Ororo's eyes, which were normally a crystal blue color, were pure white now, as they always were when using her powers. The rain water flowed over her body, matting her hair to her neck and back, but she seemed to not care.

Of course there was more to it. Harry had added tiny pieces of the metal he was now calling Orihalcum throughout her suit's top, which though thin would stop nearly any attack. Ororo's suit also had an anti-shock runic array on it along with a version of a Notice-Me-Not that Harry called a Remember-Me-Not. If the disillusioning spell Harry put on her wore off or if she became too active for it to cover her people would be able to see Ororo but the moment she was out of sight they would never remember what she looked like or sounded.

She looped one arm around Jean looking over at her lover. "I take it you two have found something?"

Harry nodded grimly, the sword of Gryffindor in his hand, its point slashing through the rune on the street. "Oh yes, we found something. We're standing inside a massive runic array that someone's set up across the city. I'm not certain how it's supposed to work, it uses Aztec and Cimmerian runes, neither of which I'm that familiar with. But I know enough to know the general gist of it: ritual sacrifice. Someone wants to suck the life out of everyone caught in the array. And if they're using Aztec runes, it isn't a little bit of energy from everyone, but all of it."

Ororo and Jean shared one shocked glance then Jean stepped away, stripping off her outer clothing, unmindful of the fact they were technically in public despite no one else being out and about on this street at this time of night. Her own uniform wasn't nearly as attractive or strong as Ororo's being the same one she had worn for years as part of the X-men. It was skintight everywhere covering her from neck to foot and wrist. Outside a large triangle going from her waist up to the top of her chest which was green, the rest of the uniform was dark blue. The last bit was the mask that Harry had placed a heavy Remember-Me-Not charm on, much like the headdress Ororo wore. It also kept her hair, now being plastered to her head by the rain, out of her eyes. Despite this she shook her head, vowing to herself to get a new uniform as soon as she could this one was far too bland.

Harry too was readying himself. The illusion of his clothing dropped away, and he muttered, "Magia Erebea," siphoning about a fifth of his magical reservoir to reinforcing his body's durability, speed and strength. Before draining the Juggernaut and through him Cyttorak of a bit of his power Harry wouldn't have been able to add to his strength. But now, with the amount of power he just put into it he would be able to go toe to toe with Rogue possibly more and still have most of his power available for other things.

Ororo frowned. "Do you think we should get in touch with our contact with Scotland Yard and MI5?"

Harry thought for a minute then shook his head. "Let's wait on that for now, we might be able to handle this on the sly."

That idea was quickly smacked over the head however when a snarling voice came from the rooftop on their left towards the center of the city. "So, the mistress was right… there was someone interfering with the laying of the array. I know not who you three are, nor why or how you are interfering but know I, Eliphas, will make your deaths swift."

The man this voice belonged to was a tall man with somewhat wide shoulders and the build of a boxer. He had black hair, and was wearing a decent business suit, and in one hand held an umbrella over his head to keep off the rain. If not for the fact he was standing on top of a roof like it was an everyday occurrence he would have looked like a normal business man. If not for the strange veins of green pulsing on half his face and the visible portion of his neck, or his dead black eyes, visible in a sudden crash of lightning, he might have been handsome. As it was, he simply looked wrong, sick in some fundamental manner that went far beyond the physical.

Harry and the two women shared a glance then he shrugged. "Yeah thanks for that, but how about not?"

The man didn't reply with words, jumping down towards them faster than a man of his size should have been able to move. Before anyone could react he was standing right in front of the trio. His hands with claws growing out of his fingers slashed forward in an attempt to gut Harry but instead simply smacking him in the side. The slash was powerful, but not powerful enough to slice into Harry's crisis suit. Yet his Magia Erebea hadn't made Harry any heavier, and the blow swatted him aside.

Harry cursed as he felt his feet leave the earth for a moment, but Jean responded with the swiftness of thought, blasting the man back with a telekinetic fist of power that slammed him away to smash into a wall.

The man snarled, and got up from the blow far faster than any normal man would have, but Jean, her powers flaring around her in a nimbus of flame, reached forward with one hand. A giant hand of flame slammed the thing that wore the skin of a man into the wall of the building behind him, pinning him there. He fought back, again showing much more strength then he should have had, but not enough to break out of the claw of telekinetic force that held him still.

This didn't seem to matter to Eliphas though and he snarled at Jean, his mouth filled with pointed fangs. "You will tire eventually mind witch, and when you do I will gut you!"

Harry scowled but before he could hit the man with any spells (and after that threat Harry wasn't at all certain what spell he would use) gunfire erupted from the rooftop the man had jumped down from, and several dozen zombie-vampire things charging towards them from both sides of the road. Many of them looked normal save for how they moved. Their clothing for the most part was poor and worn. Others looked like well off people their clothing decent enough. But all of them had fangs that gleamed in the light of the lamp posts along the road, and their faces were utterly devoid of anything but snarling fury.

"Fuck." Harry said mildly then twisted to one side, dodging a stream of bullets that would have slammed into him from the rooftop. While his crysis suit made him able to shrug off bullets, that didn't mean he was about to get hit when he didn't have to.

Ororo took to the sky, raining down slashes of air pressure, ice spears and lightning. The men on the roof, all big, bald men with white V's painted on their faces, scattered under her assault, trying to fire back but blinded by the rain and ice Ororo was throwing around like they were going out of style.

During her assault the wind rider noticed that the men seemed to ignore wounds that should have made them wince or cry out at the very least. She wondered if they were on some kind of drug or something, and then frowned as one ignored having his arm chopped off by a piece of metal her wind had torn from a roof. He fired back at her ignoring the fact he was missing an arm, and she sighed sadly, changing tactics. Now instead of trying to force them to retreat or knock them out, she went for the kill, and her lightning and ice spears rained down with lethal force. The air around the thugs began to become colder quickly, slowing their movements, and the winds picked up to hurricane force, hurling them around like they weighed next to nothing.

While his lady was dealing with the men up top Harry turned his attention to the zombies that were coming toward him. He frowned and began to send out spells to immobilize them, wondering if these things could be returned to normal, but he doubted it. The men firing at us however, they made their bed and will damn well sleep in it, my lady will see to that.

He frowned, noticing these men were far faster and seemed to have a bit of magical resistance, not enough to overcome a Incarcerous or Immobulous, but enough to ignore a Stupefy. They spread out trying to come at him from all sides, and he twisted and turned, trying to take out as many as he could before they closed.

Jean waved her free hand, slamming the other half of the zombie horde away. Unfortunately that moment of inattention was enough for the first man to break out of her telekinetic claw. He was far stronger than the zombie things, and charged forward even faster now, his façade of humanity falling away to reveal gray-green skin pulled taught over his skull. "Die mind witch!"

Harry however was ready and turned swiftly ignoring the zombie things now almost upon him, shouting, "Difindo!"

The spell sizzled out, a wide beam of yellow light in the rainy night, slicing into and through the main, cutting his legs out from under him. "ARGHGH!" Yet despite the shout of agony, the thing kept moving, crawling along on the ground toward where Jean was still standing in the center of the road.

Jean was not impressed and slammed another claw of telekinetic power onto the man.

Seeing that Harry turned his attention to the other half of the crowd of lesser vampires, if that was what they were. Seeing him as the greater threat all the vampire things concentrated on him, and he at last began to use area effect spells, immobilizing, stunning and tying them up in turn. When they came to close, he lashed out with the sword of Gryffindor or a Lacero driving them back until he could take them out with distance attack spells.

While Harry was taking care of the horde Jean sent her mind into her captives. She bludgeoned past Eliphas's mental defenses, which were surprisingly formidable but not enough to stop her. A moment later she reeled back, gagging and almost retching on the ground, her power flickering out. The undead thing began to crawl toward her again but Harry, having finished dealing with his own enemies moved up behind him and stabbed him through the chest into the ground, pinning him there like a butterfly on paper, then he almost casually used more 'Difindo's' to cut the monster's arms off. "Keep those claws to yourself mate. Phoenix, what did you find?"

Jean took a moment to regain control of herself and gratefully leaned on Harry's hand for support as she got to her feet, shaking her head. "Yeah I found out a lot, way more than I ever wanted to know to be honest. This guy is a trouble shooter for the bitch in charge of this. That one's named Selene Gallio, and she's some kind of mutant physic vampire. She can leech the life energy from anyone and add it to her own. On top of that she's a mage, and she's been around since at least the roman era using her ability to leech life from other people to extend her own."

The vampire/zombie thing at Harry's feet cackled. "CAHAHAH, fools, my mistress is immortal, your paltry powers are nothing to her!"

Harry glanced down at him, his emerald eyes beginning to crackle with power. "I've got a lot of experience killing people who think they are immortal. What is this Selene planning?"

Eliphas once more growled and tried to free himself from the sword of Gryffindor stuck through his chest into the road below, but without arms or legs it was a laughable attempt. "My mistress will succeed, she will ascend and your lives will become her power! There is nothing you can do to stop it!"

Jean went on. "She's created a magic ritual to suck out the life force of everyone living in London, there's a bit there about something called psychic signature I don't understand, but it will also somehow take power from everyone else in the UK, not as much but some. She intends to use it to become 'all powerful'" she held up her fingers quoting that part, shaking her head in disgust. "The ritual is supposed to take place in the 30 street Mary Axe. She supplied Vixen with the magic and the plan to take out STRIKE, knowing they would be the only group that could counteract her. Our being here has thrown a wrench in the gears, but at the time she sent this guy and the others out she still intended to do the ritual. We haven't destroyed enough of the array to stop it. We have until the clock strikes three, something about…"

"The stars being aligned," Harry nodded. "All Aztec rituals were designed to take advantage of the stars in relation to their land, so they would naturally have to calculate the difference. Fuck," he said mildly again, but his eyes told of his rage, his magic sparking in them like green lightning.

Ororo arrived back sometime in the middle of Jean's explanation having finished off the troop of ten mercs. Now she frowned, her own white eyes crackling with fury at the thought of so much senseless loss of life. "This ritual, how do we disrupt it?"

Despite addressing the question to Harry it was Jean who answered, gleaning the response from the information taken from Eliphas. "Destroy the runes that are part of the array, but even then she might be able to use the central part of it to drain the people nearby."

Ororo nodded looking around them. "I have another question. Why hasn't anyone come out to check on what all the noise was about?"

The trio now looked around them, and realized Ororo was right, no one had come out of the houses or apartments around them to see what was going on. Even in the worst neighborhood, which this wasn't that would have been unusual. But Harry and the two women also saw several apartments had lights on that hadn't before the battle began, yet there was no one moving around in them or on the street.

Harry frowned. "I thought I felt something magical happen halfway through that fight just now, but I didn't take much notice of it at the time. She must have used a sleep spell or something."

Not wanting to waste any time and believing him no longer a threat the trio left Eliphas there, hurrying away down the street. They soon realized that the entire city had been put to sleep. Several people lay in clumps around an entrance to a bar, asleep on the ground or each other while the rain continued to pour down on top of them, their umbrellas' forgotten. Several cars had crashed, their drivers having fallen asleep at the wheel, though the few the trio checked seemed to be breathing despite their near death experience. Nowhere was anyone awake and moving about.

Harry nodded grudging appreciation. "Whoever this is, she's powerful to do this so quickly to a city the size of London."

"I think we need to bring in some more help," Jean said, looking over at Harry.

Harry frowned, but nodded, and began to write down the runes to look out for. "Call it in Storm."

OOOOOOO

Natasha Romanova had been having a very topsy-turvy day. First was the flight from California to Heathrow in a supersonic jet, which was fun but not exactly comfortable. Then she spent several hours in customs, primarily because while she had all the ID requirements of a SHIELD operative, SHIELD itself was not exactly welcome outside the states just yet, and the Brits knew Natasha from her days working for the Russians during the final years of the Cold War.

They weren't exactly happy to have a spy of her skills in their country, but eventually she was released into the personal care of the head of MI5 Jack Harper (and four of his top agents, but who's counting?). And then, rather than finding herself at one of MI5's bases in the city, she found herself in Buckingham Palace in what was a small meeting room deep in the palace. This meeting was not just with Jack Harper but with the chief of police for Scotland Yard Roger Towney. Next to him was an old general named Lord Arthur Demontebanks who had been a captain in world War 2 and who Director Fury had called 'good people' (his highest appellation). On top of that was the costumed Captain Britain, leaning against the wall. He looked rather imposing in his suit colored like the union jack.

Natasha took a moment to admire the man's physique, the man's six pack and bull-like chest on display in the skintight suit. She idly wondered if his face, covered as it was by a mask was as handsome as the rest of him. His presence wasn't wholly unusual, since his powers would make him a help in any kind of action. The fact his sister (not public knowledge but the connection was known to SHIELD), the now crippled Betsy Braddock sat next to him, her face turning toward whoever was speaking, was odd however. Though she wasn't the oddest addition to the group, that prize would have to be King William himself, who sat at the head of the table.

William's reputation abroad was much more mixed than it was in the UK. While his policies were generally seen as good (of course there were people who didn't agree but that was true for any leader) the fact was he was a king, someone who ruled by 'divine right' rather than election, stuck in the craw of a lot of Americans and pro-democracy movements worldwide. The fact he generally ruled with the will of the people and in no way had abused his power since taking the throne sort of threw a wrench into the idea that he was one of those old uncaring kings, but the gut reaction was still there.

Natasha didn't have a problem with the ideas of kings, what she did have a problem with was the fact one of her missions as a spy for Russia had been trying to have the man assassinated in the closing year of the Cold War. The attempt failed obviously, and thankfully her part in that had never come to light, but it was still making her feel oddly nervous sitting in the same room as one of the ones who got away.

"I understand she is here from Director Fury General, and I agree that his record makes Fury trustworthy. But that doesn't necessarily translate into trusting all of his agents." Jack, an almost obese man in his fifties growled this through his heavy beard, his beady little black eyes trying to pin Natasha in place with minimal success. "This woman was one of the best Russian assassins in the last leg of the Cold War, how can we trust her?"

"I don't," Arthur riposted, smiling faintly. He was an older man only about five or so years younger than William, with short cropped white hair streaked with black and a very well trimmed goatee. He was also fit and trim despite having been paralyzed in a riding accident four years ago, his arms showing significant muscle definition. He often joked that his horse had done what years of warfare couldn't. "I trust Nick. Despite his little out of body experience, the man is sharp. I doubt any young lass like this is going to pull the wool over his eye."

The king had been silent up to this point, and Natasha had actually been wondering why the hell he was here but he chuckled now immediately drawing the attention of the police chief (who had sided with Harper about not trusting her) and the others to him. "Indeed, Fury was ever described as a good judge of character, though we never met the man ourselves. Be that as it may our realm might be in need of her skills."

Arthur nodded grimly, and the police chief looked thoughtful but Jack frowned. "Sir as horrifying as the assault on STRIKE was, we haven't seen any kind of follow-up assault. It's been nearly a week. If the attack was meant as a prelude to something bigger they would have pushed the next assault through by now."

His words seemed to sway Towney, but neither Arthur nor the king seemed moved. "In this you will have to trust an old war-horse's instinct Mr. Harper. We…" The king stopped speaking when the door opened and one of the Kings Guard entered, moving to him swiftly and whispering in his ear. The king looked at the man askance, his eye narrowed, then shrugged before turning back to the others. "It would appear the second shoe has begun to fall. Tell them what you told us."

The man braced to attention, resplendent in the dress uniform of red cloak and black pants despite the late hour, his unit insignia two black kukri knives crossed on a field of green on his arm.

The rotation for the unit serving as the king's guard was random and chosen from every military unit of appropriate size, normally a company size split between Windsor and Buckingham. After the massacre of STRIKE however William and the PM had agreed to enlarge the guard to a company in each castle.

At the moment they were from the Nepalese Gurkhas of the 2nd Battalion King William's own, and their devotion to their sovereign was absolute. This was due to both tradition and personal loyalty. William had set up a retirement package for the Gurkhas, soldiers native to the Indo-Asian country of Nepal who served in the British Army that included resettlement and relocation in the British Isles for them and up to three dependents, with an extra dependent added for officers above that of lieutenant. That had been seen as too generous at the time and still was to many native Brits, but the Gurkha regiments had served with distinction over the years, and William had decided they should be rewarded for it.

Despite their present assignment, they were serving soldiers not just pretty (a debatable point) faces in uniforms. "Sirs, the soldiers and officers on night duty outside report something odd going on. They report all movement beyond the palace's fence seems to have just… stopped. The palace guards on outer patrol fell where they were standing, and all traffic outside has ceased." There wasn't much traffic at this time of night but there was always some, after all cities never really slept whatever the time of day.

Natasha bolted upright in her chair wondering what the hell was going on while the others looked skeptical. William however was simply frowning in thought. A second later however one of the police chief's adjuncts came into the room so fast the Gurkha nearly drew his sidearm on him. "Sir, we have someone on the line calling for code Vermilion, he calls himself Wizard."

Roger paled while Jack looked shocked and Arthur and William's faces both blanked as their self-control locked down. Betsy and captain Britain however simply looked grim. William looked at Natasha's quizzical expression and elaborated. "Code Vermilion is the highest danger code we currently have, the worst case scenario after the assault on STRIKE; an attack on the entire city, possibly the nation as a whole." He looked at the policeman who had just run in. "Is Mister…Wizard still on the line?" The man nodded. "Then please put him on speaker phone, I think we all need to here this."

The man obeyed, placing the phone into a speaker cradle and moving it to the center of the table. William waited until the man nodded and then spoke. "Mister Wizard, we are all listening here, do you have any idea what is going on?"

"I'd say so yes," Harry's voice came back, its tone grim despite his flippant words. "The assault on STRIKE was designed to take out the first line of defense against magical assault, this is the main event. An ancient sorceress named Selene intends to use magic to drain the life-force of everyone in the city. She also seems to have cast a spell over the city to put everyone in it to sleep, though if she did that as part of the plane before sending out her troops to finish the work for the ritual or because me and mine discovered her plot I can't say. If you weren't under those wards of yours you'd be out too, but I doubt they're strong enough to stop you from being included in the ritual."

Arthur's eyebrows rose, but he had seen the assault of Mys-tech a few years ago, and knew about wards and magic. Magic on this scale was shocking but he knew enough to not make a fuss, as did the police chief. Jack frowned for a moment, but he had worked with Captain Britain and Dr. Druid a few times over the last year, so after a moment nodded at the captain, who also nodded grimly. Beside him Betsy now looked a mix between scared and angry, but it looked as if anger was swiftly swamping the fear. Natasha was the only one who thought that magic was something out of fairytales, but since the locals seemed to be taking it seriously, she decided to go along with things.

"And do you have a plan to deal with this Mr. Wizard?" Captain Britain asked.

"Just Wizard please, no need to be formal after all." For some reason that rather lame joke sent a much needed ripple of laughter around the room. After a second the voice on the phone went on. "We need to cut out the runes and take out Selene and her allies, who apparently are held up in the 30 street Mary Axe. Myself and my two allies can handle them, but we can't do that and negate the runes, nor am I certain we could keep her attention solely on us."

William looked over at the captain of the Guard, who nodded firmly. "We can send at least half the company out sir so long as yourself and these gentlemen stay in the castle."

William nodded. "Due to the wards we believe ourselves safe enough here."

On the other end of the line Harry frowned. He didn't know what the wards on Buckingham palace would to the vampires. "Be aware that Vixen has troops of her own and they are heavily armed with high tech weapons and they seem to be high on some kind of combat drug that makes them ignore pain. And I have no idea if the wards of the palace will do anything to the vampires, they aren't magically created."

The captain and the general both grinned. "That won't be a problem on our end."

"I'll meet you outside the palace then, be aware there will be three of us, and we will be arriving by air." Without another word Harry ended the call.

William smiled faintly at Harry's abrupt nature, then turned to the captain. "You heard the man Captain Nedari, I suggest you hop to it."

The Nepalese man smiled, saluted, and ran off. William turned back to the others. "I would suggest you join them Ms. Romanov, and you captain."

Captain Britain frowned. "Sir if the wards fail or if she has superpowered help she may send it after you here. I'd prefer to protect the palace if that is alright."

William frowned momentarily, noticing again that for all his strength Brian seemed to doubt himself, and was not dealing with killing Slaymaster well. Still it was almost to be expected by someone who, despite his power, had never been trained as a soldier. Betsy on the other hand was already slowly making her way out of the room, though what she could do to help or indeed what she was planning the king didn't know.

"Very well captain," he said, a little bit of disapproval leaking into his voice, causing the bit of the man's face that was visible to flush. "The rest of us will adjourn to the reading room, there is little we can do now but wait, though I would suggest you go after your sister before you rejoin us."

Natasha, still wondering what the hell was really going on, rushed out to grab her weapons from the guard post outside the palace where she had been forced to leave them.

OOOOOOO

On top of the 30 street Mary Axe building, Selene Gallio, sorceress and mutant stood, staring out across the city. While there were a few taller buildings, none of them were in as central a location as this, making it the natural place for the ritual. The marks of said ritual ran around the oddly shaped top of the building, connecting it to the wider runic array laid out on the city, with the center being the building's roof where Selene stood.

Selene stood around five feet nine with long black hair lose to the small of her back, a fit trim body encased in a leather corset and leggings, and crimson colored lipstick standing out sharply on her pale features. To look at her one would think she was a young woman, around twenty five or so, with a rather unhealthy dominatrix fetish.

Selene was old, though she preferred to use the phrase eternal instead. She had been born well before recorded history, well before anyone even thought of keeping track of time in the Hyborian Age of humanity. Later she estimated that she was born around 17,000 BC, in a poor little village somewhere, even she did not know where nowadays, after so long many of her oldest memories were faded or gone. She could possibly have been the first mutant to ever been born, and her power set her on the road that she would travel all her life.

Some could say that Selene's power made her evil, and possibly for the first four thousand or so years that was true as she learned how to control it, but after so long there was no doubt that Selene was as evil as it came. How else can a person view anyone who looks at other people, other human beings, not as food alone, but as pawns. That is how Selene viewed the people of the world, as things to enhance her power. Even the original vampires, Varnae and his children that emerged six thousand years before the present day, had respect for humanity. Selene did not, to her every other person alive was either a threat to be dealt with (or avoided), a pawn to be used, or food to fuel her power.

She had not originally been a sorceress, but after she had been feeding for 4000 years or so she began to realize that she could use the life force she drained from her victims for more than simply heightening her physical abilities and retaining her youth. She had apprenticed under one of the most powerful sorcerers to ever live, the ancient mage known as Kulan Grath, and eventually betrayed him to his enemies. But that betrayal did not save her from those same enemies and she lost much of her power when she was defeated in turn by Red Sonja and Conan the barbarian. Indeed it was only because of one of the final spells she learned from her old master that she was able to survive her apparent death.

But it could be said that learning from losing is one of the most important things anyone could learn, even an immortal like Selene. For the next thousand years Selene refrained from doing anything that would draw attention to her, moving from place to place so no one could realize that she did not age as other people, growing in the use of her power, learning from those sorcerers she could without drawing attention to herself. She perfected her old Master's final spells, and became immune to practically any normal weapon and many a magical spell. While her body could be pierced, her soul would remain even if her heart was carved out and her body would eventually heal itself. Of course this was before the days when burying bodies began. That later added a whole new problem to deal with when 'dying'.

After that, she experimented with her original power, and found that she did not have to drain the entirety of a person's life force. She could choose how much to drain, and if she drained Just enough to wipe her victims personality she could then fill that empty cup with her own commands and come to dominate them utterly. To Selene's mind that was even better then draining them and watching as the light faded from their eyes. To utterly dominate someone, to take all that they had could be, all that they ever would be, and to wipe it out utterly, to replace it with her own mind and her own will? That, she felt was the height of power. Using this power she corrupted a crew of explorers, and traveled the world with them, seeking out new magical knowledge, always on the search for ways to add to her power. Later Selene learned how to change her pawns, to make them stronger and have some of the same abilities as herself.

Selene did not have any truck with any of the Elder Gods or anyone who would deal with such, which severely limited the sorcerers she could learn from. Selene was interested in being the master, not the slave and knew that in a relationship between any of the Elder gods and a sorcerer who the true master was. The ones who would not enslave were too neutral or honorable for her purposes. And later she ran into problems with the Sorcerer Supreme, those magicals who rose above their fellows in order to protect the world from misused magic as well as extra-dimensional threats.

It was after a Sorcerer Supreme threw her out of China that Selene first learned of the Nahua and their sacrificial rituals. There were many societal/economic reasons why human sacrifice began among the civilizations of Mezo-America, but Selene was not one to care about reasons, only outcomes, and the fact of the matter was that some of their sacrifice-based magic sounded much like her own abilities magnified 100 times over. Yet because of her defeat at the hands of the Sorcerer Supreme she would not be in a position to do anything about it for a long time, and turned her attention elsewhere. She devised her own runic array based of ancient Cimmerian that would take the life force of anyone around it and feed it into her. With enough life force she could ascend to Godhood.

She chose Rome as the city to test this array on mainly because she was an egotist, but also because she felt that Rome was the most powerful nation in the world. If she could ascend to Godhood and at the same time decapitate Rome the only nation that could potentially challenge her ascension, then it would be like killing two birds with one stone.

Here she was betrayed not by her own hubris, but by one of her servants suddenly growing a conscience. Eliphas was a general of Rome who had first fallen into her service because he wanted revenge against his wife who had left him for a senator. In return for the added strength speed and stealth necessary to carry out his personal revenge Eliphas became one of her first true servants, who chose to serve her of their own free will. This allowed him to retain much of his mind and will, and for some reason her powers made him stronger, faster and far more durable than her mindless pawns.

Yet it was because of him that her attempt to sacrifice the city of Rome to her own power failed. Eliphas had a soft spot for children, and when he came upon a child at one of the points where he was supposed to inscribe the runes for her array he broke momentarily from her control in order to warn the child to leave the city. Of course the child told her parents, who were highly placed senators who in turn told the authorities. And thanks to a recent addition to the senate, a powerful mage called Myrlin, Selene's plans were thwarted and her own power supremely diminished as she again had to deal with her physical form dying. It took her over five hundred years to reconstitute her body from the ashes after Myrlin cremated her body.

Selene spent the next 250 odd years slowly gathering her strength, and then went to Mexico after the Aztecs were broken by the Spaniards to search for their runes. She slowly gathered her power and her knowledge again, for she was determined that when her chance came again, she would ascend to Godhood no matter who stood in her way.

She sat out the world wars, content with gathering her strength and her knowledge, and it was around that point when Eliphas reappeared under the name Eli Bard. Selene had cursed her former follower with un-life, turning him into a twisted vampire thing and then made certain that he was buried in the earth before she was discovered in Rome. It turned out he had been around for a few years, and had made a new identity for himself in London and wished to make amends. He had joined a shady high society club called the Hellfire Club and was slowly accumulating wealth and power.

Selene was not yet prepared to move with him however, but the Hellfire Club seemed an interesting tool. She moved to the Americas, where she created an empire based off of land ownership as well as investing. Her magic had grown to such an extent that she could hide from anyone, even the so-called haunted Sorcerer Supreme if she wished, and she used that power to create a financial empire. Then she went to the Hellfire Club and demanded entry. Such was her wealth that they had to allow her in, though she always got the impression that Buckman and Shaw at the very least were not only wary of her but terrified. As well they should be. Shaw was a mutant, something that she could see from a mile off, had powers, yet nowhere near enough to combat her, and they both knew it.

About two years after that, Eli got in touch with her again, and told her about the declining Hellfire Club in London as well as a book he had obtained. The book contained knowledge of the ancient Aztecs that she had been searching for millennia, not having found anything when she went to Mexico after the conquest. The book detailed the way the ancient Aztec head priests would gather their power. What they did was not to sacrifice the entire body, but to sacrifice a little bit of everyone's soul in the entire nation, tying the taking that power with a single sacrifice.

It was based off symbology and the psychic nature of a nation. With a king or an Emperor or someone of that ilk, there was a tiny bit of everyone's energy that fed into them. When there was a capital city the result was much the same. Everyone in that country fed a little tiny bit of power into that capital as it was always in their thoughts somewhere.

Of course in a country like America that power would be minuscule since the president was not, as the ritual called it, tied to the land. America was also not a normal country as the ritual saw it, too large and far too diverse. But King William was tied to the land, and London had been a capital for far longer than Washington and the thoughts and minds of the United Kingdom were tied to it in a way that Washington could not hope to match. The ritual also needed for the stars to align properly to work, and that time was fast approaching.

That, and the fact that Eliphas had already begun to set the groundwork for her inclusion in the London chapter of the Hellfire Club made her decide that her time had come. She remained in New York for a time, slowly transferring her wealth and money to London, always staying away from anything that could bring any attention to her. The London Hellfire Club was grateful to have her power added to it, and the New York Hellfire Club was just as grateful to see the back of her. None of the trio of Kings would admit it, not even Edward, who was the most outgoing, but all three of them had been afraid of her, like wolves who sense that there is a greater predator around.

Then she transferred herself, and within a week the Hellfire Club London Branch answered to her body and soul. The two main movers and shakers besides Eli were barely of the ranks that the New York branch would call a bishop, and easily disposed of. Eliphas was the only one who was of a true bishop rank somewhere between a bishop and king frankly, and he was totally subservient to her.

Emma Steed was another bishop who wished to be a queen but did not have the finances or influence necessary. A dark-haired young woman of 28, who had been born into old money and been determined to change it into new money she was actually quite an attractive young woman with dark raven colored hair cut short to her ears, piercing black guys, a svelte body with long legs, B cup breasts and sharp mind. She was also a mutant with an interesting telekinetic ability to create telekinetic/telepathic chains of varying length she could control with a thought. It made her a very dangerous weapon, and she was the first to fall to Selene.

Despite her telekinetic powers she was no match for Selene who shattered her mind and made Emma into one of her chief lieutenants. Sometimes Selene felt that she hadn't done a complete job on her, that there was a bit of willpower left somewhere in the younger woman, but if it was there it hid itself well.

The other woman of the hellfire club London branch was of a woman named Courtney Ross, who was the white bishop; though she tried to call herself the White Queen the rules of the Hellfire Club forbade it. You had to be of a certain level of power and wealth (calculated with regards to inflation) to call yourself a king or queen. She was not a mutant like Emma, and her mind was much more easily crushed. Her business of transportation however was much more useful than Emma's building and construction business, and allowed Selene to slowly build up a force of mindless pawns in London. Some of these were willing, and those she allowed to retain a bit of will, but others were not. A hobo here, a tramp here, the homeless and useless that no one would miss became her slaves in far more profound a manner than they could ever comprehend.

It was around this time that she became aware of STRIKE and the threat it could pose especially the telepaths. Selene had not dealt with many mutants over the centuries preferring to hide herself away, but telepathy was one area where she knew herself to be vulnerable. Oh, Selene had built up her mental and magical mind defenses to an almost absurd degree, but it wasn't a natural thing for her and a powerful telepath who wanted to could break into her mind given time.

That was one of the reasons why she had kept so low a profile while in New York. The psychic profile of a powerful telepath lay over the entire state like a waiting lightning cloud. That and the fact that the Sorcerer Supreme was there. Before Stephen Strange became the Sorcerer Supreme Selene had felt confident in her ability to defeat him if need be, but after he had received the mantle of Agamotto that had changed.

At this point however Selene had put in too much time and effort to moving to London, and knew that the time of the ritual was coming up. If she wanted to ascend to her rightful place as a goddess, she would have to do it now, or wait another thousand years. Therefore she made contact with the local crime lord Vixen who had a bone to pick with STRIKE and a few of its superpowered members already. Vixen thought she would be an equal in the partnership, but not 10 minutes after meeting Selene she too was broken, made into one of Selene's lieutenants.

Selene supplied the magic and spells and Vixen supplied the muscle. It was almost ridiculously easy to break STRIKE, and when Dr. Druid teleported in to investigate what might be going on in London she and Eliphas were ready. While the last of the Celtic Druids had been able to teleport away before Selene could finish him off the injuries he had sustained in that short moment of magical combat had assured Selene the man was no longer a threat.

After STRIKE was taken out she spent a few days using her mindless vampires to move around the city in the darkest portions of the night to carve runes into the cityscape for the runic array. She was cautious here, knowing that MI5 and Scotland Yard would be on their guard but she was running out of time. The planets would be in alignment soon, and the ceremony and the ritual array had to be ready.

Now, she was faced with this new wizard with odd powers and his allies at the most inopportune moment. She used a spell to see through Elpihas's eyes and watched the ambush impressed despite her years at the combat ability the wizard and his fellows showed. The other two were mutants, and despite the fact that one of them was a telekinetic she felt they were no real threat. Either could be overwhelmed through brute force but the wizard was something different, and the scope and breadth of his powers remained an unknown, though they reminded her of the battle wizards Camelot fielded, but as she had no desire to fight Morgan or Merlin she had never ventured to England so long as they were around.

At that moment she was faced with a choice, to back off and once more disappear, allow the wizard to dismantle the runic array and leave a few pawns to cover her escape. Or she could up the ante and go for broke.

In the end the allure of godhood was too much, and Selene decided to roll the dice. Instead of retreating she upped the ante, using a bit of her husbanded power in a single spell to put the entire city to sleep. As she had expected it hadn't worked on the wizard or his fellows, and she had been rather surprised that it hadn't passed the wards around Buckingham palace either. That was worrisome, but those wards were finite, they were not powerful despite their rather amusing nature.

"What will we do mistress?"

Selene turned to look at Vixen standing by the doorway into the building. The other woman's sharp pointed features always rather amused Selene given her chosen name and she wondered idly which came first the look or the name. But that was rather a chicken of the egg sort of thing and didn't really matter at the moment.

She looked out across London from the top of the 30 street Mary Axe. "They will come for us," she said calmly, "I know not how or what their assault will be, but the wizard at least has realized what is going on. Let him come," she said calmly as she raised one hand her mind already forming the words of the spell. "Let them see what their paltry skills and abilities can do to the coming of true darkness."

She concentrated for a brief moment more than raised two fingers in either hand to the side and then brought them down to slap lightly together intoning a spell. "Summu Nura!" The spell shockwave rang out from the strangely shaped building, and as it went the lights covering the city went out like a snuffed candle.

She waited a moment and frowned as her eyes, enhanced through millennia to be sharper than any mortal eyes, saw pinpricks of light in the distance moving towards Buckingham Palace. She concentrated began raising one palm above her head and slowly pushing it out towards the city in front of her. "Магла на стравот! (Fog of Fear)"

From that Palm appeared a cloud of darkness, impenetrable blackness, and with it came an aura of fear to overwhelm even the staunchest heart. It grew and grew and grew roiling through the city.

As she watched it and felt the backside of that aura of fear Selene laughed. "Let him come! Let him come and witness the ascension of a goddess!"

A moment later however her laughter stopped, and she scowled angrily as her Fog of Fear was cancelled by a shockingly white light, splashing out across the city. She shook her head amused. "Let him pit his pitiful lights against this darkness. Let him come, he will find me waiting for him."

Emma Steed, standing silent to one side her head down her entire body showing her subservience, looked out at that light. While the majority of her felt fear, the small, hidden part of her psyche, hidden behind the mental equivalent of her chains in the deepest part of her brain, felt a emotion it had long since given up on ever feeling again: hope.

OOOOOOO

Harry led the way flying over the cityscape towards Buckingham Palace, and the trio of fliers arrived swiftly at the edge of the wards to see a little over a hundred of soldiers gathering right inside the wards and Harry nodded in approval at their professional manner. They were not taking anything for granted, and had over a dozen men on look out looking around into the city, eyeing the rooftops and the roads while the others gathered in defensive positions. It was obvious they could move out swiftly, but just as obvious that they were ready for anything.

Ororo looked at them and nodded approvingly, "Nepalese, so these must be some of the British Gurkhas."

Harry racked his brain for a moment. He knew that name from somewhere, but he had only dealt with some SAS instructors, not the regular British military. "Good soldiers? I think I've heard of them but…"

"Oh yes," said Ororo as the trio landed amid shouts of exclamations surprise but no real concern. A captain hurried forward and she continued to speak switching to Nepalese for the benefit of the soldiers around them before translating back to English. "Very good soldiers, very tough and determined. I believe that they are also known for knife fighting, they use a special curved knife called a kukri. If we had time I would like to see how good they are really."

The captain smiled briefly at that, while a few of the nearby soldiers who overheard her chuckled.

"I'm not even going to try," said Harry dryly. "I don't want to get smacked again for using a translation spell so is it all right if we all speak the King's English?"

The captain chuckled again, always good to see people who know how to joke in times of peril. "You are Wizard?"

"That would be me," Harry replied. "Not the most original, but descriptive at least." He frowned a little as he noticed a woman coming out of the Castle Gates, a woman whose face he had seen through Hedwig's eyes. "I think we'll stick to our codenames for now. I'm Wizard, this is Phoenix and this is Storm." Ororo inclined her head regally, while Jean simply waved a hand looking around at the dark city, the rain still coming down and soaking everything.

"What would you have us do?" Captain Nedari asked. Around him his men already wearing night camo were preparing for night action, slipping on infrared goggles underneath wide brim hats to keep off the rain, checking their L85A2 rifles (some of them had grenade launchers added underneath the rifle) and their knives. Ororo was correct, there knife work was one of the things Gurkhas were most known for, and each of them wore a long, curved kukri at his side. A few of them were also setting up L108A1 light machine guns in hastily prepared positions.

"Our campaign is going to be twofold." Harry said briskly looking at the captain and glancing at the woman who had just moved up beside him. "For one thing, we need to cut out as many runes as possible from the runic array as a whole. One part of Aztec arrays is that the whole can still work if only a few runes are removed, so destroying as many as we can is essential." He knelt down and touched the grounds intoning "skrøpelige kartet."

The as yet not-introduced woman jumped back in alarm as the ground rose up to create a small 3-D diorama of the city about ten feet across. Harry waved a hand over the top of it and a simulacrum of the runic array as he suspected it was laid out appeared. Then he took out a conjured piece of paper and copied it thirty times. The paper had the runes he had seen so far written on them, as well as a few others Harry could remember from Cimmerian. "Now…"

"What the Hell?!" The woman interrupted, gesticulating at the map, "How the hell did you do that!"

"If you can't deal with magic, then you're not going to be of any help here." Harry said briskly looking up at her.

She shook her head angrily stung by his tone. "I-I can handle it I guess, though that is one hell of a vague explanation. My codename is Black Widow, and trust me I live up to my name."

Harry looked over at the captain who shrugged but nodded. "She is an American spy from SHIELD, an agency which I was debriefed on. They are supposed to handle 'super' issues like this, yes?"

Natasha nodded firmly and Harry shrugged, connecting the woman in his mind to the man who had been spying on the X-mansion. "All right, if the captain here is going to vouch for you that's fine for me."

"These," he said tapping lightly and motioning to a few bright spot on the runic array he had laid out across the 3-D map. "Are the places where I think the power siphoning runes are going to be, the ones who will actually drain the life energy of those around them. Those are the ones that have to be taken out no ifs, ands or buts."

"These others," he said marking down a second part of the array that was drawn like lines from the 30 street Mary Axe rather than in one of the many circles around it, "gather that energy and move it towards a central location. Take them out and the energy won't flow along the array, but it will still be drained unless we take out enough of the first sort. I suspect that the array is going to be guarded at key points by Vixen's men as well as the vamps." and he briefly described both to the soldiers around him, with Ororo telling them about how the thugs seemed able to ignore most wounds, up to and including the loss of a limb.

The Nepalese were slightly superstitious and Harry's talk about vampires had them touching their weapons nervously, but their eyes were gleaming with eagerness at the idea of combat after so long. This was certainly going to be a different battle than they were normally called for, but nighttime actions were one of their specialties, and it certainly beat just standing around looking pretty.

Harry frowned wondering if he could add anything to the soldiers, and then looked up as he felt a spell go off in the distance. He watched in alarm and shock as the lights all around them went out. "Shit," he muttered, "they know we're coming."

Behind him Jean flared her aura even brighter, while Ororo somehow summoned little tiny motes of electricity around her as Harry did the same with a Lumos spell. The redhead shook her head her now soaked hair stuck to her head so much it didn't move. "Did this Selene bitch just cast another spell that covered the entire city?"

Harry nodded. "I'm not certain what spell she used but she seems to have knocked out all electricity and…" he broke off as from the 30 street Mary Axe a mass of dark smog spread out covering the city even further. With it came a miasma of fear that shook even the staunchest hearts around Harry.

The wizard shook his head, gathering his power and intoned "Noli Vinci!" This was another spell he had designed based on the Patronus spell which simply pulsed a massive feeling of confidence and courage out. The spell could be made as powerful as the caster wanted, and this time Harry didn't hold back.

The light of his spell spread out slamming against the encroaching smog and through it, completely overcoming the aura of fear throughout the entire city, but the smog was unaffected by the emotion based counter-spell.

Harry looked around at the troopers around him as well as Ororo who was shivering slightly and Jean, who looked a cross between anxious and angry. The Black Widow didn't seem as effected or was simply better at hiding it. "Selene, the woman behind this thinks to scare you, to make you run and hide rather than stand against her! What do you all think of that!?"

"Kaatar Hunnu Bhanda Marnu Ramro!" shouted the soldiers back at him, angry at the very idea someone thought they would try to hide or run away.

Harry looked over at Ororo who smiled, her white eyes sparkling with more than the power that she commanded. "Better to die than to be a coward."

Harry laughed. "Gryffindors the lot of them, still good soldiers all the same. But this was a good move by Selene, she knows that the darkness helps her vampire allies, and I bet she's done something to Vixen's men too."

Captain Nerdali shook his head. "While my men and I are good night fighters, we still need some light to see by. With so few stars, no moon and this rain, we'll be at a disadvantage at anything but knife range. I would take my men against any normal foe at that range anytime, but against these vampires?"

In response Harry raised his hands, then gathered his power and slammed them together with a clap that rang around the square, intoning a Chinese spell he had learned from a book that Luna's classmate Su Li had loaned him. "Shi Jundai!" Suddenly the square was full of conjured golem all of them in the shape of monstrous men of clay. Normally they would be weak and easily dispelled by another magic user, but with the power Harry put into the spell they would be durable and dangerous against any purely physical threat.

His eyes flared with power Harry brought his hands up again and then moved them to the side. This was no spell really, he was simply imbuing each Golem with the light of a Lumos spell. The golems started to glow with a bright flaring light as if they each held a small sun inside the pushing away at the darkness.

Harry turned back to the captain briskly. "One fire team per golem, I'll order them to obey your men. Spread out of the city destroy any wards you find. Myself, Storm and Phoenix will move towards the 30 street Mary Axe."

"With me," said Natasha grimly. "You might need some subtle backup rather than brute force."

"That only leaves communication," said captain Nerdali. "That first spell seems to have taken out our electronics. We'll need to communicate with our teams, warn of ambushes and coordinate our efforts" Indeed all the Gurkhas had removed their headsets, which were dead like they had been dropped into a tub or water or something.

"I can handle that," a female voice rang out. Harry and the others turned to see Betsy walking toward them, her head held high despite needing to lean on her brother, who had decided to guard the castle from the exterior as well as keep watch on his sister.

"How so Ms?" Harry asked.

"I'm a telepath, and a decent one at that. I can keep in contact mentally with the soldiers." She could also maybe use her powers to sense out any ambushes, but she didn't know if she could, and wasn't going to mention it until she was sure.

Betsy's power of telepathy was not like Jean's, who had to concentrate to use it consciously, though these days it was getting easier and easier to use for long periods of time. Nor was it like Emma's, like a radar sweep going on all the time around her coupled with the ability to send out her own mind in the form of an astral projection at need. Betsy's was more like the sonar of a bat, always on and giving her an image of the minds around her. she never delved into them unless she had to, though most of them lacked the definition and sharp borders of a trained telepaths so she picked up some surface thoughts, but after so long she was able to ignore them easily enough.

Jean frowned, looking at the purple haired woman. "Are you sure you can do that over the entire city?"

"No, but over about forty blocks or so, yes. I'll have the mother of all headaches tomorrow, and it will exhaust me badly to do it even for an hour, but I should be able to."

The Gurkhas all looked a little askance at using a mind reader to communicate between them all, but none of them had any better ideas. Harry, if they had an hour or more to spare, could have come up with something but as it was already past 12 and pushing past 12:30 they didn't have any time to spare. "All right we'll go with that idea."

"One question," said one Gurkha fingering the top of his kukri, the curved long knife holstered at his side. "These vampires, what is our rules of engagement with them?"

Harry paused. The vampires that had attacked them earlier had seemed to come from all walks of life. Most looked like hobos or people from the streets, not the sort that anyone would mess, but then there were the ones who looked richer, and more normal. "Phoenix you've touched some of the vampires' minds, are the vampires worth trying to save?"

Phoenix, who had been staring out into the darkness beyond the light that Harry's golems were putting off turned back a frown on her face. "I" she paused, suddenly looking far younger and more vulnerable despite the aura of power still surrounding her. "I don't think so," she said quietly.

"You don't understand, whatever was done to them… their minds are gone. Their souls… their minds whatever you want to call it that made them who they were, whatever that was is gone. All that's left is the imperative to obey, nothing else. Some of them still have a facade of their normal personalities, but that's it. There's a bit of instinct underneath that, with a desire to feed, but that's all. I, I don't think they can be saved."

Charles might be able to save one or two with his greater knowledge and power, but even then it would be the ones who had a portion of their normal personalities left, and they were the ones who gave them to Selene willingly according to their own and Eliphas's memories.

Ororo strode up to her friend and put an arm around her shoulder comfortingly. "Can they spread whatever this is? This vampiric disease?"

Jean nodded sadly. I'm not certain the ones who are completely mindless can, but the few I sensed in that last group, the ones that had some semblance of minds left… they could, it was part of the reason why the few I scanned joined up."

"Does that answer your question trooper?" said Harry softly. "For those that move faster and seem more intelligent than the others, they gave themselves to this willingly. No quarter to them and as for the others," Harry shook his head. "Give them mercy."

Captain Nerdali nodded grimly, but whatever he was going to say was interrupted by the shattering sound of gunfire coming from a few buildings on the far side of the road way. At the same time over a dozen vampires came loping out of the darkness, pausing momentarily as they saw the light from the golems and Harry.

That momentary pause proved to be their undoing as before anyone else could respond Jean turned her telekinetic power flaring out in broad wings of flame to either side and she screamed, a scream of sadness and rage mixed with a cry of a hunting falcon. She brought her hands down slamming row upon row of pillars of telekinetic energy blasts down onto the vampires burning them all to ash.

At the same time she was doing this Harry and Ororo turned their attention on to the shooters in the rooftops. Their dual assault, lightning and hurricane gale spears of wind from Ororo and several attack spells from Harry swiftly dealt with the shooters. They turned back to the captain and Ororo cracked out "You have your orders Captain, let's be about it." With that she and feet Phoenix took the air, and Harry followed swiftly.

"Firebird and Thunderbird together," said the Gurkha captain in his native tongue looking over at his lieutenants, shaking his head to clear his large hat of the rain for a moment. "Suddenly I think that we are on the winning side yes?" With that he swiftly broke his command up, assigning fire teams to each golem, and then pointing them in different directions. He talked briefly to Betsy, introducing her to the fire-team leaders and his lieutenants to let her get to know the people she would be communicating with, then the half strength company broke up into fire teams and began to spread out through the city.

Behind them the captain, two fire teams and Betsy dug in at the entrance to the palace, while Brian took to the air, patrolling around the palace.

OOOOOOO

Harry and the two ladies flew through the air towards 30 street Mary Axe which was possibly the oddest name for a building Harry had heard, built seemed almost normal in comparison to the building itself, which looked like a strangely shaped bullet standing straight up.

Almost immediately they ran into the problem of all very visible lights in the darkness, that being that there were also targets. Gunfire erupted from all around them, and Jean frowned angrily. With a thought she grabbed all the bullets flying towards them in midair and pushed the bullets straight back down where they came from.

Below more of Vixen's steroid and mentally damaged thugs were swiftly riddled by their own bullets, some of them dying instantly while many ignored their wounds easily and kept firing up at the flying trio.

At the same time, spears of what could only be called black lightning shot out from the top of the building. Harry raised his hands throwing up a "Protego Maximo!" The magical shield deflected the black lightning up into the sky. "Mine I think," he growled. 'If that is not Selene I will eat my shoes."

A second after he stopped speaking telekinetic chain shot up towards them, but it was immediately blocked and smacked aside by a single wave of Jean's hand. "And mine," she answered, her eyes dark with mixed sadness and fury. "I'll take out whoever shot that out and keep the men that were firing at us just now busy." Ororo and Harry nodded and zoomed on, with Harry throwing simple attack spells at the top of the tower which were blocked or deflected as fast as he sent them with what felt like contemptuous ease.

Ororo suddenly gasped as they saw the front of the oddly designed building. The front doors were open and out came over a hundred vampires and zombies, zooming down the road that would eventually take them to Buckingham palace. Many of them looked as if they had been dug up from the graves around London, and indeed they had. Selene believed in preparing contingency plans, and she felt that a few dozen real zombies to go with her vampiric minions would provide enough of a distraction for her to either finish the ritual or get away. Of course they were now being used for another purpose, but good plans were ones you could change at any given time.

Harry had learned there were a few buttons of his lady that a wise man would not push. Now he learned another one, that desecrating the dead ranked well above hogging the covers or not having fruit for breakfast. She screamed, a scream of pure rage and god(ess) like fury. "This will not be allowed!"

She raised her hands into the air her eyes glowing with power and out of the rainy darkness came not a few, but thousands of lightning bolts, slamming down into the undead horde accompanied by sheets of ice and hurricane force winds. "Go back into the ground honored dead, this life is not thine, relinquish it and have peace again!"

Under her assault the horde of vampires and zombies first faltered, then broke up, and finally simply died, charred and broken and ripped asunder by her furious assault.

Harry was busy dueling with whoever was in the tower, and so didn't have time to even shout a warning to his lady when a single bullet traveling at near supersonic speeds shot up from halfway down the tower. It impacted her right in the middle, and it was only the fact that Harry had reinforced her suit as his first experiment with Orihalcum scales that saved her from more than a bruising. As it was, the Orihalcum scales underneath her suit and the charms to absorb impact saved her from any significant injury, but it still knocked the wind out of her and caused her attack to falter. Of course by this time her overpowered attack had done its job, and the undead had been forcefully returned to the earth, mostly in pieces admittedly.

Ororo shook her head, moving aside with a burst of wind to dodge another rifle around. "Will you be all right against whoever is up there alone?"

"Go on love," he said his voice almost light and playful despite the seriousness of the moment. "I can handle my partner in this dance alone."

"Good," the African woman replied, having caught a glimpse of the shooter. "I believe I just spotted Vixen. That is one woman I wish to have a chat with."

Harry nodded grimly. For some reason, a reason that he understood all too well but wasn't going to voice, after reading Vixen's background Ororo had developed a rather deep hatred of the woman.

That hatred came from the fact that the two of them came from similar backgrounds. Ororo was a very young girl when the embassy her parents worked at in Cairo blew up killing her parents and burying her in rubble, and she had spent her formative years on the streets of Cairo, one of the nastiest cities in the world. Vixen lost her parents at an early age, and had to live on the street from an early age in the area of London that had once been made famous by Jack the Ripper.

But whereas Ororo had risen above the thievery that she had to do to survive, only seeing it as a means to an end, Vixen had fallen into crime and reveled in it from the get go. Where Ororo left her life as a thief behind to explore the world beyond the city Vixen delved ever deeper into it. She prayed on people, selling drugs and taking what she wanted by force. Ororo loathed her, seeing in her what Ororo might have become if she had made different choices.

Ororo nodded and shot off, dodging another supersonic bullet in midair, thankful beyond words that Harry's spell that had changed her eyes into that of a owl hadn't worn off yet allowing her to see almost like it was daytime. With that she could see where the rifle was pointing and dodge accordingly.

OOOOOOO

"H-Wizard and O-Storm are fully engaged with the leaders of this attack," Betsy reported, a bit of sweat beading on her brow as she struggled to use her powers at so long a range for her. Well, that and remembering to use her new acquaintances code names. "Phoenix is engaged with another mutant and a group of fifteen shooters. Storm was really angry there for a minute, but that seems to have faded. Black Widow is closing in one Phoenix's position fast." That emotion had actually come through strongly despite Ororo's odd static filled mind.

Betsy and Captain Nerdali sat in a makeshift tent made over the 3-D map. It was only one of over a dozen the troops had put up. Betsy wondered for a bit what they were supposed to be for, but the smells of medical antiseptic reached her at one point even through the rain, and that answered her question.

Captain Nerdali nodded then looked at the 3-D map, where icons created by Harry showed him, Jean and the captain's men spreading through the city. None of his men had run into any opposition yet, but it was only a matter of time.

OOOOOOO

Terrence Mugabo was a sergeant in Gurkha Rifles and a damn good one. He was never going to be an officer, he didn't know anything about manners or how to stick his pinky out or anything like that, but he was good with his people, and very good with his knife. This saved him this evening, for when he and his four-man team moved slightly ahead of the golem with them it was his quick reaction time and his knifes that saved his life.

Out of the darkness ahead of them came five vampires, their forms that of everyday homeless people, dirty and almost sickly but their speed belying that nature. Even so, the five team strong fire team raised their assault rifles two fo them going to their knees on the wet concret of the street and all five began to fire. They belted out enough metal to put one of the vampires down before the others reached them, the darkness having allowed them to close without being seen. One of them reached for the Sergeant, and Mugabo stepped back very slightly raising his knife swiftly out of its sheath to slice into the thing's chest

That wasn't enough however and the vampire kept trying to slash Roger's throat out. His kukri lashed out again catching the thing on the wrist, slicing through skin and bone to amputate one of its arms but despite this the thing kept trying to get at him.

Thankfully Mugabo's arms were long and he was a very strong man and he was able to hold the vampire at bay while around him his men fought the other three vampires.

Suddenly an arm of stone reached across the Sergeant and grabbed the things head's crushing it in a powerful grip. With that respite Roger turned quickly, bringing his knife around and slicing into the side of a vampire who had his back to him. The thing turned swiftly at the sound of Roger's kukri singing through the rain but couldn't move fast enough to dodge the blow entirely. The kukri sliced into the things neck and back out, slicing away half its neck. The soldier it had been attacking took the opportunity to slice the back of its knees out with his own kukri.

Fight over for now, Terrence noticed he had one man down but the vampires were also down. The golem was moving around as swiftly as it could (which wasn't very fast admittedly), it's large fists rising and falling as it crushed skulls. Another one of his men had taken out a few phosphorus grenades. Normally used to make smoke they could be used to start fires and that was what the trooper was doing now, lighting the dead bodies on fire. The fire caught swiftly, and the dead bodies began to burn.

Terrence nodded grimly inwardly amused at the odd form of combat, how close and personal it was, like a throwback to the time before the British brought modern warfare to India. With the golem following him, Terrence backtracked the zombies, and swiftly found one of the rune things that Mr. Wizard had told them about glowing slightly in the dark with a sickly yellow. The sergeant knelt down and used his kukri to carve through the rune. The thing flared for a moment and went out. Satisfied he stood up and turned to the others nodding simply. "Let's move on."

This was not the only small clash going on in the city. The Gurkhas fought Vixen's men and the packs of vampires set to guard strategic points of the runic array, trading shots with the first, but all too often having to face the second in knife range. Despite their training and reflexes that was a losing proposition, but thankfully all the fire teams also had a golem that could handle the vampires easily enough.

Betsy was invaluable in this, using her power to tell each group what the others were doing, relaying orders from the captain, which allowed him to use his troops training and skills to best effect. More than a few times he had a group retreat from a pack of vampires to lead them into an ambush by another fire team. The darkness and the rain worked for the vampires, but the golem's light allowed the troopers to see them. Eventually the golems began to lead the way, providing mobile bulwarks behind which their fire teams fired at the vampires.

And those troopers with grenade launchers attached to their rifles began to use them as well whenever they spotted the vampires at sufficient range. However given the total darkness they were fighting through and the fact the vampires could see so easily in it, those times were few and far between.

Vixen's men were not so much an issue. They couldn't see anywhere near as well in the dark as vampires, and were no match for the Royal Guard at range or in close. Many times the Gurkhas used their maneuverability and ability to communicate to take them out without any casualties.

Yet all this was a mute point if Selene was still able to activate the rune at the appropriate time.

OOOOOOO

Jean scowled angrily. Telepathy didn't come as naturally to her as using her telekinesis did, and finding the minds of the individuals below wasn't very easy considering how weak they were. So the choices were to stay up here and simply shield herself from their gunfire, or get in closer and possibly have to deal with more vampires. Luckily for her, the woman with the telekinetic chains was much easier for her to spot.

She dived down towards the short-haired woman, gliding to one side as the woman again tried to throw up a chain of telekinetic power. As it flew past her before curving back Jean noticed that the end of it was barbed. An interesting mental construct, Jean thought idly before throwing out her own telekinetic attack, claw of flame which the girl dodged rather adroitly, moving like someone who had been trained as a dancer or possibly in acrobatics. From the woman's other hand another chain shot out, and then she twirled her head and of all things another change seems to appear from her forehead shooting out with a spear tip at the end.

Jean dodged through all three chains while making her way down toward the woman until a backhand of telekinetic powers slammed into the woman's chest before she could dodge. The blow threw her off the side of the roof she had been standing on, though she caught herself with her telekinetic chain swiftly. At the same time two of Vixen's thugs raised their rifles from hiding places on the rooftops around Jean and began to fire on her. Jean was forced to conjure up a telekinetic shield, to block the incoming bullets.

More rounds cracked out in the darkness, but this time they were aimed at two of the shooters who went down their heads now missing significant chunks. To the shock of the shooter this didn't actually seem to bother them. Seconds after going down they arose and turned, but Natasha started using experimental incendiary rounds which was filled with magnesium. This time she went for chest shots, and when the bullets hit they ignited easily, setting the thugs on fire which seemed to do the trick thankfully.

Natasha ducked under a pink chain of what she thought might be telekinetic energy as it zoomed in from the side trying to take her head off. But with the pressure taken off Phoenix she was able to turn her own power once again against the other telekinetic, who was sent flying backwards again slamming into a building and through the wall.

"If you take out the shooters," shouted Jean, having to shout as the weather suddenly worsened, the rain coming down in torrents around them. "I'll take her out."

Natasha touched her head where a chunk of her hair had been sliced off, that was how close she came to being beheaded by the chain of telekinetic force. "that sounds like a good division of responsibility yes."

Jean grinned and with a burst of telekinetic power shot off through the hole that the other telekinetic's body had made in the seven-story tall building across from them.

Unbeknownst to either woman however, someone else had pulled himself together and had gone hunting for who he called the mind witch.

OOOOOOO

By the time Ororo reached the window from which the shots had come from her assailant had retreated deeper into the building and Ororo landed looking around angrily. In one hand she began to gather the wind, readying the sphere of pressurized hurricane force that had destroyed the Seeker and had finished off Candra. In her other hand little blips of plasma light appeared, lighting her way as she moved out of what looked like a dining room into a office area then into a hallway.

The building some called the gherkin (though why it was called that Ororo could not fathom, it looked more like a metal and glass bullet than a pickle) was a mix of a business building tourist sight, and dining center. The interior of it showed this odd dichotomy, hence how Ororo could go from a dining room that was rather nicely made up to a vision from cubicle hell on the same floor. The stairwell matched the interior as a truly strange design, being marble for 36 floors.

She paused then, letting the lights around her hand disappear for a moment she tried to discern which direction accent had gone, up or down. After a moment she decided that Vixen was the sort who would always go to ground, feeling more comfortable in a place where she could escape from. Decision made Ororo moved down the marble stairwell.

About ten floors down she dodged backwards as shots rang out from below, and with a thought sent a massive torrent of wind downwards. Ororo shook her head, it was rather more difficult inside to use her powers, and the close confines in the darkness was getting to her a little, but thanks to Harry's spell on her eyes, the darkness wasn't quite enough to send their into her claustrophobic hysteria helped by the fact the stairwell was larger than an normal one.

The blast of wind smashed a doorway down below throwing one of Vixens thugs through it and out the other side riddled with the pieces of the door. Despite this he still tried to get to his feet but by that point Ororo was on the same level and she sent a lightning blast straight into his face. The man collapsed headless to the ground and she moved on growling angrily at yet another life wasted.

This was the beginning of a pattern. Every five levels or so Ororo would run into one or two of Vixen's thugs, but thanks to her Orihalcum reinforced suit and her own reflexes the only injury she took was bruises and left check being nicked by marble shrapnel.

The same could not be said of her enemies. Bullets barely slowed her down, and her return blasts of wind and ice (the easiest two powers for Ororo to use inside) killed each group in turn.

At first it was only one or two thugs but as she neared the first floor Ororo ran into stiffer resistance, seven thugs behind hastily erected defenses with a few armed with crew served weapons.

Here however the thugs made a mistake. One of them, slightly larger than the others carried a rocket launcher. Unfortunately Ororo's eyes could spot it even while she ducked back from the heavier caliber rounds of the crew served machine guns. When the man tried to fire it up the stair well, Ororo shot a powerful blast of wind at it, redirecting it sharply into the wall right in front of their defensive position.

The rocket exploded, sending some of the thugs and their defense sprawling. Before the survivors could recover Ororo was down in among them, using her martial arts to disable them in close and using ice and wind to slam them to and fro.

Soon after that Ororo found herself in the entrance way of the tower. The entrance was a large façade of three stories, with aluminum paneled arches connecting the outer plaza to it, and incidentally controlling the flow of traffic in and out.

With the rain and lack of a moon it was also as dark as a hole in the ground, but with the spell on her eyes Ororo could see through it clearly enough. "You cannot hide any longer," she said lifting a hand in sending little notes of electric light through the area lighting it. She sent these little electrostatic charges forward, impacting the walls and aluminum paneled arches around Vixen's current hiding place behind a security desk.

Vixen came out of the side of the desk, raising a handgun to shoot at Ororo causing her to duck aside. Behind her a window shattered, letting in the rain and wind.

A return blast of wind from Ororo took the other woman off her feet slamming her against the wall.

Ororo got to her feet calmly brushing the glass from window off of her with one hand while sending out a small bolt of lightning to destroy the woman's rifle with the other.

"Some people," Ororo said moving towards the other woman, "Might feel sorry for you. After all your parents died leaving you on your own on the street, how else were you to survive but turn to crime? But I am not one of them. I grew up in the same exact environment, only tougher and harder. I never gave into the darkness, to the easy path. You did so willingly. There are no words for my contempt for you, and that was before you joined with this Selene woman. Unlike anyone else involved in this madness, you joined willingly for monetary gain. You were willing to sell the souls and the more than souls of everyone in London for your own monetary gain."

"Are you trying to preach to me?" asked Vixen a fox-like snarl on her face as she stood up one hand going toward a small hold out gun under her leopard skin coat. "I know what I am, keep your sanctimonious opinion to yourself."

"No I wasn't trying to preach to you, I was simply stating why you're going to die now. This isn't a fight, this is an execution long overdue." The woman across from her looked through the dark of the interior of the building's entrance at Ororo's blazing white eyes, and something in them beside Storm's power made Vixen shudder and back away. Even her mentally enforced loyalty to Selene couldn't block the sudden fear, but it was too late.

Ororo charged forward. The woman tried to use her holdout pistol but Ororo slammed it to the side, wincing a little as she felt her pinky break upon impact with the gun, but her other palm shot out into the other woman's throat crushing her larynx.

Vixen went to her knees, her hands coming up to grasp uselessly at her now ruined throat.

Without any emotion on her face Ororo grabbed the other woman's hair and dragged her outside. Being outside among the rain and whether rejuvenated Ororo considerably, and she rose into the air one hand above her head.

Vixen looked up still holding her ruined throat gasping for air as blast of lightning shot out of the sky to impale her to the ground. The bolts went on and on for a full minute, and when it finally stopped Vixen was a charbroiled husk.

Ororo leaned back against the side of the tower wiping the rain and sweat from her forehead wearily. That had been unpleasant, but necessary. Such a woman was a cancer on society, and would undoubtedly have started up again if allowed to escape. After a moment Ororo shook herself and took to the sky intent on helping Jean and then the Gurkhas as they destroyed the runic array around the city.

OOOOOOO

The Royal Guard was not having an easy time of it, but they were slowly clearing out the vampires and mercenaries. The Gurkhas routinely used grapnels and set up enfilading fire to route the mercs or the vampires, though the vampires were tougher. And about an hour into the battle Captain Britain joined in, slamming down from out of the ongoing rain to grapple with the vampires at any position where the battle turned against the soldiers directed hither and yon by his sister's telepathy. The soldiers still lost men, and many more were wounded and evacuated back to the palace, yet more and more runes were crossed out as time went on. Despite this however the ongoing fighting throughout the city was but a sideshow to the main event.

OOOOOOO

Harry and Selene both had distinct advantages going for them in their contest. Harry was immensely powerful, though still unused in many ways to that power, and had reflexes that were beyond anything Selene had ever encountered before. His reflexes were so fast they could keep up with Quicksilver, and he could cast spells far faster thanks to that. He also had spent a large portion of his life locked in magical combat or preparing for said, sometimes against opponents which outclassed him in many ways. His magical method also lent itself to combat against other wizards as easily as mundanes, and was built for speed.

Selene was one of possibly only two or three magic users on the planet that could match Harry in power for a time. He had much greater reserves than her, though she didn't know that. She also, despite having gone out of her way most of her immortal life to not openly fight other sorcerers, had far more experience than him. She was ruthless, with a repertoire of attack spells that just had to be seen to be believed.

Harry could have told anyone that within five minutes of Selene's initial attack. The curses and attack spells she hurled at him from the top floor of the bullet shaped building were imaginative and powerful. Some of the cruse almost looked like a few of the darker ones he had seen the Death Eaters use in his old dimension, but not quite, and their speed was far greater. Still Harry was far too quick in the air to get hit with such, and he had one hand covered with the strongest shield he could create, while using his own offensive spells to negate hers when he felt the need.

Selene also used transfiguration to great effect. Birds, griffins, dragons and other fantastical creatures suddenly conjured out of midair assaulted him every minutes but he destroyed them as they came grimly taking everything she could throw at him. Some of them were illusions, but many of those illusions covered smaller transfigured creatures, and after one of those tried to stab him in the back with its beak (not getting through thanks to his crysis suit and Magia Erebea) Harry made certain to wipe all the beasts Selene sent at him out with extreme prejudice.

But it was the cutting spells she sent him that were the real danger. They were of a variety he had never seen before, jagged slashes of dark purple slicing through the rain swept night coming at him fast and furious. The one time one had snuck through to clip him its edge had sliced through the crisis suit and his Magia Erebea enhanced skin to open a gash on his side. It wasn't serious, and he closed it with a reflexive Episkey, but it was a sign that she could hurt him despite his strength.

Despite this however, Harry had discerned enough of her skills, and her personality on top of that to start to think up a plan to deal with her. Up to this point Harry had used only the barest minimum of his spells to combat her conjured beasts and attack spells, but now he upped the ante. One hand began to glow white and red then he shouted, "Gaudete vento urente!"

From that hand several dozen small multicolored thimble sized bits of light zoomed out, each one targeting a transfigured beast, and when they hit, they exploded like a rocket. His other hand filled with lightning and several assault zoomed out from that hand as well, decapitating the largest transfigured beasts or smashing through a few of the illusions to hit the one bit of them that was real.

The transfigured monsters died under this rapid and overwhelming assault and before Selen could recover from the suddenness of his assault Harry zoomed on, dodging several cutting spells and hammering into the magical shield Selene had raised around the tower's top floors shattering it like glass. Harry landed across from Selene on the top floor of the building, his emerald eyes flaring like green lightning in the dark.

This floor of the bullet shaped building was designed as a bar with a 360 degree view of the city around it. It was supposed to have several tables scattered around and a central bar centered around a few metal and concrete pillars, but that was all gone now. Instead the tables were gone, the bar as well, and the floor was covered with runic script leading to a spot at the center of the room, where Selene stood.

Harry took a moment to look at her, standing there in a leather corset, thigh high boots, and short leather shorts. With that and her white skin, long black hair, sexy body and crimson lips she looked like a sub's wet dream. Harry however saw more than her physical form and shuddered at what he didn't see.

Despite the sudden overpowering nature of his assault Selene seemed more amused than anything else. "What is your name boy?"

"I don't share my name with the dead." said Harry coldly, his hands crackling with eldritch energies,

"Bravado is the hallmark of the young and dimwitted," said Selene scornfully and suddenly from all sides came hundreds of cutting spells slamming and slicing through the air at Harry.

Harry dropped to his knees slamming his hands onto the ground and shouting a spell that encapsulated him in stone from the floor below them. The hundreds of slicing spells cut through the stone dome, but when the dome crumbled Harry was no longer there.

"Amusing," said Selene looking around and activating her own magical senses. This saved her from a rather ignominious defeat as suddenly the ground underneath her shot up in a spear that would've impacted the center of her chest if she hadn't leaped aside.

Harry suddenly apparated directly in front of her his hand lashing out to smash into her face with a punch that sent Selene careening away to slam against the glass behind her, shattering it. She would have fallen out if her hand hadn't suddenly grown claws which she used to dig into the ground.

She stood up, wiping away blood from her mouth. "You'll pay for that." Selene snarled then gestured with a single finger. "Don't you know that you never attack a sorceress in her place of power?" Indeed it was never good idea to attack a sorcerer or sorceress anywhere they had time to set traps. This allowed them to lay traps, and there was nothing so dangerous to a magic user as the unseen.

Harry found this out when the tables that had been thrust to the edge of the top floor suddenly came alive, spitting out's shards of wood and metal at him from behind. His reflexes saved him however, and he ducked out of the way returning fire. "Bombarda!"

His spell destroyed two of the tables, but Selene snapped her fingers again and the floor that he was standing on that did not in fact have any rooms to dealing with the runic arrays she had sent out across the city exploded under them.

"Idiot boy," Selene laughed. "Did you honestly think that you and your puny magics could stand against me?"

"I see," said Harry from out of the smoke of the small explosion. "Ventus Dolor!" A blast of wind caught Selene in the center of the chest throwing her backwards and incidentally clearing the air between them. She looked up from her crouch to Harry completely unharmed though his crysis suit looked a little singed around the feet. "That was dangerous, still I seem to have come up with a solution."

"And that is?" Selene growled.

"Overwhelming force! Terraemotus!" Harry shouted slamming his hands down onto the ground. A magical wave of magic shot out through the floor, they were on, detonating all the traps that Selene had prepared in the floor and the various pieces of furniture.

Selene cursed then began to fire curses and attack spells at Harry, but he dodge them all adroitly returning fire. Selene used the few remaining surprises she had prepared here in the center of her power, but Harry shattered them easily, pressing her hard.

After a moment she realized that in close like this Harry had the advantage, his speed and reflexes made him almost impossible to hit while his return shots were dangerously pressing her magical shields. She had layered three magical about her, but two of them had already been shattered, forcing Selene to do something she hadn't in far too many millennia, dodge wildly.

To make matters worse, the ritual array on the floor had been badly damaged, and it would take at least an hour to put right.

Suddenly she thought up a plan, and leaped backwards towards a window firing two spells at Harry that he had never heard of before. "скелетразбие!, Enu Mekelmu!" One spell was a bright orange bolt, the other a white arrow shape. These spells were made to shatter the targets skeleton or boil his eyes in his skull. The thing about them that was different however was they ignored the target's shields.

Harry, not wanting to chance being hit by unknown spells, a survival trait for magic users, dodged to one side, halting his attack for a second.

This allowed Selene the time to turn and look out over the city gathering the pieces and bits of debris that she had used previously in her transfigured and conjured beasts. This time they were smaller of course, but that just made them harder to hit and with another wave she covered them all with illusions masking their numbers and throwing them at Harry.

Harry started to use area effect spells, uncaring of which was illusion or which was reality simply going for destroying as many as he could as quickly as he could but he was unable to do both this and concentrate on taking out Selene.

Selene used this time to reach out with her magical power to a nearby church, and a second later it began to creak and groan as it took on the aspect of a giant. While nowhere near as large as the building they were currently on, with a bit of magical aid it jumped up onto the floor they were on, shattering the wall further and raining down debris which both combatants quickly used to their advantage to transfigure into beasts that attacked one another and their opponent.

Here Selene again showed her mastery of transfiguration, changing thousands of tiny bits of shattered glass and stone into a horde of ants that sought to engulf Harry.

Harry however wasn't idle and used his own spells to counter many of the attacking beasts, and then used a spell that changed the rain pouring down into ice bits which he then sent at a few of the beasts, before using a wind spells to send the ants directly back at Selene, who snarled and swiped them to the side, trying to get Harry with a cutting spell, but missed when Harry returned fire.

He suddenly took to the air to dodge the giant's fist which crashed down into the floor of the topmost story of the Gherkin laughing a little as it destroyed even more of Selene's runic array.

He flew up the arm of the giant towards its head, dodging its fist again, throwing out a web of fire that caught a dozen conjured birds as they tried to dive-bomb him, and then flew on into the giant's face. "Neque Hasta et Longinus!" This was not in fact a spear spell, simply a far more powerful bombarding spell that contained the explosion into a small area, making it much more powerful. The giant fell back out of the building, taking out more of the wall as it fell to the ground forty stories below.

Rather than be bothered by his skill however Selene laughed having worked out yet another ploy. "Double Jeopardy this time boy!" She shouted raising her hands towards the city. "ayangyn avarga jad!" A giant spear of black lightning appeared in her hand, and she threw it through the rainy night towards one of the apartment buildings nearby.

Harry gasped in shock, and apparated directly in front of the lightning, smashing it aside with a hand reinforced by several shielding spells.

"Now here's the question!" said Selene almost gaily as she sent another lightning out randomly forcing Harry to intercept it before he could slam into another building. "Can you keep defending the rest of the city, and stop me, before time runs out?"

That wasn't a bluff, there was enough of the array left around her for Selene to activate it once the appropriate time came. It was one of the lovely things about Macedonian and Aztec runic arrays, both of them were extremely robust systems. They were wonky in terms of time and the alignment of the stars and other things, but they could still be used if they took damage up to a full third of the entire array.

Harry saw red. There were a few things that really got under his skin, one was trying to threaten children (a surefire trip to the grave if Harry was around), another was threatening people who couldn't fight back, it set his saving people thing™ on overdrive.

For the first time Harry grasped all of his magical power, not just the amount he was comfortable with using p to this point, but all of it and slamming his hands together and then through them apart making a circle around the street containing the Gherkin. "Sciath na BhFéadfadh!"

This was a spell he had taken from one of the books on battle magic from the books in the Hogwarts library here in this dimension. It couldn't block out transfigured creatures, or keep out dark beasts or anything that could think, what it could do was block any attack spell cast on it as long as the power lasted. It was extremely power consumptive, but one of the best shields against magical assault that Harry had ever read about, though the power aspect was possibly why it had never existed in his former dimension. Even Voldemort would not have had the power to cast it without some other power source.

Harry however had no issue whatever with the power consumption. A wall of iridescent magical power sprang up shooting into the sky and creating a dome around the Gherkin and a few surrounding buildings.

Selene gasped at this show of magical power, realizing that the boy facing her might well have been holding back so far, and then had to shield her eyes as one of her attack spells slammed into the shield with blinding force.

In the wake of the noise and fury of that detonation the shield stood strong, and her opponent was nowhere in sight. Selene scowled angrily, waving her hands in the air and intoning a spell to cancel all illusions, but even that was too slow. Before she could do anything further Harry appeared directly in front of her, his hands reaching out to grasp her neck.

Instead of trying to split away immediately she laughed triumphantly and brought her own arms up to grasp his hands, one of the few parts of him that weren't covered by his crysis suit. As soon as their hands contacted one another, inside their bodies their two mutant powers went to war.

Selene was a vampire in the truest sense. Her mutant power allowed her to leech the life force of her enemies adding it to our own. It was only later that she learned how to use that added life force as a magical power source, but in so doing she changed the life force into magical power, which for normal people, even sorceresses like her, was not the same thing.

Harry's power however sucked magic out of anyone or anything he touched. There were a few things that he couldn't drain, he couldn't do it to a spell which had already been launched, and he had yet to try to do on inherently magical creatures like house-elves or demons. Harry's bonding to the house-elves somehow negated his ability to drain them, and Harry was actually very leery about attempting to drain demons seeing as the magic he had taken so far from various enemies had 'flavors' to them, and he was very much afraid of what a demons magic would 'taste' like.

Their powers were in direct conflict. Selene's tried to leech the life force out of Harry while at the same time was losing her magic to Harry's own touch. Unfortunately for Selene, Harry's life force and magic were one and the same. That meant as fast as she could suck out his life force it was reinforced by the magic she he was looking out of her.

Not a minute into the contest she realized what was going on, and deciding that she couldn't afford to lose all of her magical power Selene broke away, using a point-blank cutting spell, which slashed a long gash open in Harry's crysis suit along one of his pectoral muscles, but because of his own incredibly fast response that was all.

Harry fell back, one hand going up to his chest, glowing with a faint healing spell but his other shot out what he might start calling one of his calling card spells "Drill of Light!"

Again Harry poured far more power into the spell than he would normally, but even then he didn't realize how much power he had just taken from Selene. Rather than the fifteen he expected twenty shot out, and the drills of mixed lightning, pure magic and light shrieked through the rain and air toward Selene.

Selene gaped at the attack spell which was unlike anything she had seen before, and barely dodged the first few. The next several however shattered her shields like glass,, and the drills tore into her, ripping one of her arms away, a fair chunk of her side, chest and legs.

To anyone normal this amount of damage would have killed her, possibly immediately, and certainly painfully. Selene however was not moral, and within seconds her body regenerated.

Harry didn't let up however, sending out spell after spell.

Selene's attacks now became more desperate yet at the same time crueler, spells that would flash fry his innards, peel him like a grape, make his intestines burst out and strangle him, his bones shatter or to turn to goop.

However this didn't have any real impact, as all of them were countered and Harry kept pressing her using mid level spells to drive her back, forcing her out into the air where he was not surprised to see that Selene could float.

Selene snarled, wiping on hand over her eyes to clear them from her rain-slicked hair, ignoring the fact one of her breasts was showing, since her outfit didn't regenerate with her body. "You will not beat me BOY! I will ascend to godhood tonight!"

Harry laughed. "I've heard better threats before, and besides I don't think the world needs a goddess of S&M."

Selene snarled and redoubled her attack, but there was no doubt now who was winning their duel.

OOOOOOO

On the streets of Chicago Steven Strange paused, shaking his head as his senses, connected as they were to the ley-lines of the planet, told him something big had just happened in the United Kingdom.

Next to him Clea looked at him. "Is something wrong?"

"Something elsewhere perhaps, though what I just felt might be Mr. Potter dealing with that something major in no uncertain a manner. At least two people are throwing around magic at an amazing scale. Perhaps I should have agreed to aid Harry in dealing with whatever trouble was brewing in the land of his birth. Certainly you two seem to have this well in hand."

Indeed that was rather understating things. Thor and the Destroyer's forced entry from the pocket dimension of Asgard to Earth's had sent shockwaves of weakness through the dimensional wall, culminating here, at the normally weakest point near their entry. The city of Chicago was an odd place, and had been home to a group of demon worshipping Native Americans centuries ago, before they were wiped out by the Cheyenne tribes. The city was still a weak point in the dimensional wall however, yet Steven's presence here and now did not seem necessary.

Clea of course was well up to the task of dealing with demons from imps to greater demons since she came from the Dark dimension, a place ruled by a greater Demon Lord.

It was Wanda who was the surprise. Her chaos based magic might cause some odd reactions, but it seemed as if demons, who generally had some magical resistance (with the amount varying due to personal power and age) were unable to protect themselves from it. Now as the two senior magic users watched she used her powers to rip through the horde of demons around her.

Her chaos magic wasn't pure attack magic, some of them were changed into stone, some into fluffy bunnies, others lost limbs or tripped and were trampled by their fellows. The results seemed to vary, but the outcome did not.

Clea shook her head rather amused. "I think my young apprentice and I need to have a talk about moderation. But other than that yes, I am very proud of her progress."

Steven nodded, and the two rejoined the battle, swiftly routing the demons back into the portal they had emerged from.

OOOOOOO

Natasha grunted as a bullet ricocheted off the rock of the rooftop gargoyle she was hiding behind, sending small pieces of rock digging into her shoulder, one of them opening up her left. She returned fire ducking out one side and blasting away with both pistols and her attacker went down. There was a momentary lull in the action and she fell back under cover banging her head lightly against the gargoyle. "This has not been a pleasant evening." She muttered and got to her feet moving swiftly from cover to cover keeping her eyes open. But there didn't seem to be any more enemies around. That was unfortunately when she heard an unearthly howl from the street below her.

Jean had found that the other woman's control of her telekinetic chains was rather impressive, but she lacked the power and ability to really keep up with her in a telekinetic battle. It was simply the fact that there were over 20 shooters around here and they seemed to want to ignore Natasha to concentrate on her that kept the battle going so long.

Of course Natasha was very thankful for this, but Jean wasn't. Thankfully attrition soon made Vixen's men turn their attention to Natasha and Jean pressed her advantage swiftly, slamming aside with fists aflame the chains of the other woman, red and orange against black and purple. The older woman quickly became desperate, falling back and using her acrobatic ability to stay away from Jean's telekinetic assault. She seemed to have a bit of precognitive ability, and was always moving just a second too fast for Jean's attacks to hit, but it was only a matter of time and they both knew it.

A sudden snarl of fury and pure animal rage came from the dark alleyway beside the redhead and it was only her telekinetic powers that saved her life when a claw came out of the darkness to try and rip out her throat. "Your life is mine mind witch!" Eliphas snarled.

It had taken him some time, but eventually he had been able to reconnect his limbs, and he had come after Jean with single-minded purpose, infuriated beyond all reason at her searching his mind. Of course this hadn't done his façade of being human any favors. He now had fangs poking out of his mouth, green skin over a spare frame and his hair was gone, and his face was much more skeletal than it had been.

Jean pushed off the ground swiftly backpedaling, using her telekinetic power to force her body to move as fast as her mind could force it, dodging Elipha's slashes. He (debatable at this point in Jean's mind, it looked far more appropriate) was faster by far than any human could move, so she had to push her body beyond the limit. Of course she would pay for it later with pulled muscles but at the moment she needed that speed.

The other telekinetic user went to her knees for a moment gathering herself and then attacked Jean again as well.

Bullets cracked out from Natasha above them on the rooftops, but only the woman seems to bother dodging them. A few hit Eliphas but he ignored them pressing the attack forcing Jean backwards, despite the fact that her entire body was now encased in an aura of flames that seem to burn his skin. The man's mind was now completely focused on one thing only, taking revenge on the mind witch that had broken his mental defenses.

Natasha thankfully was able to occupy the other telekinetic just long enough for Jean to gather herself and she grabbed Eliphas's flailing arms in two grips of telekinetic flame. With a howl she threw him away from her, and then while he was in the air sent searing hot column of fire straight into his chest.

Elihpa snarled and growled and tried to move aside but Jean grimly kept her aim on him, and then a bolt of lightning slammed out of the night sky into him from behind. The dual assault did what neither could do separately and at last broke through whatever power was keeping Eliphas alive past death. With a shudder and a last despairing scream Eliphas's ability to heal himself failed, and his body crumbled and burned to ash under their assault, the ash scattering in the rainy night.

Natasha however hadn't fared so well. Already slowed down from a few bruises and several wounds her opponent used her telekinetic chain's end to spear her in the her calf pinning her in place. The woman was about to use another chain to spear the pinned Natasha through the neck, but Ororo used a wind attack to pick her up and throw her head first against the side of a nearby building. The telekinetic chain wielding woman's head cracked with bone crushing force against the side of the building and she collapsed boneless to the ground.

Emma Steed didn't have any of the unnatural vitality of the vampires, she hadn't been made into a full vampire because she had her own company to run and Selene did not want any attention brought to her so had to leave some mental faculty there. It wouldn't have been enough for the other woman to break her bindings, in fact it hadn't been enough to even attempt it, and Selene regularly fed from her vitality besides but it was enough to make her just as vulnerable to injury as a normal human being.

Jean breathed a sigh of relief and would've fallen to her knees if not for Ororo's hands on her shoulders. "Are you well my friend?" Ororo said softly.

Jean impulsively embraced her, their wet chests pressing into one another as she nuzzled into the older woman's neck breathing in the scent of the rain on her skin and a faint hint of cinnamon and cardamom that was simply Ororo to her senses. "I am, thanks to you," she muttered kissing the skin there before pulling away to look Ororo in the eyes.

Ororo at her gaze with a faint smile on her face and firmly hugged the younger woman back, kissing her on the lips slightly before moving away. Jean smiled, realizing that a decision had been made there or perhaps a better way to say was that a decision had been acknowledged. It only fell to Harry to finish the deal.

Which, she thought rather giddily, I'll force him to do soon enough. But it has to be at the right moment, I want it to be romantic.

Suddenly in the distance near the top of the Gherkin building they could see a pinprick of black colored flame shining in the dark, while in the rainy sky above them Captain Britain began to descend toward them.

OOOOOOO

At the same time Eliphas arrived to press Jean so strongly, Harry Leapt back from a exploding spell from Selene, then smashed her from the air toward a building he had alighted on during the initial contest against her first wave of transfigured beasts. As she hit the roof he smiled and sprang the trap he had laid on each of the roofs he had stopped on during that time. "Activate!"

Suddenly a sphere of light surrounded Selene on all sides where Harry had been moving, and he stepped back smiling faintly even as he poured more power into the shield.

Selene scowled angrily. "This will not avail you anything Boy, I can easily break through this." With that she attempted to send out a spell to shatter the sphere or magical light around her. She frowned faintly as her magic seem to sputter and go out for a moment before she could regain control of it. Selene shook her head, this battle had already drained her reserves horribly, and whatever this shield was it seemed to be feeding off her as she had fed off on so many in the past millennia. The irony was not lost on her, but that did not make her any less determined to break out.

Harry gestured, and suddenly the sphere shrunk dramatically, and Selene was lifted off the ground the sphere now encompassing her entire body in about a foot in every direction. It was only now that Selene realized how badly she had underestimated the other young man, as she felt her magic drain out of her. She looked down and realized with a shock that it was also draining her vitality. Where before she had the skin texture of a twenty-something year old woman, now she looked forty, and she was getting older by the second.

The shield Harry had created was a mix of four different runic arrays he knew combined into one something that he would never have even attempted, but Harry had a skill at making things work in combat for him. Harry had an ability to come up with things on the fly that often pissed off his friends back home. It was a skill that particularly irritated Hermione who was a by the book learner and detested the fact that he was able to get such results on the fly without prior planning.

The shield took aspects from a regular Protego shield, which was able to be shaped and molded as the caster wished. Then next bit was a portion of the ward he had used to power the runic array for Ororo, which was even now draining Selene just as she had wished to drain every person in London. And the last bit was taken from the array he had created after trial and error for the workroom in High Note where he created Orihalcum.

He grimaced as he poured more power into it. Selene was throwing everything she had at the shield around her now, desperately trying to find a hole, trying to break at least in one portion of the shield. Even as her power drained from her Selene kept on trying.

"What are you!" she suddenly shouted as one hand now gnarled with age slammed out trying to force her way through the shield just a little bit. Yet even as she did her fingers dissolved into dust. "No magic I know of could keep me here like this! No one could have ignored my touch like you did!"

"To you," said Harry looking at her coldly. "I am justice long overdue."

The crone that was now Selene cackled. "You think this is enough to stop me! I have lost my physical form before, I will rise again! And when I do boy, I will hunt you down and slay everyone you love before ending you!"

"Your soul can survive separate from your body." Harry said nodding and now moving forward, one hand raised pouring power into the shield as Selene kept on trying to break out. The other however began to gather magic for another spell. "But there are spells that affect the soul you know. And I have quite a bit of history killing people who think they are beyond death."

There was just a moment for that to register in the other woman's mind and Harry was suddenly in front of her one hand reaching out to gently touch the outer edge of the shield around her wincing at the touch of his own spell. "Black-Fyre!" he growled and from the palm of his hand shot out the black flame of darkness, the flame that fed off everything including the souls of its victims

Selene had only a moment to look in shock and rising terror at this thing that had suddenly joined her in the globe of light the black flame forming the faces of fiends and magical beasts before closing with her then she began to scream. The screaming went on and on as the flames consumed her body and soul. Harry grimly stayed there, his palms pressed against the shield, one hand pouring more power into the shield itself while the other powered the flames.

It took 5 minutes for Selene's soul to succumb to the flames, but eventually all that was left was a last despairing wail on the nighttime wind, and Selene Galileo, the oldest mutant on the planet was no more.

With a shudder Harry slowly reined in the Black flames, dissipating them as he shrunk the shield with his other hand until it was in the palm of his hand and a last guttering flame went out. When the last bit of flame disappeared he let the spell shield fade as around him the runes he used flared and died.

He fell to his knees for real this time, gasping in air. That fight had taken more out of him physically then the fight against Magneto, and he was covered with wounds. He still had a lot of magical power, possibly as much as a third of his magical reservoir left, but physically even with his Magia Erebea he was drained, since it didn't actually effect his endurance. With a sigh he got to his feet casting healing spells on himself shaking his head in amusement. "More scars for the collection," he muttered wondering what Ororo would think about them, particularly the long slash that crossed one of his pectorals. He actually hoped that one didn't leave a scar, he had enough of those on his body already thank you so much. His ribs along one side were cracked by some spell he hadn't dodged enough of, and one shoulder was sore too. All in all however he had gotten off lightly.

With Selene's death the spells she had cast across the city faded one after another, and Harry watched as the lights came on across the city and the people began to wake up from their magic induced paralysis.

A moment later Ororo and Jean landed next to him, and both of them immediately grabbed him into a hug pulling him to his feet again. "Are you well my love?" said Ororo softly nuzzling into his ear on one side while he felt Jean resting her head on his shoulder for a moment on the other.

Harry chuckled quietly as his arms went around both women. "I'm all right, but I am really looking forward for a few days vacation after this. And if anyone asks for my help in the next few weeks I'm going to turn them down. Every time I agree to help someone these days it seems to pull me into another crisis. My saving people thing is fully satisfied for the moment thank you."

Both women chuckled, shaking their heads wryly.

OOOOOOO

In a place untouched by the passage of time a being totally outside it's purview looked up, her bony countenance somehow showing shock and pleased surprise. Again Death turned from contemplating her suitor's latest attempt to gain her attention to stare at the tiny black and crimson soul spark that appeared in front of her.

"Selene the immortal," she mused. 'I had given up ever seeing you here." After a moment she chuckled, the tone crypt dry and rather disturbing for all of the humor in it.

"Ah of course, the Life Defender strikes again. I really must think of something nice to do for him. He is cleaning up loose ends in the paperwork for Earth rather well, even if he doesn't realize he's doing it."

OOOOOOO

Of course that wasn't the end of things. After Harry renewed the modified confounding spells on all three of them Phoenix and Storm joined the Nepalese soldiers moving around the city clearing out their last pockets of resistance. Without Selene dominating their minds and directing them, the vampires succumbed to their animal instincts lashing out at anyone nearby. Luckily there were only a few of them remaining after the last few hours, and they had already been cornered by the Nepalese soldiers who cut them down and burned their bodies with brisk efficiency.

They also took out any remaining runes from the giant array spread out over the city as they could find. While the opportune time for the ritual had passed, any mage that came along would be able to activate any of the runes that remained until they were destroyed.

While Jean and Ororo were helping the King's Guard, Harry moved back to the Castle and began to help with the wounded. The Gurkha Rifles had a company of two-hundred and twenty troops guarding Buckingham palace before this all began. Fifty randomly chosen troopers had remained in the castle with a lieutenant in command to guard the king and the other civilians (servants were included in that as well) and another 16 dug in around the entrance to the castle with their captain and Betsy. A hundred and fifty-four of the King's guard joined the battle in the city. Of those, thirty died in the battles against Vixen's men (not many) and the vampires (much more than half) and a little under sixty were brought back to the castle, where the captain had already set up a few rooms to house the wounded. The Gurkhas did not have a doctor in their unit, but had grabbed the royal doctor, who lived in the castle to take care of the royal family.

As soon as the spell keeping the city asleep halted the captain sent some of his men over to the nearest hospital to grab as many doctors as they could find and hustled them, some of them protesting, back to the castle. There weren't many, as the hospital was preparing for the influx of injured from accidents across the city.

A few fire teams ran into trouble in the embassy district to inform the ambassadors and their staff what had happened before they began to react. The guards of the various embassies were furious and wondering what the hell had happened to knock them out, and the ambassadors were not much better. The Gurhkas, now with their communication working was able to relay a story the king and his fellows had thought up on the fly: a two part terrorist attack using gas released over the city had hit, but the second part had been foiled by the Gurkhas. The captain and his men were not happy with taking all the credit, but when asked about it once he returned to the castle Harry agreed with the story.

With the communication network up and another spell that Selene had placed over the city to make people outside it not notice anything was wrong, the nation woke up to what had almost happened (the general story anyway) and began to respond. Soon enough dozens of companies of the British army, including an entire medical company from the 3rd Medical regiment landed in the square outside the palace and the forces from the nearest army bases moved into the city grim-faced and angry at what might have happened on their watch. Two SAS squadrons parachuted right down on the Palace, taking up positions everywhere around answering to General Arthur, closing off the whole area.

The rest of the medical regiment was already on the road moving toward the city with the entire 4th Mechanized brigade. William felt that was overkill, but Arthur didn't and the king wasn't going to override him.

The medical teams went to work immediately, patching, sewing and trying to save the troopers lives. But they were astonished to find upon their arrival that the worst of the injured troopers were already on the mend.

Harry moved from soldier to soldier, using his spells and potions to save the lives of the most badly injured soldiers. Most of the wounds were from the vampires, the Gurkhas had only lost five men to the mercenaries, who fought in a way they were used to but simply… well… worse than the Royal Guard.

So the major injuries were caused by the vampires. Instead of bullet or ricochet wounds there were bite marks, torn and rent flesh ranging from minimum to major as well as a few limbs torn off. Now if the cut was 'clean' and within the last ten minutes Harry could have done something about them, his own right arm had been cut off in his fight with Bellatrix, and his godfather had been able to reattach it after the fight ended. Here however that wasn't going to happen. Still his potions could so something for the others.

The blood replenishing potion helped those who were in the most danger of bleeding out before aid arrived, helped by his healings spells to close the wounds. With soldiers that had their arteries cut, one in particular had lost his leg at the thigh, he used Essence of Ditanny, one of the potions he hadn't planned to sell right away to close the wounds with the help of his spells.

He only had limited amounts of all of his potions and essence of dittany was one of the ones he had the least amount of, but it helped with the most major wounds, and his healing spells could handle the rest. Some soldiers had been hamstrung from behind, apparently a favorite of the vampires harkening back to animal instincts. His anti-paralysis potion helped there, growing back their tendons like the Skelegro potion could grow back their bones.

Not that Harry was a miracle worker. Many of the Gurkhas had lost eyes, their faces ripped or bitten by the vampires. Harry could heal their faces but their eyes were beyond magical medical knowledge. That and these that had lost limbs he could not help beyond keeping them alive.

What he could do however was enough to shock the military medical teams that the army flew in, as well as the doctors from the nearest hospital and the doctors from the nearest embassies. A few of the ambassadors had decided (wonder of wonders) that recriminations and finger pointing could wait until later, and had offered their own security teams and doctors to the effort around the city to deal with everything.

Most of those joined the teams of police and EMTs working their way through the city, helping those who were injured when they fell asleep under the influence of the 'gas'. Over forty deaths had been reported so far, mostly in cars whose drivers had succumbed to the attack and crashed. There were also a few who had fallen asleep while climbing stairs, but the number of dead was actually ludicrously low considering. If the attack had happened in the middle of the day, even if the 'second gas' hadn't gone off then the deaths from even the first stage would have been horrendous.

That was only a peripheral issue to the doctors assigned to the Gurkhas wounded. Astonishment dominated everything else, that and professional interest. "How is this possible?" One doctor muttered in his native language, German as it happened.

Yet his tone carried through and an American doctor next to him looking over and nodded. The trooper he had been looking at had five major wounds in his side, as if some wild beast had ripped out his side, just barely missing anything major. The wounds however looked as if they were a few days old. "I know what you mean," he muttered in English, assuming the other doctor would be able to speak it if he was assigned here in London. "What the hell are they using to heal these men?"

One of the troopers smirked and waved his hands in the air. "It is magic, yes?"

The doctors who heard him all scoffed but the troopers seemed to get a kick out of it, breaking out into laughter regardless of their wounds. Even one of them who had a lung injury laughed, his wound having been healed by a lung clearing potion and ignoring the doctor looking at his side in shock with a bit of medical gear.

Another doctor nodded his head over to where Harry was moving through the wounded, still dispensing potions to some of the wounded soldiers, clapping others on the back, joking with even the ones who had lost limbs and making them laugh which was actually pretty easy considering the light hearted yet tough nature of the Gurkhas themselves.

The doctor, whose name was Andre Ivascario and was from the Italian embassy, chuckled at the sight, but his words were serious. "Think that one over there is dispensing some kind of new medicine. I don't understand it but…"

The German nodded. "If there are medicines that are responsible for this, then they've got to be experimental, or we would have heard about them before ja?"

The American nodded. "Definitely, if the Brits had access to this stuff, whatever it is and didn't share it, well I don't doubt my employers would have something to say about it."

One of the army doctors laughed a little hysterically. "Trust me this is something entirely new."

The three of them and a few other doctors around them exchanged glances. While their governments might want this just because it would make their militaries far more effective if they could turn around injured troopers this quickly, the doctors saw it as what it really was: a breakthrough in medical technology that could help countless people worldwide.

The American slowly nodded. "If this is something real, then we owe it to our profession to find out for certain."

The German nodded and looked over at a Swiss. "One month observation you think?"

The Swiss frowned looking around at the troopers moving around who should not have been, the ones who should by all rights have died from blood loss and the ones who going by their wounds should have been crippled but now were walking around. Some of them were limping, some of them looked weak, but they were alive and well.

To call it a miracle wouldn't have been too far off the mark. "I think we should shorten it to three weeks close observation and three months distant. Whatever this is, it's too good to sit on for long." If the medicine went from close to distant observation it would be sellable to the military. The Civilian medical boards would take longer to okay a new medicine, but for some reason the Swiss didn't think that whatever new medicines they were using would have any problems.

The doctors from the different embassies all nodded, while the Brits exchanged glances. They all shared the thought that if this new type of medicine panned out that their county would hopefully be on the inside line to start using it.

It was at this point that the King and a few of his guardsmen dressed for combat not parade as was normal came out along with the general Arthur and Jack Harper.

Harry joined the king along with captain Nebari. He filled William and the others in on the fight, with captain Nebari adding his own bits.

William shook his head. "When we asked for your aid we did not anticipate that the problem would be so large, nor so serious. It was our instincts that forced us to ask for your aid and it has paid off handsomely for ourselves and for our kingdom. We thank you Mr. Wizard," he finished looking up as Natasha limped into the hastily contrived medical area, leaning on to Nepalese soldiers. Behind her Jean and Ororo arrived, looking very weary indeed.

"Don't worry about it," Harry nodding at his two friends. "This is the kind of thing that you needed my help to deal with. While I won't say that some form of compensation wouldn't be nice, I wouldn't be who I am if I could have turned away from this."

He nodded at the captain and Betsy, who was asleep in a chair utterly exhausted from using her powers in a way that no telepath had ever thought to use them. Captain Britain stood by her chair, one arm on the back of the chair protectively. "And if not for your Guard and young Betsy and the captain, this would have been much worse, and we'd still be dealing with groups of heavily armed arseholes and packs of vampires spread out around the city, not to mention a runic array waiting for someone to come along and use it."

"We know this, and we will show our gratitude to our citizens in no uncertain manner." William shook his head smiling slightly. "Still Harry," he said his voice low so Natasha couldn't hear. "You'll not find us ungrateful. If you could come before us here at Buckingham Palace in four weeks time we believe we can start finalizing your companies placement as well as I can show our appreciation."

Harry looked at the King for a moment then nodded moved away toward Natasha.

"What," she muttered, scowling angrily, still not really believing all she had seen tonight. "What the hell happened tonight Mr. Wizard?"

Harry went to his knees in front of her without responding, grabbing her lower leg and pouring the last of the Essence of Dittany potion over the skin. Luckily the ragged puncture wound wasn't nearly as bad as it looked, and the last of the salve was enough to heal it enough that she wasn't in any danger of being crippled or bleeding out.

When she began to speak again held up a hand in front of her face. "Confoundus," he muttered, directing the extent of the spell as it struck. "Something I don't want your superiors to know about just yet" Harry.

Suddenly Natasha couldn't remember his face or anything about his powers or Storm's or Phoenix's only remembering the nature of the threat.

William looked at this a little askance but Harry shrugged. "She might be trustworthy, hell from what I've found out about him her boss might be trustworthy, but I don't trust the people who are funding them. If there isn't anything shady going on why isn't SHIELD a more widely known and open intelligence agency and just its people and offices secret. Why isn't it more widely acknowledged outside of the US?"

William nodded thoughtfully, then shrugged. Your business is your own I suppose." Then he looked out across the city at the sound of sirens and the shouting and yelling as a crowd of civilians and the vultures of the Fifth estate slowly began to make their way toward the palace. "We suppose you are going to disappear and let us to deal with this?"

That's the idea said Harry cheerfully standing up and pushing Natasha into a chair.

Jack shrugged. "We already put out the story of some type of gas attack. It was supposed to be a two pronged assault but we were able to stop the second half and the King's Guard moved out to take apart the second half of the attack. We can put it on Vixen, and stand a few others alongside of her, I understand Ms. Phoenix took a prisoner, so that will do for now so long as we all tow the party line."

William nodded having already signed off on that idea. While magic was well known in some circles in Britain, the majority of his citizens and of course the foreign powers would not be mentally capable of seeing the truth.

Captain Nebari frowned. "My men will not be happy to lie, but I will swear them to secrecy." He looked over at Ororo and said in his own language, "We thank you and your friends, weather goddess." He bowed clapping his hands together. "This has been a most intriguing night, and we all know that we have you and yours to thank for our lives."

Ororo responded in the same tongue shaking her head. "It is by your blood and bravery that this victory was won. We could not have done it alone."

That was the stark truth and all three of the superpowered trio knew it. Harry was the only one that had enough energy to go on, Jean and Ororo were nearly falling asleep where they stood, and they haven't faced more than a small portion of Selene's forces. Oh, with Eliphas, Emma and Vixen in the mix it was probably the best portion, but numbers would've told in the end.

"Still we thank you" Nebari said again bowing a second time to Jean and then a third time to Harry.

Harry nodded and walked over to his ladies but was stopped by William's voice calling him. "Mr. Wizard, a final question: You called yourself British, but you owe us no allegiance. You say you were a citizen of the isle, yet you command as if born to it, and you gather like minded people around you, uncaring of other's laws. So I ask you, do I speak to a subject or to a king?"

Harry paused in his walk toward Ororo and Jean, then thought of his dreams and hopes for the future, and what he mentally called the Israeli initiative. "Eventually, perhaps, but until then, I'm just a man who will do what I think is right, regardless of law or border.")

The King smiled faintly. "We will see you in a month Mr. Wizard, until then." With a final nod he turned to head towards the growing crowd at the far end of the open area in front of Buckingham Palace, his face already sliding into a grave, concerned countenance as he mentally began to go over the speech he and Jack and Arthur had put together. It wouldn't be enough to deflect the reporters, but they would not be getting anything from the palace or the guard. Not that many would try, the Gurkhas had a bit of a reputation for being tough with reporters.

Harry finished his walk toward Ororo and Jean, putting an arm around their shoulders. "Let's get out of here ladies."

Jean nodded, settling her head against his shoulder wearily. "That sounds like an excellent idea, I could sleep for days. I am so tempted to cancel on Emma later today." Jean had never used her power for so long at such a high level before, and was utterly wiped. That didn't even include the fact she had used her telekinetic powers to force her body to move faster than it normally would have been able to.

Ororo too was exhausted. Despite the normal weather of the night having helped her she had rarely had to use her powers to such an extent, and her body and mind were both feeling the strain. All three of them were looking like exhausted, bedraggled rats after this nights battles.

Harry smiled a little. "You've forgotten that there is a ten hour difference between here and California. If we go there now we could sleep for at least 16 hours."

"What are you waiting for then, Potter?" she snarled playfully smacking him lightly on his chest, "let's go."

Harry chuckled then pulled the two women against his body and teleported them to Hogwarts. From there, after leaving a message for Melody, he asked Cory to teleport them to New York since he didn't want to risk doing so on his own with his increase in magical strength throwing off his self control (teleporting was much more difficult than healing spells), and from there they teleported into the Fantastic Four's Baxter building after he asked permission from Agatha. The old woman was fine with it but she demanded the story behind their exhaustion in return. By the time they arrive even Harry was on his last leg, having, rather stupidly admittedly, cancelled his Magia Erebea after leaving London.

Harry barely let go of his ladies and turned his body just enough for him to collapse into the sofa in the Fantastic Four's living room. Ororo and Jean leaned against one another as they made their haphazard way down the hallway collapsing into the guest bedroom their arms still around one another as they slammed boneless into the bed.

Agatha watched this with a raised eyebrow and a faint smile on her face. It was around seven in the evening local time, but if these three were awake before tomorrow afternoon she would eat her shawl.

OOOOOOO

Harry woke up slowly the next morning to small hands smacking his face lightly and a voice gurgling. He also felt a small weight on his chest and what certainly felt like drool pulling on his chest.

He opened his eyes slowly and looked at Franklin laying on his chest, playing with a few of the rips in his crysis suit and gurgling happily at him. Harry smiled gently at the toddler, reaching up with one hand to ruffle Franklin's hair. "Hey little buddy, how're you doing?"

The baby giggled even more happily, trying to grab Harry's nose which Harry was wrinkling at him. "How did you get out of your crib this time hmm?"

Franklin giggled and suddenly was about a foot above Harry's chest. Before he could drop Harry caught him easily, and got to his feet. "Ah, I see, what a clever little man you are."

He lifted Franklin up to one shoulder and used a mild sticking charm to make him stay there, though part of Harry was wondering if Franklin's odd powers, which he didn't have much of a handle on just yet, could break the charm if he wanted to move strongly enough. "Well Franklin I think we should let Madame Harkness sleep in a bit, what about you?"

Franklin giggled again, smacking Harry on the head in what he decided to take as agreement. Harry nodded and the two adjourned to the baby room, where Harry spent the next few hours playing with the toddler.

His mind was only partly on that however, the rest was spent analyzing himself and his core as well as the battle last night. The battle had been trying, yet with both Selene and Harry constrained in the damage they could do to their surroundings, (for very different reasons, Harry just didn't want to cause a lot of collateral damage, Selene didn't want to damage the array) and the fact Selene never realized until the last moment she was outmatched, the battle hadn't truly been difficult. And that was a little worrisome.

Selene had a breadth of magical spells that was amazing and her power was far more than Voldemort's, in fact I feel safe to say Selene would have wiped the floor with Tommy boy. Dumbledore might have given her more trouble, a battle between magic users normally comes down to control than to anything else but even there Selene would have killed old twinkly eyes in short order. And I was able to fight her on an even footing. I knew my reflexes and skills had grown in the Negative zone, but I am still getting used to my new magical strength. Hell even after reinforcing my body I don't think I used up half of my core. Physically I was exhausted, but magically I was nowhere near my limits.

When this whole thing with meeting Stane tomorrow is over I've got to get a handle on my magical strength. The numbers and impressions I've got so far mean nothing to me. I need to know what I am and am not capable of, and start to experiment with simply wielding my magical power sans spells. Spells are all well and good to focus my power especially for small detail things, but they are also limiting in scope. If I could have simply commanded my magic to do what I wanted I wouldn't have needed to spend all that time writing down those one shot runes to help create my capture spell.

Agatha found them there when she woke up, startled to not have been woken up earlier by her young charge. She watched them for a time before speaking. "So, why exactly were you and your young ladies so exhausted last night, young Potter?"

Harry smiled faintly. "We had a bit of an issue of the dark sorceress kind, and she had a horde of playmates too." Harry briefly described the night fought fighting Selene and her forces, not going into too much detail but giving Agatha enough information to understand how bad it was and how much worse it could have been.

Agatha frowned. She had heard of a mysterious sorceress named Selene in her youth, but to think that the same woman had been around back in the Roman era was astonishing. Neither Harry nor Jean realized how much older than that Selene was, she had never told Eliphas how old she really was after all, and Harry didn't care. "A most interesting tale Mr. Potter despite being told in cliff-notes mode." Inside however the old woman was wondering how strong this Fate Marked had become and what he was going to do with his power going forward.

After that Agatha decided to take advantage of Harry being there and asked him to watch Franklin while she went out with her familiar Ebony to find some food. Ebony much preferred to hunt in the wilds but Agatha wasn't willing to let him hunt in the city for fear of catching something. So the two of them would go to a national park for the day, where Agatha could walk the woods at her own pace and Ebony could hunt for small squeaky things among the roots and grass.

Harry was fine with that, knowing his ladies and he would be staying in California for the next two days regardless. Harry paused as that idea registered. Since when did Ororo and Jean become my ladies rather than my lady and my friend? He thought for a moment the smiled faintly a rush of warmth feeling him as he thought of the young redhead, and the fact Ororo seemed to be serious about her own feelings for Jean and the idea of her joining the two of them.

Jean was so… amazing. That was the only word for it, just like Ororo. Powerful, kind, intelligent, driven, gentle, beautiful in body and soul, was it any wonder Harry found himself drown to her after helping her break out of her shell? And if the way she sometimes acted, she felt the same way for him. For all the time I've spent fighting it, this is one battle I'm glad I lost. Still, I'll want to make it particularly romantic…

About an hour later, after changing Franklin's diaper and walking around the apartment complex Harry made his way with Franklin in tow to the kitchen to whip up some food for the two of them and the two sleeping girls. "So little mate, are you on solids yet?"

Franklin giggled at the new game as his friend was playing, tapping his fingers against the toddler's mouth and looking inside. The baby did in fact have several teeth already, but nowhere near enough to actually chew something hard. "Apple cinnamon and honey mash it is then."

With a pop a female house-elf appeared next to Harry and the toddler waddling along beside him. "Young master wishes for us to make food for the baby?" She was one of the elves who had taken Ororo's continued language lessons to heart, not that her speech was perfect yet. "I's be Nessy, master."

Harry smiled down at the little creature , ruffling her large ears. "That's alright Nessy. Sometimes it is better to cook for someone else by hand rather than let someone else do it. But if you could bath Franklin here and watch him for a bit while I make some food that would be great. How is Melody doing today?"

"Young mistress Melody be fine master, she be… I mean she is spending time reading and exploring, and will be fine until you return. The chef-elves fed her well and she is happy."

"Good," Harry sighed in relief. "If one of you could pop her up to High Note, I'll come and get her after we meet up with Emma later today. I don't think she's ever been to the ocean after all. Oh," he snapped his fingers, "And when we go out later, remind me to buy some cookbooks and some books on uniform designs. I in no way want to give any of you clothes," he hurried on, "but uniforms you can wear rather than those doilies and pillow cases would be good. You'd all look much nicer that way."

The house elf teared up a little at wearing a uniform chosen by their master, something only elves bonded to the nicest and oldest families ever could wear. "Yes master, I will remember." For a second she popped off and returned swiftly, having informed Cory, who had taken charge of most long distance teleporting duties, about bringing Melody to High Note in a few hours. Come now baby sir," she said, "It be bath time for you."

Franklin chuckled and took her hand, letting the small creature lead him off having gotten the idea that the elves were friendly and fun. This proved to be the case in the bath as well, the elf using her magic to clean and wash the baby and moving around a few toy ducks (Susan had bought one, Reed had bought one, Johnny had…) to play with him.

While this was going on Harry got to work cooking. Harry spent the next fifteen minutes in the kitchen working on a lunch meal for Franklin, himself and his ladies with more to come. When a tone went off and a mechanical voice said 'warning incoming teleportation' he looked at a security screen set into the kitchen wall, smiled faintly and began to make more food.

Below the Fantastic Four had just teleported in. They finished another adventure, once more helping Black Bolt regain his throne from his mad brother, and were rather ragged around the edges. Mr. Fantastic was walking almost like a zombie, Johnny's flames were out and his head was bandaged, and Susan, the best looking of them all, was frazzled and drooping with weariness. Even Ben looked a battered despite his stone skin, and one of his arms was in a sling.

Fighting the Mad Maximus had not been pleasant, especially when he had an army of robots and Inhumans at his command. The alliance he had made with the genetic High Council had made him almost untouchable, and the reverence the normal inhuman put in the council had helped him stay in power until Black Bolt was convinced by Crystal that it was Maximums who was keeping him from Medusa. After that with Blackbolt and his family fighting with the FF they had prevailed and broken the city Atillan out of the strange pocket dimension Maximus had transported it to.

Not that they had won everything they wanted. Black bolt still felt it was best for his people to remain unknown and separate from the rest of humanity, and had demanded that Crystal stay with her family. Johnny was rather pissed about that, but after much discussion Reed and Black Bolt had agreed the two could communicate and that Johnny could join Crystal in the city from time to time, so long as he called ahead on the new communication device Black Bolt and Mr. Fantastic had designed.

The whole incident had made Reed reevaluate Black Bolt's powers. Before this he had simply felt he was super strong and had a supersonic attack of immense and uncontrollable power, now he felt there was something more to it. What that was he didn't want to share with anyone just yet, but the fact was Black Bolt might have been fighting the entire time with his equivalent of kid gloves.

The quartet made their weary way down into the living quarters portion of their suites, and were assaulted with the smells of cooking almost immediately. Looking at one another in surprise they made their way toward the kitchen, expecting to find Wyatt or Agatha there cooking for themselves and Franklin. Instead they found Harry there, wearing a crysis suit that had seen better days.

Harry turned to them smiling faintly before he saw them all. "Wow. You all look like you were put through the ringer."

Reed chuckled wanly. "We certainly had an… interesting time of it yes. And yourself?"

"Myself, Storm and Phoenix had an… interesting night yes. I imagine you'll see the modified version of it on the news sometime today."

"Oh," Ben grunted, "one of those."

"Definitely one of those." The three of them looked at one another then shared a laugh before Harry went on. "Sorry the three of us crashed here. We needed some down time and we have a bit of a shindig down in LA tomorrow, so this lets us get some time to rest and recuperate before heading out."

"Not a problem," Reed waved away his concern, "Though I would like your help in a week or so to see if I can block out unwanted magic users. No offense but…"

"None taken, I'll be happy to help, so long as you can promise me it won't turn out to be the start of something major. That seems to have happened too often lately. Besides it should be interesting to see if you can use science to offset magic."

Reed laughed, remembering how Harry's offer of aid to find Crystal had spiraled into a fight against an army of demons. Not that Harry seemed to mind that at the time.

"Food will be ready in a few minutes, so if someone could get out the plates and drinks?" Ben and Johnny helped with that, while Susan and Reed went to get changed.

On the way there they saw a little creature walking beside their baby Franklin who was walking unsteadily on his own. Franklin looked up and when he saw them smiled happily. "Ma!"

Susan laughed with delight and went down to one knee, pulling her baby into a hug. "Oh Frankie, you said your first word! And its ma!"

Reed laughed in delight, reaching a hand forward to rub his son's head. Lately he had been worried about the odd powers Franklin sometimes exhibited, but it was at moments like this when those worries seemed to fade away to nothing. "Hello little man. And who are you?" he asked, looking down at the little creature that had been watching Franklin.

"I am Nessy sir, a house-elf bonded to our master Potter."

Reed nodded making a note to figure out what the little creature meant by that later. Right now he looked at his wife, kissing her gently on the forehead while Ben, Johnny and Harry moved out to see what the fuss was about. "I think we deserve a few days of family time don't you?"

Susan beamed up at him happily, while Franklin grabbed his hand, laughing as it stretched in his grip. "Da!"

Reed teared up a little at that and Ben chuckled. "Well whattya know, the big brain has a heart too."

Franklin looked over his mother's shoulder at the craggy face of his godfather and Jonny and said "Ba, Ja!"

The two shared a glance then as one said "Close enough!" and laughed.

Harry chuckled too, and nodded his head back toward the kitchen. "Food's ready, grab it whenever, it's homemade bread, pasta salad, and baked salmon. Nessy, if you could hang around until we're ready to move on, that would be nice."

"Nessy will do so master."

OOOOOO

Jean woke up to a barely heard murmur of conversation in the hallway beyond the door to the guest room as her pillow rose and fell under her. Then it dawned on her that pillows don't generally move like that, and opened her eyes. She saw she was lying on one of Ororo's breasts, their arms around one another as they shared the single bed in the guest room.

Her eyes traced her friends body, taking in her body admiringly. I... I love this woman, she thought to herself, not as much as I have come to love Harry but its close. How the hell did a good Christian girl like me end up in this situation?

Jean frowned a little bit as she considered that thought before the frown disappeared with a wry smile. Oh screw it, I passed the point of no return a long time ago.

She looked up and saw Ororo was awake, smiling down at her through her frazzled bed head. "Hello my friend."

Jean smiled, hearing the note in Ororo's voice when she said 'friend', but meant something more. "Morning to you too Ororo." The two chuckled and then looked up as someone knocked on the door. "Room service."

The two ladies laughed recognizing the voice, and Ororo replied. "Excellent timing, bring it in right away bellboy."

Harry opened the door carrying a tray of food, a smile on his face while behind him the Fantastic Family spent time with their youngest member. "Hello ladies, either of you still sore from last night?"

Jean raised a weary arm, allowing Ororo to scoot back to put her back against the back of the bed her head flopping face first into the pillow beside the African woman. "I'm sore all over Harry, I had to literally push and pull my body along to force it to keep up with Eliphas's attacks."

While Jean's body was sore, her powers seemed back to normal, indeed she felt stronger than ever, as if using her powers was like a muscle, the more she used them the more powerful she became. That was amazing, but she was still constrained by what her body could handle.

Storm too, was fine. The exhaustion of her body having been cleared away by a good night's sleep, and the weariness caused by using her power had faded to nothing, the winds of the world filling her and giving her strength.

Jean gasped as she suddenly felt hands on her lower back, kneading her back through the uniform she was still wearing. She looked up in shock to see Ororo chuckling and turned her head to see Harry had put the tray down beside Ororo, well within reach of both of them, before moving to the foot of the bed and kneeling over her legs. His hands had started their massage on the small of her back and were slowly moving up.

Though she couldn't quite turn her head enough to see them, and lost interest in doing so when they began to sooth her muscles almost immediately. She gasped and nearly mewed in pleasure as he worked on her, Ororo's chuckles in her ears. "Harry is very good at that isn't he?"

Harry looked at Ororo for a moment. He had started to massage Jean's back before he really thought of it, and was only now realizing what it looked like. Yet his lady, like all the other times he seemed to get close to Jean, merely smiled at him happily. He smiled back, leaning in to kiss her gently on the lips, then went back to work.

Harry moved down from her back to Jean's legs, kneading the muscles along her calves and down to her feet then switching to her legs. There wasn't anything overtly sexual about the massage, but it was certainly suggestive even with Jean fully clothed in her suit. "How's that feel Red?"

"Lovely, " Jean breathed then blushed slightly as her stomach rumbled. "Though I think I'm well enough to get some food into me now."

Harry stood up letting Jean turn around onto her back. "Thanks Harry, that was great, and the food looks fantastic."

Harry smiled at her thanks, then the three passed the time talking about their respective battles from the evening before and eating the meal Harry had provided. Harry redid the Remember Me Not spells on their features, and then the three went to pay their respects to their hosts and head out to meet Emma at her hotel.

While they did that Harry went to pick up Melody and one other person.

OOOOOOO

Harry knocked on Kurt's door. At the blue elf's verbal response he stuck his head in and asked. "How'd like to help me with a rather large prank?"

"I am yours to command oh master," said Kurt bouncing up out of his chair eagerly and grabbing his image inducer. The last few weeks had been utterly boring for him, Kitty, Evan and Rogue. All the action seemed to be going on without them involved.

Rogue had lit into Scott a little, as had Charles, when he came back and told them about him and Phoenix having helped the Fantastic Four against demonic invaders. Charles had been concerned about Scott and Jean needlessly endangering themselves, but Rogue had been irritated they hadn't brought her along (oh and the others too).

It had actually been a net gain though. For Rogue, it was obvious that whatever had been between Cyclops and Jean had disappeared. While the two were still friendly whenever Jean was around, which was rare nowadays, Scott seemed to have no more romantic feelings toward the redhead, which was good for the southern belle. In fact Scott had begun to flirt with her in the past week, subtly most of the time, but she was enjoying it a lot.

In terms of the team, Scott had gained an edge of unpredictability that he lent to their team exercises in the Danger Room, and had developed a level of empathy with all of them. He demanded their best during the training sessions and he lead the after dinner discussions that Harry had started, but outside of that time he was fine with them goofing and showed a caring side of him simply hanging out with them. Where before the teens had only been acquaintances and teammates, they had now become fast friends.

To Kurt it had still been boring, so the idea of getting in on a prank had him jumping in no questions asked. "Who are we going to prank oh master?"

"The who is Tony Stark and a lot of high class people at a party in L.A. The only problem is that to be part of this gag, you'll have to change your image inducer to make you look like a girl." Kurt blanched at that and Harry decided to sweeten the deal. He wanted Kurt along thinking that having a living individual along to play the part of Anastasia would allow the part to be more fluid and reactionary than a purpose conjured golem with a lot of spells on it to obscure its body. He could tell Kurt was wavering though, and decided to sweeten the deal. "Come on laddo, think about it ritzy food, lots of fun, and you get to spend some time in LA before and after, fun in the sun, the beaches and the waves…"

Kurt adopted a thoughtful pose. "It's a great sacrifice, but for the sake of the prank I will agree to it."

OOOOOOO

Emma looked up as she felt a familiar presence enter the main lobby of the San Francisco hotel she was currently staying in. She stood up in welcome, smiling only slightly despite her pleasure, they were still in public after all. Jean made her way over to her friend swiftly. As they were still in public the two women only shared a brief but heartfelt hand clasp yet telepathically their avatars actually shared a hug on the astral plane between their two astral projections, and their greetings were much more effusive there.

Behind Jean, Ororo entered the hotel lobby and hurried over to the two younger women. Emma looked at her in query, and Ororo said, "Harry will meet us wherever we go, but he and Kurt, one of the boys at the Institute, are figuring out the parameters for the 'Anastasia prank' as he calls it."

She shook her head resignedly but didn't really have the heart to object to their plans overmuch. After the last few days, heck after the last few weeks she felt Harry needed a bit of time to let his hair down... or let someone else's image induced hair down if it made him smile.

Emma nodded and motioned the two to follow her. "Come on, I've already found the best local store for our little shopping expedition."

Jean rolled her eyes, but the two girls didn't let go of one another's hands as they walked on. "Why do I think when you say 'best', you mean most expensive rather than widest selection or location or anything like that?"

"Oh please of course it has those things too." Emma chuckled, already feeling the weight of the last few days and dealing with Shaw for so long slipping away.

"By the way," Ororo said, interrupting the back and forth before it could begin, "Harry will be speaking to you about… a business opportunity later on. I think he needs your help with something going forward."

Emma shrugged. "Whatever he wants I'll do, I owe him too much to quibble, and besides, I don't have so many friends I'll turn away when one needs my advice."

Jean looked at her friend, realizing that the past few days must have been much harder on her than Jean had thought to push her to actually say something like that aloud, but determined to talk to her later.

In point of fact this was correct. Emma had to put up with Shaw for the last few days, until he was called away to one of his businesses in Canada. Sebastian was sharp, very good at picking things up, and watched her like a hawk. It had been a very trying time, almost as bad as being back at home with Adrienne and Winston both ganging up on her.

The trio of beautiful women made their way out of the hotel and down the streets of LA, with the two young women exchanging good natures barbs and digs while Ororo trailed behind, joining in only occasionally, but with devastating force.

The trio of beauties walked four blocks before turning into a large high class clothing store. Here Jean watched Emma interact with the sales reps, noticing her imperious, yet not unkind mannerisms as she ordered them around and the redhead shook her head a little bemused. Soon Jean got some of the same treatment with Emma directing her to the dresses that were both classy enough and that Emma felt would good on her.

Emma even started to order Ororo around, trying to direct her to dresses that she felt would flatter the African woman the most, but Ororo ignored many of her suggestions, keeping her own council with a faint smile on her face at the younger girl's manner. However Ororo had her own ideas as to what she was going to wear, and wasn't going to budge on it.

As the three moved into a changing room with several dresses each, Jean asked quietly, "So which is the real you?"

Emma looked up, one eyebrow raised. "What do you mean?"

Before replying Jean used her telepathic power to see if anyone else was nearby, then when she was certain they were alone she went on. "You seem to change your outward expression and manner to match the environment and who's around. That cold face you have when you're trying to keep people at a distance, the flirtatious face..." she blushed a little, "You've turned that one on me and Harry a few times, both to get your own way and to deflect attention from you. Then there's the shrewd businesswoman face, and then there's the one that we saw when we all met at Hogwarts, and the one I've seen glimpses of today. So, which is the real you?"

Emma paused as she was about to take off her skirt then did so slowly her head cocked to the side contemplatively. "I-I don't know, not really. In my family we're taught almost from before we can walk to control ourselves, to show the world nothing, to be ice. Then most of us realized we had tobe ice not only in front of strangers but in front of our own family. I've lived my entire life knowing that my family was more dangerous to me than anyone on the outside could ever be, and most of that time I've known I could not escape them. The only one who that was not true was for my older brother Christian, and he was powerless to help me."

She shook her head, her face nearly cracking as she remembered how he had died recently, her voice lower than before as she went on. "And my father killed him, not because he was a threat, not because he was a disappointment, no the last thing that pushed him over the edge was because he wanted to send me a message." She spat that word, and fell silent for several minutes as she pulled on a one piece dress, looking at herself in the mirror contemplatively before pulling it off.

"I, I've never been around anyone who I have never had to try to influence or try to protect myself against, and until recently the very idea of anyone seeing the real me, if there was a real me under the masks, would never have occurred to me."

She shook her head laughing quietly, and Jean could almost see the control of her face and body slowly disappearing. "Then I met Harry Potter." She laughed again, her blond hair moving from side to side as she laughed. "There he was, this strange boy who sat across from me when he really shouldn't have been able to get through my telepathic field, and instead of trying to take advantage of me or even hit on me, he saw me as this stranger who might need his help."

Emma smiled wistfully, "He didn't flirt with me until I flirted with him later. He didn't do any of the normal things that I had become so used to, and he saw through my guise to the real me. To the worried young woman who was very much afraid she was going to have to whore herself out to survive." Her voice had gotten very soft, enough that Jean had to concentrate to hear her.

After a lengthy pause, Emma continued. "And when I didn't understand him, when I tried to influence him as I had so many other men, he simply laughed and ignored it. It wasn't exactly my best moment, but he didn't hold it against me, and the people I've met since interacting with him…" she looked at Jean with emotion filling her eyes. "None of you," she paused "I don't have to protect myself from any of you."

Jean smiled faintly with a nod of her head. "He has a way about him doesn't he?" She paused looking over at the other girl then decided to go for broke. She sent forth her telepathic avatar, and when Emma, a quizzical look on her face, did the same, took her friend's avatar through the belsham-trees that protected Jean's mind and into her tower.

Emma looked on in shock that Jean would let her into her head like this. "Jean, I…"

Jean shook her head and sent reassurance to her friend, "I figure it would be easier to show you the memory than try to explain it, and besides, I wanted to show you that I trust you too."

Emma's avatar actually teared up a little at that. In all her life she had not met someone who was willing to trust her so implicitly, and she vowed to be worthy of it, . She watched as Jean's avatar moved through her mind, picking up a small book that was a deep red, indicating some strong emotion.

Jean came back and proffered the small book to Emma who after a moment's hesitation touched the cover of the book, then watched the memory of Jean and Ororo in the bathroom of the mansion discussing sharing Harry play out around her. The sight of their naked bodies grabbed Emma's attention for a moment, but their words soon drew her back and she gasped in astonishment. "You mean she was serious about sharing?! Oh my god… I… knew she wasn't jealous when we were flirting… but I didn't think that was even a real chance!"

"I… yes," Jean said, hesitantly. "He, and I, we, we've shared a few… a few moments of our own lately, and Ororo and I, well she's as much as told me she… cares for me, and is willing to have me join them. I, I love Harry, and I love her but I'm also drawn to you and… You'll have to wait of course, I'm sorry but…"

Emma brushed that aside now openly staring at the black woman's body as she re-watched the memory through Jean's eyes, causing Jean to blush as she noticed where 'her' eyes had drifted a time or two. "I thought when I started to think of entering this race that I didn't really stand a chance of getting very far. But… now you're telling me that maybe I do have a chance, I… I would just be last to cross the finish line so to speak. And I can't tell you whether or not I'm really in love with him at this point either. Interested oh yes, very interested…

Emma trailed off for several long seconds before deciding to go for broke… but I'm also interested in you."

Suddenly they exited the memory and the two avatars stared at one another. Jean blushed slightly under the other woman's gaze but didn't back away, matching her stare fiercely. This went on for several moments but then Emma chuckled. "I won't push things with Harry or Ororo , but I might push you."

Jean chuckled even as she turned and guided Emma's avatar out of her mind. "I don't think that you would be who you are if you didn't, and honestly I really like the way our friendship is going. I don't think our friendship, or possibly eventual relationship would be very… peaceful or calm, but who says it needs to be?"

Emma laughed and the two retreated back to their physical bodies. "I can almost guarantee that it won't be calm my dear. We'll push and prod one another, but that's part of the fun."

Ororo had no idea what had happened between the two women, one moment they were talking the other they were both staring at one another silently, then they were laughing again. She had a good idea however, and chuckled, wondering how long it would take before Emma could prove that she both had a emotional connection to Harry and was willing to join Ororo, Harry and Jean. Ororo knew that Jean would join them shortly, unless she decided to wait with Emma until she could join them as well, which was doubtful considering the looks and emotions she could see building up behind those jade eyes.

These thoughts were interrupted by the sound of laughter coming from the main sales floor. The two girls dressed and exited to find that Harry had arrived, with Kurt in tow for some reason. Harry's eyes lit up in pleasure when the two girls came out and gestured at his companion, who was in his normal image induced guise, but didn't for some reason seem to be garnering any attention from the other shoppers or the saleswomen. Harry on the other hand seemed to be garnering some interest, but Ororo standing right next to him seemed to warn them off for now. "Ah good, just who I was hoping to see. Since Ororo has refused to try, could you two try to make Kurt here into a woman?"

Emma scoffed at the very idea, wondering what Harry was up to, but Jean laughed. "Of course, his image inducer!"

"What is an image inducer?" Emma asked.

Kurt grinned at her. After Harry had made certain no one was looking (or could notice anything) he began to use his image inducer, changing his appearance. Where before a thin gangly sort of grungy teen stood, was first a blue elf then a dishwater blonde girl.

Emma's eyes went wide, connecting the dots and realizing the change was being created by some device or other. Jean however narrowed her eyes. "Is there any reason you chose to use Taryn as the female figure?"

"I don't like friends who turn their back on my friends, besides Harry was and I think she's perfect for the role of airhead." Kurt said then paused as Emma walked around him, as if she was inspecting him or something.

Harry smirked. "We're going for dumb, but rich and barely legal, so I guess Taryn fits the bill." He then explained the purpose of the prank, and Emma nodded thoughtfully. Having a teleporter around, other than Harry would be a useful addition anyway, and the idea of amusing herself at Stane and Stark's expense appealed to her.

"Taryn's not that rich," Jean said dryly shaking her head, but was strangely moved by the two boys wanting to take a bit of revenge on the girl who had been her friend for years before throwing her to the wayside because of a perceived slight.

Emma shook her head. "Setting aside the fact that something like this would be worth a hell of a lot on the open market, not just for spying purposes or anything like that, let's move on. How much control do you have over the image? Can you change clothing, height, hair color etc?"

Kurt responded a little nervous at how Emma was eyeing him, or rather her, at present, "I can change anything from a base body I download into it, though of course it has a limited battery and the more changes we make the faster it wears down the battery."

"Hmm… still a fascinating device, I don't suppose I could ask who designed it, or who has the patent?" Jean bumped her friends shoulder and Emma sighed theatrically, a portion of her reveling in the fact that she was almost entirely surrounding by friends, people she didn't have to protect herself from. With the others vouching for him she was willing to show some emotion around Kurt, though obviously to a lesser extent.

"Fine, we'll ignore the obvious commercial applications this could have and move on. How good is… whatever you've done to make people not notice us?"

"Not that good, more a magical equivalent of sleight of hand." Harry replied.

Emma nodded and she and Jean dragged Kurt into the changing room farthest in the back, where the two girls started to work on the blushing boy, who despite the nature of the attention was rather enjoying the position he found himself in, in a changing room with two girls who were the epitome of hotness.

"Alright, let's get her body type correct first. We want her to look youngish, almost but not quite, jail bait," Emma said briskly, clapping her hands together.

Kurt nodded and began to change the image that covered him slightly, making her a little more gangly looking, and decreasing her breast size until Jean told him to stop. "Okay, now let's change her features a bit." Kurt suddenly gulped, realizing he had suddenly become the two girl's guinea pig.

Over the next forty minutes Emma and Jean worked together to create the perfect rich, but slightly dumb, blond. In the end Kurt wore the image of a somewhat thin, barely adult looking young woman with B-cup breasts and a rather decent rear, which Kurt took a few too many looks at in the mirror earning him a telepathic slap upside the brain. Her eyes were light brown, rather doe-eyed really, with a pert nose and decent cheekbones. She was also blonde, a fact that Emma rather groused about with Jean telepathically, hating the whole 'dumb blonde' image but realizing her war against it would have to be on hold for the moment.

From that point the two of them had to go back to shopping the old fashioned way while Kurt hid under a Notice-Me-Not from Harry and his image inducer charged from a plug in the dressing room the two woman had taken over.

While Jean was helping to find a dress for Kurt's new image, Emma glared at Harry and Ororo, both of whom were looking far too complacent. "Are you certain that you don't want me to look at what you chose?"

"Positive dear," Ororo said, smiling a faint smile. "After all, this way it will be a surprise."

Harry merely shrugged. "I found something that compliments my date, so that's all I really care about. This way the two of us can go and grab Melody then spend more time on the beaches. Are you done with Kurt?"

"Not just yet, but the next stage Jean can do ourselves I suppose." Emma frowned, not liking the idea of these two seemingly fashion oblivious people having chosen their clothing, but decided she would wait and see. The idea of going through the minds of the stores workers occurred to her, but in the end decided it wasn't worth the effort, and would take away from time spent shopping with her friend. "Alright, but if either of you show up dressed inappropriately I will do my utmost to give you the telepathic equivalent of a spanking, am I clear?"

Harry and Ororo chuckled, and exchanged hugs with Emma and Jean then Ororo and Kurt waited until Harry popped off and came back with Melody. He did this by the simple expedient of exiting the store and heading into an alleyway behind it, which didn't have a security camera, then popped up to High Note, grabbed Melody, a change of clothing and swimsuit for her, and popped back with Melody in his arms.

Upon joining the group inside the shop Melody looked right through Harry's Notice Me Not at Kurt. "Did you know you sound like a very strange combination of a guitar solo and church music on a harpsichord?"

Kurt looked over at Harry shocked at the little girl spotting him through the spell covering him, and then at Harry's smile. Kurt shrugged and smiled himself at the little girl with the multi-colored hair and wide eyes. "I did not know that liebchen, but it does not surprise me. Are you looking forward to seeing the ocean?"

Melody nodded firmly and not five minutes later the image inducer was charged, and Harry and Ororo led the group out of the shop. From there they walked through the city to China Beach, a small, out of the way beach that was actually a part of the edge of the city. It was small and remote, but the swimming was good, the view was great, and the sun felt amazing.

Ororo drew some attention in a rather revealing swimsuit, scandalizing several matrons around while she dozed in the warm sun. Kurt, thanking god that his image inducer was water proof, swam around like a fish.

Melody and Harry were both enjoying their time at the beach, the first sight for Melody of the ocean and only the third for Harry, and the first time he had actually gone swimming in the ocean. If not for the Hogwarts' Black Lake he wouldn't have even been able to swim at all. Now he was holding Melody's hands as the young girl learned to swim. "That's good, keep kicking your fee like that, and remember to keep your head above water."

Melody gasped in air and continued to kick out while Harry led her around by the hands in the water. Despite the rather bizarre hair coloring the two made a rather sweet sight for the other beach goers. After about fifteen minutes of this Harry let go of one hand and then, fifteen minutes later Melody was able to move along in the shallows on her own.

Ororo woke up at that point and found a picnic basket beside her. She looked around warily then asked the air "Do we have a house-elf to thank for this?"

Nessy popped in briefly, crouching down so as to be hidden by Ororo's body and the picnic basket. "Yes Miss, we always watch the master and anticipate his needs."

Ororo smiled and rubbed the little female's head in thanks, then stood up and called the others in for food. Melody raced over, famished by the unusual amount of exercise, with Harry and Kurt following after.

About three hours later Jean and Emma had finished shopping, and joined them. After a brief stop in the dressing rooms they joined the group, with both of them wearing bikinis. Jean's green suit was more sporty than anything, but it still showed off her taut stomach showing that the redhead had some muscle there, and barely covering her up top. She reveled in the glances of not just Harry but also Ororo and Emma.

Emma was dressed in a black and white stripped bikini. The bottoms were more shear than Jean's, and while the top seemed to have more material, the cut of it made that bit of material have to work much harder to cover her anywhere close to as much. Around her waist she also wore circlets of gold chained together. She too enjoyed the looks she was getting from Harry and Jean, and surprisingly Ororo as well.

She sat down next to the castle Harry and Melody were in the process of building, looking at it rather critically. "You do know you put it too close to the water? It will wash away tonight."

Melody giggled. "So, then we can just make another one, right Mr. Harry?"

Harry smiled fondly at Melody, "Yep, that's how this is supposed to go I think. Besides I doubt that our castle is good enough to be preserved or anything."

"Hmm… well the size is impressive at least," Emma responded, which was indeed the case. Harry and Melody had taken up around six feet on a side to create the outer wall of their castle, and it came up to Emma's knees. The inner castle they were currently working on was going to be even taller, if the mound of sand was any indication. "Now, what this castle needs is parapets."

Emma joined them in their play while Jean and Ororo went swimming. Kurt had found group of young teenage girls and was going around with them for the day, enjoying himself immensely.

Ororo and Jean swam out as far as they could before hitting the safety net and then floated there side by side with their eyes closed. Ororo lifted her head to glance back at the beach, a faint wondering smile on her face. "I would not have thought that Emma of all people would be into building sand castles."

Jean shrugged, not wanting to say that she had felt a wave of sadness and regret from her friend when she caught sight of the sand castle. "If anyone, besides Harry, deserves some time with no pressure or worries, it's Emma." She paused before continuing, "What about you? Having fun my friend?" Jean put the same emphasis on friend that Ororo had started to when mentioning her."

"Oh undoubtedly, this has been an idyllic time, precisely what we needed after the night from hell." Ororo paused turning from floating on her back to gently treading water, in time to see Jean nod her head in the water to show her agreement with that statement. "You look magnificent by the way. And I think Harry is done with fighting his attraction to you, if this morning, and the looks he sent your way are any indication."

"And are you still... still certain you are fine with me joining you two?" Jean asked, turning on her side but using her power to remain floating in place easily.

Ororo looked at her then raised one hand to trace the contours of her friend's side, while her eyes were locked with Jean's own. "More than certain, my dear, ecstatic and looking forward to it."

Jean let out a breath of air she hadn't realized she was holding. "Good. I… I love him Ororo, and I care deeply for you too. This, this isn't anything my parents or my upbringing would see as acceptable, but god, I want to join you so much."

Ororo nodded happily, and the two floated for a time in silence. Jean however had something else to ask about. "Um, what about Emma?"

She raised a hand out of the water, waving it toward the beach. "I can tell she has growing feelings for Harry, and I, she and I have come to care for one another. Not as much as I have come to care for you, but…"

Ororo nodded thoughtfully. "A case of like calls to like I think. I am not as certain about her feelings toward Harry though. Or at least I don't think she has let herself really acknowledge the things she feels, and I would say her feelings toward me are physical attraction at best."

Jean nodded sadly. "She just hasn't spent enough actual time around us for that, but I don't want to, well sort of seem to leave her behind, or leave her out of things. She is still the one of us that is in the most physical danger day to day, and I…"

Ororo nodded. "I know how much danger she is still in. Today has undoubtedly been a good day for her though, a chance to let her defenses down. She will come to terms with how she feels toward Harry. And I have a feeling she will make an effort to know me as well. If she wishes to be .. affectionate with you, neither Harry nor I will object in the least, and we will not say anything." Ororo laughed suddenly, splashing her friend in the face. "Well, other than the fact it would be, as Harry would say 'ruddy hot'!"

Jean spluttered under the water and by the time she recovered her friend was meters away heading into shore.

While this deep discussion was going on Emma was enjoying herself playing in the sand with Melody and Harry. That this allowed her to flirt with Harry on and off was just icing on the cake. She enjoyed feeling his eyes shift to her whenever she bent over, or squatted down in view of him. It was completely different from the feeling of being watched by people too far away for her aversion charm to hit them, it made her feel desired, not lusted after. It was an odd and very fine distinction but it was there. One of them empowered her and made her feel good, while the other merely made her feel dirty.

She frowned suddenly, as that thought jarred her loose from the happy time she had been having since meeting up with Ororo and Jean, Before she could become too concerned however the voice of Harry broke into her sudden grim mood. "Don't worry."

Emma looked up at him across from the rather large castle they were shaping with their hands into Harry's face, and saw no concern there, only kindness and affection staring back at her. "I hit you with a spell that would confound the eyes and mind of anyone looking for you with… ill intent. You're safe enough for today."

Emma nodded gratefully and the two went back to working on the castle for a few minutes before Harry spoke again. "I must say that I would not have pegged you as the sort to like sandcastle building."

The blond woman's face fell, showing an openness that would have shocked her fellows at the Hellfire club and brought about withering contempt from her sister or father. "Going to the beach was a treat in my childhood, especially when my brother and I could get away from the others. Of course most of the time we were there because my father was meeting someone at their beach house or because he was holding a informal business meeting with his associates, but that just meant us kids would be unsupervised. My mother never left the mansion, leaving it to the servants to watch us."

That was said with as much scorn as she could muster. Her mother's descent into drink and prescription pills had started long before Emma was old enough to know why her mother was never around. In point of fact it was a wonder the woman had kept from drinking during her younger sister's birth.

"In any event we all went off to do our own thing. While my younger sister stayed with the nurse, Adrienne would go off looking for some poor animal to torture, and Christian and I would swim and build sandcastles. It was the only time the two of us could really let our guard down." Her face firmed, her eyes crackling with grim determination.

Harry nodded at her, wordlessly reaching over to squeeze her shoulder. "I hope that when that issue is resolved, you find some peace in it."

Emma smiled wanly. "I hope so too, but I will settle for never having to fear my family again."

At that point the two swimmers rejoined them and the group spent the time until the sun went down finishing Melody's giant castle. After that Jean decided to stay the night with Emma. Ororo decided to head back to the institute with Kurt so she could spend the next morning with the kids, mainly Kitty admittedly, the young girl was a dear younger sister to Ororo, and leaving her behind to be with Harry was hard.

Harry gave Jean a small, but expensive looking bracelet made out of intertwined bronze and copper pieces made to look like flames, which had a Remember me not ward on it, so in case they didn't meet up before tomorrow evening, she would have it to protect her identity from anyone looking to exploit her relationship with Emma. After Emma explained the fact this would indeed be necessary, and promised to show Jean some telepathic trick she could use to further confuse things, Harry took Melody back up to High Note.

Melody was an utterly exhausted, yet exceptionally happy girl as she slept on Harry's shoulder after a lovely day. She didn't even wake up when Harry used a Scourgify on her to clear off the sand, salt and water or when he changed her clothes via transfiguration. Not even when he tucked her into her bed aboard the asteroid station.

Harry looked down at the young girl who had somehow gone from being a charity case to being an important part of his life, then leaned down and gently kissed her forehead before turning away. He assigned to of the elves that now lived up here, about sixty strong at this point, to watch her for the evening and into the next day, then turned in himself. "Today," he muttered, not realizing he was echoing Ororo, "was a very good day. Just what the doctor ordered."

OOOOOOO

After spending a lovely day together just hanging out in Emma's suite at the hotel Jean and Emma got out of Emma's Ferrari 458 and the blonde handed the valet her keys the two young women ignored the man's gaping stare with ease.

Jean had decided on a rather slinky one-piece red dress. It showed a bit more of her décolletage than she was happy with, and despite the fact it had straps up the front of her bare shoulders, she couldn't actually wear a bra underneath it because the back of it was bare. Around her waist was a crisscrossing string of beads, while on one wrist she wore the bracelet Harry had given her. On her feet she wore heels, torture devices she had rarely worn before, their straps wound around her lower legs. Her hair was done as well, falling like a river down her upper back, and Emma had helped her put on makeup, something else she would never normally have done, but for something like this it was almost mandatory. So she had a bit of eye liner, and red lipstick on her lips.

Emma's dress was white of course, and much like their bikini tops from the day before, while her dress seemed to have more material, it actually showed quite a bit more. The dress fell from her shoulders along her sides, with a large V cut out of the chest area starting at right above her navel and moving up to her neck, showing that bit of her chest through a white gossamer. The dress fell to just above her ankles, with a high slit on her right side well up her thigh. Her back was also uncovered in a wider V shape. She too was wearing high heels, but unlike Jean who felt distinctly uncomfortable in hers, Emma looked almost natural in them. Emma wore a bit of makeup, some rouge for her cheeks, some eyeliner, and light pink lipstick.

All in all, while they were slightly younger than the majority of women at this party, they both fit right in due to the way they looked, and more importantly the way they carried themselves.

The two of them slowly made their way through the throng towards the front of the entrance where Obadiah was greeting the guests as they arrived. In person Obadiah was a tallish bald man, with quick intelligent eyes set into a stern, craggy face, with a body that might have been powerful in his youth, gone slightly to seed now, not in fat but in the lack of definition. He wore a somewhat old fashioned black tuxedo with a white undershirt. He greeted everyone with a ready-made smile, and seemed as at home in front of the cameras and the crowds as one would expect from the vice president of a company the size of Stark Industries.

The man took one look at them and smiled in what he thought was a suave manner but on a person that much older than the two of them came off as merely lecherous. "Emma Frost, I presume? And who is your lovely companion?"

The way he said companion put a distinct spin on the word, but neither Jean nor Emma lost their cool at it. "This is my friend Jean Grey, she's an engineering student and I thought that she might find it interesting to meet both you and Mr. Stark if he deigns to show up."

Emma had no worry about sharing her friends name, even if the bracelet Harry gave her didn't work , Emma fully intended to erase all knowledge of the redhead from Stane's mind, and anyone else's who had the slightest bit of ill intent toward her. Jean knew it too, and had actually agreed to it. She didn't like it, but she didn't want to bring any pressure or danger down on the X-mansion, which despite the amount of time she had spent away from it over the last week was still technically her home for the next week and a bit.

Obadiah smirked a little secret smile at that but took one of Jean's hand 'gallantly' kissing the back of it. "An honor miss. I hope that if you're interested in a job that you think of us first. Stark Industries is always interested in hiring up-and-coming talent. And I hope," he said looking over at Emma, "that we can get past our first rather strained conversation. I had just had a very rough day and I probably came across rather more strongly than I intended."

Emma knew how the game was played in public, and merely nodded graciously. "We'll talk further Mr. Stane, for now however you have other guests to greet." With that the two young women moved past him, and Obadiah turned with a smile to the next group of people coming in.

The two young women circulated through the party, not moving further away from each other than necessary to move through the crowd, more because Jean was unused to this sort of environment than for any other reason. The two of them definitely garnered a lot of interest from the rest of the crowd, not because of who they were but because of their looks and their age. There was a certain type of man who felt that younger meant easier, and many of those attending this party seemed to fall under that heading.

"Is it just me," said Jean telepathically, "or are we sort of on display here? It feels like all the people here are here to be seen and to look important, nobody seems to be talking about anything important."

Emma laughed inside and along the telepathic link, something that made a very odd sort of shiver go through Jean and she decided that she liked it when her friend laughed. "Ahh, but that is the entire point my dear. You won't find any backroom deals or any deals at all being made here, save for the occasional scheduling of a meeting. It is simply an event where everyone is on display and everyone is eager to see something interesting. If someone says anything important here it's because they want other people to know they have that opinion, not because it's their real one. If they want to get up on their soap box they do it outside before or after the party, not in here."

"I've decided on something." said Jean aloud a few minutes later as she again fended off a man who was interested in talking to the sexy redhead. The fact the man was pushing forty and didn't seem to care about her own age was just one of many reasons why she threw up a little inside her mouth at the very idea. "That whatever else I become, a social butterfly will never be part of it. This is fucking horrible."

"You're telling me" said Emma, shaking her head as she too fended off a suitor who wanted to dance. Emma hadn't worn the charms Harry had designed for her today, seeing as she might need to use her own 'charms' to distract Stane or Stark if he showed up, and she shook her head, realizing for the first time how nice it had been to not worry about being hit on by random strangers. "I think we've done enough mingling, let's head over to the bar, then find a little table somewhere and you and I can pretend to be talking about something while I do… something else."

Jean took her hand and motioned with her head over to the bar and Emma nodded for the benefit of the people around them while Jean asked telepathically "What exactly are you going to be doing?"

"Something you would probably not approve of as a matter of principle." Emma responded a little bit evasively.

Jean raised one eyebrow, as her friend ordered a pair of martinis and moved over to a table. Emma sat down while Jean leaned against the wall next to her. "I rather think that my sense of right and wrong has been changing recently, so long as you don't go planting ideas and thoughts into the mind of anyone here I think I would be fine with it. "

"Not everyone Jean, just Stane."Emma took a sip from her martini, looking around them to make certain they were not being observed more than the norm for two hot young women at a party like this.

"Oh" Jean replied with a small smirk on her face, nudging her friend as if she was telling her a joke, "Well in that case go right ahead. I'll turn around anyone who tries to talk to us, and warn you if anything comes up. That man's hiding something, and I think we should know what."

Emma chuckled and leaned back against the wall behind her. Nothing in her body language changed from one moment to the next, she was far too good at this for her body to give any outer signal of what was going on. But she merely nodded along to how Jean was describing some engineering ideas and concepts that she wanted to work on, a technical discussion that was enough to dissuade the people around them from listening in overmuch, coupled with Jean slowly subtly pushing them away telepathically, like Emma was doing in Switzerland when she met Harry.

While Jean was doing this, Emma sent forth her astral projection moving through the minds around them to find Stane's. He was still out at the entrance, meeting and greeting people, yet he was also talking to a reporter of some kind.

Emma easily entered his mind, which almost surprised her after the difficulties she had run into at the Hellfire Club. Shaw of course knew about telepaths and had built up his defense against them. Buckman was a paranoid bastard who wanted to cover any and all bases against mutants and Peirce might well have met a telepath, since Emma still felt his hatred for mutants was much more personal than Buckman's fear of the unknown and different. Yet while Stane was just as paranoid as Buckman he had never even considered telepathic assaults. In fact he hadn't considered mutants at all, not seeing what the fuss was about, a surprisingly refreshing attitude despite coming from a man like him. It only took her a few minutes to find out that he had indeed been involved in Tony Stark's near-death experience in the Middle East and was in fact the leak for the weapons that had nearly killed him. "Oh my," said Emma to herself as her mental avatar sifted through his memories. "Someone's been a very bad boy."

It didn't seem as if he had any real overarching goal, he simply felt angry and bitter about how Tony had taken center stage, much like she had thought, but seeing it so starkly confirmed was rather shocking. He also had several people in the American government backing him. Two of them were new, having jumped behind him after Stark made his announcement about Stark Industries pulling out of the weapons industry.

The other was one of the senators on the Senate Military oversight committee, Emma recognized him as someone who was anti-mutant and who wanted America to take a firmer stance internationally to 'protect its interests'.

According to the information in Stane's bald head that senator, Jackson R. Trevor knew and had signed off on Stark's death, seeing it as making an omelet for the future by breaking a few eggs now. He expected Stane to cut a deal with him to sell weapons to the US Armed Forces at half the cost. Obadiah had no intention of doing so of course, but the senator had connections that had allowed him to cover a lot of Stane's moves, including the weapons leak and insider trading.

Emma was almost tempted to somehow get in touch with Trevor and point him at Obadiah and see which backstabbing bastard would gut the other, but decided against it as being a little too outside her control. However that thought didn't stop her from searching throughout Stane's mind for anything else incriminating, as well as passwords, hidden caches of weapons, money and anything else the man was hiding.

Strangely enough he was now somewhat ambivalent to the idea of having her killed so he could buy her stocks later on, though from her perspective the idea of his trying to seduce her and bring her onboard later was little better.

A moment later however Jean's avatar appeared next to Emma's smacking it on the back of her head with the mental equivalent of a shout. "Get back to your body Emma, Tony Stark's here."

Emma came back to her body blinking slightly which was the only exterior sign of her out of body experience. She nodded at Jean, then looked towards the entrance where Tony Stark was moving through the crowd meeting and greeting in a somewhat absentminded manner. She frowned slightly, wondering if she dared to send out her thoughts into him, but Jean took her hand.

The redhead shook her head, looking a little sternly at her. "Going into Stane's mind I was fine with." She sent, "Going into Stark's isn't necessary or needed. Just because we're telepaths doesn't mean we have the right to go into the minds of everyone around us."

Emma frowned then nodded. As a telepath she well knew the dangers of trying to treat other people as if they were less important than her. Since that was what her father did and she wanted to distance herself as far as possible from Winston she wasn't to cross that line without a very damn good reason. "You're right, I won't say that I won't ever probe someone if I sense something unusual, it can sometimes be useful, but under these circumstances you're right."

Jean frowned but realized that was as much as she was going to get from her friend. And Jean knew if she had been forced to rely on herself, her wits and her powers for so long that the morality of their use would have become blurred in her mind. That didn't make Emma power-hungry or villainous or anything like that, or even immoral, it just made her more willing to do things in her own self-interest. Jean wasn't in a position to call her out on it.

Jean had a support structure most of her life, a reluctant and rather standoffish one admittedly in the case of her parents, but it was still there. Emma didn't have that, and it was only recently that she had actually gained a support team in Jean, Ororo and Harry.

"I'll go along with that," she said aloud, bumping her shoulder against her friend's lightly, "But try to keep to a minimum okay? And here he comes now, with Stane, I wonder what they're up to. And is it just me or is Stane sort of directing Stark?"

"They're not up to anything," Emma sent telepathically. "I'll tell you about what I found out in Stane's mind later. It's not pretty, and pretty much confirms what we already knew." She then switched to answering aloud. "And you're right, Obadiah is leading Tony around. Tony might be popular, intelligent and good with the ladies, but that doesn't mean he is good with working a crowd, especially not after so long hiding away. I would however warn you, he's likely to hit on us, either, or, possibly both at once."

Jean allowed a slight frown to appear on her face at Emma's telepathic message then laughed aloud at her verbal response. "Well, too damn bad for him, old men with goatees are not my cup of tea." Emma laughed by which point the two men had come up to them where they sat at their table and both she and Emma nodded politely to them, waiting for Obadiah to do the introductions.

"Emma Frost," said Stane, holding out one hand to her and gesturing with the other to Tony, "May I introduce Tony Stark."

Tony was a man in his early 30s, spare of frame and in relatively good shape since he had kept up with tennis and running most of his life. He had a goatee and a small mustache and wore a very expensive Armani suit like a second skin, and all in all looked the perfect image of a rich playboy. His eyes however were bright with intelligence, and they seemed to glitter as he bowed over Emma's hand grandly. "Charmed, I'm sure. I understand you bought some shares in our company Ms. Frost, I have to admit to being surprised, since your family's corporation hasn't done business with our company before."

Stane had willingly told Tony about the new shareholders, not telling Tony that he had bought up as many shares as he could. After Obadiah got over his anger at not being able to buy out the new shareholders he had realized he could use them to throw Tony off kilter. The kid had been acting very odd lately, spending even more of his time than usual working in his personal laboratory at his Malibu home, and the rumors of how he had escaped were… interesting to say the least, and Obadiah was very interested indeed on what he might be working on.

Of course being away like that didn't translate into Tony being completely out of touch with the company. Tony's personal assistant Pepper was very good, and under her auspices the company had slowly begun to change from a primarily weapons manufacturing company into a high-tech consumer goods company. The reverberations of that change were still being felt of course, and would be for years, as workers were laid off who didn't have any skills in the new factories, as other companies moved in to take over the share of the weapons industry, and other things.

Stane still plans to reverse that trend, and hoped that at least Emma and Weatherby would get behind him. Weatherby sounded like a man Stane could work with, behind the idea of staying in the weapons business and not interested overmuch in meddling with the company. Emma was another matter, and he had no idea really how she would jump. But she was incredibly attractive, and if Stane could woo her, in any sense of the word, her assets and her family's assets would be an excellent addition. For now they could be used as stalking horses to see how Tony was really doing.

For his part Tony was rather taken with the two young ladies in front of him. Unfortunately while he had many skills correctly discerning the age of a woman who dressed and looked like these two was not one of them, and he had never cared to keep track of the Frost family, even if his father had not liked the patriarch.

"So Ms. Frost," he said moving adroitly to one side of her and letting his hands run down her shoulder and arm before she moved away. "What're your thoughts about the present issue? Do you believe in the like this old guy seems to think, that we should continue making weapons or are you a forward thinking individual like me?"

"While I consider myself a forward thinking individual," Emma responded dryly, moving away from him even further, "to put it bluntly, I think that you were an idiot to make that announcement at the time and in the manner you did. While I bought stocks in your company because I believe that it can be a fantastic long term investment, that proclamation was almost, but not quite enough, to make me rethink my opinion on your sanity and competence."

That bluntness seemed to shock Tony out of his flirtation which was what she had desired. She went on, not letting him respond. "Instead of announcing to the world that you're going to shut down building and designing weapons, you should have stopped all sales then searched the interior of your company for the leak that allowed those terrorists to have the weapons you mentioned in the first place. Halting your manufacture of them does nothing if the weapons you've already made are still making their way into the hands of individuals like that."

Stane winced slightly at that. While he had been able to cover his tracks as much as possible, if Tony went searching for how those weapons got out, he would be bound to find the leak. His personal assistant and that damn partial AI Jarvis would see to that.

"Not that I think that you can't continue to make your company a fortune in consumer goods. It just is that your initial response was as much bombast and show rather than actual problem-solving. Still I understand that PTSD is a harsh trauma to go through, and I imagine once you're over it you will regain your equilibrium." finished Emma, thoughtfully looking at Tony, with her head cocked to the side, her voice switching to 'honest sympathy'4 at the end of her statement.

Tony had recovered enough from her frank assessment and now asked cautiously "I thought the federal investigators were leaning toward the leak being from one of the army bases over there."

"Please," Emma scoffed. Next to her Jean was watching her friend work with amusement, but didn't interrupt. "You can't honestly think that they could get weapons that new from the army? At least not without there being immediate and glaring red flags. Did you even follow up with that idea to make certain that the weapons they used against you were in fact present on any of the military bases in the area?"

"Well, no I've been… busy with other things."

"Then I suggest you get your priorities straight. If you really want to do something about your weapons getting into the hands of people who would misuse them, there are better ways to go about waving a giant hammer destroying everything around you in the attempt to squash one vermin."

While Stane was enjoying the biting tone the young woman was using on Tony he wasn't enjoying the fact that she seemed on board with the fact that Tony was switching Stark Industries entirely away from its real moneymaker. Nor did he like the fact that she seemed to be pointing him at Stane, though of course she didn't know that. He decided to make certain his tracks were covered before doing anything else, and decided that he might have to accelerate his plans to deal with Tony before he could start searching.

Tony on the other hand had not liked being brought to task in such a manner, but unfortunately for his ego could not find any way to dispute what she said. "I assure you Ms. Frost, that while my announcement may have had you question my competence as you put it, I do have plans in place to ferret out the individuals who sold my weapons to unsanctioned groups. And you still agree with the fact that we shouldn't be making weapons?"

Emma frowned. "Don't put words in my mouth Mr. Stark," she said coldly and Tony actually winced a little at her icy tone. "I think that weapons creation will be with humanity for as long as we are human, just because you're no longer making the weapons doesn't mean someone else like Justin Hammer will stop. You may like to assume that your hands are clean, but that doesn't mean someone else won't dirty theirs and not care."

Tony scowled angrily. In his opinion Justin Hammer was a warmonger of the first degree, his weapons were shoddy and lacking in any kind of imagination, but the man made a lot of them, and his business was the only real opponent in the weapons industry that was on the same level as Stark Industries.

Of course there were the weapons that sometimes crossed the border from Latveria to the rest of the world, but Dr. Doom wasn't interested in crass commercialism. "Hammer is a scumbag of the first degree, and you're right he's the type to only care about his bottom line, but that doesn't mean I want to seem to be connected to the same sort. And if you're only interested in your bottom line then the private sector may prove to be even more lucrative."

"True," Emma said with a nod. "The commercial sector is poised for a breakout, and there is certainly a great deal that could be done in computer technology, making it cheaper and easier for the consumer to get as well as cell phones and portable technology of all sorts. If you can go into that area just as strongly as you have represented the weapons industry you'll be making out like gangbusters and I won't seek to interfere too much with the company."

Tony nodded, ignoring that last as the bluff it was, while she had 11% stock, that wasn't enough to make a lot of waves. "That's what we intend to do, that and possibly the energy sector. There's a lot of good that can be done if I can figure out a way to reduce the cost of the arc reactor. Don't worry Ms. Frost, those stocks will be money well spent."

"But how likely is it that you'll figure out how to reduce the cost of the arc reactor?" Said Jean looking at him with her head cocked to one side.

Stane smoothly interposed himself, thankful the conversation had moved away from dangerous topics, though he briefly wondered why he hadn't introduced the redhead before this, and it took him a moment to remember her name despite her beauty. "I'm sorry I neglected to introduce you. Tony, this is Ms. Grey a friend of Ms. Frost's who is here as her guest."

"I'm following an engineering line of education at the moment," Jean said, nodding her head. "I'm particularly interested in miniaturization when it comes to the arc reactor, the reactor you've got now is rather too huge, and I think it's output could be much better too." She rattled off a few numbers that she had worked out to that effect and both Stane and Tony were impressed.

Stane in point of fact was now seriously wondering if he could interest the young lady in a job after Tony wasn't around. Despite his own desire to keep the company in the weapons business, he knew there could be a lot of money to be had in other sectors.

Tony however was just as interested in Jean as a woman as with her mind, and he let his lower head do the thinking for him yet again. "While that sounds good to me Ms. Grey, most of what you just said would require a metal harder and stronger than anything I've been able to create so far. Still your ideas are interesting, and I would be interested in continuing this discussion, say over dinner sometime?"

"Isn't she a little young for you Tony?" said a voice rather more coldly than normal behind him, and Tony turned with a ready smile on his face.

Behind him stood Pepper Potts, his personal assistant and secretary, as well as predominantly the voice of the company lately. She was a redheaded woman around Tony's age who was usually rather self-effacing in public but who possessed a sharp, sometimes biting wit. Despite her somewhat shy personality and her natural inclination to follow others however, Pepper could show off far more personal courage than most would think she had.

During the time he had used to recreate the item that had allowed him to escape in a far better, more streamlined version, Tony had used Pepper to relay orders to the company whenever he thought of the company at all.

The fact was that Tony was not a businessman, he was an inventor and a damn good one, but he did not think like regular businessmen, who put the company and profits first. He saw the company as a means to an end, which allowed him to create and play with his toys. He wasn't even a scientist like Reed Richards, he wasn't pushing the boundaries of what was known, merely fiddling and toying with what was already known in new and interesting ways.

Pepper was the shoulder he leaned on for anything to deal with the company, she was a fantastic organizer, really good with the little things, as well as being a decent enough manager of his public relations. Of course with Tony that meant both regular public relations and his nigh weekly flings with different girls. The two flirted on off, but Tony had never seriously hit on Pepper as much, after looking at her in a cocktail dress, he suddenly felt he should have been. This wasn't the first time he had seen her dressed like this, but there seem to be something extra to her tonight that for a moment that stopped his ready reply.

This was probably a good thing since Jean nodded politely at the woman and said "I rather think I am considering I'm graduating from high school in a week." She didn't in fact say that she was already 18 pushing 19 in a few months, but that statement would be enough to stop Tony from hitting on her.

Pepper nodded having heard enough of the conversation to realize that despite the fact that she should probably hate this young woman for being so damn good looking in a red dress with her flaming red hair rather than Pepper's own ginger colored hair Jean did in fact have a mind underneath all that. "Well if you're looking for a job I would suggest continuing with what you're doing, we won't be hiring any more weapons developers after all."

She looked up at her boss. She had been meaning to ask Tony if he was feeling well enough for this party, but after hearing him flirt or at least attempt to flirt with the younger woman that was gone from her head and she went on rather grimly. "If you're feeling up to it I have over a dozen public speaking announcements, and we really should work on following up with your initial press conference. Like Ms Frost said," here she nodded at Emma who nodded back, "taken alone it sounds like the ravings of a lunatic, but we have some hard numbers on the next quarters outlook to share with our stockholders and Ms. Frost isn't the only one of them here tonight."

Pepper frowned slightly. She had done some research, but by the time she had started to look at who was buying their stocks, Stane had covered his tracks far better than before, setting up several fake identities to show the few stocks he had snatched up before Harry (not that she or Obadiah knew who it was of course) went on his spending spree. "I have to say I'm not happy with the fact our shares have been consolidated so much, but I…"

A susurration of noise went through the crowd, and Jean and Emma looked around with Stane to look at the entrance-way. The crowd around it was parting in the face of what was coming through and Jean and Emma both blinked at what they saw walking toward them, with Jean making a little noise at the back of her throat. Emma looked and shook her head slightly, murmuring "oh my…."

Ororo had decided on what looked like a sari. It had two wide bits of clothing going over her shoulders but not covering them, falling down her front to join the rest of the dress to sweep around her legs in purple glory. Her arms were bare down from the shoulder, and the sari only allowed a bare hint of décolletage to show. Around the edges was a crisscross pattern of silver and black brocade, with a pattern that looked like blowing wind stitched out in silver. Ororo's hair was done into a complex braid down one side of her head down to her chest and she wore the golden chain that contained the warding array that Harry had created for her. On one wrist she wore another bracelet in silver and gold that had the same sort of charm on it as the bracelet Harry had made for Jean.

Emma whistled under her breath, smiling faintly. Well now, no wonder Ororo didn't want my help when we were buying dresses. That is magnificent on her. And as for Harry… if that is what he is going to look like in the future, I am most definitely jumping on the wagon now.

Harry had adopted a illusion of a man that looked about twenty years older than him but with the same general features bar his lightning scar and green eyes, which only people who already knew him could see through the illusion. He stood slightly taller than normally, with wider shoulders. Harry wore a very good tuxedo with a red vest underneath and a silver stud with what looked like a Celtic design on it in lieu of a tie.

Jean practically whimpered at how good the two looked then found her eyes caught by Harry's. Suddenly, despite his inability to send or receive mental messages Jean somehow knew that he felt she was just as good looking as Ororo, and his desire and love for her, despite his having not actually said the words yet, flowed through her. She smiled in welcome, and Harry smiled back, a smile she somehow knew was only for her at the moment.

While Ororo had volunteered to be a distraction at this event, knowing that her identity was hidden under his charms, Harry had decided to add a bit more to his own magical defense. He wore a slightly under-powered Remember Me not charm, much like the permanent ward he had placed on Ororo's suit, that would make anyone who looked at him be completely unable to remember anything about him. Those with weak minds would be hard pressed to even notice his face, especially with Ororo there to take their attention.

The two green eyed individuals broke off their staring before anyone but Ororo and Emma could see it, and the two newcomers walked toward where Tony and the others were.

Obadiah smiled, moving forward with his hand outstretched. The man was slightly younger than he expected, but the face was the same as on what little of a background he could find about the man. "Mr. Weatherby I presume, I'm Obadiah Stane."
Harry smiled, though this time wasn't nearly as warm or welcoming as the smile he had set Emma and Jean's way. "Mr. Stane, a pleasure to meet the man who kept Stark Industries afloat for so long. And it's George please. May I introduce my lovely date for the evening, and well beyond it, the lovely Ms. Munroe."

Ororo smiled and Obadiah nodded, noticing that the other woman didn't put her hand out to be kissed or anything like that. "A true pleasure madam. May I introduce Emma Frost and her friend Ms. Grey, fellow stockholders, and the man of the hour Tony Stark."

"Indeed, the ponced up idiot from the news in the flesh? I do hope you have some plans to recoup your companies losses in this last quarter." Harry said, his voice going flat.

Tony flushed at Harry's sardonic tone which came through very clearly with his faint British accent but fired back quickly. "As a matter of fact I do, so long as you can keep an open mind about things."

Harry hummed noncommittally while Ororo looked over at Jean. "I love your dress my dear, it is often very difficult for those of us with odd hair colors to find dresses that so match us like that one does you."

Jean smiled, a little too warmly for such a compliment from someone who should have been a stranger, but no one noticed. "Thank you Ms. Munroe, and may I say that sari looks lovely. Would you like to get a drink? I think this discussion is going to become business related, and that is one area I really can't be bothered to care about."

Ororo nodded and the two walked off toward the bar. Harry smiled as they walked off, knowing that the two of them were communicating telepathically, filling one another in on their day. He was right about the communication part, but both women were using this time to compliment one another further and exchange endearments in their heads where no one could see. And then of course the discussion turned to Harry.

Harry himself however turned to Tony. "And what might these ideas be exactly? Realize that at the moment it looks as if you're doing your best to pilot your company into a mountainside as fast as humanly possible."

Tony grinned. He hadn't expected to be put on the spot like this, but if there was one thing about Tony, he was good under pressure. "Well for one thing, I've already come up with plans for several new miniaturized computers, which can also take the place of regular cell phones, I call them T-phones, and I think that they would sell really well on the open market. Not only will they be cell phones, but they will also have some of the same functions as a computer. Then there are a few other technological devices I've thought up and designed, including a new type of laptop, and several new types of computer screen."

Harry nodded, glad to hear the man was at least thinking about the future of his company, from what Harry had read he wouldn't have wanted to bet on that. "Those sound well and good, but do you honestly think you would make more money selling those into the civilian sector then you would selling bulk weapons to the American military? That's not even looking at your foreign sales? As an ex-soldier myself, old boy, I have to say that I am not exactly pleased with that. Your company is one of the main sources for high-tech weaponry in the West, and I have to say I would put more stock in your weapons than in anything from Hammer Industries which is the other name that springs to mind in that field."

Tony shrugged. "I honestly don't particularly care about that, it's more important to me that the weapons I've designed don't kill anyone anymore. I don't care anymore about which side the bodies are on, I just don't want my weapons to be used to put them in the ground."

"And as for numbers?" Pepper put in, seeing 'George' frown slightly. "If you like I could e-mail you our projections for the next quarter. Mr. Stark is correct that there isn't any one big name in computers, especially in the portable computer market. Toshiba and Compaq and the others all make decent laptops but nothing that is revolutionary. The tech we're looking at would, and we think it would help us corner the market quite quickly."

Harry scratched his chin thoughtfully, and Emma interjected. "Well I for one would like to look at your numbers Ms. Potts," and she gave one of her better known e-mail addresses, one of the ones that she wasn't displeased that people knew about. Pepper then promised to send her a spreadsheet soon.

Obadiah was not pleased that Tony seemed to be convincing George and Emma that his position was correct, but out in public he couldn't truly go against Tony without Tony finding out that he was his in-house enemy. His plans were not that close to fruition that Obadiah could afford that just yet. They might have been if he hadn't been sidetracked by needing to figure out everything he could about the new stockholders.

Emma was easy to find a lot about, most inconclusive however, and none of it good for him. But her looks and age made him reconsider a hard option in her case. Anastasia was easy to find a lot about, proper little rich girl who had two grandparents die and leave her and her older brothers and parents some money, which she promptly squandered.

George Weatherby however was a different story. He was ex-SAS. That was it. The sum total of everything Obadiah, with all his connections and power, could find out. That meant he had truly been somebody in the black community. Talking to him on the phone had made Obadiah think he would be easy to convince to back Stane in his push to marginalize Tony, but so far in this discussion George seemed more open than Obadiah could have hoped.

'George's' next words however allayed some of his fears. "Mr. Stark, I'll be honest with you. I'm not happy about this. Not only as a stockholder, since that is a rather new addendum to my life, but as a soldier. I well know how horrible combat can be," he said shaking his head. "And I can understand that your initial reaction was to do something, and what you did was in keeping with your personality, grandiose and rather egotistical."

Tony's eyebrows twitched slightly, but he did indeed have an ego so didn't argue the point.

"However, in recent years there has been a sharp rise in the number of high-tech weapons seen in terrorist hands and in countries whose governments are, shall we say, of questionable morality? Your company is one of the few companies that up until your own issue had remained relatively clean of anything that could smack of backhanded dealing to these individuals, and as such you were trusted by the people on the ground."

This part was actually taken almost verbatim from a magazine written by soldiers and ex-soldiers that Harry had read a few weeks ago, in one of his few moments of downtime.

"And he while I can sympathize with you and your ordeal and the need in you to do something, the way you went about it is simply wrong. If you were going to stop the sale of weapons it should've been a gradual process rather than a 'cease all' order like this, that way you could have controlled it. It's not about the bottom line," 'George' finished, shaking his head, "it's about the people on the ground that look to your company for their edge, to the workers who looked to your company for their livelihoods."

Tony rolled his eyes. "I heard that speech before thanks," he said waving his hand. "I've got plans in motion that may affect things but that's all I'm going to say."

Emma shook her head. "While I can sympathize with the people on the ground Mr. Weatherby," she said looking him in the eyes and surreptitiously winking with the eye that Pepper, Obadiah and Tony could not see. "To me it is about the bottom line. So long as your figures agree with you I will back your movement into the commercial sector and out of the weapons industries, though it won't be without cost, which we can sort out at a later date. If you'll excuse me gentlemen," she said bending her neck slightly, "I believe my drink needs a refill."

Tony smiled and nodded at her as she walked away then turned back to 'George'. "Whatever you may think, I do understand your point, but I think that this is the best thing for me the best thing for my company. I've faced my own weapons pointing back at me, and I am damn certain that I don't want it to happen again."

Harry snorted, "Oh, I see. You don't want to face your own weapons pointed at you. But you'd be okay with having weapons developed by Hammer pointed at you?"

"Putting aside that point, what have you done to make certain it doesn't Mr. Stark?" said Harry shaking his head. "You may have cut off the manufacture part of your company, but there are still guns out there that you made, locked up in some warehouse somewhere. You haven't found the original leak yet have you?"

Obadiah frowned again not liking the direction this conversation was taking and he stepped in adroitly. "I assure you are doing all we can to find the leak, and while the government is looking at the military connection we've been searching our own records and our own resources and distribution points. We haven't turned up anything yet, but I'm certain we will."

"You see," Tony said, slapping Obadiah on the shoulder, "Everything is being taken care of. Trust me Mr. Weatherby, the world will be a better place without the weapons my company has created in it."

With that Tony walked off. Behind him Harry rubbed his forehead thoughtfully. While he really didn't have a problem with Tony stopping the weapons manufacture, the way he went about it didn't sit well with Harry. It was a big picture move without really understanding that the big picture was made out of little pictures. Tony hadn't responded to his comment about the workers that were now unemployed (though Harry knew they would be snatched up by rival companies soon enough) the hundreds of now defunct warehouses and factories not only nationwide but worldwide.

When he first heard about Tony Stark Harry had sort of expected Tony to be like Reed, an absent-minded scientist sort who needed someone around to bring him down to Earth occasionally. And there was a certain similarity there, but not a lot. Reed was the absent-minded professor in truth, and he knew it and relied on other people to bring him out of his frequent trips into scientific Lala land.

Tony had a good grasp of interpersonal relationships, but he was more of a narcissist then Reed was. Harry had no doubt that Tony cared for the people he met, but he didn't show any care or compassion for people outside that sphere, no understanding of how his own actions could cause ripples above and beyond what he wanted to cause.

Tony was extremely intelligent, but there was a brittleness to him, a weakness to him above and beyond his need to feed his ego. Harry wondered if it was simply PTSD from his recent brush with death. Whatever the case, Harry didn't like how he had the personality of a grandstander, such people were dangerous to be around.

Harry looked over at the entrance to the gala, using a small one shot communicator in his pocket to send a message out to Kurt, who was waiting for his big entrance. "Ah well," Harry said shrugging. "That was an interesting first meeting, and if Tony had actually been polite enough to actually respond to my points rather than to ignore most of them like he did I would've warned him about the hurricane that's about to descend upon him."

Obadiah looked towards where Harry was looking and saw a young woman whose face he vaguely recalled seeing from a picture from when he was looking up information on the people who had bought stock in Stark Industries. Pepper however looked and had no clue what Harry was talking about and asked worriedly, "What do you mean hurricane?"

"I met a rather… young lady outside while awaiting entrance," said Harry rather pompously. "She looks all of, I would say 18 pushing 15 if you know what I mean? And she was positively gushing about the opportunity to meet Tony Stark."

"Oh God," Pepper said frowning as she saw the blond who frankly Pepper wanted to send to bed. She looked far too young to be allowed he at this party without a chaperone. "Don't tell me one of our investors is a fan girl?"

"Afraid I can't say that," Harry cheerfully, "shall we go get some drinks, this might be a good show."

Obadiah laughed, and moved to join Harry. While he fully intended to kill Tony Stark eventually, that didn't mean he couldn't have fun watching his irritation at this first. They joined Emma, Ororo and Jean at the bar.

Pepper remained behind for a moment, warring with herself about what to do at this point. After a moment she decided to let events take its course for a bit. After all she didn't really like how Tony had sort of talked down to Mr. Weatherby who seemed a pleasant sort. Nor did she like the fact he flirted with girls that were so young as Emma and Jean. She could ride to the rescue after she watched the fun.

At the bar Tony had just picked up his drink when he heard a loud high-pitched female voice behind him. "Oh my God it is you, Tony Stark!"

He turned with trepidation in his heart and saw a young girl who he would have to say was 16 at best, though obviously she would have to be older than that to have been allowed in here, and she would had to have a invitation to. She wore a one-piece dress that thankfully covered her body pretty well, with flared shoulders and a long skirt, but the low décolletage revealed far too much skin for someone that young and that body shape. "Er, yes I am, can I help you miss?" Tony said hoping that the woman wasn't a total dimwit and wouldn't try to flirt with them. Good god she almost looked young enough to be his daughter.

This hope was in vain. The blonde wrapped herself around his arm almost but not quite shouting loud enough to be noticed by everyone in the room, "OH my God, I've been wanting to meet you for so long! You're so dreamy!"

At the bar Harry had taken up the place next to Ororo which was between Jean and Emma and the older African woman, while Obadiah took a chair next to Emma. One hand lightly touched Jean's hand while his other held Ororo's as he nodded slightly at Emma. Jean, wearing a slightly bemused expression reached out and tapped her friend on the shoulder as if making certain that she was watching the activity around Tony. Now that the four were connected Harry pulsed a small spell between the quartet muffling their words as well as covering them with a small illusion that made it seem as if they were watching the interplay around Tony.

Emma looked quizzically at Obadiah who had turned away and didn't seem to hear her last question. She looked over at Harry smirked at her. Emma shook her head, not wanting to break her mask while in public even with whatever it was Harry had done covering her. "You are a most useful individual to have around Mr. Potter".

"I am to please, my lady." Harry said bowing slightly then said seriously. "Sit-rep, what's Obadiah up to, and does anyone else here think that Tony is a little… brittle? I can't really describe it any better than that, sorry."

"I would call it brilliant but flawed," responded Emma promptly. "The man's a bit of a narcissist and that seems to feed off his intelligence but that isn't actually that abnormal in highly intelligent individuals."

Jean nodded. "You're spoiled by Mr. Richards, Harry. He's one of the most levelheaded and self-effacing geniuses in the world, compared to Dr. Pym for one. Tony is actually pretty normal for geniuses, though I would say that I would prefer to see him have some more empathy."

Harry nodded a little bit, "I suppose I'll withhold judgment then but I just don't like the guy. He's a bit too egotistical and about the big picture for me. Now, what about Obadiah?"

Jean looked over at Emma who smirked and filled her friends in on what she had found in Obadiah's mind.

As the quartet was talking Kurt was doing his best not to laugh aloud, which even the charm Harry had placed on him to sound like his character wouldn't be able to block out. Being the girl in this scenario was rather disturbing, and being this close to another guy was making it worse, the payoff would be tremendous. His mouth was already salivating at the thought of all the ritzy food he saw over at one of the corners, and yesterday and today had been amazing fun just lounging around in the beaches of San Francisco before they came down to LA.

Of course when he got back to the Institute he'd have to deal with his friends' envy, but that was just icing on the cake really. And the look on the bigwigs face was well worth the momentary discomfort. Harry really was the master of pranks.

Five minutes later Tony finally extricated his arm from the girl's surprisingly strong grip which stopped the verbal worship she had been heaping on him. Some would have found that pleasant, but not when it came from someone of such limited intelligence. "Um, we-well I hope you enjoy the party Ms. Anastasia, I'll see you around but I see some people I really need to talk business with. If you'll excuse me."

With that he tried to escape, and Kurt/Anastasia pouted outrageously then slouched over to a table and sat down. Around her the crowd realized the entertainment was over and everyone went back to mingling and their regular discussions, while Harry adroitly lifted the spell on the quartet.

He turned to Emma and bowed, "Now that the entertainment is over, I believe there is a dance floor somewhere in here. Would you care to accompany me Ms. Frost?"

Emma looked over at Jean who nodded, tapping her head behind her ear thoughtfully as if she was scratching something there and Emma nodded. "I'll be delighted to Mr. Weatherby, so long as you don't step on my toes at least."

"Ah, that much at least I can promise."

With that the two walked off, leaving a rather disgruntled Obadiah behind. He looked over to where Jean and Ororo were discussing fashion, with Jean leading the discussion, since Ororo couldn't bring herself to care about fashion in the slightest. He sighed and began to circulate the party once more, wondering if he could get Emma alone at some point that evening.

The duo passed the young girl who had been so bothering Tony and Harry patted her shoulder. This was a prearranged signal, and the words he said didn't matter to Kurt after that. "Chin up there, he'll be back soon enough just keep after him."

Anastasia/Kurt looked up and nodded, inwardly relieved. "Don't worry I know true love will conquer all!"

About 3 minutes later, in a darkened corner of an empty staircase Anastasia disappeared and in her place stood a rather dapper young man with curly hair in a good suit. Now that his part in the prank was over, Kurt could have some fun tonight, and since he was already inside, no one would think he didn't belong.

Once they reached the dance floor, Emma and Harry began to dance around, but in reality they were having a discussion under a modified Mufilatio.

"So do we do something about Obadiah or not?" Emma asked. "I don't think we want someone like him with the resources of Stark Industries. Despite the fact Obadiah doesn't have a stance on mutants yet, it's only a matter of time. On top of that the man is dangerous on a personal level. Once he realizes he can't influence our thinking enough he will move against us physically." The fact she knew he had plans to try and seduce her had nothing at all to do with her opinion about the disgusting old man, nothing at all…

Harry frowned thoughtfully then shook his mental head. "I think the fact that we are neither backing Tony or backing Obadiah is enough to let us keep under his radar for now. Obadiah struck me as a sort of person who would rely on brute force only as a last resort. Warning Tony about how high he needs to look for his internal enemy should be enough. If it becomes a physical confrontation between the two somehow, like via whatever it was Tony used to escape from those terrorists, the Fantastic Four are within 15 to 20 minutes flight from here anyway. I remember Johnny telling me he frequently flies down to LA or further in less time than that."

Harry had hoped to actually make an ally of Tony, but the brittle and egotistical nature of Tony's personality dissuaded him.

Emma paused thoughtfully then said. "I could enter Stark's mind and implant the suggestion that way. Could even get some more information out of him about his plans going forward? He really didn't tell us anything you know."

Harry paused then shook his head. "No, while I trust you could do it and get away with it at this point we can't really justify it. He's no threat to us, and whatever he is up to might serve as a distraction to our own moves."

"Which are? Ororo said something about you needed my help and I'll do whatever I can. I owe you too much to quibble. I wouldn't say this aloud, not even covered by your spells, but you've done far too much for me not to want me to pay you back anyway I can."

Harry shook his head rather embarrassed. "Don't worry about it, I only did what I wanted to. As for how you can help me, I seem to have set up a bit of a bidding war, pretty much like you said I should only with quite a bit more in the way of advertising for my potions. We ran into a bit of bother over in England, you probably heard of it on the news?"

Emma eyes widened. "You had something to do with stopping that terrorist attack, the one that hit London?"

"Let's just say there was more to that story then the normal individual could handle. Anyway," he went on, "after the battle was over I used quite a lot of my readymade potion supply on some of the soldiers that stood with us. There were at least a dozen doctors from various countries."

"How did you manage that? Never mind I don't want to know. That is excellent. The amount of money you will make with those potions alone will jumpstart all your future plans."

"I hope so. There seems to be a few places in the economy where my own plans could slip into niches easily enough, outside of power which I know Jean mentioned. For one thing, I hope to go into mining in a major way, I believe I mentioned wanting to look into space-borne industries?" Emma nodded, her head cocked to one side, her hair falling like a blonde wave down one side of her face.

"Well, that will be one area of interest for me. While first and even second world countries seem to have enough metal and resources, that isn't the case in third world countries, and I could certainly think of ways to produce the metal needed even in first world countries more easily. Certainly using my… patented techniques I might be able to make it much cheaper on my end."

Emma whimpered a little at the idea, licking her lips. "You, you could run Shaw and another one of the Inner circle out of business if you went into it as hard…" she said the word with a certain tone to it, but Harry didn't pick up on it. "As I think you will. That would certainly make my takeover of the Hellfire club much easier."

Again she thought of telling Harry about Buckman, but again thanks to how little information she had about the 'Sentinel Program' she discarded it for now.

"I can see that, but even though I've found something that may allow me to meet demand for my potions" He wasn't entirely finished with that yet, but he would come much closer after figuring out how to safely using the time-turning runic array. "I still have no idea where to start on the business end. Who do I need to hire, how many, what kind of laws will I be dealing with, etc, etc."

"I'll give you a minimum list of positions you need to fill before you start selling to the public." Emma promised. "You said you set up a bidding war, military and civilian and how many?"

Harry paused for a moment remembering the number of doctors helping with the Royal Guard's wounded. "I think there were about six different countries represented, both civilian and military doctors, though the majority was British military."

Emma whimpered again, going moist at the very thought of what terms she could force through with that many interested parties. "Ooh… I'll help you with that certainly. And um, you'll also need a distribution network, Frost Pharmaceuticals can help with that, and I can transfer some our doctors to work with you if you want."

"That sounds like a good idea, and if you remind me before we split off again, I have a communication mirror ready for you. Wasn't much trouble really, just had to make the array small enough to fit. "What about your own plans?" Harry asked, cocking his head to one side.

"The first stage should be complete in the next day or so, possibly even now" replied Emma calmly, that question having brought her back to Earth with a bang. "I cannot tell you exactly when it will occur, but it cannot be stopped now, not by him or me."

After that they ironed out the way they would warn Tony about the need to look higher.

"By the way," Emma said as they were walking off the dance floor to where Ororo and Jean now stood along the side, smiling in welcome. "The way you were talking business was such a turn on."

Harry laughed shaking his head. "So what, talking profits and money is like talking dirty to you or something?"

"Please, nothing so gauche as all that, it just shows another aspect of you that I am attracted to."

Harry frowned slightly as the second song they had danced to came to an end. "Emma, I…"

Emma shook her head, while the two walked over to the edge of the dance floor. Jean and Storm stood there, the redhead holding a nearly full drink. "Don't worry, I'm not going to push you to join you and Ororo, or, if I'm honest, you, Ororo and Jean. I want to, but I don't think I'm in love with you, attracted, oh yes, but in love? I'm not certain I even know what that means. But maybe someday…"

Harry gulped and nodded. "Um, well, maybe someday." By that point they had reached the other two. "Would you care to dance my lady?" he asked Ororo.

The African beauty shook her head and gestured to Jean. "I believe this young lady would like to go first."

Harry paused looking Ororo in the face and after a moment Ororo nodded faintly amused that despite all the signals she had sent him about being open to this, despite their actual conversations about it he was still looking for reassurance. After her nod however he smiled gently and took Jean's hand, weaving a spell about them as he took her to the dance floor.

The passersby would see the two of them dancing almost as if they were father and daughter, a middle-aged man doing his duty by dancing with his lady's new younger friend, but nothing could be further from the truth than this was to the reality.

As soon as they were on the dance floor their arms went around one another's waists, Harry's one hand gently resting right above Jean's rear, and the other resting between her shoulder blades on her bare skin, sending a shiver down both their spines. Jean's hands clasped around his waist, resting at the small of his back as they danced slowly to the music.

"Having fun Red?" Harry asked winking at her.

Jean laughed. "The last two days have been fantastic, but the night before, that I could've done without." Harry nodded with a smile, and the two danced on for a time just holding one another.

Eventually Harry's hands began to move around on her back, one hand remaining still just above her rear, his pinky grazing the top of her rear, while the other began to play with her hair. "You did magnificently you know, you do everything magnificently," he murmured, looking into her eyes. "I saw the way the guys here looked at you, even Tony looked at you and Emma. You could have anyone in the world you wanted."

Jean shook her head. "I might be able to have anyone, but there's only one I really want."

Harry gulped. Now that he came to it he was almost afraid of finally giving into his feelings for this young girl, afraid that he wouldn't be able to be the man that both she and Ororo deserved him to be. That was his worst nightmare about this. That the three of them would try to make it work, only to realize that both girls wanted more of his attention then he could give without scorning the other. That would break their current friendships, which had become the cornerstone of his life.

He looked over Jean's shoulder towards Ororo only to find his lady looking back at him with understanding and love.

Harry took a deep breath, nodded a final time then looked at the girl who he called 'Red' as part of a defense mechanism against his growing feelings towards her. Are you sure about this?" Harry whispered into her ear.

Jean smiled up at him the bare inch between their heights, their faces close. "I have never been more certain about anything before Harry, but you need to say it Potter. Say it."

Harry smiled gently and leaned into one of her ears where he whispered, "Jeeaan." The way he said it sent a shudder through the redhead, the emotion in it laid bare and she tightened her grip around his waist moaning a little. "I love you Jean," he said and then kissed her ear. "I want you, I love you as much as I love Ororo, and I want you with us."

Jean moved her head back slightly smiling at him. "I love you both," she said simply one hand moving from his waist up to the back of his head. "And I want to join you."

While the words might have come out rather formal in their wording, the emotions between the two were anything but. The air practically crackled around them with passion, repressed desire and love, and when Harry leaned down the small distance to her lips and kissed her, all that pent-up emotion came out.

Jean returned the kiss immediately, her hands tightening around his head and waist, while his own one hand went to the back of Jean's head and the other to her rear, pulling them against one another as they kissed. A time or two they broke for air to stare at one another through half lidded eyes and then attacked one another's mouth again, kissing on and on while murmuring words of love.

Emma and Ororo had stood by the edge of the dance floor and Emma shook her head looking around at the crowd of dancers, none of whom realized what was going on. She did however, and the sheer emotion of the scene took her breath away and made her body react as it had earlier to hearing Harry talk business. It was almost like being a voyeur watching the scene in front of her, the emotions between the two were so real and powerful. It reminded Emma strongly of watching Harry and Ororo dance at the dance club after she had gone to the X mansion.

She shook her head. "That is one of the most beautiful things I've ever seen," she said honestly, "and I so want to join them right now."

Ororo chuckled, laying a hand on the younger girl's shoulder. She would've done more if they weren't in public, but she wasn't certain how Emma's powers would have hidden something like her putting her arm around the other girl in a hug. It certainly would've looked odd considering they were supposed to be practical strangers. "Don't worry my dear your turn may come."

Emma nodded slowly and took a breath at Ororo mentioning it so openly,. "I… guess I know, and Jean has basically said she won't shut me out which I suppose I will have to do for now. Until you and I get to know each other at least," she said looking at Ororo challengingly, daring the other girl to back away from the idea of Emma joining them.

Ororo however simply nodded her head chuckling, she was amused by the way Emma hid her hope behind a challenging demeanor. "That would be an excellent idea, however I think we need to break those two up for now. Harry's done the 'dutiful boyfriend bit and danced with my younger friend' she said holding her fingers and making air quote marks, "but any longer than one song for that sort of thing would probably look very strange."

The two women shared a laugh and then moved over towards the dance floor, with Ororo butting in and Emma grabbing her friend as the music began to speed up into a faster song. "You," said Emma looking at her friend, "are one lucky bitch you know that?"

"I know," said Jean dreamily, briefly touching her rather sore lips looking at Emma. Then she frowned. "Where did my drink go?"

"Oh I drank it. You wouldn't have liked it anyway, far too subtle for your plebian palette anyway." Emma replied airily, throwing her hair back. "And far too strong. It would have put a lightweight like you on your back, and then you would never have had that lovely moment."

Jean's eyes narrowed. "Oh, as I recall you were the one who became drunk first during our sleepover back at the mansion. After all, I was the one you were using as a pillow, not the reverse."

"Then you're memory is faulty, and you toss and turn in the night. The places your knees wound up, well…"

"Well then," Jean said, leading the way back to the bar, though Emma wasn't actually fighting her, "There's only one way to settle this."

Behind them Ororo and Harry watched the two walking away, shrugged and decided to finish the song before going after them. Emma and Jean were big girls after all, they could handle themselves, and besides Harry wanted to go find Kurt.

He found him talking up a rather good looking young lady by the table that was laden with food. The two of them were eating and chatting amicably in German, so Harry waited until he caught Kurt's eyes, then nodded at the men's room. Kurt excused himself, and the two men chatted for a few minutes, after which Kurt had a final mission for the night.

OOOOOOO

Tony sighed rather sadly as he made his way towards his car. While Obadiah might've been happy with the way the evening went (the old man had checked in with him then left early, heading out on a trip to one of their African plants) Tony's evening hadn't really been that good despite his desire to show himself and make certain the public knew he wasn't an invalid. The new stockholders had thrown him for a loop and that didn't even count Anastasia who Obadiah had informed him was another stockholder. The old man had laughed at Tony's look of horror, but Pepper at least had been somewhat sympathetic.

Tony shook his head forcefully removing thoughts of Pepper from his mind for the moment; he could come back to his developing feelings for his secretary later. Not that it was going to be easy or anything, after all while he had had literally thousands of girlfriends over the years he could honestly say that none of them had particularly mattered to him except as momentary objects of affection, or as a cruder man would've put it, notches on his bedpost. But his attraction to Pepper was just as much mental as it was physical, and that threw him for a loop.

For now however he concentrated on his thoughts about Mr. Weatherby, the strangest of the trio of new stockholders. Anastasia was simple and straightforward, as was Emma Frost. Dangerous in the second one's case, but easily understood. Yet there was something about George that bothered him, something about the man's body language and tone of voice. There was no awe they are, but there was no awe in Emma either, nor any real sign that Tony was anything but a normal person, so there had to be something else, something that set his hackles on edge. The fact the man was probably far more intelligent than he let on wasn't enough to put him on edge like this, there had to be something else.

His musings were interrupted as he neared the valet, where he was absconded by an all-too-familiar voice telling him from his left side. "So where are we going Tony?"

Before he could move Tony found his arm yet again gripped by the underage looking stalker that he had somehow acquired. "W-well miss Anastasia,"

"Oh just call me Anny, everyone does!" the blond said, looking up at him with a fatuous and adoring face.

"Well miss," he said gamely trying to remove her from his arm, "I'm still under doctor's orders to be asleep by a certain time and I'm afraid I've rather overshot that already," Tony lied with the ease of long practice, using his so-called invalid status to his advantage. "But I'm certain we can meet sometime later at a stockholders meeting somewhere, and at that point I'll probably be feeling much better."

The girl actually surprisingly let go at that having slightly. "I'll hold you to that."

After bowing grandly Tony left swiftly, not noticing the fact that the girl had slipped a small piece of paper into his tuxedos pocket. Behind him the young woman re-entered the party, disappearing soon after to allow Kurt to find his young dinner partner. While he wasn't all that outgoing, the girl being from Germany like him made it easier for the two to talk, and it was fun, more than repaying him for the irritation of being female and having to flirt with Tony.

When Tony got home he found the note in his tuxedo pocket when he was getting undressed. At first he assumed it was 'Annie's' phone number or something, yet when he went to rip it up and toss it out he found he couldn't tear the paper. This was because Harry had hit the paper with a indestructible charm, a short time-based spell, but it would be enough for this.

Tony looked down at the plain looking piece of paper than turned and went down into his lab, ignoring for now the nearly finished body armor that he had dubbed Iron Man. He walked over to an analyzer, and stuck the paper into it. "JARVIS, give me a reading on this."

A moment later the semi-AI that served as his house security, lab assistant, communication computer and butler, responded, its computerized tones sounding a little confused and somewhat worried. "Sir, it is merely a piece of paper, wood pulp."

"JARVIS, look at this." When one of the computer's sensors was on him, Tony tried to rip it apart again, only to fail just as badly as before.

JARVIS answered a bit hesitantly. "Sir, you are not given to planning pranks on me so I would ask if you are drunk, and if so should I prepare the normal cure?"

"I'm not drunk, still, here you try." Tony moved the piece of paper over to one of the many robots he had around his lab/workshop/garage. The machine obediently began to try and tear it apart, but even the machine's strength didn't do anything.

"I… I am at a loss as to explain this sir. My molecular analysis subroutine is showing as working at 100%, but this does not compute or match nay known information in my data banks."

"Yeah, I was just thinking the same thing."

"Might I suggest sir that you see what the message on the wood pulp actually says before you continue to try and test it to destruction?"

Tony nodded, and opened it and read the note therein which said simply 'watch your back around Obadiah'. He stared at it for a moment then sighed and decided he would think about it later before getting ready for bed.

OOOOOOO

Winston Frost got into the back of his limo, anxious to get home and have a nice nightcap before bed after what had been a surprisingly busy few days. His plans to grab a larger chunk of the weapons market had slowly borne fruit after Shaw and Leland had transferred ownership of a few multi-purpose factories and think tank respectively, but he had spent the last few days staving off attacks both minor and major from competitions. These ranged from sabotage both physical and software related, as well as attacks on a few of his new scientists, and a smear campaign against the name of his weapons company Cold Steel.

Yet Winston had deflected or reversed all of them, and within a few weeks Cold Steel would be putting out a new line of weapons and he was quietly confident that they would find a seller's market.

He leaned back in his comfortable chair and reached for the wine coaster in front of him.

"Straight home sir?" said the limo driver.

"Indeed," said Winston shortly, never having seen the point of being friendly or talkative with the help. "Quickly if you please."

The limo driver, one Ralph Zegerisk, nodded, and the two guards assigned to his personal retinue got in on either side of Winston, one sitting across and down, while the other one took up the window seat on the far side of the limo, letting ample space between him and his boss. Winston's men knew not to crowd him.

About 40 minutes later the little timer in Ralph's head clicked, and suddenly his head was full of the knowledge that his boss had been sleeping with his wife for several years and he reacted pretty much as Emma had thought he would. He waited calmly, calmly,until they were on an empty stretch of highway heading upstate towards home. Then with one hand he disabled all the controls in the back of the limo, so that the guard glass between the front and the back wouldn't respond to commands. Then he reached with the hand on the outer side of his body and pulled up a little surprise.

At that point he began to speak. "So you're in a hurry to get home are you? So you can fuck my wife again behind my back! You bastard, I don't care how rich you are or how much you pay me, no one cuckolds me and gets away with it!"

The two bodyguards looked in shock at their boss wondering where the hell this it come from, the allegation giving them pause. Winston wondered the same thing but his face showed nothing. Oh he knew who the man was, but how he had found out about his trysts with the maid was another matter. "I have no idea what you're talking about Zegerisk. As that is a serious charge to make against someone, I will overlook this outburst but only if you pull over now and get out of the limo. I won't even put a black mark on your record after I fire you."

"Oh someone's going to get fired!" the man said and then without warning began to shoot over his shoulder with a shotgun he had hidden up front, though his conscious mind didn't remember doing it.

The two bodyguards had already pulled out their Glocks and fired back swiftly, nailing him in the head and back through the chair, but the damage had already been done by that first blast of buckshot, neither bodyguard having thought their friend would have a weapon like that.

Winston hadn't tried to dodge or move at all, not realizing how dangerous this moment was, assuming as always that he was still in control, but he was wrong. The blast from the shotgun caught him square in the chest and face, and he died almost immediately, the buckshot slamming through his unprotected body, ripping his head and face to shreds.

Emma had contemplated some way of coming up with a plan that would let Winston have enough time to realize that it was Emma who was killing him for a few moments, and to somehow make him understand that it was both to protect herself and to avenge her brother, but in the end decided against it. Her father was too wily an opponent to give him that much time, and this way it would be much more certain.

As soon as the shootout began it was over. Ralph lay slumped in the chair, one of the guards was bleeding badly from a shoulder wound from a stray pellet and the other was reaching forward over the chairs trying desperately to grab the steering wheel of the car to steer it off the road onto the emergency shoulder along it.

Both bodyguards would live to give their statements to the police, though one of their shoulders would never be the same again. When questioned Ralph's wife would break down and admit to the affair, though she had seen no sign her husband had found out before this all happened. After that the police wouldn't look deeper into it considering it an open and shut case.

Emma's first strike had hit home, while miles away her second one faired almost as well.

OOOOOOO

Adrienne gazed across at her 'date," her Frost mask in place and only her eyes showing her anger. It wasn't a real date of course, the man across from her was not her type at all, but the power he represented, that was something she could get into bed with, and she had thought they had been doing just that. "What," she said icily, "do you mean by that?"

Robert Hildebrant looked over at her, his face showing faint surprise, and something else, contempt. "I would think what I said was simple enough to understand. My employer is no longer convinced that backing you is a viable solution to the problem Cold Steel might eventually become."

While Justin Hammer was based mostly in Europe, his men in America were not picked out of a hat. Robert and his nominal boss Steven Smythe, were both extremely competent, and they had looked at the loss gain ratio for this little agreement between them and the second Frost offspring, and decided that it was no longer worth it. There was evidence that Emma had gotten some evidence to link Hammer Industries to her kidnapping attempt, and none of the secrets Adrienne had passed on were important, neither in total or taken singly. And with Cold Steel proving that it was going to be around for a while, and with the tumult in the market caused by Stark Industries, Robert had other things Steven and he both felt he should concentrate on. The choice to cut their losses now was a simple one.

Adrienne glared at him, but then sat back,. Her mask in place as her mind worked furiously. She had no leverage here, she had contacted Hildbrante, not the other way around, and it was true their relationship hadn't really panned out as she had expected. Her sister Emma was still around after all. However, she felt her attempts to sow dissent and hate between her and Father have borne more fruit than this association. Adrienne felt that perhaps she should concentrate there, as well as on her burgeoning connections in the Hellfire Club. "Very well, I won't say you don't have reasons. But realize that if I do come to lead my family's corporation, you will not see any remuneration."

Robert nodded, pleased the young woman was taking his news so well. "That is agreeable. Up to this point we have neither of us gotten anything substantial out of this, so going back to a clean slate is possibly the best for both sides."

It was at that point that one of Adrienne's bodyguards came towards them from the door of the bar the two were meeting in. Robert frowned, then motioned with one finger to his own plain-clothes guard, dressed as a waiter moving around the bar tonight, to do nothing.

Adrienne's bodyguard looked irritated and worried, and the young blonde frowned. After him came her other bodyguard looking much the same. She knew both of them, not as well as her regular guard who had fallen a few days ago in a biking accident and was laid up with a broken foot, but they seemed competent enough and she wondering what was going on to have them both so flustered.

The bodyguard closed swiftly, leaning over to whisper in her ear. "Miss, we have to go, we monitor all radio frequencies around here, and one of them just lit up, saying there was a bomb threat on this building. The police are on their way."

Adrienne's eyes widened slightly, then narrowed. This can't be a coincidence. A bomb isn't at all like Emma, she would never be that crass, and anyway where would she get the resources? But it could be a aimed at someone else… She looked over at Robert, her mind working furiously. "Is this you're doing?"

Robert frowned slightly, laying his hands on the table between them, keeping his eyes on Emma's bodyguards. "I assure you I had nothing to do with any bomb scare."

"A likely story," one of Adrienne's bodyguards scoffed, then reached down and hauled Adrienne to her feet. "Regardless Miss we should get you out of here now."

Adrienne was about to shout at the man about how he was manhandling her but before she could Robert's official bodyguard reacted, grabbing the man by the shoulder. "Let's all calm down here…Ack!"

The 'ack' came from the fact the man he had thus grabbed had turned and sucker-punched the man in the face. Before anything else could happen Robert's other bodyguard, the one dressed as a waiter pulled out his gun, causing a ripple of screams to resound the bar as people scrambled for cover.

Adrienne's other bodyguard pulled his own gun, and the two fired as one, after which things got… chaotic. Seconds into the firefight Adirenne, who had taken cover behind a booth, was shot in the head by one of Robert's guards.

In the end Robert Hildebrant walked away wondering how things had derailed so quickly. Adrienne's bodyguards were dead along with one of his, and the other was being held for the murder of Adrienne herself. Luckily Robert had not been infected by the madness and had simply dived under the table staying there until a single policeman burst into the room and arrested his remaining guard.

The radio report Adrienne's bodyguards reported was not in fact from the police, and while the whole incident was highly suspicious, and Robert and his bodyguard would be questioned for some time, nothing would come from it save for the bodyguard doing jail time.

OOOOOOO

Back at the gala Harry and the others had simply stayed and partied. Around eleven local time Kurt popped back to the mansion by Cory, who Harry had assigned to help them with this duty. Kurt had a lot of fun, and despite being a girl for some of the time had felt it was well worth it.

The quartet stayed until the gala ended by which time Jean and Emma were well into their cups, leaning on one another rather drunkenly as they exited the gala. It was something that Emma would never have done, save for the fact that Harry was there, and told her he would keep her safe this evening.

As soon as they were out of sight Harry's charms went to work, and Obadiah and a few other less savory individuals would have no memory of George the man, only his voice and words, and no sense at all about the gorgeous redhead other than the simple fact she was gorgeous and had red hair. The same was true of Ororo. It was a masterful piece of charm work, if Harry said so himself.

Realizing neither was in any shape to drive Harry adroitly stole Emma's keys from her passing them over to Ororo. With that done he gently took Jean in his arms, and guided her down the street towards his supercar while Ororo took Emma back to her own car. From there they drove the cars over to where Emma's hotel was (she and Jean had transferred down from San Francisco that morning) and then took the elevator up to the penthouse suite.

Harry gently steered Jean toward one of the beds, and she flopped down on top of it, half on and half off the bed. Harry laughed quietly, kneeling down next to her running his hands over her legs which earned him a murmur of appreciation from the inebriated young woman. He gently pulled off her high heels, running his hands up Jean's leg.

Behind him came Emma, who was as drunk as Jean but who was for some reason more amorous than tired. She aimed for same bed as the redhead, leaning lightly on Ororo, but ignoring the older woman's attempts to divert her elsewhere. Ororo had actually stayed away from the sauce for the most part, having not enjoyed being drunk the last time.

Jean giggled drunkenly. "Ish thish the part where you have yer wick-hiccup-wicked way wis me, Harry?"

Harry shook his head. "Sorry love, not when you're drunk like this."

Emma giggled, plopping herself on the redhead's lap where she lay on the bed. "I," she said annunciating the words carefully with the attention of the highly inebriated. "However, am not nearly so noble." Before Jean could respond, Emma leaned down and kissed Jean on the lips

Jean responded, bringing her hands up and kissing Emma back. Their hands began to roam around their bare backs, moving into one another's dresses to grasp and fondle.

Harry remained where he was kneeling at the foot of the bed, his eyes wide as he watched this. Ororo too was watching in something between shock and arousal and the incredible sight. "Er, should I be jealous right now or what?"

"I think it is an 'or what' moment my love, that is… that is erotic in the extreme." Ororo said, an amused, yet slightly dirty smile on her face.

Emma had moved down her friends neck and begun to nibble there, while Jean looked over her shoulder at Harry licking her lips in such a way that Harry instantly felt himself harden. A moment later the redhead had somehow flipped Emma over and was not on top, she looked over her shoulder at Harry and then began to do a incredibly sexy strip tease.

She first unbuckled the wide string of sequins that was around her waist, letting it drop to one side then undid the tie behind her neck, letting her dress fall to bunch around her waist. She turned slightly, so that Harry could see her hands holding her breasts, smiling rather wickedly.

Alas the drink had gotten to both ladies, and that was the end of the show. Emma had fallen asleep under her friend and seeing this Jean dropped to the side, soon joining her.

Ororo and Harry looked at one another then gently tucked the two girls in before retreating to the suite's other bedroom. Aroused by the show the two had put on Harry grabbed Ororo and carried her swiftly into the suites other bedroom. The rest of the world would come knocking tomorrow morning, but for tonight, there were other matters to see to.

End chapter

---

Okay, before anyone compliments me or anything about the chapter length, realize this is what happens when one part of my schizophrenic muse refuses to let me go. Seriously, I haven't written anything else, and I have done little else. While my work hasn't suffered my school work, for the first time, has. I have a paper due Tuesday that I should have been working on for the past two weeks, and now I am going to have to do it in four days, something I thought I had left behind me in my high school years. I was invited to a party Friday I didn't go, instead staying home to work on this. I need to step back from this story, it is a black-hole sucking in everything else. The next few chapters, when I put them out (I'm not abandoning it, don't worry) will be much shorter, about thirty-thousand words max.

And before anyone asks why I put in so much down time, realize that family, loved ones, and people to come back to is why people fight, just as much as protecting the people around them. I wanted to show Harry and his personally created family, as well as the FF and theirs revitalizing themselves.

In the original, Vixen was some random ass crimelord. I don't know about you, but in my opinion crime-lords don't go about calling down the Feds on their heads normally by assaulting a spy agency directly. Not even the Kingpin, Silver Sable or any of that level would be so stupid, if more because they see no point to it than anything else. In this story I try to explain why Vixen went to such lengths, as well as introducing a big baddy, showing off Harry's mental and magical muscles, and putting Selene down big time, and yes she is fucking gone forever now.

Captain Britain will not be the next recruit for Harry's team, he's still got some soul searching to do, but he may join eventually. Or not, I really don't have much of a handle on his personality so can take him or leave him. If anyone can tell me what he would be like as a character (and that means more than his powers) I might go back and flesh him out. And unfortunately Betsy won't be seen for a while either – this was just a glimpse of her as she is now. She will have an entire chapter, possibly more, devoted to her later on regardless if she joins the family or not, but I hope this has shown a glimpse of her nature and skills.

By the way, the movie fight between Destroyer and Thor? Lame, so lame. Changed it entirely.

Tony and that whole scene was hard to write, I had to mix in business with the pleasure. As you can see Tony means to be this universe's bigtime inventor – Ipad and iphone etc, but really only as a sideshow.

A quick question for X-force fans, Warpath – has he ever fought the Hulk, and if so on a scale of 1 to 24 where would he and his older brother Thunderbird rate? Hulk is obviously 24 (plus 4 if really angry), juggernaut was 22, the thing is 20 or so, Thor is 20, Colossus 18, Rogue in this story 16 at the moment. That is just strength, not durability or anything else, and I am assuming that the Hulk is the strongest physically out there. And physically, where would Thanos place? I'm trying to put together a exact level of strength (not fighting ability or skill or anything like that) for this story, despite the fact it seemed as if the authors of the comics could never agree to one.

Oh and I saw a picture of a young Franklin Richards about eight or so and his mother who was imitating a horse for him. Now, its probably me, but that idea is a little disturbing. In my family it was always one of the guys (me since I'm one of the older 'kids') who was the horse, not a woman. It just looked wrong.

Would also ask for some story recommendations. I would like to read a story with an Awesome McGonagall or one where she is brought to task, or a story where Harry/Hermione start moving and changing things in first year – pairing is solid but doesn't have to be the center thing, and I would prefer the two of them stand alone without goblin/mysterious advisor/parental aid until later. Bashing is welcome but not compulsory of the Weasleys and Dumbledore. Or possibly a story with those two as a couple transported elsewhere, that would be fun. And any stories off this sight about Harry/Jean or Harry/crossover harem that actually ahs a plot would be very welcome.