Disclaimer: I do not own Harry Potter or any of the characters attached.
Reviewers:
Patwas-Potter; I was aiming for that sort of effect.
Moppl; I agree that I focus too much on the DA, but it's a huge part of Harry's life, so it gets a lot of coverage.
Now, how many death eaters actually no how to fight as a team? None of them, if they did, they would already control the magical world. The DA on the other hand, have been taught how to operate as a team to improve their chances.
I think a lot of the death eaters tactics and mentality also come from the fact that they have never been in a large scale battle where they have to track more than one target at a time. They are mostly made up of purebloods that have been taught how to DUEL, not FIGHT. The DA has been taught how to fight, not duel.
Nixinox; patience is a virtue.
Chapter 23: Improvements.
"Harry, that was Harsh." Blaise said, they had just finished their first day which had ended with a massive duel, the entirety of the old DA verses the entire group of new recruits, roués were simple, now harmful spells, stunners are to be treated as the killing curse in that if someone is hit with it, they're out until the end.
The new recruits were all out within two minutes, all being hit with at least three stunners.
The only recruit of any note was Su Li, a sixth year muggleborn Ravenclaw of Chinese decent. She'd been brought up knowing how to fight with the martial arts and swords since she was three…she had her father, a black Ronin, to thank for that.
Unfortunately, while she was fast and agile, her knowledge of combat spells was woefully lacking, she was taken down last, being hit by six stunners simultaneously…that many would have killed her if it wasn't for the fact she was so fit.
"I know…did you speak to Su Li?"
"Yeah, she'll teach us as much as she can."
"Brilliant, but there is one question that's begging to be asked."
"And what's that?"
"What do you want for your reward?"
Blaise just smirked before dragging him to their room, while hoping the silencing charms were more powerful than the ones they put on the RoR.
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The next morning at breakfast, Rose dragged Harry into his room where he found Padma, Hermione and Blaise waiting for him.
"We…we don't know if it'll work, but we think it will, so…here you go." Hermione said nervously, before handing Harry a simple ebony box.
Looking at it suspiciously for a second, Harry put the box on the bed, where he lifted the lid and gasped at the contents.
A silvery-white mechanical arm.
Harry gently lifted it out of the box while Hermione listed its properties. "A solid, pure titanium casing, with a specially made blood crystal in the palm…made with the combined blood of yours and Blaise's magical animagus forms. Inside is a magical core of yours, Blaise's and Rose's magical form's feathers, hairs, tears, and Blood."
"The core, combined with the Blood crystal should make it possible to cast through the arm. Movement is provided by modified muggle electrical motors and servos, along with a specially made system for interpreting what you want it to do…it picks up the information that stops at the dead nerves, before it reaches said nerves, this allows it to move without live nerves to attach to."
"It has a strength of roughly five times that of a normal human, so be careful with it."
"Okay." He absently said while staring at the arm in awe. "Erm…how do I attach it? There are no straps or anything to hold it on."
"Harry, are you a wizard or not?" Hermione asked. "Put your stump in the end, the arm will then attach itself to the stump and…Erm, mould into the skin and bone."
"Mould?"
"You see that the arm goes to about three inches above the elbow? Well, that is going to…join with the skin and some of the elements in your body to make a steel-like alloy that holds the arm on the skin. Inside it, it'll do the same to the scar tissue and, the, Erm, bone." She finished uncomfortably.
"Will it hurt?"
"Yes…a lot."
"Will it stay attached permanently, or can it be removed?"
"It'll only be permanent if we bond it to you."
"Okay." Harry said before placing his stump in the arm, taking a deep breath and bracing himself for the pain.
He let out a sigh of disappointment when nothing happened after a few moments.
Then all he knew was pain before he blacked out.
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Harry came to in a bright white room that had an antiseptic smell much stronger than the one in madam Pomfrey's hospital wing.
Chamber Hospital Wing…or CHOW as it had been dubbed for short.
His first thought was 'what is it with me and hospital wings?', his second thought was, 'why does my arm hurt?'
Then the memories hit.
Struggling into a sitting position, he carefully pulled the cover away from his left arm, revealing the beautiful silvery-white artificial limb…that didn't feel artificial at all; in fact it was feeling pain, which should be impossible.
The pain soon receded though as he saw some of the outer plating slide back into place after repairing a tiny piece of damage inside the arm that it must have received as he thrashed in pain.
Looking around, Harry spotted their second healer, Susan Bones, heading his way.
"Morning Harry." She greeted while she ran some diagnostic spells over him.
"Morning, how long was I out?"
"Over 22 hours, morning run starts in a few minutes, so I thought I'd come see if your fit enough to join in, or if you'll have to be strapped in to stop you from hurting yourself."
"Oh…what about lessons yesterday?"
"Postponed, they just broke them up into fire teams before teaching them about teamwork."
"Okay…how many teams are there?"
"24 fire teams, organised into 8 squads of 3 teams. They are split into three groups, blue, green and red. Red has two squads in, the others have three." Susan recited from memory…in Hermione's exact tone of voice, meaning that she'd told Susan to tell him.
"Did 'Herms' tell you what was wrong with me?"
"Yes. Your arm bonded itself straight to you when it shouldn't have, they think the core was too powerful and too perfect for you that it overloaded the arms systems, damaged a lot of them, then rebuilt them hundreds of times better and more efficient. It wasn't meant to be able to self repair, but it can now, it's even stronger than before…you could punch through a concrete wall without even trying…those are just some of the benefits, the rest will be discovered over time."
"Okaaaay. So that means I can leave then?"
"Yes."
"Brilliant." He said as he hopped out of bed, only to discover that he was only wearing his boxers…causing Susan's eyes to grow as big and round as galleons, and her cheeks to turn beet red before she covered her eyes and began stuttering about his clothes being under the bed before she turned around and ran for the door.
Harry had just turned around to get his clothes, so he failed to see Susan take one last peek before running off with one last thought on her mind 'You two are so lucky'.
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Harry entered the main chamber just in time for the beginning of the morning run, deciding that he was feeling more energetic than usual, he set off at a dead sprint in an attempt to test himself.
He made it round the chamber twice before deciding that his lungs couldn't cope with much more and settled into a fast jog for the rest of the fifteen minutes.
Once the time was up, he got down on his human hand, wrapping his artificial one behind his back and did as many one-handed push-ups as possible.
At 100 he decided that he should move to sit-ups if he wanted any breakfast.
At 200 sit-ups, he decided that he was too hungry to wait any longer for food.
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"Blaise, the 'arm-team' and me would like a word with you, so please hurry up with the exercises." Susan said, interrupting Blaise's admiration of the changes to her bonded.
"Sure, I can't do anymore though, so I'll come now." She replied while getting up to go speak to them.
Upon reaching the breakfast tables in the centre of the chamber, she sat between Rose and Padma facing away from Harry so she could stay concentrated on the conversation.
"So…what's this about?" Blaise began very…eloquently.
"The arm's changed Harry…not his personality, I don't think, but physically, well…" Rose started.
"I don't know just how good a shape he was in before, but he's now in peak physical condition…or at least peak for a normal person, I'd bet that he could get even better, especially considering his metamorphic abilities have been unlocked." Susan said with a pink tinge to her cheeks.
"Do you think he realizes that he hasn't got his glasses on, or that his eye colour changes to the same colour as the ones he's looking into?" Hermione asked.
"No, a metamorph can't tell when they make a change like that…at least not without training." Rose said.
"I thought you were still locked."
"I was until a few days ago."
"Okay, Susan, you mentioned his physical fitness. Anything else you can tell us about."
"His energy levels have sky rocketed, physical and magical. Do you all know how a person's magic is measured?"
"No." They all murmured…well all apart from Hermione, but she knows everything so there's nothing new there.
"Okay then, everyone, even muggles, have a MEL, or Magical Energy Level, and a MAL, or Magical Access Level. The MEL is measured in SMU (Standard Magical Units), and the MAL is measured in SMUPS (Standard Magical Units Per Second). The average MEL is between 200,000 and 300,000 SMU."
"Muggles have a MAL of less than 2 SMUPS, squibs are less than 10 SMUPS. Even the most basic of spells, like Lumos, take more than 10 SMUPS to cast, but are maintained at about 1 SMUPS. To be accepted at Hogwarts, you have to have an MAL of 200 SMUPS or more. The average MAL of a witch or wizard is about 400 SMUPS."
"Harry used to have an MEL of 35,000 SMU, he now has one of 1,000,000 SMU, that's more than Voldemort and Dumbledore's 950,000. His MAL used to be about 350 SMUPS; it's now about 1,000 SMUPS compared to Dumbledore's 850 and Voldemorts 950."
She paused to allow for the gasps of shock to go round the small group.
"How? That sort of an increase requires rituals, not just dark ones, but truly black ones that need human sacrifices." Hermione asked in shock.
"my guess is that he was under some magical blocks. I'm not sure if you know or not, but when a powerful child is born, there parents usually put powerful blocks on their magic, restricting both MEL and MAL to more average levels. The blocks usually have a failsafe in them so that in certain circumstances they temporarily shut down, allowing full access to their magic, which explains why Harry could overpower Voldemort after the third task."
"And his Patronus, that takes 450 to cast and 50 to maintain." Blaise agreed
"Which means that he has just destroyed the blocks which would have disintegrated at 17 anyway."
"What does this mean for his spell power?" Hermione asked, worried about everyone's safety.
"Nothing, the spell automatically regulates the power for him…though he can put more power into his spells at will."
"Good, so, what do we do about him?"
"Rose teaches him about his morphing, I'll teach him about power boosting." Susan suggested.
"Okay…why do you know so much about power levels and such?"
"My aunty removed the ones that my parents put on me this summer."
"Okay."
"Blaise?" Susan asked.
"Yes?"
"Why did you have silencing charms around your room?"
Blaise blanched, Harry had screamed that loud before he passed out that he tore through the silencing charms around their room, causing the DA to come running.
"Why?" she asked.
"Cause from the glimpse of Harry I got this morning, I can make a few guesses."
"It took you till this morning to work it out?" Hermione asked in shock.
"Well he's the first boy to make me think those thoughts."
"Susan, no one is that innocent."
"Padma, she said 'boy', your-" Rose said with a strange glint in her eyes.
"I'm bi. I like boys fine, I've just never been attracted to one before."
"I don't blame you, were all ugly creatures." Harry said as he slipped into a seat opposite Blaise and between Hermione and Susan, causing Susan to go bright red then sheet white.
"How much did you hear?" she squeaked out.
"Since you explained just how powerful I was."
"So you heard about…about…" Susan stuttered nervously.
"Your preferences? Yes. But…" he said, before leaning over and whispering something in her ear, causing her to go wide eyes as she moved her stare from her plate to Rose.
Harry just leaned back and said that she had to think about that. Before tucking in to a huge breakfast.