Chapter 5

Dumbledore was concerned, though that had become the norm after the last couple of years at Hogwarts. As he normally did when things weighed heavily on his mind, Dumbledore was walking through the Forbidden Forest. First was when Harrys' school letter was never sent out. The owl he personally gave it to simply circled the school before landing back at his desk. He had heard from Miss Figg years ago that he had not been seen in a while but thought nothing of it. He assumed the Dursleys had finally gotten over their resentment and hatred of the Potters and began to take his warning to keep the boy safe seriously.

Near the beginning of last year, a first-year student, 1 Hermione Granger, was nearly killed by a troll and then at the end of the year, he found Quarrel dead in front of the Mirror of Erised when he went to inspect the stone. He seemed to have died of dehydration and the back of his head was scarred and malformed. And now this year had started with students getting petrified. The year culminated last week in a student going missing for hours, a teacher losing all his memory. Thankfully though, thanks to the heroic actions of Ronald Weasly and Nevil Longbottom, the missing student who turned out to be Ron's sister was saved and the monster killed. To the ageing headmaster's horror though, the beast had been a basilisk. Nearly a 1000 years old and almost 20 meters long.

The most terrifying part when he spoke to the young Weasley boy about what happened. He spoke of someone saying they were Tom Riddle, who had seemingly come from a diary and was trying to take her body before the basilisk was summoned. It was only with the intervention of Fawkes and the Sword of Gryffindor that the beast was slain. He had even managed to take 1 of the monster's fangs and stab it into the diary, destroying the shade of Riddle. After he had dismissed the boy after giving 200 house points, he had examined the book and discovered his worst fears were true. Tom Riddle, Voldemort, had blasted Horcruxes. A fragment, a shade of him was still out in the world somewhere.

And then just earlier in the evening during 1 of the last staff meetings of the year, before students all went home, Professor Trelawney had another prophecy. Most teachers paid it no mind, viewing her as a fraud at best and that divination was fake at worst. While nearly everyone acted like it was nothing, Dumbledore knew differently. He would not have hired her if she was a fake.

He was constantly going over it as he walked, the prophecy short but seemingly very important.

"A priest in red, coming home once again.
What will be once was and what once was will be again.
A golden leader before his time
shall rule the stars once more."

Dumbledore was not sure what any of it meant but knew it had to be important. He had spent the last half hour silently walking through the forest while thinking it over but came up with nothing. He was about to turn back to the school when a dozen meters ahead he saw a centaur, Firenze, was out as well. Quickly walking forward, Dumbledore gave a greeting to the friendly creature. "Ahh Firenza, I was not expecting to see you this evening. How are you this evening friend?"

Firenza would look down at Dumbledore before smiling and greeting him. "Hello headmaster, I am doing well this evening. The foals had started acting rambunctious so I decided to come out for some astronomy." He would look up towards the stars before continuing. "The stars can hold the answers to many questions. Perhaps you can…" He would trail off, a look of shock and confusion on his face had not gone unnoticed by Dumbledore

.

"Firenza, what is wrong, do the stars speak of a dark year ahead?" Dumbledore looked up but did not see anything noticeable different, though centaurs used astronomy differently than wizardkind so may see something.

After another minute of staring, the centaur would respond. "No headmaster, not that. There, do you see Mars?" He would point at it before continuing after Dumbledore said he saw it, "It is far too bright tonight, and then there below it. The constellation priest. A martian priest. And there above it, the golden yellow star. It has not been seen for 1000s of years and should not have risen for a very very long time. When translated to English, its name can mean things like Leader, king and emperor. Mars is rising towards it." He would look down at Dumbledore. "I have no idea what this means, something like this has never happened. Is the magic in the area feeling off?"

The old headmaster would reach out with his magic to feel the area. It was a very rare ability to do, something he had practiced for hours every night for almost 30 years. He was about to respond with a no but there, a little over a dozen meters ahead of him, the magic was condensing. Carefully drawing his wand, Dumbledore approached it. It was condensed like the point when someone apperated somewhere but felt different somehow. Regardless though, this should not be possible, they were still inside the Hogwarts wards.

As he got close, Dumbledore could feel it slowly leaching his magic away. However before he could back away, it stopped. The magic stopped flowing, the point stopped condensing. Then, in what could only be described as a flash of light the spot exploded, throwing Dumbledore back a few meters. Looking up from where he landed, Dumbledore gasped.

There standing where the magic was condensing was a being. Though he could not make out a lot of detail, he could clearly see 2 green lights where Dumbledore thought its head would be as well as a glowing blue thing on its side, lighting up red clothing. From what he could tell, the being was tall. It was almost as tall as Hagrid. The thing was looking from side to side frantically before its gaze snapped onto him. It seemed to speak to him, though in no language Dumbledore had ever heard, to him it sounded simply like noise. He was about to respond when the glowing eyes of the being dimmed and went out before it crumpled to the ground in a large crash on breaking twigs and grinding metal.

Quickly getting up, Dumbledore ran to it to inspect. He found it was wearing a large and heavy red robe but it was unconscious. Sending a Patronus to Hagrid to come quickly. They had to get it to the hospital wing and Madam Pomfrey to make sure it was alright.

Arriving in just a few minutes, Hagrid went to pick up the creature but found he couldn't, it was simply too heavy. It took Dumbledore casting a lightning charm on it to be able to set off, back to the castle and to the hospital in no more than 10 minutes. A large axe-like weapon firmly in its grip and dragging behind. It was only a matter of time before it woke up and they would have answers.


Vitaetus was scared, true and properly scared. He did not know what happened when studying the vortex rifle but he was sucked into the warp, the realm of chaos. He had barely managed to grab his servo skull and stash it in his robe. It was not all bad though, being so close to Terra when he was sucked in, there were far fewer daemons around due to the Omnissiahs' light. Nevertheless, he was still scared and knew only one thing he could do. He began to pray.

He prayed to the Omnissiah and Machine God to let him back into reality, to allow him somewhere safe. He prayed for them to guard his soul and guide him to safety. He didn't know how long he sat there floating in the warp, at times it felt like millennia were passing and others seconds but he only focused on praying for safety and forgiveness. This continued until finally, both an infinite amount of time yet instantly after he was brought into the warp, he was back on his feet on solid ground with alerts going off. In the corner of his HUD, he missed an alert.

=ALERT: SYSTEM CRASH IMMINENT=

=ALERT: SYSTEM CRASH IMMINENT=

He was too shocked to notice it. Vitaetus was looking around, sweeping his gaze side to side. All around he saw trees but there. He snapped his gaze to an old human male laid out on the group staring at him. Speaking in Lingua-Technis he only managed a single question. "Where am I?" but he would never receive an answer before his whole world went black and he knew no more for a time.


REBOOTING… 25%
REBOOTING… 50%
REBOOTING… 75%
+=REBOOT COMPLETE. PRAISE BE UNTO THE OMNISSIAH=+

Vitaetus came with a start. He remembered everything vividly. He angered a machine, he was sucked into the warp. He… he was deposited somewhere with humans, the Omnissiah listened and saved him. Now he just had to make sure everything was working and find out how long he was out and so delved into his internal cogitators, the process to him taking half an hour but to the outside world only a second.

Run system check

{Running…}
{Running...}
{System check complete. Alert, high gravity detected. Gyroscope out of alignment. Recalibrate? [Y/N]}

Vitaetus quickly selected yes and allowed it to run while he looked over the rest of his systems.

{Optical sensors offline. Activate? [Y/N]}
{Audio receptors offline. Activate? [Y/N]}
{Vocal and lingua processor online.}
{Cardiac system online}

{Mechadendrite Alpha through Epsilon online.}
{Volkite blaster offline. Activate? [Y/N]}
{Bionic limbs operating at 100%}
{Fusion reactor online. Containment chamber integrity 75%}

Overall, Vitaetus was happy with the results. The Omnissiah had blessed him. The damages from the warp could have been a lot worse. He quickly activated all the offline implants and made a mental note that minor repairs were required on the reactor. After another couple of seconds, he receives an alert that the gyroscope was recalibrated and so he began to look around. He was no longer in a forest but rather was laid out on a stone floor.

Around him, there were a lot of beds lined along the wall with large windows across. The room seemed to be lit by torches and chandeliers with candles. There did not seem to be any electric lighting nor could he detect any radio signals around. It seems he had ended up on a feudal world somewhere. Perhaps they knew of a communication station somewhere to talk with any ships in orbit.

The view showed that the planet he was on, wherever he was, was in its night cycle. Nearby he saw a closed door and heard voices coming from inside though did not know the language.

{Unknown language detected. Searching…}
{1 language found. Designation English. Ceased usage circa M20. Translating.}

That was odd, a dead language? Maybe a planet that had yet to be rediscovered or had just been overlooked in data logs. Knowing the administratium, the second was most likely. With this in mind, he began to listen while picking himself up off the ground. "I am telling you, Albus, I have no idea. I know he is human but that is about it. And look at these wounds. Duel lung removal and eye removal, brain transplant, heart removal and triple amputation. He should not be alive let alone have been able to speak to you. My only guess is that the metal on him, whatever it is, is keeping him alive somehow." Vitaetus, knowing they would have questions and he himself some as well, mainly where the nearest Imperial outpost was, walked up to the door and knocked on it.


Dumbledore was concerned. Not only about the person they brought in. After Hagrid had dropped off the person he had left. Leaving him and Poppy to figure this out. From what Poppy was saying, he suspected necromancy. But then how had it gotten within the wards? And speaking of the wards, he had just felt something from them. Like someone was probing them after bouncing off. He would need to check it out after they were done here. Though his attention was snapped back to reality when a sharp knock was heard on the office door.

Madam Pomfrey was, well she was not sure how to feel. She was scared, confused and slightly intrigued. The reason for this was her newest patient. She knew he was a human and male but that was it.

About half an hour ago, Dumbledore and Hagrid had come in carrying him and when she first saw the man, she almost screamed. The person had horridly pale flesh, many tubes and cables running throughout their body and 3 of his limbs seemed to be covered in what she assumed was armour. As soon as Hagrid had placed the heavy man on the ground, The headmaster explained to her what happened on his walk in the forest. As soon as she heard the being had passed out, she immediately set out to work on getting them back up.

It was there she had begun to feel like she did. Like with everyone she started with a basic spell for their medical history as well as basic information such as weight and age and current wounds. What she saw when the information started to appear on her parchment was surprising. According to the spell, the person barely weighed 25 kilograms and was over a century old. It was when she got to the wounds that she pulled Albus into her office and began demanding anything he knew. The person, if they could be called that anymore, should be dead a dozen times over.

There were hundreds of different burns, removal of many organs, the brain being seemingly transplanted somewhere else in his body, both the rib cage and spine being extracted and 3 limbs being amputated for the metal ones. And that was before she got to the many different things attached to the outside and going into him. She had no idea what any of it was but knew it looked extremely muggle in its design. And so that led to her explaining to Albus she had no idea what to do or even where to start with getting him up. She was just going through the list of wounds with the headmaster when a knock was heard at her office door. With a confused look at the door, Pomfrey said, "I didn't hear anyone come in, and no student should be out this late." And so she opened it, perhaps a staff member needed a calming poltion.

Opening the door, she was met with a wall of red cloth and metal. Looking up, she gasped in horror as she saw 2 glowing green eyes staring down at her from nearly a meter above her head. And then the owner spoke. "Good evening Madam. I take it I have you to thank for shelter after landing on your planet?" Pomfrey could only stare in horror after the large, half-metal man spoke, trying to stutter out an answer through all that managed to come out was a loud, ear-splitting scream of terror as she backed into the room.