Harry fired his two tiny revolvers at different rates, at two charmed quaffles, peppering them. The pistols were packed with different sorts of ammunition, and he was observing and recording the event.
He was testing ammo at the moment, and so his twin minis–that he normally kept one on a calf, thank you very much–were runed above and beyond, and each had a special function.
He flew his broom slowly, without holding it with hands after a sudden braking maneuver, destroying the balls, holstering the twins and totally flooring it and zooming away.
Leaving her behind was hard, Harry bit back some tears as the air brushed against him. He was sure his broom was crying too the way he had been pushing it. Duty called though, and vengeance was best served cold. Actually, this dish had frozen over, thawed, and cycled through it time and again, rotting away Harry's desire for a normal life.
After minutes had turned to hours, he was smiling again. He loved shooting and flying. He felt like a sheriff, a cowboy, riding a powerful stallion.
The Moon set, the Sun rose, and Harry's mind drifted from topic to topic, focusing on nothing in particular for very long. Sometimes he did some tests, sometimes he swapped brooms. Sometimes he did dives, and banks, and he just so loved flying.
The feel of flight resistance, as he called it, was quite different when flying a broom compared to riding Sirius' motorcycle. Obviously Harry had went to see Hagrid before running away. The half-wizard-half-giant gave him many tools and resources to survive the better with.
Bored, he reached down and his fingers skimmed the water. He was still disillusioned, and his broomstick was as well.
He rose away from the water. Should he fall off, Harry pondered his courses of action. He could always accio his broom back, cast a spell to slow down the fall, and catch the flying broom back when it would come near him. He had invented the broom disillusionment charm for the broom, or at the least self-taught this version of it to himself. He could cancel the charm at will, even from a distance, he was sure of it. He hadn't tested it, but he was confident in his work.
An upward apparition though, that could be useful too. Harry wasn't sure if he could apparate with a broom while flying. He had simply never tried it before— always riding without fear.
Must be getting' old… or paranoid, figured Harry, and he twisted the broom in mid-air. His apparition exploded not too far away.
He was confused for a split second, but Harry recovered his course. While flying earlier on, he had decided on a roundabout way. He would fly to Malta, camp there, and fly from Malta to the UK through France.
As it was, he flew over the international waters of the Mediterranean, far away from any wizardly nation scanning for illegal encroachment on their territories. Harry didn't know the exact method used by every single nation, but he knew one thing for certain. Enough distance is enough to get away from any problem, at least in the topic of international wizarding spycraft.
This particular broom model that was being tortured was a Kirin 777 that he had picked up some years ago while in Japan. Excellent maneuverability at the expense of top speed. Continuously flying at the max was demanding on the charms any broomstick had woven into it. Quidditch moves were mostly sharp acceleration, maximum deceleration, crazy banks, impossible turns. Nothing about Quidditch was long distance sprinting, and ninety-nine percent of all brooms worldwide were used for the sport.
Besides, for long distance travel most of the planetary wizards used rugs, both luxurious and comfortable. Some nations had their own alternatives, and some people simply didn't bother going anywhere.
Harry preferred broomstick flying over a rug, any day any distance. Something about feeling like a jet fighter, he supposed, as opposed to a huge airliner.
The wizard, or as he preferred to call himself–the warlock–spotted little muggle ships with migrants making their way to Europe from North African shores. At times, they would be intercepted by coast guards from various European nations. Other times, they would land safely on the European shores. Sometimes he would see large muggle oil tankers or container ships, and he even saw many luxury yachts and cruise ships.
Perfect time to try out his newest acquisition, the warlock decided, and took out his magnum. He hadn't had time to engrave any runes on it yet. As he lazily zoomed on through the air somewhere over the sea, he let loose a snitch.
His vision was crystal clear as he was wearing a mask he had made himself: a relic from his journeys into Siberia. Although its original purpose was to withstand the harsh winters of North Asia, it also helped with the wind, rain and glare of the Mediterranean.
Following the snitch, he shot once. The trigger on Harry's new handgun was pretty heavy. Something to fix later, he decided. He was shooting his revolver with his off hand. His hand tingled with numbness.
"Bang. Bang. Bang," the revolver sang its song. The recoil was so strong his hand was actually going numb.
Harry could not land a single hit on the snitch. The recoil from the gun actually hurt his hand. That's what a .500 Smith & Wesson Magnum does though, he laughed to himself. He switched hands, hoping his accuracy would improve with his regular hand. Holding the broom with a half numb hand as he chased the snitch was not fun, but he took his time to aim. He had one round left in the massive revolver.
The thing was obscenely huge but destroyed cinderblocks like a slingshot would a glass bottle, even without any runes.
The only drawbacks were that it was somewhat unwieldy. And it hurt to shoot it, it was really loud, and only had five rounds. And would remain that way only until Harry had time to engrave it with his newest set of runes he had been working on.
He knew some of the runes he needed to carve into the pistol, but as always he would feel them as he began to write. Some projects just evolved by themselves. All he had to do was sit in the rune-wright's chair.
He could engrave heat sinks so the gun barrel would always be the same temperature no matter how many times he fired the gun. Or, he could install a ruby in the hilt to absorb the heat. Decisions, decisions. The one would overheat eventually in a really tough fight, and the other was so much more complicated. He thought about the ruby as the Sun shone through him.
The ruby could channel a lot of energy, given enough bullet explosions. Sure, some energy was used to push the bullet forward, but a lot was wasted, and ripe for the picking. Harry wondered how he could bind the ruby to the gun.
Besides heat, he also needed to control, or annul, recoil. Harry has had a project he's been wanting to do in the future for a while now: increase the amount of bullets a drum or a mag could hold.
He was not sure how to manage the spatial compression work and still make the mechanisms work, but he was certain he could convince some trunk makers and engineers to help him out. Gold worked miracles when cash wasn't enough.
For long distance flying, Harry protected his hearing with regular muggle earplugs. He had bought a whole bunch of nice ones in Montréal on Saint-Laurent Boulevard from the music store that many musicians used.
"Bang!"
The snitch exploded. Grinning, Harry holstered his new gun.
This particular broom had a compass attached it, although now it was invisible. The broom was a British long-distance flyer and came with a cushioned seat. So he simply rode on west and avoided the coast.
One of the oldest magical communities of the world, Malta, was only a few hours away. They apparently even had relics from Atlantis for sale after a recent expedition into the deep seas. He was super curious to check that out.